KEY POINTS:
Rotorua businessman Phil Verry has described as "baseless, scurrilous fiction" an anonymous claim that he paid private investigators to steal Don Brash's emails.
He is threatening defamation action against former Act leader Richard Prebble who used his newsletter this week to raise the issue.
Mr Prebble did not
name Mr Verry.
The former MP said "anonymous tip-offs" to MPs claimed the taking of the emails - which formed the basis of The Hollow Men by Nicky Hager - "is the work of a rich individual from the Bay of Plenty, who has an obsession with the Reserve Bank and has paid private investigators a bucketload of money to obtain the documents".
The Herald and other media have since been told by parliamentary sources that the the tip-offs referred to by Mr Prebble were contained in a letter to Act leader Rodney Hide.
The letter, which named Mr Verry, is believed to have been received by Mr Hide several weeks ago.
It is also understood to allege Labour MPs' emails may also have been hacked into - an issue Mr Hide raised in the House recently.
Mr Hide refused yesterday to confirm or deny whether he had been sent a letter with Mr Verry's name and the accusations in it.
He also refused to say whether he had passed any information in regard to Mr Verry on to Mr Prebble.
Mr Prebble refused to name the man he had referred to.
In an email headed "defamation" to Mr Prebble yesterday Mr Verry said one person, believed to be a journalist, told him she had been given his name by the "office of the Act party".
Mr Hide said he would find it hard to believe his office would give out such information.
Mr Verry, a former Wool Board director and the head of Rotorua's Red Stag Timber company, said yesterday that while Mr Prebble had not named him, the detail in the email was enough to identify him.
This was primarily because of his vocal opposition to Reserve Bank monetary policy.
"I've got no involvement with this matter at all. I have no knowledge of it. Everything that Mr Prebble is choosing to say is untrue as far as it applies to me, it's a complete fantasy and fiction."
It was "totally discreditable that Mr Prebble has allowed, or chosen to have what he claims is an anonymous person, access to his columns for their nefarious purposes without even bothering to telephone me, without bothering to check the authenticity of the story or any element of it.
"It was very easy to do, we live in the same area, he wouldn't even have to pay a toll call.
"The real story here is that someone is obviously trying to discredit me. Who are they and what is their motives? I'm asking Mr Prebble this."
Mr Verry said he had met Dr Brash several times when he was Reserve Bank Governor, after being asked for his views on monetary policy.
Some changes were made as a result, but the main problem remained, "which is that the interest rate instrument simply is impotent".
Mr Verry said he had not been spoken to by the police, despite a report his name was handed to police.
A spokeswoman for Detective Inspector Harry Quinn said he had no comment on the email investigation other than to say it was continuing.
A senior National MP said that, while it was impossible to say whether or not the claim was true, not a lot of significance was being attached to it.
Hager has previously said his information came from six National sources.
He said yesterday he would continue not to engage in any debate about his sources.
