KEY POINTS:
An ugly afternoon in Parliament - and, at times, a downright nasty one; an afternoon when the atmosphere was choked with personal attacks, personal insults, charges of blackmail, allegations of dirt-throwing and threats to really dish the dirt.
Even by its own not always exemplary standard, the House
looked in particular sorry state as MPs bickered and needled one another through constant interjections and a succession of points of order during a torrid question-time.
It normally takes around an hour-and-a quarter to get through the dozen questions set down by parties for ministers. Yesterday it took close to two hours, with Speaker Margaret Wilson struggling to keep some appearance of order as members went for one another's throats.
The gloves were not just off. They had been left in the dressing-room. Quite why things should have got so rough is hard to explain. But the tone was set from the moment the Prime Minister produced some material which she and Labour thought would finally nail John Key.
With National's leader challenging Helen Clark to produce some solid figures on projected profit returns and estimated capital investment in the re-nationalised railway network, the Prime Minister noted Key had been a director of Bankers Trust, the advisers on the 1993 privatisation of the trains and Cook Strait ferries.
"Ask yourself the question: Who benefited from the sale of TranzRail? Mr Key and his mates."
But Helen Clark had more. She alleged that Key had made comments in his capacity as National's associate transport spokesman on the 2003 sale of TranzRail to Toll Holdings without declaring he held 30,000 shares in TranzRail. Key looked pensive when confronted with the conflict of interest allegation. He just kept on asking his prepared questions.
However, the mood of triumph on Labour's benches was punctured when Key later told the House he had not had shares in TranzRail at that time. It was the Prime Minister's turn to look pensive.
Key's response to what was a serious allegation had been delayed by NZ First's Ron Mark's refusal to allow him to make a personal explanation. Mark objected simply because National had refused NZ First leave to do the same several weeks ago.
Tit for tat. It summed up the afternoon. But if Clark's gaffe was a low point - and it was revealing in showing the lengths to which Labour is going to find some dirt on Key - there was more to come.
A further argument which began with Mark's leader, Winston Peters, accusing National of "venal, corrupt politics" culminated in Act leader Rodney Hide referring to Peters as a "tired old drunk".
It took a few minutes, but Peters eventually demanded Hide apologise. "If he does not, then I am going to tell the House the truth about him, which I have hitherto kept to myself. He can laugh and giggle. This is his last warning."
But Hide argued he could not apologise. If he did, it would look like he was being blackmailed and Peters had "something on me that was true".
There was more argument and more intervention from the Speaker. But no apology. Peters saved whatever he had to say about Hide for another day.
But the interjections, barracking, needling and insults continued. At one point, Labour's Trevor Mallard described a question from National's Anne Tolley as "just stupid". The stopper had clearly been put on the milk of human kindness.
But most sobering of all was the realisation that all this was a portent of what is yet to come - an ugly, nasty and vicious election campaign.
