Labour keeping Benson-Pope to spite National, says expert

David Benson-Pope

Labour could be defending David Benson-Pope to spite National rather than because they genuinely want to protect him, Victoria University political lecturer Jon Johansson says.

Mr Benson-Pope has been the centre of a new swath of allegations relating to his actions as a teacher at Bayfield High School.

It has come out that girls complained about Mr Benson-Pope after he walked into their shower block, and one said he hit her with a ruler.

Last year police found a prima facie case after investigating allegations he assaulted students but decided not to prosecute.

In the past, Prime Minister Helen Clark has been quick to dump ministers in trouble; Dover Samuels, Lianne Dalziel and John Tamihere spring to mind.

Dr Johansson said it was possible she and senior caucus colleagues were protecting Mr Benson-Pope because they did not want National to score a scalp following a tough election campaign.

"There is a real ugliness about our domestic politics at the moment and I think that's part of the context of which perhaps Clark is thinking 'I am not going to give National a trophy here'," he said.

"Whether that's affected a more clinical assessment of Benson-Pope's moral authority to be a Cabinet minister is open to question and once the people start speaking, by way of public opinion polling, that's going to become clearer."

Today in Parliament, Helen Clark fired a warning shot at National deputy leader Gerry Brownlee, saying she had seen material relating to when he was a teacher and cautioned against throwing stones in glass houses.

"Given that the PM has raised this today, that is the nuclear option," Dr Johansson said.

"That is an absolute show of defiance. Certainly the public are the only losers once politicians go down this route."

Auckland University political scientist and Robert Muldoon biographer Barry Gustafson had a different theory.

He said he previously saw the Prime Minister in contrast to Sir Robert, who defended his MPs no matter what.

"Far from defending a minister, if a minister did something that was clearly unwise they took responsibility for it... she did not try ever to defend the indefensible," he said.

He suggested that after Helen Clark was involved in controversies -- over signing a painting she did not create and being a passenger in a speeding motorcade -- she had become more accepting.

Prof Gustafson rejected the notion that Mr Benson-Pope was holding Labour to ransom by threatening to quit if he was demoted because Dunedin South was a safe seat and the Government had the numbers it needed in Parliament.

"I don't think he could hold that over them. In fact, it might be the tidiest -- if he goes as a minister for him to go as an MP and then you don't have the embarrassment of him in the House."

Prof Gustafson said Mr Benson-Pope may yet survive.

"I've got no crystal ball. The Prime Minister is a very, very strong person. Having committed herself to one course of action she may very well go through with it, on the other hand she has in the past appeared to support somebody to the point she feels she no longer can and then they are dropped very quickly."

He expected there to be tensions in the party over the case, especially amongst feminists and the teacher unions.

Dr Johansson said people such as Mr Samuels and Ms Dalziel might start to feel aggrieved over Mr Benson-Pope's special treatment.

He said Mr Benson-Pope had shown poor judgement throughout -- his handling of the allegations was possibly worse than the actual claims.

"It's always amazing that what was learnt from Nixon and Watergate never seems to get sheeted home to politicians that frequently it's the attempts afterwards to limit the amount of damage that proves to be the greater burden for them."

Prof Gustafson agreed and said Mr Benson-Pope's image and credibility were damaged.

"If he'd been more up front and said he had perhaps done these things but he couldn't recall them -- but it was the vehemence of his replies and the fact that he doesn't in fact seem to appreciate that putting tennis balls in boys' mouths and wandering into girls' showers is just not, and never was, what a professional teacher should have been doing," he said.

"I think his judgement is now so questionable it would be difficult for him to continue."

Mr Benson-Pope was re-elected despite last year's events but Dr Johansson said Labour would be watching polls with eagle eyes.

"If supporting Benson-Pope comes at the expense of her party, Government and her own personal standing, she (Helen Clark) might revisit her position."

National has been running the line that by continuing to support Mr Benson-Pope, the Prime Minister had damaged her own credibility.

"That's the political attack here. Notwithstanding the seriousness of what the allegations are and his defence of them it also provides the opportunity for National to attack Clark's credibility," Dr Johansson said.

Should the latest allegations abate they will bubble away under the surface and make Mr Benson-Pope's role of Social Development and Employment Minister difficult.

"His biggest problem is how can he stand up in that portfolio and make statements about the nature of families, or the different kinds of issues that come up in that portfolio, when at the very least he has shown appalling judgement during periods of his teaching career and at worst has engaged in inappropriate conduct," Dr Johansson said.

"It's that whole moral authority to be a member of the executive that seems to me to be the starkest question about him continuing in that role."

- NZPA