Plunket will write for Metro

Sean Plunket. Photo / Paul Estcourt

Radio NZ will allow its well-known and sometimes fractious star Sean Plunket to write a magazine column, despite having battled through the Employment Relations Authority to stop him.

The cash-strapped state broadcaster had won a ruling from the authority, allowing it to ban Plunket from writing the political column while he was on the public payroll.

It is not known how much the radio network paid in legal fees to employment barrister Michael Quigg only to back away from its victory.

But the Morning Report interviewer confirmed yesterday that he had reached an agreement with his employer, and his first column would appear in next month's Metro magazine. The magazine would pay him for the column.

Plunket was the first journalist to back former minister Shane Jones into a corner this week, leading to his confession to hiring in-hotel "blue movies".

Asked how he would describe his relationship with Radio NZ chief executive Peter Cavanagh, he said: "It's professional."

Simon Wilson, the editor of Metro, said Plunket would be "writing from within the Wellington political scene ... "