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Speaker 1: Labor leader Chris Hopkins has spent the last twenty four

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Speaker 1: hours defending his decision not to turn up to the

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Speaker 1: public COVID inquiry. The Commission decided against summonsing him, just

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Speaker 1: into are doing, Grant Robertson and I shaveraal because it

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Speaker 1: would be legalistic and adversarial, which the terms of reference prohibit.

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Speaker 1: Graham Edgeler is a constitutional lawyer. High Graham, Hello, should

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Speaker 1: they have gone ahead and just summons these guys anyway.

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Speaker 2: If they think they need it? And so I think

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Speaker 2: that's you know, it's the they have the power to

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Speaker 2: do all of these things. But the question is really

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Speaker 2: for the Royal Commission is are we missing out on

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Speaker 2: information that we wouldn't otherwise get information that we might

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Speaker 2: need to be able to make our conclusions and make

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Speaker 2: our recommendations. And if the answer to that was yes,

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Speaker 2: then they should exercise it. They seem to think at

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Speaker 2: the moment that they don't need to have the summons,

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Speaker 2: but it's something they have in their back pocket, you know,

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Speaker 2: if you know they're still sort of getting information from them.

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Speaker 2: If they start getting sort of stonewalled about the type

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Speaker 2: of information that that they want and can't get it,

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Speaker 2: then it's power they have and should seriously consider using

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Speaker 2: if they need it to get the information they need

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Speaker 2: to have to make their recommendation.

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Speaker 1: They seem to be, I mean not they seem to be.

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Speaker 1: They are worried about the fact that it would appear adversarial,

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Speaker 1: but as the summons itself adversarial, if the interview that

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Speaker 1: it then elicits is not adversarial.

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Speaker 2: It's a little you know, sort of formally sort of

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Speaker 2: giving a document to someone saying if you don't turn up,

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Speaker 2: you're committing a crime. You know, I could see why

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Speaker 2: people have that sort of thing. I mean, I would

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Speaker 2: have hoped that the ministers or former ministers would have

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Speaker 2: agreed to go, you know. I sort of their reasons

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Speaker 2: for it don't seem particularly strong for me. You know.

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Speaker 2: It's something that I think we should expect ministers or

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Speaker 2: former ministers to do when these sorts of things happen.

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Speaker 2: We had it about a year ago with Minister Karen

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Speaker 2: Sure before the Whiteengua tribuneal which is also a Commission

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Speaker 2: of Inquiry, and they weren't getting answered and so they

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Speaker 2: did exercise their power to issue are summons and at

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Speaker 2: that point sort of the government ministers who are up

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Speaker 2: in arms about former ministers not doing this now up

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Speaker 2: in arms that any tribunal would ever ask a minister

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Speaker 2: to come along and answer anything.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean apart from them obviously playing politics. So

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Speaker 1: that that's a fair point that you're making. But isn't

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Speaker 1: that fascinating that the White Tungi Tribunal was prepared to

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Speaker 1: summons her over simply changing one tiny part of a

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Speaker 1: piece of legislation, and yet this Commission of Inquiry of

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Speaker 1: Equal Standing is not prepared to do it on something

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Speaker 1: that has touched every single one of our lives. Is

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Speaker 1: a thousand times bigger than what Karen Shaw did.

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Speaker 2: I think part of the issue in that case is

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Speaker 2: the White Tannguy Tribunal was prepared to just accept written

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Speaker 2: responses and the minister then just didn't want to provide anything,

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Speaker 2: didn't want to answer written questions. It's oughtkay, okay, well

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Speaker 2: you're not going to do anything, then we need you

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Speaker 2: know something. In this particular case, I understand that at

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Speaker 2: least some of the former ministers have met with some

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Speaker 2: of the commissioners sort of they sort of informally in private,

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Speaker 2: and are also providing written answers to all the sorts

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Speaker 2: of questions that the Commission has, and so I think

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Speaker 2: that's probably the difference is that they are getting written answers,

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Speaker 2: which were what Karen Shawed didn't want to provide at

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Speaker 2: the time.

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Speaker 1: Hi, yeah, fair enough. Hey listen, I'm given that they

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Speaker 1: don't want to appear publicly. Should the transcripts of the

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Speaker 1: interviews and evidence that they have given be published?

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Speaker 2: I think it sure. I don't think it needs to

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Speaker 2: be published now. I see no reason why it couldn't

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Speaker 2: be published when the commission makes its report. You know,

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Speaker 2: sometimes you know, we think maybe to the christ Church

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Speaker 2: terror attack Commission of Inquiry, you know, a lot of

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Speaker 2: sort of perhaps sensitive national security information that you wouldn't

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Speaker 2: want published this. You know, there might be a few

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Speaker 2: things you need to redact or something like that with

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Speaker 2: you know, protect privacy with people's names or whatever. But

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Speaker 2: I see no reason why that they couldn't release the

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Speaker 2: the evidence when when they get to the end, and

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Speaker 2: I think that would be appropriate.

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Speaker 1: Graham, thanks for your time, mate. This is Graham Angelo,

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Speaker 1: constitutional lawyer.

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