An evangelical Christian movement has unveiled plans to build a secondary school in a village.

The South Downs Education Trust, which has links to The Plymouth Brethren, found favour with Horsham District Council who supported plans to build an independent school in Ashington.

The school is planned for land north of Ashington, near Horsham, and would take 60 children aged 11 to 17.

Since April 2004 it has been run from portable cabins at the Brinsbury College Campus, at North Heath, Horsham, but its lease expires in July next year.

The proposal was recommended for rejection by Horsham District Council planning officers but councillors voted in favour subject to a legal agreement.

The decision has angered people living in the village, who claim it contradicts planning policies agreed earlier this year.

The Plymouth Brethren began in Ireland in the late 1820s before splitting into two main branches, the Open Brethren and Exclusive Brethren.

The Exclusive Brethren are thought to number around 40,000 worldwide, and are headed by a Sydney businessman, Bruce Hales, who is called the Elect Vessel and the Man of God.

As their name suggests, the group practices a strict separation from the world, generally associating only with each other and avoiding outside influences such as TV and the internet.

Ashington Parish Council chairman John Berry said Horsham District Council banned any developments outside the village boundary unless it could be proven to bring benefits to the community.

He said: "We're astounded in as much as the policies which were brand new in Spring this year have been broken at the first attempt to test them.

"I know the school and council have been looking for a site for some time. But, the council should have realised then that this proposal wouldn't match the policies and they should have told the school to look again.

"They are trying to prove it will bring benefits to the community by building a doctors' surgery and chemist. We've had a surgery in the sports pavilion but there was no call and the doctor ceased coming.

"We've also got someone in the village with a licence for a chemists but she wants a property in the village. It is too dangerous to build something like that outside the village on the site they're proposing.

"There's not really anything they can provide."

The Trust hopes to construct two buildings on the site on Billingshurst Road. One building will house the arts, crafts, textiles wing and two classrooms, and the second would include science rooms, six classrooms and offices.

The school at the Brinsbury College campus attracts students from Horsham and Broadbridge Heath and Arun, Adur and Mid Sussex districts.

Coun Berry said in three years half the students would be drawn from Horsham but the school attracted no students from Ashington.

Ashington resident John Sabin, of Billingshurst Road, said the school did not meet any local needs and would not benefit education standards in the county.

He said: "I'm not saying these people shouldn't be allowed to have a school but they must take their chances with everyone else.

"They've got a few pupils in Horsham. Why not find a site in Southwater?

"Why overturn policy in favour of a faith school which won't benefit education standards in West Sussex unless you belong to this very strict christian denomination?

"Why are we going out of our way to help an organisation which may be doing a good job in its own lights but doesn't have any benefit to the local community?"

Extracts:

Maxine McKew has declared that Bennelong is a Labor seat for the first time, in a press conference outside her campaign headquarters at Eastwood at midday.

"This is now a Labor seat for the first time," she said.

The victory was also a win for grassroots campaigning over the "buckets of money" Mr Howard and the Liberal Party had pumped into the seat, she said.

"Mr Howard and the Liberal Party spent $20 million in the campaign for Bennelong ... all we promised was a child-care centre."

"People want things fixed, they want hospitals fixed and they want schools fixed. I made Kevin aware that there were some real needs in Bennelong, particularly educational needs."

A young opponent of the Electoral Finance Bill was taken aback when Education Minister Chris Carter replied with an email asking: "Are you a member of the Exclusive Brethren?"

Simeon Brown has emailed all MPs several times asking them not to support the bill and saying it restricts freedom of speech.

He twice got a response from Mr Carter asking if he belonged to the brethren.

Mr Brown, 16, said he was disappointed at the response, which bordered on religious discrimination.

"I asked him how my response to this provocative question would change his response to me. How would it be different if I was Exclusive Brethren, or just a concerned citizen, like me?

"You don't expect that from ministers. You expect them to be a little bit helpful, and outline their reasons for supporting the legislation."

Mr Carter did not know Mr Brown's age, or his religious affiliations - the teenager is a Reformed Baptist - but said Christianity was not part of the submissions he made.

A spokeswoman for Mr Carter said the question was the minister's standard response to messages against the Electoral Finance Bill.

"He was making a point about people trying to buy elections. He's trying to make the point that the Exclusive Brethren tried to influence the 2005 election secretly."

If, as predicted, the Australian Labor Party wins the Australian federal election tomorrow, then the Exclusive Brethren may face well-deserved retribution for their repeated attempts to subvert Australian state and federal politics.

According to Melbourne's Age, the ALP wants at least four Australian federal government agencies to investigate the shadowy right-wing sect, which is alleged to have given an undeclared $A370,000 donation to erstwhile Prime Minister Howard at the last federal election in 2004. The Australian Federal Police, the Australian Taxation Office, Australian Electoral Commission and Austrac have all been asked to scrutinise Exclusive Brethren financial relationships to the dying Liberal federal government.

Most seriously, the Exclusive Brethren are alleged not to have declared the transfer of considerable monetary sums across borders. This may be an offence under two pieces of federal legislation - the Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorist Financing Act 2006 and the Financial Transactions Reports Act 1987.

In addition, the ALP alleges that the sect also made false declarations about domestic financial transactions. It may have also used misleading names in electioneering pamphlets. Finally, it may have also used a front company, "Willmac", to avoid restrictions placed on the scope and scale of Australian federal electoral donations. The Australian Federal Police have replied that such investigations are already underway.

Indeed, something similar appears to have occurred in Tasmania during this very campaign. According to the Tasmanian Mercury's Luke Sayer (22.11.07), there is a mysterious possible case that involves a mailout of anti-Green election material from a particular address. However, while the property is apparently surrounded by EB residences, the business person at the centre of this possible debacle was perplexed at this, and would like the EB sect to clarify that he is not involved with them. Tasmanian Green Senator Christine Milne, has said that if this is the Exclusive Brethren, they have breached Australian federal election law.

To offset accusations that it is a partisan organisation, the Exclusive Brethren have tried to make a contribution to one ALP candidate for campaign expenses, but ALP Leader Kevin Rudd has quite rightly labelled the Exclusive Brethren as an extremist sect. Predictably, the Exclusive Brethren have accused the ALP of attacking a 'religious minority'. With ALP victory almost certain after tomorrow's election, the Exclusive Brethren will probably now find itself under scrutiny on both sides of the Tasman.

Tough. Perhaps our own Labour-led government might want to emulate its trans-tasman counterpart, and expand the scope of its own investigations into this thoroughly unpleasant organisation's activities over here?

Labor has launched an offensive against the Exclusive Brethren, asking four federal agencies to investigate the sect's activities.

The ALP has also revealed that, early in the election campaign, a Brethren member tried to donate cash to a Labor candidate in an apparent bid to undermine Kevin Rudd's stated opposition to the sect. The donation was rejected.

Exclusive Brethren spokesman Tony McCorkell dismissed Labor's move as "a vicious and intolerant attack on a religious minority that ill-becomes any political party in a democratic society".

He said the group had nothing to hide, and would co-operate with any investigation.

The sect has been a good friend to Prime Minister John Howard, meeting with him a number of times, exchanging letters, praying for him and pumping more than $370,000 into his re-election bid in 2004.

ALP national secretary Tim Gartrell late last month referred allegations to the Australian Federal Police, the Australian Taxation Office, the Australian Electoral Commission and Austrac, which investigates large financial transfers.

The allegations are that the Brethren failed to declare the transfer of large sums of money across borders under the Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorist Financing Act 2006 and the Financial Transactions Reports Act 1987, that it made false declarations about domestic financial transactions, that it used false names in election advertising material and that it used a front company, "Willmac", to avoid strict electoral donation requirements.

The AFP has responded that the allegations are "under evaluation".

The ABC's Four Corners program reported last month that cash deposits of up to $120,000 in a Sydney bank account had helped fund advertising to assist Mr Howard's re-election. It is unclear if those deposits were declared to Austrac.

Labor has also revealed that its campaign headquarters warned candidates against accepting any donation from people unknown to them after catching a member of the Exclusive Brethren trying to give $250 to a candidate in an electorate in the centre-west of NSW.

Mr Rudd publicly repudiated the Brethren in August, saying it was an "extremist cult" that "breaks up families".

Labor's Anthony Albanese said yesterday there was a need "to get to the bottom of the Exclusive Brethren's shadowy links and donations to Australian politics".

Mr McCorkell said any investigation would clear the religious group.

The Exclusive Brethren have reportedly begun campaigning against The Greens Party in Tasmania, distributing leaflets warning against voting for the party.

The leaflets are addressed to the "Citizens of Tasmania", and authorised by over 50 members of the Exclusive Brethren group.

Greens Leader Bob Brown has called into question the groups motives, saying that no one will listen to their "weird" policies.

"I don't think people will take much notice of what the Exclusive Brethren, with their weird policies of not allowing married women to work, of banning their children from being allowed a university education and of dividing families forever," Mr Brown said.

The Exclusive Brethren were recently implicated in accusations suggesting the group had funneled over $300,000 in support of Liberal Party advertising.

It was alleged that the group had used a complex network of cash transportation to pay for advertising in key media publications supporting the Liberal's, and lambasting the Greens Party.

The allegation also raised questions over the ethical standing of the groups leaders and whether or not they declared the deposits to the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC).

Registered charities and Church groups are by law not permitted to participate in political lobbying or pressure, and risk losing tax exemption if they do.

It was also revealed that both Prime Minister John Howard and Treasurer Peter Costello had met with leaders from the Church on "several" occasions, with Labor Leader Kevin Rudd labeling the group "extreme".

Both the PM and Mr Costello denied their meeting was conspiratorial, saying that anyone has a right to put their views to elected Government.

The Exclusive Brethren however does not allow its members to vote in democratic elections, nor attend school's, watch television or socialise with those outside of the Church.

Fairfax Newspapers also revealed this month that the Prime Minister had exchanged letters with the group on five separate occasions since 2003, but would not release the documents until after the election.

The group has also been involved in American politics and in campaigning for the conservative Republican party.

Extracts:

Having been a member of the Liberal Party for over 30 years, I believe that Coalition Senate ticket which rewards Family First with second preferences is not a ticket that most coalition voters would be comfortable with.

Family First has been born out of a chatter movement which calls upon Christians for support.

John Howard stated that he would prefer a Family First senator in a hung Senate to a minor party senator of any other persuasion. Howard’s requisite is based upon his belief that the Family First senator would be easier to control than any other.

Family First and their running dogs, such as the Australian Christian Lobby and the Festival of Light, support values which fundamentally look sound, but are subject to very little constructive criticism within fundamentalist Christian circles.

There are apocalyptic and neo-catastrophic attitudes held by many Christians, who are falsely of the view that war with Islam will bring about the end of the world and therefore the establishment of God’s Kingdom.

They ignore the fact that Christ’s stated position was to return for a Church which was without spot and blemish.

Howard’s predisposition to accepting all comers, such as the Exclusive Brethren, augers badly for the political morality of this country.

The Exclusive Brethren religious sect has entered the federal election debate with a scathing attack on Greens senator Bob Brown.
The normally secretive group has launched a statewide letterbox campaign endorsed by 51 members.

It says the church has been subjected to a sustained campaign of vilification by Senator Brown.

But the senator says the Brethren are reaping what they have sown.

"They were attacking the Greens for years before we stood our ground and exposed them," Senator Brown said.

"They are responsible for their own behaviour and when they enter the political arena they must be accountable.

"The question is, if they are not voting, what are they doing this for?

"Maybe Mr Howard is so desperate he needs the 10,000 votes of the Brethren," he said

Senator Brown said he believed a huge amount of Brethren money was being poured into the Coalition's campaign.

"They can put in $10,500 a person and nobody will ever know because this Government changed the laws," he said.

Brethren spokesman Tony McCorkell said Tasmanian members felt Senator Brown's comments had to be responded to.

"They are saying enough is enough," Mr McCorkell said.

"Senator Brown seems to be obsessed, and our members have got together to put this out.

"But I wouldn't call it a political advertisement against the Greens or Senator Brown.

"It's not a campaign activity really, as much as a written public response to Senator Brown."

The Brethren leaflet is also of concern to a businessman whose address was listed as part of the authorisation.

Ardern's Crash Supplies owner Brian Pope said the leaflet had nothing to do with his business at 15 Devon St, South Burnie.

"It's a mystery to me, and certainly has nothing to do with my business," Mr Pope said.

"I want them to do another mail-out to tell people my company has nothing to do with this."

Mr McCorkell said Brethren member David Urquhart owned property at 15 Devon St.

But Greens senator Christine Milne says the mail-out may have breached electoral laws.

Senator Milne said the law required the address where the person endorsing the material could usually be contacted.

It also required the name of the printer, with breaches attracting a fine of $1000 a person or $5000 for a group.

The Brethren, a "non-voting" group, ran ads in the 2006 Tasmanian election urging people to vote against the Greens.

It was alleged the Liberal Party played a role in the advertising, with confusion over invoicing to the party account.

Prime Minister John Howard and his senior ministers have denied any link with the sect.

Only days away from the Australian federal election, the Exclusive Brethren have launched an ill-timed anti-Green attack against Senator Bob Brown, an openly gay man, in his native Tasmania.

As usual, it was the Melbourne Age newspaper's Michael Bachelard that reported this latest development across the Tasman. One wonders at the Exclusive Brethren's sense of timing, though, as this rather plays into the hands of those who regard New Zealand's Electoral Finance Bill as a necessity, primarily designed to stop exactly these shenanigans.

This latest pamphlet is a significant departure, however, as it clearly identifies forty eight men and three women as members of the right-wing sect, currently under fire on both sides of the Tasman for its anonymous contributions to John Howard's Liberals and the Brash-era National Party here. Brown is attacked for repeatedly lobbying for a federal Senate investigation into Exclusive Brethren activities, while the federal Greens are lambasted for an apparent belief in bestiality, inciting Aboriginal riots after a death in police custody on Queensland's Palm Island (2004), and urging "infiltration" of the sect.

Tasmanian Green MP Christine Milne suggested that there might well be connections between the sect, the Liberal Party and logging interests in the state, where native forest preservation is a key issue, while Bob Brown suggested that this was the latest in a long line of Exclusive Brethren attempts to buy elections for the Howard administration.

Meanwhile, anti-reform groups held a march in Auckland last week to oppose the Electoral Finance Bill.

On TVNZ's One Network News, the so-called "March for Democracy" was held by the usual suspects. One of the organisers, John Boscawen, is a former ACT New Zealand treasurer, while the Christian Right's Family First and the Sensible Sentencing Trust were the other culprits. I'm sorry, but it's sheer laziness to describe most of this lot as "Middle New Zealand" as it did.

Family First is a Christian Right pressure group. Its founder, Bob McCroskie, is a media host on the fundamentalist Sky Digital "Shine" television channel, and regularly contributes to Challenge Weekly. The organisation was one of the ringleaders against Sue Bradford's anti-belting bill, and is currently in high dudgeon about advertising for TV3's Californication.

At a time when the Australian media is full of articles about the Exclusive Brethren's interference with their previous and current federal elections, why is it that the New Zealand 'mainstream' media lacks even the most elementary diligence when it comes to analysis and investigative reporting of both sides of this complex issue?

Religious sect the Exclusive Brethren has dramatically intervened in the federal election campaign with a letter sent "to the citizens of Tasmania" warning about the "anti-development and immoral policies" of Greens leader Bob Brown.

The letter will intensify the feud between the Brethren and the Greens, which started after the sect ran secret advertising campaigns against the party at previous state and federal elections.

But media and political pressure on the church over the past two years to identify itself in electoral advertisements has paid off — the letter names 48 male and three female sect members, saying they are "members of a Christian group commonly known as the Exclusive Brethren".

Church members do not vote and, in the past, have produced hundreds of thousands of dollars of pro-John Howard political advertising while obscuring the source of the funds. The Tasmanian letter complains about "many unfair statements" made by Senator Brown inside parliament and in the media, saying he has tried twice to instigate a senate inquiry into the sect.

It says Senator Brown, who faces re-election this Saturday, has "actively and persistently vilified a religious Christian minority".

The letter refers readers to the Greens and Brethren websites, but also to an anonymous US-registered blog at www.greenswatch.com.

The site accuses the Greens of a belief in bestiality, of starting the race riots on Palm Island in 2004, and of "plotting to infiltrate the Exclusive Brethren".

A Brethren spokesman told The Age the letter was written because church members felt it was "time to speak out against the venomous attacks that continue to be made by Senator Brown".

Senator Brown said the letter was the pay-off for John Howard from a meeting with the Brethren's world leader, Bruce Hales, in the Prime Minister's Parliament House office in August.

"I think the church's members are pouring hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars into this campaign … and under the Government's new electoral laws, an individual can put in $100,000 around the country without any disclosure being made," he said.

The second Tasmanian Greens senator, Christine Milne, said there was a "high correlation" between advertising from the Liberals, the religious right and the timber lobby in the state.

But the Brethren spokesman denied any input from the Liberal Party. Any donation to political parties was "a private matter and is not related to (members') life in the church".

The Exclusive Brethren religious sect has dramatically intervened in the federal election campaign with a letter sent "To the citizens of Tasmania" warning about the "anti-development and immoral policies" of the Greens leader, Bob Brown.

The letter will intensify the feud between the Brethren and the Greens, which began after the sect ran unsourced advertising campaigns against the party at state and federal elections.

But media and political pressure on the sect in the past two years to identify itself in electoral advertisements has paid off: the letter names 51 members, saying they are "members of a Christian group commonly known as the Exclusive Brethren".

Members have in the past produced hundreds of thousands of dollars of pro-John Howard political advertising while obscuring the source of the funds.

The letter complains about "many unfair statements" made by Senator Brown, saying he has tried twice to instigate a Senate inquiry into the sect.

It says the senator, who faces re-election, has "actively and persistently vilified a religious Christian minority". "We urge you to have a careful look at the calibre of candidates and their policies to see what type of person is suitable to represent you, as part of the leadership of this great nation," the letter says.

It refers readers to the Greens and Brethren websites, but also to an anonymous, US-registered blog at www.greenswatch.com. The site accuses the Greens of a belief in bestiality, of starting the 2004 race riots on Palm Island and of "plotting to infiltrate the Exclusive Brethren".

Senator Brown said yesterday: "I think the church's members are pouring hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars into this campaign … and under the Government's new electoral laws, an individual can put in $100,000 around the country without any disclosure being made."

A spokesman for the Brethren denied any input from the Liberal Party.

Australian Greens leader Bob Brown has hit out at election campaign criticism from the church group, Exclusive Brethren.

The group is dropping election material in mail boxes around the state, urging people to be careful about voting for the Greens.

The material, titled 'To the Citizens of Tasmania' and authorised by 51 church members, alleges the Greens are anti-development and have immoral policies.

Senator Brown says the Exclusive Brethren, while advocating how people should vote, have never been allowed by their church leader to vote themselves.

"I don't think people will take much notice of what the Exclusive Brethren, with their weird policies of not allowing married women to work, of banning their children from being allowed a university education and of dividing families forever if there's an adult who's got the sense enough to say I'm not going to follow Bruce Hales anymore."

[Bold added]

Extract:

The Electoral Finance Bill was inspired by an instinctive hatred of personal wealth (especially when it benefits political opposition, as witnessed by the Exclusive Brethren's ridiculous attack on Labour and the Greens) and resentment by the Government that it was unable to steal public funds for its election campaigning. However, the overarching impulse, revealed in the desire to raise the weights of any opposition, has been to legislate to remain in power.

Extract:

The PSA is pleased with changes made to the Electoral Finance Bill as it makes the funding of political parties more transparent which is good for democracy.

“We support the amendments that restrict anonymous donations to political parties and create
stricter disclosure rules for donations from secret trusts,” says Brenda Pilott, National Secretary of the PSA which has 55,000 members working in the state sector and local government.

“These changes should mean that wealthy individuals and groups can’t use their wealth to try and buy an election,” says Brenda Pilott.

The need for this change was highlighted during the last general election when the Exclusive Brethren poured more than a million dollars into a secret campaign to try and influence the outcome of the election.

Extract:

The Greens yesterday trumpeted their role in revising the bill, saying the new version should allay the concerns of most New Zealanders.

However, the party - which last election was targeted by an initially anonymous negative advertising campaign funded by the Exclusive Brethren ...

Extract:

A new regime to clamp down on anonymous donations is expected to hit National Party coffers as Labour fights to "keep the hollow men and secret money out of politics".

The changes to the way elections can be funded were sparked by events of the last election - in particular the campaigning by the Exclusive Brethren against Labour and the Green Party.

Yesterday, Prime Minister Helen Clark said one of the key purposes behind the bill was "to get the hollow men and the secret money out of politics".

Extract:

The heat will go on later this week, as the grizzlies turn their attention to a law its opponents say will end democracy as we know it.

The Electoral Finance Bill is all about digging up the playing field which Labour saw as not being level last time round.

Money flowed into the Tories' war chest through secret trusts. The Exclusive Brethren was a clandestine third party, and whilst it did not actually advocate a National Government it bagged the Greens, and without them the Labour lot would have been struggling.

Labour was forced to cough up more than 800 grand which it was found to have overspent so it is now getting its own back.

Usually when the law is changed on electoral matters all the parties are consulted. Not on this occasion though, the Tories were left out in the cold. Hardly surprising considering they would not have agreed with very much of what was being proposed.

Secret donations to political parties will now be limited, but third parties like the Brethren will be able to spend up to 120 grand - enough for four full page newspaper ads. In the original bill secret donations were not even covered off.

The days of the National party relying on millions of dollars of money from anonymous donations appear to be over.

The controversial electoral finance bill has been reported back from select committee and it severely limits how much parties can fundraise through anonymous donations.

There are also heavy restrictions on how much money outside groups can spend on influencing the election result.

It was the Exclusive Brethren's sneaky and secretive million dollar foray into trying to engineer a change of government last election - that is behind this major shake-up.

It backfired on Don Brash, who was caught having a memory lapse.

But now there will be a limit on what outside groups can spend and say in an election year - using such attack advertising.

The bill has prompted protests in the streets and now MPs scrutinising it have recommended changes, so;

Third parties, like the Brethren, can spend $120,000 in an election year - that's up from $60,000.

That will take effect from January 1st 2008; a three month period was considered and thrown out.

Non governmental organisations, NGOs, won't face restrictions - as long as ads stick to debating issues.

All anonymous donors giving $1000 or more must tell the electoral commission their name and address.

And those anonymous donations to parties will be capped to $240,000 next election.

That will hurt National a lot more than Labour - National has channelled millions through secret trusts for years.

The Human Rights Commission bagged the bill initially as an assault on the freedom of speech.

It is happy with some of the changes, but not happy the public won't have a further say.

And the organiser of the weekend's protest remains annoyed.

Another protest is planned on parliament this Wednesday.

Extract:

Professor Davis rarely becomes involved in politics, but last year was dragged into the centre of the political stage after newspapers and Investigate magazine published articles about his private life.

It later emerged that the Exclusive Brethren religious group had hired private detectives to investigate Professor Davis and leading Labour MPs.

The Exclusive Brethren funded an expensive anti-Government and anti-Green campaign during the last election, a motivating factor behind the drafting of the Electoral Finance Bill.

John Howard has exchanged letters five times with the Exclusive Brethren since 2003, but after 14 months of stalling on a simple freedom-of-information request, his office will not release the correspondence until well after election day.

The Age was informed last week that it was authorised to receive edited copies of four letters from members of the secretive sect to the Prime Minister, and one from the Prime Minister to the Brethren sent as recently as September last year.

But the release was delayed by another 30 days to give the Brethren a chance to appeal against the decision, taking the earliest date of receipt of the correspondence to December 13 — three weeks after voters decide if Mr Howard will remain Prime Minister.

It is the first time the Prime Minister's office has acknowledged any correspondence with the religious sect with which the Prime Minister has had very close contact over many years. Mr Howard was embarrassed in August when The Age revealed he had met Brethren world leader, Bruce Hales, and at least one sect member who is under police investigation over his role in funding pro-Liberal campaign advertisements in the 2004 election.

Greens leader Bob Brown said the Government had once again manipulated the FoI Act to hide information. Mr Brown was told by the Prime Minister's department, in response to his own FoI request in 2005, that "no records of correspondence with persons identifying as representatives of the Exclusive Brethren … were located". The response to The Age reveals that three relevant documents existed.

"I was lied to. That's clear. Straight deception," Senator Brown said. "But I'm used to it with the Government."

The Age FoI saga dates back to September 29 last year, when the paper requested any communications between Mr Howard and members of the Exclusive Brethren. After a number of clarifications were requested, the last in February, months elapsed with no action.

In May, however, after further prompting, Mr Howard's "senior adviser (Government)", Andrew Kefford, who was the decision maker in the request, responded that the search for documents was complete. A 30-day consultation period with "third parties" (the Brethren) would begin at that time.

In June The Age was asked to pay $623.90 which was paid four weeks later. In September, two months after the money was paid, the department said it was "finalising consultations".

On October 26, after further prompting, The Age was told that Mr Kefford, was "conscious of the delay and has indicated that he expects to consider the matter over the weekend".

The following Monday, Mr Kefford said more consultation was needed — a process that continued until November 12, when the decision was delivered — including the 30-day appeal period.

Mr Howard's spokeswoman Nicki Savva denied that the Government had stalled the request to save the Prime Minister embarrassment before the election.

"That is rejected absolutely … there has been no politicisation of the charges. The proof of that is in the handing over of the letters," she said.

Ms Savva said no documents had been revealed as a result of Senator Brown's request, because he had not named the correct members of the Brethren who wrote the correspondence.

Ms Savva also tried to blame The Age for the delays.

Extracts:

Most senior members of the Labour Party are convinced that they almost lost the last election because of the million-dollar secret campaign funded by the Exclusive Brethren. Only the exposure by Green Co-Leader Rod Donald and the inept denials of Don Brash saved them.

Seldom will the media run a partisan political campaign. So it was an extraordinary decision for the New Zealand Herald to launch a campaign against the proposed campaign law. A headline banner across the front page, reading "Democracy under attack" would have had most of us thinking that it was referring to the mischief created by the Urewera 16 - not the Government.

Such a defiant show of power by our nation's biggest newspaper wouldn't have been taken lightly. I'm sure this will result IN some MPs backing off on at least some of the proposed changes - which is good. However, the damage is done. The perception that Labour and its allies were up to no good is now ingrained in the public psyche.

Extract:

On Thursday afternoon Labor hopeful Maxine McKew walked through a church garden in Bennelong, the electorate she hopes to steal from Prime Minister John Howard next Saturday.

However, Ian McAllister, a political scientist at the ANU, believes the Prime Minister will likely hold his seat because he is, well, the Prime Minister, and the incumbent. "The party is named after him," McAllister says. "It's the Howard Government. Even though he has a popular, very televisual opponent my gut feeling is that he will keep Bennelong."

Highly unlikely, says veteran Canberra election analyst Malcolm Mackerras. "I have no doubt Howard will be defeated in Bennelong, and the party that wins Bennelong will win the general election."

Mackerras said the possibility of a byelection — if Howard wins his seat but then resigns, as he has said he would — may also discourage voters from backing him.

It is to Sydney what the seat of Chisholm is to Melbourne. Chisholm is held by Labor but the two electorates are remarkably similar. Chisholm includes Box Hill with its large pocket of established Chinese and Korean-background voters. The suburb of Eastwood in Bennelong has the second-largest Chinese-born community in Australia — 12,000 people — and 5000 Koreans. At Eastwood's state primary school, 85 per cent of students do not speak English at home. The sprawling suburbia of Bennelong's Epping and Ryde is similar to Chisholm's Mount Waverley, Ashwood, Mont Albert or Burwood. Bennelong's working-class pocket in Ermington is not unlike Clayton.

It used to be a white, middle-class Bible belt stronghold. It is the centre of Exclusive Brethren operations although, in contrast to the last election and, no doubt because of increased scrutiny, the politically active religious cult is conspicuous by its absence in Howard's campaign this time.

The Exclusive Brethren have rejected suggestions from Greens leader, Bob Brown, that the religious group may be involved in a political smear campaign.

Yesterday, Senator Brown said an election leaflet attacking the Greens policy was misleading and on many points, wrong.

He said he was concerned the Brethren might be involved because of links to the Tasmania's Liberals' Damien Mantach who authorised the brochure.

But the group has denied having anything to do with the brochure.

A spokesman for the Brethren says Senator Brown should apologise.

We have called our campaign against the Electoral Finance Bill "Democracy under Attack". Some have questioned this, saying surely it is an issue of freedom of speech, not democracy. They are perhaps defining democracy in the narrow sense as the right to vote.

Democracy without free speech is a sham. Some of the most repressive states in recent history have called themselves democratic on the grounds that the solitary party permitted to express political views and take part in elections allowed people to vote. Saddam Hussein won his final election with something like 99 per cent of the vote. The Soviet Union was a carnival of elections; right down to factory level leaders were solemnly elected, but not if they spoke outside the party's permitted line.

Nobody is suggesting the Electoral Finance Bill will constrain political debate to that degree. The only element our Government has in common with those further left is that it shares their fear of private money in political debate. The bill is aimed not at outright bribery of voters - long outlawed - but at the right of independent organisations to promote issues of concern to them in an election year.

Not many do so in this country. The seven Exclusive Brethren who wanted to see Labour and the Greens defeated at the last election were a rare example of citizens wealthy enough to publicise their concerns. They did it maladroitly, believing they could keep their religious identity secret, and managed mainly to embarrass the party they wanted to support.

But election campaigns are supposed to be instructive public examinations of the people who want to represent us and make crucial decisions for us. The seven Brethren's extreme material naturally attracted a great deal of curiosity about who was behind it and whether the National Party had encouraged it. Those questions presented the party's then leader with an examination he did not always handle well. The exercise was instructive for voters.

The Electoral Finance Bill would rule out exercises such as that. Any organisation wishing to spend money to advance a view in election year would be required to disclose its intentions in advance to the Electoral Office, disclose the sources of its finance and face a limit on the amount it could spend.

Political parties must do all of that, though the bill as drafted puts non-parties under a much tighter financial restriction than parties, and another bill in the House this week allows parties to bypass the concerns of the Auditor-General about their use of public funds for electioneering. The political playing field is being tilted very much in favour of parties in Parliament.

Is it really necessary to restrict people's freedom to spend their own money if they want to participate in public debate? These are not people standing for election, they simply want to persuade voters to their point of view. Their success will depend on who they are (which they would be foolish to hide), the validity of their concerns and their powers of persuasion, much more than the money they spend.

Some have attempted to legitimise the bill by pointing to similar provisions in the United Kingdom. These are probably the same people so aghast at successive anti-terror laws passed in that country that whittled away human rights and damaged its democratic credentials. The fact that political debate is less free elsewhere is no justification to pursue a lower common denominator here.

The genuinely democratic left hold that democracy requires not just free speech but roughly equal speech. Since wealth is unequal, they want to control its influence on elections if they can. But people are unequal in many ways. Some are more intelligent than others, some more attractive, some more energetic or well organised or simply more interested in politics than most people. Should they have unequal influence?

A healthy democracy welcomes contributions from them all.

(Bold Added)

Extract:

Metiria Turei: Does the Minister agree that if non-party groups run million-dollar advertising campaigns that are simply parallel party vote campaigns—just as the Exclusive Brethren did last election, with its blue pamphlets that stated “Change the Government”—then a cap on party election spending is simply pointless and we may as well just go to the American system of $1, one vote?

Hon PETE HODGSON: The member is absolutely right. Let us just briefly reiterate what happened in the last general election in this country. The National Party had a party cap of $1 million and electoral expenditure on top of that. There was a party cap of $1 million. That is the law. The law constraining us on how much we as candidates for election can spend has been around since 1895. That was the law for the last election—$1 million for the National Party, $1 million for the Green Party, and $1 million for the Labour Party. But, guess what? Along came the Exclusive Brethren, which spent more than $1.2 million in addition to the National Party’s cap. This legislation states that that situation is not a very good idea and that we should try to put a stop to it.

Hon Tony Ryall: Is the reason why the Government continues to suppress the advice of the Ministry of Justice to the Minister and the Government the fact that those reports point out that advertisements like the one I am holding, which had to be counted as an election expense last time, will not have to be included as an election expense this time, which means that the Labour Party can steal even more taxpayers’ money to steal another election?

Hon PETE HODGSON: It does not really much matter how much time that member wishes to devote to weaving a more and more elaborate conspiracy. It does not matter how much time he wants to spend on that. The fact is that the Ministry of Justice is bound to follow the Official Information Act in its entirety. It will follow the Official Information Act in its entirety and it will contest processes where it sees fit to do so. The ministry will do that.

The Greens leader Bob Brown has criticised the Liberal Party over a brochure that attacks the party's policy.

The election leaflet that has been distributed in Launceston in northern Tasmania includes quotes from the Greens' 2005 drug policy, and says the party is soft on law and order.

Senator Brown says the Greens now have a new drugs policy and publishing old policy is misleading.

He says it is very similar to brochures used to attack Greens in past election campaigns and he is concerned that it has been authorised the Tasmanian Liberal Party state director, Damien Mantach.

"The Liberals and the Exclusive Brethren, particularly Mr Mantach who's authorised this brochure, have been in talks in the past," he said.

"They've worked together in the past to mislead the electorate about the Greens, I wouldn't be surprised if that's happening this time."

The Electoral Finance Bill is a necessity, despite hyperbole and exaggeration from the National Opposition, seemingly determined to protect possible further election funds from the Exclusive Brethren.

According to the New Zealand Herald, the Exclusive Brethren "Gang of Seven" sent off an email to the Chief Electoral Officer about their intended expenditure on behalf of the Opposition.

This communication was from Ron Hickmott, self-described as a 'Christian businessman'. He had spoken to Mr Henry earlier in the day and requested a formal meeting to discuss the consequences of his group's proposed actions under the terms of Electoral Act 1993. Three other 'Christian businessmen' would also attenda meeting with Mr Henry. They were Andrew Simmons and Phil Win from Auckland and Matt Goudie from Palmerston North.

Reproduced in the New Zealand Herald, the email read as follows:

"We represent a group of Christian businessmen concerned as to the course and direction of the current [Labour-led government]. Accordingly we have put together an election programme with a budget of $1.2 million with the goal of 'getting party votes for National' as this is the only way change will come about.

"Our programme involves extensive publications throughout the country with a theme showing and demonstrating mistrust in the current Government and building trust in a Brash-led National Government.

"We write seeking clarification and direction re the election funding issue, specifically that anything we do does not compromise National's funding position [their emphasis].

"Typically,

1. Does it compromise National's position if we communicate to MPs and candidates our strategy?

2. Does it compromise National's position if we show them draft publications before they are published?

3. Is there any legality prohibiting us printing 'Vote National,' 'Vote Brash' and including a photo of Dr Brash on [the advertising]? Can this be done without compromising National's funding position?

4. To what extent can we legally advise, direct, assist, communicate or other with National MPs and candidates?"

As Audrey Young noted in her Herald article on Monday, the National Party didn't need this assistance. It had access to more than the permissible $2.4m that it was allocated within the three months before a general election under the Electoral Act 1993. National was able to start its campaign expenditure well before that period, with Exclusive Brethren financial aid. Ironically though, it was Brethrengate that may have cost the Opposition the election, or so Young argues that "National believes."

(In which case, it must be asked, why are they so eager to shut down debate about the current Electoral Finance Bill? Or does money really talk so much that it drowns out everything else within the Opposition hierarchy's hearing range?)

According to Young too, the Electoral Finance Bill is based on similar legislation in Britain and Canada- but not Australia, where the machinations of the Exclusive Brethren have been reported in the Melbourne Age over the span of its election campaign.

One has to give the Herald due credit for this news coverage. It fulfils its professional obligations to report news in an objective, neutral and fair manner, despite its own editorial opposition to the Electoral Finance Bill.

Source: Audrey Young: "Exclusive Brethren's email set stage for Electoral Finance Bill" New Zealand Herald: 12.11.07

Undoubtedly the most damaging headline suffered by a party at the last election appeared on the front page of the Herald.

It read, "Dr Brash: I am not a liar". The National Party leader had made that remark after admitting what he had earlier denied: that he did know the Exclusive Brethren were behind pamphlets attacking Labour's allies, the Greens.

His admission, midway through the election campaign, did as much damage to National as anything published by the Brethren did to Labour. It is worth recalling this in answer to those who accuse us of political bias in our efforts to stop the Government's Electoral Finance Bill. But more importantly, it illustrates that independently financed campaigns can be a double-edged sword.

The bill would severely restrict the amount any organisation other than a political party can spend in putting a point of view to voters in an election year. It is prompted almost entirely by the silliness of seven Exclusive Brethren in 2005, whose efforts Labour blames for its loss of support in smaller cities.

National, with somewhat more evidence, blames the same campaign for tarnishing its leader's credibility and costing it crucial votes. With friends like the Brethren, who needs enemies?

The clumsiness of political causes with more money than sense, though, is no reason to muzzle them. Labour sounds obsessed by the supposed power of money. Declaring the Government's resolve to proceed with this repressive legislation, the Prime Minister says, "The National Party benefits enormously from big money in New Zealand politics."

Money is only as good as the message it brings. For some voters at the last election the Brethren's material would have resonated with their own moral unease at some of the social legislation the Government has passed. Others, probably many more, would have dismissed it as the ranting of religious oddballs. Not many, though, would have felt a need to control it.

New Zealand is a liberal democracy. Its political culture allows free speech and holds that anyone can contribute to debates that influence its democratic decisions. Most New Zealanders probably suppose their elections are less regulated than in fact they are. Laws already try to limit the donations given to candidates and parties, the amount they can spend and the broadcast advertising time each is allowed.

The law also forbids others from publishing material that declares support for a candidate or party without their authorisation, lest it breach their spending limit. The Brethren took care that theirs did not expressly support National while it attacked Labour. Labour is determined to bring that sort of campaign under control from now on.

Its bill will insist that any group wanting to spend money on political campaigns in an election year will have to register its intention and its right to spend its own money will be restricted. The weight of criticism of the bill before a parliamentary committee will no doubt lighten its restrictions a little, but only a little. The spending limit might be doubled, the definition of a political campaign narrowed, but elections will be less free.

At the same time that private money is to be brought under tighter control, public money is to be more readily available to parties for campaigning purposes, and now it seems departments of state may be given an exemption to the paid publicity restrictions in the bill.

The Government is clearly determined to pass this repressive bill in the belief that money, not messages, wins elections. It insults the intelligence of voters, breaches a human right and curtails democratic debate, for the sake of its own survival.

An elderly Exclusive Brethren man who is a former church leader and trustee of a Queensland Brethren private school, has been charged with sexual offences against a child.

It is the third case of alleged sexual abuse of children to emerge from the secretive sect in the past 12 months, but church elders deny any pattern of behaviour. And the hierarchy of the church has denied any prior knowledge of the alleged abuse by the Queensland man.

"[World leader] Bruce Hales has never been aware of this until The Age wrote to me," a spokesman, Tony McCorkell, said. "I can clearly say to you that Mr Hales did not know about this, and has not sought to cover it up."

Once they became aware of the allegations, sect leaders interviewed the alleged victims and perpetrator, then immediately handed the case over to police.

The man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was charged on October 30 by a regional Queensland court with two counts of indecent treatment of a child under 16.

He has been confined in his home by the sect, has been barred from attending church services, and will be "withdrawn from" [excommunicated] shortly.

The offences he has been charged over allegedly occurred in 2003 and relate to one young child. But the police are investigating other alleged offences involving several other victims, as far back as the 1970s and 1980s.

Police would not comment.

The Herald has been told the man was at one time a highly respected elder of the church who had fallen out of favour in recent years. He had been a trustee of the local Brethren secondary school.

"He was probably the most actively involved of all the board members in any of the campuses," a former Queensland teacher said.

It is understood none of the offences are alleged to have occurred at the school.

Clive Petrie, an excommunicated Brethren man, will appear in court in New Zealand soon facing six indecent assault charges. Late last year an Albury man, Lindsay Jensen, was sent to jail over a series of indecent assaults against two young sisters.

Labour's determination to pass the Electoral Finance Bill goes back to an email sent to former Chief Electoral Officer David Henry on Wednesday, June 8, 2005.

It set out how a group from the Exclusive Brethren wanted to spend over $1 million to campaign for the election of a National government without the money having to be counted as a National Party election expense.

The law allowed them to spend limitless amounts attacking the Government but they had to be a lot more careful in how they voiced their support for Don Brash and National.

Labour argues the campaign was an attempt to buy the election result.

The email was from Ron Hickmott, who described himself as a Christian businessman. He had spoken to Mr Henry earlier in the day and was now formally asking for a meeting with him to clarify the Electoral Act 1993.

He was going to bring three other Christian businessmen to a meeting with Mr Henry the following Tuesday: Andrew Simmons and Phil Win from Auckland and Matt Goudie from Palmerston North.

The email speaks for itself:

"We represent a group of Christian businessmen concerned as to the course and direction of the current [Labour-led government]. Accordingly we have put together an election programme with a budget of $1.2 million with the goal of 'getting party votes for National' as this is the only way change will come about.

"Our programme involves extensive publications throughout the country with a theme showing and demonstrating mistrust in the current Government and building trust in a Brash-led National Government.

"We write seeking clarification and direction re the election funding issue, specifically that anything we do does not compromise National's funding position [their emphasis].

"Typically,

1. Does it compromise National's position if we communicate to MPs and candidates our strategy?

2. Does it compromise National's position if we show them draft publications before they are published?

3. Is there any legality prohibiting us printing 'Vote National,' 'Vote Brash' and including a photo of Dr Brash on [the advertising]? Can this be done without compromising National's funding position?

4. To what extent can we legally advise, direct, assist, communicate or other with National MPs and candidates?"

On the date that the email was sent, no one but Prime Minister Helen Clark and her inner circle knew when the election was going to be held.

The Herald had run an article just the day before setting out all the dates the Prime Minister might choose between July 30 and September 24 - it was eventually September 17 and she announced the date on July 25.

If the date had been the earliest, July 30, the regulated period would have been all of May, June and July.

Whatever the date, National's coffers were chock-a-block. The business boycott of National under Bill English's leadership in the 2002 election had been lifted with the election of Don Brash to the National leadership.

It undoubtedly had more money to spend than the $2.4 million it was allowed to within the three months before an election.

So National broke conventions and started its campaign spend-up well outside the regulated period.

National's red and blue billboards (iwi/ kiwi, tax/cuts) had been going up over the country for several months.

While the media coverage more than doubled the value of the billboards because of the commentary they continued to attract, Labour was seething that National's wealthy donors were allowing it to campaign for a greater part of the year than other parties.

The Christian businessmen outed themselves during the election campaign about the same time as the heat went on Dr Brash over what he knew about their activities.

National believes that the Exclusive Brethren cost the party the election (Labour polled 2 points higher than it did).

Other factors fed into a review of the law: the traditional select committee inquiry into the election, some confusing case law on what comprises an election expense arising from the unsuccessful electoral petition taken by Winston Peters against Bob Clarkson in Tauranga, and election law reform overseas, particularly in Canada and Britain.