Loans ‘whitewash’ strongly denied

Press, 17 July 1980, Page 1

Loans ‘whitewash’ strongly denied

PA Wellington The Opposition last evening asserted in Parliament that the man appointed to investigate the Fitzgerald loan affair, Mr J. R. Mills, was known as a long-time, active member of the National Party. But Mr Mills vehemently denied this later. “That is absolutely without foundation,” Mr Mills said last evening from Wanaka, where he is retired. “I have never had anything to do with the National Party.” Mr F. D. O’Flynn (Lab., Island Bay) told Parliament that Mr Mills had been either a chairman or an executive member of the Southland division of the National Party, and suggested -a “whitewash” was being set up. But the Attorney-Gen-eral, (Mr McLay) said the National member for, Invercargill, Mr N. P. H. Jones, had assured him that Mr Mills had never been associated with the National Party in the 25 years Mr Jones had been associated with the Southland sub-division. Mr Mills, a former temporary judge of the

Supreme Court, has been chosen by the Government as . a one-man Commission of Inquiry. into the granting of a $106,000 Marginal Lands Board loan to Mr Jim Fitzgerald and Mrs Audrey Fitzgerald to develop their farm near Wellington. The couple are friends of the chairman of the board, the Minister of Lands (Mr V. S. Young). Mrs Fitzgerald is the daughter of the Minister of Agriculture (Mr Maclntyre).

The'' controversy was made public after a member of the Marginal Loans Board, Mr R.- White, a National Party member, resigned and alleged political pressure had been exercised in the Fitzgeralds’ favour.

Mr O’Flynn told Parliament- last evening that Mr Mills “was known for a long time as a strong, active member of the National Party.”

The terms of reference of the present inquiry, indicated that a: “whitewash” was being set'up, said Mr O’Flynn. Mr McLay said that when he approached Mr ' Mills he had no knowledge of or interest in any political affiliation that he might have had.

“I give the lie to the claim that there is, in some way'some form of political preference made in this choice of a former temporary judge of the Supreme Court as a commissioner of inquiry,” Mr McLay said.