Trotter admits taxpayer funding of parties needed so Labour can (ironically) pay back the taxpayer

Lucyna has done us a big favour (please forgive her Fairfax) by retyping in the Chris Trotter column from today's . Go read it.

State funding has become a matter of necessity for the because of the unprecedented and massive political levied on it by the auditor-general in 2006.

Trotter admits Labour need state funding because of the Auditor-General requiring them to repay the $800,000 of taxpayer funds illegally funded by the Parliamentary Labour Party (taxpayer). Talk about robbing Paul to pay Peter. And remember they haven't yet paid it back.

They will also note the arbitrary character of the decision to restrict his investigation to printed material distributed in the final three months of the 2005 election campaign (thus excluding National's )

Trotter again attacks the Auditor-General, comparing him to Sir John Kerr. But Chris misses a big point above. National's red and blue billboards were 100% funded by the National Party, not the taxpayer. The AG could have gone further back then three months and it would not have affected the billboards because they were not taxpayer funded.

Go read the whole column. It is almost as good as the one in which Trotter said Labour were justified in breaking the law, so long as it stopped National winning the election.

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