(Photo: Dominic Hammond)

Left to right: Fiona Tait, Deborah Garrett, Sandra Mattiassi, Vivienne Sands, Lawrence O'Halloran, Ross Gardiner, Bette Overell, Dean Golding, Anita Spencer Simon Cottle
Holding Banner: Paula Feehan and Zane Hookham
New Zealand Parliament. The 'Hearing' of NZ Petition to Abolish Vivisection 20 March 1991.

A change of scene and appearance of new characters, each one a pioneer of the N.Z. abolitionist movement who is consigned to the annals of history on page 307 of Animal Research Takes Lives - Humans and Animals Both Suffer. No-one who was closely involved with NZAVS' second petition during the testing and anxious time of endeavouring to get it heard in Parliament will ever completely forget the trauma of those years. Viewed from a clearer perspective and at blessed and merciful distance of time, the understanding of events which were then incomprehensible are seen more clearly, and with greater understanding than when they occurred, or, in the case of this Petition, failed to occur.

With 100,640 signatures achieved between WDLA 24 April 1987 when the Petition was launched, and WDLA 24 April 1989 when it was presented to Parliament with hundreds of quality submissions, NZAVS' team was a force to be reckoned with. Ten Members of the Society's Petition Sub-committee (affectionately named Operation Knockout), each holding an individual brief, assumed responsibility for presenting and forging into the grasp of the Primary Production Select Committee a specific aspect of the case for abolition. After months of rigorous rehearsals in simulated Parliamentary Committee format, and with comprehensive knowledge of the issue team members became adept not only in answering the most stringent interrogation but in the art of parrying and overturning questions into effective counter-attacks. Confident, they were part of a meticulously-planned exercise.

Simultaneous to these preparations, the writer was making indefatigable forays into the labyrinths of Parliament in attempts to get the Society's Submissions registered and its witnesses heard under the precepts which appertained to previous hearings of petitioners.

The witholding of legal channels from NZAVS at the time of this second petition was not due to a whim or conniving of a single committee chairman. This was an era of political upheaval, changes of government, and consequently changes of committee personnel. In conflict with their flagrant incompatibilities Members of Parliament who were normally divided in bitter personal rivalries, when assuming the position of Chairman to the Primary Production Committee, ignoring the fact that this contentious Petition was one of the largest and most controversial ever submitted to the Government, paradoxically became reconciled and resolute in an unmoveable unanimity not to register submissions or allow more than the writer, as Principal Petitioner, to present evidence.

"The extent of the consideration to be given by the Committee is entirely over to the Committee."
- Letter to the writer from the Chief Ombudsman, quoting from Parliamentary Practice in New Zealand.

"All Select Committees are empowered to deal with petitions as they see fit."
- Letter to the writer from Fran Wilde, M.P.

(Letters to the writer from the various Prime Ministers spanning the period of our Petition, regardless of party, were in the same vein.)

Finally in sheer desperation, under imminent threat of the Petition lapsing, with a reluctant and slippery promise to hear witnesses, a decision which the Secretary of the PPC unashamedly informed the writer was motivated by the wish..

"to get this Petition out of the way"

Delegates were eventually tricked into accepting a bogus 'hearing'. The writer's efforts to get the justice due to 100,640 petitioners, for a petition which had strictly adhered to government regulations every step of the way, had taken just one month short of two years.

At this unique moment in history it is worthwhile and justified to pause for a moment and take brief stock of the man, who by twist of fate the gods decreed to preside from his pivot of authority to hold sole jurisdiction over this Petition in which so many years of preparation and money had been invested.

On 20 March 1991, the NZ Primary Production Select Committee Chairman was Ross Meurant who had been leader of the notorious Red Squad at the time of the 1981 Rugby Springbok Tour, organiser and participant of vicious physical attacks against peaceful anti-apartheid protesters.

Stolid, unimaginative, out of his element, ill at ease and with undisguised ill-will, Meurant received our delegation. More reminiscent of a backwoods turnip-grower than an aspiring parliamentarian, Meurant was devoid of charm and showed no hint of the social graces or essential refinements demanded of his position, neither did he display any visible sign of intellect. In a flash summing up as the writer entered the chamber she was struck by the deteriorated standards since the days of former hearings at which she had given evidence on other issues, wherein Chairman of Committees addressed petitioners by name, maintained basic courtesies, and no matter how perverse the subject were adroit at acknowledging petitioners' evidence usually congratulating them on various aspects of their submissions, if only in the name of diplomacy.

Slumped in his seat at the place of honour at head of the table, showing more interest in the mysteries of his thumbnail than the countenances of his visitors or the business at hand, Meurant studied this wondrous phenomenon with increasing fascination and intensity as he suffered the verbal evidence of two witnesses. Without flicker of interest, sign of comprehension or animation he resurrected from his supine state whilst the first witness was in mid-speech to ask:

"how much longer it would be"

Coming to life again during the second witness' delivery for as long as it took him to mumble that "he had to go" and the other committee members "could take them along to their rooms if they wanted to hear more". To this day the remaining eight witnesses have never presented their so-carefully-prepared briefs.

The reason for Meurant's inability to carry out, for lack of time, the duties for which his salary is paid by the tax-payer, must be recorded in this bitter chronicle of salient affairs in NZAVS' history. Shortly after this 'hearing' Meurant was exposed in explosive headline news for conducting illicit arms dealing operations with overseas powers, only escaping dismissal from government by a whisper. Four years later, in early 1995 he was banished from his key positions to the back bench in punishment for involvement in equally nefarious affairs which ran counter to his position in government. Like Knapp, Meurant was using his position as an M.P. to facilitate personal lucrative activities to which his parliamentary responsibilities were subordinate.

After the debasing and iniquitous suffocation of evidence in a charade that was camouflaged as a 'hearing' (described in detail in Mobilise! 30) the writer made a series of approaches to the PPC appealing for it to hear the evidence of the remaining eight witnesses. Eventually, given less than a week's notice for the writer to contact members of the team, have them organise their personal affairs and travel to Wellington from their various destinations, they were offered a second 'hearing', for which Meurant said he would allow no more than 30 minutes... overall. On receiving this message the writer immediately telephoned the Committee Secretary of the PPC officially declining the 'hearing' on two counts: first that the notice given was insufficient for the team to make its arrangements; and second that a maximum of 30 minutes to present the evidence was unrealistic. This was immediately recorded in an official letter which was hand delivered to the Secretary of the PPC who later that day confirmed she had handed it to Meurant.

In a despicable tactic contrived to suit his own ends, Meurant feigning ignorance of NZAVS' refusal of the conditions offered for the proposed 'hearing', omitted to inform his colleagues on the Committee and allowed them to attend in the belief it was to take place. Shocked NZAVS members consequently heard over National Radio at midday on 17 April 1991 Meurant announcing that:

"the Committee has been waiting all morning and these people haven't turned up"

It took one of the most unpleasant battles of the writer's career, first with the staff of the Radio NZ news-room and later with the Head of Broadcasting to get the truth reported, a correction that wasn't broadcast until the 10 p.m. news which few people heard.

Despite exhaustive enquiries of the PPC, the Ombudsman and a succession of Prime Ministers NZAVS received no further response to appeals to have the Petition heard and it subsequently disappeared as though it had never existed.

The following extract is from a major article in NZ Listener dealing with NZAVS and its activities in which Hall once again interfered thus:

"I think like so many issues, you have to be careful not to sway the mainstream of opinion.(!) If you are appearing to be relatively conventional and sensible you are going to make more headway with the majority of the public."