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Download AudioFormer cabinet minister Sandra Lee-Vercoe says there need to be major changes to parliament’s culture.
While not commenting directly on the Darleen Tana’s resignation from the Greens, she says the New Zealand parliament is known as a hostile work environment.
She says it’s even harder for women and for Maori women and women of colour.
During her time there she had stalkers, people breaking into her home, death threats and even an HIV-positive person who flew to Wellington twice with the express intention of biting her.
“It’s very difficult to deal with nutters in the public who are coming after you on the basis of your gender or your race but what could be changed and must be change is the way people behave within the House and towards each other,” she says.
Ms Lee-Vercoe says deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters telling Te Pati Maori’s Hana Rawhiti Maipi Clarke to shut up was an example of unacceptable behaviour, as she was elected by the people of Hauraki-Waikato to speak up, not shut up.
