PETERS COMPLAINS ABOUT GREENS' 'POT CO-ORDINATOR'

New Zealand First has complained about the Green Party's use of taxpayer
money to employ a cannabis law reform co-ordinator.

However, Parliamentary Services, which administers MPs' budgets, said the
Green Party was entitled to use its out-of-Parliament budget in this way.

A spokeswoman for the service said that it was in fact a sensible use of
the money because the party was an issues-based party of list MPs rather
than constituency MPs.

The budget was used to support the work of MPs outside Parliament.

It was generally used by electorate MPs for offices and staff to answer
constituents' queries.

Parties such as ACT and the Greens made better use of the money by
employing people to handle issues, for instance by assessing attitudes to
research.

Mr Peters today issued a statement which said the Greens were using
taxpayer money to promote the use of cannabis.

"This is a serious misuse of public money. Why should taxpayers' money be
spent promoting the use of an illegal drug?

"The Greens want immediate legislation to cover possession of cannabis for
personal use and appear to also want taxpayers to fund their campaign.

"New Zealanders are already paying the salary of a marijuana-promoting MP.
Surely that is more than enough of an outlay on this nonsense," Mr Peters said.

However, the Greens denied the co-ordinator would be promoting drug use.

A spokesman said the person would be looking at drug law reform "in the
same way they could be promoting or co-ordinating and researching work on
any other aspect of legislation".

"The job would be identifying and communicating with key sector groups that
have an interest in cannabis policy and then working towards solutions to
the issues raised by drug law reform.

"It's no more an abuse of taxpayers' money then whatever uses Mr Peters
makes of exactly the same budget.

"There is nothing in the rules governing the use of that budget that says
we can't do this."

The spokesman said the Greens were looking for up to six other policy
co-ordinators including in the areas of safe food, ground-based pest
control, sustainable agriculture, and social and economic justice.