Transcript of interview with Brian Henry

The following is a transcript of Mr Henry’s explanation of his arrangement with Mr Peters as told to your correspondent on July 17.

NBR: So you solicited the money from Owen Glenn?
Brian Henry: I phoned Owen Glenn and asked him for a donation, which he agreed to, yes.
And where was his money paid to?
Me.
To you personally?
Yep.
Like your 01 chequing account or something?
Sort of like that, yeah. Paid to me.
And in the Peters and Clarkson case who paid the costs ordered to Clarkson on that?
Sh--, I couldn’t tell off the top of my head. I couldn’t answer at the moment.
So when you got the money from Glenn did you put it somewhere else, like the solicitor’s trust fund?
No, it was paid to me as fees. I’m a barrister, I’m allowed to take fees.
Okay. So this was in fulfillment of the fees?And you invoiced Winston?
I have never invoiced Winston.
Okay
Understand the point you’ve just got. Until I invoice Winston he has no debt.
Okay?
Do you understand that point? Which means he has nothing to declare because he has no obligation to pay a debt. And I can choose when I invoice, and I can choose to donate such of my time in the (unclear) as I wish and there’s nothing illegal about that at all.
So when you’re say calling up Glenn, you’re asking him to fund you to help out Winston Peters?
Essentially, that’s what the argument is. I’m not going into the exact details of the conversation but the answer is he knew he was paying the legal bill, contributing to the legal bill for the Tauranga electoral petition. And I’m the fella that did it.
Except there’s no legal bill until you invoice?
That’s right. And I’m entitled to take money on account of costs, I’m a barrister.
Right. I get what you mean. This is the timing thing I’m struggling with. There’s no debt…
No debt until an invoice is rendered to Mr Peters and Mr Peters needs to declare.
But at the same time you’re collecting money from Glenn in anticipation of an invoice?
No. On account of costs.
The costs to you of pursuing the litigation?
Yeah.
Sort you’re of asking Glenn to finance your activities, and you’re..
What happens is barristers are entitled to money on account of their costs, and when they’ve finished their file and when they choose to. they render a note of their fees.  At that time there’s a debt owed to them by the instructing solicitor who renders an invoice to the client. And at that time there’s  a legal obligation on the part of the client to pay the solicitor. I can’t sue Winston for the fees. It has to go through my instructing solicitor.
When did you invoice the instructing solicitor?
Have I done it yet?
I don’t know.
No, There is no bill, there’s no debt. Nobody understands that yet. There is no debt owed by Winston Peters to me until the invoice is rendered and there is no invoice rendered. Full stop. End of discussion.
So you’re contending you have donated time to Winston Peters?
I can donate any time I wish to Winston Peters and that is completely lawful.
Is that what you’re saying has happened here?
I’ve donated a huge amount of time to Winston over the years – completely huge - and this is the exact same thing. Winston’s talking about a moral obligation to pay, not a legal obligation, and he works very hard at that moral obligation. Make no error.
To pay what?
To pay me.
But he doesn’t pay you.
Well, he pays the instructing solicitor who pays me.
But he hasn’t paid you in this case?
He has paid money towards me himself personally to me yes.
I thought there’d been no invoice?
He pays on account of costs. There doesn’t have to be an invoice, he can pay on account of costs.
So he nominates a fee?
No, he says I can afford to pay you this today and I say thank you.
Is that a usual sort of arrangement?
It’s a perfectly lawful arrangement.
---
I’m still not clear on this. If there’s no debt Peters owes, what exactly were you collecting money from Glenn for?
The eventual final costs of the electoral petition. He’s just making a contribution towards those costs. Paid to me on account towards a final bill when rendered.
Final bill from who to who?
From me to the instructing solicitor, from the instructing solicitor to Winston.
So the Glenn donation is part of that final bill when rendered?
It will be when rendered but it hasn’t been rendered yet. So there’s no debt due.
Okay. Will there be an invoice rendered to the instructing solicitor?
No comment. It’s up to me, when I decide to make it, and I’m entitled to donate as much of my time as I want. Eventually there will be a full accounting done, because we do that. When I make that decision to do it, I make that dec to do it.
So the Glenn donation has stayed with you?
No, it’s simply paid on account of my costs, quite lawfully paid on account of my costs.
So is it sitting there in anticipation of the bill, or is it a set-off?
No. It’s paid to me, then it’s taken into my books as money paid on account of my costs, which I as a barrister am entitled to do.
So that’s like income?
It’s paid to me on account of my costs, which is money that’s mine. And that’s the end of the question. Tax is paid on it the usual way, GST is paid on it, everything’s paid on itin the usual way.
So you paid tax on it?
It’s my fees. It goes into my fees bill that goes to the IRD in the usual way. It’s not trust money or anything like that.
So Mark Keating, in the Herald, talking about tax implications…
He’s stupid. He’s an academic. They sit away and say ‘Henry doesn’t pay his tax.’
If they think I’m stupid call me stupid, but don’t say I don’t pay my tax… I pay tax. In the usual way.