Angry MP denies drinking

National's Tau Henare took grave exception in Parliament yesterday to an oblique suggestion that he might have been drinking before making a speech on a road safety bill.

When Mr Henare had finished his speech, next up was Labour's Kelvin Davis who opened with: "If ever there was an advertisement for a zero alcohol intake, that speech from Tau Henare was it."

Mr Henare was back on his feet in seconds, pointing out to Assistant Speaker Lindsay Tisch that it was out of order to even suggest a member had been drinking.

Mr Tisch didn't seem to want to make an issue of it.

"I hear what the member says. I'll just remind members to be very careful about what one says. Time is running out and I'd like to think that we could actually have something constructive," he said.

That didn't satisfy Mr Henare, who invoked his right to make a personal statement to the House.

"I want to go on record as saying that I have never, and will never, take a drink or even look like I take a drink. Everybody that knows me knows that I actually hardly ever touch a drop of the devil's water."

It wasn't clear from that whether Mr Henare didn't drink at all, or only very rarely, and Mr Davis picked up the point when he resumed his speech.

"I apologise. We all realise he was sober when he made that speech," he said.

Mr Tisch's patience ran out.

"That doesn't add any value whatsoever. That's the end of the matter," he told the MPs.

Mr Davis apologised for any offence that had been taken, and that was the end of the matter.

Henare hits Twitter
As usual, Mr Henare was very active on Twitter last night as The Copyright (Infringing File Sharing) Amendment Bill (which passed this morning) was debated in parliament, at one point telling technology journalist Juha Saarinen to STFU (an internet abbreviation for "shut the f**k up"). 

However, those familiar with the MP's tweets would realise he was displaying no more than his usual level of candour.

Mr Henare messaged NBR's Chris Keall this morning:"Yip thats me, very rare occurance it is to see me sucking back more than one Tui".