Winston Peters has written a letter to the Dominion Post. Most of it is an attempt to justify his donations of tax payer money to charity. But the letter (as printed) ends with this
I’m humble about my achievements as foreign minister, and leave it to others to recount them. But how is it, 10 years later, with fuel costs rising astronomically, that my term as minister has cost the taxpayer 25 per cent less than a foreign minister of a decade ago?
No doubt Winston is expecting more praise for his coup in getting Condi to visit in late July. With regard to the question can we just say that fuel prices have only really had an impact of airfares in the last 6 months or so, in real terms fares have been dropping since Don McKinnon's time. The reason why Don's travel bill was so high was a mixture of our hosting APEC, solving the Timor problem and his running for international office. McKinnon of course had the Secretary of State and the President of the US visit in his time. Does Winnie have something up his sleeve?
