Pamela Corkery (born 1956) is a
New Zealand
New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 List of islands of New Zealand, smaller islands. It is the ...
journalist, broadcaster, and former politician who served one term (1996–1999) as a member of Parliament for the
left-wing
Left-wing politics describes the range of political ideologies that support and seek to achieve social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy. Left-wing politics typically involve a concern for those in so ...
Alliance
An alliance is a relationship among people, groups, or states that have joined together for mutual benefit or to achieve some common purpose, whether or not explicit agreement has been worked out among them. Members of an alliance are called ...
party.
Private life
Corkery (née Mc Nutt) was born in the South Island, and grew up in
Dunedin
Dunedin ( ; mi, Ōtepoti) is the second-largest city in the South Island of New Zealand (after Christchurch), and the principal city of the Otago region. Its name comes from , the Scottish Gaelic name for Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland. Th ...
. She has been married three times, and has two children.
[
]
Member of Parliament
A well-known journalist and talk-back host in New Zealand, she first entered politics standing as an independent candidate for the Auckland mayoralty in 1995.
She then became a high-profile parliamentary candidate for the Alliance
An alliance is a relationship among people, groups, or states that have joined together for mutual benefit or to achieve some common purpose, whether or not explicit agreement has been worked out among them. Members of an alliance are called ...
party, and was elected to Parliament as a list MP
A list MP is a member of parliament (MP) elected from a party list rather than from by a geographical constituency. The place in Parliament is due to the number of votes that the party won, not to votes received by the MP personally. This occurs ...
in the 1996 election. She left Parliament in 1999 after one term. In her 1999 book ''Pam's Political Confessions'', she wrote, "Politicians are, by and large, far more self-deluding, devious, bloated, insecure, egocentric wankers than I had feared." (p. 9).
Professional career
After leaving Parliament, she returned to her work as a journalist
A journalist is an individual that collects/gathers information in form of text, audio, or pictures, processes them into a news-worthy form, and disseminates it to the public. The act or process mainly done by the journalist is called journalism ...
, and talk-back host at Radio Pacific
TAB Trackside is a New Zealand horse racing and sports broadcast network, incorporating two pay TV channels. The TV channels are available on Sky channels and the Spark Sport streaming service. The radio station broadcasts on 14 AM radio and 16 ...
.
Corkery presented the live interview show ''The Last Word'' on TV One from March 2003 until the show was cancelled in September 2003. She appeared in a 2008 episode of the TV travelogue ''Intrepid Journeys
''Intrepid Journeys'' is a New Zealand television series, which screens on TV ONE in New Zealand and on Vibrant TV Network in the United States. Making its debut in 2003, the show focuses on New Zealand celebrities who travel to exotic countries ...
'', being shot at point-blank range with a 9 mm pistol, while wearing a ballistic vest
A bulletproof vest, also known as a ballistic vest or a bullet-resistant vest, is an item of body armor that helps absorb the impact and reduce or stop penetration to the torso from firearm-fired projectiles and fragmentation from explosions. Th ...
in Colombia. She has fronted two documentaries for the TV3 Channel 3 or TV 3 may refer to:
Television
*Canal 3 (Burkina Faso), a commercial television channel in Burkina Faso
*Canal 3 (Guatemala), a commercial television channel in Guatemala
*Channel 3 (Algeria), a public Algerian TV channel owned by EPTV ...
show '' Inside New Zealand'', looking at the nation's gangs. For ''The Gangs'', which aired in 2008, she spent 18 months with the gangs, including filming an operating methamphetamine
Methamphetamine (contracted from ) is a potent central nervous system (CNS) stimulant that is mainly used as a recreational drug and less commonly as a second-line treatment for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and obesity. Meth ...
lab
Lab most often refers to:
* Laboratory, a facility to conduct scientific research
Lab or LAB may also refer to:
Places
* Láb, a village near Bratislava in western Slovakia
* Lab (river), in north-eastern Kosovo
People
* ISO 639 code for the an ...
. The second documentary ''The Truth about Asian Crime'' aired in 2009; police cancelled interviews planned for the programme, saying they believed Corkery had a conflict of interest.
With business partner Rebekah Hay, she announced in 2010 that she would be opening Pammy's, "the world's first legal bordello ..exclusively for female clients". The Auckland bordello ran an ad in ''The New Zealand Herald
''The New Zealand Herald'' is a daily newspaper published in Auckland, New Zealand, owned by New Zealand Media and Entertainment, and considered a newspaper of record for New Zealand. It has the largest newspaper circulation of all newspaper ...
'' offering NZ$240 an hour for male prostitutes
Prostitution is the business or practice of engaging in sexual activity in exchange for payment. The definition of "sexual activity" varies, and is often defined as an activity requiring physical contact (e.g., sexual intercourse, non-pen ...
. Her application for a resource consent was withdrawn in April 2011.
Internet Party
In May 2014, Corkery was hired as the press secretary to Laila Harré
Laila Jane Harré (born 8 January 1966) is a New Zealand politician and trade unionist. She was the first leader of the Internet Party, and stood for Parliament in the 2014 general election through the Helensville electorate. From 1996 to 200 ...
, the leader of the newly established Internet Party. During the 2014 general election campaign, Corkery labelled a journalist a "puffed-up little shit" at the campaign launch for the Internet Party on 25 August 2014. The comments were made in reaction to requests by journalists for interviews with party founder Kim Dotcom
Kim Dotcom (born Kim Schmitz; 21 January 1974), also known as Kimble and Kim Tim Jim Vestor, is a German- Finnish Internet entrepreneur and political activist who resides in Glenorchy, New Zealand.
He first rose to fame in Germany in the 1990 ...
about comments he had made suggesting he had hacked a German credit rating system.
Following the 2014 election, despite no formal announcement of her resignation from the role as press secretary, Corkery has not engaged with the Internet Party publicly, and returned to occasional editorial pieces with the ''New Zealand Herald'' and other media services.
See also
* List of New Zealand television personalities
This is a list of New Zealand television personalities, including presenters and journalists. It includes those who left the profession, retired, or died.
A
* Suzy Aiken – television personality and Prime News presenter
* Peter Arnett – te ...
References
External links
The Sitting
brief video interview at TVNZ
{{DEFAULTSORT:Corkery, Pam
1956 births
Alliance (New Zealand political party) MPs
NewLabour Party (New Zealand) politicians
Living people
New Zealand television presenters
New Zealand women television presenters
New Zealand journalists
New Zealand women journalists
Women members of the New Zealand House of Representatives
New Zealand list MPs
Internet Party (New Zealand) politicians
Members of the New Zealand House of Representatives
Writers from Dunedin
Politicians from Dunedin