David Benson-Pope

David Henry Benson-Pope (born 1950) is a New Zealand politician. He is a former Member of Parliament for Dunedin South and has been a member of the Dunedin City Council since 2013.

Benson-Pope previously served as a Dunedin city councillor from 1986 to 1999 and returned to local government after his parliamentary and ministerial career was ended by a series of misconduct allegations.

Early career

Born in Dunedin and educated at King's High School, Benson-Pope received his tertiary education at the University of Otago and at the Christchurch College of Education. While studying education he was president of the Students' Association at the college, and National President of the Student Teachers' Association of New Zealand.

Working as a teacher at Bayfield High School, where he taught German and outdoor education for 24 years, he became involved in the teachers' unions and was first elected to the Dunedin City Council on a Labour Party ticket in October 1986. He was re-elected to the city council four more times and resigned in 1999, when he successfully contested the Dunedin South electorate for the Labour Party.

Member of Parliament

In 2002, Benson-Pope became his party's Senior Whip. He entered Cabinet in 2004, becoming Minister of Fisheries, Minister Responsible for the Law Commission, Associate Minister of Justice, Associate Minister for Education (schools) and Associate Minister for the Environment. He oversaw the drafting of the legislation for civil unions in New Zealand and gained a reputation as a political "Mr Fixit" and "master of the dark art of politics," but was also known as "difficult to deal with."

Despite briefly losing his ministerial positions leading up to the 2005 general election due to allegations of misconduct during his teaching career, Benson-Pope was appointed Minister of Social Development and Employment and Minister for the Environment when that election returned the Fifth Labour Government of New Zealand for a third term. He lost those positions in 2007 and served the final year of his parliamentary career on the backbench.

Allegations of misconduct as a teacher

Benson-Pope was temporarily stood down as a cabinet minister in 2005 after allegations from former students about the use of violence in the classroom. The allegations included stuffing a tennis ball in 14-year-old's mouth, throwing tennis balls at students to keep them quiet, striking a pupil with the back of his hand making the pupil's nose bleed at a school camp, and caning a student hard enough to draw blood. Benson-Pope denied the allegations. Claims that he misled Parliament were not referred to the Privileges Committee by the Speaker and after three weeks Benson-Pope was restored to his portfolios, except for his role as Associate Minister of Education.

Further claims about Benson-Pope's conduct as a teacher were revealed the following year. '' Investigate'' magazine published, in February 2006, allegations that he entered the girls' dormitory on a school camp to awaken students twice, and that he told them once that they were taking too long to shower after a "mud run." Benson-Pope denied any impropriety.

Allegations of misconduct as Minister for the Environment

Benson-Pope faced further controversy in 2007, which led to the resignation of his ministerial posts and the end of his Parliamentary career.

In July 2007 it emerged that a political advisor in Benson-Pope's office (the Labour Party's Trade Union Affiliate Vice-President Steve Hurring) made phone calls which led to the sacking of the Ministry for the Environment's newly appointed communications manager. The issue revolved around her relationship with the chief press secretary to National's parliamentary leader John Key, despite the fact that she had "made a disclosure of her personal connections" during the appointment process. (Under New Zealand's State Sector Act 1988, ministers and their staff were prohibited from being involved in employment matters within government departments for which they are responsible. The Act requires the chief executives of those departments "to act independently of Ministers in matters relating to decisions on individual employees.")

After a week of intense pressure focusing not only on the allegation that his staff had acted improperly, but also that he himself had misled Parliament, the media and Prime Minister Helen Clark about his knowledge and involvement, Benson-Pope offered his resignation from Cabinet at noon on Friday 27 July 2007. Clark accepted the resignation, saying, "The way in which certain issues have been handled this week has led to a loss of credibility and on that basis I have accepted Mr Benson-Pope's offer to stand aside". An editorial commented, "Not for the first time, he and the Government have been embarrassed less for what he has done than for his inability to simply say what he has done."

Despite subsequent investigations by State Services Commissioner Mark Prebble and former State Services Commissioner Don Hunn found that neither the Minister nor his staff acted in any way inappropriately, Benson-Pope remained a backbencher for the remainder of the parliamentary term. His resignation triggered a significant reshuffle of the Cabinet. Although Clark indicated that Benson-Pope could be returned to Cabinet at a later time, he was not reselected as the Labour Party candidate for his electorate at the 2008 general election (which, in any event, Labour lost), and left Parliament.

Local government career

After losing his bid to remain Labour's Dunedin South candidate for the 2008 general election, Benson-Pope rejected an invitation to stand for the Aotearoa Legalise Cannabis Party and did not stand as an independent candidate.

Returning to Dunedin, Benson-Pope worked as a resource consent manager and sought election to the Dunedin City Council in the 2013 local body elections. He stood as an independent candidate and was elected on 12 October 2013. He was re-elected in 2016 and 2019.

During a live-streamed Zoom meeting of the city council held on 5 May 2020, Benson-Pope was seen in the camera of his computer cleaning his study with a feather duster whilst "pants-less". Members of the public, councillors and senior managers watched on as the meeting faced technological difficulties. Benson-Pope said he was not wearing pants but was wearing shorts after gardening earlier in the day and stated he was "delighted" that his cameo provided a welcome diversion but "it wasn't intentional."

Benson-Pope was re-elected to the Dunedin City Council for a fourth term during the 2022 Dunedin local elections. He was not given a chair or deputy chair role within the Dunedin City Council by the new Mayor of Dunedin Jules Radich. In late October, Benson-Pope supported an unsuccessful motion by Green councillor Marie Laufiso to close the pay gap between councillors assigned deputy chair roles and those without these duties. The motion was defeated by a margin of 11 to 4 votes.

In December 2022, Benson-Pope and Labour councillor Steve Walker were locked into a pay dispute with Mayor Radich after the Mayor proposed reducing the salary of councillors without additional responsibilities by 11.7 percent. Benson-Pope and Walker claimed that Radich had offered them committee roles which he knew they would reject. In response to criticism, Radich rejected claims that his actions were political and claimed that they reflected the difference in work he expected from councillors holding additional responsibilities. In mid-December 2022, the Remuneration Authority rejected Radich's proposal to cut Benson Pope and Walker's salary by 11.7 percent on the grounds that it was unlawful. In mid-December, the DCC considered a revised proposal that would reduce the salaries of the deputy mayor and deputy chair by NZ$2,144 and NZ$2,460 while raising Walker and Benson-Pope's salary to $8430 each, bringing their annual remuneration to $72,783.

Personal life

Benson-Pope is married with twin children.

References

Further reading

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External links

NZ Parliament website
details on David Benson-Pope


entry for David Benson-Pope

Timeline: Benson-Pope career controversy
from TV ONE

{{DEFAULTSORT:Benson-Pope, David
1950 births
Living people
New Zealand Labour Party MPs
Dunedin City Councillors
Members of the Cabinet of New Zealand
University of Otago alumni
New Zealand educators
New Zealand MPs for Dunedin electorates
People educated at King's High School, Dunedin
Members of the New Zealand House of Representatives
21st-century New Zealand politicians
Christchurch College of Education alumni