Tibet "neither here nor there", says Chris Carter

Wellington, July 30 NZPA - It is not clear who paid for outgoing Labour MP Chris Carter's unsanctioned trip to Tibet, but it can not be ruled out that taxpayer money was involved.

Mr Carter has been thrown out of caucus on a unanimous vote after an abortive attempt to undermine leader Phil Goff, and on August 7 the party council will almost certainly expel him.

He has said he will remain an independent MP until the next election as Te Atatu's representative. He said he would not stand in the next election.

An unsigned letter Mr Carter sent to media representatives yesterday, seeking to undermine Mr Goff and foment a coup against him, backfired spectacularly.

Mr Goff said Mr Carter took a two-week trip to Tibet during the last parliamentary recess. He did not follow the rules around international travel, failing to tell the party whip he would be away, or to get support from caucus.

"That's two weeks we would have relied on him being here," Mr Goff said.

Mr Goff found out Mr Carter had left the country only after the fact.

This morning, Mr Carter refused to tell Radio New Zealand whether he had been to Tibet and who had paid for the trip.

"I'm not going to discuss international issues, you're just throwing this in as a red herring. That's neither here nor there," he said.

As a current MP with more than four terms in Parliament Mr Carter is entitled to a 90 percent rebate on international airfares for himself and his partner.

It is unclear whether he used that rebate for the trip to Tibet.

If he had travelled on parliamentary business the trip would have been paid for with taxpayer money. That would have had to be approved by the party.

Mr Carter did not tell anyone in the Labour hierarchy he was going on the trip.

It is possible the trip was funded by the Chinese Government.

Senior Labour MP Trevor Mallard said Mr Carter went without permission from the Labour Party or Mr Goff and had exhibited some "pretty unusual" and "pretty irrational" behaviour lately.

The latest quarterly release yesterday of MPs' travel details was probably a trigger for his behaviour, Mr Mallard said.

Any expenses for Mr Carter's Tibet trip were likely to show up in the next round of expenses in three months' time.

Mr Mallard said he was worried about Mr Carter.

"He's always been a bit eccentric, I think we all know that."

Party president Andrew Little suggested people were concerned about Mr Carter, who had been under a great deal of stress.

Mr Mallard said the rest of the Labour caucus was behind Mr Goff.

Mr Goff told NewstalkZB stress over Mr Carter's expenditure was behind his outbreak, after he mishandled apologising to the public in June for using his ministerial credit card for items such as massages.

Ordered to apologise by Mr Goff, he led reporters on a chase through the corridors of Parliament and called a press conference the next day to say he was sorry about the way he had spent taxpayer money.

"I gave him a second chance, but nobody gets a third chance. He has not been up to doing the job that I've required of him, I don't have confidence in his judgment," Mr Goff said today.