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Anatomy of a $76 million political dirt file |
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Friday, 19 December 2008 |
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In 1980s corporate culture no one would have looked twice as John Key tucked into mussel chowder and sipped champagne at a classy Wellington restaurant in August 1988.
He and his dining companion, Paul Richards, joked with the maitre'd and revelled in the bonhomie. Like all traders, they were well-known on the restaurant scene. By their account, this $342.40 lunch was at Plimmer House on August 31.
Key and Richards were mates and had been colleagues in foreign exchange at Elders Merchant Finance, the Wellington division of swaggering Australian corporate Elders IXL. It was Key's last day - he was heading to Auckland for a job at rival Banker's Trust. Key and Richards would soon be working together again on trading floors around the world. But this was the end of an era.
They called their lunch the Last Supper.
This week, 20 years later, that lunch and the events surrounding it had Key's opponents salivating at the thought that it could lead to the National leader's political crucifixion.
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