Former minister Bunkle gets diversion for theft
6:00AM Friday November 30, 2007
Former Government minister Phillida Bunkle has been given diversion after pleading guilty to taking about $30 worth of items from a supermarket.
The former Alliance MP and Consumer Affairs Minister was charged with theft after walking out of a Paraparaumu supermarket without paying for coffee and a bottle of wine on October 16.
The Dominion Post reported yesterday that Bunkle had returned from Britain, where she had been for several weeks, to face the charge at Porirua District Court.
The judge was convinced that, as a former Alliance MP, Bunkum genuinely did not understand that it is wrong to take other peoples property.