Council candidate hosting disinformation meetings blamed 'child' for online posts
Wednesday, 7 September 2022
A council candidate regularly hosted meetings with Voices for Freedom and other disinformation groups at his “home”, but says he does not necessarily agree with their views.
David Harnett is standing for the Waimakariri District Council in the Rangiora-Ashley ward and is one of at least seven candidates in the area with links to conspiracy or disinformation groups.
A source told Stuff that Harnett regularly posted on Telegram about the World Economic Forum and the Great Reset conspiracy, which claims, without foundation, a global elite is using the Covid-19 pandemic to dismantle capitalism and enforce radical social change.
Online platform Telegram has been home to most New Zealand conspiracy groups and disinformation platforms.
Hartnett’s posts have since been erased and he did not respond to questions about them, but did confirm he was a member of Health Forum NZ – another conspiracy platform – on Telegram.
The source said that Harnett hosted regular meetings where Voices for Freedom and other disinformation groups spoke. The meetings were held at a Rangiora hangar where he runs his avionics business, they said.
Harnett said the meetings happened at his “home”, and were started by friends who brought along others “he did not necessarily agree with”. He said he had not held any meetings for the past four to five months.
In a Facebook post, Harnett claimed mask-wearing was “just another state control tool”.
When asked about the post, he initially claimed a child must have used his social media account. He then said he didn’t remember the post, but eventually said he did remember commenting on the post.
Harnett was filmed by 1News at an anti-Government protest led by the Freedom and Rights Coalition in Christchurch on February 19. The footage showed him holding a trumpet and wearing a placard with the words: “Tyranny. When people fear the Government.”
Harnett, who said he was not vaccinated against Covid, also claimed anecdotal evidence of the vaccine making people sick, contrary to scientific evidence.
Woodend-Sefton Community Board candidate Rachel Clark also had conspiracy views, including the unfounded claim the Covid-19 vaccine was an experimental gene therapy.
Clark recently spoke at a Counterspin meeting in Cust, near Rangiora, and shared how she had walked out of her job due to vaccine mandates.
In her candidate profile, Clark said she believed in being transparent, but refused to say whether she was a Voices for Freedom member.
“What’s that got to do with anything?”
She refused to answer any other questions on her affiliations.
At the same Counterspin meeting, Kaiapoi-Woodend ward and Woodend-Sefton community board candidate Vicki Payne spoke about an invite-only Telegram group that fellow community board candidate Rachel Clark is also in.
Payne, who has shared conspiracy views, set up the secretive North Canterbury Community Support Group to share ways for like-minded locals to meet and connect. In a Telegram post, she said the group was working “closely” with Derek Tait from the Freedom and Rights Coalition.
She shared how they had formed coffee, gardening and skills and learning groups where disinformation and conspiracy theorists spoke.
Vocal anti-mandate protestor Colin Wightman, who is standing in the Oxford-Ohoka ward, has also expressed conspiracy theories, while Phil Shaw, standing for the Kaiapoi-Woodend ward, has a third stake in conspiracy theorist Chantelle Baker’s new media company.
* CLARIFICATION: Rachel Clark was incorrectly also named as Rachel Wood in an earlier version of this story. Amended Thursday, September 8, 2022, 9.30am.