![\"Councillor](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/councillor-te-waka-mcleod-believes-phone-cameras-repeatedly-P3L7AM4O6JAOFM3QB4Y7CEOQPE.jpg\")
<\/p>\nNew Plymouth\u2019s M\u0101ori ward councillor says two onlookers were aiming to intimidate, by filming her in the council chamber.<\/p>\n
By Craig Ashworth of Local Democracy Reporting<\/p>\n
The pair deny they were recording and want their names cleared.<\/p>\n
Councillor Te Waka McLeod interrupted last Thursday’s meeting to ask Debbie Hancock to stop filming her from the public gallery.<\/p>\n
McLeod said Hancock \u2013 who stood unsuccessfully for council last year \u2013 repeatedly pointed a phone towards her, lowering it every time McLeod looked up.<\/p>\n
New Plymouth District Mayor Max Brough ordered Hancock to stop as the alleged filming was disturbing McLeod and the meeting.<\/p>\n
McLeod said Hancock’s companion Kevin Moratti then took up the filming.<\/p>\n
The Mayor again insisted they end the disruption.<\/p>\n
“It\u2019s causing a distraction and a nuisance, and if it carries on, you\u2019ll be asked to leave,” Brough said.<\/p>\n
McLeod later said Hancock\u2019s phone was pointed at her several times before she objected.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Councillor Te Waka McLeod believes phone cameras repeatedly filmed her in the chamber. (Source: Local Democracy Reporting)<\/p>\n
“When someone’s directly pointing a camera at you, towards you, many times \u2013 I just wonder what the motivation is behind that,” she said.<\/p>\n
McLeod represents New Plymouth District Council\u2019s Te Purutanga Mauri P\u016bmanawa ward.<\/p>\n
“I felt like … they were trying to intimidate me.”<\/p>\n
‘It’s got out of hand’<\/p>\n
Afterwards Moratti said neither he nor Hancock had been filming.<\/p>\n
He said he raised his phone to follow the meeting while sending messages, rather than looking down.<\/p>\n
“Vertical, you can look straight across the top of your phone\u2026 and you can carry on at least being interested in the meeting,”<\/p>\n
Moratti said he\u2019d officially object against the disruption finding.<\/p>\n
“It’s got out of hand, so it needs to be addressed.”<\/p>\n
Moratti was a foundation board member of Hobson\u2019s Pledge, which campaigns against Treaty rights and interests, and is a former Act Party candidate.<\/p>\n
He heads the Taxpayer Union-aligned New Plymouth Ratepayers Alliance, which on Facebook posted that Hancock raised her phone “to get a signal”.<\/p>\n
Hancock was unable to be contacted, but on Facebook said she hadn\u2019t been filming but “looking at other things”.<\/p>\n
She wrote that she was troubled an accusation was acted on without proof.<\/p>\n
“Nobody approached me and asked what I was doing.<\/p>\n
“Instead, an assumption was made about my behaviour, and I was publicly singled out.”<\/p>\n
‘100% sure’<\/p>\n
Last October Hancock stood for council on a ticket of four endorsed by the Ratepayers Alliance, which was formed by Moratti, Brough and councillor Murray Chong.<\/p>\n
Councillor Kerry Vosseler \u2013 the only winner from that ticket \u2013 turned to wink at her allies as a point of order was raised against their behaviour.<\/p>\n
After the meeting Vosseler said she “didn\u2019t see anything untoward”.<\/p>\n
“We all hold our phones at different levels to read, et cetera.<\/p>\n
“I\u2019m sure if it was a recording that the person would\u2019ve stopped because there\u2019s a risk of you getting kicked out of the chamber.”<\/p>\n
Councillor John Woodward raised the point of order that prompted the Mayor\u2019s rebuke.<\/p>\n
Woodward later said he was certain Hancock and Moratti were filming.<\/p>\n
“I\u2019m 100% sure they were.<\/p>\n
“The phones were pointed in Te Waka’s direction, and it would be an unusual position to put your phone if you were checking Messenger or scrolling Facebook.”<\/p>\n
Woodward said people were free to film meetings but not to disrupt such crucial work as long term plan deliberations.<\/p>\n
Councillor David Bublitz said he\u2019d seen Hancock pointing her phone towards McLeod and Moratti follow suit.<\/p>\n
“Lifting up [his phone] as soon as Ms Hancock was asked to put it down \u2026 the timing of it seemed interesting to me.”<\/p>\n
LDR is local body journalism funded by RNZ and NZ on Air<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New Plymouth\u2019s M\u0101ori ward councillor says two onlookers were aiming to intimidate, by filming her in the council…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":586628,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[111,43,139,69,135,16715,145],"class_list":["post-586627","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-politics","tag-taranaki","tag-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/586627","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=586627"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/586627\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/586628"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=586627"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=586627"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=586627"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}