Big read: Inside the first two years of the Taxpayers’ Union

Senior writer·NZ Herald·23 Sep, 2026 02:25 AM11 mins to read‌In 2015 political scientist Dr Bryce Edwards told the Herald he believed the Taxpayers' Union “has the appearance of standing for wider society when it represents the far right of politics." Nicky Hager’s new book, Dirty Work, has made multiple allegations about the Taxpayers’ Union and its co-founders Jordan Williams and David Farrar, who have denounced the claims as false. But as this republished 2015 story by David Fisher shows, controversy is nothing new for the organisation, which was then only Dirty Politics, had recently revealed Williams’ close relationship with Whaleoil’s Cameron Slater. John Key was the Prime Minister, Farrar and Williams were running the Taxpayers’ Union together, with Chris Bishop’s dad John their board chair. He described the entity as “an ambition that burned hot & hard in the minds of Williams and Farrar” while political scientist Dr Bryce Edwards called the Union “the Act Party in drag”.