Fellow Pet Owners & Followers of the Harry Kelly Case . . . and the Collusive Machinations of the Veterinary Sector’s ‘Regulatory’ Environment
- MPI says: "Actually, we’ll do whatever the Veterinary Council tells us to do.”
- VCNZ says: "Name the specific veterinarians you wish to complain about."
- Massey says: "We are redacting all names."
As the legendary comedian, social critic and actor George Carlin once famously quipped (and may just as well have been warning the New Zealand pet-owning public about the veterinary sector and its “regulatory” machinery):
“It’s a big club and you ain’t in it.”
Below my introductory commentary you’ll find my detailed response to the brief, terse four-paragraph “outcome” of the Ministry of Primary Industry’s 10-week “investigation” into breaches of the Animal Welfare Act 1999 by Massey University’s Veterinary ‘Teaching Hospital’ aka Companion Animal ‘Hospital’:
Actually, say the MPI “Investigators”, “We’ll let the Veterinary Council (VCNZ) tell us what they want our findings to be" . . . while the VCNZ's CEO Iain McLachlan is under Law Society investigation for colluding with Massey's Dean Jon Huxley over (what his and Huxley's email exchange strongly suggests) the intention to let Massey tell the Veterinary Council what they want the VCNZ's findings to be . . .
MPI ‘Investigators’: ‘We’ll Let the Vet Council Call It’
Well, that was predictable, wasn’t it?
Ten weeks after their “investigation” began with their receipt of a primary report comprising 342 pages of forensic evidence (including but certainly not limited to photographs and other detailed graphical support), a supplementary 13-page summary of my dog's perfect viability before being admitted into the (as demonstrated by his unnecessarily fatal outcome) dangerously lethal environment of Massey's Companion Animal "Hospital", and nearly 100 other items of evidence and information . . . the two Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) “investigators" have just sent back a four-short paragraph email – essentially saying they’ll let the collusive Veterinary Council call the outcome of their (the MPI’s) supposed “investigation”.
We all know Massey is a huge, powerful, well-funded (including by the taxpayer) institution with power networks and collegial loyalties running through every stream of New Zealand commerce and government agency networks – somewhere at some level.
We all know the reputational stakes of something like the Harry Kelly case are high indeed if genuinely investigated and brought to light – both in terms of individual careers and of the institution’s student (including overseas student) appeal.
But, MPI, you and the other parties determined to keep a lid on it, nonetheless have a job to do . . . as abhorrently uncomfortable to the prevailing powers as the obviously unsavoury revelations would be, if you were to do your job, and do it thoroughly, transparently and ethically.
You have a responsibility to the New Zealand public, the taxpayer, current and potential (both domestic and overseas) students, and most of all – via the MPI's mandate to police the New Zealand Animal Welfare Act 1999 – to protect the animals in Massey’s possession and the privately-owned pets of their fee-paying clientele.
And with the now-revelation that you have joined forces with the “leadership” of Massey and of the Veterinary Council to force-feed the case YOU are mean to be investigating and prosecuting into their demonstrably collusive, conflicted, dead-end “complaints” process, you have re-neged on your statutory and ethical obligation to all of the above stakeholders . . . and most especially to the 64 percent of New Zealand households that own one or more pets . . . and any of those pets that, at any time in their lives, find themselves in the decidedly dubious and dangerous environment of Massey’s Companion Animal “Hospital”.
As the legendary comedian, social critic and actor George Carlin once famously quipped (and may just as well have been warning the New Zealand pet-owning public about the veterinary sector and its “regulatory” machinery), “It’s a big club and you ain’t in it.”
As you will read from the response of the “investigator” appointed to head the “investigation” into Massey as triggered by the Harry Kelly case, 10 weeks and a mountain of evidentiary documentation in, the “outcome” is basically as follows . . . and it demonstrates the closed-loop, self-protectionist, circular, dead-end-by-design landscape of full-blown regulatory capture and procedural evasion that I have been progressively revealing through the
now 70+ articles I have produced on the Harry Kelly case.
- MPI says: "Actually, we’ll do whatever the Vet Council tells us to do.”
- VCNZ says: "Name the specific veterinarians you wish to complain about."
- Massey says: "We are redacting all names."
What’s interesting is that – according to a goading anonymous email very obviously from a Massey insider, weeks ago – this was always the intended “outcome” . . . or some other form of “dismissal”.
The anonymous emailer had, across several nasty little emails, insisted I read an interestingly recent puff piece in the industry association-produced “VetScript”, written by (or ghost-written for) MPI’s Chief Veterinary Officer and Massey PhD Alumna Mary van Andel (whose profile can be found featured proudly on Massey’s website), waxing lyrical about the longstanding and tight relationship between Massey and the MPI.
So determined was this anon that I should read and get the "we don't break ranks at any level in this industry" pointed message, that they kept on emailing the link across several anonymous missives . . . with their insistence finally reaching the point of copying and pasting the entire article to make absolutely certain I would read it.
But here’s the thing the institutionally arrogant can’t see hiding in plain sight:
While they’re busy doing a collective fist pump every time they engineer their next obstruction, they’re playing the short game.
I’m playing the long game. My primary objective has expanded. It’s now as much about exposing the institutional crud, collusion, and amoral filth of this big industry web as it is about obtaining justice – because "justice" remains a moot point when the harm done cannot be undone. A life taken (in the literal animal equivalent of an outright human murder) cannot be given back. And the literal torture that preceded that animal-equivalent murder cannot be made not to have happened to that animal. That treasured, privately-owned, sentient being.
Here's the exchange, with the Ministry of Primary Industry's "investigator" Pete Govers' pathetic initiating email below my response.
From: editor@consumeraffairswriter.com
Sent: Friday, 24 July 2026 3:41 pm
To: 'Peter Govers (Pete)' <Peter.Govers@mpi.govt.nz>
Cc: 'Emma Stephenson (Emma Stephenson)' <Emma.Stephenson@mpi.govt.nz>
Subject: RE: VCNZ update
Pete:
With reference to your question in your below email, which reads as though it were written by the same party as drafted VCNZ Deputy Registrar Liam Shields’s June 8 email to me (certainly you are obviously in possession of that email): “It is our understanding that a formal complaint has not yet been lodged with the Veterinary Council of New Zealand (VCNZ). Could you confirm whether this is correct?”
You are clearly in possession of Shields’s June 8 email to me, thus it is difficult to believe you are not also in possession of my same-day response to him. Thus, you are fully aware that I have not laid any complaints, and you are equally fully aware of the many reasons why not – and you will know all of that because I have been providing you with granularly detailed information on the matter, including this central component of it, since the middle of May.
Principal among the reasons (again, you know this, including the many other reasons listed below), is that – per your email: “ . . . the process for making a formal complaint with VCNZ which would be to submit in writing and identify the veterinarian(s) you wish to make a complaint about”. By your own recognition, that requires me to know (a) the identity of the veterinarians (ALL of those involved in the case), and (b) which decisions and actions pertained to which veterinarian. I have none of this information. You are in full possession of the “Clinical Summary”, as well as my own 342-page report to you (and substantially more material still). You can clearly see that all names, initials and identifiers have been struck through, throughout the entire document, with heavy, black boxes.
Therefore, would you please confirm whether my interpretation of your below email is correct i.e. you are stating that . . .
Despite the fact that the Ministry of Primary Industries has its own independent statutory mandate to investigate potential offences under the Animal Welfare Act 1999, you will defer entirely to the Veterinary Council of New Zealand’s (VCNZ) complaints “process”, and you will do this in full knowledge of the following facts:
- Notwithstanding your below email,
“We understand that Liam Shields has previously explained the process for making a formal complaint with VCNZ which would be to submit in writing and identify the veterinarian(s) you wish to make a complaint about”, both Massey University and the Veterinary Council have refused to disclose the identities of
all the veterinarians involved in what was done to my dog – including and especially, the veterinarian on November 30’s midnight to 9am shift (if there was indeed even a qualified veterinarian in attendance that night), who approved the commencement of my dog’s catastrophic overdosing with an unnecessary and strictly contraindicated sedative and who either approved or conducted the (apparently intended in one way or another to be fatal) disconnection of his IV fluids.
My articles documenting the evidence of this information-release evasion – together with the actual correspondence – can be found at these links:
Veterinary Council of NZ to Disclose Names: Don’t Get Excited. It’s Not What It Sounds Like.
Can I Have A Straighter Answer, Please, Vet Council's Liam Shields? Do I Get the Names or Not?
Slippery Birds of A Feather . . . Massey & the Vet Council Flock Together
STILL WAITING, MASSEY: Five Months of Stonewalling . . . And Counting
Massey Withholds Footage Following Discovery of ICU Cruelty: Formal Complaint Filed With Privacy Commissioner to Force Full Release
Yes, Please, VCNZ's Liam Shields, I WILL Have the Names You Have Been Obligated to Extract from Massey for the PAST THREE MONTHS
- That the Chief Executive Officer of the VCNZ, Iain McLachlan, is under active Law Society of New Zealand investigation for collusion with Veterinary School Dean Jon Huxley to obstruct natural justice.
My articles documenting the actual correspondence between them, and related issues, can be found at these links:
Massey's Dean Jon Huxley Assures Collusive Veterinary Council: Nothing to See Here, Boys
Veterinary Council of NZ to Disclose Names: Don’t Get Excited. It’s Not What It Sounds Like.
- That the Veterinary Council’s prosecution rate is an at-best, optimistic 1.5% . . . meaning that the VCNZ finds a way to avoid prosecuting more than 98 out of every 100 complaints brought to it, as found by a 2019 study, co-authored by none other than Massey’s own Professor Jenny Weston who holds a dual position across both institutions (from the VCNZ’s own website: “Prof. Jenny Weston Ex officio member & Deputy Chair (of VCNZ)” and “Academic Lead for Veterinary Science at Massey University” . . . and having previously chaired the VCNZ Complaints Assessment Committee.
One of the core complaints Weston would be potentially directly “prosecuting” (or not) would be against her very own protégé, “Dr” Steffi Jalava. Jalava (whose identity I obtained through my own investigations) was the very “veterinarian” who converted my dog (my private property) to the university’s commercial utilisation of him for unauthorised student training activities and “educational” video productions . . . which involved the continuation of the catastrophic overdosing commenced by the veterinarian or non-veterinarians on the November 30 overnight shift, and the either reckless and/or intended-to-be-fatal disconnection of his IV fluids for the purpose of those student activities and multiple (at least eight admitted to but six never supplied) “educational” videos filming my dog in the state of massive chemical collapse into which Jalava and associates had engineered him for the “educational” purposes Weston had taught them to perform in their “instruction” of students.
My articles documenting this structural interconnectivity and the overarching issues can be found at these links:
FOLLOW THE MONEY: The Compromised Veterinary Regulatory & Accreditation 'System'
UPDATED: The Conflicts-of-Interest Web Spins Wide . . . And Catches All (As Did the Trap I Set)
- That there are multiple points of structural interconnectivity and conflicts of interest between Massey and the VCNZ, including at the level that represents the “leadership” of the unnamed individuals that would be the subject of the complaint if their identities were in fact disclosed.
My commentary on these structural interconnectivities and active conflicts of interest is here:
FOLLOW THE MONEY: The Compromised Veterinary Regulatory & Accreditation 'System'
- That I prepared a 342-page, forensically-detailed, evidence-replete, graphically-supported report for you and Ms Emma Stephenson, and provided tens (perhaps into the hundreds) of items of additional supporting material, together with a 13-page report containing my dog’s independent (and up to 12-days recent to the overnight Massey admission for simple 24-hour rehydration) veterinary records that conflict directly with Massey’s claims and falsified “records”.
My articles about my preparation of those reports for you, are here:
UPDATED: MASSEY VETS FALSIFY RECORDS: POLICE REPORT FILED
- That I have directed you to many of my now 70+ articles on The Customer & The Constituent, and at the International Institute for Improvement in Veterinary Ethics (IIIVE), a substantial percentage of which demonstrate – graphically – acts of intense animal cruelty and clinical irresponsibility.
The Customer & The Constituent NZ
International Institute for Improvement in Veterinary Ethics (IIIVE) (Investigations)
- That Massey University’s Director of Governance & Assurance, Jodie Banner, continues to withhold information (including but certainly not limited to all staff names, six of the admitted-to videos – even the “least-worst” two that were actually released demonstrating extraordinary cruelty to a little blind, catastrophically sedated dog – taken of Harry during staff’s commercial utilisation of him in his overdosed and IV-disconnected state for heinous student activities) after now seven months of my continuing attempts to extract this information and these materials through Privacy Act and Official Information Act requests . . . which I continue to have to refine and revise to combat her evasions, disingenuous and dishonest responses, point blank refusals and non-acknowledgements.
Here are some of my articles relating to Ms Banner’s information release evasions here:
STILL WAITING, MASSEY: Five Months of Stonewalling . . . And Counting
- On the note of the above, in evading a request for release of information which would have assisted my efforts to get closer to the individual responsible for my dog’s repeated catastrophic overdosing, Ms Banner – inadvertently – in her May 13 OIA “response” assumedly unintentionally revealed what should be the cause of significant concern for any agency investigating animal welfare i.e. that the very drug Harry was overdosed with (I believe with fatal intention, but certainly to achieve a fatal outcome, albeit preferably one I was duped into participating in) requires no record of it to be made in the Controlled Drugs Register whatsoever.
It appears, from what I have been able to ascertain, along with Massey and the VCNZ’s refusal to name any veterinarian in attendance on the November 30 overnight shift, that any level of staff appears to be completely at liberty to administer any volume and any frequency of these heavy sedatives to any client's pet – including for their own convenience.
UPDATED: Massey Vet Teaching Hospital ICU: Where Empathy Goes to Die
I will shortly be publishing a very revealing piece dissecting Jodie Banner's May 13 OIA "response" – with graphic support for what appears clearly to have been the continuing overdosing of my already catastrophically overdosed dog long after the last actual recorded dose.
- That it is entirely transparent that Dean Jon Huxley’s strategy to push me into my (according to him) only available avenue being a complaint to the Veterinary Council of New Zealand, when that avenue is specifically designed to ensure any complaints would go precisely nowhere.
Massey's Dean Jon Huxley Assures Collusive Veterinary Council: Nothing to See Here, Boys
- Regarding the repeated use of “complaint” by Massey, by VCNZ and now by yourself, in the singular, that there would be more than one complaint necessary i.e. plural, because what my dog suffered, he suffered at the hands and decisions of more than one “veterinarian” . . . notwithstanding the issue of whether or not Massey’s emergency facility – its Companion Animal “Hospital” runs its midnight to 9am shift without a licensed and registered veterinarian in attendance (noting that even that question is one that both Massey and the VCNZ refuse to acknowledge).
My article – and the related correspondence trails – on that specific matter is here:
- Aside from the redactions and information refusals by Massey, and the repeatedly broken undertakings by the VCNZ to compel the identities of all veterinarians involved in the matter, there is other information that needs to form part of any complaint, depending upon which of the licensed veterinary staff any individual complaint pertains to e.g. the falsification of my dog’s time of killing on December 1 and the December 3 digital scrubbing of the associated records in Massey’s back-end audit logs (constituting an offence under the Crimes Act 1961).
UPDATED: MASSEY VETS FALSIFY RECORDS: POLICE REPORT FILED
- You are in possession of several of the anonymous emails clearly sent by Massey staff:
I sent these to you and to your co-investigator, Emma Stephenson some months ago. Subsequent emails from the same sender/s have goaded me over the apparent intention for MPI to “dismiss” the case.
Also, repeated emails from (to me, clearly the same internal Massey sender/s) aggressively insisted, by way of support for their goading that MPI would dismiss the case, that I read a puff piece they finally reproduced in the body of one of their subsequent anonymous missives to ensure that I did, in fact, read it.
The message I was meant to “get” was clearly that the MPI and Massey were too closely collegial at the highest levels for any “investigation” to go anywhere:
“Ps: here is the article I recommend you read that appeared in the latest vet script magazine: Mary van Andel, MPI’s Chief Veterinary Officer, discusses the longstanding partnership between MPI and Massey School of Veterinary Science.”
So I will ask you clearly, Pete:
Massey’s and the Veterinary Council’s strategy for claiming innocence in this matter (notwithstanding the weighty volume of granular and graphically supported evidence I have published) is to force me into a rigged “complaints” process, structurally conflicted from top to bottom, openly collusive per the correspondence I have published between the VCNZ’s CEO Iain McLachlan and Dean Jon Huxley (and now representing exhibits in the Law Society investigation into McLachlan), without the actual identities of those I wish to lay complaints against despite this being an obviously logical component of any complaint . . . so that a “nil finding” dismissal can be conveniently produced.
Has your support of the Massey/VCNZ strategy been enlisted in order to achieve what was indicated to me as being the inside intention vis a vis the anonymous, goading Massey emailer?
That is the only way any logically minded, intelligent reader can interpret – indeed, even plainly read – your email of today.
If that is the case, I would again draw your attention to the fact that the Ministry of Primary Industries has its own independent statutory mandate to investigate potential offences under the Animal Welfare Act 1999, and that whether the strategy evident in your email of today was always the intended (indirect but very effective) manner of engineering a dismissal . . . or whether it is the result of pressures now being brought to bear upon you to avert what should be your neutral and integrity-directed processes, you remain holding that legal and statutory obligation, regardless.
And certainly you have all the expert resources available to you to conduct the process independently of the Veterinary Council of New Zealand.
In the meantime, here are just some of the questions you would be asking, if your intention was to genuinely investigate this case:
Massey VC Pierre Venter & Dean Jon Huxley: Questions Requiring Your Upfront, Unspun Answers
Regardless of whether or not you and Ms Stephenson take the actions required of you as dictated by the clear statutory obligations under which the Ministry of Primary Industries is entrusted by the public to operate – and to operate with honesty and integrity – I will continue to publish, ongoingly, in accordance with the findings of my own investigations and deliberations.
If no investigation is conducted, that will then include the serialisation of the 342-page report, the 13-page supplementary report, and all other information that I prepared for the Ministry – much of which I have been holding back from publication in respect for your processes, and optimistic that you might be one organisation to act with genuine neutrality, transparency and integrity.
Jordan Kelly
From: Peter Govers (Pete) <Peter.Govers@mpi.govt.nz>
Sent: Friday, 24 July 2026 9:38 am
To:
editor@consumeraffairswriter.com
Cc: Emma Stephenson (Emma Stephenson) <Emma.Stephenson@mpi.govt.nz>
Subject: VCNZ update
Kia ora Jordan,
It is our understanding that a formal complaint has not yet been lodged with the Veterinary Council of New Zealand (VCNZ). Could you confirm whether this is correct?
We understand that Liam Shields has previously explained the process for making a formal complaint with VCNZ which would be to submit in writing and identify the veterinarian(s) you wish to make a complaint about. The simplest way to do this is by completing and submitting the VCNZ notification form which was linked in Liam’s email to you dated 8 June 2026.
As the regulatory body for veterinarians, VCNZ is responsible for assessing and investigating the majority of the concerns and allegations you have raised. We will be seeking information regarding the outcome of any VCNZ investigation, as this may assist with our own enquiries.
The Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) is the regulatory authority responsible for animal welfare matters. Should VCNZ identify any potential breaches of animal welfare legislation during its investigation, MPI will consider those matters as appropriate.
Regards
Pete
Peter Govers| Senior Investigator
Corporate Services | Investigations & Compliance Support
Ministry for Primary Industries - Manatū Ahu Matua | 21 Domett Street, Ahuriri, Napier 4110 | PO Box 12034, Napier 4144 | New Zealand
DDI: 64-4-570 4989 | Mobile: 022-0109817 | Email:peter.govers@mpi.govt.nz
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