The Saudi sheep deal is a deal that we need to know more about. I believe it warrants an inquiry.

Millions of dollars of taxpayer money has been handed over to a businessman in the Middle East and we've flown 900 live sheep to him. This man, Hamood al Khalaf has said "jump". And we've said "how high"?

In the last 12 hours or so, more revelations have come to light under the Official Information Act. We know some of the 900 breeding ewes that were flown to Saudi, died. We also know the majority of lambs born died too.

The correspondence shows that MFAT was concerned about 'reputational' risk and how the public might react once news got out about the deaths of these sheep -- MFAT staff were instructed to produce some 'defensive points' on this.

And by the way, we paid for those sheep. They were bought with taxpayer dollars -- the government paid $1.5 million for those ewes.

We also know we paid Al Khalaf $4 million. The government has blamed Labour for this and suggested it was facing a legal threat. A threat of up to $30 million. There is no evidence anywhere of this.

So Al Khalaf was given $4 million and was told to invoice for the money -- and this is what he was instructed to do -- and i quote -- "for your invoice of $4 million, please state that it is for services set out under the contract."

The contract was for a capital contribution and research and development-- so the New Zealand taxpayer has invested millions in sheep farm "research and development" in the Middle East, apparently. There is no business plan. No sound reason for why we would do this. And the majority of the lambs died anyway.

So really, this is what it is. The government has paid this man - who felt aggrieved when we stopped the live sheep export -- some money. A lot of money. He's been paid off, basically, because we want to get a regional trade agreement in place.

It is patronising to the New Zealand public to deny that it is anything other than that. It was a one-off cash payment. There is no legal threat. Nothing at all.

But what is most telling, i think, is that the Auditor General reviewed the deal and said the business case for this was -- quote -- "weak". And later stressed that any involvement had to be limited.

Still, we went ahead with it, flying live sheep to the other side of the world and transferring millions of dollars to a businessman. And that is why we need to know more. That is why we need an inquiry. This deal continues to raise more questions than answers.