In between hideous nonsense like "Maori leapfrogging over the copper wire to mobile network", Rodney Hide managed to squeeze in this amusing bit in Parliament, at the second reading of the Telecommunications Amendment Bill:

When Richard Prebble was the Postmaster-General or whatever we had in those days, which was not so long ago, he received a memo from the New Zealand Post Office. Do people remember the New Zealand Post Office? This would have been in the 1980s. The memo was advice to the Minister, and it stated: "We do not see much future for the fax machine in New Zealand, because we are perfectly served in this country by telegrams." The New Zealand Post Office recommended against the introduction of fax machines into New Zealand.


Heh.