Who is deborah coddington

Coddington, who celebrated her 50th birthday last year at a swanky party attended by a society who's who, has been a figure of controversy in her own right and through association with Taylor, The couple got together in the late s when Taylor was something of a cultural icon, a celebrated publisher famous for such controversial output as The Little Red Schoolbook and Tim Shadbolt's Bullshit and Jellybeans.

Having married young and given birth to a daughter, Briar, Coddington left her husband and later joined Taylor on his property at Martinborough in the Wairarapa. Surrounded by friends, they ate good food, drank good wine and drove matching Mercedes cars. Coddington threw herself at the business as much as Taylor. But the high life they enjoyed did not go down well with the mounting number of people owed money through their enterprises.

He was declared bankrupt. Rumours swirled that the couple would break up, stories in part stirred along by Taylor, who told a creditors' meeting that the couple were no longer together. It had become an issue at the meeting because Coddington was listed as one of Taylor's major creditors, giving her more votes than many of the others he owed money. Whether the couple did actually split at the time, or whether it had simply been a convenient thing to tell the creditors is unclear.

But after about five years, Coddington took up journalism, and Taylor went back to publishing, and landed back in hot water. Reed Publishing, which had published Who's Who in New Zealand since , launched court action after Taylor began work on a similar publication. The parties eventually settled out of court and Taylor was allowed to carry on, his version carrying the title New Zealand Who's Who Aotearoa. More than a decade after that battle, the editor of Reed's version, Max Lambert, remains worked up about what happened.

That also created confusion," says Lambert. Lambert says there is no confusion over who was involved. Indeed, in various Taylor books, Coddington features in the credits. The depth of public reaction to the edition of the sex offender index caught Coddington by surprise. With the praise came abuse and death threats.

Around the same time, storms began brewing around the publishing businesses on both sides of the Tasman. According to documents obtained by the Weekend Herald, Coddington was the company's owner. It was not a happy workplace.

Employees complained about the conditions and not being paid. Sawyer has never seen a cent. Four years later, Bernard Moore, another former employee, took employment court action against New Zealand Who's Who Publications, but he too has not received his court-ordered payment.

But complaints from former employees were the least of the problems for publisher Taylor. From the late s, a pattern of complaints began to emerge from customers saying books they had ordered were not arriving. Since his return from Russell, Taylor had specialised in vanity publications such as the who's who series.

The company approaches people to ask if they are interested in being included in the book. They are invited to send in their biographical details, and are given the opportunity to order a copy of the book for a special pre-publication price.

In other words, the money starts rolling in before a page of the book is printed. In Australia, the New South Wales fair trading authorities began warning people off the venture, and they were not alone. Coddington attributed her change in perspective primarily to her recent marriage to Wellington lawyer, Colin Carruthers QC. Later, however, Coddington transferred her support to the ACT New Zealand party, which ranked her sixth on its party list in the election, high enough for her to enter Parliament as a list MP.

Coddington first became involved in politics in the context of the Libertarianz party, and in the election and the election, the Libertarianz ranked her second and third, respectively, on their party list. Many New Zealanders know her as the compiler of a register of sex-offenders which aims to publicly identify those convicted of sex-crimes. This register, first published in , generated considerable criticism from those who alleged it breached the rights of criminals named in it.

She has also published a registry of convicted child molesters in Australia. Coddington has also had a high amount of media interest in her personal life — early in journalists widely canvassed the financial problems of Alister Taylor, her partner and her subsequent split from him , and later the same year, the media reported Coddington's distress about attention received from Roger Kerr , the executive director of the New Zealand Business Roundtable.

Kerr allegedly chased her drunk, across the grounds of parliament. Coddington described the media's portrayal of events as "wildly overblown". From to , her partner was the controversial publisher Alister Taylor, with whom she had three children.

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