(UPBEAT MUSIC) (BLEEP) off. Controversial. (CRASH!) Confrontational. ...your (BLEEP) head off. Compassionate. Oh my God! (APPLAUSE) These are just some of the things that have made Fair Go New Zealand's number one consumer watchdog. There is no need for this. Tonight, we look back on the laughs... and the tears. (SOBS) You all right? Thank you. The moments that made Fair Go a hit... (TYRES SCREECH, ENGINE ROARS) ...for 40 years. You can turn that off. One thing I'll say for your programme ` you help get things done. Copyright Able 2018 Here we are. Yeah. 'Lately we've been thinking of the 1970s, 'which is why we've come to this place.' How many hours of footage do you reckon they have in here? Well, I reckon they must have a lot. 'This is the New Zealand film and television archive.' This is very Get Smart. I know. Am I 86 or 99? You're 86. I'm 99. Are you? It feels about right, doesn't it? What do you mean? Well, the was the brains in the operation, wasn't she? I'm gonna report you to HR in my shoe phone. (LAUGHS) 'Carefully stored away...' This is massive! '...somewhere in this highly restricted vault...' Maybe that way. I think it's this way. No, it's definitely this way. I'm going this way. All right. '...is Fair Go's entire 40-year history.' What are we looking for? F ` Fair Go. F's down here. Oh, maybe it is that way. OK. That's why you're the brains of the operation. 'Our show started in 1977. Hado was only 2 years old.' Like your wardrobe at home? Yeah. Pretty much the same. This is my sock drawer. There you go. Oh yeah, Fair Go. Here we go. Yes. Right between Eyewitness News and Dig This. 'I'd only just been born.' This looks like number one. So this is it ` the very first episode of Fair Go. Apparently. I feel like I should have gloves on. BOTH: Oh. (BOTH LAUGH) That can't be it. It's gotta be more than that, surely. 'In 1977, Fair Go was transformed 'from a Kiwi colloquialism to must-see TV.' 40 years of television history. Makes a man feel young. 'It's the second longest-running show on NZ TV.' I've been on the show about five minutes. Mm. Which is why we've called an old war horse out of retirement. This is fearless Fair Go reporter Kevin Milne. This is a bit surreal for me. I feel like Junior Fair Go, Master Fair Go or the Boy at Fair Go. Yeah, that's right. You're almost the grandchild of Fair Go. (LAUGHS) Mr Fair Go. I always think of Brian Edwards as Mr Fair Go. Brian Edwards was the man who kicked it off in '77. Good evening and welcome to the final Fair Go for 1977. Over the past year, we've unearthed some... And in case you're wondering why there's no copy of that very first show... In the old days, it was all tape. It was always taped. The tapes were great big thick things. They were worth a lot of money, and you couldn't just kind of store them; you had to wipe them and reuse them. And, sadly, that's what happened. From the very beginning, Fair Go did things differently. Normally we do name the people who appear on Fair Go, but, well, as for the terminally stupid, we'll give this chap a break just this once. Because we were naming names, the impact was amazing. Once Fair Go went to air, it just became an instant hit. People loved it. It was like a real brawl. You knew that there was a hell of a lot at stake. The name and shame game ` it didn't go down well with big business. They come out in crates like this. But viewers loved seeing the boot on the other foot. I remember there was a story about a firm called Clutch Services that Brian was interviewing. And the guy honestly looks like he could just step out of his seat and clout Brian at any point. It was fantastic but scary. Kevin Milne, very much a man of the '70s, would have to wait six more years to join the Fair Go team. It's only a matter of the insurance company writing the cheque. 'I loved bringing up companies that had stuffed people around' and to make their morning a shocker. I just adored that because... these people have been giving other people trouble for so long; it was time they got a bit of their own back. Must have made you feel good. You feel like you're on the right side. Oh, absolutely. Loved it. It's a view shared by many of his contemporaries. Well, we loved doing it, and so we showed that we loved doing it. It was the only kind of television that I could have imagined myself working in. It's got heart. It's got integrity. It's got authenticity. It's got, you know, longevity. It's got nous, and it's got sassy. I don't think I'm speaking out of turn to say it was more iconic than the news. because everyone knew someone who knew someone who'd been helped by Fair Go, who'd be done by Fair Go, who was in the process of writing to Fair Go. It was a huge deal. Fair Go's always gone into battle for the little guy. ...them to treat me like that. And of course I got my Irish up, and I thought, well... Fair Go. (CHUCKLES) And from time to time, things didn't quite go to plan. Was there something about a line on a house? CHUCKLES: Oh yeah. Yes. I did some silly things and made mistakes in different sorts of ways. Being television, you've always got to kind of illustrate these things, so I painted a line right up the side of the house, across the roof and down the other side. And then problems really come into it, because it gets to the house and shades, oh, about 0.6m off the side of the house. Now, this is the hill's boundary line. 'And I'd been assured by the painting people that it was like kindergarten finger-paint paint; 'we'd just hose it off at the end.' And no. The sun came out. We had lunch. The sun came out and baked the line on their house. so when I left that day, I remember saying goodbye to them, and not only did they have this problem with the boundary line, but they now had a sort of fluorescent pink line straight across their house that we couldn't get off. That wasn't the only boo-boo. Well now, you've guessed it. Getting studio volunteers to count out the number of hokey-pokey nuggets in a pottle of ice cream also backfired badly. How you getting on? You found any? Yeah. Not many. Oh, there's quite a bit here. I remember this as a boy. I was a boy in Gore watching this. It was talked about for ages. Well, unfortunately, a couple of quite elderly women volunteered to do it. And I thought, well, who am I to say 'You're too old to do this'? So they each had a litre of it. Elderly people take everything quite seriously. They're very dutiful. Well, this is a big job. But we got a call about three days after that show from a GP, saying, 'Nothing too dramatic, lads, but I think that you ought to know 'that two of my elderly patients have got frostbite.' And I imagine they're probably the only people that have ever got frostbite in the world from putting their hands too long in ice cream. Fair Go has always been a huge hit with the audience, but Milne reckons the early stories weren't necessarily the best. If you have a look at the first programme or the earliest programmes still around, you'll notice that the stories are not particularly strong, to say the least. There was a guy called Spencer Jolly, who was probably the best investigative journalist in New Zealand television, and he decided to work for Fair Go. And on this programme, you'll see that he's dealing with a complaint from a young boy who didn't get any lollies in a lolly scramble. And there was no vision of him, so there was no... It was a terrible story. About 80 of us entered, and when the lollies were ready to be thrown, only one was thrown. Some lolly scramble. All scramble and no lolly, eh? But jolly good for the teeth. Many years later, people used to say to me ` and they probably say to you guys still ` 'Oh, gosh, I wish we could still get those great old stories in the old days, 'you know, back in Brian Edwards' days' and all that sort of stuff. And actually, if you go back and look at it, no, not altogether all that strong. But it wasn't till Philip Alpers comes along in the early '80s and started turning Fair Go into a very powerful investigative current affairs show dealing with consumer information. After the break ` (TYRES SCREECH) the fight for consumer rights takes to the streets. My name's Philip Alpers, from Television New Zealand, from the Fair Go programme. I wonder if I could ask you a question or two. (BLEEP) off. 1 Now, live from the Avalon NFU Studios... Over the course of 40 years, Fair Go has gone through a constant evolution, but it has always been focused on helping the little guy. Brian Edwards used to say this is a story of sorting out people who are hurt; it's not about people breaking the law or breaking some regulation. We don't care about any of that. We're not policemen. We are human beings, basically, helping out. But how do you feel about that? Oh, marvellous. You feel quite happy about that? Yes, definitely. Over the years, there's been plenty of big names all too willing to join the fight for consumer rights, but it's Alpers who's credited with giving the show teeth. We owe a lot to Brian Edwards, but we owe a lot to Philip Alpers too. Good evening to you and welcome to another edition of Fair Go. He used to wear white suits and fedoras and Panamas and all this sort of things. He had this kind of theatrical` He had a bald head. He looked like Shakespeare. And so it was easy to not take him terribly seriously. How can Philip wear such gaudy ties without blushing? Friend, you ain't seen nothing yet. This is what I wear every other day of the week, all right? Gaudy indeed! But he did some of the best current affairs stories Fair Go's ever done. He turned it from being an entertainment show into an extraordinarily powerful investigative show. (APPLAUSE) Welcome back. It was the only kind of journalism that I can imagine myself doing ` journalism in which I was committed to what I was doing, telling a story on behalf of somebody else, and trying to make a difference. 'Fair Go approached Alan Travis as he left Auckland Airport.' Alpers always got his man. Mr Travis? My name's Philip Alpers, from Television New Zealand, from the Fair Go programme. I wonder if I could ask you a question or two? (BLEEP) off. The funny thing about that was he was sort of trying to take a swing at me, but then after the interview ` because these people have really good social skills ` after the cameraman had shut up, I started talking to him, and he smiled and he said, 'You're really good at this. 'You put yourself in exactly the position 'where I had to hit my wife before I hit you.' I believe you're taking anything up to $90,000 in cash with you. I wasn't conscious of it at all. As I say, I didn't like that kind of confrontation, but it did make wonderful television. (BLEEP) off. That's all I've got to say to you before I lay you out. He was also responsible for one of the biggest payouts in Fair Go history. It all began... with this car. The Toyota rust story was the greatest of them all. In those years, 1980 and 1981, Toyota built nearly 18,000 Corollas and Starlets. Total value on the street in round figures ` $177 million. Toyota, that's incredible. It produced more money out of a story than any other story had ever done. It produced millions for New Zealanders who were complaining about their cars having rust. It was a massive story. This is the Toyota assembly plant in Thames. I started hearing stories from panel beaters about this rust problem with Toyota cars. And it was endemic. It was through a whole model. And it got more and more exciting, and I got into the research, and I dug right down, and I spoke to all of these people who shouldn't have been speaking to me at all. And eventually I thought, I've got it. And I said to everybody, 'I've got it! I've got it!' And then I walked out into the car park, and my car was one of them. Big payouts, big personalities meant Fair Go would regularly draw million-plus audiences ` Roughly a third of New Zealand's entire population. We couldn't believe that it was number one all the time. I mean, here we were just having fun and doing the type of advocacy journalism that we really believed in that would have got us sacked if we were in the newsroom, and yet it was just so... Well, rewarding's the only word I keep coming up with. It was tremendously rewarding to be on that show. Of course, life could be tough for those on the wrong end of the camera. One thing I'll say for your programme ` you help get things done, and I certainly won't procrastinate any more on this one. Tim Shadbolt was arguably Fair Go's most famous bad guy. Yeah, well, I did. I reckon I'm a real upfront honest Kiwi that's just made a few mistakes in my life, like every other New Zealander, and I reckon three programmes just on Tim Shadbolt was a little bit over the top. Putting the boot into a Kiwi icon wasn't easy. I'm a huge admirer ` or was a huge admirer ` of Tim Shadbolt. I still am, actually, for the work that he now does in Invercargill and that sort of thing. But he was an amazing guy in the '60s, and he was a great hero of ours. But he let a lot of people down when he was in the concreting business, and I think he thought that he could just sort of entertain his way out, and as much as we all liked to think that Shadbolt was this wonderful guy and it was great to have him on our show and all that sort of thing, we wanted a result, and he didn't give results. He just didn't. I don't know why he wouldn't. So we put the boot in. Shadbolt declined our offer of a right of reply. MAN: But the money was hers, Tim. SHADBOLT: Yes, but didn't she come out a winner? For $600, she got a $3000 drive; she got all her money back, plus interest. I think it's really great that we didn't give him any leniency. You know, we treated him like everybody else. I think it's really good that we did that. Mr Walsh, I work for a Fair Go programme ` TV New Zealand. As any Fair Go reporter will tell you, it's usually arrogance, stubbornness and bad decisions that land people on Fair Go. Are you gonna give her the money back? The funny thing about it, actually, is that the number of con artists on Fair Go is much smaller than you might imagine. Most are rip-offs. The big dough is from white-collar companies refusing to accept their responsibilities. It's not shoddy tradies. The big dough is the banks and the insurers and all this sort of stuff. American Home Assurance have actually given me this cheque to give you. There's a quarter of a million dollars from them. Getting insurance payouts for ordinary Kiwis like Maria Te Wheu became Milne's speciality. It was my favourite story. It had so much going for it, but it had a delightful woman who had sadly lost her husband in a crash just after she'd taken out some life insurance, but the agent had not passed the papers on to Norwich Life. And therefore Norwich Life said, 'Well, we didn't have the file, 'so how could we have accepted the policy?' We have given considerable consideration to the events that have occurred. Norwich Life is prepared to make full payment to you of $100,000 as an ex gratia payment. Oh my God! (APPLAUSE) This magic TV moment came courtesy of Norwich Life's CEO. Oh! They're not just words, Miria. I have a cheque here for $100,000... Oh my God, I don't believe it. ...from Norwich. (CHUCKLES) A fantastic side story to this is that the chief executive couldn't be there on the night. We prerecorded his message when he gave over the money. He had to go to Fiji, but his board had told him, 'When you come back to your office, 'if this hasn't worked properly for us as far as we're concerned, 'there will be an envelope on your desk. That means you're fired. 'If there's no envelope, take your seat and continue working.' Wow. And when he got back, he had done such a brilliant job that, in fact, they did keep him on. Getting a resolution was a big part of Fair Go's DNA. Your reaction? It's just wonderful. But so too was getting a laugh. I think there are two big, big things about Fair Go. One was confrontation. The other one was humour. ...TV star like Philip Alpers, it's terribly important to know what shampoo and conditioner to use. (LAUGHTER) Philip's hair's just... (LAUGHTER DROWNS OUT SPEECH) So for Philip, I use this heavenly turtle oil shampoo and conditioner. A little on top. And secret fractionated formula fondles the follicles. Penetrating protein from the tummy of the turtle titillates the tired tousles. A special formulation to give Philip's hair extra body and Philip's body extra hair. You'll be surprised at the results. I love it. Ah! And so do I! Ever seen a turtle with flyaway hair? It'll work for you too. After the break ` the lighter side of Fair Go. That's up next. 1 Hello? Mr Harrison? Holding people to account made for good telly. You remember that two grand you took off me? Hey. Hey, cut it out. Cut it out. Cut it out. But it was the light and shade that really got people talking. The perfect programme was one that had a really powerful, solid story at the top and then just a really good laugh at the end of the show. Take a complaint from a guy who brought some nuns off Mr Pope. I advertised in The Herald for four nuns, and I got a phone call in the afternoon saying, 'This is Mr Pope speaking.' And I thought, this guy's mad. He couldn't get them to breed. I said, 'I only want young nuns.' Suddenly, you've got comedy gold. Ethel, how do you feel about all this? Well, if it's gonna make Vic happy, I'll go along with it, I knew, of course, that nuns were a breed of pigeon, but the key thing was to do a story with him where the build-up was him just talking about nuns. Well, there's no point in having four hens to breed from. No, you can't breed from four hens, can you? No, I don't think so. He was smart enough to know what I was getting at, and so he just kept referring to all these lovely questions in a dead straight face. It worked an absolute treat. Back then, Milne was the mere apprentice to the master of making them laugh. (UPBEAT MUSIC) I love entertaining. I'd rather do an entertaining story than a serious, gritty one. And I really wanted to be one of those crusading current affairs journalists in my mind, but then when it came to actually doing it, that really isn't where my strengths were. This girl was fresh as a flower just caught in a shower. Passed me cool as a breeze. I had to give her a squeeze. Kerre was the first to take a TV ad and give it her own spin. It's the Cool Charm ad. Oh yes. At the Papakura Military Camp, where I had to spray myself with Cool Charm and parade past soldiers. In the ad, the soldiers break ranks and go running after the very attractive woman. In this one, I was basically clawing at them, desperate for them to look at me, and (CHUCKLES) they wouldn't have a bar of me. And it finished with me doing the Benny Hill chase, chasing the soldiers as they fled from me ` and my Cool Charm. Of course, it was viewer complaints in real life that often generated the best laughs. Three... Huh. No problem. Although it's a long, long way down. Atta girl, Alpha. The cat door that was installed` Oh, the cat door. That was installed at the top of the door instead of the bottom. And we had Rosalie Nelson, who was the most exquisite redhead ` just a beautiful young woman, brilliant journalist, great communicator ` and she got her two Burmese cats to be our cat stunt cats... to try and get up into the cat door. We had them on mini trampolines. We had rope ladders. But that really was` I think the credit for that one goes to Rosalie's cats and Sarah Stretton, who was the director on that. She was brilliant. For someone who spent just a few years on the show, she left a legacy of laughs. I remember my first day at Avalon, but I don't remember my first day on Fair Go, I think probably because I was so terrified. You know, it was live television, and I was working with some enormously influential journalists, and I really didn't have... I really didn't have the nous or the experience to be there, I thought. And, in fact, quite a few other people thought that too, I think. (UPBEAT MUSIC) That winning combination of comedy, controversy, and confrontation turned Fair Go into a formidable brand. So I think, in a way, the first 20 were the great years for Fair Go. I don't think you could say that the best stories emerged out of the first 20. It was just a bigger hoo-ha. Next week ` (CRASH!) We started seeing some extraordinary brawls going on. threats and backlash. (BLEEP) crane you with that. There was a famous case of a guy who rang us up one Saturday morning and said he was going to blow up the house. Look! There is no need for this. There were a lot of big disputes and fights in back gardens and all that sort of stuff. You've got to let him get off and get up and turn the camera off. This is silly. Look, come on. That's next week.