This afternoon, following reports of break-ins at Mr Mitchell's Parliamentary and electorate offices almost a year ago, Ms Collins told the Herald her husband's office had been burgled six weeks ago.
Mr Wong-Tung is a director of Oravida, the company belonging to National Party donor Deyi Shi whose meetings with Ms Collins late last year in China -- when she was there on a taxpayer funded ministerial trip -- sparked a conflict of interest furore.
"He came into work and noticed that the lock on his lockable cabinet had been smashed."
The cabinet held his laptop which had not been taken. Amounts of cash left by staff on desks around the office had also not been taken.
"It seemed a very odd thing at the time and I presume that someone may have been interested in the information that was on that laptop," Ms Collins said.
"It's one of a series of interesting little break-ins around computers," she told the Herald.
She said that included the break-ins at Mr Mitchells' offices in September and October last year, in which a laptop and phones were stolen.
Mr Mitchell also told the Herald on Sunday his email was hacked during those burglaries.
Ms Collins and Mr Mitchell's reports of break-ins come as the Government responds to Nicky Hager's book Dirty Politics, with claims the writer and the left in general were the ones indulging in dirty tricks such as the hacking of blogger Cameron Slater's website which yielded the messages Hager based his book on.
- Adam Bennett of the NZ Herald
