Air New Zealand says it is very concerned about false accusations of discrimination made against it by an American airline which refused passage to the partner of one of Air New Zealand's gay employees, and says it will be confronting the airline over it. Northwest Airlines blamed its interline travel agreement with Air New Zealand for the incident, which saw 60-year-old Air New Zealand employee Rob Anders unable to redeem a prize he'd won at a work Christmas party for travel on Northwest Airlines, because Northwest didn't recognise his partner as a “spouse”. Northwest, who have since relented and allowed Anders and his partner to claim their prize, said in a statement that the misunderstanding occurred because Air New Zealand doesn't reciprocate Northwest's policy of recognising same-sex partners for Northwest employees who travel on Air New Zealand. Air New Zealand's corporate communications manager David Jamieson says he is very concerned at Northwest's attempts in the American media to blame them for the fiasco, saying Air New Zealand is the only airline in the world to have a completely non-discriminatory policy for staff travel. “Air New Zealand introduced ‘registered nominees' in 1991. An employee could have absolutely anyone they want (without fear of recrimination) fully accessing their staff travel benefits,” he told GayNZ.com. “They could even change that nominee to someone else every 12 months. There is no other airline in the world which can match Air New Zealand's generous liberalisation and non-discriminatory practice on eligibility or longevity.” Jamieson says Air New Zealand will be raising the discrimination allegations with Northwest “as a matter of priority”. Ref: GayNZ.com (c)