Electoral Matters Bill

I move, That the Electoral Matters Bill be now read a second time. I thank the Justice and Electoral Committee for its consideration of this bill and for the amendments recommended to it. The bill amends section 55 of the Electoral Act, which relates to when a member of Parliament must vacate his or her seat. It also cures an anomaly in section 55E of that Act that could see the Governor-General or a senior judge take a role in the party-hopping procedure. The bill also makes a number of procedural and technical amendments to the electoral broadcasting regime, to allow the Electoral Commission to allocate funds for electoral broadcasting for the next general election more effectively.

I now turn to the main amendments to the bill recommended by the committee. Firstly, the purpose of the bill is to clarify when a member of Parliament is required to vacate his or her seat. In the 21st century, New Zealand people with dual or multiple citizenship are becoming more and more common. This also applies to members of Parliament. However, it is essential that members of Parliament demonstrate an ongoing commitment to New Zealand and the people they represent. The bill amends section 55 of the Electoral Act, to set out clearly that a member of the New Zealand Parliament must be a New Zealand citizen at all times, and the circumstances when an MP must vacate his or her seat. The committee recommended some changes to the circumstances in which an MP must vacate his or her seat. These include if an MP accepts nomination as a candidate for election to a Parliament in a country other than New Zealand. The committee recommended including a reference to a governing body, which might not have been included in the term “country”—for example, an Australian state. The committee also extended the prohibition to include local government, with the inclusion of the word “municipality”. The committee also recommended that it be made clear that an MP must vacate his or her seat if he or she agrees to an appointment to a governing body.

The bill also includes a number of straightforward amendments that will allow the Electoral Commission to allocate funds for electoral broadcasting for the next general election more effectively. It does this by removing some of the well-recognised anomalies and administratively burdensome processes of the current broadcasting regime. These amendments have been recommended following inquiries into the 1996, 1999, and 2002 general elections.

The major changes in the bill to the electoral broadcasting regime are, firstly, that the bill will repeal the outdated requirement for the Electoral Commission to invite broadcasters to provide free or discounted time for electoral broadcasting. Secondly, the bill amends the provision of the Broadcasting Act so that only registered parties will be eligible for allocations of time and money. The committee also recommends some changes to these provisions. The committee clarified that additional members of the Electoral Commission appointed for the allocation of broadcasting time and funds must not be included in decisions to refer suspected broadcasting offences to the police. This is to avoid conflicts of interest, as the additional members of the committee are also members of this House. The committee has also recommended that any money allocated to a political party that is not utilised by that party must be returned to the Crown by the Electoral Commission. These funds are appropriated by Parliament solely for the purposes of enabling parties to meet the costs of broadcasting election programmes. If this money is not spent by political parties on election programmes, it should be returned to the Crown.

The committee accepted TVNZ’s submission to allow non-political commercial advertising between different opening addresses. Election programmes that are aimed at influencing voters must not be broadcast between different opening addresses. Either non-political commercial advertising or non-electoral programmes may be broadcast during different closing addresses, which must be broadcast on the same night. One reason for treating closing addresses differently is that there is limited ability for a reply.

The committee also considered the matter of electoral signs. The committee acknowledged that the inclusion of any recommendation on that matter would be outside the scope of this bill. However, under MMP it is difficult for political parties to conduct nationwide campaigns for the party vote, as each local authority has its own requirements. I have held discussions with the Society of Local Government Managers and Local Government New Zealand to explore whether the matter could be resolved by voluntary guidelines. Despite the goodwill demonstrated by the local government representatives, there are doubts as to whether the guidelines can be implemented into bylaws and district plans in time for the 2005 general election.

I therefore intend to introduce a Supplementary Order Paper for consideration by the Committee of the whole House. The Supplementary Order Paper amends the Electoral Act to provide for a national standard for managing electoral signs. The maximum size of electoral signs is proposed to be 3 square metres. Electoral signs that meet the specifications may be displayed for a period of up to 2 months before polling day. In addition, regulations may be passed to standardise the design of electoral signs, and to set out the procedures to be followed by any person before displaying an electoral sign.

Extensive consultation is to be held before the regulations are finalised, and I welcome contributions from local government. My discussions with representatives of local government suggest that local authorities want to continue to have the ability to control the location and density of electoral signs, fees payable, and actions in relation to non-complying electoral signs. Local authorities are in the best position to take into account local conditions in managing those matters, and I agree with their proposal. However, since starting on this process it has come to my attention that the National Party will oppose this Supplementary Order Paper, which every other political party has, at this stage, indicated support for.

I want briefly to refer to the select committee’s report to this House. The select committee took up the matter of electoral hoardings and said that it was concerned—that was the unanimous view of the select committee, which has two National Party members on it—that variations in local authority rules can unnecessarily impinge upon free political speech. It said that because some local authorities were setting controls on what could be on an electoral hoarding. The committee noted that any proposals to change or to deal with that issue would be outside the scope of the bill. It then stated: “We encourage the Minister to address guidelines for hoardings at the Committee of the Whole House stage (if his discussions with the Society of Local Government Managers have not had satisfactory resolution by that time). We propose that minimum levels could be set, where appropriate, for size, content, and display period.”

The Supplementary Order Paper, which I am in the process of discussing with all the parties in the House—and I have submitted a copy to them—proposes to do that by regulation. The reason it is to be done by regulation is that my officials advise me that it would be very difficult, if not impossible, to identify all the Acts of Parliament that would need to be changed, and to include them in this primary legislation. By giving regulatory power, we have the time to consult with local government and with all the political parties, and then can bring in regulations that will cover all of those contingencies.

The National Party has also claimed that that process of having regulation would enable the Government of the day to bring in electoral hoardings to suit itself. It has indicated that this Government would want the hoardings to be all red and simply praising Helen Clark. That is ludicrous. The person who made the claim knows full well that before regulations can be promulgated they have to be discussed with the parties affected. In this particular case, they would be discussed with all political parties and local government, so there could be no sneaking up of issues on anybody. The second thing is that any regulation has to go before the Regulations Review Committee, which is chaired by an Opposition member. If, in fact, the Opposition parties felt that something was wrong, it would be brought back to this House and dealt with.

I want to make it very clear that I am putting forward this Supplementary Order Paper with a very open mind as to how we can effectively change the words to convey the required intent. There is no intention whatsoever to play any dirty pool as claimed by the National Party spokesperson. I am consulting very widely. If we cannot reach an agreement on the Supplementary Order Paper, if it does not have the support of sufficient numbers in the House, then it simply will not go forward, and an opportunity will be lost.

The point is that, under MMP, the hoardings that go up across the country are for the party vote, and the country has to be looked at as an electorate as a whole. For some members of Parliament to have to have five different sizes of hoardings that are to be set up on five different dates and to have all sorts of different words on them makes it impossible. The select committee recommended a change in that area in 1996, 1999, and 2002. Those concerns have been brought to local government, and it is time for this House to take some action on them. We have said to local government that Parliament is concerned about three things: size, content, and starting date. For local government, the issues are location, density, and non-compliance. We agree with those.

I recommend this bill to the House.

National supports this legislation. The Minister, Rick Barker, commented on the Supplementary Order Paper that he will be introducing and that we heard about for the first time last week. It is not something that National will rush into lightly. We are concerned that there has not been any consultation on the areas he mentioned. The Minister mentioned that they were matters outside the scope of the Justice and Electoral Committee report. That is exactly right; that is why we did not take them any further. One would think that if they were outside the scope of the bill, that would be the end of the matter until further discussions could be held.

We cannot dictate to councils what they should be doing. We acknowledge there are differences in the way councils operate under their bylaws. Some councils in my area do not allow signage, at all. One particular district council allows only two signs per candidate in its area. In other areas it is open slather—one can have as many signs as one likes. There is an inconsistency, and that is acknowledged. But the Minister has come out with a draft Supplementary Order Paper without any consultation with the parties as to what is intended—such as regarding the colour one can use on a sign. Certainly, National will not want to use red colours on its hoardings, but that could be dictated in the final determination on that issue. In terms of size, a 3 square metre sign is quite big. We could probably accommodate a 3 square metre sign, but, at the same time, to be allowed to put it up only 2 months in advance is something we could not support. Nothing in the Electoral Act states that one could not put up one’s signs today. I have been looking at section 214 of the Electoral Act, which states that signs could go up now, but the Minister’s draft Supplementary Order Paper states that we could not put up signs until 2 months out from the election. That would mean that section 214 of the Electoral Act would need to be changed.

In section 214B(1)(b), “election activity” refers to a number of things, and promotes posters, billboards, signage, and whatever. Paragraph (d) refers to election activities occurring in the 3-month period before polling day, but the Minister has just said that we cannot put up signs until 2 months before an election. That means that the Electoral Act would have to be changed, just to accommodate the 2-month provision he mentioned. I do not know that the Minister has thought this through. The current law states that I can put up my signs now. They still have to be authorised. It has been suggested that they should be authorised by the Electoral Commission and the Chief Electoral Office. I have been in touch with both those organisations in the last couple of days, so I am not speaking off the cuff on this. I have done some research in this area, and there is nothing to suggest that those signs cannot go up right at this very moment. So when the Minister says: “Ha! You can put up the signs only 2 months out from the election.”, I say to him that some major changes will have to occur to section 214 of the Electoral Act. At the moment I can put up those signs today.

I do not have the provision in front of me, but I think that section 214B talks about signage in the 3-month period as being when the $20,000 we would have to account for comes into effect [Interruption]—I am not confused at all; I have this in writing. That is a major concern. It is one of the reasons why we will not be supporting the Supplementary Order Paper. Although the intent of it is fine—and I was on the select committee that looked at this—we are certainly not going to rush into something just because of the whim of the Minister that it needs to happen.

I come back to the bill and to some of the other provisions that we think are important. Although I said at the outset that we will be supporting the bill, it is interesting to see in the introduction to the commentary on the bill that the Electoral Commission will no longer be required to invite broadcasters to provide free or discounted time. That is an interesting point, because it is really only Television New Zealand and Radio New Zealand that actually do so. When I was involved in the 1996 election campaign as National’s campaign manager, I found that the possibility of getting any free or discounted time from broadcasters was pretty remote. So we have no difficulty with the commission saving itself a lot of time by going specifically in future to those broadcasters, which are State-owned.

The next point in the commentary, which is that only registered parties will be eligible for allocations of time and money, is also important. The current law has provided that a political party can get an allocation of funds for its broadcasting activities right up to the time of allocations. This bill states quite clearly—and it is something we agree with—that the party has to be registered at the time the election is called. I think it will limit a lot of the fly-by-nighters—parties that come along at the end of the day. Although it is not specifically mentioned in the bill—certainly, I mentioned it in the first reading debate—I think the increase in the allocation for broadcasting money from $2 million to $3.12 million including GST is significant. Over time there have been increases in costs. It is not specifically mentioned here, but we certainly discussed the fact that over time we have seen huge increases in costs. What we need to be able to identify and use, with those costs, is a fair allocation of time.

One of the areas we have major concerns about is the creation of vacancies. It is interesting that we were in urgency on 6 August 2003 when we went through all the stages of the Electoral (Vacancies) Amendment Bill, which overrode section 55 of the Electoral Act to allow a member sitting here this evening—the Hon Harry Duynhoven—to remain a member of Parliament. Section 55(1)(b) of the Electoral Act provides that a seat becomes vacant when a member swears allegiance to a foreign State or power. Section 55(1)(c) provides that a member’s seat be vacated if the member is a citizen of or takes out citizenship of another country, or takes some other action like renewing a passport. We voted against that piece of legislation. We said that it was a cynical manipulation of Parliament and that it was absolutely outrageous that the law could be changed retrospectively where someone had broken it.

The point I make here is that when we look at page 2 of the commentary on the bill, we see that that member would not be a member of Parliament under this provision in the clarification of the current legislation. It states quite clearly: “We support the requirement that a member of Parliament seek a fresh mandate from voters …”. That is what we said at the time. We said that there should have been a by-election, and that is what the commentary states—that there should be “a fresh mandate … if he or she acquires a fresh foreign allegiance while in office.” It goes on to state: “We also recommend that new section 55(1)(cb) be clarified so that a member of Parliament will have to vacate his or her seat if he or she accepts nomination as a candidate for or agrees to appointment to a governing body which might not have been included in the term ‘country’, for example, an Australian state.”—and it goes further than that.

So here we have in the bill, which National is supporting, a provision that clarifies the law. Had this provision been in the legislation at the time, the member who was able to get in under the Electoral (Vacancies) Amendment Act would not be here today. These are major concerns. Although we support this piece of legislation, it cannot go by without our saying that the provision enacted at that time under urgency was a manipulation of the system that, in my view and in National’s view, brought Parliament into disrepute. This bill tidies it up, and that is why we are supporting it.

Unfortunately, that speech in support of the bill was somewhat churlish, I thought, and it did not deal with the issue of explaining why the National Party has opposed the Supplementary Order Paper without even knowing the full details. I would have thought that any mainstream political party would at least take the opportunity to learn what was in the Supplementary Order Paper before making a caucus decision about it. It certainly flies in the face of logic, and tends to leave absolutely open the issue of what National would do in the unlikely event that it ever became the Government of this country again, because the Supplementary Order Paper is a significant improvement on the very hodgepodge arrangements that exist amongst local authorities at this particular point in time. We deserve to hear quite a bit more about the National Party position in respect of this. It simply defies logic, and I think that those members will find themselves somewhat exposed in this debate on the matter.

If the Minister is forced to pull the Supplementary Order Paper because of lack of support, at the end of the day, it will be on their heads. We will then go back to the hodgepodge whereby some local authorities say signs can be up for 3 weeks, and some local authorities say they can be put up 3 months in advance, and they regulate size.

I think that given Lindsay Tisch’s position as campaign organiser for the National Party on one occasion, he knows the stupidity that situation causes for those who have to organise the campaign for the party vote. It is a sensible Supplementary Order Paper and, frankly, I find the National Party’s position absolutely scurrilous.

First, on the question of the Supplementary Order Paper to prevent local authorities from interfering with free speech in electoral advertising, I believe that it will be possible to produce some provisions that all parties should agree to. I hope to work with the Minister to improve the wording on the draft that has been circulated. It appears to me that the fears people have that this is an attempt by the Cabinet to get control of advertising could have been avoided if that had been made clear in the draft. It has not been, but I think that it can be done. Much more important is that this bill is the sort of routine tidy-up that occurs after every election, when issues are raised. But this time it goes to some reasonably crucial issues and, in particular, electronic advertising.

One of the features of the New Zealand electoral scene is the vital control exercised by a few journalists. When Television One decides what it is going to cover in an election, TV3 tends to follow suit, and the other media regard what is being dealt with on television as the election issues. If that had been the case in the United States or in Australia, for example, there might well have been completely different election outcomes, because in those countries, election speech can be a debate between—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson): I am sorry to interrupt the honourable member. The time has come for me to leave the Chair for the dinner break.

Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m.

National supports the Electoral Matters Bill but, as I will later detail, has some reservations about a proposed Supplementary Order Paper dealing with advertising hoardings for the next election. The electoral framework and its integrity is the hallmark of a constitutional democracy. New Zealand has no written constitution. There are only three developed countries in the world that do not have a written constitution and they are Israel, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom. That is not to say that we do not have a whole lot of written constitutional material, but it falls short of a written constitution in the normal way. It is mainly a question of definition. We have an assemblage of statutes, parliamentary Standing Orders, and conventions. The statutes include the Constitution Act, the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act, and the Electoral Act. We are here tonight looking at the Electoral Matters Bill, which proposes some amendment to the principal Act—the Electoral Act.

There are amendments in respect of this bill that run in two directions—firstly, there are amendments to the Electoral Act, and, secondly, there are amendments to the Broadcasting Act. The history of the changes to the Electoral Act has been canvassed by other speakers. Members may recall that in 2003, in circumstances of urgency and asserted need, the Electoral (Vacancies) Amendment Bill was rushed through this Parliament under urgency, suspending the application of section 55(1)(b) and (c) of the Electoral Act in respect of members of the current Parliament until the close of polling day for the next general election, and requiring a member of Parliament to remain a New Zealand citizen at all times.

Fairly or unfairly, the finger was pointed at Mr Harry Duynhoven and the actions that he had taken. But it is a fair point that New Zealand law tolerates, and even encourages, dual nationality. That is clear from the Citizenship Act. Double nationality frequently occurs by descent, as it did in Mr Duynhoven’s case. Dutch nationality has to be governed by Dutch law, so there was an argument that the retrospective nature of the law that was passed in the Parliament of the Netherlands meant that Mr Duynhoven had always had Dutch nationality. In New Zealand, of course, the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act provides that every New Zealand citizen who is of, or over, 18 years qualifies for membership of the House of Representatives.

At the time when the Electoral (Vacancies) Amendment Bill was passed it was asserted by some that 20 members of Parliament might have been captured by the current law. Those issues are now matters of history in the context of the report back of the Electoral Matters Bill and its second reading today.

When comparing the bill with section 55 of the Electoral Act, I note that some significant changes have been made. They are reasonable changes, I would assert, in the context of what has been done. The inclusion of the phrase “foreign Head of State” with reference to swearing allegiance to a country is akin to swearing allegiance to King and country or Queen and country. The other change that has been made, which I think is also reasonable, is a change to provisions by addition so that a member of Parliament will have to vacate his or her seat if he or she accepts a nomination to a governing body that might not fall within the definition of country. That might include, for example, the Northern Territory. There was an opportunity for the select committee to say that it is not really on to be a mayor or a councillor and a member of Parliament in this country. But that was not the choice that was taken.

The other significant changes are to the electoral broadcasting regime. In the time available I do not have sufficient remaining to discuss those changes in any great detail.

💬 Simon Power: Seek an extension.

💬 Darren Hughes: We’ll agree!

With an invitation to seek an extension and with agreement from the junior Government whip that seems to be the most happy outcome. At the close of my speech I will seek a short period of, say, 20 minutes to make the amplifying comments that I would like to make.

The three key points that lie behind the broadcasting regime are: firstly, the Electoral Commission will not be required to invite all broadcasters, which used to be the case, to provide free or discounted time for election programmes, and that is a good move because surprisingly not all broadcasters have any interest in politics and were not prepared to respond to those invitations; secondly, to ensure that only registered parties will be eligible for allocations of time and money; and, thirdly, to provide more clarity around the issue of advertising during opening and closing addresses.

When the Minister spoke at the commencement of the second reading he referred to a Supplementary Order Paper, which presumably only has the status of a draft. It has caused some real concern to the Opposition parties because of the ambiguity of its content and the uncertainty of its width. The Justice and Electoral Committee made comment about the need for something to be done in connection with electoral hoardings. That was not a new issue. It has been raised a number of times, most recently in the 2002 general election report where the comment was made that amendments to electoral legislation for the 2005 general election should include national guidelines on hoardings. But the problem here, of course, is that such changes are outside the scope of the bill. That is apparently why the Government is proposing this Supplementary Order Paper.

The concern of the select committee was quite manifest. We were concerned that variations in local authority rules can unnecessarily impinge on free political speech and add to the costs of advertising. The Government is incredibly reluctant to amend the Resource Management Act. Why that reluctance is there is not immediately apparent, unless it is that people like the Hon Marian Hobbs cling to the view that it is fine legislation. It may have good elements but time has shown it to be truly flawed. In the context of what we are talking about here, the situation was that there were completely different rules between various local authority districts. So if a particular hoarding was proposed, then in some districts it was necessary to make—in the jargon of the Resource Management Act—an application for a non-notified planning consent. For others a notified consent was required.

It all underscores the fact that the administration of the resource management legislation in New Zealand is incredibly uneven and inconstant around the country. That is because different local authorities approach issues in different ways and have a different view as to how much regulation is appropriate. It is appropriate that those issues be standardised, so it is good that the issue has come to the committee.

I imagine, in principle, that a well-drafted Supplementary Order Paper would draw support from National. But that can scarcely be the case when the current draft Supplementary Order Paper would give to councils such swingeing powers covering the size of hoardings, colour of hoardings, and placement of hoardings. Just imagine if the Governor-General made regulations by way of Order in Council that required all the signs within a district to be in National Party blue.

The Electoral Matters Bill covers a small range of matters in terms of elections. There is meant to be a more profound review, which has been called for by justice and electoral committees for several years, but this bill really deals with two principal matters: the Electoral Act and the Broadcasting Act. In terms of the Electoral Act, the key provisions relate to the vacating of a seat by a member of Parliament, and the membership of the Electoral Commission. In terms of the Broadcasting Act, there are really three matters that are being dealt with in this bill. They are the provision for all broadcasters to provide indications of broadcasting time for elections, the provisions to give broadcasting funding to political parties or parties standing candidates, and the opening and closing addresses. I will deal with the latter matters first, which are smaller matters. There will be an opportunity, no doubt, during the Committee stage to deal with the membership issue, and I will save my comments till then.

In terms of the Electoral Commission membership, the minor parties in this Parliament are very unhappy about the fact that Labour and National have members on the Electoral Commission, and believe that that is quite contrary to the MMP environment we have. I note, and people who have read the bill as reported back from the Justice and Electoral Committee will also have noted, that ACT, United Future, and the Greens were all unanimous in their view that, effectively, there should not be political party representation on the Electoral Commission. New Zealand First, by way of interest, took the view that New Zealand First should be on it but nobody else apart from National and Labour should be, which shows the degree of arrogance that has been built into New Zealand First. However, certainly when the Electoral Commission is dealing with things that are matters of the election process, which is owned by all New Zealanders and is critical to our democratic institutions in that it involves the election of a new Parliament, it is quite inappropriate that political parties have representation on that commission, and, particularly, it is inappropriate that only two of the political parties that exist, and only two of the nine that are represented in this House, are represented on it and are able to have input into it, while the others are not. That ought to be changed, but my guess is that while we have the domination by Labour and National they will not be prepared to let that go.

In terms of the Broadcasting Act, as the Act currently stands the Electoral Commission must approach every single broadcaster in the country and ask it to indicate what free time it might make available. I have been involved in the administration of the last three elections, in the last two as party secretary of Future New Zealand and United Future respectively. I know how much of a nightmare that issue has been for the Electoral Commission. It has to send out hundreds and hundreds of letters, and to follow up all the replies from the broadcasters, which invariably come back and say they will not provide any free election programmes, but offer to make available discounted time. I think there will be quite a saving of the Electoral Commission’s time during the very busy election period in that it will not have to send letters to all those broadcasters. In fact, there are only two that it will need to deal with—that is, Television New Zealand and Radio New Zealand. I think that is a good move. It makes a lot of sense, and it certainly saves a huge amount of time for everybody who is involved in the electoral process, from the Electoral Commission down to the political parties and their secretaries at the time.

In terms of the provision of election financial support, currently the law provides that registered parties and parties that will stand at least five electorate candidates are eligible. In three MMP elections we have seen that no party has put up at least five electorate candidates without also being a registered party. That is not at all surprising; as we know, the list vote is really the critical vote, and the chance of independent people, representing either themselves or small parties that have only a very few candidates, getting representation through the electorate vote is highly unlikely. Therefore, I think it makes sense that, effectively, registered parties should be the only ones that are eligible. Any party that stands an electorate candidate who has a reasonable opportunity of winning a seat will inevitably register as a party, because that might mean it gets a second seat if it does well through that process.

The critical issue, though, in this part of the bill is the opening and closing addresses. Here, we are really just talking about TVNZ and Radio New Zealand, and the fact that Radio New Zealand is non-commercial means that when we talk about the advertising during the period of the opening and closing addresses it is really only TVNZ that we are talking about. Certainly, in response to TVNZ’s submission, the committee’s view was that we should not place undue restrictions on the ability of TVNZ to sell advertising during the time of the opening addresses in particular. We felt that, on balance, that was an unnecessary restriction. Essentially, the opening and closing addresses are to take place between 7 p.m. and 9 p.m., and we have provided that the closing addresses will take place on only 1 day. Typically, in the past, TVNZ has allowed about 35 minutes for all parties’ closing addresses, which is a relatively brief time. Therefore, we thought it was quite reasonable to have those closing addresses one after the other, without any break for advertising. In terms of the opening addresses, however, they can easily be spread over more than 1 day—a longer period. Therefore, we felt it was appropriate to allow advertising.

When we are talking about advertising it is important that we distinguish between advertising programmes and election programmes, with election programmes being ones that encourage a person to vote for or support, or not to vote for or support, a particular party. They will be banned during the period that opening addresses are being conducted. We felt that was quite appropriate, so that people do not get unfair advantage in terms of that period. That means there will not be able to be advertising in the middle of an election opening address, but there will be able to be advertising in-between opening addresses. In particular and importantly, there will be able to be advertising between 9 p.m. on 1 day and 7 p.m. on the next day, if the broadcaster decides to have the opening addresses over 2 days. Of course, it would have been a bit of a farce to have a situation where the broadcaster was unable to have any advertising for a 24-hour or 26-hour period, so it was important to address that. The bill as it stood was quite ambiguous in that regard, and we have tidied it up with the amendments that have been reported back.

There are opportunities for abuse. In particular, there are opportunities for abuse by people advertising in-between two parties’ opening addresses. For example, United Future might well want to see an advertisement for sexual services of one sort or another put before and after the Labour Party’s opening address. That might go down well! However, there would also have been opportunities for abuse if we had not allowed that advertising. In particular, it was pointed out that, effectively, if we did not allow it, then people who had opening addresses on the first night might be able to advertise during that day and that evening the fact that their opening addresses were going to come up that night, whereas the next night that could not happen. Conversely, people whose opening addresses were on the second night could then follow up with advertising after their addresses had finished. So there was the prospect of manipulation there. Because of the opportunity for abuse, we felt that at the end of the day it was for the broadcaster to make sure that advertisements that were broadcast in-between the opening programmes were not, effectively, election programmes and were not advocating election things. We felt that, given that the broadcaster would commit an offence if it allowed that, it would take a conservative approach to ensure as far as it can that advertising that occurs between the opening addresses is not of the kind that is influential on voters or potential voters who are watching those opening addresses.

One thing that I was concerned about is a relatively small point. Clause 18 provides that where there are unused funds, funds the invoices for which have not come into the Electoral Commission within the stipulated 50-working day period, the Electoral Commission is banned from paying out on them. The effect of that will be that if a broadcaster sends its invoice through to a party and the party does not pass it on in the due time, then the broadcaster will not be paid, and the political party will not be able to pay it, either. That is a concern I have, and I will address it more at the Committee stage.

I rise on behalf of the Green Party to support this bill and this Justice and Electoral Committee report back. I will not make a lengthy speech, because I sat in on only part of the select committee consideration of this bill. My co-leader Rod Donald was there for the bulk of it, and of course he is well known for his erudite positions on electoral matters. I will not be able to do him justice if I carry on for too long, so I would like to address just some of the issues, in brief.

We do support this bill, because we think it makes a number of useful amendments to electoral matters. In particular, the Greens are pleased to see that some of the recommendations that select committees have made over the years have been picked up. Recommendations from 1996, 1999, and 2002 have been picked up, particularly those in relation to broadcasting matters. If we look at the report back we can immediately see that three major things have been picked up: that the Electoral Commission will no longer be required to invite all broadcasters to provide free or discounted time for election programmes; that only registered political parties will be eligible for allocations of time and money; and the creation of more clarity around the issues of advertising during opening and closing addresses. Those are matters that we are supportive of and commend.

We are also pleased to see clarification of the law around when MPs must vacate their seats because of their relationships with foreign nations. In particular, there is clarification that MPs must vacate their seats when they acquire a fresh foreign allegiance while in office—an allegiance to a foreign State, head of State, or power. That provision is broadened slightly to cover situations where the allegiance is to a person rather than a country or State. Also, the allegiance has to be a fresh one. The bill clarifies areas where there has been confusion before. A member who had dual citizenship who was simply renewing a passport might, in the past, have been seen to be breaching the Act. The bill now makes it clear that is not the case. That is an obvious and sensible thing to do. And the bill clarifies that where a member accepts nomination as a candidate for a foreign governing body, that is obviously a situation where a member has a clear conflict of interest, and that person should have to vacate his or her seat in those circumstances.

However, we were, along with other members of the committee, incensed at the continued domination of the Electoral Commission by the old parties, and their refusal to acknowledge that we are no longer in a first-past-the-post Parliament, that this is an MMP environment, and that things have changed. The question of party representation on the Electoral Commission has to be addressed. It is interesting to see the old parties of Labour and National find their common interest when it comes to these things, and shut out all of the other, smaller parties. Yes, it is a shameful thing, but that is what they did in the select committee. I have to say it was quite bizarre to hear discussions in the select committee in which both National and Labour members were adamant that when their party was the non-Government party its representative was able to represent all of the other non-Government parties of Parliament. They were saying that when they provide the Opposition representative, that representative can represent everyone. The Opposition representative technically covers everybody, including United Future members, who support the Government on confidence and supply issues while at the same time viciously attacking it for its “think pink” policies at every opportunity, and attacking the very principles that underpin the Labour Party—they do that at the same time as they say they support the Government—and also the Greens, who have helped the Labour Party Government pass all of the progressive legislation that it has passed. All of the progressive legislation that it has passed has had the support of the Greens, yet at the same time we have had the door slammed in our faces when it comes to developing a more friendly working relationship with the Government. The National Party thinks it is able to represent the full scope of these things, and that is quite bizarre.

Of course, it is quite unacceptable that only two parties are represented on the Electoral Commission when it comes to defining and deciding issues around funding for political parties with regard to broadcasting and other matters. The Greens, ACT, and United Future have said that party representation should simply be abolished; that, actually, it is not just a question of getting more representation, that there should not be party political representation on that body, and that it is quite inappropriate that it should continue. It is unfortunate that it has remained in place.

💬 Judy Turner: I agree.

We do agree on some things. I have to say I was even more disgusted by the position of New Zealand First, which looked like it would support the position of the Greens, ACT, and United Future on this matter, then suddenly turned round and presented the committee with the comment that the commission should have two additional members: one for New Zealand First, and one for the other parties represented in Parliament at the time. What a bizarre thing to say! That party had five members in the last Parliament. Their luck is in and their numbers have gone up in this Parliament, although some members of the public could be forgiven for thinking there is actually only one member of New Zealand First. I think some of its own MPs think there is only one member of New Zealand First, judging by their own comments in the media. When asked: “What do you do?”, one of them—I cannot remember which one—said: “Oh, I don’t do anything. I leave it to Winston.” We can all be forgiven for thinking that there is really only one member of New Zealand First, and the others are just kind of voting fodder to make him look good by showing he has some back-up. That was quite a weird reference to find in the report back of the select committee.

It is not acceptable that party political representation on the Electoral Commission remains, particularly within an MMP environment. As I have said, it shows how the T. rex parties find their common interest when it comes to these matters, and we think it is a real shame. Nevertheless, we do support the bill.

I wish to speak on the Electoral Matters Bill and to comment on some of the comments made by Richard Worth of the National Party.

Hon David Cunliffe:Who?

Yes—who! I was amazed that he was commenting on national policy statements, because I remembered that when a certain party was in power for 9 whole years, and Simon Upton was the Minister for the Environment, in those 9 whole years there was only one national policy statement. I find the comments that Richard Worth made in the debate tonight absolutely amazing.

💬 Hon David Cunliffe: National is not good on policy.

National is very good at procrastinating in this particular instance. Simon Upton is a lovely chap, but in 9 whole years there was only one national policy statement on the environment. This bill does some very, very good things, tightens up many procedures, and makes many technical amendments to the Electoral Matters Bill, which should make the next election much more efficient.

In taking this call on the Electoral Matters Bill on behalf of the National Party in Opposition, there are two points in particular that I want to discuss. The first concerns the words, which are so much at the head of the commentary on this bill, that the Justice and Electoral Committee unanimously supported the requirement that: “a member of Parliament seek a fresh mandate from voters if he or she acquires a fresh foreign allegiance while in office.” Well, well, well!

Members of this House will recall that we had the Prime Minister, I am sure, stand up in this House and say that this clause would be changed. She said that the situation of denying members of Parliament their seats because of some anachronism of 1886, or whatever it was she was going on about, was beyond justification. She asked why in this day and age we would have such a separation.

So we had this incredible situation where the law directed the Speaker to expunge a member from this House if he or she breached the Electoral Act, yet a member was allowed to sit in the Chamber, clearly in breach of the law, all that time. Although clearly in breach of the law that member was able to stay in this House, and this Government brought in special legislation to legalise and validate a breach of the law. The law was clear. In those circumstances, when a member has taken a foreign oath the Speaker should kick him or her out of the House. That is what the law said the Speaker should do. Well, it did not happen that way. According to this law, the Speaker—Parliament’s man—should have required Duynhoven to leave this Chamber—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson): The member will use the member’s full name—Speakers’ rulings 26/7 and 26/8.

—Mr Duynhoven to leave this Chamber—but he did not. So the Government then wrung its hands and said: “The legislation should be changed. It shouldn’t be allowed to happen. Whoever thought that would be the case?”. We suspected it was because we know that there was probably more than just one case on the Government side on that issue.

I notice we have not heard a single thing from Tim Barnett. We have not heard a single thing from Taito Phillip Field. We have not heard a word from them on this whole issue. What we have here is this bill, now saying that if a member of Parliament takes an allegiance to a foreign power then he or she will be kicked out. Well, I do not know whether that will count for much. It still requires someone to exercise discretion and obey the law, and have somebody kicked out of Parliament.

The Government would argue that it has put up an amendment that says that Mr Duynhoven was solely renewing his passport. Was it not the actual fact that the Dutch Government had passed a law to remove people’s citizenship, and then decided to reinstitute that law? Therefore there was no renewal of a passport, because the passport was invalidated. It ceased. There was no right. The Government in Holland brought in a new right that people could apply for their passports, and Mr Duynhoven went to get one. So this Government stood up in the Parliament and said: “What Mr Duynhoven did was no big deal. No one ever thought it would happen that way. The law is hundreds of years old and will be changed.” What do we have in this bill today? Exactly what the Opposition was saying at the time: Harry Duynhoven broke the law and the Speaker, according to the law, should have vacated that member’s seat if that person did, in fact, take allegiance outside of this House, and outside of this country. The Government has not changed that. If Harry Duynhoven applied for a British passport under this bill, he would be out, and I would expect the Speaker to exercise his responsibilities under the law and vacate that seat.

💬 Judith Collins: It would certainly have happened, had it been one of us.

It would definitely have happened, I am sure, regardless of which party the member came from. I cannot believe that a Speaker would have exercised favouritism on the basis of which party Mr Duynhoven was from. I do not believe that. But I would say this. If Mr Duynhoven had applied for his passport under this law, unanimously supported by the Labour members—and I do not think they realised this when they voted for it—they are saying what Harry Duynhoven did was wrong, it was against the law, and he should have had his seat vacated. But members will recall it was at a time when this Government did not want a referendum in a coastal electorate on its handling of the seabed and foreshore issue. Therefore there was all this jiggery-pokery so that no one actually had to consider whether he had broken the law.

Speaking of political shenanigans, what about the shocking revelation from the Hon Nick Smith today? This Government came to the Opposition seeking support for a bill that would have allowed the Labour Party to decide the colour of every other party’s political hoardings. Labour would have been able to decide where they go, the colour, the design, and the layout of everybody’s election hoardings. That is what Rick Barker tried to bring into this Parliament, under the approval of the Prime Minister. It was discussed in Cabinet that Rick Barker would go and try to pull the wool over members’ eyes. You know how it was done, do you not, Mr Speaker? Members were telephoned and told: “Oh, we’ve just got this little innocuous amendment based on the unanimous recommendation of the select committee, and we would like your support for it.” Well, thank goodness the National Party’s Richard Worth was on to this. When he got a copy of the bill it was clear that we were not going to support the Supplementary Order Paper that the Government was proposing.

Here is another one of these mistruths that we get from the Government. Did members hear on Morning Report the Government saying: “It was a unanimous recommendation of the select committee that the Government should have the ability to regulate and decide the size, colour, and format of the hoardings.”? Well, do members believe that? I thought it was Lianne Dalziel speaking on the radio when I heard that. But I looked at what the recommendation was. Basically it was a comment from the select committee, saying that it wanted the Minister to look at some levels and guidelines for hoardings, not a law that lets the Government decide the colour, size, and design of everybody’s election hoarding in New Zealand. Is that not a rort? That is the sort of thing that goes on in Mississippi, where the governing party decides what everybody else’s election hoardings will look like and what colour will be used. Does one member in this House not think that the Government would rule out the use of blue, black, green, yellow, or purple? Of course it would.

This is a desperate Government that knows its separatist agenda will be its undoing. This is a Government that has divided this country on a separatist, racially based policy setting, and it will be this Government’s undoing. Its separatist agenda of forcing racial preferences and separatism on this country will be the undoing of this Government, and that is why it desperately wanted to have—[Interruption] I hear Mrs Hobbs. Let us turn to what people’s declarations are on their enrolment forms. Do we want to go there? No we do not, because that is a rort, and what the Government was proposing is a rort. Thank goodness it has ended.

Bill read a second time.