Appropriation (Continuation of Interim Meaning ofFunding for Parliamentary Purposes) Bill

Well, that is interesting, is it not? Here we are in this Committee debating a bill that is due to come into effect before Christmas, before the end of the year, and the Labour Government is shutting down the debate on it. We are not even allowed to debate it in this Chamber—

The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley): The member will be seated. The decision about how long a debate goes on is the Chairperson’s decision. If the member wishes to criticise the Chairperson, there is a proper process for doing so.

Madam Chairperson, Government members opposite moved the closure motion, and the debate on clause 1 was closed based on a vote. At no stage did I intend to criticise your decision. I was criticising the Government for moving a closure motion to shut down debate on this bill.

The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley): OK; I accept that.

This bill is due to come into force on 1 January next year. I want to make the point I made when this bill was introduced: the Government has had the whole year to negotiate this bill. As insidious as the National Party found the whole bill in essence, we were prepared to talk about the processes around moving forward, understanding that this validation bill would lapse at the end of this calendar year. However, the Government has made no attempt to set up sensible, reasonable, cross-party negotiations. The first time the matter was raised with the National Party was in September. So the previous Minister of Justice was sitting on this piece of legislation, knowing that it was going to expire at the end of the calendar year. It has been discussed at the Parliamentary Service Commission as expiring at the end of the year. Everyone has been aware that the legislation was due to expire, but the Government and the previous Minister of Justice have done nothing—absolutely nothing—until it was so late in the piece, the end of September, when negotiations were started.

Now we are faced with 3 or 4 weeks of sittings of the House in which to rush a bill like this through. We cannot even fully debate it in this Committee without having closure motions moved by the Government after only a couple of speakers. That is outrageous; that is an assault on democracy.

💬 Sue Moroney: I raise a point of order, Madam Chairperson. The speaker on her feet is asserting that she is not allowed to debate this bill although she is clearly on her feet debating the bill.

💬 Hon Tony Ryall: That’s not a point of order.

The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley): We will have just one warning on this; when I am trying to rule on a point of order there will be silence. It is not a point of order.

So we are now in the position of having to debate this bill under extreme provocation and extreme circumstances, because it is time limited. There is no opportunity for us to discuss alternatives to this insidious bill.

We are told that if this bill does not commence on 1 January next year, we will have no rules under which to operate. That is absolutely absurd. This Parliament had perfectly good rules. We do not need this bill. We could quite easily see this legislation lapse and go back to the old rules that were in force prior to this backward, retrospective, validating legislation, and if everyone abided by those rules there would be no problems. We have worked hard this year to clarify the rules so that everyone understood them. We could start on 1 January, when this new legislation is due to come into effect, and as long as everyone abided by the rules there would be no prosecutions or problems. We could all carry on under the rules that Parliament lived under, in reasonable circumstances, for a number of elections.

We are now faced with this legislation that will legitimise and legalise behaviour that was against the existing rules. There is no need for this legislation to come into effect from 1 January next year and to run for another 18 months. The existing rules were perfectly adequate. If people had abided by those rules, then the Auditor-General would not have found in the way he did, and we would not be in the situation we are in today whereby the Labour Party is trying to rort the rules.

I do not know whether members have read the latest Listener editorial but there are four words in that editorial that sum up this bill wonderfully. Those four words are “the public deserve better”. It is an absolute disgrace to the democracy of our country that we have a law that has been introduced under urgency that follows another law that was introduced under urgency—

💬 Hon Ruth Dyson: It’s not under urgency.

We all know that the previous bill was supplied to the Opposition 2 hours before it was supposed to be debated in the House. We now have the same tricks again and the public deserve better. The public deserve to have some confidence in the democracy of our country and in our Parliament. The public deserve better.

All that can be said about this law is that it is one law for MPs. This bill should not have a commencement date at all. It should not be necessary to introduce this bill. If this Government had done what it said it would do last time, this bill would have quietly lapsed. As the Minister of Finance said last time: “There is a sunset date. It will expire at the end of next year. That has been done because we had to respond to the need for a broader review of the rules.” We have not had a broader review of the rules, and this is not it.

The reason we are back in this Chamber debating this invidious legislation is that the Government did not do what it said it had to do. We all know and we should all appreciate the absolute importance of electoral law in our country, and the importance of electoral law having at least some form of consensus in the House if it is to be at all enduring. This bill does not have consensus. It is an absolute disgrace. We would not need a commencement date for yet another roll-over piece of legislation if the Minister had actually done something about it before now—if he had made an effort to sit down with the other parties to work through the issues and produce a generally consensual and therefore enduring electoral law. He has failed.

We would not need a commencement date if, for example, such rules that needed clarification were so clarified in the other invidious piece of legislation joined at the hip to this one—namely, the Electoral Finance Bill. One cannot treat one bill without the other. But here we are today with yet another commencement date for yet another invidious bill that is a disgrace, because Labour was caught cheating. The Labour Government was caught cheating. It knew the rules, it broke the rules, and then it validated its own illegal actions. Yet here we are today with some interim measures, some continuation of definitions, and some new commencement date for substantially the same definition, knowing that, in the words of the Minister of Finance: “The House will still have to come back to permanent long-term rules in 2009.”

We do not need a commencement date for a disgraceful bill that provides, with its twin the Electoral Finance Bill, that there will now be one rule for politicians and one rule for everyone else. We do not need a commencement date for a shameful piece of legislation that says that politicians will be able to do almost anything when it comes to political advertising but that the public will be able to do almost nothing. It says that we will make it harder for ordinary private citizens to have freedom of expression, which restricts public advocacy and is a dramatic assault on human rights. But it states that we will relax the rules for incumbent members of Parliament, especially Government ones, and that is shameful.

We do not need a commencement date for an invidious piece of legislation because the Labour Party issued a pledge card it should not have issued and because of the Labour Party’s utter, utter disregard for electoral law and for ordinary, normal democratic principles. The Listener editorial is quite intriguing. It states that MPs will be covered by the “One Law for MPs Bill”, which allows them to campaign next year, right up to the day before the election, using the generous taxpayer-funded allowances given to each party represented in Parliament, and that, what is more, this spending will not be counted as part of each MP’s individual spending cap.

Kate Wilkinson has been here only a relatively short time and I have to say that I have a degree of respect for her because she is a frank-talking lawyer—an industrial lawyer, I think. But, my goodness! I have to say that she read that speech beautifully but I do not know who the hell wrote it, because it is wrong—absolutely, totally wrong.

We learnt today at the Parliamentary Service Commission, from Rodney Hide, that the National Party approached him—a chap called—

💬 Anne Tolley: He lied.

Is the National whip going to deny this?

💬 Anne Tolley: Yes.

This is what Rodney Hide told the Parliamentary Service Commission. He said that Wayne Eagleson—who the hell is Wayne Eagleson—on behalf of the National Party came to Rodney Hide and said “The best way to handle this issue is to roll it over.”

💬 Anne Tolley: He didn’t say that.

Yes, he did.

💬 Anne Tolley: He did not.

He did, and I took particular note.

💬 Anne Tolley: I know you did.

Did the member see me writing it down?

💬 Anne Tolley: Yes, I did.

Did she?

💬 Anne Tolley: Yes, I did.

No, the note was in my brain. National members make one noise here in this Chamber to the public, and another noise behind the scenes. They know we have to have rules and we have to have legislation to govern the activities of MPs. Kate Wilkinson knows this because I have worked with her on the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee and I know that she is a sound-thinking person. I do not agree with her politics but I know she is a sound-thinking person. She knows that we have to have rules governing what MPs can or cannot do when it comes to an election. That is what—

💬 Bob Clarkson: You didn’t do that at the last election.

Goodness me, Bob Clarkson is actually speaking in this Chamber. He is not asleep in the lobby. He is actually here speaking. Goodness me!

💬 Barbara Stewart: He hasn’t taken a call though.

He has not taken call—will the member over there take a call? Will Mr Clarkson take the next call? I would welcome him taking the call. Goodness me!

💬 Hon Tony Ryall: Will New Zealand First pay the money back to the Western Bay Finance depositors?

Will I pay the money back? Mr Clarkson will find out in due course what we are going to do with the money, but I can tell the member that New Zealand First stuck to the rules, and we will stick to these rules. We did not employ international consultants to work out what we should do in the campaign because we thought it was going to be a July election, as those guys did, and then use taxpayers’ money to produce the hoardings before the event. We did not do that. We stuck to the rules, and we had this brochure checked off by Parliamentary Service. Parliamentary Service will tell the members that. We also had it checked off by the Electoral Commission, and the commission will tell the members that.

This commencement date is the right date. We have got to roll over this bill, it is absolutely essential we roll over this bill. Members can see the discourse that National is in. The National members do not even agree with one another so it is essential we roll over this bill, and to a time that takes it beyond the next election to take the heat out of the situation.

This bill has three pages. It is very straightforward, it simply says what an MP can or cannot do in terms of doing his or her job as an MP. One would expect the criteria governing what an MP can or cannot do to be different from those of a candidate. It is ridiculous of Kate Wilkinson to put candidates and MPs in the same barrow. It is absolutely ridiculous. She knows it now that she is an MP, or she will find out if she does not already know. I know she knows it. It is a different kettle of fish being here representing people, from being a candidate trying to be a person here representing people. MPs have got to be allowed to do their job and do their job effectively.

💬 Colin King: What are you talking about?

Those guys over there clearly do not know what an MP’s job is. It is not to sit here, make noise, and oppose everything that comes up under the sun. Members are here to make constructive criticism.

The designers of this bill, the people who want it rolled over, should reflect on the opportunities it offers because of the structure of the finances it covers, and the manner in which those finances are issued, dispensed, and ultimately accounted for, because I foresee a problem. Just as I hear Mr Brown occasionally talking about his marine experience, I have had a bit of experience in marketing, sales, and negotiation, and I sense there is a real problem with this particular bill. I would honestly encourage those who are saying “Yes, we’ve got to have it. Yes, it’s necessary.”, to think about what it might cause, because I do not think this legislation has been thought through at all so I am very, very pleased to be speaking against it.

Prior to preparing my notes to speak on this bill I carefully read the speeches that were given at the time of the first reading. I have heard people speaking about it during question time and I am definitely left thinking that if this were a sales opportunity, someone is trying to sell me a pup with this bill. In many ways it is a classic example of what happens when a Government is as blindly regulation-driven as this one. One has only to look at the way the bill is being introduced, and at the aspects we are discussing at the moment. Every day one hears of yet another instance of rigorous regulation being imposed on the lives of Kiwis. People are actually getting sick of it, but Labour sycophants are loving it.

The self-perpetuating cycle of regulation goes something like this. Ministers will be judged to be efficient by their commitment to regulatory political correctness. One has only to analyse and assess the recent promotions in the soft-shoe shuffle to see this being borne out. The cycle continues—as each clings to regulation for self-justification and as shortcomings become evident, then the solution is more regulation. Then if one has no fresh regulation, one rolls it over—rolls over what one had before. That is why we are going to see a perpetuation of what occurred before, but this time it will be legal.

In respect of this particular bill there are differences. We are not just rolling over, as I have been told, the same legislation that we had before, because the situation has changed. There is a scissor action occurring interacting between this bill and the Electoral Finance Bill. On the one hand in the appropriation legislation parliamentary funding can be spent on soft election advertising, then the other scissor blade comes in with the proposed Electoral Finance Bill, and MPs’ spending on soft election advertising does not count towards a party’s or a candidate’s election spending cap. The scissor action effectively cuts a line between existing members and new candidates, especially—and I refer to the previous speaker—new candidates with names that are difficult to pronounce. If it is being suggested that I will find it a little harder to get my name known as a list MP than I would as a candidate, I have news for that member.

Other members have spoken at length on the inequity that this bill will create. But if I may, I would like to sound a different note of caution. The note of caution is expressed towards those who have been so enthusiastic for it. If the bill goes forward as it is, it will not be long before it has to be changed again, because I suggest it is being used for a purpose it is not designed for, for a situation that no longer is there, and it will create opportunities to bring about the very things it is supposed to prevent. We heard earlier from my colleague the Hon Tony Ryall, who illustrated some of the things we have seen in the past—the bright red print process is what we call it. It produces information such as that written here: “You are better off with Labour.”

💬 Kate Wilkinson: Propaganda! Pure propaganda!

It is pure propaganda, but it will be called “information”. In a normal election year, as one progresses towards election time, and as the campaigns begin—

There are a small number of amendments in my name that I have been moved to put forward because I am concerned that the Government was taking closure motions on this Appropriation (Continuation of Interim Meaning of Funding for Parliamentary Purposes) Bill after only two speeches from the Opposition. I tell the Government members that if they want to be voting on every date in 2008 and 2009, then Ms Moroney should go ahead and cut this debate short. She will prove what a great junior Labour whip she is when she has the Committee voting for 2½ hours on amendments.

If this Opposition does not get the chance to have a say, that is exactly what this Committee will be doing, because we will not allow the rights of the minority in this Committee to be stampeded across by a party that in this bill will favour the red printing press, such as we have never seen before. The amendments that I have for this Committee—[Interruption] She is such a great junior Labour whip that it will be really well received in the Beehive when it is found out that because of her move to concertina two Opposition speakers on the bill we will all be a voting on amendments.

I put forward these amendments because I do not think this bill should come into effect this year. I do not think it should come into effect until some time later, so I have put forward amendments that will have this bill coming in at a later date, because it will give a future Parliament the opportunity to deal with this sort of law in the way that it should.

Like the Electoral Finance Bill, these pieces of legislation should be dealt with on a multiparty basis of consensus across the House. We simply cannot have the law that applies to parliamentary spending and the election changing every election depending on who the winner is. That is the thing that has forced this House for generations to come together on rules that all the parties—certainly the main parties—can agree on. Parties realise that what goes around comes around and that what is done by the Government to the Opposition invites that Opposition, when it becomes the Government, to do to the Opposition what it is doing to the Opposition now. That is the reason why we have always had an approach of bipartisan agreement under the old system, and multiparty agreement under the new system, to the rules of election spending and the rules of election finance.

That is why we have moved amendments to get this bill debated in a better culture where there can be multiparty agreement and all the parties come together. It is not good for democracy that the rules around parliamentary spending and elections change depending on who the victor in the election is. That is what happens in South America. That is what happens behind the Iron Curtain. That is what happens in corrupt banana republics. Whoever the winner is, they change the electoral law to suit them, and that is what is being proposed here.

At the last election, under the old rules, it was illegal to spend money on materials like those I am holding—which are, no doubt, designed to promote, as they do, the Labour Party—in the period of the election, and they had to be counted as election spending if they were produced. Under what is being proposed in this bill and the Electoral Finance Bill, these brochures promoting the Labour Party and its candidates can go out in the days before the election and they will not be counted as election spending.

This bill, together with the Electoral Finance Bill, provides immunity from coverage for parties and members of Parliament because of their work as members of Parliament. At the last election these materials I am holding and the credit card were found to be election expenses and costly, and they had to be declared. But what has happened? This bill, together with the Electoral Finance Bill, says that all this bright red election material, paid for by the taxpayers, will become perfectly legitimate in the election campaign period. If these things go out now and they are within the rules, they are not counted as election activity. They are counted as informational.

💬 Peter Brown: What do they say?

They say that Helen Clark is doing a great job and to vote for her. That is what they try to say. They say they are delivering more for families.

💬 Hon Bill English: What do they say about Trevor Mallard? More punch for your dollar.

Yes. They say: “More punch for your dollar.” That is what he is saying in this material. This material going out now is not an election expense, but it is during the election period.

I am happy to take a call on the commencement clause in what is a very important bill. I point out to the member who has just resumed his seat that when he was in Government and was making the rules, he felt that it was perfectly fine to pass the Electoral Act of 1993 that governed how parliamentarians can spend their money as MPs to communicate with their constituents. When he was in Government he thought it was fine to be able to do the kinds of things that we have all been talking about doing here tonight; he thought that was fine. He did not have a problem. In fact, he was a Cabinet Minister in the National Government that passed the very laws we are affirming here today.

I also want to point out that what we are doing here today is exactly what the National Party wanted to do in the cross-party talks that occurred. It is exactly what National members wanted to happen, until they saw a cynical and dishonest political advantage in trying to pretend that this was not the position they had taken the whole time. I have been sitting here listening to this debate. I say to the National members that they are not doing themselves any favours over this. It was fine for Bill English and Tony Ryall to stand up in this House and pass an electoral Act that allowed exactly what we are doing today and exactly what the members of this Parliament thought was the law, until the Auditor-General’s report. Many of us disagreed with that report but we accepted it and we paid the money back. As we know, just like that forward pass in a certain rugby game between the All Blacks and the French, one does not always agree with the referee but one accepts the decision and moves on.

We are debating a commencement date for something that simply continues what we have always understood to be the case since National passed the law in 1993. Those members stand up now and try to take the high ground, as they always do, from a base completely lacking in any moral conviction. They use much of their funding to close electorate offices so they can spend more money on pamphlets about themselves. I suspect that next year—

💬 Anne Tolley: Ha, ha!

Anne Tolley can laugh. There were four electorate offices in the East Coast electorate under Labour; there are now two under National. But they are so cynical, that I suggest we may see some opening next year in the East Coast electorate. Maybe we will see that, as the National Party members decide they will try to take the moral high ground and say they are not spending any more money on promoting themselves but are instead opening electorate offices. I say that the public of New Zealand are far more savvy than that. They can see through it.

💬 Hon Tony Ryall: Look at your brochures.

I say to Mr Ryall that he was quite happy to put out pamphlets when he was in Government—he was quite happy to put them out before the last election—and I just say that people in glass houses should not throw stones.

I will be watching with interest the next election campaign. That party over there has $7 million to spend. For every single pamphlet that goes out with the parliamentary crest on, we will be telling the people of New Zealand: “This is the National Party that stood up and said this money should not be spent.” We will tell the public that it is the same National Party that stood up and accused other parties in this House of being corrupt for doing exactly what we have always understood the law to be, and it is exactly what they have always understood the law to be, and they are still happy to spend that money. There is a word for that and we are not allowed to use it in this House, but the people of New Zealand know it. Mr Ryall is telling them all to be quiet now and to hush down, because he knows they are on shaky ground.

For every pamphlet that goes out next year with the parliamentary crest on it, we will be saying to the National Party members: “Where are your standards now? Where are your high morals?”. We will remind them that they stood up in the House and called other parties corrupt for using parliamentary spending in the way we had always assumed we were allowed to. We are simply carrying this over until we can get some kind of cross-party agreement on how the rules should be set after the Auditor-General’s report. The National Party backed out of those talks when Labour said it would do exactly what National was asking for. When we said we would extend the provisions and do exactly what National had been asking for, National backed out and said it would play political games on this issue. I say that that is not good enough.

I say to the National members that they can bleat on all they want but we will be watching during the next election campaign. We will be watching that party, which passed the very law we are now affirming in this House, for every dollar of taxpayers’ funding that its members spend, after they stood up in this House and said they believed this measure to be corrupt. So I say good luck to the National members in the next campaign, because they will need it.

My colleague tells me that Labour is 23 percent behind in the East Coast electorate. I would advise the Labour candidate to stay away from that electorate, because a Labour Party candidate wandering around the East Coast having to answer questions about the use of taxpayers’ money in the last election will be getting no votes whatsoever.

We need to remind the Committee of just why we are here. This bill does not need a commencement date, because Parliament does not need this legislation. The only reason it is here is that Labour broke the rules in the 2005 election, after it had been told by the Auditor-General what the rules were.

Before the election the Auditor-General said: “Remember there is a 3-month period, and in that period of time the rules are tight and you should be very careful.” During the 3-month period, after the Auditor-General had told the Labour Party—and everybody—to be careful, Labour was told the same thing by the Chief Electoral Officer during the election period. In fact, it was only about a month out from the election. The Labour Party wrote back to the Chief Electoral Officer and said: “Yes, the pledge card is electioneering.” Labour members agreed, and they said they would count it in their expenses. That was not the National Party rabble opposition, and it was not the nasty, smearing Auditor-General; it was the secretary of the Labour Party. That is who it was. I do not think the Labour MPs knew that. Labour put down on paper that, yes, it accepted that the pledge card was electioneering. By definition, that means that Labour accepted that it broke the rules. The public knows Labour broke the rules, because it paid back the money. Have members ever seen Helen Clark admit she is wrong about anything? No, except for the pledge card, when Labour paid back the money.

But, of course, as the member said, Labour still does not accept that it can do anything wrong. Once Labour had paid back the money it then wanted to cover it up by saying that everyone broke the rules, and that the Auditor-General is so silly that it has to pass legislation to validate MPs paying for the lighting in their office and putting ads in the paper for constituent clinics. That is why Labour passed this law. It said that if it got caught out, the Auditor-General must be stupid and the rules must be wrong, so we have to validate everything that MPs have ever done. That is the sort of standard of morality that Labour has set. Labour members believe they are the only people who can validate everything that MPs have ever done.

That is the legislation that expires on 30 December, which is why this bill is here with a 1 January commencement date. It should not have a commencement date. The bill is here only because Dr Cullen was piqued that he got caught out. He was angry and frustrated, so he made Parliament pass a law to prove that Labour was right. That is what this bill is all about—to try to prove that Labour was right.

We do not need the bill. As the previous speaker said, the rules have not changed since before 1993—in fact, since about 1989. The rules are the same. The only thing that ever happened was that Labour broke them. Egregiously and deliberately, Labour exceeded the expenditure limit for the election by $600,000 or $700,000. It has never been done before. The way to make sure that rules count is to enforce them. Unfortunately, after the last election, the rules were not enforced when they should have been enforced—on everyone. Other parties broke the rules to a minor extent. The rules should have been enforced. That is what this bill is here for.

I invite the member for the East Coast to wander round the countryside looking for voters for Labour and to tell them that Labour is passing legislation that means that MPs can spend what they like, right up to election day, but the candidate who is running against her cannot.

The member for the Tainui Māori seat is over there. The Māori Party candidate standing against her will be limited to $20,000 for election year, but Nanaia Mahuta will have the ability to spend about $80,000—all of it public money. The Māori Party candidate will have to go and raise the $20,000 with cake stalls and raffle tickets. Nanaia Mahuta will get $80,000 handed to her. That is Labour’s definition of a fair go. In fact, Labour thinks that money given to someone is better if it is public money.

I appreciate the opportunity to speak on the commencement date of the Appropriation (Continuation of Interim Meaning of Funding for Parliamentary Purposes) Bill, which is 1 January 2008. Let the Government on the other side of the Chamber understand one thing about that date and about this commencement clause: the people of New Zealand will respect the effort being put up by this side of the Chamber to expose that date and this legislation for exactly what it is.

💬 Chris Auchinvole: What is it?

It is a disgrace. It is a further insidious socialist attack on the way of democracy of this country. That is what it is. The commencement date in this bill is necessary only because that Government over there—that party over there—acted against the rules that existed at the time. The Labour members will not accept that. They will not front up to that. They would rather play around with our system of democracy.

💬 Chris Auchinvole: In denial.

They are in total denial.

On the commencement date of this bill, New Zealand will not be the New Zealand of the strong, bipartisan sense of democratic tradition that has served this country so well for so long. On that day—the first day of the new year and the commencement date of this bill—newspapers around the country will be able to repeat the headline of this Monday’s New Zealand Herald: “Democracy under threat”, because that is what the commencement date of this legislation will mean to New Zealanders.

New Zealanders are following this debate very, very closely. They understand that 1 January 2008 is actually not very far away, and they ask: “Why the rush?”. Why is the Parliament of New Zealand, with all the issues that New Zealand is facing, spending tonight debating the commencement date of this legislation, which is necessary only because the Government broke the rules? That is why this commencement date is necessary, and I suggest that New Zealand First members really think very, very carefully about their position.

The speech on the commencement date made by Peter Brown was not a good speech. Goodness knows what he was on about. He had better go away over Christmas and think about 1 January, the commencement date, and think about what ordinary New Zealanders are saying about this bill. He should have no doubt at all that ordinary New Zealanders will make their view very, very clear. Throughout New Zealand, there is a very strong sense of unease at the action that this Government and its coalition supporters are taking.

On 1 January 2008, the commencement date of this bill, New Zealanders will realise just what sort of Government they have. New Zealanders will think about the things that have been said in this Chamber during the debate on the commencement date, and they will reflect on the comments of the Hon Tony Ryall, the Hon Bill English, my fine colleague Kate Wilkinson, Chris Auchinvole, and Christopher Finlayson. They will reflect and they will be grateful and respectful because at least there was one party in this House that stood up in the defence of New Zealand’s democratic way of life.

We, the members of this House, are elected to represent the people in our constituencies and in the country. They expect this party on this side of the House to speak out against this legislation, against the commencement date in it, and against the fact that if it is passed, on 1 January 2008—it is not long away—democracy will not be the same.

I am speaking on clause 2, which, as we know, is the commencement clause. Clause 2 of the Appropriation (Continuation of Interim Meaning of Funding for Parliamentary Purposes) Bill, as drafted, states: “This Act comes into force on the day after the date on which it receives the Royal assent.”

As some speakers have been suggesting, given that the Appropriation (Parliamentary Expenditure Validation) Act 2006 expires on 31 December 2007, it would make sense that if this vile legislation is to go through, the commencement date should be 1 January 2008. Putting aside the merits of the legislation for the moment and focusing—as indeed we must—on the commencement clause, we see that there is a certain symmetry in having a commencement date of 1 January 2008. I imagine that if the Electoral Finance Bill is enacted—against the interests and concerns of the National Party—the commencement date for the Electoral Finance Bill could also be 1 January 2008.

That is appropriate, because we would then have, on 1 January 2008, the enactment of this shabby legislation, the Appropriation (Continuation of Interim Meaning of Funding for Parliamentary Purposes) Bill—which would facilitate Labour’s next pledge card and atrocious advertising we had in 2005—and, at the same time, we would have the commencement of the Electoral Finance Act, which, of course, is designed to shut down political discourse throughout election year. So there is symmetry, it seems to me, in having a commencement date of 1 January 2008.

Had it not been for the formula in clause 2—namely, that the Act comes into force on the day after the date on which it receives the Royal assent—another appropriate commencement date could have been today, because with the release of the report from the State Services Commission today, we have seen the undermining of the political neutrality of the Civil Service, as evidenced by that very sad report. So we have a Government that is dedicated to upholding democratic ideals, introducing legislation, to commence on 1 January, that provides the basis for the misuse of parliamentary funds. On the same day we have the Electoral Finance Act, which is designed to shut down political discourse throughout the country for one-third of the election cycle, and we have an undermining of the political neutrality of the Civil Service. When we put those three elements together—

💬 Chris Auchinvole: What do you get?

—we see two very concerning matters, I say to Mr Auchinvole.

First, we see the overstepping of vital informal limits that were hitherto central to political contests. It was always understood that there were certain lines beyond which one did not go, and Labour does not accept that any more. Secondly, it represents a ruthless and consistent use of the power of the State to advance the interests of one party—the Labour Party—at the expense of democratic society.

Well, I say to this revolting Labour Government that it can have whatever commencement date it wants. It may by chance win a vote in the Committee tonight, but the National Party will not let it get away with it. This Government will be held to account. There will be an accounting, because this kind of legislation, which seeks to ride roughshod over fundamental democratic principles, is immoral and will be repealed, just as our leader has said. Whatever commencement date this Government applies to the electoral finance legislation, that too will be repealed, because there are limits. There are informal limits. In a society like ours, if one does not respect the informal rules, if the parties do not act according to a certain set of standards, then one leads one’s country by the shorter route to chaos.

We see the standards of the Labour Government in its seeking to have legislation to commence, as clause 2 provides, on the day after the date on which it receives the Royal assent. We see the standards of this Labour Government evidenced in the correspondence between the general secretary of the Labour Party and the Chief Electoral Officer in September and October last year—on the one hand expressing concern, and on the other hand withdrawing it.

I move, That the question be now put.