Electoral Referendum Bill

I will take just a brief call on Part 3. This part deals with the total referendum expenses of a registered promoter in respect of the regulated period not exceeding $300,000. I presume that there are also amendments to this part from the ACT Party—it just seemed odd to be dealing with them in respect of Part 2.

The only point I want to make is that the citizens initiated referendum limit is $50,000, and as this is a citizens initiated referendum masquerading as a Government referendum, I think the amount should have been the same. This, however, was a negotiated settlement, as it were, between the political parties. We have swallowed some dead rats on both sides, and we are not going to have a debate about who swallowed the bigger rat—the Minister in the chair is looking vaguely uncomfortable. The reason this figure was settled on was that it represented the lowest end of a range that represents a medium-level campaign spend in the retail sector. We are talking, for example, about something that would include some television advertising, print media, advertising in the newspapers, and brochures being delivered to people’s houses. That seemed to be an acceptable level at which to resolve the matter.

Access to television was the one area where I felt there was an incredible sense of disquiet, and that was the reason there were so many more submissions to the Electoral Legislation Committee on the third-party campaign expenditure limits in the Electoral Referendum Bill, as opposed to the other legislation. Everyone knows that television advertising is very powerful. Companies would not use it if it were not as powerful as it is, and it can be used in a way that I think is unfortunate, in that we could see a campaign of deliberate misinformation about the effect of the supplementary-member representation system.

I know that every speech I will be giving between now and when we hold the referendum will refer to the supplementary-member representation system as first past the post with a winner’s bonus, because that is what it is. I will just put on record how that would have worked in the last election, and, fortunately, the New Zealand Herald columnist John Armstrong put it all together in a nice little piece. I will quote that into the record: “And before anyone mouths the words ‘supplementary member’, let’s beware of false prophets in sheep’s clothing. No doubt those wanting a return to those dark ages will seductively offer the supplementary member system as a halfway house between FPP and MMP. That system is in part proportional. It might look like a compromise. It is not. It is nothing short of snake oil elixir. Had last year’s election been fought under that system with a Parliament made up of 90 constituency seats and 30 list seats, National would have won 67 of them, compared with its current 58. That party would have had an absolute majority of 14 seats with just under 45 per cent of the vote. The Greens’ current entitlement of nine seats, would have been slashed to just two. So much for proportionality.”

I wanted to read that into the record in Part 3 because I want the public of New Zealand to know that they are not being offered a straight choice between proportional representation and a non-proportional system. They are being offered proportional representation in exchange for a version of first past the post, which looks as if it might be a compromise, but which is nothing of the sort. I think that with the campaign expenditure limits we have some hope for ensuring the public education campaign run by the Electoral Commission has some chance of success, in respect of ensuring the real messages get out there and ensuring people understand what the choices are.

The last point I make is in response to one of the comments made by the ACT Party: this is not a debate about freedom of speech. It is not about free speech; it is about paid speech. That ACT member said that he is championing the ordinary New Zealander who wants to speak out against the Prime Minister’s position on supplementary-member representation or against MMP, but that member is not championing their cause, at all. He is not championing their cause one bit. Which ordinary New Zealander has access to $300,000 in order to promote their particular view? There are those of us who will continue to express those views, and the expression of opinion is perfectly valid. But paid advertising should be accurate, and it should not misrepresent the importance of this referendum to the people of New Zealand.

I will respond to those comments from the Hon Lianne Dalziel because, like the Hon Lianne Dalziel, I was expecting a debate about the expenditure limits—the limits on the amount promoters will be able to spend for or against any particular electoral system—specified in Part 3 of the Electoral Referendum Bill. I was somewhat surprised that the Chairperson put the amendments from Hilary Calvert to the vote in the previous part. The ACT Party promoted an amendment that would allow third parties to spend up to $750,000; if we could not get Parliament to agree to a $750,000 limit, we suggested $500,000.

It is interesting that Lianne Dalziel criticised the fact that we put forward an amendment that would allow a third party the ability to spend $500,000, because she would call that paid speech. Yes, it is paid speech: it is buying advertising. It is what political parties do. Earlier this afternoon we voted on a bill that would enable the two major political parties in this Parliament to spend over $5 million—$5 million in paid speech, I tell Ms Dalziel.

💬 Hon Member: How much?

Five million dollars. Yet we will restrict the right of an organisation that wants to be involved in this referendum to try to sway the votes of New Zealanders one way or the other to the sum of no more than $300,000.

That is not the only thing Ms Dalziel misrepresented. She derided my contribution by asking which ordinary New Zealander has $300,000 to spend. We are not talking about individual New Zealanders; we are talking about organisations. We are talking about organisations that want to get involved in this election campaign.

I sat on the Electoral Legislation Committee that considered this submission, as did Ms Dalziel. She will be well aware that an organisation came along and submitted on this bill—an organisation that had formed to promote the MMP option. It was not one person; it was a group of people who purported to represent a much larger group of people, and they sent their spokespeople along. I do not know the name of the organisation; I cannot recall it—it may have been “Promote MMP” or “Pro-MMP”—but certainly an organisation had formed for the purposes of promoting MMP. That is right: it is not one person, but a whole series of people, an organisation—a grassroots New Zealand organisation. So for Lianne Dalziel to stand up and suggest that the ACT Party is talking about one New Zealander having the right to spend $300,000 misrepresents our position. Worse than that, she actually knows that she misrepresents our position.

The other point Lianne Dalziel made was that under the provisions of this bill, third parties—organisations such as the one that appeared before our select committee—will have access to television. They will have access to television to promote their view one way or the other in support of or against one of the four different systems that are being put forward.

It is interesting that she finds the use of television particularly obnoxious. The reason Labour finds television obnoxious is that it is powerful. One can actually persuade and influence people through television. We know that one of the reasons Len Brown’s committee put down for their success in Auckland was the early use of television.

Television is also denied to the smaller political parties in this Parliament; they are denied the chance to spend their own money on television. Another major failing of this Parliament is that it has not taken the opportunity to correct that problem.

💬 Amy Adams: This is the referendum bill; it’s not the finance bill.

This is the referendum bill, and I explain to Ms Adams that under the referendum bill people can form organisations for or against one or more of the electoral systems that have been promoted. They can spend their own money, they can spend it up to $300,000, and they can spend it on television. It is a pity that parties in this Parliament are denied the opportunity to do that.

Notwithstanding the fact that the limit is set at $300,000, the ACT Party will be voting for this bill. We support the right of New Zealanders to have a say on their electoral system; we think it is important. But also we think it is important that the people be informed and that they understand what is being offered to them. It is a tragedy that by putting limits on organisations such as the one that appeared before our Electoral Legislation Committee in Wellington—I think it included academics from Victoria University—we deny New Zealanders the opportunity to be fully informed.

I note that Lianne Dalziel referred to the supplementary member system. She called it first past the post with a winner’s bonus. I could take issue with that description of it, too, but I will not do so.

The other amendment that Hilary Calvert put before Parliament this afternoon was to do with the actual voting form that appears in schedule 1. I thought that I might have had an opportunity to speak to that before it was put before Parliament. Earlier this afternoon, the ACT Party put forward an amendment that would have provided for a vote in the referendum on the existence of the Māori seats. We did that because in the 1986 Royal Commission on the Electoral System the commissioners in recommending MMP also said that once there is a proportional system, there is no longer any need to have electoral seats set up on a racial basis.

💬 Hone Harawira: They were joking.

Mr Harawira may well say they were joking, but they were not. The record shows that the royal commission in recommending MMP said if there is a proportional system, a system where every vote counts, there is simply no need for the Māori seat option. It is a pity that Parliament took the opportunity of voting down that amendment this afternoon. Thank you.

Part 3 agreed to.

Part 4 Review and miscellaneous provisions