Electoral (Integrity) Amendment Bill

I move, That the Electoral (Integrity) Amendment Bill be now read a second time.

It’s a great pleasure to take this opening call in the second reading of this piece of legislation, because it does a very fundamental thing in our democracy. It affirms the very basic principle of MMP, which is that proportionality of party representation in Parliament is everything, and it reaffirms the point that the electorate, and only the electorate, determines the make-up of Parliament. There’s a corollary to that: it, further, affirms that no individual MP on a whim can change the proportionality of representation of parties in Parliament. That is what it does.

Now, there’s been a lot of scaremongering and commentary, particularly from members opposite, or actually, really, from only one member opposite, and that’s Dr Nick Smith. But, actually, what he has singularly failed to do—and I might say he is in quite good company, because I have been stunned at those with letters after their names, occupying senior academic positions at our universities. Every single one of them has totally failed to refer to the number of conditions attached to a decision by a party to remove a member from their ranks, or, at least, to give a notice to the Speaker to give a notice to the member. So Dr Nick Smith, and pretty much all members of the National Party and others who have commented on it, have failed to take into account the provision in the bill that in order for a leader to take any step at all, the leader of the party—the leader of the particular caucus—must have the support of two-thirds of that caucus. That is a major safeguard.

We wouldn’t be in the position where, for example, you had an MP in your ranks who said “It’s time the party”—the National Party, in that case—“did something to show what it stood for.” and was met with members in his own party moving motions in their caucus to expel him. That was the experience of Maurice Williamson. Those were members opposite, prepared to expel one of their own members for having the temerity to go public—in 2003—and say, “It’s about time we had a party that knew what it stood for.” Well, I might add, 15 years on, we’re still waiting. Maurice Williamson is gone, but 15 years on, we’re still waiting.

The reality is this: this bill is important. It’s an important signal, an important provision in our electoral law make-up, to make sure when voters vote under our MMP system—and we have a system that goes out to secure the confidence of the voting public—that their decision matters, that their vote counts, and that their collective vote which determines the make-up of this Parliament cannot be changed by an MP who, part-way through a Parliament, decides on a whim they’re going to do something different and distorts the proportionality of Parliament. It has happened before in this Parliament, and it has happened under comparable legislation to this.

All members in this House will know of the case involving Donna Awatere Huata, who abandoned membership of her own party, and that party—the ACT party—took action. It went to court to determine whether or not the proportionality of Parliament had been upset. The Supreme Court, the highest court in our land, determined that proportionality had been upset, and, on that basis, she was out and she was replaced. That was right because when it comes to the voice of the electorate, when it comes to voting systems, the collective voice of the electorate must stand for something. It should not be undermined by members in this House who decide on a whim, or for whatever other reason, that they’re going to go on a frolic of their own and upset the proportionality of Parliament that the electorate has determined.

If they want to do it, because any member is free to do it—and that has happened also in this House. Dame Tariana Turia, a former Labour Party member, decided that she could not live with decisions of the Labour Government at the time, and she left. She left the party, and she tested her mandate with her electorate. She wasn’t the first, but she was one of the most recent. She did it, and that is the proper thing to do. She came back under the banner of a new party, with an electoral mandate.

💬 Hon Michael Woodhouse: This would disallow that. This would prevent a by-election.

If Michael Woodhouse thinks that that would somehow be prohibited in this legislation, no wonder Nick Smith’s in the trouble that he’s in. If that’s the collective understanding of the National Party caucus, they’re going to be on that side of the House for a long time, because it shows to us they cannot read legislation. It shows to us that they don’t understand the basics of understanding legislation, because that would not be prevented under this bill. This bill is about reaffirming that very basic principle and that very basic point.

But, you see, here’s the other thing—here’s the real constraint on dodgy political decision-making, and that is that politics will still continue. You see, on this side of the House, we’re quite happy to tolerate and understand and even sometimes embrace difference. A couple of parliaments ago, one of our members, Damien O’Connor—standing up fiercely for the rights of his electorate—voted against his own party, the Labour Party, at the time, in favour of a Government bill to deal with windfall timber from a major storm on the West Coast. He did the political thing: he spoke with his party, spoke with his colleagues. His colleagues understood. Of course he had to look after the core interests of his constituency, and it happened. Politics will still happen. Politics—political judgments—will still be made.

I compare that, for example, with what we saw in this House just earlier this year, when this House was dealing with a member’s bill on medicinal cannabis and a couple of members opposite said, “No, we’re going to vote for it, because we’re the young liberals of the National Party, and we’re going to defy our then leader, and we’re going to vote for it.” Everybody was excited: “Look at this. A new, invigorated National Party is doing something it’s never done before in having MPs that are prepared to abandon the whip.” Then, when it came to the vote, what happened? They all voted the same. Those “Young Liberal Turks”,—who put their name out there and said “We’re not going to be bound by the old morays of the National Party any more.”, voted with the rest of their dull, grey colleagues, might I add. They did that.

We take no moral lesson from members opposite when they talk about the great right to abandon your party whip and all the freedom of speech stuff, because they don’t do it. They’ve never done it, and they’re never going to do it. Poor old Maurice Williamson was the last one who dared to stick his head above the parapet, and they tried to expel him. Well, on this side of the House, the reason we don’t worry about this is because we understand the right of members to disagree and to have a debate and to enjoy the privileges of this party. But one thing that this side of the House totally gets is that being in this House is not about being part of an elite. It’s not about taking the privilege to the point where we deny the will of the electorate.

What members opposite actually want to do when they oppose this legislation is have the right to defy the will of the New Zealand electorate. That is the contempt in which they hold voters in this country. Well, voters in this country have been very clear to me and to other members on this side of the House that they want the right of every voter, when the electorate votes collectively, to have their vote respected. It is respected when this House accepts that the proportionality of party representation in this House is solely the preserve of the electorate. It is not the right of members in this House to arbitrarily and sometimes capriciously decide they know better, they are bigger and more important, they are part of an elite, and they can defy the will of the electorate.

This bill affirms a fundamental principle of MMP. Now, I know we’ll hear all sorts of speeches, because we know that Dr Smith loves talking about 1930s Germany, and he accused various Government officials of being something pretty close to it, which was pretty despicable on his part—he’s a pretty despicable MP at times. But one thing is absolutely clear, and that is what this bill stands for and what this Government stands for, and that is the right of the electorate to be respected and the obligation of this House to respect the judgment of the electorate every three years, when they decide the make-up of this House and do not give licence to individual MPs to completely subvert it.

I just remind members that all members in this House are honourable members.

Freedom of speech, tolerance of dissent, and respect for democracy are core Kiwi values that are worth fighting for. National opposed this bill at first reading and at select committee, and we will do so at every stage of the parliamentary process. The right of voters, and voters alone, to dismiss MPs was established 330 years ago with the Bill of Rights 1688. The powers in this bill for a party leader to dismiss an MP have no place in a liberal democracy like New Zealand.

This bill is, ironically, named the Electoral (Integrity) Amendment Bill. Its purpose, process, and the behaviour of Government MPs have been completely lacking in integrity. The Government says the purpose is to prevent distorting the proportionality of Parliament from party-hoppers. This is bunkum. The number of MPs switching parties has been negligible in the last six parliaments. There has only been one in the last decade, and that was Brendan Horan, who was desperate to stay in New Zealand First. There have been far greater distortions in proportionality from by-elections, from MPs resigning under the six-month rule, and from the threshold rule.

The real purpose of this bill is to prop up this fragile Government by silencing any internal criticism. The Government’s own statement on this bill says—and I quote—“[It] will have a chilling effect on the expression of dissenting views by MPs.” That sends a shiver up the spine of every Kiwi who loves and believes in democracy. This bill is about Parliament giving Mr Peters a legislative hammer to nail MPs—like Brendan Horan—who he falls out with.

It is important that I detail the lack of integrity of the select committee process. We had 55 submissions—not one supported this bill unamended. We had 21 constitutional and electoral law experts from our four great universities, the Human Rights Commission, the Law Society, former Speakers, and even the Clerk of the House opposing this bill.

There are four concerning aspects of the process. Government MPs refused to discuss or consider any amendments, despite dozens of reasonable proposals from both officials and submitters. Secondly, Government MPs—shamefully—blocked the Justice Committee from even providing a report to this House on the bill. The Government refused to release the advice on this bill’s compliance with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act, despite that always being made public in the past, and it’s an important issue when we have 21 legal experts saying it breaches the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. We also wanted it recorded that the committee unanimously resolved for officials to appear to answer questions on the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act issue, but they refused to attend—something I have not seen in 28 years. These unprecedented lengths the Government has gone to to hide critical advice completely contradicts this Government’s position that it is the most open and transparent Government ever.

The Green Party position over this bill sets a new low in parliamentary integrity. Co-leader Marama Davidson says this bill is undemocratic, she says it is a threat to democracy, and she says it goes against Green Party principles and policies, but they are voting for it. She justified it by saying this—and I quote—“It is in our supply and confidence agreement, and we had to.” That is untrue and contradicts the advice from the Cabinet Office that has now been leaked by horrified Green insiders.

Late last year, Mr Shaw stated that the advantage of the supply and confidence agreement was this—and I quote him—“Green MPs will not vote for anything they do not agree with.” That is exactly what is happening here. This betrayal of core values could not be more serious. A founding Green co-leader said of the same legislation, in 2001, that it was the most Draconian, obnoxious, anti-democratic—

💬 Hon James Shaw: I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. Dr Smith has now brought the memory of Rod Donald into this debate and into question time a number of times. I think this is the fourth time that I’m aware of—

💬 DEPUTY SPEAKER: Would you get to the point? Is there a point of order here?

💬 Hon James Shaw: Yes, there is. I’m offended and I’d like him to withdraw and apologise. It is called waving a dead man’s hand—

💬 DEPUTY SPEAKER: Everyone will sit down.

💬 Hon James Shaw: —and he has no right to speak—

💬 DEPUTY SPEAKER: Sit down!

💬 Hon James Shaw: —for Rod Donald.

💬 DEPUTY SPEAKER: Sit down! When the Speaker is on their feet, members resume their seats. That is not a point of order. Unfortunately, you cannot take offence on behalf of another member. That member is absent; you cannot take offence on behalf of another member. That is not a point of order, and I call the Hon Nick Smith to continue.

Let me quote from the Hansard—

💬 Hon James Shaw: I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker.

💬 DEPUTY SPEAKER: Are you going to—

💬 Hon James Shaw: I am not offended on behalf of anybody else; I am offended.

💬 DEPUTY SPEAKER: I am sorry, but the point of your offence is on behalf of another person. You are taking offence at reference to another person. You cannot do that. It is not a point of order.

A quote for Mr Shaw’s benefit from the parliamentary Hansard: “the most draconian, obnoxious, anti-democratic, insulting [piece of] legislation ever inflicted on this Parliament.” Yet it is now to become the law with the votes of people like Mr Shaw. We also heard evidence from officials at select committee that this bill breaches the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Only six months ago, I heard the member in this House quoting the importance of those treaties and human rights, yet today is the vote on a bill that tramples on those very rights.

The lack of integrity from New Zealand First on this bill is no better. When a National MP left for New Zealand First, Mr Peters totally backed him, saying it was his right and he was not elected to swear an oath of blind allegiance to any political party. Mr Peters’ principles are as shallow as a bird bath. If an MP leaves a party for New Zealand First, that is their constitutional right, but if an MP leaves New Zealand First for another party, he calls it a constitutional outrage.

One of the most substantive submissions we heard was from David Carter, who provided the report of the Inter-Parliamentary Union on 162 parliaments around the world. That report states that laws of this sort create—and I quote—“political party dictatorship[s]”. It goes on and says that the free mandate of MPs is an indispensable part of our democracy. None of the countries that we would want to be associated with have those laws. In most parts of the world, this law that we are passing would be against their constitution and wrong. I ask the House to reflect on the war memorials on this wall, for those who fought in World War II, who then had a part in writing the constitution of Germany to protect the values of freedom, which this law would offend and would be against.

Here is the most important issue with this bill—and it motivates Mr Peters’ insistence on it, but has caused such angst for constitutional experts, like Professor McLean from Auckland University. The most important rule in our constitution is that Government must maintain a confidence in this House; that is why confidence votes are so important. They have been lost 13 times in this Parliament due to MPs losing confidence and voting the Government down. This bill weakens that check by enabling the Government to sack those MPs and replace them with compliant ones. If it was a court, we would call it jury-rigging.

Finally, this bill is about not the rights of MPs, but the rights of the public. They lose the exclusive right to fire MPs. MPs will be more subservient to their party leaders and less responsive to their constituents. MPs will be more party robot and less individual thinker.

It was with great pride that I read The Economist magazine that rated New Zealand, of 170 countries, one of the most democratic countries in the world and Transparency International ranking this fair country of New Zealand as the least corrupt country in the world. This bill risks eroding those stellar rankings.

The Government has time to pull back. I ask them to reflect on Helen Clark who, in the same position—same legislation, same stage—in 2005, abandoned an identical bill. I call on Green Party members throughout the country to encourage their MPs to at least vote for our amendments that set a sunset clause and greater judicial checks.

National will work with anyone and everyone. We will do everything to protect this country’s core values around democracy and freedom of speech.

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. The question that those listening on will have in their minds now is: why are the National Party so afraid of the voters? What is it about the democratic process that they are so afraid of? What is it about the principle of MMP that says it’s the voters who should decide the make-up of Parliament—what is it about that principle that they are so afraid of? Why do they believe that members of Parliament once they get to Parliament, having been elected under a party banner, should be free to abandon that party banner and distort the make-up of Parliament in a way the voters never intended without going back to those voters for a mandate?

It is absolutely acceptable for a member of Parliament to stand up in this House and say, “I do not support the position of my party, and I’ve got to go back to the electorate and seek a new mandate because I don’t support the party that I got elected under.” It’s happened before, and members of Parliament who have done that have been rewarded by their constituents for doing just that. Tariana Turia did that. I disagreed with her doing that, I was disappointed when she did that, but she did it and she was re-elected. She had the integrity to go back to the people of her constituency and say that she didn’t feel she could be a member of this party any more—the Labour Party—and therefore she sought a fresh mandate from her constituents. When Winston Peters was expelled from the National Party, he had the integrity to go back to his voters and say, “I am no longer a member of my party, of the party under whose banner I was elected, and I will therefore seek a fresh mandate.”—and he got it. He was not afraid of the voters.

So what is it about the National Party of today? What is it that they are so afraid of that if they think they are no longer willing to support the position of their party, they should not have to go back to their constituents and seek a fresh mandate? Why is that a problem? What is so affronting about that?

Rarely has a bill in this House been the subject of so much misinformation as this one has been, and much of that misinformation—much of that misinformation—has been propagated by the increasingly bizarre questions from the Hon Dr Nick Smith. Over the past couple of weeks, he has compared New Zealand to Zimbabwe in his contributions. He has reached back to the depths of the 19th century and invoked the name of Winston Churchill, who he told us had changed parties twice over appeasement, which the history books will say is not true. In fact, the only time Winston Churchill changed parties was once, in 1904.

So let’s go back 120 years and consider what Nick Smith is holding up as the beacon of democratic representation. What is he holding up? Well, let’s go back 120 years: women could not vote in that Parliament, half of the working-class men could not vote in that Parliament, Oxford University had its own MPs in that Parliament, and half of the Parliament—half of the Parliament—was reserved for rich men who gained their seats through a hereditary entitlement. That is what Nick Smith is now holding up as the beacon of democracy for New Zealanders. I think we’ve come a long way since then. One hundred percent of the MPs in this House are elected by the people of New Zealand, and that is exactly as it should be.

If the members of this House no longer feel that they can remain true to the policies and the platform that they were elected under, then they should go back to the people of their constituencies and they should seek a fresh mandate. If they are standing on a point of principle and the people of New Zealand believe that it’s a legitimate point of principle, then they may well be rewarded for that, but this idea that MPs part-way through a parliamentary term can go and set up a whole new party and then, for the remainder of that term, represent an entirely different platform—that’s what the National Party are arguing for: an entirely different platform to that which they were elected under. That is what the National Party are saying that people should do, and I thoroughly disagree with that proposition. I think that members of Parliament, having been elected by the people of New Zealand on a party platform under a party banner, should stay true to that.

Nobody is suggesting that the conscience vote in this House should be removed. We’ve seen conscience votes exercised in this very term of Parliament. In fact, the only party in Parliament that prevented its MPs from exercising their conscience was the National Party, because several members indicated publicly that they were going to exercise their conscience one way, and then the National Party stopped them doing that. On this side of the House, we’re happy for MPs to exercise their conscience on conscience votes. They will go back to their constituents in the next election, and then people will be able to decide one way or the other. Medicinal cannabis was exactly that case: members on our side voted for and against that, but those members on the other side of the House who wanted to vote for the bill were prevented by their party from doing so.

So nobody on this side of the House is proposing that the conscience vote be done away with. Nobody on this side of the House is saying that where members disagree with their parties and the parties are OK with them voting their conscience, they should be prevented from doing so—and, as my colleague Andrew Little pointed out, there’s history with that. Damien O’Connor disagreed with the Labour Party on issues to do with the West Coast and has voted differently to the party. He’s still here; the party didn’t seek to expel him from the Parliament. So there’s all this scaremongering on the other side about the potential effects of this that, simply, is almost entirely false.

The issue here at heart is that the voters of New Zealand should get the Parliament that they vote for. That is what MMP is all about. Why should MPs be able to leave their parties, set up new parties, and remain in Parliament potentially for three years? Under the National Party’s reasoning, someone could be elected under a party banner, the day after the election they could start a whole ‘nother party and promote policies completely contradictory to the platform they were elected under, and that is OK. That is not OK, and New Zealanders have been very, very clear that they don’t support that approach, because those MPs who have done that—the history of MMP will show—don’t generally tend to fare very well when they stand for re-election at the next election. What this bill does is it says they shouldn’t get that far. They should have to seek a fresh mandate when they do it, and there’s nothing wrong with that.

This bill is perfectly acceptable. It says that it is the voters that should determine the make-up of Parliament, and I do not understand why the National Party think that is such an affronting idea.

You only get the sorts of frantic speeches that we’ve had from the Government today and the frantic interjections that we’ve had from the Government’s support party today when the members of those parties know that they are seriously on the back foot and out of step with what the general public is prepared to accept.

I think the claims by Mr Hipkins and claims by the Hon Andrew Little that, somehow, it’s the voter who should always be determining who comes into this place is just a little bit of chicanery, really, I suppose you would say. It is snake oil salesmanship, because the reality is that this bill makes it abundantly clear—and Mr Little himself, in his comments, stated it—that it asserts the primacy of the party leader. It is the party leader who determines what actually happens to dissident MPs. You’d have to ask yourself, in a Westminster democracy, a safe democracy like we have, where you can have simple changes of Government without too much angst or otherwise, and a system that does respect voter choice, would you have a bill before the House that will see the power of our democracy concentrated in the hands of the three or four or five leaders of parties who are in this House?

It doesn’t surprise me that Mr Little wants to stand up and say “Well, it’s now all about the party vote. It’s all about the party vote.”, because while that does determine the make-up of Parliament, the reality is that those three parties who are forcing this particular provision upon the electorate of New Zealand are all made up predominately of list members of Parliament. And it is completely disingenuous for the Hon Chris Hipkins to say, “Well, if they disagree with what is currently before the House, they should resign and they should test their mandate.” They can’t, unless the leader backs them. So there is no way that that is a legitimate thing to say. It is utter nonsense.

I’ll tell you something else: the idea that we should somehow be reprimanded for calling into this debate the past comments of Rod Donald is, to my mind, pretty sad. I considered Rod Donald to be a friend of mine. I’d known him for many, many years before we both entered Parliament at the same time. I enjoyed having a lot of discussions with him. I was on the wrong side of his argument over MPP, but he achieved something in this country that is quite unique because he, more than anybody else, swayed the vote in favour of MMP. But he did not see some kind of primacy in that going to the potentate leaders of trumped-up political parties.

When we come into this House after any general election and we take our seats in various places and we are called up by the Clerk to swear our oath or make our affirmation, we’re not called in party blocs; we’re simply called alphabetically, because every member who is declared elected to this House is elected equally. For a bill like this to come before the House that, effectively, will say, in the first instance, list MPs are totally beholden to the party machinery—

💬 Darroch Ball: You haven’t read the bill.

—every bill, on every bill; totally beholden to the party machinery—is, I think, a great travesty.

Look at those who have in the past stood up against their parties. Let’s keep it into recent times, where people might be able to remember—going back to Brian MacDonell from Dunedin North. Brian MacDonell declared himself an Independent because he could see what the Labour Party was going to do. He could see that when they went into the 1984 election, they would present themselves as being the champions of the people, they’d present themselves as being—interestingly—a kinder New Zealand, but then, of course, we all know what they did. They completely upended it and became the most right-wing Government that this country has ever seen in delivery of economic policy. Brian MacDonell had every right, on behalf of the people who elected him, to take the position he took.

There was talk today about Tariana Turia. Well, Tariana Turia was elected by her electorate, by the Māori seat that she represented, and those people’s best interests, she considered, were not being served by the foreshore and seabed legislation. It would also have been interesting to members of this House to note that the Hon Dame Tariana Turia was also concerned about Māori health statistics, Māori education statistics, and Māori achievement statistics. She left the Labour Party, and she did seek a mandate and got it again. Had she been a list MP, she’d have been out the door, and all the concerns of those people who had supported her on that basis completely lost—completely gone, apparently not at all valid.

So we come today to a situation where a bill that’s before the House is, frankly, just a way of paying the piper—paying Mr Peters for his support for the Government. There is nothing more in it. But I’ll read these names: Tau Henare, Ann Batten, Tuariki Delamere, Jack Elder, Neil Kirton, Tukoroirangi Morgan, Deborah Morris, Rāna Waitai, and Tū Wyllie, and then Brendan Horan—all people who have left New Zealand First. Now, when you’ve got a list of 11 like that, you ask, who was it who really should have gone? What was it about the arrangements in that party that meant that those people lost their voice? It is because the leader set himself up in some kind of supreme position, and that’s what we’re mandating with this bill today.

I’m not surprised the Green Party heads are down, because no party in this current Parliament has benefited as much from the ability to move in and out of parties as the Green Party has. The Alliance was a loose collection—loose collection—of multiple parties, of which the Green Party was a substantial bloc. But they only got the opportunity to have their voice heard in Parliament by eventually separating themselves from the Alliance, staying in Parliament, and running their campaign for the last six months of that Parliament, virtually, as Independents, albeit there was this mickey mouse arrangement where Jim Anderton remained as the leader of the Alliance.

Then there’s Jim Anderton himself. There is a man who became an Independent, stayed in Parliament, and railed against the excesses of the 1984-90 Labour Government and, ultimately, was rewarded by the people of Sydenham. When it became Wigram, he was leader of the Alliance, but only so long as that held together, and it fell apart because the constituent parties felt their voice was not being heard. So it is a wrong proposition to say that, somehow, someone in this House standing up and saying “I believe in this, because I think it represents what the people who sent me here want me to do.” is somehow wrong, taken away, and put into the hands of a leader.

Let’s be clear: all this nonsense in here about a person notifying the Speaker and all that sort of thing—that’ll never happen. MPs can resign any day of the week they want right now. I know Darroch Ball’s considering it, and I don’t blame him. But to have a situation where a leader goes around and taps all the caucus members on the shoulder and says, “Hey, we’re sick of him. We want him out. So I’m going to write to the Speaker.”—that is not democracy. That is far from democracy. That is the sort of thing that you see in countries where there is turmoil every time there’s an election.

So our position is very, very strong. We will not support this bill. And, yes, people will leave parties from time to time; they will sit as Independents. In the end, in a short electoral cycle, there is plenty of opportunity for the voters to make a decision about the choice that that individual has made. But, I state again, it is totally disingenuous for anyone to say that a list member of Parliament can choose to leave Parliament and have their position tested by the electorate. They can’t, and what this bill does today is make it abundantly clear that if you are a list member of a caucus, you are beholden entirely to the views of the leader—in other words, the four or five people in this Parliament who will lead parties now control our democracy.

I think Gerry Brownlee’s made it quite clear that one of two things has happened. The first is that he hasn’t read the bill properly, or the second is that he’s been led down the garden path by Nick Smith, down the creek with no paddle, and Nick Smith is taking the rest of the National Party members with him, with an ill-informed, uneducated, ill-read look at what this bill is actually trying to achieve and what it actually is going to achieve, whether they like it or not—whether they like it or not.

You see, there’s a couple of things that, firstly, Nick Smith said and that Gerry Brownlee backed up. A couple of quotes: the first is that it allows the leader “to dismiss an MP”. That is absolutely and totally false—absolutely and totally false. It is written in the legislation itself that there needs to be a two-thirds majority caucus decision. Now, I’m not entirely sure how the National Party caucus runs, or is trying to run at the moment—let’s put aside the fact that it’s rudderless at this point in time—but that’s not how a democratically run party that is represented in this House runs. Two-thirds majority—that is stipulated in the legislation.

The second is something very strange that Mr Smith said. He said that it doesn’t allow voters to fire the MPs. That’s what he said—quoted. This legislation actually does that very thing. It puts the mandate on the people of this country. It puts the decision on the people of this country, in two ways.

💬 Brett Hudson: No, it doesn’t.

In two ways, Mr Hudson. If you want to listen up, you might learn something, because, obviously, you haven’t read the bill, either.

💬 DEPUTY SPEAKER: Actually, I don’t have to read the bill.

That member, Mr Hudson, will learn something if he listens, because he obviously hasn’t read the bill either. Stop listening to Mr Nick Smith. You see, if one is a list member, then who put them in this Parliament—who put them in this Parliament? Why are there a number of seats, proportionally speaking, in this Parliament, the way that they are very much today—the way they are today? The people.

💬 Hon Gerry Brownlee: Not the voter directly.

Oh, yes, they did.

💬 Hon Gerry Brownlee: No, they didn’t.

Oh, yes, they did, Mr Brownlee. Oh, yes, they did. It’s called a party vote, you see. This is the biggest problem that this National Party has had over the last decade. When they were in Government, they acted like this was first past the post—like it was first past the post.

Here’s a question, Mr Brownlee, and all those sitting over there at this stage: hands up who believes—truly believes—that they would have got and won their seat, if they’re a seat holder, not standing on a National Party ticket. Hands up. Mr Brown—Simeon Brown—put your hand up, if you will. See, the only person was Mr Nick Smith. That’s how far out of touch that gentleman is, and that’s how far he is leading the rest of this party, the National Party, down the garden path. They want to listen to him. Mr Smith actually believes that he would have won this seat as an Independent, but no one else—no one else here.

See, this is the whole point. The Rt Hon Winston Peters, when he disagreed with the National Party, what did he do? He took his opinions and his grievances with the National Party back to the people. He resigned and he went back to the people and he got a mandate. That is what one calls a mandate.

The arrogance is palpable from that side of the House that they truly believe that they’re sitting there because of them—because of that tick. Whether that party likes it or not, we are living in an MMP environment, an MMP democracy. The most important word represented in MMP is the “P” for proportional. Who decides what proportion is sitting in here? The people—the people do. So what the National Party want in not having this legislation is that when the people are ticking the party vote on election day, they will have absolutely no certainty whatsoever that that will remain. Now, they can talk about the individual electorates voting that certain person in and whatnot, and if they truly believe that they got there because of that, then they should take their differences—that they quite obviously have—when they leave that party, and take it back and get a mandate, just like the Rt Hon Winston Peters did.

When someone such as Dr Smith has strong opinions about, obviously, political issues, you usually end up landing on the left side of the argument, on the right side of the argument, or somewhere in between. Unfortunately for Mr Smith, he has landed in la-la land, and he is taking the National Party with him.

I’ll give an example of what I mean. I’ve got two opinion pieces here, from opposite sides of the spectrum, and both of them agree with him. One is from Chris Trotter and the other one is from—not usually a bastion of or a flag-bearer for New Zealand First—one Mike Hosking. They both say the same thing. I want to quote, firstly, from Chris Trotter, because he’s actually got it right. If we listen to the likes of Nick Smith, he says, “The rights of the poor old voters are, of course, almost entirely disregarded by these upright constitutional guardians. The electorate’s assumption that the undertakings given to it by political parties immediately prior to the general election will remain viable for the full three years of the Parliament term is dismissed”—by the likes of Mr Smith and the National Party—“as quaintly naïve.”

Mike Hosking, opposite on the political spectrum but of the exact same opinion, who said—and Gerry Brownlee mentioned the Alliance—“Go back to Alamein Kopu. She fell out with the Alliance, but because she fell out with the Alliance, she just got to sit in Parliament.”

💬 Hon Gerry Brownlee: I didn’t mention her at all.

No, you mentioned the Alliance, so if—

💬 DEPUTY SPEAKER: I mentioned nobody.

Mr Brownlee mentioned the Alliance, which is what I said—which is what I said. “She wasn’t elected to Parliament, she was elected on the Alliance list, but she got to sit in Parliament for free.” He goes on to say—and I quote—“if you are elected under the umbrella of this particular organisation.”—being the party—“If for whatever reason you cannot cope with that and you no longer want to be part of that organisation, you don’t get then to just sit in Parliament as an independent as you didn’t get elected that way and therefore you should get booted out.”

If Mr Brownlee or anyone else from the National Party has doubts about this legislation, perhaps they just want to see the writing on the wall from their mates. They are saying that this legislation upholds the very nature of MMP in this country—of MMP in this country.

It is not up to the whims of the individual MP, just because they don’t like the ticket they’re sitting on any more, to quit and not represent what the voters want them to and what they voted for on election day, which was the proportionality of this Parliament. That’s why the arrogance is palpable coming from that side of the House. On this side of the House, we recognise as a basic fundamental that we represent the people of this country—that we represent the views and the wants and the needs of the people of this country and how they voted. Anyone else that is going to vote against that legislation disagrees with the statement I just made—disagrees with the fundamental basics of an MMP environment in this country. It is disgraceful and telling at the same time that all the seat holders sitting over there did not put their hand up when I asked them. That answers the question for them, and it speaks volumes for the public of this country.

So, in answer to the last point that the previous speaker, Darroch Ball, made, actually, we don’t have the arrogance to put our hands up and make the assumption that people would vote for us again. We’d go back out to seek that mandate. But let me put one thing to you. Let me ask you—let’s see a show of hands here—

💬 DEPUTY SPEAKER: No, don’t ask me. You can ask the member.

Sorry, Madam Deputy Speaker. Let me see from Mr Darroch Ball—I’m very interested to see whether he’s going to put his hand up or not, because he’s talking about MMP and the system. So when people went to the ballot boxes and voted for New Zealand First at the general election last year, do you think two-thirds of your voters supported you because they thought that you’d form a Government with Labour and the Greens? Do you? Do you think—put your hand up. Put your hand up. Oh, he’s not putting his hand up—that’s interesting. [Interruption] So he’s not going to—oh, that’s very interesting. The big speech about MMP, and all of a sudden now he’s reneging on that. He won’t put his hand up. He won’t actually admit the fact that maybe it’s just possible—and, actually, the polls told us this, because they went from 7 to 3 percent—

💬 Hon Gerry Brownlee: They saw his name.

Well, they saw his name. It’s just possible that maybe half of your voters under an MMP system voted for you with an expectation that you were going to form a Government with the National Party. Did you ever consider that?

💬 DEPUTY SPEAKER: I’m sure they did, but don’t bring me into the debate.

So maybe we should have wiped the result and we should have just gone back and started again under the premise that you put forward to this House.

Let’s have a look at what else he said. This is what he said. He said that Nick Smith and the National Party—in fact, Mr Little said this as well in his opening comment—don’t understand the bill. He said we’re ill-informed, we’re undereducated—

💬 Darroch Ball: Uneducated, not undereducated.

Yes, sorry—uneducated. So tell me something: what do you say to the Clerk of the House? What do you say to Dr Edward Willis, who has a PhD in constitutional law? What do you say to Dr Christine Dann, a founding member of the Green Party? What do you say to the Human Rights Commission or Sir Lockwood Smith, a former Speaker? What do you say to 19 legal—

💬 DEPUTY SPEAKER: Would you stop bringing the Speaker into it?

Sorry, you’re right, Madam Deputy Speaker. What’s your response to 19 legal and political science academics, including Andrew Geddis? What’s your response to the Legislation Design and Advisory Committee? What about Keith Locke? I know that there’s some sensitivities about past Green Party members—I will address that shortly. But what do you say to Keith Locke, former—

💬 DEPUTY SPEAKER: Don’t keep bringing me into the debate.

Sorry, Madam Deputy Speaker. What’s your response to—

💬 Hon Members: Ha, ha!

—sorry—Graeme Edgeler, electoral law expert; Jeanette Fitzsimons, former Green Party co-leader? I’m going to come back to her submission because, honestly, from my point of view, her submission was actually one of the most credible, and she brought up some points that no one else actually covered. The New Zealand Law Society; Professor Janet McLean, constitutional law professor at Auckland University; Professor Jack Vowles, professor of political science at Victoria University of Wellington; the Rt Hon David Carter, a former Speaker—what you’ve done is you’ve stood in this House and you’ve told them that they’re ill-informed—

💬 DEPUTY SPEAKER: I haven’t.

—and they’re uneducated—

💬 DEPUTY SPEAKER: I haven’t.

—and also that there’s a lack of understanding around the bill.

💬 Darroch Ball: Yeah, that’s what I just said.

Oh, you’re standing by that? So you’re applying all of that to the list of people that I just mentioned? OK, we’ll take that. No problem.

The other thing that I wanted to address was this, and it comes back to comments that the Hon Chris Hipkins made and that the Hon Gerry Brownlee addressed. I see that Marja Lubeck is in the House. Marja Lubeck was voted this year—

💬 Marja Lubeck: Say something nice.

I’m going to say something nice, don’t worry. She was voted into this House as a list MP—

💬 Marja Lubeck: And a good one.

—and, she says, a good one. What she has done is she’s come out very strong in terms of issues in Rodney, which is the electorate that she lives in, which is my electorate, as the electorate MP. We’ve just had the extension of the road of national significance cancelled, so we’re fighting very hard to try and get that reinstated. My expectation is that she’ll be a strong voice within the Government for the electorate of Rodney. That’s what my expectation is. The problem with this bill is that the minute it passes, she is purely a creature of the party. That is exactly what Marja Lubeck is going to become—a creature of the party. I’ll tell you why. I’ll explain to you why. I’ll explain to you why, so people at home can understand why.

The reality of it is this: if I take a position against my party on something that relates to my electorate, and this bill was triggered—which, by the way, we won’t, because we highly value our list MPs along with our electorate MPs. We don’t differentiate between them. We all have got a contribution to make, and we’re all an important part of the team. So we won’t be taking any notice of this ridiculous bill. But, anyway, if I took a position on it, I can go back to the electorate, right? I can go back to my electorate, like you say, and I can seek a mandate. I can go back and say, “I’m no longer aligned to the values of my party. I don’t agree with this policy that they’re going to implement. It’s going to be bad for us. I’m coming back and I’m going to stand as an Independent, and I’m going to seek a mandate from you.”—sorry, Madam Deputy Speaker. I know you’ve given up on me, but I am trying.

But the problem is that Marja Lubeck can’t do that.

💬 Marja Lubeck: Why not? Are you calling me a puppet?

Because you can’t go back—yes, you are. She’s hit the nail on the head. Now she’s starting to understand. Yes, you are a puppet—yes, you are a puppet. The problem for Marja Lubeck is this: she can’t go back and seek a mandate. You’re gone—you’re gone. There’s no coming back—

💬 DEPUTY SPEAKER: Actually, I bring the member to order. The member is actually addressing the Chair, and if the member thinks about that, it might help him in not bringing the Speaker into the debate.

That’s a very good point, because I know that you could seek a mandate, without a doubt, Madam Deputy Speaker.

The problem with this bill is that she can’t go back to Rodney. She can’t go back to Rodney and seek a mandate, and that’s the whole point—that’s the whole point. I can; she can’t.

💬 Hon Gerry Brownlee: Just cannon fodder.

She’s cannon fodder. You are a puppet. When this bill passes, you become a puppet. You can’t represent the people of Rodney—she can’t represent the people of Rodney.

I just want to address the Green Party and the Green Party leader, the Hon James Shaw, very quickly before I finish, because he and I sat in the green room last week before we went on to The AM Show, and I said to him, “James, I wanted to acknowledge the leadership that you showed through a very difficult period when Metiria Turei had to leave Parliament around the benefit fraud storm that blew up. I thought that you showed outstanding leadership qualities through that—that was a difficult thing.”

💬 Darroch Ball: I want to count how many times he’s said “you” in this speech. It’ll be ridiculous.

Have you got a comment to make on that, because I firmly believe, actually, that he did. But the issue that I have now with the Hon James Shaw is this—and I understand why you get upset when you hear Rod Donald being quoted in the House, but the reality of it is that he has left that on Hansard for a reason. He spelt out very clearly how he feels about this bill, or how he felt about a bill very similar to this one. So the thing that I’d be worried about, that I genuinely feel, is that if you continue down the path that you’re on—and I know you’re going to take a call—

💬 DEPUTY SPEAKER: Would you look at me—would you look at me? It might help you—it might help you.

Sorry—sorry, Madam Deputy Speaker. If Mr Shaw carries on down the path that he has chosen at the moment, then I personally feel that the leadership qualities that were on display for us during the general election, you’re going to have a massive—sorry—Mr Shaw is going have a massive stain on that legacy that you have created. At the end of the day, if you—sorry. If Mr Shaw sat there and actually thought about it, if you sat there for a moment and reflected and thought, “If Rod Donald was sitting in this seat, what would he do?”—

💬 Darroch Ball: This is disgraceful—this is disgraceful.

No, there’s nothing disgraceful about it—there’s nothing disgraceful about it. I’m sorry—we’ve gone back and referred to Hansard, an official record in this Parliament. James is going to have an opportunity to address it, but what I’d ask is just to reflect on that, because I don’t personally believe that the leader of the Green Party supports or believes in this bill any more than we do. Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker.

Tēnā koutou katoa. I want to start by thanking the submitters who came along to the Justice Committee. It’s a select committee that doesn’t have a Green member on it, but I went along, as did Marama Davidson. We wanted to hear their voices. I do thank them and acknowledge that many will be disappointed with our decision to support this bill today, and I would like to explain the background to our decision. I would also like to acknowledge and address some of the concerns raised by the Opposition for the well-being of the Green Party, our principles, and our decision-making processes, given that they’ve brought us into this debate so repeatedly.

Of the many, many decisions that we’ve made since the 2017 election, the decision to support this bill has been the most difficult for the Green Party. The decision to change the Government was not difficult. The decision to join this new Government was not difficult. The decision to ask for and win 20 incredible Green priorities in our confidence and supply agreement was not difficult. We have already implemented many of the confidence and supply wins, and we are working constructively with the coalition parties to implement all the others. It is not difficult to stand for Green kaupapa, even when we do disagree with the coalition parties. We have done that on trade policy, we’ve done it on defence spending, we’ve done it on animal welfare, and we’ve done on the Māori wards.

So the difficult decision on this bill is not typical of the kinds of decisions that we’ve had to make in joining this Government. What does make this decision uniquely difficult is the strong competing principles. The first is that the Green Party has spoken out vehemently against a bill like this in 2001 and 2005. The competing principle is that the Green Party is now committed to this new, multi-party Government, built on the merging of three parties’ priorities in the first truly multi-party MMP Government—MMP, a form of Government fought for and brought about in large part by the great work of the great man Rod Donald, a man who has been brought into this debate, whose memory has been dragged through this debate, by members in the Opposition who worked so hard during his life to impede his great work. That’s disgraceful.

Our confidence and supply agreement includes a commitment to act in good faith to allow Labour and New Zealand First to implement their coalition agreement. Mostly, that doesn’t involve the kind of proactive support in the House, but this bill does. So it is this commitment to good faith and our commitment to see the new Government succeed that has decided our position on this bill. We know that most out there—we know that nature can’t afford another three years of a neo-liberal National Party Government.

I now wish to address the process we’ve taken to come to our decision. Far from some sort of smoke-filled back-door deal, the Green Party has gone through a robust internal process. We announced initially that we would support the bill to select committee. That gave us the opportunity to reach out to our grassroots, and it also gave our members the opportunity to be heard and to have their views put on the record. We have discussed and debated the competing principles behind this bill, led by our party’s national executive and its policy committee, which represent elected members from the grassroots. I would like to thank that group for the work that they’ve done with our caucus in coming to this decision.

Many people understood our support of this bill and some didn’t—some pushed for us to oppose it, including many who submitted to the Justice Committee. I would like to acknowledge especially Jeanette Fitzsimons and Keith Locke, our great previous MPs, who will be disappointed in our support. These people were heard, and I’m sorry that the outcome will be disappointing them today.

To be clear, we do not think that this is a particularly good bill. We don’t think it addresses a pressing issue in New Zealand today, and we do have concerns about party caucuses—[Interruption]

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): Order! I’d like to hear the member’s speech.

—we do have concerns about party caucuses being able to remove MPs from Parliament. So, yes, this was a difficult decision, but it has come about because we’ve decided that this new Government must succeed and we must support it in good faith to succeed.

We decided to change the Government because we knew that the 250,000 Kiwi kids living in persistent poverty, beneficiaries, the multitude of families living in cars, our young people without mental health care living in an epidemic of youth suicide, and our natural environment could not afford another three years of the heartless, neo-liberal Government that that side of the House was leading. They couldn’t afford it. This Government is bringing about significant green change and principle-led green change: the zero carbon bill, an end to oil and gas exploration, removing dehumanising sanctions for beneficiaries, world-leading domestic violence leave, and mental health services for under-25-year-olds, just to name a few.

So the confidence and supply agreement does that but it also allows the Green Party to speak out on our unique kaupapa. That is something that’s close to my heart. Protest is close to my heart and I value you it as an out-of-Government Green Party MP—[Interruption]

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): Order!

💬 Hon Gerry Brownlee: Flexible kaupapa.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): Order! Mr Brownlee.

💬 Hon Gerry Brownlee: I beg your pardon?

CHAIRPERSON (Poto Williams): I’m calling you to order.

💬 Hon Gerry Brownlee: Are you naming me?

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): I’m calling you to order, Mr Brownlee.

💬 Hon Gerry Brownlee: Well you cannot do that in that style.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): Mr Brownlee, I have asked for the House to come to order. There has been a barrage across the House. I made it very clear that I wanted the barrage to stop. Now, we are permitted to interject. Those interjections need to be few and far between, and preferably witty, I think, is the phrase. Now, that is not the case. This is a robust debate, but I would like the opportunity to hear this speech.

Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. So the confidence and supply agreement allows the Green Party to represent our unique kaupapa, even when we disagree, and I will, in particular, continue to lead our position as the only party in this House who maintains our opposition to the Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement. We will work to change the trade agenda so that neo-liberal principles will not be able to mar our democracy again. I will keep loud on disarmament; I will keep protesting against mass spying and the spy bases.

Marama Davidson stood in this House not long ago to push the Government on discriminatory establishment of the Māori wards. She will continue to lead on honouring Te Tiriti and decolonisation, a paradigm-shifting stance that we’ll bring people along with eventually.

We have spent 19 years in Opposition and nine months in Government. The Green Party owes a huge debt of gratitude to the wider movement—to everyone who’s worked so hard to put us in this privileged position today. Deciding to be part of this new Government is the biggest opportunity in our party’s history to make great green change, and we intend to take that opportunity.

Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. In this House today we have witnessed the death of a party. The Greens have left the building. They have left their principles, their foundation principles, everything they stand for in the dirt. They chose a new member of Parliament to make the call while their co-leader sat there—full of self-righteous indignation when interjecting earlier, and, as quiet as a lamb, gave the job to a junior member. What a disgraceful example of poor leadership.

We see the Greens completely tarnished. A difficult decision they had to make, “marring democracy”—they use these words, and yet they betray those principles. I have been astonished by their willingness to fall over, to show no backbone whatsoever, not only to the principles that they were founded on but also to the utterances of their wise leaders—the ones that paved the way, the ones that they stand on the shoulders of.

The member who just resumed her seat, who took the last call for the Greens—Golriz Ghahraman—is somebody who is supposedly a champion of human rights. That’s only if they’re overseas. The human rights that have been trampled on by this bill are in New Zealand. Those victims are in New Zealand and in this House, and I am astonished at their outrageous manipulation of the truth.

Essentially, what was confirmed in that speech today is that the Greens sold their souls for the baubles of office—and I’ll come back to New Zealand First soon. They did not have the courage to say no to Winston. They took it all and they—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): Order! You must refer to the member with his proper name, please.

Winston Peters. They had no courage to say no to Winston Peters—just to be clear.

💬 Darroch Ball: I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. I’m not going to sit here and listen to that member talk about people’s lack of courage.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): Is that a point of order? That is not a point of order.

💬 Darroch Ball: Yes, it is. It’s out of order.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): This has been a very robust debate—

💬 Darroch Ball: She can’t say people lack courage.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): Excuse me? Excuse me—do not answer me back when I am speaking. This has been a very robust debate. There have been lots and lots of very robust conversations across this House, and I will let the member continue with her speech.

Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. Let’s look at what some of the submitters had to say, because I sat on the select committee hearing, to my amazement, a series of former Green MPs and Green Party supporters saying how much they condemned this bill and the Greens’ spineless stance on it. We had Jeanette Fitzsimons, the Greens’ co-leader from 1999 to 2009—no mere rookie who’s just come into the House, but someone who really did the hard yards for the party. She made a number of excellent points and she summed up this bill in this way: “The Bill breaches the Bill of Rights, denies freedom of speech and association, is contrary to international and NZ precedent, and is opposed by an impressive array of senior legal, constitutional, and political experts. It is unnecessary to address any real problem.” As far as she was concerned—and I agree with Jeanette Fitzsimons—“Integrity cannot be legislated for.”, nor, apparently, can it be drummed up in what’s left of the dregs of the party she was part of for so long.

When we look at what was said by that submitter when she came to the Justice Committee back in March, the idea, somehow, that proportionality of the House is disrupted, and that’s why this bill is needed—how ridiculous is that? The overhang, the by-elections—these are the kinds of things that change the party balance in the House. Are we going to legislate about those? What would have happened had this bill been in force—

💬 Darroch Ball: No, because the voters vote for it. Get it right.

That member wouldn’t be here, that’s for sure. New Zealand First would not be anywhere to be seen. In fact, both National and Labour were initially formed by party-hoppers: Labour back in 1916 by members switching from the Social Democratic Party and the united and labour parties; National in 1936 by members from the United Party and the Reform Party. New Zealand First—and one could wish it otherwise—would not exist if the Rt Hon Winston Peters had not left National, and he said in 1996, “Members of Parliament have to be free to follow their consciences. They were elected to represent their constituents,”—

💬 Darroch Ball: He resigned and went back and got a mandate—he got over 90 percent, I believe.

—unlike the member who’s barracking now, who has no constituents, and is utterly unelectable. Winston Peters went on to say, in 1996, that members of Parliament must “not swear an oath of blind allegiance to a political party. If an MP feels that membership in another elected party better serves his or her constituents, then that can be put to the test at election time.” Rod Donald said, at the time, “What has changed?”, and I agree with his comments, as well.

I think that when we come to Jeanette Fitzsimons again, she says, “The bill is a poor solution, looking for a non-existent problem.” She also confirmed to us in March, when she came before the Justice Committee, that the Greens did not have to vote for this bill. They were not required to under their confidence and supply agreement, which was a revelation at the time. It’s subsequently come out because it’s been leaked by disenchanted Green affiliates, but it is certainly not in their confidence and supply agreement.

The Greens tend to talk about good faith. Good faith? They’re trying to prop up a coalition Government under good-faith measures—swallowing a dead rat was how the co-leader Marama Davidson referred to it. As my colleague the Hon Dr Nick Smith said, “Get used to the taste.”, because they’re selling their souls in a variety of different ways, but this is by far the worst.

We had another former Green MP, Keith Locke. He renamed it the “Party Conformity Bill”. He called it a new low in parliamentary integrity. He said that as far as he was concerned—he’d voted against this legislation, I think, four times—it violates the right of free speech by allowing for MPs to be expelled from Parliament as a consequence of speaking or voting differently from their party caucus and then, subsequently, to be excluded from that party caucus. He said, “It violates freedom of association by expelling an MP from Parliament for voluntarily ceasing his or her membership of a parliamentary party, or transferring his or her loyalty to another party.” Essentially, it turns party MPs into what Rod Donald called “party robots”—that was kind. They’re more like poodles, which we see every day with the motley crew across the House.

The Green Party, of course, would not have been in existence either with this bill. In 1997, they withdrew from The Alliance to pursue their more progressive agenda—that’s fine.

When you look at the history of the New Zealand Parliament, and you look at the way it has changed, and you look at the way this bill will stifle any further change—we had not one, but two former Speakers of the House who came before us, including the Rt Hon David Carter, who made a number of excellent points, not only reflecting his past role as Speaker but, because he also chairs the New Zealand branch of the Inter-Parliamentary Union, he is somebody who knows about the way it is exercised and the way parliaments are run internationally.

He said—and I quote—“This report is critical of the sort of law being proposed” and it will turn us into a place where we have party political dictatorships—excuse me for muffing your words there a little bit, Mr Carter. The essence of what he was saying is that while party loyalty and discipline are necessary, they must never impair the full and effective exercise of freedom of expression and association by any member of that party, since these are overriding, fundamental human rights, and the rights of people who are elected into this Parliament.

Other colleagues have talked about being electorate MPs and being elected, and this bill would override, for example, in my case, my North Shore voters who brought me in here. That the party leader, now or in the future, could expel an electorate MP is an outrage.

We also heard from Dr The Rt Hon Lockwood Smith, who said that he felt it was his duty as a former Speaker to highlight how far this bill goes against the longstanding democratic traditions of our New Zealand Parliament. He said that this is a bill that “could breach that fundamental right of Members to speak in the House freely, even if it causes discomfort to a Member’s party” or its leaders. During his nearly 30-year political career, he said that parliamentary debate had “become more constrained and increasingly controlled by the political parties. Accountability to political parties has been strengthened at the expense of accountability to voters, especially local constituents. The instances of Members crossing the floor … have become almost non-existent. There is no case to impose an even tighter regime on MPs with this bill.” His submission was that the “protection of the privilege of freedom of speech in the House must take priority and not be put at risk by the provisions of this Bill.”

Many people suggested that this is a bill, like its earlier iterations that were voted down and were unsuccessful, that ought to have a sunset clause in it—an expiry date. Several submitters suggested that that expiry date be the end date of this shaky coalition, because that’s all this bill is designed to do—it’s to prop up a coalition that could not exist otherwise.

It has a number of names. We’ve been calling it the waka-jumping legislation. It could also be called the “Winston Peters Self-Preservation Bill” or—my particular favourite—the “Brendan Horan Memorial Bill”. As far as I am concerned, this is a bill that has no part in New Zealand democracy. This is a bill that has no part in this House. It is a bill that we should all be ashamed of, except for us in this party, because we will vote it down every step of the way. I commend the work that my colleague the Hon Dr Nick Smith is doing on this bill, and I do not in any way, or ever will, commend this bill to the House.

I am pleased to take a call in the second reading of the Electoral (Integrity) Amendment Bill. The aim of this bill is to enhance public confidence in the integrity of the electoral system.

The Justice Committee received 55 submissions. I thank the officials and advisers, and the submitters. Labour members are disappointed because National members, led by Dr Nick Smith, chose to put politics ahead of select committee business. We can all reflect on what happened in committee last Thursday, the very last meeting before the bill was due to be reported back on the following Monday. National members, led by Dr Nick Smith, refused to deliberate on the draft report, despite the fact that the draft report was on the agenda and had been circulated for review and amendments in advance.

The Justice Committee is a split committee of eight members, comprising four from National and four from Labour. For any such split committee, and for any such narrative report, normally the report would be in three parts. The first part is the committee report, reflecting the views of the submitters—so in this case, their voice would be lost—the second part would be the views of the Government / Labour Party, and the third part would be the views of the National Party. In that regard, I believe that National members will also regret that their view is not reported to the House. They would otherwise be able to say anything they like within the Standing Orders, and nobody else would have any editorial control on that sort of report. I appreciate that Dr Smith is disappointed now because he probably wishes to paddle but is without a canoe.

During considerations, officials and advisers have been subject to criticism and attack. Dr Smith went as far as moving a motion of no confidence in the advisers and officials. With due respect, Dr Smith should really not challenge the advisers and officials, because their job is to explain the policy initiatives. He should really challenge the Minister who is responsible for the Government policy initiatives.

I recall also Dr Andrew Geddis’ earlier email to the committee seeking an extension for his law students, but that request was also defeated. We said “Yes.”, and National members said “Yes but”, provided the committee would grant an automatic and universal extension to everyone else.

It is fair for me to say that during the entire process that this bill was considered, the committee was subjected to constant disruptions caused, largely, by Dr Smith. Having said that, I also reflected on the latest development concerning the bill and the publicity it has attracted. Yes, I was quoted in the media as saying that Dr Smith’s been around in this place for close to 30 years and should be the father of the House but not the bane of the committee. I stand by the first part of the statement, but, reflecting further, I should not have used the word “bane”, and I’d like to apologise to Dr Smith in that regard. I say this sincerely.

Any advisers or any committee members that are subject to his sort of scrutiny or disruptive actions would walk out of the meeting room wiser and stronger. Why? Because, as they say, all trees need wind to grow stronger. I am that type of tree, and Dr Smith is that sort of wind. If he is happy, he gives us a breeze. If he’s upset, he becomes a strong wind. If he’s really upset, he gives everyone tornadoes.

Nobody would deny that National has won many seats. I’d rather them being powerful but still being reasonable and humble. That will win them more respect.

I seek the leave of the House to table the draft select committee report on the Electoral (Integrity) Amendment Bill and the amendments proposed by National that the Government members would not want, so that they can be included on the record of the House.

Leave is sought for that action. Is there any objection? Yes.

To make Dr Smith happier and help him even further, given he has tried three times, I seek the leave of the House to table the draft report of the Justice Committee on the Electoral (Integrity) Amendment Bill.

💬 Brett Hudson: With the amendments?

That’s what the draft report was.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): Let the member put the leave. Can you put the leave again, please?

I seek the leave of the House to table the draft report prepared by the Justice Committee.

Leave of the House is sought for that course of action. Is there objection? There is none. It can be done.

Document, by leave, laid on the Table of the House.

Thank you very much, Madam Assistant Speaker. It’s a sad day for democracy in New Zealand when we are debating legislation which will limit the freedom of speech, the freedom of association, and the freedoms of New Zealanders here in this House. This is a sad day for New Zealand’s democracy. What we’ve heard from the other side of the House is excuses, excuses, excuses. We all know the real reason why this legislation is being put through the House, and it’s because it’s all about Mr Winston Peters and a deal that he’s done to try to get power and to try to protect his authority—

💬 Brett Hudson: He can’t trust his own team.

—and because he doesn’t trust his own team. That’s right, Mr Hudson. He doesn’t trust his own team in Parliament.

The key argument—the only argument—which Mr Andrew Little put forward for putting forward this bill was to protect the proportionality of Parliament. Well, the only safeguard he’s put in the bill is two-thirds of a caucus. Well, I just want to remind Mr Little that he only got four other votes for his own leadership bid, so it would only work if he was the leader of the Labour Party. That’s the only person it would protect—him.

Well, I want to remind the House of the words of the late Rod Donald, and we’ve heard this: this is “the most draconian, obnoxious, anti-democratic, insulting [piece of] legislation ever inflicted on this Parliament.” All we heard from the Green Party when they got up to speak was excuses, excuses. They have sold their souls and sold their principles in voting for this piece of legislation. They have not listened to their members, and they’ve come up with a whole list of reasons why they think that they are going to get policy concessions, but they’ve sold their principles—policy concessions, but they’ve sold their principles in the process. They have no courage, they have no principles, and soon they will not even be in Parliament.

This bill is an affront to democracy, and it is something which has been done in smoke-filled back rooms of Parliament, because there is nothing in the coalition document which requires the Green Party to support this piece of legislation. There’s nothing. They have sought Cabinet advice, and the Cabinet advice said there is no reason under the confidence and supply agreement why they should support it. The only logical reason is there must be something in the 36-page secret document, which still hasn’t been released, and it still hasn’t been released because they are hiding from New Zealanders what the real intentions and real policy decisions were, which were made in smoke-filled back rooms prior to this coalition Government being put together last election.

This bill is an affront to democracy, and I’ve heard Mr Darroch Ball get up and try to defend it from New Zealand First’s position. Well, he forgets that his own electoral record is that he received 2,155 votes at the last election—612 fewer party votes than the party even got in Palmerston North, and that’s probably the 612 people he met, because that’s what happened in Palmerston North.

💬 Hon Gerry Brownlee: He didn’t do that much work.

He probably didn’t do that much work. He probably met 100 people and they told six friends. That’s probably what happened. The New Zealand First Party MPs are getting up to try to defend themselves, because they are trying to defend their own list position leading into the next election. They know that they are at the whim of their leader, Mr Winston Peters, who will be determining whether any of them will stay or go at the next election.

This piece of legislation is to protect this coalition, because they know they’ve only got a three-seat majority. They’re scared of what might happen, and they want to stop all of these list MPs from firing off and deciding that they will do something. They’ve decided that they’re going to consign themselves to being bound by the leadership, bound by Winston Peters, and they’re putting aside the principles, which they have sold for no policy concessions and no real gain for them. We will not be supporting this legislation.

What a lot of song and dance! I wouldn’t be surprised if we heard that the apocalypse was coming and that a tsunami would ensue if this legislation passed. I wouldn’t be surprised if the members opposite had been taking up some drama classes in their spare time, with the amount of stupid accusations that this legislation will not be bringing.

So let’s get down to the facts. What does this bill actually do? What does it actually do? Well, it protects the proportionality of Parliament, so that voters, when they vote, get what they vote for. As a list MP—one that has already been called a puppet today—I was elected to this House on the basis that I stood on the Labour Party’s shoulders—I stood upon the values that the Labour Party represents. [Interruption]

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): Settle, members—settle.

That’s why I am here, standing, speaking in this House today. If I should depart from those values, I should not deserve a seat in this House.

So let’s just say that on a Thursday night, the Hon Dr Nick Smith, the Hon Mark Mitchell, and I have a few beers and we decide we’d like to start up a new party. A new party—just the three of us. We’d be called the “Freedom of Speech Liberation Party” or maybe even “Feminists United”—you don’t know. So if we start up a new party, that’s fine, according to the National Party. All those people who voted for me to be here for the Labour Party would get me hanging out with the Hon Nick Smith and the Hon Mark Mitchell in a new party, with a different name. Well, I believe that that’s not fair on democracy and the voters of New Zealand, and, for all the cries we’ve heard about democracy, I believe that this bill furthers democracy because it ensures that the voters get what they voted for.

The main criticism we’ve heard today from the National Party is that this bill is an affront to freedom of speech. Isn’t that funny—freedom of speech. So when we had the opportunity in this House to vote on conscience for Green Party member Chlöe Swarbrick’s bill which would have enabled people to grow cannabis for medicinal purposes, I quite rightly remember a number of National Party members of Parliament who stood on the tiles in the morning and told me that they would be voting for that bill, because that’s what they believed in. But by the p.m., when the vote was taken, they were voting against it because they’d been whipped into line by their leader to do the right thing by their party. So don’t tell me that this bill is going to come along and infringe freedom of speech when we don’t even have it in the first place.

So what else are we going to say here? [Interruption]

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): Settle down, members.

What is the National Party actually worried about? What is the real thing that they are so angry about in this bill that makes them stand up and take their drama classes and cry “Tsunami!” at us today in the House? Are they genuinely concerned about freedom of speech? Are they really concerned about freedom of speech? When do we otherwise hear National Party members quoting former Green Party members in this House? Is that the real motivation under this line? I believe the real reason is that it forms part of the coalition agreement, and that’s what gets under their skin. It’s a symbol of the fact that they are in Opposition, and where they are a drifting, bitter, and fractionalised bunch that have grasped on to this bill in some lame sort of grief counselling for the fact of coping with being in Opposition. This is symbolic of the fact that they are in Opposition, and that’s the true reason why we’re hearing this barrage today in the House.

So I would like to say that we support this bill. We support this bill in the House today because it stands for parties being represented in the House in the way they should be, and it stands for the fact that members can speak, indeed, whether they are list, whether they are electorate, or whatever they come from. If they come into this House on the back of their party, they have an obligation to the voters of New Zealand to stand by that party, and this bill delivers that result. Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. I commend this bill to the House.

This bill is a constitutional affront. It’s not just me who says that. It’s not just my good colleague the Hon Dr Nick Smith who says that. Academics from around New Zealand say that, human rights experts from around New Zealand say that, and the Green Party leaders from yesteryear say that. The only party in Parliament that has consistently voted against constitutional affronts like this bill is the National Party of New Zealand.

I want to canvass three things in my contribution to this afternoon’s debate, and I want to start with the Green Party. I want to start with the extraordinary contribution made by Golriz Ghahraman to this debate. Frankly, her speech was a disgrace to her party and an embarrassment to her predecessors in the Green Party. Let’s dispel once and for all the myth that the Green Party is obliged to vote for this bill—they are not. We know that because of leaked Cabinet Office advice that has come from ordinary, hard-working grassroots Green Party members that specifically says the Greens are not obliged to vote for this bill. What does their co-leader say? She says, “We are doing this because the confidence and supply agreement holds us to do it.” That is wrong. We know that is wrong. The Greens should have the courage of their convictions and listen—and listen—to their former co-leaders. They can and they should vote against this legislation.

What else did we hear from Miss Ghahraman? Well, we heard a lot about child poverty, and, I think, neo-liberalism—the bête noire of the left—was mentioned about 45 times. We heard a lot about oil and gas. We heard a lot about housing and poverty. I’ll tell you what we didn’t hear much of: not much about the bill—not much about the Electoral (Integrity) Amendment Bill. Golriz Ghahraman is a human rights expert. She is fond of telling us she’s worked around the world on human rights matters and she’s got a constitutional law degree and all sorts of things. Heaven knows we’ve heard a lot about that in the last nine months. She could not mount a single proper argument in favour of this legislation other than to say, “We’ve done a deal and we’ve sold our soul. We are unprincipled, and we are going to vote for this legislation.”

The third point I want to make about the Greens is they will not even come down to this House and promise that they will amend the legislation or attempt to amend this legislation when it gets to the committee of the whole House stage. If they were serious about putting through this bill and making it a serious bill, they would try and amend it. My colleague Dr Nick Smith has a whole series of amendments. There were loads of amendments suggested to us by the New Zealand Law Society and by lots of groups during the select committee process. None of those amendments have been made or recommended by the Justice Committee, so there’s plenty of opportunity to discuss them.

There is plenty of opportunity for us to amend this bill in the committee of the whole House stage. I note that there are constitutional scholars on Twitter and others in the public who have said they’re very happy to work with the Green Party to improve the bill. One amendment, for example—I’ll just throw this out there during this speech. One contribution could be to amend the retrospectivity, because, as the Law Society pointed out in their contribution to the select committee, members in this Parliament were elected with this law not in place, and if it passes in this Parliament, it will, essentially, retrospectively amend the law as at 23 September 2017, when the last election was, and say that members who are not elected under one system of our government will then have to be subject to a different system. That is constitutionally repugnant as well.

The Greens could get rid of that easily. The New Zealand National Party—I’m not the spokesperson, but I am confident in saying, because my colleague Nick Smith’s nodding at me—we would support that. Another thing that we would support is the ability to give judicial review, and that brings me to the second part of my speech, which is about human rights.

Why is judicial review important? I’ll tell you why. It’s important because one of the reasons why the Attorney-General has certified to Parliament that the bill complies with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act is because there is the ability for judicial review to be taken. The New Zealand Law Society rightly pointed out in their contribution to the select committee that the Attorney-General’s New Zealand Bill of Rights Act analysis says that members can be not “ ‘subject to a capricious or unreasonable exercise of the measures they are not left without remedy’ as they could apply to the High Court for judicial review.”

Judicial review is very important. Basically, it’s the only reason why the Attorney-General has concluded that the bill is consistent with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. However, the Law Society also made a number of very serious points to the committee. It is very doubtful that judicial review is actually available. Why do they say that? Well, in the only case decided under previous iterations of this legislation—Prebble v Awatere Huata—three judges in the Supreme Court expressly left the question open as to whether or not judicial review applied. Now, the parties in Prebble v Awatere Huata assumed that judicial review was available, and so the court, therefore, didn’t have to decide it. They just accepted that it was available. But, the Chief Justice expressly noted that it was at least arguable that such a decision was not reviewable or was only reviewable on limited grounds. Justice Gault said it was difficult to see the content of a notification under section 55D as reviewable, and Justice Keith made similar comments—three judges out of five, that’s a majority.

Why else is it arguable? They also expressly left open the question of whether or not parliamentary privilege prevented the courts inquiring into what goes on in Parliament, and the courts—in the case of cases like Prebble v Awatere Huata, and in the cases that may be yet to come—would have to consider voting records. They may have to consider caucus deliberations. They may have to consider what goes on in this place. In this Parliament, we are jealous, and we are keen to protect our privileges.

The other point to make about parliamentary privilege is that Prebble v Awatere Huata was decided before the passing of the Parliamentary Privilege Act 2014, which has significantly tightened the law around what the courts can and can’t inquire into in this Parliament. The Law Society made all these points. They are important points, because if judicial review is not available, then the remedy that mitigates the harm done to a member’s rights in the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act is not dealt to. Therefore, the harm accrues to the member and makes it an unjustified limit on the rights that he or she enjoys.

What rights am I talking about? I’m talking about freedom of association and freedom of speech. It was a former justice of the Supreme Court in the case of Hosking v Ranting that made the point that freedom of expression is the first and last trench in the protection of liberty. It is, in some ways, one of the most important rights that we enjoy. It is particularly important for members of Parliament, and particularly electorate MPs, to be able to express, freely and frankly, the concerns of their constituents, because their mandate does not belong to party leaders. This is the critical point. The mandate that is given to members in this House does not derive from their party leaders; it derives from the people, and it derives from their votes. So human rights are extremely important in this debate. The analysis that I’m putting forward to the House that the Law Society offered is very important.

What engagement did we have with this on the select committee? Well, we attempted to get to the bottom of this very important issue. We asked the Ministry of Justice to provide legal analysis. That was declined by Labour members. We unanimously resolved to invite the Attorney-General and Crown Law to come to the select committee and explain, but that never happened. The Human Rights Commission expressed grave concerns about the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act content of this bill, and various other legal experts did as well. I’ll tell you something very interesting. If you go to the Crown Law and Ministry of Justice websites, you will find the underlying legal analysis in relation to section 7 reports that have been made or not made by the Attorney-General to Parliament. The only example you will find of a section 7 underlying legal analysis being replaced by the Attorney-General’s own interpretation is in relation to the Electoral (Integrity) Amendment Bill. That says everything about this bill.

Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. It gives me great pleasure to rise in support of the second reading of this Electoral (Integrity) Amendment Bill. I do just want to say one thing in opening, because I think it’s important to get some things on the record, and that relates to the fact that Crown Law was indeed invited to come and speak to the Justice Committee but it did decline that invitation. It had a very good reason for doing so: Crown Law had given advice to the Government in respect of this bill, and, as legal adviser, it would have been entirely inappropriate for them to come to the committee. The only thing they could have said is, “The advice that we have given is privileged and we can’t go further into it.” That would have been an absolutely meaningless thing to do.

However, I want to turn to the bill, because I think it’s important to remember that the debates that happen here are significant. Whilst we can bicker amongst ourselves, people who want to know what is intended by this legislation listen to what goes on. I think that a lot of what has been said here is quite inaccurate. If we do look at the purpose of the bill, we see that the purpose is to maintain proportionality—to ensure that what people voted for is the Government that they actually get. Then, from that principle, we can look at the rest of the legislation. In fact, there is some scaremongering that’s gone on that there are no checks and balances here. That’s not true at all. In fact, if we look at what has to happen before a seat is vacated under this legislation, there are checks upon checks upon checks.

It is simply not accurate to say that the leader of a political party can dismiss a member, and it’s quite pernicious for that to be said in this House. In fact, the first thing that has to happen is that the party has to expel the person—not the parliamentary party, but the party itself. We can look at the bill and see that in clause 5, section 55A(2), requires that “the member of Parliament ceases to be a parliamentary member of the political party for which the member of Parliament was elected.” If we go further, to section 55D(d)(i), we see that the leader has to warrant “that all other requirements imposed by the rules of the political party for which the member of Parliament was elected relating to the giving of a notice … have been satisfied;”. So what we have there is a political procedure.

Now the interesting thing—and Mr Bishop delved into Prebble v Awatere Huata and that suggested that it might not be amenable to judicial review. He’s quite right to ask the question, but he’s quite wrong in his answer. If we go back a bit further, we can see that judicial review of political parties was well recognised in Peters v Colling back in 1993. Now, that was a case where Mr Peters was not selected—strangely, if I may say so—for the Tauranga seat by the National Party. They probably rue the day they ever did that. But whilst the judge there said that the internal workings of the party weren’t reviewable and that what the rules were and how they chose to organise themselves weren’t renewable, whether the rules were adhered to is reviewable, and that’s a really, really important distinction.

💬 Chris Bishop: It’s completely—no, it’s not.

So where there are rules about how the party determines its own membership—rule 12 for you, Mr Bishop, so you better look out for that one. For you, it’s your regional council and your board that decide whether you’re in or out, but that is a reviewable question because it is about rule adherence. In fact, in Awatere Huata itself, the question was left open.

💬 Chris Bishop: Exactly.

The parties there—I accept your point, Mr Bishop. It was left open, but both parties’ senior counsel there accepted two really important things—accepted them as unarguable—first, that the question was amenable to judicial review, and, second, that there was no question of privilege involved. So that’s actually at the first—party—stage.

Then we get the second protection, a really important protection—that this matter has to go to caucus, and two-thirds of caucus have to agree. Now, I think we need to recognise that members in every party of this House are pretty robust. They don’t lie down and just take someone else’s opinion. So to persuade two-thirds of the party that something has gone badly wrong is significant. [Interruption]

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): Order! [Interruption] Order! I’d like to hear the end of this speech, please. Thank you.

Kia ora, Madam Assistant Speaker. And we must remember, of course, that the leader has to be satisfied that the actions of the member have distorted and will continue to distort proportionality in Parliament. Now, what Awatere Huata does say is that that can be broadly interpreted. It doesn’t simply mean how they voted in the House, but, importantly, it’s forward-looking. It’s not just what they’ve done in the past; it’s how they behave in the future.

The further and additional protection is the notice to be given to that member. It’s essentially a warning shot. The member is given a notice saying “I think that you’ve behaved in a way which distorts Parliament. What have you got to say about it? What are you going to do about it?”, so the member then has a choice. They can do what some would say they should and resign, if that’s what their conscience dictates. They can go through this process, or they can go to their party and say “I recant. I agree that I have distorted proportionality. It won’t happen again.”, in which case there’s no basis for any notice to be given to the Speaker.

The other concern that was raised—another important concern—is the relationship between this and parliamentary privilege. The Parliamentary Privilege Act sets out what parliamentary privilege is, and it’s a critical part of this House. But what’s going on in respect of that party, in respect of the party members and its membership, is very clearly not a parliamentary proceeding. It is not subject to and does not attract the privilege of this House. That is what the Parliamentary Counsel Office has said.

I have read the Parliamentary Privilege Act and if we look at what a parliamentary proceeding is, it is set out in section 10(1). It is “words spoken and acts done in the course of, or for purposes of or incidental to, the business of the House”, and the membership of a caucus is not something that is critical to the conduct of business in this House. It’s not a parliamentary proceeding and, therefore, it does not attract that privilege. What that means is it is subject to the ordinary courts of the land, so that proceeding is subject to the ordinary proceedings of the land.

The fact of the matter is that we have a mixed-member proportional system. People go to the ballot and they cast that critical vote for the Government that they want. The current system is such that there can be aberrations in that if we get people changing their party allegiances midstream. Democracy does not stand still. This is a development which is needed to make sure that the will of the people is adhered to in this Parliament. The people of New Zealand deserve the Government they voted for, not some Government that individual members have constructed themselves.

The fact is there remains plenty of scope for members to act within their conscience, to promote their views, and to advocate for their electorates. In fact, they would be remiss if they did not do that. We, however, have to act in accordance with our own conscience. Electoral integrity involves not only proportionality—how one votes in the House—it also involves loyalty to one’s electorate and also courage to adhere to one’s conscience, and this legislation embraces and upholds all of those principles. Thank you.