Election Access Fund Bill

Mr Chair, thank you very much. This is an exciting day to be sitting in the chair for the first time, having taken this member’s bill through with the support of all of the parties in this Chamber. So I want to thank all of my colleagues in all parties for their support thus far.

Just to give those who are listening and/or watching the debate—the pleasure of watching the debate—this morning the background as to what this bill does, this Election Access Fund Bill was first drafted by Mojo Mathers, who is a former Green Party MP and the first profoundly deaf member of our Parliament. We took it through quite a rigorous select committee process, and I want to thank the Governance and Administration Committee for their entertaining me on their select committee pretty much every single session that they considered this Election Access Fund Bill. I also want to thank the Minister of Justice for allowing his justice officials to be available for consideration of this bill.

There are a number of changes that have come through the select committee process but all pertain to the general intention of the Election Access Fund Bill—that being to establish a fund administered by the Electoral Commission that would facilitate the participation of disabled persons in political life, particularly allowing disabled persons the ability to engage in general elections. The changes that we got and worked through, actually acknowledging and considering a number of the concerns that were raised from a number of different parties throughout the first reading in particular of the Election Access Fund Bill, can be broadly summarised in three thematic areas.

The first is that we have narrowed the scope and deepened the focus. By-elections of general electorates are now to be included; however, unfortunately, because of the narrow scope of a member’s bill, this couldn’t extend to cover local government elections. Parties and NGOs, who in the first form of the bill as originally drafted—will no longer be able to access funding, but instead the funding will be available for candidates from the time that they declare their intention per the definition in the Electoral Act 1993.

We have also made some changes to the definition of “disabled persons”. That is to align this legislation with other law in this area and also to streamline delivery of this fund, particularly around eligibility. It’s also the case that payments are not to be considered election expenses or donations. This is really fundamental, actually, in making sure that the whole reason that we are administering this fund is to remove those barriers that other candidates—candidates without disabilities—simply don’t face. This is fundamentally about barrier-free elections.

Thirdly, and finally, the part of review: the select committee considered that already built into the bill as drafted. The Minister is required to review the Election Access Fund Bill and its operation within a few years; however, they have decided to move ahead with also adding in consideration of the Electoral Commission, which is something that absolutely we as the Greens and myself as the sponsor of this bill can agree with, and I’d like to thank again all of the parties in this House, even those which we often find ourselves on the politically opposite side to, in coming together to support a bill which, I think, is going to be a massive step towards a more fundamentally equitable and inclusive democracy and, therefore—hopefully—society. Kia ora.

Thank you, Mr Chair. I want to congratulate Chlöe Swarbrick for bringing this bill to the House and to the Governance and Administration Committee and to reconfirm her words that the committee worked very collegially on this very non-political issue. I think we’ve come to a really good space with this bill. We had in our mind the whole time the needs of disabled persons and their ability to stand on the hustings alongside everybody else who is brave enough to nail their colours to the mast and stand for Parliament.

I want to acknowledge Mojo Mathers also, who I do hope is listening in to and watching today’s debate. Mojo and I did stand on the hustings together on several occasions when Mojo was representing the Green Party in the Waitaki election of 2017. I am very pleased that, while Mojo has moved on to a possibly much more satisfying life than being a member of Parliament—she is a woman of very strong conviction and felt very, very strongly that the needs of disabled persons should be acknowledged and legislated for so that they can, all candidates who are disabled persons, have a fair old suck of the sav when we’re going out for the vote. I think this bill does that, and I think that the committee’s deliberations, particularly in the committee stage, brought about some very good, pragmatic improvements to the bill.

I think, for me, the eligibility for the funding, which was narrowed down by the committee to be available to individual disabled persons to assist them—so this bill is not about assisting a party or an organisation for the candidate; it’s about assisting a candidate to be able to foot it on the stage, and often it is a stage. Often it is a stage, and there are steps and microphones and there are all sorts of environments that we go in to, from street corners to auditoriums, and so this bill, I believe, achieves a great deal for disabled persons.

The other point I wanted to touch on very briefly was around the review of the operation and effectiveness of the fund after the first election. I thought that was critical, because as a committee we worked really hard to make sure that we had captured everything that we possibly could. We had to discard some things like by-elections and local body elections. Well, maybe we can consider those in the future. So, in effect, we parked those issues because, partly, they were out of scope of this particular bill but, more importantly, we had a desire to get it right as much as we could. So a review in three years’ time will enable the Parliament of the day and the committee of the day to make amendments to the Parliament as they see fit. I think that’s a really good process.

I will speak only in this committee stage of the bill—just speak once—so I want to finish by congratulating Chlöe Swarbrick for her work, together with our committee. She didn’t bring baking ever, but—it’s just a small thing, I suppose.

💬 Rt Hon David Carter: That’s a promise.

Yeah, it is a promise; it’s never too late. This is a good bill—it’s a good example of parliamentarians working together—and I commend it to the House.

Thank you, Mr Chair. It’s a pleasure to talk on this bill, as I did in the first reading of the Election Access Fund Bill. Being a member of the Governance and Administration Committee, I felt a real sense of pride that this had been progressed through the member, and just understanding the history from Mojo Mathers and her hard work. I remember the member saying in her first reading, in introducing the bill, that although Mojo is obviously deaf, what her real passions were were around animal welfare and water. Sometimes we put the onus on those, say, with the disability to therefore be the vehicle to carry this through. But the member made it very clear that, actually, this was in addition to that, and the legacy that she left to be implemented I felt was both admirable and I am personally proud to actually see this through. So, well done.

We’re at the committee stage now and we’ve heard from the previous speaker that the committee did deliberate at length. We got many submissions. We took a process that was inclusive, and that gets a big tick, because sometimes we just apply the normal standard to the way that we engage and consult, but this bill was done slightly differently. So I just wanted to point out those two important fundamentals, in terms of their legacy of the previous member but also the intent of the Governance and Administration Committee.

Two parts here—look, it’s fairly straightforward, but I want to reinforce the issue around the narrowing of the scope and the deepening of the focus, because we did talk about this at length. Primarily, I think, some of that was around the urgency of getting this through, and I know the member there was very eager to try and get it in sooner than what the deadline is. But it is what it is. We’ve put by-elections in there and we’ve talked at length around local government, and several of us have a local government background. So I think the advice, then, was “Look, let’s just get this done and let’s add that later. Let’s work on that later.”, and the Minister will be reviewing this and maybe that’s something that could be picked up then and how it ties into the Local Government Act, the Electoral Act, and some other legislation that just nicely sits with this bill. Certainly, there was debate around the parties and NGOs in terms of access. No, they can’t access this—candidates only, and that too was talked about.

I think it was an important conversation to have around the definition, too. Often these terms don’t mean much and sometimes we’re a bit flippant about how they are written or how people are referred to, but I think the inclusive intent of how we were engaging on this came through in terms of getting that definition right, and so I’m certainly supportive of that.

The last bit in that first point is that streamlining of delivery—those criteria. That’s always needed when you have a fund. I know that in previous experience when you had been administering funds from—in fact, any fund—the stronger the criteria the better, because that essentially says what’s eligible and ineligible, and that’s about clarity than anything else.

I guess I should have started with this but the fundamental here is also around removing barriers, so being barrier-free. We live in a democratic society. This is an absolute crucial and vital part in terms of what underpins this bill, so that’s in there too.

The last point is that the select committee did, as I said at length, talk about how we were going to review this, what the role of the Minister in this is, and I talked about local government at length. I think there will be other things like any fund that you set up from scratch. There are certainly things that as you do a work through, you find out, “Hey, let’s do this; let’s tweak that.”, and so that’s an admirable point to add in. Thank you, Mr Chair. I commend this bill to the House.

I take a brief call on this. First of all, again, I thank Mojo Mathers and also Chlöe Swarbrick for their effort to make this happen. I must say, as the chair of the Governance and Administration Committee, I feel quite privileged to work with different parties and particularly the sponsor of the bill, Chlöe, and it has been quite a consensus for us to actually work on this. As I said earlier, in the second reading, we have an obligation to support people with disabilities to participate equally in politics, particularly in the general election. As many people have emphasised, under article 29 of the United Nations Convention on Rights of Persons with Disabilities, New Zealand as a country which has ratified this convention has the obligation to make sure that people with disabilities have access to politics.

The Government has done a lot in terms of making it happen. For example, in the last election, the Electoral Commission—actually, according to an Electoral Commission report—had 1,649 fully accessible voting places and 654 voting places accessible with assistance. So the Government has been making an effort to make sure that people with disabilities are able to participate, and there is a quite high percentage of satisfaction from disabled persons in terms of participating in the elections.

Nevertheless, we still face a number of challenges in terms of helping these people. For example, it has been a challenge for people with disabilities to participate, or to meet the candidates and even to participate in televised leaders’ debates, according to some submissions, because they were not able to participate due to lack of captions. Also, in terms of multimedia platforms, again, it has been a challenge to these people. Online voting is another challenge. So we do have those challenges in terms of helping these people to participate in the general elections or other local elections. To participate in terms of elections can be a challenge; to be a candidate can be a bigger challenge. For example, these candidates—these people with disabilities—may find it hard to get to the venue. Transportation can be a challenge. Interpretation can be a challenge, and for that reason we do need to find some ways to support these people. That is why this bill is particularly important. We need funding to support these people so that they are able to become a candidate and to participate as a candidate.

The committee received a large number of submissions, including 84 unique submissions and 385 form submissions. The committee made a number of changes. Chlöe Swarbrick has mentioned some major changes, including, for example, who can receive this kind of funding. How to define candidates—so we now include those who have declared their intention to become a candidate. So this is a kind of broadened scope of this definition.

In other changes, for example, we now have reduced the funding to individuals instead of having parties or not-for-profit organisations, and also made sure that the funding would not be counted as donations, because this will encourage parties to help candidates to apply for the funding, and also as tax exemptions. Basically, the funding will not be counted as income for any candidates—that will, again, encourage candidates to apply for the funding. So all these changes have improved the bill, and I believe it is now an excellent bill.

Thank you, Mr Chair. I just want to take a short call. I was actually briefly subbed on to the Governance and Administration Committee, I think, for maybe one or two sessions. I just wanted to make a couple of points if I could.

Firstly, I wanted to talk about how the select committee itself was set up to ensure that those who were either in the gallery or able to pipe into the select committee were able to have as much access to the discussion as possible. I think it’s important for us to lay that out because in the discussion, as people who perhaps don’t have disabilities, it’s important for us to understand the context in which we are having this discussion. So I think it’s really useful for us to know that the select committee did what it could to ensure that as many people had access to the discussion as possible.

One of the interesting discussions that I was actually on was: when does a candidate become a candidate? And when we’re exploring this in normal electoral cycles, that’s an interesting issue. Because pragmatism appears to have range over this committee, and they have removed several of the provisions that were in the original bill as it was presented; it has kind of streamlined that, but it doesn’t mean that the conversation itself is not important. I think what we would hope to get to in the future is coming back to those conversations where, in the fullness of the electoral cycle, we will make it possible for people to indicate that they want to be candidates and that the material that is provided to them and the opportunities to speak and to engage in debate become much more open for everyone to participate in. The legislation that we’ve landed on actually removes a lot of that and just allows for the provision of funding for people who decide to become candidates, but we shouldn’t lose sight of the arguments and the discussion that was held. It is important for us to recognise that the Electoral Commission will be reviewing this, and that’s really important because there may be some provisions that were not considered that people who engage in this process and who have access to this fund will then highlight.

I do want to acknowledge Mojo Mathers. She too stood in Christchurch East. I had lots of conversations with her and her whānau about the difficulties that sometimes occurred for her to be able to participate fully in the debates, often in the public meetings and public forums. But she was, for me, a real-life example of the ability to overcome a lot of that and present really capably as a strong candidate for her party.

I do want to mention, too, that this is part of a wider piece of work that I think that we are doing across the Parliament. I think we’ve got the whole of Parliament’s support for the Parliamentary Champions for Accessibility Legislation. This is a step along the journey to ensuring that we all have access to democracy. Thank you, Mr Chair.

Thank you, Mr Chair. I request only to take a call for a very short period of time. Others have spoken about the general worth of the piece of legislation, and for what it’s worth I add my voice to that. Whether we come at it from a lens of equity or equality of opportunity, either way it seems a worthwhile thing to do to be able to improve access for all New Zealanders and, in this case, disabled persons to our democratic processes.

I have one question of the member in the chair, Chlöe Swarbrick, and I know that she’d approve of a thorough process in this way, so I’ll give her that challenge or that opportunity should she wish to take it. It’s a relatively minor point but, none the less, I am generally curious regarding the commencement date. Originally, Ms Swarbrick, you had a six-month period that would herald the Act coming into force, but I see the Governance and Administration Committee has changed that to a calendar date of 1 July 2021. So I wonder how you feel that interacts with the fact that we don’t know the timing of any elections between now and that date. It’s probably a reasonably arcane point, but if you care to turn your mind to it and respond, that would be a matter of interest.

My only other comment would just be around the point that others have made regarding the non-applicability, for now, of the local government elections regime to this new mechanism. I just note that, as others have already commented—for example, the Hon Jacqui Dean—it’s helpful that there’s a review of the Act that must take place, and that includes a review of the scope of the Act. So I just want to place on record that I think it’s a valuable thing for that review, when it does take place, to include, under the heading of “scope”, the possible applicability of the bill—or the Act, as it will then be—to the local government environment, and that seems to be somewhere that Parliament is moving in the general direction of anyway, as evidenced by the recent reporting of the election inquiry from the Justice Committee, of which I have been a part.

So that’s all from me. Mr Chair, thank you. If the member cares to respond, I’d be grateful.

Thank you very much, Mr Chair, for the opportunity. As a member of the Governance and Administration Committee, it was a real privilege to be part of listening to the submissions on this bill and to understand in greater detail how it would be applied within New Zealand during the election process.

I have a question for the member in the chair, Chlöe Swarbrick, which I’m really interested in knowing a little bit more around. I know that we’ve had a lot of discussion around eligibility for funding, but I’m interested to know if there is any more detail available now or whether that is part of the review that will be coming in the future—particularly around how we ascertain different disabilities and how the level of funding would apply to each individual as they require that.

The bulk of the submissions we heard gave information around the requirement for a translator to be paid for—for example, in the course of a public debate or a public meeting where it would be able to have a paid interpreter coming and translating to sign language live. But there may be a wide variety of other disabilities, whether they be physical or otherwise, that may be covered by this funding. So I would be really interested to know the way forward in terms of ascertaining what obstacles are in place that prevent people from either being candidates or from standing at an election and how those different levels of ability are ascertained and what types of assistance can be provided to ensure full access to democracy in New Zealand. I think that’s probably one of the greatest challenges we have as a country in order to making every aspect of our community and our democratic system accessible: it’s to make sure that we are aware of those obstacles, understand how they present to two different people, and understand what types of different mechanisms can be employed to ensure that we have full accessibility.

I’ve said it before, but I’ll say it again: I’d just like to thank Chlöe, as well, for her excellent work in this space. To pick up another member’s bill is never an easy piece of work, but I would like to commend her on the fact that she has taken it up with just as much passion and determination as was done previously with Mojo Mathers. So I think that has been well and truly heard within the disability community.

It’s always great to have bills in this House that reconfirm our commitment as a Parliament to making sure that we are continually assessing the needs of those people in our community that don’t have full access. It is always a fight to make sure that we examine everything and remember that life is a fight for a lot of people who don’t have easy access to things that we might take for granted on a daily basis.

So I’ll defer to the member in the chair for any answers going forward, but the particular issue that I’m interested in is how we ascertain those levels of different abilities and what types of support can be provided and what that role is in terms of providing financial assistance through the Election Access Fund Bill that that can happen through. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr Chair. Just a very brief call, and it’s more a question. In Part 2, clause 7(2), it says that “The Electoral Commission must not issue a notice … without first consulting persons and organisations that the Commission considers appropriate, having regard to the purpose of the fund.” I wonder if the member actually believes that part goes far enough. In other words, you’re leaving it wide open to the Electoral Commission to decide who those organisations may be. I know it’s difficult to put in legislation or even regulations naming people, but I would hate—because this is such a big move and a bold move—that some of those organisations are left out or it’s a tick-box exercise rather than, in reality, getting to the depth of the situation. So, in my brief call, I’d just like the member to consider how that may be addressed. Thank you, Mr Chair.

Mr Chair, I’d just like to take a call, if I could, on this committee stage of the Election Access Fund Bill. I’ll start by congratulating the member Chlöe Swarbrick for bringing this bill forward, taking time out from her usual role of being a global voice of a generation and enraging older white men everywhere to bring this thoroughly practical and considered and sensible member’s bill forward. It is important that we have a House of Representatives to represent everyone, including older white men, but we’ve seen, I think, the example, obviously, of Mojo Mathers having made it into the Parliament, but also a number of candidates that we know, and New Zealand First has run a number of disabled candidates—a fully blind candidate in a recent election. Apparently, we once had, quite literally, a one-armed paperhanger run for us in one of the Auckland electorates, I believe.

So this is a welcome step. We do need to make it accessible. New Zealand First were concerned, and I guess we just want some reassurance from the member that this is not a socialist conspiracy for party political funding by the State. We were concerned about that at the start. We are pleased to see that the bill has been narrowed to come down to funding of the individual candidates and just for expenses that are incurred as part of that disability—things like interpreters, sign language interpreters and the like. So just some reassurance that you’re not using this as the thin edge of the wedge to come in here with some wider scope and conspiracy theory.

I guess, in terms of the funding, do you have any idea of what this might cost and how broad this could become? Because I guess it depends, as the previous speaker alluded, on what the criteria are for who is disabled and who isn’t and how wide you expect this to be. Do you expect this to be accessed by a number of people? As I think Tracey Martin alluded to in her second reading speech, we’ve actually got a legally blind member in our caucus at the moment, who possibly would be eligible for this if he chose to be. So it could be that actually the scope could get quite broad. So how can we keep that narrow or make sure that we know that the funding will be there to carry out what we’re proposing?

I guess that’s pretty well where we see it as New Zealand First. We do support the intent of the bill, getting more disabled people being prepared to put their names forward for Parliament, but we do want to see that it’s not just the thin edge of the wedge in terms of that wider State funding of political parties, which we do not support. So I just, once again, commend the member on the bill and look forward to it progressing. Thank you.

E Te Māngai, tēnā koe. Tēnā koutou e Te Whare. I want to thank all of my colleagues for the brilliant contributions that we’ve had so far to this committee of the whole House stage of the Election Access Fund Bill. I will address all of the concerns that have been raised so far, most recently those by my colleague Mark Patterson—#notallwhitemen.

So, with regard to the statistics here that we’re looking at, the Office for Disability Issues reports that a quarter of New Zealanders are impacted by physical sensory learning, mental health, or other impairment. In very practical terms, per Ministry of Health data, that means that 1.1 million New Zealanders can be considered as having a disability. That is a huge portion of our population. What you find following through those data points is that those who do identify with having a disability are typically also those who are overrepresented in negative statistics such as underemployment.

I want to also thank the Office of the Clerk. As was mentioned by my colleague the Hon Poto Williams, they went above and beyond to make the select committee process fully accessible—that being having New Zealand Sign Language interpreters. I also want to thank the Governance and Administration Committee—in particular, the chair, Dr Jian Yang—for accommodating those submitters who needed extra time because of certain communication impairments or otherwise in order to communicate the basis of what they needed to put forward, to really have their say in that democratic process.

I also want to touch on the point made by Paul Eagle, who stated that I wanted to get this bill through as quickly as possible. I think that’s probably the case with most members in this Parliament. We want to see these processes expedited as democratically as possible. But it is the case, I think it’s worth noting, that this bill was first drawn actually at the start of 2018. I remember it really vividly because I was at O-Week at the University of Otago, and I got the call from my EA, Tim Onnes, who told me that the Election Access Fund Bill had been drawn. It was really exciting, because I had only put it in a few weeks prior, with the blessing of former Green MP Mojo Mathers, and it wasn’t until 16 May 2018 when the Governance and Administration Committee opened submissions. Those members of the Governance and Administration Committee will be aware that we did consistently extend the report-back time, with the good grace of the Business Committee accepting that, to ensure that we got the best possible legislation that was as functional as possible and really served its purpose.

I also want to speak to the point made by the Hon Jacqui Dean, who is also an excellent, engaged member of that Governance and Administration Committee, around her point of that review after the election period. That is a really crucial function of this legislation: to enable the Election Access Fund Bill to review itself through the Minister of Justice and through the Electoral Commission per the amendments from the select committee, because it will hopefully trigger, in future, extensions of accessibility to our democracy, and particularly to our elections. That was also touched upon by the Hon Poto Williams, who spoke about this bill being a starting point. It was indeed in the second reading of this legislation that I spoke about this being the first step on a very long journey towards a truly inclusive and equitable democratic system.

I also want to touch on the point made by the chair of that select committee, Dr Jian Yang, who spoke about the consensus and working across the parties that we saw in that Governance and Administration Committee. I think that that was only plausible as a result of the goodwill that all members of that committee brought to the table, but also their backing of the kaupapa or the intention behind the legislation. I really, really want to thank all members in this House. If citizens out there are ever unsure or uncertain about how much the House of Representatives really cares about our democracy, you only have to watch the process that got the bill, this bill, to the place that it is in today.

To address some of the questions that have been raised, I’ll first turn to the question from my colleague Chris Penk, who asked about the commencement date. Those were changes that were made—in clause 2 the commencement date has been changed in the report back from the Governance and Administration Committee. Originally, the commencement clause read as “This Act comes into force immediately after the expiry of the 6-month period that starts on the date of Royal assent.” It is now that the Act comes into force on 1 July 2021. This is a commencement date that was arrived at in consultation with and based on the advice of the officials who came before the Governance and Administration Committee. I’ll happily put on the record, as my colleague Paul Eagle, already, I believe, has, that I wanted to bring it forward as quickly as possible. In an ideal world, I actually think all members of the committee and all members of this House would like to see this fund in place prior to the 2020 election. But unfortunately the Electoral Commission and Ministry of Justice officials advise us that practically it just would not be possible with the loaded agenda that we’re heading into 2020 with, that being at least the two referenda, should this House decide to put any more—Mark Patterson?—up. But at the very least right now it is two items of referendum and, obviously, the general election.

The reason that we’ve settled on that defined date of 1 July 2021—the member Chris Penk did mention that there could be any number of elections between then and now. Thankfully, I believe we have a more stable democracy than those of what we’re seeing in other Westminster models. But that is simply for the sake of having certainty for the Electoral Commission so that they can put that in stone and know a time line that they have to work towards.

Speaking to the points raised by my colleague Ginny Andersen, who is also on the select committee. She asked about how we can ascertain level of disability, and how we would provide for the funding to enable those candidates with those disabilities to overcome those barriers. I believe it’s here really important to note that this Election Access Fund, this bill, empowers the Electoral Commission to administer the funds. That means that the fund is administered at arm’s length from any political process. That’s really critical, not just for the day to day administration of what is supposed to be providing equity to our democracy but also for addressing a number of concerns that were raised across the House in the first reading and throughout the select committee stage and also by spokespeople on disability issues and electoral reform from all political parties, in making sure that we got the most robust and fit for purpose Election Access Fund Bill possible.

Fundamentally, there will be an application process that means that candidates who would like to put themselves forward, who identify with having a disability, apply to the Electoral Commission and are provided that support from the Electoral Commission, which feeds into the question by my colleague Lawrence Yule, who is also on the Governance and Administration Committee, pertaining to clause 7(2)—that being “The Electoral Commission must not issue a notice under subsection (1) without first consulting persons and organisations that the Commission considers appropriate”. The reason that we didn’t seek to prescribe who the Electoral Commission should be consulting with in order to put out that notice is because we didn’t want it to be too prescriptive. There were submissions on both sides of the fence, some people saying that we needed to provide that explicit list, others saying that we should leave it open because it is the case that the area or the sector of disability access advocacy is evolving. So it is simply that we have left that open for the time being and its efficacy will be evaluated further down the track with the built-in required evaluation from the Minister of Justice and the Electoral Commission.

Now, finally, in my final 40 seconds, to turn to the issues raised by Mark Patterson, a wonderful, intelligent man, about New Zealand First’s concerns with regard to the cost of this, in particular, and whether this is a socialist conspiracy. Mr Patterson, I guarantee you when we are pushing the socialist agenda it will be far more explicit. This is not communism by stealth, as Working for Families was once described as. It is, in fact, about improving our very democracy. Kia ora.

Parts 1 and 2 and clauses 1 and 2 agreed to.

House resumed.

The Chairperson reported the Election Access Fund Bill without amendment.

Report adopted.