Privilege — Conduct of Members—Disruption During Vote

Members, we come to the consideration of the Report of the Privileges Committee, and I refer members to the statement I made on 15 May about this debate, which dealt with the Standing Orders surrounding it, although some media outlets seemed to misunderstand that. The committee’s recommendation to impose penalties would represent a significant development in the practice of the House. A proper opportunity for debate must be provided before the House arrives at a decision.

The debate on this matter should be civil, as should any debate in this House. While members may criticise each other, this should not amount to personal reflection or attacks. Members should constrain their speeches to relevant points, and avoid repetition and discreditable references. Failure to do so will see the termination of members’ speeches. I invite the chairperson of the Privileges Committee to move a motion that reflects the recommendations of the committee.

I move, That Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke be suspended from the House for 7 days for acting in a manner that could have the effect of intimidating a member of the House in the discharge of their duty;

That Debbie Ngarewa-Packer be severely censured by the House and suspended from the service of the House for 21 days for acting in a manner that could have the effect of intimidating a member of the House in the discharge of their duty; and

That Rawiri Waititi be severely censured by the House and suspended from the service of the House for 21 days for acting in a manner that could have the effect of intimidating a member of the House in the discharge of their duty.

These recommendations follow the Speaker’s ruling on 10 December 2024 that a question of privilege arose from the actions of the Hon Peeni Henare, Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer, and Rawiri Waititi following the first reading debate on the Principles of the Treaty of Waitangi Bill on 14 November 2024. At the conclusion of that debate and during the vote, the four members left their seats to perform the haka, and three of the members advanced towards the seats of another party, something the Speaker has ruled cannot be considered anything other than disorderly.

All four MPs were referred to the Privileges Committee and subsequently invited to appear before it. Mr Henare did so, and he accepted he should not have left his seat. The committee recommended he apologise to the House for acting in a disorderly manner that disrupted a vote being taken and impeded the House in its functions, and he unreservedly did so on 25 March 2025.

However, the three other MPs declined to appear before the committee, ostensibly because the committee rejected their request to appear together rather than individually, while clarifying that each member would be able to attend in the public gallery. The committee wanted them to appear individually as it considered that would be of most assistance to it in considering the question of privilege. It especially wanted to clarify whether there was any premeditation behind the actions, given Ms Maipi-Clarke told media Mr Waititi was supposed to rip up the bill and start the haka, but instead handed it to her to do so.

The committee sought to arrange hearings twice more, but the members declined each opportunity. We have therefore had to consider this matter based on observations on 14 November, including video footage. This footage clearly shows Ms Maipi-Clarke casting her party’s vote before proceeding to rip up the bill and start a haka. The Speaker can be heard saying, “No, don’t do that.”, before rising to his feet. However, a number of Opposition party members then rose to their feet and joined Ms Maipi-Clarke in performing the haka, with Ms Maipi-Clarke, Mr Henare, Ms Ngarewa-Packer, and Mr Waititi leaving their seats.

Ms Maipi-Clarke, Ms Ngarewa-Packer, and Mr Waititi moved across the Chamber floor to face members of the ACT Party, who were seated at their desks. Ms Ngarewa-Packer approached the front of the ACT Party desks and, while performing the haka, pointed at ACT Party members using a hand gesture similar to a finger gun. At the conclusion of the haka, Ms Ngarewa-Packer repeated the gesture and, simulating a firing motion, said, “E noho.”—or “Sit down.” The Speaker suspended the sitting of the House.

When the House resumed nearly 30 minutes later, the Speaker ruled that Ms Maipi-Clarke’s conduct was “appallingly disrespectful” and “grossly disorderly”. He moved that Ms Maipi-Clarke be suspended from the House and the motion was agreed to.

Based on our review of the video footage, we considered that the facts of the matter are clear and occurred as I have already outlined. We invited Ms Maipi-Clarke, Ms Ngarewa-Packer, and Mr Waititi to provide written evidence and they jointly responded, saying, in essence, that their actions were an expression of tikanga, upholding the values and obligations of Te Tiriti o Waitangi and their tino rangatiratanga.

One of their arguments was that tikanga Māori and haka were not matters for the Privileges Committee to consider. On this, the committee agrees with them. It is not there to set or debate the rules of Parliament but, rather, to uphold the rules as they are, not as some people may wish them to be. To be clear: the haka is not banned in the House. However, the rules of Parliament—the Standing Orders—under which it operates state that permission has first to be obtained from the Speaker and that any actions must not impede the business of the House. No such permission was sought for the 14 November haka, and it most certainly did impede the business of the House as it was carried out during a vote.

The ensuing chaos led to the Speaker suspending the House for nearly 30 minutes—so here we are at the crux of the matter. It is not about haka. It is not about tikanga. It is not about the Treaty of Waitangi. It is about following the rules of Parliament that we are all obliged to follow and that we all pledged to follow. It does not matter our gender, our ethnicity, or our beliefs; in this House, we are all simply members of Parliament and, like any institution, it has rules. The Standing Orders already include severe penalties for people who break the rules, without the requirement to even go to the Privileges Committee. For example, any member who is suspended under Standing Order 92 that subsequently refuses to obey the Speaker’s direction to leave the Chamber can be suspended from the House for the remainder of the calendar year without further question. I’m quoting from Standing Order 95, for the avoidance of doubt.

In this instance, the Speaker referred the matter to the Privileges Committee, which subsequently carried out a thorough inquiry over six months before coming to a majority decision. Make no mistake: this was a very serious incident, the likes of which I have never before seen in my 23 years in this debating chamber. I am a robust debater, as many of you will know, but I follow the rules of this institution and I am a proud member of it, and I appreciate and accept that my views are not those of all in this House. And that is why we are the House of Representatives. We cannot bring this House into disrepute by ignoring those rules, especially if it results in other members being intimidated, and that is exactly what happened on 14 November 2024. The behaviour of Ms Maipi-Clarke, Ms Ngarewa-Packer, and Mr Waititi was such that it could have the effect of intimidating other members of the House acting in the discharge of their duties.

It is highly disorderly for members to interrupt a vote while it is being conducted. The right to cast one’s vote without impediment goes to the heart of being a member of Parliament. It is not acceptable to physically approach another member on the floor of the debating chamber. It is particularly unacceptable for Ms Ngarewa-Packer to appear to simulate firing a gun at another member of Parliament. We, therefore, by majority, find that all three members have each committed a contempt of the House, and we are recommending the penalties as I have already laid out.

After six months of meetings and hearings, which all committee members participated in in a professional manner and with civility, it is disappointing to now hear personal attacks and allegations of racism. I utterly reject that. We have simply done our job. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

I move, That all the words after the first instance of “That” be replaced with “Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer, and Rawiri Waititi be censured by the House for acting in a manner that could have the effect of intimidating a member of the House in the discharge of their duty, and that Debbie Ngarewa-Packer and Rawiri Waititi be suspended from the service of the House for 24 hours, to take effect on the first sitting day following the conclusion of the Budget debate, and that Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke face no further sanction, having already served a period of suspension.”

This is a serious matter. Deliberately disrupting the business of the House is serious, interrupting a vote of Parliament is serious, and I would say to the Māori Party that when you interrupt a vote of the House, you’re not just interrupting the votes of those who are voting in favour; you’re interrupting the votes of those who are voting against something as well. All members of the House deserve to have their votes recorded, and when members deliberately disrupt the House, there should be some sanction for doing so.

It is never OK to intimidate another member of the House. But the sanction being proposed by the Privileges Committee is totally out of line with existing parliamentary practice, and is disproportionate to the allegations that have been posed.

Let’s be clear about what the Māori Party are not being sanctioned for. They are not being sanctioned for doing a haka, because haka have been performed in this House and that is acceptable. They are also not being sanctioned for refusing to appear before the Privileges Committee, because that is completely legitimate, as well. No one is obliged to appear before the Privileges Committee and the Māori Party chose not to, and that is their right and they should not be sanctioned for that.

They are being sanctioned because they broke the rules of the House, they behaved in a disorderly manner, and they interrupted a vote of the Parliament, and there should be a sanction for that. But we have never seen a sanction of this nature in New Zealand’s history before.

We’ve had members undertaking fist fights in the lobbies, and they were not suspended at all. We’ve had members driving tractors and Land Rovers up the front steps of Parliament, and they were not sanctioned. We have had a recent case where a member left their chair, walked to the other side of the House, and stood over a member and thumped the table, and they were not sanctioned by the House. We’ve had a recent instance in this term of Parliament where a member was prevented from leaving a select committee because another member was standing over him, and they were not sanctioned by this House. And yet we seem to have gone from a situation where members were not sanctioned to one where a 21-day sanction—the harshest by a factor of seven—is being applied to these members. It is disproportionate. A sanction is appropriate; this level of sanction simply is not.

I draw on the advice that was provided by the Clerk of the House to the committee. The Clerk’s job is to provide advice to the Parliament on its proceedings in a way that is not political but that upholds the traditions and the conventions of this House, and the Clerk made the advice clear that suspension of members is a rare occurrence and that a long period of suspension would represent a substantial change in the House’s practice. Let’s be clear: the recommendation of the Privileges Committee is exactly that. The Clerk further advised that the committee ought to recommend a long suspension only with the broad support of members, not simply a bare majority. That has not happened in this case. The Clerk also advised that the committee should clearly set out its rationale in arriving at the particular penalty so that a consistent approach could be followed in the future. I’ve read the report several times. There is no rationale. There is no criteria that could be followed in the future. This is an arbitrary number plucked out of thin air. How can that possibly stand in this Parliament?

Why do we choose a 24-hour suspension? It’s quite simple, Mr Speaker: because it’s already in the Standing Orders. Had you, as Speaker, named those members at the time, given this is the first instance in which they had been named, they would have been suspended for 24 hours, as one of the members was. If they did it again, they’d be suspended for seven days, and if they did it again, they’d be suspended for 28 days. Those are the existing rules of the House.

The Privileges Committee is departing from the well-established practice of this House in its recommendations, and the sanction they are proposing is totally disproportionate. It is wrong and against the traditions of our democracy for a Government to use its majority in Parliament to suspend and remove from the service of the people of New Zealand its political opponents. The reason the Clerk advised that the committee should seek near unanimity on this matter is because of exactly that. Other parliaments around the world have seen members of the Opposition suspended by the Government, and we in many cases have criticised them for doing that. What moral authority will we have to do that again in the future if this House engages in exactly the practice we criticise other countries for doing?

I am not defending the Māori Party, and I’m not saying that their actions should be without sanction—they should be. The motion that we have put forward would see them sanctioned in line with the previous practice of this House, and that would be appropriate. Departing from that and imposing the harshest sanction the New Zealand Parliament ever would have imposed would be wrong.

I was absolutely shocked to learn that a member of the Privileges Committee asked about the committee’s supposed power to imprison a member of the House. That happens in tinpot dictatorships and banana republics. No member of this House should be inquiring about whether they can imprison a member of their Opposition. It is undemocratic and it is wrong, and the fact that the question was even asked is a stain on this House.

Respect for democracy means respecting the rights of all members of Parliament, who are elected by their people to represent them in this House. Taking away that right should be only after a very, very high threshold has been met, but the Government haven’t even articulated what that threshold should be.

If they are going to impose the harshest sentence ever recommended by the Privileges Committee, they should be very clear on what the criteria were that they weighed that against, and they have not done that. They should be very clear on what the future criteria for this nature of sentence—if you like—should be, and they have not done that, either. They are accusing one party of breaking the rules of Parliament—which I happen to agree they did—whilst also not following the rules themselves. Any moral authority they want to claim here has been severely diminished by the fact that they themselves are not following the existing rules of the House. The sanctions that this House imposes are set in the Standing Orders—24 hours, seven days, 28 days; in that order—and the Privileges Committee have not followed that.

But the last point I want to make is perhaps the most important of all. Looking around the world—and I say this to all members on all sides of the House—democracy is quite literally hanging by a thread. Days like today hold a razor blade up to that thread. When people around the country look at this House and say, “Why should I have any faith in the institutions of democracy?”, this is a very good example of why. Parliament is spending more time talking about itself than talking about the issues that matter to them.

And before the Government members go “The Opposition have a choice.”, the Government scheduled this debate for today. They had that choice. The Government recommended a penalty that is harsher than any the Parliament has ever imposed before, and that was their choice. The Government chose to impose that penalty by majority rather than seeking consensus, as the Privileges Committee has almost always done in the past, and that was their choice. They have brought this before the House today and they have made that choice, and it should be subject to scrutiny.

What they’re doing today is wrong. Imposing a penalty that removes three members of the House during Budget week—preventing them participating in one of the two occasions the Opposition has in a year to vote no confidence in the Government—is simply wrong. This is not a tinpot dictatorship or a banana republic. We should stand up for the values of democracy, even when they are inconvenient and even when people are saying things that we disagree with. That is not what the Government are doing today.

The Hon Chris Bishop—we go from side to side in the House.

I move, That this debate be now adjourned to Thursday, 5 June 2025.

Point of order, Mr Speaker. This particular debate potentially infringes upon the rights of individual members. I think it’s not unreasonable, when the Government is moving such an adjournment, to ask them why they are doing so. This questions members’ ability to participate in the House.

You’ve made your point of order. I don’t have to, but I will seek some specificity about the reason for the adjournment motion.

The Government has come to the view that, given the centrality of the Budget process to Parliament, it would be appropriate for Te Pāti Māori members who may or may not be suspended following the conclusion of the consideration of the substantive motion to participate in the Budget. There is no more important role for Parliament than scrutinising and debating the Budget. It is a confidence motion, by definition, in the Government; the Government cannot govern without the approval of the Parliament. Constitutionally, it is right that they participate. So we are moving to adjourn the debate so that this week can focus, rightfully, on the Budget and the details of it, rather than this issue, which has occupied far too much of Parliament’s time already. So the motion reads that the debate be now adjourned to Thursday, 5 June 2025, which is the next sitting block.

Right. Before you do that—you may have to do that again; I’ll call you again to do that—I need to make it clear that the question is that the amendment to the motion be agreed to. [Interruption] No, it’s procedural. Mr Hipkins has moved an amendment, I’m just saying that’s what we now debate. You may now move whatever you want to.

Hon Chris Bishop: Mr Speaker, this is an adjournment motion, which is technically—

SPEAKER: That’s right. I’m not talking about your motion.

Hon Chris Bishop: —non-debatable.

Hon Member: This is a Standing Order.

SPEAKER: Yeah, I know it is. No, hang on a minute. Let’s get a bit of calm here. All I’ve said is that following Mr Hipkins’ speech, I should have said to the Parliament that the question is that the amendment to the motion now be agreed to. You then stood up and said that you move an adjournment, right? So the question is that the motion be agreed to. Those in favour will say aye.

Rt Hon Chris Hipkins: Point of order, Mr Speaker.

SPEAKER: I’m in the middle of a vote.

Rt Hon Chris Hipkins: Which vote are you putting?

SPEAKER: I’m putting the motion to adjourn the House. Look, I was clarifying—[Interruption] adjourn the debate, sorry.

Hon Member: But he hasn’t moved it yet.

SPEAKER: He has moved it. He’s moved it twice, actually.

Rt Hon Chris Hipkins: Point of order, Mr Speaker.

SPEAKER: Look, I know this is charged. It’s a little unexpected—it’s certainly not what I expected. I would just suggest don’t trifle with the Chair today, because I’m sick of that.

That’s fair enough, Mr Speaker. But I just want to point out that this affects members’ ability to participate in the House. The effect of the motion that Chris Bishop has just moved potentially removes the ability of the Māori Party to vote on the Budget, because the Budget will not be voted on until after 5 June. If the motion had passed today for 21 days, it’s possible that by the time the vote for the Budget came up, they would be back in the House and they got a vote.

SPEAKER: OK. Look, I’ve listened enough. The member frequently referenced the Standing Orders through his speech. He will, therefore, know that under Standing Order 134, given that there is a motion of the House to suspend the debate, I have no ability other than to accept it and put it to the House. But the question is that the motion be agreed to.

A party vote was called for on the question that this debate be now adjourned. [Interruption]

You don’t speak, at all, while there is a vote in progress. So anybody who thinks they’re moving, just sit still for a minute and be quiet.