Cullen Michael: Appropriation (Continuation of Interim Meaning of Funding for Parliamentary Purposes) Bill — Second Reading 
Cullen Michael: Appropriation (Continuation of Interim Meaning of Funding for Parliamentary Purposes) Bill — Second Reading 
[Volume:643;Page:13015] 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN (Minister of Finance) 
: 
 I move  
That the Appropriation (Continuation of Interim Meaning of Funding for Parliamentary Purposes) Bill be now read a second time 
. As I said last Thursday this is actually a very simple bill. The current legislative framework governing spending by parliamentary parties expires on 31 December this year and this bill extends that expiry date until 30 June 2009. The extension is required because we are unable to reach agreement across parties on a new permanent regime. 
It has been interesting to hear some of the arguments put forward by National to oppose this bill—arguments that are unusually weak even for National. The reality of course is that this is one of those bills that National really hopes will pass even though it will vote against it. The last thing that National really wants to happen is to have no funding for the activities it has been engaged in over the last year or so to be available in 2008. Mr Heatley is smiling wisely as he knows the truth of that particular reason. 
We know for two reasons what National’s real hopes are. The first way we know that National does not really oppose the bill is that the central proposal to extend the expiry date of the current legislation came from National itself. Mr Brownlee actually confirmed this in the House a week ago when he said National was happy for a rollover provided it would lead to a much shorter election period. In other words as long as we were prepared to allow lots and lots of National Party money to be spent in the last few months before the election—the vast treasure chest that National has available particularly the money it has available from Macquarie Bank—to purchase public-private partnerships post the election it would be quite happy to have a rollover of the current legislation in relation to parliamentary spending. Perhaps this explains why National sent into the House Bill English Nick Smith and Anne Tolley to oppose the bill—because Mr Brownlee could not possibly speak against it because he knew that National’s position was a quite different one. Perhaps that is why Mr Brownlee has been unable to speak on this issue any more because it might reveal more of the strategy in that regard. 
So we know that National does not really oppose this bill as the bill does nothing more than implement its own proposal. The second reason and the much better reason why we know that National really does not oppose this bill is that it keeps spending the money that comes from Parliamentary Service for communications. National has thrown around some absolutely outrageous claims around the use of parliamentary resources. It has accused other parties of corruption. It has likened New Zealand to some of the worst non-democratic regimes in history. Compared with us Pakistan is a beacon of light in a democratic world or at least one would sometimes think that from the speeches we have heard. Despite all of this National keeps spending parliamentary resources on the very things it says they should not be able to be spent upon. 
What is lacking here is some consistency. If it is corrupt to produce material such as John Key’s “10 Budget Pledges” published in May this year then where are the calls from Bill English and Gerry Brownlee for John Key to resign? If it is corrupt to produce material such as John Key’s “Join the Conversation” 
postcards published this year then where are the calls from Mr English and Mr Brownlee for John Key to resign? If it is corrupt to produce material such as John Key’s letter to a Wellington community group sent out in June this year then where are the calls from Bill English and Gerry Brownlee for John Key to resign? We all know that Bill English would really like John Key to resign but it is simply not credible for National to try to claim some high moral ground while still collecting the lion’s share of parliamentary funding—by far the largest amount goes to National—and spending it on exactly the things it claims it should not be spent upon. 
After all the person who sits opposite just over there squawking during every question time muttering his little “Oh!”s yelling out and going completely berserk almost every day sent out this year on parliamentary letterhead a publication headed  
Nick Smith MP for Nelson 
. This sometime deputy leader of the National Party sent out this publication with the parliamentary crest outlining why New Zealand needs a new Government. The publication was paid for by the taxpayers paid for out of Parliamentary Service paid for out of the communications vote on Parliamentary Service letterhead and was from Nick Smith. It is all about tax and bureaucracy home affordability Crown environment and migration. 
Then there was what I thought was an extremely bold bold question from Dr Smith: “Want to meet your MP?”. One wonders what answer came back from the masses in Nelson at that point. Probably not a single person turned up at the Nelson market from 9 a.m. to 12 noon outside Rebel Sport and the pet shop. Probably not a single person went to the Nelson AMP show from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. and one doubts whether anyone went to the Nelson electorate office because the risk was that person might have met Dr Nick Smith spending the money from Parliamentary Service. 
Nick Smith comes into this House and sits over there saying it is corrupt to spend money from Parliamentary Service on communications out to the electorate. There is a word for that and it is one of those many many words in Parliament’s dictionary of words that we cannot use which is almost bigger in number than the amount of words we can use in Parliament. This is one of those words that describes this particular letter from Dr Nick Smith as it does of course most things that came out from Mr Key. 
On the topic of lack of credibility if there is any person who lacks credibility on this issue it is Mr English. Mr English does the deepest moral outrage of anybody on the National Party front bench. But it was Mr English when leader of the National Party who put out into the public arena in the 2002 election campaign a pledge advertisement carrying the parliamentary crest paid for out of taxpayers’ money and on the parliamentary communications vote. It was a pledge advertisement in the newspapers—National Party’s pledge. Do those words “pledge” and “parliamentary spending” ring a bell? The bit that is different is the National Party. That spending was all right at that point was it not? After all National was desperately trying to get above 20 percent of the vote so presumably it was OK. Was it corrupt for Mr English to spend that money in 2002? Will he pay back the taxpayer for that spending in 2002? Or is it the case that previous convictions should not be taken into account in that particular regard? The fact is that National does not follow the same standards as what it says it does in this respect. 
This bill grows out of genuine multiparty engagement. I put on record my appreciation for the good faith shown during those negotiations by all parties other than National which at the end of the day made it quite clear that it wanted to link this to the Electoral Finance Bill that it could not give away the political advantage and that it could not actually front up to what it was doing but that it hopes like hell that the majority holds together to pass this bill so that it can carry on doing next year what it has been doing this year the year before the year before that and every other year that I can remember during my time in this House.