Brownlee GerryHon GERRY BROWNLEE (National—Ilam): 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.Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: —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."