van de Molen TimTIM VAN DE MOLEN (National—Waikato): Thank you Madam Speaker. Our role in this House is to uphold democracy and I am absolutely amazed and quite frankly disgusted to hear the comment from the member that has just taken her seat Tracey Martin saying that Parliament can't be trusted. The Hon Tracey Martin has just told this House that Parliament cannot be trusted to make this decision—but presumably Cabinet can! What a ridiculous statement to make in this House—another Minister now jumping up and down trying to suggest that this is appropriate. This is an absolute outrage and an affront to this House.For over 160 years in our democracy in the 20-odd referenda that we have had never—not once—has this happened before. This is disgusting. Every single time Parliament has had the opportunity to be involved in this process the public has engaged had their input through select committee as is proper and yet again we are seeing another instance of this Government cutting out the public from the parliamentary process—the arrogance of them to assume that they know best and the public should not have a say in what is a fundamental democratic right in this House. This is quite frankly an outrage and the Government should be disgusted.Hon Andrew Little: And what a pity it's not happening. What a pity for that member it's not happening.TIM VAN DE MOLEN: Members of the defence force have fought for the freedoms that we have in this country and the Minister scoffs at those members who have fought and again he should be disgusted by that.Hon Andrew Little: The member is talking rubbish.TIM VAN DE MOLEN: Perhaps he should have made an effort to actually consider the people—DEPUTY SPEAKER: Can I just—[Interruption] Order! Can I just remind the Minister that I note that he is to speak—he can just calm down and let this member have his opportunity.TIM VAN DE MOLEN: Thank you Madam Speaker. Indeed the Minister is somewhat caught out by this it would seem and is rightly feeling it is just that he has been held to account for a disgusting piece of legislation that's been put forward.So as I've said over 160 years this has never happened and the Minister tries to say the Regulations Review Committee can sort it out so it's no problem at all. Well that's quite a disingenuous comment and I'm sure the Minister is well aware of that. Every single referenda that has been before this House has gone through the proper process. Parliament has considered it the public has considered it and yet in this particular instance suddenly for whatever reason this Government decides they know best and are going to circumvent that process—as they have already actually with a couple of other electoral changes they've proposed so far in this parliamentary term.Where has been the consultation with the Opposition? Any changes to electoral law should be consulted broadly. This is a fundamental tenet of our democracy in this country and yet the Government sees fit to change it at will—suiting perhaps their political agenda. And of course I won't make comment on what that might look like but to consider from the public's perspective that a Government can just make ad hoc changes to electoral law is surely concerning for the wider public. And indeed we've been hearing that on this side of the House I know through my offices in the Waikato people have been expressing significant concern at the ability to just make such wide-ranging changes on fundamental tenets of our democracy without proper consultation without proper process and without involving anyone in this House and the wider public through that as well.We hear about the Government's intent for this to be binding referenda. Well whilst—Darroch Ball: That's right.TIM VAN DE MOLEN: Great to hear the consent there. Perhaps the member might like to consider what a binding referendum is because quite frankly having three parties on that side of the House just agree in principle that Hey if we get back in we'll do this."—that is not a binding referendum. A binding referendum actually requires this House to pass legislation that will come into effect as the result of a referendum being passed. That's how a binding referendum works and for whatever reason this Government's decided to rewrite that part of our democracy as well. "No no that's no longer a binding referendum" the Government says: "A binding referendum is just us agreeing in principle that 'hey we'll get on and do this' "—whatever it might be. Although actually the question might change somewhat from what was agreed in the referendum because "Perhaps we'll do a select committee process afterwards."—unless of course the Government's not going to listen to anyone in that select committee process which wouldn't quite frankly be surprising.What we've also heard from actually just going back to Minister Martin's comment as well about how we need to evolve and adapt so that we can remove bad processes—for the Minister to be suggesting that electoral—effectively constitutional—changes like this is bad process is quite frankly outrageous and to me shows just how disconnected this Government is and how little regard they have for the processes of this place and for the wider public in New Zealand.When we come here we have huge obligations and responsibilities to those members of our constituencies that have elected us or for those who are list MPs to the wider voting public who have supported their particular party. That is a massive obligation and responsibility. To come here and just tweak as necessary as the Government is doing with these changes is an outrage for members of the public and quite frankly I am surprised the media is not making more of this as well and that we've not seen a much more significant beat up as a result of this. I'm sure that once the public becomes aware of it that will indeed happen because the public expects transparency. They expect openness and this Government has committed to those two facets in particular claiming to be the most transparent and open Government and yet we're not seeing it. Time after time bills coming before this House are having a shortened report back or are being pushed through under urgency and not going to select committees at all. For those that are the shortened report back doesn't allow the full capacity for the public to engage in that parliamentary process to have their say in what are quite often very important matters.Now look certainly there are some aspects that can be put through in a speedier and more succinct process and we've supported those where it's appropriate but those should be rare and they should be for more minor aspects that do not have fundamental changes that would require wider consultation. It would be quite frankly arrogant of us in this House to assume we know better than the public on any issue whatever the bill may be. That is a major part of why we go to select committee: to enable the public to engage to allow experts to come in to share their understanding on integral facets of what we're proposing with a particular piece of legislation. That is critical. We can't know everything here. The public have the right to be involved in any of these considerations and in particular in areas such as electoral law changes. We've seen many times now where this has happened by this Government.I just reiterate: this process that's being proposed under this particular bill has never never happened in the history of the New Zealand Parliament—the Referendums Framework Bill first reading looking to allow Cabinet to make the decision on what the wording of a referendum will be. Quite frankly that is an outrage as I've said. It's never happened before—20 referendums over 160-odd years of our Parliament it's never happened. In the UK the same Westminster system: 380-odd years and not once have they done this sort of process. Surely the Government can look at that and realise they are well out of line well out of touch with how the democratic process should work how legislation such as this should be brought before the House and the opportunity the public should have to engage to be part of the democratic process. We've heard the Speaker many times over this parliamentary term looking to outline his concerns around the lack of engagement with the public. Well how are the public to engage to get involved with the parliamentary process when they are not given the opportunity on such a fundamental part of what is critical for running this Parliament and that is electoral law changes?We've seen time and again that the public's scrutiny is absolutely critical to not only giving confidence to the public but ensuring that any amendments can indeed be included to ensure that we end up with the right piece of legislation before this House and then going on to be enacted into law. So to suggest that Cabinet can simply make that decision is quite frankly outrageous especially when we consider that in reality having a referendum at election time will always have some political impact. If the public are getting confused by questions or indeed the particular question has an appeal to a particular audience that can well result in changes. That just reinforces the need to have broad discussion on these sorts of areas. So quite frankly we will continue to oppose this. This is terrible process and a terrible affront to our democracy. This House deserves better New Zealand deserves better and we will fight this every step of the way. Thank you."