Parker David: Electoral (Administration) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Parker David: Electoral (Administration) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:663;Page:10898] 
Hon DAVID PARKER (Labour) 
: 
 I have a brief contribution to make on the Electoral (Administration) Amendment Bill. Firstly I was on the Justice and Electoral Committee and I say we dealt carefully as the Minister of Justice Simon Power acknowledged with the issue of whether the structure should be an independent Crown entity or an Officer of Parliament. Through that process we had a very good submission from Dave McGee QC and good submissions from people who were in favour of the Officer of Parliament model being used. In the eyes of the committee those submissions were outweighed by the points that were made by Dave McGee against following the Officer of Parliament model. Amongst his good points though was to emphasise to us that the conventions that we have around our institutional arrangements are really important in a country that does not have a written constitution. Even countries that do have written constitutions often still rely upon unwritten conventions as to how they administer important institutions to maintain public confidence in the independence and impartiality of those institutions. 
One of the ideas that the select committee put forward reflecting the submission from Dave McGee QC was that we should have more rigour around the process by which we appoint people who are not Officers of Parliament but who are being appointed by Parliament to independent Crown entities. I know that the Minister has come forward with a letter dated 28 April that sets out how he proposes to make the first appointments to this commission. But the underlying point that Dave McGee made was that there should be perhaps some changes made to the Standing Orders in order to regularise the way in which we make appointments to not only this body but also other bodies such as the Abortion Supervisory Committee and the Independent Police Conduct Authority in order to have greater public confidence that those process will be continued impartially into the future. 
The other point I make is a more general one. Yes it is good that we are aiming for a consensus around these laws and the criticisms that were made by the then Opposition National Party of our last reform of the electoral financing law had some justification in terms of how some of it went too far in the absence of a consensus. On that basis the Minister retreated back to the prior status quo representing a consensus in respect of electoral financing and he has run a process to change it in future. But it has become apparent to me through that process that if we use the status quo as the foundation in the absence of a consensus on the changes that should be made the Government can always resist changes that it does not think are in its interests. It can say there is no consensus for the changes because it does not agree with them. I think that rather than the need for a consensus there is a need for give and take so that we arrive at a consensus whereby we give a bit on our side and other parties of opposing views give a bit on their side. 
I think that this point comes at us in respect of the issue which is unresolved in our law of third-party campaigning. I know that we have a different view as to what should be the rigours of the control on third-party campaigning compared with the National Party’s view but I also know that the royal commission said the absence of controls on third-party campaigning makes a nonsense of having controls on political party campaigning because political parties can go and use another vehicle that is related to them. That vehicle does not even have to be unrelated; the parties can control it and it can be completely unrestricted in the way that it campaigns. Now it seems to me to make a mockery of the underlying purpose of the election finance rules. If that situation prevails in the electoral financing legislation that comes out of the select committee it will be an example of the Government withholding a consensus and effectively saying that controlling third-party campaigning is not in National’s interest so the Government will stick with the status quo. I do not think that is what I mean or what most New Zealanders would think is meant by trying to provide fair electoral laws that have a broad consensus around them. 
That issue is not specific to this bill. I do value the work that the Minister has done but I just think that there is a need for a wee bit of give and take on the part of the National Party on that particular issue.