Ryall Tony: Appropriation (Continuation of Interim Meaning of Funding for Parliamentary Purposes) Bill — In Committee 
Ryall Tony: Appropriation (Continuation of Interim Meaning of Funding for Parliamentary Purposes) Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:643;Page:13139] 
Hon TONY RYALL (National—Bay of Plenty) 
: 
 I am pleased to be able to take a call because I would like to speak on the number of significant amendments being put forward by National Party members in this Committee. I want to support the amendment from Anne Tolley that will put further restrictions on what parties can do in the election period and will make sure that the rules are the same as in the electoral finance legislation. If the Government is so keen on the Electoral Finance Bill then it should vote for Anne Tolley’s amendment. 
I also want to support Chris Finlayson’s amendments which will make it clear that whether or not it is explicit that a party is seeking support through its printed material it is an election expense. That is the problem with this bill together with the Electoral Finance Bill. 
The red printing presses have been running overtime. Here they are—one after the other—taxpayer-funded brochures being sent out all around the country at the taxpayers’ expense together with this photo of a woman who purports to look like the Prime Minister of New Zealand. The brochures have been put out all around the country. They are paid for by taxpayers’ money and they are fine this year. The brochures are fine this year but where this bill oversteps the mark as Gerry Brownlee told the Government is that a party should not be allowed to put them out in the months before an election. That is what Gerry Brownlee and the National Party members have said. 
I say to the Labour Party members that they should put out brochures in the non-election period but they should not be allowed to do it in the election period. In the weeks before the election they should not be able to put out brochures including the phrases “thousand-dollar savings” “kick-start” “more support for families” “lower tax” and “support for patients” and say that that is not electioneering. Of course it is electioneering if the material is put out in the weeks before an election. 
It is the same for the pamphlet  
Supporting Kiwi Business 
. A party should not be allowed to put that out before an election and that is what this bill allows. It states that this sort of material which is fine in a non-election period should not go out in an election period and that if it does go out in an election period then it should be counted as an election expense. If a Labour Party candidate who is not a member of Parliament puts this out in the weeks before an election it is an election expense and it counts. But if a Labour MP puts this material out in the weeks before an election it is an MP’s expenditure and does not count. That is not right. 
I say to the Government that it is not too late. What has happened in this Parliament in the whole time I and other members have been here is that this sort of electoral-related legislation is always done on a bipartisan or multiparty basis. The only thing that the two big parties ever used to disagree on was when the electoral roll should close. National always said a month before the election and Labour said on the day before the election. We gave in on that in the end. We have been supporting that provision for some years now. 
The two main parties agreed on virtually everything for this reason: we cannot have the rules change every election depending on who wins. That is what Labour is inviting future Parliaments to do—the majority will jackboot over the minority to favour the majority. That is what the Government and its cronies are doing. They are inviting future Parliaments to change the rules every election to suit whoever is in power. The Ministers do not mind. When they lose in 2008 they are out in 2011. It is the Labour Party people who are standing in 2011 who should be standing up to their leaders and saying: “Look what we’re doing to them may be done to us in 3 years’ time.” 
That is why we have always had the rule in Parliament that when it comes to important electoral legislation or spending rules we basically get agreement between the two main parties because it is unhealthy for the rules to change every election. That is why the National Party says it is not too late to look back and change and let us move forward together with a number of rules that suit New Zealand. The Government should not make a fool of itself and invite retaliation from future Parliaments.