Penk ChrisCHRIS PENK (National—Helensville): Thank you Mr Chair. Just a reasonably quick one on this occasion I think. Polling disruption sir remaining within Part 1 obviously—my colleague the Hon Tim Macindoe has already spoken about the kinds of situations in which this situation may arise and I don't intend to either try your patience or indeed embarrass myself by giving an inferior rendition of a song already well sung by Mr Macindoe but it did occur to me that it's interesting that we're talking about disruptions that are unforeseen or unavoidable. It occurs to me now—and I'm embarrassed to say that it didn't occur to me at the time of the select committee consideration that the phrase unforeseen or" is somewhat redundant. I mean one might have a disruption that's unavoidable and notwithstanding that one might have foreseen it. It's of no consequence from the perspective of whether polling is disrupted. Anyway that's sort of more by the by so to speak but the part that I was wanting to highlight for the sake of the nation is section 195 as it would be within the existing Act—we're talking about clause 17 of the bill—"Adjournment of poll on polling day" and actually I don't really have a question for the Minister so much as I'm wanting to speak to what I actually think is a good bit of lawmaking by the Justice Committee as a whole. The provision that we've created—and yes I do include myself in that first-person plural so I'm patting myself on the back somewhat. What we've got there—actually if I'm to be fair the officials gave us some very good advice in this space. Looking at the scenario where a poll might be adjourned on polling day a pretty serious scenario of the kind that Mr Macindoe mentioned—so without going through them all they include a riot or disorder a terrorist act and so forth. In that situation the Chief Electoral Officer must consult with a number of people and they are listed as three items but they could be more than three people. One is "the Prime Minister;"—well that makes sense. That person is of course nominally in charge of the country and I say "nominally" in the sense that one is somewhat a caretaker in that role. But nevertheless it's as good an authority as we have even in that situation in relation to the election. Also "the Leader of the Opposition;"—I think that's important for a sense of fairness and balance as between the Government and Opposition. One thing we did discuss was the fact that that wouldn't mean the leaders of other parties in the Parliament including in the coalition—for example if there was a Government coalition or indeed parties that make up the Opposition notwithstanding that the Leader of the Opposition is not their leader—or Independents but also similarly precluded would be candidates for the election who are outside of Parliament at that time. We thought that notwithstanding that we were not being fully comprehensive that was a fair place to land so to speak because in the scenario that we're talking about of extreme disruption an adjournment of poll on polling day is a very serious consequence. It would not be right to force the hand of the Chief Electoral Officer to have to consult with a large number of people and we thought it was reasonable that the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition could brief their respective people and offer a perspective from their respective sides of the aisle. Then we come to the third category of person which is "any person or organisation that in the Chief Electoral Officer's opinion is able to give information about the scale and duration of the unforeseen or unavoidable disruption;" so that's a different rationale really. The consultation I think in the case of the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition is in the nature of giving advice about what is happening and keeping them briefed really as opposed to taking advice about the nature of what's happening. But in the case of someone or an organisation that the Chief Electoral Officer might wish to contact and think is appropriate to find out for example the prospects of the terrorist act or the riot or the adverse weather condition and so forth abating that's something that we thought was valuable to provide at that time. Similarly in the case of a notice being given of adjournment "as soon as is reasonably practical" after that direction the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition are to be notified. Again I suppose we'd have a reasonable expectation that they would represent the interests of a pretty large proportion of the population between them. Then to give public notice in any way that seems appropriate—there's a degree of flexibility there recognising that in the case of a terrorist activity etc. it might be possible to be a bit creative about the way that information gets out there."