Little AndrewHon ANDREW LITTLE (Minister of Justice): Thank you Mr Chairman. Look there have been a few contributions from members on the Opposition benches that I think are worthy to respond to. I'll come to the Hon Dr Nick Smith's points he's raised just now—totally legitimate points to make about the justiciability of any aspect of this bill. In fact in his first contribution he said there is legal doubt about judicial review. There is no legal doubt at all. With all due respect to Dr Smith I think he overstates—unusual I know—some of the arguments that have been put about concerns about justiciability. It has already been shown that legislation of this nature is justiciable. We saw it in the Prebble v Awatere Huata litigation. Where there is exercise of private power against an individual such as a party against an MP representing them the court will intervene to ensure that that action has been lawful. That's what they did in the Huata case.The problem with the amendment that is being proposed—I think it's Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) 59. The problem with that SOP is in the opening words: Any action". Any action in these relevant provisions of the bill as proposed would be subject to judicial review. Now that is a nonsense because it is not every action that is subject to judicial review. The voting of two-thirds of a caucus could not possibly be subject to judicial review but that is what the SOP calls for. It calls for the reviewability of the receipt by the Speaker of a notice. That could not possibly be subject to judicial review in a properly drafted SOP. That SOP must be voted down if we are to maintain the integrity of the lawmaking function of this Parliament. It is an absurd amendment to propose.Where power is exercised against an individual such as would happen in relation to a decision by a caucus conveyed to the Speaker by a leader of the party and which has the effect of removing that member of Parliament then that has to be reviewable—and it is reviewable as it has been proven to be reviewable in litigation on this matter. We could use the dramatic language and the exaggerated language of "unchecked unrestrained discretion of the party leader"—there is none and it is not what this legislation provides for.If I can go through—with all due respect—to the Hon Tim Macindoe whose real complaint was about unbridled power of course I say to the member there is no unbridled power; there are checks and balances throughout. There's the requirement to have support of two-thirds of caucus. There is a 21-day period which can be a cooling-off period a discussion period a fixing-up period as these things always are.Simeon Brown: I was very heartened by his concern at what he described as a "fire-at-will" provision. That'll be very useful in the future to debate in this Parliament because we don't like that on this side of the Chamber either. But his question that he raises is: what recourse do members have? Members who are subject to this process who might find themselves subject to a notice or would otherwise have been removed from Parliament—they do have the right of judicial review because some of the actions are properly justiciable in relation to this.To Dr Smith's latter point—he asked for an assurance that the provisions are reviewable. I've given him that assurance. The problem with Supplementary Order Paper 90 is that it is so confusing and contradictory that it wouldn't only make a good appearance in an episode of Blackadder it'd make a fantastic appearance in a Monty Python sketch. So this provides that "No party leader may give notice under [the relevant section] if the High Court issues a declaratory judgement that they are in breach of the New Zealand Bill of Right Act"—but if you've given the notice you've given the notice. A declaration is not going to undo the giving of the notice; it is just a declaration. So the argument must be that there's going to be this appointed time where you're just about to give it and hopefully some declaration is going to be issued. It is an absolute nonsense. Of course the courts are very loath to get into declarations of actions provided for under statutory actions. So that is an absurdity. It is a nonsense.Again for the integrity of the lawmaking function of this Parliament it must be voted down—that'd be more embarrassing to the Inter-Parliamentary Union if that went through. So all of those issues are covered off Mr Chairman."