Graham Kennedy: Standing Orders—Sessional 
Graham Kennedy: Standing Orders—Sessional 
[Volume:669;Page:16423] 
Dr KENNEDY GRAHAM (Green) 
: 
 I rise to address this report from the Standing Orders Committee on the pecuniary interests of members. The report reflects a considerable body of work I think on a very important subject. I have followed through this issue in the Standing Orders Committee and have been actively engaged in it in recent months. Like the preceding speaker Trevor Mallard I thank colleagues for what has been a fairly cooperative exercise within the committee. 
I am satisfied that the committee has returned a useful report. We shall be supporting adoption of the report and the changes to the Standing Orders that the report recommends. It is worth recalling that the review emerged from a recognition by the 48th Parliament that a particular affair in 2008 had caused public concern and had perhaps eroded confidence in this nation’s legislature. The previous Speaker had requested the Privileges Committee to examine the rules surrounding the financial interests of members and to make recommendations to ensure that the House was “not brought into disrepute” and impeded in its functions. Although I agree with Mr Mallard that the Standing Orders Committee succeeded—and rightly so—in keeping the review depoliticised I think it is important to recall that it was highly sensitive political issues that provided the genesis for this whole exercise—namely the Owen Glenn affair in 2008 that involved the leader of New Zealand First the Rt Hon Winston Peters. 
I recall the report of the Privileges Committee which stated: “We recommend by majority that the Rt Hon Winston Peters”—I repeat the Rt Hon—“be censured by the House for knowingly”—I repeat knowingly—“providing false or misleading information on a return of pecuniary interests. We recommend by majority that the Rt Hon Winston Peters be ordered to file within seven days of the House so ordering amended returns for the years ended 31 January 2006 2007 and 2008 covering any gifts debts or payments in kind that he has not previously registered.” So it is a reminder of the degree of sensitivity that prevails around this thing—this same gentleman is now struggling below the watery surfaces of public opinion to re-enter this House—to ensure that the House is no longer brought into disrepute. Let us continue in hope. 
For its part the Privileges Committee believes that the Standing Orders Committee of the 49th Parliament has reviewed the rules for the declaration of pecuniary interests; this is what we have been doing and this is the fruit of our endeavours. We considered of course the purpose of the Register of Pecuniary Interests of Members of Parliament and found it to be sound. We went through a gamut of issues which have been touched on by Minister Brownlee and Mr Mallard such as beneficial interests in trusts the issue of real property the issue of interest rates legal fees paid on behalf of members if they are involved in litigation pertaining to their parliamentary activities airline upgrades and other things. We in the Green Party are happy with the outcomes of all those issues. 
But in my opinion the most important development coming out of the report is the agreement we have reached concerning the scope of what we mean by “pecuniary interests” and Minister Brownlee touched on that. In short there is a need to broaden the scope beyond the strict meaning of the word “pecuniary”; I think that was fairly clear. We discussed the possibility of omitting the word “pecuniary” entirely from the name of the register and just having it as “register of interests” but it was very clear that that would go way too far for the purposes of the House. We would end up being obliged to declare whether we were influenced in any way by the Church of Scientology the Climate Science Coalition the doctrine of creationism or maybe the Flat Earth Society. It would have been ridiculous. So I think it was the correct balance to make it explicit that members are required to declare some interests that may not be pecuniary or financial to them but that are limited to certain specified interests. I think we got to the right conclusion. 
I do not want to go into any more detail on the provisions of the report but I will make three broad points before I conclude. The first is that the Privileges Committee expressed a number of principles that support the approach of transparency. I think the Standing Orders Committee endorsed that and we in the Green Party certainly embrace it. The first principle is that the onus is on members to make an honest attempt to recognise and declare all pecuniary interests—that is fine. The third principle—I am skipping the second principle for the moment—is that all distinct interests must be declared regardless of whether they are channelled through a trust or third party and that is fine. The fourth principle is that the approach in declaring interests should be if in doubt to declare them—and that is critical and fine too. 
The second principle I think is more complex. The second principle says that the House’s decision to administer its own regime for declaring interests places a strong moral imperative on members to comply with the requirements in the spirit of the House’s own rules. I think with respect that that is one huge understatement. Administering one’s own regime when it comes to pecuniary or financial interests is always going to be problematic. I have personally always been somewhat apprehensive over any organisation—whether it is the New Zealand Law Society today’s FIFA or last century’s Ku Klux Klan—that decided to administer its own regime of self-behaviour. Although I think that all members of this House are acting with integrity and good intent when they undertake to administer their own regime and to place upon themselves principles and standards of the highest level I think that in the normal course of human events we nonetheless fall short. So I personally am always pretty apprehensive about self-administration of one’s own financial regime. When it comes to MP expenses we have seen in the last few months a move away from self-administration towards the administration of the independent Remuneration Authority and I wonder whether in due course we may want to reflect on this within that context as well. That is the first point. 
The second broad point is to remind the House that we have had a register of pecuniary interests for the executive I think for the last decade and a half or thereabouts and we have had one for the legislature for the last 4 years or so. In each case it is for the protection of individuals both in the executive and in the legislature. But we lack comparable protection for the judiciary and recently the saga of the resignation of former Justice Bill Wilson has prompted a member’s bill on my own part to record a register of judges’ pecuniary interests. That looks as if it may be well-received by both the Government and the Labour Opposition and I look forward to collaborating with them in pursuing it later. 
The final point is the relationship between public sector and private sector funds. I believe it is right and proper that public funds be open and transparent in terms of accountability and scrutiny. The public has a right to be assured that public funds are properly spent and that public servants—in this case elected MPs—are not in any way influenced through a conflict of interest. I think this report goes some way to meeting that goal. 
But the same standards in my view need to be applied to private sector funding. If we have learnt anything from the global financial crisis of the past 2 years it is that there should be no difference between the standards we proclaim for the handling of public funds and those there are for private sector funding. I myself do not discriminate between the taxpayer and the consumer and I would be interested to learn whether ACT the Association of Consumers and Taxpayers shares this view. I ask why the individual New Zealander should insist on the strictest standards of transparency and accountability for public funds but should tolerate a veil of opacity and secrecy for private corporate funds. We are all affected equally by both; we are all in this together. 
The pure obscenity of the public bail-out of private corporations that have failed through corporate and individual greed which masqueraded between the mythological walls of the free market commercial risk performance-based bonuses and executive leakage will stand as an abomination of the past two decades. It is time to insist on the same levels of accountability the same standards of transparency and the same threshold of behaviour between the public and the private sectors.