te Heuheu Georgina: Electoral Finance Bill — In Committee 
te Heuheu Georgina: Electoral Finance Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:644;Page:13612] 
Hon GEORGINA TE HEUHEU (National) 
: 
 I am very pleased to take a call especially following that member. She can talk about filthy little hands and about getting caught out! It is the Labour Party that was caught with its filthy little hands in taxpayers’ funds—public money. It is that party that was caught out. The only reason the member can stand there and pretend that someone else was caught out is that that party made its illegal action legal through an Act of this Parliament. So it is absolutely laughable that that member is talking about filthy little hands when the filthy little hands are on that side of the Chamber and when the party on that side of the Chamber was the party caught out. 
I will briefly make some comments about clause 122 of the Electoral Finance Bill which deals with time limits for prosecution. My colleague Chris Finlayson talked about the liability of candidates party secretaries and third parties. I commend Chris for his work in that area because it is absolutely right that our financial agents should not be liable on their own. As I say Chris has obviously done a lot of work to make sure that if financial agents are going to be liable then they ought not to be liable on their own and that is good. Clause 122 deals with the liability of financial agents in relation to the filing of returns. 
There is a clause in this bill that deals with offences relating to the return of candidate donations. There are clauses about offences relating to the return of party donations the return of third party donations the return of a candidate’s election expenses the return of a party’s election expenses and the return of a third party’s election expenses. 
It is a shame that the Minister has gone because I am unsure whether the new young Minister in the chair Darren Hughes is able to take a call on clause 122. Our objection to the clause is that it states: “A prosecution against a financial agent under any of the … sections” I have just outlined “must be commenced within 6 months of the date on which the return was required to be filed.” If we think about it we say that the time frame of 6 months is clearly not sufficient. 
Serious offences are being dealt with in these provisions and the penalties for these offences are very very serious. When we are talking about our agents acting on behalf of parties or acting on behalf of candidates then we need to be very very careful that they are not prosecuted unduly or wrongly. We need to be very very careful that the evidence being amassed should anyone be unfortunate enough to fall within these provisions is carefully brought together and carefully managed and that people who have otherwise acted in good faith in the matter of the filing of these returns are not caught under this provision. So we say that a time frame of 6 months is just not sufficient and that a minimum of 2 years is a better time frame for this provision. 
I wonder whether the Minister at this late stage in the proceedings would consider an amendment to this clause. I am sure my colleague Chris Finlayson has put in an amendment to it but I ask the Minister to take a call. This may be an opportunity anyway for the Minister in the chair to take a call and consider whether 6 months provides a sufficient time frame and whether the Government would be prepared to extend that to 2 years. 
The reason is that these are serious offences. The penalties are huge and it is our view that following the last election the police would have been I think unduly hampered in respect of the time frame set by the bill and we do not want that to happen in the future. We want to make sure that people who have behaved in good faith and with the best of intentions are not caught under this provision. Perhaps on some preliminary investigation there may be a question as to whether an offence exists in which case it is absolutely important that the police have the proper time to investigate such a case with care and to manage it properly.