Bishop Chris; Rurawhe AdrianCHRIS BISHOP (National—Hutt South): Thank you very much Mr Chair and I'm taking into account what you say. It's a funny little clause isn't it really clause 6 in the bill. When you first look at it you think Well that's just literally one sentence and it's largely minutiae." But actually when one turns to think about it properly one is struck by how significant it is because in a funny sort of way it undermines the very raison d'être of the bill itself. It undermines the purpose of the bill and I'll explain why that is."In section 133 after 'section 55' insert 'or 55A'."—sounds pretty anodyne sounds pretty reasonable. It just sounds like a tidy-up phrase that's a consequential amendment based on what the rest of the clauses in the bill do. Except—except—section 133 of the Electoral Act is to do with petitions and not the petitions that come to Parliament and say "We want you to do a particular thing." and that get considered by a committee. The particular mechanism in the Electoral Act which is around electoral petitions—very rare in our parliamentary history. Although ironically enough the man who is almost the sole person in the Parliament who is in support of this bill the Rt Hon Winston Peters made it to Parliament in 1978—40 years ago—via an electoral petition against Boorman in Hunua—Hon Tim Macindoe: It was against Malcolm Douglas.CHRIS BISHOP: Sorry—Malcolm Douglas Tim Macindoe points out. The Boorman petition was a separate one.So the electoral petition has a particular place in our law and what this clause does is basically say "None of the electoral integrity provisions apply until the petition's been resolved." Well it's a funny little clause really because the Electoral (Integrity) Amendment Bill says that proportionality is paramount—in fact proportionality is so important that we are going to give to party leaders—or parliamentary leaders of political parties in the parlance of the bill—the power to determine if they reasonably believe that proportionality is being distorted and therefore remedy what is perceived to be a wrong.So the whole bill is about the importance of political party proportionality except for—and this is clause 6 of the bill—when there's an electoral petition at which point the bill says "Oh we can't have any of that. We've got to let the petition resolve itself." So it's a funny strange thing actually and actually when you think about it the incentive is almost on elected representatives to arrange petitions so that they are not potentially subject to the provisions of the electoral integrity bill which will become an Act—we hope not but it is likely to be the case.So just riddle me this: my friend Tim Macindoe is elected and it turns out that Tim Macindoe is no longer in the marginal seat of Hamilton West—it used to be marginal but he's managed to make it into some extravagantly safe seat for the National Party. If only Hutt South was like that but anyway. Mr Macindoe gets elected and it turns out it's a marginal seat and it's contested and there's been a bit of chicanery and there's contested votes and some people have ticked both boxes and you've got to work out crosses and noughts and that sort of thing. And so there's a petition.But actually at the same time it turns out Mr Macindoe is not really a member of the National Party and—you know I don't want to insult him but it turns out that Mr Macindoe has got some pretty wild views out there. He's sort of like the modern-day Gilbert Myles or the modern-day Michael Laws. They've sort of come in with the tide and you're not quite sure how that happened and actually Gilbert Myles I suspect is still sitting there saying "I'm not quite sure how I got elected in the '99 election."—beat Phil Goff apparently in the safe seat of Roskill as it then was but anyway.And so the party leader whoever it is—Simon Bridges—says "Oh no I'm sick of this. Let's get rid of Tim Macindoe the errant MP for the marginal seat of Hamilton West." And so the leader or the Prime Minister or the Leader of the Opposition goes to the caucus and he says "This guy who's been elected in Hamilton West—we can't have any of this. He's out there saying all sorts of things against the party constitution and against the values of the National Party and against the manifesto that we were elected on—CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): Sorry to interrupt the member but it's come time for me to leave the Chair. The committee is suspended until 9 a.m. tomorrow. Pō mārie.Sitting suspended from 10 p.m. to 9 a.m. (Wednesday)"