Smith Nick; Salesa JennyELECTORAL (INTEGRITY REPEAL) AMENDMENT BILLSecond ReadingHon Dr NICK SMITH (National): I move That the Electoral (Integrity Repeal) Amendment Bill be now read a second time. It's with great disappointment that I note Labour's decision to oppose this bill and leave this Winston Peters - inspired law permanently on our books. This law is a stain on New Zealand's proud liberal democratic traditions and our core Kiwi value of tolerating dissent. This repeal bill originally introduced in the name of Sir David Carter our former Speaker gained the support of this Parliament due to the Green Party switching their support last July. This reinforces that there never was a majority in this Parliament for this Draconian law. Similar bills were rightly condemned by Green Party founders Jeanette Fitzsimons and Rod Donald. It will for ever be a black mark on the Green Party that they compromised their principles and voted for the current law in 2018. The select committee process on this bill was a sham and Labour members should hang their heads on how they treated such an important issue. Labour never attempted to engage in the issue and completely ignored the strong advice of 15 academics from four law faculties four departments of political science and three departments of history across all our universities. We even had lifelong members of the Labour Party pleading for their MPs to support the bill in vain and the extent of Labour's argument to retain the law was simply We got the numbers." They may well have used Michael Cullen's phrase: "We won. You lost. Eat that!" They used their majority on the Justice Committee to block giving the committee evidence and free and frank advice because they know as well as anyone that they would have mirrored the criticism from all the legal academics. There is nothing in the eight pages of the select committee report where Labour attempts to justify their position and it does show how arrogant Labour has become. I do contrast this with the Clark Government. The select committee report on the same issue was at least reasoned. But I want to read to the Parliament what the Clark Government said: "This law is needed as a transitional measure as we adopt from FPP to MMP. That's why it has a sunset clause expiring in five years. We believe the rate of defections will follow a similar trend to other countries declining and as parties and members adapt to the new electoral system." That prediction proved correct. There have been negligible party defections over the last six parliaments. By Labour's own logic this law is attempting to fix a problem that does not exist. Labour's support for this legislation actually shows a lack of confidence in themselves. They must believe they need to handcuff through this law Labour members to the party because they are fearful some may jump ship. They have a large caucus and a Māori caucus that's particularly strong and demanding. It seems they fear another Tariana Turia and want this law as an insurance policy. My problem with all this is that the Labour Party's interest should not override the interests of our nation and this democracy. We should not be selling out on the important principle that MPs must be free from the threat of dismissal from this Parliament for the views they hold or for the way they vote. I also want to emphasise how badly this law puts New Zealand out of step with other liberal democracies. None of the top 20 democracies as ranked around the world have such laws. This law would breach the constitution of the United States and of Australia or Canada. It would be anathema in any of the United Kingdom parliaments and for those who justify this law on the basis that we took MMP from its home in Germany I draw to their attention the constitution that was so carefully crafted after the horror of World War II in which their constitution would prohibit such a law. Such laws are considered undemocratic by the EU. New Zealand actually couldn't join the EU because it would be prohibited because of this law. If we look at the Inter-Parliamentary Union of which all members of this Parliament are members—the oldest organisation on best parliamentary practice—it argues such laws are inappropriate and wrong. The countries that have these laws are sham democracies: the likes of Zimbabwe Cambodia and Uganda. We should also be upfront about the origins of this flawed law. The architect Winston Peters bears a huge grudge over the five New Zealand First MPs who abandoned his party in 1998. The problem is that Mr Peters had only three years earlier loudly and proudly defended Michael Laws defecting from National to join New Zealand First. He passionately argued then that it was the constitutional right of an MP to leave a party if they felt it had lost its way that MPs should not just be robots to do whatever their party bosses or leaders told them and that voters would have the final word at the next election. The unsavoury heritage of this law gives good reason to repeal it but the even stronger argument is the proud heritage of the 1688 Bill of Rights. It specifically protects the freedoms of MPs in this Parliament to speak their mind without the threat of dismissal. The fact that Labour's Attorney-General accepts in his New Zealand Bill of Rights Act report that this law has a chilling effect on MPs' expression of views reinforces the harm from this law. The significance of the Bill of Rights is recognised in the opening ceremony of every Parliament when this mandate for free speech is renewed. Winston's law needs repealing for us to reassert the importance of free speech in this Parliament. I also want to bury the notion that the law is needed to protect the proportionality of Parliament and the party vote. There are many aspects of MMP in which pure proportionality is not followed: there's the 5 percent rule; there's the rule where an MP may resign and cause a by-election as occurred in Northland; and there's rules about when their seats can be vacant for six months. There is also the legitimate question as to whether an MP leaves the party or whether the party leaves the MP that was so eloquently put by Jim Anderton when he left Labour in 1989. The same can be said of defectors like Derek Quigley and Marilyn Waring: the principled one can actually sometimes be the MP rather than the party. Then there's the argument that somehow changing parties is a mortal sin when actually it is part of the natural evolution of democracy. Every single party in this Parliament was formed by party-hoppers. The Labour Party was formed by party-hoppers in 1916 National in 1936 ACT in 1996 the Greens in 1999 the Māori Party in 2004. Most people would accept that Winston Churchill is the greatest parliamentarian in all times. We recognise it with his picture on the way into the House. Do MPs realise that Winston Churchill changed parties three times? If this was the law in the United Kingdom he would have been kicked out of Parliament and not been able to lead the UK out of its darkest hour. I want to conclude with a final point about our constitution. The only check on the power of Governments between elections is on the confidence votes that are so important to this Parliament yet what this bill says is that if an MP loses confidence in their Government they can simply be dismissed and replaced by a newbie who would support them. If it was a jury we'd call it rigging. The very last point I want to make is this: of course I'm a proud member of the National Party and I respect that members are loyal members of other political parties but at the core of this bill is this: our first duty is not to the political party that we represent but to the people of New Zealand and this wonderful country that we are here to represent. I plea to this House to reconsider because this bill is fundamental to the rights of this Parliament and to our democracy. ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jenny Salesa): The question is that the motion be agreed to."