Wong Pansy: Electoral Finance Bill — In Committee 
Wong Pansy: Electoral Finance Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:644;Page:13657] 
PANSY WONG (National) 
: 
 At least the Green Party member is prepared to reveal some of her real intentions about supporting the bill. Somehow this bill is all about not allowing the National Party to do x y and z. It is very strange to pass legislation that targets one political party and say one wants a level playing field. But at least the member is trying to tell us some of the real intentions in ramming through this legislation. The Minister in the chair the Hon Annette King has been talking about our deputy leader Bill English who happens to be accepted in the public and in the media as being about the only person who really understands the Electoral Finance Bill and all he did was ask some questions about the meaning of— 
Hon Judith Tizard 
: I raise a point of order Madam Chairperson. I am terribly sorry to interrupt the member but the sound is so loud that it is actually hurting my ears. Could we have it turned down? 
PANSY WONG 
: That is a compliment coming from the Hon Judith Tizard. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) 
: There is not a lot I can do. It is the system. 
PANSY WONG 
: What a way to complain! Certainly some of us have voices that can be heard and that is some consolation to me. I hope the Minister will hear this properly. 
At least we can tell that there is some consistency among the Labour Government. When the Hon Annette King the Minister in the chair cannot answer the questions she blames and attacks the Hon Bill English. All he did was ask some questions about the interpretation of the legislation. The consistency from the Hon Annette King is the same as that from the Prime Minister Miss Helen Clark. She hit out at the  
New Zealand Herald  
when that paper dared to run an editorial asking questions as to why the Labour Government is trying to rush through the legislation. She criticised it as being shallow error-prone media. She went on to lament that journalists in New Zealand are not taking more interest in the effect of international foreign affairs on New Zealand and the only reason is that the media outlet did not send enough journalists to cover her photo-opportunity overseas trip. 
In fact I did question why right now this House is debating the Electoral Finance Bill when we take into the wider context today’s  
Dominion Post  
headline “5000 children ‘slip through the cracks’ ” of not enrolling in any school. In the House today all the Minister of Education could do was ask “How accurate is 5000?”. Well whether it is 4000 or 5000 children the public should be very concerned about that. Also in today’s  
Dominion Post 
 was a statement: “Courageous neighbours are being praised for saving the life of a mother who was being stabbed repeatedly in the middle of the night.” I would suggest that the wider context out in the public is about law and order education and the health system falling apart because of too much bureaucracy and not much attention paid to the real issues. Here we are with the Labour Government continuing to engage in pushing through legislation with the help of the New Zealand First doormats that the public does not want passed. Ten thousand people marched in the street and the Labour Government will simply not take notice. Well actually I can see why MPs like Doug Woolerton from New Zealand First want to rush through this legislation. I understand he wants to support this legislation because the existing MPs and political parties in the Parliament actually have the right advantage in passing this legislation. Candidates who are not in the Parliament from 1 January would have only $20000 to spend until whenever election day is but MPs and elected political parties right now in Parliament can spend whatever they like. Why do we have this benefit and privilege? It is because the Labour Government rushed through legislation to do that.