Hughes Darren: Parliamentary Service (Continuation of Interim Meaning of Funding for Parliamentary Purposes) Bill — First Reading 
Hughes Darren: Parliamentary Service (Continuation of Interim Meaning of Funding for Parliamentary Purposes) Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:654;Page:3074] 
Hon DARREN HUGHES (Labour) 
: 
 I immediately signal that the Labour Party will be voting in favour of the first reading of the Parliamentary Service (Continuation of Interim Meaning of Funding for Parliamentary Purposes) Bill. This bill has had a long history in the Chamber. It is not the first time the contents of this legislation have been debated. In fact this is the third occasion on which our attention has been drawn to the contents of the legislation—as the Leader of the House indicated. What is different on this occasion is the calmer nature in which the House finds itself considering the bill and as ridiculously tempting as it is to quote back from some earlier  
Hansards 
 when this issue was addressed by the Chamber I will resist doing that and say that I think it may be possible finally for the parties in Parliament to work together to come up with an enduring and proper definition of “parliamentary purposes”. If we are able to do that then that would be a significant achievement for Parliament. 
Clearly we would not want to see the current definition expire on 1 July but extending it only until the end of next year puts a responsibility on the House to come to a solution that will be a permanent definition rather than an interim meaning of funding for parliamentary purposes. I am sure the Leader of the House will bring all his drive energy and determination to ensuring we achieve that target by December 2010. The Labour Party will certainly be working constructively with him in order to make sure that that can happen. 
In the meantime it is important to reinforce some of the points that Mr Brownlee made. First of all this bill enables members of Parliament to do their work but it draws an absolute line between the work of members of Parliament in terms of their constituency their legislative work and their representational work and what would be considered electioneering. It is very clear that it will continue to be against the law for the Parliamentary Service to fund advertising in particular for anything other than a proper parliamentary purpose. In other words it will exclude electioneering—that is to ask somebody to vote for a certain person or a certain party to seek support for the election of a certain person or of course to ask for donations or financial support for or membership of a political party or for a financial donation to a particular candidate. Ruling those things out continues the practice that members of Parliament have been working under since we have been applying those new rules. I have to say that the processes that Parliament now has through the Parliamentary Service are far more robust than anything we have seen here before and I think they will assist us in coming up with a permanent meaning of “funding entitlements for parliamentary purposes” Nobody would like to see the legitimate work of members of Parliament impeded but it is important that people know that that funding cannot be used for those areas I just mentioned. 
The bill extends the time line for the definition until the end of next year and I repeat what I said about the desire of Labour to work with the Government on it. It is true that many of the aspects covered by this bill are covered by conventions that have built up in Parliament over many many years for representing and serving the people of New Zealand. Many of those conventions are now documented by way of the Speaker’s directions. That has been very helpful for members in terms of seeking funding for their work. I believe the pre-approval system of publicity in particular has ensured that members do not—particularly inadvertently—find themselves in a situation where they have not complied with Parliament’s rules when they are advertising for their purposes. 
I pick up on the point the Leader of the House mentioned about funding for certain candidates. There is an important category very rarely seen where a member of Parliament may be elected on the night but not be able to be sworn in for a period of time or conversely elected on the night required to take part in post-election Government formation and planning but then not finally sworn in because of a change either in special votes at a constituency level or in party votes across the country. Of course we had an example of that at the last election: Mr Cam Calder a National Party list MP was named as a member of Parliament on election night but in the final count was not sworn in to the Chamber. I do not think anybody would want to see him have to fly to Wellington from his home in South Auckland and stay in Wellington for a period of weeks only to find that he was not joining the Parliament and therefore needed to reimburse the money. I think the rules are very clear about tidying that up. It is probably appropriate in the case of Mr Calder because of course in the Mt Albert by-election the National Party candidate is a sitting list MP and if she was to be elected it would be Mr Calder who would come to Parliament to replace her on the list—the people of Mt Albert would be sending somebody from Manurewa down to Wellington as their representative. So it is probably quite important we have those provisions in the legislation—not that of course I see that scenario happening but it is very important that the people of Mt Albert know that a vote for Melissa Lee is a vote for somebody called Cam Calder. 
Hon Dr Jonathan Coleman 
: It’s a vote for progress. 
Hon DARREN HUGHES 
: It is not a vote for progress at all. In fact today it is a terrible vote because today it is a vote against tunnels for Waterview. I have never seen a candidate have his or her legs chopped from under him or her as disgracefully as we saw today when the Minister of Transport did that to Melissa Lee. The only other time I have seen that happen was when Jim Bolger took the legs out from under a candidate in Wellington Central called Mark Thomas. And guess what? He is the campaign manager for Melissa Lee in this particular election. So what is it about National that when it seeks to pull the rug out from people it does it so royally? I am sure there is a support group for the two of them in Mt Albert at the moment. 
But to return to the bill Labour will be supporting it. The Leader of the House has indicated a shorter period of time for the select committee process than would be normal. But we will be facilitating that on the proviso that we are serious about working towards that period of the end of 2010 when political parties are able to come up with a proper definition. It seems to me that we cannot for a fourth time—Mrs Turia shakes her head but I am sure she will want to work with us to make sure we do not—come up with an interim meaning of “parliamentary purposes”. It does start to stretch credibility if for the fourth time we are not able to achieve a permanent meaning. I am certain we will have her goodwill when it comes to that particular matter. 
Hon Tariana Turia 
: No. 
Hon DARREN HUGHES 
: She is indicating that maybe we will not. But I think it is important that all parties give us their goodwill—we have to get together on that matter. We support the first reading of this bill and look forward to it proceeding transparently through the House at this time.