Little AndrewHon ANDREW LITTLE (Minister of Justice): Thank you Madam Chair. Look I found the members' contributions largely helpful and I'd like to respond to some of the questions posed. To the member who's just resumed his seat the Hon Mark Mitchell there is a pretty obvious answer to the question that he has posed which is provided for in clause 5 in the proposed new section 55A(1) which is it does not apply to independent members. So if there were to be a coalition Government supported by three independent members and those three independent members decide to go their merry way and do something else and not support the Government of the day they are free to do that. That has not distorted the proportionality of Parliament. It might have some other consequences but that is the matter.Hon Dr Nick Smith: They've joined a party.Hon ANDREW LITTLE: The fact that the Hon Nick Smith would say that independent members somehow by joining a coalition become members of the party suggests to me he doesn't quite understand how political parties work. I don't believe that for a moment actually; he does. But that would suggest therefore that his interpolation is somewhat mischievous.Can I go back to the questions posed by the Hon Nick Smith as I understood them to be. He made a statement that said that this bill would allow—he gave the example of the Deputy Prime Minister the power to remove as he said any member of Parliament that didn't agree with his views. It doesn't give any person in this Parliament the power to do any such thing at all. What it says is that if a member who ceases to be a member of their party resigns or is the subject of a process within their caucus which requires two-thirds of support of the caucus and the leader notifying the Speaker then they cease to be a member of Parliament. You have to get all the elements right and the suggestion that I think that member made—there are no checks and balances—is just demonstrably wrong.That member posed a question about Tariana Turia. Well that member knows that Tariana Turia left Parliament. She left Parliament because she was opposed to what her party was doing and she wanted to re-establish her mandate. She had the personal integrity to do that and what all members looking on at that time saw and will reflect upon now and know is that all of these processes—the actions that members take when they are in the difficult situation of questioning the collective judgment of their party—are political judgments. Dame Tariana Turia as she now is judged that what she was being asked to do by her party at the time was unconscionable. Her conscience dictated that she should not only remove herself from the party and from Parliament but re-test her mandate which is what she did—entirely legitimate political judgments to make. Of course Marilyn Waring did one better. She prompted an entire Parliament to be dissolved and a snap election to be caused. All of that happened.He posed the question about the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. The Attorney-General's certificate is very clear that this does not compromise the Bill of Rights. Then he asked the question: where is there a constitutional lawyer who agrees with me? I'd turn that question on its head and say that of the 23 self-claimed constitutional experts who put their name to the matter how many got the analysis right? None of them did because none of them referred to the checks and balances in the bill but that's what happens. That's what happens from time to time.Now the Hon Tim Macindoe posed some questions as well. I'm intrigued by his Supplementary Order Paper 65 that actually would hand over the power to the party general secretary or in their case the party general manager which would almost certainly be a breach of the Parliamentary Privilege Act but I'll leave it there and say no more anyway.Mr Bishop raised a question which goes to the heart of this whole matter: what does it mean to distort proportionality? This is a question that has been before the Supreme Court and the Supreme Court said that if a member of Parliament indicates because they failed to pay their membership fees or otherwise shows that they are not a member of the party any more then that has distorted the proportionality of Parliament—that was the Prebble v Awatere Huata decision. The second kind of response to that is what I said to Dr Smith before: that in the end political judgments will be made.Hon Dr Nick Smith: By the leader—by the leader.Hon ANDREW LITTLE: This does not stop politics happening. And Dr Smith yells out By the leader." No Dr Smith has got it wrong again. There is a safeguard on this. It requires two-thirds support of a member's caucus for this to happen."