Brown Peter: Members of Parliament (Pecuniary Interests) Bill — First Reading 
Brown Peter: Members of Parliament (Pecuniary Interests) Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:612;Page:9268] 
PETER BROWN (Deputy Leader—NZ First) 
: 
 Let me make the case clear for New Zealand First right from the onset. We do not support this. This is absolutely— 
David Benson-Pope 
: What are you going to hide? 
PETER BROWN 
: I have absolutely nothing to hide at all. I resent Richard Worth standing up here and saying that we need this bill because we are possibly corrupt. One thing I will say about the politicians of this country is that basically they are corruption-free and we do not need this to— 
Richard Worth 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. My speech has been misrepresented. I can take exception to that within the Standing Order. I was talking about the need for regimes of accountability and disclosure not saying that there are corruptions in Parliament. 
Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER 
: I wish to rule on that point of order and tell the member that he will raise that at the end of the speech. He should not interrupt a member’s speech. 
PETER BROWN 
: That is a typical comment from someone who does not know what he is talking about. 
Rod Donald 
: Your coalition partner! 
PETER BROWN 
: My coalition partner? The purpose of this bill is outlined in the explanatory note:“The Bill will strengthen public trust and confidence in the parliamentary process by promoting greater transparency openness and accountability.” Whoever wrote that or anybody who believes that is living in cloud cuckoo land. The explanatory note goes on to state towards the end: “The Bill provides for a summary of members’ interests to be published and available for public inspection.” I would suggest to members that there would be no purpose for that. There will be people nosing into what others own what they do and what their assets are for nosy-parker reasons in total. 
The main area of concern as regards MPs is conflict of interest and I believe the Standing Orders deal with that quite adequately now. Standing Orders 165 to 167 are adequate to deal with conflict of interest by MPs. I have no problem with that. Equally New Zealand First has no problem in divulging if we are employed in some other venture. Any employer would like to know if an individual is employed anywhere else. But what I own has nothing to do with Mr Benson-Pope or indeed anybody else in this House. It is to do with myself and my family. What I owe has nothing to do with anybody else whatsoever. What somebody owes me has nothing to do with anybody else but myself and my family. Indeed how much I have in the bank or anything else has nothing to do with those folk over there. They should stick their noses in their own business and leave me and my colleagues to run our own affairs. 
It is ironical that this Government that wants every MP to be transparent is producing a bill—the Criminal Records (Clean Slate) Bill—that allows criminal records to be concealed. Where the dickens is this Government taking this country? The word “conceal” in that bill is stated as meaning: “to protect the criminal record or information about the criminal record of an eligible individual from disclosure to a person body or agency (including without limitation a government department or law enforcement agency) for which there is no lawful authority under this Act to disclose the criminal record or any information about the criminal record”. Protect the criminal and open the doors to the law-abiding person who wants to become an MP! This is absolute rubbish. We will be opposing this bill all the way. 
I notice in this bill that from time to time as he sees fit the Auditor-General may investigate. I have to say that the way I feel now if this bill should pass I will not be disclosing a damn thing. That is the way I feel right now. If Labour members want to tie up the Auditor-General checking into me and probably my colleagues and one or two others then so be it. If they want to waste taxpayers’ money checking into my personal affairs then so be it. I am of the mind now not to cooperate at all should this bill pass. 
This Government would be well advised to look into its own areas of activity such as paying lobby groups to lobby MPs. 
 That is where its priorities should be. That is where the possible corruption lies—paying lobbyists to lobby MPs for a smoke-free bill and the prostitution bill and paying the Prostitutes Collective $50000 to $60000 a month for goodness knows what. That is where the corruption could be. 
We are not impressed by this bill. It is absolutely ridiculous totally worthless and it will create more problems than it will solve. Every nosey parker under the sun who wants to get stuck into an MP will be investigating his or her background assets and what have you and generally making life difficult. Frankly I have nothing to hide my colleagues have nothing to hide but we do not have to disclose the detail to Mr Hawkins or indeed anyone else. [ 
Interruption 
] That member thinks we should. What purpose would it achieve for me to tell that member what I own? What would he do with that information? It would just make it damn awkward to go about our— 
Hon Richard Prebble 
: Throw it around. 
PETER BROWN 
: They would throw it around. They could say that that guy has this and that guy has that. This House is meant to be filled with honourable people. If we say something a little bit titzy-witzy or what have you we have to stand and apologise because we are all people of honour. Let us start from that premise. We do not have to disclose what we own our assets how much we owe what is on our credit card or goodness know what. That is absolutely ridiculous and unacceptable. New Zealand First will be opposing this bill all the way.