Dean JacquiHon JACQUI DEAN (National—Waitaki): Interesting isn't it that when the going gets tough Labour descend into personal abuse and personal attack you know and this very passive-aggressive type of parliamentary argument where a member—and indeed a Minister—will get to their feet and call for some real debate and then in an extremely aggressive yet passive manner undermine and denigrate members over the House. I regret that very much in the debate on Part 1 of the Referendums Framework Bill. Both the Minister in the chair and the Hon Clare Curran cited the Environment Canterbury (Temporary Commissioners and Improved Water Management) Act which took place back in about 2009 I think or 2010 from memory and said this is the precedent you know; these things are the same. They're not the same. With respect what is happening here with this Referendums Framework Bill and what happened back with the appointment of commissioners for Environment Canterbury (ECan) is—there is nothing similar. In the first instance this bill deals with electoral law and there are conventions of this House which are being ignored in the development of this bill and I'll talk about that a little bit more. But secondly the ECan commissioners bill was there to solve a problem and that problem was that Environment Canterbury utterly failed to notify and even get an operative water plan much to the detriment of water quality in Canterbury. So if that side of the Government of the day wishes to get up and criticise a Minister in the Hon Dr Nick Smith who had the fortitude to call in the councillors and appoint commissioners in order to solve a problem then good on them but I certainly don't agree. We certainly know that under the tenure of the commissioners—and yes I am coming back to the bill Madam Chair—there was a significant advance in water quality and allocation that ECan could not achieve. So on two counts I utterly reject any notion of similarity. In fact the only problem that the Government is trying to solve in this bill is its rather tricky coalition agreements. For that I think this bill does not deserve to have any kind of praise heaped upon it.CHAIRPERSON (Hon Ruth Dyson): I just wonder if the member could turn to Part 1 of the bill now. Thank you.Hon JACQUI DEAN: Yes thank you. Thank you. What I was doing—CHAIRPERSON (Hon Ruth Dyson): I understand what you were doing.Hon JACQUI DEAN: —was a preamble to Part 1 of the bill and so now I will move back to my point around the conventions of electoral law because in the preliminary provisions of course clause 4 provides for one or more referenda to be held in conjunction with the next general election. My contention is that for a number of years in New Zealand electoral law has been the matter of a Justice Committee inquiry into the general election and also into the local election. Now the question I have for the Minister is why not use that well-understood parliamentary process for determining whether there were to be referenda held at the next general election? The process is there. It is a standing committee of Parliament. The Justice Committee every three years turns its attention to this matter. It is not the Opposition's position that the inquiry into the 2017 general election was commenced in a timely manner. It could well have been generated on the first meeting of the committee which has happened in previous parliaments. The fact that it was not should not be an impediment for a consideration of referenda attached to the next general election 2020 having to go outside of that process. Even to today the select committee has not yet reported back on the inquiry into the 2017 general election. So I would like the Minister to explain to the committee just why this issue could not have been considered within that context allowing experts in the field—of which there are many in electoral law who come to the Justice Committee to give their view. [Bell rung] Madam Chair?CHAIRPERSON (Hon Ruth Dyson): Before I give the member another call I'd really encourage her to speak to Part 1 of the bill.Hon JACQUI DEAN: Thank you Madam Chair. So in the context of an inquiry into the general election it is not too late for the Minister to invite perhaps the chair of that committee to extend the report back. The reality is that constitutional electoral matters fall well within the purview of that examination.So finally on Part 1 in my contribution I want to mention clause 5: the referendum" is defined to mean a referendum that has been declared by Order in Council so thereby subverting also what has been common practice in New Zealand. It does seem to me that the purpose of this bill including Part 1 and other parts to which we will have something to comment on is excluding input from the New Zealand public. It's not good enough to say that the framework bill—and I don't also agree that this is just a framework bill—with its select committee stage which has been and gone where the public have been able to submit is in any way making up for the lack of public engagement by way of a select committee process to determine the wording of the referenda.So Madam Chair I thank you for your indulgence but there were several points I wanted to make. Thank you."