Ghahraman GolrizGOLRIZ GHAHRAMAN (Green): Thank you Madam Speaker. Democracy is a human right and it is in lots and lots of ways the one right that underpins them all. Taking account of the rights of those whose rights haven't always been central to the workings of this Parliament is what that one vote per person democracy that we hold so dear is all about. This bill is about ensuring that that one vote per person everybody's voice counts" model of democracy is at least some way close to being real and it's not necessarily all that close to being real if it's all about the donors that big money—I'll say corruption—that people out there do fear when they think about the way that money operates in politics.We had I think a moment just a couple of speeches ago that was to quote the Hon Paul Goldsmith—because he says this a lot—a chilling moment for democracy but I don't think he realises that we was actually the cause of it. He said in articulating why it's important for members of this House and politicians out there in New Zealand to receive big money secret big money that it's about being accountable—accountable to big secret money; not voters but donors who donate secretly with no limit. That was the policy being championed through the auspices of accountability. That isn't the type of democracy that most New Zealanders think we have. That's not the kind of democracy that would ever really deliver for for example beneficiaries or as we know if we look overseas for climate action for labels on cigarette packets for health for the type of mining and deep sea drilling that we want to ban in this nation for the environment or for marginalised communities like migrant workers. We want a democracy that delivers for all of those groups. We want the decisions being made in this House to be strong not the kind of accountability that prioritises big secret money.The way that this bill came about is because some might remember I had a member's bill ambitiously named the Strengthening Democracy Amendment Bill that did suggest limits to donations and in particular limits to secret donations. That didn't proceed through its first reading but this bill is related to that work because last term when first I raised the issue of donations reform and was told repeatedly by various Ministers that it wasn't a priority because it wasn't an issue something happened. Three of the five political parties in this Parliament got into some form of trouble around donations. It became clear that New Zealanders needed assurance that we are not beholden to big money that we are not beholden to secret big money that the rules are clear and transparent and that our democracy is functional. It was through that work that this bill came through. We heard from the public and just last month we had the first in the living MMP democracy piece of comprehensive research delivered by Lisa Marriott and Max Rashbrooke into political donations in New Zealand. They spent a year interviewing the general secretaries of all of our political parties big donors members of Parliament past and present and they came out with recommendations.One of the findings that is in line with the accidental admission that Paul Goldsmith made earlier is that the big donors did feel entitled to influence as a result of their donations. They said that in their interviews with the researchers. They said that they gained special access through successive Governments to Ministers to leaders of the Opposition and that it was expected that that would result in influence on policy. It's on the record.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): The member is skating very close to contravening a number of Standing Orders and Speakers' rulings relating to imputing impropriety in the House. I just want the member to be very mindful of not making any allegations of impropriety within the context of this House and the Government.GOLRIZ GHAHRAMAN: Thank you Madam Speaker.Maureen Pugh: Including corruption.GOLRIZ GHAHRAMAN: It's not about what anyone in here did—ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): No no. Yes the member is right; the word is "corruption" but also the imputation of impropriety. I'm very happy to have a yarn with her later.GOLRIZ GHAHRAMAN: Thank you Madam Speaker. So I come back to the bill a bill that aims to ensure that New Zealanders have trust in our system and that we know who is taking a stake in our democracy and that if there is influence we at least know who they are. It is about transparency. But I will come back to that piece of research because it did recommend limits to secret donations—and the limit they proposed was in line with my bill; it was $1500 not as high as this bill proposes so we're not quite there yet—and it also suggested that we need limits on donations altogether. Actually to say that we have this sort of gentlemen's agreement where New Zealand doesn't have that kind of political interference is one thing but to leave us vulnerable to the kind of politics that has come about elsewhere in the world like in the United States because there has been no limit means that that culture change is very much on the table here. It could happen here and it may or not have in different ways but we are vulnerable.This bill is a good bill in that it at least acknowledges the problem. It acknowledges some of the research and acknowledges that the Electoral Commission came to the Justice Committee in the general election review and said that it's really hard to investigate whether there have been donation breaches because the limit in terms of transparency is so high that people can slip donations and they just don't know and can't do it properly.This bill makes it easier to enforce the law. It makes it easier for New Zealanders to know what's in fact happening in terms of political donations but it doesn't go far enough in terms of what the research shows. One of the things that is left out is an actual limitation to donations. So we don't have a limit. I don't think most New Zealanders would expect that that would be the law. I hope that through the select committee process we hear from some of the researchers some of the people who were involved in giving evidence to researchers and some of the groups that came forward and that that finding that New Zealand's democracy is still vulnerable becomes more clear and we can engage more meaningfully with what those limits need to look like not only in terms of transparency but in terms of getting big money out of our democracy altogether and coming back to the kind of accountability that democracy should be about. And that is accountability to voters to communities whether or not they can afford $5000 or $15000 or $35000 and whether they want to be on the record or not it's about those conversations. It's about saying that actually beneficiaries solo mums on the benefit migrant workers and the disability community all deserve the same level of influence in our politics as those big corporate donors that want to remain nameless and want a limitless stake in our democracy. I do commend the bill to the House."