Woodhouse MichaelHon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE (National): Oh thank you Madam Chair—an inspired choice and a great segue actually from my colleague Chris Bishop because I also want to talk about the Minister's own words in respect of proportionality and then I will talk about my amendment to clause 1 which does two things. Firstly it removes the word (Integrity)" from the name of this bill and the Act because actually that frankly is an oxymoron. But it also talks about a new procedure for vacancies and I too want to talk about as an example the Northland by-election.But before I do I think what's really important is to remind the Minister in the chair Andrew Little of the very words he told this House just last week. He said in his second reading speech—and I quote—"It affirms the very basic principle of MMP which is that proportionality of party representation in Parliament is everything"—is everything—"and it reaffirms the point that the electorate and only the electorate determines the make-up of Parliament." I see the Minister nodding—he remembers those words—only this bill will not do that. In fact the Electoral Act already does not do that and the Government's changes make no attempt to give effect to the very words that the Minister of Justice has told this House are the purpose of the bill. The best example of that that we have is in the Northland by-election and I have some amendments—Darroch Ball: Oh it is not.Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE: Well Mr Ball says it's not so he should just pipe down and listen because he is wrong. If he thinks that I'm wrong that's fine; he can speak up and say why he thinks that. But I have an amendment to this clause and an amendment to introduce a new clause that provides for a new process for what will happen in the event of certain outcomes of a by-election regardless of whether that by-election is caused by somebody being forced out of Parliament under this legislation. It matters not the circumstances that lead to the by-election; as the Minister says it matters that proportionality is everything. The proportionality of party representation is everything.Now we know the Rt Hon Winston Peters a sitting list member of Parliament won the Northland by-election—won it at that point—and of course as a consequence of that under the rules of the Electoral Act proportionality was upset. National should have had by that 2014 general election result 59 members of Parliament—59 members of Parliament—but for the last two years of the 51st Parliament the National Party had 58 members of Parliament. I can't remember the number that New Zealand First won on election night in 2014—let's say it was 10. As a consequence of that by-election and in the face of the preference of the New Zealand people they got one more seat. Ria Bond from Invercargill became a member of Parliament and had the goals that the Minister himself espouses for electoral integrity been maintained she would not have.Kieran McAnulty: What's this got to do with the title?Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE: Well it has everything to do with what the Minister says is the goal of this bill because the goal of the bill is not being achieved by the words in the bill. I might dislike this bill I might hate this bill with a passion and I might think that it is an affront to democracy and that it levels us up with those doyens of democracy Zimbabwe and Sierra Leone—those fantastic democracies on which we model our democracy—but actually it doesn't even do that. It fails its lowest test that the Minister has set for himself. The standard that the Minister himself has set that of proportionality of party representation—that's everything. Well OK if that's everything then the Minister must support the amendment that I will bring later on and he should certainly support one of the many sensible changes to the title of this bill that we're debating in clause 1.First we remove the word "(Integrity)"—that frankly is an affront to the English language. Secondly we get process-focused because that's about the best thing we can say about this bill—it is a process. It is a terrible process but let's at least call it what it is."