Chauvel Charles: Electoral Finance Bill — Second Reading 
Chauvel Charles: Electoral Finance Bill — Second Reading 
[Volume:643;Page:13399] 
CHARLES CHAUVEL (Labour) 
: 
 That was an extraordinary contribution from a member of Parliament who on 22 March 2007 said this in his interview with GayNZ.com: “I am not interested in the abuse nastiness and petty point-scoring that consume my opponents.” Well if the sorts of discussions we have just heard about Ms Pillay and me are Mr Finlayson’s contribution to the debate on these issues then “bring it on” I say. 
“The business community cannot give us enough votes to win but they can provide us with money.” That is what the previous leader of the National Party said when asking his caucus to take the party’s leadership away from Bill English and that is the attitude that still lies behind the National Party’s opposition to the Electoral Finance Bill. We would not be here unless those National members opposite thought that democracy was for sale. We need to ensure that our system in the words of the Green Party is based on the principle of one person one vote not one dollar one vote. As a member of the Justice and Electoral Committee I am proud to observe that the public obviously agrees with that sentiment. Public participation in the select committee process was extensive and admirable. The committee has recommended extremely significant changes to the original bill and those changes are based on the evidence that the members of the committee heard. In other words the select committee process worked as it was intended to—the Government introduced a bill extensive public submissions were heard on it and the select committee recommended changes. The House is now considering those changes in the bill as reported back and presumably in the week in which the House next sits we will consider them in more detail in the Committee of the whole House. That is democracy at work. That is how the Standing Orders envisage this Parliament working and the process I am pleased to report is healthy. 
I want to run though some of the significant changes that the committee has recommended to the House. It was pointed out to us that after the National Party and the Labour Party the biggest single spender in the 2005 election was—guess who? It was the Exclusive Brethren. 
Chris Auchinvole 
: The unions. 
CHARLES CHAUVEL 
: No not the unions; the Exclusive Brethren. Their spending doubled the effective amount of money available to the National Party which was doubled again through collusion with the Maxim Institute the so-called Fair Tax lobby and through donations from the very wealthy which were laundered through secret trusts. Clearly it is necessary to close these loopholes by regulating the expenditure of political actors not registered as parties—the sort of soft money regime that has caused so many problems for democracy in the United States. The bill as reported back liberalises the originally proposed spending limits to apply to those third parties. One submitter who I see is in the public gallery now Mr Graeme Edgeler made some very helpful suggestions to the committee. He suggested that the limit should be increased “to allow a nationwide pamphlet or nationwide newspaper advertising campaign”. In accordance with that recommendation clause 103 doubles the originally proposed spending cap. A third party can spend $4000 on candidate advertisements in an electorate and $120000 for other purposes. 
Chris Auchinvole 
: Tinkering with this law doesn’t make it good. 
CHARLES CHAUVEL 
: Another important change—and I know Mr Auchinvole will be listening carefully to this—in the area of regulated forms of expression relates to the definition of “election advertisement”. The Human Rights Commission and many non-governmental organisations pointed out that the original definition was unduly restrictive of freedom of speech. So in response the committee recommended a change to the definition of “election advertisement”. [ 
Interruption 
] Mr Auchinvole should listen carefully; I know it is difficult for him to understand but he will get hold of it. 
Clause 5(1)(a)(iii) has been deleted in line with a suggestion by the Human Rights Commission amongst others. There we see the process working again—submissions were made and the committee listened and reported back to the House accordingly. This clarifies that taking a stand on issues as opposed to advocating for a party or candidate will not fall under the definition of “election advertisement” for the purposes of this bill. Any person or organisation will remain free to say whatever they like about any matter. It is only when they enter into advocacy for or against a party or candidate as Peter Dunne has said that their actions or expressions will be regulated. 
In accordance with the further submissions of the Human Rights Commission it has been made clear in clause 5(2) that the term “periodical” should exclude media activities and the practice of blogging in order to give full effect to the freedom of the press and to freedom of speech. Also clearly excluded is communication between companies and shareholders in response to a submission from Mr Bruce Plested executive chair of Mainfreight. That is further evidence of the committee listening to submissions and acting accordingly. 
It has also been made clear that provided a third party’s membership includes a majority of New Zealand citizens or residents it is eligible to register as such. Also Kiwis under the age of 18 are included in the ability to become third parties or members thereof. These changes along with others mean that the bill provides an appropriate balance between on the one hand the need to protect freedom of expression and on the other hand the desirability of keeping democracy open to all regardless of income. These are changes that respond to a host of submissions made by groups and individuals such as Presbyterian Support New Zealand. 
Chris Auchinvole 
: This is getting a bit boring. Wind it up. 
CHARLES CHAUVEL 
: Mr Auchinvole may not be interested in the views of Presbyterian Support but members on this side of the House are. We listened carefully to them to Business New Zealand to Professor Andrew Geddis and to the Royal Forest and Bird Protection Society all of whom asked for the changes that I have just outlined. We listened carefully and we recommended those changes by majority to the House. 
The author of the No Right Turn blog has an interesting item on scoop.co.nz today. His is only one of many voices writing in praise of the bill as reported back but his perspective is not featured funnily enough in the  
Dominion Post 
 or the  
New Zealand Herald 
 which is consistent with those newspapers’ historically unchanged editorial leanings. On Scoop today the author of the No Right Turn blog says this: “the upshot”—that is what has come back from the committee—“is a bill which has no effect whatsoever on the freedom of speech of ordinary people or NGOs while properly restricting the ability of the rich to circumvent party spending limits with parallel campaigns and so buy elections. … And judging by the wailing and gnashing of teeth over on the right it looks like the bill will have exactly the desired effect: limiting the pernicious influence of money over our elections and ensuring that each of us has an equal political voice.” [ 
Interruption 
] Members opposite may wail and gnash their teeth but they should remember that the reason we are here today is that they tried to rort the system in the last election. They were the ones who breached the longstanding convention in this country that a party declares where it gets its money from in an election campaign. Labour does so with the unions. We do not seek covert funding of $5 million from various groups and try to get around the rules. Members opposite may have managed to disguise this well from the media but we understand what they did and we will make sure that it cannot happen again and that in this country democracy is not for sale.