Tolley Anne: Electoral Finance Bill — In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee 
Tolley Anne: Electoral Finance Bill — In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee 
[Volume:644;Page:13469] 
ANNE TOLLEY (National—East Coast) 
: 
 I would like to speak to a particular clause here tonight too. I would like to talk about clause 17 which is the clause that prohibits third parties from being registered in the lead-up to an election. The original bill that came before this House proposed 42 days—that is from writ day the listing of third parties would be prohibited. I want to refer to the information that was provided during the Justice and Electoral Committee hearing because submissions from a whole range of people including Associate Professor Andrew Geddis Family First New Zealand Libertarianz the Employers and Manufacturers Association the Human Rights Commission David Farrar the New Zealand Law Society Mr Graeme Edgeler and about 13 other submissions focused on this clause. Of course their concern was that the effect of this was particularly unfair if an issue arose late in an election campaign—that is in the 6 weeks leading up to an election when the election campaign proper is going. If a third party or an interest group had not formally registered it could not take part even if it was forming part of an intense electoral debate. Let us say that a party came out with a proposition in that 6 weeks in the election campaign proper—for instance someone said they were going to ban the SPCA. If the SPCA had not registered as a third party prior to that it would not be able to take part in the debate and it could have its future debated amongst political parties and candidates without it being able to put its side of the case. A large number of organisations made representations to the select committee. 
I have to say that the New Zealand Labour Party supported the provision that was in the bill originally—that is banning unregistered people from taking part in that last 6 weeks of an election campaign—because apparently it wanted to ensure that there were no surprises late in a campaign. Well actually nobody has told political parties about the “no surprises” clause because that is when political parties spring their surprises and that is the very time when organisations and individuals out in the community should be able to get involved in an election campaign. That is in fact the very time that the public are listening to an election campaign. 
So this Labour-led Government wants to ban unregistered people from taking part in that 6-week lead-up and we heard that in the select committee from the members opposite. Interestingly enough of course groups like the Human Rights Commission said and I quote from its original submission: “It is difficult to conceive of a greater limitation on freedom of speech than this and it cannot be imagined that the degree of restriction was intended. The effect of the bill is to muzzle a person or group which finds itself in this situation.” 
Jill Pettis 
: Quote from the second one! 
ANNE TOLLEY 
: I hear some raucous talk from across the way saying “Read the second one.” Well I will actually because the commission having had a look at the changes to the bill—and let us remember that in the bill that has come back we still have the words “on writ day”—said in its follow-up after the bill was reported back to the House: “The commission requests further consideration of clause 17.” In its original submission it proposed its deletion. In fact the Human Rights Commission said that that clause should be deleted and in fact it is continuing to say that it should be deleted. It accepts that there may well be legitimate administrative reasons for a close-off date but it should be as close as administratively practical to polling day. So the commission is rejecting this proposal from the Labour Government and its lackeys. 
The other organisation that commented on this clause was of course the Electoral Commission. It said in its comments to the select committee that it also recommended removing this clause. The commission said that that would effectively prevent individuals and groups from making a contribution to debate during the critical campaign period if they had not listed as a third party. So did anyone listen either to the Human Rights Commission or to the Electoral Commission? Only National listened.