Dalziel Lianne: Electoral Referendum Bill — In Committee 
Dalziel Lianne: Electoral Referendum Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:669;Page:16411] 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL (Labour—Christchurch East) 
: 
 I was not going to take a call on this part because this part is not particularly relevant to the issue that Metiria Turei just raised but I thought I should foreshadow that yes we will be moving an amendment to remove clause 54 from the bill which is in a later part. I will talk to the reasons why we will do that at the appropriate time because I am sure the Chair will rule me out of order if I was to try to discuss it now. He is nodding his head very sagely. 
I will talk about clause 3 “Purpose of Act”. It states: “The purpose of this Act is to make provision for an indicative referendum to be held in conjunction with the first general election after the commencement of this Act in order to provide electors with the opportunity to express an opinion on the preferred system of voting for election to the House of Representatives in New Zealand.” I think it is worthwhile to reflect in the Committee stage on why the purpose has been written in that particular way. As a country we did not know that we would be having a referendum on MMP despite the very widely held misbelief that we had been promised one when MMP was first introduced under a National Government in 1996 but we did have a very strong signal from National in this regard. 
I have a quote from the coverage of the announcement made when Mr John Key then the Leader of the Opposition announced in the lead-up to the 2008 election the 10 election pledges that the National Party was taking to the election. One of the pledges—in fact the very last pledge of that list of pledges—was a promise for a referendum on MMP. I will come to this point later on when we get to the provisions relating to the caps on expenditure for third parties but it is important to remember that we already have provisions in law on citizens initiated referenda. This is a citizens initiated referendum. It is masquerading as a Government one and the deal was done in the lead-up to the 2008 election. Here is the quote from the  
New Zealand Herald 
: “Mr Key who made the referendum one of 10 election pledges in his speech to National’s annual conference today said he believed voters would reject MMP. ‘I think the country may well vote MMP out’ ”—that is a split infinitive if ever I saw one but there we go—“ ‘but I think they will vote in another proportional system’ he told reporters. ‘I don’t think they’ll go back to first past the post.’ But after 12 years of MMP it was important to give voters a choice he said. ‘I do think voters thought they were going to get an opportunity to kick the tyres and we’re giving them that opportunity.’ ” I hate that expression; in fact recently he has used it very inappropriately in relation to the Pike River disaster as well. On this particular occasion he is making it sound as if kicking the tyres is a very casual thing but actually it is not. This is quite deliberate and we know exactly who is behind the desire to have this referendum. 
We also know that this statement: “I don’t think they’ll go back to first past the post.” was put there deliberately because the target is the supplementary-member representation system. The target is to get rid of MMP and replace it with the supplementary-member representation system which is first past the post with a winner’s bonus. That is all it is. It is nothing more than that. It is not a system of proportional representation. Of the 120 seats in Parliament only a small number—30 of the MPs—are voted in under the supplementary-member representation system so it does not make the result proportional at all. 
I think it is important when looking at the purpose of the legislation in clause 3 that we are talking about people expressing an opinion on the preferred system of voting for election to the House of Representatives. This was a deliberate strategy to get this in front of the public eye. It has nothing to do with kicking the tyres; it has everything to do with the predetermined plan—well I was going to quote that wonderful expression from Justice Mahon from the Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Mount Erebus Air Disaster but I will not use that language because I might be held up for a breach of the Standing Orders for that as well. 
When we get to the other provisions of the bill I will certainly talk about the amount of the cap and why it is important. I will also talk about the amendment that I am moving by way of Supplementary Order Paper.