Katene Rahui: Electoral (Finance Reform and Advance Voting) Amendment Bill Parliamentary Service Amendment Bill — Third Readings 
Katene Rahui: Electoral (Finance Reform and Advance Voting) Amendment Bill Parliamentary Service Amendment Bill — Third Readings 
[Volume:669;Page:16464] 
RAHUI KATENE (Maori Party—Te Tai Tonga) 
: 
 The Maori Party is pleased to support the Electoral (Finance Reform and Advance Voting) Amendment Bill and in doing so we support the reform of the Electoral Act and the associated guidance it will provide political parties our supporters and parallel campaigners regarding the precious issue of funding for spending on election advertising. The really big question we found missing from the bill and the really big question on our mind is how political parties actually go about raising this funding. If we look at the Maori Party we are expected to do amazing things with five loaves and two fishes. It seems to be the same sort of thing amongst our whanau as well. They are used to doing it that way so we are getting used to doing it that way as well. But that aside we want to acknowledge the leadership of the Minister of Justice the Hon Simon Power in establishing this legislation and the reforms it makes in relation to going where there is only broad consensus. 
This year there have been a few occasions across the House where consensus has largely been achieved. In particular I think of the tobacco reforms introduced by my colleague Tariana Turia and of the Canterbury earthquake response when parties across the House worked together for the greater good. I have drawn on that precedent in calling for a cross-party accord on child poverty similar in effect to the one on New Zealand superannuation so that members of Parliament can consider policies on children as sacrosanct as policies for older people are. It is a challenge that I hope all members will consider over the summer break. 
In coming back to this bill the Maori Party is confident that it will establish a regime that is fair and transparent for all groups and individuals as is vital for the operation of democracy. The Maori Party supports the range of electoral finance reforms contained in this legislation including a register that is publicly available to record the contributions of third party promoters in terms of their investment in election advertising. We think this will ensure openness and transparency concerning the identities of third party promoters. We have agreed with the proposed increase in the amount of money that parties and candidates can spend on election campaigning and we agreed that it should be set at the rate of inflation for each general election. In the interests of greater transparency for the general public it would however be useful to know why there needs to be twice as much funding available for by-election campaigns. Given the events of yesterday we would recommend such information be circulated before the 5 March by-election in Botany. We believe that these changes ensure that anything spent on behalf of or towards political parties is above board and open. 
The Maori Party has also supported the public’s call for greater transparency in order to desist from the practice of using trusts or lawyers’ accounts to obscure the identity of donors. The Maori Party supports reforms that ensure greater certainty and transparency in the conduct of the electoral process. We were particularly pleased that the reforms remove the requirement for advance voters to make a written declaration before election day. From an administrative point of view this is helpful in removing another layer of costs from the schedule but more important it removes a barrier to participation. We are hopeful that the Maori voting public in particular will be able to take advantage of that mechanism. 
I want to just touch on the move to introduce more certainty to what counts as election advertising by modernising the definition. But we would like to see the issue of unethical advertising addressed in the implementation of the bill. Consider the appalling way in which some parties and advertisers have used Maori as negative fodder during election campaigning. We should never again return to the era when politicians gambled on national identity and threatened the unity that has been so desperately sought by pitching campaigns to create unnatural divisions between iwi and Kiwi. 
Finally although the Maori Party supported the Minister’s Supplementary Order Paper keeping broadcasting out of this bill we are disappointed that there is nothing on the agenda signalling the reform of the broadcasting regime that has existed since 1990. Although we can understand that there were widely held views about this we cannot forget the issues that have arisen in the past over varying interpretations of the rules over the broadcasting period. We thank the Minister of Justice for his leadership throughout this bill. We thank the chair of the Electoral Legislation Committee Amy Adams and we also thank all the members on the committee who made this such an interesting and useful way to deal with this issue. We note that there has been cooperation—mostly—right across the House to ensure that this legislation was able to proceed without further delay. 2011 is just around the corner and I have no doubt at all that the drive for an effective efficient and equitable electoral system will continue to remain a priority for all the parties in this House.