Macindoe TimHon TIM MACINDOE (National—Hamilton West): Thank you very much Mr Chair. I was enjoying what Mr Seymour had to say and I endorse his comments but I am pleased to be able to return very directly to the four Supplementary Order Papers (SOPs) that are under debate at the moment.In commencing can I just draw attention to the comment that the Minister of Justice made in his reply to one of the suggestions that was made by a colleague calling for a review to be undertaken by the Justice Committee. Mr Little in reply suggested Well that's already there because the select committee already reviews each general election and can review these other matters as well." I had commented in an earlier call that that is what I had the privilege of chairing in the 2011 to 2014 Parliament. But Mr Little is wrong in his reply to my colleague and I think it was Mr Hudson who had made the comment because Mr Little forgets that that particular inquiry is a convention of this House. I think it would be very surprising if the House didn't undertake it but there is nothing in legislation to require that inquiry; it's a convention. What we are trying to do through this SOP in the name of Mr Bishop is ensure that an important convention is actually enshrined in legislation because the consequences of this legislation are so serious.In my previous call I spoke predominantly to SOPs 76 and 79 in the name of Chris Bishop so in this call I would like to focus on SOP 77. One of the things that I find most extraordinary and indeed deeply ironic standing here in the Parliament today is that we have a Government that in its 10 months—nearly 11—in office has become absolutely notorious for conducting reviews for Africa. It's hard to think of an area of public policy that isn't currently the subject of a review which is simply because they came to office thoroughly unprepared. They didn't know what they wanted to do and now they're going out to every conceivable agency to get some ideas to tell them what they should do. But here where there is a very good reason for having a review of a Draconian new law members opposite are absolutely silent. We'd have to assume from the way that they have voted on every previous SOP that they are going to vote this one down as well. Only the Minister has taken calls and in his responses has shown a willingness to engage—I give him credit for that—but he has got some of the fundamental aspects wrong.I mentioned earlier how impressed I've been by the contributions of members of the "class of 2017" but I want to apologise to my colleague the Hon Dr Nick Smith for not saluting his leadership in this particular bill. It has been characterised by considerable energy and intelligence and focus on the part of the member for Nelson and I thank him for the leadership that he's brought.Now the Minister in the chair Andrew Little is going to have this as a permanent stain on his reputation and I feel sorry for him in that—Hon David Bennett: Don't.Hon TIM MACINDOE: —because he is a very fairly decent person. Well my colleague and friend the MP for Hamilton East is telling me not to be too sympathetic but I know that the Minister doesn't support this bill and surely therefore the one thing that he could do to try to mitigate against its worst offences would be to have reviews of it that might see it removed sooner rather than later from the statute book.So I do hope that he will take it on board because he is in the invidious position of having every constitutional expert in the country telling him that this is outrageous and if ever there was going to be a parliamentary production of Othello we have now found the sitter to be cast as Iago. Reputation Mr Little—oh reputation. Yours will be in tatters with the constitutional experts with whom you're going to meet for the remainder of your time as Minister of Justice.So I've listened carefully to debate on this part but "debate" implies an engagement and an exchange of views. Actually there's been no debate because the members opposite will say nothing at all. Maybe they say it best when they say nothing at all. But certainly they are conveying to us—maybe they are conveying to us—just how deeply disturbed they are. And I know that Ms Ghahraman here is very opposed to this. No one could argue for a moment that the Opposition hasn't won this debate because we haven't even had a contest.So let's focus on the crucial role of the Electoral Commission. I've listened to the outstanding contributions from my colleagues. I have spoken earlier about why the Law Commission was so important and also the select committee but in fact it is the Electoral Commission that is in charge of monitoring the rules for general elections in this country and all other electoral matters to do with referenda and the like—by-elections and so forth. It is crucially important therefore that the Electoral Commission have the tools to do their job because when they have those tools they can be really crucial.Take for example—and Mr McAnulty will know this from his friends up in the Wairarapa—what happens when a member overspends in an election. Mr Boorman paid the price of being evicted from Parliament and it was the Electoral Commission that was charged with doing that. Giving the Electoral Commission the power to have a review—[Time expired]"