Little AndrewHon ANDREW LITTLE (Minister of Justice): Thank you Madam Chair. I just wanted to make some brief replies to some of the comments that have been made in the last set of contributions. To the speaker who has just resumed her seat Erica Stanford I simply say that it is a very sad day when she considers that in order to do her job and fulfil her moral mandate she needs a definition in legislation of what integrity is. She was well able to articulate what fulfilling the mandate of the people was—the democratic will of the people. It does not need to be defined in legislation.Let me go back to the Hon Nick Smith and his contribution—and indeed many of the members who have spoken before who in terms of describing integrity have talked about their right to stand up for very important things. Members in the Opposition may not like to hear this but I will say it because it is important to put on the record that the track record of National Party MPs for standing up for things against their party is woeful; in fact non-existent. So Nick Smith claims to be the great environmentalist pledged in high office to reform the Resource Management Act and failed. He says he wants to protect the waterways of Nelson and he had ample opportunity for year after year as Minister for the Environment to do it and did not do it. So there is no moral lesson taken from members from the National Party about being independent.Jacqui Dean says that she does not want to stand for what her leader stands for. Well she should tell Simon Bridges that because I think he's entitled to know. But it does not mean—Hon David Bennett: I raise a point of order Madam Chairperson. The Minister is taking advantage of his speaking role in attacking members of the Opposition personally. It should not be allowed in this House and that's something that is not appropriate—CHAIRPERSON (Poto Williams): Thank you. Thank you I do understand your point of order. Prior to the Minister taking this call there was a previous member who went through a list of MPs as a definition of integrity. I'm suggesting to the member that as a counter to that argument the Minister is providing another list. This is a very robust debate so if I rule that particular discussion out of order then I must also rule out the robustness of the debate that has happened previously.Hon David Bennett: Yes—CHAIRPERSON (Poto Williams): No do not question the ruling. It has been made. Thank you.Hon Dr Nick Smith: I raise a point of order Madam Chairperson. I do not wish to question your ruling. I think it is a fair one and this is a robust debate. But I would ask that where the Minister does choose to attack a member that you'll take that into account in terms of future calls so members might be able to defend their reputation.CHAIRPERSON (Poto Williams): I will make that decision based on the quality of the debate and the relevancy of the debate. I will not make that decision based on a suggestion by a member in the committee.Hon ANDREW LITTLE: Thank you Madam Chair. Now look I have listened very carefully to all the contributions and I don't want members to think that I have sat here not hearing what they've said and I want to acknowledge them. So the next on the list was of course the Hon David Bennett but of course he spoke about matters we've already voted on so I have no further response to what he has said—Hon David Bennett: A few because you can't answer it.Hon ANDREW LITTLE: —and because I've already answered the points that he has made but because they're light points there's not much to respond to.I want to say the Hon Gerry Brownlee who typically makes well-informed contributions to the debate did on this occasion but I think his history is slightly awry when it comes to John A Lee. John A Lee's hanging offence was to disparage his leader when his leader was terminally ill and in fact it was a conference resolution of the Labour Party that saw him expelled from the party. Indeed had the same thing happened even under this legislation I imagine the result would have been the same as well. But I take his point on the other people that he spoke about.Simon O'Connor at least referred to the proposed definition of integrity in the Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) but I just go back to the point I made in relation to Erica Stanford's contribution which is that we don't need that defined in the bill. When it comes to the will of the people this bill is all about preserving the will of the people—the collective vote of all New Zealand to establish the proportionality of party representation in Parliament. This bill inherently meets that definition which is why this SOP is not needed.