SpeechDENIS O'ROURKE (NZ First): New Zealand First is opposed to this bill as a whole because we think that the existing provisions for opening and closing addresses are perfectly satisfactory and need not be changed. But I am not going to repeat my second reading speech on that because that is not necessary. The point I want to make here is that if this change is going to go ahead then it needs to be satisfactorily and properly considered and it was not.It was not because it was a rushed bill inserted into the system really as a result of the introduction of the Electoral Amendment Bill. It had not been considered at that time. The Minister decided to try to insert it and it has ended up as a separate bill. I agree with the Law Society in particular which made a submission on the Electoral Amendment Bill saying that the whole thing has not been given proper consideration or in particular enough time for consideration. This particular bill demonstrates the results when things are not properly considered and poor decisions are made.I want to refer to one area in particular. That is the fact that the bill re-enacts the existing provisions relating to the allocations to political parties. That is actually a critical consideration. It is all very well to eliminate the opening and closing addresses on the State-owned broadcasting facilities but if the criteria for the allocation of funding are also not addressed then that is a job that is not completely done. So just re-enacting that without the agreement of all the parties despite New Zealand First writing to the Associate Minister of Justice and requesting that that be done—the Minister just blasted ahead anyway and all of the other parties other than New Zealand First think that it should just go ahead. I can understand why because they see themselves as being somewhat advantaged by it whereas I think New Zealand First and other small parties are disadvantaged by it.The reasons I give are these—and if you look at the criteria you can actually see why. These criteria desperately need review because things have changed in the many many years that have passed since this was enacted. In fact this particular bill is a significant change which by itself should result in a review of those criteria. Those criteria are archaic outdated and desperately need review.These are the criteria for allocating the funding as between parties: (a) the number of persons who voted at the … preceding general election …"—we think that is absolutely fine because you can see what the results of the preceding general election were and know which parties got what support. But then in "(b) "the number of persons who voted at any by-election … since the … preceding general election …"—well a by-election could happen within a few months of the preceding general election and it may be nearly 3 years before the following general election takes place so I do not see that that is particularly relevant. That needs to be reconsidered.The third one is the number of members of Parliament a political party had immediately before the end of the last Parliament—also something easy to ascertain and it is a fair consideration. Then there is this strange provision for any relationships that exist between one political party and another—any relationships. I heard what Chris Bishop had to say about that yesterday. He said that they should be taken into account and pointed to the one that currently exists between Labour and the Greens. Is that actually going to mean that either of those political parties will get less? I think they would jump up and down if that was to be the case and so they should. So why is that there? It desperately needs to be reviewed.The next one is other indications of public support especially opinion polls. Well you get a whole range of conflicting opinion polls and they are notoriously inaccurate. It is not a consideration that should be taken into account in our view. That desperately needs to be reviewed. So you can see that this bill is not being properly dealt with. It is not properly considered. This particular issue needs to be reviewed and I want to ask the Minister why that review was not undertaken."