Mitchell Clayton: New Zealand Flag Referendums Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeMitchell Clayton: New Zealand Flag Referendums Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 11 August 2015. Volume:707;Page:5585. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]CLAYTON MITCHELL (NZ First): It is great to be in a very engaging debate this afternoon particularly with Mr Macindoe who reminds me of a pit bull chewing a wasp with his references to frustration. I look at his face and I understand the frustration that he feels because the people back home—the vast majority of New Zealanders—feel exactly the same way about the nonsense that is going on in relation to this flag referendum.I have a great name for the bill and it is better than everything I have heard so far. I think it is a name that should be seriously considered; in fact it may even be worth putting in a Supplementary Order Paper. It has got to be called the “Clayton’s Flag Referendum Bill” because this is the flag referendum you have got when you have not got a referendum. Let us be honest: the way we are doing this is absolutely back to front. This is about not asking the people of New Zealand: “First and foremost do you want a flag change—yes or no?”. The polls can do it. The newspapers can go out there and ask the question. We are largely hearing from the rank and file New Zealanders that they do not want this referendum.What we are also hearing is that it is an absolute waste of money. This bill may be better called the “Waste of Taxpayers’ Money Flag Referendums Bill” because that is exactly what it is. Putting $26 million into a flag referendum is an absolute waste of time dialogue and money because the vast majority of New Zealanders do not want it.Tim Macindoe: Two main parties promised it at the last election.CLAYTON MITCHELL: We have got New Zealanders out there with faces like twisted sandshoes in frustration with the Government because it will not stand up and listen to them Mr Macindoe—and you are one of those people not listening. Anyway he is giving a lot of this and not a lot of that.I have to say that the amount of money that $26 million takes up would be around about 10 percent towards a better ferry system for those commuters travelling from Wellington across to Picton. Ten percent—that is a hefty deposit for a new reliable interisland ferry transportation system for example. What $26 million would do is upgrade around about 900 houses in our underfunded social housing stock around the country and yet this Government says we cannot afford to do all of these things—we have got no money for it. Yet it can find $26 million pull it out of its pocket and throw it on the table. It is absolutely disgusting. It is a disgrace that we are allowing ourselves to get into this debate because we have got a legacy that this Government wants to leave behind particularly what John Key wants to say he delivered for this country. We are seeing a lot of depression and we are seeing a lot of frustration out there from people in small businesses and it is costing New Zealanders not only in their well-being and their mental state but in their pockets as well.This is nothing but a vanity fair. If this Government were serious about putting a referendum forward it would first and foremost ask the question: “Do you want it?”. If the answer was yes then we could go into the whole discussion about which one of these flags the public would like to see put forward. The flags that I have seen today and the comments that I am hearing on social media and seeing in the newspaper are a disgrace. It is a debacle. With an open mind I cannot see one of those flags jumping out and me saying: “Well being objective that might work.” They just do not work. I would like to go back to this one Gareth Morgan’s winning flag. That makes a little bit of sense. You have got Labour on the left National on the right and you have got New Zealand First in black and white coming up through the middle and separating them. That is exactly what is going to happen. The polls will show it. They are starting to tell it now. This Government is getting concerned about the movement.Mr Macindoe you were saying that New Zealand First has supported this in the past. We have not supported it. We have been dead against it. We have not been standing up there saying: “Let us have a referendum.” prior to now. We have been the only party standing fast on our position of leaving New Zealand’s flag as it is and not wasting taxpayers’ money. Thank you.