Smith NickHon Dr NICK SMITH (National—Nelson): Thank you Madam Speaker. One of the things that makes me just so proud to be a New Zealander and a member of this Parliament is that we are the fourth-oldest continuous democracy in this world and this Parliament has actually been at the core of so much of New Zealand's success. But democracy is a delicate flower that we must be continuously out to protect and safeguard and I want to congratulate my friend and colleague David Carter as an experienced parliamentarian and as a Speaker caring enough about our democracy to introduce this bill. The electoral amendment bill that was passed in 2018 was the worst bill of the 52nd Parliament and in these closing weeks it's entirely appropriate that we point out the failings of that bill and seek to repeal it. There is a very fundamental point of what makes a country a democracy and it is this: the people elect its members of Parliament and the people alone are entitled to fire them—the people alone are entitled to fire them—and the moment we give party leaders the power to dismiss a member of Parliament that has been democratically elected we erode the very fabric of what makes our parliamentary democracy so important.This law that is being challenged today would be unconscionable in the mother of all Parliaments in the United Kingdom. It would never have even got off first base. MMP was founded in Germany; it would breach the constitution of the Federal Republic of Germany should anybody pass such an offensive law. As my colleague David Carter from the Inter-Parliamentary Union said this law puts New Zealand in the company of Draconian authoritarian States like Zimbabwe or like Venezuela which not a member of the New Zealand public or member of this House would want to associate ourselves with. It was a further disgrace that this law was the product of simple leveraging from the coalition negotiations. Actually our electoral law needs greater protection than simply being a plaything of negotiations. Our electoral law in my view needs to have greater entrenchment to stop those sorts of rorts.As Mr Carter said this law change is the product of the paranoia of one member who simply wants the power to be able to fire his caucus as a consequence of his personal experience in 1996 and never in a democracy should our electoral law be dominated by one particular person's vendetta and experience. When this bill was introduced it was exposed that every member of New Zealand First was required to sign a contract of $300000 were they to leave that party and that is equally unconscionable as was displayed at that time.Now the member Mr Greg O'Connor asked: well what's happened in the last two years and why does it equally concern me? It is because it is the change in the culture of this place that goes with this law. The moment members of this Parliament know that any one of the party leaders has the power to fire a member means that the courage of our convictions is watered down and the duties that we have as a member of Parliament to represent our people and to stand up for what we believe is eroded. One of the great values that I think is at the core of Kiwi values is a tolerance of dissent—that while we may disagree we will vigorously defend the right of others to be able to respect their opinions and in no place is the right of dissent as important as in this Parliament.I want to conclude by making a tribute to Jeanette Fitzsimons who we recently memorialised. I would invite all members of the House to reflect on her speech as we make a decision to send this bill to select committee and remove this blight from our electoral laws—ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Ruth Dyson): I'm sorry the member's time has expired.