Peters Winston: Electoral Finance Bill Broadcasting Amendment Bill (No 3) Electoral Amendment Bill — Third Readings 
Peters Winston: Electoral Finance Bill Broadcasting Amendment Bill (No 3) Electoral Amendment Bill — Third Readings 
[Volume:644;Page:14038] 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First) 
: 
 The New Zealand First Party believes in capitalism as the best way socially and economically to organise the affairs of society. But when we talk about capitalism we talk about responsible capitalism of the type articulated by men like Benjamin Disraeli and Keith Holyoake in the 1950s and 1960s in New Zealand. We do not talk about the elitism the autocracy the oligarchy or the special interests that certain people in this Parliament represent today and nothing else. That is the modern National Party. It is light years away from what it used to be and Mr English had the audacity to stand up here today repeating myths and shibboleths that are not true. He knows that they are absurd but because he has an attentive audience from the foreign-owned principal media of this country namely the Christchurch  
Press 
 the  
Dominion Post 
 and the  
New Zealand Herald 
 he knows he can get coverage. 
Let me ask members this question. Did the  
New Zealand Herald 
 complain back in 1993 when the National Party shut down another political party from advertising on any occasion in the campaign on radio or TV? Did the  
New Zealand Herald 
 complain? Did the  
Dominion Post 
 complain? Did that great doyen of the free and the faithful the Christchurch  
Press 
 complain? Not a word not a sound not a mutter not a murmur. That is what principle is about in this Parliament. This party over here got $1.4 million in the last campaign in secret trusts. Where did it come from? This party gets more than $7 million every year now. The taxpayer pays the National Party above all other parties $7 million - plus to prosecute its parliamentary business. Now tell me why would a party want an uncapped fund after getting $7 million from the taxpayers? 
What is mysterious about this whole campaign over the Electoral Finance Bill is this. We are trying to find out whose freedom of speech is going to be suppressed. Has anybody told members whose freedom of speech is going to be suppressed? Well I have not heard. Here comes the second mystery. What do the opponents of the bill want to say from now until the next election and why would they want to spend millions of dollars buying space to say it? What do the opponents of this bill want to say from now until the next election and why would they want millions of dollars to say that? 
R Doug Woolerton 
: They shouldn’t need it. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: They should not need it; that is exactly right. If National members’ attention span can manage it they should think about this. There is so much free speech around that we are swamped with it. We hear it all the time whether or not we want to listen. Listen to the talkback shows. There is enough free speech to keep a small town going 24 hours a day—there is so much hot air. Everybody has a view from the All Blacks to dare I say it Nicky Watson. Everybody has a view about everything. We have never had so much free speech in this country’s history. Why are we being warned every day by the National Party and its rich friends that this freedom of speech is to be taken away from us? 
Charles Chauvel 
: Mendacious civil rights. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: Mendacious civil rights? They still do not know what that means. They could be given millions in a campaign on literacy and they would still not be any wiser at the end of the process. But here is my point. What is it that has been taken away from New Zealanders that these paragons of democratic virtue—in the National Party of all parties—are seeking to defend? Bill English gets up in a right lather posturing as he does and giving his legal views which are not worth the paper they are written on. They are wrong they are false; nobody is going to be denied a chance to speak up at the next election. 
I just want to say this to my friend Tim Shadbolt before he makes a mistake. It was a New Zealand First Treasurer who uncapped the funding to tertiary institutions in this country back in 1998. That is a fact. For the first time the funding was uncapped. He should read the fine print and he will not be so alarmed. But if he thinks he has a friend in the National Party he has lost it—he has lost his fine political instincts. If he thinks the National Party will help him my poor friend Tim has lost his political touch so I say to Tim: “Be careful.” 
New Zealand First is happy for the National Party to have all the opportunity it needs for freedom of speech because we just might hear a policy. Can I ask these questions? What is the National Party’s policy on Working for Families? What is its policy on medical care for all ages? What is its policy on the Reserve Bank legislation? What is its policy on for example KiwiSaver? What is its policy on tertiary education funding or latchkey kids? What is its policy on asset sales? What is its policy on foreign banks price gouging New Zealanders? What is its policy on business taxes to come? The National Party does not have a policy. I have some little doubts about this because I would like National to have enough money to sell its policies. But of course it will not cost much because right now we have not heard one—on anything. 
Hon Maurice Williamson 
: What does Garth McVicar think of this? 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: Let me tell the member that if Garth McVicar thinks he is helping the sensible sentencing cause by lining up with the National Party then he has sold the cause down the drain. 
Hon Members 
: Ha ha! 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: Oh yes! I remember the National Party’s last policy on law and order. Do members know what it was? National spent $340 million on a computer called INCIS. That computer was such a brilliant piece of technology it would go out and arrest all the lawless in our society! Garth McVicar should know that $340 million was the cost of the last law and order policy that the National Party put up before the country. Do members know what happened? The computer’s operators could not get it to work. 
Hon Maurice Williamson 
: What does Grey Power say? 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: I was down at Nelson with Grey Power last Friday and I say to Maurice Williamson that its members are still cheering. 
Hon Maurice Williamson 
: Oh yeah? 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: They are still cheering because for the first time they heard the truth. Up until then they had been hearing the shibboleths from one Nick Smith. So we can see why they were confused. What is the National Party’s policy on Fonterra—come on—or on Television New Zealand— 
Dr Wayne Mapp 
: What has this to do with the Electoral Finance Bill? 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: It has everything to do with it. I say to Dr Mapp that is why we want to know who is backing National because we are not going to have the kind of covert money that is destroying democracy in some countries in the Pacific today. Oh yes! Dr Mapp from Auckland University used to understand this at one time. Does he remember when the National Party was selling the BNZ? 
Dr Wayne Mapp 
: Get back on the topic. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: Does he remember that the National Party sold the BNZ? He was a councillor for the National Party was he not? [ 
Interruption 
] Yes he was. So the National Party sold the BNZ— 
Hon Maurice Williamson 
: They did not “sell” the BNZ; they bailed it out. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: Yes it did. It was 22 October 1992—do members not remember? The BNZ 30 percent—[ 
Interruption 
] No no. Who sold it to the National Australia Bank? The sale of the BNZ to the National Australia Bank was effected by the National Party yet the front bench of the National Party are denying it. There is Maurice Williamson a front-bench member of the National Party who cannot remember yesterday. What is its policy today? It is still the same old policy. 
National says that if this law were only for the 3 months out from an election it would be OK. What an amazing confession! If the law were only for the last 3 months of an election campaign then National says it would be OK. So what is the issue here? The issue is that National could not spend all the money that it has been given over and above the $7 million the taxpayer gives it every year. Can we imagine Holyoake worrying about this legislation? Can we imagine Marshall worrying about this legislation? Can we imagine Adam Hamilton worrying about the legislation? Can we even imagine Muldoon being concerned about this? Of course he would not because he would be out there doing some real campaigning at public meetings not organising photo opportunities at the  
New Zealand Herald 
 and advertising and DVDs and stealing somebody else’s copyright on songs. That is what has happened here. 
The National Party has lost it! It needs this money to disguise the inability of its front bench. It is the worst most hopeless untalented front bench the National Party has ever had. Come on! I ask Doug Woolerton because he and I have been around a long time we had been in the National Party for a long time—long before these current guys—whether that front bench is the worst he has ever seen. 
R Doug Woolerton 
: Absolutely! 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: There you are; that is the voice of an expert. So we all agree.