Appropriation (Parliamentary Expenditure Validation) Bill

RODNEY HIDE (Leader—ACT) Link to this

I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. I think that in the spirit of cooperation we should just move on, but I want to draw your attention to something; I am not worried about it now, but I want to make this point, and then I am happy for Mr Brown to resume his speech. Your ruling has been a bit tough. I noticed that when Paula Bennett interjected on Trevor Mallard’s point of order, you threw her out. When Mr Harry Duynhoven interjected on Judy Collins’ point of order, you threw him out. But when Peter Brown interjected on mine, as was acknowledged by everyone, somehow that was perfectly OK, and you did not offer any sanction whatsoever.

Hon MURRAY McCULLY (National—East Coast Bays) Link to this

I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. I take you back to the events surrounding your request for Mr Duynhoven to leave the Chamber. When members are told by the Speaker to leave the Chamber, they are required to go immediately, with no further action taking place in the Chamber, and, normally, the Speaker holds up proceedings to make sure that the member who has been instructed to leave does leave.

After Mr Duynhoven’s offence was drawn to your attention, you decided you had to require him to leave. You instructed him to leave, but, rather than leaving, he wandered over to the whip and engaged in a lengthy conversation. My colleague who had raised a further matter was already well into the development of his theme before Mr Duynhoven left the Chamber. I draw to your attention the fact that you had already ruled his actions to be disorderly by requiring him to leave the Chamber. The only thing that can happen after that is for his behaviour to be ruled to be grossly disorderly and for him to be named. That is the approach that you took with regard to one member today, and I now require that you consider taking precisely that action in respect of Mr Duynhoven.

Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN (Leader of the House) Link to this

This is quite important. The matter is now out of time. That matter should have been raised when it happened; the member cannot raise it later. It is now out of time. One could have made exactly the same point about Ms Bennett when she delayed her departure from this House. It is beyond the point of time that the matter should have been raised; the member should not try our patience further.

Hon MURRAY McCULLY (National—East Coast Bays) Link to this

I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker.

PETER BROWN (Deputy Leader—NZ First) Link to this

I will commence where I left off before that interlude. I want to make this point absolutely clear: New Zealand First will pay any moneys that it rightfully and lawfully owes. However, we have reservations—and we are entitled to have reservations—about the Auditor-General’s summation. [ Interruption]

JEANETTE FITZSIMONS (Co-Leader—Green) Link to this

The Greens will abstain from voting on this bill, in accordance with our cooperation agreement with the Government on all matters of confidence and supply. A month ago I announced that the Greens would pay the full amount found to have been spent outside the scope of our parliamentary appropriation but that we would not support validation legislation, on the principle that MPs should not use their power to legislate in order to remove themselves from accountability. Since then, it has been clarified that the form taken by the legislation makes it a matter of confidence and supply, so there would need to be an extremely good reason not to observe our commitment under the cooperation agreement, which is to abstain. It is also clear that this legislation is actually required by the Public Finance Act, and the House cannot really get around that.

We would be entirely happy not to oppose the bill at all if all parties had committed themselves to their moral obligation to repay any spending that has been found to be outside the scope of the appropriation. However, two parties have yet to make that commitment. We would be very concerned if this legislation was used by them as an excuse not to pay the money back. The obligation is simply a moral one. We can find no legal obligation on any party to make restitution for what is found to have been spent in error. But the passing of validation legislation does not absolve anyone from that moral obligation, onerous though it must be for parties that, like our party, have reduced representation this term compared with that in the previous term.

In the Committee stage, we will support those clauses that set out the rules from here on. If the bill could be split into two, we would support those clauses at the third reading too, but it appears that it will not be. It is essential that the law gives us some guidance as to the meaning of “parliamentary purposes” and “electioneering”; otherwise, none of us know what we can and cannot do with our leaders’ budgets right now. It is true that we were all warned that we could not use parliamentary appropriations for electioneering, and I think we all agree with that. It is also true that electioneering has never been defined, so we all followed a rule of thumb that we could not ask for votes for a candidate or a party, and that we could not solicit money or membership in any way.

The Auditor-General’s 2005 report did not clarify electioneering any further than that. To the extent that it did try to clarify the rules, those criteria are not applied in the Auditor-General’s 2006 report. Our 2006 spending has been audited using a different set of rules from those set out in the Auditor-General’s 2005 report. For example, the 2005 report identifies a principle of democratic interaction, saying that dialogue between representatives and the public is a valid and fundamental part of a democracy. Yet newspaper advertisements that invited the public to discussions with me on climate change and oil depletion were ruled out of order, though they made no reference whatever to the election.

We also have a new rule that the legality of an action changes dramatically 3 months before an election. That is despite the opinion of the Solicitor-General, which the Auditor-General says he relies on, that explicitly says that things lawful for the rest of a parliamentary term do not suddenly become unlawful 3 months before an election. The Auditor-General relies on the Electoral Act for that ruling, which is never applied to the spending of the Parliamentary Service appropriation. It is a particularly difficult ruling to apply, given that one never knows that the 3-month period had started until the election has been called, which usually occurs at least a month later. So we are meant to try to second-guess when the election will be held, in order to determine when spending suddenly becomes unlawful.

The Auditor-General has applied a ruling that any mention of the future, or of a vision, by a party constitutes electioneering. That would seem to favour parties that wish only to preserve the status quo. I also fail to understand the application of a criterion of wide dispersal, where the more widely a communication has been dispersed, the more it is held to be electioneering. Under MMP, list members and parties have nationwide constituencies. Surely, if a communication is lawful in one place, it is lawful in several places. I raised my concerns regarding all those newly imposed criteria with Mr Brady when I asked to see him, and I have still not had any satisfactory explanation of the criteria that he has used.

Since the election, the Auditor-General has defined as electioneering any discussion on matters not actually before the House. No such ruling was given to us before the election, and it advantages members of the Government, who are likely to want to talk about legislation they are promoting, rather than Opposition parties, who prefer to discuss with the public legislation they would like to introduce but have not had the opportunity to introduce.

Clause 7 defines “parliamentary purposes” in the way they have been understood for some time: excluding the seeking of votes, money, or members. At least with that through, we can continue to do our jobs as MPs in the interim, while new rules are developed before the next election. The Greens look forward to participating in that process.

Some very serious issues of democratic principle are raised by this investigation and this ruling. Members and parties are elected to pursue certain policies on behalf of the public. Elections are, or should be, a contest of policies. The business of Parliament is partly about ensuring stable government, and much of its lawmaking is not particularly contentious. But it is also about a contest of ideas for the future of our country. A central question is whether MPs are allowed to use parliamentary funding to discuss their policies with the public. That goes to the heart of the issue. If they are not permitted to do that, then parties without rich backers will have difficulty in informing the public about what they propose, and a poorly informed public cannot support a democracy. The ruling from the Auditor-General says that we may not use our leaders’ budgets to tell the public about the policies we are advocating. It is hard to see what we can, then, use them for. Can Dr Brash, for example, give the House his word that no letters were sent from his office in the 3 months before the election outlining the National Party’s policies, or is it just that there is no audit trail for that sort of activity as distinct from advertisements taken out in newspapers?

It will always be difficult to draw a line between where work as a parliamentarian stops and electioneering starts. That is why we need clear guidelines if the line is to be drawn in a different place from where we always thought it was drawn. In particular, this report is a very partial audit of parliamentary funding for parties. It has looked only at advertising expenditure. If the advertising budget cannot be used to discuss our policies with the public, then surely neither can our staffing budget, our travel budget, our accommodation budget, or our phone budget.

If staff are not allowed to prepare responses to questions from the public and the media about our policy positions, it is difficult to see what they can do in the period after the House rises for the election. There is no parliamentary business for them to assist with. Parliament is in recess then in order to allow the democratic process of electing representatives to occur, at which time the overwhelming public interest is in learning factually about the policies the parties are proposing. No one has ever told us that all staff must be sacked on the day after the House rises for the election, which would be the consequence of applying the criterion the Auditor-General has proposed.

The report also raises questions about the use of money allocated for MPs’ travel and other expenses during that period. It is surely absurd that we cannot use parliamentary money to invite people to a meeting to discuss our policy, but we can use it for the leaders to travel to the TV debates, which are totally about electioneering.

Those are all matters that the Parliamentary Service committee must consider in order to have new rules in place before the next election. It may be that the definition of “parliamentary purposes” should be somewhat narrower than that set out in clause 7. Advertisements that do not solicit votes or money, but that nevertheless make disparaging comments about other parties or simply carry slogans with no information or content, might equally be held not to be for parliamentary purposes and to be solely for electioneering purposes. That is for the Parliamentary Service committee to determine in its deliberations. For the moment, we have the guidance we need in order to continue to do our work as MPs.

TE URUROA FLAVELL (Māori Party—Waiariki) Link to this

Tēnā koe; kia ora tātou. For months this Parliament has been swooning over three little words, and they have not been “I love you.” “Pay it back” has been the constant call, and today we see how this Government is addressing the political inferno that has erupted around paybacks. We thought that last Thursday the Government had the guts to fess up, to come clean—

Hon PETER DUNNE (Leader—United Future) Link to this

In speaking to the Appropriation (Parliamentary Expenditure Validation) Bill, I want to make my remarks in two parts. The first part deals with the Auditor-General’s report and the response to that, and the second deals with the legislation itself. I think that at least one party in the House may not have quite caught up with the news that United Future has agreed to repay the amount deemed owing in the report, and we will do so as soon as we are in a position to meet that commitment.

That commitment will not change with the passage of this legislation. Our view is that although we think there are considerable flaws in the Auditor-General’s report and the logic that he applied to his decisions, those considerations actually count for nothing in the public mind. The public is clearly of a view that parties misappropriated their funding and that parties have consequently to make good that misappropriation. Whatever our thinking about the nature of the report and the way it was carried out, we will honour that commitment. That stands, regardless of the fate of this bill. So I say unequivocally to those who fear that the passage of the legislation may be used as a vehicle to say that what was deemed to be unlawful is therefore now lawful, so our obligations do not apply, that in our case we do not accept that logic. We accept the commitment and we will meet it.

The second point I make relates to the bill itself. It has been said—and I think with some truth—that validation measures are not unusual in this Parliament, and some very large validation measures have been passed through this Parliament over the years. In fact, I recall one for something in the order of $350 million in one instance. In this case, Treasury has advised that, given its role as the steward of the public finances and looking at the provisions of the Public Finance Act, there is now a question—a very real question—about the validity of all parliamentary expenditure under these headings, going back to 1989-90. The consequence of a question being asked about the lawfulness of expenditure over a 17-year period raises serious questions for the integrity of the books of successive Governments over that period. Therefore, there is a strong case to pass legislation to clarify immediately that that expenditure was, in fact, lawful; that removes not just a question of doubt over the 2004-05 and 2005-06 years, but the question of doubt that Treasury has identified right back to 1989-90.

I observe in passing that at that level this is just not an argument about parliamentary spending. If the integrity of the books of New Zealand is in question, then so too is our integrity in the international financial marketplace, and our ability to do business in that sense has been adversely affected. So this legislation becomes more serious and more necessary in that regard.

The next aspect of the legislation that is important is to clarify the definition of “electioneering”. We may not be in election mode at the moment, but it is unclear, arising out of the Auditor-General’s report—and particularly if one relies on the advice of the Solicitor-General, then looks at the conflicting advice from Mr Hodder—what actually constitutes electioneering at the present time. One thing we can say is that a majority of parties in this House, if not all, have historically had a view about what one can and cannot say, and that view is challenged in the Auditor-General’s report. So at the very least, an argument emerges that we need to codify what it is that constitutes election spending, and that is what this bill does by taking a very conservative approach in that it effectively replicates what most of us have understood to be the status quo.

But because there is uncertainty moving forward, the bill introduces a sunset clause at the end of next year—31 December 2007—on the strong understanding that in that time the Parliamentary Service Commission, members of Parliament, and the parties in this Parliament will work to develop new rules that are more specific, more transparent, less uncertain, and less open to the misinterpretation that clearly applied across the board, at least in the mind of the Auditor-General, before the 2005 general election. So this bill sends a signal in that regard—that it expects further work to be done.

Members may well ask: “Why the urgency—why the need to do this right now?”. I say two things in response to that. Firstly, the Speaker, in her response to the Auditor-General’s report last week—and I hope I am not involving her in the debate by quoting her report—highlighted some circumstances that could be occurring right now where expenditure by members on areas they thought were legitimate is brought into question. For the safe and good running of this Parliament and the whole process that we are about, that cannot continue unanswered.

The second point is that my party has already had accounts for payment returned to it by the Parliamentary Service since last week—accounts that in the normal course of events would be paid because they satisfy the conditions—on the grounds that in the wake of the Auditor-General’s report, new uncertainties now apply. So we are now getting to the situation where the day-to-day business of this place—and I am not talking about electioneering accounts—is being put in some doubt, not by officious bureaucrats, but by cautious people saying: “Given that ruling, we are uncertain as to how we proceed.” So that is what introduces an element of urgency into this legislation.

There will be many who will say that this is Parliament rushing to get itself out of a hole. I do not think that is true, because even by making lawful what the Auditor-General has deemed to be unlawful, in my view we do not remove the moral obligation on those who have accepted it to repay the debts that have been attributed to them. But what we do is remove the uncertainty that now affects the Crown accounts, that now affects the way in which this Parliament operates, and the big question that hangs not so much over us but over the staff who support us, about what they can actually do as part of their normal duties helping us do the work we are elected to do.

This has not been one of Parliament’s most glorious moments. This has not been a happy affair, whatever position one takes in relation to it. But the reality is that we need to act decisively to resolve it. Given the commitments that most parties have made to meet the obligations imposed upon them by the Auditor-General, we need now to tidy up this situation so there can be no uncertainties in the future.

I hope that parties do not take the view that this lets them off the hook. United Future takes the view that we have some obligations imposed upon us by the Auditor-General’s report. In the case of a very small party, they are very big obligations. I was tempted at the beginning to declare a massive financial interest in this, because it certainly is for my bank balance. That is actually not the point. We accept that responsibility, we move on, and now we make sure that the rules that emerge as a result of this exercise are ones that are robust, clearly understood, able to be supported by all, and not subject to the sort of misinterpretation, misunderstanding, and unruly and sometimes very bitter debate that the experience of the last election has occasioned.

RODNEY HIDE (Leader—ACT) Link to this

There is no need for validating legislation. Sure there has been some unlawful spending, as identified by the Auditor-General. Well, that can stand. It can be left as unlawful spending. I do not believe that our Parliament and our Government have done themselves at all proud in the way this matter has been handled.

The Auditor-General is an officer of Parliament. We make him an officer of Parliament so he is independent of the political day-to-day business of Government. We spend taxpayers’ money. I believe that we did try to stay within the rules. I believe every party when it says that. However, we know that it is possible to get it wrong, and we did. The person who said that we got it wrong was the Auditor-General. He gave us an opportunity to have an input on his draft report and I believe that every party, bar New Zealand First, did so. New Zealand First, for its own reasons, chose to dispute the report after it had become finalised. I myself sent a strong letter to the Auditor-General, and I met with him and spoke on the phone on, I think, three occasions. I made a very strong representation to him and he listened to me most carefully.

In the end, he reached his conclusions and I regard him as a referee. If this Parliament, we as politicians, and, indeed, the Government, are to have any sort of integrity and legitimacy, then we have to say: “OK, I gave it my best shot. The Auditor-General gave me an opportunity, and this is what he has found.” And it does hurt that he found against us. It hurts not just financially, it actually hurts that we have been accused of spending money unlawfully. I know that our party—and I am sure the other parties, including the Labour Party—believed that it was following the rules. But, having been found by the Auditor-General to be outside the rules, then I think that as parliamentarians we have to accept it and lump it.

What I found particularly distasteful was Ministers of the Crown, including the Prime Minister, attempting to bully the Auditor-General and to attack the Auditor-General, because I think that brings his office into question. I certainly believe that it undermines the authority of our Parliament, because every other New Zealander apart from the 121 MPs in this House, when found to be operating unlawfully, cannot rush off and change the law. They cannot turn round and abuse the referee. There are consequences for doing that.

Here are we, making the laws for the rest of New Zealand to follow, attempting to uphold our justice system, and, indeed, offering some integrity to the way in which taxpayers’ hard-earned money is spent, yet we saw the Prime Minister and Ministers of the Crown attack the Auditor-General in a way that we would not accept from any other New Zealander. We have seen Ministers of the Crown, including the Prime Minister, attempt to say that there are no rules for how they spend hard-working taxpayers’ money. Well, that cannot be right.

Now we find ourselves in Parliament changing the law to make lawful what the Auditor-General found to be unlawful. I will make it plain what we are saying here: MPs have unlawfully spent money that was hard-earned by taxpayers, so what will we do? We will use the special privilege and special power we have to change that law in order to make what was unlawful lawful. That is wrong.

It is wrong that we are doing it, and it is wrong that we are doing it in such haste. We can think of all the issues that confront New Zealanders, and our Government and our Parliament say that they are too busy to deal with them, but when it comes to our politicians’ own self-interest—wow! Suddenly Parliament has time. And we are rushing it through under urgency so that the public, whose money it is that is being spent—by us—does not have a say, and so that when we are found in breach of the rules that we expect all New Zealanders to follow and all civil servants to follow and uphold at their peril, we do not worry. No, under Helen Clark’s Government, we rush in with the legislator’s pen, we stop Parliament in its tracks, we bring legislation into the House, and we pass it under urgency.

That cannot be a right process, and the easiest thing to do is for us to pay the money back. I value United Future’s position that those members will pay it back; I value the Labour Party’s position that it will pay it back. I think that that is the right thing for us to do, as much as it pains us. But it cannot be right that we are here under urgency, changing the law, and I will make it plain.

We had a situation where the Prime Minister signed a painting that she did not paint. There were legal implications arising from that. We cannot rush off and change the law on that basis. The law of art fraud has to stay as it is. We know from the police report that, yes, the Prime Minister broke the law. What she did was unlawful. She was not prosecuted or convicted, and that is fine, but what she did was unlawful—just like the spending that Helen Clark did was unlawful and just as the spending that the National MPs did was unlawful—and it should just stand. It does not need validating legislation. Helen Clark’s motorcade sped through the South Island at breakneck speed. That, too, was unlawful. We did not rush off to change the law to say that we will make lawful what was unlawful. Ruth Dyson was caught having had too much to drink then driving. We did not rush to change the law—no! Members of Parliament have to accept the consequences of the rules. They cannot use their special position of power and privilege to change the law.

I listened most carefully to Dr Michael Cullen’s reasons for the other expenditure that MPs make and I think there is confusion over what the rules now are. I certainly think that when we head into the next election there will be huge confusion, so the rules have to be tidied up. But the way to tidy up the rules is not to rush legislation through Parliament. It is not actually Parliament’s legislation that defines how we can spend the money. There is a reason for that: we do not want the courts looking into Parliament and at how it spends the money. That is why we have never put it on the statute book; it is for Parliament itself to decide. So what we should be doing, rather than rushing in here in Parliament to change the rules, is to take a considered approach, as is envisioned, in order to get some proper rules about how we spend the money.

Let me put in my two pennies’ worth. I think we should have budgets, like we have with the leaders’ budgets and for MPs. I do not think we can control the spending with a whole lot of rules. I think that is too tough. So I suggest instead that we have fewer rules and more transparency. I think the public has a right to know how political parties spend its money, what they spend it on, and how it is broken down, and I think the Parliamentary Service should be subject to the Official Information Act. In fact, I would go so far as to say that the Labour Party should be able to take its leader’s budget and spend it on the pledge card. That is its budget. But I say that the public has a right to know, because we have found that that is where the rubber hits the road. The public has a right to know how we spend its money.

Hon PETE HODGSON (Minister of Health) Link to this

In the few minutes between now and the dinner break I will see whether I can convince my colleague Mr Rodney Hide to change his vote on the basis of this logic. I understand that the member said he felt that passing this legislation did not matter. He did point out that it had no bearing on whether one paid the money or refunded any outstanding moneys. He did understand that the passage of this legislation lets no one off the hook in terms of one’s decision of whether to refund any outstanding moneys, and he does understand that the non-passage of this legislation puts no one on the hook in respect of refunding any moneys owed.

He also pointed out the fact that money has been unlawfully spent and, even though Madam Speaker and Treasury think that the legislation should be passed, he has an argument that asks: “If it were not passed, what harm would be done?”. I will not respond to that; that is his point of view. But I do invite the member to reflect on this: we do not know now what we can spend money on. We do not know that now. There is a reason prospectively—not retrospectively, I say to Mr Hide, but prospectively—to say that this legislation should be supported because it provides parliamentarians with a brightline as to what they may and may not do prospectively until new rules are in place. The Auditor-General’s findings, whether or not one agrees with them, are broad, wide reaching, and significant. The changes have been enunciated by speaker after speaker.

Well, that ruling stands unless this legislation passes. Therefore, all this stuff about Dr Brash going to Nelson to sign up a person from the Green Party into the National Party, and all of the examples given by Dr Cullen in the first speech in this debate are true—and any legal opinion would back that. In fact, the Solicitor-General’s own legal opinion backs that.

Hon BILL ENGLISH (National—Clutha-Southland) Link to this

In order to remind the House of why we are debating the Appropriation (Parliamentary Expenditure Validation) Bill today, let us go back to 22 August last year. On that day, Labour Party volunteers all around the country went to their electorate offices and campaign headquarters, and picked up boxes of the pledge card. Those volunteers set off to every corner of every suburb in every town, to deliver that pledge card. They put it in mailboxes, street by street.

The families, young people, and pensioners of New Zealand went out to the mailbox, picked up their mail, and took the pledge card back inside. Some of them just threw it in the rubbish because they were sick of the election already, and some of them had a quick look and saw Helen Clark’s face on the card—nothing new—and did not take any more notice of it. Others picked up that pledge card and looked at it. They saw promises of a rates rebate; of 250 new community police, which made them think about the burglary down the street last week; and of a $10,000 grant to young couples who were trying to buy their first home. Then they looked at the TV and saw pictures of the political leaders going about the business of election campaigning. Those good citizens of New Zealand thought they were in an election campaign. And so did the Labour Party volunteers, who were delivering that pledge card.

But if members read the evidence that the Labour Party gave to the police when they investigated complaints under the Electoral Act, they will find that two people at least thought Labour was not in an election campaign. They were the people who were running it: Helen Clark and Heather Simpson.

Hon MURRAY McCULLY (National—East Coast Bays) Link to this

The bill, and the circumstances in which the House finds itself tonight, should invite members opposite to reflect. Indeed, it should make all members in this House reflect, because we in this Parliament have a unique role. We have unique powers, and with those unique powers go some unique responsibilities. Yet, today, we find ourselves not just legislating under urgency; we find ourselves legislating about ourselves.

I invite members opposite, and those who want to prop them up in this Chamber, to apply a very simple test. It is this: if the Auditor-General’s report concerned the actions of private citizens or a private organisation, or even of a Government department or local authority, and that organisation or local authority had breached the terms of the Public Finance Act, would we be here tonight rushing a bill through all stages, on the first available parliamentary day, to address that matter? Would we be here tonight, under urgency, using the extraordinary powers of this House to rectify the matter, on the first available day? Would we be trying to avoid the select committee process, by which every other measure that goes before this House is subject to scrutiny? No, we would not. Would we be trying to avoid any form of public scrutiny over the normal parliamentary timetable of a bill? No, we would not. Would we see the lack of consultation with the parties that are affected by the law that is sitting on the Table of the House, because parties on this side have not been subjected to any form of consultation, in the way that any ordinary New Zealand citizen or organisation would enjoy that consultation about a measure that touched their affairs? No, we would not see it happen, were it not for the fact that this legislation suits the affairs of the New Zealand Labour Party.

Today, as a consequence of that fact, we see that this Government has no hesitation in hijacking the legislative process, hijacking the parliamentary process and the parliamentary timetable, through urgency; in reducing the normally non-partisan role of the Minister responsible for the Parliamentary Service, and of the officers who serve in that service, to the role of pawns of the Labour Party and their mates—all to serve the narrow, partisan interests of the Labour Party and its friends. That is an abuse of this Parliament. It is an abuse of the legislative process. It is an abuse of the confidence of the New Zealand public, who elected the representatives who sit in this Parliament. It is an abuse of that confidence.

Worst of all, these are actions that are driven by a motive that should never be allowed to rear its ugly head in this Chamber. It is naked, shameless, unprincipled self-interest. It is the very thing that we commit ourselves, at the commencement of each day of sitting, that we will put aside, in the interests of the public we are here to serve. That is what is driving this Labour Government in taking this bill through the House under urgency tonight.

This measure has some important implications. First of all, as a result, we will see State funding of political parties, in a significant way, introduced into the New Zealand law. That is something most New Zealanders are opposed to; something that New Zealanders will have no say about, because we are doing this without consultation with them, and, in many ways, without their knowledge. We certainly do so without their consent.

This is also bad legislation because it places politicians above the law. We are simply passing this measure because, unlike any other class of New Zealanders, we can. We know that it is wrong, and members opposite know that it is wrong. That is why, of course, we are doing it under urgency. The way in which this measure is being handled politicises the Parliamentary Service Commission, which has now some decades of history running this institution. It politicises that institution, in a way that members opposite, along with others, will learn to regret over time. And that is not a threat; that is a promise. There is no going back from that.

Let us be clear about one thing, as this measure goes through the House in the space of these 2 days. Some parties in this Parliament, despite what they might say, have absolutely no intention of paying back the money they have unlawfully taken from the public of New Zealand. That is the reason for this bill. This bill is being passed so that those parties will not have any legal obligation to pay back the money they have taken unlawfully. The New Zealand First Party knows full well that it votes for this measure tonight so that it will not have to pay the money back. It is galling to sit in this Chamber and hear Mr Brown tell the House that the New Zealand First Party will meet all of its lawful obligations, as it participates in passing, under urgency, a bill that will ensure that New Zealand First has no lawful obligations, at all. Even Mr Brown can work that out.

There is only one reason for the rush, for the urgency, for the avoidance of public scrutiny, for the avoidance of a select committee process—that is, because some people in this Parliament have no intention of meeting the obligation they have to the New Zealand taxpayer to pay the money back. By the end of this week they will have no legal obligation to do so.

We do not have State funding of political parties in New Zealand, and there is a reason for that. The public is opposed to it. The public has always been opposed to it. That is why, for three successive elections, the Labour Party has hidden the fact that taxpayers have picked up the tab for the centrepiece of its election campaign—the Labour Party’s pledge card. Members on this side are pretty suspicious; those of us who have been in the Parliament for a while are deeply suspicious about the Labour Party, and we think all sorts of terrible things about Labour from time to time. But it did not cross our minds—it never ever crossed our minds—that the Labour Party would have the sheer gall to use taxpayers’ funds to purchase the pledge card, which has been the centrepiece of not just the last election campaign but the last three election campaigns.

Members of the press gallery have asked us, almost incredulously: “How can it be that you people haven’t got on to this before?”. We have had to give them the honest answer that we simply did not think that even the Labour Party could stoop so low as to use taxpayers’ money to fund the Labour Party pledge card. We did not ever think it was possible. Nor did many of the institutions that guide our society think that it was appropriate. It is deeply revealing, as a result of the revelations we have seen in recent days, that the Parliamentary Service officers did not think it was the right thing to do, either. Those officers paid over the money they were obliged to only because they had a gun to their head from Heather Simpson. They were told absolutely: “Pay up, or you know what consequences will be coming your way.” By the end of this week, the Labour Party pledge card will be able to lawfully be paid for with taxpayers’ money. That is the fundamental change in the law that clause 7 of this bill will make.

I conclude by regretting most sincerely the shabby politicisation of the Parliamentary Service Commission that has seen this bill come to the House. Normally when we pass a bill we have procedures that ensure the bill sits on the Table for a while so that all of the parties that will be affected by it will know what will happen to them, that they will have their ability to have a say, that we have a select committee process, that we have transparency, and that we pass bills over weeks and months, not over hours and days. That is because transparency and accountability to the public are fundamental principles of the way in which this place operates.

But because of the naked self-interest of the Labour Party, all of that is being put to one side to pass a bill that suits certain members of this House. That is an outrage. It is an outrage that the Minister responsible for the Parliamentary Service Commission has been prepared to engage with the Minister of Finance in that process and make her officers do the same. She has sold down the river members of Parliament on this side of the House, and she will never ever regain our confidence as a consequence. She will never regain the confidence of members on this side of the House in relation to the administration of the Parliament. Her use of Jack Hodder and Chapman Tripp, who foolishly lent their names to this enterprise, is very much a matter for regret. That was a shoddy piece of work on their part. Even the Attorney-General will know that that is the case.

The New Zealand public are not silly. They know what is going on here. They have worked it out. This is one giant nail in the coffin of this Government. These people will be down the road, and the sooner the better.