Electoral Finance Bill—Select Committee Timetable

Madam SPEAKER Link to this

No, the member has no responsibility.

Madam SPEAKER Link to this

That is not appropriate, either.

Rt Hon Winston Peters Link to this

I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. That is entirely what is going on here. It is appropriate when this House is being called into question or is being challenged from outside that we should know the grounds on which it is being challenged. We know why this case is being brought. We know who is behind the complainant and who the plaintiff is, and we know what the plaintiff wants to know. But to use a member of Parliament to challenge a select committee to set its timetable is entirely constitutionally wrong.

Gerry Brownlee Link to this

The issue here is that there is an action currently before the courts. There is a matter that the court will have to hear and, presumably, rule on. Where the difficulty arises is that the courts have gone to Parliament’s programme—to the book that is published quite frequently—and have looked at the report-back date for this particular bill, and it says 15 January. So the courts have said that if this matter is to be heard on 25 November, then there is plenty of time for whatever judgment may arise from that to be considered before the matter is reported back to the House. The problem arises from the fact that the time in which a select committee reports back is pretty much in the hands of the committee and, in fact, in the hands of the chair of that committee. So the simple question is whether the select committee will be reporting this bill back to the House before the court can hear the submission by those who are putting the issue before the court, or whether the select committee will respect the process that the court has to go through. I do not think it is unreasonable that the chair of the select committee should be able to outline exactly what her thinking is on the role that the select committee has when there is this sort of action before a court.

Hon Dr Michael Cullen Link to this

I do not remember the exact wording in the question, but it seems to me that the question asked for the select committee chairperson to comment on what Crown Law told the court. She bears no responsibility for that, at all.

Madam SPEAKER Link to this

The difficulty we have here, I think, is that this is a matter for the committee and not for the chair alone. It was on that ground that I felt it was inappropriate.

Hon Bill English Link to this

I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. I think there is just a bit more to it than the issues you have considered. I mean, it is legitimate enough, but we often do have contention about process between Parliament and the courts. Sometimes it is Parliament’s correct role to ignore what the courts are doing, but this seems to me to be a time when Parliament could cooperate with the legal system. This is simply because the judge has made a decision on the basis of wrong information published by Parliament. Parliament has published a date for the report back. The court and the parties to those proceedings have relied on that information. The judge has published a decision. It seems to me to be somewhat churlish if Parliament says: “Well, it’s nothing to do with us. We have published information that’s misleading, and the court has made decisions on the hearings based on it, but it is nothing to do with us.” It is a simple matter for the select committee chairperson to state correctly when she, or the Government, intends that report back to happen, and then the legal process in New Zealand can follow through in the way that the judge and, I am sure, all the participants in the case intend. It seems odd that because Parliament will decide, on the basis of a very narrow technical definition, what a select committee chairperson is responsible for, we are going to frustrate the proceedings of the High Court, when Parliament was responsible for misleading it in the first place.

Hon Dr Michael Cullen Link to this

First of all, let me come back to the simple point: a question was asked of a select committee chairperson for which she is not responsible. She is not responsible for what the High Court was told by Crown Law. If anybody is responsible, it is me, as Attorney-General. Secondly, of course, the only report-back date that can be in the public arena is that date by which the committee has to report. The committee at this point cannot say that it is reporting back on such-and-such a date. The committee may or may not do that; that is within its own competence at the present time. I also say that one of the issues in this case is whether the High Court can consider a matter that is a proceeding before Parliament, and I would hope that colleagues might support Parliament over party politics in that sort of matter.

Madam SPEAKER Link to this

I thank the members, but the matter is not as simple as it has been put. This is a matter for the select committee. It is not a matter for the chair of the select committee—or of any select committee—to prejudge what a select committee will do. That ruling is according to the Standing Orders.