3. Hon BILL ENGLISH (Deputy Leader—National) Link to this
to the Minister of Justice
Has she attended any meetings in the past week at which issues related to the Electoral Finance Act 2007 were discussed; if so, did she make any contributions to those meetings?
Hon ANNETTE KING (Minister of Justice) Link to this
Yes, as the Minister of Justice I have attended several meetings in the past week at which the Electoral Finance Act was discussed, and I participated in all discussions.
Can the Minister confirm reports that she failed to speak up at a Labour Party congress meeting on the Electoral Finance Act when the suggestion was made that material produced by Government departments should be used for Labour Party electioneering, and that this practice has been stopped only because the media brought attention to the plan and the Prime Minister intervened to try to stop it?
What confidence can the public have in the administration of the Electoral Finance Act in the light of Labour’s very poor record of breaching electoral law, and in light of the fact that the Minister of Justice, who is responsible for the Act, took part in a session at the Labour Party conference focused on working out how to rort it?
I believe that New Zealanders will have confidence in the Electoral Finance Act if members of this Parliament, particularly Bill English, stop trying to stir up trouble and stop trying to make it into a political issue because they do not like what the Electoral Finance Act does in terms of them cheating the New Zealand public at the last election.
Hon Peter DunneAt any of the meetings the Minister has participated in in the last week has there been discussion about some of the problems that are now becoming apparent with the operation of the Act in respect of the interpretations being placed upon its provisions by the Chief Electoral Office and others; if so, would she be prepared to consider convening a meeting of all parties to discuss the issues that have emerged to see whether common ground can be reached on amendments needed to make this Act workable so that the people of New Zealand can decide the next election, not the courts?
At meetings there have been discussions about issues that have been raised in this Parliament in terms of problems. In terms of the member’s suggestion that there ought to be a meeting of all parties, I would certainly listen to any suggestion, but I have to say to the member that unless such a meeting was entered into in good faith by every party in this House, I think it would be a waste of time.
Has the Minister seen reports such as that on the Ministry for the Environment from late last year indicating that Ministers’ offices and the Prime Minister’s office were coordinating Government department publicity for election year, and can she confirm that it has always been part of Labour’s plan to shut down its critics and use taxpayers’ resources and Government departments to run its election campaign?
I certainly cannot. That is yet another one of Bill English’s malicious fabrications, which this House has been subjected to over many weeks.
Is it a malicious fabrication that the Electoral Finance Act led to a decision yesterday that an MP’s newsletter probably breaches the Act, and if an MP’s newsletter breaches the Act, then probably every press release put out in Parliament breaches the Act; and what will she do about that, given that it is her legislation, which has been designed to shut down anyone who criticises Labour?
Can I say in respect of that issue that the ACT member concerned did exactly the right thing in seeking clarification. It would depend what a member puts in his or her newsletter. A newsletter is not open slather; it is not able to be used to electioneer just because it is called a newsletter. That member did the right thing and I suggest that Bill English follows her example.
Can the Minister remind the House whether 4 months after the Electoral Act 1993 was passed—which was the last time the electoral law was revised—the following things happened, as have happened this year: a ruling that the Government had breached its own law; two high-profile cases of the Government’s party president getting the law absolutely wrong; and a Government Minister issuing a press release saying that the law is an ass and needs a serious and urgent rewrite, as Minister Peter Dunne issued today?
No, I cannot recall exactly what happened after the 1993 Act was brought into force, but I am advised that every amendment that we have ever had to the Electoral Act has led to problems in terms of interpretation. It does take some time for things to settle down and I expect the same will happen with this Act.
Why would anyone believe that a committee of all parties would bring about changes to this law, when we had a committee of all parties called Parliament all last year, where all the issues that have now turned out to be very difficult were raised with Labour and with that Minister and she refused to make any changes whatsoever, and when those parties that supported her in the legislation have now discovered they did not understand the law and are now trapped and paralysed by it as well?
Unfortunately, the member constantly makes things up. Obviously, I was not the Minister of Justice throughout the year when the bill was being debated. Also, the member said that absolutely no changes were accepted; I would ask him to speak to Christopher Finlayson, as some of his amendments were accepted. This is the second thing the member has got wrong. Unfortunately, he has a habit of making things up in this Parliament.
I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. Last week we had a discussion about the Standing Order that prevents the use of epithets and other discrediting statements in the answers to questions. I pointed out at that time that it was becoming a habit of the Government. Of course, Parliament can tolerate some of that, but not when it becomes a consistent feature of every answer, as it has been from this Minister.
Madam SPEAKER