3. Hon BILL ENGLISH (Deputy Leader—National) Link to this
to the Minister of Justice
Is it Government policy that political parties may electioneer with advertising material produced by Government departments; if so, why?
Hon ANNETTE KINGHas the Minister been advised that following the public endorsement by Mike Williams, president of the Labour Party, of a strategy of having Labour activists use Government department - produced advertising material, the Inland Revenue Department has instituted formal systems to monitor the use of its publicity and to identify any MPs’ offices ordering high numbers of pamphlets; if so, what does she think this says about the Inland Revenue Department’s faith in the New Zealand Labour Party?
It could say two things: firstly, that the Inland Revenue Department is being cautious or, secondly, that it is very interested to see just how many people are interested in what was happening in terms of tax cuts.
Has the Minister also been advised that, following Mike Williams’ statements, the Inland Revenue Department’s internal emails show that its communications staff expressed the belief that a KiwiSaver flyer intended for delivery to every household in New Zealand was “too far towards the promotional” and that the flyer was subsequently cancelled?
No, I am not aware of that. But I imagine that all Government departments would be being very cautious.
Has she been advised that, following the statement made by the president of the Labour Party, Mike Williams, that Labour activists could use Government department - produced advertising material, the head of corporate services at the Inland Revenue Department suggested that all information programmes such as household flyers should cease until after the election?
Is the Minister disturbed by the fact that, after all this, the State Services Commission and the Inland Revenue Department told the New Zealand Herald that the reason they had pulled the pamphlet was “strong uptake of the programme”, when the emails show that, in fact, they pulled the ads because they believed they promoted the Labour Party too much?
I would believe the word of the Inland Revenue Department and what it said publicly. But I am concerned that this member raises questions in this House about everybody in every other party and about the way they are acting in relation to the Electoral Finance Act while always, of course, pretending that his party’s hands are clean. I would ask the member what he has done about the pamphlets I have here, which were handed out at the Fieldays. They are unauthorised and were paid for by taxpayers’ money, and they will be sent off to the Electoral Commission because this is nothing more than two-faced hypocrisy from the National Party.
Gerry BrownleeI raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. Day after day you have accepted answers to questions on this topic from this Minister that have been woefully inadequate, on the basis that she has said that the Minister does not offer an opinion on the Electoral Finance Act. She has just done exactly that.
Madam SPEAKER
Rt Hon Winston Peters Link to this
Seeing that the Minister has put into contention the issue of various political parties being at Mystery Creek, is she aware that at that occasion of a few days, a lot of political parties had their own booths there, including New Zealand First, the National Party, and the Labour Party, but that, of course, the National Party members went around photographing everyone else’s booth and not their own?
That tells this House one thing: National members are more interested in being the tell-tale tit of Parliament than they are in getting on and having an election campaign, fair and square. They probably even used parliamentary money to buy the camera to take the photographs.
I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. I take exception to the comments made by the Minister. The reality is that we just did not want those parties to feel lonely.
Rodney HideI raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. Time and time again you rule questions out of order—and I would have asked you about this question, but I was quite interested in the answer, so I let it pass—but I am sure that the Minister of Justice is not prepared to accept responsibility for National Party members or for whom they might or might not take a picture of, yet that question was allowed. I fail to see how the Minister of Justice has any ministerial responsibility for that matter. You upheld that question, yet when we ask her questions about the law and she says that she does not have any responsibility for that—
I think I get the member’s point; he is making a speech now. I listened very carefully because the questions from Mr English also could have been ruled as being within the ministerial responsibility of the Minister of Revenue, but he phrased his questions in a way that asked whether she received any reports about them without doing that, and so did Mr Peters. It was on that basis that I allowed both lots of questions. They did not directly go to ministerial responsibility and the Minister answered in that way.
Can the Minister tell us what it says about the faith of the Public Service in the integrity of the Labour Government when, even after the Prime Minister backed away from her party president’s strategy of using publicly produced pamphlets for electioneering purposes, and despite the Prime Minister saying that she had done that, the Inland Revenue Department went ahead and implemented a system to monitor the behaviour of Labour MPs to ensure that they did not use publicly produced pamphlets for electioneering?
I seek leave to table the internal emails from the Inland Revenue Department that show it implemented a monitoring system to ensure—