Open Writing

My November 2007 article, “When a Democracy is not a Democracy’, outlined reasons why New Zealand was not the democratic nation it purports to be. Since then there has been a further assault on New Zealand’s democratic status in the form of the Electoral Finance Act.

At its introduction to parliament, the Labour government argued this legislation was necessary as it would prevent undue wealth effecting electoral outcomes and maintain public confidence in the administration of elections by providing greater transparency and accountability on the part of those engaged in election activities.

The Electoral Finance Act makes it illegal for anyone to spend more than NZ$12,000 criticising or supporting a political party or taking a position on any political matter, or to spend more than NZ$1000 criticising or supporting an individual Member of Parliament, without first registering as a “third party” with the state funded, Electoral Commission. It also makes “third party” spending of more than NZ$120,000 illegal.

Those registering as a “third party” are subject to various regulations including a search warrant.

The Electoral Finance Act also extends to the finances of “third parties” in that they must disclose all donations they receive over NZ$1,000. Anonymous donations over this amount received by “third parties” must be given to the State.

This law applies for a full election year.

Restrictions are also placed on those wanting to stand for parliament. A candidate who is not currently a Member of Parliament is only allowed to spend NZ$20,000 seeking election over an entire year, whereas an existing MP has in addition to this NZ$20,000 limit, larger and more freely available taxpayer funding, thus making it even more difficult to defeat a sitting MP. No other democracy in the world has such severe restrictions.

It was obvious from the start the Labour government was determined to have their way over this legislation, as the process which led to its introduction in the House of Representatives involved discussions with only its supporting parties and not the opposition.

Despite protestations from the Human Rights Commission, the New Zealand Law Society and political lobby groups, this scandalous piece of legislation was steamrolled into law with the most narrow of majorities.

After passing its first reading on 27 July 2007, the Bill was sent to the Justice and Electoral Committee for consideration. The committee was due to report back on 25 January 2008. The closing date for public submissions was 7 September. However, on 31 August, the government indicated it intended to make some unspecified changes to the Bill, thus preventing the committee from hearing criticism of the existing provisions and the public making submissions on the new provisions.

The committee reported back to the House of Representatives on 18 November and recommended the Bill should proceed. The alterations were announced and the Bill passed a second reading vote on 22 November.

The Committee of the Whole House stage began on 3 December and the Bill passed its third reading on 18 December 2007. It was signed into law the following day.

The Leader of the Opposition National party, John Key criticised the Act saying “it was cynically designed to protect incumbency, but National simply did not have the votes to stop it.”

In passing this legislation the government acted with complete disregard to the recommendations of the New Zealand Human Right Commission, who at the outset recommended the Bill be withdrawn, rewritten and any alterations to existing legislation “subjected to the widest possible scrutiny to ensure credibility and legitimacy of whatever electoral reform emerged.” The Commission also recommended the period prior to Election Day when free speech was restricted should not be extended to eleven months as this would effectively negate the right of New Zealanders to have their say for one out of every three years. No other democracy in the world has restrictions on free speech for this length of time.

The overriding effect of the law is to reduce and restrict the rights of individuals or groups to spend their own money either criticising or supporting any political party.

Those in favour of the Electoral Finance Act argued that placing a cap on ‘third party’ political spending prevented those with the most money having the most say and similar legislation was in effect in other modern democracies. They cited the example of Britain and Canada both of whom required “third parties” to register with official electoral regulators and the identity of “third party” donors made public.

Those wise souls who were aware of what the Government and its political cronies were up to, were aghast at the hypocrisy of introducing legislation designed to reduce and restrict the rights of individuals or groups to spend their money on political activities, while at the same time they were supporting the Appropriation Act, which legalised spending on a large range of previously illegal activities, and freed up the ability of the government and other political parties to spend taxpayer money promoting their views.

Despite the media giving a lot of publicity to the matter in the run up to it becoming law, there was little public debate from the average New Zealander. An initial protest march in Auckland drew 2,000 protesters and a subsequent march, 5,000. Smaller protests were held in Wellington and Christchurch. From a population of 4 million, this is a paltry number.

In the 1970s writer, Gordon McLaughlin wrote a book describing New Zealanders as the passionless people. I think he hit the nail on the head. The government can erode our human rights as much as they like and apart from a few brave people ringing a talkback show, most others won’t turn a hair. Their attitude is why worry about anything as mundane as democracy, when there are better things to do like playing sport and enjoying the great outdoors. Nothing untoward can happen here, as this is God’s own country!

However, this is election year in New Zealand, and we may see the Electoral Finance Act has been an Act too far.