0 Some thoughts on Electoral Act breaches

3News reports that the Labour Party wants an inquiry into why the Police chose not to prosecute John Banks; check this out:

Labour is calling for an independent inquiry into recent investigations and prosecutions involving politicians, in the wake of the John Banks scandal.

Friday will be the Epsom MP's last day in Parliament as he is quitting after being found guilty of electoral fraud.

Labour's justice spokesman Andrew Little says the public is entitled to know why the police decided originally not to prosecute Banks.

"There is a real question now that has to be examined more closely by a very high-powered, legally trained person," he says.

Mr Little says an independent agency may be needed to look into allegations of electoral malpractice and corruption.

We actually agree with Andrew Little on his final point above. But we reckon that Andrew Little should be careful what he wishes for, given the Labour Party's past record of electoral infringements that were not prosecuted. 

Cameron Slater has refreshed a story published in Truth when he was editing it, detailing some outstanding and unresolved alleged breaches of the Electoral Act:

Back when I was editor of Truth I OIAd the Electoral Commission about outstanding complaints they had sent to the Police for prosecution.
To date nothing has happened with those complaints.
Here is what I wrote back then. The sentiments and facts remain the same:

In our January 3rd issue we reported the following story. This has since been picked up by other media agencies, so we thought we would refresh your memories on how you heard it first at Truth.

Police are sitting on more than twenty open investigations referred to them for prosecution under the Electoral Act by the Electoral Commission.

Truth has obtained details under the Official Information Act that reveal Police seem to have no interest in prosecuting offences and breaches of the Electoral Act.

Of the 32 cases referred, 6 have lapsed because the prosecution time limit has expired.

62 dual vote referrals remain open and un-prosecuted.

Headline cases referred by the Electoral Commission that remain open with little or no progress are the Green party worker Jolyon White’s alleged vandalism of National’s signs at the 2011 election, several of Labour’s flyers including their ‘Stop Asset Sales’, ‘Prices are Rising faster than wages’ and ‘Ohariu Census’ pamphlets.

Only 3 cases have been closed, with no action or prosecution resulting.

The Electoral Act is the governing act to keep checks on political parties and candidates. The Police do not appear to be interested in prosecuting these cases.

We agree with Cameron Slater that the Police seem to have no interest in getting involved in electoral offences. We even have a possible solution! 

We reckon that the Electoral Commission should be given the necessary powers to set up a prosecutions branch, independent of the Police and of any political parties. Those staffing the branch would have an in-depth knowledge of electoral law, something that the Police seems to lack. 

Whilst some of the offences listed above may seem trivial, they are breaches of the law nonetheless. Political parties are given extensive information from the Electoral Commission as to what they can and cannot do. If they choose to ignore that advice, as David Cunliffe did with his tweet on the morning of last year's Christchurch East by-election, a prosecution should be strongly considered. If there is no sanction for breaking the law, there is no incentive to comply with it.

If the Police lack the will to prosecute, then that responsibility should be passed on to an agency that will treat breaches of the law with due seriousness. That agency should be the Electoral Commission, which already administers the Electoral Act.

Do you agree?

0 Idiot/Savant on Labour's Electoral Act flip-flop

Idiot/Savant from No Right Turn has ripped into the Labour Party over its plans to outlaw coat-tailing:

On Firstline this morning, Labour's David Cunliffe promised to introduce legislation to scrap the "electorate lifeboat" provision of MMP within his first hundred days in office:

“The incoming Labour-led government under my leadership would, within our first 100 days in office, initiate moves to repeal this part of the Electoral Act.
“National has supported a widely discredited electoral rule which skews the democratic process to its own political ends. The New Zealand public can see through that,’’ said David Cunliffe.

I think this is a terrible change. The one MP rule is a vital safeguard which ensures representation of smaller parties. Without it, our Parliament would be much less representative than it is at present (unless it was balanced by a removal of the 5% threshold) - and therefore much less democratic.
It doesn't help that there's the usual enormous helping of hypocrisy from Labour on this.Despite their claims to have been "principled and consistent" on the issue, they quietly gifted Coromandel to the Greens in 1999; their opposition is more recent, and based entirely on a desire to rob National of potential coalition partners. And in order to do that, they're willing to make our Parliament less representative and rob their fellow citizens of a democratic voice. It is immoral and undemocratic - but its what happens when you get professional politicians who view the electoral system as a game to be rigged to their advantage, rather than a framework to maximise democratic representation and responsiveness.

I/S is dead right about Labour's hypocrisy on this issue, even though he downplays it by only mentioning Coromandel. Labour of course gave Jim Anderton a leg-up in Wigram election after election after election by standing a series of Neville Nobodies against the former Labour Party president. Here's a potted summary of how that dirty deal worked:

By the late 1990s, Labour under Helen Clark had largely purged itself of the influence of Roger Douglas. Realising that the cost of a split in the left-wing vote was a continued National government, the two parties agreed to form a coalition for the 1999 elections. Anderton became Deputy Prime Minister after National lost the election. He was also given the newly created post of Minister of Economic Development, which had an emphasis on job creation and regional development initiatives.
Towards the end of the parliamentary term Anderton came into conflict with the Alliance's administrative wing. Party president Matt McCarten and his allies claimed that the Alliance had become too close to Labour, and that it should take a less moderate path; Anderton replied that some moderation was required for the Alliance to accomplish any of its goals. There were complaints that Anderton was too dominant in the party's decision-making and over the fact that he supported the government's stance on the bombing of Afghanistan, while the executive and wider membership opposed it. Eventually, Anderton and three other MPs left the Alliance, establishing the Progressive Coalition, later renamed the Progressive Party. In order to get around the Electoral Integrity Act, which had been passed largely because of Anderton's complaints about waka jumping, Anderton technically remained the Alliance's parliamentary leader until the writ was dropped for the 2002 election.
In the election, Anderton was returned to Parliament, and the Progressives took the Alliance's place as Labour's coalition partner. Although Anderton won his electorate, the small amount of support the Progressives received (1.4% of the party vote) was enough for only one other Progressive – deputy leader Matt Robson – to enter Parliament. Anderton gave up the deputy prime minister's post to Minister of Finance and Labour deputy leader Michael Cullen. He remained Minister of Economic Development, and also held other ministerial portfolios. He ranked third in Cabinet, behind Clark and Cullen.
In the runup to the 2005 election Anderton renamed his party "Jim Anderton's Progressive Party". However, he was the only Progressive returned to Parliament by a narrow margin after many left-wing voters voted for Labour to prevent a National government from being elected due to a split on the left. He became Minister of Agriculture, Minister for Biosecurity, Minister of Fisheries, Minister of Forestry, Minister Responsible for the Public Trust, Associate Minister of Health, and Associate Minister for Tertiary Education.
The 2008 election saw a swing to the right, with National winning approximately 45% of the party vote to Labour's 34%. Anderton retained his seat but the Progressives' share of the party vote remained low, at less than one percent.^[3] In a move described as "unorthodox" by the New Zealand Herald, Anderton announced that he would remain in coalition with Labour in opposition. He said that a priority for the Progressives would be to support better access to dental care.^[4]

Yes; even in Opposition, Labour and Anderton were joined at the hip and were one in everything but name. We remember well the farce in 2002 when the Alliance split (to be led by none other than Laila Harre), and Helen Clark used every excuse in the book plus a few more to justify Anderton's position, and to avoid an early election. It was a farcical time.

But wait; there's more. There was also a time when Peter Dunne was useful to Labour, so Labour's candidates in Ohariu didn't try too hard. Dunne was rewarded with Ministerial roles when he supported Helen Clark and Labour in the post-election wranglings after the 2005 General Election, even though his supporters were expecting him to support National, and have nothing to do with Winston First.

So Labour has been more than happy to deal with coat-tailing MP's in the past, and based on present polling, it will need coat-tailing MP's this year if David Cunliffe is going to form a government. Then, of course, he's going to use the majority accorded to him by the dirty deal with coat-tailing MP's to change the Electoral Act to outlaw coat-tailing.

Idiot/Savant is dead right. This is indeed an "enormous helping of hypocrisy" from Labour and its leader. But why would we expect anything else?

0 Has Labour learned nothing from the Electoral Finance Bill debacle?

Those who have been hanging around Keeping Stock for a long time will know our history. The blog was started due to our anger at Labour's insidious Electoral Finance Bill, rammed through Parliament in the last sitting days of 2007. It was bad legislation, and the process was even worse.

After its defeat in 2008, many in Labour acknowledged their mistake, and their Act was repealed and replaced. The new law is not perfect, but it sure beats the legislation rammed through by Labour, with the support of the Greens and Winston Peters.

Today, it would appear that Labour has learned nothing from the 2007 fiasco, and two subsequent defeats at the polls; Stuff reports:

Labour leader David Cunliffe has committed to legislation that will remove the "coat-tailing" provisions that allow small parties to get more MPs into Parliament.
The party already has a member's bill before the House, but Cunliffe said legislation would be introduced within the first 100 days of a government he led.
Coat-tailing allows for smaller parties that have not reached the 5 per cent threshold, to bring more MPs into Parliament on the back of one MP who may have won an electorate seat.
It also can allow larger parties to do deals that would help smaller parties into Parliament, which happened with ACT and National in the Epsom seat in Auckland.
The Internet Party and Mana have also merged their list, in the hopes of bringing more MPs into Parliament on the coat-tails of Mana leader Hone Harawira, if he retains his Te Tai Tokerau seat.
Cunliffe said he challenged prime minister John Key to sign up to Labour's bill, but the party would move to change the Electoral Act within its first 100 days in government, regardless.
"We're saying a very principled and consistent thing," he told Firstline this morning.
"We think it's wrong, no matter who does it. 

It's good that Labour is now admitting it was wrong to put up low-profile candidates against Peter Dunne in Ohariu, against Jeanette Fitzsimons in Coromandel and against Jim Anderton in Wigram for all those elections. Even in 2008, when the tide was going out on Labour, they still gave Anderton an armchair ride into Parliament by standing a candidate who got almost 10,000 more party votes than electorate votes.

There is no need for Labour to rush through this legislation under urgency and with either an abbreviated or no select committee process however. The "100 days" target sounds snappy, but the reality is that if Labour was able to form a government, they have to start on the assumption that the coalition will be robust enough to last a full three-year term. That leaves plenty of time for a full select  committee process and a proper parliamentary debate, without the need for urgency.

To trample on the Electoral Act in the cavalier manner which Labour is proposing sets a very dangerous precedent. That alone makes us very suspicious that today's announcement by David Cunliffe is an act of political posturing, possibly influenced by Labour's internal polling showing distaste for the MegaMana dirty deal.

And of course the ultimate irony would be this; Labour forms a coalition with the GIMPs, of whom MegaMana have coat-tailed into Parliament, then outlaws coat-tailing. Hypocrisy much?