Extracts from the Report
The Auditor-General doesn’t mince words. He lashes The Parliamentary Service for their interpretation of the rules, but also makes it very very clear MPs have ignored his warnings and committed flagrant breaches.
I am concerned that I found a substantial amount of material that amounted to electioneering. A number of advertisements and newsletters expressly solicited votes. However, even where no express soliciting of votes occurred, a large number of advertisements contained material that could only be described as election platforms and promises. I was particularly disappointed to find that the Service paid for significant amounts of newspaper advertising by some parties in the last week before the General Election. That advertising was incontrovertibly of an electioneering nature, and I could not discern a legitimate parliamentary purpose for it.
I have found the nature and extent of electioneering advertising expenditure put through the Service by MPs and parliamentary parties disturbing. In this regard, party-generated advertising produced by Leaders’ offices was of most concern.
I find it hard to accept that, despite my 2005 Report and the message to be careful about advertising expenditure in the pre-election period, behaviour did not change.
October 12th, 2006 at 3:35 pm
“I find it hard to accept that, despite my 2005 Report and the message to be careful about advertising expenditure in the pre-election period, behaviour did not change.”
And that has to be the crux of it no matter how much they squirm…
October 12th, 2006 at 3:52 pm
“I note that my findings do not necessarily indicate that any provision of the Electoral Act 1993 have been breached by any person. Those questions are separate, they are not my responsibility and my enquiry did not consider them.” Page 8 of the report.
A little naughty to point to the corrupt and illegal practices sections of the Electoral Act 1993.
October 12th, 2006 at 4:01 pm
Innocent – what is most interesting though is the SG and AG used case law under the Electoral Act to come up with their definition of electioneering.
Now it’s not a total slam dunk, but one can make a reasonably good case that almost every dollar identified by the AG, should have been included in parties election returns. This would mean Labour actually over-spent by $800,000 if it was all party vote material.
Now answer me this. Is it an offence to file a false election return which omits some items of expenditure?
October 12th, 2006 at 4:20 pm
It’s fairly clear that Labour overspent by $800k. They bought an election with money they weren’t entitled to use.
Paying the money back is only half the remedy. We should be holding Labour to account and demand fresh elections.
October 12th, 2006 at 4:24 pm
Demand away! Who would support national in a no confidence vote?
October 12th, 2006 at 4:38 pm
Probably not even National hisself.
October 12th, 2006 at 5:41 pm
DPF
Still digesting both reports and the legal advice.
The Auditor General’s approach to whether something is “electioneering” (the key factor is proximity to an election but it’s not limited to proximity) is a reasonable person test. He construes parliamentary business narrowly and the prohibition widely. He also focused on those things with an audit trail while acknowledging that there might be other electioneering but it was impossible for him to tell: like staff time for example.
My instinct is that this approach is seriously flawed as there is no certainly to what is permissible at all.
It would be interesting to assess National’s recent worthy release on environment policy which contains a number of policy undertakings that are only achievable should National be leading the next Government. Any “we will” statement must imply voting for National surely on any reasonable person test? [see para 4.27 page 38] And should the legal treatment of this publicly funded document differ because it’s after an election rather than before? I cannot see why the proximity to an election is at all relevant.
There is no legal reason why the interpretation of the law is tighter because of the proximity to an election.
MATERIALLY FALSE RETURNS
On the materially false return of Party donations and Electoral Expenses issue, one would have to show that the General Secretary filed a false return and intended the return to be false in a material way to the legal standard of beyond reasonable doubt. The General Secretary would have a defense to a charge of an illegal practice assuming he did file a materially false return (established beyond reasonable doubt by the prosecution) if he showed no intention to submit a materially false return and that he took all reasonable steps to ensure the accuracy of the return. Again there is more or less a 70 day time limit on commencing proceeds on this.
In the pledge card case, the Labour Party took 2 sets of legal advice (one formal) and attached an addendum to the Party return. On legal advice it withdrew its offer to comply with the Chief Electoral Officer’s view of the law and that of the Electoral Commission. I don’t recall the General Secretary of the Labour Party being interviewed on the issue.
October 12th, 2006 at 6:04 pm
Well…. this doubles the number of investigations in NZ history that disregarded the interests of the political establishment to tell the truth.
Justice Peter Mahon of course, and now Kevin Brady.
October 12th, 2006 at 10:01 pm
I think Mahon was wrong not to find Pilot error. What was he DOING flying that low for goodness sake.
October 12th, 2006 at 10:08 pm
Oh Christ.
Stick to chewing gum.
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