The parties bid for our money
April 28th, 2008 at 10:26 pm by David FarrarThe Electoral Commission is hearing oral submissions today and tomorrow on how to divide up the $3.212 million (incl GST – please note National!) of broadcasting allocations for parties. They have also put up on their website the written submission by the parties. They also get allocated 102 minutes of time on TV One and Radio NZ for opening and closing broadcasts.
The Kiwi Party and Pacific Party forgot or decided not to apply, so miss out.
- ACT says they don’t like the system (esp that parties cannot buy their own time). They claim the $3.2 million should be divided up equally amongst all parties which are viable to gain seats. This would give $400 million thousand to each of the eight parliamentary parties. They have no chance of getting this. Their backup plea is give National and Labour a bit more, but treat the other six parliamentary parties the same. They do not reveal their membership size but say they have 30,000 people on their mailing list. They also amusingly claimed that as Don Brash got 40% with ACT’s policies, they should get money reflecting that.
- ACLP cites a poll giving them 7.9% support. But only in Greymouth! Also that they have the longest serving party leader.
- Libertarianz call the rules immoral, and says they want as much money as possible, which they will not spend, hence saving the taxpayer money. I love it!
- Maori Party has 23,215 members (impressive – around three times that of Labour). Want more money so they can campaign in Maori (te reo) also.
- New World Order (no not joking) just wants one minute for their opening adddress. Should be fascinating!
- NZ First claim to have over 10,000 members. Say that Winston’s poll ratings should count more than the party’s. Says NZ First should get more funding than all other parties except Labour and National. They won’t.
- Labour makes a big fuckup in their submission and additionally gives National 100,000 extra votes (combined party and electorate) and mistakenly claim Labour got 39.70% of the combined votes and National 40.89%. Would be funny if National got more money based on Labour’s inability to add. They also claim there are no published polls on the electorate vote but this is untrue as Colmar Brunton poll on this monthly. Labour twice claim there are no electorate polls so are misleading the Commission significantly.They say that the average of all polls for last year has Nats 49.3% and Lab 36.3%. They claim 54,892 members but this includes “compulsory members” through affiliates and it is unknown how many people have voluntarily joined Labour – 8,000 is the rumoured level. As they are now low in the polls, they have changed their previous position to claim poll levels should have just the same weighting as number of MPs and votes at last election. Their conclusion is National and Labour should get the same despite National being ahead even on their own suggested criteria. Next tier should be NZ First and Greens. Third tier Maori, Act and UFNZ, Fourth Progressive and 5th those not in Parliament.
- Progressive says should be three tiers – Labour and National in tier one, NZ Furst and Greens in tier 2 and the other four parliamentary parties in tier 3. Whines a lot that their polling is bad because junior Coalition partners get little publicity.
- RAM have not learnt how to turn off full justification in MS Word. Cites votes in AUckland council elections.
- Alliance says the minimum for any party should be $25,000 (was $10,000 last time). Refers amusingly to leadership changes and “schisms”.
- Family Party just cites media coverage.
- Green Party has around 4,000 members. Say no party polling below 2% should get opening address time but can get funds. Says National and Labour should get same funding. Then Green Party get third largest amount – more than NZ Furst due to their low polling.
- Liberal Party has a long whine about corruption involving the State Services Commissioner, the Chief Ombudsman and the Auditor-General. How the hell do people like this get 500 members? They claim they will get 5% to 10% of the vote. Want 10 minutes for their opening and closing addresses. No chance.
- National has been consistent with its 2005 submission (unlike Labour) and have said Labour and National should get the same amount of money despite National’s massive lead in the polls. Doesn’t state membership level but that confident higher than any other party. A minor boob in they refer to 69 electorates instead of 70 which it now is. Says tier two parties for funding should be all the other parliamentary parties except Progressive. Notes the two main parties got 62% of the funding in 2002 but 80% of the votes. Advocates the share going to them should increase to 66% or two thirds. Also wants the share of opening broadcast time (combined for the two majors) to go from 33% to 42% which would be 15 minutes each.
- South Island Party quotes from its own Wikipedia entry in support of its application. Hilarious.
- United Future whines about Gordon Copeland leaving and says he should still be treated as a United Future MP as he was a List MP. Quotes 2002 election results as they prefer to ignore 2005. Incorrectly claims that NZ First got 44% more MPs in 2002 than the Greens despite just 1% more vote. The are right NZ First had 13 MPs to 9 Greens but NZF got 10% to 7% for the Greens. They also speculate that Labour may not have won the last election if they had not been given $200,000 more broadcasting money than National. Says they should get the same. They support all the other parliamentary parties bar Progressive being second tier for funding. Their submission is probably the most comprehensive and well argued and even recommends specific funding levels for all tiers.
The non parliamentary parties appeared on Monday to argue their case. The parliamentary ones appear on Tuesday. If I can spare the time I might pop down and blog them.
I am also going to do some of my own calculations based on the Labour Party submission, but correcting the errors they have made. Will blog these when done.
Related posts:
- Broadcasting Allocations
- And the majors
- The Family Party want more money
- Calculating the broadcasting allocations
April 28th, 2008 at 10:49 pm
“Labour twice claim there are no electorate polls so are misleading the Commission significantly.”
Perhaps they just aren’t aware of this little nicity? Maybe there is no lie? All in all it is a disgraceful smear by DPF and if he had any decency he would apologise to the Labour Party and confine himself to debating issues not smearing those he disagrees with.
Vote:April 28th, 2008 at 10:59 pm
Go roger, keep posting and you will soon be up to 3000
Vote:April 28th, 2008 at 11:04 pm
Phillip John/Roger Nome:
Ah the Kiwiblog village idiot – attempted threadjacking right from the get-go.
Labour’s a political party that’s reputed to poll intensely. To suggest they’re unaware of “this little nicity” [sic - have you been binge-drinking again?] defies belief.
Vote:April 28th, 2008 at 11:12 pm
“Peak Oil Conspiracy” – The person with the stupidest handle in the blogsphere (who are the conspirators supposed to be again?), has a go a thread-jacking with an intemperate outburst involving name-calling (this guy’s supposed to be an “extremely wealthy lawyer”?)…
But eventually gets around to trying to make a point.
“Labour is a political party that’s reputed to poll intensely.”
oh, so you have evidence which proves Labour’s representative(s) at the Electoral Commission are cognisant of Colmar Brunton’s electorate polling? No? So it remains a smear.
Vote:April 28th, 2008 at 11:18 pm
Phillip John/Roger Nome:
Go cry to your mummy.
It is a point. One you know is true and apparently can’t rebut.
By the way, Phillip John, I’m very happy to set my blogosphere record alongside yours. For starters, I don’t use Whaleoil’s avatar on avatar-enabled blogs like Kiwiblogblog. Oh – and when do you plan to apologise to Bryan Edwards and Owen McShane?
Vote:April 28th, 2008 at 11:20 pm
POC – I’m not going to help make this thread about you (much as your ego may like it). Now stick to the thread topic. There’s a good boy.
“One you know is true and apparently can’t rebut”
You’re still yet to prove that the Labour Party representative(s) at the Electoral Commission were cognisant of that fact, and until you do you should cease the smearing no?
Vote:April 28th, 2008 at 11:24 pm
Phillip John/Roger Nome:
Yes, change the subject when the going gets uncomfortable, there’s a good chap. Very poor attempt at the moral highground, I’m afraid. Try posting a decent rebuttal to DPF’s analysis.
Edit: I’m not smearing when I speculate, on entirely plausible grounds, that those drafting Labour’s submission should have been aware of the electorate polls. For a classic example of smearing, reflect on your ill-advised remarks about Bryan Edwards and Owen McShane.
What – are you saying Labour’s stacked that organisation with stooges too?
Vote:April 28th, 2008 at 11:24 pm
And here Roger again shows why he is seen as the most untruthful commenter on Kiwiblog. Labour make a submission full of multiple falsehoods and he thinks I should apologise for pointing it out, instead of even considering that they should get a rocket for not even doing the most basic research on their submission. But in Roger’s world lies are a good thing if they are from parties he agrees with.
The Colmar Brunton electorate poll results are all on the TVNZ website and the Parliamentary Library has them in their data series on the Parliamentary Intranet. Considering the Labour Party President used to run a polling company, I find it incredible that they could be unaware.
Vote:April 28th, 2008 at 11:32 pm
It was a written submission. They have not yet appeared in person. There is no excuse for that level of inaccuracy in a formal written submission to the Electoral Commission.
Vote:April 28th, 2008 at 11:36 pm
POC
“Yes, change the subject when the going gets uncomfortable”
And he’s still trying to thread-jack. Incredible.
DPF:
“Considering the Labour Party President used to run a polling company, I find it incredible that they could be unaware.”
Who’s “they” (the Labour Party representatives)? If “they” involves Mike Williams, I may concede that you have a point, but otherwise it’s still just a smear.
“But in Roger’s world lies are a good thing if they are from parties he agrees with.”
And another smear (and one you seem to make commonly against nearly all the left wing commentators here). I’ve argued many times here that Heather Simpson’s actions around the pledge card issue were dishonest, and of no credit to the Labour Party. But of course you know this and just aim to discredit…
Vote:April 28th, 2008 at 11:41 pm
You just have to laugh at Winston sometimes. He continually ignores his poor polling. Now he claims he has 10000 members and wants to be considered the 3rd party in New Zealand.
I suppose you do have to try and claim every cent you can but your claim has to have some credibility.
I hope they laugh at him and provide him with the same amount as Anderton and Dunne. The other two one man parties.
Vote:April 28th, 2008 at 11:43 pm
POC:
“I’m not smearing when I speculate, on entirely plausible grounds, that those drafting Labour’s submission should have been aware of the electorate polls”
Should have? How could you know? Do you know who made the submission? I actually suspect cock-up rather than conspiracy in this instance. You (and sadly DPF) seem to be of the groundless conspiracy school of thought. A smear based on a conspiracy theory. That’s all it is.
Vote:April 28th, 2008 at 11:45 pm
Labour and Nats even Stevens, because it’s not about what you’ve got but what you do with it. Second tier for the minors, third tier for the no-hopers and comic relief.
Vote:April 28th, 2008 at 11:46 pm
Phillip John/Roger Nome:
Let’s take stock of DPF’s post:
(1) Labour makes a big fuckup in their submission and additionally gives National 100,000 extra votes (combined party and electorate) and mistakenly claim Labour got 39.70% of the combined votes and National 40.89% – that’s two mistakes rolled up into one.
(2) They also claim there are no published polls on the electorate vote but this is untrue as Colmar Brunton poll on this monthly – that’s a third mistake (repeated twice but we won’t double-count).
(3) They claim 54,892 members but this includes “compulsory members” through affiliates and it is unknown how many people have voluntarily joined Labour – 8,000 is the rumoured level – that qualifies as an unqualified misrepresentation.
(4) As they are now low in the polls, they have changed their previous position to claim poll levels should have just the same weighting as number of MPs and votes at last election – that’s a self-serving flip-flop.
Labour’s submission was submitted by Mike Smith, General Secretary, and you’re suggesting he didn’t have help from party insiders who are presumably well-informed about electoral funding matters? Particularly when they’re asserting a funding position by reference to political polls?
How can you see through those Labour good-National bad coloured glasses?
Edit: Phillip John asks: do you know who made the submission – clearly he hasn’t even read Labour’s submission!
Vote:April 28th, 2008 at 11:55 pm
“(1) Labour makes a big fuckup in their submission and additionally gives National 100,000 extra votes (combined party and electorate) and mistakenly claim Labour got 39.70% of the combined votes and National 40.89% – that’s two mistakes rolled up into one.”
Well that just proves the conspiracy then POC! Labour is trying to get more broadcasting funding for National so they can inherit an economy at the beginning of a recession! So National will only have a one-term stay in office. Brilliant!
Obviously with the claim that “there are no published polls on the electorate vote” they’re just trying to fuck around with the commission, have a few kicks before National get in.
Ok, you’ve convinced me of your conspiracy theory now POC, well done, I’m off to bed.
Vote:April 29th, 2008 at 12:01 am
Phillip John/Roger Nome:
We agree on one thing: you’d best be off to bed before you embarrass yourself further!
Now that we’ve seen the back of Phillip John (for the time being), I’d be interested in other people’s suggestions about the appropriate criteria for broadcasting allocations. It can’t be right to point to the prevailing political polls. Party membership may be a fairer approach – but those figures are *cough* politically sensitive. In any event, the quality of “election messages” last time was rather uninspiring – a bit like cold porridge.
Vote:April 29th, 2008 at 12:04 am
Mike Williams is appearing along with Mike Smith who signed the submission.
Vote:April 29th, 2008 at 12:07 am
I see one commonality among a few non parliamentary parties… they don’t seem to know how to use a word processor and/or format a formal letter properly.
Vote:April 29th, 2008 at 12:15 am
South Island Party quotes from its own Wikipedia entry in support of its application. Hilarious.
It’s pretty clearly a different South Island Party. The hilarious bit is that they’re planning the capture the “sizable measure of residual support” left by their predecessor – which they admit was only 2600 votes in 2002. So that would be a sizable fraction of SFA then.
(BTW, if anyone knows anything about the new South Island Party, or any of the other new parties, please contribute to their wikipedia pages. Paid journalists can’t be expected to do their own background research, after all…)
Vote:April 29th, 2008 at 12:31 am
Now now, folks. You’re all being rather hard on Roger Nome. I find it entirely plausible that Labour Party secretary Mike Smith doesn’t bother with a trivial “Nicity” like making sure his correspondence with electoral agencies is factually accurate. I do hope Labour’s candidates will be a tad more careful.
Vote:April 29th, 2008 at 2:15 am
Perhaps Roger Nome is correct perhaps Labour are not aware that there were any electoral polls.
Of course that does beg the question – are they just plain stoopid? Their leader is on record saying that senior officials are easily “confused”.
Vote:April 29th, 2008 at 5:35 am
I just gotta say this: The Labour Party’s arrogance is breath-taking. As the party of government, it has already attempted to spike the opposition’s guns with the EFA. This is after deliberately misleading and disregarding the EC’s recommendations about the Pledge Card, then subsequently rorting the MMP system to retrospectively validate their deliberate ‘misappropriation’ (I think is the trendy term for ‘theft’). The union movement is on-record as saying it will be advocating on that party’s behalf, and the man-power and capital value of their addition is completely overlooked. The main union EPMU which has bailed them out countless times will be producing their own General Secretary, as next Labour Party President (yet, according to both the EPMU and Labour it should be considered an unrelated third party ‘As the EFA intended’ (to quote one minion). They have swung it so that they can spend as much tax-cash as they desire on ‘public service messages’ (ie covert advertising for Labour policy through a protracted mulit-media campaign throughout the election year), and on top of all that, when they do make a submission to the Electoral Commission, they once again, flip-flop, fail to do their sums, misrepresent, and attempt to coerce that body into giving them (yawn – it’s getting repetitive now) more cash than they are entitled to.
Vote:Yet, if you have the audacity to draw attention to this, you get some brainless ‘pop-up troll’ shooting the messenger, as they run point for the Labour Party ‘Ministry of Truth’, in some juvenile attempt to maintain an ethically corrupt system in situ, simply because they have so deluded themselves that they no longer can muster even the imagination to accept that what they are supporting is immoral. Intellectual lightweights. These are the kind of people who would have joined Rohm’s Brownshirts because they thought the uniforms were a bit sexy. Lee – http://monkeyswithtypewriter.blogspot.com/
April 29th, 2008 at 6:56 am
Well said Lee C, very well said.
Vote:April 29th, 2008 at 9:36 am
Everyone knows Labour don’t care how much they get from the broadcasting allocation, because if they’re short of cash, they can just steal it from the Consolidated Fund and put through retrospective legislation once they’re caught.
Vote: