What’s wrong with the Bill

In this article the Herald looks at the Bill, and highlights the changes made at Select Committee.  The changes make the bill workable, but not desirable.

They have a good summary at the end, I reproduce here:

What’s wrong with the bill

It rewrites election laws in a partisan way.
New Zealand does not have a written constitution. It has a series of acts and conventions which make up our unwritten constitution. Electoral law is part of this, so it is usually changed in a bipartisan process – but not this time.

It expands the regulated spending period to almost a year.
The regulated period on free speech would expand from three months before an election to start on January 1 of election year – almost a third of the election cycle.

It doesn’t apply the same rules fairly.
The bill imposes new anonymous donation disclosure requirements on interest groups – but not political parties.

It could push some interest groups out of politics altogether.
A complicated compliance regime is imposed on interest groups that want to participate in elections. This may put them off participating at all.

It tilts the playing field in favour of the Government.
The tighter restrictions on candidates’ spending, seen in conjunction with the easing of parliamentary spending on communication, give sitting MPs an advantage.

And it gets even worse when you tie this into the changes for parliamentary spending, with parliamentary expenditure entirely exempted by the Bill.