Have Labour and Greens broken the CIR Act?

Whale blogs:

Back in March last year David Farrar asked if the Greens, Labour and the Unions might break the Citizens Initiated Referendum .

On top of that leaked documents showed that they intended to work together on the referendum, utilising taxpayer funds to do so.

Those documents clearly show it was a co-ordinated campaign working together.

S42 of the Citizens Initiated Referenda Act states:

Every person commits an offence and is liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding $20,000 who, either alone or in combination with others knowingly spends, on published or broadcast in relation to an indicative  , more than $50,000

And the election returns show:

  • Service and Food Workers Union – $26,269
  • Labour party – $45,382.95 
  • Public Service Association – $3987.18
  • The Green party  – $39,541.49
  • The NZ Council of Trade Unions – $523.20
  • – $23,356.08
  • The NZEI – $547
  • NZ Nurses Organisation – $556

Whale points out:

Total Spend  by Unions, Labour and the Greens is $140,162.90

Labour and the Greens by themselves breach the act, with combined spending of $84,924.44

Will be very interesting to see what the result of a complaint would be.

Comments (35)

Login to comment or vote

Add a Comment