Electoral Law Reform
At the moment, there are two Bills making their way through the Parliamentary Process which effect the way we are representated in Parliament. Both are bad
The first bill is the Electoral (Integrity) Amendment Bill - the Justice and Electoral Select Committee has heard submissions on the bill and will report back to Parliament soon. I think this Bill is very anti-democratic - it makes the presumption that a Party Leader and Party Caucus can second-guess what voters decided.
While I feel sympathetic to the ideals of the bill, how can anyone decide which Members of Parliament have betrayed the voters that put them their in the first place.
The second is the Electoral (Reduction in Numbers of Members of Parliament) Amendment Bill - voted to the Justice and Electoral Select Committtee this week. I'm sure if we held a public competition to name 20 MPs to be thrown out of Parliament as under performing then we would probably get 121 nominations. But we would also get 121 nominations of MPs to keep because of their good, hard work ethic (Well okay, maybe Judith Tizard might struggle to get that nomination.)
When MMP was introduced there were 60 General Seats and 5 Maori Seats. Ten years on, there are now have 62 General Seats and 7 Maori Seats. Next election we will have 71, 72 or even 73 seats - increasing the possibility of overhang seats (affecting proportionality). With the population of New Zealand growing towards 5 million in the next 30 years (an extra 15 electorates) we will also have to face the choice of enlarging electorates to maintain proportionality or increasing the number of MPs back up to 120 in just 5 or 10 years.
Finally, the Bill will make it difficult to get alternate representation. In Wellington, all electorate MPs are aligned to the Government. If the number of list MPs was reduced then it would be harder to get action from an MP to push something against current Government policy - like the Herceptin Petition.
The first bill is the Electoral (Integrity) Amendment Bill - the Justice and Electoral Select Committee has heard submissions on the bill and will report back to Parliament soon. I think this Bill is very anti-democratic - it makes the presumption that a Party Leader and Party Caucus can second-guess what voters decided.
While I feel sympathetic to the ideals of the bill, how can anyone decide which Members of Parliament have betrayed the voters that put them their in the first place.
The second is the Electoral (Reduction in Numbers of Members of Parliament) Amendment Bill - voted to the Justice and Electoral Select Committtee this week. I'm sure if we held a public competition to name 20 MPs to be thrown out of Parliament as under performing then we would probably get 121 nominations. But we would also get 121 nominations of MPs to keep because of their good, hard work ethic (Well okay, maybe Judith Tizard might struggle to get that nomination.)
When MMP was introduced there were 60 General Seats and 5 Maori Seats. Ten years on, there are now have 62 General Seats and 7 Maori Seats. Next election we will have 71, 72 or even 73 seats - increasing the possibility of overhang seats (affecting proportionality). With the population of New Zealand growing towards 5 million in the next 30 years (an extra 15 electorates) we will also have to face the choice of enlarging electorates to maintain proportionality or increasing the number of MPs back up to 120 in just 5 or 10 years.
Finally, the Bill will make it difficult to get alternate representation. In Wellington, all electorate MPs are aligned to the Government. If the number of list MPs was reduced then it would be harder to get action from an MP to push something against current Government policy - like the Herceptin Petition.
posted by Michael at
1:58 PM
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