Sunday 9th October, 2011

Q+A interview on electoral system options.

The interview has been transcribed below. The full length video interviews and panel discussions from this morning’s Q+A can be watched on tvnz.co.nz at, http://tvnz.co.nz/q-and-a-news

Q+A , 9-10am Sundays on TV ONE. Repeats at 9.10pm Sundays, 9:05am and 1:05pm Mondays on TVNZ 7

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LIANNE DALZIEL & SIMON BRIDGES interviewed by GUYON ESPINER

GUYON ESPINER
Now it’s time to welcome our guests, Lianne Dalziel in Christchurch , welcome to you.

LIANNE DALZIEL - Christchurch East MP
Good morning.

GUYON And Simon Bridges joins me here in the studio.

SIMON BRIDGES - Tauranga MP
Morning, Guyon.

GUYON Mr Bridges, you want to switch to the Supplementary Member system. Why?

SIMON Because I think, actually, if you look at our history, we’ve lurched from one extreme to the other. So, we’ve had First Past the Post - the sort of uber-macho, majoritarian system - and then we’ve gone from that to MMP absolutely at the other end of the spectrum, where diversity is valued over everything else and that all that matters is the party and the party vote. I think we can actually have something in the middle that’s moderate and balanced and takes, I think, the best from both without necessarily sacrificing really anything.

GUYON Lianne Dalziel, it sounds like a reasonable proposition the way that Mr Bridges puts it.

LIANNE Well, it’s been deliberately couched that way in order to frame the debate as one of being reasonable. In actual fact, the people of New Zealand voted to change our system to one of proportional representation, which is a system which is prevalent throughout Europe . It is the way of the future. It’s not the way of the past, which is where Simon would drag us back. I’m afraid the Supplementary Member system is not a halfway house between First Past the Post and MMP. In fact, I’ve heard it described as First Past the Post in drag or First Past the Post with a winner’s bonus. Uh, with Supplementary Member, you just have First Past the Post seats and a few extras added on.

GUYON Simon Bridges, she’s right there, in respect. It’s not really a proportional system, is it? If the Greens, say, didn’t win any electorate seats, they could win 20% of the entire vote and get six seats - six being a fifth of the 30 list seats. So you could win 20% of the vote and get six seats. Whereas under MMP, you’d have 27 seats on those numbers. It’s not fair, is it?

SIMON I accept that there’s issues in relation to the small parties. But, look, if your concern is diversity, actually, and you look at MMP, what it has done is where has the diversity come in terms of Asian and Maori, Pasifika? It’s come from the big parties off their list. There will still be 30 list MPs coming in under Supplementary Member. There is plenty of room to keep that diversity, which I’m a big fan of, and I think New Zealanders are. And that’s the good part of MMP actually without sacrificing some of the negatives and the things that you also get from MMP, like the tail wagging the dog - and that’s your minor-party point - like, actually I think list MPs and lists that are highly problematic - and we probably haven’t got time to go into that - like actually a cultural change in Parliament where we’ve gone from being a party of representatives to a party of brands and parties. And I think there are deeply negative things there.

GUYON Lianne Dalziel, are there-?

LIANNE Can I-?

GUYON Away you go.

LIANNE The point I wanted to make is that diversity isn’t just the different forms of diversity that Simon’s mentioned. I mean, I do appreciate our Parliament is much more diverse than when I first entered Parliament in 1990. We’ve gone from 21% women to over a third women. You know, so there has been a lot of diversity in that regard. But there’s got to be a contest of political ideas as well. If the last election had been held under Supplementary Member, then the Green Party, instead of getting nine seats in Parliament, would have got only two, and the National Party would have had a 14 seat absolute majority with less than 45% of the vote.

SIMON What you’ve seen under MMP is you’ve seen a shrinking of the minor parties. I’d doubt very much you’d see a change under Supplementary Member. You would still see all of the parties in Parliament today there in Supplementary Member.

LIANNE Simon, you’re talking over my example, which is that in the last election, the Green Party would have only got two seats instead of nine. The National Party would have got 67 seats instead of 58.

SIMON I think one of the things that Lianne is fixated on is who gets into Parliament and the diversity and the parties and so on. Actually, it’s also important to look at what the results are in terms of Parliament and what kind of a Parliament you get.

GUYON Well, let’s put that to Lianne Dalziel. I mean, do you accept, Lianne, that there is an issue with the way that MMP is run and some of the flaws, perhaps, in the system? Do you think that we need to fix it rather than ditch it?

LIANNE Yes, I do, and I think that there are some issues. I mean, I spoke to a Grey Power meeting recently, and I said, ‘Hands up everyone that would like to see some little change to MMP. Something about MMP that you don’t like.’ Almost every person in the room put up their hand. And my answer to them was the only way that you get to review the things about MMP that you don’t like is to vote for MMP in this referendum. Because the law only provides for an independent review of MMP, with the Electoral Commission undertaking that review, if MMP is returned. So that’s why I’m saying to everyone that even if you don’t like some aspects of MMP, you must vote for MMP.

SIMON The review is much more problematic than people say. It raises far more questions.

GUYON One of the questions that people have about MMP - and, in fact, it would be the same with Supplementary Member because there’s 120 MPs under both systems. In Australia , there’s one MP to every 97,000 people. England - one MP to every 95,000 people. New Zealand - one MP to every 36,000 people. Simon Bridges, isn’t the problem-?

LIANNE I think-

GUYON We’ll come to you in a minute, Lianne. Isn’t the problem, as many people see it, that there are simply too many MPs in Parliament?

SIMON Look, I accept that’s an issue, actually. I’ve always thought 99 is a better number than 120. I think there are issues in the length of the term. So there are other electoral issues we can solve. But in terms of the systems, um, I think we have a much better opportunity, a more moderate, balanced system that blends MMP and First Past the Post in Supplementary Member.

GUYON Lianne Dalziel, what are your thoughts about the numbers of MPs?

LIANNE Well, I think that 120 is a good number in the sense that we don’t have an upper house. And I think that this is a point that others don’t take into account when they talk about the number of MPs in Australia , for example. They don’t count all the state governments, and they certainly don’t count all the upper houses. If you don’t have an upper house, you’ve got to have some checks and balances. We saw two very clear examples in the last couple of weeks of Parliament where the rule of law would have been breached by a government that had an absolute majority. The fact that the Opposition could work with one of the government’s support parties in order to get changes to the law actually shows how MMP can work, and you would not get that under Supplementary Member.

GUYON Isn’t she right, Simon Bridges? I mean, when Muldoon was the leader of the National Party and the Prime Minister, he used to be described as, you know, the most powerful democratic leader in the world because in New Zealand , if you have a majority, there’s nothing you can’t do.

SIMON Well, Muldoon’s an extreme example. But what he had under First Past the Post and he would have under Supplementary Member to a much greater extent than under MMP, is he would have individual MPs going down there with a mandate. The culture of MMP is all about party and party brand, not internal dissent. In actual fact, internal dissent within parties under MMP is fatal. You cannot have it. So, actually, I would argue that the examples Lianne’s talking about, actually, if you had a stronger system of electorate MPs going down representing their communities, you have a much better of chance of getting that kind of dialogue and debate.

LIANNE (LAUGHS) Simon, come on.

SIMON At the moment, it’s party to party.

LIANNE Simon can’t run that argument.

SIMON Yes, I can.

LIANNE He knows perfectly well that under First Past the Post, you have safe Labour seats, safe National seats and a few marginal seats, which means that the only people that ever decided the results of the election in the past were people who lived in the seat of Eden, the people who lived in the two Hamilton seats, the people who lived in the odd seat around the country that was a marginal seat.

SIMON Disagree.

LIANNE We used to have people as marginal seats organisers for the main political parties because they knew that was where the elections were won or lost.

GUYON Let’s push this forward just briefly to finish this. Uh, a prediction - what do you think is going to happen in the referendum?

SIMON There’s absolutely no question that the soft-left consensus means that the vote-for-change lobby is absolutely the underdog. I think at the moment, uh, we’re looking at MMP. I’d like to see some debate on this, frankly, because we haven’t seen any.

GUYON Well, we’re having one now. Final word with you, Lianne Dalziel. Do you think MMP is going to come home on the night?

LIANNE I think that the people will see through the campaign that’s being run against MMP. They will want to make some changes to MMP.

SIMON It’s hardly a campaign.

LIANNE They’ll vote to retain to MMP and then have the Electoral Commission do an independent review.

GUYON Ok. Better leave it there.

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