National to officially ditch the EFA

National announced yesterday that they are going to ditch the anti-free speech Electoral Finance Act which thousands of Kiwis protested over, including yours truly:

National Party Deputy Leader Bill English says all New Zealanders with an interest in free speech will welcome John Key's confirmation today that a National-led Government will repeal the oppressive Electoral Finance Act.

"This is a self-serving law, passed in haste, and designed to silence Labour's critics in election year.  National will end the farce."

Mr English is commenting after the release of the National Party's electoral law policy was released today. 

"The Electoral Commission and the Law Society have expressed serious reservations about the impact of the EFA on free speech and freedom of expression.  Labour has belittled these concerns.

"The Electoral Finance Act has been a total shambles and those parties who supported it are now all regretting they did so.  We do hope they embrace the chance to fix it."

National will move to repeal the Electoral Finance Act 2007 immediately after the election, but retain the provisions around the transparency of donations.

The old sections from the Electoral Act 1993 will be reinstated, and the Electoral Finance Act sections relating to donations, will be inserted into the Electoral Act 1993.

"National concluded long ago that there needed to be more transparency around donations.  We were genuinely surprised when Labour failed to put in any controls around donations when the law was initially drafted.

"We will retain those provisions from the EFA, and reform electoral law through a process that involves all parliamentary parties and the public in a fair and timely manner.

"When electoral watchdogs say they can't understand the rules, when the law society says the Act is stifling free speech, when MPs have no clear steer on what is an election advertisement – that is banana republic time.  This law should never have been passed and will be repealed by National."

A good clear policy for a confused badly drafted law.

Related Political Animal reading

Electoral Finance Act March Mar 9, 2008
Electoral Finance Bill Vote
NZ losses democratic freedom
Mike Moore turns the knife
List of MPs who voted for Act
Cartoon and comment
Auckland Protest against EFB
The purpose of the Bill is clear

To view National's electoral law summary visit: http://national.org.nz/files/2008/electoral_law.pdf

c Political Animal 2008

Labour's election bribe could be a whopper

I have written in the past about the fact that Labour are going to try and buy the election, and they will. They did it in 2005 and they will do it in 2008.

The only thing now is since Labour are so far behind National in the polls and have been consistently for well over a year, and there is an overwhelming feeling for change in the country, that vote buy is going to have to pretty bloody big.

Considering Cullen has mismanaged us into a big debt position through 9 years of wasteful spending, and there have been mutterings lately of cutbacks in cash election promises from National and Labour, one rumour that is going around-thanks Matthew Hooten for the tip off- and sounds plausible is writing off all student debt.

When I heard that of course I felt my bile forming into a future cancer because I paid off the frigging loan in full ten years ago, and so I should, I should have had to pay something for my education.

Writing off the billions owed in loans to the taxpayer of course its a nutso idea, but it would probably be a matter of an "accounting charge" on the balance sheet with no effect of the country's cash deficit, so acceptable to Cullen and politically acceptable for allot of the left voters. 

Having said that, if such an inherently silly idea is proposed by Labour there could be a backlash from people like me who have already paid their loans off and other taxpayers who think Uni students are elitist oiks whose wealthy parents should pay for their own education.

c Political Animal 2008

POLL: TV3 TNS Poll, 28 Septr 2008

The latest TV 3 poll out today continues the year long trend of a very healthy lead for the National Party:

(Angus Reid Global Monitor) - The governing Labour party will likely lose its re-election bid in next month’s legislative ballot, according to a poll by TNS released by TV3. 36 per cent of respondents would vote for Labour in the next election to the House of Representatives, while 49 per cent would support the opposition National party.

The Greens are third with five per cent, followed by New Zealand First with three per cent, and the Maori Party with two per cent.

Labour leader Helen Clark has acted as New Zealand’s prime minister since December 1999. In November 2006, Don Brash—who had served as National’s leader since October 2003—announced his resignation and was substituted by finance spokesman John Key. 

Continued

Labour will have to pull the biggest bribe in New Zealand political history to get the electorate to vote for them.

c Political Animal 2008

Helen Clark gives good head

A lovely little piece from Ana Samway's Sideswipe, indicating that people would rather have their dogs chew the head off Helen Clark than they would themselves vote for her:

Pete Couchman from Masterpets sheds some light on the popularity of the Helen Clark Election '08 dog toy. "The fact that Helen is selling out may have little to do with popularity. Masterpets' 'Dog-tucker' poll is a reverse poll, where it pays not to be ahead. The old saying of being 'fed to the dogs' is rather poignant when being chewed by dogs up and down the country ... "

The head girl is ahead in the popularity stakes for getting her head-toy head chewed off by 59% of New Zealand's mongrel owners-this is on top of Winston Peters clearly doing the same.

The 59% for Helen Clark's head rating mirrors National's voter support in the Political Animal Blog poll and I am picking the Masterpet poll to be more accurate than some of our official ones, even though there is overwhelming support for the National Party in the majority of them as well.

c Political Animal 2008