In the lead up to last year’s referendum on our voting system, New Zealanders
were re-assured that if MMP was preferred, the system would be reviewed and
improved. This promise is likely to have persuaded many people who might
otherwise have voted for change, to vote for MMP.
A key issue of concern is that all MMP governments are coalitions.
This results in broken promises, backroom deals, instability, and unpredictable
governance. The lower the party vote threshold, the more the door is opened for
radical forces to achieve parliamentary representation and have a direct
influence on political decisions - at a cost to the greater good of the
country.
The Electoral Commission has completed its MMP review and is about to make a
final recommendation to government. With respect to the present five percent
party vote threshold, their draft report states, “the
Commission’s sense is that 5% is too high and that 3% is the lowest end of an
acceptable range. We suggest 4% is preferable… It is in line with comparable democracies
such as Norway and Sweden.”
The Electoral Commission didn’t need to look at outcomes from
overseas jurisdictions to tell us what the impact of lowering the party vote
threshold will be on New Zealand – such comparisons are largely irrelevant as their
outcomes are set within their own political environments. Each political
environment is unique and after six MMP elections, we can call on our own
experience to see the effect MMP has had on New Zealand politics. We know with
absolute certainty that here in New Zealand lowering the party vote threshold would
enable more extreme minority interest groups to dictate to the larger “broad
church” parties like National and Labour – in the way that the Maori and Green
parties have.
We clearly saw the tail wagging the dog in 2007 when the
resignation of Labour MP Philip Field from the Government of the day forced
then Prime Minister Helen Clark to call on the Green Party for coalition
support. The “price” of that deal was the very unpopular anti-smacking law.
The tail is also wagging the dog on John Key’s watch. The “price”
of National’s 2008 coalition deal with the Maori Party (the parliamentary arm
of the Maori sovereignty movement), which won only 2.4 percent of the party
vote at that election, was the secret
signing up of New Zealand to the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of
Indigenous Peoples (an agreement deemed so radical that former Prime Minister
Helen Clark refused to sign), and the
repeal of public ownership of New Zealand’s foreshore and seabed to open it up
to tribal claims.
More concessions were gained in the 2011 coalition deal with National when the
Maori Party negotiated a hand picked panel to review New Zealand’s
constitutional arrangements - no doubt to recommend the Treaty of Waitangi be given sovereign
status . Let’s not forget that the Maori Party only achieved 1.4 percent of the
party vote – it does not even represent a majority of Maori!
Advocates of a lower party vote threshold claim that it would
encourage wider representation, which of course it would. But representation is
always a matter of degree. New Zealand is not short of political choices at
election time. In 2005, there were a total of 19 parties to chose from: 99 MP
Party, ACT New Zealand, Alliance, Aotearoa Legalise Cannabis Party, Christian
Heritage Party, Democrats for Social Credit, Destiny New Zealand, Direct
Democracy Party, Green Party, J. Anderton’s Progressive, Labour Party,
Libertarianz, Maori Party, National Party, New Zealand Family Rights Protection
Party, New Zealand First Party, OneNZ Party, the Republic of New Zealand Party,
United Future.
By 2008 some of the smaller parties had dropped out but some new
ones had emerged including the Family Party, the Kiwi Party, the New Zealand
Pacific Party, RAM – Residents Action Movement, the Bill and Ben Party, and the
Workers Party, to again give voters a choice of 19 parties.
In 2011, when National was strongly contesting a second term, the
fact that only 13 parties challenged the election reflects a similar pattern in
2002 when Labour was riding high, when only 14 parties stood.
Many ardent MMP supporters would like to see a free-for-all with
no threshold at all for parliamentary representation. In such a situation, 2008
could have resulted in the Aotearoa Legalise Cannabis Party, the Kiwi Party,
and the Bill and Ben Party holding the balance of power!
As we argued in our submission to the Electoral Commission,
without a public safeguard to curb the excessive legislative power that minor
coalition parties can exert under MMP – such as a citizens’ right of veto over
new legislation – the risk of lowering the party vote and giving fringe and
excentric or radical minorities more influence than they already have is too
great. To prosper New Zealand needs a strong and cohesive government that acts
in the best interests of the wider community, not the forever vocal fringe
elements of it.
Dr Muriel
Newman is a former MP who runs the New Zealand Centre for Political Research public
policy think tank at www.nzcpr.com. This article was first published in the Herald.
6 comments:
"(MMP) results in broken promises, backroom deals, instability, and unpredictable governance" - same as FPP.
A much lower threshold would be preferable - 1%? MMP was designed to better reflect the opinion of the nation, and so far it has done just that. Whether or not you personally like the make-up of that nation or its Parliament is of little consequence.
1 member parties will have only as much influence as the larger parties are prepared to give them.
Under FPP, losing one MP would have meant a general election, thus giving maverick MP's an element of "power". Same issue s the 2007 situation you refer to.
The "secret signing up" to the Declaration could just as easily have happened under FPP. The real question is, Where were the opposition parties?
Dump mmp - bring back fpp
The arguments for MMP regularly assume that the old system did not represent minority interests.
That is simply not so. Both main parties tried to appeal to as many sections of the electorate as possible -- the old, the young, employers and employees, Paheka and Maori, etc. In fact, one of the regular attacks on the system was that "There's no difference between the parties" - that is, "They both appeal to all" (and thereby represent all).
That's an exaggeration, of course, but it has an important truth.
Actually the minority interests are often overrepresented in a two party duoploy as both try to outdo each other in wooing a minority vote. FPP always resulted in the ruling party leaning to the political direction of the strongest third party. So Social Credit made for a left leaning National government and Bob Jones made for a right leaning Labour government. I think people wold not vote for Bill and Ben etc if they thought that they had a chance of being elected. No threshold at least gets rid of tactical voting such as Epsom. Also many small parties are not rising because the wasted vote principle means you vote for who you hate least rather than those who really reflect your views because the media are always threatening that your vote will be wasted. I would prefer a system of transferable vote where you can give the newface a vote and if he doesn't make it at least your second choice will not allow your vote to be wasted. The concept of two good candidates splitting the vote and allowing a candidate to win that is opposed by most of the electorate is what people really hated about FFP and we still have that in MMP electorates.
Isn't there one simple principle to decide the threshold for the party vote ? It should be 10% because, if you can't convince 1 in 10 people to vote for your party's policies then your party doesn't deserve to be in Parliament.
All parties need to have convincing policies to succeed and to get into parliament.
Just a random thought on this. I dislike the impact of bribing the minor parties leading to influence well beyond their result. I do wonder though whether the arguements for or against the threshold would actually have the impact we think. With only a few minor parties to choose from to form a coalition, does the scarcity actually give them more power than of there was a larger number of of 1 member parties? For example, if National had ten, 1 member parties to choose from, the impact of the five 'chosen' would be less than the Maori Party now.
Post a Comment
Thanks for engaging in the debate!
Because this is a public forum, we will only publish comments that are respectful and do NOT contain links to other sites. We appreciate your cooperation.