Climate change: the stakes in Australia

Australian Labor Party Leader Kevin Rudd has outlined his first acts in government if he wins this weekend's election and becomes Prime Minster. Top of his list? Ratifying Kyoto. It's a costless decision domestically, as Australia is meting its generous Kyoto target and will have credits to sell, while a growing number of Australians are becoming concerned after years of crippling drought and water shortages. But it will also have a significant effect internationally, in that Australian ratification would leave the USA totally isolated in post-Kyoto negotiations, with no allies at all in the denialist camp. This is unlikely to make any change to George Bush's position - but it will make it that much easier for his successor to reverse it and rejoin the international community on climate change. And that seems to be a good reason to hope for an ALP victory at the weekend.

(Oh, and withdrawing from Iraq was number five on the list. So an ALP victory will mean america will be without allies on that front as well).

Tracy Watkins gets it

For a while I've been talking about how MMP means the rules have changed, and pointing out that once you consider possible coalitions, National may be a lot further from government than they look, despite fairly large leads in the polls. Now, it seems that the Dominion-Post's Tracy Watkins has noticed as well. In her column on Monday, she pointed out that MMP throws a spanner in National's works, and that Labour, rather than National, would be celebratingthe latest poll:

On the surface of course the poll is hardly bad news for National. But – once the vagaries of MMP are thrown into the mix – that is not the same as good news.

Sure, National's support has dropped – but at 50-odd per cent, which is where National was polling in September, there was always likely to be some slippage. And a result of 45 per cent on election night would put the Treasury benches within National's reach. But – and this is where the worry beads get pulled out – not close enough to be assured of crossing the line. Based on Saturday's poll results, National would hold 57 seats and could muster another two with the help of its natural allies, ACT and UnitedFuture. Close – but not close enough to break out the cigars.

Labour, in the other camp, would hold just 51 seats, but can call on its natural allies the Greens and the Progressives, taking it to 58 seats.

Under this scenario, the Maori Party is kingmaker. And if events of the past few weeks have proved anything, it is that they remainan uncomfortable fit with either of the major parties. Its response to the police terror raids put it beyond the outer fringes of where most of Labour and National's mainstream supporters stand.

This is basically the same result we've seen for a while: the Maori Party will choose our next government. And they'll be even more likely to if they win six rather than four of the Maori seats. Unfortunately this point is usually left out of what passes for poll analysis, which tends to have a shallow focus on the two-party horse race, despite the fact that FPP has been dead for 12 years.

The other refreshing thing about Watkins' column is that she addresses the other aspect of MMP: it can bring together strange bedfellows. While I think the Maori Party is more likely to go left than right, it's not a given. So what happens if they end up supporting National? According to Watkins, it means the latter's agenda would be scuppered from the beginning. While they would have a majority on confidence and supply, they would have a difficult time getting one on legislation in a Parliament which was predominantly left-leaning. As a result, they'd either have to pursue a far more centrist path, or rely on using confidence votes to push things through. And the latter would likely swiftly upset the Maori party, resulting in a midterm change of government. And the same would go for the Greens.

The result is that it's basically all-or-nothing for National. Unlike Labour, they can't govern or deliver on their promises if forced into a coalition which crosses the political centreline. Which makes you understand why so many of them long for the days of FPP...

Election funding: scaremongering

Having failed to defeat the Electoral Finance Bill at select committee, National has now resorted to scaremongering about it, with Deputy Leader Bill English warning that "ordinary people" will need to watch what they say to avoid falling foul of the law, and that they should seek legal advice "to make sure they don't break the law simply by voicing their opinion."

Bullshit.

As far as ordinary people are concerned, the EFB imposes no restrictions that do not already exist in law, and actually provides clarification in the area of blogging. It does not stop you from voicing your opinion on a political candidate or party. It does not stop you from distributing a small number of flyers or taking out an ad in a community newspaper, though you will have to disclose your name and address, just as you must under existing law. And it certainly does not stop you from e.g. starting a blog and venting your opinions on the internet. Quite the contrary, in fact, as personal, non-commercial blogs (such as this one) are specifically excluded from the definition of "electoral advertisement", and therefore are exempt even from disclosure.

In short, "ordinary people" have nothing to fear from the Electoral Finance Bill. The only people it affects are those who want to spend tens of thousands of dollars on parallel campaigns and helping parties to circumvent their spending limits. And those aren't "ordinary people" at all.

Election funding: the HRC on the report

The Justice and Electoral Committee's report [PDF] on the Electoral Finance Bill praised the Human Rights Commission's input and said that the HRC "believed the changes enhanced freedom of expression and upheld the right to participate in electoral processes". So what do they really think? Fortunately, they've since put out a statement:

Several significant changes to the Electoral Finance Bill go some way to addressing the Human Rights Commission’s concerns about freedom of expression and citizen’s rights to participate.

“We’re pleased to see the very wide definition of election advertisement has been dropped which allows outside groups to participate in issues-related advocacy,” says Human Rights Commission, EEO Commissioner Dr Judy McGregor.

“We also welcome the acknowledgement of younger people’s rights to participate and the end to age discrimination against those under 18 years in electoral processes.”

The Commission also welcomes the proposed amendment that removes the need for a statutory declaration which was an unnecessary compliance burden.

And on the negative side, the HRC thought the regulated period was still too long, and that third-party spending limits should have been higher. These changes of course would have run directly counter to the purpose of the bill, which was to prevent the circumvention of spending limits through parallel campaigns and early spending. The only interpretation is that they think that these are not serious problems in New Zealand. I humbly suggest they read The Hollow Men, look at the National's 2005 campaign, and think again.

They also think that the changes should have gone back to the public for further consultation - something which, to be blunt, is not part of normal Parliamentary procedure, and for which there is no time anyway. If the bill is to come into force on January 1 2008 - something vital to achieving its purpose - it must be passed before the end of the year. A delay would see us facing another election in which shadowy campaigns funded by big money attempted to subvert the will of the electorate. And that is something we should not allow to happen. The right to free and fair elections is a human right, just as freedom of speech is - but on this occasion, it seems the HRC has got the balance wrong.

Election funding: reported back

The Justice and Electoral committee has finally reported back [PDF] on the Electoral Finance Bill, and recommended that it be passed. However, the bill has been substantially amended, and generally in a positive way. The two most important changes - and the ones that completely take the ground out from under those arguing against the bill - are the removal of clause 5 (1) (a) (iii) (the "taking a position" clause) from the definition of electoral advertising, and the removal of the onerous statutory declaration system for third parties. Combined with an increase in third-party spending limits and some tweaks to ensure that advocacy NGOs ordinary business of representing their member's interests is not captured by the bill, the upshot is a bill which has no effect whatsoever on the freedom of spech of ordinary people or NGOs, while properly restricting the ability of the rich to circumvent party spending limits with parallel campaigns and so buy elections.

Other positive changes include applying the "transmitter" regime to candidate and party donations (effectively outlawing laundering except by the Electoral Commission), clarifying the exemptions to ensure the media are not inadvertantly captured, removing the discriminatory provisions from the third-party requirements, and doubling the penalty for a corrupt practice from one to two years imprisonment. They also clarify the situation around anonymous donations to make it clear that financial agents can not be willfully blind to the source of a donation (as they can be at present).

The down side is primarily around disclosure limits. Quite apart from the ugly compromise of having the Electoral Commission launder anonymous donations, there has been no reduction in the disclosure threshold for parties, there is still no requirement for pre-election disclosure (meaning we have no idea who is buying our politicians until after the fact), and the threshold for third parties has been increased from $500 to $5000. I would have by far preferred a simple $1,000 limit for everyone, under the same rules originally applied to third parties: either you disclose the identity of the donor, or forfeit the money. Unfortunately, this still protects the place of secret money in election campaigns, something a democratic society simply should not tolerate.

Overall, the bill has been substantially improved, and I seem to have got most of the changes I requested in my submission. The Coalition for Open Government seems happy too. And judging from the wailing and gnashing of teeth over on the right, it looks like the bill will have exactly the desired effect: limiting the pernicious influence of money over our elections, and ensuring that each of us has an equal political voice. And that is something the right in New Zealand are deeply opposed to.

Another tool for democracy

NZ Referendums is a site aimed at encouraging use of the Citizens Initiated Referenda Act 1993. The Act is theoretically a powerful tool for letting politicians know what we think, but a high threshold (you need the signatures of 10% of eligible voters, or around 200,000 people) and hostility from MPs has seen only three referenda voted on since it was passed. The website aims to change that by providing a platform for people to float broad ideas for a topic and gain an idea of support, hash out the exact wording in preperation for a formal referendum proposal, and then use the network of supporters to collect signatures.

Given the threshold involved, I'm not sure that this will really be an effective tool (OTOH, it's a tool, which is a lot better than we have at the moment). However, it strikes me that such a site would be perfect for organising petitions to Parliament. These have similar co-ordination issues to referenda, but without the intimidating threshold, and are IMHO a much more useful method of feedback. Hopefully the site will be upgraded to allow this - or else I suppose someone else could always set one up...

(Hat tip: Holden Republic)

Climate change: working around Bush

US President George Bush is well-known for his opposition to serious action on climate change. Domestically, he has refused to ratify Kyoto, while internationally he has worked to undermine it (chiefly by trying to set up rival agreements which promise - and therefore will deliver - nothing). However, the US is a federal system, and so state governments have taken the lead where the federal government will not. In 2003, north-eastern states formed the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative to establish a joint "cap and trade" scheme to limit their emissions. Earlier in the year, western states followed suit with the Western Regional Climate Action Initiative. And just last week, mid-western states set up their own scheme, the Midwestern Greenhouse Gas Reduction Accord. The membership of these emissions trading and reduction schemes is shown in the map below:

(Map of greenhouse gas agreement membership in the US. RGGI members in blue (observers in light blue), WCI in green (observers in light green), and MGA in red).

While the states have formed three seperate schemes, their markets will be linked to each other and to the global market by the Climate Registry and the International Carbon Action Partnership. So it is effectively one big emissions trading scheme covering most of the US. In other words, most of the US is now effectively "in" Kyoto and working to reduce their emissions - despite Bush's opposition.

We don't want tax cuts

That's the finding of a Fairfax poll released today. Asked the obvious question - tax cuts or public services? - people overwhelmingly chose the latter:

As for which public services people would prefer, the answer is obvious: health and education. While National likes to talk about "low quality" spending in these areas and question whether spending more money will bring any benefit, when people are facing long waiting lists because the government will not fund enough operations, and have to wait at A&E because of capacity constraints caused by underfunding, that's a difficult case to make. It's also difficult to argue when schools are having to charge parents hundreds of dollars a year in "voluntary" donations for services they should be providing for free. And of course we have the example of the re-universalisation of primary healthcare to show how spending more money on health can make a real difference to people's lives.

Another interesting finding is that we don't want privatisation either, even the "partial selldown" National offers - 56% (including 49% of National voters) oppose any further asset sales.

This is the real choice we face in next years election: tax cuts for the rich and looting the state, or decent, well-funded public services which benefit everybody. And this poll is the reason why National really doesn't want to talk about it, but instead adopts tactics of lies, obfuscation, and spin.

Murdered

Brian Raymond Peters, in the company of fellow journalists Gary James Cunningham, Malcolm Harvie Rennie, Gregory John Shackleton and Anthony John Stewart, collectively known as “the Balibo Five”, died at Balibo in Timor- Leste on 16 October 1975 from wounds sustained when he was shot and/or stabbed deliberately, and not in the heat of battle, by members of the Indonesian Special Forces, including Christoforus da Silva and Captain Yunus Yosfiah on the orders of Captain Yosfiah, to prevent him from revealing that Indonesian Special Forces had participated in the attack on Balibo.

That's the finding of a coroner's report [DOC] into the deaths of the Balibao Five, just released this afternoon. In other words, it was murder, and a war crime. The question now is whether the Australian government will seek to extradite and prosecute those responsible, or whether they will continue their policy of looking the other way on Indonesian human rights abuses and extend it to abuses committed against their own citizens.

As the Indonesian Human Rights Committee point out, it's a question also faced by New Zealand, as one of those killed - Gary Cunningham - was a New Zealander. We have a case, we have a clear law (the Geneva Conventions Act 1958) under which the offence can be prosecuted, which provides for extraterritorial jurisdiction for such offences. The government should put its money where its mouth is on human rights, and use it.

Election funding: an ugly compromise

A couple of weeks ago, the Dominion-Post reported that the government would be correcting its biggest blunder in the Electoral Finance Bill, and would be moving to end the practice of anonymous and laundered donations. But if the report in today's Herald is correct, their "solution" will leave a bitter taste in many people's mouths. Rather than cracking down on anonymous donations and imposing proper disclosure of everything so that we will know who is trying to buy our politicians, the select committee has instead tried to go halfway. So, trusts and bagmen will be required to declare the source of the money they are passing on, and there will be a new declaration threshold of $1,000, above which the identity of the donor must be disclosed - all of which looks pretty good. But parties will still be able to receive large anonymous donations, provided they are funnelled through the Electoral Commission. The amount will be capped at $240,000 per party, but the net effect will be the same: we will still have dirty money in our political system, only rather than being laundered by National's corrupt network of trusts, it will be done by the official election watchdog instead.

There's no question that this is an improvement on the current system, where there are no limits on how much secret cash parties can receive while conspiring to keep the identities of the donors (and the influence they gain over policy as a result) out of the public eye, but its a very ugly compromise. And again, it is light years from Labour's early rhetoric, in which they promised to end laundering and impose a declaration threshold of $250. Once again, Labour's self-interest has won out over principle, cloaked in sophistry about how dirty money is harmless if the donations are "truly" anonymous - as if we could ever trust them on such an issue.

I'm with DPF in thinking that the Greens should put their money where their mouth is on this issue, and put up an amendment at the committee stage to kill this system of government laundering and force National and Labour to vote on disclosure. But its also worth remembering that National claims that they too oppose anonymous and laundered donations (despite being their chief beneficiary). It's time we called them on it. National can adopt a constructive approach by putting up amendments and daring the government to vote against its own base by opposing them, or it can continue to display its bad faith through mindless opposition in service of their donors. It will be interesting to see which they choose...

90 lashes

That's the penalty in Saudi Arabia for a women being in the car of an unrelated man. And apparently it more than doubles if they rape you.

This is simply monstrous. And yet these are America's "progressive" allies in the Gulf. If that's "progressive", I'd hate to see what regressive countries do.

"Not unduly harsh"

That's the opinion of Britain's Law Lords on the government's practice of deporting Darfuris back to face torture, harassment, and genocide in Sudan. Which makes you wonder: what would they consider "unduly harsh"? And if what is going on in Sudan doesn't constitute a valid fear of persecution under the Refugee Convention, what possibly could?

Grossly improper

For well over a century now, New Zealand has been blessed with a professional, politically neutral public service, which faithfully serves the government of the day regardless of their ideological bent. A key underpinning of this has been the independence of the public service in employment decisions. Public servants are hired and fired not by Ministers, but by Departmental Chief Executives, a move designed to ensure appointment on merit and prevent cronyism, patronage, and political retaliation. But recently, this has come under threat. First, there was the sacking of Madeleine Setchell on the basis of her partner's political views - an act found to have been simply wrong by a subsequent investigation by the State Services Commission. And now it seems it has a sequel, in the hiring of Clare Curran. Unlike some, I am not interested in Curran's political views - such conflicts of interest are routinely managed within the public service, and pose no real problem. Instead, the problem is how she was hired: her name was originally floated by the acting Minister:

Mr Parker told reporters he had suggested Ms Curran's name to the ministry during a discussion on what communications help it needed.

He had suggested her because "I knew her to be very able in these areas".

Mr Parker said he had known Ms Curran long before she joined the Labour Party through her work with her company Insight Communications.

"I didn't recommend who they should hire and I wouldn't do that," he said.

But regardless of how it was phrased, this is still grossly improper behaviour from a Minister. Chief Executives have a statutory duty to act independently in employment matters, and Ministers should respect this. While the contract was put out to tender, and Curran was appointed on merit, suggesting a specific individual for a position could be seen as an attempt to influence the employment process, and this should be avoided. It is, bluntly, simply not a Minister's business who works for "their" department, and they should keep the hell out of it.

Death penalty moratorium update

Last month, New Zealand joined a coalition of progressive nations in backing a UN General Assembly resolution [PDF] calling for a global moratorium on the death penalty. Currently, the resolution is before the UN Third Committee, where various pro-death penalty countries led by Singapore are attempting to scupper it. But while it has 85 co-sponsors (out of a total UN membership of 192), the voting has been close, with 80-odd countries in favour vs about 70 against, with a further 42 countries either abstaining or not showing up to vote. If it survives, then it will face a final vote in the General Assembly in mid-December.

Election funding: it's today

According to the business statement just read out in the House, they'll be doing the second reading of the Electoral Finance Bill on Thursday. Which means the select committee report should be coming out sometime today.

I'll be watching the select committee page closely, and have an analysis as soon as possible after it hits the web.

Correction: Corrected misheard day.

Update: Or maybe not. Maybe it will be tomorrow, or it could be as late as 11:30 on Monday. I'm not sure I can cope with the tension...

Charged

Back in August, Polish soldiers killed six civilians during a firefight with insurgents in eastern Afghanistan. Now seven Polish soldiers have been charged with war crimes over the incident:

Poland's chief military prosecutor said the troops had not come under attack from insurgents as previously thought.

The prosecutor said they violated international law when they opened fire on the village. Women and children were among the dead.

Rather than an accident or "collatoral damage", it seems this was a premeditated revenge attack on the civilian population in retaliation for an incident earlier in the day. That is not legal, it is not moral, and those involved should be going to jail.

Election funding: the HRC changes its mind

Opponents of the Electoral Finance Bill have made a lot of noise about the Human Rights Commission's submission [PDF] on the bill, which called the bill "a dramatic assault" on freedom of expression and called for it to be radically changed. But according to a story in yesterday's Independent (offline), it seems the HRC has changed its mind:

The Human Rights Commission has altered its view after the Justice and Electoral select committee's handling of the controversial Electoral Finance Bill, according to Green Party co- leader Russel Norman.

[...]

Norman said he understood the commission has written again to the committee. In the second letter the commission says it has been impressed that the select committee has gone a long way towards alleviating its concerns in its redrafting of the legislation, Norman said.

This prospect was always apparent, given that the HRC's conclusion was based on the definition of electoral advertising, the high regulatory burden on (small) third parties, and the bill's discrimination against children and young people. But these flaws were widely pointed out, even by the bills' supporters, and so were highly likely to be changed. And now that they have been, the EFB's opponents will have to come clean about the fact that they're not really defending democracy or freedom of expression, but rather the "right" of the rich to try and buy themselves power.

BZP bill back

The Health Committee has reported back [PDF] on the Misuse of Drugs (Classification of BZP) Amendment Bill, and recommended that it be passed unamended. I'm appalled, but not surprised. Reading their report, the committee has simply ignored the empirical evidence of relative harmlessness, and not even considered how to resolve the serious inconsistency with the BORA [PDF] raised by the Attorney-General (which could have been fixed with a very simple amendment), instead handwaving it away with the promise of a future review. So, it's prohibition for prohibition's sake, and bugger consistency, evidence, or fundamental human rights.

We're paying him for this?

It's fairly well-known that National's Bob Clarkson doesn't exactly like being an MP. I thought however that despite that, he'd at least bother to turn up and do his job. But apparently not:

According to the wonderful TheyWorkForYou website these five quotes have been Bob Clarkson’s scintillating and sum contribution to parliamentary debate since 21 August:

• (17 Oct 2007) Interjection : “Bureaucratic!”
• (10 Oct 2007) Interjection : “Tell us the end of the story.”
• (19 Sep 2007) Interjection : “Force?”
• (22 Aug 2007) Interjection : “A bit like the Labour Government.”
• (21 Aug 2007) Interjection : “Yes, I did, actually.”

That's 19 words in 21 sitting days - less than one word a day. And for that, we pay him $110,000 / year?

Though, to be fair, Clarkson did get to ask a question today - but as Toad points out, this is his second for the year. And its not like he's been doing much else - he's issued only three press releases. Again, why are we paying this man?

A proportionate response?

From the Herald: Hikoi marches on police commissioner:

Protesters from the Tuhoe Hikoi have marched up Molesworth St to Police Commissioner Howard Broad's office.

They were met by a four-deep police cordon armed with batons.

Because that's really the way to respond to public protest: an overwhelming show of force with an explicit threat of violence. Would they have done the same if the protestors were pakeha? And how many actual criminals would those police have been caching if they weren't acting as a personal bodyguard to the police commissioner?

It's also worth noting that while the police thought the protestors justified this response when outside their boss's office, they didn't think it justified such a response when it was at Parliament (which represents the people they actually work for). But I guess its just another example of the police putting a high value on "protecting their own", and a much lower value on their actual job of protecting the public.