by Tony Orman
Democracy is dying, in case you haven’t noticed.
It’s exemplified by governments’ – note plural – increasing use of by-passing the select committee process.
Select Committees comprising Members of Parliament sit and listen – or are meant to listen – to members of the public giving their opinion on proposed law.
So what has a perceived erosion of democracy got to do with the outdoors and environment and even down to fishing and hunting?
The answer is everything – so read on.
In 2017 former prime minister Sir Geoffrey Palmer wrote a startling blog post expressing concern about the state of democracy in New Zealand.
It surely should have been headline news but it wasn’t. Which raises a large question marks about the media’s competency and sense of responsibility. But I digress.
Geoffrey Palmer’s statement was aimed at a National government, led by John Key.
Geoffrey Palmer had very good reason to be concerned for various issues around the National government led by ex-money trader John Key.
Among a number, one action by the government was totally unprecedented.
Almost eleven years ago, on April Fool’s day 2010, Nick Smith, then minister for the environment and government by pushing the ECan Act through Parliament, sacked the democratically elected Environment Canterbury (ECan) council and installed hand-picked sycophantic state commissioners.
Outraged
The move outraged the Law Society Rule of Law Committee which denounced the ECan Act as repugnant to the “Rule of Law”. Most were appalled.
But it went through pushed by National’s Nick Smith.
Involved was ECan’s failure to protect the integrity of the Water Conservation Order (WCO) protection, akin to a National Parks status, applying to rivers such as the Rangitata and Rakaia, both notable public salmon and trout fisheries.
The erosion of democracy underlies every issue – and the outdoors is no exception.
For example, in April 2016 Nick Smith was at his dictatorial best when he removed the right of local councils to consider and hear submissions on 1080 poison aerial drops and put the final and only say with himself as minister. The public’s democratic right to input was abolished.
The point is the merits or demerits of 1080 isn’t the issue.
The alarming aspect was the undemocratic way in which a dictatorial measure was installed rendering the public mute.
I can recall making submissions on trout farming in the early 1970s where I was allowed to speak for an hour and then answer questions from MPs for half an hour. I made submissions to other Select Committees.
To the Maori Fisheries Bill 1990 I was granted over an hour.
In the same year 1990 to the Conservation Law Reform Bill, which set up Fish and Game councils, almost an hour. There other similar timed select committee presentations made.
Full Steam Ahead
But the erosion of democracy was already underway and gathering pace.
In 2004 the government’s ERMA review of 1080 was a “kangaroo court” with the vast majority of submitters restricted to only five minutes. It was a token gesture to consultation – lip service only.
The two big poison spreaders DOC and OSPRI had requested the review. That was a pointer to it being a farce. Not surprisingly the ERMA review in 1080 gave the poison the green light even before all public submissions had been heard.
The Council of Outdoor Recreation Associations of New Zealand (CORANZ) expressed deep concern at the time, that parliament’s select committee democratic process was being undermined at the expense of the public giving submissions.
CORANZ Chairman Andi Cockroft made an oral submission to a select committee dealing with the Resource Management Act (RMA).
After being beforehand, granted 15 minutes speaking time the chairman Labour’s Duncan Webb interrupted Andi Cockroft’s submission after five minutes and said the committee had heard enough thereby cutting the oral presentation short by ten minutes. Duncan Webb should have known better. He is a lawyer.
It was an insult to CORANZ – and to democracy.
MPs are Public Servants
Usually not acknowledged is that MPs are really public servants voted in to serve the public and the public interest.
Calling our Prime Minister our leader is a misnomer. National’s John Key and Bill English, Labour’s Jacinda Adern and Chris Hipkins were each simply the most senior public servant in NZ.
The National government was voted out in 2017.
But the new coalition government of Labour continued the government trend of diminishing democracy.
Firearm law changes following the Christchurch March 15, 2019 mosque tragedy, were rushed through in just a few days. Over 12,000 submissions were considered in just two days – defying credibility.
The hasty clumsy law targeted law abiding, firearm owning citizens. Criminals and gangs invariably with no firearm licence yet possessing illegal firearms, were ignored.
Also ignored was the blatant, incompetent way in which the offender an Australian terrorist, obtained his firearm licence, despite glaring inadequacies in his application.
Arrogance
The current coalition government has been brazen to the extent of arrogance with its Fast Track Approval Act bypassing the select committee process. But it was nothing new in considering the last 50 or so years. After all in the late 1980s, the 4th Labour government known as Rogernomics, sold public assets at heavily discounted rates, to corporate friends without any consultation with the owners, the people.
Since Rogernomics, the tendency to skip public input has characterised governments and increasingly so to the present day.
All governments of during the last 50 years or so, have been guilty.
Back in 2011 a Victoria University study revealed that urgency motions were conducted 230 times on more than 1600 bills from 1987 – a year of a Labour Government – then to 2010 – a year of a National government. Staggeringly, over half the bills introduced to Parliament during that time were accorded urgency at least once in their enactment process.
The Victoria University study pointed to a lack of justification, as another critical element of concern.
Unjustified
“Reasons given for issuing the motion were consistently dubious and vague in their nature and, although valid motives cropped up sporadically, it was evident that a significant number of urgency motions passed were based on either freeing up the order paper or, occasionally, an element of something more sinister.”
According to one source, an analysis of parliamentary records, shows in the first term of John Key’s National government (2008–2011) there was “a high, and at the time, notable use of urgency, which often bypassed the select committee stage to pass legislation quickly”.
“During the Ardern/ Hipkins-led Labour government (2017–2023), urgent parliamentary procedures were used to pass legislation bypassing or shortening standard select committee, enabling swift action on urgent matters. Significant examples included bypassing select committee scrutiny for parts of the Three Waters legislation and, in 2022, passing 24 bills under urgency, with several skipping the public submission process.”
Deliberate Euthanasia?
There was no pause in the quiet euthanasia of intentionally ending the life of ailing democracy with a change of government in 2023.
“The same National-led coalition government in New Zealand significantly increased the mis-use of urgency to pass legislation without select committee scrutiny, with over 30 bills bypassing this stage in the 2023–2025 term.”
The “urgency” motion is an extremely powerful mechanism at the hands of Parliament. Bills moved under it may be rushed through up to all stages in just a couple of days. Not only are extra-sitting hours permitted, but critical periods of consultation such as the select committee can be completely side-stepped.
This means that chances for public input are extinguished and time for reflection and review by law experts is extremely difficult to the point of being impossible.
Misuse of “urgency” motions is nothing new in New Zealand’s Parliament. However “urgency” is a dangerous tool very vulnerable to hard nosed politicians who have little or no respect for the people and the public’s democratic rights.
The zeal of sitting government should never trump the importance of proper parliamentary and public scrutiny.
This year is election year.
The erosion of democracy should be a key issue.
It’s up to us to make democracy work. I know it’s difficult with a media that selectively publishes news, but try. Democracy is not something you believe in or a place to hang your hat, but it’s something you do. You take part – participate. If you stop participating, democracy crumbles.
That’s why the politicians as outlined in the article, cointinue to erode the democratic rights of the voting people.
The very perceptive article reminds me of the neat quote which goes “People shouldn’t be afraid of their government. Governments should be afraid of their people.”
The loss of democracy is often described as a slow, internal decay rather than a sudden event, driven by apathy, the rise of authoritarian leaders, and a lack of engagement by people.
As pointed out above in the article, democracy has been shoved aside in the anti-democratic moves with John Key, Jacinda Ardern, Chris Hipkins and now you are seeing the continuous erosion of democracy with the likes of Shane Jones and Chris Bishop and their ramming through of laws like the Fast Track Approvals Act.
Arrogant governments ride roughshod over the environment and resources like clean, free flowing rivers. The angling public suffer enormously with irrigation to serve large factory-type dairying farms in low rainfall regions and with the consequences of rising nitrate levels bad for not only river health but human health.
Neo-liberal economics as espoused by ACT is based on Rogernomics or Thatcherism, where people are ignored.
As pointed out, neo-liberalism was introduced with Labour’s Lange and Douglas in the 1980s, and carried on by successive governments led by Bolger, Shipley and to a lesser extent Labour’s Helen Clark.
It’s well nigh time to tell arrogant politicians to restore democracy.
Revolution time at the ballot box in November!
The government should be setting an example, not exploiting it. They then expect the general public to abide by the laws set down, but not so it seems.
To listen to the people is too hard; they do what they want to do. While we have a government that is a corporation, we will never win. WE need a system change.
Having been involved in health politics for many years I have observed the appalling loss of democracy in that sector.
In the early 1990s Annette King as health minister promoted the newly established district health boards as making health issues more ” open and accountable”. What a farce that turned out to be. I had two brief spells as an elected member of the West Coast DHB board. Local views had no place there with directives from the ministry in Wellington being implemented by the local ceo in cohorts with the government appointed chair and deputy. The seven locally elected members were utterly powerless. Anything that might have interested the public was discussed in camera (secrecy) with the media excluded. This process plumbed new depths when management dumped a hugely respected Grey Hospital general surgeon for no other reason than that he didn’t bend the knee to their bureaucratic empire. The fact that I was the only board member to vote against his sacking indicates the pressure that
even elected members felt under.
I realise this is a totally different angle from Tony Orman’s account but it seems to me to be the same dismantling of democracy that we are seeing throughout the New Zealand political process and I have no doubt that in health its underlying aim is the stealthy privatisation of health services.
If you are concerned about the trend towards anti-democratic legislation and a pro-development attitude to the environment (let alone the state of the nation’s waterways) write to your MP and copy the letter to the PM.
No need for a long spiel, just keep to a few basic points. Also remind the politicians that they are merely actors and their time on stage is limited.
As the bard said, they have their exits as well as their entrances.
What concerns me about the current political scene is how many MPs see politics as a stepping stone to bigger things. The good government of NZ is not a priority.
Funny how politicians change when they get into office. They go from being the people’s champion to the bureaucrats puppet almost overnight. They are too clueless to know better.
Democracy was lost years ago, the lying, cheating, racism and corruption are hardly questioned, politics is about control, not democracy.
Selling Assets should also be an Election Issue . Politicians like David Seymour are not looking at the full picture > Case in point hocking off Air NZ ? Tourism now is a main income source for our Nation & Air NZ is the “King pin” , at the base of a Mega $ Bucks Tourist Industry ? We don’t need Air “Atlas” or Air China running the show for us . Kiwis should be in charge of their own industries & future , selling off more of our assets is not on ! what a debacle it now is, with our Power Co’s all sold off ? Special thanks to Max Bradford .
Don’t forget democracy begins at home; in our clubs and local organizations. How is your fishing club etc in terms of democratic decision making? We need to practice what we preach.
The author’s letter references “governments” in the plural, prompting reflection on New Zealand’s identity in the global landscape. Some view New Zealanders as independent thinkers, drawing on the pragmatic #8 wire mentality. Others argue that, in matters of policy and worldview, New Zealand tends to follow international trends rather than forge its own path. But the country today is more diverse, and it is increasingly integrated into the wider world.
A notable instance when New Zealand truly asserted its independence was during the tenure of the Lange government, which banned nuclear-armed and powered ships from its waters. This bold stance earned the respect of much of the international community but has also seen New Zealand excluded from AUKUS.
However, aligning closely with other nations has at times drawn New Zealand into conflicts and disputes that are not its own. Examples include the commitment of resources to Afghanistan and the Vietnam War, despite the general population’s opposition to involvement in Vietnam. These were required because of our participation in ANZUS.
These experiences illustrate how New Zealand straddles a line between asserting its independence and following the lead of powerful allies. While such alliances can offer security, they may also come at the cost of national autonomy and moral authority.
New Zealand’s government operates in the style of the British Westminster system, but both society and politicians are significantly influenced by the United States.
In a recent article by Ben Thomas published in the Press (Saturday 28th February, P A12), the digital challenges faced by parliamentary select committees were highlighted. Submitters have been using social media algorithms and AI to overwhelm committee processes, resulting in an unmanageable volume and range of submissions. In some cases, committees have responded by adopting similar algorithms to summarise submissions. These tools, originating from the USA, risk undermining thoughtful deliberation and established practices, and the opportunity for oral presentations.
The use of such digital submissions and algorithmic responses is misguided and detrimental to good governance and encourages lawmakers to bypass good practice and make arbitrary decisions, leading to poor outcomes and an authoritarian hierarchy.
This authoritarian outcome is evident in the United States. The Trump regime reflects how far the USA political system has decayed with previous allies reorganising bilateral arrangements after regular Trump insults, quite apart from weaponizing the justice system against Trump critics inside the USA. Opposition from within appears largely ineffective. And we don’t want to follow this example.
But the concern arises, if effective people-based decision making becomes too difficult, governance may become increasingly arbitrary and autocratic. It’s a system issue.
The ballot box is a key democratic tool, yet our voting choices reflect an outdated system. We are now a diverse country, with advanced tools, and frequent political realignments every three years disrupts consistent planning in infrastructure, social policy, and environmental policy. New Zealanders deserve better.
It is a long-term view, but New Zealand must clearly define its goals, and where it wants to stand, and ensure a political system with outcomes that respect both its people and environment.
Denis Morgan