The Electoral (Disqualification of Convicted Prisoners) Amendment Bill is nothing more than the latest in a long line of dog-whistle attempts to make the Government, the National Party seem tough on crime. This House should be gravely concerned that some of its members can come in here and propose legislation for those reasons, without any regard for its practical implications. Those members would place political image above fairness, above the value our society places on the civic duty of voting, above the effectiveness of our electoral roll, and above prisoners’ reintegration into society upon release, and in ways that would be impractical to implement for all the reasons that Lianne Dalziel set out in her very fine contribution to this debate.

As well as this bill being completely impracticable, the Attorney-General has notified the House that the bill is unjustifiable because it is inconsistent with the electoral rights affirmed by section 12 of the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990.

The Crown Law Office looks at the legislation. It looks at overseas cases and comparable provisions in international agreements and legislation to consider whether courts or international tribunals have considered whether similar provisions are consistent with fundamental rights and freedoms. Let us look at the advice this House has received on that point. As far as a blanket ban on prisoner voting is concerned, it breaches the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act because it is inconsistent with the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the High Court decision in R v Bennett, and decisions of the Supreme Court of Canada and the European Court of Human Rights.

The advice states that inconsistencies with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act can be justified where the provision serves an important and significant objective, and where there is a rational and proportionate connection between the provision and the said objective. The stated objective of this bill is to disenfranchise the most serious offenders. The Attorney-General does not express an opinion on whether that is an important and significant objective but, regardless, he concludes that the objective to disenfranchise the most serious offenders is “not rationally linked to the blanket ban on prisoner voting”.

There are three reasons for that, which are worth having in the record of the House. First, not every person serving a sentence of imprisonment is necessarily a serious offender, and people who are not serious offenders will be disenfranchised. That is the advice on the record from the Attorney-General. The example given is a fines defaulter, who may be imprisoned, but who hardly qualifies as a serious offender. Secondly, an irrational inconsistency is created so that mentally impaired prisoners who are detained in a hospital or secure facility for less than 3 years could vote, while all prisoners serving sentences of less than 3 years in prisons could not vote. Currently both groups are treated the same. Nothing in this bill deals with that issue. Thirdly and finally, the advice states that the blanket ban on prisoner voting is both under and over-inclusive. It is under-inclusive in that a prisoner convicted of a serious violent offence who serves 2½ years in prison between general elections can vote, and it is over-inclusive in that someone convicted and given a 1-week sentence coinciding with a general election would be prevented from voting. There is a complete inconsistency there, which a select committee would be simply unable to resolve.

This bill has no intention other than to make the Government look tough on crime. In doing so, it is proposing impractical changes. If the Government were really tough on crime, it would not be taking police cars off the street, decreasing firearms training for the police, and slashing $21 million of funding from the police. Most of all, it would not be coming to this House every day to implement the sort of outdated economic policies that create inequality and impoverish our communities in such a way that creates crime in the first place. This is a bad bill. It is window dressing and it is offensive. It will not work, and that is why Labour opposes it.