Parliament - House of Representatives 1854-2004

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Introduction

New Zealand's Parliament dates back to 1854, just 14 years after the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi and the beginning of the European settlement of the country. For most of the New Zealand's history as a nation state, it has had some form of elected government. Few countries can boast such a long and uninterrupted history of democracy.

Parliament first met in Auckland in May 1854, and in 1865 moved to Wellington, the capital city, where it has remained. Today there are two parts to Parliament - the House of Representatives (or the lower house) and the Governor-General, but between 1854 and 1951, there was a third part, the Legislative Council (or the upper house).

In 1893 New Zealand became the first country in the world to grant adult women the vote; all adult men could vote from 1879. In giving the vote to women, New Zealand became the world's first true democracy.

Legislative Council

The Legislative Council was an upper house whose members were appointed rather than elected. Its major role was to amend or revise the legislation passed in the House of Representatives or lower house.

The Council was meant to be New Zealand's equivalent of the British House of Lords and play an independent and influential role. This did not happen and the Council never had too much to do. Once governments could appoint its members ― a role they soon took from the Governor, although he still approved the nominees ― the Council's independence weakened, especially when governments stacked it to suit their own purposes.

Every now and again Council members bucked against the government. The big showdown came in 1891 when the Council obstructed the policies of the Liberal government. Trying to stack the Council backfired when the Governor refused to approve the nominees; Britain finally ordered him to cooperate. From then on, there would be no chance of an independent Council, but it gave governments an attractive way of rewarding loyal MPs.

Governor and Governor-General

The Governor-General (or the Governor before 1917) summons and dissolves Parliament, and assents to legislation it passes. The Governor-General also appoints the Prime Minister and attends the Executive Council to receive advice about government decisions. It is a convention that the Governor-General accepts the advice of a Prime Minister who is supported by a majority of the House.

Between 1840 and 1854 the Governor, appointed from Britain, ruled New Zealand on behalf of the Queen. The settlers had little time for rule by a Governor and wanted to elect their own government. After the elections in 1853, Governor George Grey angered the settlers by delaying the calling of Parliament. Grey's temporary successor, R.H. Wynyard, hardly helped when he refused to give power to a government formed from a majority in the House. This issue was not resolved until 1856.

After this, the House asserted itself, although the Governor kept an important role in military matters and Maori policies. Things reached a head in the 1860s, especially when the spiraling costs of the wars in the North Island got the country into financial trouble. In the end, New Zealand undertook to pay for its military affairs and the Governor's reserved powers over Maori affairs were removed. The Governor now became largely a symbolic figurehead.

House of Representatives: Doing Business

The House of Representatives comprises the elected members of Parliament who represent the people of New Zealand. Until 1951, the House of Representatives was also known as the lower house. A political party or parties with the majority of votes in the House form a government, which answers to the House for its policies and actions.

Sittings and sessions

Until 1996 the House needed a quorum of members in the debating chamber for the day's business to begin. Getting a quorum could be a problem in the early years; some MPs did not attend sittings because of travel problems, some left before the session had finished for the year, and others failed to turn up at all.

The House used to start its sessions in the middle of the year to suit the many MPs who were farmers. Sessions lasted two or three months to allow them to get home for Christmas. As the House got busier, sessions got longer, and there would often be a rush of work at the end. The mid-year start continued until 1984 but now Parliament sits through much of the year, with periodic adjournments and sessions that last for the government's full term.

In the 1850s the House began (or sat) at noon three days a week, and ended (or rose) in the evenings. As the business of government grew from the 1860s, the House had to sit later, from early afternoon. When the practice of stonewalling became common, the House would often keep sitting until early the next morning ― 3 a.m. or even later. From 1928 the House rose at 10.30 p.m., but it was not until the late 1930s that sitting beyond midnight largely disappeared.

Making decisions

The House makes decisions on motions before it. A formal vote or division into those for and against a motion takes place whenever MPs want to see if the government has majority support, slow down or disrupt proceedings, or record their views.

The traditional system for taking divisions continued until 1996. When division bells were rung, MPs absent from the chamber would have a few minutes to return before the doors were locked; sometimes the keys to the chamber were temporarily 'mislaid' so that latecomers could arrive in time to vote! MPs went into the 'Ayes' and 'Noes' lobbies on either side of the chamber, and had their names ticked off a list. The Speaker would then announce the result and the doors would be unlocked.

Since 1996, MPs have not had to be physically in the chamber to vote because parties can declare their total votes, including the proxy votes of absent members.

Organising votes

MPs known as whips organise members of parties into blocs to vote and speak in debates. The whip's job has been described as 'keeping a House'. They monitor the day's order paper, grant leave from the House, and make sure there is a quorum. Whips act as the eyes and ears of a government, and need a thorough knowledge of what goes on in the chamber. For this reason, they traditionally sit near the front bench.

For much of Parliament's history, whips also organised 'pairs'. 'Pairing' was the informal agreement between MPs on different sides that when one was absent, the other would not vote. This was a way to ensure that the business of the House could be conducted fairly when MPs were away or ill. Whipping and pairing were processes based on trust and cooperation between MPs. Those MPs who unwittingly broke their pairs by being in the chamber had to vote with the other side. Pairing was not officially recognised in the House's standing orders until 1951. It was abolished in 1996, and replaced by the party vote system because the many parties in the House under MMP made the previous system unworkable.

Select committees

An important part of Parliament's business is done in select committees, which are small groups of MPs who discuss and report on matters referred to them. The House requires committees to hear evidence in public. Committees consider bills and deal with many other things, including petitions presented to the House, finance and expenditure, or how the House works. Since 1979 all bills have been sent to select committee as well.

The select committee structure was overhauled in 1985, and the role of committees was expanded to provide fuller consideration of government policies and expenditure. Under MMP from 1996, select committees have become more important and the government's control of them has weakened. Committee chairs come from different parties, and membership across all the committees is in proportion to the number of MPs in each party.

House of Representatives: The Opposition

Testing the government

The Opposition uses a variety of tactics to hold the government to account. In the past, slowing down or obstructing business was common practice. Sometimes the Opposition simply walked out of the chamber en masse so there would be no quorum and a vote could not be taken.

Before the 1930s, the Opposition could bring the House to a standstill just by talking on and on. This was known as 'stonewalling' or 'filibustering' - using the standing orders or speaking so long in a debate that business ground to a halt. Stonewallers had to be organised: they would speak in shifts to keep a debate going, sometimes for several days. Some speeches were downright silly - MPs would talk about their favourite hobbies, or name all the people in their electorate. One MP spoke for over 24 hours during a stonewall in 1876 that went on for four days. MPs would bring blankets and pillows into the House so that they could snooze in comfort. Stonewalling did not disappear until 1936 when the Labour government introduced the 'closure' - moving that a debate terminate.

Asking questions

Question time is a chance for MPs to ask questions of ministers, although they may not always get the answers they want. Written notice would be given of questions to be answered. Government MPs would normally ask straightforward questions, but those in Opposition could ask curly questions that put the government on the spot.

Once parties formed from the 1890s onwards, question time became very popular with the public who went to Parliament to see MPs battle it out in words on the floor of the chamber. Two hours was put aside for questions on Wednesdays, and then in 1962, 30 minutes of oral ― as opposed to written ― questions began each sitting, with supplementary questions being asked at the discretion of the Speaker. Question time kept getting longer: 40 minutes in 1974, 45 in 1985, and then about an hour in 1996 when a greater number of questions requiring an immediate answer could be asked.

House of Representatives: The Speaker

The Speaker, who is elected by MPs, has a key role in representing the House to the Crown and in presiding over the House. The Speaker determines the proceedings of the House and keeps order. The Speaker is also responsible for parliamentary expenditure, chairing the Parliamentary Service Commission, and running the buildings and grounds.

To function effectively in the modern House, the Speaker has to be impartial. This was not always the case in the past, however. In the nineteenth century, the era before party politics, some Speakers were very partisan. In the 1860s, Speaker David Munro, who supported the government, resorted to underhand tactics to get a government bill passed before the session ended ― as the break for dinner approached, he had the clock put back so the bill's final stage could proceed.

This changed once parties were formed. Since the 1890s, the ruling party has usually supplied the Speaker, although once in office, the Speaker is expected to leave party ties behind. Owing to the legalistic nature of the role, many Speakers have been lawyers, and until the 1990s, the Speaker wore a formal wig in the chamber.

One of the Speaker's tasks is to open each day's sitting of the House. A messenger and the Serjeant-at-Arms, carrying the mace, precede the Speaker from the Speaker's office along the corridors of Parliament House and into the debating chamber. The Speaker takes the chair, and then reads the prayer to open proceedings.

Discipline in the House

The Speaker's authority is backed up by standing orders, which have been revised greatly since 1854. These orders outline the procedures for the sittings of the House and the passage of bills, stipulate what can and cannot be done or said, and indicate the disciplinary action that may be taken against MPs who break the rules.

In the nineteenth century Speakers could fine MPs for disorderly conduct or contempt of the House, but this rarely happened. They could also 'name' MPs and formally record their misconduct. This first occurred in 1887 when MP Julius Vogel made insinuations in the House about the Speaker's drinking habits. The Speaker could also order an MP to leave the House, and the House could pass a motion condemning the MP's actions. These motions were both serious and rare, but being ordered out of the chamber was more common, and MPs did not always take this seriously. In the 1970s and 1980s, an informal 'sin bin' penalty was introduced in which MPs were ordered to leave the chamber for a while to 'cool off' without any further action being taken. Today, if an MP is 'named', the House votes on whether she or he should be suspended from the House for a certain period; if suspended, the MP loses her or his voting rights.

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Speaking rights

New Zealand adopted the British practice of making MPs speak off the cuff or from notes, rather than reading prepared speeches. This rule lasted until 1996 after which MPs could read formal speeches. In practice, Speakers found it hard to enforce the 'no-reading' rule. Many new MPs were terrified at the prospect at speaking only from notes. When the Speaker challenged MPs who looked and sounded as if they were reading, some would deny they were reading a speech by saying 'I am speaking from rather full notes'.

There was no time limit on speeches in the nineteenth century. A few MPs would speak for hours if they got the chance, and there was little the Speaker could do to stop them. As government business grew, it became clear that speaking time had to be limited otherwise nothing would get done. The time was set at 30 minutes, or an hour for important debates, in 1894. The time got less and less during the twentieth century: 20, 10, then 5 minutes. The Speaker has the job of regulating the time with a clock and a warning bell on his or her desk.

Keeping time

Time is important in the House, and especially for the Speaker who has to monitor the time of speeches during debates. In the early days in Wellington, a large number of clocks had to be wound manually, and regularly. Between the 1920s and the 1950s, a Post Office technician set the 'master' clock and synchronised 'slave' magnetic clocks. But no two clocks seemed ever to show the same time and MPs could use this as an excuse for being late into the chamber. The time-setting service ceased in the 1950s and new, more accurate clocks were installed in the early 1960s.

Dressing down

Among the Speaker's many duties was ensuring that MPs came into the House dressed appropriately. This was more complex than it sounds, for Parliament had rules about jackets, ties, hats, and when they could and could not be worn.

An old British House of Commons custom forbade MPs from wearing hats when entering or leaving the chamber or when addressing the House (although they were generally worn in the chamber at other times). The rule that MPs had to rise and take their hats off as messages from the Governor were read had them bobbing up and down like jacks-in-the-box in the early days. The standing orders of 1865 specified that if a member wanted to speak (usually to a point of order) after the doors had been locked for a division, he had to do so from a seated position and with his hat on. Some MPs had to scramble desperately for a hat, anyone's, whether it fitted or not. The custom persisted into the 1960s.

By that time, some MPs were protesting about the stuffy dress code. At a time when many men wore their hair long and coloured shirts were all the rage, MPs Bob Tizard and Warren Freer launched a 'jackets off' campaign. In the warmer weather, Opposition MPs defied the Speaker by removing their jackets, donning them again only under dire threats of suspension from the House. Tizard rubbed it in by wearing a garish orange towelling hat right under the Speaker's nose. But the Speaker stood firm and Parliament's formal dress code remained.

In the 1980s in summer sittings the rule on the wearing of jackets was relaxed but ties stayed. In 1993 Speaker Peter Tapsell ordered the jackets back on. Men must still wear jackets and ties, though Rastafarian MP Nandor Tanczos wore his heart on his sleeve in a suit specially made of 'hemp' fabric.

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