Campaign plan to dump MMP electoral system

A nationwide campaign is being planned to persuade New Zealanders to drop MMP.

The Nelson Mail has reported that the campaign involves prominent businesspeople.

Although the group's publicly stated goal is to put the decision on the future of MMP into the public's hands, it is understood that at least some of its backers are aiming to overturn the controversial proportional representation system.

The group has formed a trust to steer its campaign, called the Citizens Majority Trust.

Its backers include Wellington businessman Peter Shirtcliffe, who led the original campaign opposing MMP's introduction in the early 1990s, and Margaret Robertson, who forced the 1999 referendum on the number of MPs, which resulted in an overwhelming public vote for a smaller Parliament.

It is being fronted by Aucklander Stuart Marshall, an economist with Bancorp, who has a prominent media profile as an economic commentator.

The other trustees are also prominent members of the business community.

The trust is preparing to launch a nationwide petition late next month. It is understood the group is also preparing to lobby MPs and launch a media campaign and is prepared for a head-to-head battle with political opponents.



It is planning a complicated two-stage approach, aimed at forcing two referendums to decide the fate of the electoral system.

The petition, organised under the Citizens Initiated Referenda Act, is intended to ask a question about taking the review of the electoral system out of the hands of "self-interested politicians" and giving it to the public to decide by way of a binding referendum.

If the petition can get the support of at least 10 per cent of voters a referendum will then have to be put to the public to vote on the same question.

The trust hopes that referendum will win enough backing to force the Government to then hold a further, binding referendum on the future of the electoral system.

- NZPA