Give us warts and all Parliament coverage

Press and TV cameras should be able to rove Parliament and not be restricted to showing only MPs making speeches, according to the latest Herald-DigiPoll survey.

The survey found 57.9 per cent of people opposed current rules that order the media to show only MPs making speeches and forbid shots of rows of empty seats or MPs relaxing.

Of 750 people surveyed, 32.9 per cent backed the rules. The other 9.2 per cent had no opinion or refused to answer.

The survey follows yesterday's decision by Speaker Margaret Wilson to ban TV3 cameras from the debating chamber for one week from Monday.

The channel broke the rules this month by broadcasting Associate Education Minister David Benson-Pope asleep in Parliament.

Ms Wilson said TV3 stated that while it knew it was in breach of the code, the channel believed its actions were acceptable within the recent liberal interpretations of the rules.

The broadcaster said concern at plans to remove the right of television stations to have their own cameras in Parliament also prompted it to broadcast the pictures. Those plans have since been dropped.

Ms Wilson said she did not accept TV3's explanation and said the channel was in "serious and deliberate" breach of the code.

"It was gross breach of the standing orders and a direct challenge to the authority of the Speaker," she told Parliament.

She said broadcasting the pictures did not fit with recent interpretations of the rules.

She said the ban was not without precedent. In 2000, photographers from the now defunct Evening Post were banned for a week after the newspaper published photos of then National MP Annabel Young yawning in Parliament.

She said changes to the rules were a question for Parliament's standing orders committee.

The Herald-DigiPoll survey also found 78.4 per cent of people opposed the plan to remove television news cameras from Parliament and for Parliament to set up its own, taxpayer-funded television coverage of the House.

There was 14.3 per cent support for the proposal.

- NZPA, and staff reporter