KEY POINTS:
The Engineering, Printing and Manufacturing Union wants to prevent the Electoral Commission from entertaining public objections to the registration of third parties under the Electoral Finance Act.
The union yesterday asked the High Court at Wellington to make such a ruling during submissions on a legal challenge to
its own registration as a third party by the National Party.
The case is the first major legal test of the controversial new law.
Another case will be heard in the same court today, when John Boscawen and leading members of Grey Power, the Sensible Sentencing Trust and the Act Party, in a separate action, attempt to get the court to say the former bill and now the law contravenes the Bill of Rights Act 1990.
Justice Alan MacKenzie reserved his decision on the union registration but said he was "conscious of the urgency" attached to the matter.
His decision will determine not only whether the public can lodge objections, but how liberal or restrictive third party registration will be on groups closely associated with political parties.
The EPMU is an affiliate union of the Labour Party and its national secretary, Andrew Little, is the affiliate's vice-president and is on the party's ruling New Zealand Council.
If it is registered as a third party, the union can spend up to $120,000 on election advertising this year.
If it is not allowed to register, it can spend no more than $12,000.
The National Party's challenge to the union's registration, argued by Peter Kiely, advances an objection originally made by National activist and blogger David Farrar.
The Electoral Commission publicly released the union's application, received an objection and referred it to Mr Little for comment before the commission agreed to register the union.
Rodney Harrison, QC, for the union, said that if such a process had been intended, it would have been stated in the act. He wants the court to not only reject National's challenge, but to find that the commission either cannot or need not consider objection from anyone other than the applicant.
Crown Law counsel Peter Gunn, for the commission, said that could lead to "absurd" outcomes. The Electoral Act gave the commission the power to conduct inquiries, and publicise and consult as it saw fit.
On the main objection of the union's registration, Mr Farrar and National argued that the union should be ineligible under the provisions of the Electoral Finance Act which exclude a person "involved in the administration" of the affairs of a party. They say the term "person" should include "a corporation sole, a body corporate, and an unincorporated body," as stipulated in the Interpretation Act.
The union and commission say that the clause in question means natural persons, not legal persons and therefore the union, could not be excluded on those grounds.
Mr Farrar has argued that if that is the case, then all sorts of groups associated with a party, such as Act on Campus, would be eligible for third party registration and spending of up to $120,000.
That would negate the intention of the act, which was to eliminate such parallel campaigning.
Mr Harrison disputed that that was the intention of the act and said it had not been stated in either the purpose or select committee report on the bill.
The parties to the case have agreed to limit the argument at this stage to the issue of "persons".
If the judge upholds National's challenge, the union might still register; the commission will then reconsider the union's application and only then decide whether it was "involved" in the Labour party's administration.
Mr Harrison acknowledged that it might be theoretically possible for a body to be involved in the administration of a party because the act did not disallow it, but he thought it unlikely to happen.
Mr Kiely produced evidence that Mana Motuhake, formerly an incorporated body, had been part of the Alliance and involved in its administration.
CONTEXT
* The EPMU is an affiliate union of the Labour Party.
* If it is registered as a third party, it can spend up to $120,000 on election advertising this year.
* If it is not allowed to register, it can spend no more than $12,000.
