Congrats To Unite On Signature Collections

The Kiwi Party offered commiserations to the leadership of the Unite Union and all those involved in their efforts to force a referendum on the minimum wage. It will be a great disappointment to have worked so hard and collected 200,000 signatures and yet find the target of the required 10% of electors still beyond reach. Collecting 200,000 signatures is a significant effort and worthy of congratulations,

“Not reaching the target is not proof of a lack of public support for the referendum", said Kiwi Party Leader, Larry Baldock, "simply a lack of resources and volunteers. I can fully concur with Unite’s comments when they stated, “Wherever we went, people flocked to sign the petition. Our only limitation was not having quite enough resources and volunteers to get us over the line.”

“New Zealand’s current system of Citizens Initiated Referenda needs a major overhaul. Apart from the oxymoronic nature of non-binding referenda, there is simply no justification for requiring citizens in New Zealand to have to collect more than 10 times as many signatures per capita to force a referendum than is required in Switzerland, California and many other states or nations.

“In Switzerland it is 50,000 signatures in a population of 8 million, California around 300-400,000 in a population of 36 million, and Italy 500,000 in a population of nearly 60 million. Also the EU Commission is apparently currently considering a system of Citizens Initiated Referenda that would require only 1 million signatures out of a population of approximately 500 million.

"On top of our high threshold requirement there is the ridiculous spending cap of $50,000 for advertising the petition. That does not go very far when trying to promote the petition nationwide."

The Kiwi Party polices for reviewing the CIR Act are available on our website at Referenda policies and minimum wage policy.

Ends

© Scoop Media