Compromise to prevent MPs scrambling for chairs

11.30am

MPs have reached a compromise to avoid a musical chairs-style scramble for the best seats when Parliament opens on Monday.

Parties met today to try to sort out the seating arrangements after several small parties complained over National's claim to nine frontbench seats, given its election rout.

The Speaker, almost certain to be incumbent Jonathan Hunt, will eventually decide seating but, as he won't be elected until after MPs take their seats, an unsightly dash is feared.

Mr Hunt chaired today's meeting where senior MPs failed to reach agreement on a long-term solution.

Instead they agreed to a compromise where the opposition parties on one side of the horseshoe shaped chamber and the Government parties on the other will sit in alphabetical order.

The unusual intermingling of MPs will stay in place for one day until the Speaker is officially elected and Parliament's business committee meets for the first time.

If the committee can't agree then, the Speaker will make a binding ruling.

National's 27 MPs can fit exactly into a main block of seats between the Speaker and the first aisle, giving them nine frontbench seats directly opposite the Labour frontbench and National's main ministerial targets.

Green co-leader Rod Donald described the situation as a "farce" given that National was smaller than the combined forces of the other parties not in government.

If National takes the nine prime seats, that means only five crossbench seats will be left for New Zealand First, ACT and the Greens. Together they have 31 MPs, four more than National.

The Greens, with two co-leaders, have been pencilled in for one frontbench seat.

Mr Donald argued for NZ First, with 13 MPs, to get three front bench seats and the Greens to get two. ACT would get two, "which means National will have to accept seven".

New Zealand First leader Winston Peters left the meeting saying he still believed the front seats should be shared evenly, but the "arrogance of the National party" meant they refused to compromise.

Senior National MP Gerry Brownlee said his party's position as the official opposition -- as the largest party not in government -- was indisputable.

The minor parties were trying to overturn 150 years of tradition in New Zealand due to a "bit of a victory" at the election.

National would be sticking to its position at next Monday's meeting.

The minor parties were making a big deal out of a "pathetic issue", Mr Brownlee said.

ACT's acting leader, Ken Shirley, said the compromise would stop an "unseemly scramble".

For MPs it was important where they sat as it was part of the "theatre of Parliament", but he would be surprised if the public was interested in the seating spat.

After the meeting Mr Donald said he would still seek to get scrapped the standing order which defined the Leader of the Opposition.

Standing orders -- the rules of Parliament -- are currently being reviewed.

New Zealand retains the old system where the leader of the largest opposition party is the leader of the entire Opposition. Bill English, leader of the much depleted National party, will hold that position in the new Parliament.

The position gives Mr English a higher salary and more money for support staff. He will also get the right to appoint representatives to some committees, such as those dealing with electoral boundaries, and the right to be consulted over some appointments and matters of state.

"The title is a misnomer, an archaic throw-back to the days of first-part-the-post," Mr Donald said.

National will not support the change in the rules and Prime Minister Helen Clark has said the position of Opposition leader could still be justified in New Zealand's Parliament, but what was unusual was the "fragmentation of the Opposition" across National, ACT, NZ First and in some areas the Greens and United Future.

"I wouldn't think we would want to rush in to saying there should be no leader of the Opposition, but in an academic sense it is an interesting question."

- NZPA

Graphic: Seats in the 47th Parliament

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