KEY POINTS:
Bitter debate marked the passage into law of rules governing how MPs can spend parliamentary funding during election year.
National accused Labour of rorting the rules to use taxpayer money on election material and Labour in turn accused National of hypocrisy and exaggeration to score political points.
Deputy Prime Minister Michael Cullen has said the Appropriation (Continuation of Interim Meaning of Funding for Parliamentary Purposes) Bill was a simple measure which assured certainty and transparency for all parties.
The bill extends to June 2009 the interim rules on parliamentary spending that were put in place after Auditor-General Kevin Brady caused an uproar by ruling that most parties wrongly used their allocations during the 2005 election campaign.
The interim rules say MPs can spend their parliamentary funding any way they want as long as they do not use it for electioneering - explicitly seeking votes, support or funds for their parties.
They have always been able to use parliamentary funds for explaining their policies, and it was that grey area which caused most of the problems last election.
National MP Tony Ryall said Labour was giving MPs the power to spend taxpayer money on material that was election material by any other standard, but which would not count as an election expense.
Non-MP candidates would be penalised as they would come under the regime being set up by the Electoral Finance Bill and its expenditure limits, Mr Ryall said.
He also said Labour had failed to reach agreement with National on the issue, so therefore the law could not "endure".
Labour MP Paul Swain accused Mr Ryall and his colleagues of hypocrisy and misleading the public over what the law did to score political points.
He pointed to material National produced before and after the Auditor-General's ruling - some as recent as this week - which would have been declared unlawful under that ruling.
The bill passed into law by 66-51.
The measure, along with the Electoral Finance Bill, will set the ground rules for next year's election.
The rewriting of electoral law, which is about how parties can raise and spend their own money during campaigns, is due to be debated in Parliament tomorrow.
- NZPA
