The speaker’s little helpers: the other chairmen of parliament

From Louis Collins

At its core, politics is about the exchange of ideas and arguments. In parliament, these ideas and arguments develop into bills and often laws. Given the high risks, it is crucial that the debate is vigorous but also polite and orderly.

Enter the Speaker of the House, whom you know as Gerry Brownlee – or as he is now more commonly known, Mr. Speaker.

Brownlee is the boss among the chairmen of Parliament. This term may conjure up an image of a judge, but when it comes to the speaker, the better comparison is that of a referee or umpire. However, the Speaker is more than just a referee or moderator of a debate, he is essentially the closest thing to a Minister of Parliament and the leader of the legislature.

The role is constitutionally important as it represents the House of Representatives to the Sovereign, with the Speaker sitting third in New Zealand’s order of precedence after the Governor-General and the Prime Minister.

Largely thanks to the almost symbolic tendency of political pundits to make such comparisons, sporting analogies have actually become quite useful in explaining the often arcane world of parliamentary proceedings. To some, the legislative session looks like a Machiavellian chess game, while others may draw parallels to a stand-and-slug boxing match.

No matter which sporting discipline you prefer, common features are teams in the form of parties, players in the form of representatives, a discussion room as a playing field and the speaker who blows the whistle and ensures order.

As with most sports, the Parliamentary Referee has a team of assistant referees (or touch judges) in the form of the Deputy Speaker – essentially an understudy to the Speaker – and Deputy Speaker, who remain party MPs but have the full authority of the Speaker during election campaigns speaker chair.

Considering that a normal meeting week lasts 17 hours, that’s a long time for one person to chair. Therefore, the Deputy Speaker and Deputy Speakers play a key role in sharing the burden.

The official role of Deputy Speaker has existed since 1992, with the role of Deputy Speaker being introduced four years later in 1996. Previously, the New Zealand Parliament used the Westminster model, where there was a committee chair who chaired the often lengthy committee of the Whole House stage. This remains one of the main tasks of the Deputy and Deputy Speakers of Parliament.

In the Chamber, the Speaker (Gerry Brownlee) primarily leads Question Time, the general debate and (more rarely) the various reading debates of a bill. What you will never see, however, is him chairing the committee of the whole House. This is the crucial stage of the legislative process after second reading, where MPs really examine a bill section by section.

In this 54th Parliament there is one deputy speaker (National’s Barbara Kuriger) and three deputy speakers (National’s Maureen Pugh, Labour’s Greg O’Connor and the Greens’ Teanau Tuiono – the first leader of the Greens). The House sat down with Kuriger, O’Connor and Tuiono before clerks held one of their presession briefings.

As Deputy Speaker, Barbara Kuriger shares the aptly named Speakers Corridor with Speaker Gerry Brownlee in Parliament.
Photo: VNP/Louis Collins

When should you whistle?

Deputy Speakers continue to have responsibilities within their own parties, so both Tuiono and O’Connor have the unique task of moving between partisanship and bipartisanship.

“[Parliament is] “an incredibly isolated place,” says O’Connor.

“Everyone has a role here. Within the party you have the role of a spokesperson and that is where your expertise really lies. In government you are a minister and this is your area of ​​expertise. As speakers or chairmen, we are of course confronted with each other.” So, if you will, it is almost a task in which you remove all these topics. It’s probably one of the very few roles in the House of Representatives – especially for elected representatives – where your job is to actually have oversight of everything.

Over the years, each speaker has approached their role differently and applied the rules of debate with varying degrees of rigor. The same applies to these three chairmen. For example, Kuriger says she sometimes takes a tougher approach herself to avoid being perceived as biased.

Like a watchful referee, Tuiono sometimes feels the need to tell the players in the discussion room to go ahead and play the game. “It’s all on TV, you know, and if we can see them drifting somehow, then the nation can see them drifting too. It recognizes that they are here to have their say, and so is the government. “Everyone is here to have their say, but we have to make sure things move forward.

O’Connor uses another sporting analogy.

“Like any referee in any game – if you don’t know who the referee is and you didn’t notice him at the end, then they probably had a great game and that’s pretty much our goal. When you start presenting yourself as a speaker – you don’t want to be the referee who blows the whistle every two minutes. We want a free debate, as long as it is possible within the framework of the Rules of Procedure, which are too rigid; you also have to take the personalities of the House into account.

The speaker can also ensure that these personalities do not manifest as personal attacks. When things get really heated, they even have the option of kicking a member out of the chamber, which is similar to a red card.

“The real heroes”: the employees of Parliament

For Tuiono, the role of a neutral figure in the verbal melee is also a unique opportunity to watch the debate from the parliamentary equivalent of a courtside seat.

“When you sit in this chair, you have the overview, you see everything. You can see the politicians doing their bit and trying to organize their parties. You have the staff, the real heroes of the house, supporting us to do our job and really get into some of the details. Some of these bills are extensive… We go through these details and try to interpret the rules and speaker decisions in light of the various debates that people have, which can be quite complicated.

The three senior officials with wigs at the Commission’s opening of Parliament.
Photo: ©VNP / Phil Smith

If Kuriger, O’Connor and Tuiono are the assistant referees, you might think of the Parliament clerks as the TMO or third referee. Kuriger says they were key to familiarizing herself with the nuances of the role early in her tenure.

“The first time you’re asked to do the job, you think, ‘Oh, how do I know how to do that?’ They are the people who sit next to us and no one hears much from them except when they vote, but they actually make us look good.”

Presiding over the “Game of Time.”

Filibustering is synonymous with American politics, but it certainly occurs here in New Zealand – although usually only in one phase of the debate. The House Committee of the Whole phase is all about getting into the details and the duration is not specified. This is fertile ground for an extended debate about the smallest specifics.

“The House of Representatives is a game with time,” says Kuriger. “The government always wants to move quickly and the opposition always wants to slow it down. I’ve sat on both sides and it’s always the same.”

O’Connor agrees. “When we are in committee, one side wants to close the committee, the other side wants it to continue. So as a leader in the middle, it’s very important to be fair, because if you do it right, when.” If you finalize a part and then put it to a vote, both sides – even if they don’t agree – will accept that they made a fair decision. And that’s really the goal, especially during the Committee of the Whole [House] Stage.”

As long as new materials or ideas are discussed in the plenary committee, the debate can continue. It is the chair’s job to keep track of what has already been said and to ensure that the discourse remains relevant to the specific part of the bill being discussed.

Fortunately, Tuiono says, there are materials that make this easier

“We actually have transcripts that we want to keep a close eye on, what people said, the nature of the arguments.” [made]who said it and stuff like that. But a really experienced debater can bring in new material, they can get very, very specific, I found some members’ contributions to be very creative.”

O’Connor has one term for such members.

“This person you could call the Anorak, who knows absolutely all the rules inside and out. And they are the people who often know as much, if not more, than the employees. So when these people talk, you know for sure.” They’ll probably know exactly what they’re talking about.

Conversely, during her previous tenure as chair, Kuriger has gained a solid understanding of what is not effective in the full House committee.

Deputy Speaker Barbara Kuriger (centre) chairs the committee stage of the Pae Ora (Dissolution of the Māori Health Authority) Bill, February 28, 2024, alongside Health Minister Shane Reti (left) and Clerk David Bagnall.
Photo: Johnny Blades

“Those who are frustrated, those who come in and probably didn’t participate in the debate – they’re making a wide-ranging statement on a very narrow debate and wondering why that might lead to a closure of this part.”

Kuriger, Tuiono and O’Connor all agree that this role has given them a better understanding of Parliament as an institution, largely due to the non-partisan nature of the task.

“You also get this overview and get a feel for what actually drives the different members and also the different parties, which I think you wouldn’t get if you just sided with your own party.” That’s why good to hear all these different perspectives and see where they come from.”

RNZ’s The House, providing insight into Parliament, its legislation and issues, is produced with funding from the Parliamentary Office.