Lisa Owen interviews United Future leader Peter Dunne

Headlines:

Without any negotiating leverage Peter Dunne admits “specific policies were not on the agenda”, but says he still has “an entrée” to raise United Future’s preferred policies

Dunne went into negotiations with a list of policies in his “back pocket” but was only able to secure a commitment to “good working arrangements”

Draws a line in the sand over RMA reform: If National is to get his support it would need to make sure that the environmental principles of the Act aren't weakened.

Defends his appointment as a minister saying United Future’s 4500 votes not the issue, it’s a matter of John Key honouring his pre-election promise
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Lisa Owen: United Future got its third consecutive agreement with National this week even though the party's vote fell to just 4500 nationwide. Peter Dunne is hard at work meeting his constituents right now, but I spoke to him a short time ago and began by asking him how negotiations went in practical terms.
Well, they were different from previous negotiations, Lisa, because this time the Government has a majority in its pocket so it doesn't actually need to negotiate from a majority. So what we talked about instead were for sorts of areas that we've worked on in the past together, and how we might take those forward in the future without there being specific policy agreements around them.
Lisa Owen: Did you go in with some kind of wish list, and what kind of percentage of what you wished for did you actually get?
I wasn't entirely sure how these talks were going to pan out for the reasons we just discussed, so I had some things in my back pocket that I was prepared to put on the table if it came down to a shopping-list environment. But, basically, what I was concerned to ensure was that we had a good working arrangement so that the issues that we wanted to pursue from our side of the table, we would be able to do so over the next three years.
Lisa Owen: What was in your back pocket?
Oh, the usual sorts of things. We talked about Flexi-Super. Now, the flexi-super policy that we had by agreement previously got to the stage of a government discussion paper and consultation on it. While we haven't got a specific agreement around it this time, we will continue on that because the superannuation debate is still alive.
Lisa Owen: But it's not in there, Mr Dunne, and if you said it once, you've said it a hundred times on the campaign trail that your top two policies were that flexi-super and the other one was income splitting.
And the point about both is, as I said at the beginning, because National has an outright majority, these are different types of agreements. Previously, you would trade an agreement on these policy points in return for support. This time what National was saying was, 'We don't need your support but we want to have a wider working relationship.' So specific policies were not on the agenda, but that wider working relationship, which funnily enough means that...
Lisa Owen: Hang on. I just want to be clear on this, Mr Dunne. So does that mean that National has given you an indication, a clear indication, that those two policies are non-starters this term?
No. We haven't talked about their fate specifically. But we didn't talk about what boxes you were going to tick, if you like, on a checklist. And this is the point where these agreements are different from those that have gone beforehand because previously they were very simple. You've got a suite of policies accepted in return for giving the government support. This time the government doesn't need support, and what it's saying is it wants support on confidence and supply only. It's not seeking support on any other matters, but there's the avenue there for discussion. So in one sense, it's an even better deal because we've got an entree to talk about issues and we're not necessarily committed to supporting them if we disagree.
Lisa Owen: Well, you've said that you're basically there to smooth off the rough edges of the government's legislative programme, but I'm just wondering how you can do that, because you've basically outlined the lack of power that you have in this situation, and they have the numbers every time.
Yes, and this is a good-faith agreement. The Prime Minister has made it very clear that while he doesn't need those additional numbers, he wants to work with people to give his government more breadth. I guess that's going to be the test. So when issues arise where there are differences, both ACT, ourselves, the Maori Party, the question will be, even though our votes are not necessary, how can we work either individually or collectively to make changes.
Lisa Owen: A good example of that is going to be the RMA, isn't it - the Resource Management Act, because you were part of blocking that in the last term. What would they need to do? What changes would there need to be to get your support, given that they want a wider mandate?
I've made it very clear right from over a year ago that I had no objections and don't have any objections still to changing the processes by which the Act operates, to speeding up application times and all of those sorts of things. None whatsoever. But I do object to changing the principles of the Act to weakening the principles. So I guess where National would need, if it was to get my support for the legislation to make some progress, would be on making sure that the principles and key operating procedures of the Act aren't weakened. But the processes? No problem with speeding those up at all.
Lisa Owen: All right. So, I just want to look at your numbers. The Legalise Cannabis Party — they got almost double the party vote of United Future and the Ban 1080 Party got about the same as you, so is 4500 votes a mandate for being a minister?
Well, I don't think that's the issue, actually. I think the issue is I was elected as the member of parliament for Ohariu. The Prime Minister made it clear before the election that regardless of the outcome in terms of what National did, it would look to work with the parties that had been partners to it previously — ACT, United Future, The Maori Party. He honoured that commitment. The invitation to come to talks and to take a role was the Prime Minister's invitation. I didn't go banging on the door saying, 'Hey, let me in,' because I had nothing to go with. So I don't think the issue of mandate arises in that respect.
Lisa Owen: OK, I'm wondering how long are you going to be around for, do you think? Will you stick out the term? I mean, is United Future going to be your party for the term of do you think you're going to be absorbed into the National Party at some point?
No, look, I was elected as the United Future member of parliament. I've always given a commitment to serve a full term after each election as the United Future member of parliament, and that's what I'll be doing.
Lisa Owen: All right. Thank you very much for joining me this morning. Peter Dunne.
Thank you.
Transcript provided by Able. www.able.co.nz

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