No charges over Labour EFA breach

Newstalk ZB is reporting that the Police have decided not to prosecute the Labour Party over a breach of the Electoral Finance Act with its Budget pamphlet. Here's the text of the story:

Police have decided not to prosecute Labour over one of its pamphlets that breached the Electoral Finance Act.

The Electoral Commission had deemed that the "We're Making a Difference" pamphlet, distributed at Waikato University in March, was an election advertisement but had not referred it to police as it decided to use the first breach of the Act as a caution.

A complaint was laid by a member of the public and after completing enquiries police say there was insufficient evidence to proceed to lay a prosecution. They say information obtained about the pamphlet indicates it was not generally available for public distribution.

Wow! That is a huge surprise!! But why would a political party go to the expense of producing a pamphlet (and remember, this was the one with the American family pictured) and then have it "not generally available for public distribution"?

And given that the Electoral Commission had already given Labour a warning for the "We're making a difference" pamphlet, do we take it that there will be a "three strikes and you're out policy" - namely a warning from the Electoral Commission, a warning from the Police and then prosecution? Or will it be the colour of a party's rosette that will really be "making a difference"?