Melissa Ji-Yun Lee (; born 1966) is a New Zealand politician. She was elected to the House of Representatives as a list MP for the National Party in the 2008 election. , she is the National Party's spokesperson for broadcasting, communications, digital media, and ethnic affairs.
Early life and career
Lee was born in South Korea and grew up in Malaysia before moving to Australia and then to New Zealand in 1988 with her family. She has a MA Hons (First Class) in Communication Studies. Based in Auckland, she spent twenty three years in journalism, including a five-year stint at the Sunday News and writing for numerous publications including The New Zealand Herald and The Listener. She was also the producer of the TV magazine series, Asia Downunder.
Member of Parliament
In November 2008, Lee became a List MP in the New Zealand Parliament. Her maiden speech included sections in English, Māori, and Korean. In English, she mentioned crime, education, and anti-Asian racism issues in New Zealand. In the Māori section, she mentioned the history of Māori first coming to New Zealand by canoe from Hawaiki and compared it to her own migration to New Zealand by aeroplane. Near the end of her speech, she thanked, in Korean, all the people that had given her support "simply by virtue of [their] shared heritage".
Lee became the second Korean, and first Korean woman, to win the election to a non-Korean national legislature. (The first Korean elected to a foreign national-level office, Jay Kim, became a member of the United States House of Representatives in 1992.)
A poll conducted between 10 December 2008 and 19 April 2009 by the Spanish newspaper, 20 minutos (20 minutes) ranked Lee as the world's 51st most beautiful female politician.
First term and Mt Albert by-election, 2008–2011
During the first months of entering Parliament two Conscience votes were taken, Melissa Lee voted against the Misuse of Drugs (Medicinal Cannabis) Amendment Bill and the Liquor Advertising (Television and Radio) Bill.
On 16 April 2009, Lee announced her candidacy for the National Party nomination in the 2009 Mount Albert by-election. She defeated the previous local National candidate, Ravi Musuku, to win selection for the National Party on 4 May 2009.
On 13 May 2009, Lee told a candidates' meeting that the SH20 Waterview Connection could divert criminals from South Auckland away from the electorate. Lee apologised the next day, saying "if South Auckland people (find) my comments offensive, I apologise. It wasn't about them. It was about criminals." Prime Minister John Key later said the remark was a "stupid statement to make". Later that day she apologised again saying, "I apologise unreservedly for the comments I made regarding South Auckland... I sincerely regret my remarks." In the by-election, Lee attracted only 3,542 votes, coming a distant second to Labour's David Shearer's 13,260 votes.
During the by-election, allegations were made in May 2009 that Lee's production company Asia Vision had spent New Zealand on Air money making a promotional video for the National Party ahead of the 2008 election. Lee called the allegations "ridiculous", saying that all work on the video was done by volunteers. The Green Party referred the video to the Electoral Commission, saying that it should have been declared as an election expense. An investigation conducted by New Zealand on Air later cleared Lee of the charge of misuse of funding.
Later in 2009, Lee used NZ$100,000 of contingency funding to increase the markup for Asia Downunder in violation of her contract with New Zealand on Air, which she described as "an innocent error".
In April 2011, Lee courted controversy when, after she had made a speech supporting the controversially rushed-through copyright law 92A, it emerged that hours earlier she had tweeted "Ok. Shower... Reading ... And then bed! listening to a compilation a friend did for me of K Pop. Fab. Thanks Jay" which appeared to contradict her stance on law 92A.
Second term, 2011–2014
During the 2011 general election, Melissa Lee increased her electoral vote in the Mt Albert electorate but failed to unseat David Shearer, who retained the seat by a margin of 10,021 votes.
On 20 December 2011, John Key announced that Lee and John Hayes would become Parliamentary Private Secretaries, a role not in use for several years. Key appointed her to the portfolio of Ethnic Affairs, given the heavy workload of Judith Collins as the newly appointed Minister of Justice. In January 2014, Lee was appointed Chairperson of the Social Services Select Committee.