Mitchell Mark: Official Information (Parliamentary Under-Secretaries) Amendment Bill — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeMitchell Mark: Official Information (Parliamentary Under-Secretaries) Amendment Bill — Second Reading[Sitting date: 25 May 2016. Volume:714;Page:11299. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]MARK MITCHELL (National—Rodney): It is my pleasure to take a call on this the Official Information (Parliamentary Under-Secretaries) Amendment Bill. I would like to acknowledge the chair and the other members of the Government Administration Committee who worked on this bill.National voted against the bill—we did vote against the bill at the first reading—because we felt that there is an important distinction that is drawn between the executive which is subject to the Official Information Act (OIA) and Parliament which is not. I will come back to that point a little later in my speech.The work of the parliamentary under-secretaries can be sought through the Minister they are responsible to. Having gone through the select committee process however which was thorough and after hearing the submissions it was apparent to us that the public would like more accountability and transparency around the parliamentary under-secretaries in Government and we felt that this bill did achieve that. Therefore we decided that we would support the bill.I did want to address one comment that was made by the chair of the committee and it was directed at David Seymour. I know that in the first reading I referred to this bill as the “Pick on David Seymour Bill” because I felt that it was politically motivated and that it was directed at a member of Parliament and the leader of the ACT Party David Seymour. But tonight we have been told by the Opposition that this is not the case—that it is not about David; it is about parliamentary under-secretaries.There are two things that I want to raise that would contradict that. The first is the statement made by the member sponsoring the bill Adrian Rurawhe and I want to acknowledge the member who is in the House tonight. This is what he said: “My bill is a direct challenge to the anomaly in how parliamentary under-secretaries are treated with respect to the OIA. Parliamentary under-secretaries exercise delegated authority from ministers in specific policy areas but they are not subject to the Official Information Act 1982. There is no reason for this to be the case. Under-secretaries are undertaking work as part of the executive branch of Government and they must be accountable to the public in the same manner as the rest of the executive.”That statement I accept and I support 100 percent and if it had been left there then I could also accept the argument that this was not directed at David Seymour or even at a policy that he has been the sponsor of—that is our charter schools. That is a policy that the Opposition and Labour are against. But the member sponsoring this bill went on to say this—and I know that Mr Cunliffe is speaking after me and maybe he can address this for us. The member went on to say: “After the last election ACT Party leader David Seymour was appointed an under-secretary to the Minister of Education with responsibilities for charter schools.” So now he has introduced David Seymour into the debate. Now he has introduced the charter schools policy into the debate which would be in direct contradiction to what the select committee chair just got up and said—that it was not about David Seymour.The member went on to say: “He is also the under-secretary to the Minister for Regulatory Reform. Charter schools were excluded from the OIA when they were set up an arrangement the Chief Ombudsman said may be unconstitutional.”—that is fair enough raising that point; I accept that—“It is therefore vitally important that those with oversight responsibility for these schools such as Mr Seymour are subject to proper democratic accountability. National and David Seymour may claim that they have already accounted for this with respect to Mr Seymour’s delegated responsibilities; if so why do they have such a problem supporting a bill that seeks to correct the anomaly in legislation?”The point that I would make is that although we have decided to support the bill I still feel strongly that this was a bill that was directed at David Seymour and that it was directed at the charter schools policy which as we have seen has actually been very successful. I would invite the speaker from the Labour Party who is following me Mr Cunliffe—Carmel Sepuloni: He’s not following you Mark.MARK MITCHELL: Well—Hon David Cunliffe: I’ve never followed you Mark. I’ve never been able to follow you.MARK MITCHELL: That is true. That is very true David but you did seem very excited and very interested in this debate so maybe you will get the chance—I would have liked to have heard you on the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). That would have been interesting your position on the TPP because we thought you might have been a free trader. Maybe I got that wrong.Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: However we are not talking about that just now.MARK MITCHELL: Sorry Mr Deputy Speaker. The other thing that I wanted to mention about this bill is that I want to come back to the first point that I made around the distinction between the executive and Parliament because most of us in this House pride ourselves on the fact that our primary role or one of our primary roles is serving the communities that elect us to represent them. A big part of that is that all of us will sit down and we will have a constituent clinic where a constituent is able to come into our office and they often share personal information and we are often the last port of call in terms of being able to help them to remove some of the stress that they are under. It is really important that they are able to come in with confidence and know that the sensitive and personal information that they share with us is protected and is going to be treated confidentially.One thing that I did speak about in my first reading speech and I did use a military term—and certainly our New Zealand Defence Force people would have known what I was talking about when I said “mission creep”. Effectively what that means is that you start off with one idea and then gradually it starts to change and transform. I think the danger around this bill to a certain extent is that now that it is before the House—and I think the leader of the ACT Party alluded to this—where do we start and where do we stop? Maybe we could see some Supplementary Order Papers come in asking or at least challenging as to why say the leaders of Opposition parties are not also subjected to the same level of transparency. Government should be without a doubt and we accept that and I am proud of the fact that this Government is extremely transparent and continues to move and look for ways to be even more transparent. There is one thing that is very very true in politics and it is that the thing that will get you is the attempt to make a cover up on something. The minute that happens—Richard Prosser: Transparency and lack of opacity aren’t the same things.MARK MITCHELL: I hear New Zealand First members laughing. I do not know whether they have got experience of that but they seem to be supporting the comment.Anyway I am very happy and very pleased to have been able to take a call on this the second reading and I just highlight the fact that we in the National Party will be supporting the bill. Thank you.