Smith Lockwood: Government Superannuation Fund Amendment Bill (No 2) — In Committee 
Smith Lockwood: Government Superannuation Fund Amendment Bill (No 2) — In Committee 
[Volume:606;Page:3838] 
Dr the Hon LOCKWOOD SMITH (NZ National—Rodney) 
: 
 The Government Superannuation Fund Amendment Bill (No 2) is a small bill of no more than three pages. It affects a very limited number of people—about 800 adults and some 19 children. However that does not mean to say it is not an important bill. It affects the very lives of those few people in a very significant way. 
The Government should realise that the title of the bill is not very helpful. If one looks at the development of the titles of bills in recent years one will see there has been a movement to try to make sure that the titles are helpful to those scanning them to try to understand what they are about. If for example one looks at the titles of taxation amendment bills one will see they have helpful words in them to help people understand what the bills are about. There is an income tax bill in front of the House at the moment that has tax rates for Maori in it and the title says that; it talks about tax rates for Maori among other things. But this bill is called the Government Superannuation Fund Amendment Bill (No 2). That gives us no guide as to what this bill is about. 
I understand that what Rodney Hide has just been telling the Committee is absolutely correct: the Government Superannuation Fund has lost $380 million in the last 14 months. What Rod Donald has just told the Committee is absolutely true: beneficiaries of the Government Superannuation Fund do not have to be particularly worried about that because their entitlements are guaranteed. It is the taxpayers of New Zealand who should be saying to this Government: “What the hell are you doing losing all this money that we taxpayers then have to make up?”. That is a hugely important issue but the title of this bill should make it clear that for example the bill is not designed to remedy that problem. Given the fact that the fund has lost $380 million in the last 14 months anyone could assume this is a bill designed to remedy that. Why would someone not assume that? It is the most significant issue affecting the Government Superannuation Fund in the last 12 months and if people see that there is an amendment bill maybe they will assume that it is designed to remedy that problem but it is not. If I recollect correctly there was an amendment bill to the Government Superannuation Fund within the last 2 years that actually freed up the investment of funds in the Government Superannuation Fund. 
That is the problem with this title. It does not remotely indicate what the bill is about and that is not good enough. I think Rod Donald had a fairly useful recommendation for the title. It should be the “Government Superannuation Fund (Spouses Annuities and Children’s Allowances) Amendment Bill”. That would be a useful title because it would help those who use Acts of Parliament in their professional work and the citizens of this country who need to refer to the laws of the land to find legislation that is important to a limited number of people. Anyone searching titles in future will have no idea what on earth this title means. There is nothing in either subclause (1) or subclause (2) of the title clause that says what this bill is about. 
Rather than Dr Cullen standing up and protesting about Rodney Hide mentioning that the Government Superannuation Fund has lost more money under his stewardship than under that of any other Minister of Finance in probably all time rather than his being embarrassed by that and getting testy about it I would have thought that as Minister it would be useful for Dr Cullen to propose an amendment to identify the bill. It would not be very difficult. It would have been quite simple to amend the title to make the bill readily identifiable and to make it more useful to those who may need to read it in the future. I suggest that instead of raising points of order the Minister should be doing that. 
The difficulty of a title like this in the short term—apart from the fact that in the long term people will not know what the legislation is all about—is that the Government cannot close down what members say about it because it is a totally general title. We are not permitted to debate Parts 1 and 2 of the bill in the debate on the title—that would be outside the Standing Orders—so we are debating what is probably the most general title I have ever seen. There will be a lot of debate on it.