Ardern Shane: Births Deaths Marriages and Relationships Registration Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Ardern Shane: Births Deaths Marriages and Relationships Registration Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:647;Page:15995] 
SHANE ARDERN (National—Taranaki-King Country) 
: 
 I rise in opposition to this Births Deaths Marriages and Relationships Registration Amendment Bill for a lot of the reasons that have been stated. I have been wondering for some time until I listened to the Minister tonight and looked at the number of Supplementary Order Papers about what was really going on but I think I have now figured it out. We certainly could not figure it out in the Government Administration Committee. I acknowledge the officials and the work that they did to help us to find our way along a very difficult path in the select committee. 
What I think has happened is that Dr Michael Cullen—for whom I hesitate to admit in front of my colleagues tonight I have a reasonable amount of admiration for his ability to manage the House process as a politician and as someone who has survived in this place for a long time—has gone through the legislative time frame looking forward for the next 3 months or 6 months. He has decided that the Order Paper is very thin and that we need to go back and look at legislation that has a few years on it. Last night we were debating legislation that had nothing wrong with it but it was passed in 1946. Tonight we are debating legislation that was passed in 1956 and there is nothing wrong with that. What I can see happening is that the Leader of the House has told his ministerial colleagues to get someone maybe a PhD student to trawl through all the legislation in Parliament and find something the Government can put up because it needs something to go on in order to fill up the time of the House. So we have the Births Deaths Marriages and Relationships Registration Amendment Bill to debate in the Chamber tonight. 
The select committee did do its work. We went through a thorough process I say to the Minister in the chair the Hon Rick Barker. All of the concerns raised during that process were totally overlooked or overruled until the Government members did the numbers and hello they counted their fingers and toes. Rick Barker kicked one of his shoes off and hello he found that things were not adding up here. 
Hon Member 
: Six toes. 
SHANE ARDERN 
: Right! Well he asked where the Government should start and what should happen now. He went back and started with the point of least resistance. He knew that the Nats had dug in a bit so he went to the Greens and asked what their concerns were. He ran through their concerns and said two or three Supplementary Order Papers should be able to fix those concerns up. That was a few numbers in the bag. 
Then Rick Barker went to New Zealand First which has Peter Brown who had quite a few concerns about the bill. He raised them legitimately in the select committee and he did a fine job of doing that. Rick Barker thought that he had better get Peter Brown’s concerns tidied so he asked what he needed to do in order to achieve that. And what do we know members get here tonight with—well I do not know how many Supplementary Order Papers we are up to now. I say to the Minister that the Supplementary Order Papers are pretty good. They have on them most of what was suggested to him at the time of the select committee process. Here we are tonight in the Committee stage of this bill with something like what was recommended at the beginning which might have been a bit of useful legislation. 
But the reality is this. We had genealogists we had academics and we had all sorts of people with all sorts of qualifications—even journalists—appear before the select committee. We had the editors of both the  
Dominion Post  
and the  
New Zealand Herald  
appear before the select committee representing the wider journalism fraternity. They said to us in no uncertain terms—in fact I got myself into a bit of strife by taking on one or two of them—that this bill would make the information that they need to report from time to time much more difficult. They said that they would not have such easy access as they do at present to accurate information for things that are important to the public if this bill was to proceed in the way that had been intended to. Some of the genealogists said that they would not be able to carry out what most people would see as being in our best interests whether as individuals or as the public at large if this bill was to pass in the way that it was. 
So I am pleased that the Minister has gone back looked at some of the submissions and produced the Supplementary Order Papers that he has produced tonight. But at this stage the National Party—now that the Government has denied those who have contributed to the legislation the opportunity to participate in the process in the select committee—will not support such a shonky process. So we cannot support the passage of this legislation. National members are concerned about the lack of a clear problem definition. There was no problem. We asked about the fraudulent behaviour or activity that might take place and we also asked about potential fraud that could take place given that we are now moving into a more digital age of recording and computerised information. We asked at that stage about any evidence there was of fraud—any evidence—or where the potential for fraud might be and we were unable to find such evidence. There was all sorts of speculation—you know; if one stepped out on the road then one might get run over and if the moon falls then the world will go off its apex. 
Progress to be reported presently. 
House resumed. 
The Chairperson reported the debate on the performance and current operations of Crown entities public organisations and State enterprises; progress on the Births Deaths Marriages and Relationships Registration Amendment Bill; and no progress on the Family Court Matters Bill. 
Report adopted.