Genter Julie Anne: Companies and Limited Partnerships Amendment Bill — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeGenter Julie Anne: Companies and Limited Partnerships Amendment Bill — Second Reading[Sitting date: 02 July 2013. Volume:691;Page:11434. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]JULIE ANNE GENTER (Green):E te Kaihautū o te Whare tēnā koe. E ngā mana e ngā reo e ngā mātāwaka e rarau mai nei tēnā koutou katoa. Tēnā koe Mr Assistant Speaker.[Mr Assistant Speaker of the House greetings to you. To the authorities languages and ethnicities settled here salutations to you all. Thank you Mr Assistant Speaker .]I rise to speak on behalf of the Green Party on the second reading of the Companies and Limited Partnerships Amendment Bill. I would like to start by discussing some of the broader issues of companies and company regulation in our current globalised economy and then I will speak to the specifics in the bill before us.The Green Party is very interested in tools that we can use to get a clean green economy that works for all New Zealanders not just the few not just the mates of the National Government. Our global reputation as a clean green and fair place to live and do business is essential to this end and the Green Party believes that it is an important responsibility of government to make sure that the reality backs up and enhances our global reputation. This John Key - led National Government is doing just about everything it can to ensure that New Zealand does not live up to its global image as a clean green and fair place to do business and the Green Party—The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Order! I must remind the member that when we are on a second reading speeches must be related to the bill. You can comment on things related to the bill but you cannot make the substantive matter of your speech other than what is in the second reading. There are a number of Speakers’ rulings. I refer you to Speakers’ ruling 110/6 and Speaker’s ruling 112/2. I ask the member to come back to the contents of the bill.JULIE ANNE GENTER: Thank you Mr Assistant Speaker. I was getting to the contents of the bill which ultimately is a consequence of this Government’s failure to manage the economy well. This Government knew about the problems related to company registrations in New Zealand and the large number of New Zealand - registered companies that were engaged in international illegal fraudulent activity—money-laundering—3 years ago and it has taken 3 years for the second reading of this bill to come before the House. It took over 2 years for this bill to get its first reading before the House. I think that it is an example of the Government’s failure to manage the economy well and its failure to put in place important regulatory frameworks that would protect those New Zealand businesses that want to do the right thing.Most business people and most citizens are honest and want to do the right thing but those who want to make an honest living and want to do business without ripping off people or the natural environment are disadvantaged by a lack of Government regulation that levels the playing field. They are disadvantaged in a number of ways. First of all they can be easily undercut by competitors that cut costs by cutting corners; or in the case of the problem addressed by this bill New Zealand businesses that trade overseas have had a layer of compliance cost and regulation foisted on to them by this Government’s failure to act on fraudulent and irresponsible companies for 3 years. This amendment bill finally addresses a serious problem that the Government has been extremely slow to act on which is the large number of New Zealand - registered companies that have been engaged in large-scale tax-laundering money-laundering and fraud internationally.In 2011 and again in 2012 my colleague Dr Russel Norman asked questions and called media attention precisely on this issue because the Government was taking so long to act. It had not prioritised the issue. It was back in July 2010 that Simon Power a former Minister of Commerce got Cabinet agreement to tighten up the rules and deal with the serious problem of money-laundering. We are now in July 2013. Why did this bill which is not even as tough as international best practice would have it be take 3 years to get to its second reading before the House?We are happy to see the minor moves towards tightening things up that are proposed in this bill. The criminalisation of serious breaches of certain directors’ duties is well overdue. We would like to see the same sort of tough-on-criminals stance that this Government likes to talk about all the time applied to white-collar criminals and company directors who have not been living up to their responsibilities.The requirement to have a director who lives in New Zealand has actually been watered down in the bill as it has come back to the House from the Commerce Committee. We did think that it was probably appropriate to at least have an agent who was in New Zealand to ensure that we had some identifiable individual who had some sort of substantive connection with the company who could be questioned about the activities of the company and who could in certain circumstances be held to account. Unfortunately that requirement was dropped during the select committee process.There is a question about whether or not the Government is actually living up to its responsibility to put in place the boundaries that will enable honest clean green businesses to thrive here in New Zealand when it is listening primarily to company directors. Is this Government sufficiently independent to put in place a serious regulatory regime that is going to enable those businesses that are doing the right thing to continue doing the right thing?Today in the House we have heard a lot from the Government from the Minister about the need for balance. We hear the word “balance” used quite a lot but we do not see a lot of actual balance. We see a lot of preferential treatment for some big companies. Actually it strikes me that the National Government is kind of like a parentwho gives in to every demand of an already spoilt child when it talks about being pro-business. Instead of putting in place the boundaries that will enable companies to thrive and enable new companies to be formed and instead of creating a truly competitive environment it tends to privilege the existing big businesses like Skycity like its mates.So it is not actually a pro-business environment that is being facilitated by this bill; it is a kind of knee-jerk anti-regulation approach which does not recognise the important role in the wake of the global financial crisis that the Government has to play in ensuring that consumers and investors have the appropriate information to make decisions. As the global financial crisis proved the neo-liberal consensus of the 1980s and 1990s—that the least-regulated economy was the one that functioned best—is not the case.As our economy becomes ever more complicated complex and globalised that asymmetry of information makes it easier for companies to make a quick buck and for international organisations with nefarious activities to set up shop and get some sort of registration in New Zealand which they can then use to ends that actually undermine the reputation of New Zealand business internationally.The Green Party will be supporting this bill even though we regret that it does not require registered companies to obtain Inland Revenue Department numbers it does not address the problems around nominee directors it has dropped the requirement for an appointed agent to be resident in New Zealand and ultimately it does not go very far. We are quite happy to support it because finally after 3 years we are seeing some action on this important problem which is a threat to our reputation globally. Thank you.