Curran Clare: New Zealand Business Number Bill — Third ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeCurran Clare: New Zealand Business Number Bill — Third Reading[Sitting date: 12 April 2016. Volume:713;Page:10436. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]CLARE CURRAN (Labour—Dunedin South): You know when the Minister Judith Collins gets up and reads a third reading speech in a very quiet monotone voice that there is a problem with the bill and there certainly are some real problems with the New Zealand Business Number Bill. This is a bill that when it came before the Commerce Committee had general support across the House. And the more that we teased into it the more that the submitters came and spoke to us about it the more we realised how unprepared this Government was and how it had not done the work that needed to be done before a bill such as this was introduced and the more we realised how deeply flawed it was.Labour is supporting this bill tonight with very strong reservations. We support it in this third reading because of the intent and because ultimately we all agreed in the first reading and at the select committee in the process and that this was actually a good idea. We had no idea though that this Government had not done the work that it needed to do. And if you want the proof of that pudding the proof was that in her third reading speech the Minister Judith Collins said that 183 I think Government agencies were being consulted with around whether or not they would implement the New Zealand Business Number that that was yet to be determined and that there was “hope” that would happen in the near future. We heard that word used several times by the member Melissa Lee who was the chair of the select committee. We heard that word used several times in her speech—around how “hopefully” this New Zealand Business Number will be implemented across the public sector. Well quite frankly it is not good enough to bring a bill to the House and say: “Hopefully the public sector will actually implement it.”This leads to the main flaws in this bill—the two main flaws that were attempted to be dealt with during the Committee stage by my New Zealand First colleague on the select committee Ria Bond and my colleague from the Labour Party David Clark with the two amendments that were put forward in the Committee stage and were voted down by this Government which would have dealt with the two issues around the time line and the intention of this bill actually being realised. Unfortunately sense did not prevail and I think that is a deep shame because there were opportunities in this bill to make some real change for the business community for the private sector and also across the public sector across Government agencies. There have been words used around transforming the economy. Well there is no evidence that this bill will in the short to medium term transform the economy. I think it is going to take another Government being voted in to actually see the realisation of the true intent behind this bill and I think that is a deep shame because—Brett Hudson: I think it’d be a deep shame if Labour were voted in absolutely.CLARE CURRAN: It is a deep shame and we were told this by numerous submitters. We were told this by the Chartered Accountants we were told this by Federated Farmers we were told this by other submitters—that if this bill did not get implemented across the public sector then it was a sham. And the outcome through this whole process was that the Government could not deliver. I think that is a testament to a Government that really has lost its way a Government that is not doing the work that it should do before it brings a bill of this substance to a select committee and a Government that really is not as my colleague David Clark said looking out for the interests of small business across New Zealand is not paying attention and is trying to introduce something that is actually not going to work in the short term.We are deeply concerned that the Government has not outlined a clear plan or committed the necessary funds for the bill’s stated purpose to be achieved. I think the Opposition in good faith did its best through this process to say that actually this is what the Government needs to do and that we need to have these things in place. But the Government was not listening and is just as it does with all pieces of legislation—or you know 99.9 percent of legislation—railroading it through because it has the numbers on the floor of the House even though some of the most significant submitters coming before the select committee really had severe concerns.One of our concerns in the short to medium term is that this is just another number. We heard no convincing reason through this whole process why the IRD number should or could not be adapted to achieve one universal number for interaction with the Government. I do not know whether we have an actual number for how many actual Government departments have committed to the initial roll-out of the New Zealand Business Number but we heard through the third reading speech from the Minister that there is going to be a plan to implement the legislation through whole-of-Government directions. That is just Government-speak for saying “We did not do the work. We did not do the work and we have to go back and actually consult properly with those different agencies to try to come back with some kind of figure.”These 183 agencies—surely there should be some direction to those agencies around whether or not they are going to commit to this legislation. This is legislation being presumably passed in this House tonight. Why are those Government agencies not being required to commit to that tonight? Why is it going to take an unspecified amount of time for that to happen? What kind of signal does that send to the private sector and to small businesses across New Zealand about whether or not adopting yet another number is going to be effective? What kind of signal does this send to New Zealand about the economy and the transformation of the economy that this bill is supposed to have the effect of? This bill is a shambles. It should not have been a shambles. It should have gone smoothly through all of its stages but it did not. It has had stiff opposition from across the House around the substance of the bill and the deep flaws within it and that is a significant issue.Labour recognises—absolutely recognises—the need to support businesses by cutting red tape where possible to reduce the cost of business transactions for small businesses whether they are sole traders partnerships trusts or whatever. But we believe absolutely that this Government has put itself in the position where it cannot deliver on the promise that lies behind this bill which is why we are giving it only qualified support.The bill hoped to enable Government to provide more consistent and joined-up services saving businesses time and enabling greater e-commerce between businesses and we believe that this bill falls disappointingly short in the short to medium term because the Government has provided no evidence—no evidence—that this will be anything other in the short to medium term than just another number. It has sold itself short and it sold New Zealand short by not providing a credible time line by not putting the resources in place and by not requiring the public sector and all those Government agencies to adhere to what it says is going to transform the economy. This is a disappointing bill.