Volume 695 Week 61 - Tuesday 3 December 2013Text is incorporated into the Bound VolumeVolume 695 Week 61 - Tuesday 3 December 2013[Sitting date: 03 December 2013. Volume:695;Page:15113. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Tuesday 3 December 2013Mr Speaker took the Chair at 2 p.m.Prayers.Questions to MinistersState-owned Assets Sales—Genesis Energy and Public Support1.Dr RUSSEL NORMAN (Co-Leader—Green) to thePrime Minister: Does he stand by all his statements on Government policy?Rt Hon JOHN KEY (Prime Minister): Yes in the context they were made in.Dr Russel Norman: Does he stand by his reported statement on asset sales that “the sales process could be delayed if market conditions were unsuitable.”; if so what would constitute unsuitable conditions to pursue the sale of Genesis Energy?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: Yes; any vendor always reserves the right to not take an asset to market. One would assume that the conditions would be ones that would see a poor price received by the Crown.Dr Russel Norman: Does he agree with Brian Gaynor of Milford Asset Management that there is not a “hope in hell” of the Genesis sale going ahead and that “Unless things change dramatically for Mighty River Power and Meridian it won’t happen.”? And if he does not agree why not?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: No I do not agree with Brian Gaynor but I do agree with David Hay who thinks there is not a hope in hell of him getting a fair trial from the Greens.Kevin Hague: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. It would be appreciated if you could prevent the Prime Minister from including extraneous material—Mr SPEAKER: Order! I will certainly do my best to assist members asking supplementary questions. In that particular case the member asked two questions within the one supplementary question. The Prime Minister very adequately addressed the first one.Dr Russel Norman: Does he agree with the statement by William Curtayne of Milford Asset Management on the odds of the Genesis sale going ahead when he said: “It depends on the Government’s desperation to get rid of it. There is always a price for an asset. If they want to take a big haircut they will likely be able to sell it”? And if he does not agree why not?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: No. What I can tell the member is that the Government has received around about $4 billion so far for the assets it has brought to the market. We know that the member does not like the mixed-ownership programme. We know that he wants New Zealanders to have democracy and to vote on that but when it comes to democracy in the Green Party he is trying to stamp it out.Grant Robertson: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. In the last question time we had in relation to Mr Joyce you made a ruling about the continuous inclusion in answers by Ministers of material that was not relevant to the question—that is under Standing Order 383/2—and you noted yourself that that would lead to disorder in the House. We have now had two answers from the Prime Minister today that have done that. There will be disorder and I ask you to bring him into line.Mr SPEAKER: When I made a ruling on the Thursday of the last sitting week it was with regard to a Minister immediately starting an answer with an attack on the person who was asking the question. I referred to Speaker’s ruling 176/3 and pointed out that that in itself leads to disorder. In this particular case the question was asked ithad political connotations and I think the Prime Minister addressed it and equally with a political flick back. That is part of this political exchange.Dr Russel Norman: Does he agree with the recentDominion Post editorial that said: “The Government’s asset sales programme has been an unmitigated disaster—so disastrous it borders on economic vandalism. Valuable assets built up over generations have been hocked off at firesale prices to a handful of investors because Mr Key’s Government could not bear to admit now was not the right time to sell.”?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: No what I do believe is that the Government has brought to market companies that have generated $4 billion approximately in assets. We will see those companies operating better and we will have a better oversight when it comes to those companies. If the member does not like it he should rise to the challenge I issued to him last week and buy them back. He would have to borrow the money. Or in the case of that member he would print the money. If he wants to get—Mr SPEAKER: Order! That answer now is quite sufficiently long.Dr Russel Norman: Does he agree with the editorial in theMarlborough Expressthat “[No] voter should disregard those referendum papers when they arrive in the mail … Even if assets-sales opponents can’t make themselves heeded they can make themselves heard … This being the case—whatever they think—it is far far better to speak up.” and to have your voice?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: As I seriously made the point before the member wants to parade around the country using taxpayers’ money to make New Zealanders go and vote on something that was the major campaign plank of this Government and its election result with a record number in 2011. The member has just gone out today and in a press release called me a Muldoonist and he is running around snuffing out any chance of a tilt at leadership. Well that is Muldoonist if you ask me.Rt Hon Winston Peters: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. That is four questions and four replies and they all repeat the first second and third mistake in the end—the Prime Minister abusing a questioner who is legitimately going about their business. When are you going to throw him out?Mr SPEAKER: When I determine that it is necessary to do so. [Interruption] Order! Otherwise there may be some people leaving the Chamber early. That was a question that again had a political loading and if members ask questions with political loading they are likely to get an answer back with some political overtones.Dr Russel Norman: In light of the growing consensus from the business world from the media and from the public that asset sales have failed are an economic disaster and should be stopped will he cancel his plans to sell Genesis Energy?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: I just do not agree with the proposition of the member. We know he does not like the programme and we know he wants to go and print money or borrow more money—that is the way the Green Party’s economic policy works. But normal New Zealanders do not want more debt on the balance sheet; they want better-performing assets and they want a stock market that has more variety. This is a member who wants New Zealanders to invest their KiwiSaver accounts in Australian electricity companies but is not prepared to have them invested in New Zealand ones.Economy—Reports and Forecasts2.JOHN HAYES (National—Wairarapa) to theMinister of Finance: What reports has he received on business confidence and the outlook for investment and jobs?Hon BILL ENGLISH (Minister of Finance): ANZ last week released its ANZ Business Outlook for November. The report shows that a net 61 percent of businesses are optimistic about the year ahead which is just below a 15-year high. The retail sector is the most optimistic recording the largest lift in confidence in November to a 19-yearhigh. A net 39 percent of agricultural firms expect increased activity which is also a 19-year high suggesting a broad-based improvement in business confidence. A net 47 percent of firms expect increased activity in their own businesses and that is around a 14-year high. Investment intentions and hiring intentions are at the highest in 10 years. ANZ noted that this result suggests positive growth prospects for jobs and the economy because businesses have the confidence to invest more money and employ more people.John Hayes: What other reports has he received on New Zealand’s improving economic outlook and how are interest rates expected to respond to higher growth?Hon BILL ENGLISH: The New Zealand Institute of Economic Research recently released its quarterly predictions. It forecast a continuing recovery with growth of 3 percent next year in line with forecasts from the Reserve Bank and Treasury. It forecast that economic growth is likely to deliver more investment more jobs and more wage increases. Firms are advertising and hiring more and hours worked in the economy have now recovered back to pre-recession levels. The New Zealand Institute of Economic Research expects interest rates to rise in 2014 as higher growth starts to hit capacity constraints in the economy. This has been clearly signalled by the Reserve Bank for some time and businesses are generally anticipating some interest rate increases.John Hayes: How are business confidence and hiring intentions translating into more jobs and higher economic growth?Hon BILL ENGLISH: There is an ongoing improvement in the outlook for jobs. In the year to September employment increased by 53700 new jobs and wages grew faster than expected and were ahead of inflation. Unemployment fell to 6.2 percent in September but it is still too high. New Zealand’s annual economic growth is currently 2.5 percent but as it picks up and companies follow through on their intentions to hire more people we would expect to see the creation of yet more jobs. Overall this picture is reasonably encouraging but there is plenty more work to do.John Hayes: What steps is the Government taking to build on this improved business and consumer confidence to help deliver investment jobs and growth?Hon BILL ENGLISH: The Government is continuing a broad programme of microeconomic reform designed to support businesses to make the decision to invest another dollar and employ another person. That programme has set out over 300 initiatives in the Business Growth Agenda. This is contributing to business confidence but the credit for recovery belongs to people in New Zealand’s workplaces who have been resilient and productive through difficult times. They will be looking forward to the prospects of more workers alongside them in the workplace higher wage increases and some dividends from economic growth.Hon David Parker: Does the same New Zealand Institute of Economic Research report for December from which he just quoted say that “Auckland house prices have surged to unprecedented levels relative to history and international experience …” that the average house price in Auckland now costs 10 times the average household income compared with the historic norm of three to four times and that “There is more borrowing and the risk from a potential fall in house prices is high.”; if it does say that does this imbalance in the economy together with declining rates in homeownership not show that National’s housing policy is in disarray?Hon BILL ENGLISH: No it does not show that. Auckland housing is too expensive. That is why the Government started 3 years ago on a programme that has led to the announcement just a few weeks ago of several thousand opportunities for new development and several thousand more will be announced before Christmas. I look forward to the Opposition supporting the Government’s housing accords its ResourceManagement Act reforms and its attempts to free up the supply of new housing to make housing more affordable for New Zealanders.Immigration Policy—Impact on Labour Market3.Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First) to theMinister of Immigration: Does he stand by his statement “I want to make it clear that jobs for New Zealanders will always be the number one priority”; if so why?Hon NIKKI KAYE (Associate Minister of Immigration) on behalf of theMinister of Immigration: Yes because it is true.Rt Hon Winston Peters: If the answer is: “Yes because it is true.” was he making New Zealand students the No. 1 priority when the Government changed the rules so that foreign students could work in New Zealand whilst they studied in New Zealand; if so how?Hon NIKKI KAYE: The reason we made those changes is that there is actually clear evidence that international students contribute significantly to the economy. I would be happy to get the member specific figures around the contribution that they make but he may be aware that there was a recent report that showed that significant contribution.Rt Hon Winston Peters: Does he believe it will be harder or easier for New Zealand students to get New Zealand jobs over the holidays when they now have to compete with foreign students applying for the very same jobs in the New Zealand economy?Hon NIKKI KAYE: I think you have to take a number of things into account when you answer that question. The first thing I would say which is repeating what I said before is that there is a significant economic contribution made by those people so there are jobs that are sometimes created by some of those people coming into the labour market. The second thing I would say is that there is a range of other contributions that international migrants make. If you actually look at the international migrant investor category for instance which I think is contributing about—Rt Hon Winston Peters: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. My question was very exact—Mr SPEAKER: Order! I heard the question. What is the point of order?Rt Hon Winston Peters: Well I am about to make it—Mr SPEAKER: Yes.Rt Hon Winston Peters: —if you will give me slight chance to do that.Mr SPEAKER: I will give the member every chance to—Rt Hon Winston Peters: The Standing Orders require the Minister to be to the point and to answer the question. My question was is it harder or easier—Mr SPEAKER: Order! I have heard enough. [Interruption] Order! The member asked a question. The Minister was addressing that question quite adequately. The member cannot demand an answer in terms of whether it would be harder or easier. The member has other supplementary questions. If he wants a more incisive answer to his questions then he had better design a more incisive question.Rt Hon Winston Peters: I can do it better than you can. [Interruption]Mr SPEAKER: Order! Supplementary question Brendan Horan. [Interruption] Order! I have called Brendan Horan for a supplementary question.Rt Hon Winston Peters: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. [Interruption]Mr SPEAKER: No it is a point of order so it will be heard in silence.Rt Hon Winston Peters: I seek a clarification of your ruling there. If you would like it to be more incisive how would you be more incisive than to—Mr SPEAKER: Order! The member will resume his seat. [Interruption] The member will resume his seat. He is now challenging a decision I made about the adequacy of the answer and to use a point of order to do that will lead to disorder.Brendan Horan: How can the Minister be serious about making jobs for New Zealanders the No. 1 priority when last year his department issued over 145000 temporary work visas for heartland Kiwi jobs including nearly 2000 dairy farm workers and even 507 truck drivers?Hon NIKKI KAYE: I cannot confirm the figures that he mentions but what I can tell him is that over the last 5 years there has been a drop of about 20000 in the number of work visas issued. So under our Government I think we are having that balance of investing in New Zealanders and ensuring that they are at the front of the queue while seeing a significant drop in terms of those work visas.Brendan Horan: I seek leave to table a Official Information Act response to over 145000 temporary work visas having been issued in the past year including—Mr SPEAKER: Order! Leave is sought to table this Official Information Act response. Is there any objection to that being tabled? There is. Supplementary question the Rt Hon Winston Peters—sorry the right honourable Prime Minister John Key.Rt Hon John Key: To the Minister—[Interruption]Mr SPEAKER: Order! I apologise to the Prime Minister.Rt Hon Winston Peters: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. My point of order is that now I do deserve an apology.Mr SPEAKER: The member will not be here for much longer to receive any apologies at all; I can assure him of that.Rt Hon John Key: Could the Minister tell the House whether it will be easier for a student to get a job over summer if they are working for a company that could be exporting to China—to which there is now $8 billion worth of exports taking place—if they go to a company that might have a 90-day probationary period if they are part of the businesses enjoying interest rates at a 50-year low—Mr SPEAKER: Order! [Interruption] Order! The question is now certainly long enough. Will the Minister please address it.Hon NIKKI KAYE: That is an excellent question.Grant Robertson: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. Most of that material was not even close to being within the responsibility of the Minister of Immigration.Mr SPEAKER: Order! I ask the member to look at the primary question. The question then asked whether it is easier to get jobs etc. That refers back to—Grant Robertson: And there was a whole lot of material that was nothing to do with it.Mr SPEAKER: There was quite a lot of material in it and when I realised the extent of the material that the Prime Minister was trying to outlay I brought him to heel. [Interruption] Order! This close to Christmas I would be reluctant to be asking members to leave the House but if this disorder continues I will not hesitate to do so. Would the Minister please complete the answer.Hon NIKKI KAYE: As I said before that is an excellent question. I can confirm that what the Prime Minister mentioned is only half of the initiatives that we have done under our Government to ensure that young people have access to a job. Yes under our Government more of them will be able to get jobs because of the excellent economic policies that we have implemented.Rt Hon Winston Peters: If the reason for export education is to attract more foreign students who will pay for their New Zealand education with foreign money from their foreign economy in order to benefit our export education economy how does exporteducation work if the foreign student is unable to pay for their education here without first working in our economy?Hon NIKKI KAYE: With regard to the first part of the question I would say to him that my understanding is that the changes we recently made around student workers’ rights will contribute $2.6 billion to the international education sector.Rt Hon Winston Peters: This is not an answer at all for goodness’ sake!Hon NIKKI KAYE: Yes it is because it actually translates to 28000 jobs. So the point Mr Peters is that it is not just about the visas that are issued. It is about the jobs that are created by the international education sector and our estimate is that that is 28000 more jobs for young New Zealanders.Rt Hon Winston Peters: How on earth can an export education policy work or make any sense at all when New Zealand students are already struggling to find jobs in this country and when Australia has just shut down the option of work for the same students whom he is allowing to work in our country?Hon NIKKI KAYE: We set our immigration policies for what is best for New Zealand. As I said before the way that it works is the international education sector contributes a significant amount in terms of new jobs and 28000 is what we anticipate as a result of the changes that we have announced. For instance in the electorate of Auckland Central I can tell you that there are a number of education institutions that are creating real jobs for students over the summer because of those young people coming to study here.Health and Safety Workplace—Corporate Responsibility and Legislative Reform4.Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE (Leader of the Opposition) to thePrime Minister: Does he stand by his statement that corporate manslaughter legislation was “off the table”?Rt Hon JOHN KEY (Prime Minister): In a word no. I did not use the phrase “off the table”. What I actually said was I had some discussion with the Attorney-General about it and the last discussion I had certainly did not indicate that that was where we were likely to go.Hon David Cunliffe: Is the Prime Minister now hedging on this matter because his justice Minister Judith Collins has said she is still awaiting advice and investigation?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: No. What is true is that Ministry of Justice officials have been looking at the issue of corporate manslaughter but the Minister of Justice advises me that there have been very few successful prosecutions. What I am also aware of is that the changes that we are actually making in relation to workplace safety legislation mean that they will include harsher penalties and specific duties on directors relating to health and safety including prison in some extreme cases. So it is unlikely that corporate manslaughter will be necessary.Hon David Cunliffe: Given that three-quarters of New Zealanders polled favour the criminalisation of corporate manslaughter is his reluctance to move forward not based on one set of rules for his corporate mates and another for people who get killed in mining and forestry?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: If the member is—[Interruption]Tracey Martin: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I take offence to the word “tosser” being used inside Parliament by the Hon Tau Henare.Mr SPEAKER: I did not hear the interjection but if the member has taken offence at the interjection I ask Tau Henare whether he interjected with that word; if so could he withdraw and apologise.Hon Tau Henare: I withdraw and apologise.Mr SPEAKER: Thank you. I think to be fair to the member we will have the question again.Hon David Cunliffe: Given that three-quarters of New Zealanders polled want to see corporate manslaughter criminalised is this not just another example of the Prime Minister looking after his big business mates while ordinary Kiwis get killed and maimed in mines and in forests?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: I do not think that the member actually listened to my answer. The reason why the Government does not believe it is necessary is that it is already making those changes in the proposed legislation.Hon David Cunliffe: Does he agree with Hancock Forest Management which says that our forestry safety system is broken?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: I do not necessarily agree with that statement. What I do agree with is that this is an industry that needs significant change. I will say that the tragedies that have taken place in the forestry sector are running at a rate roughly very similar to when the member was a Minister under the Clark Government. What is certainly true is that there is a need for change and this Government is embracing that change including putting $30 million into the new WorkSafe New Zealand including undertaking an audit of all of the forestry firms that are out there at the moment and including writing to the forestry owners and lifting overall performance. Everyone agrees that nine deaths are nine too many but this has been a longstanding problem in the forestry industry.Hon David Cunliffe: Given that on his watch there have been 90 serious injuries and 30 deaths in the forestry industry which is much more than under Labour why does he then think that “writing to forest owners” is in any way sufficient?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: Firstly I would have to check the member’s facts because we know that often it is not the case but—Mr SPEAKER: Order!Rt Hon JOHN KEY: What I can say is that the Government recognises that there is a need to improve health and safety. These are changes to a sector that has been operating for a very long time under existing rules. This Government is doing something about it. Quite sadly the member was part of a Government that did nothing about it.Hon David Cunliffe: How exactly does the Prime Minister plan to make the forestry industry safer when he has ruled out an inquiry and now corporate manslaughter charges or is it just that fact that Mr Bridges says “Yeah” he says “Nah” and Mrs Collins says “Maybe”?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: That sounds more like a David Cunliffe speech actually. But anyway stepping back to one side the member needs to go and look at what the Government is actually doing. This is a serious area and the Government has a serious response which included an independent task force. I might say that if you look at what the Independent Taskforce on Workplace Health and Safety came out with it made it clear that it did not think corporate manslaughter should be progressed. What the Government is progressing is much tougher rules in the new workplace safety legislation that will be introduced next year which will include duties and specific responsibilities on directors that can include a term of imprisonment. We are also putting a huge amount of money into WorkSafe New Zealand. We are out there working with every business in the forestry sector we have got a non-compliance audit going on and we are writing to forest owners. If the member thinks that we are not doing enough I think he is barking up the wrong tree.Hon David Cunliffe: If the Prime Minister is so enamoured of an independent task force for forestry why will he not enact the recommendations of the royal commissionon Pike River which required the families to be compensated while he washed his hands including of the corporate obligations?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: Firstly I do not believe that to be correct. Secondly if one looks at the Pike River situation and the tragedy that was Pike River the Government has done a number of things. Firstly it has honoured and will continue to honour all of the ACC obligations to those families with the current estimate likely to be about $20 million. Secondly the Government is also aware of and has tried to play a part in where it can the individual trust funds that have been established which total about $8 million for those families. Thirdly I have had extensive conversations with those families and the one moral issue they have actually raised with me is entry into the mine. The Government has no legal responsibility to fund the re-entry into the mine yet we have set aside between $7 million and $10 million to do that and will continue to potentially do more if required. It is a great tragedy but it is also a great tragedy that that member is playing politics with it.Hon David Cunliffe: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I just wish to say I take offence at being accused of playing politics with a matter of life and death on the Pike River miners’ deaths and if—Mr SPEAKER: Order! This is a debating chamber. People will throw political barbs from one side to the other. To say that a member is playing politics—Hon Annette King: He’s allowed to take offence.Mr SPEAKER: Sorry?Hon Annette King: He’s allowed to take offence.Mr SPEAKER: I just do not think that politicians can take offence at that to be honest. This is a political debating chamber. If politicians were not using political tactics I fail to see why they would be here.Hon David Cunliffe: I seek leave for the Crimes (Corporate Manslaughter) Amendment Bill in the name of Andrew Little to be set down for first reading as members’ order of the day No. 1.Mr SPEAKER: Leave is sought for that particular course of action. Is there any objection? There is.Accident Compensation—Levies5.CHRIS AUCHINVOLE (National) to theMinister for ACC: What recent announcements has she made in respect of changes to ACC levies?Hon JUDITH COLLINS (Minister for ACC): Yesterday I announced $387 million—Hon Tony Ryall: How much?Hon JUDITH COLLINS: —$387 million—worth of ACC levy reductions. The new rates will be in place for the levy year starting on 1 April 2014. The Government is also on track for further levy cuts in the following levy year. The work levy paid by businesses will decrease by 17 percent. The earners levy paid by employees will decrease by 15 percent. This means that the average New Zealand household can expect to keep just over $200 more each year. Small businesses will be around $180 better off annually and larger employers will receive on average a $6000 reduction.Chris Auchinvole: What other statements has she seen in respect of alternative levy cuts?Hon JUDITH COLLINS: I have seen the media release from the Labour Party spokesperson on ACC where he advocates for levy cuts that would give a miserly—Mr SPEAKER: Order! I cannot see that this is a responsibility of the Minister.Hawke’s Bay Water Management—Minister’s Involvement6.EUGENIE SAGE (Green) to theMinister of Conservation: Does he stand by his statement “No I did not” when asked in this House whether he gave any indication to the Department of Conservation on the direction or content of its submission on the Tukituki Catchment Proposal?Hon Dr NICK SMITH (Minister of Conservation): Yes and I am sorry to bore the House by again repeating the statement by the Deputy Director-General of Conservation Doris Johnston who said: “The Minister did not play any role in my decision making. He gave no direction. He never told me his view.”Eugenie Sage: How does the Minister reconcile the statement that he did not provide any indication with the fact that a Department of Conservation staff member sent an internal email stating that staff could not provide much comment at a forthcoming meeting on the Ruataniwha scheme because “We will still be waiting for guidance from our Minister.”?Hon Dr NICK SMITH: The record is quite clear that I did seek a copy of the department’s submission before it was made to the board of inquiry. It is also very clear if you look at the hundreds of pages that have been released to the Green Party and others that on the Friday prior to my meeting the recommendation from the department was a neutral submission—i.e. before the department even met with me there was a departmental senior official recommending a neutral submission.Eugenie Sage: I seek leave to table an email from a Department of Conservation staff member to Doris Johnston which says that Department of Conservation staff were waiting—Mr SPEAKER: Order! Leave is sought to table this particular email. Is there any objection—[Interruption] Order! I am putting the leave to the House and members can decide whether they want it tabled or not. Leave is sought to table that email. Is there any objection? There is none. It can be tabled.Document by leave laid on the Table of the House.Eugenie Sage: Does he still stand by his statement that he did not provide guidance when that is what Department of Conservation staff said they were waiting for and 2 days after he met with senior management the department’s substantive submission which it had spent over 3 months preparing was suppressed?Hon Dr NICK SMITH: The member is being very selective in the documents that she is quoting. On the Friday prior to the meeting with my department when Department of Conservation officials met with the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research and met with the regional council—after that meeting departmental officials decided they would lodge a neutral submission. The only direction I gave to the department was that I wanted to see a copy of the final submission before it was lodged and that was received by me and that was the submission that was lodged.Eugenie Sage: Is not the Minister trying to cover up the fact that he influenced his department not to submit on the largest irrigation dam scheme in New Zealand despite the impact that the scheme would have on water quality and native fish in the Tukituki catchment?Hon Dr NICK SMITH: I do not think the words of Doris Johnston can be clearer. She said she made the decision. She said she did not know what my view was. She said that I gave no direction. The only way the member’s claims can be correct is for a senior public servant appointed by the previous Government to be not telling the truth.Hon Ruth Dyson: How can he say that he exercised no influence over the Department of Conservation’s decision to withdraw its substantial submission queryingthe model allowing nitrates to allow the Tukituki River to be toxic and cause ecosystem collapse when an email from his office at 8.46 a.m. on Tuesday 30 July says: “The Minister would like to see the DOC submission together with a short note justifying it prior to the submission being lodged.”?Hon Dr NICK SMITH: A Minister asking the department to provide him with a copy of a submission before a board of inquiry and an explanation of why is absolutely proper. I would love to show the member the hundreds of pages of submissions that were approved by previous Ministers under the Labour Government on equivalent boards of inquiry.Question No. 4 to MinisterRt Hon JOHN KEY (Prime Minister): I seek leave to table advice from the Ministry of Labour that indicates there were more deaths in forestry under the previous Labour Government—that there were seven more—Mr SPEAKER: Order! Leave is sought to table that particular document. Is there any objection to it being tabled? There appears to be none. It can be tabled.Document by leave laid on the Table of the House.Points of Order—Disputed Material in QuestionsRt Hon JOHN KEY (Prime Minister): I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I wonder whether I could ask you to reflect on the fact that sometimes on this side of the House we have been making the point that we cannot rely on the numbers that are presented by Opposition members.Grant Robertson: How’s this a point of order?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: It is a point of order actually thanks very much sunshine. [Interruption]Mr SPEAKER: Order! It is raised as a point of order. The Prime Minister has asked me to reflect on something. I have given him the chance to make a statement. Please allow him to do so.Rt Hon JOHN KEY: I wonder whether I could ask you to go away and reflect on that because members on this side of the House have from time to time on recent occasions been pulled up because they have challenged the validity of the numbers that are raised. This is I think the second or third question time in recent times that the Leader of the Opposition has actually deliberately or otherwise misled the House.Mr SPEAKER: Order! I get the point the Prime Minister is making. I will reflect on it. I think it is substantially the point I have been making throughout this question time. It is a political debating chamber and people are going to level figures that can at all times be disputed. But I will reflect on the matter for the Prime Minister.Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE (Leader of the Opposition): I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. In reflecting upon that matter as requested by the Prime Minister and given the Prime Minister’s statement that in the 9 years of the Labour Government according to his information which may differ from ours there were seven more deaths than he has admitted occurred under his Government in 5 years would you turn your mind to the veracity of the point that the rate of deaths under the current Government is much higher than under the previous one.Mr SPEAKER: Order! I will certainly consider both the points that have been raised but whether I get to the stage of turning my mind to the figures that are being advanced by effectively one side or the other is probably something that is unnecessary in my ruling. I will reflect on the point that the Prime Minister has made—[Interruption] Order! The information will now be available because it has been tabled.Roading Wellington—Wellington Northern Corridor Road7.PAUL FOSTER-BELL (National) to theMinister of Transport: What progress is the Government making on the Wellington Northern Corridor Road of National Significance?Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (Minister of Transport): Very good progress. Yesterday it was my privilege to turn the first digger bucket of soil to mark the start of the construction of the MacKays to Peka Peka Expressway an important milestone on the Wellington Northern Corridor. Yesterday also marked an important milestone for Transmission Gully a section of the corridor with the New Zealand Transport Agency announcing the preferred bidder and final details of that being made available in February. Beginning the construction of the MacKays to Peka Peka Expressway and the announcement of the preferred bidder for Transmission Gully are significant steps forward in the Government’s long-term strategy to improve transport infrastructure nationally and locally.Paul Foster-Bell: What are some of the many benefits of the Wellington Northern Corridor?Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: The MacKays to Peka Peka Expressway is expected to be open to traffic in 2017—Hon Annette King: How about putting that kilt on.Mr SPEAKER: Order! The member has a right to ask a question and to at least have a chance to hear the answer. Could I ask for a little less interjection from my left-hand side of the House.Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: I am slightly intimidated by Miss King’s excitement over my recent customary dress but—Grant Robertson: It wasn’t the dress we were worried about.Mr SPEAKER: Would the Minister now continue with the essence of the answer.Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: She might not have been worried about the dress but she was excited by what she saw. The MacKays to Peka Peka Expressway is expected to be open for traffic in 2017—[Interruption]—and Transmission Gully—Mr SPEAKER: Order! [Interruption] Order! Can we just have an end to the comedy show and a completion of the answer would be helpful.Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: It is very difficult for me. I accept that the Te Reo that is required here Peka Peka in the context of their laughter is probably causing a degree of excitement but I do have to get this information out for the public.Mr SPEAKER: Well the Minister had better hurry up because he is running out of chances.Grant Robertson: There’s only one pecker.Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: Well it has got worse; it has gone from Annette King to Grant Robertson. I am terribly intimidated now.Mr SPEAKER: And I invite the Minister this time to finish his answer or I am moving elsewhere.Grant Robertson: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker.Mr SPEAKER: I will hear the point of order. It might be helpful.Grant Robertson: I just want to reassure the member that I have no interest in his “Peka Peka”.Mr SPEAKER: And that is certainly not a point of order. Does the Minister wish to finish or shall we—supplementary question?Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: I do. The question was about the benefits. I would like to get the answer out there. It is important for the people of the Wellington region.Mr SPEAKER: Well the Minister had better hurry up and do it.Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: The MacKays to Peka Peka Expressway is expected to be open for traffic in 2017 and Transmission Gully is aiming for completion by 2020. The full 110 kilometres of the Wellington Northern Corridor is expected to be completed by 2024. This work is expected to provide up to 8000 new construction jobs and once completed about a thousand jobs will be the effect on a permanent basis throughout the community. I would like to thank the mayors of the region who turned up yesterday Fran Wilde Ross Church Nick Leggett Wayne Guppy and Celia Wade-Brown all of whom have been extremely supportive of this important piece of infrastructure. The only thing that could stop this road now is a Labour-Greens Government.Hon Peter Dunne: Has the Minister received any advice from the New Zealand Transport Agency about the level of progress to be expected in reasonable circumstances next year with regard to both the construction of the expressway and Transmission Gully?Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: I would like to begin my answer by acknowledging the hard work that the Hon Peter Dunne as MP for Ōhariu has done over a long number of years to promote this project. We would expect to have the preferred bidder in contract in February with work perhaps beginning by the middle of next year. On the MacKays to Peka Peka Expressway we are following a similar process and would expect that work to commence perhaps in the third quarter of next year.State-owned Assets Sales—Estimated Revenue Genesis Energy and Public Support8.Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE (Leader of the Opposition) to thePrime Minister: What is the current estimate of proceeds from the Government’s asset sales programme?Rt Hon JOHN KEY (Prime Minister): Treasury’s most recent published estimate included in the Budget Economic and Fiscal Update in May was $5 billion to $7 billion. The member will of course be aware though that that included Solid Energy which is no longer part of the programme.Hon David Cunliffe: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. The Prime Minister has not addressed the question which was on notice and which asked for the current estimate of proceeds not the Budget Economic and Fiscal Update.Mr SPEAKER: I will allow the Prime Minister to answer the question as he had not quite completed the answer. He certainly started with the latest Treasury figures but we will see where it gets to.Rt Hon JOHN KEY: Treasury’s most recent published estimate included in the Budget Economic and Fiscal Update from May is $5 billion to $7 billion.Hon David Cunliffe: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. The Prime Minister has again referred to the Budget Economic and Fiscal Update and is alleging that that is the most recent—Mr SPEAKER: Order! The Prime Minister said the most recent Treasury figures so that is an answer to the question. I will allow the member as he continues his supplementaries an additional supplementary question.Hon David Cunliffe: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. The question did not ask for the most recent published figures; it asked for the current estimate of proceeds. That was a question on notice—as you will admit very straight—and I would ask that you hold the Prime Minister to the question on notice.Mr SPEAKER: The Prime Minister has used the current published figures by Treasury to answer the question. That is not to the satisfaction of the member and I can understand why. I am not responsible for the answer that is composed by the Prime Minister provided that it addresses the question. On this occasion the best way forward is—[Interruption] Order! The most appropriate way forward is that I will allow themember additional supplementary questions to see whether he can delve into it and I will be watching carefully those supplementary questions.Grant Robertson: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. This is a separate matter from that point of order. In an answer during question No. 1 from Dr Norman the Prime Minister actually gave a figure of $4 billion. He actually gave that figure during question No. 1. So it is very difficult for us on this side of the House to understand how we can now relate back to a previous figure when he actually gave the figure of $4 billion in another answer.Mr SPEAKER: The member is making a reasonable point which is why I have suggested that the best way forward now is allowing the Hon David Cunliffe to continue his supplementary questions knowing that he has an additional supplementary question.Rt Hon JOHN KEY: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. The member needs to go and look at his own question. The question was what is the current estimate—Mr SPEAKER: Order! I have moved past that. We have accepted that your answers have been given. I can understand why the member is not happy with that answer and I have said that the way forward now is additional supplementary questions. That is the way we will proceed.Hon David Cunliffe: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. We seem to have got ourselves into an interesting situation here because I have received a copy of an answer to a written parliamentary question which refers directly to a subsequent Treasury update—subsequent to that of the Budget Economic and Fiscal Update—Mr SPEAKER: Order! Then the way forward is for the member to now use his ability to ask supplementary questions. I invite the member to ask a supplementary question.Hon David Cunliffe: According to the Treasury reportEstimated Proceeds of the GSO Programme which was provided to Ministers in October 2013 subsequent to Budget 2013—which was forgettable but which was in May—what are the estimated proceeds from the asset sales programme according to this more recent update?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: I do not have that data in front of me. If the member wants to direct the question to the Minister of Finance he has that data.Hon David Cunliffe: I seek leave to table an answer to a written parliamentary question—Mr SPEAKER: Order! No no. We do not go down the track of tabling written questions. The member has made his point. We are not going to start tabling written questions in question time.Hon David Cunliffe: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I do seek your guidance here. It was a worthy primary question a question on notice—Mr SPEAKER: Order! I just need to understand what the point of order is. If it is relitigating a decision I have already made that will lead to disorder.Hon David Cunliffe: No it is not relitigating; it is seeking your guidance on a more general implication of the ruling you have made which I think is a legitimate follow-on point of order. A question on notice has been provided that was specific and straightforward in asking for not a previous but a current report. It is clear from an answer that the Government has provided in writing to the Opposition that a report exists and has been received by Ministers that is chronologically subsequent to the one referred to by the Prime Minister. We are not dealing with a supplementary question as you well know but a question on notice which was very specifically worded.Mr SPEAKER: Order! [Interruption] Order! We are now relitigating exactly where we were. The member asked a very clear and concise primary question. The member is disappointed with the answer. I share some of that disappointment. Therefore havingaccepted that the Prime Minister had addressed that question I gave the member the ability to ask a further supplementary question. He has used that supplementary question to show very clearly that there is some more recent data. That has made the political point. But to continue now to relitigate whether the first answer was satisfactorily addressed or not will lead to disorder.Hon David Cunliffe: Which of the following two statements is true in relation to the Treasury reportEstimated Proceeds of the GSO Programme presented to Ministers in October 2013: first that the Prime Minister has no knowledge of it and does not know how much the asset sales programme is on track to generate or second that he does know but is not frank with this House or the New Zealand public?Mr SPEAKER: Order! I will leave the Prime Minister to answer that.Rt Hon JOHN KEY: I will take the third option none of the above.Hon David Cunliffe: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. Given that the previous supplementary question sought a binary yes or no answer how could he possibly—Mr SPEAKER: Order! No. The member asked a good political question and got a political answer back.Hon David Cunliffe: Why is the Prime Minister so terrified of the citizens initiated referendum that he is hiding the estimated proceeds until voting is over and why does he not want New Zealanders to be able to make an informed decision?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: Well unless the member knows something I do not know about the end date of the citizens initiated referendum the Minister of Finance advises me that at the Finance and Expenditure Committee meeting tomorrow he will give the latest update.Hon David Cunliffe: Given that in answer to I think my second supplementary question the Prime Minister said that he did not know what was in the Government share offer report of October and then in a subsequent question said that he neither did not know nor did know would he like to clear up the confusion and restore his name for heroic transparency by releasing the document in question to the House which is the Government share offer report of October 2013?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: Firstly the member needs to wait only one more sleep and the Minister of Finance will update it. Secondly if one looks at the bottom end of the range it was $5 billion and that programme as I was trying to point out while the member interrupted me included Solid Energy. We know that about $4 billion has been raised so far and we have got Genesis to go. It is very very simple. If the member wants to be heroic then he will do what the Greens do. He will print some money and he will buy back the assets.Hon David Cunliffe: In relation to the Prime Minister’s reply to the previous supplementary question that he looked forward to the proceeds of the Genesis sale can he confirm that he will indeed proceed with the sale or would he accept this challenge: if over a million people vote in the asset sales referendum against the sale of State assets will he suspend the sale of Genesis Energy—will he suspend the sale of Genesis Energy?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: Let me refresh the member’s memory. In 2011 there was a general election. Labour ran an entire campaign opposed to the mixed-ownership programme and got the worst result in 85 years of the Labour Party. The National Party ran on the ticket of the mixed-ownership model and got the best result it has ever had in MMP history and the second-best result ever. Over a million people voted. When it comes to arrogance it is pretty simple. The member has asked the question through the referendum about whether people support the programme. If the answer to that from New Zealanders is no then the one who will not be listening to the public will be DavidCunliffe if he does not guarantee that he will buy the assets back. As we saw his weasel words were out in full display the other day—Mr SPEAKER: Order! Order!Grant Robertson: Point of order Mr Speaker—[Interruption]Mr SPEAKER: I am just waiting for the member’s own team to assist him.Grant Robertson: I seek leave of the House to table figures from the 2011 election that indicate that more people voted for parties opposed to asset sales than voted for parties in favour of them.Mr SPEAKER: Order! No. Every member if they cannot recall the election details will easily be able to research it.Dr Russel Norman: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I have listened to this question because I did not want to interrupt the flow. I would ask you to reflect that the primary question was to do with the current valuation. The Prime Minister’s primary answer was a 7-month-old valuation and then in his following answers he said that he has access to a current valuation. How can you possibly say that he answered the primary question when he said that he has access to a current valuation as to what he is going to get for selling the assets? How can you say that he answered the primary question?Mr SPEAKER: Order! I heard an interjection at one stage where he did not have that information. He was aware the information was going to be released. He was arguing that he did not have that information.Hon David Cunliffe: Given the Prime Minister’s apparent ability to change his tune within—Mr SPEAKER: Order! Order! That sort of question is not helpful either. Could the member rephrase his question—[Interruption] Order! It was only the Thursday before the adjournment when I was asked by the Labour Party to make sure that Ministers did not start with a personal reflection on a member on this side of the House. Today we have just in this particular question had a very clear reflection on the Prime Minister. I cannot have rules for one side of this House and not for the other. [Applause] I thank the Labour Party particularly for acknowledging that. Now we will have the supplementary question.Hon David Cunliffe: Mr Speaker in order to facilitate progress of the House—Mr SPEAKER: Order! Just ask the question.Hon David Cunliffe: I am thanking you for the ruling. Can we clear this up once and for all by the Prime Minister giving an unequivocal answer to the following question: will he continue with the sale of Genesis Energy no matter how many people in New Zealand vote against his asset sales in the citizens initiated referendum?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: As I said the Government went to the election in 2011 and campaigned on this asset sales programme. It is very simple. The Government has gone to the people of New Zealand and got a majority. The reason the member asked that question is that he does not want to answer the question of whether he will buy the assets back. It is pretty simple David. Put up the money. Your mate—Mr SPEAKER: Order! Order!Hon Clayton Cosgrove: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. [Interruption]Mr SPEAKER: I am just waiting to assist the member for both sides of the House.Hon Clayton Cosgrove: That question simply asked whether the Prime Minister would proceed or not—Mr SPEAKER: Order! The member will resume his seat. The member cannot expect to have a yes or no answer to that particular question. [Interruption] Order! Does the member wish to stay for the balance of question time? [Interruption] Order! Does the member wish to stay for the balance of question time?Ship GroundingRena—Environmental Impact9.JACQUI DEAN (National—Waitaki) to theMinister for the Environment: What reports has she received on the environmental impacts of theRena grounding?Hon AMY ADAMS (Minister for the Environment): I recently received the Rena Recovery monitoring programme 2011-13 research report into the effects of pollution on the Bay of Plenty following theRena grounding which was today released by the Bay of Plenty Regional Council. The results show that initial fears of long-lasting and negative effects on beaches reefs and fisheries can for the most part be put to rest. Although the environment has not yet returned fully to its pre-Rena state it is improving and the report concludes that the grounding of theRena should have no long-lasting environmental effects.Jacqui Dean: How did the Government work with local communities to mitigate the impact of the grounding?Hon AMY ADAMS: The Government invested $2.42 million to support theRena recovery plan which addresses and monitors the long-term effects of the grounding in collaboration with the community iwi businesses and central and local government. The programme identifies the environmental issues for the beaches seabed water fisheries wildlife and management of waste and sets out the responsibility for the recovery and the monitoring of each aspect. I want to commend the local communities iwi and council for their commitment to this project. With their help we will continue to monitor the Bay of Plenty environment as it tracks back to its pre-Rena state.Brendan Horan: Would the Minister agree that to return the Astrolabe Reef to its pre-Rena state the bottom line must be that the Government commit to removing the festering rotten wreck from the reef?Hon AMY ADAMS: Well in terms of the impact on the reef itself I would note that the report has only very limited sampling because of course it is still an active salvage site. In terms of the removal of the wreck from the reef that is an issue that I believe is being taken to the local council for resource consent. I do not believe it would be appropriate for me to comment on a local council process.Brendan Horan: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I asked that the Government commit to removing the festering rotten—Mr SPEAKER: And the Minister very adequately addressed that.Te Ururoa Flavell: In light of her response stating that the report talked about no long-lasting effects of theRena disaster would she confirm that this may well change should that wreck remain on the reef?Hon AMY ADAMS: Well the report does not make any comment about the impact on the reef from the wreck staying or going so that is not a question I feel able to answer. As I mentioned in answer to the previous question from Mr Horan whether or not the wreck remains on the reef is a matter of live debate and of an application I understand to the local council. All the information in relation to that will be put as part of that process.Education National Standards—Student Achievement Data10.CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka) to theMinister of Education: Is she satisfied that the introduction of National Standards has led to a tangible improvement in student achievement; if so why?Hon HEKIA PARATA (Minister of Education): Yes. If by tangible he means measurable the national standards data shows a small overall improvement in reported achievement from 2011 to 2012 with reading up 1.2 percent writing up 2 percent and maths up 1.4 percent. Obviously we have data across two data points only and so it is early days as I have often said in this House. But parents have told me again and againthey value the good clear information about their child’s progress. I would also note that of the over 2100 schools in the system just two did not report national standards data for 2012 so there is good uptake and it is making a measurable difference.Chris Hipkins: Why is she satisfied that national standards will improve student achievement when a report released by her own ministry found that national standards had incorrectly measured the achievements of around four out of every 10 students?Hon HEKIA PARATA: A number of the components of the New Zealand education system take some time to bed in. As the member will know the New Zealand curriculum introduced in 2000 took 12 years and our national qualifications framework has taken a decade to be moderated. The Education Review Office itself constantly reviews how well that methodology is working. We have a substantial body of evidence now growing on how well we are doing with national standards where we need to improve and we are continuing to do that. But mainly we are improving how we report to parents who are most interested in how well their children are doing and national standards help deliver that.Chris Hipkins: Does she believe that national standards are providing better information on student achievement to parents given that fewer than half of the parents surveyed believe that national standards were providing a valuable record of their student’s learning?Hon HEKIA PARATA: Yes and although the member has not disclosed the name of the particular report I am assuming it is the New Zealand Council for Educational Research report where fewer than half of the sample responded so we are talking about half of a half and actually three-quarters of parents in that same research report said that they appreciated getting clear reporting on national standards.Rt Hon John Key: Does the Minister think it will help the progress of young New Zealanders when we measure and monitor and report to them to their parents and to their teachers the progress of a child and their capability in reading writing and maths relative to not doing so; and what does it say about an organisation that cares more about the unions than it does about the kids?Mr SPEAKER: The Minister can answer the first part—[Interruption] Order! The first part of the question can be answered.Hon HEKIA PARATA: Yes another good question. Of course we are interested in that and of course parents want to know how well their children are doing in reading in writing in maths in science—in every curriculum subject. Now that we have national standards they are able to do that by child by classroom by school and by year which has never been able to happen before. Now we are able to do that we can also intervene without guessing as previous administrations did and know where we need to invest science and maths resources and other such initiatives. We are interested in every child unlike the Opposition.Chris Hipkins: Will the latest statistics from the OECD show that New Zealand has plunged from seventh in science to 18th from 12th in maths to 23rd from seventh in reading to 13th a decline that educational experts have widely predicted will be exacerbated by national standards?Hon HEKIA PARATA: I am unable to answer that question because the OECD results are embargoed under a very strict protocol the detail of which will not be released until 11 o’clock tonight in New Zealand.Chris Hipkins: I seek leave to table a speech the Minister delivered last week on 28 November to the Iwi Chairs Forum where she did talk about the OECD statistics.Mr SPEAKER: Order! Any member can seek out that speech if they so want.Chris Hipkins: Is it the Government’s intention that teachers should spend increasingly more time filling in forms to comply with Government reportingrequirements and less time actually teaching; if not how does she respond to the 60 percent of teachers and 70 percent of principals surveyed who say that national standards have created more work for little gain?Hon HEKIA PARATA: Again let us be clear about that sample because when you use 60 percent and 70 percent you are talking about fewer than 180 schools out of 2100. Nevertheless we take those concerns seriously. So what has this Government done? We have designed with teachers a progression and consistency tool where—let us be clear—we are not asking teachers to make new judgments. We are asking them to compile all of the judgments they already make enter them into a tool put good quality data in once and be able to use that information multiple times.Rt Hon John Key: Can she confirm that when the Programme for International Student Assessment results are officially released tonight those 15-year-old children will not have ever done national standards and that may well be part of the problem?Hon HEKIA PARATA: I can confirm that absolutely because the 15-year-olds upon whom these results are measured went through school from 2001 to 2012. Therefore regrettably they were not caught by national standards.Biosecurity Management—Government Initiatives11.SHANE ARDERN (National—Taranaki - King Country) to theMinister for Primary Industries: What announcements has he made on strengthening New Zealand’s biosecurity system?Hon NATHAN GUY (Minister for Primary Industries): Last week I presented official appointment certificates to 32 new quarantine inspectors and five new detector dog handlers. Sixteen of the new inspectors will be based in Auckland eight will go to Wellington and eight will go to Christchurch. Three new dog teams will go to Auckland and one will go to Wellington and one to Queenstown. The new front-line recruits will further strengthen New Zealand’s biosecurity front line. These appointments mean that close to 100 new quarantine inspectors have joined the Ministry for Primary Industries in the last 14 months and the ministry is planning to recruit a further 24 quarantine inspectors in March next year.Shane Ardern: What other announcements has he made on strengthening New Zealand’s biosecurity systems?Hon NATHAN GUY: Last week I also unveiled one of the 12 new X-ray machines that have been installed in Auckland Christchurch Wellington and Queenstown airports and in Auckland’s international mail centre. The modern machines mean that the Ministry for Primary Industries will be able to screen items with greater accuracy and image quality. This will further strengthen our biosecurity system as border staff will be better equipped to spot risk items before they enter New Zealand.Shane Ardern: Why is the Government placing such a high priority on biosecurity?Hon NATHAN GUY: New Zealand’s primary industries account for 72 percent of New Zealand’s merchandise exports and of course they are the backbone of the New Zealand economy. It is vital that we protect these industries from biological risks associated with imported pests and diseases. That is why biosecurity is my No. 1 priority and it is why last week’s announcements are the latest in a range of actions taken by this Government to boost biosecurity.Hon Damien O’Connor: Do the 56 biosecurity incursions under his Government provide enough evidence of its biosecurity failure or does he now need X-ray machines to prove that cutbacks to staffing cuts to funding and the introduction of species such as European alpine newts angry pest birds black grass seed and wood termites have undermined New Zealand’s biosecurity reputation and put the whole New Zealand economy at risk?Hon NATHAN GUY: The member’s rhetoric is inaccurate. What the member needs to understand is that I have got hold of a report recently that shows that in 2007 that member’s Government was warned that it had a number of gaps and inconsistencies in the biosecurity system limited progress was being made in addressing these issues and these issues had been given insufficient priority. If the member wants me to go through a list of incursions under that Labour Government’s watch I am happy to do it. In fact I will—Mr SPEAKER: Order! That will not be necessary.Hon Damien O’Connor: I seek leave to table a list of 50 incursions that have occurred—Rt Hon Winston Peters: How many?Hon Damien O’Connor: —50—from 2008 to 2012.Mr SPEAKER: I just need to clarify the origin of that document.Hon Damien O’Connor: It is an answer to a parliamentary question—Mr SPEAKER: Well then if it is an answer to a parliamentary question it is available to all members.Hon Damien O’Connor: I seek leave to table another paper.Mr SPEAKER: Again if it is an answer to a parliamentary question—Hon Damien O’Connor: Yes it is but I am not sure that everyone has access—Mr SPEAKER: Order! Everybody has access to parliamentary questions once they are published.Broadband Ultra-fast—Infrastructure Pricing and Contract with Chorus12.CLARE CURRAN (Labour—Dunedin South) to thePrime Minister: Does he stand by his statement that “We were never going to use legislation because we knew right from the get go that people wouldn’t vote for that”?Rt Hon JOHN KEY (Prime Minister): Yes in the context that I made it in relation to the question I was asked.Clare Curran: If as he says he knew from the get-go that he was not going to use legislation why did his Government’s discussion document include three options to do just that?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: Because if the member saw all the statements I made that was in relation to a period post that point. What is true is that the retail service providers wrote to the Government and suggested a recommended price along with potentially seeking agreement from Chorus. That would have required legislation but what became apparent because the parties could not reach an agreement was that from that point on there was never any chance of legislation.Clare Curran: How can he credibly deny that he was not intending to overrule the Commerce Commission when the Chorus Chief Executive Officer Mark Ratcliffe has publicly said that legislation appeared to be an option until last Thursday?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: It potentially was an option when it wrote at the time—not Chorus because it would not agree with it—but from that point on it became pretty obvious that legislation was not possible because what was clear was that other political parties would not support that.Clare Curran: How can he say that “No one anticipated … the magnitude of the fall.” in the wholesale copper price when at the time of the Chorus demerger Goldman Sachs forecast a price of $8.47 a month which is lower than the ultimate Commerce Commission price of $10.92?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: Well it is relatively easy. I relied on two experts in this area. The first person said: “the people of New Zealand who are receiving broadband servicesnow will find that their existing copper services will actually go up in price when they are waiting for fibre.”Hon Steven Joyce: Who was that?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: That statement was made in 2011 by Clare Curran. Then I relied on another muppet who said: “The average New Zealander will pay at least $5 more a month for the same service they are currently getting on their copper phone line.”Hon Steven Joyce: Who was that?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: That statement was made by that muppet in 2011 called—Mr SPEAKER: Order!Clare Curran: Can he not see that it is his Government’s inept handling of this issue that has created false expectations for Chorus of an inappropriate overrule of the Commerce Commission and that this and his comments that Chorus would go broke are responsible for the current uncertainty around Chorus and the roll-out of the ultra-fast broadband?Rt Hon JOHN KEY: A few things—firstly the member is deliberately misleading the House. I said that it could go broke—Mr SPEAKER: Order! The Prime Minister cannot accuse a member of deliberately misleading the House. He can start his answer again.Rt Hon JOHN KEY: The member has misled the House because the statement was “could go broke” and actually that is reflected if you look at the share price reduction in how severe analysts believe the situation is. Secondly everybody including the member thought at the time that the price would either stay the same or go up. But let me say this. The Government is firstly committed to ultra-fast broadband. Secondly the Government is committed to finding a way through this current situation. Thirdly the Government’s view is that Chorus needs to play its part but the Government is likely if there is a substantial hole as referenced by the information the Government may or may not receive from its independent inquiry to then go and speak to Crown Fibre Holdings to ask it to look at what options might be available. That could include moving some of the money around in the existing contract all of which may be possible to ensure that ultra-fast broadband is built on time for New Zealanders.Clare Curran: I seek leave to table the tape of the Prime Minister saying that Chorus could go broke which appeared on Television New Zealand.Mr SPEAKER: Order! Is this a transcript that is well available to members if they want?Clare Curran: No it is not. It is a tape.Rt Hon JOHN KEY: The member needs to go and look at her ownHansard. I said it would—Mr SPEAKER: Order! That is not speaking to the point of order. Leave has been sought to table this particular tape. I am going to put the leave and the House will decide. Leave is sought to table it. Is there any objection? It can be tabled.Recording by leave laid on the Table of the House.Clare Curran: I seek leave to table a report by Goldman Sachs dated 28 November 2011 and titledTelecom Corporation of New Zealand Ltd—Life after Chorus.Mr SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table this particular report by Goldman Sachs. Is there any objection? There is none. It can be tabled.Document by leave laid on the Table of the House.Hon David Parker: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. Earlier today you were invited by the Prime Minister to consider whether the Leader of the Opposition hadmisled the House in respect of forestry statistics. Given that the Prime Minister has said that there were no reports of impending decrease in the copper price the Goldman Sachs report should be viewed by you also when assessing that earlier point of order because the same issue arises.Mr SPEAKER: I thank the member for his very valuable advice. As I have said I will give further consideration to the point raised by the Hon David Cunliffe.Points of Order—Authentication Process for Substantive QuestionsHon GERRY BROWNLEE (Leader of the House): I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I have waited until the end of question time. Can you just have a look at question No. 12 where within the quotations marks it says: “We were never going to use legislation because we knew right from the get go that people wouldn’t vote for that”? There is no explanation in that question of the relationship to what it is. If this question time is going to be valuable for the public I think there should be some explanation of the context around that. The other point I would make is from further up in the afternoon. I think this is a worse offence. The Hon David Cunliffe asked question No. 4 and then put in quote marks the words “off the table”. They were comments not made by the Prime Minister yet they are conveyed on the question sheet as if they were. I think there is clearly something going wrong with the verification process and frankly it needs to be tidied up.GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central): It is a fairly clear thing. When we provide questions to the Clerk we have to provide authentication for those questions. We provide that authentication and that ends up on the question paper. Where we are unable to do that there is occasionally dialogue with your office and we sometimes have to change the question when we have not been able to provide that authentication. So if it ends up on the question paper it has been authenticated.Mr SPEAKER: The point raised by Grant Robertson is right. There is a very rigorous process by which questions are looked at carefully by the Office of the Clerk before they are finally accepted. Authentication is required. However Mr Brownlee raises a reasonable point in that sometimes some of the quotes probably need more looking at than perhaps occurs on all occasions. I will consider the matters raised by both Mr Robertson and the Hon Gerry Brownlee.Urgent Debates DeclinedHealth and Safety Workplace—Forestry IndustryMr SPEAKER: I have received a letter from the Hon Shane Jones seeking to debate under Standing Order 386 the response of the Minister of Labour to the nine forestry deaths so far this year. For there to be an urgent debate there must be a particular case of recent occurrence that involves the administrative or ministerial responsibility of the Government. With a death on 29 November although it is another tragic occurrence there is no ministerial responsibility for the actual ownership and running of most forestry operations. An urgent debate is a way of holding the Government to account. There must be distinct governmental responsibility for the particular case that is sought to be debated. Furthermore the Government is halfway through a proactive programme of assessing cable logging and contracting operations. On this basis I am not convinced that the Government’s response to the forestry deaths has reached the stage where an urgent debate is warranted. There will be other opportunities to debate this matter. The application is therefore declined.Appropriation (2012/13 Financial Review) BillFirst ReadingHon BILL ENGLISH (Minister of Finance): I moveThat the Appropriation (2012/13 Financial Review) Bill be now read a first time.A party vote was called for on the questionThat the Appropriation (2012/13 Financial Review) Bill be now read a first time.Ayes63New Zealand National 59; Māori Party 2; United Future 1; ACT New Zealand 1.Noes56New Zealand Labour 33; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 7; Mana 1; Independent: Horan.Bill read a first time.Land Transport Amendment BillFirst ReadingHon GERRY BROWNLEE (Minister of Transport): I moveThat the Land Transport Amendment Bill be now read a first time. I further nominate that the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee considers the bill. The bill aims to address the harms and social cost caused by drunk drivers in New Zealand. Each year drunk drivers are responsible for an average of 61 deaths and 244 serious injuries with a social cost amounting to almost $450 million. The bill will amend the Land Transport Act 1998. The Land Transport Act provides for a range of functions relating to land transport including specifying the adult drink-driving limits.The main purpose of the Land Transport Amendment Bill is to reduce the legal drink-driving limits. The adult breath-alcohol limit will be reduced from 400 micrograms of alcohol per litre of breath to 250 micrograms per litre of breath. The blood-alcohol limit will reduce from 80 milligrams of alcohol per 100 millilitres of blood to 50 milligrams. The bill will also put in place infringement offences for They would be able to rebut that or challenge that presumption in court.In closing the changes proposed by this bill demonstrate the Government’s determination to improve road safety for all New Zealanders by reducing drink-driving. I acknowledge that there is great interest from all sides of the House in this bill. I commend it to the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee and I know that there are others who will have a great deal of interest in providing very significant input to what eventually will become a bill the House can pass. Thank you.IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North): Labour supports the Land Transport Amendment Bill and we do look forward to the consideration of it at the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee. We anticipate that there will be significant public interest in this legislation not just from people who are interested specifically in road safety but also from people who have an interest in public health and the impact of alcohol and other substances on the health and well-being of New Zealanders. In fact there was some discussion at the Health Committee about whether we ought to ask for this bill to be considered at the Health Committee. That was a suggestion made by Kevin Hague because of the wider health implications of this legislation. I am sure that will be a significant aspect of the conversation that will be had at the select committee.We support this legislation because alcohol is one of the leading contributors to death on our roads if not the leading contributor to death on our roads. So far this year 231people have died on New Zealand roads. If the statistics that have been gathered in recent years are borne out when there is close examination of those numbers then around 80 of those people will have been killed where the accident is attributable to alcohol and/or other intoxicating substances. Over the years although we have been successful in reducing the overall road toll—with one unfortunate blip last year but generally the trend is heading downwards—what we have not been able to do is reduce the impact of alcohol and substance use on the road toll. In fact back in 2008 33.1 percent of all road deaths were attributable to alcohol and/or drugs. Last year in 2012 33.8 percent were attributable to alcohol and/or drugs. In the intervening years the percentage has gone up and it has gone down but it has generally sat around the mid-30s. Slightly above a third of all accidents are caused by alcohol and/or drugs.It is for that reason I think that the police came to Parliament and said that the single most impactful thing that Parliament could do to reduce the road toll would be to reduce the drink-driving limit. It has been clear for a number of years that that is the course of action that Parliament needs to take. Unfortunately however the Government has sat on this bill for far too long. It was back in 2009 that Steven Joyce as the transport Minister at the time actually looked like he was about to act. It looked like Cabinet was very very close to introducing legislation that would do exactly what this legislation does but for some reason Steven Joyce and the National Cabinet decided not to act. It may have been something to do with polling or it may have been something to do with the fact that they wanted to push the issue past the last election. We cannot really be sure what it was that caused them to fail to act but what we do know is this: it certainly was not public opinion. Public opinion has been behind this measure for a number of years now. And it certainly was not the evidence because the evidence gathered overseas where other jurisdictions are years ahead of New Zealand is that lowering the drink-driving limit has a tangible and fast impact on the road toll. So public opinion supported this measure and the data supported it yet for some reason the National Government did not support it. And frankly we can only speculate about why that was.This legislation does something a little bit different from what the Labour Party has been proposing for a number of years. Back in 2009 when Steven Joyce failed to act our then transport spokesperson Darren Hughes introduced a member’s bill to the ballot that would have taken the action that the Government failed to take. That member’s bill was eventually passed to me in my roles as transport spokesperson and associate health spokesperson and I was lucky enough to have it drawn from the ballot. I also attempted to have the Alcohol Reform Bill amended as another mechanism to make this change. The Government voted against that at the time but once the member’s bill drafted by the Labour Party was pulled from the ballot then all of a sudden the measure became a priority. The reason for that of course is that it had parliamentary support. The public were behind it the data supported it and then Parliament was going to act with or without the National Party—with or without the Government. It is nice to be able to have an influence over the Government from the Opposition benches. I am pleased to say that knowing that Parliament was going to act with or without it inspired the National Government after 4 long years of considering this topic to finally do the right thing.But this bill is different from what the Labour Party originally suggested. It introduces fines and demerit points for being over 0.05 but under 0.08. We will support that notion going to the select committee. We want to hear what the evidence tells us. We know that jurisdictions overseas have taken both approaches either simply reducing the limit and making it a criminal offence to be over 0.05 or having a series of fines and demerit points as a way of deterring people from becoming intoxicated and then getting behind the wheel. We want to see what the evidence says around that but I want peopleto understand that driving over 0.05 is not a minor thing. It should not be a minor offence regardless of whether it ends up being an infringement offence or a criminal offence. Driving at 0.05 or more increases the risk of being involved in a fatal accident by 5.8 times over someone who is driving at zero with no alcohol—a risk 5.8 times greater if you are driving at 0.05. If you are driving at 0.08 then there is a 16.5 times increased risk of being involved in a fatal accident. What is more that not only increases your likelihood of being involved in an accident but increases the severity of the accident as well. Twelve percent of minor injury crashes are attributable to alcohol 21 percent of serious injury crashes are attributable to alcohol and as I said before 34 percent of accidents where somebody is killed are attributable to alcohol. So alcohol not only increases the likelihood that an accident will occur but increases the likelihood that that accident will be more severe and will result in serious injury or death.This is not a minor topic and it should not have been an issue on which the Government preferred to put some sort of political expediency ahead of doing the right thing back in 2009 when it had the data. New Zealand has been slow to act on this issue. Just 16 countries including New Zealand still have a 0.08 limit. The vast majority—39 countries—have a 0.05 limit. A significant number of countries actually have a lower limit than that. New Zealand is out of step. We are behind and it is a tragedy that we have taken 4 years more than we needed to in order to pass this legislation.Three hundred and thirty-six people died on our roads in 2008; 121 of those were attributable to alcohol. The numbers of deaths attributable to alcohol were 140 in 2009 144 in 2010 87 in 2011 and 104 in 2012. Those numbers could have been reduced if the Government had been prepared to act and that is the great tragedy. But we do support these moves. We do want to have the debate about the differences of opinion between the two different approaches that the Government and the Opposition have been proposing. We look forward to the passage of this bill through the House and we look forward to this change being made by the middle of next year at the latest because this is something that New Zealand desperately needs.The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson): I call the honourable member David Bennett.DAVID BENNETT (National—Hamilton East): Thank you Mr Assistant Speaker.The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson): You are welcome.DAVID BENNETT: It is a pleasure. Just speaking in regard to the Land Transport Amendment Bill it is a very good bill brought to the House by the Minister of Transport. It is something that as that last speaker Iain Lees-Galloway and the Minister said has been a long time coming. There is a public opinion I believe that it will be supported amongst the community. I think that the time is now right for this bill and it is ready.Sue Moroney: It’s too late.DAVID BENNETT: The Opposition over there—we have Miss Moroney chirping in. Labour had 9 years in Government. They were high road toll years and Labour did nothing about that. It did nothing. It is all right for its members to say those things now but when they had the chance they did not act. We are acting. We have got the research. We are putting this bill up and we have acted in a very consistent way.TheSafer Journeys: discussion document was the first step in that. It looked at roads to make sure that the roading quality was up to standard and it looked at some of the rules around driver education and driving. At that time we brought in the zero blood-alcohol rate for young people so young people have a zero limit for alcohol when driving. That was the first step and that was an important crucial step in this process.This bill is the next step where we are looking at the rate between 0.05 and 0.08 blood-alcohol concentration. That is something that we need to do at this time. When we look at the question that Labour Party members have asked they have used figures of the total road deaths that may be alcohol attributed. It is important to look at the numbers that are in that range. The numbers we have are that there are about five fatalities and 62 serious injuries that result from that range. Any death on our roads is one too many but it is a small proportion of the 80 or 120 or 140 deaths that the Labour Party has attributed to alcohol. You must remember that when we take this bill into account.It is not so much that this bill will stop deaths on our roads due to alcohol but it is another step in sending the right signal to our drivers. It is about sending the signal that if a person drinks and drives they are not only putting their lives at risk but they are putting other people’s lives at risk and they will get caught. They will have to deal with the consequences of getting caught.One of the questions will be around whether we have a fines system or a demerit system or whether you lose your licence if you are in that blood-alcohol range. This is a bill that takes a very balanced approach and brings in that infringement fine and demerit point approach for that range. It is a transition for New Zealanders it is an understanding of what it takes to drive on the roads and it is part of the education process. New Zealanders have basically got the message but there are some who have not got that message. They drink large quantities of alcohol and drive and cause very difficult situations for our emergency services and for many people involved in those crashes.There is a possibility that you could go as the Labour Party is talking about to totally losing your licence if you are over that limit. That is a possibility. However when we look at those limits—and I am sure this will come out in the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee—those balances between zero and 0.08 blood-alcohol concentration are very difficult to actually quantify scientifically and personally with different people and their ability to absorb alcohol and all those other things. There is a set range.This bill takes into account the different aspects of the ability of people to drive and also to accommodate what alcohol may be in their system. But it sends a very clear message that any alcohol is putting you as a driver in danger of incurring an infringement with the police and that is the message that we want to send to people—that they should not drink and drive. We have done that with young people. This is the process whereby we are doing that with the adult population. This is a good bill. It is on the right track and in the right frame. The select committee will I am sure have a good look at it to make sure that we get it through the House as well as possible. Thank you.DARIEN FENTON (Labour): I am pleased to take a call in the first reading of the Land Transport Amendment Bill. The bill lowers the adult legal alcohol limits from 400 micrograms of alcohol per litre of breath to 250 micrograms and from 80 milligrams of alcohol per 100 millilitres of blood to 50 milligrams. I am really pleased that the Government has finally taken its lead from the Labour Party which has been agitating and pushing for this change since 2009 as we heard from our colleague Iain Lees-Galloway. It is a real shame actually that the Government did not take the chance in 2009. It did have other chances which I will talk about in a moment. In 2009 and in every year since then—4 years—people have been unnecessarily injured or killed because the Government did not have the courage to take this step at the time.In 2010 there was a bill that came to the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee following on from the Cabinet consideration of this issue and that was the Land Transport (Road Safety and Other Matters) Amendment Bill. That was the billthat the previous speaker David Bennett was talking about where we introduced zero tolerance for drivers under 20 introduced interlocks for people with alcohol convictions and so on. The Government also had the chance then to deal with this issue. It was a feature of the submissions on that bill which were very noticeable. When going back and having a look at the submissions we see it was one of the biggest issues. There were about six issues that were highlighted during the submissions on the bill but one of the biggest issues was from people submitting to the select committee that the Government should take the chance to deal with this issue of lowering the blood-alcohol content. Apart from submissions from a range of individuals and very respectable ones as well we had submissions from the Drug Foundation the Cycling Advocates Network Alcohol Healthwatch the Drink Driving Interventions Trust the National Addiction Centre and theHerald on Sunday. I remember that one very clearly.TheHerald on Sunday ran a campaign on this and it started I believe with Darren Hughes’ member’s bill which Iain Lees-Galloway eventually took over. It started with that. It supported that bill and ran a campaign to get New Zealanders to pledge to drink two drinks as a maximum which was a very successful campaign. That is when we first started to get the feedback from the public that this was something they supported. In fact there was overwhelming support from the public. As I say theHerald on Sunday did a very good job back in 2010 so we are talking 3 years ago. Of course the Alcohol Advisory Council also recommended lowering the blood-alcohol concentration. Rural Women New Zealand and the New Zealand Nurses Organisation talked about not only the safety issues but the health issues and also how important it was to try to take the opportunity to minimise harm injury and death at that time.What happened during that process? The Government despite many many strong submissions decided that it needed to have more information. Even though there had been many studies—and at that stage in 2010 there had been many studies; there were international studies and others—showing the benefits of lowering the adult blood-alcohol content to 0.05 the Government kicked for touch by saying there was a lack of New Zealand - specific research in the area. I do not know what spooked the Government. I do not know what spooked the Minister of Transport Steven Joyce as he was then and Cabinet when they first discussed this in 2009. I do not know what spooked them in 2010 but there was a cop-out. The Government had the opportunity to fix this issue then and not only that but we have had a member’s bill for many years now on this issue.During the Committee stage of the Land Transport (Road Safety and Other Matters) Amendment Bill Labour put up an amendment that would have reduced the blood-alcohol limit. So there was yet another chance for the Government to take up this issue and Labour tried very hard to help the Government save face on this. But guess what happened? In 2010 the Government voted against that amendment and it has consistently refused to support members’ bills from members on this side of the House that would have addressed this problem some time ago. Instead the Government went into this long-winded process of needing to gather evidence. Even going back before that as I said the Minister was acknowledging under Safer Journeys in 2009 that the public wanted change. Everybody knew then and they know now that reducing the blood-alcohol content makes a difference. I remember the Minister Steven Joyce saying at the time when he introduced restrictions on cellphone use that this was a no-brainer. I would have thought this was a no-brainer as well in 2009 in 2010 in 2011 and on and on. But what we have had instead is a no-brain response until Gerry Brownlee came along and suddenly realised that this was an issue that was going to get some traction by Labour because a member’s bill had been drawn.In fact I remember very clearly that the then Minister of Transport Steven Joyce tried it out for himself. He decided as he was the transport Minister to drink three-quarters of a bottle of wine and found he was still legally able to drive. He said that that was crazy and it is crazy. We all know that. If anyone watched a TV3 programme recently—Sue Moroney:Campbell Live.DARIEN FENTON: It wasCampbell Live. You would have seen a larger guy drink 12 bottles of beer which is a huge amount of alcohol. It is crazy. Steven Joyce said in 2010 that it was crazy but what happened in between time—Sue Moroney: It would be good if they told us. It would be good to know.DARIEN FENTON: It would be good to know that. He knew he was incompetent to drive and he said that the existing settings for legal alcohol limits for drivers were just ridiculous. So here we have had a crazy just ridiculous situation carry on for 4 years.The current blood-alcohol limit that we have for adult drivers was set in 1978. It is very clear that society changed its views on drunk-driving and it became less acceptable for people to get into a car when they had had a few drinks. Just in the same way many many years ago when we introduced seat belts that was a bit of an outrage at the time but it is completely acceptable now and people are moving on to other safety measures as well such as having restraints for older children in cars. Society does move on.But since 1978 and particularly since 2009 so much research has consistently demonstrated the benefits associated with lowering the blood-alcohol concentration limits in saving lives and preventing serious injuries. We also know that many other countries have already done this. In Australia in New South Wales they achieved an 8 percent reduction in fatal crashes and a 7 percent reduction in crashes causing serious injury. Queensland achieved an 18 percent reduction in fatal crashes and a 14 percent reduction in serious crashes and on it goes in Belgium and France. The statistics are there. New Zealand is no different. We knew that this was the case 4 years ago. Why did we need 3 years of research to tell us what everybody knows? This is sensible. It is a sensible measure. We have had the evidence. I am really happy that the Government has finally accepted what is obvious. I look forward very much as a member of the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee to debating this bill.KEVIN HAGUE (Green): It is a pleasure to take a call on this bill the Land Transport Amendment Bill which the Green Party will certainly be supporting. It is interesting that we have arrived today at a day when there seems to be a consensus across the House about the damage caused by a person with a blood-alcohol concentration of over 50 milligrams driving a motor vehicle. Other members have already talked about some of the parameters of the problem. Thirty percent of crashes are alcohol related and a higher proportion are serious crashes. The Law Commission in its report noted that drink-driving fatalities in this country were higher than in other countries. In 2009 there were 138 deaths arising from crashes where alcohol was a factor. New Zealand as other speakers have noted has one of the highest blood-alcohol concentration limits in the world and the current limit has been in place since 1978. Others have mentioned the incredulity of those who test the amount of alcohol that is required to reach that 80 milligram limit. It is between six beers and nine beers for an average adult man and between four and six for the average adult woman over the course of 2 hours in order to reach that 80 milligram limit. I do not know about you Mr Deputy Speaker but certainly speaking for myself if I had been drinking anything like that amount I would not be safe to drive.So what about the reform attempts in recent years? Other speakers have referred to those. We had the reduction of the limit recommended by the Law Commission. We then had the Ministry of Transport and itsSafer Journeysdocument recommending areduction from 80 milligrams to 50 milligrams. Interestingly a previous speaker David Bennett spoke about the necessity of reducing the blood-alcohol concentration limit for drivers under the age of 20 to zero as a step towards this goal. Although I commend that and commend that particular measure I see no reason at all why this measure being introduced today could not have been introduced at the same time as indeed had been recommended by both the Law Commission and the Ministry of Transport. There is nothing at all about reducing the blood-alcohol concentration limit for drivers under 20 that was necessary to set the stage for this change that we are now proposing and considering. Interestingly this is another one of those cases where Parliament is lagging well behind public support and public opinion. When expressed as the number of drinks needed to get to the limit just 2 percent of the public actually support the current blood-alcohol concentration limit—just 2 percent. There is extremely wide-based and strong support for making the change.Other speakers have already talked about the opportunities to make this change that have been squandered actually since 2009. At the time we made the changes to the youth limit we could have done it. In the Alcohol Reform Bill which the House considered last time we could have done it and the Government chose not to. It is my belief that the Government is moving now to make this change only because Iain Lees-Galloway’s member’s bill was pulled out of the ballot and therefore the Government could no longer avoid the issue being debated on the floor of the House. That is why we are seeing a Government bill on the matter.When we look at this bill most of the framing of the drink-driving issue has been around the proposal to lower the limit effectively extending the category of offending downwards from 80 milligrams to 50 milligrams. There has not been much discussion in the public arena or indeed in specialist circles around the other aspect that the Government intends to do which is effectively to introduce a new category of offending with much lower levels of penalty than the existing penalties in the current law. I think that is an interesting point because the argument for lower penalties for less severe offending of course holds true. But even when we consider the current law above 80 milligrams there are not graduated penalties above that. There are penalties and it becomes a matter for the discretion of the judge and for the courts to determine what level of penalty is applied. So it is a very curious approach that the Government has taken to effectively introduce an entirely new and much less serious category.The point of law is to achieve a variety of things. One is to directly protect people from risk of harm as a result of having dangerous drivers on the roads. A second point is to actually impact on the whole range of drink-driving behaviour and reduce the amount of alcohol that the whole range of people consume in relation to driving bringing benefits right across that spectrum. Then the third benefit is to provide a very direct disincentive to those who might otherwise drink excessively and then drive motor vehicles. The question is whether the lower penalties that the Government intends for people who are consuming to a level that takes their blood-alcohol concentration to between 50 milligrams and 80 milligrams will be sufficient to achieve the disincentive effects that we want and those other benefits of the law change. I am going to be very interested to hear what submitters say to the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee because I believe that those penalties will not be adequate to achieve the kind of gain that we want to see.In the explanatory note of the bill the Government says: “The analysis indicates that conservatively an average of 3.4 fatalities and 64 injuries per year could be saved and that the policy would have a positive net present value of $200 million over 10 years …” etc. etc. The question for me is that I do not see how those numbers were derived because actually with the lower level of penalties the disincentives the shapers ofbehaviour that we use currently above 80 milligrams will not be the ones we use. So those numbers may in fact be an overly optimistic estimate based on the lower level of disincentive that the Government is intending with this bill.The additional points I am going to be looking for in the submissions are first of all whether 50 milligrams is low enough. Why ought we to have any permitted level of blood-alcohol? Certainly other countries—Sweden and Norway for example—have effectively a zero limit. They have that because they recognise—and it is set out inSafer Journeys—that actually at any level of alcohol consumption judgment and skill are impaired. People become worse drivers and that means they are more likely to cause crashes with all of the consequences of fatality and injury to themselves and to others. So why is there any limit at all? Is 50 milligrams low enough?The other point is that there is another change that has not been discussed so far in this debate which is that the Government is intending that someone who is found to have more than 50 milligrams but less than 80 milligrams will not be able to seek a blood test. They will get their infringement notice on the basis of the breath test alone. I am going to be very interested to see what submitters have to say to the select committee about that quite significant change. So with those reservations I again state that the Green Party will support this bill at its first reading. Thank you.MIKE SABIN (National—Northland): It is good to see that the Land Transport Amendment Bill is enjoying good support. It is a very important bill. Of course there have been some comments about delay as we generally expect when there is support of this nature. The reality is that there have been some significant reforms going on in this space over a number of years now—in the whole alcohol and drugs space. There has certainly been a lot of work and research looking at this particular nexus between the 0.05 and the 0.08 level as it relates to drivers on the road. One thing that we have been able to establish is that there is a relatively small group of people who fall into that category. With all legislation whether or not it is for matters like this it is about sending messages but achieving balance in doing so. There is always the risk that the sledgehammer is used to crack the walnut and there is also the risk that if we do not send stern enough messages we essentially empower or engage the community to disregard the dangers and the consequences of their actions in matters like this.One thing that we know is that swiftness and certainty play a very significant role in deterrence. Ultimately just because there is a limit—and the member Kevin Hague raised a very good point as to why the level should not be zero as we have with youth—and because someone can drive with an element of alcohol it does not mean it is a good idea and it does not mean that they actually have to. It is still up to the individual to make a responsible call about whether it is appropriate in their view. That is where we come back to setting the messages and putting the levers in place to try to get that balance right. One thing is for sure and that is that 86 percent of the population in New Zealand consumes alcohol and there is a large number of people who have issues with it. But there are far greater numbers of people who actually do not and we need to consider them in the mix when we are passing legislation and getting that balance right.I am looking forward to the discussion on this bill. I think it will be an interesting piece of legislation to work on. I certainly encourage people to make submissions. Thank you.DENIS O’ROURKE (NZ First): New Zealand First will support the Land Transport Amendment Bill to go to the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee. Statistics show that drink-driving in New Zealand is still a very serious problem—61 deaths between 2009 and 2012 plus over 1000 injuries are far too many. The Minister of Transport it seems has been dragged kicking and screaming to take action on thisand this bill represents minimal action and far too late. It is too little to tackle a major cause behind a majority of road accident deaths and serious injuries and of long-term emotional or psychological trauma to many more people and their families.New Zealand First supports the overall thrust of the bill to lower the allowable alcohol content from 80 to 50 milligrams per 100 millilitres of blood when driving and to reduce the current breath-alcohol limit from 400 micrograms of alcohol per litre of breath to 250 micrograms. In the bill disobedience in respect of these new limits is to be addressed only in the form of infringement offences on the grounds that they are in the less serious range of offending. The existing limits are therefore to be regarded in the more serious range and are criminal offences with much larger penalties. The lowering of these limits however is justified and necessary because there is much evidence and research already available to show enough driver impairment between the proposed limits and the existing limits to warrant this action.The recentCampbell Liveprogramme though not a scientific study was nevertheless a convincing demonstration of how our limits are far too high and that most people drinking far less than these limits are in fact not capable of driving safely and are likely to harm themselves and others if they do so. The programme showed that although people with higher body mass may be able to drink and drive with close to an 80 milligram blood-alcohol limit without significant impairment a large proportion of the population—those with less body mass and especially women and more especially young people—cannot do so safely. Therefore it is clear to me that New Zealand’s alcohol limits in relation to driving are far too high are out of touch with international best practice and indeed are out of touch with public opinion.The part of theCampbell Live demonstration however that impressed me most was the realisation that the main value of a significantly lower blood-alcohol limit is the fact that it is highly likely to mean that drinkers will start to make decisions much earlier in their drinking sessions about how much they will drink and whether they will drink and drive. Therefore they are likely to make much better decisions. Further when people go to functions or out to socialise they are much more likely to make alternative transport arrangements if they know that they will be drinking more than the two to four standard drinks that would take them over the new blood-alcohol limit as proposed in this bill.The Government has announced that its proposed solution is that an infringement of the new rules prohibiting driving with a blood-alcohol limit of between 51 and 80 milligrams or with a breath-alcohol limit of between 251 and 400 micrograms will not be treated as a criminal offence which would incur the full force of the law as for driving with a blood-alcohol limit of over 80 milligrams or a breath-alcohol limit of over 400 micrograms. Instead the legislation provides only for a small fine of $200 and 50 demerit points. Demerit points may lead to loss of licence to drive for a period but the $200 fine is nothing more than derisory and is clearly an inadequate deterrent. Demerit points are often easily disregarded especially by the young because they usually do not have an immediate effect. The $200 fine is simply not enough. These new penalties therefore do not reflect the seriousness of the offences; they undermine the seriousness of the offences. They smack of the proverbial slap on the wrist with a wet bus ticket. Young people are especially likely to think that they might drink over the new limits without being too worried about the penalty—almost an invitation in fact to drink to the criminal limit. The new penalties are unlikely to have the desired result of getting people to make their drinking and driving decisions earlier in their drinking sessions. That should be a primary objective.The Government has yet again showed the same weakness on alcohol issues as it showed recently with the so-called reforms for the sale of alcohol in New Zealand which did not reduce the purchase age for alcohol which took a wimpy approach toopening hours and which took no action on issues such as those relating to alcopops. Clearly the Government yielded then to the alcohol industry lobby on that legislation and this bill it seems to me adopts a similar half-pie approach as far as penalties go.It seems to me that on this important law and order issue the public of New Zealand actually do want stronger action and leadership than what this Government is apparently prepared to take. It is an issue that the public need to give us in this House some guidance on as to how far they want the new rules or legislation to go. For that reason there needs to be a chance for the public to have their say and we in New Zealand First want to hear those submissions at the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee. We want to hear what the experts have to say too because there has been a lot of research and a lot of evidence gathered and they can offer a lot. We want the new limits and penalties to reflect public opinion but we also want the optimum degree of public consensus possible because in the end what we really need is a culture change towards more sensible drinking habits especially among young people so that success in achieving road safety objectives will come more from improved attitudes and practices than from the fear of high penalties but that does not mean that penalties should be soft. The penalties must reinforce and underpin the process for social change and better drinking habits along of course with continued education and promotional efforts.New Zealand First will support this bill to go to the select committee especially so that submissions from the public can be heard for the reasons I outlined. However New Zealand First is likely to be seeking higher penalties also for the reasons that I have outlined and we are interested in what the public have to say about that. We suspect that the Government’s limp-wristed approach on penalties will not be supported and that the public will show that they want stronger penalties to tackle such a serious problem. I hope that people will make submissions that they will say what they feel about this and that the experts will give us the benefit of their expertise as well and mostly I hope that the Government will actually listen to all those people. If as I suspect increased penalties are what people want I hope the Government will heed that and make the changes necessary. So I look forward to the select committee process for those reasons and New Zealand First will support the bill to that stage.CHRIS AUCHINVOLE (National): This bill the Land Transport Amendment Bill will make our roads safer while still allowing people to socialise responsibly. We should pass this bill. Thank you.Dr MEGAN WOODS (Labour—Wigram): It is my pleasure to take a call to discuss the Land Transport Amendment Bill a piece of legislation that many others before me have talked about. The purpose of this bill is to lower the adult legal alcohol limits from 400 micrograms of alcohol per litre of breath to 250 micrograms and from 80 milligrams of alcohol per 100 millilitres of blood to 50 milligrams; and to enact the civil infringements of $200 fines and 50 demerit points that will be imposed on those who fall between the 50 and 80 milligram levels. I think it is important that we as a House can come to consensus and collective agreement around how it is that we as a society deal with those who choose to get behind the wheel of a car after they have been drinking to a level that makes them a danger not only to themselves but to others who use the road. I think that it is really important that we do not see this issue becoming highly politicised and that we can come to an agreement. So it is a pleasure to be part of a debate where parties are signalling their support for this bill to go to the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee to hear the submissions and for finally doing something about lowering even further the number of deaths on our roads caused by alcohol.As many speakers before me have outlined this is a piece of legislation that has a long history. It has been a long time in the making. It has been brewing for a while and my colleagues Iain Lees-Galloway and Darien Fenton pointed to Darren Hughes and hismember’s bill that he brought to this House in 2009. It is an interesting history that this piece of legislation that we are standing here and debating today has.I think the idea that we are debating—whether or not we are going to make a change as legislators in this country that will mean fewer deaths of New Zealanders—is really important. We have the power with decisions we make in this House that will mean that fewer New Zealanders will needlessly die on our roads. I think that is the important stuff that drives many of us in this House. Between 2006 and 2008 30 people were killed in accidents where drivers were known to have a blood-alcohol content of between 0.05 and 0.08. We can treat this as a dry statistic of 30 people or we can think about the 30 human beings and the families of those 30 human beings their friends and all their networks who were needlessly mourning the loss of a loved one. This is really important stuff and it is important that we crack on with it because as others have noted it has been a long time coming.I think that it is really important that we go back and revise the blood-alcohol limits that were set in 1978. I remember growing up in the 1970s and 1980s in New Zealand and there being an entirely different attitude to drinking and driving in this country. The concern of many of the adults around me seemed to be whether or not they were going to be caught not whether or not they posed a danger to themselves or to others who were using the roads. As a student in the 1990s I was part of the SADD movement—Students Against Drunk Driving—where we signed contracts with our parents. There was a two-way contractual agreement that a parent or a new teenage driver would come and pick up family members if they had consumed too much alcohol. We have seen much societal change that has led to fewer deaths on our roads but it is my belief that we need to revisit blood-alcohol limits that were concocted in the 1970s when we did have an entirely different attitude to drink-driving.In July 2010 Cabinet did make some decisions around what was going to happen with drink-driving as many speakers have alluded to. There was a lowering of the youth drink-drive limit for drivers under 20 years of age—the blood-alcohol content was lowered. I think that the evidence did point to the fact that many of the deaths and injuries on our roads do happen amongst the lower-aged cohort of people. But there was a perplexing decision to maintain the current adult drink-drive limit at its 1978 level of 0.08 while we went and did some more research. I think that the then Minister of Transport Steven Joyce had an attitude that is somewhat perplexing to me. In this House in response to a question from Darren Hughes the Minister Steven Joyce said: “before lowering the adult blood-alcohol limit the Government would want to ensure that the specific impact on the road toll of drivers with a blood-alcohol concentration of between 0.05 grams and 0.08 grams was known and that the move had very broad support amongst the driving population of this country.” I am all for consultation but when it comes to making decisions about where we need to set a safe limit for the amount of alcohol that people are allowed to drink before they get behind the wheel of a car I think we need to rely on the science and the evidence and perhaps not on how people feel.We already had very well-established international evidence. We had well-established New Zealand evidence. We could have made this decision back then in 2010. New Zealand lagged behind the rest of the world and I do not know whether Steven Joyce really did believe that there was something inherently different about New Zealanders and their physical make-up that meant that their level of blood-alcohol should be substantially different from those in Australia or those in other places that had made moves to lower the blood-alcohol limit.It is somewhat perplexing that this is a Government that has run roughshod over the will of New Zealand during its 5 years in Government but on this the level of blood alcohol it chooses to go out and see how people feel. It just does not make sense to me.At the time in 2010 we on this side of the House the Labour Opposition offered cross-party support because we do not believe that this is an issue that should become a political football. We believe that this is an important health issue for New Zealand—an important issue where we can literally save the lives of New Zealanders each year. We offered up that support. We also pointed to what international experts were saying about the New Zealand Government’s and Cabinet’s decision not to proceed with the lowering of the blood-alcohol limit. The UK drug and alcohol expert Professor David Nutt described National’s reluctance to make a decision on this as weak and making no sense. This was how the international expert community felt about how our Government was dealing with a really important issue.We did not need to go back and do more research; we had research coming out of our ears. The Law Commission’s report on alcohol left no doubt that blood-alcohol limits needed to be lowered. There just simply was not a need to go back but the Government did. The Government decided to go back and now we have a report that shows that indeed if we had done this we could have literally saved lives. I say that it is not before time that we see this legislation come before the House. It is a pity that we are not heading into the Christmas season—a period of time that is notorious for road accidents and for drink driving—of 2013 with these lowered levels with which we could literally be saving lives.But I will not be churlish. It is good to see it going to the select committee. The public do now have a chance to make their views heard. Other members of this House have raised areas where people might want to have a say. They might want to raise questions about whether this is the right limit as has been alluded to by earlier speakers. They might want to raise questions in their submissions about whether or not the sanctions that this legislation is imposing are appropriate and whether they are the right sanctions. Whatever way I am very pleased to see this bill progressing through the House and I really do urge people to have their voices heard in the select committee process and make it clear to this Government and give it a clear message that the time is right now we cannot delay any further and we need to get on with this. Thank you.Dr CAM CALDER (National): This bill the Land Transport Amendment Bill will lower the legal blood-alcohol limit. That will make our roads safer. I wholeheartedly support this bill.Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Five minutes—Carol Beaumont.CAROL BEAUMONT (Labour): It is very interesting to me that very brief calls are being taken on the other side of the House on something that is a very serious matter and something that in my time in this House has been traversed on many occasions. Like my colleagues I stand to support the Land Transport Amendment Bill. It is about time. It is about time we did something about lowering the legal adult alcohol limits.This is something that is not as I have said new. I happened to look back at the Law Commission reportAlcohol in our Lives: Curbing the Harm. I sat through many hours of submissions on the legislation that arose from that very important work done by the Law Commission and I just thought it was worth reminding the House what the Law Commission said. It said: “Drink driving and transport policies—In our Issues Paper we suggested there was a strong case for the blood alcohol limits to be reduced from 80 to 50 mgs of alcohol per 100 mls of blood for all drivers with zero tolerance for drivers under 20 years of age. We also said consideration should be given to the introduction of alcohol ignition locking devices for all convicted drink drivers. Although we did not seek submissions on these matters”—and this is the important bit—“but encouragedthem to be made directly to the Ministry of Transport as part of the Safer Journeys consultation we received more than 1240 transport-related submissions. These were forwarded to the Ministry of Transport for its consideration. Our view is unchanged: like the majority of the submitters we believe blood alcohol limits must come down.” That was the Law Commission in 2010.The fact of the matter is that there have been numerous opportunities to do what is being done now. My former colleague Darren Hughes as others have mentioned had a member’s bill to deal with this issue because the Government was not brave enough to deal with it at the time and kicked it to touch instead of dealing with it as part of the alcohol law reform process and then the follow-on to Safer Journeys. Instead of being brave enough to deal with something that actually would have saved lives as others have said we went for more research. In fact I can recall listening to discussion in the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee about how we needed more research on this matter because our roads were different from those in the other countries we were talking about so therefore we needed this research. We had submitter after submitter and evidence provided around what was done in other jurisdictions why it was important to make this change and how the level of impairment between 0.05 and 0.08 increased dramatically. All of that information was there but no action was taken.It is important that we have on record here the very real question of why it has taken the Government so long to introduce this bill and how many New Zealanders have died as a result of that inaction. That is a serious matter. Certainly it is clear that most years apparently drink-driving is still the major cause of road accidents in New Zealand with an average of 61 fatalities 244 serious injuries and 761 minor injuries caused by at-fault drivers who have been drinking. The social cost of those injuries and fatalities is $446 million—a huge sum in our country. But that of course is just the financial cost; the emotional cost to the individuals who are seriously injured and to the families of people who are killed or seriously injured is just phenomenal. It is a huge issue and the fact that it has taken so long I do think is very very serious.We will be looking closely at the penalty regime that is put up in this Land Transport Amendment Bill. We are not convinced that the suggestions around a different regime for those who have blood-alcohol levels between 0.05 and 0.08 are right but we will be carefully scrutinising submissions on that matter. Thank you.Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Gareth Hughes—10 minutes.Gareth Hughes: Ten minutes? Five.Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Sorry 5 minutes. Testing.GARETH HUGHES (Green): Kia ora. Ngā mihi nui ki a koutou. Kia ora. I rise to support the Land Transport Amendment Bill 2013. I want to start off by just acknowledging the families and friends of victims of alcohol-induced road deaths on New Zealand streets and roads. For these people this is not academic and this is not politics; this is about a loved one whom they have lost so I want to acknowledge the heartbreak. We know there have been hundreds of whānau affected by alcohol on our roads and what the Green Party wants to see is fewer Kiwis dying needlessly because we have got rules in place to protect other drivers and other passengers on the road to make better decisions and to keep us safe on the roads.We support this bill. We think it is a good step forward to see the blood-alcohol levels reducing through this legislation. Obviously we can rehash all the old political debates of a few years ago but what we did see was a tremendous missed opportunity 2 years ago where a confluence of factors—official advice the Law Commission public campaigns by the media public opinion polling—turned in the direction of lower blood-alcohol levels. This side of Parliament very clearly called for it. We did not take that opportunity but it is good we are finally doing it now.What we are seeing is some changes from that such as the effectively zero blood-alcohol rate for under-20-year-olds and alcohol interlocks. They are some progressive steps but we need to go further and align our entire blood-alcohol levels at that 0.05 level.What this bill basically does is reduce from 400 micrograms to 250 micrograms and from 80 milligrams to 50 milligrams the blood-alcohol breath and blood tests respectively. We support that. We support the 0.05 blood-alcohol concentration as it is called because it is the World Health Organization recommendation. I understand that around 23 other OECD States have a similar regime. This is the norm internationally. When you look at the data—we have had the debate around whether the data is sufficient or not—we have seen 300 international reports calling for this and this is something the Green Party has been calling for for a while.What I would like to question and we welcome the approach of the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee are the official statistics that the New Zealand Transport Agency has put out around this that are contained in the legislation. It says we are going to see around 3.4 fewer fatalities a year and a net benefit of around $200 million a year. This is significantly lower than the agency was estimating only a few years ago if I recall correctly in theSafer Journeys document which talked about fatality savings of 15 to 33 per annum from reducing from 0.08 to 0.05. So we will look at that in detail at the select committee.We note that the benefit-cost ratio of this law is around 10:1—considerably higher than the motorways the Government is ramming through our Parliament. There we see independent reports saying that there is a benefit-cost ratio of 0.4 for the motorways. In other words you are throwing 66c away for every dollar the Government is borrowing off the taxpayer to invest in them. I guess we would also like to make the point that when it comes to saving lives on the roads sometimes think-big - style motorways that cost billions to borrow to build are not the best solution. There are cost-effective solutions we could be doing right now across Northland’s roads Waikato’s roads and the roads in the Coromandel if we were not spending so much money on some of these mega white elephant projects—solutions such as better walking and cycling median strips and the like.Hon Maurice Williamson: That’s the way to get freight to the market eh—cycling.GARETH HUGHES: Cycling? We know that it is a lot safer to cycle Mr Williamson and the benefit-cost ratio there is in the order of 20-30:1 not the less than 0.5:1 that as we see for the Government’s motorways.We would also like to question in the select committee the penalties. We note that these are extraordinarily low. The fine for breaching the new civil—not criminal—infringement period is $200 and 50 demerit points. That is quite a lot lower than the current civil penalty so will it be a disincentive? We would also like to question why no evidential blood test is required and also given that the Attorney-General has called the bill inconsistent with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act what the good rationale for it is. As it is presented it is simply a cost-saving measure which he rightly points out could actually cost more in the long term if we see more legal cases.But ultimately what we need to get to the bottom of is our alcohol problem in this country: why Kiwis are even contemplating having a few drinks and driving unsafely. We need to have more alcohol treatment for the 30000 people who are detained for alcohol offences while driving. Only 5 percent got alcohol treatment according to the latest data I have seen despite the $4 billion social cost. It is high time that New Zealand dealt with our cultural alcohol problems and that we support safer roads. Kia ora.SIMON O’CONNOR (National—Tāmaki): I will take just a short call on this bill the Land Transport Amendment Bill mainly in retort to a couple of the thoughts expressed. From the Green Party it does sound like the key around stopping drink-driving is to ban roads. Maybe that is a step forward. We hear from the Labour Party members that they had an epiphany around drink-driving one day after 9 years in Government. And we hear from New Zealand First—Hon Annette King: That’s rubbish—total rubbish and you know it.SIMON O’CONNOR: Oh yes we have excited them. We have excited them now. We have livened them up.We are pleased that this bill has the widespread support of the House. We are looking forward to working with David Bennett in the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee and in the House. Thank you.Bill read a first time.Billreferred to the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee.Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill (No 3)First ReadingHon MAURICE WILLIAMSON (Minister for Building and Construction) on behalf of theMinister of Local Government: I moveThat the Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill (No 3) be now read a first time. At the appropriate time I intend to move that the bill be referred to the Local Government and Environment Committee with an instruction that the committee report to the House on or before 12 May 2014. It is my privilege to introduce this bill. In doing so I must acknowledge the work of the Hon Nick Smith. My colleague was the original architect of the Better Local Government reforms significant parts of which this bill implements and he has continued to provide valuable support and ideas. I also acknowledge the work of the Rt Hon David Carter under whose direction the bill to implement the first phase of the Better Local Government reforms was passed.Local authorities provide important services and infrastructure that households and businesses use every day. It is therefore vital to the New Zealand economy society in general and even the environment that councils are efficient effective and well run. We need to be confident that our local authorities are capable of facing the challenges of the 21st century. This bill enables better and more efficient local authority operations. It is about providing councils with the tools and options with which they can up their game. It includes provisions designed to provide greater transparency to communities about how councils are planning to manage and are managing the infrastructure those communities so heavily rely on.These changes are complemented by other good-practice initiatives such as Local Government New Zealand’s plan to soon introduce a centre of excellence to assist the sector in financial effectiveness and value. Although the bill is not specifically aimed at the worst-case scenarios the Kaipara District Council situation is worthy of mention. The Auditor-General has just completed her investigation into the council’s involvement in a waste-water scheme. I do not propose to discuss the details of that case but they provide salutary lessons to us all. This bill and legislation passed last year address many of those lessons. Changes enacted last year allow Ministers to identify potential problems with councils obtain information on their nature and extent and provide an appropriately tailored response. This bill introduces requirements for greater transparency in the management of infrastructure and greater discipline in the documentation of agreements for infrastructure that is to be provided by third parties. Councils will be required to consult their communities using more tightly focuseddocuments that highlight key issues rather than having these hidden in lengthy often opaque draft plans.This bill also complements the changes made to the Local Government Act in 2012 in other ways. It increases the range of options through which local authorities can achieve efficiencies and the scale at which services and facilities are delivered. For some councils and communities the best option may be to follow the reorganisation path to amalgamation or to other major restructuring. Others may find perfectly worthwhile solutions to issues by working together and increasing their use of shared services.The bill expands the options available for local authority reorganisations. The Local Government Commission will be able to consider establishing local boards as part of the governance arrangements for new unitary authorities as well as in existing unitary authorities. The boards will have features similar to those in Auckland but can be tailored to local circumstances. In the circumstances where reorganisation is not justified or not possible the bill contains measures to make it easier for councils to cooperate and collaborate to improve efficiency and effectiveness.The bill also includes measures to enable councils to achieve efficiencies in other ways. For example the Government has decided to provide councils with more flexibility about how they consult their communities. This is not about removing requirements to consult but about improving the processes that are used. The aim is to enable councils to design engagement processes that are appropriate to a range of different circumstances and community interests. The new significance and engagement policies will provide a clearer guide about how and when communities can expect to be engaged.This bill reduces the number of occasions where the costly and time-consuming special consultation procedure has to be used. It enables the use of a wider range of technology with which councils can communicate with their communities. The bill also improves consultation on council long-term plans and annual plans. It provides for consultation documents with a greater focus on the issues that are important to ratepayers rather than containing voluminous detailed information that is understood by very few.Local authorities own more than $96 billion in fixed assets mostly infrastructure. The majority of councils are managing their assets well on a day-to-day basis but communities require greater assurance that these assets are being managed strategically and sustainably over the long term. This bill therefore reinforces the importance of asset management planning as part of a council’s prudent stewardship of resources. It requires local authorities to prepare an infrastructure strategy for at least a 30-year period. The strategy will identify the significant infrastructure issues faced by the local authority the options for addressing the issues and the implications of those options. Officials at the Department of Internal Affairs have prepared an example infrastructure strategy to help illustrate what it is intended to do and how it might look. I encourage submitters on the bill to view the example infrastructure strategy which is available on the department’s Better Local Government website. I am advised that it has been downloaded around 560 times already.One means by which local authorities raise money to pay for infrastructure to meet growth is through development contributions. Development contributions are one of many costs that make up the price of new houses. Therefore it is important that development contributions are fair and no higher than they should be. This Government does not want future generations priced out of homeownership. This bill introduces a measure to ensure that development contributions are better focused and more transparent. The range of infrastructure for which development contributions can becharged will be narrowed. This narrowing reflects the principle that developers should pay only for the infrastructure that is required by the development whereas communities pay for the infrastructure that will benefit the whole community.This bill also introduces a new objections process through which people can challenge inappropriate development contributions charges. New principles are included to guide how development contributions should be applied and there is greater encouragement for developers to provide more local infrastructure in return for paying lower development contributions. Commencement provisions in the bill mean that councils will need to review and update their development contributions policies within 1 month of the bill’s enactment. This reflects the need for urgency. I appreciate however that many councils may find this time frame ambitious. The select committee process provides an opportunity for those councils and other interested parties to express their views on this matter. I will be interested in the committee’s assessment of whether the time frame in the bill is indeed appropriate.In 2002 local government legislation was updated for the start of the 21st century. This bill ensures that local authorities are equipped to meet the challenges of the decade ahead. I commend this bill to the House.Hon ANNETTE KING (Labour—Rongotai): I stand to speak to the Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill (No 3) the next local government bill introduced by this Government and to say that the Labour Party will support this bill in its first reading and going to the Local Government and Environment Committee. That is not to say Minister Williamson that we do not have some concerns about the bill itself but we would like the public to have a say on the bill in the democratic way that they should. We will be looking first of all to make sure that a bill that is introduced in December just before Christmas has a considerable length of time for people to make submissions on it because we all know that there have been times when select committees have required submissions on bills that come in this late in the year to be made over the Christmas - new year period. That is incredibly difficult for New Zealanders who save their holidays for this time of year. They do not actually want to sit at the beach writing out a submission on a local government bill. So I—Hon Maurice Williamson: Oh you’re kidding me.Hon ANNETTE KING: Although I am sure Mr Williamson did that in his spare time I think most New Zealanders would want to have a barbie and a beer rather than to be writing out submissions. So I say to the Minister that I hope there is going to be considerable time given for submissions to be made on this bill.The next point I would make is to ask whether the Government is going to listen to the submissions because the Minister made a rather bad start in his presentation today when he complimented the Hon Nick Smith on his Better Local Government legislation and his approach to local government. Well Minister you may well have been asleep when Nick Smith made his speeches and when he introduced his Better Local Government legislation. His handling of it was disastrous. It was the first part of the major changes. Part one of Better Local Government was disastrously handled. In fact the regulatory impact statement that went with the first part of these changes was one of the worst I have ever seen. In fact it said that there was no justification for most of the changes that the Government wanted to make. Then the New Zealand Institute of Economic Research did a very good piece as well. It said that it could see no justification for change. We were then told by Minister Nick Smith that you did not have to believe everything that the institute said. Of course it put out a report last week saying how well the economy was going and the Government said: “Of course you must believe the New Zealand Institute of Economic Research.” So it—Hon Simon Bridges: They got that one right.Hon ANNETTE KING: Oh according to the junior Minister it got that wrong. Yes it did get that wrong about everything being better in economic terms in New Zealand. So I have to say that we have some doubts about the consultation that will take place on this bill. If it is going to be like the first bill we had absolutely no notice was taken of the many many submissions that were made on the bill. They came from all around New Zealand from Southland to the far north. They came from local government they came from NGOs they came from the community and they came from community boards. They said: “Do not take away the four well-beings that exist in the Act. Do not take them away.” And did the Government listen? No it did not. It bowled on ahead. It brushed aside all the submissions. It said: “Too bad. We don’t care what you think. We’re doing what we want anyway. Take that or leave it.” So we have concerns that even if submissions are made on this bill they will not in fact be listened to although it will not make any changes. Maybe the Minister would like to assure us that there is going to be some real consideration given to what local government says about this bill.There are some things in this bill that I think could potentially be very positive. Looking at the consultation that local government has to undertake and making that more transparent more open and streamlined—some of it is very onerous—I think that could be a good change but I would like to hear from local government as to exactly how it would work. I note that the Government had several options it could have chosen when it came to local government consulting with its community. It has taken quite a flexible approach but let us see whether local government thinks that that is going to work. At the end of the day these bills are all about control of local government. We have always seen local government as being very very important and making its own decisions within a framework within a community. We have seen the tightening of its ability to make those decisions under a Government that says that it believes in open government and that it likes businesses and communities to get on with things. We have not seen that in local government. So I will be interested in what local government has to say about consultation.Development levies is another area. We need some more information as to what the details are going to be about what development levies can be applied to. The Minister did not outline that in great detail. I assume Minister that that is because decisions are still to be made about what development levies can be applied to by local government. I think we need to know the detail. As they say the real issue will be the detail of what is being proposed.There are also in the bill some changes to the Local Government Commission. These are ones that do worry me because the Local Government Commission is not an elected organisation. Its members are Government appointments. There have been some very good people on the Local Government Commission. I have great faith in Basil Morrison in fact as the chair of that Local Government Commission. He is a very experienced man. He is not going to always be there. But under these changes the Local Government Commission is going to be able to create council-controlled organisations and joint committees as part of the reorganisation scheme. That means that the Local Government Commission can decide that there will be council-controlled organisations set up in local government. I do not agree with that. I think that is a decision that needs to be made by local government itself. I think the proliferation of council-controlled organisations in many councils has been to the detriment of local councils and local communities. There is a lack of accountability by council-controlled organisations. Often there is no elected representative at all. In fact there are only people appointed by councils and they do not have to account back to the public of New Zealand and the ratepayers as to how they spend their money. They do not have the accountability and the connection with the community that you would expect at a local government level.So I am concerned about allowing the Local Government Commission to decide that it can create council-controlled organisations. I am also concerned about the commission deciding on joint committees. Surely we want local government to look at how it is working and what joint committees it thinks it ought to have rather than having an unelected commission making these decisions.So there are some positive things in here but there are also some things in here that need to be looked at more carefully. I like the idea of long-term infrastructure plans. We know that local government controls a large amount of infrastructure—more than $79 billion of infrastructure assets—and also it has got an additional $12 billion in land and buildings. So it does need to have long-term plans. But can I say to Minister Williamson that perhaps it would be good if the Government had a similar approach to long-term infrastructure strategies in planning because that is something we do not have. In fact I think it was a National Government that got rid of the planning commission we used to have when we looked at long-term planning for infrastructure in New Zealand. In Government we very much go from one electoral cycle to the next. So although it is a good idea to impose long-term plans on councils perhaps the Government might like to look at itself to undertake something similar.In conclusion I think the Government also ought to look at allowing local government to make some of these decisions about how it can lift the bar in improving its own performance. After all it is the one that is going to carry out the work.NICKY WAGNER (National—Christchurch Central): I rise to support the Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill (No 3). I support it because it amends the Local Government Act 2002 and it gives effect to the second phase of National’s Better Local Government changes. New Zealand’s 78 councils make up about 4 percent of New Zealand’s economy. They spend $7.5 billion of public money every year and they manage over $100 billion worth of assets so we really do need to make sure that they are operating as efficiently as possible.This second phase of the Better Local Government changes and reforms will empower local authorities. It will empower them by giving them the tools to provide better services for their local communities. We all have the same aim. We want to deliver better services to New Zealanders under very tight fiscal constraints and to build a more productive and generally more competitive economy all round.I just want to have a look at three or four of the main provisions of this bill. The first one is about extending the local boards model. This is the model that is used in Auckland and has proved to be very successful and other councils have asked for a similar model to be used. Under our first lot of reforms we allowed that model to be used in an urban unitary authority if it had a population of more than 400000 as it was reorganised. This bill will allow local boards to be an option in a proposed reorganisation to any new unitary authority and even as part of existing authorities. That introduction will be determined on a case by case basis—looking at the community seeing what they require—and it will be led in consultation with the Local Government Commission.The bill also focuses on more efficient delivery and governance of local authority services. The idea behind that is that the bill can encourage greater collaboration and more shared services between local authorities. It will do this by providing a range of practical ways to achieve those efficiencies of scale without necessarily amalgamating or creating bigger units. It just gives more flexibility to collaborate and to deliver better cheaper services.The bill also encourages better consultation decision making and planning. It basically gives more flexibility to councils and more clarity about how and when they must consult. The current law allows very little flexibility. Under this bill councils willhave the flexibility to use new techniques and more modern technology when they consult with the public. It does not remove any requirements to consult or affect any provisions about Māori engagement with council decision-making.After an in-depth study about development contributions this bill improves the development contributions regime. It will clarify and show the range of infrastructure that can be financed by development contributions. It also provides new principles and a new purpose for development contributions that will be inserted into the legislation to guide their use and to provide greater transparency.I was interested to hear the Hon Annette King supporting better infrastructure delivery and asset management. This is a very important role of local government and this bill will improve decision making about infrastructure. What will happen is that councils will be required to prepare an infrastructure strategy for at least a 30-year period. We know that the vast majority of council spending is around large infrastructure programmes so they will need to have a plan for 30 years and they will have to incorporate this into their long-term plans after 2015.The bill also adds the principle that asset management planning is part of a council’s prudent stewardship of resources so there will be a greater oversight of that spending. I think it is time for that. I think it was mentioned earlier that we had the report from the Auditor-General about Kaipara District Council and that certainly was an example of where spending was not monitored closely enough. We want to see that all councils have the tools to make sure they spend their ratepayers’ money well.These reforms are a really important part of our programme to build a more productive and competitive economy and to deliver better public services for all communities. We do want to work with local government in these really challenging financial times and make sure that they can deliver in the most efficient and affordable way to their ratepayers and for all Kiwi families. Thank you.MEKA WHAITIRI (Labour—Ikaroa-Rāwhiti): Tēnā koe. Tēnā tātou katoa. I am happy to take a call on the Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill (No 3) particularly in light of the Auditor-General’s reportInquiry into the Mangawhai community wastewater scheme which was tabled in the House today. I say “particularly” because in the Auditor-General’s own words it was a “woeful saga”. Kaipara District Council “failed to attend to its fundamental legal and accountability obligations.” It was woeful because Kaipara District Council “effectively lost control of a major infrastructure project.” and in terms of the work undertaken by the Auditor-General’s own office her comments were that her office “[fell] short of the standards I expect.”I stand along with my colleague the Hon Annette King from this side of the House in support of this bill at its first reading. We particularly look forward to it going to the Local Government and Environment Committee where there will be further scrutiny undertaken. But like my colleague the Hon Annette King I too have some reservations about this bill that has come before the House. Labour’s position is clearly one that upholds the democratic rights of all citizens in all communities throughout Aotearoa New Zealand so it makes sense to us that local issues and local concerns are addressed at a local level. In looking at this particular amendment bill we are seeing the opportunity for us to look at practices that govern local government to ensure that open and transparent practices are not only said to take place but actually taking place.I also share the concerns about bills being introduced so close to Christmas. I do hope that the Government ensures that there are adequate time lines—real time lines—for people to have their say on what is a considerable piece of legislation being brought before this House. I also encourage the Minister of Local Government the Hon Chris Tremain—and again it will be supported by the work undertaken by the selectcommittee—to ensure that the submissions that will come before it are fairly received fairly considered fairly analysed and go towards informing how the bill will be presented in its final state. Having been a member in this House for less than 6 months there are many bills that have come to this House that have given me some concern. But I am here to support this particular bill. I am here to support its first reading.I want to draw the House’s attention to the comments of the President of Local Government New Zealand Lawrence Yule who welcomed the Auditor-General’s report. But I also note his comments around the issues about governance and management capability at the local government level. As much as this side of the House endorses local decisions at a local level there are also some realities that we face around the capacity and capability to do that particularly when it involves major infrastructure projects that commit ratepayers’ money to better the areas for which local government is responsible. I applaud the response by the president in putting up his hand as the president of that organisation to ensure that there is intensive training given to new councillors who may be elected for the first time and also as most communities do for taking responsibility for improving local government at that level.Regarding the parts of the bill that we are being asked to comment on can I first talk about how the bill amends the Local Government Act to change what development contributions can be used for and to allow for objections to development contributions charges. I too look forward to more detail about exactly what those contributions will look like and what they will be used for. The other change in the bill is the encouragement of more collaboration and shared services between local authorities. It is absolutely a no-brainer that if we are moving to a shared service model the efficiency gains that can be achieved through that approach will speak for themselves if it is fully implemented. For me it means saving ratepayers’ money so that it can be put into areas that may be under pressure and we mentioned earlier about the four well-beings. I support that as a proposed amendment.The other area that this bill touches on is making consultation requirements more flexible. The member from the Government who stood and spoke before me Nicky Wagner mentioned iwi and Māori consultation. My experience is that we have some very good models out there in Aotearoa New Zealand but we definitely have some that need to do a lot better. I have recently been sitting on the board of inquiry hearings into the Tukituki Catchment Proposal and issues of consultation with iwi Māori up and down the riverway definitely need to be understood a bit more not only by people in this House but also by people in local government. This will ensure that when we are consulting iwi Māori as per the Resource Management Act we are actually speaking to the right iwi. We go on further to talk about an engagement policy. Of course nothing more needs to be said around that. Again it will be a test of how and whom we engage with and ensuring that those views are considered and taken into consideration.I too stand in support of the long-terms plans that are being proposed in this amendment bill. Again the bill is an encouragement to the Government to take the widest view on planning particularly in terms of key stakeholders not just business and community groups. As that side of the House as well as this side of the House will acknowledge New Zealand’s society is changing it is getting more diverse and therefore more views need to be considered when we are coming up with long-term plans.One of the key points that I want to end this call on is again referencing the President of Local Government New Zealand Lawrence Yule when he talked about capacity building and a commitment to training councillors. I want to commend this side of the House for doing its share of growing mayors and councillors particularly with the recent loss—our loss; their gain—of Canterbury mayor Lianne Dalziel. I also want toacknowledge Stevie Chadwick the Mayor of Rotorua and a former member of this side of the House and of course we cannot go past the Hon Rick Barker who now sits on the Hawke’s Bay Regional Council. So I would just like to stand and commend those three particularly and the work of this side of the House in building capacity at the local level. Nō reira thank you very much.EUGENIE SAGE (Green): Tēnā koe. I am pleased to take a call on behalf of the Green Party on the Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill (No 3). For anyone listening to Minister Williamson’s speech—David Bennett: Why don’t you stand up for democracy in your party?EUGENIE SAGE: I will start again. Anyone listening to the Minister for Building and Construction’s speech would assume that the bill was about making local government more productive more consultative and more efficient and certainly there are in this bill some changes to the principal Act that could do that by broadening the scope of the triennial agreement. That could encourage more collaboration between councils and more shared services. Things like infrastructure strategies are also a sensible idea.But there are four major reasons why the Green Party is opposing this bill. Firstly the bill represents another attack by National on local democracy and competent councils. Secondly by changing the consultation requirements around significance and around long-term plans the bill potentially reduces the community’s ability to participate in important council decisions. By making consultation more flexible potentially there is less consultation. Thirdly just as the Government is privatising our energy companies and Air New Zealand—public assets that have been built up over generations—this bill encourages councils to consider privatising council services and community infrastructure. Finally the changes to development contributions will benefit property developers and subdividers at the expense of ratepayers.I will deal with each of these issues in turn. The National Government is promoting major ad hoc change to the structure and organisation of local government throughout New Zealand without any clear purpose except its mistaken view that somehow bigger local government is better. This bill together with the changes last year to the Local Government Act will allow the Auckland unitary council model with its big super-council and weak local boards to be rolled out elsewhere in New Zealand. That is another example of this Government centralising power. More power is being concentrated in the executive and more power is being given to Ministers to intervene and interfere.This bill potentially extinguishes many of our competent city and district councils centralises power at the regional level in unitary councils and replaces those competent councils with local boards. That is because the bill allows the Local Government Commission in any proposed reorganisation to axe city and district councils which represent their communities and replace them with local boards. That is part of the brave new world of super-councils and big new unitary councils.At the moment the principal Act allows these local boards to be established only when unitary councils are established in metropolitan areas with a population of over 400000. The bill removes that provision. In Hawke’s Bay where the Local Government Commission has come out with its proposal for major reorganisation we would see a major loss of democracy with I think 53 elected councillors and four mayors replaced by just nine councillors one mayor and a clutch of boards. Of course we have seen the mayors of Central Hawke’s Bay Wairoa and Napier opposing this proposal because of the attack on democracy it represents by substituting competent councils with local boards.There is a very fundamental difference between the role of boards and that of councils. A board’s role is to identify and communicate the interests and preferences of people in the board’s area to the unitary authority. Boards have no power to set rates and no power to make by-laws. They have the power to recommend but they lack the decision-making power that councils have to make decisions on behalf of their communities. So that is why we see this bill—in combination with the changes to the Local Government Act which requires 10 percent of the community to sign a petition in order to get a poll on a reorganisation proposal—as an attack on democracy.National wants fewer democratic council structures. It wants to make it more difficult for the community to take part in decisions by their councils and in these reorganisation proposals. This provision around boards is about encouraging two tiers of local government in New Zealand axing regional councils and axing the district and city councils. The axing of regional councils which have a specific responsibility for natural resource management the management of coast air and water will mean that there is less attention given to environmental management in local government.We are concerned by the attack on public participation by the simplification of consultation requirements for a lot of local government activities. Yes that may make consultation more flexible but making it more flexible may mean that councils have to be less thorough in ensuring that their communities get a say on their major decisions. For example there is a proposal in the bill to change the purpose of long-term plans. It will no longer be to provide an opportunity for participation by the public in decision-making processes on activities to be undertaken by the local authority. Certainly those long-term plans can be complex but actually putting them out for public submissions is a key part of the community saying what the council should be doing over the next 10 years.Thirdly there is our concern about the privatisation thrust in the bill. In clause 11 it becomes mandatory for local authorities after each election to review the cost-effectiveness of the council continuing to provide infrastructure services and regulatory functions and the clause requires the council to consider having a council-controlled organisation or some other person or agency such as a private company providing these services. This whole push towards having more council-controlled organisations will make the management of our three waters—stormwater waste water and drinking water—much less transparent and much less accountable. This requirement to review will potentially force councils to consider privatising those services.The other issue we have a problem with is development contributions. That is where we see this bill as being a charter for property developers because of the way in which it restricts councils’ use of development contributions by limiting the purposes for which they may be levied. Under the current Act councils can levy development contributions to help fund reserves network infrastructure or community infrastructure. Community infrastructure is defined very broadly yet the bill replaces that definition with a much more restrictive one so that councils can levy development contributions to fund only community centres community halls play equipment and toilets. So National’s definition of community infrastructure does not include libraries cultural centres swimming pools or skateboard parks—any of those things that help provide community amenity.These changes are quite consistent with this mean-spirited Government. It is not interested in fairness and it has economic policies that are increasing the divide between rich and poor creating a much more unequal society with all the social harm that goes with that—educational underachievement crime and social alienation. With changes such as this one to community infrastructure it fails to recognise that localgovernment has a critical role in building social cohesion and building resilient communities.The only thing we are pleased about is that we understand the Minister of Local Government is prepared to look at this definition of community infrastructure. It needs to go back to what it is in the principal Act. We see developers as having a responsibility to help fund community infrastructure because it is their development that helps create the need for it.Nicky Wagner: You want housing and you want them to pay for everything else.EUGENIE SAGE: Not that that makes it too expensive as the member for Christchurch Central is claiming. Last year National showed that it did not care about community well-being by stripping out the promotion of well-being from the Local Government Act. These changes around development contributions are done with the same intention. We also have a concern about this whole notion of an objection process for development contributions. Again it is the Minister who will appoint the commissioner or the panel that hears the objection not the council. That will be a way of developers tying up councils and objecting to development contributions and to paying their share of the costs of service provision.Finally the other issue we have with the bill is the promotion of more use of council-controlled organisations. The 2002 Act was very clear about safeguarding the provision of water supply and the three waters in council ownership in public ownership and setting in place a number of checks and balances that this bill will seek to undermine.MAGGIE BARRY (National—North Shore): I rise to speak to the Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill (No 3) in its first reading. As has been noted by other speakers this bill gives effect to the second phase of National’s Better Local Government reforms and although the Opposition does not like it local government as with central government as with every household in this country needs to deliver better services within budget. We are under tight fiscal constraints—that is true. We have seen with the Kaipara District Council the worst example of its kind—profligate spending and improper scrutiny of what was going on there—and it was a problem that became worse and worse. This kind of legislation will put paid to that sort of thing.This is a bill that includes provisions for extending the local boards governance model outside Auckland. Where I live and I represent the people of the North Shore the local boards work very well. I do not share the Opposition’s contempt for them or their condescension around their ability to make key decisions that are community-led and community-based. I think that democracy works very well and when people are elected they represent people and at a local board level the model works very well. In Devonport and Takapuna where I live I think that a lot of the people who are on that local board would take great exception to the utterances of the speaker Eugenie Sage who has just sat down.As with the first phase of the local government reforms—Hon Anne Tolley: If they’ve listened.MAGGIE BARRY: Yes indeed if they have listened which of course they will not have because they are the Greens and they never listen to anyone who thinks differently from the way they do. But as with the first phase of local government reforms any reorganisation of local government has to be community-led. This is a bill that is going to encourage greater collaboration and shared services between local authorities. It is a bill that will also provide councils with more flexibility and clarity about how and when to consult. There is not in my view a downside to that. This Government wants to work with local government to deliver efficient and affordable local government services for New Zealand families and I commend this bill to the House.ANDREW WILLIAMS (NZ First): I take a call on behalf of New Zealand First on the Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill (No 3). New Zealand First will support this bill in its first reading and through to the Local Government and Environment Committee for the fact that we believe that some areas of it have merit. But there are other areas that raise some alarm bells. In supporting this important bill we believe that the correct process will be to take it to the select committee to allow submissions and to allow the people of New Zealand and organisations throughout New Zealand to have input.New Zealand has only two tiers of government—central government and local government. We are one of the most under-governed countries in the world in our Westminster system. Compared with Australia we have a very limited amount of government. Australia has state local and federal government and federal government is then split into the Senate and that sort of thing. Here in New Zealand we are very reliant on local government working very closely with central government and vice versa.Having grown up in a family involved in local government—my father was a borough councillor in Waipukurau back in the 1960s and 1970s—I have seen how local government evolved in those days of the small boroughs. Many people in this room perhaps do not give sufficient recognition to the fact that communities have grown around New Zealand as a result of the hard work of local representatives local community representatives who have helped to develop their communities develop their villages and their towns and develop their districts into what they are today. New Zealand would not be the proud nation it is today with the quality of life we have today if it were not for those local representatives and community boards working with the people in their communities to develop their particular place of living. In that respect it is disappointing that this Government often seems to put down local government and make out that it is just not functioning and is not playing its part in the important fabric of New Zealand society. It is.When I look at some of the recommendations in this bill I almost think it is like the Government trying to tell local government how to suck eggs. Basically the Government is trying to give a lecture to local government when in most cases not one of the members sitting on the other side of the House has had any experience whatsoever—Nicky Wagner: That’s not true.ANDREW WILLIAMS: I said most of them. I did not say all of them; I said most of them. Most of them have had little or no experience in local government. In that respect when they say this bill will encourage and facilitate shared services and joint delivery I can inform them that this has been going on for many many years. I can tell you that before the amalgamation of the Auckland councils there were shared services over many areas of Auckland and across many of the councils in terms of the recycling of rubbish libraries control of animals and pets environmental issues across our beaches environmental discharges all sorts of water supply arrangements sewerage outlets and various other things. There were shared arrangements going on all the time. The same can be said for other authorities around New Zealand.We heard submissions earlier in the year on the earlier local government bill in terms of what was happening in the likes of the Bay of Plenty amongst the many councils there which are already working collaboratively to share services; in the Waikato; and in other areas around New Zealand which are already working together to share services. In a sense this provision is coming in and putting it in black and white but it is already happening. I know that Local Government New Zealand is already doing a good job in working together across the regions and providing supportive services fromLocal Government New Zealand to assist local authorities throughout New Zealand to work more collaboratively.The bill also talks about long-term council plans being easier to read and less voluminous. The Minister for Building and Construction said they are voluminous. Well Minister they are voluminous because that is what was required by law. It was required by the likes of Audit New Zealand and it was required under the Local Government Act in order for the plans to be fully transparent to the people. All the facts and figures had to be laid down in those 10-year long-term community council plans. It was simply a fact of life.Most councils did put out a good summary. Certainly the North Shore City Council which I was with like many other of the more responsible local entities in New Zealand put out very good summaries to assist people and put on extensive roadshows and all sorts of public information happenings to ensure that people were fully aware of what was going on. So again as I said the bill is telling councils how to suck eggs because the sharing of services was going on. Sure you had the complicated documents but you also had the summarised documents to assist. In this day and age with the improvements in electronics and website-based information sources this can happen far more readily. A lot of the technical background detail can be loaded on to the various council websites and accessed by the public where in the past perhaps a lot more was printed. It no longer needs to be done that way.In terms of the proposed 30-year infrastructure strategies again this bill makes out that this was not occurring. I can confirm that we had a 25-year forward blueprint of where our city of North Shore was going and what the 25-year projected requirements were across all the various infrastructure across the demographics across the population and across the roading and other infrastructure. When I was mayor we were the first council in New Zealand to bring out a 15-year long-term council community plan. We went from a 10-year fixed plan to a 15-year plan—the first council in the country to do so—because we recognised that a longer-term plan was beneficial to the community. At that time we also adopted the Shand report which came out in 2007 and recommended more intergenerational debt. It should not have been that one generation took on the debt with 15 20 or 25-year loans when something was being put in for a much longer purpose. In that respect for instance we built a 100-year pipeline from the North Shore out to the Auckland channel costing $116 million. That was taken with a much longer loan—50 years intergenerational—because in 100 years’ time that pipe will still be there and it should not be just this generation paying for that pipe; it should be paid for through the generations.It is somewhat disappointing that this Government continues to put the boot into development contributions. Certainly there have been some questions over some aspects of development contributions and the levels that they have risen to in some respects but again the North Shore City Council was one of the very first councils in this country to bring in development contributions and it did so in relation to the North Shore busway. That was a very very expensive project. It cost $100 million-plus but it recognised the fact that with the growth of the population—the fastest growth north of the harbour bridge of any area virtually in the country—it was necessary to provide the public transport infrastructure and the busway infrastructure to cope with the growing population. Therefore the increasing numbers of subdivisions and sections that were going in were basically there to feed off a growing population and a busway was required to service that. We certainly would not have needed the busway with the existing population. It was for the growth in the population that that was determined. Over a number of years through the court process the level of development contributions was identified and as part of that with a growing population they haveother requirements for things such as swimming pools libraries and other community provisions—and that is required. Cities like Dunedin that have a flattening or even declining population do not have the same requirements. Other provincial areas around New Zealand do not have the same difficulties because they are not developing at the same rate. But areas like the North Shore and other parts of Auckland require development contributions. Otherwise how could the existing ratepayers afford to provide for a very rapidly growing population?It is almost like when you join a golf club or a sports club and you pay your upfront entry fee to become a member. It is the same with the development contribution. You are paying your fee to buy into the club to buy your bit of land to start your development or to subdivide your property—cutting off the back section or whatever it is. You are paying that fee to buy into that infrastructure. So I am sure the Local Government Act Amendment Bill (No 3) will receive a lot of submissions.In closing can I just say that it was very disappointing for instance on the Environment Canterbury submissions earlier in the year and others revolving around local government that this Government basically paid lip-service to the submissions. Many many learned people—QCs and authoritative people with extensive local government experience—came along to the Local Government and Environment Committee but basically were not listened to and were not recognised and their submissions went wanting. I hope that this bill will receive the full light of day with this Government. I hope that the Government will take on board the submissions from all the various parties and not just pay lip-service again to what is intended.New Zealand First does see merits in areas of this bill. We will be supporting it through to the Local Government and Environment Committee and we hope it will be robustly debated and that the Government will take on board positive and proactive contributions that come from the public.PAUL GOLDSMITH (National): It is my pleasure to speak briefly on the Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill (No 3) because we do want to advance the programme. It builds on the first phase of National’s Better Local Government reform programme. The first phase is focused on local government’s core roles streamlining local authority reorganisation procedures and making councils more fiscally responsible. New Zealand’s 78 councils make up 4 percent of the economy but they also spend $7.5 billion of public money each year and manage $100 billion worth of assets. It is crucial that we do this as efficiently as possible and have good governance arrangements.Since 2002 when councils’ roles were expanded councils’ debt has quadrupled. In Auckland where I live the Auckland Council’s debt projections are truly terrifying. Councils must be able to play their part in economic growth but we do need to maintain a system that reduces red tape not grows it that minimises the rate burdens on households and businesses and that limits debt while providing high quality infrastructure. This second tranche of reforms is aimed at doing that and on that basis I commend the bill to the House. Thank you.IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North): It is a pleasure to take a call on the Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill (No 3) which Labour does support. We have some reservations about this bill but we do support it going to the Local Government and Environment Committee and we look forward to plenty of public consultation on this matter. I am sure that most councils will want to come to the select committee and have their say. I am sure that Local Government New Zealand will be preparing its submission as we speak. I should imagine that there will be representatives of developers and representatives of communities who will also want tohave their say on this legislation. We look forward to the debate and to considering all the different provisions.The stated aim of this bill is to amend the Local Government Act 2002 to enable councils to be able to “play their part in creating an environment conducive to sustained economic growth … [by providing] effective processes and governance arrangements fair and efficient decision-making and charging practices and sound asset management planning.” That all sounds very positive. It is almost impossible I should think to disagree with a statement like that. Of course it does not really tell us very much about what the bill actually does. But so often these motherhood and apple pie statements are designed to do exactly that. They are often in fact designed to hide things that might be a little bit more controversial and that might have some ulterior motives behind words that everybody agrees with and everybody can support.So what are some of the provisions of this legislation? The bill provides the option of the creation of the local boards as part of any reorganisation of local government by the Local Government Commission. Labour does believe in local democracy. We actually do believe that communities should get to participate in their local democracy. We do believe that local government should be free to make as many decisions as possible without central government clamping down on it and usurping its local authority in the manner that this Government has done time and time again. So the idea of local boards where they are appropriate is a good one but what is behind this is the Government’s desire to see a “reorganisation” of local government—i.e. more amalgamations of local councils. There may be communities that do want to have amalgamations and assuming that they are done appropriately assuming that there is good reason and assuming that it will create efficiencies that the local communities support that is something that central government should not get in the way of.But what we are opposed to on this side of the House are the kinds of forced amalgamations that we are starting to see—the system being set up where one community can essentially force an amalgamation on another. We are seeing in Hawke’s Bay that central government is trying to strong arm local government into an amalgamation and there certainly is not universal local support for that type of amalgamation. The provisions in this legislation are designed I think to enable more and more of those amalgamations to happen. What we do not support or certainly what we are wary of on this side of the House is central government dictating to local government what its territorial area should be and where it should amalgamate with other councils. We go into the select committee wary of that being behind some of those local board provisions.Development contributions have been a vexed issue for some time. I know there was a while when a previous Minister of Local Government seemed quite enthusiastic about getting rid of development contributions altogether. The effect of getting rid of development contributions would have been that costs that are currently borne quite rightly by developers for infrastructure that councils provide in order for a new development to be able to fully function are moved to ratepayers. Whether it be the provision of water waste water or roads—all the fundamental infrastructure that any development requires—the responsibility for that would have been taken from those developers who are developing those sites not out of any altruistic value but because they want to make money out of that development and moved on to the ratepayers. So widows paying their rates on a house that may be of some value but where they have very low income and are struggling to pay the rates would have ended up having to pay more rates in order to subsidise the profit-making developers.I am glad to see in what I have read of the Cabinet paper that the current Minister of Local Government Chris Tremain took to Cabinet that he has diverted the Governmentaway from this idea of eradicating development contributions altogether. That is a sensible decision by Chris Tremain. I am glad that Cabinet appears to have supported that. But what the Minister does plan to do is to try to somehow restrict development contributions. It would be very interesting to work out through the select committee process what the real practical impact of that is actually going to be on councils and on ratepayers because any restriction on development levies does not mean that councils do not need to find the money from somewhere for those capital developments. That money still has to come from somewhere. So if it does not come from the developers through the development contributions where will it come from? What we are concerned about on this side of the House is that that will be yet another cost that the ratepayer has to bear So it will take from the—Hon Anne Tolley: Think of what it will do for house prices.IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY: Well the Minister opposite Anne Tolley is saying: “What about house prices?”. Well I would love to see something in this legislation—a cast-iron signed-in-blood guarantee—that states that any reduction in cost for the developers will be passed on to the purchasers of those houses. If there was that guarantee built in to the legislation then I might believe what the Minister is saying when she interjects from the other side of the House. But that guarantee does not of course exist in the legislation and there is a real risk that any reduction to development contributions will end up going in the pockets of the developers—possibly ending up in the coffers of the National Party through the contributions made by the developers to say thank you for the additional profit that they make out of those developments. It is possible. It is quite possible. We on this side of the House are wary of low-income and middle-income taxpayers and ratepayers ending up bearing more costs so that the National Party’s mates can make more profit.There is another underlying issue here that I think we need to be wary of and that is the privatisation agenda from the Government. It states quite overtly in the supporting material that it finds it desirable for greater use of private investment for building infrastructure. Alongside that is a desire for greater use of council-controlled organisations and for those council-controlled organisations to control infrastructure across a number of councils. If you pull all this together what you get is independent organisations in control of a significant amount of capital investment. That makes those entities ripe for privatisation. It creates something with enough critical mass that the private sector would become interested in purchasing those council-controlled organisations and taking private control of that infrastructure. The problem with that of course is that this is monopoly infrastructure which is at the moment owned by the users of that infrastructure. Therefore the owners being the users will make sure that the costs to the users are kept to a minimum. If you take that monopoly infrastructure and hand it over to the private sector you then have owners who are interested in making a profit and who are not interested in giving the best result for the users of that infrastructure. That ultimately drives up costs for the taxpayer and the ratepayer as well and creates quite a nice little earner for the National Party’s mates.So we need to be wary about what this legislation actually does. We do support it. We will support it going through to the Local Government and Environment Committee. We will listen to what people say when they come to the select committee—The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Sorry but the member’s time has expired.CAROL BEAUMONT (Labour): I intend to take a very short call on this bill the Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill (No 3) but I think my colleague Iain Lees-Galloway has summed up our approach. Although we are supporting the bill weare wary—very very wary. There is a lot of language in this bill that causes us concern particularly around the issue of consultation. It seems to us that this bill will erode the consultation that councils have with ratepayers by repealing most requirements to use the prescribed formal process when consulting under the Local Government Act 2002. The question we ask ourselves is why the Government wishes to scrap that provision. Local government plays an incredibly important role. The fact is that most New Zealanders probably do not understand just how significant its role is. Local authorities make up 4 percent of our gross domestic product and manage nearly $100 billion worth of public assets. Those assets are essential services like water and waste water important regulatory functions for households and businesses as well as a range of community facilities and community development provisions. It is very significant yet our local government elections showed recently a lack of understanding of that importance. We are concerned that reducing consultation provisions can only make that worse.I suppose I would also just reinforce the concerns that Iain Lees-Galloway has mentioned about development charges and what the implications of those are. To conclude we are wary because we see this bill in the context of so many other actions by this Government in relation to local government where it has an attitude of being patronising and an attitude of undermining local government democracy. So we will be scrutinising and listening to submissions very very carefully. Thank you.DENISE ROCHE (Green): I have some concerns whenever this Government and its members mention the words “flexibility” and “simplifying” because it seems to me that it is frequently a way of eroding democracy. This bill the Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill (No 3) is the third local government bill that this House has seen. It is the third opportunity this Government has had to run roughshod over local government. But there have been other opportunities as well—the Government has also introduced the Housing Accords and Special Housing Areas Bill which undermines planning in Auckland and it has made amendments to the Land Transport Management Act which means that councils have to have transport strategies that are consistent with the Government’s own priorities which again run roughshod over councils. We have seen the removal of the four well-beings from the Local Government Act in the last tranche of reforms. We have seen restrictions on councils and their involvement with the Biosecurity Act recently.I remind the House that local government is where local representatives make local decisions for their local communities. This bill endangers that. Although the Greens do support the aims of this bill—the more efficient use of resources—we are concerned about the potential for forced amalgamations much like the Auckland forced amalgamation. That was a forced amalgamation and we are not particularly happy to see that happening elsewhere in the country. Yes councils have been working together—and they should be encouraged to work together more—for the provision of services. But councils should not be forced to amalgamate and they certainly should not be replaced with local boards.The provisions in this bill to enable local boards to occur in other local government amalgamations or in existing councils do worry us because we do not see local boards as the magic bullet. Local boards have the ability to advocate and they do that very strongly and they represent their communities well in Auckland. They definitely do that. However they have not got the ability to set rates they have not got the ability to determine how those rates are spent and they can advocate only to their governing bodies. This Government seems to have the idea that super-councils are the way to go and that bigger is better. I can assure this House that that is not always true. Certainly what we have seen in Auckland is a reduction in democracy specifically with thecreation of council-controlled organisations. It is incredibly worrying that this bill sets up a similar system where the Local Government Commission can actually be advocating for more council-controlled organisations which wrests control of decision making away from democratically elected representatives.We are also concerned about the changes in this bill to the Local Government Act 2002 around consultation processes particularly on long-term plans. We understand that consultation can be difficult and that sometimes it does take time. But it is a democratic process and we do need to ensure that people have the ability to hold their democratically elected councillors to account about the decisions they are making for them over the long term. We are concerned that the simplifying aspects in this part of the bill will mean that people are shut out or that information about those decisions will be withheld or ignored.It is also obvious to us throughout this bill that the privatisation agenda this Government has for State assets continues with what it is attempting to put into this bill for council-controlled assets—in particular the requirement in the bill to review the cost-effectiveness of service delivery arrangements and for councils to consider alternative options. When we have asked officials what that means it means that councils should be considering the private provision of services that councils have run or council-controlled organisations.Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m.DENISE ROCHE: I would just like to say that we oppose this bill.TIM MACINDOE (National—Hamilton West): I support the Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill (No 3).Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Sorry?TIM MACINDOE: I support this bill.A party vote was called for on the questionThat the Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill (No 3) be now read a first time.Ayes104New Zealand National 59; New Zealand Labour 33; New Zealand First 7; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1; Independent: Horan.Noes14Green Party 13; Mana 1.Bill read a first time.Billreferred to the Local Government and Environment Committee.Hon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON (Attorney-General) on behalf of theMinister of Local Government: I moveThat the Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill (No 3) be reported back to the House by 12 May 2014.Motion agreed to.Harmful Digital Communications BillFirst ReadingDebate resumed from 14 November.GARETH HUGHES (Green): Kia ora. Ngā mihi nui ki a koutou. Kia ora. There is something about Green MPs being interrupted tonight and I am pretty glad we did not see the Attorney-General do that at the International Court of Justice but he did do a fantastic job on that occasion. When I was interrupted we were talking about theHarmful Digital Communications Bill a bill the Green Party supports. It is something we see a real need for. We also look at it as a bit of a good example of when we can be drafting laws for the modern internet age—laws that relate directly to the internet age in which we now live. So the Green Party is proud to support it. Obviously we do not stand on the side of bullies. We oppose bullying. We want to see a rational smart and effective use—Maggie Barry: Except if they’re challenging leadership.GARETH HUGHES: If there is one bully in this House we know where she is sitting do we not and when we are talking about bullying we see bullying not only in parliamentary locations like this not only on the street and in the media but also online and what we see is some pretty nasty bullying on venues like Twitter. I am not going to talk about the member Maggie Barry when it comes to bullying because there is some irony. There is some irony when this bill is introduced by the Minister Judith Collins. If I can think of a single Minister or a member of this Parliament who probably bullies more than anybody else on Twitter and online it is that Minister. So there is some irony there but we all like to work with the Minister and work with the Government to make sure we have a robust effective legislative solution and we think it is high time that we actually looked at legislation in this area.Obviously everyone knows bullying has been happening probably as long as humans have been around. I am not going to bore the House with tales of my pretty extensive bullying—being the victim of course—during primary and high school. Bullying has always happened but what we are seeing now is a different kettle of fish. In the internet age what you can see is anonymity. You can see imagery and videos posted without the victim’s knowledge or approval but also there is the pervasiveness. It can stay online despite being perhaps embarrassing video material. As we have seen so graphically with the Roast Busters scandal sometimes once the material is up it is virtually impossible to ever get it down because it has been copied and shared so much. So it is important that we do design our laws to work for 2013 and we know that some of our bullying laws have not been up to scratch. They were written in the pre-internet environment. It is time to modernise our laws.I have got to say that I did have a bit of a chuckle because I think this might be unprecedented in the sense that it is the first bill ever to use the word “viral” in the explanatory statement talking about potential viral videos to reach global audiences. It is interesting to see that word used in legislation.I think it is also important to point out that it is not the internet’s fault that we are seeing internet bullying and bullying on social media sites. It is not the internet’s fault. The internet is simply a platform. I think members might get the wrong sense and I think it is important we go into the select committee deliberations with that front of mind because the internet is simply an enabler. It is a fantastic tool that is shaping our global society and economy and what we should not be doing is curbing that openness that freedom which makes it so powerful on some crusade to stop something that has been happening for ever of course.Of course bullying is nothing new as I have said but what we see when we look at the data in this country from I understand the Law Commission is that one in 10 New Zealanders has experienced harmful communication on the internet. When you look at the regulatory impact statement you read that NetSafe which does fantastic work deals with only around 75 complaints of cyber-bullying every year. So it is not a large amount but I am sure that for those 75 it has had profound consequences and has made a huge difference to their lives.So the Green Party supports this bill. We look forward to the select committee process. We urge people who have experienced bullying in their lives to make asubmission particularly if it is online bullying. We want to see a healthy society where our kids primarily are protected. We want to look after them. We want to empower parents who—I think even in the internet age with legislation such as this—will always play a critical role when it comes to dealing with bullying. We want to give kids the skills and the experience to be able to deal with bullying. But I acknowledge that in the internet age sometimes you need a remedy. Under the status quo the only remedy a person has if say infringing content is posted online pretty much is to go to court which is a costly time-consuming and quite a daunting enterprise for victims of bullying. So setting up this new communications tribunal with a communications commissioner as a remedy to try to persuade internet service providers for example or third party content providers to remove infringing material I think is a good cost-effective hopefully efficacious solution which would make a difference. Obviously the ability to still go on to the court for criminal charges is still a potential remedy but it is good to be able to save time and hopefully get that material down as fast as possible using the communications tribunal.We note from the regulatory impact assessment that the costs are incredibly low. We are looking in the order of around I think $115000 per annum—not an insignificant sum but a sum that is manageable and hopefully will make a real difference to people as they go about their lives. We note the safe harbour provisions for those people hosting content—that they are protected under statute if they remove the infringing material based on a complaint—which we think is good. We will be looking for the detail in the Justice and Electoral Committee on exactly how those provisions will be used.The fish hook I will be looking out for in particular is the crux of the legislation which is what is called a new communication offence which obviously can be taken to the tribunal or ultimately up to the court. The offence is to “cause harm”—quite a broad definition. Some members in this House no doubt have caused harm to political opponents. Other members might as part of their campaigning for a more progressive or better country have caused harm to a potential polluter or criminal. So it is quite a wide definition and we will be looking at how that is going to apply in detail. Obviously in a free and open country with robust rights of freedom of speech we do not want to be constraining freedom of speech because someone’s feelings might get hurt and the new methods of cyber-bullying provide cheaper and faster ways to get satisfaction as they would say.We also want to see protections for other legitimate forms of freedom of speech such as for parody or satire which is something I have attempted to do in the copyright sphere. What we want to do is protect legitimate victims but we do not want to give people a new legal means to try to stifle free and open democratic speech. That is what we will be looking out for. We would like to acknowledge the work of the Law Commission and the work of the Government and we welcome the select committee process. Thank you. Kia ora.Hon KATE WILKINSON (National—Waimakariri): It is a pleasure to take a short call on the first reading of the Harmful Digital Communications Bill. We have heard that the purpose of this bill is to mitigate the harm caused to people by digital communications and to provide the victims of that communication with a quick and efficient means of redress. It makes it an offence to send messages and post material that is harmful online and it is punishable by 3 months’ imprisonment or a $2000 fine.I think it is especially important that we encourage our young people to make submissions on this bill because we have already heard that the Law Commission found that one in 10 New Zealanders has experienced harmful communications on the internet and that number doubles for those between the ages of 19 and 29. Otherresearch has shown that one in five New Zealand high school students has experienced some form of cyber-bullying or harassment. Frankly that is not acceptable and it certainly would be our wish that as many young people as possible can actually submit on this bill so that their views can be known. This is about sending a strong message to those who continue to harass and harm others online. Time is up for them. I commend this bill to the House and I commend it to the Justice and Electoral Committee for detailed submissions.TRACEY MARTIN (NZ First): Kia ora. I rise on behalf of New Zealand First to speak in support of the Harmful Digital Communications Bill. As my colleagues have said it is definitely time that this legislation came into the House.I am the chair of the board of Mahurangi College and on a daily basis we deal with students who are bullied or traumatised. I think that many of us adults now realise that—and I believe that as Kate Wilkinson said young people should come and speak to the Justice and Electoral Committee—what is so awful about this type of bullying is that there is no escape from it. It follows these young people into their homes. It follows them and they fear opening their Gmail account or their MSN Hotmail account. They fear looking at their phone when there is a text message. They have fear all the time.We have several questions that we hope will be fleshed out during the period of time that this bill is with the select committee. When I was a kid a troll was a person who lived under a bridge inThe Three Billy Goats Gruff. Today trolling is something that happens on Twitter or other accounts. For those New Zealanders out there who like me or my mum do not know what I am talking about that is when no matter what you post online somebody decides they are going to say something negative about it. There will never be a good comment from a troll on Twitter. It will be interesting to know whether that will actually at the end of the day be considered harm under this bill. Does a person have the right to tweet on an account or post on Facebook or whatever and not be harassed in that way? It is basically digital stalking.We do believe that it is time for the bill and we commend the Minister of Justice for bringing the bill to the House. We note that point 8 of the regulatory impact statement has got a definition: “Harmful digital communications cyber-bullying and digital harassment can take a variety of forms including emails texts phone messages blog sites forums and social media sites like Facebook and Twitter. These mediums can be used to intimidate spread damaging or degrading rumours publish invasive and distressing photographs and harass people.” I guess that New Zealand First would see that as addressing what we call the invisible man theory. If human beings think they cannot be seen and if they think they cannot be caught there are levels they will go to that they will not go to if they are looking a person in the eye or if somebody can see them take those actions.We need to send a very clear message to not just those who are currently using this environment for harassment but actually all young people and all people using those social media sites that they are a public forum. Somewhere somebody can see what you post and when you post it. I think that for selfies and things like that people have taken a photo sent it for a moment and then been caught out thinking that it goes away. It does not take a second for somebody to take a snapshot of it or—I am not quite sure what it is called actually on Facebook—they take a shot of the page and then it is there for ever.Denise Roche: A screenshot.TRACEY MARTIN: A screenshot—thank you very much.I would also like to know whether—when we actually get down to the nitty-gritty of this—when somebody is actually found to have breached the law and caused harm we are going to try to come up with a digital solution to remove that item from the internet.There are images out there that once they have been taken down from one site have been shared and placed in so many other places. How will we pull those back? Whose responsibility is that? And how long does the period of harm have to be? Let us just take for example young people in their 20s today who go out and like all of us party. They party with their friends. I know a young man for example—Chris Auchinvole: Oho!TRACEY MARTIN: I do I do. I know several young men but I will talk about this one particularly. He is not the young man yonder so we do not have to worry about that. I know a young man who went out partying with friends and who imbibed too much of the alcoholic beverage and found himself on the floor singing rollicking pirate songs I think they were and a video was taken. That young man now wants to climb a corporate ladder and that video has appeared. That video has appeared on YouTube. Does his prospective employer go to YouTube as has been mentioned before and go and have a look at Facebook and other things to see what this young man has been doing and will that affect his ability to climb the ladder of any corporation or company? I would like to know how long ago the image had to take place or how long the posting has to have been there. How long is the extension of harm? What if a photo was put up one day and now 10 years down the track actually creates harm inside an employment environment?We really need to have some strong digital citizenship training inside our schools around those things. I believe if a penalty is applied that will drive some more of that training around the digital citizenship that is required both for those who post for very reasonable reasons and for those who actually post to harm others.New Zealand First has some concerns around the safe harbour provision. I go to the explanatory note of the bill which under “Safe harbour provisions” says: “The purpose of this is to ensure that a content host cannot be held liable for content they host that is posted by another person but which the host does not know about.” My question is upon whom does the burden of proof lie with regard to that statement? Is it the victim who now needs to actually prove that the host was aware that this posting was up and that they did not remove it when they had the abilities to do so? And would a 12-year-old and a 13-year-old be able to do that? Is this workable for a 12-year-old and a 13-year-old? They are among the many victims that I see. So those are questions we would like have.I am a little bit concerned by Gareth Hughes’ comments that the internet itself is just an enabler. It sounds a little bit to me like the argument of the gun lobby in the States that actually it is not guns that kill people; it is people with guns. There is a responsibility on the hosting agency. There is a responsibility on those people who carry those sites.We have concerns. If we recognise for example that that is actually a problem then why do we say that it does not have to be mandatory? There is a section in the explanatory note of the bill that states: “While not a mandatory authority this would have significant persuasive powers in relation to website hosts or ISPs operating outside New Zealand jurisdiction.” We run into that cross-country jurisdiction issue. It is going to be something that will have to be looked at very carefully and it is a continuation of the issue of how international law is going to need to be aligned around these issues. But if we recognise that it is harmful why are we placing it on a voluntary basis? Why are we not saying that this needs to be put in place before you can broadcast here? Other Governments do that. Other Governments make decisions about websites that will or will not come into their nation.I also want to just highlight another area clause 10 of the bill “Proceedings may be brought in District Court”. I highlight clause 10(1)(c) where the principal of aneducational establishment if the individual concerned is a student at the establishment and with the consent of the student can bring proceedings to the District Court. Who pays for that? Where is that money coming from? If it is a teacher does that mean that the teacher themselves must bring the case? I would argue that the board of trustees as a good employer has a responsibility towards any teacher who has had damaging information posted about them by students to actually pursue the removal of that material from the internet. I have known students who took their phones with cameras into classes took videos of their teachers behind their textbooks and then put them up for comment from other students and so on and so forth or who graded teachers etc. and not in a constructive way. Teachers are appraised appropriately but putting videos up on Facebook to let every man and his dog write what they think about them is not appropriate. So I have some issues around the fact that first if a principal brings proceedings there is a cost to the school for that and two that as a good employer teachers should also be covered by this. A principal or board of trustees should be able to take this action to protect their staff.But all in all it is time for this legislation. New Zealand First will support it—Scott Simpson: Good.TRACEY MARTIN: —and we look forward to it coming back to the House with some amendments. We understand that Mr Simpson agrees with us on that so that is great. So we support the bill and commend it to the House.MAGGIE BARRY (National—North Shore): I rise to take a short call on the Harmful Digital Communications Bill at its first reading. This is a bill in the name of the Hon Judith Collins. There has been a lot of discussion about cyber-bullying through society in New Zealand for probably the last 2 to 3 years and it is a very serious issue. The Law Commission has done some excellent work in this space. Its reportThe News Media meets ‘New Media’ has been a document that has been helpful to the Hon Judith Collins in drawing up this bill.Essentially the bill creates a set of 10 communication principles that will guide an approved agency and the courts. It is all very well to talk about digital bullying and cyber-bullying and so forth but it needs to be clearly defined. I think that the principle of creating an approved agency creating a new civil enforcement regime which includes appointing an approved agency as the first port of call for complaints is also useful because vexatious complaints will occur in this space and it does need to be filtered. That agency will be able then to investigate and resolve complaints directly and quickly and the most serious complaints will be referred to the District Court. Those I think are excellent measures.I will take this up in more detail at a further reading. In the select committee process aspects of this bill will be formalised and it will emerge as a very strong and apparently well-supported piece of legislation. I will not waste the time of the House by doing what the Green member did which was to take cheap shots at other parliamentary colleagues. I will leave it at that and commend this bill to the House.CLARE CURRAN (Labour—Dunedin South): Labour also supports the referral of this bill the Harmful Digital Communications Bill to a select committee. As I think has been pointed out there are in the current environment a number of good reasons for us to be having a conversation about how harmful digital communications should be defined and what the remedies are for dealing with them. There is certainly no doubt that the Law Commission’s work on which this bill is based was an important piece of work. I would contend that it is not an end in itself that it is an evolving issue and that the Law Commission has attempted to come to grips with something that has not been addressed in this country before. So it is a good start. However I would contend that the bill that is in front of us although I guess you could call it also a good start is certainlynot without some fishhooks and some issues and I want to outline some of them tonight because it is absolutely critical that during the select committee process which Labour supports this bill going through there is a very good and open discussion.One of the most important things that we should not do with a bill such as this is to try to rush it through and treat it in a way that is reactive to a couple of big issues that are happening in society at the moment and have caused a lot of media attention. When we make laws in this Parliament we must make them in the cold light of day considering all of the issues and considering the wider issues of principle that lie behind such a new piece of law that is attempting to regulate what happens on the internet. This is new territory for New Zealand. It is new territory really in most of the world and we must as a small progressive country be mindful of the wider issues some of which I want to outline tonight in the House.Things that I think are very important are the 10 communication principles upon which the bill is based. I think that is a really good solid foundation for this bill. The second thing that I want to commend is the fact that this bill has got a very strong alignment with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990 and I absolutely commend the Minister of Justice for actually putting in front of this House a bill that draws such a direct link with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. I think that is a good foundation upon which to start.Things that I have some questions around are to do with the safe harbour provisions which I will go into in a minute. The question mark I have around the concept of an approved agency—and I know there is a public discussion beginning around this—is whether it is a good idea for an agency that plays an advocacy role to then play a mediating role. Has that been properly thought through? Also what accompanying resources might need to be put into that agency in order for it to deal with what is likely to be an enormous number of complaints and issues? Sorting the wheat from the chaff—finding the ones that really do have to be dealt with—is going to be a major challenge. This is as I have said new territory and it is absolutely critical that we have thought all of those things through.Secondly I think there is also a question mark around costs. I know certainly from the previous discussions by my colleagues that the bill appears to be silent on where the costs get recovered. Those issues are really important. Is there a cost recovery role that should be thought about in terms of who actually pays for a lot of the change in practice that will result from this bill being enacted if it is enacted? A couple of things that I think raise alarm bells directly are the issues around the potential criminalising of children and certainly in the discussions in the select committee on this bill this is going to be of enormous importance and interest—thinking through what that actually means and how that can impact out there in our community.Just as an aside it was also drawn to my attention that the very purpose clause has a bit of a problem in it and needs a bit of a rewrite straight away. It states that “The purpose of this Act is to mitigate harm caused to individuals by digital communications”. Well “harm caused to individuals” does not happen by digital communications; it actually happens by people. I know that my colleague in New Zealand First raised a different perspective on that but the fact is that the internet is not a sentient being as I think my Green colleague Gareth Hughes pointed out. The internet does not cause the harm; it is the people using the internet who cause the harm. I think that is also pretty important for us to talk about.There are many things to discuss in this bill. There is going to be an enormous discussion at the Justice and Electoral Committee about these matters. I just want to put on the record that I have reservations around having a piece of legislation that creates new criminal offences in the digital environment. My uneasiness is built on the premisethat bullying harassment and abuse is bullying harassment and abuse no matter what the medium is in which it occurs whether it is in the playground on the phone on your Facebook page or by text but then I certainly think that this is the discussion. This is the crux of the issue and I think it is important for every member in this House to have an open mind coming into the discussion on this bill.Is the internet a special place where a new paradigm is existing where issues can take off and in a matter of minutes and certainly hours there can be a maelstrom created and harm that might not happen in the physical environment? I certainly think that that question has to be considered. Therefore do there need to be new criminal offences and measures developed for actions that happen on the internet but do not exist in the physical environment? I certainly think that that is going to be one of the major issues for discussion at the select committee.ALFRED NGARO (National): I rise to take just a brief call to note the support of all of the House for this Harmful Digital Communications Bill. As the member Clare Curran has just been talking about it is important to note that bullying is an attitudinal thing. It is a behavioural issue where people decide that they want to impose their power and control issues on others. We know from the many cases around cyber-bullying the impact that this has had.What I am looking forward to as part of the Justice and Electoral Committee is hearing some of the submissions. One thing I would like to say to those who are out there in the communities and listening tonight is that we want to try to encourage more young people to come forward. We know that when we went out withGreen Paper for Vulnerable Children over 10000 submissions were heard. There were a number—almost 2000—that came from young people. We would like to see a similar approach taken for this bill. We are keen to see that they would do that. It is one of our priorities to deliver better public services but more important is to protect people from harm and particularly protect them from cyber-bullying.This bill will approve an agency to become the first port of call for complaints. We think that this bill is actually a bill that will get a lot of interest. We are looking forward to the connections with our community and to hearing its concerns and also to hearing some solutions around that. I want to commend this bill to the House and support its first reading. Thank you.Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Raymond Huo 5 minutes.RAYMOND HUO (Labour): I would like to start my contribution by congratulating the judges and legislators in the UK on their great leadership in developing both the case law and the statutory law to keep pace with the developments of the internet and online media. The UK High Court recently ruled that Sally Bercow did libel Lord McAlpine via Twitter and she has agreed to pay him damages. The court found that her statement on Twitter constituted a serious libel both in its natural meaning and as an innuendo. For the victims Lord McAlpine and his family the defamatory statement caused considerable unnecessary pain and suffering. The judgment is one of great public interest and it provides a warning to and guidance for people who use social media.In April this year the UK Parliament passed its Defamation Act 2013 which is likely to come into force early next year. The new legislation contains provisions that will reform the law of defamation particularly in relation to internet service providers and publishing on the internet. Probably the most important change for online content is in section 8 under which the new single publication rule replaces the longstanding multiple publication rule which was established in an 1849 case. In the modern world this centuries-old law has been interpreted recently by the courts to mean that each new hit on a web page constitutes a fresh publication and accordingly a new cause ofaction. The limitation period for defamation of 1 year therefore effectively refreshes on a rolling basis as long as the article remains online. As Labour’s associate spokesperson on justice I think it is reasonable for me to say that our legislation in respect of online publication and social media is lagging behind the reality and our legal regime is not robust enough.The introduction of the Harmful Digital Communications Bill is something positive for us to start with. The purpose of this bill is to mitigate the harm caused to individuals by digital communications and to provide victims with a quick and efficient means of redress. I am not quite sure how the bill would provide victims with a quick and efficient means of redress. It appears that the bill creates a new civil enforcement regime and also creates new criminal offences. Harmful digital communications—cyber-bullying and digital harassment—can take many forms such as communicating through emails text messages blog sites and social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter. The victims of harmful digital communications are often children and young people who are particularly vulnerable and who require appropriate protections. The victims of harmful digital communications include politicians and business people etc. as well.As part of the civil enforcement regime this bill sets out 10 new communication principles to guide the functions of the court and the approved agency. Again how will these principles enhance the means of redress? I look forward to the progress of this bill and also the input and submissions from the stakeholders. With regard to criminal offences the bill creates a new offence of posting a harmful digital communication with the intention to cause harm. So overall the enforcement regime as introduced is largely civil so there is a problem with cost—Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! The member’s time has expired.DAVID CLENDON (Green): It is good to see that there seems to be unanimity and support for the Harmful Digital Communications Bill and that is a good base for the beginning of the Justice and Electoral Committee conversation. I think that around the margins as the committee digs into the consequences and the implications of this bill there will be some conversations some debates and indeed some arguments to be had about how to ensure that it achieves what is intended in the purpose without overstepping the mark or creating undesirable outcomes. So it is a good thing that it has come to the House.It is not unusual to see legislators trying to catch up with technology. That has been the lesson of the last century or more—telegraph to radio to television and now of course to the internet. The internet I think is a game changer in technology. It is revolutionary to the extent that the characteristic that makes it so is its accessibility. Anybody with a couple of dollars to spend at an internet cafe and a free email address can create a Facebook account and they are in business. You are in a position to achieve a great deal and unfortunately you are also in a position to do some harm and to create some mischief. That is what this legislation seeks to remedy or try to put some reins on. The purpose of the bill is declared as being “to mitigate harm” caused to individuals by three digital means. I think that is sensible language. To mitigate is to endeavour to make good. Clearly once something is on the web once an accusation has been made once some sort of threat has been extended through digital means then it is out there. It is not something you can undo entirely. Mitigation is I think the appropriate approach to undo the mischief to the extent that that is possible to do the least harm in a sense to put right to the extent that that is possible.I do think that the select committee might have to have a bit of a think about the definition of “harm” given in the legislation which talks about “serious emotional distress”. With all the best will—I think that that is a good starting-off point but I dowonder about what the manifestation of it will be. How will it be demonstrated or proven ultimately to the satisfaction of the court that somebody has suffered serious emotional distress? A young teenage boy a youth for example might be very reluctant to admit to distress albeit he might have good reason to feel that. There are situations where I think that definition may prove inadequate or even a burden. Off the top of my head I cannot offer anything better at the moment but I do think that a worthwhile debate to have would be to see whether it is the most adequate definition of harm that the legislation can come up with.I think that it is a strength of the legislation that it has such principles. For example it talks about preventing anything that is indecent or obscene. Clearly the definition of what might be indecent or obscene is very much about context. In many situations a naked human body need not be deemed indecent or obscene and would not be but in some contexts it will be. I think that basing this legislation around those key principles will enable this agency as it evolves and indeed the courts to establish a sense of context to determine reasonably in a given context whether something is indecent or obscene or whatever else the apparent harm might be. So I think it is a very sensible and in fact quite subtle approach but also a very robust one. I commend the drafters for having come to that point.We have heard a lot about the fact that this bill can be seen as defending the well-being of young people and that is very true. But it is also the reality that adults grown-up people can also be subject to cyber-bullying. People in abusive relationships might establish some physical space between themselves and abusers but the electronic abuse can continue. I think we need to keep in mind that it is not only about young people. Clearly there is much to be said about this.I do think it is a positive thing that this agency will also have an educative function. Young people are vulnerable in part because they make themselves vulnerable. So to the extent that this agency will have that educative function or duty I think that is a helpful thing in order to keep putting the message out there that there will be some organisation whose task it is to endeavour to educate our young people particularly about protecting themselves against these forms of abuse. I think that is a very helpful thing.So I do commend this bill. I think it is a good starting-off point for what could be a very helpful piece of legislation and I wish the select committee well in its deliberation. Thank you.TIM MACINDOE (National—Hamilton West): The Harmful Digital Communications Bill is an important measure dealing with contemporary issues of widespread and significant public concern. I want to acknowledge and thank the Minister of Justice for the energy that she has shown in bringing this measure to the House. I know it is widely welcomed by the community at large who are concerned about these matters. I want to thank all members for the intelligent contributions that they have made in this first reading debate and I wish the Justice and Electoral Committee members well with their deliberations on it.Bill read a first time.Billreferred to the Justice and Electoral Committee.Consumer Law Reform BillIn CommitteeTIM MACINDOE (Junior Whip—National): I seek leave for the Committee to take the parts schedules and clauses of the Consumer Law Reform Bill as one question.The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Leave is sought for there to be one question on the Consumer Law Reform Bill. Is there any objection? There is no objection.Parts 1 and 2 schedules 1 2 and 3 and clauses 1 and 2CAROL BEAUMONT (Labour): It is a pleasure to finally be making some progress on this Consumer Law Reform Bill. Along with my colleagues I will be explaining why we support this bill. It is an important piece of legislation to get passed into law and it is very disappointing that it has taken so long to get this far. In supporting this bill we are looking forward to its passing because the essential proposition is that it updates and modernises our consumer legislation including giving us greater alignment with our colleagues across the Tasman. But despite the importance of doing this and of modernising our consumer legislation so that it better reflects the reality of the modern environment that consumers now consume in and provides greater protection for those consumers this bill has languished on the Order Paper for an indecent amount of time.It seems that the Minister of Consumer Affairs has a bit of difficulty getting his legislation through because we had exactly the same situation with the consumer credit legislation. Again that dragged on for a number of years despite being a really important and essential piece of legislation that we are now considering in the select committee. This bill itself and the consumer credit legislation are particularly important for New Zealand consumers at a time when many many families are struggling to make ends meet. The consequences of poor consumer decisions the consequences of rip-offs and the consequences of false advertising—all of those things are actually significant. Families do not have significant amounts of spare money. They need to be able to spend wisely and not be ripped off. But consumers have not been a priority for this National Government.Finally we are getting some progress and that is partly because there was a campaign. There actually had to be a campaign led by Consumer New Zealand to get this legislation moving. As it said in its magazine in February last year legislation was expected to be introduced into Parliament by the end of 2010 to align our consumer laws more closely with Australia’s. That did not happen. Consumer New Zealand went on in a piece this year where it started urging its members to put pressure on the Government to actually do something with this legislation. It said: “Once we had some of the best consumer laws in the world. But they are now outdated and there are significant gaps in consumer protection.”Having strong and relevant consumer legislation is important for not only consumers but also businesses so that everybody knows what the framework is that they are operating in. When this legislation was drafted after a review of our consumer legislation the Government touted it as legislation catching up with developments in consumer trends. Well the irony here is that it has languished for so long that it is probably out of date before it has even been passed because we know that this is an area where things do change fairly rapidly. If I again draw a link to the consumer credit legislation during the time that that has languished we have seen an absolute explosion of pay-day lenders a greater profile for mobile shops and truck shops and so on—since the time when there was the first review of the Credit Contracts and Consumer Finance Act. Things move quickly except for the legislation to protect consumers.The outcome of the Ministry of Consumer Affairs review has been a long time coming but we are pleased to say that there is progress being made with this bill. It has been a relatively robust process and there are good changes in there. But I just want to outline the time lines specifically because they are interesting. In 2009 the review wasinitiated. In June 2010 a discussion document was released. In April 2011 a bill was introduced in Parliament. In February 2012 there was its first reading. In October 2012 the bill was reported back from the Commerce Committee. In December of that year was the second reading. Now—almost a year later—we are doing the Committee stage. That must be some sort of record. It is incredible. It shows how bad the situation is. Almost a year has passed since the bill’s second reading.What does this bill do? Let us get on to this. The Consumer Law Reform Bill is an omnibus bill that amends the Fair Trading Act the Consumer Guarantees Act the Weights and Measures Act the Carriage of Goods Act the Sale of Goods Act and the Secondhand Dealers and Pawnbrokers Act. It repeals the Auctioneers Act the Door to Door Sales Act and the Layby Sales Act as well as the Unsolicited Goods and Services Act.The legislation is a major reform and will touch on a very broad range of businesses so obviously there will need to be some good clear information put out once we do get this legislation passed to ensure that both businesses and consumers are aware of these changes. Essentially some of the key changes are the introduction of new prohibitions on unfair contract terms and standard form consumer contracts under the Fair Trading Act an extension of the criteria before businesses may contract out of the Fair Trading Act and the Consumer Guarantee Act in business to business transactions the addition of a power for the Commerce Commission to compel individuals to attend interviews to provide evidence about possible fair trading offending—hopefully leading to greater compliance—and a provision making suppliers responsible under the Consumer Guarantees Act for goods that are sent by courier up to when the goods are delivered to the consumer. I am sure that my colleague Clare Curran will talk quite a bit about online trading so I am not going to go into that stage.Unfortunately I was not a member of the Commerce Committee but I know that it scrutinised this legislation very carefully and made a quite substantial number of changes in the legislation that I am sure we will talk about during the course of the Committee stage. We are dealing with the bill as one question but there are two parts in this legislation. The significant one is Part 1 which amends the various consumer laws that I have talked about. Part 2 provides for new auctioneers legislation.This legislation is important and it is long overdue but the other thing that I would like to really test here is the commitment to making this work. It is all very well to improve protections and rights for consumers but how are we going to make sure that people understand what those rights are? Also are we going to really put a lot of effort into assisting consumers with their rights?I would like to acknowledge at this point in my speech the work that is done by people like the citizens advice bureaux and budget advisory services because actually they end up being the de facto advocates for consumers in this country. There are many consumers who have no idea at all about their rights under our consumer legislation. In some ways if you have rights and you do not know about them it is almost the same as not having them. So there is a really important role here to ensure that with the passing of this legislation—when we finally get to that point—we put a lot of time and effort into widely disseminating information in an easily understandable form that tells consumers what their rights are under this legislation.It is in my mind worth thinking about whether there is more we could do to assist those consumers who may be particularly vulnerable. I would perhaps include in that group people for whom English is not their first language—and obviously a lot of the materials are produced in English. I would include in that group younger people perhaps and older people and people with mental health issues. There are many consumers who are actively ripped off perhaps more so in the consumer credit area. Iknow from being on the select committee that is currently looking at that legislation that certainly we are having many many examples being given to us of absolutely appalling behaviour. None the less for those vulnerable consumers generally it would be worth considering how we could better serve their needs. Certainly in the UK consumer advocates are specifically established as part of Government agencies to actively work with consumers. I think that that is something we should work on here as well.In conclusion for my contribution this time I do just want to—Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE (Labour): As my colleague Carol Beaumont has said we will be supporting this legislation the Consumer Law Reform Bill. She touched on a very important point that was brought to the attention of the Commerce Committee which was that we can implement any sort of regulation or legislation that we like but if there is not a high degree of financial literacy or consumer literacy—in this case it goes hand in hand—and people are not aware of their rights and are not aware of the protections contained within this legislation then it does not provide much protection at all. So I would be interested to know from the Minister in the chair the Attorney-General whether there are plans afoot from the Government to provide an educative programme—not just a couple of slick pamphlets that we might dish out to those wonderful people at the citizens advice bureaux and budget advisory services or whatever and sort of contract it out to them but a concerted education programme to promote this legislation and the rights and the responsibilities contained within it.Consumer protection law is imperative if one wants to maintain the economic confidence of purchasers buyers and sellers alike and if consumers are to believe that when they are entering into contractual arrangements they are going to be treated in a just way and that those who may try to walk around those contractual arrangements will be dealt to. I note that there is an increase in the maximum penalties for breaches of the Fair Trading Act from $60000 to $200000 for individuals and from $200000 to $600000 for bodies corporate. I think that is a substantial amount of money and it brings penalties in to line with the nature of the offences.I would note with interest though the section of the commentary in respect of unconscionable conduct. I note that it says in the commentary that “Unconscionability applies where courts consider it unfair or inequitable (or ‘against good conscience’) to allow a party to enforce its contractual rights against another party who is detrimentally affected by an oppressive bargain.” I am sure that the Attorney-General whom we are lucky enough to have in the seat tonight and who is an eminent barrister solicitor or both—probably all of the above—could probably give us a dissertation for hours and I would actually be one who would appreciate that in terms of the detail in respect of this clause. Others in the Chamber may not appreciate it but I not being a lawyer would be gratified for his expertise—Hon Maryan Street: In Latin.Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE: Well no I was not in the top class at school so we did not get to do Latin. English would be preferable.I do note that even though the Australian cousins have similar provisions in place the select committee chose to wait until they had bedded in and until there was a substantial body of common law and precedent that we could learn from. But I would be interested actually in terms of the definition of unconscionable conduct. For instance we note that in this place the former Minister for Small Business the Hon John Archibald Banks is in some difficulty as we speak although we cannot go into the grave detail of that given the nature of the court proceedings that are yet to come to fruition. But I would be interested in the point of view of the Attorney-General who has been a lawyer in private practice and a senior partner as to whether that in itself given the nature of the oppressive contractual arrangements—a willing buyer and a willingseller money changing hands brown bags and other things—would fit within the definition of unconscionable conduct. It would be interesting to note and I am sure that the body politic in this place would be very very interested to know whether the conduct of the Hon John Archibald Banks who is guilty of one crime already in his political career convicted in a court of law and in some difficulty now would be considered unconscionable.I know that that is a legal term. As I say not being a lawyer myself I would be interested if the Attorney-General would turn his mind to it and dust off the precedent books. I am sure that he has represented and has either prosecuted or defended people in Mr Banks’ situation over the years or has provided learned legal advice. Perhaps he could shine some light for those in this Chamber and also for those consumers who are listening on whether if anybody else was to get into a similar set of difficulties that would be considered unconscionable conduct under the Act. We know of course that there was an exchange of money there was a willing buyer and a willing seller and there was a verbal contract I assume for services rendered—we presume or it will be proved—and I would like to know whether that would fall under the definition. It is a fair question I think. There are other precedents in this Chamber—not as colourful or as graphic as that of the Hon John Archibald Banks—where this definition may come into play.Moving on from that I would also note Ms Beaumont’s comments in terms of the time frame to implement this legislation. This legislation is at its essence about protecting consumer rights—basic folk who go out and purchase goods and services or enter into contracts and who in many cases are probably not aware that they are contracts as such. They are just as I say willing buyers and willing sellers—people getting on with their lives—and they are exposed from time to time to the reprehensible conduct of others.I would note for the record the time line. There is a bit of a pattern with this Minister of Consumer Affairs Mr Foss. It seems that he is unlike the Attorney-General who manages to punch through in rapid fire Treaty settlements and I compliment him on that. He has beaten me to it; he has complimented himself—he was nodding. I tried to get in quickly but he has beaten me to it. As I say in all seriousness—and it is not often that we compliment each other in this place—he does get through his legislation his Treaty settlements in rapid fire and in record time.That is in stark contrast to his colleague Mr Foss and I believe to his predecessor Mr Bridges who sort of began this tawdry pace way back in 2009. Then we had appropriately of course discussion papers in 2010. The bill was introduced on 20 April 2011 which was some time ago. The first reading was in 2012 and the time line went onward and onward and onward until we get to this point. In the dying days of this parliamentary year with 4 sitting days to go we are at the Committee stage of this bill and it has sort of been dragged along as if it has had an anchor attached to it. This is important legislation and that time line speaks a lot I think to the priorities or the lack of priorities of this Government. What is more important to the Government? Asset sales are very important to it and it has botched a few of those in the last few weeks but consumer protection law is not so important. This bill has been hanging around since 2009.I am advised that the Australians—my colleague will correct me if I am wrong—managed to get their consumer reform legislation through in pretty efficient time. I cannot blame the officials and I do not blame the officials for this because officials work to the time frames of Ministers. Ministers set the agenda Ministers say what is important to them and what they want officials to push through and officials—being the honourable folks they are—obey their Ministers. So it seems to us that even thoughthis legislation is very well intentioned—and we will support it because it is very very important—it would have been good to see this come through earlier given some of the other pieces of peripheral and minor legislation we have had to deal with under urgency at other times in this last parliamentary year so that we did not have to drag back to 2009 which is some years ago to actually transact this piece of legislation. It is very important.I had some experience as an Associate Minister of Justice in terms of consumer protection legislation with regard to the real estate industry. There were different sets of parameters but the principles were exactly the same. Those eminent men and women—most of them or 90 percent of them; there are about 10 percent who are sharks—had to change their whole industry. They were forced to do that by this Parliament. I believe that National voted against that legislation and said that it would repeal it but when it became the Government it did not do anything about it because it is a good piece of legislation. That has changed the nature of that industry and that has given protection to people who are engaged in possibly the biggest transaction of their lives—that is the purchase or sale of a property or of commercial premises.We got that legislation through actually in record time—within 12 months I think—because it was important and because there was a groundswell of support from people. The evidence came literally in bags into my office in terms of mail from people who felt they were being dealt to and were vulnerable. This legislation reflects the vulnerability of consumers—ordinary folk as I say; honest folk—who are just trying to transact their business to make purchases and to engage in services or purchase services and they deserve that protection.I end on this note. I would ask the Attorney-General whether he could ask his officials what the process post this legislation will be in terms of providing education to the public.MOJO MATHERS (Green): I am extremely pleased that finally the Consumer Law Reform Bill is coming before the Committee. It is a bill that is long overdue to modernise consumer protection law in New Zealand. It would be fantastic if it could get passed before Christmas especially when so much spending is going on in New Zealand.The Green Party is particularly pleased to see the unsubstantiated representation clause in the bill. At the moment we have lots of products that are increasingly trying to jump on the “greenwash” bandwagon and that make all sorts of claims about how they will be clean and green reduce the impact on the environment be environmentally responsible and so on. By and large consumers are very trusting. If a company makes that claim about its product then consumers will often believe that that is the case—that that product is better than other products on the market and will have a lower environmental footprint—and therefore if they care about these issues as many do they will choose to buy that product. It is extremely difficult to prove that those companies are making a false claim and it can be costly and ineffective so not many of them actually get taken to task for making such a claim even though they are profiting from making these claims especially when they are unsubstantiated. So it is fantastic to see that the bill has a clause that will finally address that by placing the onus of proof on the company making the claim to prove that it has some evidence to back that claim that it is making. It is a very simple straightforward expectation that you do not make a claim unless you actually have some evidence for that claim.Consumer New Zealand gave a very powerful submission to the Commerce Committee. It tests a lot of products for their claims and it gave the example of a vacuum cleaner system where a $3000 vacuum cleaner was advertised as being a world-class indoor environment management system that reduces asthma and allergies.When Consumer New Zealand actually tested it it found that it performed no better than the $100 product on the market. So people were paying basically $2900 more for a product on the basis of its claims which were found to be unsubstantiated and unproved. That is the kind of thing we do not want to see happening. It puts honest traders honest companies at a severe disadvantage. It is fantastic that finally we have a law that places the onus of proof to back the claim on to the company making the claim.It was quite extraordinary at the select committee to see the number of large companies submitting against this bill. The committee came under a lot of pressure. Power companies wine-growing companies all sorts of companies said: “No no no don’t make us prove that our claims are actually based on fact.” I want to congratulate the select committee members on withstanding that fairly obvious hypocrisy on staying on the side of consumers and consumers’ rights to be protected and on retaining that clause. However the select committee did recognise that there is a case where sometimes claims are made that are so fanciful that they are obviously untrue and that this is just a sort of marketing ploy that could be used to say: “Oh if you consume this product it will make you a superhero.” or something like that and suggested a clause in the bill that allows obviously exaggerated claims to continue to be made.We are also very glad that the Commerce Commission has got additional powers to enforce notices—investigation powers. One of the concerns that I did have after the select committee hearing was that there is no clause in the bill to allow substantiation notices such as they have in Australia. So we wrote to the Commerce Commission to ask whether it would find having powers to issue substantiation notices helpful in enforcing the clause around unsubstantiated representation. It wrote back saying that it had originally sought these provisions but it now thinks that the substantiation provisions in this bill are actually going to be workable because they are simpler they are more easily enforceable and they provide a better education tool. The commission is confident that it has sufficient powers under this bill as it stands particularly in conjunction with the information-gathering powers it has. Because of this letter from the Commerce Commission we are hopeful that this bill will work as intended and that it does have the powers to enforce unsubstantiated representation effectively.The other part of the bill that we are incredibly pleased to see is the fact that for the first time online traders will be required to identify themselves as such. In the past very often if you were on an auction site such as TradeMe and so on it was not always clear whether the person selling the product was in trade or not. Of course it is only when someone is in trade that the protections of the Consumer Guarantees Act come into play. It is incredibly important from the consumer perspective that they know when someone is in trade when they are purchasing something from someone. Again this was a clause that was strongly resisted by a lot of groups and auctioneers in particular—traders who use the online website for auctions. I am very pleased to see that this has been retained because people do not realise the difference when they are going online. It is fantastic to see that consumers are now going to be properly protected whenever they are purchasing from a trader whether that is online or off-line at any kinds of venue. They will be protected under the Consumer Guarantees Act and that is a great move forward.Dr DAVID CLARK (Labour—Dunedin North): I rise to speak to the Consumer Law Reform Bill. I note from the start that Labour will be supporting this bill through the House. We are looking forward to it passing and we are wondering why it has taken so long. We are scratching our heads. We are still waiting for that bit of advice from the Attorney-General that Mr Cosgrove sought and we might be waiting for some time by the look of things.Hon Clayton Cosgrove: Another 4 years.Dr DAVID CLARK: It may be another 4 years before he gets back to us. And who knows how long this bill will languish on the Order Paper before it makes its way through its stages.There is no doubt that we need strong consumer law in New Zealand. We need protections in place. Mojo Mathers has just referred to the example of the vacuum cleaner. We heard other examples earlier in the debate. There have been several in my local situation that I have heard of recently. TheOtago Daily Timesrecently reported a scam in Central Otago involving workmen coming to lay driveway entries doing incredibly poor workmanship overcharging and then disappearing into the mist. This is all too common sadly. In Brockville in my electorate—Hon Clayton Cosgrove: Where?Dr DAVID CLARK: Brockville. It is a great suburb in Dunedin North. I invite the member Clayton Cosgrove to come to visit Brockville. It is a fantastic suburb in the Dunedin North electorate. It is a very wise suburb that knows how to cast its votes in the right direction. There are excellent constituents in that suburb I would have to say. One unfortunate thing that seems to be happening there to one or two families as was reported to me recently when I attended the opening of the community orchard is that pay-day lenders are making their way into that suburb. They have specific families that they visit that they pick on. They wait outside until the family member whom they are trying to enforce a debt with comes home.That kind of behaviour should never be allowed. It happens because of slack law in New Zealand. It happens because this Government has not prioritised consumer protection. Quite frankly it is a disgrace. That kind of abuse that kind of lending that is allowed in New Zealand that is permitted that kind of scamming that goes on is something that the Labour Party stands up against very strongly. It is often those who are the most vulnerable who are picked on. They are at their wit’s end. They are caught off guard by a knock at the door when they are trying to manage children. They are trying to work out where the next dollar is coming from and they are caught in a vulnerable moment with a product that looks attractive at first blush. They are sold on that product and then taken advantage of. They do not have the representation they might have to represent their interests and the law is not strong enough to give them an easy response.I want to ask a few questions about the nature of unconscionable conduct which my colleague Clayton Cosgrove raised. He noted that unconscionability applies when courts consider it unfair or inequitable or against good conscience to allow a party to enforce its contractual rights against a party who is detrimentally affected by an impressive bargain. He raised the question really of whether and where it might exactly apply. He raised the issue of John Archibald Banks and the ability to apply it in a legal case. Of course he did not discuss the matters about which Mr Banks is appearing before the courts because that is something that cannot be discussed in this House. His previous prosecution can be but not the current one. I was wondering to what extent it applies and whether if a party negotiated a deal where they had themselves over a barrel—for example they purchased a product and negotiated that the product was to supply a service and that service was not delivered properly but they had got rid of all the comebacks they might have—that would be unconscionable conduct and could be enforced.I guess I am thinking here of the example of the Skycity deal the casino deal which has been debated often in this House where the Government put itself over a barrel and got itself into a situation where Skycity was the only bidder involved. The Government made political promises that it felt it must deliver on and essentially gave Skycity an open cheque in that it said: “We will not have any comeback if the facility is not runproperly. We won’t have any compensation for GDP loss. We won’t have any compensation for loss of income tax. We will open up the cheque book if it runs over in the planning stages and looks like it’s going to cost a whole lot more. We’ll pay for the whole thing off the back of problem gambling and we will have only 18 jobs for New Zealand as a consequence.” That is the Skycity deal the casino deal that this Government has done. Is the law enforceable in a way that the Government can then ask whether it is protected after putting itself in such a stupid position in the first place? Can the Government ask whether it has negotiated itself into a position where consumer law ought to protect it? I do not think that it can in the case of this law. I do not think that this law is designed to protect Governments from their own stupid decisions. If it only could that would be a good thing.It is exactly the kind of thing we see played out on a grand scale. We saw the Government give $30 million out to Rio Tinto and get absolutely nothing for that. We would have thought that it might ask for a jobs guarantee or some kind of future certainty. Maybe it got a little tilt in the price of the asset sales deal it was trying to get through as a result of shelling out $30 million to a corporate in New Zealand. Likewise with the Skycity deal maybe that got the political promise over the line. But again the Government has put taxpayers in such a devastatingly poor position that you have got to wonder whether it has some rights having put itself in a position where a contract ought not to be able to be applied in good conscience because it is such a bad deal for the Crown.This bill is making its way through the House as I have said incredibly slowly. Inequalities in New Zealand continue to widen. This Government has overseen the greatest level of inequality that New Zealand has had since records began. We had tax cuts in 2010 that saw the wealthiest 10 percent get 40 percent of the value of those tax cuts and the—The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Order!Dr DAVID CLARK: —most hard-up 20 percent get just—The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Order!Dr DAVID CLARK: —2 percent of the value of those tax cuts. The kind of inequality that has gone on is something that this bill is trying to protect against. It is trying to make sure that those who are most vulnerable are protected and we compliment the Government for the small measure that is being taken here. It often seems so distracted by ideological agendas asset sales and the interests of the big end of town. Here we have some consumer law.Paul Goldsmith: Repetitive.Dr DAVID CLARK: It is going through very slowly but at least it is offering some protections for those people. I petition Mr Goldsmith at the back there to try to do what he can as a now highly rankedTrans Tasman MP to make sure that he is also looking out for the little guy. He tells me that—Hon Clayton Cosgrove: Who? Lindsay?Dr DAVID CLARK: No no Mr Goldsmith at the back there. He tells me that he is very interested in right-wing politics but I petition him to—Hon Clayton Cosgrove: Wasn’t he John Banks’ biographer?Dr DAVID CLARK: He was John Banks’ biographer and you remind me of the unconscionable conduct earlier but—Phil Twyford: Hagiographer please.Dr DAVID CLARK: We are not on hagiography yet I do not think.Paul Goldsmith: I take no responsibility for the subject.Dr DAVID CLARK: Well let us not get into that debate. Let us move away from that and come back to the debate at hand. I petition Mr Goldsmith to do what he can tomake sure that markets are fair in New Zealand and do not advantage just the big players through unlevel playing fields.This legislation which does take some steps forward for the average consumer is a bill that is really a major win for Consumer New Zealand. Consumer New Zealand and itsConsumer magazine highlighted in February last year that delays in consumer reform were really leaving Kiwis a lot worse off than the Aussies who have progressed their legislation much more rapidly. That petitioning together with work from Labour and public support from Labour has meant that this bill has wriggled along a little bit but we would really strongly implore the people who sit opposite us in Government to up the pace at this stage. A snail’s pace is not good enough for consumer protections. We actually need to get this legislation through to make sure that those who are most vulnerable are protected and that we have sensible laws so that people know when they are investing in a product that it is what it should be and that they have a fair comeback if it is not what it should be or what it claims to be.ANDREW WILLIAMS (NZ First): I take a call on the Consumer Law Reform Bill on behalf of New Zealand First. New Zealand First is supporting this legislation as we have through its other readings in this House. We are fully supportive of any measures that go towards protecting the New Zealand consumer and beefing up legislation to protect New Zealand citizens and residents.We note that this is also bringing New Zealand consumer law into line with Australian consumer law which we are also very supportive of as so many of our transactions cross the Tasman with so many goods and services going to and from both countries. Therefore it is appropriate that our consumer laws very much line up with theirs. I note however that in the last week we passed an Act in terms of covered bonds. In this House we brought in a 10 percent covered bond regime for the Reserve Bank whereas Australia has an 8 percent regime and that we highlighted last week was an inconsistency. Why would New Zealand adopt a higher threshold than Australia’s? In these areas I think it would be far more advantageous for New Zealand to have far more alignment with many of Australia’s laws rather than going along on our own.In terms of this bill it amends a number of Acts: the Fair Trading Act 1986 the Consumer Guarantees Act the Weights and Measures Act the Carriage of Goods Act the Sale of Goods Act and the Secondhand Dealers and Pawnbrokers Act. It also repeals the Auctioneers Act the Door to Door Sales Act 1967 the Layby Sales Act 1971 and the Unsolicited Goods and Services Act 1975. So quite a number of Acts are either amended or repealed as a result of the Consumer Law Reform Bill which means that a lot of this legislation—some of which was enacted well before the age of the internet before emails and before mobile phones—is being brought into the modern era where so much is now being done electronically.The bill particularly means that online traders who are transacting over the internet will be required to be identified as online traders. Again that is a good move to protect consumers because so often they are not absolutely sure whether the person whom they are dealing with is a private individual or somebody who is actually in a regular online trading activity.The bill ensures that goods are received properly and in good order. Again that will give great relief to the many consumers who always wonder if they are buying over the internet via television offers or whatever it is whether the goods and services that they will receive will be exactly as advertised or shown or promoted to them. So again under this bill the sender is responsible for the goods until the recipient signs that the goods have been received in good order. Again that is good law.It also brings into line standard contract forms to prevent unfair contract terms. That is also modelled on Australian law. It means that there will be much more standardisation of contract forms for consumers so that again they do not end up signing up for things that are on forms that are perhaps not that appropriate or that they do not fully understand. In that respect it is often the most vulnerable in our society the people who can least afford to lose their money or be affected by the loss of the well-earned funds that they have—this will help those innocent consumers who otherwise could be greatly out of pocket and who cannot afford to be in that position.New Zealand First is also pleased to see that penalties will be increased in the case of individuals from $60000 to $200000 and in the case of companies and bodies corporate etc. from $200000 to $600000. Again that sends the right message to people who go into this area and are operating unlawfully or are certainly not honouring what they should be providing to consumers that they do stand a much higher level of penalty for that.The bill also provides for more protection in terms of misleading representation. Again we often purchase what we are not seeing or handling ourselves and then we find that it is not how it was represented. That can be very very disappointing and costly to consumers. So in terms of tidying up all the false or misleading representation again the bill sends the right message that there will be greater protection for the people of New Zealand.It also includes the ability for compulsory product recalls if the Minister of Consumer Affairs steps in and determines that a product should be recalled. Again that is a good move. Quite often we hear of instances where products should have been recalled and the manufacturer or the supplier is reluctant to do so. In that respect it is good that there are greater ministerial powers to step in where consumers or the public are at risk and to provide for compulsory product recalls where appropriate.So in closing New Zealand First supports this bill. We think it is long overdue. We are disappointed that it first came into the House in February 2012 when the Minister was the Hon Chris Tremain. I think there have been one or two Ministers in the seat since then. It is a shame that this area of legislation which protects everyday New Zealanders and everyday citizens has taken the best part of a year and a half to get to the Committee stage and then hopefully to the third reading. It is disappointing that it has taken so long because I think that in this area where the internet is moving so quickly where electronic transactions are moving so quickly and where goods and services in a consumer society are moving at a far more rapid pace it is a shame that the parliamentary pace of this legislation has been so much slower. It should have been quickened up to protect New Zealand consumers. New Zealand First supports this legislation.CLARE CURRAN (Labour—Dunedin South): I would also like to echo what has been said tonight about the Consumer Law Reform Bill being an important piece of legislation that is ultimately about trying to provide more of a fair go for consumers. You would think that in this Parliament priority would be given to passing this sort of legislation as quickly as possible especially when it comes back from a select committee and when there has been such a lot of work done at the select committee on it.A number of substantial changes were made to this piece of legislation that were agreed to by the Commerce Committee in consultation with the officials. I would like to acknowledge the work done by the officials on this bill. Pretty much all of the work that has been done in the consumer area has a lot of solidity behind it and there is a lot of thought that has gone into it. It is not perfect obviously and we have had criticisms particularly when it comes to pay-day lenders loan sharks etc. But with regard to thisparticular piece of legislation there was a lot of good work that went into it and it should have come back to this House well before it did. It should have gone through and become law well before now. Basically I am echoing everybody on this side of the Chamber on that particular issue tonight.Before I get into the substantive area that I want to cover tonight I would just like to say that one of the substantial changes that was made at the Commerce Committee was to the penalties being imposed for breaches of the Fair Trading Act. I just want to mention those penalties because they are quite substantial. The fines went from $60000 to $200000 for individuals and from $200000 to $600000 for bodies corporate. The figure of $60000 might sound like a lot of money but actually in order to prevent those breaches of the Fair Trading Act the increase in those penalties was important and I think it is a substantial part of this bill.I would also like to turn to one of the pieces of work in this area that has been mentioned a couple of times tonight. It is still yet to be dealt with in the legislation because we are waiting until Australia has developed a body of authoritative case law on the matter. That matter is very pertinent on a number of issues particularly at the moment and it is around the concept of unconscionable conduct.I am treating this area very seriously. The commentary states: “Unconscionability applies where the courts consider it unfair or inequitable (or against ‘good conscience’) to allow a party to enforce its contractual rights against another party who is detrimentally affected by an oppressive bargain.” Well there are many examples of this that could be used right now but one of the most pertinent examples is in the area of Chorus and the Government. The question that has to be asked is whether an inept contract is an oppressive bargain. I think that is a pretty pertinent question right now because it appears pretty much as if there is some sort of issue and that somebody is to blame here. There are so many questions and this issue seems to be changing day to day but I certainly think that underpinning it is this concept of unconscionable conduct.It is a pity I put it to you tonight in the Chamber that this issue is not included in the bill because then we might have actually had the ability to apply a remedy from another piece of legislation to try to address the debacle that has occurred right now. Is Chorus the problem or is it the Government—Hon Clayton Cosgrove: Both.CLARE CURRAN: —and who is telling the truth? Or is it both? But if it is both then where is the unconscionable conduct? Is it in the way that the contract was developed or is it in the way that the contract is being carried out? Or is it the fact that 2½ years ago when the relevant telecommunications legislation was written by the previous Minister for Communications and Information Technology Steven Joyce who pushed through that legislation it included a provision that everybody else in the industry seemed to know about which was going to be reviewing—[Bell rung] Speaking to the unconscionable conduct aspect of this piece of legislation everybody else seemed to know about the review of the copper pricing that was going to happen except for the Government. We know that Chorus knew about it because it was in the first prospectus that it put out. In fact it was also in the regulatory impact statement—The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Order! You are not talking to the bill.CLARE CURRAN: It was in the regulatory impact statement in that piece of legislation and it certainly has got relevance to unconscionable conduct because the question that has to be asked is what has gone wrong with this contract? What has gone wrong between the Government and the contracting company? Who knew what who knew what when and who knew whether Chorus was going to go broke? I put it to you that this is an extremely important issue which would have been addressed in this pieceof legislation potentially of whether Chorus is going to go broke or whether it is not going to go broke.Chorus said that it is not going to go broke but the Prime Minister said that it could possibly go broke. The issue is whether the Government was planning to legislate to override the Commerce Commission or whether it was not planning to legislate despite the fact that the Minister has actually put out a review document—The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Order! This is not a debate about Chorus.Hon Clayton Cosgrove: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. I understand your point. However it is within a member’s right to use an example to illustrate a point within the legislation. Prior to your taking the Chair a number of members have used examples.The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): I hear the member. Using examples is fine but this is not a debate on Chorus. The member must come back to the substantive matter of the bill.Hon Clayton Cosgrove: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. If you will just bear with me I think the point that was being made is that if you look at the piece of legislation that is being referred to there are two parties to a transaction and you can illustrate the point around that—The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): I thank the member. I have made the ruling. The member must refer back to the substantive matter of the bill and what this bill is about. It is not a 5-minute talk or a speech on Chorus.CLARE CURRAN: Thank you Mr Chair. In the part of the commentary on the bill relating to unconscionable conduct it says that “The Australian Consumer Law includes unconscionable conduct protections” but that those protections “have encountered some technical problems.” The Commerce Committee agreed that it would be prudent to wait until Australia has developed a body of authoritative case law on the matter—as I started off by saying in my speech tonight—before following suit. That was because the Commerce Committee considered that implementing unconscionability provisions “could lead to a period of uncertainty while the provisions were tested by the courts in Australia and New Zealand.”I put it to you tonight that there is a period of uncertainty happening right now that affects consumers in this country. It is about whether their internet prices are going to stay up high or whether they are going to drop which is what the Commerce Commission has recommended they do and the commission has actually put out a final decision that they should drop. That is a fair trading issue that is a consumer issue and there is a period of uncertainty now.There are now two judicial reviews happening. One judicial review is the Minister for Communications and Information Technology’s own review in which she has three options each of which requires legislation. The other judicial review is that of Chorus which is taking the Commerce Commission’s final decision to court. If that is not a period of uncertainty that is affecting consumers then I do not know what is.There is unconscionable conduct that has occurred. The questions are where has that unconscionable conduct occurred who is to blame who knew what when and why is it that the consumers of New Zealand are going to end up paying? If Chorus is going to have to be bailed out by this Government then it is the consumers who are going to have to bail it out ultimately. That is the essence of that issue and that is why in this piece of legislation which is all about consumer law reform there is this disconnect that seems to be occurring where you have got a piece of legislation that sits on the Order Paper for 2 years and does not go through the House and you have a Government that is basically coming up with one idea after another to try to bail out a private companyand its shareholders in order to protect the dividends of that company. That is unfair. It is an unjust situation and it is the consumers of New Zealand who are losing out.Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE (Labour): I just want to take a brief call again on the theme which a number of us have spoken on this evening of unconscionable conduct. Within the commentary on the Consumer Law Reform Bill as I referred to before it talks about unconscionable conduct applying where courts consider it is “unfair or inequitable (or ‘against good conscience’) to allow a party to enforce its contractual rights against another party who is detrimentally affected by an oppressive bargain.” In case the Chair may think that I am wandering away from the bill the words I want to concentrate on directly for a moment are “oppressive bargain”. I am going to illustrate the point by another Government decision two parties to which—and you may have been distracted Mr Chairperson. I am referring directly to the words “oppressive bargain” in the commentary and I am going to illustrate that with an example.The example is one of Rio Tinto. There were two parties to a transaction a contractual arrangement yet one party negligently stupidly negotiated a deal paid a lot of money gave away a number of components and got nothing back for it. The question I would have for the Minister in the chair the Minister for the Environment because she is a lawyer and she will know far better than me is whether that would be considered enforceable given that Rio Tinto—not through any nefarious means but simply through good management good negotiation and smarts—worked out that the Government had nailed itself to a time frame to sell Meridian Energy and therefore waited waited and waited until that time line was almost going to be breached and it sprung the trap.The deal as I am sure you and others will know was that there was going to be job protection and all sorts of other things—benefits to Southland and New Zealand—were going to rain from the sky and the deal was done. The deal was a halving of the notice period a decrease in the power price for Rio Tinto and 30 million bucks thrown in for good measure. That was the deal. The question is whether that could have been deemed to be an oppressive bargain given that one side got everything and the other side got nothing. And we know that before the ink was dry on the $30 million cheque Rio Tinto had through theSouthland Times indicated that maintenance jobs were going. We know now that there was no guarantee of those jobs encompassed in the deal and further we know that the Minister negotiating the deal Mr English never asked for a guarantee. That is the detail of a transaction—Dr David Clark: Never asked for it?Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE: Never asked for it. So the question I would have for the Minister in the chair is whether this consumer concept of unconscionable conduct where a bargain could be considered oppressive applies to this particular transaction. It seems to me it would because one side gave away not just the kitchen sink but the kitchen and the lot—the whole house—and got back zero. That party could have been stupid negligent or incompetent or all of the above.I have never seen a transaction or a deal done where one side gives so much and gets nothing—absolutely nothing—back in return unless you count the fact that the Government managed to do the deal and tried to pump up the price of the Meridian Energy float so that it could get it away. I suppose you could say the Government got that out of it. It cleared the decks on that. But for 30 million bucks a decrease in the power price no jobs guarantee and a halving of the notice period the question I would have is what we the Parliament on behalf of the taxpayers got for that. I would call that an oppressive bargain. I do not blame Rio Tinto because Rio Tinto’s job is to get the best deal that it can for its shareholders and to quote the Prime Minister if it is “dealing with a bunch of muppets” which it was through the Minister of Finance andnegotiators then so be it. But I would like to know from the Minister whether that particular transaction 30 million bucks would constitute an oppressive bargain and in doing so unconscionable conduct.JAMI-LEE ROSS (Junior Whip—National): I moveThat the question be now put.Motion agreed to.The question was put that the amendments set out on Supplementary Order Papers 273 and 404 in the name of the Hon Craig Foss be agreed to.Amendments agreed to.Parts 1 and 2 schedules 1 to 3 and clauses 1 and 2 as amended agreed to.The Committee divided the bill into the Fair Trading Amendment Bill the Consumer Guarantees Amendment Bill the Weights and Measures Amendment Bill the Secondhand Dealers and Pawnbrokers Amendment Bill the Carriage of Goods Amendment Bill and the Auctioneers Billpursuant to Supplementary Order Paper 405.Arts Council of New Zealand Toi Aotearoa BillIn CommitteeDebate resumed from 24 September.Part 2 Community arts providers(continued)JACINDA ARDERN (Labour): It is my pleasure to resume the debate on the Arts Council of New Zealand Toi Aotearoa Bill. This was being hotly debated when we unfortunately had to cease our last opportunity to discuss the changes that Minister Finlayson wants to make to the way that creative arts are governed. This is essentially what this bill does. It shakes up the administration side of Creative New Zealand’s four governing bodies.Just to recap if I may for the benefit of everyone watching—potentially from the community arts sector which is particularly affected by this bill—the purpose of the bill according to the Government is to replace Creative New Zealand’s four governing bodies which currently include the Arts Council with a single board called the Arts Council and it comprises 13 members. That is probably the most significant element of this bill—that it will be a significant consolidation of the membership and that is something that in particular we have expressed serious concerns about. Our significant concerns relate to the voices of in particular Pacific Island Māori ethnic and young artists who contribute to the vision of Creative New Zealand which is currently governed by four bodies and will go down into just a single Arts Council. That concern was something that was supported by those who made submissions on this bill.In particular replacing the Te Waka Toi committee with just four qualified persons to represent Māori was something we had significant concern over. We have spoken to that in particular. The response that came from the Minister in the chair at that time as I recall was that the legislation allowed the ability to set up subcommittees. So for instance he clarified through questions that it would be possible for a pseudo Te Waka Toi committee—a faux Te Waka Toi committee as it were—to be established under the bill anyway which begs the question: why then is there the need for the legislation if the legislation empowers the council to be able to do that anyway? Well I think what we will find is that it will not have the same standing as that previous committee. In fact obviously it is strongly weighted instead to effect a reduction through its requiring four qualified persons to represent Māori on a council of 13 members instead.But the appointment process for those individuals is something worthy of discussion. I think we should always put scrutiny into these processes given in the past we have seen for instance that the appointment process for the Families Commission since this Government has come into play has meant that we have literally ended up with a “National Party Family Families Commission” where at least two of the members are direct relatives of Cabinet Ministers. They may well be qualified because they are family members for the Families Commission. But I think that just demonstrates the importance of keeping rigour in these appointment processes particularly when you see a significant reduction in the representation of these groups. The same goes for the South Pacific Arts Committee which has been replaced by two members who are then given the weighty job of representing their community on the council. That is also something that we should give heed to—just the weight of those particular roles for those six individuals.But I want to come speaking specifically to Part 2’s community arts provider provisions which set out in clause 14 that the “Arts Council may designate community arts providers”. Clause 14(1) states: “Any body involved in community arts including any local authority may apply in writing to the Arts Council to be designated as a community arts provider.” This begs then a couple of questions. To what extent do we believe that this initiation by local authorities themselves is likely to take place? There are certainly councils that I know for which this is not a high priority in terms of delivery. Secondly in fact it is not really included in the well-being. Well the well-beings are not included—let us be honest—for local government. So I am not sure how realistic the notion of this being instigated by local councils will be when you see such variation in their beliefs about their role in the provision of the arts or even indeed in recreation—more so recreation.In fact we have seen a real shift over time I think in the way that at a local body level there has been a decision to move away from considering the arts in that overall well-being element of local body provision. Now we see a real separation of recreation being maintained—that is sports and solid things like grounds and engagement in activities like that—to the detriment of involving for instance in amongst all of that provision things like dance which is the eighth-most participated-in sport or recreation form in New Zealand. Tens of thousands of New Zealanders participate in dance in some form in New Zealand.Grant Robertson: Interpretive dance.JACINDA ARDERN: Interpretive dance.Grant Robertson: Friday nights.JACINDA ARDERN: I do not think cutting shapes on the dance floor is factored in. There literally is a robust survey that tells us that New Zealanders do participate in that form of creative expression. To what extent is that really being captured by local councils now? And to what extent should we be leaving it up to local authorities’ instigation to make an approach to the Arts Council to be designated a “community arts provider”?I want to use a specific example here. Tauranga City Council for instance in some elements of council provision is strong. It has a fantastic gallery space. It really pays homage to Nigel Brown in that area and there is a lot of local pride there. On the flip side the council wants to charge for library books. You see a real division in the way that some of that council decides to treat what we would consider public good and the well-beings. Another example is Morrinsville. The Matamata-Piako District Council there has the benefit the blessing of the Wallace Gallery a fantastic collection which has had significant funding—as you well know Mr Chairperson Tisch—via that wonderful donation by Sir James Wallace to that township. What provision has thecouncil made for that wonderful facility? In fact I know it is a highly contentious facility now because the council does not necessarily believe that it is within its core duty to provide that facility.That is one of our concerns with Part 2 of the bill and that is why one of the things that we want to see enhanced is the ability of community arts to be bolstered by the Arts Council and not left to chance. It is something that we have got some significant concerns around. As for the extent to which we need to put a little bit more robust guidance around community arts development I ask to what degree will we see an even-handed approach in the way that that decentralised level of funding is meant to be treated particularly given a community arts policy is yet to be completed as far as I know. These are some of the issues that we remain concerned about because yes we do support decentralisation and the ability of communities to drive what they desire to see in their local areas around community arts provision but to what extent are the provisions in this bill really satisfying that?How many of those local areas will be able to meet the threshold test to be designated as a community arts provider if they do not for instance have the support of their local council? The locals there may have a huge amount of enthusiasm and desire but if the Arts Council is able to designate a body as a community arts provider only if it is satisfied that “(a) the body complies with any guidelines set by the Council for community arts providers; and (b) the body represents in relation to the arts either a specific geographical area or a defined community of interest.” you would imagine that it would be interested in the local council’s view on that. If they do not have the support of the local council—again perhaps the Matamata-Piako District Council would not support a move like that—then what happens to them? I have heard some argue that that just demonstrates there is not enough desire in the community and not enough backing and therefore so be it but how fair is that on those who are living in those geographic regions not to have access in that way?TRACEY MARTIN (NZ First): I rise on behalf of New Zealand First. We will be voting against this bill the Arts Council of New Zealand Toi Aotearoa Bill. Our concerns are predominantly around the voice of community inside this legislation.In particular there is Supplementary Order Paper 35 in my name which deals predominantly with Part 2. It would change the heading of clause 14 to “Arts Council to designate community arts providers” to make it a definitive statement that it will designate community arts providers. If one goes to clause 15(1) it would change to “The Arts Council must allocate funding to a designated community arts provider.” Clause 16(1) would change to “The Arts Council must establish community arts councils in relation to specific geographical areas.” We believe that without a directive for this to be done the creation of this Arts Council and the removal of several bodies—two in particular the Māori representative body and the Pasifika representative body—is really a centralisation of this decision making.I quote the Minister for Arts Culture and Heritage in his second reading speech when he said: “The bill … removes the requirement for the Arts Council to provide a strategic plan every 3 years—a pointless exercise if ever there was one. This requirement is considered to be an unnecessary duplication of the obligation to provide a statement of intent under the Crown Entities Act 2004. I remember from my time in Creative New Zealand that no sooner had one completed one strategic plan the whole exercise had to start again. It was an utter waste of time.” That was the Minister in his second reading speech.It is the very voice of community that is the reason why New Zealand First will be opposing this bill. The Minister in that statement talked about strategic plans along with the designated desire to distribute these funds down to a community level. A strategicplan means you have to go out and you have to talk with communities the people of New Zealand whose money it is. This centralisation in this way through this bill puts the decision making into the hands of a very select group of selected people—selected by the Minister—and now with no requirement to do a strategic plan that goes out for any public consultation. There is no actual requirement. They “may” establish community arts councils. They “may” allocate funding. They “might” do this and they “might” do that but there is no requirement for them to do so.Once again it will be rural New Zealand that misses out. It will be rural New Zealanders in places like Warkworth—who are going to have with the funding that it received through the arts funding through this grant in the last few years the most amazing mosaic town clock in the centre of their town and they deserve it just like any other taxpayer of New Zealand deserves it. But it will be those rural communities whose voices we are concerned will not reach this committee and hence that is why we are seeking to change Part 2 through my Supplementary Order Paper.My colleague will address some of the other concerns we have when she seeks a call later on. But we just want to reiterate that without a strategic plan how can the people of New Zealand really know where this council is going to go to? Without a strategic plan and the consultation around it how truly can this council gain the voice of New Zealanders—the New Zealanders on the ground who pay their taxes every day who want to see Tutus on Tour and who want their waterfronts to have surprise art all over them just as much as anybody in the centre of Auckland or anybody walking down on the Wellington waterfront? Without this Supplementary Order Paper change these are the voices that we believe will be cut out of this equation.We also do not feel—and this will be expanded on by my colleague—that the four seats for Māori and the two seats for Pasifika are adequate. Without any community voice anywhere else inside this legislation the removal of these seats not only lessens but tips that balance of input from those communities which we all recognise and respect for their cultural input to the arts and cultures that make us as New Zealanders. Some of the things that we are famous for overseas some of the reasons why we are actually at the top—GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central): It is a pleasure to take a call on Part 2 of the Arts Council of New Zealand Toi Aotearoa Bill. I know that I am not allowed to refer to the absence of members but the participation of the Minister for Arts Culture and Heritage in this particular part of the debate would be useful not only because obviously we all enjoy his company in the Chamber but also because I have a number of questions around Part 2 that I think the Minister might be able to shed some light on.Part 2 deals largely with community arts providers and I want at the outset of my contribution to make clear that the Labour Party is a strong supporter of community arts councils. We believe that at the grassroots level community arts councils play a critical role in providing opportunities for local communities to participate in the arts to provide support and funding for that and to ensure there is coordination of arts activities at a local level. Right throughout the history of New Zealand’s artistic and creative endeavours community arts councils have played an important role so we strongly support them.But the language that is contained in Part 2 of this bill is at times confusing vague and weak. I actually agree with Tracey Martin about the fact that if as set out in clause 18 we are going to have administration of community arts councils by local authorities let us just say it. Let us just say that is what we are going to do. At the moment we have this odd permissive phrasing in clause 18(1): “The Arts Council may appoint a local authority to have administrative responsibility for a community arts council”. But itmight not as well and what happens in the situations where it does not? In fact the whole clause is full of negative language about what will happen when funds are allocated and how funds can be taken away from community arts councils. But it does not go into much detail about what community arts councils are there for what they should be doing and how they can be supported. So I think there is lack of directness in Part 2 and it raises a series of questions that I intend to work through in a couple of calls.The first of those is when we come to the beginning of this which is clause 14 “Arts Council may designate community arts providers”. It lists in clause 14(2)(b) that the Arts Council can create one of these if “the body represents in relation to the arts either a specific geographical area or a defined community of interest.” One question I would be asking the Minister in the chair the Minister for the Environment to take a call on—or indeed the Minister for Arts Culture and Heritage if he is listening to us—is this. One of the submitters to the bill was the Taieri Community Arts Council from Dunedin. It made a very brief submission to the Government Administration Committee but it was quite pointed.I will read just the beginning of it. The “Taieri Community Arts Council is in the process of winding up its business and ceasing to exist.” Bear in mind that the Government sat on its tush on this bill for so long that that was in 2010 so we can make a fairly sound assumption that the Taieri Community Arts Council did wind up its business. It said: “This is because Creative New Zealand have decreed that no Community Arts Council may ring fence funding for an area within a local authority.” My understanding of this is that the Taieri Community Arts Council sits within the Dunedin City Council boundaries and presumably Creative New Zealand and the Dunedin City Council were saying that they could not agree to funding an area like the Taieri Community Arts Council within that local authority.My question for the Government is whether this change in Part 2 allows an organisation like the Taieri Community Arts Council to operate in the way that it wanted to before it wound itself up. What it was saying was that it had a defined area of interest which is the Taieri Plains area around the township of Mosgiel for those who come in from Dunedin Airport. The Taieri Community Arts Council was providing opportunities in that area that it did not feel were being provided by the local authority and it wanted to be supported for doing that. Like a lot of community arts providers it also then went on to say that it felt that Creative New Zealand over the years had let community arts dissipate and that there was too much concentration—in its words—on “high art”. We know that the Minister for Arts Culture and Heritage Chris Finlayson is a great fan of high art and that is all very well but community arts councils do operate at the core of arts provision in New Zealand. So that is a question for the Government. Would an organisation like the Taieri Community Arts Council have the ability to be able to operate and ring-fence funding for an area within a local authority? That is a question that we would like answered.I then want to go on to clause 16 of the bill which talks about the establishment of community arts councils in relation to geographic areas. This is where Tracey Martin is absolutely right that if you—Tracey Martin: Cool.GRANT ROBERTSON: I know; there is a first time for everything.Tracey Martin: Ha ha!GRANT ROBERTSON: No no! This is where Tracey Martin is correct: community arts councils are here being established under clause 16 for specific geographical areas but then if we flick over to clause 18 suddenly we are giving localauthorities an administrative role. So which is it? Is it both? How do they work together? I am uncomfortable passing a law that is so vague in this regard.I think that when this passes into law it will end up causing more confusion for local authorities and more confusion for existing community arts councils as to how they are meant to operate in this new regime. Bear in mind that this bill repeals the previous Act so this is it. There is nothing else. Clauses 14 through to 18 are it for community arts councils and I simply do not believe that there is sufficient guidance in here for community arts councils and local authorities as to how they should behave in this part of the law. So there are some questions there for the Government that I believe it should answer.If it cannot answer them I think it should support Tracey Martin’s Supplementary Order Paper 35 because at the very least that gives some certainty that it is local authorities that will be doing this. I would want within that the assurance that there is flexibility for sub-areas within a local authority to be able to form a community arts council. I think that probably that flexibility is contained in the other clauses here but at the moment I think this is an extremely vague and confusing area of the bill. Unless the Minister in the chair is able to explain what the Government is actually up to here we certainly cannot be supporting Part 2 of the bill.Le’aufa’amulia ASENATI LOLE-TAYLOR (NZ First): I rise on behalf of New Zealand First to speak on one aspect of the Arts Council of New Zealand Toi Aotearoa Bill that pertains to the accessibility of funding through decision making for minority groups particularly for Pacific peoples. It is quite a concern for me when I look through this bill. I am also very pleased to hear that the Labour Party is actually supporting my colleague Tracey Martin’s Supplementary Order Paper 35.This bill contains exclusionary provisions that are not transparent and that limit the ability of certain communities to access the available funding at the right level because their voices will have to be channelled through another layer of bureaucracy. They have to go through a different layer because their voices are not considered good enough for them to be sitting round the same table or sitting on the same council as those whom the Minister has elected to be part of the Arts Council.Although New Zealand First supports the appointment of the Hon Luamanuvao Winnie Laban as chair of the council we are concerned about how this bill will be perceived by those who really need it the most. The restrictive process of attaining funding will inevitably make the process of accessing crucial funding more difficult. That funding could go a long way for the communities that need it the most. I am talking about the Pacific community here. Their arts their crafts and their dramas have been recognised by New Zealand in order to sell or to market itself at the international level. These restrictive provisions will make this bill futile and will create a barrier for many people that will stop them taking up funding opportunities that they deserve.I can see the vision that this bill aims to support but the vision is inconsistent with the bill we have before us today. If the Minister for Arts Culture and Heritage wants to create more funding opportunities then this bill should require some reassessing or reviewing in the area of allowing the voice of Pacific Island people at the decision-making table. But if the point of this bill is to make it more restrictive and exclusionary towards potential providers and community networks then the Minister is going about things the right way. That is the way that this bill is presented to us.I will read from the bill. In Part 1 clause 3(2)(c) and (d) states: “recognise the arts of the Pacific Island peoples of New Zealand; and … recognise and uphold the principles …”. It talks about principles. Which principles is the Minister referring to when he is not even considering the people or the voice of the Pacific Island people being part of this decision making? Also in order to get the distribution of funding to the right levelof the community Pacific Island peoples are going to have to go through a different layer.I think that I must call it a con artist attempt because that is what it is all about. There are many people out there who recognise Pacific arts as unique and who consider them invaluable to New Zealand’s culture yet this bill takes away the opportunity for ordinary Pacific New Zealanders to have fair access to the decision-making process of funding at the right level. This bill is nothing but a layer of con bureaucratic attempts that is being used to stop Pacific communities from having a voice through a committee. This bill aims to justify the Government’s efforts to eliminate Pacific organisations from being able to expand on their skills in Polynesian arts and also to recognise the culture and the unique contribution that they have made to this country for many years. It is appalling to see ethnic groups like Pacific people being treated so unfairly. I am saying “unfairly” because they have worked really hard for this country. They have made this country their home and yet their culture and their arts are just being used and taken for granted.The Ministers boast about the uniqueness of Pacific arts—if it is not music it is dance or drama or through a poem. One thing that I want to make clear is that the Pacific is not there for the purpose of exploitation. The Pacific people are resourceful and they have the innate abilities that often generate adequate resources of income. It is certainly an area that is fast becoming a platform for others to learn from. New Zealand has a pivotal role to play in ensuring that our Pacific people in New Zealand receive the means to be self-reliant self-efficient. Our Pacific people in Aotearoa do not want a handout; all they want is a hand up. That is what they want. This bill will fundamentally ensure that Pacific Islanders will require a platform from which to prosper and benefit from economic growth and development.This bill should be reviewed to avoid Pacific artists being marginalised and overwhelmed by the new structure the Arts Council is actually introducing. That is the reason why we believe Supplementary Order Paper 364 in the name of Jacinda Ardern which used to be Supplementary Order Paper 34 in the name of Charles Chauvel is a good Supplementary Order Paper and that it should be supported. It really recognises the loophole that this bill has created. I am going to be absolutely astounded if the bill passes as it is. It is a con artist in action and it has no regard for the benefit of the ordinary Pacific artists of our country. Thank you.CATHERINE DELAHUNTY (Green): Ngā mihi nui ki te whānau whenua o te Paremata i tēnei pō. It is nice to have an opportunity to speak briefly on this Arts Council of New Zealand Toi Aotearoa Bill because we agree with many of the sentiments that we have heard tonight from New Zealand First and from the Labour Party. We will not be supporting the bill as written. My colleague Asenati Lole-Taylor was just referring to the marginalisation of Pacific people through the overall process of the bill. But we are on Part 2 so I am going to address my comments primarily to Part 2 and to tautoko the comments of some of my colleagues about the confusing nature of it.The first statement in clause 14(1) of Part 2 seems clear that the Arts Council may designate community arts providers. “Any body involved in community arts including any local authority may apply in writing to the Arts Council to be designated as a community arts provider.” That statement is quite clear. After that the whole thing goes to hell and I do not understand it. It is incredibly contradictory and confusing. You do not know whether the community arts provider is part of the Arts Council or part of the local council or whether the local council is part of the arts provider. It is honestly very badly structured and I am sure the Minister had something in mind but I do not know what it is.I think that if we are going to reform Arts Council structures in funding it is very important to recognise the flax-roots and grassroots dimension. I think that my colleague Grant Robertson talked about support for the higher arts but for those of us lowly people who spend a lot of time in small communities where the arts are a thriving part of our unique identity the way in which arts funding is structured is a critical matter. It is not clear exactly who is relying on whom here but we have changed the powers of local authorities in other pieces of legislation from this House. We have stripped the well-beings as a key priority for local authorities which is where the arts used to fit and we are now focused on a very narrow definition of the responsibility of local authorities.The fear that I hear from other parties and from the Greens is that when we do that we lose that sense of the vitality of the local arts as an essential part of what a local authority might be responsible for. If a local authority is not responsible for it then we need a local arts council or arts provider that is. We need to know clearly how that is going to work who is going to fund it and who gets to decide who is on it. A centralised process is not going to work. In order to make sure that everything that happens at our flax-roots grassroots level—from kapa haka through to community painting murals drama cultural contributions from all of the tangata whenua metauiwi katoa in our communities—is going to be vibrant and successful it cannot happen from a centralised authoritarian perspective and we really need that vitality.It may be that something is envisioned but I have been reading through these clauses and trying to figure it out. There seem to be more clauses about how to get rid of these bodies if they are not performing than there is clarity about what their performance relationships and jurisdictions actually are. It is disturbing to see all of these clauses that talk about how to get rid of community arts councils if they do not fit with the Arts Council’s national criteria. I really am at a loss to see why this is a step forward.We have concerns about the bill overall but we would have liked to support it. We are great believers in the arts. We passionately believe that the success of our communities is through the success not just of sports and economic activities but also of the arts. They are an economic activity in themselves and provide an incredible amount to communities but they do often need that small grant that seeding funding.I have been a recipient of arts funding grants myself in the Mahurangi area. I know how important it is to community organisations to get these grants. In the Hauraki where I live I know how important it is to our communities that this money is made available in ways that are transparent and accountable—not just nationally through this bill where they can shut you down if you are not doing it according to their rules but from a local perspective. This money is highly contested. It is sought after. People sweat blood over what might be only $1000 but for them it is the difference between participating in the local kapa haka competition and not participating and between doing the community mural with the children on the foreshore and not doing it. They want to know that they have some accountability here. They want to know that they will be able to say who is going to decide about this.It is a shame that we do not know more about what Part 2 actually means and who is going to end up with the resources and the power. I think these questions of power are very important in all bills and in all types of issues but particularly for arts at the community level because often they are marginalised. [Bell rung] I just want to take a short remaining call on this. If at the community level community arts providers end up being disenfranchised and people who are active at that level feel that they have less power than before then Parliament will have failed. It will have failed to do something that could be useful which is to look at the arts sector and ask whether it is working and for whom it is working.Those are critical questions. Unfortunately from reading Part 2 I cannot give a critical answer to those questions because I do not think it is well drafted and I do not think it is clear. The word “may” appears in virtually every clause. There is not a direction. The Arts Council “may designate a body” and “may if satisfied” do this; it “may establish community arts councils” that “may apply in writing …”. If we restructure and get rid of all other legislation pertaining to community arts there needs to be a lot more rigour a lot more accountability a lot more clarity and a lot more commitment to making sure that the flax-roots and the grassroots have the power.At this point Part 2 to us is something that we absolutely cannot support. At the moment we cannot support the rest of the bill either. It is with regret that we express that because community arts are the lifeblood the identity the meaning and the uniqueness of being a citizen in a group of other citizens creating your own reality. We should be supporting that in a coherent manner. Thank you.JAMI-LEE ROSS (Junior Whip—National): I moveThat the question be now put.A party vote was called for on the questionThat the question be now put.Ayes64New Zealand National 59; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1; Independent: Horan.Noes55New Zealand Labour 33; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 7; Mana 1.Motion agreed to.The question was put that the amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 35 in the name of Tracey Martin to Part 2 be agreed to.A party vote was called for on the questionThat the amendments be agreed to.Ayes55New Zealand Labour 33; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 7; Mana 1.Noes64New Zealand National 59; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1; Independent: Horan.Amendments not agreed to.A party vote was called for on the questionThat Part 2 be agreed to.Ayes64New Zealand National 59; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1; Independent: Horan.Noes55New Zealand Labour 33; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 7; Mana 1.Part 2 agreed to.Progress to be reported presently.House resumed.The Chairperson reported the Consumer Law Reform Bill with amendment and that the Committee had divided it into six bills and progress on the Arts Council of New Zealand Toi Aotearoa Bill.Report adopted.The House adjourned at 9.57 p.m.