Hudson BrettFinance and Government Administration SectorBRETT HUDSON (Chairperson of the Governance and Administration Committee): Thank you Madam Chair. It's a pleasure to speak on this debate because after all what we're really talking about here as we review the financial performance of Government entities from the previous financial year is that essential bedrock and extremely high-performing economy and set of public services that the outgoing National-led Government has left for the incoming coalition Government. Already we've seen in the media in the last day or so a feeble attempt by this Government—Kiritapu Allan: I raise a point of order Madam Chairperson. BRETT HUDSON: —to create crises where none such exist—CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): I'm sorry to interrupt the member. A point of order—Kiritapu Allan.Kiritapu Allan: Madam Chair pursuant to your commentary in the introductory remarks of this section it was noted that the comments from the chairs of select committees were not to be overtly political and I just ask for some guidance in respect of the comments being made by the current speaker.BRETT HUDSON: Speaking to the point of order Madam Chair—CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): I don't need any help. The member is absolutely correct. This is a report from the Governance and Administration Committee and it should be reporting the findings and the discussions of the select committee. It should be absolutely non-political.BRETT HUDSON: Thank you Madam Chair. So what the committee was able to report across the entities that it looked at is a reflection of the solid state of the accounting the books the handling of their accounts and indeed the services that our Government agencies are delivering to New Zealanders. One I'd like to touch on to begin with please is the Department of Internal Affairs. It's a bit of a department about everything actually in New Zealand. It has an extraordinarily broad remit and with it comes a great responsibility across huge areas of interest to the public a responsibility that it takes very seriously. One of such areas one of the challenges it has and which it spoke with us about is the ability to keep each of the silos—they may not like them to be referred to as such but just for ease of understanding—of the services it provides. Each one of them has to be accounted as very much almost an independent entity. They can't be in deficit in one and in surplus in another. They're meant to manage each of them effectively and they have done a very very good job in the year in question. They've actually achieved a small surplus a surplus of almost $30 million which they have advised us is a necessary buffer because as they forecast into both the current financial year and years ahead there will be some pressures that come particularly as a result of the change in the validity of passports which was made by the previous Government. Whereas for some years we had operated with passports that would be valid for five years all new passports will be valid for 10 and the department spoke to us about how that will impact revenue flows around the delivery of those services over the coming years. They also highlighted for us at the same time of course that some of their costs—in fact many of their costs—around technology are quite fixed. So they'll see quite a flat to moderately increasing cost base but a revenue line particularly around passports that will vary quite differently from where it's been in recent years. So they did highlight to us that although—and we agreed—they have done a very very good job in managing the services against the budget that they have had it isn't going to be without its challenges in the coming years.When we spoke to them about passports too we were very interested to get a sense from them about how the extended validity period may or may not compromise the security of the passports of New Zealand which are held in very high regard around the world—one of the highest-regarded countries actually if you use the measure of visa-free entry into other countries. Their view is that once you get to around seven or eight years there is a challenge around the embedded security elements within passports but they remain very confident that the work they continue to do to improve in that area will continue to keep us in good stead despite that change in passport validity.The other area we spoke to them quite a great deal about was the delivery of digital services through what used to be the Government Chief Information Officer office but now is the Government Chief Digital Officer. One area which we did raise some concern about is the identification or log-on verification service the Government runs called RealMe. Consistently over the years the uptake in that service falls well well behind projections and it's something that we have encouraged the department to put a great deal of emphasis on: creating extra value to grow that number of logins. Thank you Madam Chair.