Dalziel Lianne: Fair Trading (Soliciting on Behalf of Charities) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Dalziel Lianne: Fair Trading (Soliciting on Behalf of Charities) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Sitting date: 09 May 2012. Volume:679;Page:2140. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL (Labour—Christchurch East) 
: 
 Thank you for the opportunity to address the Committee stage of the Fair Trading (Soliciting on Behalf of Charities) Amendment Bill. As the former chair of the Commerce Committee who was chairing the meetings that dealt with this particular piece of legislation I thought it was appropriate to respond to a comment made by the member who has just resumed his seat Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga. I think to be fair—and actually I think my colleague Phil Twyford is correct in terms of the content—legislation that does not have substance within it is hollow. I cannot think of any other description for it. The reason it is hollow is that it was not possible in the framework of a member’s bill to deal with the substantive issues that needed to be dealt with in order to cover the issues that need to be addressed. We think that it is important. We on this side of the House do think it is important to address this issue. Do we think this is ideal? No we do not. Are we supporting the bill? Yes we are but largely because it will sit in place only for a very short period of time and it will be subsumed as it were by the consumer law review legislation that will travel its way through the House over the next wee while. I think that bill has already gone to a select committee. [ 
Interruption 
] It has. During the context of that legislation I think we will be able to see this matter addressed. In actual fact we may never see the regulations passed under this bill.  
It really came down to a point where there were two pieces of legislation that came to our select committee that were ahead of the consumer law review. It was decided that one of them would be held back and would basically sit within the review itself and the other one—this one—in the name of the Hon Amy Adams as she is now she was very keen to progress. I think one of the main justifications for us agreeing to that request was the belief that there were some important public interest issues that should be put out there to increase people’s awareness. That would enable people to ask the question: “How much of my charity dollar is going to the charity?”. I think that one of the points that has been made several times over in the debate thus far is that there is often a considerable cost in getting that donor who is then going to commit to donating for the rest of their life. There are people who continue to pay an ongoing tithing or something to a church to a local charity or to Greenpeace or something like that— 
Phil Twyford 
: Oxfam.  
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL 
:—Oxfam—where there is a considerable amount of upfront cost. The agencies that do this work actually do charge a lot but once you have got somebody basically hooked on a— 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: Regular payment. 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL 
: “Regular payment” are the words I was looking for.  
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: Would you like me to help you? 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL 
: Yes I would love your assistance. It would actually be a rare and unusual event for you to be giving me a hand Trevor! Sorry. The point that I am making is that once you have got people on to regular payments it actually operates on that inertia basis—that it actually is more trouble to go and end the automatic payment than it is to just carry on with the payment. I think it is a very important issue to bring to people’s attention but I do not think people should get completely bogged down in the idea that just because there is a commercial operation that enables people to come into that giving programme that there is somehow something wrong with that because I do not think that is the case. I think a lot of large charities internationally rely on those commercial operations to make that initial contact for them—and they get paid well for that—but then the benefits flow on to the organisation for a long time to come.  
I do not think we will ever see regulations passed under this legislation but it has been a very useful exercise in order to bring public attention to an issue that is of concern and that is how much of their money that they are giving for charity is actually going to the charity. And when you are actually making that donation in a very direct way I think people are entitled to know the answer.