Parker David: Commerce Commission (International Co-operation and Fees) Bill — In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Parker David: Commerce Commission (International Co-operation and Fees) Bill — In Committee 
[Sitting date: 29 May 2012. Volume:680;Page:2640. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Hon DAVID PARKER (Labour) 
: 
 When I came down to the House today I looked at the Order Paper and we had 12 hours and 2 minutes remaining of the Budget debate. And here we are just a couple of hours later having switched not to the next bill on the Order Paper but the one after it. The Government seems to be in a state of disarray today— 
Hon Craig Foss 
: No they’ve done the others. 
Hon DAVID PARKER 
: What’s that? 
Hon Craig Foss 
: They did the Crown Entities Reform Bill. 
Hon DAVID PARKER 
: It did the Crown Entities Reform Bill? The Committee stage went through very fast did it? Well I might be mistaken but I did not think— 
Hon Lianne Dalziel 
: We did that. 
Hon DAVID PARKER 
: We did it very quickly. Well the first mistake that we had from Gerry Brownlee today was when he came down here to speak in the Budget debate and despite his being responsible for the Order Paper which said the amendment was in the name of David Shearer he said it was in the name of Grant Robertson about three or four times until Mr Joyce sort of with some embarrassment whispered into his ear that he had that one wrong. Then of course— 
Hon Member 
: Touch of the “Banksies”. 
Hon DAVID PARKER 
: A touch of the “Banksies”. That is right—a touch of the “Banksies”. Then we had some debate around the Budget and when it was obvious that the debate was about to turn to Vote Education and the terrible debacle that there has been for the Government around intermediate schools lo and behold all of a sudden we had an adjournment motion on the Budget debate. Even with many many hours remaining in that Budget debate it was not convenient for the Government to continue. It had to come to these other “urgent” pieces of legislation which have been languishing— 
Hon Lianne Dalziel 
: How long has this one been sitting there? 
Hon DAVID PARKER 
: Well that is right. This Commerce Commission (International Co-operation and Fees) Bill was introduced originally by the Hon Lianne Dalziel in the last Labour Government. It then languished at the Commerce Committee for some time because there was more— 
Hon Lianne Dalziel 
: Under the chair of Lianne Dalziel. 
Hon DAVID PARKER 
: —under the chairpersonship of Lianne Dalziel because there was some more pressing and important business before the committee for it to attend to first. Then the bill having been back here since November 2010 the Government let it languish on the Order Paper until today because— 
Hon David Cunliffe 
: They must be hurting. 
Hon DAVID PARKER 
: I have heard that the Government has been hurting so much that the Prime Minister’s emissaries have been around the press gallery today blaming Hekia Parata. Collective responsibility is not really— 
The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch) 
: Order! Part 1. 
Hon DAVID PARKER 
: I am being told that we should be addressing Part— 
Hon Clayton Cosgrove 
: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. [ 
Interruption 
] Are we interjecting on points of order now? 
The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch) 
: A point of order the Hon Clayton Cosgrove.  
Hon Clayton Cosgrove 
: With respect and not challenging your ruling the Minister in the chair the Minister of Commerce in his address did actually say that he was going to—and fair enough too; he was wandering slightly wide of Part 1—address some other issues which in fairness to the Minister I think were valid. But if that leniency is going to be extended to Ministers it should be extended to those on this side of the Chamber. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch) 
: I have given the speaker 2½ minutes of talking about things other than Part 1. I have asked him to come back to Part 1 and I know he is going to. 
Hon DAVID PARKER 
: Thank you Mr Chairman. That is a fair point and I will come back to the bill. This bill would allow the Commerce Commission to share information if there was an inquiry being conducted in one country or another into for example the efficiency of provision of education and there was said to be some anti-competitive practice at large. It could be whether charter schools were cooperating amongst themselves in a way that was anti-competitive and it would be interesting to know from the Minister whether if the Crown was engaged in some anti-competitive procedure that was affecting school conduct—for example if it was to try to tell all of the intermediate schools in the whole of the country that they should close down their technology— 
The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch) 
: Order! 
Hon DAVID PARKER 
: Mr Chairman this is within order. I am asking whether if the Crown was to give a direction to all of the intermediate schools it would be caught by the inquiry functions of the Commerce Commission that are being extended in this legislation. I am not sure from my reading of this legislation whether it applies only to private enterprise actions like charter schools or whether it would apply to Crown actions were a Minister or a Government silly enough to tell schools that they had to change student-teacher ratios in a way that effectively required—I want the Minister to take a call as to whether that sort of conduct on the part of the Crown would be caught by these investigative functions that could now cooperate and whether it could get lessons from Australia as to whether that country has ever been silly enough to give a direction to its intermediate schools in a way that would close down all of their technology classes. I am interested in the Minister taking a call and answering that question. 
I am also interested in another matter. At times we have regulated monopolies in New Zealand including in respect of electricity lines. There is an unclear point in New Zealand as to whether the input methodologies that are relied upon to set the prices for lines are right in New Zealand.  
Hon David Cunliffe 
: It’s a hot debate.  
Hon DAVID PARKER 
: It is a hot debate. It is going to appeal at the moment and Vector would say that the Commerce Commission in New Zealand is allowing it a lower cost of capital than is allowed in Australia.  
Hon David Cunliffe 
: What does the Minister think?  
Hon DAVID PARKER 
: I would be interested to know what the Minister thinks of that and I would also be interested to know what the Minister thinks as to what the consequences of that are for the regulated monopoly. I will tell you why I am interested: because I have been told that the consequences of that for Vector are worth between $400 million and $700 million. We could benefit from cooperation with the Australian authorities as to what they think is the right answer to that.  
Hon David Cunliffe 
: It’s like two Skycity Casino deals.  
Hon DAVID PARKER 
: Well that is the exact point I was going to make Mr Cunliffe. It is strange that you should mention that because if rather than pinging Vector on its return on capital the Government was to say to Vector “Why don’t we give you the same rate of return as they have in Australia and you build us a convention centre?” we might get a convention centre for cheaper than the Skycity group is willing to do it without the adverse effects of the pokie machines. So it would be interesting if the Minister could respond as to whether this sharing of information between regulators on both sides of the Tasman in this case could actually turn up some information to show whether that decision by the Government in respect of the Skycity Casino is not really as silly as it appears from the outside.  
Hon David Cunliffe 
: Dotcom.  
Hon DAVID PARKER 
: Dotcom. That is right. Well look the police seem willing to share his computers so maybe this is just another example of sharing of information. 
There is one other serious question I would like to raise and that is what controls there are going to be against the inappropriate sharing of information. I would not want to see information being shared—for example in relation to telecommunications companies—with some countries that do not have proper checks and balances in the protection of the civil liberties of their people in their countries. I think we have to be a bit careful—[ 
Interruption 
] What is that?  
Hon David Cunliffe 
: Not naming any of them.  
Hon DAVID PARKER 
: Not naming any other than Fiji perhaps which I would name as a close neighbour with whom we should not be sharing information on some of these matters. 
I have raised a number of questions. I am particularly interested in the point as to whether there could be a sharing of information on and whether this bill would apply to decisions of the Crown as effectively a monopoly purchaser of education services if it made some ridiculous decision that would effectively cut technology classes out of all schools—whether that sort of thing could be the subject of an inquiry by the Commerce Commission for the purposes of which it could gather information or share information with the Australian regulator. That seems to be the most practical instance that we have had recently of some monopoly or monopsonist practice that has terribly adverse effects and that there needs to be an inquiry about.