SpeechDr JAMES McDOWALL (ACT): Thank you Madam Speaker and I apologise to my colleague for trying to steal his call. It is great to be back and have Parliament back and be sitting again with Ministers answering questions or sometimes vaguely addressing questions. I have to say however that I'm not a huge fan of the landscaping job that's been done out the front of Parliament. It is a sorry state of affairs out there. This weekend we saw some mind games being played out as well as a whole lot of very unhappy residents business owners and Wellingtonians just trying to go about living their lives. What was absent was any real leadership from the Government. Earlier this month the Government announced yet another multi-stage approach in its COVID-19 response: this time the gradual winding down of managed isolation and quarantine (MIQ) finishing in October—in theory. On the one hand I applaud the Government for providing a time line that people can plan around. But on the other hand MIQ is past its use-by date and needs to be put out of its misery for the misery it's creating sooner rather than later. In its announcement the Government said that they're maintaining MIQ to reduce the spread of COVID-19 in our community from recent arrivals". However there is little justification for its continued existence for most of this year. With the number of community cases undoubtedly more than what is actually been tested and showing up—starting to get on that exponential curve—we're only picking up a few dozen at the border. It is evidently far more likely that people coming into New Zealand over the next few months will catch COVID-19 here domestically rather than bring it in with them. There is no need to prolong the anguish of Kiwis and visa holders trapped overseas—not to mention their families here. Using MIQ to limit the spread of Omicron is arguably nonsensical at this point. The Government also stated that their plan will finally—I say "finally"—but it will "immediately" address worker shortages. My first thought was "An acknowledgment—I can't believe it—albeit small one of the damage caused by its immigration policies and a lack of visa processing in general." My next thought was that I'll believe when I see it because in all my years of interacting with the immigration system it has never even remotely been as poorly managed as it is now under this Government—not by a long shot. The Government has run out of ideas in addressing a total shambles of its own making. Recent examples are the scenes of migrants that you would have seen on TV or in person in Auckland especially sleeping or camping out on the street all night just to get the chance to remain here. This a highly predictable outcome of the way that medical certificates are dished out. Once upon a time any registered doctor in New Zealand could issue a medical certificate for immigration purposes. This made sense—they are medical professionals after all. For better or for worse this was changed some years ago—it probably made sense at the time—but as a result around New Zealand there are just 135 doctors who can do this for immigration purposes. In fact in my home city of Hamilton there are just four who have Immigration New Zealand seal of approval. They are now dealing with a significant number of people needing to get medical certificates before the end of July when applications close. Given Immigration New Zealand has only managed to approve 15 percent of the applications in their little December trial run of this resident visa I wonder if they're actually quite happy to see the bottleneck caused by the lack of approved doctors around the country. This is just one thing that could have been so easily avoided with proper policy-making. For our international student market we thought we would be getting them in semester A in good numbers but now it turns out that it's just going to be mostly semester B with a cap on those numbers. That's assuming countries like Australia haven't taken them all yet which they probably have. We had the Productivity Commission last year bamboozle the Government's entire justification behind its mythological immigration rese—and speaking of which by October 2022 it would be 30 months since the border closed. With changes to the skilled migrant category coming why haven't stakeholders far and wide been involved in a consultation process? The reality is that simple changes can be made to our immigration settings to achieve what the Government wants in the medium to long term without leaving behind a trail of human misery. If you're an entrepreneur and you want to innovate here in New Zealand you want to come here and do that you are evidently not welcome; there's no good visa option. And if you're already here on a work visa and try to set up a little side business for some extra income you will have your visa cancelled and deported. None of this makes sense. ACT will continue to be a productive and thoughtful Opposition in Parliament and we'll use our time well in proposing good ideas for the country. Thank you Madam Speaker."