Hayes John: State-Owned Enterprises and Crown Entities (Protecting New Zealand’s Strategic Assets) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Hayes John: State-Owned Enterprises and Crown Entities (Protecting New Zealand’s Strategic Assets) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
[Sitting date: 29 August 2012. Volume:683;Page:4898. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
JOHN HAYES (National—Wairarapa) 
: 
 The members who are promoting this bill the State-Owned Enterprises and Crown Entities (Protecting New Zealand’s Strategic Assets) Amendment Bill across the other side of this House are economic illiterates. There are three ways of growing a business and none of those ways involves locking up 75 percent of the ownership of a company in a way that would bring this country to its knees. The bill proposes— 
Chris Hipkins 
: Put some enthusiasm into it. 
JOHN HAYES 
: I do not need to shout. I am discussing ideas. The bill proposes that there should be a public referendum. Well there was a public referendum at the last election and I was in Mr Cosgrove’s seat the electorate that he was busy trying to become the member of Parliament for and I was listening to what the community was saying. It was not supportive of his ideas because he was campaigning against the National Party. He did not support asset sales. Why did he not phone his good mate Mike Moore in Washington who is New Zealand’s outstanding ambassador in Washington who was head of the World Trade Organization and who was a Minister in Labour Cabinets over a long period of time? I ask why he did not ring his mate Mike and say: “Hey Mike am I on the right track with this legislation? I’ve got a lot of time on my hands now that I’m a list MP. I’m looking for a member’s bill to write. Would this be a good one?”. If he had Mike Moore would have said: “No forget it. You’re absolutely on the wrong track.” 
Mr Cosgrove is also on the Finance and Expenditure Committee and he may remember—if his memory is going to last that long—that John Palmer chair of Air New Zealand spent about 30 minutes in our committee extolling the virtues of mixed public-private ownership and its benefit to Air New Zealand. I am not sure why Mr Cosgrove would not have heard what Mr Palmer was saying. He is a well-respected businessman in this community. He was saying: “Forget it. This is not a smart deal. You get much greater synergy much better decision-making when you bring in representatives of the private sector to run the board.” 
We stood at the last election and said we are going to be selling up to 49 percent of assets in State-owned companies. Why are we doing that? Because we do not wish to borrow more than 30 percent of gross national income as debt and we are going to invest the proceeds from the sale first of all into the community by giving it a broader capital base and share options for older folk who are retiring and want a cash flow into their retirement. We are going to use the money to benefit our young people through better education facilities. My electorate in the Wairarapa has no shortage of need in that area to bring our 100-year-old schools up to today’s technology. We are going to spend money on hospitals to again look after our older and young people in the community. 
We have passed legislation that guarantees the Government will own at least 51 percent of the energy companies and prevent any other shareholder from owning more than 10 percent. There is no need for this bill. Why would you completely clog up any ability in this community to move sensibly forward with an elected administration? Under an MMP system you have to involve a cross-party selection of other parties in this House. I think that if you go to the community and you get its backing then this particular draft of the bill is simply trying to fill up this House with absolute nonsense. It is a bill that will not pass. I do not support it because what it would lock us into is higher debt higher interest rates and lower gradings from Standard and Poor’s. I think what we need to do is to broaden the pool of investments for New Zealand savers and deepen our capital markets. I am sorry but I do not agree with this bill at all. Thank you.