Swarbrick ChlöeCHLÖE SWARBRICK (Co-Leader—Green): E te Māngai tēnā koe. Tēnā koutou e te Whare. I hope I'm not betraying the confidence of my mates across these seats but Rawiri Waititi the co-leader of Te Pāti Māori just dared me to make this exciting—so Mr Speaker if you will indulge me. Unfortunately for Mr Waititi the fact of the matter is that the Taxation (Annual Rates for 2023-24 Multinational Tax and Remedial Matters) Bill as recommended back from the Finance and Expenditure Committee as the Hon Dr Deborah Russell just outlined very articulately and very clearly was unanimously supported. I think the fireworks are probably going to fly at the committee of the whole House stage.So let me just unpack some of that kind of technical basis that I'm talking about here for those who are following along at home. What the bill does the Minister of Revenue just outlined pretty clearly and it was with that unanimous support to raise the trustee tax rate to 39 percent to align with the top income tax rate. That of course is to stop people from moving their money around in such a way that they avoid paying that top tax rate of 39 percent some evidence of which we saw borne out in some of the reporting from IRD to the Finance and Expenditure Committee. There also is the establishment in law requiring multinationals headquartered in Aotearoa to pay a top-up tax to the IRD if their effective tax rate is lower than 15 percent. And this is of course part of an international coordinated push by the OECD to implement a set of rules to stop a race to the bottom when it comes to corporate taxation. Also those changes with regard to ACC and Ministry of Social Development payments and lump sums requiring the Government to match the 3 percent contributions to KiwiSaver made by those on paid parental leave and relief from recognising insurance income for businesses impacted by flooding and cyclones recently—those are the relatively uncontroversial pieces of this legislation.However for those following along at home they may have seen that this Government has recently stated that they will be putting forward a number of new policies as tabled by the Minister and foreshadowed by the Hon Dr Deborah Russell which we will be debating at the committee of the whole House stage. So I just want to make it really clear to those who are following along at home that the Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand currently supports the bill at the second reading because it is the version of the bill that does those things which I have just outlined. It is not the version of the bill which will come into effect after the Government uses its three-headed taniwha majority to push through the changes for repealing back to the two-year brightline test and those interest deductibility changes as well as removing depreciation deductions. So relatively uncontroversially again the Greens support this.So if I can just offer some broader reflections particularly on that select committee process. I also wanted to join with the Hon Dr Deborah Russell in offering our appreciation to Therese Turner who as the Hon Dr Deborah Russell outlined offered many many years of service expertise and independent advice to subsequent Finance and Expenditure Committees in this Parliament and those beforehand.Ryan Hamilton: When's the exiting part?CHLÖE SWARBRICK: So to the exciting parts as the members of the Government are asking me for. Well the exciting part is—or rather the rather depressing part is—that we know based on IRD's other reporting from for example last year with subsidiary papers from Treasury that we have a tax system in this country that sees the top 311 families pay an effective tax rate less than half of that of the average New Zealander. And unfortunately this bill does nothing to fix that unfairness—that fundamental unfairness—in the way that our tax system operates. And in fact even worse than that prior to Christmas under urgency this Government introduced legislation which repealed requirements for the IRD to report against a set of tax principles basically to showcase to New Zealanders whether the tax system is working efficiently and fairly in such a way that all of us could expect—i.e. to inform the public debate on tax with evidence. Spooky stuff—spooky stuff—as far as the tax debate here in Aotearoa New Zealand is concerned!If I can allude to other hearings that we've had at the Finance and Expenditure Committee particularly related to the subject of tax we recently had Treasury officials in who I questioned about the productivity implications of our tax system and they made it abundantly clear that were we to introduce the capital gains tax we would not only generate the revenue necessary to invest in the infrastructure that all New Zealanders deserve but also that we would have a fundamentally more productive economy.So finishing on that point the Green Party supports the bill in its current version but the far more deeply unequal and dare we say rather undemocratic process to introduce substantive and material changes at the committee of the whole House stage whereby we are not going to be able to have that select committee process such as the Government intends to do by virtue of what they themselves have tabled in the House today is something that we will be opposing further down the track. So just to make that abundantly clear to all who may be following along at home—I apologise for not being able to make all this too exciting but I guarantee you the fireworks will be coming because we will not be letting this Government get away with increasing inequality which they know full well and their advice bears out will occur as a result of them progressing this policy agenda.