Goldsmith PaulHon PAUL GOLDSMITH (National): Thank you Madam Speaker. There he is bold as brass—the Minister Michael Wood who has amazingly been stood down as the Minister for one portfolio but carries on as if nothing has changed and he continues on as Minister of employment delivering his speeches. It doesn't matter if you have a clear conflict of interest that hasn't been managed properly—no worries! Under Chris Hipkins it just carries on. Maybe he might get round eventually to selling his shares and then maybe he might be reinstated—who knows? Anything is possible in this Government. So here we have the health and safety bill that we're dealing with the Health and Safety at Work (Health and Safety Representatives and Committees) Amendment Bill. Wouldn't it be wonderful if just once this Minister and this Government came along to the House and wouldn't this just be amazing if they came along to the House one day with a bill that was to reduce the costs that small businesses were facing? If they just once—just once—came along and said Look we're just conscious of the fact that business is tough and that there are enormous costs being applied in order for these small businesses"—mum and dad - owned operations—"who are struggling to survive against rising costs and overwhelming pressures in terms of the interest rates the rates that they have to pay and everything that they have to deal with. Competition is tough and they're struggling to get by." Just once—once—could you imagine if this Labour Government would come along with a piece of legislation that said "We recognise that it's difficult out there and we want to take a little bit of the pressure off you and reduce the costs that you have to face in your business."—just once. Never—never—will you see that from this Government. All you ever see is legislation that comes along and says "Here's a problem that we're going to fix by putting some more costs on to your business." Now of course everybody in this House is desirous of improving the record of this country and the people in this country in terms of workplace accidents. Since the previous National Government introduced the health and safety at work legislation there have been hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars spent on WorkSafe on extra regulations and on everything that every New Zealander can see in terms of the huge effort made around health and safety. All the cones on our roads all the scaffolding on our buildings—everywhere you look there has been hundreds of millions of dollars poured in to try to improve our health and safety outcomes in our workplaces and the sad reality is that we've made only modest improvements. So I would have thought the one question that a Minister of health and safety would be asking himself is: have we got the measures right and what are we doing that's working and what isn't working? Instead of doing that when we look at the regulatory impact statement on this bill it basically just says—and this is part of the problem with this Government. You're meant to have a Treasury that's meant to be looking carefully at regulations and doing a cost-benefit analysis. What it says basically is that "this is in the Labour Party manifesto in 2020 and it's going to happen". There's actually no real evidence either way and this is it and the option is just this basically and that's what we're going to do. So that's about the depth and sophistication of the analysis that's been applied here.So all I'm conscious of is the fact that what we've got here from Michael Wood—six times he was asked and six times he didn't deal with one particular issue. On this matter he has brought a piece of legislation into the House which nowhere have they indicated that there is an immediate problem with small businesses around health and safety that will be solved by insisting that if one worker—if you have a business with three employees for example it only takes one worker to say "I want to be the health and safety rep." and that means two days off work every year going off to a training and all the costs associated with that. That's fine. But the point is it's no big deal. It's just another couple of thousand; what does it matter? It's just a bit of extra cost; it doesn't matter. But unfortunately when it comes on top of very rapid increase in the minimum wages an extra week of sick leave an extra public holiday and all the other things that the Government has added on that's fine—that's fine. Then they look around and then they wonder why everything is more expensive for New Zealanders and they wonder why small businesses are struggling. And they wonder why if we were to take the example of the mental health of small business owners being—all the surveys indicate massive issues. Massive issues there. When we look at health and safety at work does anybody consider that as an issue and the pressure that has been added on to those small business owners by this? Has that been factored into the considerations and thought? No; not at all.So the only thing the Government can do is come along each week with a new piece of legislation that adds an extra layer of cost on to those small businesses which many of them—some of them are doing fantastically well and good luck to them but most of them are struggling under a barrage of extra costs under a time of rapid inflation and poorly managed economy.So my plea to the Government is to actually take a wider look at this and just once consider that maybe there is something they could do to take some pressure off those businesses in terms of the regular costs that they face. And then ask the basic question: of all the hundreds of millions that have been invested into WorkSafe and into health and safety are we getting the best results for that investment? Have we got the settings right? That's a reasonable question to ask but I don't see any real introspection and consideration on that. All we've got is an ill thought through manifesto promise in 2020 that is being rammed through the House with little consultation with the small business sector and little real effort to understand the reality of the situation on the ground whereby if you're a small operation three or four employees and one person decides they want to be the health and safety rep and if there are five employees and they want to have a health and safety committee that's all well and good. But it's just one thing after another after another after another for those small businesses. And we on this side of the House are conscious of that. We're concerned about that. We do want to do the best we can for all New Zealand workers and one of the best things we can do is encourage those businesses to be strong and profitable and continue to provide opportunities. Thank you very much Madam Speaker."