Beaumont Carol: Consumer Guarantees Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Beaumont Carol: Consumer Guarantees Amendment Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:664;Page:11807] 
CAROL BEAUMONT (Labour) 
: 
 It is a great pleasure to rise and speak in support of the Consumer Guarantees Amendment Bill a member’s bill in the name of Dr Jackie Blue. I congratulate Dr Blue on bringing this bill to the House. It deals with an important issue. In tough economic times making sure that consumers are protected is more important than ever. Both parts of this bill address areas where there is a genuine concern in the community. I have certainly heard it being expressed and I am sure that other members of this House have too. So Labour supports this bill and will cooperate with its consideration in the select committee. 
This bill will ensure as Dr Blue has said that extended warranties will include more information about enforceable guarantees and will also ensure that there is a cooling-off period after purchasing an extended warranty during which time a consumer can cancel the warranty and be entitled to a full refund. That is important because far too many people are unnecessarily purchasing extended warranties often at quite considerable cost. As has been said the bill also extends the general consumer protections to purchases made through websites such as TradeMe. As Dr Blue has said a significant amount of buying and selling in this country occurs on TradeMe so that is very important. It is important that consumer legislation is kept up to date. I note that this matter is one that the Minister of Consumer Affairs talked about some considerable time ago. As Labour’s spokesperson on consumer affairs I heartily agreed with her at that time. But nothing has yet happened so I say again it is great to see Jackie Blue’s work here. 
We think this is a sensible bill that we should support. But an interesting point is that this bill is being introduced at a time—and there are quite specific amendments in this bill—when finally we have seen the consumer law reform discussion paper emerge just in the last day or so. The Minister of Consumer Affairs the Hon Heather Roy has been talking about this much-awaited reform discussion document for some time. It is part of her one law one door approach to consumer law. We will take the same constructive approach to that review that we are taking to this bill because consumer law is by its nature something that changes and can change quite rapidly. The requirements and needs of consumers can change quite quickly. We expect that the Government will support Dr Blue’s bill so the Government is prepared to advance some quite narrow amendments at a time when it is reviewing consumer law. But the Government also seems to be indicating that it is unwilling to support my bill which looks at putting in some regulations at what we might call the fringe end of the consumer market—the loan shark end of the consumer market—because it is reviewing the Credit Contracts and Consumer Finance Act and in fact probably because of the wider review of consumer law. Therefore the Government says it cannot possibly support the bill that I am sponsoring. That seems to be somewhat of a double standard. 
I would just put it on the record that we can look at Labour’s voting record during the term of this Parliament in relation to certain members’ bills and see that Labour members have not been petty and political about the bills that we have supported. We have supported bills on their merits. This is one such bill and Amy Adams’ bill and Simon Bridges’ bill in relation to animal welfare are two more bills that come to mind. 
As I said Labour will support the intention of this bill to amend the Consumer Guarantees Act 1993 in relation to both extended warranties and the supply of goods and services by suppliers through a competitive bidding process that uses online trading. Both provisions are about assisting consumers to make informed decisions about purchasing in terms of extended warranties and competitive bidding. In relation to extended warranties the cooling-off period during which a consumer can change his or her mind cancel a purchase and still receive a full refund is important. 
Labour is supporting this bill because it is sensible. That is a good reason to support a bill. It is sensible and it meets an express need. This bill does however underline for me just how long it has taken the Minister of Consumer Affairs to get around to doing anything. Even members of the National Government are becoming sick of waiting for something to happen in the consumer affairs area and have to put bills up to amend the legislation. It is interesting indeed to see that happening. However I acknowledge that the consumer law reform discussion paper has finally emerged this week. It is quite an extensive document I have to say and it does what the Minister said she would do which is go through most of the existing consumer law such as the Fair Trading Act the Consumer Guarantees Act the Weights and Measures Act the Auctioneers Act and the Door to Door Sales Act. That Act definitely needs to be reviewed I might add; it is one that I have been working on as well. Also included in the discussion paper are the Layby Sales Act and the Unsolicited Goods and Services Act. 
It will be very interesting to see how the process regarding the discussion paper works and what people have to say. I do hope that a real effort is made to get extensive consultation on this document and lots of submissions because certainly in terms of the review of the Credit Contracts and Consumer Finance Act despite that being an absolutely critically important area and one that is of massive concern in terms of fringe lending only 55 submissions were received. I understand that that particular review was not actively promoted to the public; there was quite a limited process of getting contributions to it. I think that was a shame. I do hope that in relation to the Minister’s consumer law reform we—absolutely all of us in this House—generate a lot of contributions to the review process. 
I comment that not only has it taken 19 months for that review document to come out—or the discussion paper I should say—but the review of the Credit Contracts and Consumer Finance Act took 9 months to come out. Despite the fact that the 55 submissions were received by the end of November still no policy recommendations have emerged from the other end of that process either. So there is a need to make sure that we make progress in terms of consumer legislation. I wonder whether this Minster’s heart is in it. Dr Jackie Blue on the other hand has not sat by and waited for things to happen. She has got out there with this member’s bill and brought it to the House and we support her in that. 
Much change is needed by consumers and perhaps it is worthwhile to reflect on the sorts of things that are needed. As I said in tough economic times the consequences of making poor consumer decisions can be very significant for families. There can be situations where people do not know their rights; in fact those situations are very common. I am sure that across this House we would share a concern about things like poor levels of financial literacy and a lack of understanding of consumer rights. The consequences of that can be very very significant for families. Improving consumer knowledge and protection is important; that is a good purpose of this bill. 
I think that probably we need to do some work in the consumer area around vulnerable consumers in particular. There are people who because of language barriers low literacy poverty or age—because they are older or younger—are perhaps not as able as other people to look after themselves. We have seen some very sad cases. Just in the last week I read about the case of an elderly lady who was absolutely pressured into buying a completely unnecessary vacuum cleaner. She was completely traumatised by the whole experience and she felt that she had been physically intimidated by the salesperson. So consumers particularly vulnerable consumers need much information. I do think we need to look at situations where exploitation is happening as is the case with regard to loan sharks. 
Of course updating our consumer law is also important because relationships in the consumer area change. Who would have thought that there would be the amount of trading online that now happens? Who would have thought that even 3 years ago? Certainly 10 years ago it would have been a complete surprise to people. From this side of the House I think one can imagine that we want to see greater regulation in some areas and certainly the area of loan sharks is an example of that. 
Finally in terms of what consumers need I say there is also an increasing desire by consumers to ensure that the products that they buy are well understood and are ethically made—all of those things. That is my final point in terms of consumer law.