Bishop Chris: New Zealand Superannuation and Retirement Income Amendment Bill Taxation (New Zealand Superannuation and Retirement Income) Bill — Third ReadingsText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeBishop Chris: New Zealand Superannuation and Retirement Income Amendment Bill Taxation (New Zealand Superannuation and Retirement Income) Bill — Third Readings[Sitting date: 20 October 2015. Volume:709;Page:7370. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]CHRIS BISHOP (National): This legislation as is typical of Government bills at the moment is sensible and prudent legislation that I think has widespread support in the House. It stands in stark contrast may I just say in passing to the Keep Kiwibank Bill advanced by the member who spoke earlier Clayton Cosgrove which has been the subject of some discussion so far in the debate. The Keep Kiwibank Bill wants to entrench Kiwibank to the extent that we have a secret ballot in New Zealand requiring 75 percent of Parliament to vote to remove those provisions. That was a silly bill. In fact it actually breaches Standing Order 266 because to pass an entrenched provision through a bill you have to have 75 percent of Parliament to—Hon Clayton Cosgrove: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker.The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): The member may be going to test me but away you go.Hon Clayton Cosgrove: You have already—Hon Ruth Dyson: You passed Mr Assistant Speaker.Hon Clayton Cosgrove: Indeed. You have already ruled on relevance. I think that was the speech Mr Bishop made last week and—The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): And the point is that I am the only person who can rule on it and it cannot be brought up by way of a point of order. You anticipated a comment that I was going to make. I did call a member back to the bill when he was getting too far away from it. The member I think should refer to this bill and not to a bill that passed through the House last week.CHRIS BISHOP: Thank you. I was pointing out that—The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! No. The member does not make excuses; he just gets on with the debate.CHRIS BISHOP: OK. This is sensible legislation because it allows for funding investment vehicles and as the Minister of Finance rightly pointed out there is a prohibition in the superannuation legislation that means that the Guardians of New Zealand Superannuation Fund cannot control businesses outright. And actually that is a sensible provision because as has been pointed out the New Zealand Superannuation Fund has grown to the extent now that it could actually control vast swathes of the NZX. But the guardians have asked for greater flexibility in the way in which they invest in order to allow controlling interest in passive holding subsidiaries which will allow them to use global best practice in the way in which they invest and this will obviously maximise the return for taxpayers.There was some discussion previously in the debate and also in the first and second readings of the original bill and then at the Finance and Expenditure Committee. I was not a member of that select committee but there was some debate as to whether or not the Minister of Finance should be able to approve the investment classes of the funding investment vehicles. I think it is fair to say that things have gone back and forward on this point but the conclusion that the Government has come to is that it is absolutely paramount that we protect the independence of the Superannuation Fund—absolutely paramount. As the Hon Clayton Cosgrove rightly pointed out in his contribution to the debate politicians are not great at deciding what particular companies to invest in and they should remain well away from it.I want to briefly canvass some of the claims made by members opposite about the prudent decision that the Government took after the 2008 election to suspend contributions to the Superannuation Fund. Members opposite have made much of this in the debate today and in previous debates. I think there are probably three things to say about this. The first is that if the Government had decided to continue to make contributions to the New Zealand Superannuation Fund it would have essentially been borrowing money to invest and that negates the understanding of risk. It would show that the Government does not understand risk. It would be like putting money on a credit card to invest in global equities which are highly volatile. So as Michael Cullen pointed out when he set up the New Zealand Superannuation Fund that is not a smart thing to do.The second thing is that although it is true to say that the New Zealand Superannuation Fund has made good returns in the last 6 or 7 years it is equally true that in that time it could have made extremely large losses and I suspect that members opposite would be saying something very different today if the Government had continued to borrow money at a time at which we were already borrowing to maintain entitlements and invest in infrastructure and things like that. Members opposite would be saying something very different if the New Zealand Superannuation Fund had declined in value by 30 or 40 percent or any amount of money—they would be saying something very different. It is all very well to look back in hindsight and say—The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! I am just going to draw the member back to the bill.CHRIS BISHOP: I think I have made my remarks in rebuttal to the point about the Superannuation Fund. Look this is something that National supports. We support the independence of the New Zealand Superannuation Fund. We support the New Zealand Superannuation Fund. This is a prudent bill that will maximise returns for taxpayers and with that I commend this bill to the House.