Catchpole Brent: Third Readings 
Catchpole Brent: Third Readings 
[Volume:609;Page:6924] 
BRENT CATCHPOLE (NZ First) 
: I rise on behalf of New Zealand First to support this legislation because we feel it tidies up a lot of loose ends within the area of consumer protection. I would like to touch on a few points. Telecommunications being excluded as a good is an issue that we looked at very strongly and for a long time during the debate at the select committee. It was considered that perhaps telecommunications should be included as a good but we considered the prospect of having undesirable issues coming down the line. I refer to things that Internet service providers are not responsible for coming from overseas and we really felt that it was impossible to continue leaving telecommunications in there as a good. It is included as a service but not as a good as we could not expect Internet service providers to be responsible for unexpected events coming into their networks and being passed on. They would certainly try to prevent those from happening but there are ways of getting them through without detection. So it was decided to remove that. 
Computer software is another issue that we looked at and I think that we made a mistake unfortunately by leaving it in the legislation as a good. It is not an actual physical item that one can sell on. One buys only the licence to computer software. Computer software does not really fall under the original Act of 1908 because it is only the licence that people buy and people do not have a right under that licence to then on-sell that good. The end user cannot on-sell the licence to another person. So we have made a mistake in the legislation by leaving computer software in as a good. 
Electricity is another item that we looked at in depth and I think that if we had incorporated the generators into the legislation it would have strengthened the whole electricity industry but the electricity industry is very complex and it is an industry that perhaps will have to be revisited when the inquiry into electricity is carried out. 
We have heard a lot about water quality and local councils being responsible if water quality drops below an acceptable standard. I suggest that all New Zealanders would like to drink fresh clear water of acceptable quality. But many councils have allowed their water quality to drop. In some cases that is due to poor maintenance and in other cases it is due to the particular water supply that the area receives and sometimes councils cannot—particularly one that Stephen Franks mentioned last night; he was referring to water in Rotorua I think it was. 
Stephen Franks 
: Paekakariki. 
BRENT CATCHPOLE 
: Sorry; Paekakariki Rotorua also I think and certainly Taupo have the same problem in that the water cuts out the washers in the taps mainly due to the pumice content. That is something that is very difficult to extract from water particularly at source. So water quality really has to be considered and councils need to be responsible for the maintenance of their pipe work; and if it is the pipe work that is the problem then I think the councils should be responsible. 
I was particularly disappointed in the number of Supplementary Order Papers that the National Party put on the Table. National was trying to have water and waste water removed from this legislation. The reason I am disappointed is that the people out in Kawakawa Bay in the Clevedon electorate are desperate to have a waste-water reticulation system put in. Their septic tanks continually overflow out on to the beach and people are unable to swim at that beach. There is a fish farm nearby and the quality of the water has dropped there and they are no longer able to operate that fish farm. 
The people of Kawakawa Bay were promised last year by the Mayor of Manukau City that they would have a waste-water system in place by the end of this year. That has subsequently been withdrawn and they are now not expecting to have that waste water for another 3 years. It has been postponed and that is unacceptable. The people of Kawakawa Bay desperately need their waste-water system. They are in the same position as Beachlands was about 5 or 6 years ago—they fought for years to try to have their waste-water system put in place. It was finally done by the Manukau City Council during the 1990s and they are now satisfied with it. But Kawakawa Bay people are fighting and desperate to have their waste-water system put in place. So if this bill supports the needs of the people of Kawakawa Bay in the Clevedon electorate then I will most definitely support it and New Zealand First supports it as well.