Clark David: Taxation (Annual Rates for 2015-16 Research and Development and Remedial Matters) Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeClark David: Taxation (Annual Rates for 2015-16 Research and Development and Remedial Matters) Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 01 December 2015. Volume:710;Page:8439. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Dr DAVID CLARK (Labour—Dunedin North): I am very sorry to see Mr Robertson cut short given he is limited to only four speeches in this part of the bill. He was cut down in his prime but I am sure there will be another opportunity maybe in the title and commencement debate to finish the argument that he was developing. I did not have the privilege of sitting through the select committee process on this particular bill although the questions I will bring up relate to previous editions of a very similar bill because a very similar bill gets put through this Parliament every year tidying up a number of these same issues and that is a good thing.I want to say something very positive from the Opposition benches about this bill. This is a necessary and important thing and I hope that those listening at home or watching on the TV can also see that there is a very constructive thing going on here where Opposition members are drawing attention to concerns about the bill which is designed to patch up where there are loopholes. This Part 3 of the bill is tidying up the Income Tax Act to make sure it achieves the purpose that it is set down to achieve. So when my colleagues pick some holes in it they are actually doing the Government a favour because there is an opportunity for Supplementary Order Papers to amend the bill to tidy up any little things that come to light through this part of the debate. So my questions are in a similar vein. The Minister in the chair Nathan Guy I am sure can get himself briefed if the answers are not immediately to mind.Firstly I want to just talk about clause 69B which talks about the exceptions for overseas accommodation. I am wondering what level of discussion was had that settled on the paragraph (a) and (b) definitions in new section CE 1C(1B) of what should be included in this aspect of the Act around the cost of accommodation. Paragraph (a) says for the purposes of subsection (1): “the actual cost to the employee for the accommodation; or (b) a reasonable estimate of the expenditure that is likely to be incurred by the employee or group of employees for whom the amount is payable.” When this debate has been had in the past there has been a debate around what constitutes accommodation for the purposes of work and what constitutes accommodation that goes above and beyond that—so the nature of the accommodation.If someone is going to do a simple job fixing a factory line and they are put up in a five-star hotel with swimming pools for a period of a week when the job takes 1 day even though it is “at or near an overseas work location”—those are the words that are found in the Act—is that a legitimate form of accommodation to take and to be included for the purposes of tax exemption? It seems in the spirit of the law that that would not be the case but how you draw those lines is a very difficult thing to do and I wonder—the Minister may know the answer to that—about what debate was had this time in the select committee and why these words were chosen which seem very broad to me. This seems a very broad definition. It is simply “at or near an overseas work location” full stop. The cost to the employee for the accommodation—there is no specified time limit around it or the reasonable estimate and there is no specification of what type of accommodation. So that is my first question that I would appreciate a response from the Minister on.The second question relates to clause 75D which some colleagues have already referred to the community housing trusts and companies aspect of the bill and the shift from the words—in clause 75D(1) it says to replace “a trust and its trustees or a company (as applicable the ‘entity’) whose activities are predominantly” with “a trustee or company (the ‘entity’) whose activities involve”. This is the shift from a trust being defined as something that predominantly does something to something “whose activities involve”. I am trying to understand what the purpose of that shift was because again if this shift means that say for a charitable purpose trusts want to house medical people in a community where they cannot attract medical people because the accommodation is too expensive—this is a debate that has been had before—is that achieved and is there an unintended consequence where trusts are also doing other activities that are not really in the spirit of a trust for that purpose? Why has this been changed? There will have been a live debate—[Bell rung]. Mr Chair?The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): Dr David Clark fourth call.Dr DAVID CLARK: Thank you Mr Chair. There will have been a live debate I suspect about that if I am not mistaken. What are the checks and balances and how has the select committee assured itself that that purpose will be achieved?The next area that I am interested in—and perhaps I should declare a personal conflict—is the accommodation provided to ministers of religion. This old chestnut—it comes up every time in these remedial matters bills in recent years. Let us remind ourselves that the purpose of this is to ensure—excuse my voice is going; I have a cold—Grant Robertson: He’s really emotional.Dr DAVID CLARK: It is not an emotional response. It is to ensure—as I understand it and the Minister can correct me if I am wrong—that those small communities often in hard-up places that have very few professionals left in the community want to retain their minister of religion. This is because often in some small communities in remote places the minister of religion will be the only person with a tertiary education who has training in counselling and conflict resolution and who can witness documents and so forth. For isolated communities it is very beneficial to have that kind of person available aside from the usual stuff that ministers of religion do in those communities: the “hatch match and dispatch” as it is called in the trade. Aside from the hatch match and dispatch having people in town who can perform those other more secular functions of witnessing documents negotiating their way through disputes and so on is what is being protected here.But the definition is the bit that I want to ask about because it seems very broad. I know that my colleague the Hon Clayton Cosgrove may delve further into this but on the surface—he was talking about it earlier I certainly hope he will; I will be disappointed otherwise—it leaves it largely up to the religion itself to define who is in and who is out: somebody whose duties are related mainly to the practice study teaching or advancement of religious beliefs. What constitutes “religious beliefs” is I guess the fundamental question and how broad is this category? We know in human rights legislation that we have a real issue again and again and again when we have some kinds of discrimination where there are exemptions for people who fall under a religious category. So the Catholic Church for example quite openly says that it will not ordain women to the priesthood at this stage and that does not sit neatly with our wider human rights legislation and it creates problems.At some level in our society a conflict occurs that is challenging to resolve. Actually in this House we are often not willing to go near it. Here in this particular clause of the bill we have the advancement of religion generally defined. I am wondering whether there is going to be guidance provided as to what constitutes a religion that is inside and what is outside the scope when we are talking about this accommodation exception in clause 81 on pages 48 and 49 of the bill. I would be very interested in what the Minister in the chair the Hon Nathan Guy has to say about the definition of that exception. I can see he is studiously studying his papers and I look forward to his contribution shortly. Thank you very much for the opportunity.