O'Connor Simon: Taxation (Annual Rates Employee Allowances and Remedial Matters) Bill — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeO'Connor Simon: Taxation (Annual Rates Employee Allowances and Remedial Matters) Bill — Second Reading[Sitting date: 27 May 2014. Volume:699;Page:18328. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]SIMON O’CONNOR (National—Tāmaki): I am very pleased to rise to speak on the Taxation (Annual Rates Employee Allowances and Remedial Matters) Bill and not so much on the green economy which we have heard about from Gareth Hughes the last speaker—CaptainPicard I believe if I looked correctly in the newspaper this morning at theStar Trek convention.I wanted to raise a couple of points particularly from the Greens. I am sad that they are opposing this bill. Any tax bill is obviously designed to make the economy work more efficiently and to provide the Crown with an ability to pay for what it needs. The irony that we are seeing from the Greens is that they want to spend more and more money on we are hearing now a gold-plated insulation system but they are not actually interested in a bill like this which provides tax revenue. We also heard what I think is a massive contradiction around the opposition to subsidies. Those Green members see the desire to have oil rig exemptions for foreign seismic vessels and the like which was introduced by a Labour Government and happily rolled over by the National Government as a subsidy but then they continue on to talk about subsidies for biofuel subsidies for other clean green smart technologies—of course they are never really specific about what they are—and also subsidies that are effectively in the nature of the Green Investment Bank that they talk about.On the other side we heard from Labour members about the continuing disquiet around Facebook and Google. As my colleague Paul Goldsmith pointed out they are not quite talking about the ban on those sites that they had initially suggested. We heardfrom another speaker from Labour a little earlier that the key to economic growth in New Zealand is to create more taxes such as a capital gains tax. It does not make sense.This bill does make sense. It is an omnibus bill and it is addressing a number of issues in the economy—a number of issues that have been fed back to us by employees and by employers of course. It is addressing areas around employee allowances first and foremost—those elements from travel to meals—and seeking clarification there. This is a party about removing red tape and providing clarity. The bill is also looking as we have heard about at the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act in America. The thing I would add there of course is that if you are a citizen of a country or a member of a club you play by those rules be you a New Zealander a Canadian an Australian or an American. That is really quite critical so we are putting those mechanisms in place. We are also working around the whole thin capitalisation approach where at the moment people are able to load debt against their investments. We have looked at that and said that that is not appropriate. This is a wide-ranging bill as you would expect with an omnibus bill. I support it in its second reading and look forward to the Committee of the whole House.