Ross Jami-Lee; Shaw JamesLAND TRANSPORT MANAGEMENT (REGIONAL FUEL TAX) AMENDMENT BILLInstruction to CommitteeJAMI-LEE ROSS (National—Botany): I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. I sense you're about to put the House back into committee. I wish to move an instruction. Would this be an appropriate time to do so?DEPUTY SPEAKER: Yes I'm prepared to hear it.JAMI-LEE ROSS: I move That it be an instruction to the committee of the whole House on the Land Transport Management (Regional Fuel Tax) Amendment Bill that all members wishing to speak that have already spoken in Part 2 have the ability to have a full four calls reset to zero so each member is able to restart their speaking number.I move this instruction because I think it's important given the House has just—Hon Chris Hipkins: Point of order.DEPUTY SPEAKER: Well this is a point of order.Hon Chris Hipkins: No he's moved on to debating it I assume.DEPUTY SPEAKER: No I still understand he's taking a point of order. I will allow the member to speak to the point of order of course.JAMI-LEE ROSS: Well Madam Chair when one takes a point of order to let the member speaking—DEPUTY SPEAKER: Madam Deputy Speaker.JAMI-LEE ROSS: Madam Deputy Speaker—it's been a long night. That's why the Government's taking urgency. When a member moves an instruction a member does so by way of point of order and I'm continuing with that. I have the ability once I've moved an instruction to debate that. I now wish to do so.Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Leader of the House): I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. That is clearly out of order as it's an instruction to the presiding officers.JAMI-LEE ROSS (National—Botany): Point of order.DEPUTY SPEAKER: Are you speaking to the point of order or is this a different point of order? I had a point of order from the Hon Chris Hipkins. Are you speaking to that?JAMI-LEE ROSS (National—Botany): I'm speaking to that. The House has the ability to issue an instruction to the committee on how it should consider speeches and how it should consider the debate. My instruction says to the committee that it is instructed and the presiding officer within a committee is required to be bound by an instruction from the House as well. My instruction says that the committee should consider this bill as if members have a fresh opportunity to debate that and have their call number reset to zero. That is quite within the House's right to do so.DEPUTY SPEAKER: I've heard enough. I'm just going to get some advice. Under Standing Order 176 (1) An instruction may be given to a committee of the whole House extending or restricting its powers in regard to consideration of the bill or other matter referred to it" so the motion is in order. I will accept that motion. That is now debatable.JAMI-LEE ROSS (National—Botany): Thank you Madam Deputy Speaker. I debate this instruction and I move this instruction very seriously. I do so because we're in an extraordinary situation where the House has just resumed because the Minister in the chair moved that the progress be reported. Once progress was reported the House was then put into urgency. That is the right of the Government but when the House takes urgency and when the Government takes such an extraordinary step as to—midway through a debate; midway through the consideration of a committee stage—Hon Chris Hipkins: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. I was incorrect and you are correct. However Standing Order 176(6) states that where an instruction only relates to increasing the number of questions the committee is to debate there is no debate on that motion.JAMI-LEE ROSS: Speaking to that point of order Madam Deputy Speaker. You have already ruled. You ruled that I am able to debate this. You ruled that this is a debatable motion. Notwithstanding the fact that Mr Hipkins has belatedly found something in the Standing Orders you've made a ruling now. You have the right to make that ruling. I have the right to debate it because you've made that ruling.DEPUTY SPEAKER: In fact that is correct. I have made a ruling and it is debatable and the debate will continue.Hon JAMES SHAW (Green): I raise a point of order Madam Speaker.DEPUTY SPEAKER: Are you questioning my ruling or is this a fresh point of order?Hon JAMES SHAW: It's in relation to the ability to debate. The clock hadn't started so I wasn't sure how long the member was going to be able to debate for—whether it was five minutes or 10 minutes.DEPUTY SPEAKER: Yes it is 10 minutes.JAMI-LEE ROSS (National—Botany): Thank you. I think this is the third attempt now to take this and I think that just highlights for the members around that'll be making a decision on how they wish to vote on this instruction that we have such an extraordinary night. I say it's an extraordinary night and it's extraordinary move for me to move this instruction because we do have such an extraordinary situation.The extraordinary situation we have where we've just had the Government put the House into urgency means that we are now in a position where we are having to take urgency on a matter that is to do with taxation a matter that we weren't expecting we would be in urgency under and a situation where we quite legitimately as the Opposition were using our ability to put up amendments our ability to put up arguments our ability to delay the passage of a piece of legislation that we believe is dangerous. We should now have more of an opportunity to put forward arguments put forward amendments and put forward very valid reasons why this bill should not progress—because the House has taken urgency because midway through the process because midway through the consideration of this bill the Government's had a complete change of tack and the Government's had a complete change in situation where they're having to now take urgency on this. It wasn't expected. They are in a position where they're now embarrassed. They are in a position where they've had to do something that I haven't seen in the seven years I've been here. We should have had the opportunity to have our calls reset to zero.The reason I suggest this is because there's an important principle in play when the House considers something in urgency or when the committee considers something in urgency because the normal rules around tight speeches the normal rules around ensuring members are kept very tightly to the debating points the rules around ensuring that our amendments are considered and not too broad—those rules get moved out quite a lot when we go into urgency. There's very clear precedent that when the committee's considering a bill under urgency the parameters broaden considerably. The parameters broaden in such a way that the Opposition has more opportunity to put forward amendments the Opposition has more opportunity to test in the committee whether or not we should be putting forward new parts and the Opposition has the ability to try and go even further to delay the legislation because the House has taken an extraordinary move to take urgency.So if the Opposition has the ability to under an urgent situation broaden its parameters broaden its debate broaden the amendments that we may put forward it's only fair and reasonable that we have our call number reduced back to zero because the situation we were operating under for many many hours—and I accept we worked hard on that and I accept the Government didn't like it and I accept we sent them into a position where they had to take urgency. But the fact that we were able to do that and the fact that we now have a situation where the House is in urgency about to put the House into committee stage we should have a fresh go.We should have a fresh go because the rules of engagement have changed. We should have a fresh go because the way in which the committee now has to consider the bill and the way in which we all operate as members of Parliament—the playing field's changed. So if the playing field's changed if the Government's now in a position where they've been embarrassed into taking urgency because the opposition to a regional fuel tax is so strong that the Opposition has utilised its full might and muscle to delay the legislation and they're now having to take urgency we deserve a good proper go to do so under urgency in those circumstances.Madam Deputy Speaker I know that you were listening to the debate a lot both in your office and when you were presiding as the Chair in the committee. You will know Madam Deputy Speaker that we were working hard to ensure we kept our debate tight and we were working hard to ensure we had new amendments that were legitimate. You know that we were working exceptionally hard to debate this properly. We were doing what Oppositions do.Oppositions have the right in the Parliament to delay legislation. Oppositions have the right in the Parliament to stand up and express a view on behalf of New Zealanders about why a dangerous piece of legislation shouldn't proceed. Oppositions have long held the ability to delay a Government and to impede their legislative programme. That's what we've done. That's what we've managed to do. That's what we've managed to force the Government into—an embarrassing situation. But because they've taken an extraordinary step—and I say it's an extraordinary step because we didn't expect it. I say it's an extraordinary step because it was never signalled. I say it's an extraordinary step because the Government—the Leader of the House has never at any point in time that I've seen in the media said "Hey we're going to be taking urgency on this piece of legislation." We deserve a full go. We deserve the full set of calls.So I ask that the House give serious consideration to this instruction. I ask that the Government in fact allow us a full go. OK they've taken urgency now. They're going to lose their select committees tomorrow. I don't know if there's any—Chris Bishop: Kelvin Davis?JAMI-LEE ROSS: —oh Kelvin Davis is on tomorrow. I don't know if there are any committees that are going to be doing Estimates hearings but those opportunities have been lost and I know the Government wouldn't do that unless they felt strongly that this has to happen. So I say to the House: if this is such an issue where the Government feels so strongly that it wants to take urgency.Hon Member: Repetition.JAMI-LEE ROSS: I'm allowed to be repetitious. They have just put the House into urgency. It's an extraordinary step and it wasn't expected. So I say: if this is going to proceed then the House needs to give consideration to this instruction so that we get a fair whack at it so we get a fair opportunity to speak to the bill afresh so we can put new amendments up and so we can ensure that this gets a full debate."