Dunne Peter: Income Tax Bill — Instruction to Committee In Committee Third Reading 
Dunne Peter: Income Tax Bill — Instruction to Committee In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:616;Page:12092] 
Hon PETER DUNNE (Leader—United Future) 
: 
 I was not going to take a call in this debate but I listened very carefully to the member who spoke immediately prior to the Minister. One of the things she said that aroused my attention was that she was concerned this bill was being rushed. I should tell the Committee that this bill’s genesis goes back to the time when Robin Oliver who is sitting to the right of the Minister in the chair Michael Cullen was a callow youth. Many of us have aged considerably during the genesis of this legislation. I was the Minister 8 years ago and it was on my work programme at that stage so it is hardly rushed legislation that we see in the Chamber this evening. In fact if one thinks back over the tax reforms that have been made over the last 20 years one realises this rewrite—which is effectively a rewrite of legislation first passed in 1913—is long overdue. [ 
Interruption 
] It goes back to the genesis of income tax in this country in 1913 and the legislation has been repeatedly amended. This is the first substantive plain-English rewrite in the history of that legislation. By my calculation it is some 80-odd years since income tax began so claims that this is rushed legislation are ever-so-slightly exaggerated. 
I want to speak briefly about the issue of film tax. The Minister made some comments about that and I recall the situation in 1999 particularly well because I was the chair of the Finance and Expenditure Committee at the time. I recall the claims made to that committee by a variety of people in the film industry that if we dared to tamper with the existing regime which provided for the most generous write-offs previously known to humanity then the film industry in New Zealand as we knew it would die. The select committee was to put it mildly somewhat sceptical about those claims. We called together the representatives of the film industry of the Inland Revenue Department and of Treasury. Mr Oliver and others—Dr Cullen certainly—will recall that we had a round-the-table morning when we actually sorted out with the Minister’s concurrence the regime that we have now. All the dire threats that that would be the end of investment in films in New Zealand look a little hollow today when we celebrate the success of Peter Jackson and  
The Lord of the Rings 
 because that was at the time that  
The Lord of the Rings 
 project was getting off the ground. The issue being raised was not just related to  
The Lord of the Rings 
 and the grandfathering provision but to the message that it would send thereafter. Since that time we have had  
The Last Samurai 
 and we are talking about  
King Kong 
. I see there is talk now of  
The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe 
 which has been announced in the last couple of days as being another film likely to come to New Zealand.  
The point I am making is that the film regime we now have may not be perfect but it is a vast improvement on what we had previously and there is certainly no great evidence—contrary to the member’s claims—that it acts as a disincentive to investing in New Zealand. In fact the evidence is quite to the contrary of that. All the evidence we see and hear—at the Oscars in Los Angeles and from other producers—is that New Zealand is a very attractive destination in which to make movies. That has nothing much to do with the tax system and a lot to do with the scenery the cost of labour and the expertise of our film makers. So I think that that argument is a little spurious as well.  
Pansy Wong made some other points that I do not intend to go into. But I do find myself having to rise to defend the honour of a variety of past Ministers including my immediate predecessor the Rt Hon Wyatt Creech who—I am sure—would be horrified at the accusation that he was party to rushed legislation in the Chamber tonight given that he ceased to be the Minister in charge of the bill about 9 years ago. This is a long overdue rewrite. Our taxation laws were a mess because of the complexity of the changes that have been made over recent years. The fact that the law and the drafting of it have not kept up with changes in style and form and the fact that we could have arguments about form and substance in another context all demonstrate that the rewrite is long overdue.  
This bill has been through the Finance and Expenditure Committee; it has been considered ad nauseam. A Committee of the whole House process of this type is not unreasonable. The myriad number of taxation practitioners and those who follow these matters with interest will be desperately keen to see this project which has had a “mists of time” feel about it finally enacted. We are embarking on that process this evening and I am delighted at last to see work that I thought would never be completed coming to fruition.