Clark David: New Zealand Business Number Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeClark David: New Zealand Business Number Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 30 March 2016. Volume:712;Page:10029. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Dr DAVID CLARK (Labour—Dunedin North): We on this side of the Chamber in the Labour Party intend to support the New Zealand Business Number Bill but we have had reservations about the bill right throughout the process because as was stated from the outset by the chartered accountants there is a very real risk that the New Zealand Business Number becomes just another number and that this bill implements exactly the opposite of what is intended.The intention of course is good. We believe in making interaction with Government as simple as possible for businesses so that businesses can get on with doing what they do best: producing goods and services and hopefully exporting some of them for the wealth and prosperity of our country. So we support the intention of this bill. We want to be able to (a) enable businesses in New Zealand to interact more easily with Government which is the stated purpose in the bill and (b) reduce the cost of business transactions in New Zealand.We want to support those intentions those purposes in the bill. However our concern from the start has been that the Government has no clear plan as to how this is to happen because it is asking only a few agencies to take this course of action. It is asking only a few Government agencies to step up and use the New Zealand Business Number as their primary number for contact with Government.We on this side of the Chamber want to move an amendment. In fact Ria Bond my colleague in New Zealand First is going to move an amendment to the bill that would force the Government to use this business number thereby achieving the purposes of the bill. Ironically it takes the Opposition to suggest a course of action that actually achieves the purposes of the bill. But there we are—that is the Parliament we are with currently.I intend to move an amendment to Ria Bond’s amendment—believe it or not; an amendment to an amendment—that will ensure that it is done in a time frame that is reasonable so that over 2 years the Government has time to implement the purposes of this bill so that businesses can then have one number to deal with when they are dealing with Government. Those 2 years will give the Government sufficient time to pass any Budget measures required to enable departments to meet that challenge.The Government tells us there will not be a great deal of cost so I do not imagine that it will be a big deal but we have learnt not to trust entirely what the Government says when it comes to IT programmes—we have seen what has happened at the Inland Revenue Department with child support legislation revisiting this House several times and we have seen what has happened with privacy matters at several departments under this Government’s watch. So we will give them time to sort out their own affairs so that they come back to this House—sort out any budgetary matters and switches that need to happen so that they can implement this bill and achieve the very purposes that are specified in the bill. That is a single point of contact for all businesses with the New Zealand Government in terms of having just one number—one number—that they need to use to interact with Government.I expect this particular amendment that is being proposed and with my modification would also be supported by Federated Farmers which in their initial submission made it very clear that they would like to see this expanded. They think that the initial list of Government departments not including places like WorkSafe New Zealand or Immigration New Zealand will hamper their efforts in dealing with the Government and therefore creating another number just creates more work for Federated Farmers members. I share Federated Farmers’ concern and I trust that they will be supportive of this amendment because it achieves the purpose that they have asked to have achieved in this bill.Likewise Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand had a concern that this number that is being created “just becomes another number” to quote them—just becomes another number—“rather than a replacement for the many current identifiers as is intended.” So I expect that were it here Chartered Accountants would support the amendment that is proposed because it ensures that the bill’s purpose is achieved.The Government in select committee looked very flat-footed when it was questioned as to why it would not happen quicker—as to where the plan was for this to be implemented. It had no clear answers as to how it would be ensured that this was not just another number for an indefinite period. There was no forthcoming explanation as to when and where the number would be universally adopted in Government.This amendment that I am moving affects clause 28. Ria Bond’s Supplementary Order Paper says that “Government agencies must use NZBN”—that is the heading—“A Government agency must use the NZBN of an entity (including using it in addition to or substitution for any other identifier the Government agency may use for that agency) if that use is in accordance with the purposes of this Act.” My amendment to her amendment simply slots in after the words “a Government agency must” the words “within 2 years of the Act coming into force”. It gives the Government time to order its affairs to make sure this change happens without the kind of embarrassment it had to face in respect of child support legislation where it had to come back to Parliament to change the very Acts it put through Parliament because it was not able to deliver on them. So this gives the Government time to get its affairs in order; it gives the Government time to achieve the very purpose that it has set out in this bill and to make sure that businesses are not hampered by yet another number when dealing with Government.This slow implementation that will otherwise happen will incur additional cost for businesses because we already know—and it is their very argument behind this bill—that too many numbers has an additional cost and an additional compliance component as businesses wrestle with the different parts of Government and the different numbers that are required and so on. It also avoids the double jeopardy and the potential conundrum that arises if agencies wait for all businesses to adopt the number: if everyone adopts a wait-and-see approach—“Government doesn’t seem to be adopting it fast; we won’t adopt it fast”—and that kind of slow progress where the number falls by the wayside because Government agencies are not implementing it and people are not using it.This is a very sensible amendment. I commend Ria Bond for putting it forward and I will take some credit for ensuring that it does have the right time frame around it. Far be it for me to be a wallflower in this debate—but it is an important amendment and it does make sure that the bill achieves its own purpose. How ironic it is that the Government could be putting forward a bill that actually achieves the opposite of its own stated purpose; how ironic that we could be spending taxpayer money in the hundreds and thousands to put this bill through the House with all of the parliamentary staff and all the MPs and the costs attached to that just so that the Government could achieve the opposite of what is laid down.I look forward to the Government supporting Ria Bond’s amendment with my amendment to it because it is a sensible way forward. It ensures that the bill really does achieve what it sets out to achieve in making one point of contact—one number—for businesses to use when they interact with Government. It will reduce compliance costs. I expect it will keep Federated Farmers and Chartered Accountants happy in their requests and rightly so. It is a very sensible thing to do: to reduce compliance costs to support businesses to have more time to get on with the good things that they do to make our economy more prosperous.So as I said from the outset we will support the bill and we trust that the Government will see sense and actually seek to implement the very bill and its purposes as stated in its own propaganda.