Ngaro AlfredHon ALFRED NGARO (National): Thank you Mr Chair. There's been a number of quotes from King Lear and here's one of my favourite ones When we are born we cry that we are come to this great stage of fools" and that's where we've come to. It is a great stage of fools where it is foolishness of all the things that have been talked about around the regional fuel tax (RFT).But we're here in this debate to talk about the things that are important and Mr Chair as you rightly said you are the sole adjudicator about issues of the debate. I want to introduce a new issue of debate. It's in this part in Part 1 and in particular in regards to Part 1 new section 65L which talks about the early termination of RFT schemes. In particular this portion of the bill talks about the fact that when the RFT scheme has been applied for and when an implementation is being initiated are there moments in which there should be by Order in Council an early termination. It talks about the fact that in section 65L(1) the proposal of a regional fuel tax under the Minister of Finance and the responsible Minister—those are the two Ministers that are to be responsible. So what I'm proposing in my amendment to clause 5 is to include "After new section 65L(2) insert new 65L(3) The Minister of Finance and the responsible Minister must recommend such an order if average fuel prices in the country reach $3 a litre."—$3 a litre. It's a pragmatic and it's a practical sense of this.There was a time when no one even thought that it would get to a point where fuel prices would even reach $2.20 or $2.30 and yet now we've reached that. It's at the point where people have said that the highest fuel prices that we have seen now for 91 octane fuel is actually at the price of $2.20 or $2.30. In fact in my local gas station which I'm pretty sure the Minister of Transport goes past—mind you he's often probably in a ministerial vehicle. But I wonder whether he knows what the cost of the price at the Z Energy station on Te Atatū Road is? He may not know because he probably doesn't look at that. It's actually $2.14 is what it is at present. It's one of the cheapest ones in Auckland but it's still at a point where people are still struggling in our communities.So when we say in this clause why is it that $3 would make a difference to the impact on our community—why is it that it should be included in new section 65L as an early termination clause for the power of an Order in Council? Well let's take some of the comments that come from people like Ken Shirley who's the Road Transport Forum CEO. Here's what he said: "I hate to be a merchant of doom but it is not inconceivable that we could reach $3 a litre". If we do here is the impact on our communities: it's our regional and our rural communities it's our public transport but more importantly it will be the impact on our low-income families.I put this in because this is critically important for us to consider why $3 should be a threshold in which an Order in Council should then enact itself for an early termination because it's the only area in which there are geopolitical conditions which we are not in charge of. There was a time when barrels of oil were down as low as $50 a barrel. It got up as high as $193 a barrel. We don't know where that will go. There are instabilities offshore in areas like Iran and so forth so we are not in control of that. But what we are in control of and what this Government can be in control of is an early termination to an RFT—a regional fuel tax scheme. What it can do within its power is to be able to terminate that scheme if the impact on that is to the communities in which it serves. Three dollars is at a point in fact we have to say that does have an impact on our communities.Let's take this from the AA petrol prices' spokesperson Mark Stockdale and here's what he says: "The regional fuel tax to councils looking to raise revenue while avoiding rates is something that will appeal to them." But again the impact that he and others are commenting on is that when it gets to a point when it is at $3 a litre then the only way that it can be enacted in which there can be some relief to those communities is where there is an inclusion inside the bill hence the reason why my amendment is a pragmatic and a practical application which I seek to introduce. I hope that the Minister will take time to reflect on this and think about this—hence the reason why the committee of the whole House is to look at areas like this.So I submit this amendment. I think it's a pragmatic and practical way of saying that when it gets to a threshold where it is unbearable for the communities whom we are wanting to serve the Government has the means and a tool in order to relieve that suffering that difficulty and that struggle in our communities."