Dalziel Lianne: Offices of Parliament — Address to Governor-GeneralText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeDalziel Lianne: Offices of Parliament — Address to Governor-General[Sitting date: 14 May 2013. Volume:690;Page:9850. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon LIANNE DALZIEL (Labour—Christchurch East):This motion Government motion No. 1 as we have heard is the process by which Parliament alters the appropriations for our Offices of Parliament. In speaking to the motion I wish to address the increase in Vote Ombudsmen. Clearly an increase is required—there is absolutely no question about that—but I want to speak about the reason why such a major increase is required.As we heard from our member Darien Fenton who was on the Officers of Parliament Committee which heard evidence on this particular matter the request was for funding for an additional eight ombudsmen. The committee came down with a recommendation of six I think with Treasury being at the other end of the bargaining table as it were with an offer of only four. I think four would have been an insult to the requirements of the office and I guess six is seen as a compromise.Just to reflect on what Darien Fenton said I think that she amongst others has felt that we really ought to be thinking very carefully about the pressure we are putting on the Office of the Ombudsmen. When we look at what the Chief Ombudsman actually said in her last report we see that she described the financial restraints under which the office is operating and the pressures on its staff as acute. What that means is that the office will increasingly be unable to achieve its performance targets for resolving complaints. I think that that is an incredibly serious indictment.We have the Office of the Ombudsmen for a very good reason. I think Maryan Street gave a very good summary of why New Zealand is held in good standing internationally—these independent Officers of Parliament who are able to scrutinise on behalf of the people of New Zealand ensure that the executive is held to account for the roles that it plays.Vote Ombudsmen is funded on the basis of about 1000 to 1200 complaints being open and under action at any one time. However it had over 1700 open and active cases at the end of June last year and nearly 2400 at the end of December. So within a 6-month period the over-representation of open complaints under action in the Office of the Ombudsmen doubled—it doubled in 6 months.So a lack of staff meant that of those complaints 465 requests for assistance remained unallocated at 31 December 2012 and it is not surprising given the extent of the increase. But when one looks at or drills into those figures what the Chief Ombudsman is saying is that the office is anticipating more than 14000 requests for assistance this year—an increase of 36 percent since June 2002 and of about 65 percent over the 2 years since June 2011.I think 2011 will have resonance with people in this House—certainly with those of us from Canterbury because we know what happened in 2011 and we know why this massive increase in the number of complaints going to the Office of the Ombudsmen has occurred. I want to just put on record that this is a direct result of the failure of the Government to provide support to the people of Christchurch as they are forced to deal with the Earthquake Commission and the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority under the provisions of the Official Information Act.Instead of having a policy of complete transparency and instead of just saying: “Yes we’ll post that out to you. We will provide you with the information you want in a timely fashion.”—because of course the Earthquake Commission is not emailing stuff at the moment for some reason—people are instructed to apply for information under the Official Information Act. This is what is clogging up the system. Instead of looking at the end of the problem which is the amount of funding that has to go into the Office of the Ombudsmen why for heaven’s sake will somebody not say to the Minister responsible for the Earthquake Commission and for Canterbury earthquake recovery: “Sort out the problem at the front end. Deal with the people of Christchurch in a reasonable and fair fashion.”?Nobody is asking for special treatment. Nobody is asking for favours in Christchurch. All we are asking for is that people have access to the information that they need so that they can make decisions about their own lives.Hon John Banks: Calm down calm down.Hon LIANNE DALZIEL: The Minister can say that I should calm down and I would like to calm down in respect of this particular matter but the trouble is we have been arguing right from the very outset that people were going to require additional support. We have been arguing that they would need support to deal with the Earthquake Commission and more particularly that they would need support to deal with their insurers. But to get to their insurers they have to get through the Earthquake Commission first and when the commission says as its default position: “Apply under the Official Information Act.” we end up with a snowball effect in the Office of the Ombudsmen. I do apologise if I sound like I am disappointed but I am. I am very disappointed—Grant Robertson: Very genuine.Hon LIANNE DALZIEL: Well we have actually been asking for some advocacy support for the people of Christchurch for actually years now—not just months and not just weeks. For years we have been asking the Government to actually respond to the needs of the people.Instead of giving people the information they want the Earthquake Commission says that they have to make an Official Information Act request. I just want to give you a little example. It concerns a friend of mine who actually thinks that the Project Management Office which has got a contractor in to fix up her house has charged the Earthquake Commission more than it should have had to pay. She thinks it has charged for things that it has not actually done. So she contacted the Project Management Office—Fletcher EQR they call it—and she sent them an email and said: “Could you just let me know whether they charged for a Portaloo because I know they did not have one?” and she asked whether they charged for x y and z because she knows they did not do it. The response that she got was: “You will have to forward your request to EQC under the Official Information Act.” Look she is trying to save them some money.I have heard case after case after case—I am just using this as one example. There are cases throughout Christchurch where good decent Christchurch residents are saying to the Earthquake Commission: “We think you’re being ripped off. We’d actually quite like to make sure that you’re not. We actually know that that’s good money that’s being spent on our behalf to get our homes repaired in a timely fashion.” They are offering to help and what did they get in response? “You will have to make an application for that information under the Official Information Act.” Wake up—wake up people! This is just so avoidable and preventable. Work with the people of Christchurch and they will work with you.The Earthquake Commission has helpfully placed an Official Information Act request form on their on-line presence but it has also had to say on there: “At present your request may have a 3 to 4 month delay as EQC works through the significant demand for information of this type.” Hello! Again wake up! The reason the public are asking for this information is that they now know that it is publicly available. They know that it can be provided to them in a reasonable fashion. It means that more and more complaints end up in the Ombudsmen’s office when they do not need to be there.This is all because the Government has refused to meet the needs of Christchurch residents who are struggling with the complexity of the Earthquake Commission insurance interface and with the interface with the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority as well. This could have been resolved if the Government had taken up our offer of a collaborative solution a triage system an advocacy service—and I know that lawyers in Christchurch have offered on a pro bono basis to take some of those very very detailed cases to the court. The reason I believe that Mr Brownlee has scaled this back—and Mr Brownlee has scaled it back; an insurance advocacy service will be smaller than originally planned—is that apparently the need is no longer as great as it was. Well it is still a month away. We know it is going to be much less than what people need and that is why the people of Christchurch have responded by setting up something completely different which they will announce.Let us all work together and get a solution for this because otherwise we will be back here asking for more resources for the Office of the Ombudsmen because ultimately that will be where the buck stops.