Tirikatene Rino; Rurawhe AdrianCUSTOMS AND EXCISE BILLIn CommitteeDebate resumed from 27 February.Powers and Obligations (continued)RINO TIRIKATENE (Labour—Te Tai Tonga): Thank you Mr Chair. I'm pleased to continue my contribution—third time lucky—on this committee stage of the Customs and Excise Bill. If you could indulge me while I sort of get back up to speed again but this is a comprehensive bill whereby we are wanting to bring the New Zealand Customs Service up into the 21st century. It's about modernising and updating their processes and obviously the empowering legislation. In this debate we are covering the theme of the powers and obligations.I was mentioning in my earlier sections to this contribution the powers that reside with the Chief Executive of the New Zealand Customs Service. I note that there is a continuation of the title for the Chief Executive of the New Zealand Customs Service being referred to as the Comptroller of Customs. As I understand the title of comptroller goes all the way back to 1910 so we've had over 108 years of the head of the New Zealand Customs Service being referred to as the comptroller. I guess my question to the Minister of Customs is: as we are modernising the New Zealand Customs Service through this legislation why are we continuing with the term comptroller" for the administrative head of the New Zealand Customs Service?Right throughout the legislation it's referred to as the chief executive and I guess "comptroller" appears to me to be a very archaic term. It doesn't really align with hauling the New Zealand Customs Service into the 21st century. We know that chief executives have been established under the State Sector Act for a very long time and I guess I really want to go a bit deeper just to understand why we have the term "comptroller". What's in a name? Are there any express or implied powers that reside in a comptroller whether it be at law or however—some sort of extra powers that derive under that title which are separate to the powers conferred under this bill? It is such a very historical and quite antiquated term so I would just like some guidance I guess from the Minister as to why the chief executive still has to carry that name.And I understand the current head of customs is again referred to—I believe it's an acting chief executive at the moment. It may be because it's aligned with practice with other customs services around the world I'm not too sure but it seems to me that if we are modernising if the purpose is to modernise the New Zealand Customs Service then surely that might be one of the changes—yeah those old titles that we can do away with and move into the 21st century and be proud to have the New Zealand Customs Service led by the chief executive. For instance right throughout the legislation all of the powers are conferred on the chief executive and I guess why not go for consistency of language? Why not apply that consistency to the current head of customs? We can leave those old terms to history. Leave them to history and let's step out boldly in the 21st century by making sure that we do have clarity—clarity.That's why I do want to go back to the point: are there any powers of a comptroller that are separate to the chief executive? I think that's a very important point because if there are then it does lead to uncertainty. It seems like it might be some sort of officer quasi-military title. I'm not too sure. I'm not an expert in that area but "comptroller" seems like it is quite a hierarchical term. We have a deputy comptroller we have officers and it seems like it's a specialised term for a customs-type officer—the head officer. And so I'm interested in whether there is some sort of dual role that is played out by having that title in addition to being the chief executive. I think it's important because it goes to the delegations that flow from that title and so I would seek Minister Whaitiri's clarification on that point.As I've said I think it's important that we do modernise the New Zealand Customs Service. It is a very high performing Government department. It does a lot of great work and we are definitely updating the powers that it does have through this piece of legislation but I think it's very important that we make sure that comptroller and chief executive are not confused and if there is confusion I think we should remedy that confusion by just going with the current modern-day term of chief executive. Thank you.Hon Andrew Little: Mr Chair.Hon Peeni Henare: Mr Chair.CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): I call the Hon Andrew Little.Hon Peeni Henare: Aw!"