Brown Simeon; Rurawhe AdrianSIMEON BROWN (National—Pakuranga): Thank you very much Mr Assistant Speaker. I would just like to ask and I think the member for Epsom asked the question of Greg O'Connor Does the member believe in gravity?" He doesn't seem to believe that rents will rise because of this piece of legislation. Well it's very nice to know what the member might believe or might not believe but there's also the markets and market forces which are well evidenced and something which I think can actually be evidenced rather than just talking about what some member might believe or not believe.The problem with this piece of legislation the Residential Tenancies (Prohibiting Letting Fees) Amendment Bill is that quite simply it is virtue signalling and trying to make the other side of this House feel good about themselves. They think that by banning something you can simply make something just evaporate. Well we've got news from this side of the House for them and the news is this: money doesn't grow on trees. Money doesn't grow on trees and costs will be passed on.We have to go back and ask the question: what is a letting fee for? Well it's for a service. It's a service that landlords have done in order to have a property rented out—listing a property advertising—[Interruption] They might be yelling because they don't want to hear the truth but that's OK—conducting open homes vetting prospective tenants. All of those things take time and I know that the other side don't like to think it but time costs money and someone has to pay. At the end of the day just like rates are passed on to the tenants water charges are passed on to tenants letting fees will also be passed on to tenants and they will have to pay as well.The regulatory impact statement says there has been no consultation on this proposal. The full extent of impacts cannot be identified. Greg O'Connor can stand up and say he doesn't believe in stuff—well there hasn't even been any consultation done on this proposal. The reality is—we heard Ron Mark say he doesn't really care if the costs are passed on as well. So on one hand you've got Greg O'Connor saying he doesn't believe they will then you hear Ron Mark saying "Well I don't really care if they do."Well the problem is for tenants—and this is where they're letting down those people that they're trying to help—that while tenants might have say a $500 charge—$10 a week; that's $10 per week that they might get increased in their rent—well that won't be removed in the second year. They'll be continuing to pay that year on year and instead of having a letting fee which they pay once it'll be something which will continually be paid and then it'll be increased and they'll be paying it again.This piece of legislation is deeply flawed. It is simply virtue signalling to make the Government feel better. It's not building a single house—we're still waiting for that to happen as well—and it's not getting to the root cause of the problems that they're trying to solve. So we oppose this piece of legislation because it's a ridiculous piece of legislation and we look forward to some better stuff coming soon. Thanks.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Adrian Rurawhe): This is a split call—five minutes. I call David Seymour."