Bayly AndrewANDREW BAYLY (National—Port Waikato): Thank you Madam Speaker. It is a pleasure to be talking on the COVID-19 Response (Management Measures) Legislation Bill. So the first thing I'd like to say is there are elements in this bill that we do support and it is a wide-ranging bill. It affects many many Acts. But particular measures around allowing lotteries to run at alert level 3—there's three entities that have been provided for specifically which are important and I think in the current environment for them to be able to get funds to continue to operate during this difficult time is very appropriate.Changes to allow councils to delay rating valuations—obviously with restrictions particularly in Auckland now that we're going into week nine. Thirdly empowering the coroner to allow remote participation—obviously pretty logical stuff—and deferring a number of regulatory requirements as a result of changes or the alert levels that are going on at the moment. So that is fine and most of that didn't need to go through under urgency. In fact you've struggled to understand why on earth they were passed as part of this bill that needed to be passed—well debated and in the Finance and Expenditure Committee over the last 10 days.The biggest issue that we have and the main reason why we're opposing this bill is that the two significant things should have been subject to a proper debate. That's namely around the rent proposal elements and the second one is around the local body and how elections can be delayed. Those are very significant. The first because of the financial consequences to people and secondly the constitutional issues that relate to the second around the holding of council elections which are due at 8 October this time next year.So I want to just turn to the Property Law Act changes and the previous speaker Barbara Edmonds just said Well hey we have to do something and this is going to be fine and dandy." Well as I mentioned in my question to the Minister of Finance at question time I just remind the speaker that Retail New Zealand when they did a survey at 30 September—so it's not that long ago—showed that a third of retailers are not confident that their businesses will survive the next 12 months and specifically asked for a financial payment to be made in terms of rent support. So they are looking for cash unlike what the previous speaker spoke of.We are now in Auckland and I've come down here after having been locked up for nine weeks in Auckland and I've seen what's going on there. You walk down the main streets of North Shore and over 40 businesses have closed their doors—40 since the start of this lockdown. If you go through the CBD it's like a wasteland. That is the scale of what's going on. Whilst the Minister keeps talking about the level of wage support that's going to make these companies survive and the level of resurgence it is clear from the various surveys—and the retail one is the most significant showing that a third of businesses think that they're going to fail over the next 12 months—that it is absolutely essential that we are putting in place mechanisms that get cash in the hands of those desperate mums and dads that own businesses particularly in the area of Auckland. This bill does nothing for it.What this bill does is socialises the cost of a Government-imposed lockdown and transfers the responsibility for the financial cost of that from the Government who is the one who has imposed the lockdown and transferred that cost to landlords. The Government has in this bill effectively socialised the cost of the lockdown and transferred it to landlords. That is fundamentally wrong. The solution that should have been put up 18 months ago not when we are now entering week nine of an Auckland lockdown—what the Government should have done 18 months ago is dealt with this properly and substantially. Of course the same mechanism was proposed all that period ago and of course was turned down by New Zealand First and quite rightly so.Now that we've got a Government that has total power on its own merits to be able to do anything not only have they chosen to reactivate the same proposal that was roundly rejected but they've done it under urgency. I think that is terribly wrong and shows a Government that is using absolute power to achieve its means by doing so in a manner that does not allow for adequate consultation. I applaud all the companies and people who fronted up to the select committee over a matter of three days to present their case in the short period of time that they've had to prepare it and they've presented well.The reality is that this proposal what it does is it forces that cost to the landlords to provide some rent relief. It is wrong the way that it's gone about and we have four principal issues with it. The first one: the bill refers to what is called a fair proportion of rent. So when we asked the advisers to the committee "What is meant by the term 'a fair proportion'? Can you elaborate on that? Can you provide some guidance?" it was unclear that they could. It has been a deliberate decision by the Government to leave it as an unclear definition. That means that it has to be defined probably in the courts. That also means a time delay. So the first issue is around what is understood by the term "fair proportion".The second thing is that this whole approach cuts to the core of the sanctity of contract law and that is one of the principal concerns we have with this piece of legislation. Because when you start to interfere when you have a Government starting to interfere between agreements agreed by two parties and impose themselves and not only just impose themselves but also to reallocate how money is to be paid between those two parties that is fundamentally wrong and that is why this is an incredibly shoddy piece of legislation.The third thing is that the proposals apply to all commercial tenancy arrangements. Many many submitters made a strong proposition that it should be linked to small to medium businesses. At least put a criteria on it or very logically link it to the wage subsidy scheme—which is by the way what I'd link the National Party's rental package to to the 40 percent decline in revenue—or to a loss in income or capital.Those were four very good grounds for setting some criteria because many people were concerned that what you might have is very large companies taking advantage of this. Many may be not even New Zealand resident-type companies or owned by New Zealanders taking advantage of these new unclear laws to benefit themselves financially.The other issue—the fourth one—is the issue of lack of access. This is a very significant issue. Of course what we ended up with in the bill is a reference to the Auckland District Law Society—27.5. This is about where a business is unable to fully conduct its business from its premises. We heard from many submitters including Michael LeRoy-Dyson who actually has a 27.5 clause in his tenancy arrangement and he cannot get agreement with his landlord.This is wrong—this whole approach. The lack of clarity around it is a fundamental flaw. And that is even before I start to talk about the local government elements of this bill. It is wrong. We will oppose it."