Shaw James: New Zealand Superannuation and Retirement Income Amendment Bill — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeShaw James: New Zealand Superannuation and Retirement Income Amendment Bill — Second Reading[Sitting date: 07 May 2015. Volume:705;Page:3334. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]JAMES SHAW (Green):I would like to start by echoing the words of Iain Lees-Galloway warmly commending the words of Andrew Bayly about the New Zealand Superannuation Fund. Of course Andrew Bayly is very credible in this area. He is one of the few people in the National caucus who knows a few things about finance having come from a long background in it. So we should accept his word as it comes. I just want to start by pulling out something that Bill English said when he was introducing the New Zealand Superannuation and Retirement Income Amendment Bill earlier referring to the fact that most parties in the House supported the introduction of the Cullen fund back in 2001 implying somehow that National was actually one of the parties that had supported it which of course it did not. National’s preferred solution as to what to do with these vast Government surpluses was to cut the top tax rate and not to save for the future and not to worry about the demographic bubble that is approaching as the baby boomers retire. That is entirely consistent with the National Government’s policy of sticking its head in the sand when it comes to the demographic tsunami that is approaching us.It is interesting to note of course that National’s preferred way of dealing with the fund since getting into Government has actually been to replicate its policy back in 2001 which is to cut taxes so that there is not enough money to run surpluses so that it does not have to put anything into the Superannuation Fund. I will just say it again. Back in 2001 when it was opposing the creation of the New Zealand Superannuation Fund the preferred approach of the National Party was to cut taxes and reduce Government revenue rather than to put it into savings. What it has done since getting into power is cut taxes to the point that Government revenue is running below its ability to run surpluses and so has not put money into the New Zealand Superannuation Fund. So although Government members wax lyrical extolling the virtues of the fund they are actually acting completely consistently with their earlier policy of not supporting the fund.I just wanted to say as my colleague Dr Russel Norman said earlier that the Greens have consistently supported the fund since its creation. In fact it was only Green Party votes that actually got the fund created and got it over the line in the first place. However in relation to this bill we do have a deep concern that the types of vehicles that are being authorised by this bill will enable the use of tax havens. The risk is that New Zealand’s Government-owned State-owned sovereign wealth fund is actually exploiting loopholes in other countries’ taxation systems and we do not think that that should be enabled. Of course a lot of people will say that countries choose to be tax havens; they choose to have the kinds of laws that they do. The United Kingdom which is verging on being a tax haven is simply tied up in knots in terms of its own legislation—something like 70000 pages of tax law. We should not actually be exploiting other countries in terms of their ability to gather revenue to pay for education or health care or anything like that. We would not want other countries to be doing that to us and so we consider that to be a risk of these fund investment vehicles here.In conclusion we should be setting an example not selling out. We should be upholding the ability of other countries to gather the revenue that they need rather than exploiting loopholes for our own benefit. And New Zealand’s own sovereign wealth fund our own savings fund should really embody Kiwi values of fair play. So although we do and always have supported the New Zealand Superannuation Fund we will not be supporting this bill.