Scott AlastairALASTAIR SCOTT (National—Wairarapa): Thank you Madam Assistant Speaker. I didn't want to interrupt Mr Finlayson's comments. I just thought I'd give it—Hon Ruth Dyson: No we'd rather listen to him too actually.ALASTAIR SCOTT: Would you—would you madam senior whip! Madam Assistant Speaker thank you for the opportunity to make comment on the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) ratification bill. That's what it does: it ratifies the trade agreement that is so important. And as the previous speaker has mentioned it has taken so long to get to this point. Reflecting on the build-up to this point those same speakers that have just spoken so positively on this bill were just not very long ago speaking so aggressively against it. It's quite interesting—at least interesting" is an understatement—to see the swing in the political dial.Hon Willie Jackson: Oh it's different.ALASTAIR SCOTT: They say there's a difference—Willie Jackson says there's a difference and I challenge him to stand up and even name the differences because Minister Jones could not name the differences though he too said there were some strong differences. There's a couple of pages that acknowledge that. There are some minor changes but the fundamentals of it are the same as what the National Government brought in— Chris Bishop: No no. Willie says it's different.ALASTAIR SCOTT: —under the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement (TPPA). And if Willie Jackson does say it's different then let him stand up and take a call and just describe in detail the big changes that the Labour Government has made to enable them and New Zealand First to vote for the ratification of this bill. I too would also like to acknowledge all those people that have been involved over the years as Minister Jones said and hundreds and hundreds of people thousands and thousands of hours having to deal with the political swing from one pendulum point to another but still determined to make sure that this multilateral trade agreement takes place because you can imagine how difficult it is to get you know quite frankly more than one or two people to agree. It's difficult enough getting agreement with your partner across the dinner table. Imagine how difficult it is to get a whole family together to decide on where to go on holiday. So I can just only imagine how difficult it is to get the 10 parties together to agree on the whole entire framework and agreement.We talk positively about this trade agreement and it absolutely is but remember that in a negotiated agreement we must be giving something up in return for the stuff that we receive. It's not all one way. It is good and overall the pluses outweigh the minuses and that's why we participate and that's why all those parties participate. That's why in a bilateral relationship you can do certain things but you can't get everything done in a bilateral relationship. Often it's useful to have a third party or a fourth party in this case 10 parties to be able to cross-subsidise—"cross-subsidise" is not quite the right word but to be able to agree multilaterally to enable those two original parties to benefit from the agreement. I'll just give you one example. So we know that we've got greater access to have our beef go into Japan. That's because the tariffs in Japan—big tariffs—are going to be reduced over quite a long period of time. That hurts the Japanese beef producer because at the moment they're protected. New Zealand beef though it's competitive because we've a cheaper and effective and a high-quality product—we can't get it into Japan because of the tariff structures that are in place. So the Japanese beef farmer is going to see more and more New Zealand product on the shelves in Japan. So that group is one of the losers in this trade agreement. Overall that's great for New Zealand but we may not have been able to give a lot to Japan because we're only a little nation. But perhaps the agreement has enabled Japan to sell more product into say Canada. That's a good thing and I'm reflecting on and I want to come back to my point relating to the definition of ice wine. The definition of ice wine can now only be used for wine from grapes that have been frozen on the vine. Now when you read that you think that is definitely a plus for Canada. So they're going to win because of that clause. They're going to win at the cost of New Zealand winemakers because we can't freeze grapes on a vine and really turn it into ice wine. When we see a dessert wine it's usually botrytised wine—that's the fungus that shrinks the grapes to concentrate the sugars and then you make the wine from that. But those grapes haven't been frozen—certainly not frozen on the vine. But in Canada they have a situation where you can get these dehydrated grapes late in the season and they're frozen which gives the grape a characteristic. Now prior to this we could call our botrytised wine or even a non-botrytised wine—a sweet wine say—a New Zealand ice wine because it's just a name; it's nothing specific and there's not a determination of what that means. But now we are not—Dan Bidois: Sounds good.ALASTAIR SCOTT: It is a bloody good wine actually. It's sweeter than a rosé but not a rosé. But now we will not be able to do that. Now only those people who can produce this wine from frozen grapes on the vine—you can't take the grapes off the vine and freeze them; they've got to be frozen on the vine. So that's a win for the Canadians and a loss for New Zealand winegrowers. It's a very small loss but that give-up that loss to our market place is part of the give-up which enables us to have access to the Japanese beef market for example.So my point here is that multilateral agreements can have benefits that are not necessarily available in bilateral agreements. Now bilateral agreements are very important as well—no doubt about that. As Minister Jones said himself the Chinese agreement the first free-trade agreement with China—pioneers in free-trade agreements if you like. My second point I just want to reiterate is that there are things that we have given up. There are things that other nations have given up. There are things in industries in whole industries that they are giving up because their tariffs will be reduced. Unfortunately there are some countries that want to increase tariffs and that is to protect and to surround and to put them in their own different parallel universe in a way. Dan Bidois: In South America. ALASTAIR SCOTT: Yeah unfortunately the Americans had that mentality at the time and so I wonder—and it would be great if they could join the CPTPP and there's nothing to stop them except for the fact that they would also have to give up some access give up something for them to join in the party. It would become a party of 11. The Tariff Act is also affected and as I say the tariffs are barriers to trade. It's fantastic to see that the Labour Party and the New Zealand First Party are voting for this because I recall just a few years ago when the Labour guys were voting against the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement there was an ability for one or two of the Labour members to vote for the agreement. I think it was Mr Shearer who voted for the agreement. Mr Finlayson might have a better memory than me. Mr Shearer was able to vote for the TPP agreement to cross the floor and support—Hon Christopher Finlayson: It was Goff wasn't it?ALASTAIR SCOTT: Was it Goff? Goff did—that's right. Thank you. And that's fantastic but now it's great to see that they're all voting the same way that Mr Goff voted those years ago. It's great to see the pendulum swing—that essentially 90 percent of us are in favour of this free-trade agreement. We know that it's great for the economy. It's great for all those people that Louisa Wall referred to. It raises the tide it increases the economy it creates jobs and it is just simply a wonderful thing."