Cosgrove Clayton: Fighting Foreign Corporate Control Bill — First ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeCosgrove Clayton: Fighting Foreign Corporate Control Bill — First Reading[Sitting date: 22 July 2015. Volume:707;Page:5261. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE (Labour): I want to firstly thank Mark Mitchell for his contribution. It was a measured contribution in the spirit of the non-partisan nature with which trade agreements between our two great parties and latterly other parties over many many years—decades—have been dealt with.As for the last contribution by David Bennett it was a waste of time. David Parker in his address did what I think the Government should have done. I am a rabid free trader. I believe in free trade. I am part of a party that has been pro - free trade and has initiated as Mr Bennett pointed out in his snide way many free-trade agreements including the China agreement. Mr Bennett is right that there are investor-State dispute settlement provisions within the China free-trade agreement and that is a well-known fact. Maybe he has just come out from under the mushroom in the last couple of days and worked that out.But here I say to Mr Bennett is the difference: when we negotiated the China free-trade agreement—specifically Phil Goff and Helen Clark—one you did not see the outcry. You did not see the angst within the communities because as a Government and through those two individuals we brought communities with us. We kept them well informed. I accept that you cannot—and it is naive of those who say that we can—somehow negotiate an agreement in public. You cannot. You do not negotiate wages in public. You do not negotiate trade or commercial deals in public. It is a nonsense to put that forward.But what you can—and I am certainly critical of the National Party on this one and slightly critical of our commercial sector—talk about is what has been; i.e. the China agreement and other agreements that have been. You can talk about as Mr Bennett in his own weird sort of way tried to articulate the notion of investor-State dispute settlements within the China agreement. You can actually talk about what have been the benefits or the downsidesof say the China free-trade agreement—but what I would argue are the benefits—and you can make a case that if we got even a slice of 40 percent of world trade for our commercial sector and our people in New Zealand in respect of jobs growth and wealth to exploit that would be a good thing. You can generate those sorts of discussions.I note and I believe I was attacked at the time by the Green Party which is sort of a badge of honour for me that I was the one when I was shadow trade spokesperson who asked Tim Groser whether he would fight for and ensure that similar provisions and safeguards that exist within the China free-trade agreement that protect New Zealand’s right—despite investor-State dispute settlement—to regulate and legislate in the public good are in the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the answer was yes. The Green Party attacked me and said I was sucking up to the Government for actually eliciting a commitment from them. But we will work that one out in some other stratosphere.I say as Mr Parker did that the reason and the only reason we are supporting this bill—which I have to say with respect is a very simple bill but it is very broad far too broad in what it seeks to achieve. I do agree with the National Party that if this was adopted it could well negate free-trade agreements and that is not a good thing for our country. But what Mr Parker has articulated is the ability to have a select committee that examines this very issue and effectively do what the Government should have done years ago. For Mr Bennett to get up and say that we have come late to the debate on this is piffle. We have been asking publicly that the Government articulate and discuss with stakeholders within the bounds of confidentiality and raise these issues and actually put the debate out there—actually put the debate out there—so people can indeed be reassured.I am not a conspiracy theorist. I do not believe in the trade bogeyman. If you look at trade agreements despite our Green friends throughout history where you have open markets where you have opened closed economies it does lead to better environment labour and human rights standards and greater wealth for those people. Where you have developed countries that can actually access wealthy markets for their products and services it does actually lift economic growth and standards of living. That unless you live in a flat-earth society is undisputed. So the rationale for us supporting this simply to the select committee process is to allow a public debate.I thank Mr Mitchell again for his contribution. It was measured. It was non-partisan. I conclude with this—slightly off target—to place on record my thanks to Minister McCully the Prime Minister and the Government for their support of our ambassador to the US Mike Moore who we know is recovering from some health difficulties. I take this opportunity to briefly simply congratulate him. He has done a job well. His task was to get trade promotion authority and to ensure that trade promotion authority got through fast-tracked because you cannot have a Trans-Pacific Partnership without trade promotion authority and he has done that job. He is a person who is a passionate free trader. I would put his knowledge of this agreement and stack it up against that of anybody in this House even Mr Groser—he may be insulted by that—as a person who would know the credibility and integrity of this deal. Mr Moore is a patriot. He is a citizen of this country and he is a believer in free trade.But let us not try to have all the colourful weasel words. Let us take Mr Mitchell’s example. We will support this for one reason and one reason only: to do what the Government has failed to do and that is to engender a public debate so that people can actually examine this proposal for what it is.