McClay ToddHon TODD McCLAY (National—Rotorua): Before he goes to have his late dinner I'd like to congratulate the Minister Stuart Nash for bringing this legislation to the House. It is the best piece of legislation I've seen from that Minister in five years and it's one of the worst bills that's ever been brought here because it's not going to do a single thing actually to help small businesses get paid on time.We've heard from Government member after Government member after Government member that there isn't a cost to this and all they want to do is measure because measurement is important and it will help them ensure that small businesses are paid quickly. But when we say to them Why aren't you the Government measuring outcomes in health and whether people are getting their operations or in education and whether or not kids are learning properly or in any part of Government—why aren't you measuring?" They say "Because it's not important." But when it comes to the private sector they want to impose a burden and a cost albeit well-meaning upon those businesses. And to the last speaker in this debate Dr Deborah Russell: there is always a cost when you ask a business to do something other than run their business. There are many times when it is justified and it should happen but this is the Government merely passing the buck and putting an onus upon businesses to do the job that this Government promised five years ago that they were going to do for small businesses in New Zealand.When we put in questions—written questions—to Ministers at the moment more often than not they say "It is too much work for our departments the information is not readily available. We are not going to ask them to do it because the cost would be too high." But if you are a business in the private sector you don't get to pay for things out of taxes you don't get to waste money you have to be accountable—like this Government wastes money. Then actually this Government says it's OK to burden businesses and make them do the job the Government should be doing themselves.The Labour Party—in Opposition and then in Government—made a commitment to small businesses that they would fix this issue and speed up payments. And merely asking companies that have a greater than $33 million turnover including revenue and including GST to report to collect information to publish it themselves every six months and to hold that information for seven years—and get any part of that wrong including I don't know only holding it for 6½ years there would be a fine; in some cases a substantial fine—tells me that this is a Government that does not understand how businesses work.Now Stuart Nash wants to make it easier for smaller businesses and to speed up payments to them. Bring legislation that says companies must do that. Don't just say "We're going to do a little bit of measuring and we're going to collect a bit of information and we're going to get those companies to publish that information and if we find that that they're not doing this properly then we will legislate—and we might." because that's not what the commitment was that this Government made to New Zealand small businesses it's not the promise that they made and it is certainly not what they are delivering in this House today.I think that information and the collection of it and its analysis is important. Actually good information and good analysis leads to good law and good rules and good regulation. But we don't see that from this Government. In fact what we see is excuses when it comes to what they should be doing and they pass the buck and they burden others—in this case businesses in New Zealand who have already done it tough. But what you hear in every speech underlying every speech from Government members on this legislation is that businesses can pay this they can afford to and actually they have a responsibility to when it's the Government and the members speaking in this debate from the Government that have the responsibility to meet the promise they made to New Zealand small businesses and actually make a change. This legislation sadly won't do that.When we look at larger companies there are times when they don't pay their bills as quickly as they should. They shouldn't do that. They should pay efficiently and quickly just as they demand that they should be paid quickly as well. But here's the problem: this legislation focuses on any business or any enterprise in New Zealand with $33 million worth of revenue including GST and it doesn't go anywhere near a single Government agency or department that may or may not pay on time. How about the Government collects information on that? They don't need to pass legislation. They have the ability just to inform each of their heads of ministries or departments to report to them individually or collectively on the payment terms and how well they do as a Government. It's another promise they made before the last election but there's no measurement there. And if we asked the Government to do it if we put in a written question or an Official Information Act request I give you a guarantee that the Government will say "It's too hard to do it's too costly and we won't instruct our officials to do it."So they'll put cost upon businesses. But to make sure the Public Service is running well to make sure that they are paying the bills on time or I don't know to make sure our hospitals are delivering operations or people are seeing their doctors or their specialists in a timely manner this Government doesn't believe in measurement. It doesn't believe in collecting information. It certainly doesn't believe in league tables. But if you are from a business then actually this Government is coming after you.What would be a much better use of this House's time would be something that actually sped up the payment terms for small businesses where there is a problem. For many small businesses who have done everything this Government asked of them during lockdown—they took on debt they closed their doors they stayed at home they paid their workers they acted on behalf of the Government doing the Government's job half of the time—the thanks here is: "We're going to do a little bit of measurement and publish it every six months and if somebody doesn't do what we say we're going to fine them." Well that's actually not good enough.I think Stuart Nash probably wanted to bring a much better piece of legislation into this House and it was either stopped when he got to Cabinet or stopped by the officials or he like so many others in this Government—other Ministers—have just given up. And that's not good enough because it's not good enough for our business community. It's not good enough for hard-working New Zealanders. It is certainly not good enough for the people that run small businesses that believed Stuart Nash and his colleagues before the last election when they said they would fix a problem that they had identified before. And if they didn't think it was a problem then they shouldn't have said so while asking people to vote for them; they should have said "We're just going to pass a law that's going to measure this for five or six years and we might do something about it."What this country needs is a Government that can deliver and actually takes action. Press releases of fancy slogans and pieces of legislation that don't fix the problem are not helping New Zealanders. Sadly that is one of the many reasons that this Government is struggling in the eyes of New Zealanders. If they turn around and start doing their job properly who knows what might happen. But at the moment there will be people all over the country who are disillusioned by what this Government is doing. And as I look across at some of the members over there I hope they don't end up running a small business after the next election because I said deflation wouldn't help them be paid any faster."