Faafoi Kris: Third Readings —Text is incorporated into the Bound VolumeFaafoi Kris: Third Readings —[Sitting date: 30 October 2014. Volume:701;Page:463. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]KRIS FAAFOI (Labour—Mana):Malo ni. Mr Assistant Speaker I think this is my first opportunity to speak in the House with you in the Chair. So can I congratulate you face to face on your appointment and I hope you do not read what I said about you in Hansard in my earlier speech in this Parliament during the Address in Reply debate.This is legislation that does have broad support across Parliament. As Clayton Cosgrove said earlier in his contribution on this legislation there are advantages to the merger of the New Zealand Institute of Chartered Accountants and its sister body across the Tasman. We do support that in this age of a global economy where suitable and compatible regulations are going to be advantageous to both New Zealand and Australia. We on this side of the House do support any efficiencies that we can get from it.This legislation was in the Commerce Committee of the previous Parliament so I would like to acknowledge everyone who sat on that. It was a bipartisan process and I would like to extend our thanks for the way it was handled by the committee chair Jonathan Young. As Clayton Cosgrove pointed out there were some tricky issues around the exemption of particular people from the membership of chartered accountants’ organisations. That was a tricky one which I will get to later.There was a democratic process for the New Zealand Institute of Chartered Accountants members to decide as to whether or not it thought this merger was a good idea. I understand that close to 70 percent of the membership who did vote were in favour of this. That is not to say that there were not some members who were opposed to it. They were predominantly smaller practices in rural areas and we did hear a number of submissions from those types of practitioners. I hope that those people who oppose the merger can be kept happy despite being opposed to this merger.I did want to talk to the issue that Clayton Cosgrove brought up in regard to the Exclusive Brethren. We gave its members what I thought was a pretty fair hearing. You may have thought because of our past dealings with them from this side of the House that we might not have but we did take a principled approach to the request for which they came to the select committee—for an exemption to be members of the professional body. Their religion excludes them from being members of other organisations if those organisations go against what their fundamental religious beliefs are but the changes in this legislation meant that you could not be a qualified accountant if you were not a member of the organisation which would have put them out of business. So they came to the select committee asking for an exemption.I think they were probably a little bit nervous because of their previous history with politics but as Clayton Cosgrove said we did look at it in a principled way. They did want to make sure that they were abiding by whatever rules the organisation was going to have and also that they would be subject to any disciplinary measures that may come about. But their religion meant that they could not be members of that organisation. So I would like to thank the members of that committee and also the officials for what was a pretty tricky negotiation to try to make sure that we got the balance right.This legislation contains an amendment to the Financial Reporting Act—the parent bill has been split up into four separate bills now—to insert new section 36M. There are some conditions that an accountant who does hold these religious beliefs has to make sure that they meet if they want to practice as accountants. First of all the body has to be satisfied that the religion that the people have is bona fide and they have to have a written agreement with that body to make sure that they keep to the rules and that if they do break the rules any disciplinary action that may be forced upon them will be adhered to. If at any stage the organisation thinks that that particular accountant who does have those religious beliefs is not going to stick to that they can have that exemption removed.This took up quite a bit of the time of the select committee. Again I do want to thank the officials because it did perplex us. There was not a lot of precedent floating around. It obviously was a tricky issue with the issue of religious beliefs but there was one similar exemption in a piece of labour law which we looked at closely. I think we came to what was a very happy place for the members of the committee itself and also those businesses that came to submit to us.As Clayton Cosgrove said this is a piece of legislation that we agree with. We now hope that the new Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs has some time to look at other things in his new portfolio area. I do understand he is outside Cabinet so he may not get the impetus that we would want from a Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs especially around the area of what was in the Credit Contracts and Consumer Finance Amendment Act which was passed last year—around loan sharks. I hope that will be a priority for the new Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs. It was this Government in the previous term that did not take any action on putting interest rate caps on loan sharks. I hope that the Minister now that this bill has been completed might be able to take a fresh look in the 51st Parliament at those loan sharks who are out there terrorising the most vulnerable people out in our communities charging the most exorbitant interest rates. The new Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs might be able to look at that.As we have said on this side of the House this is a piece of legislation that we know will be beneficial for New Zealand. The industry wants it on this side of the Tasman as do the accountants’ organisations on the other side of the Tasman. We hope it will open up new business opportunities for us. We understand it might also create some new jobs in New Zealand because the new omni-organisation may set up its back office here in New Zealand. We think that is obviously one of the spin-offs of making sure that these two sets of regulations both here in New Zealand and in Australia can be closely related.But as I say now that this piece of legislation will be disposed of very soon we hope that the new Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs can get some new legislation through the Commerce Committee of which the Hon Maurice Williamson is now a member. I look forward to having many robust discussions with him. Today we talked about stereos from the 1970s in Fiji. I look forward to his colour and his incisive mind on the Commerce Committee from now on.This is legislation that I believe has cross-party support so Labour will support it but there are some reservations. Cheers.