Brown SimeonSIMEON BROWN (National—Pakuranga): Thank you Mr Chair; thank you for the opportunity to take a call on the Plain Language Bill which I would describe as a solution looking for a problem because ultimately there's a lot of words being used. I haven't actually done a word count but someone should do a word count because I'm pretty sure it could be basically a sort of a letter from the Public Service Commissioner to the entire Public Service saying Please use plain language kind regards."—could actually have fixed the problem. Rather we've got many thousands of words. But I'm not sure if the member has done a word count. I'd be interested to know if she has; and if so how many words are in this piece of legislation. But I have got a number of questions that I will be asking about this piece of legislation throughout this afternoon. And I guess the first place I'd like to start is at the definition of plain language. And it says here in clause 4A "What is plain language". Now it doesn't end with a question mark it's a statement which I thought was a bit odd and it doesn't sound very plain at all. And then it says "In this Act plain language means language that is—(a) appropriate to the intended audience". So I guess the first question is: are there different levels of plain language that can be used dependent on the particular intended audience for a document and how are the Public Service departments going to be able to assess whether they're using that appropriate level of language? Because clearly that is the first part to the definition that they have to meet. So first they have to clearly know obviously who the intended audience is and then I understand some bits later on in the bill try to narrow that down but they also have to know what the appropriate level of language for that intended audience is. So I guess the question is: what does "appropriate" mean in that context? Are there various types of plain language that could be used dependant on the different type of audience?Subclause (b) is: "clear concise and well organised." Now obviously we kind of all know what clear and concise and well organised means; however does this require the particular Public Service departments to use any particular software? Because I know there's a lot of software out there such as Grammarly which will provide a number of different ways for people to be able to use language. Does that require that sort of language to be used in that context?The next clause is 4B "What documents must use plain language" and this is a really large section. So for people listening at home there's a lot of words in this section and I would say it's clearly not plain language the way this bill has been written. Again I'd ask the member whether she's considered whether this bill could have been written in more plain language. And I guess a broader question is: does this bill require legislation? Does this bill actually require legislation to be written in plain language? Because I can tell you there are a lot of people up and down this country who are paid to interpret legislation and they do a very good job of it. And the point is that legislation is complex but it's also a public-facing document. Every piece of legislation is available on the legislation website in the archives—it's available. So my first question here is: what documents must use plain language? Is legislation covered by the plain language requirements of this legislation? Because if it is I would put it to the member that this piece of legislation that she is bringing to the House doesn't use plain language in a number of cases and should be considered as to whether it actually complies with the very piece of legislation that she is bringing to this Parliament.The next point I'd like to raise is in regards to the documents. And it says here in clause 4B(c) "the document—(i) provides information about what services are provided by or on behalf of a reporting agency". So look there's a range of different things here regarding the document "(ii) provides information about filing registering or lodging information" "(iii) explains to the public how to comply with a requirement". So there's a range of different sort of narrowing down factors here to try to narrow down. So I guess the question is: how did the member come to the point where she's come up with this definition of legislation or documents which should be narrowed down to? Where was the scope decided to be drawn to try to actually determine what documents should use plain language and what documents shouldn't? Because I think the public have quite a lot of questions about that."