edithatogo/nz-hansard-corpus huggingface dataset:
Simmonds PennyPENNY SIMMONDS (National—Invercargill): Well here we go again—the Labour Government heaping more regulatory pain on our small-business people who are trying to get back on their feet. And they are so keen to do it that they will get it started under urgency. Of course we all must do everything we can to ensure that workers are safe in their workplace. Sadly this Government did not even bother to go out and consult with the small businesses to see what they were doing. If they had done that they might have found that they were effectively and informally—as you would be in a small family environment—looking after each other. But no this Government has to impose regulation on them.I read recently that most small-business owners do not expect to be taking any time off over Christmas. They don't have enough workers to do it they're so busy and they won't get any time off with their family. Can I just compare that with our members of Parliament on the other side. Recently in a select committee we were looking at dates to hear submissions on a particular bill and I said Well let's do it at the end of January. We can have those submissions at the end of January—" Oh no they couldn't do that.Marja Lubeck: Point of order Mr Speaker. I believe that the member's referring to discussions at select committee that happened in a private session not a public session.SPEAKER: Well is that correct?PENNY SIMMONDS: Sorry Mr Speaker do you want me to sit down? It was just a time in the select committee when we were trying to decide on submission hearing dates.SPEAKER: Well just avoid discussing things that are not yet public.PENNY SIMMONDS: Thank you very much Mr Speaker. My only reason for bringing it up was to compare that MPs seem to be intent on ensuring that they have a good two months off—Dr Deborah Russell: Point of order Mr Speaker. I understand that the incident that the member is referring to occurred during a private session of a select committee—in the most recent sentence she's uttered.SPEAKER: Thank you. If that is correct as I warned the member before and if it happens again I will consider terminating the member's speech.PENNY SIMMONDS: Thank you very much Mr Speaker. I'm merely wanting to point out—SPEAKER: No no no. Don't even refer to it. Just move on.PENNY SIMMONDS: Right. I won't refer to it. I will refer to our poor hard-working small businesses that are getting no time off over Christmas. They certainly aren't getting two months off over Christmas and yet this Government is keen to put more regulatory compliance on them. Thank you very much Mr Speaker."
Lubeck MarjaMARJA LUBECK (Labour): Thank you Mr Speaker and I had no intention of bringing that up at all. But I want to say: what a rubbish speech from the previous speaker the Hon Todd McClay who is trying to lecture this Government on health and safety. Now let's remember that this member was very likely a part of a Government in 2015 that classified worm farming as dangerous but not dairy farming. So this is an Opposition that is trying to tell us about health and safety when they in fact caused all of those issues. So I'm actually really privileged and honoured to be rising in support of the Health and Safety at Work (Health and Safety Representatives and Committees) Amendment Bill at this first reading. I'm also looking forward to this bill coming to our select committee the Education and Workforce Committee and hearing these submissions on that.Health and safety outcomes as we heard from the Minister have improved since the regulatory changes and establishment of WorkSafe after of course the Pike River mine disaster. But New Zealand still has a high rate of work-related harm in comparison to other countries. Now I did that hear that member the Hon Todd McClay make a statement once I think of wanting people to be safe but that's all I heard in that speech. I did however hear at least 25 times the word cost" mentioned so that is very clearly where the National Party has its priorities. The member Todd McClay said that if there is an issue or a problem we should deal with it. Well Mr McClay people still get injured and die at work. Last year there was a fatal work-related injury claim in New Zealand of 54. Our rates of fatalities in fact per hundred thousand workers are roughly double those of Australia and are four times what the UK has.So it's an absolute privilege to take a short call on this bill. I'm looking forward as I said to hearing the submissions on this and I commend it to the House. Thank you."
Ngobi TerisaTERISA NGOBI (Labour—Ōtaki): Tēnā koe Mr Speaker. As we've already heard this bill addresses the disparities in access to the ACC scheme for Māori for Pacific peoples for disabled peoples for women for ethnic communities for children and young people and for our kaumātua—our seniors.So this Labour Government has already started some of that work in addressing these inequities—for example extending the ACC cover to maternal birth injuries for women. This bill continues this Labour Government's plan to look after all New Zealanders. You would think that the National Party would support this bill and all New Zealanders not just their rich mates. For that I commend this bill to the House.
McKelvie IanIAN McKELVIE (National—Rangitīkei): Thank you Mr Speaker. Well well this is a bill I could go on for hours about. ACC of course is one of the great New Zealand innovations and you've got to give credit to those people who put it together initially because it is one of the great schemes in New Zealand.The interesting thing I find about this bill is that it's really charging ACC with looking into its own processes and if you think about that from a logical perspective for a Government agency it's not necessarily the best way of doing things. I would have thought that if we needed to look into the transparency and levels of access to a scheme you wouldn't really charge the people charged with protecting the scheme from the people who want to access it to look into that.So I think that whilst getting ACC to look into some of these things or having some of these things looked into is a perfectly logical way to go about things from our perspective we'd like to see what comes out of them at select committee. So I don't support the bill at first reading but I do think there's some irony I guess in getting the gamekeeper to look at how they protect their own. I think there could be other ways; obviously that will come out in the course of the select committee work and I look forward to seeing how that goes. Thank you Mr Speaker.
Roberts AngelaANGELA ROBERTS (Labour): It is a pleasure to stand and take a short call on this bill that isn't about nothing. This isn't a bill looking for a problem. This is a really great bill to help to ensure that we have better equity and health outcomes for more New Zealanders. And it is because of that that I commend this bill to the House.
Boyack RachelRACHEL BOYACK (Labour—Nelson): Thank you Mr Speaker. Just acknowledging the previous speaker's comment about this bill being as good as the Plain Language Act—that's a great compliment I think for this bill. It's an excellent bill. The piece I like the most in this bill is the reduction of the stand-down period for people who have been injured and are entitled to ACC from six weeks down to two weeks. For working people who are no longer able to go and earn wages anymore and they become injured reducing that stand down makes a huge difference to their availability to be able to pay the rent. It's an excellent bill I look forward to seeing the submissions and I commend it to the House.
Penk ChrisCHRIS PENK (National—Kaipara ki Mahurangi): Thank you Mr Speaker. As others have said on the National Party side—I mean we've made our position pretty clear—it's not obvious either as a matter of common sense or as advised by the Minister's office or regulatory impact statement or similar what the need is for this bill. Particularly we've heard from the Labour contributors to the debate that it's important to help vulnerable people. Of course it is. People who need the services of ACC are vulnerable by definition. They've suffered some accident or injury of course otherwise they wouldn't be eligible for the scheme. Now if it were necessary to establish that such access was not possible then of course research can and should take place but it doesn't need a piece of legislation to do that. This is with all due respect the Plain Language Act of this week. And I say that with all due respect. Let's just say it's as good as the Plain Language Act and everyone can assign the value however high or low they wish accordingly. But in any case ACC doesn't need to be legislated to look into it and just to the point that Toni Severin made the ACC scheme's been going for 50 years. This week feels like it's been going 50 years so I won't prolong it any longer. But let's hear the justification for this at select committee. But we can't support it in the meantime.
Omer Ibrahim; Rurawhe AdrianIBRAHIM OMER (Labour): Thank you Mr Speaker. It's a pleasure to take a short call on the Accident Compensation (Access Reporting and Other Matters) Amendment Bill. This bill simply follows from previous improvements to the Act which were on maternal birth injuries. This change would ensure that ACC focuses on all New Zealanders rather than those who made a claim because now there are a lot of inconsistencies in the Act itself.For me the best part though is for those who are on low incomes because the 80 percent earnings threshold is lower than the minimum rate of weekly compensation itself. I just want to tell the previous speaker Toni Severin that this bill is worth urgency because it affects a lot of people. It will help a lot of vulnerable people—the group of people that's been in the Minister's speech previously. So it is a good bill and I commend it to the House.SPEAKER: This is a split call. Chris Penk—five minutes.
Belich CamillaCAMILLA BELICH (Labour): Thank you Mr Speaker. I'm incredibly proud to be doing a short call on the Accident Compensation (Access Reporting and Other Matters) Amendment Bill. Now the House will recall that we had another bill in relation to ACC recently on birth injuries also brought by our excellent Minister for ACC the Hon Carmel Sepuloni. That bill was brought to the House in order to increase access to a group of people that hadn't been able to access ACC. This bill in the same vein follows the advice that she received showing there were disparities in access by Māori women Pacific peoples disabled people ethnic communities children young people and seniors. So I ask the National Party: if you were the Minister if the National Party was the Minister what would they do if they got that information? Nothing. That's what they're telling the House today: absolutely nothing. I commend this bill to the House.
Simmonds PennyPENNY SIMMONDS (National—Invercargill): Thank you Mr Speaker. It does feel somewhat bizarre to be standing in the House debating something in urgency on a Friday—Friday afternoon which it is now—for at least two parts of a bill that don't need legislation for it to occur. My colleague has mentioned that over a considerable period of time for about 30 years ACC were publishing that sort of in-depth information so there is no reason why the Minister could not ask ACC to monitor and put in their annual report Māori access women and people with disabilities. There is no need for this legislation. We are standing here under urgency debating a bill that the Minister can make happen anyway without legislation. It seems bizarre. On the change to the eligibility for the minimum rate of weekly compensation no regulatory impact statement has been done so we just don't know who this applies to how many and what the impact could be. I was desperately trying to think of what it might be. I guess it might be those that are perhaps on a training wage or a start-up wage. Perhaps that's what it's applying to but the Minister hasn't given us that information. So we're sitting here standing here debating something that we don't have any idea about how many people it might apply to and what the impact might be. And I'd have to say that that's pretty much par for this Government: that they don't bother to do that due diligence to have a look at what the impact might be what it might cost therefore what it might add to the budget of this country. We've seen it. We've seen with Minister Hipkins that he can miss a whole due diligence process that means low to mid hundreds of millions of dollars of extra money might be needed in his reform of vocational education of the polytechnics. I know this will be much smaller but it's about the bad practice of not doing due diligence not checking what the cost might be. And that's how you get a Government that just spends money like water and doesn't pay due diligence as to why it's doing that. So we're opposing this bill at its first reading but we're willing to work constructively in the select committee provided we get a bit more information to actually inform us why we are even looking at this bill. Thank you very much Mr Speaker. We oppose it at this first reading.
Lubeck MarjaMARJA LUBECK (Labour): Thank you Mr Speaker. It's a pleasure to take a call on this bill that is about increasing the equity of access to entitlement from this scheme. The Minister has already outlined the fact that this Government has taken steps to address the inequity of access to the scheme for women by extending it to maternal birth injuries. It's really interesting to hear the previous speaker Simon Watts say there is no evidence of people struggling to access ACC. Well that member obviously needs to get out more and talk to actual working people because when I was an advocate for working people in my previous role there were plenty of people that had had trouble accessing ACC. So indeed this bill is about access Mr Watts and that is what this bill is doing. It will reverse some of the incentivising of people to go back to work early which was one of the first consequences from when National in Government changed the ACC legislation. This is a great bill. Ka mihi ahau ki tēnei pire ki te Whare.[I commend this bill that is before the House.]Thank you Mr Speaker.
Belich CamillaCAMILLA BELICH (Labour): Thank you Mr Speaker. I'm pleased and proud to stand to take a call on the Legal Services Amendment Bill today. This is a great bill. It removes a user charge that currently prevents access to justice therefore increasing access to justice for New Zealanders which I think we can all agree is something that the whole House should agree on. I do want to respond briefly to the members on the other side. I do feel a slight warming towards this bill and so I hope that when it is referred to select committee we can all agree to support it. And I commend it to the House.
O'Connor SimonSIMON O'CONNOR (National—Tāmaki): Look thank you Mr Speaker. The National Party continues to oppose this bill—as much to send a signal to the Government about rushing through legislation without proper consideration oversight and transparency. We anticipate it will go through to select committee which will be a good chance to try and interrogate some of the themes here.Look we all understand there are difficulties accessing justice—and yes expense is one of them. I think it's probably rather important to note to the House: people do not lose access to justice because of this. The very fact that there's interest on an unpaid fee indicates people don't pay the fee but still get the service.Now that's still a bit of an issue there that needs to be addressed but when you look at all the issues we are facing in society today—including the murder of a dairy owner constant ram raids violence attacks assaults in the community. We had just one of my young people—the father's been in touch with me—who was attacked the other day. Fortunately she knew karate and gave the guy a kick in a place that you'd want to give a guy a kick in and she got away.But long and short there's a lot of crime and activity. This bill whether or not noble is hardly the highest priority I would think of a Government needing to address a surge in crime. So as we say at this point as a signal National is opposing. But I presume it will make the vote and get into select committee and we will interrogate it more there.
Henderson EmilyDr EMILY HENDERSON (Labour—Whangārei): Kia ora e te Māngai o te Whare. It is hugely disappointing to find that the National Party are not supporting this bill. I am surprised there is any lawyer or ex-lawyer who could possibly consider that it is in the interests of justice for us to continue to charge this application fee or to continue to charge interest.As an ex-lawyer of both the criminal court and the Family Court over many years I am aware of my many colleagues—and on occasion myself—who have not only applied for exemptions constantly but also actually paid the fee ourselves in order to allow our clients to apply for much-needed cases over relationship property over custody and over employment as we have heard. This bill absolutely necessary to undo the damaging policies of previous Government. I am very pleased to say ka mihi ahau ki tēnei pire ki te Whare [I commend this bill that is before the House].
Webb DuncanDr DUNCAN WEBB (Labour—Christchurch Central): Kia ora e te Mana Whakawā. This bill supports access to justice. The National Party appears to oppose that. I certainly do not. I commend this bill to the House.
Williams Arena; Rurawhe AdrianARENA WILLIAMS (Labour—Manurewa): Tēna koe Mr Speaker. You know anyone following along to the House this morning would be forgiven for being a little bit confused about this. Every speaker in this House has stood up for access to justice. Everyone in this House believes that in a fair and just and democratic society one of the most fundamental things is that we need to be able to access justice so that we can preserve our rights so that things are fair for us whatever we think those rights-balancing exercises may be. So they might be a little bit confused to hear the ACT member Nicole McKee who is a very sensible member talk about this bill as a good idea that she supports and then for the National Party to oppose it. It doesn't make sense. Victims use this fund. Families in the Family Court use this fund. To be charged $50 as a user charge does not have a policy rationale anymore. It's simply a barrier to access to justice that this Government is getting rid of and we're being opposed in this debate for opposition's sake. I really hope that we can come together in the select committee and find a way through this in a consensus-based approach because it doesn't make sense not to support this bill.SPEAKER: Harete Hipango—five minutes.
Walters VanushiVANUSHI WALTERS (Labour—Upper Harbour): Thank you Mr Speaker. We had a saying in Community Law which went The opposite of poverty isn't wealth; it's access to justice." Legal help must be affordable for it to be accessible. I give my Opposition colleague some advice: there was a wonderful series that RNZ ran in the summer of 2021-2022 called Is this Justice? They covered a number of people including a young man who was bringing an employment claim that left him significantly in debt with a caveat over his house. So this does really put some people who are trying very hard to raise valid legal claims in an extraordinarily difficult complex space.One of my colleagues on the opposite benches spoke about existing provisions in the legislation. They are there. However as Frances Joychild KC notes to have legal aid debt written off is very very rare. She says "The person has to be dog poor just about living in emergency accommodation with nothing to get it written off." There is very much a need and I commend this bill to the House."
Goldsmith PaulHon PAUL GOLDSMITH (National): Thank you Mr Speaker. The previous speaker referred to the basic sort of concern around access to justice which I think everybody in the country and certainly in the Parliament is very focused on. If you think about the justice sector more broadly what are the challenges that we really need to be focused on? It's around dealing with violent crime more effectively dealing with youth crime more effectively and then third actually speeding up the process of the courts which is taking years for people to get access to justice. Unfortunately there's not much progress being made on any of those three key areas. But we see a plethora of bills coming from the Government on bits and pieces that may or may not help with those overall challenges that we face.There's no question that legal aid is a system that is not working as well as it could do. It's far from clear to us that reducing the small barrier in terms of the $50 fee will help with that particularly and certainly doing away with interest on loans will only encourage people not paying them back in any great haste. I'm not sure whether they are the right places to be focusing the Government's intention. Actually trying to speed up the process so that people can get on with their lives more quickly and dealing with the broader context of crime so that we have fewer victims of crime in the first place I think would be a better area for the Government to be focused.So we're far from convinced that this makes sense this legislation. In fact when you look at the detail it's very light indeed. In fact it seems like this has just been thrown together without a great deal of thought whatsoever. So we'll be interested in the select committee process to hear from the broader sector. But our general impression from looking at this piece of legislation is that the Government doesn't really have its eyes focused on the big issues in justice that need to be resolved more swiftly. I wish and encourage the Minister to get herself focused on those issues today. Thank you.
Andersen GinnyGINNY ANDERSEN (Labour—Hutt South): Thank you very much Mr Speaker. Well it's disappointing to hear the National Party won't be supporting the bill. Some of the changes to the legal aid system made under the previous National Government caused thousands of New Zealanders many obstacles in order to access justice. So this is a bill designed to remove those obstacles. The Legal Services Amendment Bill repeals sections of the Legal Services Act from back in 2011 that require the payment of a user charge and interest on unpaid legal aid debt—pretty clear to me. The proposed changes will mean thousands of New Zealanders who would otherwise not be able to afford a lawyer will be able to have proper legal representation. The justice system can be a stressful place for many people who are not familiar with it—financial barriers and the stresses that come with them make the experience much more overwhelming than it should be. The bill responds to the Ministry of Justice findings from back in 2018 on legal aid. Budget 2022 provided $148.7 million to strengthen the legal aid system. We will continue to make improvements to the justice system so everybody in New Zealand has appropriate access to justice. I commend the bill to the House.
Sosene Lemauga Lydia; Rurawhe AdrianLEMAUGA LYDIA SOSENE (Labour): Thank you Mr Speaker. I rise to take the last call on behalf of the Government in the first reading of this bill. This bill provides clarity and certainty for local authorities. The change is to improve natural hazard information provided in the LIM report otherwise known as the land information memorandum report and align the processes of the Official Information Act to improve the LGOIMA otherwise known as the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act 1987 to have that better alignment and it fits in the larger plan of the Government's larger objectives. I commend this bill to the House.Motion agreed to.Bill read a first time.SPEAKER: The question is That the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Amendment Bill be considered by the Governance and Administration Committee.Bill referred to the Governance and Administration Committee.
Local Government Official Information and Meetings Amendment Bill — First Reading
SpeechHARETE HIPANGO (National): Thank you. I take the last call for the National Party on the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Amendment Bill—also being referred to in the House as LGOIMA which sounds a bit like an infectious condition.So in terms of the infectious nature of this the National Party has indicated supporting this at the first reading through to select committee. And it is dealing with process issues. So notably that this has come before the House under urgency. The process issue—as has been identified by colleague Simon Watts—this is under urgency why is that? When this has been well-known by the Government with a disclosure statement having been prepared and also a regulatory impact statement prepared in June this year and also November last year.So here we are bearing in mind almost 12 months later the Government deems that this is a matter of urgency and here we are. What's very important about this bill Mr Speaker—welcome to the Chair—is that this is as I said addressing matters of process where the bill will make changes to improve the process of making available important information to the public.In relation to natural hazards provided in the land information memoranda which are known as LIM reports to those persons who have purchased properties—buyers beware—needing to check out whether there is anything to be concerned about the nature of the property. So the land information memoranda will identify as a result of this LGOIMA the alignment of provisions in the Act also associated with whether it is appropriate or not to withhold certain information.Listening to debates in the House it's been interesting because this bill is very much focused around local government territorial authorities. So in my Māori development role—and I'm looking across the House at the Minister for Māori Development—we are aware that within the Māori Land Court there is particular information held and sometimes that information is not made available and accessible to the local government territorial authorities.It will be interesting at select committee when this bill is being examined the importance of being able to access all the appropriate information. That's called due process as well in terms of the diligence of it being scrutinised before the select committee.So keeping my call brief the National Party supports this bill. Appropriately it's going to select committee—questionably why it is under urgency but importantly that the public gets the opportunity according to due process to scrutinise the elements of this bill. I commend the bill to the House.
Webb DuncanDr DUNCAN WEBB (Labour—Christchurch Central): Thank you Madam Speaker. Very happy to take a call on this bill on the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Amendment Bill. I'm very surprised to hear the ACT Party suggesting that there shouldn't be all available information on a LIM. Property owners by selling and buying should be able to see the nature of the land they're buying—all of the information that pertains to it including all natural hazards information. I absolutely commend this bill to the House.
Kanongata'a AnahilaANAHILA KANONGATA'A-SUISUIKI (Labour): Kia ora e te Mana Whakawā. Ka mihi ahau ki tēnei pire ki te Whare. [Thank you Madam Speaker. I commend this bill that is before the House.]
Smith StuartSTUART SMITH (National—Kaikōura): Thank you Madam Speaker. It's a pleasure to speak on the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Amendment Bill. Actually like my colleague Simon Court spoke there earlier I am very concerned about property owners whose LIMs could be attached to their property title highlighting that they're at risk of flood and sea-level rise etc. and actually all the current data that they're using is using the flawed representative concentration pathway (RCP) 8.5 model and that has been completely discredited now and actually even the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change have walked away from it at the COP flop—the latest COP meeting: COP-27. They've completely walked away from it. It actually hasn't made the mainstream media yet—shame on them; they should be talking about this. This is massive news. So Madam Speaker for your information instead of expecting a business as usual temperature rise of 4 to 5 degrees by 2100 it is now 2.5 degrees by 2100. That's business as usual. RCP 8.5 actually could only be achieved if we burnt coal for everything increasing coal consumption by many many times what it is today and including using coal to run our cars. It's not going to happen and that's why they've walked away from it. They should have done it a long time ago. Actually everyone in New Zealand should know about it and rejoice because we don't have a climate emergency. Yes we have a climate issue and we're going to address that but it's certainly nowhere near an emergency. Thank you Madam Speaker.
Bennett GlenGLEN BENNETT (Labour—New Plymouth): Kia ora Madam Speaker and I'd like to congratulate the previous member—the member of the ACT Party—as he crunches the numbers for his bid to become the next leader of ACT. I look forward to that being announced shortly. I support this piece of legislation the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Amendment Bill. It's good legislation. I'm glad that we can get it through under urgency so it can go out to the public and we can consult on this piece of work so I commend this to the House.
Strange JamieJAMIE STRANGE (Labour—Hamilton East): This is an excellent piece of legislation. I commend it to the House.
Pugh MaureenMAUREEN PUGH (National): Thank you Madam Speaker. I stand with the National Party in support to get this bill under way. The Local Government Official Information and Meetings Amendment Bill or LGOIMA as we call it. The issue around it being dropped in urgency I think was well-made by my colleague Simon Watts. If it's so urgent that we're dealing with it in urgency where we're dealing with something like 24 pieces of legislation—some of them introduced and passing through all stages during this urgency session which means no public scrutiny—if the process started and the advice was given last year it isn't really that urgent that we need to be dealing with it here. But it could be another one of those bills that is pushed off to a select committee in the next couple of weeks and they'll call for submissions over Christmas and it gives everyone a break. So everyone out there in New Zealand that's got anything or any interest in these types of bills will be deprived of their Christmas break because they'll be flat out writing submissions and reading legislation.There's a couple of things in here that I just wanted to flag. The alignment has been spoken about with the Official Information Act (OIA) and LGOIMA makes sense. The disclosures around LIMs and property information make sense. But the one that does raise a flag with me is around aligning LGOIMA with the OIA so that we have information disclosure rules. And that's going to be interesting to watch as the select committee processes that. The wording is something like withholding grounds for information that would be likely to prejudice the security or defence of New Zealand." So you know could that mean inciting distrust in the Government if it's deemed to be mis- dis- or mal-information as we are becoming so familiar with. So I think we've got to be very careful we don't align this with hate speech laws as well. This is just OIA in LGOIMA—Simon Watts: Tricky eh?MAUREEN PUGH: Could be very tricky Simon Watts—that we start to control disclosure of information based on other things.But the other one in that particular area of alignment is around the information that can be withheld that is likely to prejudice the security or defence of New Zealand or the international relations of the Government of New Zealand and that is allowing the Prime Minister to certify those. Now does relations of the Government of New Zealand also include the reputation of said Prime Minister? And if it does is it something that the select committee should turn its mind to? I think they've got an interesting job ahead of them. I commend it to the House."
Boyack RachelRACHEL BOYACK (Labour—Nelson): Thank you Madam Speaker. It's a pleasure to take a call on the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Amendment Bill. As has been mentioned this bill amends the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act to ensure that information on natural hazards including climate change impacts are included in LIMs. The bill ensures that we have consistency and transparency across councils across Aotearoa and is a critical action under the Government's recently released national adaptation plan so that communities and households can plan for their future. This bill is important for my electorate of Nelson and for the whole Te Tau Ihu region in light of the recent flooding that has occurred across our part of the country. Our communities are seeking certainty and information regarding their properties and this is a particular matter that they have spoken to me about in light of the recent flooding events. As a member of the Governance and Administration Committee I look forward to receiving submissions and considering this bill. It's an excellent bill and I commend it to the House.
Utikere TangiTANGI UTIKERE (Labour—Palmerston North): Well thank you Madam Speaker. It's a pleasure to rise as the final speaker and I think—[Interruption]ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Barbara Kuriger): Order! Sorry just a moment. Sorry but we cannot have the gallery participating in the debate. TANGI UTIKERE: Thank you Madam Speaker. What that contribution from Maureen Pugh indicated was what sums up the National Party's approach: doomsday pessimism and scepticism. But on this side of the House we're something different. This bill will allow for greater certainty for the future within the minerals space and on that basis I commend the Crown Minerals Amendment Bill to the House.
Sosene Lemauga LydiaLEMAUGA LYDIA SOSENE (Labour): Thank you Madam Speaker. I rise to take a short contribution on the Crown Minerals Amendment Bill. This bill is proposing changes to modernise the Crown Minerals Act 1991 and to support more environmentally conscious management of resources consistent with the Government's climate change commitments. The new amendment bill brings the original Act up to date. I commend this bill to the House.
Simmonds Penny; Kuriger BarbaraPENNY SIMMONDS (National—Invercargill): Thank you Madam Speaker. I'm very pleased to be able to call out the Government and speak on this bill. Of all the vanity projects of this Labour Government—and there are plenty of them—this Government's approach to mining generally and coal particularly has to be the supreme vanity project of all. This country's energy: 7 percent is contributed by coal—7 percent. The rest of the world? Well let's have a look: US 12 percent coal; EU 14 percent coal; Australia 31 percent coal; China 62 percent coal.Well what's our 7 percent of coal usage used for? Now I know this will be a revelation to the other side of the House—it'll be an absolute revelation—but New Zealand has got a primary sector. We grow and produce food and we send it offshore and it makes about $30 billion a year for this country. It takes a lot of energy to be able to process that food and send it overseas and feed about 40 million people across the world. So wake up other side of the House.This Government needs to remember they have more than doubled the import of Indonesian coal since they've been here. So if we do not mine coal in New Zealand coal in those wonderful provinces of Southland and the West Coast of the South Island then dirtier and more emissions-intensive Indonesian coal will need to be imported. And how does it get here? It gets here on boats and they need energy. Then it has to be trucked to Huntly and that needs fuel. More Indonesian coal needs to come into Huntly to provide electricity to the grid when we need that thermal backup.So you go you great Labour Government climate warriors—you go. You keep talking a big game on the national stage while you keep importing more and more Indonesian coal. Thankfully—thankfully—National has a lot more common sense and will oppose this ridiculous bill. Thank you.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Barbara Kuriger): Debbie Ngarewa-Packer—five minutes.
Kanongata'a Anahila; Dean JacquiANAHILA KANONGATA'A-SUISUIKI (Labour): Kia ora e te Mana Whakawā. This bill will bring the Crown Minerals Act up to date changing the Government's approach from promoting" to "managing" it. I commend this bill to the House.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): I call Penny Simmonds—a five-minute call."
Coffey TāmatiTĀMATI COFFEY (Labour): Yeah that's a grumpy contribution there from that member Andrew Bayly. But that's OK—it's early in the morning. What he needs to understand is that we're doing this in the best interests of New Zealand. For that reason this side of the House commends the bill to the House.
Bayly AndrewANDREW BAYLY (National—Port Waikato): Thank you Madam Speaker. Well it's a pleasure to be talking on this new bill. Gee we're ripping through them this morning. As my good colleague Stuart Smith has already identified we're opposing this bill the Crown Minerals Amendment Bill. This is a ridiculous bill.First of all I listened to the member just before Rachel Brooking who talked about this being an important resource". Well if you can't use it it doesn't become a resource. It's not a resource and in fact I'd argue that in the title of the Minister the Minister of Energy and Resources why don't we just strike out "Resources"—because that is what this is about. This is about stopping the exploitation of a whole lot of minerals in New Zealand and we don't need to worry about it do we because we're so wealthy! New Zealand is so wealthy let's just let that go—let it go—because we're just going to survive and we don't need to worry about all this stuff.It is interesting listening to Mr Smith talking about the rare earths that are available in New Zealand particularly polysilicon which he talked about in UV panels etc. But the electric vehicles the batteries—all that stuff could be mined here. This is about keeping New Zealand in a situation where we're self-reliant. What have we just learnt about COVID? It was about making sure that you keep manufacturing and you keep resources as close to home as possible so you're not overly reliant on going offshore for a lot of very precious metals which is what this Crown Minerals Amendment Bill is about.This bill is about virtue-signalling but even worse than that this is about throwing away billions of dollars' worth of value. We all get the issue that mining needs to be done in an ecological and environmentally sustainable way and it can be and has been and should be. We get that—that's not up for debate. But to say that this resource is no longer going to be promoted no longer going to be allowed and that we'll just manage what we've got is a different proposition and is absolutely wrong for New Zealand and for future New Zealanders.Even in terms of managing it Part 2 imposes a whole lot of extra requirements. Obviously now you've got to get iwi sign-off on reports—all that sort of stuff. Slowly we will see if we let this Government carry on for another term that they will slowly increase the regulatory barriers to this to make it even harder for the mining companies whoever might be taking it according to a consent arrangement to be able to continue their activities because the Government has slowly ratcheted that up so that they get to the stage where most people say it's not worth it.This is a bad bill. It's bad for New Zealanders. It's bad for young New Zealanders and future New Zealanders because it is throwing away and squandering the future wealth of New Zealand. It's a bad bill."
Brooking RachelRACHEL BROOKING (Labour): Thank you Madam Speaker. While I don't agree with everything that the previous speaker has said I do agree about the importance of minerals.What we're talking about here is a change to the Purpose clause of the Crown Minerals Act. Now Crown minerals are defined in section 10 of the principal Act—that's petroleum gold silver and uranium.The changes to the purpose at 1A(1)—at the moment it reads The purpose of this Act is to promote prospecting for exploration for and mining of Crown owned minerals for the benefit of New Zealand." This bill will amend "promote"—which was inserted in 2013—to "manage".This is an important resource. It's unusual because it's Crown-owned so there's a property interest. And rather than "promoting" the change is to "manage" and that is sensible for the reasons outlined by the Minister. I commend the bill to the House."
Utikere Tangi; Dean JacquiTANGI UTIKERE (Labour—Palmerston North): Thank you Madam Speaker. It's a pleasure to rise as the final speaker on this bill the Fuel Industry Amendment Bill which is an important step to increase fuel market competition and at the end of the day that will benefit consumers at the pump and at the bowser. So on that basis I commend the bill to the House. ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): The question is that the motion be agreed to.
Sosene Lemauga LydiaLEMAUGA LYDIA SOSENE (Labour): I rise to take a short call on the Fuel Industry Amendment Bill. The bill introduces the prospect of price regulation more competition and it's better for consumers. Kiwis want to pay a fair price at the pump. I commend this bill to the House.
Strange JamieJAMIE STRANGE (Labour—Hamilton East): I commend this bill to the House.
Uffindell SamSAM UFFINDELL (National—Tauranga): Thank you Madam Speaker. I rise to oppose this bill the Fuel Industry Amendment Bill. I'm not convinced that what we need are price controls. This is not the sort of way that you make the market work and if anything if you look over at what they've done in the UK it's looking like it's going to be a complete disaster. They're on the brink of having to nationalise their energy just to do this which is a massive problem. Look we agree that prices are too high; that much is evident. When I returned to New Zealand I think I was paying 83c or 84c occasionally for diesel and recently I think it got pretty close to $3. It's subsided in the last couple of months but it's still far too much. And a lot of New Zealanders are feeling the cost of living crisis brought on predominantly by this Labour Government. [Bell rings] Now we've got a number of major—what happened there Madam Speaker? I didn't realise I'd gone through three minutes so quickly. ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): It was great—no it was great.SAM UFFINDELL: Now we've got a number of major fuel companies in New Zealand. Competition is not the problem. We've got five major ones and we note that where Gull is in place fuel prices are generally 10c to 30c a litre cheaper. Now I use Gull pretty frequently. We've got them on Hewletts Road in Tauranga and also just up the road in Te Puke. And that is what we do. We get on Gaspy and we see when Gull is offering us the good deal and then we go. So bringing that competition into the market is very important.I'd also like to reference Timaru Oil Services Ltd. who wanted to set up an import terminal hub in my electorate of Tauranga but were not able to get that over the line due to resource consent—just like we're not able to get the Port of Tauranga third berth over the line due to resource consent at an enormous detriment to this country. We hide behind little concerns and put that in the way of actually getting things done. So we don't need price controls. We have a proper functioning market. We have competitors in the market. We have an additional oil service terminal that we can bring into the market in Tauranga. And those are the things that we need to be focused on and those are the things that will make a real difference to the price of petrol for New Zealanders.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): Jamie Strange—five minute call.
Kanongata'a Anahila; Dean JacquiANAHILA KANONGATA'A-SUISUIKI (Labour): We found the last National Government supported by ACT asleep at the bowser for nine years. We are taking a balanced approach. I commend the Fuel Industry Amendment Bill to the House.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): Sam Uffindell—a five-minute call.
Genter Julie AnneHon JULIE ANNE GENTER (Green): Tēnā koe Mr Speaker. Tēnā koutou e te Whare. Really this debate and many other debates that we have right now in this House are about two different versions of the world—one where we create an economy that works for everyone especially the planet which ultimately we all need to survive and thrive; or one in which we say hands off" but that just allows entrenched interests that already have power and wealth to continue concentrating more of that. That is the great battle really that is happening right now in the 21st century. It's happened before—this is the first time I guess that we've seen such concentrated wealth in quite a long time. In previous times it didn't end well—it ended in very violent conflict so now we have democracy and it's time for us to take control and to make sure that we're ensuring that the economy works for us and works for the planet. Because without a planet we have no economy.So this bill is actually quite interesting and I have to commend the Labour Government for bringing it to the House. It is really obvious that in New Zealand we have problems in key sectors getting actual competition. The dominant economic ideology since the 1980s has been "Competition's going to solve all our problems." Well we now have several decades of evidence that it's not solving our problems here in New Zealand it's not serving New Zealanders and it's resulting in higher prices.One of the key drivers of inflation is the fact that we have concentrated market power which is enabling some big corporates to have super profits in certain sectors including—there's evidence of extra high margins in petrol. So in economics we know what price controls are—they're used to create a fair market that is accessible to all; they're used to make goods and services affordable and curb inflation. So this is a perfect tool at this time. We'd like to see this tool used in other areas.I will mention to my colleagues in the National Party who say "Oh but there's five players in the industry; therefore there's competition": oligopoly—that there can be concentrated market power when five companies control more than 50 percent of the market. We know that there's evidence of that happening so these are well-known concepts in economics. And the reality is on the right side of the House they're trapped in a kind of ideology that isn't supported by evidence. They want to say "Oh yeah petrol should be affordable to everyone but we're not going to do anything about it."But I do want to say obviously that with climate change we have to be investing in alternatives and if as the Green Party had argued 20 years ago we had invested in an electrified transport system that was less reliant on private vehicles and we'd done more to phase out coal from Huntly then we wouldn't be as susceptible to rises in petrol prices because our transport system wouldn't be so reliant on it. So that's another thing we can do to protect people from high petrol prices and price gouging but also help us respond to the climate crisis. The Green Party supports this bill."
Coffey TāmatiTĀMATI COFFEY (Labour): We'll be supporting the bill over on this side of the House. I commend it to the House.
Brooking RachelRACHEL BROOKING (Labour): Thank you Mr Speaker for this opportunity to talk on the Fuel Industry Amendment Bill which gives the ability to make regulations. The aim is to keep profit margins under control and it's one of the many many things that this Labour Government is doing to get cost of living under control. Thank you Mr Speaker.
Clark DavidInstruction to Economic Development Science and Innovation CommitteeHon Dr DAVID CLARK (Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs): I move That the Grocery Industry Competition Bill be reported to the House by 23 March 2023.Motion agreed to.