Cunliffe David: State Sector Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Cunliffe David: State Sector Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:610;Page:7312] 
Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE (Minister of State) 
: 
 I move  
That the question be now put 
. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Clem Simich) 
: I note that the Hon David Carter has been seeking the call for some time but members have been clearly indicating that they wish to move on to the bill itself. 
Hon DAVID CARTER (NZ National) 
: 
 Thank you Mr Chairman for observing my persistence. I certainly want to talk to the title “State Sector Amendment Bill” because in my mind that title does not reflect the true ramifications of this legislation. We see a lot of amendment bills going through this Parliament and in many cases they involve minor amendments but I want to argue that this bill is not about a minor change to the State sector and therefore should be called the “State Sector Restructuring Bill”. The history of this legislation was detailed when the Minister himself took a call about a quarter of an hour ago to explain why we are discussing the State Sector Amendment Bill. This bill is about the ability of the Government to significantly restructure our State sector and not have to bring that restructuring back to Parliament for Parliament to debate it. 
When Mr Mallard took his call he said that this bill was a relatively minor piece of legislation—I think he used the word “innocuous”. He talked about a situation occurring whereby if a public servant “got a nominal change in his or her role” then that person should not be entitled to redundancy. That is why this legislation was rushed into the House at the time we had the Christine Rankin issue on the table. The Minister shakes his head—he has forgotten. That is why the Minister introduced this legislation and gave it a 5-week period in the select committee before it had to be reported back. It was because there was an important issue around a certain embarrassment for the Government associated with a certain person called Christine Rankin. The Government restructured her job restructured the department and took that as an opportunity to get rid of her. That is why this legislation should be called not the State Sector Amendment Bill but the “State Sector Restructuring Bill” because that is the sort of power it gives the Minister. 
The Minister can take the next call to explain why the select committee was given only 5 weeks before the bill was rushed back into the House—where lo and behold it sat on the Order Paper for two long laborious years before Mr Mallard thought: “I think we should try to finish it off. We’ve got ourselves into an embarrassing situation with the State Sector Amendment Bill and we now need to at least complete the process we started.” That is the issue with this legislation. It is not about a minor amendment to State services. It is not about changing the redundancy possibilities or provisions for employees of the State sector when there is a nominal change in role. Christine Rankin was not faced with a nominal change in her role. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: Her contract had expired. 
Hon DAVID CARTER 
: That Minister wanted to get rid of her—so did Mr Maharey—because she was so effective. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: Ha! Ha! 
Hon DAVID CARTER 
: The Minister laughs again. He should be ashamed at the way sickness and invalid beneficiary numbers have increased under that Government. Christine Rankin would not have let that happen; she cared too much about the people. She was not going to cast those people into the benefit trap whereby the Government hopes they will vote Labour for the rest of their lives because they do not know any better. She wanted to actually help people and give them an opportunity to make a commitment. 
I say to Mr Mallard that that is what this legislation is all about. It is about making sure that the Government does not get into an embarrassing situation when it has someone who is actually good at their job and performing so well that it goes against the interests of this Government which quite likes seeing people trapped on a benefit. That is why I am arguing strongly that this legislation be meaningfully named by calling it the “State Sector Restructuring Bill”.