McAnulty KieranKIERAN McANULTY (Labour): I was asked to provide a bookmaker's perspective on this particular piece of legislation. It is vitally important that the media I hope and the public recognise that on the whole this House is coming together to address a problem that would have caused considerable inconvenience to many people because there are a lot of people out there that use the social institution of a club or their local pub to go along and get together and watch something that's important to them and that of course is the All Blacks performing in the Rugby World Cup later on this year in Japan. They have a tremendous chance to do what no country's ever done before and win three in a row. Whilst I accept and respect the views of those that say that this probably should have been sorted out four years ago when we were in a similar situation and were faced with having to do a similar piece of legislation nevertheless I don't believe that's a reason to oppose it. We've got a situation in front of us now that we do need to fix because there are clubs around the country that have followed the rules as they are written out and have been declined their application to extend their licence to allow them to serve alcohol while showing the Rugby World Cup games. Rugby is vitally important to us as New Zealanders. It is deeply ingrained in many of the communities—all of the communities indeed—that we live in just like mine in Wairarapa. My beloved Wairarapa Bush beat Wanganui in the weekend by the way Mr Assistant Speaker and I'm sure you'd be very pleased to hear that. The fact is that you know many of us have grown up supporting rugby since we were young and for something that is essentially an administrative issue that is easily resolved it would have been a real shame to deny not only those people that wish to enjoy a responsible drink whilst watching the rugby but also those people—they might live in rural areas they might live in areas that the previous Government did not supply rural broadband to and therefore cannot connect to Spark and see the All Blacks. They've got to get together and do so at a club. They might also just simply not be able to afford the pay-per-view nature of the coverage of the Rugby World Cup and it would be a real shame if we did not extend the ability for clubs and pubs to get an extension of their licence to continue to serve alcohol whilst they are showing the games. Of course we do have a very good chance. Despite the confusion that was raised in this House by the Hon Nikki Kaye New Zealand is of course ranked at the top of the world and ready to go and we are going to do very well. I was reflecting on the speeches during the speeches of the last Rugby World Cup. A very good friend of mine Andrew Little and I happened to be in London at the time and I thought the House might enjoy this wee anecdote. I was young and ready to impress—of course I was wanting to get a decent spot on the list—so I thought I'd show the Labour leader at the time a good night out in London which was of course where the Rugby World Cup final was. I'd never actually spent any time in London so I had absolutely no idea what I was talking about and Andrew asked me to take him to a pub full of New Zealanders. The only pub that I knew was the Walkabout. I jumped in a cab and I said to the driver Take us to the Walkabout." and he gave me a funny look. He started the car and turned round the corner and parked up and said "Here it is." So my first opportunity to try and impress Andrew Little and I blew it. But luckily enough nevertheless I was given a very low list position and then unexpectedly we did quite well at the election and here I am. So there you go. The point is that this particular piece of legislation is very basic. It's very straightforward and it fixes something that should have been fixed a long time ago. I think that the calls for this to be addressed have been heard and I also want to point out one very important piece of information. It's not actually easy for some people to find the schedule of games for the world cup. They just need to look at the back of the legislation. Every single game is listed in the back of this piece of legislation and the New Zealand games are highlighted in bold as are the semi-finals the quarter-finals and of course the final.We're very pleased to see that this Government has worked alongside other members like David Seymour and those on the other side of the House that have put forward this idea. Everyone has seemed to have claimed some input in this. I had absolutely no input into this bill at all but I am very pleased to stand and speak in favour of it."