O'Connor DamienHon DAMIEN O'CONNOR (Minister of Agriculture): Thank you very much. I was going to take the time to run through I guess the rationale for the bill and perhaps I'll take a few minutes to do that. Look we are passing this bill through urgency. It's really important that it does pass. The shareholding suppliers of Fonterra had a vote on this. It was a very open process and they voted to support this through. It makes a number of changes that the members speaking refer to: the ability to share down to have one-third of the shares in a company that has for the most part and going way back in history—that says for every kilogram of milk solids you should hold one share; that has been changed. There were amendments made under what was called TAF—Trading Among Farmers—as an attempt to change the capital structure to remove what they called redemption risk if a whole lot of farmers left. In my view it was a faulty structure in the first place and we're now being asked to come in and straighten that out. I think it's reasonable that we do that with the endorsement of the shareholders. It's not a terribly controversial bill but it's one that is important. It's important that we get it right. And it is ultimately the tension between a competitive dairy market situation that keeps pressure on the single biggest player which is Fonterra doesn't allow monopolistic or monopsonistic behaviour that gives farmers a fair go and ensures that the company operates in an efficient way into the future. And so we as a Government have supported them. We've worked with Fonterra and we've made some adjustments not ones that Fonterra wished for but ones that we thought were really important to ensure the tension within the sector to drive the efficiency that we need.In terms of the people leaving Fonterra and/or people who might be sharing down and they have shares that might be worth $5 or $6—I'm not sure what they are at the moment actually—and then there's a fear that if they're forced to sell down or they are leaving the industry there might be an excessive number of shares come into the market at once and slump the market price. The fact that the share price has gone down in anticipation of some of this is a bit unfortunate. None the less the vast majority of the asset value is not in the shares but in the value of the farm. Those farms rely on the efficient operation of Fonterra and they need to get this capital structure right to be able to operate efficiently into the future. So while there might be some short-term pain—I acknowledge that and I've had emails from people—the long-term gain here is worth the changes that we're making. But the $300 million that Fonterra has allocated to buy back shares to ensure that people can have somewhere to sell their shares is really important. But also the provisions around the requirement to have a market-maker to have someone who's going to be in the market to buy and sell shares so that farmers aren't trapped are really really important. So those provisions are in here along with a few other issues. Can I just come back to the one of ensuring that some fairness is there for the core measure of the dairy industry the milk price or the raw milk price which is the price paid to farmers for raw milk prior to any value-add that might occur in Fonterra or in some other company. There's been some claims and accusations that because the vast majority of those on what they call the milk price panel are appointees of Fonterra or connected to it they had been managing in their own interest not in the interest of the wider dairy industry; so we've decided to have an independent chair. The chair's actually appointed by Fonterra but on the recommendation of the Minister and one further independent and it's just to ensure that those people won't be answering to the Minister; they'll be answering to Fonterra and to the process of the milk price setting ultimately overseen by the Commerce Commission. And we've made some changes to ensure that if some of the requirements in setting that milk price are ignored by Fonterra which had been the claims then the Commerce Commission—there are some technical terms that I daren't repeat because I'll get into trouble from the Minister of Commerce here about alpha and beta and all these kind of valuation things that go beyond me; they're algorithms that are used in this system. If the milk price panel chose to ignore one of those core components then it would distort the outcome of their exercise. There have been claims there and so we've said that the Commerce Commission can enforce them to use all of those core components. It's not that the Commerce Commission will tell them what they should pay to farmers. They will make the recommendation following the process. Ultimately Fonterra still has the ability to set its own milk price but the raw milk price will be one made through—and will be transparent so that other companies that are using it as a benchmark will know what that is and it will be more accurate arguably than some claim it has been in the past. So that's the Commerce Commission questions I guess that the member was asking for. You know they will have an ability not to force the final price but to ensure that the process has been adhered to by the milk price panel. The other one is the entry provisions. People will still be able to apply to Fonterra and Fonterra will pick up their milk if they are within the normal collection zone. There is an ability for them to say no if someone is in an unreasonable position and it will require a whole lot more cost to pick that milk up. I think that's something that the farmers of Fonterra have been asking for—that they don't want to be forced to pick up milk when other companies could say no as a normal part of their supply arrangements. I'm not wanting to shut that down. I hope that that answers a few of the questions that we have there that ultimately the milk price panel and the way it works we hope will be more transparent that people will have more confidence in it and that that will ensure that people who might want to come into the dairy industry will have a fair benchmark by which to judge themselves and their farmer suppliers will have the same benchmark. So I'll sit down and answer any further questions if people have them. Thank you.