Smith StuartSTUART SMITH (National—Kaikōura): Thank you Madam Speaker. We've just heard the most thoughtful speech and well-thought-out speech from the other side in opposition. I pay tribute to the Hon Poto Williams. She's a very capable Minister and she may even have a promotion coming as soon as today. I hope she does. The main thrust of the opposition to the bill was that this wasn't going to solve everything. It's not. I never claimed it would at all. But then we heard I think Fletcher Tabuteau let slip that they're working on something. Well it's been three years of this Government and they're still working on something. Then there were references from Dr Duncan Webb that they had put these great things in place like the insurance tribunal. Well the insurance tribunal appointed a judge who has Family Court experience. I don't doubt he's a very capable judge but there's a heck of a difference between Family Court issues and insurance issues—they're vastly different—and that may explain why it's been so unsuccessful. The tribunal's had 113 applications to deal with the issues that this bill would go part-way to deal with. Out of that they've resolved 32—just 32—with an average time for a judgment of 123 days. It is painfully slow. Our Government promised so much from this tribunal and it's delivered very little. The reason is of course because it's such a complex issue. This bill will in fact make some difference—and I accept some of the criticism from the bill. Some of it is very minor and could be dealt with in select committee. But the main thrust of it is to actually have the claim accepted or declined and have a settlement offer put in front of the claimant. That hasn't occurred for months—many many months—well over six months and that uncertainty this bill seeks to resolve.The bigger disadvantage for an insurance company the moment they make a settlement offer is they have to provision for it. Now one small insurance claim of half a million dollars is large to the homeowner as an example but it is not large in insurance company terms. But in terms of a large event that would be multiplied by many hundreds thousands perhaps. Once an insurance company has to provision for that claim they need and want to get it off their books as quickly as possible. So the argument that they'll simply make low-ball offers to fulfil their obligation just doesn't stack up actually. There will always be a gap between what the claimant wants and what the insurance company wants to pay. And there should be because the insurance companies are taking everybody's premiums. So they have to be very careful about what they pay out and only pay out what they legally have to and likewise the claimants have paid premiums over a long period of time and they want to maximise their opportunity to get an insurance payout. There will always be a bit of a crunchy meeting of minds and eventually it will be resolved. To try and deal with that in a bill and to make that be rushed through that last bit of the process would be incredibly difficult and simply impose more unfairness into a situation when people are dealing with the high stresses of losing their homes. This bill though allows the claimant to get to that point so that they can actually have a settlement offer in front of them and it would enable them to move on with their lives. I think it's a great step forward to put this bill forward. I've heard very weak arguments against. The only exception of a good response came from the Hon Poto Williams. It's unfortunate that someone like Duncan Webb couldn't have brought something more to the House than his very weak arguments that he put forward. So with that I commend my bill to the House. Thank you.Bill read a first time. Bill referred to the Governance and Administration Committee.