SpeechDENISE LEE (National—Maungakiekie): Thank you very much Madam Speaker. So for those listening and/or watching we're dealing with an instruction to committee a referral motion. We would like to go on record here from this side of the House that we do not think that the report-back time frames should be shortened for the Māori Affairs Committee for this Local Government (Rating of Whenua Māori) Amendment Bill and that we don't think that the select committee should have authority to meet at any time while the House is sitting. I personally just feel a little bit miffed at this particular motion because we've been kicked back on my Education and Workforce Committee when we've asked to meet during House sitting times because we think it's been appropriate and we haven't been allowed to but yet we have this particular motion being put forward. I would like to refer to the content of the bill not for the sake of the content of the bill but in relation to how important I think it is that we don't try and fast track this. When we look at the regulatory impact assessment it was very much noted there that some people weren't able to be consulted. So I think that there are going to be a significant amount of submissions. I think there are going to be cases—even if not numerically definitely in content—where people have not had a chance to have their say. For instance we know that farmers and general land owners weren't consulted in the impact assessment report.This is 9800 Māori land rating units we're talking about. That's a lot. This is not a bitsy omnibus bill and we have some questions that people may want to submit on some issues that are of sizable significance—for instance the powers of the chief executive to potentially write off rates applying to non-Māori land as well. Is that an element of the bill that people may want to submit on? Is the shortened time frame the right way to go about this? Are we in fact in very unusual times here in Parliament and would people expect Parliament to deliberate and use its processes in a normal fashion and take its normal time frame which we know everyone here in this House knows would be six months not half the time? That's what we are making a stand on here on this side of the House. We're looking at half the time to take and debate and look at a bill that has some sizeable issues in it. Something else that's been raised is implications to landowners whose land is under the national policy statement of indigenous biodiversity. What are the implications for them? Is it right that as a House we say Right well we're facing lots of issues at the moment not all of them parliamentary; many of them health. Is fast tracking anything in this Parliament the right way to go about it?" I would argue no. I would argue that the New Zealand public want to see Parliament treat everything seriously and give it its due time frame. That also applies to MPs sitting when the House is sitting when ordinarily they wouldn't. They'd expect select committees to behave in a very normal and process-driven fashion. I may be a first-term MP and I'm learning all the ways that select committees operate and how the processes—all the ins and outs—work but in this particular bill I think it's a no-brainer whether you're a first-termer or whether you're a senior MP. This particular bill—with significant issues that have been highlighted as very potentially serious and contentious issues by different councils around the country; someone's even used the "racism" word. This is absolutely a topic that should be given the correct and standard amount of time to be analysed. So we're very clear on this side of the House: it should not have a shortened time frame it should not have half the time frame that we would normally take and we should also not give the ability for the select committee to sit during the times that the House is sitting. They should undertake their normal procedures. Kiritapu Allan: Madam Speaker.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Ruth Dyson): You've had a call in this debate. You only get one sorry."