Clark David: Taxation (Land Information and Offshore Persons Information) Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeClark David: Taxation (Land Information and Offshore Persons Information) Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 09 September 2015. Volume:708;Page:6437. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Dr DAVID CLARK (Labour—Dunedin North): I find the suggestion from the Minister for Land Information this bill increases compliance somehow and that it makes things simpler rather extraordinary when the evidence presented by the speaker prior my colleague Grant Robertson pointed clearly to the strange legal concoction that sits in this bill: the notion of feeling the greatest connection to a property. It is something that appears in no other legislation and is something that makes the definition of a “main home” very vague indeed.I want to just reflect for a minute on the kinds of greatest connection people may feel—to explore this loophole. I suspect for many speculators the properties with which they will feel the greatest connection are the ones they make the most money from because that is why they are connecting to the New Zealand property market. It will have very little to do with where their family is living. It will have very little to do with those things that we may regard—those of us who live in one home and own one home—as the reasons for connecting to a home.This legislation is designed it seems to have big loopholes in it. It is designed in a way that will not collect the kind of information that the public is very interested in: the register of buyers which has been sought for some time. This is legislation that will encourage offshore parties to obtain New Zealand bank accounts for no practical reason and to make no use of the accounts other than to obtain an IRD number and it is legislation that is unlikely to achieve its goal.Those who wish to exploit the loopholes are given every encouragement through this legislation. It is not as the Minister suggested legislation that will increase compliance or make life easier and simpler; it is bad legislation. We on this side of the Chamber are opposed to the putting through of bad legislation. The only reason that we will be issuing any support for this bill is that it is a gentle step along the way. It is highly likely that a future Government will be back here correcting the mistakes in this legislation and a future Government will be making it legislation that increases compliance and that actually achieves the principles that were laid out in the arguments for having such legislation in the first place. I hope that that Government will be a Labour Government because I doubt very much that this Government will have the audacity to come back again in such a short time to correct legislation with so many loopholes and impracticalities about it.I wonder what other reasons for “greatest connection” there may be. Why else would people have reasons for having a great connection with properties? What legal issues will be fought? What tests will be put in place to understand what the most legitimate reason for the greatest connection to a property is? It seems an entirely subjective test on the surface and it is going to require a great deal of legal debate and probably litigation to sort out what that may mean in different contexts. It is very strange that the main home has been exempted. People who have a main home here are highly likely to already have a bank account and an IRD number. Simply to complete the purchase of the original home for most peopleI would suggest involves having a bank account in New Zealand—or for most New Zealand citizens in any case.So this legislation is vague open to misunderstanding and confusion and although it does improve on the current lack of information regarding overseas house purchasers it is needlessly weak and a half measure—the kind of half measure we are coming to expect from this Government. It is disappointing that we will find ourselves revisiting it before too long when we could be doing it properly in the first place at more limited expense to Parliament rather than spending a million or more dollars of costs to put through a new piece of legislation to tidy up after this Minister. I would ask the Minister again what she understands by “the greatest connection” to the property how that will be legally defined and what kinds of debates she expects will happen before that definition is tied down. These are questions that this Parliament needs answers to if we are to understand how this legislation will work.