Belich CamillaCAMILLA BELICH (Labour): Thank you Madam Speaker. It's a pleasure to be back in the House and to be speaking on this third reading of the Incorporated Societies Bill. So it's a special honour I think to be the last speaker in the third reading of a bill especially one that has taken such a long time to come to this stage and also one which is replacing an Act which has served New Zealand and New Zealanders so well for such a long time. So I won't take too long but I do want to go over some of the important points of this bill and along with the majority of the House support this bill today.The Incorporated Societies Act 1908 governs around 24000 incorporated societies. People may not hear those words that much unless they're involved in them. But we often hear about clubs associations federations some marae unions and organisations that some of us in this House will be familiar with: political parties. So this bill would replace the existing Act and put in place a modern Act which we think on this side of the House—and most in this House I would think would agree—retains the best of the previous Act but also modernises this legislation.But before we move forward to passing this bill into law I thought it would be interesting to look back at just how much times have changed since 1908. So in 1908 it was a high point for the temperance movement in New Zealand and I understand that 12 districts in New Zealand voted to go dry that year. How times have changed. Another thing that happened in 1908 was there was quite a strong lobby for women to take up smoking in moderation which is another sign of how the times have changed. A thing that's relevant to the side of the House was 1908 was the year that the Blackball miners' strike took place and this preceded the formation of the Labour Party some eight years later. And I think this was mentioned in Andrew Little's first reading speech on this bill. He's particularly passionate about this bill as you would have heard and the changes that it will implement.One last thing that happened in 1908 that I was able to find was Ernest Shackleton a hero of our Prime Minister set sail from New Zealand to Antarctica. And we've all seen the state of the boat of Ernest Shackleton and how that's aged. That will just give us a bit of an indication of how long this particular Act that we we're replacing has been in place. I think actually that was one of his newer boats as well; the 1908 boat was an earlier version. So the Incorporated Societies Act must change too just like the rest of New Zealand. It's lived a life longer than most members of this House. But in agreeing with my colleague on the other side of the House it should not be replaced because of its age only. It should only be replaced because what we're doing is replacing it with something which is more fit for purpose modern and will serve New Zealanders better and those who are volunteering in these important incorporated societies will be able to utilise this legislation more easily.It is relevant to a lot of people. It may not be something that you hear about as much as some of the other legislation that we have passed and it's not—I have to say the majority of the emails I get are not about this Act but I did receive one about two weeks ago asking me about the progress of this legislation. So I just want to say Tony we are going to be putting this into law soon." and I know that there will be many many people in the voluntary sector who will be looking for the passage of this bill especially after it's been moving through this House and the process has taken such a long time.So a further reflection really on the process to get to where we are today is: obviously we have an Act which is of some substantial age and in 2010 the Law Commission was charged with reviewing the 1908 Act and it delivered its report recommending principles to change the Act. These principles as I understand although I wasn't on the select committee or in Parliament at this time were taken and then incorporated into the bill that we are looking at today. And I just wanted to acknowledge the Hon Judith Collins who I understand was the Minister at the time that the report was delivered in 2013. So I just wanted to acknowledge her contribution to this bill and it really does emphasise how it does have support and involvement from both sides of the House.So some of the—quickly—principles that they wanted to include in this bill were principles really at the heart of what incorporated societies are in New Zealand. So incorporated societies are run by their members and they have primary responsibility for holding societies to account and if you don't have members then really it's not the type of incorporation for you. They also thought it was an important point that society should not distribute profits or financial benefits to their members and we've heard some of the changes that will be implemented as a result of this particular principle but also how the select committee made some additional changes to make sure that important things like scholarships or hardship grants were still able to be utilised by incorporated societies as I understand they are at the moment. Also societies are private bodies and it was thought by the Law Society that they should be able to act without State interference and independently. So those are all principles that were carried forward into the drafting of this bill.This bill will as I've said replace the 1908 bill with a modern bill and it will make incorporated societies more robust improve governance provide constructive options for dispute resolution while retaining the best of the tried and tested 1908 Act and codifying the case law into the Act which as we all know makes it more accessible for people and easier to understand. And that's something that we should be endeavouring to do with all of our legislation.I think we've covered most of the changes of the bill. It's surprisingly a bill that I could talk about for much longer but I think it's time to make this bill a law. And so after 114 years this is a bill that's time has come and I commend this bill to the House.Motion agreed to.Bill read a third time."