Brown SimeonSIMEON BROWN (National—Pakuranga): Thank you Mr Speaker and thank you for the opportunity to take a call on the Arms (Licence Holders' Applications for New Licences) Amendment Bill. What we've heard from the members on the other side of the House is: Not our fault not our fault; don't look at us don't look at us." I'm sick and tired of hearing people on the other side of the House blame other people for problems that we're facing today. These guys have been in power for five long years—five years of failure—and they keep blaming other people for their problems.Today I think is one of the worst. I mean we've heard about the potholes—it's National's fault that there's potholes on the road! The health system—well it's National's fault we don't have enough nurses! Well now it's because of something which happened in 1992—the year after I was born—that we're not processing licences fast enough today and we have to bring this legislation to the House. That is just absolutely appalling and the tens of thousands of firearms licence holders up and down this country who I know are listening and watching this very very closely because this is important to them they will be laughing at their TVs laughing at their radios laughing at their online streaming—however they're listening today—and saying what a joke this Government is. The only thing they're saying as well is "Thank goodness they've finally listened!" because it's taken them years—years and years—to actually come to the realisation that. Because of their failure to actually make sure that the police are able to process licences quickly enough they've had to come with a fix to actually get this sorted.Back in 1992 the good legislators of this Parliament would never have thought that a situation would arise where there would be such an incompetent Government who couldn't actually process licences that quickly or that slowly. They never would have anticipated such an incompetent Government back in 1992 but lo and behold we have one. We have the most incompetent Government that New Zealanders have ever had. They can't even process firearms licences for licensed firearms holders. That's embarrassing; it's frankly embarrassing. As the police spokesperson last year I had these people getting in touch with me on the phone messaging me on Facebook emailing me and saying "I don't know what to do; I've got these guns I've got my licence I've got my application in I now have to find somewhere else to store these guns. I don't have somewhere else I can store these guns. Do I break the law? Do I try and find some other solution?" And they've been put in these precarious situations. And the reason why they find that so difficult is because these people are law-abiding firearms licence holders. They want to follow the law. They pride themselves in following the law. These are upstanding members—DEPUTY SPEAKER: All right Mr Brown you can start talking about that law now. You've had four minutes.SIMEON BROWN: —and this law which they have been forced to break by this Government's incompetence—this bill is seeking to finally fix their problem and this significant serious issue that these people have been put in and I just want to tell the House how hard it has been for these people—DEPUTY SPEAKER: Well you can tell them about the bill now please.SIMEON BROWN: Well the bill is addressing the issue that these people have been facing because of the incompetence of this Government—the rank incompetence of this Government—but thankfully this bill is here to address this issue. And so this bill does make some small amendments to ensure that if someone gets their licence application in prior to their licence expiring they will no longer have to go through that terribly terribly stressful and difficult position where they had to find where they would place their guns in the meantime—at incredible cost or incredible stress or in some cases without the actual ability to do that. So thank goodness this Government has finally listened!But what we haven't heard from the members on the other side is—they haven't actually addressed the real issue. This is a fix and yes we support this because it actually addresses and makes sure that there is a fix. But it doesn't address the real issue which is that the police are taking so long to actually process these licences in the first place. And this is what this Government does: it talks a big game. But actually right across public services in New Zealand public services are going backwards; processes are taking longer. You can't get on the phone and have a conversation with someone in a decent period of time. These are the real issues which this piece of legislation doesn't actually address. I looked through the piece of legislation. It doesn't seek to actually address the time frames it's taking for New Zealanders—law-abiding firearms licence holders—to actually have those issues addressed.I tell you what I know submitters will be coming to the select committee and they will be telling the select committee exactly about those problems—the amount of months and months and months that they've been waiting—and they will tell the select committee. They will say "Yes this fixes"—DEPUTY SPEAKER: Yes Mr Brown. You can anticipate what the submitters will tell us but what you're going to tell us about is the bill because if I have to ask you again you'll be finishing this presentation.SIMEON BROWN: Well the issue here is that this bill doesn't address the issue which is the actual delay in the processing and that is going to be a serious issue which actually I think needs to be looked into in select committee. And I'm more than happy to wait to look at those submissions and I'm sure they'll be very interesting.But the other issue that this bill doesn't actually address is that this Government has failed to actually go after the real target when it comes to firearms in New Zealand. They've spent a lot of time focused on law-abiding firearms licence holders in New Zealand—DEPUTY SPEAKER: Thank you—I've invited you now several times to actually address the bill. You've now again spoken about what's not here so—SIMEON BROWN: Point of order.DEPUTY SPEAKER: I'm now going to Mr Brown—SIMEON BROWN: Point of order.DEPUTY SPEAKER: Mr Brown I've warned you several times. You've now not addressed what's in the bill despite being asked. Your speech is now over. I'm now going to call the next speaker.SIMEON BROWN (National—Pakuranga): Point of order. This is a first reading speech and it's an ability to talk about the bill and talk about what we as the National Party want in the bill and what we see as problems in the bill. It's a broad-ranging debate about the piece of legislation. I've been raising issues very relevant to what this bill is seeking to address.DEPUTY SPEAKER: Right and you have done that. You did that for six minutes and then I asked you several times. Having done that you've now gone back to discussing all issues other than what's in the bill. So your speech is over Mr Brown. The next speaker is Vanushi Walters.CHRIS PENK (National—Kaipara ki Mahurangi): Point of order. Sir I do ask you to reflect on the fact that you allowed members opposite to go back as far as 1992 in relation to background issues vaguely connected at best in relation to the bill and that of course is perfectly appropriate because as has been noted it is the first reading speech environment. I think it's reasonable to anticipate what kind of submissions might be made albeit that obviously they can't speak to those exactly as to the content being in the future. But I'd just ask you to reflect on the move you've made particularly from a point of view of consistency across the House again noting the nature of a first reading speech in responding to some of those historical issues.DEPUTY SPEAKER: I'm pleased Mr Penk that you did mention the relevance of building on the 1992 provisions. So the reality of it and I'm pretty generous about it four minutes the member had where he hadn't actually addressed the bill at that stage. I think that's pretty generous particularly when he was actually referring to what the people at home might have liked to see. So the decision will stand."