Watts SimonSIMON WATTS (National—North Shore): Thank you Madam Chair—too many Simons in this House. Just building on referencing clause 15 the amendments to section 40 I've got four questions with regards to this point. I think it's a theme that's been carried through by a number of speakers. I guess I'm reflecting and the question for the Minister is around what is the problem we're trying to fix or whether this is legislation a solution looking for a problem. I just did quick review in terms of the feedback. The previous speaker talked about the competitive nature of the electricity sector in New Zealand. There are 40 providers. Overall Consumer New Zealand's done some analysis released recently which articulated that 52 percent of Kiwis are very satisfied with their power company and it goes on and rates Electric Kiwi at 70 percent satisfied 77 percent of Powershop and they mention Flick as well.The point there is: are we dealing with an industry a competitive industry—which it is; there are a number of players in that industry and consumers have choice—and therefore what is the problem we're trying to fix by introducing this new consumer representation group in clause 15 of the bill? So that's the first question: have we seriously done the assessment around the problem statement firstly.The second question is: if we're just going to ram this through then what is the cost in order to fund this and the question around the analysis that's been undertaken independently around the cost flow-through to consumers in terms of power prices or the bills they get because you cannot introduce regulation or degrees of bureaucracy without that having a cost and that cost needs to flow down. In this case it will flow down no doubt to consumers so I'm interested in what analysis has been undertaken around that what the estimate of that cost is and what it will cost to actually fund this bureaucracy that will be put in place to try and deal with a problem that I think is yet to be defined.The third question I have is again in relation to clause 15 a little bit more broadly. How does the Minister see that this new consumer agency is going to work in the context of the authority needing to manage the concept around competition within the sector? I think there is a mismatch and I think it was mentioned a bit earlier as well. There is a mismatch around what the authority's objectives are and gee haven't we seen this with the Reserve Bank introducing What's your core business what's your focus—inflation." and now they've got another one. Well it's interesting to see the same thematic coming through in clause 15 of this bill in terms of this consumer panel which in effect—and this has been assessed by external parties as well—creates a mismatch or a conflict in regards to what is actually the job they need to undertake which in effect is to create and ensure that we have a competitive electricity sector.So I think that the introduction of this consumer panel—and I'm interested in the Minister's comment on that. One of the unintended consequences potentially of this consumer panel playing in conflict with trying to create a competitive structure is that we need fewer players in the market because they have the capability and scale—that may be argued and I'm pretty good at arguing that scale brings benefits. But one of the unintended consequences may mean that we will see less competition as a result of that because of the drive around the consumer panel.The last question I've got is in regards to the analysis provided by the Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment and it's been mentioned before around the fact that the officials have felt that the costs of implementing the entity under clause 15 are going to exceed the benefits. So we've now got an official Government organisation telling the Minister "Nice but it's not going to cut it." It's going to cost more to put in than any of the benefits. So what assessment or peer review of that advice from officials has the Minister undertaken to satisfy herself that this is required and—more importantly in terms of taxpayers' money—that this is actually going to deliver the outcomes that will make an improvement. From all the assessment that we can see in regards to clause 15 in Part 1 of this bill that will not be the case. Thank you."