Goudie Sandra: Public Transport Management Bill — In Committee Third Reading 
Goudie Sandra: Public Transport Management Bill — In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:650;Page:18770] 
SANDRA GOUDIE (National—Coromandel) 
: 
 I rise to support my most excellent colleague Maurice Williamson and I totally agree that the bill should be called the “Public Deception Transport Bill”. It is being rushed through under urgency which is extraordinary but we need look only at the purpose of the bill to understand why. The purpose of this bill epitomises the way in which this Government likes to operate and that is about absolute power and control that is tantamount to a dictatorship. That is what the purpose espouses by conferring on regional councils powers to set standards for commercial and public transport to provide for regulation and registration and to help regional councils and the agency obtain the best value for money in achieving affordable integrated safe responsive etc. public transport. But essentially it screws the scrum. 
This is not an equal situation where people sit down and negotiate the best outcome. This is a contract situation where the regional council can virtually dictate what it expects and then it is up to a transport provider as to whether it wants to enter into that agreement with the regional council. Why would it? We will not get people stepping up to the plate and wanting to support regional councils if they are going to try to take advantage of this legislation to have a much more powerful position in the contract negotiations. That is what this bill is all about. This is the sort of legislation that epitomises this current Government. It does not do its homework and that has been quite clearly espoused by Maurice Williamson. He has shown quite clearly that the Government has failed to do the proper work and the proper analysis to get the best outcomes for all those involved and particularly for the people who are trying to be best served by a public transport system. 
The Government continues to fail the people of New Zealand and further poor legislation like this is just a constant glaring example of the Government’s failure to do its legislation correctly. We have only to look at the bill to see all of the changes that have been made and then we can look at the two Supplementary Order Papers which are quite substantial as well. That completely underscores what Maurice Williamson has been saying. The Government has not been doing its homework. It should have gone back and taken the opportunity to address the bill particularly when it did get a letter sent to it from the Regulations Review Committee. The Government had the opportunity to go back and address the bill in light of that letter coming to the fore but it did not take that opportunity. There can be no more glaring example of the Government’s failure to uphold the democratic principles that we want to see espoused in this Parliament. 
This happens time and time again in legislation. There is poor problem definition which means that the Government does not come up with the correct solutions to deal with those problems and we get convoluted legislation which the Government just does not understand the ramifications of. Another glaring example I have to say is the Electoral Finance Act and that has been declared unworkable. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Marian Hobbs) 
: Come back to the bill please. 
SANDRA GOUDIE 
: I am giving an example of yet more legislation that is just a constant mess. Perhaps the Minister might like to take a call and explain why the democratic principle of making sure that all those matters pertaining to the bill was not dealt with. I am talking about the Regulations Review Committee’s letter to the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee and perhaps Dr Michael Cullen might like to explain to the Committee why the step was not taken to readdress that matter through the select committee as espoused by Maurice Williamson. I think it is incumbent on the Minister to get up and explain her Government’s position in regard to not going back and doing the job properly. I think that would be eminently responsible. But no we will not see that. We will not see why option B was not dealt with appropriately and once again that has all been explained very well by Maurice Williamson.