Edmonds Barbara; Doocey MattHon BARBARA EDMONDS (Labour—Mana): Thank you Madam Chair. I was watching the Minister's comments even though I was also watching the Hurricanes who are now at the top of the table. I had a bit of déjà vu actually watching this game because they beat the Highlanders when I was actually working at Michael Woodhouse's office.CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): I know it's 10.12 at night but that is an indulgence. Please come back to the bill. Thank you. I come from Chiefs country.Hon BARBARA EDMONDS: Thank you Madam Chair for indulging me for a moment for again the Hurricanes being the top of the table. Coming back to this particular bill I actually want to speak in favour of the amendment put forward by Dr Lawrence Xu-Nan. I know the Minister has said that he wasn't going to support it but I want to add another reason why I think he could possibly reconsider it for the Minister. That's because in the regulatory impact statement it talks about the LDAC guidelines and why retrospective legislation would be allowed which is clause 2 I understand but this is talking to the title amendment by Dr Lawrence Xu-Nan.So the LDAC for members of the committee is the Legislation Design and Advisory Committee or council. They are some of the most senior legal officials within our country and when a bill is put to the House except for in this particular case because it's urgency the bill will get referred after the first reading to LDAC. LDAC will then provide advice to the select committee—basically a legal review of the draft legislation to ensure that it meets particular criteria. They also provide opinion and advice to the select committee which the select committee uses to test with officials.In this particular case because we are going through under urgency this bill was not able to go through the LDAC process which is why there have been a number of contributions on this side of the Chamber. But why I wanted to put my support behind Dr Lawrence Xu-Nan's amendment is because his tabled amendment is inserting the words retrospective validation" after "instalment plans" so it would read "Accident Compensation (Interest on Instalment Plans and Retrospective Validation) Amendment Bill.So LDAC in their guidelines say that sometimes you're allowed to have retrospective legislation which the member Camilla Belich has taken us through and which she does question around the technical error side. But putting that particular contribution aside my question as to why I believe that Dr Xu-Nan's amendment should be put through is that when you actually look at clause 2 the legislation comes into effect from Royal assent so therefore this bill looks forward but yet it is also retrospectively applying for interest that's been accrued for those businesses on instalment plans. So the Royal assent basically says "Yes we validate that interest that has been accrued on instalment plans." But it's not retrospective application; it's retroactive—it's looking forward.So that's why I would actually support Dr Lawrence Xu-Nan's amendment because it makes a small change to the title so that therefore in the future when people are looking back they can say "Well this applied by Royal assent looking forward." There's no LDAC opinion on this because it went through urgency. The application date is from Royal assent. But yet if we could have that small change to the title it therefore actually provides retrospective validation. I think that's where Dr Lawrence Xu-Nan was looking when—Dr Lawrence Xu-Nan: It's a really serious thing.Hon BARBARA EDMONDS: It's quite a serious thing the good doctor says as to why we would allow that small change to a title which provides clarity to the public that yes this legislation is retrospective in application even though it has Royal assent which is in clause 2 which I'm sure other members of the committee will work through carefully. But I think it would be one that I would like to know whether I could convince the Minister and even if I didn't convince him the Hurricanes are still the top of the table so it's a great night for Wellington.Hon MATT DOOCEY (Minister for ACC): Oh thank you very much Madam Chair. Just a response to that member to acknowledge that the Hurricanes are at the top of the table and it's just a bit unfortunate the Crusaders aren't or they would have knocked the Hurricanes off."