Lotu-Iiga Peseta Sam: Copyright (Infringing File Sharing) Amendment Bill — Second Reading In Committee Third Reading 
Lotu-Iiga Peseta Sam: Copyright (Infringing File Sharing) Amendment Bill — Second Reading In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:671;Page:18121] 
PESETA SAM LOTU-IIGA (National—Maungakiekie) 
: 
 It is my privilege to speak on the third reading of the Copyright (Infringing File Sharing) Amendment Bill. This is an opportunity to thank the Minister Simon Power for his work in bringing about this bill which cleans up some of the mess from the last Government. It is an opportunity to thank the Minister also for his negotiation skills. There was a lot of negotiation going on not just with other parties but with stakeholders in order to get what I believe to be fair and reasonable legislation that addresses the needs of all stakeholders. 
I will talk on a couple of other points but first I also thank the officials. We have brought a number of bills to the House through the Commerce Committee. Our relationship with the officials in getting legislation through our select committee—but also through the House—is good. We salute the officials and the work that they do. This piece of legislation certainly provided some pretty complex issues to work through. 
I will touch on a couple of issues during this speech. One is about cost recovery. I mentioned in the Committee stage that I think it is a pretty big point. When the Internet service providers or Internet protocol address providers came to the committee they talked about the huge burden of cost for implementing such systems. Depending on the size of the Internet service providers some said it would be in the millions of dollars and some said it would be in the hundreds of thousands. But in terms of coming to an actual cost per notice processing fee they came up with a range of between $14 per notice and $56. Those notices far exceed the actual price of the transgression. We could not work out in this legislation an appropriate cost recovery or fee-paying system. That will be left to the regulations. In my opinion it is not always ideal to leave these types of fee-paying systems to the regulations but in this case I think the officials will work closely with the relevant stakeholders to find a system that is fair and reasonable for the parties. It may be relevant to note that regulations have been set up in the United Kingdom on a cost-sharing basis. That may be a model that our officials and certainly the stakeholders here may look to. 
This legislation has been about balancing competing interests. We have all noted the importance of private property rights the importance of intellectual property rights and the investment by our industries—especially our creative industries—in making those products and services and the importance of balancing that out with the freedoms of individuals to express themselves and the freedom to certainly access the Internet. I think on balance this legislation has been put through in a really effective way. I think the legislation will be workable. But just as a warning if you like to the members opposite I say this is still subject to evidence being produced that this system will work. It is not a guarantee as one of my colleagues from across the aisle has said and we will not support that as a Labour member said prior to my speech. It will be about collecting the right amount of evidence and a decision being made in the future in a review period that will be reasonable in order to see whether the current regime is working and whether a suspension system will be put in place. But this is very good legislation; I think it balances out the competing interests and I commend it to the House.