Lees-Galloway IainIAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North): The Prime Minister is fond of coming to this House and telling people to get some guts". I have a message to the National Government about this legislation: get some guts. The Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety is absolutely right when he says that this is a contentious issue and I think National should get some guts and deal with this contentious issue itself rather than pass the buck on to our territorial local authorities. This Government which is so fond of saying to local government that it has to focus on its core responsibilities that it has to stop increasing rates and that it is always the local government's fault for anything that the Government does not want to take responsibility for is passing the buck on an issue that is fundamental to the role of the New Zealand Parliament.This is a matter of industrial relations. We are the decision-making body that is responsible for industrial relations not local government. Local government representatives turned up to the Commerce Committee in droves and said to the Government: "Make a decision about this." Some of them said that they were in favour of it some of them said that they were indifferent to it but they all said: "Make this decision yourself. Do not pass this on to us. Do not pass this on to us because it will force costs on us." This legislation forces councils to make a decision about a contentious issue—one that divides communities—that this National Government does not have the guts to deal with itself.The Government says that this is all about choice. Well where is the choice for National MPs? Because the Minister is right when he says that this Parliament has considered multiple bills about this issue and not one of them—not one of them—has passed first reading. Repeatedly parliaments have rejected the idea of Easter trading. The reason parliaments have rejected Easter trading is that National MPs have voted against it so where is the choice for National MPs on this issue? If it is all about choice—if we should be giving local councils and local communities more choice—well let us just dissolve Parliament. Let us just dissolve Parliament and get local councils to do everything. That is the message that we have been hearing and I am sure we will hear from National MPs about this issue—that it is all about communities having their own choice. Well let us all go home. Let us all just go home spend some time with our families and give up on Parliament and we will just have local councils make all the decisions. That is the message that we are hearing from members opposite because they have not been able to get some guts and deal with this issue themselves.I am opposed to this legislation but not on religious grounds. I know that many people are opposed to it on religious grounds but I am opposed to it because I believe that we should set aside some days that are for families and communities to spend time together. We hear so often from members opposite about what is important about keeping families together about what is important about building strong communities. Well actually—Hon Ruth Dyson: A family that shops together stays together.IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY: Ha ha! Spending time together—being able to spend time together—is a really important part of building communities and building families. We as a nation should set aside some days when families and communities can spend time together. For historical reasons we do that predominately on days that are Christian festivals. Personally that is not terribly important to me. I know it is important to others and in fact that is why National MPs have repeatedly voted against previous attempts to have Easter trading. If we were to have a debate about what other days we might have what is the sensible number of days to set aside for families and communities and what would be appropriate days to do that in New Zealand that is a debate I would be prepared to engage with. But that is never the debate that the National Government initiates. The debate that the National Government initiates is on how we can reduce the number of days that are set aside for families and communities.If we are doing this to Easter Sunday well why not Good Friday? Good Friday is just 2 days apart from Easter Sunday and we are told that for tourism reasons it is absolutely vitally important that shops can open on Easter Sunday yet for some reason it is OK that they are going to be closed on Good Friday. Being closed on the Friday is not going to make or break these businesses but somehow being open 2 days after that on the Sunday is absolutely fundamental. Businesses are going to go under if they do not have this opportunity so why not? Why not extend this legislation to Good Friday? Why not extend it to Christmas Day? That is the logic. That is what the retailers who came to the select committee told us this bill should actually do so where is the logic? Where is the logic?The other thing that is illogical is that the Minister comes to this House and says: "What we've got at the moment is completely inconsistent across the country. We've got one set of rules in one town and a different set of rules in another town." Well this legislation is not going to fix that. This is not going to fix that. In my part of the country you could have one set of rules in Palmerston North and 15 minutes up the road in Ian McKelvie's electorate you could have another set of rules in Feilding. That is completely inconsistent and that is what is going to happen across the country. Different councils are going to make different decisions and communities that are close together are going to have completely different sets of rules. That is madness. That is madness and what is madness about it is that it is exactly the problem the Government claims this legislation is going to solve but it does not. So the legislation is fundamentally flawed.I want to know from members opposite why they are so opposed to the idea of people just pausing from commercial life pausing from consumerism taking a day out and actually spending time with their families. What is so terrible about that idea?Hon Michael Woodhouse: They have that choice.IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY: That is what I want to know. What is so terrible about that idea? The Minister says that they will have that choice because he has written into this legislation that employees will be able to refuse work on Easter Sunday. Well let us just step back and have an honest assessment of that.Hon Michael Woodhouse: He doesn't think much of unions—that's the honest assessment.IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY: Most of these employees are in pretty precarious employment situations. They do not have regular hours they are often not working full time—in fact more often than not they are not working full time—and they are reliant on maintaining a good relationship with their manager so that they can get as many hours as possible. When they are in that situation are they really going to turn down the requirement to work on Easter Sunday? Honestly does the Minister think that?The Minister's cheap little jibe is that we must not have much faith in the unions if we think this is going to be a problem. Well actually very few of these people are in unions. I actually hope that this legislation encourages people to join the union because they are going to need the union to stick up for them if they want to be able to refuse to work on Easter Sunday. But the truth is that through a variety of means this National Government has eroded union rights has made it harder for unions to recruit people and has made it harder for unions to bargain for people and actually union membership in the retail sector is remarkably low. These people are not represented by unions; they are on their own. They are completely on their own and the Minister thinks that people in a precarious employment situation are going to feel confident to turn around to their manager and say: "No I'm not going to work on Easter Sunday."We know what happens: slowly but surely their hours get whittled down. We as a Parliament decided to address that issue with the zero-hour legislation. We got there in the end. We got there in the end. Well why are we creating more opportunities for people in precarious employment to be exploited and forced to do things that take them away from their family and take them away from their community? It just shows how completely out of touch with reality for working people this National Government has become.This legislation is shambolic. It is going to create inconsistencies across the country. It is going to force councils to do things that not only are expensive but will actually divide their communities as well. I will be very proud to go and cast my personal vote against this legislation. I say to the National MPs who have consistently voted against Easter trading in the past that it is time to get some guts. It is time to find your conscience. Come and join us over in the Noes lobby."