Curran Clare: Taxation (Bright-line Test for Residential Land) Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeCurran Clare: Taxation (Bright-line Test for Residential Land) Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 10 November 2015. Volume:710;Page:7843. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]CLARE CURRAN (Labour—Dunedin South): The definition of the brightline rule or the brightline test describes it as being composed of “objective factors” which leaves little or no room for varying interpretation and the purpose is “to produce predictable and consistent results” in its application. I think that you could describe this piece of legislation as being the very opposite of that test. So it is not a bright line; it is a very muddy clouded line that is being produced by this Government as its way of doing something about the rampant speculation in the Auckland housing market and the impact that that is having on our country and our country’s economy and the ability for New Zealanders to afford to buy a home to afford to rent a home and to be able to get ahead in this life. What this Government is doing with this legislation is just turning it into a political stunt—an absolute political stunt—that will require this House within the next couple of years no doubt to be looking at this again because it is so token and so inadequate.With particular regard to Part 1 of this legislation there is the test at clause 15 the test that goes to residential land only; clauses 6 and 15 which exclude the sale of a person’s main home from the test; clauses 4 and 11 which exclude inherited property from the test; clause 10 which excludes the transfer of property as the result of a relationship breakdown; and so on and so on—the point being that the test of a brightline is there for consistency and for there to be no or very very little room for inconsistency in that objective test.Despite the fact that there was a very truncated period for the Finance and Expenditure Committee for the hearings and submissions on this bill there were some very good submissions on this bill. Almost all of them questioned the objectivity the objective test and the consistency of the brightline test which is why we are going to see this legislation back in the House again.I want to refer briefly to an article by Terry Baucher—which no doubt other colleagues have mentioned—who is an Auckland-based tax specialist. He makes the very good point that good tax policy takes steps to remove inconsistency and improve coherence. Well this legislation is not doing that.My concern particularly—because I know that colleagues are speaking about other aspects of this bill—is about the number of people who will get caught up in this legislation who should not be caught up in this legislation and about where the grey and muddy clouded areas will affect them. My concern is about the people who make the decision to sell the home that they have bought within that 2-year period because of personal circumstances and who have no idea of the impact that this legislation will have on them. This legislation has no regard for them or for the impact that it will have on them. Whether they are people who have somebody die in their family who have a divorce in their family or for whatever reason there are unintended consequences from this piece of legislation. That is one of the reasons—