Clark David: Companies and Limited Partnerships Amendment Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeClark David: Companies and Limited Partnerships Amendment Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 18 June 2014. Volume:699;Page:18665. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Dr DAVID CLARK (Labour—Dunedin North):I rise to speak on Part 1. It is a delight to actually stand to speak in favour of the Companies and Limited Partnerships Amendment Bill. It is a positive contribution to make in this House and we from this side of the Chamber do not always get to commend the Government for making a good step forward. It happens rarely but it is great that here we are debating a piece of legislation that takes the country forward through criminalising breaches of directors’ duties. None of this detracts from what Clare Curran said. Why has it taken so long? The fundamental point she made in her speech is worth repeating. But here we are passing a bill that will help to level the playing field. It is the dishonest practice—Sue Moroney: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. I am reluctant to actually stop my colleague while he is in the middle of his contribution on this bill but I know it is after the dinner break and I am not sure—The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy): Order! If the member is making a point of order she should make the point of order and not comment on dinner or any other reason. Points of order should be made tersely.Sue Moroney: Well my very terse point of order is that I can barely hear my colleague speak and there are members opposite who have moved their seats in order to try to barrack at speakers on this bill. I do not know what they took in during the dinner break—The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy): Order! Now I have cautioned the member and the member has deliberately—so I am going to require an apology to the Chair before I do anything else.Sue Moroney: I apologise to the Chair.The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy): Thank you—Hon Todd McClay: Speaking to the point of order—The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy): No I am not taking any more and the barracking was too much so the point of order is upheld.Dr DAVID CLARK: Thank you Mr Chair. As I was saying I was congratulating the Government on its good behaviour and unfortunately those members have let themselves down as your point of order has rightly ruled.But here is the Government dealing with the criminalisation of breaches of certain directors’ duties and actually making a law that helps to level the playing field a little bit step by precious step. It is true that this bill has taken many years to get to this point in Parliament but here it is describing what penalties should apply for bad faith where directors knowingly act in a way that results in serious loss to a company through the incurring of debt through fraudulent dishonest behaviour and so on.We know that this kind of legislation is incredibly important in our democracy. If we wish to have a functioning democracy where businesses can flourish and where people who work hard and have talent can get ahead then we do need a level playing field. We need a set of useful regulation because it is certainly true that where there is good regulation our markets can prosper and make good decisions and where there is poor regulation or a lack of oversight very poor outcomes can come into play.We are lucky that we continue to enjoy a reputation broadly in New Zealand as a country that has a transparent and robust democracy. We have a long and proud history of democracy. Of course those things are under threat all the time and we must be wary and it is very good that the court has found the honourable member—or formerly honourable member—John Banks guilty because we have seen an important judicial process take place and we have a robust judicial system that can actually say when something is wrong.There are other things that do not get across that line. There are decisions made in this House that we might find ethically repugnant that end up making life more difficult for many people and we can all think of our own examples of those. But here we are debating a positive piece of legislation—a piece of legislation that will actually improve the lot overall of New Zealand and improve the health and the atmosphere in which our institutions our businesses can flourish.There are of course many other things that do not find their way into Part 1 of the bill or into the bill at all—other things that would help to make our environment flourish. I mention in passing pro-growth tax reform the kind of research and development tax credits that Labour would like to see introduced and a capital gains tax that would see money move away from the speculative housing sector into the productive sector and would actually increase exports.We would like to see a growing economy. This Government seems reluctant to grow the economy where that will put at risk the interests of the wealthiest few. We know that the interests of the 1 percent that are at the very top are growing all the time that we have the largest gap between rich and poor that we have ever had that the majority of New Zealand citizens are going backwards that median wages have dropped in real terms under this Government’s watch and that there is no doubt that this is the Government with the worst economic record in 50 years. So it is therefore a pleasure to get up and support at least one piece of legislation that makes a small step in the right direction which has taken a long time to get here but we certainly welcome it on this side of the Chamber.We do want a more positive New Zealand—one where New Zealand families can hope to own a company one day to build up from perhaps owing a small business starting themselves out saving working hard registering a company and all of these things. Clause 7A in Part 1 of the bill covers the nature of an application for registration of a company.