McClay Todd; Salesa JennyHon TODD McCLAY (National—Rotorua) (remote): Madam Chair thank you very much. To the Minister I want to go back to what the soon to be honourable Andrew Bayly said and that was a direct question to the Minister about that letter that the Minister spoke of that Andrew Bayly read from and it was a letter that came from the gaming industry. It was also sent to the Minister. Did the Minister read that himself or did he merely get a briefing for officials on it or is he not aware of it? I know in previous portfolios before in the last Parliament he had to admit that he was speaking to documents he hadn't fully read. If that's the case here it's acceptable—Ministers get a lot of information; they have officials and others who deal with it—but actually did he read that himself and if not will he get his officials to get it for him quickly and consider it before my Supplementary Order Paper comes up for a vote? That's the first thing.The second is he talked about the changes around intention and effect when it comes to market position. I have a particular concern around this. I don't disagree that actually we probably need better rules or clearer rules for the Commerce Commission because the Minister is right. It's not that they haven't won that many cases; they haven't taken a lot because of course if they're not sure of a prosecution a conviction they're not likely to take a case. The point here though Minister is it's as much about resource as it is about the law. I'm not arguing there are not changes in the law needed but it is about resource. His Government has increased the amount of money that has gone to the Commerce Commission but actually it's gone to the Commerce Commission as a result of an inquiry that his Government directed them to undertake and they now monitor fuel pricing in New Zealand.You will remember many many years ago a very important commerce issue that falls under the jurisdiction of this Act when the Prime Minister was accused of being the fleecer-in-chief" because a very large amount of tax that the Government takes from fuel—the large make-up of the component of a litre of fuel that today is over $3 is taxed. They instructed by way of letter the Commerce Commission to undertake an inquiry into that. The Commerce Commission's come forward with its position. The Government said "Job done; see bad oil companies". Well the price is now higher; the extra money that the Government gave the Commerce Commission largely is to continue to monitor that.So the point of this is that actually yes there are changes needed to the law but we can't merely make it easier for the Commerce Commission to take cases and win them in a court because actually we need certainty on both sides but it is a resourcing issue. They actually don't have enough money to do all the things that they need to and sometimes they don't take cases because the resource is not there. And whilst the Government gave them the ability to initiate their own inquiries they haven't been able to do so because every time the Government has a political problem—two years ago it was petrol prices when Kiwis were being fleeced at the pump because of the amount of tax the Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern collects on the way through. Then it's the supermarkets because the price of everything's going up and supermarket prices are going up and a very large part of this is because the Government keeps putting in place rules regulations and cost increases that flow through to the cost of our food and supermarkets. Supermarkets have a role to play but they actually are not the only ones.You know every time the Government has a problem and they dump it on the Commerce Commission; the Commerce Commission can't do the things that the Minister is saying this legislation will help them to do. And that comes back to the point of the change of the legislation: rather than intent its effect. So if somebody intends to break the law and use a dominant position yes of course they're breaking the law—the Commerce Commission can take a case here. If they take an action and you know it was not foreseeable that it would have an impact upon a market but it does have the effect they can still be prosecuted and that creates greater uncertainty and hesitancy and cost which again flows on to the consumer.The final point I'd make is an example of where the Government is working with companies in New Zealand and providing taxpayer support around innovation and R & D which is a good thing. In this case it's in the kiwifruit sector where much of the kiwifruit that comes to market and new variants and so on is a collaboration between the sector and growers—Zespri in this case—and the Government. Each side puts money in and they produce a lot of this which is dealt with by way of intellectual property. The challenge we have is that taxpayer funds are put into this and therefore then the intellectual property is put aside for the use of the other party that's not the Government and there are growers and others in New Zealand that might want access to some of this product—or innovation I suppose—that is not being used and may never be used but others may want to do so for the betterment of the economy of New Zealand. And there's an example for instance of kiwi berries but many many others that are not on the level of production they should be. So I'm asking the Minister whether these changes will have an impact upon that in as far as—CHAIRPERSON (Hon Jenny Salesa): Order! Order! The member's time is up."