Parmar ParmjeetDr PARMJEET PARMAR (National): Thank you Mr Chair for this opportunity to be able to contribute. I'm taking this call to move the amendment in my name that is After clause 11 insert new Clause 12". Clause 12 is to amend the Road User Charges Act 2012. So this proposed clause amends the Road User Charges Act 2012: "At the end of section 33(3) replace '.' with ' and whether there is a Regional Fuel Tax scheme in place in the region where the [road-user charges] vehicle is primarily used.' " The purpose of this amendment in my name is to ensure that a road-user charge collector can take into consideration the presence of a regional fuel tax when deciding whether to waive or refund a vehicle's road-user charges. Our position is very clear: ideally we don't want to see this regional fuel tax legislation overall going through. But I'm proposing this amendment to help businesses and also to keep the cost of living for people especially people on superannuation as low as possible. If Minister Twyford decides not to accept my amendment I would like to really hear from the Minister why the Minister thinks that this amendment is not a good one to be accepted and the amendment proposed to be put in the legislation. I was talking to some people in Mount Roskill and yes there were groups of some business people; there were groups of people there who are on superannuation. One business person that distributes their products all around the country raised this concern with me: to compete with products that are coming from overseas—for some reason some products that come from overseas even after the shipping charge goes on them are able to be sold at a cheaper rate than the products that are manufactured locally. So what this business does is to compete with these products it delivers products free of delivery charge and this is just a tactic that the business has adopted to compete with other products. The concern that this business person had was that with this regional fuel tax legislation going through—in the first step they know that the Auckland Council has already approved that 11.5c per litre is going to be implemented from 1 July and with this legislation going through it is going to be around 25c a litre. It's going to be really hard for this business person to be able to absorb the freight charge—the freight charge of the deliveries that he does all around the country. He said that he might reconsider the number of positions that he has in his office. So somehow these businesses will try hard to absorb this additional cost of freight in their business but there will be some form of impact and that could be in terms of someone becoming unemployed. Then in that conversation we had a couple in the group that is on superannuation. Their concern is that it's not just about the fuel charge because with freight charges going up—as most of the freight is diesel and that is where the road-user charge becomes relevant—they said the cost of everything else especially food will also go up and it will become really hard for people on superannuation. I'm talking about families and businesses in Mount Roskill where we know that the families already find it really hard and this legislation is going to make it harder for them. They said that the cost of food is the biggest worry they have. As a couple they like to go out once a week and they were saying that they will have to reconsider their once-a-week outing because even the restaurant food will go up because it is not just about the petrol prices going up but it's about everything else that is linked to petrol or diesel. Everything else that is delivered through various freight mechanisms—the costs of those things are also going to go up. It's really important that we take into consideration people—those who are on superannuation businesses that really want to make sure that they're doing well and are able to employ more people—so that they are not affected. So that's why I am proposing this amendment in my name that is that a road-user charge collector can take into consideration the presence of a regional fuel tax when deciding whether to waive or refund a vehicle's road-user charges. This would give some form of relief to businesses because they will be able to continue their practice of doing deliveries that are free of charge and also the cost of food and other things—[Time expired]"