McKelvie IanIAN McKELVIE (National—Rangitīkei): Thank you Madam Assistant Speaker. Well that was something to follow but I've got a comment or two to make on one or two of the previous speakers. I think it's a great shame when we get Ministers coming to the House and one particular Minister spent four minutes 30 seconds of his 10 minutes speaking about us instead of about his own portfolio—that shows he has little to speak about—and of course that's one of the critical portfolios in the country at the moment education. It seems strange he would spend four minutes 30 seconds talking about us but I suppose we like it. Then I want to comment a little bit on a couple of comments that the Hon Ron Mark made. He made the point that if you're in the army and you stay long enough in Waiōuru you meet everyone in New Zealand. Well I can assure him as the MP for Rangitīkei if you're the MP for Rangitīkei and you stop in Waiōuru you meet everyone in New Zealand too because you've got to go through Waiōuru to get north or south or east or west and so it's a very good place Waiōuru. And of course the army and the defence forces are a very important part of the Rangitīkei electorate. I want to start today by congratulating the Government oddly on their response to M. bovis. I think they've made a very brave decision to pick up that M. bovis response and run with it and I think they will be successful in eliminating it. It's a pretty brave thing to do when you think that 40 years ago in New Zealand we started to eliminate TB from our cattle herd. We haven't got there yet and of course one of the very topical issues of the last few days—the eradication of the possum from New Zealand—is one of the reasons we haven't got to the elimination of TB in New Zealand. So it's an issue that is a difficult one to grasp and I think they've done a good job with M. bovis and I congratulate the Minister Minister O'Connor for his work on that. However as a backbencher in this Parliament and one who's likely to be a backbencher throughout my time in this Parliament I want to comment on one or two other things that affect us backbenchers. I just want to make a comment on the running of select committees because I think that it's the one chance backbenchers have in the Parliament to make a very real input—Marja Lubeck: Better tell it to your own team when they don't show up.IAN McKELVIE: One of them's speaking just over there. I hope you get further than I have Matt—ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): Order! You must refer to them with their proper name—even your own members thank you.IAN McKELVIE: The MP for Northland. Sorry Madam Assistant Speaker—the MP for Northland. But I want to make a brief point about select committees because I think it's important for the whole Parliament that select committees take their time or as much time as they're able to over issues that are important to the Parliament. I think that it's really important that we all have time to have an input in select committee. I don't think we're getting that at the moment on one or two select committees I'm involved with and I think that's disappointing. Hence it will lead to some frustration and I think we're inevitably going to get that frustration coming out in the performance of those select committees. I think it's important that select committee chairs give time for people to be involved. I think it's important that Ministers when they're trying to influence select committee chairs remember that as well. I want to also just talk about one or two other things that affect the Parliament I suppose because I think it's a really important place. I think it's very important that we have an opportunity to say what we think in here and that we do it in a manner that I think is acceptable to everyone in the Parliament. And I'd like to see that improved in the next year or two and I would hope that that might be something we can achieve.Anyway having said all that I now want to spend some time wondering about what the year of delivery will exactly bring and I want to start with roading. My area's affected badly by the Manawatū Gorge. We're now seeing New Zealand Transport Agency proposing the alternative route speed limit be dropped to 60 kilometres an hour for a 14-kilometre stretch of a very important arterial route. And whilst there are a number of accidents on that road I think it's a bit of a stretch to drop that speed limit to 60 kilometres an hour throughout the length of that road. That is a very important route for us in the Manawatū and the Hawke's Bay area and it's one that I hope the Government moves on very quickly and progresses the redevelopment of that road or the new road or the alternative route as it will be I suppose. I hope that's progressed in good time.I also want to comment briefly on the Levin to Ōtaki road because that road is without doubt one of the most dangerous roads in the lower North Island. It has four very dangerous bridges on it a large amount of traffic and for those of us who travel that road frequently it is often very slow. Now the interesting thing about that is that when they finish the Ōtaki stretch of that road the bypass of Ōtaki that's going to back all the traffic up in Levin. Now Levin's not a little town like Ōtaki. Levin's quite a big town. It's got two sets of traffic lights and you can queue up at them for quite some time. When that road hits them in a two-lane road it's going to be much more dangerous and much more frustrating for traffic. I think it's really important that that road's progressed. It is going to be progressed in a two-lane form at some stage in the future. I think it's urgent that it be progressed much quicker than that because a hugely important factor for us in the Rangitikei and the Manawatū area is our connection to Wellington—to the port to the capital and for other reasons.I want to now speak briefly about I suppose what I call sustainable regions or what's been referred to in here today as sustainable regions. That is I guess Minister Jones' fund that's supposed to be making us sustainable. And whilst he's getting around New Zealand or that fund's getting around New Zealand we haven't as the Hon Paul Goldsmith said seen many jobs created yet. And as a part of that I want to touch on the billion trees. I've expressed concerns about the implementation of the billion trees programme in Parliament before. And I guess the fortunate thing about the billion trees programme is that the sheep industry is having its best run it's probably had since 1951. So it's precluding the billion trees from progressing at the rate they might otherwise wish it to. And so that's hugely fortunate in my view because there is some country in New Zealand that is absolutely eminently suitable for farming sheep on and I would hate to see that country go into trees because it would certainly inhibit the diversification of our food production and our industry. And certainly at the same time there are places that trees need to go. I urge that we plan that very carefully because I think that if we don't we're going to end up some years down the track regretting the decisions we've made. Interestingly we saw some of that happen after Bola on the East Coast where trees were planted on country where now they have been taken out again. And I don't imagine they'll go back in because it's highly productive farm land but none the less they were planted as a bulk planting after Cyclone Bola. That's changed. I want to comment briefly on the rental housing issue because I think it's of concern where we might get to there. The moment Governments interfere in things we get into trouble with them and the two very good examples of that in my view are both the racing industry where we have the Racing Act which controls the racing industry—that's been tested by that Act—and the other one I want to talk about is the Dairy Industry Restructuring Act which of course was bought in to create Fonterra. But none the less it's caused distortions in the marketplace. It's caused cows to be farmed where they shouldn't. It's caused milk to be picked up where it probably should never have been picked up. I think we should probably look to the future and hopefully that Act will be able to be scrapped because I think the less interference we have from Government in business and productivity in New Zealand the better off we are. It's most important that we do. [Bell rung]Briefly as I'm getting through my time by the sound of that I want to talk about the fisheries sector of which I have the interesting role of being the spokesperson for the Opposition on fisheries. We have some challenges in that fisheries sector not the least of which is the relationship between the commercial fishery and our recreational fishery. Our recreational fishing industry—it is an industry in fact—is hugely important to New Zealand. Some 800000 people go out to catch a fish and most of them are more successful than I am. None the less it's important that as the number of people involved in that industry grows we need to make sure that that sector is protected and has the opportunity to go and catch a fish within reason whenever they want. I think that's most important for us and we've seen some publicity in the sector in the last few weeks which I think the Minister needs to resolve. We need to urgently engage new techniques in the fishing industry to ensure that it's sustainable and to ensure that bycatch is maintained.That's one of my interests; the other interest I have of course is as the spokesperson for racing. We've seen the racing Minister—or the Deputy Prime Minister in fact—talk a lot about introducing legislation to implement some pieces of the Messara report. He hasn't got to that point yet. I think it's urgent that he does because he delayed some legislation that would have got the racing industry going at a greater speed. So I hope that gets implemented as quickly as possible. Of course in the last few weeks we've seen the Karaka sales which contribute a huge amount to the New Zealand economy in action and only yesterday was the first of the standardbred sales which also contribute a lot to our economy. It's most important that the racing industry and that Act get to Parliament. Thank you Madam Assistant Speaker.