Hipkins Chris: Protected Disclosures Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Hipkins Chris: Protected Disclosures Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:653;Page:2734] 
CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka) 
: 
 Fundamentally the Protected Disclosures Amendment Bill is about accountability and the abuse of power and I think we want to consider that for a moment. Jacqui Dean talked just before about the Otago District Health Board; I thought that was a really good example of where some serious wrongdoing was uncovered and because it was uncovered was able to be dealt with. One of the important aspects of the protected disclosures legislation is that the people who do that kind of uncovering of wrongdoing can be protected and do not lose their jobs. What is really important too of course is that the people who then fix up the mess created by that do not get sacked as well. That was certainly not so in the case with the Otago District Health Board which Jacqui Dean mentioned because the chairperson who then intervened and cleaned up the mess was sacked for political reasons by the current Minister of Health. That person did not get due fair process but was simply sacked because the new Minister of Health wanted to swagger around to try to prove the point that he was in charge of things. 
I would also like to talk a little bit about some of the other people who might be covered by this legislation. It is always good to put these things in a context so I will talk—hypothetically—about a staff member in a Minister’s office who was concerned about serious wrongdoing within that office. For example if the staff member had uncovered and had knowledge of the fact that the Minister had failed to declare a shareholding in a business he or she was using his or her ministerial capacity to promote we would want to ensure that the person who disclosed that had some protection. If the staff member wanted to disclose the fact that the Minister had used a diplomatic passport to travel overseas to promote a business in which he or she had a financial interest we would want the person who disclosed that to be protected. If the staff member wanted to use the legislation in order to disclose that the Minister had failed to disclose that companies he or she was associated with were being investigated by the Serious Fraud Office we would want the staff member to be protected. If the staff member wanted to use the protected disclosures legislation to disclose that the Minister he or she worked for was in fact in charge of a bill that altered the powers of a local authority for which that Minister had been identified as the lead legal adviser we would want that staff member to be protected if he or she decided to disclose that. Ultimately this legislation is about power the abuse of power and protecting people who disclose the abuse of power—and those who abuse power include Ministers. 
I want to alert members to some of the changes that this bill puts in place. Under clause 4(2) new paragraph (g) is added to section 3 of the Act to extend the definition of an “employee” to be someone who works “as a volunteer without reward or expectation of reward for that work.” A good example of that would be parliamentary interns. They fit that definition: they work in a Minister’s office “as a volunteer without reward or expectation of reward for that work.” and they see an awful lot. So they would be in a position to disclose information about the gross misuse and abuse of power by a Minister of the Crown. This legislation extends the protection of the Protected Disclosures Act to them and that is something I think we should be in favour of because ultimately there has to be high standards of conduct within the Public Service. 
It is importance for public confidence in the Public Service that the public knows there are high standards of conduct in the Public Service but is it not regrettable that we cannot say that about the Ministers in this Government at this present point in time? 
Even though it has been disclosed through one means or another that there has been serious misconduct by a Minister in this Government still the Prime Minister continues to refuse to do something about it. He has called the Minister “stupid” in public. He has given him a bollocking. He has said that the Minister has no more lifelines and no more chances yet every time there is another revelation about what that Minister is involved with the Minister continues to hold his ministerial warrant and he is given one final warning and then another “final” warning. 
We want to ensure that anybody who has information about that kind of thing—whether he or she works in a Minister’s office as a staff member a volunteer or an intern—should be able to make a protected disclosure without fear of retribution or reprimand. I think that is a very important part of this legislation. This bill was introduced by the previous Labour Government so of course we will be supporting it.