Faafoi Kris: Telecommunications (Development Levy) Amendment Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee Third ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeFaafoi Kris: Telecommunications (Development Levy) Amendment Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee Third Reading[Sitting date: 21 May 2015. Volume:705;Page:3773. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]KRIS FAAFOI (Labour—Mana): It is a sad indictment on the level of debate in this House from the National Party that that was one of the better contributions to this bill. I commend Mr Macindoe for getting up and at least telling the truth about their position on this bill. He did not say anything to support it because the grounds on which to support this piece of legislation are very thin.It was with ultra-fast speed that the Minister for Communications was forced to eat her words from her first reading speech. I will for the benefit of the House remind the National Party what Amy Adams said in her first reading speech: “The industry will not need to put their prices up or explain to their customers why their bill is changing.” Within the hour not even 60 minutes had passed from those words leaving the Minister for Communication’s mouth Spark New Zealand issued a press release making a liar of the communications Minister. That press release says that now the Government has confirmed the levy/tax will continue rather than reduce as originally legislated for it has put upward pressure on future costs and Spark will have to pass that cost through to its broadband and on-account mobile users. Not even an hour had passed.We had the Minister who said: “No New Zealanders don’t worry we’ve got this sorted. We’ll get this money from the telecommunications industry.” And then the telecommunications industry said: “Well actually Minister we’re going to get it from Kiwis.” According to this press release from Spark the average bill of Kiwis using broadband will go up by $1 a month. You can argue: “Hey that might not be a lot of money.” It certainly is not a lot of money for the people who support the National Party with all their big cheque books but it certainly is to people on this side of the House.There needs to be some scrutiny around this piece of legislation as to the effectiveness of the expenditure for the first tranche of the Rural Broadband Initiative. Maybe Mr Seymour might like to join the Labour Party and other parties on the Commerce Committee to get an inquiry on the effectiveness of the Rural Broadband Initiative. I think Mr Seymour actually raised a very good point: is what we are doing the most effective use of the money? Is it the right technology?We may not agree with everything that Mr Seymour may want to look at but he might want to join our initiative to get an inquiry into whether or not we are getting good value for money. I always thought that the ACT Party was the bastion of trying to make sure that every taxpayer dollar was spent well. But no no no not tonight—not tonight. Three hundred million dollars was spent on the first tranche of the Rural Broadband Initiative. We want to know whether that money has been spent effectively.From that side of the House we heard during the Committee stage at least very few speeches. They are lions in their seats but lambs on their feet. They would not get up and take a call to say: “Well this is good spending of $300 million.” At least David Seymour stood up and said: “Hey is this money being spent effectively? Are we doing the right thing?”. I look forward to Mr Seymour getting to the Commerce Committee—a very good select committee—and helping us get our inquiry over the line. I look forward to you coming to our meeting next Thursday.Four hundred and fifty million dollars is not chump change; it is a lot of money. And $300 million has already been spent on the first tranche. There is concern in rural communities as to whether that expenditure has been effective to deliver what has been promised by this Government and that is that 86 percent of rural people would get at least 5 megabits per second. There have been—and I believe that the number is three or four; I think it is three—rural communities come to our Commerce Committee and say: “Well Parliament that hasn’t been our experience. We have slower or ineffective broadband speeds in our area and we were promised this.”We thought it was a really good idea to see whether or not that first $300 million was spent effectively. I thought that the Government might think that too but no we have already heard from the chair of the Commerce Committee that she is not interested in having an inquiry. Maybe we need just that one more vote. Maybe on Thursday morning at 10 o’clock which is roughly when we have our meetings Mr Seymour you might want to turn up and help us out. I am sure that you and your members do not want to see $450 million go down the drain.We actually do want to make sure that the Rural Broadband Initiative is effective. We actually agree with the objectives of the Rural Broadband Initiative. Who would not? Isolated rural communities want to make sure that they are connected not just for economic benefit; there are educational benefits and health benefits from the Rural Broadband Initiative. If we are going to spend more money we want to make sure that that money has been spent effectively and that simply has not been the case.There has also been an argument from that side of the House—not a very strong one—that this will not affect the telecommunications industry. That is not necessarily the case because the telecommunications industry is not very impressed with this Government. The industry is saying that this piece of legislation has been rushed through urgency. Geoff Thorn—no stranger to us; he used to be the general manager of Parliamentary Service—who is now the chief executive of the Telecommunications Carriers Forum—[Interruption]Hon Member: Take a call Mr Bennett.KRIS FAAFOI: Yes take a call. Get up. You were here for the Committee stage but I did not hear one peep out of Mr Bennett—not one. All he can do is interject—all he can do is interject. Well just shush for a minute Mr Bennett and listen to what the telecommunications industry has got to say about your process—slamming this through at 11 o’clock at night.This bill has been introduced under urgency and doing so avoids any public debate. Well heaven forbid that we have public debate. Heaven forbid that we actually let the public have their say on this seeing as they are going to be the ones who are paying for it—a dollar every month. We cannot have the people coming in here. This is a proposal that has not been the subject of any consultation and that has avoided the usual scrutiny that would apply to Government spending. They go on.For the benefit of Mr Bennett this bill extends a tax. That word “tax” is mentioned four times in this press release I must add and that tax to date has not been explicitly recovered from consumers. However the industry cannot continue to absorb ongoing costs of this magnitude. Translation: the telecommunications industry has absorbed these costs and is saying it cannot do that any more. As we saw from Spark who is going to be paying now? Its customers—its customers. The Government is furiously trying to spin: well do not blame us; blame the telecommunications companies. Well who is passing this legislation through in the dead of night? It is this Government—it is this Government—and there is no scrutiny. No members of the public can come and ask any questions and this is the way the Government is doing it.The Rural Broadband Initiative is a great thing but if we are spending $450 million we want to make sure we do it properly. Do not just throw the money out there into the wind and hope that everything is all right. If we are going to spend $300 million we want to make sure it is being done properly and this piece of legislation allows us to collect $150 million more to roll out the second tranche. I think we should take a big deep breath and have an inquiry to look at whether the first tranche worked before you have $150 million more spent. It can be done otherwise we might be wasting taxpayers’ money. I know Mr Seymour hates that so I look forward to seeing him on Thursday morning at the Commerce Committee. It might be your turn to bring the baking.