Hudson Brett: New Zealand Business Number Bill — Third ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeHudson Brett: New Zealand Business Number Bill — Third Reading[Sitting date: 12 April 2016. Volume:713;Page:10438. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]BRETT HUDSON (National): It is a pleasure to rise in support of the New Zealand Business Number Bill in its third reading. A previous speaker Dr Clark showed—it is actually pleasing to see—a very strong interest in small and medium sized business. But actually the New Zealand public were asked very recently about what they thought of the Opposition and its plans and I think the public showed very strongly that they seemed to believe that the quickest and easiest way to massively grow the number of small businesses in New Zealand would be to put Labour in charge of the large ones.Clare Curran: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. This is a third reading speech and this is a speech about a Government bill and not about the Labour Party.The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): I am listening carefully to the content and any relevance is a matter for me to rule on. I am asking Brett Hudson to continue.BRETT HUDSON: Thank you Mr Assistant Speaker. I think that was well borne out in the contribution that Dr Clark had to make. Sitting on the select committee we have seen this bill go through each of the stages and go through the submissions process and advice from officials. When we had the Committee of the whole House what we saw was quite frankly a reckless amendment suggested on the floor one that would force agencies to have to set aside other business—other technology business; other business work—simply to meet an arbitrary deadline that the Opposition might have liked to place. When I spoke on that and when I reflected after the Committee of the whole House as we headed into this reading I first thought: “Is this merely an illustration that the Opposition members do not understand technology?”. It could well be that but then on further reflection I was worried that perhaps it is more symbolic of their not understanding business—that they did not actually grasp what they would be asking public sector agencies to set aside in order that they might meet some arbitrary deadline set by the Opposition.Just earlier this evening we were debating the Taxation (Transformation: First Phase Simplification and Other Measures) Bill. This is a tax transformation programme that is going to last for a number of years at the Inland Revenue Department (IRD). The Opposition members would—The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Order!BRETT HUDSON: —have the IRD set that aside—The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): That is not part of this debate.BRETT HUDSON: —simply to meet the requirements of the amendment that they supported in the Committee of the whole House. So I wondered whether perhaps they simply had not grasped the business and then it occurred to me that it could be worse. It could actually be the case that because they realised that Parliament being sovereign has the right to impose any conditions it chooses upon society upon individuals and upon public sector agencies that just because it could it would—and it would do so without giving any consideration as to the other business or the other activities that those agencies are obliged to be delivering over the next 1 2 or even more years. Quite frankly the amendment and Labour’s amendment to the amendment were not only reckless they were feckless.The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Order! There is Speaker’s ruling 137/4. You can mention in passing amendments that have been defeated in the Committee of the whole House but you cannot dwell on them at length. So I will ask the member to come back to the content of the third reading speech.BRETT HUDSON: Thank you Mr Assistant Speaker. So what we do have in the House at the third reading is the bill unamended which will provide a mechanism for small and medium sized businesses in particular to be able to undertake their interactions with the Government in a much more cost and time-effective manner; one that will help them to avoid the troubling and quite frankly wasteful exercise of doing things like repeating such basic public information as the nature of your business and the address—that public register of information—not having to repeat that with every agency you deal with if any of that should change even such as an address if you relocate and not having to provide that update to every single agency.This is a very effective and pragmatic bill. I have enjoyed working on it through each of the stages. It does appear as if it will pass in the House tonight and I commend this bill to the House.