Clendon David: Shop Trading Hours Act Repeal (Waitaki Easter Trading) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Clendon David: Shop Trading Hours Act Repeal (Waitaki Easter Trading) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
[Sitting date: 27 June 2012. Volume:681;Page:3477. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
DAVID CLENDON (Green) 
: 
 I will begin by supporting the words of our colleague Dr Rajen Prasad who has just resumed his seat. He covered some of the bases that I would otherwise have mentioned. So I will cut to the chase. We understand this is to be a personal vote but I can speak with complete confidence on behalf of myself and all of my colleagues when we say we will be very happy to oppose this bill the Shop Trading Hours Act Repeal (Waitaki Easter Trading) Amendment Bill as we have opposed by our count seven previous bills that have endeavoured to liberalise trading laws on Easter Sunday. Hopefully this one will have as little success. 
There are a number of reasons for that and not least of all is that we are not a bit convinced that workers’ rights will be protected. My colleague Denise Roche will say more about that a bit later. I would stress again that for 361½ days of the year it is pretty much open slather for stores to trade and in a leap year they get an extra day—362½ days. So 3½ days a year are reserved for family time for non-trading time to a large extent at least. We are talking about restricted days—Christmas Day Good Friday Easter Sunday and Anzac Day morning until 1 p.m. 
The suggestion has been put that this is a very contained and a very localised proposition particularly focusing on Wanaka. In answer to that I would say it is the thin end of the wedge argument. If we are going to allow Wanaka to trade on Easter Sundays how long before Dunedin puts its hand up or Clutha or indeed Christchurch? And we sincerely hope that Christchurch will once again become a tourist Mecca as it has been in the past. 
I think it is useful to consider what is actually at stake here when we say there may be no trading no opening on these 3½ days of the year. It is interesting to look at the exemptions to that rule on the Department of Labour website. It is instructive to just look at who may open on these restricted trading days. We have been offered a vision of Wanaka—tumbleweeds blowing down the main street frustrated tourists with pockets full of money unable to spend it. What nonsense! 
Let us start off with dairies—the good old-fashioned dairy—selling milk papers cat food or whatever it is you happen to need to get you through that day the usual bits and pieces the newspapers of the day all of those things. Takeaways cafes and restaurants may open on these days. Nobody will perish for want of food. They can sit in a place and eat and drink as you would on any other day of the year. Service stations are free to trade. We can fuel our cars. Again service stations offer quite a range of food and magazines. You can buy a fan belt a light bulb or whatever it might happen to be you need to buy on that day. 
Duty-free stores are allowed to open to service tourists if they choose to on any one of these days. Genuine tourists who are passing through on their way to an airport and want to pick up their duty-free are very welcome to do so. Service providers may offer a service on these days providing they are not selling product so video rental stores can open. Your local hairdresser can choose to open. Your local chiropodist or your sports masseur can choose to offer a service on any one of these days. There are abundant opportunities to spend your money if you so choose. 
The list goes on. Real estate agents—you can even buy a house on any one of these days. Garden centres may open on Sunday and of course on Saturday. They have a day off on Friday. You shop for plants at the garden centre on Saturday and Sunday and you plant them at your home on Monday. That does not seem onerous to me; I have done it personally many times. Any shops within a transport hub selling again food drink papers magazines—the things that travellers want and need—are readily available on any of these days. Shops within bona fide markets craft markets may open on these days. 
Souvenir stores in Wanaka may sell pounamu merino and leather products on any one of these days. They are genuine souvenirs. Give me a break when you tell me that there are people who cannot have an opportunity to spend their money in Wanaka on any one of these days. It is not the reality. Who wants these changes? It is the chain stores the department stores and the supermarkets—the sites that employ large numbers of employers. Most of these outlets that may open are owner-operated small to medium sized enterprises. If I owned a store as I did for a number of years I would have the choice as an owner-operator to open and provide goods or services to the public on most of these days.