Mark RonHon RON MARK (Minister of Defence): Thank you very much Madam Deputy Speaker. I rise obviously on behalf of New Zealand First to signal our support for the passing of this legislation. It is interesting it's always interesting listening to Opposition speeches opposing legislation that has gone through the select committee process and I would like to start by congratulating the Social Services and Community Committee on the work that they did and congratulating them on their two-page report. Actually the bulk of page one was taken up by the heading. Half of the first page is actually the heading then the recommendations.Chris Bishop: The report's twice as long as the RIS.Hon RON MARK: But I guess the real—Mr Mr—what's his name? Lives out in the Hutt—sorry Mr Bishop. Mr Bishop's got a lot to say over there and no doubt he's going to take a call and he'll have another full 10 minutes to make his call. So just to answer his sort of chatter across the House there is the minority view filed by the National Party contained in this report on the bottom of page two. And it's a huge report. It's massive. It's all of two paragraphs—three if we consider the words National opposes this bill" because that's the entire content of the third paragraph.So I'm finding it a little bit hard to take seriously anything that I'm hearing from the Opposition benches or anything that we're likely to hear from Mr Bishop in no doubt what will be a full-blown 10-minute blast. Try as I might if I wrote out their total objections contained in this bill it would only take me one minute maximum. And what do they talk about? Well some of the things that they talk about in these two paragraphs stating their opposition to this legislation—which let's be clear this Government thinks is dealing with a bit of a rort. That's what it's doing. It's dealing with a rort that allows landlords or their agents to arbitrarily charge prospective tenants a fee not based on the actual cost of the transaction.We often hear from that side of the House about market forces; and how supply and demand will dictate what's available; and how much one pays; and how one should just let the market forces determine; that business people are clear analytical. They study their business models and their business cases and they come to sound logical reasons as to how they're going to charge what their margins will be and what those expenses consist of that accumulate to a total fee—known in this case as a letting fee.Well if that's true why from one end of the country to the other are landlords using such a blunt tool as charging people one week's rent regardless of the house; regardless of its location; regardless of which city we're talking about; and regardless of the conditions that apply in each of those provinces districts towns and communities in which various rental properties are located? It's a ridiculous argument coming from the Opposition who touts itself as being fiscally competent astute in business and friends of the business community.You know a cynic might say that there are alternate reasons for their supporting or opposing legislation like this. A cynic might say—DEPUTY SPEAKER: Well actually the Standing Orders would stop the cynic.Hon RON MARK: Well the Standing Orders would stop the cynic so a cynic wouldn't actually say it. But a cynic would certainly think about some of the things one sees recently in the media. But anyway we'll move on from that. I'm simply saying a cynic might ponder those things and wonder why the National Party is so determined to support landlords on this stupid fee.Chris Bishop: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker.DEPUTY SPEAKER: Yeah I did try to warn the member that Standing Orders are quite clear—which I'm anticipating your point of order.Chris Bishop: That is indeed my point. The Standing Orders are very clear that it is not to be implied that members are acting on outside influences in this House.DEPUTY SPEAKER: That's right.Hon RON MARK: That's true. And I withdraw and apologise if I gave any such insinuation Mr Bishop. I know that the National Party members themselves number quite a few landlords and I understand their concerns and I understand that they would be concerned that they might have to bear this cost and therefore they would be sympathetic to the arguments that were put across the select committee table in that respect in that regard. Of course I do.I heard arguments here saying that landlords are exiting the housing rental market because of this bill. I heard a comment say there are far too many risks to being a landlord these days; that people have scrimped and saved to save the money to buy a house. Now most of the landlords that I know—and I've got some good mates and I actually used to have a couple of rental properties myself down in Christchurch. Smart business people actually leverage against the equity that they currently have in real estate. They don't actually scrimp and save. They don't actually save up money in the little jam jar as was being suggested here tonight. They actually go to their bank manager—and on the rising escalating house prices that happened under that last Government nine years of sky-rocketing house prices on the back of a shortage of supply many landlords made themselves extremely wealthy and were able to leverage against massive equity gains.And why do some of the landlords exit the housing rental market right now? Well let's talk about it. Mr Kieran McAnulty knows because he's from the Wairarapa like I am. We are seeing people exiting the housing rental market right now because they have decided from a business perspective that their equity is at a point where it's smart to cash up. They have decided that because so many Wellingtonians and people from Auckland—the Auckland refugees getting out of there escaping that rather bizarre economic environment—are cashing up their houses cleaning up their $1.5 million coming down to the Wairarapa and buying up houses hand over fist. Houses are appearing on the market in Masterton Carterton and South Wairarapa one week and are gone the next. Landlords are making a conscious business decision to capitalise on exactly that.Let me tell the Opposition who clearly don't seem to understand a lot about business these days—it's been a sad thing to see the deterioration in the National Party's understanding of commerce but it's there in this debate tonight—that these people are making clear commercial decisions. They have realised some spectacular capital gain so they are cashing out of the market and they are doing other things with their money—some because they're retired and they're putting that into their retirement fund; some because they're entering into other markets. It's a commercial decision. It's not about this bill. It's got nothing to do with this bill.In fact here's the irony: as the Hon Judith Collins said there are some good landlords out there. There are some good business people out there. There are some philanthropic business people out there. And these are the people who are recognising that this piece of legislation is good and that it's going to clean some people out of the market who shouldn't be making these charges. These are the people who are also staying in the housing rental market because they see a greater public good. And I applaud them. Many of them are actually National Party voters. I applaud them for their strong sense of social conscience and for their understanding that this fee is a blight actually on the reputation of good quality landlords and it needs to be done away with. And it shall be tonight."