Curran ClareCLARE CURRAN (Labour—Dunedin South): Well that will be a hard act to follow. It is not very often that a member of the Opposition stands and says that they are actually proud of a bill that has come out of a select committee and is ostensibly a Government bill but ultimately was not. Labour supports this bill and considers it to be quite a revolutionary bill. In fact we helped draft a substantial part of it and it is mostly a bill that has come from this side of the House in terms of driving and supporting what lies behind it.Labour has been supporting the telecommunications industry for a number of years to reduce all of those barriers that the Minister talked about—or started to talk about but really did not go into depth on. Barriers have been experienced by thousands and thousands of businesses and by people who either live down driveways or in apartment buildings or run businesses in buildings that have got more than one tenant.People listening to this tonight—and I hope there are people listening on their radios and watching on their televisions—there are literally thousands of people who are so frustrated angry and upset and who have been waiting months to try to connect to ultra-fast broadband (UFB). The UFB itself once you get it is great—there is no doubt about that—but the palaver that you have to go through to actually get connected is actually quite appalling for many New Zealanders. For those who live down driveways and those who live in what they call multi-unit dwellings apartment buildings etc. this bill will remove impediments. It will do other things as well which I will get on to but that is so important. The industry and New Zealand have been waiting for this for years. Labour outlined in its 2014 policy how we would support a change of legislation—that was 3 years ago. It was 3 years ago and we have only got the legislation now because the previous Minister for Communications Amy Adams has been sitting on her hands on this piece of legislation. It was absolutely ready to go. The ideas were there it had been largely worked through and it has taken this long to get to the House. That is just shameful. It has taken far too long.The Commerce Committee was told last year by the Telecommunications Carriers Forum which is the peak body for the industry that 17 percent of connections require a consent and that a third of them were experiencing major delays. However we also heard from Enable Networks which is a lines company that is rolling out fibre—the UFB—to Christchurch that 60 percent of its work was experiencing delays because of bureaucracy and barriers in the system. Thankfully this bill will get rid of some of those barriers and some of that bureaucracy; it will not fix everything. That is another story and hopefully we will have time to go into that during the Committee stage as we will with some of the many many stories of people who are having so much difficulty connecting.This is a very unusual bill because half of it—and the Minister played this down and he played it down because it actually shows that it was not Government policy—was introduced during the select committee process as a result of a submission from Northpower which is again a lines company. It is an electricity lines company rolling out fibre in Northland. Northpower asked the select committee to allow it to put fibre for telecommunications purposes on its existing network poles that were situated on private land without the need to acquire easements. Northpower is as I said already rolling out UFB around Whangarei. It is a poster child for good practice. Northpower wanted to extend its reach to the whole area that it covers to be able to provide fibre to rural New Zealand but the law did not allow it to do so. So it effectively submitted the framework for a Supplementary Order Paper at the select committee which was not in the bill and it begged the committee to consider it.This idea had been around for a while—again on this side of the House we were supportive of that idea and were a bit horrified to find that it was not in the bill that was originally tabled in the House. But no it was not in the bill—and I will come to that in a minute. What Northpower was suggesting bypassed the ministerial process—it bypassed ministerial policy. It is a revolutionary provision because it bypasses the Government's own rural broadband programme. Should the opportunity provided by this legislation be taken up by electricity lines companies it will fast track the ability of rural New Zealand to get fast internet. I cannot emphasise that enough and that is why it is revolutionary. It is an economic development opportunity. It is a regional development opportunity that is now going to be made available and—guess what—it is not the Government's own programme and it was not even the Government's own idea and yet it is coming to the House in a bill. That is why it is so unusual and that is why I am standing here today saying why we support it so much.It is actually going to help close the digital divide. Now those electricity lines companies have got an opportunity right around the country—or if they choose to do an arrangement with a third party the legislation provides for that as well. Now there is an opportunity for any of you MPs in the House today who have got a rural constituency and people who have been banging on your doors asking: Why can't we get fast internet? Why are we on dial-up speed still?". There are so many of those communities—I read them out during question time in the House today—asking: "Why can't we get it? Why are we the second-hand cousins? Why aren't we considered as important—that we can't get it?".Today Simon Bridges crows about the Government's second version of UFB. Rural New Zealand is going to have to wait for 7 years to get connected to UFB under the Government programme. Well this legislation is an opportunity now for the lines companies to make a business case in their areas and offer fast internet—not Government-sponsored—to the rural constituencies. That is a fantastic thing.I cannot wait for this legislation to be passed because we know that the digital divide is real. So far the Government has spent $300 million on the rural broadband programme. Many New Zealanders outside the main centres are held back because of poor connectivity. In Southland 24 percent of rural businesses lack connectivity. It affects their ability to attract staff and people to move to the regions—41 percent say the internet service does not meet their needs. In Huntly just 44 percent of households have internet access 51 percent in Tuakau and 51 percent in Taumarunui. In Clutha it costs $100000 to connect to fibre through a transition cable that goes through the Clutha area because there is no break-off point. This is quite revolutionary. To finish I want to commend the committee—I do want to commend the committee. We worked really hard. There was a lot of goodwill and this was an example to me of how a select committee can improve build on and make real legislation that makes real changes for communities. I really do commend the work that the committee members did and how seriously they took it because we were not receiving guidance or policy input on this major part of the legislation. The sticking point for the proposal originally was whether or not Federated Farmers would support it. They realised how important it was and a negotiated arrangement was come to and that shows just how a select committee can drive a really powerful process that will deliver for people. This is not really a Government bill—just saying. This is a bill that has come out of the select committee. It is going to be revolutionary and it really is going to deliver good connections and close that digital divide in New Zealand."