Brownlee Gerry; Peters Winston; Woodhouse MichaelQuestion No. 11 to MinisterHon GERRY BROWNLEE (National—Ilam): I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. It's to do with the question that was not asked by the National Party today. I think over the years if you go through Speakers' rulings there's been a number of rulings about members being away etc. A lot of those rulings were based on the fact that sometimes members couldn't get to the House and the most recent stuff in there is of course from 2011 and 2014 when the Standing Orders Committee considered how best to deal with those particular matters. So what I'm suggesting is that where there is—could you have a think on behalf of the House about how reasonable it is for a side of the House to determine whether or not a member who is a Minister should be able to have the time granted to them to be here to answer questions about comments and other statements that they have made.Hon Chris Hipkins: Speaking to the point of order—SPEAKER: No I don't require any support from the Leader of the House. This matter was considered by the Standing Orders Committee certainly in 2017. A lot of members of the committee were supportive of putting into the Standing Orders a requirement for the Government to indicate which Ministers would be available on the morning possibly at 9 o'clock before questions were to be lodged. The member was the person who led the opposition to it. Now I hope—I hope—[Interruption] Order! I hope that at some stage notwithstanding the previous Government's opposition to it we can get to the point of the Government implementing that which does not require a change to the Standing Orders. But I just want to say to the Hon Gerry Brownlee that I think he's pretty cheeky bringing it up.Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (National—Ilam): I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. It's clear that there'll be a number in this House who have full recollection of that discussion. You'll also I'm sure recollect that my concern was that it would be a forward notice of who was going to be there at any particular time. The reality is that on a daily basis that's not a bad practice but it was in the context of something that I would have to say was completely new to the House in my time: an initiative from me to give the House a week's notice of the business—full business—that was likely to be transacted. So I think your characterisation of me being cheeky in raising this is completely unreasonable and a misrepresentation of a select committee discussion of which I imagine there is some record.SPEAKER: Well I certainly—and I can see from the faces of other members present—have a different recollection and I don't like it being characterised as a misrepresentation. We certainly have a different recollection of what occurred there and I might say it was an issue on which a couple of members including myself were I think more heavily focused than the member might have been at the time.Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (National—Ilam): I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I think that's a bit of an unreasonable statement from the Chair actually—to suggest that any member was not focused while they were at a hearing of a select committee let alone the Standing Orders Committee. But it's become quite a practice I think in recent weeks for the Speaker to make these strong statements which personally I would caution against. Might I also say that it's not unusual for people to change their mind on these things much as we've seen the Deputy Prime Minister change his mind on the CPPPT"—whatever it's called nowadays.Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Deputy Prime Minister): I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I want you to reconsider whether there should be not further consideration of a "not as I do but as I say" rule otherwise Mr Brownlee will have no chance of protesting in this House.Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE (National): I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. At the risk of prolonging this discussion I want you to reflect on the comment that you made in your answer where you said that the previous Government had opposed those moves and just to remind you that the members of that committee—of which I was one—are representatives of this House and not of the Government.SPEAKER: Yes and the point that I will reiterate is that members I think from all three parties currently in Government supported that change but because of the way that the committee works and the fact that we do seek at least a substantial majority at the committee it was a suggestion that was blocked by the National Party."