Nash StuartHon STUART NASH (Minister of Police): I would like to talk about Subpart 6 Amendments to Fair Trading Act 1986". Clause 61A—this amends section 47G "Commission may require person to supply information or documents or give evidence." First of all I'd just like to make a point: it says "Commission may require person …" Shouldn't it be "a person"? It doesn't really matter. I mean everywhere else in the bill it talks about "a person" as opposed to "person". It doesn't really matter; I'm just making that point.There are a couple of points I would like to make about this clause and the first one is: why is it that the commission "may" only require a person and doesn't compel a person to supply information or documents and evidence? I just wonder under what circumstances—because the Fair Trading Act is sort of fundamental to well as it says the fairness of our retail sector or how commerce works I suppose in this country. Does the commission in any other part of the Act—I haven't got the Act in front of me. Is there any other part under the Fair Trading Act where the commission can actually compel someone under the Fair Trading Act to provide information or documentation or evidence? The reason I ask this is because if the commission does not have the power to compel then it is very easy for someone to just say "No I'm just not going to engage with the commission." If one side decides not to engage with the Commerce Commission on this then again the logical next step is that justice is not seen to be done.The other thing I would like to talk about on this is new section 47G(1A) in clause 61A. This is where we insert "A person may appear before the Commission". We've talked about audio and audiovisual; I'm not going to talk about that at all but what it says here is "A person may appear before the Commission under subsection (1)(c) by audio link or [video] if the Commission and the person agree."Now my question around this is: where does the onus sit? So for example if the person agrees must the commission agree or does the commission have the right not to agree? Or is it the other way round? So if the commission agrees and the person disagrees is that enough? I would've thought that that is the logical way that this should run but I am concerned—well I would just like to know and I actually think it should be clearer. If the person agrees then I would almost compel the commission to agree as well.The reason I say that is again it may be—and I'm not saying this is by any way or any stretch of the imagination going to happen—that the commission might say "Well you live in the very Far North. We're going to disagree to you appearing in front of a video or audiovisual link". What that does is it places an undue cost or burden for that person to actually come down and meet the commission in person. So what I would like to see here is that if the person agrees to meet by audio or visual link then the commission must also agree to do the same.Part of that question is also: under what circumstances would the commission disagree? Let's make an assumption here that as the law reads it the commission may disagree to meet with someone—if the person agrees the commission may disagree. Under what circumstances would the commission disagree to meet with someone via audio link or audiovisual link? I can imagine that there might be a time—and it may be that they believe the evidence cannot be delivered in a way that allows justice to be delivered. But I cannot think of any situation where the commission would not agree to meet a person if they had agreed as mentioned because the burden could be far too high for a person to come down to let's assume Wellington or Auckland—I don't think the commission would go anywhere else. And why would they? I know there's not a commission in Kaitāia for example.But this is about reducing the burden of compliance or the onus for someone to appear in front of the commission. So I think this should actually read that if the person agrees then the commission should agree. That's all I've got to say on that matter. Thank you very much."