Falloon AndrewANDREW FALLOON (National—Rangitata): Thank you Madam Chair for the opportunity to speak to Part 2 of the Commerce Amendment Bill. This relates to the regulation of airport services which in my view is a very important but probably understated part of this bill. We've talked a lot this afternoon about other parts of the bill but this is a very very important part which I think is worthy of a lot of debate.I want to draw the committee's attention to the fact that in the bill it specifies three airports they being Auckland Airport Wellington International Airport and Christchurch International Airport. So my first question for the Minister is: at what threshold does an airport become large enough or provide enough services to be included in that list? As we know Auckland Wellington and Christchurch are our three largest centres. But if you look around the country at the moment there are a large number of airports which are increasing services and they're increasing the number of airlines that are flying in which is very good to see. And so the example I'd draw the Minister's attention to specifically would be Queenstown. Queenstown now I believe has more airlines flying into it than Wellington Airport does which is very good for the South Island and very good for my part of the world. So that's my first question to the Minister: at what point does an airport become of a scale or of a size to be worthy of being included in this list?The second question I have is just in relation to a point that Brett Hudson made which is in relation to oversight by Parliament. The piece of legislation before us talks about strengthening the regulatory regime. Of course strengthening the regulatory regime usually means imposing more regulation. It also goes on to say: the commission and the Minister to consider when deciding whether to impose a stronger type of regulation on airports in the future". And that I guess on this side of the House is of concern to us: that a Minister could go off and willy-nilly decide to put additional regulations on without adequate parliamentary oversight. Of course Ministers always have the opportunity to put on regulations but our question I guess is: what oversight does Parliament have of that process?The third point I want to make is just coming back to other airports because my electorate—I'm very fortunate—has three airports: Timaru Airport Ashburton Airport and Rangitata Island Aerodrome which if you haven't been there I thoroughly recommend. It's a great part of the world. And I have this hope I guess that Timaru Airport will one day provide services to the east coast of Australia and perhaps as far as the Pacific. So I have concerns that if this piece of legislation as it's currently drafted specifies three airports how far will the Government want to go with that? Because what they are talking about is increasing regulation on those three existing airports but what plans does the Government have to increase regulation on other airports other than those three specified airports?The last question I have is just coming back to how those airports are determined. The bill as it's currently drafted talks about—and I'll read one of the three examples because it's Auckland Wellington and Christchurch airports but it says in here "the company (as defined in section 2 of the Wellington Airport Act 1990) that operates Wellington International Airport or any subsidiary of or successor to that company …". And so the question I have for the Minister is: who determines what the successor or subsidiary is? Because as we know companies can structure themselves in many many ways. Look at Air New Zealand for example: they operate multiple companies under the banner of Air New Zealand. They also have Air Nelson they have Mount Cook Airline and until a couple of years ago they also had Eagle Airways. Airlines and airports and companies in general construct themselves in such a way that they can have multiple subsidiaries and so who determines under this Act what companies are or what subsidiaries are as defined by this bill?That also relates I guess to the successor aspect. So again unfortunately companies do go under from time to time and they do restructure themselves and it can be very difficult sometimes for regulators to determine what a successor company is. So my last question to the Minister is: under this Act who will determine who the successor company is if Wellington International Airport for example went into liquidation and a new company came in to take over Wellington International Airport—that would obviously be the successor but if they were to structure themselves in such a way that that was to become unclear who would determine who the successor airport and company was?"