Edmonds BarbaraBARBARA EDMONDS (Labour—Mana): Thank you Madam Speaker. It's a pleasure to be able to speak on this bill because it's actually not a bill that came before the Finance and Expenditure Committee which I was on. It's really nice to be able to come into the third reading of a bill that I've actually been really looking forward to because it was something that was in our manifesto. This bill fulfils one of our commitments relating to merchant service fees charged to retailers. It wants to bring them in line with comparable economies across the world because New Zealand fees are higher than some of our other counterparts.Retail payments are the nuts and bolts of the market economy. The retail payment system is what makes it possible for consumers and merchants to sell and receive goods and services. The common ones that have been spoken about tonight and right throughout the whole bill process have been credit and debit cards and EFTPOS cards. These are all really familiar not just to the House but to everyday New Zealanders because we are one of the highest users of EFTPOS cards throughout the world. The issue that this bill resolves is that the fees that sit behind them are simply too high. This has been a problem for a while now but COVID-19 has accelerated the reason for us to have to put this bill to the House and put it forward. COVID-19 changed the way that we spend our money and online and contactless transactions are being used more. These payment methods currently again have higher fees and they put additional pressure on businesses who then pass it on to the consumers.For most people they'll know that when they do some transactions—when you go through payWave—it says Do you accept the 0.02 percent" or the 0.2 percent "merchant service fee?" and you have to say yes in order to pay for it with that credit card. But it's not necessarily 0.02 percent; it's usually 2 percent 3 percent or 5 percent. It's too high compared to the rest of the world.Again I was not a member of the select committee but I sat through the committee of the whole House debate yesterday. I want to congratulate the Economic Development Science and Innovation Committee. I heard very loudly and clearly—right throughout the debate last night and a number of times tonight—that they are a very small but hearty committee. So congratulations to the members across the House and to the chair the member Jamie Strange. Examining their report back the bill seeks to address four main problems: higher merchant service fees; lack of competition in the market which is why you can have higher service fees; and the incentivisation for customers to use these payment methods because they get the kick back of a reward. There are a number of reward services that most people are familiar with with credit cards and some of those particular services. This incentivises them to use it in order to get a reward somewhere else. The other issue is that high merchant service fees disproportionately affect small businesses. For those not familiar in the House 98 percent of businesses in New Zealand are small businesses and a large proportion of them are retailers particularly in an electorate like mine Mana where I think retailers are around about the fourth-highest industry out of our electorate. During the campaign I remember talking to one of my regular coffee cart owners. His name was Kenny and most people know his coffee cart which is near the Harvey Norman and the Pak 'N Save petrol station. He talked about the monthly fees he was having to pay to his merchants and he said it was around $6000 a month. From his perspective—and I absolutely agreed with him—$6000 was too high for a small coffee cart owner. But the reason why he still paid that fee was because he felt like he had a moral obligation to his customers. Given COVID he wanted to minimise contactless transactions as much as possible. So I say to Kenny and to all those small business retailers across the country who we promised that we would make this commitment that we would reduce the burden on them in relation to merchant service card fees we are doing that tonight.I would like to once again thank the Minister for his work on this thank the select committee for their review of this and thank the 30 submitters on this particular bill. Thank you Madam Speaker. I commend this bill to the House."