Brownlee GerryHon GERRY BROWNLEE (National): Well thank you Mr Chair. You are right: the debate is about what's in the bill and what is about to go into the bill is of course everything that's contained in the Supplementary Order Papers (SOPs) that sit on the Table—everything that's contained in the 50-page SOP dropped on the table at 1.30 this afternoon. They are in the bill and every one of those provisions relates to what's here in Part 1 of the bill. CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): Yes sorry to interrupt the member but I'm saying nothing that has been tabled affects Part 1. Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: Well with respect Mr Chair everything that has been tabled as an SOP affects everything that is in Part 1 of this bill. This bill in Part 1 sets out as previous speakers have said that under Schedule 1 of the Income Tax Act 2007 there are requirements for workers to pay particular levels of tax requirements for businesses to pay particular levels of tax and it goes on and on and on. But the bill today also of course undoes some of the usually reasonable expense claims that can be assessed against income for people who are paying tax. I go back to the point that's been made by the previous two speakers that 10 percent of the workforce—10 percent of the taxpayers in this country is a better way to put it—cover off or pay for 50 percent of that Government revenue: 50 percent of the $38 billion that the Government collects annually in income tax. So the question becomes if that is such an embraced fact an embraced circumstance by the population of this country why do we need these other SOPs? Why can't this particular part stand on its own as it does in this Act and why there a necessity to start digging into it and pulling it to bits and making it harder for people to invest in a way that has wider social benefit? One thing that is absolutely certain is that this will see in my opinion a number of people recognising their obligations under the Income Tax Act 2007 for the 2021 tax year and beyond—and beyond—start to make investments that will in some way at some point mitigate against some of the tax that they are liable for at the present time. So what we're going to see is a massive industry of transfer of investment as a result of these provisions that are put in the bill today. I think it's very interesting to have listened to a previous speaker who talked somewhat dismally I think about what life is like in this country: work hard put your head down make an effort be entrepreneurial be deeply committed to your workplace do your best day in day out through your entire 40-plus years of the workforce and if you do get up to the top end of the salary scale above $100000—above $180000 even—then you pay massive amounts of tax. That seems to me to be a legislated disincentive to growing the New Zealand economy and we've had this as a way of operating for far too long. It's being exacerbated I think by the insistence that we stick to the rates that are in the 2007 Act and incorporate the new $180000-plus 39c in the dollar rate but then also have a whole lot of previously accepted mitigations against the tax liability removed in the same bill. Mr Chair. I'm conscious of what you said about sticking tightly to this part but we will talk later and extensively about the effect that some of the provisions proposed for this bill and the SOPs will have on some of the problems that are supposed to be sorted out by it. In the meantime it would have been far more innovative for the Government of the day to say We can encourage a whole lot of activity if we were to start lowering the tax burden on that 10 percent of New Zealanders who provide half of that revenue now." Even if we'd said too "We'll lower the burden on some of the 13 percent of taxpayers who pay that chunk in the middle." that might have made some difference to some of the problems this bill's proposing to sort out."