Flavell Te Ururoa: Telecommunications Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Flavell Te Ururoa: Telecommunications Amendment Bill — First Reading 
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TE URUROA FLAVELL (Maori Party—Waiariki) 
: 
 Kia ora Madam Assistant Speaker. Tena tatou katoa a tena tatou wananga nei i tenei take. 
[ 
Greetings to us all especially those of us debating this matter 
.] 
The art of whaikorero is a skill that is frequently commented upon in Te Ao Maori. In reflecting on our finest orators we will often speak of those people who have that expertise in their ability to connect people along lines of whakapapa. We speak with awe of the way in which these master orators are able to define relationships and link individuals to histories and to collectives. The key to our ongoing survival as people is in such connections. 
It is within this context therefore that we turn our attention to the proposal to unbundle the local loop to unbundle bitstream and to introduce naked digital subscriber line broadband services. I have to say from the start that this is new vocabulary. The terminology of telecommunications does not come easily to me. But I understand the value of communication. The bill amends the Telecommunications Act 2001 to ensure the efficient and effective regulation of the telecommunications sector. This means that in effect the bill is sending a strong public policy signal to Telecom and to Vodafone that they will be subject to a greater degree of Government regulation. I understand that the bill enhances the ability of the Commerce Commission to intervene strategically to promote the development of competition in the telecommunications markets. Phone and Internet providers can now present a deal just for the individual. 
In case people are not aware that there is actually already a choice of providers just listen to the list of those that are currently tendering for our business: Hautaki Trust Saturn Communications Econet Holdings ACN Kwiknet Netsurf Splurge Internet Surfnet Slingshot Supra Actrix Networks Raider TelstraClear Wave and IHUG. I could go on; that is probably just the start. Our rangatahi know these names like they know clothing labels. Indeed their cellphones are the fashion accessory that every rangatahi wants when he or she hits school or kura. Those who do hook up to a provider will jump from provider to provider depending on which has the best offer on line for that month. That is precisely how it should be. 
Under a virtual duopoly consumers have not been well looked after and some basic questions remain. Why does Aotearoa have the highest mobile phone rates in the OECD? Why does it cost exactly the same in real terms to make a voice call from my office here in Parliament to my Wellington home as it does to make a call to my home in Ngongotaha—that is Rotorua for those who do not know? I am charged extra relative to the physical distance yet there is no electronic distance involved. 
The ability to be well-connected now means far more than the quality of our social networks as perhaps it did in previous generations. Being well-connected is now driven by something as basic as telephone and Internet access. Indeed  
Social Report 2005 
 describes how Internet and phone access is one of five significant variables that help us to understand social well-being. What do we find? People living in Pasifika families have the lowest levels of telephone and Internet access in the home—88 and 16 percent respectively—followed closely by the levels of access of people living in Maori families which are 92 and 28 percent. The other groups featured in the low-level rankings are families with unemployed adults and sole parent families. Sole parent families are half as likely as two-parent families to have Internet access—25 percent compared with 50 percent. 
The Maori Party is keenly motivated by the need to ensure we do everything in our power to enhance social well-being. Therefore we come to this bill with the hope of ensuring that there are other opportunities for other providers to compete for clients and force our fixed-line communications costs and indeed our mobile prices down to a realistic global price. I have found that fixed-line communication costs in New Zealand including ADSL broadband are much higher than in most other OECD countries and it is artificially kept that way. My question is why is that so. 
We are concerned that this bill is primarily focused on regulation of the fixed line and it completely ignores mobile issues. Our concern is that the bill will pass without mobile issues being discussed and that it will take another amendment bill whenever that might be to address the mobile market concerns. It is the cost of our mobile technology that Ernie Newman boss of the Telecommunications Users Association of New Zealand has labelled as scandalous alleging that New Zealanders are being ripped off by the current duopoly of the two big providers. New Zealand has the highest overall mobile calling rates out of 30 OECD countries which is entirely due to the lack of competition in the mobile industry. This is particularly urgent for tangata whenua as our Maori spectrum interests are associated with mobile. Until the mobile issues are sorted tangata whenua access to the telecommunications industry and the $3 billion mobile market is restricted. 
The other key interest we have in the Telecommunications Amendment Bill is the distinction being made between specified and designated services. Specified services are services where the Telecommunications Commissioner can regulate everything except price. Designated services are services where the Telecommunications Commissioner can regulate everything including price. Regulation of everything except price is not regulation at all; it is a complete nonsense. There is a current mechanism in the Telecommunications Act to move specified services into the designated services category. However this mechanism is slow and cumbersome. 
Generation Y want a regulated roaming solution now and the way of achieving that is through deleting specified services and moving the specified services into the designated services category. Generation Y Maori are online as well and to be frank they astound me with their versatility and command of the technology. Our kids are able to hold an old-fashioned conversation with me while at the same time texting their cousins. They can download electronic screensavers and MP3 files faster than I can work out how to answer the cellphone. I consider myself a pretty techno-smart sort of guy but I am still pretty hooked into the idea that a cellphone is basically a small phone. However my children and my nieces and nephews see their cellphones as the doorway to a world far beyond the white pages. They take infrared photos of each other while I am still searching for the on-off button. At least I am one ahead of one of my co-leaders who calls his new-age cellphone his raspberry. 
The Maori Party will vote in support of this bill to support the right of all of our rangatahi to expand their knowledge and their capacity to communicate even further. We are also of the view that we want the debate to go ahead to allow healthy competition in order to achieve world-class broadband or high-speed Internet services for New Zealand. Ultimately it is our belief in he whakapapa ta te korero—the value of maintaining and expanding our communication with each other—that leads us to support the opportunity for further debate. Kia ora tatou.