Bishop ChrisCHRIS BISHOP (National): Thank you Mr Speaker. Let me speak with extremely plain language. This bill is the stupidest bill to come before Parliament in this term. National will repeal it. And I can't believe we are down here on Thursday morning debating this waste of time bill. I actually feel sorry for Rachel Boyack because she is a conscientious and diligent member of Parliament and she has had this ridiculous jobsworthy stupid bill landed on her and she's had to shepherd it through. I actually assumed—I think most of us assumed—at its first reading whatever it was that it would go off to the Governance and Administration Committee and would never see the light of day ever again. It would just be quietly discharged from the Order Paper quietly done away with and we'd just forget that Parliament had wasted all of its time debating the first reading. But no here we are again. I can't believe it. I just can't fathom it. Here we are again. And poor old Rachel Boyack. And the Labour backbenchers are sitting there going There but for the grace of God go we because what if I end up with a similarly stupid bill?" They're all sitting there—Anna Lorck and Helen White and Sarah Pallett—and they're all going to lose their seats at the next election. They're all sitting there going "I'm toast. I'm 'gone-burger'." Because Tukituki is finished. Jamie Strange is sitting there at Hamilton East. He's gone. Sarah Pallett's not going to win Ilam again. Helen White couldn't even win Auckland Central last time around. [Interruption]ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Ian McKelvie): Order! Order!CHRIS BISHOP: She's toast and she's sitting there thinking "What am I going to do?" I can tell you something for free. The way to advance—the way to advance and win a seat—is not with bills like this. National opposes this bill for five reasons. The first is—look at the bill. It is in a shocking state. As Simeon Brown noted no departmental disclosure statement no regulatory impact statement no cost-benefit analysis. You only need to look at it. Look at what the committee's done to the bill. There's more black lines here and more insertions than there is actual text that it started with; we've completely rewritten the bill. So the bill is in a shocking state. It's been completely retrofitted and we should get rid of it. The second reason we oppose this bill is what it says about the priorities of this Government. A hundred thousand New Zealand kids are chronically truant from school we have child poverty going up we have kids living in cars—after Labour said they would fix these problems. We have thousands of New Zealand children living in motels. And what's Labour got the Parliament doing? Plain-language officers for every Government department—not just Government departments; every reporting agency that is a Crown entity. That's the priority. Not child poverty. Not kids in cars. Not kids who are truant. Not economic growth. Not productivity. Not all of the manifold problems bedevilling this country but plain-language officers. I mean it just actually beggars belief. I say to the Government—I mean I wish you would drop it but on the one level; I also think "Carry on charge on." because every time you put this bill before the House you just illustrate to New Zealanders why they deserve to be thrown out of office at the next election. The third point is about bureaucracy. It's just actually unfathomable what we are doing here. Every single reporting agency—not "may" but "must"; it's an imperative it's a didactic imperative—must appoint a plain-language officer. As Simeon Brown quite rightly said it's the plain-language police. Every single Government department every single Public Service agency the Department of Internal Affairs the Ministry of Health the Ministry of Education every single Crown agency the New Zealand Transport Agency Health New Zealand—every single one. You read it it's in Schedule 1 of the Crown Entities Act 2004—every single one. And yep is it true that these plain-language officers could be existing bureaucrats existing people who work in Public Service departments? Yeah in theory. Is that likely to be the reality? Bear in mind this Government has hired 14000 more bureaucrats since they came to office. So what are the odds that they'll just appoint one of them? I mean the sensible thing to do would be to put some poor communications officer at the Transport Agency and say "In addition to all of the graphics and the comms work and all of the PRs you do to fluff up the Government you should also be the plain-language officer." But no no no that's not what will happen. I'll tell you what's going to happen. Here's what's going to happen after this bill gets passed. If you go on to seek.co.nz and trademe.co.nz and all the other job agencies what will happen as you'll see an ad for a plain-language officer for—pick an agency. There's literally hundreds of them. Those will be the job ads and people will end up having to apply for these jobs. I mean what sort of ridiculous job is it? People are going to see these job ads from the New Zealand Government these well-paid bureaucratic jobs to be a plain-language police officer inside a Government agency. There'll be hundreds of advertisements on SEEK and TradeMe. It's going to be absolutely ridiculous. And their job will be to issue guidance issue instructions issue consultation documents. And it's not a "may". It's not an optional extra here. This is not an option. This is a "must". It's an imperative. The Government is making these people do things and there'll have to be the annual report to the Public Service Commission. I'll tell you what's going to happen. Again I'll make a prediction. We'll also see advertisements for the Public Service Commission to hire people to analyse all of the reports going into the Public Service Commission about the compliance of the Ministry of Health and the Department of Internal Affairs and every other Government agency. The artificial limb board is probably on the list. I think they're a Crown entity and they'll all have to submit a report and then the Public Service Commission will have to analyse them and file them away and that will involve hiring more bureaucrats. Hon Member: The Auditor-General—CHRIS BISHOP: The Auditor-General—Hon Paul Goldsmith: They'll have to check.CHRIS BISHOP: They'll have to check. Yeah that's right. The Auditor-General will have to go and check and there'll be compliance checks and so that will be more bureaucrats.This Government has never seen a bureaucracy that they can't just add another layer to. It's just ridiculous. And of course all of that is wealth-destructive of New Zealand. All of that is sapping away the lifeblood of the actual productive economy and the Labour Government just does not understand that.The fourth point as to why National opposes this bill strongly and will repeal it is there are alternatives to legislation. And this was well canvassed in the excellent minority report from National members from the Governance and Administration Committee. Now the Legislation Design and Advisory Committee a very august body turned up and they said "Look there is no need to legislate. You are putting this bill through the House for no reason. There no need to legislate." They submitted the policy objective was best achieved through non-legislative means noting legislation guideline 2.3 "Legislation should only be made when … necessary and is the most appropriate means of achieving the policy objective." Just issue a bloody report. Just send out a file note. Send out an email from Peter Hughes to the Government agencies saying "Look we expect you to write concisely and clearly and plainly and it's really important that people can read documents." That's literally all that's required. And then maybe you know send someone around every couple of years just to have a look or maybe we can ask about it in select committee or things like that. We don't need the plain-language police in every single Government agency. It's just absurd. So it breaches the Legislation Design and Advisory Committee guidelines and it also flies in the face of what the Office of the Clerk said which is the same thing as well. The Office of the Clerk said the requirements in the bill are uncertain and without consequence—and that's the fifth point: there's no enforcement here. The giveaway is clause 10A of the bill which has been inserted in it. Basically it says "This Act does not confer a legal right or impose a legal obligation on any person that is enforceable in a court of law." This bill is literally pointless. It imposes no legal rights it imposes no legal obligations and none of it is enforceable. So Parliament is passing something that is basically nugatory. It's a complete waste of time. None of it is enforceable. None of it imposes any legal rights no legal duties that are obliged to be performed by anybody or enforceable by anybody. So Parliament is going to spend hours and hours of its time through the committee process the first reading the second reading—unless the Government comes to its senses and drops this bill—passing a bill that is unenforceable that would more easily be achieved through other means will add hundreds of bureaucrats to the system and is in such a shocking state that it doesn't have a regulatory impact statement it doesn't have a cost-benefit analysis and it's not actually clear what requirements it imposes. But the more important point is the signal it sends about priorities: enforcing plain-language police on Public Service departments as opposed to real issues facing New Zealand. We will repeal this stupid bill."