Sage Eugenie: Mixed Ownership Model Bill — In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Sage Eugenie: Mixed Ownership Model Bill — In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee 
[Sitting date: 19 June 2012. Volume:681;Page:3070. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
EUGENIE SAGE (Green) 
: 
 The finance Minister said earlier today that many New Zealanders do not know about Mighty River Power and its business. That is enormously patronising. Thousands of New Zealanders understand about the sale of State assets because thousands of New Zealanders are signing the referendum petition. I would like to comment specifically on the removal of the mixed-ownership companies from the purview of the Ombudsmen and the Official Information Act. That is because the Government does not trust its own mixed-ownership model by removing the scrutiny of the Ombudsmen. Clause 6 of the Mixed Ownership Model Bill takes Genesis Power Meridian Energy Mighty River Power and Solid Energy from under the application of the Ombudsmen Act while clause 7 removes Solid Energy from the application of the Official Information Act. The other companies come out from under the Official Information Act by virtue of the fact that they are removed from the State-Owned Enterprises Act. 
This is a major loss of accountability for these new entities. That is particularly because the bill also removes the ability of the Minister of Finance and the Minister for State Owned Enterprises to direct these companies to get information from them and because it means that the social responsibility and good-employer provisions of the State-Owned Enterprises Act will no longer apply. The combined effect of these changes will be to substantially diminish both ministerial and public oversight of the mixed-ownership model and that is totally at odds with New Zealanders’ interest in these companies as the majority shareholder. We have had the Ombudsmen as independent Officers of Parliament separate from the executive having a vital constitutional role for nearly 50 years. They have been a watchdog and a check on the abuse of power by Government departments and State-owned enterprises and they have been a mechanism by which citizens can seek redress against overbearing power and make the State-owned enterprises accountable. They have investigated complaints under the Official Information Act and they have helped improve the way in which State-owned enterprises have dealt with those and with public information requests. 
There was a strong and thoughtful submission from the Office of the Ombudsmen which Mr Clark has referred to opposing the move to remove their oversight. That means that the public will be largely impotent in terms of the accountability of these mixed-ownership companies and so will the Crown. It is very ironic that the role of the Ombudsmen is being removed when in the private sector similar ombudsman roles have been set up in both banking and insurance for the very reason that they are seen as cost-effective and affordable when compared with the cost of litigation in the court. We have a previous major State-owned enterprise Timberlands West Coast where the Official Information Act and the Ombudsmen were both absolutely essential in providing oversight and scrutiny of that organisation. It was because of the information that members of the public and conservation and environmental organisations were able to get using the Official Information Act that there was a major change in Government policy and a cessation of beech logging on the West Coast. Without the Ombudsmen’s involvement without the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act the public would not have got information on the royalties being paid by Timberlands about the cross-subsidy of its pine business from the logging of rimu forest. The public would not have been able to flush out the detail of the beech logging plans. It would not have got that body of information that was able to achieve a change in Government policy and the protection of those native forests by the direction of the Minister of Finance and the Minister for State Owned Enterprises. 
So it is absolutely critical with these mixed-ownership companies that that role and oversight of the Ombudsmen be returned. That is why the Greens will be supporting a Supplementary Order Paper in the name of Russel Norman to put that oversight back in. It is also inappropriate that that oversight is removed because local authorities’ council-controlled organisations are subject to the Official Information Act and the scrutiny of the Ombudsmen. They are commercial entities. So why is the Government wanting to remove this check this accountability mechanism? Is it because the Government plans to sell off the remainder and to increase the 49 percent to more than 51 percent? If the Government was so confident in this mixed-ownership model it would retain these key constitutional checks and balances these key safeguards instead of doing what it is doing in removing these entities from the oversight of these Officers of Parliament. So this bill is bad. Again the lack of accountability in the mixed-ownership model for these companies is bad.