Donnelly Brian: Communications Legislation Bill — In Committee 
Donnelly Brian: Communications Legislation Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:634;Page:6030] 
Hon BRIAN DONNELLY (NZ First) 
: 
 This is probably a very appropriate time for New Zealand First to come into the debate given that contribution by the Minister in the chair Pete Hodgson because it was New Zealand First that facilitated those meetings with the Minister. I can confirm that what the Minister was saying was absolutely correct because I have a copy of the letter in front of me. It states that New Zealand First expressed its concern in the second reading with regard to this particular issue regarding the Radio Frequency Users Association of New Zealand and the radio mobile spectrum. We said at that time that we would be putting up a Supplementary Order Paper. 
I can say that as a result of the meetings that have been held with David Thompson the Minister representatives of the Radio Frequency Users Association of New Zealand and members of the Ministry of Economic Development matters have been resolved. David Thompson has been in communication with me and said that the association is more than happy now that the issues its members raised at the Commerce Committee—which they considered had not been addressed appropriately through the select committee process—have now been addressed as a result of the work by New Zealand First. I asked the association what the problem was. I found it was that New Zealand First did not have a member on that select committee to pick up the genuine issues that were raised there so somebody outside the select committee needed to pick up those issues and genuinely run with them. I guess the situation was like this. The association had gone through the normal processes put up its submission to the select committee and been ignored. Its members had been shunned and there is some reference to that in the report back. But they came to New Zealand First and asked whether we could help them to fix that. We said yes we could and we have done that. So what the Minister said is correct. 
The issues that revolve around this particular matter are not unimportant issues. The part of the spectrum that we are talking about is the part that was captured by the Radiocommunications Act 1989. All the other users of that spectrum got their incumbency tenure except for the users of the land radio mobile part of the spectrum. Since 1989 even though it is in the sixth schedule of that Act nothing has been done about that matter. Whereas the owners of the other parts of the spectrum have been able to get investment in there because there is security and they are secure in their future use of it this legislation was creating a high level of insecurity. And not only was that the case but the legislation was also creating what could have been seen to be an environment in which there was no value in providing any long-term investment and the actual users themselves felt under threat. 
I will quote from the Minister’s letter because I am sure he will not mind that in order to give members some understanding of just how important this part of the spectrum is. He wrote: “It is acknowledged that the land mobile service provides essential services to both Government and private industry as highlighted during the recent severe snow storms in southern Canterbury where for a lengthy period such services provided the only reliable form of communications.” It was that part of the spectrum that was under threat. National and ACT would probably say it should be sold to the highest bidder. New Zealand First has a much more responsible view of the whole thing; it believes that such things as social responsibilities have to be balanced against economic imperatives. New Zealand First therefore although we did not even have a member on the select committee that looked at this legislation said that no something had to be done about the issue. We facilitated the meetings we achieved the necessary outcomes and as we say we have once again fixed it. Thank you Mr Chairman.