SpeechCLAYTON MITCHELL (NZ First): Thank you Madam Speaker. I'd just like to thank the member Dr Jiang Yang Dr Yang Jiang—I think that's how you say it—with his rendition of Sun Tzu's Art of War with his generals in the field shooting guns and being there. I think that was eloquently spoken. I'd also like to take a moment to acknowledge Liz MacPherson for having the fortitude and courage to do the honourable thing to actually tender her resignation for her role as chief statistician. It wouldn't have been an easy decision to make although it was the right one. I think you have to take a moment to consider what will be taking a huge weight off her mind but also the weight that she has had to deal with over the last couple of years in coming to terms with this.The report that's come out—although I haven't read it in its entirety I've had a chance to have a look at it. I think it's given a very clear and fair overview of some of the failings from this census but it also acknowledges some of the failings and some of the avoidable problems moving forward that we can take some learnings from. I'd also like to acknowledge quite strongly how impressed I was with the speech that the Hon James Shaw has given today because he I think has humbly acknowledged his responsibility in this situation unlike what Dr Jian Yang has spoken about with regards to saying he's not taking any responsibility at all. He's taken this matter very very seriously from the very start and has acknowledged as the Minister he is responsible for it but moving forward he is responsible to ensure that these problems don't happen again.I've got Nick Smith smiling at me like a Cheshire cat across the House at the moment. In none of his speeches in any of his attacks that he has given in the House about this situation has he—he's been completely disingenuous for not giving any responsibility to Ministers of the previous Government for their planning and their lack of execution from it. With five Ministers that they've had at the helm to actually deal with this problem the first decision—and I have to say the right decision—to start phasing into a digital framework has been completely and utterly discounted from this member's elastic—Hon Dr Nick Smith: Has the member read the report? CLAYTON MITCHELL: You should have been listening—with his elastic conscience when it comes to this issue moving forward. DEPUTY SPEAKER: I am. CLAYTON MITCHELL: Sorry you are yes. Hon Dr Nick Smith: Has the member read the report? CLAYTON MITCHELL: I've already spoken Mr Smith. You've got to start listening all right? So the point being is what we've got to deal with here is a bit of a bugger's muddle but nothing that we can't tidy up from. I have to say the idea to move into a digital framework moving forward is important. But the push that they have made the previous Government had made to try and make this all happen within a five-year period—when the elections took over and a new Government took its new phase in 2017 in late October there were only five months until the census came on board. Yet there's an expectation from Nick Smith and the previous Government that the Minister should take on all the responsibility for all the work leading up to something that had been planned out for five years. Now it's not as bad as the member across the House would like to make out. There has been a lot of exceptional data that is going to be very very useful. But we've also got the opportunity to make sure that moving forward we don't have these technical issues repeat themselves. That's the key to this. That's what I've picked up out of the Hon James Shaw's comments this afternoon is that there is a lot of opportunity to tidy things up in certain spaces. There are also some issues that were out of any Minister's control and that was the incident around the Kaikōura earthquake. Now that took a lot of focus a lot of time and took resources away from Statistics New Zealand. When they were doing that trial there were issues with the depth of that trial that took place. Certainly moving forward we cannot predict when we have a natural disaster such as the one we had and those people's availability but we can just ensure that Statistics New Zealand and the role that they play needs to be taken very seriously. This is why we've had the continuity of the role under the leadership of this Government whereas in the past we've had very much a changing in and out baton-changing sort of an atmosphere which doesn't help for that continuity to take place. Of course we've got extra funding to ensure that Statistics New Zealand can actually get the data that they need. They certainly do have the expertise there and we've just got to make sure that we're not out there virtue-signalling trying to discourage or discombobulate—which is the favourite word of the month—the public which will be listening to some of this rhetoric from across the House and have been definitely misinformed. Moving forward some of the key positive independent findings of that review is that the IT systems and a register of addresses will now be available for future census surveys and Stats New Zealand has a good understanding of integrating administrative data with census information to produce high-quality data sets—which was the idea set forward by the previous Government but they didn't quite come up with a plan of how they were going to execute that. The 2018 census attempted to implement unprecedented changes as Stats New Zealand moved forward over a short period of time. I think in hindsight it would have been better to take a slower more methodical approach than the one that the previous Government had come forth with at such rapid fire. So to wrap things up I would just like to again say to the Minister who is taking responsibility for fixing this mess up to ensure that the next census that we have in a little over three years' time is going to be a lot better—and with the learnings that we have learnt from the mistakes that the previous Government has made that we've been left to tidy up we'll be certainly well-pleased. Hon Dr Nick Smith: You haven't read the report. CLAYTON MITCHELL: Yes I've read some of the report as I said in my earlier contribution. So ladies and gentlemen that's all I've got to say today. Thank you Madam Speaker.