SpeechSecond ReadingHon MICHAEL WOOD (Minister of Transport): I move That the Road User Charges (Temporary RUC Reduction Scheme) Amendment Bill be now read a second time.As we canvassed in the first reading of this bill the Government is moving swiftly to tackle some of the cost of living pressures that Kiwis are feeling. We moved very very quickly on this issue in response to increased pressure on energy prices. Within hours of Cabinet deciding that fuel excise duty would be reduced that was enacted. We've also moved through a $40 million investment to ensure that Kiwis have access to half price public transport over the next three months. Reductions to road-user charges (RUC) are the other part of the package to ensure that all transport users in New Zealand do feel some relief given the increases in prices that we are seeing coming through due to the war in Ukraine and other supply-chain factors.It is worth noting and I respond here to some of the debate that's occurred in the Chamber this evening that this has been quite a complex piece of work. As has been canvassed changing road-user charge rates given that there are over 200 different rates that are set by regulation depending on the weight and axel load characteristics of different vehicles is a more complex matter than simply enacting a temporary reduction to fuel excise duty. I want to acknowledge officials from Waka Kotahi and the Ministry of Transport who have turned that piece of work around very very quickly indeed.Frankly in the debate that we've had tonight the National Party has been spinning around like a top in terms of the lines that they have been putting out in respect of this issue. I think Mr Hamish Rutherford has his work cut out in the next few months in order to try and establish a little bit of message discipline there. Because what we got from a number of the speakers in the Chamber tonight—and we'll call these people team Simpson" because he probably led the charge on this—was an allegation that effectively the Government is moving too fast on this issue that we should've slowed down to get more advice then engage and check in with officials. We had a lot of criticism from Mr Simpson that the process has moved along too quickly that actually we should've slowed it down and delayed the benefits of this policy coming into effect for those people who need relief on road-user charges. Of course that is consistent with the parliamentary strategy that we have seen tonight whereby the National Party opposition has opposed the urgency that the Government put forward to deal with this issue swiftly and want to slow the progress of this reduction down. So that was one perspective that we heard from the Opposition benches tonight.The other which we'll call the "team Brown world view" was that this process has been too slow that we should've somehow just willed into existence a complex legislative change across those 200 rates with integrity and transition measures in place to make a robust piece of legislation. I think that that is consistent with the way that that member approaches the portfolio from time to time. He is capable of living existentially in two worlds as we've learnt with his opposition to the regional fuel tax but his delight about the fact that it's building the Eastern Busway into and through his electorate. So that is relatively consistent for that member.But what I would say is that over a period of three weeks for officials and Government to turn around this policy and to be able to present legislation to this House to bring this change into effect from 21 April I think is very good work indeed. It is worth noting that when the change comes into effect from 21 April it will apply for the full three-month period. So it will be a period of time that the reduction will apply that is comparable or that is the same in duration as the reduction to fuel excise duty and also to the public transport half-price fares that we have brought on as well.There is one other point that I wanted to cover in the course of my comments in this second reading speech which may provide some useful clarity about how the transition arrangements will work. It's been canvassed in the debate so far that people obviously do purchase their road-user charge licences in advance. So there is a question about what will happen for people who have purchased those road-user charge licences before the reduced rates come into effect. Are they able to access the benefits of the reductions that will come through this piece of legislation? The good news there is that we have structured this change to enable those people to also get the benefit. So vehicle owners who do have an existing RUC licence with unused distance will be able to purchase what's called an "overlap licence". This is a provision which is in existence in the existing legislation; it's called an "overlap licence". With that the licence begins on the current odometer or hubodometer reading at the time of the purchase. The unused distance on the existing licence can then be automatically credited to offset the new licence costs and that can be done at the new reduced rate. So Kiwis will be able to benefit from this policy by purchasing road-user charge at the reduced rate during the three-month period. But if they have purchased previously then through this mechanism they will also be able to access the benefits of the reduced rate as well. I thought that might be useful to inform the remainder of the debate.So I am very pleased that we're able to move forward quickly with the second reading of the bill. Very hopeful that we can move through this legislation and put it into effect so that this important change to help Kiwis with cost of living pressures can come into effect from 21 April and complement all of those other good things that our Government is doing to support Kiwis at this time."