Seymour DavidDAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): Thank you Madam Speaker. I rise on behalf of ACT in support of the Remuneration Authority (COVID-19 Measures) Amendment Bill. It is absolutely right and proper that at a time when people across the New Zealand economy or at least the private sector are taking 10 15 20 or in some cases up to 70 percent reductions in pay Parliament should be at least somewhat making its own contribution and showing its own leadership. But the way that we have come to it also reveals so much about the clunkiness and inertia of the political process to do something that the rest of the country had to do with urgency months ago. This is a Parliament that when the Government wants it to can pass legislation such as the public health measures a couple of days ago in less than 24 hours and yet the pathway of getting to this legislation has taken us over two months. It was 17 March when I first said to the House that Parliament is going to have to take this sort of initiative and it was if I remember rightly 14 April when the Prime Minister was happy to bathe in national—indeed global—media adulation for her leadership and announcing that an MP pay cut would be made. Yet here we are a month later still introducing a bill that has an inferior outcome and don't forget that along the way I sought twice to introduce a bill that would have cut all MPs' pay—no ifs no buts—and the Prime Minister's party or members of it vetoed the introduction of that bill. Today we have before us this Remuneration Authority (COVID-19 Measures) Amendment Bill which doesn't actually cut MPs' pay in the way that most people would recognise as a pay cut. All this legislation does—and it needs to be said and let's be clear because no one else has said it—is it says the Remuneration Authority can cut MPs' pay by up to 20 percent for up to six months and it looks like—as far as anyone can tell—that's going to be voluntary and up to the individual MP. Well it gets more interesting because I have amendments on the Table that I expected to be debated that would have made it mandatory for MPs' pay to be cut by 20 percent—not voluntary—because you see in the private sector people aren't taking voluntary pay cuts as proposed in this bill; they are taking mandatory pay cuts. If we are to show leadership we should be doing it the way the private sector up and down this country is and the funny thing is that in a stitch-up between parties on both sides of the House it's been agreed not to even have a committee stage and debate those amendments. That's what needs to be put on the record and that's what people at home need to understand: Parliament didn't even want to debate making these pay cuts mandatory. They want to keep them voluntary and why might that be? Well I suspect the reason is that some members in the Government parties don't actually plan to take it. No problem: I have another amendment here which would fix that from the public point of view very simply by saying that for these specific individual pay cuts in this period the Remuneration Authority must publish who took it. But unfortunately this House and parties on both sides stitched up and agreed not to debate transparency. So it won't be compulsory and it won't be transparent who voluntarily took it. That's the legislation that is being debated and rushed through the House without even having the debate on whether it's compulsory or whether it's transparent. I hope that members from other parties will get up and say what their intention is because I've been making it clear for weeks—in fact months—that this has to happen and I'll certainly be signing up for the 20 percent over six months but what about the other MPs in other parties? Are we going to hear for example from the Green Party that it doesn't apply to their MPs because they tithe their salary to the Green Party election campaign? Is that what they're going to say? Well it's not compulsory—the House didn't want to debate that—and there won't be transparency. So in theory we'll never know unless there's a leak—and I should certainly hope not—from the Remuneration Authority. So is the Green Party going to siphon their voluntary non-transparent pay cut into their election fund? I hope the Green member will get up. She's shaking her head at me so she should get up take a call and actually say it. And what about the Labour Party? Is it true that the reason it took so long to bring this legislation to the House and the reason they were so eager not to debate making the pay cut compulsory and transparent is that there are Labour Party backbenchers who do not want to take the pay cut and have no intention to? Well there are a further 10 calls—10 speeches—remaining in this debate if members of Parliament wish to take them so I hope that those members who didn't want to debate making it compulsory or transparent are going to get up and tell the New Zealand public what their intentions are because I think that the public deserves to know. Here's another reason why they should do it. It is true as Tracey Martin has said that in the context of a Government aiming to spend and borrow an extra $140 billion MPs' pay I'm afraid to say is a relatively—in fact a very—small amount of money. So this fiscal saving to the taxpayer won't be noticed amongst the Government's other largesse but the example that it sets can have an impact on the expectations of pay for civil servants up and down this country. I would say that if civil servants look and they say It's compulsory for us but the MPs in Parliament did a stitch-up where they refused to make it compulsory refused to make it transparent who did it voluntarily and refused to debate either of those two things." you're going to have serious dissension amongst the Civil Service who are required to take the 20 percent pay cut and you're not going to see much wiggle room on voluntary pay cuts in the Civil Service. I'm talking about highly paid civil servants—those on $600000 or $700000 in some cases. Thousands of them on six-figure salaries are going to say "Well if the Parliament engaged in a stitch-up if they didn't make it compulsory and we don't even know how many if any of them agreed to take it then why should we?" and then one of the main benefits of this legislation of MPs showing leadership and transparency in order to inspire cost reductions for the taxpayer in the Public Service is lost. That's not leadership but it also tells us something about this Government. As I mentioned the Prime Minister was more than happy to take the adulation for great leadership and for declaring there would be a pay cut. But as is so often the case with this Government the marketing was there the spin was there but there was no bill ready to actually deliver it. Even after the passage of a month when this House has managed to urgently pass all sorts of legislation from the registration of forest workers to registering tobacco importers it somehow hasn't managed to get around to this vital MP pay cut bill. So I support the bill. It's been a long time coming—far too long in the view of the ACT Party—but let it be remembered always that this Parliament refused to debate making it compulsory and refused to debate making it transparent as to who has taken it voluntarily. Thank you Madam Speaker."