Little Andrew: General DebateText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeLittle Andrew: General Debate[Sitting date: 24 June 2015. Volume:706;Page:4710. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]ANDREW LITTLE (Leader of the Opposition): There are times when the House has to do a number of things. The first is to not to reduce itself to comic entertainment such as the last speaker Christopher Finlayson did. Secondly there are times when it is entirely appropriate for this House to put aside the robust cut and thrust which is the bearpit that this Parliament is even during the weekly general debate in order to focus on those things that unite us. This country and this House had that experience just a few years ago with one of the worst workplace accidents we have seen in this country’s history. That was the Pike River disaster. As a consequence of that tragic disaster the country was united in the need to do better on workplace health and safety. Even within this Parliament parties united around the need to do better when it came to workplace health and safety.This Government did the correct thing in assembling a high-powered royal commission of inquiry which investigated the causes of that accident. It went very widely and it looked at the systemic causes the regulatory causes and the things that the Government itself contributed to. It was an honest appraisal and it was a royal commission that came up with some very serious recommendations. This Government did the next important thing and the right thing to do. It drafted legislation and brought to this House a bill that truly reflected the issues raised by the royal commission. It was part of that growing consensus amongst workers employers politicians civil servants and the entire community that we needed to have something better to protect workers at work.I sat on the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee. I had the privilege of sitting on the select committee where we received many submissions. Some submitters however did not speak to their submissions such as Talley’s but then there was a reason for that possibly—that they were not part of the consensus. Perhaps now they will be. That piece of legislation inched its way forward and there were contests of ideas. There was push back but in the end the broad consensus remained—until it went back to the National Party caucus and then something happened.Something has happened in the National Party caucus in the last few months. We cannot put our finger on it—and Maurice Williamson sits there rubbing his hands; I am not sure whether with glee or with concern—but something has happened in that National Party caucus. The consensus that has gripped the rest of the country that once gripped this Parliament has fallen apart and we are entitled to know why because there is a very serious issue. There continues to be a very serious issue about our health and safety performance and we must be able to put longstanding differences aside. The National Party has always seen itself as an ideological warrior for some in the employing class but it has never seen to have a sense of pragmatism and unity when it comes to workplace issues. It has lost it completely. We must find the way to redraw that consensus to bring it back together.It was encouraging last night to see Amy Adams the Minister of Justice—spoken of so fondly by the Attorney-General just now—come out and say that it is time for a corporate manslaughter law. She said she wanted to see it as part of the Health and Safety Reform Bill. What a pity that it was not in the first reading in the first draft that came to the House. It would be a pity if it just appears as a Supplementary Order Paper because it is an issue that ought to have been the subject of public submissions. But what a positive step for a Minister in the National Government to take until of course a few hours later when we saw the response. It was not from us not from members of the community and not even from members of the employer community but from her own National Party colleagues who then started a process of pouring cold water on the idea.Well it is time that this National Party in Government understood the importance and the urgency of getting our workplace health and safety performance to improve. What is it with this National Party? Why is it so divided not just on this issue but on others as well? Why are those members trying to lead a breakdown in the national consensus that we have on such an important topic? What has gone wrong?Let me be very clear. On this side of the House we stand firm and true for better workplace health and safety and for proper accountability. We must never repeat the situation where directors sit round a board table and just positively ignore their obligations and their responsibilities. Bring that bill back bring it back unchanged and give us better health and safety across New Zealand.