Hudson BrettBRETT HUDSON (National): I rise as appears to be the case across the House in support of this the Telecommunications (Property Access and Other Matters) Amendment Bill in its second reading. I would just like to begin by acknowledging and commending Mr Cunliffe for his comments about the work that was done in the Commerce Committee by individual contributors and by the committee as a whole on the provisions around helping to extend fibre to our rural areas. I note that the committee worked—in fact it was an absolute joy to work in this committee on this particular bill for these very provisions and reasons—and Mr Cunliffe himself I will note worked very hard to ensure that we maintained consensus across all of the parties and individuals on the committee and that work of his contribution and the other members has absolutely made this a bill that I think we can all be quite proud of as members of the committee and also as members of this Parliament.Before I move to talk a little bit more about the rural connectivity side I will just note as other members have said that the heart of the bill as it was introduced to the committee was about making it easier for people in multi-unit dwellings and for people who share common infrastructure and facilities with other people to connect to our faster broadband. If you look at some of the problems that have been articulated in the current consenting process it is understood or estimated that approximately 71000 households may currently be prevented from connecting to ultra-fast broadband due to consenting requirements the processes and potential objections under the current provisions. In fact in December 2016 there were 800 orders sitting waiting for connection where consenting had been running for 50 or more days. All that is doing is preventing people from making use of the services that faster broadband can provide to help them whether it is in their own lifestyles in study or in some cases for businesses to use in support of conducting their business more effectively and more efficiently. So the heart of those measures will help those people to connect much faster and will ensure that more and more people can take advantage of our high-speed broadband.But in the area of rural connectivity and particularly extending fibre to the rural areas I have to say I would like to commend Northpower for its wonderful submission. In some respects it could have been termed as non-compliant but it introduced an idea that it was willing to use infrastructure it already had to help New Zealand and New Zealanders in rural areas to get even better internet connectivity. I commend the then Minister for Communications for agreeing to allow the committee to consider that as an amendment to the bill as it stood. In fact the committee was afforded an opportunity to undertake policy work during our consideration of the bill.It was an extremely good process to be a part of. It was robust. The conversations in the committee were clearly articulated by members coming from different perspectives and ultimately we reached a point where we were all very comfortable that what we are doing will give the opportunity for more New Zealanders across the country particularly in rural areas to connect to broadband—and it does so while protecting individual property rights and also protecting the business interests of those electricity companies that may offer their existing infrastructure as facilities for fibre to be strung across. So this was a wonderful process to have been a part of. I commend the committee for the work it did and I commend this bill to the House.