Williams Arena; van Velden BrookeARENA WILLIAMS (Labour—Manurewa): Thank you Mr Chair. I have two points to make on this clause. The first is to highlight the need for the nine-month period that I have suggested in my amendment. As my colleague Camilla Belich has pointed out this would allow the Minister to write to a committee of her choosing say it was the Education and Workforce Committee to conduct an inquiry. That has been traversed by Camilla. That is not what I will be speaking about. I would like to help the Minister consider some of the other options available to her perhaps using a model like Scotland's Futures Forum to discuss this kind of amendment which has been back and forth in and out of our statute book and really does call for some bipartisan agreement around it.So something like Scotland's Futures Forum or a citizens' forum which are two different things are models of engaging with the people who a law affects but while presenting them with evidence that has been independently gathered so that they might make informed decisions about their policy making. My colleagues are very excited about this. They're having a very lively conversation about it beside me.So what Scotland's Futures Forum allows as a lawmaking model for Parliaments like ours is to delegate decisions that have consistently been passed back and forth between major political parties where there is no agreement. This kind of model if the Minister were to choose to take up my amendment and then allow a nine-month period would allow her to convene a bipartisan forum that also had representatives of people who are most affected by this—employers employees but also experts—and to consider the evidence for this.I think the first briefing of such a forum which would be considering this piece of legislation would consider perhaps the research of Motu. It was published with funding from the Treasury into the effect of trial periods in employment on firm hiring behaviour. That research asked the question about whether the option of using trial periods had affected the quantity of hiring by firms and the types of individuals hired and the stability of employment relationships. It would be really useful for a committee of Parliament to be informed by the expert evidence but to have alongside it individuals who are outside of Parliament who were most affected by this law hearing that evidence and making evidence-based decisions.That first briefing from Motu would show that research they conducted found no evidence that the ability to use trial periods significantly increased firms' overall hiring. They estimated that the policy effect was statistically and economically insignificant: a 0.8 percent increase in hiring on average across all industries.My contention here is that it would be really useful for the Minister to be able to spend that nine months considering—with a group of parliamentarians who are interested in the long-term future in providing certainty to employers—the evidence basis for making these kinds of decisions. It may be that that forum—Hon Simeon Brown: They just want another working group.ARENA WILLIAMS: —and there's some very enthusiastic discussion over this side of the Chamber also on the Futures Forum. I look forward to discussing it with that Minister because there are some issues in our infrastructure pipeline that could do with some bipartisan treatment too. But this would allow the Minister to consider how we get longevity in this policy. How do we find a common ground? Because I have faith that that Minister is interested in finding common ground here. That is how our democracy works when it is most flourishing when we agree on the way that we can serve our people the best and this is a great option for that. I hope she will consider my amendment.Hon BROOKE VAN VELDEN (Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety): Thank you Mr Chair. I wanted to specifically talk to the contributions that have already come and I suspect will also follow about changing the commencement clause. Look this is pretty standard that a commencement happens after a Royal assent. I don't think anybody is challenging that. But would we delay it for more information? No. This has been a widely canvassed debate since 2009. Ninety-day trials have been around in New Zealand since 2009 so since that time period we have gathered quite a wide range of information that has informed our commitment to the New Zealand public. It has informed our commitment as part of the 100-day plan. We have a clear mandate from the New Zealand public to do this change.