Hodgson Pete: Duties of Statutory Officers (Census and Other Remedial Provisions) Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee Third Reading 
Hodgson Pete: Duties of Statutory Officers (Census and Other Remedial Provisions) Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:675;Page:20803] 
Hon PETE HODGSON (Labour—Dunedin North) 
: 
 That is all very interesting but it is no defence of why the Duties of Statutory Officers (Census and Other Remedial Provisions) Bill is being heard under urgency. We have not heard from the member who has just resumed his seat Kanwaljit Singh Bakshi the member on the opposite benches before that or any National member any defence as to why this bill should be passed under urgency. I have spent a bit of time as Minister of Statistics and the key feature of the issue of statistics is that it be treated with a certain arm’s-length approach by politicians. Process around statistics matters. The independence of statistics is important. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: The member got captured. 
Hon PETE HODGSON 
: It may be that I was captured by the Government Statistician of the day. It is absolutely true that when one is a Minister of Statistics other Ministers want the Minister of Statistics to beat up a little on the Government Statistician and when one is a member of the executive other than as the Minister of Statistics one joins the other 19 in trying to beat up on the Minister of Statistics in order to try to usurp the independence of the Government Statistician. 
This however does not work and it is important that it does not work. It may be that there are some processes relating to release timing and the use of adjectives when improvement or reasonableness could prevail a little more from time to time—I am sure that people would argue that. But the underlying fact is that a Government that has an independent set of statistics is a believable Government. Conversely a Government that has a constrained or politicised set of statistics is not believable. We can all list nations on both sides of that. 
Tim Macindoe 
: How is this politicising? 
Hon PETE HODGSON 
: There is an intervention of some sort from a humanoid opposite. A vaguely humanoid personage wishes to make an intervention. Let us hear from him. 
Tim Macindoe 
: I want to know how this is politicising it. 
Hon PETE HODGSON 
: It is politicised by screwing around with the numbers—screwing around with the numbers—I say to the member opposite. That is what “politicised” means. 
When China says that its CPI is this that its population census has changed by that or that its GDP has altered by the other some people are unkind enough to say that that may be wrong because the statistics in the view of some commentators are not sufficiently independent in the People’s Republic of China. They do not say that about New Zealand however. The statistics in New Zealand even if they are subject to ongoing correction—and they are—are regarded as being free of political influence. Why does this matter in this debate? Because it is important—I think; we think—to have legislation like this referred to a select committee in order that the Government Statistician and people who work for that department can be taken into the select committee and their advice on the legislation can be received. 
We assume that this is what the Government Statistician wants. We assume that the Minister of Statistics is merely allowing a sensible decision to be given legal effect. That is what we assume. But the independence of statistics is sufficiently important that we ought to test it openly and a select committee process is how that happens. This select committee process is being denied the Government Statistician is being denied the New Zealand public and is being denied this House. Do members think the Opposition should roll over and let that happen? I do not think so. 
There will be opposition to this legislation only on the basis of process. It seems sensible to delay a census by 2 years or perhaps 1 year or 3 years; I am not sure. It seems sensible to do that because of the earthquake. If it is sensible it is certainly the case that we need to do it by statutory amendment. It cannot be done otherwise. We accept that. We can read black-letter law like anyone else. But it is not OK— 
Sandra Goudie 
: They can read! They can’t add. 
Hon PETE HODGSON 
: It is not OK I say to the “Orange Roughy” for an earthquake that is 6 months old next week to be the cause of something that only now comes to the House. It is not OK. It is 5 months since we were told that we would have to delay the census—5 months. What has the Minister of Statistics been doing? Is this a big piece of legislation? It is not. Is it difficult legislation? It is not. Does it involve some expense? Yes a little. Did he have trouble getting money from the Minister of Finance? Apparently— 
Hon Maurice Williamson 
: A little? It’s $94 million. 
Hon PETE HODGSON 
: It is $94 million. OK now we are going to quibble. So because it is so costly—here is the logic now. The logic as offered by way of interjection goes like this: there is a delay the delay is caused by the cost and the delay is absolutely unavoidable because of the cost. On the other hand delaying the census itself is unavoidable because we cannot make any sense out of a census when we have a bombed-out second city of the nation. Therefore the one conclusion we can draw is that the Minister of Statistics failed to properly make that argument to the Minister of Finance and took 5 months to fail—5 months to achieve no progress on this. All he needed to do was say: “Bill what about the idea that you’ve got no choice? What about that Bill? Has there been a rattle down in Christchurch? Verily there has. Do we need to delay the census? Verily we do. Will it cost money? It does; it does. Therefore cough. There ain’t no option.” That is the end of the debate. 
The Minister of Finance may have asked for the cost to be brought down a bit. I would have if I were the Minister of Finance. But you see can I just say to the Minister of Statistics that he does not need 5 months to bring his costs down; he needs 5 weeks or 5 days. It is not a major exercise. There has been diddly-squat going on here. The Minister of Statistics has been sitting on his hands. The Government Statistician has perhaps been sitting on his hands. Everything has happened too late. It has been brought to the House in a bit of a hurry. Everyone is in a bit of a blind panic about it. We have been asked to roll over and our answer is no thank you. 
If the Government wants to govern badly it should wear it. If the Government wants to govern slackly it is the Government’s problem. If the Government wants to govern without the disinfectant of daylight then it is on the Government’s head but the Government should not invite the Opposition to roll over and say that it does not matter because it does. It does matter if the Government wants to play fast and loose with the processes of the House. It does matter if the Government wants to cut public viewpoint out of this legislation. It does matter if there will be no hearings in front of the media. It does matter that we are debating this bill at this hour of the night under urgency. It matters. It is not OK. We are not putting up with it. 
Is there any part of that that the Government does not understand? Let us see. I will pause. There is silence from members on the Government benches. They have now understood that the Opposition’s job is to make sure that process is followed properly. That is what we are paid to do. One of the many jobs of Her Majesty’s loyal Opposition is to ensure that good process is followed and that urgency is used when urgency must be used—not when it is convenient to use it; not when it is a cover-up for slackness in earlier months; not when it is due to dilatory behaviour by officials by the Minister by the Cabinet committee in question or by whomever; and not when there has been a bit of debate over $94 million. Not for any of those reasons; we do not roll over for any of those reasons. If there is a good reason for urgency we will be very happy to support it but this legislation is not such a reason.