O'Connor Simon; Rurawhe AdrianSIMON O'CONNOR (National—Tāmaki): Thank you very much. Look I'm very pleased to speak to I suppose examining the whole question of why we are looking to truncate this process around the Exclusive Economic Zone and Continental Shelf (Environmental Effects) Amendment Bill.There are a number of things that I think need to be looked at. The fundamental one—if this House is going to do something then we have to do it properly. So we've heard from the Government that this is a simple piece of legislation. I don't intend to get into the specifics of it except to say it is very very simple. It provides the House really or the Government in particular with two options: either we push it through the House very quickly because everyone agrees with it or we take it to a full-length approach.We've heard in some of the discussions if not the banter across the House: first and foremost the Government said it's simple; it's very very simple. Well the offer is here and remains from the Opposition that we are more than happy to sit down if you will right now and move through all the processes. In fact the irony is that this House has probably spent more time debating the undemocratic move to truncate this process than it would have taken to move this bill through all its stages and have it done and dusted and to allow the Government to move on to other pieces of legislation.The other side—we've heard it from the Greens from one of the Ministers that really the reason they want to have this go to a select committee albeit for only a couple of weeks is that they want a full democratic process. It's always said with the great intentions of the Greens in that rather serious tone. Well if that's true I come back to my first adage: if you're going to do it then do it properly. So I suggest to the Green Party members and to the Ministers of the Crown that if that's truthful and they really want the New Zealand public to have their say on this vitally important piece of legislation well then allow the committee to have a full amount of time to have that discussion.So I suppose for me and it's probably my philosophical training I don't like contradictions. And all that we're getting unfortunately from the Government is an array of contradictions here. Unfortunately these contradictions are habitual. It's only been a few months ago that we had the Government truncate and force through another piece of legislation. I don't intend to get into the substance of it but it's illustrating a problem—Hon Member: Arrogant.SIMON O'CONNOR: —an arrogant Government as one of my colleagues—Hon Scott Simpson: An arrogance.SIMON O'CONNOR: —as two of my colleagues have now said. Does anyone want a third? No. It was the overseas investment law and now Act pushed through at speed—at speed unnecessarily. It is for me and for this side of the House a growing concern of why the Government is continuing to put these shortened truncated processes in place.I had questions myself when the overseas investment one was done. I have further questions now—probably even more so with this one. The overseas investment one was actually quite a technical rather deep policy issue: why did we not allow people to have their say? On this particular one around the economic zone it's been a fault which has been identified. In many ways you could argue that we could have actually dealt with this even through a statutes amendment process.Hon Scott Simpson: That should have been where it went.SIMON O'CONNOR: It could have been an option. In fact we've only just had that coming through recently. But here we are truncating the process.If it is ultimately incredibly simple easy and I suspect with agreement—with everyone in the House in fact disappointed that the motion by the Hon Scott Simpson has been defeated. But if it is completely utterly simple then let's get that piece of work done now. If it is something which requires the New Zealand public to have their in-depth say on well then why not allow a full select committee process?One of the reasons I'm having I suppose a growing alarm in my head is: what's the agenda? I know it's a hypothetical—Hon Scott Simpson: It's hidden and secret.SIMON O'CONNOR: It's a hidden and secret agenda potentially. As the Speaker will know and certainly those members of the House will know once you go through a select committee process there is the opportunity to add SOPs—what they call Supplementary Order Papers. If this House was to move through the process immediately—Hon Andrew Little: It's not a speech by a philosopher.SIMON O'CONNOR: No I could actually switch to Greek if you like.Hon Andrew Little: Try Greek. It's all Greek to me.SIMON O'CONNOR: That would be more double Dutch to that side. What we're dealing with here is a truncated quick process through the House. If we were to just go through all stages in effect there's no chance to put SOPs—we would only deal with the substance of the bill. I have to wonder whether or not the Government is planning in some way to add SOPs into the process over the next couple of weeks which may actually expand what this supposed amendment bill is meant to do.Then we end up in a whole new much higher level contradiction. The first contradiction is that again if it's simple why are we not dealing with it now; or if it's complicated why not give it a full process? But the worse contradiction is if an SOP is tabled by the Government around this bill it will be done after—after—the public's had its say. It's a way of avoiding dealing with the public. So this is just filled with contradictions. It is ultimately I think—for the benefit of Mr Little—a pyrrhic decision. It's a pyrrhic decision. It's one that has no real value—it looks good but has no real value.So I'm going to wind up—truncate if you will—this speech which is symbolic of what this House should be doing today: to rip through the process and to have supported the Hon Scott Simpson's motion that we just pass it through all stages. I have but one piece of advice to the Government if I would to end with. It's something that they will be familiar with. I mean it's something I suppose—a fairly easy concept and something which the Government has supported before. So in relation to this bill the third item on the Order Paper this relatively simple bill: let's do this.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Adrian Rurawhe): Before I call the next member if there are any new arguments and debating points now would be the time to bring them out.