Parker David: Regulatory Improvement Bill — First Reading 
Parker David: Regulatory Improvement Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:654;Page:3044] 
Hon DAVID PARKER (Labour) 
: 
 I rise to support the Regulatory Improvement Bill and I endorse some of the comments made by earlier speakers. There is always a need for housekeeping in Government. As life becomes increasingly sophisticated there is increasing sophistication in regulation in order to regulate the increasingly sophisticated ways in which we go about the business of our lives and commerce. That sophistication and complexity means that on occasions we have regulations that are inconsistent with each other. In a perfect world of course those inconsistencies would never arise but they do in the real world. 
Simon Bridges 
: What about just legislative laziness? 
Hon DAVID PARKER 
: Well I will come to that. That interjection was from Simon Bridges from the National Party and I will divert to that issue since he has raised it. 
Yes we do see some legislative laziness already from the National-led Government. National should probably put most of the blame for that on its coalition partner Mr Rodney Hide who is responsible for this very bill. It seems somewhat ironic that year after year we have been lectured by Rodney Hide on the need to know the true cost of regulatory change before imposing it when on the issue of the biggest regulatory change that this country is going through at the moment—that is regulatory changes to the system of governance in Auckland—that most basic rubric of his most closely held principles is being ignored. I know some of us doubt the number of principles that really are held by Mr Hide but I thought that if one principle was close to his heart it was the need to properly cost regulatory change. Yet in this House this week we had a question asked yesterday of Mr Hide about whether there had been any costing of the changes that have been rushed through by the National - ACT - Maori Party Government to the system of governance that was recommended by the royal commission. The royal commission as part of its very lengthy and thorough process properly costed the consequences of the changes that it proposed. The National Government very quickly came up with some proposed changes to those but it has not costed them. 
Notwithstanding the fact that National has not costed those changes it will rush them through under urgency next week. So we have changes with billion-dollar consequences over time to Auckland and National has not costed them. The culprit has left the Chamber. People used to say “The President has left the White House.” Well the culprit has left the Chamber. He knows that that is true. He was called into order by the Speaker today because he tried to hide from the House the reality that was eventually proven under the questioning of Phil Twyford although yesterday Mr Hide had twisted the meaning of a question as if it was about the process costs of the reforms rather than the actual cost of the reforms.  
Grant Robertson 
: Dancing on the head of a pin. 
Hon DAVID PARKER 
: Well that pin became very uncomfortable for him today. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: Something was pricked. 
Hon DAVID PARKER 
: Yes that is right. A bit of hot air was expelled after that particular attempt to hide the truth from the public. The truth was exposed for what it is. 
It is somewhat ironic that the perk-buster the person who stood for regulatory rigour is this same day bringing forward a bill that represents improvements to regulatory form but of course this bill is not Rodney Hide’s bill. It was prepared by the previous Labour-led Government under the ministerial guidance of Lianne Dalziel. The current Minister’s only contribution to regulatory reform is to make matters worse by proceeding with changes to Auckland governance that even now have not been costed. You know we have the legislation on that coming forward next week under urgency. When the Government sits under urgency it does not have to give advance notice or copies of legislation to the Opposition or the media. The normal checks and balances that we have when we are considering legislation are absent when we sit under urgency. 
Against that background one would think that the regulatory reform man the man whose rubric of his stance on things is to properly cost them would in that situation go even further towards having decent information for the public and for this Parliament on the economic consequences of the changes to the regulatory structure and local governance structure in Auckland as a consequence of the Government’s rushed changes to those proposed by the royal commission. Let us not forget the royal commission had the involvement of a judge and other very experienced panel members who brought to bear their expertise and they had the assistance of the relevant Government departments to properly cost those things. That has all been thrown out by the National Government. It has come up with alternatives to the commission’s proposals that are not only less democratic but also probably cost more. We do not know that; we do not know how much extra they will cost. We know that many millions of dollars of costs will be borne by Aucklanders but we still have not seen the figures. 
I turn to some of the improvements that are made by this bill. Omnibus bills are restricted in this House because there is a constitutional risk that we can put into an omnibus bill things that fundamentally change lots of different areas of legislation and they do not get the proper scrutiny that they need if they are all hidden in one omnibus bill. That is why we are pretty restrictive of the circumstances in which we allow omnibus bills to come forward here. The common theme here is that the changes do not deal with significant issues of legislative principle; they deal with regulatory compliance costs. Each of the changes made under this bill improves regulatory processes and therefore reduces compliance costs without making changes to the fundamental underlying principles of the relevant Acts. 
One of the changes is to the rules relating to overseas companies. Some years ago the rules were changed and there was a new rule that said that companies with overseas ownership were no longer required to file audited financial statements to the Registrar of Companies. Previously they did have to file those statements and the change was made to say they did not have to do so yet at the moment we have the nonsense that the very same companies that do not have to file audited statements have to appoint an auditor. That is obviously inconsistent. If a company does not have to file audited financial statements then why should it have to appoint an auditor? This legislation fixes that up by making it possible for an overseas company to pass a resolution that it does not appoint an auditor. The same situation applies to New Zealand companies. There is not a special rule for overseas companies; it is the same rule for New Zealand companies and overseas companies. Accordingly that rule is being changed. 
Some other changes are being made to the Designs Act. At the moment one can have a registered design. The Designs Act gives people some form of right to protect their design. If people have a novel design and they register it under that Act no one can come along and as of right copy that design and then flog it off to somebody else. It is the output of the designer and for a limited period of years there is protection for the designer under that Act. At the moment the designer or the holder of those rights under the Act can lose those rights if they lapse because the designer did not pay a renewal fee. That seems to be a pretty harsh penalty. If designers forget to pay a $100 fee they lose the rights to their design for ever. That is too tough and it needs to be fixed. The relevant authorities need to be given discretion to reinstate those design rights upon payment of the fees—with penalties probably for late payment. But upon payment of those fees and penalties the rights of the designer ought to be reinstated. That is another thing that this bill does. 
There are various changes to the Fisheries Act and to the Gas Act. There are overlapping ways in which the sellers of gas have to report liquefied natural gas under the Gas Act and another Act. That inconsistency is being resolved. Improvements are being made to processes under the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act 1996. There are some pretty arcane procedures there that should be applied to things that are high-risk but ought to not be applied to things that are low-risk. This legislation attempts to make some changes in order to make that legislation more practical. 
That is why the Labour Party will be supporting this legislation. Thank you.