Woods MeganDr MEGAN WOODS (Labour—Wigram): It is my pleasure to take a call. I would like to thank the Minister in the chair Jacqui Dean for taking the opportunity to take a call but I have some further questions for that Minister in the chair.As colleagues who have taken calls on this side of the Chamber have said we did previously support this legislation. We supported it to the select committee but there were just too many questions at that select committee stage. I did not sit on the Commerce Committee but from talking to colleagues who did and reading through the reports that came out of that there are some glaring questions that need to be answered.One of those questions for me and one I would like the Minister to respond to is why New Zealand is choosing to go down a very different path to Australia where Australia has a regime that allows this to remain in ministerial discretion. That is the regime that Australia has had and as the speaker who has previously spoken Ria Bond who has just taken her seat has identified it actually is a situation that has worked in New Zealand. Members are using the Canterbury earthquakes as an example of why it is that we need this legislation to come into play. What we have an example of there is the ability for things to be done a little bit differently in exceptional circumstances under the current rules. So why is there a need for this shift? Why is there a need for us to put in place a regime that is fundamentally different to Australia's—one of our largest trading partners—why is it that we would do that?I would also like to address the Minister's comments that she made around the need for the subjective nature of the test. I think the Minister when she took her call said that was because of necessity. I dispute that. Actually the advice that was put forward to the select committee actually did talk about different subjective and objective tests that could be applied. I would like to know why it is that objective tests around—for example a numerical objective test around a proportion of a market that was affected or other proportionalities and numerical measures were not put into play and that we have a solely subjective test at play here. That is something that I would be interested to know why it is that we have not chosen when there were various models that were put forward—why any element of objectivity in that test was put into play.If we do actually look at the clauses in the bill—new Part 4 clause 10 which has a number of letters following it—that lay out the investigation and where the public interest test lies in clause 10F of the bill. What I would like to know—the Minister has said on the issue of waiting which I think is an important issue that what we have is we have heard from industry that it needs some kind of clarity. It needs to know the rules it is playing in. It needs to know what is going to be the really important element when applying these tests. One of the things that led to us pulling our support from this was listening to New Zealand exporters and New Zealand manufacturers telling us how detrimental this would be to their businesses and how this would not be a help at all.If we turn to clause 10F of the bill where the public interest test is laid out in clause 10F(3) paragraphs (a) through (h) I would just like to ask the Minister some questions around that. In subclause (3) we have: In investigating whether imposing the duty is in the public interest the matters the chief executive must investigate include the following: (a) the effect of the duty on the prices of the dumped or subsidised goods:". What is the trigger? When we are talking about the effect what kind of trigger are we talking about here? What threshold has to be passed in order for the chief executive to think that that is significant?We then go to paragraph (b) "the effect of the duty on the prices of like goods produced in New Zealand:"—again what kind of ballpark are we talking about? What does the impact have to be in order for the chief executive to take this seriously as a consideration? This is something that I would like to hear from the Minister on. If we look at paragraph (c) "the effect of the duty on the choice or availability of like goods:" now this is a very broad test and I think we do need some clarity from the Minister. What scope are we talking about here? How broad does the choice have to be or how narrow does it have to be in order for this test to be applied? That is something that does need to be clarified.Even more oblique is paragraph (d) "the effect of the duty on product and service quality:". I would like to know more from the Minister on exactly what is intended by this clause. What do we mean by "the effect of the duty on product and service quality"? What threshold has to be crossed in order for this to be deemed significant? In paragraph (e) it states: "the effect of the duty on the financial viability of the domestic industry:". So what I would like the Minister to tell me is whether this means it is going to put a single player out of business whether it undermines several players in a particular industry whether or not it reduces the profits of a single player in an industry or whether it reduces products across the board to several players in that industry. What does that mean and how will that be applied?And then if we go further down that list to "whether there is an alternative supply (domestically or internationally) of [the] goods available:"—how broad? How broad are we going here? Are we saying that somewhere in the world there is an alternative or are we saying that that is available in New Zealand or that it is available in markets that we trade with regularly? What does that mean in application in terms of how this legislation is intended to be applied? Then there is the very broad criterion in paragraph (h) which is "any factor that the chief executive considers essential to ensure the existence of competition in the market."These are the factors that the chief executive can investigate when applying the public interest test. These are not "ands" or "ors". They exist in beautiful harmony together but what we do need to know from the Minister is what the strongest driver here is. What is it that the chief executive will be looking at most strongly when making these assessments when applying this test? To say as the Minister has when she took her call and said that we need to leave that that we do not want to be too prescriptive that that is not desirable—well it is desirable to those in the industry to know what the rules are that they are going to be operating under. We are introducing a new test here and I think that businesses and industry players deserve to know exactly what those rules are. To simply say that it is too prescriptive to talk about weighting does not cut it and I would like the Minister to take a further call and give some clarity to the Committee and indeed to impacted industries about what that may be. These are the criteria that will be applied when the Minister makes a choice about whether or not the countervailing duty will be applied.The Government has decided it wants to go down this route—that it wants to go down the route of having a change of legislation where we have a regime and tests. Well people need to know what that means and I look forward to hearing from the Minister and hearing what each of those factors that the chief executive will investigate when applying the public interest test mean and what the relative weightings will be. I understand that the Minister cannot be absolutely precise and say it will be the same in every single circumstance but what we do need to know is what the direction of travel is. The industry is telling us it does not have that at the moment. There is confusion there is lack of clarity and it is not good for anybody when our manufacturers and our exporters are left wondering where it is that they stand around the kinds of protections that will be in place for them. Of course Labour wanted to be able to support this legislation but when it came down to the detail like this—and we went through it in detail at the select committee—we could not be satisfied. We could not be satisfied that the right rules and a robust enough regime had been put in place. So I look forward to hearing from the Minister in the chair."