Jones Dail: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
Jones Dail: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
[Volume:626;Page:21139] 
10.  
DAIL JONES (NZ First) 
 to the  
Coordinating Minister Race Relations 
: What has been the total cost across all Government agencies in the last financial year of providing internal or contracted Treaty of Waitangi - related courses and education material on the Treaty of Waitangi? 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD (Coordinating Minister Race Relations) 
: 
 I thank the member for his question and for the drafting of it today. There are nearly 3000 Crown entities. The training for each is a matter for the chief executive and I do not hold the details for all of them. 
Dail Jones 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. My question was about the total cost not the number of entities. Has the Minister not done his homework in the last 2 days to let me have the cost? 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD 
: Just to make it clear I have not chosen to instruct my staff to ring 3000 Crown entities to ask them what they spent on these things no. 
Hon Dr Nick Smith 
: The 3000 entities the Minister refers to include about 2600 schools and nobody is suggesting that they be included. When a Minister cannot provide the answer to such a question the normal practice is to say that it has not been possible to do so within the time and that it will be provided to the library and to the member at the earliest possible opportunity. Question time becomes a farce when a Minister simply says that he cannot be blowed to get the information. I ask you whether you would require the Minister to answer the question within a reasonable time frame through the normal practices Parliament has adopted. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: There is no normal practice. Sometimes Ministers say that; sometimes they do not. It is up to the Minister how the Minister responds and that response will be judged accordingly. 
Dail Jones 
: What efforts will the Minister make to provide the information at least by way of a written question in the usual time available for written questions; or is he of the view that spending about $50 million worth of taxpayers’ money on this farcical effort to introduce people to the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi is just a waste of time and that the money should be better spent on something like reducing say exorbitant school fees or hospital waiting lists? 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD 
: The total budgeted cost of the Treaty of Waitangi information programme in the agency for which I am responsible was $2.74 million. This year that was money very well spent. I advise the Minister to have a good read of the information because if he did so some of his attitudes might change. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. The position of Coordinating Minister Race Relations was created by the Prime Minister specifically to look at these very issues in Government departments. The Minister has held this position for almost 18 months. Is it not reasonable to expect a better answer to Mr Jones’ question than “I don’t know.”? 
Madam SPEAKER 
: I thank the member for his comments and the information but the Speaker is not responsible for the quality of answers. The Minister did address the question; others will judge the quality of his answer. 
Hon Dr Nick Smith 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. Standing Order 370(1) states: “An answer that seeks to address the question asked must be given if it can be given consistently with the public interest.” The public have a very real interest in knowing how their money is spent. Your ruling is extraordinary. Effectively if a member asks any Minister about how money is spent the Minister can with the precedent you have set this afternoon say: “I don’t have that; I’m not providing it.” That is not the standard we have had from previous Speakers. I ask you to reflect on your ruling in respect of basic disclosure of financial information from the Government. 
Hon Dr Michael Cullen 
: Indeed the member read the Standing Order correctly but misunderstood what it meant. It meant that the answer must seek to address the question if it can be given consistently with the public interest. He has raised this point of order in a number of different ways over recent months and every time he gets it wrong. There are circumstances in which a member consistent with the public interest should not even seek to address the question because of the nature of the information that might be involved. In this particular instance the Minister certainly did address the question. One of the problems we have in this matter is that members opposite have a common tendency to phrase questions poorly and then complain when they do not get the answer they expected. The question asked: “What has been the total cost across all Government agencies …”. If the member really expects the Minister to go through every school every district health board every Crown entity and agency and every department to elicit that information I say bluntly that the time and cost involved is not reasonable and the Minister should not be expected to provide that. If of course what the member wanted was that within the core public sector and that within the administrative arm of Government then he should have phrased the question properly rather than using language that these days has a much broader meaning than perhaps the member has been accustomed to in the past. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: Speaking to the point of order— 
Madam SPEAKER 
: No I will just rule on this first because it is consistent as Dr Cullen said with the understanding of what is meant by “public interest”. His interpretation is consistent with the rulings that have previously been given. Speakers’ rulings in the past have also emphasised that it is not for the Speaker to judge the quality of the answers. It is not for the Speaker to do that; members do and the public does. The member has to address the question however and he had addressed it. Is there another point of order? Stephen Franks I think had a slight precedent over Gerry Brownlee. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: Not in my assessment he doesn’t. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: Well in my assessment on this he does. 
Stephen Franks 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. My point of order is related but different. I think the Minister’s answer in which he said he had asked his unit—I am not sure whether he used the word “unit” but that is what his staff in this role have been described as in the past—and they had said it was approximately two point something million actually allowed him to narrow the scope of his responsibility way lower than when it was announced. He was expressly described as the Coordinating Minister Race Relations. His job was described as to rove through departments and to establish whether programmes were addressing need instead of race. The Minister should not be permitted to duck by saying that he had asked his unit when his responsibility was expressly stated as being Government-wide. At the very least he should be obliged to say whether he has ever bothered to try to find out what the expenditure is across the Government on this kind of race propaganda. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: I am sorry that is not a point of order. The Minister as I heard in answer to one of the questions explicitly said he had not sought that information so he addressed that point. But you are arguing again if I may say about the quality of the answer. That is for others to judge. The answer addressed the question. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. My point of order is much along the lines of the point that Mr Franks has made. But I want to point out that Dr Cullen has said that there is a problem with the way questions are being asked and the way understandings are being considered by members asking those questions. The reality is that the Prime Minister is the person who went out and said what Mr Mallard would be doing. It is the Prime Minister who gave the nation an expectation that Mr Mallard was the man to put his finger on the problem. It is not unreasonable that Opposition parties ask Mr Mallard whether he has managed to nail it down. I have to say immediately to you Madam Chair that you have ruled and we accept that he has done nothing. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: That was not a point of order. 
Dail Jones 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. It follows on very nicely from Mr Brownlee’s point of order. In actual fact New Zealand First tried to ask this question of the Prime Minister yesterday because that is where all this started from. The office ruled that we could not ask this question of the Prime Minister. The Government decided that it would pass it over to Mr Mallard. We would have presumed that the Prime Minister passed it over to Mr Mallard because she thought Mr Mallard knew what he was doing and would be capable of answering the question. So far it seems that we are out of luck on both counts: Mr Mallard does not know what he is doing and is incapable of answering the question. So I guess that is where the matter has to rest in the meantime. 
Hon Dr Michael Cullen 
: Of course the Government is perfectly free to transfer a question to the more appropriate Minister but it is not for the Government to correct the inadequacy of questions asked by members opposite. If the member cannot frame his question correctly it is not up to the Prime Minister to do it for him. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: The member is right that in fact who addresses the question is a matter for the Government. 
Dail Jones 
: Are we to take it in this House that when it comes to trying to get information about the many tens of millions of dollars that are being spent on this education programme relating to the Treaty of Waitangi and its so-called principles the attitude of the Labour Government is that we should not ask such questions because the Labour Minister in charge considers them to be a waste of time as he indicated in his answer to the House yesterday; is that a reference to the treaty programme itself or to the way in which the money is being spent? 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD 
: What I did indicate earlier is that the Treaty of Waitangi information programme is costing $2.74 million this year. That is certainly not a waste of time. There are however some programmes and some approaches run by Government departments that I would describe in that manner. 
Stephen Franks 
: Why has the Minister not used his powers as Coordinating Minister Race Relations to coordinate a stop to the hundreds of Government advertisements which are a waste of time that variously oblige bewildered mechanics carpenters or caretakers to show their “commitment to the Treaty of Waitangi” or “knowledge of the place of the treaty in New Zealand’s constitution”; even for the jobs that might need such mysterious knowledge can the Minister tell us what that place is? 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD 
: As I indicated to the member yesterday it is not my job to do the job applications for him. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: Would the Minister address the question. 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD 
: As I indicated yesterday it is my view that a number of job descriptions for the public service totally and unnecessarily refer to treaty knowledge or similar matters. I have talked to the Minister of State Services and he has talked to the State Services Commissioner and he has talked to chief executives. Unfortunately somewhere down the line the message has not gone through absolutely brilliantly and I am sure that the State Services Commissioner will have another discussion with chief executives at some time. 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. I am greatly concerned at the attitude this Minister has taken to what is a very very serious question and a very serious political issue. He knows full well what we are after. We want to know the amounts being applied in respect of the portfolio that he has been given charge of. It is simply a contempt of this Parliament to be told now 28 hours after the question was first lodged when the framing of the question was argued about that he will not give any answer at all. That is what it comes back to. It is not that the Minister might be embarrassed—that is what a Government sometimes has to wear—but he is actually saying that he does not care what members ask and that he will not be bothered to tell them. That is not a satisfactory way of conducting his responsibilities. Above all it is an absolute contempt for Parliament. The Minister’s job is to come down to the Chamber and in front of the whole country answer the questions he has been properly asked. If you Madam Speaker judge the question to have been properly asked then the Minister should properly answer it. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: That is not a point of order. The member has made his point known as have several other members. I have ruled on that point. It is not a point of order. 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: You have not ruled on my point of order Madam Speaker. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: Yes I have. 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: My point of order is that it is your duty to make sure that the Minister answers the question or makes some effort to answer it. He cannot say that he does not give a damn and therefore will not bother to keep himself appraised of the information and come down to the Chamber to tell Parliament what is going on. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: It is members’ day. 
Hon Dr Michael Cullen 
: That is not of course what the Minister said. The Minister said that the question asked across all Government agencies and that it would be an enormous job to provide the information. For example almost every school in New Zealand that I am aware of spends some time on providing internal education material on the Treaty of Waitangi. It is a pity perhaps that they did not do so in the days when that member and I went to primary school and secondary school. How on earth are we to disentangle those costs which are part of courses run in schools throughout the country to answer this particular question? The Minister did give information on the money that he is directly responsible for in terms of Treaty of Waitangi information material which I think is some $2.74 million. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: We are now into debatable material— 
Hon Ken Shirley 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. It is a new point of order. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: I am ruling. We are now into debatable material. We are trying to get to a general debate; members may like to pursue the matter there. I would just like to note for members that Speakers cannot oblige Ministers to say anything. All that Speakers are responsible for is ensuring that the question is addressed and addressed relevantly. Can we please now move on or do we now have a point of order? It is on a different matter I hope. 
Hon Ken Shirley 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. It is certainly on a different matter. I heard you say to the House that after all it is members’ day. You were implying that there is a lower standard of tolerance that you are prepared to be more indulgent and that if we are wasting members’ day it is not of the same consequence. I think that if that was the case then many members of the House would take exception to that. Members’ day has equal status and the Speaker should not be more expeditious in encouraging greater constraint on time in support of Government business of the day over members’ business of the day. I am really seeking an assurance from you Madam Speaker that that was not the implication you seemed to make. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: Of course it was not. If the member took that inference then of course I apologise. It is members’ day and members are entitled to spend the time as they wish.