Clark DavidHon Dr DAVID CLARK (Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs): Thank you Mr Speaker. I want to begin my contribution as the previous speaker did—Ingrid Leary member of Parliament for Taieri—by acknowledging the passing of the Hon Stan Rodger who was a predecessor of mine in the finest electorate in New Zealand. I do want to acknowledge his family in particular and the wider family and pass on the condolences of this House. We know something of that man and his statesman-like contribution to our country in service in a Cabinet but also in many other roles in our community and serving Dunedin for a very long time. So I just want to put those respects on record. He was a man with style is the final thing I'll say. I very much enjoyed his anecdote which I'm sure he shared with others: he sent a sealed letter to the Otago Daily Times (ODT) early in his parliamentary career to be opened upon his retirement. And upon his retirement that letter was opened by the ODT editor and in it he had outlined very clearly that he intended to retire after the number of terms in Parliament that he actually was involved. So he was the member of Parliament for Dunedin North from 1978 through to 1990 and that was something that he was very clear on early on. He had a spirit of service and that was something that he was clear on right at the start of his career.This is a Budget debate and I do want to acknowledge the Hon Grant Robertson in the Budget that he has delivered which sees New Zealand well placed in a situation where there's global uncertainty. Our debt is amongst the lowest in the OECD. We have a situation where we've got record low unemployment and we've got ratings agencies giving New Zealand triple A ratings something very few other countries in the world can claim and we've got a sure and strong leadership. It's a Budget that is about providing economic security for the country while supporting Kiwis who face cost of living pressures—and other speakers have spoken about the cost of living payment. I will mention in passing of course the continuation of the removal of the fuel excise and also the half-price public transport fares and that goes on in perpetuity for community service card holders. All excellent changes that are being passed through in the Budget.I also would like to very much mention what we're doing in the grocery sector. On Budget night we put through some urgent legislation to ban practices which the major supermarket players the duopoly have used to block their competitors from coming into town. The use of exclusive covenants restrictive covenants exclusive leases—those things will be banned in the future. They will become unenforceable if they've been applied historically. And that is the first concrete step that we've taken in response to the Commerce Commission's report which found that the supermarket duopoly were taking by their most conservative estimate a million dollars a day in excess profits out of Kiwis' pockets each and every day of the year. That's their most conservative estimate.So we want to make sure that Kiwis are getting a fair deal at the checkout. The removal of covenants was the first step and of course we've since announced further steps. The support for that work be resourced out of the Budget too for making sure that we explore how to put in place very clearly a mandatory backstop for a mandatory access to wholesale. The access to wholesale piece was something the Commerce Commission described as absolutely critical to ensuring a more competitive market. You can't run a supermarket with empty shelves. So the retail part of the business requires wholesale supply. That is locked up by the duopoly currently and we intend to free that up.We've accepted 12 out of the 14 recommendations from the Commerce Commission. The other two were rejected on the basis that we want to go further. We want to have an access regime for wholesale for other grocery retailers who might want to enter the market or for smaller players to expand. We want a mandatory backstop to that to make sure that it happens. And we also want reviews of competition done more regularly than the Commerce Commission suggested: not every three years but every year. So we've gone further than the Commerce Commission wanted or suggested in their work but we accept the findings that there are excess profits. We want Kiwis to be getting a fair deal at the checkout. We know cost of living pressure is hurting Kiwi families. That's why we want to address the duopoly's dominance.