Heatley Phil: Injury Prevention Rehabilitation and Compensation Amendment Bill — Instruction to CommitteeCWH In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee 
Heatley Phil: Injury Prevention Rehabilitation and Compensation Amendment Bill — Instruction to CommitteeCWH In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee 
[Volume:609;Page:6508] 
PHIL HEATLEY (NZ National—Whangarei) 
: 
 I too would like to move onto the schedules and I do have some questions for the Minister. I would like to commend the Chair Mr Ross Robertson on the way he is looking after the Committee. I recently spoke to pupils at the Ruakaka primary school and I promised them that members of Parliament would be on their best behaviour while in the House and you are certainly helping them to do that Mr Chairperson. I am glad that is now recorded in  
Hansard 
 as I promised. Thank you for that and for resolving the issue around the “ghost” section—section 75A of the Customs and Excise Act 1996. 
Part A of the schedule concerns goods manufactured in New Zealand.It concerns motor spirit with a Research Octane No. less than 92—that is regular grade. People will know that I am the member of Parliament for Whangarei and that the Marsden Point oil refinery resides in that electorate. I am well aware of what they are doing there to ensure that they produce petroleum products that do not hurt our environment but are still very good products for motorists throughout New Zealand to use. 
I have a question for the Minister about these rates of duty. Members will see the four columns the first being headed “Excise item number”. I am referring to Part A “Goods manufactured in New Zealand” and I am referring to excise item No. 99.75.15C. That particular number refers to motor spirit with a Research Octane No. less than 92. That is regular grade and the unit column is per litre—and we have been talking about the increase to 5.08c per litre tonight. The last column is the “Rates of duty” column and it states: “36.2c plus 8c per g of Pb”. I assume that that is lead. A litre of petrol I take it weighs less than a kilogram would that be right?Yes one litre of water weighs one kilogram. 
Hon Harry Duynhoven 
: No! 
PHIL HEATLEY 
: Harry Duynhoven does not realise that one litre of water weighs one kilogram. He should be ashamed of himself. The Minister in the chair Judith Tizard should know that one litre weighs one kilogram at 273 Kelvin. Per gram of lead one litre of petrol would weigh roughly slightly less than one kilogram. 
What I want to know from the member is how many grams of lead per kilogram roughly are in one litre of petrol? If there is an additional 8c per gram of lead and there is substantial lead in one litre of petrol I would like to know—and I am sure other members would like to know—how much that puts up the price to consumers.I ask the Minister in the chair to answer that question. How many grams of lead are in one litre of petrol; therefore how much is contributed by the lead content? I assume that is some sort of penalty. I have already given the Minister a brief lecture on how much the petrol should roughly weigh. If she could work that out and report to this Committee I would very much appreciate it. 
Interestingly enough these levies or what we call taxes which have been increased by this Labour Government will contribute to accident compensation.When people read Part A and Part B of the schedule they might not realise that the Accident Compensation Corporation already has about $3.5 billion in reserves. It is worth questioning whether it would get a better return by investing some of that money in road safety initiatives—that is in the fence at the top of the cliff—rather than billing New Zealanders more levies.