Edmonds BarbaraHon BARBARA EDMONDS (Labour—Mana): Thank you Mr. Speaker. I just want to acknowledge the Minister of Finance's comments in relation to her support in obviously bringing this bill to the House. She set up quite neatly how the view of the cautious support in the first reading has now come to full support of the bill and I do want to acknowledge when we do agree on things. So thank you Minister for your comments in relation to the bill.The bill had its first reading just over a year ago. As part of the policy development for this bill—because it was subject to a review an earlier review—the previous Minister of Finance the Hon Grant Robertson wanted to check in with Sir Michael Cullen who was the founder of the New Zealand Superannuation Fund. He wanted to check in with him about his views about this because he wanted to ensure that—you know was this the intention and purpose? Because it was very clear that when the fund was first put in the ability to have controlling interests were not part of that element; it was not part of the initial Act as it was introduced. Then obviously with the review they allowed for what are called fund investment vehicles" which could take a controlling interest in some entities such as land as I understand it and some particular rural vehicles. But he wanted to go back to Sir Michael and just be able to check base with him to say "Is this what you were thinking of at the time when you established this fund?"I do want to pay tribute to Sir Michael because it wasn't long after that that Sir Michael did pass away. When the Hon Grant Robertson went to Sir Michael and asked him he agreed it was time. It was not the right time when the fund was first established because at that time they wanted to ensure that the purpose of the fund was to grow as fast as possible to meet the expectations needed to basically build its bank. Then as things slightly change over the years the fund has exceeded all expectations for what the Guardians of New Zealand Superannuation had wanted—so it's actually gone past that. So Sir Michael said "Now is about right. Now is about the time to be able to make that policy change." So I do want to acknowledge the late Sir Michael Cullen for first of all his founding of the fund and then second of all for his careful advice that he gave to the previous Minister of Finance the Hon Grant Robertson.As the Minister has set out there are some peculiarities with this particular bill. As members of this House will know the Official Information Act (OIA) basically covers most official information of Crown entities and of Crown agencies. But this particular bill has a very purposeful exclusion from the OIA and that is again to ensure that the private sector part of the fund is not subject to the OIA and treated in the same ways that the information—which would probably be highly commercially sensitive—is not subject to that Official Information Act request.The bill also does require there are five-monthly reviews of the super fund and how it functions. The bill does talk to—basically the 10th-year review of this particular bill coming in is to ensure that that review takes a backward look to ensure that it is tracking the way that it should be in the 10 years after the bill gets passed. It's good to have those checkpoints.I also want to briefly support some of the changes that the Finance and Expenditure Committee—sorry more commentary that they had. They were really careful to ensure that they weren't overstepping the mark because they wanted to—as members have said in the House previously and through the select committee process—ensure that the Guardians stay as a separate and independent entity and they wanted to make sure they didn't overstep that mark which is why one of the considerations that the Finance and Expenditure Committee thought about was in relation to some of the amendments to section 61. That was whether it should remain in the primary legislation or whether they should enact secondary legislation. But again the members basically considered that no it was necessary to keep it as part of the bill as introduced. So I just want to acknowledge the Finance and Expenditure Committee.So there's not much more I can add on this part of the bill. Obviously if there is an intention that we need to have another look to ensure that the revised-track version of the bill in the committee of the whole House stage if it needs to be done then we will consider that at that particular stage. Otherwise this side of the House the Labour Party does commend this bill to the House."