Bishop ChrisCHRIS BISHOP (National): Well here we are on the second reading of this shoddy bill shoddily put together by this shoddy Government. And it's still not at all clear why we are actually doing this. We continue to oppose this legislation.There were some wild claims made during the first reading debate on this bill not the least of which is the member for Taieri's contribution which basically amounted to: I'd really like to go home and Parliament doesn't need to be in session. I'd like to go home and surely there are more important things we can be doing." Well I want to make a very serious point: there is nothing more important to this House than the making of law. It is right and proper that the Opposition scrutinise that legislation particularly when the Parliament is being asked to do something retrospectively because it is true to say that this bill is a technical anomaly in some senses—that is true in some senses—but it's also worth noting that the bill retrospectively changes the law. So the behaviour that was of a particular type on 11 August last year that will now be seen in May 2021 in a different way. As Helen White knows and Arena Williams sitting next to her both lawyers both fine lawyers as they know—Hon Simon Bridges: Steady on.CHRIS BISHOP: Simon Bridges says "Steady on". I think both got their law degrees from the University of Auckland—Hon Michael Woodhouse: Oh in that case the second best university in the country. CHRIS BISHOP: So they're sort of adequate. Second best law faculty in New Zealand after the Victoria University of Wellington law school.Hon Michael Woodhouse: What about Waikato?CHRIS BISHOP: Well I'd be a bit careful about what I say about Waikato University given the Prime Minister got a degree from there. But look these two lawyers know that what we're dealing with here is the serious stuff. And I want to make a serious point about the quality of the information given to the Parliament around helping us to decide whether or not to pass this legislation. It is pathetic in its paucity. It really is. There is nothing in the legislative statement really. The legislative statement—as I may have mentioned in the first reading speech—says pretty much nothing. The departmental disclosure statement at one point says in relation to Part 1—the general policy statement—"N.B. The text you provide to your PCO or IRD drafter for inclusion in the explanatory note should be identical to that presented here." Well it's not and also that should clearly have been taken out.There's basically no analysis in "Part 2: Background Material and Policy Information. Are there any publicly available inquiry review or evaluation reports that have informed … the policy to be given effect … ?" No. "Does this bill seek to give effect … in relation to international treaty?" No. Well that's probably fair enough. "Were any regulatory impact statements provided to inform the policy decisions that lead to this bill?" No. So no regulatory impact statement no background policy information. And then as I said earlier the best explanation about what we're actually doing here was given by the Minister in his first reading speech. And we had to wait until the Minister actually got up and sort of explained with some at least precision or clarity exactly what we were doing. That is not the right way to make law. If Parliament is being asked to do something retrospectively it should be provided with the information well in advance of the bill being presented to the Parliament.I don't know which member it was opposite who said previously "You know you can't really expect the Government to have done a full regulatory impact report." Well I'm sorry—yes we can. Actually we should demand that because let's be very clear about what we're doing. If you read the general policy statement it says "This visa-conversion process creates a technical issue where some Australians may have been charged an MIQ fee for which it could be argued that there was no lawful authority to charge." So just reflect on that—Australians may have been charged a fee for which they shouldn't have been charged. Basically a bunch of people we don't know how many a bunch of people were illegally charged a fee. So they've been subject to a penalty; not imprisonment or not you know a massive penalty. But they have been charged something that they shouldn't have been charged. Well the funny thing is the bill doesn't even say that itself. It says "they may have been charged." They don't actually know. They don't actually know. As Michael Woodhouse points out it's incredibly equivocal: "They may have been charged. We don't know." And that's a whole other issue as to why the Government doesn't have any idea.So Australians coming to New Zealand may have been or probably were charged fees they shouldn't have been charged. So there's sort of two things you can do in response to that: you can say "We'll refund them" or "We can just do the easy—"—that's the hard thing to do because then you've got to go and find them and then you've got to go and figure it all out.Hon Michael Woodhouse: They probably haven't paid yet.CHRIS BISHOP: Yeah they probably haven't paid yet because seven million bucks is overdue including by the way just while we're on that—riffing on that—$4 million from August September October and November last year. So we're now six months in.Hon Member: Honesty box MIQ.CHRIS BISHOP: Honesty box MIQ. So Australians probably were charged money that they shouldn't have been charged. So as I say you've got two choices then: you can go and find them and refund them or you can do the easy thing which is just retrospectively change the law to say "Oh don't worry you should always have been charged." Well no surprises what this Government chose. This Government chose the easy option which is—under the cover of Budget urgency—put the House into urgency on Friday morning. I should at this point clarify my remarks from the first reading speech in which I said the press gallery were hung-over—I've had a number of texts from members of the gallery and it just shows that you think no one's paying attention and it actually turns out they are. I should clarify my remarks. I almost—Hon Member: Which is most of them.CHRIS BISHOP: Yeah well. I almost did a point of order and made a personal explanation in relation to clarifying them—not all of them are hung-over only some. So we're in Friday morning we're now at 10 past 10 and we've had a school group come in to watch this unedifying process—hello to all of you—where the Government is retrospectively saying to Australians who were charged "Potentially you shouldn't have been charged but you were and that's legal." So they've taken the easy option rather than just go and refund people who were charged illegally. They've just done the easy thing which is to ram something through retrospectively. I think it was Helen White in the first reading who actually mounted at least a decent defence of it when she said that "Retrospective law can be OK because no one's being penalised." Except that is wrong; that is just wrong. Retrospective law can be fine if it confers a benefit that wasn't otherwise available to you. Of course because you know no one's actually worse off; in fact you're better off. So that's fine. That's an acceptable form of retrospective legislation sometimes although the general principle is still that it's wrong. But let's be clear this bill retrospectively validates illegal charging. So this is not conferring a benefit. This bill validates something that may or may not have been illegal at the time and says it is legal now. So it does actually penalise people.If I'm an Australian resident who came in under a critical purpose visa or whatever in I don't know November last year I might be one of those 600-650 people and I may have been charged a managed isolation and quarantine (MIQ) fee for which there was no legal authority. Now I've got to tell you there is nothing more important to Parliament than working out whether or not people are charged fees and penalties appropriately. There is nothing more important to the power of Parliament. That is the whole purpose of Parliament—to allow the Government to raise revenue in a lawful way. What we are being asked to do as a Parliament is basically say that the Government made a booboo when they did the MIQ legislation last year and then we've got to fix it up.I've got a lot more to say about this. The other problem with the bill and the other reason we oppose it is we're being asked to amend through primary legislation regulations. So clause 5 of the bill—regulations amended—means the regulations through the Schedule. Again a shoddy way to make law. Regulations can be amended via the regulations. They're made by the Governor-General through Order in Council made by Ministers. You're not meant to put the House into urgency to put through one clause to amend regulations through primary legislation. That's just totally inappropriate. The Government made a mistake. They should be upfront about that. And they should explain to the House exactly why this bill is so necessary and so justified. It's a shoddy process and a shoddy way from a shoddy Government."