Lees-Galloway Iain: Christ’s College (Canterbury) Amendment Bill — In Committee Procedure Third Reading 
Lees-Galloway Iain: Christ’s College (Canterbury) Amendment Bill — In Committee Procedure Third Reading 
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IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North) 
: 
 I am a little bit surprised that Government members have not taken a few more calls on the Christ’s College (Canterbury) Amendment Bill given that one of their colleagues introduced the bill. That was breaking with convention. I heard Sandra Goudie interject during the previous speech: “There is no convention in Parliament” which was an interesting statement to make. But the Government is breaking with convention in having someone other than the local member of Parliament introduce a private bill. Given that that member is one of their colleagues I am really surprised that Government members are not taking more interest in the bill. The bill has obviously attracted endorsement from all parties in the House. It is sensible legislation and I congratulate the governors of Christ’s College on bringing it to Parliament through an MP who is resident in the Christchurch area. 
The bill amends the Christ’s College (Canterbury) Act 1910 to remove difficulties in administering property vested in the college when according to recital (2) of the preamble the intended purpose or purposes with which the property was given to or vested in the college have by the passage of time “become redundant uncertain as to application impractical to implement” or where the property generates income that is “inadequate or in excess of the amount necessary” for the original purposes. 
The select committee took its task very seriously gave the bill the scrutiny required and came up with some appropriate amendments I think to narrow down the powers of the governing board of Christ’s College so that the changes it makes to the purposes and use of the available property or trusts are also narrowed down somewhat. I think that that is a sensible restraint on the powers of the governance board in terms of changing the way it uses those funds which have been granted to the college by people who might now be long past and of course have no ability to have a say in those changes and who potentially could disagree with the types of changes that the board might want to make. The legislation just limits the board’s powers ever so slightly and I think that is a sensible move. 
I agree with the comments of my colleague Grant Robertson that we should not just allow these private bills to pass through without some comment. It is good to look at them seriously and to give them the same scrutiny we would give to any other bill. Again I refer to the fact that Government members have taken less and less interest in this bill as it has continued through its stages and now they seem to have tired of the whole thing altogether. 
Jo Goodhew 
: You should not assume. 
IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY 
: I can assure the junior Government whip that I have one eye on the clock and I am certainly aware that we are getting closer and closer to the dinner break. I can assure her that I will not go on too long in my speech lest she be concerned that we give this bill too much scrutiny. We never know; in the third reading debate it is probably a little bit late to discover something massive in the bill that we might want to change and too late to make any amendments but it is still important to give a bill like this the type of scrutiny that it needs. 
Perhaps one of the reasons why Christ’s College turned to a National MP was as some kind of vote of thanks for the Government’s spend-up on private schools—a spend-up that was to the detriment of public schools it is fair to say. Perhaps that is why this bill is in the name of Nicky Wagner; I do not know. But it does reinforce the stereotype—one that I have been working hard to try to break with my colleagues on this side of the House—that not all private schools and graduates of private schools have National-leaning tendencies. 
Hon Ruth Dyson 
: What does that have to do with you? 
IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY 
: My colleague Ruth Dyson wonders what that has to do with me. She obviously was not here during the Committee stage when I confessed about my background of having been privately educated. 
This is a sensible bill; it has been sensibly amended by the select committee. Opposition members feel that it is an important enough bill to have the appropriate level of scrutiny and now I believe that my colleague Ruth Dyson has a few words to say on the matter.