Ardern Shane: Radio New Zealand Amendment Bill — In Committee Third Reading 
Ardern Shane: Radio New Zealand Amendment Bill — In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:616;Page:12246] 
SHANE ARDERN (National—Taranaki - King Country) 
: 
 I rise to speak in opposition to the Radio New Zealand Amendment Bill on behalf of the National Party. If anybody is listening tonight they will understand why the National Party is working so vigorously to get back on the Treasury benches. Listening to the contribution from the newly appointed Minister the Hon David Benson-Pope one would understand why a change of Government is necessary in this country. 
Gerrard Eckhoff 
: It is vital! 
SHANE ARDERN 
: It is vital for a change of Government in this country. 
There are a number of questions we need to put to Mr Benson-Pope tonight and I hope he will take a call and respond to them. What does he mean by “ethical”? Does he mean making a decision and then doing a U-turn on it? Does he mean signing paintings that they did not paint then destroying the evidence before the matter gets to court? What does it mean? 
When one looks at the legislation the Government is putting in here tonight with the words “spiritual and ethical” one has to ask where this Government is going. I went back to the second reading to see what the Minister Hon Steve Maharey had to say. He said: “I pause for a moment on the matter of the spiritual and ethical elements put into this bill which do not mean a religious denomination. It means that New Zealanders in terms of programming do have concerns about value issues which may well be religious issues and about issues of spirituality in the broad sense that represents the wide range of cultures that make up our society.” 
Now that has made it absolutely clear has it not? That has cleared it up for all of us. Now I understand what it means. Now we know—it is here in the  
Hansard 
. No wonder everybody is clear on this issue! Has anyone ever seen or heard so much gobbledegook about something? It is like talking about the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi. It is as vague as that. Nobody knows what it means. 
If one goes to the  
Concise Oxford Dictionary 
 which my good colleague did to try to find out what some of these terms mean one will find that they are very accurately described. They do mean religious and they do mean denomination. Well maybe in the agnostic spiritual manner that is being applied here by the Prime Minister there is a new meaning. I am sure the Minister will take a call and explain this to us but from my perspective it looks like social engineering. The socialists are at it again. In the only national-owned radio station as the member from the Green Party pointed out they are interfering in the most agnostic way. It is social engineering of the highest order. 
One size fits all does not always work. What we have in this legislation now is a clause that says that it will cover the full range of age groups. What does that mean? Does it mean that in the morning we will be hearing  
Mickey Mouse 
 in the evening we will be hearing opera and sometime in the middle we will have Heavy Metal? Is that what it means? I do not know. I know that my kids have a different taste in music to mine and I know when they were younger they had a different taste to what they have now. I know that my parents had a different taste in music to mine so does that mean that they will run the full spectrum of radio entertainment in terms of programmes? I do not know what it means. Maybe the Minister can take a call. 
It looks like typical socialism to me—one size fits all; Parliament knows best; the Labour Government will dictate in the charter what the radio programme will do. It will not allow those who are in charge to come up with something that is sensible or ethical. It will not have anything like that—certainly not ethical. Does it mean—and I think this is a question for the Minister as well—that Radio New Zealand will no longer run any of the Labour Party spin because clearly that is not ethical? Or does it mean that it will never ever report any comments from the Prime Minister of New Zealand because there is a very high possibility that they will not be ethical? They will certainly be agnostic—there is a question about that. 
There is one part of this legislation—I cannot go through my whole speech being totally negative it is against my better judgment to do so.