Cosgrove Clayton: Consumer Law Reform Bill — Second Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Cosgrove Clayton: Consumer Law Reform Bill — Second Reading 
[Sitting date: 11 December 2012. Volume:686;Page:7415. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE (Labour) 
: 
 I want to pick up where my colleague Lianne Dalziel left off saying that of course we will support this bill the Consumer Law Reform Bill. We agree with its objectives. Who would not? However it does not abrogate a Government’s responsibility to be an active player in supporting maintaining and enhancing consumer rights. My colleague talked about the earthquake and I saw there was one member over there who was spitting bile over at this side as she was speaking about the difficult situation that many of our consumers are dealing with in Canterbury in my area and others. The situation they find themselves in is they are dealing with the monster insurance company—legalled up with all the experts—and the granny or grandad at 83 years old with a munted house is on their own not knowing what to do and receiving very very little support if any from the Crown apart from the good offices of say the community law centres the citizens advice bureaux and their legal expertise and others. The odds of them getting a good deal are stacked against them. 
Most of us in this House are not lawyers so we do not have that precision of legal expertise to interpret contracts and documents that are put in front of us. But I suspect most of us in this House have the wherewithal to go and hire the experts we need to assure ourselves of the fact that the deal that might be put in front of us by an insurance company in that situation in Canterbury or others either is a good deal or is not a good deal. I know from dealing with local folks in Canterbury—for instance a very straight example is even when it comes to pathways and driveways where individual folks have been asked by project managers to sign a contract and in one case I think it was 14 pages before the job was done that had blank dollar figures in it. Blank dollar figures—that is not on. The point my colleague was making is that there is a role even despite this law for a Government that felt that it was appropriate to surgically intervene on these matters. 
In respect of say insurance companies and some of the examples I have cited there is a role for the Government to surgically intervene despite the passage of this legislation and its overarching objectives and remedies in respect of consumer rights. We know of course that this—what is the term? The behavioural term? 
Hon Lianne Dalziel 
: Unconscionable. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: This unconscionable behaviour is catered for to be dealt with in this legislation. You would have to argue— 
Hon Simon Bridges 
: Oh leave David Cunliffe out of it. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: Oh we will get to you in a minute. We will get to you in a minute. 
Hon Simon Bridges 
: Don’t be so mean. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: We will get to you in a minute— 
Hon Amy Adams 
: Mr Nasty’s back. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: Oh well I was not the one who interjected on the colleague as the old acid drop in the corner there has a crack. Unconscionable behaviour is dealt with in this bill. When we talk about—if we are going to talk about individuals—unconscionable behaviour I am mindful of some examples a bit close to home. One could look at and one would hope that this legislation would deal with what I call the “Brown Bag” factor—the “Brown Bag” factor—where “Brown Bag Banks” of course got himself into some difficulty— 
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER 
: Order! Look the member can use the illustration but we are not going to put tags on people’s names. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: OK. Far be it from me to refer to the Hon John Archibald Banks in that way but we could look at Mr Banks’ situation and ask whether his situation would be dealt with in some way shape or form under this legislation. I am mindful of the fact that it deals with false and misleading representations. I would have thought that would be very germane to the Hon John Archibald Banks in his situation in respect of Mr Dotcom. I am mindful here of a passage in the bill commentary that is very interesting which talks about “Unsolicited goods and services”. We know that the Hon John Archibald Banks alleges that he received some unsolicited—or were they solicited? We are not quite sure of the nature of the bodyguard or what was in the brown bag—and I am not referring to the Hon John Archibald Banks—or whether those services or goods or dollars or rocks and stones or gold bars or whatever they could have been were unsolicited or not. Mr Banks maintains they were not solicited. Mr Banks maintains that when he received the bag the sack the envelope the whatever he did not know what was in it. 
I am mindful of the passage in the bill commentary under that heading of “Unsolicited goods and services” that says: “To ensure that museums could”—I do not know whether they are referring to that old political relic John Archibald Banks—“still treat anonymous goods left with them as gifts rather than as goods left under their care which they are obliged to try to return.” I do not know whether—that old political relic Mr Banks—when the officials drafted this they were mindful of Mr Bank’s situation. I do not know. I do note with interest and I would ask whether this was an unsolicited good or service in the media that Mr Banks has purchased an elephant. I do not know whether that was an unsolicited purchase or— 
Hon David Cunliffe 
: The elephant in the room. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: The elephant in the room. I do not know the name of that elephant or whether that elephant has been given a name—maybe “Brain Fade” or something like that. But I do note from fifth form science that I am told elephants have a damn good memory and I am wondering whether Mr Banks has looked at this legislation and thought that maybe a remedy for his lack of memory was to purchase an elephant. That elephant may be able to provide some instruction. He may remember what his name is. He may remember where he comes from what he did yesterday whether he took a helicopter ride whether he met Kim Dotcom what was in the brown bag and what was in the envelope. This could be very very instructive. It could be a remedy in medical science that we have simply not seen to date and Mr Banks may have made— 
Denis O’Rourke 
: High technology. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: This could be as my colleague said a high-tech breakthrough given that elephants never forget—elephants never forget. So I look forward to the scientific or DNA evidence or research that will probably be published in Harvard medical journals and other learned institutions around the world as they compare the size of Mr Banks’ fading memory and cranium with that of his elephant “Brain Fade” and it will be interesting to see where we go with that. I know that the learned judiciary in coming days next year may call the elephant actually as a witness on medical advice— 
Hon Lianne Dalziel 
: The only credible witness. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: —the only credible witness—to provide some sort of benchmark for amnesia or other medical conditions. 
 On a more serious note this is important legislation. None of us in this House would disagree with protecting and enhancing consumer rights. We have seen cases over recent years where consumers have been led down the garden path have not had their rights preserved and have been abused commercially and otherwise. I suppose I should come back to my original point which was that there is still a role for the Government because even this legislation once put through—and I do not mean any disrespect to our communities—is reliant on those in the communities who have the experience the skill or in many cases the financial resources to act in a way that despite the legislation can protect their own interests. What I get concerned about are those vulnerable souls out there who do not have the experience perhaps of us in the House and other places and who do not have the—I will not say “guts”; that would be inappropriate. But those who would not be brave enough if you like in the face of say insurance companies to say no to resist or have the confidence—that is the word I was looking for “confidence”—to resist some of the pressure that is put on consumers they are out there on their own. They do not have the facility to seek advice and they do not have the resources to seek advice. 
All they are seeking actually—they are very smart—is to know whether this is a good deal or not but they do not have the resources that we do in our areas of interest to gain that backup to have that confidence or to gain that support. Despite this legislation there will always be a role to protect those people—and in some cases not to be unfair often from themselves—from a position of a lack of knowledge where they get themselves into difficulty where they put themselves under pressure or where they are subject to the pressure of commercial interests. Acting in good faith as those individuals are—and we have all dealt with them in our various communities—they get themselves tied up in legal and consumer knots. So there is a place here I think for consumer education to be enhanced and there is always a place despite any legislation put through where Governments must be prepared as I said at the start of my speech to surgically intervene where there are gaps and where commercial entities try to pull the wool.