Sepuloni CarmelCARMEL SEPULONI (Labour—Kelston): Firstly I just want to say that I was very surprised to see that the Government has shifted Easter Sunday shop trading from being what has traditionally been a conscience issue to whipping its whole caucus to vote in one particular way. It is disappointing because we do look back over the record of this particular issue and we see that over the last 10 years it has been brought to this House four times all times when members were given the opportunity to vote according to their own conscience. Tonight the National Government has taken the opportunity away from its own caucus. I did hear Marama Davidson talking about public interest and the public's right to choose and that really has to be reflected in this Chamber when it comes to that issue as well. So as I said it is disappointing that the Government members have not been given that opportunity particularly—and it is important to note—when you look back over the track record of this issue when it has been brought to the House and the fact that actually within the National Government and National Party there have been varying opinions on what needs to happen with this particular issue. I really do feel for the National Government members tonight not having that opportunity. I am sure that many of them are disappointed that they cannot vote according to their conscience and instead have been told what they need to think and how they need to vote. It is disappointing particularly because I know that many of the people from the National Government's own benches who would have opposed what the Government has put up would have done so based on religious grounds. So to have that religious freedom removed by your own whips by your own leadership is incredibly disappointing. I just needed to make that point before we move into some of the other issues that I have with this particular bill. I think the major issue that I have looking at Part 1 is that this simply does pass the buck on to local councils which will create a shambles of different rules across the country. That is what we have got to be concerned about: that there will not be any consistency. People will not know in one particular area whether or not the shops are open or closed. You move to one area you have to work there you are living in another area you do not have to work there on particular days—there is going to be a high level of inconsistency because of what the National Government is proposing and because of that inconsistency we can expect a shambles to unravel. But I guess most of us here and the general public are used to a shambles unravelling because of that National Government. We are concerned. We are the party for workers—everybody knows that—and we believe that workers deserve to have some guaranteed days off. We believe that as Marama Davidson and others on this side of the Chamber have said in the Committee tonight there are plenty of days in the year for people to shop. We do not need to be adding more days and taking away a few of the protected days that we had sectioned off so that people were guaranteed particular days off. It is unrealistic to say that people can refuse to work on Easter Sunday because people who do will be penalised. There are power relationships in any workplace so it is going to be very difficult for someone to turn down their boss when they are asked to work on these days. It is disappointing that in this bill and just in general the National Government is not proposing any extra compensation for working on Easter Sunday. It expects people to give up this important family time this important rest time this important break from working without recognising it as a public holiday. I think that the general public would be absolutely shocked by that because we have always seen that as a sacred public holiday. The fact that now the Government is going to expect people to work or hand it over to councils to make the decision on whether people should or should not work on those particular days but not put any safeguards in place in this bill to ensure that they would be getting paid extra compensation is incredibly disappointing. It just goes to show again that the National Government has no regard for workers. That is really what we are talking about when we are looking at this bill. We are concerned that this will be one more cost pushed on to councils at a time when this Government is pressuring councils to lower costs. That is a very valid point that needs to be made. Just going back to Part 1 of the bill I also want to point out—and this came up because of a moment with Su'a William Sio and a call that you made earlier Mr Chair that you did correct. I am not criticising the call that you made but even just looking at the drawing up of this bill we are talking about the fact that what the Government is proposing will result in a shambles. Even the way that this bill has been sectioned off is incredibly hard to read so I can see why Mr Chair you had difficulty before and got confused about the two different parts—we have a Part 2 Trading on Easter Sunday" and we have a Part 2 "Transitional savings …"—not knowing that the Part 2 "Trading on Easter Sunday" section is actually part of the principal Act. It is not a part of the bill and it is inside Part 1 so it could be debated as part of Part 1. I just want to say that someone has overlooked the fact that this could have been written up a little bit more clearly so that it could be more easily debated in the House. Those are just a few of the points that I have at this point in time. I am sure that I will have some more to discuss later on tonight. Thank you."