Sio William: Trade (Safeguard Measures) Bill — Second Reading 
Sio William: Trade (Safeguard Measures) Bill — Second Reading 
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SU’A WILLIAM SIO (Labour—Mangere) 
: 
 I am happy to rise on behalf of the Labour Party to support this Trade (Safeguard Measures) Bill. What I will want to do is spend some time articulating why we support it and conclude with some remarks that I hope the other side will accept as constructive criticism.  
But before doing so I do want to make mention of an event that took place yesterday because I think I might not get another chance to put it on the record. I was privileged yesterday alongside my colleague the Labour Party leader David Shearer the Hon Phil Goff and the Minister of Foreign Affairs to join with the Governor-General and many other MPs to participate in the funeral of the King of Tonga. I think it is important. I have a significant number of the Tongan community living in my electorate and they would want me to express to this House the appreciation that they have and I convey that to the Governor-General to the Government Ministers and to all the parties who were present yesterday.  
It was a huge strong delegation which I think signals the importance of the relationship that New Zealand has in the international area but more important in this case with Tonga and the Pacific Island nations. We do have a close relationship not only on a personal and educational level but also on trade and so I thought it was appropriate that I do so at this particular time. I do want to place that on record because irrespective of what the outside world might feel about the King of Tonga the people of Tonga have a high regard for their late King.  
I want to do that because only today I have been advised by some in the Tongan community that they are complaining to this Government and I have encouraged that complaint to go to the Minister of Foreign Affairs as well as to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. I know it is hard for the Government to choose who goes and who does not go but in this particular case I have asked the Tongan Advisory Council to lay its complaint directly as to why it was not part of that delegation. I thought: “Get it on record. Where credit is due place that. But then also make it known to this Government about what the Tongan Advisory Council is intending to do.” So those are my comments to preface.  
As I said the Labour Party does support this bill. After all it is a bill that began under the Labour Government with the good work of the Hon Lianne Dalziel and I think it is important as mentioned by other speakers that we take this quite seriously. The safeguard measures are to try to ensure that duties are placed on certain goods that come into the country particularly where certain industries might be under threat. I am not a member of the Foreign Affairs Defence and Trade Committee so I did not get a chance to hear the submitters although I understand there were five submitters from significant organisations in New Zealand.  
But it was interesting reading some of the report that in terms of our used tyres we have lost some significant industry because we did not place enough safeguards on certain goods. I will give you an example. We have lost the footwear industry as regards all types of children’s men’s and women’s footwear. It was interesting that over a 2-year period when we removed the protections on our borders the volumes of import in regard to footwear increased by 124 percent. As a result of that not only did we lose the market share the profitability and the return on investment but we lost I suspect thousands of jobs. Again I am belabouring the point that there is a role for appropriate safeguards in order to protect our local industry.  
It was interesting that I found for men’s and boys’ underwear that the removal of the licensing controls over those particular goods allowed for imports to increase by 289 percent over a 2-year period. Again what we have witnessed over the past as a result of not having those safeguards or those protections on our borders with regard to those goods is loss—the complete loss I would say—in that industry: the loss of profitability the loss of our sharemarket and also the loss of hundreds if not thousands of jobs. Again with used tyres I note that in terms of used tyres for motor cars and light commercial vehicles over the 1-year period of 1992-93 there was an increase of 52 percent in our imports.  
It was interesting that the temporary safeguard authority did not think that safeguard measures were needed at that particular time. There are also the abrasive discs in 1995 which are the grinding wheels or the cut-off wheels and imports increased by 28 percent over a 1-year period. Again the temporary safeguard authority concluded that there was no ground for safeguard measures. The point I am making is that Labour supports having these safeguard measures because I think where certain industries are threatened by imports we need to act fast and we need to act decisively in order to protect those goods.  
But also we need to protect the profitability in our own sharemarket because in this day and age as this Government knows we are not only going through a recession but we have hit depression. I understand from some of my mates who are at the Ports of Auckland that a recession is when their neighbour loses their job but a depression is when not only their neighbour loses their job but everybody else in that neighbourhood loses their job. There is a real need for us to be protective of our manufacturers in particular and I hope that in the years ahead we can do more work in order to increase and support and encourage the manufacturing industry. I do not think that we are really taking the full potential of the manufacturing sector and being able to ensure that there is a deliberate and more determined plan.  
I suppose that brings me to my criticism of tonight and as I said I hope the Government does take it by way of constructive criticism. It has taken us almost 4 years to have this bill come to the House. As I said earlier it began with the previous Labour Government with the good work of my colleague Lianne Dalziel. It went to its first reading in 2009 and there were only five submitters. There were not hundreds or thousands of submitters so I do not think the select committee really took a lot of time to deliberate on this. But only now is this Government bringing it in for the second reading. We should have had this in the House some time ago.  
I suppose what that highlights is that it reinforces what we have been saying all the time about this Government. Where is the deliberate plan for protecting our industries for boosting our economy for creating jobs? Is it just simply rolling out the action points? Where is the comprehensive plan? Because of the ad hoc nature of the way this Government has treated this particular bill we are continually on the back foot. The Government is not just focused on cuts to funding cuts of public sector jobs; this House will recall when this Government first came into power the mantra for its cuts to the public sector was that it was capping the workforce. It was not cutting the workforce.  
Hon Ruth Dyson 
: Capping not cutting. Ha ha!  
SU’A WILLIAM SIO 
: That is right. Today the public sector has lost over 5000 jobs across all Government departments and other State-owned enterprises. That is over 5000 jobs. I also understand there are over 2500 jobs still unfilled and the morale of the public sector is so low at this particular time that I am hopeful that this Government acts quickly. Simply merging Government departments is not going to get us to where this economy needs to get. We need jobs and this bill should have been in the House a long long time ago.  
Bill read a second time.