Smith StuartSTUART SMITH (National—Kaikōura): Thank you Madam Chair. Well it's my first call in this—I hope I get a number more on this particular bill. But I have an amendment in my name to exclude the area of the Marlborough District Council from this legislation and the reason I do that is for the concern of my constituents. In the Marlborough Sounds people who live on D'Urville Island face not just a boat trip but a car trip to buy their groceries. They'll be driving for 2½ hours and they'll have to go across French Pass in order to get in the car and drive into the fine town of Blenheim to get their groceries and that's a huge extra cost that they will have to pay. It's a cost that they have to bear and unfortunately there isn't a tram or a trolley and I'm unaware of any plans to put a trolley or a tram out to D'Urville Island.Hon Tim Macindoe: Don't they matter?STUART SMITH: Well you would wonder. The member raises a very good point that actually people who live in regional New Zealand they matter. Actually they are the ones that are the buttresses for our economy and they ensure that the rest of us have a standard of living that we all are able to strive for and we expect in this country. Fortunately on this side of the House we stand for regional New Zealand and we understand regional New Zealand. It's a great pity—it's a great pity—that Matua Shane" he needs to come out to regional New Zealand and actually learn something about it because there's a lot that makes regional New Zealand tick that he does not understand. I'm surprised there Mark Patterson that you haven't actually helped him out with that but never mind. I will endeavour to help educate him tonight because the costs are disproportionate on people who live hours away from a shopping centre to do their weekly shop. They can't do it daily because of the time it would cost and the fuel costs that this bill would impose on top of people's day-to-day living costs. It's simply inequitable.But it's more than the Marlborough Sounds as important as they are. If we go up the Awatere Valley for example it's another two-hour drive to get your groceries going in the other direction. Those people all worthy New Zealanders who deserve to have a fair standard of living and you're taking it away from them—that's what you're doing. You're adding costs on to people—CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): I'm not.STUART SMITH: Not the chair Madam Chair—of course not you.Kieran McAnulty: Amateur.STUART SMITH: Well that's right—it is an amateur bill. I totally agree with you Kieran McAnulty. It is amateur hour in the Government and it's quite obvious to see. I mean question time today was bad enough but this is just ridiculous this bill I'd have to say. And when we see the costs that would be disproportionately pushed on to these hard-working New Zealanders it is just ridiculous. I think it's a very regressive tax anyway and I would have thought those people living in South Auckland would have been the ones that that party across the way would have been most concerned about but it doesn't appear to be the case. Can I say also in the farming sector this fuel cost will be borne on them and they operate in a world commodity market and are unable to pass those costs down the line. It's simply taking a little bit more out of their bottom line every time they fill they tractor and every time they fill the truck or the car or the farm quad. That is just simply not an equitable tax and I can't believe that one of the parties across that way who purports to support regional New Zealand doesn't understand that very simple fact.Then if we turn to the small fishing businesses and aquaculture who are also totally reliant on fuel in their boats to go out and put food on the family table and to supply fish in the markets for all of New Zealand and the benefit of all New Zealanders they are paying a very heavy price because of this misguided—and I can't really understand why they have thought about this because councils could actually cut that amount of money out of their expenditure if they simply focused on it. Businesses do know how to cut costs because they have competition. Councils are not a business. They are not actually able to focus on how to get fat out of a system and be more efficient. They're certainly not noted for being the most efficient entities in this country."