Stanford Erica; Hipkins ChrisERICA STANFORD (National—East Coast Bays): To back up my colleague Penny Simmonds I think her point was around the Supplementary Order Paper that is now included in the bill in terms of new section 17A in clause 5B which is around network planning. We have always been concerned around the fact that in section 17A it states that (2) the Minister may at any time (a) impose new conditions on the approval or (b) amend or revoke any existing conditions." which is a huge red flag especially if you're talking to the lenders because nobody is going to lend to a provider when the Minister can change his mind halfway through on any conditions that he imposed at the beginning.We know this because we spoke to the banks and they said quite clearly that this is a red flag and they are unlikely to lend on this. Now when I took this to officials and brought it up with them in select committee they said to us "Oh no it's fine. It'll only ever be driven by the applicant—if there is a change driven by the applicant." So I drafted Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) 182 which goes directly to this and basically says that if that is the case and if what the officials are claiming is true—that it will only ever be driven by the applicant—then let's put it in the bill.Supplementary Order Paper 182 requires the words "at any time" to be replaced with "with the consent of the applicant". So if it's driven by the applicant he needs to consult with the applicant and the applicant needs to consent to those changes—if it's true what the officials told us in select committee. This SOP is very important for the reasons I've already outlined. It's a huge red flag for the lenders. It's a huge amount of uncertainty. It's a sword of Damocles hanging over the developer or the early childhood provider in that things could be changed at any point during their build outside of their control at the whim of the Minister because that's how the legislation reads. If it's true that it will be driven by the applicant then the Minister should accept my Supplementary Order Paper which says that the consent of the applicant must be given in order for any changes to be made. This is the one clause in the bill that all early childhood providers and developers the council and banks raised concerns about with me and at the select committee and as much as I tried to get this changed I wasn't able to. So that's why I have brought forward this SOP and my question to the Minister is: is it true what the officials told us? Is it the case as they told us in the select committee that it will only be driven by the applicant and if that is the case will he support my SOP to make sure that any changes that he does make are in consultation with and with the consent of the applicant? If he does support this it is going to make a huge difference to the funding of these developers and the funding of these early childhood centres when they go to the bank and ask for money because this is the one part of the bill that is a huge red flag. So the question to the Minister is: will he accept my SOP and make sure that he has the consent of the applicant and was it the case that this will in fact be driven by the applicant?Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Minister of Education): I would simply point out to the member a couple of things. One is that centres at the moment apply for funding to build new early childhood centres without in many cases ever having applied for a licence. They don't apply for the licence until the centre is already finished. In fact in one case as the local member of Parliament not as the Minister of Education I attended the opening of a new early childhood centre in my own electorate only to discover that in fact at that point the centre hadn't even applied for its licence. It's a very nice centre. It subsequently did apply for a licence. It's been a very popular centre and is serving the local community very well but that centre had gone all the way through the process of consenting building employing staff and getting ready to go before they even applied for a licence. So the idea that there is less certainty now when centres are basically being given pre-approval of a licence before they go through that process is I think absurd. No banks submitted during the select committee process. No banks have raised this issue with the Ministry of Education so I don't accept the assertion that the member makes that this somehow is going to lead to less certainty.I think it does somewhat contradict the question she was asking earlier which is around the ability of the Minister or the person approving the licence to be able to set the requirement for milestones to be met. And as the member will be aware from time to time those milestones may need to be changed by negotiation and that's what the bill allows for."