Beaumont Carol: Motor Vehicle Sales Amendment Bill — In Committee Third Reading 
Beaumont Carol: Motor Vehicle Sales Amendment Bill — In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:666;Page:13621] 
CAROL BEAUMONT (Labour) 
: 
 Let me start by taking up the challenge that my colleagues have given the House. I say that my first vehicle was a baby-blue Mini with a fibreglass clubman front. 
Darien Fenton 
: Blue? 
CAROL BEAUMONT 
: I know I know; I was quite young at the time. I have to say that it was a very cute little car. I thought it suited me very well. I look forward to hearing what the honourable Minister John Boscawen’s car was when he gets up to speak. I acknowledged our new Minister in my previous contribution but I also acknowledge Heather Roy. It is great to see her back here. That is wonderful. 
I will talk specifically about the provisions in the Motor Vehicle Sales Bill about the disputes tribunal. My colleague the Hon Lianne Dalziel went through a bit of the background on process. Although it is fair to say that this has taken quite a long time it has been a reasonably effective review process. The matters that were raised have been dealt with in this bill. I think it is a very good thing for this House that we have a robust process where we review things we get people’s input we then translate that into a bill and it comes before the House albeit perhaps somewhat slowly except for the final bit which is being forced through under urgency. That seems a little strange. 
I will talk specifically about the Motor Vehicle Disputes Tribunal. There are changes in this bill to the jurisdiction of the tribunal and also around decisions being publicly available. The tribunal established by the Motor Vehicle Sales Act was brought into effect in December 2003. It can hear claims under the Consumer Guarantees Act the Fair Trading Act and the Sale of Goods Act. It can decide claims only when one party is a motor-vehicle trader and the other party is not. Currently it can decide claims of up to $50000. This bill amends that by increasing the jurisdiction to $100000. 
I took the time to have a look at what was suggested in the part of the process where the discussion document went out after the review. The review had 12 recommendations. There were two that I could see that related to the tribunal. One was the extension of the jurisdiction that I have just mentioned. The other was the publication of the decisions of the tribunal. Both of those recommendations have been picked up in this bill. I looked with interest at the annual report of the tribunal. I have to say that it looks like the tribunal is a fairly effective body. In the last year the tribunal reported to—the year ending June 2010—it had 266 applications. That number was up on the previous year. I am unclear whether that is because there are more difficulties or because of a greater understanding of the process. 
The tribunal reports that 93 percent of all applications heard had a decision issued within 2 months of the date of filing. Ninety-five percent of all applications were heard and a written decision given within 3 months of the date that the application was filed. That seems a reasonable process. What is interesting is that in its annual report it provides examples of cases that in the adjudicator’s opinion required special mention. They are quite interesting. The ones that were raised in the annual report of the Auckland tribunal talked about a car-fair trader. The purchaser was a young Spanish holidaymaker who went to the Auckland Carfair at Ellerslie Racecourse which is very close to the part of Auckland where I work the Maungakiekie electorate. 
The example was about the car that he purchased and the issues that went on as a result of that. The second example that the tribunal drew attention to was interesting as well. It was about a faulty transmission in a 6-year-old vehicle that had travelled only 34000 kilometres. As the daughter of a mechanic it does seem to me to be a bit out of order that such a thing would happen. That was the second case that the tribunal drew to attention to. The third case considered whether a problem was caused by contaminated diesel or a faulty fuel-injection system. 
I think that it is useful for tribunals like this to do that. I am not saying that just to fill up time. It is useful for tribunals to draw to our attention these sorts of cases so that consumers can be informed and that we can look for trends and so on. Interestingly enough in its annual report the tribunal made some recommendations for amendments to the Motor Vehicle Sales Act that the adjudicator thinks desirable on the experience of the tribunal. We are looking at amendments to the Motor Vehicle Sales Act in relation to the tribunal. I think this is an example of good practice: that we have a tribunal that is identifying where it finds issues that are worthy of further attention. I think that that is a very good process. In this document I have it makes recommendations which I would also like to make to amend the Act. It concerns section 94(1)(b). It is the provision that requires the tribunal for the purpose of protecting the public—which should be a fundamental part of consumer legislation—to direct the chief executive of the Ministry of Justice to publish a notice in the  
Gazette  
if the tribunal in determining an application decides against a motor vehicle trader. This section appears not to impose such requirements on the tribunal when it determines an application against a manufacturer—a manufacturer of a vehicle as opposed to a trader. 
In the last case that I told members about—on whether the problem was with contaminated diesel or a faulty fuel-injection system—the manufacturer was found to have breached the Consumer Guarantees Act. But because of the wording of section 94(1)(b) of the Motor Vehicle Sales Act the tribunal was unable to direct the publication of the manufacturer’s name in the  
Gazette 
. That may be considered a gap that the Minister of Consumer Affairs may wish to close by amendment. 
I was pleased to see that obviously ministry officials have briefed the Minister well. In a recent media comment Mr Boscawen referred to this very matter that was suggested about allowing the manufacturer’s details to be published as well as those of the trader. He has acknowledged the point raised by the tribunal and I think that is fantastic. This is based on the real world: here is the problem the problem is identified and the ministry picks up the issue. 
What interests me though a little I say to the honourable Minister is what it says and I would like the Minister to answer a question on it. It says: “ ‘These issues are being considered as part of the “One Law” 
review of consumer legislation currently being undertaken by the Ministry of Consumer Affairs’ Mr Boscawen said.” The One Law—One Door review—which I will talk more about later everybody will be pleased to know—is a consumer law reform discussion paper and submissions on it have closed. It is looking at the identification of updates and principle-based legislation and it is looking at seven pieces of legislation. It specifically does not include the Motor Vehicle Sales Act. I am aware that the tribunal deals with other Acts as I have just said dealing with consumer guarantees fair trading and the like but I worry a little bit because at the time of my loan sharks bill the then Minister Heather Roy said that some of the concerns we were raising around extortionate interest rates and irresponsible lending would also be covered by the One Law process. 
Again I think that that was a marginal call. It was convenient to be able to say that so that it looked as though the Government actually cared about this issue—an issue that is harming many in our community. In the area where I live and work it harms many people. There was evidence recently for those who saw the  
Campbell Live 
 programme about a young man looking for loans in Onehunga and Panmure who was offered all sorts of interest rates. But going back to the point at the time the Minister said that that issue was covered by the One Law review process. I hear now that the new Minister says that this issue around vehicle manufacturers as opposed to traders can also be covered by that. 
I am a little worried about what I call review creep. There is a bit of review creep going on here in terms of the consumer law reform process; any issue that is raised in terms of problems for consumer law is somehow we are told packaged up in this. When people take time to look at the document it certainly does not seem immediately clear how the issues of excessive interest rates in particular are a central point of it. They were marginal. There was a separate review of that process going on. In looking at in relation to the Motor Vehicle Sales Act I cannot necessarily see how the matter that the Minister has said would be dealt with will be dealt with. I urge the Minister to answer that question.