Tirikatene Rino: Border Processing (Arrivals and Departures) Levy Bill — First Reading Second Reading In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeTirikatene Rino: Border Processing (Arrivals and Departures) Levy Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee[Sitting date: 21 May 2015. Volume:705;Page:3895. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]RINO TIRIKATENE (Labour—Te Tai Tonga):Kia ora Mr Assistant Speaker. I am pleased to speak at the second reading of the Border Processing (Arrivals and Departures) Levy Bill. Ordinarily a second reading takes place after the bill has been referred to select committee and has received public submissions and viewpoints from the industry and from all around affected persons. That is the path that this bill should be taking but unfortunately here we are on Saturday approaching 6 o’clock and we are now into the second reading of a bill that this Government has admitted is a tax. I would like to acknowledge Mr Smith for telling the truth and acknowledging that this levy is a tax. So thank you Mr Smith for that. I am sure you will progress really well amongst your team. Good luck to you.This is a tax and unfortunately it is a slap in the face for New Zealand’s tourism industry. It is the second-largest foreign-exchange earner for our country: over $10 billion in earnings is generated by the tourism industry. What was the tourism industry told about this? What was the tourism told about this—absolutely nothing. And who is its Minister the Minister of Tourism? That is right “Jandal John”—“Jandal John” flip-flopping all the time. Just a couple of years ago he was trying to advocate to bring down these taxes so we could actually have open transfer and facilitation of tourism travel. But no what has he done? He has absolutely thumbed his nose at the industry and absolutely gone contrary to all of the work that it has been doing. It has been outlined in the 2025 strategy of the New Zealand tourism industry. A lot of work has been going on in terms of promoting freer flow of tourists and what we are seeing is the opposite. This bill will actually be doing the opposite. It is just an attempt by this Government to collect more revenue by targeting travellers—ordinary Kiwis ordinary folks and all of our international visitors who want to make a trip to New Zealand.But there is a cost to this. There is the assumption that yes we have got a free flow of visitors but if you look at the trans-Tasman market for tourists there are a million empty seats on those flights every year. It is a highly priced competitive short-haul flow of aircraft and so it puts a lot of pressure on the travel agents the airline industry and the like.Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7 p.m.RINO TIRIKATENE: As I was saying before the dinner break the tourism industry has identified the actual benefits from lowering or having no travel taxes imposed. It has been working very closely with our Australian counterparts. There are a million vacant seats—unused seats—on those routes and the tourism industry research said that there could possibly be a 13 percent yield in benefits from maintaining or having lower or no travel taxes imposed. But what has this Government done? It has actually done the complete opposite and we are now imposing our own travel tax.The other point I want to make is around what the proceeds from this travel tax will be going towards. As we know they are going towards protecting our borders and biosecurity. Basically this is an admission from this Government that its border management has been underperforming. This measure is an admission of that and what we have seen are the incursions of fruit flies and other nasty organisms that pose a real threat to our primary industries especially. This should not be taken lightly. It is a very very serious matter our biosecurity system. I know that the Ministry for Primary Industries has various levels of protection I guess that we use. But this is an admission that the Government has been underperforming because you know you are in trouble when you have to call your fisheries officers out to try to chase a fruit fly or look after a sick pig. You know you are in trouble when you are doing that. Our dedicated and highly trained fish cops have been diverted by biosecurity matters.Kris Faafoi: Coast gets plundered.RINO TIRIKATENE: Absolutely and then the coast gets plundered. So that is an admission from this Government that it has underperformed in this area. It is a shame though. The Crown has funded our biosecurity system and our services and it should continue to do so. There is no need. It is hurting our tourism industry and it remains to be seen whether there is a reduction in visitor numbers as a result of the imposition of this tax.The other point I want to move on to now goes back to the Joint Border Management System the JBMS. That is right that $100 million lemon which has not even been delivered yet. The full functionality has not been delivered and it is still kept a secret. If this travel tax is imposed I think that the travellers—the people who are leaving our shores and our tourists—have a right to know what their levy spend is actually going on. The Minister has given an assurance with regards to the Joint Border Management System that there is nothing to see and everything is all OK. Well if that is the case then why keep it secret? I believe that if Kiwis are paying this tax which is there to protect our borders and there is a joint system that has cost $100 million then Kiwis need to know what they are paying for. There has been a failure to deliver on the Joint Border Management System. For cargo users of the Joint Border Management System there is a user-pays charge. They know what they are paying for. Well what is the passenger component? What is the passenger component of the Joint Border Management System? What is that passenger component because travellers have the right to know? They do have the right to know.If passengers are paying a levy for greater enhanced sophisticated risk analysis of their movements well then it is very fair that the public of New Zealand especially who have paid over $100 million so far have a right to know what they are actually getting. Enlighten us Minister. Enlighten the country as to what it is because what are the risk and intelligence tools that the Joint Border Management System is delivering? We want to know because the system still has not been delivered yet. It is 3 years too late. It still has not been delivered. We have been told that the delivery date is going to be December this year but now it is getting put back. We are getting signals that it can be put back again. The Joint Border Management System is actually the engine room or it is supposed to be. The computer systems between the Ministry for Primary Industries and the Customs Service are joined up so all of the passenger screenings and the biosecurity risk analysis are driven by the Joint Border Management System. If the travel tax is going towards that then we need to know what the passenger component is. Hopefully the Minister will enlighten us later on because that is a very serious issue of public interest given the huge price tag on this system which no one seems to know what it is doing and you never hear anything about it.Hon Nicky Wagner: It’s because it’s working so well.RINO TIRIKATENE: Well it is not working so well. If it was working so well why are you keeping it secret? Why are you keeping it secret Minister?Hon Nicky Wagner: Success is no news.RINO TIRIKATENE: Well no. This Minister has been negligent in suppressing the details. The public of New Zealand deserve an answer particularly now that all travellers who will be crossing our borders will be paying a levy that will be subjected to the Joint Border Management System. They are paying for it so they have a right to know what they are getting for their spend. So we are looking forward to your elucidation on that point. We know that this is just another tax we know it is a broken promise from this Government and we continue to oppose this bill.