Curran Clare: Copyright (Parallel Importing of Films) Amendment Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeCurran Clare: Copyright (Parallel Importing of Films) Amendment Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 24 September 2013. Volume:693;Page:13647. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]CLARE CURRAN (Labour—Dunedin South): Really support for this Copyright (Parallel Importing of Films) Amendment Bill is a line call for Labour. It has been very interesting listening to the speeches from New Zealand First and the Greens on this because we have all got something in common. It is not all the same thing but we do have some of the issues in common. I think when making this line call in Labour’s minority report on this bill we called it qualified support and in the second reading of this bill I called it grudging support.Kris Faafoi: Grudging?CLARE CURRAN: Grudging. That is because of the time period that it has taken to get to this point where the film industry is still not at the point where it has converted to the digital technology and where it has come before the Commerce Committee yet again asking for another extension.I certainly think that in the select committee we had one of the best discussions on copyright that I have experienced in my almost 5 years in Parliament. I was impressed by the evolution of understanding by my National Party colleagues. I think they finally actually get some of the issues involved. I do want to give credit to the chair Jonathan Young and to his colleague Sam Lotu-Iiga for the interesting discussion that we had on the business issues and the competition issues in the select committee.I acknowledge the point that New Zealand First is making around the need for the time period to convert to the technology. I have to say that I differ on the issue of the use of downloading techniques by members of the public in order to get access to material that they cannot get otherwise. That is I guess where the Greens and Labour converge to some extent on the absolute importance of this Parliament being aware of why those issues are so important and why—with New Zealand being a small country at the top of the world or the end of the world depending on which way you are looking—it is so critical that our economy and the habits of consumers so much rely on the internet and why the internet has to be considered and be up front in the consideration of any legislation in this House. I do not think that this legislation has quite got there but it is going some way there.We had 10 submissions on this bill. They were evenly balanced in terms of for and against. There was a submission by the New Zealand Motion Pictures Exhibitors Association. I do want to talk about that because one of the points that the associationmade is the critical reason as to why Labour supports this bill. We support it because essentially it is about protecting the viability of cinemas outside the five main metropolitan cities from the effects of unrestricted parallel importing. My colleague Jacinda Ardern and the New Zealand First member Tracey Martin made this point as well about the absolute importance of our regional cinemas. I want to actually take us to what that importance is why it is important and where some of these cinemas are because that is why we think this bill is important. We think that the other reasons for supporting this bill that were put up and have been supported by the Government on the other side are not as important. It is time that the big cinema chains got their act together and worked out their business models to deal with the way that people and their consumer habits have changed.Regional New Zealand is important and Labour actually gets that. The services that are provided in regional New Zealand—cinema being one of them—are actually really critical for communities. It is really important that regional New Zealand does have access to the same kinds of services that its urban cousins do. This is one of the critical ones. I think my colleague Jacinda Ardern mentioned that there are 120 film venues around New Zealand. Well 80 of those film venues—in the sense of being chains and activities—are in regional New Zealand and are described as independents andarthouse cinemas. They are defined as being where they get to be seen in small independently owned cinemas art galleries film societies schools and university classrooms. They tend to be locally owned and operated by New Zealanders or community trusts and often can be dependent on the larger players for access to film titles and distribution.I will give a little bit of history here because it is important. In the early decades of film-going in New Zealand the independent cinemas dominated until the ascendancy of the duopoly of what were called then theKerridge Odeon and Amalgamated Theatres chains. Does anyone remember them?Hon Members: Yes.CLARE CURRAN: Yes. They largely controlled film distribution and exhibition in New Zealand. That has changed now and we have the large chains which are the Event Cinemas Hoyts Cinemas Reading Cinemas etc. There are others but a good number of these cinemas are small. They are a really integral part of New Zealand. I want to actually tell you what a few of them are. I did go through the list. There is an interesting list. They include the Capitol Cinema in Te Puke the Castle Duo Cinema in Kaikohe the Cathay Cinemas in Kerikeri and CinemaParadiso in Methven South Canterbury and CinemaParadiso inWānaka. They include the Circus Cinema in Martinborough the De Luxe Theatre inŌpōtiki the Fiordland Cinema the Focal Point Cinema in Levin and the Lido Cinema in Hamilton. They include the Light House Cinema and there are several Light House Cinemas—including Light House Cuba and Light HousePētone. They include theMetroCinema in the town hall in Dunedin and Rialto Cinemas also in Dunedin the Penthouse Cinema in Brooklyn the Starlight Cinema inTaupō and The Monkey House Theatre in Whitianga. There are many and I could go on about them. These are cinemas that provide an integral service in their communities. They are in the process of converting to digital technology but they have struggled. That is the reason why Labour supports this bill—because of that struggle and the time that it has taken which is longer than we would like but those communities need the time to translate.I would like to say that this bill does not address a wider issue. I would like the Minister of Commerce to hear this because it is actually important. This bill is just the continuation of an extension. What it does not do is provide a mechanism for some of these cinemas that may not be able to make that transition in this time period. We have said very firmly that if we become the Government and certainly while we are on thisside of the House we will not support a further extension. But there is a wider issue and that issue is that those cinemas are important. It is a wider community issue. It goes beyond the scope of this bill. I think that for the Government—this issue was raised in the select committee—there is an issue that should be addressed about community support for integral services such as community cinemas that may not under their current circumstances be able to make that financial transition to the digital technology. We certainly do not support this bill being extended further but for those cinemas that issue needs to be addressed by the Government.