Clark David: Standards and Accreditation Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeClark David: Standards and Accreditation Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 01 July 2015. Volume:706;Page:5033. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Dr DAVID CLARK (Labour—Dunedin North): I want to make my first contribution focused on Part 2 clause 41: “Transitional provisions” which are actually surprisingly interesting. I challenge members opposite to have a look through these transitional provisions because there is some cracker stuff in here. There is some stuff that tells us a bit about what the Government is on about here and it is buried in the related schedules which are referred to in this part of the bill.Clause 41(1) refers to schedule 2: the transitional provisions relating to the transfer of the functions work and employees of the Standards Council. One of the things that is immediately obvious in there is that the assets records liabilities and debts of the existing Standards Council will transfer and become vested in the ministry. With that comes both opportunity and risk of course. I am not familiar with the detail that is recorded in those records and I do not know whether they will capture all of the intellectual property that goes with the existing members of that council or a portion thereof and exactly what grace there will be in the handover of that given the fact that the members on that council will be feeling a little like they have not been listened to and like their contribution has not been valued for what it was and is currently. The opportunity lies in there though for the Government to learn something from it.I have already expressed concerns around international connectedness representation in international fora and having New Zealand represented at the table when standards are set to ensure that New Zealand industry interests are protected as well as New Zealand interests more generally and the relationships that are built around that. I want to skip from there to clause 4 of schedule 2 which talks about determining whether each subcommittee’s work will continue or not. This is a crunch issue and it will be in these decisions that we see where the Government’s agenda lies—which things it wants to flick on which things it wants to continue with and where its funding priorities lie. I suspect strongly that we will see that it will focus on those industries that are already wealthy and can afford to fund the development of standards readily and focus less on those industries that are nascent that are full of entrepreneurs full of people who wish to make a mark on the world stage the young and growing enterprises that we would want to encourage to ensure an increasing diversity in our economy.The diversification issue is one that comes up again and again around this Parliament. We know that we are too reliant for our wealth on the primary sector. We know that we are incredibly grateful for the efforts of the primary sector but this Government is content to blame them when it goes wrong and it seems to have no strategy for diversifying the economy. Here we will see in this particular handover in these transitional arrangements just where its priorities lie. We will see whether the Government chooses to continue on with the work that would diversify our economy or whether it focuses instead on those industries that are already entrenched. So this is where the rubber hits the road—Part 2 is an incredibly important part of the bill but in this part of my contribution I am focusing just on that clause because there are other clauses I wish to speak to.The next thing that leaps out at members here and will outrage some of course is clause 5(3) of schedule 2 and I will read it out for members who will not have read it before I am sure: “This clause overrides Part 6A of the Employment Relations Act 2000.” It is a very short clause and—Hon Ruth Dyson: Say that again.Dr DAVID CLARK: It says: “This Act overrides Part 6A of the Employment Relations Act 2000.” This is the protection for vulnerable workers that is in the legislation. The Government has in a schedule at the back of this very thick bill shoved in a clause that overrides the protections for vulnerable workers. It is right here. Why? Why in this bill of all places? It just goes to show that the real agenda of the Government is tucked away here and I would be very interested to hear from the Minister just why this clause is so important. How many people who work at the Standards Council are vulnerable workers? There are probably one or two cleaners maybe and some part-time workers.I am not sure but the Minister has it in for them. He has put in a clause specifically to ensure that they are not protected in this transition. And it goes on in clause 6 where it talks about terms of employment of transferred employees being treated as continuous employment. It states: “The employment of a transferred employee by the Ministry is to be treated as continuous employment for the purposes of any enactment.” So if they are transferring people they do not want to be giving any special privileges. They do not want to be making any redundancy payments first or carrying over or anything. It is all in the interests of the ministry and in the interests of this particular Minister I would suggest. It is an outrage that that can be put in the schedules at the back hidden away to be discovered only when the fine print is read on this bill.These transitional arrangements tell us a lot about the Government. They will be where the rubber hits the road as I have said in this bill. There are also clauses in here about the Government Superannuation Fund and what people are entitled to. It specifies what they are not entitled to quite precisely because the Government does not want people to be better off for this shift. This is a Government that is so mean that in the subclauses of the bill it overrides the vulnerable worker protection that we have ensconced in our legislation in this Parliament. I consider that to be an outrage and it shows just how out of touch this Government has become if it thinks it can get away with hiding these things away in the fine print and not have it noticed in the debate.This is certainly something that was not brought up at the select committee. I think there would have been something in our minority report had we spotted that particular schedule at the time. I do not think we spent much time on the schedules at the back of the bill. But it is something that has leapt out at me right now in this debate. I would be interested to hear whether the Minister would consider making an amendment to thatat the last minute because it is certainly within his powers to do that.But as I said at the outset one of the other tests will be when we see what the ministry transfers what work it carries on with and what work it does not carry on with. These are the things that will matter for the industries that are seeking the support of standards that are in their interests as they develop products and want to put them out on the international market. Can the New Zealand products and the New Zealand manufacturers be guaranteed that the international standards will be easy for them to reach in terms of the manufacturing techniques and varieties available here or will they be standards that play to the interests of whoever is in the room with an excluded New Zealand component because it is just not a priority for this Government? The funding as I said at the outset has not been a priority. It will come down to this “where rubber hits road” section and we will see that it is also not a priority and that is signalled clearly by the fact that the vulnerable worker clause overrides existing legislation here in the schedule at the back of the bill.Of course Mr Faafoi has already noted the overriding of the concerns of industry members in the select committee—I suspect that those same concerns will be thrust aside in the transitional arrangements as the Government tries to give its handover and says that this is the valuable work of the Standards Council—these are the international fora that are the most important that we attend and this is where we have got the most traction and where we have the relationships that can ensure New Zealand’s interests are protected. On the track record of what we have seen so far this Government has blinkers on.The Minister is dead set on doing things a certain way of drawing more into his mega - multi-enterprise the Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment monolith with the big sign outside. It is a power grab and there can be no mistake about that. This is an attempt to bring more under his control to direct officials to skew it towards the interests that he is interested in and as we see these transitional arrangements I am sure we will see more of the same.So my submission to this Committee is that it would be very good if the Minister would explain why the clause in the legislation that protects vulnerable workers needs to be overridden in this schedule. Whom in particular is he trying to target here and why and also why is it being so specific around any payments that are carried over and any arrangements around employment? It feels a little bit like the Government is being mean-spirited in targeting a small group of individuals who made a genuine and lasting contribution to New Zealand’s economic development and there is a deep irony in that coming from a Government that is driving down exports as a percentage of our GDP. That is unfortunately making life hard for small businesses with fewer small businesses being created under this Government than the previous Government. That is the irony I guess in this bill: we have a Government obsessed with controlling the transitional provisions to ensure that no one—no one—is looked after in the transition. Thank you.