Clendon David: Advanced Technology Institute Bill — In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Clendon David: Advanced Technology Institute Bill — In Committee 
[Sitting date: 27 November 2012. Volume:686;Page:6844. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
DAVID CLENDON (Green) 
: 
 I am pleased to make some brief initial comments to this first part of the bill the Advanced Technology Institute Bill which contains as we know the purpose the interpretation and the statement of binding the Crown. We will say a great deal more about this bill later. You will be aware of course that the Greens initially supported this bill at its first reading in the belief that there is a place for an organisation of the type that this legislation seeks to establish. But we have changed our view on that given that to a large extent the objectives the functions and indeed the operations of this new entity are so poorly defined in this legislation. There is still a great deal that is unanswered. There is a great deal that we simply do not know about how this organisation will be structured even what the transitional arrangements will look like how it will operate and what powers it will have. We do know that they will be substantive in that there is a great deal of concern both in the business and indeed in the research and the tertiary sectors and in the Crown research institutes and elsewhere about how this piece of legislation is going to roll out. 
On the question of functions which are core to any organisation—to any piece of legislation in fact—we absolutely do not know what the boundaries are what the parameters are of some of the powers of this new organisation not least of all around funding—the allocation and administration of funding. We asked some very pertinent questions at the Education and Science Committee to which we got answers along the lines of “Come and ask us later when we have made those decisions.” which will be after the legislation has been passed. That is an appalling process. That is a process that denigrates and indeed dismisses the importance of due parliamentary process. 
The point has already been made by Labour speakers that we had 6 weeks from go to whoa. We know that that constrained submitters. We know as the last speaker David Parker quite correctly pointed out that the sorts of organisations that we would expect to make substantive comments about this sort of legislation are those very organisations that actually want to make well-informed substantive thoughtful comments based on reflection and engagement of their stakeholders. They had no time to do that and the bill the drafting of this legislation is so much poorer for it. 
We do not know in fact what the reason was for the haste. Why have we been presented with a document in which even core functions and powers are so poorly described and outlined? What was the reason for haste? We have asked that question repeatedly and I would love to hear the answer to it. I understand entirely that there is no reason to sit on one’s hands when there is a need to be filled. Nobody on that select committee indeed in this Parliament wants to see legislation delayed just for the sake of process but nowhere did we hear a compelling reason for such extraordinary haste in this instance. 
We understand that the title of the bill will be changed and we will talk of that later but the reference to Sir Paul Callaghan has been made. We absolutely hold the late Sir Paul in the highest regard. I never thought that in my life I would sit in a town hall in Wellington listening to a person talking about the relationship between science and industry and that you could have heard a pin drop. It was as if a rock star was on stage—an extraordinary scientist an extraordinary communicator. Our reluctance in opposing this legislation is in part because we are very concerned that it is not seen as any reflection on that gentleman or his legacy. 
The chair of the Education and Science Committee Nikki Kaye made comments about some proposed amendments that were in her view rather prescriptive. I take issue with that. She referred to the need for flexibility and innovation. I believe that the functions the powers and the operating principles of this bill give the Minister of Science and Innovation such extraordinary control over the future of science funding and the creating of those relationships but the very innovation and the opportunity for this organisation to act flexibly and to respond to business and to the research sector will be seriously constrained. It is and it will be a tool of the Minister—that is patently clear if one looks at the provisions and obviously we will be commenting on the detail of those later. To suggest that the very sound proposals for amendments that were put up by the Opposition parties were overly prescriptive is unfortunate and does not accurately reflect the genuine concerns that this bill is so loosely drafted as to be unworkable.