Adams Amy: Methodist Church of New Zealand Trusts Bill — Second Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Adams Amy: Methodist Church of New Zealand Trusts Bill — Second Reading 
[Sitting date: 18 November 2009. Volume:659;Page:7797. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
AMY ADAMS (National—Selwyn) 
: 
 I am very happy to rise this afternoon and take a call on the second reading on the Methodist Church of New Zealand Trusts Bill. I echo the words of the speakers who have already spoken setting out that there appears to be broad support in the House for the bill. Certainly when the Finance and Expenditure Committee considered the bill there was very wide-ranging support for the bill from the outset and the time that the committee spent on the bill was very much as Mr Burns has said about making sure that the bill was in as good a legislative state as we could get it. No committee should ever take that matter lightly. No matter what support a bill has I think it is the duty of all of us to ensure that the laws we pass are as good and as correct as they can be. Although when we are dealing with an organisation like the Methodist Church we have no reason to fear its motives my view has always been that the legislation has to stand alone and we cannot give any law a free pass on the grounds of the particular people involved. 
From my perspective and from my background in trusts law I was particularly concerned in our work on this bill to ensure that we set the parameters correctly. As has been said already in this debate this bill was about ensuring that the church did not need to go through what would otherwise be the normal process for amending trusts. We recognised that this particular set of circumstances warranted the Methodist Church having a cleaner simpler cheaper way of tidying up some obsolete trusts. Given that we were providing it with effectively an easier path through than other trusts would have I think it was incumbent on us to ensure that we did not let that provision go too far and that appropriate safeguards were in place. 
As Mr Burns has already described we worked on a number of amendments in committee to ensure that was the case. We have talked about ensuring that all amendments under Part 2 would need to go before the Attorney-General. I think that provides an important check and balance to ensure that if there were any improper conduct there would be the potential for some oversight. The other important change that the committee recommended is about the appointment and removal of trustees. The width of the provision was the subject of some debate. I take responsibility for being the main proponent for requiring the change and my view was that the ability to appoint and remove trustees which goes right to the heart of controlled trusts and trusts law should only extend to the sorts of trusts that the church came before us to seek help in amending—that is the obsolete impractical out-of-date children and orphanages trusts that we all recognised it had a problem with. In terms of the way that the bill had been originally presented to us the concern was that it would give the church an unfettered ability to change trustees in any trust with which it had an involvement. I think that would cut across too many important principles of trust law and the rights of the settlors of those trusts when they were set up. 
We spent some time on it but I make no apology for that. I think it is important that we get these things right. I think we got to a very good result and I note that through this bill the Methodist Church has been brought into line by being given similar powers to those this House has already given to the Roman Catholics the Presbyterians and the Anglicans. It is certainly something this House has done before. That notwithstanding we looked at this bill on its merits and on its face. As I said I think the committee has done some very good work in ensuring the appropriate safeguards and checks and balances are in place. I think they are now. 
I conclude by saying that this bill always had our support in terms of the objectives it was trying to achieve. I think the committee has done excellent work in refining the detail of the legislation and I am very pleased to support it. 
Bill read a second time.