Mallard Trevor: Crown Entities Reform Bill — In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Mallard Trevor: Crown Entities Reform Bill — In Committee 
[Sitting date: 23 May 2012. Volume:680;Page:2375. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD (Labour—Hutt South) 
: 
 I would like to speak to clause 1 and 2 of the Crown Entities Reform Bill. I think this is probably the appropriate time also to speak to my amendment which is set out on Supplementary Order Paper 32 dated yesterday. To make it clear the effect of the amendment is to delay the commencement of Part 3 by 3 years in order to give the opportunity to the Government to fulfil its commitment to have the review of the Charities Act and in particular the Charities Commission before the Charities Commission is disestablished.  
I think members on this side of the Chamber are of the view that it is better not to review things after they have been disestablished. It is better to review them to see whether they are working to see whether they have come up to speed and to see whether there can be changes made to them in order for them to work properly. And it is better to do that before the disestablishment rather than doing the disestablishment and reviewing something that then does not exist any more. It seems to be relatively pointless to do a review of an already disestablished organisation. Therefore the effect of this amendment is to delay the commencement of Part 3 so it does not come into force until the day 3 years after the date on which this Act receives the Royal assent. That is working on the possibility the likelihood that this bill gets a third reading and gets a Royal assent at some stage in June. That amendment runs the Charities Commission through the period of the review and that then is the point at which you go forward.  
There was a debate on our side as to whether in fact we should move an amendment as far as Part 2 of the bill is concerned. I know that there are some strongly held views around the Chamber. I heard the member Kevin Hague speaking eloquently on Part 2 of the bill earlier and I invite him or any of his colleagues if they want to amend my amendment to include a delay for Part 2 as well in order to keep the Mental Health Commission and its work going for a period. It might well be a good idea for them to get an amendment drafted up and copied off with 10 photocopies put on the Table of the House so members can in their debate consider it. Then there would be the ability to consider that question.  
I think we have come to the point where there is acceptance in the Committee around Part 1 and therefore it is logical to have it coming into force at the beginning of the financial year. I am one of those people who still sometimes think for the purposes of legislation of the old financial year which used to finish on 31 March back in the old days; 1 April was a new financial year. I know for a number of companies that is the case but as far as Government departments are concerned and Government budgets are concerned the financial years are 1 July to 30 June. Therefore it is pretty hard to make a case for a change in the coming into force of the part of the bill that we accept should come into the Act.  
I want to go to the explanatory note of my Supplementary Order Paper and the reasoning behind the delay. That is the agreement that was made between the Government and the charitable sector with the formation of the Charities Commission and the agreement that it would be independent. That was fundamental to the agreement between the Crown and the sector made in 2005. Although I am not going to pretend that it is an agreement with the status of the Treaty of Waitangi it is something that was a serious agreement with a very large sector a sector that is very much voluntary and where a lot of organisations and individuals have been involved. They go I think from the people who do the relatively small collections for the RSA with the poppies and other areas for the charitable funds to be raised by the RSA; there are people like the Foundation of the Blind. There are a number of collections. I mean we do Plunket collections and there a number of organisations that are either charitable in themselves or have wings that have charitable status.  
They were the ones that were involved in this treaty—this agreement—after a lot of discussion with the Government. I think it is unlikely given the legislation that is around that failure to abide by this agreement will result in anything that looks like a Treaty claim although I think it is fair to say that with the activist Supreme Court that we have got it is slightly unpredictable. I see the Attorney-General nodding; oh he is going to sleep. Oh I see. He should try to stay awake at 9 o’clock at night. But I think a number of us have seen some decisions from the Supreme Court that have been slightly unpredictable and whether or not the Supreme Court would regard this as a matter for its review and its intervention given the treaty arrangements that existed in 2005 and that are referred to in the explanatory note of this Supplementary Order Paper which goes to the commencement date is a moot question. It is a moot question and I am not sure which way it would be likely to go.  
Without referring back to the bits that have already been passed there is a requirement to consult with charitable entities. The board that is set up and the chief executive both of the board and the department have to have a consultation with the entities that are within the sector. My question is what consultation has occurred with them to date in advance of the passing of this bill— 
Denis O’Rourke 
: None. They had a month.  
Hon TREVOR MALLARD 
: Sorry?  
Denis O’Rourke 
: They had a month.  
Hon TREVOR MALLARD 
: No no I know they had—it was actually a little bit of a mess because of the way I understand the legislation was brought in before the election. No one understood the requirement to make submissions before the election and subsequent to that there was not a calling for submissions again and there was confusion. But sorry to the member that was not the point that I was making because that would be outside this particular clause.  
The proposed amendment goes to the delay and the question is whether if this amendment is passed the Minister would make a commitment to do that consultation with the sector at that point. You know that is an opportunity to have the consultation and to do what we expect would be done in order to make this legislation work properly. My view is that there is a real possibility that the Government does not like this particular provision because it would require it to have a period of 3 years and it is slightly unpredictable what might happen in those 3 years. It might consider it slightly untidy but I just want to say to the Minister of State Services that every now and again there is tidiness and there are principles. It would be good for the Minister to accept the principle of consultation with this sector before precipitating this sort of change—this very serious change because this is the abolition of a commission. Albeit I do accept that it is going to be replaced by a board and there is a certain amount of “What’s in a title?” but there is certainly an indication of autonomy. There is a different—