Goldsmith PaulHon PAUL GOLDSMITH (National): Thank you Mr Chair. One of the issues raised in Part 1 of this bill—this is the Screen Industry Workers Bill which is seeking to undo the legislation that was called the Hobbit law" which was introduced by the National Government back in 2010 or 2012 I can't remember which and which was put in place in the context of a big union fight which was frankly threatening the arrival and production of The Hobbit films. It was an arrangement that the National Government of the time brought in in order to ensure that they went ahead. And since then the New Zealand film industry has gone from strength to strength. It is in a reasonably good shape although of course it has been battered severely by the COVID restrictions over the last couple of years—just starting to come out of that. And I'm bound to say that the feedback I'm getting from many in the sector is: "Great! We were just finally getting our head above the water post-COVID. There's still lots of issues that we're having to deal with—lots of sickness and things like that. Oh dear I just wish we weren't having to deal with very significant labour relations changes at the same time." So the timing of this bill is a questionable one.And the most fundamental question I have for the Minister relates not just to Part 1 but to the bill itself which has been in the freezer for two years. It was introduced by a Minister many Ministers ago I think back before the last election in 2020 with a hiss and a roar and then put in the freezer and it has been pulled out stuck in the microwave two years later and is suddenly being pushed quite rapidly through the last stages. And so the fundamental question I have for the Minister is why—I suppose to talk through the timing of why he thinks this is a good time to be undergoing very substantial reform in an industry that is still battling the effects of COVID just getting itself back on its feet again. There's quite a bit of stuff going on. There's also of course the merger of TVNZ and Radio New Zealand which nobody seems to understand the logic therein. Hon Willie Jackson: No—only you.Hon PAUL GOLDSMITH: I'm getting slightly off topic. Old Willie Jackson probably understands it. Well who knows what goes on in Willie's mind. But anyway that's going on at great expense and will have implications and consequences for the industry unknown at this stage. And so they're dealing with that they're dealing with COVID and they're wondering why on earth we need to be dealing with this now. So that's a question around timing.The second question is a more substantive one in relation to Part 1 which talks about the exemption from prohibition of restricted trade practices. And this is potentially a very significant change in our employment relations. Here it's just listed as it relates to the screen industry but there is of course deep nervousness that this is I suppose the first cab off the rank of a wider Government agenda to enable contractors to ignore the Commerce Act which is all about individual companies and contractors not being able to collude in a cartel fashion with each other over pay and conditions and arrangements and cost. So the idea of an independent contractor meeting with all the other independent contractors and collectively coming up with a scheme is what's called a cartel and it's been ruled out in the Commerce Act. So this legislation is wanting to change that and have an exemption for this industry. So I suppose the question I have for the Minister is: can he be open about his thinking there in terms of what his intentions are for—well why just this sector? And does he have plans for other sectors?Hon MICHAEL WOOD (Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety): I mean the member took all of about 15 seconds in his first speech to stray into striking irrelevance in respect of this particular debate but let me respond briefly—CHAIRPERSON (Ian McKelvie): Minister order! I'll be the judge of that and the member did qualify his comments very well if you listened properly.Hon MICHAEL WOOD: And I'm very generously going to briefly respond to his questions around the timing of the bill by contrasting it with the fact that the National Party made its previous changes which stripped away fundamental international worker rights in urgency overnight. This Government has actually worked through a careful process of consultation and collaboration with the sector itself to develop these proposals. So the member's opening utterances suggesting that there's deep alarm or concern in the sector are entirely baseless. This piece of legislation is based on a tripartite working group which had both unions and producers at the table which brought back joint recommendations which have formed the basis for this piece of legislation and the detailed provisions of it have been worked through very carefully with them over recent months. The member may have blinked and missed it but there were a couple of other events over the course of 2020 and 2021 which did somewhat disrupt the Government's legislative programme and we are returning to those important things now.The relevant matter which the member did refer to was clause 7 of the bill which relates to prohibitions on restrictive trade practices. This is quite an important part of it because effectively the grand bargain of the recommendations that came through from the screen industry working group which are reflected in this bill is that the contractor status will largely be retained for workers in the sector—and there are seen to be benefits for that from people in the sector—but those workers will have the ability to collectively bargain. It is unusual for people who are contractors to be able to collectively bargain but that was the joint recommendation of both the producers and the workers who were involved in this process to try and strike a balance which ensures that those rights which were taken away by the previous Government and which mean that workers in this sector uniquely—remember workers in this sector uniquely—under the previous legislation were prohibited by that previous Government's legislation from being able to test their legal status in the courts. Let's remember that's what that lot did to workers in this sector. They took away the right of these workers to go to the courts and test whether they should lawfully be able to be considered employees or contractors. That was the starting position that we've had to try and work through and get to a collaborative outcome on. So the outcome as recommended by the group is that people retain their status as contractors but they're able to exercise collective bargaining rights—a right which employees in New Zealand do have. So that was the balance that was struck and that is the reason that we have clause 7 in this bill in the way that it is set out."