Tabuteau FletcherFLETCHER TABUTEAU (NZ First): Thank you for the opportunity to speak on this bill and I do commend the member who has put this forward. I have to go back a couple of contributions from that side of the House to acknowledge Mr Reti and his considered debate in the House tonight. An analysis of actual detail—how refreshing from that side of the House—instead of being told how complicated it is how broad it is and something about supply chains: beautiful. You have picked that up really well. Let us just look at some of the facts here. What I want to do is acknowledge Mr Reti's contribution and take some of the wording from the Tariff Act 1930 from the US and its recent update. Let us see what the US is trying to do:  'Forced labor' as herein used shall mean all work or service which is exacted from any person under the menace of any penalty for its non-performance and for which the worker does not offer himself [or herself] voluntarily." What a definition. What a great place to start for the member who spoke prior David Bennett to come to the select committee and say actually what Mr Peeni Henare has in his legislation may not be on the money but look at the precedent from around the world and the countries that have acknowledged that this is a problem. In fact Mr Reti's contribution was so good that it belied the fact that there are specific solutions and there are specific attempts. Yes they are complicated but that is not a reason—it is absolutely not a reason—to not support sensible legislation to combat slave labour. New Zealand First as you can tell supports this legislation. New Zealand has been an advocate for labour rights for most of its history. In fact it was just last week that we had the New Zealand Business and Human Rights Forum come to speak in Parliament and use the facilities. At that forum's launch it was said: "New Zealand businesses are increasingly recognising that respecting human rights is not only the right thing to do – it's also good for business." This bill should be unanimously passed tonight because I do concede the point around definition and where we proceed to from here but we need legislation to begin that battle and to encompass the efforts of the World Trade Organization trade agreements. Actually I will go through some of them. For example—and let us not confuse the issue here—New Zealand First completely opposes the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement because it is a bad trade deal but in it at least the US was trying to work towards "the highest-standard most progressive [work standards] in history. It's got strong enforceable provisions for workers preventing things like child labour. It's got strong enforceable provisions on the environment helping us to do things…" to protect people. The United States is seeking an enforceable labour obligation that would require countries to uphold international labour standards in their laws and practices as reflected in the 1998 International Labour Organization declaration and Mr Reti spoke to that. We have a framework. We have something to begin the debate and this House—this Parliament—needs to bring it into legislation to make it meaningful to make it binding on the House so that we can not only look after workers in New Zealand but also protect businesses here and look after people from around the world. Thank you."