Robertson Grant: Student Loan Scheme Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Robertson Grant: Student Loan Scheme Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:678;Page:1440] 
GRANT ROBERTSON (Deputy Leader—Labour) 
: 
 Clauses 1 and 2 are the title and commencement date which normally would be a short debate but there are some issues when we come to the commencement clause that I think are worthy of focusing on. But in this call I want to focus on the title of the bill.  
The title of the bill is innocuous—the Student Loan Scheme Amendment Bill. In fact the bill could be better termed the “Student Loan Scheme (Ending the OE) Bill” because that is in effect what this will do for some New Zealanders. What this bill is saying to New Zealanders who want to go away on a normal length OE to the UK of 2 years is that it is not the pragmatic solution that Peter Dunne put forward in 2007 and that he articulately very well in Parliament in 2007. That pragmatic solution was struck to ensure that somebody had a provision to undertake their OE. It was not that they were getting off scot-free—they are still paying interest when they are overseas—but they got some recognition of the fact that we support New Zealanders to do this and encourage them to return.  
We have heard already in this debate that in fact the evidence that Treasury and the Ministry of Education have provided to the Government is that there is a likelihood that this may discourage people from returning from overseas and therefore increase the annual student loans impairment. So we could easily call the bill the “Student Loan Scheme (Ending the OE) Bill”.  
Certainly a title that it could not be called is the “Student Loan Scheme (Pragmatic) Amendment Bill” because it loses the pragmatism that formerly was in the legislation. During the earlier debate Peter Dunne mounted an argument for why the loan repayment holiday should be taken down from 3 years to 1 year. The problem with that argument was that if you followed it all the way to its logical conclusion there should not be a loan repayment holiday. Mr Dunne’s argument was that all borrowers needed to be treated the same essentially whether they were in New Zealand or whether they were overseas. Well if that is the logic get rid of the loan repayment holiday altogether.  
Hon David Parker 
: And the interest. 
GRANT ROBERTSON 
: That is right—and the interest as well because borrowers in New Zealand are not paying the interest. So Mr Dunne’s logic has fallen from him here because he has taken it from 3 years to 1 year but it does not make any sense in terms of the argument he made. The title of the bill certainly would not be able to be the “Student Loan Scheme (Pragmatic) Amendment Bill” and it would not be able to be the “Student Loan Scheme (Logical) Amendment Bill” because it fails both of those tests. The loan repayment holiday was put in place as a pragmatic solution to the fact that we do not want New Zealanders who go overseas for a short period to have things put in front of them that will make it less likely that they will return to New Zealand.  
During the dinner break I had a tweet— 
Simon Bridges 
: Sausage roll.  
GRANT ROBERTSON 
: I did not have a sausage roll actually. I had a very healthy dinner Mr Bridges: salad ham and a roll just so you know. Mr Bridges on the other hand was once again wallowing in his Chinese takeaway from down the road which we see him have most dinner times.  
But what this person told me in the dinner break was that they had worked overseas as a volunteer for a number of years on the basis of the loan repayment holiday. They were actually able to spend 3 years working overseas paying interest—not actually abdicating their responsibilities; knowing that interest would be accruing on the loan—doing volunteer work and have the loan repayment holiday for 3 years.  
The repayment holiday would be down to 1 year now under this scheme. That would be good and that would be useful but it does not support New Zealanders in what has been their traditional activity of going on an OE knowing that at the end of those 2 years or possibly 3 years if they got an extension on their visa they would be able to come back to New Zealand and they would not have had to make those loan repayments in that time. This is pragmatism and I do think that if the Student Loan Scheme Amendment Bill was to be titled any other way it would be around a reference to what now happens for New Zealand graduates who go away on their OE. 
On this side of the Chamber we want to make absolutely clear that we want people to pay their loans back. Whatever concerns we might have about student loans and the size of student debt we want everyone who is in this scheme to feel that people are making their repayments and that people are doing what they need to do. But when there is an opportunity for people to go overseas and do what New Zealanders have done for decades and for generations it seems very unfortunate that the Government is not prepared to take up the pragmatic solution it was offered.