Burns Brendon: Methodist Church of New Zealand Trusts Bill — Second Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Burns Brendon: Methodist Church of New Zealand Trusts Bill — Second Reading 
[Sitting date: 18 November 2009. Volume:659;Page:7795. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
BRENDON BURNS (Labour—Christchurch Central) 
: 
 I move  
That the Methodist Church of New Zealand Trusts Bill be now read a second time 
. This is a private bill and it was my privilege to introduce it to the House on behalf of the Methodist Church of New Zealand which is centred in my electorate of Christchurch Central. That is home also to the mighty Crusaders and Canterbury rugby teams but unlike other members we do not need to dwell on their various glories. 
The Methodist Church as every member of this House will know is a very well-respected religious institution. It has had a very long and proud history here in New Zealand dating back to the earliest days of European settlement. It has a very strong role and purpose in our communities in terms of sharing resources and assisting the poor and the disadvantaged and that very proud tradition continues to this day with a wide range of services and interventions provided by the church. 
Over the years the Methodist Church has attracted a large number of benevolent contributions and some of these have been preserved in the form of trusts for charitable purposes. As a consequence of that long history the Methodist Church now holds some of those trusts for purposes that have become obsolete. Of particular relevance to this bill is that a large number of trusts have been held in the past for Methodist orphanages and children’s homes. The Methodist Church like all other churches now no longer undertakes the care of children and there are no such institutions still in operation. The amount of money held in trust is generally quite small and unfortunately it cannot be utilised for the purposes for which those trusts were established—hence the requirement for this bill. At the moment the only real alternative for variation to the purposes of those trusts is by way of application to the High Court which is an expensive lengthy and sometimes impractical way to deal with trusts and changes to trusts. 
The purpose of this bill is twofold. Firstly it provides an alternative process to the one under the Charitable Trusts Act of 1957 to vary charitable trusts in general held by the Methodist Church and secondly it widens the purposes of the children’s trusts to allow those trust funds to be used for the benefit of children in New Zealand. 
At this point I thank my colleagues on the Finance and Expenditure Committee under the chairmanship of Craig Foss. I am also grateful for the support we received from the Parliamentary Counsel Office and from the Ministry of Justice and indeed for the submissions received from the Public Trust and Trustees Executors. They were very helpful in terms of shaping this bill. The select committee gave the submissions considerable consideration. At times it seemed to take almost as much time as some of our more omnibus and sizable tax bills but I think we have ended up with a bill that we can all be relatively pleased with. 
I should note that a number of changes have been made to the bill as introduced. The original clause 12 specified that trusts for charitable purposes would be referred to the Attorney-General for his oversight and consideration but we considered that such specificity might exclude some church trusts. Our suggested recommendation then makes it clear that all schemes prepared under Part 2 relating to any church trust would have such oversight. In relation to trusts dealing with orphanages and children we are making some suggested changes to clause 18(1) in Part 3 as the clause applies to trusts funds and trust properties held for Methodist orphanages and children’s homes in New Zealand or for the care and welfare of children. The amendment we are suggesting removes any doubt as to whether the funds could in future be applied for non-charitable purposes. 
Perhaps the most contentious change that has been suggested by the Finance and Expenditure Committee relates to clause 21 which we suggest be removed and replaced by new clause 19A. This clause provides that if trustees of those trusts who have in the past been delegated to look after the interests of children by orphanages and other institutions are to be appointed or removed then that can happen only after consultation with those trustees. There was a view in the select committee that if clause 21 had proceeded as originally devised it may have given a rather unfettered power to the Methodist Church. That is perhaps not a very likely prospect; as I said in my introduction the Methodist Church is a very long-established church with a very proud history of service to the poor and needy in our community. But obviously legislation has to be framed in a way to make sure that any possible contingency has to be covered. 
Again I thank the Finance and Expenditure Committee for its support of this bill and its passage through the House. I ask the House to support the bill through this second reading and the bill’s remaining stages. I hope that the House is able to conclude the progress of this bill before a particular date in December which all good Methodists and other Christians will be celebrating.