Muller ToddTODD MULLER (National—Bay of Plenty): Well that's such a disappointment because I don't sit on the Finance and Expenditure Committee and obviously it's been lovely to hear how collegial they are most of the time—at least when the Government members don't forget what time it is. So it's been very interesting to listen to the debate this afternoon. I was hoping for something far longer and more erudite from the previous speaker Kieran McAnulty but alas we will never get to really hear what he thinks about the Taxation (Annual Rates for 2018-19 Modernising Tax Administration and Remedial Matters) Bill.If anyone is still watching it is quite a remarkable bill to be talking about at the end of the first week on a Thursday. It's felt in fact at times over the last 90 minutes that as more people have spoken the oxygen in here has got less. But there have been a couple of contributions that I really do have to take issue with. The first one was the contribution from the learned colleague the Hon James Shaw and his interpretation of our opposition to the tax rates which are inherent in this proposed legislation. He then moved on to give us a philosophical view of the National Party's outline with respect to tax.As I was listening to him talk about the wonders of increased taxation it reminded me that for the Green Party in particular there is not a social ill there is not an issue in society that increased taxes and Government spending can't fix. At the core of their philosophy—in fact it's ironic; when he was extrapolating that because we are a party that is proudly of the corner that less taxes and more efficient use of taxpayer money should be the primary driver of Government policy he's essentially arguing that really if you follow that logic through from a Green Party perspective why not a 100 percent tax and we can all sit back and relax in the delight that the Government can manage all of society's issues on our behalf. So it was a very interesting contribution from Mr Shaw.Of course as those who have listened today will have picked up many aspects of this bill we support. Indeed the pro-business simplification of the system enabling a business in particular to be able to do their job more effectively in terms of interfacing with IRD had its genesis in the previous National Government. The reason we oppose this bill relates particularly to the setting of the annual rates of income tax. The Government is right that it's a rollover of what is currently in place or was in place in the last financial year but that of course is the core difference because we had signalled and promised that had we got back into power we would have made a threshold adjustment with respect to those rates which I think and we all think on this side would have been welcomed. Indeed close to 45 percent of the country believed in voting for us that that was indeed going to happen.A lot of areas have been traversed. I won't cover many but I will touch on a couple. One is that I'm very pleased from a previous small business perspective that we are going to assist small businesses with respect to changes to the binding rulings regime. I have been a chief executive of a smaller business where we have gone through this process—or the business went through this process—and certainly providing some surety and more cost efficiency with respect to that engagement is welcomed. Apparently in this legislation in the charities section there are an extra 13 I understand which have been applied to the list which is given charitable status. We support that but it is added to the 2500 that are already there. Certainly from our perspective we think there is opportunity to look into some of the issues with respect to those who are on that charitable status. I think there's a feeling that not all of them necessarily should still be there because their businesses and activities perhaps have moved on from being a true charity in that sense of the word. So we would encourage the Government to do some thinking in that space.Interesting afternoon—my colleague Deborah Russell certainly provided a highlight with respect to secondary tax lecturing. I suddenly felt I was back at Waikato University introduction to macroeconomics. It was very enjoyable. I hope you've enjoyed it at home and I certainly whilst commending the thinking behind this bill for the reason outlined cannot support it. Thank you.