McClay ToddHon TODD McCLAY (National—Rotorua): Madam Deputy Speaker thank you very much. In respect of this bill the National Party—the largest party in this Parliament—will be supporting it to first reading but we will be paying a lot of attention come the committee to make sure that it is a worthwhile and worthy piece of legislation. But I must say I am a little surprised to be speaking to this bill so soon in the term of a new Parliament and indeed of a brand-new Government. I had a little look at the things that people campaigned on last year and didn't see this high up on the list. I'm quite worried that this piece of legislation being delivered so very very early during the term of this Parliament is really an indication of things to come or more to the point things not to come because I'm not sure this is the number one issue that New Zealanders are grappling with. It's certainly probably not the number one issue that New Zealanders thought of when they cast their vote—just 7 percent of them for New Zealand First for instance or less than 7 percent for the Green Party—about five months ago.But what's most interesting is that the State Services Commissioner was already working on many of the ideas that are now contained in this piece of legislation. So when the Minister responsible suggests that no other Minister has ever done anything about this well gee whiz there must not be a lot going on over in that office for his researchers and staff to be digging up such real pearls. Because if we go and have a look back not only at Hansard in this Parliament but certainly a lot of press coverage during the course of last year there was a lot spoken on some of the issues that are contained in this legislation. Indeed our then Prime Minister was quite vocal about one of the issues which possibly is covered by this. So a conversation with the State Services Commissioner meant that they started that piece of work and the Minister knows that the work was started long before he got there.Having said that there are some issues that are important to deal with in the goodness of time. I'm glad that such importance has been placed on this by the new Government that they've decided to prioritise it as opposed to many other things that they've been speaking of. When it does come to committee we will be wanting to have a very close look at it and make sure that the detail of what's in it will actually work.There is one word of caution though I suppose that's very important. Now the taxpayer absolutely has the right to expect openness and transparency particularly when it comes to State enterprises and the pay or conditions agreed for their CEOs but we must also make sure that in the provisions that are put here—the board of an enterprise must get the explicit permission of the State Services Commissioner. Where that cannot be reached it's the Minister that must intervene and decide. We must be very very careful here that actually the Minister's responsibility does not move into the area of the competence of those boards because actually the role of the Minister is very different than that. The Minister gets to direct the boards make decisions around that but actually shouldn't be making the decisions of the boards.The second thing is that whilst we want to make sure we get the very best person or people that we can to run a number of these agencies we need to make sure actually that a desire on the part of the Government to show that they are in touch with New Zealanders doesn't get in the way of the very best people being there. Some of these organisations are very large most certainly very complex and in many cases the State Service will be in competition with the private sector for finding the best person to deliver for them.I know we haven't had mention of it but we need to be careful that the legislation doesn't become a witch-hunt for a few CEOs and particularly whilst it's important we consider the pay scales of some of them if we look at the New Zealand Superannuation Fund they absolutely—absolutely—must have independence from Government and from Ministers and secondly they must seek the very best people they can to run those organisations to make sure the billions of dollars they are entrusted with on the part of the New Zealand taxpayer are well managed and that there's a good return there. So we need to be careful again that it doesn't just become a witch-hunt or a political sideshow. But we will be supporting the first reading and then based upon submissions and that process will decide the position of the National Party thereafter. Thank you.