Shirley Ken: New Zealand Trade and Enterprise Bill — Instruction to CommitteeCWH In Committee 
Shirley Ken: New Zealand Trade and Enterprise Bill — Instruction to CommitteeCWH In Committee 
[Volume:609;Page:6264] 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY (Deputy Leader—ACT NZ) 
: 
 ACT New Zealand is apparently the only party opposing this bill. In speaking to the title of this legislation I note that the previous legislation was called the Industry New Zealand and Trade New Zealand Integration Bill. Therein lies the real problem. ACT is asking what the role of the Government is. Is it the role of the Government to keep setting up new organisations and shuffling the chairs? We say it is not. In looking back at the history of this particular title members may recall that we used to have the Department of Trade and Industry. In those days there was import licensing and the like and everyone had to lobby the politicians to get their import licences from the Department of Trade and Industry. That went away and we set up the Ministry of Commerce. The role of the Ministry of Commerce was the legitimate role of Government—that is the role of regulator. In other words all of the regulatory functions that the Government should be performing were tucked into the Ministry of Commerce. 
In 1988 we set up the Trade Development Board and philosophically I would still have to question that. Is it the role of Government to be out there doing the trade? I say that is a function of the private sector—it will do it best. The role of Government is to ease the passage for that trade and get the fundamentals right—certainly things like tariff barriers between nations are the legitimate role of Government. But when the Government becomes the active player I think one gets into difficulties. I acknowledge however that Tradenz under the stewardship of Peter Shirtcliffe did some splendid work in those early years. 
In more recent times we have had the Government getting back into the active player role in promoting industry with Industry New Zealand. We say that is fundamentally flawed philosophically. It is really saying: “I’m from the Government I’m here to help you and I’ll bribe you with your own money and wow gee boy have I got a deal for you!” That is what the Minister in the chair has been doing—he has been going around the country trying to bribe people with their own money. We have already heard of the incredible failures associated with that. 
Getting back to the title essentially we have Industry New Zealand and Trade New Zealand. It will actually be spelt “INZTNZ”. What sort of State agency will that be? Who wants an “INZTNZ”? ACT says that is not the legitimate role of Government. We know that compliance costs and the taxing of small and medium-sized business are the biggest obstacle to growth and wealth creation in this country. Setting up another super-bureaucracy by melding these two organisations together is not the answer. I heard the National speaker say in relation to the title that his party proposes to set up a new organisation called Investment New Zealand. I am sorry but ACT opposes that. All that is doing is going back to the Development Finance Corporation. It will fail for the same reasons that the Development Finance Corporation failed. It is not the legitimate role of the Government to be doing those sorts of things. I thought we were past that era. 
We have had a long painful transition in this country. The rest of the world has left us behind on most fronts and here we are talking about going back to the failed policies of the past. We are doing it firstly with Jim Anderton’s Industry New Zealand which has been going only 2 years— 
John Carter 
: Less. 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY 
: Less actually and all we have had is a succession of failures. They are the sorts of failures one expects when one politicises something like the promotion of industry. Why? Because that is not the role of the Government. All one invites is pork-barrel politics and that is what we have seen. We have mentioned the Sovereign Yachts fiasco and that was a fiasco. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) 
: I am sorry but I did give the member a warning about the title. Please keep to the title. 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY 
: Indeed because this is all to do with the title. The title is the New Zealand Trade and Enterprise Bill and the proposal is to meld Industry New Zealand and Trade New Zealand into a superministry. ACT says there is no point in playing around with the title. We say that this legislation is wrong in principle from the outset and we should not be having it in any form whatsoever. That is the essential message from the ACT party.