Jones Shane: Telecommunications Amendment Bill — Second Reading In Committee Third Reading 
Jones Shane: Telecommunications Amendment Bill — Second Reading In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:636;Page:7133] 
SHANE JONES (Labour) 
: 
 Kia ora morena Madam Assistant Speaker. I rise to support much of what Dr Smith has said. However in my case there will be great content and great brevity unlike in his delivery. 
I must say that the Finance and Expenditure Committee formed a collaborative spirit on this bill and we operated between two poles. The first pole was how does a group of legislators effect better competition outcomes and provide a statutory basis for improved competition whilst at the same time not compromising a pro-investment framework. When we were given the bill it followed a long list of events of a particular important nature in relation to the calendar of this House. It followed on from the Prime Minister identifying that telecommunications reform would comprise an important part of the work programme. So it is with particular pleasure that I stand as the chair of our committee having seen the Prime Minister deliver in her speech early in 2006 that the outstanding problem of competition in telecommunications would not sit hovering without being given the overdue attention of the State and now we stand here passing it. 
The officials were of great assistance to our committee. On our committee we are basically generalists. We have had three hefty statutes to shepherd forward and eventually take root in the legislative landscape. The first was the KiwiSaver Bill the second was the Taxation (Annual Rates Savings Investment and Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill that we put to bed last night and the third was the Telecommunications Amendment Bill. When I say that we are generalists there is a strong understanding of the importance of getting the balance right between the regulatory stick and ensuring that investors and the business community can go about their activities of pursuing profit because through profit lies rewards for those people who are prepared to invest in enterprises. 
Yes Dr Smith is right to highlight the fact that the value of Telecom shares took a wee bit of a dip earlier in the year but it is unfair to label as the culprit for that dip the policy that was leaked but that was shepherded and brought forward by my colleague Mr Cunliffe. Telecom itself had made a host of investments not all of which yielded profit. I have no doubt in my mind that the impatience in the market as to how well it was doing was also behind the drop in the value. 
But once the bill found its way to our committee we provided ample opportunity for submitters—a number of whom proved to be very raucous—to come before the committee. We even went beyond the call of duty and enabled an academic to present and run the risk of putting us to sleep at about 9.30 at night. This late hour is reflective of the industriousness of this committee. She rates a mention although much of the content of her work did not find a great deal of favour with members of our committee maybe because Bryce Wilkinson that great friend of the market and opponent of anything to do with regulation was her mentor. However her work is referred to in the committee’s report. 
The Internet service providers who are going to really struggle despite the existence of this improved competition framework had an opportunity to be heard. The incumbent had a second opportunity through being given a private hearing. The committee members took a little stick for that but we felt that given the huge amount of commercial worth tied up in the Telecom company the Telecom people deserved an opportunity to speak candidly with committee members and vice versa. Obviously the other players including TelstraClear all had an opportunity and they were challenged by Mr Williamson who asked them whether they were acting and talking in a manner consistent with their parent company over in Australia. Indeed Telecom was asked a similar question as to why it was saying one thing in Aotearoa and another in Australia. 
So in all it proved to be a successful select committee process. I give full credit to the assistance we received from the officials who from time to time have to work with the very creative and dare I say haphazard process when politicians are let loose on new policy in a select committee. But it all came to pass. It is a reasonable compromise. We are confident that competition will flow and investment has not been thwarted. We look forward to lots of the promises that were given to the select committee being fulfilled. We hope we will see an improvement in competition investment and infrastructure. I say to all my fellow committee members that we worked well and we have come up with a reasonable compromise. Have a merry Christmas. Kia ora tatou katoa.