Carter DavidRt Hon DAVID CARTER (National): Thank you Mr Chair. I wanted to first of all acknowledge the contribution we've had from Dr Deborah Russell. She does understand tax and she does acknowledge that it's a very complex piece of legislation. I also want to acknowledge Minister Stuart Nash. There have been a large number of questions raised and I think on this occasion the committee of the whole House is working well with the Minister making every effort to answer the questions that have been raised. There's one that I raised earlier which he hasn't addressed and I just wanted the opportunity to raise that again. I was raising questions about the advance pricing agreements and I asked could he explain the difference between an APA—an advance pricing agreement—and a binding ruling. He certainly then gave us an explanation of a binding ruling and I think in giving that explanation he might want to just seek some advice from officials as well because in giving that explanation he said a taxpayer enters into a discussion with the Inland Revenue Department and they agree an arrangement as to how tax might lie that is binding on IRD but then the Minister said it's not binding on the taxpayer. I don't think that's right and I think he just needs to check that through because my understanding of a binding ruling is it binds both the IRD and the taxpayer. So I'd be grateful for clarification on that. But the second issue I raised was with the advance pricing agreements—if he could explain the difference between those and a binding ruling—and then the question is how many APAs are there. How frequently does IRD enter into substantial discussions with obviously larger corporate taxpayers and determine these advance pricing arrangements? How frequent are they? How many are there in existence? The second point I just wanted to pick up on was raised by the Hon Amy Adams with regards to the extending of the time bar and the work the Finance and Expenditure Committee did on that. IRD came to us and said it needed seven years because of the complexity of these issues. The select committee worked hard and said Listen it's currently four. You want to extend it to seven. We can understand why but hang on. That's a bit tough on any corporate that only finds out that it might be under investigation after say 6½ years." So we've made a modification in the select committee—a recommendation to this committee of the whole House—that the initiation of discussion between IRD or perhaps their difference of agreement with the taxpayer must be started within the four-year period. But then the Minister in addressing the Hon Amy Adams' point said "But the investigation must conclude by seven years." I want the Minister give me some information as to how an investigation concludes. It seems to me that the IRD could indeed start a discussion with a taxpayer around that four-year period then spend the next three years arguing with that taxpayer and not actually finalising things and then suddenly realising there's a time constraint against them right on the eve of the seven years it could just say "Investigation finished. Here's your tax liability." with no further discussion at all. So I'd just be grateful if the Minister could give some answers to those two queries. The first one is about the APAs—the advance pricing agreements—and the second one is around just how an investigation that's up against a time line of seven years has to be concluded by the IRD and in a reasonable way to the taxpayer so that the corporate taxpayer then has the ability to know that it's been finalised in a fair and consistent way."