Webb DuncanDr DUNCAN WEBB (Labour—Christchurch Central): Tēnā koe Madam Speaker. It's funny isn't it? Why the urgency?" we hear from the Opposition and then in the same breath "We're not moving fast enough." The reason this bill is being dealt with under urgency and was introduced under urgency is because the problem is urgent. Businesses are crying out for help and we are going to deliver it. I'm going to go to the Property Law Act amendments because I'm absolutely flummoxed with the view of the other side. They don't seem to think that these measures are necessary and they raise the issue of retrospectivity. So let me deal with some of those issues.Firstly the Property Law Act which is being amended implies numerous clauses into leases across the board and this is just in addition to an existing framework of implied clauses. Secondly we have a law of frustration already that looks backwards in time when there are extraordinary circumstances and adjusts the relationships appropriately in the benefits and burdens of the contract. In a sense this clause is simply doing that. It's saying the parties cannot have been expected to contemplate that their lease would be affected by a global pandemic. We are going to assist them in resolving that tension in a fair way. Thirdly the Auckland District Law Society believes the common lease used in commercial premises in New Zealand has pretty much an identical framework and that is being used as a template for what parties would have negotiated had they turned their mind to it.In terms of retrospectivity it is absolutely essential that this relief is given. In a sense it's no more retrospective than any addressing of a frustrating event would be. Anything where the parties can't make the contract which they contemplated it to be at the outset. So this reform of the law is greatly needed.In terms of what is a fair proportion we received many useful submissions on that some of which suggested we set out a list of factors. We took careful advice and reflected on it and we thought that that wouldn't be useful. But I do want to make it clear that things like whether someone has received the wage subsidy would be relevant. Whether someone has been able to conduct a profitable business even though they've been locked out of their premises would be relevant. All of those things will be relevant and obviously the revenue that a company has the tenant has would be relevant as well.There is one other important thing I want to say. In respect of the claim—I think it was Mr Bayly who was talking about large tenants and landlords with mortgages. Landlords can use this clause too. If a large tenant simply says "Go away. I'm not paying my rent. I don't want to." this is a clause that the landlord can use to say "You have to pay a fair proportion of the rent." So it's a really useful and important clarification of the law.In terms of if it's going to be effective we absolutely think it's appropriate to look at how far back we should go whether we should go to the beginning of lockdown on 18 August or not.Lastly I'll talk about dispute resolution. We absolutely need a speedy dispute resolution process. Arbitration can work but it can also be expensive and a little unwieldy. This is really a prompt for parties to get together and sort their problems out themselves if they can to mediate if need be and arbitrate if necessary.This Property Law Act reform is not a great shift in the law. What it's doing is it's imposing a clause on the parties which if the parties were asked two years ago "What would you do if there was a global pandemic and you were locked out of your building?" would be the fair place to land. That is why I commend this bill to the House."