Adams AmyHon AMY ADAMS (National—Selwyn): Nine months into this Government we are seeing a level of arrogance and dismissiveness and know-everything that I haven't seen in a Government just this early on and what an appalling attitude to process. This is a Government that thinks it knows so much better than everyone else that process is a mere inconvenience to be swept aside when it doesn't suit. The dismissive attitude to anyone who doesn't agree with them who's simply just wrong" is appalling and as I say contemptuous of New Zealanders who do have an interest in what happens in this country.Let's have a look at the examples. You've got the oil and gas decision where the finance Minister didn't even bother to ask Treasury what the economic impact might be. The energy Minister didn't bother to take the advice that she was given about the actual emissions profile impact of that. We've got a police Minister who hasn't bothered to read advice given to him by his police commissioner because of course Stuart Nash knows so much more about policing than the police commissioner ever would. And we've got a corrections Minister who isn't actually sure if he's read the advice. He hadn't read it; he had read it; he's not really sure; but anyway apparently it doesn't matter—look over there there's a squirrel!But actually one of the worst examples I've seen of this appalling approach to process is in this rapidly unravelling situation around Te Ārai development. This is important because you have here one developer of a multimillion-dollar piece of land selling sections almost exclusively to wealthy foreigners being carved out of a piece of legislation. Now any time a Government says "Actually here is the law but this one developer shouldn't be subject to it." of course there are going to be questions as to why. So we asked the questions: well why is that—why does this Government want to carve out this exemption? And actually we've heard a number of interesting stories.But before I get into that I do think it's worth making this very clear: on this side of the House we've got no problem with these developments. We do recognise the value of foreign money coming in to grow our businesses to grow our economy to build more houses for New Zealanders and actually we also recognise that sometimes having wealthy foreigners coming here creates real prosperity for this country and it certainly doesn't impact housing affordability for New Zealanders. So we don't have a problem. But what we wouldn't be doing is passing a law saying "It's not OK for anyone but just this one group that we've carved out." with very real questions around it. That is our concern. No problem with the development but the process is hugely dubious.This is a Government that has railed against any sort of foreign money into development any sort of foreign ownership. So why would you carve out these properties? Well Mr Parker said on a number of occasions on Morning Report and repeatedly in this House that he had to do it to avoid a Treaty breach—this was an iwi settlement asset so it had to be carved out because otherwise there could well have been a Treaty breach. According to Mr Parker he didn't know there were other developers involved in this property for quite some time.Well I find that incredibly hard to believe because let's run through what we do know: Shane Jones told this House that in the middle of January he was meeting with those very developers—meeting with John Darby meeting with Ric Kayne—and he knew absolutely that they were involved in the development. The Finance and Expenditure Committee submission on 15 February made it very clear that John Darby and Ric Kayne were involved in this development. The New Zealand Herald article that came out on 5 March made it very clear that this was a Ric Kayne development and yet the Minister in charge of the legislation claimed no one bothered to tell the very Minister in charge of the law about any of that until apparently mid-March when Treasury we understand told Mr Parker "Oh yes there are some other developers involved in the land. Not really sure how much they own. By the way we don't think the exemption should go ahead." And yet still Mr Parker is claiming that the reason it went ahead was to protect an iwi asset to protect against a Treaty breach and apparently it was the Treasury advice he relied upon in reaching that decision.So I'm going to be very interested to see that Treasury advice and see exactly what it says—and isn't it interesting how long it's taken to come out? So even when Mr Parker found out there were other developers involved which was before the paper went to Cabinet did he then ask the obvious question: how much of the land is iwi-owned; how much is owned by developers? No. Today in the House he admits himself that that is not up to the standard we should expect of our Ministers and that's the only thing I agree with Mr Parker on—that is not up to the standard we should expect. This is a process that has a lot more questions to answer."