Horan Brendan:Inquiries Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeHoran Brendan:Inquiries Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 21 August 2013. Volume:692;Page:12726. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]BRENDAN HORAN (Independent):I was not going to take a call in the Committee stage of the Inquiries Bill but as it seems everyone else is now in favour of the bill it may be useful for me to take a short call. I have a letter from the Speaker guaranteeing me the same rights and privileges of any MP within this House and I was speaking on that before I was foully given a yellow card earlier this evening—The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy): Order! The member may not refer to a matter that was in a previous bill. That ruling has been made and done. If the member is going to use this opportunity to redress that I will terminate his speech.BRENDAN HORAN: Thank you Mr Chairperson. I was not able to talk in those second and third readings and not able to do anything about that but I will not seek to take more than a proportionate time of this Committee.Last night when the House was considering the second reading of this Inquiries Bill I was in Auckland at a meeting of 300 to 500 people concerning Nathan Guy’s Snapper 1 snapper review. Parliamentary business takes many forms—the swans in Hyde Park as Paul Swain recalled in his valedictory speech and in August 2013 being able to catch a feed of snapper. But this morning arriving back from Auckland I caught up with theHansard from last night and learnt that Holly Walker and Metiria Turei had expressed the concerns that I had.This law change is being passed after languishing on the Order Paper since November 2009 having made absolutely no progress since the Government Administration Committee reported on it. The issues with it have been well canvassed and I do not need to repeat them. I could deliver a dissertation on the benefits of the Government having a well-managed legislation programme instead of a logjam on the Order Paper of sometimes 50—and often 60—Government bills. Then yesterday a substantial revision-tracked Supplementary Order Paper Supplementary Order Paper 330 appeared in the name of the Minister of Internal Affairs having presumably being expedited through Cabinet and departmental processes in the past week or two.I take my purpose and responsibilities as a member of Parliament scrutinising legislation seriously and I do all I can within the resources and the hours available to me. I make the effort to consider my vote on every bill and my vote opposing thesecond reading was based on caution—based on the knowledge that those who legislate in haste often repent at leisure.When I first read this bill I immediately found a spelling error. At first I thought it was self-depreciating humour and it is appropriate that that member the Minister of Energy and Resources is in the chair beside you. I thought it was humour of the stuttering bumbling administration of the Snapper 1 proposals of the Crown minerals bill and other bills that have passed through this House.But I am today still concerned that the revision-tracked Supplementary Order Paper a document of some 25 substantive pages has changes to the bill on 15 of those pages—60 percent of the pages have changes. I do not know what devil may lurk in that detail. I was not able to look at every page but I know that some parties have been negotiating with the Government have been looking at the detail and have been making progress. That is their right and their duty and that is good. However I believe that it is good for there to be time available for interested parties to be able to look at proposed changes. What would the Law Commission the Law Society or indeed others think of the Minister’s Supplementary Order Paper with changes on 60 percent of the pages? We simply do not know because there has not been time.I would draw two matters to your attention. Some time ago the Minister of Justice of the day brought the Electoral Amendment Bill (No 3) to this House. I would like to quote from Doug Graham’sHansard from 29 February 1996 moving the second reading of the bill the equivalent of what is now the first reading after changes to Standing Orders. In moving the bill he said: “It tidies up a printing error that occurred in the Office of the Clerk during the preparation of the assent copy of the Electoral Amendment Bill (No. 2). Members will recall that in passing section 79 of that Act the House agreed that the threshold figure and the definition of national donation in the new section 214f of the Electoral Act would be $10000. Unfortunately when the Clerk’s Office came to prepare the assent copy a zero was omitted from the figure so that it mistakenly became”—