THURSDAY, 8 APRIL 2021
The Speaker took the Chair at 2 p.m.
KARAKIA/PRAYERS
ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jenny Salesa): Ke tau lotu. 'E 'Otua Māfimafi, kuo mau taa'i mālie 'i ho'o 'ofá mo e ngaahi tāpuaki hono kotoa. 'Oku tuku homau lotó ka mau hū atu ke ke malu'i ange mu'a 'a e Kuiní, mo tataki ange 'emau fua fatongia 'i he Fale Aleá 'aki 'a e poto Faka-e-'Otua, 'ofa pea mo e 'ulungaanga malū, ko e 'uhí ko e mo'ui mo e melino 'o e fonuá. 'Oku mau kole atu 'a e ngaahi me'á ni hono kotoa 'i he huafa ho 'aló pē 'e taha ko Sīsū Kalaisi ko homau fakamo'uí, 'Emeni.





BUSINESS STATEMENT
Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Deputy Prime Minister) on behalf of the Leader of the House: Next week, the annual review debate will begin. The debate is the committee stage of the Appropriation (2019/20 Confirmation and Validation) Bill and is 10 hours long. It will be conducted under the revised procedures for committee stage, with Ministers responding to questions from members. On Tuesday, the House will consider a motion to approve orders made under the COVID-19 Public Health Response Act 2020 and a motion to continue the Act until the end of the year. Wednesday will be a members' day. A debate on the report of the Finance and Expenditure Committee on the Budget Policy Statement 2021 will replace the general debate. The second reading of the Fair Trading Amendment Bill will also be considered next week.
CHRIS BISHOP (National): Thank you to the acting Leader of the House for that. Can I ask him whether or not the Government has given any thought to allowing members' notice of motion No. 1 to be debated during the members' day next week, thus not eating into Government time, just members' time?
Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Deputy Prime Minister) on behalf of the Leader of the House: On behalf of the Leader of the House, as the acting Acting Leader of the House, no, we haven't given consideration to that matter.





PETITIONS, PAPERS, SELECT COMMITTEE REPORTS, AND INTRODUCTION OF BILLS
SPEAKER: Petitions have been delivered to the Clerk for presentation.
CLERK:Petition of Jessica Keltie, requesting that the House amend the rules in the KiwiSaver Act 2006 or update the definitions in the Care of Children Act 2004 to allow a person less than 16 years old to opt into KiwiSaver with permission from a parent or guardianpetition of Angela Meyer for The Gender Justice Collective, requesting that the House urge the Government to create a National Women's Health and Wellbeing Strategy and Action Plan and ensure that $6 million is allocated to create this in the 2021 Budget.
SPEAKER: Those petitions stand referred to the Petitions Committee. 
Ministers have delivered papers.
CLERK: Classification Office, Statement of Performance Expectations 1 July 2020 to 30 June 2021Classification Office, Statement of Intent 2021-2025Government Response to the Report of the Social Services and Community Committee on the petition of Jenn Hooper.
SPEAKER: Those papers are published under the authority of the House.
Select committee reports have been delivered for presentation.
CLERK: Report of the Finance and Expenditure Committee on the Budget Policy Statement 2021 and the Half Year Economic and Fiscal Update December 2020report of the Governance and Administration Committee on the Report of the Controller and Auditor-General, Managing stormwater systems to reduce the risk of floodingreport of the Regulations Review Committee on the COVID-19 Public Health Response (Alert Level Requirements) Order (No 6) 2021.
SPEAKER: Those reports are set down for consideration.
The Clerk has been informed of the introduction of bills.
CLERK: Income Tax (Adjustment of Taxable Income Ranges) Amendment Bill, introductionRegulatory Standards Bill, introductionHuman Rights (Disability Assist Dogs Non-Discrimination) Amendment Bill, introduction.
SPEAKER: Those bills are set down for first reading.





ORAL QUESTIONS
QUESTIONS TO MINISTERSQuestion No. 1—Finance
1. GREG O'CONNOR (Labour—Ōhāriu) to the Minister of Finance: What recent reports has he seen on the New Zealand economy?
Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Minister of Finance): Last week, Xero released its latest Small Business Insights data, showing that small business revenue was up 1.5 percent in February from a year ago. The data also showed positive revisions to revenue figures in December and January, with January's revision showing it had joined every other month since May 2020 in reporting positive annual revenue growth for New Zealand's small business sector. Xero's insights show that small business jobs were up 1.8 percent in February, compared to pre-COVID levels in the first week of March 2020. We will continue to see volatility in economic data in New Zealand across the next few months as the impacts of COVID continue to show through, but we shouldn't lose sight of the positive underlying indicators for the New Zealand economy.
Greg O'Connor: What reports has he seen on how New Zealand's export sector is performing?
Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: This week, the ANZ released its Commodity Price Index for March 2021. It showed the World Commodity Price Index lifted 6.1 percent, and the New Zealand Commodity Price Index rose 7.4 percent from February, both hitting new record highs. ANZ said the strength in the index was primarily driven by a sharp lift in dairy prices, which have actually hit their highest level in seven years. They also reported meat and fibre prices rose in March, and are up 5.9 percent from a year ago; the horticulture index was unchanged; and the forestry index rose during the month, and is up 25 percent on a year ago. While our borders may have been largely closed for people movement, our exporters have continued to do a great job in supporting New Zealand and helping continue to see New Zealand open for business.
Greg O'Connor: What reports has he seen on the international context for the New Zealand economy?
Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: This week, the IMF released updated projections for the international economy, revising up its global growth forecasts for 2021 and 2022. The IMF said, "Even with high uncertainty about the path of the pandemic, a way out of this health and economic crisis is increasingly visible." It is good news for New Zealand that the rest of the world can see the path for reopening their domestic economies to where New Zealand has been for some months, particularly as our export sector is in a strong position to benefit from the higher rates of global growth. However, the IMF also warned that a high degree of uncertainty surrounds these projections. Against the backdrop of an ever-changing global pandemic, the Government remains committed to supporting our economy as the recovery continues.




Question No. 2—Health
2. Dr SHANE RETI (Deputy Leader—National) to the Minister of Health: Does he stand by all his statements and actions?
Hon ANDREW LITTLE (Minister of Health): Yes.
Dr Shane Reti: When he replied to concerns around the mental health report this morning and said, "Let's not get dramatic about it", what part of the report is too dramatic for him?
Hon ANDREW LITTLE: The member must've misheard my answer. I wasn't talking about the report; I was talking about the interviewer.
Dr Shane Reti: Subsequent to the latest report being released, has he instructed health officials to ensure the indicators that were removed will be included in the next annual report?
Hon ANDREW LITTLE: I have spoken to ministry officials about the nature of the report, and suggested to them that if they think the content of future reports needs to change, then that should be in consultation with relevant stakeholders.
Dr Shane Reti: Is he concerned that New Zealanders will not believe his first response here today, but instead will remember him saying, "Let's not get dramatic" about mental health reporting?
Hon ANDREW LITTLE: I don't think I've faced such a confusing succession of questions, but my first answer was yes, and I stand by that answer.
Dr Shane Reti: Does he think the CEO of the Mental Health Foundation was being dramatic when he said this morning that the mental health situation in New Zealand has got worse under his Government?
Hon ANDREW LITTLE: I don't think the head of the Mental Health Foundation was being dramatic, but he was wrong.
Dr Shane Reti: Has he read any briefings around rationalising specialist services at provincial hospitals to manage funding down pressures?
Hon ANDREW LITTLE: No.




Question No. 3—Arts, Culture and Heritage
3. PAUL EAGLE (Labour—Rongotai) to the Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage: What recent announcements has she made about futureproofing the arts, culture, and heritage sector?
Hon CARMEL SEPULONI (Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage): Last week, I announced the first round of the Cultural Sector Innovation Fund, called Te Urungi: Innovating Aotearoa. Through a series of nationwide events, Te Urungi encompasses a new approach to supporting ideas, collaboration, and safeguarding mātauranga Māori. In acknowledging the impact that COVID-19 has had on the sector, Te Urungi aims to provide support for creatives to work collectively in designing more sustainable and resilient ways of working. This is a key part of the Government's COVID-19 response to help the arts sector rebuild and recover.
Paul Eagle: What is different about this particular fund?
Hon CARMEL SEPULONI: I'm excited that Te Urungi provides us with an opportunity to take a different approach to supporting the arts sector. Over 2½ days, cultural sector practitioners, creatives, collectives, and organisations will be supported by mentors and experts to collaborate, develop, test, and refine their ideas as part of a rapid design process. At the end of each event, the most promising projects will receive funding to support their further development. While securing funding will be a key goal for the participants, these events are being designed so that everyone walks away with new knowledge, skills, and connections that can be further explored and developed moving forward.
Paul Eagle: What feedback has she seen about the announcement?
Hon CARMEL SEPULONI: An opinion editorial in the Dominion Post written by Mark Amery stated, "This week's announcement of … Te Urungi: Innovating Aotearoa is a good example of a government exploring how it can be more open and collaborative with the creative sector beyond the usual gatekeepers." We will continue to gather more feedback as we consolidate and roll out more Te Urungi events across Aotearoa.




Question No. 4—Finance
4. ANDREW BAYLY (National—Port Waikato) to the Minister of Finance: Does he stand by his statement in regard to tenants being evicted from their properties as a result of the housing changes, "I don't think it's a fair characterisation at all, and in fact those changes have not kicked in yet"?
Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Minister of Finance): Yes, I do stand by my full statement, which was a response about the impact of the interest deductibility changes, among other things, where I said there is a four-year phase-in period for anyone who is currently using the interest deductibility mechanism.
Andrew Bayly: Is it Government policy that interest deductibility changes will be backdated to 1 April; and, if so, does he agree the housing policies have already kicked in?
Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: I don't accept that for the phase-in of interest deductibility. There will still be 100 percent availability of that through until the end of September.
Andrew Bayly: Did he expect that the phased removal of interest deductibility would result in mum and dad investors evicting their tenants because they can't afford the tax increases, as has been reported in the media?
Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: I reiterate the comment I made in my last answer: up until 30 September 2021, 100 percent interest deductibility is still available.
Andrew Bayly: Has he asked for specific advice on whether the interest deductibility change he has announced will push up rents and evictions?
Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: As has already been stated in this House during the debate when these announcements were first made, there is a wide range of advice around the impacts on rents. That is because there are a number of issues that impact rental prices, including availability of housing. The questions that people have around their future investment decisions are ones that they will make over the coming months, but there is a wide range of advice on those matters.
Andrew Bayly: What was that advice, and why hasn't he made it public?
Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: In answer to the second part of the question, as was stated in the House earlier this week, that advice will be part of a wider release coming in future weeks.
Andrew Bayly: Is he aware of a recent survey of 3,700 people—mum and dad investors—that revealed that 74 percent of these people now intend to push up rents in order to afford the new-house tax changes?
Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: I'm not aware of that particular survey. What I am aware of is the fact that most landlords in New Zealand value good, solid, long-term relationships with their tenants and look after their tenants.
Matt Doocey: Point of order, Mr Speaker. Can I just ask: previously you took one question off the National Party; the Government MPs made a comment during Mr Bayly's question and there wasn't a question taken off them.
SPEAKER: Sorry. I missed it. I was focusing on dealing with an urgent question during that time.
Matt Doocey: Well, Mr Speaker—
SPEAKER: I missed it; I'm sorry. 
Matt Doocey: Well, will you seek to remedy the question taken off us?
SPEAKER: I'd really not like to get into running this in a way which involves—
Hon Member: Appeal rights?
SPEAKER: Yeah, well, Mr Penk has indicated that it would be quite good to have access to the videos. It certainly would have helped Dr Smith yesterday.
Hon Dr Nick Smith: I would have hoped it would be the video referee.
SPEAKER: It would have helped Nicola Willis—I'm getting that name right today—yesterday, if we did have access. But I'm not proposing to take questions away based on telling tales.




Question No. 5—Revenue
5. BROOKE VAN VELDEN (Deputy Leader—ACT) to the Minister of Revenue: Will the public be consulted on the proposed changes to interest deductibility; and if so, what is the timeline for that consultation?
Hon DAVID PARKER (Minister of Revenue): Yes, the public will be consulted in the coming months, and final design decisions as a result of that consultation will be announced before the changes take effect on 1 October 2021.
Brooke van Velden: Is there anything that submitters could say that would change his mind about his interest deductibility proposals?
Hon DAVID PARKER: Well, yes, as to details. Broadly, the consultation will include the interest allocation approach and the application of rules to particular ownership structures, the treatment of interest costs when a property is sold, the definition of new builds, as well as a number of technical issues, including those relating to specific industry sectors. 
Brooke van Velden: What safeguards will he consult on to ensure that homeowners are not forced to sell their property due to their increased tax bill?
Hon DAVID PARKER: I've seen reports this week, including from people saying that they owned 70 properties, 45 of which were residential rentals. And my reading of the analysis in that article was that the overall tax bill for that particular taxpayer after the four-year transition period would be $45,000 per annum, which would be about $1,000 per property. I suspect most property investors will take decisions as they think fit for their future investment portfolio. But clearly, in the case of that particular individual with 70 properties, the effect was going to be around $1,000 per property per annum.
Brooke van Velden: Will he consult on ways to lessen the tax burden this proposal is projected to have on mum and dad landlords, who will face no other option than to raise rents or sell their asset?
Hon DAVID PARKER: Well, in respect of the assertion in that question that they have no other option other than to raise rents, I would note that most landlords did not drop their rents when interest rates decreased in recent years.




Question No. 6—Environment
6. RACHEL BOYACK (Labour—Nelson) to the Minister for the Environment: Is the Government supporting waste minimisation; if so, how?
Hon DAVID PARKER (Minister for the Environment): Last week, I had the pleasure of opening a manufacturing plant upgrade at Golden Bay Cement in Whangārei, which now uses old tyres to fuel the Golden Bay Cement kiln. Can I begin by acknowledging the efforts of the Hon Nick Smith and the Hon Eugenie Sage in advancing this project in prior Governments. It's a very important project. This plant now uses waste tyres as part of its fuel, and it's going to have a big impact on one of New Zealand's biggest waste problems. The Government has funded $16 million of the $25 million project, which is a Fletcher Building initiative assisted very substantially through the Waste Minimisation Fund.
Rachel Boyack: How will the Golden Bay Cement project minimise waste and reduce carbon emissions?
Hon DAVID PARKER: This very innovative project really is a win-win-win. It helps a significant waste problem, reuses a valuable resource, and reduces coal use. By using old tyres as a fuel, Golden Bay Cement will reduce their coal use by about 15 percent and their ironsand use by about 15,000 tonnes a year—it uses the wire in the tyres instead. Without harmful effects from air discharges, it will divert from landfills or stockpiles about three million end-of-use tyres per annum, making a big dent in the six million end-of-use tyres that New Zealand produces every year.
Rachel Boyack: What other projects is the Government supporting through the Waste Minimisation Fund?
Hon DAVID PARKER: The Waste Minimisation Fund has helped reduce waste under multiple Governments. Some of the most recent funding decisions include a $294,000 project with the Nelson Environment Centre to expand their e-waste repair, reuse, and recycling project. There's a lot of others; I'll only name one. They're very diverse, but $150,000 went to RefillNZ to promote refillable and reusable behaviour to reduce the use of single-use plastic water bottles.
Hon Eugenie Sage: What progress has been made on the establishment of a mandatory product stewardship scheme for tyres so that importers, retailers, and consumers all contribute to a circular economy approach to end-of-life tyres?
Hon DAVID PARKER: Good progress is being made on that. In July 2020, the Prime Minister announced for the Government Cabinet's decision to declare six products, including tyres, as priority products under the Waste Minimisation Act, and the Government's currently developing the regulatory proposals to support implementation of those priority product stewardship schemes, including the tyre industry's proposed scheme. Public consultation is anticipated in the second half of this year.




Question No. 7—ACC
7. JAN LOGIE (Green) to the Minister for ACC: Does she think it is acceptable that ACC now has a more restrictive policy on birth-related injuries, when 85 percent of New Zealand women experience perineal injuries? 
Hon CARMEL SEPULONI (Minister for ACC): I have the deepest sympathy for women who—particularly, those who suffer grade 3 and 4 perineal tears. This occurs during 1 to 2 percent of births and, clearly, can be life changing. However, the member is mistaken: ACC does not have a more restrictive policy. It is bound by its legislation, which does not cover a birth injury unless it is caused by the medical treatment the mother received or a failure to provide treatment. I have asked officials for advice on whether high-end perineal tears should be covered by ACC's legislation. 
Jan Logie: How does the Minister explain a drop in claims for perineal injuries from around an average of 30 a month, to only four claims a month, from August? 
Hon CARMEL SEPULONI: ACC has sought advice from the medical practitioners—people like obstetricians—on perineal tears and where perineal tears may be caused purely by the birth of the child versus by treatment, and has more clarity from the medical experts on what the differentiation between those two scenarios would be. That is what has led to the drop in claims. 
Jan Logie: How does she think people with birth injuries—for example, pelvic rotation—will rehabilitate if they can't afford the hundreds of dollars for, say, osteopathic treatment? 
Hon CARMEL SEPULONI: There is support and healthcare available through the health system. One of the issues that has come up for me, as the Minister discussing and exploring this issue, has been the inconsistency of healthcare and supports available between different DHB catchment areas, and I guess that level of inconsistency isn't necessarily just confined to perineal tears and the treatment of them. I will say that the work that's being done on the health and disability review system and where we are heading is an attempt to address some of those inconsistencies, and we would all like to see that happen. 
Jan Logie: Is the Minister concerned that investigations have shown ACC is more likely to deny women's claims and, if successful, pay them less than men? 
Hon CARMEL SEPULONI: With regards to perineal tears and the assessments that have been made with regards to who is eligible for ACC support, the advice I've had put in front of me is that it is the medical experts that have provided the clarity and the guidance on what may be caused purely by childbirth as opposed to treatment or a lack of treatment, and with regards to women or men getting differential support through ACC, I don't have any of that information in front of me. 
Jan Logie: Will the Minister consider initiating a review of ACC to ensure gender equity of access and outcomes? 
Hon CARMEL SEPULONI: This Government is committed to equal access to supports through ACC, and if there are inequities that are occurring, then, yes, I would expect to receive advice from ACC. 




Question No. 8—Tourism
8. RACHEL BROOKING (Labour) to the Minister of Tourism: How is the Government supporting councils and regions most impacted by the loss of international tourists to build infrastructure for regional development?
Hon STUART NASH (Minister of Tourism): Business in five regions face greater economic uncertainty than others, given their reliance on overseas visitors. The drop in regional tourism activity is primarily measured by monthly data for economic card transactions collated by the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment. The regions are Queenstown Lakes, Kaikōura, Westland, Fiordland, Mackenzie District—Aoraki / Mount Cook. For this reason, I am reopening a special fund, the Tourism Infrastructure Fund, that last allocated support to councils pre-COVID, in November 2019. Although all councils will be able to apply to the Tourism Infrastructure Fund, I've instructed that applications from these regions be prioritised. Between $13 million and $18 million is available in this round.
Rachel Brooking: How has the Tourism Infrastructure Fund supported small councils in the previous rounds?
Hon STUART NASH: The fund is primarily designed to support small councils facing pressures on their infrastructure from an increase in tourism numbers and demand which they cannot fund from their limited ratepayer base. To date, 154 projects have been funded by the Government. It has enabled councils to build and maintain important assets like public toilets and showers, car parks and footpaths, waste disposal and water treatment facilities, freedom camping sites, picnic shelters, jetties and boat ramps, bike stands, and mountain bike hubs. The Tourism Infrastructure Fund and a dedicated freedom camping fund have allocated around $87 million to support regional tourism and visitor facilities in the past three years.
Rachel Brooking: What reports has he received from councils or tourism operators in the five beautiful priority areas about the impact of the Government's support?
Hon STUART NASH: I met with the Mayor of Kaikōura and councillors and tourism operators in the town last week. They told me their town has been doing it tough in the five years since the earthquake, but they have big plans for making the best use of the fund and are looking at an innovative proposal to develop a network of walkways and cycleways along the coast, which will be popular with domestic and international tourists alike. The Southland District Mayor, Gary Tong, says he's been keen to discuss ideas with Fiordland locals about the best way to support jobs and businesses there. The Mackenzie District Mayor, Graham Smith, says his council will be taking full advantage of the support, a sentiment shared in public comments by Queenstown Mayor Jim Boult and Westland Mayor Bruce Smith. One objective that is shared across all five regions is the need to diversify their local economies to reduce their reliance on one industry: international tourism.




Question No. 9—COVID-19 Response
9. CHRIS BISHOP (National) to the Minister for COVID-19 Response: Did he receive a paper from the Ministry of Health dated 26 January 2021 outlining the initial delivery schedule of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine and an 11-week roll-out schedule; if so, why has New Zealand not cumulatively administered 390,413 as stated at week seven?
Hon Dr AYESHA VERRALL (Associate Minister of Health) on behalf of the Minister for COVID-19 Response: My office received the document on 28 January. This was a draft early design plan which showed one scenario based on information available at the time. Specifically, it shows three phases, with delivery dates only available for phase 1, reflecting the first tranche of Pfizer vaccine doses we purchased. Since then, we made a decision in February to purchase enough Pfizer to cover the population over 16 years of age, meaning an additional 8.5 million doses. On the basis of that, we also then received several updated delivery schedules from Pfizer. We then developed a roll-out model that consistently scaled the number of doses given per day over time until July, when the majority of our stocks arrive. This means the model we operate to now differs substantially from the draft document in question. We also made decisions in February to change the sequencing framework to prioritise border workers and front-line health workers.
Chris Bishop: Why, when the Government has received over 450,000 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine, are we not even close to administering the 390,000 the Ministry of Health outlined in January?
Hon Dr AYESHA VERRALL: I reject the notion that the document in question was a finalised plan. It was a draft. But let me be clear on what would happen if we pursued a roll-out at the speed the member is suggesting. We would have burnt out the stocks, and we would now be closing down vaccination sites, sending the staff back to their other jobs in the DHB in order—[Interruption]
SPEAKER: Order! Order! No, the Minister will resume her seat. I'm just going to ask people to turn the volume down on my left so I can hear the answer. Can I also make—I don't know if I'm meant to make this sort of suggestion. I think if the Minister put her pen down, it wouldn't wind them up in quite the same way.
Hon Dr AYESHA VERRALL: We will be delivering this vaccine roll-out in a sustainable way, with an incremental increase over time until the stocks arrive in July.
Chris Bishop: Why, when the Government is in possession of an additional 225,000 doses more than the ministry knew it would have when it provided the advice in January, are we nowhere near the 390,000 doses it said should be administered in week seven?
Hon Dr AYESHA VERRALL: As I mentioned in my previous answer, we need to gradually and sustainably scale up the number of doses delivered over time so that we don't need to unroll the vaccination programme we are rolling out.
Chris Bishop: Why did the vaccination dashboard released yesterday not publish the weekly targets into the future of how many doses of the COVID-19 vaccine would be administered, when the Minister has been receiving numbers as early as January on this?
Hon Dr AYESHA VERRALL: The ministry has published an outline of the model, which reflects the doses to be delivered in the future.
Chris Bishop: On that model, will the Government publish the underlying data from the spreadsheet that goes into the graph that the ministry has released, so that New Zealanders can assess for themselves how many doses will be administered in every week?
Hon Dr AYESHA VERRALL: The spreadsheet of the number of doses delivered per week was added to the ministry website last night.
Hon Dr Nick Smith: That doesn't address the question.
SPEAKER: Order! Order! I'm going to ask the member to repeat his question, and I'm going to ask Dr Nick Smith to stop trying to chair the House from that seat.
Chris Bishop: Well, it was a bit off the cuff, so this may not be it.
SPEAKER: Well, the question was, essentially, will the Government publish the underlying data from the spreadsheet.
Chris Bishop: I can ask it again, but OK.
SPEAKER: Well, I can remember what the member said.
Hon Dr AYESHA VERRALL: So the ministry has published an outline of the model that will show our progress towards scaling up towards the end of the year, and we consistently provide weekly updates of our progress against targets.
Chris Bishop: Why has the border worker announced at 1 o'clock today as—[Interruption]
SPEAKER: Order! Order! Can the members from two parties down the back just behave themselves and be quiet, please.
Chris Bishop: Why has the border worker announced at 1 o'clock today as contracting COVID-19 not yet received any doses of the COVID-19 vaccine, and what are the logistic issues the Director-General of Health indicated were the reasons he has not yet been vaccinated?
Hon Grant Robertson: Point of order, Mr Speaker. The question on notice covers a specific document and a schedule of vaccinations, and I don't believe that question flows on from that matter.
Chris Bishop: Speaking to the point of order.
SPEAKER: Well, speaking to the point of order—the member can table my note if he wants to.
Chris Bishop: Well, I accept on the first clause of the question, but I think the second clause of the primary, around the administration of COVID-19 vaccines, brings it within the scope.
SPEAKER: And that was my ruling when I made a decision on an urgent question: that it could be incorporated within supplementaries to this question. The primary question is just wide enough. And for the Government's information, in case anyone is still counting, because of the urgency of the situation, I granted the Opposition an additional supplementary question in order to cover that off.
Hon Dr AYESHA VERRALL: The investigation into this case is under way, and, indeed, that will be a question that we are asking. We continue to progress vaccination of border workers. We have achieved high levels of vaccination in the border workforce—over 17,000 people—and we now have a small number with whom we are having conversations about redeployment.
Chris Bishop: How many front-line border workers are yet to receive the COVID-19 vaccine?
Hon Dr AYESHA VERRALL: I'm very happy for the member to put that question in writing to my office and we'll provide the answer.




Question No. 10—Transport
10. SIMON COURT (ACT) to the Minister of Transport: Does he stand by his statement in the light rail Cabinet paper, released on 31 March, that the project faces "a funding shortfall, requiring substantial central government support"?
Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Deputy Prime Minister) on behalf of the Minister of Transport: Yes, in the full context of the Cabinet paper, which makes it clear that funding and financing of the project will be better understood through the business case and policy work.
Simon Court: Will he rule out increasing petrol excise duties and road-user charges to fund light rail, as suggested in the Cabinet paper, while he is transport Minister?
Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: On behalf of the Minister, the Government has indeed ruled that out for this term of Government.
Simon Court: Will he rule out reprioritising other transport projects to fund light rail, as also suggested in the Cabinet paper; if so, which projects could be reprioritised?
Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: On behalf of the Minister, as the paper notes, there is a considerable amount of work to be done to decide on the exact funding arrangements. It is not my intention that we take money away from existing projects, but we will be working through a number of funding options.




Question No. 11—Women
11. SARAH PALLETT (Labour—Ilam) to the Minister for Women: What recent reports has she seen on New Zealand's gender equality gap?
Hon JAN TINETTI (Minister for Women): I'm pleased to inform the House that New Zealand's placing on the Global Gender Gap Report has moved from sixth place in 2020 to fourth place in 2021, just behind Iceland, Norway, and Finland. On 30 March 2021, the World Economic Forum released its 2021 Global Gender Gap Report, a report that analyses the gender equality gap for 156 countries by looking at data from four indicators: economic participation and opportunity, educational attainment, health and survival, and political attainment. This is welcome progress and shows this Government is delivering for women.
Sarah Pallett: What does the report highlight is a contributing factor, or contributing factors, for New Zealand moving from No. 6 to No. 4, as the most equal country?
Hon JAN TINETTI: This report highlights the success of New Zealand's work on closing the gender pay gap, increased women's participation in the labour market, and our share of women in professional and technical roles. It also highlights New Zealand's increased representation of women in Parliament, up from 40 percent to 48 percent in 2021, and increased women in ministerial positions to 40 percent. However, the report does indicate that despite this progress, we still have some more work to do, and, as the Minister for Women, I am committed to continue to see this progress.
Sarah Pallett: What initiatives have been progressed in the last four years that have contributed to closing the gender pay gap?
Hon JAN TINETTI: Under this Government, New Zealand has made significant progress on the gender pay gap and pay equity. For example, with the Gender Pay Gap Action Plan, we've delivered the biggest drop in the Public Service gender pay gap in 17 years. It's now at 9.6 percent, the lowest ever recorded. We've passed the Equal Pay Amendment Act, enshrining in law the principle of equal pay for work of equal value. This will deliver significant pay increases to female-dominated workforces and will make sure women are paid fairly. We have achieved the highest ever representation of women in several important areas in Parliament, reached our target of 50 percent women in public sector boards and committees, and 53 percent in public sector senior leadership roles. We've also increased paid parental leave from 22 to 26 weeks so that parents can make choices about balancing paid work and caring responsibilities, introduced leave for people who have experienced miscarriage, and introduced domestic violence leave.




Question No. 12—Health
12. MATT DOOCEY (National—Waimakariri) to the Minister of Health: Can he confirm that since 2017-18 the average wait-time for child and adolescent mental health services has got worse across at least 16 of the 20 district health boards?
Hon ANDREW LITTLE (Minister of Health): I am aware that wait times have increased slightly over the last five years for child and adolescent mental health services around the country; however, this is also consistent with increased access to services over this time period, meaning that more people are receiving support. Child and adolescent mental health services are funded to see children and adolescents up to the age of 18 with the highest level of mental health or alcohol and other drug needs. I have been advised that the Ministry of Health provides DHBs with guidelines on data reporting through its Programme for the Integration of Mental Health Data, known as "PRIMHD"—the data collection programme. However, as this data is collected and aggregated at the DHB level, it's not possible to verify the consistency of the data that the member, in reports made public today, has himself collated. One of the challenges we have in the system about getting accurate data is because of the nine years of underinvestment by the previous Government in IT infrastructure.
Matt Doocey: In light of the Minister's response, when he used the word "slightly", how does that reconcile when some DHBs are reporting an increased wait time under his watch from 34 days to 59 days?
Hon ANDREW LITTLE: My answer referred to the slight increase across the system as a whole. Across the system as a whole, those wait times have increased between 5 percent and 7 percent, and that is because of the growing number of young people getting access to the services, which is pushing those times out.
Matt Doocey: Why, then, when the Minister refers to years of underfunding in the former National Government, were reported waiting times stable and declining under the last National Government, when, under his Government, they have increased significantly?
SPEAKER: Order! The member just can't ask about why something was declining under the National Government. That is not his responsibility.
Matt Doocey: Does it concern the Minister, with all his announcements of investment, that waiting times for child and adolescent mental health services were stabilised and declining under the former National Government yet under his watch they have increased significantly?
Hon ANDREW LITTLE: What I think has happened is that expectations have increased because this is a Government that has put a lot more—way more—into mental health and addiction services than the previous Government did. More people are getting more access to services, and it is putting pressure on those services, but that's why we have given ourselves four to five years to transform a system that was so badly run down by the previous Government.
Matt Doocey: Why will the Minister not take responsibility for the fact that waiting times for child and adolescent mental health services have increased significantly since Labour came to office despite promising to increase access?
SPEAKER: OK. I'm going to ask the member to rephrase his question. The member starts off with an assertion which has not been as yet justified.
Matt Doocey: Will the Minister take responsibility for the reported waiting times for child and adolescent mental health services that have increased in the last three years?
Hon ANDREW LITTLE: What I will take responsibility for is continuing the incredible work that this Government has been doing to rescue a poorly neglected and run down mental health and addiction service, putting more investment in it, and helping more people who have desperately needed it for so long.
Matt Doocey: Why, when we are constantly told by the Government that they have invested new money into mental health services, are there reports from mental health professionals stating the money is not flowing in?
Hon ANDREW LITTLE: Well, just to put some context around that, what I can say is that this Government has put an additional $318.4 million of ring-fenced funding around specialist mental health services in the last three years, compared to the previous three years, which was $194.5 million. So we have nearly doubled what the previous Government had put in over an equivalent period of time. The services in this country around mental health were so badly run down, and that's why we've had to give ourselves a five-year time frame to transform them, to do the investment and to transform them. That programme of work is 20 months in. We have a way to go, and we're doing our best to help the people who most desperately need it.
Matt Doocey: Will the Minister commit today to releasing the data for waiting times in mental health services?
Hon ANDREW LITTLE: All information and all data that has been publicly available will continue to be publicly available, and that member has himself produced material from publicly available data. So we will continue to honour that commitment.






IMMIGRATION (COVID-19 RESPONSE) AMENDMENT BILL
First Reading
Hon KRIS FAAFOI (Minister of Immigration): I present a legislative statement on the Immigration (COVID-19 Response) Amendment Bill. [Interruption]
SPEAKER: Order! The very senior members down there should know much better. Start again, please.
Hon KRIS FAAFOI: I present a legislative statement on the Immigration (COVID19 Response) Amendment Bill.
SPEAKER: The legislative statement is published under the authority of the House and will be found on the Parliament website.
Hon KRIS FAAFOI: I move, That the Immigration (COVID-19 Response) Amendment Bill be now read a first time. I nominate the Education and Workforce Committee to consider the bill. At the appropriate time, I intend to move that the bill be reported back to the House by 29 April 2021 and that the committee have the authority to meet at any time while the House is sitting (except during oral questions), during an evening on a day on which there has been a sitting of the House, and on a Friday in a week in which there has been a sitting of the House, despite Standing Orders 193 and 196(1)(b) and (c).
SPEAKER: Sorry, can the member just repeat those numbers, please.
Hon KRIS FAAFOI: Despite Standing Orders 193 and 196(1)(b) and (c).
SPEAKER: Now, is the member aware that that differs from the advice that I have received previously?
Hon KRIS FAAFOI: I'm looking at my sheet, Mr Speaker, and I may have to add Standing Order 195.
SPEAKER: All right. OK, that having been done, that's clear and we've now got notice of what the member's going to move later, thank you.
Hon KRIS FAAFOI: Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. It has been almost a year since Parliament unanimously supported the passage of the Immigration (COVID-19 Response) Amendment Act of 2020. It amended the Immigration Act of 2009 by establishing eight administrative powers to allow the Government to respond effectively and efficiently to issues arising due to the imposition, obviously, of the global pandemic. The bill was considered by the Epidemic Response Committee in the previous Parliament. When we in this House considered the bill last year, it was not clear how long the impacts of the global pandemic would last for, and we hoped it would be brief so that eight powers would expire on 15 May of this year. 
However, the House will be aware that while New Zealand's domestic situation has improved since the introduction of the powers, the global circumstances under which the powers were initially passed have not changed as much as we had hoped. New Zealand still has closed borders to much of the world, and the global pandemic is still infecting and killing large numbers of people, and there is a risk that future variants of the virus could impact on visa operations again.
The arguments for continuing to maintain the flexibility that these powers give will remain until border restrictions can be lifted. The bill only changes the duration of the powers of the bill passed last year. It does not propose any changes. The bill therefore seeks to extend the duration of those eight administrative powers and shifts their appeal date to the close of 15 May 2023.
It does not propose to change any of the aspects of the powers, although it does look to extend the maximum duration of any associated regulations from a three-month maximum to a six-month maximum. I propose this because the frequent renewal of the regulations is costly and the short time span of each renewal of those regulations is causing uncertainty. The time frame for the passing of the bill reflects the upcoming expiry of those eight powers, and it will also enable the select committee to consider the case for an extension and, obviously, to take any submissions from those who have any comments to make about the use of those powers and any potential changes they might like to see because of its use over the last 11 months.
The bill does justify an efficient select committee process. As I said, it doesn't introduce any new powers. It extends the same settings with a technical change to the length of the maximum duration of the regulations. Last year, when the bill was submitted on—and I believe the Hon Michael Woodhouse may have chaired that or was certainly on the Epidemic Response Committee at the time—there were 13 written submissions and the select committee heard oral submissions over two days. We do want to make sure that this does have public scrutiny and public input. As I say, it was unanimous when the bill passed last year, but there may be some input around how the powers have been used over the last 11 months that the select committee may want to hear. 
This year, stakeholders have already been engaged on the extension of the current powers, and there are existing safeguards on the use of the powers that will remain in place. For example, the powers relating to classes of persons can only be exercised by special directions made by the Minister of Immigration, and they have to be made public and they can be overturned. So, in summary, this is about ensuring we continue to have the legal and legislative tools we have had in the past 12 months to adapt to changes presented by COVID-19. 
I won't go into the powers and detail as the legislative statement has been tabled already. But broadly, they enable the Government in response to COVID-19 to amend visa conditions for large groups of people. They also extend the visas of large groups of people for varying periods of time, and that power certainly has been used. Through regulations, it is able to stop people from overseas from making applications for visas while we have our border restrictions, and it can revoke a deemed—and that means an automatically granted—entry permission or visa while we have our border restrictions in place; in other words, telling people who have tried to arrive on the likes of marine vessels or by private planes that they have to leave. Most of the powers have been exercised over the last 12 months that they've been in existence, with the exception of the ability to revoke the entry permission of a person deemed to hold entry permission. 
Over the last year, Ministers of Immigration have exercised the special direction powers a total of 18 times. One of these uses benefited around 20,000 people by extending temporary visa entry class visas held by certain employer assisted workers and their family members. And also, in February, I extended the temporary visitor visas of 9,500 people for two months so that they could remain lawfully in New Zealand while they were organising travel home or applying for further visas. 
The regulations which prevent most people offshore from applying for a temporary entry class visa unless invited to apply, they've also been renewed every three months since they first came into effect in August of last year. And these regulations have stopped the inflow of applications which wouldn't meet border exceptions criteria to allow the applicants to enter New Zealand. 
Most non - New Zealanders who wish to travel to New Zealand now gain approval to do so through qualifying for a border exception, then being invited to apply for a visa, and a visa is granted on condition that the person has a critical purpose, as laid out in the border exception instructions for travelling to New Zealand. As we have seen, there are always debates about which critical skills or humanitarian circumstances should be prioritised for entry, but I note that New Zealand has been admitting about twice as many people per capita as Australia has.
As I said, the powers in the current Act are subject to safeguards. The major safeguard is that the powers relating to classes of persons can only be exercised by special directions made by me, and I cannot delegate these functions. And the special directions must be tabled with the House of Representatives here in the House and are disallowable. This means they have to be made public and the special directions can be overturned. Together, these form safeguards against any Minister of Immigration using these powerful and sweeping powers in ways that Parliament did not intend when the legislation was passed. 
Generally, the exercise of the powers has to be clearly tied to COVID-19 or the effects of the responses to current COVID-19. The two exceptions to those protections are the power to suspend the ability of certain offshore persons from making temporary entry class visa applications and the ability to tell people planning to come here by marine craft or private aircraft that their deemed entry permission will be revoked if they try. 
Obviously, all of the powers are also subject to the two-year sunset clause if the bill is passed, which we obviously plan to do. The bill maintains important powers to enable the Government to respond to the COVID-19 outbreak as it might develop over the next two years. 
So I move that the bill be reported back to the House by 29 April 2021, and that the committee, as I said, have authority to meet at any time while the House is sitting, during an evening on a day in which the House has been sitting, on a Friday in a week which there has been a sitting of the House, despite those Standing Orders 193, 195, and 196(1)(b) and (c). I commend the bill to the House.
ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jenny Salesa): The question is that the motion be agreed to.





ERICA STANFORD (National—East Coast Bays): Thank you, Madam Speaker. I'm pleased to take a call on the Immigration (COVID-19 Response) Amendment Bill under much better circumstances, can I say, than we originally passed a similar bill a year ago, when I wasn't able to be in the House. We were under strict lockdowns, and there were just a few of us here to debate this legislation originally.
A year ago, there was a need for this legislation. We had a thousand or more Immigration New Zealand employees who were unable to work from home during lockdown and unable to process visas. Even under level 3, we had only 20 percent of those workers allowed back to work, and at level 2, 50 percent, so there was a need for extraordinary powers to be passed to the Minister in the absence of Immigration New Zealand officials not being able to go to work. With around 350,000 temporary visa holders onshore at the time needing help from Immigration New Zealand, again, this legislation was necessary. We had 200,000-plus work visa holders with employment conditions that needed variations, 70,000 student visa holders needing their visa conditions relaxed, and 55,000 visitor visa holders needing extensions.
It was a radical bill that we passed a year ago. There were significant powers that were transferred to the Minister to alter whole classes of visas at the stroke of a pen, affecting tens of thousands of lives, and we were under no illusion at the time that this was a spectacular transfer of power to a Minister. But, given the circumstances at the time, it was necessary, and we were satisfied somewhat that there were sufficient safeguards in the bill to act as a check on these significant powers. Most of the powers can only be exercised by special direction—as Minister Faafoi outlined—through disallowable instruments made by the Minister, and the ability to suspend applications offshore have to be made by Order in Council. Six of the eight powers can only be exercised to the advantage, or at least not to the disadvantage, of visa holders, and, importantly, there was that sunset clause of one year.
Over the last year, to be fair to the Minister, the powers under this Act were used 18 times, and for entirely appropriate reasons. The way in which they were communicated at times was not desirable, but I will speak about that later. But in credit to the Minister, he has used his powers well to extend work visas, extend visitor visas, extend working holiday visas, and ease conditions to allow those holders to remain in New Zealand and work in the horticulture industry, for example. He's waived fees for onshore Recognised Seasonal Employer (RSE) workers and waived the requirement for chest X-rays for RSE visa applicants. 
This bill today asks us to extend these very significant powers for another two years, and there are a number of problems with this request. We need to be very clear about the reasons that the Minister wants to grant such extreme powers for such a long time. 
The reasons that this Parliament agreed to grant these powers in the first instance was, as I mentioned, that those Immigration New Zealand workers were unable to work from home, but now we're in a situation where we have a thousand-plus Immigration New Zealand officials who are all able to work from their place of work. They're not at home, or they shouldn't be at home—I assume they're all working from home and have the ability to process visas—and the question for the Minister is: what work has he undertaken in the last 12 months to enable his staff, the thousand-plus staff, to be able to work from home? 
Granting extraordinary powers to the Minister for two years means we need to be asking these questions. We've had a year for these immigration officials to be able to be working from home, and with the fact that they are actually now able to work from their place of work, we have to question the need for this bill when they are able to do their jobs. 
At the time we passed this bill a year ago, we had 350,000 visa holders onshore—a significant amount of people that needed the conditions of their visas changed, potentially. But those numbers have changed, and we heard nothing from the Minister today—there was nothing in his speech—to indicate what those numbers are now. We know that a significant amount of those people have left. The question for the Minister is: why can't those Immigration New Zealand officials who are now working from their place of work process these visas in the normal way that they normally would? There haven't been any numbers from the Minister on this to give us any reason to grant him these extraordinary powers for such a long period of time, and you'd think that he would have given them today, given that he is asking for such a lot for such a long time. 
The other reason that we granted him these extraordinary powers was that there were people who were stuck in New Zealand and they were unable to get home. Many of those people have now left. There are flights out, they are able to get home, and there's also visas available to be able to cover those people. We will be raising these questions at select committee and at committee stage, because they do need to be answered. The Minister, I think, was not forthcoming enough today on the reasons that he wants this power to be extended for such a long time. 
The extension for two years raises two questions for us—or it leads us to two assumptions, I suppose. The first is that two years leads us to think that New Zealand's borders are going to be closed for a lot longer than this Government is letting on, and the second thing that it leads us to assume is that there is no plan from this Minister in his portfolio. 
Addressing the first point of the borders being closed for a lot longer than we expected, two years is so much longer than what anyone expected. Even at one year last time, you had people like the Law Society questioning whether or not that was too long a time, and they raised serious concerns about that. Now, we see in the Cabinet paper that he was actually thinking about three years, or having no sunset clause at all. So we must consider, in light of the Government's comments also around the need for purpose-built managed isolation and quarantine (MIQ) facilities—we've heard the Government saying, "Look, we don't need MIQ purpose-built facilities because even if we started now, by the time we'd have them built, it'd be 18 months and we won't have a reason for them in 18 months." Yet here we are, being asked to give the Minister of Immigration two years of these very, very special powers, and the question is: why does he need two years? 
He didn't give us any reason in his initial speech as to why two years is required, and why on earth was the Minister considering three years, or no sunset clause? These questions need to be answered at committee stage. A check on these powers was one year, originally, and two years is a lot to ask. 
On that second point, about no plan from the Minister of Immigration, we haven't seen anything from him in the last year that gives the ability for Immigration New Zealand staff to be able to work from home. If resourcing is a problem, then why hasn't he done anything in that area over the last 12 months to allow Immigration New Zealand officials to process visas in the way that they normally would? What has he done about upgrading Immigration New Zealand's ability to process things online? These are questions that need asking, because if we're going to be just giving extraordinary powers that we wouldn't normally give to a Minister, we shouldn't be doing so because he's been lazy for the last 12 months. 
What we need to know also is why Immigration New Zealand is in such a mess. There's a revolving door, a high staff turnover. Residence applications are taking two years to be processed, there's a backlog in the expressions of interest pool, residence files aren't being processed, and their own Minister forgot to implement the residence programme numbers in January 2020, causing all of these problems. Immigration New Zealand officials are on a go-slow because of this Government's ineptitude around immigration settings, and, on top of all of that, we've had the Minister ignore split migrant families. And here we have a Minister saying, "Hey, transfer me all of these extraordinary powers, please.", after being completely lazy in his immigration portfolio for the last nine months. This is—
Hon Members: Ooh! 
ERICA STANFORD: Well, the truth hurts. 
We are being asked to do a lot, and we will talk about process, or my colleagues will talk about process, because I'm running out of time. But what I do need to say is that, with reservations, we will support the bill, not because of the Minister doing a great job in his portfolio, but—but—for the many visitor visa holders who we cannot send home to COVID hot spots who are frail, elderly, immunocompromised, and vulnerable, and who are spending money here, for those RSE workers that we desperately need, for those work visa holders that need the conditions of their visas changed, and for those working holiday visa holders. 
But we will ask the Minister to be more clear in his processes and his communications. He talked earlier about giving a visitor visa extension. We have to remember, he gave that five days before all of those visitor visa extensions were about to expire. 
So we support this bill, with serious reservations, and my colleagues will have more to say. 





MARJA LUBECK (Labour): Thank you, Madam Speaker. Isn't that speech an absolute example of why the National Party keeps going down in the polls? Because they're out of touch, completely disconnected with actually what New Zealand is about and what New Zealanders want. New Zealanders want to be safe in their country. New Zealanders don't want the borders opened all over the place, as this National Party has been calling for from the beginning. We were standing here a year ago saying, "No, we shouldn't be opening the borders.", when they were calling for it. 
Now, the previous speaker did mention a couple of questions which I think common sense would easily be able to respond to. The question from the member was: what are the immigration staff doing now? Well, if anybody has any illusions on the fact that this is an extremely busy department, they are on another planet. But, obviously, most of those staff who were previously processing the normal visa applications are now dealing with the border exemption applications. So there is your answer. 
The other question was: why two years? Well, I think we do this for two years because we don't have to spend this time in the House again if this pandemic is raging on a year from now, which is very well possible. Nobody would hope so, and, in fact, when we were going through the last bill, we were hoping that by this time we would be no longer needing these powers, but we are. So who knows where we are this time next year—so, hence it is two years.
So the Minister outlined very clearly that this is a really simple bill. It doesn't introduce any new powers. In fact, all it does is extends the same settings. It extends the repeal date of the Government's temporary powers. It needs to do so because otherwise that initial original bill that I just mentioned would expire next month. That original bill was passed unanimously by Parliament.
So what this bill will do: it will maintain the additional immigration system flexibility approved last year by Parliament. The previous member, Erica Stanford, was trying to scaremonger around the wide-ranging powers, which, by his own admission, the Minister totally mentioned the powerful and sweeping powers of this particular bill. But the bill has major safeguards in it, and they will continue to be implemented. Again, the Minister outlined those very clearly in his speech. I'm quite happy to reiterate, as the previous member didn't pick those up.
Firstly, the majority of the powers cited within this particular bill are disallowable instruments. So that means that those instruments—or, in layman terms, the powers as delegated to the Minister—can be disallowed by the House. So, basically, that means that there is a really clear precaution in place to provide that accountability mechanism to use these immigration powers.
Secondly, the exercise of those powers also needs to be really clearly tied either to COVID-19 or the effects of any responses to COVID-19. So, really, they can only be exercised in relation to COVID-19. So it's a really simple bill, and I think it's a helpful reminder for all of us—in particular, the previous speaker—that while our response to COVID-19 has been very successful, there are still global circumstances under which these powers were initially passed, and they still stand.
We in New Zealand are not immune to what happens in the rest of the world, and we've certainly seen that over the last year. But because of this Government's action to stop COVID-19 at the border, we are able to enjoy all those freedoms that we have—and the interaction—in New Zealand. We are able to go to our markets and have our events and hug and meet our families and friends, and that is a really different situation in so many other countries in the world. In fact, New Zealand is, to date, still the envy of the rest of the world. And if the previous member were maybe to have a look outside of Aotearoa New Zealand and see what it's like for people in other countries, they might have a clear understanding of how fortunate we are.
My parents in the Netherlands just celebrated—celebrated?—their second Easter in lockdown. It's a third wave in that country despite having had the lockdowns, despite starting their vaccination programme. They still have thousands of new cases every day. So since March 2020, they've been inside. They can't go and see their family. They can't see their friends. They've been cut off from their grandchildren and children. Many like them, all the elderly and vulnerable, are afraid to go out. They are unsafe and so they're staying home. So that is the reality for most of the country. So let's count our blessings for where we are and what we have, because COVID-19 continues to rage around the globe.
What this bill does is it maintains those really important powers that have enabled our Government to respond to the COVID-19 outbreak as we've seen it and as it will, perhaps, develop over the next two years. So it has given our country a real opportunity to build back better, and that is thanks to that strategy that our Government developed to eliminate COVID-19 from our communities and to keep New Zealanders safe.
I always really like to think back to what our Minister Grant Robertson said in his 2020 Budget speech. He said—and he spoke to the "glimmer of silver lining on the darkest of clouds", because we have that opportunity here in New Zealand to build back better. So as chair of the Education and Workforce Committee—
Chris Bishop: Oh, are you? Oh my Lord!
MARJA LUBECK: Yes. Indeed I am. In fact, Mr Bishop, that committee was referred to recently by one of the Ministers as not only the hardest-working but also the best-looking select committee in Parliament. So there you go.
So as chair of that particular committee—despite being an extremely busy select committee—I am indeed looking forward very much to receiving submissions on this bill over the next couple of weeks. We are going to report back to the House, I understand, at the end of this month, on 29 April. I commend this bill to the House. Thank you, Madam Speaker.





CHRIS BISHOP (National): Well, that was a typically mediocre contribution from that Government member Marja Lubeck. I'm quite staggered to discover Marja Lubeck is a chair of a committee, but, anyway, I suppose, happy days for her.
Marja Lubeck: The only chair you've got is to cheer up!
CHRIS BISHOP: Yeah.
We support this bill, but with reservations, and I want to make a serious point, because there was really no engagement with the substance of the issue by the speaker who just spoke before me, and that's the reason why I described it as a mediocre contribution, because I think if members on the other side were reasonable and fair—and I know there are some smart members on the other side—they would acknowledge that the powers being given to the Minister through this bill are substantial. They're eight temporary powers to impose, vary, or cancel conditions for classes of temporary entry class visa holders; the power to vary or cancel conditions for resident class, extend the expiry date for visas, to waive any regulatory requirements, to revoke entry permissions—I means, these are literally huge powers. It wouldn't be fair to characterise them as "Henry VIII" powers—"Henry VIII" powers in the legislative parlance in New Zealand refer to giving the Minister the power to actually change the law passed by Parliament. So it probably wouldn't be fair to call them "Henry VIII" powers, but they are big and they deal with who can come into New Zealand, the conditions upon which they can come into New Zealand, and the conditions upon which they can stay.
Now, we backed the legislation back in May last year, and the Minister has pointed out it passed the Parliament unanimously, and the reason for that is that, you know, no one knew what was going to happen back in May last year—you know, we were in the middle of the lockdown, extraordinary circumstances, it felt like the world was crashing down around us in the island of New Zealand—or islands, plural. So I think that was the right decision.
But things are different now, and I acknowledge what Ms Lubeck says around the fact that COVID is still running rampant around the world, and we still don't know much about the future. And that is why, on balance, we are backing the bill, because we do still think the Minister needs to be able to respond flexibly, and we generally think the Minister has used the powers given to him in a good way. We support the various orders that he's made, pursuant to the Act.
But I just do want to make the serious point that we granted the Minister these powers for a year, and now he's gone for two years, so we object in principle to that—two years looks like an overreach to us; it looks like an extension that is too long. Possibly, we could support another year, in which the Government would then have to come back and legislate again, but, you know, there's nothing actually wrong with that in principle. In fact, I would argue, constitutional principle would dictate the Government should come back and seek a further mandate from the legislature for the granting of extraordinary powers.
So, you know, two years—I can see why the Government's done it, because it's convenient for them and it's convenient for the officials, because we'll just abrogate the power to the Minister and to the Government and, you know, we can sort of sort things out later, within the two-year window. But it's not good lawmaking; it's not good lawmaking. So we object to the two years, and we're going to argue through the committee process—the shortened, truncated committee process—that the Government's powers should be limited down to one year, and I think that's a reasonable request. I think it's consistent with constitutional principle, I think it's consistent with good lawmaking practice, and I think it should just be a one-year extension.
The other thing that sort of arises from the two-year extension is, you know, respectfully, what has the Government been doing for the last year in relation to the future policy settings in relation to migration? So, you know, again, back in May last year, it was very difficult to predict what would happen into the future, so let's retain some flexibility, give the Minister the power to do these variations, to do these alterations, because we don't know what's going to happen. We do have more certainty now; there's no doubt about that. We're in a more certain environment compared to where we were in May 2020, and I think the Government should have done some work around what immigration policy settings should look like into the next year and the year after that. And it may be that if that work had been done, we could have a much more tailored bill, because this bill, essentially, just replicates everything that we passed last year. And, again, bad lawmaking—we could have got a more tailored bill if we'd done the work in relation to exactly what is required for our immigration policy settings. So I think objectionable in principle and objectionable in practice, but, you know, we will support the bill to the committee to try and get some changes to it.
I do want to talk about the truncated select committee process. It's just unacceptable that we are having a shortened time frame again. I know members opposite will say, you know, the National Party was guilty of that when we were in Government, and blah-blah-blah. You know, there's some truth to that, but two wrongs do not make a right, and it is not legitimate to continue with a shoddy select committee process just because you can.
And what I fear with this Government is the power that accrues from 65 seats is vast, and the temptation is always to use the power. You know, that's the whole point of Government; it's to use power. For the first time, we have, under MMP, a Government with 65 seats. You know, Geoffrey Palmer said it would never happen. In fact, I think I'm right in saying that Geoffrey Palmer said it was impossible for anyone to ever achieve an absolute majority under MMP. Well, he's been wrong about quite a few things recently, not the least of which was last night in relation to the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act, and he was wrong about this as well, because this Government does have that, and we respect the mandate. I'm not arguing with the mandate, we respect the result of the election; I'm just making the point that with election results that are extraordinary, like that, comes extraordinary power. We don't have a strong legislature in New Zealand in comparison to the executive. We have an executive that is taken from the legislature. And when you have that, and when you have 65 seats out of 120 to one party, that results in enormous power accruing to the executive and accruing to the party that holds the executive at that time. Of course, that flows down into the legislative measures that are taken in terms of process. And it is wrong, I believe, that a bill like this goes to a shortened time frame.
You know, I come back to the point: we've had a year. We've had a year to sort this out. We could have had a bill introduced in November-December last year, after the election. I acknowledge that would have required some quick work by the officials. But, frankly, no disrespect to the immigration officials, and no disrespect to the Public Service more generally: not a lot of work gets done by the Public Service during the election campaign; I'm telling you that for free. Not a lot happens in terms of substantive policy work, because everyone's waiting to see who'll be back in Government.
So that work could have happened at any time in the last year, and then the Government could have turned up with a more tailored bill after the election and put it into the House for a select committee process. But they haven't done that, and that does concern me. Instead, what we've got, right at the very tail end of the one-year limit expiring, is the Government going, "We've got to do something about this. Oh, we'll just extend it for another two years."
And that does concern me, because I'll tell you what I reckon happened: what I reckon happened is that everyone kind of forgot about it, everyone kind of forgot Parliament had passed this bill, and it expired, and then, at some point, some smart official went, "Um, Minister, do you realise that the Act actually expires at the end of April? You should probably extend it, and so on." And the Minister Kris Faafoi said, "Yeah, that's a good point. We probably do need to do that. We'll just quickly ram it through and we'll go for the two years."
And that's the point around the power, right? That's the point around what happens when you have 65 seats and you have all the power, because in that environment, what happens is what the Minister wants, the Minister gets, because the Minister takes the paper to Cabinet and says, "Here's what I want to do." As long as Cabinet signs it off, it goes to the caucus, and I'm telling you now, to the Labour backbenchers, it's not in your career best interests to oppose what a Minister takes to caucus—good luck to you if you do; I admire your courage and your spirit, but I don't think many of you do. I'm not having a go at you; I'm just saying that's the way the place works, and so the things go through the caucus, and then the Minister turns up to the House, and with 65 votes for a bill, and then it can happen. It can happen, and it's going to happen, because the Government's got 65 votes.
So that's the reality. But my point is a better process would have been to introduce the bill to the House after the election and allow a much longer time for select committee scrutiny, because these are enormous powers we're giving to the Minister, and we're just allowing three weeks. It's not good enough, we'll vote for it, but we'll try and improve it at committee. Thanks very much.





IBRAHIM OMER (Labour): Thank you, Madam Speaker. Can I first acknowledge the Minister of Immigration, who is very hard-working and, in fact, not lazy, and he works around the clock—so just to say a quick thankyou to our Minister. 
Although we had a successful response to COVID-19, my colleagues on this side of the House and on the Opposition side as well will know how the border closures have impacted immigration and the devastating effect it had on our communities, in migrant communities. Every day, I receive hundreds of emails from people about their visa difficulties. Because of that, we must ensure that this legislation is extended so our immigration system is equipped well to deal with the ongoing complexities and continues to be responsive and flexible.
I just want to share a quick story about the importance of the border closure and why we are seeking the extension of this bill. A friend of mine, who I have known, travelled overseas for a family emergency last December, and he just got back two weeks ago. So as soon as he landed at the airport, he tested—well, before he left the country, he tested negative, and as soon as he was taken to the managed isolation and quarantine (MIQ) facility, he tested positive again. So this person was someone who is not political, and he was one of the people who also opposed the MIQ system that we have in place, the quarantining system that we have in place. After what happened to him, he called me and he said, "Now I know why we have what we have in place. Now, in fact, I appreciate not only what this Government is doing, but"—he also encouraged that we must continue to do what we're doing while this virus is raging around the world. 
While we spend time in this House today discussing the details of the Immigration (COVID-19 Response) Amendment Bill, I would like to make sure that we don't overlook who this extension deeply affects. Yesterday, a colleague and a member on the other side made an accusation that we don't care, that we don't listen, that we are not involved with the migrant community any more. Actually, I refute that—I refute that. While the accusation was being made, myself and my colleagues on this side of the House—every day, we are deeply involved with our migrant and ethnic communities, and we understand their struggle, we listen to them, and we are committed to them. 
In saying that, I'd like to pay a tribute to the role of the migrant workers in getting us through this pandemic. I'm speaking about cleaners, security guards, supermarket workers, caregivers, and nurses, who—many of them, I had the privilege of working at their organisation to advocate this time last year, when we were in a deep, deep lockdown. We always respect and love them. 
In saying this, I would like to focus on the positive impact that this extension of immigration powers legislation will have on our migrants who will be able to stay in New Zealand and work for longer. The past year has been very difficult and challenging for us. We have had to come together as a nation, as individual communities, to fight back and defeat this pandemic, and we did so very well, with bravery. Extending the COVID19 immigration powers will continue to allow businesses to retain migrant workers, the migrant workforce, and make them available for our industries who are facing labour shortages, and give our Government the ability to extend temporary visas for migrants. 
Earlier today, also, Hospitality New Zealand, in a press release, said that they welcome this move to extend immigration flexibility by two years. They need their existing essential workers to be able to stay and to also have the ability to extend visitor and working holidays. This bill, through the ability to waive application requirements, just will ensure that. We need to make sure our immigration system has the powers and tools to adequately respond to the dynamic situations that present themselves in an unprecedented period.
Lastly, this bill will underpin the Labour Government's strategy to eliminate COVID19 from our communities and to keep New Zealanders safe. Our border settings are a critical part of the plan, and this bill is very, very important for maintaining those settings. 
On that note, I commend this bill to the House. I will also be looking forward to seeing this bill in a select committee, and I'm very open-minded and I'm very positive to engage with the speaker on the other side of the House to make sure that we have got a bill that's going to serve our communities for the next two years. Thank you, Madam Speaker.
ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jenny Salesa): The next call is a split call.





TEANAU TUIONO (Green): Kia ora, Madam Speaker. I rise on behalf of the Greens, in this split call, to talk on the Immigration (COVID-19 Response) Amendment Bill. The original amendment of this bill, when passed last year—and I just wanted to acknowledge the context in which this bill was passed. We were moving into lockdown and things needed to move quickly and fast, and the Government did that. So I wanted to acknowledge that context. In terms of trying to keep our country safe and moving forward through the COVID crisis, the amendment Act created eight time-limited powers, and we are looking to extend those powers. But I was just reflecting on what my Uncle Ben said to me once. He said, "With great power comes great responsibility.", so with this great responsibility, I think it's also a time that we need to actually reflect on what the future policy settings for immigration could look like.
The immigration system has been broken for quite some time and there have been voices that have been excluded from the immigration conversation. I was thinking about where the voice of tangata whenua is. Where is the voice of the people that hold the mauri of Te Tiriti o Waitangi, within their immigration conversation? I also was thinking about all of this in the context of Pasifika peoples, because, yes, we have the COVID crisis, but we also have the climate crisis as well. In those future policy settings I think it's really, really important for us to actually think about that in that wider context, because we need to have an immigration system, I think, which is more welcoming to Pasifika peoples, who are becoming more and more displaced because of climate change. This is, I think, an opportunity for us to rethink that within the context of the time frame of the two years.
There are some questions around what will happen if, all of a sudden, the unemployment rate drops and these jobs disappear. What happens to those workers? So we need to actually think about the workers and the people getting these visas, within the context of communities, within the context of them becoming deeply rooted within those communities as well. So I support what was said earlier about the role that essential workers played in getting us through the last year. Within the context of making sure that we are not exacerbating worker exploitation, it's really important that we think about that within this context. 
I was thinking about it because some of the things that have been said to me, within different communities that I'm connected to, they look at immigration and they think about it and they think about that in the context of things that have happened before in the past. One of those things that happened in the past is around the dawn raids, where Pasifika peoples were invited into the country because there were labour shortages, but as soon as those jobs dried up, next thing you know, whole swathes of them were, sort of, rounded up and deported. So we need to make sure that whatever we do within this two-year period, those workers' rights, those rights of people that have come here to build lives and to build communities and to work with families, are protected.
I commend this bill to the House.





RICARDO MENÉNDEZ MARCH (Green): Tēnā koe, Madam Speaker. It's a privilege to take some time, in this split call, to address the Immigration (COVID-19 Response) Amendment Bill and the extension of the powers that it grants the Minister. The Green Party will be supporting this bill, but we do want quite a few issues noted. As my colleague Teanau Tuiono noted, this is an opportunity to address the many issues that our broken immigration system has had since before the pandemic and that have been exacerbated by the pandemic.
I want to pay tribute to the many people on temporary visas, onshore and offshore, who have been generous in sharing their hurt—their experiences caused by the pandemic and our immigration system—because what we've currently got is an immigration system that discriminates against people based on country of origin, that discriminates against people based on whether they're disabled or otherwise, that discriminates against people based on wealth. And I think the Minister has an opportunity to use his powers to close the gap on this discrimination that exists in the immigration system.
One of the things that I think the Minister can do is change the conditions that people from non-visa-waiver countries face that mean they have more barriers to even apply for an expression of interest to apply for a visa. We hear all these stories of people from non-visa-waiver countries having to do things like fetch missions to even be reunited with their families. The Minister could actually change the conditions for people in those countries to be able to apply. Now, that does not mean that we stop taking a health approach to COVID-19. It does not mean that we're saying, "Let's not put those security measures at our border in place." But what we are saying is that our immigration system and the settings that we're now going to be putting in place should not discriminate against people from countries such as India simply because of where they are from.
I do also think, as my colleague Teanau Tuiono explained, that we have to address the issue of migrant worker exploitation, and exploitation in general. As the Minister has rolled over visitor visas and working holiday visas, we have to acknowledge that people who have no working rights in this country are put into a vulnerable position. People who do not have access to State services by nature of their immigration status are also put in a vulnerable position, and so we do hope that the Minister uses the powers granted by this bill to grant pathways to residency so that people onshore are not having to apply for emergency benefits that are currently really difficult to access or that they're put in situations where they are working illegally and taken advantage of by employers in industries like the construction sector and subsequently detained and deported. I do think this bill presents an opportunity to transform our immigration system that underpins community, workers' rights, and our families.
I want to pay tribute as well to the many groups who have been calling for these changes from the grassroots, whether it's the Supreme Sikh Society, who presented a challenge to parliamentarians when they opened the sports centre—for us to reunite families, for us to decouple work visas from single employers, for the Government to stop visa delays. The Migrant Workers Association has been calling for pathways to residency, and I think that, ultimately, this presents an opportunity for the Minister to listen to these calls from the grassroots, with the powers that he is going to be given by the nature of this legislation. There's also unions, Unemig, and many Pasifika communities who understand the pains that have been caused by subsequent Governments, by nature of our unpinned white immigration policy, that, ultimately, we are facing the legacy of.
Lastly, I think that, while these powers will allow us to act swiftly and take a health approach to the pandemic in relation to immigration settings, we also have to acknowledge the structural issues that Immigration New Zealand faces currently. I think it's unacceptable for people who currently have visas to face delays when they're transitioning from one visa to another, or when they're applying for a visa in the first place. As we look forward to transforming our immigration system to one where no one is exploited and where human rights are upheld, I do hope the Minister takes a proactive approach in addressing the many calls from migrant communities that have been raised since the pandemic started. Kia ora.





Dr JAMES McDOWALL (ACT): Thank you, Madam Speaker. In considering this bill to extend the extraordinary powers granted to the Minister of Immigration, we thought it prudent to reflect on the overall performance and outcomes achieved by Immigration New Zealand on the direction of the Minister since the enactment of the original legislation. ACT supported that legislation, as has been stated already, given the high degree of uncertainty caused by the novel coronavirus and, of course, the lack of an obvious vaccine—in fact, no one really knew if we were even going to get a vaccine in those days.
Like many in this House, we put our trust in the Minister to use these extraordinary powers to work hard to protect families and livelihoods in the context of a global pandemic. We had high hopes for a smart and compassionate border, but the Government achieved neither. It's also not just about the border; it's about the treatment of migrants already here in New Zealand. The global pandemic has obviously brought about many challenges, especially with regards to New Zealand border management in the context of an elimination strategy. Those who are directly affected by the Government's immigration policies were suddenly caught up in all that uncertainty, and we owed it to them to get it right.
What has, unfortunately, occurred repeatedly over time is that the Minister has leaned on COVID-19 as a convenient sole excuse for a department that has long performed appallingly and is only getting worse. Migrants and employers are well aware that the problems at Immigration New Zealand started well before the pandemic. As a co-owner of an immigration law firm, I myself have seen a department that is steadily falling apart at the seams, and the negative impact that this has had on migrants and businesses over the years.
This bill brings us to where we are today, with a promised, hopefully, widespread vaccination campaign under way that gives hope to all New Zealanders and prospective New Zealanders. We are in a very different place to where we were at the passing of the original legislation, and, in ACT's opinion, an extension until May 2023 is asking too much—especially given the performance of the Minister. The world will look very different in 2023, and it is irresponsible for us to support such extraordinary powers to the Minister to act unilaterally for almost the rest of this parliamentary term.
For those migrants looking for a pathway to live and work permanently in New Zealand, they were disheartened by the suspension of the expression of interest programme, which closed off the skilled migrant category of residency. There are now more than 7,000 people waiting in that queue, and it's growing rapidly and going absolutely nowhere fast—talk about shooting yourself in the foot. Given that application wait times for just the existing skilled migrant category applications can exceed two years and is most likely getting worse, I think the Minister needs to be upfront to those waiting in the queue. Will they actually ever have their applications looked at, let alone processed to completion—I find it hard to imagine—or will the Minister have to face a reality of the calamity that he himself has caused? 
What the Government has, effectively, done is lock thousands of skilled migrants into temporary visas, all the while pretending that we have a proper system in this country. This is also bad news for employers, who reach out to me on a daily basis to express their frustrations over the lack of skilled people available for work. And with families being split, many migrants are giving up and leaving New Zealand.
On the other side of the equation, the border exemption process is an absolute lottery, it's a shambles, and it barely evaluates people's circumstances properly. I heard from one migrant who actually won that lottery, and good on her. She made more than 40 applications, all saying exactly the same thing, and then finally got approved. I mean what planet is Immigration New Zealand living on, seriously? 
On Tuesday of this week, I attended the peaceful demonstration by split family members outside Parliament. Many of them are highly skilled migrants, healthcare workers, teachers, scientists, and so on. Their stories are heartbreaking: years without seeing their loved ones, including very young children. Resolving their desperate situations doesn't even require extraordinary powers, and there's certainly enough capacity in managed isolation and quarantine. In fact, there are a thousand spaces today—unbelievable. 
If the Minister had been doing his job properly and using his extraordinary powers for good, he'd be responsive in granting visas and entry so that families can be reunited with their loved ones. It should have happened months ago, yet here we are without a plan from the Government—well, they don't have a plan—and without hope. Unfortunately it's gone into the Minister's overflowing too-hard basket.
The Recognised Seasonal Employer situation, as we all know, is dire, and the policies of the Government to try and address this have been totally insufficient, with fruit rotting on the ground season after season, growers closing down after decades of being in business, and with our exports suffering while many Pacific Island countries have been COVID-free for a long time or have never even had COVID. The Government's efforts to fill vacancies with Kiwis have utterly failed, and we're now even seeing health and safety taking a turn for the worst as farmers and long-term workers are at the point of exhaustion—"beyond desperate" in the words of one farmer whom I spoke to. It's a straightforward fix, but clearly it's just all too hard for the Government.
Common themes emerged in my conversations with immigration advisers and lawyers up and down the country: desperation, no plan, no transparency, and a complete demise of Immigration New Zealand's credibility. One well-known immigration adviser and, I'm happy to say, former Labour Party supporter said to me, "I thought this was a listening Government, caring, kind, but that has long been eradicated."
Hon Kris Faafoi: Richard Prebble!
Dr JAMES McDOWALL: Others in the sector told me that people are on the brink of mental health breakdowns—
Hon Kris Faafoi: We got rid of him a long time ago!
Dr JAMES McDOWALL: —with counsellors overwhelmed with migrants in crisis. And I hope the migrants in crisis with mental health issues know that the Minister is laughing at them right now. Many are entering poverty—living in vans because they have to look after their families at home. The result will be a long-term traumatised migrant population. 
With extraordinary powers, there needs to be extraordinary accountability and extraordinary performance. This bill removes a layer of accountability that, frankly, should be reinstated. The primary legislation, despite its shortcomings, should be respected. And I would also note that the supposed safeguards in the bill are relatively meaningless given the make-up of the Labour-led Government. A two-year extension of these powers could simply extend the pain that migrants will have to endure under this Government's watch.
We've had enough of Immigration New Zealand, we've had enough of this Minister, and we are opposing this bill.





ANGELA ROBERTS (Labour): Kia ora, thank you, Madam Speaker. I wasn't in this House when this bill was passed by everybody, but, as a member of the public and a citizen of this country, I was really relieved to see the evidence of an ability to work across the House and respond to this pandemic in such a way. This bill—or the renewal of this bill, a continuation of what was established a year ago—is evidence of our ability to work across the House and be nimble and responsive, something that is absolutely essential when every day the context within which we are working changes—every day. You know, the reflection about not knowing whether or not we would have a vaccine is absolutely true, and, as we look externally and look across our borders, we notice that things are still pretty precarious in the rest of the planet. So this isn't just about how safe we feel right now—and the reason we can feel safe right now is because of the decisions that were made in the House a year ago.
So what I'm really pleased to consider is that this bill will come to my select committee, and the proposition that it is going to continue in the state that it was originally in is because it was effective. We have heard that from across the House. It has worked. It has enabled a nimble and responsive processing of these issues over the next 12 months. So it retains the safeguards, and it ensures some greater certainty, actually, in such uncertain times.
I know that there were concerns raised about the truncated process, but what it does is it continues the prompt response—it means that we can continue to be nimble and responsive, but we still have an opportunity to collaborate. I'll just remind you that there were changes made. The explicit condition around the exercising of powers was added on the recommendation of the Epidemic Response Committee last year and reflected the submissions to the committee. So this idea, this implying that there will be an abuse of power, just doesn't cut it. The evidence is not there. We are collaborators in this House—you have proven that when you passed this last year—and we will continue to do that. We will collaborate in the select committee, because we're pretty good at that, actually, and we will make sure that things continue to work for our people and we can continue to be able to be responsive and nimble. So I commend this bill to the House.
ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jenny Salesa): The next call is a split call. I call Stuart Smith.





STUART SMITH (National—Kaikōura): Thank you very much, Madam Speaker. Well, that was an interesting contribution. It talked about a prompt response. Actually, if it was a prompt response, the Minister of Immigration would've brought this bill to the House last year and had enough time in front of the select committee to go through a proper process. Unlike the member that just took her seat, Angela Roberts, I did actually sit on that committee, the COVID response select committee, last year and listen to all of the submissions that we had. It was a very quick and fast process to get this through. No one's denying we needed the bill at the time, and we probably need it now, but I do have some serious concerns about this.
What we've seen with the pandemic around the world is a grab for power—a grab for power from Ministers, like we're seeing now—and I think we should all be concerned about this no matter what side of the House you're on. Very, very attractive if you happen to be a Government Minister, but is it a good political process? I don't think it is—I don't think it is at all. Having the power in a Minister's hands on things at a time of an emergency we understand, but we are reaching far further than that. This is not just about opposing for opposing's sake. We are, in fact, voting for this bill—
Hon Member: Support it, then.
STUART SMITH: Well, unfortunately, we are supporting it. I think it is needed, but only just, and it is not needed for two years, however. I think one year is more than enough, and the Minister could bring it back to the House. To go through it in such a truncated process when we did exactly that last year in a time of emergency I think is not justified. We've not heard the justification for that at all. It's been very weak, actually. I think the speeches from the other side of the House have been nothing more than grandstanding, actually. We needed to hear really good, sound arguments about why this is going to be such a short process, why we're not going to be able to have the adequate scrutiny that a select committee could bring to it, because we didn't do it last time because of the state that the country was in at the time. We're not now, and we owe it to the people who are affected most by this. So we're going to have a short process, we're not really collaborating, I don't think—if we were collaborating, as I said, we would've been talking about this a couple of months ago.
When we have this in place, it's all very well that the Minister can make decisions, and the argument is that this will all happen quickly, but let me remind you that last year we had in Central Otago a large number of Recognised Seasonal Employer workers who were almost begging for food because the Minister wouldn't make a decision. All they had to do was utilise the powers in this bill to allow those people to go up to Marlborough where they had a job, where they could be paid. Instead, they were living off the charity of the people in that area who kept them in warm clothes and in food. So we have the Minister now saying he needs this bill because he has to be able to move quickly. Well, you don't have a track record of doing it, actually, and it is appalling. We have these people in our country who've come from overseas to work here, to do us a favour, actually, and also to have an opportunity for them to make money in their own homes and make a better life for themselves, and then we treat them like we did then. I think it's appalling. It's embarrassing, and the Minister should be—I know he's covering his eyes; he must be appalled. He needs to take responsibility and move quickly. We've heard—and we still hear it—every public servant when things are slow: "Oh, it's COVID. Oh, it's COVID—it's a pandemic." What a load of nonsense. The whole immigration system is a mess, it's poorly led, and it's poorly run by—and the leadership I'm talking about is starting at the political level. We have to do much better than this. I think we're very bad hosts in our country, and I think that's because of the way we're getting the leadership from the top and the Minister of Immigration. He needs to pull his socks up and do the job properly.
This bill is being supported, albeit reluctantly, and let's hope that we might see some better performance out of the Minister. I don't know how that's—I mean, you've got lots of people in the caucus now; surely there's someone that can make a decision in a timely manner. So it's with reluctance that I commend the bill to the House.





Dr DUNCAN WEBB (Labour—Christchurch Central): Kia ora, e te Mana Whakawā. I'm surprised that Te Paati Māori isn't taking this call, but I'm very happy to stand in its place to take this call on this important bill. And, Stuart Smith, I don't know where he's been, but if he hasn't been listening to the news today, only today we've shown that we have to be very quick on our feet when it comes to immigration issues, because things change rapidly, and the need for these powers to be nimble and responsive is acute. So we absolutely need to pass this bill to give the Minister—and a very good, very competent, and, if I may say so, a very compassionate Minister—
Angie Warren-Clark: Hard-working.
Dr DUNCAN WEBB: —I forgot hard-working, Angie Warren-Clark—the powers needed to properly administer. And, look, we do have broad support for this bill, across this House, which does acknowledge that we recognise that. I thank most of the Opposition members for that. I commend this bill to the House.





ANAHILA KANONGATA'A-SUISUIKI (Labour): It's an absolute privilege to stand here to make a short contribution to the Immigration (COVID-19 Response) Amendment Bill. My short contribution will take us down memory lane to last year, but before I do that, I want to acknowledge the excellent Minister the Minster Kris Faafoi. Thank you for your leadership in shepherding this through the House at this time, which is really, really required and needed by the country.
On 28 February 2020, we had our first case of COVID-19. On 14 March 2020, arrivals were asked to isolate. On 19 March, gatherings were restricted to 100 and borders closed. On 21 March 2020, the Prime Minister, our leader, the great Rt Hon Jacinda Ardern, announced four tiered alert levels. On 23 March, we went into alert level 3. On 25 March, we went into alert level 4. On 31 March, we extended the state of national emergency. On 20 April, we went back to alert level 4 and we stayed there for five days, then we stayed for two weeks at alert level 3. And on 11 May 2020, we were at alert level 2. 
I have been thinking: why wasn't I in the House during that time this bill was debated in the House? That's because we were at home and this work was done in a time that was needed to be done, with prompt, fast efficiency. So I want to acknowledge Parliament, all of Parliament, who have agreed that this is an important bill that needed to be addressed.
But also, what we do forget is the public servants that had worked through that time that I have just spoken about, that have worked night and day to ensure that New Zealand is safe. I want to say to the Minister, in his work with his officials, to extend our thanks to the public servants who have done that in bringing this bill to the House.
I'm not going to go and respond to any negativity on that side—we'll just put it like that—but I think that some of them are a bit confused. Last year, it was a good idea to do this, and today it's not such a good idea. We've heard from the Minister himself that it had gone through a select committee process and that all of Parliament had agreed to it, and this is extending the eight powers without any further changes.
I want to end my speech with acknowledging Prakash Pabla, who was in India during this time last year. Prakash usually goes through three pairs of shoes doorknocking or delivering pamphlets in Papakura for elections, but this year he couldn't do it. When he came back to the country in February, he said to me, "Can you extend this—if you get a moment to say thank you, could you please thank the Prime Minister, Jacinda Ardern, her Cabinet."—which includes the Hon Kris Faafoi here—"Thank them for keeping New Zealand safe. Thank the staff at managed isolation.", because they provided excellent care of him, and now he's back in Papakura, within the Labour Party in Papakura. I just want to say—I've spoken too long—I commend this bill to the House. Mālō.





Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE (National): Great speech, indeed, said Deborah Russell. I think I heard Anahila Kanongata'a-Suisuiki say last year, in criticising the National Party's position on this, that we thought it was a good idea last year; why do we not think it's a good idea now? Well, the answer is quite straightforward: the conditions that warranted the emergency powers—and they were emergency powers; significant transfer of power to the Minister—worked for the conditions that existed then. As a former Minister of Immigration, I've got a reasonable amount of knowledge about those powers and the instructions—the mountain of instructions, that the Minister gives to Immigration New Zealand in order to be able to give effect to the Immigration Act 2009. It cannot be said that those conditions still exist. Now, on balance, the National Party will support this bill at first reading and send it to select committee—we'll talk about the process when the motion for the report back is moved—but we did have over a thousand Immigration New Zealand staff unable to process in the manner in which they normally would; that's not the case now, and we have to acknowledge that.
So the question has to be: why does the Minister seek not only, I should add, powers for two years but the Cabinet paper, as I read it—Mr Faafoi took a Cabinet paper to remove the time limit altogether. And, obviously, there was a Cabinet discussion where he was overridden. I have the Cabinet paper here, and the Cabinet paper makes it very clear—if I can just find the appropriate paragraph—at paragraphs 15 to 18: "I propose the removal of the expiry date from the powers." No expiry date whatsoever. He said, at paragraph 18 to the Cabinet, "I consider the power to suspend the ability to make visa applications remains critical as long as borders remain closed. Under the Immigration Act, visas cannot be granted if the holder is unlikely to be allowed to enter, but they cannot be declined if they meet the relevant policy settings." And that was his reason for removing any time bar on those significant powers he was given. Cabinet, clearly, didn't agree with him, because the Cabinet minute and the bill we are discussing extended it by what he would say is "only" a further two years. I would suggest, and the National Party believes, that, if this bill is appropriate, it is appropriate for no more than 12 more months.
The Minister is right, and he mentioned it in his first reading speech, that, actually, the way in which immigration instructions are framed, if somebody meets the policy criteria for the acceptance of a visa, there are no legal grounds to decline that visa. We know we can delay them for a long, long time; look what is building up and the backlog to the residence class visas, skilled migrant, partnership, family—every one of those categories is now in quite significant backlog and delay. But, if that was the problem, solve that problem. And the Government can do that by one of two ways: (a) they could pass a bill with a much, much narrower term of reference to enable the Minister to be able to suspend those criteria, or (b) he has the power to do so under the immigration instructions. He can simply issue a new instruction suspending those criteria. Now, it probably would be better for the Parliament to give that power rather than for the Minister to act unilaterally, but nevertheless that should not be used as a reason to extend the powers much more broadly to whole classes of visas, even if that is not unfavourable and can be favourable to the visa holder or the class of visa holder.
Remember, I think there were 30,000-something what are now called "employer assisted" work visas that were extended by the stroke of a pen. Now, employer assisted visas—temporary visas—require a significant criterion to be met, and that is that there isn't a New Zealander able to do that job. And in many cases that's the case. In a lot of cases now, because of COVID and because of our increasing numbers of jobseekers, people who have lost their jobs in tourism and hospitality, who are looking for work, with the stroke of a pen may have that opportunity to work usurped because an overseas worker has their visa extended. We have over a thousand Immigration New Zealand staff who are back at work, who could be able and have for years considered those visa applications independently and on their merits, who now will not have to do that. And my question is: if they're not doing that—
Erica Stanford: What are they doing?
Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE: What are they doing? They are very, very good people. I know a lot of them, and they perform outstandingly well in their core business: saying yes or no to a visa application based on its merits and the immigration instructions and law. So why are we just saying—the Minister wanted it indefinitely—for two years that won't happen? Because it may well be affecting New Zealanders and their ability to get into the job market.
Now, with apologies to the Minister if he did send me the data, I was very interested in the comment in the Cabinet paper that there was no financial implications to this—paragraph 28: "There are no direct financial implications arising from the proposals in this paper." I cannot accept that that could be the case because—
Hon Kris Faafoi: It's a few hundred thousand dollars each time we change.
Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE: A few hundred thousand? Well, that's very interesting because, I think from memory, Immigration New Zealand earns a couple of hundred million dollars a year in visa applications.
Hon Kris Faafoi: What do you think has happened to that revenue right now?
Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE: Well, it's probably gone down the karzy! There's probably none. So the financial implications are that, currently, the taxpayer is now funding the work of Immigration New Zealand because the revenue from visa applications has dropped away dramatically. But to say that the continuation of this has no financial impact is quite wrong. It means that the New Zealand taxpayer is funding the application process for another couple of years, at significant cost, and I think it behoves the Minister to tell this House, and for the select committee considering the bill to know, what that number is.
One thing I think we have done is lose sight of any fiscal probity when it comes to COVID response. We talk about multibillion-dollar initiatives now as if they're chump change, as if debt does not matter, as if another few hundred million here or $3.8 billion there or whatever the Budget 2021 will bring can continue without consequences. The Minister might scoff and say, "Well, there's going to be no change", but that means the taxpayer will continue to pay, and I think we need to know what the impact of that is.
This is a challenging one for the National Party. We will support it at first reading, but I don't think it should be taken as read that we'll be able to continue to do that if we don't get a curtailment of the duration of these powers, and actually I think it speaks volumes for the lack of confidence, what the Government calls the abundance of caution, that they have in responding to COVID. At some point, we have to move from a pandemic situation to an endemic situation, and this week we've seen a significant step forward in that with the opening of the trans-Tasman bubble, but going into lockdown, closing our borders, difficult though the Government might have thought that was, was the easy part. The difficult decisions about how we transition to treating COVID as endemic and getting back to whatever new normal it might be is going to be far, far more challenging, and simply continuing the powers for another two years is, I think, a recognition that the Government doesn't have a plan to get out of where they're at and they just want to continue the status quo. If that's the case, I think my party will struggle to support this bill past first reading. But I'll be fascinated at the submissions, at any changes to the bill that might be able to be made to curtail the duration and nature of those powers, and I look forward to that process.





TANGI UTIKERE (Labour—Palmerston North): Tēnā koe, Mr Speaker, and it's my pleasure to rise to take what is the final call on the Immigration (COVID-19 Response) Amendment Bill. I have to say that over the course of the afternoon, we've heard a number of contributions, some more interesting and valuable than others.
I guess what's really important is that we need to reflect on, well, what does this amendment bill actually seek to do? Quite simply, it seeks to amend the principal Act that was enacted last year, which has eight powers that are, in essence, time limited powers that exist. I want to concur with colleagues that have already commended the Minister the Hon Kris Faafoi on the sterling job that he has done in protecting our country and those—
Hon Michael Woodhouse: Sterling? Did the Minister write this speech?
TANGI UTIKERE: Yes, sterling, indeed. I am delighted that the Opposition concur with that.
I say that the Minister has undertaken and performed a sterling job, because even the Opposition accept that on the 18 occasions under which the Minister has exercised those special direction powers, the Opposition accept that they have been appropriate in every single one of them. So that is why he is a fantastic Minister who is doing an excellent job. And the Minister himself also, this afternoon, indicated that at the time that this principal Act was enacted, it was not clear, actually, as to the impact of the global pandemic at the time, and we are still, obviously, learning through that, and that uncertainty is also accepted by the Opposition. So that is pleasing to hear.
But, in essence, this is a very simple and straightforward bill. It comes in two parts, but I just want to touch on two of them. The first is that it will extend the repeal date of those temporary powers by two years, and much has been said around that. The member opposite inferred in her contribution earlier today that the Government, in setting that two-year time frame, is seeking to hide or suggest that the borders would be closed for longer than we might suggest. Now, that is not the case. If the member had a look at the Act, those powers can be rescinded when it is safe to do so, within the two-year time period, if that is the case.
Secondly, it also amends the maximum duration of a suspension for some persons who are offshore to make these applications, from three months to six months. And what I would suggest is, in response to the honourable member who had recently resumed his seat: why is that? Well, do we need to reiterate that perhaps they're missing the point? Immigration New Zealand staff, who were processing normal visa applications, are now dealing with border exemption applications. That is a huge workload, and those members here who have constituents that come and meet with them to discuss that—perhaps the Opposition don't realise that because they don't have many constituency seats, but the reality is that that is a huge level of workload that the staff in Immigration New Zealand are undertaking, and that's why it's so important that we move to amend that three-month time frame to one of six months.
In summary, this is really important. It will be an amendment bill that will be subject to public scrutiny, and, as one of my colleagues commented earlier, New Zealand's immigration system does need to be flexible, yes, but, in my view, it also needs to maintain its currency and its value. We are perceived and seen and received around the world as having a strong response to COVID, and our immigration settings, our immigration approach, is a key part of that. It is a keystone, a cornerstone, part of that. And so on that basis, I am delighted to commend this bill to the House.





A party vote was called for on the question, That the Immigration (COVID-19 Response) Amendment Bill be now read a first time.
Ayes 110
New Zealand Labour 65; New Zealand National 33; Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand 10; Te Paati Māori 2.
Noes 10
ACT New Zealand 10.
Motion agreed to.
Bill read a first time.
DEPUTY SPEAKER: The question is, That the Immigration (COVID-19 Response) Amendment Bill be considered by the Education and Workforce Committee.
Motion agreed to.
Bill referred to the Education and Workforce Committee.





ERICA STANFORD (National—East Coast Bays): Point of order. I seek leave for the Education and Workforce Committee's consideration of the Immigration (COVID-19 Response) Amendment Bill to include amendments relating to new powers allowing the Minister to create a class of visa for the purposes of reuniting split migrant families, which would otherwise be out of scope.
DEPUTY SPEAKER: Leave is sought for that purpose. Is there any objection? There is objection.





Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE (National): As my colleague Erica Stanford interjected when the Minister was speaking, the bill may not be materially different, but the conditions under which this bill is being passed are extremely different from 13 May 2020 when this House gave those extraordinary powers to the Minister. And I do acknowledge—as others have; Mr Utikere, I think, mentioned it—that the Minister has discharged his responsibilities responsibly and well. That is not the point, and the reason that the National Party will be opposing this motion—the reason is quite simply this. Twenty-one days—twenty-one days is not sufficient time to give appropriate scrutiny to the impact on the immigration system, on our business and migrant community, of the extension of these powers for another two years. Let's bear in mind, the Minister did not refute my claim, and it's in the Cabinet paper, that he wanted those powers to be indefinite. And had Cabinet not overruled him, we would be debating a motion for the indefinite granting of these powers with a select committee process that lasts three short weeks.
There's a bit of a pattern emerging here in the Government since 2017, and I look forward to the data being analysed about how many bills have been passed under urgency, how many bills have been passed with a shortened report back for the select committees, because it will make quite telling reading.
In April last year, I represented this Parliament at a World Bank political forum. It wasn't in a nice place like Geneva or New York; it was in Andersons Bay in Dunedin in the dark hours, in my pyjamas, where I Zoomed into this very informative meeting where Ministers and members of Parliament from around the OECD gave a report of the manner in which democracies had responded to COVID. The overwhelming theme of that was the degree of concern at what they described as "a form of executive fiat" and the overriding of the democratic processes that undermined the very democracies that we hold so dear. I've spoken of that in the past, and I think it's relevant to this motion today. We're doing it again. We're treating the public with disdain by saying that this legislation that has quite a significant impact on a wide range of stakeholders—and I'll go through them—can be appropriately scrutinised in 21 days.
It got, last year—and I chaired that committee, so I should know. I think we had seven days last year—seven or eight days, and that was—
Hon Grant Robertson: We're tripling it.
Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE: Well, yes. The Minister of Finance interjects that he's being generous by taking it from seven or eight days to 21 days. I think that speaks volumes to the approach that this Government has. Because doing the right thing is a very different process from doing it in the right manner, and the Government has a significant power. They could've come to the House today and passed this bill under urgency—they have 65 votes out of 120. They do, I think, start to treat this place as a bit of an irritant, that parliamentary scrutiny is getting in the way of executive fiat. 
Last year, I described the Prime Minister as Rob Muldoon with slogans and kindness. That struck a nerve, but I stood by those comments then and I stand by them now—the irritant that this Parliament has for the very process of scrutinising the bill and making it better. And I would point out that in the very short time that we had last year for this bill to be passed, we actually made some very good improvements to it thanks to the speedy work that the submitters were able to do because we were all in lockdown, I think, or we'd just come out of lockdown. They probably had a little more time on their hands to be able to do that. These are not the same conditions.
We have precious little time now to hear from the stakeholders, and I expect them to come from three main groups. Businesses will want to know what this means for them, not so much for the people who are here and can stay, but for the people who aren't here and they want to get in, and this bill will prevent that from occurring. It is a paradox, but we have a mismatch in skills. We have higher levels of unemployment and job seeker numbers in this country who will be competing for those onshore temporary visa holders who, as a class of visa holder, could have their stay extended, undermining the ability of those workers to get the jobs that are going. But we also have a number of highly skilled workers who businesses in New Zealand do need and who this bill may prevent from being able to bring in because of the border closures that will continue.
I think we'll hear from migrant groups. In fact, I encourage migrant groups to submit to the select committee, at the risk of loading up my colleagues on that committee with a great deal of work and some long hours; it's going to be the case anyway. But these migrant groups have been significantly impacted by COVID and the inability to leave or come, and we've got to hear what that means and what sensible suggestions they might have for improving this bill.
I think we're going to hear from separated families. I think Erica Stanford has done an excellent job in highlighting the human side of the separation of families as a consequence of the Government's response to COVID, and while the instruction leave was declined by this House—and it's pretty clear where the objections were coming from—that, in my mind, will not prevent separated families from seeking to submit on this bill and tell their stories and point out how the legislative changes we've made are having a negative impact on them. All of that being done within 21 days and for us to be able to come back to this House and for the select committee to come back and say, "We have given the scrutiny of this bill every opportunity." I don't think they're going to be able to say that, and I think that's bad for lawmaking. It risks bad law being passed. A good law last year in one situation doesn't make the same law being extended good law, and that has to be scrutinised.
So I expect we'll hear from lawyers. We will hear from immigration agents. We'll hear from the people who were at the coalface of our immigration system who have the real knowledge of what's going on. We need to know and hear from them so that we can understand what we're doing in the name of this bill.
We can't do that in 21 days, and I'm sad we're back here again. The pattern is emerging of an override or a lip-service to the parliamentary process. There's some times when I've been in select committees when six months hasn't been long enough because of the complexity of the legislation that we're passing, and this is, on the face of it and in its detail, not a straightforward piece of legislation. I think the Minister said something like 350,000 non - New Zealanders in New Zealand last year on temporary visas. The number is probably pretty low, but one thing I know as a former Minister of Immigration is that every single one of those visa holders has a story that is different from the next, and one of the reasons we have such a huge piece of legislation in the Immigration Act 2009 and a mountainous pile of immigration instructions for Immigration New Zealand and their staff to follow is because every story is different, and that's why we need to have discretion; it's why we need to have exceptions to policy. It's pretty much why we needed, last year, to have this legislation—so that we could keep things going.
The conditions have changed. I'm not convinced we need it now. I'm certainly convinced that we can't give it a decent going over in 21 days. I'm sad for those committee members, because the motion also includes sitting on a Friday of a House sitting week, so that's then the constituent work that MPs who would normally have been doing that; they may sit outside of Wellington, which means they may not be able to give proper attention to the other work that's going to go on in this House. That is a very big encumbrance on the MPs who I know would be prepared to do that if they had longer or if the case for doing so had been strong—
DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! The member's time has expired.





Instruction to the Education and Workforce Committee
Hon KRIS FAAFOI (Minister of Immigration): I move, That the Immigration (COVID-19 Response) Amendment Bill be reported to the House by 29 April 2021 and that the committee have the authority to meet at any time while the House is sitting (except during oral questions), during an evening on a day in which there has been a sitting of the House, on a Friday in a week in which there has been a sitting of the House, and outside the Wellington area, despite Standing Orders 193, 195, and 196(1)(b) and (c).
We are asking for an expedited process through the select committee, for this process, for the simple fact, which I pointed out in my first reading speech, that the powers within the bill that was passed last year expire on 15 May. In order for the Government to have one of the crucial tools that we have used to keep New Zealand safe over the last 12 months, to be able to maintain the system flexibility within our immigration system, to respond to the pandemic that these powers approved by Parliament this year, it's extremely important to continue to have as an important tool for the Government. As was said in first reading speeches, again, the powers that are in the amendment bill are the same powers that were dealt with in the Act as it is and which were taken through select committee. The only minor amendment, I believe, that is within the legislation—the bill that has passed now—is that the relevant regulations, time frame, the request in the bill is to move that window from a three-month window to a six-month window. Again, the existing safeguards within the current Act look to be extended as well.
We look forward to those in the public and members on the other side of the House having an opportunity to scrutinise the bill. Again, those powers are similar to what were traversed by the last select committee, the Epidemic Response Committee, in the last Parliament, and they contain powers relating to classes of persons that can only be exercised by special directions made by the Minister of Immigration, made public, and, of course, can be overturned. Again, after 12 months, it's timely that a select committee and the public are able to have a look at that. Again, 13 submissions to the select committee last time—we encourage people, in the expedited select committee process, to have their say.
Can I thank everyone in the House for their contributions to the first reading debate, whether they support the bill or have reservations about the bill to support it at first reading. We want to make sure, again, that it gets the scrutiny that it deserves by the select committee. But, again, these powers expire on 15 May, and the Government wants to continue to make sure it has these powers to keep New Zealanders safe.
DEPUTY SPEAKER: The question is that the motion be agreed to.





Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (National): I thought the Minister did an admirable job of standing in the House this afternoon, attempting to explain why this legislation has to go through with the very minimum of public scrutiny applied to any bill. What he should have said is that "We just had our eye off the ball. We didn't recognise that we were getting close to the time when the legislation, that was quite appropriately passed under similar conditions 12 months ago, was going to expire."
I think what also sits in behind this is his recognition that his own department is in very bad shape indeed. I don't think there's any way that you could say anything nice about the immigration department at the present time. Now, while they're dealing with a lot of different circumstances, that is their job. It's what they're meant to do. The question is: why are there well over 12,000 current applications for residence sitting in a queue, not being dealt with? 
What is annoying about this is that there are businesses up and down this country trying to get in skilled people who they cannot get locally. Despite their efforts to recruit, they cannot get them locally, but they also cannot bring people in because of that massive backlog that has been accumulating inside immigration for such a very long time. It is a privilege to come into New Zealand. It's a privilege to become a resident, no question. But it is also a necessity for our economy to have the workforce that drives the economy that allows us to all afford the lifestyle that we have in this country. 
As the Minister said today, with the stroke of a pen, he's settling the next 12 months' worth of applications for over 300,000 people. Now, it sort of gets the mind boggling a little bit. If you think of how many towns in New Zealand you'd have to bundle together to get 300,000, how many parts of Auckland you'd have to separate out to get 300,000—
DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! Can I ask the member to speak to the motion. It's not a—
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: I'm responding to the comments made by the Minister. I've got them written down here in front of me. So if he was able to say them, I should be able to respond to them. I'll do my best—
DEPUTY SPEAKER: No, I'm waiting to hear how that—because in what he said he did relate it to why, at the end of that, it needed a shorter report-back time frame. So I'm asking the member to do the same.
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: Well, what I'm making the point about is that he was very creative about offering a reason to the House for that shortened time frame. The simple case is that they had their eye off the ball; no question at all. So now we have a bill that we're supposed to in just 21 days—21 days available to the select committee to consider this list of eight extraordinary powers. I think when you have that volume of people—300,000-plus who are here on temporary visas now, more than 12,000 waiting in the queue with their residence application, and then thousands offshore who have left New Zealand for one reason or another who want to come back to various jobs here—all will want to have a say on this, as will their employers. 
We know what the situation is in the agricultural industry and the horticultural industry at the moment. We know that there are other industries throughout the country who've got all sorts of issues they want to deal with. You know, the thing that is extraordinary is that the Minister is giving his department these powers, because in the end it's the department that makes the recommendations to the Minister about how to exercise those powers. Yet he sits there, knowing that this is a department that is not operating at an optimum level at all. So, yes, there should be a longer scrutiny by a select committee so that you can have the general public gaining a greater degree of confidence about the exercise of these powers. 
I don't need to go through the whole eight of them, but when you have the power to waive the requirement to obtain a transit visa in individual cases, by special direction, the public need to know what that is all about. The public need to know what that's all about, because the way I read it, it means that someone coming from a country that has a very, very large amount or a considerable amount of COVID-19 infection—and we've seen the actions taken by the Government today to prevent people from one country coming in for a period of time because of that very sort of thing. But this would apparently give the department via the Minister, or the Minister via the department, the opportunity to in some cases say, "No, no, don't worry about it. Come straight in." Now, the public need to know that. The immigration service need to explain to all of those consultants out there, the many lawyers who live off the end of this stuff, exactly what that means, but, more importantly, to all of the communities around the country that want workers, to find out what that also means. 
There's also the power to waive any regulatory requirements for certain classes of application by special direction. In other words, if someone has the favour of the Minister, then they can get whoever they like in, and that is a very, very broad power. I remember this House once railing about some powers granted to a Minister in here, referring to them as "Henry VIII" powers. That is totally "Henry VIII"—totally "Henry VIII". 
Hon Grant Robertson: The member has similarities.
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: And I see his lookalike over there, shaking his head and saying "No, no, that's not the case.", but it is. It is simply a provision for the Minister to decide who comes and who doesn't. Nothing short of that. You could go on and say, "Well, there's the power to suspend the ability to make applications for visas or submit expression of interest in applying for visas by class of people by Order in Council." Well, that would certainly mean that it would simply mean that we'd pick out particular countries and say, "The doors are open—in you come."
Hon Grant Robertson: Talk about the motion.
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: The doors are open—in you come. Now, that might be, as Mr Robertson, the finance Minister, is pointing out, a good thing. I don't know why he would think that was a good thing when there needs to be an understanding by the general public of what that means. He and I would take a different view on that. Those are the sort of things that get sorted out at a select committee, by allowing people to come in over a period of time to make their submission. 
Now, the other thing that goes back behind all this is that there is clearly a flagrant disregard for the lawmaking processes in this country being exercised by the Government at the present time. 
Hon Grant Robertson: Oh, come on!
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: Because while they'll sit there waving their heads from side to side, the reality is it's happening all the time, happening very, very frequently. There would not be a week of Parliament this year when there hasn't been some kind of truncated process put in place, some kind of urgency taken, or some kind of extra power grabbed by the executive to run the country. Mr Robertson sits over there chuckling away. He knows it's the case—he knows it's the case. I see he's got his tie off, so he's off down to the club shortly to talk to all the local punters and tell them what a great Government they are. 
The reality is they're losing their opportunity in this case to exercise some of the freedoms they should have to express their views. 
Greg O'Connor: We don't have to tell them; they tell us.
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: And there's Mr O'Connor, over there. He's another one who's always on about how great the Government is, how wonderful it is, how much it's in touch with the people.
Greg O'Connor: No, we get told—
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: Now, he's shaking his head, saying, "No, we're not." Well, at least he's got the moxie to admit that they don't really care about what people think. They just want to do whatever they can. It's this sort of action where a Government simply decides, "We don't want to hear too much from the people. We're not really interested in what they might say." And while the Minister stood there making an interesting case, he should have just said, "Look, we took our eye off the ball here. It's still necessary and so we want to keep going with it." That might have been a better position to take than giving the absolute flimflam that came out and will be part of the Hansard record today.
The National Party, having said all that, recognises that we have to have some mechanism to try and sort out the abysmal state that the immigration department are in. We do have to have some mechanism to give security to those 300,000 visitors or work visa people in New Zealand at the moment who are contributing to our economy. We also need to make it clear that when people are coming in, there might be an opportunity for a Minister to consider some classes of worker that are absolutely essential in our economy. While we don't like this process, we recognise that for a short time longer, that may be necessary. But why two years? That seems to lack any ambition at all, to try and sort out a Government department that has not stepped up and recognised the conditions that it should be delivering on for New Zealanders in getting through their big workload.





SIMON COURT (ACT): Thank you, Mr Speaker. Now, the ACT Party opposes this bill because it suspends a system that is already one of the worst-performing parts of Government, and it acts as a fig leaf for a Minister who's made no effort to reform and encourage the performance of his ministry. Worse than that, now it's been referred to the Education and Workforce Committee for a truncated process, and for a lot of the time that this bill is intended to be before the select committee, the House won't be sitting—there is a recess—and so that makes it much more difficult for us members of the Opposition to coordinate with our stakeholders and with those who are interested in submitting. So it's yet another example of a Government that's under pressure, that comes to Parliament with excuses like "Well, we need to do it under urgency"—another one of these "Dog ate my homework" moments that we've heard from other Ministers in this Government.
The ACT Party believes that rather than extend these extraordinary powers till May 2023, the Minister could alternatively have said, "Look, my department wants to offer a better way of working that's fairer for those people here on work visas and those applying to come to New Zealand to work"—who are desperately needed by businesses and engineering and construction and the primary sector—even tourism. It turns out that with the travel bubble with Australia about to be extended to the nine states of Australia, New Zealand will need hundreds, if not thousands, of ski field workers, who don't typically come from places like Ōhākune or Wānaka or Queenstown; they come from Brazil, they come from Europe, they come from Asia, and they come to New Zealand for the experience of working here, enjoying our culture, and contributing to our economy. 
So rather than offering an opportunity for New Zealand's businesses, which depend on this temporary labour—
DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member needs to actually speak to the motion. It's about shortening the report-back time frame for the select committee. You need to reference those to the motion. 
SIMON COURT: Thank you for your direction, Mr Speaker. So there are many, many stakeholders who would like an opportunity to contribute to better public policy when it comes to immigration, and they will have an extremely limited opportunity to prepare submissions to the select committee. We already know that the immigration authorities and the Minister have provided a confusing and inconsistent response to those stakeholders and those affected by poor decision-making, and by allowing such a limited amount of time at select committee, that's doing nothing to restore the confidence of those sectors affected in this Government or in the immigration Minister and his department.
We understand that up to 7,000 people have applications, expressions of interest, for residency on ice, plus thousands more, which, in theory, could be being processed within a two-year time frame, although there is no actual time frame for their expressions of interest for residency to be considered. Currently, that is all suspended. So while the Government may consider that this is success, it really shows you what a low bar and what a lack of ambition the Government has, actually, to create better public policy. It also shows, by offering such a limited opportunity to consider this bill at select committee, how reluctant they are to expose their poor public policy, their flawed approach to regulation, their lack of concern about the regulatory impact of these types of bills. 
Again, that is why the ACT Party opposes this bill, but we will be encouraging our stakeholders and those affected to, as quickly as possible, make effective submissions—although, judging by the repeated assertions of the number of votes that this Government has in the House of Parliament, we don't expect them to listen to the concerns of stakeholders. They've shown an arrogance and an unwillingness to respond to the genuine concerns of stakeholders, people in the primary production sector, those tourism businesses desperate not just for tourists but also for the workers needed to staff their businesses.
ACT will continue to oppose this bill, although we look forward to proposing better public policy and better solutions at select committee. [Interruption] Thank you, Mr Speaker. 
DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! Members, don't seek the call until the member speaking has taken his seat.
Dr DUNCAN WEBB (Junior Whip—Labour): I move, That the question be now put.





ERICA STANFORD (National—East Coast Bays): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I'm looking forward to speaking to the motion in opposition.
Can I just say that there wasn't any reason given by the Minister today that held any wait as to why we need a truncated select committee process. Basically, the only thing that he said was, "Well, this bill is basically the same as last time; therefore, we only need 21 days." As my colleague Michael Woodhouse pointed out earlier, the conditions surrounding this bill are entirely different than they were a year ago. There are so many more things to consider now than there were a year ago. We do understand that a year ago, when we only had 10 days from the introduction of the bill to the legislation being in place, that process needed to be quick, and we were wholeheartedly on board with it. We were in a pandemic situation. We didn't have any clarity about what was going to happen. We are in a very different situation now—the conditions are very, very different—and the one thing that strikes me from the Minister's speech today is he left out so much information that is going to be required at select committee, and we are going to need a much longer period at select committee to consider these conditions that we are now in.
The conditions that we had a year ago, where we had our immigration case officers being at home, where we had 350,000 people on shore who needed their conditions of their visas varied, and we had people who needed to leave New Zealand. Those conditions now are very, very different. We didn't hear anything from the Minister today to shed any light on why he needs these two years, so the select committee process that we need to go through is going to be required—a proper select committee process—to unearth all of these things. There wasn't anything said today about whether or not all of the immigration case officers are now working from their place of work. There wasn't anything today to indicate how many people are now on shore needing these visas to be extended—so all of that information we are going to need to require at select committee.
I know that last time we held the select committee, there were only 12 submissions. This time I have heard from—as Michael Woodhouse said, there are three groups of people, but I have heard from so many immigration advisers and lawyers who want to have a say on this bill, who are questioning the reason for two years, who are going to need time to put their submissions together. And here we are, we're having another short time frame that was completely unnecessary. This can't have been a surprise to the Minister that this was going to run out. It's in legislation. As Chris Bishop said earlier, the only thing that we can expect happened was that he just forgot about it and it wasn't until one of his officials said, "Hey, maybe we should do something about this." He went, "Oh, quick, yep. We better put this through."
Can I just say, though, while the reason he's asked for this short time frame is because the bill is significantly the same, in his opinion, as it was a year ago, can we just think for a moment what would have happened if he'd got his way in Cabinet and there was no sunset clause, and we were stuck with this shortened process? We would have had an entirely different bill. So it is only by the fact that he didn't get his way to have either three years or no sunset clause at all, which is what he actually wanted. It's only by the fact that the Cabinet said no to that that he's able to stand up here today and say that the bill is much the same as it was a year ago. But, actually, that could have been very different, and we would have been stuck with a very short time frame in order to get this passed with a significantly different bill.
But as I said, the conditions around this bill are very, very different. Although Mr Greg O'Connor said that this Government is a victim of its own success—actually, it's a victim of a Minister with his eye off the bill, which is why we're here debating this motion to give 21 short days that we're going to have to sit over a break, on Friday. For the members of the committee, like myself, who are constituent MPs who have meetings booked and events booked during that time, it is going to be very difficult for us.
I know that I have 10 minutes. I am not going to take that whole 10 minutes today, because I'm sure everyone wants to get out of here and get home to their electorates, but I would just like to finish by saying there was no need for this shortened time frame. The Minister could have brought this bill at the end of last year, and we could have had a much longer process for those immigration officials, for those immigration lawyers, and for those migrant groups. I know that those split migrant families will want to come to the select committee. They're all working, they're all under extreme stress, and now they've got hardly any time to put their thoughts down on paper and come to a select committee. This is unfair on those stakeholders, it's unfair on split migrants, it's unfair on the visitors that are here or the Recognised Seasonal Employer workers that are here in this country to give them such a short time.
Finally, we oppose this motion, not only because the Minister has dropped the ball, but also for the fact that he is just very lucky that he didn't get his way in Cabinet—this bill isn't significantly different. The only reason that it is arguably much the same as it was a year ago is because his Cabinet colleagues turned him down on no sunset clause. But the way that the Minister has conducted himself around this has been short of what we would expect from a good Minister and we oppose this motion.





GREG O'CONNOR (Labour—Ōhāriu): I move, That the question be now put.





A party vote was called for on the question, That it be an instruction to the Education and Workforce Committee that the Immigration (COVID-19 Response) Amendment Bill be reported to the House by 29 April 2021 and that the committee have the authority to meet at any time while the House is sitting (except during oral questions), during an evening on a day in which there has been a sitting of the House, on a Friday in a week in which there has been a sitting of the House, and outside the Wellington area, despite Standing Orders 193, 195, and 196(1)(b) and (c).
Ayes 75
New Zealand Labour 65; Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand 10.
Noes 43
New Zealand National 33; ACT New Zealand 10.
Motion agreed to.





FINANCIAL MARKET INFRASTRUCTURES BILL
Third Reading
Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Minister of Finance): I present a legislative statement on the Financial Market Infrastructures Bill.
DEPUTY SPEAKER: That legislative statement is published under the authority of the House and can be found on the Parliament website.
Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: I move, That the Financial Market Infrastructures Bill be now read a third time.
I want to thank all of the members across the House who have contributed to the enlightening debate on this very important, if somewhat technical, piece—
Hon Michael Woodhouse: Can't wait for the plumbing references.
Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: —of legislation that is in front of us now. It's a frightening spot to see Mr Woodhouse in! So it is with great pleasure that I stand here for the final stage of this bill. To recap for members who haven't, perhaps, been following along as closely at home for what this bill does, this is a timely piece of legislation to provide a new framework for the regulation and oversight of financial market infrastructures, or FMIs. They are an important part, if a little-known part, of our financial system.
What we have been talking about mostly in the House when we've been discussing this is what we call payment systems; so the ways in which transactions that we all make on our credit cards or using things like Apple Pay and so on—the systems that underpin that. But also, there are a number of other infrastructures that are not so much about what we might do with retail spending but are involved in what are called central counterparties or settlement systems, where you've got payments that are transferring between financial institutions, to do with things like derivatives, that take place within particular financial market infrastructures, that are often set up by banks or other financial institutions to do that work. This is how bonds are traded and this is how a lot of important underpinnings of our financial system work.
In New Zealand, we have not had a framework to govern this, that international agencies, such as the IMF, have seen as being sufficiently robust, and so that is precisely what this bill does. It makes sure that the agencies who are responsible for looking after this work, that being the Reserve Bank and the Financial Markets Authority (FMA), are both given the authority to do the work and given the powers that they need to undertake that work.
The bill particularly focuses on what are called designated FMIs. This is where these have some level of systemic importance. That is something that both the Reserve Bank and the FMA have the power to designate. But, actually, a financial market infrastructure can decide itself that it wants to be one of these, and that gets considered by those agencies, and I think that's important.
It's a regime based on a framework. It has flexibility to allow the regulators to do their job underneath it. It is a very important piece of legislation and I commend it to the House.
DEPUTY SPEAKER: The question is that the motion be agreed to.





ANDREW BAYLY (National—Port Waikato): Thank you, Mr Speaker. This is our final session on this very interesting bill. I think the other day at the committee of the whole House, the interchange on the various technical aspects of this—
Hon Grant Robertson: Enlightening.
ANDREW BAYLY: Enlightening, as the Minister of Finance says. Of course, as he correctly points out, it's a very technical bill. I don't want to go through a whole host of it; obviously; we're drawing to a close on the bill. We all support the bill. As the Minister talked about, it is a very small part of the financial sector but a very important and actually very significant part in terms of quantum of money involved in derivatives and trading of such products. The two definitions, or separations—however you want to look at it. One is over-the-counter derivatives and ones that are traded across the exchange. So we've got two types of derivatives; they drive financial markets. If you're doing an interest rate swap to mitigate some of your risk, these are the types of instruments you use to actually split up the risk, whether it might be an exchange risk, it might be an interest rate risk, and use derivatives to achieve that outcome.
So the bill is about putting in place a better framework. It's been driven from a lot of the work overseas, particularly following the Lehman bank closure and a number of other institutions in America and, to some extent, in the UK. This is very timely that we do this. We've talked about a lot of the detail in the committee of the whole House, but I think, in terms of trying to arrive at a place where we put in place a legislative platform that will enable us to have proper regard for these, at the moment, not as well-regulated as they could be type of instruments, I think we've landed in a good place. I'm glad everyone has come together across the House, and I just also want to acknowledge the officials who worked with all the committee to take us through all the detail of that. I just want to say thank you very much.





DEPUTY SPEAKER: Members, the debate on this bill is interrupted and set down for resumption next sitting day. The House stands adjourned until 2 p.m. on Tuesday, 13 April 2021. Pō mārie. 
Debate interrupted.
The House adjourned at 4.55 p.m.