Thursday, 30 October 2014

THURSDAY, 30 OCTOBER 2014

THURSDAY, 30 OCTOBER 2014

Mr Speaker took the Chair at 2 p.m.

Prayers.

Business Statement

Business Statement

Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Deputy Leader of the House): When the House resumes on Tuesday, 4 November the Government intends to progress a number of first readings on the Order Paper, including the Policing (Cost Recovery) Amendment Bill and the Organised Crime and Anti-corruption Legislation Bill. Wednesday is a members’ day.

Oral Questions

Questions to Ministers

Economy—Interest Rates and Inflation

1. ALASTAIR SCOTT (National—Wairarapa) to the Minister of Finance: What reports has he received on the economy, particularly on the direction of interest rates and inflation?

Hon BILL ENGLISH (Minister of Finance): This morning the Reserve Bank Governor conducted his regular review of the official cash rate, which he confirmed will remain at 3.5 percent, which is low by historical standards. As I noted in the House yesterday, consumer price inflation at 1 percent is right at the bottom of the Reserve Bank’s target band, despite strong economic growth and real wage growth. The governor noted that New Zealand’s economic growth has been faster than trend over 2014, which has helped to reduce unemployment and added to demands on productive capacity. He added that low-interest rates, construction sector activity, and high net immigration continued to support economic growth. He said there will be a period of assessment before any further policy adjustment, which we think means that it will be some time before he raises the official cash rate.

Alastair Scott: What observations did the Reserve Bank Governor make about inflation and the outlook for the cost of living?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: The governor noted that the consumer price inflation remained modest, right at the bottom of the bank’s target band, at 1 percent. The factors contributing to low inflation include subdued wage inflation and well-anchored inflation expectations, because we have a robust policy targets agreement with the Reserve Bank Governor. He also referred to weak global inflation, falls in oil prices, and the high New Zealand dollar. He pointed out that house price inflation has also fallen significantly since late 2013, partly due to interest rate increases and partly due to loan-to-value ratio restrictions. He noted that inflation remains low despite stronger growth.

Alastair Scott: How are the current low-interest environment and the growing economy being reflected in business confidence and investment?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: I think the dawning realisation that interest rates will not reach the peaks that they did in 2008—in fact, they could peak at a much lower rate than the 10 percent they reached then—is good for business confidence. ANZ reported that business confidence rebounded in October above its long-run average. A net 27 percent of firms are optimistic about their general prospects, up 14 points on September, which may be related to the outcome of the general election. These expectations are consistent with solid growth, good employment, and investment intentions among businesses. Statistics New Zealand numbers show that business investment increased by 7.7 percent in the year to June, led by investment in construction and infrastructure.

Alastair Scott: How do current interest rates compare with historical levels, and how is this being reflected in mortgage and business lending rates?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: It is usually the case that as the economy goes through a growth cycle, interest rates rise considerably. The Government has been working hard to do what it can to ensure that interest rates in this economic cycle remain lower for longer, because that would be good for households and businesses and prevent a build-up of imbalances. We are focused on tight fiscal policy, which has enabled interest rates to stay lower for longer, and we have also taken an active approach to sorting out the housing market, which has been one of the biggest drivers of mortgage rates in previous cycles. Average residential floating mortgage rates remain quite low, at around 6.7 percent, in this cycle, and the average business lending rate remains below 6 percent. Back in 2008 these equivalent rates were home mortgage rates of 11 percent rather than 6.7 percent, and business lending rates were 9.2 percent rather than the current 6 percent.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: How do New Zealand’s interest rates compare with those of Japan, China, the UK, Europe, and the US?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: I know that the member does not like good news, but the good news is that New Zealand did not have a two decade recession like Japan, so our interest rates are higher. Our interest rates are a bit higher than the UK, which is a place where real incomes were cut by up to 10 percent as a result of the recession. They are a bit higher than the US, where the housing market collapsed and middle-class incomes have not moved for 10 years, so it is not a bad problem to have.

State and Social Housing—Availability and Accommodation Supplement

2. PHIL TWYFORD (Labour—Te Atatū) to the Minister for Social Housing: How many families with children have been subsidised through the Accommodation Supplement over the last six years to live at the Western Heights Caravan Park in Rānui she described as being not the right place “for children to be growing up in”?

Hon PAULA BENNETT (Minister for Social Housing): Given the time available, the Ministry of Social Development was unable to calculate the exact number of families with children who have lived at the Western Heights Caravan Park and received the accommodation supplement. If it would help the House, but I am not sure it does, that I give an estimate, I would say well over 1,000, to be fair. I have long acknowledged that Western Heights is a far from perfect place to live, but to take away from the people who live there the right to access the accommodation supplement would be to take away a basic entitlement that low-income people have to subsidised housing.

Phil Twyford: When she declared “We will house more people in social housing.” and that she counts people, not houses, can she tell the thousands of New Zealand families living in cars and caravans and garages exactly how many extra families her social housing policy will house over the next 6 months?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: I have been the Minister for Social Housing for weeks, not months, so we are still working our way through actual numbers on where that is at, but what I will say is that in April we introduced the income-related rent to be available to community housing providers. That is so it is not used in just State houses and can be used in other means of housing, which will open up that availability so that people have better options than just a State house that may or may not be available.

Phil Twyford: Why can she not tell the House how many extra people her policy will house, given that she stood there yesterday, after 6 years in Government, and declared “We count people, not houses.” and “We will house more people in social housing.”?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: What we will be making available is more places through income-related rent, and I think the member can look forward to announcements around that in the near future. That will give some indication on what will be happening with the social housing market and how many people will be advantaged by that.

Phil Twyford: How does she expect to house even the 5,500 people on the waiting list, when, as the Minister of Finance said very recently, they only put enough additional income-related rent subsidy in the Budget to house 500, a tenth of the waiting list?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: As I just indicated, the member can look forward to announcements in the near future on the number of income-related rents that will be available.

Phil Twyford: When the residents of the Rānui caravan park sent her packing at the public meeting in September last year, was it because they saw through her scapegoating of the caravan park after having done nothing to add more social or emergency housing over the last 6 years, or were they just being ungrateful?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: I have a lot of admiration for the people who are living anywhere in Auckland, actually, and particularly for those residents whom I knew well from being their member of Parliament for quite some years. What I will say, though, is that in the last figures I could find in the short period of time I have had since this question was put down, in August 2013 there were 28 people who lived at the park who were on the housing register. There were only 28 that were there. In June 2014, 162 people were living at the park, and 28 of them had dependent children. So, no, I certainly do not think they are ungrateful. I think they do a remarkable job in what are incredibly difficult circumstances.

Export Sector—Accession to Agreement on Government Procurement andOther Initiatives

3. MARK MITCHELL (National—Rodney) to the Minister for Economic Development: What recent progress has the Government made on making it easier for Kiwi businesses to sell their products and services abroad?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE (Minister for Economic Development): I am pleased to advise the House that overnight the World Trade Organization gave the green light to New Zealand’s accession to the World Trade Organization Agreement on Government Procurement. The accession to the agreement, which took 2 years of negotiations, guarantees New Zealand companies access to bid for Government contracts in 43 countries around the world. Previously, New Zealand companies have needed to go through the often time-consuming and costly process of building offshore branches to be able to bid for those Government contracts. The agreement will remove the need for that, allowing them to do business with offshore Governments and Government agencies from a New Zealand base, creating more jobs and local investment in this country.

Mark Mitchell: What does this agreement mean for Kiwi businesses?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: Accession to the Agreement on Government Procurement will give New Zealand businesses and exporters guaranteed access to bid for overseas Government contracts, worth around an annual US$1.7 trillion. The agreement currently covers 43 World Trade Organization members, including the major markets of the US, Canada, Korea, Japan, and across the European Union. That number will grow to 45 with the accession of New Zealand and Montenegro, and a further eight World Trade Organization member countries are currently in the process of joining the agreement, which will open up more markets for New Zealand companies. Acceding to the World Trade Organization Agreement on Government Procurement is one of the more than 350 actions contained in our Business Growth Agenda, and specifically one of the key initiatives identified in the export market stream, which is aimed at lifting the proportion of exports as a percentage of GDP to 40 percent by 2025.

Mark Mitchell: What other work is the Government doing to grow New Zealand exports?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: A lot of work, led by trade Minister Tim Groser, who works very hard for his country. We have signed free-trade agreements with Malaysia, Hong Kong, and ASEAN. We are progressing well on agreements with Korea and with the Gulf Cooperation Council. Just this last weekend Minsters met again in Sydney to continue discussions on the Trans-Pacific Partnership. We are, of course, funding the promotion of our education and tourism industries. We have established the New Zealand Story, which is a new marketing framework to help our businesses leverage New Zealand’s brand and values on the world stage. As part of this year’s Budget, we have expanded the number of New Zealand companies that New Zealand Trade and Enterprise works with intensively from 500 to 700, recognising that an increasing number and range of New Zealand businesses are doing more and more of their trade offshore and looking to break into more and larger markets.

Sexual Assault Allegations—Roast Busters Case

4. KELVIN DAVIS (Labour—Te Tai Tokerau) to the Minister of Police: Does he believe the Police decision not to prosecute the Roast Busters has resulted in justice for the girls involved?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Minister of Energy and Resources) on behalf of the Minister of Police: It is not for the Minister to comment on the outcome of Operation Clover, as that is an operational matter for the police. However, what I can say is that I have been assured by the commissioner that the police undertook a thorough and professional investigation into what has clearly been a challenging and complex case. I accept that the decision not to lay charges has prompted a wide range of reactions, but I am assured that the victims have been the primary concern throughout the investigation and that this was a very carefully considered decision.

Kelvin Davis: Given that the police believe something happened in eight incidents involving seven victims and five suspects but just did not think they could secure a conviction, what is it that they believe did happen?

Mr SPEAKER: The Hon Simon Bridges, in as far as there is ministerial responsibility.

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: Clearly, these are operational matters for the police. It would be inappropriate, in fact, for the Minister to involve himself in the detail of this series of prosecutions or potential prosecutions. I think what I can say is that the victims were the primary concern. It was a very well-resourced operation. I have been assured, through the inquiries that have been made, that it was a thorough and professional investigation.

Kelvin Davis: Does the Minister of Police believe it is acceptable that the police cannot prosecute in this case?

Mr SPEAKER: Again, in as far as there is ministerial responsibility. I will leave it for the Minister to answer. It is a marginal call.

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: It is very clear that all prosecutorial decisions come under the Solicitor-General’s guidelines for prosecutions. They have got two tests involved there, and one is clearly whether there is a sufficient level of evidence. What has been clear here, through the media and also what I am aware of, is that it failed on that test.

Kelvin Davis: What changes does the Minister of Police believe he needs to drive to give survivors of sexual violence confidence they will have a better than average chance to see justice?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: Law reform in an area such as this, criminal justice, is for the Minister of Justice. I can certainly advise the House that there is a range of law reform matters going on, not in relation to a specific case or cases but in relation to the general area of criminal justice and sexual violence. This includes, following the Law Commission’s review of the Evidence Act in early 2013, a drafted Evidence Amendment Bill that will, for example, require the defence to give notice before trial that it intends to raise issues about a complainant’s previous sexual history, and also making a number of changes in relation to child and youth witnesses that will, we believe, result in the right kinds of changes.

Sexual Offences—Pre-trial and Trial Processes

5. METIRIA TUREI (Co-Leader—Green) to the Minister of Justice: Will she ask the Law Commission to resume its work on alternative pre-trial and trial processes in sexual violence cases in light of the decision by Police not to prosecute those involved in the Roast Busters case; if not, why not?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Associate Minister of Justice) on behalf of the Minister of Justice: This is an area that the Minister is interested in taking some further advice on and then looking into. We are committed to supporting victims of crime, particularly victims of sexual violence, and therefore how they interact with the justice system is an area that is constantly being reviewed. We do not want to make decisions based on any single particular case, but the issues raised are of general interest and the Minister will be requesting further advice in this area.

Metiria Turei: How can the Minister not support the immediate resumption of the Law Commission review, given that there are seven formal complaints in the Roast Busters investigation and yet not one can pass the test in the Solicitor-General’s prosecution guideline of a reasonable prospect of conviction?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: As I have said, the Government is not going to react to a particular case, but these are important issues—there is no question of that. The Minister is certainly taking an open approach and seeking advice on these very important issues.

Metiria Turei: Does she agree with the President of the Law Commission, Sir Grant Hammond, when he said: “the Law Commission has been told that participants in criminal trials, both victims and defendants, find the current adversarial process to be very alienating and disempowering,”; if she does agree, is this not further evidence to ask the Law Commission to immediately resume its work?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: As stated, clearly they are matters the Minister is taking advice on. I think there is a fair set of issues that the member raises that do need to be looked into very carefully and closely. But I think in direct response to the member’s question about whether we in some way, shape, or form move to a different kind of system here—inquisitorial, for example—clearly something would have to be thought through very carefully. There are, as with any changes like this, real pros and cons. It is not entirely clear, for example, whether it would improve victims’ experiences or whether it would result in a higher conviction rate. So I think, as I say, these are things that need to be thought through carefully and, dare I say it, judiciously.

Metiria Turei: Does the Minister agree with the former Minister of Justice Simon Power when he said that it was worrying that only 10 percent or about 2,000 sexual offences were reported each year; if she does agree, is this not a good reason to ask the Law Commission to resume its work to improve the system so that victims are more comfortable with reporting cases?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: The low rates that the member talks about have been a concern for many years and I think rightfully so. That is why we have increased funding in terms of the support in these areas; that is why, as I have said, in a number of areas including a drafted Evidence Amendment Bill, we are seeking to make things simpler and easier for victims, and that is why also the Minister is seeking advice on the points raised in the primary question here.

Metiria Turei: Why will the Minister not ask the Law Commission to immediately resume its work when victims, lawyers, judges, and support services all agree that the current system does not work, and even esteemed members of our judicial system such as Dame Silvia Cartwright, who told the Law Commission: “If I had a daughter who was raped, I would strongly advise her not to go near the criminal justice system.”?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: As I have already said, these are very much matters that we are taking advice on. As I have also already said, we need to consider these matters carefully because there are pros and cons in relation to any system changes. Let me also say, though, that I think the Commissioner of Police has made it very clear that the police do want complainants and victims of crime to come forward. I think women in New Zealand can be very clear that those matters will be dealt with with sensitivity, thoroughness, real professionalism, and the resources that they merit.

Marama Fox: Kia ora, e te Mana Whakawā. Does the Minister agree with Rape Crisis that the system fails survivors of sexual violence; if she does, how will she ensure that the system does deliver justice for survivors and their whānau?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: Of course the justice system works incredibly hard to support victims of sexual violence. We are constantly reviewing the way they interact with the system, and we are interested in ways in which we can improve the experience of complainants. I note, for instance, that there is much going on in relation to specialist court victim advisers, funding for victim support and rape prevention education also in this area. So it is something that is being worked on very hard indeed.

Business—Funding Sources for Small Businesses

6. STUART SMITH (National—Kaikōura) to the Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs: What is the Government doing to help small businesses access capital markets?

Hon PAUL GOLDSMITH (Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs): The National Government is committed to building and deepening access to capital for smaller high-growth businesses, and the recently passed Financial Markets Conduct Act is already making an impact. Many of the Act’s growth-focused initiatives took effect from April this year, such as enabling equity, crowdfunding, and peer-to-peer lending. Under new regulations a New Zealand company may raise up to $2 million in 12 months from licensed crowdfunding platforms. This creates more funding options for smaller and potentially high-growth businesses.

Stuart Smith: Have any businesses taken advantage of these new funding avenues?

Hon PAUL GOLDSMITH: Yes, I am advised that a number of businesses are benefiting from these new regulations. I am aware of one company that has recently raised $700,000 in fewer than 2 weeks through crowdfunding. The Financial Markets Conduct Act is just another example of the National Government making it easier for New Zealand companies to do business through our Business Growth Agenda to grow their businesses, create jobs, and, ultimately, to improve living standards in New Zealand.

Trans-Pacific Partnership—Scope of Negotiations and Release of Information

7. Hon PHIL GOFF (Labour—Mt Roskill) to the Minister of Trade: What are his bottom lines for New Zealand becoming a party to the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement?

Hon TIM GROSER (Minister of Trade): I can assure the member that there is a very clear bottom line, and that is that when this negotiation, which has many moving parts, settles down, if it ever does—and we can see exactly what we are expected to do and exactly what we will get in return—unless it clearly is in our view in the net national interest and we are confident we can carry that debate, we will not be a party to the agreement.

Hon Phil Goff: When successive New Zealand Governments have committed themselves strongly to the principle that the Trans-Pacific Partnership must be high quality and comprehensive, will he sign up to a deal that does not meet that standard by continuing to allow damaging market access restrictions on major New Zealand exports, such as dairy and beef; if so why?

Hon TIM GROSER: The only deal that I would recommend to our Cabinet, and through it to this House, is that we accept and pass the enabling legislation. It would be a deal that addresses all of our issues on a comprehensive basis, without any exceptions for our important export industries.

Hon Phil Goff: In the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement, will he compromise on New Zealand’s sovereign right to legislate for legitimate public policy goals in areas like health and the environment; if not, how will he guarantee New Zealand’s right to constrain actions by foreign corporates that are detrimental to our public policy goals?

Hon TIM GROSER: Well, the answer in principle is very clear. We will not sign agreements that do not allow legitimate public policy regulation in the public interest in the future. The devil will be in the detail in describing that, and it is an extremely complicated issue.

Hon Phil Goff: Will he protect New Zealand’s absolute right to prevent the promotion of a harmful product like tobacco by pushing to exclude tobacco from access to investor State disputes procedures, and what support within the negotiations would there be for a stance of that nature?

Hon TIM GROSER: Well, this is one of the most sensitive issues in these negotiations, as the member well knows. With the strong support the New Zealand Government has given to Australia on a case that, although not arising from these negotiations, arises from a previous negotiation, we will ensure that we maintain a position whereby any future Government can maintain very strong anti-tobacco legislation.

Hon Phil Goff: Why are groups in New Zealand with the public interest at heart, such as medical professionals, not given confidential access to draft texts when the United States reports indicate that multinational corporations have access to such texts in areas where they have vested financial interests?

Hon TIM GROSER: Well, I cannot comment on how other Governments seek to invite their stakeholders into their consultation process. All I can say is that we have, in respect of this negotiation, the most effective and fullest form of stakeholder consultation, and if other groups feel they wish to engage in a more serious consultation, they know where to come.

Hon Phil Goff: When the Minister has the right under Trans-Pacific Partnership rules to provide negotiating texts in confidence to relevant groups outside the Government, why has he not taken advantage of that right to ensure that core groups like medical professionals are properly informed about the issues under negotiation?

Hon TIM GROSER: We are trying to make this negotiation a success, and the member is well aware that there is some quite heavy politics here and that full disclosure to certain parties is likely to lead this to go immediately into the public debate on an ill-informed basis before the deal has been done. We are very conscious of the interests of New Zealanders in protecting themselves from such legislation, and we will continue to take a very responsible approach in this negotiation.

Hon Phil Goff: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. The critical part of my question was to provide draft negotiating texts—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I listened very carefully to the question because it was quite a substantial question. The Minister has adequately, to my satisfaction, addressed the question that was asked.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: When will the Government abandon its policy of evasion, obfuscation, and secrecy and tell the New Zealand public exactly what concessions and sacrifices the New Zealand Government has already agreed to in the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations?

Hon TIM GROSER: Well, happily, we do not have a policy of evasion and obfuscation to abandon.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: How can he claim to be part of an open and transparent Government when there has been zero public scrutiny and zero input publicly into the terms that New Zealand is agreeing to in the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations, as evidenced in his answers today?

Hon TIM GROSER: Well, I would invite the member to reflect on his own extensive experience in Government, and he will be well aware that in the process of forming positions, they are held under strict confidentiality until the decision is taken. Then there is a process of full accountability, and this will be no different.

KiwiRail—Public Safety

8. MARAMA FOX (Māori Party) to the Minister of Transport: What advice has he sought from KiwiRail about how they will increase awareness of the general public around railway tracks and require drivers to reduce speeds when travelling through residential areas following the tragic death of a young man in Te Kūiti on Sunday night?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Minister of Transport): Firstly, can I express my condolences to the family at this sad and difficult time. As the Minister of Transport I take the public safety of the rail network very seriously, as does KiwiRail. To keep people safe on the rail network, KiwiRail has advised me that it is working with local communities to ensure that measures such as fencing and signage are in place, as well as carrying out educational initiatives focusing on raising awareness of the risks around the rail corridor.

Marama Fox: Mehemea ka kitea i tere rawa te haere o te tereina i Te Kūiti, he ngā whakaaro o te Minita ka tīmatahia e ia, kia kore ai te iwi whānui e whara?

[If excessive speed of the train is found to be an issue in the Te Kūiti case, what actions does the Minister plan to initiate to ensure greater public safety?]

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: I appreciate what I think is a fair and sincere question. I do not, however, intend to pre-empt the inquiry’s investigations that are going on by certainly the police, by KiwiRail internally, and also by a coroner. Certainly, though, I can assure the member that I will consider any actions coming out of the investigations once they have been completed and reported to me.

Sexual Violence—Prevention and Victim Support

9. TRACEY MARTIN (Deputy Leader—NZ First) to the Minister for Women: Does she support the Prime Minister’s statement on election night that “I will lead a Government that will govern for all New Zealanders”?

Hon LOUISE UPSTON (Minister for Women): Yes.

Tracey Martin: In what specific ways will the Minister for Women ensure that women fully benefit from the Prime Minister’s aspirational statement?

Hon LOUISE UPSTON: There are many opportunities for women to contribute more to our economic growth. In particular, it is about making sure that women are aware of the opportunities in growing industries. Construction is a great example. The construction industry is growing and is expected to be in double digits by the year 2017. So there is an opportunity for us to work with industries, employers, and women, of course, to make sure that they are aware of those opportunities.

Tracey Martin: What priority does the Ministry of Women’s Affairs give in its work programme for 2014-15 to the issue of sexual violence and abuse against women and girls?

Hon LOUISE UPSTON: Any violence against women is abhorrent, and I am committed to working with the other Ministers in the sector—the Minister of Justice, the Minister of Police, and the Minister for Social Development—to ensure that we have a work programme that is not just about dealing with victims of sexual violence but actually preventing it in the first place.

Tracey Martin: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. Just for some clarification, both the questions I have asked—one, in what specific ways; and, two, what priority—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! Just make the point of order please.

Tracey Martin: I am not confident that the questions have been answered by the Minister—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I can assist the member. In the first case, there is no doubt in my mind that the question was answered or addressed. In the case of the second one, I think the way forward would be to invite the member to ask the second question again with regard to the priorities of the Ministry of Women’s Affairs, and allow the Minister to answer it.

Tracey Martin: What priority does the Ministry of Women’s Affairs give in its work programme for 2014-15 to the issue of sexual violence and abuse against women and girls?

Hon LOUISE UPSTON: There is a group of Ministers who will work together in the space of sexual violence. It will build on the work that was done in the previous Parliament. As the Minister for Women, I will proudly play an active part and will make that a priority for the year ahead.

Tracey Martin: What specific steps is the Ministry of Women’s Affairs taking to address the prevalence of sexual violence against women—specific steps?

Hon LOUISE UPSTON: I have been in the role of the Minister for Women for 2 weeks. One of the things that I will be focusing on in the weeks and months ahead is focusing the work of the ministry into the areas that count for New Zealanders. It will be aligned with the Government’s priorities. But I will make this commitment to the member: it is clear in New Zealand that sexual violence is intolerable. I have also said in my speech in the Address in Reply debate in this House that I welcome any very practical comments and solutions from any member of this House who has a solution that they believe will reduce and prevent any sexual violence against any woman of our land.

Tracey Martin: In light of that answer, and in recognition that as a new Minister she will have been briefed on previous work, what steps is the Ministry of Women’s Affairs taking to improve the capacity of Government agencies to identify and appropriately deal with violence against women and the sexual abuse of women and girls?

Hon LOUISE UPSTON: I want to reiterate the comment that I made in my previous answer: I will proudly work with the other Ministers who are involved in this important work, and I will be working on the priorities with the ministry according to the work that has already been undertaken, to work with our plan going forward. As I have said, as a new Minister those decisions have yet to be made, but I will take those commitments seriously, and, at a later point, I would be more than happy for that member to put a question in writing. As I have said, give me more than 2 weeks and I will happily share that with the member, and I would very, very happily share any contribution to solving this issue that you might have.

Workplace Health and Safety—Ports

10. IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North) to the Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety: Does he agree with Port of Tauranga corporate services manager Sara Lunam that they are “not responsible for other companies’ employees on Port of Tauranga”?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE (Minister for Economic Development) on behalf of the Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety: No, not necessarily at all. It would depend on the detailed arrangements between the Port of Tauranga and the lessees of its facilities and the activities that they undertake. The Health and Safety in Employment Act sets out the duties of employers, persons in control of places of work, and contracting principals, and it is quite comprehensive. Further, the new Health and Safety Reform Bill—

Chris Hipkins: Speak up.

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: —currently before the House, makes it clear that all those who have influence on—well, be quiet and you will—[Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! The members are complaining that they cannot hear, but if they continue to interject and yell at the Minister, then they have no chance.

Chris Hipkins: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. The interjections actually started when members could not hear the Minister. He was actually heard in silence for the first half of his answer, and people could not hear him.

Mr SPEAKER: That is no excuse for then continuing with that level of interjection. I am going to invite the Minister to start his answer again, and I request from my left-hand side a reasonable level of silence to allow the answer to heard.

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: No, not necessarily at all. Under current law, it depends on the detailed arrangements between the Port of Tauranga and the lessees of its facilities and the activities that they undertake. The Health and Safety in Employment Act sets out the duties of employers, persons in control of places of work, and contracting principals, and it is quite comprehensive. Further, the new Health and Safety Reform Bill, which is currently before the House, makes it clear that all those who have an influence on health and safety outcomes in the workplace have a shared responsibility to keep workers safe, and they need to consult and coordinate with each other to make sure that happens.

Iain Lees-Galloway: Will he state for the record that there will be no change in the Health and Safety Reform Bill to the responsibilities of principals and owners of workplaces for the health and safety of all workers on their sites, and no erosion of the worker participation provisions?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: That bill is currently before the Parliament—in fact, I understand, currently before the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee. It would not be appropriate for the Minister at this stage to say what will or will not happen to that bill while it is currently before the select committee.

Iain Lees-Galloway: Is he concerned that the increased casualisation of the workforce is resulting in increased accidents at our ports, with 25 of the 26 accidents and both of the deaths at the Port of Tauranga relating to employees or contractors not directly employed by the port; if so, what will he do to reduce the casualisation of the workforce?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: The health and safety of workers at the port, and, in fact, at any other workplace in New Zealand, is non-negotiable. It does not matter what the contracting arrangements are, the responsibilities are there and they must be met. There are a number of investigations going on at the moment by WorkSafe New Zealand into accidents that have occurred at New Zealand ports, and the regulator will absolutely take enforcement action if that is what is required.

Iain Lees-Galloway: Does the Minister accept that the majority—the overwhelming majority—of accidents and deaths have involved people on casualised contracted employment arrangements, not direct employees of ports?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: I would be very interested in reading the member’s data. That is not my understanding, but I have to say that I have not actually been briefed on that. It certainly has not been raised, but I think that if the member looks, he will find that there have been issues of workplace injuries and fatalities under all sorts of employment arrangements.

Iain Lees-Galloway: Will he undertake to do a full sweep of site inspections, as was done for the forestry sector, to stop the shameful toll of seven deaths and 133 serious accidents that have occurred at our ports in just the past 3 years?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: It is clear that any workplace fatality is unacceptable, but we have, in fact, set up a new regulator, WorkSafe New Zealand, which was established in December 2013 to take a stronger monitoring role and to enforce compliance with the law. I can advise the member right now that WorkSafe is undertaking a number of investigations of incidents at New Zealand ports, and it will take the action that it believes is appropriate. It will be briefing the Minister on a regular basis as to any other action that it believes needs to be taken from a policy perspective.

Iain Lees-Galloway: That would be a “No”, then?

Mr SPEAKER: Order!

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. That is the second or third time the member has got up and tried to characterise the answer. This is a serious subject, and I think the flippancy with which he is approaching it is inappropriate.

Mr SPEAKER: It is indeed the second time that I have noted the member stand up and start his supplementary question that way, which is unacceptable. I warned him last time not to do it, and he has continued to do it. I am very tempted to complete this line of questioning and certainly, if that habit was to continue from that particular member, that would be the action I would take. On this occasion I will give him the benefit of the doubt.

Iain Lees-Galloway: Does he consider appropriate rest and meal breaks to be necessary for port safety; if so, why is he pursuing changes today to remove minimum entitlements to rest and meal breaks from the Employment Relations Act?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: The member is incorrect in his assertion. Nothing in the Employment Relations Amendment Bill affects the obligations on employers to keep their workers safe. Any member who represents that is misrepresenting the bill in the House this afternoon. It is up to employers and employees in the bill that is yet to pass the House to negotiate what breaks are reasonable for their workplace, but employers must meet the health and safety obligations in their workplace at all times. [Interruption] I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. The member has again characterised the answer immediately after—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! On this occasion there is a difference. The member has interjected—it was not a helpful interjection, and I accept that—but it was not as if he did it at the start of his question, which was the issue I addressed earlier.

Transport Infrastructure, Wellington—Rail Network Upgrades

11. PAUL FOSTER-BELL (National) to the Minister of Transport: What progress is being made on Government-funded metro rail upgrades in Wellington?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Minister of Transport): Last week it was a privilege to help pour the foundations for the last of the 640 masts carrying new electrification hardware between Redwood and Muri, a part of the wider Wellington metro rail upgrade project. This part of the project is more than 2 years ahead of schedule and will help provide a more reliable and efficient service. The $88 million upgrade project represents a significant part of the Government’s $485 million investment in Wellington metro rail. These investments have helped Wellington remain our leading example of metro rail, with 95 percent on-time performance and customer satisfaction.

Paul Foster-Bell: What other milestones have been reached in the Wellington metro rail upgrade project?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: The Government’s $485 million investment has also paid for the upgrade of the rail network to power the Matangi fleet and the purchase of Matangi trains, for improvements to reduce service delays, for the extension of the electrified network to include Waikanae Station, and for the completion of Wellington’s new train maintenance depot. This Government is committed to the continuing success of metro rail in Wellington as well as in Auckland, where we are investing nearly $1.7 billion for the upgrading and electrification of the rail network.

Health Promotion Agency Board—Potential Conflict of Interest

12. KEVIN HAGUE (Green) to the Minister of Health: Is he satisfied that all conflicts of interest that arose by the head of Food and Grocery Council Katherine Rich being a member of the Health Promotion Agency were managed in accordance with the provisions of the Crown Entities Act 2004; if so, why?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN (Minister of Health): Yes; because there is no indication to the contrary.

Kevin Hague: How specifically has Mrs Rich or the Health Promotion Agency managed her conflicts, when according to the agency’s minutes she has never ever recused herself from a discussion or decision of the board, even one involving alcohol, sugar, or tobacco?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: I think that is very much the point. I have had the Ministry of Health review all those minutes, and it tells me that there is nothing inappropriate in the conduct of any board member in the context of the Crown Entities Act 2004.

Kevin Hague: I seek leave to table the minutes of the Health Promotion Agency board from July 2012 to July 2014.

Mr SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table those particular minutes of the Health Promotion Agency. Is there any objection to those minutes being tabled? No, there is not. They can be tabled.

Document, by leave, laid on the Table of the House.

Kevin Hague: Does he agree that there is an untenable conflict of interest in the same person who submitted to the Health Committee against the plain packaging of tobacco also participating in a Health Promotion Agency discussion aimed at promoting the plain packaging of tobacco?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: No.

Hon Dr Nick Smith: What conflict of interest did Green MP Steffan Browning have in advocating homeopathy as a solution to the Ebola epidemic?

Mr SPEAKER: I do not believe there is any ministerial responsibility for that question.

Kevin Hague: Will he ask Health Promotion Agency chair, Lee Mathias, why Mrs Rich was allowed to participate in discussions about junk food, tobacco, and alcohol when the Crown Entities Act requires members with conflicts of interest not to take part in any discussion or decision of the board relating to, or otherwise participating in, any activity of the entity that relates to a matter where a conflict of interest may exist?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: As I answered earlier, we have had a look at those minutes. They have been reviewed by ministry officials, and the advice from them is that there is no conflict.

Kevin Hague: I seek leave to table a hard-copy version of a Powerpoint presentation from the State Services Commission, dated February 2014, explaining to members of Crown entity boards what their legal obligations were.

Mr SPEAKER: On the basis that it may not be that easily obtainable by members, I will put the leave. Leave is sought to table that particular hard copy of a Powerpoint presentation. Is there any objection to that piece of paper being tabled? There is not. It can be tabled.

Document, by leave, laid on the Table of the House.

Kevin Hague: Will he investigate the Health Promotion Agency’s management of Mrs Rich’s conflicts, including the role of the Health Promotion Agency chair, Lee Mathias, given that Ms Mathias appears to have allowed Mrs Rich to participate in discussions where her role as a lobbyist conflicts seriously with her role as a health promoter?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: I disagree with the assertions in that member’s question.

Kevin Hague: Does—[Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! The member still has a right to ask questions.

Kevin Hague: Does Mrs Rich retain his confidence, given that she has never even once declared a specific interest in any agenda item on the agendas of the Health Promotion Agency, has never recused herself from any discussions or decisions, and clearly has not managed her conflict in accordance with the Crown Entities Act?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: That is absolutely incorrect. When Katherine Rich applied for that position, and when she was appointed, she declared her potential conflicts of interest. They were recorded in the Cabinet paper. My advice to the Green Party is to stop focusing on issues that do not advance quality health care for New Zealanders; start focusing on how we are going to get increased access to quality health care across the population. That is the real issue, and that is what I am focusing on as Minister of Health.

Dr Megan Woods: What were the circumstances that led him to receive the direct communication from the chair of the Health Promotion Agency regarding Katherine Rich that he cited in the House last week when he said: “She has always been an ethical member of the board. As chair I have always had confidence in her contribution.”?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: The circumstances were the sustained and ridiculous personal attacks on Katherine Rich by the Green Party, which prefers to focus on ridiculous stuff like treating Ebola with homeopathy rather than on the key issues facing New Zealanders in the pursuit of quality health care.

Dr Megan Woods: Did he consult with any other organisations or persons regarding the suitability of Katherine Rich on the board of the Health Promotion Agency; if so, which organisations or persons?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: Her appointment went through a Cabinet process, and all the appropriate processes were followed.

Dr Megan Woods: Did the Minister consult with any other Ministers about the role of Katherine Rich on the board of the Health Promotion Agency; if so, whom?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: Yes; Cabinet.

Urgent Debates Declined

Sexual Assault Allegations—Roast Busters Case

Mr SPEAKER: I have received a letter from Kelvin Davis seeking to debate under Standing Order 389 the Government’s inability to prosecute claims of sexual abuse. In order for an urgent debate to be held, there must be a particular case of recent occurrence involving ministerial responsibility. The police yesterday afternoon announced their decision that charges would not be laid following the Operation Clover investigation. Although the Minister of Police is answerable to this House for police operational matters, under our system of Government the decision to prosecute or not is not a matter of ministerial responsibility. Had the police in making their decision revealed substantial or substantive policy changes, I may have been inclined to accept the application because of the public interest. I note that the Independent Police Conduct Authority has yet to report finally on its investigation. A Government’s response to such an inquiry might occasion an urgent debate if it were to reveal a new or significant development of significant importance in itself that warranted setting aside the business of the House. However, the purpose of an urgent debate is to hold the Government accountable for an action that has occurred for which it is responsible. There must be a distinct Government responsibility for the particular case for which leave is sought to debate. An urgent debate is not an opportunity for a general debate on issues of concern to members. The application is therefore declined.

Address in Reply

Address in Reply

Debate resumed from 29 October.

JAMI-LEE ROSS (National—Botany): What a great day it is to be part of the National-led Government in this House. What a great day it is to be a member of this National-led Government, because in about 15 minutes’ time, this House will be expressing confidence in this Government to continue working for New Zealanders for the next 3 years. This House will be expressing that confidence because the voters of New Zealand expressed confidence in this Government after the hard work of the past 6 years—after 6 years of delivering for New Zealanders, after 6 years of doing what we said we would do, and after 6 years of focusing on the issues that matter for New Zealanders.

When the public went to the polls on 20 September, they looked at the people on the list for the National Party, they looked at the fine members of our caucus—all 60 of them—and they decided that they were fit to govern this country. When they went to the polls and looked at the Opposition, they decided that it was a bunch of parties that could not work together, could not agree with each other, did not support their leaders, and kept focusing on the negative issues that New Zealanders do not care about. Their failed policies and their failed leadership were resoundingly rejected.

This party actually focuses on positive matters. It is all fine and well for the Opposition to say it cares about positive things, but actually you cannot say you are going to focus on positive issues on day one and then forget about it for the rest of the election campaign. We have had 6 years of delivering for New Zealanders. That is why we are sitting over this side of the House, and I am proud to be part of this party.

I sat through many of the maiden speeches that were delivered in this Chamber, and I have to say that I was incredibly impressed by the calibre of the top-quality candidates that we have on this side of the House. We have 14 new MPs from various backgrounds representing New Zealand. Because of the diversity, the knowledge, the integrity, and the huge skill that they bring to this House, I am proud to be standing alongside them.

When you sit here at question time and you look up at the Government members on the backbench, you see a party that is focused on renewal, you see a party that is focused on diversity, and you see a party that has brought huge talent into this Parliament. When you sit here and look at the other side of the House, you see the same old faces with the same old failed policies and the same old negativity that they brought during the election campaign. Listening to question time this week, you would not have thought that we had actually had an election, because exactly the same issues that New Zealanders rejected—rejected—only a couple of months ago were still being talked about by the Opposition members. They have not learnt the lessons. They are still talking about their failed old policies that New Zealanders rejected.

This party is delivering strong, stable government for New Zealanders. That is why we were re-elected. We have a Prime Minister who is a strong leader and who has led this country through some difficult times in the past 6 years. But we are coming out of it, and looking pretty good as a country. We are coming out of it as a country that is more confident and as a country that is achieving more for New Zealanders living in this country. New Zealanders know that. The voters know that.

New Zealanders want to see an economy that is growing. Under the leadership of Bill English as the Minister of Finance, we are delivering a growing economy for New Zealanders. Eighty-three thousands jobs in the past year, growth of 3.9 percent, one of the fastest-growing economies in the OECD—that is what New Zealanders care about the most, and we are delivering for them on the economy.

We also care very much about the housing situation in this country. The Opposition likes to characterise us as not caring, but we are delivering the policies and we are delivering the legislation that will lead to more affordable housing in this country. We need more houses to be built in Auckland. That is what Minister Nick Smith has been delivering in the past few years. We are also focusing on getting more people into housing. The Opposition thinks the only way the Government can help with housing is to own the housing. We are actually focused on the people who will be in those houses, not necessarily on owning the houses. Under the leadership of Paula Bennett with Nick Smith and Bill English, I am confident that housing will improve for New Zealanders in this country.

When it comes to law and order, New Zealanders know that we are safer in this country because of the hard work of the past 6 years. Crime rates are down. Crime is at a 35-year low. Reoffending is down. We are going to be putting more effort into rehabilitation in our prisons and more effort into getting working prisons.

Pita Paraone: What have you done for the north?

JAMI-LEE ROSS: That is achieving for New Zealanders, and no amount of squawking from the newer member Mr Paraone in the back will help, because we are delivering for New Zealanders in this area.

In education, I think we have 60 members on this side of the House who were very proud to see policies being promoted in the election campaign that will lift the achievement levels for all Kiwi kids. We are seeing better achievement levels being delivered, but we have to get better-quality teaching. The Labour Party cares only about what the unions want. We care about what the parents of New Zealand want for their children. New Zealand parents want a better-quality education system so their children can achieve at higher levels. That is what we will be delivering for New Zealanders.

When it comes to the health system, the 40,000 more elective surgeries being delivered for New Zealanders means that better public services are being delivered to the people on the ground. Under the health system, more Kiwi kids are going to get the health care they need. More Kiwi kids are getting access to general practitioners. More Kiwi kids are getting immunised. As a parent in this country I am proud to see that we are delivering on the health policies that New Zealanders deserve.

When we look at the Canterbury situation, one of the regions in this country that really delivered for the National Party at the election was Canterbury. Why was that? Because the effort, the hard work, and the investment that we are putting into Canterbury show that this Government cares about the people of Canterbury. They have been through some incredibly tough times. The Opposition again just focuses on the negative. We are focused on the investment, we are focused on getting more apprentices there, we are focused on getting more housing going, we are focused on getting more building happening in Canterbury, and Canterbury is working for New Zealanders as well.

I am incredibly proud to be a member of this National-led Government. I am proud that we have a Prime Minister who is working hard for New Zealanders every single day. We are part of a Government that is delivering for New Zealanders every single day. The National-led Government looks forward to working for New Zealanders for another 3 years.

To the Opposition, if I can give those members some advice, I say stop worrying about the leadership and stop worrying about the infighting. Focus on what the issues are that matter to New Zealanders: the economy, law and order, health, and education. It is a novel idea but it actually works. It is a novel idea but it actually works, because when New Zealanders wake up in the morning they care whether they have a job to go to, they care whether they can put food on the table, they care whether their kids have an education system that is working for them, they care whether they have a health system that will deliver for their children. They want to know that they have a home that they can live in and a home that is affordable. We are delivering for New Zealanders. That is why John Key is the Prime Minister again for another 3 years. I look forward to working with these fine individuals for the next 3 years.

TIM MACINDOE (National—Hamilton West): There are just 8 minutes left of the 1,140 minutes allocated for this Address in Reply debate, and I have counted every one of them. The motion that was so ably moved by Chris Bishop and seconded by Barbara Kuriger just 9 days ago—it seems so much longer—notes that a respectful address be presented to His Excellency the Governor-General in reply to His Excellency’s speech, which was delivered earlier that day in the Legislative Council Chamber. The Speech from the Throne demonstrated the continued energy and determination of a competent and busy Government that is focused on the issues that matter to New Zealanders. That verdict was emphatically delivered by the electorate on 20 September. Like my colleague Jami-Lee Ross, I am very proud to be a member of the New Zealand National Party, which is delivering in Government on the promises that we campaigned on in 2008, in 2011, and again in 2014.

There is no doubt that John Key will go down in history as one of the finest Prime Ministers this country has ever known. He and his Government, ably supported in important measures by our confidence and supply partners—the Māori Party, ACT, and United Future—are making a very positive difference in a wide range of vitally important matters for this country. I am delighted to be the final speaker in a debate that supports the proposition and to add my view that we are very well served by our current Governor-General, Sir Jerry Mateparae. I thank him and Lady Mateparae for their dignified and unstinting service to our nation. I want to congratulate all the presiding officers. Mr Speaker, you lead a team of very experienced and capable people who I am sure will serve us well in this Parliament.

Along with others, I want to congratulate all the new MPs in this House. What an impressive batch of maiden speeches we have been treated to over the last fortnight. I echo the comments of the Hon Phil Goff last night that maiden speeches are inspiring and uplifting because they so often reflect the humanity and values of those who are delivering them, in a way that is not always apparent in our subsequent contributions in this House. All 24 of the maiden speeches that we have heard in the past fortnight were of a very high standard. I congratulate the new members on the effort and thought they all put into them, and I look forward to working alongside them in the years to come.

I am especially delighted by the outstanding new National Party crop—the class of 2014. There are many future stars in our caucus, and I know that many of them will be going far. That is great for our party and for a good Government in the years to come. I congratulate all the new and returning Ministers and wish them well in the important duties they will undertake. I especially wish my predecessor as Government senior whip, the Hon Louise Upston, well. She is a very focused and hard-working member who fully deserves her promotion. I enjoyed serving as her deputy from the start of last year. I thank my caucus colleagues for electing me to the position of senior whip—at least I thank them, but sometimes I wonder about it—and also for the commensurate promotion for my good colleague on my left, Jami-Lee Ross, the member for Botany; and we welcome Joanne Hayes as the third member of the Government whips team. Already she is making a fine contribution in our office.

I want to thank the voters of Hamilton West for re-electing me with a further increase in my majority. I do not take their support for granted—firstly, because Hamilton West remains the true bellwether electorate of New Zealand. History shows that where Hamilton West goes, so goes the nation. Once again, our party vote almost exactly mirrored the party vote right across the country. And, secondly, half of the predecessors in my role were defeated after just one term in office. I am only the third MP to have been elected to serve three consecutive terms in Hamilton West, following in the footsteps of the late Mike Minogue, who was a fellow Nat but probably the last member of a National Party caucus who would have been chosen to serve as a whip in any of the Governments led by Sir Robert Muldoon, and my immediate predecessor and good friend, councillor Martin Gallagher. Some of the new members may not know that Mike Minogue’s career was brought to an end by our newest Assistant Speaker, the Hon Trevor Mallard, in the Labour landslide of 1984, which I note was just a mere 6 years before the new member for Clutha-Southland entered the world. Martin Gallagher holds the record for having served four terms—although it was with a 3-year holiday between his first and second terms—so my next electoral goal is to trump his achievement.

We always have to work very hard in Hamilton West campaigns. I want to thank my excellent campaign committee, led by Giles Brant, and the electorate team, led by Stephen King. What a wonderful effort they and all our loyal supporters throughout the city put in. It is humbling to be a candidate in those circumstances and I am deeply grateful for their combined efforts. The credit for our win is deservedly shared by so many. I acknowledge candidates from all parties who stood but were unsuccessful, because their contribution to our democracy was incredibly important and I know full well just what huge sacrifices were involved not only for them but for their immediate families. In fact, as my class of 2008 colleagues never tire of reminding me, I know better than anyone, I think, in this House how to lose an election campaign. If I win again in 2017 I will finally have achieved a 50 percent pass mark in all the elections I have contested.

Last weekend in my electorate Hamilton West School, which is one of the oldest in New Zealand, celebrated its sesquicentenary and I had the privilege of helping to unveil a plaque in a garden featuring a sculpture by the renowned sculptor David Lloyd and to plant a kauri tree in the grounds close to one that was planted as part of the school’s centennial celebrations in 1964. It was a glorious day—well, of course every day is glorious in Hamilton—and the atmosphere matched the weather. I want to congratulate the principal, Mark Penman; board of trustees chair, Rachel Chapman; their staff and trustees; and all the organising committee and school families for the memorable and highly successful reunion. I thank them for the superb contribution that that fine school has made to our city, and the sound teaching and guidance imparted to all who have passed through the gates during the past 150 years.

I am very proud of our constitutional arrangements. Our Westminster system of democracy has delivered stability, freedom, and respect for the rule of law; an appropriate balance between the functions of the judiciary, the executive, and the legislature; and many other features that we often take for granted but are cruelly denied to so many people in other parts of the world. I am therefore a strong supporter of our constitutional monarchy and hope that we will continue to uphold it and respect it for many years to come. The alternatives are much less attractive and far less unifying.

However, I do believe that the time has come for New Zealand to adopt a more distinctive and recognisable flag. Much of the Union Jack is a wonderful design reflecting the heritage of many in this House, myself included. I think it is anomalous for our country to continue to have a flag that has another country’s flag incorporated within it. I understand and respect the concerns of some of our returned servicemen and women in this matter. My own father, uncle, and grandfather all served in the major conflicts of the 20th century. Indeed, the uncle I never knew was killed in action in 1945 and buried in Italy. But the emblem on their tombstones is not the flag; it is the silver fern. I believe it would be appropriate for that to be incorporated into our flag, where it would gain widespread respect and support, I feel sure.

I proudly swore the oath on Monday of last week to commence my third term in this House. As others have noted in this debate, it is a great privilege to serve as a member of Parliament and I and all my colleagues will do our level best to serve not only the good folk of our electorates but all who sent us here in the important work that we will undertake during the course of the 51st New Zealand Parliament.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the following words be added to the Address: “and expects, over the next 3 years, to see every child grow up in a warm, dry home; the number of affordable homes built increased; every New Zealander have access to affordable healthcare; wages for all rising faster than the cost of living; jobs created and unemployment back under 4 percent; exports increased as a percentage of GDP; the economy diversified towards value-added goods and services; economic and social inequality reduced; targets to measure and reduce child poverty; a cross-party approach to addressing domestic and sexual violence; real measures to target climate change and improve our sustainability; a plan for the recovery of Canterbury; and the Government to be guided in their work by the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi; because without these commitments and goals New Zealand will not grow or move forward to the future New Zealanders deserve.”

Ayes 57

New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 11.

Noes 64

New Zealand National 60; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Amendment not agreed to.

MARAMA FOX (Māori Party): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I have got that wrong. We are two votes for. I need to correct the vote. I am a newbie.

Mr SPEAKER: Order! The vote has been taken and has been read. The member can now seek leave to change her vote and if leave is granted by the House, the record will be adjusted accordingly.

MARAMA FOX (Māori Party): Kia ora, Mr Speaker. Apologies to the House. I seek leave to change my vote.

Mr SPEAKER: And can you just clarify what your vote now is?

Marama Fox: Two votes for—[Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! This is an important matter. There is an amendment being moved by the Hon Annette King. I am putting the motion to vote on that amendment. The member must now indicate to the House whether she is supporting the amendment that has been moved by the Hon Annette King, which would require her to vote for it, or she is voting against it. I need to know.

MARAMA FOX (Māori Party): Kia ora, Mr Speaker. The phone has told me again that we are two votes opposing it, which I thought was right in the first place, but the phone told me otherwise.

Mr SPEAKER: I thank the member. She is a new member so I have allowed for this to be sorted out with some patience. The vote as announced therefore stands.

A party vote was called for on the question, That a respectful Address be presented to His Excellency the Governor-General in reply to His Excellency’s speech.

Ayes 64

New Zealand National 60; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Noes 57

New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 11.

Address in Reply agreed to.

Address in Reply

Presentation to Governor-General

Mr SPEAKER: The address is as follows:

ADDRESS FROM THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

to

His Excellency Lieutenant General The Right Honourable Sir Jerry Mateparae, Chancellor and Principal Knight Grand Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit, Principal Companion of The Queen’s Service Order, Governor-General and Commander-in-Chief in and over New Zealand.

YOUR EXCELLENCY—

WE, the House of Representatives, thank you for the speech addressed to us when you opened this Fifty-first Parliament.

We assure you that the matters referred to in your speech will receive our careful consideration.

Ko te tūmanako nei kia mahi tahi tātou katoa.

[Our hope is that we will work together.]

Address agreed to.

Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Deputy Leader of the House): I move, That Mr Speaker, accompanied by the mover and seconder and other members of this House, do present the said Address to His Excellency the Governor-General at a place and time to be appointed by His Excellency.

Motion agreed to.

Bills

Employment Relations Amendment Bill

Third Reading

Hon Peseta SAM LOTU-IIGA (Minister of Corrections) on behalf of the Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety: I move, That the Employment Relations Amendment Bill be now read a third time. This bill implements the Government’s policies aimed at a flexible and fair employment relations framework. At its core, this bill is about ensuring employers have the confidence to compete and expand while maintaining key protections for employees. The Government is committed to maintaining the framework for collective bargaining. The bill increases choice and flexibility in this framework, reduces ineffective bargaining, and improves fairness and balance in bargaining requirements. To prevent unnecessary and protracted collective bargaining, the bill amends the Act so that a collective agreement is not required for bargaining to be concluded. It enables the parties to apply to the Employment Relations Authority for a determination that bargaining has concluded. The bill provides employers and employees with more flexibility around the terms and conditions from the start of the employment relationship by removing the 30-day rule.

The bill also acknowledges that the workplace needs to reflect modern lifestyles. The amendments give all employees the right to request flexible working arrangements right from the beginning of their employment. Flexible working arrangements help employees find the right work-life balance for them and their employer, and can also improve productivity. These changes aim to improve participation in the labour market by people who would otherwise not be able to work because of competing responsibilities. The bill makes some changes intended to make clear what confidential information an employer does and does not have to provide in situations such as potential redundancies or disciplinary processes. These changes ensure a balance between employees’ rights to information and their rights to privacy.

In 2012 the Government completed a review of the continuity of employment provisions in Part 6A in the Employment Relations Act. The review found significant operational issues for businesses. The problems came from transferring employees’ entitlements and information to a new employer. Some of the provisions were particularly onerous for small and medium sized enterprises. The bill aims to fix these issues, and it will give more certainty and clarity to employers and keep key benefits for affected employees. The bill makes the rest and meal break rules in the Employment Relations Act more flexible. It maintains the importance of rest and meal breaks, while making sure that they are practical for each workplace. The bill encourages employers and employees to negotiate in good faith the timing and duration of rest and meal breaks that are cognisant of the nature of that business. Finally, the bill introduces requirements for when and how the Employment Relations Authority must give determinations, in order to speed up those determinations.

To conclude, this bill provides a package of measures that will enhance the employment relations framework. The bill was the subject of extensive scrutiny by the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee, and I would like to thank the members of that committee for their work on the bill. I would also like to thank all of the officials who worked so hard in the advancing of this bill. I commend this bill to the House.

IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North): Labour is deeply and sincerely opposed to this legislation. It shows the arrogance of this National Government that the first thing it does after being elected to office for this third term—the first thing it does—is to undermine workers’ rights, to undermine health and safety at work, and to pass legislation that has just one purpose, and that is to keep wages down. John Key said he was going to govern in the interests of all New Zealanders, but what his first piece of legislation does—the first thing that this Government does—is to drive down wages for the vast majority of ordinary working people.

New Zealanders do not want these changes. The overwhelming majority—thousands of submitters—came to the select committee, wrote to the select committee, and told this Government: “Do not pass this law.” I distinctly remember when the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee went down to Christchurch. It was a difficult day. You could tell the strain and the pressure that the people of Christchurch were under. One submitter said something that really hit home with me. She said: “We have enough insecurity, enough instability, enough things in our lives that make life so difficult. Please don’t add one more thing that will make our lives more insecure.” That really hit home with members on our side of the House, anyway, but it obviously did not have an ounce of impact on the Government members.

This legislation works to undermine collective bargaining. It works to undermine unions’ efforts for industry standards. It brings in niggardly little taxes, such as the strike tax, to punish people who take partial industrial action. Just today, workers at Statistics New Zealand are enforcing work-to-rule regulations, and there is no doubt that this Government will attack those public servants with the provisions that it is passing in this law today. It removes the Part 6A protections for vulnerable workers—people like the cleaners who come into this building when our work is done. They come in and work through the night. Some of the lowest-paid and most vulnerable workers in New Zealand are having their rights undermined by this Government. It says that employers can just walk away from collective bargaining. So when unions make any claims that might be a little bit difficult or might actually require the employer to sit at the table and work through difficult issues—whether they be about pay, whether they be about conditions, or whether they be about the state of the industry, which is something that both the employer and the workers should be interested in; anything that is difficult—the employer can get up, walk away from the table, and get an opinion from the Employment Relations Authority that bargaining has concluded. Then, of course, we know what the employer will do next. It will look to put everybody on to individual employment agreements—divide and rule—and keep wages down.

One of the most insidious aspects of this legislation is the removal of the requirement to put a new employee on the same terms and conditions as any collective agreement in that workplace during the first 30 days. Right now, if an employer wants to put an employee on better terms and conditions than the collective agreement, it is entitled to do so. So the only change—the only thing that this change can be designed to do—is to put new employees on less favourable terms and conditions than those prescribed in any collective employment agreement that exists in that workplace. That is the only reason that a Government would pass this legislation. What is that designed to do? To make new employees more vulnerable and to drive down wages in the workplace.

I heard the stand-in Minister refer to the fact that productivity should be the driver of wage increases, and we on this side of the House absolutely agree. Since 1989 labour productivity in New Zealand has increased by 58 percent. Wages—real wages—in New Zealand have increased over that period of time by just 18 percent. The benefits of improved productivity have overwhelmingly gone to the owners of businesses and not to the workers in businesses. And this Government has the gall to say that increased productivity will lead to improved wages, and that we should not legislate to strengthen workers’ rights so that they have the right to bargain for better wages. Well, clearly, even under the legislative provisions that we have had in the last decade, workers’ pay has simply not kept up with productivity. The benefits of improved productivity have been going to the few—the people whom National always stands for—and not to the many.

We need strong legislation—the opposite of what this Government is passing today—to ensure that a growing economy and better economic outcomes are shared by everybody, and not held by just a tiny number, a privileged few. That is what today’s changes will do. They will enshrine and entrench the privilege of those who have benefited from economic growth over the last decades, and it will continue to disenfranchise those who have struggled to make ends meet, to put food on the table, to put a roof over their families’ heads, and to give their families the opportunities that they want.

Unlike this Government, whose members do not listen when people come to a select committee and make submissions, we went out to the people of New Zealand over the last week and we asked them what they thought of the changes to rest and meal breaks. We started a petition a mere week ago. Today that petition was tabled in Parliament—51,628 New Zealanders have signed the petition over the last week because they want this Government to know that getting rid of rest and meal breaks will make them less safe and less productive at work. On this side of the House, we believe in listening to what New Zealanders have to say. We do not dismiss what ordinary Kiwis have to say about legislation, and we will listen to the 51,628 people who have told this Government to stop cutting back on rest and meal breaks, and to stop the other changes that are in this legislation that undermine the rights of working people.

I know that members opposite think that rest and meal breaks are something insignificant. They think it is a trivial matter. Well, there are plenty of examples of why this is not trivial. Jetstar pilots had to go to the Employment Court to make sure that their rights to rest and meal breaks under the current legislation were upheld, because pilots like Richard Greenslade could start work as early as 5 o’clock in the morning and finish as late as midnight. Because they have duties whilst their planes are on the ground, there was no opportunity for pilots like Richard to take a rest and meal break throughout the day. The Employment Court turned round to Jetstar and said: “No, under the current law you are required to provide for rest and meal breaks.” As someone who flies fairly regularly, I have to say that I think it is pretty important our pilots get rest and meal breaks to make sure they are refreshed and ready to pilot their planes, to make sure not just that they are safe at work but that their passengers are safe as well.

The changes to this law, which the National Government is passing today, would validate Jetstar’s decision not to provide rest and meal breaks to pilots like Richard. That endangers the safety of every single person in New Zealand who travels on an aircraft. And there are countless other examples of how workers’ safety, and the safety of all New Zealanders, will be undermined by the changes made in this legislation. That is why we will listen to the 51,628 people who have signed this petition telling the Government to keep their rest and meal breaks, to save their rights, and to not further erode the rights of working people in New Zealand.

Labour is deeply and sincerely opposed to this legislation, because it is not in the interests of ordinary working people. It will not improve wages. It will not improve health and safety. It simply makes more people more vulnerable, which, frankly, is the legacy of this National Government.

JONATHAN YOUNG (National—New Plymouth): Just following on from Mr Lees-Galloway, if his Jetstar pilots had sought that advice, they would have been told that section 6 of the Health and Safety in Employment Act 1992 imposes a general duty on employers to take all practical steps to ensure the safety of employees at work, including providing and maintaining a safe working environment. Under that Act, employers’ responsibilities for controlling hazards extend to any person’s behaviour resulting from physical or mental fatigue that might be an actual or potential source of harm to themselves or others. So they are obligated under the Health and Safety in Employment Act 1992, section 6, to ensure that their pilots are rested to the extent that they do not, in terms of any fatigue, cause harm to themselves or any other person. So we need to be very clear that this bill, the Employment Relations Amendment Bill, does not trump and override the provisions of that Act. That is important for New Zealanders to understand, following the very heated and forceful point of view—which carries so many inaccuracies—that the member has put forward.

One of the other things is that this Government, during its time on this side of the House, has been working relentlessly to grow this economy, to increase jobs, and to increase wages. Just this last year, as we know, inflation went up 1 percent but the average wage went up 2.7 percent—that is something we celebrate, and something we want to see happening more often. So Mr Lees-Galloway’s claim that what we want to do is depress wages is, in fact, quite contrary to every intent and purpose and goal of this Government.

We need to understand that we live in a fast-changing world, where it is no longer about competing interests between employers and employees, or competing interests between one company and another, or one region and another. In today’s world, where 85 percent of what we manufacture is exported, we need to understand that it is a matter of one country competing against another. In that global market place it is very important that New Zealand maintains its advantage, and its advantage is around quality of produce and goods, and being able to get it to market in a very competitive way.

Therefore, we have to ensure that our companies and our economy are flexible to the point where efficiencies can continue to drive that competitive edge, which we must maintain in order to sell our products around the world, in order that our companies may continue to grow, continue to employ people, and continue to pay good wages. So what this bill is attempting to do is to bring the flexibility and fairness into our employment relations framework. One of those areas, of course, is that of collective bargaining. The bill changes the duty of good faith, so that it no longer requires parties to conclude a collective agreement—but only under certain conditions. The Employment Relations Authority may declare whether collective bargaining has concluded. The aim of this is to reduce overly protracted bargaining and give some certainty and balance to the collective bargaining framework.

We understand, of course, that the Hon Peter Dunne, the United Future leader, expressed concern that the bill would embolden employers or employees to merely go through the motions of negotiation, only to walk away from collective bargaining simply because they object to the direction the negotiations are taking or to their being party to a collective agreement, and then to call in the Employment Relations Authority to declare the end of bargaining. Because of those concerns about possible surface bargaining, new section 50KA has been inserted so that the authority cannot declare bargaining concluded if the parties have not complied with the duty of good faith. The employer cannot simply walk away. They must bargain in good faith with the intent of reaching agreement. These changes aim to prevent bargaining becoming unnecessarily protracted and costly, which is not good for either party.

Just as I conclude my contribution, the previous speaker, Iain Lees-Galloway, talked about rest breaks and meal breaks. What we need is some flexibility around those. We understand that Labour, in the last year of the last Labour Government, brought in a provision that came into force in 2009. What it means is that under the current legislation New Plymouth Airport’s control tower would have to be closed down while a tea break took place, because it is operated by a single person.

Imagine a parking building that has a sole attendant. How would you feel, Mr Lees-Galloway, if you were unable to leave the building for 10 minutes because the attendant was on their statutory break? These are just common-sense issues. These are the real issues that are there, and this is the flexibility that is needed. How would it be if, in order to maintain the ability for people to move in out of that car-parking building, they had to employ somebody else—

Hon Clayton Cosgrove: Mate, you’re full of it. Don’t be silly.

JONATHAN YOUNG: —to take the place of that person for 10 minutes in the morning and 10 minutes in the afternoon? Absolutely, Mr Cosgrove, it is ridiculous. It is absolutely ridiculous. That is why some of these provisions are there and must be negotiated in good faith.

Iain Lees-Galloway: Give me an example—one example.

JONATHAN YOUNG: There are plenty of examples.

Iain Lees-Galloway: One example. Come on, name one. Name one.

JONATHAN YOUNG: Stop barking away like that. I have just named a couple, all right?

Iain Lees-Galloway: No you didn’t.

JONATHAN YOUNG: Yes I did, indeed. In fact, why was it that Labour brought in this provision only in its last year of 9 years in office? Why was it? Was it because it was such a problem? Obviously not—obviously it was not a problem.

I believe that this bill is going to create flexibility for employers and employees to work through to come to very good arrangements on how it will work for their work situations. I am very happy to commend this bill to the House.

CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka): I begin by noting that the member who just spoke, Jonathan Young, did not name one real, actual example in his entire contribution. This is all about ideology for the National Party. It is all about anti-unionism and “anti-workerism”. It is not actually about real people. This is fundamentally a question about fairness and decency. This is about the working conditions of everyday, ordinary New Zealanders who go to work because they want to work hard, because they want to provide a better future for themselves and their families, and they simply cannot get ahead under this National Government.

It speaks volumes about the priorities of this Government that it seems to think the way to make New Zealand more internationally competitive and the way to improve our job market is to drive down the working conditions of those who are currently in the workforce. That seems to be National’s entire approach. Jonathan Young pointed out that 85 percent of what we manufacture in New Zealand is exported, and we are competing in an international market. I say to Jonathan Young that he is absolutely right on that, but we will not improve our international competitiveness—we should not be striving to improve our international competitiveness—by driving down the working conditions of New Zealanders.

Iain Lees-Galloway: Race to the bottom.

CHRIS HIPKINS: If we are simply going to engage in the race to the bottom, all New Zealanders—all New Zealanders—will lose out.

I want to talk particularly about the amendments to Part 6A, which will affect vulnerable workers, and the changes that the Government is going to make there, because there is no better example in this legislation of the way that National is working to drive down the working conditions of everyday, ordinary New Zealanders who go out and work hard to get ahead.

Why do we have Part 6A? We have Part 6A to stop the cycle of contracting out—and constantly contracting out the same work—being used as a way to drive down employment conditions for people in those service-level industries. Take, for example, a cleaning company for an office block. Let us say it employs 19 workers in that particular cleaning company, and every year it re-lets the contract. What is the main thing that the people bidding for that contract are going to be competing on? They are going to be competing on labour costs. So every hard-won gain that an employee cleaning an office block gets out of one employer could be taken away within a short space of time by another employer who bids for the contract based on a lower labour cost.

Part 6A is designed to protect those workers and stop that from happening. So why is the Government taking it away? The Government says it is taking those protections away—watering down those protections—only for people who work in outfits of 20 or fewer employees. Here is the question for the Government: what is to stop a large company—let us call it Spotless—simply setting up a whole lot of subsidiary companies, each employing fewer than 20 workers, at each of its worksites? That is what companies will do. This will guarantee that no matter how large a company is, it will be able to opt out of its obligations under Part 6A by simply structuring its business affairs in a way that it can exploit the loophole that this bill creates. It removes protection for vulnerable workers such as cleaners and the people who scrub pots and pans in kitchens. It removes all of those protections from them, and it is blatantly unfair. It comes down to a question of fairness, and this legislation simply is not fair. Driving down wage costs in New Zealand is not a good strategy for increasing the number of jobs that we have, or for improving our international competitiveness.

I want to talk about the duty to conclude collective bargaining, and I particularly want to talk about the Ports of Auckland and the duty to conclude collective bargaining there. Had there not been such a duty to conclude, its bargaining would have ended long ago and its work would have been contracted out. The provisions in the Employment Relations Act stopped that from happening. These are the very provisions that the National Government is trying to remove.

Simon Bridges specifically quoted the Ports of Auckland earlier on when he was justifying these changes. Of course, we know that this is part of the orchestrated smear campaign that the National Party and its surrogates, such as Cameron Slater, have been engaged in when they have tried to drive down the working conditions for those who work for the Ports of Auckland. We know that now, for a fact, because it came out in Nicky Hager’s book that the National Party and others were colluding, and that the Ports of Auckland were paying money to bloggers such as Cameron Slater to smear people who were involved in that particular industrial action.

Hon Annette King: Disgusting.

CHRIS HIPKINS: It is absolutely disgusting. These are the people whom John Key admits to talking to regularly on the phone, but not in his capacity as Prime Minister, of course, only in some other capacity. Perhaps he gets Moonbeam to pass the notes across for him. But, actually, these are the people the National Party chooses to collude with. This is the style of dirty politics this Government is quite happy to own and quite happy to engage with. I think it absolutely stinks. It stinks particularly when it uses those links to drive down the working conditions for ordinary, everyday New Zealand workers who simply want to go out there, do a hard day’s work, get paid appropriately for it, and have appropriate working conditions, so that they can fulfil the Kiwi dream, which is about making a better life for yourself and your family. The everyday workers out there want to be able to do that, and this Government is making it harder and harder for them to do so.

I want to talk about rest and meal breaks, and I want to acknowledge the over 50,000 New Zealanders who, in 1 week alone, have signed a petition against these changes—

Hon Member: 51,000.

CHRIS HIPKINS: Over 51,000. Here it is; I have a pile of it. This is only in a week—this is only in a week—that these people have signed a petition against this. I suspect there would be a heck of lot more than this if the petition had been running for longer. I want to point out that, primarily, this is not going to affect the unions—this is not a union argument. Primarily, it is going to affect those who are not covered by a union collective agreement. We are talking about young New Zealanders getting their first job. Mums and dads out there will be interested to know this. These are their kids we are talking about, who are going to be going out to get their first job and who are going to find out that their rights at work are being eroded by the National Government.

Iain Lees-Galloway has already given the example of the pilot working for Jetstar. I want to talk about another case. I found a very good case of a bus driver. The tramways union raised the issue last year that some bus drivers in Auckland have been resorting to urinating in bottles because they are being ticketed when they park at public bus stops to use public toilets. That is because they were not being given at the time the appropriate rest and meal breaks so that they could go to the toilet. Is that the type of country that this National Government wants to live in—one where bus drivers get their buses ticketed because that is the only way that they can go to the bathroom? I think that is absolutely disgraceful, and yet that is what this Government is quite happily signing up to with the changes that it is making.

I mentioned young workers before. Well, young workers—new, first-time workers—go and work in places like McDonald’s. The Unite union launched action on behalf of McDonald’s workers last year over the company’s failure to provide workers with meal breaks. One of the young McDonald’s workers who appeared before the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee was then dismissed from the company, in part, allegedly, for his appearance before the select committee. That is absolutely disgraceful. I think that those young New Zealanders who go into those first jobs should have the guaranteed right to have a meal break. I think that some of the examples that the Government has quoted—for example, it is talking about aged-care workers. I think aged-care workers do a fantastic job, and if they need a break to have a cup of tea and to go to the bathroom and to put their feet up for 15 minutes, I think they should damn well get it. I think that it is absolutely disgraceful that this Government wants to take that away from people who are working in the aged-care sector and early childhood education. They are doing some of the most valuable jobs for our society, and this Government thinks it is OK to erode their working conditions to the point where they cannot even have a cup of tea and go to the bathroom, and I think that that is absolutely disgraceful. This is a question of fairness and decency, and this Government is simply turning the other way.

Eroding the working conditions of ordinary, everyday New Zealanders is not the way that John Key is going to deliver on the brighter future that he promised New Zealanders 6 years ago, and thus far has failed to deliver. New Zealanders did vote in large numbers for the National Government over the last three elections, waiting for that brighter future. If this continues, they are still going to be waiting in 3 years’ time. Eroding their rights at work, and eroding their pay and conditions, is not the way to deliver on the promises that the National Government has made. We should be aspiring to a higher-wage economy, not a lower-wage economy in the way that this National Government is doing. We should be aspiring to have some of the best, or the best, employment conditions in the world. We should not be racing to the bottom so that we can compete internationally with countries that use sweatshops—and that seems to be the argument that Jonathan Young was putting forward earlier in this debate.

This is a bad piece of legislation. This is a piece of legislation that will have an impact on every New Zealander who goes out there and works hard for salary and wages during the day. It is wrong, it is unfair, and the Labour Party will continue to vigorously oppose it.

MARAMA FOX (Māori Party): Tēnā koe, Mr Deputy Speaker. I want to start by apologising for completely stuffing up the vote just a few minutes ago.

Hon Annette King: Don’t worry—don’t worry.

MARAMA FOX: I know—it is a learning curve. I am going to make sure that I get this one right, because this is one that we feel very strongly about.

The Māori Party stands to oppose again the Employment Relations Amendment Bill. For the benefit of the other new members who might need some advice, like I did, and just to make it perfectly clear, the Māori Party voted against the first reading of the bill on 5 June 2013, we voted against the second reading on 19 March 2014, and we will be opposing it again. There was never any question in our minds as to why we oppose the bill. He aha te mea nui o te ao? He tangata, he tangata, he tangata. It has always been about the people—in this case, the situation for workers and their whānau.

Louisa Wall: That applies to every vote.

MARAMA FOX: Kia ora. We believe that this bill will weaken workers’ rights by allowing bosses to walk away from collective agreements. The new law introduces the right for employers to opt out of multi-employer collective bargaining. Although we welcome the new measure that requires employers to have first acted in good faith, it is the fact that the principle of collective bargaining is threatened that we are particularly concerned about.

The concept that we in the Māori Party have always believed in is that innovation in the economy should be built upon a foundation of workers’ rights and terms. It should not be a case of either/or. We believe that our community and our nation can have both. We believe that our people can be both employer and employee. We can create future prospects of economic growth, while at the same time adhering to conditions of employment that are socially and economically fair.

I want to share with the House an anecdote that comes, appropriately, from a book called Three Cups of Tea: One Man’s Mission to Promote Peace … One School at a Time: “We all sat there laughing and sipping tea peacefully … An infidel and representatives from three warring sects of Islam. And I thought if we can get along this well, we can accomplish anything. The British policy was ‘divide and conquer.’ But I say ‘unite and conquer.’” I turn to us in this House and remind us of the importance of kotahitanga—a purpose for being that unites us and achieves gains through working together.

This week, the Labour member for Ikaroa-Rāwhiti, Meka Whaitiri, issued a challenge to iwi leaders to step in on the Employment Relations Amendment Bill, on which I congratulate her. I support this. I want to place on the record that when the Talley’s strikes happened in Wairoa, the Māori Party did exactly that. We called in the iwi to support the workers and the iwi leaders came to the call. Ngāti Kahungunu provided support for whānau affected by loss of income. The Māori Party joined with iwi leaders, taking on a mediator role. Through collective solidarity the employers, the iwi, the Māori Party, and the whānau were able to unite and conquer. We should never forget that our greatest capacity for influence is not only through speaking out and against; it can come even more persuasively when we work together, speaking up to unite.

Iwi leaders are the employers and employees. They are members of whānau. They are workers. They care for whānau in te rohe, just as the members of the Māori Party or the Labour Party or all the parties in this House can effectively do. We need to work together for the greatest gain, which in this case is to support workers’ rights. The goal would be that we work collectively with Māori organisations to make a difference. My greatest hope is that in this Parliament we can work together for what is right. Dividing certain groups against each other will never achieve the difference we need.

The Māori Party has always spoken out in support of the right of workers to be treated fairly. We are particularly concerned in this legislation with the change to the rule protecting the jobs of vulnerable workers in industries such as catering, cleaning, and laundry services when the employer loses a contract to a rival bidder. We know that the people whom it will most likely affect will be those in these sectors—caretakers, hospital orderlies, and such. We know that it is women, Māori, and ethnic minorities who make up the majority of those workers. Disadvantaged groups, often low paid, have limited bargaining strength in the labour market and are most likely to be disadvantaged by these changes that strengthen employers’ rights and power. Greater protection is needed for these workers, not less.

We believe that the proposed changes to rest and meal breaks are inconsistent with international human rights and have negative implications for healthy and safe working conditions, particularly for vulnerable workers, including our youth. For the record, once more—and I will make sure that I get it right—we oppose the bill.

DENISE ROCHE (Green): I am deeply saddened to be speaking on this the third and final reading of the Employment Relations Amendment Bill today. It is disappointing that this Government has let old and outdated ideology dictate its legislative agenda. But perhaps it is not so surprising that this is the first piece of legislation in this term of Government, when over the last two terms what we have seen is this Government consistently applying its policy directions towards the rich and the powerful—oil companies, property developers, Skycity Casino—to keep them rich and powerful.

In this case, the lobbyists include cleaning companies like CrestClean, a franchise company that over the last 6 years has harangued MPs with its request that the Government change the law to ensure that some of the lowest-paid workers in this country lose their ability to maintain the small bit of job security that they have when a cleaning contract swaps over to another contractor. This is the business that sought to undermine the Building Service Contractors of New Zealand Inc. through its hired gun lobbyists and its blogger mates, outlined in Nicky Hager’s Dirty Politics book.

During the submission process of the bill last year, I vividly recall the oral evidence from parliamentary cleaner Mareta Sinoti. She spoke to the 2,000 or so written submissions that were presented to Parliament by the Service and Food Workers Union cleaners—cleaners from throughout the country. She spoke to their submissions. All of those submissions asked the Government to back off on the removal of Part 6A of the Act, the part that deals with the security for vulnerable workers like cleaners. Mareta was very thoughtful. Her submission was incredibly heartfelt. I do not think I was the only one who had tears in their eyes as she essentially begged the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee not to remove Part 6A. She talked about how, as a parliamentary cleaner, her job had been restructured several times, and although she kept her job, her hours had frequently been reduced and she had to do more work for less income in total. But she also said that she was proud to work for Parliament.

Mareta Sinoti is the worker who was insulted by a National Party member of Parliament who suggested that if she did not like the job, it should go to someone else who wanted it. She earns less than $15 an hour for the privilege of cleaning up after us. I guess it was this offensive remark from the Hon Tau Henare that epitomises the hard-nosed approach that this Government wants to introduce into the employment relations environment in New Zealand. The Government says it wants flexibility, but in a labour market with a high unemployment rate, flexibility essentially vastly weakens workers’ rights, which turns into low wages and, as others have said, a race to the bottom, where the cheapest workers get the jobs.

To prepare for this reading, I went back and reviewed some of the 15,000 or so submissions to this bill. The vast majority of them were from people like teachers, nurses, caregivers, dairy workers, engineers, and many more. I want to thank them for participating in this democratic process. It is a darn shame that the Government has not taken on board any of their suggestions. I also looked at the advice that was provided around specific changes to the bill. I looked at the regulatory impact statement. This is what it says in a column that measures the choice and flexibility against some of the changes to collective bargaining provisions. The proposal to repeal the 30-day rule for new employees would increase flexibility and choice for employers. The proposal to allow an employer to opt out of multi-employer bargaining with 40 days’ notice of initiation would increase flexibility and choice for employers but decrease it for employees who want a multi-employer collective agreement. The introduction of partial pay deductions for partial strike action would increase choice for employers. But it also says here that this might see some new forms of action and it could lead to an increase in intensity of partial strike action and a number of complete strikes. The provision to amend the time frames for bargaining initiatives increases choice and flexibility for the employer; it decreases choice and flexibility for workers in their trade unions.

The object of the original Employment Relations Act 2000 is “(a) to build productive employment relationships through the promotion of good faith in all aspects of the employment environment and of the employment relationship—(i) by recognising that employment relationships must be built not only on the implied mutual obligations of trust and confidence, but also on a legislative requirement for good faith behaviour; and (ii) by acknowledging and addressing the inherent inequality of power in employment relationships; and (iii) by promoting collective bargaining;”. It goes on in section 3(b) to say: “to promote observance in New Zealand of the principles underlying International Labour Organisation Convention 87 on Freedom of Association, and Convention 98 on the Right to Organise and Bargain Collectively.”

The Government’s changes absolutely undermine everything in these objectives. Regardless of whatever weaselly way the Government wants to spin things, it takes away the obligation for employers to act in good faith towards their employees. This bill is not only unprecedented; it is unwarranted. I have seen no compelling evidence that collective employment negotiations are bad for the economy or that workers are holding the country to ransom through unreasonable demands. The amount of industrial unrest in this country has declined in recent years—an average of fewer than a dozen stoppages a year over the last several years. The most notable recent full-on disputes were the Ports of Auckland and the Maritime Union of New Zealand workers, and the meatworkers at Talley’s AFFCO, and even the current bank workers dispute with ANZ. They have not been about demands for massive pay increases. They have been about holding on to their job security and opposing casualisation of the workforce and the demands that their employers have made for them to do that. In the case of Ports of Auckland and Talley’s, the employers went so far as to use industrial action themselves through lockouts to try to force those workers into making agreements around that. They were locked out for weeks at a time. Although the Government says that it wants to reduce the costs associated with collective bargaining, this appears to be a fallacy. Multi-employer collective employment agreements reduce costs for employers. They are a more efficient use of employers’ resources because of economies of scale.

The Government stated in the opening address from the Governor-General last week that one of its priorities for this term was to enact and enforce good workplace health and safety. Given that there were nearly 183,000 workplace injuries recorded by ACC in the last financial year and workers in farming, forestry, and fishing have a one-in-four chance of being injured at work—and that is not even factoring in the shocking number of deaths in these industries and in our ports, I might add—I absolutely applaud those aims of the Government. But the changes in this legislation will not help with good health and safety practices. The bill creates an environment where New Zealand workers will be discouraged from speaking up about any of the health and safety risks on the job. They will not even have the simple right of a tea break during their work shift. We know that in many high-risk industries—like forestry, for example—fatigue is a major contributor to accidents and injuries on the job. We know too that health and safety is a culture that needs to be created on the job, and that means workers need to speak up. We can see that difference in the exemplary health and safety record of the Huntly mine, which is highly unionised—compared with the tragedy that was the Pike River mine.

As a Parliament we should do our best to provide legislation that supports and protects our citizens. I stand with the hundreds of thousands of workers in Aotearoa New Zealand who need legislation that protects their rights at work. Please oppose this bill.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): The member must call out “Mr Speaker”, or, if we are in Committee, “Mr Chairman”. I call Clayton Mitchell.

CLAYTON MITCHELL (NZ First): Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker. On behalf of New Zealand First I would like to rise and speak against this Employment Relations Amendment Bill in its third reading. But I have to say before I get under way that it is great to be on the benches on this side, fighting with passion and seeing the passion that is coming from this side, opposing this bill. It is great to be alongside common-sense - thinking people.

I start by acknowledging the honourable Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety, Michael Woodhouse, for his comments in the Committee last Wednesday evening, 22 October, after we came back from our nightly scheduled meal break. I felt that the Minister’s comments in relation to his own personal experience in dealing with his staff in the past were, to say the least, commendable, particularly as he outlined the importance of good employer-employee relations and open communications. I would like to add to the honourable Minister’s comments by saying that I too, along with the majority of employers around New Zealand, have an excellent employer-employee relationship with staff, which is achieved by understanding the needs of workers. These employment needs include job stability and good wages, all wrapped up in a safe and harmonious workplace. On the other hand, it is also important for employees to understand the needs and requirements of employers, which include workers being honest, flexible, productive, and, above all, skilled. When both needs are balanced, business and industry will be able to flourish in this country.

However, history has shown us that without solid, robust legislation, employees can be taken advantage of by employers trying to get more than their fair and reasonable entitlement. The Employment Relations Act is designed to protect the very people affected by the worst of those employers, who would seek to take advantage of workers. A good example of this kind of employee exploitation was seen most recently in a story that was uncovered by New Zealand First, which saw kiwifruit workers in Tauranga being paid lower than the minimum wage, not being given regular breaks, and expected and forced to work in appalling conditions. These employers used and abused their employees and had little or no regard for their legal and moral obligation to ensure their workers were looked after. This legislation would be going a long way towards aiding and abetting those rogue employers. We need to work towards good, solid legislation that gives a balanced perspective, protecting workers and giving the employers the tools to ensure good working relationships are maintained. This balance needs to make sure that workers’ rights are protected, whilst ensuring that employers are not being restricted by inflexible employment legislation. “Balance” is the key word here.

This newly introduced Employment Relations Amendment Bill will go a long way towards undermining the rights of workers. In 2010 National stated that statutory rest and meal breaks were added to the Employment Relations Act under the previous administration and came into effect on 1 April 2009. National supported that legislation then as it gave statutory recognition to breaks, reflecting standard practice across New Zealand. Now National is trying to reassure us that all workers will remain entitled to reasonable rest and meal breaks under this bill. We remain unconvinced of that. Supposed safeguards included in the proposed changes ignore the reality that in many workplaces those affected are unaware of, or unable to assert, their rights and will open themselves up to be marginalised in the workplace. In fact, the Post Primary Teachers’ Association submission to the Employment Relations (Rest Breaks and Meal Breaks) Amendment Bill in December 2009 is of interest. It stated: “Prior to the introduction of the current legislation on meal and rest breaks, the provision of such breaks for our members was largely dependent upon the good will of employers. Practice was variable. The lack of time available for rest and meal breaks was a frequent concern for many members. In a worst case example, all of the staff in a north island school were required by the employer to be on duty at every break. Six of those teachers were diabetics who were having problems managing their health without adequate meal breaks and other employees were under significant stress from the regime.”

The Independent Taskforce on Workplace Health and Safety recently commented that lack of job security reduces the willingness of workers to even raise health and safety concerns about breaks being restricted or not being available. We join the considerable concerns shown in the submission process that will impact on employees’ health and safety, particularly when we consider some of New Zealand’s more hazardous occupations such as forestry work—which has been outlined earlier—and those of truck drivers, port workers, and meat processors, to name but a few. Why we would allow employers and employees to be able to negotiate away their meal breaks is beyond me. Think of the huge risk that tired and weary truck drivers would pose on our roads. Think of the exponential increase in workplace accidents this would have on our forestry industry, which is a trade that already has one of the highest accident and injury rates in this country. Imagine tired and hungry meat processors with their minds on their stomachs and not on their tools. All of these industries and many more will have increases in workplace accidents under this bill.

We have no doubt this bill will negatively affect vulnerable workers, families, and their communities. There has not been a strong demand by employers or employees to introduce this new legislation, so why is this Government seeking to fix something that is not broken? Why would this Government not take into account the public submission strongly opposing this bill? More recently, we have just heard that over 51,000 submissions have been brought forward in less than a week, not to mention that the Minister considered 1,750 unique submissions. Ninety-four percent of them were opposed, and only 2 percent supported it. On top of this, the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee received 11,908 form submissions, all of which were opposed to the bill. No wonder we are having a low turnout in our voting. The bill was primarily supported by employer representative groups and individual employers. It was opposed strongly by individuals, community groups, unions, and employee representative groups.

I cannot understand this Government’s motivation to fast track this bill at all. I have to say that if this amendment was common sense and was designed for the betterment of all New Zealanders and not just the employers, it would get the full support of New Zealand First, but it does not. In fact, it is far from common sense. That is the irony of common sense—it is not very common, particularly in relation to this Employment Relations Amendment Bill. This bill takes away core values that hold our workforce together. It exposes the more vulnerable and has the potential to exploit our much needed and valued workers—employees who are the backbone of any successful business.

New Zealand First is firmly committed to addressing the concerns of low-paid, vulnerable workers. New Zealand First opposes this Employment Relations Amendment Bill on the grounds that it is unnecessary. It will undermine wage-fixing principles under New Zealand law and create conflict between employers and employees. I quote John Boyd Orr: “When the Industrial Revolution of the nineteenth century brought a rapid increase in wealth, the demand of workers for a fair share of the wealth they were creating was conceded only after riots and strikes.” Is this what we want for the future of this country? We have a proud history of leading working conditions in this country and this bill would be a backwards step. I repeat: we believe that this bill is an unnecessary piece of legislation. It has the potential to create a hostile environment and actually negatively affect both workers and New Zealand businesses. We must oppose this bill. Thank you very much.

ALASTAIR SCOTT (National—Wairarapa): It gives me great pleasure to speak on the first occasion post - my maiden speech yesterday in support of the Employment Relations Amendment Bill. I have heard the Opposition talk negatively, trying to concern us by scaring the general public around health and safety issues and talking about Jetstar planes potentially crashing. That is just nonsense. This bill does not override any health and safety obligations of any employer. This is about giving flexibility and giving some reality to what is actually happening out there already today.

I will give you a very simple example. I have employees of my own who spray when the weather is fine. These guys are flexible and pragmatic about their working conditions. We have agreed that they will continue to work and spray when the weather is calm and obviously take their break when the wind picks up or the rain starts to fall. That is what is happening out there today, and this bill reflects what is real. These guys over here do not understand the realities of the workplace. They do not understand what flexibility really is required in the workplace, so that is why I am here today supporting this amendment bill.

I am going to talk about the flexibility that is required to reflect the balance between the needs of the employees and the needs of the employers. I reject the scaremongering tactics employed by the Opposition regarding health and safety. It is a non-event. It is not an issue. I commend the flexibility that this bill allows. Remember, there is an obligation to negotiate contracts in good faith, and that remains. The employer is not able to walk away, as the Opposition suggests. Good faith means just that. It means sitting at the table, negotiating hard, and finding a practical and real solution to the employer-employee relationship. Thank you for this opportunity today. I support this bill wholeheartedly.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): I call Catherine Delahunty—5 minutes.

CATHERINE DELAHUNTY (Green): Kia ora, Mr Assistant Speaker. He mihi nui ki te Whare Paremata. Welcome to the glorious 19th century, dressed up in the not-so-new flexibility-speak. At the final moment of this bill, let us drop the charade. The Government has a clear goal to remove basic organising rights for working people, reduce wages, and reduce union power. I am holding up a broken cup today. This broken cup symbolises that tea break rights are broken. It is not an accident that the cup is broken. The purpose of the law is to entrench the power of employers to decide what happens in the workplace, from bargaining participation down to the tea break. If anyone wants to strike about this, book it in the diary and promise you will be back at work at a set time, not when the power balance has been restored. That is what this bill is about.

Let us not forget, in the glorious 19th century, that slavery increased production. It was very flexible—incredibly flexible. The employers were flexible. So long as the slaves did not expect anything, it was fine. The broken teacup is only one part of the awful Dickensian plan, but one of the problems we face is that younger citizens do not know what unions are, let alone read Charles Dickens. That is one of the challenges in the 21st century, with this 19th century approach. The broken cup represents the breach of the vestiges of good faith left in the employment relationship—the attacks on the multi-employer collective, industry standards, rest and meal breaks, strikes and lockouts, the 30-day rule for new employees, a lack of protection from restructuring, and more. These are all losses of rights, being deliberately created. The privileged do not need to understand them. The contracted people in the middle classes and the low-waged workers often do not even realise they are losing them.

Let us get down to brass tacks—concrete issues, such as others have talked about. A friend of mine works in a bakery in a supermarket. Her current tea break consists of 10 minutes, but it takes 10 minutes to walk to the tea room, so it is already quite academic. Her employer is not very concerned about that. She stands up for the rest of the time. She is not allowed to sit down in the bakery. They stand up. And then she gets to walk for 10 minutes to the tea room, and then her tea break is over. This bill will now remove the charade and prevent any pressure on any employer to actually provide a tea break at all. It is really going to work, for the employer.

Today workplace safety was exposed as another charade in the ports around this country. But the contracting culture and the weakening of collective organising means that no one is ultimately responsible now for the safety of workers in what need not be a dangerous place. This applies to forestry as well as ports, which have a hideous and a very recently growing record of workplace deaths. Perhaps the cup of tea might be a good idea for this whole House, in this legislation—perhaps a tea break on this assault on workers’ rights. Perhaps we should all take a breather and the cup of tea and actually have a bit of a think about what it is like for other people, and show some empathy for people who are vulnerable in their workplaces. However, people and rights can be broken, as this cup has been. If this speeds up production, eliminates collective strength, and facilitates employer power to work away from fair negotiation, that might sound all right for some people. But for others, it is literally a disaster.

For the benefit of people with no imagination and no experience of unfair power balances in their workplace—and, after 10 year in a shearing gang, I could talk to you quite a lot about that—the value of collective organising is lost on them, so I need to spell it out. Everyone, except greedy employers, benefits when people have rights at work and the right to stand together for fair wages and conditions. The Green Party says to the working people of this country: “This bill may try and break your cup, but we will stand beside you.” There is a positive solution to employment relationships. It is called justice and respect—respect for collective bargaining, fair wages and conditions, and a good cup of tea. Everyone benefits from that working environment. Higher wages, great working conditions, and recognition of the need to balance power result in better relationships. And better relationships are what make everything work. Therefore, the Green Party is ashamed of the Government for having this bill. We will never support such legislation.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): I will just explain the new procedures for this Parliament. The 9th call will always be a split call. The Green Party will get the first call. My comments are probably directed to the Labour members. Call No. 9 from now on is going to be a split call, and the Green Party will always get the first call. The other 5-minute call goes to a Government support party, not necessarily to the Government but to a Government support party. If the Government support party does not take the call, it goes to the Labour Party. I am calling Su’a William Sio—5 minutes.

Su’a WILLIAM SIO (Labour—Māngere): Thank you for the opportunity to speak in opposition to the Employment Relations Amendment Bill. Only just very recently we debated the Speech from the Throne and in that speech there were references to flexibility in the employment sector, yet we now know, after looking into the detail of this bill, exactly what that means. In the Government’s own regulatory impact statement it said “flexibility for the employers but no flexibility for the workers”. In fact, its own regulatory impact statement said that the contents of this bill are inconsistent with the international conventions that protect workers’ rights. So I want to make it quite clear to all the new members of that particular Government that this bill is inconsistent with the international rights upheld by the international community: the right of workers to a fair wage, the right of workers to have unions represent them, and the right of workers to be able to bargain collectively as an organisation. Those are the rights that have been removed by this piece of legislation.

I want to make reference again to the new members of this Government. I heard some very good, passionate speeches from those who gave their maiden speeches of late. It gave me some hope that there is some humanity in the experiences of those members, and so they need to speak up against this Government. They need to put their foot down and vote against this bill because henceforth, once this bill passes, the Government will be on record as a heartless group of no-good gangsters, because that is what it is. It is ganging up on the New Zealand workforce. On the one hand it says it wants to reward people for their productivity, but this bill is designed to drive wages lower. How on earth can workers be able to earn a living to sustain themselves and support their families? How on earth can workers be able to hold down a house, given the increases in rent of recent times?

This is an anti-worker bill. It is anti-worker, and I want to say to Minister Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga and Alfred Ngaro that if they vote in support of this bill, they will go down in history as two members of Parliament who were determined to harm the members of their very own community after standing of their shoulders to get to where they are. In this last election, members of our community voted for those members and they expect something from them. They expect them to stand up for their rights, and when they vote in support of this bill, they are telling the rest of our communities and all working-class communities throughout New Zealand they do not give a damn. They do not care. They do not care one iota whether working people are able to make a living and support their families.

This Labour Opposition will continue to hold those members to account to make sure they walk the talk. All this time, about child poverty, nothing has been done. All this time, about housing affordability and providing housing for our community, that has not been addressed, and this bill will for ever make it more difficult for families with children to support themselves and for families to get into a house because this bill is anti-worker. It attacks the working group. I want to call on all working people now, those who are in a union and those who are not members of a union. They must step forward. They must come forward now and begin the agitation, because this bill mirrors exactly what National did in the 1990s. We are going backwards.

Last Monday, on Labour weekend, some of our young people celebrated the lives of Bill Andersen and Fred Evans—people who stood up for workers’ rights, despite the attacks on them, despite being imprisoned, despite being locked out, despite being kicked out of their workplaces, despite going to jail, and despite Fred Evans giving up his life. That is the kind of environment this Government has now created—one where workers must step up and fight. And they must fight if we are to regain some semblance of our dignity, as enshrined in international conventions.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): The member’s time has expired.

DAVID SEYMOUR (ACT—Epsom): I rise on behalf of the ACT Party in support of the Employment Relations Amendment Bill. Before I give some of the remarks I have prepared I have to say there is a certain unreality in what we hear from the Opposition. We had one member saying that we are going towards Third World conditions. Has he really seen what labour conditions are like in Central America or Africa or South-east Asia or the Middle East before he says that we in New Zealand are falling short of international standards? There is an unreality not only in space but also in time. I was not surprised to hear some of our opponents saying that we are going back a century. One even said that we are going back two centuries. But the unreality is this: they are insulting the people who fought for better rights in the 19th century. They do not really understand the differences, and that is why they are so out of place in 2014 in New Zealand.

I would like to congratulate the Minister in charge of the bill, the Hon Michael Woodhouse, the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee, the submitters, and the officials involved in getting the bill this far. I would also like to acknowledge the work of my ACT Party predecessors in improving this bill. Most of all, I would like to thank my fellow Epsom electors. This bill, more than any other, has acutely demonstrated the role that the Epsom electorate plays, and has played, in ensuring stable centre-right Government in New Zealand. This bill has been advanced, stalled, and now advanced again, in each instance due to the presence or absence of an ACT MP from Epsom in this House.

I can hear the Labour MPs’ frustration. Not only can we move towards best practice public policy without them—

Richard Prosser: They’re not saying anything.

DAVID SEYMOUR: I have heard enough of it, Mr Prosser, but ACT has absolute certainty about who its leader is. This is also a teachable moment, not only in politics but in public policy. Listening to the Opposition members during the latter part of this debate, they seem to assume that human relations such as employment relations are a static affair. They seem to assume they can shift outcomes by legislating the conditions under which people work and that people will never change their behaviour in response to a change in public policy.

An easy way for the Opposition to see the fallacy here might be—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): I am sorry to interrupt the member. Members on their feet other than those speaking cannot interject from the floor of the House; only from a seated position.

DAVID SEYMOUR: An easy way for the Opposition to see the fallacy might be to imagine some of the bill’s provisions or proposals in reverse. We might imagine that employees should not be able to abandon a so-called vulnerable employer. Perhaps we would propose that an employee be compelled to keep working for such an employer, regardless of what a poor employer they turned out to be, and regardless of what other opportunities presented themselves to that employee. Fanciful? I ask the members to think carefully what the logical difference is between that scenario and the situation in which large employers continue to be placed under this Act. Or we might imagine an Act wherein employees were thought most likely to tire of bargaining, but it would require them to conclude an agreement unless the authority saw fit to absolve them of this default obligation. Or we might imagine a world where it was the norm for employers to partially withhold payment when dissatisfied with employment conditions and to expect no partial reduction in work ethic as a result.

This bill, even after amendment, let alone the kind of bill the Opposition would have passed, is about giving rights to employees by imposing duties on employers. The thought experiment of reversing the roles of employer and employee shows how misguided it is to attempt to improve outcomes by interfering in the contractual arrangements that employees and employers would otherwise enter into. The Opposition, and any sensible person, would reject these hypothetical laws. It is plain to see, I am sure those members would say, that employees either would not take such jobs or would expect to be paid more in return for accepting such duties. They might even say that such rules would be silly. Far better to relieve employees of such Draconian duties and allow them to negotiate their own conditions, I am sure they would say, if the proposition was put in reverse.

Why, then, do the opponents of flexible labour markets in general, and this bill in particular, not see the futility in trying to legislate a different outcome in the labour market and the damage it is likely to do? Why, indeed, has the National Government compromised on the vulnerable worker clause and the requirement to conclude bargaining when these should be removed entirely? The answer lies in another fallacy, and we have heard about it from the earlier speakers today. It is over 150 years old and has been disproven every single year since. It is the fallacy that labour will fall in value vis-à-vis capital. It is a failed hypothesis, most recently resurrected by a particularly trendy French populist author, that we are heading for hyper-capitalism and, comrade, the revolution is just around the corner. Well, it has been coming for 150 years and it still has not come. In reality it is labour, not capital, that has risen in value since those members’ mate Mr Marx wrote about it.

These economic trends have real implications for politics and policy today. They explain why the Labour Party has lost its base, and why new members of the Green Party, who are very literate at economics, might make very effective leaders in the future. But the reality is that the employers in the Epsom electorate and up and down this country have fixated on the challenge of attracting and retaining staff. Competition for workers amongst employers is as aggressive, if not more aggressive, than competition for jobs amongst workers. Those employers must look askance at the Opposition’s assumption that workers have no other options, are a dime a dozen, and are easy come easy go. That simply is not the reality of the New Zealand workplace in 2014. It is a market place, where competition works both ways.

Hon Member: Somebody put him out of his misery.

DAVID SEYMOUR: And if the gentleman calling out there has any doubt, I entered the workforce working 60 hours a week for $7.50 an hour.

I support this bill because it is a step in the right direction towards more flexible markets. Like all attempts to improve public policy, this amendment is imperfect. Economic reality and experience suggests it should have gone further. Governments cannot legislate market outcomes, but can influence them.

Let me leave the Opposition, which I concede has some good intentions, with two initiatives that might better help New Zealanders achieve pay and conditions improved upon what they have now. Nominal pay rates are worthwhile only to the extent that they are useful for buying real goods. The price of houses, for example, has doubled relative to incomes over the last two decades, and overwhelmingly this is due to local authorities prescribing an urban development pattern incompatible with the housing that people actually want. Far more could be achieved for working New Zealanders by improving the responsiveness of the housing market than by making futile attempts to shift bargaining strategies in the labour market.

Another contributor to the outcomes in the labour market is the skill level of employees. Employees with greater skills earn more, and this factor is growing in importance. Indeed, increases in inequality of market income in the Western World can be tightly attributed to increasing returns for skills. You can earn more and more, increasingly, if you are more literate and more numerate.

The real work achieving the Opposition’s purported objectives, I am pleased to say, is actually already being done on the supply sides of the housing and education sectors, and I am proud to support and encourage this Government in this work. I am proud to support this bill and hope that this Government will one day pursue best-practice policy by confronting the fallacies that underlie too much of our labour law legislation. The duty to enter into and conclude bargaining should be gone. The duty to retain staff almost unconditionally under Part 6A depended on the type of employee, and now the type of business should also be gone. Doing so would put us in touch with the labour market. Doing so might also put the Labour Party in touch with the labour market. It would put us in touch with 21st century businesses that succeed or fail based on their ability to attract and retain workers. Those are the people I speak for, Mr Seymour – Mr Speaker. We have not heard enough from them so far. I commend this bill to the House.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Just before I call the honourable member, we are having trouble here with the bell, so I will call out “2 minutes to go”, if you last that long.

PHIL TWYFORD (Labour—Te Atatū): I do not know about Seymour—I think I have heard enough, Mr Assistant Speaker. I want to start talking about the forestry industry. Forestry is an unregulated industry. It is dominated by contracting. It is devoid of collective bargaining. It is a perfect model of the kind that the Employment Relations Amendment Bill seeks to extend across all sectors, and it is the very industry, with low rates of unionisation, whose workers will be most badly affected by this law. It is an incredibly flexible industry. The members on the Government side of the House talk about flexibility as if it is this great thing that they are bestowing on the New Zealand workforce and New Zealanders, but I think they should think pretty seriously about the real-life consequences of these policies and of this bill for New Zealanders in industries like forestry.

Tomorrow the Independent Forestry Safety Review Panel will release its report. It is campaigning by the union movement that has brought this about, which is ironic given what it going on here with this bill. It was the union campaign that highlighted the hidden shame of the forestry industry, not just the accident rate but the appalling terms and conditions in this industry, where the tea break legislation, which this bill does away with, is not even enforced and there is no hope of collective bargaining because of the fragmented nature of the industry. It was these failures that last year saw 10 workers killed and 180 people seriously injured at work, it was these failures that left 1,200 forestry workers on ACC for more than a year out of a workforce of 6,500, and it was these failures that led to the death of workers like forestry worker Charles Finlay, who was killed on the job in Tokoroa in July last year.

I have here Charles Finlay’s individual employment agreement, and at the conclusion of my speech I am going to table it because I think it is appropriate in this debate that members of the House should be able to look at an individual employment agreement from the forestry industry, which is the kind of agreement that will be a direct consequence of the legislation that National is passing today. This agreement is what individual bargaining looks like in reality—this is the thing that this bill promotes. It allows employers to favour individuals if they want to, and this bill makes it legitimate for an employer to refuse to settle a collective agreement, even if it is what the workers want. This agreement says it all. It was signed in 2005 and never updated, except for small increases in pay, and it has a limitless requirement for hours worked—limitless. Overtime worked was paid at the standard rate and, after 27 years in the bush, Charles Finlay was earning only $16 an hour, regardless of the fact that he was working 10-hour to 12-hour days. I have here as well some of Charles’ payslips, and I will come to those later.

This agreement was signed before the last Labour Government introduced mandatory tea and lunch breaks in 2008, and when it was signed it included just one break: half an hour for lunch. As I said, I also have some of Charles’ payslips, and they confirm his pay rate of just $16 an hour. They confirm the long hours he was working, in this most dangerous of industries. But I also have some of his timesheets, and they tell the real story of work where there is no collective bargaining—as much of this flexibility that the Government is selling as the employer wants and no premium for long hours or experience. The timesheets show that Charles often started work at 4 a.m. and finished at 4 p.m., with a half-hour smoko in between—12-hour days, 11½-hour working days in the middle of winter, in the middle of the country. Mr Finlay might have had tea breaks as well, but if he did, these were not in his agreement in 2005, so they would have come about only through the introduction of the law passed in this Parliament by the fifth Labour Government. Charles Finlay was killed at 5.30 in the morning. On the day he was killed, it was dark and cold. He had been home barely 12 hours from his work the day before when he was up again and off for more hard, hard, low-paid, and dangerous work. Charles Finlay leaves behind a widow on 80 percent of $16 an hour, raising 11-year-old twins and a 21-year-old son.

Tomorrow the Independent Forestry Safety Review Panel will recommend that the employment terms and conditions of forestry workers support safe workplaces, but today the Government, and this Minister, makes that much more difficult to achieve. The Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety himself, in his first speech in his new role, conceded to the Business Leaders’ Health and Safety Forum that there is a link between safety and conditions of work, but now we have this bill in the House, which does not recognise that. In other industries without collective bargaining, it is the same. In fact, the four industries that have the most fatalities have minimal or no collective bargaining or organised workers with protection to raise employment issues. I am talking about forestry, fishing, agriculture, and construction. Talk to these workers to see what this bill is trying to deliver for everyone. The wages in dairy farming decreased last year during the boom year, while immigration went up. It is an industry out of control with regard to hours of work and low wage rates, where 42 percent of the workforce turns over in less than 1 year. That is what an industry looks like when there is no collective bargaining, and that is what this National Government wants for everyone.

Take the ports. The Government has used—in fact, Simon Bridges was very open about saying that the Ports of Auckland dispute was partly the inspiration for this law, but let us look at that. Within only a couple of months of a dispute with the Ports of Auckland’s workforce over casualisation, the employers told the workers that they were all going to be fired and their work contracted out. It negotiated with foreign stevedoring companies to bring in strikebreakers en masse. That dispute was not protracted—it had been going for only 2 months—and the Ports of Auckland decided to dismiss its entire workforce. Well, the members of the Maritime Union of New Zealand—whom I am proud to call my friends; many of whom live in my electorate in west Auckland—stood up to an employer determined to casualise their jobs and take away their rights at work. And that is what this bill is intended to do—to make it easier for employers to do that to their workers.

I want to say to Charles Finlay’s widow and children, if they are listening to this debate, that even though this National Government is determined to weaken the rights of working people and take away their rights at work, Charles’ death will not be in vain. New Zealanders are fair people, and we in the labour movement will not rest until those rights are restored and strengthened. We stand for fairness at work. We believe in having a high-value economy, where people are paid well for skilled, secure work, not the crude, dog-eat-dog, 19th century approach that is the hallmark of National’s approach to labour relations. The great irony of this National Government is that it came to office talking about the wage gap between New Zealand and Australia, yet every bit of employment legislation it has brought to this House and passed in the last 6 years has been, at its heart, a determined effort to drive down labour costs.

This is not about vilifying all employers. In fact, I do not believe there is a groundswell of support from New Zealand employers asking for this law. Hardly any of them submitted. There were more than 13,000 submissions on the bill, and they were overwhelmingly opposed to this law. But make no mistake—this bill is intensely political. It is the National Party throwing red meat to its more hard-line ideological supporters in the business community. But it will, unfortunately, incentivise and encourage the worst behaviour by the worst employers. Labour stands for fairness and decency, and all of these things are undermined by this legislation in the House today. It is non-union members who will be the worst affected. That is the irony of this. Labour is utterly opposed to this bill.

Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE (Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety): It is my pleasure to take what I expect will be the final call before the vote on the third reading of the Employment Relations Amendment Bill. I want to acknowledge my friend and colleague Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga for moving the third reading motion as I was unable to do so, and I appreciate the whip’s indulgence in giving me this final call. This afternoon it was my great privilege as the Minister of Police to attend my first graduation ceremony at the Royal New Zealand Police College in Porirua. I want to congratulate those graduants of Recruit Wing 287 as they are now sworn members of the constabulary in New Zealand.

There is a very interesting thing about the New Zealand Police. Those men and women in the New Zealand police force are not allowed to strike. In fact, this House legislated against the right of those workers to take industrial action. What this House also did was provide for some flexibility, some compensation, and some processes of mediation and arbitration in the event that negotiations between them and their employer became protracted. It is the same with the New Zealand Defence Force and a number of other organisations in this country. It is sound, it is sensible, and it is flexible. Do we hear the wailing and gnashing of teeth from the other side about that kind of flexibility? Absolutely not. So what I completely fail to understand is why the very pragmatic, sensible, flexible arrangements that are being proposed in this bill are being so opposed by the Opposition.

Mr Seymour, in his first intervention on this bill, has rather quizzically seen that very moderate changes, in his view, are getting what he thought, I think, was an overreaction. Well, I think that Mr Seymour needs to get used to that because that is the nature of the industrial relations landscape in this House. Even the most moderate, sensible, flexible changes will be railed at by the Opposition, and we have seen that throughout this debate.

For generations, similar types of practical accommodations were able to be made where the circumstances required them, and we have mentioned those sorts of things such as the night shift nurse in the aged-care home, the supervisor at the 24-hour service station, and the sole-charge air traffic controller at small airports—very practical solutions, which were made unlawful in 2008 by the amendments to this Act. We have heard a lot. We have heard about bus drivers urinating in bottles, and about the very important conditions that Mr Twyford described in the forestry sector. Those sorts of things are unlawful now, and they will be unlawful in the future. What angers me about the tub-thumping rhetoric by the cloth-cap wearers in the Opposition is that their irrational and incorrect description of flexibility as being the arbitrary removal of tea breaks has created a climate of fear amongst hundreds of thousands of workers in this country—the very workers they claim to represent—and for that, the Opposition should be ashamed.

I want to turn now to the duty of good faith not requiring a duty to conclude collective bargaining. I want to thank the architects of that clause, the fifth Labour Government, which introduced that provision when the Employment Relations Act was passed in 2000. It was sensible, it worked, and, for reasons that the National Party and ACT party in Opposition could not fathom, it was removed in 2004. Well, we are putting it back, but we are doing more than that: we are creating very good provisions for the prevention and control of what is called surface bargaining, which can be conducted not just by employers but by employees and their representatives. The Employment Relations Authority has to be satisfied that good faith has been undertaken before a decision to conclude the bargaining process is made, and that, of course, for 60 days at least, prevents the right to strike. It also prevents the right of an employer to lock workers out. It goes both ways.

Finally, I want to talk about Part 6A. As a rugby referee, when one comes off the field and both teams are pretty unhappy with one’s performance, you think you have done a pretty good job, and that is certainly the case with Part 6A. The unions are unhappy and the employers are unhappy with what are some moderate, sensible changes that I think will actually support the types of workers who support the Labour Party.

Mr Hipkins in his intervention asked—and I paraphrase—“What stops a company like, say, Spotless, from structuring its business to create a means to get around Part 6A?”. Well, he clearly has not read the bill, because exactly those provisions on the effective control of franchise arrangements to prevent such structuring have been put into the bill. It is also noteworthy that those genuinely small organisations—and about 75 percent of the organisations in, say, cleaning in this country are sole practice or very small family-owned businesses—do have the means or the wherewithal to embark on the responsibilities as set out in Part 6A. Often they are migrants or workers who have been cleaners themselves, who have set up their own businesses and are struggling to make them work, and who are successful in getting new tenders. They should be protected, I think, from the obligation—the burden—that would have them comply with Part 6A. These are very sensible, very practical, and, I think, appropriate changes to the Employment Relations Act.

As I say, I think Mr Seymour needs to get used to the fact that even sensible changes to our employment relations and ACC legislation will have the Opposition members up like meerkats. But I support this bill. This is good for our employment relations landscape. It is good for employers, it is good for employees, and I commend it to the House.

PHIL TWYFORD (Labour—Te Atatū): I seek leave of the House to table the payslips, employment contract, and daily timesheets of Charles Finlay, a forestry worker who died at work.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Is there any objection? [Interruption] I am just checking—do you have permission?

Phil Twyford: Yes.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Is there any objection? There is no objection. The documents will be tabled.

Documents, by leave, laid on the Table of the House.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the Employment Relations Amendment Bill be now read a third time.

Ayes 62

New Zealand National 60; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Noes 58

New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 13; New Zealand First 11; Māori Party 2.

Bill read a third time.

Third Readings

Third Readings

Hon NATHAN GUY (Minister for Primary Industries) on behalf of the Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs: I move, That the Auditor Regulation Amendment Bill, the Charities Amendment Bill (No 3), the Financial Reporting Amendment Bill, and the New Zealand Institute of Chartered Accountants Amendment Bill be now read a third time. The legislation arising from the Accounting Infrastructure Reform Bill will enable the accounting and audit industry to be more effective and more efficient. This Government has progressed a raft of important changes for the Business Growth Agenda, which began with the passing of the Financial Markets Conduct Act 2013 and the Financial Reporting Act 2013.

The Financial Markets Conduct Act ensures financial markets are fairer. It regulates how financial products are offered, promoted, issued, and sold, to support confident and informed market participation. The Financial Reporting Act improves transparency. It has reformed reporting obligations by removing the requirement for smaller companies to produce complex financial statements. It allows shareholders of small and medium sized companies to decide whether the company must prepare financial statements, enabling companies to better direct resources where the need is greatest, growing their businesses. The accounting infrastructure legislation is the third step and will build on these improvements. It will realign the structure of the audit and accounting industry so that participants are able to quickly adapt in an evolving environment. A more competitive and efficient accounting market will ensure better business advice for New Zealand firms, while a robust audit industry will provide improved assurance for users of financial statements, building confidence in our financial markets.

Together, these pieces of legislation will encourage the confident and informed participation of businesses, investors, and consumers in the financial markets. They support a key plank of the Government’s Business Growth Agenda—that is, the development of our capital markets by promoting fair, transparent, and efficient financial markets. I thank all the submitters who took the time to contribute to this very important legislation. I commend these bills to the House.

Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE (Labour): I am going to confine my comments to only some of the legislation arising from the Accounting Infrastructure Reform Bill. The legislation is, of course, supported by the Labour Opposition. The legislation is relatively straightforward. I do agree with the Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs that it brings accounting practices in New Zealand and Australia closer together in similar ways to what has been done by both Governments, over many years, in terms of trans-Tasman commercial arrangements in banking and legal entities and sectors. It will indeed promote a far more efficient arrangement and better business outcomes, I think, for that profession, and it is supported, in large part, by the accounting sectors both here and by CPA Australia.

That being said, as I said last night, when we last dealt with this, we did have some difficulties—well, not so much some difficulties, but we did probe officials on a number of areas—around charities and the impact of the legislation on the charitable sector, which I think was a concern shared by both sides of the House. I think Mr Young was the chair of the Commerce Committee. We did not want to impose undue difficulties or costs on the charitable sector. I think we worked through those issues pretty well. There was also the thorny issue of the religious objection clause. The select committee, I think, tested our officials. The motivation was not to test out, if you will, the religious notions of the particular group of submitters—the Exclusive Brethren—who came before us. It was to ensure, bluntly—and I know this may sound reasonably humorous, but it is not—that we were not setting up a situation where bureaucrats were having to make religious judgments, as it were, and where nefarious folks could use the exemptions that are in the legislation to somehow walk round the legislation and the rules in terms of membership and the obligations that membership and the entity governing it would entail. There was quite lengthy scrutiny of officials and they were sent away to deal with that issue.

There are indeed a number of precedents. The one that I recall reasonably vividly is the Labour Relations Act amendments that were made going back many, many years, where that particular scheme of arrangement and exemption was allowed. In respect of the Exclusive Brethren, I note for the record that both Damien O’Connor and I actually ended up getting a meeting with the then Minister of Labour, Margaret Wilson, to make the case for that particular group that that exemption should be extended in the new and amended legislation. I have to say in passing that little did we know what that particular sect was up to, and neither did the public—

Kris Faafoi: As a principle—as a principle.

Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE: —as a principle—realise that it was trying to buy an election with a million bucks and put a knife in the throat of our democracy. But putting that aside, we were grateful to the officials and, I think, both sides of the House worked through the issue in a bipartisan way. I would hope—and we did seek assurances in the Committee stage from the Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs—that that particular exemption clause could not be abused. We hope that is the case. To be fair, in other pieces of legislation, it has worked pretty well.

The bills and the main provisions deal with reducing restrictions on legal form for audit firms, charity assurance, members of accredited bodies performing statutory audits, qualified accountants performing statutory accounting roles, and a number of amendments in respect of the New Zealand Institute of Chartered Accountants. I think that it is appropriate that the House keep dealing with—and I am glad to hear the Minister say that there is further legislation to come, in terms of this—the trans-Tasman relationship. Australia is our closest neighbour, and is, effectively, one of the biggest, if not the biggest, markets we have. We have had CER for many, many years, we are getting closer and closer as one market, and business is being transacted in more modern ways with a greater frequency. So it is appropriate that these pieces of legislation are progressed through in order to make it more efficient and easier for the commercial sector on both sides of the Tasman to transact business.

I will say in passing also that it is—and this is no disrespect to the new Minister—a bit of a worry that on the one hand the Government says that these measures form part of its growth and business agenda, but on the other hand it took out the portfolio of commerce from within Cabinet. The Government did not downgrade it within Cabinet; it took it right out of Cabinet, and it not only downgraded it to outside Cabinet but dropped it to the basement, or closer, probably, to the political dunny—to No. 25. This is the Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs we are talking about. We have had some substantial Ministers of Commerce on both sides of the House who have made substantial contributions. I am thinking of Simon Power—

Hon Member: Paul Goldsmith?

Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE: —Lianne Dalziel, and, with a bit of luck, Paul Goldsmith might get there, as long as his performance is a bit better than when he was chairing the select committee. But he may well get there.

Kris Faafoi: He’s on watch—he’s on watch.

Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE: Yes, he is on probation. We will give him the benefit of the doubt—a fair go.

Hon Member: 90 days.

Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE: Yes, we will give him the 90-day rule—we will give him that. I will just say that it is a bit of a contradiction and a bit of a worry when the Minister of Commerce is dropped to the even darker depths of where Maurice Williamson was dropped once or twice, I suspect, and dropped right outside Cabinet. What signal does that send to commercial entities? We know there are priorities in Government—I have been a Cabinet Minister inside—and we know the more senior you are, generally, the faster you can get things through. If you are not in the ring it is harder to do. This piece of legislation, other pieces of legislation, and future pieces of legislation will not, it seems, have the priority that they once did. We know that Minister Foss took an inordinate amount of time within Cabinet to drag commerce legislation through the process and through this House. Maybe, sadly, that is one reason why he was bounced, but that should not have been the case for the portfolio that is commerce.

It is slightly odd that the Government does wax on about its support for the commercial sector, which we all support; the need for creating greater, appropriate efficiencies, which we support; and its need to cut through red tape and the regulatory frameworks, which, appropriately, we do support. But when you take the Minister and the portfolio and you bump them right down to the most junior of junior ministerial portfolios right outside Cabinet, I just wonder what signal that sends. It would be great if speakers who are going to speak on this legislation would get up and give us some sort of an assurance that that does not mean that an appropriate commerce or consumer affairs law is going to somehow—[Bell rung] Was that you or the bell, Mr Assistant Speaker? Ha, ha! We may have a problem here. Thank you. Ha, ha! Is there a doctor in the House? At the risk of being thrown out—but what signal does that send to the commercial sector?

Does this mean that commerce legislation will not only be delayed through some of the former incompetence but be delayed because it struggles to get the priority it should? If you want to have a business framework and you want to grow a business and you want to do things to help the commercial sectors, surely that was one portfolio that should have remained not only within Cabinet but at a senior level within Cabinet. I recall Simon Power as Minister of Commerce, I think, at No. 3, or No. 4 at worst. He sat on the front row, got his legislation through, got it through swiftly, and much of that legislation, to be fair to him, was positive and supported by this House. Now there are no impact players. They are on the bench. The water boy or the oranges boy, or whatever, has got the portfolio and that is where it sits.

We do support the legislation. It is a good piece of legislation. It went through a good process with the Commerce Committee, but I just hope that when we look at the priorities of the Government—there are a lot of commercial guys over there—that Government members are going to have a chat to the Leader of the House or the Prime Minister and still promote commerce legislation as a high priority, as it has been in the past.

Hon Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga: I will.

Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE: Mr Lotu-Iiga says: “We will.” I will hold him to that. We wait and see.

BRETT HUDSON (National): I rise with great pleasure to take this short call to commend this legislation—the bills arising from the Accounting Infrastructure Reform Bill—in its third readings in the House. It is a pleasure, too, that I am speaking on legislation that has broad support across the House. I recall watching this legislation being debated in the Committee of the whole House, and it is fair to say that it was treated very much with multipartisan support, which was great to see. Although this particular legislation is not perhaps as sexy as some other areas of legislation are reputed to be, it is indeed important legislation and in fact it has some important changes.

This Government is focused on our Business Growth Agenda as a policy engine to drive growth in this country, to provide higher-paying and more jobs. That includes things like investing in infrastructure, investing in skills, opening new markets, harnessing our natural resources, and also strengthening our capital markets, which is where this legislation and these changes sit.

What is most important, and what I talk about today, is confidence: confidence from investors, confidence from lenders, and confidence that will translate to market conditions that will mean that our businesses can find people to invest in them, they can borrow money to grow, and, in growing, they will create more jobs. They will be able to strengthen their businesses and they will be able to pay people more.

This is the third part of a legislative programme promoting fair, transparent, and efficient markets. The programme had the Financial Markets Conduct Act to give confidence in market behaviours. It had the Financial Reporting Act, which improved transparency and also removed some costly complexity for smaller companies. That is always very pleasing to see.

This legislation, of course, improves efficiency. It realigns the structure of the audit and accounting industry so that participants can adapt more quickly in an evolving environment, and it provides a more competitive and efficient accounting market that will ensure better business advice for New Zealand firms. This will improve confidence in capital markets and it will support our economic growth, and that ultimately delivers more prosperity for New Zealanders.

This legislation will also improve competition and our international outlook in our market. I am pleased to say that it has tidied up some areas that were obviously of concern to the industry and to businesses, as well as to members within this House, obviously. The Registrar of Companies now has some criteria to use when considering applications for approval for people as qualified auditors who are overseas individuals. I am very pleased to see that it also addressed an issue that was raised by the Institute of Chartered Accountants around making sure that statutory audits could still be performed. It is my great pleasure to commend this legislation to the House. Thank you.

KRIS FAAFOI (Labour—Mana): Malo ni. Mr Assistant Speaker, I think this is my first opportunity to speak in the House with you in the Chair. So can I congratulate you face to face on your appointment, and I hope you do not read what I said about you in Hansard in my earlier speech in this Parliament during the Address in Reply debate.

This is legislation that does have broad support across Parliament. As Clayton Cosgrove said earlier in his contribution on this legislation, there are advantages to the merger of the New Zealand Institute of Chartered Accountants and its sister body across the Tasman. We do support that in this age of a global economy where suitable and compatible regulations are going to be advantageous to both New Zealand and Australia. We on this side of the House do support any efficiencies that we can get from it.

This legislation was in the Commerce Committee of the previous Parliament, so I would like to acknowledge everyone who sat on that. It was a bipartisan process, and I would like to extend our thanks for the way it was handled by the committee chair, Jonathan Young. As Clayton Cosgrove pointed out, there were some tricky issues around the exemption of particular people from the membership of chartered accountants’ organisations. That was a tricky one, which I will get to later.

There was a democratic process for the New Zealand Institute of Chartered Accountants members to decide as to whether or not it thought this merger was a good idea. I understand that close to 70 percent of the membership who did vote were in favour of this. That is not to say that there were not some members who were opposed to it. They were predominantly smaller practices in rural areas, and we did hear a number of submissions from those types of practitioners. I hope that those people who oppose the merger can be kept happy, despite being opposed to this merger.

I did want to talk to the issue that Clayton Cosgrove brought up in regard to the Exclusive Brethren. We gave its members what I thought was a pretty fair hearing. You may have thought, because of our past dealings with them from this side of the House, that we might not have, but we did take a principled approach to the request for which they came to the select committee—for an exemption to be members of the professional body. Their religion excludes them from being members of other organisations if those organisations go against what their fundamental religious beliefs are, but the changes in this legislation meant that you could not be a qualified accountant if you were not a member of the organisation, which would have put them out of business. So they came to the select committee asking for an exemption.

I think they were probably a little bit nervous because of their previous history with politics, but as Clayton Cosgrove said, we did look at it in a principled way. They did want to make sure that they were abiding by whatever rules the organisation was going to have and also that they would be subject to any disciplinary measures that may come about. But their religion meant that they could not be members of that organisation. So I would like to thank the members of that committee and also the officials for what was a pretty tricky negotiation to try to make sure that we got the balance right.

This legislation contains an amendment to the Financial Reporting Act—the parent bill has been split up into four separate bills now—to insert new section 36M. There are some conditions that an accountant who does hold these religious beliefs has to make sure that they meet if they want to practice as accountants. First of all, the body has to be satisfied that the religion that the people have is bona fide, and they have to have a written agreement with that body to make sure that they keep to the rules, and that if they do break the rules, any disciplinary action that may be forced upon them will be adhered to. If at any stage the organisation thinks that that particular accountant who does have those religious beliefs is not going to stick to that, they can have that exemption removed.

This took up quite a bit of the time of the select committee. Again, I do want to thank the officials, because it did perplex us. There was not a lot of precedent floating around. It obviously was a tricky issue with the issue of religious beliefs, but there was one similar exemption in a piece of labour law, which we looked at closely. I think we came to what was a very happy place for the members of the committee itself and also those businesses that came to submit to us.

As Clayton Cosgrove said, this is a piece of legislation that we agree with. We now hope that the new Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs has some time to look at other things in his new portfolio area. I do understand he is outside Cabinet, so he may not get the impetus that we would want from a Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs, especially around the area of what was in the Credit Contracts and Consumer Finance Amendment Act, which was passed last year—around loan sharks. I hope that will be a priority for the new Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs. It was this Government in the previous term that did not take any action on putting interest rate caps on loan sharks. I hope that the Minister, now that this bill has been completed, might be able to take a fresh look in the 51st Parliament at those loan sharks who are out there terrorising the most vulnerable people out in our communities, charging the most exorbitant interest rates. The new Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs might be able to look at that.

As we have said on this side of the House, this is a piece of legislation that we know will be beneficial for New Zealand. The industry wants it on this side of the Tasman, as do the accountants’ organisations on the other side of the Tasman. We hope it will open up new business opportunities for us. We understand it might also create some new jobs in New Zealand, because the new omni-organisation may set up its back office here in New Zealand. We think that is obviously one of the spin-offs of making sure that these two sets of regulations, both here in New Zealand and in Australia, can be closely related.

But, as I say, now that this piece of legislation will be disposed of very soon, we hope that the new Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs can get some new legislation through the Commerce Committee, of which the Hon Maurice Williamson is now a member. I look forward to having many robust discussions with him. Today we talked about stereos from the 1970s in Fiji. I look forward to his colour and his incisive mind on the Commerce Committee from now on.

This is legislation that I believe has cross-party support, so Labour will support it, but there are some reservations. Cheers.

Hon MAURICE WILLIAMSON (National—Pakuranga): Mr Assistant Speaker, I will not trouble you with using the entire time and then having to put up with that dreadfully flatulent sound that you were making over there before because of your squeaker—

Hon Ruth Dyson: Oh, that’s outrageous.

Hon MAURICE WILLIAMSON: Well, it is not outrageous. If you had heard the sound he made, you would know what I was talking about.

In the words of Henry VIII when he was speaking to Anne of Cleves, I will not keep you long, but I will just talk about a few things, and they are to do with the changing world we live in. As a young man growing up in Matamata I used to go with my dad to see the local accountant. He had a big Friden machine. It was big, with buttons down and with big handles, and you turned them all and it kept adding things up. That is where we were just during my lifetime. No such thing—

Kris Faafoi: When was that?

Hon MAURICE WILLIAMSON: That was in the 1960s—the early 1960s. So that is how far we have gone now, where most accounting is done online. It is done through phenomenal companies like Xero, that wonderful New Zealand-based accounting firm, which is taking on the world.

I give notice to this House that we will probably be back here many times in future years, changing the law again, because what used to be a set in the office, with the armbands up and the quill pen and the Friden machine, is now going to become a global service, like a whole lot of other industries. We need to open up our minds and get rid of all the shackles that have stopped some of those people growing. The more we can open it up to the rest of the world to participate, and the more we can open it up for New Zealand accountants to participate in the rest of the world, we will be doing the whole country a great service.

So it is part of the Business Growth Agenda, and it is something that is well and truly overdue. I tell this House that we will be back in many years to come doing the next tranche, and the next tranche, as accounting changes before our very eyes and morphs into forms that we have yet to be able to even understand. I support the legislation.

JAMES SHAW (Green): The assurance industry is a critical component of our economic framework. The idea that there is a trusted independent watchdog of the public interest underpins investor confidence and ensures financial probity on behalf of our country’s leading institutions. New Zealand has generally been isolated from the kinds of catastrophic audit failures such as Enron and WorldCom that shook up the industry and led to such restructuring back in the early 2000s.

When the Accounting Infrastructure Reform Bill first came before the House we did have a number of concerns. Although not opposed to widening the pool of people who are able to perform audits, we did have a concern that in New Zealand’s comparatively light regulatory environment, there was some risk that to do so would lower the quality of audits being performed.

Second, we were concerned that the regulatory impact statements indicated that there was little or no evidence that the proposed changes would bring about the benefits that we were looking for, such as quality audits or being aligned with other jurisdictions. Many of those benefits could be achieved if we were to move to a co-regulatory regime, such as in the UK, or a direct regulatory regime, such as that in Australia—which are two of our major trading partners—rather than retaining the relatively light self-regulatory environment that New Zealand has.

Our third main concern was that, really, this represented a bit of a missed opportunity for a broader review of New Zealand’s regulatory environment in the wake of the global financial crisis and domestic finance sector meltdowns. However, obviously, the bill contained a number of other measures that we supported, such as introducing the requirement for financial statements of medium and large sized charities.

However, we heard the submissions and we were assured that the proposed changes are relatively minor and will not substantially change the status quo within the confines of the current framework. We do still hold the concern that the current framework, which relies on self-regulation, is out of line with some of our major trading partners—for example, Australia and the United Kingdom—and that a co-regulatory or direct regulatory framework, such as those employed, would reduce economic risk in New Zealand. However, given that the changes in the final set of bills do have the support of all submitters and that, if enacted, they do seem to make our regulatory framework more efficient and more effective, we are supporting these bills. Thank you.

FLETCHER TABUTEAU (NZ First): May I take this opportunity to congratulate you personally, Mr Assistant Speaker, on your appointment to the Chair. It is great to see you there. On behalf of New Zealand First, I rise in support of the bills divided from the Accounting Infrastructure Reform Bill. It is an exciting topic. I am sure one of the Ministers would class it as exciting and sexy.

New Zealand First is very much supportive of enabling business and making business practice that much more efficient through the simplification of processes, especially for our Kiwi-owned organisations. The question does arise, however, at what point does efficiency go beyond what is reasonable and fair? I reflect on previous discussions in the House today, in fact, on matters also of great importance to business and the people of New Zealand. It should not be the role of this Government, for example, to allow private enterprises to spend the next few generations treating their people as guinea pigs, trialling employment scenarios that undermine the humanity inherent in their own human resource. It will come to a stage of protest and revolution, as those in our casualised workforce, desperate for what work they can find, slowly realise they are not just numbers on a balance sheet, and businesses will be forced to learn or, hopefully, will learn once again, the true cost of undermining their human resource. They will be cutting and slicing up the livelihoods of people in New Zealand.

But I do digress.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): You do.

FLETCHER TABUTEAU: It is important to note the intent of the bills divided from the Accounting Infrastructure Reform Bill. The legislation widens the definition of those entitled to perform audits—a more comprehensive and accountable system, which will authorise registration of overseas audit firms, for example. At the same time it fixes an anomaly that has very much restricted the structure of firms or organisations wanting to be recognised auditors. Now New Zealand auditing firms can incorporate using the company form if they so desire. New Zealand First expects to see an improvement in efficiencies in this area as firms structure themselves as they see fit.

At the same time, the legislation does remove some of the requirements set out in law. Initially, one would be wary of the intent to broaden those qualified to undertake such a task, and then, additionally, remove some of the rules outlining how certain tasks can be undertaken, especially with regard to this very important role within our business sector. Many of us may think of a small, bespectacled individual sitting in a darkened room and hovering over spreadsheets and calculators with their three coloured pens at the ready, but let them show up in your office and one will invariably see the quiet power they wield. Woe betide you if you have a bad audit.

Auditing is a tool for accountability. An audit is a thorough examination of a company’s financial records, and typically involves a chartered accountant working through them to ensure they are a true and accurate reflection of a company’s financial position. An audit provides more financial transparency to shareholders and stakeholders, and security that its financial position has been checked by a chartered accountant. New Zealand First is content, however, with the increase in those able to undertake audits, given new section 42E, being inserted in the Charities Act where, for example, with regard to charities, if a charity entity fails to comply with new section 42C, the charitable entity commits an offence and is liable on conviction to a fine not exceeding $50,000. Further, the legislation outlines the newly formed institute of accountants’ statutory requirements to control and regulate the profession of accountancy practised by members in New Zealand. We are satisfied there are checks and balances.

A name change away from the New Zealand Institute of Chartered Accountants’ “chartered accountant” endorsement to a generic “qualified statutory accountant” title will allow for religious considerations and what the committee has decided are conflicts with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990. The legislation will improve the effectiveness of charities offering different criteria for different-sized charities.

As outlined under the new Section 42D, a charitable entity is defined as “large” essentially if its expenditure over the two preceding periods is more than $1 million, or “medium” if over the two preceding periods its total operating expenditure is less than $500,000. Because these are large sums of money, it would seem to me it is important that our larger charities provide financial statements that are of a high quality. As noted earlier, it is also heartening to see that our smaller charities will be able to use money as it is intended, rather than towards overly onerous compliance costs.

The intent of the legislation was to free up some of the restraints that were being imposed at the time on the Institute of Chartered Accountants. I note, despite the legislation not having passed yet, that the New Zealand Institute of Chartered Accountants is no longer and that we already have the organisation now named Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand. I was privy to some of the discussions held by the membership of the former New Zealand Institute of Chartered Accountants over the past year or more as a stakeholder, as head of the business school. It was in this role that I was aware of the debate that did in fact rage up and down the country. I take this opportunity to commend my friends and those members for their decision to merge. I hope the combined approach works for you all as you hoped it would. I have seen much change within the organisation itself already. I acknowledge that the combined branding brings some inherent strengths, especially for labour mobility across Australia and New Zealand particularly, but also into the wider world.

It was of interest to note also that the new legislation will allow the New Zealand Institute of Chartered Accountants to disestablish the role of president and vice-president. Unfortunately, one of the arguments for this is that the Australian equivalent will have its own presidential roles, rendering the New Zealand equivalent unnecessary. New Zealand First hopes that the New Zealand branch of the amalgamation can maintain its side of the relationship and hold New Zealand’s perspectives and interests to the fore.

If this legislation was created in order to help businesses in meeting their obligations and, in so doing, to save them some costs and time, then I commend the committee for its work. This legislation does what it sets out to do. The accounting and audit industry will now be that little bit more efficient and effective in what it can do. This is why New Zealand First stands in support of the legislation. New Zealand First will always stand in support of any legislation that is good for New Zealand business. We know the incredible work of the businessmen and businesswomen of New Zealand, and this type of legislation, which serves to lower costs of compliance, is an example of a common-sense policy we can and will always support.

The work of the Commerce Committee is indicative of what can be achieved when a bipartisan approach is taken, when a committee is open to submissions and is willing to listen to those most affected by the changes proposed. I commend the committee for the amount of work, the level of complexity, that had to be worked through together in order to achieve this outcome. Can I suggest that this committee provides a good working model that should be followed by all other committees in this 51st Parliament. Thank you.

KANWALJIT SINGH BAKSHI (National): Mr Assistant Speaker, it is my pleasure to take a call, my first call in your presence as a presiding officer. I congratulate you. I look forward to the day when a member tests your patience and you send him or her out of this House. It will be a real pleasure to see that.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): The odds would not be high on that member.

KANWALJIT SINGH BAKSHI: I would love to do that.

It is my pleasure to take this call on the legislation arising out of the Accounting Infrastructure Reform Bill. It is part of the Government’s Business Growth Agenda. It is wonderful legislation that the Commerce Committee, which I was a part of, did a lot of work on. I commend this legislation to the House. Thank you.

GARETH HUGHES (Green): I understand this is a split call. Or am I taking another party’s call?

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): If that is what you want.

GARETH HUGHES: Sure. I probably will not take the full 10 minutes, even if it is not a split call. Kia ora, Mr Assistant Speaker. Ngā mihi nui ki a koutou. Kia ora. My dad worked for the Inland Revenue Department for many, many years. I do not know whether anyone else has had the experience where you do not really want to tell people at parties whom you work for. So he would make a joke, because he did not really want to say he worked for the Inland Revenue Department and taxed people. He would say: “Oh, it’s a taxing job. I don’t want to tell you.”, and then he would have to, under his breath, say: “I work for the IRD.”

I wonder whether auditors are the same because it is not a particularly, in the words of Minister Bennett, sexy job, but it is a critical job in our economy. Although maybe they do not get the kudos other sectors have, auditors play a critical role in the financial health of our economy—everything from the surety in the stock market and the key role they play there for investors through to avoiding fraud and malpractice in some of our companies, through to the critical role they play in our Parliament in advising us on the financial health of some of our State-owned enterprises.

We have also seen, as James Shaw pointed out in his contribution, where auditors have failed. We can see catastrophic consequences, as we saw with that absolutely gigantic Enron collapse in the US, which you can pin to the failure of auditing requirements. They play a critical role. That is why we were a little bit reluctant in the first reading of this legislation—and in fact voted against it. We did not think the case had been made for why we needed to broaden the scope for auditors and take the risk of a light-handed regulatory approach.

We went into the select committee process with an open mind. We would like to acknowledge the chair, thank the submitters, and thank the officials. What we heard there was unanimous support for the changes adopted. We think they are common-sense changes. For example, the merging of the New Zealand and Australian bodies makes some sense, with the two bodies supporting it. We think widening the ability of people to become auditors, as long as they are accredited, within a standardised approach makes sense because ultimately auditors play a critical role in our economy.

I know that previous Green speakers in the series of debates on this legislation have talked about the risks of a light-handed regulatory approach. This is something we have learnt from New Zealand’s history, when you look at the leaky homes fiasco and the billions of dollars of liability that has accrued to central government and local government. We need to make sure that regulation is appropriate, but we cannot have this approach where all regulation is bad by virtue of the fact that it is regulation. Regulation, like auditors, plays a critical role in our economy, and that is why the Green Party will continue to support smart, targeted, appropriate regulation and auditing. Thank you. Kia ora.

CARMEL SEPULONI (Labour—Kelston): It is good to speak on legislation that we do support. Labour does support this legislation, and we do agree with its intent. We have heard from a broad spectrum of voices from the accountancy, audit, and professional services industries, including small and regional practitioners, regarding this legislation. We are aware that there is a diverse range of views on the future and the shape of the industry, not just those put forward by the Institute of Chartered Accountants and other representative bodies.

The intent of this legislation makes the accounting and audit industry more efficient and effective, hence we will be supporting it. We are happy about the common-sense approach that appears to have been taken with this, and we congratulate the new Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs, Paul Goldsmith, on attaining the commerce portfolio. In saying that we congratulate him, we are concerned that the Government has placed the commerce portfolio at the very bottom of the executive totem, outside Cabinet at No. 25. So on this side of the House we are concerned that the Government is not giving it the recognition or prioritising it in the way that we would expect and, actually, that we think that the general public of New Zealand would expect any Government to do.

There are important issues within the commerce portfolio that do need addressing, such as the reform of section 36 of the Commerce Act to improve the policing of competition law by the Commerce Commission. I have to say that National has had a really poor track record on modernising commerce legislation since the departure of Simon Power. You know, on this side of the House, despite the fact that he was a National Minister, we did have a lot of respect for Minister Simon Power, and we just have not had a Minister from that Government with the same ability and competence since he departed.

Chris Bishop: You wait for Goldie. You watch Goldie. Just wait.

CARMEL SEPULONI: We are really lacking that level of competence, just in general, across the board with the National Government.

Hon Ruth Dyson: Chris Bishop thinks he’s going to be a Minister in 5 minutes.

CARMEL SEPULONI: Chris Bishop thinks he is going to be the next Minister. Given the low levels of competence, that is possible.

National has had, as I said, a really poor track record and has let important commerce legislation languish on the Order Paper for inordinate periods of time. We ae hoping that Minister Goldsmith will be able to pick up the pace from outside Cabinet, but, again, despite the fact we do support this legislation and we support the purpose of this legislation and we support the provisions of the legislation, we are concerned that the priority being given to the commerce portfolio has been really low and, actually, really insulting. We are concerned about that.

The five main proposed law changes with this are, one, reducing restrictions on legal form for audit firms; two, charities assurance; three, members of accredited bodies performing statutory audits; four, qualified accountants performing statutory accountancy roles; and, five, the structure of the New Zealand Institute of Chartered Accountants. So all of those things and the detail that is involved with that are things that the Labour Party supports.

In terms of the main provisions we see there that the amending rules on who may perform statutory audits—[Bell rung]—I am sorry my time is nearly up. Just going back to what I was saying, we do support this legislation. We support the intent of the legislation. We have concerns about the recognition that the Government is giving to the commerce portfolio. That is all I have to offer today. We support the legislation in front of us. Thank you.

Dr PARMJEET PARMAR (National): I congratulate you, Mr Assistant Speaker Mallard, on your election. My views on the legislation arising from the Accounting Infrastructure Reform Bill equal those of my colleagues. This legislation aligns with the Government’s Business Growth Agenda as it proposes a number of important changes to enable more efficiency and effectiveness and also an improved international outlook. It is a great pleasure to commend this legislation to the House. Thank you.

STUART NASH (Labour—Napier): What a lot of people do not realise is that about 80 percent of all legislation that passes through this House is actually done in a bipartisan way. We all support this. We like the sort of regulation—80 percent—

Hon Member: Multipartisan.

STUART NASH: Well, bipartisan, tripartisan—whatever it might be. But the Accounting Infrastructure Reform Bill is one of those bills that I know the Commerce Committee worked really hard on, because what has happened since 2008—since the financial crisis, I suppose—is that there has been a lack of confidence in a lot of our financial markets and in the auditing response, etc., and, actually, a lack of confidence in the people who are charged with carrying out a lot of the duties in terms of looking after people’s investments. So this legislation is, essentially, just another piece of legislation that improves the confidence and improves the level of transparency across our whole financial markets structure.

I did have to laugh when my colleague Carmel Sepuloni said that we were disappointed in the Minister of Commerce, and Chris Bishop said: “Just wait.” I am not too sure whether Chris Bishop thinks he is going to be the new Minister of Commerce, but maybe he is.

Hon Member: Trying to roll him already.

STUART NASH: Yes, I know. Those members talk about what goes on in our caucus. Well, I think if I was the Minister of Commerce—and who is the Minister of Commerce these days? It used to be Mr Foss. I am not too sure who the new Minister of Commerce is. Who is it? Who is it, whip?

Tim Macindoe: Paul Goldsmith.

STUART NASH: Paul Goldsmith. If I were Paul Goldsmith, I would be watching my back, actually, because Chris Bishop has those knives out. It is that old adage, you know: “They are the Opposition.” And the enemy? “They are the ones behind you.” So well done. It is good to have someone who is ambitious—there is no doubt about that—and I love your ambition, Chris. Well done! But—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order!

STUART NASH: —just wait a couple of seconds, Mr Bishop.

When I said that we support this legislation—and we do support it—there were a couple of concerns that were brought up, and I would just like to bring those concerns up, just to talk about them and put them out there. Who knows—maybe there will be amendments going forward. I was not a member of the Commerce Committee that deliberated on the Accounting Infrastructure Reform Bill. I did not hear the submissions. I have had a look at a couple of them.

By and large, it is a good legislation, but I did have a couple of concerns. One of them was on the commencement date. The commencement date for a lot of these parts is actually 1 April 2017. I just sort of wondered aloud—but unfortunately I did not get a response from the Minister—why we were leaving this for 2½ years and whether there were a whole lot of processes that were going on at the time, or whether there were some things that needed to be worked through the system. But I just thought that 2017 was a long time to wait for parts of this legislation to be given the Royal assent. And the unfortunate thing was that the Minister could not actually tell me which parts of the legislation were going to be implemented upon gaining the Royal assent and which parts had to wait for 2½ years. I think the last parts of this legislation do gain the Royal assent on 1 April 2017, which makes sense from a financial year perspective, but it just provides a little bit of uncertainty, which this legislation is actually trying to mitigate. We try to avoid uncertainty in legislation, I suspect.

The other thing that I was a little bit concerned about was actually new sections 42C and 42D, to be inserted into the Charities Act by the Charities Amendment Bill (No 3). This is the stuff around charities. There are over 3,000 registered charities in New Zealand. A lot of them go to the public of New Zealand seeking funds, wearing the badge of goodwill, as they should, because we are not a particularly giving society compared with a lot of others, and that is the truth. However, when we do give money, we like to think that that money is given and is being disturbed in good faith. What this legislation actually says is that if you are a large charity—and by “large” the definition was that you have an operating expenditure of over a million dollars—then you have to have your accounts audited. That makes absolute sense, because if you have got an operating expenditure of over a million dollars, that is a lot of money and you have solicited a lot of donations from a lot of hard-working Kiwis.

But what it also says is that if you are a medium-sized charity—and the definition of a medium-sized charity is a charity with an operating expenditure of between $500,000 and $1 million—you do not actually have to have your accounts audited. What does have to happen is a qualified auditor has to do a review of the accounts, but that is not a full audit. I was just a little bit concerned that whenever New Zealanders do give money, they do like to think that it is given in good faith, and to me $500,000 in operating expenses is quite a large charity. Would you not agree, Sam? It is quite a large charity, and I would have thought—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order!

STUART NASH: Oh, sorry, Mr Assistant Speaker.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): And I am “you”—so two errors.

STUART NASH: Sorry, you are right. I mean—[Interruption] Ha, ha! I apologise for my indiscretions. This is something I am passionate about—[Interruption] In this House, during this speech. [Interruption] Ha, ha!

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): The member has 4½ minutes left.

STUART NASH: Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker. I suppose the one thing I am passionate about, and the one thing that I really do not want to see again, is the confidence of the New Zealand public take another knock because there has been a charity that has not had its accounts audited because it does not have to have them audited by law. I just think it is a concern. I would have liked to see this legislation include medium-sized charities as well. According to the definition of a medium-sized charity, it has an operating expenditure of $500,000 to a million dollars. I just think that there should have been a provision in the legislation that said that these accounts had to be audited. But the interesting thing is, in fact, that the fine for not undertaking the provisions was the same for medium-sized charities and large-sized charities—that is, $50,000. So there does seem to be a little bit of inequity there.

The other thing is also that the cost of an audit really is not that much when it does provide a level of investor certainty. It is anything from $2,000 to $4,000, and I would have thought that to provide your philanthropists or the people who have given you money with a level of certainty, $4,000 or $5,000 is not much to pay at all to get that certainty. But, as mentioned, we do support this legislation. It goes a long way in terms of reducing the restrictions on the legal forms for audit firms.

There was one other point, which I think is quite important, from Part 2 of the Financial Reporting Amendment Bill. Part 2 was quite a technical part of this bill, and so it is difficult to argue because it is very technical. But one thing it did do is it muzzled what the members of a disciplinary tribunal for the Institute of Chartered Accountants could actually say in public. I found this a little bit strange, and I wondered whether this was dealing with an issue that had arisen before. The chartered accountants came to the select committee and actually said: “You know, we do have problems with people on our disciplinary committees actually going to the media and”—[Bell rung]

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): That is the bell for 2 minutes.

STUART NASH: Oh, thank you very much. Phew, that is a relief—I thought I had left my cellphone on for a second.

Jami-Lee Ross: It’s as limp as this speech.

STUART NASH: Mr Assistant Speaker, can you believe that that member has called this speech limp? All members on this side heard that member speak and, I tell you what, he used the word “you” 15 times in 15 sentences, and I was astounded that the Assistant Speaker, whom I have immense respect for, did not pull him up, because that member has been in the House for long enough to know that you do not turn to your colleagues and say “you”, “you”, “you”—I am just quoting the member, Mr Assistant Speaker.

But, anyway, what I was saying is that I was interested in the fact—

Jami-Lee Ross: Take a point of order to withdraw and apologise.

STUART NASH: Well, I was about to take a point of order, I say to the honourable member, but I decided not to because the Assistant Speaker had given a ruling earlier in this week, I think it might have been, when he said that it is not appropriate to raise a point of order during a speech just because someone says the word “you” two or three times. That member did cross the line, but I thought he was going hell for leather. I did not want you to just implode in front of all your members. So that is why I did not take a point of order, but I was quite tempted to.

But, anyway, just coming back to the legislation, I did think it was quite strange that what this legislation did is muzzle what members of the disciplinary committee could actually say in public. The reason why I was a little bit surprised about that is that I think what needs to happen is that when you are engaging an auditor, or when anyone is engaging an auditor—you, Mr Assistant Speaker, myself, or any charity that is engaging an auditor—they need to know that that auditor is a person of good character. Could I make one more point, Mr Assistant Speaker?

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): The member’s time is expired.

TIM MACINDOE (National—Hamilton West): Notwithstanding Mr Nash’s long list of indiscretions, this has been a mostly intelligent debate. I thank all members for their constructive contributions, and if I stop now, we will get the vote in before the House rises.

Bills read a third time.

Sittings of the House

Sittings of the House

TIM MACINDOE (Senior Whip—National): The House has made excellent progress this week and, as it is 1 minute to 6, I seek leave to rise early.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Well, I will put the leave to the House, but I do note that I would otherwise have had to call out of retirement my old friend Tau Henare, who was interrupted mid-call as he retired. Is there any objection to the House rising? There is no objection.

The House adjourned at 5.59 p.m.