Tuesday, 17 November 2015

TUESDAY, 17 NOVEMBER 2015

TUESDAY, 17 NOVEMBER 2015

Mr Speaker took the Chair at 2 p.m.

Prayers.

Visitors

Australia—Delegation, Victoria Legislative Assembly

Mr SPEAKER: Honourable members, I am sure that members would wish to welcome a parliamentary delegation from the Victoria Legislative Assembly, led by the Hon Michael O’Brien, present in the gallery.

Motions

Paris—Terrorist Attacks

Hon BILL ENGLISH (Acting Prime Minister): I seek leave to move a motion without notice condemning the terrorist attacks in Paris on Friday, 13 November.

Mr SPEAKER: Is there any objection to that course of action being followed? There is none.

Hon BILL ENGLISH: I move, That this House condemn the terrorist attacks in Paris and extend its condolences to the families and friends of those killed and injured. I would also like to acknowledge Her Excellency Mrs Florence Jeanblanc-Risler, French Ambassador to New Zealand, who is in the Speaker’s gallery today. New Zealanders were deeply shocked by the brutal events that unfolded in Paris 3 days ago. Our hearts go out to the innocent people caught up in this despicable act of terrorism. In particular, we extend our deepest condolences to those who have lost loved ones, as well as those who were injured, some of whom are still fighting for their lives.

As our Prime Minister has said, New Zealand stands shoulder to shoulder with France in the global fight against terror. Sadly, this is the latest in a series of terrorist attacks on innocent communities around the world. Like France, New Zealand values—if not takes for granted—peace, security, and freedom. These attacks in Paris were directed at these core values. It is abhorrent to us that people going about their daily lives were gunned down in cold blood in an act designed purely for the purpose of killing as many as possible. This is an assault on the democratic freedoms that we cherish.

After the attacks the New Zealand Government responded immediately to check on the well-being of New Zealanders known to be in Paris. The Prime Minister also conveyed his sympathies to the President of France. The Prime Minister will express those sympathies in person to the President when he attends the conference of the parties on climate change in Paris later this month. Finally, I can inform the House that a condolence book has been set up in the foyer of Parliament for visitors and staff to express their condolences. Thank you.

ANDREW LITTLE (Leader of the Opposition): A city that represents the best about our civilisation has been attacked by those who wanted to return us to the worst kind of barbarism, and the Opposition stands with the Government and condemns the attacks in the strongest possible terms. We support the efforts to track down and bring to justice the perpetrators of this atrocity.

Let us remember why these attacks occur. It is not only about extremists killing innocent civilians. The perpetrators of these acts do them to cause fear and terror amongst all citizens of the free world. They win when we succumb to the fear that they foster. They win when we respond only with anger and hatred. They win when we turn on ourselves and on our peaceful communities and on others in our communities. They win when our only response is revenge and retribution. They win when we feel that the only way to be safe is when we abandon our freedoms and curtail our rights as citizens of the free world. When confronted with the barbarism of the sort that we saw on the weekend—barbarism that kills and maims the innocent—the urge for revenge and retribution is real and it is human. In our shock and in our anger we want to avenge, to exact an equal price, but it is when the urge for revenge is greatest that our humanity must take over—our sense of ourselves as loving and peaceful and just people.

For just as the perpetrators of this gross violence wish us to cower in fear to their warped tyranny, so also do they want to see us abandon our humanness—and we must never do that. Because to do so is to yield to their fearmongering, and we must never concede to fear. As we deal with our shock, our anger, our revulsion, our vitriol, our insistence on justice in the face of the grossest injustice, we must never fear the path of peace. We might have differences of party in this Parliament but we are united by our humanity. Let us stand in solidarity with the people of Paris and all France, and in solidarity with all peoples of the world to achieve a just peace.

Dr KENNEDY GRAHAM (Green): The Green Party stands with the people of France in their moment of grief and trauma. To paraphrase a valiant leader from a century ago: your sons and daughters so cruelly slain in the city of Paris this Friday evening are our sons and daughters today, for we are united in sorrow and respect. Our hearts go out to the families of the fallen.

We live in a new age in which humanity is divided not only by ideas but by standards. Our emerging notion of global morals and values, our sense of how to conduct ideas and interests, and how to aspire to manage human conflict humanely have themselves become subject to challenge. The means of conflict are never pretty, but the world is witness today to two forms of belief: one holds that there exists a threshold of behaviour below which no human, by virtue of being human, is expected or permitted to sink; the other is that there is no such threshold. What we have witnessed in the deserts in recent years and what we have witnessed in this new century of ours, in the streets of our cities all around the world, is barbarity of a kind unprecedented in the modern age. It is not that humans have never acted thus in the past—it is that we believed that we had, through pain and effort, civilised ourselves to a higher point. However modestly so, we believe our values and morals today to be of a higher kind.

As we look ahead, the art of global leadership—to be shared by the leaders of all nations—will be to agree on how to respond to such barbarity with stern and far-reaching effect while retaining the values we already hold dear as a young and fragile global community. We do not pretend today to have infallible insight into how that challenge is to be met, beyond affirming that our existing principles and institutions enshrined, essentially, in the UN Charter and in the Statute of Rome are to be strictly respected. We are at a moment of reckoning. We cannot in the heat of the moment lose sight of what we have achieved over the past century, of what we hold dear, of where we wish to head. Perhaps we need to have a debate in this House on these very issues.

Meanwhile, let us pay our respect to the fallen in Paris, and also in Beirut, and Ankara, and Moscow, and Boston, and Garissa, in Gaza and Jerusalem, and Sana’a, and in the skies above Egypt. Let us pay our respect to the peoples and the Governments of these countries, and indeed of all countries, on this planet that we share.

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First): New Zealand should speak on this crisis with one voice, and so we add our voice to this motion and we support views expressed by other members of this House. We want the French people to know that New Zealand is with them in their hour of grief and anguish at this despicable terrorist outrage. Vive la France.

Hon TE URUROA FLAVELL (Co-Leader—Māori Party): E Te Whare Pāremata ō tātau, tēnā tātau katoa, tēnei te tū ake ki te tautoko i ngā kōrero kua kōrerohia. Kai te whakaae atu ki te ia o te kōrero, ki te wairua o te kōrero ēngari, kia hāngai tonu taku kōrero ki te hunga kua mate, me taku kī atu: “E Tū e, he aha te taonga i haere ai koutou ki te mate? He tara tārau tē, tē! He pā tehetehe! He huruhuru whare riha! He papa pounamu ki te ringa kia māwhiti te karu, e!”. He kupu kōrero tērā mō te hunga kua ngaro i te tirohanga kanohi.

Tata ki te rua rau tāngata i parekuratia ai nā te āhuatanga o te hunga—ko ētahi i mate, ko ētahi i puta, ko ētahi kāre anō kia kitea ēngari, i mahi rā i wā rātau mahi nā runga i te riri, nā runga i te aha rānei, ko wai ka mōhio! Waiho tērā hunga ki a rātau anō, i te tuatahi me tangi ki ngā mate e kōrerohia nei, ngā whānau, te hunga i noho nei, e kaputī nei, e kanikani nei, e mātakitaki nei i te āhuatanga o tā rātau noho i Wīwī, e kore mōhio nō rātau, ā, i reira tētahi nanakia e whakaaro ake nei, ā, ki te kōhuru i a rātau. Nō reira, me pēnei rawa te kōrero, koutou i Te Pō, e moe, e moe, e moe! Koutou te whenua o Wīwī e tū pakari nei ki mua i te aroaro o te hoariri, tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou, kia kaha, kia toa, kia manawa nui!

I ngā tau kua hipa ake, ko Te Māori i haere ki Wīwī. I hiahia nō Te Ao Māori, otirā, tēnei whenua ki te āwhina i a Wīwī i roto i ngā uauatanga o te pakanga. Ko Te Pakanga Tuatahi tērā, ā, nā runga i ngā āki o Tā Apirana Ngata mā, o tā Te Rangi Hīroa mā, eke atu ngā Māori ki tērā whenua. Nā Te Ao Māori anō rātau i whakaako ki ō rahi, ērā momo āhuatanga, otirā, i ako nei ngā Māori i ngā waiata o Wīwī. I tēnei rā, ko Te Ao Māori tēnei e tū ake ki te tautoko i a koutou i te wā o te tangi, te wā o te aroha, te wā o te pōuri kia taea ai koutou te puta ki te whai ao, ki te ao mārama! Nō reira, koinei tētahi paku kupu ki a koutou kai aku rangatira Wīwī, otirā, ngā mea o Wīwī e noho nei i Aotearoa nei, e whakaaro nui nei mō tō koutou whānau kai wīwī e noho ana. Ka tangi ake, hoi anō tē taea te aha! Kia kaha, kia toa, kia manawa nui!

Tētahi waiata hai āwhina, hei whakamāmā i te āhuatanga o te ngau o mamae, ka whai mai ā kō ake nei. He kōrero e pēnei ana te kōrero: Mā wai rā e taurima te marae? Ēhara i te mea ko te marae o Te Ao Māori ēngari, arā, ko te whenua te kōrero! Mā te aroha, mā te whakaaro nui ā tētahi, ki tētahi! Tēnā, he wai.

[To this House of Parliament of ours, acknowledgments to us all. I rise in support of the contributions made. I agree with the flow and spirit of the discourse, but my address must remain focused on those who died, by saying to them: “Alas, oh Tū, what was the treasure that caused you collectively your death? A condiment of ecstasy—no, no! Thrusts of naked manhood! Hair that houses nits! Greenstone tiki in hand, you may well stare; woe is me!”. Those are words from a lament that expresses deep grief for the dead, lost from the sight of mankind.

Approximately 200 people were affected by the terrorist attack. Some were killed, some escaped, and some have not been found yet. But no one knows the reason for the attack—whether it was in anger or whatever. Leave that lot there among their own; our task in the first instance is to grieve over the deaths alluded to here, the families, the ones who were merely socialising, having a cup of tea, dancing, and seeing how people live their lives in France, unaware that a villain was present and thinking about murdering them. So let me put it this way: you in the Void, sleep, rest, slumber; you, the country of France, standing strong before the enemy, I salute, acknowledge, and commend you. Be strong, brave, and stout of heart.

In years past it was the Māori, indeed, who went to France. Māoridom—in other words, this country—wanted to help France during the difficulties of war. That was the First World War, and through the urgings of Sir Apirana Ngata, Sir Te Rangi Hīroa, and others, Māori arrived in that country. Māoridom also taught them to work alongside your masses, and in all those kinds of things. Furthermore, these Māori learnt French songs. This is Māoridom standing here today to support you in your moment of grief, empathy, and remorse that will enable you to emerge into the world of light and understanding. So this is but a small tribute to you collectively, my esteemed ones of France, but at the same time to those living here in New Zealand from France. We have huge considerations for your families living back there in France. We grieve but are unable to do anything! Be strong, courageous, and stout of heart.

A song to help and ease the pain that gnaws will follow shortly. It is a tale that goes like this: who indeed will tend to the marae? It is not as if it is referring to the marae of Māoridom, but rather to the country. That is what this tale is about. A feeling of empathy and a high regard of one for the other will tend to the country. Now then, a song.]

Waiata

Mā te tika, mā te pono, mā te aroha, koinei ngā kaupapa nui, tēnā koutou, kia ora tātau!

[Fairness, sincerity, and compassion—these, then, are important principles. Acknowledgments to you collectively and my regards to us all.]

DAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): On behalf of the ACT Party, I would like to add my voice to those who have gone before and express the deepest sympathy and condolence to the victims, their families, and those still recovering from injury, but also to all of the French people in this time of great suffering. As earlier speakers have alluded to, this attack does lead to questions about how a society like ours, which has been so lucky to inherit the tenets of freedom, responsibility, and tolerance, should deal with and respond to those who do wish to do harm and are not tolerant. For my part, I think that we should be prepared to have that debate and never be afraid to state the values that make our country great, but today we should be giving our condolences to the people of France. Thank you.

Motion agreed to.

Voting

Correction—Taxation (Bright-line Test for Residential Land) Bill

Mr SPEAKER: Honourable members, on 12 November when the House was considering the Taxation (Bright-line Test for Residential Land) Bill the result of the vote on the question that the bill be now read a third time was incorrectly announced as Ayes 107, Noes 12. The correct result is Ayes 105, Noes 12. The record will be corrected accordingly.

Oral Questions

Questions to Ministers

Economy—Performance

1. NUK KORAKO (National) to the Minister of Finance: What steps is the Government taking to support a more diverse and resilient New Zealand economy?

Hon BILL ENGLISH (Minister of Finance): One significant step is improving access for our exporters through trade negotiations. Alongside the recently completed Trans-Pacific Partnership, the Government is currently negotiating the ASEAN Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, involving 16 countries; the Trade in Services Agreement, involving 23 countries, reducing barriers to service exports; and the Environmental Goods Agreement negotiations, aiming to reduce tariffs on 54 environmental goods across 14 countries. A free-trade agreement with the European Union has recently been commenced. Just last week it was announced that exports to Chinese Taipei have increased 22 percent to $1.2 billion in the year since the agreement was signed with it.

Nuk Korako: What recent reports has he received pointing to an improving outlook for the New Zealand economy?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: It is pretty clear that the economy was softer than expected in the first half of 2015. Recent data is a bit more encouraging. The BNZ - BusinessNZ Performance of Services Index for October was 56.2, showing continuing growth in the service sector, which matters because it is 70 percent of the economy. The BNZ - Business NZ Performance of Manufacturing Index was also in expansion, at 53, showing growth in manufacturing for the 37th consecutive month.

Nuk Korako: What role is the Public Service playing in increasing productivity as part of delivering better services for New Zealanders?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: As I said, services are 70 percent of the economy, and the public sector is a significant proportion of those services. By tying the funding of public services to getting better results, we are lifting accountability for each dollar that is spent. We are starting to see results. The total welfare liability is now independently estimated at $69 billion, which is down $7.5 billion in the year to June 2014. About 2 percent of the reduction is due to reforms made by the Ministry of Social Development.

Nuk Korako: How is the Government’s continuing investment in better social services helping to support higher resilience?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: In one pretty important way, and that is our investment in young people. The Government has developed a number of new pipelines for young people, from school through training and into education, in particular the Youth Guarantee and Youth Service programme. In both cases we are seeing good results, and the number of young people not in employment, education, or training is as low as it has been for a long time.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: If any of that is true, why could he not tell his colleague who asked the question that in his numerous caucus or sub-caucus meetings, rather than come along and try to bore the House?

Mr SPEAKER: That is a very marginal question—the Hon Bill English.

Hon BILL ENGLISH: Purely for the member’s benefit, because he is known for conducting politics on the basis of being free of facts, and it is always useful for him to hear from us. [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! Question No. 2—[Interruption] Order! David Bennett, I am calling for order.

Overseas Investment—Silver Fern Farms

2. Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First) to the Minister of Finance: Does he stand by all his statements?

Hon BILL ENGLISH (Minister of Finance): Yes, in particular those that were intended to help that member’s understanding of the economy.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Does his statement “The commercial arrangements between the investors are not really the Government’s business.” mean that he is absolving the Government of any responsibility for the operations of the Companies Act and the Takeovers Act with regard to Silver Fern Farms; if so, why?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: Yes, I stand by that statement. The Government is not responsible for the commercial arrangements entered into between Silver Fern Farms and the recent buyer. If there is any question of the Companies Act being breached, then that is a matter for the enforcement agencies.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Does he stand by his statement “hardened, long-term shareholders in Silver Fern Farms … voted overwhelmingly in favour of the transaction.”, and does that mean he supports board members failing their fiduciary duty to disclose to shareholders the true—

David Bennett: Say it outside.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: —I will—the true financial state of a company subject to sale to majority overseas interests; if not, why not?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: The statement means what it says, and that is that a company that has suppliers who, I know, scrutinise it very closely ran a series of meetings for a shareholder vote. In fact, I think that, legally, they did not actually have to do that, but they did it. If there are any questions of directors not meeting their fiduciary duties, that is a matter for the shareholders, in the first instance, and the enforcement agencies otherwise.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: How can it be acceptable for shareholders in New Zealand’s largest meat exporter to be given documentation 2 weeks before the end of its financial year, when directors knew full well that that documentation was false and much, much worse than Silver Fern Farms’ true financial state?

Mr SPEAKER: It is a very marginal question. I will leave it for the Minister of Finance to answer it.

Hon BILL ENGLISH: That is simply an allegation that has been made, no doubt, to the member and now by the member in the House. Anyone who has an interest in it can go and check that out, but, of course, the board would be required to meet its legal obligations of disclosure.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Why will National not act on the operations of the law in a conspiracy that is of wine-box proportions, designed to avoid the Takeovers Act and Companies Act, defraud shareholders led by company chief executive officer Dean Hamilton, the banks HSBC, CBA Finance Holdings, and Rabobank, the American investment bank Goldman Sachs, which got $10 million for the deal—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! Bring the question to a conclusion.

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: —so-called independent advisor Grant Samuel and Associates, law firm Harmos Horton Lusk, and Silver Ferns Farms?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: To give the member credit, the original conspiracy that he was referring to actually was one, and it was a very complex one. In this case, I think it is a bit less obvious that there is the same kind of nefarious activity as was associated with the wine box. But if the member has allegations of that sort, he is free to broadcast them publicly outside the House and take them up with the people concerned.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: If that is the Minister’s challenge, then what exactly is his role as a senior Cabinet Minister, the Minister of Finance, in these matters?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: As I have pointed out, we do not have a role. I mean, I have had a role as a neighbour of some of the long-term shareholders who have been very motivated about the meat industry for a number of years. In fact, I have seen some of them quoted in the media recently, now satisfied with the state of the meat industry, which I never thought I would see happen. I would suggest the member take that up with shareholders.

Health Services—Orthopaedic Surgery

3. Hon ANNETTE KING (Deputy Leader—Labour) to the Minister of Health: What is the impact on patients and staff of not covering all inflationary pressures in health?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN (Minister of Health): The impact from increasing Vote Health by $4.1 billion over our 7 years in Government is 5,500 more doctors and nurses, pay rises for nurses, and better access to services across the board. In recent years, while many nations froze or cut health funding, our increases have been amongst the biggest in the developed world.

Hon Annette King: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. It was a question on notice, and I asked: what was the impact of not covering all the—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! No. The question has been addressed, although, I accept, not to the satisfaction of the member. I will allow the member one additional supplementary question if she wants to use it.

Hon Annette King: In light of that answer why has orthopaedic surgeon Geoff Anderson spoken out publicly in the past few days, saying that it is harder now to get a knee replacement on the public purse than it was 4 years ago?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: I do not know Geoff personally, but what I would tell him is that back in 2007 we were doing 8,439 orthopaedic operations; we are now doing 10,590. That is an increase of 25 percent. So I would be very happy to share those statistics with Mr Anderson. He is probably operating at the moment, but if you give me his email address I will send them to him.

Hon Paula Bennett: What reports has he seen that claim access to hip—[Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I am sorry to interrupt. I am just having trouble hearing the question. Would the Minister please start it again.

Hon Paula Bennett: What reports has he seen that claim access to hip and knee surgery has got worse, and how accurate are these?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: Last Wednesday during question time Mrs King tabled Official Information Act documents that she claimed showed that access thresholds for hip and knee replacement had increased at the Auckland District Health Board. She then followed up with a press release that got wide coverage, including a front page Dominion Post story. She claimed that the number of points needed for hip or knee access thresholds for replacement surgery had gone up from 50 to 70 points between 2013 and 2015. I was suspicious, as the number of hip and knee surgeries at the Auckland District Health Board had increased 30 percent over 7 years. After receiving a statement from the Auckland District Health Board a few days later saying that the hip and knee threshold had not changed from 50, I checked the tabled Official Information Act documents—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! The answer now is miles too long.

Hon Annette King: Why would orthopaedic surgeon Geoff Anderson not tell the truth when he said he had one patient in her 50s in pain who risked losing her job and had been given the highest possible points he could give her, but she was still told no?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: Well, I do not think the member should accuse Mr Anderson of not telling the truth, but I am not familiar with Mr Anderson or his district health board. I would be very happy if Mr Anderson wants to contact me directly.

Hon Paula Bennett: Could he please give an update of what the Official Information Act response that was tabled last week actually showed in its report to the House?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: Tellingly, the Official Information Act responses that Mrs King tabled during question time did not show that the threshold has gone up at the Auckland District Health Board between 2013 and 2015. Fifty was the threshold in 2013, and it was still the threshold in 2015. The figure of 70 that Mrs King used in the House was just plain wrong.

Hon Annette King: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! [Interruption] Order! This is a point of order. [Interruption] Order! I have not heard from the member yet. This is a point of order. I wish to hear it in silence.

Hon Annette King: The Minister has just said I was plain wrong—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I want the point of order.

Hon Annette King: My point of order is that I wish to re-table the Official Information Act response showing—

Mr SPEAKER: No. [Interruption] Order! No, the member is now trifling with the Chair. [Interruption] Order! Does the member have a further supplementary question?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: Speaking to the point of order.

Mr SPEAKER: No, there is no need to speak to the point of order.

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker.

Mr SPEAKER: Yes, if the Minister is raising a fresh point of order we will hear it, but if the Minister is now—[Interruption] Order! My patience will not last much longer around this duel between the two. If the Minister has a fresh point of order we will hear it, but if it is attempting now to relitigate discussions that occurred, then I will take a very dim view of it. I would advise the member to remain in his seat.

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: I seek leave for Mrs King to be able to re-table the—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! You cannot seek leave on behalf of another member.

Hon Annette King: Has he seen the Official Information Act responses from district health boards that show that 48,000 who needed a specialist appointment for orthopaedics have been sent back to their GP without having being seen since 2010-11?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: No. As the member knows, there is no complete data set. We are the first Government to put that data together. All we do know is that there has been a 25 percent increase in hip and joint replacements under this Government. That is the only fact in this debate.

Hon Annette King: Does he realise that throwing around percentages and figures ignores the pain and suffering of people like Ken Smith of Napier, who was unable to walk or drive but could not get an operation and has paid $23,000 out of his retirement fund for knee surgery?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: The only person in this House who throws around patients’ names here is Mrs King. All I can tell you is that the number of hip and knee replacements has increased 25 percent under this Government. We are doing more; that member was doing a lot less.

Hon Annette King: In light of the growing number of people forced to pay for surgery—and Mr Smith made himself public, not me—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! Just ask the question.

Hon Annette King: —are Professor Bagshaw’s comments correct when he said we are slowly creeping into a privatised health system?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: Mr Bagshaw has been a Government critic since about 1998, and he is wrong. What is really a shame about that front-page article is that it is written on the basis of an incorrect tabling of an Official Information Act response and incorrect facts provided by Mrs King to the press. I do not think they would like that much.

Hon Annette King: Is he being transparent with the public when he talks in percentage terms for increases in orthopaedic discharges when, in reality, the 34 percent increase since 2008 equates to an increase on average of 44 operations per year per district health board and includes all orthopaedic procedures, not just hips and knees, where the main problem is?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: No, the member is incorrect. Hips and knees—there were 8,479 operations 7 years ago and today it is 10,590. The only person who is not being transparent is the person who tables false Official Information Act—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! That will not help the order of this House.

Chris Hipkins: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. We have had a series of issues over the past week about members making disparaging comments, questioning the word of other members, which has resulted in some fairly serious consequences for some members. Mr Speaker, are those rules going to be applied consistently? Repeatedly through the answers that the Minister just gave he questioned the word of another member.

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I listened very carefully to the answers. Apart from the very last comment by the Minister, nothing, in my opinion, was out of order. The last comment made was not going to help the order of the House, and I admonished the Minister at the time.

Health Services—Orthopaedic Surgery

4. Dr SHANE RETI (National—Whangarei) to the Minister of Health: Can he confirm that elective orthopaedic surgical discharges have increased by 34 percent, from 18,240 in 2008 to 24,439 operations this year?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN (Minister of Health): Yes, I can. The number of elective orthopaedic surgical discharges has increased by a third under this Government, thanks in part to our $4.1 billion funding increase over the last 7 years. Orthopaedic surgeries cover things like hip and knee joint replacements, which themselves have increased by 25 percent, from 8,400 to 10,600. This increase in surgery is a key part of National’s plan to improve health services to patients and demonstrates our efforts to always do more.

Dr Shane Reti: What other reports has he received about patient access to hip and knee joint replacements?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: I received a report last week that stated that access to hip and knee joint replacements in our public hospitals is getting harder and that patients were having to wait in pain before reaching the threshold number of points required to receive surgery. Upon investigation, it became clear these claims were unsubstantiated and wrong. The claims were based on the threshold score patients required for such surgery in 2013 and comparing that with the average score of patients above the threshold who received surgery in 2015. These two statistics are not the same. Disappointingly, the member who made these claims was Mrs Annette King.

Mr SPEAKER: Order! The last part will not be necessary. [Interruption] Order!

Dr Shane Reti: What other reports has he received about the performance of the public health system?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: I have received a range of incorrect reports this year that have followed a similar pattern, including ones that stated that few GP clinics in Auckland were offering free visits to under-13s, that $1.7 billion had been cut out of the health budget, that signing the Trans-Pacific Partnership would cost the health budget $1 billion and kill New Zealanders, and even about individual cases such as the Northland woman who had her home-care support hours cut and who turned out to be a mental health patient. All of these claims were totally wrong and they were all made by the same member, Annette King. [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! [Interruption] The interjection from my right is certainly not helping the order of this House. [Interruption] Order! I did not hear the interjection that came from my right, but I invite the member now to rise and ask her supplementary question.

Hon Annette King: So will the Minister contact Mr Geoff Anderson and tell him that he is wrong when he says it is harder to get a knee replacement now than it was 4 years ago? Instead of mouthing, just answer the question.

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: As I said in my previous answer, if the member would like to supply Mr Anderson’s email address I am quite happy to get in touch with him. I seek leave to table an email from the Auckland District Health Board to my office, explaining that its threshold score for patients to receive hip and knee surgery has remained unchanged since 2013.

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

Mr SPEAKER: Question No. 5—[Interruption] Order! Question No. 5, James Shaw—[Interruption] Order! The conversation across the House will now cease.

Climate Change Policy—Treasury Advice and Long-term Strategy

5. JAMES SHAW (Co-Leader—Green) to the Minister of Finance: What advice, if any, has he received from Treasury in the last 18 months on the importance for New Zealand businesses of certainty about long-term policy settings?

Hon BILL ENGLISH (Minister of Finance): I regularly receive advice from Treasury on the importance of consistent longer-term policy, and the Government focuses on delivering as such. It is important, for example, to have consistency on climate change policies. It would be very disruptive if, for instance, we ditched the established emissions trading scheme for a carbon tax, heavily taxed agriculture without any proven technological solutions for reducing emissions, and suddenly announced we were trying to achieve carbon neutrality—whatever that is—by 2050.

James Shaw: What specific action has he taken since Treasury advised him that he should secure a greater degree of political party consensus on climate policies so that businesses can factor climate change into their long-term decision-making?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: In the first place, it is not actually Treasury’s role to give advice about the breadth of support in Parliament for particular policies, so in that case I actually just did not listen to it. Secondly, the Government has got a climate change position. It is outlining that at the Paris conference, as it has already outlined it here in New Zealand. From what I can see, there is a fair amount of political support behind that.

David Seymour: What would be the effect on long-term policy stability had the Government adopted an aggressive peak oil mitigation strategy when the Greens first raised that?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: It would be pretty disruptive, but I do not think that the Greens really expect anyone to take their policy positions too seriously. Often they are about symbolism and—[Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! [Interruption] Order! I apologise.

Chris Hipkins: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. Previous Speakers have ruled, and you indeed have re-emphasised this ruling last week, about members using supplementary questions and Ministers using supplementary answers in order to attack another party. The question attacked another party and so did the answer. [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! No, I do not need—I listened carefully to the question. I do not think it did attack. The answer may have got political, but the question, in my mind, was not an attack on a political party.

David Seymour: Point of order.

Mr SPEAKER: I need to know: is it a fresh point of order?

David Seymour: Speaking to the previous—

Mr SPEAKER: No, I do not need—I have ruled.

James Shaw: Why is this Government acting unilaterally to set climate policy when Business New Zealand has advised that its major companies group says that it wants more Government leadership on climate policy, clarity of direction, and cross-party agreement?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: By and large we are not acting unilaterally. For instance, this Government, when it came in in 2008, adopted the emissions trading scheme that was put in place by the previous Government—in fact, invented by the Green Party—because we thought in the end it was most logical to have a price. I understand that the Green Party position has now changed because the price is not high enough and there is not enough pain associated with improving carbon emissions. So we have not shifted ground, but the Green Party has, and it is a bit unfortunate because there was general consensus on the emissions trading scheme.

James Shaw: Why does he believe that New Zealand needs a 30-year plan for infrastructure but not for climate change, which will impact on infrastructure?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: We do have—in fact it is more than a 30-year target; it is a 35-year target, I think, of minus 50 percent by 2050, because, as we know, you know, it is going to take a long time for the world to heat up significantly, and it is going to take a long time to take the measures that might mitigate that.

James Shaw: Given that the Government has a target of a 50 percent reduction in emissions by 2050, what is contained in the plan to achieve that target?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: The main tool is the one we adopted that was Green Party policy, and that is the emissions trading system, and that is the beauty of it—as demand for carbon credits rises, the price will rise. That has been happening. The price was very low. It has now risen quite a lot in the last couple of years, and it may well continue to rise. That is a sound long-term policy, which I think most parties agree with.

James Shaw: Does he agree with the Prime Minister in explicitly ruling out cross-party negotiations on achieving long-term policy stability on climate change, and does he think that business owners can take any comfort about what they can expect from the Government?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: We are always interested in discussing these issues, but on some of them there are just some deep differences, and on others the Green Party has changed its position, and it would be a bit hard to know. I mean, if the Green Party wants to can the emissions trading scheme and move to a carbon tax, that is a pretty big shift. It would certainly take a lot of talking to persuade the Government it was the right thing to do, and I actually cannot understand why the Green Party has changed its view.

James Shaw: So has he received any advice that changing climate policies every time there is a change of Government is a good idea for business, for farmers, or for the country?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: I think that a feature of the New Zealand approach, at least, is the stability of core climate change policy—that is, the emissions trading system, and the electricity market, which promotes renewable energy. Those have now been in place for about 10 years. The major parties have tended to back that. The Greens did up until pretty recently, I think, so I would argue to Business New Zealand that there is pretty steady policy, actually. Maybe it does not like the implications of it, but we are not changing it.

Unemployment—Rate and Long-term Unemployment

6. GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central) to the Minister of Finance: Does he stand by his statement that “the Government would not be chasing around the unemployment numbers, 3 months to 3 months. We take a longer-term point of view because that is the realistic one”; if so, how many quarters in a row has unemployment risen?

Hon BILL ENGLISH (Minister of Finance): Yes. The unemployment rate has risen 0.1 percent in each of the past four quarters, after falling in each of the five quarters before that. Statistics New Zealand reports that over the past four quarters an extra 34,000 people have gone into work, the labour force participation rate has remained near record levels, and migration into New Zealand remains at record levels.

Grant Robertson: In light of his focus on the long term, how many New Zealanders are now considered to be long-term unemployed—i.e., they have been unemployed for 26 weeks or more?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: I cannot give that member that number off the top of my head, but we evaluate that in great detail, actually, when the welfare liability is updated every 6 months, and that shows us not just who is unemployed today or who has been unemployed for a longer period but what the likely path is for those people over the next few months. We have a very proactive system in Work and Income New Zealand for dealing with them individually.

Grant Robertson: Why are there now 46,000 people who are long-term unemployed if he has so much activity going on to address their concerns?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: Dealing with them one by one is about as precise a focus on them as you can get. Of course, that number has gone up a little bit because the economy has been a bit softer and there are record numbers of people showing up to the labour market. As the economy strengthens again, which looks likely, then that number may well come back down again.

Grant Robertson: Is it correct that the 46,000 long-term unemployed is the highest level since 1999, other than two quarters in 2012?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: I would certainly want to investigate the number, because, as the member will be aware, in the welfare reform process there has been a lot of reclassification of people, and the product of that reclassification is that a lot more people are now regarded as available for work. They used to languish on the sickness benefit under the Labour Government, which decided they were hopeless and gave up on them. We do not give up on people like that. Even if they cannot get a job immediately, we try to help them get ready to get a job.

Grant Robertson: Given that the Australian economy was recently described as “a basket case”, with unemployment at 5.9 percent, why should that description not apply to New Zealand, now that we have a higher unemployment rate than Australia?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: To be fair to our cousins across the Tasman, “basket case” is probably exaggerating the challenges that that economy has. Our unemployment rates have been remarkably similar. Our GDP growth rates are pretty similar, even though we are really quite different economies. One measure of it, though, is that for the last 6 months we have had a net inflow of people from Australia—for the first time in a generation—which tells you something about what normal Kiwis think are the relative job prospects.

Grant Robertson: Why does he not get up front with New Zealanders about the fact that his policies have led to unemployment rising for four consecutive quarters and more New Zealanders spending longer out of work, and that for all of the glossy Business Growth Agenda, none of his policies are working?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: Normal New Zealanders have been listening to that member say that alongside the manufacturing crisis, and they are not actually taking any notice of the ongoing negativity about the economy. The fact is that the economy has had a significant shock from the sharp reduction in dairy prices, and it is actually handling it pretty well. And we expect that as the economy strengthens, the employment numbers will gradually—and, I may say, slower than we would like—improve.

Property Investment—Tax Reforms

7. CHRIS BISHOP (National) to the Minister of Revenue: What progress has been made on the Government’s investment property tax reforms announced as part of Budget 2015?

Hon TODD McCLAY (Minister of Revenue): Last week the Government passed the brightline legislation, which is an important tool to ensure property speculators pay their fair share of tax. The new brightline test requires income tax to be paid on any gains from residential properties purchased on or after 1 October and sold within a 2-year period, with the exception of the owner’s main home, inherited property, and transfers of relationship property. The brightline test is just one part of the Government’s approach to tightening the property investment rules.

Chris Bishop: How is the Government ensuring investors pay their fair share of tax?

Hon TODD McCLAY: The brightline measures, together with rules requiring buyers and sellers to provide an IRD number and for non-residents to also provide their foreign tax identity number and a New Zealand bank account, will help the Inland Revenue Department to better identify investors in New Zealand’s residential property market. The Inland Revenue Department will be watching transactions and will enforce income tax rules on those who might try to avoid their obligations outside the 2-year period. The Government provided the department with $29 million of extra funding in Budget 2015 to focus on property tax compliance. This will take the Inland Revenue Department’s total budget for work in this area over the next 5 years to $62 million, which is expected to generate an additional $420 million of tax revenue.

Chris Bishop: How will the residential land withholding tax support the brightline test?

Hon TODD McCLAY: Yesterday I introduced a tax bill that proposes a new withholding tax on sales of residential property by people who live overseas and go on to sell that property within the 2-year period of their purchase. This tax will act as a collection mechanism for the brightline test. The proposed residential land withholding tax will ensure the integrity of the tax system and it will bring the collection of the brightline tax into line with other withholding regimes. This proposal, together with the new brightline test and changes to collect better tax information about buyers and sellers of residential property, will help to ensure that everybody pays their fair share of tax on gains from property sales.

Northland District Health Board—Funding

8. Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First) to the Minister of Health: Does he stand by all his statements?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN (Minister of Health): Yes, in the context in which they were given. I especially stand by my statement that the number of patients in his Northland electorate receiving elective surgery has increased from 5,700 a year to 8,500 a year under this Government. Perhaps of even greater interest to the member is the 53 percent increase in elective surgery in the Auckland District Health Board, his district health board of residence.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. The Minister is trying hard, but he cannot conclude with an erroneous statement irrelevant to the question—and it is erroneous, and I can prove it.

Mr SPEAKER: Order! No. [Interruption]. Order! The member will resume his seat. There is nothing out of order with the answer that was given.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: If he stands by his statement that “Delivering more elective surgeries has been a priority for this Government” and that he has allocated more funding to the Northland District Health Board to deliver year-on-year increases in elective surgery, can he explain the 30 percent blowout in the Northland District Health Board’s current financial budget?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: There is not a 30 percent blowout in the current financial budget.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: You don’t know. You don’t know.

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: There is not, sorry. The member has not got his facts right. [Interruption]

Rt Hon Winston Peters: You cannot say that, baldy.

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I do acknowledge that the member was provoked by a member on my right. If David Bennett wants to continue interjecting, this is the very last warning that he is getting in this question time.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: I will take it again, Mr Speaker. What assurances can he give the people of Northland that they will not lose vital health services due to the Northland District Health Board’s current budget blowout of 30 percent?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: There is no budget blowout of 30 percent. In actual fact, Northland got an extra $23 million last year. Over 7 years the budget there has gone up $119 million. They are doing more elective surgery; they are getting more doctors and nurses. They have actually also got free GP visits for under-13s. Northland is doing very well and making a big impact, positively, on the health of the people up there—you should go and have a look.

Education, Ministry—Independence

9. CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka) to the Minister of Education: Does she have confidence that she is receiving quality independent advice from her officials?

Hon HEKIA PARATA (Minister of Education): Yes.

Chris Hipkins: Has she received advice indicating that the vast bulk of support for students with special needs who are sitting National Certificate of Educational Achievement (NCEA) exams has been going to students at the wealthiest schools; if so, why has that huge inequity not been addressed?

Hon HEKIA PARATA: The member is fully versed on that, because I have answered that in written questions to him—so, yes, I have provided those answers. The member is also aware, as is the House, that I have said repeatedly that we are not yet in a good enough place but that we have improved significantly. However, the House needs to be aware that having softened the criteria by which schools can apply and having provided support for schools to apply, we cannot make schools apply—98.4 percent of all applications were approved. Schools need to apply, and we will work with them to be successful.

Chris Hipkins: How is it equitable for only 450 students at decile 1 to 3 schools to gain that support, whilst over 3,000 students at decile 8 to 10 schools got the same level of support in the past year?

Hon HEKIA PARATA: As I answered very fully in my answer to the primary question, it is a matter of schools applying.

Chris Hipkins: Why did staff in her office require ministry officials to change advice in a briefing to her that indicated that the changes she implemented over the past year have not addressed the huge inequity in who receive special assessment support with the NCEA exams?

Hon HEKIA PARATA: I saw and signed the final report, and, again, as the member is fully aware, since he has the email exchange, none of what he alleges is true.

Chris Hipkins: Does she believe that it is acceptable for the Education Review Office to change its independent recommendations after consultation with the Ministry of Education; if so, what is the purpose of having the Education Review Office as an independent agency?

Hon HEKIA PARATA: Again, as the member is aware, because he is in possession of the letter that the chief review officer provided in response to those scurrilous allegations about the professional integrity of herself and her office, which that story has alleged, it is very much misplaced. It is a matter of fact that the Education Review Office and the ministry talk to each other. The Education Review Office, as an independent evaluative agency, makes assessments that have implications for the policy and operations of the ministry, so it would be nonsense for it not to ensure that it was serving the education sector well.

Chris Hipkins: Is she satisfied that she is getting value for money from the 200 percent increase in the Ministry of Education’s public relations budget, in light of the growing number of revelations that it is using this extra resourcing to operate war rooms to reduce embarrassment to the Government?

Hon HEKIA PARATA: I think it is more important that the sector feels it is getting value for money, and the sector tells me—

Hon Members: They don’t.

Hon HEKIA PARATA: Well, of course, the member speaks only to a particular element of the sector, whereas I, of course, speak to and listen to the full range, and they are getting value for money.

Climate Change—Displacement of Pacific Island Nations

10. DENISE ROCHE (Green) to the Minister for Climate Change Issues: Did New Zealand oppose Australia’s effort to try and remove the “climate change displacement coordination facility”, which would have created a body to help people escaping the effects of climate change, from the draft text of the UN climate agreement?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Acting Minister for Climate Change Issues): No.

Denise Roche: Given that the US, British, and French Governments all support the creation of a body to deal with people displaced by climate change, does he think New Zealand is on the right track by supporting Australia’s opposition?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: Yes, I think New Zealand is on the right track.

Denise Roche: Given that there is already relocation under way for people from Fiji, Papua New Guinea, and the Solomon Islands because of climate change, does he agree with the Prime Minister that we do not need to do anything about people displaced by climate change because “that’s not an issue that we’re going to face in the next year or two.”?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: Yes, because although we accept that climate migration is an issue, it is an issue, we think, that is for the future, and a future concern.

Denise Roche: Does he agree with Minister of Immigration, Michael Woodhouse, that establishing domestic policy to deal with climate change migration is a “paternalistic, colonialist, white person’s guilt response”?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: Yes.

Small Businesses—Online Security

11. MELISSA LEE (National) to the Minister for Small Business: What Government resources are available to help small businesses keep themselves safe online?

Hon CRAIG FOSS (Minister for Small Business): Businesses can be victims of online scams, as well as individuals. Online scammers and fraudsters use all sorts of tricks and scams to steal from small and medium enterprises. During International Fraud Awareness Week, which is part of an international initiative to raise awareness of scams and promote safe online practices, I would encourage small businesses—[Interruption]—and many members opposite to utilise the resources available to them, such as using Connect Smart, which promotes online safety for businesses; using the Companies Office to check out the integrity of a New Zealand business, or not; taking note of warnings from the Commerce Commission; and using the Scamwatch website to see what is currently being pushed out there. Whether or not you are a small business or an individual, any online claim that seems too good to be true most probably is.

Melissa Lee: What can small businesses do to prevent becoming victims of online fraud?

Hon CRAIG FOSS: New scams appear almost constantly and they are becoming increasingly sophisticated. By taking sensible precautions, businesses can avoid becoming victims. Employing a few simple online safety tips could be the difference between a successful business and a struggling one. No one wants to see their hard work and all the time and effort that they have put into their business stolen. I encourage all businesses to get up to speed, and to view information and communications technology security as being as important as the security of their buildings, office, and equipment.

Offenders, Returning—Supervision and Monitoring

12. JACINDA ARDERN (Labour) to the Minister of Justice: On what date did she or her department instruct the Parliamentary Counsel Office to begin drafting the legislation to create a supervision regime for deported offenders that will be debated today?

Hon AMY ADAMS (Minister of Justice): I instructed officials to work with the Parliamentary Counsel Office to begin drafting the legislation as a priority following Cabinet’s confirmation of the policy on Tuesday, 27 October as, pursuant to the Cabinet Manual, drafting instructions cannot be given until then. I instructed officials to begin developing the policy following the initial advice on the issue in February of this year.

Jacinda Ardern: Why did her Government begin drafting this legislation so late when she knew about this issue as early as December of last year?

Hon AMY ADAMS: Firstly, the member is wrong. I first received advice on this issue in February of this year. The drafting of the legislation is very different from the development of the policy. That began as soon as I became aware of the issue.

Jacinda Ardern: If the Minister knew this was an issue only in February, why did her Government progress the extended supervision order legislation in April last year—a law that applies to returning offenders as well—but this bill, instead, will go through a rushed, flawed, last-minute process?

Hon AMY ADAMS: There were a number of issues that changes to the public protection order and the extended supervision order regimes were intended to address, one of which was about returning offenders, but I can point out to that member that offenders have been being deported to New Zealand for years and years and years without any supervision. No member in this House was unaware that that was happening. That has always been the case and, unlike Labour, we are doing something about it.

Jacinda Ardern: How many offenders have entered New Zealand in the last year due to being deported from Australia, when her Government knew it was an issue, and cannot be subject to this monitoring regime because of its late entry into Parliament?

Hon AMY ADAMS: I do not have the number covering the last year, but I can tell that member that it was considerably less than the estimated 700 that arrived under the Labour Government with no supervision.

Jacinda Ardern: Can the Minister confirm that the rate of offenders coming back into New Zealand now is five times higher per month than it has been in recent years?

Hon AMY ADAMS: The advice I have is that prior to Australia’s policy change the numbers coming to New Zealand were around 60 to 100 a year, and the predicted number now is around 250 to 300 a year. However, members should note that that also includes people who are being deported back to New Zealand not because of their convictions but because of bad character grounds. That was not previously included, so not all of that increase is about deported offenders. [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! If the members wish to have a discussion they are welcome to do so outside the Chamber.

Urgency

Urgency

Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (Leader of the House): I move, That urgency be accorded the introduction and passing of the Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill, the introduction and passing of the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill, and the passing of the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill. These are three bills the Government considers should be dealt with expeditiously and therefore in urgency.

The Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill comes as a response to what is expected to be an increased flow of deportees coming into this country, and it seeks to have those deportees who have got criminal records, even though they have served their time, be treated just as New Zealand - domiciled convicted people would be as they left prison for the various ranges of offences that will be covered under this provision.

The Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill corrects an error that has existed in legislation for a very long time, going back into the early part of the last decade. It essentially moves an entitlement date from the final day of the stand down to the first day outside the stand down. If it is not corrected, there is a significant fiscal cost for any Government.

The third bill is the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill. As people will be aware, there is a hearings programme going on in Auckland at the moment relating to its local plans, etc. The response to those has been quite significant. There are large numbers of people who want to be heard, and this bill will facilitate their participation in that process by allowing there to be a different arrangement for ensuring that anyone who wants to be heard can be heard. For those reasons we are proposing this urgency motion.

A party vote was called for on the question, That urgency be accorded.

Ayes 63

New Zealand National 59; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Noes 58

New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 12.

Motion agreed to.

Business of the House

Business of the House

Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (Leader of the House): I seek leave for there to be a question time at 2 p.m. on Wednesday, 18 November and Thursday, 19 November, and for questions to be lodged in the normal manner according to Standing Order 381, notwithstanding the urgency the House will be in.

Mr SPEAKER: Leave is sought for that course of action. Is there any objection? There is none. It will occur.

Bills

Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill

First Reading

Hon AMY ADAMS (Minister of Justice): I move, That the Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill be now read a first time. As the Minister of Justice, my paramount concern is, of course, the safety and security of the New Zealand public. The aim of this bill is to better protect the law-abiding public by ensuring that a similar regime of supervision applies to convicted offenders who served their sentences in prisons overseas as applies to those convicted and imprisoned in New Zealand. It puts into effect the third of three initiatives we have had under way to strengthen New Zealand’s oversight of deported offenders.

In late December 2014 Australia made changes to its immigration laws, and in February of this year it became clear to me that there was the potential for a greater number of New Zealand - born offenders to be deported back home than had previously been the case. Let us be quite clear: we cannot stop Australia exercising its sovereign right to ultimately decide to deport any category of people that its Parliament decides is lawful, nor can we change the fact that Australian law permits those being considered for removal to be held in detention centres during that process. We have registered at a number of levels that we do not agree with the policy and we do not like it, but the fact of the matter is that we cannot force the Australians to change their law. So we have created a supervision regime that will better protect New Zealanders from those offenders returning to New Zealand. As with those released from New Zealand prisons, we can never completely remove all risk, but this legislation is an important part of reducing the risk for law-abiding New Zealanders.

For generations Australia and other countries have deported New Zealanders who commit crimes abroad without any oversight back in New Zealand. On average, these numbers were around 80 to 100 each year, and included the most serious of offenders. With the recent policy changes in Australia, these numbers have increased to potentially around 250 to 300 a year, and this, of course, poses an increased risk to New Zealanders. However, it is important to note that not all these people are deported offenders. The new regime also includes deportations on character grounds, so the number of offenders being deported has not increased by that same amount.

It is critical that we have in place a regime that can manage and supervise the offenders who do return, many of whom have been convicted of serious offences. The proposed supervision regime as set out in this bill will mean that offenders who arrive in New Zealand shortly after being released from prison will be subject to the same sort of oversight as offenders who have served a similar sentence here. The proposed regime in the bill will apply automatically to returning offenders who are sentenced to more than 1 year in prison in another country, who return to New Zealand within 6 months of their release from custody overseas, and who were imprisoned for behaviour that would be an imprisonable offence under New Zealand law.

The bill contains three specific aspects. The first is allowing police to compel returning offenders to provide information—names, date of birth, fingerprints, etc., and, in qualifying cases, a DNA sample. The second is the standard monitoring and supervision conditions that will automatically apply to all returning prisoners who are sentenced to more than 1 year in prison in another country and who return within 6 months of being released from custody, including time in detention centres. This includes those who are released early. The regime will apply regardless of whether the offender is eventually deported or removed, or chooses to return voluntarily. The length of time each offender will be supervised will be based on the length of their overseas sentence. Finally, the bill gives new powers to the District Court to impose special conditions on eligible offenders, on either an interim or an ongoing basis. This allows the court to impose conditions on any offender who is subject to some form of monitoring or supervision at the time that they return to New Zealand, regardless of how long it has been since their release.

Another key addition to the proposals that I announced a few weeks ago is the inclusion of a mandatory review of the operation of the legislation by the Justice and Electoral Committee 2 years from the bill’s commencement. The proposal is that the bill is referred to the Justice and Electoral Committee for review and report to Parliament, as I consider that the issues to be canvassed are likely to traverse across operational, practical, and social matters as well as just legal matters. From the outset it has been my intention that criminals being returned to New Zealand should be subject to the same sort of oversight as offenders who have served a similar prison sentence in New Zealand, and this bill achieves that aim.

The Government has moved at pace to get this entirely new regime in place. This has not been an easy task, and it has involved working across three agencies and, of course, with Australian officials. A key aspect of the regime has been getting the information we needed from the Australians. With a register and information-sharing agreement now in place, I announced the proposed regime earlier in the year, confirmed Cabinet approval 3 weeks ago, and am now introducing a bill to Parliament. Developing an appropriate oversight regime for returning offenders is complex. We have needed to strike the difficult balance between offenders’ rights and public safety. Despite these challenges, we have introduced a bill that will provide protection for New Zealanders where there has previously been none.

The estimated time to draft a bill, from instructions being received to introduction, is around 80 working days. This bill was drafted, consulted on, and approved by Cabinet in just 12 working days. The quick turn-round demonstrates the Government’s urgency and commitment to protecting New Zealanders. Kiwis can be assured that this Government has done all it could and moved as quickly as possible to get an appropriate oversight regime in place, given the restrictions we have had in getting the information from Australia.

Throughout the development of this supervision regime, I have endeavoured to work with my parliamentary colleagues on all sides of the Chamber. In my view, political parties should be able to work together on issues as important as these. I would like to think that every party in Parliament recognises that there is a gap in the law and supports a bill that does something about it. I have been working with all of the parties in Parliament all the way through the process since Cabinet confirmed its approach. There are some areas that we do not necessarily agree on, but I have endeavoured to engage in numerous discussions with them and to provide opportunities for them to offer suggestions. They have received copies of the Cabinet paper and draft bills and have been updated regularly on revisions. We have gone backwards and forwards where we can, and I have done that in an effort to try to build widespread support, but, in the end, of course, voting decisions are theirs.

I also have to thank the Ministry of Justice officials and the Parliamentary Counsel Office for all of their tremendous work in getting this bill put together in such a timely manner.

To conclude, I wish to thank this House for accepting the need to pass this bill under urgency. There is strong public interest in putting in place appropriate systems to manage the risks posed by returning offenders. This bill does exactly that. I am proud of the proposed supervision regime and the speed with which we have responded to this issue, and I commend the bill to the House.

JACINDA ARDERN (Labour): I want to begin by acknowledging that, as the Minister of Justice set out, she has indeed involved the Labour Party—in the last week or so—in the final stages of the drafting of this bill that is coming before the House. I will share, as will my colleagues, some of our misgivings over the content of this bill. We appreciated the opportunity to raise those with the Minister directly. I appreciate her giving direct responses to some of those misgivings, but, unfortunately, on some of them we have not yet reached common ground. I would say, though, that in principle we absolutely see the need for a piece of legislation like this. We continue to question, though, why it is that we are debating this bill in such a rushed way, when it was clear for many, many months now that this was going to be an issue that needed to be addressed. That is a legitimate issue that we raised, obviously, in question time today.

Before we begin this debate we need to be absolutely clear that there are two issues at play in debating the context of this bill. There is the debate around who is being deported and why. We will continue, by the good work of Kelvin Davis and of Andrew Little, to question the legitimacy of the policy that has been adopted by our Australian counterparts. Because, of course, offenders from overseas have been deported back to New Zealand where they are legitimate citizens for years now. Of course they have. But the operative word there is “citizens”. What we have seen at play in recent times is a real muddying of the waters over when one determines someone to be a citizen—or not.

We have individuals now who, for all intents and purposes, are not New Zealanders in their minds. They identify as Australians, their families are Australians, they have grown up in Australia, in some cases they are born in Australia, and they are being deported to this country. We will continue to battle on that point, on behalf of those who are resident here in New Zealand and whom it does not serve well for these individuals to be deported back here, but also on the principle of human rights that these individuals are encountering themselves. That is a point that needs to continue to be raised by all sides of this House at the highest level.

I have to say that this is not an issue that is new internationally. There have been examples of this happening in the past. Tonga, Samoa—they know policies like this. They have a growing population of people from Los Angeles, Salt Lake City, San Francisco, and Dallas. These are individuals who grew up in the United States, who have no recollection of life in Tonga, who identify as Americans and have no family in Tonga but have found themselves deported to that country, and have found a difficult path of reintegration, let alone rehabilitation. Because we know this is a policy that has been adopted by another country in the past, we can learn the lessons of a country like Tonga that has tried to then deal with the fallout of such a policy.

First, the lesson should be to battle the policy, and we will continue to make that point. The second lesson then is, in lieu of being able to successfully do that, how do you ensure that your country is prepared for those who have been deported back here? And there will be a range of categories: those who sit in the minor offences category, and those who do legitimately require—for the safety of the community—to be monitored within that community. But nothing in this bill speaks to the issue of proper reintegration and rehabilitation.

And yet we only need to look at our own experience with offenders being released from prison to know that key to someone’s successful rehabilitation is their access to housing, is their access to community support, is their access to employment, is their access to full health and well-being. That is fundamental if we want someone to be reintegrated successfully into a community. Why else, for instance, does the Department of Corrections have a policy of locating offenders in a prison close to their family and their community? Why else do we have Release to Work programmes? Why else do we ensure that parole boards do not release people from prison until they have appropriate accommodation? And, yet, here we have a policy where we already know people are walking out of an airport with nowhere to go, and nothing that I have seen in any of the Government’s preparation for this bill speaks to that point. That serves those individuals poorly, but, primarily, it serves New Zealanders poorly. They are the ones whose safety we should be ensuring when we are looking for answers in a piece of legislation like this. We know that we need to be prepared.

The Minister raised that, of course, we have had people deported to New Zealand over a number of years—but not to the scale that we are seeing now and not for the range of offences that we are seeing now. In fact, we are looking at five times the level of deportation per month than we have seen in the past. We know it is an incredible increase because those who are working in the community with these individuals have spoken of their struggle to manage that influx of individuals. What they have received? A paltry $100,000 I believe it might be, Mr Davis? PILLARS? A small amount of money in order to try to manage this huge increase in offenders.

Yet what are we doing in this bill? We know that the Department of Corrections, to be able to just make sure that it does the bare bones of monitoring—just checking where people live—needed an extra $5 million. So if you are going to do a proper job of wraparound and reintegration, you are going to need a lot more than that, and yet there is nothing in the preparation of this legislation that speaks to that point.

I want to speak briefly to the time line of this bill. We had a short exchange in the House before this bill came before Parliament about when the Minister first instructed Parliamentary Counsel Office. Of course, there would have been a bit of back and forth with officials before that point, but we know that drafting began in October. My question is, why were we able to identify that overseas offenders returning to New Zealand and going unmonitored would be an issue—in April 2014—and yet we did not begin this piece of work until October or, at a stretch, February? At the beginning of 2014, that is when we debated the Parole (Extended Supervision Orders) Amendment Bill.

I want to read an excerpt from a definition in that bill. Section 107C of the Parole Act, replaced by clause 7 of that bill, sets out the meaning of “eligible offender”. It states: “(1) In this Part, ‘eligible offender’ means an offender who— … (b) is a person who (i) has arrived in New Zealand within 6 months of ceasing to be subject to any sentence, supervision conditions, or order imposed on the person for a relevant offence by an overseas court;”—by an overseas court. We knew in April 2014 that we needed to apply a regime for the serious end of offenders coming in from overseas, and yet we did not use that opportunity, when we identified that gap in our legislation, to put through a broader monitoring regime. Yes, we did not have an agreement with Australia around information sharing at that point. That did not stop us from doing the preparatory work. We all know what issues there are when you put through a last-minute piece of legislation.

This side of the House wants to ensure that we have a monitoring regime, which is why we have said that we will support the bill. But we also proposed, via David Parker and Andrew Little, that we have a dual bill process: that we put a sunset clause into this rushed piece of legislation for a year and that in this House, while we pass this bill today, we also conduct a first reading of a duplicate bill. That bill could then go through a full select committee process, a full second reading process, and a full final stage—all in time to replace the rushed, short-cut version in a year’s time with a bill that has had full consideration. We believe that would be a much better, more robust process to undertake, rather than waiting 2 years and simply having a select committee review that piece of legislation. We stand by that suggestion. We think it was a constructive one to make.

Any bill where you are putting in place the potential to curtail civil liberties should, at the very least, have a decent process through a select committee. The public should be able to have their say. The legal fraternity should be able to have its say. That is how we make good law in this House. Not by trial, which is essentially what this piece of legislation is about to go through. I will use my second reading contribution to talk about some of the areas where we have concerns that we are leaving gaps open; where we are relying on the Department of Corrections to highlight, in some cases, offenders who need monitoring regimes. We know it is a pressed department, but I will leave that to my second contribution.

Hon Peseta SAM LOTU-IIGA (Minister of Corrections): It is an honour to speak on this, the Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill. Before I do though, I must convey my thoughts and prayers to the people of Paris, France, and all those caught up in terrorist conflicts around the world.

Returning to this bill, can I congratulate the Minister of Justice, the Hon Amy Adams, on introducing this bill. It has taken some time to work through what are some complex issues. As she has already stated in her first reading speech, it is about balancing the safety and security of the New Zealand public with individual liberties—as the last speaker, Jacinda Ardern, has mentioned—but it is also in response to the changes in immigration laws in Australia.

This has been a process where we have been working alongside our colleagues in Australia as well as the officials in order to bring about a framework for change that will be enduring and lasting. Department of Corrections officials have formed part of that group and have visited Canberra. I was in Australia in July when we signed a memorandum of cooperation in order for the sharing of the information from the states through to our Department of Corrections here in New Zealand to ensure that that cooperation and that level of collaboration is expected, and it certainly is required.

At present the vast majority of deported offenders are not subject to any formal management on their return to New Zealand. This has been the case, as the Minister stated, over a number of years. So this is the first Government—the first Government—to intervene and to respond to this need. What it does is solve this problem by giving the Department of Corrections and the police the powers that are necessary to supervise these deported offenders on their return to New Zealand. That will be consistent with the approach that we take to managing released prisoners from New Zealand’s own prisons. It does that by allowing corrections officers to manage the risk that these people pose to the public. A number of these offenders have been convicted of serious crimes and the Government’s duty is to protect our citizens from harm, and that is what this bill is about.

The last speaker did talk about protecting the rights of these deported offenders and these criminals in terms of their citizenship rights. Well, it was the Labour Government that was part of the agreement with the Australian Government to curtail some of the rights of New Zealanders in Australia. So she knows that, we know that, and the people of New Zealand know that.

I think the second point to make around some of these deported offenders is, you know, if they do not want to give up some of their rights in Australia, then do not commit the crimes. Do not commit the crimes—is that something simple to ask of some of these offenders?

Hon Dr Nick Smith: It’s a very good point.

Hon Peseta SAM LOTU-IIGA: Well, I think it should be made, Dr Smith. I think, you know, you give up some of your rights when you commit crimes.

In terms of the reintegration services, corrections officers are working alongside organisations like New Zealand People at Risk Solutions, Goodwood Park, and the Manukau Urban Māori Authority in order to provide some of these social services, and it is a collaboration within Government. So the Department of Corrections will work alongside the police and will work alongside the Ministry of Justice as well as the Ministry of Social Development to provide some of the services that these returning offenders may require. But we cannot compel them to take up those services, because, obviously, they are citizens returning to New Zealand who have the ability to choose to take up those services or not.

As the Minister has already said, the length of the supervision period provided by the bill is clearly linked to the length of the prison sentence imposed on the deported offenders in those overseas jurisdictions. So the longer the prison sentence overseas, the longer that period will be on their return to New Zealand. So, for example, those on life sentences can be managed for up to 5 years out here in New Zealand. Eligible deported offenders will be subject to standard release conditions, which are the same as those currently used to manage prisoners in New Zealand.

In addition—and I think this is a really important clause within the bill—the Department of Corrections will be able to apply to the courts for the imposition of special conditions on deported offenders where it will help to reduce reoffending and enhance public safety. I think the last member who spoke should consider that point and consider the fact that the department, through its chief executive, can apply to the courts for special conditions to be imposed. One of the conditions, for example, can be the imposition of electronic monitoring where it is deemed necessary.

This bill complements some of the changes made in late December 2014 to enhance the extended supervision orders and introduce public protection orders. I know there have been some questions regarding the use of those orders, but there is a high threshold. Those changes were made to meet the need for those particularly high-risk individuals who do require extra supervision. So this bill provides for the Department of Corrections to apply for those extended supervision orders and public protection orders where appropriate.

I just want to sum up by saying there is an increased number of deported offenders arriving not just from Australia but from around the world—250 to 300 per year. I believe that this bill is an appropriate response to that need to, particularly, supervise those deported offenders who are high risk who return to our shores. It is about supervision and it is about monitoring but it is also about rehabilitation and reintegration, and that is why the support services and the Department of Corrections will be working alongside a number of Government agencies and also a number of NGOs that do fine work in the community to help these offenders reintegrate and rehabilitate as part of their release into the community.

That is why this bill provides the Department of Corrections and the police with the powers to manage some of those risks to the public posed by deported offenders. It is about offenders’ rights versus public security, but I will always come down in support of public security and public safety. I commend this bill to the House.

KELVIN DAVIS (Labour—Te Tai Tokerau): Tēnā koe, Mr Deputy Speaker. The previous speaker, the Hon Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga, was correct. We are debating this because of a law that the Australian Government enacted. That law was enacted in order to capture terrorists. What it has in fact done is cast such a wide net that it is now also capturing criminals, including low-level lawbreakers. What the Australians have done is subscribe to the politics of fear. They have created an enemy, and that enemy is now low-level crims. They have created the enemy, and they are using that enemy to justify all manner of human rights abuses.

My objection to their law is in fact the human rights abuses. Minister Adams was correct. The Australian Government has a sovereign right to make the laws as it sees fit, but the objection I have to the law it has created is that it lacks any proportionality where these low-level lawbreakers are now being subjected to the most heinous of conditions in detention centres. I believe that New Zealand has an obligation, as a member of the international community, to stand up and expose just how bad those conditions are. It is easy for us as a nation to condemn terrorist organisations and Third World countries for their human rights abuses. It is a lot harder for us to stand up and address the abuses of our closest friend and our ally, but that does not mean to say we are wrong to do it. I believe that we need to speak out wherever there is tyranny and abuse.

There is no justification really for the detention centres—first of all, because the prisoners could have their visa situation assessed before their prison sentence ends. If they go through that process and it is determined that their visa is going to be totally revoked before the end of their prison sentence and they get deported, I am au fait with that; I am OK with that. Better still, if the prisoners are let out into their communities and they spend time at home with their families, working, paying tax to the Australian Government, while that process is going through, that to me is an even better and more humane system. But if the Australians determine that they must detain these people, then all I think our New Zealand Government needs to ask is that they be detained in a humane fashion.

Everyone knows that I have been over there and I have met detainees. I have listened to their stories. We have heard how they have been abused and they have been antagonised by guards, and how they have been beaten. The Australian Government is denying all this. There is a simple reason why. The bigger the lie, the easier it is to hide. The Australian Government is hiding these human rights abuses.

Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! Can I just draw the member’s attention to the bill. Can he sit down while I am on my feet; thank you. The member has spent about 3½ minutes outlining the current situation in Australia, which has been well debated not only in the House but also across the media. He now needs to bring himself to the provisions of the bill and to debate those, please.

KELVIN DAVIS: The situation in Australia leads to these detainees being brought back. In a couple of days’ time, we are going to have a planeload of New Zealand detainees arriving on our shores. My colleague Jacinda Ardern rightly raised the question as to why it has taken so long and why this legislation has to be drawn up in such a hurry.

My first understanding of this problem was back in January of this year. Jacinda Ardern has said that this situation arose maybe in April of last year when we first became aware of it with other legislation. My understanding was that in January of this year a woman who committed murder in Australia was sent back to New Zealand and is living in Kaikohe, up in Te Tai Tokerau. She arrived with no conditions whatsoever imposed upon her. If she had been released into the Australian community she would have had all manner of parole conditions, but, because she was deported directly to New Zealand, she did not have any conditions imposed on her. At the time I said that it was really important that this situation be addressed. That woman, I do not believe, really holds much of a threat to the community. But let us change the situation. If she was a child molester and she arrived back in New Zealand, back in Kaikohe, and happened to live next to an early childhood centre or a school or a playground or a park, that is the reason why this legislation is necessary and the reason why I do support it going through. But I do not think that that should stop me criticising the process it has gone through and the hurried aspect of it.

Let us just also understand that these detainees do not want be here. They would prefer to be back in Australia with their families and their support networks. One of my main criticisms of this legislation is that although they are arriving here and they are going to have these monitoring conditions, which I agree with, my greater concern is that there is no social support in the legislation to really look after their needs. I understand that they are going to arrive in New Zealand and I think they will be given a couple of hundred dollars and 5 days’ accommodation in a motel somewhere. The concern is that they will be arriving basically with no food, no clothes, no job—nothing. That is why about 5 or 6 weeks ago I suggested that an appropriate response—a welcoming party—would be for the Government to open up and pay a marae to look after them for the first 3, 4, or 5 weeks of their time here in New Zealand. That way they would have somewhere to go to. That way they would be fed. That way they could have a whole heap of support services descend on that marae, to specifically address the needs that would help them to get back on their feet.

The other day the Prime Minister said that he is the only one standing up for victims. Well, my real concern is that if we do not have the support networks in place for these people when they arrive here, they are going to be set up to fail. If they do not have support networks and they do not get on their feet quickly, then they may have to resort to crime to get by, which is going to create new victims right here in New Zealand.

Another concern of mine is that when they arrive here, and if we do not have the wraparound support services for these people, then they are going to be easy fodder for gangs. They will be looking for someone, somewhere, to support them and help them get by and to protect them. The gangs will be sitting around, right now, going “Heck, we’re going to have 20 or 30, maybe a couple of hundred, ex-prisoners from Australia arriving here with very little support.”, and they can fill the void of the support agencies. I know Minister Lotu-Iiga said that the Department of Corrections is going to be working with various agencies, but it is not explicit here in the bill as to what that support is going to be. I think that the Government needs to act swiftly to make sure that these people are not set up to fail once they get here; that they are supported.

I do have concerns about the Department of Corrections being able to monitor the situation when these people get here. We know that the department struggles to monitor people on electronic bail and in all sorts of other situations. We know it is struggling in prisons. I would like to think that the Department of Corrections does receive more in its budget to enable it to employ people who will look after these deportees.

Just to wrap up—and again we are going through this whole process over the course of the evening. I just want to wrap up by saying—and it does go back to the situation in Australia. At some stage in the future there will be an inquiry into the human rights abuses in the detention centres in Australia. I believe that when that inquiry does happen, guards will be called to the witness stand. They will be asked to testify and they will be asked the question—

Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! The member cannot go there. The member was given some latitude earlier in his contribution. This does not relate to the bill. The member should confine himself to the bill.

KELVIN DAVIS: I do have just one sentence.

Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: I am sorry, but the member cannot get into that situation. In effect, the Speaker has ruled that you cannot go there, and you should not go there.

Jacinda Ardern: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. My colleague is speaking to the origin of a significant number of these offenders who are being deported directly from this place. In fact, the bill itself references the fact that many of them will be held in detention before being deported here. It is explicitly mentioned in the bill, and I would have thought it would be in scope.

Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: The provisions of the bill relate to the monitoring of those people when they are returned to New Zealand. Those are what the provisions are. It is fairly straightforward. The member has already been given 4 minutes of a 10-minute speech to cover that, when he was asked now to confine himself to the bill. Once the Speaker has intervened and said “Don’t go there.”, it is not in order for the member to say “Well, I’ve just got a little bit more to say.” I am sorry, but those are the rules, and I do not make them.

KELVIN DAVIS: The detention centres are wrong and they need to be closed.

JACQUI DEAN (National—Waitaki): It is my pleasure to speak to the Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill throughout the course of today. First of all, before I address the bill, a question was raised, quite rightly, that, in the bill provisions around the reintegration of returning offenders, who will be subject to conditions under this legislation are not noted in the bill. As my colleague in front of me, Jono Naylor, points out, no, it is not in the bill, and, in fact, that is not normally in the bill.

This Government has a very strong work programme under way traversing a number of relevant Government agencies involved in offender rehabilitation: New Zealand Police, the Department of Corrections, Immigration New Zealand, the Customs Service, the Ministry of Justice, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, the Ministry of Health, and also the Ministry of Social Development. Those agencies are working together—and have been for some time—to ensure that we are ready to support, monitor, and begin the reintegration of these offenders upon their return to New Zealand. So it is this Government’s priority, in fact, to ensure that there are plans in place for these individuals who are being returned to New Zealand and who will be subject to the orders that are passed in this bill, with a focus on reintegration but also keeping our communities safe. That is entirely consistent and in line with a number of pieces of legislation that have fairly recently gone through this House, such as the orders mentioned by a previous speaker.

On the extended supervision orders, perhaps a point around the context of this bill that I want to make is that this Parliament did put through extended supervision orders, which came into being in December, and also public protection orders for those offenders who did not commit their crime in New Zealand. But in the absence of an information-sharing agreement it was not possible at that time to extend parole conditions and supervision conditions or orders against offenders who committed their crimes outside of New Zealand. We were simply unable to craft up a regime for monitoring and rehabilitating offenders in the absence of an information-sharing agreement. That was completed in February of this year and here we are in November with the bill before the House.

Although the gap between February and mid-November might seem a long period to traverse, in fact an awful lot of work has been under way to put a system in order that will cater for those people who are increasingly being returned to New Zealand, many of whom are coming from Australia due to a change in its internal legislation with changes to its migration legislation. The register that is being brought about in this legislation to track offenders, and information-sharing arrangements with Australia will give us the detailed information that we need and puts the New Zealand Government, the Department of Corrections, police, and everyone else in a better position to properly assess and to monitor these offenders returning to New Zealand.

We still need all criminals being returned to New Zealand to be subject to the same form of oversight as New Zealanders when they complete their term of imprisonment for a similar prison sentence. So this bill implements a regime, a supervision regime, to cover the gap. There are three key aspects in this bill. The first aspect is to allow police to compel returning offenders to provide information—so that is their name, their date of birth, their fingerprints, and, in some cases, a DNA sample. Previously police could ask but there was no degree of compulsion. Secondly, there will be standard monitoring and supervision conditions that are automatically imposed on eligible returning offenders. So they are pretty standard and will apply to all eligible returning offenders. Thirdly, there will be new powers through the auspices of the District Court to impose special conditions. Those special conditions will be restrictions, for example, on not residing near a school, or not residing near a day-care centre or something like that. Orders can also be subject to electronic monitoring. There will be further interventions today on this bill and I will leave my contribution there. Thank you.

METIRIA TUREI (Co-Leader—Green): The Green Party is abstaining on the Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill today. We recognise the need for legislation to manage the return of New Zealanders who have serious convictions after they have been deported from another country. This is an old issue. Such citizens have been returning back to New Zealand for years and years and years. There has been no legislation in place to effectively manage this issue in the past but we do recognise that there is an escalation over the consequences of that deportation policy, given the gross breach of human rights that the Australian law imposes on New Zealand people.

There is no doubt that Australia has the sovereign right to make any laws that it likes, but that does not excuse the wrongfulness of its law and nor does it mean that simply because it is Australia and we have a close relationship with it that we should be soft on Australia for its human rights abuses, and we still have serious concerns about New Zealand failing to raise this issue when Australia was seeking a seat on the United Nations Human Rights Council. That is the kind of time—exactly the right time—for New Zealand to stand in favour of the rights of our own citizens as opposed to the personal relationships between some members of Government in New Zealand and some members of Government in Australia. So I agree with Peter Dunne here when he described—I think he used the word “villain”—Australia as the villain; I think that is what he said, and his condemnation of its Draconian and unjust deportation laws.

We understand the need for legislation, however, to deal with that unjust law; we do not agree that such urgency is necessary. We want to see some kind of select committee process for this legislation even if it is a short one. This bill deals with a very complex set of issues, a very careful balancing between the rights of every New Zealander to be treated fairly and the issues of public safety where New Zealanders with serious convictions are coming home. We do not underestimate the complexity of that balancing: what is the right framework; what are the right impositions; who has the responsibility to undertake what actions; and how do you assess the potential risk, if you like, of some versus others who are returning, especially if you do not access to full information. All of that uncertainty and complexity is real, but we need to make sure we have the best possible law that deals with that because of the complexity.

We want to make sure that New Zealanders have the best possible systems in place to support the deportees when they return, particularly with much greater support for their rehabilitation and resettlement here. For those who have never—or hardly ever—lived in New Zealand this will be quite a culture shock and there needs to be some support around that. There are many community organisations that invest all of their time and effort into providing that support, and they need Government now to back them, and there is not sufficient backing in our view.

We also want every New Zealander to be able to access their appeal rights and, where a person has completed their sentence, not to be subject to any form of double jeopardy. They should not be punished twice—once in Australia for the conviction and then again here in New Zealand—because we have a legal regime that is inadequate, that tends to impose more obligations on a person than can be justified in the context of their personal circumstances—the circumstances of their conviction.

So it is really important that we get this legislation right—absolutely critical. Legislation passed in haste always leads to problems. Those of us who have been here for a few years have seen time and time again Ministers coming back for urgent and rather embarrassing corrections where mistakes have been found some weeks later in the legislation that they said was so urgent it had to be passed immediately. What is even important with that is that we do not want New Zealanders being caught up in the consequences of hasty, mistaken legislation, especially when you are talking about legislation that uses the coercive power of the State. The right to detain a person is the most—not violent, but the most excessive use of power that the State has. If we are going to make law that allows for some form of detention or deals with those kinds of issues, we need to be very, very careful as to how it is constructed. So even just taking a few days for an external review of this legislation would be extremely helpful.

We have precedent for speedy but also considered legislation. For example, we can learn the lessons from the Canterbury earthquake bill. That bill was very hastily drafted in response to a terrible tragedy that happened in Christchurch. Despite the need for quick action and the emotional intensity of the issues surrounding the earthquake, the Government did agree to a short select committee process. I think it was about 24 hours; I might need to be corrected on that. That gave experts and members of the public a chance to help expose the gaps and the inevitable mistakes that you find in hastily drafted legislation. As a result of a very short select committee hearing, which was held in Christchurch, 30 changes were made to that legislation. It meant that 30 mistakes, or 30 inaccuracies, or 30 potential injustices were remedied before the Parliament passed it, and that is a good thing. That is why we have a democratic process for the passing of legislation.

Unfortunately, this bill is not going to be subject to that democratic oversight as it should be. It certainly is not unheard of for a bill to have less than 4 days of select committee hearings, and there were at least three other bills passed in the last Parliament that had 4 or fewer days of select committee consideration, but at least it gave a chance for an external review of the legislation. Taking some time, for example, to hear from the Human Rights Commission, from the Law Society, and from the New Zealand People at Risk Solutions among others would ensure that this bill is genuinely effective in the maintenance of public safety without unduly breaching the human rights of New Zealand citizens.

I do appreciate that I had the opportunity to have a conversation with Amy Adams on Friday about the then draft bill. The bill has been improved over the weekend, and that is good. We were concerned that the amount of information that was being asked of returning offenders—for example, all of their familial ties, which, quite frankly, is impossible to define let alone to provide—was quite Draconian. We are pleased to see now that the bill requires only the same amount of information that is required under the Policing Act. We were concerned to make sure there was equity in the treatment of the returning New Zealanders and the treatment of New Zealanders who obtain a similar conviction here. There is no need for more information. It needed to be much more equitable.

The review clause is an addition. It is better than not having one. Two years, in our view, is too long. We would prefer to see a review completed well before the election, because we are talking about a review just before the election—almost bang on to the month. That is too late, and an earlier review process would be better. We think that a sunset clause is probably better because that forces the issue, and Parliament does not tend to do anything it does not have to, as we have seen with the consequences of this bill. But at least there is some kind of review, and that process could be improved over the next day or so.

We were also concerned to narrow the definition of “returning offender” so that those with minor historical convictions would not be caught up in this legislation. That did not happen. We think that it is still an issue with the nature of this bill. It is too wide. It casts too wide a net, although we do understand how difficult it is to construct the perfect provision. It would be better if we had an external review through a select committee process to give us new ideas about how to improve the language of the bill and therefore narrow its impact.

We understand that some New Zealanders are returning to New Zealand this week—they are being deported—and that there is a need for some urgency. We think that those two issues could be split and that the dual process that was described by Jacinda Ardern is another way of going about this. We need to be creative when we are in these kinds of situations. On balance, we recognise the need for the legislation. We do not accept that it should go ahead without some kind of public scrutiny, and we would like to see that. Thank you.

DENIS O’ROURKE (NZ First): New Zealand First will support this bill through all its stages. Offenders have, of course, been returned to New Zealand over many years without too much difficulty, and New Zealand no doubt has returned offenders to Australia in the same way. But never has there been an occasion involving the sheer number of people to be returned to New Zealand from Australia that we are about to see in the next few weeks, or months, or, indeed, years.

We first need to ask the question: what has changed that this should now be happening and why do we now need this bill? What has changed, of course, is Australian law and, more important, what has changed is the Australians’ approach to human rights issues altogether concerning their non-citizen residents. Whether we like it or not, the Australians are deporting people who should, in fact, not be subject to deportation, because they have resided in Australia for many years—many of them for well over 10 years. Some would have arrived as infants. Many have their families in Australia, their homes there, their jobs there, and their lives there. They are in every true sense really Australians despite their New Zealand citizenship. They are not New Zealanders by choice and have very little connection with New Zealand.

Nevertheless, these people are coming back, and we will need to deal with that situation in the way that this bill, or something like it, proposes. Many have actually committed only minor crimes, and some indeed may well have committed no crimes at all. It is actually doubtful in many cases whether their wrongdoing justifies deportation, and one of the things we will need to consider in this bill is whether the regime that is to be applied to them here in New Zealand would be justified either. Most of these people will actually be punished twice as a result of what the Australians are doing in creating the need for the situation to be dealt with in this bill. The long-term residents who are being deported have committed crimes in Australia as the product of Australian society, not as the product of New Zealand society, so should it not actually be the Australians who deal with the aftermath of that, and not New Zealand? Nevertheless, we have to deal with the situation as it actually is, not as we wish it should be. So we do need legislation of this kind.

It seems that the right-wing Turnbull Government, which is such an admirer of John Key, is looking for a way to impress the Australian public, and its deportation policy is one of those measures. The fact that it is a gross infringement of human rights seems to be no concern of theirs, but it actually is a lot of concern to us because we have to accept back here in New Zealand what are, essentially, in many cases, not really Kiwis who have committed crimes in Australia. It is actually an unreasonable imposition on New Zealand that our so-called Aussie mates are fobbing off some of their convicted crims on us, and that is the truth of the matter. By contrast, New Zealand does not deport people who have been here for over 10 years, and that is what we have a right to expect should happen in Australia as well. Australia needs to reconsider its human rights actions and record in this way.

New Zealand First does accept that this bill is needed. We regret that it is needed, but we accept that it is needed. It is needed so that we will have a mechanism for dealing with the people who are already beginning to arrive back here in significant numbers. But we should not do it without protest. John Key says that he has raised it with Malcolm Turnbull, with no obvious result. We should be making it clear that Australia’s law is wrong and should be changed. John Key has been acting more like a public relations man for the Australian Government than a Kiwi Prime Minister, and that is the truth.

There has been very little time to study the detail of the bill, but I do appreciate the Minister of Justice providing advance copies of the draft bill to us so that we could have a good look at it, because we know that the matter is urgent and we accept that this bill does need to be treated with urgency. There is a clear need to see that deportees are received here in an orderly way that looks after their need for reintegration and that allows New Zealand to impose conditions on their return to New Zealand so that the New Zealand public can be properly protected. In doing that, we will be doing nothing much more than what happens to New Zealand prisoners who are released from prison. So I do not see that the intent of the bill is really much of a problem for us.

I am interested in the definition, as the Greens are, I hear, of what is a “returning offender”. The bill says that a returning offender is one who has been convicted of an offence that would be imprisonable in New Zealand for a term of 1 year or more—would be imprisonable for that period, not convicted for that period. We know that a lot of legislation provides for maximum periods of imprisonment, but we envisage that not all offending will be that serious, and, in many cases, the actual term of imprisonment will be a lot less. So I think there may be a bit of a problem with the bill in this respect, and that is one of the matters that will, I am sure, be the subject of a review when that happens within the next 2 years. So, notwithstanding that problem, New Zealand First will continue to support the bill because we do need a regime, and this is better than nothing, for the time being. But it is far from perfect, and I look forward to the review so that we can deal with some of those issues.

I also see that there are various provisions to identify people, including DNA profiling and powers for the police and others to ensure that the necessary information is obtained. Some of those look to me to be a little Draconian and I wonder whether they should be necessary, especially for some of the low-level offenders that we are going to be receiving back. So that is going to be another issue for review, I feel, within the next couple of years. The people who are returning can be required within 6 months to provide the information required. That seems to me to be a very long period, and I wonder whether that is too long. If this is such an urgent problem and needs to be dealt with so effectively and so quickly, then why should we be allowing a period of up to 6 months for that purpose? Again, I think that is going to be a matter for review within the next 2 years. It is not something that will cause New Zealand First to vote against the bill at this stage, but something that we will need to look at in the future.

The Commissioner of Police will determine who is a returning prisoner, and that is something I may be talking a little bit about in the second reading of this bill because, again, there are some issues there. There are also provisions for dealing with people who arrive after 6 months of release, and that applies to people who were being supervised in some way before leaving for New Zealand or who were subject to the equivalent of our extended supervision orders or public protection orders. That is not inappropriate, and I do not think that would be a matter for grave concern. It is a particularly important matter for public protection.

In the end, all of the fundamental provisions of the bill are acceptable to New Zealand First. We are not happy with the extent of some of them. I will be criticising them again later in the debate and I do hope they will be attended to, at least, when the bill is reviewed in the next 2 years. I want to commend the Minister for adding that provision to the bill, because the next 2 years are a period within which we are going to learn rather a lot, and the review then will be absolutely necessary. For the meantime, however, New Zealand First will support the bill.

JONO NAYLOR (National): I have to say I was slightly perplexed by one of the things that the previous speaker, Denis O’Rourke, referred to when talking about the difference between something that was an imprisonable offence and somebody being convicted, because, at least in this country, I do not think you can be imprisoned without first being convicted.

This bill is part of the Government’s ongoing programme to make New Zealand safer for our citizens. It is part of an ongoing programme, and over the last year we have seen an introduction of extended supervision orders, we have seen public protection orders put in place, and this is, again, just part of our ongoing commitment to New Zealanders that we will keep them safe. This bill does meet the expectations of New Zealanders that we will do what we can, where we can to keep them safe. It is the very least that we can expect—that those who are being deported from other countries who are convicted criminals will experience the same or similar types of probationary regimes as people who have been released from New Zealand prisons. And so, of course, this is absolutely paramount. This is the primary goal, the primary purpose, of what we are trying to achieve through this bill and, so, therefore, it is exceptionally critical that we get this in place.

I know that there has been concern about the urgency of it but, as we know, there are people currently being deported from other countries to New Zealand with nothing in place. So I think it is important that we are in a position to be able to get this through now that we have got a good bill that is drafted and is going to serve the purposes that we want it to, and that we now get this done as quickly as possible. So, therefore, I will commend this bill to the House.

DAVID CLENDON (Green): As we heard just a few minutes ago from Metiria Turei, the Greens are abstaining on this legislation, and that is not a position we like to be in. We like to take a position to support or oppose. Whether we support or oppose legislation, we would all agree that most bills coming to this House are improved by appropriate process through the House and its processes. In this instance, the abstention decision was a difficult one. We do not disagree with some of the fundamental principles of the bill.

The Minister of Justice in her introductory comments made the point that the matter of deportees arriving in New Zealand—people who have offended elsewhere—is not a new problem. She gave us a figure of, typically, 80 to 100 people, historically, who might be returning to New Zealand with this sort of history behind them. She suggested that, possibly, we are looking at something like a three-fold increase in that—from 80 to 100 to, perhaps, 250 to 300 people whom we can expect per year, at least in the short term. That is a real problem. Acknowledging, also, that some of those people will not be offenders; they will be people deemed to be of bad character but who do not have a criminal record. So the numbers are not quite as severe as the Minister might at first have indicated, but we do accept that there is an issue; there is a problem here to be resolved.

Some of the underpinning principles of the bill we have no problem with, such as the notion of endeavouring to align the treatment of returning people with those who have offended and have served some sentence in New Zealand. That is not a bad principle—treating like situations alike—however, there is sufficient in this bill to concern us. We cannot support it, not least of all because, essentially, we have been flying blind on the Minister’s intentions. We got a draft bill—a rough cut of the bill—less than a week ago. I think Thursday last week we got to have a little look at what the Minister was intending. We have heard already that even in a couple of days we were able to suggest positive and useful amendments to the bill that will make it a somewhat better bill. It is an unfortunate reflection, I think, on this Government that it seems not to have learnt the lesson that engaging with stakeholders at an early stage in any policy development is likely to generate better policy, and is likely to get support for legislation if it is done in a timely fashion.

We have heard various opinions about when this process began; when the problem was acknowledged. We know that at least from the beginning of this year we knew that there was a problem, because the Minister and, indeed, others were hearing of the NGOs in Auckland that were endeavouring to offer some support to people who were landing at our airport with no support, no network, with a history of offending, and nothing was there for them. We have known this has been a problem for quite some time. In July of this year I wrote to the Minister. I sent a letter to her on 16 July asking for a briefing, for a conversation about her intentions and what the Government was planning to do about getting some sort of regime in place to manage this very real and existing, and even urgent, problem. Two weeks later I got a two-line response thanking me for my inquiry and telling me that the Minister had no time to speak to us at that point. That is not indicative of good process.

Would one not think that this was always going to be an issue that would be controversial? It was always going to be a matter that involved human rights, and we are seeing now the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act report that indicates that, yes, there are real concerns about that. Would it not simply be good practice to engage with other parties fairly and reasonably to endeavour to build support, and, critically, for it to not only engage with us but to engage with the public? What does the regulatory impact statement—which, incidentally, we got to see about an hour ago when it landed on the Table—say? It gives a good overview of the policy advice that the Minister has received and the analysis that has been done. What are we told in this document about consultation? Well, it is not a pretty sight, I have to say.

There was targeted consultation with the New Zealand Police and the Department of Corrections—entirely appropriate. An early draft of the regulatory impact statement—the policy advice—was circulated to: New Zealand Police; Department of Corrections; Crown Law; Parliamentary Counsel Office; Ministry of Health; Department of Internal Affairs; Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment; New Zealand Customs Service; Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade; Treasury. Nowhere do we see any reference to one of the many NGOs that might have added value to this. My time has now expired. I will return to the point of the lack of consultation—which has been acknowledged in the documentation—in a later contribution.

MARAMA FOX (Co-Leader—Māori Party): Kia ora, Mr Assistant Speaker. I think it is fair to say that it has been no secret that I have been a critic of this whole process. That is not simply because of this bill, but the situation that we have had in Australia that has meant that we have had to rush to get something together to try to fix this situation where offenders are coming back to New Zealand and are being largely unmonitored, and we have no recourse to be able to do anything about that, and, in many cases, we did not even know that they were here.

I talk about the situation in Christchurch, where it was found that a man who had been convicted of paedophile offences had been returned on a plane straight out of prison, dropped off at the airport in Christchurch, and was then recognised and living at the time with a family with young children, just down the road from a school. That is when it came to my attention how little we knew—with the information sharing coming from Australia that was non-existent at the time—how little we had done to prepare for this despite the fact that this had been happening in this country for many, many, many years, and how little the Australian Government actually thought of us to do it in the first place.

I have been outraged—outraged—that deportees who have committed serious offences have been coming here for a long period of time with no information, outraged that when all of this started to come about and some pressure came on the Australian Government that it actually then took those deportees and put them into detention, effectively giving them a double jeopardy—as has been mentioned here—and impeding their human rights, because to be there in the first place is exactly what that is. I have been outraged that people who have committed no offences are being deported, and, therefore, we come to this situation that we are in today: rushing through a piece of legislation to try to deal with these issues that we have all spoken out against, actually, from both sides of the House—some more fervently than others, but we have all criticised the Australian Government for the place that we find ourselves in now.

I actually want to commend the Minister for taking the opportunity to come and speak with us personally. We had a number of issues that we were concerned about when the draft bill came to us—concerns that we were able to have alleviated through those discussions and some minor amendments that were made. Therefore, the reason we are supporting it through urgency is that we have had our concerns satisfied that those things have been addressed, but, as you see, a number of people have also picked up other things that may get addressed in the second reading and in the Committee stage.

I also want to commend the Minister and the members of the National caucus, and the other ministries, because we are concerned not just about the law and how it pertains to these people who are coming back from Australia and into New Zealand but about their reintegration, about their manaakitanga, and the way that we are able to support them so that we do not have new instances of new crimes being perpetrated on a new set of victims in our country. I agree with the New Zealand First member that, actually, Australia has washed its hands of these people who have grown up in Australia, have been criminalised in Australia, and have been sent back to us for us to clean up its mess. I do not say that lightly. It is not about the people. We need to make sure we support the people because they need to be able to come back and integrate into our society so that we can ensure the safety of our people. So I do commend the Minister for getting this legislation on the table.

I am absolutely appalled that this is a blatant disrespect of our nation from the Australian Government, specifically so around the people of questionable character. I have been given assurances that the monitoring system and the regime that will be put in place will not be any more erroneous than it would have been if they had had those conditions placed on them in Australia, and that there will not be an extension to that so they will not be further stigmatised in this country after having gone through some horrendous things in their country, when they come back here. I am assured by the Minister that that is taken care of.

We need to have time to go through it very carefully before the second reading—and that points to the urgency of it—but I want to make sure that something is done. We should have taken the opportunity to speak out against it. We did not. We had the chance, and New Zealand should have reconsidered that at the United Nations periodic review, and now we are rushing through legislation to deal with the mess that the Australian Government has made. Thank you.

CHRIS BISHOP (National): I just want to make two quick remarks about the Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill. Firstly, just to deal with this issue of urgency—is the bill urgent? The answer is absolutely yes. There has been some debate in the first reading about when exactly this issue arose and who exactly knew what and when. Jacinda Ardern, I think, in her first reading speech said that everyone has been aware of this since April 2014, and Kelvin Davis says it was December 2014, and others have said perhaps it was in the new year. But I think the key point is that, regardless of when this was picked up on, the effect of the Australian policy change, through its migration amendments in December 2014, has been to throw into stark relief the consequence that more people will be deported from Australia to New Zealand. It averaged about 80 people before the policy change and it is now expected to be about 250 to 300. So the key point is: what is the parliamentary and legislative response to that? It is important that we get that right.

Actually, the Government has been working quickly over the last few months to get that right, and it actually takes time to get information-sharing agreements in place. It takes time to get a register in place, and to get the information from the Australian authorities to make sure that we can do this properly. So now we have the legislation before the House, and the Minister of Justice has talked about how quickly the officials have moved on this. I think they have done a good job.

Actually, if you read the section 7 report that the Attorney-General has laid before the House under the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act, he commends how quickly the officials from the Department of Corrections, the Ministry of Justice, and from other agencies have moved to make sure this happens. I mean, this piece of legislation deals with numerous rights under the Bill of Rights Act: the right to be free from search and seizure, the right of freedom of movement—numerous rights under the Bill of Rights Act, all of which could potentially have been impinged on by this legislation. In all respects, bar one very small matter that was to do with DNA samples, which is something from back in 2009, this complies in the Attorney-General’s legal view with the Bill of Rights Act. I think that speaks volumes, actually, about how hard the officials have worked to get this regime into place. So that is the first issue.

Just very briefly on the Australian policy—does anyone like the Australian policy on this? No—no, indeed. Numerous members of the House, to varying intensity, have expressed that view, but the critical point is that we need to do something in response. I take issue with what Mr O’Rourke said, briefly, about how the Prime Minister has been a—I think it was a puff—public relations person for Malcolm Turnbull and the Australian regime. Rubbish. Nothing could be further from the truth. It was actually a very good speech from Mr O’Rourke, so I will not go too hard on him, as I sometimes am wont to do—it was actually a very constructive speech, and, actually, it reflects the general degree of constructiveness and collegiality that the House is expressing on this bill. So with those brief remarks, I commend this bill to the House.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): The Hon David Parker, I understand, for 5 minutes.

Hon DAVID PARKER (Labour): Correct, so I should start. This bill is being considered under urgency. It has been brought to the House after, we are told, 12 days of drafting, because the Government has been so ineffective in running earlier processes that it did not get to parliamentary draftspeople until 12 days ago. And it stands out obviously in the form of the bill. Take clause 7—“Who is returning offender” does not even make grammatical sense. There will be a number of other mistakes in this bill.

Unfortunately, this House has to deal with it under urgency, and we actually agree that given that the Government has got to this point it should be dealt with under urgency, but it does take away liberties from people. The Attorney-General says that those interferences with the liberties of returning criminals are justified, and I think he is probably right, but we cannot be sure that that line is drawn in the right place exactly, without considering these things carefully. Neither can we be sure that it is going far enough to protect the New Zealand public, without these things being considered carefully.

I thank the Minister, Amy Adams, for her interactions with the Labour Party, and in particular with Jacinda Ardern, but it is obvious from those interactions that the form of the bill has been changing substantially in the last day, and yet we are expected to believe that the form of this legislation will be perfect. I made a suggestion through Jacinda and Andrew Little that we guard against mistakes here by passing two forms of this bill today. One would have a sunset clause that would say that it expired after a year—we said: “Say a year.” If the Government came back and said “Say 2 years.”, we probably could have lived with that, but it should have had a sunset clause.

At the same time, under the same debate with no more parliamentary time, we offered to cooperate with this at the Business Committee. We said: “Pass a second version of the bill, identical except that it would not have a sunset clause and it would not commence until the date of the sunset clause in the first bill, and send that to the select committee.” And then, starting tomorrow, the select committee could have heard from the Law Society, heard from the victim impact groups, and heard from civil society as to where the flaws are in this bill, because there will be flaws in this bill.

I say, Amy Adams, why did you not respond positively to that request? The Minister Amy Adams replied saying: “Well, we’ll have a review after 2 years.” That is not the same thing. That is a review as to whether the legislation was working as anticipated; it is not “Review now as to whether this legislation is right tomorrow.” That was a very good offer from the Labour Party as to how you get the balance right between protecting the public—because we might not have properly protected the public in the form of this bill—and making sure you are not unduly penalising people post-release who should not be further put upon. I cannot understand why the Government did not accept that.

The final point I will make, because I think I am just about out of my 5 minutes—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): No, you have got a minute and a half yet.

Hon DAVID PARKER: I have got a minute and a half left. Why is it that on a bill like this, which is being introduced in such a hurried way under urgency, the Government members are not taking their allotted time? Why is it that they are not taking the trouble to actually read this legislation? They only need to get to clause 7 of the bill to find the first obvious grammatical mistake, which is on page 4 of the bill—it is not a long way to read through it to get that mistake. Why is it that we have not had a discussion as to how it is that we guard against the risks that we are creating—[Bell rung]—through the urgency motion? My colleague David Shearer will take the rest of this 10-minute call to illustrate to the public how lax this Government has been in terms of meeting time lines so that we would not be doing this in such an urgent manner.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): The honourable David Shearer, for 5½ minutes.

DAVID SHEARER (Labour—Mt Albert): On Thursday “Con Air” arrives: a flight that is chartered by the Australians that is arriving here with 20 people who have just been released. They will arrive here, and we hope that the legislation that is going through urgency here will be in place for the arrival of that plane. That is a disgrace, when this Government knew last year, on 14 December, that Australia had changed its laws.

And that Minister of Justice over there received on 12 February a memo from her ministry that said “The number of offenders being deported to New Zealand from Australia is likely to increase significantly as a result of recent changes to Australian law.”, that “Some deported offenders who have been convicted of very serious offences may pose a significant risk to the New Zealand community.”, and that “Offenders born in New Zealand who have lived most of their lives overseas are likely to face additional challenges reintegrating into the community and avoiding reoffending.” That is a disgrace; that was in February this year, and here we are with 2 weeks of Parliament to go and we are ramming through a piece of legislation that should have been written months ago.

In the meantime there have been dozens of people who have already come back. Some of those have come back on charter flights chartered by the Australian Government, which is too worried to put those people on commercial flights and instead is putting them on charter flights. As the Minister of Justice herself has acknowledged, although some of those people are there for relatively minor offences, they include people who have been convicted of murder, of manslaughter, of rape, and of paedophilia. We have no checks and no ability to stop those people when they arrive, and they will disappear into New Zealand. The police themselves say that 43 percent of those people who have arrived need to be on some sort of supervision list—43 percent.

And last week we had the audacity of the Prime Minister, who stood up here, in an extraordinary outrage, and said that the National Government was protecting New Zealanders. Can you imagine what he should be saying now? He should be apologising to New Zealanders that the Government has nothing in place for those people who have arrived back—nothing in place. He should be apologising now for not making the preparations, for not standing up to the Australians, and for not saying to Mr Turnbull—instead of having some sort of love fest—that nobody coming into New Zealand can come back unless the Australian authorities give the details of what they were convicted for.

Right now we know that the Australian authorities are not giving us those details that we are seeking from them, so we actually do not know who is coming through to New Zealand. We do not know what crimes they have committed and what risk they might be to New Zealand. Instead of Mr Key saying that we have a wonderful relationship with Australia—yes, we might have a great relationship with Australia, but, at the end of the day, that relationship should serve to further our interests, and this is certainly not in our interests, when they will not in any way cooperate with us in giving us the information about returning criminals to New Zealand.

If we had just some sense of cojones in that Government, we should at least say to the Australians—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! That is a term that has been ruled out previously. The member will withdraw it.

DAVID SHEARER: I withdraw that. If this Government had any sort of moral standing, it would have said to the Australians: “You don’t tell us who’s coming, we don’t let you land.” It is as simple as that.

I believe that we are in a serious situation, where the Government has been telling us all along that it is standing up for our protections and our freedoms. It is certainly not. It is not standing up for us when it comes to New Zealanders coming back here with criminal convictions and no legislation and no procedures in place to receive them, and it is not standing up for those New Zealanders who have been wrongly detained in Australia by Australian authorities after having done their time. That too is a right that should not be taken away from anybody. That Government is absolutely shameless, and it should be ashamed of itself and of the way that it has actually treated New Zealanders.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Ah—Alfred Ngaro. I apologise; it was the first name that I was losing.

ALFRED NGARO (National): That is all right—thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker. Look, there has been a lot of huff and puff and heat from the other side in the previous speeches that have been made but when we talk about actions of a Government, the Minister of Justice has already spoken about the fact that in 9 years under a Labour Government, nothing had been done. An estimate of around about 700 offenders had come into the country under that watch, so this is not the time to turn around and ask what it is that we have done—what is it that the Government has done—because even during those members’ time, we know that there were a number who came through. That is right—we will not hear anything from the other side, because they are silent on that, but what we are unanimous about—

Kris Faafoi: Did you not just listen to David Shearer? Are you deaf?

ALFRED NGARO: No—he actually tried to put the blame and the accountability fully on this Government. The Minister was also really clear that actually when she was officially informed was February of this year. So what this Government is doing and what this Minister is doing is taking the initiative with the Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill, rather than allowing this to continue to lapse.

We know that under the regulatory impact statement it is really clear. The issues of concern, which will concern all New Zealanders—and to my colleague Mr Bishop when he talked about the purpose of urgency—are that in the regulatory impact statement, on page no. 3, it clearly indicates that since 2013 approximately 70 percent of returning offenders have been convicted overseas of serious offences. Hence the reason for urgency; hence us putting this in place, because we think this is absolutely important. The offences that we are talking about are assault, they are armed robbery and burglary, they are rape and sexual assault, they are murder and manslaughter—they are of the kind that is of great concern to the community and to the nation as a whole. We know that there will be a long term of urgency in the House.

I just want to finish off with a couple of comments. The bill contains three key aspects that I think are really important. The first is allowing police to compel returning offenders to provide information. The information sharing that we are talking about is important, and it may require DNA sampling. The second is around standard monitoring and supervision conditions that are automatically imposed on all eligible returning offenders. The third, which we will hear more of, is new powers of the District Courts to impose special conditions, such as restrictions on not residing near a school, that can be subject to electronic monitoring. I believe that this bill is important. It is important that we get this through the House in urgency. I commend this bill to the House.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): I am about to put the question, but before I do put the question, I just want to make a ruling, because it appears that we have some conflict between our Standing Orders and Speakers’ rulings. Some members during the debate have indicated that they intend to abstain, but I have not heard any member indicate that they are going to vote No. Normally the expectation is that members call for a further vote only if they wish to challenge the outcome and have given their voices in the minority, and Speakers’ rulings 73/4 and 74/1 indicate that. However, it is my view that it is in the House’s interest for members to be able to record their position when they wish to abstain. This is consistent with Standing Order 140 and with the principle that members cannot call for a further vote if they voted with the majority. So I am indicating that notwithstanding previous rulings I will take a division on the question, notwithstanding no member saying No.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill be now read a first time.

Ayes 107

New Zealand National 59; New Zealand Labour 32; New Zealand First 12; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Abstentions 14

Green Party 14.

Bill read a first time.

Second Reading

Hon AMY ADAMS (Minister of Justice): I move, That the Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill be now read a second time. In this slightly unusual situation, where we are having the second reading immediately following on from the first reading, I do not propose to do what I would normally do in a second reading debate and go through in some detail a number of the matters that I set out in my first reading contribution. Instead, what I want to do is take the time to expand further on some of the rationale for the structure of the bill and the way it will operate, to provide the House and anyone following this debate with a little bit more context around that. Then I do want to touch on some of the allegations that have been made around what is perceived as delay, and I can assure the House that there absolutely has not been.

So if we start with the operation of the bill, I said in my first reading contribution that the bill is about trying to replicate as closely as possible—and I do not pretend that it is an exact replication—the sort of supervision and management of offenders that they would likely have been subject to if they had served the same sentence in New Zealand. The reason it is not an exact fit, and the reason that it has been very complex to work through these policy matters, is that, of course, you are dealing with a regime that needs to apply in a blanket way and yet be very careful to not traverse unfairly on the rights and the provisions of natural justice and the rule of law in respect of the returning offenders; have the right sort of oversight in place; and also provide the flexibility to seek additional specific conditions when that is needed, in the absence of the mechanism that is normally used in New Zealand, which is the Parole Board.

So it is very easy, I think, at this stage, when all that work has been done, to look at the framework and say: “Well, you know, you could have banged that out sooner.” But the reality is that we were having to spend far too long—far too long, actually—negotiating with Australia to get the right information, so we could assess the type of people coming back; the risk profile; the sort of information that anyone who has been a Minister will understand you absolutely must have before you can work through any of the processes the Cabinet Manual requires around quantification of the impact of the changes you are proposing and the cost of them; making sure we had the budgetary provisions in the Cabinet paper to make sure it was adequately resourced; and getting all of the appropriate components that you have to be able to certify, as a Minister, when you are bringing proposals for a new policy to Cabinet and then to this House. To do all of that, as I say, it was a matter of working with corrections and with police, but they really could not even begin to do their work until Australia had stepped up and provided us with this information.

I have said publicly, and I will say here again in the House, that I am disappointed that we, as a close neighbour and for a long time a close friend of Australia, found ourselves in the position where the impact on New Zealand was brought to my attention first in February of this year. What that meant was that New Zealand found itself starting from a completely cold start once the law was already in operation. That is not ideal, that is not the way that we expect to deal with Australia, but that is the position we were in—that is the position I was in.

I think we responded in an absolutely timely way. My officials have confirmed that the first advice that ever came in front of me—it was certainly not mentioned in the briefing to the incoming Minister; it was not mentioned in any briefings at the time—was on 12 February. At that point I instructed them to begin work immediately on this framework. The suggestion that some members of this House have made that somehow that is all just a bit of precursor fluff and the work actually starts when you start drafting, I think reflects a lack of understanding of the process. Drafting is the end of the process.

I want to commend and pick up on the comments that my colleague Chris Bishop made when he commented on the section 7 New Zealand Bill of Rights Act report by the Attorney-General. I would say this, but I think he is absolutely right. These are issues that could so easily have gone one step too far in terms of the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act issues, or, equally, one step too light in terms of protection. We have ensured that we did everything we could to land it in an appropriate place. Yes, the bill has continued to evolve, particularly with the news that came through to us in the last few days around this large number of offenders who are on their way back, where Australia has not given us advance notice and has not given us a lot of lead time with the information. That information has been followed up on. Given that that is now a new development in the way these processes are flowing—and it was certainly not mentioned in any of the briefings—we have continued to make sure that that is as tightly provided for in the bill as we can.

I mentioned that the bill, effectively, replicates a parole framework. What that means is that if you have been—not you. If the offender—sorry, Mr Assistant Speaker; it certainly would not be you. If the offender has been released from custody in the overseas jurisdiction—and can I just get on record, very clearly, that although a lot of the debate is around Australia, and that is absolutely the source country for the vast majority of the people whom this bill will touch, it is not the only country. This bill applies to anyone deported to New Zealand, from any jurisdiction—we just have to bear that in mind. The framework applies when the offender is released within 6 months of their return and released from custody, and that definition of “in custody” very clearly also covers any time they spent in detention centres.

The reason for that is that what these conditions are about, whether they are applied in New Zealand or under this bill, is helping to oversee the highest-risk period for an offender, which is the time when they are first released from prison. The longer they have been in prison, the harder that reintegration is, and therefore the longer the monitoring tends to occur. It is not a punitive attack on the offender; it is about making sure that someone who has been in an institution and under very strict rules for a long period of time is carefully monitored and watched for offending behaviours and for the assistance they will require as they reintegrate. If someone has served an offence in Australia, for instance, and has been living and working and going about their business in Australia for some time, it would not be appropriate to then turn round and impose those sorts of oversight conditions. If, however, they have only recently been released, then we absolutely need to be tracking that sort of behaviour.

The bill then goes on to provide that there is recognition that, although we have an automatically applying framework, some offenders will require a more directive, more restrictive set of conditions. Their offending will justify that. In that case, the conclusions that I reached through that policy development process were that it would be quite inappropriate to try to provide for that in this legislation. The risk of getting it wrong, one way or the other, was simply insurmountable. So what the bill provides is that in that instance there are whole new powers to go to the District Court, and have the District Court act in lieu of a Parole Board to make the case by case assessment as to when those additional, more restrictive conditions are required.

The final piece is the collection of information. I want to pick up on the comments Metiria Turei was making in the first reading around the definition of “identifying particulars”. We did have a good discussion, for which I thank her, on this point. She had picked up a concern that I was also considering at that time, which was just saying—had that actually gone too far? Had the information that the police had asked us to provide for—was it too much, in that they did not need it? Actually, I felt that it was a fair point. We went back and looked at it, and agreed that actually narrowing that down to the definition in the Policing Act was appropriate. But let us not cast aside how critical it is that we have that information. There is every prospect that as offenders are returned to New Zealand, and we get their biometric details and the like, we might find some cold cases, unsolved in New Zealand, now resolved. We do not know that, but I would not be the slightest bit surprised if that is the case. It certainly means that that information will be held in the same way it would be if they had been serving sentences here.

The last point I want to make in this contribution is just really to inject a little bit of a calm note, I guess, into what has become at times—not in this House, where I think the debate has generally been reasonably constructive—but actually in some of the media commentary there has been a degree of almost hysteria. Let us remember that we release people from our prisons in New Zealand every single day. These are people, whether they have served their sentence in New Zealand or Australia, who have been sentenced and have served their sentence, and, actually, in our system of justice and in most systems of justice around the world, when you serve your sentence you return to the community. That is the reality.

So all this hysteria about “There’s murderers walking around. There’s rapists walking around.”—actually, every single day we release from New Zealand prisons people who have committed serious offences. These people are in the same category. So let us not overblow this. Let us not suggest that somehow the public should be battening down the hatches. It is actually still a relatively small number of people, compared with the New Zealand population, and the same sort of people, and the same sort of conditions that happen in New Zealand. Yes, it is important that we have a commensurate regime in place, but let us not suggest that somehow the bogeyman has landed and it is the beginning of the end. We need this legislation, but I think some of the hysteria from some quarters of the media has been unhelpful. With those words, I commend the bill at its second reading.

JACINDA ARDERN (Labour): I want to respond to an issue that has come up across the House during the initial first reading of this bill. That question has been that we somehow, as a party, are not able to critique the speed of this legislation and the timeliness of it because we have had offenders from Australia deported into New Zealand under a Labour Government. We also had Australian offenders deported here to New Zealand under a National Government before that. No one has ever argued that we have not had a regime that allowed, legitimately, New Zealand citizens to be deported to New Zealand. What has changed under this Government, in recent times, is that an amendment was made to Australia’s immigration Act that has led to a significant increase in the number of people being deported here—significant. In fact, from what I have seen, it is up to five times per month the number of offenders than we have seen in the past. So the scale has changed significantly.

The second thing that has changed is that, finally, New Zealand was able to negotiate an information-sharing arrangement, which allowed a monitoring regime to be put in place—pretty critical if you are going to undertake this piece of work. Things are not the same as they were 7 long years ago, when Labour was in Government, so I think it is probably not necessarily the legitimate point of debate that members on the other side of the House would like it to be.

Like the Minister Amy Adams, I think this is an unusual second reading speech, given that it is immediately after the first reading. Usually at this time we would have a conversation about the changes that have been made at a select committee. I want to use this opportunity to just highlight, again, that it would have been useful if we had—as Metiria Turei and as David Parker have mentioned—a dual-track process that would allow this stopgap law to be put in place, but we allowed for parliamentary consideration and a new regime to replace this law in a year’s time. If you look at the regulatory impact statement—under external consultation, 3.6: “In the time available only New Zealand Police, the Department of Corrections, and Crown Law were consulted on drafts of this bill.” I know, given the short time frame—we were being consulted right up to this morning on some changes—that that consultation would have been relatively rushed. There was no Law Commission, no Law Society, no Parole Board, no PILLARS—groups that always bring to the table substantive and useful arguments and critiques of this kind of legislation. Again, I want to make that point: we still could have been debating a dual-track process, the public still could have had their say, and that would have been highly desirable.

I want to use my second reading speech, though, to highlight some of the issues that we are likely to spend a bit of time critiquing in the Committee stage, the first of which is the fact that we will keep making references to detention centres, despite the discussion between the member Kelvin Davis and the Deputy Speaker in the first reading where the Deputy Speaker requested that we stop referring to detention centres. I would like to point out to the Deputy Speaker that under clause 17(3) of the bill, there is reference explicitly to immigration facilities, because for the purposes of this bill they count as incarceration. And, as defined by the Minister, individuals who are released from prison and have 6 months outside of prison custody technically should not have elements of this bill apply to them, unless that 6 months includes a turn in a detention facility. And why? It is because you are not, therefore, mimicking someone who is reintegrating into a community, because you are still incarcerated. A detention facility is incarceration. Therefore, it has the dual act of meaning that your liberties are removed from you for longer, and the double whammy of meaning that you will be monitored for longer as a consequence. And yet you have absolutely no control over that period of incarceration. So it is a dual injustice, as it were, in terms of how this bill would then apply to you. So we think it is absolutely right that we are able to talk about incarceration in detention centres as part of this legislation, and what defines, of course, that incarceration, and what people are enduring in those facilities.

The second issue that we will be drawing on in the Committee stage is the appropriate application of the law as it relates to the gathering of offenders’ information. I want to thank other members who have raised instances, in the development of this bill, anywhere in the legislation where we have seen the law go beyond what we would consider to be reasonable. Our bar for what is reasonable is what we have already passed through due and thorough process in the New Zealand Parliament already. So if we are, for instance, putting in place a regime that is more stringent in terms of who is required to give a bodily sample that goes beyond our existing bodily samples legislation, then we would consider that to be unreasonable. If it asks for the police to gather more information than would currently be the case for someone who was being paroled, we would consider that to be unreasonable. And that is where we need to critique as well. The legislation sets out the time for which a person could be detained in order to hand over those samples and hand over that information. Again, we need to check that it mirrors exactly requirements in the current existing New Zealand law, because at least that law has gone through a thorough process.

It is probably right to point out that I am advised that where the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act vet falls down is around bodily samples, and that that is because of existing bodily samples legislation having failed that New Zealand Bill of Rights Act vet when it initially went through. But, again, that is something we will be looking at during our second reading.

The third point that we will be focusing on during the Committee stage is the dual regime that is set out in subpart 2 of the bill, because this is where the bill applies to both sets of categories of individuals—returning offenders and returning prisoners. Our concern is that between those two groups there is the potential for some gaps to emerge, and that those gaps, actually, could emerge at the higher end of offending rather than the lower end. And I want to just delve into that a little bit now. For instance, in the bill under clause 16, it defines who is a returning prisoner: “A returning prisoner is a person who has been determined by the Commissioner to be a returning prisoner in accordance with the criteria set out in section 17.” Clause 17 then goes on to define that “The Commissioner must determine that a person is a returning prisoner” if they have “(a) … been convicted in an overseas jurisdiction of an offence for conduct that constitutes an imprisonable offence in New Zealand; and (b) has, in respect of that conviction, been sentenced to (i) a term of imprisonment of more than 1 year;” or cumulatively more than 1 year, and “(c) is returning or has returned to New Zealand within 6 months after his or her release from custody during or at the end of the sentence.” Then it goes on, for the sake of clarity, to point out that custody does indeed include immigration facilities.

So we have here a default regime. Basically, if you are in prison for an offence of a certain period of time and you come out, you are immediately stuck in a detention centre, and then you are shipped to New Zealand, automatically you will have a monitoring regime applied to you. What if, however, you are released into the community for 6 months and then come out? You could have a life sentence and be in that category. Well, then we are reliant on the regime that applies to returning offenders. That regime requires the Department of Corrections to make an application within a specified period of time to the courts to have your parole conditions as they were in Australia—to apply to have a similar regime to apply to you here in New Zealand.

We are relying on the department to be quite spry under these circumstances, and it could well be that those whom we wish them to be spry about have committed a range of offences that we would consider to be high end. We know from the information that we have seen in the regulatory impact statement that, for instance, we have already had since 2013—15 percent have been offenders with rape or sexual assault offences, and 5 percent with murder and manslaughter. And, yet, how many extended supervision orders has the Department of Corrections applied for when for the last 2 years we have had people in those high categories—how many? Not one. So we will use the Committee stage to delve into whether or not a system that is relying on a department that is struggling will deliver the outcomes that New Zealanders desire.

JACQUI DEAN (National—Waitaki): In this second reading speech I just really want to briefly reaffirm that this Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill gives authorities the power to assess—so they have the power to assess returning offenders—and to supervise those who are returning to New Zealand, most of them coming from Australia.

What this bill does is it strengthens the oversight of deported offenders as they come back to New Zealand. Why do we do that? We want to protect New Zealanders. We also want to continue this Government’s very strong move towards successful reintegration back into New Zealand’s society if it is the case that these offenders will be staying in New Zealand. It brings them into the same monitoring and parole regime experienced by New Zealand - based offenders who have committed a similar crime. That is why I am a little sceptical about the objections we have heard so far from some Opposition members around the fact that this bill is passing through all stages under urgency. There are no extra parole conditions, no extended supervision conditions, no extra conditions being promulgated by this bill. What it is doing is capturing, if you like—pardon the phrase—those offenders who hitherto have been returning to New Zealand and are largely, except for those who get caught up under the extended supervision orders regime, unsupervised, and that is of concern to us all.

So if I look very briefly at clause 37 of the bill, which looks forward to the review by the Justice and Electoral Committee of the day in 2 years’ time, I think that rather than having two bills—one with a sunset clause and then working away on another bill—a review after 2 years is eminently sensible. Given the fact that this bill is confined to not changing parole conditions and supervising conditions but rather expanding the net, protecting more New Zealanders and, hopefully, reintegrating more returning offenders, I think this mechanism is eminently sensible. I think the Justice and Electoral Committee of the day will give a lot of thought as to how best to evaluate and, if necessary, make improvements to this legislation. Thank you.

KELVIN DAVIS (Labour—Te Tai Tokerau): I would just like to take over from where the previous speaker, Jacqui Dean, left off with the review by the Justice and Electoral Committee in 2 years’ time. What the member is in effect saying, and what the Minister of Justice was in effect saying, is that they are going to trial law for 2 years. That is not the role of Parliament—to test law out and to trial law out. You either make law that works, or you do not make it at all. I think it is silly to say: “Let’s just try this law, let’s just put it out there and see how it goes. In 2 years’ time we’re going to have a look at it.” It would have been a lot more sensible to have two bills, one with a sunset clause and one that continues on.

I would also like to talk about clause 17(2). Jacinda Ardern spoke about the “release from custody”, which means “release from custody in a prison or, if a person is detained in an immigration or other facility following release from prison,”. I just want to finish off a point I was trying to make earlier. When there is a review of what has gone on in the immigration facilities in Australia, guards will be asked why they participated in the abuses. Their answer will be that they were simply following orders. Where have we heard that type of defence before? That is why it is imperative that even though the Australians are a sovereign nation and they can make the laws that they want, it is imperative that we stand up to laws that are wrong and that lead to human rights abuses.

I would just like to talk about the criteria for determination that a person is a returning offender or a returning prisoner. They are similar but different. A returning prisoner is a subset of a returning offender: “A ‘returning offender’—(a) is a person who has been convicted in an overseas jurisdiction of an offence for conduct that constitutes an imprisonable offence in New Zealand and, being liable for deportation or removal as a result of that conviction, has returned to New Zealand; and (b) includes a returning prisoner.” That was clause 7. So clause 17, “Criteria for determination that person is returning prisoner”, says “The Commissioner must determine that a person is a returning prisoner if the Commissioner is satisfied that the person—(a) has been convicted in an overseas jurisdiction of an offence for conduct that constitutes an imprisonable offence in New Zealand; and (b) has, in respect of that conviction, been sentenced to—(i) a term of imprisonment of more than 1 year; or (ii) 2 or more terms of imprisonment that are cumulative, the total term of which is more than 1 year;”.

The reason I raise those two definitions is because I have an actual case of a detainee. My understanding here is that he is still on Christmas Island. He is a guy that I met there. But who knows, he could be on a plane right now and be ready to land in New Zealand in the not too distant future. But here is his story from an email from his mother. The young man’s name is Beaudine Adams. She says he has been in Australia since he was 4 years old, so “All he knows is Australia. He has no connection with New Zealand at all. He is a son, brother, father, fiancé, and friend to all whose lives he enters. So he got into a toxic relationship. His partner used to beat the living—out of him. It was reported to the local Ipswich police several times. The response was always the same: ‘You’re a big bloke, and she’s hitting you?’ There was never any paperwork filled out, as they made Beau feel like a wimp. The partner’s father was a police officer there. Beau had asked her to leave many times. One day she was hitting him with a pole and it broke the skin on his right wrist. He grabbed the pole out of her hand, struck her on the top of the leg. She left and went to the police station, taking out a DVO.”—which I assume is a domestic violence order—“No mark was left on her leg. He decided it would be easier to get away from that relationship, so he left and went north to Mackay.

She constantly texted and phoned him, then within a week of him leaving she boarded a plane and flew up there. She phoned him, claiming she was going to drop the DVO and had no way home and no money. She pleaded with him to take him back to Ipswich. He answered her text, answered her phone call, picked her up from the airport and took her back to Ipswich. They argued all the way back. Back at the house she attacked him. He restrained her by the wrists while she constantly kicked him in the shins. She went straight to the police station and said he had broken the DVO and claimed he assaulted her. So he was charged with occasioning bodily harm and three breaches of the DVO: one was the texting, one was the phone call—both of which she instigated—and one was holding her captive.” They assume that was because he was driving her in the car back to Ipswich.

“He went to Brisbane Correctional Facility, awaiting his hearing. He was there a total of 159 days. They took his issue to the Supreme Court. Judge Donaldson presided. He was shocked at her claiming she was ‘scared for her life’ yet continued to contact him and then boarded a plane to be with him. He was released on bail. He never broke the bail, but he did break the parole conditions, or the conditions of his release, because he smoked cannabis. He was due to be released on 18 May.” They went to collect him, only to be told he was going to Perth. He was flown to Perth, and then went to Yongah Hill, which is a detention centre. On 8 October he was sent to Christmas Island. The reason I raise this case is that reading this story—and I admit that this is one side of the story—I am not sure that he is either a convicted prisoner or a—what was the other?

Metiria Turei: Returning offender.

KELVIN DAVIS: Or a returning offender. So he has been in trouble with the law. It sounds like he was on remand. It does not sound like he was actually convicted of anything. Like I say, I am just taking what I am reading here from the mother’s email. But if that is the case, then what applies to him if he happens to be on the plane that is heading here in a couple of days? What category does he fall under? Does he turn up and have no conditions imposed on him? Does he turn up and certainly get no social support nor any sort of support to get himself back on his feet, to get a job, to feed himself, to clothe himself? That is why I have concerns around this bill. It has been rushed.

I have to admit I stumbled over a few words because of the wording. It says in clause 17: “Criteria for determination that person is returning prisoner”. Being a former school teacher, I do not know whether I would have accepted that grammar from a student. This is why we have concerns that the bill actually does not cover everything that it should do. The least of the problems are grammatical errors; the worst of the problems are that some of these returning people are not actually going to fall into the auspices of this bill.

I just also want to touch again on the social side of things. There is nothing in the bill around the social side of things and looking after these detainees when they return to New Zealand. Again, it was about 5 or 6 weeks ago that I suggested that the Minister for Māori Development put some budget aside to look after these people when they arrive, so they can be fed and housed on a marae for a few weeks so that they can get on their feet. He said no, that is not necessary because every Māori—and, let us face it, many of these people are Māori—has some sort of connection to somewhere in New Zealand, even if they do not know it. Earlier in the day when the Minister spoke about the terrible events in France he finished with a waiata: “Mā te tika, mā te pono, mā te aroha”, which means: through the truth, through faith, and through compassion we can achieve things. I am just asking where the compassion of the Minister for Māori Development is for these people. If he is saying that all Māori have connections back here in New Zealand, where is the compassion for these people so that we can actually stand them on their feet and get them back to those very people whom they are meant to be related to?

I met Raymond. I forget Raymond’s last name. He was on TV the other night. He said he was born in the South Island. He was deported back to New Zealand and arrived a matter of weeks ago. He had nowhere to go, nowhere to stay. An elderly couple from Tai Tokerau, from Whangarei, actually put him up in their place. That was a great act of compassion. The trouble is that that set a bit of a precedent. Not every person who comes back is actually going to have that sort of support when they get here. Kia ora.

CHRIS BISHOP (National): Look, I am very pleased to take a call on the second reading of this important bill. I just want to make a couple of remarks briefly—firstly, just to respond to some of the criticism that has come from members opposite. I think it was David Shearer, in the first reading of this bill, who posed the somewhat provocative question or statement that the Government was not standing up for New Zealanders or for Kiwis.

I actually think the record will show the opposite. When looked at in the light of day, in the cold reality of the situation, the record will show the opposite. The Government has stood up for Kiwis. The Prime Minister has stood up for New Zealanders. Minister Woodhouse, who is sitting here in front of me, and other Ministers have expressed their concern at some of the Australian policies that have come to light in the last 18 months or so. But Australia is a sovereign country that makes its own laws and makes its own rules, and, at the end of the day, there is little that New Zealand can do about that. But what we can do is manage our own affairs and put in place a regime, which this legislation does, to make sure that we manage those who are returning to New Zealand.

The second thing I want to briefly touch on is whether or not this law should have come before Parliament sooner. Members opposite, particularly Jacinda Ardern and Kelvin Davis, have suggested that this should have happened way back in February or March. Jacinda Ardern said that the Government had known about this situation since April 2014. Actually, as the Minister of Justice said in her second reading contribution, this was not in the briefing to the incoming Minister that gets provided. This was a law change made by amendments to the Migration Act in Australia in December 2014. The Minister was adverted to this in February 2015.

Imagine what would have happened if the Government had turned up in Parliament, and one of the first things we had done for the year, at the start of this year, was to immediately legislate to deal with that situation. Members opposite would have been up in arms. They would have cried that it was an outrage. They would have said the Government was moving too quickly. They would have said that the Government is legislating in haste. It will make mistakes. You can write your script yourself, Mr Assistant Speaker. That is exactly what members would have done. Actually, that would not have been the right thing to do. The Government has taken a deliberate process over the last few months, working with the Australians to set up a register and get that information out of them that will allow this legislation to be effective. And now we come before the House today to legislate to put it into place.

There has been a lot of hot air from members opposite. There has been a lot of huffing and puffing, as my colleague Alfred Ngaro says.

Denis O’Rourke: A lot of very good arguments, too.

CHRIS BISHOP: There has been a lot of huffing and puffing from Denis O’Rourke, but that is typical of that member. But, actually, when looked at in the cold, hard light of day, this is a necessary bill. It is necessary to legislate under urgency. The Government can hold its head up high when it comes to this issue. Thank you.

METIRIA TUREI (Co-Leader—Green): I think Mr Bishop is wrong. It has been a very measured debate, and rightly so. It is a very serious issue, which we are having to deal with very quickly. I have appreciated the analysis from all sides of the House—probably bar that one—so far, each of which has shed some light on both the process and the content of this legislation and why it is so important.

I just want to reflect on two issues raised by the Minister of Justice, Amy Adams. One was about the process. She described how a great deal of policy work goes into an issue like this and that criticising the 12 days of drafting—it sounds funny when you say it like that—does not acknowledge the amount of work that goes into policy development. I agree. When you are working on new policy and, in particular, complicated policy, it takes a lot of time and a lot of work. The actual construction of the final legislation does not take as much time, once you have got the policy settings right.

The concerns from the Opposition have been that in the process of developing the policy, the Government has not looked outside of its own confines to find out what the right options might be. My own colleague David Clendon offered in July to talk with the Minister about those policy settings and was refused. The Government did not want to talk with any of the Opposition members about this. I am not sure whether Labour was able to have a direct conversation about the policy as it was in operation. There is no indication from the Government that its members talked with agencies outside of Government agencies, like the Law Commission, the Human Rights Commission—agencies that they can trust to keep information confidential. These are major institutions in New Zealand and they are just as capable of keeping information confidential.

But the point of policy development is you get new ideas about how to deal with the problem, and you find as many different ideas as possible—constructive ideas of how to deal with the problem—and then you try to build the best policy out of it. That is why you talk with other people outside the confines of your own office. That is why you go and find experts from outside the parliamentary process who are less invested in the politics and the pressure of the issue, and much more interested in the effect of the legislation on the community as a whole.

That is why we have a select committee process. We have a select committee process because we want New Zealanders to tell us how this legislation will affect them. What are the areas of their lives that we do not know anything about that will be affected? How could we improve it if the effect is bad? What might we want to support more if the effect is good? That is the point of the democratic process of discussion and consultation.

A wiser process would have been something like Ruth Dyson used to do when she was a Minister. She would call in the spokespeople on the particular issue she was dealing with as Minister. We would all go, from across the political spectrum, to her office to hear where the policy development was going, what she was thinking about doing, and what the pros and cons were. We could talk to her about that collectively, so we could hear each other’s ideas, and better policy was developed as a result. But early on in the process, and on something as critical as this legislation, that would have been a wiser course. We have had the entire year to enable proper consultation across the Parliament and with the experts outside of Parliament, and none of that happened. That is why we have a bill where already there have been some issues raised.

I would touch on Kelvin Davis’ example, his story, of a young man who is currently being detained, where it is completely unclear what part of this legislation he would be covered by. Would he be a returning prisoner because he has been detained and there are some complications around his detention? Would he be a returning offender, which has less oversight? How does that young man know where he fits in the legislation? Legislation that deals with the criminal law, that deals with the coercive powers of the State to detain and question you, should be as clear as possible for every single New Zealander, particularly those who are going to be subject to that law. This is the kind of example that would be raised in the select committee. Experts would be able to have a look at how the law applies to that situation and perhaps another few, to see where the gaps are in the legislation that need to be filled, and provide that advice to the Parliament so we can build better law.

That is why the Greens have said so strongly that we need to have at least a short period of a select committee inquiry to investigate that. We do not want to be supporting bad law that does not work, bad law that is confusing, bad law that captures people who should be not captured and infringes their human rights, and bad law that fails to capture the people who pose a significant risk to the public safety of New Zealanders but manage to fall outside the cracks. We do not want to pass law like that. We want to pass good law. We cannot do that in a circumstance where it has been drafted hastily, the policy has been developed without any consultation, and there is no chance of an external review from the experts who deal with this sort of stuff every day on the ground.

I would just end on Amy Adams’ own words, where she said that the drafting of this policy of the law could have gone one step too far or could have been one step too low. The problem, of course, is that we do not know that. We do not know whether the balance has been struck, because we have not got any advice or any information from anywhere but within the Minister’s own office. That is not adequate when you are in the lawmaking process. It is not what the democratic lawmaking process should be about. Thank you.

DENIS O’ROURKE (NZ First): We in New Zealand First accept that we have a rather novel situation here. We also accept that it is not of the Government’s making. I have already criticised the Australian Government for that, and am not going to go back there. I have also criticised John Key for some of his behaviour over it. Again, I am not going back there now. But I do want to say that I think we should all see this bill as a starting point, and that there is going to be a journey after this, to continue to deal with what is happening in terms of the return of offenders from Australia to New Zealand, and that the bill will need review. I am glad to see that there is a review provision in it so that we can do that. There are going to be a number of areas where there are provisions that may, in the end, prove to be inappropriate or that are likely to cause problems or that, in fact, prove to be unfair.

I am certain that we are going to see all of that happen within the next 2 years, but New Zealand First does accept that the matter is extremely urgent because of what the Australians have done to us and because there is actually going to be a significant—very significant—number of people returning from Australia to New Zealand, and that is going to happen within a matter of days. So we accept that this is a pretty good attempt at some legislation in the first instance, but we do not accept that it will be the end and we think that the review will be necessary and changes will have to be made in due course. So we accept and we will support this bill, warts and all, because it is certainly better than nothing at all. Nothing at all would, in fact, mean relative chaos, so the urgency is obvious and the need for some fairly comprehensive legislation is clear. This is better than nothing. It is not as good as I would have liked to see in terms of the refinement of some of the provisions, some of which I am going to refer to in a moment.

But the bill is saved by clause 37, which requires the Justice and Electoral Committee to review the whole bill after 2 years and then to report to Parliament. Implicit in that is that the Government will be willing to make changes. It does not say that. There is no actual commitment from this Government—if indeed it is still here in 2 years—to make the changes that may be needed. However, I welcome the provision for the review and I am sure it will be taken seriously by all concerned.

New Zealand First does have areas of concern, which I briefly referred to in my first reading speech. One of those areas is clause 10, and clause 10 relates to detention by police for the purpose of obtaining identifying particulars. Clause 10(1) allows detention of an offender at any time within 6 months of return, and I wonder whether that provision is actually reasonable because one would expect that if any action needs to be taken, it would need to be taken well within 6 months of an offender’s return. So I raise the simple question—why so long? Surely that period is too long and ought to be reduced. In fact, where people have committed only obviously minor offences, then I think that perhaps there needs to be some way of sifting those people out so that they are not subject to the full rigour of what we see in clause 10.

One of the other provisions, in clause 10(2), refers to police detention for the purpose of taking identifying particulars at any time within 6 months and states: “A constable may detain an offender … only for a period that is no longer than is reasonably necessary in the circumstances …”. What on earth does “no longer than is reasonably necessary in the circumstances” really mean? It is actually a very wide power conferred on the police for them to judge how long that may be, and I would prefer to see a maximum period prescribed in the Act rather than to rely on such a wide and indefinite term.

That is not the only issue because, relating to how the particulars are taken, we see that clause 11 states that a constable: “(a) must do so in a manner that is reasonable … and (b) may only use reasonable force … to secure those identifying particulars.” So there is a tremendous reliability on reasonableness and reasonableness of the police. I think that the police usually are very reasonable but there are many cases that one could point to in which they have not been. So New Zealand First is a little concerned about the breadth of those provisions and the reliance on the reasonableness of police actions. I accept that those particular provisions will probably be used only in relation to samples for DNA testing and not for other areas, but, if that is the case, why is it not restricted to just that. I do not understand why it is as wide as it has been stated. That is one of the areas that may cause difficulty in the future, so it is a concern to us and maybe that is something that we could discuss further in the Committee stage of the bill.

The final area—actually the penultimate area in which I wish to express some general concern—relates to clauses 26 and 27, and these relate to special conditions that may be imposed by the court, and the kinds of conditions are specified to be the kinds that are set out in the Parole Act. Having just reviewed the Parole Act, we can, I think, all be relatively satisfied that those are generally reasonable conditions, but I still suspect that the breadth and definition of this power for the court may actually cause problems. The reason I say that is because the basis is in terms of events that have occurred overseas, convictions that have occurred overseas, and circumstances that have occurred overseas, and I just feel that that may lead to difficulties when it comes to imposing appropriate conditions.

I do note, however, with some satisfaction that there are limitations on that. Clause 26(2) states: “A court must not impose a special condition for a longer period than the period for which the standard release conditions apply to the returning prisoner.” And clause 26(3) states: “A court may not impose a special condition unless it is designed to—(a) reduce the risk of reoffending … or (b) facilitate or promote the rehabilitation and reintegration of the returning prisoner; or (c) provide for the reasonable concerns of victims of the returning prisoner.” Those are well worthwhile provisions.

But clause 27(3) is an area of general concern. Again, nothing absolutely specific, but when you read the words in subclause (3) it states: “to avoid doubt, a court may impose interim special conditions on the information that is then available to the court, even though that information is incomplete or additional information is still being sought.” So that power for the court to impose quite serious conditions on incomplete or unreliable information is, for New Zealand First, another area of concern. The application may be made without notice but the special conditions will expire after a period of 30 working days. Nevertheless, I just express a general concern over that particular provision.

The last part relates to Subpart 3—people returning more than 6 months after release from custody. There is some possible difficulty over that, in that a person must have been under some kind of supervision or something like an extended supervision order or a public protection order for the subpart to apply, and yet I still feel that there is room for concern that after 6 months the ability to impose those conditions may not be appropriate.

ALFRED NGARO (National): I rise to take a brief call on the second reading of the Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill in its stages before the House. I just want to make comment to Mr O’Rourke that I agree with his comments. I work with Mr O’Rourke on the Justice and Electoral Committee and I know, as he said, that we both agree that the bill is important and that it needs to be rushed through under urgency because of the concerns that there are in regard to safety, particularly around the supervision and the monitoring.

So my brief comments on the second reading of the bill are particularly in relation to Subparts 2 and 3 of Part 2. These define the returning prisoners and establish a supervision regime for them to be administered by the Department of Corrections on a basis comparable with its supervision of prisoners released on conditions as well, whether or not they be non-custodial. Some of those conditions are that the Department of Corrections will be able to apply to a court for a period of supervision for offenders who have been in the community for more than 6 months where they were subject to supervision or monitoring at the time of their leaving the other jurisdiction as well.

The second point is that under the supervision regime returning prisoners will be supervised in the same way as those who have served a prison sentence in New Zealand as well. The regime will also apply regardless of whether the offender is deported, removed, or returns voluntarily. As I said in my first reading speech in regard to the regulatory impact statement, we know that of those who are returning offenders, over 70 percent of them have committed crimes of a serious nature, so it is important that the supervision regime is in place.

The last point I want to make is that the length of supervision periods will be related to the length of sentences imposed. For example, offenders with a sentence of 2 to 5 years will be supervised for 1 year, which is similar to what would be in place for prisoners released in New Zealand. Along with my colleague Denis O’Rourke, who has just left, I agree with the urgency with which this legislation is passing through the House, and I commend it in its second reading.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): The next call is a split call. David Clendon—5 minutes.

DAVID CLENDON (Green): At this stage in the proceedings we are normally debating a bill as reported back from a select committee. That is the nature of the second reading of a bill. After the first reading a bill is sent off to a select committee. Typically there will be a period of some 6 weeks or so when the public and interested parties can make submissions. The select committee then hears some of those submissions orally. We will sit around a table, with all parties represented, and we will hear what the general public and people with some expertise have to say about the provisions of a draft bill. From that, we cogitate, digest, and come back to the House, I think, almost inevitably with something better than was first presented as a draft bill. I think every drafter of a bill, be they a Minister or a member, will confess that bills are seldom perfect at first blush, but they are improved.

We have been denied that opportunity with this bill, and I think that is significant, given the public interest in it and the fact that it does make a number of people in our communities uneasy. We have already had proof just in the last few days that broader consultation has actually generated some improvements to this bill. I think there is some irony in the fact that in the regulatory impact statement, which, as I said earlier, we only got to see at about 3 o’clock this afternoon, the point is made in paragraph 98: “The timeframe for developing the proposals”—being the policy proposals on this bill—“did not allow consultation with the public. The Parliamentary process for options requiring legislation will get an opportunity for public consultation.” Unfortunately, that has been denied to members of the public because of this urgency process. It is not a defensible process.

Yes, there is some need to get this legislation through. We concede, and we have, the need for some haste. We do not accept, however, that even a truncated select committee process was beyond the means of this Government. We could have reasonably expected to hear from the Law Society, the lawyers and the judiciary who will obviously have a role in the implementation of this legislation. They are generally quite good at spotting fish-hooks and operational matters that we as legislators might miss. We almost certainly would have heard from the Human Rights Commission. We know from the report on compliance with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act—which, again, we have had access to for barely 2 or 3 hours—that there are concerns about that, particularly around the bodily samples issue. We could reasonably have expected to hear from advocacy groups like Rethinking Crime and Punishment, like JustSpeak, like the Howard League for Penal Reform, and like Prison Fellowship New Zealand—organisations that are credible with good, evidence-based contributions to make with long experience in working with offenders both in prison and after their release.

These people could have made a really valuable contribution to developing this legislation. They could have made it better, and they are now to be denied that opportunity because this is being done with such unseemly and unnecessary haste, going from go to whoa in a matter of 2 hours on a Tuesday when Opposition parties have had only a few days to look at the draft bill and did not get a final look at the bill as we are debating it until about 11 o’clock this morning. We could even have heard from the New Zealand Police and the Department of Corrections. I suspect that Police might have had some points to make about the impact on their budget as a result of the requirements on them to enforce this. We know that Police are already overstretched in budgetary terms. This legislation will add to their concerns and it would have been useful for them to have an opportunity to say that.

I mentioned earlier that this bill has been improved, given that the Opposition had a few days, essentially, over the weekend to think on it, look at it, and give feedback. A number of the improvements include the mandatory review. The Minister has suggested 2 years. We agree with our Labour colleagues that that is far too long. The 2 years will expire slap bang in the middle of—or very shortly after—the next general election, which means, realistically, that it will probably be nearer to 3 years before a review is completed. We should have a review at least within a year, if not sooner.

The identifying particulars that returning offenders will be obliged to give will reflect the Policing Act. We think that is a good thing. It does narrow the scope. It means that we are not going on a fishing expedition. We will get the necessary information and nothing more than that. We managed to get more information available in determination orders. I will come to the specifics in the Committee stage. For now I express our regret at this very poor process.

PEENI HENARE (Labour—Tāmaki Makaurau): Tēnā koe, Mr Assistant Speaker. Thank you very much for this opportunity. I rise for the second reading of this particular bill. I want to echo many of the sentiments of concern raised by my colleagues, in particular on this side of the House. But before I do that, I do want to just point out a comment made by the member Mr Naylor during the first reading around being convicted before being imprisoned. Recently, on 5 November, I remember Parihaka, and Te Whiti o Rongomai and Tohu Kākahi, who were imprisoned without trial or conviction.

Anyway, I digress—and now to the points of this particular bill. We do agree that it is necessary for a particular regime or a system to be put in place. Admittedly, we acknowledge that this is somewhat of a knee-jerk reaction, and if there is one saying I am sick and tired of hearing in this House, and even repeating in this House, it is: “Well, I guess this is better than nothing.” It seems to be a theme that is running across a lot of the policy agenda and the legislation agenda of this Government, and here is another case. Members on this side of the House have expressed concern around the democratic process that most bills go through, and around just how fast this particular bill has been rushed in.

The member opposite, Jacqui Dean, has mentioned that a robust conversation was held in particular by many of the Government departments, and those Government departments, we know, are the Department of Corrections and the Police. But I do want to just echo and support the point made by the Green members about some of the other organisations in our communities who play a vital role in prisoner rehabilitation as it currently stands in New Zealand. I am sure they have a lot to contribute and a lot to comment on in terms of this particular legislation, however they have been denied that particular opportunity.

Also, just on the comment about the consultation or the discussion that was had by Government agencies, I see too that in clause 15(e), in Part 2, it talks about how the Department of Corrections can make applications to the “appropriate court”, and in the bill it describes it as the District Court. The Justice and Electoral Committee, members of which are in this House, will know about some of the capacity issues that have hit the courts in recent times, in particular down south, and that some of them have been closed. I just question the actual capacity of Government departments and Government agencies to deal with this particular bill.

I briefly mentioned earlier rehabilitation and the importance of it. The definition, to my mind, of rehabilitation is a planned intervention that attempts to change or alter whatever aspects that caused the prisoner’s criminal activities—things such as interpersonal relationships, behaviour, addictions and addressing those issues. This is in the hope that the likelihood of recidivism is decreased.

We are debating, in particular, two of the streams, or capacities if you like, of this particular regime, and one of them is around a returning prisoner and the other one is talking about other offenders. We have some concerns around that and around the need for more rehabilitation services.

I do want to support the notion put forward by my colleague Mr Kelvin Davis around the support from the Māori rehabilitation angle, in which I think the marae can play an important part. I want to mention Waatea Marae in Tāmaki-makau-rau, which, as far as I know, is certainly one of those points that can assist with this type of legislation and the return of our citizens back to New Zealand. Kia ora.

JONO NAYLOR (National): Firstly, can I just acknowledge the history lesson from the member opposite, Mr Henare. It was a good reminder, I guess, that there have been times in New Zealand when things have been less than ideal, and, hopefully, as we continue to improve things right across history, we can now make sure that some of those things do not ever happen again and we can have legislation that will be good for New Zealand.

This, as I said in the first reading, is good legislation for New Zealand, because paramount behind this legislation is the protection of New Zealanders in order to keep them as safe as we possibly can—in this instance, from people who are returning from overseas who have been deported because of their criminal behaviour. There is an expectation, as I said in my first reading speech, that New Zealanders can expect that we will have similar sorts of provisions in place for people who have been serving time overseas as for those who have been serving time in New Zealand.

There has been—and I guess I would expect there to be, anyway—a certain level of concern about people’s civil rights in this kind of legislation, but I think, ultimately, we have got to find that balance between people’s civil rights and safety. I think it is important to highlight that this regime is going to apply only to offenders returning to New Zealand within 6 months of being released from custody. So we are not talking about those people who perhaps are just being deported for issues of character and we are not talking about just those people who have had issues with speeding fines or otherwise, but we are very much targeting those people who have committed crimes that have had custodial sentences attributed to their crime.

So what we now need to do is have something in place to ensure that if they are going to be returned to New Zealand, whether it is against their will or otherwise, we reintegrate them in the best possible way we can. That is exactly what this bill sets out to do, and so I commend it to the House.

Hon DAVID PARKER (Labour): David Shearer, in his contribution in the first reading debate, said that as he understood it, offenders from Australia who have been convicted and returned to New Zealand following conviction are arriving in New Zealand without particulars being provided to the New Zealand Government at the time as to what the offences were that they were convicted of in Australia and perhaps sometimes when they are arriving. I want to hear from the Government whether that is the case, because there are only two explanations for that. Either there is irresponsible behaviour on the part of the Australian Government—firing convicted criminals back to New Zealand without telling the New Zealand authorities enough information so that New Zealand authorities can protect New Zealanders in case they need to be protected—or there has been absolute incompetence by the New Zealand Government in not getting that information, which could have been made available if it had asked early enough. Those are the only two explanations I can think of, and I want to hear if—

Hon Michael Woodhouse: There are many others.

Hon DAVID PARKER: Well, the Minister of Police interjects that there may be many others. Take a call and tell us what is happening—

Hon Michael Woodhouse: Well, wait for the Committee stage.

Hon DAVID PARKER: “Well, wait for the Committee stage.”, he says. Well, it would be nice if one of your members could actually take a call and address these important issues now.

I want to turn to another issue. You know, this bill was dropped on us. The first time we saw the wording of this bill in detail—the outline of it had been provided by Amy Adams to Jacinda Ardern. But in terms of actually seeing the legislation in written form—which has changed even in the last day, as I said in an earlier contribution—was after question time today, at about 3.30. We then had the first reading and we were all preparing for that. We are now into the second reading—and it is not even yet 6 o’clock—and I have had a chance to read through it a little bit further.

I am concerned that we are ousting the jurisdiction of the court to overturn an improper determination by the commissioner of whether someone meets the criteria for being a returning prisoner that would trigger the provisions under clause 24, which says that a returning prisoner is then subject to standard release conditions. Clause 17 sets out the criteria to be applied to where the commissioner must determine that the person is a returning prisoner, and then it sets out what should be in a determination notice. Then it says that someone can apply to the Commissioner of Police to review that determination—that is set out in clause 22 of the bill—and then it says in clause 28 of the bill that a court may vary or discharge those release conditions, except that in clause 28(2) it says: “A court must not discharge a standard release condition with effect from a date that is less than 6 months after the date … of the determination notice.”

I want to hear from the Government as to whether it thinks it is ousting the jurisdiction of the New Zealand courts to say that the commissioner was acting illegally and applying the wrong criteria during that 6-month period, because, I tell you what, if I had come back from overseas and I had had a traffic conviction or something and been convicted of an imprisonable offence overseas—and it is not just Australia that this legislation applies to—and I got back here and was slammed with one of these notices that said that I was all of a sudden subject to these notices and I thought it was wrong, I would actually want to go to the court and challenge it. I would not be happy with only having the right to go to the Commissioner of the Police and say: “Please trust me, I’m a good criminal. Let me off.” You know, I think that if the effect of this legislation is that we are ousting the jurisdiction of the court to consider these things in that period, then that is poor legislation and it goes too far.

I am not sure that that is the effect of clause 28(2) of the bill, but it does say that a court must not discharge a standard release condition with effect from a date that is less than 6 months after the date of service of the determination notice being given, so it is arguable, I suppose, that during that 6-month period the court does not have jurisdiction. It may be that you can take a judicial review route, but I am not sure—it is not clear from this bill.

This reinforces the point that the Labour Party made, which is that we should have a two-track process here. We should be passing this bill under urgency because we have got no choice but to do it in order to protect people now, and it should have a drop-dead date of a year—a termination date. On the same date, we should be passing an identical bill through only the first stage, and that bill should commence on the termination date of the bill that is a short-term fix. It should not have a drop-dead date, but it should go to the select committee, and then we can sort out through submissions from the Law Society, from the Sensible Sentencing Trust—although, I do not often listen to it; it does not often have much good sense to pay, but it does have a right to make submissions—from Rape Crisis, from the civil liberties groups, and from all in the civil society who have got an interest in these things. That is how a proper Government would deal with this conundrum, but this Government has refused to do it.

Finally, I also hear that some of these people are getting back to New Zealand with no money and no ties and are ending up sitting on the Work and Income doorstep the next morning because they have been delivered into the hands of New Zealand without any support being provided to them. I would hope that as the Government sort of realises that this problem needs to be addressed, it also looks at what it needs to do to minimise the prospect of those people reoffending and to maximise the chance that they can be meaningfully reintegrated into our community in a way that means that they do not end up reoffending against other New Zealanders.

I, again, return to this point as to whether we have got the balance right between protecting New Zealanders from returning criminals—we are not clear that we have got that right in this legislation and we do not have time to properly consider that under urgency; that should be being considered on a parallel track in the bill that should go to the select committee—and, similarly, whether we are going too far in regard to some people who ought not to be caught up in this and truncating their ability to go to court to test whether they are being properly caught up in it. That too could have been sorted out in the parallel-track process of the second bill, which could have gone to the select committee today—today. I think it just shows a complete lack of proper process on the part of the Government that not only would it leave it so late to bring this legislation to Parliament but, having forced it upon Parliament, it will not actually agree to us letting that occur.

The idea that the Government would itself review things in 2 years—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): I am sorry to interrupt the honourable member. The time has come for me to leave the Chair for the dinner break.

Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m.

Hon DAVID PARKER: Before the dinner break I was talking about why it was important, given that urgency has been accorded to this bill, given that we have already found some defects in the bill, and given that we do not know whether it goes far enough to protect the interests of potential victims being subject to crime by these returning criminals—and, conversely, we do not know whether it goes too far and catches people in the net who ought not to be caught, and we cannot know in this truncated process because the Government has taken so long to get this bill to the House that urgency is necessary, but none the less the normal protections that follow normal processes have not been applied—that we should have a two-stage process, with two versions of the bill being read a first time now. The offer was made to the Government that one of them would have a drop-dead date, or an end date, of a year or 2 years—we were not too fixed on the specific date—and that that bill would be passed through all stages today. At the same time we would have a bill that was identical in all respects, except that it would take effect only from the drop-dead date of the first bill and would pass only one stage and then go to a select committee.

The Minister’s answer was that the Government was planning a review in a few years anyway. Well, it is completely different, and, of course, it is a review by the Government and the Government departments. If it gets this legislation wrong in ways that could have been fixed at a select committee, it is not going to say in 2 years’ time or 3 years’ time: “Oh, we got this all wrong, guys.” It will be minimising the problems. It will be saying: “Oh well, it was all right. There was this little detail that perhaps ought to have been fixed.”

That is the difference between the Government being able to do things by itself and Parliament having oversight. If it was good enough for the Government just to do things quickly by itself without parliamentary oversight and public submissions from groups like the Law Society, the Council for Civil Liberties, Rape Crisis, and other victim groups—if that was the way in which we ought to properly do things, we actually would not have the normal three stages of legislation and the select committee process. I am dismayed that the Government has not taken up that very sensible offer that we made.

TIM MACINDOE (National—Hamilton West): This is a very important measure, which needs to be enacted as quickly as possible. I welcome the broad support it is attracting throughout the House.

Bill read a second time.

In Committee

Part 1 Preliminary provisions

JACINDA ARDERN (Labour): This bill obviously sits in two rather concise parts. Part 1 is really the opportunity for the Committee to talk about the relevant legislation, which this bill heavily references. I think it is really important that we make sure that those references are accurate. As a member from the Greens has already pointed out, where the bill was seeking to mirror the legislation that sets out what identifying particulars the police can seek, it actually went broader and further than existing legislation in New Zealand. I think it is important that we pay attention under the preliminary provisions to ensure that this bill does not overreach. Because as the Minister said in her first reading speech, she has tried to draft a piece of legislation that substantively mimics existing legislation in New Zealand. So that is why in my contribution to the Committee I will be looking at the comparisons between this bill and existing legislation.

I want to start with the purpose clause because obviously in the purpose clause you would hope that the Government would capture the primary aim of this legislation. The purpose clause states that “The purpose of this Act is to obtain information from returning offenders …”. Note there that it is from returning offenders. There is an absence of talking about, obviously, the agreement that we have signed with Australia, because we know now from the Minister of Justice that we are receiving incomplete information for some offenders. So we are in this Act setting out how we will obtain information from returning offenders and, secondly, “establish release conditions for offenders returning to New Zealand following a prison sentence of more than 1 year in an overseas jurisdiction.”

There are two really important points in that purpose clause. Firstly, there is the question around the other jurisdictions. We are talking about just overseas jurisdictions in this purpose clause. A lot of the discussion in this House has been restricted to Australia. I would find it really helpful if the Minister in the chair could share with us, because none of the regulatory impact statements discuss any additional analysis carried out beyond Australia, what kind of information-sharing agreements we have with other overseas jurisdictions that will allow this bill to apply to them? How workable is it for those overseas jurisdictions? With New Zealand and Australia we know we have comparable legislation. Is it possible to make sure that we interpret overseas offences in the same way for a jurisdiction that goes beyond Australia? That is the first point.

The second point from the purpose clause is that nowhere in that purpose clause does it talk about the safety of the community, reintegration, or rehabilitation. The words, again, are simply to “establish release conditions”. The reason I raise this is that within the Parole Act, which is heavily cross-referenced in this legislation, yes, there is a relatively short purpose clause but that is because within the Parole Act 2002 it was pretty groundbreaking in the fact that it established a set of what were called guiding principles. So section 7 of the first part of the Parole Act 2002 talks about the guiding principles of the Parole Act, an excellent piece of legislation that the Hon Phil Goff worked tirelessly on right up until 2002 when it was introduced. Some of those guiding principles are around the way that the Parole Board itself makes a decision about the release of a prisoner. Obviously that goes beyond the jurisdiction of this purpose clause because the decision has already been made for release. But it also goes to the guiding principles of release conditions.

For instance, we see in the relevant guiding principles of the Parole Act, which is heavily cross-referenced in this bill, that in section 7(2)(a): “Other principles that must guide the Board’s decisions are—(a) that offenders must not be detained any longer than is consistent with the safety of the community, and that they must not be subject to release conditions that are more onerous, or last longer, than is consistent with the safety of the community;”. Those would have been useful guiding principles to establish in the purpose clause of this legislation because, as the Minister has set out, we are trying to mirror that legislation in this legislation and those guiding principles sitting alongside that purpose clause would have given, I think, some groups both the comfort and the satisfaction that we are not trying to apply here double jeopardy, an extra layer of conditions on someone who has already served their time, but rather a proportionate set of conditions. So that was a lost opportunity, I think, in that purpose clause not to have, say, some principle clause alongside it.

Coming back, then, to the idea, though, of reintegration and reducing reoffending. If we look at the regulatory impact statement, when it talked about the purpose of this bill, it said that “The overarching goals are to protect the public from reoffending, and provide greater support for the reintegration of returning offenders.” That, in the executive summary of the regulatory impact statement, is meant to be the main goal of this bill, and yet none of that language is contained in the purpose clause. Because if, for instance, you were looking to the overarching goal of protecting the public from reoffending and providing greater support, you would surely use the evidence that the Ministry of Justice has around what the most successful way to prevent reoffending is.

I had a little look on the Ministry of Justice website to find what it was setting out as best practice when it comes to reducing reoffending. It has a little document here called “Effective interventions to reduce re-offending”. Again, if that was the primary purpose of this bill, I would have expected some of this to be contained in the purpose clause, or even in the bill. But when we look at this set of guidelines—yes, it does pertain to youth offending, because, obviously, that has been a focus of the Ministry of Justice. It is an area where we assume that we have a better opportunity to reduce reoffending, but the principles are the same. It states: “Good interventions that reduce re-offending are based on key principles to ensure they are effective when implemented, and include key components …”. These are the key components—this is what I would have expected, either in the purpose clause or, at least, in Part 1 of the bill: “To ensure interventions are effective they: start with a good assessment of a person in the context of their friends, family, whānau, and community to identify needs and re-offending risks.” Nowhere do we see, in the purpose clause or in this bill, set out that there would be any analysis of that kind of those offenders.

Secondly, “work with the young person holistically to provide timely and appropriate support …”. We know there is no support set out in this bill for those being reintegrated, because there was not even a Budget bid made for it—it is simply around monitoring. Also, “focus on getting a young person back into education and training …”—and in this case it would be work—and “focus on transition back into the community”. So if the overarching goal, according to the regulatory impact statement, was protecting the public from reoffending, I would have expected to see some of the Ministry of Justice’s guiding principles around reducing reoffending somewhere up front in this bill. They are completely absent, not just from the purpose clause but from the bill itself.

Instead, what does it canvass as the options? In the regulatory impact statement, option 1 is enhanced support services; option 2 is registration and monitoring of returned offenders—and we know that the definition of those is set out in Part 1; option 3 is a mandatory system imposing release conditions on specified groups of offenders; option 4 is a discretionary system where the District Court imposes release conditions on individual offenders. We have, essentially, in this bill a hybrid of options 3 and 4. Maybe that is why the purpose clause has not included anything that speaks to the wider issue of community safety by reducing reoffending, because it did not opt for that option. It could have combined them, but that is not what the bill has provided.

I want to come down a little further, under the interpretation clause, because as I have set out, we need to make sure that we analyse each of these clauses to check that they are being used appropriately. I want to ask the Minister in the chair a question though. Under “overseas jurisdiction” it includes the self-governing States of the Cook Islands, Niue, and Tokelau. Why has that been included? It “excludes the islands and territories within the Realm …” but not the protectorate. Is there anything to suggest from Niue or the Cook Islands or Tokelau that they plan on bringing in a regime like that? Because, otherwise, it seems interesting to me that they are specifically included in this regime and in this monitoring regime.

KELVIN DAVIS (Labour—Te Tai Tokerau): I would just like to follow on, obviously, from Jacinda Ardern, who has raised some very good points about the purpose of this bill—that is, the purpose being “to obtain information from returning offenders and establish release conditions for offenders …” There is nothing there about rehabilitation and the reduction of reoffending. These people, who are going to arrive on our doorstep within the coming days, have no support conditions around them to help them get back on their feet, having been deported from their support systems—their family and friends—which, as Jacinda Ardern says, is one of the key elements of reducing reoffending and helping people to rehabilitate.

But I just want to touch on the release conditions, and release conditions in the interpretation clause mean “a standard release condition or a special condition”. I have pulled out the Department of Corrections information from its website there. It says: “Standard conditions apply to all offenders and can include: reporting regularly to community probation.” That sounds well and good for somebody who has been released from a New Zealand prison out into their community near their family and friends, but what happens to these men and women who have turned up in New Zealand, who have no connection to New Zealand, and who might arrive in Auckland, for example, but find that the best place for them, somewhere where they can try to find work or maybe establish themselves with a family member, is somewhere else around the country?

I take the example of Raymond—and I forget his last name again, sorry—who left New Zealand as a young child and lived all his life in Australia. He is 50-something now, but he originally came from somewhere near Dunedin. On his return to New Zealand, he has been put up by a compassionate couple up in Whangarei. For now, Whangarei is where he is living, and he may have to report to a community probation officer in Whangarei, but the reality is that he does not have a job in Whangarei and he is looking for work elsewhere. So he is going to be moving around the country to various places while he is looking for work, and it is going to be difficult for him to find where those community probation offices are in the various towns that he may have to move to in order to earn a living.

So there are restrictions on living and working arrangements. Well, the biggest restriction for them is the fact that they do not have anywhere to live. They arrive in New Zealand, I am told that they will get a couple of hundred dollars in their back pocket and then 5 nights in a motel or hotel somewhere, and then they are on their own. How on earth are their living arrangements going to be restricted when they have nowhere to live? Will they be banned from living in shop doorways on Lambton Quay or under bridges in Auckland?

There are restrictions on associating with certain people. Look, these guys are going to turn up in New Zealand with no support networks around them, no family, no friends, and nobody to turn to. I have already said in the second reading that my concern is that they are going to be just fodder for gang members, who are going to see these guys who they know have possibly been in prison and in detention centres. They will be ripe pickings for the Killer Beez, the Mongrel Mob, and the Headhunters, without the support networks around them, which are really necessary. Remember, this bill addresses just the monitoring of release conditions; it does not address anything around supporting them in their social environment.

Another standard condition is the limitations on the offender’s ability to move to a new residential address. Well, it goes without saying that they are going to have difficulty moving to a new residential address. In fact, they are going to have difficulty moving to any address, let alone to a new residential address. We understand that these conditions are there so that if they are a sex offender, they do not actually end up living next to a school or a park or a playground or an early childhood centre or somewhere where there are vulnerable people. We understand that. But it is one thing to have these standard release conditions for prisoners released from New Zealand prisons; it is another thing to have them for people who are coming back from Australia from detention centres or having been released from prison in Australia.

I would also just like to touch on the interpretation clause—and again I spoke about this in the second reading—and the definition of a “returning offender” and a “returning prisoner”. “A ‘returning offender’—(a) is a person who has been convicted in an overseas jurisdiction of an offence for conduct that constitutes an imprisonable offence in New Zealand and, being liable for deportation or removal as a result of that conviction, has returned to New Zealand; and (b) includes a returning prisoner.” The other one is the criterion for a person returning as a prisoner, I think it is meant to say—the wording in the heading in clause 17 is a bit weird. “The Commissioner must determine that a person is a returning prisoner if the Commissioner is satisfied that the person—(a) has been convicted in an overseas jurisdiction of an offence for conduct that constitutes an imprisonable offence in New Zealand; and (b) has, in respect of that conviction, been sentenced to—(i) a term of imprisonment of more than 1 year; or (ii) 2 or more terms of imprisonment that are cumulative,”.

The reason I raise this is if you look at Kō Rūtene, a guy who has not been charged, let alone imprisoned, let alone detained—do conditions like this apply to a man like Kō Rūtene, who is detained in a detention centre or a prison in Australia without charges and may, in time, be sent back to New Zealand? Does this—

Hon Amy Adams: No.

KELVIN DAVIS: The Minister is shaking her head. So Kō Rūtene will come back to New Zealand, if he is deported, and he will just fit back into society? That is good to hear—that is good to hear. The question is why on earth he is locked up in Australia in the first place, and our Government is doing nothing to address that. Maybe it has information that we do not know, but it just seems really strange on face value that this is a guy who was there to protect the Prime Minister in Afghanistan and would have laid down his life if he had to, and yet the Prime Minister will not get off his feet in order to assist that gentleman.

As we go through this bill, no doubt there is going to be a number of issues that we raise. Again, the whole speed of this process has meant that there are, I believe, drafting errors. I will just return to the heading of clause 7, which says “Who is returning offender”. That does not quite make sense to me. The heading for clause 17, “Criteria for determination that person is returning prisoner”—again, the old schoolteacher in me is slightly offended by the grammar. Maybe I am just missing something in my naivety, but as we go through I am sure that more errors will emerge. It is just an example of why it is necessary to take our time in drafting legislation and not rushing it through, as this has been, in 12 days, I believe—because we have known that this situation has been on the cards for the last 12 months. Kia ora.

CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka): Normally in this part of a Committee stage debate we would have the opportunity to reflect on comments that submitters to the select committee had made, and so on. Many of the things that we would reflect on at this point in the proceedings would be whether the bill is going to meet the stated purpose; whether there were other options that were not considered that should have been; whether, in fact, there are parts of the bill that do not address some of the issues that it purports to address; and whether there are, in fact, gaps in the legislation. Of course, our ability to do that comprehensively and thoroughly is somewhat constrained in this instance, because the bill has not been to a select committee. It has had its first and second readings already today, and it will probably be passed into law, if not tonight then certainly at some point tomorrow. Therefore we have to, I guess, guess at what people might have said when they were submitting, and try to identify the gaps in the legislation within a very short and constrained period of time.

The first thing that leaps out at me in reading through the legislation is one of the big gaps, for me, and that is if the purpose of this bill is to identify people who will be at risk of reoffending when they are deported to New Zealand, the first question that I have is not about whether we should be fingerprinting them and all of those things, which the bill adequately deals with; it is about what this bill does about reintegration and support within the community for people who have offended whilst in Australia, for people whose base is primarily in Australia—or another country, because, of course, this bill is not specific only to Australia. There is nothing in the bill that deals to that.

Of course, reintegration is one of the most important factors in preventing reoffending. Everybody who works within the corrections system will say that for a prisoner who has recently been released—and bear in mind, the types of offenders whom we are talking about in this legislation have been released only within the last 6 months or so—the amount of support they get within the community during those critical first few months is actually a big factor in whether or not they are likely to go on and reoffend. There is very little in the bill that deals with that issue.

The second part of the bill that leapt out at me was the fact that this requires the Department of Corrections to trigger things in the first place. There is nothing automatic about this. This requires the Department of Corrections to be on top of things, and I have to say I have some real concerns, given the recent performance of the Department of Corrections, as to whether or not it is actually up to the job of doing that. We have seen huge issues and huge concerns raised about the performance of the Department of Corrections, and yet we are now placing this enormous emphasis on it being the agency that would have to instigate any of these things to take place. That concerns me greatly.

So we come back to the basic question, which is: why are we here, what are we trying to achieve, and will this bill actually deliver on it? Our priority is, and I am sure, actually, this is a shared priority across all of Parliament, keeping New Zealanders safe—keeping New Zealanders safe and making sure that we are adequately monitoring and supporting people who have previously been sentenced to a term of imprisonment who are released into the community. We should not approach that differently if they have been released from a term of imprisonment in a different country from the way we would approach it if they had been released in New Zealand. That is a principle that I think we all support. The question is whether, in fact, this bill adequately addresses that.

There are also questions that I have around the fairness of the way this legislation is being approached and the fairness of the way some of the people who find themselves subject to this might be treated. I have got questions about why the 6-month provision applies in the way that it does. As I said a moment ago, this applies to people who have been released from prison within the last 6 months. What if it was 7 months? What if it was a serious offence that they were released from only 7 months ago? How does the 6-month time frame get arrived at? That is something that I would very much like to hear further feedback on.

The purpose clause, clause 3, which I want to turn my attention to, makes it clear that these provisions apply only to someone who is “returning to New Zealand following a prison sentence of more than 1 year in an overseas jurisdiction.” I think that this is something that people at home would maybe get a little confused by, given some of the recent rhetoric around that. So, yes, this bill would cover rapists and murderers, absolutely, but it is also going to cover a number of offenders who are much, much lower down the scale of offending. Some, you could even say, would be deemed to be petty crimes, although the phrase “petty crime” is something that I am hesitant to use, because all crime is a crime, at the end of the day.

But these are people shoplifting, for example—in some areas that would have a prison sentence of more than 1 year, so someone could be deported back to New Zealand for shoplifting and they would fall within this category. There are probably some vehicular offences that may end up in this category as well, and I think we should consider all of the range of offences that might be covered by this legislation and not simply say that the only people who are going to be covered by this are rapists, murderers, child sex offenders, and so on. That is not the case. It is going to cover quite a spectrum of people, and the response to the different levels of offending needs to be different. Again, there is very scarce detail from the Government in the supporting material supplied around this bill for how that response will be different, depending on the nature of the offending that has taken place.

We are only on Part 1 now, and I want to get into the substance of some of my wider concerns when we get to Part 2, which contains, I think, the operative clauses of this. But I do want to put on record just my general concern about the gaps in the legislation, because simply collecting the information and bringing someone under the purview of the Department of Corrections actually, really, is just a fraction of the situation. I am far more interested in what the Government is going to do to support reintegration.

If we are looking at people who have been living overseas for a long period of time, they may have no roots in New Zealand whatsoever—no connection with the communities that they find themselves in. They will be isolated, and, in fact, fingerprinting them, even putting them under supervision, is not going to change that, unless they are supported. They are still going to be just as likely to reoffend, even if they have had all their fingerprints taken and are being supervised. They are still just as likely to reoffend if they do not have the adequate support in place. I do not have any satisfaction or any evidence to suggest that the Government is truly prepared for that and truly has a plan in place for how to deal with that. Although the Labour Party is certainly supporting this legislation through—because we support the intent of the legislation, which is to keep New Zealanders safe—let us not overlook the fact that this legislation has not had the scrutiny that it deserves and that it should, in fact, be more thoroughly examined.

The final point that I want to make in this, my first contribution to this debate, and I hope to make many, many more, is I hope—

Jacinda Ardern: Many?

CHRIS HIPKINS: Oh, many, many more. I hope that this legislation will be re-examined in relatively short order. Whilst I can understand why the Government wants to progress this legislation with some urgency now, because it has not dealt with the issue adequately up until now—it has known about this for a year, and it has taken it that long to bring it to the House, and therefore we have no choice but to progress it under urgency now—I hope that will not preclude it actually having a more thorough examination farther down the track. I hope that the House will be back reconsidering these matters with proper public scrutiny, including a full select committee hearing, so that we can actually make sure that we are doing the right thing and we are not just putting in place a knee-jerk reaction that will not do what it purports to do.

Hon PHIL GOFF (Labour—Mt Roskill): The heart of this particular debate on Part 1 is the purpose clause. The purpose clause sets out, in a reasonably anodyne way, that this legislation is about obtaining information from returning offenders and establishing release conditions for offenders who have come back to New Zealand having spent at least a year in a jail overseas. Well, “overseas” is a euphemism. We are not talking about overseas; we are talking about Australia. We know that the reason for this bill is that we are going to have a flood of people sent back to New Zealand because of the changes to the Australian Migration Act 1958, which was changed last year. I want to ask the Minister in the chair, Amy Adams, why she did not act earlier, if the purpose of this bill is actually to protect the safety of New Zealanders. There is not a person in this Chamber who does not want to protect the safety of New Zealanders. Why have we left it so late to pass this legislation through the House? We have got 861—861—deportees about to flood back into New Zealand.

But it is worse than that, because already, in the period, I think, between May and September of this year, 157 offenders have been deported back into New Zealand. I want to ask the Minister what the offending of those 157 people was. What level of risk do they pose to New Zealand society, and why did she do nothing, knowing that these people were coming back—having known that for a year? There are 157 people coming into New Zealand and we do not know what they did, or what level of risk they pose to New Zealand, or what things are in place to protect New Zealanders. I sat in this Chamber the other day, to be accused by the Prime Minister of protecting rapists and murderers who come from Christmas Island. There were none there, but amongst this group of 157 there very likely will be some rapists and murderers. When the Prime Minister can direct an accusation to the rest of the House about how we were backing the rapists and murderers and not worried about public safety—I want this Minister to come clean and say why this negligent Government has allowed 157 people who have offended overseas to come back into New Zealand, some of them possibly rapists and murderers, and why there was nothing put in place in a timely way to protect New Zealanders against that.

The purpose of this bill is to protect the safety of New Zealanders. We are accused of backing rapists and murderers, yet the Government sat on its chuff and did nothing while 157 offenders came back into this country without any release conditions at all, without the knowledge or the information on those people that New Zealanders have a right to know. The Minister has known about this and the pending flood of deportees that the Australians, very kindly, are dumping in New Zealand, for over a year—for over a year. Why do we get legislation not at the eleventh hour but at the 13th hour? There are already 157 of those offenders here, and there are a whole lot more coming. I think it is a fair question, Minister. Why could we not have put this legislation before the House a year ago? Is there any reason why we could not put this legislation—designed with the purpose of protecting the safety of New Zealanders—before the House in a timely way? We have had no explanation of that.

I want to say that if we were looking at the purpose of the bill, which is to protect the safety of New Zealanders, the first thing we would have done was have the guts to stand up to Australia and say “Some of those people should come back to New Zealand, and we will deal with them and we will have proper provisions in place, but some of them are your responsibility. If a kid goes to Australia aged 6 months old, has lived there for 30 years, has children who are Australians and parents who are Australians, and they are shaped by Australia, why is it our problem?”. Did our Government have the guts to stand up to the Australian Government and say that it does not protect the safety of New Zealanders to send people to this country who do not know this country, who have no support mechanisms, who have no friends or family here? They will be alienated. They will be angry that they are separated from their family. And the Australians—our mates, the Australians—have put the problem on us. So if we want to achieve the purpose—

METIRIA TUREI (Co-Leader—Green): Continuing on with the theme in relation to the purpose of this bill, and also the discussion in relation to rehabilitation, I just want to note for the information of those who are listening to and watching this debate that there were a number of options that the Government had. There were four, in the main that had, at various levels, greater or lesser rehabilitative support. I just want to identify the decision making that the Government went through and some criticisms that I have of it.

In the regulatory impact statement that comes with the bill there is a clear description of the objectives of this legislation, which largely go to the purpose of protecting the public from reoffending and providing greater support for the reintegration of returning offenders. It talks in this official document about there being a strong link between those two objectives. Improving public safety is very strongly linked to providing rehabilitation for returning offenders, so that they have options other than offending to live a good life.

It talks about how vital it is to recognise that returning offenders are potentially vulnerable. They are a vulnerable cohort, whether as a result of age, their socio-economic background, or their lack of social connections on returning to New Zealand. These all increase the risk of their reoffending if they are not supported. Core to reducing reoffending, and therefore risk to public safety, is making sure there is a great deal of support wrapped around those people who come to New Zealand from Australia under the deportation regime.

There are four options that were considered by our Government. One was an enhanced support service—more like a refugee resettlement service, if you like—a wraparound service around the returnees would look at all of their different needs over a period of time of 6 weeks to 2 months. It would be looking at where they were going to live, how they were going to get work, what kind of training they would need—all of those things to help them reintegrate. Option 2 was a register, a bit like the child sex offender register that we have operating here. Options 3 and 4 were mandatory supervision and discretionary supervision. This bill is a mix of options 3 and 4.

So the bill is a mix of options 3 and 4. But in this table, which people can get access to if they want to have a look at the papers, it is very clear that the enhanced support service has the best support for reintegration and, therefore, to help reduce the risk to public safety. It is the best option in terms of maintaining the human rights of returning offenders, making sure that their dignity is upheld and, therefore, our dignity is upheld. The best option in terms of cost-effectiveness—certainly the cheapest of the options—was to have this wraparound support service. This official document gives it a low score for public safety, which actually goes against what the whole paper is arguing—that the best support and wraparound services for these people improve public safety. I am not quite sure how they got there.

Then it goes on to talk about the effectiveness of enhanced support services—which are very cost effective—and that there are existing programmes, both the refugee resettlement programme and the corrections-funded Out of Gate programme, that already exist as models to use. So they did not have to reinvent a new system; there is actually one already in place that could be remodelled to fit the needs of these particular offenders. The cost is about $2,000 a person—compared with the existing system—as set out in the bill. We are talking around $4 million a year, I think, if I have got that right from the papers. Enhanced support services cost less than $2 million—about $1.5 million a year—so they are very cost effective. This is the kind of thing that we need to have alongside either a beefed-up or existing regime. In fact, that is what the regulatory impact statement also says. It says that all the options except for this support system require legislation, and that the enhanced support services could be easily run alongside any other regime we have.

And this is one of the arguments that have been made. If the Minister had engaged with members of the Opposition and with experts outside of the ministries—those who are involved in the reintegration of prisoners or who have been involved in supporting ex-prisoners and reintegrating them back into the community—I think they would have got better advice about how to mould a better policy that properly addresses both the risk to public safety and the connection with the need to reintegrate.

But they did not ask, and so there is a gap in the policy framework that does not properly meld the best practice that we know. We know that the more support for reintegration and rehabilitation, the less likely people are to reoffend. That has to be your first step in developing the policy for these returning offenders. Then from there you start to ramp up if you think that there is a need for more supervision, like we might see with those with very serious convictions or very recent convictions. But the starting point is missing, and so we are not going to get the levels of public protection that we could and should have because we do not have the enhanced support services that even the public officials know will work to reduce the risk to the public.

It goes to the purpose of the bill, which is too narrow and too constrained to really deal with the overall objective of the legislation. It goes to the failure of the Minister’s office to really work with others who are specialists in this area to get the best policy advice. As a result we have a bill hastily drafted that will probably fail in its effect.

GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central): I do want to pick up on the points that Metiria Turei was making in her contribution. I too want to refer to the regulatory impact statement, which, as the previous speakers have outlined, gives us what the Government’s objectives are for the legislation. It is on the basis of these objectives that the Labour Party is supporting this legislation, because we too agree with the idea of protecting the public from reoffending and providing greater support for the reintegration of returning offenders. I would venture to suggest that everybody in the House shares those objectives.

So when we follow those objectives through to the purpose clause, things start to go slightly astray in terms of meeting the objectives. It states: “The purpose of this Act is to obtain information from returning offenders and establish release conditions for offenders returning to New Zealand following a prison sentence of more than 1 year in an overseas jurisdiction.” Well, it certainly could be argued that that represents some steps towards objective 18.1 in the regulatory impact statement: “protecting the public from reoffending;”. Getting the necessary information is an important part of that.

What I want to focus on in this part of my contribution is that I think it fails completely to talk about objective 18.2: “providing greater support for the reintegration of returning offenders.” I do that on the basis of looking at the options that the Government considered when deciding what to do in this area. As best as I can tell, having read the regulatory impact statement and the bill but not having had the benefit of a select committee process, where this would have been discussed in some detail and where submissions would have been sought from the likes of the Law Society, for instance, which probably would have provided some very good advice right at this point on whether or not the actual drafted legislation meets the objectives of the Government and whether the purpose clause fulfils its role—so having had a look at that, it is fairly clear that what are options 3 and 4 in the regulatory impact statement, a “Mandatory supervision regime” and a “Discretionary supervision regime”, elements of both of those is what we have ended up with in the legislation in front of us.

If we then go to those two parts of the regulatory impact statement and see what the officials thought those two options did for the principle of reintegration, which should be core to the purpose of this piece of legislation, under the mandatory supervision regime the officials concluded that there would be good support for reintegration. However, they highlighted the risk that a mandatory system “will treat all returning offenders as a homogenous group with similar reintegration needs. Offenders will be returning for a broad range of offences … [and] a formal system of supervision for a significant proportion of the offenders does mean that there would be a significantly higher level of support to reintegrate than the status quo.” That will work for those people if they get on to the conveyor belt of support in terms of what is defined in this part of the bill as a standard release condition.

Where things get more concerning is when we do move into the area of a discretionary supervision regime. The concern I have here—and this is written quite well by the officials, I think—is: “A discretionary order means that many returning offenders would not be subject to it and would therefore not receive the benefits the order may provide in terms of support for reintegration.” That is an area of grave concern for us, because what we are looking for when we talk about reintegration are issues like employment prospects, accommodation, health needs, and community support, which Kelvin Davis outlined in his contribution. If we do not have a consistent regime in place here, a regime that is appropriate for each person who is returning, then we run the risk that a number of those core elements of reintegration will not be picked up. This is the danger in this clause, looking at the purpose of the bill—that we actually, in a rushed, hasty process, have not got in front of us enough advice, in my view, as to whether those concerns raised by officials in the regulatory impact statement are met by the bill. We have got the statement that “special conditions” can apply. Maybe—maybe—they will apply, but we do not know that for sure. So I lack the confidence, standing here today, having not seen a select committee process and having not got further advice on this matter, as to whether or not those core issues about employment, accommodation, health, and community support are dealt with.

What we do know is that the people coming back—

Hon AMY ADAMS (Minister of Justice): I have just been listening to the debate over this first part of the bill, and I wanted to wait to get a bit of a sense of some of the issues that members wanted to raise before I responded. So I want to go through a few of them.

Kelvin Davis, in his contribution, was asking the question about whether and how the regime would apply to someone who may have been deported from Australia who had no criminal convictions. It is a fair point and I want to make it very clear. I indicated in nodding and shaking my head what was happening, but I thought it was better to get it on the record. I want to be really clear about this. This bill is not about replicating the decisions Australia has made as to who should be deported. We do not take that into account. So if Australia deports someone because they are of a bad character, it says, or because they have some other concerns to Australia, that is not a trigger under this bill. The only thing that triggers the provisions in this bill is a conviction for offending that in New Zealand would have been an imprisonable offence and for a minimum length of time.

So if someone was convicted in—I happen to know that in Thailand it is an offence to insult the royal family. Well, that is fine; it is not an offence here. So, clearly, if that person were deported back it would not be triggered. Similarly, if a particular person in Australia is deported back to New Zealand who has no criminal charges or convictions but for other reasons, which the Australians, obviously, have to work through and to justify, they are not caught by this bill. This bill is not about being punitive and adding a layer; it is about trying to pick up exactly—well, “exactly” is too strong—or in as similar way as possible, the conditions that that offender would have been under, had they served the same sentence in New Zealand. That is why the test is always “Have you served the minimum of a year in prison?”, because that is the threshold we use for release conditions, and “Is it conduct that would have been imprisonable in New Zealand?”, because, again, we are not going to impose someone else’s standards, and, if it is, then we need to mirror what we would do in New Zealand.

The question was also asked about the 6 months. I think I mentioned in one of my contributions—the member may not have been in the Chamber earlier this evening or earlier today—that the intent of the 6 months is to say that these conditions are about monitoring an offender while they reintegrate from a period of being incarcerated in an institution. Once they have been back in society for some time, the need is not the same. These people have served their sentence. This is about saying, as they come out from that very restricted environment, we know that is a very high-risk time for reoffending, and so we want to support and monitor and oversee these prisoners in the same way that they would have been in New Zealand.

The call I had to make—and, yes, it is a line call; you have got to put it somewhere—is that if they have been out in the Australian community for more than 6 months, then that case cannot be made in the same way that we need to help them with that reintegration. Within 6 months, we think the case can be made. However, the question was asked about what happens if they have been out for 7 months and they still need monitoring. The bill provides that if they come back to New Zealand and are subject to an ongoing monitoring regime—let us say they have got lifetime monitoring because there was serious concern in Australia that they needed to be watched—then it enables the New Zealand authorities to go to the courts here and say “Well, actually, in this case, we think it is made out”, and would they look at it. It does not apply automatically, but there is that provision if they were subject to an ongoing monitoring regime.

The other point I just wanted to pick up on was Grant Robertson’s contribution just immediately before I rose to my feet, talking about issues like health and education and housing. And, actually, it feeds back to Kelvin Davis’ points, as well, around reintegration and the difficulties that some of these offenders are likely to have reintegrating, given that some of them—not all of them—have very few, if any, ties to New Zealand. That is a very valid concern. That is the concern that we have been raising actively with Australia all throughout this process. We have not got it to change its view on this, but this is one of the two key concerns that we are raising time and again with Australia: deporting people back to New Zealand who, other than their DNA, are really not New Zealanders. They were born here, they have citizenship—and with that go a whole lot of protections—but actually for a number of them that is the extent of their connection.

We absolutely agree that that creates additional difficulties with reintegration of some of these offenders and, I think, creates a very valid ground as to whether the moral view of whether they should be sent back has been properly applied. But, as everyone in this Committee has acknowledged, we can all have views on that, we can all express them, and I think many of us share them, but none the less Australia has made the decision and there is a certain extent of also having to deal with it.

So the bill is looking at the justice aspects of that. That is not to say that there are not really important issues around things like health and education and welfare support and employment and financial assistance. I can tell members in the Committee that agencies and Ministers in those areas are actively working to make sure that we have the right framework and advice and support in place. Once these offenders land in New Zealand they are New Zealand citizens and they have access to exactly the same support, entitlements, and assistance needs as their case warrants. We all know that the Ministry of Social Development and the like work through that on a case by case basis. None the less, they have a particular piece of work to try to work through those issues. I do not purport to have provided for all that in this bill. This bill is about picking up the parole oversight part of the puzzle. I am not saying that the rest is not critical; it is. I have not seen anything that suggests legislative change is required, though. That piece is also going alongside it.

The final comment I just want to make in this contribution on this part—because it is, obviously, the very reasonably functionary part of the bill; the next part is far more where the substance is, and so I want to save our time for that. But the other comment I am just going to make is that it does seem somewhat incongruous that on the one hand this is being called rushed and it is all being rushed and crammed through, and on the other hand we have taken far too long. You know, you cannot have it both ways—you cannot have it both ways.

The one point I would make is that when Mr Goff asked why this legislation was not in the House a year ago, Australia had not changed its law a year ago. We found out on 12 February. We started work immediately. We have not stopped work on since 12 February. This is the process it takes to get into this place. I am very proud that that process has worked well. Officials have had one hand tied behind their back, trying to get information out of Australia. Frankly, people who think that you can just have an idea one night and then get it into legislation in the House for something this complex are revealing, I think, the fact that they have not had ministerial roles dealing with issues of this complexity.

And that does not even take into account—even Jacinda Ardern mentioned it in her second reading contribution—that Labour could never have done this because it did not have the information-sharing agreement in place. Well, exactly. We had to have the information. We now have that information, and we have acted. So we started as soon as we found out. We have not stopped. It is in the House quickly because it needs to be passed quickly. But to suggest that somehow nothing has happened and it could have happened a year ago is wrong and, frankly, belittles the debate that we should be having on this pretty important issue.

DAVID SHEARER (Labour—Mt Albert): I just want to pick up where we last left off. I do not agree with the Minister in the chair, the Hon Amy Adams. This is the Official Information Act response I received from the Ministry of Justice. Yes, she got a memo on this on 12 February, but this actually went through on 14 December in Australia. It was brought to the ministry’s attention by a media outlet at the end of January. Prime Ministers Abbott and Key talked about it at their ministerial meeting in February, and yet it has taken until now, 17 November, with 2 weeks of Parliament left to go, effectively, that we are actually rushing this through under urgency.

I do not buy the argument that we had to have the information-sharing agreement absolutely nailed down, because right now we still do not have good information coming out of Australia. Pretty much everybody knows that Australia, because of its complex federal and state system, is not providing the information that we need to be able to process in good time the people who are coming back from Australia. But what we do need, and what obviously the Labour Party will be supporting, is clearly to have the sorts of provisions that we would have for New Zealanders in a similar situation. I think that is a principle that I can certainly accept and that we can all accept. But to say that somehow that had to wait until 2 weeks in the middle of October before we started drafting this legislation is absolute nonsense. We could have had this in place some time ago.

We could also have been making a much firmer demand on Australia to provide that information. We had Prime Minister Turnbull come here just over a month ago. I do not know what happened in the meeting between Mr Key and Mr Turnbull, but I can tell you that from our side that was the only thing we talked about—the rights of people coming back and being sent back, and also the information that we had when we were in Government to make sure that we were able to protect ourselves. It really actually grates that last week, in an extraordinary sort of outburst from the Prime Minister, he pointed the finger across the Chamber and said to us that somehow we do not care about the safety of New Zealanders or about the possibility that rapists and murderers and whatever are coming back to New Zealand. Of course we do—that is why we are standing up and agreeing with this legislation. But to accuse us of that when this legislation had not even hit the House, when we already have 200-odd people who have come back under a regime where there are absolutely no protections is absolutely wrong.

I think the issue here is what the objective is of this legislation in the first part of the bill, which is to provide for similar management for offenders, whether a sentence is served in New Zealand or elsewhere. Obviously, that pertains mostly to Australia when they are coming back. It is about protecting the public from reoffending and providing greater support for the reintegration of returning offenders. I am reading from the national interest statement here, which makes the obvious point that the two are very closely linked together—that if you are going to be protecting people from reoffending, then the process of reintegration is essential to making sure that that actually happens.

Let us just remind ourselves what we are looking at here in terms of reoffending. The police, in the reports that are put out, recommend that 43 percent of the people who are sent back under the current conditions will require some sort of ongoing surveillance. That is a significant number of people. I recognise what the Minister was saying before about the numbers who are coming. Some of the numbers are now going to be including a larger group who will have more minor offences. But certainly since 2013, 70 percent of offenders have been convicted of serious offences including 30 percent for assault; 20 percent for armed robbery and burglary; 15 percent for rape or sexual assault, including child sexual offences; and 5 percent for manslaughter or murder. In 2013, 48 percent of those people coming back under the old regime and reoffended within 2 years. So half of the people coming back under the old regime reoffended within 2 years, and here we have a situation where Australia is, firstly, sending people back. I completely agree with the Minister that the moral case for doing that, which is for the benefit of Australia—leaving people without a spouse, a father, or a mother on that side, and, secondly, bringing somebody over here without any connection to New Zealand—is actually bad for both countries, quite apart from the people concerned. You begin to wonder whether Australia has lost its moral compass somewhere along the line.

The point is that with those people coming back, we have to make sure that they are looked after properly. Although I accept what the Minister says about this legislation being narrow and only looking at the justice part of the equation, what we are hearing out there is that there are offenders who have come back who are ending up in the doorways of Work and Income, waiting for it to open, who do not have jobs. We are hearing of people being sent back, looking to commit crimes. Crimes have already been committed by these people who have come back, as well, already. There is no plan in place to make sure that those people are reintegrated properly so they do not reoffend. Although I accept that this is not a central part of this legislation, for God’s sake, it has to go alongside it, surely. It absolutely has to go to alongside the legislation, to make sure that the two things are together. I do not see any evidence of that at the moment, with the reports that I am hearing of people ending up on the street and, actually, not being met at the airport and just being told to get into a taxi.

I just want to finish by saying that although we accept the purpose of this bill, the objectives of this bill, I do not believe that the way it is being put through, the way it has been introduced to the House, and the speed with which it is being done will do New Zealand any favours whatsoever. Thank you.

DAVID CLENDON (Green): It has been interesting to see the uniform responses from Opposition members about the primary content of this part, which, of course, is clause 3, the purpose statement. What purports to be a purpose here is stated as being to “obtain information from returning offenders and establish release conditions for offenders returning to New Zealand …”. That is not a statement of purpose; that is a description of a mechanism for achieving a purpose or a range of purposes. It is a remarkably monocular view. I understand how it emerges: you get too close to a document and you do not get the distance from it to realise the gaps in it. This is the value of a multi-party, multi - stakeholder development of policy, which this patently is not.

The Minister of Justice put up some defence of this purpose statement, saying that those matters about support, which we have heard referred to already, are being dealt with elsewhere. The Ministry of Social Development was mentioned, as were various other agencies. What I do not see in this bill is any legislative framework that provides incentives for returning offenders to cooperate and to actively participate in their own rehabilitation and reintegration. That is what is fundamentally missing. The clues were actually there. The officials, I think, did a very good job of steering towards what could have been a much more balanced and much more useful and helpful piece of legislation.

We have heard reference already to this little table—this matrix of options—and the strengths and weaknesses. The enhanced support service was seen as being poor in terms of public safety. I agree that standing on its own a voluntary system of “Yes, I’ll turn up and I’ll go along with some of these support services.”, in itself would not have been sufficient to assure public safety or to contribute to making our communities safer. But I do argue that a set of enhanced support services wrapped round these people is necessary to get to achieve the outcomes, the real purpose, which is to make our communities safer, to endeavour to ensure that these people do not reoffend, and to improve the likelihood of them reintegrating and ultimately becoming useful and productive members of our society.

I say the officials did a very, very good job of that. They noted, in passing, that the enhanced support service option mechanism scored very well in terms of cost-effectiveness. A little bit of money spent well will go a very long way to reducing the likelihood of these people ending up back in jail at a cost of $100,000 per year, simply to accommodate them in jail. That is putting aside the social cost of offending, the cost of prosecution, the court process, and the like.

I mentioned that I believe that the officials have done some good thinking here. I reference particularly paragraph 33 of the regulatory impact statement, where they talk about the option as being partially based or potentially based on a refugee resettlement model. I think that is a really interesting idea. I think that is a very constructive idea. The idea that these returning offenders will come along and simply plug into Work and Income, to the Ministry of Social Development, and to the various other existing services overlooks the fact that these people are a unique class of people. These are people who might feel very little connection to New Zealand. We have heard evidence already of individuals who left the country as infants, barely children, and now they are returning as adults, and unwillingly at that. They may not necessarily want to be part of New Zealand. They are a unique group of people.

I think this notion of treating these people more in the way that we treat refugees—for example, there is the notion of having an orientation programme, making it attractive, and giving these people some incentive to participate actively in reorientation. It would say “OK, guys and girls. You’re here. This is it. You’re back here for now. Let’s make the best of it. Let’s help you get your bearings.”, in what, to many of them, is actually a new community, a new culture, albeit not vastly dissimilar from where they have been, but certainly with some substantial significant differences. There is focusing on the information needed to help people live in New Zealand, people who have not lived here perhaps since they were infants and who have no memory of it, and there is the idea of completing physical and mental health checks to assess their settlement needs. We can impose, and we will come to this later, in a later part of this bill—it talks about the possibility of establishing, either under the standard conditions or the special conditions, conditions that one way or the other require people to go through a needs assessment. That is OK. Yes, we are demanding that they must, which can immediately create a level of opposition.

We know people who have the lifelong experience of disguising illiteracy, low levels of educational achievement, and alcohol or drug dependency. Those people get pretty good at hiding those realities. We could get people involved in a much more cooperative approach, something along the lines of this proposed refugee resettlement, where these people can become active participants in their own reintegration. I see nothing in this legislation that is going to encourage or incentivise or even, frankly, oblige these people to do that.

The point, as I say, has been made very clearly that these offenders will face very similar challenges to the ones that those refugees who are coming to this country are facing, who are coming, in a sense, unwillingly. They are very pleased, I dare say, to leave where they are coming from. Perhaps this was not their first choice. The fact is that there is a sense of volunteerism, if you like, which will be absent from these people who are being returned against their will. So I do think we have missed a considerable opportunity there to legislate to do the right thing by these people.

The mention of cost has been made. It is about $2,000 per person. That does not sit very well. The only significant—if you could call it that—resource that the Government has put in to date was $100,000-odd, which has been given to People at Risk Solutions in Auckland in order to assist it to at least meet these people and make some effort to settle them. The fact is that it has been doing that work at least since the early months of this year. In March and April, I know for sure, it was doing that, and that $100,000 has to last it until June next year. That is more than 12 months. That is spreading that $100,000 extremely thinly, given the numbers we are likely to see, even using this quite modest notion of $2,000 per person.

This is, as I say, and I will come back to the point—some of the provisions in this legislation are necessary, but they are simply not sufficient. For that reason we cannot offer our support to it.

Hon DAVID PARKER (Labour): There are two issues I want to raise in this call. First of all, the purpose of this legislation is in part for the New Zealand Police to gather information on returning criminals. We have been told in earlier stages in this debate that some of the offenders who have been returned or deported from Australia to New Zealand have come without particulars being known to the New Zealand authorities, and that is one of the reasons why we need to be able to stop those people—so we can get that information from them.

I would like to know from the Minister of Justice whether that is correct and whether, in respect of the intervening period from earlier in the year when increased numbers of people were being deported from Australia to New Zealand, there were any instances where people arrived in New Zealand and the New Zealand authorities on their arrival did not know the offences of which they had been convicted, particularly in serious cases. If that is the case, then that seems to me to be irresponsible on the part of the Australian authorities, and we in this House have got a right to know whether that is the case. If that was the case, it seems to me that there are only two possible explanations for it: either the Australian authorities were not willing to provide the information or, if they were willing, the New Zealand authorities did not seek it. So I would like to know whether there were any cases between the start of the year and now where people have been deported following serious offences and where the particulars of their offending were not known. I think that is a reasonable question to ask the Minister and I would ask that she respond to that point.

The second point I want to make is a point that has not yet been made in respect of the interpretation clause, clause 4. Clause 4 sets out the meaning of “determination notice” and “returning prisoner”. This is necessary because the legislation says that where the Commissioner of Police determines that the nature of the returning prisoner’s prior convictions and penalties passes a threshold, then that person is said to be a returning prisoner within the later provisions in Part 2, subpart 2 of the bill, and the definition is given effect to through clause 4 of the bill. I, in an earlier contribution—and I do not know whether the Minister was in the Chamber at the time—asked the question as to whether the effect of clause 28 on those definitions means that the jurisdiction of the court to consider whether indeed the Commissioner of Police has made a valid determination notice to catch people within the provisions of the Act as being a returning prisoner is ousted. My reason for that question arises from the words that are in clause 28(2). If a determination notice is made by the police, it seems that a court cannot discharge or vary the terms of a standard notice that has been imposed under this legislation and that the jurisdiction of the court is being ousted. I would like the Minister to comment on that.

In terms of the issue that I started with, which is the estimated 157 people who have been deported to New Zealand between May and September this year—which I think was the figure that was used by my colleague Phil Goff—I want to know whether on arrival the New Zealand authorities had instances where they did not have information. That goes to the question as to whether this legislation goes far enough, because my understanding is that the legislation is not of retrospective effect and that we will still have a lacuna in the New Zealand information if that information was not collected at the time and was not provided by the Australian authorities.

I would hope the advice that we have had in this Committee today on that point to date is wrong, because I would find it almost unbelievable that the Australian authorities would deport from Australia to New Zealand people who have lived there all of their lives; who are, from their point of view, Australians; who have no support networks back here; and on whom the New Zealand Government may have absolutely no records. If these people have been living in Australia for 30 years—effectively, all of their adult lives; often since they were very small children—the New Zealand authorities will have no records of their own in respect of these people because they have never been in New Zealand. They might have been born here, they could have left New Zealand as a baby, and there will be no records here of their offending while they were in Australia. There will be no records of any of their other interaction with governmental authorities because they have had none. Therefore, the New Zealand system is blind to their history and the risk that they pose, except to the extent that that information later comes to the New Zealand authorities.

Who holds that information? Actually, the organisations that hold that information in respect of the people who have been living in Australia are the Australian authorities. I would be very surprised if the Australian authorities had been deporting more people with serious offences between May and September without providing to the New Zealand authorities details of the offending, the sentences, and also other information if it had been requested by the New Zealand Government. If the Minister could answer that question, that would be appreciated.

Secondly, what requests were made for information in respect of that group of people from earlier this year until the passage of this legislation? If, in fact, people have been arriving without information, I would expect the Australians to provide that information voluntarily, but if they have not, I would also expect the New Zealand Government to be seeking it. I would have thought that if a similar request were made of New Zealand authorities in respect of people whom we were deporting to Australia, the New Zealand authorities would cooperate with Australia, and I would hope that that sort of cooperation would be reciprocated. Thank you.

JACQUI DEAN (National—Waitaki): I move, That the question be now put.

IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North): I want to just take a reasonably short call on Part 1 of the Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill, in part to respond to a comment that the Minister of Justice made in her contribution from a few minutes ago and also in part to look closely at the writing, the drafting, of some of the clauses in this part, and one clause in particular. But, first, I want to address a comment made by the Minister, and I think it was in response to Phil Goff and others who raised questions around the timing of this legislation.

The Minister said that raising the issue of timing was somehow belittling this debate and belittling this issue. I say to the Minister that there is only one person who has belittled this issue, and that is the Prime Minister. The only person who has actually engaged in undignified action around this legislation is the Prime Minister, so if anybody is belittling this debate it is him.

I think the issue of timing is a fair one because the Minister was aware of this in February at the latest. That means that the Minister had February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, and half of November to get this legislation drafted and brought to the House. In fact, this legislation would have been better prepared if the Minister had actually moved more quickly and brought it to the House in a timely fashion so that it could have gone to a select committee, so that we could have had proper consideration of this legislation. So it is not in any way belittling to say that the Minister has had time to deal with this legislation and is now rushing it through because she knows that there is a plane-load of detainees heading back to New Zealand. It is exactly the type of issue that needs to be raised on a matter that is being considered by the House under urgency where we have not had the benefit of the select committee process to make sure that this legislation is drafted appropriately to make it fit for purpose.

I do want to look at just one matter of drafting, and it may not be the most significant. I know that some of my colleagues want to look at other matters of drafting. In the interpretation clause we have the meaning of “returning prisoner”. It says that “ ‘returning prisoner’ has the meaning given to it in section 16”. That is actually a perfectly normal thing to find in an interpretation clause. So we go to clause 16, which is entitled “Who is returning prisoner”. It states: “A ‘returning prisoner’ is a person who has been determined by the Commissioner to be a returning prisoner in accordance with the criteria set out in section 17.”

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): This is in Part 2.

IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY: This is to do with the interpretation, Mr Chairman—the interpretation clause, which is in Part 1. In Part 1, the interpretation clause, it says that that is set out in section 16. Clause 16 tells us nothing. You read the interpretation clause and you refer to clause 16, and the interpretation clause actually does not give us a meaning for “returning prisoner”. We have to go to clause 17 for that. Why is the wording in clause 16 not in the interpretation clause? That seems to be the most logical place to put it, and then clause 17, or maybe clause 16 in this case, could set out the criteria for determination that the commissioner has to use.

It appears to me to be one example of weak drafting in this legislation. It is the kind of weak drafting that you get when a bill is rushed, and the kind of weak drafting that could be sorted out at a select committee if the Minister, back in February, when she knew this was an issue, had actually moved with the speed that was necessary to bring the legislation to the House in a timely fashion and give Parliament and the public the opportunity to scrutinise it appropriately. As it is, we are pushing through legislation that does curtail some people’s rights, and we are doing that without public scrutiny. That is a very unfortunate situation to be in, and it is a situation that we are in because of the Minister’s lacklustre response to something that the Australians informed her about, at the latest, in February. There is some evidence that the Minister should have known about it before then.

So that is a simple question for the Minister. Why is that particular bit of the legislation drafted in that fashion? Why is the interpretation clause weak in that fashion? I know that other colleagues will be raising drafting matters in respect of other clauses as well.

Hon PHIL GOFF (Labour—Mt Roskill): I want to start off by asking the Minister of Justice again to clarify when she first knew that there was a problem and started working on it. She said in answer to a question from Jacinda Ardern in the House this afternoon, and again when she took the call, that nothing was being considered until February of this year. I have on my computer screen here Stuff news, dated 25 January 2015, and the former Minister—this Minister’s predecessor; somebody called Judith Collins—said that this was an issue that the Government had been aware of and was intending to make changes on, and it was looking at a monitoring system in order to protect the community. Is it not the truth, Minister, that the Government has been aware of this for years? In the last year the Government was aware that there was five times the number of deported people coming back to New Zealand. That is new—the quantum is new, but the issue is rather older than that.

Again I ask the Minister what there is in this bill that, to achieve the purpose set out in clause 1, could not have seen this bill introduced years ago, if not months ago. One of the problems I have—and it is a genuine problem—is that we know that the purpose of this bill is to try to ensure the safety of the community, but how do we know the bill will achieve that purpose? You know, Mr Chairman, that what would normally happen—

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Oh.

Hon PHIL GOFF: Everybody in the Committee knows, Mr Chairman, that what would normally happen is that this bill would go to a select committee, and we would hear from people with specialist knowledge in this area. We would hear from the experts. We would hear from the people who have been dealing with offenders with these sorts of criminal records in the past, and we could have subjected this bill to particular scrutiny—if only it had been introduced months ago, or years ago, when the Government knew that this problem was pending. So I want to know why it is that we are rushing this bill through the House without public input, without expert input, and without proper consideration so that we would know we could achieve the purpose of it. Why has the Minister left this to the thirteenth hour?

I want to come back to the regulatory impact statement, because this gets to the heart of the purpose that clause 3 talks about. It says: “Returning offenders pose a risk to public safety …”. It goes back to 2013, which, again, raises questions about how long this Minister has been aware of it. It says that since 2013, 70 percent of returning offenders have been convicted of serious offences—30 percent of assaults; 20 percent of armed robbery or burglary; 15 percent of rape or sexual assault; 5 percent of murder and manslaughter. Then the regulatory impact statement goes on to say that over a third—35 percent, actually—of these returning offenders had reoffended within 12 months, and 48 percent, or nearly half, had reoffended within 2 years. So here we have the regulatory impact statement setting out that the purpose of this bill is to achieve safety. There is a real risk to safety. Some of these people have offended seriously. Nearly half of them will reoffend again within 2 years, and yet the Government sat on its chuff and did nothing.

I think the Committee is owed an explanation of why the Government did not act. Why are we debating this after 157 new offenders have come here since May? I want to know from the Minister what the offences are that those 157 have committed. Are they serious offenders? Are they likely to be recidivist offenders? What level of risk do they pose to the community? What has this Minister and this Prime Minister done to protect New Zealand? This Prime Minister got up on his hind legs and said that the Opposition was doing nothing to protect us against rapists and murderers. Actually, the Opposition does not have power. The Government has power, and for 12 months this Government, this Prime Minister, and that Minister have done precisely nothing.

ANDREW BAYLY (National—Hunua): I move, That the question be now put.

MARAMA FOX (Co-Leader—Māori Party): I have been sitting here listening to the debate about the purpose of this bill. I find it a bit rich, actually, that the Opposition is pointing to the past 1 year. We could go back decades—decades, actually—when successive Governments have done nothing about this. We have had people being deported out of Australia and back to New Zealand for decades.

The major impact on increasing that number happened in 2001, under the Labour Government. I do not want to say “Oh, it’s your fault, and it’s your fault.”, but actually a whole lot of impacts have happened on Australians—they consider themselves Australians, but they are Kiwis who live there—since that immigration law change. Yes, that has been ramped up since December last year when this new threshold came into force in Australia, sending a whole lot of people back across the Tasman. But for the 1 year I have been in Parliament, we have been talking about this since the time we walked into this Government. I know that the Māori Party has been raising this in the years it has been here, but these issues go back a long, long time, and I am grateful, actually, that we are here doing something about it because we do need to protect the citizens of this country.

One of the things—and there are many things—that I was very clear with the Minister about is that the Minister, under this piece of legislation, does not have the extraordinary powers that the immigration Minister in Australia has. He can deport people under the questionable character provisions, and seal that record. He does not have to share that record with the Australian court, or with the prosecutors, or even with the person they are deporting back to New Zealand. So they may actually have some serious concerns that we are not even going to know about because that Government does not even share them with its own people, let alone us. I find that abhorrent, and I am grateful that we are doing something about it and that the Minister of Justice has not, through this draft legislation—because, frankly, I would not agree to it otherwise—given herself extraordinary powers to further impact on the lives of these men and women who are coming back to us. We are picking up the pieces of their lives, and we know that the purpose of this bill is narrow so that we can deal with the immediate concern now. And it may have been, yes, a year since it was implemented in Australia, but it has been decades in this country that people have been deported back to us, and successive Governments have done nothing.

So I am grateful that we are doing something, and that, actually, we have taken up with the Government that those other supports are going to be put in place, and we have assurances that they are happening. We have examples of where that is already happening, and that is the question here, because we have tried for many years to ensure through programmes like the ones that are happening in prisons around the country now—Māori focus units and such—to ensure recidivism is reduced. We want to make sure that they come back into our society and we help them pick up the pieces of their lives that are further damaged by the Australian Government’s ignorance and their blatant disrespect for our country by imposing these laws on those Kiwis who are living there, and we are picking up the pieces of those things.

So I am over listening to those people talk about the length of time that it has taken, because they did nothing when they were the Government, and it is a bit rich to listen to that now. We are doing something now, and I support the Minister in making this happen. And, in fact, those extraordinary powers of the immigration Minister in Australia to seal a record—it could be something, but it could actually be nothing, and we do not even get to know that. That is the disrespect that they pay to us, and I am glad that we are going to deal with just the people who have committed those offences who, in New Zealand, would have conditions put around them to ensure the safety of our community.

So yes, although there are minor offences being caught up in this regime at the lower end of the threshold, we have not excused the fact and the point that there are actually serious offenders who are coming back to New Zealand, and we need to protect our country and our people and our society from the risk of reoffending. I want to get assurances, and we have sought those assurances from the Government, that other programmes will be put in place. But let us deal with the issue, and the issue right now is to ensure that those parole conditions can continue in New Zealand, because until this goes through, they can come back here and we have no say. We had no monitoring before. We had no ability to ensure that a paedophile was not living in a home with children, and not living—

Jacinda Ardern: That’s actually not true. That’s not true.

MARAMA FOX: Well, you had the opportunity, actually. You had the opportunity.

CHRIS BISHOP (National): I move, That the question be now put.

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Yes, we have had an extensive debate on these four clauses, so I am going to put the question.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the question be now put.

Ayes 63

New Zealand National 59; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Noes 57

New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 13; New Zealand First 12.

Motion agreed to.

Part 1 agreed to.

Part 2 Returning offenders: management and information

METIRIA TUREI (Co-Leader—Green): One of the issues I raised with the Minister of Justice late last week was the definition of a returning offender in clause 7. The whole point of the returning offender clauses in this bill is to capture personal information—name, address, date of birth, fingerprints—of people who have committed offences in Australia and have been deported. In the description of this, the rationale is that they have been convicted of an offence in Australia that would be an imprisonable offence here and have been deported because of that offence, but that is not what the definition says. So I would like to just get some clarity from the Minister about how this definition of a returning offender came about and, particularly, the extent to which it captures people who, really, there should be very little public concern about—so people who do not pose a risk of any kind and so, therefore, it is unjust to require this additional information from them by the police.

A “returning offender” is defined as including a returning prisoner, but that is irrelevant for this discussion, and as “a person who has been convicted in an overseas jurisdiction of an offence … that constitutes an imprisonable offence in New Zealand”, so it is a similar offence to what we would have in New Zealand that would lead to imprisonment, or at least has a sentence of imprisonment. Then it goes on to say “and, being liable for deportation or removal as a result of that conviction, has returned to New Zealand;”. It says “being liable for deportation or removal as a result of that conviction,”, not being deported or removed as a result of that conviction.

So I just want to get some clarity around those cases. There may well be people who are being deported from Australia because they fail a different part of the good character test, and there are lots of examples of that—for whatever reason, the Minister over there decides that they do not like them and they want them to be sent back here. And it has got nothing to do with any previous convictions. They may well have been convicted of an offence 20 years ago, 25 years ago—

Marama Fox: Forty.

METIRIA TUREI: —10 years ago, or 40 years ago. They could be convictions that, actually, do not have any genuine relevance and do not pose any risk to New Zealanders. The person might not have been convicted of anything in the ensuing 40, 20, or 10 years and there might be no evidence that they propose any genuine risk here, but because they have a conviction in Australia, it makes them liable for deportation, and so, therefore, they are caught by this bill. I ask the Minister whether we could find some ways to constrain this definition more so that those people who commit minor historical offences—where it is pretty clear that this is a person who has been kicked out under the ridiculous rules of Australia, as opposed to an actually sensible reason—are not caught by this legislation. There is no need for them to be caught because they do not pose any risk to New Zealand society.

There is a degree of discretion in clauses 8 and 9 allowed the police in seeking identifying information, but, as we know, there is not always a great deal of trust in the police and its ability to use this kind of discretion wisely. For those of us who have been involved with the Māori community for many years, we know that Māori tend to be targeted, and so we want to be able to protect particularly those who may not have a relevant conviction in the sense that it poses any kind of genuine risk and is very minor and very historical, but may be subject to other kinds of profiling by the New Zealand Police and who are then subject to this law. And there is no protection for them here.

This definition of returning offender captures practically everybody who will be deported if they have any kind of conviction in Australia, no matter how historical. The key part of this key point is that it then means that this definition of a returning offender is largely dependent on the criteria that Australia sets for deportation. They are not independent criteria that we have set here based on our own assessment of what constitutes a genuine risk of recidivism or a potential threat; the law is premised on Australia’s definition of what a qualifying offence is. And, frankly, I have no interest in Australia’s definition. Its law is a disgrace. It is contrary to human rights. Its law explicitly says that all rights of natural justice do not apply. So I would like some of this addressed, if that is possible.

JACINDA ARDERN (Labour): I just want to begin, because it is relevant to Part 2, by just reflecting briefly on the contribution made by Marama Fox. She finished her speech by saying that until now there had been no way of monitoring, for instance, child sex offenders or sex offenders who were deported back to New Zealand. That is actually not the case.

The Minister of Justice knows, because she was the Minister who was in the role of Minister of Justice when this piece of legislation came through, and that is the Parole (Extended Supervision Orders) Amendment Act. The interesting thing about this Act, which demonstrates that, actually, we are not being contradictory when Labour, on the one hand, says that this bill should have had due consideration because it could have gone through earlier—the point is made by the extended supervision Act.

This Act began its life in April 2014, when we still did not have our information-sharing arrangement with Australia. We knew, however, that that was on the cards. The Minister was working hard to try to get officials and counterparts on board. That piece of legislation—and this is relevant to Part 2 because it talks about the similar regime that has been used here as has been used in Part 2—talks about the meaning of an eligible offender, and this language will be familiar.

It says here that a person who is eligible “… has arrived in New Zealand within 6 months”—again that 6-month timeline—“of ceasing to be subject to any sentence, supervision conditions, or order imposed on the person for a relevant offence by an overseas court; and (ii) has, since that arrival, been in New Zealand for less than 6 months; and (iii) resides or intends to reside in New Zealand.” Those are the criteria for an extended supervision order to apply to someone who has committed an offence at a high enough level.

We know that we already have offenders who fulfil those criteria. This is relevant because in Part 2 we are covering them off again. There is a definition in there that allows for someone who has committed a serious offence to be covered by this bill, but we already have a regime. We know that since 2013 approximately 70 percent of returning offenders have been convicted overseas for serious offences: assault, 30 percent; armed robbery or burglary, 20 percent; rape or sexual assault including child sex offenders, 15 percent; and murder or manslaughter, 5 percent.

Yet it is my understanding that extended supervision orders have not been used once. That is my understanding. I would be very interested to hear from the Minister why that is the case. The reason I would be interested in hearing that is because in Part 2 we have two regimes set out. One is a default regime; the other is a regime that must be triggered through an application through the courts by corrections.

If we already have a regime like that set up through the extended supervision orders but it has not been used, why is that? Was the threshold test not met? Were corrections not spry enough to make the applications? Was the definition of the offenders captured incorrect? This is really critical information because if there has been some kind of drafting error in the extended supervision orders—given it mirrors what we are doing in Part 2—we need to know that. Why has it not been used? You need to also know it because the Department of Corrections plays a critical role in enacting part of this Part 2.

Let us go through this, because I want to just explore, potentially, whether there may be two gaps where we are exposed by the two definitions in Part 2 of who is covered under this legislation. Under clause 17 we have the criteria for determination that a person is a returning prisoner. Keeping in mind that the definition applies, we have a returning prisoner and we have a returning offender. One is more immediate than the other. The returning prisoner—“The Commissioner must determine that a person is a returning prisoner if the Commissioner is satisfied that the person—(a) has”—and as we have traversed already—“been convicted [of a relevant offence]…of more than 1 year…and (c) is returning…within 6 months”.

The important point here, and I want the Minister to confirm whether or not I am correct, is if they come back to New Zealand and a determination notice is not issued within 6 months of that return, is it correct that that opportunity is completely lost for any kind of monitoring regime? So they could fulfil the criteria for a determination order, as set out in Part 2, but if corrections drops the ball and if for some reason the determination notice is not offered, or if there is no opportunity for a determination notice to be issued in writing, then that opportunity is lost.

The reason I raise that is because in clause 19 it sets out that “The Commissioner must serve a written notice on a person”—we are now calling them “p”. I do not know if this is a new drafting thing, but for the rest of them they are just called “p”. I find that confusing. In the criminal world there is another reference for “p”, but that means person. So if I read out “p” it means person. “The Commissioner must serve a written notice on a person (P) who has been determined to be a returning prisoner. (2) The notice must be served,—(a) if practicable, on P’s return to New Zealand; or (b) if service on P’s return to New Zealand is not practicable, as soon as is reasonably practicable …in any event, not later than 6 months after P’s return to New Zealand.”

I know that we have difficulty serving protection orders in this country. It is a massive task and the police do not even always do that job even if we know that the person that the order needs to be served on has committed assault on a victim. The police then are not always the ones serving the notice. So how do we know who is serving these notices? Who is serving them? Is it the police? Because I am very sceptical of their ability to make sure that every single person who is covered in this bill will be able to be found in a practicable time by police.

I would be interested in clarification. Who is doing that job? Essentially, if someone arrives and disappears and we do not find them in 6 months, it is game over, no matter how serious their offence. It is a point I want to make to this Committee.

This bill is not based on the seriousness of offence. It is not. That is not what determines whether or not you will be covered by monitoring conditions. What is determined is how quickly you are deported after you are released. That is what determines whether you will be monitored. That seems to me to be a flaw in the principle of what we are trying to do here. For instance, someone who has had low-level offending, done prison for a year or more, they come out, they are detained straight away in a facility for 6 months, brought back to New Zealand, and they will be monitored. By default they will be monitored.

Someone, however, who, for instance, may be on a life sentence but has been free in Australia for 6 months is not covered by default. If they come back into New Zealand, we are then reliant on the next definition. I will find it in the bill. The next definition is for the returning offender who returns to New Zealand more than 6 months after release from custody. For these offenders, we are absolutely reliant on the court imposing conditions on that returning offender as set out in this bill.

So, again, that is reliant on the application of the chief executive to impose any conditions on a returning offender to whom this subpart applies—and the subpart, of course, being the definition around their having spent 6 months or more free but having some conditions imposed on them. Again, that happens if you have got a serious offence. So this seems to be a big hole. The default stuff seems to potentially cover a lower level, but potentially the more immediate, but we are reliant on corrections being spry for those areas where they might have a set of conditions that are being imposed by Australia that probably should continue to be imposed here.

I come back to my original point. If we are to have faith in corrections being able to do that sufficiently, why, when we know the seriousness of offenders who have already found themselves in New Zealand, have we still not used extended supervision orders? Does that demonstrate that we should not have faith in corrections that it is necessarily going to apply this subclause correctly and in a timely manner? That is my concern.

We have merged together two definitions around who is being captured, and we may end up being more punitive to the lower-level offenders than we necessarily might be on those who might have a wider set of conditions. I accept that the Minister, I think, has identified this issue herself with the new clause, I think, that is 27(1), which reverses the onus, that the court, basically, for a certain level of offending has to impose conditions. But that actually was about making sure that where we had incomplete information we were doing something quickly and effectively.

I have concerns that we are leaving too much up to officials who have already demonstrated to us that they are stretched and may not apply their discretion appropriately.

CATHERINE DELAHUNTY (Green): Tēnā koe, Mr Chair. Tēnā koutou e Te Whare mō tēnei pō. I just really want to take a call because I think it is quite rare for the Greens to abstain on a bill. We do not like abstaining, and I think one of the reasons we are abstaining, particularly with relation to Part 2, was outlined very clearly by the previous speaker, Jacinda Ardern, because it is not fit for purpose, and what we believe is that there is a law that needs to happen. There is somebody out there who needs to be monitored, and there are groups of people whose offences are always going to be of concern and should be monitored, but there has to be rigorous, consistent clarity, and this bill is not rigorous, consistent, or clear. So that is why we are abstaining, because we believe there is a bill that needs to be done, needs to be created, but this ain’t it.

So instead of Australia calling the shots, we would really like to see our Government say to Australia “Before you start sending people back through your completely Draconian and mad, incoherent system of punitive, political lack of judgment.”—which is what the Australians are doing at the moment in a random way, because of their xenophobic approach to all kinds of issues—let us say to them “We will be ready to deal with you, and we don’t want these people”—many of whom were brought up in Australia and spent their lives in Australia—“sent back here until we’re ready to cope with it.” And in order to be ready to cope with it, we need, through a select committee process, to hear from human rights experts and the judiciary and the police and the citizens who engage with these issues so that we get it right.

We agree with the Minister Amy Adams that there are people who need this monitoring—we do not disagree with that. But I would like to support my co-leader in her issue around Part 2, around the definition of “returning offender”, and address my remarks to those parts of Part 2 that talk about this returning offender. Again, we are in the hands of the Australians. They are deciding whom we are going to categorise as requiring monitoring, and that does not seem right, because if anyone here has been following the way in which people in detention are treated, the arbitrary nature in which the Australian law is being applied in section 501, etc., we cannot rely on them. We need to be clear ourselves about what we are trying to do.

I am taking a call tonight because I want to speak for political dissidents. In any law that affects people’s human rights and affects anybody who is involved with the criminal justice system, somebody needs to get up and say political dissidents can be captured by these kinds of laws. So a crime that is deemed to be an offence overseas and that can also be an imprisonable offence in New Zealand—and be liable for deportation—could be a political crime. So you could have somebody who is found guilty in Australia of a political crime that is also on the books in New Zealand, but the way they were convicted and the reasons for their conviction under Australian law could be quite different from what we would decide was right. But who makes that determination? So we are leaving that to the police force to decide, and some of us have concerns about that because we know that political dissidents could be sent home and be of concern to the legal authorities in this country simply because they are political dissidents.

So we are cautious. We are very cautious about anything that smacks of that kind of broad-brush gathering into the net of all kinds of people. So it is not only the issue of people who have committed offences at the lesser end; it is also people who might commit offences that actually, under the light of sanity and reason, such as we might have here, are not requiring this level of monitoring and this level of direction from the courts for the 6 months after they are returned, etc. But we would not be able to determine that, because we are adopting the Australian decision. So if we go to Part 2, subpart 3, it says that if an offender was in detention immediately before his or her return to New Zealand, then these sections apply to this person and the court may impose conditions on them. So being in detention is not the test. Getting into detention in Australia does not mean you are a serious offender; it means you got caught up in the net and you may or may not be a serious offender. That is our concern, and that is why we really had to abstain, because urgency has led to some of the most ineffectual and—

CATHERINE DELAHUNTY: I will just take a brief call, Mr Chair, because I am not a legal expert and this is certainly a complex legal issue. But what I would say is that complex and broad-brush approaches to what is actually quite a narrowly defined problem are problematic, and we have seen with urgency in this House before, when the House does things that are potentially a breach of the Human Rights Act, that it can be a real problem and they have to be rectified. And, again, if we look at the conditions around taking bodily samples in clause 14, the Criminal Investigations (Bodily Samples) Act 1995 applies to certain returning offenders. In fact, a constable can issue a databank compulsion notice requiring the offender to give a bodily sample.

I am actually myself quite offended by the word “offender”. I think some people have committed offences where they will probably be tagged all their lives with being a risk to the public, but some people, after they have served their time, do not deserve to be called an offender for the rest of their lives. I think with regard to the distinction in the law here around criminals and offenders, I would prefer to see language that makes it clear what we are actually talking about, because people who have done their time who have not committed serious crimes—how many times are they going to be re-criminalised by language like this? So we have real concerns about this kind of language and about clause 14, and we would be interested to hear from human rights organisations about this kind of issue.

So Part 2 does raise many issues for us. We are concerned about the broadness of it, the powers of the police—the contradictions that were raised by the previous speaker, Jacinda Ardern, about the extended supervision Act not being used, which suggests that we are doing this because there is a panic on, created by the Draconian Australian legal process, but not because this has been thought through and this has been planned.

I think another Labour Party speaker earlier talked about the powers of the police, which would be stronger than the powers of the courts. We have to—especially after Roast Busters—refuse a romantic view of what can happen when we give powers to the police to make judgments that rightly belong in the courts. That is an important issue for us, which we would have liked to explore. I myself would be happy to be proved wrong about this bill, not through urgency but through a select committee process that laid out clearly who should be on this register, who is an offender and needs constant monitoring, and who is not. If we could make that bill clear and if we could actually create some clarity in that bill, then I think there would be wholehearted support. But until that time we are unable to do that because it is too broad a net.

Also, those of us who work with political dissidents in Australia are concerned about the direction of Australian politics and law and the impact that is having on people who are likely to be—if not now, then in the future—detainees for what is actually their right to dissent. We will stand for the right to dissent being excluded from this kind of monitoring and this kind of lifelong branding as an offender, because that is what keeps us safe. If we do not make these distinctions—if we make our law broad-brush—then we will fail to protect the democratic right to dissent and the democratic right of people to cease to be a criminal offender and to actually be a citizen, again, who has done their time. If we want to create a society where everybody stays an offender for ever, that is not a society where we actually create healing. There are people who need to be monitored; there are people who do not. Thank you.

CARMEL SEPULONI (Labour—Kelston): I have got a few different queries about Part 2 of this bill. I am going to start right at the beginning here, where it says: “A ‘returning offender’—(a) is a person who has been convicted in an overseas jurisdiction …”, and I will not even continue with that because I would just like clarification from the Minister of Justice about what constitutes an overseas jurisdiction. I notice in Part 1 it is defined. It says “ ‘overseas jurisdiction’—(a) excludes the islands and territories within the Realm of New Zealand; but (b) includes the self-governing state of the Cook Islands, the self-governing state of Niue, Tokelau, and the Ross Dependency”.

I am just a little bit confused, because I thought that those were the only islands that made up the Realm of New Zealand. So I am wondering whether the Minister of Justice can clarify that for us. So just, again, to repeat, “overseas jurisdiction”—that definition is a bit confusing, because clause 4(1) says “(a) excludes the islands and territories within the Realm of New Zealand; but (b) includes the self-governing state of”—

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): We are on Part 2.

CARMEL SEPULONI: Yes, Mr Chair. I am relating it to the fact that a person who is a “returning offender” in Part 2 is someone “who has been convicted in an overseas jurisdiction”, and so I am just talking about what the definition of “overseas jurisdiction” is there. But I will leave that to the Minister to ponder, and it would be great if she could respond, because, as I am sure she can imagine, we are all a little bit confused by that.

I just want to get clarity around what happens with these offenders when they are returned to New Zealand. It does say that a returning offender “is a person who has been convicted in an overseas jurisdiction of an offence for conduct that constitutes an imprisonable offence in New Zealand and, being liable for deportation or removal as a result of that conviction,”. So, looking at that initially, I am thinking that they have been deported, but are we saying here that they might not necessarily have been deported, they may just have been liable for deportation? Because if they had been deported then I would assume that they would be met at the airport by someone here to take over from whomever has escorted them back to New Zealand, and in that instance I would think that the identifying particulars that are also talked about in Part 2 could then be gathered at that point, rather than leaving it to, potentially, some time within the first 6 months that they are back in New Zealand.

On that subject, just in terms of being able to gather those identifying particulars within the first 6 months after the offender has returned to New Zealand, I just want clarification from the Minister around the circumstances in which it would be appropriate for the police to detain that returning offender. So would that be because they have been taken in under some other charges, or they have come under the watch or notice of the police because of some other potential criminal activity, or could the police just be informed of the fact that this person is a returning offender and then just show up to their house, or their place of work, or a mall on the street where they perhaps were, and then detain them at that point? I guess I am just trying to work out what the appropriateness of detaining these people within the first 6 months of them returning to New Zealand might be.

Looking further down, where we see “Storage, etc, on Police information recording system of identifying particulars”, there is one bit that is a little bit concerning. It says: “However, photographs or visual images of a returning offender, and impressions of that person’s fingerprints, palm-prints, or footprints, that are provided in response to a request under section 9 or obtained under section 11 in error must be destroyed as soon as practicable.” I want to know what situations the Minister envisages where someone’s identifying particulars might be taken in error, because this is really specific to returning offenders. Are we saying that there is the potential here for someone to be identified as a returning offender, and that actually being mistaken identity—in which case that is why this particular clause is in here: to cover off that particular scenario?

I guess I would just like to know from the Minister whether or not there have been situations in the past where these types of things have arisen or whether she can envisage that as being a potential problem down the track. I guess, especially in light of the fact that there is a 6-month period to gather that information, are we going to potentially see people who are not returning offenders—

DENIS O’ROURKE (NZ First): As I have said in previous speeches, New Zealand First does support all of the various parts of this bill, for the reasons that I then gave. We do want to see a comprehensive and practical way of dealing with people who are returned, especially from Australia in the current circumstances, and who perhaps need—in fact, definitely need—supervision or monitoring. But there are some parts of the bill that if this had been a select committee process rather than what we have got here tonight—a much more restricted process—I would be seeking to improve or change.

One of those would be clause 7(a), and I think Metiria Turei has already pointed out the fact that this is a very, very wide provision indeed. It does refer to the “person who has been convicted in an overseas jurisdiction” at any time, and for an offence that if it was in New Zealand would be an imprisonable offence. Some quite minor things would fit that description of “imprisonable offence”, so we could be talking about very minor things indeed for the purposes of this clause. Then it goes on to refer to “being liable for deportation or removal as a result of that conviction,”. How would we know what a person is liable for in Australia or in Iran or in Timbuctoo or wherever? We would not. So this clause, I think, is problematic. It may well lead to difficulties in the future, and if this was a select committee process I would be asking for it to be tightened up and improved for those reasons. That is something, perhaps, that we will have to tend to when eventually this bill is reviewed.

When I turn over the page I see in clause 10(2) that “A constable may detain an offender … only for a period that is no longer than is reasonably necessary …”. What is reasonably necessary for the purpose of getting somebody’s particulars? How long is that? Is that 80 years, 8 minutes, or what? I guess you could take a practical approach and simply say that what it really means is that the police can hold somebody for as long as they like, until they get the information they want. In actual fact, what this section should be doing is specifying a specific period of time for which the police can hold a person, and no more, because it is too open as it is there.

Then, when I look a bit further in clause 11(a) and (b), I see again that we have this “reasonable” test, and the police are to do what is “reasonable”. I do not think that they are well-equipped to do that. What does it really mean when it says that a police officer can “take identifying particulars … but—(a) must do so in a manner that is reasonable in the circumstances”? What is reasonable? Is holding a person’s head underwater for 3 minutes reasonable, until they give up the information? I do not know; neither do the police, I do not think, either. Could we not be a little bit more specific and a little bit more professional in the way that these things are drafted? I am not so concerned about the use of the term “reasonable force”, because that is actually defined in other cases and probably in other legislation. The point I am making is that if this was a select committee process, we would be getting stuck into some of these terms and some of those provisions, because they are really, I think, pretty sloppy.

These faults are not enough for New Zealand First to vote against the bill, but I would certainly prefer to see some of those things attended to. Moving over to clause 26, concerning returning prisoners complying with special conditions imposed by the court, I think that that is all fine except for one point, which is subclause (3)(c), where: “A court may not impose a special condition unless it is designed to—(c) provide for the reasonable concerns of victims of the returning prisoner.” What on earth does that mean? What is a reasonable concern of a victim? I cannot understand how a court will deal with that, and it is another part of the bill that really should be improved.

Again, just over the page, in clause 27, where I see that, in terms of interim special conditions—and those are the ones that I would have thought that you would need to be particularly careful of, because they can be imposed immediately—it says in subclause (3) that this can happen even if the court does not have the complete information available to it, or it is still being sought. I do not understand why that is there, because one would have thought that a court must be trusted to make a decision only when it has got enough information to make that decision on. It should not be empowered to make decisions where it has not got information—that just does not make sense. That needs attention, and that is going to cause problems.

Again, in clause 27(5): “The application may be made without notice and a court must not require that notice be given.” There is a bit of a problem with that. It should, perhaps, refer to the possibility that that notice may not be possible, in which case that would be reasonable, but not just a bland declaration that this can be done without notice. There should be some limiting words on that. In the following subclause (6), I am glad to see that, at least, the clause expires after 30 working days, because that is actually a hell of a long time. It is a month, and probably it is too long. I would have liked to discuss that in a select committee, and will not get the opportunity to do so.

I could go on and on, really, in scrutinising the bill in this way. The point I am making is that it is a real shame that it is not going to a select committee, because we would all have had the opportunity to make some really constructive improvements to this bill, to avoid some of the problems that I think we are going to get and that we will now have to wait 2 years for a review for. I would like to express to the Minister my disappointment that we have not had a select committee process, because I think that that little bit more extra time would really have resulted in better legislation. I will leave it at that.

Hon DAVID PARKER (Labour): I want to talk to the Supplementary Order Paper that I have filed, and explain why I think it is necessary. Minister Adams, at clause 9 of the bill the legislation provides that the police may, when an offender returns from overseas, “as soon as is reasonably practicable, request a returning offender to provide identifying particulars”. “Identifying particulars” are defined as having the meaning set out in section 32(5) of the Policing Act. Section 32(5) has a list of “identifying particulars”, and I will read it. It means “any or all of the following: (a) the person’s biographical details (for example, the person’s name, address, and date of birth): (b) the person’s photograph or visual image: (c) impressions of the person’s fingerprints, palm-prints, or footprints”. It all goes to identification of the individual and facts that go to that end, not to the convictions or penalties that that person has had overseas.

It is understandable why identifying particulars are that narrow in New Zealand, because, of course—

Jacinda Ardern: The police already know.

Hon DAVID PARKER: The police already know those particulars of their prior convictions and their offences from the New Zealand governmental records that the police have access to. What we do not know, in respect of overseas offenders—unless we have been provided that information by an overseas jurisdiction, which we will not always have been provided—is, actually, the nature of the offence and the sentence that the person has had in that overseas jurisdiction. Maybe that is not a problem with Australia; I am not sure. We have not had answers to the question as to whether that—[Interruption] There have been gaps in the Australian situation—well, you should be able to ask the offender what was the offence that they were convicted of, and what was the penalty, and they should cooperate with the New Zealand authorities in providing that information. It is even more clear, in respect of some other jurisdictions where we do not have those close relationships but none the less this legislation applies to—because this does not apply just to Australia; it applies to other overseas jurisdictions, as I am sure the Minister understands.

My suggestion, Minister, is that we in this Committee amend that clause to make it clear that in addition to the identifying particulars that are as defined in section 32(5)—which I think clearly has to be read eiusdem generis and really relates to identifying particulars of the offender rather than their record of criminal offending, which is a different thing—the obligation of the person is to disclose the details of any overseas conviction and overseas penalty for any such conviction of the returning offender. Without that, I do not understand how you are going to be able to get from the offenders by right of law the information that the authorities need to determine whether the other provisions that kick in under this legislation apply or do not apply, because the tests that you have later in the legislation relate to the seriousness of the offence and the convictions. I do not see any way that you have got the right to require that information of an overseas jurisdiction. You might have cooperative relationships that normally provide that information that we in New Zealand do not have jurisdiction to require Russia or India or China to provide that information to us. What we could do through this legislation is require the returning offender to provide that detail of information, or at least cooperate with you in a way that enables you to get that information and if they do not, well, they suffer the consequences of not getting the liberty that they probably want.

Hopefully, this matter is not a matter that you are going to have to take an instant decision on before 10 o’clock. If you are, then you are going to have to—with respect—take a decision in the chair as to whether you think that my analysis of that is correct. [Interruption] Sorry, Mr Chairman. The Minister in the chair will have to take a decision as to whether there is a gap in the legislation, because, in my understanding, one of the things that the Government wants to achieve in respect of this is gathering the information that is needed, at the border, to assess whether these other flow-on consequences should apply to the person, and if you have not got the information as to what is the nature of the conviction and what is the nature of the penalty, I do not see how that can be done properly.

This actually raises the other question as to whether the review provision at clause 37 is adequate. I, for reasons that I have said previously but I have not had a response from the Minister while I have been in the House—I have not been in the House the whole time, so the Minister may have given an explanation previously. But this is another instance of why the review after 2 years by the Justice and Electoral Committee is no substitute for the process that the Labour Party Opposition was suggesting, and, you know, I like to think that I approach these matters from the point of principle. I agree that urgency is necessary—we are critical of why it is necessary, but we do not have to agree on that to agree that we should be doing this in the best possible way, given that we are in urgency. I still think it would be desirable to have a companion bill going to the select committee now with a sunset date in this legislation that was a reasonable period out. We had suggested a year—it could be 2 years. You could at the same time have a bill in front of the select committee that was hearing submissions upon it, which would have turned up issues such as the one that I have identified and some of them such as Denis O’Rourke and other members have identified, which could be resolved at the select committee process in the year so that the legislation that went forward from that period forward after the initial legislation lapsed could take into account all of those issues.

Another issue that I still await a response to is arising from clause 28(2), which appears to oust the jurisdiction of the court to consider the validity of a decision made by the Commissioner of Police that triggered the imposition of standard release conditions. It appears to me that clause 28(2) is an attempt to oust the jurisdiction of the court. I think it would be helpful to the courts, if the Minister has a contrary view, that that be expressed. I am not sure what the intention of clause 28(2) is, but it appears pretty plain on its wording to say that “A court must not discharge a standard release condition with effect from a date that is less than 6 months after the date of service of the determination notice.” I am not clear whether that is intended to oust the jurisdiction of someone to go to court to say that the Commissioner of Police was ultra vires the preconditions to the issue of—sorry, I have forgotten the name—the determination notice that the Commissioner of Police issues. I would request that the Minister particularly consider this issue as to whether you are going to get all the information you need from an offender once they arrive back, on the border. Perhaps that could be considered overnight.

Hon AMY ADAMS (Minister of Justice): I have again listened to the contributions thus far on Part 2, and have tried to jot down for myself issues where I have felt that there has been a genuine issue raised by someone who has taken the time to try to understand the bill and is seeking clarity. I want to try to respond to each of those in the time we have left this evening.

The first one I am going to start with is one that has come up from a few speakers, which is around who is caught by the requirement to give identifying particulars and the information involved in that, and whether that is too wide. Metiria Turei raised the point earlier, and I did want to respond to that. That comes into the definition of who is a returning offender and, therefore, how wide that goes and how that works. So the first point is that the wording in the definition talks about, as I have made clear, someone who has been convicted of an offence that is an imprisonable offence in New Zealand. Just as a comparator, under the Policing Act, the requirement to provide identifying particulars—which, as we have discussed, is the same scope of information—applies to anybody who is being lawfully held in custody by the police; so much, much wider. For any offence at all that is arrestable in New Zealand you have to provide that information and, once it is provided, the system has it.

So what we are saying with returning offenders is, the bar is actually higher. It is only when the conviction relates to an imprisonable offence. So, in that sense, not only is the bill about putting society in the same position it would be in if these offenders had served their time in New Zealand, in terms of the supervision regime, you could say it is about putting the system in the same position it would have been in had these people been through the system here. But, in fact, it is actually even narrower than that because it cuts out anyone who was arrested or charged or convicted of a lesser offence. So I hope that assuages the member’s concerns somewhat. That is what I went back and had a look at after we had had a discussion.

The other point, which I think Miss Ardern raised, was the words around being liable for return as a result of that conviction. Again, the point that we are trying to pick up here is that there is a distinction between a New Zealand citizen who is travelling or has lived abroad who may well have had a conviction overseas but who is just coming home. There is no intervention of the other jurisdiction, there has been no suggestion their visa is going to be cancelled or is being cancelled—they are just coming back. There is no suggestion in any way that this legislation should therefore require them to provide returning particulars. So the wording here is making it very clear that their return to New Zealand is part of them being liable for removal because of that conviction, not that the conviction is there and they are otherwise liable for removal. Their liability for removal has to be as a result of that conviction. So the member’s scenario where it might be some long-forgotten historic thing that has nothing to do with their removal would not pass that threshold test.

The second thing, though, in that wording, the other thing we had to be careful of, is exactly the situation with the offenders who are returning back this week. You can be liable for removal, you can have had your visa cancelled, you can be going through a review process, or you may just have decided you are not going to fight it and you are going to go back voluntarily. So what we did want to make sure we captured is, where these offenders whom we are looking to capture are being returned to New Zealand, that the legislation covers them, whether or not they voluntarily elect to waive their rights and get on a plane once that process has started, or whether they fight it all the way and get deported under operation of law. So that is the wording but with those two safeguards: of the type of offence that is caught, and that the removal is as a result of that conviction. So I hope that addresses that in some way.

I want to come to David Parker’s comment about clause 28, which I think you raised in Part 1. I did not respond then because I knew it would come up more appropriately in Part 2. I can assure the member that my reading, my advice, and my understanding are, absolutely, that it does not oust the jurisdiction of the court. What it is reviewing, of course, is whether, once a standard condition is in place, it should be varied. If, of course, it was ultra vires and it is in position, then a standard condition has never been in place, but to make it even clearer we have got clause 22(5), which makes it very clear that the court has a jurisdiction still to review the determination notice. Nothing in that clause changes that so, yes, I think that does make that point clear.

Mr Parker, I also wanted to touch briefly on your typescript amendment that you have just put in front of us. I think you are quite right—I do not think there is going to be a need to make a decision on it tonight, so I am happy to keep talking to you about it. But what I will say is that I do not personally see at this stage that it is necessary. I think it runs the risk of being circular, in that you have to know the person’s criminal offending record to be able to declare them a returning offender, to be able to compel them. So if you are then relying on what they tell you as the justification for that process, I think it becomes circular. The advice I have had from the police is that they do have the ability, through their international counterparts, through Interpol—quite outside the new information-sharing regime we have with Australia—to seek that information. They raised no concerns with me that there is any inability to get that and, as I said, I think you would end up creating a circular argument. So at this stage I am not of a view that it is needed, but I am certainly happy to keep having a discussion if you want to, to address that slightly differently.

Mr O’Rourke raised some issues, and I think Carmel Sepuloni might have as well, around the detaining of offenders with a purpose of serving a notice and getting the identifying particulars. It is not at all uncommon to provide that the police have the power to detain for that purpose. Detaining simply means “Just sit here in this room while we work you through this notice and take your fingerprints.”, otherwise you are detaining them unlawfully. So it is not some “At will, as long as we like, whenever we feel like it we can lock these people up.” It is simply staying in the rules.

Denis O’Rourke: That’s what it says, though.

Hon AMY ADAMS: No, because what you have is very long-established case law on exactly this sort of wording, which makes very clear what “detaining for such time as is reasonable to carry out the function” means, and nobody who operates in this area of law is under any illusion that it means anything other than a sensible amount of time to do what you need to do, without putting the police foul of the law. So, believe me, we have considered that and, I think, in the light of case law, we can be quite comfortable.

Finally, let me just come back to the final comment Mr Parker made around the review clause. I have addressed it. You may have missed it, but I accept the view that the Labour members put up. My view was that rather than having two parallel processes happening at the same time, the review should occur once we have a period of operation of the legislation. I have indicated that I am quite willing to talk with members if they think the structure of it should be set up differently in terms of who carries out the review or the period under which it is set to go. But I am of the view that that review will be a far more useful mechanism.

Now, of course, there is nothing that stops a select committee or, of course, myself or whoever the Minister is, reviewing it prior to that. But the point is to assure this House that the legislation will be compelled to be reviewed and returned to this House once there is a period of operation under it. I did consider the Labour members’ proposal. In my view it is unnecessary, and that the review proposal we have put in the bill is a better outcome. I accept that Labour members do not agree with that, but none the less I certainly did consider it and respond to Labour members on that basis. I think that is really all I wanted to respond to, in respect of the discussion tonight.

The only final point I would make is in respect of Mr O’Rourke’s comments, that there are things he would have liked to test. That is why I did offer you many opportunities to contact me with any queries and we could have discussed them and worked through them. You did not take that up, which of course is your right. In terms of what you have said in the House, I am comfortable that you have not raised anything that has not been thought of in drafting, but the offer is still there, Mr O’Rourke. If you think there are things that you think you would like to see changed, you are welcome to contact me over the course of this evening or in the morning. My door is still open. If issues can be identified, I certainly want to hear them and work with you on them. I may not agree, but we can at least have that discussion.

KELVIN DAVIS (Labour—Te Tai Tokerau): I have got just a couple of questions for the Minister around, again, clause 9, “Police may request returning offender to provide identifying particulars”. My colleague David Parker has gone through those particulars, namely—I will start from the second point—photograph or visual image, impressions of a person’s fingertips, palm-prints, footprints. All of those things are something that can exist along with the person’s name and date of birth, but my concern is the address. What happens to these people who turn up and they do not have an address to go to? I believe that for the first 5 days they will be put up in a motel or hotel. What happens to those people after those 5 days when they do not have an address to go to?

I ask the question because it is an offence not to provide that address. The offence is that they are liable on conviction to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 6 months, to a fine not exceeding $5,000, or to both, and I would hate to think that just because they are people who have been deported to no fixed abode in New Zealand and do not have an address to provide the details of to a policeman, they would, in fact, be in breach of that particular part of this bill. So that is something that I would like to have cleared up.

What happens to these people who do turn up? They do not have an address. They are put in a motel for a couple of days and then, after that, what happens to them? They are given, I believe, only a couple of hundred dollars in their back pocket. That will not pay rent for particularly long, and after that they are on their own. That is the question that I would really like the Minister to answer. I think it would just be totally unfair for these people to be in breach of the clauses.

The other issue that I have is just around the wording in a number of the clauses. It is the word “may” that is scattered around.

Debate interrupted.

Sitting suspended from 10 p.m. to 9 a.m. (Wednesday)

TUESDAY, 17 NOVEMBER 2015

(continued on Wednesday, 18 November 2015)

Bills

Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill

In Committee

Debate resumed.

Part 2 Returning offenders: management and information (continued)

JACINDA ARDERN (Labour): I want to return to the element of debate that my colleague the Hon David Parker raised during the debate on Part 2 of this bill. On this side of the Chamber, this element of Part 2 demonstrates to us why we should be undertaking a dual process with this piece of legislation because this appears, from our perspective, to be a drafting flaw in Part 2 of the bill.

As has been discussed previously, this bill derives a lot of its meaning through the cross-referencing of other Acts, primarily the Parole Act but also, under clause 10 of the Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill, the Policing Act 2008. That part of the bill makes particular reference in clause 10 to the ability of police to detain returning offenders—returning offenders being the entire cohort, not just returning prisoners—for the purpose of taking identifying particulars. It will seem obvious on first blush why we would want a provision like this in the bill. The ability for the police to detain is set out in clause 10(2), “for a period that is no longer than is reasonably necessary in the circumstances for a constable to take the identifying particulars of the offender”. That is similar language to what is used in the Policing Act. In a sense, what we are doing here is allowing the police, once a returning offender comes back into our borders, to take relevant information for police files. When I say “relevant information”, we have codified that in this legislation by cross-referencing the Policing Act.

And it is not just identifying particulars that we are seeking; for the purposes of the Criminal Investigations (Bodily Samples) Act we are also seeking DNA samples where that prisoner qualifies under the bodily samples Act. But the bit that I want to dwell on again—it was raised by David Parker, and the Hon Amy Adams undertook to take the issue away, but when the Committee rose last night it seemed particularly clear to us that there would be no movement on this issue, and this is the problem. Under the Policing Act 2008, Part 3, “Powers, operations, and offences”, section 32(5) states: “ ‘identifying particulars’ means, in relation to a person, any or all of the following: (a) the person’s biographical details (for example, the person’s name, address, and date of birth):”—we have already highlighted that this will obviously be incomplete information, given many of the people returning to New Zealand will not have a specific address—“(b) the person’s photograph or visual image: (c) impressions of the person’s fingerprints, palm-prints, or footprints”. Obviously here we are not talking about DNA because that is covered by the Criminal Investigations (Bodily Samples) Act.

Nowhere in these requirements under “identifying particulars” in the Policing Act, which is the direct reference for this bill, is there anything about taking information about the nature of the deportee’s offence or offences. There is an obvious reason for that according to the Policing Act, and that is because within domestic legislation—of course if they are in a police station having their particulars taken it is because the police have charged them with an offence and they of course know by default what offence has been committed. It makes sense.

For this legislation we have got a completely different set of circumstances. For the legislation that we are debating here, the person will have been charged and convicted in another country. We do not necessarily have that complete information, so when we take those identifying particulars it would make sense that in Part 2 of this bill we be very specific about allowing the police to require that information to be shared. One might argue—the Minister could argue; the officials might try to argue—that we might have that information from an overseas jurisdiction from which the person has been deported. We know that that may not necessarily be the case.

How do we know that? Because in our discussions with the Minister in the lead-up to this bill being developed, new section 27(1A), from memory, was added quite late in the piece because the Minister discovered that the 20 individuals who are being deported to New Zealand this week did not have complete information. New section 27(1A) in Part 2 has been added quite late by the Ministry of Justice for good reason—to allow those with serious offences, for instance, sexual assault, murder, rape; what we would consider to be serious offences—to have the courts required to issue interim orders unless there is any reason not to. We know that we may not have complete information about some of those offenders in order to make a complete application in that early stage when they first arrive. So the fact that new section 27(1A) exists demonstrates to us the incomplete information that is coming back with some of these deported individuals, and acts as further evidence of why there should be, under clause 11 of Part 2, under the provision about police taking identifying particulars, an additional set of particulars, and that is the nature of offending—the nature of the offences—and it could be that you could define it as “for which the individual was deported from an overseas jurisdiction”. As it stands, the Policing Act 2008 is incomplete for the purposes of this bill.

If the Minister refuses to add this, we are creating a rod for our own back, and we will have a farcical situation where a tourist coming into New Zealand for the purposes of visiting casually will be required to give more information on an immigration declaration at the border than we will require a person who is being deported back to New Zealand because of their offending, and that is because we will not be requiring that same level of disclosure, and we should be. It would be farcical to simply rely on being able to access information via Interpol in order to complete information we could simply require to be shared by an offender. For goodness’ sake! We are taking their DNA samples. That is the most invasive gathering of information that is possible under New Zealand law, and yet we will not require them to disclose their offences.

From Labour’s perspective, this particular drafting oversight demonstrates to us why—and I highlight this again—we would have liked, within this part or perhaps attached to the title and commencement clauses, a sunset clause, which would mean that this bill would expire within a year, and, at the same time, we would be passing a duplicate bill at first reading that would then progress through the House, through all stages, to allow us to pick up these kinds of errors and to allow us to give the public time to have their say. It would also allow the legal fraternity to have their say on this piece of legislation, and we would make sure at that point that such errors did not occur. We do not believe that simply having a review after 2 years is sufficient. It means that errors like this would remain longer than is necessary, and this Parliament does not operate on the basis of trial—that we put out a law and just see how it goes without having a proper process up front, and that is essentially what we are doing here. I would really appreciate the Minister giving us a final word on whether she will be undertaking to make that drafting change. Otherwise, we think it is farcical that it is not included, and, again, it proves our point on the rushed nature of this legislation.

I want to speak very briefly in the 1 minute I have remaining to a similar issue around the default provisions in the Parole Act, which this part references, and it is the standard release conditions. Again, we have this bizarre reference in this bill, in clause 4(2), that says: “In this Act, unless the context otherwise requires, a term that is used but not defined, but that is defined in the Parole Act, has the same meaning as in that Act.” So, basically, it is a catch-all that says: “If we haven’t defined something and you’re a bit confused and you don’t find it here, you should find it in the Parole Act, we hope.” It is a catch-all phrase, because of the obviously rushed drafting. The Parole Act 2002 standard release conditions, on reading, are not designed for someone who is deported from overseas, are heavily reliant on existing information being available, are heavily reliant on their being released to a known residence, and are heavily reliant on that person not being transient. These standard release conditions, which we are cross-referencing here, are not necessarily fit for purpose for people who are being deported. Again, it shows the rushed nature of this bill.

CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka): If I had been part of the select committee process, which, of course, has not happened on this bill, there are some questions that I would want to tease out as part of that process. I want to turn particularly to clause 17 of Part 2, “Criteria for determination that person is returning prisoner”. One of the things that I would have wanted to tease out through the select committee process is the comparability of laws and sanctions in different jurisdictions to ensure that we capture, through this clause, all of the people whom we hope to capture. So it seems to me that the principle that we are trying to achieve here is to ensure that somebody who is coming back to New Zealand, having been sentenced offshore, is treated in New Zealand in a similar way to the way they would have been treated had they been sentenced for that offence here in New Zealand.

The wording of clause 17 leaves a little bit of ambiguity, which I would like to seek some reassurance on from the Minister in the chair, Nicky Wagner. Clause 17(1) says: “The Commissioner must determine that a person is a returning prisoner if the Commissioner is satisfied that the person—(a) has been convicted in an overseas jurisdiction of an offence for conduct that constitutes an imprisonable offence in New Zealand;”. So the first part of that suggests to me that if someone has been sentenced offshore for something that is not imprisonable in New Zealand, they would not, therefore, be covered.

Other jurisdictions have things that are illegal that in New Zealand are not illegal. So if somebody had been sentenced offshore and is returning to New Zealand, and that was not an illegal activity, they would not, therefore, be covered. My understanding of what the Minister of Justice contributed in the debate yesterday was that that, therefore, meant they would not be covered. The Minister used the example of some jurisdictions having imprisonable offences for criticism of the monarchy, for example. If somebody did that offshore and was imprisoned for that and came home to New Zealand, they would not be covered because in New Zealand that is not an imprisonable offence. But when we get to clause 17(1)(b) it says “has, in respect of that conviction, been sentenced to—(i) a term of imprisonment of more than 1 year; or (ii) 2 or more terms of imprisonment that are cumulative, the total term of which is more than 1 year;”. The reason that I am interested in this is that different jurisdictions will, obviously, treat things more severely or more leniently than they may be treated in New Zealand.

So the question that I have is, if someone had served a prison sentence overseas, for example, that might have been significantly less than what they would serve in New Zealand and, therefore, does not fall within this criterion, does that not mean, therefore, that we are not capturing all of the people whom we are attempting to capture through this legislation? So had they been sentenced offshore to, say, 6 months’ imprisonment for something that in New Zealand would have given them a minimum prison sentence of, say, 2 years, why would they not be captured by this? That is one of the questions that I would like to get some reassurance from the Minister on, because it seems to me that clause 17(1)(a) suggests that what we are trying to do is achieve consistency with New Zealand law, yet clause 17(1)(b) does not have any such additional requirement in terms of the length of the sentence. So I would like to get some further clarification and advice from the Minister on that.

The next part, in clause 17(1)(c), says: “is returning or has returned to New Zealand within 6 months after his or her release from custody during or at the end of the sentence.” And, again, there are some areas of ambiguity that I would quite appreciate some clarification from the Minister on—and can I welcome the new acting Chairperson to his significant elevation and I congratulate him on that. Some clarity from the Minister, just regarding the returning to New Zealand within 6 months, is needed. The reason why I am interested in this is that if somebody is sentenced for child sex offences in an overseas jurisdiction, they have completed their sentence, are released into the community, and have been at large within the community for more than 6 months, why would they not therefore be covered by this clause, and if they are going to be covered by other provisions, what would those other provisions be? Those are the sorts of questions that, had this bill been to a select committee, I think we would have clearer answers to than the ones that we have had so far to date from the Minister.

Those are the brief questions that I have for the Minister at this point in the debate. I have further questions as we go along, but I see the Minister taking notes so I am hoping that we will get some answers to some of those before the debate proceeds.

POTO WILLIAMS (Labour—Christchurch East): With your indulgence I would like to be able to give some context to my speech, which I hope over the course of this debate becomes quite fulsome. Yesterday when I was in the House I tried on several occasions to rise to take a call on this particular bill and was unable to do so, and I feel I must give my contribution some context.

I was very disappointed to see the passage of this bill rushed through the House under urgency. There should be very good reasons why bills come to this House under urgency. Not only do we have one bill, not only do we have two bills, but we have three bills that this House needs to debate and review and pass under urgency. For the other two bills that are coming up there are valid reasons why this has to occur, but for this bill, I do not see why it has taken the Government almost a full year to get this bill to the House. When it does get here it is full of holes, it is poorly drafted, and it will require a significant amount of re-work at some stage. And are we going to be given the opportunity to do that in a timely fashion? No, we are not. We are given 2 years to sit and wait and see how this bill develops over the next couple of years. The impact that that is going to have on the returning offenders is going to be a wait and see.

I am very concerned that the Minister has done this because I would not have expected that of her. I do not heap praise on members of the Government often but I think that Minister Adams is a credible, capable Minister, and I would have expected better of her than this bill, which appears to have been rushed at the last minute, with amendments at the 11th hour before the bill is read in the House. Frankly, it is not good enough. In fact, I would have expected this type of drafting legislation to come from other Ministers across the House, such as the one who will always have the ignominy of saying that worm farming is dangerous to workers.

But this bill has got a really truncated process. Members of the Opposition, and in fact members of the Government, should be given the opportunity to speak on behalf of those who would have presented at select committee. We should be given the opportunity, and we will be given the opportunity, to speak their voice because they are unable to speak for themselves. There would be many submitters on this, because this is a very emotional bill. There are many aspects of it in relation to the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act, in relation to human rights, and in relation to the safety of the public that need to be explored fully. We need to make sure that this House is given the opportunity to do that.

I want to speak particularly to some of the aspects that have arisen, notably around clauses 20 to 26, which talk primarily about the monitoring process that will happen once these people have landed. Let us face it, they are sitting in a plane waiting at the end of the runway to taxi to come here, and we are, at this 11th hour, attempting to put this legislation into place so that we can have some confidence in the safety that will go in place around monitoring them.

From reading the regulatory impact statement, it would appear there are many policy statements but no clear direction on how we are actually going to support these people when they arrive. That is a major concern because if this bill is about the safety of the New Zealand public, and we have not decided how we are actually going to monitor these people—we have not got the policy developed and in place—there is a serious flaw here.

I want to talk about the people from People at Risk Solutions in Christchurch, and notably Helen, who came and saw me several weeks ago with a woman in tow—I will just call her “J”—who arrived in New Zealand from Brisbane with 3 days’ accommodation arranged and $200 in her pocket. That is all she arrived with. She would have been caught up in this piece of legislation.

How is it that we are going to be able to cope with the influx of offenders returning to New Zealand if we have not got the basics in place to actually support them? What is the impact? If we were at the select committee we would be asking the officials to give us the costing. What is it going to cost the New Zealand public to put this in place? We would be getting some really good information from officials about what the monitoring programme looks like. We would be getting some really clear steers from officials about what rehabilitation needs to go in place. We would be getting a really good understanding of the implications of the human rights aspects of collecting DNA and blood samples of people.

We would also have a much better idea of these offenders—what their offence history is. At the moment, that is very unclear, and, in fact, we do not know for sure that we will ever have the full disclosure of their offence history. How is that acting in the public safety of the citizens of New Zealand? If we had given this piece of legislation the due process it deserves, we would have had many of those questions answered before the bill came back to the House for the Committee stage and final readings. Unfortunately, we are not going to be given that opportunity.

I sat here in the Chamber when members of the Opposition parties rose and asked questions and sought advice and put their speeches, and not a single member of the Government stood and took a call to defend this process. The only person who spoke was the Minister, at the end of the night. Why is that? Why are we not getting the Government MPs getting to their feet, taking a call, and actually providing some context—

Hon Ruth Dyson: Maybe it’s because they’re useless?

POTO WILLIAMS: You are absolutely right. They are like cocktail sausages on sticks, sitting over on the other side of the Chamber, just sitting there—

Hon Ruth Dyson: Don’t be so rude about cocktail sausages.

POTO WILLIAMS: I apologise to cocktail sausages. They are sitting there, please—do they even have copies of the legislation in front of them? One member across the other side of the Chamber. How is that? You bring the House into urgency—not you, Mr Chairman. The Government brings the House into urgency and the Government MPs do not even have the ability to stand up and defend their Government, defend this urgency process, and defend the fact that members of the public have not been able to have their say on this very serious matter.

I challenge the members across the other side of the Chamber not to just stand and move closure motions but to actually get up and do the work of Parliament and do your debate. If you actually have your pieces of legislation in front of you, that is for you to refer to. Anyway, thank you for this opportunity. There is much more I would like to debate and I shall refer to that, but at this stage I would like to see whether the Government MPs would like to take a call. Thank you.

METIRIA TUREI (Co-Leader—Green): I just want to talk about the two amendments that the Green Party has put on the Table. They relate directly to the review clause, which I think is clause 37, at the end of the bill. That clause provides that the Justice and Electoral Committee must, 2 years after the commencement of this legislation, review the operation of the legislation. The Minister has said that the reason for the 2-year time period is to give the law a chance to be operational and for various experiences to be had, and to understand how the law may or may not be working effectively and what could be improved. She has also said numerous times, including late last night, that she is open to narrowing the time frame for that review.

We have put two amendments on the Table to change the review period from 2 years from commencement of the legislation to either 12 months or 18 months from the commencement of the legislation. Our preference is for there to be a review in 12 months, and that comes as a result of the information from the regulatory impact statement, which describes just how many offenders the Government expects to be returned to New Zealand over the next period. It is saying that 280 will return to New Zealand in the 2016-17 year and again in 2017-18—plus, we have a bunch arriving tomorrow, and we will have more over the next few months. So there will be a large number of New Zealanders returning under section 501 of the Migration Act in Australia and subject to this bill that we are debating. We do not think that we need to wait much longer than 12 months to see how those 100 or 200 people will be affected by this legislation. There are more than enough examples of the implementation to know whether or not the law is working effectively and what we should be doing to change it. If the review is delayed much longer than 12 months from now, the chances of fixing the law before the next election are very slim.

I will just go back and say that the 2-year review currently in the bill means that the review will not start until about the same time as the general election in 2017. If it starts just before the general election in 2017, nothing will happen for the entirety of the 3-month election period, and probably nothing until the beginning of 2018, at least, because of the time it takes to get Parliament up and running again. So the actual review itself might well be 2½ years away, and possibly no changes will be made for 3 years—and that, frankly, is just too long. So let us bring the review period back to a more reasonable time frame where the process starts at least a year before the general election, gives a chance for a few months of review by the select committee, and then gives an opportunity for the Government to look at the recommendations for change and to construct the legislation for change, and for that to go through the House.

As we have seen with this particular bill, we know how long policy development and the drafting of legislation can take. We do not want to be in this situation again, where we have urgency for such critical legislation that deals with criminal law and human rights. It is a very poor process for such important legislation. Our argument is: bring the review forward and make sure that it can be completed and that the legislation can be drafted, and preferably passed, well before the general election. That way we will know both that the human rights of the offenders who are returning will be better protected, because there will be a closer review of what happens to them—there will certainly be enough examples of how the legislation affects offenders, because so many will be returning in the next 12 to 18 months—and that the lawmaking process can get back on track. We want to have good quality law. We do not want to be debating law that is riddled with mistakes. They are not intentional mistakes; it is just the consequence of a rushed job.

We are supposed to be professionals at the lawmaking business, and we can do much better, but only if the review clause in this bill is changed to make sure that we have the time to do our jobs properly. We owe it to the New Zealand public to do our jobs as best we can and when we are making law about human rights and criminal law, to apply all of our best efforts to the best quality job. So I am strongly advocating to all parties, including the Minister and those Government parties, to support, preferably, the 12-month review. I think that gives us the best amount of time, but even the 18-month review period will at least get us started well before the election. It better upholds our reputation as a lawmaking institution that makes sure it does the best and creates the best possible law in these circumstances. Thank you.

Hon DAVID PARKER (Labour): Can I thank Metiria Turei for those amendments, and I am sure that the Labour Party would support something like that, to bring forward the review. We still think it would be preferable to have a two-track process, starting today, which would have put a parallel bill to a select committee for consideration of submissions that could be called tomorrow by the select committee and be heard in the normal process, and within a year we would have a fully worked-through, parallel bill that fixed all the mistakes that, no doubt, there are in this bill—and there is no doubt that there are mistakes in this bill. That would take effect on the expiration of this bill, which could then have a termination date of a year from today. That would be a better solution, but the Government has rejected that. I think that that shows how abusive it is of parliamentary processes generally and how unconcerned it is to get the exact balance right between civil liberties but also how unconcerned it is to protect the members of the public properly in the interim period between now and that review, which it has got currently set out there 2 years ahead.

On that last point, I want to return to an issue that I raised with the Minister of Justice last night, which is that as far as I am aware, there is nowhere in New Zealand law a requirement for people who have got convictions overseas to disclose those to the New Zealand authorities. Government members are not saying I am wrong, we have had no advice to the contrary from the Minister, and it seems to be nonsensical. Someone can return to New Zealand with a serious criminal offence overseas and no New Zealand authority has got the right to get that information from them. It might get that information from Interpol, sometimes. It might get it from a cooperating country like Australia, sometimes. There are other countries in the world that are in no state, because of their civil disorder, to provide us with that information, even if they wanted to. So, no doubt, there are instances in New Zealand where returning serious criminals do not have a duty to provide information on what those convictions overseas were.

Let us take what happens under this bill. This bill applies only in respect of orders for returning prisoners if those people have been returned within 6 months of their release from custody—so we cannot find any protection in subpart 2 in Part 2 of the bill—and in respect of Part 1, the only thing that they are required to provide us with is identifying particulars, and, as I have said in earlier contributions, those identifying particulars as defined in the Policing Act are biographical information. They go to identification of the person, not their convictions. So there is no doubt in my mind that that classification of identifying particulars in this legislation does not extend to their prior convictions.

I want to also point out another problem with this bill that I think is unintentional, and, again, it points to why we should be having this two-track process. Clause 9 of the bill says that “The Police may, as soon as is reasonably practicable, request a returning offender to provide identifying particulars and may detain the offender under section 10 if the offender refuses.” Clause 10 then says that the right of detention applies for only 6 months after the offender’s return. Again, it is clear that this requirement to, effectively, have a compulsion mechanism so that you can get those identifying particulars applies for only the first 6 months after someone’s return.

What is the policy rationale for that? I do not understand why it is that you would not want to have particulars of people for whom, maybe because of Australian incompetence or New Zealand authorities’ incompetence, it does not happen for the first 6 months. All of the sudden there is no need to have the particulars of people who have committed serious offences but who were not picked up in the first 6 months. Indeed, this actually shows a problem in this legislation in respect of what has already happened.

I agree that you should not have retrospective legislation that places people at double jeopardy retrospectively, but it is actually a different thing to say that, prospectively, information you should have collected previously but you have not collected because of the incompetence of the Government—that you should not actually have the right to collect that information in the future if that is necessary to protect New Zealanders. I think that it is proper that the New Zealand authorities get information on people who have had serious convictions overseas after they return to New Zealand, even if you do not ask for it for the first 6 months. After this legislation passes, we can do something in respect of the first 6 months, but not thereafter.

Another issue, which actually cuts the other way, is that we actually might be going too far in respect of some offences. I was thinking about situations that go the other way. If you are a person who is under 27 years old and you are a New Zealander, you have got rights to live in the United Kingdom for up to 2 years and get a work permit. I think that is, in general, the rule. It might have been tightened a little, but it is something like that. I know this to be a particularly relevant issue, because it actually happened to a friend of mine. A friend of mine stayed over there for longer than the 2 years and was then at risk of prosecution. She actually departed from the UK, but others do not and actually overstay, in breach of the immigration laws in the UK. If they are convicted it is an imprisonable offence, and it would be an imprisonable offence in New Zealand too, the maximum sentence for which would be more than a year’s imprisonment, I think.

You would also be liable for deportation. Even if you were not deported, you would be told that you were liable for deportation and you would find yourself coming back to New Zealand. You would actually be a returning offender within the definition of clause 7(a). We might want that, but I have not heard any Government member or the Minister actually say that that sort of returning offender is going to be caught by this legislation. I think in theory they are, and yet with regard to the person whom I have talked about earlier—the person who might have had a murder conviction or a paedophilia conviction in an overseas jurisdiction at some earlier period and who comes back to New Zealand—we have got no right to get the particulars of their prior offending, even if they might pose a threat to the New Zealand public. That is another illustration of how this legislation might not be getting the balance right. It might be attaching to people to whom we, as a Parliament, might not think it should attach; it might not be attaching to people to whom it should attach in order to protect the public.

That is another reason why I cannot see why the Government is being so stubborn about refusing to allow the parallel process, where a second version of this bill goes to a select committee so that we can actually consider these issues. Members of Parliament on this side of the House have done their best to make these contributions upon a simple reading of the bill, thinking what the implications might be. People who are more expert in areas of the law than we are—specialists or people from the Law Society with a special interest or victim impact groups—will have other issues with this bill that we have not thought of, and we are not going to get the opportunity to improve this legislative regime as a consequence until we have a review.

I suspect the Minister is going to come and say “Well, look, maybe the review period should be brought forward a little bit so it doesn’t coincide with an election.”, and that is a good thing. I thank the Minister for that, and we in the Labour Party would support that if the Minister were to do that.

Finally—and I will just recap on one point for the benefit of the Minister of Justice, who is now in the chair—I do not accept the circular definition point. One of the points the Minister made yesterday was there would be some circularity introduced because if you have the requirement to provide particulars but you do not know that they are an returning offender, then you would not necessarily know to ask them, and therefore it is circular. It is actually not circular; it is just that it would not always apply. Given that clause 9 in terms of the request for identifying particulars always applies—it does not expire after 6 months; the only thing that expires is the Government’s right to detain for non-compliance with the request to give identifying particulars—I think we are left with a gap in the law.

It is a nonsense that someone who has returned from overseas—let us say someone is picked up on a suspected paedophilia charge outside a school. This could happen; it does happen in New Zealand. The police say “We don’t know about you. What have you been up to?”, and that person says “Oh, look, I’ve just come back from overseas. I’ve been overseas for 10 years.” That person has got no duty to tell them whether in that 10-year period they were spending, you know, 10 years in prison in Pakistan, or something, for charges relating to children.

That has got to be a nonsense, and we can fix it in this legislation by requiring that a person who returns from overseas who is a New Zealander who has been convicted in an overseas jurisdiction of an offence that constitutes an imprisonable offence in New Zealand and who was liable for deportation—you do not have to be deported; you just have to be liable for deportation—has a duty to provide information to the police, if requested, as to what their conviction was overseas and what their penalty was. It seems to me a very sensible proposition from the Labour Party, so I would hope that Parliament backs my amendment.

Hon AMY ADAMS (Minister of Justice): I want to take a call to talk on a typescript amendment I have tabled this morning picking up concerns and discussions that I have had with other parties over the course of the evening. I said last night in my contribution that I was happy to continue to talk to parties and, if we found areas of common ground, to support them where they made sense. This morning I have spoken with the Green Party, the Māori Party, and the Labour Party—I am sorry, Mr O’Rourke, I have not had a chance to reach out to you—around the clause on the length of the review. There was some concern expressed to me that there was a preference of this Committee that the review period be shortened from 24 months, or 2 years, to 18 months. The Government will support that, and so I have tabled an amendment doing that, which will be coming to members. It also just picks up some advice I have had from the Clerk, which I do not think will be of any great concern to the Committee.

Just so that you are all aware, the bill as introduced talked about referral to the Justice and Electoral Committee. This amendment is just providing more flexibility so that the Clerk can nominate the appropriate committee because, as we know, various parliaments constitute committees in various different ways. So because it has just been tabled I will read it to you: “Replace clause 37 … with: 37 Review by select committee. A select committee to be determined by the Clerk of the House of Representatives must, 18 months after the commencement of this Act, review the operation of this Act and prepare a report on that review.” So in other respects it is the same but with a shortened time period and just making sure that there is no issue around the select committees at any point in time being reconstituted, as the Clerk would have the ability, obviously, to determine the appropriate one, which I do not imagine members will have any great concern with.

I did just want to also come back to Mr Parker. We discussed last night that I would consider his typescript amendment around whether we need to add the requirement for a legal compulsion on returning offenders to give us their criminal histories. My view at that time was that it was a circular argument and that we would need to have their criminal histories to know that they were returning offenders to then collect the information, but I undertook to confirm that. That is certainly the advice that I have had through from officials. Without their criminal history records we cannot classify them as returning offenders. The only way that we could make sure that was comprehensive would be, potentially, to require every returning New Zealander to disclose all criminal convictions, and that is not a step I am prepared to take as an intrusion on New Zealanders returning to their home country.

So, firstly, I am convinced that to do it in the manner proposed where it is only returning offenders is circular because we already know their criminal histories at that point, but the other point I checked in discussion with Mr Parker was whether police were confident that they had the ability to get criminal history information from any jurisdiction. They assured me that they are. They assured me that they are and that they do not see that as necessary, so on that basis we will not be supporting it.

The other point I would make is that once a person is identified as a returning offender we of course have the ability to take their biometrics, take their details, and then of course continue to follow up. So we will have enough information to determine them as returning offenders and then in the future, obviously, with biometrics we can continue to build on that. But the police’s advice to me is that it is unnecessary, the legal advice to me from my department is that it is circular, as I had first thought, and so on that basis we will not be supporting that amendment.

KRIS FAAFOI (Labour—Mana): I thank the Minister of Justice for her contribution. There is an episode of The West Wing where the President’s chief adviser Leo McGarry paraphrases Otto von Bismarck about there being two things you do not want to see being made, and that is laws and sausages. I think this is one of those instances where you wish you did not see a law like this being put together in this fashion. It has been rushed, and I think the contribution that the Minister has made around an amendment she has just tabled and an amendment tabled by my colleague David Parker is pure evidence that the Government is rushing this piece of legislation through. It should have had time when it first had notice of the need to address these returning offenders and returning prisoners. It should have been addressed at the beginning of this year.

Mr Chair, I know you want me to speak to Part 2, so I will talk about it in the context of what is and what is not in this part. What is in this part is some of the easy stuff, and what is not in this part is some of the stuff that there would have been questions about if this were to go through a select committee process. Some of my colleagues have talked about that stuff, which includes some of the services that would help reintegrate and monitor some of these returning offenders and returning prisoners.

The easy stuff is in there. I will look at an example, and that is clause 13, which states that it is an offence to not comply with a constable’s direction if they feel that they have to detain you or they want to get information from you about your offending or your convictions overseas. Clause 13 is pretty simple. The easy stuff is in there. But if we had the opportunity to sit down in a select committee—and it would have been the Justice and Electoral Committee or the Law and Order Committee—we and, I think, some of the submitters would ask some pretty basic questions of the Government around what we do with these people when they get here. What kinds of support services do we have for them? What do we do around reintegration? It is my understanding that when the Government took a snapshot of offenders or those who had been convicted and have come back from overseas over the last couple of years, the reoffending rate of those people was roughly 20 percent higher than for those who had been released from New Zealand prisons. So we do have an issue, because the likelihood is that these people coming to our shores, having been deported, will have a much higher reoffending rate than those who are released from New Zealand prisons.

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): I am going to interrupt the member. I am going to invite him to now move from a general second reading type of speech to a particular discussion of Part 2.

KRIS FAAFOI: Thank you very much, Mr Chair. I was speaking around reoffending. I guess in relation to David Parker’s amendment, which changes clause 9, having more information about their offending and what level of risk they would pose would be helpful to the Government in being able to offer them those kinds of reintegration services. The fact that David Parker had to put forward his amendment shows the rushed nature and the ill-thought-out nature of this piece of legislation.

For those at home who want to know what Mr Parker’s amendment is about, it amends clause 9 around the identifying particulars for people who are deported to New Zealand. In clause 9 he wants to add the words “, and the details of any overseas conviction and overseas penalty for any such conviction of the returning offender,”. You would think that one of the basic things in this piece of legislation would be to know not just who they are, because as it stands we understand the identifying particulars just tell the authorities who this person is.

To get an idea of how much of a risk they may be to the public—because this is what we want to make sure we can mitigate for, for New Zealanders, and this is what the Government claims it is putting this piece of legislation forward for—we want to know exactly what risk profile these guys and these women may have to the New Zealand public. But in the bill itself we do not have the mechanism to be able to find out what they may have been convicted of. So Mr Parker has seen fit to put forward this amendment to clarify what “identifying particulars” are. Are we surprised that we have had to do this? Well, no. Within the regulatory impact statement we find a statement that is becoming all too common.

KELVIN DAVIS (Labour—Te Tai Tokerau): I would like to talk to clauses 16 through to 20 regarding returning prisoners. Clause 16 talks about who is a returning prisoner. Clause 17 outlines the criteria for determining that a person is a returning prisoner. Clause 18 talks about the time for the commissioner to determine that that person is a returning prisoner. Clause 19 states that “[t]he Commissioner must serve a written notice on a person (P) who has been determined to be a returning prisoner.” Clause 20, though, describes what that determination notice must look like. It states that a “determination notice must—(a) state that the person named in the notice (P) has been determined by the Commissioner to be a returning prisoner for the purposes of this Act; and (b) state that P is subject to release conditions under this Act; and (c) state the period for which P is subject to release conditions;”, and sets out the standard release conditions. It states that the person “must report to a probation officer at a probation officer at a probation service centre within 72 hours of service of the notice; and (f) provide information about how to contact a probation officer;” and so on and so forth.

But what this does is actually neglect the actual human side of this situation. If we take, for example, the planeload of prisoners who we believe are arriving in the next day or so, if they are prisoners who have come off Christmas Island let me tell you now that they will be traumatised, they will be upset, and they will be in shock as to what has happened to them over the last few days. They will come here. They will not have legal representation when they get here. They will have difficulty making sense of anything that the authorities throw at them, such as this determination notice that they are a returning prisoner.

We have got to remember that these are people who are coming under extraordinary circumstances and that what are standard release conditions to New Zealand prisoners who have had time in prison here, who have had access to their lawyers, who have had access to legal advice—those conditions do not apply to the people who will be arriving on planes. Their lawyers are over in Australia. The chances are they have not seen their lawyers for probably 8, 9, or 10 months of their detention, because part of the system in Australia is that they are being denied regular access to their lawyers.

So they are getting here without any legal representation, without any support people around them, without any support base whatsoever, without their family or friends being at the airport to greet them, and yet they are expected to make head or tail of this determination notice. All things going well it would be served on them immediately upon landing here in New Zealand, or, if not, within a practical time, but certainly not greater than 6 months out. Maybe after 4 or 5 months of being here they might actually have been able to settle down and just get their heads around what has actually happened to their lives. Their lives have been flipped into turmoil, basically, from being put in detention, going through the whole situation in the detention centres—in particular, Christmas Island—to then being taken off the island and being taken back to a prison in mainland Australia, then being brought here.

They will be in shock, they have been traumatised, they will not know what is going on, and yet they are going to be whacked with this official notice without any legal support, without any assistance—or very little assistance—from the authorities. They do not even know where they are going to be living. They do not know beyond 5 days what is in store for them. They will not have an address to go to. They will not know. If the motel that they are plonked in is in Auckland somewhere, in 5 days’ time they might be in Hamilton, they might be in Rotorua, they might be in Whangarei—they might be anywhere in New Zealand. And then the whole situation changes because then they have got to find a new probation officer, they have got to find other people to report to depending on the location where they are going to end up.

So I have real concerns about the human side of this. It is fine for the work to be done here, but it is basically in a vacuum without regard for what those men and woman have gone through. That is why I believe that this should not have been done through urgency. We have had enough time through the course of the year to write this legislation and to do a good job of it. Instead we have heard that it has been drafted in 12 days.

DENIS O’ROURKE (NZ First): I think when considering the Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill we need to try to think about the practicalities of it and to try to take a practical approach to some of the issues that are bound to arise with new legislation. I support what a lot of other members have said about some of those issues.

We are currently thinking a lot about Australia and its deportation of offenders from there, but we also should think about some of the issues that may arise where people are being deported or who are just arriving indeed from other countries. Some of those countries will not be friendly countries. Some of those countries will be places from which it is difficult to get information. We need to think about some of those issues as well. So it is in that light that I believe that the Government should seriously consider and, in fact, adopt David Parker’s typescript amendment.

I think he raises a very good point in that the term “identifying particulars” used in clause 9, and defined in clause 4 as having the same meaning as in section 32(5) of the Policing Act 2008, simply refers to the provision of name, address, date of birth, and the provision of a photograph, fingerprints, palm-prints, or footprints. That is all the information that that section provides. So what we are going to get as a result of this bill when it is enacted is that information.

It seems to me that what we also need to be able to get—at the border if necessary, or as soon as possible after a person returns, whether from deportation or just arriving—is details of convictions. As I have said, that may not actually be readily available from countries that are not friendly or cooperative or just do not have the facilities or the capacity or indeed the intention of providing that information for us, so that information needs to be obtainable from the person concerned.

Details of convictions are at the heart of the bill. It is that information that the rest of the bill actually depends on, and yet the bill seems to be deficient in not really attending to this issue of being able to adequately require the person concerned to give that information and as soon as possible. So I think that David Parker’s amendment to clause 9, which would add the words “, and the details of any overseas conviction and overseas penalty for any such conviction of the returning offender,” is absolutely necessary. I do not understand why the Minister is not seeing it in that light and actually adopting that amendment.

I heard what she said about this idea of a circular argument, but I do not think that washes at all. The point is this: the police or an immigration official, or whoever is in the position of needing that information, should be able to insist that that information be provided. It does not seem to me that that is in any other legislation. It does not seem to be in the Policing Act. I cannot see it there. It is not in this legislation. That is the information that is really fundamental to this legislation, and yet there is not even a requirement for a person to respond when asked to give details about convictions or penalties.

So I think that for that reason this amendment by David Parker is one of those that should be adopted by the Government. After all, what possible harm could it do anyway? What is wrong with being able to ask and insist on an answer to a question as basic as “Do you have any convictions from the countries you have been in, and what were the penalties?”, and so on. That seems to me to be quite basic.

I want to also move on to some of the other amendments that have been tabled and, I think, deserve consideration. One of those deals with clause 37, and that is a very important clause, because we all know that this legislation is going to require review.

JAMI-LEE ROSS (Junior Whip—National): I move, That the question be now put.

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): We have now been on this part for 2 hours, and I think it has been half an hour at least since I heard anything that was new. So I think the Committee is in a position to make a decision on the matter.

A party vote was called for on the question that the question be now put.

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): While the Clerk is adding up the votes, I will remind people—I will pretend I did not hear, I think—that if people call for a division from a particular point of view it is a requirement to vote that way. I will not name the member who appears to have done the opposite.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the question be now put.

Ayes 63

New Zealand National 59; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Noes 58

New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 12.

Motion agreed to.

The question was put that the following amendment in the name of the Hon Amy Adams to clause 37 be agreed to:

replace this clause with the following new clause:

37 Review by select committee

A select committee to be determined by the Clerk of the House of Representatives must, 18 months after the commencement of this Act, review the operation of this Act and prepare a report on that review.

Amendment agreed to.

The question was put that the following amendment in the name of the Hon David Parker to Part 2 be agreed to:

insert in clause 9 “, and the details of any overseas conviction and overseas penalty for any such conviction of the returning offender,”, after “identifying particulars,”.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the amendment be agreed to.

Ayes 44

New Zealand Labour 32; New Zealand First 12.

Noes 77

New Zealand National 59; Green Party 14; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Amendment not agreed to.

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): We come to the two amendments in the name of Metiria Turei, which I am going to now rule out as being inconsistent with the bill as amended by the Minister’s amendment.

Part 2 as amended agreed to.

Schedule 1 agreed to.

Clauses 1 and 2

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): The honourable Grant—no.

GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central): I wish I was.

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Well, premature.

GRANT ROBERTSON: I want to actually talk about both clauses 1 and 2 in some calls in this particular part of the debate. The first of those is to talk about clause 1, the title, which will be the Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Act. It is quite clear that in terms of this title, the “Information” bit is the focus of the bill. So we have had a number of contributions from members as we worked our way through Parts 1 and 2 about the way in which information is provided. We have had amendments proposed to try to ensure that the New Zealand public can feel secure that all the information that the New Zealand Police and the Department of Corrections need is being provided. The jury is out on that. We have certainly seen, up to now, some considerable difficulties about the provision of information. I even heard the Minister of Justice on the radio this morning unable to tell New Zealanders where the first load of people coming from Australia on an aeroplane would land—did not know, she said.

Hon Ruth Dyson: At an airport.

GRANT ROBERTSON: Yes, well, that is a good guess, Ruth Dyson, that it will be at an airport. That narrows it down a little bit, does it not? So it is still clear that there are difficulties and issues with the amount of information that is flowing to the Government.

We also had the Minister of Justice tell us that she did not find out about this until February. Well, that is hopeless. Clearly, her sources of information are very poor. The New Zealand media was reporting it in January; the legislation was passed in Australia in December. So the flow of information to the New Zealand Government has not been good. The Minister this morning on the radio blamed the fact that this piece of legislation is now being rushed through under urgency on the fact that she did not get the information about the prisoners that was required to draft this legislation until September. That is just ridiculous. And if that is actually accurate—that the Australian Government has been withholding that information from the Minister of Justice—well, it speaks volumes about the poor state of the relationship between New Zealand and Australia under this Government that the Minister of Justice did not even get access to the information required to draft this legislation until September. I actually do not believe that, by the way. I think that that is just a case of the Minister finding an excuse for having dragged her feet on this issue from December last year.

So the bill’s title, that this will be the Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Act—yes, it is about information, there is absolutely no doubt about that, but the failure of this Government to get on top of the flow of information on this issue, I believe, has been writ large by the Minister over the last couple of weeks. But the main part of the title that I want to focus on in this call is around the question of “Management”. So the title is the Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill, and in the Chamber last night the Minister of Justice told us that we should not go looking in this piece of legislation for the way in which the offenders who are returning to New Zealand will be managed in terms of their reintegration. She told us last night that this was a justice bill. She said: “This is not a bill about reintegration.” Well, just pause on that thought for a moment. Is that not what it is all about when somebody actually goes into prison or, in this case, returns to New Zealand as a person who has been imprisoned and ends up in an effective parole-like arrangement? Is not the management of them all about reintegration and rehabilitation? That is what this bill should have been about.

To the credit of the officials, that is what they thought this bill should be about. They wrote in the regulatory impact statement and in the advice that we have now seen in this Committee all about the importance of reintegration. They gave paragraphs of material to it. They put it in the objectives, which should have been what this legislation ended up being about. And then the Minister of Justice stands up in this Chamber last night and says: “Don’t come looking in this legislation for information about what’s going to happen in terms of accommodation, in terms of employment, or in terms of health outcomes.”

Every member of this Committee who represents an electorate in a large town or city has dealt with a prisoner who exits the prison system and falls through the gaps.

Peeni Henare: That’s right. Come to Tāmaki Makaurau.

GRANT ROBERTSON: That is right, Mr Henare. In my office in Wellington Central I have prisoners who come in. They have spent their $300 from the steps to freedom grant within the first 24 hours, and they do not have anywhere to live. We have to work with them because the Government decided not to fund the former Prisoners Aid and Rehabilitation Society, now known as People at Risk Solutions, properly any more. We have to work with them to find their way forward. Imagine being somebody who comes to New Zealand under these arrangements who has no backstop and has not lived here for 45 years. They have got nothing, and the Minister of Justice says: “Well, don’t come looking in this legislation for anything that’s actually going to really help with”—to quote the title of the bill—“ ‘Management’ of returning offenders.” The Minister says: “Don’t go looking in this bill to see if we’re actually going to sort out their accommodation.”

Kelvin Davis raised this in the Chamber last night. What happens when those people come in? I heard the Minister say this morning: “Oh, they will be met at the airport and they will be asked ‘Have you got somewhere to live?’ ‘Oh, I don’t know. Maybe I do. I’ll go and stay with my cousin who I used to play with when we were 4 years old, which is the last time I saw them.’ ” We know that information that is provided in those moments is often wrong or misleading. Answers are given by people to get out of the way. They do not want to deal with any of these officials any more. “Yes, I’ve got somewhere to live.” Yes, that is a satisfactory answer. Box ticked; away we go.

What about the health outcomes and the health issues? There will be significant mental health issues involved, not only, I might say, potentially, for those who are the returning prisoners and offenders, but also for others in the community who might know them or have some experience of dealing with them in some way—them or their families.

Peeni Henare: Family in Australia.

GRANT ROBERTSON: Yes. Mental health issues are one of the biggest issues in terms of reintegration: the support that is required to be able to become part of a community. Again, the needs are greater here than they would be for released prisoners in New Zealand because the lack of whānau support, the lack of family around, actually will make those mental health issues even bigger. Where is that in this bill? Where is that in the bill that is about the management of returning offenders—that is what the title of the bills says: the “Management” of returning offenders. And the Minister says: “Don’t come looking in this bill for how we will actually manage them in terms of their mental health, in terms of their accommodation needs, in terms of how they will actually reintegrate into the community.” This is a perfunctory response, a rushed response, because the Government mucked around and failed to heed the warning signs coming out of the Australian lawmaking process, and as a result, that is not here in this bill.

I actually think it was David Clendon from the Greens last night who got up and spoke about how as you followed through the advice of the officials, the objectives that they put up, and then you found your way to the purpose of the legislation, it lost its focus. It suddenly became this very functional piece of legislation about information and its relationship with the Parole Act. So the title of this bill to my mind is actually a misnomer. This is not about the management of these returning offenders; it is, in fact, about the mismanagement of these returning offenders and the failure of this Government to have in place the kind of reintegration and rehabilitation regime that is now needed. These released prisoners and released offenders should not be coming back to New Zealand; they should be going to Australia, where their family is. The Government has failed in its advocacy in that regard. Now it is doubling up on the failure by failing to put in place a proper reintegration programme.

I just want to briefly, in the remaining time left to me, speak about clause 2, the commencement date, and the fact that this comes into force on the day on which it receives its Royal assent. That will probably be today, or tomorrow at the very latest. That is too late. That is a failure by this Government: the fact that here we are on 17 November 2015 when this will come into force. It was December 2014 when the Australian Parliament passed this legislation. I guarantee you if we look into the cables that emerge out of the New Zealand High Commission in Canberra there would have been one in December that said that a big change had just happened under Australian law about what happens to people who have served time in prison or who are regarded as being of bad character. I guarantee the New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade officials were up to the task of doing that. Perhaps the Minister had gone off for her Christmas break; perhaps she was not focused on it. Come January there were articles in the newspaper. They would have been reported to the Minister, but the Minister failed to recognise those.

Tony Abbott came over here for the 1-day cricket game between New Zealand and Australia, which New Zealand won—Kane Williamson hitting a six with New Zealand nine down. I was there. I saw John Key and Tony Abbott meeting. Apparently that was when they finally got around to first discussing this—in February. John Key, perhaps in the euphoria of the Cricket World Cup, forgot when he got back to Wellington to say: “You know what, Amy Adams? We should actually be drafting up some legislation now, so we are ready on this.” Did not bother to do that—did not bother to do that. Sat around and waited for information to come from Australia, and then finally gets around to introducing a bill about 9 months later. That is hopeless; it is a failure.

Hon TREVOR MALLARD (Labour—Hutt South): It is relatively unusual for me to take a call in the Committee stage, but I will not be sitting in the Chair again on this bill. There are a couple of technical concerns that I do want to place on the record of the House. The more I have looked at it, the more concerned that I am. I am speaking in particular to clause 2 of the bill, which indicates that the bill is to come into force today or tomorrow, depending on when it gets through and when it is checked. But because it is coming in so quickly, my argument is that it has got to be technically right in its entirety.

There are a couple of points that I want to check with the Minister of Justice to make sure that we have got the drafting exactly as the Government wants it. The first one goes to clause 17(1)(c) in Part 2, which is outside of this bit but is of timely essence. If there is an individual who, in the Prime Minister’s words, is a murdering rapist who has finished their sentence in Australia who goes to Christmas Island for 6 months and 1 day and then returns here, are they intended to be covered? Because they are not covered by the bill. The drafting of the bill does not have them covered. The person who is 1 day out of Christmas Island will not be covered by this bill the way it is currently drafted because they have finished their sentence 6 months before. Christmas Island is not part of their sentence—so they will not be covered by this.

The next question I want to ask, I will put on the record that I have had a discussion about it with individuals who are responsible for the bill, and they have a different opinion because they rely on the Interpretation Act. The question goes to clause 17(1)(a) and (b) and whether that offence or an offence and that conviction are automatically considered in the plural. I want to put to the Minister the case of someone who has had 10 convictions of assault and been sentenced to 4 months on each of them—so 10 convictions of assault, sentenced to 4 months on each of them. Because they are separate convictions for separate offences, that means that they do not meet the criteria according to this bill. They can be quite a serious offender—quite a serious serial offender—but they are completely different offences. They have not just beaten up six people in one pub; they are been to six separate pubs and beaten people up in each of them. They have had different convictions and different offences. That is not cumulative; they are separate offences. The sentencing might end up being cumulative but because they are separate offences then my argument is that this does not apply.

So it is a pretty simple series of questions. I know that some officials are of the opinion that “an offence” means “offences” and “that conviction” means “those convictions”, but, generally, when this Parliament is drafting laws and it deliberately means the plural because plural is more serious than singular it says so. It says “an offence” or “offences” and it says “that conviction” or “those convictions”. In my opinion, this bill does not do that. I want to place that on the record, and every argument that Mr Parker has used earlier as to a method of getting this bill better drafted applies.

JACINDA ARDERN (Labour): It is my pleasure, as it were, to take a call on the title and commencement provisions within this bill. Obviously, the commencement date in particular has been the source of robust debate in this Committee, and I will again reiterate Labour’s position on that, but I want to start with, first, a very short reference to the title clause. Obviously, this bill—and there are a few iterations that I have seen during the quite rushed drafting of this bill, but the title that we are working to now is the Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill.

The notion of the word “returning” implies a distinct connection between the individual whom this bill covers and their connection to New Zealand, and I think this comes to the heart of one of the debates, one of the issues, that my colleague Kelvin Davis has been battling for many, many weeks now. That is the notion that, yes, we are happy as a Labour Party to support a bill that monitors offenders who are legitimately being returned to New Zealand as New Zealand citizens. They are, for all intents and purposes, New Zealanders. They were born here, they have connection here, they have whānau here—they are New Zealanders.

We are happy to support the monitoring of those individuals for offences that they have committed overseas and for their legitimate return to New Zealand. We do the same to other countries—let us be clear. If we have someone who has come into New Zealand and committed a crime, we will try them in New Zealand, we will have them serve their time in New Zealand, and then we will deport them to the place from which they have originally come, where they reside—the place where their citizenship exists and lies.

But we must be absolutely clear that at this stage this bill is covering more than those people. This bill will also be covering individuals who, by Australia’s determination, are not Australians, and we refute that at the moment the place where it has chosen to draw that line is fair. If you said to any individual “Is it fair that a person who was moved to a country like Australia when they were a baby, has been raised in that country, has worked their entire life in that country, has married a person from that country, has had children who were then raised in that country”—is it fair to determine that because their first 7 months of life were spent in New Zealand, they are a New Zealand citizen, when they do not even identify themselves in that way? Our law books may define them in that manner, but if that individual does not even define themselves in that manner, is that fair?

Secondly, where does the threshold sit for when you can, therefore, define that that person should be deported? We know that—we have had lots of discussion in this House as to whether or not it has been fair or not to say to the Government that it should have moved more quickly. We maintain absolutely that it should have because the difference between the last 12 months and, say, the last 10 years is that last year the Australians changed their law. They changed their immigration Act, which allowed them to move the threshold for deportation. It is usually up here—a bar around the types of offences you had to commit before you were deported. They moved the bar so low that we now have people with very, very, very minor offending in the category for which they will be deported. On top of that—minor offending—there is also the fact that these people do not even see themselves as New Zealanders.

So that is why I think that the title of this bill, which is a title that talks about returning; the act of coming home—for some of these offenders that will be true. They will have whānau here, they will have community here, they will, for all intents and purposes, be New Zealanders. But for a large chunk of individuals, they are not returning home. They are being moved to an entirely new country, and that makes the job for New Zealand that much more difficult because the key to reintegrating an offender is their connection to community, their connection to a place to reside, their ability to work, and so on. So I dispute the use of the word “Returning” in the title, and I would argue that “Overseas Offenders (Management and Information) Bill” would be a better reference.

On to the commencement clause—this has actually become a cornerstone of the debate in this Committee. Yes, we have said from the beginning that we agree with the need for this provision—this Act—to come in rapidly, and as this commencement clause states, it provides that the bill “comes into force on the day on which it receives the Royal assent.” For those listening, that basically means that as soon as we are done here debating it and the Queen’s representative in New Zealand gives it a signature, it becomes law. It then is in force. So that will be pretty quickly—that is about as quick as we ever make anything law in New Zealand. There is a good reason we do things slowly, usually—

Jami-Lee Ross: Thanks for “Parliament 101”.

JACINDA ARDERN: —and that is to get things right. That is to get things right. But the issue here—

Hon Ruth Dyson: What was that grand contribution, Jami-Lee?

Jami-Lee Ross: I said thank you for the “Parliament 101”.

JACINDA ARDERN: Jami-Lee Ross, I am speaking under the assumption that there are people out there beyond this Chamber who are watching, who might be interested in the way that we usually do things in this Parliament. Usually—usually—we would debate it first in this Chamber. Then we would send it to a select committee, and a select committee would ask the public to come and give its views.

That is not happening in this case. We are using a shortened period because the Government says we need this law to be in place very, very quickly. We agree we need something in now. What we dispute is that we should have started this process a year ago. Had we started it a year ago we could have given the public a say on this piece of law. We could have made sure that we did not have errors in it—and we have identified a number of drafting errors through this debate.

So what would we do as an alternative, given that we are here at this crossroads right now? No. 1, we would keep this commencement clause and allow this legislation to start immediately. But at the same time we would have taken a duplicate of this bill, and at the same time that we would have passed one into law we would have sent an exact copy of it to select committee for it to be reviewed properly—for it to be scrutinised properly. Then we would have made sure that this version expired after a year, and the version of this bill that had had proper consideration would then replace it. We proposed that to the Minister of Justice. We thought it was a really elegant solution, but unfortunately that has been declined.

What is our next option? Our next option is to look at when we review this piece of legislation. I absolutely accept the intent of the Minister when she set out that she wanted the bill to be reviewed after 2 years. She did not want it overlapping with the election period; she wanted it to be clear of that, for us to give proper consideration. I absolutely accept her rationale. Our view is that that is therefore an argument to make it even earlier. Give it a year. In 12 months’ time, in next December, let us kick off a select committee review with urgency. Make it over the same time period that you would usually receive submissions on a bill, so nice and tight. Receive submissions, collect your data and evidence, review the operation of the legislation—we could have it all done and dusted, back in Parliament by, say, March the following year, well within any election period.

So 12 months, we would say, would be the optimum, but if the Government does not want to go with 12 months then we would also support 18 months. Generally, we want a shorter time period for review, so we will be supporting both of the Green Party’s amendments, which would bring that review period earlier than the 2 years that have been stipulated. On this I would acknowledge the Minister’s absolute goodwill in engaging with other parties in trying to set an appropriate time line for review, but I see no argument against 12 months.

At the moment we are receiving 25 offenders on average—and that is increasing—per month. We will have had hundreds, inevitably, based on the statistics we are seeing coming out of Australia, by the time we come to review this in 12 months. We will know how it is operating. In fact, I would wager that if one case hits the headlines—if one monitoring case goes wrong and hits the headlines—we will be reviewing this legislation straight away. So why not make it 12 months? Labour will be supporting those amendments. I encourage the Committee to make the review period 12 months. In lieu of that I encourage it to make it 18 months. Either way, we have got to do something to make sure that this legislation is operating properly, because it has been rushed.

KELVIN DAVIS (Labour—Te Tai Tokerau): Talking to clause 1, the title clause, I pick up on a number of points that previous speakers have made. The title will be the “Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Act 2015”, but Jacinda Ardern has made the perfect argument that many of these people are not returning New Zealanders. Let me give you an example. When I was on Christmas Island and visited the 8 detainees one of them was a young man by the name of Ronald Neilson. He looked and he sounded Australian, and let me tell you: the reason he looked and sounded Australian is because he was born in Australia—he was born there.

Paul Foster-Bell: How does one look Australian?

KELVIN DAVIS: “How does one”—obviously the member there has not been to Christmas Island, has not spoken to these people, and absolutely does not know what I know about their situation. It is fine for him to sit over there in his seat spouting off, but he does not actually understand the human side of this whole situation and he does not care.

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Order!

KELVIN DAVIS: Let me explain. This man is Australian. He was born there, and yet this bill that that member’s party has written talks about returning offenders. Well, he is not returning anywhere. He is being deported from his homeland. That is the point that the member needs to look at.

Then we talked about the offenders. We have got Kō Rūtene, who has not committed any offence in New Zealand or Australia. The Minister of Justice said last night that he is not going to be subject to this legislation if he gets deported back to New Zealand. There will not be somebody at the airport waiting to ask him for his identifying particulars and that, to ask for his identifying information, and that is good, but he is also not going to be eligible for the $200 in his back pocket or 5 nights in a motel while he is trying to get himself on his feet.

I also raise that case about Kō Rūtene because there are going to be more and more New Zealanders—or more and more Australian New Zealanders—who are going to be deported. I do not know if anyone has heard about the ill-fated Operation Fortitude, which was set up in Melbourne in late October, where the Australian authorities—

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Order! [Interruption] Order! The member will sit. We are on the title and commencement clauses. You have had more than half your speech so far in summing up, which you are allowed to do. It is a peroration; that is fine. I would now like to hear something on the title and commencement.

KELVIN DAVIS: Thank you, Mr Chair, but I am talking about people who are going to be deported under this bill who are said to be offenders, yet they have not offended. Operation Fortitude, an ill-fated police and Australian Border Force operation in Australia—it is going to end up that more people are going to be deported as offenders. Then we have the word “management”. Well, this is mismanagement, because these people’s situations will not be managed other than a couple of hundred dollars in the back pocket, 5 nights in a motel, and then nothing. There is going to be no support for them beyond that. What they are going to do is the question.

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Tie it back to the title and commencement. Tie it back to the title and commencement.

KELVIN DAVIS: I am talking about the management of these people.

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Tie it back to the title and commencement. Tie it back.

KELVIN DAVIS: It is. I am talking about the word “management”, which is in the title, Mr Chair. These people are not going to be managed.

The information that is then being collected—well, it is scratchy information at best. One of the best examples of the information that is going to be collected from them is their address. When you have just got out of Christmas Island—sorry, not you, Mr Chair. When a person has just got off Christmas Island, has just got out of a detention centre in Australia, and is brought back here, they will have no address. They have no address to return to. Let me tell you about another detainee who is coming back who has connections to the Bay of Plenty area. He was raised in New Zealand, where he had a horrific childhood, suffering all sorts of things. He witnessed his father murder his mother. His father committed suicide. He was sexually abused. He does not want to go back there to where he came from. He told me, on the island, that there is no way on earth he wants to go back to where he came from, to his former address, and possibly meet the people who have committed the abuses against him. So these people are not being managed. The information about them that is going to be collected, such as their addresses, is going to change, because their lives are in a state of flux. We need to be cognisant of that whole situation around it. The title “Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Act 2015”, will not, I believe, really represent the full picture. It does not represent—

CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka): I am happy to take a call on the title and commencement clauses of the Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill. I want to begin by talking about the commencement clause first. The commencement clause in this bill is a very simple one. It means that the bill comes into force on the day on which it receives the Royal assent, which is likely to be at some point in the next two or three days. The issues that I want to raise—because we have not had an opportunity to discuss this, because of the urgent nature in which this is being put through—is why this bill does not also have a sunset clause, why this bill is simply coming into force and never expiring.

The proposal that the Opposition put to the Government was that we would support the bill—and we are supporting the bill through—with an addition of a sunset clause under clause 2, the commencement clause, and a first reading of an identical bill that was then referred to a select committee for consideration. That would mean that the immediate provisions come into force straight away—or pretty much straight away; as I said, once the Royal assent is received in the next day or two. But, because there would be a sunset clause in here, the whole bill would expire after a certain period of time, once a new bill had been passed to replace it. The same bill could then go through the select committee process, which would allow a lot of the questions that have been debated in the House to be properly addressed and properly answered. That is not going to happen, because of the nature of the urgency.

Sometimes legislation is urgent, and in this case, with people coming back to New Zealand—or coming to New Zealand, I should say—in short order, there is a need for some transitional measures. Therefore there is justification for this bill to come into force straight away—

Jacqui Dean: What about the victims?

CHRIS HIPKINS: Well, I am just saying—Jacqui Dean is asking me: “What about the victims?”. That is why I am suggesting that this bill should come into force straight away, but I am saying that the victims may also have a desire to have a say on this. Why should they be denied the opportunity to have a say on this legislation? Actually, sending it to a select committee does give the victims the opportunity to have a say.

It means that we could put the bill into force immediately. That means that there would be no increased risk, but it means that all those affected could actually thoroughly examine the bill and have a contribution to the process. Therefore, I think it is disappointing that the Government has not put a sunset clause into this legislation. I actually think, having sat through and participated in many, many urgency debates, that most legislation that goes through under urgency should have a sunset clause, with a more considered, deliberative process to ensure that there is a long-term solution in place, because there are very few bills that I have seen progress through the House that cannot be improved through a select committee process.

We then come to the title clause, clause 1, of the bill: “This Act is the Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Act 2015.” The first thing I want to highlight is that these are not necessarily returning offenders. First of all, they potentially never did any offending in New Zealand, so they are not returning to the point at which their offending took place. They are being deported from a country where their offending took place, and they would not necessarily regard themselves as returning to New Zealand, because some of them will not regard New Zealand as home. They would regard Australia, or another country, as home.

There is a fairness aspect here that needs to be considered. When we talk about people returning to New Zealand, let us put the facts on the table. In many cases they will have left New Zealand when they were very young. The fact that they were born in New Zealand is one consideration; they could have left as babies, having been born in New Zealand, and lived their entire life somewhere else. They could have been educated somewhere else. Their families could all be based somewhere else. Their entire relationship structure could be based somewhere else. They would potentially have been contributing taxes somewhere else, and now, having gotten themselves into trouble at some point—again, in some cases, quite minor offences could be resulting in people coming here—they find themselves deemed to be returning to New Zealand, a country that in many cases could be as foreign to them as any other place on the planet. So using the words “Returning Offenders” in the title of this bill potentially gives, I think, the wrong impression.

Using the phrase “offenders”, again, also potentially gives the wrong impression, because are they still offenders? They have previously been offenders. What if they have served their time and they have been released? They have done their time; they may no longer be offenders. They may have done everything required of them to turn over a new leaf. Why should they be regarded as offenders?

SUE MORONEY (Labour): What a shambles. What a shambles this bill is. I am going to start by talking about the commencement date, to start off with, because I think that that is the part that shows what a complete shambles the Government has made of dealing with this issue. The commencement date for this bill should have been about this time last year, quite frankly, because that is when the Government says that it was informed by the Australian Government that it was making the law change that was going to bring these supposed returning offenders back onto our shores. Yet they were being brought here, and have been for almost 12 months now, without any supervision, without any of this so-called management and information that this bill puts in place.

I want to share a story about how this bill is too late, because the commencement clause should have been a lot earlier than this. I know that because in about August this year I went and visited People at Risk Solutions in Hamilton. That is the service that used to provide rehabilitation services for prisoners when they leave prison here in New Zealand. I say that they used to provide that because, in fact, that organisation has declined to take up the Government’s new contract in that area, because it is so appalled at what the Government is requiring in terms of that contract. But I will come back to that point a little later on.

The Hamilton People at Risk Solutions told me in August that it had had a number of these people who had been deported from Australia to New Zealand just cold calling it, rocking up to its doorstep and telling it that they had arrived. They had been deported back, they had no family, they had no support services, and they were knocking on the door of the People at Risk Solutions organisation in Hamilton, saying: “Please help us.”

The reason they were doing that was that they had been told by the Australian authorities that the People at Risk Solutions service in New Zealand would help them. That is what they were told when they were forced to leave the Australian shores. “Go and see the PARS service.”, the Australian authorities said. “They will help you.” Well, the Hamilton People at Risk Solutions service did help those people, because it felt so sorry for them—they were in desperate need of support—but it had no funding to do that. It had no prior notice that it was going to be required to do that.

This is a service that is struggling to survive because of the bad contracting regime that this Government has put in place for prisoners coming out of New Zealand services. It would not sign up to that contract. Here it was, a service that had shed staff very recently because it was principled enough to not sign the dodgy contract that the Government had put in front of it to continue to provide that service for people leaving New Zealand prisons. Here it was, having to struggle to provide that service for these so-called returning offenders, whom it knew nothing about. There had been nothing put in place for the management of those people, and they have been coming back to New Zealand since the beginning of this year, Minister Adams. What were you doing? What were you doing all of that time?

Hon Member: What was she doing?

SUE MORONEY: I am sorry. To the Minister, I ask what was the Minister doing all of that time while those people were returning in ones and twos and threes and fours to New Zealand’s shores without any support mechanisms in place and without the forethought of the New Zealand Government to do anything for their plight?

That is not only a problem for those people in that situation, but that is a problem for New Zealand society. We know that people have been in these dreadful situations where they have been deported. They have been in the sorts of conditions that Kelvin Davis witnessed over in Christmas Island. They have served their time. They have then been thrown into detention centres without any certainty about how long they were going to be there. What I have heard, as Labour’s immigration spokesperson, is that many of these people found the conditions in these detention centres, particularly on Christmas Island, to be more dangerous than—

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Come back to the bill.

SUE MORONEY: —what they had been seeing in prison, so they felt less safe. The reason why I raised that is that it is directly related to the commencement clause. These people were not getting the support from the New Zealand Government when they arrived in New Zealand, and yet they had been in these very dangerous situations—traumatised, arriving on our shores, without any help. I am going to divulge—

Hon RUTH DYSON (Labour—Port Hills): There will be plenty of opportunity, I am sure, for my colleague Sue Moroney to take another call to finish off that contribution. Mr Chairman, it will be a relief to you, I am sure, that I want to speak to clauses 1 and 2, on the title and commencement.

I want to begin with a contribution on the title clause. An earlier contribution described the title of the bill, Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill, as a misnomer, and I think that is an entirely appropriate reference. The bill’s title is wrong, it is misleading, and it is totally inadequate to describe the purpose of this bill. And I have to say that I think all members in this House would agree with the purpose of the bill; it is to make sure that New Zealanders are protected. People who are convicted of offences overseas and come back to New Zealand deserve to have a level of security around them that other New Zealanders have if they commit comparable crimes and serve sentences in New Zealand.

I was reminded earlier today at the White Ribbon breakfast of how important it is for relationships to be open and respectful. I would recommend to Parliament that we reflect—and a number of members were at that breakfast this morning—on some of the contributions that are made as this bill proceeds, because as is obvious in clause 2, on the commencement date, this bill is going through an unusual process.

We are not having the usual process of a bill being introduced by a Minister clearly outlining the point of why are we having the bill introduced to Parliament. It then usually gets referred to a select committee, where people with expertise in the area or people who just care a lot about it can make a contribution and can add to the thoughts of Parliament. We then come back and go through a considered debate in detail. But we have not had that opportunity, because, as clause 2 outlines, this bill, having been introduced only yesterday, has gone through the entire process until 10 o’clock last night, starting again at 9 o’clock this morning, and it will go through until midnight tonight without the opportunity for that rigour.

The Labour Party proposed a parallel process to the Minister of Justice. We have heard that this bill needed to be introduced under urgency because we have got a boatload of so-called—as described in the title of this bill—returning offenders coming to New Zealand this week. So we had to do this bill under urgency. Why was work on this legislation not commenced last December, when everyone in Australasia knew that the Australian law had changed and that offenders were going to be treated differently in terms of them having to be returned to their country? I will ask the Minister again: what happened between December 2014 and November 2015, when we suddenly have a bill—which has taken only 10 days to write—introduced and passed through all stages under urgency, when everyone in Australasia knew that the Australian Government had changed the law in December 2014?

Then in February of this year when the then Prime Minister of Australia met with the current Prime Minister of New Zealand at the cricket, did they not discuss the implications of this significant law change on New Zealand? And if they did, did the Prime Minister just forget to pass on that critical bit of information to the Minister of Justice?

There is no explanation as to why this bill has been introduced under urgency and rushed through, and why, under clause 2, we are going to see the Act coming into force the day on which it receives the Royal assent. We have had a year. We are rushing through legislation. We know what happens when legislation is rushed. It is always wrong, and critical questions from members of Parliament—none from the National Party, because none of them has made a contribution—are still unanswered.

So just to go back to the title, clause 1 of this bill—“Returning” is one of the biggest misnomers. We have heard over recent weeks tragic stories of people who went to Australia as children. They have no connection with New Zealand other than in theory, and have been raised, made friends, made contacts, have worked, and have contributed in Australia as though that was their place of birth—but in clause 1 they are described as returning. Many of those people do not see themselves—

PAUL FOSTER-BELL (National): I move, That the question be now put.

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): I am going to hear the Hon David Cunliffe.

Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE (Labour—New Lynn): I appreciate the opportunity—in fact, it is my first opportunity—to offer my support to this bill and to reiterate that of the Labour Party. I want to use this title and commencement opportunity, which is, by convention, an opportunity to sum up some of the arguments that have been raised during the course of the bill, in the Committee stage in particular, to reiterate, firstly—

Tim Macindoe: No, it’s an opportunity to talk about the title and commencement.

Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE: —in relation to the title; thank you, Mr Whip—firstly, Labour’s support for the bill, because our priority is, and always has been, to keep New Zealanders safe. It is important when we have prisoners returning to New Zealand that they are both monitored for safety and rehabilitated into society. I think it was Tony Blair who said—and it is not that I agree with everything he has ever said; certainly some things I do not, but I like the line where he said that it is important to be tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime. We must ensure that this bill addresses both of those dimensions in its implementation. That is why Labour lent its support to extended supervision orders and why we have consistently pushed for the Government to establish an information-sharing regime with Australia in relation to deported offenders. However, we have had some concerns with this bill.

I see the Minister in the chair, the Hon Amy Adams—like my colleague Ruth Dyson, we were both at the White Ribbon breakfast—and I need to acknowledge the Minister. I thought she spoke very well on that occasion. I am not sure that the Minister’s timing has been as good with this bill. We have known about this issue for months—close to a year. We are here 2 days before the first planeloads of ex-Christmas Island detainees are due to touch down, and we are passing this through Parliament under urgency, through all stages, denying the public their normal opportunity to have input through the select committee process. The question has to be asked—and the Minister may care to address it, because we ask the question respectfully—why we have got ourselves into this situation. It is certainly not because Labour or other Opposition parties have been stalling it, because we are supporting the legislation overall. I think the public deserves an explanation as to the timing and process.

Secondly, in relation to the management and information aspects of the bill, which are contained in the title, the management requires, as I have said, both the tracking and public assurance function, and also the rehabilitation function. As the Committee has discussed this bill through the Committee stage and we have worked through it clause by clause, and as my colleague Kelvin Davis has repeatedly said, there ain’t much here about rehabilitation. And it is very practical stuff. When someone who has not lived in New Zealand since they were 2 or 3 years old—and that was 30 years ago—gets off a plane and they have no family here, they have no friends here, they have no job here, and they have no money because they have been in prison in, say, Australia or they have been in detention, and they get off the plane and they have whatever it is, the $100 that they get started with and a voucher for a motel for 5 days, what then?

The answer is there is sweet nothing for them beyond that. The likelihood is that the lowest common denominator will emerge and people may be taken up by gangs or other environments that are not going to be conducive to the public interest. It is so much cheaper and so much better to put the fence at the top of the cliff rather than the ambulance at the bottom—to keep people out of bad company by supporting their integration back into society. So in the title of this bill, “Management and Information”, we just wish there was a bit more management to go alongside the information.

The third thing we want to raise is that the part of the regime for the most serious offenders has to be triggered by the Department of Corrections—again, a management and information issue. The problem with that is that the department has been rumpy—that would be the best description. The Minister of Corrections has been on termination watch over his management of the Serco circus. We have had fight clubs, we have had violence, we have had drug use, and we have had all sorts of carry on in the privatised prisons. It has been very much—

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Order! That is not part of this.

Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE: —the same as the sort of things that have been shocking the public about Christmas Island.

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): No—that is not part of this.

Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE: So the management of corrections has been wanting, and we want to make sure that the management of returning offenders under this bill—

STUART NASH (Labour—Napier): I think a good name for this bill would actually be the “Closing the Gate After the Horse has Bolted Bill”. Let me read a quote. It says: “The Government is looking into a monitoring scheme for serious offenders deported to New Zealand.” Is that a quote that came from the Minister of Justice that we have heard in the debate in the last couple of days? No. That is a quote dated 25 January 2015. Minister, your Government has been well aware of this all year—for longer than this—and yet you tell us that a bill has been drafted in the last 10 days. This is an issue that has been on the table. That quote is from the press. That quote is not from a select committee paper or from some sort of article that we got out of the Official Information Act. That was in the press. This is a bill that should not be here under urgency, because it should have been passed by this House about 6 months ago when we realised there was a real problem here.

If we have a look at this bill and the words that make up the title, which is what we are debating, the first one is “Returning”. If you look at the Oxford Dictionary, which is used as the legal benchmark for the definition of language, it says the meaning is to come or go back to a place. As Kelvin Davis has alluded to, there are some people who are actually being deported back to New Zealand, whence they had never come. There is no provision in this bill to send an offender back to the city that their family might have come from or where their support networks might be located, if, in fact, they have any support networks. As we have heard, they get $300 in their back pocket when they land in New Zealand. If their family is from Invercargill, from Napier, or from anywhere else in the country, they have zero ability to even get back to a place where they may have an opportunity to start a new life, where they just might have an opportunity to become a productive citizen. There is no provision for that whatsoever.

Let us go to the next word, “Offenders”. I think in the 21st century one of the basic tenets of our democracy is that you give people a second chance. If they have made a mistake that means they end up in jail, they have done their time once they leave that jail. It does not matter what the mistake was or how bad it was or what previous life they led—if they have served their time, then they deserve a second chance. They are not offenders once they are out of jail. That is a misnomer. I think it denies these people the ability for a second chance where their support networks are, where their families are, and where they have built a life.

Let us have a look at the next word, and that is “Management”. When you look at the dictionary definition of “management” as well, it normally has a proactive connotation. It is about a way forward. This bill provides no way forward for any of these offenders or these Kiwis—or Australians—returning back to New Zealand. We have not heard how they are going to be managed—that will allow them to transition from the life they came from, from the detention centres they were in, from the jails where they spent time, back to being productive members of society. That must be the ultimate gain for any community: to make sure that people have a second chance and that we put the processes in place and the management in place that allow them to once again have the opportunity to become productive citizens.

And then we go to the next word—let us forget “and”—which is “Information”. What is this information going to be collected for? The Minister has provided no indication whatsoever of how this information is going to be used in a proactive way to once again allow these people to get on their feet and become productive members of society, which is what we need to do. So this is not the Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill. It should be the “Government Mismanagement and Non-Information Bill”. What this is dealing with is one point in time: a specific point in time when a person from Australia who has done their time lands in New Zealand. That is that. It does not deal with the situation that then arises for our communities and for the person who has returned to New Zealand. It does not tell us how or what the community is going to provide for these people that will allow them to become productive citizens. It does not provide us with any opportunity for what that person themselves is going to be responsible for or how they are going to be given any sort of management plan to allow them to integrate.

JONO NAYLOR (National): I move, That the question be now put.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the question be now put.

Ayes 63

New Zealand National 59; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Noes 58

New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 12.

Motion agreed to.

Clause 1 agreed to.

Clause 2 agreed to.

Bill reported with amendment.

Report adopted.

Third Reading

Hon AMY ADAMS (Minister of Justice): I move, That the Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill be now read a third time. We have heard a lot about this legislation from yesterday afternoon and through today, but what I want to just come back to is the situation we are dealing with. We have heard a lot from the Opposition that I think paints a reasonably misleading picture of how we have got here. But here is where we are. At the beginning of this year we were in a situation where for many, many years serious offenders returned to New Zealand without any sort of supervision or oversight. I accept that as Australia changed its law at the end of last year, which took effect at the beginning of this year, those numbers have increased. But the fact is that serious offenders—murderers, rapists, child sex offenders, drug offenders, violent offenders, the full category—have been coming back to New Zealand for many, many years without oversight, without supervision. I first became aware of this issue and got advice from my officials on 11 February. I immediately instructed them that I thought New Zealand needed a regime to supervise these offenders and the work has been moving since that time.

Suggestions that somehow the writing of the bill is when the work is done represents a fundamental misunderstanding of the process. For those who have not been Ministers and who have not been in this House, I can tell you that in the work of putting together a new regime, the drafting is the very last piece. You have to start with understanding the implications on the agencies, how you are going to resource it, what the right balance is between the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act issues and safety and security issues, and to do that you have to know and understand the quantum and the nature of the people being returned. So I have said from the outset that we have to have this in place. Let us get work under way to build it. But in the meantime we must conclude better information-sharing with Australia to make it work.

I got the issue put on the Prime Minister’s agenda at the end of February, to raise it right up the agenda. That led to finally concluding the information-sharing agreement with Australia. I always maintained that that had to be in place before we could finalise this, so that we could assess the impact on the Department of Corrections and so I could stand and say quite confidently that we understand the resources required for the Department of Corrections and for the police, we know the cost, and we have resourced it. I can say to this House that we have done that work. We have spent the time getting the police, the Department of Corrections, the Ministry of Justice, the courts, and their Australian counterparts lined up, knowing what we need, and how it is going to work. This suggestion that you just rock up to the parliamentary drafters one day and say “Write me a bill that says something.”, and the rest of the time is just fluff, frankly is absurd; it is absolutely absurd. This piece of work has been going at pace since it was first raised with me.

That is more than the Labour Party members can say. Labour had offenders—serious offenders—coming into this country, all the way through its time in office and it did not do a thing. Frankly, I have been talking about this and putting out releases about the programme of work on this throughout this year, and not once—not once—would Labour members be able to point to a single statement, a single question, from them saying “Where is it? What’s happening?”, or calling for it. The only person speaking this year about this issue and about the need to do it has been me. I have worked on it. I have delivered at pace, but I have made sure we have got a regime that is fair to offenders, that balances their rights properly, that does not create a double jeopardy, but still provides the monitoring and assistance that I think New Zealanders need.

So now 9 months later, when this debate concludes, we will have a regime in place for the first time that supervises these offenders. I am very proud of that. I know that New Zealanders have been at risk from serious offenders in our communities without supervision, until now, and that is what we are moving to address. Can I also just address the fact that somehow this is a knee-jerk reaction to the arrival that we are expecting later this week. I can tell members in this House that if they follow the announcements I have made, which frankly they showed no interest in until they saw a chance to have a bit of whack, they will see that I have been making announcements that this bill was progressing at pace, it would be in the House this week, and would be progressed as fast as possible. The impending arrival of the offenders came after all of those announcements.

So what we now have is the conclusion of three pieces of work that I set up when the issue was raised with me in February. There will be a register to track and monitor these offenders that all of our law enforcement agencies can access. It will be a single point of information, no matter where they are in the country, sharing that information. That is in place—check. There will be an information-sharing agreement with Australia, so that when these people come back we have good advice on their psychiatric state, their criminal risk, their behaviour in prison, their known affiliations, their criminal histories—anything we need to make a proper risk assessment and to apply to the courts for whatever additional orders might be required. Having a regime in place where you can apply to the courts for orders, without that information, would simply have been a piece of paper. You have to have the information. We have it. We now have the regime to go alongside it.

This regime is about putting in place the same sort of oversight that offenders would have expected had they been released from a New Zealand prison. No supervision regime will ever remove the risk. We are dealing with serious offenders, some of whom will reoffend, as offenders who are released from New Zealand jails reoffend. But what we can now be comfortable with, and confident in, thanks to this bill, is the knowledge that the offenders who come back to New Zealand who have only just been released from prison—not people who have offended long ago; but the ones who have only just been released from prison—will be subject to the same sort of oversight, regardless of whether they have served that sentence in Australia, in New Zealand, or in some other country. I think that is appropriate. It would make no sense to have to serve parole if you stayed in Australia, but not if you came back to New Zealand. So this bill fixes that gap.

The last thing I want to make comment on is the Australian policy that this is all about. I said in my opening contribution that we are not responsible for Australian law. We do not like the way this policy operates. We do not agree with New Zealanders who went to Australia as very young children potentially being removed, when they have no ties to New Zealand. We do not like New Zealanders being held in immigration detention centres. But what we are saying is that although we cannot change that, we have absolutely expressed our concern at those policies at the highest levels. Mr Little is going to speak to Australian backbenchers. We spoke to the Prime Minister. We spoke to the Minister of Justice. We spoke to the immigration Minister. We continue to raise our concerns every single day—not every single day, but every single time we get that opportunity. We do not like that Australian policy, but at the same time these people will continue to return to New Zealand, as they always have, and now, thanks to this National-led Government, for the first time—the first time—we will be able to supervise them.

Can I make just one final point, which is that although the numbers will go up and have gone up since Australia changed its laws, a large number of that increase are not returning offenders. They have been deported on bad character grounds. It is about 40 percent, we understand. Furthermore, the extra part of the increase where they are offenders is because the Australian policy is now picking up much lower-level offenders, as we heard the Opposition members acknowledge. So when you are talking about that core of serious offenders, many of them were always deported back to New Zealand. They continue to be deported back, but now they will be supervised. They will be under probation. We will have the power to go to the court and get orders to protect the New Zealand public, because that is our primary goal. I commend the bill to the House with great pleasure.

JACINDA ARDERN (Labour): I want to begin my final contribution on this bill by acknowledging that the Minister of Justice has, in the past week or maybe 2 weeks, engaged with us as an Opposition party on the finer drafting details of this bill. I acknowledge that that has indeed happened. But I can tell you that it is a sure sign that something is being done at great pace, with great haste, and, unfortunately, without the scrutiny that good lawmaking deserves, when you are being engaged with to that degree so late in the policy development. So, yes, I acknowledge that the Minister gave us a call and shared with us various iterations of the bill. But the fact that we were getting amendments on the morning this bill came to Parliament demonstrates part of the problem that we have with this process. When you rush law, you unfortunately make bad law. You inevitably make mistakes.

I want to debunk some of the myths that have been raised by Government members in defence of that process. They have said: “Look, we did it in a rush because this was as fast as we could go. We could not have produced this legislation any more quickly than we have.” They have made all sorts of claims about Opposition members in the process. I want to debunk some of the myths that have been raised in the House. Myth No. 1—the statement that somehow we are not allowed to raise process points because deportation is not new. No one has ever said that this is a new issue. Of course, we have had offenders deported back to New Zealand for many, many years and from many, many countries—legitimate citizens. In fact, the Minister’s own notes—

Hon Maggie Barry: 700 under Labour. Nothing done.

JACINDA ARDERN: And no one has ever denied that, Maggie Barry. No one has ever denied that.

Hon Maggie Barry: No protections. So what did that member do about it?

JACINDA ARDERN: Maggie Barry, can I just quote from Minister Adams.

Hon Maggie Barry: That member does nothing.

JACINDA ARDERN: Do you want to listen for a moment? Do you want to listen?

Hon Maggie Barry: Not really.

Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! I am calling for order. If the Minister does not want to obey that, then she can go somewhere else. I do not care.

Hon Maggie Barry: Sure.

Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: And she is carrying on doing that right now. Do not do that.

JACINDA ARDERN: Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. I think if the member is willing to listen, I am perfectly happy to follow the facts as set out by the Minister. We have never disputed them. Yes, in recent years, as it states in the Cabinet paper, approximately 60 to 100 offenders have been deported to New Zealand each year after serving a prison sentence in an overseas jurisdiction. No one on this side of the House ever denied that. However, recent changes—the paper goes on to acknowledge—in Australia’s visa cancellation policy have resulted in a large increase in the number of offenders being removed or deported to New Zealand. Those numbers are then explained. The rate of deportations has increased from an average of five per month in previous years to 25 deportations per month since June 2015. So, yes, deportations have occurred before but not as we know it now—not as we know it now.

So what about the claim then that was made by the Government that at least the Government is doing something? Well, that is because it had it within its power. I am not just saying that because it has been in Government for 7 years—apparently, we can still be blamed for errors of times gone past—but we are actually in a different environment. Not only has Australia changed its laws in the last year, which means we have this rapid increase, but we also have more information available to us. So I say to Minister Barry that when Labour was in Government we had no information-sharing regime. Australia was not giving us the information that we now have through an information-sharing agreement, which was signed only in September, and we now have the ability to put in a regime like this. In fact, Amy Adams herself said that having a regime in place without this information would have been meaningless. So to somehow blame another Government for not having done something that the Minister herself claims would have been meaningless without that change in process, I think means that those claims from that side of the House are totally unfair and unjustified.

But the Minister has then made the argument that she has gone as fast as she could. Yes, we are not naive; we know how legislation is drafted: you create a regime and then you give your instructions to the Parliamentary Counsel Office. The Parliamentary Counsel Office, which literally writes the law for us, was not told what to write until about 3 weeks ago. This law that we are debating here was drafted 3 weeks ago. Anyone who has read legislation knows that it is a complex job. If you do not have time and proper scrutiny things go wrong. This started 3 weeks ago. Did it have to be that way? No, the Minister herself acknowledged that she knew that we had a problem—well, if she read the paper she would have known—well over a year ago. The Australians said “Hey, New Zealand, we are changing our laws. You should know about that.” a year ago. The Minister claims that she has been working on it since then. Really? Really—it does not take year to give drafting instructions to the Parliamentary Counsel Office. In fact, as far as I can tell, some of the Cabinet papers on this—which are the first step in the process—that went to the Cabinet saying “This is what we should do.” happened well after August. We know there was at least 6 months when nothing appears to have been happening and in that time hundreds of offenders were being packed up and shipped out.

So, yes, we have a problem with the time line for this bill—we have a problem with it. Our concern is that as a result we will have made bad law. What signs do we have that that might be the case? Well, let us look at the way that the law is going to work. The law has set out that there will three sets of different kinds of offenders coming back into New Zealand—three types of returnees—and we would add that the first category are those who should not be deported back in the first place. As the Minister said, we are not talking just about offenders who are being sent back to New Zealand; there is a character test that is the cause of about 40 percent of the people being deported back into New Zealand. They are failing a character test. These are people who believe themselves to be Australians who are being deported to New Zealand—a place they have no connection to—simply because they may have been born here or have New Zealand parents. On a character test they are being sent back. We think that is wrong and will continue to fight that. I acknowledge again the enormous amount of work that Kelvin Davis has done on that, because our Prime Minister has not.

The second group of people who are being deported here and are covered by this regime are what we call returning prisoners. Returning prisoners are those who are defined as having been released for having served a sentence for an offence that attracted a sentence of a year or more. They are being released and they have not spent 6 months out in the community. The rationale of the Minister is that if they have not spent 6 months out then we do not know whether they are able to reintegrate properly. So that group of deportees when they come back into New Zealand will be automatically be monitored—automatically. The point here is that you will notice that we are not focusing on the offence of the person being deported. It does not matter whether or not they have committed a highly violent crime or whether they have stolen something from the backseat of a car. That is not what New Zealand in this regime is paying attention to. It is simply whether or not they have been in the community for 6 months. That in itself has some issues attached to it.

Then the next category of people are those who have been out in the community for 6 months before they have been picked up by officials and sent back to New Zealand. For that category of people to be monitored, New Zealand’s Department of Corrections has to apply to a court. Those individuals could be murderers—and we know that some of them are. They could have been child sex offenders—and we know that some of them are. They will be covered by a regime only if the Department of Corrections goes through the courts. Our concern is that we have already since December 2014 had the ability to monitor serious offenders who are deported to New Zealand if the department asks for them to be. How many has it asked to be monitored in a year? Zero—not one. Thirty percent of people who have been deported back to New Zealand in the last 2 years are categorised as serious offenders. The Department of Corrections has applied for not one of them to be monitored. We are concerned that this bill is reliant on a department that is underfunded, under-resourced, and managed poorly at present, and we are giving them an enormous job.

In summary, this bill has been rushed unnecessarily. It has not been given due consideration and, yes, although we agree that we need a regime, we argue that we should have had another bill go through a full process to replace this one. It is disappointing that we are here in this House doing this at the last minute, because New Zealanders’ safety is reliant on our doing a much better job than this.

Hon Peseta SAM LOTU-IIGA (Minister of Corrections): I rise to voice my support for the Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill. What this bill does in principle is to empower the Department of Corrections to supervise returning offenders. They are offenders who will be managed under standard as well as special conditions consistent with those used to manage offenders who are released from New Zealand prisons—consistent with those offenders. As the Minister of Justice has already said, this is a regime that is currently not in place. It is a regime that no other Government prior to this Government has seen fit to put in place.

This bill is about providing conditions to manage the risks of those returning offenders in the interests of public safety and public security. Public safety and public security are the No. 1 goal here. We have heard members opposite talk about reintegration and rehabilitation, and they are important, but the primary goal is to ensure the public’s safety and security from those offenders who are returning. How does that happen? Well, it happens through regular engagement by probation staff, by agencies, and by NGOs who are out there doing the mahi, doing the work, currently with offenders who are released from New Zealand prisons.

It is about managing those people and making informed decisions. This bill sets in place a framework within which we can obtain information from the respective authorities in Australia. That includes the Federal Government but it also includes state Governments. State Governments oversee the imprisonment of Australian as well as New Zealand citizens who are in state correction facilities.

Of course, secondly, it is about conditions that are used to facilitate the rehabilitation and the reintegration of offenders. Members opposite have talked about this but, as I have already said, safety comes first. Also what should be mentioned is that some of these returning offenders—quite a number of them—will be awaiting appeal. So whether or not it is appropriate to impose conditions in terms of rehabilitation and reintegration when some of these people will actually be returning to Australia needs to be determined within those conditions.

Thirdly, members opposite have talked about rehabilitation and reintegration not being in the primary legislation. Well, it is not appropriate that they be in the primary legislation because the conditions to determine the safeguarding and the monitoring and the surveillance of these returned offenders will set out quite clearly on an individual level how those offenders will be managed.

As has already been stated, the Department of Corrections has been working alongside other agencies, both justice and police, all year to prepare for the return of this increased number of offenders from Australia. The Department of Corrections has helped manage and supervise these people, as is envisaged by the bill. It is essential that we know who they are and what they have done, and that we have some detailed information around their needs, around the risks, and around some of the challenges that will be in place in terms of monitoring these offenders once they return to these shores.

That is why in July I went to Darwin and I signed a memorandum of cooperation alongside corrections Ministers from the various states. Ultimately, some of that more detailed information in order to manage some of these offenders is going to be required from the states. That includes psychological reports and some of the assessments and the risk analysis and risk assessments that those states do in order to manage those offenders both within those corrections facilities in the states as well as upon release, and the conditions upon which they are released into Australian society. This legislation is not to manage just Australian deported offenders; it is to manage deported offenders wherever they come from, right around the world. We know that there are also risky offenders that come from other countries. This legislation will capture those people.

In terms of rehabilitation and reintegration, I can say to this House that the Department of Corrections is working alongside other agencies. It is working alongside NGOs, like, for example, People at Risk Solutions, which does a wonderful job in the community helping to rehabilitate and reintegrate offenders. A grant of $100,000 was given to that society in order to help with the reintegration services for returning offenders. Of course, that will not be the only cost. There will be many other costs, and members across this House have noted the cost that will be incurred not just by the Department of Corrections but by other agencies in order to, in the long term, take care of and monitor these offenders.

Of course, the department will work alongside and in collaboration with some of these community providers, as well as social service agencies, local government, and other Government agencies in order to support these offenders as they adjust to life in New Zealand. That is in the same way that the department will work closely with deported offenders to ensure that they have this support alongside domestic offenders.

This bill has a twofold role. It is about holding offenders to account in terms of the conditions imposed and it is about safety and security for all New Zealanders. A mother of a victim came on Radio New Zealand National this morning and said it has the potential to save lives. It has the potential to save lives where monitoring of a high-risk offender will lead to a better outcome and avoid the risk to, and the deaths of, New Zealand citizens. I support this bill. It allows for fine work to be extended to offenders returning to New Zealand from overseas. It is in keeping with this Government’s track record of driving legislative change that strengthens our ability to keep the New Zealand public safe first and foremost as well as reintegrating and rehabilitating these offenders. That is why I commend this bill to the House.

KELVIN DAVIS (Labour—Te Tai Tokerau): I have very few problems with what the intent of this legislation is—that is, to collect information so that these deportees, when they return to New Zealand, can be monitored by the probation service, by the parole services, or by whoever needs to monitor them. That is not really the point. We have objections around the time it has taken to get this bill to the House, and the shoddy drafting of the legislation.

Let me give you an example. On 25 January, in the Northern Advocate, which is not exactly the world’s most widely read newspaper, there was a report about a woman who was deported from Australia. She had participated in a murder in Australia and was sentenced to a number of years in jail. She was deported back to Kaikohe. I will not name the woman, because she has to get on with her life. But she is not going to be much of a problem to the Kaikohe community. Murderers do not tend to go on and murder over and over again, except, of course, serial murderers, I must admit. That woman is very little risk to the Kaikohe community.

The point of the story is that in that newspaper report on 25 January the former Minister of Justice Judith Collins said that the deportation of prisoners was an issue that the Government was aware of and that needed to be changed. She then went on to say that the Government was looking into a monitoring scheme for serious offenders deported to New Zealand. That was in January. We had an admission by the former justice Minister, the predecessor of our current justice Minister, saying the Government was well aware of this issue and that it was looking into a monitoring system for serious offenders deported to New Zealand. And now, 11 months later, we are going through this whole process, based on legislation that has taken 12 days to draft. There is something seriously wrong with the story that the country has been told in terms of the genesis of this legislation.

The Minister who has just finished speaking, Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga, talked about the primary goal being public safety. We have no problems with that, but my question is: how does the bill protect public safety when we are deporting people from Australia and dumping them here in New Zealand with a couple of hundred dollars in their back pocket, with vouchers for 5 days in a motel, and then telling them they are on their own? How is it protecting public safety when they do not have the support systems around them? They do not have their family networks around them—they are back in Australia—and they do not have legal representation here in New Zealand, because their lawyer is back in Australia. How is New Zealand going to be a safer place if they do not have their support systems and do not have the proper networks and social services wrapping around them to the extent they should?

The Prime Minister stands up and says he is the only person who is speaking for victims in New Zealand. That is rubbish. If these guys are not supported to the extent they should be, what the Prime Minister is going to do with this regime is create more victims here in New Zealand, and that is what we are trying to prevent at all costs. That is why we say that this legislation, although it is good to look at the information-gathering side of things and all that, is missing something in the fact that there is little mention of the support services that need to be wrapped around these guys. Once their 5-day motel voucher has run out, where do they stay? What is going to be put in place for them? That is why I suggested some 5 or 6 weeks ago that the Government should fund a marae—and let us face it; many of these people are Māori—to look after these people, to cater for them, to accommodate them for 4 or 5 weeks while services can come in and provide some comprehensive wraparound, get them on their feet, and help them to get a job and an IRD number, and all those sorts of things that they probably do not have.

As I said in the Committee stage, many of these people have no connection to New Zealand. One person I met on Christmas Island, a young man by the name of Ronald Neilson, was born in Australia. He has no connection to New Zealand. He said to me: “If they are going to deport me, deport me to Bali.” He knows more about Bali than he does about New Zealand. Despite the fact that his parents were born here, he has no connection.

The Minister has made out like she is the only person running around doing things and that the Government has set up this information sharing about criminal risk. That is great. All this information sharing is fine, but the information that the Australian Government has not shared with us is the number of people who are on the plane that is meant to be arriving tomorrow, where that plane is going to land, or what the names of those people are—the most basic things. It has not shared that information with us. So it is fine for the Minister to get on her high horse and start talking about the great system they have set up for sharing information, but when it comes to what is happening on the ground and what is going to happen to tomorrow with the arrival of a planeload of deportees, they have not shared the most basic bits of information.

So how do we support these people? We do not know who they are. We do not know their criminal record. We do not know where they are going to go. I wonder whether those people know which motel they are going to be put up in. None of these questions have been answered. That means these people are bound to be dumped on our streets, and, if they do not have the support systems that they require and they run out of food and they run out of clothes and they are cold at night and they have no money, chances are they are going to have to resort to crime to get by. They are being set up to fail. All the monitoring in the world by the probation service does not put food in someone’s stomach, does not get them money, and does not give them a job. These are the issues that we have concerns about.

Some of these people have not even committed crimes in Australia; they are being deported because they fail a character test. And let me tell you about something that I believe is extremely frightening, and that is an operation by the Australian authorities, its Border Force—that is the immigration people and the police. It is Operation Fortitude. Just google it. It is an operation that was meant to go ahead in October of this year where the Australian Police and the Australian Border Force were going to randomly check people’s visas on the streets of Melbourne. So, basically, they were going to be racially profiling, or profiling people and checking their visas. If their visas were not up to scratch, then they could have been detained and deported. And those people could well have ended up here in New Zealand for nothing more than just not having their visas up to scratch or completing that process properly.

That means we could have more people uplifted from their homes in Australia, from their families, and from their support networks and landed here on New Zealand soil where we actually have to look after them and where we have to re-establish them. And, of course, as I have said, if we do not do that properly, these people will be set up to fail, and they have not committed a crime. They will be set up to fail. Does that mean that they have to commit crimes to get by? Does that mean we create more victims in New Zealand?

I just want to finish telling the story, and I have told it already during the course of this debate, about a young guy, Beau Adams, whose entry into the Australian criminal system was on dubious grounds to start with. He had a domestic violence order put against him. The person who put that domestic violence order against him then texted him, phoned him, insisted that he drive her somewhere, they argued, she claimed that he broke the domestic violence order, and he was then imprisoned. And I do not even know that he went to court; he was definitely on remand. He was there for 159 days before he was eventually sent to Perth, from the east coast where he lived, and then on to Christmas Island. I am not even sure that that guy has been charged with a crime and he could possibly be sent back to New Zealand, where he has not been since he was 4 years old.

I know that Australia has the sovereign right to make the laws that it makes, but its laws are wrong and we in New Zealand are the ones who are bearing the brunt of its poor laws. And if this does not work, if this legislation that we are enacting now does not work, then we are going to create more New Zealand victims. Kia ora.

JACQUI DEAN (National—Waitaki): I will make only a brief contribution. I think many of the issues have been traversed. I just want to pick up on a point from the rather breathtaking speech that Kelvin Davis has just given to the House. He fears that under this legislation returning offenders will be “dumped on the streets”. Well, the news is that this piece of legislation fills the gap and will take care of people so they are not dumped on the streets. That is exactly the point of this legislation.

The point that I think is being missed by the Opposition is that this bill is about protecting New Zealand citizens. This bill captures those people—and I used that word advisedly—at the border, where, hitherto, in particular under the previous Labour Government, hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of serious offenders came across our border unremarked, unknown about, only caught by chance if they were caught and then were, essentially, free to go into New Zealand society to live adjacent to schools and adjacent to families with one child, and that Government of the day did nothing. So spare me your hollow words across the House, because this is the legislation that is plugging that gap and making New Zealanders safer in their own homes.

I have sat through much of this debate listening to the Opposition saying that this Government is making bad law. Really? Is this Government making bad law? I did not hear a single argument about why. David Parker alerted us to a spelling mistake. Thank you very much. It may have been a point of grammar, but I did not hear any cogent argument as to why members opposite were saying this was bad law, because it is good law. What this law is doing is placing a new supervision regime, which is very similar to that which is imposed on New Zealand - based offenders when they are released from prison, when they go out in our society. Tell me what is bad about that. The thing is, the Opposition essentially agrees with the position of this Government, and that is where its objection to this bill has utterly failed. This is a good bill, and it will do as it intends to do, which is to make New Zealand safer for New Zealanders.

METIRIA TUREI (Co-Leader—Green): I suspect that this debate has actually been, at heart, one of furious agreement—to be frank—about the need for legislation to manage the issues for those who have been deported from Australia and elsewhere, who need some kind of monitoring for some reason, or the recording of their details with the Police. The content of the bill reflects that comparatively well.

I think the Government has made a mistake in not acknowledging its process failures as effectively as it should have. It would not be difficult to do, to acknowledge that it could have done a better job of consulting other MPs from across the House. I would note that Amy Adams did say that she is the only one who has been working on this issue. Well, my colleague David Clendon asked her for a meeting to talk about exactly this in July and was refused. So that is inaccurate, and it is unfair in the sense that if this had been, from the start, a collaborative effort across the political spectrum and with some of the critical external agencies—like the Human Rights Commission, the Law Commission, and the Law Society—we would have got a better-quality piece of legislation.

The Government has a tendency to keep its cards far too close to its chest and to not understand that there are real opportunities for cross-party engagement on these serious issues where we all agree. We all agree we need legislation to deal with the deportees. We all agree that the Australian legislation is disgraceful and is a breach of human rights; everybody thinks that what it is doing is wrong. So why not choose to work on those areas of common ground, as opposed to this manufacturing of huge drama in the House over the detail—detail that could have been properly worked out with a decent process?

It has been an interesting debate over the last 24 hours or so, and, as a result of the debate, we have made changes to the legislation. My own conversations with Amy Adams led to a constraining of the information that is going to be required of returning offenders. I am pleased for that. I am pleased that she was seriously considering that at the time. The House has agreed to change the time frame for the review of the law from 2 years to 18 months. That at least gives us a chance of getting a review completed and all changes made before the next election. Again, that is good.

No doubt better changes could have been made with more time and with even a short select committee process, by which we could have got some external analysis and external review of the legislation. That is what the Greens have asked for. Even a day’s worth of select committee would have been beneficial to find ways to improve the legislation. There is no Government department that knows everything, and sometimes you need the practitioners—the people who will put this law into practice every day—to give us their analysis of it and how it will actually affect their work, so we can make it the best possible legislation. Overall, I think that is why the Greens are abstaining on this legislation. We understand the need for it. There is broad agreement on the basic purpose. But the details—the law itself—could have been much better if the process had been more collaborative. It is an example to the Government that it really needs to be rethinking its strategy on some of these big issues.

I would say that the other area that is now left open and could benefit from a more collaborative approach from the Government is the rehabilitation for offenders. As the Government’s own paper on this bill, the regulatory impact statement, has said, there is a critical connection between reducing the chance of recidivism—further offending—and the quality of the support that wraps around an offender. Those two things cannot be separated from each other. In this debate over this bill, which is about the monitoring but not the rehabilitation, there has been very little from the Government—the Minister or other Government MPs—about the importance of it, about what they are going to do to increase services, and how they are going to better engage with communities. Kelvin Davis suggested funding for marae to do this work. It is great idea. The fact is, we know that agencies are already saying that they are well over their capacity to deal with returning offenders as we speak and are desperately looking for more support. Often some of those agencies are too afraid to speak out and to ask for more support, because of their concerns about being punished politically.

We now actually have this opportunity to set aside the politics around the issue and to have a cross-party working party, or it is a chance to have a conversation directly with the relevant Ministers—including the Minister for Social Development and the Minister for Building and Housing, as well as the Minister of Justice—to find out how we can best support the best possible support services and rehabilitation for those who are returning. If there is one way to stop reoffending, it is making sure that offenders have genuine options for making a decent life for themselves when they get back here.

We have heard a lot about—particularly from Kelvin Davis, and I do want to acknowledge his efforts in debate in this House; I think he has made some amazing contributions about the stories of the people who will be affected by this bill. He is quite right that there are people coming who have absolutely nowhere to go when they arrive here. They know no one. There is nobody here for them. What can we possibly expect for them but the worst outcomes if we do not immediately put in place intervention when they arrive? Not a punitive intervention—one that respects their dignity, gives them choices, and provides them with the support they need to take the next steps to build a new life here.

That is something that, again, we all agree on. We all agree that should happen, we all agree how important it is, and we all agree that it is critical for public safety, so let us find a way of working together on this. The Government’s—I am not sure how to describe it—block about working with the Opposition means that it makes mistakes, and it makes mistakes that those members do not suffer. It is not anybody on the Government benches who is going to—

Chris Bishop: Listen to the Greens. Oh!

METIRIA TUREI: This is an example of exactly what I am talking about. They are not listening to a contribution about how we can best work together; they are deciding to just shout. This is just a fact: they are not the ones who are going to be affected. It is the offenders—

Chris Bishop: It does not actually mean collaborate; it means just do what you want.

METIRIA TUREI: Here we go again. They are just shouting, for no good reason. It is the offenders who will be affected. It is their victims who will be affected. So we need to make sure that when we are making law about other people, we recognise how far away we are from those lived experiences and how little we know about what really happens, and, therefore, make an additional commitment to those people who are directly affected that we will act in their best interests by putting aside the political arguments and shouting, and actually work on what is the best and most decent policy for New Zealanders. That is why we are in this business; that is why we are in the Chamber. Let us see if we can improve on that after this example. Thank you.

DENIS O’ROURKE (NZ First): New Zealand First still supports this bill warts and all, but buying into it is a bit like buying a new car, especially if the old one has died and a new one is needed immediately. What one gets one will be stuck with for a significant period in the future, whether it is fit for one’s purposes or not. It would be good to have tested it properly before buying it, and probably one should have studied it for a few months to see whether it would be fit for purpose, but that luxury has long gone—and so it is with this bill. Clearly, it should have been introduced months ago. The Minister of Justice said the process started in February—and for her, yes, I am sure it did, but not for the rest of us. The rest of us have had just a few days to look at this bill, to study it, to see its ramifications, and to debate it, and that really is not good enough. That is not the usual process, which we have a right to expect in this Parliament for this kind of important legislation.

New Zealand First deeply regrets that it is necessary at this stage to pass such a bill under urgency. When you think about it, it has been almost a year since the Australians passed their legislation, and it has been 9 months since the process began in New Zealand to respond to that legislation. So in the end we get this rushed process to pass a bill under urgency when, in fact, much better could have been done, and that rushed process shows in many of the errors and the inadequacies in the drafting of this bill.

We in New Zealand First are quite happy to acknowledge that the fundamentals of the bill are perfectly OK. We are quite happy to ensure that offenders are identified on arrival in New Zealand, and we are happy to ensure that prisoners returning to New Zealand comply with Parole Act conditions and any special conditions that may imposed by the courts. We have no difficulty with that, but it is the detail of the bill that has caused concern. Those matters, as we know, are usually sorted out in the select committee process, and that process is missing from this bill. The most important aspect of that is that the public has no opportunity whatsoever for any input into this bill, and that is a very significant matter. I would have looked forward to hearing from organisations such as the Law Society and many others that have special expertise and could have contributed to a much better piece of legislation. We are not going to get that either, and that really is a shame.

The only saving grace is clause 37, which requires a review and report by the Justice and Electoral Committee after 2 years. The Minister’s amendment says now that it should be in an appropriate select committee after 18 months, but not even that is long enough in the circumstances. There were always two better options.

Firstly, I think Labour’s parallel process option is the one that ought to have been adopted. That would require, effectively, two bills—one passed now and the other to go through the select committee process in the normal way with full public consultation and so on. That would have been the best of both worlds. We could have had legislation that comes into force this week—as this bill will—and yet have a select committee process to sort out all of the issues that there are with it. I think that the only reason the Government is not willing to do that is that to do so would mean that it would be admitting it had acted too late. That is the reason why this Government is not willing to adopt that very sensible dual process, which the Labour Party proposed.

The other option was a closer date for review than 18 months. When you think about it, 18 months means May 2017 at the earliest. That is the time at which election issues are really starting to warm up, leading up to the election campaign for later that year. Effectively, it really means that the review would actually be in 2018. That is far too late. The opportunity to learn from experience after this bill is passed is in the first year. That really requires the review to start no later than 12 months from when this bill is passed this week. That is not being adopted and that also is a shame, because to wait until 2018 for a complete review will mean that a lot of issues that will arise will go unfixed for far too long.

This could have been done a lot better, and New Zealand First deeply regrets that the Government has not taken on board those concerns expressed by many of the Opposition parties in Parliament. We already know of some of the areas needing review, which could be—but will not be—amended right now. Indeed, Minister Adams herself produced amendments within hours of the first reading of the bill, so she herself knew that she was bringing to Parliament a bill that actually needed amendment from the very beginning. Opposition parties have offered amendments in good faith to try to help improve the bill. A few have been accepted, but most have not been seriously considered, and that also is a shame.

There was not the opportunity for a select committee process, which would have provided for much better amendments and review of the bill. Actually, when you consider it, this bill really could have been introduced by the Government at least, say, 6 weeks ago, because it has had at least 9 months, if not more, to bring the bill to Parliament. If it had done so 6 weeks ago, we could have had a shortened but worthwhile select committee process with public submissions, and especially submissions by expert organisations, and the result right now, this week, would be much better legislation.

I want to acknowledge David Parker and Trevor Mallard in particular, who raised drafting issues and issues of substance and placed them on the record. Those issues have not been dealt with, and they ought to be. It should not be necessary to wait until 2018, effectively, for those matters to be looked at again. David Parker in particular offered an amendment, which I thought was well worthwhile, to add words to clause 9 to add a requirement for offenders—as they are so called in the bill—to provide information about convictions and penalties. That information is obviously necessary. Why has it been left out? It would have been so simple to add those few words—completely harmless words, completely worthwhile words—which would have added some important information. But the Government has refused to do it, with some pretty weak excuses made by the Minister—excuses, I would have to say, that did not really make any sense. So the bill will now be passed without those words added, and it will be the poorer for it.

I raised a number of issues regarding clause 7, especially around the term “liable for deportation”. Those also have not been addressed. I raised issues about clause 10(2), concerning the period of detention. The Minister said case law could be relied on to define what a reasonable period is, but why not specify a maximum reasonable period in the bill? That would have been better, so the Minister’s response, I think, was completely inadequate on that. I and others have raised a whole raft of other issues—issues of substance, issues of drafting—and all of those will now have to wait, effectively, until 2018 before anything can be done about them. Really, that is not good enough for a process for legislation of this importance.

Finally, let me say this: New Zealand First has always supported the objects of this bill—the object of making sure that we are ready to accept a greatly increased load of offenders and returning prisoners, especially those from Australia but also from other countries. We have always accepted the need for that. It is probably legislation that should have been done years ago, so we have been happy to see this legislation come forward. We support it. What we do regret very deeply, and protest about very strongly, is that it has been so slow and that the opportunity for Opposition parties and, indeed, the public to have genuine and substantive input into this bill has been completely inadequate.

JONO NAYLOR (National): Well, it has been an interesting discussion over this last day and a half, as we have been hearing things. Some of them, actually, have even related to the bill. It has been interesting, and, I guess, disappointing, from my perspective, to have heard so much focus from a lot of people on Australian law, when this House should be dealing with New Zealand law.

I guess I would ask the question: is it the role of New Zealand to advocate for our citizens who are living abroad? Absolutely, yes, it is. And in dealing with that—and that is why I just want to commend the work that has been done by the Prime Minister, and by Ministers Adams, Woodhouse, and Lotu-Iiga, who have been dealing with their counterparts in Australia doing that work. But this bill is not about what happens in Australia; this bill is about what happens as a result of what is happening in Australia, which is that there are people who are being deported from Australia who are New Zealand citizens. Yes, maybe they do not have a lot of connection with New Zealand, but although they have been in Australia for all that time, unfortunately they have not become Australian citizens for reasons that only they can tell for themselves.

One of the concerns that I have heard from members opposite—and I just want to reiterate that this is not the case. There is a lot of talk about those people who are being deported for issues of character. Those people are not caught up in this process. The bill is very clear in Part 2 in its description of who a “returning offender” is and who a “returning prisoner” is. Those people who are being deported for issues of character—I think we would all agree that that is not necessarily a great thing for Australia to be doing, but they will not be picked up in this. So those people will not be victimised by this bill in the way that, I think, members opposite have been conveying, and I think that is disappointing.

This is a good bill. It is a bill designed to help keep New Zealanders safe. It is designed to ensure that those people who are returning after convictions in other countries will be treated in the same way that people who are being released from New Zealand prisons will be treated. I think it is only summed up, really, by the overwhelming support that it has had around this House. It is, in fact, a good bill, and I look forward to seeing it enacted, hopefully later on today or tomorrow.

Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: This is a 5-minute call on behalf of the Green Party—David Clendon.

DAVID CLENDON (Green): Some years ago Sir Geoffrey Palmer made the comment that this legislature, this Parliament, contains the fastest lawmakers in the West, and, unfortunately, the experience of the last 24 hours or so demonstrates that I think we can still lay claim to that rather dubious distinction. In less than 21 hours, by my count, since this bill landed on the Table, we have had about 8 to 8½ hours of debate on a very substantive matter. This is not a trivial piece of legislation. We agree that on occasion there is need for haste. There are occasions when urgency is necessary and important.

We do not accept that this is a case of such compelling urgency that in a 10 or 11 - month process—by the Minister’s admission, at least 10 or 11 months of work have gone into this. Could we not squeeze out 1 week when we could invite members of the public, the community voluntary sector, the legal fraternity, and the judiciary to come and have an opinion about this bill? Even in the course of yesterday evening the Opposition parties were able to add value and to make this a better bill, on the basis of very little information, with very little time for analysis, and that indicates how much better this bill could have been had even a very truncated select committee process been allowed.

I particularly feel for the community voluntary sector. The success or failure of rehabilitating and reintegrating the people who do return to New Zealand, once they have been registered, supervised, monitored, etc.—a lot of the hard work of bringing those people back into our communities will be done by people in the community voluntary sector, some of whom are partially Government funded, but who, to a large extent, rely on voluntary time. They are people who give up their time, their energy, and their experience to try to bring people back into the fold. I think we should acknowledge that, and I think it is somewhat disrespectful of this Parliament not to have included that community sector in the preparation of this policy, which it will have a considerable part in implementing.

I must take a moment to acknowledge PARS, the Auckland-based group, which was formerly the Prisoners Aid and Rehabilitation Society, and now I think it has rebranded as People at Risk Solutions. At least since the beginning of this year it has been sending people to the airport to meet offenders who have been deported—to meet deportees—and to endeavour to assist them. Two middle-aged women, women in the prime of life—or else there was one senior kaumātua who would go alone—would go out to the airport, not really knowing what they were dealing with; knowing that they were meeting deportees who may have been confused or angry, who may have had major alcohol and substance abuse problems. Out of that, their courage is extraordinary—courage to actually put themselves personally at risk in order to go to the airport, meet these people, and bring them back, and endeavour to get them at least a roof for the night and to link them in to whatever social services were available. They have been ignored, and I think that is very, very unfortunate and disrespectful of those people.

I will not dwell on the fact that the Minister of Justice sort of indicated she has been carrying the burden alone for this year. Actually, we put our hands up to be part of that. My colleague Metiria Turei made comment on that; I will not dwell on it.

The Greens are not opposing this bill. We are absolutely opposing the process; we are not opposing the bill, because we acknowledge there is a problem.

Hon Craig Foss: Are you voting for it or against it?

DAVID CLENDON: No, listen carefully. We are not opposing this bill, nor are we supporting it; we are abstaining, for the simple reason—

Hon Craig Foss: You’re paid to be in here to vote.

DAVID CLENDON: We are voting. We are not opposing this bill, because we understand there is a problem. We agree with the principle of aligning the treatment of returning offenders with what happens to people domestically. We understand the information-sharing issues. We think parole is a good thing. There was research put out earlier this year by Anne Opie indicating that longer periods on parole are an indicator of less reoffending, and that is a good thing. So we have no problem with the principles of this bill.

We could have supported it, had it been a better bill and had we had a better process, and it is unfortunate we have not seen that. We have heard reassurances that the support mechanisms will be put in place to ensure these people who are returned have some sort of a fighting chance of keeping out of trouble, keeping out of the justice system—of not reoffending. We will be looking to see that. We will be looking hard to ensure that the organisations, both Government and non-governmental organisations, that actually do that work are being properly resourced and properly funded, because without that, this legislation will have been a waste of time. It is not sufficient to supervise and monitor. We need support mechanisms. We will be looking to see they are in place. Thank you.

MARAMA FOX (Co-Leader—Māori Party): I have listened intently both here and in my office to the debates that have raged about this bill. There is no question that many of the members who have spoken have offered good advice to the Minister of Justice. The Minister has listened to some of that, and we are going to have a reduced period of time to review this legislation, given that it is going through under urgency and given that we are rushing to put something in place that should have been put in place many years ago—in fact, decades ago.

I think that the purpose of this bill, as widely discussed last night, is narrow. In fact, I am grateful that it is narrow and that, actually, we are going to deal with the justice aspect of this for parole and parole only. Some of the people who are returning to us have been treated poorly—that has been widely talked about. They have been treated harshly, and, in fact, if the 6-month rule applies, then for those people who have been in detention centres for 7 months, 8 months, and longer, this need not apply to them unless they are seriously offending. Some people have talked about the DNA swabs and the fingerprinting, which, again, applies only to those whom it would have applied to here in New Zealand under similar conditions for similar offences. So I am glad that there is a narrow scope.

We have talked about the people of questionable character. I have no idea why they are being deported merely for associating. One of those people, Kō Rūtene, as we have highlighted in the past, was picked up visiting someone in prison. Picked up visiting someone—if that is considered association, then we should be warning all of our Kiwis now not to go visiting anybody in prison for fear that they will be deported. In fact, my Facebook has been rife with instances and questions of people concerned about this legislation, about what is going on over there, and about whether or not coming home at Christmas time will see them stopped at the border and sent back. So I am glad that there is a narrow scope here.

I am glad that the Minister does not have extraordinary powers and that the courts will be the adjudicators of whether or not somebody who comes back 6 months after being released from prison will then need to have these parole conditions placed on them. I would not like to see any of those people who have already been harshly treated come back and be harshly treated again.

This is about the safety of our communities. For that purpose we are happy to support the bill, but also because the Minister herself has made the attempts to come and discuss the issues that we have had with the proposed draft that we got to see, and to make some small amendments here and there to ensure that it is as reasonable and fair as we are able to do.

I take on board the points that the Opposition has made around the urgency and the time. If we were able to give it some consideration and at least go to the select committee stage, maybe we could have crafted this and taken on board the opinions of those people in the community who do work in this space.

I have been given assurances and have seen some of the work that has been going on with rehabilitation. It is something that as a party we have been very concerned about, hence the reason why we have established things like Whare Ōranga Ake for the rehabilitation of offenders and to reduce recidivism. I want to support Metiria’s comments around that rehabilitation, to ensure that these people coming back—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! Can I just ask the member to refer properly to other members. Thank you.

MARAMA FOX: —yes, thank you—will be adequately supported not just through parole conditions but through rehabilitation and support services, as we know that they are being alienated from their families.

The People at Risk Solutions group, which David Clendon has spoken about, has been doing an amazing job, and it needs to be commended for that job. We as a Government need to ensure that groups like it are also supported post putting this bill through. I want to assure communities that we have given it great consideration, albeit in the condensed time. This is for the safety of our communities. Although we have been loud about those people coming back for minor offences, we do recognise that there are also people caught up for major offences and that they will need our support, our monitoring, and our care. Therefore we support this bill. Thanks.

ALFRED NGARO (National): There were a number of comments made about this bill. One of them, which was of interest during the second reading, was a comment by Mr Shearer with regard to the fact that the events of tomorrow, Thursday, will be “Con Air”. He talked about the aspect of a number of offenders who will be returning from Australia back to New Zealand, as well.

If one thinks about that movie, Con Air, it is an interesting story. In that story, a 1997 American action film, a hundred of the most serious offenders in the United States were on a plane, going to a detention centre, but inside there was one Cameron Poe. He was an army ranger who unfortunately, through a situation and a circumstance, found himself convicted of manslaughter. So out of a hundred there was one who was there, and there was Vince Larkin, who was the US Marshal, who was there to try to save the day for this one offender.

I think that the movie proves the point of some of the comments that have been made by the Opposition, which is that it is true to say that there will be some of those detainees who do deserve justice—who have possibly been unjustly imprisoned or detained, for whatever reason. We on this side, in the Government, also understand and recognise that. However, we also want to recognise that inside of that there are a number who, for their own circumstances, and some outside of them, are put in that situation where they have offended and have, in a sense, broken the law.

This bill has been rushed through, as we know, because of the changes in the Australian Migration Amendment Act 2014, which amends the old Migration Act 1958, that mean character and general visa cancellations mean that we have now got this rushed aspect. Previously there had been up to 80 to 100 offenders returning to New Zealand; now the estimated forecast is up to 250 to 300—hence the reason why we have had to move to urgency.

The comments across—and I know even from New Zealand First that Denis O’Rourke has been in favour—are that the principles fundamentally have been right. I just want to comment on one thing that I think has been raised in regard to the question: when these offenders return, what provision will be made for them? This is called the Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill. In other words, it is a bill that is particular in its cause and purpose to ensure that when they do arrive we ensure that there is supervision and monitoring in place in that process. However, they will still be subject to the conditions that mirror those in the Parole Act of 2002. Therefore they will still need to go to a probation officer, who will ensure that their living and working arrangements are appropriate and also whom they associate with.

The other thing that is important is that those offenders who return to New Zealand will be able to access the prisoners’ aid and rehabilitation that has been talked about, such as from the New Zealand Prisoners Aid and Rehabilitation Society Inc. and the services that it offers. The last thing that I want to say is that the Ministry of Social Development will ensure that they receive all the Government support that they are entitled to. We have talked about 5 days, which is part of a period to be able to reintegrate back in again, but they will still have those support services that we think are important.

This bill has been rushed into urgency because it does meet a need of safety and concern for all New Zealanders, not least all those who are offenders who are returning not just from Australia but from other parts of the world. The bill is intended to be able to ensure that we have a regime of supervision that monitors them in such a way that if there is any repeat offending, that can be dealt with, and, at the same time, there is an appropriate process to lead them on to hopefully being good citizens who contribute to New Zealand, as well. We believe that this bill is right. The monitoring and review by the Justice and Electoral Committee in 2 years is appropriate, rather than having a sunset clause. So I do commend this bill to the House.

Hon DAVID PARKER (Labour): Can I begin by responding to Marama Fox’s contribution, the vast majority of which I agreed with. Thank you for that contribution, Marama Fox. But there was one mistake made, I think, and that was—if I understood your contribution correctly—when you said that if someone has been in a detention centre for 6 months following their imprisonment, they will not be caught by the returning prisoner provisions of this bill. Actually, that is not correct. The bill at clause 17(2) says that that 6-month period runs from the release of custody, and release of custody means “if a person is detained in an immigration or other facility following release from prison,”. The date is from the release from the immigration or other facility, not the release from prison. I am pretty sure—in fact, I am sure—that I am right about that. I have just read from the relevant subclause of the bill.

I do not say that to criticise the member but to highlight the problems that we have in Parliament when we pass legislation under urgency. It is understandable that members who make contributions to this debate cannot be expected to get their heads around all of the finer details and, indeed, around the effect of important provisions like that one. I take it, from your comment, you would think that that is going too far, in respect of this legislation, and that underscores the fact that maybe we are. I have also pointed out other examples of where we might be going too far, and I have pointed out other examples where we are not going far enough to protect the interests of New Zealanders.

If I could re-traverse the issue that we had discussions with the Minister in the chair about earlier—about whether you can get the required information from someone who has returned to New Zealand having had a conviction overseas that is not necessarily known to the New Zealand authorities, which I think is an appropriate thing that the New Zealand authorities should be able to learn from the offender if they have not learnt it from Interpol or some other country. This bill does not allow the police, at some later stage, to require someone who was convicted and has served a sentence for a serious offence overseas to have to tell the New Zealand authorities about it if they ask them about it. The Minister said that that will never be a problem, because they can get that information from overseas authorities. I am sorry—that is naive and untrue. It is just not right. Take, for example, someone who was in Syria. Do we really think that we could get proper information from Syria about what convictions a returning New Zealander might have had whilst in Syria some years ago? It is fanciful. It is laughable. It is also true in respect of various other African and Asian regimes. It is just not believable.

We still have the possibility of people returning from those jurisdictions to New Zealand, and there is no record in the New Zealand system of those persons offending overseas—and these will not be common occurrences, but, none the less, they are things that we can think of that could occur and that we should have a legislative fix for. What happens when, for example, someone is investigated following a crime that they are alleged to be involved with in New Zealand? These are distasteful examples that we do not like to talk about, and I do not want to ramp them up because I do not like trying to spawn fear in society and I am not trying to do so here, but it is true that some sex offenders against children have a recurrent problem. It is actually one of the reasons why the likes of Australia want to get rid of them out of there and send them back here. If they have come from another country, not like Australia, where you could get that information, I would want there to be a duty upon the person to say: “Well, yes, I was in Syria. I lived there for 20 years, and that’s why there’s no record of me being in New Zealand, because I’ve been overseas for 20 years.” That person should have a duty to disclose their convictions.

We cannot have those discussions at select committee; neither can we have the submissions that we would get from the Law Society or from Rape Crisis, or even from the Sensible Sentencing Trust, which, as an organisation, I generally abhor for its hypocrisy and for its wrongheadedness—its hypocrisy being shown by events with David Garrett when he was here, having backed him for a discharge without conviction and name suppression after he had been found to have stolen the identity of a dead baby as part of his passport fraud, when it generally opposes both for criminals. That sort of hypocrisy annoys me, but none the less, I respect its right, in a civil society, to make submissions on legislation. I would defend even the right of the Sensible Sentencing Trust to come along and say that this legislation does not go far enough—if that was its view. We have heard from Marama Fox and others about how People at Risk Solutions—and I would say the Howard League for Penal Reform also—has got a relevant interest in these things. It might not be directly in respect of this legislation, because this is about management and information, but if there is no parallel process elsewhere in Government dealing with the need to help these people reintegrate and minimise the risk that they will reoffend, that is actually something that would be highlighted by those submissions to select committee. That is one of the reasons we have these processes.

I want to say why all of these things go to the underlying principle of why it was that the Labour Party suggested we have a parallel process with a sunset clause for this legislation. It was a very simple process we were suggesting. It would not have elongated this process in the House. We could have had two bills being considered at the same time. The parties of Parliament would have agreed to that through the Business Committee. One of the bills would have been taken through all three stages under urgency, and it would have had a sunset clause or an end date of a year, say—we were flexible as to the date—and then the second form of the bill would have passed only its first reading and would have commenced at the end date of the first version of the bill, and it would have gone to select committee. Through that process, we could have advertised tomorrow, we could have heard from submitters, and we could have taken the time to actually get this legislation right.

I do not think we have fixed even the grammatical error that is in clause 7 of the bill. It was pointed out to me by David Shearer and raised by me in the first reading debate. It says “Who is returning offender”; it means “Who is a returning offender”—they have missed out an “a”. That sort of error should be fixed. There will be other mistakes in this bill that could be of import as to what the legislation actually means. We have not had the time to deal with that. It would have been fixed at select committee if the Government had chosen the process that we suggested. The idea that a review via an established select committee is the answer—I do not think that is right. Select committees do not have to hear submissions. The select committee is controlled by the Government. This select committee will have a majority of Government members. They can just say if this is too much of an embarrassment or if they do not want this particular item coming up—they can actually cause that inquiry to be very short. They do not need to hear submissions from the public. They do not need to do a proper job. If it is too embarrassing, they probably will not. Governments often act like that.

The reason that we have multiple stages of processes—there is the Committee stage some time after a select committee has looked at the legislation—is actually to make it better legislation. We have offered the Government a practical way to achieve that, and it has thumbed its nose at us. I think it actually shows what scant regard the Government, including the Minister Amy Adams, has for proper processes and for getting the balance right between individual civil liberties and protecting the rights of the public, both of which are relevant on this occasion.

Finally, can I end by saying that I am pretty fed up with the position that the Australian Government is taking in respect of New Zealanders living there. As others have said earlier in this debate, it is true that we deport some serious criminals back to Australia, but it is also true that if people live in the country from close after their birth, then they are, effectively, Australians. Why is it that we are not ensuring that those people in Australia have all the rights of Australians, including the right to live in their country after they are convicted of less serious offences? Why is it that they cannot get proper social support? They pay for social insurance like disability insurance. They actually pay, and they do not get it—they are excluded from the scheme even though they pay for it. They cannot get decent support as students. Women who break up with their partners and have children in the country cannot take their children out of the country and back to New Zealand because of the Hague convention, yet they cannot get the support that they need in order to maintain themselves and their children while they are there. Those things should be addressed properly by the Government. They are not—we do not hear the Government standing up for the rights of New Zealanders in that regard.

Final point—I am still offended by the Prime Minister’s comments last week about our supporting rapists. It was a low point in this House, a low point for the Prime Minister, and particularly galling given that clearance and conviction rates in respect of rapes that occur in New Zealand are decreasing under the Police department under his watch.

CHRIS BISHOP (National): I just want to start my brief remarks in this debate by picking up from where Mr Parker left off. I think it was, as is typical for Mr Parker, a learned contribution to the debate, and there are a few areas I agree with him on.

What I do disagree with him on is this issue as to whether or not the Justice and Electoral Committee will do a good job in reviewing this legislation. I am a member of that venerable committee, which is chaired by Jacqui Dean, and Alfred Ngaro, next to me, sits on that committee as well. We will do a good job in reviewing this piece of legislation. The Government does not have a majority on the Justice and Electoral Committee, and, actually, I am surprised that Mr Parker would impugn the integrity of the committee, because we will do a good job working that through.

The other point I want to make is to respond to Mr Parker’s remarks about how the Government has scant regard for properly calibrating the balance between civil liberties and public safety. Actually, if they read the section 7 report that the Attorney-General has provided to the House, members will find that officials have done a very good job in a short space of time of drafting this bill in a way that strikes that right balance—so much so that only one, very minute part of this bill conflicts unjustifiably with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act, and that is the section around DNA sampling.

Finally, I want to pick up on Mr Clendon’s remarks about how the New Zealand Parliament is the fastest lawmaker in the west. This is something that Geoffrey Palmer said a few years ago. That was definitely true back in the days of Rob Muldoon, you know, when we had the Economic Stabilisation Act. I think it was Sir Robert who said you could do anything in this country as long as you hang your hat on economic stabilisation. When we had that Act, which allowed the Minister of Finance—who at the time was the Prime Minister—to literally do anything to the New Zealand economy through the stroke of a pen under regulations passed through the Executive Council, that was certainly true, but that has been repealed. We now have MMP and so it is a lot harder for Governments to do things.

But it is certainly true—and this is why this is relevant to this bill—that every legislature around the world retains the ability to do things quickly. Every Parliament retains the ability to do things expeditiously, under urgency—call it whatever you like. Every Parliament has that ability. Why? Because sometimes you get circumstances like we have before the House today. Sometimes it is necessary to move fast and pass laws. Sometimes it is necessary to get a framework and have Parliament move quickly to put that in place. That is certainly true when it comes to this situation. It has been well canvassed by members, particularly on this side of the House, as to why it is necessary to move quickly. It has been well canvassed why we do need to pass this bill as quickly as we can. The officials have done a good job. And finally, in closing this debate, I want to say that this is a Government that stands up proudly for New Zealanders, this is a Government that stands up for the rights of Kiwis in Australia, and it is necessary that we pass this bill. And with that, I commend this bill to the House.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Before I put the question, I will quickly summarise a ruling that I made yesterday, on the understanding that there are members in the House who wish to abstain from voting. Normally one can call for a party vote only when one is opposed to the decision, but that, unfortunately, leaves us in a position where abstentions, where there is not otherwise a division, cannot be recorded. So what I did on the first reading and what I will do on this reading is that I will indicate that there is to be a party vote on this question.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the Returning Offenders (Management and Information) Bill be now read a third time.

Ayes 107

New Zealand National 59; New Zealand Labour 32; New Zealand First 12; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Abstentions 14

Green Party 14.

Bill read a third time.

Bills

Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill

First Reading

Hon ANNE TOLLEY (Minister for Social Development): I move, That the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill be now read a first time. The Government has a long-established policy position on benefit stand downs as a way to encourage people to make provision for a short period without income before relying on State assistance. The policy intent has always been that stand-down periods are full calendar weeks without State income. To be very clear, this means that a 1-week stand down is 7 days and a benefit would commence on day 8. Operational practice has always reflected the policy intent.

Work and Income commences benefits on the day after the stand-down period ends. However, there is a technical error in the Social Security Act that allows a benefit to commence on the day that a stand-down period ends, instead of the day after. The error occurred as a result of an incorrect amendment on 3 June 1998, but, unfortunately, it was not discovered until May 2014. This bill corrects that error so that a benefit will commence on the day after a stand-down period ends. The change has retrospective effect to 3 June 1998.

The error needs to be corrected quickly to, firstly, uphold the Government’s policy intent; secondly, to ensure that previous ministry practice is validated; and, thirdly, to avoid any unintended financial cost to the Crown. The bill does, however, protect people from the effect of the retrospective validation if they have had a benefit commence on the day that a stand-down period ended before the amendment is enacted, whether through a new grant or a review or an appeal process that commenced before the bill comes into force.

The bill also provides an opportunity for people to seek a review of a decision about their commencement date if their benefit was commenced incorrectly since the error was detected on 20 May 2014 onwards. They can do this before or, in the case of a benefit that commenced on or after 20 May 2014, after the bill comes into force, up until what I am proposing, 8 January 2016, if the Supplementary Order Paper I have tabled in this House is accepted by the House.

This is a fair and balanced approach that allows beneficiaries to claim what they were entitled to under the law while mitigating the financial risk to the taxpayer. Initial data suggests that since June 1998, when the error occurred, 2.7 million benefits have commenced after a stand down. We also know that if this is not corrected the ongoing additional cost is likely to be around $6 million a year for a technical error in law, not a change in policy. The fiscal risk to the taxpayer cannot remain unchecked, which is why we have separated out this change from the Social Security (Extension of Young Persons Services and Remedial Matters) Amendment Bill.

I believe this bill takes a fair and balanced approach to correcting an error in the legislation. Beneficiaries will have until 8 January to lodge an appeal for any benefits granted from when the Ministry of Social Development became aware of the issue in May 2014.

I also want to take this time to acknowledge Labour’s Carmel Sepuloni, who came to me when the issue was raised at the select committee with a constructive proposal for such a review process. We always want to be able to work across party lines on issues such as this. This error went undetected for 17 years, across a number of Governments, so it is fitting that we are able to work together on a balanced and fair solution. I commend this bill to the House.

CARMEL SEPULONI (Labour—Kelston): I would like to first point out that we have made an attempt to work with the Government on some changes here. We were disappointed in September when we realised that the Government was planning to retrospectively change the law in relation to the issue of historical underpayment of welfare entitlements via the Social Security (Extension of Young Persons Services and Remedial Matters) Amendment Bill. That issue was not fit to be in that bill. Concerns were raised with us by beneficiary advocates about the fact that they felt it had been hidden in there as a way to disguise what the Government was attempting to do.

Since we did write to the Minister for Social Development in September after realising that that clause was in that piece of legislation, there have been conversations and letters backwards and forwards between us and the Government about what changes it has been planning. There are some elements of what it is attempting to do that we would say are better than what it had originally planned, but there is one major element to this piece of legislation that we cannot support, and I will go into that in detail shortly.

The exchange between us and the Government has been going on since September. On 15 October I met with Minister Anne Tolley and she showed me a draft of the bill. Not long after that I wrote to the Minister and highlighted our concern that if the bill was put through under urgency, there was no application period for those who had been underpaid from 3 June 1998 to 20 May 2014. This bill does take into consideration those who have been underpaid since May 2014 to September 2015, because the Government recognises that it was aware of the technical error and so feels that those people should have the right to be able to make an application or a claim, so a window of opportunity has been provided for them. But there is no window of opportunity for all of those people from 1998 to May 2014 to be able to have that same window of opportunity to make a claim. I just saw a National MP shaking their head, like: “That is unnecessary.” Actually, it is necessary to provide people with that natural justice. The Government says it is a technical error, but we in this House know, and everyone out there across New Zealand knows, that when money is owed to the Government, it is chased relentlessly. The point here is that actually when the shoe is on the other foot, the same thing—natural justice—should prevail.

I want to give a recent example where the shoe was on the other foot and the Government was seen to chase New Zealanders relentlessly for cash, and that is in respect of the Novopay disaster. Only a week ago we saw in the media that the Government has now moved to get debt collectors involved in chasing up the $1.8 million from almost 2,000 school staff who were overpaid by Novopay. The education sector was put through hell with the Government’s botched-up Novopay debacle. Some were overpaid, some were underpaid—some were underpaid for months.

Peeni Henare: Some weren’t paid.

CARMEL SEPULONI: Yes. Of those who were overpaid, more than 80 percent of them have repaid that debt, but in this instance, because it was money owed to the Government, the Government has demanded that that money be paid back. The shoe, in respect of this issue that we are talking about today, is on the other foot.

There are a number of people out there who justifiably should have the right to make a claim. It has been brought up that there would be thousands of people who would be entitled to make a claim. The chances are—from the conversations I have had with people—many people would not actually put in a claim. It might be 1 day over the last 17 years that they are entitled to, but there are certain pockets, certain workforces, where actually there could be something significant that was lost here. We have been talking to our teacher-aides, teacher assistants, some of whom go in and out of employment four times a year, some of whom have stand-down periods for benefits four times a year, and some of whom have been providing that teacher-aide service and working in our schools for several years, not just 1 year. We respect the job that those people do and believe that they should have a window of opportunity to make a claim. Other workers that we have had discussions with include seasonal workers, who are in and out of work and on to benefits with stand-down periods. They should have the right to make a claim. People who are in and out of temporary work should have the right to make a claim.

We know that many people would not take up the opportunity to make a claim, but natural justice should prevail, and they should be given that opportunity. We have put up Supplementary Order Paper 142, which we think is a fair compromise here. That would provide a small window of opportunity for people to be able to make that claim, as we have suggested should be done. The Supplementary Order Paper that I have put up delays the commencement of this bill for 6 weeks so that there is that window of opportunity for those who are underpaid by a day or more, depending on how many times they were stood down between 1998 and May 2014, to put in that claim.

We do not think it is asking too much. We think fair is fair. We know that when money is owed to the Government, it is chased up relentlessly. When the Government owes people money, it should not have the right just to retrospectively change the legislation so that it takes away the right of New Zealand citizens to make a claim. We are pushing hard for that amendment and asking that the Minister and the National Government consider supporting that Supplementary Order Paper that would delay the commencement date of the bill to enable people to have a window of opportunity to make a claim. Jono Naylor is laughing. I do not actually think it is a funny matter, Jono Naylor.

We have had a few other issues highlighted in the media recently that really do show up the hypocrisy of the National Government in respect of this issue.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): No, that is not a word that can be used. The member will withdraw.

CARMEL SEPULONI: Apologies.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): I am sorry. The member will withdraw. I did not require her to apologise.

CARMEL SEPULONI: OK, thank you. I do not mind apologising. This really does highlight—what is another word for it? [Interruption] It does highlight the inconsistencies of the National Government. So here we have some of the, potentially, poorest members of New Zealand society who are now going to be denied the right to claim for $27, or whatever it might be, for the day that they were underpaid by the Government after a stand-down period. The inconsistencies are highlighted when we see that we have a Minister for Social Development who does not want to pay that amount of money to those people who are entitled to make a claim, but does want to pay $3,000 to Paula Rebstock per day for her role as chair of the Child, Youth and Family review panel. We have a Government that does not want to pay out people who are underpaid in their benefit for a day, and yet we have got a Government that will engage in extravagant spending like the $500 sheep repairs for the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment, the $26,000 Christmas party for that ministry, a $140,000 TV screen, hair straighteners in the bathrooms, an $11 million New York apartment, a $26 million flag referendum that no one in New Zealand wants, and, potentially, pandas for Wellington.

It does show up inconsistencies with the Government’s approach to New Zealand citizens, and all we are asking is that the Government provides a window of opportunity for these people to make their claim and that the Government delays the bill by 6 weeks so that these people have that window of opportunity to do that. Thank you.

ALFRED NGARO (National): I rise to take a first call on this, the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill, going through all stages under urgency. The point I want to raise—as the previous speaker, Carmel Sepuloni, has talked about—is that the issue is this has been a legislative error since 1998. It goes some time back, so I think there needs to be some cognisance that the issue of responsibility and liability probably goes a long way back. However, we are at this point where we do need to address a critical and a technical issue where the legislation does not follow policy. I just want to put that on the record. Although we can talk about the responsibility and the liability of this Government, which it is taking under urgency, we also remind the House and those who may be listening that this is an issue that has been a legislative error since 1998. I want to make that point really clear. We are taking responsibility, and this is what needs to be done.

I do want to acknowledge the previous member too. She did also make petitions and inquiries into this issue under a previous bill. I know that it was also due to her persistence in trying to get us to a point where we could address this issue. But I also want to acknowledge the Minister for Social Development who herself has also taken on the role of responsibility to ensure that we progress this bill under urgency because of the concerns that there are. I want to talk about some of those concerns, as well. We must act quickly to mitigate the increasing financial and legal risks that this technical error poses to the affordability of our welfare system. I think that is quite critical and it is important as well.

One of the issues, too, that comes up is that the tax reduction and social policy legislation from 1996—and I know that people out there will be riveted to hear about this—contained an error that technically provides for benefit and stand-down periods to end a day earlier than intended. So there is the technical aspect that this bill is trying to address. Again, I want to go on record as commenting on that. That is what this bill is trying to address.

The other aspects, I suppose, and the concerns that have been raised by the member in her speech are around the impact on beneficiaries. The bill protects people from the effect of a retrospective validation. If they have had a benefit commence on the day that a stand-down period ended before the amendment is enacted, whether through a new grant or a review or an appeal process commenced before the bill comes into force, then any reviews relating to that period, back to 3 June 1998, that are lodged prior to the legislative amendment coming into effect are allowed. This is to provide some sort of protection for those in that situation as well. There are a couple of other points. Those people affected can do this before or, in the case of a benefit that commenced on or after 20 May 2014, within a 6-week period after the bill comes into force. The other thing is that these protection provisions are a measure of the Government’s good faith and do not negate the original policy intent that a benefit should commence on the day after a stand-down period begins.

There are some other points I want to raise. The legal and financial risks of this error have been increasing, so we are fixing the problem. We do acknowledge that it is a problem, it has been a problem for some time, and we do need to address this. In fact, in May 2014 the Social Security Appeal Authority alerted the Ministry of Social Development to this error, and through that alert and through that judgment, it was important that it acted in the appropriate way. In May 2015 Cabinet agreed that a correction was needed, with full retrospective effect to 3 June 1998, when the Tax Reduction and Social Policy Bill 1996 took effect. At this time the risk to the Crown was considered relatively low. A plan was put in place to correct the error that was established and amendments were included in the Social Security (Extension of Young Persons Services and Remedial Matters) Amendment Bill, and that amendment bill is currently before the Social Services Committee. In the meantime the ministry practice is to continue to reflect the policy intent until the legislative correction is passed, as it was considered that people should be able to get only the assistance that they were intended to have.

I look forward to other opportunities to speak in the House on this bill as it goes right through all its stages under urgency. Again, we first of all take responsibility for what was an error that goes some time prior, to the time of 1998. It is a legislative error, a technical error, that needs to be corrected. The intent of the Minister and of the select committee, and also, hopefully, of the House, is that we will correct this error through having this bill go through the House under urgency. I commend this bill to the House at its first reading.

POTO WILLIAMS (Labour—Christchurch East): Tēnā koe, Mr Assistant Speaker. Tēnā koe e Te Whare. Thank you for the opportunity to rise and take a call on the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill. Firstly, I just want to raise the matter that the previous speaker, Alfred Ngaro, touched on: when does owing something to somebody become a “technical matter”? As my colleague Carmel Sepuloni pointed out, in the case of an individual owing the Government, it is not technical, but the other way round; when the Government owes the individual, it becomes a “technical matter”.

We are pleased that the Government saw sense to take this portion of the Social Security (Extension of Young Persons Services and Remedial Matters) Amendment Bill out of that particular bill and craft it as a piece of legislation on its own, because it is an important aspect and it is a stand-alone, one-off situation that needs to be dealt with separately. There were concerns when this was discovered within the aforementioned bill that it would become a matter that would not receive the full attention that it requires.

What we are concerned about are the rights of those who are seeking to make a claim and that their right to seeking those arrears has been curtailed for those people who may have been able to make a claim for arrears that have occurred between 1998 and the period halfway through 2014, when this original technical matter was found by the ministry. That is an important issue because it has not really been fully explained or justified why the ministry has decided on this period. I know that the technical matter was discovered at one point and the ability to fix it happened at another point, but that does not excuse the ministry or the Government from looking at what was actually owed to those people from 1998 and having a conversation with them.

We have had no information provided about what the cost of that might be. How many days are we actually talking about? There is no information to give us a real sense of what is going on here and how many people might be impacted on by this. In that case I find this really unfair. There will have been people who may be entitled to claim only 1 day, but there are people who have, for example, seasonal work who may be on and off benefits, on and off stand-down periods, over the course of many years and who would be owed quite significant amounts of money. So in terms of that aspect of natural justice those people will not get an opportunity to make a claim whatsoever, and that is technically unfair.

So here we are in urgency again, with a truncated process without the ability to get really, really sound information, particularly from submitters—people who may have a slightly different perspective and who should be given full consideration of those views. Yet again, we are not able to take full opportunity to hear what those views might be. So there will be no full select committee examination, but we do want to look at what people are already saying out there in the public about what is going on, and I just want to quote from something that was in the Waikato Times—that illustrious publication. It says that “The Ministry of Social Development takes a dim view of benefit fraud.”—we all know this—“It has … about 100 specialists who investigate abuses of the benefit system or accusations that some welfare recipients have pocketed money” that they are not entitled to.

So the overpayment of benefits is one reason why money might be owed, and this can arise where changed personal circumstances affect a beneficiary’s entitlement. Underpayments are another matter. The Government can simply write a new law to validate the short-changing of beneficiaries, as it is now doing, to deal with the costly implications of serious maladministration. Yes, this is a matter that has been discovered in recent years, but it is not an issue that relates to just that time period within which that matter came to light. It is an opportunity to review more fully the implications for those people who may have been affected earlier on.

Just in relation to the departmental disclosure statement—because there is no regulatory impact statement—I want to look at a couple of aspects: points 4.3 and 4.9, about retrospective effect. Point 4.3 states: “Provisions in the Bill have retrospective effect, which could be seen as contentious, as generally legislation should operate prospectively not retrospectively … The amendment to section 80BA [of the Social Security Act] to correct the commencement date of a benefit so that a benefit commences on the day after a stand-down period ends will be retrospective to 3 June 1998, in order to validate the Ministry of Social Development’s previous practice …”. However, in point 4.9 we now note that: “To acknowledge that the Ministry of Social Development’s operational practice should have been amended when the error was discovered on 20 May 2014, clients whose benefits were commenced on or after 20 May 2014 may apply for a review of decision …”. That is the statement that I find of most contention. The date at which the error was discovered is the date from which claims can be made, and that is blatantly unfair.

Members of the beneficiary advocacy community, such as Kay Brereton, were very hopeful, when the error was first discovered, that the Government would look at the legislation being retrospective to 1998. Sadly, she, along with other beneficiary advocates, is saddened to hear that the period has been brought forward to 20 May 2014.

We are not likely to support this bill unless my colleague Carmel Sepuloni’s amendment is supported by the Government. Her amendment would allow a period of time, 6 weeks, in order for those affected beneficiaries to make the appropriate claim, as they should do. This is right, and we should allow that period for that to happen. I do not see any reason why the Government would delay that. It is certainly not giving us any indication that there is an issue with not wanting to pay what is owed to beneficiaries for that period of time, yet we are not getting the indication that the Government would support that amendment. It is a fair amendment and it should go ahead. Thank you. I will have the chance to speak more fully on this during the bill’s passage through the House, and I thank you for the House’s time.

TODD MULLER (National—Bay of Plenty): I rise to take a short call to stand in support of the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill. I guess we are already at the start of what no doubt will be a somewhat arduous afternoon and evening, based on what we have just had to listen to. We have heard that the core difference of opinion in respect of this bill is about what the policy intent of the stand-down period was. When that regime was put in place, successive Governments, going back a number of years—as you can see here, back to 1998—always held the view that if you were put on a stand down when that regime was put in place, it was for a calendar week. Everybody—those who were administering the law and those who were claiming under the law—held the view that it was for 7 days that you were stood down and on the eighth day you stood back up in terms of accessibility for a benefit. Everybody assumed that that was, indeed, the law that we were working to.

So to have the conversation here around broad natural justice now for those before May 2014 where everybody could be available for further review and potential addition for money that they were potentially excluded from—to me, that misses the point. If you have a policy intent that is clear and you have successive Governments that have acted accordingly, then that, ultimately, has to be at the core of this debate. Of course, when you have had—as we have had—a ruling in May last year that identified comprehensively that this was actually a technical error and that technically, under the law as it was written, it should have been paid on the seventh day as opposed to the eighth day, as everyone had assumed that it should be, then, clearly, this legislation is required. It is required under urgency, as we have all collectively agreed today, and you need to apply some natural justice.

Therefore, what the Government is proposing in this bill, where you provide opportunities for those from that day forward to when this legislation comes into effect—actually, 7 weeks beyond that, even—I think is a particularly generous approach. I think it is fair-minded and it gets the balance right between ensuring the original intent of this legislation is upheld—and that we make it absolutely clear through retrospective legislation that we are going to have in law what everyone assumed to be the case all along—and having a process for those who were in a review prior to May last year and for those who have subsequently identified that there is a particular issue. I think that is fair legislation. I look forward to having a sensible debate around that policy intent being confirmed by legislation here over the next few hours. I very much support this bill through the stages and commend it to the House today.

JAN LOGIE (Green): The Green Party opposes this bill, which seeks to retrospectively remove the legally established rights of New Zealanders for the primary purpose of saving this Government some money. I think this bill speaks to some very important points in relation to New Zealanders’ relationship with the Government around trust, balance, the rule of law, and transparency.

Over 1 million New Zealanders did not vote in the last election. Many of those New Zealanders were low-income New Zealanders. Today we heard from the Salvation Army that children in Auckland are living in cars, garages, camping grounds, and emergency housing. We heard that this is due to a lack of housing, in part, but also because some people’s experience of Work and Income has been so bad that they will do anything to avoid going to Work and Income, even if that means giving up their legal entitlements to support. These two things are calling us, as a canary in the mine, warning us of a very fundamental breakdown in trust between the Government and this House and a large number of citizens in this country.

This bill does not work to rebuild that trust. This bill fundamentally erodes that trust further. The urgency that this bill is being brought to this House under is a fabrication and an abuse of power. There is no plane arriving tomorrow and there is no threat to the country; there are only people without much money lodging claims for an average of $80—$80 to which they are still legally entitled. There is only a Government that has, since May last year, knowingly denied people their legal entitlements and that now seeks to give those people only 7 weeks to be able to get their legal entitlements and that is knowingly denying anyone else before that point access to justice. This bill—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): I apologise for interrupting the member, but the time has come for the lunch break.

Sitting suspended from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m.

Debate interrupted.

Obituaries

Jonah Lomu

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN (Minister for Sport and Recreation): I seek leave to move a motion without notice on the sudden passing of Jonah Lomu.

Mr SPEAKER: Leave is sought for that course of action. Is there any objection? There is none.

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: I move, That the House mark the passing of the prominent New Zealander Jonah Lomu. The whole of New Zealand will be in shock and sadness today to learn of the sudden passing of the great Jonah Tali Lomu—the greatest No. 11 ever in an All Blacks side. Anyone who was living in New Zealand in the 1990s and the 2000s would not have failed to notice the massive impact that Jonah Lomu had not only on sports fans but on the wider community in this country. He was a man who came from very humble beginnings in Māngere, South Auckland, and who rose to become the first ever global rugby superstar. He brought a lot of joy to New Zealanders, and no one will ever forget his performance at Cape Town in the semi-final of the Rugby World Cup in 1995, when to the great delight of all New Zealanders he scored four tries against the English, ran right over the top of them, and asserted our primacy at the top of the rugby world, at least for a week.

Jonah Lomu was a man whose achievements went way beyond rugby. He was a major inspiration to a whole generation of young Polynesian men because Jonah proved that you could come from anywhere in New Zealand and make it to the very top. He was a man who was extremely generous with his time. He was a loving father. He gave generously to a wide range of causes, and he remains an inspiration not only to those who follow sport but to anyone who is battling against the ravages of a chronic disease.

There will only ever be one Jonah Lomu. In 100 years from now, when they name the greatest ever All Blacks team, he will still be the best ever No. 11.

We mourn his passing. We know that he leaves behind Nadene, his wife, and two young sons, and our thoughts at this time are with those two little boys and their mother.

Hon TREVOR MALLARD (Labour—Hutt South): On behalf of the Labour Opposition, I would like to join with the Minister for Sport and Recreation and extend our condolences to Jonah Lomu’s family—both to the immediate and to the extended family. Those of us who have been watching rugby for some time will remember him bursting on to the scene at the 1994 Hong Kong Sevens, and then following that in 1995 when, although there were four tries, it was the one that sat Mike Catt on his backside that we will remember the most, over a period of time.

Jonah went on to earn a total of 63 All Blacks caps over his career. He played for a number of Super Rugby teams. I think the Minister is correct to say that a combination of international television, Sky Sport, and the predominance of Adidas, frankly, meant that he went from being one of our stars to a world star. That was something that I think was really important, especially given the fact that he was a Wesley College old boy and from South Auckland.

I think it is also appropriate to place on the record our thanks to Grant Kereama for donating his kidney, for extending Jonah’s life and the quality of his life. I do not totally agree with the Minister, as to this being a major surprise. I think that those of us who saw him in the stands in the telly shots during the Rugby World Cup recently saw a frailness that we had not seen for some time, and that was, to a certain extent, foreboding.

The Labour Opposition supports the Minister and extends our condolences to Jonah Lomu’s family.

KEVIN HAGUE (Green): I rise on behalf of the Green Party to join others echoing the comments made by the Minister and by Trevor Mallard expressing our sadness and condolences to Jonah Lomu’s family. Recently we have been celebrating the performance of our All Blacks team at the Rugby World Cup, and of individual players within that team. But it is true that at no point, either now or at any point in the past, has any player so dominated the sport of rugby as Jonah Lomu did and will continue to do in people’s memories. Others have already mentioned that 1995 World Cup campaign, and in particular that try involving the encounter with Mike Catt.

Jonah Lomu’s fame, popularity, and influence have extended far beyond the sport of rugby, and indeed far beyond the countries where rugby is played. He has become an icon for his strength, skill, determination, and, as the Minister says, for his generosity also. He was often the last player to leave the field, still signing autographs for kids until the kids had gone.

I sit on the Health Committee, and we have recently been hearing about the ordeal that is dialysis, and that is an ordeal that Jonah Lomu has had to sustain for many years now.

The Green Party expresses our shock and our sadness and our deepest sympathy to Jonah Lomu’s family and friends.

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First): As Muhammad Ali was to boxing, so was Jonah Lomu to rugby. He was simply the greatest player we have ever seen, and anyone who was lucky enough to be at the Sydney sportsground the time he first turned up—when he got the ball 70 metres out, sent Damian Smith and three other guys flying, got all the way to the corner, and then gave the ball to Kronfeld—would have then heard the buzz, which no one will ever hear again, so loud of Aussie admiration, which is not easy to get. An Aussie sports field will never forget how good this man was. To use Tina Turner’s famous song, he was simply the best.

It is a very sad day—a tragedy—because for much of his playing time towards the end, he was never fit, he was never really well, and we did not see the best of him.

Our condolences go out to his family; to the very special relationship he had with Tonga, as someone whom they owned; to Wesley College, his school, which he made seriously famous because of his athletic prowess; to the people of Māngere in South Auckland; but above all to all his friends and admirers all over the world.

Hon TE URUROA FLAVELL (Co-Leader—Māori Party): Jonah Lomu te toa o Tonga, Jonah Lomu te tōtara o Te Moana-nui-a-Kiwa, Jonah Lomu te ngākau ngāwari, Jonah Lomu te pāpā ki ngā tamariki, e moe! I nanahi nei i kōrero tēnei Whare mō te hunga i Wīwī i mate i te parekura nui i tū ki reira. I tēnei rā kua hoki mai ki te wā kāinga. I noho tata te hunga mate o te wā kāinga ki te hunga mate o tāwāhi kia taea ai te kī, koutou o te mate, haere, haere, whakangaro atu rā. Ka tangi ake ki a ia me tana whānau, tana hoa rangatira, otirā, rātou o Tonga e tangi nei i tēnei rā. Nō reira, kāti ake huri noa kia ora tātau katoa.

[Jonah Lomu, warrior of Tonga, tōtara of the Great Ocean of Kiwa, affable one, and father to children, sleep! Yesterday this House accorded tributes to the ones in France who died in the huge calamity that occurred there. Today we have returned to the home front. The death of the one at home is closely associated with those overseas, making it possible to say to you, the dead, depart, go forth, and fade away. I truly mourn for him, his family, his wife, and at the same time those of Tonga grieving today. So, enough—my appreciation to us all throughout.]

I join with other speakers in saying what a sad day it is for Aotearoa, and it was a bit of a shock to see the news coming over.

I will just bring one other perspective to the House today. As an old boy of the greatest rugby school in the country, St Stephen’s School, there are about three or four schools that my generation, my school, loved playing: Wesley College, Te Aute College, Church College, and others. One was Wesley College, and I in my day played Wesley College, and because that was pretty much one of the closest schools to St Stephen’s School, when it was alive, it was always a very, very hard game. I am glad that I was not around in the generation that Jonah Lomu came through, because he brought a totally different perspective to the game that we have. In my day, Wesley College played our third XV; in his day they played our first XV.

I can say this, from all the old boys of St Stephen’s School who think about the relationship that St Stephen’s had with Wesley College, we think about our Wesley brothers and sisters, and we think about Jonah Lomu’s whanau. We hope that the next couple of days will be easy on them as the whole nation mourns the death of a wonderful man, who gave, as the Minister said, not only to the rugby world but, actually, to the nation by way of his donations and looking after our tamariki. Nō reira, e moe Jonah Lomu te toa o Te Moana-Nui-a-Kiwa.

[And so to you, Jonah, warrior of the Great Ocean of Kiwa, sleep.]

DAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): I will not reflect on the previous speaker’s choice of the greatest rugby school in New Zealand, but I would like, on behalf of the ACT Party, to join with other leaders in expressing condolences at this very sad time to the family of Jonah Lomu, and also to pay tribute to such a tremendous man, such a freakishly great athlete, such an inspiring leader, and such a great ambassador for New Zealand. Thank you.

Motion agreed to.

Oral Questions

Questions to Ministers

Finance, Minister—Climate Change Policy

1. JAMES SHAW (Co-Leader—Green) to the Minister of Finance: Does he stand by all his answers to oral question No. 5 yesterday?

Hon BILL ENGLISH (Minister of Finance): Yes.

James Shaw: When he said yesterday that “it is going to take a long time for the world to heat up significantly, and it is going to take a long time to take the measures that might mitigate that.”, what did he consider to be significant?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: I would not want to get into a technical discussion here, but I was just reflecting on the time spans covered by the climate change models, which run out for about a hundred years.

James Shaw: Would he say that it is significant or insignificant that global temperatures will have risen by 1 degree by the end of this year, which is halfway to the agreed global limit of a 2 degree rise?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: It was in anticipation of that kind of temperature increase that the previous Government, with the then support of the Greens, put in place the emissions trading system, and the increase in the carbon price probably reflects the growing understanding that those temperatures are rising and that more mitigation will be required.

James Shaw: Given that National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA) has found that the 2013 drought, which cost the New Zealand economy an estimated $1.3 billion, was longer and more severe because of climate change, would he not agree that taking “the measures that might mitigate that.” is more urgent than he suggested yesterday?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: I think that one can have a discussion about the degree of urgency around climate change policy without relying on individual weather events, where it can be difficult to connect one to the other, or to suggest to the public that some particular policy might avoid droughts in the future—I think that is unlikely. There are debatable points about how much urgency, and I guess that will be discussed at the Paris conference in the next few weeks.

James Shaw: Given, then, that NIWA has also found that events such as the 2014 Northland rain storms, which cost $18 million just in direct insurance claims, are now twice as likely to happen because of climate change, would he not agree that taking the measures to mitigate that is actually more important than he suggested yesterday?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: The member could go through a list of individual events that point in the direction that the climate is warming up, but, as he knows, probably better than most, it is a global system and the impact of global action is what is going to be important, and that will be tested in the next few weeks in Paris.

James Shaw: What advice has he received from Treasury about the economic impact of the more frequent and more severe floods, storms, and droughts that are already happening, or anticipated to happen, in New Zealand?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: I have not received advice specifically on that, although when I have looked at advice from other sources, it has been clear that there are some balancing effects, and that in some parts of the world we are going to see, for instance, more food production rather than less. In fact, Treasury’s advice is largely focused on the fact that New Zealand faces the prospect of giving up more economic growth per unit reduction in carbon output than any other developed country. This is one of the reasons why the Government is pretty careful about how it sets its targets, because the economic cost to us of any target that is similar to another country’s target is higher.

James Shaw: How exactly does this Government’s economic strategy of “more roads, more cows, and more oil” fit with the urgent need to reduce our climate emissions in the next 30 years?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: I suppose, in the first case, we want to be pretty careful about the negative effects of “no cows, no oil, and fewer roads”, which is the Greens’ policy. We are unlikely to go down that track, but as I have said before to the member, the principal tool for making complex trade-offs around climate change is the emissions trading system. It sends a price signal; that price signal is currently changing. It is a bit unfortunate that the Greens have abandoned what was a multi-party consensus and are heading off in the direction of a carbon tax.

Ministers—Confidence

2. ANDREW LITTLE (Leader of the Opposition) to the Prime Minister: Does he have confidence in all of his Ministers?

Hon BILL ENGLISH (Acting Prime Minister): Yes. They are competent and hard-working Ministers.

Andrew Little: Why does he have confidence in the Minister for Building and Housing given he used ministry funds to host meetings designed to promote Parmjeet Parmar’s candidacy in a possible by-election?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: That is absolutely ridiculous. The Government makes—[Interruption] The Government has a HomeStart policy that will help thousands of young New Zealanders into their first home, and of course local MPs are turning up to promote the policy. We cannot help it if Labour is worried that Labour would lose a by-election in Mt Roskill.

Andrew Little: Why did a ministerial staffer in Nick Smith’s office say in an email: “Parmjeet Parmar has also expressed a strong interest in hosting a road show as she is keen to raise a local profile in Mt Roskill in case of a by-election.”?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: The National-led Government is in the fortunate position that its backbenchers like our policies. They know what they are and they want to promote them. I know that is not the case in the Labour Party, but it is the case over here.

Andrew Little: Why does he have confidence in the Minister of Education when her officials intervened to change a damning independent report on education for toddlers and babies from the Education Review Office?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: Of course there is confidence in the Minister of Education, who has done more than most Ministers of Education to focus on delivering the promises of public education to those who need it most and has the total backing of the Government in that respect. The member’s other allegations are just wrong.

Andrew Little: Why will the Government not release to taxpayers a taxpayer-funded New Zealand Trade and Enterprise report about sheep that were flown using taxpayer funds to die in a taxpayer-funded corner of the Saudi desert?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: As I understand it, the key information in the report is commercially sensitive. There is no aspect—[Interruption] The circumstances to which the member is referring have been thoroughly investigated by the Auditor-General, and Cabinet is quite happy with the nature of those arrangements. [Interruption]

Andrew Little: Well, their heads are somewhere. Why are New Zealand taxpayers funding secret research reports for the private benefit of Saudi sheikhs?

Hon Members: Sheeps?

Mr SPEAKER: Order! The question has been asked; it will now be answered.

Hon BILL ENGLISH: Maybe secret sheikhs and the sixth sheep. I do not know what the member is referring to.

Andrew Little: So what steps will he now take to address the widespread and growing perception amongst New Zealanders that his Government is just corrupt? [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: I did not hear the last word, but—the Hon Bill English.

Hon BILL ENGLISH: That is simply not true. This Government is more open and more transparent than any previous Government. More of its official proceedings are published more quickly; more data is more open to anyone. The Government is fully transparent.

Services Sector—Productivity

3. JONATHAN YOUNG (National—New Plymouth) to the Minister of Finance: What proportion of the economy is made up by the services sector, and how can the Government boost the productivity of this sector?

Hon BILL ENGLISH (Minister of Finance): The services sector now generates around 70 percent of GDP. This includes retail, media, accommodation, construction, food services, and utilities, and, of course, services also contribute to goods production. It is a large sector, and therefore its productivity is an important driver of productivity in the economy. The Government, of course, is the largest provider of services, making up a bit less than half of the services sector. So we focus, as our contribution to productivity in the economy, on the productivity of Government services.

Jonathan Young: Why is competition important to the services sector, and what steps is the Government taking to improve productivity?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: A number of steps: sharpening competition law, as announced yesterday; reviewing the Commerce Act to ensure that the sections preventing anti-competitive behaviour are appropriate; and improving the ability of consumers to drive competition themselves—for instance, in the electricity sector, but also significant pilots in the disability sector, where people who have long-term disability can control their own budget and make their own choices. This is a bit disruptive of traditional Government services, but it will improve the productivity of the services and the living standard for people with long-term disabilities.

Jonathan Young: How have different components of the services sector been performing recently?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: The latest BNZ productivity of services index shows that the services sector, which makes up 70 percent of the economy, has had 63 months of expansion, and in September recorded the highest rate of growth since 2007. The ICT sector has been growing at about 9 percent per year since 2008, and ICT exports have grown at 14 percent a year over the past 6 years. Tourism has been performing particularly well. Total tourism spend in the year to March 2015 was $30 billion, up more than 10 percent on the previous year.

Jonathan Young: What are the main drivers of productivity in the services sector, and what steps is the Government taking to lift them?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: In its recent report Boosting services sector productivity, the Productivity Commission identified five drivers: competition, knowledge sharing through internationalisation, new skills development, innovation, and quality regulation. The Government is taking steps in each one of these areas—in particular, through the likes of the Rules Reduction Taskforce, where we are taking steps to cut red tape that prevents innovation in services—and also through the reform of Government services to promote innovation and more efficiency.

Overseas Investment—Silver Fern Farms

4. Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First) to the Minister of Finance: Does he stand by all his statements?

Hon BILL ENGLISH (Minister of Finance): Yes.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: As the Minister of Finance, can he comment on this astute observation about the Overseas Investment Office “They are under-resourced in my opinion.”, and what is he going to do about it?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: I am not sure who made that statement, but many people could have and they are probably right. The Government is in the process of looking at an increase in fees paid by overseas investor applicants in order to improve the resources of the Overseas Investment Office.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: How can increasingly concerned Silver Fern Farms shareholders trust the Overseas Investment Office to forensically examine this latest deal when that same keen observer added “So when people say the Overseas Investment Office approves nearly everything put in front of it, that’s true.”, and what is he doing about it?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: The Silver Fern Farms shareholders can rely on the same process as anyone else involved in these transactions, and that is that the Overseas Investment Office has to apply the law, a law brought into this House, actually, by that member. If they believe that the law is not applied they can do what a number of other parties have done, and that is take the Overseas Investment Office to court and get the courts to tell us whether it did its job properly.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: If that same person, who happens to be the Prime Minister, says the Overseas Investment Office is under-resourced and that it approves nearly everything put in front of it, and the Minister of Finance is ultimately responsible for its funding, is he not alarmed that lawyers Harmos Horton Lusk formed the company that became Silver Fern Farms Beef Ltd a full year before proposals were put to shareholders; if not, why not?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: I think I would characterise the connection between those ideas as looseness of association. The Overseas Investment Office has the task of looking into all the commercial arrangements around any application that is made to it, and I am sure if there is anything nefarious in this one it will uncover it.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: I seek leave to table a document showing the Minister has contradicted what Mr Key told the Chinese—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! We do not need it further described. I need the source of the document and the date of the document.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: It is a publication, Rural News, not widely available to members.

Mr SPEAKER: Rural News—[Interruption]—Order! Rural News is very easily sourced by members.

Grant Robertson: Which of his statements is correct: last week, when he said that the economy is “going through another softer patch, for the obvious reason of lower dairy prices.”, or a few months ago, when he said that dairy is a smaller part of the economy than most people think and that the overall performance of the economy depends on how the rest of the export sector does? Which is it?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: Of course, both things are right. As I pointed out in answer to an earlier question, tourism is now our largest export and growing quite fast, and the dairy sector is around 7 percent of GDP, so there is no doubt the drop in dairy prices has had a negative impact on the economy. The success of tourism and ICT will have a positive impact on the economy.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Why would he rise in this House and say that I am responsible for this legislation, which is demonstrably false, and why would the Prime Minister claim that he cannot change the law because New Zealand First will not support the tightening of the Overseas Investment Act when not one person from the National Party has ever approached us on this issue? Why make—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! The question has been asked.

Hon BILL ENGLISH: They must have made the mistake of going to the Northland office of New Zealand First. The member has never been happy with the fact that the current Overseas Investment Act was written under his sponsorship. We are enforcing—

Rt Hon Winston Peters: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. That is the second time that Minister has made that claim. I am not going to do the normal thing and call him what he is, but the fact is that he should answer the question and not tell falsities.

Mr SPEAKER: The Minister is responsible for his answer. He is answering it. If he is misleading the House, then there is—

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Well, he’s not allowed to lie.

Mr SPEAKER: Order! Then there is an appropriate means by which that can be addressed subsequent to the answer given. Does the Minister have anything further to add?

Question No. 5 to Minister

GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I seek leave for this question to be answered by the Minister of Finance, for whom it was originally set down.

Mr SPEAKER: No—I was unaware that it had been transferred, but if it has been transferred, that is the decision—[Interruption] Order! If the member wants to stay to ask the question, he had better not interrupt in that vein. The member can proceed if he so wishes; otherwise, we can move forward. [Interruption] Order!

Dairy Industry—Milk Price Forecasts

5. GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central) to the Minister for Primary Industries: Does he agree with the advice of the Prime Minister in regard to dairy prices made in November last year when the average price at the global dairy auction was US$2,561 a tonne for farmers not to get too worried, and that the price would bottom out soon and start climbing again; if so, can he advise what is the latest average price at the global dairy auction?

Hon NATHAN GUY (Minister for Primary Industries): Yes. The very good point the Prime Minister was making is that global commodity prices are indeed volatile. They go up and they go down, but the medium to long term outlook for dairy is very positive, with growth in key markets in Asia. The latest average price at the Global Dairy Trade auction overnight was US$2,345, which is 29 percent higher than the August low. As we all know, prices have been affected this year by international factors beyond our control, including growth in the overall supply, trade sanctions by Russia, and the EU lifting its dairy quota.

Grant Robertson: In light of that answer, does he further agree with the Prime Minister that “The biggest indicator you would see, if there really was a long-term systemic problem, would be a reduction in land prices”?

Hon NATHAN GUY: Land prices, as we know, go up and down, but the important point is that the long-term outlook for dairying is extremely positive. Just a few months ago, the Labour Party was calling it a crisis in the dairy industry, and, actually, prices are higher than when Labour was calling it a crisis.

Grant Robertson: Does he now agree with the Prime Minister that there might be a systemic problem, with today’s Real Estate Institute of New Zealand dairy farm price index noting a 19 percent fall in prices for dairy farmers?

Hon NATHAN GUY: The dairy prices are volatile, but the long-term outlook for farm prices is very strong because we have only a limited supply of land. As a result, prices will go up and down. That is something that the Labour Party does not seem to understand. Land prices go up and down, but the important point is that the medium to long term outlook for the dairy industry is incredibly strong. Farmers are taking a long-term view.

Grant Robertson: Was the Prime Minister correct when he said: “The biggest indicator you would see, if there really was a long-term systemic problem, would be a reduction in land prices”?

Hon NATHAN GUY: I agree with the Prime Minister’s comments, but, importantly, what I have said is that you need to take a long-term outlook. That is why Labour, day in and day out, extracts a small subset of figures and gives them profile. In actual fact, what the member should be doing is looking at the long-term outlook for dairying. Because we have significant free-trade deals with Asian communities, and because we are supportive of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which that party will not even support, which—

Mr SPEAKER: Order!

Hon Damien O’Connor: If global dairy trade is supposed to be global, why have the seven other companies who have used the platform withdrawn, leaving Fonterra as the only company trying to flog off its commodities on a Fonterra-owned but Boston-based trading platform?

Mr SPEAKER: In so far as there is ministerial responsibility, the Hon Nathan Guy.

Hon NATHAN GUY: The Government does not have a role in deciding which companies participate on the Global Dairy Trade. That is indeed a decision for private businesses to make. For the member to stand up and say that it is all about Fonterra’s commodities, well, Fonterra knows that it has got challenges in front of its own business model, and it needs to look at long-term, value-add contracts.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Minister, if the issue of trade is so important, why is there a boycott to the second-biggest importer of dairy products in the world, namely Russia, which he goes along with, as does the Prime Minister?

Hon NATHAN GUY: I am surprised that the member is alluding in the House this afternoon to the fact that New Zealand should be there negotiating a free-trade agreement with Russia. That does not make sense—that does not make sense.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: You were, and you are. What a fool.

Hon NATHAN GUY: The member should realise that just recently Fonterra has had some plants relisted into that market.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Oh! What did your Prime Minister say?

Hon NATHAN GUY: The member does not seem to understand the wider geopolitical issues of right now. If the member was supportive of free-trade—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! The Minister will resume his seat.

Investing in Educational Success Programme—Progress

6. Dr JIAN YANG (National) to the Minister of Education: What progress has been made on the Investing in Educational Success initiative?

Hon HEKIA PARATA (Minister of Education): I was pleased to announce this morning that the number of communities of learning have more than doubled, including more than a quarter of a million of our children and young people—and in every region. Communities of learning now cover 793 schools—almost a third of all schools—only 1 year after introduction. This is significant progress in this Government’s $359 million Investing in Educational Success initiative and reflects that schools across New Zealand are driven to provide the best possible educational achievement for their students. These latest communities include schools in Northland, East Coast, Taranaki, and Wellington, meaning that we now have every region in the country involved in this enormously exciting initiative.

Dr Jian Yang: How do communities of learning assist students and teachers?

Hon HEKIA PARATA: Communities of learning put kids and their achievement at the centre of a joined-up pathway from early childhood to schooling, and on into tertiary options. They set common achievement challenges and receive additional funding to enable teachers and principals to share expertise and best practice to meet them. We know that quality of teaching and leadership are the biggest in-school factors for lifting achievement. The involvement of families and communities is also vital, and communities of learning will help everyone to play a part in helping our kids to succeed.

Chris Hipkins: How much of the $53.1 million underspend in primary education last year, a significant factor in the Government’s momentary claim to surplus, was due to delays in the roll-out of the Investing in Educational Success initiative?

Hon HEKIA PARATA: The roll-out of this policy began on 1 July 2014. We have not yet completed this financial year. We are ahead in terms of the numbers forming, but we are being very prudent with the resources available.

Chris Hipkins: It’s not what the annual report says—read the annual report.

Hon HEKIA PARATA: I do read the annual report, and I think we commended it to you in the written parliamentary questions.

Question No. 7 to Minister

JULIE ANNE GENTER (Green): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I am on my feet because we are about to hear a point of order.

JULIE ANNE GENTER: I seek leave to have my question transferred back to the Minister of Finance, as he is ultimately the Minister responsible for the funding of rail infrastructure.

Mr SPEAKER: I will not be putting the leave. Can I ask members to please have a look at Speaker’s ruling 169/5. Does the member wish to continue?

Transport Infrastructure—Railways

7. JULIE ANNE GENTER (Green) to the Minister of Transport: Does he agree with the Secretary to the Treasury that “there could very well be some merit” in evaluating and funding rail infrastructure on the same basis as State highways and other transport infrastructure?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Minister of Transport): Yes, to some extent, although I note it was a very qualified statement by the secretary.

Julie Anne Genter: Why is rail infrastructure not eligible for funding from the National Land Transport Fund when it benefits road users and the country as much, if not more, than highway expansion and also decreases carbon pollution?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: It does in fact receive money from the National Land Transport Fund—just last week I was at a park-and-ride opening in Ōtāhuhu—but primarily rail is funded from the centre through Crown appropriations.

Julie Anne Genter: Why is his Government spending over $1 billion a year on highways—and that funding is ring-fenced—with low economic efficiency that increases carbon pollution, when it could be investing that money in the rail network, which complements the road network, moves freight more efficiently, and reduces pollution?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: The reason we invest so heavily in roads is that they are great for the economy and for people, but we also invest, and have over the time we have been in Government, billions of dollars in rail. We have got a proud record of that.

Julie Anne Genter: Is he aware of any country in the world besides New Zealand that is looking at scrapping electric trains and replacing them with diesel trains because of lack of funding?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: I would have to do a Google search.

Homelessness—Families

PHIL TWYFORD (Labour—Te Atatū): My question is for the Minister for Social Housing—[Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I am very tempted to be asking that Minister to leave the House. The question has been called. There is no need to interject like that.

8. PHIL TWYFORD (Labour—Te Atatū) to the Minister for Social Housing: Is she embarrassed that families are living in cars?

Hon PAULA BENNETT (Minister for Social Housing): No, but I do not think it is acceptable for people to be living in cars, and that is why the Government is pursuing a social housing reform programme to increase the number of social houses.

Phil Twyford: Will she commit to a nationwide strategy to end homelessness, properly resourced with houses and the funding for support services to help people get their lives back on track?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: That is simply what we are doing with our social housing reform programme.

Phil Twyford: Is she seriously describing the current policies and funding commitments as a nationwide strategy to end homelessness?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: I certainly am, and I certainly also see it as a way to make sure that we are looking after New Zealand’s most vulnerable, not just in homelessness and those going into State houses but equally in affordable housing—making sure that people have opportunities on the housing continuum, from $2.5 million in just the last few months on emergency housing, through to 20 percent social housing on Crown land, through to a number of other measures that we take seriously.

Phil Twyford: When almost half of our homeless are children, how can she justify allowing so many of them to remain on the streets?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: I am not justifying anything. What I am saying is that we have a social housing reform programme that is seeing success, that we need to have more of it, that it is unacceptable for those children to be living in those circumstances. If you take Auckland alone, you have got a population increase of around 40,000 in just the last 12 months. As we know, the building of new homes is not keeping up with that population increase. However, we are seeing a record number of building consents since 2009, and we are equally seeing more than 800 houses for Housing New Zealand contracted out and under construction just in the next 12 months.

Phil Twyford: Is she ashamed of the fact that if National stopped its State house sell-off and used the 2,000 vacant State houses, it would be enough to house the homeless, but she just does not have the commitment to do it, and if she is not ashamed of that, why—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! The question has been asked.

Hon PAULA BENNETT: I think it is good that we get a few facts on the table. Housing New Zealand houses are at the highest occupancy they have ever been at, at 98 percent. Equally, with those 2,000 houses that are vacant, we have—

Phil Twyford: 1,000 fewer on your watch.

Hon PAULA BENNETT: Can I just give you some answers, because you are asking the question. Three hundred and twenty-two of them are vacant because of meth contamination. We have also reduced the vacant turn-round times significantly: from the 50 days that it used to be, to an average now of 34 days. We are doing the work that needs to be done, because the member is the first one to say that these houses are cold and need to be refurbished. So between the vacancies, we are actually refurbishing them and doing exactly what is needed. [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I say to both members that if they want to have a further conversation, go to the lobbies.

Paparoa National Park—Pike River Memorial Track

9. JOANNE HAYES (National) to the Acting Minister of Conservation: What are the benefits of the Pike29 Great Walk, and the extension of the Paparoa National Park that takes effect today?

Hon Dr NICK SMITH (Acting Minister of Conservation): The 3,971 hectare extension to the Paparoa National Park ensures that the mine site is properly respected, but is also accessible for the families and loved ones of the 29 miners. It is also a significant gain for conservation, in that it includes rich podocarp and beech forests and is home to the great spotted kiwi, to whio or blue duck, to kaka, and to kakariki. The new track is the first Great Walk in more than 20 years, and the only one exclusively on the West Coast. It makes up stunning views from the limestone gorges of the Pororari Valley, stunning views from the Moonlight Range of the Tasman Coast and the Southern Alps, and it also will give people an experience of the rich mining history of the West Coast, through to the community of Blackball.

Joanne Hayes: Who initiated the idea of the Pike29 Track, and what will be the next steps from here to create this new Great Walk?

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: The track was first proposed by the Pike families group and its spokesperson, Mr Bernie Monk. I visited the site and met with the families, both in person and in conference calls, and there was overwhelming support for the venture, albeit it is inevitable across such a group of families that there will be some differences of view. The track will require changes to the Paparoa National Park Management Plan, and consultation on that will begin shortly. The Department of Conservation will also start the process of design and procurement. Cabinet has provided a budget of $10 million for the track to be constructed, as well as ongoing maintenance funding of $350,000 a year in the department’s baseline.

Chris Hipkins: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. This question is set down to the Acting Minister of Conservation. I just seek some clarity from you as to the basis on which a Minister can be acting when the primary Minister is in the House.

Hon Gerry Brownlee: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker.

Mr SPEAKER: I will allow the Hon Gerry Brownlee. I do know the answer.

Hon Gerry Brownlee: It is not uncommon that if there is any possibility of there being any conflict of interest, then a Minister will hand that responsibility to another Minister. That is the simple explanation. There is nothing being hidden here.

Mr SPEAKER: And indeed the announcement made at the weekend, I noted, was in the hands of the Acting Minister of Conservation.

New Zealand Trade and Enterprise—Saudi Agri-hub Report

10. Hon DAVID PARKER (Labour) to the Minister for Economic Development: Does the withheld NZTE-funded report on why most of the lambs died on the taxpayer-funded farm in the Saudi desert confirm or disprove the statement by Hon Nathan Guy on 18 June 2015 that he thought the lambs could have died in a sand storm?

Hon NATHAN GUY (Minister for Primary Industries) on behalf of the Minister for Economic Development: The information sought is commercially sensitive and was provided to New Zealand Trade and Enterprise with an obligation of confidence. I do not think it is in the public interest to provide it to the House. I would note that at the time the Minister for Primary Industries made it clear that he understood the mortalities could have been due to a sandstorm but that he did not have the full details. Brownrigg Agriculture issued a press statement later that day, which indicated the mortalities were due to a rain storm and a range of illnesses.

Hon David Parker: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I would ask for your assistance. This is an area of public interest—funded by the Government, overseas, New Zealand Trade and Enterprise—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! Can I have the point of order, please.

Hon David Parker: I think the Minister does have a responsibility to answer to this House, and I would ask that you request him to do so.

Mr SPEAKER: Can I ask the member to familiarise himself with Speakers’ rulings, and particularly Speaker’s ruling 193/3, “Obligation to answer”. An answer must be given “if it can be given consistently with the public interest”. In this case the Minister has responded on two points: one, it is not in the public interest; and, two, it is commercially sensitive. That is his opinion. It is certainly what he is allowed to say, and it addresses the question.

Hon David Parker: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. There must be a point where those claims just are not credible, and so what I am asking you to do—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! No. The Minister has given an answer. It may not be to the satisfaction of the member. My job is to see whether it has been answered and addressed in accordance with Speakers’ rulings. I have done that. I have gone so far as to reference it to the member. That is the end of the matter. Proceeding with further supplementary questions is the best way forward for the honourable member.

Hon David Parker: If it was not a sandstorm in the desert that killed the lambs, does the report show whether poor maternal ewe health caused by heat-stress or an unsuitable diet contributed to the 80 percent lamb death on the farm in the desert funded by the New Zealand Government?

Hon NATHAN GUY: On behalf of the Minister, I have not seen the report, so I cannot answer the details of that.

Hon David Parker: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. The Standing Orders are clear that when Ministers come answering on behalf of other Ministers they should inform themselves of the details. Also, this is the Minister for Primary Industries, who was willing to answer questions at the select committee, and yet comes here contriving to be ignorant of the answers.

Mr SPEAKER: Order! Very, very soon we will be moving to the next question. The Minister is responsible for his answer. If he rises and says he has not seen that particular report, then I must accept his word. If the member has other information or feels that this is a case of misrepresentation, then there is a very appropriate course of action, but it does not involve raising it on the floor of the House. We will proceed with further supplementary questions—[Interruption] Order! I am on my feet. We will proceed with further supplementary questions, but if there are any more of what I consider to be pointless points of order, I will not hesitate to move to the next question. I am trying to assist the member, but he must accept the answers that are given, if they are in line with the Standing Orders and Speakers’ rulings.

Chris Hipkins: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I draw your attention to the primary question, which references the report in question that my colleague David Parker is asking about. In his answer to the primary question the Minister said that he did not believe it was in the public interest for him to make further comment on the report. How could the Minister make that claim if he has not read the report?

Mr SPEAKER: That is for the Minister to judge and for the public of New Zealand to judge. That is the answer—[Interruption] Order! That is the answer that has been given by the Minister. It may not be satisfactory to members on my left-hand side. They will judge that. The public of New Zealand will judge that. The way forward is further supplementary questions.

Chris Hipkins: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. A fresh point of order.

Mr SPEAKER: I would be grateful.

Chris Hipkins: A fresh point of order, and it is purely for a matter of clarity, because the Minister is answering on behalf of another Minister. Is he answering that the Minister has not read the report or he as the acting Minister has not read the report? That is just for the purpose of clarity, so that we can tailor our supplementary questions accordingly.

Mr SPEAKER: The member, in answering, should have addressed the question by answering on behalf—he did not. I will allow the Minister to clarify, because I would judge that he is answering that as the Minister for Primary Industries, not as the acting Minister for Economic Development. But I will allow the Minister—

Hon NATHAN GUY: I was answering on behalf of the Minister for Economic Development.

Mr SPEAKER: Then that statement has been made.

Hon David Parker: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I accept your ruling that according to early Speakers’ rulings it is for a Minister to decide whether something is in the public interest.

Mr SPEAKER: Can I have a point of order then?

Hon David Parker: I ask you to reflect on whether it is right for you to say that it is fair for the Minister to say that he had not read the report, given that the report is in the primary question.

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I did not say it was fair for the Minister to say he had not read the report. I am saying that the Minister did state that he had not seen the report. The Minister is responsible for the answer, not me as Speaker.

Hon David Parker: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker.

Mr SPEAKER: No, we are now—

Hon David Parker: There are Speakers’ rulings on this.

Mr SPEAKER: Well, if the member wants to quickly refer me to one I will have a look at it.

Hon David Parker: Yes, Speakers’ rulings say—

Mr SPEAKER: Number?

Hon David Parker: Yes, I will give it to you.

Hon Gerry Brownlee: 192.

Hon David Parker: Speaker’s ruling 168/1 actually, Mr Brownlee. Speaker’s ruling 168/1—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I require silence from my right-hand side.

Hon David Parker: —says that “Ministers should be in a position to answer supplementary questions.” Given that this was about a New Zealand Trade and Enterprise - funded report, the Minister answering on behalf of the other Minister should be in a position to answer questions about the New Zealand Trade and Enterprise - funded report, otherwise it is pointless asking questions.

Mr SPEAKER: Order! The Minister is in a position to answer the questions—[Interruption] Order! He is then not answering them to the satisfaction of the member. That frequently happens in this House. Does the member have a further supplementary question?

Hon David Parker: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. Is the Speaker now making a ruling—

Mr SPEAKER: Order!

Hon David Parker: I am asking for a ruling as to whether you are making a new ruling as Speaker that Ministers do not need to have read the report in the primary question and can now just say “I didn’t read the report, therefore I don’t need to answer.”?

Mr SPEAKER: No, I am certainly not saying that and the member is now trifling with the Chair and wasting time. I am certainly not saying that Ministers can come to the House ill prepared. If they come to the House ill prepared that is for the members of the Opposition to judge and it is for members of the public to judge. If the member has a further supplementary question I will hear it, but otherwise I am very tempted to move to the next question immediately.

Dr David Clark: What a hopeless Government.

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I do not want another interjection from that member this question time. It has been consistent—

Hon David Parker: Supplementary—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I am on my feet. There have been consistent interjections from the member. That will be the last one for this question time.

Dr David Clark: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker.

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I have ruled.

Dr David Clark: Point of order.

Mr SPEAKER: What is the point of order?

Dr David Clark: I have been out of this Chamber for most of question time. I cannot accept that comfortably. [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I apologise to the member. I have been hearing interjections from that area. I did not realise the member had not been here, so if it was not him it is somebody in his very near vicinity and I immediately apologise to the member. [Interruption]

Chris Hipkins: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker.

Mr SPEAKER: If it is a genuine fresh point of order, I will hear it. But if it is the member continuing to waste the time of this House, I will take a very, very dim view.

Chris Hipkins: A different issue. You just warned a member that if he would interject further you would ask him to leave the Chamber. While you were on your feet doing so, there was significant interjection from the Leader of the House. Does the same standard apply to him?

Mr SPEAKER: There has been significant interjection from both sides of the House through a number of points of order. To sort out one side at this stage I do not think would be appropriate. I should perhaps be dealing—[Interruption] Order! If I addressed Dr David Clark the wrong way, I have apologised. That is the end of that matter.

James Shaw: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I wonder whether you could help me with this. In reference to the Speaker’s ruling that you just referred to, Mr Parker said that Ministers should come prepared to respond to the primary question, and you said that if they were not prepared then that was a matter for public judgment. Does that mean that when the Speaker’s ruling says that they should come prepared that there is no consequence if they do not—other than the court of public opinion, so to speak?

Mr SPEAKER: If Ministers come ill prepared and do not answer questions to the satisfaction of this House, the public are also watching and they will then judge the performance of Ministers. It has been like that ever since I arrived here.

Hon David Parker: Given that his Government was warned that flying heavily pregnant sheep to a farm in the hot desert was risky, why did he allow his Government department to proceed with, and fund, this ludicrous plan?

Hon NATHAN GUY: This is about a food security partnership and an agri-hub to showcase New Zealand technology. It is a prudent long-term investment that this Government has decided to make.

Hon David Parker: Is it the ultimate shame of this whole saga that even after dishing out the $4 million bribe, building a $6 million farm in the desert—

Hon Gerry Brownlee: You can’t say that.

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I will determine that, but if it is an inflammatory type of question it will possibly get an inflammatory answer. Carry on with the question.

Hon David Parker: —and spending a million dollars flying sheep, his Government has now admitted that the deal will not even get the free-trade agreement that he was wanting to get across the line completed?

Hon NATHAN GUY: I refute those allegations. This is about a food security partnership, an agri-hub, and this is about showcasing 30 New Zealand companies and their goods and services and what we have to offer to the Gulf State. [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! Before I call the member for his supplementary question can I ask that members on my left-hand side also listen to the answer.

Hon David Parker: How much extra trade with Saudi Arabia in New Zealand agricultural products and services has resulted from the demonstration farm in the desert, excluding, of course, the $12 million of taxpayers’ funds that have already been spent?

Hon NATHAN GUY: What that member does not seem to appreciate is that this is about a long-term investment—[Interruption]—that we are prepared to make, a food security partnership, showcasing New Zealand technology—[Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! There is just no point in continuing with an answer.

Hon David Parker: Given the Minister’s recent experience with inflatable sheep, did he consider using them because they might have a better survival rate?

Hon NATHAN GUY: What we have seen this week is that Labour’s books are in tatty shape and they are very under-inflated.

Flag Referendums—Cost

11. Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First) to the Deputy Prime Minister: Is he confident that the money spent on the Flag Referendum is appropriate and lawful?

Hon BILL ENGLISH (Deputy Prime Minister): Yes.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Perhaps the Minister can explain how much was spent on this advertisement in the Air New Zealand inflight magazine last month, containing only four of the options, which meant it was a total waste of public money?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: All the advertising and publicity is under the control of the Flag Consideration Panel to ensure that it is independent of the Government. I am happy to take that issue up with the member, but it is quite possible that some of the material was produced before Parliament’s somewhat sudden and unexpected addition of a fifth flag. [Interruption]

Hon Gerry Brownlee: Air New Zealand’s man on the inside.

Mr SPEAKER: Order—to Mr Brownlee.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: In your case it would be a blessing.

Mr SPEAKER: Now we will have the question.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Why was it necessary for the Electoral Commission to advise New Zealanders that they should not cast an informal vote, which is their choice if they want to have it, or to spend, in a desperate 24-hour flag-athon with Newstalk ZB and the New Zealand Herald, such huge amounts of money just because they are two leading media handmaidens in New Zealand?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: I am not sure just what the member is referring to, but I do not think there is any question about the lawfulness of the spending, as he asked originally.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Can he explain to New Zealanders why there is no silver fern in any of the alternative flag options, or is this a deliberate deception given this is Fraud Awareness Week?

Hon BILL ENGLISH: I do not want to oversimplify the explanation but the reason there is no silver fern in the alternative flag options is that there is no silver fern in the alternative flag options.

Food and Beverage Industry—Sugar and Food Labelling

Mr SPEAKER: Question No. 12—Ian McKelvie.

IAN McKELVIE (National—Rangitīkei): My—[Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order!

IAN McKELVIE: Apologies, Mr Speaker. I cannot hear myself think. My speaker is to—[Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! We are nearly there. One question to go. Question No. 12—Ian McKelvie.

12. IAN McKELVIE (National—Rangitīkei) to the Minister for Food Safety: What initiatives has the Government put in place to encourage the food and beverage industry to reduce the sugar content of their products?

Hon JO GOODHEW (Minister for Food Safety): Last year the Government introduced voluntary front-of-pack labelling called the Health Star Rating system. These labels make it easy for shoppers to understand the nutritional value of the food that they are buying, so that they can make healthy choices more easily. This has created a competitive environment in which the industry has reduced sugar in order to obtain more stars.

Ian McKelvie: How has the industry responded to this labelling system?

Hon JO GOODHEW: Very well. Already there are more than 600 products on supermarket shelves. They are using these labels already. The number of products being rolled out with new labels is growing so fast that the product lists are almost out of date when I receive them. Well over 1,000 products will be on the shelves by the end of the year, and that will continue to increase as the phasing-in periods for the new labels come along. Very important, more than 95 percent of all juice and non-alcoholic drinks will soon have the Health Star Rating labels, and our two largest supermarket chains are rolling the labels out on their home-brand products and the bulk bin sections of their stores.

Ian McKelvie: How are these labels encouraging the food industry to reduce the sugar content of these products?

Hon JO GOODHEW: The voluntary system has encouraged food businesses to look carefully at their recipes in order to reduce sugar, fat, and salt to improve the nutritional content. Many of our staple products, like breads and cereals, now contain less sugar. This is just far too much good news for the Opposition to possibly contemplate, it seems. Due to this initiative, 70 percent of all breakfast cereals have been reformulated to reduce sugar content—and they did it voluntarily, members of the House. Nestlé last night announced on television—

Mr SPEAKER: Bring the answer to a conclusion.

Hon JO GOODHEW: —that it has doubled the fibre level—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! The answer is going on too long.

Bills

Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill

First Reading

Debate resumed.

JAN LOGIE (Green): As the bells rang, I was speaking to the point of the importance of trust between the people of this country and the Government and, indeed, this Parliament. This bill in front of us, going through this House under urgency, I think, creates the risk, at the very least, of giving New Zealanders the impression that the first rule is that the Government is never wrong, and when the Government is wrong, see rule No. 1: the Government is never wrong. And I want to say very clearly that I do not want to live in that society. I want to live in a society where as a Parliament we seek to strengthen—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Order! I am sorry to the member. Those who are leaving the Chamber, please do so quietly and as quickly as possible so that, in fairness to the speaker, we can all hear.

JAN LOGIE: As I was saying, I want to live in a society where as a Parliament our focus is on strengthening the people’s trust in the Government and public institutions and where we do our best to protect the rule of law and the human rights of everyone in this country. There are some very significant principles at stake with this piece of legislation. I have already spoken to the principle of trust, and quite significantly connected with that is the principle of balance.

Last year this Government, in this Parliament, passed a piece of legislation to strengthen Work and Income’s requirement to recover debt from beneficiaries. It did this in response to court rulings that suggested the human rights of beneficiaries to shelter and food may actually have primacy over Work and Income’s right to reclaim debt. I want this House to think about that—that when the court said the human rights of New Zealanders may take primacy over the Government’s fiscal agenda, this Government came to this House with legislation that said: “No, our fiscal priorities need to take priority.” This House passed legislation that undermined people’s human rights to shelter and food. And now here we are about a year later in this House, when the Government has been told by the courts very clearly over year ago that it is misapplying the law and denying people money that they are entitled by law to access, and the Government is saying: “Oh, we made a mistake. I know the courts think we owe these people this money, but, actually we’re retrospectively going to rule out that right and deny people that money.” I think that raises some pretty major questions of trust and balance.

I want to talk this House through the process as it has happened, as I can work out—the time line. The law was introduced on 3 June 1998, and section 80BA(4) of the Social Security Act states that if a stand-down period applies under this section, benefits commence on the day on which the stand-down period ends. The day on which the stand-down period ends is the day on which the benefit commences, and yet, somehow, for 18 years, the Ministry of Social Development has been commencing the benefits on the day after the stand-down period ends. That is a pretty clear piece of legislation—benefits commence on the day the stand-down period ends—yet for 18 years, despite reviews of legislation, that piece of legislation has been misinterpreted.

We have been hearing from the Government that, well, that was a technical error and that there was always the intention that the stand-down period be a week and that benefits commence the day after, despite the fact that the legislation says “the day on which”. I have asked the Parliamentary Library to go through the debates at that time in 1998 to consider where the debate was and whether there were some points raised in the debate that would back up what the Government is telling us. The library could not find one reference that backed up the Government’s perception that this was not the intent of the law. We have nothing on record that backs it up.

Then in May 2014 we had the courts establish that Work and Income was incorrectly interpreting the law. That is well, well over a year ago. That practice of misapplying the law has continued until 29 September, denying people what they were by law legally entitled to. It seems to me very worrying that despite there having been two court cases reinforcing that law and—as we heard from a previous speaker, Alfred Ngaro—Cabinet having considered the fact of those court rulings, Work and Income still refused to implement the law. It chose to act illegally until about 2 weeks after this came to the media’s attention.

So we have court rulings—two court rulings—we have a Cabinet consideration, and nothing. There was a decision and there were choices not to apply the law to beneficiaries as it was written. I can assume it was only because Work and Income did not think that beneficiaries would have any public support to back them up on accessing their legal rights, until the matter managed to come to the attention of the media—through advocates raising this in a select committee. The Minister for Social Development said to me that she was not aware, and then we get to a very significant problem of a major breakdown between Minister and department.

DARROCH BALL (NZ First): It is a pleasure to rise on behalf of New Zealand First to speak on the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill. In its essence it is a rather simple bill in so far as it wants to change one section of the principal Act. I would just like to read out part of the general policy statement, which is in the explanatory note of the bill: “This Bill amends the Social Security Act 1964 to correct, with retrospective effect to 3 June 1998, an error in the legislation that does not give effect to the policy intent that a benefit commences on the day after a stand-down period ends as opposed to the day on which the stand-down period ends.” In other words, as the Minister has said, and as other members have said, this bill corrects a technical error in law. It is not a change in policy. That is the basis on which, and the reason why, New Zealand First will be supporting this bill.

There are a couple of issues, however, and firstly I want to talk about the process that we are going through at the moment under urgency. There are a couple of issues about that process, and one of them is the actual lack of communication from the Minister for Social Development and from the Government as a whole with regard to the change in legislation, what it is going to look like, the intent, and even with regard to when we were going to go through the legislation and go through urgency itself. With legislation like this, which is an actual correction in law that spans successive Governments, you would think that communication was key.

Why are we going through urgency in the first place? That is the second issue. We see, if we put together the time line, as Jan Logie did, that in fact this change in legislation was actually placed in another piece of legislation, and months later—in fact, 18 months later—we now find ourselves under urgency. What are the reasons for that? I think it boils down to the fact that the Government was found out and wants to rush it through to ensure that it is not fiscally disadvantaged in the end.

There is one key point that has been brought up by Labour, and that is that the Government knew of this issue back in May 2014. In the departmental disclosure statement, in the last paragraph, under the heading “Any other unusual provisions or features”, it says: “the Ministry of Social Development’s operational practice should have been amended when the error was discovered on 20 May 2014,”. So the question that obviously comes out of that is: why was the operational practice not amended in May? As we can see, and as I stated right at the start, it is actually a simple enough bill and it is a simple enough change, so why was it not changed, and why was the issue not communicated to the beneficiaries and to the public back in May?

As far as communication to the beneficiaries is concerned, it is all well and good to give them 6 or 7 weeks—I think it has been pushed out now to 8 January—but, again, the lack of communication from the Minister is disappointing. However, that time period is only as a result of the process we are now in—urgency. If we were not under urgency to get this pushed through, there would be no need for a time limit on when people who got a benefit from May 2014 can apply.

The other question actually is: if, out of a matter of principle and fairness, there is a 6 or 7 or 8-week period when beneficiaries who received a benefit from May onwards can apply, why is everyone not able to get the back-pay for that? Why do they have to make an application to do so? In this day and age, with digital computer records and everything like that going back to May 2014, there will obviously be records of all those beneficiaries who will be eligible for this back-pay. So why are we going through the rigmarole of making beneficiaries apply when it can be automatically done? That is a question that, hopefully, the Minister can answer during the Committee stage.

The two main reasons why New Zealand First is supporting this bill are the intent of the original legislation, and the intent of the stand-down period itself. It is easy, actually, to get dragged down an emotive pathway where we are seeing the effects of beneficiaries’ poverty. There is bill called the Support for Children in Hardship Bill going through the House, and we have heard stories about children who are homeless in Auckland. We have got issues with child poverty throughout New Zealand, and obviously those are big problems for this country. But this is not the problem here, and this is not the legislation that we need to change to fix that problem. Labour and the Greens are opposing this bill based on that emotive pathway. So, in reference to that, I would actually like to look at the departmental disclosure statement again. It highlights right at the start that this bill amends the Social Security Act to correct “an error in the legislation that does not give effect to the policy intent …”. So New Zealand First’s stance is that if you take those beneficiaries from day one, from 1998, and if the legislation itself was written to the intent of the bill—we know that it was not—those beneficiaries would have received exactly the same amount that they have already received.

So if the legislative error was not there the beneficiaries would be no better off today than when the mistake was made. So we are correcting that, and we have heard from Labour and from the Greens that the beneficiaries are owed money and that they missed out on a day, but the intent of that original legislation states that they did not. And, of course, if the situation was reversed and the intent was for them to have the extra day and they did not, of course we would be holding the Government to account on that.

Also, some have said that there is an issue with the retrospective effect. The departmental disclosure statement says that in this case the retrospective provisions can be justified to ensure that the Government policy intent is upheld, that the practice and understanding that has been previously applied by the Ministry of Social Development is validated, and that financial costs to the Crown that were not anticipated are avoided. New Zealand First agrees with that.

I would just like to finish off with a 3 News article about this urgent Government bill that is going through to fix a benefit error. TV3 states that beneficiaries are being underpaid by 1 day. It is disingenuous to report that, because that is not the case. Beneficiaries have not been underpaid by 1 day. The intent of the bill was fulfilled, and that is why New Zealand First is supporting this bill.

It has always been Government policy—in fact, the Minister has said it too—that the benefit will commence the day after a stand down, and that the stand-down period is a 7-day period. So it is not just the case under the National Government; it has been so under successive Governments. And it is a little bit contradictory for the Labour Party to oppose this when the policy intent was being fulfilled under the Labour Government too.

I have got a few more things to say, and I will say them in the second reading and in the Committee of the whole House, but at this stage we will be supporting the bill.

JONO NAYLOR (National): I would just like to acknowledge the contribution made by Darroch Ball because he did highlight the fact that this is actually a very technical bill and not one that we need to get too carried away on in terms of the wider impacts on families who are dependent on benefits or otherwise. This is a technical bill. There is a technical error in some of the drafting that needs to be fixed, and that is exactly what we are looking at.

Some people have talked about the fact that there was nothing compelling in Hansard or in the debates when the initial legislation was put in in 1998. I think the issue here is that you have got to look at the intent. When you have a stand down, people would normally acknowledge that, actually, after a period of a stand down, then that kicks in, and not necessarily on the day on which it ends or otherwise.

But there have been some conflicting ideas about this, and so today, through this legislation, we are going to put it right. When you are putting things right, you have got to make sure that things are, in essence, fair and practical, and I believe the balance we have arrived at with this legislation is both fair and practical. It is not practical for us to for ever and a day keep taking people’s challenge of things going back as far as 1998, and so what we are saying is, actually, from the point at which this legislation comes into practice, you will not be able to go back to 1998.

However, I think it is fair and reasonable for us to acknowledge that, actually, since May of 2014, perhaps things should have been done differently. So there is an option through until January this year for people to apply for a refund for where they have been unreasonably treated, perhaps, and that is exactly what will happen. Thank you.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): The next call is a split call. I call Marama Davidson—5 minutes.

MARAMA DAVIDSON (Green): Kia ora. This bill seeks to fix a mistake that recently came to light that found that the law was not being followed. The law was not being followed and people receiving a benefit were missing out on a day’s pay, and that has been happening since 1998.

What I would like to raise in this short call is that the law says that they are entitled to this—this is a legal entitlement. Retrospective legislation to deny people what is owed to them is, I think, an affront to the rule of law, and when that affront to the rule of law harshly impacts on those already doing it tough, then to me that is a stain on our moral society, on a transparent society, and on a society that has to be based on trust, which my colleague Jan Logie has already referred to. The operational blunders have been raised often, and rightly, I believe.

We go to intent again, which I feel is a good point to raise. Firstly, where does it say what the intent was? I think the onus should be on the Government to prove that. But, secondly, even though that was the intent, the law was quite clear, and so this is a legal entitlement that we should be upholding as per good lawmaking in this country. Some 10,000 people have already applied to get what they are entitled to, so this, we know, directly affects a huge number of New Zealanders and would help in numerous and meaningful ways.

I know that the previous speaker, Jono Naylor, would prefer that we do not talk about them and that we try to ignore the stories of absolute hardship, and also the stories where this would help and the stories where this would be an investment in our children—for example, those who are homeless, according to the report released today. Denying this payment is absolutely going to add to the hardship that too many are already feeling. For example, the economy and the state of employment at the moment are up and down. They are tumultuous, so people have needed to move in and out of employment for so many valid reasons.

I know that in my own past, as a mother of young children in full-time, paid employment, it was validly difficult trying to uphold that in light of huge costs. I had to keep trying to find a job that would enable me to work but would also properly cover my basic living costs. So that is a very real situation that many people face. You know, that is the nature of our current employment market. It is precarious.

Again, I would like to support what Poto Williams has said. I also wanted to talk about our seasonal workers. Often the nature of their work is unstable. They are often in and out of these employment situations, and this has undoubtedly hit them hard. Those stand-down periods have undoubtedly hit them hard.

My last point is that I also stand—again, despite what some members would like to ignore—to acknowledge the disproportional effect that this will have on Māori, Pacific, and migrant communities. I am asking for written responses to see whether we can also get a handle on how many children this payment would benefit. We are opposed to this bill. Thank you.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): The Hon Ruth Dyson—5 minutes.

Hon RUTH DYSON (Labour—Port Hills): I just want to commend Marama Davidson, the member who has just resumed her seat, for her contribution to this debate. I say to the member Darroch Ball from New Zealand First, who spoke before her, that I think he should have listened to her contribution and figured out that, actually, the law as written in 1998 did not make it clear that the way it was operationalised after that was, in fact, the intent of the law. Nothing in the Hansard records would lead one to assume that that was the case. But I do not think that there was a deliberate attempt, either by the Minister at the time—who was the Minister in 1998?

Carmel Sepuloni: I’m trying to find out.

Hon RUTH DYSON: OK. I cannot recall who the social welfare Minister was in 1998, but I do not think the Minister at the time or the current Minister for Social Development or the department have made a deliberate decision to underpay beneficiaries—to start people getting their benefit a day later than they were intended to.

This is an error. This is legislation interpreted 18 years later in a different way than it has been implemented. So that is not the challenge for this House to debate. In my view, the challenge for us is to say: how should we fix what has been determined through the appeal process to be a misinterpretation of the law? So, of course, you have to say that either we are going to change our operation, or we are going to change the law. The Minister has decided to have a bob each way, and that is where I disagree with her.

I think that it is fair enough for her to take a call as the Minister and say “Well, we’ll start the payment the day after the stand down ends, as we will do as we have been doing.”, or “We will start it as the original law intended. We will leave the law as it is and start it on the last day of the stand down.”—that is the difference. That is where the 1 day comes from. But to then say “We’re going to change the law to the way it has been interpreted”—that is, leaving all those beneficiaries with a day less of their payment than they would have had if it had been interpreted in the way that it was intended—“to retrospectively take that off them.” is unfair. It is saying “We interpreted the law wrongly for 18 years. We found out 15 months ago that we were doing it wrong, but we are going to retrospectively take that entitlement off”—how many people? We do not know. It could be thousands. It could be hundreds.

The Minister, Anne Tolley, sort of dismissed it in a radio interview that I heard. She said: “Oh, it’s only a day, so it won’t be very many.” Well, actually, over 18 years it could be quite a lot. If teacher-aides, for example, are employed term by term, they may be on a stand down four times in 1 year, and over 18 years that is quite a few days’ payment they would be entitled to. But the Minister has said: “Oh, we’ve got to balance changing the law with financial responsibility.” Well, I say, actually, our job is to comply with the law or to change it, but not to change it retrospectively to suit—what? The Budget? Convenience?

People were left out of their legal entitlement because of a misinterpretation, and I do not think they should have that 1 day’s pay from their benefit taken off them by a retrospective law change. So that is where I strongly disagree with the determination that the Minister has come down on. Retrospectively taking away an entitlement is bad law. It is unfair, it is wrong, and I would not want my name to be marking alongside it. I do not understand, if it is as few people as the Minister has said, why she is happy to go along with it.

So I think we should stick to the facts of this case. The idea that some have raised that there might be worthy beneficiaries and not-so-worthy beneficiaries—I do not agree with that at all. I think that is a disgraceful slide into value judgments, which is not appropriate for this Parliament.

The idea that Parliament should fix a misunderstanding only from the day that it discovered it is just plain nonsense. The courts would never do that. The courts would never say: “This is our determination and from now on you will interpret it.” The courts operate in a way of interpreting our law from the time that a law has passed. That is the standard that is set by our judicial system, and I think it is a standard that this Parliament should follow.

Dr PARMJEET PARMAR (National): Thank you for the opportunity to speak on the first reading of the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill. The matter being dealt with in this bill under urgency is a very urgent matter because there are a number of people who go on benefit each day, and it is dealing with that number of people. This bill is to clarify the Social Security Act about the commencement of benefits, and to ensure that the Government’s policy intent is upheld.

This Government is committed to our welfare reforms. We know hundreds of people are getting off benefit every day because they are getting into jobs. When people go on benefit there is a stand-down period. The current practice—when I say “current practice”, the practice I am referring to is the one that started in June 1998 and ran until 29 September 2015, because from 29 September 2015 we have changed the practice to reflect what is in the legislation. The current practice has been what the intention of the legislation was, which is to start the benefit after the stand-down period finishes—that is, the next day after the stand-down period finishes.

So the current practice is in line with the intention of the legislation, but if I look at the legislation it says that Work and Income people should start benefits from the last day of the stand-down period. So there is a big discrepancy in the legislation and the intention of the policy, and it is important that the legislation reflects the intention of the policy. It is a great bill. I support this bill and commend it to the House.

IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North): I enjoyed that speech from the member Parmjeet Parmar. The senior Government whip, Tim Macindoe, was staring at her throughout, I think encouraging her to take her seat. I guess now that the member does not have taxpayers’ money available to her to promote herself as a possible candidate in an upcoming by-election she is having to do it the old-fashioned way, by using her time in the House to try to raise her profile in the event that she should find herself the National Party candidate in any upcoming by-election.

The member also said that this is an urgent matter for the Government, I guess as some way of trying to convince the House that this bill actually belongs in the urgency motion. Well, if it was such an urgent matter for the Government it would have dealt with it somewhere between May 2014 and today. More than a year and a half since the Government realised that it had been breaking the law, it is finally getting around, under urgency, to dealing with it—a year and a half after it realised it was breaking the law.

I have heard members opposite say: “Oh, this is just technical. It’s not such a big deal.” The last time I checked, being ignorant of the law was not a defence for breaking the law. But even when the Government became aware of the fact that it was breaking the law, it continued to break the law until it became public. So the test for this Government was not “Are we doing the right thing? Are we adhering to the rule of law?”; the test was: “Will this look bad for us on the front page of the Dominion Post?” When it started to look bad for it on the front page of the newspaper and on the 6 o’clock news, only then did this Government decide that it was probably about time to start doing something about it. I think that goes to the motivation of this Government. If it can get away with it, it will break the law. Only when it becomes politically dodgy for it, is it actually prepared to do something about it.

I actually do not think this is just a trivial matter, because it actually helps us to understand the standards to which the Government holds itself. We have heard about the housing Minister’s office encouraging Housing New Zealand officials to involve Parmjeet Parmar—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Order! This is not in the bill.

IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY: —in a roadshow, because she wanted to raise her profile—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Order! Come back to the bill.

IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY: —and we have heard about a range of other matters that actually question the standards of this Government. I think the fact that it has brought this legislation under urgency more than a year and a half after it discovered it was breaking the law is just another example of the shoddy standards of this John Key - led Government.

The other thing I have heard, about why this is just a trivial matter, is that for the people involved it is not a lot of money—it is just 1 day on the benefit. There are probably not many people involved, although the Government cannot tell us how many people are involved. It cannot tell us what the cost of compensating everybody who has been affected by this breach of the law by the Government would be. I do not even think the Government has told us what the cost of the opportunity to seek compensation that it is offering will be. There is very little information for the House from this Government.

But I want to challenge the notion—and other members have done this as well—that this is a small matter for everybody affected by this, because there are a number of people, and it is a growing number of people, who move in and out of work on a regular basis. They are people who are in temporary work like seasonal work, like fixed-term contracts, and like casual work and people who get their work through temping agencies or labour-hire companies. For a lot of people these days, they are moving in and out of work. Every time the work that they have comes to an end—whether it be because it is a fixed-term contract, whether it be because it is seasonal work, whether it is casual work that has come to an end—they then have to go through this stand-down period.

The example that has been used a number of times, particularly, is of classroom support people. They have a number of fixed terms every year because they are actually employed only during the school term. For those people, they are having to go through this stand-down period four or maybe five times a year. That is 4 or 5 days every year for many of them. We are talking about an 18-year period here, over which maybe four or five times a year an individual may have been denied a day of benefit that they were entitled to under the law. So for some people—and I appreciate that it is probably not an enormous number of people—this is more than just trivial. Just because it is a small number of people—possibly; we do not actually know, because the Government cannot tell us any figures. Just because they are not people who are a priority to the National Government does not mean that it is not very real for those people, and it does not mean that we as a Parliament should not address that for them and compensate them for it. I think it is more than just trivial.

Actually, I think it raises the issue of just how relevant and appropriate this stand-down period, as it is applied today, actually is in the 21st century, because the number of people who are engaged in this type of temporary work is growing, and growing at a dramatic pace. Overall, in the New Zealand employment market, around 10.5 percent of workers fall into one of those categories of temporary workers—around 10.5 percent. OK, so that is a significant number of people, but only one-tenth of the overall employment market. However, for the jobs that were created between 2008 and 2012, a full 28 percent of those jobs—28,600 people—are actually in that form of temporary work. In recent years the overall proportion of people in these temporary work situations has grown significantly, and that is a trend that shows absolutely no sign of abating at all.

This issue of the stand-down period is actually one of those issues that falls into that suite of issues that we on this side of the House are talking about as part of our Future of Work Commission, because the nature of work is changing. This is maybe a 19th century, but probably not—very much a 20th century policy, when overall the vast majority of people were in stable work with a set number of hours a week, had long-term prospects of staying in the same job, and were not moving in and out of employment on a regular basis. That is, sadly, becoming a thing of the past. The fact that it is becoming a thing of the past is not something that we should resign ourselves to, and we as parliamentarians should be looking at how we provide employment security and income security for people. But we have to acknowledge that the nature of work is changing, and this policy of putting people through a stand-down period, especially those people who are on fixed-term contracts and especially those people who, by the very nature of their work, are required to go through a stand-down period a number of times a year—I think it is a well-overdue time for us to reflect on that policy and actually ask ourselves as a Parliament whether that is an appropriate policy in the 21st century.

In a lot of ways, I think, this change is perhaps not the change we should be debating. We should actually be debating the question of how the stand-down period actually operates and whether it is appropriate. On this side of the House we do not see this as a trivial matter and we will not trivialise it in the way that members opposite have. This is significant, and for the people who have been affected by it, it is significant. We actually need to acknowledge that and treat this as a serious issue and try to actually get it right, because some people have been severely affected—

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

STUART SMITH (National—Kaikōura): We do not take this as a trivial matter at all on this side of the House. I think the reason we are debating this bill today is that the policy intent back in 1998 was very, very clear, and due to drafting errors or poor wording we have ended up with the legislation not matching that policy intent. That needs to be addressed for many reasons, but not the least being a fiscal one. Although there has been a little bit of politics from the Labour Party in this particular debate, I think the contributions from the Green members underline for those who were in any doubt that they certainly are not ready for the Treasury benches. It would be, certainly, a cruel and unusual punishment should they ever get the opportunity to be unleashed on us in that area.

This is a very timely bill. It is very good to get it done at this point. It absolutely nails the problem that we have of getting the legislation lined up with the policy intent. I commend it to the House. Thank you.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill be now read a first time.

Ayes 75

New Zealand National 59; New Zealand First 12; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Noes 46

New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14.

Bill read a first time.

Second Reading

Hon ANNE TOLLEY (Minister for Social Development): I move, That the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill be now read a second time. I want to reiterate the Government’s consistent and longstanding position on benefits and stand-down periods. The current stand down provisions in section 80BA of the Social Security Act first came into force in 1997. These provisions were based on the policy agreed in 1996 that benefits commence on the day after a stand-down period ends. This policy has never changed. The legislative error created on 3 June 1998 is a technical mistake, not a policy change. However, the result is that it provides for people to have an additional day of benefit payment that they were never intended to have. So the legislation needs to be changed to avoid unintended Crown costs, but, in effect, that is costs to the taxpayer.

We need to avoid unintended costs to the taxpayer, but we are attempting to do this in a fair way. There are three separate provisions protecting people who have been able to receive this additional day or who want to lodge a review to receive it. This is a very reasonable compromise that provides a balance between clients’ interests and the financial costs of the error.

I would like to take the opportunity to outline to the House the process that clients can now expect if this legislation comes into effect. Clients who have already lodged a review request—and I understand there are between 8,000 and 10,000 of those to date—will continue to have it processed in the normal way. These reviews can relate to a benefit granted back to 1998, when the legislation was amended. Those who have been granted a benefit after a stand down since the operational practice changed on 29 September 2015 will also be protected by this bill. This bill will also enable people who have been granted a benefit since the Ministry for Social Development was made aware of the error to seek a review. These reviews, if my Supplementary Order Paper—Supplementary Order Paper 141, tabled in the House today—is passed by the House, must be lodged by 8 January, giving people 7 weeks to do so. Review forms are currently available online and at all Work and Income sites. They can be posted, they can be faxed, or they can be emailed. In addition to this, the Ministry for Social Development has created an online form that can be submitted electronically, and this will be available once the legislation has passed.

I want to make it clear that these protection provisions are a measure of the Government’s good faith. They do not negate the original policy intent that a benefit should commence on a day after a stand down finish period ends. As I said earlier, those seeking a review will have 7 weeks to submit their request for review, and I think that this strikes a balance between what is fair to them and what is fair to the taxpayer. I commend this bill to the House.

CARMEL SEPULONI (Labour—Kelston): I want to reiterate some of what I said in my first speech and then also just elaborate a little bit more on that. We have concerns about this bill because of the fact that it takes away the rights of those who would have been eligible for an additional day paid out of their benefit from 1998 to May 2014. The Government, in terms of the Supplementary Order Paper that the Minister was just talking about, is trying to make allowances so that those who would have been eligible between May 2014 and September 2015—so that there is a window of time for them to actually put in a claim, but she is ignoring everyone from before 20 May 2014.

I can understand the Government’s immediate concern with that group that it is accounting for in the Minister’s Supplementary Order Paper. I guess there is a sense of urgency there for the Government and probably some legal obligations and possibly legal ramifications if it does not do it. That is pointed out in the departmental disclosure statement where it is made very clear in section 4.9, where any other unusual provisions or features are discussed, and it states: “To acknowledge that the Ministry of Social Development’s operational practice should have been amended when the error was discovered on 20 May 2014, clients whose benefits were commenced on or after 20 May 2014 may apply for a review of decision of that commencement date in the 6 weeks after the legislative correction is made and the retrospective amendment will not apply to their decisions.”

So legally the Government should have done something immediately, but it did not. And today we have heard National Government members stand up and say that there is a sense of urgency in respect of introducing this bill, when there actually should have been a sense of urgency on 20 May 2014 when this error was discovered.

So many members across the House have said that this is really just correcting a technical error in that the intent of the bill is being corrected and that that was always there. But actually none of us were there at that select committee. None of us, or very few of us in this House, were in Government at the time that the bill was going through, so I find it really interesting that so many new members of Parliament—as new as me or even newer—are saying that the intent of the bill was clear. It would be interesting during the Committee stage to hear from the two members who are still in the House who, I believe, were on the Social Services Committee at the time in 1998, when this bill was passed, and they are Gerry Brownlee, who was deputy chair then, and Annette King. We are looking forward to her contribution at the Committee stage.

Chris Bishop: We all are.

CARMEL SEPULONI: She is holding herself back. She really wanted to speak in the second reading, but we have allowed Poto and Iain Lees-Galloway to take the next two speeches, and Annette will make a contribution in the Committee stage.

Chris Bishop: What about Ruth?

CARMEL SEPULONI: Ruth was not on the select committee at that time. So that is our concern, that those people are being denied the right to make a claim, but also there are issues with this particular bill. We are disappointed that there is no regulatory impact statement for this bill.

The Government’s secrecy around the retrospective removal of natural justice for those who are owed arrears between 1998 and 2014 is highlighted in the lack of a regulatory impact statement to accompany the bill. I know that there are situations where a regulatory impact statement is not required, but given that even from the outside, even for a person who is not necessarily that actively involved in politics, there is a huge impact to this bill you would think that the Government would do the responsible thing and provide us with a regulatory impact statement. The impact really is that this bill will ignore the thousands of people who had stand-down periods between 1998 and 2014 and were denied at least 1 day’s pay, and for those who were in and out of work, they were denied multiple days of pay. So it is disappointing that there is not a regulatory impact statement.

We have heard from the Minister about the fact that there was some attempt to negotiate around this. I want to acknowledge, if I have not done already in the House, that this error—yes, it may have occurred when the legislation was drafted back in 1998, but the technical error continued under both National and Labour Governments. So, of course, out of good faith we did contact the Government to see whether or not we could work on this together to come up with a solution. A couple of the things that the Government did do were good; I will not deny it that. It took this out of the Social Security (Extension of Young Persons Services and Remedial Matters) Amendment Bill and has done it separately. That needed to be done. The Government has also made sure that there is a window of opportunity for anyone who was affected by this during the time that the Government was aware of it, so from May 2014 to September 2015. That is a good thing.

The only thing that we are concerned about, as I said earlier, is the number of people, particularly those people who would have been in and out of work, who stand to lose something from not being able to make a claim. The only thing we are concerned about is that the Government is still not providing an opportunity to do that. The easy solution is Supplementary Order Paper 142 that I have put up, which delays the commencement date of the bill. It provides an opportunity for those people to be informed, to get their papers in, and to make a claim. It is only a 6-week delay that that Supplementary Order Paper is asking for, but 6 weeks is enough time for people like Kay Brereton, who has been amazing throughout this whole process—beneficiary advocates like Kay—to get the word around so that anyone who wants to make a claim is able to do so. I just want to reiterate that the chances are most people will not be bothered doing it, but it is about natural justice and it is about making sure that they are at least given the opportunity to do so.

I just want to perhaps touch on another couple of things in here—actually, no, I think I have covered everything off. I know that the Greens have put up a Supplementary Order Paper to delay the commencement date as well. Theirs is for 6 months, ours is for 6 weeks, but the intention is the same. It is to provide that window of opportunity for people to make an application and put forward a claim. I think the Greens have also got a Supplementary Order Paper that requires that the Government actually promotes or advertises it, so that people are made aware of their rights and their right to make a claim during a fair process.

I am looking to see what the Government does. I am disappointed in New Zealand First, but we will talk to some of the other members—apart from Darroch Ball—at a later stage today. Thank you very much.

ALFRED NGARO (National): We are not disappointed in Darroch Ball. I think he is a wise young man, who comes from Liston College out in the west. I actually visited Liston College not so long ago and saw the principal there, who said that they are proud that one of their old boys has become a member of Parliament, so I think they are very proud of Darroch Ball. We are proud that he is a member of the Social Services Committee and makes a great contribution to the committee as well.

Just in regard to the second reading of the bill, I think there has been a lot said about the bill. It is a technical piece of legislation that is correcting something that goes back to 1998. I will keep saying that again, because it has been some time since then. So I do not want to go over that, as I have sort of laid it out in my first speech, but I just want to talk about the issue around financial cost.

Before I do that, there was a comment by the previous speaker, Ms Carmel Sepuloni, around the regulatory impact statement. It was a good point. She asked why it is that we do not have a regulatory impact statement. In actual fact, what has happened is that this piece of legislation has come out of the current piece of legislation that is before the Social Services Committee called the Social Security (Extension of Young Persons Services and Remedial Matters) Amendment Bill. It is inside that bill that there is a regulatory impact statement, which has the issues that have been detailed. So just to answer the question about a regulatory impact statement, that is the purpose and that is the reason why it is in there.

Hon Ruth Dyson: What does it say? What does it say, Alfred?

ALFRED NGARO: So it is in there—I do not have that in front of me right now, OK, but we can get that. I am sure that throughout the night there will be opportunities to talk about the points that I want to raise in regard to the regulatory impact statement on this current bill.

I just want to touch on a couple of things that have been raised that I think are important in regard to the financial costs. Officials have estimated the total cost of backdated payments to be in the region of $3.5 million for clients whose benefits commenced on or after 20 May 2014 who lodge a review in the 6-week period after the legislative change. That may rise—we are not sure—but that is what is currently before us at the moment.

Until the legislative change takes effect the ministry will begin paying benefits consistent with current legislation. This will increase benefit expenditure. The effect of this change to current operating practice has been estimated at around about $0.4 million. So I think there was a question that was asked in some of the speeches about understanding what those costs could be. On that last point around financial cost, to put this in perspective, we reduced the expected costs of supporting current beneficiaries over their lifetime by $7.5 billion last year. That has become part of the overall package that this Government has made to provide support to those who are on benefits as well.

That is my sort of brief contribution at this stage. I look forward to the Committee stage and some of the other discussions and debates there may be, but I do commend this bill in its second reading to the House.

POTO WILLIAMS (Labour—Christchurch East): Firstly, I just want to make a comment on something that the previous speaker, Alfred Ngaro, mentioned. They have included the technical correction of this error as a way of saying that the Government is actually doing things for beneficiaries. I find that totally bizarre, actually. It should be doing this. This is an error that needs correcting. You should not be crowing, Mr Ngaro, that this is part of the Government’s programme to support beneficiaries; this should have been done in the first place, actually. They are completely owed what this bill intends to do.

Hon Anne Tolley: Nine years of Labour didn’t pay it back, either. Nine years of a Labour Government didn’t pay it back.

POTO WILLIAMS: Minister, must I remind you that 1998 was the date of the error. There have been many Governments since then.

David Shearer: Seven long years.

POTO WILLIAMS: Absolutely—absolutely. So let us not quibble about which Government is responsible. We know that the National Government likes to blame everything on Labour, because it takes no responsibility itself—it takes no responsibility itself. Hey, we have got broad shoulders. We are taking responsibility. When we come to the Committee stage, I want the Government MPs to take responsibility and take some calls, which they did not do on the other bill that went through today under urgency. So let us see. We will see what happens. We know that the Government has forced us into urgency on three bills, but its members are not even prepared to stand up in the Committee stage and take calls to defend the Government’s position. It has gone quiet over there. Thank you—thank you for that. I will continue with my second reading speech, thank you very much.

We all know that this bill has come out of a need and a desire to correct a technical error, but I want to ask a question, and during the Committee stage, I hope, Minister, that you will answer it. Why was this bill actually part of the Social—now, what was the name of that bill, Carmel?

Hon Ruth Dyson: Extension of Young Persons Services.

POTO WILLIAMS: The Social Security (Extension of Young Persons Services and Remedial Matters) Amendment Bill—thank you. Why was this—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! I will just remind the member to address other members properly.

POTO WILLIAMS: Thank you. Ms Sepuloni—thank you very much. Why was this bill part of that piece of legislation? Why was that?

I think it is amazing, and it is great that that significant piece of work was actually taken out of the original bill so that we can actually discuss this properly. It should not have been part of that bill. Was it actually an attempt to cover up the fact that this error had come to light—and not come to light in recent times, but, actually, a year and a half ago? It was a long time ago that this error came to light, but the Government sat on it. It sat on it until November 2015 in order to actually force the bill through under urgency. Then we get to the point where people have got until 8 January to apply for a review—7 weeks. We all know that if people are looking to apply for a review, we have got a couple of weeks of closure at our Government offices; so, technically, that is going to cut a couple of weeks from their ability to get their applications in for the review process.

Why is this happening now? What is so urgent about doing this right now? According to Mr Ngaro, the cost of this is $3.5 million. Is that going to change if we pass this piece of legislation today or if we pass it at the beginning of next year? I say: not significantly. So what is the hurry to get this bill through under urgency? Is this an excuse to hold us in the House to pass this piece of legislation—and the one before and the one following? No one has really justified this to us, as yet. I would be really interested to hear your comments on that, Minister, when we come to the Committee stage—if you would take a call on that.

I really recommend supporting the extension of the commencement date of this bill, which will give people adequate time to find out whether they are able to apply and to then put in an application for review. The Greens are advertising the fact. I think that is a great idea. It shows real openness and transparency. It could do, on the Government’s part, to actually capture those people who need to look at whether they want to respond. Indeed, Carmel Sepuloni did say that the people she has spoken to probably will not—that they will not be bothered by it. But at least it gives them the opportunity to do that. When we come to the Committee stage, I will be really interested to get some answers from the Minister about why she will not be looking at an advertising programme and at an extension of the commencement date, which actually makes a lot of sense, and whether the ministry has done any work on how many people have actually been captured by this, going back to 1998—and not just Labour Governments but National Governments as well. I know that we will have plenty of opportunity to traverse this through the Committee of the whole House, and I look forward to doing so. Thank you.

TODD MULLER (National—Bay of Plenty): I rise this afternoon to support the second reading of our bill, the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill. I would like to start by making a few comments about responsibility. I found it very interesting listening to the previous member lecture us in respect of responsibility. I think it is the height of responsibility, actually, to put this bill in place, as we have this afternoon.

The bill corrects this technical error, with full retrospective effect back to 3 June. It is the height of responsibility and fairness to have included in that bill an acknowledgment that those who have lodged a review of decisions relating to a benefit commencement on or after the 1998 amendment can still have their review processes seen to in the normal manner. It is an extremely responsible and fair bill and Government that acknowledges and puts in, under Supplementary Order Paper 141, a 7-week review period where clients have benefits that commenced after the Social Security Appeal Authority decision of May last year. But, in my view, it is completely irresponsible to be holding the view that because of this technical error, every benefit commencement going back to 1998 should be included. It is irresponsible from a logic perspective, and it is irresponsible from a taxpayer perspective.

Also, I do go back to the core view that I have in this debate. It relates to the Government in 1998, successive Governments since, and the Ministry of Social Development and its predecessors from 1998 through to today all holding the view that a stand-down period, particularly when applied to a particular week—it was at the end of those 7 days that you were stood down, and then on the eighth day it began. Everybody was under that assumption. Those who made the law, those who were administering the law, and every one of the Ministry of Social Development’s clients who came to the door were equally under that assumption. So everyone assumed that that was what the rules were, until, of course, this particular Social Security Appeal Authority decision from last year.

This is a responsible Government, which has put together a comprehensive bill that reflects the policy intent, ensures that it is retrospectively validated, and then has, in my view, very fair and natural justice for those who are caught up in this process to have their interests looked at and protected. It is a good bill. I look forward to future debate and discussion. I commend the second reading to the House. Thank you.

JAN LOGIE (Green): I would like to talk in some detail about the use of urgency for the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill, but, before I do, I do need to address some of the points raised by the previous speaker, Todd Muller. He said that this bill is the height of responsibility and fairness. This bill seeks to retrospectively remove the legal entitlement of some of the poorest New Zealanders, all for the purpose of saving this Government money. That, I think, goes to the point that we are hearing consistently from that side of the House, that financial responsibility means that the Government has to bring this bill to the House. Any money that would go to those people—it would obviously be irresponsible for the Government to hand out money to people. The intent of this bill is that it was always clear that it was supposed to be “the day after”, even though section 80BA(4)(a)(i) of the Social Security Act reads “the day on which the stand down period ends;”. I do not know how that can lead people to think it is the day after. You read the words, that benefits commence “on the day on which the stand down period ends;”, and suddenly you interpret that as the day after, which is what this Government has been doing. The Government does not seem to understand the rule of law. The Government is telling us, despite how the courts have interpreted this, based on the debates and from reading this legislation stating “the day on which”, that actually the intent was always clear that it was the day after. That really does stretch the Government’s credibility; it really, really does stretch credibility.

I would like to speak a little bit more too, specifically because this is the second reading and this is the time when we normally would have been through a select committee process. This Government, through a previous speaker, has told us that, well, we have been through a select committee process because there was a provision in another bill, which related to the extension of youth services and was entitled the Social Security (Extension of Young Persons Services and Remedial Matters) Amendment Bill, that sought to retrospectively deny those people their rights. It looked nothing like this piece of legislation, might I say, but there was a provision in that bill that covered this, so therefore—we were told—we have been through the process. Well, I do want to point out to people that there was one submission that picked up this point. I cannot even talk about what we were told from the departmental advisers because that is business that is still in front of the Social Services Committee, so I would be breaching privilege if I spoke about the advice that we were given in relation to that point in this bill. This, I think, raises some significant process issues in that we are now debating a bill and the Government is telling us that that process applies to this and means we can go through this under urgency, but I cannot talk about the detail of it because it is still under select committee privilege. That is worrying. That is not a good process at all.

I would like to remind people to think about the appropriate use of urgency. There was a book published on this a few years ago, called What’s the Hurry?, which talked about the 10 guiding principles for the use of urgency, for this House to consider. Point No. 1 is “Legislatures should allow time and opportunity for informed and open policy deliberation”. That has not happened. Point No. 2 is “The legislative process should allow sufficient time and opportunity for the adequate scrutiny of bills”. Days? No. That is not adequate time. That condition has not been met. Point No. 3 is “Citizens should be able to participate in the legislative process”. Again, that has not happened. Point No. 4 is “Parliament should operate in a transparent manner”. Well, putting a provision inside another bill, on a very substantive point, hidden as a remedial matter, which the Government was hoping nobody would pick up? That is not transparency. Moving this bill through under urgency, without the ability for public participation—that is not transparency. Refusing to implement the court’s decision and bringing this through, under this process, is not transparency and does not uphold the rule of law.

The next point is point No. 5: “The House should strive to produce high quality legislation”. How can we produce high-quality legislation when we are rushing it through? Point No. 6 is “Legislation should not jeopardise fundamental constitutional rights and principles”. One of those is around the rule of law and non-retrospective legislation, and here we are putting through, under urgency, retrospective legislation that undermines the rule of law. Point No. 7 is “Parliaments should follow stable procedural rules”.

Point No. 8 is “Parliament should foster, not erode, respect for itself as an institution”—and that, to me, goes to the very, very heart of what is wrong with this piece of legislation. When we have over a million people who did not vote, where we have people not going to Work and Income because they find that experience so alienating that they are living in cars because they do not want to deal with it, and here the people’s benefits get cut by 100 percent or 50 percent if they miss a bus and miss an appointment. Here the Government is making a very, very fundamental misinterpretation of the law, which reads to me so clearly. It is saying “Yes, we made a mistake, and we’re just going to fix that up and deny all of you your rights over the last 18 years.”; not “OK, we made a mistake. We’re going to fix this for the future.” That would have been credible. We would have supported that, if you had brought that case. But, no, you are doing it retrospectively, and it is so out of balance with those people’s experience of how you—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order!

JAN LOGIE: Not you, Mr Assistant Speaker—how the Government implements this system. It is so out of balance and such a misuse of power that it undermines the respect for Parliament as an institution. The ninth point is that “The Government has a right to govern, so long as it commands a majority …”, but the respect for this principle has to be balanced against all of the other points, which we have clearly seen are not met by this legislation. Point No. 10 is “Parliament should be able to enact legislation quickly in”—it says—“(actual) emergency situations”. Well, tell me where the emergency is, beyond the fact that people are putting in claims to get back an average of $80 from the Government to be able to put some food on their table before Christmas, to access a right that the courts have established very clearly and well over a year ago that they are entitled to—where is the emergency in that? This is a shameful use of the House and the process, and a misuse of power by this Government.

I would like, in this very short period of time remaining to me, to point out some of the issues that people have been raising that I have been able to see, even though we have not had a select committee process, sadly. One person’s comment was: “If only someone had told Greece that dealing with debt was as simple as passing a law saying they don’t have to pay.” People are seeing this. People who do not have much resource, who have a fragile relationship with the State, are watching this, and their confidence is being eroded. People have talked about the fact—I have seen—that they would like to apply, but actually their situation at the moment is that they would have to print out the forms, sign them, get down to a Work and Income office, and they do not have a printer. They do not have access in terms of filling in the forms on email, to be able to scan and sign them, and they cannot get down there. Here are people who are being told or they have just found out that they have got this legal entitlement, and they want to access it, and they are going “I don’t know how to do this.” They basically will have too short a period of time because of where this cuts off, unless, of course, it was after May 2014, and those people will have a few weeks, until 8 January—over a holiday period, over an incredibly stressful time of the year. People with other languages may not find out—the Government has made no commitment to notify anyone to let them know of their rights. We are also hearing from people that they are actually not in a position to be able to access the technology to be able to apply. Really we need to go back to the point that these are stand downs, which is a debatable point and has been for a long time in this House, because it impacts on people’s ability to provide shelter and feed themselves.

Hon RUTH DYSON (Labour—Port Hills): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. During Jan Logie’s contribution she made the point that the advice to the Social Services Committee is, obviously, still with the select committee, and cannot be part of the contribution of the House because the bill is before the select committee. This legislation that we are debating now has been removed at the select committee from that bill, the Social Security (Extension of Young Persons Services and Remedial Matters) Amendment Bill. So the primary bill remains with the select committee. We have got a bit of it here, but we are not able to access the officials’ advice. It is not a usual situation, and I wonder whether you could give that consideration and some contribution on whether we would be able to get, particularly in the Committee stage, access to that officials’ advice—just on the part that is relevant to this bill, because that bit is no longer before the select committee; the rest of the bill is.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): I was listening to Jan Logie’s comments, and she was, I think, accurate in her summation of the situation, notwithstanding the fact that the chair of the Social Services Committee, Alfred Ngaro, has assured us that this bill is substantially the same, in its effect, as part of the bill currently being considered by the committee, and in fact he referred to the regulatory impact statement, and referred members to that, which is available. I am advised that the advice, because it is still with the committee, is not available to this House for continued debate. I think that is a matter that at some stage it would be appropriate for the Standing Orders Committee to have a look at.

The other point that I would make is that in the end the House is the master of its own destiny, and if a member, especially the chair of the select committee, thought that there was useful advice available on the effect of this legislation from departmental officials, then it would be within his right to seek the leave of the House, notwithstanding the particular Standing Orders and Speakers’ rulings, for that material—just that material—to be made available, and I would put it if he did so.

Hon ANNETTE KING (Deputy Leader—Labour): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I wonder, having heard your ruling, whether you could give some advice, because we are told in the departmental disclosure statement that there is no regulatory impact statement available, and then we have a regulatory impact statement called Extension of the Youth Service dated February 2015. Is it possible to direct us, because we cannot find it in this regulatory impact statement. Either, one, there is not one, or we are told this is something, and we cannot find where this part of the bill is mentioned in here. So have we got a regulatory impact statement that relates to this part of the legislation or not?

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): I am sorry. I did rely on the assurance from the chair of the committee that the regulatory impact statement did cover this particular clause, and I apologise if I misinterpreted him. If the member is saying that it does not and the member said it did, that is a debatable matter, on which I am not going to rule.

Hon ANNETTE KING (Deputy Leader—Labour): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I draw your attention to the departmental disclosure statement. Where it says “Were any regulatory impact statements provided to inform the policy decisions that led to this Bill?”, the answer says “NO”. So could I ask you to ask the Government to clarify whether we have a regulatory impact statement on this bill or not.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): The answer to the member’s question is no. I am not going to ask the Government to do anything. It is a matter for it to do something, if it so wishes.

DARROCH BALL (NZ First): I would like to just make a few points in my second reading speech and reiterate a couple. The first is, the main reason why New Zealand First is supporting this bill is that it is a technical error in law and not a change in policy. I know that a couple of the parties in the House are arguing against that fact. In fact, we have heard a few arguments from the Labour Party and the Greens about why they are opposing this bill. There was an argument that there was a trust issue or about the way that the process has been conducted.

We have heard of emotive issues in regard to child poverty and poverty in general, and of beneficiaries bearing the brunt of those issues of poverty and why they deserve to have that money back-paid. We also heard an argument that there was actually no intent at all, or that the intent was not known, for the original bill and that the beneficiaries are actually owed 1 day’s worth—on average $80—of back-pay and that the Government is in debt to them. But, at best, this is actually a loophole in the law, because if you look at the intent of the original legislation—but not only the original legislation; if Labour wants to go through the Hansard and look for original comments on the original intent of the original legislation—we are talking about the way that the policy was implemented for the last 20-odd years.

Like I mentioned in my first reading speech, the intent was fulfilled by successive Governments. The 7 days of stand down was always the intent of the policy and, like I said in the first reading, if the legislative error that was written was written to the intent of the bill, the beneficiaries would have received the exact same amount as they did receive. If the tables were turned and the intent of the bill was that they were supposed to get that extra day but the law was written differently, that would mean that they were owed that extra day in pay, and then New Zealand First would be stating that and holding the Government to account. But this is a legislative drafting error; this is not a change in policy. That is why New Zealand First is supporting this bill.

The other reason too, apart from the intent of the original bill, is the actual intent of the stand-down period. I know that it has been brought up and there are some issues with the concept of a stand-down period, but the fact is that the stand-down period is there, it is in law, and it is being implemented. I went to have a look at the Social Security Act 1964 to actually have a look at the stand-down period and why there was a stand-down period and the justification for the stand-down period. It says in section 80BA(2): “Every benefit to which this section applies shall be subject to a stand down period calculated in accordance with Schedule 28.” I went and had a look at schedule 28 and basically it takes into account and calculates and assesses the average wage or income for the individual. It takes into account the living conditions of the beneficiaries in regard to whether they have got children, whether they are a solo parent—and all other issues like that: income, marital status, and children. So when the beneficiaries went in to apply for their benefit from 1998—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! Excuse me. Can I get the member standing over there to crouch down. Thank you.

DARROCH BALL: —until May their needs were assessed. So their needs for which benefit they needed and how much they were going to get, which included their living status and included how long they needed to be on stand down, were assessed.

Like I said and like the Minister has said and other members have said, the intent of the stand down was for it to last for a full working week, so 7 days. It does not make sense that the benefit would start on the seventh day; it would occur on the eighth day. That was the intent and it has been happening through successive Governments. But New Zealand First does have an issue with the review period for the beneficiaries who applied for their benefit from May last year. If it is going through until January it has been extended to 7 weeks now. Obviously that includes the Christmas period—a busy period—and it would minimise the number of people who were actually able to go to apply in the first place. So I think that it is being a little bit disingenuous in extending it through the Christmas period.

Like I said in the first reading, there is the fact that we do not actually think there is a need for a review period because we believe, if it is a matter of principle, that when the Government actually knew that there was an issue with the legislation in May 2014 and it still did not implement that change, then every single person who got the benefit from that point should automatically be getting the back-pay that they are eligible for. You know, it was only May 2014. We have got the records. We have got the ability to do it digitally. We know exactly who is eligible for it and it can be done very quickly. We should not be expecting beneficiaries to have to go into their offices or go online and apply for this back-pay. We believe that it should be automatic from May onwards. That is where I will leave it at the moment. I will look forward to the Committee stage, but at this stage New Zealand First will continue to support this bill.

JONO NAYLOR (National): I just want to limit my contribution on this particular occasion to addressing a couple of things that were raised by the previous Green member. There were a couple of accusations in there levelled towards the Government that were pretty much unfounded, and I think need to not go unchallenged.

There was the way the bill was talked about in terms of the Government trying to save money. I think that is the role of the Government to a certain degree, is it not? The only money that the Government actually has control of is, in fact, the money that it has received from the taxpayers of New Zealand. Sometimes they are not necessarily that willing to part with that money, and so it is beholden on us to ensure that we look after it in the most prudent possible way. [Interruption]

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! I will just ask the member to sit. Could I also ask the junior Opposition whip not to interject as she walks along. Thank you.

JONO NAYLOR: Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker. As I was saying, I think it is really important for us to actually act in a prudent way on behalf of the taxpayers of New Zealand.

The other point that was made was that originally this legislation was somehow buried in another piece of legislation, and was just being referred to as “remedial matters”. Well, if there ever was anything that was a remedial matter, this matter is absolutely it. What we are trying to do is remedy something that was done—as the previous speaker from New Zealand First, Darroch Ball, said—in a legislative drafting error. We are just wanting to remedy that, get it tidied up, and get it sorted out. It is really important for us to get this legislation through, to get things back on track to the way that they were always intended to be, and that is why I think it is important that we do this under urgency and get it through in the best possible time.

MARAMA DAVIDSON (Green): Again—again—all that we know about intent is what was written in the law, and the law was very clear. I would like to pick up on the previous speaker’s reference to saving money, being prudent, and what is a fiscal risk to the taxpayer. I think we can just look at housing, for example. If we want to look at managing money and managing investment for good economic outcomes, we can look at how the Government has failed to invest in the needs of New Zealanders and families, and, in the long run, we actually end up paying through the nose for it—all of us taxpayers. I just wanted to make that point.

Again, I absolutely know that this is poor process—that we are here under urgency debating this piece of legislation without any consultation. It is those voices that I would like to take a moment to uphold at this stage of this lawmaking, and I would like to pick up, most certainly, on the point that my colleague Jan Logie referred to, about the Work and Income regiment—about their clients’ responsibility often being cutting; nearly every time, it is cutting. Just some months ago I sat in a room with a whole group of the Manukau community—job seekers who were talking about the barriers to finding suitable and meaningful employment, including, for example, transport, and about how, in south Auckland, the Work and Income regiment is made particularly hard with the lack of good, accessible, and affordable public transport. In those cases, as we have heard, missing any meetings has been cutting on those very people who are doing their darnedest to try to find work and to be contributing members of society—not just socially but also economically. This is absolutely the stage where we would have heard those stories from the people themselves who are going to be directly impacted by this very piece of legislation.

I think, at this stage, I will talk about the fact that I have been in this job for 2 weeks and already I can see how easy it would be for MPs to be very removed, and understandably so, from the realities that many ordinary New Zealanders face. As an MP, I am able to travel free of charge. I have an accommodation benefit so I can do my job. This has been 2 weeks of my life, and I absolutely agree that we need the tools to do our job, but the realities, in contrast with the very people this is going to impact on, are important, particularly at this second reading. I salute all of those people who have struggled and have done amazing things with a small amount of money, to do the best for their lives.

I have a quote here. Jan Logie wrote a blog recently about this issue—this bill—and a person underneath wrote: “The New Zealand Government, not matter who it is, has tried to get as much money back from beneficiaries as they can. No sole parent on a benefit gets to see their child support paid by the other parent. All beneficiaries pay secondary tax at approximately $20 for every $100 earned, yet they dock your pay based on your gross wages.” So it is those voices that I wanted to give my time and support to in this second reading. I reiterate that there is no urgency. There is no genuine case for urgency at this time. Thank you.

Hon RUTH DYSON (Labour—Port Hills): Can I just commend the comments that Marama Davidson just concluded her contribution to this debate with, particularly in relation to the fact that there is no urgency for this. We have heard that the Government found out about this misinterpretation between the way the legislation was written in 1998 and the way it was interpreted subsequently over 18 years. We heard that it discovered that disparity in May last year. How can it be possible that between May last year and November of this year there has not been an opportunity for this to be rectified? But wait—it has been. There is a bill before the select committee right at this very moment. This bill was included with that bill, and suddenly, for some reason—we have not had an explanation from the Minister or the Government members of the select committee—that part of the bill was taken out and put as a stand-alone bill.

I think that is a good thing, because it is an entirely separate issue from the ones that are dealt with under the Social Security (Extension of Young Persons Services and Remedial Matters) Amendment Bill. So it is good in terms of robust process that those bills are separated, but it is not acceptable for this bill to get rammed through the House, through all stages, under urgency, with lightweight contributions from members of the Government who are writing it off as a technical bill when clearly they do not understand it. The arrogance of first-year MPs is gobsmacking. It is just extraordinary—the number of MPs who have been here for 1 year and 5 minutes and who are so arrogant and born to rule—extraordinary.

This is not an issue on which any party needs to blame another party. Both National-led and Labour-led Governments have taken the operationalising of this as the correct interpretation of the law. We were wrong. Both sides were wrong. Nobody is blaming Anne Tolley. In fact, we have all commended Anne Tolley for engaging in the discussion with us about that. I do not know why the backbench of the National Party had to get up and throw rocks. It is not that sort of debate. Feel the vibe, Todd, feel the vibe. It is not that sort of debate.

Todd Barclay: I’m not even speaking.

Hon RUTH DYSON: I would say the surname if I could remember it, but I cannot. What is it? Barclay—Mr Barclay; I apologise. I apologise even more because I was going to call you Todd McClay but I knew that was wrong. This bill is about a misinterpretation. The challenge for Parliament is: how should it be fixed?

For 18 years we have been paying beneficiaries a day later to start their benefit than the law said. That has been determined now in a separate judicial process. Parliament needs to fix it. What the Minister has said is that the Government will accept that court determination but not right back to the beginning where it first started doing it incorrectly—just from the day it was told about it. That is an incorrect interpretation of the way the court has determined Parliament’s responsibility to not do anything but comply with the law. We either change it or we comply with it, but changing it retrospectively is not a correct process, particularly in this situation. So this is not a matter of blame. This is certainly not a matter of the current Minister or former Ministers wanting to cheat beneficiaries. It was just interpreted in a way that has now been determined as wrong.

So in our view people right back to the very start of this, from the day that it was first changed in 1998 right through until now, should be able to apply if they choose. We should give them a fair period of time, advertise it properly, make sure that everybody knows about it as much as possible—that is fair—and say: “If you had a stand-down provision when you applied for a benefit, you may have got your benefit a day later than you were legally entitled to. We—Parliament—have determined that you should get that day’s benefit paid to you.” How is that irresponsible? It is not. How is it anything but fair? It is not. It is the fair and proper thing to do as Parliament’s response to the determination that that Government received in May last year—that this issue has been misinterpreted.

I would really recommend the Government to relook at its response. I think this is an opportunity for us to get it right. We have a chance now over the next 6 or 7 hours as we debate this further, and I really urge the Government to just think again. We can get it right. It is a very small amount of money, but I think it is worth it.

Dr PARMJEET PARMAR (National): Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker, for the opportunity to speak on the second reading of the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill. I am taking a short call just to talk on one component of this bill, and that is the retrospective component. I see that members opposite have very short memories, and I am going to revive their memories. It was the previous Labour Government that amended the Immigration Act in 2003. That legislation was rushed through the House. That lapsed tens of thousands of applications that were in the queue for 2 to 3 years. The applications were in the queue for 2 to 3 years.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! Sorry; I was temporarily distracted, but I do want to remind the member that we are talking about the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill.

Dr PARMJEET PARMAR: Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker. I was just reminding the Opposition members that they have passed legislation that was retrospective. That legislation was surprise legislation, and it was labelled monstrous legislation.

If we look at this bill before the House, we can see it provides a fair opportunity to those who want to seek a review of the decision about the commencement date of their benefit, as long as they seek that review within the allowed time frame. Having this provision in the bill is not going to undermine the original intent of the policy. The intention is that the benefit should commence after the stand-down period finishes. It is great bill. I support this bill, and I commend it to the House.

Hon ANNETTE KING (Deputy Leader—Labour): What is the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill all about? We are told it amends an error in the Social Security Act, with retrospective effect to 3 June 1998. It was an error. It did not do what we thought it was going to do, and we need to correct it. It has got a retrospective element to it, no doubt. But we are not standing here saying that that is the problem. What we are saying is, yes, it does need to be fixed, no doubt about it, but the Minister of Social Development said it needed to be done in a fair way. So the argument I am going to put to the Government is: is it being done in a fair way and is natural justice being served in the way that it is being done? And I will get to that in a moment.

I always go to what has been said about a bill before it comes to this House, because none of us are necessarily experts, and so we rely on the best of advice. I always go, first of all, to the regulatory impact statement. We have relied on regulatory impact statements on bills in this House for as long as I can remember. And we are told by the member, Alfred Ngaro, who was, I think, the chair of the Social Services Committee, that there was a regulatory impact statement. I went and talked to him and said: “But your regulatory impact statement doesn’t address this bill at all. It’s all about the extension of the youth service.” So, members opposite, when you stand up to speak with such eloquence, you do not know what you are talking about, because your regulatory impact statement does not relate to the bill. So if the members are reading this as some sort of comfort, you are not going to get much at all.

So then, members opposite, go and read the department disclosure statement. Maybe it will tell you something about this bill that you did not know. Always look to see what it says. It says: “Are there any publicly available, inquiry, review or evaluation reports that have informed, or are relevant to the policy to be given effect by this Bill?”. Answer: no. “Were any regulatory impact statements provided to inform the policy decisions that led to this Bill?” Answer: no. This is one that I thought was interesting: “For the policy to be given effect by this Bill, is there an analysis available on: (a) the size of the potential costs and benefits?”. What is the answer to that? It is no. And then we are asked: “Has advice been provided to the Attorney-General on whether any provisions of this Bill appear to limit … the rights and freedoms affirmed in the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990?”. No advice has been given. So I go back to the point I started with: this has to be fixed, but is it being fixed in a fair way?

You see, the Minister for Social Development has put up a Supplementary Order Paper saying that there are going to be some people who will be able to claim. And, as my colleagues said, the Government has known since May last year. So why has it not done something earlier? What it is doing in this is allowing some to claim the day they should have been paid. Is that fair? [Interruption] The Government is only allowing some to claim, Minister Bennett, from when it found out there was a problem. If you went to court and said “I didn’t know I was committing a crime.” is that a defence? Is it a defence when you do not know something? I think the answer is no. You cannot use that as a defence; it is not a defence. Just because the Government did not know and no Government has known, it is not a defence. So Supplementary Order Paper 142, which my colleague Carmel Sepuloni has put up—and if it is accepted by the Government we will vote for the bill—is fair and gives natural justice. It says: “Give everybody who could have been affected 6 weeks to put in an application.”

How many, I wonder, would put in an application for their 1 day if they were given 6 weeks but they were given a fair go and natural justice? What is so hard about that, members opposite? All their heads are down, of course, because the members opposite know that is not natural justice and that it is not fair. And, surely, this Parliament should be about passing fair law, just law, and law that is based on natural justice. Do we not go out and make speeches about that and how fair we are in this democratic country of New Zealand? And then the Minister brings in a bill and allows some people to be able to claim their day’s benefit based on the fact that her department found out at a certain time. So when it found out, from that time those people can be included. Does that sound fair? I do not think so.

We would like to support this bill. In fact, in respect of Carmel Sepuloni’s Supplementary Order Paper, if the Minister, wherever she is, is listening, I would suggest that she looks at it and that she considers it. Would you not want to have the major support of the parties in this House to pass this retrospective legislation, which we all hate? Retrospective legislation has been passed in this House on many occasions, so the member who just sat down in her seat, Parmjeet Parmar, who was being all righteous about the fact that Labour had done some retrospective legislation has not looked at enough debates and Hansards of this place. Of course there are times when there is retrospective legislation. There are times when you have got to fix mistakes that have been made in legislation. That happens. But because it is retrospective, and because we are doing it under urgency, therefore denying a whole lot of comment and input on this particular piece of legislation, then I would have thought a Government that really did care about justice—and I cannot believe that Chris Finlayson can think that this is fair. He is the Attorney-General. Actually, he did not get to provide any advice. I cannot believe that he thinks this is fair or just when an arbitrary date can be set and that is used to give some people the right to claim money back but disregards everybody else.

I do not believe there would be very many people at all who would even bother to apply, because you would have to remember, between 1998 and today, when you left work and when the person did not get their pay at the right time. You would have to remember that. And that, I would imagine, would probably be beyond the ability of most people, unless they are very good at bookkeeping and they have kept all their records and their payslips and so on. So I would not have thought it would be very difficult to allow anybody who was affected from 1998, in a 6-week period, to put in a claim for their 1 day. So I am very sorry that the Government cannot see the strength of that argument, and I look forward to the chair of the Social Services Committee, Alfred Ngaro, returning to this House with his comments on the regulatory impact statement that he mentioned in his speech. He said the comments we needed were in this one. They are not in this one. There is no regulatory impact statement on the department report, there is no advice given to us, and all I can assume is that there is a whole lot of bungling going on, yet again. Surely this should have been done in a straightforward manner with the principles of fairness and natural justice at the centre of it. That is not what we are getting today.

STUART SMITH (National—Kaikōura): Well, I do have to give credit where it is due. I think that was a masterful speech from a person who I think that the 150-odd people who were in Palmerston North the other weekend would prefer to see as their leader of the Labour Party, Annette King. But that was a great speech.

Hon Ruth Dyson: What an arrogant prat.

Chris Bishop: A good speech from a good member.

STUART SMITH: That is right.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): No, I am going to require the member to withdraw that interjection. [Interruption] Carmel Sepuloni.

Carmel Sepuloni: I didn’t say anything.

Hon Ruth Dyson: I think it was me. Probably me.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Who used “arrogant” and then another word?

Hon Ruth Dyson: Me.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): I require Ruth Dyson to withdraw.

Hon Ruth Dyson: I withdraw and apologise.

STUART SMITH: Well, I am going to take that as a compliment that I have had someone withdraw and apologise.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Now the member will resume his seat. I am going to remind the member, as I probably should have reminded my old friend Annette King, that when the Speaker has ruled, members do not refer to that ruling; they just get on with business.

STUART SMITH: Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker—lesson learnt. This piece of legislation corrects a 1998 legislative error. It is quite clear. Everybody agrees there has been an error, and that 7 days actually is a week to everybody except for the courts in this case, and we are fixing that piece of legislation. Retrospective legislation has been discussed for quite a bit of time here this evening and there have been some holier than thou speeches given across from the other side. But as to the residency provisions that were referred to by my colleague earlier, people have been in the queue for 2 to 3 years—they did not get 6 weeks. It was summarily dismissed overnight. Sometimes you have got to make decisions around what is responsible, what is right, and what is good governance. That is what the National Party stands for, and it is with that in mind that I commend this bill to the House. Thank you.

Hon RUTH DYSON (Labour—Port Hills): I raise a point of order, Mr Assistant Speaker. I was momentarily distracted by reading your earlier contribution in the 1998 debate, actually, Mr Assistant Speaker. Earlier I raised a point of order in relation to the advice from the officials at the select committee, and you indicated then that Parliament was in its own hands—we are the masters of our destiny, or words to that effect. You suggested that a member could move that we agree that the advice on this bill, that is still stuck at the select committee and that we cannot access, could be made available to us. You indicated it would be appropriate for the chair of the select committee to do that. He has not been able to do that so far. I am keen to have that advice if we are going to get it before Committee stage. Can another member move it, is my question.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): I do not think that I indicated that a member could move. I did indicate that, with the appropriate caveats, leave could be sought. To be absolutely clear, the mere tabling of advice does not mean that members can refer to it. If it were to be tabled, it would have to be with leave sought for it to be tabled for the purpose and for members to have permission to use that advice. I also indicated that it is not for me to recommend that any member do that.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill be read a second time.

Ayes 75

New Zealand National 59; New Zealand First 12; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Noes 46

New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14.

Bill read a second time.

In Committee

JAMI-LEE ROSS (Junior Whip—National): I seek leave for all clauses in this bill to be debated as one question.

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): Leave is sought for that purpose. Is there any objection? There appears to be none. The matters will be debated as one question.

Clauses 1 to 6

CARMEL SEPULONI (Labour—Kelston): In standing up to speak to this particular bill, I just want to speak to the purpose of it and then talk about the Supplementary Order Paper that I have tabled—Supplementary Order Paper 142—and that I am hoping will be supported by the Committee. I think one really important point to make before I even get started—Ruth Dyson just found out this little fact—is that legislation came to the House in 1998, and that is when the technical error occurred. The interesting part of that is that the bill at that time went through the House in urgency as well. So here we are again, in urgency, correcting a technical error that was made under urgency back in 1998.

I guess that is the danger of rushing things through—not having the advice we need, not having all the checks and balances in place, not having the Attorney-General look over it, and not having a regulatory impact statement. Those are all concerns we have when we look at a piece of legislation like this, and even more so because of the fact that the technical error was made in 1998 when a bill went through in urgency. I really do hope that in 17 years’ time we are not back here correcting a technical error that was made when there was an attempt to correct the technical error that had been made 17 years beforehand as a bill went through urgency.

As I pointed out to the House during the first and second readings, we support the fact that there needs to be some correction here. We support the fact that we need to correct a technical error that occurred. Our concern here is the commencement date, which can be easily addressed by the Supplementary Order Paper that I have put up. We are concerned about the commencement date because of the fact that it closes out the opportunity for so many people to be able to have natural justice and make a claim. We saw in the media in the lead-up to this bill coming to the House today that the Minister for Social Development has allowed in this legislation a window of opportunity for those who missed out on that 1 day, between May 2014 and September in 2015, to be able to make a claim. The Minister’s statement is that because the Government had knowingly acted illegally during that time period it is important that that particular group of people, who may have been stood down and denied a day of pay, be given natural justice.

We have heard from members in the House who are supporting this bill that their belief is that because this is a technical error, anyone prior to May 2014 should not be given the same opportunity or the same level of natural justice. We oppose that because it is not actually the fault of the beneficiaries over the last 17 years that there was a technical error in the legislation. An example I used of where the shoe is on the other foot is the fact that the Government is still relentlessly chasing money owed to it in respect of the Novopay debacle. What we have seen in the media in the last week in that case is that $1.8 million is still outstanding to the Government because people were overpaid during that whole fiasco. That was not the fault of the people who were overpaid, and yet the Government, because it is money that it is owed to it, is relentlessly chasing that money.

Here we have the Government needing to make changes to correct a technical error, But the way it can be read, which I am sure is the perception of many, is—oops—the Government owes a whole lot of New Zealand citizens and it does not want to pay out. So it takes the easy option and retrospectively changes the legislation so it does not have to give people the money. How great it would be for all those citizens who owe money to the State if they could retrospectively change legislation so that they were no longer held accountable or liable for the money they owe. I am thinking of those poor teachers who now have to pay back the money that was overpaid to them because of a Government disaster that we call Novopay.

The Supplementary Order Paper that I have in front of me will delay the commencement of this legislation by 6 weeks. That is the window of opportunity we asked for right from the beginning. As the Minister pointed out—and I have alluded to it as well—we have tried to negotiate with the Government over this, and the reason we have tried to negotiate is that the technical error has been allowed to exist under both Labour and National Governments. So it is an issue that we should be working on together to find a solution to. The one area of disagreement is whether or not these people prior to May 2014 should be paid out. Our solution to this is actually just to put up an amendment that would delay the commencement of this bill by 6 weeks. And, as I said, that is all we said to Minister Tolley at the beginning, and that is all we asked for, really—that there be a 6-week period where those who are entitled to claim would be able to make or put forward a claim.

The explanatory note of Supplementary Order Paper 142 says: “This Supplementary Order Paper amends clause 2 so as to delay the commencement of the Bill for 6 weeks. This would give people who have been penalised by the incorrect payment of benefits a window in which to lodge a claim for back payment, in line with natural justice requirements.” Some arguments have been put as to why we should not do that. One of those arguments is fiscal. The unfortunate thing is that we have no real knowledge of what the numbers are that we are talking about here because of the fact that there is no regulatory impact statement. No one has really analysed it.

We were told by Alfred Ngaro that because the elements of this particular bill were originally in the extension of the Social Security (Extension of Young Persons Services and Remedial Matters) Amendment Bill, we might be able to find the detail in the regulatory impact statement there for these particular measures. Actually, I have gone through that regulatory impact statement. I know that Ruth Dyson, sitting here, has gone through it. Annette King has gone through it, and there is nothing in there about the commencement of benefit side of things, despite the fact that, actually, the commencement of benefits part was originally in the extension of the youth services bill. I think Poto Williams has gone through the regulatory impact statement as well.

So I need to point out to Alfred Ngaro, the chair of the Social Services Committee, who pointed us in the direction of that regulatory impact statement, that there is nothing in there about the elements that we are talking about today. So it is a real issue that we do not have a regulatory impact statement in here. No one can comment on the fiscal implications, because there is no evidence to say how many people have been affected and how much money is involved, and, to top it off, we know that a large number of people who might be eligible to make a claim probably would not make a claim because of the efforts they would have to go to.

There are many people who were briefly on a benefit but have been in work ever since that one period in their life when they may have found themselves unemployed and having to rely on a benefit—those are the vast majority of people who go on benefits—and they will not be wanting to put forward a claim. So we are concerned that so many people are being shut out in this process. We do know that many of them would probably not even want to make a claim, but it is just the fact that natural justice is not being given the opportunity to prevail.

I hope that Government members see the merits in having the majority of the House support them on a piece of legislation like this, particularly when it goes through under urgency and is a retrospective piece of legislation, and I hope, as Annette King said, not only that they see the merit of that but also that they see the merit of supporting Supplementary Order Paper 142. It is a small ask from us. We will support the bill if the Government or the majority of the House supports us on this Supplementary Order Paper to delay the commencement of this particular piece of legislation to allow that window of opportunity for all of those people who have the right to make a claim to make that claim, rather than shutting them out completely from the process and honouring only the claims that have already been made—even though we are glad that the Government is doing this now—or honouring only the claims of those people who were affected post 20 May 2014, when the Government became aware of the fact that it was acting illegally.

I do just want to say that a lot of the National Government MPs have stood up here today and said that there is a sense of urgency with getting this through—but, unfortunately, there was not a sense of urgency on 20 May 2014.

JAN LOGIE (Green): I rise to speak on the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill in this Committee stage. And there is, despite it being a very, very small bill, quite a bit to say about this, though it has been pointed out in this Committee that this is happening through urgency, that the provisions in this bill are—we are being told that they are substantially the same as the provisions that were included in the Social Security (Extension of Young Persons Services and Remedial Matters) Amendment Bill. I sit on the Social Services Committee; I have been hearing evidence on that bill. These provisions—although some aspects of them are the same, there is detail in this bill that is significantly different, and in this process and consideration of this bill in this Committee stage, we do not have all the information in front of us to be able to debate this properly.

As has been pointed out, the regulatory impact statement in the original bill made no reference to the provisions in this bill or, indeed, in the significant parts of the original bill. We are not able to put the departmental advice that was offered to the select committee on the original bill into discussion in this debate because it is still under the privilege of the select committee. I did want to bring that into the debate, partly because I think it illuminates part of my concerns about this bill and partly because of the fact that I do not believe that the principles of transparency and good oversight from Parliament have been enabled through this process. I would wish for that to be properly debated and considered by this Committee because I think it goes, potentially, towards raising some pretty fundamental concerns about the relationship between the Minister and the department, if nothing else.

So what this bill does is it amends the Social Security Act to correct—we are being told—with retrospective effect to 3 June 1998, an error in the legislation that does not give effect to the policy intent that a benefit commences on the day after a stand-down period ends, as opposed to the day on which the stand-down period ends. Already, through the first and second reading debate, we have had discussion on that particular point because we are being told that the intent was always for the stand down to end on the day after, despite the fact that the legislation says very, very clearly and unequivocally that the benefit should commence on the day on which the stand-down period ends. I do not believe there is any way of misinterpreting that, but we are being told that the intent was for it to be the next day but, somehow, for 18 years this has gone unnoticed and that the policy has been operationalised in a way that does not match the law. That, in effect, has been a breach of the law.

I do admit to there being a possibility—and I am aware that this has not come to the House’s attention or to a Minister’s attention, because it has been pointed out to the Social Services Committee on numerous times in my short time in Parliament about the problems with the Social Security Act. It is legislation from the 1960s, it has been amended so many times, and there are so many regulations attached to this piece of legislation that it is one of the—if not, the—most complicated pieces of legislation on our books. It is possible that although the language is absolutely clear—“a benefit commences on the day on which the stand down period ends”—people did not look at the legislation because it is so complex. We need to work on that because this is the legislation that enables the most vulnerable people in our country: people who through disability barriers in employment are unable to work, people leaving violent relationships, people who have been left responsible for the care of their children, and people who have been made redundant. They are people who are trying to feed themselves and put a roof over their head when they are not able to be in the paid workforce.

This is the piece of legislation that ensures those rights that we supposedly all uphold, those fundamental human rights to food and shelter and the ability to participate in our society—although that last point has been so hopelessly eroded. So when the Government comes to this Committee and says that we need to fix a mistake that it has made we need to look at this very closely. That it had got it wrong was brought to the Government’s attention in May 2014, and it was not brought to its attention just once; it was through two rulings of the Social Security Appeal Authority that it had it wrong.

If you were following the rule of law and the established relationships, the process would have then been for the Ministry of Social Development to change its practice and to ensure that it was abiding by the law, and for Cabinet then to look at the fact that it thought there was a different intention to this and then bring in legislation to change that in the future so that the law matched what it wanted it to do. There is nothing in that good process that says retrospectively you deny people access to their rights as they were written in law, and that is really at the heart of what this debate is.

I do want to say that I really have such a struggle with the fact that the Government is saying that it will give people who have had the law misapplied post May 2014 a period until 8 January to be able to get in their review, but that people who had the law misapplied before that date will have no chance of review. Once this legislation passes, that is it. We have been letting people know about this so that they could get that review in, because we believe that they should have that right of review as the law guaranteed them, and somebody has just emailed me saying that Work and Income is not accepting the documents that have been previously accepted by other offices where people are being paid out up to this point. Several Work and Income offices, I am being told, are now saying that those emails do not belong to the Ministry of Social Development and that they are not accepting them.

When you are going to cut off a deadline for people that gives people money and that gives people access to a fundamental right by law in this peremptory manner, this kind of stress and confusion is more likely to happen. It goes back to my very, very original point of the absolute importance of our seeking to ensure people’s trust in Government, and that trust is being undermined significantly by this legislation and by this process. The people who are most affected have already had, many of them, very difficult experiences with the State, and what they are now going to take away from this process is that they were entitled to something and the Government has decided that “Well, yeah, you were entitled to it, but now we’re going to change the law so that you can’t get it.” That is what people understand from this.

On average so far the people who have claimed have got $80. That is $80 that can go towards the rent, that could go towards buying a Christmas present for their kid, that could potentially let their kid go to a swimming pool—things we know that families on benefit at the moment are not able to afford. Those absolute basics that when I grew up I assumed everyone had access to of a holiday, of a kid having their own bed, of three meals on the table, of the chance for a camping holiday—things like that are not going to be able to delivered by this bill and they would not have been able to be delivered by that 1 extra day’s payment, but the principle is—

Hon ANNETTE KING (Deputy Leader—Labour): This is the question and answer time when the Minister in the chair gets to answer the questions posed by the Opposition. So, Minister Wagner, I have a couple that I would really appreciate you answering. First of all, was the Minister aware that the original legislation passed in 1998 was also passed under urgency, and does she think maybe that accounts for the fact that perhaps we—all the parties in the House—made an error at the time? And, hopefully, can the Minister assure the Committee that we are not going to be making another mistake and that we have got this absolutely right?

I would also like to know what the financial impact is of this change, because I have read what the Minister has said. She said: “We’re talking a day … it’s not a huge amount.” So if it is only a day and it is not a huge amount, what would be the cost of that—taking it back to May 2014, for the people who are allowed to apply—to the Government? I thought that work would have been done, because the Government has known about this problem since May 2014, and 4 or 5 months ago it introduced a bill, the Social Security (Extension of Young Persons Services and Remedial Matters) Amendment Bill, that had this particular part hidden in it. I thought it would have done this work for the Social Services Committee, and perhaps the chair of the select committee might be aware of what the financial impact is. Was that provided to the select committee? Because if it was not it seems to be a strange way to go about making a change to the law.

But I suspect there was no work done on what the financial impact was, because the departmental disclosure statement actually asks “[Is] there analysis available on: … the size of the potential costs and benefits?”, and the answer is “No.” So this has been put together on the word of the Minister—and Minister Bennett is mouthing to me. I am not quite sure what she is mouthing, but maybe Minister Bennett knows, as she is in Cabinet, what the financial cost of this is. Was the Minister for Social Development correct when she said that “We’re talking a day … it’s not a huge amount.”? If we are talking a day and it is not a huge amount, quantify the huge amount. If it is not a huge amount, what is it? Could the Minister—either the Minister who is in the chair, Minister Wagner, or maybe Minister Bennett if she would like to take the chair, because she is in Cabinet—tell us what the financial cost is.

Carmel Sepuloni: She was the Minister.

Hon ANNETTE KING: I think she was the Minister for Social Development in May last year. Was that correct, Minister? So did the Minister at the time seek to find out what the financial costs would be? Did she seek to find out what the costs would be if you allowed a period of time to allow anybody who was affected back to 1998 to put in a claim?

We have put up Supplementary Order Paper 142, which I support, saying why not allow this very small window—this very small, 6-week window—to allow those people who might be affected back to 1998 to put in a claim. Did the Government do any work on the financial cost if there was a period of time during which people could put in a claim? Were there any costings on that? Because maybe the Government would find that it was not very big at all, if we go by the Minister saying that it is only a day and we are not talking about a huge amount. So if that work has not been done, why was it not done? What we are getting here is a closing-off of natural justice. That is wrong, and I would have thought that before the Government closed off natural justice to people who had been affected by an error it would quantify what that impact is. What is the financial impact of it?

The other thing that I wonder whether the Minister could answer is why there has been no advice provided to the Attorney-General on any provisions of this bill that appear to limit any of the rights and freedoms affirmed in the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990. The Minister in the chair may or may not be able to answer this: was any advice sought by the Minister of the day on whether there would be any limits to the rights and freedoms of New Zealanders? I would have thought that was pretty fundamental, when you are going to carry out retrospective legislation—that you would want to know whether there was any limitation on the rights and freedoms of New Zealanders. Could the Minister in the chair tell us whether any advice was provided to the Attorney-General, to let him give some advice? Because I believe that Christopher Finlayson would have looked very carefully at this.

Grant Robertson: As he does.

Hon ANNETTE KING: As he does. He is a very meticulous man, and very well related. He would have looked very carefully at this legislation to see whether it did limit their rights and freedoms. But he was not given the opportunity—because the departmental disclosure statement said he was not asked—so we do not know whether it does or not. So, Minister in the chair, I would like to know whether any advice was provided or sought from the Attorney-General. Would that, or would that not, have been an important issue for a Government that prides itself on human rights and democracy? Would that have been an important issue?

I urge the Government to reconsider Supplementary Order Paper 142 provided in the name of Carmel Sepuloni, who has said in this Chamber: “We will support this bill. We understand the problem. We know it has to be fixed.” But will the Government reconsider her Supplementary Order Paper to enable a window of time for anybody who is affected to put in an application? I would lay odds on that there would not be very many of them. I do not think a lot of us keep such good records that we can remember when we stopped and started work, and went on a benefit and did not go on a benefit. “Was it 1999, or was it 2001? Was it on 29 March?”. I mean, what are we talking about? Let us get real. How many—[Interruption]

Chris Hipkins: Pre-pubescent; doesn’t have that problem.

Hon ANNETTE KING: Oh, well, I do not believe the member from Clutha would have a clue when he stopped and started work! Give us the dates that he stopped and started work.

I think they have made a mistake here, and I am saying: correct the mistake now by accepting Carmel Sepuloni’s Supplementary Order Paper. You would get the broad support of the parties in this House, Minister. Perhaps the Minister in the chair does not have the authority. I know she is not the Minister in charge of the bill—she is in the chair; good on her for being in the chair. But maybe she has not got the authority to make this decision. I suggest a little whisper to Minister Bennett—Minister Bennett is a very powerful Minister. She may be able, because she was there when this mistake was discovered, to persuade the Government to accept the Supplementary Order Paper. It would not be the end of the world for the Government if you did. I can promise you that we would not crow very much if this Supplementary Order Paper was accepted, because you know what? We would be providing natural justice and fairness to New Zealanders.

I wonder whether we would do this if it was something that affected a business. I wonder whether we would have the same approach. But this is about people who are on a benefit, and I just hope, Minister, that the Government has not been blinded by the words “benefit” and “beneficiaries”—that this is not just some sort of approach where, because they are beneficiaries, it is easy to deny them natural justice and fairness. I hope that is not the case. Give them the benefit of the doubt, in this House. So I say, Minister Bennett, do your best: see whether you can accept the Supplementary Order Paper. Give a 6-week period, and we would support the bill.

GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central): I want to pick up a couple of points from Annette King, but I want to talk about two things: I want to talk about the issue of principle and the issue of practicalities. Up to now I have not spoken on this bill, and, as somebody who has observed this, I fundamentally do not understand what the National Government is doing here, in terms of the point of principle—the idea that a mistake was made, an error occurred, and people did not get what they were entitled to, and the National Government chooses the date on which it discovered the error as the point at which compensation kicks in, rather than going back to when the error was made. There is not a point of principle in that. That is the problem, because if we were taking a principled approach, it would be that an error was made.

To quote the Attorney-General in this House recently—and he was quoting L V Martin—“It’s the putting right that counts.” The mistake has been made. The Government can now do what it needs to do in order to allow those affected by the error to make a claim. This legislation goes against the principles of natural justice, which get talked about constantly in this House—the very thing that we are all charged with doing when we are elected as members of Parliament to uphold the rule of law and to represent the concerns of New Zealanders. It just seems to me that, actually, the National Government has taken a call, for some reason, to limit this on a financial basis and to trash the principle. That is what it looks like.

That brings me to the second of my points—and I will come back to the issue of principle in a moment—which is, as a member of Parliament and with this bill not having been through a select committee process, I would want now to be reading a report from the Government that gave an estimation of costs. That is what would enable us to start making some good and sensible decisions. There is a factor that I know will make this difficult, and that is the point that the Hon Annette King has just been discussing, which is: just how many people would take this up? I have got an alternative idea about the information that we could get that would help us to decide the practicalities of this piece of legislation, and that would be to get some information about the amounts of money that individuals who have already claimed have asked for. Was it $80? Was it $100? Was it $1,000? How much money are we talking about at an individual level, where we know who the people are?

I accept the point that we are not necessarily going to know how many people will apply, but I think the Minister in the chair, or another the Minister, might be able to stand up and talk to us about the amounts that individuals are getting, because, in total, they will not be that much, but they will be meaningful to those people who get them. We are talking here about teacher-aides, people on short-term contracts, students coming in and out of being a student and in and out of work and study requirements—people for whom $80 or $100 will make a difference. But you know what? That is not the point. The point is not the $80 or $100, even though it will make a big difference to those people. The point is the principle: that an error was made—an error that continued through different Governments; for nobody here can wash their hands of it. Perhaps some party members who have not been part of the Government might feel they can, but nobody in here can really wash their hands of it, because we have all been in Parliament. We have all got a shared responsibility in doing the right thing, in actually saying “You know what? This was a mistake. We’re going to give a decent period of time”—and here I want to also support Carmel Sepuloni’s Supplementary Order Paper 142—“for everybody to have a look, work out whether or not it’s worth their while applying, and go ahead and do that.”

I simply cannot understand why a Government that tells us it believes in natural justice, that tells us it believes in the rule of law, that says that it upholds the rights of the citizens of this country, would not come here to this Chamber and say: “We get it. The mistake’s been made since the law was passed in 1998.” Now is the time to make sure that we can do that. Perhaps the Minister may well be able to do that now.

CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka): I am happy to take the first of what I hope will be several contributions—

Hon Members: Many, many.

CHRIS HIPKINS: —many, many contributions during this Committee stage on this bill, particularly as the whole bill is now being debated as one question. There are many, many aspects of it that I hope to dig into, but first of all I want to start at a higher level, and call this bill for what it is.

This is a symbol of the National Government’s approach to governing the country, which is that it is quite happy to break the law—and let us be clear that that is what has been happening for many, many years now. The Government has been breaking its own law, and then, when it gets caught out, it comes to the Parliament to legislate to make legal what was previously illegal.

When Government members were in Opposition, which we can remember that far back, they railed against that kind of approach—how horrific it was that the Government of the day might legislate to make legal something that was previously illegal. Yet here we are, under urgency, legislating to make legal something that was previously illegal—with no public scrutiny, no select committee process, and a very truncated debate, in the sense that we are now debating it all as one question. That, of course, is symbolic of the approach of this National Government. And yet no one from the Government side has spoken during this Committee stage debate to answer the many legitimate questions that are already being asked, and I am sure that there are more to come.

Why is it that the Government is in such a hurry to remove this right, this monetary entitlement, from people who are on benefits? Yes, the Government may say that this is 1 day, but what happens if somebody has been on and off benefits over that period of time? Seasonal workers, teacher-aides, many, many people who could be affected by this are going to retrospectively have their legal entitlement taken away. Let us be really clear about that—they are legally entitled to this money. If a business was legally entitled, by the letter of the law, to a sum of money from the Government, would we be here, under urgency, legislating to take that entitlement away from them? I do not think we would be. I do not think the National Government would do that.

So why does the Government feel that it is acceptable to do that to someone who has been living on and off a benefit? They are the people who are most likely to be affected. They are the people who are making an effort to get out there and work. They may not be able to find full-time, long-term, sustainable work, so they might be doing seasonal work, or work that comes and goes, which means that they have an on-again, off-again relationship with Work and Income. They are the ones who are most likely to be affected by this.

So why is the Government doing this, if the Minister says that it is only a relatively small sum of money that we are talking about? That is what the Minister has said. Here is an open challenge. Question No. 1—how much? How much is “a small amount” of money? That is the first question—how much is “a small amount” of money? What is the total amount? I am not talking about per person. I am talking about what is the total liability that the Government is legislating to remove here. That is question No. 1 for the Minister, and I am looking forward to hearing the answer to that.

Question No. 2 is: how many people does the Government estimate are likely to be affected by this legislation? That is question No. 2. Question No. 3, related to question No. 2, is: within that group of people who are likely to be affected, how many of them are likely to be affected more than once? If it is just simply that they applied once and they missed out on a day, then that is one issue. But if it is that they have been on and off a benefit—and the seasonal workers whom I mentioned would definitely fall into this category—how many of them are there likely to be?

Those are the first three questions that I have for the Minister, and I am very much looking forward to those answers, because my contribution as the debate progresses will, in part at least, depend on what the answers to those questions are—bearing in mind that the Government has known about this for some time. It has known about this for some time. The Government moved to close the loophole only when the public found out that this loophole existed and that this problem existed, so it sat on this information for a significant period of time.

The problem, of course, has been in existence since 1998—a significant period of time, and only now are we addressing it. So why has it taken so long for the Government to bring this legislation to the House, and why the rush? Why the hurry? If this problem has been around since 1998 and the Government has known about it for quite a long period of time now—a year and a half it has known about it—why the rush to suddenly do this?

This brings me, of course, to a few other questions. Why is it that the Government is not giving people due notice so that if they have an entitlement they could actually gain that entitlement? Why is it that the Government is suddenly taking it away? Why is it that the Government is preserving the entitlement for only a very small subset?

Hon ANNE TOLLEY (Minister for Social Development): I am pleased to take a call in this debate. First, can I start by apologising both to the House and to the chairman of the Social Services Committee, whom I particularly misinformed about something to do with this part of the bill being in the regulatory impact statement that was before the select committee. My understanding, and the advice that I have received, is that because the proposed amendments are technical revisions that re-enact the current law to improve legislative clarity, they are, therefore, exempt from the regulatory impact analysis requirement. So that is the first thing. I apologise to my colleague whom I misinformed about something in the regulatory impact statement.

With regard to the questions that have been asked about a number of issues, can I start by saying that in my first reading speech, introducing this bill to the House, I did actually quantify the number of benefits that we believe, at this early stage, have been paid since 1998, and that is 2.7 million benefits. It is impossible, without doing a manual check, to know how many of those are eligible, first of all, for the stand downs, because not all benefits—movements between benefits, sanctions, etc.—are necessarily accorded a stand down. Without going through every single one of those, and we have not done that work, I cannot give the member any further details, but 2.7 million benefits paid is a large amount.

Secondly, what I know is that, as at this morning, 8,500 people have lodged reviews, many of which will go back to 1998, and all of those are protected under this piece of legislation. That is because of the publicity and, I have to say, the very earnest work on behalf of a number of beneficiary advocates, in particular, Kay Brereton, who, I understand, because of her personal circumstances and the remote place she has lived, has done an outstanding job and gone without power in order to make sure that the power she had was made available to help people get their reviews in. So 8,500 people, as at this morning, have taken advantage of that, and I understand that the average payment is around $105.

I have said, both in the first reading speech and in the second reading speech, that the Government has tried to strike a balance, remembering that this is not a change of policy. The policy was clear back to 1996. A 7-day stand down means 7 days standing down. That is basic English. What we had was when an amendment was made to the law in 1998, it was worded badly. Nobody knew about that—neither a National-led Government nor a Labour-led Government. Neither did the beneficiaries. Everyone processed that stand down as though it was 7 days, meaning 7 days without State assistance. So there has been no change of policy.

The Government has tried to strike a balance between being fair to those who, when that error in law was pointed out to the Government, should have been entitled to that extra payment, and we have made that available to them. I have got a Supplementary Order Paper to extend that through to that New Year break—so right through until 8 January. That is plenty of time, and I have made every effort to make sure that it is as easy as possible to get that review in for those going back to May of last year. Anyone who currently has a review in the system will be treated as business as usual, and they will go through that review process.

CARMEL SEPULONI (Labour—Kelston): I have got a few questions for the Minister, the Hon Anne Tolley, and a few responses to some of the stuff that she has just said, as well. Firstly, I just want to raise the issue around the fact again, because the Minister may not have heard this earlier argument, that, actually, this technical error was committed in 1998 when this bill went through under urgency in a similar way to what we are seeing now. So is the Minister concerned that when we rush through legislation like this, as was done in 1998, these errors do occur because of the fact that we do not have anyone looking over it, we do not have any of our officials giving us advice, and the Auditor-General has not had an opportunity to look at it? Is she concerned that that may happen again? Really, we do not want to be back here in 17 years’ time correcting a technical error that happened 17 years beforehand to correct a technical error that had happened 17 years beforehand whilst the bill went through under urgency.

The Minister has brought up the number of people whom they think may have been impacted by this. She said it was 2.7 million. She has not mentioned any fiscal cost, but we know that this was highlighted in the departmental disclosure statement. It says, basically, that provisions in the bill have retrospective effect and that the retrospective provisions can be justified because of three different things, including, apparently, financial costs to the Crown, but we have no figures. Actually, even in this departmental disclosure statement it points out the fact that there are no numbers or no figures around what this could potentially cost.

The Minister has said that 8,500 people have made claims so far. I guess, with that in mind, what is the rate of application that has gone on here? I know that, really, the applications started to be made after the Government started to pay out. I know that there was an increase in the number of claims that were being put forward once people knew that they could actually get paid out. So I just want to know from the Minister what that rate of claim has been. Have they been getting a thousand a day since then? Then we could maybe anticipate 6 weeks down the track, if they were to delay the commencement date as I have asked for in my Supplementary Order Paper, potentially what the cost to the Crown would be. But at the moment we are going blind because there is nothing here that we can see with regard to costings or anticipated costs for the Crown if they were to open it up so that all of those people could make a claim or, as we suggested, have that small window of opportunity for people to make a claim.

The Minister talked about the reason why there is no regulatory impact statement and has cited the fact that these are technical changes as a reason for not having a regulatory impact statement. I just want to point out that I did look this up because I was interested to see where there would be a rationale for not having a regulatory impact statement. What I have found is—3.1, “Exemptions”, says: “The value of completing even a modest Regulatory Impact Statement (RIS) is likely to be limited in some circumstances, such as those where the potential proposals would result in little or no change to the status quo legislative position or would have no or very small impacts outside of government.”

That makes me question the Minister on what she was saying. Actually, this does not have no or very small impacts outside of Government. This has huge impacts outside of Government because of the number of people—2.7 million people—whom the Minister cited as having gone on or gone through a stand-down period to go on a benefit over the last 17 years. So I think it is not fair to say that the Government is justified in not producing a regulatory impact statement, because I do not think any person in this room would think that the potential to affect 2.7 million people outside of here is something that would not have an impact.

So I really would like the Minister to speak to that. Again, I would like her to answer the question around the rate at which the claims have been coming in so we can get some idea of potentially what that 6-week window of opportunity would mean for those people in terms of cost. I would like to know at this stage what the average amount is that people have been claiming for or what they have been eligible to receive. So the Minister would know, in terms of those who have already been paid out, what the average amount is that is being paid out there. How many days have they been claiming for? Has it just been the one day that the Minister mentioned?

DARROCH BALL (NZ First): I would just like to speak on the Supplementary Order Papers that have been put forward. I can understand the rationale behind why Labour and the Greens have put the Supplementary Order Papers forward, based on their perspective, on their argument, that beneficiaries are owed a day’s stand down. That is obviously not what New Zealand First believes.

The theory of the Supplementary Order Papers I can understand, just not the execution of them or the justification for them. So a couple of the justifications for Labour’s Supplementary Order Papers are that it will not cost much because there will not be many people who will apply—the majority will not apply. If it is a matter of principle, like we have been hearing about the Supplementary Order Papers and it being a matter of natural justice, if it is a matter of a fundamental right by law, if it is about trusting the Government, then based on the principles in the Supplementary Order Papers from Labour and the Greens should not everybody be getting that day’s stand down extra? They should not have to apply for it. Should they not be getting it automatically?

The Minister says that, on average, at the moment it is $105 per payout, and we are talking about 2.7 million benefits that have been paid. Of course not all beneficiaries will be eligible, but if we take even half of that, even a good chunk of that, where would that money be better spent than retrospectively thinking that a beneficiary should be owed that extra day’s payment when, in fact, the intent of the bill was fulfilled in the first instance?

Like I said previously, if the mistake was not made in the writing of the law, beneficiaries would still have received the same amount of benefit as they did. That is because the intent was fulfilled. The Supplementary Order Papers from both Labour and the Greens—New Zealand First cannot support them because fundamentally that would be going against and contrary to what we are agreeing to with this bill and why we are standing and supporting the bill. We believe that the intent of the bill was fulfilled and that there is no money owing to the beneficiaries.

I have just put a typescript amendment on the Table. If we are talking about natural justice, then the point from where the Government knew that there was an issue—which was May last year—is the point where people should be eligible. They are, and the Government is giving 7 weeks for them to apply. We actually believe that everybody who received a benefit who is eligible and who was not given that 1-day stand down should be automatically paid that amount. That is the point in time—from when the Government knew—that every beneficiary should be paid from. That is the natural justice aspect and the perspective that New Zealand First stands by.

IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North): We find ourselves in an interesting situation this evening. What we are doing is we are, under urgency, rectifying a mistake that was made under urgency 17 years ago. It demonstrates the danger of using urgency for these matters. We do not have a regulatory impact statement. We have not had the select committee process to scrutinise the legislation.

I want to look at the departmental disclosure statement, but to say it is scant is a bit of an understatement. There is very, very little advice for those of us who are being asked to vote on this legislation to actually give us confidence that we are getting this right. I have been a member of this House for only 7 years, and in that time I have seen a number of errors made—a number of errors made—when we have been in a rush.

My concern is that again, quite unnecessarily in this case, we are rushing this legislation and we are in danger of mucking it up again. To the best of our knowledge, this legislation will meet the Government’s purpose and intent, but it thought back in 1998 that it was going to do that, and it was wrong then. There is every likelihood the Government is going to be wrong again tonight.

There is another thing that I find slightly unusual. It is not that we are retrospectively making something that was previously illegal legal, because, as Chris Hipkins pointed out, that has happened before. Parties in Opposition tend to rail against that type of thing and then when they find themselves in Government they suddenly discover that it is actually perfectly acceptable, so I am not going to rail against that as such. But what I do find odd is that the Government was prepared to carry on acting illegally once it discovered that it was doing so.

This is not something that the Government has realised in the last few days, or weeks, or even months. The Government realised this was happening in May 2015, a full year and a half ago. So the Government has carried on, quite happily, acting illegally, until it realised it was a political issue for it. Now, all of a sudden, we are in a rush.

The Government could have brought this legislation—I feel like it is sort of Groundhog Day, because I was saying the same thing yesterday with the last piece of legislation under this urgency motion. The Government could have acted more swiftly and brought legislation—the legislation is only two or three pages long.

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): It is tragic to interrupt the member.

IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY: It is, is it not?

Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7 p.m.

IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY: Immediately before the dinner break, I was lamenting the fact that it had taken the Government a year and a half to bring this legislation before the Parliament, all four pages of it. It really does baffle me why it took so long to bring this legislation to the Parliament, and now, after waiting for such a long period, why the Government is passing it through all stages under urgency without any opportunity for scrutiny. There is no regulatory impact statement and no select committee process.

What we do have is the departmental disclosure statement, which I think raises some issues and questions. Is there any publicly available inquiry review or evaluation reports that have informed or are relevant to the policy to be given effect by this bill? No. Were there any regulatory impact statements provided to inform the policy decisions that led to this bill? No. For the policy to be given effect by this bill, is there analysis available on the size of potential costs and benefits? No. Is there analysis available on the potential for any group of persons to suffer a substantial, unavoidable loss of income or wealth? No, even though we, in fact, know that the impact of this legislation is to limit the opportunity people have to seek redress for having lost a portion of income that they were entitled to under law.

Essentially, for just about every question that is asked—the standard questions asked by the departmental disclosure statement—the answer is no. I think it actually demonstrates just how little work has been done to prepare this legislation and to make sure that what we do tonight rectifies a situation that was caused by legislation being passed under urgency back in 1998, and the errors that came with that.

I would like to turn my attention, though, to the Supplementary Order Papers. There are three Supplementary Order Papers: one in the name of Carmel Sepuloni, one in the name of Jan Logie, and one in the Minister’s name. I would like to start with my colleague Carmel Sepuloni. The effect of her Supplementary Order Paper would be to delay the commencement of this legislation by 6 weeks, and that is simply to give people an opportunity to actually seek some redress.

I think we are particularly thinking here of the people who have been affected by the incorrect application of the law numerous times. We have spoken about the fact that for a lot of people this will not have affected them just once. There are many people, particularly those on fixed-term contracts, those who are in casual work, and those who are in seasonal work in particular, who will have moved in and out of work many, many, many times over the 18 years that this policy has been implemented inappropriately.

For some of those people we could be talking significant sums of money. For most people, if it has occurred only once or twice, then, probably, the hassle of applying to retrospectively gain that 1 day’s worth of income is probably not worth it for them. But for some people there may well be some value in making that application.

What Carmel Sepuloni’s proposed amendment would do is give people a very short window—and I think the Government could easily work with us on this—to allow people that opportunity to apply to receive the income that they ought to have, had the legislation, as it was originally drafted, been applied appropriately. I have heard a couple of members dismiss this approach. I think when they do that they assume that everybody falls into that category of people for whom this has happened only once or twice. There will definitely be people—not that we know for sure, because the Government has not been able to provide us with figures—for whom there would be value in exploring exactly how much they are owed by the Government and taking the time to do that.

Jan Logie’s amendment is similar, only it gives a 6-month window. Really, what we are debating here is how long is an appropriate length of time for people to be able to make that application. Certainly, on this side of the Chamber we have got no problem with the 6-month window—6 weeks or 6 months; either of those would be acceptable to us.

Then we come to the Minister’s amendment. This is a really interesting one. This amendment allows people who have been denied what they were legally owed under the law during the period in which the Government knew it was acting illegally to be able to apply for that and to pick up retrospectively the money that they were entitled to. I find this interesting. I think it is good, in a way, that the Government is trying to rectify the fact that it was acting illegally, but, nevertheless, it is a fact that the Government, for a year and a half nearly, knowingly denied people income that they were owed under the law, even though the Government knew that the legislation as it was drafted said they were entitled to something different.

We can support that as well, but we do not think it goes far enough. We actually think that the amendments in one of those other Supplementary Order Papers—either Carmel Sepuloni’s or Jan Logie’s—need to be passed if we are to take a principled approach to this, which is that people were entitled to some income, it has been denied them, and they should be given the opportunity to apply to receive what they were owed.

My suspicion is that most people will not apply. It will not be worth their while to make that application, but for a handful of people it will be worth their while making that application. I think there is value in supporting those two Supplementary Order Papers on that basis. I think I will end this particular contribution at that point.

Hon RUTH DYSON (Labour—Port Hills): I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. I am not doing this to trifle with your earlier considerations. I am doing it because the Minister for Social Development, who is responsible for the bill, is now in the chair. The point of order that I raised earlier, which I now wish to repeat and seek further guidance on from you, was that because this bill was introduced as part of another bill that is still at the Social Services Committee—this part of the bill has been taken out of the select committee process and is now before the Committee of the whole House, under urgency, going through all stages—we do not have the benefit of the officials’ advice. [Interruption]

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): The first thing is that Ruth Dyson will resume her chair. The member who interjected while I was on my feet will stand up, withdraw, and apologise.

David Bennett: Withdraw and apologise.

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Withdraw and apologise?

David Bennett: I do withdraw and apologise, yes.

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Thank you, Mr Bennett. I am ready to rule on this. I have previously ruled. I think the first time the matter was raised the Minister was in fact in the Chamber. It was raised by Jan Logie. What I ruled at the time was that I suggested that the chair of the select committee—and it would have to be a committee member, I think, to have the material—excise that material from a report and seek leave of the Committee in particular terms, so that members are able to debate it. Then it would be up to the Committee. It would have to be a unanimous decision of the Committee, and members would be able to do that. No one has done that, and therefore I am going to rule that I have got nothing further to rule on.

CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka): I want to deal with a number of issues in this contribution, the first of which is that I note that this bill, at clause 3, refers to the principal Act. It states that this Act amend

s the Social Security Act of 1964. I am going to refer, in many of the comments that I make, to the actual original Act in the part that we are amending. But I do want to note at the outset that the Ministry of Social Development website notes that there is actually a full rewrite of that legislation under way and that it is due in the House by the end of 2015. I wonder, in fact, whether that has highlighted other areas that might need to be addressed, which the Minister may want to alert the Committee to.

The reason that I am referring to the principal Act is that I wanted to check with the Minister on what basis the Government is claiming that the wording in the Act was inconsistent with the policy intent at the time the original amendments in 1998 were passed. The reason that I ask that is that we are amending clause 80BA(4), and if you look at 80BA(3), the clause immediately prior to that—

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): The section.

CHRIS HIPKINS: What was that?

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): The section.

CHRIS HIPKINS: The section—sorry—immediately prior to that, that defines when a stand-down period begins. The sections that we are amending amend when a stand-down period ends, but if you look at when a stand-down period begins, it is actually very clear: “… if the person’s employment terminated or the person is given notice of termination of employment before he or she applied for the benefit, the day after the date the person’s employment ceased.” So in that section it is very clear that it is the day after that that the stand-down period begins. But then the very next subsection, which was in exactly the same amendment—the same legislation that amended the Act, which is what we are now amending—it goes on to say that benefits commence on the day on which the stand-down period ends. It seems to me that if the policy intent in the original drafting was to make that differentiation, or it was to make no differentiation, why was a different form of words used in the drafting of the Act?

So, really, the question that I have for the Minister is, on what basis is the Government claiming that the legislation was incorrect, not that the application of the legislation was incorrect? If the application had been incorrect, then I do not think that there is any justification for the Government to retrospectively go back and try to change the law to make right an incorrect interpretation of the Act as intended by the agency that was implementing it. On the other hand, there may be some justification if it was a genuine drafting error in the legislation, but I struggle to accept that when the subsection immediately prior makes a clear differentiation between the “day on which” and the “day after”.

For anyone following along at home, they will probably think “What on earth is he talking about?”, but actually it is quite important because it comes down to the issue of fairness and whether, in fact, this was a mistake by the agency implementing the law in that it interpreted the law incorrectly, or whether it was a mistake made in the passage of the law in the first place. I think, given very careful scrutiny of the original Act, I am actually falling in the category that it is the former, which is that it is actually a mistake in the way the law has been interpreted by the ministry in its implementation. Therefore, I do not think that there are good grounds to retrospectively change.

If the Government is saying it is now changing the policy intent to bring those two things into line, that is a legitimate call for the Government to make. It can pass that legislation going forward into the future, which would make the two clauses consistent, but what is the rationale, other than it being a fiscal cost to the Government because the agency implementing this has made a mistake in incorrectly interpreting the law? There cannot actually be a justification for amending the law retrospectively in the way that the Government is seeking to do through this bill because the mistake is in the interpretation of the law, not in the law as passed. The law as passed, it seems to me, made a clear differentiation in its intent and in the way it was drafted between the stand-down period beginning and the stand-down period commencing. That is specified very clearly that the stand-down period commenced the day after somebody’s employment ceased, but that the stand-down period ended on the day the stand-down period ended.

Therefore, I do not think that there is a case to be made to say that it was a drafting error because the sections are inconsistent. That must have been picked up at the time. This went through a full scrutiny process, I presume, at the time, and, therefore, trying now to say that the policy was not incorrectly implemented by the drafting of the law, I do not think stands. I think it is perfectly legitimate for the Minister to say that the law was incorrectly applied by the agency responsible for paying out the benefits, but, frankly, I think, who should wear that liability? It was not the mistake of the beneficiaries receiving the money. It was the mistake of the agency. So who should bear the liability for that? Should that liability be with the Crown, the Government, or the agency responsible, or should that liability be with the recipients? If it was the incorrect application of the law, I do not think it should be the recipients who bear the liability. I think it should be the Crown, the Government, and the people who made the mistake who bear the liability for that. I would be interested in hearing further comments from the Minister on that.

Hon ANNE TOLLEY (Minister for Social Development): Thank you to the member Chris Hipkins, who has just resumed his seat. Thank you for that nice try. But in fact it is very clear that the Government policy that was developed in 1996 was in the legislation enacted in 1998. It has been Government policy since 1998 that the stand-down period would cover a full week. So a 7-day stand down meant 7 days without State support. That is what was intended.

I do not know how the legislative error was made—none of us were here at that time—but the policy intent is clear. The operational intent has been clear and has been carried out. What the Government has said, and we are talking about liability, is that once the agency knew—so from that first appeal—that the legislation did not support the operational policy, those people are entitled then to a review, and that is what is protected in this bill.

I do have to say, to clarify a statement I made earlier, that as at this morning just over 8,500 people have asked for a review. That is not just from May of last year. They are perfectly entitled, and protected under this legislation, to that review, going right back to 1998.

JAN LOGIE (Green): Following on from that, I really have had some of my concerns echoed in those raised by the Labour member Chris Hipkins around the interpretation of the law and whether that is the problem or whether it was a drafting problem. I am grateful that the Minister is here in the Chamber and is speaking and engaging on this bill. However, we have heard from the Minister, as we have heard from other members on this side of the Chamber, that the policy intent was clear that it was for a 7-day stand down.

But I believe if you are bringing retrospective legislation to this House to say what the intent of the law was when it is so clearly different from what was written in the law and from what the courts have decided is the meaning of the law, then the onus really, I believe, should be on the Government to provide us with some evidence of that assertion. We have had no evidence of that assertion. We have not had anything in the Hansard debates. We have had nothing on paper from the Minister. We have just had the oft-repeated assertion that that was the intent. We have nothing to back that up whatsoever.

I would now like to speak in my contribution to our Supplementary Order Papers, which we have been hearing about, that we have put forward on this bill. We have been hearing from Government members again that the Greens are being irresponsible for asserting people’s legal rights to access their legal entitlements. Somehow that is fiscally irresponsible, and a certain definition of fiscal responsibility obviously overrides the rule of law and people’s access to their legal entitlements.

I do want to just point out that actually our Supplementary Order Papers clearly demonstrate that we are willing to work with the Government to ensure the certainty that they seem to be seeking with this legislation and that we believe that that certainty can be balanced with what I believe is the primary responsibility of Government, which is to seek to build trust in this Parliament and in our public institutions. So what we have proposed in our Supplementary Order Papers is to allow a 6-month period for everyone to be able to lodge applications for a review and to require the Government to advertise this opportunity. So if it was a genuine mistake, it is OK to fix that in the future. If the Government has a particular policy intent that it would like to see implemented, then we will debate that policy intent on its points. But if you are going to introduce retrospective legislation to deny people their legally established entitlements, then I think a bit more should be required than what is in front of us with this piece of legislation.

I really think that the proportionality—the Government needs to offer more, particularly when we look at the balance of this and at somebody who is accessing the entitlements of Work and Income who may have missed a bus, whose bus may have been late, or who may have been at a tangi or in hospital for a psychotic episode and who misses an appointment at Work and Income and gets their entire benefit—or if they have children, half of their benefit—cut. The severity of that penalty for what is in most people’s minds, I would suggest, a completely reasonable situation or mistake—for it to be penalised so harshly, and then for the Government to come to this House and say “Well, OK, a mistake has been made. We’ll take that and we will give some of you 6 weeks to be able to put in an application and we are not going to mention it.”, is completely unnecessary. And we have to point out that this will be reported in the media tomorrow and there will be people who would be entitled to money now if they had heard about it today, who will hear about it tomorrow, potentially after the Royal assent, who will not be entitled to money.

That is setting up a situation of grievance that is completely unnecessary, when we could actively seek to build people’s trust and confidence and see the Government as recognising its wrongs and seeking to right them and give people access to an entitlement. That is possible in this debate, and members can choose to support our Supplementary Order Papers to be able to deliver that.

What we are going to get at the moment—and I do need to speak to that kind of process around those who have missed out on money because of the misapplication of the law from 1998 until May 2014. When they hear this in the news, potentially tomorrow, they could think: “Oh, I’m an educational support worker. Actually, the way the Government funds our schools means that I need to rely on a benefit outside term time. Gosh, I might be eligible over each year for three lots of quite a lot of money, coming up to this Christmas, while I am really struggling to feed my family and doing a fantastic job in schools, in helping schools run and our children being able to learn. Gosh, I’d be entitled to this—but oh, I’m a day too late. It’s all over the media today and I didn’t hear this in time and I’ve missed out.”

I do not see how anyone in this Committee can think that is fair, when we have educational support workers and we have seasonal workers in some of the lowest-income areas in this country who we know—you know, there are not many job choices in particular areas in this country. There is seasonal work, particularly in the area the Minister is from, I think, where we know that a lot of people are stuck into seasonal contract forestry work. They will have been on and off benefit, and their legal entitlement as of today would be for quite a significant amount of money. But when this bill goes through and gets the Royal assent—probably tomorrow; I cannot be sure—they will not be entitled to anything.

That is setting up quite a significant impact. We do not have a regulatory impact statement because, we are being told, there is no significant impact from this legislation. Well, I would like to hear the Minister or anyone else tell me how it is not a significant impact for somebody in the community to have heard about this and then find out from their auntie tomorrow that they were able to claim some money, and then they are not able to. That—in real terms, in real life—is a major impact, and I am at a complete loss to understand how that is not considered a significant impact.

I would also like to speak about the fact that the law was interpreted by the courts in May 2014 and the Ministry of Social Development did not change its interpretation of the law or the way it enacted it, knowing—and it was given two court rulings telling it this—that what it was doing was, in effect, illegal. The ministry continued that practice. The Minister has told me that she was shocked to find that out. Despite this law change apparently having gone to Cabinet at around the same time—so, knowing that there was a problem there and there had been a court ruling—she had not checked whether the ministry had changed its policy. That, to me, raises some pretty significant issues relating to either the Minister’s oversight or the ministry’s responsibility in informing the Minister. That does seem to me a very worrying breakdown of relationships. I am particularly worried that it may not be isolated to this point.

There was a report put out by the Child Poverty Action Group last year looking at the interpretation of relationships, there is a very famous case, Ruka v Department of Social Welfare, and then the report by Frances Joychild, which was instituted by the then Minister, Ruth Dyson, I understand, looking at whether the Ministry of Social Development had implemented the changes that were signalled by the court at that time, and it found out that it had not. So I am very worried, and the Child Poverty Action Group report indicates that it still may not have implemented the changes. I would quote, if I had the report right in front of me, some of the strength of language of the report. It is deeply worrying for me, when the courts have the role of interpreting law and the ministries and the Government have the role and the responsibility to implement it as it has been interpreted. If that fundamental relationship is being broken on a consistent basis by this Government, or any Government, then we have an absolutely fundamental problem that should worry many people.

CARMEL SEPULONI (Junior Whip—Labour): I seek the leave of the Committee of the whole House to have the officials’ advice provided under the Social Security (Extension of Young Persons Services and Remedial Matters) Amendment Bill that is related solely to the matters under consideration in the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill excised from the select committee and provided to the Committee of the whole House.

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): The member might want to add a little bit more: “so that members can use it for debate purposes.”

CARMEL SEPULONI (Junior Whip—Labour): So that members can use it for debate purposes.

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Because otherwise, I would have to stop you. I think that is relatively clear. Is there any objection to that material being provided? There is objection. It cannot be.

CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka): I would like to thank the Minister who was in the chair a moment ago, Anne Tolley, for her contribution with regard to the concerns that I was raising about what the original intent in the passage of the legislation was. I have some further comments to make on that in response to the Minister because she raised the issue, first of all, of what the Government policy of the day was, not what the legislation was. Ultimately, the question, therefore, from a legal standpoint, becomes: which takes precedence—Government policy, or legislation? Actually, the law is pretty clear: legislation trumps Government policy. Government policy informs legislation in the way the Government presents it to the House, but the word of the law is what ultimately takes precedence. So regardless of what the Government’s policy intention was at the time, the question was what the legislative intent was at the time, and the legislation, it seems to me from a very clear reading of the principal Act, was actually quite clear.

Then the question becomes: what remedy is there if there was an error in the Act? So we turn to McGee, the authority on these issues in the New Zealand House of Representatives, and it makes it very clear that if there is an error in the drafting of legislation, the law that takes precedence, the law that applies, is in fact the law as assented to. Even if there are mistakes between the House’s passing legislation and it being signed by the sovereign—being given the Royal assent—it is the legislation that receives the assent that ultimately becomes the law. Even if the Government’s intention was not enacted by the law, the fact is that that was the law that was signed by the Governor-General and, therefore, that was the law that applied. Therefore, is there good cause for retrospectivity?

I then turn to the Legislation Design and Advisory Committee’s advice on these matters. The Legislation Design and Advisory Committee guidelines are very clear. It is in the very beginning of the committee’s principles of legislative design—Chapter 3, Part 1.7—that it specifies “Legislation should not affect existing rights and should not criminalise or punish conduct that was not punishable at the time it was committed.” It goes on to say: “The presumption against retrospectivity: The general rule is that legislation should have prospective, not retrospective, effect.” Therefore, the question that the Committee needs to turn itself to is whether there is good justification for effectively taking away someone’s rights—for making right something that was wrong, or wrong something that was right previously.

I think that the Parliament needs to be very, very careful in doing that, particularly when it comes to issues of individual rights and entitlements. This is not an authority that we are dealing with. It is not a legislative body. It is not so much a Government department. This is something that affects individual citizens. I think the Parliament needs to tread very carefully when we are trying to change the law retrospectively in that regard, particularly as these retrospective changes go all the way back to 1998. It is the better part of two decades’ worth of previous application of the law that is being retrospectively changed by this legislation, and I think we need to be very careful about that. I think that the Legislation Design and Advisory Committee is quite right in its guidance to the House and to those drafting legislation that prospectivity should be the main principle behind legislative drafting, not retrospectivity.

To recap those three points I just made—regardless of the Government’s policy intention at the time, it is the legislation as given the Royal assent that takes precedence and that triumphs. Secondly, if there were mistakes in the legislation that was given the Royal assent, it is the version of the legislation given the Royal assent that ultimately is the law. Regardless of whether the mistakes were in Government policy or in the drafting of the law, once it was passed and once it was assented to, that was the law, and that has been the law since 1998. The third point is about whether there is a case for retrospectivity, and, really, I think the Parliament will be going against itself, against its own advice, and against its own better principles if we allow this legislation to go through with the retrospective clauses that exist within it. I think we enter dangerous territory when we pass the legislation in the way we are going to be passing it, if this bill is passed now.

There are further points I am going to make about the substance of clause 5, but I will do that in a further contribution. Thank you.

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): No, the member will not, because he has had four calls.

POTO WILLIAMS (Labour—Christchurch East): I want to expand upon the arguments that have already been made in the Committee this evening about the potential conflict. Are we talking about the issue of drafting errors or are we talking about the application and the implementation of policy? I think it is very clear, from what my esteemed colleague has already provided, that when we talk in clause 4 of the bill about section 80BA(4) of the Social Security Act, which talks about the end of the stand-down period, we have not included the previous subsection, which talks about the commencement of the stand-down period and has the fullness of that period, where the language in one talks about ‘the day after”, and the language in the other talks about “the day on which” the period ends. We obviously have an issue here. The issue has been around the original drafting of the legislation, which was rushed through the House under urgency, and, as another of my colleagues has noted, we are again in a process of urgency to correct what may have been either a drafting error or a policy implementation error.

I just want to pick up on the policy implementation part of this. We are in a truncated process and we have not had the ability either to have the input from officials or the input from people who will see the fullness of the application of this bill when it becomes law and is implemented in the workplace. There is obviously a problem, a concern, with that. If we had had the opportunity to have that, if we were not in a truncated process, and if we were not in urgency, we would not be heaping, in my view, a problem on top of a problem on top of a problem. We could be doing this correctly. We could be crafting the legislation appropriately and doing what we should do, which is to ensure that we either amend what happened in 1998 or amend the application of this policy, this legislation, in its application on the ground.

We have heard very clearly that there have been calls from this side of the Chamber, after the issue was raised initially by Jan Logie and then by my colleague the Hon Ruth Dyson, for an opportunity for us to have the information from officials as part of this process, which would certainly add an opportunity to debate this more fully. The previous Minister in the chair, Anne Tolley, has been saying that the intent of the policy is clear. Well, we are not sure of that because we have not been given the evidence of that. It would be in the best interests of ensuring that we get the legislation right, to have that information. Clearly it is needed. Clearly the members on this side of the Chamber would like that information, but, unfortunately, it appears that we have not been able to get access to that.

But there is a real issue with what happens with bills over time, when they become enacted and when the legislation is then interpreted by the courts, and then we have the opportunity to implement that at the coalface. This legislation actually has a significant component within it that may provide opportunities to people to gain back what they are owed. It might come as a surprise to members, but there are people who are watching this debate at home who actually contacted me during the dinner break, asking about their ability to become part of this process. Would they be able to apply? The Minister spoke earlier of 8,500 people who have applied for this process. What will happen this evening is that by virtue of the fact that this legislation will pass, we are putting a stop to a whole lot of people being able to apply for what is owed to them. That is hugely unfair when the Government has not, as it should do, made every effort to contact people and to advertise the fact that this is a process—

CATHERINE DELAHUNTY (Green): Tēnā koutou Te Whare nui. I have been in this House for nearly 7 years, and I thought I was pretty cynical. I look at legislation and I think it might be misguided, but, usually, it has got some understandable merit. Then we get to this bill. This is extraordinarily mean-spirited, it is extraordinarily bizarre, and it is so arcane that the people who have actually suffered from being underpaid by the system—

Darroch Ball: It’s not underpaid.

CATHERINE DELAHUNTY: “Not underpaid.”, my colleague says—quite right. Well, they are not receiving their full entitlement. [Interruption] No? It sounds to me like they are not receiving their full entitlement when they do not get a day’s pay that they were entitled to. They are going to have enough trouble understanding it, let alone applying for it. So I think that we need to look very hard at ourselves tonight and ask “What are we doing in this House? Urgency to fix urgency.”

First of all, I would like to talk about why we do not support urgency for this kind of thing, because look at the mess. There was a drafting error, supposedly, and the courts have ruled clearly that the spirit of this is not just a spirit; it is actually in the law already—that when you are going back after a stand down, you get the money the day that the stand down finishes. This is not rocket science—thank goodness, because I am not a rocket scientist. It is pretty clear, but what about the people at the receiving end? It is fantastic for people to spend time having arcane debates on the clauses, but what about the 70 people who contacted Jan Logie today—let alone any other person in this Committee—about whether they are going to be able to get their just entitlement?

The reason that I am fired up about this, as someone who has been a beneficiary advocate on the East Coast, is that if a beneficiary dared to miss an appointment, or if a beneficiary supposedly dared to do something wrong with their paperwork, let us watch the benefit fraud unit descend on them. I have sat in meetings with the benefit fraud unit; I have seen what they do. If anyone who is on a benefit makes a mistake, it is a ton of bricks time. And then, in the last couple of years, there have been sanctions—cutting money from people. Today on Lambton Quay I talked to a beggar. She gets $13 a week from Work and Income. She is a mental health survivor who cannot get the invalids benefit. And this is the kind of system that creates this kind of mess, and then, when we make a mess, the willingness is not there to clean it up so that people can get what is fair.

How can we hold our heads up in this House and do this kind of stuff to people who are at the bottom of the heap, many through no fault of their own? And then, when the Government makes a mistake, it will not fix it fairly. It is pretty basic: fix it fairly, Mr Chair. Do not be mean—do what is right. Actually, it is pretty basic.

Iain Lees-Galloway: Be fair, Mr Chairman.

CATHERINE DELAHUNTY: Yeah, be fair and do not be mean. It is not very sophisticated language. After all, this is about natural justice. Is it not about natural justice? If we make mistakes, we have to own them. At the moment, this bill does not own what it is creating. So people are going to be knocked out of being able to apply for what is fair. They are going to be knocked out because they were on the benefit before May. If you are after May, you are in, but if you are before, you are out.

If anybody here knows anything about what it is like to live at the tough end of society, the person is on the benefit and then they get some work. The person gets some work and then they lose their job. The person gets stood down and the person then applies for a number of jobs. The person may get some part-time, contract work. The person loses that work and then the person tries to get back on the benefit—the person is constantly on and off. This is not new. This has not happened just since May 2014. This has been happening to people for—well, I would like to say since 1984, actually, but that is going back rather a long way. The benefit system is not treating people the way it expects beneficiaries to behave.

GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central): I want to begin this contribution by taking us all back to 1998. This may or may not be a pleasant memory for everybody in the Committee—1998 was an interesting year. But during that year—in fact, on 14 May 1998—this House was debating the second reading of the Social Security Amendment Bill, which, as best I can tell, is the piece of legislation that is at the root of the problem we have got today.

There is a large number of things I could raise about the debate that night. One of them involves an honourable member by the name of Trevor Mallard, who raised a number of points of order during that particular debate, including an exchange with Joy McLauchlan that involved a number of withdrawals and apologies, some of which I could refer to. If I used some of the language—

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): No. I am now going to ask the member to come to the bill’s Committee stage. Thank you.

GRANT ROBERTSON: But should, at a later date in the evening, you wish to hear that, Mr Chairperson, do let me know.

I want to refer to a speech that was given during the debate by a Labour Party member, Steve Maharey. I want to highlight three things that he said that are relevant to the reason that we are here tonight. The first of those is that early on in his contribution he made the point that the Minister of Social Welfare had that morning given to the Opposition the legislation that was being debated. That was the amount of notice it got. Is this ringing any bells for anybody? The reason we are here tonight, with a National Government deciding to retrospectively take away the rights of a group of New Zealanders, has its roots in the same rushed, hopeless pace of legislation, which this Government, once again, puts us through.

Mr Maharey was very prescient, as he occasionally was. He said: “Yet again we have an example of this Government running along behind itself, trying to get legislation together and trying to get a programme together. When we look through the Bill we see that yet again there are many issues to be cleared up and cleaned up, leaving hundreds of thousands of beneficiaries wondering exactly what it means for them.” That was in 1998. Fast forward to 2015 and the same thing is being done all over again. That is the problem members on this side of the Chamber have. Mr Maharey then went on to say “The Bill is being dealt with under urgency. It will not go to a select committee.”, and he went on to tell us the problems with that.

Once again, we are in this Chamber tonight debating a bill that has not been to a select committee. As parliamentarians we have had our right to actually see the evidence that has gone already to a select committee about this matter denied to us tonight by the National Government. But, again, the problems are—

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! No, the member will resume his seat. I want to make absolutely clear that no member has been denied the right to see that evidence. There is a right to table it that was not allowed. Members can share evidence with other members. There is no restriction on that.

GRANT ROBERTSON: Thank you, Mr Chair, and I will take up that offer in due course. So we have the problem here, just to repeat how we have got to this point. A piece of legislation has not been thought through properly. A piece of legislation was pushed through under urgency in 1998, and here we are again. The Government is attempting to retrospectively correct that with another piece of legislation that has not been adequately looked at, that has no regulatory impact statement, and that is, again, being pushed through under urgency.

Then there is this line from Mr Maharey: “This Government wants to see beneficiaries be the fall guys for its faults.” Well, you could not get a better example of history repeating itself from 1998. What I want to know from the Government, and I still have not heard a satisfactory answer since an earlier call when I asked this question. We have now been given an idea of the number of people who put in an application—$8,500. What I want to know from the Government—

Carmel Sepuloni: 8,500 people.

GRANT ROBERTSON: Sorry, 8,500 people—thank you. What I want to know from the Government is what amounts of money we are talking about here. Are we talking about $80 each for those people? Are we talking $1,000 each? Can we actually get some information into this Committee about what it is that the Government is so concerned about here? Is it the cost? Just be up front with New Zealanders. Just be up front with New Zealanders, and tell us tonight the sums of money that are at play here.

I would actually be extremely surprised if we were talking about individuals with $5,000 or $10,000. We do not know. I do not know the answer to that question right now. The Government must have some idea. The Government must be able to do this, otherwise what we will be sitting with here are members of the Government who are simply not prepared to get up and justify this legislation.

I am really struggling here. You heard Chris Hipkins earlier talking about what this Parliament has effectively decided is the way in which retrospective legislation can work in this House. There will be, from time to time, occasions where retrospective legislation makes some sense. But how can a piece of legislation be retrospective for people after an error is discovered, but not before the error was discovered? The error exists. The error has been there, according to the Government, since 1998.

It is not a matter of finding a dividing line of when a Government official told a Minister, and that happened to be in 2014, which means there is a limited scope to the number of people who can be involved. If it is an error, it was an error made in 1998, and the Government should simply front up to that. But what we learn is that history repeats itself. History repeats itself because the Government tries to ram through legislation and makes mistakes and creates further errors and further inequities.

What I want to hear from a Government member or from the Minister in the chair is some indication of the individual amounts of money that are being discussed here. This would normally have emerged during the select committee process. It is a dead-set guarantee that somehow, someone in the select committee process would have said: “This is how much it is. This is the estimation. This is how many who have come forward to us today and asked for an amount of money.” Otherwise we are flying blind here, and all we are left with is the impression of a Government that is determined to take away from a group of New Zealanders the rights that they should have. There is nothing that has been put forward in this Parliament that would give justification for that.

The intention of Cabinet, the intention of an individual Minister—we have got the names of them here. Shall we go upstairs and find Peter McCardle and ask him what his intention was when he moved this? It is irrelevant—it is absolutely irrelevant. It is irrelevant what Cabinet decided. What matters is what ended up in the law in 1998. That is the only thing that should matter to this Parliament. If we spend all of our time trying to work out what the intent of Ministers like Peter McCardle and Roger Sowry, who were the Ministers who moved it, was we could have any old thing come up. We have not seen Cabinet papers to justify that. All that we have got is the law. It is our job in this Parliament to make the law, and then, when there are mistakes, to deal with them in a way that is fair and is equitable for New Zealanders, and not to deal with them in a way that is convenient for the Government. That is the impression that I have got from this debate—that what we are doing here in the House is what is convenient for this Government.

Let us all own this as parliamentarians. A mistake has been made. A group of people, individuals in our community, have been denied something that they should have got. Let us give them the time—all of them—to make an application to get their funding back. They will not all do it—lots of people will decide it is not worth their while—but that should not be the criteria either. The criteria should simply be that when Parliament gets something wrong, it corrects it, and it allows those people who have been aggrieved and who feel that they have lost their rights or their entitlements to be able to take the course of action that should be available to them.

There is nothing that has been put forward in this Committee tonight that should justify overriding Parliament’s doing the right thing. I want to hear a National member get on their feet and give us a reason for this breach of the rights and entitlements of New Zealanders, because without that, and unless they are prepared to support our Supplementary Order Paper, we cannot support the bill.

IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North): I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. I just seek some clarification around the official advice on the Social Security (Extension of Young Persons Services and Remedial Matters) Amendment Bill that Carmel Sepuloni earlier on sought leave to table and to be debatable. As you have correctly pointed out to members, we do have the ability as members to share that advice with other members of Parliament. What we are unclear about on this side of the Chamber is whether we are able to use that official advice as the substance for debate in the Committee, given that it is still part of a select committee process.

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): I can answer that relatively easily for the member. The member cannot refer to the advice, but the member can use the advice to inform himself or herself—all right. Is that clear?

IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North): Yes, that is clear.

STUART NASH (Labour—Napier): I would like to talk on clause 4(2) of this bill, which refers to section 80BA(4)(b) of the Social Security Act 1964. But just before I do, I would like to read just one statement from the departmental disclosure statement. What the departmental disclosure statement says is a rationale of why we are putting in retrospective legislation. It says that this: “could be seen as contentious, as generally legislation should operate prospectively not retrospectively. However, in this case, the retrospective provisions can be justified to ensure: … financial costs to the Crown that were not anticipated are avoided.” And that is important.

So what the Crown is seeking to do is to avoid costs that were not anticipated. Let us look at section 80BA(4)(b) of the Social Security Act 1964. Let us look at the sort of people that this piece of legislation is potentially going to disadvantage. We are not talking about middle-class New Zealanders who can afford things and we are not talking about the wealthy, for whom $20 means nothing; we are talking about these people.

The Act actually outlines the people whom this is going to disadvantage: people who are on the benefit for “(i) sole parent support; or (ii) a supported living payment; or (iii) jobseeker support granted on the ground of sickness, injury, or disability; …”. We get the picture. These are the most disadvantaged people in our society. These are the people whom Parliament has decided need support from the Government. Therefore, what Parliament has mandated is that we give these people a level of support that allows them to live a life of at least dignity, or, certainly, allows them to stand on their own two feet while they get out of their circumstances.

Section 80BA(4)(b)talks about “(iv) jobseeker support granted to a sole parent; or (v) jobseeker support granted to a person who has recently lost the financial support of his or spouse or partner by reason of death, the spouses or partners commencing to live apart, or the ending of a de facto relationship; or (vi) a youth payment; or (vii) a young parent payment.” Again, I would like to emphasise that the people who we are looking at really screwing, in a way, or certainly denying natural justice to, are those who are the most disadvantaged in our society. We have heard that that is about 8,500 New Zealanders. In the scheme of things, that is actually quite a lot of disadvantaged people in our society who could well do with this payment, if they decide to take it up.

The term “natural justice” has been used. Let us have a look at what that means. It is actually a legal term, and what it actually means is the rule against bias and the right to a fair hearing. That is what natural justice means. That is why we are in this Parliament standing up for those who have an inability to stand up for themselves. We are the voice of these people who are disadvantaged and who look to us to do what is right. And when the honourable member Catherine Delahunty said that she was becoming cynical, I disagreed. I am not cynical. I am hopeful that we are here for the right reasons, and I am hopeful that we can actually do the right thing for those who are the most disadvantaged in our society and who need us to stand up for them and to do what is right.

I listed a group of quite specific people under the legislation that is being amended by clause 4(2) of this bill. We can see that these are people who, yet again, are possibly—let us make an assumption here—some of the most disenfranchised. I would wage a bet that the vast majority—well, a good number of them—will not know that this debate is going on.

Some of them will have advocates in the community who, when this law is passed—if we do the right thing, and Carmel Sepuloni’s Supplementary Order Paper goes through—will contact their networks and who will go out to these people as defined in section 80BA(4)(b). They will say to them: “Let me help you. Let me help you get that money back because it’s coming up to Christmas.” This bill is going to receive its Royal assent before Christmas, of that there is no doubt. And they will say: “So let me help you, and it might make a bit of difference.”

Again, I suspect what will happen is that the word will slowly spread out. When I see here that one of the three reasons for this retrospective legislation is that—

Su’a WILLIAM SIO (Labour—Māngere): This is my first call, and I am surprised that, given the importance of the legislation that we are debating at the moment, the only two pieces of information that are available to me are the Act itself and the departmental disclosure statement, which does not provide a lot of information.

I want to follow through on something that I do not believe that this Committee has really considered in depth in debating this particular piece of legislation, and that is that we are amending the Social Security Act 1964, and this bill—the Government’s bill—does not really provide a lot of information in terms of the principles and purpose of the Act of 1964. I just want the Committee to cast its sight on that particular Act, because that is what we are talking about. That is what we are amending tonight.

The purpose of the 1964 Act is “(a) to enable the provision of financial and other support as appropriate—(i) to help people to support themselves and their dependants while not in paid employment; and (ii) to help people to find or retain paid employment; and (iii) to help people for whom work may not currently be appropriate because of sickness, injury, disability, or caring responsibilities, to support themselves and their dependants:”. That really underlines what we are missing in all of this.

This is about vulnerable people, and given that we do not have the select committee process and we do not have the benefit of advice from the general public, I am asking the first question. How many of these people whom the vulnerable that this 1964 Act was set up for are affected by this retrospective legislation?

How many sickness beneficiaries are affected by this retrospective legislation? How many disabled, or people with injuries, are affected by this retrospective legislation? Some people have caring responsibilities, are unable to support themselves and their dependants, and are dependent on the State to provide support. How many of them are affected by this? If the Minister is able to provide that information, that can give us some clarity in terms of how much money is involved in this, because I understand that Minister Tolley made a comment in an interview she conducted on Radio New Zealand National. She said on 16 September 2015 that we are talking about only a day so it is not a huge amount. So if it is not a huge amount, what is the Government doing? What is it doing to the most vulnerable group of people in our community?

All the Government has to do is ensure that those people who missed out on that 1 day of a payment are given it. At the community level, the people on the ground would see that for the past 18 years a Government department has broken the law, because it has not paid them something that they should have been paid. So it has broken the law. If a business breaks the law, we take it to court. But, in this case, the harm or the damage was done by a particular Government department, and now the Government wants to act on it by refusing to pay out 1 day to the most vulnerable people.

As my colleague Stuart Nash said, $20 is a lot of money to people who are in need. In the last 7 years the group of people in need has grown, and continues to grow. So I am asking the Minister in the chair, Nathan Guy, to give us a total of the number of people in the various beneficiary brackets. How many are affected by this? Can the Minister also provide the amount of money that we are talking about, because that has not been given to us.

Dr MEGAN WOODS (Labour—Wigram): I am very happy to take a call on the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill and to put some further questions to the Minister in the chair, the Hon Nathan Guy, because we have been putting these questions but still do not have any answers. In the course of my contribution on this bill I want to share some of the questions that I have been asked by my constituents in Wigram, and share some of the stories from there.

I would like to echo the questions that my colleague Su’a William Sio just asked around what the numbers are that we are talking about here. We were told by the Minister for Social Development, who was previously in the chair, that we have, so far, had 8,500 claims made since this has gone public, but how much are they for, what brackets do they fit into, and what kind of quantum are we talking about here? That is a question that is really important to us here on the Opposition benches in order for us to understand the impact of this legislation. The Minister is dismissing it and saying that it is only 1 day, but, as my colleague quite rightly pointed out, if it is only 1 day and it is such a small thing, what is the problem? Why are Government members not looking to support Carmel Sepuloni’s Supplementary Order Paper 142, which would allow for natural justice to occur?

We also have a very big question around why we are doing this under urgency. The fact is that this was found out in May 2014—there was a High Court ruling—so why is it that we are here in November 2015 pushing this through under urgency and in real danger of making the same kinds of mistakes that got us into this place in the first place? My colleague Grant Robertson read very well from the Hansard of the debates of 1998, which showed just how we got into this predicament—sloppy lawmaking under urgency, when we do not use all the tools at our disposal as legislators to examine legislation and ask the kinds of questions that we need to ask.

Given that we do not have that opportunity for the select committee process and we do not have that opportunity for people to come and make submissions, I would like to share some of the feedback I have been getting from constituents in Wigram. A group of constituents—I have had a lot of traffic into my office in Hoon Hay—are actually a group of teacher-aides. This is a group of workers, many of whom stand down each term. So when the Minister says that this is 1 day only, that is many days multiplied by the end of term. So for her to dismiss it as being just 1 day shows the Minister does not understand the problem.

This is a group of workers—teacher-aides—who are reasonably low-paid. They work incredibly hard and make an incredible difference in our schools, but these are largely women who, when they stand down, need to reapply for the benefit to support their families. This is a group of mothers who often struggle, who have been denied assistance with raising their children—because, let us be clear, this is what they were entitled to. This is not people here seeking something that was not theirs; this is about asking that people be paid what they were rightfully entitled to.

Something I have noted is that a number of the people who have come into my office to talk about this and who are employed as teacher-aides are actually people whom I have had to help with Novopay issues. This is a group of workers who have already had to deal with the Ministry of Education not being able to get their pay right in the Novopay debacle, and now they are having to deal with another Government agency denying them what was rightfully theirs.

I think this is a very unfairly treated group of workers, and I would like to know from the Minister in the chair, Nathan Guy, how many of the 8,500 are teacher-aides—another question. We would like to see you get on your feet, Minister, and answer some of these questions that we are putting to you. This is being done under urgency and there are real questions that the Opposition is putting to the Minister, and we believe that they deserve to be answered. So for the Minister to just sit there and do his paperwork and not take a call and answer these questions, it really is not giving the dignity to this legislation that it deserves. I would like to know how many of the 8,500 who have already made a claim under this provision are from this group whom I have described—teacher-aides. How many days were these workers affected for? When the Minister says that it is just 1 day, I know that many of the women whom I have spoken to have had a stand down every term. If you put that back—they have been doing this since 1998—that is many terms. That is many days of entitlement that they have been denied.

So I look forward to the Minister taking a calling on that. I look forward to the Minister explaining to us why this is being done in urgency. I look forward to the Minister describing to us how many of the 8,500 fall into what brackets and what the actual liability on the Crown is.

Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE (Labour—New Lynn): It is customary when rising to take a call, especially one’s first call, as this is, in this debate on the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill—and what a lovely, benign, positive, rosy title that is—to state whether one supports or opposes the legislation. Unfortunately, my colleagues and I are not in a position to be able to do that because our support for the legislation is contingent upon the excellent Supplementary Order Paper 142 being put forward by Carmel Sepuloni MP—the gist of which is to delay the commencement of the bill in order to allow all those who have received a benefit between 3 June 1998, when the mistake first arose, and 19 May 2014, which, in the current bill, is when the Government is prepared to restore their rights—to fill in that gap.

If the Government assents to doing that, Labour will certainly be supporting the bill, but Labour cannot support it without that assent, because to do so would be to deny people their legitimate rights after the courts found that the Government of New Zealand is in an unlawful position, and, thus, to trammel the dearly and long-held principle that although Parliament is sovereign, no New Zealand Government can operate outside the law. A retrospective law change to fix a 17-year-old blunder being passed through Parliament in urgency without so much as a select committee meeting, is a travesty, unless it retrospectively restores the rights that, in error, the Government and Parliament unlawfully took. So either we fix it—in which case we can live with the truncated process—or we have to remind the current Government that this principle is worth fighting for and vote against it. The Government is not helping anybody. It is not helping the public of New Zealand; it is not helping the Opposition parties, which are showing willingness to cooperate under certain circumstances. That is because the legislation is being rushed through all stages under urgency, and we are going to be here until midnight tonight, and possibly thereafter, debating this bill.

There is no regulatory impact statement attached to the bill. That means there has been no set of alternative policy options put forward and analysed in the normal way. Therefore, there has been no argumentation advanced by the Government as to what the best option is and, therefore, the public has been denied the usual rigour and thoroughness of policy advice. There is no regulatory impact statement. To make matters worse, no Cabinet papers have been released to the public or to Parliament to show the logic that Cabinet followed in making its decision. The Minister in the chair may wish to take a call to explain what the fiscal risk is that the Government is concerned about. Surely that can be the only reason for not restoring, as the court has indicated, the full legal rights of New Zealanders since they were inappropriately and mistakenly taken away in 1998 and thereafter.

If it is a fiscal risk issue, and if there is a fiscal veto of Carmel Sepuloni’s amendment, then at the very least, Minister, take a call. Be up front with New Zealanders. You pride yourself, Minister, on being a rural chap who does not mess around with words. Well, just stand up and take it on the chin. Tell us how it is; we are big enough to take it. If you think it is going to cost $200 million to fulfil the High Court’s orders, tell us.

Hon Nathan Guy: Mmm.

Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE: Was that a “Yes”, Minister? Because there are those who think that Yes Minister apparently is a training video for the current Government, and the Sir Humphreys are alive and well—

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Come on—back to the bill.

Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE: —but we will not go there, with your guidance, Mr Chair.

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): No, you will not.

Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE: So there are no fiscal estimates contained in the bill. We do not know what the fiscal risk is. We do not know what the difference is between the 2014 fix and the 1998 proper fix, and that matters, actually, because we want to know what the Government’s price is for sacrificing principle here. As I said, there has been no options analysis, so the public cannot tell. Why has the Government not—and the Minister may wish to answer this—considered an interest component in the payback, because the time value of money wrongfully expropriated since 1998 would not be inconsiderable. If I can turn now to several of the clauses of the bill—

CARMEL SEPULONI (Labour—Kelston): I have got several questions to raise and points to make. I just want to start out by saying that because this is going through an urgent process, we really have been denied the opportunity to access the information that would inform us better in respect of considering this bill. Because it has been such short notice and it is going through under urgency, we do not have the opportunity to put in an Official Information Act request to find out why the Government has delayed and did not make this change on 20 May 2014, when it was informed of the technical error in the legislation. Because we have not been given the opportunity to go through a select committee process and have not had the time, we also cannot put an Official Information Act request in for the Cabinet papers—the original Cabinet papers—that would have discussed this issue back in 1998, when the original legislation was going through the House. So it is really difficult for us to take the word of the Government in terms of the intent of this bill being something, when clearly the legislation does not paint that picture.

The Chair has made it clear to us that we cannot talk about the official advice that we have got through the Social Services Committee on the bill that this bill previously sat in, which is the Social Security (Extension of Young Persons Services and Remedial Matters) Amendment Bill. However, I am assuming that we can talk about the submissions that were made publicly at that select committee, where there was relevant information that was made there during submissions that applies to this particular bill. I want to talk about that because this is the only information that we have to inform us, really, given that this particular bill has not gone through a select committee on its own. So I do want to point out the fact that submitters on the Social Security (Extension of Young Persons Services and Remedial Matters) Amendment Bill raised the point that they had concerns that the appeal rights provisions in that bill—which applied to this bill—would limit the ability to review and appeal decisions, and they had concerns that the provisions may not be consistent with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act.

I now want to just reflect on the departmental disclosure statement on the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill that we are looking at now, and just point out the fact that this bill did not go to the Attorney-General. So when we look at the section on “Consistency with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990”, we are told here that this bill did not go to the Attorney-General, and yet the advice is that the bill does not impact on the rights and freedoms affirmed in the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. Well, actually, the submitters did not feel that that was the case. They had genuine concerns that actually what the Government is trying to do, which is retrospectively change the legislation, is not consistent with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. So I think that we should be really concerned as a Parliament that the Government is looking to put something through tonight that potentially runs a high risk of not being consistent with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act.

I really want to point out some of the points that were made during that particular select committee consideration, where we had the opportunity to discuss the elements of the bill that we are talking about tonight. A submission that was made by the very effective beneficiary advocate Kay Brereton raised the concerns that I have talked about. She raised concerns that “The bill reduces the right to review for affected beneficiaries in this way, people already experiencing significant barriers in accessing their review rights, and we see this step in reducing their rights, as a move away from the principle of natural justice, where a person has a right to understand and review a decision which affects them.”

I want to take that point and then I want to go back to the bill, and I want to look at clause 5, “Retrospective effect of amendments to section 80BA”, where we see that “subsection (1) does not apply in the case of any decision or determination made before the commencement of this Act—”. Those people who are quick enough to get in are not going to have the decision on them overturned. That is because the Government recognises that their claim was valid, and I think we need to acknowledge that. The Government recognises that the claim was valid. That is why, in clause 5 of this bill, they are not—

IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North): I would also like to take the opportunity to have a closer reading of clause 5 of this bill, principally because of a comment that was made by Minister Tolley when she was in the chair in response to a point raised by a number of us on this side that this legislation acts retrospectively and that people will not be able to seek compensation for having been denied some of their benefit income. The Minister seemed to be saying in her comment that that was not correct and that people would be able to apply retrospectively. However, I do not believe that that is what clause 5—

Hon Ruth Dyson: They can apply, but they’ll be turned down.

IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY: My colleague says that they can apply but they will be turned down. That may be an accurate reading of what the Minister meant.

But I just want to explore the Minister’s statement, looking through clause 5. Clause 5(1) says that “The principal Act must be read as if the amendments to section 80BA(4)(a)(i) and (b) made by section 4 of this Act had come into force on 3 June 1998.” In other words, this legislation acts retrospectively, and we are to imagine that the changes made by this legislation came into force back in 1998, when the National Government rushed its amendment through under urgency and stuffed this up in the first place.

That, to me, appears, on the face of it, to mean that people cannot seek retrospective compensation. However, we have clause 5(2), which reads: “However, subsection (1) does not apply in the case of any decision or determination made before the commencement of this Act—”. Then we have a series of paragraphs: “(a) that affects the appellant in Social Security Appeal No. SSA 001/14 and SSA 002/14 ([2014] NZSSAA 39);”. I have no idea what that means, and that is the issue with doing these things under urgency. Here we are, debating this legislation, and I have absolutely no idea at all what that clause means. I would be grateful if the Minister, or any member opposite, could get up and explain that, because I have zero understanding of that clause.

Then there is “(b) that affects the appellant in Social Security Appeal No. SSA 115/14 and SSA 134/14 ([2014] NZSSAA 106);”—ditto paragraph (a)—“(c) that is a decision to commence a benefit on the day on which the stand down period ends;”—again, I am not sure how that will be implemented—“(d) that relates to the commencement of a benefit on or after 20 May 2014 and is the subject of an application for a review under section 10A of the principal Act made at any time within 6 weeks after the commencement of this Act;”—that bit I kind of do get. The Government accepts that it was acting illegally for a year and a half, and it will accept applications from people who were treated in a fashion that was illegal during the period in which the Government knew that it was acting in a fashion that was illegal. I get that one.

Finally, there is “(e) that relates to the commencement of a benefit at any time on or after 3 June 1998 and is the subject of an application for a review under section 10A of the principal Act made at any time before the commencement of this Act;”. I understand that one as well. I get that. It means you have to get your application in before this legislation receives the Royal assent, which is probably why the Government is pushing this through under urgency—so as to reduce the opportunity for people to actually get their applications in.

So I challenge what the Minister said, which was that people will be able to apply, although maybe Ruth Dyson is right. They can apply—apply away to your heart’s content—but the law will say that you cannot actually get compensation. I understand paragraphs (d) and (e), and I do not think they operate in the fashion that the Minister led the Committee to believe they would operate. I have no idea what clause 5(2)(a) through to (c) actually means, and I would really appreciate a member opposite rising to their feet and actually explaining that. We are here in the Chamber debating legislation, attempting—

Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE (Labour—New Lynn): I wish to spend a few minutes going through the departmental disclosure statement. This is a very unusual disclosure statement, for people watching—unusual because of its thoroughness, or lack thereof. Here is the first page, and here is the second page—they are mainly blank. There is a very pro forma series of tables thereafter, in which there are only two substantive paragraphs. So the departmental disclosure statement, which is really the only piece of analysis attached to the draft bill, is only two paragraphs long. It replaces the normal release of Cabinet documents and the normal regulatory impact statement from Treasury.

Let me then turn to the two paragraphs concerned. The first one attempts to answer the question “Does this Bill affect rights, freedoms, or impose obligations, retrospectively?”. It answers, truthfully, that, yes, of course it does, because these rights to the extra day’s benefit have been deprived since 1998.

The bill attempts to retrospectively squash what is legitimately owed under the current law to beneficiaries. It might be that the current Government thinks beneficiaries are subhuman, or that they do not deserve normal legal rights. It is here extinguishing 17 years’ worth of rights, minus a 1-year exemption, literally with a stroke of a pen, under urgency, and denying people the opportunity for the normal select committee process, and with barely a fig leaf to hide its modesty. This departmental disclosure statement is the fig leaf, and it is a pretty small one. It is pretty thin. It goes on—I think this is really interesting. Retrospective provisions are not normally allowed, of course, because that takes away people’s rights if Parliament is coming over the top and squashing rights that existed in the past. It says, however, that exceptions are “justified to ensure: the Government policy intent is upheld”. Well, how on earth would we know what the Government’s policy intent is, because there is no evidence of it, from either 1998 or 2014, provided to the House or the public.

My colleague Grant Robertson has gone to the extent of pulling out the old Hansard from 1998, and that made the point that it was a jolly rushed process and the mistake was made because the Government of the day, another National Government, acted with undue haste. But surely it cannot be sufficient justification simply that an undescribed and unvalidated policy intent—call that what you will—is upheld? If you accept that argument, then the Government could intend anything, and upholding any intention could, by that argument, be validation for retrospective law.

Second dot-point—“practice and understanding that has been previously applied …”. Well, you know, that is simply saying that if you made the mistake consistently, it is OK to keep making it. That cannot be a sufficient justification.

Third dot-point—and this, I think, is the most telling of the lot—“financial costs to the Crown that were not anticipated are avoided.” Well, there we are. That is what this all comes down to: financial costs that were not anticipated are avoided. But if the Government is going to override legal and constitutional rights on the basis of avoiding un-forecast financial costs, then the least—the very least—that it can do is to make clear what those costs are. This arrogant, out-of-touch Government does not even deign to tell the public of New Zealand what the costs are that it is overriding people’s legal rights for 17 years to fix. It does not care. The Government members do not even bother to take to their feet. I challenge the Minister in the chair, Nicky Wagner: show us you care by taking a call and telling people what the cost is and telling them why it is justified to override a court-ordered right.

The justification, such that it is, says that certain decisions of the Ministry of Social Development’s Social Security Appeal Authority are protected from retrospective validation. Well, you can say that again. They are protected by a Government that is arrogant.

POTO WILLIAMS (Labour—Christchurch East): I look across the other side of the Chamber, and I see several members of the Social Services Committee—Government members who were part of the discussion for the substantive part of this—where we were discussing the wider bill from which was extracted the component of the bill that we are now discussing. Not a single member has stood to give their view on this bill—not a single member. They have been in the Chamber for hours, probably looking at Facebook, and not actually taking this seriously. I challenge them—[Interruption] Oh, you are actually reading some other things. Have any of you got the legislation in front of you, so that you can actually track what the Opposition members are saying with regard to this bill? I suggest you have not.

Let us talk about the people who are impacted on by this, who could be positively impacted on by this: the beneficiaries of New Zealand who were denied a day’s payment because of an inaccuracy, an error that was made 17 years ago, in a piece of legislation that was rushed through under urgency. We cannot stress enough that here we are, back to the future, doing it all over again 17 years later.

What kind of information has the Government provided for us to make and pass and debate this piece of legislation? A flimsy departmental disclosure statement, but no regulatory impact statement, no idea of the cost—there is nothing on which we can base the assertions of the Minister for Social Development that the policy intent of this legislation is clear. There is no clarity. There is very little information. There is no evidence. There is no select committee process. There is no ability for anyone to feed into this process. It is only for the members of the Opposition to stand and take calls, to review old Hansards, and, actually, to do the work the Government should have done before this piece of legislation hit the Table. It has not been done. Where have you been? Why are we debating this under urgency when the Government clearly has not done the work?

When I was taking my last call I was starting to refer to a beneficiary advocate, Kay Brereton, who, according to Minister Tolley, has run out of electricity in her attempt to ensure that beneficiaries are made aware that they actually have a process that they can apply to. Surely it is the job of the Government and the Ministry of Social Development to do that work, and not to rely on someone—at their own cost, at their own expense—to find people who may benefit from this bill. It is extraordinary that the Minister actually congratulated Miss Brereton for her work but has done nothing to support her in doing it. The Government has got the resources with which to advertise for people to come forward.

I want to just quote something that Kay Brereton has said: “Beneficiaries are not able to fix a mistake they made which created an overpayment in any way but by repayment of the debt. If a person’s benefit ceases a day later than it should have under law, that person must repay the overpayment in full. There is no clemency shown to people who owe Work and Income money. This is a debt to the Crown and will be collected from the person, their estate, or any other party that can be held liable. This money currently owed to beneficiaries by the Crown would make a significant difference in the lives of many and would be a windfall, albeit small and only a day or two’s payment for families and individuals struggling with bureaucracy that gives them no leeway.”

However, when the Government underpays them, what is the response from the Government? It is to actually change the legislation so that it actually does not have to meet its obligations. Clearly, what is happening here is that when the Government found it had made its mistake, it put the line in the sand. It put the line in the sand and said that from this point forward until the legislation is passed—

JAMI-LEE ROSS (Junior Whip—National): I move, That the question be now put.

JENNY SALESA (Labour—Manukau East): Thank you for the call on the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill, which is proposed to amend the Social Security Act of 1964 with retrospective effect.

I feel compelled to speak to and to address clauses 4 and 5 of this bill. Clause 4 of the bill would amend the principal Act to entrench in law the so-called day after principle so that the benefit starts to run a day after the benefit stand-down period ends. Clause 5(1) provides that the “day after” amendment will have retrospective effect up to and including 3 June 1998. Retrospective effect is not something that Parliament should be taking lightly, particularly in passing legislation. We are here today discussing a fix, and this is something that my colleagues Carmel Sepuloni and Grant Robertson as well as others have spoken about previously. We are trying to fix legislation that was actually passed under urgency by yet again passing a bill under urgency without going through the full process of this House.

The Legislation Design Committee and Legislation Advisory Committee was established to provide advice to departments and agencies on the design and content of Government bills. In its guidelines in 2014 it notes that legislation should not affect existing rights and that New Zealand law operates on a presumption against retrospectivity. The general rule is that legislation should have prospective, not retrospective, effect. Clause 5(2) carves out expectations to the “day after” amendment in certain cases, but the retrospective effect of this bill would deprive many vulnerable New Zealanders of their right to a payment. Retrospective effect in this instance is designed to take away a full day’s benefit from many Kiwis who over the last 18 years have been owed money by this Government.

Just today the Salvation Army came out with a report that basically said that, particularly in Auckland, we have so many vulnerable families. I know that many members in this House—I am not talking about members on this side of the House—prefer to walk around with their eyes closed to the fact that there are so many vulnerable families in New Zealand. What the Salvation Army report found was that 50 percent of these families are children—those who are homeless and living in cars today in Aotearoa New Zealand in the biggest city that we have, the city of Auckland. This Government is trying to change the law that would wipe the rest of the arrears so that those who are not in the know will miss out.

The current unsightly scramble under urgency to change the law is clearly ruled more by economics rather than by concern for people or for the welfare of some of our most vulnerable citizens. Beneficiaries advocate Kay Brereton told Radio New Zealand National recently that this legislation would apply to almost every benefit that has been granted in the last 18 years. For some people, they might have gone on and off the benefit a number of times. Every time that they have gone on again, they have been short-paid by a day. These are clearly underpayments under the law. The Minister has admitted that for nearly two decades this has been the standard practice. The Minister has been quoted as saying: “We are talking a day, so it’s not a huge amount.” I can tell this Committee that although it might not be a huge amount to someone on a Minister’s salary, rectifying these underpayments could make a real difference to people’s lives—the type of good people who live in South Auckland in my electorate of Manukau East, those who are struggling every day just to feed their kids, clothe them, and to pay their rent.

It is appalling that the Government is acting in this way to take away the need to pay money owed to people on the lowest incomes, who need every cent to make ends meet. This situation has been known since last year, yet here we are today watching this Government scrambling under urgency, without the benefit of proper scrutiny, to manufacture a patch simply to save money. This is yet another instance where money comes before people. Thank you.

JAMI-LEE ROSS (Junior Whip—National): I move, That the question be now put.

Hon RUTH DYSON (Labour—Port Hills): I know that it is not appropriate to bring the Chair into the debate, but could I invite the Chair to join in my little quiz?

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): No.

Hon RUTH DYSON: I have a little quiz that I want to start my contribution with tonight. The answer is a day of the week. That is my clue for you. Consider this statement: “If a stand down period applies under this section, benefits commence as follows: (a) benefits except those described in paragraph (b) commence on the later of—(i) the day on which the stand down period ends;”—let us say that Thursday is the day the stand-down period ends—“or (ii) the day on which the application for the benefit is received:”—whichever is the later. Here is my question: if the stand-down period ends on a Thursday, what day does the benefit start?

Iain Lees-Galloway: Thursday.

Hon RUTH DYSON: Right. I heard the buzzer from my colleague Iain Lees-Galloway. He said “Thursday”, but for 18½ years Work and Income has said “Friday”. In May last year, through a series of events, Work and Income was told that it has had it wrong all this time. It has been paying people their benefits starting on a Friday and it should have been a Thursday. That is the problem that we are seeking to address in this question. I want to particularly urge New Zealand First members, Māori Party members, and the Hon Peter Dunne to think about that.

The words that I read out are the actual words in section 80BA—as only social security legislation can be numbered—(4)(a)(i) and (ii) of the Social Security Act 1964. That is what it says. If the stand-down period finishes on the Thursday, the benefit starts on the Thursday. Work and Income started it on the Friday for 18½ years, and we are fixing that problem tonight. So we have two choices. We can say: “Oh, well, we’ll just fess up. We got it wrong.” It was not deliberate, of course. Nobody in Work and Income read that and decided to short-change anybody by a day, I am sure, and I am certain no Minister has, over any of that period, regardless of which party they are from.

So we could just say: “Let’s fix it. We got it wrong.” We could say to everyone, going back to 1998, since that legislation was passed: “Put in a claim and we will look at it, and if you got short-changed by a day because we misinterpreted the law, we will pay it to you.” Or we could have a nasty, mean-spirited response and say we are not going to do that—we are not going to fix a wrong that was clearly created. We could say we are going to pay only the lawful amount to a very small percentage of people. That is what this Minister has decided.

This Minister has decided that instead of paying what the law required she is going to pay only from the day her department heard about it to the day it was determined that it had been paying it wrong. That is outrageous. It is outside the law. What the little National Party people across the Chamber are going to do is vote to retrospectively make an illegal action legal and take away a day’s entitlement from a beneficiary.

Well, I hope they sleep well, because, frankly, I would not feel too good about that being my contribution under urgency in the New Zealand Parliament. I would be thinking: “Truly? I worked so hard to get in here so I could cause the law to be changed retrospectively because it does not suit us to comply with the law?”. That is what they are doing. I would be ashamed, actually. I would be worse than feeling not good about it. I would be ashamed to be a New Zealand member of Parliament saying we got it wrong and we are not going to fix it—well, we are going to fix it for a very small number of people, but not for all those who were legally entitled to get their benefit on the day their stand-down period finished.

That has really frustrated me and puzzled me. Why would members of Parliament do that? All MPs have worked hard to get here. Whether they are list MPs or electorate MPs, they all worked hard to get here. Is that the goal? Is the goal to change law retrospectively to take money off people who currently are legally entitled to it? Those members are lacking ambition, I would say to them, if that is their goal.

I want to also comment on the process. I think the process has been outrageous. We have been denied the tabling of documents and advice from the officials. We have got no regulatory impact statement. The question for the Minister to answer is—

KRIS FAAFOI (Labour—Mana): It is my pleasure to take a call in this Committee stage of the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill. I would like the theme of my contribution to be mistakes. We are correcting a mistake that happened here in this Chamber back in 1998, as the previous National Government was in its last throes and its members were preparing to take the Opposition benches.

Hon Ruth Dyson: A bit like now.

KRIS FAAFOI: A lot like now—ready to come back over here. A mistake was made that has taken some time to fix. But the worst thing about making a mistake is when you try to fix that mistake and you make things worse by making more mistakes. It is for a mistake that we are here under urgency—again, without the transparency that should be afforded the public and this Parliament—rushing this piece of legislation through.

Looking to clause 2, it is a mistake that the Government may not—and is probably likely not to—support a couple of Supplementary Order Papers, one from my colleague Carmel Sepuloni and another from Jan Logie, to look at making things fair for those people who are affected by pushing out the commencement date by either 6 weeks or 6 months. That is a mistake. Those people who are affected have not had the opportunity to go to a select committee, because we are here under urgency, pushing this piece of legislation through.

The Government could right the mistake that it is about to make and seriously consider supporting Supplementary Order Paper 142 from my colleague Carmel Sepuloni. It is a very simple Supplementary Order Paper. It would change clause 2, the commencement clause. It reads: “In clause 2, after ‘on the day’ … insert ‘that is 6 weeks’.” That is to give those people time to be able to mount a case to say: “It is the right thing and the fair thing for us to be able to ask for a review, and if this money is rightly owed to us, we should get it.”

Can I just use an example where we think the Government would potentially add some time on to the commencement date. Let us say big corporates found out that they were entitled to money because there was a slight discrepancy within taxation law. I can bet your bottom dollar—and probably millions of them—that corporates would find a way to make sure that they could get what they thought was properly owed to them. But in this case this Government is not willing to amend clause 2, probably because of the people who may benefit from it. It is not willing to help those who are on a benefit to rightfully claim what is theirs, to give them an opportunity to say: “Hey, the right thing and the fair thing is that you should consider paying me what I think is rightly owed to me and giving us more time to be able to do that.” That is why I think the Government should seriously consider supporting Supplementary Order Paper 142 in the name of my colleague Carmel Sepuloni.

It should also seriously consider righting its mistake of not consulting people by rushing through this piece of legislation under urgency. Supplementary Order Paper 144 in the name of Jan Logie from the Green Party looks to add a new clause 7 after the final clause in this bill, to ask the department to have a period of prescribed time to undertake an advertising campaign to let those people who are affected by this change in legislation know that they should have the ability to ask for an appeal, ask for a review, and ask for what is rightly theirs.

If you look at this process at the moment, this piece of legislation is being rushed through with little or no fanfare. In the time that I have been watching this debate, there has been very little contribution from members across the Chamber. They want to sweep this under the carpet in a late-night session of Parliament so that nobody knows about it. The less that people know about this the better, in terms of the Government. That is why there is no select committee process, that is why we seem to have no regulatory impact statement, and the departmental report that we have got does not really add too much to what is going on here. So that paints a picture of a Government that would rather not have this out there in the headlines and that would rather not pay back or give the opportunity for those people who are affected to have their say, and I think that is a shame. That is why I think the Government should seriously consider the amendment to insert new clause 7 as proposed by Jan Logie, to give those people some time—

JAMI-LEE ROSS (Junior Whip—National): I move, That the question be now put.

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Yes, I am going to accept the closure motion. We have had 2 hours 50 minutes. We have heard 34 calls. It has been well canvassed over that period of time.

A party vote was called for on the question that the question be now put.

IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North): I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. At the beginning of the debate the member who has actually moved the closure motion sought leave for this debate to be taken as one question, or at least to have a single debate. That then elicits a wide-ranging debate, and it also restricts the number of calls that members can take. A number of members have reached their—

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): I have heard the member, yes. I look very closely at relevancy; I look very closely at repetition. In that period of time the Labour Party has taken 26 calls of the 34 that were taken. It has been well canvassed. I have listened to all the points that have been raised in the last hour that I have been here, and that is why I am prepared to accept the closure. The Committee will decide whether that is accepted or not. So I intend to put it.

CARMEL SEPULONI (Junior Whip—Labour): I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson.

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Is this a new point of order?

CARMEL SEPULONI: It is a different point of order. I am just seeking your advice because you have been privy to the debate that has gone on here tonight. I just want to get clarification from you. Given that the point was made that the technical error that we are here debating tonight was made because the same sort of legislation went through under urgency 17 years ago, I just wonder—

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): No, you are canvassing a point that could well have come up, and did come up, during the course of the debate. That is a debating point. It has got nothing to do with my putting the closure. The Committee will decide whether we accept the closure or not. I intend to put it.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the question be now put.

Ayes 63

New Zealand National 59; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Noes 58

New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 12.

Motion agreed to.

CARMEL SEPULONI (Junior Whip—Labour): I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. There are particular clauses that we want to support and then at least one clause that we want to oppose. So can I just clarify with you that we can vote clause by clause, rather than as a whole.

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Yes, I will be putting the six clauses separately, so you will have the chance to exercise your preference at that point.

Clause 1 agreed to.

The question was put that the amendment set out on Supplementary Order Paper 142 in the name of Carmel Sepuloni to clause 2 be agreed to.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the amendment be agreed to.

Ayes 48

New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14; Māori Party 2.

Noes 73

New Zealand National 59; New Zealand First 12; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Amendment not agreed to.

The question was put that the amendment set out on Supplementary Order Paper 143 in the name of Jan Logie to clause 2 be agreed to.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the amendment be agreed to.

Ayes 48

New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14; Māori Party 2.

Noes 73

New Zealand National 59; New Zealand First 12; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Amendment not agreed to.

A party vote was called for on the question, That clause 2 be agreed to.

Ayes 75

New Zealand National 59; New Zealand First 12; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Noes 46

New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14.

Clause 2 agreed to.

Clause 3 agreed to.

A party vote was called for on the question, That clause 4 be agreed to.

Ayes 107

New Zealand National 59; New Zealand Labour 32; New Zealand First 12; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Noes 14

Green Party 14.

Clause 4 agreed to.

The question was put that the amendment set out on Supplementary Order Paper 141 in the name of the Hon Anne Tolley to clause 5 be agreed to.

Amendment agreed to.

The question was put that the following amendments in the name of Darroch Ball to clause 5 be agreed to:

delete subclause (2)(d); and

after subclause (2), add the following new subclauses:

(3) Subsection (1) does not apply to any person that receives or has received a benefit that commenced on or after 20 May 2014.

(4) Any person to which subsection (3) applies is entitled to, and must be paid, any additional benefit owed as if the amendments made by section 4 had not been made.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the amendments be agreed to.

Ayes 12

New Zealand First 12.

Noes 109

New Zealand National 59; New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Amendments not agreed to.

A party vote was called for on the question, That clause 5 as amended be agreed to.

Ayes 107

New Zealand National 59; New Zealand Labour 32; New Zealand First 12; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Noes 14

Green Party 14.

Clause 5 as amended agreed to.

Clause 6 agreed to.

New clause 7 Department must advertise review process

The question was put that the amendment set out on Supplementary Order Paper 144 in the name of Jan Logie to add new clause 7 be agreed to.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the amendment be agreed to.

Ayes 48

New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14; Māori Party 2.

Noes 73

New Zealand National 59; New Zealand First 12; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

New clause 7 not agreed to.

Bill reported with amendment.

Report adopted.

Third Reading

Hon PAUL GOLDSMITH (Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs) on behalf of the Minister for Social Development: I move, That the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill be now read a third time. The welfare system delivers assistance to more than 1 million New Zealanders each year, and it is important that people are treated consistently and as intended by the Government.

The Government’s policy that benefits commence on the day after a stand down has always been clear. This technical error discovered in the legislation last year is providing people with an additional day of benefit that they were not intended to have. This is not right. The legislation needs to be changed to avoid unintended costs to the Crown and to the taxpayer.

The bill validates previous ministries’ practice but also provides, as a measure of the Government’s good faith, a reasonable opportunity for clients who feel their interests have been compromised to seek recompense. The bill corrects the technical error and ensures that legislation reflects the Government’s consistent and longstanding policy. I commend this bill to the House.

CARMEL SEPULONI (Labour—Kelston): We are really disappointed on this side of the House. We engaged with the Government in good faith over this matter, recognising that, actually, this was an error that occurred under both National and Labour Governments. What has come to light during this process is actually that that technical error occurred during a very similar process that we have gone through today. It occurred under urgency. It occurred because of the fact that due diligence was not given to that bill, a select committee was not called to look over it, and submissions were not made. Clearly, when we rush things through in urgency like this then we increase the chances of technical errors like that being made. So it seems ridiculous that we are here, 17 years after that bill passed, going through the same process that saw that bill fail in the first place.

All we had asked with this bill, all we had put to the Minister for Social Development, and all we had put to the National Government MPs was that they support our Supplementary Order Paper 142 to delay the commencement so that natural justice could prevail. Unfortunately, the Government could not even do that. We have seen very little argument put up during the Committee stage against what we were saying. We have seen in the departmental disclosure statement that there were fiscal considerations here, and yet we still never got an answer from the Minister or from the National Government in the House today about what exactly those fiscal considerations were, what the dollar amount was that the Government was so concerned about in respect of the claims that could come forward.

We heard from the Minister that there have been 8,500 claims made by people who think they may be eligible to claim back that day, and I say to those people and to the beneficiary advocates out there who have pushed them to put their claims in, well done, good on them. I am glad that at least those 8,500 people will have their claims honoured. Who I am very disappointed for are the other thousands of New Zealanders who are now going to be denied the opportunity to put a claim forward because it does not suit the Government’s agenda. What the Government is doing here tonight is legislating retrospectively to deny them the opportunity to claim what they will be entitled to up until the point that this bill passes and commences.

We had so many concerns raised at the Social Services Committee when the elements of this particular bill were still in the other social security bill. Those concerns should have been taken into consideration here, because, clearly, there was no select committee opportunity to hear submissions on this particular bill. But we have discussed the intent of this particular bill during a select committee for another bill, and we should have taken seriously the concerns that were raised.

There have been numerous reports about the numbers of people who may have been affected. One number we heard come from the Minister was something like 2.5 million people who have gone on and then off benefits over the last 17 years. I guess that acts as a reminder to the whole House that, actually, a large number of New Zealanders at some point in time are going to need to rely on that welfare safety net. I think that that is something that we need to be reminded of. It is not about people wanting to be long-term dependent on the State necessarily. It is about the fact that we have a lot of New Zealanders who at some point in time are going to find themselves out of employment and needing to rely on the State during that period.

So many other elements of this bill are concerning, such as the fact that it never went to the Attorney-General, and the fact that there are concerns that it may not be consistent with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act, as pointed out by so many of the submissions made to the other bill in relation to this subject. We have made it really clear that our concern too is for the people who work in jobs that are more likely to have been in and out of work over a period of time. We referred to teacher assistants, teacher aides, seasonal workers, and those who go in and out of temporary work. Those people are the ones who stand to lose now because of the decision that the Government has made.

Actually, for many of them, they have gone in and out of work over a long period of time. Some teacher aides are employed term by term. Some, at the end of each term, go on that stand-down period as they wait for their benefit to come in during the 2 weeks, or whatever it is, during the school holidays that they are no longer getting paid from the school. Those workers deserved the opportunity to make a claim. The Government has now denied them of that.

I say that they deserve it because of the level of insecurity in the work that they do, the expectations on them in terms of the service they provide, the children—our children—whom they are looking after on a daily basis, the fact that they are so poorly paid, and yet this Government was so mean-spirited that it could not take into consideration workforces like those teacher aides, like the seasonal workers, like the temporary workers. It could not take into consideration that, actually, those workers had something to gain here. It was not just a matter of 1 day—and the Minister has pointed out in press releases that it is only 1 day and that it is not much money. Well, to these people it actually would have been a lot of money, and, actually, to many of these people it would have been more than just 1 day.

Here we are in November, heading into Christmas, and that Government is so mean-spirited that now it has denied them the opportunity to make that claim, and what a difference it could have made to their families. I have spoken to so many people out and about. There are lots of people who may have gone on a benefit once over the last 17 years, maybe even twice, who, actually, have said to me: “I wouldn’t have made a claim.” But it is not about whether or not they would have made it; it is about ensuring that natural justice does prevail and that they were given the opportunity to actually do it.

That is why we put the Supplementary Order Paper up. We understand the Government’s need to correct this technical error in the legislation. We support that. But what we could not support is the fact that it was going to deny the groups of New Zealanders whom I talked about in this speech the natural justice that they deserve. All we asked was for a 6-week window for those people to be able to put in a claim. All we asked was that the Government provide that 6-week window by delaying the commencement date of the bill by 6 weeks, and it is so mean-spirited that it could not even agree to that one small ask from us. We have nothing to gain in doing this. We did it because it is the right thing to do, and all we hoped was that the Government would acknowledge that it was the right thing to do as well.

We have had several speeches tonight from my colleagues, and from colleagues in the Opposition parties, talking about this idea: what if this was retrospective legislation that applied to businesses? Would the Government be so quick to enact such retrospective legislation if that was the case? Of course it would not. And do you know what? The unfortunate thing is that if it was retrospective legislation that might apply to businesses, they would have the means by which to take out a case against the Government, they would have the influence to change the Government’s mind or to force it not to do it. But, unfortunately, we are talking about New Zealanders here who do not necessarily have the means, they do not necessarily know what is happening in Parliament, and they do not necessarily know how the decisions we make affect their everyday lives. The Government knows that. The Government knows that the beneficiaries we are talking about who stand to lose here are often, unfortunately, the people with the quietest voices.

I want to finish this final speech by just, again, expressing my disappointment in the Government. We really did want to work with the Government on this. I also want to just thank people out there who have been pushing this as quickly and as hard as they can to anyone who might be eligible—all of the beneficiary advocates. Particularly I want to acknowledge Kay Brereton, who brought this to my attention, who brought this to the media’s attention, who brought this to the attention of the House. She has done a fantastic job advocating for beneficiaries. There are 8,500 beneficiaries who now have their claims in. The only reason they really started to come in in numbers is because the Ministry of Social Development did start to pay out and people realised that, actually, this is not a hoax and they may actually be eligible for some money, and Kay Brereton is responsible for getting the word out.

I also want to acknowledge the New Zealand Council of Trade Unions. It put the word around to the unions as well. The meatworkers union, I know, put the word out because it has a lot of workers who are on work and then off work and then forced to have to go on benefit, and so may have a number of stand-down periods as well. To all those who have tried to get the word out there, I want to acknowledge them. And, finally, I just want to say “No thanks.” to the National Government for being so mean-spirited, and I am very disappointed—

Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: I am sorry to interrupt the member. Her time has expired.

ALFRED NGARO (National): I rise to take a call in the third reading of the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill. I do so because one of the things I want to make a point about, which has been made, is that we know and we have talked about the date of 1998. So like a previous member of the House who actually went to the Hansard, I too decided it would be of some interest to look at the Hansard of 1998—and it was on 14 May.

It was the Hon Roger Sowry who was the Minister of Social Welfare who put this legislation through. I want to just take a couple of lines out of that and this is what he says: “The bill also extends work obligations to some groups of beneficiaries with expectations about their capacity to take up part-time work.” So that was the intent of the bill. There was a sense that there was going to be welfare change. He also concludes his speech and contribution saying: “In conclusion, the changes to welfare benefits contained in this bill herald a radical change in the direction of welfare in New Zealand.” So that has not changed—the intent of that bill. Obviously it is the technical aspect of that bill that is of some concern.

As I was reading through the Hansard with some interest, not looking on Facebook and so forth, I actually came up to the Rev. Ann Batten from New Zealand First. I thought that New Zealand First and Mr Darroch Ball may have some interest there. This is what she said: “One thing I’ve learnt in my time here is just how shallow and simplistic the howls of outrage that emanate from Opposition parties often are whenever the Government attempts to make any improvements whatsoever.” So I think that there is some precedent there that Mr Darroch Ball is taking—that the Rev. Ann Batten, a member of New Zealand First, also too was in support of this bill and that is what she was saying there.

Barbara Stewart: Years ago. Years ago.

ALFRED NGARO: That is just here in Hansard, Barbara, so I think that is important. One of the things that I think is important that also has been raised, and also came through in some of the 26 speeches in the Committee stage by the Labour Party members, was the need for urgency. Again, how wonderful history is. I know that Mr Faafoi is a great historian. He loves reading history though—

Kris Faafoi: Someone’s going to be history.

ALFRED NGARO: OK—and here is what it says. The attack from the Opposition was around the fact that here we are, in urgency, not going through the select committee process. Well, in 2003 there was the Electoral (Vacancies) Amendment Bill. I know that the Hon Ruth Dyson will remember this, and in the first reading the Hon Rick Barker said this: “I move, That the Electoral (Vacancies) Amendment Bill be now read a first time. Because of the urgency accorded to this bill, it is the Government’s intention that the bill be passed through all stages without referral to a select committee.” Throughout this afternoon and into the evening we have heard from the Opposition about the fact that there was no robust process and about heading to select committee.

But it gets even better—and here are the little Ginsu knives—because here is the next one in 2006. That is right. They may not want to hear this. This is from the Hon Michael Cullen and this is the Appropriation (Parliamentary Expenditure Validation) Bill—in other words, that was the pledge card. Mr Cullen said: “I move, That the Appropriation (Parliamentary Expenditure Validation) Bill be now read for the first time.” There was a point of order around the fact that the National Government asked for the bill, because there was no bill at that time. The Hon Dr Cullen said this: “Speaking to the point of order, I say that a copy of this was made available to the National Party … this morning …”. There has been a lot of criticism about the process. I think that the honourable Minister, Anne Tolley, has actually been working alongside as well as possible with Carmel Sepuloni to try to come to some compromise and agreement about the intent of this bill.

I want to just finalise my comments by saying that this bill has been under urgency. We know the importance of the bill for that: 8,500 applications so far for review, and on average involving around $105. So there is not a point that is there. The Supplementary Order Paper by Jan Logie talked about the ability to advertise this. We know that there has been a promotional campaign by those departments, which has already begun—a few weeks—encouraging clients to seek reviews about their entitlements. The Government has made every step possible. It takes responsibility and, knowing the fact that this is a technical area that it needs to correct, we have ensured that as well as possible we can not only meet the needs of the requirements of the vision of this Government but also too meet the needs of those clients. I commend this bill in its third reading to the House.

POTO WILLIAMS (Labour—Christchurch East): All that last speaker, Alfred Ngaro, proves by his contribution is that he can read. That is all he proves. He makes no valid points. I want to say that one of the points that we made on this side of the House was that the Government MPs did not take a call throughout that whole Committee stage—

Alfred Ngaro: I might need to talk to Ruth about that.

POTO WILLIAMS: You might not need to. However, you should be defending your bill. After all the points that we raised I was sure that the member Alfred Ngaro, as the chairman of the select committee that saw the original bill, would have wanted to make a contribution. But no, Government MPs sit there and they throw the occasional lob but they do nothing constructive, when they have required us to sit in urgency to pass a bill that obviously does not require urgency. There has been no justification given to this House as to why urgency is required—none whatsoever.

We started the day debating the reason we were here for this particular bill, and it is really about a couple of phrases. The two phrases in contention are “on the day which” or “on the day after”. That is all this argument has been about for the whole of this debate. We know that when we go back to the original section 80BA of the Social Security Act—the principal Act—it says “on the day which”. So we have been having an argument for the last—how many hours has it been, Ruth Dyson? Several hours—to say that 17 years ago it was right, and it was implemented incorrectly for the last 17 or 18½ years.

It is a simple argument—let us fix it. Let us go back to 1998 and say: “You know what? All those people who missed out on that day, because of those two clauses, ‘on the day which’ or ‘on the day after’, the people who were actually paid on the day after, you know what, we are going to restore that. We are not going to say: ‘Hey, we found this out in 2014, and that is the day from which we are going to actually fix this.’ No, we are going to go back and have a look at the whole shebang and correct it from the beginning.” What has happened, because we have put that line in the sand and said that we are going to go from May 2014, is that there are a whole lot of people who have missed out on this, and there has been a lot of discussion about the principles of natural justice. They have been excluded from this process because of it.

The Minister said that, to date, they have received 8,500 claims. The previous speaker seemed to intimate that that is because of the work that the Government and the ministry have done. Well, actually, that is not correct. It is because of the work that beneficiary advocates have done and the word of mouth that has gotten out there as beneficiaries have been able to claim and receive what they are entitled to, that people have started to claim this process. But from tomorrow that stops for most of those people who should be included in this process. That is, frankly, unfair and not good enough. The Government takes responsibility just from the date that the mistake came to light and not actually from the date of the original error, which was when the bill was passed under urgency in 1998.

We could have actually provided a little bit more fairness in this process if we had looked at Supplementary Order Paper 142, submitted by Carmel Sepuloni, and Supplementary Order Papers 143 and 144, submitted by Jan Logie, to actually extend the period and give people an opportunity to review where they had been and what they had been doing, and potentially make a claim. We know that there are sections of the working population who are going to be impacted more than others, and those are the seasonal workers, those are workers who participate in school and education activities where their contracts cease at the end of term and they are clearly not able to engage in this process.

This piece of legislation came to the House with no regulatory impact statement, with no clarity that the policy intent was actually met through any evidence, there were no Cabinet papers to support it, and we have had to rely on the word of the Minister that the intent of the policy of the bill is actually that. This side of the House has been working all evening to look through Hansard for evidence. We have had nothing from the other side of the House, nothing at all. This has been a really truncated process when it did not need to be. We have had no external examination and we have had no official input whatsoever. It is a flimsy bill and it has been poorly drafted. We will be coming back to the House probably, in time, to fix it.

We have no idea how much this is going to cost us. There has been no financial examination of this bill whatsoever. There has been no financial examination of the cost of this whatsoever. If there has been, it has not been presented to the House, nor has it been provided to members to debate. That, surely, is not good enough. When we are spending the precious time of the House to debate this bill, surely we should know, and the people of New Zealand—the taxpayers of New Zealand particularly—should know what the fiscal implications of this bill are going to be. We have not had the opportunity to examine that. The resources of the Government are vast. They should have been used to ensure that members of the public were well informed about the implications for them and the opportunities for them to actually make claims, and not leave it up to our beneficiary advocates.

The Minister herself said that Kay Brereton had exhausted her electricity source trying to contact beneficiaries, and she applauded Kay Brereton for it. I was absolutely astonished. Surely that is the job of the Government to do that work, when it has clearly made a mistake and it needs to advise those who could benefit from that error being corrected. Surely, it was the job of the Government to do that.

This is the second of three bills that we will be passing through this House under urgency. Frankly, this one did not need to come to the House under urgency; it could have gone through the normal process. There are bills languishing on the Order Paper that are far more important and far more urgent. There has not been sufficient justification from this Government about why it needed to happen now. Clearly, the bill has been rushed. Clearly, there is a lack of evidence and a lack of a regulatory impact statement, and the other information that should have come to the House for a full and thorough examination has not occurred. There is not much more to say. We have well traversed this bill in the House. Unfortunately we will not be supporting it.

TODD MULLER (National—Bay of Plenty): What a great privilege it is to be able to stand up here and make a couple of comments with regard to the third and final reading of the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill. Was it not great to follow Alfred Ngaro, who put into context some of the interesting comments that we have heard in the last hour or so when he talked about a bit of history in regard to parties that have put historical, retrospective validating legislation into the House. For those who have been totally opposed to this, suddenly hearing some of their history repeated back to them, you could tell it was not particularly comfortable. It was a shame that he stopped. It was a shame he did not carry on for another 2 or 3 minutes.

We are retrospectively validating 17 years of policy intent. Of course, some of that covered our party, but, interestingly, it also covered the time when the Labour Government was in power, with the Minister for Social Development and Employment, Steve Maharey, and of course towards the end of that terrible Government, the Hon Ruth Dyson no doubt had officials come up and talk about the stand-down period being 7 days and the commencement of the benefit being on the 8th day. As the Minister she would have nodded and said: “Of course that is the policy intent. I’m glad the legislation reflects that.” Alas, though, a legislative error was subsequently identified, and, ultimately, we had to find the balance between fairness for those who have been caught up in that process and ensuring that what we come up with has appropriate fiscal prudence. We have done that. It is a great bill, and I commend the bill to the House.

JAN LOGIE (Green): It is with a certain amount of dismay that I stand and speak in the third reading of the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill, which has been rushed through in urgency with a very shady process that preceded that. But before I start my final contribution on this bill I would also like to join the Minister for Social Development and the members on this side of the House who have acknowledged the beneficiary advocate Kay Brereton for her work in bringing this to the attention of the House.

The truth is that if she had not noticed this hidden in the bill, the advice that we had would not have alerted us to the significance of this bill, and we would not have connected this to the decisions of the court and been able to understand the true impact of this bill. Kay Brereton, as the Minister for Social Development acknowledged, is a woman who is doing a lot of work for people who are really struggling, and she is struggling herself. She has had, we have been informed by the Minister, her power cut off due to the financial consequences of her trying to inform New Zealanders of their right to have their entitlement reviewed. There is something just so deeply perverse about that situation, where a member of our community who is trying to look out for other people is living without power from the consequences of that, when this Government has refused to take action. That, to me, is not something to honour without acknowledging the Government’s responsibility in creating that situation.

What we are doing—it needs to be said again—in the House today is passing legislation that retrospectively removes the legally established rights of New Zealanders, for the primary purpose of saving this Government some money. We have heard on that side of the House: “Well, other parties have passed retrospective legislation; nothing to see here.” Well, yes, this House does pass retrospective legislation at times. I think that every time that happens, it needs very close scrutiny, and when that legislation is being passed retrospectively and removing rights for the most vulnerable New Zealanders, it deserves additional scrutiny. And I would say two wrongs never make a right, but that is the argument, and pretty much the depth of the argument that we have heard from the other side of the House. I really think we need to review how this has happened, and the process, in my final contribution.

There was legislation introduced under urgency on 3 June 1998. That legislation under what is now section 80BA of the Social Security Act said that the stand-down period applies in this way: for benefits to commence on the day on which the stand-down period ends, not the day after. For 18 years, since that law was passed, the Ministry of Social Development has been starting benefits on the day after that stand-down period, despite the fact that there is no room to misinterpret “the day on which the stand-down period ends”. I would ask anyone in this House to misinterpret that—to think that that meant “the next day”. Nobody could interpret it that way. But the Government has been paying as if it had said “the next day” for the last 18 years. I asked the Parliamentary Library to search the Hansard of the debates for discussion to clarify that that was the intent, because we have been told again and again and again from this side of the House that the intent, despite the clarity of that piece of legislation, was always for it to be the next day. There was not one mention in those Hansard debates that that referred to that clause—not one. We have not been provided any evidence of Cabinet decisions or discussions that would have illuminated that intent either. We have just been told that was the intent.

I think that if you are going to pass something under urgency that retrospectively removes people’s legally established rights, you need to provide some evidence, at the very least. I personally think the rule of law is pretty important. I think that actually for everything to work well in this country, we need our courts to be able to establish the law and interpret our legislation, and to have primacy of that, and for any Government to follow that law as it is written. Well, the courts established in May of last year—in 2014—that, in fact, the Government was misinterpreting the law. And here we are about to remove and change that law and remove up to that point all of the people’s rights to their legally established entitlements. After that, one of the very significant parts was that the Government continued denying people’s legal rights, despite the court having established it was misapplying the laws. And, again, that was established and went to court twice—not just once, twice—and the Government continued to deny people their legal entitlements.

Then over a year later on 29 July this year this Government introduced a bill called the Social Security (Extension of Young Persons Services and Remedial Matters) Amendment Bill, a title that, you know, would, obviously—not—provoke discussion of this issue that we have had in the House tonight, which brought in this retrospective law change. Submissions closed on 9 September. There were only 10 submissions, and only one of them, from Kay Brereton, actually recognised the significance of this clause and made a submission on it. So we are being told by the Government that there is no need for a select committee process in relation to this piece of legislation because that process has already been gone through and people had the chance to submit on it, even though what we have been given today is significantly different to the clause presented in the original bill. But even then it was so hidden that nobody knew. Nobody had the opportunity to submit and offer their views and their interpretation of the legislation. So then what we had was departmental advice that did not even alert us to the significance of it. Then the first media attention on this issue was on 16 September, prompted by Kay Brereton in relation to her submission. You know, we saw an operational change on 29 September, 13 days after this came to the media—what is that, 18 months after the court ruled that there needed to be a change in the policy enactment of the law.

We do not even have a regulatory impact statement relating to this. There has been very little opportunity for submissions, no opportunities for submissions on this actual bill, and no regulatory impact statement. Technically, the only ability for there not to be a regulatory impact statement is if this legislation makes no significant change to the law—well, of course it makes a significant change to the law, because that is what the Government said the intent of it is: to significantly change the law because it thinks the law is wrong—or for it to have little or no impact outside of the Government on real life’s people. Well, what this does is very, very significant. As soon as this passes—probably—and gets Royal assent in a day or so, there will be a group of people who will find out that they were entitled today to money from Work and Income. Some of the poorest people in New Zealand who could really, really do with some extra money will find out that today they were entitled to that money but, oh, sorry, the day has passed, the Royal assent has happened, and they are not entitled to it. That is what this legislation does. That impact is real. That impact is harsh. I think it has been said already that this is mean.

We put forward Supplementary Order Papers 143 and 144 to give the Government certainty by allowing people to have 6 months to get their application in and to require the Government to advertise that it was doing this. That would have given the Government certainty, some fiscal limitations, and ensured people’s trust in the public institutions and in this House. This piece of legislation fundamentally erodes people’s trust and confidence in our fundamentally important social security system, and it is with deep, deep disappointment we will be opposing this.

RIA BOND (NZ First): I am pleased to rise on behalf of New Zealand First and take this call on the third reading of the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill. New Zealand First supports this bill, and I will endeavour to outline why. My colleague’s contribution earlier in the first and second reading, and throughout the Committee stage of this simple bill is quite correct. This bill is merely seeking to amend a technical glitch and put in place a simple, fair, and clear process to fix this glitch.

New Zealand First has an amendment that basically asks the Government to automatically include those beneficiaries who, clearly, can be easily identified by the records of Work and Income New Zealand and will qualify for a payment under this bill we are debating tonight.

The purpose of this bill is relatively straightforward, as set out in the general policy statement, which is outlined in the departmental disclosure statement. The general policy statement reads: “This Bill amends the Social Security Act 1964 to correct, with retrospective effect to 3 June 1998, an error in the legislation that does not give effect to the policy intent that a benefit commences on the day after a stand down period ends as opposed to the day on which the stand down period ends. It also provides that certain people are protected from the effect of the retrospective amendment, including those who apply for a review of a decision of their commencement date before or in the case of benefit that commenced on or after 20 May 2014 within 6 weeks after the Bill comes into force.”

I have gone over this bill to get a clear understanding of the impact of the technical glitch this Government finds itself dealing with tonight. I noted the departmental disclosure statement asks valid key questions, especially in “Part Four: Significant Legislative Features”. Point 4.3 asks: “Does this Bill affect rights, freedoms, or impose obligations, retrospectively?”. Clearly, the answer is yes, it does. Point 4.3 goes on: “Provisions in the Bill have [a] retrospective effect, which could be seen as contentious, as generally legislation should operate prospectively [and] not retrospectively. However, in this case the retrospective provisions can be justified to ensure: [that] the Government policy intent is upheld, [that] practice and understanding that has been previously applied by the Ministry of Social Development is validated, [and that] financial costs to the Crown that were not anticipated are avoided. The amendment to section 80BA”—of the Social Security Act—“to correct the commencement date of a benefit so that a benefit commences on the day after a stand down period ends will be retrospective to 3 June 1998, in order to validate the Ministry of Social Development’s previous practice and decisions.”

It is the general understanding of New Zealanders that the Government has the legal and moral duty to pay beneficiaries what it says they are entitled to. Once this assessment is processed at Work and Income, people go into a stand-down period. Therein lies the problem: the stand-down period itself. From listening to previous members speaking it seems to be the sinking ship. Clearly, members do not agree with this mandatory stand-down period, which in many cases can, sadly, force people into the early stages of poverty.

This is one of the consequences and barriers that people in New Zealand face when they are standing in line to ask for assistance to keep a roof over their heads, meals on their tables, and shoes on their feet. I am referring to casual workers, teacher-aides, seasonal workers, freezing workers, people who have been made redundant, or people whose current job and current employer are just not a good fit. They go into Work and Income New Zealand to apply for a benefit and get hit with that mandatory stand-down period, and they hope like hell that the last 50, 60, or even 100 bucks will see them through the stand-down time.

I find it amazing that legislative muck-ups have occurred over many years under both National and Labour Governments, such as this bill we are debating tonight under urgency. To recap for those viewers watching, the Social Security Amendment Act (No 2) in 1998 amended section 80BA of the Social Security Act, and it incorrectly changed the wording to mean the day the stand-down ends. The wording change was not picked up until it was identified in a Social Security Appeal Authority’s decision in May 2014—and thank goodness too. Now, 18 months later, here we are under urgency, debating this amendment and fixing a retrospective law to simply close this loophole up for good.

The legislative error was unfortunate, and operational practice was changed from 29 September 2015 so that payments were technically in line with the wording of the law until legislative change is passed. This will now add clarity to Work and Income stand-down periods. I understand that it has always been Government policy that a benefit will commence the day after a stand-down period ends. For example, that means if you have a stand-down period of 5 days then your benefit will kick in on the sixth day. This I know—I am not doubting it—was how this legislation was intended to work, and, of course, the operational practices of Work and Income support should match up.

The Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill corrects the error with full retrospective effect to 3 June 1998. This, New Zealand First believes, addresses the unintended consequences to beneficiaries and the cost to taxpayers. It means that any beneficiary who has lodged a review of a decision related to a benefit commencement on or after the 1998 amendment and before the passing of corrective legislation will still have their review process in the usual way.

Just quickly before I finish, I do empathise with beneficiaries, because no matter which way this bill that is being debated under urgency tonight is covered, or how members in this House choose to debate this bill, comments on social media sites are already slamming them for expecting to benefit from the Government’s “honest mistake”. This has been an embarrassing oversight, and I am sure a regrettable moment on both the National Government’s and Labour Government’s books. New Zealand First supports this bill.

JONO NAYLOR (National): I rise to take a short call on this because, as was said by Poto Williams earlier on, this is a very simple bill. It does not need a lot of explanation. It has certainly been well canvassed for the 2 hours and 50 minutes that it took through the Committee stage—although there was not a lot said from this side of the House; the bill speaks for itself, you see. It does not need a lot of extra input because it has actually been well drafted and well put together by a good Minister who is dealing with what is actually, essentially, a very simple remedial matter.

On that, there is not a lot more to be said, other than the fact that this will actually put something right that needed putting right. It is good that we are getting it done quickly and getting it sorted, so that there is no more ambiguity going on for a long period of time. I commend this bill to the House.

MARAMA DAVIDSON (Green): Tēnā koe, Mr Deputy Speaker. Tēnā koutou e Te Whare. I would stand by a bill that would legislate to clarify current practice, but this is not that bill. As I said at the beginning of the first reading, retrospective legislation to deny people what is owed them is an affront to the rule of law. When that affront to the rule of law harshly impacts on those already doing it tough, then that is a stain on a civil society, on a transparent society, and a stain on good governance. This is bad governance because the Government cannot budget to meet its legal obligations.

I have applied for this legal entitlement, and will be paying forward all funds received to the Auckland Action Against Poverty group. The Auckland Action Against Poverty group is an advocate for those people with the least power and those people who have their power cut off, and without them supporting people like Kay Brereton this blunder would have stayed secret. Let us role model good governance, put right a wrong, and for people to receive their legal entitlement.

I have listened to the hours of this debate and the non-debate as well, and the silence, and I am disappointed that the standard being put forward by the Government is that: “Oh well, they did it too.” Really? Is that our standard? I do not think it should be at all. It is disappointing to know that this process of making decisions relies on people to stay disconnected and to feel that the legislation being proposed does not have relevance to the realities of their ordinary lives, and I am dismayed by that.

I do not want to forget—I do not want to forget—what it is like when $20, or when $10, will make a big difference. I remember scraping that together to feed a family of five. Actually, that is luxurious for many people—$20 is a luxurious family dinner for many people. I do not want to forget that. I hope this House does not just remember it but reaches back to that connection and understands those realities, and that we are relying on those people to feel disconnected from what we are doing here.

So this is another slap in the face for the tens of thousands of those not holding the balance of power, who have been consistently getting bad outcomes from this Parliament during the tenure of the current Government. It is time they received some help from this place, which is why I am proud to oppose this bill. Kia ora.

Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: A 5-minute call—I call David Seymour.

DAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): I rise on behalf of the ACT Party in support of this bill. We have had a couple of contributions from the Green members, characterised by melodrama and an exhibition of empathy. The reality is that there are always transaction costs for any kind of system. Whether it is a company or an insurance programme, there is actually a cost of administering it and making the connections between the different parts of the machinery that need to be made. And that is one of the reasons that in most systems people design we have a statute of limitations. We say that things that happened a long time ago are going to be very, very costly to relitigate now, and so we are going to draw a line at some point in the past and not litigate prior to that.

If you would like a practical example, what we are dealing with here is a kind of insurance scheme where, if you fall on hard times, you get a benefit from the Government. If, for example, my car insurance company was to tell me that it was going to put up my premiums and add excessive costs to me and everybody else who contributed to the company so that it could relitigate a very large number of low-value claims stretching back 17 years, then the common-sense, empathic response from someone who really cares about the long-term overall welfare of the people of Aotearoa New Zealand would be to say: “That is not a good use of resources.” They would not come into this House and give us melodrama and exhibit their flow of empathy; they would actually say that is not a good use of resources.

What we are doing here in this House tonight is saying that, rather than paying excessive transaction costs to relitigate long-lost transactions that happened a long time ago, we are actually going to set a statute of limitations and move on and deal with the real business of empathically serving New Zealanders with an efficient welfare State. That is what this bill is about. Hopefully one day the Green Party members will pull their heads out and support similar sensible measures. Thank you.

Dr PARMJEET PARMAR (National): I am taking this short call to support this bill in its third reading. The 1996 tax reduction and social policy legislation technically provided for the benefit stand-down period to finish a day earlier than it is intended to, but the explanatory note clearly states that the stand-down period should be a full calendar week. That means it should be for 7 days; that means the benefit should start after the 7 days of the stand-down period finish. So we see that the practice has been in line with the intention of the bill, but the legislation has not been in line with the bill. It is important that people are treated equally under the law and that the legislation reflects the treatment that people receive.

It is unfortunate that since 1998—since we had this practice—this was not picked up by any Government, until last year when it was picked up by the court. We know that the promotional campaign is already on to inform people, inform clients of Work and Income, that they have the opportunity to seek a review of their entitlement regarding the stand-down period.

Finally, I want to thank all the people, those who have put in the effort to bring this bill before the House under urgency. I support this bill and I commend it to the House.

IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North): The explanatory note of this legislation says that this bill gives effect to the policy intent of the original legislation passed—well, the debate occurred on 14 May 1998, but it came into effect on 3 June 1998. This whole debate, and this whole legislation, has been predicated by the premise that there was a clear policy statement from the 1990s National Government that it was its intention that the stand-down period should last a full 7 days. I do not think a single member of this House has been able to find any evidence that that was, in fact, the policy intent. The only reference that we have to turn to, to try to find out what the policy intent of the Government at the time was, is the Hansard. I have spent a fair amount of time this evening, as I have been listening to the debate, thumbing through the relevant Hansard, and there is no reference at all to the stand-down period or to what the length of the stand-down period should be—certainly not in the Minister’s speeches, and it is the Minister’s speeches to the House that we often go to, to find out what the policy intent actually is, and there is no reference in there at all.

At the outset, the purpose of this legislation stood on very, very shaky ground indeed. Then we have a variety of other issues that have been raised throughout the debate this evening. Principal of those is that if it was the policy intent of the then National Government for the stand-down period to be a full 7 days, and if this was a genuine mistake, then it was a mistake born of rushed legislation. The original legislation was passed under urgency—actually, during Budget urgency, which appears to me to be a gross abuse of Budget urgency because this was not a Budget measure at all. It was passed under urgency, and it was not shown to the Opposition until a few hours before the debate took place. This is the kind of error that occurs when you push things through under urgency. In a way, it is deeply ironic that the current National Government is seeking to fix a mistake made by a previous National Government—a mistake that was made under urgency—by passing legislation under urgency; legislation that the Opposition has not had an opportunity to scrutinise properly, which we have been given no regulatory impact statement for, which we have been given no background documents for, and which we have a very, very scant departmental disclosure statement for. We are at risk once again of making bad law that is not fit for purpose and that does not actually achieve the policy intent that is being stated by the Government.

I wonder what would have been the harm of taking this legislation to a select committee, because it has been more than a year and a half since the Government actually realised that it was acting illegally—and let us be clear about that. I have heard from members opposite that this is just a technical amendment to tidy up a technical mistake. That is not quite the truth. The truth is that the Government has been acting illegally, the Government has been acting illegally for some 17 years, and Governments of both hues have been acting illegally. But the interesting thing is that when this Government discovered that it was acting illegally, it made a conscious decision to continue acting illegally, and it was only after that illegal action became publicly apparent that this Government decided to take action. So I think that speaks to the values of this Government. It is one thing to make a mistake; it is another to know that you are acting illegally and to continue to do so and hope that you can hide it from the public for as long as possible and act only when that information becomes publicly available. That is what the Government has done.

This is more than a technical amendment; this is actually retrospectively making legal what was illegal, and, through that process, denying people who have been adversely affected by the improper implementation of the legislation, as it was enacted back in 1998, the opportunity to seek compensation for the illegal activities of the Government. So when members opposite get up and make very brief speeches about how this is nothing more than a technical amendment, I say that there is nothing that could be further from the truth. Nothing could be further from the truth, because that Government knowingly acted illegally and in a way that detrimentally affected the incomes of potentially thousands of New Zealanders. We know from the one bit of information that the Minister was able to give us that over 8,000 people have made claims within the narrow opportunity that is available for people to make claims. That is 8,000 people. That will be a tiny subset of the total number of people who have been affected by this legislation.

There is another thing that I also want to challenge, which members opposite have been saying throughout the debate, and it is that this legislation is about a large number of very small claims. I think that was the thrust of the ACT Party leader’s contribution: that these are small claims that are of no real significance, and that Parliament and the Ministry of Social Development should not waste resources on dealing with them. In fact, what we suspect—and what we really know; again, we do not have details—is that there will be a group of people who are severely and adversely affected by this.

I know this is a source of great amusement for National Party members, but there are a number of vulnerable working people who are severely and adversely affected by this, and those are people who are on temporary work, people who move in and out of fixed-term contracts, people who are on temporary contracts, people who get work through labour hire companies, and people who move in and out of work on a regular basis, because every time they move out of work and have to apply for a benefit, the stand-down period applies to them. We have had the example of teacher-aides, but there will be numerous other examples of people who, by the nature of their work, move in and out of work and they will have had a number of these days where they have been illegally denied income through the benefit system, and that will total up. Over 17 years—moving in and out of work maybe 5 times a year—there could very well be some people who have been significantly impacted by this. Again I say it is a source of amusement for the National Party; that is not so for those of us on this side of the House. We are actually concerned that there are people out there who have been severely and adversely affected by the failure of this Government to appropriately address this illegal activity that the Government has been engaging in.

As I said, I have been looking through the Hansard, looking for any indication that it was the Government’s original intention for the stand down to be 7 days, not 6 days. I could not find any, but I did find this, and I think it is an appropriate way to finish this debate. It is a quote from my predecessor and friend the Hon Steve Maharey, who said at the time, during this debate: “This Government wants to see beneficiaries be the fall guys for its faults. This Government wants the victims of this Government to pay for what it is not able to achieve. There is no opportunity in this Bill. There is no chance for a person to get a decent job with a living wage. There is nothing about families in this Bill. There is nothing about getting ahead in this Bill. It is all about the Government saying: ‘We can’t get the economy to grow, we can’t give you a chance to get a job, we can’t get wages to go up, and beneficiaries are going to wear it.’ ” Those words are as true today as they were in 1998, and that, I think, is a very appropriate way to finish this debate on what is an appalling bill, which has been a shambolic process to tidy up a classic National Party shambles.

STUART SMITH (National—Kaikōura): This has clearly been a long night. I think one of the members over there is almost asleep and dreaming, given those last few words. It is actually my pleasure to have the last words in this debate, and it has been a wide-ranging debate. I think there has been agreement across the House that there is an error in the legislation, and the issue is now how far back the decision goes, as far as the applications for review. Being a good Minister and a good Government is about balance, and we have an excellent Minister for Social Development, who has struck the right balance. With that, it is my pleasure to commend this bill to the House. Thank you.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill be now read a third time.

Ayes 75

New Zealand National 59; New Zealand First 12; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Noes 46

New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14.

Bill read a third time.

Bills

Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill

First Reading

Hon Peseta SAM LOTU-IIGA (Minister of Corrections) on behalf of the Minister for the Environment: I move, That the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill be now read a first time. The purpose of the bill is to provide more flexibility to the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel to help ensure that it can deliver its recommendations on the proposed Auckland Unitary Plan to the Auckland Council by the statutory deadline of 22 July 2016.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! Can I just ask the member’s colleagues—it is quite rude to do that, Mr Naylor. Thank you.

Hon Peseta SAM LOTU-IIGA: Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker. In order to achieve this, the bill has three main components. Firstly, the bill reduces the quorum required for hearing sessions from three members to two members. Secondly, it will allow an increase in the possible number of appointed hearings panel members from seven to 10, excluding the chairperson. Thirdly, the bill will enable the hearings panel to make its recommendations on the proposed Auckland Unitary Plan in stages after hearings are completed on a particular topic, rather than in one final report.

Before I discuss these components in more detail, I think it is important to reflect on the context of these changes. In 2010 this Government embarked on a reform of Auckland’s governance arrangements, including the development of a single combined plan covering the whole region. Auckland’s first unitary plan is the biggest exercise of its kind undertaken under the “RMA”, or the Resource Management Act, and it includes the review and the rationalisation of the seven district plans, the Auckland Regional Policy Statement, and regional plans inherited from the former councils into one new, comprehensive unitary plan.

The streamlined process was designed to significantly reduce the time to produce a plan for Auckland than what would be needed under the standard Resource Management Act plan-making process. It will reduce the uncertainty, the cost due to complexity, and also it will enable speedier implementation of improved rules and regulations to support the need to increase the supply of housing, as well as business land, in the Auckland region. The unitary plan, of course, is critical to responding to Auckland’s growth and the resulting demand for development opportunities for both housing and employment.

The Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Act established this streamlined plan-making process, and it went through this House, as you all know, including an independent hearings panel that was created to hear submissions on that proposed plan. This is intended to result in a faster delivery of a high-quality, operative Auckland Unitary Plan, but to meet this need for fast delivery of the hearings panels, it is required to make recommendations by 22 July of next year.

The hearings panel made good progress. Approximately 79 percent of the hearings have been heard to date, but the independent hearings panel published 13 items of interim guidance on regional policy statement topics and subsequently on district plan level topics of regional significance. Hearings on site-specific matters are due to begin in mid-January of next year, but the focus of these topics will be the impact of proposals on specific sites, and, thus, potential impacts on individual property rights. Accordingly, the level of public interest for these topics is quite high.

The matters due to be heard represent approximately 57 percent of all the matters raised in submissions, and 39 percent of those submitters have indicated that they want to be present at a hearing session. Auckland Council estimates that these submissions contain approximately 20,000 separate requests for a change of zoning, relating to more than 150,000 properties across the Auckland region. If a high percentage of the submitters who indicated that they wished to be heard actually attend the hearings, then more days of hearings will be required than the current time frame allows, and that is why we need to make a dramatic increase in the expected workload of these panels, and it raises the risk that these panels will not be able to deliver on those recommendations at that due date in July of next year.

So it is critical that the hearings panel be able to continue its good processes and to make the recommendations to the council on time, and that is why a number of changes to the Act are required via this amendment bill. The first main component of the bill, of course, reduces the quorum required for hearing sessions from three to two members. Currently a quorum of a minimum of three members of the panel must be present at each hearing session.

Reducing the quorum from three to two, of course, will allow for up to four concurrent sessions to be held at any one time, and it allows for more submitters to be heard within the existing time frame. I consider it possible for many site-specific topics to be heard by only two members without any loss of quality of those particular hearings. For more complex or controversial topics, the existing quorum of three should be maintained, but I have every confidence in the panel’s ability to use its discretion about what is appropriate for each hearing session.

Secondly, the second component, as I have already described earlier, will allow an increase in the possible number of appointed hearings panel members from seven to 10, excluding the chair. Currently the panel comprises a chair and seven other members—a maximum of eight members on these panels. Allowing the appointment of an additional three panellists will ensure that the submissions, again, can be heard by three or more panellists, and allow up to three concurrent hearing sessions at any one time, and this would raise the overall number of panel members from eight to a maximum of 11, including the chair.

Again, the third component is to enable the hearings panels to make recommendations on the proposed Auckland Unitary Plan in stages, particularly on a particular topic, after hearings are completed, rather than one final report. Currently the panel is required to make its recommendations on the proposed Auckland Unitary Plan on one report after it has finished hearings of all those submissions.

Enabling the panel to make its recommendations in stages, again, is to expedite this system and give increased flexibility for the panel to run this process as it sees fit, and, again, reach that deadline of 22 July of next year. I believe it is a sensible and it is a pragmatic proposal, as it would give Auckland Council more time to consider the hearings panel recommendations. To avoid confusion, Auckland Council will still be required to issue its decisions on the entire Auckland Unitary Plan. This will be done within 20 working days of receiving the final set of recommendations from the hearings panel.

To support these policy changes, additional recommendations are required. Firstly, the bill will create a requirement for the Minister for the Environment and the Minister of Conservation to consult with the Auckland Council, the independent Māori statutory board, and the chairperson of the hearings panel prior to appointing additional or replacement hearings panels members. Secondly, the bill will clarify that the hearings panels may hold hearing sessions concurrently, and that an additional chair may be appointed for the purposes of chairing a hearings session.

It is critical that the hearings panel contributes to the good progress that it has made and deliver the recommendations to the council by its statutory deadline of July of next year. This bill needs to be passed by the end of this year to ensure that the policy changes can take effect prior to the expected increase in workload, which, of course, will start in January of next year.

This bill represents a great opportunity to ensure that the country’s largest planning process remains on track to become operative as soon as possible. It is Auckland’s first unitary plan, and it is significantly larger in scope and more complex than any planning exercise undertaken in New Zealand to date. Having been a member of the Auckland City Council, which put together the last unitary plan, I understand the real complexities and the time that it takes to put such processes through. With pride, I recommend this bill to the House.

Hon PHIL GOFF (Labour—Mt Roskill): That speech by the Hon Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga would have been one of the sleepiest deliveries of any introductory speech that I have heard during my entire time in the House. I know that we are under urgency, that we have been meeting since 9 o’clock this morning, and that it is a quarter past ten and probably past the Minister’s bedtime, but I thought that he could have put a little bit more enthusiasm in the speech than that. The Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill is a bill that is supported by the Labour Party. In fact, it has been requested and supported by Auckland City, and this party is certainly supportive of Auckland City and the desire to make that a great city. I hope that this bill is a sign of a change of heart by the Government, a new readiness to cooperate with Auckland City in the future, because in the past it has seemed that that has not always been the case. In fact, Auckland City and the central government often seem to have been working down different paths. I am sorry that the Minister who is in charge of the bill, the Hon Nick Smith, is not here to say this to directly—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order!

Hon PHIL GOFF: —but I regret that some of the time when the Minister makes comments about problems that Auckland faces, he is scapegoating Auckland as the cause of the very problems that his central government refuses to address. So I hope that this bill, working to implement something that Auckland City wants, is a sign of a better future in the relationship between central government and Auckland City. I hope that the Minister realises, coming as he does from a smaller town, that with 36 percent of the population of the country and 36 percent of the production of the country, for New Zealand to succeed Auckland has to succeed, and for Auckland to succeed we need a decent unitary plan. That is what this bill is designed to help facilitate.

Actually, the bill does two things. First of all, it corrects mistakes in the principal Act, the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Act of 2010—and I will get to those errors, because we have had a couple of days of urgency where all this House seems to be doing is correcting mistakes made by a Government that has been hasty and has ill-considered the legislation before it. Urgency is never a good way to correct mistakes, because when you force a bill through under urgency, in the middle of the night when the Minister is barely awake, and you do not send it to a select committee, you do not get a chance for the public to have scrutiny of the legislation, nor the committee to have scrutiny, nor the experts who could have corrected the mistakes that led to our doing this now under urgency. It is a vicious cycle, but the Government never seems to learn from its mistakes.

The first thing this bill does—and I will come back to it later—is to correct errors that were made in the principal Act, and because those errors need to be corrected, we are from the Opposition and we are here to help the Government. The second thing, and the most important thing that this legislation does, is to facilitate the processing of submissions on the draft Auckland Unitary Plan. This plan is the most complex and far-reaching of any plan that has been considered, probably in the history of this country. It is incredibly important. The unitary plan brings in 13 different district and regional plans, and it brings them together into one. And it means that we will have a resource planning mechanism for Auckland that is less complex, less fragmented, and, hopefully, better able to facilitate sound development, sustainable development, and housing affordability in Auckland.

Towards the end of my speech I want to focus on housing affordability, because the Minister, in his comments about this bill, has emphasised that this is a way to help address Auckland’s housing crisis. Well, it may, but it will not come anywhere near the need to address the level of crisis in Auckland’s housing, where house prices are now, on average, over $900,000, where they have gone up in a year by $180,000, where rents are increasing by three to four times the rate of overall inflation, and where homeownership has dropped to its lowest level in 64 years. Although the Minister may be optimistic that the unitary plan can address all of this, I have got news for the Minister: he is going to have do a whole lot more than this, and he needs to do a whole lot better than this in order to address that problem. The unitary plan is one aspect of the solution for Auckland’s crisis, but it is only one aspect, and a lot more needs to be done.

What the principal Act did was instead of relying on the Resource Management Act to bring together these 13 different plans—that would have taken a decade—it brought in a streamlined process whereby the unitary plan could be notified, submissions could be heard on it by the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel, and then that panel report back to the council. A statutory deadline for that report back to the council with recommendations has been set, it is 22 July 2016, and there is a huge amount of work still to be done—it has heard thousands of submissions, but it has another 5,000 submissions to be heard on site-specific issues. There was a real risk that this unitary plan was not going to be completed by the statutory deadline, would not be considered by the council before the council elections in October next year, and, as the Minister said, the council would not have the new unitary plan in place at the time that the special housing areas legislation is due to expire.

I am not quite sure why the Minister should be worried about the impact of the special housing areas legislation being due to expire, because the Minister set a target for Auckland of 39,000 extra houses. Does that not sound good—39,000 extra houses for Auckland over 3 years? Even if it achieved that it probably would not resolve the imbalance of supply and demand, but it would go some way towards it. But the special housing areas legislation, the expiry of which the Minister is so worried about, was due to facilitate that, and what did it do? Well, here is the business section of the New Zealand Herald. You know, 2 out of the 3 years now having passed towards the goal of 39,000 houses, how many houses have been built in the special housing areas?

Phil Twyford: Let me guess.

Hon PHIL GOFF: Let us have some bids. How many houses, out of the 39,000 that were needed by Auckland, have been completed?

Phil Twyford: 10,000.

Hon PHIL GOFF: 10,000—do I hear something a bit better than that? That is very optimistic, from Phil Twyford.

Phil Twyford: 5,000.

Hon PHIL GOFF: 5,000—he has halved it, but he is still not there—nowhere near there. Do you know, Mr Assistant Speaker, how many houses have been completed in the special housing areas?

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): No.

Hon PHIL GOFF: No, you do not know. Well let me tell you. It is 102—102 whole houses completed under the special housing area legislation, but the Minister says that we have got to rush this legislation through under urgency for fear that the special housing legislation expires. Well, I welcome 102 houses, but 102 houses, when the goal was set by the Minister himself of 39,000 extra houses, is not good. Although I have made a little bit light of it, it is a serious problem. It is a serious problem because Aucklanders no longer can achieve the Kiwi dream of owning their own home. Aucklanders can barely afford to rent their own homes. In fact, the Government is spending $2 billion a year in subsidising rentals because people cannot afford to make their rental payments—$2 billion a year and a lot of that is going into Auckland.

So let us come back to the question of the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel and how this Government is trying to facilitate it getting through the workload it has in front of it. It does it by three mechanisms, and we are in favour of those. Firstly, the bill reduces the quorum for hearing sessions from three to two members. That might have a marginal impact in terms of the quality of the input, but I think the impact would be just that: marginal. I think two members can cope with that, particularly on the very specific nature of the issues that they will be hearing from January next year. Secondly, it allows an increase in the possible number of appointed hearings panel members from seven to 10. That is a good thing because there will be more people available to serve on the panels. And, thirdly, it enables the hearings panel to make its recommendations in stages rather than in one final report. So it will make its recommendations after each point is reached in the hearings rather than as one. So we support those three measures. We support the measures to correct the mistakes of the past, but we are utterly disparaging of the Minister’s claim that even if we get this unitary plan right—and I hope we do—that that is going to solve the massive housing crisis of availability and affordability in New Zealand. It will barely touch on that. Much more needs to be done.

SCOTT SIMPSON (National—Coromandel): Well, there we have it. The contrast could not have been more apparent tonight. After the careful, deliberate, measured introductory speech from the Minister, we had the first version of the campaign speech for the Auckland mayoralty by the member for Mt Roskill, who has suddenly rediscovered his Auckland roots and is in full-blown Auckland campaign mode. He has ditched the Labour Party red tie. He has got his new campaign tie on. It has that sort of bluish, greenish tinge, and there he is, practising his speech for the 22nd, this coming Sunday, and he is going to be into it.

There he was, about to desert the Labour Party’s ship, about to leave all that he has been practising for 30 years in this House, and all for this speech tonight on this new bill, which is being introduced, as I say, after the careful, deliberate, and measured contribution from the Minister who did such a good job in setting out why it is that this House is considering this bill at this time on this night. It is an important piece of technical legislation that needs to be passed before Christmas.

The legislation needs to be put in place so that, as the member for Mt Roskill so rightly said, Auckland can continue to succeed. Even in the provinces, even in the beautiful Coromandel electorate, it is important that Auckland succeeds, because when Auckland succeeds the rest of the country succeeds and so too do the provinces. That is why I am very pleased to be able to stand in this first reading debate and support the introduction of this bill.

Effectively, when the principal Act was introduced in 2010 the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel was established. It was established to hear submissions on the proposed Auckland Unitary Plan. This plan is a very big piece of work. It is a huge undertaking. The submissions that have been received on the plan have been many and varied, and it is important that they get due hearing and that they are well considered by the hearings panel.

So this piece of legislation proposes to amend the principal Act to essentially do three things. First of all, it will reduce the quorum required for the hearing sessions from three members to two members. I want to spend a minute or two just going over some of these points, a little later in my contribution. The second thing that this bill does is it increases the maximum number of members of the hearings panel from seven to 10. The third part of this bill is to enable the hearings panel to make its recommendations in stages, after hearings are completed on a particular topic, rather than having to wait for the complete submission process to have taken place.

So what will reducing the quorum of the hearing sessions do? Well, it will reduce the number of members required to be a quorum from three to two. Currently the three panel members have to be present at every hearing session, so reducing this will mean that a flexibility can be applied that will enable up to four hearings to take place at the same time. That will speed up the process. It will speed it up and improve the efficiency.

Although three members could well be present for some of the more complex and controversial hearing topics, the panel can be relied upon to exercise its discretion. I have faith and I am confident that they will be able to exercise that discretion easily and well and without fear of concern about that process.

The second major point is that the increase in the size of the panel increases the membership from seven to 10. This will help ensure that that process of concurrent hearings can occur in a seemly and timely way. The third major change enables the panel to make its recommendations in stages. That has not been the case until now. So this is a good little technical adjustment that will help this unitary plan hearings process; it will help Auckland succeed.

I want to be the first in this House to wish the member for Mt Roskill, Phil Goff, well in his campaigning intentions. I am pleased that he has delivered the opening campaign address tonight, here in this Chamber. The few of us who are here have been privileged to hear that speech. No doubt we will hear it again on Sunday afternoon. I commend this bill to the House.

PHIL TWYFORD (Labour—Te Atatū): I thought the contribution from Minister of Corrections was a very lacklustre pitch for the local government portfolio. But, you know, local government is a great portfolio, and I can understand why Sam Lotu-Iiga would like to have a crack at it. With Alfred Ngaro sniffing around the corrections portfolio after the Minister’s rather underwhelming performance, I can understand why he would want to have a look around and see what else might be available. But on that performance—on the performance of that Minister in this debate—I do not think he has got much of a shot of picking up local government off Paula Bennett.

The theme of my contribution tonight is a message to the members on the National benches: what took you so long? After 7 years in Government, with 2 years spent brutally and undemocratically imposing the Auckland super-city on a very reluctant and unwilling Auckland community, and the last 5 long years spent fighting and quibbling and bullying the Auckland Council and being a block on the progress and prosperity of our country’s biggest city, finally we see the National Government bring to this House a bill that shows that it is cooperating with Auckland. It is actually doing with this bill what Auckland has been asking for. It is the first sign of any kind of real cooperation that we have seen in these 5 long years. I want to talk about that period a little bit in this first reading contribution.

For the folks at home wondering what a unitary plan is, I think it is worth just touching on a little bit of the recent history. In 2010, after a process of designing what the new amalgamated super-city would look like in Auckland, there were the first elections of the Auckland council, electing representatives to the structure that Rodney Hide had put in place at the behest of the National Party in Auckland—the highly centralised, over-corporatised Auckland Council. We then saw the council acting, really, on the vision that the Royal Commission on Auckland Governance had set out for it to develop the Auckland Plan, and, as my colleague Phil Goff said, the intention was the pulling together of all the threads in an integrated unified plan that would set out the vision for the city.

In 2013 there were the second elections and then the development of the draft unitary plan to replace 13 different district and regional plans and to give effect to that vision of one unified spatial plan for the city. It is bigger than Ben-Hur, as I think anyone who has looked at it will know. It is a huge, huge undertaking. As many have said before, it is really kind of the rule book for the future development of Auckland.

What we are seeing here tonight is a kind of a fix job by the National Government, and not only for poor drafting and errors in the original legislation. National decided to design a bespoke planning process for the unitary plan, because it had rejected Auckland Council’s request to give early legal effect to the draft unitary plan, which would have been a much simpler and cleaner process, by the way, and would have saved everybody a lot of trouble.

But, no, the National Government knew better. It insisted on designing a whole new bespoke process for this. It had not really thought it through. It had not thought through the quantity of public submissions and hearings that would be involved in an undertaking of this size. So what we are seeing tonight, really, is a bill that attempts to fix up some of those problems.

To really understand the context of this bill, we have to talk about two things. The first is the National Government’s tortured relationship with Auckland over the last 5 years, and the second is the deeply problematic handling, or mishandling, of the Auckland housing crisis. As the Minister, Nick Smith, has said, his main motivation for pushing through this bill is to ensure that the draft unitary plan completes its process before the housing accord and special housing areas legislation—aptly named the HASH legislation—expires later next year. So it is about those two things: the endless fighting and quibbling that has been going on between this Government and Auckland over the last 5 years, and the housing crisis.

It started in the 2010 election when, from the point of view of the National Government, the wrong guy won the mayoral election. National members spent the 2 years prior to the election trying to design a super-city structure that would allow the National Government and its cronies to dispose of the assets and run Auckland as their personal fiefdom, and then Len Brown—the wrong guy from their point of view—won the election. That is why they have not been able to get over themselves ever since. It has been 5 years where the culture of entitlement and born-to-rule attitudes have been held in check by the fact that someone else has been running Auckland, and they have been bitter and twisted about it ever since—in contrast to this bill.

This bill is cooperative. It is about moving Auckland forward, and it is about making decisions. For years we saw Steven Joyce and Gerry Brownlee pouring scorn on Auckland’s No. 1 transport project, the City Rail Link. I cannot even repeat this House the words that Steven Joyce routinely used when describing the City Rail Link to business audiences in Auckland. Nick Smith rampaged around Auckland like a sort of a rogue bull elephant, blaming Auckland Council for—let me remember what the quote was—killing the dreams of Aucklanders. That was what Nick Smith said. That was kind of the beginning of a whole pattern of several years of this National Government blaming and scapegoating Auckland Council for the housing crisis. And now Nick Smith wants to pass this bill, because he is worried that if he does not, there will be nothing to replace his special housing area records, which have been a spectacular flop when it comes to actually making a difference to the supply of houses in Auckland.

Part of the problem, I think, is that the National Government simply has not had anybody in its Cabinet who really understands Auckland. Auckland has had to put up with a string of mostly South Island and small-town Ministers who have travelled to visit Auckland, to tell Auckland what it should do. Steven Joyce is, I think, from Palmerston North, Nick Smith is from Nelson, Gerry Brownlee is from Canterbury, Amy Adams is from Selwyn, and none of them understands Auckland or has any kind of feeling for how a big city or an urban economy works.

Bill English is the other one who has spent much of the last 5 years railing against the Auckland Council for having this vision for a compact city, which this bill is designed to address by actually reforming some of the planning rules and getting a better balance between the city growing up and growing out. But Bill English, from Dipton, the great urbanist of the National Government, spent much of the last 5 years railing—

Chris Hipkins: He’s from Karori.

PHIL TWYFORD: Oh, yeah. He is not from Dipton. He is from Karori—sorry. He spent much of the last 5 years railing against the compact city as if was some great conspiracy. But what we have seen is that over these 5 years the National Government has been dragged, kicking and screaming, towards this moment—this moment of cooperation and a kind of a sensible, pragmatic working with Auckland Council to try to get a response and deliver the unitary plan within the desired time frame.

First we saw it when they got rolled on the City Rail Link, basically. They gave up. After 3 years of opposing the City Rail Link they realised they were hurting in the polls. They realised they were losing support in Auckland, because they were seen as a brake on the prosperity of the city. People like the Employers and Manufacturers Association and the chamber of commerce were saying to John Key “You are a roadblock to Auckland’s prosperity and Auckland’s development.”, and that is what finally shifted them.

So it is not a good look for this Government. It has been dragged, kicking and screaming, to this moment. At least this bill is a good, pragmatic response to the unitary plan and that is why Labour is supporting it.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): I thank the member for his comments. Before I call Todd Muller, I am going to issue a bit of a warning. I think that at least three of the last four speeches have been very much just at the edge of the bill. I know that we are sitting under urgency, and that gives a bit more latitude, but I am going to ask members now to focus more of their comments on the bill.

TODD MULLER (National—Bay of Plenty): I rise to say a few words on the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill. “What a shame.” is all I can say to your previous ruling, Mr Assistant Speaker. I was all ready to go. It was almost general debate time. But anyway—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! I have had to warn other relatively new members recently that when a ruling has been made by the Chair, it is not something for members to comment on. The member must just move on with the debate. [Interruption] Order!

TODD MULLER: Is it not great to be part of such a participatory democracy, particularly up in Auckland? When this bill was first introduced and we were thinking about how likely it was for people to be involved in the submission process, I am sure none of us had any sense of the thousands of people who would become involved quite to the level that they have.

We have heard one or two good speeches thus far, particularly the previous speech by Mr Goff, who was so enthusiastic about this bill and the opportunity to make a difference. Was it not such a contrast to have the negativity and depression of the subsequent Labour speech? Will it not be incredible in a year’s time when he is the mayor and the Opposition spokesman comes in to talk about housing? How very depressing for you, “Your Worship”.

However, as Mr Goff mentioned, there have been many, many thousands of submissions already heard, and there are many, many thousands still to go. It makes sense, does it not, when we have an opportunity here to be able to consider a bill that allows those submissions to be heard in a way that gives them due opportunity to contribute. The last thing we would want is for those submitters to have the opportunity to impart their views about the future of Auckland—as expressed in the draft Auckland Unitary Plan—to be constrained in any way.

Of course, what we have here are three particular areas relating to the reduction in the quorum for the hearings sessions. That is very appropriate. There is to be an increase in the size of the panel, and, I think most important, the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel will be allowed to make recommendations as it completes a particular topic, as opposed to waiting until all of those topics that are included in the Auckland Unitary Plan are complete.

In many respects, the reason that we are having this conversation is that we are almost the victims of our own success. We had no sense that there would be such involvement by the Auckland people. They have become involved, and it is absolutely appropriate to give them this opportunity. That is what this bill enables, and that is why I support it at its first reading this evening.

DENISE ROCHE (Green): I rise to take the first call for the Green Party on the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill. I always find it quite useful, when we are looking an amendment bill, to go and look at what we are actually amending. This bill amends another local government Auckland Council bill that was introduced in 2013. At the time that it was introduced it was one of three different parts of the Resource Management Reform Bill 2013, which was split into three bills at its third reading and voted on separately.

At that time we had serious concerns that all three parts of that Resource Management Reform Bill were a serious attack on local democracy and, basically, eroded the protections of the Resource Management Act, making economic imperatives a primary consideration when consenting for land use and the like. I mean, it even removed protections on urban trees, for example. What that bill was really about was the usual Government approach of delivering legislation that makes life easier for its mates—in this case, essentially, developers—all under the guise of really trying to do something about the Auckland housing market, which, by the way, it failed to do.

The Government at that time was saying that if it sped up the resource consent process, then it would enable developers to get through the consenting process quicker and they would be able to build more houses faster, and it would be cheaper for the developers as well because they would not have to go through the notification process. But the thing was it did not fix that, because, essentially, what was happening was that about 90 percent of the consents that were going through Auckland were going through unnotified anyway. Essentially, that was not what it was about; it actually was just about degrading the Resource Management Act.

So, yes, the original Act was just another way to make life easier for developers. I cannot think of another reason for the constant meddling by this Government in the affairs of the Auckland Council. The original Act was about forcing the Auckland super-city to develop a unitary plan for the entire region, and the Government was putting huge pressure on the council at that time to change its focus away from a compact city to extending the metropolitan urban limits. And we have heard the précis from the member Phil Twyford about the spatial plan that had been occurring up until that point.

When the original bill, which we are amending tonight, came to this House we opposed it—not just because our vision for Auckland is for a livable city and for a more compact city with a mix of medium and high-density housing along public transport links, where walking and cycling are part of the transport options, not just roads, and where we have affordable homes, where we have a clean environment, clean water, a clean sea, where we have affordable housing, and where we have safe and thriving communities. That is our vision for a livable Auckland.

We opposed that bill because we did not think that the measures that the Government was taking were actually ever going to deliver that, but we also opposed that because we thought it was about taking yet another slice away from local democracy. The original bill said that the Auckland Council would have to deliver the Auckland Unitary Plan, the planning document for about the next 30 years, and that they would have to report back the recommendations to the council by, I think, September next year.

Essentially, what the bill did was it set out a 3-year programme to develop an incredibly complex planning document that will basically guide the future of the city for generations. Others have talked about it as well. It was about amalgamating the council plans from the previous seven councils, the regional policies, and regulations—so really, really complex.

We opposed the original bill because we saw that the council was having very little control over that process. We saw the Government’s interference in the democratic processes of the local authorities, removing the right of the council to determine who would be hearing the submissions on that planning process, and on being able to even decide whether they would be on those hearings themselves—whether there would be councillors on them. That right was removed from the councils. So instead of that, the Government—and by that I mean the Minister for the Environment and the Minister of Conservation—was the one that essentially decided who would be on those hearing panels.

We are concerned about the way that happens because it seems to be an ongoing theme from this Government. It does it all the time. The latest one today was the appointment of the former MP Tau Henare to the board of directors for the Housing New Zealand Corporation and today’s revelations as well about Paula Rebstock and her huge daily payment for reviewing the Child, Youth and Family Service—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! Sorry to interrupt the member, but I had warned members earlier that it would be good to focus on this bill. It would be good if the member did.

DENISE ROCHE: The point I am making is that I am surprised that the Government did not appoint either of those two to the hearings commission to be hearing commissioners. Never mind.

Anyway, so it is really not surprising that the bill we have got here tonight is designed to fast track the hearings process, as there are still around 5,000 submissions that are specifically site based with submitters who want to be heard. A previous speaker from that side of the House said that he was surprised by that number, but, actually, that is just an example of democracy in Auckland. Certainly, people who really, really care about what happens to zoning in their communities submit on these issues, and that is what creates the number of submissions.

So, once again, this bill gives the Ministers the power to appoint hearing commissioners to speed up the hearing process so that the panel can meet the deadline that the previous Act set for the recommendations to be reported back to the council, which is July next year. That is when they have to do it.

So much of the legislation that this Government has introduced over the last 7 years is really about fixing a bunch of mistakes or adjusting for unrealistic expectations to more reasonable requirements. We agree that we do need a unitary plan and that it is critical for Auckland’s development. We acknowledge that despite our misgivings and worry about the lack of democracy around appointing the hearings commissioners to the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel, they are doing a reasonable job.

But, for all that, we are still concerned about the inroads into local democracy in Auckland, the constant meddling, and the number of pieces of legislation that this Government has introduced to hobble Auckland Council for things as far as the introduction of council-controlled organisations, which have made a whole range of council assets and council facilities unaccountable to the local people—the people who are paying for them. We have got some strong misgivings about this bill. In order for us to remain consistent with our previous approach, we will be opposing it, because we think that it does not really do much for the democracy in Auckland.

RON MARK (Deputy Leader—NZ First): This is a really interesting piece of legislation to come before the House. In fact, when I first started looking through to find out exactly what it was the Government was wanting to put through the House under urgency I was quite surprised that I had to go all the way down to item No. 15 on the Order Paper dated 11 November. I had to go all the way down to item No. 15, Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill. That led me to actually do what all MPs should do—that is, we go checking our reference material. I went on to the parliamentary website and, lo and behold, what should I find but a list of Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment bills, which added something to my confusion because clearly the legislation that this seeks to amend actually came through the House back in 2009, led through the House at that time by the Minister of Local Government who was Rodney Hide, in what was known as the famous Auckland super-city bill.

So, reading into it, it interested me that here we have another Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill, and on the back of something like five or six others. In fact, just going through it, the number of times that this Parliament has amended the Auckland super-city legislation since 2009, I do not know whether members of the House, even the members of the select committee, have taken time to have a look at it. We are talking about legislation that went through in 22 September 2009, amended 14 June 2010, 26 March 2015, 11 December 2012, 22 October 2013, 19 September 2011, 3 July 2015—it must have been a Statutes Amendment Bill, amendment bill No 3. Auckland Council bills 19 November 2015—that is the one we are looking at now I guess—11 December 2012, 3 September 2013, 14 June 2010, and then there has been a number of attempts to amend this legislation also through members’ bills. The one that I did pick up was Darien Fenton’s Local Government (Council-Controlled Organisations) Amendment Bill, which was defeated by the Government back in 2012.

What it tells me is that we seem to have here a well-established track record of fixing things that were not right, right from the get-go. In fact, if I recall in my time as the mayor sitting outside—in fact I was not the mayor in 2009, I was just “Joe Blow” ordinary citizen out there doing what I was doing; listening to the debates, reading the newspaper reports, watching the television news, and seeing the controversy around the 2009 legislation, and, if I am not mistaken, there were often heard criticisms about the speed and the level of consultation that the Government of the day was engaging in with the public, and the fact that the Government really was not interested in listening to what people had to say about their legislation. They just wanted to ram through a super-city piece of legislation and create the biggest super-city in the southern hemisphere or this part of the world, certainly in New Zealand anyway.

So here we are on the back of numerous Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment bills, once again in the House addressing another problem that has been identified. I have to say that this time it appears as though—and other speakers before me have already said the same—the Government has listened to the Auckland Council and the independent Māori statutory board, has taken advice from the chairperson of the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel, and is moving through legislation that is aimed at making the hearings process more expeditious, more flexible, and that it is able to get through what is clearly a massive workload required in producing the unitary plan for our nation’s largest city.

I guess New Zealand First has to put on the record that we never were big fans of an Auckland super-city. We prefer democracy being delivered at the grassroots level in a meaningful way, not all the rhetoric that the super-city would reduce rates; that super-cities would reduce the rate of increase of rates; that super-cities would be more efficient; that this super-city piece of legislation that we are now amending again was the end-all, be-all to fix all problems in Auckland; that we would see greater efficiencies; that everybody would be happy ever after living in the never-never land of Auckland because the National Government had generated a “super, super, duper, duper, whooper” city that everybody would simply love.

Here we are again, amending the legislation for the umpteenth time in order to make perfect something that was touted as being perfect in 2009, was clearly criticised by many people up and down the country as not being perfect, and, in fact, was criticised because it would create such a big monolith of machine that it would be slow, bound with inertia, and find it difficult to respond to the needs of the public. I guess that is what this very piece of legislation is all about: making that big monolith that is simply laden with inertia, slow and difficult to turn around like the Queen Mary in the ocean, into something more flexible so that they can actually get through the work that has been laid out.

No one underestimates the seriousness of the work that has to be done. No one underestimates the amount of work that has to be undertaken by the commissioners and the hearing panels. We see that they are reducing the quorum. I have to say that the idea of reducing a quorum from three members to two made me sit back a little. I am not used to having committees with quorums of two, but the fact that you are making it possible to have concurrent hearings run simultaneously does go some way to explaining that. At this stage we see no need to not support that.

We are looking at the increase in the possible number of appointed hearings panel members from seven to 10. Given the workload, it seems eminently sensible to us. Enabling the hearings panels to make recommendations on proposed changes in stages seems eminently sensible, rather than waiting until the final report, if one is trying to move the hearings along and meet the deadline and time line imposed by the perfect piece of legislation that was passed in 2009; which is clearly not perfect because, once again, the House is back here amending it. Clarifying that the hearings panels must hold hearings sessions concurrently and that an additional chairperson can be appointed seems sensible.

What also struck me was looking at—peeling through my notes—the departmental disclosure statement. I have done a quick thumb through that. It is all pretty standard. Clearly, the Hon Chris Finlayson has ticked it off with respect to the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. Well, no surprises in there; consistency with the Treaty of Waitangi obligations—no surprises in there. What I did find a little surprising is: “For the policy to be given effect by this Bill, is there analysis available on: (a) the size of the potential costs and benefits?”. Answer: “No.” Well, I am looking forward to hearing some explanations as to why that has not been provided by the Minister in the Committee stage. And: “(b) the potential for any group of persons to suffer a substantial unavoidable loss of income or wealth?”. Well, that would be interesting. The answer on that is a “no” as well. I would be interested in hearing why nothing has been provided to us in that respect.

Regulatory impacts—extent of impact analysis available: “Has any further impact analysis become available for any aspects of the policy to be given effect by this Bill?”. That is a “no”. Cost-benefit analysis—I think that is the one that really stuck out for me, because I would have thought, given the level of the rhetoric, the volume of that rhetoric back in 2009 when people justified the formation of a super-city for Auckland on the back of reducing costs, creating efficiencies, making it cheaper; as we go into yet another amendment of that Act I am surprised that this Government, which prides itself on being very prudent with the management of the books and fiscal understanding, has not been able to produce for the House a cost-benefit analysis on this piece of legislation and how it is going to improve for—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Sorry to interrupt the honourable member. His time has expired.

PAUL FOSTER-BELL (National): Tēnā koe e Te Mana Whakawā. In rising to speak on the Local Government Auckland (Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill I do want to thank members of the Opposition who have indicated that they will support the bill, in spite of some of the rhetoric we may have heard during their speeches—rhetoric that I can only assume is driven by the internecine machinations within their own parties.

This is a very simple measure. It reduces the quorum for hearings on the Auckland Unitary Plan from three members to two. This is not an alien concept to us; we are doing the very same thing on our Education and Science Committee in Parliament—something with which Opposition parties are fully engaging. A reduced quorum will allow us to get through hearings in our inquiry into special needs. So this is not a new theme.

Secondly, it will allow up to four concurrent hearing sessions. This is a very practical measure to allow the panels to get through the work. It increases the number of panel members from seven to 10, and it will allow the hearings to be reported back in stages as they complete pieces of work, rather than as an entire piece of work at the very end. This is a practical measure from a practical Government. I welcome support from the Opposition, and commend the bill to the House.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): The next call is a split call. Jan Logie—5 minutes.

JAN LOGIE (Green): It is with some pleasure I think, although it is quite late and my brain is a little foggy and I do need to say to the people of Auckland to whom this bill is important that I apologise if I am not at my sharpest right at this moment, but another consequence of urgency—

Phil Twyford: Come on, Jan. Spark it up.

JAN LOGIE: —I know I should toughen up, toughen up—is that we are not necessarily at our sharpest and showing our best abilities at this time of night, after sitting in the House for 11 hours.

We are now about to discuss the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill. I understand that since 2009 there have been 16—16—separate bills in this House dealing with Auckland local government. And this is the fourth Auckland transitional bill since just 2009. I think that is a bit of an indication of a problem, and it does seem—I mean, the idea has been expressed already in this House—that there is a bit of a battle going on between this Government and the local communities’ leaders. There is a battle for control of Auckland and for control of the vision for Auckland.

The Green Party, we have a vision for Auckland. You know, we have a vision for a vibrant, connected, compact city with medium high-density housing along public transport lines, where people know their neighbours, where they have the resources to be able to feed themselves, the air is fresh, the school is close and it is safe to get there, and the people know their local leaders, and that they can talk to them and tell them what they want from their local community. This is our vision. Inherent in that vision is our willingness to adapt to what we are told is needed by that local community. At the very, very heart of the Green Party vision is the belief in appropriate decision-making. Those people who are affected by decisions, who are closest to those decisions, should be the people who have control over those decisions. Yet we have had successive legislation coming through this House that erodes that principle.

David Seymour: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. We are 3 or 4 minutes into a 5-minute call, and the member has not addressed the bill at all.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): No, I am the judge. This is the first reading of the bill, and it is a 5-minute call. I am listening to what the member is saying and I invite her to finish. She has 1 minute and 53 seconds to go.

JAN LOGIE: The member considers my contribution to be tiresome. I guess that is his view of democracy and his depth of reading this bill. The detail of this bill is that—

David Seymour: What’s in the bill?

JAN LOGIE: It has quite a bit to do with democracy, you might be surprised to know, Mr Seymour. It reduces the quorum required for hearing sessions related to the unitary plan from three to two people. It allows for an increase in the number of Government-appointed Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel members, from seven to 10. Clearly, it is a demonstration of this Government extending its reach in terms of removing decision making and participatory representative decisions from communities and local Auckland people. It enables the panel to report back in stages, which is something we probably would not have a problem with, and it enables the hearings panels to hold concurrent sessions with a stand-in chairperson. Again, that is something that we probably would not have a problem with. It is about speeding up the process but in a way that would ensure people’s voices can be heard.

But the core principle here is around democracy and who has control over the vision of Auckland. This House is again considering under urgency—a process that removes democratic participation in the decision making in this House—a bill that puts extra, additional power in the hands of central government and takes it away from local government. That is inappropriate and we will not be supporting it.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): I call David Seymour—5 minutes.

DAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): When the member who has just resumed her seat, Jan Logie, apologised for her state of mind I thought she was just being gracious, but as her speech proceeded, I realised she was actually being quite honest. I rise in support of this bill. It is somewhat regrettable to be here, discussing it so late at night, to make a number of technical changes to the dimensions—not to the process, not to the people involved, and not to the accountabilities, but to the dimensions of the hearings of objections to the Auckland Unitary Plan. It is a very small technical change that is being made to the legislation, and it is worth reflecting on quite why this small technical change to the dimensions of the process, not to the process itself, is actually required. The reason is that in order to meet the statutory requirements for a new plan we are going to have to change the balance between the demand for hearings from Aucklanders and a lot of people from the Epsom electorate who have hearings required under the Proposed Auckland Unitary Plan process on the one hand and, on the other hand, the supply of people to do the hearings and hear their objections.

The reason that there is this imbalance of supply and demand is ultimately that the plan that the Auckland Council has attempted to impose upon the people of Auckland is so at odds with the national growth of a city and with the preferences of Aucklanders for how their city will grow and develop. At the base of the problem is actually epistemology—the fatal conceit on the part of the planners that they know what the correct density of Auckland should be in 30 years’ time, how people should live, how they should work, and how they should travel, and that the planners are able to tell us what sort of housing we should have, and how our particular communities should grow, regardless of what our preferences for those communities might be.

This hearings process is an opportunity for the people of the Epsom electorate and the people of Auckland, more broadly, to be heard. The planning orthodoxy with which we are being confronted has been so out of whack with how the city should grow that we find ourselves here, late at night in the House, being heckled by simpletons, in order to increase the supply of hearing time to meet the demand from people who wish to object to this conceitful plan that would change the shape of our city if it were allowed to, strangling the supply of housing to Aucklanders, pushing up the price of housing, and leaving us in a situation where we have to be here late at night to right what is a simple technical matter.

I am here to support this bill because it allows the people of the Epsom electorate and the people of Auckland to have their say in this planning process. But it would be a far better world if we had a model of growth for cities where the planning profession were put back in their box, where they respected the desires of communities rather that conceitedly impose models of development upon them, where we had a situation where cities grew organically, based on the property rights and the expectations of people who are already in those cities, and where we did not have Byzantine rural/urban boundaries at the perimeter of the city, strangling the supply of housing to Auckland, and where the city could continue to expand and give people big backyards where big dreams could grow up.

Yet we are here in order to give the people of the Epsom electorate and the rest of Auckland the opportunity to have more time to contribute their views about how they would like their community to develop across Auckland City into the future. With that, I commend this bill to the House.

JOANNE HAYES (National): I rise to take a very short call on the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill. The Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel stems from the principal Act—the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Act 2010. Its role is to hear submissions on the unitary plan and then to make recommendations to the Auckland Council, as most of my colleagues have already discussed and spoken about in the House tonight.

This amendment bill, as many speakers have already spoken about tonight, makes four changes to the principal Act, which provides for the hearings panel—for some of the changes. The first one, as we have heard, is a reduction in the quorum from three to two members. Extra panel members are to be appointed. The bill clarifies that the panel may hold concurrent sessions and appoint alternate chairpersons, and it enables the panel to make recommendations to the Auckland Council by 22 June 2016.

This is a very important amendment bill for the people of Auckland and the Auckland Council. It is an opportunity for the people of Auckland to have their say, to go and put their submissions in, and maybe even—and I do not want to denigrate what the Greens said tonight about their “Kumbaya” type future and what Auckland may look like, with neighbours all loving each other and being this whole community-type thing, which I doubt will ever happen in Auckland. But anyway, it is an opportunity for the people of Auckland to come in and be able to submit their plan to the hearings panel.

As Mr Len Brown, the Mayor of Auckland, said, the unitary plan will be the rule book for the future of Auckland. That is what Mr Brown said, and I believe that that is what it is going to be. There are huge benefits, as I have said, for the people of Auckland. I have no hesitation in commending this bill to the House. Thank you.

Su’a WILLIAM SIO (Labour—Māngere): Given that this is an Auckland issues bill, can I, firstly, with your indulgence, Mr Assistant Speaker, take this opportunity to acknowledge the death of Jonah Lomu and convey to his wife and extended family our condolences, and just acknowledge the fact that Jonah was a great friend of Pacific youth, particularly in South Auckland. He will be sorely missed by many, not just in New Zealand but throughout the world.

I now want to come to the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill. Because we are amending the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Act 2010, I want to just reflect on that for the sake of the House, and particularly for those who were not involved in the initial debates in 2010. Members may recall that when we debated the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Bill in 2010 that debate included two other major and significant pieces of legislation arising from the Local Government (Auckland Law Reform) Bill: the Local Government (Tamaki Makaurau Reorganisation) Amendment Bill and the Local Government (Auckland Council) Amendment Bill. In fact, what happened was, I think, that the House concentrated on the two significant pieces of legislation, and we paid little attention to the Auckland transition legislation. It almost appears that a pattern has emerged where when this Government is intending to hide things, it will include it with other significant bills so that nobody pays attention. People may recall that when public consultation went out on that legislation, it was during the Christmas period and people did not have a lot of time to make submissions on it.

Today, I have to say, I think Aucklanders will be equally sad that, again, we are debating issues that affect them without the privilege or without the benefit of having their experience, their expertise, and, in fact, their criticism of what this Government is doing. I want to say that members on the Government side paint it as if they are doing Aucklanders a favour. They are saying that this bill will allow Aucklanders to have a say. Well, Aucklanders will have a say. What this bill is about is it is going to fix some mistakes that the Government has made, mistakes that it has failed to fix as a result of the pattern that it has created for itself of rushing through things when it does not want the general public to have a view or to share a view in terms of what the Government is doing. And, again, you may recall that during that whole Auckland super-city debate, Aucklanders were outraged at the way that this Government collapsed the whole process and was determined to corporatise that whole Auckland super-city, and that is what we have seen.

In fact, the 2010 Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Act enabled the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel to be appointed by the Minister for the Environment and the Minister of Conservation rather than what existed at that particular time where councils appointed hearings commissioners. If we had councils continuing to appoint hearings commissioners, we would not be in this situation now of again trying to fix the mistake that the Government made. The Government made those mistakes, and it is amazing that, despite the views of the people of Auckland, this Government continues to think that it is doing OK, that it is smart, and that it knows what it is doing. The reality is we have a unique select committee process and all legislation ought to go through that particular process because that gives us the benefit of enabling the public, enabling those with deep experiences, and enabling those with expertise in these particular matters to have their say and for us to have the benefit of that experience and of that knowledge. Sadly, again, this Government just does not seem to have learnt from its mistakes and that rushing things through will, inevitably, end up with mistakes being made.

Here is the mistake—and I want to point out what we are clarifying. We are clarifying that the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel can hold hearings sessions concurrently. And so here is the hearings panel, which has been holding hearings for the public since September this year, and this bill is now saying: “You can actually do that legally.” Here is another mistake the bill is fixing—it allows the hearings panel to appoint an additional chairperson who can chair concurrent hearings when the chairperson is not available because they are chairing the other concurrent hearing. I suspect that the panel is already doing that, and it would not have this mistake if the Government had not rushed through the original 2010 legislation determined to corporatise the whole Auckland region for the sake of trying to control those assets and had allowed the council to appoint the hearings commissioners. Here is another mistake that this bill is designed to fix. It will validate any hearings sessions that were held concurrently prior to this clarification—another mistake. It validates 28 February 2014 as the closing date for submissions on the unitary plan, and it validates that any submission received between 14 January 2014 and 28 February 2014 is acceptable, as if it had been received within the statutory time frame for submissions. Another important mistake that we are having to fix in this bill is the error in the drafting of the principal Act relating to procedural requirements for the filing of appeals on questions on law with the High Court.

I do not have any problems with appointing additional hearings panel members, because if we consider the work that they are having to undertake, they are having to consider over 9,000 submissions. I understand, based on what is on the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel website, those 9,000 submissions are raising around 100,000 points concerning possible changes to the plan. There is no doubt in my mind, and in the minds of many of my colleagues, that the unitary plan for Auckland city is an important plan, but we said, right at the outset, that it was flawed in many ways. It was flawed because although this Government would talk the rhetoric about the principal subsidiarity, in actual fact, after some years of experience of the Auckland Council now, we now know that the structure is designed exactly as we predicted in those earlier debates of 2010. The public will have difficulty being involved in the decision making, because this hearings panel is a professional hearings panel of people who are well versed in the areas of unitary planning—and so it is a professional panel. When this Government says that this will give the public the opportunity of a hearing, they already have those rights. This is predominantly about fixing the mistakes that this Government made in the original legislation.

I want to say that when we went through the 2010 debate many, many people in Auckland all said that the way that the Auckland super-city was structured with its independent council-controlled organisations would, ultimately, divide the community from fully participating in our democratic processes that we have become accustomed to and that we in New Zealand value. I would have hoped that this Government had learnt its lesson from the consistent mistakes it has made with the various amendments to the principal Acts of that period, but it has not. I think—and I hope—that Aucklanders listening to this particular debate will recognise once and for all that that super-city structure was not set up to allow more democracy; it was set up, predominantly, for this Government to control that city and control its direction and control its assets in the same way it now appoints the hearings panel. I am hopeful that come the next local body election in 2016, we can get some good people on that council who can stand up and tell this Government where to go.

NUK KORAKO (National): Tēnā koe e Te Māngai o Te Whare, e mihi atu ki a koe mō tēnei pō. Before I begin talking about the bill, I would also just like to acknowledge the short poroporoaki by Mr William Sio for a great Aucklander and a great New Zealander—Jonah Lomu. Kia ora. It has been interesting tonight listening to the debate on both sides of the House. When I got the “midnight shift”, as they call it, I thought it was going to be quite a drag, but it has actually been a shift of enlightenment, because I have heard, from both sides of the House, a really good overview of the passion that comes out of Auckland. I have heard a speech from a former mayor, a potential mayoral candidate, and a housing spokesperson, and I have also heard an excellent introductory speech on this bill from this side of the House.

This is just a short call on the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill. To me, as the final speaker, this bill provides the flexibility that is needed, particularly around the recommendations that are proposed by the Auckland Unitary Plan and the council’s statutory deadline—and it is a deadline; it is 22 July 2016. The other thing is the components of the bill—the three main ones that actually deal with reducing the quorum and also with increasing the number of members from seven to 10, as we have heard so many times. Around the reporting factor of the bill, it will also enable that instead of doing one report, it can be done in stages. They are the major sorts of components.

Just to highlight the fact, though, that this bill represents a great opportunity to ensure that the country’s largest planning process remains on track and becomes operative as soon as possible. That is the real essence of the bill itself. When we talk about Auckland, it is not just about Aucklanders; it is actually about the whole of New Zealand, because of Auckland being our largest and most populous city. I appreciate being able to take this short call, and I commend the bill to the House. Kia ora.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill be now read a first time.

Ayes 107

New Zealand National 59; New Zealand Labour 32; New Zealand First 12; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Noes 14

Green Party 14.

Bill read a first time.

Second Reading

Hon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON (Attorney-General): on behalf of the Minister for the Environment: I move, That the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill be now read a second time. The Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Act established the streamlined plan-making process, including an independent hearings panel to hear submissions on the proposed plan. This is intended to result in faster delivery of a high-quality, operative Auckland Unitary Plan. The Auckland Unitary Plan is critical to achieving the city’s proposed growth targets, as well as planning land use, critical infrastructure, and housing supply.

To recap briefly, the purpose of the bill is to provide more flexibility to the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel to help ensure that it can deliver its recommendations on the proposed Auckland Unitary Plan to the Auckland Council by the statutory deadline of 22 July 2016. The panel has made good progress. However, hearings on site-specific matters, which are of high public interest due to their impact on individual property rights, are due to begin in January 2016. The panel has indicated that the expected increase in workload as a result of these hearings poses a risk to meeting the statutory deadline.

It is critical that the hearings panel is able to continue its good progress and make recommendations to the council by the deadline. In order to achieve this, the bill has three main components. First, the bill reduces the quorum required for hearings sessions from three members to two members. Secondly, it is going to allow an increase in the possible number of appointed hearings panel members from seven to 10, excluding the chair. Thirdly, the bill will enable the hearings panel to make its recommendations on the proposed Auckland Unitary Plan in stages after hearings are completed on a particular topic, rather than in one final report.

To support these policy changes, additional amendments are required. First, the bill creates a requirement for the Minister for the Environment and the Minister of Conservation to consult with the Auckland Council, the independent Māori Statutory Board, and the chairperson of the hearings panel prior to appointing additional or replacement hearings panel members. Secondly, the bill clarifies that the hearings panel may hold hearings sessions concurrently and that an additional chair may be appointed for the purposes of chairing a hearings session when the chair is unavailable due to their chairing a concurrent hearings session. The bill validates any hearings sessions that were held concurrently prior to this clarification being made. Finally, the bill validates 28 February 2014 as the closing date for submissions on the proposed Auckland Unitary Plan.

I should also say that there is a minor and technical amendment required to fix an error in the drafting of the principal Act relating to the procedural requirements—

Chris Hipkins: Wouldn’t have happened if this Minister had drafted it.

Hon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON: —for the filing of appeals on questions of law with the High Court. What was that?

Chris Hipkins: Never would’ve happened if you’d drafted it.

Hon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON: Well, that is very kind of the member to say so. It would never happen in Wellington either, because nothing ever happens in Wellington in terms of local government reform.

Chris Hipkins: His chances in Rongotai aren’t looking any better now.

Hon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON: Well, that is a remarkably perceptive insight by the member from Rimutaka at 11.35 tonight.

I want to reiterate that the first Auckland Unitary Plan is of national importance, and the success of the submissions and hearings process is critical as it could set a precedent for similar planning approaches throughout the country; probably not in Wellington. I commend this bill to the House.

Hon PHIL GOFF (Labour—Mt Roskill): Just to begin with, the Minister glossed over a number of areas, talking about clarifying and validating. The Government is clarifying that you can hold the sessions concurrently, but he glossed over the fact that it has in fact been doing that without that explicit authority for months and months. This is a cock-up that is being fixed up. So let us call a spade a spade and a cock-up a cock-up in this, and not gloss over it.

The Minister also glossed over the fact that the Government validated February of last year as the closing date for submissions. Well, that is a long time ago. That was another cock-up. Then he did acknowledge that it fixed an error in the main Act about procedural requirements for the filing of appeals on questions of law with the High Court. That is a third cock-up.

The reason I raise these things is that these mistakes have been made in the legislation we are fixing tonight, but we are fixing this legislation at 20 minutes to midnight after sitting since 9 o’clock this morning, and without the benefit of a select committee process. Is there any better way to continue stuffing up legislation than doing it in the way that the Government is doing it tonight? A wise Government would learn from its mistakes. This Government is simply repeating its mistakes.

This is the second reading. During the second reading, normally we would rise to our feet to discuss the submissions that we have heard from members of the public and experts in the area. We would discuss the consideration that the Parliamentary Counsel Office had given to the drafting and the errors that the Parliamentary Counsel Office would have found in the legislation and would have corrected before reporting back to the House. We would talk about the hours of analysis that the select committee had put into the legislation. None of us can do any of that tonight because that process was not followed.

The question I have to ask the Government is: when Nick Smith could announce the details of this legislation on 16 September, more than 2 months ago, why did this Government not get its act together and have the first reading of the bill at that time so we could have honoured the democratic principles of this House in giving the public the right to be heard on it?

I have heard members of the Government and the ACT Party tonight singing the praises of a democratic process where there is the opportunity to be heard. They were talking about the hearings that this bill is legislating for, but they did not acknowledge that they were totally contradicting themselves in supporting legislation that forbade the public—blocked the public—from being able to make submissions on it.

It is bad process to have urgent legislation. I accept this legislation needs to go through before Christmas. I agree with the Attorney-General that it will be a good thing if we could get these hearings processes operating effectively so that the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel can meet its statutory deadline and report back and we can get a unitary plan in place that will allow for better planning process and better resource management process. I agree with that. But it was not necessary to ram this thing through in the middle of the night and not allow the public to have its say.

I listened with interest to the ACT member, because he was damning the process that his predecessor from the ACT Party, in the same electorate of Epsom, had put in place and he did not see the contradiction. And then the ACT member said: “We’ve got to have a change in the unitary plan process so we can remove the rural-urban boundary so the city can move out.” But the city cannot move up. The city cannot intensify. It cannot become more compact.

I listened to the Productivity Commission and Murray Sherwin and his team yesterday, and they said: “Why have we got a problem with the availability and affordability of housing?”. He said: “If you create a situation where the city can neither move out, nor move up, there is only one thing that gives, and that is prices.” We have a crisis in availability and affordability because we have blocked the city from moving either out or up. It should not be an either/or; it should be a both/and.

The unitary plan will be about having a more compact city, and I agree with my colleagues from the Green Party on that. And, inevitably, because the population of Auckland is going to increase by a million in the next 30 years, it is going to have to move out as well. I, of course, would argue that it is good to allow that city to move out, but only, however, if you have got the infrastructure in place to make that happen.

I was down at the Karaka Lakes subdivision the other day and I drove by Pōkeno—I drove by Pōkeno. There are huge, huge developments there—I am sure that you would recognise them, Mr Assistant Speaker Tisch—but what is not there is any infrastructure to support those people. A huge percentage of the people in Pōkeno are going to be working in town, but we have got a motorway that is already clogged, we have not got a railway line that is sufficient to meet the needs, and we do not have a busway. So if the Government is going to allow this growth to happen—and the growth will happen—then, for heaven’s sake, let us get a unitary plan. Let us not only get a unitary plan that puts infrastructure in place, but let us get a Government that is committed to ensuring that we have the infrastructure so that Auckland can grow without losing the quality of life that that city offers to its people.

I agree with what Scott Simpson said. I thought it was very big of the member for Coromandel to acknowledge that New Zealand cannot succeed if Auckland fails.

Scott Simpson: That’s right.

Hon PHIL GOFF: That is absolutely right, and I agree with the member. We are on the same path on that.

I have to say that I disagree with the point made by my friends in the Green Party that this is about taking power away from local government. Auckland Council is in favour of this—absolutely in favour of this—including people like Penny Hulse, who has done so much work in actually getting this unitary plan going forward. David Kirkpatrick, chair of the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel, is also in favour of it. If I believed that the changes being made would diminish the quality of the hearings process I would not be recommending to my colleagues that we support them tonight, but I have seen no evidence that the changes that are being made do diminish the quality of the scrutiny of the submissions. In fact, I believe that they allow that panel to get through its work more effectively.

Auckland desperately needs to have a proper planning process. It desperately needs a planning process that can ensure the sustainable development of housing and business not only in the urban environment but also for the rural area and the marine environment. The unitary plan covers all of those things. It will be good to have a unitary plan—one plan for what is, effectively, one city—instead of the complexity and the fragmentation that existed, and still exists right now, actually, because of the old structure.

I want to come, lastly, to a comment that Nick Smith, the Minister in charge of this bill, made about it. He said “This bill is needed to maintain the momentum of lifting Auckland’s housing supply …”, and he also said that this bill is needed because the legislation allowing for special housing areas is going to run out. Well, I commented on that in the first reading—the latter point. Nick Smith has set a target of 39,000 houses. The special housing area was his big initiative to achieve that target.

Sue Moroney: How’s that going?

Hon PHIL GOFF: The goal is 39,000 houses, and Sue Moroney says: “How’s it going?”. Well, we have reached just over 100—102, actually. I have not got my calculator here to see what 102 is as a percentage of 39,000, but it ain’t much—it ain’t much, and we are not going to get there.

So I want to challenge the Minister in charge of this bill about this bill actually doing what he says it will do, because it is not going to hugely affect the supply of housing and the problems of availability and affordability. For 7 long years the housing crisis has been ignored. The Government has ignored the impact of speculation. Only in the last few months have we had the brightline test. The Government has ignored the problem of the affordability of infrastructure for housing. It has ignored the market failure of the slow-down in building houses after the global financial crisis. It could have built houses then. It could have avoided this problem, but it did not.

So my message, finally, is that the unitary plan—if it is done well—will help, but it will not do it on its own. The Government needs to do much more.

SCOTT SIMPSON (National—Coromandel): It is a pleasure to take a very brief call in the second reading debate. Even though it is late at night, the member Phil Goff, who has just resumed his seat, has used the opportunity this evening to twice run his lines through for the campaign launch that he will be giving on Sunday, 22 November. I commend him for running the practice lines. I think they are helpful. I think that they are good lines, and he will, no doubt, get some traction with them. He makes a good point, I think, about how important it is to the regions and to the provinces—and, in fact, to the entire country—for Auckland to succeed.

This piece of legislation will ensure that the hearings process on the unitary plan actually goes more smoothly than it has. It will be more efficient and more effective. Members across the House have, I think, given a very good account of the purposes of this bill earlier on in the first reading debate, and I want to just also endorse the comments made by the Hon Phil Goff when he was addressing the Green Party. I would also endorse his comments, and suggest that maybe the Green Party might like to, at second reading, reconsider its position because Auckland Council does want to have this legislation passed and it would be a good and useful thing if the Greens did do that. I commend this bill to the House.

PHIL TWYFORD (Labour—Te Atatū): It would be nice in this stage of the bill’s progress through the House to be reporting back on select committee deliberations. It would be nice to be sharing the advice of officials. It would be nice to be reflecting on public submissions. But, sadly, we are not going to have that opportunity tonight, and it is an irony, as Phil Goff said, that the passage of this bill through the House, which is about ensuring proper public participation in the planning process for Auckland, is being—

Ron Mark: You stole my line.

PHIL TWYFORD: And Ron Mark said it as well, I think—or he is going to. It is an irony that this process denies people the right to have a say. It denies this bill the scrutiny that it deserves at select committee. It is a bill that is about public participation in the planning process. It is a bill that is, at least in part, about fixing the defects of another bill that was earlier pushed through under urgency. The National Government never seems to learn the lessons from its mistakes. My colleague Su’a William Sio pointed out that so much of the Auckland legislation that was put in place to establish the super-city was pushed through under urgency, and so much time has been spent cleaning up the messes that were made by the rushed and chaotic processes around that law.

Why is the unitary plan so important to Auckland’s future? Well, it makes the critical zoning decisions. It includes the rules on the urban growth boundary and the introduction of new land into the supply, and all of the rules on height and density that will have such a critical impact on the pipeline of new construction—new urban development and, particularly, housing. Given the importance of development in housing supply to fixing what the rest of the country has come to think of as the “Auckland plan”, it is critical that the unitary plan is of high quality and that it is signed off in a timely way. What I think is interesting is that the critical outcomes of the bill that will make a difference to the supply of new land and housing in Auckland are the rules about the urban growth boundary and about height and density.

While the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel has been beavering away hearing public submissions and deliberating on those two essential points, it is worth noting, I think, that the National Government’s views about density have been evolving and have been moving. I thought one of the most odd chapters in this whole process was the then Minister for the Environment, Amy Adams, actually sitting up at night writing a huge submission as the environment Minister to the hearings panel on the Auckland Unitary Plan, because the Government recognises that getting it right in Auckland is not just of critical importance to the people in those neighbourhoods where particular zoning decisions or consenting decisions are made; it is actually of national importance. If we do not improve the responsiveness of the housing market in Auckland to demand and if we do not build more affordable housing and the kinds of the types of housing that people want in places where they want to live, then we will never ever fix the Auckland problem.

But the great urbanists of the National Party, Bill English and Nick Smith, spent years during the tenure of this Government railing against the compact city and basically saying that unrestricted sprawl—getting rid of the urban growth boundary—was the only way that Auckland could move forward. That was their view, and I have heard them say it in this House a dozen times if I have heard it once. But to be fair, they have moved—they have moved. I think it is probably the work of the Productivity Commission and it is talking to people like the Property Council that has made them realise that good cities must have an element of density, otherwise they will never produce affordable housing and they will never produce a livable environment that people actually want to live in.

National has moved so far that earlier this year the Prime Minister issued an edict and said that Aucklanders must get used to living in apartments. I do not know whether the prime ministerial memo has been sent out to the National Party apparatchiks on the Ōrākei Local Board and in the leafy neighbourhoods of Kohimārama, Epsom, and Parnell that the Prime Minister wants to build apartments. Not apartments in Hawaii, not apartments in London, or maybe in St Stephens Avenue, Parnell, but I do not know whether the good people of Remuera and of Epsom—certainly David Seymour is not happy about the idea of apartments and density in Epsom. I do not know whether those good people have received the memo from the Prime Minister that he wants to build high-rise apartments in their neighbourhoods. I think that if he gets his way, they are not going to have much of a say in that process.

This new-found enthusiasm for intensification has recently seen National Party acolytes on Auckland Council enthusing over an expensive study by Ernst and Young and Cameron Partners advocating a multibillion-dollar sell-off of Auckland Council’s assets, including building houses on the Remuera and Takapuna golf courses. So I look forward to the good citizens of Takapuna and Remuera—

Hon Phil Goff: What do the local members say about that?

PHIL TWYFORD: Ha, ha! I want to know what the local National Party acolytes in Remuera and Takapuna think about their own people advocating building houses on the Remuera and Takapuna golf courses, because I think that I would like to be a fly on the wall when that particular discussion is had.

Nick Smith, the Minister for Building and Housing, justified, in talking publicly about the introduction of this bill, that it was very important that this legislation was passed quickly, before Christmas, not only so that the unitary plan recommendations could be made back to Auckland Council before the deadline but because he was worried that otherwise it would not be passed and completed in time for next year’s council elections—I think that is probably a good idea—and he also tied it to the expiry of the housing accords legislation.

In a way, he is quite right that the unitary plan will have a major impact on fixing the Auckland housing crisis. There is no doubt about that, but, as Phil Goff pointed out earlier this evening, it is a very long bow to suggest that the expiry of the housing accords legislation will have any impact at all, because the legislation itself has not had any impact. As the New Zealand Herald reported recently, only 102 houses have been built in the 96 special housing areas established over the last 2 years under this Government—96 special housing areas and only 102 houses. It is not a very good batting average, and it is a singular failure of this Government’s housing policy and its much-hyped attempt to actually increase the supply of housing. It has done everything but take meaningful action to fix it. As Phil Goff said, it failed to tackle the role of property speculators in the Auckland housing market. It failed to actually build new houses that people can live in.

Bill English and Nick Smith have been talking about the Resource Management Act and blaming Auckland Council for the last 10 years. Since they were in Opposition they have been blaming the Resource Management Act for the high cost of housing in Auckland, but they have done nothing substantive to reform the Act and the way that councils operate within the Act—the way they set the planning rules. They are truly the hollow men on this issue. Actually, the draft unitary plan that this bill seeks to facilitate is the first real bit of reform of the planning rules in Auckland. It is the first attempt, actually, to use urban growth boundaries in a smarter way—to avoid having them driving up section prices. It is the first real attempt to liberalise and free up density and height rules so that more houses can be built in places where people want to live. Unfortunately, this Government has not pulled its weight. It has been all talk and no action when it comes to reforming the planning rules, but Labour is supporting this bill because we believe the unitary plan will make a difference.

CHRIS BISHOP (National): When we talk about Auckland housing these days, the two Phils come down to the House—Phil Goff and Phil Twyford. From Phil Twyford, we got what we always get, which is an angry, bitter tirade about how much he does not like Nick Smith and how much he does not like all the Ministers in the National Government. From Phil Goff, we got a campaign speech because that is what we get from Phil Goff these days—campaigning for the mayoralty of Auckland. As my good colleague Scott Simpson said, he should have put an authorisation statement on those speeches. They were political advertising. It was actually not a bad speech from Phil. This is a sensible—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): I am sorry to interrupt the honourable member. The time has come for me to leave the Chair.

Debate interrupted.

Sitting suspended from 12 midnight to 9 a.m. (Thursday)

TUESDAY, 17 NOVEMBER 2015

(continued on Thursday, 19 November 2015)

Bills

Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill

Second Reading

Debate resumed.

DENISE ROCHE (Green): I rise to take a call on the second reading of this Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill. I think it is worthwhile just traversing where the Green Party is coming from, since we are the only party in the House that is opposing this bill. Originally we said when we discussed it as a caucus that our recommendation was that we would support it to the select committee. We were quite keen to support it going to the select committee because the select committee process is where we hear from the experts—that is where we would hear firsthand from Auckland Council about how this bill would impact on it, and the pros and cons of the bill. We would have the Parliamentary Counsel Office. It would devise the bill itself for us and pick up any mistakes. We would have the opportunity to deliberate and to discuss with each other what we thought were the pros and cons, and maybe we would be able to make some amendments, if that was worthwhile. It would be the true spirit of democracy.

What I have found is that it is in that select committee process, when members from all sides of the House are actually interacting with each other, that we see true democracy in action. The submission process is also where we involve our citizenship in the democratic processes of this country. We believe that that is incredibly important. So because we could not take this bill to the select committee, and because we have some serious concerns about the erosion of local democracy and the way this Government constantly tries to take over the control of democracy and power from local councils, on balance we decided that as a point of principle we would not support this bill.

I heard members in the House last night saying that Auckland Council wants the bill, and I have no doubt it does. We particularly do not want to hold up the planning process, because we recognise its importance for, basically, setting out the plan for the future of Auckland. However, we have seen in this House time and time and time again, particularly in relation to Auckland, constant incursions into the running of Auckland by this Government. Other members have said it is basically because when the Government set up the super-city, it did not get the right mayor and it did not get the right council, and we in Auckland have been punished ever since.

This is another example of a select few in Cabinet—mostly, none of them are from Auckland—trying to get their influence on to what is our major city. We know that if Auckland does not succeed, the country does not succeed. Auckland is the economic powerhouse. But if you look at the constant meddling that this House has been putting forward in terms of the running of Auckland, we have to have some serious concerns about just what this Government is up to. Since 2009 there have been 16 separate pieces of legislation dealing with the governance of Auckland.

Phil Twyford: What does that tell you?

DENISE ROCHE: What does it tell you. It tells us that there has been a constant barrage from this Government about who runs Auckland and how it is run. So we have taken a stand that is not that popular in this House, and I can understand that. However, it is a principled position. We are not going to a select committee because, under urgency, we do not get the opportunity to do this.

We know that when the Minister put forward this bill and announced it, it was September. He was saying at the time that, essentially, the Government wants this bill in place because it wants to make sure that it has some processes in place before the expiry of the special housing accord in Auckland, which is, I have to say, a pet project from the Minister for Building and Housing. We do not see that as actually a good reason for invoking urgency. We could have gone through a process where we invited submissions, where we set up the select committee, where we got the expert evidence, and where we got a regulatory impact statement, for heaven’s sake, that actually outlined the pros and cons of this legislation. This legislation is designed to fix up mistakes from the original legislation. If we pass this under urgency without that due process, then we risk making more mistakes. If you look at those 16 pieces of legislation, a whole bunch of them are about validating stuff. It is about having another tinker because the legislation has not been true and sound. There is merit in that old cliché that the faster you go the bigger the mess. We have seen that. We have frequently seen that when it comes to Auckland and Auckland governance.

The other reason we had serious misgivings about this bill is not just the encroachment on local democracy in Auckland but also the encroachment on local democracy right across the country. I guess one of our guiding issues, one of the things that concerned us the most, was that if we allow this constant sort of undermining of local democracy—even though in this part it is just about the appointment of hearings commissioners—then we are actually saying to the Government that every single time it has overtaken due process and undermined local governance and local councils, it is OK. Well, we would like to say, on lots of issues, it is not OK.

I guess the thing that really, really brings this issue back home is what happened in Canterbury with Environment Canterbury, the regional council, which was the ultimate in this Government’s exercising its power to completely get rid of local democracy. If we just recap on that issue, we saw councillors replaced by commissioners. We saw councillors who were duly elected by the citizens of Canterbury sacked and replaced by Government appointees. That is why we have serious misgivings about this Government appointing hearings commissioners.

We know that the Auckland Unitary Plan Hearings Panel that was set up by this Government to hear and develop the plan for Auckland, despite the fact that it was appointed, has actually been doing a good job. It has got a bigger job to complete. The reason this Government has got this piece of legislation here today for us to push through under urgency is that the Government has set its own deadline—July next year—by which the unitary plan hearings panel has to report back to the council on the recommendations for the plan. It has said it has got to be by July next year. There is absolutely no reason—no real reason—for that to happen. The Government is arbitrarily choosing a deadline in order to put pressure on a unitary plan process, which is, again, a democratic process. We know it is democratic because there are over 5,000 submissions still to be heard. But if you speed up that process, then what gets lost? The unitary plan is far too important for us to have a process that is lacking in democratic principles. By having the Government set an arbitrary date, we are actually starting to erode democracy in another way.

We will be opposing the bill. We are the only party in the House that is opposing the bill, and we are doing it because of the constant encroachments on the democratic processes and principles in Auckland. Thank you.

RON MARK (Deputy Leader—NZ First): It is always a challenge, and I have said this before, when you rise at No. 7—

Phil Twyford: What would you know about local government!

RON MARK: What would I know about local government? A teeny-weeny little bit. I have to say, in response to the question from the honourable member, if I had known as much about local government when I first entered Parliament as I know today, having spent 4 years as the Mayor of Carterton—and elected unopposed in one of those terms—I would have been a better MP.

I think that many, many of the speeches that I have heard, and, sadly, a lot of the commentary that has come from Ministers as they have sought to justify legislation that they have advanced through this House, have been made from a baseline of pure ignorance about local government matters and a total lack of understanding of the consequences of those pieces of legislation that they put through and inflict upon the ratepayers and the people of those communities—which is quite a sad thing. But I am hopeful that there is a greater degree of understanding now between Local Government New Zealand and the Government, and this bill probably gives a “smidge” of hope that there is some meaningful conversation going on between this Government and local government, which is absolutely essential given the enormous amount of damage inflicted by its erstwhile Minister Mr Nick Smith when he rammed through this House, and justified the production of, the local government amendment legislation back in 2013.

I do recall as a mayor sitting in the company of many other mayors and deputy mayors, and chief executive officers and senior managers of local government territorial authorities throughout New Zealand, the absolute anger at some of the assertions of this Government about what local government was and was not doing, how competent it was, and how capable it was. It astonished me, to the point that I actually sent an email to the Minister of Local Government at the time—who is now the Speaker, Mr David Carter—and copied it in to the Prime Minister, making the observation that I could not understand why the Government would be so rude and behave in such an ill-informed manner and be so derisive of local government, given the large number of card-carrying National Party members who were mayors, deputy mayors, and senior councillors within local government incorporated. As I said in my email, I hoped that they expressed their dissatisfaction at the next election, and I know a good many of them certainly did.

What stands out in this piece of legislation, and the point in time that we have arrived at now in the House, is the irony. I say to the honourable member Phil Twyford that I was a little bit gutted because he took my first paragraph off me when he started his contribution last night in the second reading, but I am going to repeat it here today because I think it actually says something quite pertinent.

We are in the second reading. Normally this would be post a select committee hearing—a time when this bill would have been put on the Table, and New Zealanders, and particularly the ratepayers of Auckland, would have had an opportunity to make submissions to express their views, express their concerns, ask their questions, and seek some satisfaction and some surety around any of the issues that they might have spotted in this bill. This bill is designed to enhance the hearings process. This process that we are engaged in right now, ironically, is undermining the parliamentary hearings process. I do not get it. How blatantly obvious must this have been to the Leader of the House and the Government whips when the proposition was first put to them: “Oh, we’ve got this item sitting at No. 15. We need to bolster up the urgency. How about we chuck this on the Table? We’ll just flick off the select committee stage. We’ll run it through, ram it through.”

The truth of the matter is that if the Government really believes in enhancing the hearings processes and expediting more efficiently, whilst giving people the opportunity to have their say on the Auckland Unitary Plan through their submissions—if it seriously believes that that is what it is doing through passing this bill, then why would it undermine the credibility of the process of the passage of this bill by removing the hearings process from this bill? I do not get it.

Someone over there—maybe Mr Seymour, because he is, to paraphrase him, sometimes a very, very bright chap. But, as we know, very, very bright chaps can sometimes be quite amazingly thick, very intelligent people—

Jami-Lee Ross: Ron Mark would know about that.

RON MARK: Well, there he goes, “Mr Mouth”—what is his name? I keep forgetting it, but he is a “whipper”, apparently, in the National Government. But someone surely must have understood the irony of the situation—

Jami-Lee Ross: You’re proving the thickness argument.

RON MARK: —that they were putting on the Table, right now. That man will find out just how stupid his statements are come 2017 when he wants to come talk to me, will he not? But we will hold it until that day. We will move on from here, because the ignorance of that man is not worth commenting on.

I would only say to the Government that it is sad that we are pushing this bill through under urgency. We could have actually had the first reading done a month or so ago. We could have moved it through to select committee, and even if we had said—well, it is a very small bill. It is a very tight bill. It has got the support and, looking at the departmental disclosure statement, there has clearly been some very good conversation with Auckland City. Auckland City is on board with the bill—it has been involved in it. I read in the departmental disclosure statement that its consultations have been done via emails and other communications.

It would appear that if we had had a select committee process, it would have been a pretty straightforward matter from the Auckland City side. It most certainly would have given the citizens of Auckland an opportunity to come along and voice their concerns. What would their concerns have most likely been? If one takes 5 minutes to have a look at the Auckland City website and look at the unitary plan and the processes it has to go through—I mean, it is very clear that Auckland has decided on a vision statement, which is to be the world’s most livable city. Of course, to make a vision statement worthwhile there has to be a plan. This is the unitary plan we are looking at. The plan has to determine what can be built, and where.

There is no shortage of controversy in Auckland around that very question of what can be built, and where. Auckland is suffering right now from a massive housing shortage, and it is very clear that the initiatives of the Government have not done anything to alleviate that problem. Auckland people, quite rightly, in their submissions on the unitary plan, would want to have those conversations. To “create a higher-quality and more compact city … provide for rural activities”—under the Auckland Unitary Plan and the hearings that would be heard on this, I have no doubt that there are some serious concerns being raised out of Rodney and out of rural Auckland. Although people might say that their plan needs to provide for rural activities, that mere statement suggests to me that the people who wrote it actually do not understand rural New Zealand.

It is not just about rural activities—being able to get down to the river for a picnic. This is about how the economic units within the rural part of Auckland City actually operate and are permitted to operate under the unitary plan. I have no doubt that amongst those 5,000 submissions that are yet to be heard there will be some very strong views from rural Rodney.

The bill, as it lies on the Table right now, is designed to expedite the hearings process. New Zealand First has already said in the first reading that it has no trouble with those provisions. The only concern we have is around reducing the quorum from three to two—it seems a bit strange—but having concurrent committees running, under different chairs as well, seems to fill that gap. It seems to make up for some of the concerns we have. I will leave it there.

In conclusion, let us have a conversation during the Committee stage. We will have more talk around the quorum and why the Minister thinks that is OK, and we will take the bill from that point. Thank you very much.

PAUL FOSTER-BELL (National): E Te Mana Whakawā, tēnā koe; e ngā mema o Te Whare Pāremata, tēnā koutou katoa. In the second reading debate on the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill, I just want to say that I am astounded that members opposite can take such a long time to say that they will vote for, and actually agree with, what we are trying to achieve with this bill, because it is a very clear and simple piece of legislation. The key provisions are that it will reduce the quorum of the hearings for the Auckland Unitary Plan from three to two members, allowing up to four hearings to be held concurrently. This should allow the council to complete its Auckland Unitary Plan hearings by July next year, which is the legislated deadline.

I see no need to filibuster this bill—it is a very simple piece of legislation. So I will not be giving one of the waffling speeches that we have heard from members opposite. This is an excellent bill. I commend it to the House.

Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: This is a 5-minute call on behalf of the Green Party.

JAN LOGIE (Green): I rise to take another short call this evening—in this alternate universe of urgency—on the second reading of the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill. Of course, in the normal progression of legislation we would be, in this speech, reading sections of people’s submissions to the select committee and using departmental advice to support our presentations, and potentially supporting, presenting, and explaining the amendments we might be making to this bill. But we cannot do that today because the use of urgency by the Government has again denied people that ability to participate in this decision-making process and has thus removed the depth from this discussion in this House. We do not even have a regulatory impact statement to support this piece of legislation, to be able to add even a little bit more depth. So we have been given this legislation—as was the previous piece of legislation under discussion, the Social Security (Commencement of Benefits) Amendment Bill—under urgency, with no clear rationale for the urgency.

I have looked and I have listened to try to understand where the urgency is in this, and I cannot see how the changes that are in this piece of legislation could not have been anticipated and brought to this House in time for at least a truncated select committee process to have happened. One of the provisions in this bill seeks to validate 28 February 2014 as the closing date for submissions, so that submissions received between 14 January and 28 February can actually still be considered, as they have been. The need to do that surely could have been anticipated fairly early last year. It also, I understand, validates a practice of hearings panels holding concurrent sessions, which has been common for quite a while. So I again cannot see how the Government could not have recognised that earlier and brought it to the House to enable submissions.

There is even the fact that Minister Nick Smith announced his intent to introduce this legislation back in September, and now we are in mid-November rushing this through under urgency. If the key provisions of this bill were identifiable early last year and announced in September—only in September, but still—I cannot see why this is happening under urgency, and that is a key reason that the Green Party is unable to support this piece of legislation.

We feel as if we need to actually make a principled stand in support of people’s ability to participate in the decision-making process. This, at the heart, refers to the Auckland Unitary Plan and the process for developing that, and that plan is no small thing. That plan is responsible for the future shape of Auckland.

The Auckland Unitary Plan covers building regulations for mixed housing zones, where public open space is and what it looks like, building height, and the character of our houses in the different areas—the very, very heart of what makes a city. It defines the urban boundaries. It puts the rules around sustainable urban design. It puts in protections for fresh water and significant ecological areas. It covers the heritage, nature and protections for Auckland, the provisions for mana whenua, and then, as well—something so close to the heart of Aucklanders—all of the transport infrastructure around where transport corridors are, the air quality provisions, and the parking spaces, which is something very dear to my colleague Julie Anne Genter’s heart.

This is such a significant plan, with such deep meaning for Aucklanders. It is the future of the economic powerhouse of our country, and this is legislation that relates to the delivery of that plan. It is no small matter, and the bill should not be passed through under urgency.

JENNY SALESA (Labour—Manukau East): Thank you for the opportunity to speak on the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill. The purpose of this bill is to refine the massive Auckland Unitary Plan hearings process so that the panel can deliver all of its recommendations on the proposed unitary plan to Auckland Council by the statutory deadline of 22 July 2016.

Labour is supporting this bill, which will, amongst other things, drop the panel’s quorum. Clause 4 of the bill will amend the principal Act, section 136(1), to reduce the quorum for a three-member panel to only two. This should provide enough flexibility to deal with the thousands of submissions on site-specific issues that Auckland Council deals with.

As everyone in this House knows, Auckland aims to be the most livable city in the world. Auckland is a city that is growing really fast at the moment. Consequently, it faces a number of pressing issues, including a serious housing crisis issue, and my office in South Auckland sees the fallout from this every day.

The unitary plan that is proposed by this bill is a tool that would assist Auckland to meet its economic and housing needs. It is an appropriate and balanced way to deal with this issue, while protecting and enhancing what is most important to Aucklanders. The unitary plan will determine what is to be built and at which location, as well as create a higher-quality and more compact Auckland.

The Government still seems to have absolutely no firm idea of what to do to tackle the housing crisis in Auckland, in the face of the most urgent housing need that is happening there right now. Just yesterday Simon Collins in the New Zealand Herald reported that every 3 days in Auckland at least one family is seeking housing help because they do not have any other place to live. They are homeless and they are living in cars. Many families are homeless and living in cars right now in Auckland, and 50 percent of the people in those families are children. This figure, he reports, is likely to be an underestimate.

Just last week in my electorate office in Manukau East, in South Auckland, our office saw three families who were homeless and living in cars and who were in desperate need of assistance. Two of these were families with young children, and the other was a man in poor health and with disabilities, and he has a young daughter. It is appalling that there is nowhere for these families that are living like this—living in cars in this First World country, Aotearoa New Zealand—that is a permanent place for them to call their home. For mothers, and especially for women with young children, it seems that it is only in occasional circumstances—where they are victims of domestic violence—that these families can actually go into a house right away.

Our office works on a regular basis with Housing New Zealand as well as with Work and Income. I must say that our office works quite well with them. However, the highest priority that they can give a family is A20. In the whole year that I have been a local MP in Manukau East we have only given a family an A15 as the highest priority. I do not actually know what it would take for a family to get to an A20, but our office in South Auckland has not actually seen a family with a priority of A20, not even families with children who are homeless.

The special housing areas have been a complete flop. We heard last week that only 102 houses have been completed, even though Nick Smith had promised 39,000 such homes would be built. The latest Quotable Value data in Auckland tells us that housing prices have risen by $22,000 in the month after the Government announced its brightline test coming into effect. Yet again, an attempt to control the speculation in housing that has been a notable failure.

The average price of a house in Auckland is $918,000. There are so many families in Auckland that cannot afford that in Auckland. Right now, the Government needs to urgently establish effective measures to control the housing crisis in Auckland. May we recommend that a solution could be a large-scale, State-backed affordable housing development, as well as a ban on foreign speculators buying existing homes in Auckland. Thank you.

JOANNE HAYES (National): Ata mārie e Te Mana Whakawā, ka huri au ki ngā mema o Te Whare Pāremata, ka nui te mihi atu ki a koutou.

[Peaceful morning to you, Mr Deputy Speaker. I turn to the members of the House of Parliament: much appreciation to you collectively.]

I rise to take a very short call on this bill. I am really pleased to hear that the Opposition supports this bill, because the amendment bill is about the ability for the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel to hear all submissions on the unitary plan and it is about the housing issues in Auckland. It is an opportunity, as I said last night, for people who have some of these idealistic ideas about what Auckland City should look like into the future, whether it is a “Kumbaya” State or whatever it ends up being. At the end of the day this is a very short bill and it allows local government to get on and do what local government is going to do into the future for the benefit of Auckland. I am pleased to commend it to the House.

Su’a WILLIAM SIO (Labour—Māngere): Before I launch into my comments about the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill, can I state for the record that today marks 5 years since the tragic deaths of 29 miners at Pike River. Can I state for the record my acknowledgment of that Pike River community, my acknowledgment of all the families who have lost loved ones, and my acknowledgment also for the Hon Damien O’Connor, who has been a consistent voice on behalf of that community. Sadly, the tragedy is more enhanced because, on reflection and after the royal commission report, we know that those deaths could have been prevented. This House needs to take note that we have to unite ourselves around ensuring that we have legislation that protects the lives of all workers throughout this country. I want to table that for the record.

I initially raised that acknowledgment of the Pike River community because legislation arising from the tragedy would have been a piece of legislation that I think this House would be united about if it came through urgency. However, that is not the case.

I now want to get on to the bill. I want to respond because last night members of the Government continued to crow about the fact that this bill would enable Aucklanders to have a view, to have a say. The fact of the matter is that the Auckland Council has already heard 9,000 submissions with regard to the Auckland Unitary Plan, but what this bill does is it prevents Aucklanders from having a view on this piece of legislation. It prevents Aucklanders also from giving this Parliament the benefit of their experience, knowledge, and expertise.

The reason why I say it prevents them is that under normal democratic processes—and we have one of the best in the world—in the first reading the Minister in charge, the Hon Dr Nick Smith, would have referred the bill to a select committee. The second reading would have enabled us to begin to talk about what Aucklanders submitted on this particular bill. It would have enabled us to thank them for their submissions and thank the members of the committee, but that is not the case—that is not the case here. So we do not have the benefit of receiving the views of Aucklanders with regard to how they see things happening already under the structure that this Government forced upon them back in 2010.

This is where, I think, Ron Mark made it clear that nobody can figure out this Government. On the one hand, the rhetoric was that it is giving Aucklanders a view, but in this particular case it is not. It is not going to give anybody a view, and that is quite sad. So we miss out on that opportunity, and I suspect if this went out for public consultation we would have heard, like many of our colleagues, the voices of the people of Auckland tell this Government that it has screwed up. It is its cock-up, which we are now having to deliberate on with this bill.

As I itemised last night, Government members can crow all they want, but the reality is that this bill fixes the errors that the Government made back in 2010, again because of a collapsed democratic process that it undertook during that period. This Government has a habit of believing that it knows best. And let me give you an example. You see, prior to this Government changing the legislation it was councils that had the powers and ability to appoint hearings commissioners. What the principal Act did was it took that power away from Auckland councillors and gave it to the Minister for the Environment and the Minister of Conservation. So now we have the Ministers appointing the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel—and this is not to denigrate the members of the panel, because I have the deepest respect for the members of the independent hearings panel. What I am pointing out is this Government did not trust Aucklanders enough to choose their own panellists on the hearings panel. It could not trust them, because it believes it knows best.

So the Government gave itself the power to appoint members of the hearings panel. It thinks it knows best, but here is an example—and this is one of many examples of the cock-up. When it repeats the same mistake over and over again, people are inclined to say how incompetent this Government is. You know, it attempts to provide this image of itself as some kind of master of the universe when it comes to running this country, but these little things add up. I would say to Aucklanders, take note. This is not the only mistake or cock-up that this Government has made; there have been several. And it has not just been for Auckland; it also applied, as we saw, in the bills that we debated last night.

I want to say that the bill enables the Ministers to add other members to the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel, and I do not have a problem with that. But here is another example of this Government not trusting Aucklanders. If I were to view the membership of the independent hearings panel, the only two people who I would recognise as Aucklanders—and, again, you know, I have the deepest respect for the membership that is there; they are professional people with lots of expertise—are Desmond Morrison and John Kirikiri. I do not know the other members, but I would have thought, given they are hearing the unitary plan of Auckland, that the membership should, by its very nature of overseeing the unitary plan of Auckland, have an interest in Auckland and should live in Auckland. I have no disrespect for the others because I know that this is an area that requires expertise, but as an Aucklander I feel, surely, there are enough Aucklanders with the same expertise and the same professionalism who can deal with this.

Again, by giving itself the power to appoint members of the independent hearings panel, this Government sends clear signals that it does not trust Aucklanders. It does not believe there are any Aucklanders good enough to make up the bulk of the panel. So by way of advice, I would ask about that.

I am glad that the legislation does say that the Ministers must consult. Well, I am not sure. I will have to look during the Committee stage at whether the word “must” is in there or whether it is up to the Ministers, but I would think that if they really trusted Aucklanders and valued the views of Aucklanders, then they would be consulting not just with the chair of the independent hearings panel but also with the Māori Statutory Board as well as with the Auckland Council. But I would imagine, in my gut, that Aucklanders would want to see more Aucklanders on that panel, because this is about our lives and this is about our neighbourhood. And, as parochial as that view may be, it is rightly so, because we are talking about Auckland now and in the many, many years ahead. When the Government members got up last night and crowed about this bill being a bill that provides Aucklanders with the ability to share their views, the Hon Phil Goff said it was a cock-up, and that is what it is. It reminds me of a Samoan saying: “E fiu lava e nana le tamaimoa i lalo o le tanoa, ae ioio mai lava.”, meaning that the hen could attempt with all her might to cover up the little chickens but we will hear the little chickens making their noise. We know they are there. So as much as that Government attempts to try to cover up its cock-up and cover its mistakes, we all know—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): No, no. Order! I know that the member is using fowl analogies, but that expression is not one that can be used.

Su’a WILLIAM SIO: The point I wanted to make is that this Government continues to try to cover up the mistakes it has made, but we know—Aucklanders know—that this is a consistent pattern of an incompetent Government that attempts to rush things in and attempts to prevent Aucklanders from having a view, and the mistakes have revealed themselves in this House.

MATT DOOCEY (National—Waimakariri): I am rising in support of the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill. I must say in response to that last speaker, Su’a William Sio, that if I am fortunate enough to be in the House for the length of time that colleague has, I hope I do not end up being as cynical and as unconstructive as that last member who spoke.

Quite often in the last few weeks I have got up and spoken about bills pertaining to Canterbury. It is great to see the Government supporting Canterbury, and in response I want to get up and support another region that is important for New Zealand’s growth and development—that is, Auckland. I think it is only fair enough to support the biggest city.

When I look at this bill, I think I look at it in terms of efficiency, effectiveness, and economics. When we look at the detail, we see the efficiency of reducing the quorum from three to two members, the effectiveness of increasing the panel size, and the economy of scale of allowing the panel to report back in stages. Overall, I support this bill and commend it to the House. Thank you.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill be now read a second time.

Ayes 107

New Zealand National 59; New Zealand Labour 32; New Zealand First 12; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Noes 14

Green Party 14.

Bill read a second time.

In Committee

Part 1 Substantive amendments

Hon PHIL GOFF (Labour—Mt Roskill): Before starting discussion on the provision itself can I join with my colleague Su’a William Sio in acknowledging the fifth anniversary of the tragedy at Pike River. I had the occasion at that time to go down and visit the families. I know the absolute tragedy that that represented for them—the loss of their loved ones, the 29 men who put up their tickets going into the mine and never came out to collect them. I acknowledge also the tragedy that there has never been closure for those families—those bodies remain in the mine. So today as we debate this bill we are also thinking of those families 5 years out and would want to express our condolences to them for their loss, and hope that the measures that were put in place will stop any further avoidable tragedy, which is exactly what happened at Pike River.

As we get into Part 1 of the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill, which contains the substantive amendments, I want to make the point that it would really have been good to test out the provisions that are set out in Part 1 at a select committee, so that we could get feedback from those parties that are most immediately involved in this process. The tragedy of this debate in urgency at 9.45 in the morning is that we are debating measures that we have never had the chance to test against the experts in the field, the people who should have been here in Parliament to give their view on the changes that are being proposed.

Auckland Council members should have been heard before a select committee hearing so they could spell out what their views were on it. I know that they are generally in favour of the changes that are being recommended. We should have had David Kirkpatrick, the chair of the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel, before us to explain how that process had worked and whether these are precisely the measures that are needed to facilitate the timely and effective hearing of the submissions being made on the draft unitary plan. We should have had the chance to hear from the officials from the department. They are in the Chamber, but they cannot answer our questions here. However, they could have answered our questions before a select committee. That is why we have select committee hearings.

These are significant changes. By and large I am in support of the changes, but rather than support them blindly without having heard the arguments around them, I would like to have tested those arguments and questioned the officials before a select committee. I note that my colleagues from the Green Party are opposing this bill and they are opposing this bill not so much because they oppose the substantive provisions but because they oppose the process.

What we have not been told, and what the Minister in the chair, Mr Lotu-Iiga, may be able to tell us this morning, is why we are having urgency. I know that on the surface we are having urgency because it will be really good to get this bill through before Christmas so that the amendments can be implemented. But my question is slightly different from that, Minister. My question is this: if the Minister, the Hon Nick Smith, was able to announce what the bill was doing and the bill was drafted on 16 September—more than 2 months ago—why was it introduced yesterday at 10.30, I think it was, at night? Why is the management of this House so bad that the introduction was left so that we could not have the normal procedure of looking at the provisions of this bill before a select committee? That is a straight question. It deserves a straight answer.

The bill was drafted and the Minister announced it months ago, but now it is being pushed through under urgency and we do not get the chance for a proper select committee process to make sure we have got it right. That is bad process. There is no one in the Chamber who could stand up and justify having urgency as good parliamentary process. It is not. Mistakes happen. They are not picked up. The public is not given the chance to have their say. We heard members of the Government wax eloquent about the importance of this hearing process so the public could be heard. What an irony. What a contradiction, when we are debating something where the public has not been allowed to be heard. That is wrong. Everybody in the Committee knows that it is wrong, and because we did not have had that select committee—

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): I call Chris Hipkins.

CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka): Thank you very much, Mr Chairman—that is an interesting call. I am very happy to take a call on this Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill. I will be a little slower standing up next time.

I do want to just begin my remarks, though, by picking up some of the comments that some of the National members made in their contributions in the first and second readings last night, where they were talking about how important this bill was to ensure that the public got to have their say. They were waxing lyrical about the importance of committee processes and the public hearings and public submissions process and how important that was. I did think that that was somewhat ironic, given that this very bill, which they claim is going to enhance those processes, is going through Parliament without any such scrutiny itself—without any such public submissions process—without really any good reason.

Why could the Government not have simply done this using regular sitting time? This is not something that necessarily would languish for a long time in a select committee. It still could have gone through the regular legislative process. With a bit of competent management on the Government’s part—and I suspect that that was the biggest barrier that it faced in doing this properly—it could have actually got this through within a reasonable period of time and still had the democratic process respected and adhered to. There are very few bills that go through this House that are not improved through having a select committee process, and often the select committee process allows us to pick up what seemed to be minor or trivial things in the drafting of a bill that actually turn out to be quite substantial.

Given that we have ended up having to amend legislation yesterday that went through under urgency—we have amended it again under urgency, because there were errors in it that were not picked up when it went through under urgency the first time—I think that this legislation certainly could have been quite significantly improved, or maybe it could not have been, but certainly we will never know because it did not go through that process. But it is possible that we will end up having to come back and amend it.

Anyway, Part 1 of the bill deals with the substantive amendments, and the first one that I want to talk to is reducing the quorum required for hearing sessions from three members to two members. That may seem like, you know, a rather inconsequential amendment to many people, but the difference between having three people hearing your submission and two people hearing your submission can actually be quite significant. It can actually make quite a difference, and it can certainly make a difference to the submitter’s sense of having been heard. The Labour Party is supporting this bill through because we agree with the intent of the bill, but I think that this is something that we should certainly consider and tease out a little bit more as this debate progresses.

The whole point of having a process like this is to ensure that people feel that they have been heard. No such process like this is ever going to result in everybody being happy with the outcome, because consensus on many of the issues that we are talking about will be almost impossible to achieve, but people are more likely to accept the outcome if they feel they have been heard. So the first question I think the Committee needs to turn its attention to is: if people feel the process is being truncated and they are not getting their full chance to be heard by a full committee, will they end up feeling that they have been heard? I think, you know, that that is a legitimate question to ask.

There are some questions around logistics. Reducing the quorum required from three members to two members, of course, does not mean that there cannot be more members on the panel, and I would hope that in most instances there would still be more members than that on the panel. The quorum is the minimum required. As we know from select committee hearings, although a quorum may be two or three members for a small select committee, there are often six members present hearing public submissions, and that is a very positive thing. So it is important to remember that a quorum is the minimum required, and that for administrative purposes, this will probably make life easier in terms of scheduling the meetings, but I would hope that the people involved will take their responsibilities quite seriously and ensure that they attend as many of these hearings as possible. Therefore, members of the public, when they are making their submissions, will be heard by more members than that.

This bill also allows the possible number of appointed Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel members to increase from seven to 10, excluding the chairperson. It is kind of interesting because on the one level we are lowering the minimum number required, but increasing the maximum number required. With regard to my initial comments about people needing to have the sense that they are being heard, it is quite possible that they will be heard by—[Bell rung]

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): Chris Hipkins.

CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka): It is quite possible that they will end up—[Interruption] It is an excellent, excellent judgment on the part of the Chair. It is quite possible that they will end up being heard by more people if they end up having a full panel of 10, excluding the chairperson. I would quite like to know, however, why the chairperson is excluded from that calculation. If the maximum number is currently seven plus the chairperson, why move to 10 plus the chairperson? What is the justification for having the chairperson counted separately from the overall number of people involved in the hearings? I would quite like to hear the rationale for that from the Government.

The bill enables the hearings panel to make recommendations on the proposed plan in stages rather than in one final report, after hearings are completed on a particular topic, if it chooses to do so. My reading of this—and again I would seek some clarification from the Minister on that—is that the panel can give progress reports, which it can carve off particular sections of the plan to give focus to at a given time, and that that may in fact speed up the process, or at least give more certainty and clarity to the people who are affected by certain parts of the plan, if that makes sense. I just want to check that my understanding of that is correct and that actually what this means is that the plan itself can be progressed, not as one plan but as strands of the one plan, and that that might actually speed up the process. That seems to me to be quite a sensible thing to do.

I would like to get some context from some of the other members who may be speaking in this debate who have a little bit more knowledge of the Auckland planning process and of some of the contemporary issues that are being dealt with in that planning process. What some of those issues in Auckland might be that would be carved off and dealt with in smaller chunks, rather than in the overall planning process and final report-back, I do not have a sense of, so I would be interested in hearing from either the Minister in the chair, Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga, preferably, or from the other members who are involved in this particular process.

As I said, I am not too familiar with the specifics of Auckland, but I am certainly familiar with the processes of local government around my own area, around the Wellington region. I do not agree with Chris Finlayson, who said that that debate is completely irrelevant because nothing ever happens in Wellington. I think that probably says more about his contribution to the wider Wellington debate. But I do think that these processes can be difficult for members of the public to navigate. If people want to have a say in the overall direction of their city, then simply saying “Well, here’s the process. Here’s the whole plan. What do you think about it?”, could be quite a daunting prospect.

However, if the third amendment—which I am speaking to, which allows the panel to make its recommendations in stages—also allows the panel to hear particular parts at a time and pick off particular issues at a time, that potentially will make this process more accessible to members of the public. They will be able to focus their attention in on submitting on the issues that they know about and that they care about, and they will not end up being overwhelmed and distracted by a whole lot of things that are not of concern to them and that are peripheral to their areas of expertise and knowledge.

Having participated in other local government processes of a similar nature, I can say that I think that could potentially be quite welcome. As I have said, certainly I have seen people participating in the planning processes of local councils. They go along with a particular issue that they care about, and then someone will ask them questions about a whole lot of other issues that they did not submit on and do not really care about, and they find the process quite baffling and overwhelming. If there is a way to ensure that that does not happen and that their contribution can actually be adequately heard and can be appropriately targeted, it can make a difference, and that is ultimately what this process is all about. Local government is local.

Grant Robertson: Ah!

CHRIS HIPKINS: Well—

Phil Twyford: Well, it used to be.

CHRIS HIPKINS: It used to be local—it used to be local. But local government should be local—perhaps I should put it that way. Therefore, the more participation from the grassroots, from the ratepayers, and from the citizens the better, and the better that the final decisions and the ultimate plan that come out of the end of this process will be.

Grant Robertson: He doesn’t believe in central control.

CHRIS HIPKINS: I do believe in a certain amount of central control—

Grant Robertson: Only when he’s the whip.

CHRIS HIPKINS: —particularly when it comes to parliamentary processes, but—

CLARE CURRAN (Labour—Dunedin South): In my first contribution to this debate, and addressing my remarks to Part 1, may I first also join with my colleagues in remembering the fifth anniversary of Pike River and how the events of that day shocked the nation, stopped us in our tracks, and have, to some extent, reshaped our nation.

As with all major events, you always remember where you were when they happened. I happened to be standing on a grass verge in Mana, waving a sign in support of my colleague Kris Faafoi. Of course, none of that mattered. The most important thing was what was happening on the West Coast. But at least one of the good things that emerged post that was getting my colleague Kris Faafoi into Parliament.

Following on from my colleague Su’a William Sio, who talked about good process, the thing that is really the most disturbing about this piece of legislation, which on the face of it looks relatively minor, is that it is about good process. It is actually about bad process and fixing bad process. There are some significant questions that the Minister can and needs to answer. I have got a couple of them to pose in this contribution.

The public should be aware that this Government has made a habit of passing shoddy, rushed legislation under urgency, with no select committee scrutiny. Another trend has been to truncate the select committee process. There are too many pieces of legislation that are going through this kind of process. As a result, you end up with unscrutinised law, and you end up coming back and having to fix it, which is what is happening here. This Government claims that it is transparent, but nothing really could be further from the truth when you look at the sheer number of pieces of legislation that pass through so quickly that they are riddled with errors and mistakes.

My comments specifically relate to clause 6 in Part 1, which is amending the part on the right of appeal to the High Court on questions of law. It replaces section 158(6). According to the departmental disclosure statement, it is: “A minor and technical amendment … to fix an error in the drafting of the principal Act relating to the procedural requirements for the filing of appeals on questions of law with the High Court.”

My question to the Minister is what the legal implications are of this. Given that we do not have a regulatory impact statement, we do not have the advice from parliamentary counsel, and all we have is a departmental disclosure statement and the amendment has been described as minor and technical, what are its implications in law? I would ask the Minister in the chair, the Hon Sam Lotu-Iiga, during his contributions on Part 1 of the bill to tell the Committee whether or not there has been a legal opinion provided on this particular clause, clause 6, which makes the change that “Notice of the appeal must be filed with the High Court, and served on the Auckland Council, no later than 20 working days after the Council notifies the matters …”.

Given the impact and the import of the principles behind this piece of legislation and given that Auckland is our biggest city, the processes that are being set out in law under the unitary plan are significant and have significant impacts. By making that change, surely there must be some kinds of legal implications. I think the Committee needs to know what they are. If they have not been sought, then the Committee needs to know why not. I also want to make reference to clause 8—

GARETH HUGHES (Green): Kia ora. Ngā mihi nui ki a koutou. Kia ora. I rise to oppose this bill, the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill. I am sadly and reluctantly declining to answer the member Chris Hipkins’ challenge. He asked whether any member in this Committee on either side who is an expert on the Auckland Unitary Plan could stand and make a contribution. I do not claim to be an expert on the unitary plan; as a former Aucklander, though, I know the city is an amazing, lovable city. It is one of the most livable cities in the world. Although often the arcane world of unitary plans and how the Resource Management Act applies and the minutiae of the Auckland Council is somewhat far from the everyday experiences of Auckland in that sense, in the physical sense it is the footpaths, the paths, the public transport, the State highway network that the council is involved in part-funding—that is what Aucklanders experience. It is important that it gets done right, gets done democratically, and we have an efficient but democratic process.

So I am not an expert, but as a former Aucklander I want to make a contribution. I have got a few substantive points on Part 1. The first is that I would also like to respond to Chris Hipkins’ question around clause 5. This amendment bill amends the way the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel can form its recommendations. Previously, I assume in the original transitions legislation it implied that the hearings panel could make a single report with a series of recommendations, no matter how many hearing panels or topics it discussed. What clause 5 in this amendment bill does is allow the panel to make a series of recommendations on a series of topics.

I guess I am asking for Government members, or the Minister, to make a contribution on this question, because I believe it is debatable. What is the best way to engage and consult the people of Auckland and the constituent communities? Is it easier to have a single report with a series of recommendations that you can go through one time and then make a single submission on, or is it more convenient and more open, in terms of consultation, to have a series of reports coming out? You know, I genuinely believe it is debatable. Is a single series of recommendations easier to follow, or a series of individual topics? I would invite the members to weigh in and share their views on it.

In terms of the other substantive points on Part 1 of this bill, the first is the quorum being dropped from three members to two. I think I would like to echo some concerns we have seen from the Labour members on this point. We, as a parliamentary chamber, I doubt would restrict our select committee or parliamentary House quorum requirements. It is a question of the seriousness that the public see in terms of the reputation of the panel members. I think it is a live question: what is the importance of going from three to two? When you are debating recommendations with those hearings panels, obviously it is hard to break a tied vote if you have only two members. A third member makes sure clear decisions and recommendations can be put forward.

Second, we see an increase in the possible number of appointed hearings panel members from seven to 10. In this clause, which I believe is clause 7, it furthers a track record of the current Government to move from having independently appointed or separate consultation appointment processes for important decision-making members, such as on the hearings panel, which can issue recommendations, to having an appointed policy approach. I think we have got to have a debate on this issue because when you see the Government stacking appointed members, alarm bells should be ringing. When you have a body such as this hearings panel, which is hearing from the Auckland communities, hearing from the council, and making recommendations on the Auckland Unitary Plan, it is important that we have hearing members who are representing diverse communities.

When you look at the Government’s track record, particularly the member Steven Joyce’s track record when it comes to the university and polytech councils, what we have not seen is diverse communities or multi-gender positions granted. What we have seen is—I do not know whether this is in order—old, male, pale, and stale. People from the business communities are dominating those appointed boards. [Interruption] I definitely was not talking to you, Mr Chair. So I think we have got big concerns around further appointed members. Obviously, it is good that we have got greater consultation requirements, including the Independent Māori Statutory Board, along with the Minister of Conservation and the Minister for the Environment. However, I would question the Government members again: why only those two Ministers?

I would like to support the amendment in the name of Phil Twyford, which comes to include the mayor, as well, in the decision-making consultation requirements to appoint new members or a new chair to the decision-making committee. I think it is critically important we get Auckland voices involved in those conversations, and I think it is entirely appropriate, entirely legitimate, and entirely consistent with good decision-making to make sure that we get the Auckland mayor involved. At the moment we have got a Minister for the Environment based down in Nelson involved, and I think Aucklanders, when they are seeing new hearings panel members appointed, would ask questions. Why do our democratically elected Auckland Council members not get a say but the Minister for the Environment, based in Nelson, does?

Now, my third substantive point comes to clause 8, which is the concurrent hearings. Currently the hearings panel does a hearing, hears from the public, and makes a recommendation. This amendment bill allows for concurrent hearings. Again, this is a serious issue for debate. I think we should have a debate on that in this Committee stage because I can see both sides of the argument. On one hand it is more efficient. We can have multiple hearing panels having multiple public hearings so that the public can have their say, I guess, in a more timely and efficient manner.

Efficiency and timeliness are good values to espouse, but they can come into conflict and run up against the values that this House shares of having good decision-making and open, consultative, democratic input from the public. If you have two concurrent hearings—there are numerous stakeholders and communities involved in Auckland that have a wide variety of views on a wide variety of issues. Just take someone involved with a housing development, which is a very topical issue in Auckland. You could have concurrent hearings dealing with the same issue happening at the same time and it would be impossible for the same person to be in two locations at the same time, so let us have that debate. Do the efficiency benefits of allowing concurrent hearings outweigh the potential consultative and democratic pitfalls, or is that a decision where that has been thought through and a balance has been found?

Looking at clause 7 in Part 1, which inserts new section 161(8A), we see the Minister for the Environment, not the conservation Minister—and I would like to flow on from this. I know there is a genuine feeling in Auckland that Auckland is being run not from Auckland, of course, but from Wellington, and there has been a historical level of concern, I know, in this House. More than a hundred years ago there was actually talk of an Auckland party forming to make sure that Auckland interests were adequately represented, and when you see a Minister for the Environment based in Nelson making these key appointments to the hearings panel and not the Auckland mayor or the Auckland Council, it continues this.

When you see a bill, which is what we are debating in front of us, that is around decision making and that is around consultation with the public and you have a legislative process that does not give those Aucklanders or the public a say, with no select committee process—I would like to touch on the irony that we see in this. We are debating a bill around having good process and doing it in a terrible process, which, of course, is under urgency with no select committee process. Hopefully, a Government member can explain why on earth we are in urgency for this bill—a bill that was announced more than 2 months ago, but a bill that was only tabled and introduced in this House at 10.30 p.m. last night. If we are going to take Auckland seriously and if we are going to get Auckland moving, which is what I believe this House genuinely values, genuinely wants, why can we not take good process and consultation seriously? Why can we not have a more considered and deliberative approach, not just seeing a bill late last night that was to be debated the next morning through all stages? Why can we not have a good deliberative process?

What we see—and this is my last substantive point—is that this bill also validates previous errors in law. This is exactly what happens when you go through an urgency process. Mistakes get made, they do not get picked up, they do not get amended in the Committee stage, and the country is worse off as a result. The people are poorer, both in a financial sense from longer operating hours for this House and also in terms of respect for this House, where we should be putting good lawmaking and considered, deliberative legislative processes up there as aspects we aspire to. This House is united in its support for Auckland. We want to make sure there is a good unitary plan, one that the majority of Aucklanders can get behind through a good, consultative, democratic process. There are legitimate questions around having appointed panel members. There are legitimate questions around whether the drive for efficiency over democratic input—

RON MARK (Deputy Leader—NZ First): I am going to come back to an issue that I signalled was puzzling to New Zealand First when we first read this bill yesterday. It stood out quite glaringly. The proposal to move, or—sorry, I am just looking for it now. Clause 4, “Section 136 amended (Hearing procedure)”, which seeks to reduce the numbers of members on the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel from three to two. Going back into the primary legislation, this is dealt with there under section 136, “Hearing procedure”. Section 136(1) says: “At each hearing session, no fewer than 3 members of the Hearings Panel must be present.” This bill, under Part 1, clause 4, simply replaces the numeral “3” with the numeral “2”, which raises some interesting questions.

The member for the Green Party Gareth Hughes actually raised one of them. If we end up in a situation where you have two people sitting on that hearings panel and there is a disagreement—bearing in mind that under clause 5 of the bill this panel has had its powers amended through the amendment to section 144 of the primary legislation, where the hearings panel is now able, under this legislation, to make recommendations on the proposed plan, including any recommended changes to the plan, at the end of the hearing of those submissions. If we end up in a position where now, because the panel can report back in stages and it can make recommendations in stages, as opposed to having to wait until the entire hearing process is over—can the Minister in the chair, Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga, tell the Committee how you break that stalemate if at the end of that phase of the hearings the two members sitting there disagree on a recommendation?

Normally, Minister, anywhere else in the world people recognise the need to have an odd number so that you can have a debate and someone can adjudicate and there is a casting vote in there. But now we are going to report back in stages—and I am surprised that Mr David Seymour has not raised this matter. Being such a bright lad he would have picked up on this very, very quickly, I have no doubt.

But reading back into the primary legislation that Part 1 is amending in clauses 4 and 5, we know two things now: the rules around the hearings have changed, and the members on the panel can report back and make recommendations at the end of a session on a topic. When they have concluded hearing submissions on that particular topic, everyone has left the room, and they are sitting and discussing “Should we put through our recommendations now on that topic?”, if on the weight of the evidence they have drawn different conclusions and they disagree, then where does the tie-breaker come in? Where? I am going to ask the Minister because this is very important. We are reducing the quorum from three to two.

There is also another issue. If you go a little deeper into the primary legislation—I think you have got to go to section 144. If I might just whip back there briefly and have a look at section 144, “Hearings Panel must make recommendations to Council …”—no, I think it is under a different section. There is another little issue that pops up. For there to be a hearing, there has to be a chair of that panel. Under the unamended legislation you had a quorum of three, and if the chair did not turn up, the two of them could vote for one person to be the chair. Now, if there is a quorum of two and the chair does not turn up, where is it in the legislation that says that the other person who did turn up automatically becomes the chair? I do not know—well, if you do not have a quorum, you do not have a quorum, and you cannot convene. I guess the question around the appointment of chairmanship might not be relevant in there, but under the rules where you had—

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Next page.

RON MARK: Yes, it is over the next page. I know I was looking at it, and I thought: “Well, where does this work?”. If you have a quorum of three, coming to a decision is easy. It might not be to everyone’s agreement, but it is easy. I would like the Minister to please take a call. I would like the Minister to have a ponder on that and to consult because I think we have a wee problem: you might end up with a stalemate.

One of the things that is very important—because New Zealand First agrees that amending the legislation so that the panel can report back in stages is very important. Those of us who have done this sort of work in the past know that you get a pile of submissions. You can get submissions, if you take Rodney, for example, on land use, or if you take central Auckland, they will be on housing. There will be issues that will be quite contentious, but at the end of the hearings on that topic a number of drop downs will be obvious. To wait until the entire hearing process is over before one reports back on that is maybe not the soundest idea, and that is why, I am assuming, the Government has really gutted out section 144 of the primary legislation and trimmed it down—simply deleting the words “after it has finished hearing submissions” in section 144(1).

I understand that—I understand that. The ability to hear the evidence, take the stuff that is immediate and obvious, make a recommendation, and report it back there and then, when it is timely, fresh in the mind, and it is current—that is all good stuff; I understand that. But it is a problem if the quorum has dropped to two and people cannot agree.

So I think the Minister might want to have a think about that and maybe have someone scratch out an amendment, or maybe change that idea and stick with the three, because moving out the size of the panel from seven to 10 is a good idea. Given the size of Auckland City, given the complexity of the problems that Auckland faces, and given the varying views that will come before those hearings panels—you have got 5,000 submissions yet to be heard—I understand about having more people on the panel, having panels sitting concurrently, and being able to appoint chairs to other panels that are sitting concurrently. I understand all that. It is all about expediting. It is all about moving things forward quickly, in a timely manner, and efficiently without undermining the democratic process and without undermining people’s rights to have a say. So I would just ask him to have a look at that, please, and make a comment to us. Give us some satisfaction that things will not be messy at that point.

The Phil Twyford amendment—we would just signal at this point in time that we think it is a very good amendment. We think that the democratically elected representatives of the people of Auckland—this is a really simple point—should have a say in who the Minister for the Environment appoints on to that panel. It is really simple: this is about democracy. This is not about the Government having people appointed to the independent panel who fit the Government’s agenda and the Government’s thinking and who are able to produce results, policies, decisions, and directions that just coincidentally fit with the philosophical belief of the Government of the day.

Having said that, I have to put my hand up and say that I was always surprised and grateful that the Government selected me and appointed me to a couple of district health boards in my time while I was out of the House, reflecting that it was able to take on board people with differing views and different philosophies, looking for that mix. We would hope that if this legislation goes unaltered from what is before us right now, the Government will make sure that those people who are appointed to that independent panel are not political lackeys, but we would prefer that the Phil Twyford amendment goes forward to allow the people of Auckland, through their democratically elected representatives, to have the say in who is appointed to that board.

It seems to me from some of the speakers before—and I refer to Chris Hipkins’ comments—that those of us down here in the Wellington basin do not understand everything about Auckland. We know what we know through people whom we know and our own family who live up there, and from what we read. I am one of those lucky people. My partner is an Aucklander, and so I probably understand a heck of a lot more than I did before I met her, but I would not dare to stand up and say that I would be eminently qualified to sit on an independent panel looking at the Auckland Unitary Plan, or to say that I understood intimately and in detail the issues that were vexing the people of Auckland.

So we come back to the Phil Twyford amendment and say that we believe it is a good amendment. It is worthy of the Government’s favourable consideration—well, worthy of Government approval; it is as simple as that. Not consideration—it is worthy of approval, in the interests of enhancing democracy. Thank you.

PHIL TWYFORD (Labour—Te Atatū): I want to encourage the Minister in the chair, Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga, to take a call, for a couple of reasons. One is that the House is not giving this bill the benefit of a select committee process, and there are certain questions—a number have already been raised—that I think deserve an answer from the Minister. I know this is not his bill. He is not the Minister of Local Government; he is not the Minister for the Environment. We heard a bit of a pitch last night in his opening speech, which I think was an audition for the role of local government Minister—and he knows about local government. I mean, he is a former councillor on the old Auckland City Council. He might even be considering a new career in local government—that is quite possible. I think that it would be good for this debate if the Minister would, as H V Ross Robertson used to say, get up on his hind legs—

Sue Moroney: And “courtesy is contagious.”

PHIL TWYFORD: —and “courtesy is contagious”—and answer one or two questions that have been put to him. So I look forward to the Minister taking a call.

I want to speak to my tabled amendment to clause 7, but first let me just provide the context. On the question of the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel and appointments to the hearings panel, section 161(1) of the principal Act provides that the Minister for the Environment and the Minister of Conservation are to establish a hearings panel comprising the chairperson and three to seven members. That section also provides that “Ministers may appoint additional members after the initial appointment of members so long as the total number is no more than 7 members and a chairperson.” So that is the status quo—that is as things stand.

What this bill does is it increases the maximum number of members who can be appointed to the panel. Members have already rehearsed the reasons why: we need more flexibility, we need more concurrent hearings, and therefore a bigger pool of members is going to aid that outcome. But what the bill does, through clause 7, is it allows the Ministers to appoint the additional members, to a maximum of 10 plus the chairperson, only after consulting a number of other people. This is, I think, where it gets interesting. It says they have got to consult the Auckland Council, whose plan it is—the democratically elected representatives of the people of Auckland, who have to live with the consequences of this plan—the Independent Māori Statutory Board, and the chairperson of the hearings panel.

So the first question that I want to ask of the Minister, the Hon Sam Lotu-Iiga, is: why the Minister of Conservation? Why—why? I mean, Maggie Barry has a lot of opinions on a lot of things, but is she an expert on urban development? Is she an expert on town planning? Is she an expert on environmental law and the Resource Management Act? I suspect the answer is no.

I will just give you a little insight into how much the Minister of Conservation understands about matters of local government and planning. This is the Minister who was recently quoted in the North Shore Times, her local rag, complaining about the level of spending on public transport by Auckland Council. She was asked whether she uses public transport, and she said that well, she would, but she can never find a car-park at the park-and-ride by the Bayswater ferry—just cannot find a car-park. That is her excuse for not using public transport.

Well, Heather du Plessis-Allan from TV3’s Story programme went and stepped out the distance between Maggie Barry’s house and the ferry terminal, the Bayswater ferry, and the distance is fewer than 500 metres. So Maggie Barry, the Minister of Conservation, whom this bill lays down as one of the two decision makers to appoint the panel—that really shows her affinity with, and understanding of, local government matters, because, obviously, public transport is a critical factor. So, Minister, why the Minister of Conservation? I would really appreciate that explanation.

If we were running this bill through the normal select committee process we would have the opportunity to ask these questions, and the officials would—[Bell rung]

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Oh, Phil Twyford.

PHIL TWYFORD: So—

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): But let us come back to the bill, rather than to Ministers walking to ferries.

PHIL TWYFORD: Rather than Maggie Barry?

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Rather than Ministers walking to ferries.

PHIL TWYFORD: Yes, OK. So that was my first question: why is the Minister of Conservation one of the decision makers? I mean, I can understand why you would have the Minister for the Environment being a decision maker. What my tabled amendment does is it would require the decision to be made jointly by the Minister for the Environment, representing the executive, central government, and the Mayor of Auckland, who is someone who has, arguably, the biggest electorate of voters in the country and who is elected at large across the entire region and is accountable to the people of Auckland. Why not make it a joint decision and reflect the spirit of partnership that we have heard in some of the brief contributions from Government members in this debate?

It was interesting to hear Joanne Hayes say: “Oh, this is a good bill. Basically, it allows local councils to get on with their job.” Well, that is not a philosophy we have heard articulated from Government members any time in the last 7 years. What we have seen—and Ron Mark spoke about this earlier in this debate—is that local government has been the sort of whipping boy of choice for the National Government for the entire last 7 years. The decision in the principal legislation to have central government appointing all of the members of the panel typified the kind of “Government knows best”—running Auckland from its luxury offices in Wellington, because the Government knows best and it does not really care, even though it is the people of Auckland who have to live with this plan and live with the consequences.

So you can see it, actually, when you look back through the local government agenda of this Government over 7 years. We had Rodney Hide right through to the way this bespoke planning process for the unitary plan was put in place. The appointment of the commissioners, I think, is emblematic of this Government’s attitude, and I think that it would be, if the members opposite are true to their rhetoric about working with Government—and we have already said in this debate that they have been dragged kicking and screaming over the last 7 years, finally, to some kind of acknowledgment that they have to work with Auckland.

The reason that we are supporting this bill is that it is practical. The Auckland Council has asked for these provisions because it wants to get the unitary plan put to bed before the local government elections next year. So this bill is worth supporting for that reason, notwithstanding the objections raised by our Green Party colleagues, but I would urge the Government to think seriously about this tabled amendment and consider allowing the appointment of the panel members to be made jointly by the Mayor of Auckland and the Minister for the Environment, who I think is probably the logical person to do that.

It is interesting. In Richard Harman’s blog post this morning he points out that David Seymour, who made a contribution earlier this morning in this debate, is talking about reopening and reviewing the super-city legislation, which, really, is the platform for any kind of consideration of this debate. The unitary plan is the big kahuna that, basically, flows on from the establishment of the super-city. It was a bespoke process. They had never really attempted something on this scale—a spatial plan on the scale of the Auckland Unitary Plan—and it would be unkind to say that they are making it up as they along, but—

Hon Ruth Dyson: They’re making it up as they go along.

PHIL TWYFORD: —they are, in fact, making it up as they go along. And this bill, rectifying drafting errors from the earlier legislation, validating—and we will talk some more about the retrospective validation clauses later in this debate. It is a kind of a Heath Robinson contraption, this whole bespoke process.

So I would ask the Committee, and particularly the Government members—and I see we have got a new Minister in the chair now, the Hon Louise Upston. I would ask her to take a call. We did not hear once from the Minister who preceded her in the chair, the Hon Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga, but I assume she has been briefed. We have not had the benefit of a select committee process. We have not had any substantive—

Su’a WILLIAM SIO (Labour—Māngere): Normally, at this stage of the debate, members would come to the Chamber armed with the select committee report, we would come armed with public submissions from the members of the public who took the time to make submissions, we would come armed with the advice from the ministry, we would come armed with the legal advice from the Parliamentary Counsel, or we would come armed with the regulatory impact statement. Alas, none of that is available to us, and I want to state that at the outset because I think it is important. Even though the members of the Government are hanging their heads in shame because this is not the kind of practice that this House normally accepts, I would hope that they would give the time to members of the Opposition to analyse each and every one of these single clauses in this bill, because we have been denied the expert advice that we would normally receive if this bill had gone through the select committee process.

I wanted to ask the previous Minister in the chair, Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga, given that he is a member from the Auckland region, whether he would stand up for Aucklanders and help the Opposition by answering some of the questions that my colleague Phil Twyford and others have asked. I want to continue along that line and, hopefully, the Minister who is now in the chair, Louise Upston, is able to answer those questions, given that we have had neither the benefit of the expert legal advice we would normally receive, nor the regulatory impact statement—which is just bad practice. This is not the way that legislation ought to be made.

I would like to ask some general questions first, because the fact that we are debating this bill highlights that mistakes have been made, and we are validating some of those mistakes. My first question is this: when did the Government first find out that the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel was undertaking a process that, legally, it should not have? When did it find that out? I understand that the Minister drafted the bill some time ago, but yet, at the last minute—and the House does not have very long to go—we are now being forced into the position that we are currently in. So I would be really interested in when the Government first found out about the mistakes that needed to be validated with this particular bill.

The other question is a general question that I hope the Minister will be able to answer. How much is this exercise going to cost altogether, and how much will be borne by Auckland Council? I say that because all of the independent hearings panel’s expenses and all of the secretariat support that it receives is paid for by Auckland Council. Therefore, it is paid by ratepayers. Members in this House may note that there has been this huge debate in the Auckland region where many of us have blamed the mayor and the council for the significant hikes in rates that the ratepayers are having to carry, but many people do not know that it is the result of the burden that has been imposed by the legislation that this Government forced on Aucklanders back in the early days, in 2009.

So the question is: how much is this exercise going to cost, and what additional costs will it add to the work of the independent hearings panel, which will be carried, necessarily, by Auckland Council? And just a general question on that: will central government provide any incentives to Auckland City to meet some of these expenses? That is an important point that I would like the Government to answer, because there will be many Aucklanders seething with anger over the fact that the Auckland Council continues to hike up its rates. But they need to put the pieces together—it is largely a result of what the Government has imposed on Aucklanders.

I now want to turn to the substantive amendments in Part 1, and in particular to clause 4, where we are asked to replace the quorum—

TRACEY MARTIN (NZ First): I am going to concentrate my contribution on clause 6 in the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill. But, before I do, I just want to reiterate that New Zealand First is going to support this bill, not because we like it, but because we find ourselves in a positon where, once again, an error has been made by this Government and we are required to do this for the benefit of the over a million people sitting in Auckland so that their future can be defined.

I want to point out that I am one of only two members of this House who was one of the foundation elected members of the Auckland Council at a local board level.

Sue Moroney: Oh, your fault!

TRACEY MARTIN: No, Ms Moroney, it certainly was not my fault. I want to point out that the reason why this is important is that in the original legislation that set up Auckland City, a trade-off was made around the right of appeal, which is what clause 6 relates to. So a trade-off was made around the right of appeal, which restricted the ability of people to appeal once the unitary plan was in place, but that was traded off by having a draft unitary plan at the beginning of the process.

I was part of the process that, in 17 months, put together the Auckland Plan, which informed the draft unitary plan. The reason why this is a concern is that that draft unitary plan was, supposedly, one of the most open and transparent processes that every ratepayer in the greater Auckland area could actually submit on.

There are two things—and this why this ability to appeal that is now being amended again from the original piece of legislation is so important. Two things: when the draft unitary plan went out for consultation it was only available online, with huge maps that actually took a lot of broadband download speed, and so rural Rodney, for example, could not access it. So the majority of the ratepayers in rural Rodney could not access the unitary plan maps for the draft unitary plan through the process that was put into place. That led to an urgent printing of one per library, and then those people could then go to the library and look at the unitary plan maps and the heritage overlays, which this bill also talks to, and that is why it is so important that we address those issues.

The other thing that happened too, which concerns me, again, about this manipulation around the right of appeal, is that when we finished the draft unitary plan consultation—and it went on and it went back to the councillors and went back to become the unitary plan, which is what we are talking about here and what people are resubmitting on—certain things happened out of blue when the unitary plan now being consulted on came back. For example, let us talk about the rural urban boundaries. There have been 79 percent of the submissions heard by these hearings.

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! Mr Nash, could you sit down, please. I cannot see the speaker. Thank you.

TRACEY MARTIN: Thank you. Seventy-nine percent of the submissions on the unitary plan that have been submitted have been heard. There are approximately 5,000 submissions left on these specific sections, and this goes to the changing of the recommendations’ ability so that it can be done section by section.

One of the sections that is to be done next is all the submissions on the rural urban boundary. For one example—one example out of only the Rodney area—in the draft unitary plan, let us take the northern end of Warkworth. It was agreed under those submissions that the rural urban boundary would go as far as Matakana Rd. It would not jump the road, and it was agreed by the community and the Rodney Local Board, and it was put forward to the councillors.

By the time it became the unitary plan that is being submitted on, which this bill is dealing with, that urban boundary had jumped the road and gone through four private properties. That change came after major consultation, and at council level, hence my concern that what we are talking about now is pushing through quickly to meet a deadline set in original legislation—actually set in the Local Government (Auckland Transitions Provisions) Amendment Act 2013. We are talking about pushing through quickly—with split hearings, and with only two hearings people on each panel—around rural urban boundaries.

The other special area that is going to be consulted on in this last section is the special character overlays. An example of why that is important—

NUK KORAKO (National): I move, That the question be now put.

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): The members will resume their seats while I am on my feet. I am not going to take it now, but I am going to warn people that I will now be looking very closely at the speeches being on the detail of the bill, not a relitigation of the history of the Auckland region.

GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central): Thank you very much, Mr Chair. You can rest assured that I am not going to be talking about my role in the history of the Auckland region. I want to start with a question for the Minister in the chair, Louise Upston, relating to the departmental disclosure statement, which suggests to us that advice provided to the Attorney-General about whether or not there would be a section 7 report would be available prior to the introduction of the bill. I can find no evidence of such advice on the Table. I have had a quick look at the Ministry of Justice’s website, and I can find no evidence of that there. Again, this is an example of when, in a situation under urgency, we do not have a select committee process. We have an assurance here in the departmental disclosure statement that this would be available on the ministry’s website upon the introduction of the bill. It is not—it is actually not available. This is a serious matter because I do believe that when we are talking about hearings that members of the public will be participating in—which is what is covered throughout the substantive part here in Part 1—there are questions of rights of natural justice. That is one of the main issues within the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act in terms of the right to justice.

The exact wording in the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act is about the observance of the principles of natural justice by any tribunal that has the power to make a determination over the rights of the citizen. That is one of these hearings panels. That is exactly what these hearings panels are doing: they are undertaking work as a tribunal on a matter of the rights of Aucklanders and the way in which their city will be created. So we thought—well, I certainly thought I would see a New Zealand Bill of Rights Act vet come forward on this matter. I think that the Ministry for the Environment, which was responsible for the drafting of the departmental disclosure statement, also thought that we were going to be seeing a New Zealand Bill of Rights Act vet, and we do not. So I would ask the Minister in the chair to explain to the Committee what is going on here. I think it is a reasonable question.

The reason I do think that that question of the observance of the principles of natural justice by a tribunal—the clause from the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act—is brought into the situation here is what is happening in clause 4. That is, the amendment of the number of commissioners hearing is being reduced from three to two. What this bill does is increase the number of commissioners from seven to 10, which means that we are running into a situation where a hearing will be conducted by 20 percent of the membership. I want a Minister or a member of the Government to stand up and tell me whether they think that upholds the principles of natural justice. Actually making it a percentage figure somewhat masks the problem that emerges here—and Mr Mark raised this—which is that 20 percent is two people. That is just two people in a room. Does that uphold the right of an Auckland resident to fairly be heard in terms of their right of natural justice under the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act? We have already discussed the fact that once you get down to two, it is not so much a quorum as, potentially, a collusion. If there are actually only two people in the room, it is quite easy for those two people to be coming from a very, very specific point of view.

There is both a constitutional point and a very practical one, which is that when someone has come forward with their submission and they are confronted by two people, and one of them is playing on their cellphone, are they actually being treated fairly and well when they are in the room? That is the practical point. Is that the best that we could expect for Aucklanders who have taken the time to make a submission about the Auckland Unitary Plan? But if we move to the constitutional end of it, having only two people there out of a group of 10 runs, I believe, some considerable risks.

The Labour Party is supporting this legislation, but as a member who has not had the opportunity to hear from my colleagues who were on a select committee, I have not properly heard any actual justification for this. I can guess what it is. I can guess the fact that it is because—and I cannot really talk about this; oh no, I can actually talk about this in this part—they are going to expand the number of commissioners to 10 and then run concurrent hearings. So I can understand that, but I do not believe that any Minister or any—

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Sue Moroney.

Hon Ruth Dyson: Is it Sue or me?

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): No, Sue Moroney.

SUE MORONEY (Labour): Thank you. That was a very excellent choice indeed. I am pleased to take a call on Part 1 of the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill, and I want to focus my contribution on clause 4. But I just want to preface that a little by making sure that people know what my general concern is about this. And it is this point: I am based in Hamilton, and when things go wrong in Auckland, it has a direct impact on Hamilton. And at the moment, we are seeing that come marching over the Bombay Hills in the form of Auckland’s housing crisis landing in Hamilton.

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): No. Order! I did warn members earlier that they are to speak to the detail of the bill—Part 1.

SUE MORONEY: Sure. So for those reasons, clause 4 really bothers me, because what we are being told in clause 4 is that in respect of the decisions being made that affect 1.3 million people—because as of 2011 that was roughly the population of Auckland; my guess is that it is an awful lot larger than that now—just two people in a room are adequate to make decisions that will impact on 1.3 million people. My colleague Grant Robertson was doing the maths on what that means in terms of the number of people on a hearings panel, and he came up with 20 percent. I cannot even do the maths, because it is so tiny—the proportion of two people out of 1.3 million.

I particularly want to address this issue while the Minister who is in the chair, Louise Upston, is there, because I know in a different capacity she is the Minister for Women. And one of the things that really bothers me about a quorum being just two members of a hearings panel is whether we can be assured that there is going to be diversity of representation and opinion between those two people. If that is all a quorum requires, then where is the diversity of opinion? Some people may be listening to this debate and think “Look, these are environmental hearings, by and large, what on earth has that got to do with gender representation?”. Well, here is the point: what all the research and evidence tells us is that we get this right when we have diversity of opinion in the room. We know that when there was one woman—or more—on boards of American companies, they survived the global financial crisis better. Why is that? Not necessarily because the women are smarter, but because they ask the questions at the table and they make sure, therefore, that the right decisions are made. So in clause 4 I want some assurance from the Minister in the chair that there will be that diversity of opinion in the room. And I query whether we can get that diversity of opinion in the room for those hearings panels if the quorum is reduced to just two.

The other question I would like answered, because this legislation—and it is very, very bad form—is being done retrospectively, is that I want to know whether this is being done retrospectively because, in fact, there have been hearings held by the Auckland Council where it has failed to be able to get a quorum of three. If that is the reason why we are doing this, then I think that brings into some serious question the amount of scrutiny and the legality of decisions that have been made in the past—if the reason for this change is that the Auckland Council has struggled to get three people in the room at any given time. I am pleased to see that in Part 1 the Government is increasing the possible number of appointed Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel members from seven to 10, and that excludes the chairperson.

I will come back to my original point, because I think that when you increase the pool of people who can participate in these hearings and who have the expertise to participate in these hearings, then we increase the opportunity to get diversity of opinion in the room. Again, I will reiterate that that is important because when we get people—I think my colleague Grant Robertson described it as a collusion rather than a quorum—who are of the same mind, then we stop questioning the outcome. That, in my view, leads to poor decision-making. That leads to the sort of poor decision-making that has ended up not only impacting on Auckland and the 1.3 million people there and the ratepayer base there but, as I said at the outset, now impacting on the city that I live in down the road. When they get it wrong in Auckland, that ends up being a problem for Hamilton. Actually, as many other speakers have said, that ends up being a problem for New Zealand. Without a select committee process we have not heard why we are reducing that.

GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central): I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. I raise it under Standing Order 265, which covers the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. I would ask, Mr Chair, for your assistance here. We have a departmental disclosure statement that indicates to us that advice on the section 7 report is expected to be available upon the introduction of the bill. I have checked that website; it is not there. It is not on the Table—

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): I will interrupt the member and say that I have, following his speech, asked the Minister to follow up with officials on that question. We have not yet had a response.

GRANT ROBERTSON: Can I then receive your reassurance that at the point at which you get that advice you will transmit that to us by way of a ruling?

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): I have asked the Minister to make sure that that is made available to the Committee—either the report, or the fact that one has not been made or has been made. It is an important point.

DENISE ROCHE (Green): I rise to take my first call in the Committee of the whole House stage for the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill. I do note that we are on Part 1—the substantive amendments—and I will restrict my comments to this part of the bill.

Clause 4 talks about reducing the quorum of the hearings sessions from three to two, and, if we look through Part 1, the amendments are around appointing more hearings commissioners. The reason for that, essentially—and we should go back to the reason for that—is, basically, so that they can get through the hearings process more quickly than they would with the current panel total of just seven members. Clause 4 talks about reducing the quorum from three to two, which means that you can get through a lot more of the hearings quicker. I share the concerns that, I think, have been raised by other members of this Committee about what happens when you have those two hearings commissioners deliberating and they cannot make a decision because they are equally split. I guess I would like to hear from the Minister in the chair, Louise Upston, what the Government has in mind that would be the answer to that quandary. What we know is that the deliberation process is where a lot of the decisions get made, and they are based on the weighted numbers. But if it is equally weighted, then, I guess, we have got a problem.

I would also like to talk about why we actually need to have this done in such a quick time frame when, really, this is the biggest unitary plan and the biggest use of the Resource Management Act’s planning processes ever to be had in New Zealand. One would have thought that there would be a lot more care taken with consulting around who will be on the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel, deciding who would be on the hearings panel, and then actually taking the time to prepare the submissions. We know that there are about 5,000 more submissions that are yet to be heard, but the Government has set up an arbitrary date by which the report and recommendations are to be back to the council—I think it was July next year.

Part 1, we note, does actually specify that that report can be made in bits, so that as one section of the plan is covered off with the hearings, the hearings panel can actually make its recommendations on that part alone and, basically, just sort of drip-feed the decisions and the recommendations as they come through. We do not necessarily have a problem with that. Where we do have a problem is the retrospective fixing up of mistakes that were made with the original legislation, and the need for this bill being pushed through under urgency to fix up those mistakes.

I want to talk about Phil Twyford’s amendments. I note that there is a new one on the Table, which I will probably ask one of my colleagues to comment on—one of my colleagues who is more focused on the original legislation around the Resource Management Act. They would probably like to comment on the newest amendment that has just come through. I want to talk about Phil Twyford’s amendment around ensuring that the mayor, in conjunction with the Minister for the Environment, makes decisions about the appointment of the extra three hearings commissioners. The basis of our opposition to this bill is basically that the appointment process has been driven by the Government rather than by the council. We note that it does say that the Government—the Minister—will consult with both the Māori Statutory Board and the council. However, consultation is way different from decision making—and I guess we see that a lot in this House, where, basically, submissions are ignored quite frequently by the decision makers. I worry that that may be the result of the plan that we end up with, given the huge process that preceded the whole draft plan.

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Before I call another member I will just indicate to the Committee that I have been advised both from my left and my right that the advice on the question of the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act vetting is available now on the Ministry of Justice website, and no issues have been raised.

MATT DOOCEY (National—Waimakariri): I move—[Interruption]

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! Sorry; Mr Doocey has the call, and I would like to hear what he is saying.

MATT DOOCEY: I move, That the question be now put.

Hon PHIL GOFF (Labour—Mt Roskill): This part is the substantive part of the bill, and at the heart of this is a desire to allow the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel to conduct its work more effectively but without affecting the quality of its work. The Opposition supports this, but we are tested in our support for it when we have successive Ministers in the chair who do not answer questions that have been genuinely put. We have not as a House had the opportunity to ask these questions in a select committee process, so I think it is incumbent on the Minister, in the Committee of the whole House, to answer the questions. Mr Chairman, I point out to you that throughout this entire debate, the Minister has not taken one call in answer to numerous questions being put forward.

So I am going to try going through this clause by clause to get the Minister to answer the questions. We want to support this bill, but the Minister certainly is not making it easy for us, in the process of urgency, rushing this legislation through the House, with no select committee scrutiny and no endeavour by the Minister to actually answer the questions that we are putting. That is a negation of democracy, and, ironically, the clauses of this part are about democracy. It is about people’s right to be heard. If people want to be heard, they also want their questions answered. So I say to you, Mr Chair, that we want the Minister to have the chance, and to take that chance, to answer the questions.

The first thing, in clause 4, is about reducing the size of the quorum. It is going from three to two. I had imagined that this reduction was to deal with exceptional circumstances when two or three panels might be sitting concurrently, but I am starting to get the sense that this will be the norm. So my first question to the Minister is: will the norm for these hearing panels, with 5,000 submissions to be heard, from January next year, be two members or three? In exceptional circumstances I am prepared to go along with there being two. But I am concerned that that will be the norm. I also believe that Ron Mark deserves to have his question, asked more than an hour and a half ago, answered. If you have got two members, and therefore you do not have a majority on the committee, and there is a division on the committee, how is the decision reached by the panel? If you have got two members and neither is the chair, how do you decide who is the chair?

These are practical questions, Minister, and this Committee, the New Zealand public, and particularly Aucklanders have the right to have answers to those questions. They are not time-wasting questions. They go to the heart of the effectiveness of the changes that we are debating. And remember, Mr Chair, we are debating half of this bill because we are correcting mistakes made in previous legislation that has been rushed through, and here we are again rushing through legislation with no examination, no answers from the Minister in the chair, and no answers from the officials in the Chamber through the Minister.

Secondly I want to address clause 5. Clause 5 allows the hearings panel to make recommendations on a particular topic after it has finished hearing submissions on that topic rather than making all of those recommendations at the end. I think I know why this is a good idea. I think it is because that gives the council, the recommendations having been made, a longer period of time to consider and respond to them. But we have had no explanation. I have been in the Chamber continuously through every stage of this bill. We have not had one Government member address what the reason for this change is. I think the Committee deserves better than that. I think the Minister, paid her salary, should get up and answer that question.

I think it is an insult to the House, actually, that neither Minister who can answer the questions has been in the House for any part of the debate. This is Nick Smith’s bill. He has not been here to answer the questions. We could have had one of the other Ministers. We could have had the Minister of Local Government here. This House is being treated with absolute contempt when the Minister sits there dumbly and does not answer questions that are genuinely put.

The third clause I want to look at is clause 7, and that is about the process of appointing the additional members. I accept that there is a good reason to increase the panel from seven to 10, but the process set out is that the Minister of Conservation and the Minister for the Environment jointly decide and then consult. And I ask why—

Hon LOUISE UPSTON (Associate Minister of Local Government): I do want to take the opportunity to put to rest some of the concerns that the Opposition has been raising on the questions of the hearings sessions and the quorum. So I will make just a couple of points on that.

The intention of the quorum of two is around site-specific hearings. It is at the discretion of the chairperson, so not all sessions will have that smaller number. It is at the discretion of the chair. Those sessions are for hearing evidence. They are not for decision making. So, again, it is in the interests of how to get this work done, and hear the evidence, and the opportunity to do that is what you would expect for those who want to be heard. But that group, the quorum, being lowered from three to two is not a decision-making process.

So the lowering of the quorum of the hearings session from three to two is only about—I want to reiterate—the hearing of evidence. It is not about the recommendations or the consideration, which is done by the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel. So the hearings session is not a decision-making step.

DAVID SHEARER (Labour—Mt Albert): I thank the Minister in the chair, Louise Upston, for taking the floor to try to explain that particular issue around the reduction of the quorum for the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel from three members to two, under clause 4.

On the one hand, I am a little more satisfied that this is not going to become the norm, which is what Phil Goff was saying just now as part of his contribution. But, on the other hand, I am still vexed and actually quite concerned that although she has said that the two-person panel will be site-specific—and I can understand that, because there are a lot of issues to be looked at—it is not going to be a decision-making process, and that does actually create some concerns. That is because these people are going to tasked with the job, and given the responsibility, of making recommendations around a particular issue, yet they will not be able to make that decision and will cast that back to a wider group who have not been part of hearing the submissions and sharing the evidence, and therefore will not be fully apprised of the information in order to make that decision.

In some ways it is comforting to know that this is going to be—using the word from the Minister’s mouth—exceptional rather the common occurrence, but at the same time the panel is not going to be able to make a decision or make recommendations, which will have to be passed back to people who have not been part of hearing the evidence around that. I do not believe that that is a good way of making decisions on issues. I know from my own personal experience of being an Auckland MP that people are extraordinarily worried about some of the issues, whether it be height to boundary, whether it be the concentration of houses, whether it be heritage buildings—a whole range of different issues. So that raises, I believe, yet another concern that we have, certainly as Auckland MPs, as to what we are looking at in terms of the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill.

The second part of the Minister’s contribution I want to pick up on is the issue that Ron Mark raised before, which is that going from three members down to two means that we actually do not have a deciding vote. Those panel members do not have voting role—I understand that from the Minister—but we may instead have two competing recommendations coming back from that two-person panel, from which a decision is going to be made without actually understanding the full ramifications of the evidence that was heard. So that seems to me to make the situation worse rather than better.

So we have dug ourselves into a hole of complexity and bad decision-making around this, which will provide Aucklanders with no real feeling that they are getting a better process rather than a worse one at the end of this. So I thank the Minister for standing up and taking that—

Hon Phil Goff: Brief call.

DAVID SHEARER: —brief call on clause 4, but it still does not address some of the other issues.

I come now to clause 7—I am sure that there will be other people who want to pick up on the Minister’s contribution just now. Clause 7 provides for the expansion of the hearings panel from seven to 10. Once again, I think we support that, and I can see the merits in having an expansion in the numbers, excluding the chair. But the choice and the decision about who is going to be on that hearings panel is something that the Minister has not addressed, and I think that this actually does cut to choice—to whether Auckland can decide who is going to be on that panel or whether it has to be done centrally and top down. I want to come to the, I think, very good amendment that Phil Twyford has put forward as part of that, with the provision to have the Auckland mayor involved.

JOANNE HAYES (Third Whip—National): I move, That the question be now put.

EUGENIE SAGE (Green): I am very pleased to take a short call on this bill. The Green Party objects to the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill partly because of the process—the lack of any select committee process, and the fact that we are dealing with it under urgency—but also, as other colleagues have explained, because we objected to the principal Act and the fact that it is the Ministers, not the Auckland Council, who will appoint the members of the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel.

This Government does not trust local democracy, neither in Auckland nor in Christchurch nor in wider Canterbury, because in all of those areas it has got its hand-picked commissioners making major planning decisions rather than the councillors who are elected by citizens. In respect of this bill, Mr Twyford was asking questions before, around clause 7, which the Minister has not answered. I assume that the Minister of Conservation is appointing members of the panel because the Minister has responsibilities under the regional coastal plan and that the unitary plan, which the Auckland Council is now going through the hearing process on, actually includes provisions in the regional coastal plan. But it is absolutely wrong for Ministers to be appointing the panel members. It should be Auckland councillors, and this bill does nothing to correct that.

I would also like to talk to clause 5 and a very good amendment in the name of Phil Twyford, which is quite similar to some concerns that the Green Party had on the original Act. They are that this bill is allowing the hearings panel to make recommendations that go beyond the scope of submissions. It is well settled, in terms of the Resource Management Act, that when a hearings panel is makings its decisions it confines those to the submissions that it has heard, because otherwise there is the likelihood and possibility that we will get random ad hoc changes to the plan being made by the hearings panel that do not relate to the submissions that have been brought before it, that do not relate to the evidence that submitters have presented, and that go outside the scope of submissions. So throughout the Resource Management Act this limitation on the scope of submissions has ensured that natural justice prevails, and that the panel is making decisions on the evidence that is brought before it, on the submissions that are brought before it.

So Mr Twyford’s amendment will be supported by the Green Party because it seeks to ensure that the panel can only make decisions and make recommendations that are within the scope of submissions—that there is not the ability for the hearings panel to act in a very arbitrary way, go beyond that process, and make recommendations to the council that may advantage particular parties and on which it has not heard evidence. So we will certainly be supporting that.

But this bill highlights provisions that should have been tackled when the principal Act went through. They should have been tackled subsequently, when they came to light, and when the Government had adequate time to address them. Instead, what has the Government done? It is ramming them through under urgency, to limit the ability of the public, of Aucklanders, to actually have their say in this process about how their major document, the Auckland Unitary Plan, should be finalised and developed. It is again another attack on democracy, and another example of the Government failing to trust local democracy by having all of the power exercised in the Beehive rather than by the council.

PHIL TWYFORD (Labour—Te Atatū): I just want to acknowledge that tantalising intervention by the Minister in the chair, the Hon Louise Upston—just enough to get members interested in some real debate and information—but I do not want to deter the Minister from intervening again, because there are a number of questions that have been put on the table. I did notice that we have been joined by the Minister of Local Government. She must have been following this bill. I am pleased that she has taken time off from her busy schedule of vilifying State house tenants to join us for this debate.

I want to talk about clause 5 of the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill, and note that section 144 of the principal Act provides that “The Hearings Panel must make recommendations on the proposed plan after it has finished submissions,”. It has to hear all the submissions, all the deliberations, and then make its recommendations and its findings in one go, at the end of the process. We have been hearing about, you know, 5,000 site-specific zoning submissions by the people of Auckland that the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel is desperate to get through, so it can report in time on 22 July next year. I think we all understand the logic for this, but it does raise certain questions, and I would really appreciate the Minister paying attention to this and giving us a response. There is no doubt that clause 5 adds some practicality, allowing recommendations to be passed on to the Auckland Council in a kind of drip-fed way, which will expedite the whole process by allowing the council to consider recommendations as the panel goes through its work. I think we can all understand that.

But clause 5 also raises whether matters will have been properly considered in the whole, because none of the issues that the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel is considering sit in isolation. That is the whole point of the Auckland Unitary Plan. It is a holistic approach. It is an integrated exercise in spatial planning. All of these things are connected: all of the zoning considerations, land use, and so on. They all impact on each other. I think that the risk here with clause 5 is that you will get a piecemeal consideration of issues in isolation, and the hearings panel may find that by the time it gets to the end of the process and it has made all its recommendations, it may not, in fact, be happy with the tenor or the tone or the emphasis of some of the early recommendations that it made on the basis of considering submissions and deliberating on just one topic. So I would really like to hear what consideration the Minister and officials, in preparing this legislation for the House, gave to that issue, because I think that is something that needs to be considered.

I want to speak to my tabled amendment that Eugenie Sage just made some comments about. It deals with clause 5, and it replaces new section 144(5) with the following sentence: “The Hearings Panel is limited to making recommendations only within the scope of the submissions made on the proposed plan.” I think this takes us back to the principal legislation. When the amendments were made to the resource management reform legislation, they allowed the hearings panel to make decisions that are beyond the scope of the submissions that they have received on the proposed plan and on any matter identified by the panel. This was controversial at the time, and we debated this in the House, because this is a break with normal practice under the Resource Management Act. It is an extraordinarily broad power that it gives to the independent hearings panel, and that is significant because the nature of this bespoke process, and intrinsic to the whole idea of the independent hearings panel, is that it truncates public consultation. It reduces the say that people have. It cuts the Environment Court out of the process, so we have to be extremely careful in ensuring that we balance the desire to streamline and speed up and simplify with ensuring that there are the proper protections about sound decision-making and consultation. If you look at the Environment Court, the normal process—

RON MARK (Deputy Leader—NZ First): I want to start by thanking the Minister in the chair, the Hon Louise Upston, for the explanation to my questions on the issue of reducing the size of the quorum from three to two. I was writing frantically, Minister, trying to get it all down, but, from what was explained to the Committee, the Government is saying that this relates to site-specific areas, is at the discretion of the chair, and is for the hearing of evidence, not for decision making. It is not a decision-making process; it is for only the hearing of evidence.

I have got that, and I think I understand what was said. My difficulty is that I have got the primary legislation open on my laptop, and I am going through it clause by clause, trying to marry up what I have just heard with what I am reading in this legislation. So I am going to have to, unfortunately, ask the Minister to explain again for me. I am not a lawyer. I never went to university. Actually, I started my trade as a mechanic in the army and worked my way through to end up commanding troops, but it seems to me that something is not matching in here. So I am really going to need to defer back to the lawyers in the Chamber at the moment. I am looking at Mr Grant Robertson now and hoping that he will get a call to validate, or maybe argue against, what I am trying to propose.

I have looked at clause 4, which amends section 136, “Hearing procedure”, in the principal Act. If I go to section 136 of the principal Act, I would assume that the entire authorised procedure for this Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel would be laid out clearly there. It makes no mention in there of the hearings panel being restricted to site-specific considerations only. It makes no mention of it only hearing evidence. In fact, in subsection (1) it says: “At each hearing session, no fewer than 3 members of the Hearings Panel must be present.” Well, it is going down to two. It goes on to say: “(2) If the chairperson is not present, he or she must appoint another member as chairperson …”. That is going to be interesting.

As I said before, if there was a quorum of three and the chair was not there, then three would decide who was going to be the chair. If there is a quorum of two and the chair is not there, we are probably going to spend half our meeting arguing about who is going to be the chair. It just seems a whole lot easier if you leave the quorum at three, and then we can get a clear majority, appoint a chair, and move on. That is the first point.

As I go through the hearing procedure provision I can see nothing of what the Minister has explained to us—and I absolutely accept that the Minister will have taken advice from officials. So what I would like now is for us to get advice as to where that advice we have just received appears in the legislation or is cross-referenced in the legislation, because it appears to me that it does not appear in the legislation. If I go to section 164, “Functions of Hearings Panel”, in the primary legislation, what do I find? It is clear that section 164, “Functions of Hearings Panel”, does not in any way, in that very short section—section 164(a); (b)(i), (ii), (iii); and (c), (d), and (e)—restrict the hearing of a quorum of two. Help me, please, because I cannot see it.

The Minister of Local Government is here. She is having a quiet chat, so she might be able to take a call and help us understand this, but I cannot find it. I find no reference within the legislation to the explanation we have just received—that it empowers and enacts those thoughts into reality. So I am asking for help, guidance, so that we in New Zealand First can continue to support this legislation through and support the Government in doing that.

New section 144, inserted by clause 5, is very specific. We will just stay with the amendments to section 144, not what I have got in front of me on my laptop, which is the primary legislation. New section 144 is very clear. It is headed “Hearings Panel must make recommendations to Council on proposed plan”. It says it must make recommendations. It does not say: “unless it is a quorum of two, and therefore they can’t.” It says: “The Hearings Panel must make recommendations on the proposed plan, including any recommended changes to the proposed plan.” It says “must make”. It does not say: “unless there’s only a quorum of two.”

Subsection (2) of new section 144 states: “The Hearings Panel may make recommendations …”—may make recommendations. It does not say that it is not for decision-making purposes or recommendation-making purposes if there is only a quorum of two. It does not say that. I hate to be a pain, but I am struggling, and we want to support this legislation through—

GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central): I do want to pick up on Mr Mark’s contribution. He should have become a lawyer, judging from that contribution. He could defend himself from time to time as well, which might help. But I believe his analysis was spot on. I do thank the Minister for answering the questions that were raised because, as Mr Mark noted, she did that genuinely, on the basis of the advice she got from the officials.

But there is an issue here, and it does require us to look at the substantive piece of legislation that is being amended, the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Act. This Act establishes—beginning at section 128 and running all the way through to section 150—how the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel will work. The problem with the advice that the Minister gave us is that there is only one type of hearings panel. There is not a different range of hearings panels. There is not such a thing in law as a site-specific hearings panel. That is what the Minister said.

She said there would be decisions made about whether there would be three or two members on that panel, as clause 4 of this bill allows for, on a site-specific basis, at the discretion of the chair. There is nothing, from sections 128 to 150, to create that. There is simply a thing called a hearings panel. If that is the case, the hearings panel then has to do all of the things that the Act asked, which, as Mr Mark has just told us, under replaced section 144, the title of section 144 is “Hearings Panel must make recommendations to Council on proposed plan”. It does not have an option. If there are two people at a site-specific meeting, where we do not know who the chair necessarily is, that group of two people is obliged by law to make a recommendation. So in respect of what the Minister has told us, it is simply not the case in law.

It may be the intention of the officials or the intention of the Government to create a situation where a panel of two would not make a recommendation, but the problem is that is not what the law says. Mr Mark’s original question, asked now nearly 2 hours ago, still stands. The original question stands. What do we do when there are two people serving as the hearings panel who disagree on a recommendation? That is quite possible. That remains quite a possible situation. Under the law, under section 144, even as amended by clause 5 of this bill, they will be obliged to make a recommendation.

So I ask the Minister again to stand up and explain to us how, in fulfilling its role under the law, a hearings panel now potentially made up of two people will resolve a conflict, because Mr Mark’s question stands. I understand the practice that the Minister believes will now take place, but that is not the law. A hearings panel of two, who fail to make a recommendation on the proposed plan, will be in breach of the law. They will be in breach of section 144 of the law. This is the difficulty caused by moving from three to two members as the quorum. We have not had an adequate explanation as to how the law will be fulfilled. I think the Minister might be able to get further advice about that, because I suspect that the officials have talked about it. I am happy to give a bit of time for the officials to have their conversation about this.

Dr David Clark: A coin toss.

GRANT ROBERTSON: My colleague Dr David Clark suggests a coin toss. I think Aucklanders deserve better than that. I think Aucklanders actually deserve to know how this will work. We understand why parties in this Chamber, with the exception of our colleagues in the Greens, are supporting the principles of this legislation. We know that the unitary plan process needs to speed up. We know that there needs to be a more efficient process. But what we cannot be doing under urgency is passing law that is contradictory, because we will be back yet again, saying “Hang on a minute. Actually we don’t want a hearings panel of two to have to make a recommendation, because what if they can’t? What if they can’t agree?”. So perhaps there does need to be an additional clause that says exactly what the Minister told us in her intervention—that if there is—

TODD MULLER (National—Bay of Plenty): I move the question be now put.

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): We have had—[Interruption] Order! No, no points of order; I am on my feet. We have had an hour and 50 minutes on this debate. There have been 21 calls, and there have been only four members who have spoken against the provisions of the bill, so I am prepared to accept a closure motion. The Committee can decide whether it accepts it or not.

CHRIS HIPKINS (Senior Whip—Labour): I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. I absolutely accept your ruling. The Standing Orders are very specific about the form of words that a closure motion must take. The form of words the member just moved do not meet the requirements of the Standing Orders.

TIM MACINDOE (Senior Whip—National): I believe that that may have been because of the absolute commotion, and that my colleague—

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): No, that is not a—[Interruption] That is not a reason. If the closure motion—

TIM MACINDOE (Senior Whip—National): I seek leave for my colleague to be able to hear that you had given him the call, because that was the problem.

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): No—there is some confusion about this, so I will not accept the closure motion. I am now going to call Chris Hipkins.

CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka): I appreciate this opportunity to make a contribution to this debate. I want to turn my attention to clause 5 in Part 1, which amends section 144 of the principal Act. I want to talk to subsection (5) of that particular new section 144, because it deals with the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel and the recommendations that it can make. The issue that I want to canvass, which has not been canvassed by any of the other speakers so far, is the power that the hearings panel is being given to make recommendations outside of the scope of the submissions that it has received.

The conventional wisdom, if you read the rest of the section, would be that the purpose of a hearings panel is to put forward a plan, get the feedback on the plan, and then make amendments as to how the plan may be changed based on those submissions. But this particular section gives the hearings panel a much wider remit than that. It says that the hearings panel can basically do what it likes, regardless of what the submissions are actually saying. So the hearings panel could actually go through and say: “There’s some issues that we feel are important that weren’t raised by any submitters at all, and we’re going to make recommendations based on that, just because we feel like it.” It gives the hearings panel quite a significant scope.

I think that that stands in a bit of conflict if you look at subsection (8)(c), which specifies what the reports of the hearings panel must include. A report of the hearings panel must include “the reasons for accepting or rejecting submissions and, for this purpose, may address the submissions by grouping them according to—” etc., etc. So basically it says that the hearings panel has to go through the submissions and say whether they are going to be accepted or rejected. But then it can throw a whole lot of other things on the table that it does not have to go through a similar kind of process for, because the panel can just make recommendations in its own right, without reference to submissions.

It seems to me that if the purpose of the hearings panel is to get public feedback on the plan, why would we give it this much, much wider power to make whatever recommendations it feels like? Bear in mind that the recommendations that the panel makes that are not related to the submissions could well be things that the submitters would have had a view on and would have wanted to make submissions on, had they known that those were the items being discussed. Potentially, what this does is it means that the recommendations that come out of the report of the panel can recommend quite significant changes to the plans without bearing on the submissions. It seems to me that that cuts against the whole purpose of what this is all about.

The other point that I want to deal with is section 144(1) in clause 5, which says that “The Hearings Panel must make recommendations on the proposed plan,”. The question that I have got is: why is it necessarily a “must”? What if, having heard all of the submissions, the hearings panel decides it does not want to make any recommendations, and is actually quite happy with the plan as it stands? Why the word “must”? I think, again, that cuts against the grain. When you consider that in light of section 144(5) in clause 5, which says that the panel’s recommendation-making powers are not limited to the matters on which people have been submitting, it basically says that if panel members go through all of the hearings and they do not want to pick up any matters that were covered in the submissions, they must make some up. They must actually come up with something, because they are not given the option of not making recommendations. They are told that they have to make recommendations.

So I think that I would like to hear a justification from the Minister on both of those points—first of all as to why they are given this wider power to make recommendations that fall outside of the hearings process. This is a hearings panel, so why is it that the hearings panel has the ability to make recommendations on issues that it has not had hearings on and it has not received submissions on? The second point is why it is that it must make recommendations. And, of course, coming back to some other contributions to the debate, I think that that raises issues around the constitution of the panel. What happens if the panel is unable to reach an agreement? It has been told that it must make recommendations, but it might not necessarily be able to reach an agreement on what those recommendations should actually be.

So there are a whole lot of questions here that have not been answered by the Government because, aside from a very brief aside from the Minister that clarified one issue and actually probably raised more questions than answers, we have not heard from Ministers around these quite detailed and specific questions members have been raising.

TIM MACINDOE (Senior Whip—National): I move, That the question be now put.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the question be now put.

Ayes 63

New Zealand National 59; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Noes 56

New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 12; New Zealand First 12.

Motion agreed to.

The result corrected after originally being announced as Ayes 63, Noes 58.

The question was put that the following amendments in the name of Phil Twyford to clause 5 be agreed to:

replace new section 144(5) with:

(5) The Hearings Panel is limited to making recommendations only within the scope of the submissions made on the proposed plan; and

delete from new section 144(8) “, and identify any recommendations that are beyond the scope of the submissions made in respect of that topic or those topics”.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the amendments be agreed to.

Ayes 56

New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 12; New Zealand First 12.

Noes 63

New Zealand National 59; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Amendments not agreed to.

The result corrected after originally being announced as Ayes 58, Noes 63.

The question was put that the following amendments in the name of Phil Twyford to clause 7 be agreed to:

in clause 7, insert the following subclauses:

(1A) In section 161(7) replace “the Ministers” with “the Minister for the Environment and the mayor of Auckland Council”.

(1B) In section 161(8) replace “The Ministers” with “The Minister for the Environment and the mayor of Auckland Council”; and

in new section 161(8A), in clause 7(2), replace “The Ministers” with “The Minister for the Environment and the mayor of Auckland Council”.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the amendments be agreed to.

Ayes 56

New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 12; New Zealand First 12.

Noes 63

New Zealand National 59; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Amendments not agreed to.

A party vote was called for on the question, That Part 1 be agreed to.

Ayes 107

New Zealand National 59; New Zealand Labour 32; New Zealand First 12; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Noes 12

Green Party 12.

Part 1 agreed to.

Dr DAVID CLARK (Labour—Dunedin North): I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. I seek your guidance. I waited, recognising it is completely at your discretion when Part 1 is put, but I seek your guidance as to what remedies might be available to me, having sought the call for a long period.

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): The member will sit. No, I am going to deal with your point. [Interruption] The member will sit. If you wish to have a call, that is up to how your whips allocate the calls. We have moved on from there. We are now going on to Part 2, so there is an opportunity to seek a call on Part 2. That is what we are now dealing with. [Interruption] No. We are on Part 2.

CHRIS HIPKINS (Senior Whip—Labour): I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. I think, in the heat of the moment, you might have made a ruling that you did not intend to. The calls in the Committee stage are nothing to do with the whips. The whips cannot allocate calls in the Committee stage—in fact, it is at the discretion of the Chair.

The issue is that this bill is going through under urgency. I accept that Part 1 is done. We are through Part 1 now. Members who were seeking a call on Part 1 and did not get it have of course now got Part 2 and the title and commencement clauses. I just seek some reassurance that there will be some flexibility for those members who have not spoken on Part 1 but who do want to speak to those issues—that they will still get some leniency in being able to do so in subsequent parts of the bill.

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): I thank the member. I have a list of who speaks and who does not speak. Over the course of this urgency over the last 3 days I have sought to give the call to those who have sought calls. But the matter comes down to repetition and relevancy at the time. The previous presiding officer for Part 1 made that very clear, and I have carried that through. Now we have the opportunity to debate Part 2.

Part 2

Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE (Labour—New Lynn): I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. This is a matter relating to Part 2. It seeks further clarification based on the ruling you have just made. In respect of the antidote to repetition—

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): No, no—look, you are trifling with the Chair. The member will sit. The member will sit. You are just wasting time. That is all that is happening here. I am seeking someone who wishes to take a call.

Hon PHIL GOFF (Labour—Mt Roskill): Part 2 has two clauses. The first, clause 9, is a validation clause. What clause 9 does, by adding new section 170, is validate the closing date for submissions on the proposed plan that was adopted by the Auckland Council. Also, new section 171, also added by clause 9, validates any hearings sessions of the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel that were held concurrent with another session. I want to come back and focus particularly on clause 9, but I will just mention clause 10, which is about consequential amendments. I have got a couple of questions about that as well.

What we are predominantly dealing with in this part is validations. The word “validations” has a nice sound to it, but what does it actually mean? A validation is what you do after the event, to remedy a cock-up in earlier rushed legislation to retrospectively justify—

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Order! That is a word that has been ruled out. The member will not use that word.

Hon PHIL GOFF: A validation is what you do to remedy a mistake made in previous legislation, and to retrospectively justify what has been done illegally and without authority.

When we do these things retrospectively we need to look at what lessons can be learnt from how the mistake—if you prefer to call it that—was made. I am conscious that this clause validates changes that I think were made in the amendment legislation that was passed 2 years ago. The irony of what we are doing in this session today is that we are considering legislation that has not gone to a select committee.

Let us think for a moment about what the purpose is of taking legislation to a select committee. It is, on the one hand, to give the public input to make sure you have got the solutions right and to give the experts input, but on the other hand it is to allow the select committee to work in a bipartisan way to prevent mistakes from being made in legislation. So what we would have done in a select committee is we would have had the parliamentary counsel before us to make sure that the drafting was accurate, we would have had the officials before us to give advice, and, unlike in the Committee of the whole House, we would have been able to cross-examine the officials.

I do not think that happened back in 2013, and the irony is that we are doing exactly the same thing again. We are rushing through legislation that has not been considered by a select committee, and I can guarantee that we will be back again to repair more mistakes that are made because we are once again passing legislation in haste.

I want to ask a couple of questions of the Minister in the chair. The first validation we are doing is the closing date for submissions to the Auckland Council of 28 February 2014. We are remedying a mistake that relates to events that happened 20 months ago. The question that I have is: what are the implications of leaving it for 20 months before you validate this piece of legislation, which did not create the proper authority, and why has it taken 20 months to remedy this? This is something that should have been brought to the attention of the House much, much earlier.

I think the second validation is something that has wider consequences—that is, in this legislation that we are passing it allows the independent hearings panel to meet concurrently. But what we find in new section 171 is that we also have to validate the fact that they have been holding these panels concurrently for potentially a long period of time.

So my question to the Minister is: what is the scale of this mistake that we are rectifying in the Committee today? How long have those hearings panels been acting without legal authority to do what they have been doing, and what are the consequences of having left it so long to try to validate what the panels were doing without the authority of this House?

These are significant mistakes. Yes, we are rectifying them, and yes, the Opposition will support the Government in rectifying this situation, but the Committee needs to know what the implications are and why it took so long.

PHIL TWYFORD (Labour—Te Atatū): I want to carry on from the comments of the Hon Phil Goff and just briefly underline, really for the record, the irony and the bad taste that Part 2 leaves in the mouths of members on this side of the Chamber, validating the most elementary, mickey mouse mistakes that were made in the first round of the amending legislation that created these problems.

It is clear, I think, looking at Part 2, clause 9—one of the first things the chair of the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel did was extend the deadline for public submissions in early 2014. It was one of the very first things that he did. What kind of thought was put into the amending legislation to set the original deadline for submissions? How many submissions were accepted unlawfully?

Hon David Parker: How many were excluded?

PHIL TWYFORD: Well, how many were excluded? Possibly none, but, I mean, it just makes a mockery of the whole process.

Hon Member: She might know. They will have done some research.

PHIL TWYFORD: Well, I would like to hear from the Minister in the chair, Louise Upston. She has already offered one contribution. I think the Committee deserves an explanation, in the absence of select committee hearings. So that is the first issue—the validation around the closing date for submissions.

Secondly, the concurrent hearing sessions: how many sessions were held concurrently and unlawfully? This has been going on all year. The hearings panels have heard thousands and thousands of cases, and what this bill does now, under new section 171(2) in clause 9, is it basically requires that any session has to be treated retrospectively, as if it had been held in accordance with the provision to allow for concurrent hearings and as if it had been chaired by someone who had been authorised as the chairperson.

So that immediately raises the question: how many of these sessions were chaired by a member of the panel who had not been lawfully authorised to chair those sessions? What a mickey mouse outfit. I am not blaming the independent hearings panel. It—

Hon David Parker: Why not?

PHIL TWYFORD: Well, the independent hearings panel members are good, professional people of high calibre, who have been put in the invidious position of operating within a legislative framework that was rushed and poorly thought through and shot full of holes—full of errors. And here we are, within 2 years, back in the House cleaning up the errors that were made then, retrospectively.

Of course, given that we are pushing this legislation through under urgency—no select committee process. I think we had a 40-second contribution from the Minister in the chair. We have not had any substantive input into this debate from Government members, other than that very, very brief contribution from the Minister in the chair, and really no substantive contributions from the Minister for the Environment. We do not even have the Minister who is responsible for this legislation here for this debate. It is just—

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Order! You cannot say that—you cannot say that.

PHIL TWYFORD: I withdraw that. I apologise. I know that is against the Standing Orders.

So those are the validations. The other main section is the schedule, “Consequential amendments”, and the amendments to section 115 point back to new section 144 in clause 5, which we have debated here. It is consequential to the provisions that allow the hearings panels to make recommendations to the independent hearings panel on the basis of a number of submissions on one particular topic, without waiting for all of the submissions and the evidence to be heard before they make its recommendations. I just want to repeat that we have real concerns about whether that will make for a piecemeal and incoherent consideration of what is a very complex set of interlocking issues that the panel will be considering. The other sections—sections 124, 148, and 150—again all point back to the concerns that we raised under clause 5.

Dr DAVID CLARK (Labour—Dunedin North): I want to speak a bit more to clause 9. I have found a remedy for my earlier concern in that Part 2, in relation to validations and consequential amendments, effectively makes the past like the future is now intended to be. If members wish to bear in mind that this also could reflect the future—

Hon David Parker: Very existential.

Dr DAVID CLARK: A very existential way of looking at things. I shall speak to clause 9, but it does relate to clause 6, a clause that was not debated in the hour that I was seeking the call on Part 1. That goes to whether in the new world, as in the old, the bill will actually achieve its intended purpose, because with the natural justice concerns that were raised by colleagues about two-person panels and whether or not they are making decisions—and bear in mind that we are now retrospectively making that OK in this legislation—we have got to acknowledge, whether or not there are substantive decisions being made, that the decisions that two people will make, or in this case will have made, are actually likely to have had a bearing on the outcome.

For example, there is a decision to extend the hearing of evidence or a decision to allow extra questions and answers. When those transcripts are recorded from hearings, they become the basis of the reports, so there are political calls made by those around the table. When there are very few people around the table, there are very few people directing traffic, and if it is difficult to ascertain who has the lead on that, we may well find with that limited number of people on the panel that we end up with decisions that are shaped—even if they are not in substance taken—by the few members who remain on the panel.

That, I would suggest, may lead to a situation where there are more appeals to the High Court on questions of natural justice, which is something that was raised in passing—the issue of natural justice. If that is true, and if there are more concerns raised about natural justice and more appeals to the High Court, then we can imagine that, actually, the opposite of streamlining will be achieved. The purpose of this bill is to streamline the process, but if it ends up in there being more court disputes, it will achieve the opposite for those people who are trying to achieve a better way of doing things in Auckland.

For example, if there are only two people on a panel—and we are approving this retrospectively as well as being the future world—and one of those people attends to a text message, does the person presenting to the panel have the ability to argue that their case was not heard by a quorum of the panel? I think we would all agree that if somebody took a phone call and went out of the room, the quorum would no longer be achieved. But there are going to be points of dispute. When we get down to so few people hearing the evidence that is presented, there is the potential for dispute and for litigious processes to tie up these hearings. I think that is a serious thing, because if this bill is about streamlining and it actually achieves the opposite—because, as members have pointed out in the debate on Part 1, there is nothing that limits decision making by those few people in the room.

We have not had a convincing response from the Minister in the chair, Louise Upston, about how that might be so. Ron Mark raised the issue of the primary legislation making it clear that the panel can make recommendations and can make decisions along the way. How can we satisfy ourselves that those decisions will not be made by fewer and fewer people and be open to litigation because the quorum is so few? I think that this is a serious thing.

If it is as serious as I believe it is—and the Minister, I would hope, might be able to allay my fears—I would hope it has been quantified by officials. Officials will say what the likelihood of litigation is as a result of these lower numbers of people hearing the cases. The chances of having more appeals will be “x”, and that will increase the time taken to get resolution by “y”, and we can estimate the cost to those who are making submissions and the cost to the council in presenting evidence in the High Court in appeals, and so on, to be “z”. It would have been quantified somewhere by officials, surely—the cost of the risk of increased litigation.

Hon DAVID PARKER (Labour): I want to address two things. The first one will not take long. The first one is that I would like to know whether this new closing date for submissions of 28 February 2014 effectively puts out submissions that were made after that date. Are there submissions that were made after 28 February 2014 that, because of this fixed date now being imposed, are not going to be heard and do not have rights in the process? If so, how many are there? I think that is very relevant to the decision that we are taking here as to whether we agree to that new date.

The other point I want to make is in respect of new section 171(2) in clause 9, and also new section 115(ja), which is a consequential amendment set out in the schedule. The contrast here is to be made with what is happening in Christchurch. In Christchurch they had a need for a new plan as well, as a consequence of the earthquakes. There was recognition that the normal plan-making processes would take too long. Normal plan-making processes include appeals to the Environment Court, and at the Environment Court people have rights of cross-examination and can go into both the facts and the law. The reason that that process is being truncated in Christchurch is that they need a new plan and that would take too long, and so there is some justification for shortening the process.

There is also, I think, widespread recognition across most parts of the House that, actually, it does take too long to make Resource Management Act plans under the Resource Management Act. They take longer to make than it takes us to change a law in Parliament, and therefore democratically elected local government officials cannot be elected on a platform and implement it because by the time the next election comes around they still have not finished the plan change, which seems a bit nonsensical.

Against that, of course, there is the need to protect the private interests and the legitimate interests of both private people and public organisations. Why is that? Well, plans have enormous effects. They have multimillion-dollar effects. Whether you can subdivide land, how many storeys you can build on a piece of land, whether you can put a flat down below—all of these things have million-dollar consequences, very expensive consequences. They also have lifestyle effects. If you are allowed to have a commercial zone right next to you, then you are going to have to put up with a bit more noise and traffic. If you have a bar next to you that is going to be operating at all hours of the night, then that has an effect on you. These things have an effect on people, so what is the chance of changing that effect if you have not got a right to a fair process?

When you have more than two people on a committee, the chances are that the different concerns that are raised by people as to process are going to be more likely to be considered, particularly if you have got a lawyer involved. This is where I want to go back to the Christchurch plan. This Parliament protected against unfair process by ensuring that Justice John Hansen, a former High Court judge, is in charge of that process there, and therefore is more likely to impose upon his Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel—especially when he is there. But even when he is not there and he is authorising other forms of subsets of the hearings panel to hear submissions, it is more likely to be a fair process. Here, the hearing process, retrospectively, can be down to two people, and the chairperson does not have to be there. That is what we are doing in respect of new section 171(2). We are saying that the chairperson does not have to be there. So I want to hear from the Minister in the chair, Louise Upston, as to what assurances we can have that in respect of these smaller panels we are still going to have a fair process.

This is heightened by the provisions in new section 115(ja), where it says “the Hearings Panel may make recommendations to the Council in respect of a particular topic …”. If I am concerned about a particular topic and I go along to a hearings panel, and it does not even refer my concerns back to the council, what remedy have I got? It does not have to make recommendations in respect of my submission or the topic that I may raise, and I have got no appeal rights to the Environment Court because we have truncated them. I will have had no cross-examination rights at the original hearings panel to highlight my concern or to show that some other information that is being presented to the council committee is wrong. So my rights have been severely truncated as a person whose life could be affected by, say the fact that I have a tannery put up next door to my residential section—depending on where the planning line is drawn—or if I am a person who wants to bring forward affordable housing and I cannot do it because the minimum lot size is too high, or the prohibition on multi-storey buildings is inappropriate around a transport node.

All of these things have incredibly important effects, not just on the individual but on society as a whole, given the need that we have for more affordable housing in Auckland. I would like to hear from the Minister in response to those concerns that I have as to the fairness of the process, particularly given—

Su’a WILLIAM SIO (Labour—Māngere): I want to thank the Minister for her earlier comments, and I hope that she recognises that without the benefit of a select committee process we are bound to be asking her questions, given the fact that we also do not have the benefit of legal advice or the officials’ advice.

I want to refer to clause 9 in Part 2, “Validations and consequential amendments”. All of us, or most of us, in this Committee hate having to pass legislation that revalidates something, particularly retrospective legislation. I note that in new section 170 in clause 9, we are having to validate the date on which submissions were received. Rightly, some of my colleagues have asked, well, how many submissions were received that were deemed illegal that we are now having to validate so that they can be received? Hopefully, the Minister will have a view around that.

But the other thing is—and this goes to the crux of the credibility of the Government—when did it first learn about the need for validation legislation? That is important because, as I understand, the hearings had started in September last year. The hearings started last year, and we are only now, over 12 months later, passing legislation that validates the work of the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel. I think it is important that the Minister is able to tell the Committee when the Government first learnt that, because if it learnt that at the beginning of the year, why is it that we are only now passing this legislation?

The other question that I think is also important is: how many concurrent sessions have been undertaken so far? Because we are validating practices that, it is my understanding, the independent hearings panel has been doing. We are validating their actions. Does that mean that the independent hearings panel has been undertaking concurrent sessions and site visits, as the Minister said earlier? Does that mean that the independent hearings panel has been holding concurrent sessions with less than three members? Because we are now—

Hon Ruth Dyson: Fewer than.

Su’a WILLIAM SIO: Oh, fewer than—fewer than, as my colleague the Hon Ruth Dyson says. Because the reality is that if we are validating practices that have been deemed illegal since September 2014, I would say that a lot of Aucklanders will be questioning: “Who did we present our submission to, if this is what’s happening now?”.

The other question I would like to ask is: did they all have a quorum? Did they all have three? Because we are now being asked to change the quorum from three to two. Obviously, the practice may have been that it may have been difficult to get three, but if the concurrent sessions have taken place, which we are currently validating as a result of Part 2, clause 9, then what happened? We do not have the benefit of an official’s report, we do not have the benefit of a select committee report, and I think it is incumbent on the Minister in the chair, Hekia Parata, to tell the Committee so that we can have at least some clarity that we are passing this in the spirit of doing the right thing for the sake of Aucklanders.

Is there anything else that has taken place as a result that we cannot see? Because here is what we have often seen: in addition to fixing the mistakes that the Government has made in the original legislation, we have also been asked to accept that we need to speed things up. I absolutely agree, but I do not believe that Aucklanders would want to sacrifice the quality of advice that the independent hearings panel provides for us because of the Government’s attempt to rush through things, because I suspect that if we are unable to meet the statutory time frame that the legislation provides, surely it would be for the benefit of the Auckland region that we take our time and get it right anyway? But all I am hearing from the Government so far, based on the little information that has been provided to us, is that it is so intent on speeding things through that I fear that we will be back here again and—

Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE (Labour—New Lynn): I do appreciate the opportunity to make what is, in fact, my first contribution throughout this Committee stage on the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill. Relating to an earlier point of order, there are a number of members on this side who have not yet had the opportunity to make any contribution to this debate. Our whip has asked for some leniency to raise matters that may span across Part 2 and other parts. I have some specific new material that is important in the local Auckland context in my own electorate of New Lynn, and I wish to put that on the floor of the House today. I am going to then draw some specific conclusions from that, which I would ask the Minister in the chair, Hekia Parata, to comment on.

These are serious matters that go to probably hundreds of millions of dollars of future investment in my electorate, and they relate to previous expenditure of around $400 million of public funds invested by Auckland City Council, Waitakere City Council, and the Crown in the development of New Lynn to date. The jumping-off point for this issue is, in fact, in Part 2, in new section 170, added by clause 9, which speaks about the closing date for submissions on the proposed plan. It is the definition of “proposed plan” that I wish to reflect upon. Also, the issue of concurrence of sessions in section 171(1) in clause 9 becomes important in this real-life example.

I need to go into the facts briefly, and I hope that if I have not completed it, Mr Chair, you will give me some leniency on the call. In New Lynn, starting about 7 years ago, a major redevelopment project was undertaken, pursuant firstly to the old Waitakere City district plan and then to a special charette-based planning process that was crystallised in a concept document that was circulated for consultation in 2010. There was broad buy-in to that document. It was a published book. It was a vision for the future of the New Lynn town centre, which has now become one of the main metropolitan hubs under the Auckland Unitary Plan. That was in 2010, published by the then Waitakere City Council.

What that led to was a series of plan changes, including Plan Change 17, which rezoned much of the area around central New Lynn, which is now in a large special housing area. That is important to note, and I will come back to that. That, in turn, facilitated the dropping underground of the double-tracked Western Line, the realignment of several roads, and the completion of a new urban transit centre in New Lynn that has in turn transformed the town centre. An issue has subsequently arisen that that transit centre made it possible for New Lynn to intensify housing development, and I am advised that over half of the property within a kilometre radius of that transit centre has now changed hands since that investment took place. It is a dynamic and very different urban environment. There is a new development on what was the Crown Lynn clay pits and the recently vacated Monier tiles site, owned by the Australian corporation CSR, which has been purchased by a company called Avanda. That company is looking to build around 1,800 apartments on a combined site area of, I believe, around 9 hectares. This is a very intensive urban development, for which the planning is critical. Stage—

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): So can we tie it to Part 2.

Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE: Yes. So the words “proposed plan”, in section 170, relate in the minds of local stakeholders to the consultation document published in 2010 upon which the plan changes were based, which were then reflected in the current Auckland Unitary Plan. The issue that has arisen is that the special housing area and the subsequent stage one consenting decisions appear to have been made, and are arguably at odds with, certainly, the concept drawings and the spirit of the 2010 plan. That raises an issue for this Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel, which is—

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): And how does it raise an issue with Part 2?

Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE: With section 170. The Minister may wish to comment on whether the proposed plan that this refers to is the original plan upon which a large-scale development was based, or whether it is the current plan at the time at which the concurrent hearings panel sits. That is the first question that comes out of this. The second is what is the interdependency between the plan and any special housing area—

Hon HEKIA PARATA (Minister of Education): I understand that there have been a few questions on a matter relating to Part 2, and I just wanted to assist the Committee in its consideration. In the unamended Act there were potentially two viable closing dates for submissions, being 14 January 2014 and 28 February 2014. Validating 28 February 2014 as the closing date for submissions helps protect the validity of those submissions received between those two dates—those were 14 January and 28 February 2014. Thank you.

JAN LOGIE (Green): I just rise to take a quite short call on Part 2, “Validations and consequential amendments”, which is seeking to fix up mistakes in the original legislation, as I understand it. Because this bill is being rushed through under urgency, we do not actually have the opportunity to hear from submitters about whether the mistakes that we are correcting were caused by a lack of clarity in the legislation or whether the situation was more complex, leading to this misinterpretation, as it might be.

The Minister in the chair, Hekia Parata, has just stood up to clarify that the first point, around the closure of submission dates, is clarifying that there had been two dates, as I understand it—14 January and then 28 February—and that this is to clarify and provide that clarity that those submissions that were received between 14 January and 28 February are indeed valid. So was that problem in the lack of clarity in the legislation, or was that in the communication material that was sent out to people around closure dates? I am sorry if it is being obtuse, but I am struggling to get the detail of that, and that is because we have not had that select committee process.

When I have been thinking about this issue and why the select committee is so valuable, I have been realising that, actually, when we get the submissions around the details it helps us understand and fulfil our role as the Opposition in scrutinising legislation, as well as helping the functioning of Government. We get to find out how legislation is operating at the community level through the submissions. Those submissions are often reported in the media, which enables people in the community to then reflect on the impact of the legislation and the consideration of the implementation of that. Clearly, that is not happening in this process, and I really think that that, particularly when it comes to fixing up mistakes and validations in consequential amendments, is a significant point that we need to consider. It is about ensuring that we have a good lawmaking process and that people are able to consider what went wrong and properly interrogate that, and that is missing from this process.

There is the point about the closure of the submission dates and there is the point about new section 171 in clause 9, which validates any hearing session of the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel that was held concurrently with another session. We have heard previously in this debate that this has been happening for a while and that this is validating that, but, again, we have not heard how long this has been happening for. Was this happening because the commissioners interpreted the legislation to think that that was appropriate, or was this happening just because they were not looking at the legislation and they were getting on with business and trying to expedite the process? That actually creates two very different situations, and we have not had the information to tell us what the problem was, to find out whether this is the appropriate legislative response to the problem.

That is not good lawmaking, and our responsibility in this House is to have appropriate oversight and to do our best to make sure that the laws on the books serve the purpose that we want. There are, of course, more broadly than this, principles of good delivery of principle and democracy. Whether the concurrent hearings are actually something that we want to be supporting—it seems, from what we have picked up in the media and what people have said, that maybe they are. But there has been no opportunity for somebody who may have had involvement in this process and may have had concerns to be able to come to this House and express those concerns. I think that, really, is doing a discredit to the communities of Auckland—to lock them out of this process—when I really do believe the first principle of decision making in this place—

RON MARK (NZ First): Well, here we go again. Sometimes it seems a little bit like Groundhog Day in here, does it not, when we find ourselves addressing legislation for the umpteenth time because it was incorrectly passed in the first instance, or it was fundamentally flawed because it was rushed through, rammed through, because the Government of the day had a view, had a majority, and simply ignored or did not allow a full and proper process to take its path, which might have seen some of these wrinkles ironed out along the way.

Part 2, again, reinforces the value of having the select committee process, no less than Part 1 did. I am still a little disappointed—I will remain a little disappointed—that I still have not had satisfactory answers from the Government to the questions that I put regarding Part 1. Hopefully, here in Part 2, we might get some engagement from the Government, particularly bearing in mind that we are wanting to support this legislation because although we may argue that it has been done poorly, the process has been flawed, and it is not democratic, we are here, and this will help Auckland in its current bind, and the Auckland Council, which, at the very least, is made up of duly elected people, supports the legislation.

So, again, if I was to look at Part 2, I would recognise a couple of things. We have a new Part 2 to the primary legislation—there was no Part 2. Part 2 of the bill consists of new sections 170 and 171, which seek to validate certain things that were done before the enactment of this bill that we are processing now. It validates the closing dates of submissions. It validates any hearing session of the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel that was held concurrently with another session by providing that the provisions of the principal Act, as amended here, must be treated as having applied in relation to the hearing session. And the chairperson of the hearings panel must be treated as having made the necessary directions under these provisions—except that the chairperson did not, and the hearings were not in compliance with the legislation of the day. New section 170 deals with the closing dates of submissions to councils on the proposed plan. It talks about how “Despite section 123(7) and (9), 28 February 2014 must be treated as if it is, and always was, the closing date for submissions …”, as opposed to 14 January 2014—except that it was not.

Once again, we have fundamentally flawed legislation. Despite 16 attempts by the Government to patch up its dodgy primary legislation, we still have flaws here, we still have problems here, and here we are in urgency seeking to validate actions that were illegal. We are seeking to say things that happened were legal when they were not. Fundamentally bad lawmaking—fundamentally bad process.

Go to new section 171, “Concurrent hearing sessions held before 2015 amendments”—and what am I looking at? My note says “Ron, go and have a look at the bill”—chiding myself. Here we go: “Concurrent hearing sessions held before 2015 amendments (1) This section applies to any hearing session that was held concurrently with another hearing session before the commencement of the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Act 2015 (the 2015 Act). (2) The hearing session must be treated as if—(a) this Act as amended by the 2015 Act applied in relation to the hearing session; and (b) the hearing session was—(i) held in accordance with a direction given under section 165(aa) … and (ii) chaired by a chairperson appointed under section 165(b) (as amended by the 2015 Act) if the hearing session was chaired by a member other …”—it goes on and on, except that what this new section raises is a series of questions as to the situation that arose, the issues behind those situations, and the reasons for adding Part 2 and these two new sections, sections 170 and 171.

That, again, reinforces the value of having select committees. If this bill had gone to a select committee, we would have had the opportunity to look at these two sections and ask the Auckland Council what happened. We have had no such opportunity. The questions we might have asked—

CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka): I am going to make only a brief contribution in this Part 2 debate. The reason that I rise to take a call on this is that it does deal with some retrospective legislation, which is something that I am never particularly comfortable with when we do that in the House. We have done a couple of other bills that have retrospective effect during this urgency session, and I want to remind members of the Legislation Design and Advisory Committee’s advice to the House and to lawmakers with regard to retrospective laws. It states: “Legislation should not affect existing rights and should not criminalise or punish conduct that was not punishable at the time it was committed. The presumption against retrospectivity: The general rule is that legislation should have prospective, not retrospective, effect …”.

When you consider what is happening with this particular validation—this retrospective legislation here—in fact, I do not think that is in any way in conflict with what the Legislation Design and Advisory Committee is arguing. If anything, one could argue that not passing this legislation would be the violation because people have, in good faith, participated in the process, made their submissions, and had their hearings, and, potentially, if this validation does not take place, they could find that that whole process was invalid and will have to start again. I would almost go so far as to say that to be consistent with the overall principle that underpins what the Legislation Design and Legislation Advisory Committee is arguing here, we probably do need to pass this bill to avoid any confusion and to ensure that all those who have already had their say and had their submissions heard are still considered, and that they did not waste their time.

Although, generally speaking, I am relatively uncomfortable with retrospective validating laws and retrospective provisions in laws, in this case I suspect there is probably good justification. I think, however, it is incumbent upon the Government to answer the questions that have been put, particularly the question by the Hon David Parker, which was around the particular date of 28 February and whether in fact validating that date results in any exclusion of people’s submissions where otherwise they might have been able to argue the case that they should have been included. I have not had a response from the Government on that, which is somewhat disappointing. So, overall, like I said, I have looked quite carefully at these retrospective provisions, and although generally I would not support them, I think in this case there is probably a reasonable justification for doing so.

LOUISA WALL (Labour—Manurewa): I have been dying to take a call all morning so I appreciate this opportunity to contribute to Part 2, and I also want to focus on the validation provision in new section 170. I do thank the Minister for the clarification because, essentially, there was some requirement under section 123(7) of the principal Act that referred to a period of 60 working days for submissions to have been received after public notification.

The question that I have, actually, is about the period between 14 January and 28 February 2014, and how many of the 9,400 submissions that period actually applies to. It is actually relevant. I have not had clarification about access to this process of the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel. Essentially, Auckland Council went out and, as I said before, it got over 9,400 submissions on the development of the Auckland Unitary Plan. It also had an extended period when it got another 3,800 submissions. It then wrote the draft Auckland Unitary Plan, and that plan was given to the hearings panel to then consult and—this is my question for the Minister—presumably, only with people who had made a previous submission. That is where this validation clause actually becomes relevant.

My colleague the Hon Phil Goff said that there were 5,000 submissions to be heard by this hearings panel and they are a subset of the total 13,200 submissions. So, in fact, this validation clause is incredibly important if that is the relevance of this validation process. I need to know from the Minister whether or not the qualification to contribute to the hearings panel process is actually based only on your making an original submission to the Auckland Council unitary plan process. The qualification of what is a submission becomes incredibly important to the integrity of this whole piece of legislation.

If the Minister could confirm that, that would be good because, I guess, in looking at this particular clause you want to make sure that the clause actually has a purpose. So does this validation clause actually matter? I think that the Minister should let the public know the purpose, the rationale, and the relevance of this particular clause, because if it does then determine qualification for those submitters through participation in the process from the beginning to be heard, then actually that is really, really important. If it does not, and if it does not matter—and, actually, then I think the integrity of Part 1 comes into question. In fact, in new section 144(5) in clause 5 the hearings panel ultimately will make recommendations that actually may be outside the scope of the submissions that it receives, so there is not actually going to be a relationship between the submissions that it received when the cut-off date was 28 February 2014 and the ability of those submitters to make a contribution to the hearings panel process.

That is actually the crux of the argument. It is a serious point to be discussed because what we know through other parts of this particular legislation in Part 1—and I seek your indulgence, Mr Chair, just to reference back—is that under new section 144(8)(a) in clause 5 the panel can “identify any recommendations that are beyond the scope of the submissions made in respect of that topic or … topics;”. Also section 144(9)(b) says that: “any other matter that the Hearings Panel considers relevant to the proposed plan that arises from submissions … ”, but then it has got these two words: “or otherwise.” So “or otherwise” actually means that they stand apart or outside the process, and, in fact, that is what we are concerned about in terms of the integrity of this process. What that essentially says, based on what I have just read, is that this Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel can actually introduce a whole lot of material and make recommendations to the council that have got no rational basis in terms of the process that we have been through. So Auckland—

RON MARK (Deputy Leader—NZ First): I really do appreciate the opportunity to take a second call on this small part so that I might finish off the point that I was trying to make earlier on. The point I had got to in my earlier call was around the questions that still hang in our heads as we deliberate on the bill before us right now, which we would have put at a select committee hearing and would have been able to have obtained answers to, summarised, and incorporated into our report, and which might then have become the reference material for this debate. But we do not have that. And I am really pleased with the last call that was just taken because it touches very much into the area of what I have just been deliberating on for myself here in the Committee.

So some of those questions that would have arisen at the select committee are: did the hearings start in September last year? Exactly how many submissions were received? When did the chairperson start acting outside the Act? What was the Office of the Auditor-General’s view of this? Was the Audit Office aware of it?

I know, having been a mayor, that when the Audit Office comes into a council, it does not just go through the books and trace every dollar that the council has spent for the appropriateness of that dollar spent; it traces the processes and the adherence to the statutory obligations and to the legislation of the Local Government Act. So then, clearly, the Auckland Council has been operating outside the Act, and that was known, hence the reason we are here today, retrospectively, making legal its illegal actions.

So the questions we would have asked are: what was the Audit Office’s view of this? Could we have a copy of its report? Could we hear its views? What flexibility will be shown to other councils that fail to meet their statutory obligations in such a way, or is Auckland to be considered to be a different case and, therefore to be treated differently, as we are seeing here today? I mean, if Carterton was not to meet its obligations and to not take its submissions within the time line, or to have confused dates and be telling people “Sorry, the closing date was 14 January. Oops, sorry, we’re wrong. It was actually 28 February.”, would that be acceptable?

There is a fundamental question that arises around the two closing dates, and it is this: how many people who thought the closure date was 14 January 2014 and not 28 February 2014 did not put in a submission when they could have but did not know they could have, because they had no knowledge on 14 January 2014 that Parliament would be sitting in urgency on 19 November 2015 to amend the legislation to make their late submission legal and, therefore, that they could have, and should have, put it in last January and had it legally accepted?

The next question is: what recourse is there for those people who followed the rule, realised and said “Hello, it’s 14 January. I can’t put a submission in.”, and did not put it in? What recourse is there in this part to allow them to appeal and to have their submission accepted now?

I have just had a quick glance at the right of appeals under section 155 of the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Act. It refers me further to sections 156 and 157, and nowhere in there is there any opportunity for those people who acted in compliance with the law and realised on 14 January they could not put a submission in and did not put one in. Nowhere in this legislation is there an ability for them to get an appeal, and, in fact, the appeals part of the legislation specifically rules them out because you cannot have an appeal on a submission that was never lodged. It is a catch-22, nasty situation that was brought about by fundamentally flawed legislation, which is being amended retrospectively now. I think that is unfair, and I think, at the very least, those people deserve the right to have a select committee analyse and scrutinise this bill so there could have been even a minority view putting a different view back to the House.

I wait for the debate on the third reading. I think we have canvassed enough through Part 2 to make it very clear that we think this is sloppy, we think it is shoddy, and we think Auckland has been treated a little bit differently. We would hope the same leniency would be shown by the Office of the Auditor-General and by Parliament to any other territorial authority that is found to be operating its submissions processes outside the law.

Dr SHANE RETI (National—Whangarei): I move, That the question be now put.

Motion agreed to.

Part 2 agreed to.

Schedule agreed to.

Clauses 1 to 3

Hon PHIL GOFF (Labour—Mt Roskill): I would like to take a brief call on this. This is traditionally where we do a summing up of what has happened in the Committee stage of the bill, but I do want to address the title specifically. The title of this legislation, of course, is the Local Government (Auckland Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill, and it is about transition. It is about the transition of eight different councils into a single super-city and it is about the transition from 13 district and regional plans into a single unitary plan to cover resource management issues in Auckland.

Consistently through this bill, the Labour Party has supported this legislation. It has supported the legislation because we are very keen to get a single unitary plan. We also supported bringing that plan into existence in earlier legislation. What would normally have taken 10 years under the Resource Management Act will take 3 years under the principal Act that we are now amending. The way that that was achieved was by having the plan notified and then having an independent hearings panel hear submissions on it. Thousands of submissions have been heard—I think 9,000—and there are still 5,000 to go. The 5,000 to go are on site-specific issues. That is going to put real pressure on the independent hearings panel to get through by the statutorily required date of 22 July. So we have been here to support this legislation with measures in this bill such as reducing the quorum, increasing the pool of panel members from seven to 10, and allowing the panel to hear the issues concurrently.

So we have no problem with the purpose of the bill. What we have had during the Committee stage is a real problem with the process. Everybody knows that this bill was drafted back before 16 September. Minister Nick Smith had it. If this House had been properly managed it could have been introduced, it could have been read a first time, and it could have gone to a select committee so we could go through the normal democratic procedure of giving the public their say, cross-examining the officials on how the bill was put together, and asking the Parliamentary Counsel Office about whether the drafting of the bill was appropriate and accurate, and we would have got it right—we would have got it right.

The great irony of the last 7 or 8 hours—we started this at half past 10 last night and we went through to midnight—is that, again, we have been rushing this legislation through, and more errors will be made. We have not learnt the lesson of what half this legislation is about—the half that does not appear in the title was “Validation”. Validation, as you know, is correcting errors that were made in previous legislation and retrospectively legislating for what was done illegally to be now considered legal. We have had a whole lot of questions, genuine questions, for the Minister in the chair. The Ministers in the chair—none of them has been the Minister in charge of the bill—have taken two brief calls. We did not have an opportunity for the select committee to check out why things were being done in a particular way, and we have not had that opportunity in the Committee either. I deplore the fact that legislation we support has nevertheless been rushed through in the way it has been, unnecessarily. This legislation could have been introduced a couple of months ago. We could have done it properly. We could have had a better chance of making sure we got it right. We could have avoided what inevitably will be future validation legislation, which comes out of rushed legislation.

So, yes, we do support this bill. We do support the transition that is occurring in Auckland. We want a single, consistent unitary plan that will bring good resource management practices that will provide for sustainable development in the housing area and the industrial area, but we want to make sure that it is sustainable and will ensure that instead of the complexity and the fragmented nature of the current district and regional plans, we have one plan. What the Government has not explained at any point in the Committee is why it has rushed it through in this inappropriate manner and has not taken the time to answer the genuine questions that members of the Opposition had.

RON MARK (Deputy Leader—NZ First): Likewise, I just want to take the opportunity, on behalf of New Zealand First, just to sum up and again affirm that we are supporting this bill. But I have to say that at this very point, given the way in which proceedings have played out, given the seriousness with which we have tried to address this bill and to raise genuine concerns, genuine questions, about what we see as gaps in the legislation that could have been easily tidied up to remove any degree of uncertainty—I guess, given the way that it has been dealt with here today, and the fact that we know that this bill was introduced in September, it could have actually been referred to a select committee.

We have a wonderful select committee, the Local Government and Environment Committee, very well chaired by Scott Simpson—a most collegial committee. I know for certain that if the bill had been put there, we would have got it through the process, allowed submissions, enabled a report to be produced, and offered up some suggested amendments to the Government, well in time to actually have this legislation enacted so that the Auckland Unitary Plan could progress in a more expeditious manner. We are always trying to be helpful where we can on matters where we actually agree. But, you know, this process could actually have put me in this position where I could recommend to my caucus that, like the Greens, we vote against it purely on the principle of the process that has been followed here over the last how many hours, which has been seriously disappointing.

I want to say that there is one area where we will move into the third reading with New Zealand First still seriously concerned about the question of the quorum. I predict this: just as this legislation has been back to the House 13 or 16 times for amendment since it was enacted in 2009—just as it has been amended 13 times, we predict that this will come back for the toilet stop clause. The toilet stop clause will be when people realise that having a quorum of two does not allow one to let a member of the Auckland Unitary Plan Independent Hearings Panel leave the room without adjourning proceedings. We raised a number of serious issues around having a quorum of two, and we are saying that if we had kept the quorum at three, then we would have overcome those points that we have raised in the debate today.

So whether we come back to amend the quorum and put it back to three, or not, will remain to be seen. But we are predicting that it will create some questions in the hearings when you have submitters sitting there and you only have a quorum of two—only two members sitting there—and one has to leave the room. Does that mean that we are now accepting here, when this legislation goes through, that in Auckland City when those hearings panels are working they will call a halt to proceedings at that moment, at that time, to allow that member to go off and do whatever they may want to do?

Just a cautionary—we could have resolved that more easily. It would have been nice to do that, but here we go, moving to the third reading, and I guess will we not do it until the same legislation comes back for the 17th time, for its next amendment. It is quite sad, really.

Clause 1 agreed to.

Clause 2 agreed to.

Clause 3 agreed to.

Bill reported without amendment.

Report adopted.

Sittings of the House

Sittings of the House

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Members, the House will suspend for the lunch break, and resume at 2 p.m. for oral questions. Following oral questions, the Committee of the whole House will resume under urgency. The House is—

Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (Leader of the House): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. The Government has no desire to progress the third reading on this day.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): I thank the honourable Minister for that. Members, the House is suspended until—

Hon Gerry Brownlee: No, it is finished.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Well, we are breaking for lunch. [Interruption] There is no further business.

The House adjourned at 12.52 p.m. (Thursday)