Tuesday, 14 February 2017

TUESDAY, 14 FEBRUARY 2017

TUESDAY, 14 FEBRUARY 2017

Mr Speaker took the Chair at 2 p.m.

Prayers.

Oral Questions

Questions to Ministers

Employment Rate—Participation, Youth Unemployment, and Building and Construction Industry

1. MAUREEN PUGH (National) to the Minister of Finance: How is the growing economy delivering jobs for New Zealanders?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE (Minister of Finance): As this House will be aware, the growing economy is not an end in itself, but it is important for the opportunities it creates for New Zealanders. The recent household labour force survey shows that this is happening very strongly in the labour market. New Zealand now has its highest-ever employment rate of those people aged 15 years and over: 66.9 percent of people aged 15 and over are employed in this economy—that is the second-highest rate in the whole developed world. As a result of that, more people have been encouraged to come into the workforce, as shown by a record-high participation rate, which, at 70.5 percent, is also now second in the whole developed world.

Maureen Pugh: What else did the survey show about the strength of the labour market?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: The survey showed that over 2.5 million New Zealanders are in employment for the first time ever. It also showed that wages grew by 1.6 percent over the year, taking the average annual wage to $58,700. That was the fifth consecutive quarter where employment growth has exceeded population growth. The survey also showed strong growth in construction, and retail trade and accommodation sectors with 10,900 and 30,300 more people employed in the past year in those two sectors, respectively.

Darroch Ball: How is the so-called growing economy delivering jobs for the 91,000—or 13.6 percent of—15- to 24-year-olds who have no job, are not in school, or in any training, which is now at its highest level in 4 years?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: As the member will know, if he has read the survey, Statistics New Zealand itself has cast out on that number because of the timing of the number and where it has occurred in relation to tertiary education participation. It has suggested that, actually, members and people reading the report look more closely at the subsequent quarters than at that one. Having said that, the member raises a fair point in terms of the importance of encouraging opportunities for young people. I note that in the construction sector we have 10,000 construction apprentices for the first time in New Zealand’s history. In fact, across a range of sectors the numbers of opportunities in work-based training and also in tertiary education continue to grow.

Grant Robertson: In light of that answer, can the Minister confirm that when we look at the same quarter’s figures last year for those young people not in employment, education, or training (“neets”), it is up 19,000, or 26 percent, on the same quarter last year?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: I think the member just missed my answer to the previous question. He may recall, because he railed against it so much, that the survey was changed in the middle of last year. I remember him saying it was some sort of political activity that was occurring to make Statistics New Zealand change the survey. It was not political activity, and Statistics New Zealand notes in that survey the need to be careful with those “neets” figures in the December quarter because of the impact, potentially, of tertiary education participation. But the member will also be pleased that industries like construction, like tourism, are providing lots of opportunities for young New Zealanders.

Maureen Pugh: What impact is the building boom having on job growth in the construction industry?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: The member asks a good question. New Zealand is in the middle of its largest-ever building boom, with the value of nationwide building consents reaching its highest level ever of $19 billion in 2016. Residential construction is a very big part of that, reaching an all-time high of $10.6 billion in the year. The strong growth is shown by the increase in people employed in the construction sector—up 17,000 in the last quarter alone, reaching an all-time high of 242,900 people employed in construction. To help meet the ongoing demand, the Government is strongly backing employers and industry training organisations as they grow their apprenticeship and trainee numbers towards the Government’s recently announced target of 50,000 people in training and apprenticeships by 2020.

Darroch Ball: Has the Minister stopped talking about how good those rates are, due to the fact that almost 2,000 young Kiwis every month are now being added to the list of those who have no job, who are out of education, and who are out of training?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: The member obviously did not listen to my answer to the earlier question, which simply made the point that because the survey has changed, Statistics New Zealand has indicated you should have caution. The recorded numbers of “neets” were at some of their lowest levels since the global financial crisis. It has gone up a little bit according to this survey, but the way in which the question was asked about tertiary education may have had an impact on that.

Maureen Pugh: What impact is the boom having on Auckland construction employment?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: It is interesting for members to know that job growth in the Auckland construction industry has reflected the strong growth in the wider construction industry, especially in residential construction. This has seen the number of people employed in construction in Auckland reach a record high of 85,800 in the most recent quarter of the household labour force survey. It is a very big increase on 3 years ago and far surpasses the previous peak measured by the household labour force survey, which was 64,000 during the mid-2000s. So now 85,800 people are working in construction, and that is one of the reasons why it is good to see the economy growing and delivering that job growth in our largest city.

Grant Robertson: Can the Minister confirm that Statistics New Zealand’s latest household expenditure survey shows that in the year to June last year, average annual housing costs rose 11 percent, whereas average annual household income rose 2 percent, and that in the average household, income, after housing, was less than $1 a day higher than it was the year before?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: I note that the question was about the growing economy delivering jobs for New Zealanders. I appreciate that the member is up to his reading, where he has got to “E” in the expenditure survey, but if he could catch up and get to the household labour force survey that would be useful.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Why is he boasting about people being employed, when they go off the unemployment register and on to the employment register if they get just 1 hour’s work a week?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: I appreciate that the member is speaking from personal experience—

Rt Hon Winston Peters: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. This Minister has begun every answer by challenging the listening ability of members of Parliament, and now by being scathing. At least I do not think that “manual labour” is the Prime Minister of Mexico, like he does.

Mr SPEAKER: That was not a helpful point of order. Now we will return to the Minister, if he wishes to continue his answer to the question.

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: The member should go and have a look at the survey because it actually lays out the number of people in full-time employment and the number of people in part-time employment. So, for example, if you look at New Zealand, compared with Australia, we have much higher rates of full-time employment than Australia does, which is one of the reasons why we get so many Kiwis returning home to New Zealand. If the member wants to put down a question in writing, I will be more than happy to take him through the numbers, but I can tell him that these are real jobs, and it is not a matter of boasting; it is a matter of focusing on the important thing to Kiwis, which is about getting jobs so they can bring up their families.

Housing—Supply and State and Social Housing

2. ANDREW LITTLE (Leader of the Opposition) to the Prime Minister: Does he stand by his refusal last week to debate with me in public in Mt Albert on the housing crisis?

Rt Hon BILL ENGLISH (Prime Minister): Yes, I do. In fact, after listening to Radio New Zealand this morning, I can see now that there is no need for a debate because the member agrees with me that “We’ve got to build houses … That’s the critical thing. It’s about building the houses; not worrying about prices, which, frankly, are beyond a Government’s control.” I agree that building houses is the main issue, and I do not expect there would be any debate about that.

Andrew Little: If he will not front up for a public debate, will he at least visit the Fa’avale family, who lost their home after the father suffered a workplace injury, and explain to their 4-year-old son why he is now living under a tarpaulin?

Rt Hon BILL ENGLISH: If it is the case that a 4-year-old is living under a tarpaulin, he can be assured, as his family can, that we have the resource to house those people properly. We do not need a debate in Mt Albert in order to solve that problem. In fact, there is more agreement between myself and the Leader of the Opposition about the housing challenges than there is within the Labour Party about selecting candidates.

Andrew Little: Why was one State house tenant forced to wait for 6 months for Housing New Zealand to fix his cockroach-infested home when Bill English was the responsible Minister?

Rt Hon BILL ENGLISH: I have no knowledge of the facts of that case; I would be surprised if it is the way the member represents it. But Housing New Zealand, I am sure, will be finding that the standards set by some of the new providers for looking after their customers are going to be challenging for Housing New Zealand to meet.

Andrew Little: Why, in the middle of a massive housing shortage, have more than 250 State houses sat empty for over a year as he tries to flog them off?

Rt Hon BILL ENGLISH: It may be news to the member to know that Housing New Zealand, as I understand it, has around 68,000 houses. There is quite a number of those that people in serious housing need will not move into, because of the quality of those houses. You would expect that when Housing New Zealand owns one in every 16 houses in New Zealand, it should be selling some of them at any given time, so that it can renew its stock.

Andrew Little: How on earth does he justify selling State houses in the middle of a housing crisis, when Kiwi kids are homeless and living under tarpaulins?

Rt Hon BILL ENGLISH: The member should study the policy, because we are no longer limited by the number of State houses when it comes to meeting serious housing need. We now have hundreds—in fact, shortly, thousands—of houses supplied by people other than Housing New Zealand, and the number of social housing places is increasing steadily.

Andrew Little: Why, when we have the worst housing shortage in New Zealand history, does he have nothing to say about it but vague numbers—no plan and no commitment? Just what kind of leadership is that?

Rt Hon BILL ENGLISH: There are more houses now being built in New Zealand on an annual basis than in a very long time, and it is going to keep on increasing.

Andrew Little: The population is growing faster.

Rt Hon BILL ENGLISH: Well, the member is right. This is a challenge of success—4 years ago, 5 years ago, 40,000 New Zealanders left for Australia, which emptied out a whole lot of houses that other people could move into. Last year net zero left, so those 40,000 New Zealanders, each year, are still here. Over 2 years that is 80,000 people who did not leave, and that is a great problem to try to solve.

Andrew Little: So is not the situation now this: he does not turn up to Waitangi, he turns up to the Big Gay Out but will not speak to New Zealanders, he will not debate me on housing in Auckland and defend his Government’s track record—or lack of it—and he will not commit to any plan at all for housing? When are we going to see real leadership? When are we going to see any leadership?

Rt Hon BILL ENGLISH: When I was looking for examples of leadership, I did not look at the Leader of the Opposition, who went all the way to Waitangi to tell them why he was not coming. And we do not need a debate about housing, because the Leader of the Opposition and I agree that the big challenge is getting more houses built. More houses are being built now, at a rate we have not seen for decades in New Zealand.

Earthquake, Kaikōura—Government Response and Transport Infrastructure

3. STUART SMITH (National—Kaikōura) to the Minister of Civil Defence: What has the Government been doing to ensure timely recovery for people and property following the Kaikōura earthquake?

Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (Minister of Civil Defence): Three months on from the magnitude 7.8 earthquake on 14 November last year, encouraging recovery progress is being made in affected South Island and North Island communities. The Government, local authorities, and others are working alongside not-for-profit organisations and businesses on a multipronged recovery effort. People’s well-being and livelihoods are the top priority, which is why the Government has provided financial assistance for temporary accommodation, psychosocial support, and services including health and education in those communities. Specifically, the Government has committed $17.5 million, to date, in business support to Kaikōura, Wellington, and the Hurunui districts; $5 million in primary sector support; $3.7 million to boost health services in Kaikōura and Marlborough; $5 million to repair and upgrade the Kaikōura Harbour; a $3 million fund to subsidise reinforced masonry and facades; and a $500,000 temporary accommodation allowance. The Government’s response to Kaikōura and its troubles during this earthquake event has been swift and comprehensive, and it will continue.

Stuart Smith: What is the Government doing to open and repair transport links to the Kaikōura district?

Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: Through the Minister of Transport, the Government has committed $2 billion to reinstate the entire coastal highway route and the rail corridor to Kaikōura. We always believed that a concerted effort to plan and to engineer a response in a proper way and in a timely fashion would see a significant reduction in the early estimates of how long it might take. We hope this is proved right. We have passed an Order in Council, thanks to the good grace of this House, that will allow that work to go ahead with a consent. Machinery is arriving on site, and clearance of those slips will begin very early next week. We have also made significant progress on other parts of the roading network. Before Christmas, access to Kaikōura via State Highway 1 to the south of Kaikōura was restored. The inland route is now open to unrestricted travel, and we have announced the opening of two temporary bridges on the alternative State Highway 7 route between Picton and Christchurch, which will improve safety and reduce travel times as State Highway 1 is repaired. The New Zealand Transport Agency is continuing to repair and maintain the alternative State highway route for vehicles travelling through the Springs Junction - Lewis Pass route while the reinstatement work on State Highway 1 progresses.

Stuart Smith: How has the Defence Force supported the rebuild and repair in response to the Kaikōura event?

Hon GERRY BROWNLEE: The New Zealand Defence Force mobilised 815 personnel, 11 aircraft, and four ships to support the disaster relief operation in Kaikōura. It did a superb job, right across the spectrum, of the initial response, from evacuation to welfare to physical works. It was, of course, assisted by their confrères in the Australian Defence Force, the US defence force, and the Canadian defence force. Right now the Defence Force has eight hydrographers operating out of Kaikōura, surveying the seafloor and mapping the shifts caused by the earthquake. The result of the hydrographic survey will be used by Land Information to update the nautical charts for the Kaikōura Peninsula. The actual depths are now significantly shallower in parts, and nautical charts no longer accurately allow safe navigation through the region, but that will soon be remedied.

Mental Health Services—Demand, Funding, and Quality

4. Hon ANNETTE KING (Deputy Leader—Labour) to the Minister of Health: Does he stand by his statement that the New Zealand mental health system is “high quality”?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN (Minister of Health): Yes, but we have to continue progress in increasing access to services. It is clear that demand is rising, and this is in line with international trends. Responding to this and staying ahead is a key priority for the Government, and that is why we have increased total mental health spending by $300 million and why we are seeing and treating 28,000, or 20 percent more, people per year than 5 years ago. The main reason I am confident that our services are of high quality is that 9,500 doctors, nurses, allied health, and other support workers are delivering mental health services in our district health boards (DHBs) and NGOs. They are doing a terrific and very difficult job.

Hon Annette King: Is it a high-quality system when a recent review of mental health services at Capital and Coast, Wairarapa, and Hutt Valley DHBs highlighted “chilling missteps” with a “tragic failure of technology” leading to one of five murders in 15 months “involving acutely unwell mental health patients”?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: There was an independent review of mental health services in the region following that group of suicides, and what it concluded amongst its eight recommendations—the major one—was that we need to develop a single medical record for mental health clients. And the Director of Mental Health is accepting that recommendation and acting on it.

Hon Annette King: Is there high-quality resourcing for mental health patients when 19 staff in the community mental health service team at Capital and Coast District Health Board are trying to manage 400 to 500 mental health referrals a month in the Wellington region alone?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: When you are talking about resourcing at Capital and Coast, that has gone up considerably. It has gone up by 22 percent over the last 8 years, from $80 million per year to $98 million. It would be interesting to know the detail of what the member is alleging there, but what I can say is that there is more money going in and more people are being seen and they are being seen more quickly than ever. But there is no question that there is more to do.

Hon Annette King: To assist the Minister, I seek leave to table the review of the care and treatment provided to five people who attended the mental health services, health, addiction, and intellectual disability services, at Capital and Coast mental health where they raised the issue—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! We do not need the qualification—[Interruption] Is the report freely available on the internet?

Hon Annette King: Well, if people can find it, yes, it is. But it is a review report. The Minister has not seen it.

Mr SPEAKER: Order! No. If it is freely available, and the member is acknowledging it is, then members can source it themselves if they want it.

Hon Annette King: If mental health resourcing is adequate why have mental health staff written an open letter to him, pleading for help to fix “a broken system that is in crisis”, and will he now concede that mental health is underfunded and needs an urgent review?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: Well, of course, the member is referring to those strong supporters of the National Government, the New Zealand Public Service Association, which wrote that open letter. What they do know is that mental health funding has gone up from $1.1 billion per year to $1.4 billion per year—a rise of $300 million. But on top of that we are actually treating—

Hon Annette King: Praise the staff and then criticise them.

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: —listen to this—an extra 28,000 people per year, a 20 percent uplift in the number of patients. So we are doing more, we are putting more in, but of course there is always more to do and we will continue to do that.

Hon Annette King: If the Government is providing enough resources for a high-quality system, why was National MP Nicky Wagner forced to apologise for the state of mental health facilities at Princess Margaret Hospital and the people of Canterbury told: “We either continue to use the substandard facilities … or we stop delivering the services.”?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: Well, of course, as the member will be aware, there is a $1 billion capital investment programme going into health services in Canterbury. On top of that the operational funding has increased by 25 percent over 8 years, and we are determined that we are going to continue to provide very high-quality services in mental health in Canterbury. That is why we had that $20 million package last year, and that is why, of course, we are partnering with Christchurch City Council. And we will be down there on Friday announcing that $1 million contribution from the Government to partner with Christchurch City Council to continue to provide the services that are needed. The problem, though, for the Labour Opposition members is that they think the measure of success is just purely about the dollars. They should focus on the results. They might do a bit better.

Hon Annette King: All you’ve talked about is money.

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: That is your problem.

Climate Change Policy—Advice and Government Position

5. JAMES SHAW (Co-Leader—Green) to the Minister for Climate Change Issues: Does she stand by the opinion piece she wrote on 11 October titled “We’re on the right track on tackling climate change”?

Hon PAULA BENNETT (Minister for Climate Change Issues): Yes, I stand by it, because this Government has ratified the Paris Agreement, strengthened the emissions trading scheme (ETS) and will strengthen it more as we are in stage two of the review, is investing $20 million a year in agricultural greenhouse gas research, and is spending a record $1.2 billion on public transport.

James Shaw: How much have New Zealand’s greenhouse gas emissions come down since her Government came into office?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: Because our population and our economy have gone up, so have emissions in real terms.

James Shaw: Given that officials told her in May that “Under our current policy settings we are not on track to reduce emissions.”, what updated advice has she received from officials between May and October suggesting that her Government is now on track?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: Many, actually, from officials, that we are now on the right track, and that is because we have begun phasing down the two-for-one transitional measure in the ETS. Transport—we have a target of doubling the number of electric vehicles, and we are investing a record $1.2 billion in public transport and more than $300 million on urban cycleways. Agriculture has invested $65 million in the Global Research Alliance on agriculture. In energy, more than 80 percent of electricity is renewable, and we are setting targets and are on track for that to keep increasing. As the member knows, we have also got a number of working groups that are working across forestry adaptation and others, which means that we are on track to get that right.

James Shaw: Is she prepared to table the advice from officials that reverses their advice last May and suggests that New Zealand now is on track?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: Well, I think what the member is still getting mixed up is that the report that we had last year was quite clear that if nothing changed, we would not reach our target—yeah? So then what we have been doing every week—not just at that time but previous to it, as well—is working towards changing so that we can actually reach and actually start bending our emissions and seeing them going down. So I have not got the report—because I actually get them on almost a weekly basis—on the ongoing work programme of this Government, which is working towards our achieving that goal.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. The questioner asked whether she was prepared to table those reports, and she still has not answered it.

Mr SPEAKER: No, no, I do not think—well, I did not actually hear the Minister respond to that part. The question was: amongst other things, is she prepared to table such reports. I heard her comment that there are a lot of reports received. If we could have that information, it would be helpful.

Hon PAULA BENNETT: No.

James Shaw: So why should New Zealanders believe that we are on track, if the last publicly available official advice that we have been able to see said that we are not on track and we are going to miss our target by 85 percent?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: Well, because of the work that I have already outlined today in the answers to some of my previous questions, and also the fact that we have working groups on agricultural emissions, forestry adaptation, as well as, I think, some of the work that we might see coming out from Vivid Economics. I have not seen it, but we are all pretty hopeful that that has something as well that will give it—[Interruption] Well, it is not my work, so it is not my job to have seen that work. But, as you can see, there is a whole lot of work that is going on, and we are working towards that.

James Shaw: So has she received an assurance at all from any officials that all of these plans and work programmes and working groups and so on will actually reverse 8 years of rising climate pollution and put New Zealand on track to meet its 2030 climate target?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: I think it is right to be really clear that the economy is growing faster than emissions in New Zealand, and, in fact, we are actually becoming more carbon-efficient here. But, yes, I believe that if all of those things come together, then we will see our emissions reduced.

Earthquake, Kaikōura—Health Services

6. Dr SHANE RETI (National—Whangarei) to the Minister of Health: What health support and assistance has the Government made available for those affected by last year’s Kaikōura earthquake?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN (Minister of Health): The Government is committed to ensuring that the people of Kaikōura and Marlborough receive the support that they need. On 9 December last year I announced a $3.76 million support package, following the November earthquakes. Just over 3,500 residents in Kaikōura and Hurunui have so far accessed the free general practice visits made available after the quake. Four hundred people in other communities, including Marlborough, Ward, Seddon, and Kekerengu, have received free GP visits, many of which have been accessed through 19 outreach clinics that have been held throughout the region.

Dr Shane Reti: What additional mental health services have been provided following the earthquake, and what has been the uptake of these programmes?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: We know from the Canterbury earthquakes that people can feel stressed and anxious for a long time after the event. That is why the $3.76 million package that was announced provides for a range of extra mental health clinical staff. So far, Canterbury District Health Board specialist mental health teams have made just over 300 appointments, including visits with children and families, and the Nelson Marlborough District Health Board has delivered over 145 free mental health care packages, which include extended GP visits and counselling sessions. Finally, work continues on expanding the successful All Right? campaign, which was developed in response to the Canterbury earthquakes, into the Marlborough region.

Housing, Auckland—Affordability, Supply, and State Housing Stock

7. PHIL TWYFORD (Labour—Te Atatū) to the Minister for Building and Construction: My question is for the Minister of housing. Does he agree with his Auckland Housing Accord that there was a shortfall of 20,000 to 30,000 houses in Auckland in 2013; if so, how much is it getting worse by each year?

Mr SPEAKER: This question is to the Minister for Building and Construction.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH (Minister for Building and Construction): The Auckland Housing Accord was about jump-starting new-home construction, which had languished at about 4,000 homes per year for 5 years, and it projected long term that Auckland needed about 13,000 additional homes per year. No one claimed that this more than trebling would occur overnight. We have achieved the accord targets and the longest and strongest growth in residential construction in Auckland’s history. I am sceptical of shortfall estimates; officials have advised me that, depending on what assumptions are made, they may vary by as much as 50,000 homes. For instance, whether you assume an average of 2.8 or 2.9 people per house actually makes a difference of 20,000 in the number of homes. The most reliable indicator of supply and demand being in balance is stable prices. I am encouraged by the fact that over the last 6 months in Auckland, house prices have actually dropped by 2.4 percent.

Phil Twyford: Is it not strange, in a Government that professes to be interested in evidence-based policy making, that the Minister whose job it is to increase the supply of affordable housing does not even want to know how much the shortage of houses is after 8 years in Government and 4 years as the housing Minister?

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: The best indicator of the degree of supply and demand is prices. In the Christchurch market, it is very clear that we have supply and demand in balance, and that is reflected in prices. The progress that we have made in Auckland, where we have increased the number of homes being constructed from the 4,000 a year that Labour left us with to now over 10,000 a year, shows the progress the Government is making.

Phil Twyford: Why is it that if the best indicator of the scale of shortage is the price of housing, Auckland has housing that is now ranked as the fourth most unaffordable in the world and has a median multiple of 10:1; is that not a sign of the total and utter failure of his housing policy?

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: No. The difference is that house prices doubled under the previous Labour Government, and it did nothing. This Government has a wide reform programme that is seeing the rate of house build grow from 13,000 per year to over 30,000 per year. In fact, last year residential investment in Auckland grew by 27 percent in one year. This is the longest and strongest period of residential housebuilding growth in Auckland, and we are going to need more of it, given the success of the country and the strong migration that is occurring because Kiwis want to stay here.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Can the Minister, who has quoted consent numbers in this House for years, tell the taxpayers of Northland and provincial New Zealand why they are having to pay for the hash made of Auckland’s housing, when in the 5 years to 31 October 2016, 13,676 fewer dwellings were built in Auckland than were consented to?

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: The member’s figures are garbage. If you compare the number of consents that were issued between the last two censuses and the census data on the number of new houses that are completed, they are within 1 percent. The only way that member’s figures would be correct is if he were to argue that census data cannot be relied upon.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: I seek leave to table documents obtained from the Auckland Council under the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act, relating to code compliance certificates issued for completed residential dwellings in 2016 to 31 October, which are dated 27 January 2017. That is my evidence.

Mr SPEAKER: Order! It does not need any more—

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker.

Mr SPEAKER: I will allow the Minister to comment before I put the leave.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: Oh, no, put the leave. I am sorry.

Mr SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table that particular information from the Auckland Council. Is there any objection? There is none.

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

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: I seek leave of the House to table the analysis by the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) that compares consent numbers with census numbers on the number of homes, which shows that those two figures are within 1 percent of each other over the last 25 years. [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! Can I just check with the Minister—is that information freely available to members?

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: No, it is a specific report.

Mr SPEAKER: On that basis, the House can decide. Leave is sought to table that particular report from MBIE. Is there any objection to it being tabled? There is none. It can be tabled.

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

Phil Twyford: Can he confirm that the Government has no actual plan to build 69,000 additional homes in Auckland and that, in fact, all Bill English is saying is that it is possible to replace 27,000 State houses, but there is no commitment that any of the new homes that are built will be affordable?

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: The point that the Prime Minister made yesterday was absolutely accurate, and it was this: yesterday the High Court confirmed the Government’s position on the Auckland Unitary Plan. Under the existing planning rules, Housing New Zealand could only increase its stock on its landholdings from 27,000 homes to 30,000 homes. With the new unitary plan, that can be expanded to 69,000 homes, reinforcing how important yesterday’s court decision was. I would be happy to take the member to Hobsonville, to Tāmaki, to Northcote, and to the record number of homes that have been built by the Government. Last year Government agencies built more homes than in 25 years.

Phil Twyford: When the Prime Minister promised yesterday to build 69,000 new homes on Crown land in Auckland over 10 years, did the Minister tell him that Housing New Zealand officials told a select committee last week that it would take up to 50 years to do that; who does he think is not telling the truth: the Prime Minister, the Minister, or—

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker.

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I will hear the point of order.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: The member cannot assert that the Prime Minister is not telling the truth.

Mr SPEAKER: The last part of the question was certainly unhelpful. I will review it later, but I do not think he actually did accuse the Prime Minister of not telling the truth. He asked whether the Prime Minister, in saying yesterday that 69,000 houses can be built in 10 years, was correct or not.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: I would be happy to table the transcript of exactly what the Prime Minister said. He made reference to the High Court decision yesterday that reaffirmed the unitary plan changes that provided the potential for Housing New Zealand to expand its existing housing stock from 27,000 to 69,000. I would also point out to the member, if he has not noticed, that the Auckland Unitary Plan is a plan over 30 years. Last year the Government built more houses than any other year, including the 9 years when house prices doubled during the last Labour Government.

Earthquakes, Recovery—Earthquake Relief Fund and 0800 FARMING Line

8. MATT DOOCEY (National—Waimakariri) to the Minister for Primary Industries: What recent announcements has he made about Government support to help with recovery on earthquake-affected farms?

Hon NATHAN GUY (Minister for Primary Industries): Recently I announced that farmers and growers who need an extra hand on their farms as a result of November’s earthquake and aftershocks in the South Island can call 0800 FARMING and have their needs matched with skilled workers and volunteers. Many farmers have suffered damage to key infrastructure such as fences and water reticulation systems and require experienced labour to get them back up and running. The 0800 FARMING line has compiled a comprehensive database of both farmer needs and offers of help. All skilled workers deployed will be appropriately remunerated, and volunteers can have some costs reimbursed.

Matt Doocey: What other announcements has he made regarding initiatives for the earthquake-affected primary sector?

Hon NATHAN GUY: Good question. The $4 million Earthquake Relief Fund for uninsurable infrastructure repairs is progressing well. However, a number of locals have told me they need more time to gather the important information. Therefore, we have extended the deadline for this fund until 31 March this year to make sure that everyone is eligible for this and has the opportunity to apply. Other recent announcements, such as the one by Minister Nick Smith to relocate surplus temporary housing from Christchurch to affected farmers, have been warmly received.

Government Procurement Policy—New Zealand Businesses

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

Rt Hon BILL ENGLISH (Prime Minister): Yes.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: When talking about New Zealand businesses last December, does he stand by this statement, and I quote him: “I believe that by supporting businesses, the Government can do a better job of changing lives.”; if so, why does Government approve a New Zealand taxpayer-funded, cross-agency travel contract with Australia’s Jetstar, instead of our national carrier, Air New Zealand?

Rt Hon BILL ENGLISH: You would need to talk to either the officials or the Minister who is overseeing the procurement process. The Government runs a process that gets the best value for the hard-pushed taxpayers of New Zealand, many of whom I know are worried about that member’s extravagant promises about what he would do with their money.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: If he does believe in local business, as he claimed, then why would he allow a cross-agency contract with Australia’s owned and operated Jetstar, which has a horrible track record of flight cancellations and delays, such as leaving passengers stranded at Dunedin Airport for 13 hours just yesterday?

Rt Hon BILL ENGLISH: I understand that they are there along with a number of airlines. If they provide the service that the Government users find acceptable, they will do better; and if they do not, they will not.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: What will the New Zealand taxpayers get when Jetstar does not fly the routes Air New Zealand does, does not register or maintain its aircraft in New Zealand, and provides such an erratic service that neither he nor the Hon Steven Joyce flew with Jetstar for the 20-month period January 2015 to the last recorded time, August 2016—never flew the airline once?

Rt Hon BILL ENGLISH: Clearly, the member is spending a lot of time in the Koru lounge—a lot more than in his electorate. I mean, it—

Rt Hon Winston Peters: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. Again, there comes the Prime Minister with a simple line, belying the fact that he is not known as the “double dipper from Dipton”—he does not live there, for 20 years.

Mr SPEAKER: Order! [Interruption] Order! The member will resume his seat. If he wants to—[Interruption] Order! Now, does the Prime Minister wish to continue his answer, or is he—

Rt Hon BILL ENGLISH: I invite that member to go to one of his meetings where he talks about supporting the regions of New Zealand, and tell the regions where Jetstar flies to that he does not want it to be doing that, and just see how the locals react to that.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: I seek leave to table a summary of ministerial and under-secretary flights by month and by airline between 1 January 2015 and 31 August 2016.

Mr SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table that particular summary. Is there any objection to it being tabled? [Interruption] Order! Is there any objection? There is no objection.

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

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Why is it, with the Australian-owned banks, Australian retail chains, Australian ownership of our media, and now this Jetstar deal, that trans-Tasman integration seems so one-sided under the National Government, and when will he finally start to put New Zealand first?

Rt Hon BILL ENGLISH: I think in the previous question the member was accusing myself and Mr Joyce of being too patriotic by supporting only the New Zealand airlines, so I am now a bit confused. But I do not think there is much doubt that there are Australian businesses that many New Zealanders use. Whether it is furniture stores or banks, they must provide a reasonable service. We are not going to stop New Zealand households using services that they think meet their needs.

Police, Rural—Numbers, Safer Communities, and Police Stations

10. STUART NASH (Labour—Napier) to the Minister of Police: Does she stand by all her statements?

Hon PAULA BENNETT (Minister of Police): Yes. In particular, I stand by my statement regarding this Government’s $503 million Safer Communities package that by focusing on specific areas we will deliver a more responsive police service, prevent crime and victimisation, resolve more crimes, and more effectively target criminal gangs and organised crime.

Stuart Nash: Why do only 15 percent—or 140 of the new police officers promised—end up in the eight provincial districts that cover 95 percent of the country?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: The member misinterprets. Of the 500 that are going to be front line, they will also be dispersed throughout New Zealand; then there is another 140 on top of that who will be particularly for rural districts. But, of the 500 officers, a percentage of them will also be spread throughout New Zealand.

Stuart Nash: I seek leave to table an op-ed from the Hawke’s Bay Today, which is not widely read—it probably is widely read, but not widely available. It states—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! It is freely available on the internet if members want to bother looking at it.

Kanwaljit Singh Bakshi: How will the Government’s Safer Communities package help communities like Oxford?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: As I said in my column in the Hawke’s Bay Today—which I think will be widely read—the Commissioner of Police has identified the Eastern Police District, which includes Hawke’s Bay, as a priority area for new police. The Safer Communities package specifically targets the types of crime that are of concern to Hawke’s Bay residents, like burglaries and methamphetamine. It comes with challenging targets so we can actually get results.

Stuart Nash: What does she say to former police officer Chester Borrows, who said in December that rural staffing levels were dropping and police “have a bigger area to cover with less numbers”, and does this not just show that her announcement is playing catch-up with years of understaffing and staffing cuts?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: Chester Borrows is one member who has been incredibly supportive of this $503 million package of more than 1,100 police staff coming on board, and particularly of the rural officers, which, as the member quite rightly identifies, will see, of course, an increase of stations that will now be 24/7—so going from just business hours to a 24/7 police capability right throughout those districts. One of the targets is that 95 percent of New Zealanders will live within 25 kilometres of a police presence. These are all great things and ones that are well and truly celebrated by my colleague Chester Borrows.

Stuart Nash: Does she think a phone number, which will be directed to an area outside of a caller’s city or town, will make up for the fact that over 300 police stations are not open to the public?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: As I said to the member, what we will see is an increase of between 15 and 20 police stations that will go from our current business hours to a 24/7 police presence. The member actually quite rightly says that there are 300 different numbers at the moment, and that it is confusing for the public. They do not know when to ring 111. They do not know when to get hold of their local police station. Actually, you are really barking up the wrong tree on this one. The non-emergency number has been really welcomed by the public, who are really looking forward to it.

Stuart Nash: When will she do the police force and provincial New Zealand a favour and hand back the police portfolio to the former Minister Judith Collins, who actually knew what she was doing by requesting significantly more officers for provincial New Zealand?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: Unlike the member, there are 20 Ministers inside Cabinet who all celebrate this announcement and what it will mean for New Zealand—more than 59 members of Parliament for National who are all part of this, all believe in it, and are backing New Zealanders and the police, unlike the member.

Construction Activity—Residential Building Activity

11. Dr PARMJEET PARMAR (National) to the Minister for Building and Construction: Can he confirm reports that the $19 billion of construction work consented to in 2016 is the highest ever?

Hon Dr NICK SMITH (Minister for Building and Construction): Yes. It is more than double the level 5 years ago, and in real inflation terms it is more than 30 percent higher than the last building boom. Two-thirds of the $19 billion is residential, and it has grown in the last year by 19 percent nationally and 27 percent in Auckland.

Phil Twyford: But it’s half what it was in 1974.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: This is practically about—no, I just remind the member that this building boom is 30 percent stronger than the boom back in 2004 in inflation-adjusted terms. This is about as fast as you can grow a complex sector like construction. [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! [Interruption] Order!

Dr Parmjeet Parmar: What growth has there been in the number of homes built on Government land in the last year, and how does this compare historically?

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: Last year the Government built more homes than any Government in 25 years. A thousand homes were completed by Housing New Zealand through the Crown Land Development Programme and initiatives like we have at Tāmaki and Hobsonville. Agencies have a further 10,000 homes on Government land in the pipeline over the next 4 years.

Dr Parmjeet Parmar: What new announcements has the Government made to enable continued growth in housing supply?

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: Today the Government has released a discussion document on new legislation to enable urban development authorities (UDAs), in line with the recommendations from the Productivity Commission. UDAs would enable us to progress major redevelopments like Tāmaki and Hobsonville 3 to 5 years more quickly. We can see in cities like London, Sydney, Melbourne, Toronto, and Singapore how UDAs can deliver scale housing developments, stronger urban economies, and approved amenity, and that is why we are adding this to our tool box of housing supply measures. [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Question—[Interruption] Order! Mr Twyford.

Family/Whānau Violence—Domestic Violence Leave

12. JAN LOGIE (Green) to the Minister of Justice: Does she agree with the previous Prime Minister, who said about family violence, “It’s easy to think this is someone else’s problem. But it is not someone else’s problem if you are a New Zealander who cares”?

Hon AMY ADAMS (Minister of Justice): Yes, I do, absolutely, and that is why I have made family violence a core priority for me as justice Minister, and that is why, together with Minister Tolley, we have put together the ministerial work programme on family and sexual violence, involving Ministers from 16 portfolios working together in an unprecedented way to put victims and their safety at the heart of Government.

Jan Logie: Has the Minister seen any reports supporting workplace protections, such as domestic violence leave, as a pathway to safety for victims of domestic violence, which could save or change lives?

Hon AMY ADAMS: What I can tell the member is that I undertook, and the ministry undertook, an extensive consultation with the sector about what reforms were needed to improve the family violence situation. We received more than 500 submissions from across the sector and organisations and representative groups. Only six of those mentioned increased workplace protections, three of which were from the Green Party and the unions. And so the conclusion we reached was that it was not the most pressing issue that the sector was talking to us about as part of that consultation.

Jan Logie: What evidence has she seen to support her colleague’s view that domestic violence leave would cost more than the $368 million a year that it is currently costing New Zealand businesses?

Hon AMY ADAMS: The member is referring to information that I assume my colleague the Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety may have on his desk. It is certainly not something that I have seen, and she would need to direct that question to him.

Jan Logie: Does the Minister know how many workers currently have access to domestic violence leave, and how long it will take for all New Zealanders to get this support; if not, how can the Government suggest that businesses have already got this covered?

Hon AMY ADAMS: Once more, I would remind the member that questions relating to workplace health and safety relations really need to be directed to my colleague the Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety. But what I would say is that as a Government we are very aware of a number of organisations in the public and private sectors that are absolutely stepping up and looking at what they can do to support their staff members who are in need, and absolutely this is a Government that for the first time has shown real tangible commitment, real tangible action, towards reducing the impact and the cost of family violence.

Jan Logie: Why does the Government not support discussion of my member’s bill at the select committee, when community leaders such as Women’s Refuge, the National Council of Women, the Māori Women’s Welfare League, the Human Rights Commission, the trade unions, the Auckland chamber of commerce, Business New Zealand, and even the ACT Party all believe it is an important conversation?

Hon AMY ADAMS: Once more, issues of workplace laws are better directed to that Minister, but what I will say to the member is that the advice that I have seen suggests that the member’s bill would actually provide less flexibility for domestic violence victims than the amendments that this Government put in place in 2014. Unlike the member, I do not want to see the situation get worse for victims.

Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement

Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement

Debate resumed from 9 February.

Hon AMY ADAMS (Minister of Justice): What an absolute pleasure it is to rise and speak in support of the Prime Minister’s motion. It is great to be back in Parliament for 2017. Can I just say what a contrast we have seen at the start of the year between the Government and the Opposition. I do not think I have seen such a contrasting start to a year in all my time in this place. I think that since the start of this year, you could actually say it has been the political equivalent of A Tale of Two Cities: on this side, it has been the best of times; over there, it has been the worst of times. It has been the winter of foolishness and incredulity that Charles Dickens warned us about. In contrast, under Prime Minister Bill English, in the National-led Government we have as much energy and as much determination in year nine as we had in the first year.

We are proud of the record of this Government. We are incredibly proud of the work that we have done to date. But, even more than that, we have got more to do. The last month alone has shown the absolute energy and work programme that this Government is still delivering. In the meantime, Labour has been divided. Its members have been down at mouth, they have had no policy, and they have had nothing to say about New Zealand and New Zealanders. All they have talked about is themselves, their internal dramas, and their power plays. We have had their own leader making calls so bad that his members are denouncing them. His members are denouncing them and his caucus is denouncing them. All they can talk about is what is going on inside that rickety old tent of the Labour Party.

By contrast, we are not rolling out tired old retreads from the hard left of politics who split the party. We in the National Government, under Bill English, are unified and we are hard at work, and we are relentless in our desire to back New Zealanders to succeed. Just look at the last month. The last month alone—we are only in mid-February. In the last month we have announced more than 1,100 more police staff, thanks to police Minister Paula Bennett. That is a 10 percent increase in our police numbers.

We have announced that 400,000 more New Zealanders are going to get ultra-fast broadband (UFB), and I commend my colleague Simon Bridges. It is taking UFB—gold-standard connectivity—to 85 percent of the population. That will transform regional New Zealand.

We have announced just recently—and I was very pleased to announce it—a pathway to allow historical homosexual convictions to be expunged from the records of men who were convicted before 1986. I am very proud of that. It is this Government looking to put things right, and I am very proud to be able to announce it.

My colleague Judith Collins has announced a review into petrol price margins. We are going to make sure that New Zealanders are not paying more for their petrol than they should be.

Today, as you heard in question time from Gerry Brownlee, from Jonathan Coleman, and from others, on the day that is the 3 month anniversary of the Kaikōura earthquakes, we are continuing to stand by the people of Kaikōura. We will continue to stand by them, as we did for the people of Canterbury, for some time. While I am on that topic, can I just, for one moment, acknowledge those in my own electorate who have been evacuated from their homes due to the big fires on the Port Hills and wish them all the very best.

I want to come back to those announcements made in the last month, because they really are significant. Let me start with one that is close to my heart, the UFB programme. I do not think many New Zealanders realise just how incredibly advanced this makes New Zealand. This sort of connectivity is the gold standard worldwide, and this will make New Zealand the fourth-best-connected country in the world—the fourth-best—behind Japan, Singapore, and Korea. With a country of 4.5 million people on a large geographical area, that is quite extraordinary.

When you talk to people in Australia, in Canada, in the UK, and in America, they are not even aiming for broadband anything like this. Frankly, what we are rolling out is the envy of most of our colleagues around the Western World, and this is the Government that saw the benefit of it. This is the Government that put $2 billion into these programmes. We are going to make sure regional and rural New Zealand are able to partake of the digital economy. I am excited about it and New Zealand is excited about it. It is a National-led Government that delivered it, while Labour voted against it.

Let us come back to that law and order package. Minister Bennett talked about it in question time. This Safer Communities package is fundamental to making sure that Kiwis continue to be safe on our streets. It is about reducing our criminal gangs, it is about addressing the increase we are seeing in some communities around meth consumption, it is about targeting child abuse, it is about responding better to burglaries, and it is about ensuring we have got the police force to support the family violence work that Minister Tolley and I are leading, which I talked about earlier.

I agree with Minister Bennett: I think the non-emergency number is huge. I think the non-emergency number is something that Kiwis get and like. They want to know “Who do I call? It’s not an emergency, but I need someone and I don’t know who to call.” It is us showing that we understand what Kiwis need. As a rural MP, I have got to say that taking 95 percent of us to be living within 25 kilometres of a 24/7 manned station is massive. It is massive. Almost all of our communities will know there is help at hand, close by. I am looking forward to seeing, as we all are, which of those 15 to 20 stations are going to go 24/7. We know they will be spread right across the country. It is truly this Government standing up for every single New Zealander, from Kaitāia to Bluff.

Can I just point out that the Safer Communities package also includes, of course, quite significant top-ups for our rehabilitation programmes, our legal aid service, and the court system, to make sure that the whole system can cope with that work programme. I want to congratulate the Minister and the Prime Minister on that announcement because it is absolutely significant.

I want to talk a little bit about the role that I am absolutely delighted the Prime Minister has created and given to me, which is around social investment. Actually, this is at the heart of what we are doing as a Government in the social sector. It is about recognising that if we can get in earlier, respond better, and spend our money more wisely, we can create much better lives for the people in need and we can create a much smaller bill for the New Zealanders who pay their taxes and who go to work every week to pay their taxes.

It is early days, but we are already seeing outcomes from this piece of work that absolutely prove the theory. Already we have seen 50,000 fewer children living in benefit-dependent households since 2011—50,000 fewer. We have seen $12 billion, Minister Tolley, come off welfare liability, thanks to our making sure—it is pretty simple. We know our customers, we target our services, and we understand the impact of what we are doing. This is a piece of work that is going to see, right across Government and right through the social sector, our business-as-usual approach becoming more targeted and more effective. As I said, it will create better lives for those most vulnerable in society, and I am very excited to be a part of it.

I also want to talk a little bit about social housing, because I think there is a lot that New Zealand does not know about social housing. I want to tell New Zealand, for a kick-off, that we are spending $2.1 billion every single year helping Kiwis afford the cost of their housing. That is a remarkable commitment, but, actually, that is not the whole of it. Did you know that last year we committed $350 million to emergency housing? Let me ask members of this House whether they know how much was permanently appropriated for emergency housing under Labour.

Hon Members: How much?

Hon AMY ADAMS: Zero—zero. Not a single dollar—not one single dollar. Last year we committed $354 million to make sure that for every Kiwi, if they are in need of a roof over their heads, we can get them into something while we find a longer-term solution. This is a Government that actually acts for the vulnerable in our society. It acts to look after our vulnerable children, it acts to improve our education system, it acts to reduce youth crime, and it acts to help people in need of housing with social housing assistance.

We are going to be putting another 6,500 social housing places into the long-term programme over the next 4 years. As the Prime Minister said, it is not just about Housing New Zealand—we want to work with everyone in the community sector who can provide targeted and effective places that will support our vulnerable to get their lives back on track. It is not just about their housing—it might be about a range of issues, and the initiatives we are announcing are about that.

In the meantime, the economy continues to soar. This is a country that is the envy of most of the Western World. We have got jobs growing, we have got unemployment falling, and we have got $2 billion less of ACC levies—$2 billion we have put back into the pockets of New Zealanders. That is why this is a Government that is fired up and ready to go. It started this year at a gallop and it is not slowing down.

CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka): Listening to that contribution I thought: “Perhaps there’s hope for Jonathan Coleman, after all.” Perhaps there is hope after all, and perhaps he should not give up on his leadership ambitions, as the longest-running audition in New Zealand politics continues to find a successor to John Key. Amy Adams barely gets a pass mark for that contribution, because if all that she can do is to boast about the fact that National is now spending $350 million a year on emergency housing—if that is her big boast of the signature achievement of this National Government—I do not think she is in with much of a chance. I do not think that is something it should be boasting about; I think that is something it should be ashamed of. Previously, we did not need $350 million for emergency housing, because there were enough houses for the New Zealanders who needed them. I think that the fact that it is now boasting about that says everything about how it has gone completely off-track.

The overwhelming message from the National Government during this debate has been: “This is as good as it gets.” The Government that used to be ambitious for New Zealand is now telling New Zealanders that they should take what they are given, and be grateful for it. It has given up on the hope of building a better future—a brighter future—for all New Zealanders.

I looked to Bill English’s speech for a suggestion that the Government had a plan for New Zealand’s place in the new global order that we seem to now be experiencing. The world is changing dramatically around us. The neoliberal consensus that has dominated the world economy over the last 20 or 30 years is crumbling, and that crumbling is being driven as much by the right as it is by the left. I was looking for some direction from Bill English, for some leadership from Bill English, and for where he sees New Zealand fitting into this grand new world order, and there was absolutely nothing. Even the International Monetary Fund has been critical of the trickle-down economic theory that has dominated for the last 20 or 30 years, pointing out that the value has not trickled down and that it has been captured by those at the top.

Was there a word from Bill English on how we ensure that prosperity is shared? No, there was not. There was nothing in his contribution. Instead, we simply see a Government looking in the rear-view mirror to the failed ideas of the past: more privatisation, more shrinking of the State, more market, and more blind faith in monetary economics. We do not see a positive vision for the future; they are simply looking backwards. Of course, the economic orthodoxy that Bill English is so fond of and relies on is failing around the world because voters increasingly recognise that, in the current economy, effort and contribution have been decoupled from reward. There are people out there who are working hard, trying to get ahead for their families, but they are not—and it is not through lack of effort and it is not through lack of contribution; it is because the economic game has been rigged against them.

The sea change in attitudes around the world that has seen the UK voting to leave the European Union, that saw Donald Trump get elected in the United States, that has seen the very alarming rise of the far right throughout Europe—we are not immune from the trends, the underlying trends that have contributed to that. So look offshore. Those who voted to leave—the contrasts were quite stark. Those who voted to leave the European Union or voted for Donald Trump were more likely to live in provincial areas while those who voted to remain in the European Union or voted for Hillary Clinton were more likely to be in the cities—the towns and the provincial areas expressing their disquiet with the current establishment. Those splits also existed between those who have wealth and those who do not, those who are educated and those who are not, and those who are young and those who are old.

Those tensions exist in New Zealand as well, and we should not be ignoring the fact that there is a groundswell of concern amongst a lot of New Zealanders that the current economic system is not working for them. Where was the direction from Bill English about that? There was nothing in his contribution. He was simply saying this is as good as it gets, and get used to what you have got because there are no alternatives. Well, there are alternatives, and I think Bill English should be opening his eyes and his ears to those.

I wanted to hear from Bill English about how the National Government is going to tackle the hollowing-out of the regions throughout New Zealand, because make no question about the fact that we have seen—take education, for example. We have seen a decline in tertiary education provision. We have seen a decline in manufacturing employment in the regions. There are now people leaving regional New Zealand in search of employment because they cannot find it in those areas. We are seeing a growing gulf between the shareholding society and the working society: the people who own the capital are doing pretty damn well while the people who are working to generate the productivity are not doing so well.

There was nothing from Bill English in his contribution about how we can deal with that. Nothing in his contribution about the breakdown of the intergenerational compact that has been part of the New Zealand way of life. The current generation of young New Zealanders leaving school and going on to further study will leave that study with more debt than any other generation before and they will be shut out of the housing market more than any other generation before. We have seen this breakdown of the inter-generational promise, and Bill English is completely silent on that. He had nothing to say about that at all.

The housing crisis cannot be understated: one in seven Auckland houses is now being sold to major property speculators rather than to first-home buyers or even homebuyers; 78 percent of renters cannot afford a deposit for the average New Zealand home—78 percent. That is nearly 80 percent who are locked out of the ability to buy a house altogether, and their rent is continuing to increase more than their wages are increasing. What is the National Government doing? Well, it is selling more State houses. It is not building more houses. How will selling State houses and spending $350 million—as Amy Adams boasted—on emergency housing help that situation? It will not.

We need a new plan. This Government needs a new plan. The Labour Party can offer it a new plan and it is built on three pillars: opportunity, security, and fairness. A big part of the Kiwi Dream, of the Kiwi promise, has been that of opportunity: the promise of opportunity, the opportunity to be educated and to get ahead, the opportunity to find secure, well-paid work, and the opportunity to own your own home. These are opportunities that should be available to all New Zealanders but yet they are not. Let us face some facts about that. Someone who has educated parents is more likely to succeed in the education system themselves. Someone whose parents own their own home is more likely to be able to own their own home themselves. Conversely, somebody whose parents have been on a benefit is more likely to end up on a benefit, and somebody whose parents have been engaged in the criminal justice system is more likely to find themselves engaged with the criminal justice system.

Our economic and societal structure is not providing a level playing field. It is locking in inequality and disadvantage rather than helping to tackle it. We can do something about that by making sure that opportunity is shared equally, and we start with that with education: 3 years of free post-school education, making sure that the opportunities kids get at school are not dictated by the ability of their parents to pay—and yet increasingly that is happening. The same happens in early childhood education. The quality of early childhood education that kids can get is increasingly being dictated by the ability of their parents to pay. That is not the Kiwi promise. That is why we have had, since the 1930s and 1940s, this idea in New Zealand that there should be universal provision of entitlement—of entitlement to education, to healthcare, and to a secure retirement. These are values that we need to rekindle and rediscover if we are going to make sure that economic prosperity and the benefits of economic growth are shared with all New Zealanders and not just those who are already doing well, as is happening at the moment.

So there is so much more that we need to do: 3 years’ free post-school education, increasing school funding so they are not reliant on parental donations, building houses. This is something that the Government should fundamentally be involved with so that we can ensure that the dream of homeownership or even of secure accommodation—ensuring that rental accommodation for those who cannot afford homeownership is available to all New Zealanders, because today, as of right now, it is not. These are things that New Zealanders might have looked to Bill English to address in the Prime Minister’s statement and yet they would find all of those things missing. This was a time for Bill English to stamp his mark of leadership on the Government, but his mark of leadership simply says that New Zealanders should be grateful for what they have got because this is as good as it gets.

I do not think this is as good as it gets. I think New Zealand is a fantastic country. It is full of opportunity, but those opportunities are not reaching all New Zealanders, and that must be our mission. That will certainly be the mission of the next Labour Government: opportunity, security, and fairness for all New Zealanders, not just those who are currently doing well.

Hon HEKIA PARATA (Minister of Education): Tēnā koe e Te Mana Whakawā, tēnā tātou e whakawhāiti nei i roto i tō tātou Whare Pāremata i tēnei ahiahi.

[Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker, and acknowledgments to all of us gathered here in our House of Parliament this afternoon.]

Good afternoon. I am pleased to stand in support of the motion to support the Prime Minister’s statement. It has been only 8 short years that this Government, this National-led Government, has been on this side of the House, not only offering hope and aspiration and ambition to New Zealanders but delivering the environment and the conditions in which that can be realised. We have done that from an approach where we believe in New Zealanders and their capability to make choices for themselves, to take decisions to lead better and hopeful lives.

Unlike members on the other side of the House who consider themselves the third partner in every family—the increase of dependence on the Government, the happiness with which they embrace other people’s unhappiness and inability to get ahead—we most definitely are not that kind of Government. We continue to hold high aspirations for all New Zealanders, and we can stand here proudly, not boastfully but proudly, on the record that our Government has of our last 8 years. It is important to recognise that we have come a long way and that a strong economy gives us choices, and investing in that strong economy has been a hallmark of this Government under the previous Prime Minister, and under the previous Minister of Finance, who is now our Prime Minister—Bill English.

How many Prime Ministers and how many leaders can be so fit, so agile, and so gritty that they can shear a sheep and do it to beat Sir David Fagan, who is, of course, the 20-times gold medallist Olympian in one of the most difficult and most challenging sports and areas of work in the world? Of course, that is our Prime Minister, Bill English. If the House has not seen it, it is free to go on to my Facebook page, like it, and be able to watch that video. Under this Prime Minister, Bill English, a plan most definitely has been articulated to the House, and, for members of the Opposition who remain unclear or confused because they live on a planet of alternative facts, we have them produced in colourful pamphlets with pictures and photos to help those who are unable to understand facts even when they stare them in the face.

We have a record—we have growth in the economy of New Zealand, which is the envy of the world. It is still one that we aspire to improve, but it is a fact and it is that fact that gives us the choices that enable us to help New Zealanders make their lives better. We have had more jobs created in the past year—130,000 of them. We see the median income growing. We see our Government continuing to invest in those sectors that will help it to grow even more. We have been the Government that has made the biggest investment in infrastructure.

Again, may I invite members to visit my Facebook page and see on there the Hon Nathan Guy celebrating the fact that the Kapiti Expressway will open formally this week. The Kapiti Expressway is only one example of this Government’s investment in real infrastructure. Up and down the country, as I drive on newly built roads, I say: “Thank goodness for a Government that continues to give.” We just need a little bit more attention on State Highway 35, but I am not here to get parochial. I am here for the greater good of wider New Zealand.

Infrastructure has not been confined to roads. The previous speaker on this side, the Hon Amy Adams, talked about an area close to her heart—ultra-fast broadband (UFB). Ultra-fast broadband will allow for greater connectivity into the regions, the very regions that the previous speaker from the Opposition, Chris Hipkins, is out of touch about. He does not seem to understand that we have had growth in those regions. Growth is not confined to our metropolitan centres. Over in Taranaki, we see tourism, dairying, and the energy sector growing and growing. Down south we have got an outbreak of economic development occurring—

Hon Jacqui Dean: Otago.

Hon HEKIA PARATA: —all through Otago, as the member from Otago is chiming in. That is as much because we have invested in infrastructure. In schooling alone this Government has invested just on $700 million in information and communications technology to make sure that all 2,500 of our schools can be connected and can facilitate learning that enables them to engage in the global challenges that our kids are increasingly becoming a part of, and leaders in. So we have been involved in investing in infrastructure—not just talking about it but putting the hard-earned taxes of New Zealanders where our mouths have been. We understand that the arteries of a nation are its roads, its energy, transmission, and modern infrastructure such as information and communications technology.

I come from a little town well known beyond its actual size—Ruatōria. It is one of the towns that is on the list for UFB to come to first, as we move out into the provinces. That is going to make a difference for businesses, for the potential of employment there, for people to get jobs. The call centre that was recently opened there, and in Waverley, which the Prime Minister referred to, can currently employ 10 people because that is all the load that the line will take at the moment. The owners of that company have told me that with UFB the potential for greater employment is huge and untapped, and they are excited about it. These are real New Zealanders backing themselves.

I see my time is nearly up—I am going to speak even faster, because I want to talk about education. Under this Government, again, we have seen more kids participating in early childhood education. We set ourselves a target. We have been publicly accountable for it, and it is one of the problems of success. Almost 98 percent of all our earliest learners are participating in early childhood education, and that is a result of doubling, more than doubling, the funding into early childhood education.

Where do people get the argument that funding has been frozen? Only in the alternative “factosphere”, because we are now up at $1.8 billion. When we came into Government it was $800 million. In regular maths that is twice as much under this Government. In schooling it has increased 35 percent. Vote Education is the highest it has ever been, at over $11 billion. That is a 35 percent increase in education. How can that possibly be described as frozen funding?

And underfunding? At the same time student numbers have gone up by 3.56 percent. I am trusting that the Opposition can understand the difference between those two things. Funding has gone up 35 percent, student numbers have gone up 3.56 percent. How can that be underfunding, except for in the alternative reality of Andrew Little and them over there? In education, has that made a difference? The answer is yes. “Ae,” Māori tell you, “yes, it’s made a difference.” I posted—again, on this fabulous Facebook page. Clearly I am going to be swamped by people wanting to go there and see the latest report of our accountability as a Government. But, on there, we have seen overall achievement go up to over 77 percent for all New Zealanders, and the member for Mana will just be euphoric to know that Pacific Island success has gone up to 77.6 percent, from the parlous 51 percent that his Government was proud to leave to members on our benches in 2008.

So it is not just that the funding has gone up; we have seen real results for that. More kids are getting more opportunities to make more choices about the quality of life they and their families can have, because this Government has understood the critical cornerstone that education does play.

So the members on the other side can go on and on about alternative facts of underfunding, frozen funding, and undermining children’s futures, but anyone looking at the facts will know that that does not bear scrutiny. It does, then, lend doubt to the kinds of assertions and allegations that the Opposition seems intent on making.

This Government has a record of 8 years of achievement. It has a plan to go forward in 2017. It has fit, energetic, gritty, and determined people of high calibre and competence who are committed to a bright future for all New Zealanders. When we look at the leadership of the Rt Hon Bill English and the Hon Paula Bennett and the team that is alongside them and then contrast it with the people on that side—and some who have been selected and characterised as fresh faces are older than me, and I am leaving—we have got to ask ourselves: is that the kind of team, the contrast that we are interested in?

Hon Annette King: Oh, it’s about age, is it?

Hon HEKIA PARATA: I am really talking about the definition of freshness, as opposed to ageism.

I think that this Government has got a record to be proud of. It has got more to do and it is fit and purposeful in the interests of New Zealanders. Thank you.

Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: A 5-minute call on behalf of the Green Party—David Clendon.

DAVID CLENDON (Green): I am pleased to take a call in this debate on the Prime Minister’s statement, and in due course we look forward to supporting the amended motion put by the Leader of the Opposition. I am a member of the Law and Order Committee and I routinely sit, as well, on the Justice and Electoral Committee, so I was looking in the PM’s statement for issues pertaining to justice and law and order. I have to say that anybody looking for some new vision in his speech or anybody looking for some innovation or looking for some positive change would have been sorely disappointed, and, indeed, they would have been equally disappointed with the speeches we have heard from the Minister of Corrections and, just now, from the Minister of Justice, because, unfortunately, there is not a hint that this Government understands how to deliver justice or how to make our communities safe.

One positive inclusion in the statement, of course, was the increase in funding for police—the commitment to put in another 800 front-line officers and around 300 support staff. That is a good and long-overdue thing. It is interesting that only weeks ago the Government was still in denial about the fact that the police were overstretched and under-resourced, which anybody who has been listening has known for at least the last 18 months, since we started hearing directly from front-line officers that they were understaffed and overstretched, and could not get a day off and could not meet reasonable public expectations about service delivery because they were being asked to do too much with too little. So this extra funding for police is not a generous move; it is simply playing catch up. It is over the next 4 years, so for at least the next couple of years the police will continue to be working under enormous stress and under enormous pressure, and it is by no means an insightful or a visionary move by this Government. Call me cynical, but I suspect that had this not been an election year, the police would have had to make do for quite a bit longer yet.

So we are pleased the police are getting more resource. That is a necessary step, but it is by no means sufficient to genuinely make our communities safer, which is what this Government proposes to do. The police have a particular mandate and a particular skill set, and there are things they can do, but there are many things that contribute to safe communities that the police cannot do.

We heard earlier from the Hon Annette King direct quotes from people working at the front line in our mental health services—words like “broken” and “crisis”—and, again, anybody who is listening understands that that is the state of mental health services in New Zealand. The police are spending a lot of time picking up the debris—the human debris—from the failure to manage and to provide an adequate mental health service in the community. That is the part of the jigsaw that is missing. We have had a little bit of support for police, which is a good thing, but absolutely nothing from this Government to even acknowledge or confess that the mental health service is under-resourced or that drug and alcohol treatment—most people seeking treatment for drug and alcohol problems in the community are put on waiting lists and, in the meantime, very often they end up offending. Those are the people going through the revolving door in and out of prison for drug-related offences, burglaries, and the like. There was not a word in this statement about more support in that area, either. So this Government is doing very little to actually serve and make our communities safe.

We heard—and I quote directly—“Investment in modern infrastructure is a priority for the Government.”, and its members talk proudly about transport, schools, hospitals, defence, and housing. Oddly enough, they did not mention the $2.5 billion that they have committed to basically keeping more people in jail for longer—expanding capacity in our prison system. Perhaps that is something to do with the fact that our Prime Minister, a couple of years ago, called prisons a moral and fiscal failure—and what a great shame he did not stand by that very true and accurate statement. Prisons are a moral and fiscal failure and will continue to be, and it defies belief that we are spending an extra $2.5 billion on top of an annual budget of about $1.6 billion to $1.7 billion to perpetuate failure and to perpetuate crime and offending, because that is what our prisons do. This so-called social investment approach from this Government, allegedly spending money now to improve lives for the better and to reduce future costs—spending more money on prisons and locking people away is about as far removed from a genuinely social investment approach as one could possibly imagine.

This Government is failing. We will have to wait a few months and a change of Government before we see genuine progress and change.

Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: A 5-minute call on behalf of the Green Party—Marama Davidson.

MARAMA DAVIDSON (Green): E Te Māngai o Te Whare, tēnā koe huri noa ki a tātou o te hoa kaimahi o Te Paremata, tēnā tātou katoa.

[Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker, and acknowledgments to us all, fellow colleagues throughout the Parliament.]

The Greens are standing every day to affirm our commitment and our relationship as a Te Tiriti party in a way that this Government never has and never will. I am really pleased, as the spokesperson for Māori development, to be able to stand today and respond to the Prime Minister’s statement and offer him ideas of how he could have filled it in to make sure that he was honouring Aotearoa and our relationship commitment to Te Tiriti.

I was very proud to announce our plan and commitment for Te Reo in schools a couple of weeks ago. I was not surprised, because we have been talking about this for some time—for years—to also hear of the support of the largest New Zealand teachers union, Te Riu Roa. The New Zealand Principals’ Federation also came out in support, because it is something that it knows should have happened some time ago and is something that it is happy to see. That is alongside the CEO of New Zealand tourism, who understands that our Reo rangatira is our point of difference. It is our unique and amazing taonga, which we have a responsibility to save, to nurture, and to put back into the place—into the site—it was actually stolen from. That was the case for my grandmother, which is why it has taken my own family, my own whānau, three generations after her to put Te Reo back in.

I am also proud of the work of my colleague Jan Logie in leading in Parliament to call this Government to account for its proposals to water down the priority of placing tamariki Māori in Child, Youth and Family’s care with whānau, hapū, and iwi Māori. Jan Logie has raised questions to the responsible Ministers, has attended all of the meetings that she has been able to know about, and has been able to raise voices like that of Paora Moyle—an ex-State-care child herself—to uphold and raise awareness of the horrifying abuse that has taken place in State institutions. One wonders, therefore, why on earth we are continuing with this colonisation tool of removing tamariki Māori from their whānau, especially when we know and have for years upheld the practice of whāngai. To this very day, there are always Māori available—if we do our jobs and provide the support—to provide fantastic, nurturing care for tamariki Māori.

I cannot go without mentioning my colleague Catherine Delahunty’s leadership on the Public Works Act. It is a simple thing to do—to prevent public works legislation from confiscating more and more Māori land. The Public Works Act is a piece of law that has been used as one of the largest tools of land alienation—and is something that the Greens are pushing for, and something, again, that this Government will not agree to. We had Patricia Grace in last week, telling her incredible story—a common one for this whole nation—of the generosity of her tupuna Wī Pārata Te Kākākura and his amazing gifting of land to the Government, to the Crown. This has happened throughout our history: generosity in the face of deep injustice.

I am proud to be standing with a party that is upholding our kaitiaki responsibilities for mokopuna, for whānau, for whenua, and for Reo rangatira. As kaitiaki, those are our responsibilities. All of the things that I have just outlined are ways that we could uphold our commitment to Te Tiriti, and they are ways that this Government is not even willing to discuss, in most cases. This is why I am proud to see growing support from Māori for the Green Party. This is why we have been able to put up the largest number of candidates that we ever have to date. This is why the support from Māori electorates and Māori voters is at its highest to date, and we plan to continue to grow that. We back up our relationship and commitment to Te Tiriti with our work every day, whether it is by standing with the communities and protecting their moana against deep-sea oil drilling or protecting Ihumātao from being developed and stolen again—

Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: I am sorry to interrupt the member, but her time has expired.

Hon NATHAN GUY (Minister for Primary Industries): What a great start it has been for the National-led Government in 2017. It is a very exciting year. We have got the election date confirmed and we are ready to go. We have proven, just since the start of the year, how successful a start it has been for the Prime Minister, Bill English. Has it not been a fantastic start for this side of the House? When you have had the Prime Minister go up to Europe on the international stage and meet all of those top dignitaries there—and then, of course, he came back and made the right call to not go to Te Tii Marae. Of course, Labour trundled out there and then said: “Well, the Prime Minister should have been here, but, actually, we’re not even sure if we’re coming back next year.” What a terrible mixed message that was from the Leader of the Opposition, Andrew Little.

Then, of course, we had the phone call from the President of the United States of America—a very successful phone call between our Prime Minister and the President. Then we had the Prime Minister shearing a sheep on Saturday night. What Prime Minister around the world could shear a sheep in the style and in the way that our Prime Minister did? No one could. And, of course, he beat the world champion Sir David Fagan. Anyone who is interested and wants to know how good Sir David Fagan is, there is a YouTube clip of him shearing a sheep the fastest ever, in 14 seconds. As fast as that machine could go, his hand was going to keep up. He is an amazing athlete—and I say well done to Bill English.

Then, if we look across the other side of the House—what a terrible start it has been for them. We saw Labour and the Greens getting together for a sort of a state of the nation speech that had no policy announcements, and then last week the Labour caucus just imploded. I say well done to Poto Williams for speaking her mind. Of course, she could not speak her own mind—she needed to get a PR company in to do it—but, nevertheless, I say well done to that member for actually speaking up and saying something that she truly believes in. What fired up a good part of the Labour caucus was Willie Jackson coming in. Willie has been promised a great list-ranking spot, and, of course, that means that a whole lot of Labour members—who are going to lose their seats this year, so they are very reliant on the list—are imploding over on the other side of the House.

I remember speech after speech after speech from Labour in this Chamber, saying it would never do any electorate deal. No, sorry, that was the Green Party—it would never do any electorate deal. Well, what has it done? It has done an electorate deal on Greg O’Connor running against Peter Dunne in Ōhāriu. Now we have got confusion on what the Green Party really thinks, because it wants to do a deal and make sure that its candidate gets across the line in Ōhāriu. My belief, of course, is that he will not. Then we have another fresh face coming in to the Labour Party—Laila Harré. Really, are those three the future of the Labour Party? I am not really sure. We will leave that up to the good voters of New Zealand.

Can I specifically focus on the Prime Minister’s statement and his motion—just the high-level message that I took out of it. The economy is in great shape. It is going to grow at 3 percent over the next 5 years. Unemployment is going to drop to 4.3 percent. Is that not fantastic? There will be 140,000 jobs created over this period of time. We are in a fantastic position. Little old New Zealand, down here in the South Pacific, is pulling the plough, getting on with growing our economy. Tourism numbers are going gangbusters. Then, think about the police announcement made by the Prime Minister and police Minister Paula Bennett being really well received in rural New Zealand—really well received. There will be more cops on the beat and a quicker response time. They are making sure that all of our communities are safer, with a real focus on rural communities, which I think is fantastic.

Then, if we get a little bit closer to home in the Ōtaki electorate, there has been a great announcement on the UFB2 rollout for towns in my community like Ōtaki and Foxton—or Shannon, in Ian McKelvie’s electorate. They have been waiting ages for the roll-out of ultra-fast broadband, and the National-led Government is going to deliver it.

The really exciting news this week, of course, is the Kapiti Expressway. The Kapiti Expressway is going to be officially opened on Thursday.

Kris Faafoi: You didn’t want it.

Hon NATHAN GUY: And Kris Faafoi campaigned against it. Kris Faafoi, in the northern part of his electorate that he never goes to, in Raumati, had signs up against it. We are going to remind Kris Faafoi’s voters that Labour was against $630 million being invested in our community, in our region. We have waited absolute decades and decades. Five hundred jobs—created with the Kapiti Expressway. It is 18 kilometres long, with 18 bridges and 16 kilometres of cycleway, walkway, and bridleway, 1.5 million trees planted, and wetlands enhanced by about sixfold or eightfold. This is a truly majestic road. The Prime Minister is going to be there on Thursday, opening it. When Labour and the Greens were opposed to it, David Cunliffe, as leader—remember when he was leader? It was a terrible result, was it not! The reason it was so terrible was that he came out opposed to the Kapiti Expressway.

And we have always been confused about Labour’s position on Transmission Gully. Transmission Gully is going to be built, and we are going to drive on it in 2020. For my community and for the commuters who come from Horowhenua into Kāpiti and into Wellington each day for work, at the moment—just to go a 100-kilometre stretch from Levin to Wellington—it takes, at peak time, over 2 hours. It is diabolical. This Government is investing $2 billion, from Wellington Airport all the way to north of Levin—in fact, right through to Foxton, where we are going to build a fantastic new bridge over the Manawatū River and a new trestle, which will be a $70 million investment.

But wait, there is more. We are going to invest $330 million in 13 kilometres from Peka Peka to Ōtaki. I would not have a clue where Labour and the Greens are on that one. We are going to start in the middle of the year. Kris Faafoi puts his head down in shame because we know that the Greens oppose roading infrastructure and we know that Labour, depending on what day of the week it is, opposes decent infrastructure as well, because it opposed the Kapiti Expressway. Those members are now so embarrassed, I am not even sure whether Labour will turn up to the community walkover on the weekend. There will be thousands who will come to the Kapiti Expressway. It will be the first opportunity for them to walk along a section of it. Get on the bus—it will be absolutely fantastic.

But now I think I have ridiculed Labour enough.

Scott Simpson: No!

Hon NATHAN GUY: Do you want me to go on? Well, I could. I could, but I would need extra time, and I want to talk about a few other important things in the area that I look after, which is the primary sector—the powerhouse of the New Zealand economy. It is actually in pretty good shape. Dairy is going well—climbing off the bottom, rebounding really well. Horticulture is going gangbusters. The forestry sector is in good heart. Exports into China are going really well. And then, of course, we should not forget about seafood, because it has been doing pretty well, as well. Its exports are looking pretty promising.

On the other side of the coin, it is quite tough for our sheep farmers. The beef prices have stabilised and stayed up. We have got the US herds rebuilding, a bit more Brazilian product coming in—it is pretty tough down on the farm for our sheep farmers. We are doing what we can to support them. Of course, we have the Primary Growth Partnership, whereby we are investing with industry a huge amount into the red meat sector to lift its viability and productivity.

This Government is focused on irrigation, because it is really topical. When you go to Northland, where I was a couple of weeks ago, they are finding it pretty tough with drought conditions up there. They are screaming out for water storage projects. So are people in Hawke’s Bay and Gisborne. Of course, if we had the Ruataniwha Dam built now, would that not be absolutely fantastic? But Labour and the Greens oppose water storage projects. We have invested about $145 million into water storage. We believe it is hugely important.

This year is going to be a year about acknowledging the great work that our farmers, our fishers, and our growers do to actually support the New Zealand economy. They are a massive part of it. We will have policies that will support rural communities, because the produce that comes off the farm needs to get to the port. Predominantly, it goes on the road. This Government is investing in infrastructure. We are investing in roads. We are investing in rail. We have done more than in the history of the New Zealand Parliament to invest in decent infrastructure. It is going to be a fantastic year. Bring it on.

KRIS FAAFOI (Labour—Mana): I listened to that speech and the way I felt about that speech is a lot like the way I feel about this Government: I just wanted it to come to an end. It was the longest 10 minutes, and the scariest phrase I heard during those 10 minutes was when Nathan Guy said: “Wait, there’s more.” There is no more. This is a Government that is tired and out of ideas. It is behind the eight ball. This is a party that is saying that it is out there putting more police on our streets. It is just 12 months too late. That is a promise that this party over here made at the last New Zealand Police Association conference, at a time when the Government was in complete denial about whether there was increased crime and whether our police were stretched. It is 12 months late.

The Government is now boasting about a petrol inquiry that my colleague Stuart Nash called for about 15 months ago. But guess what? Who blocked that petrol inquiry at the select committee? That is right, punters, it was the National Government. So when we want to get fairness around petrol prices and when we want to get more police on our streets, do not look towards the National Party for the answers. In 2017 people will be looking towards this side of the House to find solutions to the problems that really matter to New Zealanders. Their problem during the 2017 election is going to be housing.

When I got back home from my electorate office yesterday, I decided to go for a walk as I needed to clear my head. I walked through the park and saw kids practising tag and some people walking their dogs. When I got around the corner, I saw a man standing next to a van. I pulled my headphones out and said: “Gidday, how’s it going?”. He said: “Gidday. I need to talk to you, Kris, because I need some help. I’m living in my van. I’ve been living in my van for the last couple of months. I’m in a really dire situation. I’m waiting for a Housing New Zealand house. I’m in a bit of a tough spot personally. But I’m a local and I don’t think it should be so hard to find a house to live in. I’ve been dossing at other people’s houses but I don’t want to be a burden on anyone else for much longer.”

This is not a man who was complaining about his lot. He said that he had enough food. He was on a sickness benefit but he could not get himself a home. Here he was, still a proud Porirua man, asking why it was so hard to get a house in Porirua. I agree with him, because it should not be so hard for someone who has lived in the community and who has grown up in the community—

Hon Jacqui Dean: What did you do?

KRIS FAAFOI: Well, I did what any good local MP would do and got his contact details. No one else was helping him at that stage. I want to know what the Government is doing for him. I pose that question to the members on the opposite side of the House. What are they doing for him? I can say right now, with absolute confidence, that the Government is doing nothing.

In this election, when we are talking about solutions to that man’s problems, talking about the people waiting for affordable housing, and talking about the people wanting to buy an affordable home, not just in Porirua and the Kāpiti Coast but further afield and in Auckland, where the problem is most acute, we are going to do something about it. We have been telling people for some time that we are going to do something about it.

I am very proud of the KiwiBuild programme—100,000 homes over 10 years. As the Prime Minister has said—far too late—we need to build some homes. We have been saying that for years—we have been saying that for years. The absolute solution to the problem is to build some homes, something that the party over there has failed to do in the last 8 years.

We hear from Nick Smith about consents, but we do not hear enough about meeting the targets of building those homes. Maybe Nick will have one of those consent-warming parties, where we can go along and say: “Hey, here’s my new house—oh, no, actually, it is a bare plot of land.” The consent might be there but the house is not there. That is exactly what is going on in Auckland at the moment. They are not meeting the demand.

We on this side of the House are going to take some action, and that is why I talk about KiwiBuild. At the last election we worked with the Porirua City Council to partner with it and to use some of its land to build some affordable homes in Porirua. That is part of the solution. That will be replicated around the country so that the people who desperately need homes will get them.

I want to talk about leadership, because this is going to be a big issue this year. I am proud to sit behind my leader, who, as a union boss, stood behind people like my mum when she worked in a factory. When the workers went on strike, the union stood behind my mum. When we hear members on the other side bagging the unions, I want to make sure that all those union members out there who are paid-up members and want to change the Government get out there and make sure there is a change of Government this year. We have to make sure that we kick the Government out of office in order to do for our communities all of the good things that we want to make sure happen: affordable housing, good healthcare, good education, and good jobs and wages for our people.

This Government has been in power for far too long and has ruined all those things that are fundamental building blocks to make sure that we can live the Kiwi Dream. The Kiwi Dream of owning a home has all but disappeared. I think the median price of a house in Auckland is $850,000 at the moment. The Government says it has done all it can do. That is not leadership. We need leadership, and that is where KiwiBuild comes in.

This year healthcare is also going to be an issue. I want to talk about that in the context of the front page of yesterday’s Dominion Post, which said that mental health care at the Kenepuru Hospital was unsafe. That is because of what this Government has done—on purpose. It has slowly taken $1.7 billion out of healthcare over the last 8 years. What does that mean? It means that facilities like that one in Porirua, which serves the Wellington region, get run down. The care at that facility cannot be up to scratch. The resourcing is not up to scratch. What we do get is a report that says that for a certain period one in five murders that happens here in Wellington is because of the lack of care that is offered by the local district health board. In my books, that is not good enough. That is not the New Zealand that I think most New Zealanders want to live in. We want to make sure that those who are the most vulnerable get the care that they need.

Let us move to education. We heard the education Minister talking about a whole lot of statistics, but the biggest challenge that the education system has at the moment is preparing our workers for the future that we do not quite have yet but is on the horizon. That is why I am very proud of the policy that we have of 3 years’ free tertiary education for those who have not done post-school education. That will give people a chance to re-skill, to be able to support their families in a workplace that we have not had yet but is on the horizon—and jobs will just disappear. That is what I am proud of.

There is a message that I want to say to people who are not in this House right now but who are out there in the community and are frustrated and tired of this Government: we need you. We need you to make sure that people are having those discussions that they are sick and tired of this Government. We need you to make sure that you are out there helping us, knocking on doors, delivering pamphlets, and making the phone calls so we can have a change of Government in 2017.

There was a big difference between the two state of the nation speeches—between Bill English, the Prime Minister, who is not a leader, and our leader, Andrew Little, who is a leader. We reaffirmed our commitment to housing, education, health, and jobs and wages. What did we hear from Mr English? We heard a rehash of Labour’s policy and nothing on housing, and complete denial of the No. 1 challenge that Kiwi families are facing today: either getting safe accommodation, getting warm accommodation, or having the chance of buying a house. What did Mr English say about housing in that speech? Not one sausage. He is in complete denial. They do not want to talk about it because they know they are most vulnerable on the housing issue.

I have one more ask for people who are watching at home, and it is a local ask, because there is a lot of land on Castor Crescent in Cannons Creek that has been empty since the Housing New Zealand homes were demolished back in 2011. Housing New Zealand said it would replace those homes, but they have not yet been replaced. That is having an awful effect on that community, because they want people back in their community. They want their area to be vibrant again. We can put some pressure on the Government on 4 March, because I am holding a public meeting there, and I am inviting the community to make sure that they come and send a strong message to the Government: “You promised to put back the homes you demolished in 2011. For 6½ years you have sat on your hands and done nothing. So come back, make sure you keep your promise, because the families of my area need homes to live in.”

The man whom I saw on my walk yesterday needs a house to live in. The people who come to my electorate office need a house to live in. This Government has done nothing to help those people.

To Jacqui Dean, who asked me “What did you do about it?”, I say that I am doing something about it, and your Government has done nothing for the last 8 years. You have sold houses and not built enough to keep up with demand, and that is going to be your downfall in 2017.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): The next call is a split call. Kanwaljit Singh Bakshi—5 minutes.

KANWALJIT SINGH BAKSHI (National): Thank you for the opportunity to support the Prime Minister’s statement. First of all, I would like to congratulate the Prime Minister, the Rt Hon Bill English, on his strong leadership. The previous speaker, Kris Faafoi, was talking about leadership. Leadership is what Bill English has shown, in starting this year. He is a very strong leader. We have seen his success as a finance Minister over the last 8 years, and now he is taking this country to the next level. He is a strong leader yet a very humble person who has not forgotten his roots. He is still the same Bill English for his own people of Dipton, and he has shown his connection over there.

When we talk about leadership, we have got the Hon Paula Bennett: a solo mother who started out when she was jobless, but she kept her focus, and today what is she? She is the Deputy Prime Minister of New Zealand. That is what you can achieve in this country. The sky is the limit. The only thing is that you have to do the hard work.

The Government created a lot of jobs last year. How many? There were 130,000. The previous speaker, Kris Faafoi, was saying that the Government does not have any plan or has not done anything. If we have not done anything, how come 130,000 jobs were created last year? Our economy has been constantly growing, at around 3 to 3.5 percent for the last 8 years. When Labour left office, the country was already in a depression, but because of the good management of this Government, the country is back in surplus. We are the first country in the OECD that has come back to surplus. We have got policies, we have got an agenda, and we will work for New Zealanders to succeed. It is very important for New Zealanders to understand that the National Government is the only party that has got a growth agenda.

The minimum wage has been growing for the last 8 years. We are earning, on average, almost $59,000 per annum, which is $12,000 more since we came into office. The economy is diversifying, tourism is growing, and we see a bulk of people coming from overseas to visit New Zealand. Recently I met one of the operators who was visiting us from India. He said that high-spending tourist people are looking for opportunities to come and visit New Zealand, and we hope that in the years to come we will see more and more tourists coming to this country.

I would like to touch upon the recent announcement by the Prime Minister about safer communities. It is one of the issues that is very close to the heart of ethnic people, and I have been talking to them to get their input and know about what they would like to see. The Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister, rightfully, announced the additional 1,125 more police officers, who will be helping the communities at large. It is not only in the main cities but also in the regional areas that they will be focusing.

Most importantly, I would like to touch on this topic: 20 ethnic officers are going to interact with the ethnic communities so that they can tell them what they should be doing to avoid the minor crimes that are happening in our society. More than $500 million is being invested in the justice sector so that we can reduce the crime and we can reduce the reoffending, and the Government is working hard upon that. With the new non-emergency number available 24/7, that will be helping people to address their issues when they want to get connected with the police or any other department.

I would also like to say that this Government is focused upon doing things for the betterment of New Zealanders, so that—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): I am sorry to interrupt the honourable member. His time has expired.

SARAH DOWIE (National—Invercargill): It is an absolute pleasure to rise in support of the Prime Minister’s statement for 2017. Given this is my first address to the House this year, let me wish you, Mr Assistant Speaker, a happy New Year, and given the debate was getting a little bit robust before, let me wish the Opposition a happy New Year. Why do I do that? It is because I am a happy, motivated, invigorated member for Invercargill, and I belong to a very happy, united, invigorated, driven team here on the National Government benches. We are led by a very passionate man, the Rt Hon Bill English. Why is he like that? He likes to invest in people, in New Zealanders, to help them achieve their hopes and dreams. And why is he like that—because he is from Southland, and so am I.

Why are Southlanders so happy at the moment? I can report that Invercargill people and wider Southland are in such good heart after a weekend of celebration. We hosted, in Invercargill—

Scott Simpson: Sheep shearing.

SARAH DOWIE: Absolutely—sheep shearing, Mr Simpson. We hosted the Golden Shears, the international Golden Shears, on the weekend. We were beamed live all over the world. We hosted such a fantastic, phenomenal event. Over 4,000 people attended. We had participants from over 32 countries. It was a magical event. Who also attended? Well, I was there. I was there on the Friday. I was there on Saturday. I was there both nights. Who else was there? Mr Todd Barclay, member for Clutha-Southland, was there on Friday, on Saturday—on both nights. Minister Nathan Guy showed up in support of the event and so did our Prime Minister, our Southland Prime Minister, who is now representing New Zealand. And why is that? Because the National Party is supportive of regional New Zealand. And how did we do that? How did we do that intangible result in not only showing up in support but we swung in behind that event providing $260,000 of the $380,000 event to make sure it got across the line.

Darroch Ball: And I wonder why you turned up—got to get your money’s worth.

SARAH DOWIE: And what is that called, New Zealand First? What is that called? It is called regional development. Let me say that slowly: regional development. That is right. We believe in providing initiatives to bring about medium- and long-term results. So what happened? We had an influx of people to Invercargill. They stayed in our hotels. They ate at our restaurants. They enjoyed our tourism facilities, and they spent money. This event created jobs for our people, and all the while we celebrated in our success. Southlanders are very lively, actually. When we went to the event, we participated—we got behind all of the teams. It was fantastic to watch their grit, their drive, and their determination—

Hon Jacqui Dean: Sounds like us.

SARAH DOWIE: —and watch their hard work. Exactly! It is exactly like the National Party. No wonder the National Party resonates with those people.

Kris Faafoi: You mean the sheep. I think you mean the sheep. Ha, ha! The sheep are just like the National Party.

SARAH DOWIE: We are in support of regional New Zealand and hard-working farmers and hard-working people who are involved in the primary industry. And it is not just about sheep, Mr Faafoi; it is about hard work and skill. Those people who were involved in those events were amazing. Let me give a shout-out to the New Zealand team. We had quadruple success at that event in not only the individual events but the team events. It was amazing.

But, also, it was wonderful to see our arch rivals, the South Africans—so humble and hard-working—come over to New Zealand and achieve in the blade shearing events. Blade shearing is almost a lost art, but they were amazing, wonderful to watch, and so humble, as were the New Zealand team. It was a wonderful event and I celebrate that event. I celebrate the Government coming in behind us and helping with an event in regional New Zealand celebrating the success of Southland. Again I say, $260,000 was put into that event to help us get across the line—absolutely fantastic and I cannot wait for more events, especially at our flagship infrastructure, the Southland ILT Stadium. I just want to congratulate that team on the military precision that they showed in setting up that event for each different spectacle that the stadium hosted. Thank you.

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

CLAYTON MITCHELL (NZ First): A very inspirational contribution there, Miss Dowie. I appreciate that. It is also Valentine’s Day today. So to everybody: happy Valentine’s Day—while we are giving out offerings of peace, love, and tranquillity in the House. And, of course, to everybody up there in the Gallery and to people back home—making sure that a little something is offered in love and kindness. Mr Assistant Speaker, do not go out of your way; I do not expect a present this year—that is fine.

I think the people of New Zealand are sick of the bickering, to be absolutely honest. Some days in here it is like two seagulls fighting over a chip, so it was actually quite refreshing to have something quite polite, such as the contribution we had by Miss Dowie—so, fantastic on that.

We have got a new leadership for the Prime Minister. He is definitely not John Key; he is Bill English and by his leadership he will be known. We cannot judge him for what he has not done yet; despite the fact that there have been a number of debacles over the past 8 years of this Government’s leadership. We have had a “ponytail-gate”; we have had debacle with our flag referendum. We have had the foreign trust debacle—we can all remember that. That was a terrible indictment and a real blotch on our paper. And the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement, which has now gone out the back door. We have had the Saudi sheep deal—who could forget that as nonsense? And, of course, the dodgy Sky deal, just to name a few.

Darroch Ball: Skycity.

CLAYTON MITCHELL: The dodgy Skycity Casino deal—yes, thank you for that. And, of course, we have got the problems with housing. But we cannot be throwing stones at Bill English, who is new at the helm, steering this country; we can only judge him for what he has done. In fairness to him, I think he started off quite well with his new appointment of Jacqui Dean as a Minister. We have seen the appointment of Alfred Ngaro, Mark Mitchell, and Dave Bennett—although that is questionable, let us be honest: you know, Dave Bennett. But to be fair, they are good appointments with good, hard-working individuals and we look forward to seeing how they perform this year.

We can, however, go back to 2002 when Bill English was a little bit green in the job. We want to see some real leadership from him moving forward, but let us just see how things lie. He is not responsible for what has been done, but he is responsible for fixing these problems up that I have outlined just before. The old Prime Minister, John Key—I should not call him the “old” Prime Minister, that is derogatory—towards the end of his leadership, in regard to a new bill that was entering the House called the Broadcasting (Games of National Significance) Amendment Bill, which is going to be giving free and live-to-air sports for New Zealanders—was caught saying that if this bill was introduced, it will have a negative impact on those heroes and heroines of the sporting codes because they will be going overseas to find more lucrative sporting contracts.

This is absolute nonsense. This is absolute fearmongering. It is unsubstantiated. In actual fact, the opposite is already occurring. Just as early as yesterday, Israel Dagg announced the fact that he is going to stay in New Zealand for pride of this country, for the lifestyle choices that he could have here, and to keep going with his New Zealand All Blacks team, as opposed to taking a more lucrative French contract. Last week we saw Ben Smith come out and say exactly the same thing. And when we look and we listen to the rest of the world we see they are ensuring that their people—their taxpayers who are putting billions of dollars to support sports and recreation in and around their countries—can see those sports live and free-to-air, such as Australia, the UK, India, and Canada. All those countries, plus a plethora of others, have seen the sense in doing so and they understand that those people will not leave. Those people—those sports heroes and heroines—will stay in their country, because we know that if you give access to all people equally, and not just the privileged minority who can afford to pay for subscription TV, they will be inspired to do their best, to be the best that they can be, and to stay here and be patriotic and proud Kiwis fighting for what they believe in. We know that there are 1.1 million to 1.2 million people who do not have access to Sky Sport. This is not anti - Sky Sport or anti - international companies; this is just ensuring that we are looking after the rights of New Zealanders.

When this bill comes into the House next month we hope that we can get the support and we see real leadership from Bill English, despite the previous leader saying that it was unlikely that they were going to support it. We hope that it gets the support that it deserves to make sure that New Zealanders have full and free access to games of national significance—things that inspire New Zealanders. We look forward to it progressing further. Thank you.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): I call Darroch Ball—5 mintues.

DARROCH BALL (NZ First): It is a pleasure to rise on behalf of New Zealand First for the first time this year. I am hazarding a guess that I will be standing quite a few times up until the election, because the National Government has wanted to make some changes in the social services area, and, boy, do we need it in this country. The problem that we have got at the moment, though—and Sarah Dowie’s speech actually reminded me of much of what the Prime Minister’s speech was, and, to be honest, much of what the rest of the National Government members’ speeches were, and that was: everything is awesome, blah, blah, blah, everything is awesome! That is pretty much what it is.

Let us not get things wrong. New Zealand is a great place to live. New Zealand is a great place to live, and there are some good things to say about it. But the problem and the habit that the National Government has got itself into that I have experienced over the last 2½ years of being an MP is that all it talks about is the good. It never mentions the bad, and it certainly does not mention the ugly. Well, New Zealand First is here and the other Opposition parties are here to hold the Government to account and to point out what the bad parts are that the Government is trying to do, to point out what the ugly parts are that the National Government is doing.

I recall last week that members like Mr Bayly stood up and made a list of where New Zealand was on the OECD for ranks of different things, whether it be prosperity, transparency, economic development, or whatever he said on his list. The fact of the matter is that it is good that we are there in those high echelons of the OECD rankings, but, first of all, we should be. That is where New Zealand should be. It is not that National put us there; it is National’s job to maintain us being there. So when its members start rattling off a list of where we are in the OECD rankings, that is just the job that is expected of it as the Government. That is the job that is expected of the Government to do year in, year out.

What the Government members failed to mention are all the bad lists. What about the bad lists and the ugly lists? How about we start talking about youth crime? How about we start talking about where we are ranking on youth suicide in the OECD? It is absolutely outrageous, but there was not one mention from the PM and not one mention from the National Government members. And the reason why they do not want to mention any of the bad and they do not want to mention any of the ugly is that if they mention it, then they acknowledge it, and if they acknowledge it, they have got to do something about it. The National Government does not even want to touch any problems—any bad or ugly problems—with a barge pole.

How about we talk about something that came up in the House earlier on today about the “neets” rate—youth who are not in education, employment, or training. Ninety-one thousand—91,000—15- to 24-year-olds in this country are not in a job, not in any education, and not in any training opportunities. What is going to happen to those 91,000 kids? They are going to end up being reliant on the State. Not only are they reliant on the State now but they will be in their futures. The biggest problem with that is that it is an increase of just about 20,000 young people in 1 year. That is just under 2,000 per month. We heard Steven Joyce stand up here when I was asking questions during question time today about it, and he did not even want to acknowledge it. He was making excuses about the survey and the information that we got it from.

I have not even mentioned child poverty yet, but there is a whole list of issues that New Zealand needs to be addressing that the National Government is not addressing.

I just want to quote something—and it is not like National or the Ministers or the members do not know about these bad or ugly things; they just do not want to acknowledge them. I have got a Cabinet paper—advice given to the Cabinet social policy committee—that was signed off by the Minister for Social Development and the Minister of Justice, and I want to quote something. It says: “Justice Sector agencies are working together to address a range of shared challenges, including rising rates of serious crime, a rising prison population, high demand for alcohol, drug and mental health services, worsening over-representation of Māori in the justice system, and inter-generational patterns of offending.”

But we have not heard any of that kind of stuff, and this is the most important stuff that the Government needs to start acknowledging. It is the most important stuff that the Government needs to have plans to tackle. But there was not one mention from the PM, not one mention from any of the Ministers, and I guarantee you from this point forward there will be not one mention from anyone in National about what they need to fix. Because once they acknowledge that they need to fix the important things that I have just read out, and all the other lists that we are failing on, then they need to fix it, and the New Zealand First Party is here to hold them to account and to ensure that they fix those problems. Thank you.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): The next call is a split call—Todd Muller, 5 minutes.

TODD MULLER (National—Bay of Plenty): Thank you, Darroch, for your autobiographical account of New Zealand First, “The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly”. That is a great way to kick off the year, from my perspective.

I want to contrast what we have heard through this debate from the two sides of the House, and particularly the National Government and the Labour Opposition. On this side we have a clear plan and a united caucus that, in my view, you can summarise with the words “competence, coherence, clarity, and cohesion”. This is a party that is working and that is delivering. And when I look across at the other side—what an absolute mess! What an absolute mess! It is a disparate, angry, frustrated group of politicians who have not yet realised that there is absolutely no substitute for discipline, there is no substitute for hard work, there is no substitute for deep policy thinking and, above all, there is no substitute for actually listening to New Zealanders and responding to them in a real and meaningful way, which this Government is doing.

No amount of angry, shouting rhetoric from the leader of the Labour Party is going to cover the inadequacy of the visionless lot that I look at on the other side. The Labour Party is divided, it is shallow to the core, and it is an emaciated version of its history. When it celebrates 100 years—as it has over the last few months—in my view it looks more antiquated and more out of touch than ever. A great example of this occurred in the last hour. When we were listening to a tremendous speech by Amy Adams and she was talking about our social investment model and how that is turning around lives in this country as we speak, she mentioned the word “customers”. “Customers!”, Labour members shrieked. And they did—go back and listen. They shrieked at that use of the word “customers” as if somehow that is a toxic word to use in the context of public service.

Well, this party does not resile from that. We believe that the most vulnerable people in our communities should be treated as customers. That is the philosophy that we have brought to this approach. These people are vulnerable. They need actions. They do not need more rhetoric from the other side around spending money. They need investment and activity that will work, turn them around, and actually make a difference in their lives. I thought that was particularly telling—the way Labour members reacted to the use of that word, because the idea of seeing people as customers, of actually adding value, is so foreign to their absolute being and ethos on the other side, and that is why they are struggling as they are at the moment. They are struggling particularly in the context of a social investment model that has delivered, as we heard from the Prime Minister’s statement, 50,000 children who are no longer living in benefit-dependent homes. That is real change to people and families in this country, and it should be acknowledged.

In the document that the Prime Minister spoke to when we began this debate—the Prime Minister’s statement—you can turn to any page and see an action plan that is delivering real value for New Zealand. On the first page we start where we must if we are going to deliver, as we are, a country that is moving forward: an economy that is performing. Some of these statistics are quite extraordinary. Annual economic growth is expected to grow over 3 percent and is expected to beat that over the next 4 years.

We need to look back to the 1960s, and perhaps further back in our history, before we see another such long line of strong economic growth—and that is in front of us. That is to the credit of the New Zealand people who have worked hard to get us into this position, and it is also to the credit of a Government that knows how to manage the books and get the fundamentals in place to enable that achievement to actually deliver for people and their families.

Unemployment will drop to 4.3 percent by 2021, and over the same period another 140,000 jobs are expected in this economy, which is an extraordinary outcome. And when you put on that that the average wage will rise through that period to $66,000, that is a Government that is absolutely working.

As I have been around the electorate of Bay of Plenty over the last few weeks, I have heard from person after person a view that this economy and this country are heading in the right direction. They know that you have to get the platform of economic performance working first, which we are doing, and from that platform invest in the areas of health, education, and law and order with the proceeds of that success.

Their work and our hard work are working together to deliver real value for our communities, and I am very, very proud as the member for Bay of Plenty to stand on this side of the House and support that attitude of achievement and ambition, and I am very proud to be able to support the Prime Minister’s statement on behalf of my community. Thank you.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): I call Maureen Pugh—5 minutes.

MAUREEN PUGH (National): I too join my colleagues in standing here in support of the wonderful new Rt Hon Bill English, Prime Minister of New Zealand. One of the best things that we can do for this country is establish a strong economy, and this Government is absolutely focused on the Government’s finances, because that is what gives us choice as a country. The infrastructure spend in this country over the last 5 years has been $18 billion and in the next 5 years that will increase to $32 billion. Focusing on the economy gives us choice.

We are also focusing on our young people and their education. We understand that education is one of the most important things we can do for the future of this country. We are now seeing record levels of National Certificate of Educational Achievement level 2, especially with our Māori and Pacific children. We are investing a further $359 million to keep our best teachers in their classrooms, and also so that they can share their expertise and leadership across other schools.

The workforce participation rate is the highest it has ever been in this country. We have around 130,000 new jobs created just in the past year. Average wages have increased by $12,000 since we came into Government. That is double the rate of inflation, and that means more money in Kiwis’ pockets. One of the things I am most proud of as an achievement of this Government is that over the course of New Zealand’s history there have been 82 Treaty settlements. Sixty-six of those have been under this Government, and 56 alone in this term.

Investing in new ways to support our most disadvantaged children is also a priority of this Government. We believe that the best way to improve the lives of benefit-dependent families is to get them into work. As a result of this commitment, there are over 40,000 fewer kids living in benefit-dependent homes. This is critical for our social investment policies, and we know that breaking that cycle of benefit dependency is essential for these families. However, we also know that there are some vulnerable families that do need support, and it was this Government that introduced the first benefit increase in 40 years.

This Government is also setting standards around the world. We are now the world’s least corrupt country. What a record to be proud of. We are also the world’s most prosperous country, and New Zealand is now top in the world for doing business. These are not our statistics; these are independently gathered statistics.

I would like to speak a little bit about some local projects that I am particularly proud of. Greymouth is now getting its state-of-the-art $70 million hospital, as a result of the investment from this Government. We have got the new $28 million Taramakau road-rail bridge under way as we speak, and of course West Coast - Tasman was a big winner in the latest ultra-fast broadband (UFB) roll-out. We will see UFB rolled out into Kaiteriteri, Tākaka, Motueka, Ruby Bay—small communities, but it is essential for their future—Murchison, Wakefield, and Brightwater. On the West Coast we will soon enjoy fibre in Westport, Rūnanga, Hokitika, and Reefton. This Government understands the importance of positioning New Zealand on the global stage, and we know that providing this core infrastructure is vital. We are a Government with a long-term vision for all Kiwis.

This Government is also investing in the regions, very heavily. I am very happy to be supporting the regional growth study on the West Coast, which is seeing a huge amount of attention and investment into potential projects that will secure the economy in that area. Also an exciting announcement this year was that the Government is increasing police staff by a massive 10 percent. That is an increase of 1,125 staff, 880 sworn officers. We are keeping communities safe. Thank you.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): The next call is a split call—Gareth Hughes, 5 minutes.

GARETH HUGHES (Green): Kia ora. Ngā mihi nui ki a koutou. Kia ora. I want to start by congratulating you, Bill English, on delivering your first Prime Minister’s statement to Parliament. You are now out of Key’s shadow, and the country is asking what you stand for. Can we trust you to lead in the national interest, not just in the National Party interest? You are the Prime Minister, but no one outside the National Government caucus room elected you as leader. Kiwis want to know now whether you are right for our times.

For example, Prime Minister, why did you wait until this year to say marriage equality was right? Where were you when it mattered? You were voting against it. Why did you vote against medicinal cannabis in 2009, stopping countless people getting the relief they needed, yet supported it last week? Why were you pro the racist Springbok Tour, questioning the science of climate change, and talking about refugees as Middle Eastern leftovers? How can you be for our time when you have been consistently behind the times?

The international situation is going through the biggest shift, the biggest reorientation, in perhaps a generation. Where do you stand, on our behalf? On Trump’s despicable racist immigration ban, you fell silent. You waited days to share a weak opinion, then your phone call with Trump—a hater, a bully, a misogynist—was, to quote you, “fantastic”. No, that is disturbing. Contrast that with Justin Trudeau, who said unequivocally that it was wrong, and refugees and migrants were welcome. At a time of crisis, we need to stand up and be clear in our support of human rights. We need human rights lions, not lambs in sheep’s clothing. Why did you not raise our greatest threat, climate change, with Donald Trump? He is censoring environmental data, gagging scientists, and says he will pull out of the Paris climate agreement, threatening our kids’ futures. Is it because, once again, you are behind the times?

When asked whether you were a feminist, you said: “I wouldn’t describe myself as a feminist. I don’t know what that means.” Well, let me tell you, man to man, and exactly what I tell my daughter, that boys and girls should be equal and should not be treated differently. That is exactly what the Oxford Dictionary says. Prime Minister, it is quite simply the advocacy of women’s rights on the ground of equality of the sexes. If you are not a feminist, you are against equality. I challenge you, Prime Minister, to say you are for equality. I challenge you to advocate for equality. I challenge you to act for equality.

Let us look back at your speech, in which you set out your big political vision for this year—business as usual. Business as usual means more homeless on the streets, a generation locked out of housing, more debt, more inequality, more foreign ownership, more pollution, and more cows, cars, and coal. Business as usual is our kids risking getting sick if they swim in our lakes or rivers. Business as usual means our homes, our environment, and our businesses are at risk.

The National caucus may have selected you as there was no other alternative, but there is a positive alternative for the people of New Zealand. The Green Party knows where it stands on human rights. The Green Party stands for modern and clean jobs. The Green Party stands for protecting the environment that we love. The Green Party stands for homes, for fairness, and for lifting our kids out of poverty. Green values are New Zealanders’ values, and, unlike you, we are on the right side of history. We are on the right side of the times. This year we offer change for good—a new Government with a mission to do good, good policies delivering real change, for good.

People are looking all around the world and they are worried. There are desperate refugees, growing walls, travel bans, rising tides, and massive inequality. New Zealand—we can be a bastion for human rights. We can be a home for fairness, and a place where people are happy, safe, and satisfied. The times they sure are a-changin’, and it is time. We need change, for our times.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): I call Jan Logie—5 minutes.

JAN LOGIE (Green): Tēnā koe, Mr Assistant Speaker. Tēnā koutou e Te Whare. I want to dedicate this speech in reply to the Prime Minister to all those wonderful women with hardly a minute to spare. Although there may certainly be some men in that boat, I do say “women” advisedly.

This is for all those women who are trying to care for their children as best they can, and also those trying to care for their parents as well—all those women who are still doing most of the housework, who are probably the only ones to notice that there is only one roll of toilet paper left. This is for all those women who still manage to squeeze in time to be down at the marae, in their community, and at the school gate. This is for those heroines who are doing all of this, as well as working either full time or part time, or trying not to be sanctioned by Work and Income, which according to many people I have spoken to is almost a full-time job. This is for them.

Political statements all too often, to me, seem to be about statistics and issues and political propaganda, and not people. I want those women, and the men who are doing the same jobs, to know that we value them in this House. We want to make their lives a bit easier.

The latest Statistics New Zealand report shows that although retirement is the most common reason men leave a job, parental family responsibilities is the most common reason for women. Did you know that although 63 percent of men’s work is paid, around 65 percent of women’s work is unpaid? And that the average woman gets only 84c for every dollar men earn. Māori women earn just 73 cents for early dollar Pākehā men earn, and Pasifika women just 67c. This imbalance is unfair and it creates a social incentive for women to continue carrying more of the unpaid work. We need to start valuing women’s work—paid and unpaid. Caring for and supporting others holds us all together as families, as friends, as communities, and even as businesses. That needs to be acknowledged and that burden needs to be shared.

I am thinking, in this speech, particularly of a caregiver I met last year, who was a sole parent working full time on just over the minimum wage after years of work—she was holding people’s lives in her hands every day. She was holding people’s lives and dignity in her hands every day. She was bringing up her son as a sole parent and was bringing him to work with her because she could not afford to turn down extra shifts and she could not afford the after-school care. That is just wrong. It is not valuing her important work and it is also robbing families of their rightful income and support.

This is something the Government can fix. The imbalance between men’s and women’s pay is mostly a result of underpaying women and it is mostly the Government that is doing this paying. The Green Party is absolutely committed to equal pay, and in Government it will make sure the fight for equal pay is taken up proactively by Government and is not left to all those hard-working women, on top of everything else, to have to prove their case. The Green Party will make this a priority and will make sure that there is the money there to pay them fairly.

Last week I heard the Prime Minister talk a lot, but I did not hear much about making life easier for these amazing women and their communities and the people they are caring for. I do not understand why the Prime Minister did not talk about equal pay when there is supposedly so much work going on and it is going to be a significant part of the Budget. Women are working hard for their money and it is past time we paid them right.

Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE (Minister of Immigration): Can I wish members of the House and those listening a happy Valentine’s Day. All of those romantics amongst us, I am sure, have sent their cards and flowers. There are a few shakes of the head—that is a bit sad. Romance is clearly dying in Invercargill. Actually, I do not send flowers on Valentine’s Day because I was married on the 13th of February, and that means flowers are very expensive at this time, so I do not do it twice. My wife—to whom I have been happily and blissfully married for 24 years—yesterday got a big bunch of white roses.

But there are a few people who are not feeling the love as much as I was. I do not think Poto Williams was feeling the love for Andrew Little, and she certainly was not feeling the love for Willie Jackson. And Young Labour members, well, they were not feeling the love for any of the Labour Party leadership last week. Meanwhile, on this side of the House there is harmony, there is energy, and there are new ideas. As we head into the year—an election year—that is going to be really important. I contrast that—and I am going to elaborate on a few of the areas for which I have responsibility as Minister—with a campaign strategy from Labour that looks like this: “We don’t like the Government, so nor should the public. We are not going to actually campaign on any policies.” That is what Mr Little said on Breakfast last week—“We might raise one or two more things.”

Apparently, Labour thinks all of its policy is out in the public domain, whereas this Government has not even started. We have already made a number of announcements around regional and rural broadband initiatives, and the half a billion dollars for police, which I can tell you went down extremely well in Dunedin—in my area—where people are confident that not only will every single district get extra police but also that there will be expectations around burglary-resolution rates, call outs, 24/7 non-emergency lines, and so on.

While we are talking about police I note that my friend, former president of the Police Association and a former rugby colleague at Western Suburbs, Greg O’Connor, has been selected as the candidate for Ōhāriu for Labour—good luck to him, he is going to need it. But he clearly got the Labour memo, because I have not seen a flip-flop as fast as what Greg O’Connor showed this week. After years and years and years of saying the police should be armed, the first time he was asked as a Labour candidate “Should police be armed?” he said no. He is going to toe the Labour Party’s line, which is that police should not be armed. As a former Minister of Police I happen to agree with him. I happen to agree with him, firstly, that it is the Commissioner of Police and his—or her in the future—team’s decision on what ordinance police would use and deploy. But here is the thing: at the least, one should be consistent and have the conviction to say even something like this: “Well, I don’t agree with the Labour Party line on this, but clearly it is a caucus collective responsibility.” No, he could not do that. He just flipped—he just rolled.

I think we will be seeing a little bit more of that from a party that is so desperate to get back into power its slogan will be: “We don’t like the Government, so nor should the public.” I do not think that is going to get it very far because it is going to need the sorts of ideas that this National-led Government has been coming up with for years and that it will continue to come up with.

I want to start, in my capacity as Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety, by actually expanding on comments that Jan Logie had made her in her contribution. I think this was one of the single-largest important policy announcements last year, the legislative process for which will be introduced into the House, I hope, in the next couple of months—that is, the issue of finding a legislative solution to the recommendations of the pay equity working group.

The Court of Appeal, in the case of Kristine Bartlett and TerraNova Homes and Care, handed down, what I thought and still think is, an extremely well-considered and intelligent judgment. It took the 43-year-old Equal Pay Act, which was never written or designed for the sorts of things it is now being considered to do, and made a compelling case that the Equal Pay Act 1972 is designed to provide not only equal pay for the same work but equal pay for work of equal value. The Government accepted that recommendation and set up the Joint Working Group on Pay Equity Principles, which was very well chaired by Dame Patsy Reddy, now our Governor-General, and comprised representatives from business, unions, and ministry officials. It came up with excellent recommendations for the principles that should underpin a pay equity negotiation. I think everybody would agree that the goal is for bargaining between parties not to rely on the courts or on the Government to intervene—certainly not, except in very rare circumstances. That is where we need to get back to. The Government has agreed to those recommendations and is presently framing legislation, which I hope to bring into the House—certainly in the first half of this year. I think that will go an extraordinarily long way towards achieving the sort of equity that Ms Logie was talking about in her contribution.

But, in the meantime, we are not waiting, because I announced the increase in the minimum wage of about 3.3 percent to $15.75. I understand and appreciate the calls that many have for a living wage, and if organisations can afford that, that would be fine. We certainly augment the minimum wage for families, with generous Working for Families support, income-related rents, child support, and accommodation supplements. But the minimum wage that we will have on 1 April will be the highest in the world relative to the median wage—the highest in the world—and it will be the fourth-highest in the world in real terms. So I think that is going to be a significant closing of the gap that we continue to do. I think that the 31 percent increase in the minimum wage since we have come into office, compared with a 14 percent increase in inflation over that time, sends a clear signal that this Government is keen to ensure that our starting-out workers and our lower-wage staff are well looked after.

Of course the TerraNova case has given rise to the negotiations, which the Hon Jonathan Coleman and the Ministry of Health are leading, for a settlement, hopefully, in the not-too-distant future. I am confident that when a settlement package is able to be achieved Cabinet will look at that extremely positively.

I want to just end by touching on a new role that I have picked up since December and that is as Minister for ACC. I would love to take the credit for the $126 million reductions in levies this year, which is part of a $2 billion per annum reduction that this Government has managed to introduce since 2012—$2 billion a year. That has come out of excellent work that ACC has done in combination with previous Ministers to ensure that those who suffer injury at work, at play, in treatment, and on the roads are, firstly, cared for well, are compensated for their loss of incomes, and are then rehabilitated to ensure that they can return to work or independence as quickly as they can. Those rehabilitation rates are a very important indicator of scheme performance, and I, as Minister, will be redoubling efforts to ensure that ACC continues to focus on rehabilitation rates—some people call them exit rates—and it is important that we do that because what we know is that people who stay on the scheme longer than about 9 months or so have very, very significant difficulty in getting back to work. Although sometimes it can be seen like tough love, it is really important that case managers and rehabilitation providers continue to work with claimants to ensure that they are made better.

But in the meantime I am confident that we can do that and continue to deliver the levy reductions that we have been able to provide for employers, for motor vehicle users, and for earners when they are at leisure, because only this Government—only this Government—pays that level of attention to the scheme, which it introduced in 1972 under Jack Marshall after the royal commission report of 1967. It started on 1 April 1974 under Labour and, of course, it has had successive iterations of change, but the fundamental principles remain. We will work hard to ensure that every stakeholder in ACC—levy payers, health providers, injured parties, and so on—are treated well and fairly, and I think that, for me, is symbolic of an energetic, ideas-focused Government, and we will continue to be that in 2017.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): The next call is a split call. I call Poto Williams—5 minutes.

POTO WILLIAMS (Labour—Christchurch East): Tēnā koe, Mr Assistant Speaker. Before I begin my substantive contribution can I please send my best wishes out to those people of the Port Hills, who are watching with some distress that properties are under risk of the fires. May I send my condolences to the family of the helicopter pilot who appears to have lost his life in fighting those fires.

As I am an electorate MP—and I know that my colleagues who are electorate MPs here in Labour do this every single day—my office opened its doors after the summer break on 11 January. In the next 2 weeks my office was swamped with 85 requests from constituents for support and advice—85 requests in 10 working days. A quarter of these requests were about financial hardship and many of these people had gone to Government agencies to seek support, only to be turned away—a significant number of people turned away from Government agencies that are charged with their support. For them, the National Party’s brighter future, the economic dream, is actually an economic nightmare because they struggle every single day just to be fed, just to be housed, and just to get on with life. There were 85 requests in 10 days, and I am hearing from my colleagues that it does not seem like that is unusual—from members on this side of the House.

We have had people come to us in the last 6 months—it is a practice of mine to keep a count of the number of interactions my office has with people, and I must absolutely acknowledge my team: Heather, Leeann, and Paul. They do an extraordinary job between the three of them, and I even get to pick up some of the work, we do so much. What we are finding when I do my annual report or my 6-monthly report is that many of our people are the ones for whom this Government claims that it is doing a good job. Government members say that they are doing a great job at getting people off benefit and into work, when many of the constituents who come to me in my office for support are people in employment and they are struggling to actually keep a roof over their head and keep food on the table for their kids and to get their power bills paid. I have these numbers for anyone who cares to look. I have these numbers for anyone who cares to look. And we care to look. We care to look at the numbers of people who come to us for support.

I want to talk about housing because currently this Government wants to sell 2,500 Housing New Zealand homes in Christchurch and about 350 of them are in one of the suburbs in my electorate, Shirley. We know that Government officials went to Australia after they announced the sale of these houses, because they knew that social housing agencies in New Zealand would not be able to actually take over the role of purchasing and running these homes. So they have gone to Australia. Why is it that we are looking to Australians to care for New Zealanders and keep New Zealanders in homes, because, let us face it, the profits from that will not stay here; they will go offshore.

If this Government is serious about housing Kiwis then it should not be looking offshore for community housing providers in Australia to take up the reins. Housing is a core Government function. Keeping Kiwis in Kiwi homes is a core Government function, and Labour, when it becomes the next Government, will do exactly that. It will build houses and it will make sure that Kiwis actually get the housing that they deserve. For New Zealanders out there, rest assured that the economic nightmare that this Government has delivered you will be no longer. We promise you an economic dream, where every Kiwi will have the house they deserve, the education they deserve, and the healthcare they deserve. Thank you.

PEENI HENARE (Labour—Tāmaki Makaurau): Tēnā koe Te Māngai o Te Whare tuatahi māku ki roto i ngā tikanga o ngā mātua tupuna ka tangi atu ki te hunga mate. Ko ngā mate ki runga i te pae o mahara ka whakaaro ake ki tērā hau tupuā a Kīngi Ihaka i ngaro atu ki Te Pō, ka whakaaro ake mō Te Archbishop, arā, ko Paraone Tūrei kua ngaro atu, kāti! Rātou ki a rātou, e moe, e moe, e moe!

[Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker. The first thing for me to do according to the customs of the ancestral forefathers is to lament those who have passed away. The deaths on the horizon of remembrance that come to mind are that of the renown and noted Kīngi Ihaka, who is lost to the void. I think about the Archbishop, namely, Paraone Tūrei, who has gone; enough! They the dead to themselves, rest, sleep, slumber!]

As is customary in the Māori culture, I would like to pay respects to those who have passed on in recent months since the last time the House sat. I want to acknowledge them and I now bring the conversation back to the topic at hand. Thank you very much for allowing me this opportunity. There is one word we have not heard from the other side of the House. It is “crisis”. They seem to tiptoe around the word “crisis” when actually—

Hon Members: It’s your word.

PEENI HENARE: Well, the proper word now is actually “crises”—there are so many things going wrong in Aotearoa New Zealand today and I want to touch on a couple of those. One of these crises is, as mentioned by members on this side of the House, housing—a huge issue in Tāmaki Makaurau and across the country. Another crisis issue is education. Another one is health. But for mine, in Tāmaki Makaurau, I want to focus on housing.

I want to start by saying that recently the Māori Housing Network was established to ensure that homeownership numbers amongst Māori—and opportunities for Māori tribes and other agencies to engage in providing housing for Māori people are more efficient and more effective. My research led me to these numbers and, as a fluent native Māori speaker, it pains me to say this, but I think it is one of the most appropriate sayings for the issue at hand. I know that my esteemed colleague here Mr Kelvin Davis regularly says this: “Too much hui and not enough do-ey.” I can tell you from the Māori Housing Network that for every seven public consultation hui they have, only one house is built. For every seven hui only one house is built.

I can also say to the House that none of those houses have been built in my electorate of Tāmaki Makaurau, where homeownership has now plummeted for Māori to 28 percent—half that of the general population. Pacific Island homeownership has plummeted to an all-time low of 18 percent—28 percent and 18 percent—plummeted. I believe this is a crisis. Can I also say that as of November 2016, no houses have been built in Tāmaki Makaurau and, even worse, no houses have been contracted to be built.

So what kind of a future does that leave for the people of Tāmaki Makaurau? Today the Leader of the Opposition, Andrew Little, pointed out to this House and also to the public the plight of one of our constituents living under a tarpaulin. Is this the future that our people can look forward to? I say to the people of Aotearoa New Zealand and the people of Tāmaki Makaurau that come 23 September they will have a choice. They will have a choice to make and that choice will be to make sure that the future generations of Aotearoa New Zealand have a home, that they have all of the opportunities that many members in this House have been able to partake in: homeownership, quality education, quality healthcare—something so, sadly, missing from this Government over the past 10 years.

Just to remind the House once again, before I conclude: for every seven public hui, only one house is built—none of those in Tāmaki Makaurau. For me that is a crisis. I spoke of the homeownership rates: 28 percent for Māori and 18 percent for Pacific Island people. I have not seen one vision from this Government that will put more Māori into homeownership, that will put more Pacific Island people into homeownership, instead of condemning them to private rates of rental properties. Some, and most—particularly in Tāmaki Makaurau—cannot afford it. One two-bedroom place in Tāmaki Makaurau is $560 rent per week. How can our people survive in Tāmaki Makaurau? And we know that this crisis, this plague, is indeed spreading across the country. So come 23 September I encourage all New Zealanders out there to get out and vote, and vote for change.

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN (Minister of Health): I move, That this debate be now adjourned.

Motion agreed to.

Bills

Taxation (Business Tax, Exchange of Information, and Remedial Matters) Bill

Third Reading

Hon JUDITH COLLINS (Minister of Revenue): I move, That the Taxation (Business Tax, Exchange of Information, and Remedial Matters) Bill be now read a third time. For the benefit of members, I will briefly recap the three main items contained in this bill. This is a bill that aims to ensure that people pay their fair share of tax. Ours is a good tax system and most people do the right thing and pay their tax as they should. The Government wishes to encourage more people to do so by making it easy to get tax right and difficult to get it wrong.

The principal proposal in this bill, therefore, helps to support businesses to pay their taxes by making the processes as easy as possible and, in doing so, reducing compliance costs for those businesses. To that end, the bill addresses a key concern for many businesses: the processes for calculating and paying provisional tax. This bill introduces a new option for calculating provisional tax: the accounting income method, which aims to more closely match income earning with tax payments and thus reduce compliance costs for small businesses. The bill also seeks to reduce or remove the application of use of money interest for the vast majority of business taxpayers. In addition, the bill proposes to reform the late payment penalty by no longer imposing the monthly incremental penalty from new GST, income tax, and overpaid Working for Families credits, assisting businesses that could trade their way out of debt.

I said before that most people comply with their tax obligations. Unfortunately, there is a small group of people who seek to evade their tax obligations by hiding their taxable assets offshore. The OECD-led initiative, the Standard for Automatic Exchange of Financial Account Information, aims to prevent and detect such tax evasion through greater sharing of information between jurisdictions. The second major component of the bill, therefore, proposes legislation to enable New Zealand’s participation in this global effort. Under this initiative, applicable New Zealand financial institutions will report information to the Inland Revenue Department on accounts held or, in certain circumstances, controlled by non-residents. The Inland Revenue Department will then share relevant information with other tax jurisdictions in specific countries. The Government is keen to ensure that New Zealand plays its role and meets its international obligations, but at the same time the Government is conscious of the compliance costs for financial institutions. The bill therefore contains specific measures to help to minimise compliance costs.

The third, and final, main feature of this bill is also concerned with international tax matters and proposes amendments to our foreign trust rules to ensure our disclosure rules are fit for purpose. These amendments are recommendations adopted from the recent Shewan inquiry into New Zealand foreign trust disclosure rules. The proposed amendments to the foreign trust disclosure rules will strengthen our rules and help make sure that we maintain our reputation in the context of best practice of international exchange of information.

These are the main features of this tax bill. The bill also contains a number of remedial changes intended to ensure that the tax rules continue to be applied consistently and clearly. In bringing this bill to its third reading, I thank the policy officials and the drafters who worked on the detail of the bill, the organisations and individuals who made submissions on the proposed legislation, and the Finance and Expenditure Committee for its consideration and recommendations. It gives me great pleasure to commend the Taxation (Business Tax, Exchange of Information, and Remedial Matters) Bill to the House.

STUART NASH (Labour—Napier): Labour will support this bill but with reservations. Let me first make a couple of comments. It is sad to see the Minister speaking on this bill, because I thought she was a particularly good police Minister who understood what was going on in the regions and then put forward a package to Cabinet that I think was really going to make a difference and was going to trump us right across it. Unfortunately, for some reason unbeknownst to any of us over here, she lost the portfolio and was replaced by someone—

Grant Robertson: No, I do think I know the reason!

STUART NASH: —who really has absolutely no idea. We do know the reason, do we not, Mr Robertson? But she was a good Minister who understood the issues and has been replaced by someone who really does not. As a consequence, we have the Minister who has taken over this bill. We cannot blame the Minister for this bill, because she was not the Minister when this was introduced.

The Finance and Expenditure Committee has heard—what, Mr Robertson? Eight, nine bills this term?

Grant Robertson: Yep.

STUART NASH: At least eight or nine bills. It has got to the stage where submitters, who spend an incredible amount of time and money and energy on writing submissions, have said officially that this is not the way to craft tax legislation; it is not the way to do it; there was too much before the committee; and it is not good policy. Even the experts who used to work for the IRD are sort of saying that this is not the way it should be done.

I will give you an example of this. The reason I say this is that tax legislation, by its very nature, has to be robust. It has to have a wide level of consultation so that when it goes out and is signed off by the Governor-General and becomes law it is difficult to avoid. There are always people with huge brains who spend an inordinate amount of time trying to find loopholes, and that is the nature of it, but within this piece of legislation, as an example, we are amending a tax bill that passed before this House not 6 months ago. That is not good law. Just to really show what a farce this is, we had members of the public submitting on a bill that, in fact, we were not hearing. They got confused with what bill it was and came in and submitted on the wrong bill. That just shows how poorly this Government is treating tax legislation.

Let me anticipate what Mr Scott and Mr Bishop are going to do. They are going to stand up and say: “We are the business of Government and this AIM method, the accounting income methodology, is great for business because it is going to simplify the tax system for the small to medium size business owner.” Well, it will simplify the system—of that there is no doubt. It is quite similar to, even though not quite as good as, the one that Labour released in Opposition about 12 months ago, but the thing is it has taken National 8 years. The party of business—it has taken it 8 years to introduce a piece of legislation that makes it easier for business. That is not what the party of business does. In fact, the vast majority of my friends—and I have told this story before, but I just smile every time I hear it—say “Do you know what? Philosophically, I suppose I should be National, but my business always does better under Labour. Labour always passes the sort of legislation that helps my business.”, and that is the case.

Eight years—and I know Mr Scott and Mr Bishop, and a whole lot of National MPs, will have been lobbied by different businessmen and businesswomen who have told them: “Provisional tax is a real bummer. It’s hard on cash flows. It’s hard to make ends meet. When we have a great year, it’s fantastic, but the next year when we have to pay our provisional tax, it’s really difficult. Can’t you do something about that?”. The reason I know these gentlemen will have been lobbied on it is that we have been lobbied on it numerous times. It is probably the main bugbear of small to medium sized business owners. The tax is hard to comply with and it is hard to pay—it buggers up cash flows. So National has come up with a solution, but it has taken it only 400 weeks. What does that say about the so-called party that stands up for business? Those members have been asleep at the wheel.

I suspect this bill will get the Royal assent before the election, but only just, so it is going to be 9 years that their constituents—who, in fact, are probably our constituents, from what we are hearing more and more—have had to deal with provisional tax. We could not clarify this at all or quantify it, but I wonder how many businesses actually ended up going under because they ended up with a massive tax bill. I mean, I know what it is like. I am one of these people who, when I was running my own business—just a small one—thought that I was dedicated to this. I would put aside a certain amount of money for my GST and my tax, and then something would happen with the car. I would think “Oh no, no. I have got to pay for it out of this account, but I will put it back.”, and then I would get a GST bill for provisional tax and I was like: “Oh my God! That’s right, I had to put the money back in.” Provisional tax was difficult.

It made it difficult, and we cannot expect our small to medium sized business owners to be financial gurus. What we can expect them to do—and, in fact, what we want them to do—is be really good at running the business that they have core competencies in. That is why the tax package that Labour introduced for small to medium sized businesses was so good, because it took a lot of this worry, a lot of this planning, and a lot of this cash flow management out of the hands of the small-business owner, if they wanted to do that, and it allowed them to concentrate on the issues that were important to their business.

This bill does that to a certain extent—not to the same level, but to a certain extent. That is why we are supporting this, because, quite frankly, anything that makes it easy for businesses to operate of course we are going to support. It just could have been done better. I wonder aloud—I wonder whether, in fact, those members saw our proposal and said: “Shivers! This is pretty good.” But, of course, politics being politics, they said “We can’t adopt this. We’d better come up with one of our own.”, so they came up with one that was not too bad. It was not very good; it just was not too bad, and it will make a bit of a difference. It does not come in for a while—in fact, it does not come in until after the election. But it just could have been so much better, and it should have been so much earlier—and it could have been so much earlier. You know, that is the thing about this.

The other thing I want to talk about briefly—and I am assuming that Mr Robertson is probably going to talk about this at length—is the foreign trusts rule. I had to smile to myself when I heard Minister Woodhouse talking about a certain candidate doing a flip-flop. The reason that made me smile was that I distinctly remember the Minister of Revenue saying on the television and on the radio—and I know this because I followed him in an interview—“We do not have a problem. There is no problem with the foreign trusts regime in New Zealand. Move on, nothing to see here.” Well, about—was it a week later, or was it a couple of days later?

Grant Robertson: As long as it took for a focus group.

STUART NASH: That is right, yes. So a couple of days later, he came back and said “Well, we might have a problem.”, and then, of course, it got escalated to the Prime Minister, John Key, who knew there was a problem. He had just sort of hoped that his Minister would cope with it a little bit more competently than he had. And the Minister came out and said: “Well, they’re not really doing anything illegal, but it might be immoral.”

Well, in my book, we have got a problem. When the Prime Minister says that the tax laws do not work, we have got a problem. And the interesting thing is that when we have a look at the regulatory impact statement for this bill, the IRD itself said that there was a problem with this regime. It said: “Whether it is real or perceived, it doesn’t matter. There is a problem.” So we have got to fix this problem—there is no doubt about that.

What happened was the IRD considered three different options. The first option was the status quo, the second option is what we are going with at the moment, and the third option was to actually remove any ability to have these foreign trusts. The interesting thing is it acknowledged that “Option 1 … Main objective … The status quo does not meet the objective of reducing the potential for perceived misuse of foreign trusts in New Zealand …”. So the IRD knew there was a problem—in fact, I understood that they knew there was a problem 2 years ago but did not do anything about it.

But the interesting thing is that option 2, which we are going for—which is what is in this bill that we are debating at the moment—actually says: “More disclosure in relation to foreign trusts and access to the information by relevant agencies would make it difficult for these vehicles to be used to avoid foreign tax.”—“would make it difficult for these vehicles to avoid foreign tax.” That is not what we are trying to do here. What I thought we were trying to do was maintain New Zealand’s reputation for integrity.

One thing we know for certain is that there are some very intelligent tax lawyers whose role is to find the loopholes, and when there is something that is difficult to do, all that does is just create a greater challenge. They love this sort of stuff. Option 3 would have removed any ability whatsoever to do this, and the regulatory impact statement admitted that. But we have gone for something that—you know, is it the right thing to do? In my gut, I do not think it is, actually.

If we are serious about “Brand New Zealand”, about maintaining our global integrity, I think what we should have done was say: “Hey, let’s leave this right behind. If you want to do a foreign trust or if you want to hide money, even if it is difficult, go to the Bahamas. Go somewhere else, but don’t do it here.” I think that would have been the right thing to do. So we do support this bill, but with serious reservations. Thank you very much.

CHRIS BISHOP (National): It is a pleasure to take a brief call on this very important bill—in the third reading of this great bill. I want to start my remarks to the House—which are actually my first substantive comments in the House on a bill this year; I spoke previously in the debate on the Prime Minister’s statement last week, but this is the first bill that I have had the chance to speak on in this year of Parliament—by just briefly rebutting some of what Mr Nash said.

Mr Nash started his remarks by talking about the fact that the Finance and Expenditure Committee has considered eight or nine tax bills this term, and that is true. We have had a heavy workload, and one that, I have to say, Government members on the Finance and Expenditure Committee relish, Mr Nash. We relish the chance to consider these important bills, and I think it would be fair to say there is a bit of hyperbole from Mr Nash. Look, he is not a man traditionally given to hyperbole. He is usually a very sober and sage individual who makes good remarks, but that was hyperbole, because some of the bills that we have been considering on the Finance and Expenditure Committee are to do with Business Transformation.

Actually, everyone in the Parliament, I think, recognises that modernising the inland revenue systems—the computer systems and the IT systems that underpin our tax system—is really important. We have a debate around the cost and we scrutinise those things at the Finance and Expenditure Committee all the time, but, actually, everyone recognises that that is important and that it requires legislative change. So it is a little bit rich, I think, to complain about the number of tax bills when some of them have been to do with Business Transformation.

The second thing—and this is particularly apposite when it comes to this bill—is that we have been implementing the responses to the Shewan inquiry into foreign trusts and disclosure rules. It was the Labour Party and members opposite who spent a lot of 2016 talking about how we needed an inquiry, and when there has been an inquiry and we are now implementing the legislation in response to that inquiry, Mr Nash then gets up and complains about that. So I think it is a little rich to complain about the number of bills.

Then he said that the tax process in New Zealand is a farce. But, actually, we have a good process in New Zealand. We have a generic tax policy process where things are consulted on and advanced, and where the practitioners and the tax lawyers and those people out there, including some friends of mine—poor them—are able to participate in that process. And then we get the legislation, and then we get it coming before the select committee. So we have a very good process in New Zealand. I acknowledge what Mr Nash was saying about the volume of legislation. Probably it is a little bit higher in this term of Parliament than in the past, but that is a function, as I said, of a few things that I have already made mention of.

I want to briefly mention one thing in my speech, and that is the debate that we had at the Finance and Expenditure Committee around Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) 190. There was a lot of concern raised at the select committee, and also within the public comment around this bill, around the scope of what is known as the “Henry VIII” powers that are being given to the Government by this bill.

Fletcher Tabuteau: You were staunch on that, mate.

CHRIS BISHOP: Fair to say—Fletcher Tabuteau says, you know: “You were strong on that point.” I do have to say that we put the officials at the select committee under some scrutiny, because it is a big thing for Parliament to delegate, essentially, the power to change the law by fiat. It is a big thing for the Parliament to do that—to delegate that authority to the executive. Some of the excuses, or some of the reasons, given for that—and I think I can speak for the entirety of the Finance and Expenditure Committee on this—we did not find justifiable: that Parliament should delegate to the executive the power to change the law during the period of time that the IRD was moving from one type of computer system to another type of computer system. So we put some of those changes under some pretty heavy scrutiny, and we made some changes as a result of that.

So we limited the regulation power to administration issues arising from the transition between the old and the new systems. We made sure that those transitional regulations could not increase taxpayer liability. We excluded certain provisions of the Tax Administration Act. The original drafting of that SOP was extremely broad, giving the executive enormous powers through the Tax Administration Act—or power to change the Tax Administration Act—and we made sure that those regulations could not remove or diminish the rights of a taxpayer. That fettering of the very large discretion given to the executive, I think, has made the bill a better bill.

Just finally, this bill does implement the tax package announced by the Government through Budget 2016—the small to medium sized enterprise (SME) tax package. Mr Nash was going on about the provisional tax being the bane of his life when he was operating that small business in the bay. It is true to say that all members of the House, probably, over the years, have had gripes from the SME sector in particular about the payment of provisional tax. I think we should all welcome the fact that, as a result of Business Transformation and the advancement in technology, and also as a result of the legislative changes given effect to by this bill, life will be considerably easier. That is something to be applauded and welcomed, and is implemented by this legislation. Thank you.

GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central): Well, this is a long and winding road that we come to with this particular bill, and other speakers have outlined elements of it that the Labour Party does support. We always support taxation bills that come to this House that make it easier for taxpayers and that add to the robustness of our taxation system. I want to echo my colleague Stuart Nash’s view that, after 8 years and a bit of grinding work in the gears of Government, it finally said: “Yep, we’ll adopt Labour’s policy around flexible tax for business and small businesses.” You know, all power to the Government for seeing the light in that regard.

I do want to focus my contribution, however, around the matter of foreign trusts, because this is the piece of legislation that does, finally, add a little transparency to the question of the operation of foreign trusts in New Zealand. But that is about as good as it gets because, actually, what today marks is yet another marker post in the tawdry display that we have seen from this Government when it comes to New Zealand’s reputation around the world for transparency and for doing the right thing.

I just want to read to you a couple of paragraphs from a report that came out in January this year, called “Trust us—New Zealand can hide your money!”, in the Sarawak Report. It says this: “Time and again, investigators like Sarawak Report find themselves tracing large businesses linked to, for example, Malaysian politicians like Taib Mahmud, only to find the money disappearing behind New Zealand trusts. This was thrown into glaring perspective by the Panama Papers, which revealed how shadowy businessmen the world over were all choosing distant New Zealand to park their money … and one assumes such people are neither attracted by the weather nor the convenience of New Zealand’s location.” That is what people are writing about New Zealand today.

These trusts, which we are now seeing being exposed on a weekly basis since the Panama Papers came out, are about the super-wealthy hiding their money, not meeting their tax obligations in their countries of origin, and choosing New Zealand to hide their money. We have just seen the case—which is still going through the New Zealand courts, in fact—around 1Malaysia Development Berhad, or 1MDB, which is the Malaysian development fund case, where the Low family are attempting, through the court process, to make certain arrangements for their trusts. We know on the public record that when that family went looking for somewhere to hide their money, of all the places in the world they could choose, they chose the Cayman Islands and New Zealand. They went looking for a place that had a lax regime where there was no transparency, and they came to New Zealand. We should all reflect on what that means.

We should all reflect on the fact that when this was raised, when the Panama Papers came out, the then Prime Minister’s very first, reflexive decision was to say: “Oh, there’s $24 million worth of money coming in to lawyers and accountants here.” It was not “What is New Zealand’s reputation going to look like?”, or “Heaven forbid! What’s the right thing to do? What is the right thing, morally, to do?”. No, he passed it off.

And, in fact, he said on 4 April last year, when this came out: “New Zealand has full disclosure of information when it comes to foreign trusts.” That is demonstrably not true, because today we are changing the law to create more disclosure on the issue of foreign trusts. But the Prime Minister’s reflexive thing was to back Ken Whitney and all those tax accountants and New Zealand trust lawyers who have made their money out of hiding the money of other people, and that is just not right. It decreases the confidence of hard-working New Zealand taxpayers in the system, let alone our reputation internationally.

But this goes further back—and I do want to acknowledge the officials of the IRD who helped the Finance and Expenditure Committee with this bill and who have worked hard on this issue of foreign trusts for some years. But if we go back nearly 3 years, we find the Inland Revenue Department saying to its Minister: “We have a problem with foreign trusts. We have a problem with the perception of New Zealand. They are being misused. We need to tighten the rules.” And by November that year, the IRD officials had gone further and added to their work programme legislation being drafted to tighten the regime. In fact, as my colleague Stuart Nash said, they were looking at the option of dispensing with the whole regime, let alone just tightening it.

The IRD was doing that in 2014, in November. By early December, Ken Whitney was writing in to Todd McClay, who was the new Minister of Revenue, saying: “We are very concerned that you’re going to be shutting down the foreign trust industry. The Prime Minister has told me to write to you and has told me that’s not going to happen.” Todd McClay, as a good new Minister, said “The Prime Minister wants me to jump. I am just going to find out how high.”, and they ditched that work programme. And here we are, in February 2017, finally starting to clean up the mess—finally starting to do something about it. New Zealand’s reputation, as in the kinds of documents I have just been reading out before, has been trashed in the meantime because John Key preferred to protect his mates rather than the reputation of New Zealand, and I think that is shameful.

Foreign trusts are being misused every day, and if you just want to read about it, Mr Mossack and Mr Fonseca have finally found themselves being caught up with by authorities. There is a whole heap of New Zealand lawyers and accountants looking very closely at that, because they have very close links with those organisations. We should have done better, earlier. This bill gets us some of the way, so now we will actually be able to see who the trustees are, who the settlors are, who the beneficiaries are, and where they are coming from. At least that information will be available to the police and to the Department of Internal Affairs. But, on this side of the House, we stand by what we said in the select committee and at other readings, which is that we believe we should aim for the highest possible levels of transparency. That means having a searchable public register. We do it for charitable trusts, we do it for companies, and there is absolutely no reason why we should not shine the light on what is going on here, and do that when it comes to foreign trusts.

The other thing that is missing from this legislation as we pass it today, with regard to the foreign trust issue, is that this was the moment for the Government to bring in phase two of the anti - money-laundering rules. This was the occasion to say that we were going to clean it up completely. Lawyers, accountants, and real estate agents—the people who do the most handling of these issues—are not included under our anti - money-laundering rules. Casinos are and banks are, but not the very people involved at this end. The Government knew it could have done it—in fact, some Ministers wanted to do it—and Steven Joyce and John Key said: “Oh, it’s off the front page. Don’t worry about it.” Morality is for sale one more time on this issue.

Today we should be fulfilling our obligations under the anti - money-laundering rules, but we are not, and that is a huge gap in New Zealand’s law. The Government undertook in this House for us to see draft legislation to bring in stage two of the anti - money-laundering rules late last year. It said that we would see it this year. It is the middle of February—still nothing. It is going to be pushed out, it will not be implemented before the election, and that is very helpful for those who have been lobbying against it to make sure it does not come into force.

This Government is being dragged once again, kicking and screaming, to finally do something, and it is not good enough. New Zealand can do so much better than have a Government that grudgingly has to do something—grudgingly has to do the right thing.

I am proud to be part of a party that put its hand up straight away when we saw what was happening with the Panama Papers and said: “Let’s do something about this now. Let’s protect New Zealand’s reputation.” But, on the other side, those members had to be dragged, kicking and screaming, once the focus group had told them just how bad it was getting for them. That is not good enough.

New Zealand is a better country than one that allows people to hide their money and avoid their obligations overseas. We now have some changes here. That is a good thing. That will help. It will shed more light, but we should be doing more. We should be playing our part on the world stage to stamp out this kind of corruption, not stand beside it and say that having $24 million worth of money going to lawyers and accountants justifies New Zealand being caught up in global corruption.

People are writing about New Zealand as a place where the mega-wealthy can hide their money and avoid their obligations. That is not the New Zealand I want to be proud of. I want to see us have a regime that is fully transparent, and one where we do the right thing on the world stage. You will get that with legislation from a Labour Government. Sadly, we have not got it from National.

ALASTAIR SCOTT (National—Wairarapa): It seems that the two major parties are not too far away from each other in agreeing with much of the Taxation (Business Tax, Exchange of Information, and Remedial Matters) Bill, which is always quite interesting. A lot of people do not understand that there is often agreement across the House on a lot of legislation. It might just be to the degree. Mr Robertson has pointed this out, particularly around the anti - money-laundering and counterfeiting financing reforms, which he says are not coming soon enough. Then, of course, we had Mr Nash, who was complaining about the workload of the Finance and Expenditure Committee and wanted to do less. I think we have probably got a pretty good balance. As Mr Robertson said, we will see that anti - money-laundering legislation come through later in the year.

Turning to this particular bill, at its third reading, as we have seen across the House already, there are three major parts to it. Once again, I am going to focus on the small business part and the “AIM”, the accounting income method, of calculating provisional tax. It is good to see that there is some experience among the Opposition in calculating and experiencing the payment of provisional tax. It is a difficult tax to calculate and estimate. It is not so much that people lobby us; it is just that we on this side have our own experience of doing it. We do not necessarily need to be told by our constituents what should or should not happen; a lot of people over here actually run, and continue to run, small businesses.

Again, we agree that the pay-as-you-go option that is available to taxpayers—small-business people—is a good thing because small businesses need to continue to be supported. We talk about employment and we talk about supporting workers. We can only support workers if we support the employers. The employers are the ones who employ the employees. If we are not going to look after the employers, we are going to have problems in supporting employees in the workforce.

This is a very good, sensible piece of legislation around the accounting income method. There are two other points that relate to this bill. The first is compliance with an international agreement—the G20 Standard for Automatic Exchange of Financial Account Information, which has been mentioned. We also have the recommendations of the Global Forum on Transparency and Exchange of Information for Tax Purposes, with the registration of foreign trusts by local trustees. The local trustees must disclose information about foreign trusts that they are aware of. If they do not, those trusts will not be exempt from the current tax-free status that they enjoy, being foreign trusts. It is a fine piece of legislation. I commend it to the House.

FLETCHER TABUTEAU (NZ First): I rise on behalf of New Zealand First to speak to the Taxation (Business Tax, Exchange of Information, and Remedial Matters) Bill. I intend to take a short call because I note, despite the variation of the theme, that all of us in this House actually support the legislation. My first observation is that when the Minister of Revenue came into the House to speak to the third reading, she genuinely looked quite sad. She looked sad. She spoke in a very sad way. One can only assume that she chose this portfolio. It was quite disheartening. For example, Mr Bishop and Mr Bayly are quite exuberant when they speak about tax legislation on behalf of the National Government. For once, the National Government has a lot to be proud of with regard to new legislation.

I do want to touch on what is wrong, what has been missed out, and the opportunity that was not taken. I speak specifically—and I use the very important example—of the Chinese Premier who came to New Zealand several years ago. He spoke specifically to the ruling party here, the National Government, and said: “We need your help.” What he was referring to, in reference to that assistance, was specifically around—in his case—Chinese criminals who had stolen funds and appropriated assets illegally. Those criminals were bringing those assets to New Zealand because New Zealand was—and, I posit, is still—a place to hide assets.

According to China’s own numbers, at the time New Zealand—this was only a few years ago—harboured 11 percent of China’s top most wanted criminals in this space. That is 11 percent in New Zealand, all by itself. The assistance was about closing up these loopholes. Too many people from overseas were coming to New Zealand and using the foreign trust laws—the trust laws around accountants, lawyers, and real estate agents—literally to hide money. At the time, they were using other methods as well. New Zealand First agreed completely. We posited and put it to the National Government that it needed to act quickly and promptly to close these loopholes. It knew what to do. We gave it our suggestions. It took nothing on board.

I do have to say, actually, with some genuine surprise, that three-quarters of the Shewan report was taken up by the Government in this legislation. I have to say that I was genuinely surprised at the vigorous nature with which it was written into the bill. I say that because the Prime Minister at that time stood in front of the country and not only said “There is no problem here; look away.” but also suggested and insinuated that an attack on international companies using New Zealand as a way to hide illicit funds was an unpatriotic act because we were compromising a $24 million legal industry. It was appalling. It was absolutely appalling, and hence my genuine surprise when, in my participation in the Finance and Expenditure Committee, I saw genuine efforts being made to take on the recommendations from the Shewan report.

It is with that particular reference in mind that I do congratulate the Government on being vigorous and thorough in doing so, but it has not gone far enough. It has been spoken about several times tonight. There is still a gaping hole, literally, in our legislation that allows the same individuals, the same international corporates, and the same criminals to use New Zealand as a way to hide money—to launder money, even. So we still have that problem and New Zealand First will do something about it if we are in a position to do so later in the year.

I did claim I would give a short contribution, so I move to what has been positive in this legislation. It has been mentioned by the speakers from the National side of the House, and it has to do with the accounting income method (AIM) component of the legislation. It is kind of like “Who said it first?”, but we have quite a strong history of watching Labour take verbatim our policy, and this is no exception. Then we have a strong history of watching National members claim to not take anything of ours and then kind of corrupt it and degrade its potential impact in the process of hiding the fact that they took it from our policy books. I speak, of course, with reference to something that we have been trying to lobby this Government for a long time, and that has been around the new AIM legislation, ensuring that that pay-as-you-go, as it were, component of this legislation was there so that small business can carry on in a much more pragmatic and straightforward way.

There will be a few issues on uptake, but, again, in the legislation we do have some good aspects around some of the big accounting houses with the cloud software being able to act as intermediaries and support agencies in that process. I genuinely believe small business will be better for it. I genuinely believe that, because it was a New Zealand First policy. I chide the Government for taking so long in bringing it to the House, but here we are now, nearly 9 years later. I am sure small business is applauding this decision.

In conclusion, in the main, this is a good piece of legislation with full support from the House. We have got a few more steps to go, but here we are, and I congratulate the Government on this legislation.

JAMES SHAW (Co-Leader—Green): It is a pleasure to rise and offer the Green Party’s support for the Taxation (Business Tax, Exchange of Information, and Remedial Matters) Bill. I would like to start by paying tribute to my predecessor, Dr Russel Norman, because, in many ways, this bill is a vindication of much of his work since 2012, when he first started calling attention to the issue of the foreign trust disclosure regime in New Zealand. That was brought to his attention, initially, by concerns that were made public under the Official Information Act from the Inland Revenue Department, which had, in 2012, started alerting the Government that our foreign trust disclosure regime was inadequate and that it posed, at the very least, a reputational risk to New Zealand.

The fact is that it has taken some 4 years for that issue to work its way through the system, from, at first, quiet warnings from the Government’s own agency, up through what was a reasonably spectacular media event last year—huge amounts of public concern—eventually to an inquiry followed by legislation introduced to the House by the Government.

There has been some history to this, and I think it is a tribute to his work, to the work of the Inland Revenue Department, which has persisted in spite of resistance from the Government, and to the media. Journalists like Matt Nippert from the New Zealand Herald and others have done a huge amount of fantastic investigative journalism, raising what is a very complex issue in the public mind to the point that public pressure built and the Government had to respond and try to politically kill this off by bringing in John Shewan—the Shewan report—which has led to this legislation. So thank you to all of those people who, through all of those years, have done all of that work that has led to this piece of legislation that we see passing through tonight.

As a number of other speakers have said, this is not a perfect piece of legislation. It does not actually accept all of the recommendations of the Shewan report; it goes only part of the way. So we would hope to have the opportunity to amend it so that all of the recommendations of the Shewan report are actually brought into legislation as soon as possible.

The other thing, of course, is that it is an extremely complex piece of work. Having sat through part of the select committee stage on it, working through with the officials how it was going to work, having heard some of the submissions and some of the concerns of submitters, it does worry me, like any very complex piece of legislation, that it may not have the effect that is intended. Of course, obviously, the officials who have drawn it up have worked very hard to make sure that it will, but I would like to get some assurance from the Minister of Revenue that there will be some very close monitoring over the course of the next 12 to 24 months to make sure that the bill does actually have the effect that it is intended to address, because of the complexity of it and many of the unknowns around this. So I think I would like to hear yet from the Minister some assurance around that.

I also just wanted to reflect on the risk that leaving it unaddressed does pose, or has posed, to New Zealand’s reputation. I do find it quite ironic that only 5 days ago Bloomberg—that fairly well-known multinational news corporation—did carry a story, the headline of which was “New Zealand, a destination for ultra-rich to park their wealth, has a murky trust issue”. That is only 5 days ago, despite the assurances that the Government and the Prime Minister at the time kept saying: that there was no problem in New Zealand, that we have got full disclosure, and that there is no reputational risk whatsoever. We actually see in the international business media now that some of the issues that we were concerned about last year and the year before that and the year before that are actually starting to come up to the surface. So it is timely that we are introducing this piece of legislation now, and, like I said, I do hope that it has the effect that is intended.

I would like to also call attention to the tax simplification for small and medium enterprises, because, again, this does represent a significant win, and it is great to see parties all claiming credit for having introduced that notion into the House. I fought for this when I was the candidate for Wellington Central in 2011 and again in 2014. I have been a small business person myself, and the way that we manage tax for small businesses does make it very difficult to manage cash flow. If you’re in a situation like I was in, where cash flow is extremely lumpy, it is never certain what is going to happen in the future, and yet you are required to set aside amounts based on previous years’ revenue that may have very little bearing on this year’s revenue. It does make it very difficult for small businesses to operate and to manage their cash flow. Because of that, that is an incentive for small businesses to do things to manage their cash flow that actually run up against the law, and we do not want that. We do not want to make it so hard for people that they are, essentially, forced into breaking the law or operating in violation of regulations.

I am really pleased that the House has coalesced around this idea over a number of years from a number of different sources, and I think that it is great that we are able to do that. I also just wanted to acknowledge the point that Chris Bishop made in his speech, where he was talking about the requirement for, essentially, an inland revenue computer system that is up to the task and the huge amount of work that is required in order for some of these changes to actually be able to take effect in reality; that we have actually got to have an inland revenue computer system that does the job. And so I recognise that part of the reason for the delay, particularly around the accounting income method and some of the other measures contained in this bill, is that they have, essentially, been held up by the fact that New Zealand’s systems have not yet been adequate to be able to do it.

So it is great to see some progress on that. But I think that that is, in the small business world, one of those things that I think really does stick in the craw of a lot of people. I think it is one of those things that is a pretty dry subject—not a lot of people will notice it at first—but I do think that that is one of those things that we can, with some pleasure, say: that we are doing a lot of people a lot of good through this piece of legislation.

I also would like to say that it is important that we continue to monitor the effect of the legislation around some of those issues as well—for example, this bill does include some changes around fringe benefit tax. I have a concern based on some of the submissions that I heard, that some of those changes produce some quite odd incentives for behaviour and, therefore, that means we need to make sure that we are not distorting the market in any way—or in any way that is kind of daft—as a result of some of those changes. So, again, I think that I would like to hear from the Minister about how it is that we intend to monitor the effect of this bill as it goes through.

In conclusion, we will be supporting this bill again, in its third reading. It is a pleasure to see that it passed through the House. It is great to see finally, after many years of campaigning by many people, some progress at least on the issue of changes to the disclosure regime around foreign trusts. It is disappointing that the Government’s own review did not actually make it fully into the legislation, and we will be looking for ways to improve on it in the future. But, for the most part, we are greatly relieved that this bill is here, that it is making its way through the House, and we wish it all the best. Thank you.

ANDREW BAYLY (National—Hunua): It is a pleasure to be talking on this Taxation (Business Tax, Exchange of Information, and Remedial Matters) Bill in its third reading. It is also great to hear that all parties in Parliament are supporting this excellent bill. As we have all heard, it has four key aspects.

First of all, it makes paying tax easier for businesses, which for business owners is absolutely essential. So just to recap on that: for existing payment methods, which involves provisional tax and terminal tax, what we have done in this bill is actually increase the use of money interest and increase the safe harbour provisions from $50,000 to $60,000, but we have also removed, in this bill, the penalties around use of money for the first two provisional payments. So that is for taxpayers who choose to use the existing payment system for their tax. But the major change is really the new accounting income method, which actually allows people to pay their tax, such as they do with GST, as they go, which, personally, I think is a very good proposal and a fantastic initiative for those 500,000 small businesses in New Zealand.

The second aspect of the bill—the main aspect—is about the automatic exchange of financial accounting information on tax matters. We have picked up some of the issues and recommendations. We are moving to implement them as fast as possible. But the two key changes in this part of the bill are about requiring foreign trusts to be registered with the Inland Revenue Department when they are established and allowing the Inland Revenue Department to actually check with other agencies regarding their status.

Secondly, this bill requires foreign trustees of a foreign trust to file an annual return. There are a whole lot of specific recommendations and requirements—I certainly covered this in the second reading debate—but they are very, very specific and entail a lot of detail that needs to be updated regularly on an annual basis. So I think that striking the balance around that has been really important.

The third part is around the deployment of stage one of the Inland Revenue project. Most people do not know the scale of it. It was originally going to be about a $1.8 billion project. It is now projected to cost under $1 billion. There are four stages to it. This bill deals with the first stage, and it just makes that able to happen and enables that from a statutory perspective. At the moment there is a rollout of GST coming on the first stage of the IRD platform, which is great to see. Of course, when this whole programme comes to pass and is completed and implemented, it will provide a much better connectivity between the IRD and taxpayers.

Of course, the last one is around the foreign trust disclosure rules. Obviously, there has been a lot of debate about this in Parliament. Personally, I think we have struck a good balance between what we think is absolutely required and the issue of perception. I think where we have ended up will hold New Zealand in good stead internationally, in terms of being seen as a very good place for business. Of course, we are number one in terms of being the least corrupt country in the world, and that just reinforces that position. I think this bill does that and supports and underpins it, and on that basis I commend this bill to the House.

Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE (Labour): This Taxation (Business Tax, Exchange of Information, and Remedial Matters) Bill has had a fairly robust airing over many, many months since it was first proposed by the Government and put to the Finance and Expenditure Committee. In the brief call that I have available I am going to touch on three points that other members have touched on because they are important, and, secondly, because there has been no explanation given from the Government as to why it acted in such a way.

Other members have mentioned that the bill fails completely to implement phase two of the anti - money-laundering provisions in respect of lawyers, real estate agents, and accountants. They have waxed eloquent for many, many hours in this place in respect of how good this legislation is and what a great job it will do, but those particular three sectors of our economy are exposed in terms of their transactions and should have been catered for in this legislation.

I was the Associate Minister of Justice when the then Government implemented the anti -money-laundering provisions, the Financial Action Task Force on Money Laundering provisions, in respect of banking and others. We did it because of international obligations. It was appropriate to do. We called those interest groups in and we explained what we were going to do. We worked with them to minimise cost, and we implemented them.

No one from the new Minister, the previous Minister, or the Minister before that has explained to us why those provisions are not catered for in here. If there was a reason—there may be a logical reason—it would be helpful to know. No one in Government has managed to tell us when phase two of the anti - money-laundering rules and regulations will be implemented in any way, shape, or form, as far as we know. So, given that it is an international obligation, it would be appropriate for somebody in the Government to provide some sort of direction on that.

The Government has made much of the so-called register. But, again, there is no explanation from the Minister, or the previous Minister, who initiated this legislation, as to why that register is not public. It is limited to IRD, the Department of Internal Affairs, and the Police. It is in no way public and no one has been able to—I have asked the question I think three times, as have other colleagues, as to where the mischief lies in having an open public register for the trustees, for the beneficiaries, or for anybody else in that space.

We have had Government speaker after Government speaker say, as I have said, that it is such a wonderful thing. Well, could they answer that simple question? Because this register does not meet the test of an open and transparent public register. If you are a foreign Government and you are concerned about the nefarious activity in this space, you will not be able, as a Government or as an international authority, to get access to this register. You will not be able to look at it. You will have to go through other Government agencies, but you will not be able to penetrate it in a transparent way and gain that information. The question I have for this Government is: if it is so concerned about transparency, if it believes that this is world-class, best-in-class legislation, why did it not make that public?

There may not be an explanation. I suspect there is, but they do not want to talk about it. I challenge the next National Government speaker to take up the challenge on those two points. Mr Ross—he might, given that he is on the Financial and Expenditure Committee—be able to answer those two questions: why no public register?

Jami-Lee Ross: I’m not as smart as you, Clayton.

Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE: Well, no, no. The member says he is not as smart as me. I am smart enough to ask the question; he is not smart enough to provide an answer to the question. That is the difficulty we have. If you are such a smart guy—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! I regret to say it is time for us to have some kai. Someone will resume the Chair at 7.30 p.m.

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

BARRY COATES (Green): Tēnā koutou e ngā mema Pāremata. I rise to speak about the tax bill.

Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: A 5-minute call.

BARRY COATES: The Green Party supports this bill. We do so with considerable reservations, and I wanted to introduce why we have concerns. A large part of this tax bill is in response to the issue of foreign trusts. Foreign trusts, from our perspective, are a part of our business dealings that should never have happened. New Zealand’s reputation, as has been previously pointed out by colleagues like Russell Norman over a period of years and by the IRD, has been sullied by foreign trusts. We have been widely regarded as a country that has provided a haven for hot money that is evading tax. We have been regarded as a place where organised crime and drug money could be laundered. I think this is the kind of business that New Zealand should not have been encouraging.

To the extent that this bill is remedying some basic rules around foreign trusts, we support it. However, we do not think it goes far enough. For example, one of the issues is the degree of transparency that is provided for in this bill. Transparency is the antidote to this kind of hot money and the evasion from tax and other forms of international regulation. Unfortunately, the device—the mechanism—that is included in this bill for foreign trusts is a register that is limited in its transparency. By comparison, if we look at the register of companies or the register of trusts in New Zealand, for example, what we see is that you can search these registers as a member of the public. However, this piece of legislation, as currently drafted, does not include that transparency. There is an insufficient basis for being able to understand what these foreign trusts are doing in New Zealand. I think that is a huge missed opportunity with regard to this bill. We need to crack down on tax havens.

As pointed out in the Shewan report, we also need to crack down on money laundering. We have been waiting for phase two of the anti - money-laundering provisions, which have not been included in this legislation. We have known for a long time about multinational companies that are able to evade New Zealand taxes while wage and salary earners bear the brunt of paying taxes in our country. Multinationals get away with being able to use transfer pricing to transfer their profits to countries where they pay little or no taxes, and then they compete unfairly with New Zealand companies. They put the burden of tax on most New Zealanders. That is wrong. This bill should have included a far more comprehensive closure of tax loopholes.

There are, however, some elements of this bill that we support. There is a simplification of tax that helps small and medium sized enterprises. There is a pay-as-you-go provision for tax, which is good for cash flow for small and medium sized enterprises, and that is good for New Zealand business. Small companies need that—cash flow is king—and they need these changes in this legislation. It is why we have decided to support this bill. We think that it is a step in the right direction. The Government needs to be accountable for taking the next steps and doing it urgently so that New Zealand can become a place to do business that we are proud of, not where we hang our heads in shame. Thank you.

MICHAEL WOOD (Labour—Mt Roskill): It is a pleasure to take a call to speak on the Taxation (Business Tax, Exchange of Information, and Remedial Matters) Bill, although I must concede some disappointment that the Minister of Revenue has not stuck around after the dinner break. I have very fond memories of one of my first political—

Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: We do not refer to members’ presence or not in the House.

MICHAEL WOOD: Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. None the less I have very fond memories of earlier debates with the Minister—my first political debate, in fact, when we engaged over the question of the Iraq war. I have admired the Minister’s tenacity and consistency since then, even sometimes in the face of overwhelming facts.

I want to begin on a positive note by drawing attention to the aspects of this bill that Labour supports. Of course we are supporting this bill with some reservations, which I will come to later. Those positive aspects have been noted by colleagues earlier, and they relate to Part 2 and Part 3 of the bill. Across the House there is very strong support for measures to simplify and streamline taxation matters for businesses, particularly small businesses, in respect of provisional tax. I think that is something that we can all applaud across this House.

As we have heard during the speeches this evening, various parties—and certainly my own party, the Labour Party—have for a long time advocated for these kinds of measures. Every single one of our constituencies across the country has small businesses, often operating with real constraints, people putting themselves on the line, doing what they can to contribute to our community and employ people, and the question of provisional tax is a difficult one for them. Cash flow can be lumpy and unpredictable at the very best of times. What we know about most of the small businesses—and there are about 110,000 that fall in this category—is that most of them want to do the right thing. Most of them want to contribute to our community. Most of them want to pay the tax that they know they owe to keep our society and our community going, but we have got to find ways of making it easier and more manageable for them. So the measures in this bill that lessen penalties, that streamline the system, and, most importantly, that deal with those tricky things around provisional tax are to be commended, and the Labour Party fulsomely supports them.

But moving on to the reservations, to me the question here is about doing a job and doing it properly the first time; not identifying a problem and doing half a job of fixing it up. In respect of foreign trusts, that is what we are seeing in this bill. What we have at the moment is no transparency about foreign trusts in our country. This bill gives us some transparency, but it is most certainly not enough transparency. It is my view that an important starting point is to define the problem, and to actually concede that there is a problem here. That might be the issue at hand, because of course the Government was very, very reluctant to concede—and very, very tardy in conceding—that there was a problem to begin with.

We have to remember that it was back in 2013 that officials from the IRD came to the Government and said: “We have a serious issue with foreign trusts. It’s not just some matter of technical interest. This is something that is putting New Zealand’s international reputation on the line.” The IRD officials came to the Government, came to the Minister, with that view, which they had formed—and they had formed it on the basis of good evidence. They had been watching, they had been observing, and they had seen that foreign trusts had increased, from 6,000 to around 12,000 between 2006 and 2012, and they took that to the Minister. And what happened? Well, we know what happened. We know that there were discussions between the Minister and the Prime Minister, and we know that the work that IRD commenced in this area got cut off at the knees.

And then we went through that farcical period where we had the news of Mossack Fonseca raining down through our media. We had our leading business journalists, people like Matt Nippert and Fran O’Sullivan, pointing to the fact that there was a significant problem in this area—

Chris Bishop: Matt will be happy. “Leading journo”—Matt will be happy.

MICHAEL WOOD: Foreign trusts were making a mockery of New Zealand’s reputation, which is something that Mr Bishop is appalled by. I can see that right now.

But the Government continued to resist. The former Prime Minister, Mr Key—what did he say? He said that we had transparency. He said that it was economic sabotage to be considering bringing in greater transparency to the foreign trusts regime in New Zealand. But the heat simply got to be too much for this Government. Eventually, after huge pressure, we got the Shewan report. What he said was very clear. He said that our existing rules were not fit for purpose—they were not fit for purpose. There is one very important thing that he added on to that. He said that they were not fit for purpose in respect of our cooperation with other jurisdictions. I want to return to why that is important, a little later.

I want to turn back now to what the bill actually does deliver, because it does deliver some transparency. It means that we will have a record of the names of trusts, the settlement details, and trustee and settlor contacts. That is a good start. It means that the police and the IRD, where they have reason to believe that there is something criminal or improper going on, have the ability to pull up that information.

But there is an obvious “Rumsfeldian” problem, and that is the problem of unknown unknowns. What we do not have is a truly open and a truly transparent register, which is the obvious thing to do. It is the obvious thing to do. What we are relying upon is investigating authorities from other regimes, from other jurisdictions, knowing that there is a problem and sort of having enough detail to mount a bit of a fishing expedition. I have not heard, in any of the speeches that have been provided by the Government in this debate, any good reason whatsoever put forward for that lack of transparency. Labour is asking that question, and when Labour has the ability to make a change here, we will ensure that foreign trusts are fully searchable through a register.

That is where I want to come back to the question of being not fit for purpose—not fit for purpose—according to Mr Shewan, in respect of our cooperation with other jurisdictions. How are we enhancing that cooperation with our friends and allies if they sort of have to sniff around and ask the right questions to try to uncover details of potentially criminal dealings and tax evasion from their citizens taking advantage of New Zealand’s foreign tax trust law status?

The question has to be why, when New Zealand companies and New Zealand charities are on a fully searchable register, we would provide this level of protection to foreign trusts. Mr Bayly, speaking earlier, spoke of foreign trusts as though they were businesses. Well, they are not—they are not. Foreign trusts do not contribute anything to our country. They are not paying taxes to support our system here in New Zealand. These are wealthy individuals from overseas jurisdictions, who are often hiding wealth in highly unethical ways, and there is plenty of literature on that. Why would we give them a greater cloak of secrecy than we give Kiwi charities and companies in New Zealand? That is something that this Government has singularly failed to answer, and that needs to be resolved.

As has been outlined by my colleagues, the bill also stops short of implementing phase two of the anti - money-laundering provisions. Again, there has been no explanation offered on that in the debate in this House. What we always hear from the Government benches whenever regulations are introduced, whenever there is a suggestion that a regulation should be introduced, is this argument that you have got to be very careful about that because smart lawyers will always find a way round it. That is often given as a reason for not introducing public-good regulations.

What we are doing in this case is we are leaving gaping big holes that we can identify. We are not bringing real estate in, we are not bringing the lawyers in, and we are not bringing the accountants in, when there is plenty of evidence that if you close off one avenue, that is where the hot money from overseas will go to be laundered.

Is it still a big issue? Absolutely, yes it is. My colleague Mr Robertson referred to the 1Malaysia Development Berhad case, which has made major international news, again affecting New Zealand’s reputation. It has impacted on our courts system. You have to ask why a foreign trust that owns a Bombardier plane, has penthouses in New York, has hundreds of millions of dollars of these assets in overseas jurisdictions—what is the point of that trust being registered here in New Zealand? It does absolutely no good for our country, and it can only raise the suspicion of our friends and allies on the international stage that our institutions are being used to rip them off.

So, in that respect, this bill does not meet that test of Mr Shewan’s, of enhancing our reputation and ensuring that we are cooperating with other jurisdictions that we would want to be cooperating with. I might note the comments from Mr Michael Littlewood from the University of Auckland, who noted that around the world we have tens, if not hundreds, of billions of dollars sloshing around internationally in these trusts. I say that we should have absolute transparency over what is happening there.

I just want to finish by saying that the Prime Minister began the year by saying that the Government had reached its limits, and it is kind of like that with foreign trusts as well. They knew there was political pressure, they had to do something, but they have reached the limits and they are not delivering the transparency that we need. Thank you.

Bill read a third time.

Bills

Broadcasting (Election Programmes and Election Advertising) Amendment Bill

Electoral Amendment Bill

Second Readings

Hon AMY ADAMS (Minister of Justice) on behalf of the Associate Minister of Justice: I move, That the Broadcasting (Election Programmes and Election Advertising) Amendment Bill and the Electoral Amendment Bill be now read a second time. Both of these bills were introduced into the House in my name but since that time they have transferred to the delegation of the Hon Mark Mitchell, and I make this speech on his behalf. New Zealand has a robust and effective electoral system. Both of these bills respond to the recommendations of the Justice and Electoral Committee inquiry into the 2014 general election and will help modernise and simplify the election rules. With the election fast approaching this year, it is in everyone’s best interests to ensure that the rules are clear for everyone, well before the public head out to vote. That is why these bills have been cognated to be progressed as quickly as possible, as they are closely interrelated.

With this mind, I would like to thank the parties that took part in the select committee for taking a very constructive approach in reporting back at the end of last year. Having these amendments to electoral law enacted in a timely manner is important so that the rules are clear for all parties, voters, and other participants. Can I also recognise those members of the public who took the time to make submissions.

Both bills deal with related matters of electoral law. As highlighted during their respective first readings, they implement some important changes to enhance the efficient delivery of elections. The Broadcasting (Election Programmes and Election Advertising) Amendment Bill modernises election broadcasting and funding rules in the Broadcasting Act, following a unanimous recommendation of the select committee. The bill removes parties’ opening and closing election addresses, in favour of an increased allocation for each party. Although the actual allocation amount is not in the bill, it will allow parties to spend their Broadcasting Act funding allocation to advertise with more flexibility across platforms, such as the internet, reflecting, of course, the different ways that voters now seek to get their information.

The Electoral Amendment Bill reflects the changing needs and expectations of voters, and will help modernise electoral law and practices. For example, the bill will enable the Electoral Commission to provide information to voters electronically and will allow the counting of advance votes to begin earlier on election day, to reflect the increased popularity of advance voting.

The interrelation of the two bills is clear in the committee’s recommendation that a new expense return for allocations under the Broadcasting Act be added to the Electoral Act—a change I will talk more about shortly.

I would like to touch briefly on other changes to these bills, as recommended by the Justice and Electoral Committee, beginning with the Broadcasting (Election Programmes and Election Advertising) Amendment Bill. The first of these changes is a minor amendment to clarify the relationship between the Electoral Act expense limits and parties’ funding allocations under the Broadcasting Act. The committee has also recommended an amendment to ensure that the Electoral Commission remains required to report to police when it believes an offence has been committed under Part 6 of the Act. One further minor amendment to the Broadcasting (Election Programmes and Election Advertising) Amendment Bill, recommended by the committee, ensures that the offence of arranging for prohibited election programmes applies only when doing so for a political party, as is currently the case.

I would now like to turn to the committee’s recommendations for the Electoral Amendment Bill. As I have already mentioned, the first of these directly relates to the Broadcasting Act, and highlights, again, why it is appropriate to consider these bills together. The funding allocation under the Broadcasting Act will no longer be limited to use on TV and radio. In order to provide continued transparency and assurance that the allocation is still being used appropriately the committee recommended adding to the Electoral Amendment Bill a requirement for parties to file a public, audited return of how they have spent their allocation. Adding this to the Electoral Act means that the new requirement can follow the same process in that Act, which is already used for parties’ other types of expenses and is well understood by them.

This requirement will replace the existing safety in the Broadcasting Act of broadcasters themselves providing returns of all election programmes broadcast, which would have been impractical to extend to all providers of online content and advertising. The committee has also recommended a minor amendment to the provision that prohibits electioneering within 10 metres of the entrance of an advance voting place, to clarify how some of the restrictions apply to electoral officials.

A further recommendation of the committee is to remove the provision that makes it an offence for a former MP to sit or vote in the House after they have vacated their seat by way of an appointment as a public servant or returning officer. The committee has recommended removing this offence due to its limited relevance and the fact that the situation it covers is highly unlikely to occur in practice. The committee considers that should the situation occur it would be a matter more appropriately dealt with by the House of Representatives itself, under the Parliamentary Privilege Act. The committee has also recommended a number of other minor and technical amendments to these bills, which largely clarify the current provisions and correct inconsistencies in the current legislation.

Can I first of all thank the committee members for their careful consideration of these bills and acknowledge the outgoing chair of that committee, the Hon Jacqui Dean. Regular reviews of electoral law are an integral part of maintaining New Zealand’s robust and efficient system of electoral law, and these changes reflect that same due diligence by the committee. The changes we are making in these bills will help simplify and clarify the election rules, leading to a smoother election process, and better reflect the changing needs and expectations of voters and political parties and candidates. I commend the bills to the House.

CLARE CURRAN (Labour—Dunedin South): I rise to speak in the second reading debate of the Broadcasting (Election Programmes and Election Advertising) Amendment Bill and the Electoral Amendment Bill, which are, as the Minister has said, cognated. Labour supports these bills. We commend the Justice and Electoral Committee for the work that has been done. We also commend the Minister for her efforts in reforming and modernising various pieces of legislation over the last few years, with a small plea: please can the Privacy Act be next, in terms of introducing mandatory reporting for privacy breaches and providing more teeth to the Privacy Commissioner?

With regard to this legislation, these two bills follow a fairly substantial piece of work following the last general election, in 2014—a report from the Justice and Electoral Committee, from which there were 28 recommendations. That committee did do a substantial piece of work. These two bills include 12 of those recommendations in the second part of this legislation.

The substance, with regard to the first bill—the Broadcasting (Election Programmes and Election Advertising) Amendment Bill—as the Minister said, modernises and updates the format of election broadcasts in time for the 2017 election, this year. It removes the requirement for the political parties’ opening and closing election broadcasts, which are seen—and I think there is fairly substantial evidence for them being seen—as an anachronism in today’s world. It also removes the requirement for TVNZ and Radio New Zealand to provide free time for those broadcasts. Instead this legislation allocates the equivalent of this time into an increase in the broadcast funding allocation.

For a large part of the New Zealand population, those television opening and closing statements are outdated. People’s viewing habits are changing—fewer people are watching those set-piece broadcasts. This legislation increases the flexibility that political parties have to use their allocation for election programmes.

I just want to reference the submission by the Labour Party to the inquiry that the select committee conducted, which went into some depth about the limitations of the existing regime that result in increasingly inefficient use of public funds by all parties. And this is not just relating to the Labour Party; this basically relates to the inefficiency generally of the system, which is why we are changing it. It noted that “Media consumption habits and marketing tools have changed hugely over the past 10 years. The public no longer embrace and ‘consume’ generic marketing messages. New Zealanders expect interactivity and personal relevance from all the brands they choose to engage with, including political parties. Although this is [especially true] of younger voters, the changes [are really being viewed] across all demographics.”—and I think that is probably pretty evident by the rise of Facebook and the demographics of the people who are using that. “The Broadcasting Allocation rules restrict the budget to the purchase of media and production costs for TV, radio and press only. These channels, although relevant and able to provide reasonable reach, provide decreasing cut-through as the public use modern tools (such as My Sky, [video on demand]) to filter out broadcast adverts.”

So, essentially, this is sensible, and it actually is going to enable there to be a much greater reachability and flexibility for there to be communication and engagement during our important 3-yearly event that is an election campaign, which is when we engage with voters and is a really important part of what we do.

Jono Naylor: Man, we do it all the time; we don’t do it every 3 years.

CLARE CURRAN: Of course we do, but this is the prescribed, funded part of that process, and it is important that we get it right and that we are up with the times. The Electoral Amendment Bill implements, as I think I said, the unanimous select committee report recommendations from the Justice and Electoral Committee Inquiry into the 2014 General Election. It implements 12 of those 28 recommendations.

The select committee stated that only those changes that could be realistically implemented in time for the September 2017 election would be included. The Government suggested, or indicated, that it will consider some other recommendations—that require, as it said, more time—for 2020. I want to touch on this because there are some particular issues around those recommendations that have not been included, which is a bit disappointing, in the sense that they have disenfranchised the thousands of voters who have not completed the enrolment activity that they could have done before the election. Although there is some capacity there for them to have their votes counted, there is also that disenfranchising that means that many of them are unlikely to, and that really does matter. If this Government is really serious about the recommendations that are included in this report, then these really should have been taken more seriously and given a higher weighting, a higher priority.

In the last election almost 10 percent of the population who were eligible to be on the electoral roll did not sign up before election day. Numbers suggest that the failure to enrol does not always mean that a voter does not want to participate. For the 2014 election more than 27,000 voters made the effort to vote but had their vote disallowed because they were not on the electoral roll. That is the population of a town, and that matters. That should be something that is taken really very seriously and should not be pushed out to 2020; it should have been addressed now and I am looking forward to asking some questions about that at the Committee stage, because we do not make the process of enrolling and voting as easy as we could, especially for those who change address and therefore fail to enrol, or those who are enrolling for the first time before the official roll is printed. So we have some concerns about that.

The integrity of the voting system has been well maintained, with the significant increase in early voting, and we do not accept that the risk outweighs the benefit of ensuring that next time possibly 27,000 votes will be counted.

Finally, I just want to make a couple of remarks about the fact that one of these cognate bills is a broadcasting bill and makes changes to the Broadcasting Act—section 6 of the Broadcasting Act—yet in the recent reshuffle just before Christmas the new, unelected Prime Minister disestablished the broadcasting ministership portfolio and that has gone floating into the ether—

Chris Bishop: What do you mean, “unelected Prime Minister”?

CLARE CURRAN: He has not been elected by the voters, which relates to the bills that we are actually discussing. This broadcasting portfolio has been disestablished. It has been divided between communications on the one hand; arts, culture, and heritage on the other. During the 1990s this portfolio under a National Government was folded into the communications portfolio, and one of the first things Labour did in 1999 when it became Government was to separate it out and give it the status that it needed. This is a really worrying development. There is no indication as to how those functions are actually going to be performed under this Government.

SARAH DOWIE (National—Invercargill): I am very pleased to rise as the newly elected chairperson of the Justice and Electoral Committee. It is interesting to follow after Ms Curran because Ms Jacqui Dean, who was the outgoing chair of the Justice and Electoral Committee and has now risen to ministerial rank, explained to me what a collegial—

Chris Bishop: A bright future!

SARAH DOWIE: A bright future—absolutely, Mr Bishop. She had explained to me how collegial the committee was. There seemed to be a bit of jostling there, so perhaps we will move this discussion back to talking about the select committee process and how it was that, at the end of the day, the findings in the report were unanimous.

Look, as I said, I am very pleased to be taking this call as the new chair. I acknowledge the sponsoring Minister, the Hon Amy Adams, who has spearheaded this review, and, of course, the Hon Jacqui Dean, outgoing chair. I want to thank Mr Jono Naylor, the deputy chair of the Justice and Electoral Committee, for making me feel so welcome and, actually, the members opposite, because I have chaired only one meeting—let us be fair about it—but from what I have seen it has been a very collegial committee. So the Hon Jacqui Dean was correct in her description, and I think that all of the members of the committee are willing to discuss things openly and move things along—nuanced findings and, hopefully, get agreement on most things.

Although I did not sit on this review and was not present at the debates, my understanding of these bills is basically that the substance of them are in respect of the opening and closing addresses of electoral broadcasting. Let us face it: time has moved on. We are now in an age when people are using the likes of the internet, apps like Facebook and Twitter and Instagram. I have to admit I am Generation X, so I do not understand them all—

Paul Foster-Bell: Surely not!

SARAH DOWIE: Well, I am trying to learn, Mr Paul Foster-Bell, but, look, we will continue with that education as we go along in my political career. It is about modernising, this legislation. It is about allowing more flexibility to political parties to get their message out to voters. As we have seen, as technology has advanced, people are gaining their news in many, many different ways, and—especially Generation X—are turning to such apps as Twitter. We only need to look overseas to the likes of Brexit and the American election where Twitter was greatly used. That is fair enough. It is about engaging people in democracy and it is about again informing voters through whatever vehicle the political parties see as appropriate and necessary.

To pick up on what some of the other speakers have talked about, we have seen that engagement in our democracy has dropped, so it is important that we use those alternative vehicles to engage our voters. Fewer people were found to be tuning into the opening and closing addresses with TVNZ—a 25 percent drop, apparently, in the average audience since the 2014 election. So we need to—[Interruption] Sorry—

Denis O’Rourke: All programmes have dropped. Nobody watches TV any more. Why would you?

SARAH DOWIE: Thank you. Thank you, Mr O’Rourke. You are helping me prove my point, in that technology is advancing and people are turning to different vehicles to get their news, to get their entertainment. So thank you very much for that contribution and I will look forward to your contribution on Thursday as well, as we move our agenda forward in the Justice and Electoral Committee.

I think, realistically, that although these bills make other technical changes to move electioneering forward in respect to this framework, these are good bills, they were unanimously supported across the House. They are about making things fairer, about communicating with the voters, and about helping them engage in democracy. With that, I commend these bills to the House.

Hon DAVID PARKER (Labour): You learn something every day in this place. I did not know what “cognate” meant until I heard this debate and I thought I had better look it up in the dictionary. It simply means “related, interconnected, or associated”. I think most of the people listening might prefer it if we called them related bills and said that is why we are discussing them together. Maybe I am more ignorant than most of the members here, but I suspect most of us did not know what that word meant.

Denis O’Rourke: Speak for yourself.

Hon DAVID PARKER: I was speaking for myself.

I turn, firstly, to the Electoral Amendment Bill. Democracy, which we all celebrate in this House, is incredibly important, and I think we should all be worried that there is a decreasing participation in democracy around the Western World, including in New Zealand. And if there is something that disappoints me about this bill it is that it actually really does not go very far to try to address that by making it easier for people to enrol and vote. My colleague Clare Curran has already said that at the last election 27,000 votes were disallowed, many of those because people were not enrolled properly.

We know that one of the reasons why enrolment is dropping is a lower interest in democracy. I think that is happening around the world. An additional reason in New Zealand that the rolls are imperfect is related to the decreasing rate of homeownership. When people do not live in their own home and they are moving from rental to rental to rental—

Tracey Martin: Or a car.

Hon DAVID PARKER: —or cars—it is more likely that they will not be enrolled to vote and therefore not be able to participate.

Denis O’Rourke: We need tarpaulin TV.

Hon DAVID PARKER: Well, yes. It is really sad, is it not, that a number of the people who are not enrolled to vote do not even have a house. But the decreasing rate of homeownership, which is now lower than it has been for over 60 years, is one of the reasons why enrolments are dropping.

In the face of that reality—that we have got a decreasing rate of democratic participation—you would think that a Government would be doing its utmost to make it easy to enrol. I have said for a number of years now that I think that everyone who has got an IRD number should be able to vote. A lot of overseas countries base their electoral roll on IRD numbers. It would take a very minor change to the system, to actually require a disclosure as to whether you were a citizen or resident entitled to vote, and you could save all of this money that we waste on the current roll by actually basing it on the IRD roll. Everyone, virtually everyone, who is of voting age has an IRD number. You need an IRD number if you are on a benefit. You need an IRD number if you are in work. There are virtually no New Zealanders who do not have an IRD number.

There is some complexity in ensuring that you do not have people who are not entitled to vote and are entitled to an IRD number. I suspect, if you look at those numbers, the numbers would be so small that the more effective thing might be to ignore that as irrelevant at the margin. But even if it was a problem you could devise a system, as they do overseas, to have some recognition on your IRD number as to whether you are entitled to vote or not.

You can very easily push against voting fraud also by putting a year of birth associated with the IRD number, as they do in a lot of Scandinavian jurisdictions—or some Scandinavian jurisdictions—and then you have actually got a check for someone who is coming in to vote. If they are presenting themselves in respect of an IRD number that is transparently not the same as the age that they are meant to be, you have got another check against voter fraud. That would be a very, very easy way to save money, because at the moment we have got these two records being kept—one at the Inland Revenue Department and one through the electoral system—and it would also improve voter turnout.

Why does National not then do this? Well, there is a cycle to these things through time. We know that fewer of the people who are lower-income in society vote National than vote Labour. More of the people who are higher-income in New Zealand vote National than Labour. We all know this. It is true. It does not mean to say that there are no low-income people who do not vote National or no high-income people who do not vote Labour. But the truth of it is that in general a higher proportion of lower-income people, who are more likely to be disenfranchised by current rules, would vote Labour, and that is actually one of the underlying reasons why National does not move on these issues.

We saw it also it following the—was it the last election, Clare Curran, or the one prior, when they did away with voting cards? One of the ways in which you can encourage people to vote if English for them is a second language or if it is their first time voting or they are not sure how to vote, is to send them a voting card in the mail, which makes it easier for them. It was a piece of paper about the size of a credit card. It gave their name and their address, and it sort of said that you could take the card to the voting booth. You did not have to take it along, but it made it easier for people to exercise their right of franchise to vote. And National did away with it.

Hon Members: No, we didn’t.

Hon DAVID PARKER: Yes, you did.

Chris Bishop: It’s still there.

Hon DAVID PARKER: Is it?

Denis O’Rourke: Still got it.

Hon DAVID PARKER: Oh, I apologise. National tried to get rid of them. I am sorry. Oh well, I thank you for not letting me spend the next 4 minutes on that. I thank you for that act of generosity, and I take that particular accusation back.

Another initiative that has not been advanced was enrolments on the day. Clare Curran alluded to this. Why, in today’s world of computer technology, can we not enrol on the day? Really, I mean—it really beggars belief. If you present, effectively, some form of ID, why can you not vote on the day and be enrolled on the day? I do not understand why there are barriers being put in place of that.

In respect of the counting of advance votes in advance of election day, I agree with that. It is a good idea. But I am told that at the moment the electoral officers around the land are trying to prevent scrutineers being present while that is done. That would stop scrutineers, as they have done throughout the years, effectively, being able to mark off who has voted. For many, many years in New Zealand it has been legitimate for whatever political party to keep an eye on who has voted. It is one of the checks and balances against voter fraud, because it is another check against people voting twice, and political parties have got an interest in proper processes around voting and we help keep it clean. But it is a little bit inconvenient to the electoral officers to, at times, have representatives of political parties there counting votes and looking over their shoulder, and they would rather that that was not happening. So I am told that at the moment—and this is current for the likes of the Mt Albert by-election and being proposed in respect of the general election this year—the registrar of electors, or whoever is the person who oversees elections on the day, is proposing to stop political parties’ representatives being present at, and participating in, the counting of advance votes.

In respect of the broadcasting changes, can I thank the Government for those changes. I agree with other speakers that they are very, very sensible. The way of the media has changed. We know that. It is, I think, proper that a relatively small amount by Government standards is applied to publication of different parties’ policies in advance of an election through broadcast media. Those broadcast channels are changing. They are not through traditional TV and radio to the same extent. Individual content in a somewhat broadcast manner through social media is becoming more frequent, and we saw that writ large in the American election. It is not all good what is happening through some of these social media platforms, but that is the way things are moving. So I think it is appropriate that there is a change to those rules to allow the funding to be used as political parties think best.

Political parties have got an interest in reaching as many people as effectively as they can, so the interests of political parties actually align with the public interest, which is the dissemination of information to voters. I think that more flexibility being given to political parties, rather than it all being directed to be spent on opening addresses and closing addresses, is very sensible, and I think the public policy ideal that lies behind that funding is best matched by loosening up the rules and enabling political parties to do it better than they currently can. With those comments I am pleased to record that the Labour Party is voting in favour of both of these bills.

JONO NAYLOR (National): I think that these two related bills are a really good symbol of the parliamentary process working to the benefit of New Zealanders. There was obviously an election in 2014. The Justice and Electoral Committee undertook a review of that election and made a number of recommendations from that review. The Minister has then picked up a number of those recommendations and put them into legislation, brought them back to the select committee, and now we are debating them at a second reading. I think it is a really good process, one that will mean that over time we will be able to fine-tune and enhance the democratic process within New Zealand.

Particularly I want to draw attention to the broadcasting aspect of these two bills. With the advent over recent times where we have the world of Netflix and Lightbox and MY SKY, and with all the younger people—particularly, obviously, the member Denis O’Rourke who will probably tweet this on his “Instachat” afterwards, or something—

Clare Curran: Instagram!

JONO NAYLOR: I know it is.

Metiria Turei: “Instachat”!

JONO NAYLOR: I know it is. It was supposed to be a joke, but clearly it was not very funny. But there are fewer people now who even bother having an aerial on their house, so tying opening addresses into television is something of a foregone era. So bringing it into a more modern context, where we can allow some flexibility for political parties, just makes a great deal of sense.

The content of the broad amendment legislation is, again, just bringing in some sensible things. We have seen, pretty much, agreement around the House this evening on this. The committee was faced with all sorts of quite technical issues, like deciding what is the minimum distance that someone can campaign from an advance voting booth. There was a lot of discussion about that—what happens if a candidate parks their car next to it, or otherwise. I think we have arrived at a pretty sensible place, but we are able to send a clear signal that actually trying to influence voters on their way into the voting booth, whether it is on polling day or at the advance voting booths, is not acceptable.

The other aspect that, in conclusion, I just want to talk about is the very practical idea that advance vote counting can begin at 9 a.m. on election day. Waiting until 2 o’clock, I think, is not going to benefit anybody else. For those of us who have sat through election night—if you are winning, it seems to take for ever until you find out whether you have won, and if you are losing, it is death by a thousand cuts. So being able to get those results out a little quicker will, I think, make everybody’s lives a whole lot better.

It is good legislation. I am sure we will have some robust discussion in the Committee stage, and I look forward to seeing these recommendations put into practice so that we can have a better, more enhanced election this year, in 2017.

METIRIA TUREI (Co-Leader—Green): Tēnā koe, Mr Deputy Speaker. Tēnā koutou e Te Whare. The Green Party is supporting both of these bills. They are very practical changes that are being made, and if there is more discussion to be had in the Committee stage, then we will be open to that. I just want to briefly address the change that is on most people’s minds, which is the change to the broadcasting allocation and the rules.

There is no doubt that we are already, now, in a new media communications environment in New Zealand politics. It is a natural progression that as technology changes the way that people engage with politics and with news and with information, the law needs to keep up with that. It is certainly true that the rules were unduly restrictive over the use of the broadcasting allocation and, arguably—especially in, I think, the last couple of elections—for those of us who have been heavily involved in the decisions around how that allocation is spent for our particular parties, it really did mean that quite scarce resources were being locked up in old systems that were ineffective.

From a public policy point of view, if there is going to be State funding of some kind—like this is—then the use of that money needs to be the best possible use of it, so it is not locked into old technologies that have limited impact. So, as times have changed, the law is finally keeping up with the way that people want to access the information, and I think that is perfectly reasonable. That is part of the democratic process. We do not want to be funding public money into outmoded, outdated forms of communication, particularly on issues as critical as election campaigns. You know, not everybody is into elections and election campaigns, but it is a critical part of our democratic process and it needs to be taken seriously. So we support these changes.

To be frank, I think that one of the beneficial changes here is that the funding is not locked into broadcasting time on television, in particular, and radio. I suspect that radio actually has more utility still, but anyone with Netflix knows that TV is kind of making its way out of the window, and it really does not have the kind of opportunities that it might have had in the past for the community to access information about political parties and what they are offering in an election.

The rules do still constrain to some extent the use of the money, and I think that is wise too. It is public money and we need to be held accountable for it, and the systems for accountability are, I think, good in the legislation. Expenditure limits still apply, and I think that is wise, but the bills open up the channels through which parties can use that State funding to communicate with voters in a way that best enables voters to get access to information.

I will say, though, that over the years I have been to quite a number of meetings with a broadcaster—its CEO and other senior officials—that has regularly tried to get out of broadcasting the opening and closing statements and has complained about the fact that prime time is required to be used by law. It has to use prime time for political parties’—

Denis O’Rourke: Oh, the poor little things!

METIRIA TUREI: —yes—opening and closing broadcasts. You know, I have zero sympathy for them, frankly—zero sympathy for them at all. The State broadcaster needs to take real responsibility for its role in promoting and supporting a healthy democracy, and its arguments about having to give up prime time for this are, frankly, ridiculous. So there is a little bit of me that is saying “Damn! It’s kind of getting what it wanted, after all.”, but that does not matter as much as making sure that our constituencies—the New Zealand public—get access to good information in the way that they need it the most. And, like I say, TV is kind of making its way out of the window, anyway.

We will continue to support these bills through the remaining stages of the debate. If, as I say, there are suggestions for changes to the legislation, we will look at them seriously, but I think that, overall, the bills are effective. They do not go quite as far as many of the submitters who made requests for changes to these laws asked for, but they are none the less sensible steps along the way to having a more flourishing and healthy democratic process. Thank you.

DENIS O’ROURKE (NZ First): New Zealand First has no issues with the Electoral Amendment Bill, so I will only need to speak about the Broadcasting (Election Programmes and Election Advertising) Amendment Bill and to explain why New Zealand First will continue to vote against it. There are two issues. I want to begin with what one submitter said, and this submitter was a gentleman with vast experience as a broadcaster and he really knew what he was talking about. I think he made a very good submission. What he said, fundamentally, was that he thought that the opening and closing addresses should be continued, free of charge, by TV ONE and Radio New Zealand because they had a public duty to do so.

I also think that those organisations have a public duty to do so. They whinge and whine about the cost of it and they say that not enough people are watching it, but the truth is they are required to do this for only 2 nights in 3 years—2 nights in 3 years. Big deal! They should be able to handle that without going belly up. So they can do it, as far as I am concerned, and I do think it has a lot of value.

I think that the political parties also have a public duty to make a formal opening statement in a campaign and a closing statement as well. I think it has been a good practice. If we do not continue that, all we are going to get is tedious old advertisements, especially those from the National Party. Who on earth wants to see them? For goodness’ sake, TV is bad enough without having to watch that kind of rubbish.

A lot of play has been made about the fact that 25 percent fewer people watch those broadcasts than watch television generally. Well, as far as I am concerned, television is such rubbish these days that, in fact, that 25 percent is probably general and across the board; if not, more. So that is one issue—that New Zealand First opposes this because there is a public duty for both those broadcasters and for the political parties to make formal opening and closing statements to inform the public about what their policies are and why the public should or should not vote for particular parties.

But there is a second issue. The second issue is this: the bill does not alter the formula for the appropriation to fund election programmes and advertisements between the various qualifying parties. Nevertheless, the Government has announced an increase in the total provision of $750,000 to a total of $3.6 million. What will that mean? What that will actually mean is this: National will get an even greater share of the total than before, and the smaller parties like New Zealand First will get even less—so you would not be surprised that the National Government is very enthusiastic about the bill, because it is thoroughly for its benefit and not at all for the benefit of smaller parties, like New Zealand First is currently.

Before the bill was introduced, the Minister did ask other parties for their views. I wrote to the Minister and said that we would not support it unless the criteria for the allocations between the various parties were reviewed, but I did not even get a reply to that, and that was not agreed to. So we can only suppose that the National Government wants to expand its funding gap with other parties not only by keeping the criteria as they were before but also by adding a further $750,000, knowing that the National Party will, in fact, get the lion’s share of that. That is what this bill is really about. The criteria for allocation between the political parties are in fact just as outdated as the provision claimed for opening and closing addresses as amended by this bill.

The Electoral Commission is responsible for deciding how the money is to be allocated to parties, and this bill re-enacts the existing provisions with no change—unfortunately. Currently the Electoral Commission must allocate to eligible parties in accordance with a thoroughly outdated statutory set of criteria, and I am going to go through those. They are these: “(a) the number of persons who voted at the preceding general election”—no problem with that; “(b) the number of persons who voted at any by-election held since the preceding general election”—I will have something to say about that in a moment; “(c) the number of members of Parliament a political party had immediately before the end of the last Parliament”—no issues with that at all, that is quite sensible; “(d) any relationships that exist between one political party and another”—for some inexplicable reason; “(e) any other indications of public support for a political party such as the results of opinion polls”—for goodness’ sake; “(f) the need to provide a fair opportunity for each registered political party to convey its policies to the public [through] broadcasting”—and that is fair enough.

Some of those criteria desperately need to be changed, because they are inherently unfair. They are archaic and not a good fit for an MMP Parliament. They are complex, uncertain, and, most of all, they give a massive advantage to the bigger parties and significantly disadvantage smaller parties. For example, in 2014, the National Party was allocated $1,530,622. Labour was allocated $919,829. The Greens were allocated $401,380. New Zealand First was allocated only $200,690. Even the tiny Māori Party got $100,345, while the one-member ACT Party still got an incredible $76,930. How can anyone claim that there is any fairness in that?

Criterion (b), “persons who voted at any by-election”, should not be taken into account at all. By-elections are poor indicators of what will happen at a future general election. By-elections are fought in an array of different circumstances and often years ahead of the following general election. It is a completely irrelevant consideration.

Criterion (d), “relationships that exist between one political party and another”—what on earth has that got to do with it? What has it got to do with it that there is some kind of strange agreement between Labour and the Greens? What has that got to do with funding?

Chris Bishop: No, it’s about the Alliance—it’s about the Alliance.

DENIS O’ROURKE: Why should that be taken into account? It simply does not make any more sense than the nonsense talked by that member over there.

Criterion (e), “any other indications of public support … such as the results of opinion polls”—well, just look at the record of opinion polls in New Zealand that constantly put New Zealand First at small level of support, which is then blown away by the reality of the following general election. If you want any further evidence of that, just look at what happened recently with Brexit. Look at what happened recently with the election of Trump as President, and what the opinion polls said there. Opinion polls are utter rubbish and should never be taken into account for the allocation of public moneys for any purpose whatsoever.

The public needs to understand what is really happening here. What is really happening here is that the National Party is trying to get a bit more money for itself and does not give a damn that small parties will suffer at the other end of the spectrum. That is neither fair nor appropriate, and I will tell you this: the people of New Zealand are beginning to wake up to these facts, and that will be another nail in National’s coffin, and that is a good thing.

PAUL FOSTER-BELL (National): Tēnā koe, Mr Deputy Speaker. Following on, and, in some degree, I hope, refuting that display of political baboonery and bottom-bearing we have witnessed tonight—it must be election year, Mr O’Rourke, in that you are putting on your very best Donald Trump performance. I want to speak on these cognatically related bills, the Broadcasting (Election Programmes and Election Advertising) Amendment Bill and the Electoral Amendment Bill by focusing on some of the substance of the bills, rather than politicking over it.

But first let me say that I want to refute a point that the member made. I disagree that everything on television is rubbish. I think, actually, we are living in a golden age of televisual entertainment. It may not be on the valve-powered, steam-operated set that the member has, but, certainly, I took the opportunity over the Christmas break to enjoy The Crown, the wonderful $100 million TV epic about our Sovereign and her early life. Mr O’Rourke’s opinion on the media reminds me a little bit of some of those relict dowagers in The Crown—those last vestiges of the Victorian age.

I think very few people sit down and enjoy the opening and closing broadcasts on a free-to-air TV station, like they might have done back in the 1950s and 1960s, enjoying those with popcorn and, perhaps, getting friends around to watch what the political parties are offering. I think the reality is that most Kiwis are consuming their media in a very different way, so this is very apt and appropriate legislation to modernise that part of the election advertising process, so I want to commend the Minister of Justice for the very sensible stance she has taken on this.

The one particular aspect I want to touch on—and it will be a quick reflection, because I only just rejoined the Justice and Electoral Committee last week; I was not on the committee through the hearings process—is the 10-metre buffer zone during advance voting. I will not name the party, but at the last election there was certainly, in Wellington Central, one party that was within 10 metres of an advance voting booth. It was separated by a vertical separation—

Chris Bishop: Oh, name the party.

PAUL FOSTER-BELL: No, I will not name the party; there is no need to bring it into it. Needless to say, there was a Green-hued sign on a floor immediately above a voting booth. The ruling was that, because it was a 30-metre walk up some stairs to get around to the balcony to actually physically go to that election promotion site for that party, it was sufficiently far away. I think it is very important, when this is being interpreted, that that should be 10 metres as the crow flies, rather than a 10-metre walk or ride from the site, because it is very important that we have clean, fair elections in this country. This is a very good set of bills, and I commend them to the House.

Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Dr Kennedy Graham—a 5-minute call on behalf of the Green Party.

Dr KENNEDY GRAHAM (Green): Just to pick up where my colleague Metiria Turei left off before me, we welcome the general endorsement—pretty much across all parties—for the amendments to the Broadcasting (Election Programmes and Election Advertising) Amendment Bill and the Electoral Amendment Bill. The aim is to implement the recommendations of the Justice and Electoral Committee report on the general election of 2014. Indeed, the two bills include something like 12 out of the 28 recommendations made—those that are feasible to implement before the 2017 election.

As we have said, we regard this as a natural progression in updating the electoral laws of our country. It gives us an opportunity to meet the challenges of the 21st century digital age and to make sure that the election is undertaken with due efficiency, greater fairness, and transparency perhaps.

I think it is also important in this respect to recall the point that the Hon David Parker was making earlier, to the effect that we should all carry some concern now that democracy is in danger of being degraded all around the world, and perhaps including in this country, with a decline in enrolment and the imperfection of rolls, for whatever reason, whether it is because people own fewer houses and are more itinerant, or for whatever reason and, for that matter, use social media at times. So we do have to be careful about how we proceed, and this legislation goes some way towards rectifying that.

The amendments to the two Acts will prove very useful in 2017. The bill amending the Broadcasting Act does a variety of things: it removes the requirement to have an opening and closing address, and it gives more flexibility in the use of funds to that effect; it encourages greater use of the internet; it updates laws on the return of expenditure limits; and it removes the requirement to submit returns on all the broadcasting programmes during the election.

The amendments to the Electoral Act will address the issue of interference in advance voting and gives greater clarity in that respect. They will update the law on former MPs voting in Parliament, which is remarkably obsolete. There are a number of other recommendations as well—as I said, 12 altogether. We find them all to be sound and constructive. The Green Party is pleased to support the bills.

PEENI HENARE (Labour—Tāmaki Makaurau): Tēnā koe e Te Māngai o Te Whare, kia ora anō tātou katoa, ai, ka pai, kia ora.

[Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker, and greetings once again to us all. Gosh, well done; thanks.]

I stand to contribute to the second reading debate of the Broadcasting (Election Programmes and Election Advertising) Amendment Bill and the Electoral Amendment Bill. I want to start by saying that we support the bills.

When I consider elections, as young as I am—having taken part in just a handful of elections—I am always reminded of a discussion with my son, who is of voting age. When I asked him whether or not he would vote and whether or not he would vote for his father, he said to me: “Well, are you going to fill up my car?”. The reason I give that story is that when I consider legislation—in particular, after the review, having sat on the select committee—I would like to think that the legislation would make the election a fair playing field. I think it does that with some of the broadcasting provisions and changes proposed in the broadcasting bill.

I would like to think that the legislation and the review would make sure that democracy and the ability to vote will be accessible to one and all. It is on that point that I raise some concerns. I raise concerns because as I sat and listened to the submissions during the review, there were a number of submitters who talked about being able to engage with our young people—the disengaged—in particular, Māori youth. Many options were mentioned. In particular, one of those that I would like to touch on briefly is, of course, moving to a digital era. Many members in this House have talked about the different broadcasting platforms where voices can be heard with regard to elections and where electioneering can take place in advertising.

If we are truly progressive, we want to ensure that young people in Aotearoa New Zealand are able to engage and are able access the ability to vote. One of the clear sentiments that came through to me during the submissions was about making sure that technology keeps up with the times. We heard some submissions saying that technology is not quite there in terms of keeping secure digital files. I can understand that. But do you mean to tell me that all the platforms utilised by the various companies on the internet are at risk of suffering some sort of electronic sabotage? Do you mean to tell me that we cannot find an operating system that is secure enough, that is easy to use, and that is accessible?

I think of the many young people of today who sit with their smartphones and who play on their iPads. One of my youngest children, who is five, engages on an iPad. We still hold on to this nostalgic view of walking in, grabbing a big fat orange marker, reading the name, and ticking a box. Although I do not want to steal any of the occasion and the ceremony involved in voting, I think that more thinking and planning can be done to ensure that we step in the right direction towards a digital voting system.

In my final minute—gee, time gets away—I will refer to the Māori electoral option. The Māori electoral option was an issue that came up during the submissions. The legislation does not respond to that at this particular point. We hope that it will address this issue by 2020, whereby those of Māori descent have the option at every election, every 3 years, to opt for the Māori roll. I know, for example, that there are approximately 8,000 Māori in Maungakiekie, one of the electorates in Tāmaki Makaurau, who are not on the Māori roll. I have spoken to a fair number of them who are actually quite keen to engage in and to be an active participant on the Māori roll, but there seems to be some sort of confusion about when they can opt in or even opt out. We want to make sure that that is quite clear and evident for all those of Māori heritage, so that they can make an informed decision when the time comes. In closing, we support these bills.

CHRIS BISHOP (National): I think the House is in reasonable agreement on the Broadcasting (Election Programmes and Election Advertising) Amendment Bill and the Electoral Amendment Bill, so I do not propose to take up too much time. I do just want to respond to a couple of remarks made so far during the debate. The first was the extraordinary suggestion—perhaps unrelated to the actual topic—from Clare Curran that we have an unelected Prime Minister. Of course, in this country we do not elect our Prime Ministers—that is a completely different system. What we do is elect parties, in which party leaders who enjoy the confidence of the House go on to be Prime Minister.

It was a little bit ironic, given that the Labour Party changed party leaders twice within 18 months, before the 1990 election, and there was no suggestion from anyone at the time—as Paul Foster-Bell pointed out by way of interjection—that Geoffrey Palmer and Mike Moore were unelected. So I do just want to respond to that ridiculous claim. If that is the standard of criticism of the Labour Party towards this Government for the rest of the year, good luck to it and long may it continue.

The second point that I want to respond to is some more substantive remarks made by Denis O’Rourke, who, I have to say, makes a good contribution on the Justice and Electoral Committee. We have been working pretty collegially as committee members, over the last couple of years, through this inquiry into the 2014 election. Of course, these two bills have come out of that inquiry, as the Minister noted in her introductory speech.

Denis O’Rourke played a good role on that committee. He did spend quite a deal of his speech criticising the criteria that the Electoral Commission uses when it divides the broadcasting allocation—the time and money given to political parties. One of his criticisms was that by-elections are no indication of future electoral performance.

Hon Amy Adams: How true!

CHRIS BISHOP: How true, exactly, as my colleague the Minister Amy Adams says. That seems somewhat inconsistent with the 2 years of rhetoric from New Zealand First Party members about how the Northland by-election result signals some kind of on-coming electoral apocalypse for the New Zealand National Party, which they have been fond of saying inside and outside Parliament for a good 2 years.

So I do agree with Denis O’Rourke, that by-elections are no indication of electoral support in general elections. Likewise, the by-election that we both recently had in Mount Roskill, and, I suspect, the upcoming by-election in Mount Albert as well, which will be comprehensive wins, probably, to the Labour Party, I would venture to suggest are no indications of support in the future. But, of course, they are part of the criteria for a good reason. I think Denis O’Rourke shot himself in the foot there.

The second thing I wanted to just quickly respond to was this idea—he seemed bewildered; he seemed mystified by the idea that the Electoral Commission should take into account arrangements between particular political parties, and, of course, that is a historical hangover, I suspect, from the days of the Alliance in 1999—

Tracey Martin: Then update it. They don’t exist.

CHRIS BISHOP: Tracey Martin says “Oh, that’s outdated.”, but, actually, we saw another example of an Alliance-type arrangement at the last general election when, months before polling day, the Mana party and the Internet Party decided to join forces to mount a—

Hon Amy Adams: The moment of truth.

CHRIS BISHOP: Exactly! Amy Adams says it is the moment of truth. It is certainly the moment of truth for someone and some particular political parties. Of course, they decided to combine, to try to get as many votes as possible during the campaign. So that is exactly why we have those parts of the criteria. So, with those very technical rebuttal points made in the debate so far, I will commend these bills to the House. Thank you.

LOUISA WALL (Labour—Manurewa): Tēnā koe e Te Māngai o Te Whare. I am a member of the Justice and Electoral Committee, so it is my pleasure to take a call on these second readings of the Broadcasting (Election Programmes and Election Advertising) Amendment Bill and the related Electoral Amendment Bill. Where I want to start, actually, is by reinforcing the Electoral Commission’s 2014 report, which really highlighted two critical priorities. They were, first, a need to promote voter participation and, second, finding ways to meet the changing needs and expectations of voters.

The recommendations in these two pieces of legislation actually represent 12 of 28 recommendations from that select committee process, and I’d just like to highlight three of those. The first one is about allowing the Electoral Commission to investigate a new approach to counting advance votes, including bringing forward the start time for the counting of advance votes from 2 p.m. to 9 a.m. on election day. The whole intention around that recommendation is so that we can produce better results for the public, and, at the end of the voting process, we have results earlier.

The second recommendation that has been implemented in the Electoral Amendment Bill is about enabling all submissions regarding objections to proposed electoral boundaries to be made available online, instead of the current requirement to produce a summary of all submissions, so people will be able to see what has been submitted in terms of the electoral boundary recommendations from the Electoral Commission. I think that is a much more transparent process.

The other recommendation I wanted to highlight is that we are going to provide the date from which hoardings can be erected. They are going to be Saturdayised. So there will be a standard day, and it will be a Saturday, when everybody can expect that hoardings will go up. Again, I think that for transparency, and to enable the public to then know that we are in an election period and the process has begun, that is incredibly valuable.

I really want to focus on two submissions. One relates to the Broadcasting (Election Programmes and Election Advertising) Amendment Bill, and the submission I want to focus on is the one that Denis O’Rourke focused on, actually. It was from Tom Frewen. He presented to the committee about the purpose and nature of the opening and closing campaign statements, which have historically been broadcast on free-to-air TV and radio. He thought that there has been a conflation between that public process and providing an amount of money, and that amount of money, which has increased, is now $3.605 million—so there is a difference between the purpose and nature of the opening and closing statements on free-to-air TV, and advertising.

There was quite a bit of debate in the select committee about the merit of those propositions—whether election programming is different to election advertisement. There has been a lot of conversation in the House tonight about engaging with modern technology and engaging with voters on all these different platforms, but the underlying philosophy of Tom Frewen’s argument is that at the moment we have a platform that is free to air and there is a difference between the free-to-air platform and others where there may be barriers because people have to pay for subscriptions to access those, and does using the money—because it has become all about the money—to enable more choice for political parties to engage actually undermine the whole essence of democracy in ensuring that everybody has access to information to make informed decisions?

He also highlighted for that particular piece of legislation that we gave only 10 days for public submissions, and he thought that was inadequate. I think that warrants mention in the House, because it was a particular issue that not only he but others pointed out.

The other submission that I would like to focus on was from the Law Society. It expressed concerns about the other recommendations that have not been picked up in this bill. There were 28 recommendations. This bill incorporates 12 of those, which means that 16 recommendations have not been picked up. So I think there is an expectation, particularly for a couple of those recommendations, that the Government will be picking those up in time for the 2020 general election.

What we were told as a select committee by officials was that we could not include some of them because we did not have the time to implement them for the 2017 general election. One of those recommendations was about the adequacy of provisions for dealing with emergencies, such as what happens if there is an earthquake on election day, how do people engage, how do they vote, etc., etc.

One of the other recommendations that I particularly want to focus on is the right for the Māori electoral roll option to be granted after every general election. So on 23 September we will have a general election, and after that election, as Māori voters, we should be able to choose whether or not we are on the Māori roll or the general roll for the 2020 general election. At the moment, as Māori voters, we have choice every 5 years, and that then determines the number of Māori seats that we have, but one of the recommendations to increase participation for Māori voters was to say, well, let us provide that electoral option every election cycle—so every 3 years.

I do not want to minimise how important these two bills are or how much debate was had in the select committee, because we have many challenges, I think, in ensuring that democracy actually functions, and functions to enable the participation of all eligible voters. One of the biggest issues that we had at the last election was on election day—27,000 people voted, and their votes were not counted. That is another one of the issues that we think is incredibly important. Why should we be disenfranchising New Zealand citizens from exercising their right as a citizen to have a say on election day about (a) who they want to represent them in terms of their constituency vote, and (b) who they think should govern the country in terms of which party they support and, by default—as Chris Bishop said earlier—who becomes the Prime Minister and leads our country?

So I think there are many more challenges and questions to be answered within the context of not only these two particular pieces of legislation but this area in the future. I think it is incredibly important not only for Māori voters but also for young voters. I think the more that we can do to ensure that they engage in the process, the better we will be in terms of the mandates that we each have in our communities and also the quality of the engagement that we have in the communities that we are here to serve. Kia ora.

MAUREEN PUGH (National): I stand tonight in support of the Broadcasting (Election Programmes and Election Advertising) Amendment Bill in its second reading. Thanks to the work and the effective contribution from all members of the Justice and Electoral Committee the review of the 2014 elections reached unanimous support across the parties. This is evident in the contributions in the House tonight with all parties supporting this bill.

In its report to the select committee, the Electoral Commission did note its concern at the decline of voter turnout. Voter engagement is the key to a healthy democracy, so it is vital that political parties can choose the most appropriate means of reaching the voting public, whether it be print, radio, TV, social media, or signage. This bill does go some way to addressing this by allowing flexibility to political parties in how they engage and communicate with the voting public.

This bill provides an adjustment to better fit in today’s modern and digitally connected world. It modernises the rules around advertising at election time by removing the requirement for opening and closing addresses and for those to be broadcast. It also removes the requirement for Television New Zealand and Radio New Zealand to provide time for them. This is a very good bill. It is well supported across the House and I have pleasure in commending it.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Members, this debate has concluded. There will be two questions put on this legislation. So the question is that the Broadcasting (Election Programmes and Election Advertising) Amendment Bill be now read a second time. Those of that opinion say Aye, to the contrary No. The Ayes have it.

CLAYTON MITCHELL (NZ First): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I would like to change our vote, if I may, please, to 12 votes opposed.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Well, the clerk has already announced the result. With leave of the House, if the member seeks leave, we will have it. Otherwise it is too late.

CLAYTON MITCHELL (NZ First): I seek leave to change our vote on the last call to 12 votes opposed.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): First of all, actually, what you are going to be asking for is to call for a party vote because I have already announced the result, and so we will need to have a party vote; so you will need to seek leave for there to be a party vote.

CLAYTON MITCHELL (NZ First): Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker. I seek leave to call for a party vote.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Leave is sought for that purpose. Is there any objection? There is no objection. We will have a party vote.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the Broadcasting (Election Programmes and Election Advertising) Amendment Bill be now read a second time.

Ayes 108

New Zealand National 59; New Zealand Labour 31; Green Party 14; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Noes 12

New Zealand First 12.

Bill read a second time.

CARMEL SEPULONI (Junior Whip—Labour): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I need to correct the vote. It is 31 not 32.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Leave is sought to correct the Labour vote. Is there any objection? There is no objection. The clerk will correct the votes and we will announce the result again.

The result corrected after originally being announced as Ayes 109, Noes 12.

Electoral Amendment Bill read a second time.

Bills

Trade (Anti-dumping and Countervailing Duties) Amendment Bill

Second Reading

Debate resumed from 7 February.

Dr MEGAN WOODS (Labour—Wigram): It is my pleasure to take a short call and talk about this Trade (Anti-dumping and Countervailing Duties) Amendment Bill, which is incredibly important. Labour will not be supporting this bill. We supported this bill, at the first reading, to select committee. But, as some of my colleagues who sat on the Commerce Committee—some of whom have spoken and some who are yet to speak—will outline more fully, I am sure, once we got into the detail and saw the fish-hooks, this is not a bill that we can support.

Goods are considered to be dumped if the export price to New Zealand is less than the price they are sold for on the domestic market of the exporting economy. What this piece of legislation does is it introduces a public interest test into New Zealand’s anti-dumping and countervailing duties regime. It says that changes to the law to allow goods into the country without duties can be imposed if it is considered that consumers will benefit. Officials told the select committee, when this bill was there, that this was going to be an incredibly subjective test. There is no other way to put this test in place, other than for it to be a highly subjective one. And what does a subjective test like this do? It introduces a whole raft of uncertainty for businesses. Businesses are left wondering whether or not they are going to have this subjective test applied to them.

In Labour, we support anything that increases benefits for consumers while protecting our industries, and it was for that reason we were able to support this bill to the select committee, but, as I have outlined, it is this public interest test that really is the critical thing for Labour and is what is stopping us from being able to support it. It is those criteria. It is that subjective methodology that is being applied, and we are not satisfied that these concerns were addressed in the amendments that were proposed at the select committee stage in terms of the scope and parts of that public interest test.

We share the concern of a number of submitters who appeared before that committee, who drew attention to the proposed changes and the undermining of our domestic producers here in New Zealand in favour of a shift to Australia. This is not something that in the Labour Party we are prepared to support in a piece of legislation. We are not prepared to support a piece of legislation that is going to undermine our small and medium sized businesses in this country, which are so critical for providing employment.

What we do not want to do is weaken New Zealand producers by introducing this new complexity into their business, which really does not need to be there. By removing robust protection around dumping and subsidies we are concerned that this legislation will hurt New Zealand businesses in cases where foreign producers dump products at below their export prices to benefit from subsidies. And this is not some theoretical scenario. This is something that, as legislators, we should all be wary of. It is our job to protect New Zealand’s small and medium sized businesses, not introduce legislation that weakens those protections, for no benefit. We do not see that the public interest tests and the benefits to consumer criteria and methodology that is being applied in the case of this legislation are sufficient.

That view was shared by the majority of submitters. This is not just something that we on this side of the House think. This is something that many of the submitters who came to the select committee expressed. They were worried, and they warned that this was a bill that would tilt the playing field in favour of dumped import products rather than local producers and employers or local jobs. That is not something that we are prepared to support. Why would we spend our time in this House putting in place legislation that empowers foreign companies to dump their products in New Zealand, rather than standing up for New Zealand businesses, standing up for New Zealand employers, and, most importantly, standing up for New Zealand jobs? That is something that, as members of the New Zealand House of Representatives, we should always have at the forefront of our mind.

Labour is concerned about the uncertainty that this legislation would create in the trades remedy regime. It is not going to benefit. It is not going to help our businesses achieve the growth scenarios that they need to have. This is not a piece of legislation that Labour can support.

KANWALJIT SINGH BAKSHI (National): The Trade (Anti-dumping and Countervailing Duties) Amendment Bill enables New Zealand to apply anti-dumping and countervailing duties in accordance with the World Trade Organization agreement.

This is one of those international obligations that New Zealand has, which are to be ratified from time to time. The bill introduces a test to the anti-dumping regime that will better balance consumer interests with those of the manufacturers threatened by unfairly priced imports. By introducing a public interest test, the regime can now consider whether consumers are benefiting from lower prices, more choice, availability, and quality, and whether this outweighs the effect on the industry. The Government wants to ensure that New Zealand has a competitive market where consumers get the best value for money. I commend this bill to the House.

Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE (Labour—New Lynn): It is not often that we get economic and commercial bills before a select committee where business submitter after business submitter lines up to slam the National Party. But that is what has happened with this bill. The bill is ill conceived, it is badly drafted, it is fundamentally flawed in concept, and it has been met with near derision by the business community for very good reason. It shows that this Government is out of touch with the real world of commerce, and a fix is desperately needed before the legislation is set in stone.

I am going to take the House through a couple of the key issues with this. The first is why it weakens the protections on New Zealand businesses, particularly manufacturers and exporters; secondly, why it has been universally rejected by submitters; and, thirdly, what the impact will be, as my colleague Dr Megan Woods has said, on one of our key audiences here, which is New Zealand business owners and workers.

Let me start by unravelling the puzzle of why this bill was brought forward in the first place. As part of the Christchurch rebuild there was a widely held view, and it was not wrong, that the cost of building supplies was too high because the market was too concentrated. Fair enough—that is why we have a Commerce Commission. I believe that it should be investigating the building products industry. Fletcher’s, PlaceMakers, Carters, Bunnings Warehouse, and the like need to be under the microscope. But it did not take this sledgehammer to crack that nut. What this sledgehammer does is it says that any time, in any market, goods are dumped in the New Zealand market, it does not matter if it hurts the New Zealand manufacturers—as long as it benefits consumers with cheaper prices we might say that it is OK and let it past the goalie. That is what this bill says.

This so-called public interest test says that even if it is red-hot dumping we will let it pass as long as somebody, in our view, is benefiting. The trouble with it is that the test there is so fudgy, so subjective—how long is a piece of string, who is the beneficiary, how is it measured? It is all qualitative, and the worst part is that it is amenable to lobbying and what they call political economy; who knows who. It is a slippery, slippery slope.

The next issue with it is what we call, in the jargon of economics, game theory. If the foreign company or Government that is considering dumping in the New Zealand market knows that there is a rigid protection mechanism that will kick in automatically, almost like the automatic braking system on a car, then they will be less likely to dump in the first place. If they know, on the other hand, that New Zealand has weakened its regime—so even if they are caught dumping there are still 90 days to 120 days of consideration of the so-called public interest test, and they may or may not get a leave pass. You can see that the incentives to commence a dumping action are strengthened and the sanctions against it are weakened.

Ninety extra days, higher costs to those wanting to defend New Zealand markets, higher levels of uncertainty rooted in eight subjective factors—and that is why the Government of Australia twice put to Parliament the idea that they would have the same test that is embedded here, and twice the Australian Parliament threw it out. Australian business said: “Don’t be so bloody stupid. Don’t be so bloody stupid, everyone will dump in our market.”, and they threw it out.

Where was the National Party? Were they not reading the newspapers? Have they not got Google? Sounds like the Overseas Investment Office. Read the bloody newspaper, find out why Australia threw it out, and have another think before it is too late in the third reading, because this is going to cost Kiwi jobs. It is going to cost Kiwi manufacturers. It is going to make the world easier for foreign companies and countries that sell into our market at less than their domestic cost of production. They might have surpluses—they just want to get them out of inventory. We might be seen as a soft touch. It does not matter if the paint is two bucks cheaper at Bunnings Warehouse or PlaceMakers—some poor Kiwi is going to be down the road.

That is why the Aussies threw it out, and that is why every blooming submitter who came to our committee submitted against the Government. They were not what you might call the traditional Labour-friendly submitters. They are people whom we respect and whom we work with. They were organisations like Business New Zealand, New Zealand Steel, Horticulture New Zealand, Foodstuffs, and so on and so forth. These are companies that are substantial New Zealand businesses, organisations that are the umbrella groups of commerce.

So who, then, is National seeking to help if it is not good for manufacturers, it is not good for workers, and if the main business organisations have universally panned it? We were left thinking: “Why on earth has the Government got this death wish? Why are they like a moth to a flame on anti-dumping?”. We think that there has been some lobbying going on from some domestic sectors about wanting cheaper imports.

But I come back to that point about building products. If the problem is dominance and monopolisation of import channels, that is why we have got a Commerce Act and that is why we have got a Commerce Commission. The Government should get off its comfortable backside and do something about building products instead of having this “a before b” bill that is going to cost Kiwi jobs.

But politically the Labour Party could take a different view, which is to say: “Go ahead, make our day. Make yourselves a laughing stock in the business community. Tell them that you have lost the plot—because we are not that far off an election. Fine by us.” The problem with that approach is we do not just want to be political about it. We are voting against it because we are going to put the interests of New Zealand workers and New Zealand manufacturers ahead of the pure politics. We are just telling it like it is.

This bill weakens protections. This public interest test is an international outlier. There are only two or three countries in the entire OECD that have made this folly—two or three. Our main trading partners, Australia and the United States, do not want a bar of it. They do not want a bar of it. This bill is a bad bill. It is ill conceived. It is badly drafted. Its impact will be negative. It is bad for New Zealand business. It is bad for New Zealand workers. And I will warrant it is the product of lobbying of the Government by a few narrow interests, and possibly is the brainchild of a few bureaucrats who have not spent much time in the real world.

What to do about it? The first thing is that it is not too late for the Government to withdraw the bill. The Government could say: “OK, we will progress the bill, without the public interest test. We’ll put in an SOP before this is too late, and we’ll see the error of our ways. We’ll listen to our own business community. We’ll make the best of a bad idea. We’ll take out the public interest test and get this anti-dumping regime clean, quick, and pure.”—clean, quick, and pure.

Carmel Sepuloni: That’s right, David.

Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE: My whips are telling me they want me to be clean and quick. They have probably given up on me being pure. [Interruption] Oh no. They want more. They are enjoying this so much that they want the full 10 minutes, which gives me a whole minute and 23 seconds to summarise where we have been so far.

An old rule in the House is that when you get to the bottom of your speaking notes and you have still got a minute on the clock—what do you do? You go back to the start. Start again. In that spirit, why do we think this bill is a crock? We think it is a crock because it is a bad idea. It is flawed in concept. The whole idea of an anti-dumping regime is you make your market proof from the self-interested actions of foreign companies and foreign powers that are wanting to take out domestic manufacturers and cost you jobs—for fly-by-night profits.

That is why we have an anti-dumping regime. That is why it is fast. That is why it is tough. This bill makes it weaker. It causes at least a 90-day delay. It introduces an eight-factor, subjective public interest test that gives foreign dumpers an out-clause that they do not need and do not deserve. That is why every business submitter opposed the bill, and that is why the Labour Opposition will be voting against it. We are the party of business. When we get in, economic growth in the last 30 years is faster and higher, and that is why we are honouring the intentions of business submitters tonight.

Hon Peseta SAM LOTU-IIGA (National—Maungakiekie): It is an honour to speak in this, the second reading of the Trade (Anti-dumping and Countervailing Duties) Amendment Bill. It is a good bill, contrary to the comments of the last speaker, David Cunliffe, because this bill is about promoting free trade, which we know members opposite are opposed to. This bill is about competitive markets, both in New Zealand and overseas, and this bill is also about protecting our local industries, while also promoting the interests of our local consumers.

We know that the anti-dumping and countervailing duties regime—they are legitimate tools and a legitimate regime, under World Trade Organization rules. What those rules promote is they facilitate free, honest, and fair trade. It is about our domestic industries having the confidence that this Government, and any Government, can protect against unfair prices. But it also must be balanced against what would otherwise be increasing costs to consumers, who have higher prices to pay for goods and services that are imported into New Zealand.

So it is not easy, and that is why we have introduced the public interest test. We have got to balance those lower prices—the more choices that consumers have; the new, quality goods that are imported into this country—with the effect that they have on those industries. This bill also clarifies the rate and the amount of duty that are determined. It inserts a purpose clause. It renames the bill. It is a good bill. That is why it has been brought to this House, and that is why this side supports free trade, free commerce, and free enterprise.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the Trade (Anti-dumping and Countervailing Duties) Amendment Bill be now read a second time.

Ayes 63

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

Noes 57

New Zealand Labour 31; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 12.

Bill read a second time.

Bills

Substance Addiction (Compulsory Assessment and Treatment) Bill

Third Reading

Debate resumed from 8 February.

BARBARA KURIGER (National—Taranaki - King Country): It is a pleasure to take a call on the Substance Addiction (Compulsory Assessment and Treatment) Bill. It is a bill that is replacing 1966 legislation, and it has huge potential to reduce the overall cost of addiction to society.

There are a lot of families out there who, for reasons of drug abuse, have family members who have really hit a low, and families are ill-equipped to handle it. The people concerned have got themselves into such a low, low space that they are not able to recognise this and are not able to seek help for themselves. I think that when it gets to that point, it is our role to look after those people, as part of our society.

The bill is about repealing the Alcoholism and Drug Addiction Act of 1966. Most people who use alcohol or other drugs do not need compulsory treatment and can do well when they choose to engage in a treatment programme. They are still in the recognition phase, and they can take themselves off and ask for help. However, some people really are so unwell that they are unable to make that decision for themselves.

Intoxication from alcohol or other drugs, even if frequent or distressing, is not the same as addiction. It is completely different. So we do not want people getting the impression that this is a piece of legislation that is going to be used just for taking people and restraining them in an institution for very little reason. It is going to be taken very, very seriously.

In December 2015 the Government launched the Mental Health and Addiction Workforce Action Plan to help ensure that we have well-trained mental health and addiction staff to meet increased demand and the future needs of New Zealanders. There are four key areas in which this plan works. One of them is primary care and community care; another one is the integration between primary care and secondary care; then we have specialist training pathways; and then we have addiction treatment pathways. Detention is less dependent on the ability to lock doors than it is on the ability of services to keep patients sufficiently engaged in a way that minimises their interest in and opportunities for absenting themselves.

The Health Committee has worked hard on this, and is a great team. We have really good discussions in our committee and it is a pleasure to be part of it. We talked a lot about the meaning of severe substance addiction. For someone to be diagnosed with severe substance addiction, they need to have at least two of the features listed in clause 8(2) of the bill: “(a) neuro-adaptation to the substance: (b) craving for the substance: (c) unsuccessful efforts to control the use of the substance: [and] (d) use of the substance despite suffering harmful consequences.” The test is that the specialists and those who are giving care need to be able to identify two out of four of those features. Generally, the compulsory stage lasts for a minimum of 6 weeks.

I really think this is an important piece of legislation. P and other drugs are causing huge problems to society in New Zealand these days. It is my pleasure to commend this bill to the House. Thank you.

DAVID CLENDON (Green): I am pleased to be able to speak to this bill, the Substance Addiction (Compulsory Assessment and Treatment) Bill. It is one that I have not been actively engaged with, particularly. It went, of course, to the Health Committee, which was appropriate for a bill of this nature. But my interest in it has certainly been to the extent that I look at justice issues for the Greens. Obviously, when we are talking about compulsory detention and treatment there are significant human rights issues involved, and for that reason I have sort of tracked the progress of this bill with some interest. I have no doubt that our former colleague and friend Kevin Hague would have made a very useful and positive contribution as this bill proceeded through the Health Committee.

The bill, I thought, had been around a long time, but, actually, it has not been excessively slow. It was introduced in December 2015, and had its first reading in March last year. The select committee had a good go at it. It took about 6 months to come back from the select committee, and that is not inappropriate for a bill of this significance, I think.

What is blindingly obvious, of course, is that the existing legislation that this bill replaces was seriously out of date—it was 1966 legislation. There was broad and deep agreement that that legislation is no longer fit for purpose. Among other things, it enabled the committal—effectively, the detention—of people for compulsory treatment on the say-so of two medical practitioners, but neither of those two practitioners were obliged to have any sort of specialist knowledge or experience as drug practitioners, and that was seen as an obvious flaw in this. It is a highly specialised area of treatment, and medicine, I guess, and it is appropriate that the new bill does put that right. In future it will be required that at least one of the medical officers be a specialist practitioner in this area.

The 1966 legislation allowed for a 2-year committal of a person, which we know, by modern standards, is far in excess of what is reasonable. These are very acute conditions we are dealing with—people who are unable to make decisions on their own behalf, and those sorts of conditions ought not to be prolonged. Certainly it would be unusual for somebody to be retained in that situation for a period of 2 years. The legislation, I believe, now talks of an initial period of some 8 weeks, and that is a much more appropriate period of time.

Again, the 1966 legislation required a court process, which was somewhat cumbersome, slow, and often quite daunting for people who were already in an unhappy situation of needing potentially to deprive somebody of their freedom—of their freedom of choice. It is unhelpful in these, as I say, very urgent and acute situations for there to be a slow or protracted court process, and, again, this legislation does away with that.

Overwhelmingly the feedback that came particularly from the submitters to the select committee was that there were insufficient and inadequate safeguards for the people who might be subject to this sort of legislation, in terms of protecting their human rights and protecting their well-being. I guess it reflects, sort of, the cultural norms in 1966, but the world has moved on since then, in all sorts of ways. Culturally, and in other ways, we are now perhaps a little more enlightened in our understanding that these people are actually, in their own way, victims—they have a health condition. They are not necessarily criminals, although, of course, sadly, drug addiction is often also a driver of criminal offending. But, substantially, we want to move away from the notion that we are dealing with criminals; we are dealing with people who have severe health problems, and the new legislation does recognise that.

I mentioned some of the submitters—Community Alcohol & Drug Services, Auckland, (CADS), made some very useful contributions in submitting on this bill from a very informed position. It is engaging with these people day to day, and I have to say that I have the greatest respect and regard for people who work in the area of addiction, because they are seeing people and dealing with people who are at their worst, frankly—people and conditions that, for a lot of us, would be very easy to dismiss or write off, frankly. Personally, I think I would struggle to engage with some of these people—they are in a dreadful situation. I do really respect the work that is done by the people in these various agencies, who see through that, who just see a human being in need and seek to provide some service to them.

The legislation, as I said, has had fairly rigorous attention from the Health Committee. It had a lot of submitters. As I have said, CADS was in there, as well as organisations like JustSpeak and the Wellington Community Justice Project. A lot of the district health boards submitted, and various other entities and organisations, large and small—the Privacy Commissioner. And it is appropriate that there should be broad and deep submissions on this legislation because, on the face of it, it is actually quite Draconian. It is the State saying to a person: “You’re not fit to make decisions on your own behalf, and therefore we are going to detain you and subject you to compulsory treatment.” That is fairly heavy-handed, but it also, sadly, is necessary.

What I particularly like about this legislation—it is Draconian; it is heavy-handed, but it has a very clear statement of purpose. That is one of the primary defences, I think, of human rights in this bill. The purpose clause of the bill very clearly states that the primary purpose, in this sense, is to protect people from harm. That is a very significant sort of a stake in the ground, to say that the key outcome we are looking for is to protect this person or these people from harm. The purpose clause goes on to say that it is to “facilitate a comprehensive assessment of their addiction;”—so to have a very, very clear understanding of the nature of the addiction and what you are dealing with, in terms of this person or of the health status of these people.

The legislation—the process, rather; the compulsory treatment—is intended to stabilise their health. Clearly, the focus is very much on working out how we get these people back to a situation as swiftly as possible, in as timely a way as possible, so that they can then take responsibility for themselves and ideally then morph away from this compulsory status and into a voluntary programme. There is a phrase in the purpose clause: “protect and enhance their mana and dignity and restore their capacity to make informed decisions about further treatment and substance use;”. One would hope that would be a discontinuation of substance use, because that, obviously, is the end goal for most of these people—to get them away from these very destructive drugs that are doing such terrible things to their health and well-being.

The other approach, if you like, that this bill takes, which I particularly admire, is that it outlines a set of principles. You are going to get a lot of different circumstances; a lot of different situations that people are going to be in. It is very hard to legislate for every particular circumstance or situation that might arise when you have got such a complex area as mental health well-being, to the point that we are demanding compulsory treatment. So, by establishing a set of principles, I think it is a very powerful model to say: “OK, these are the principles that will guide decision making by practitioners, by decision makers.” I think it is a very robust and appropriate form for determining exactly how people will be treated, rather than trying to be too prescriptive about it, because prescription, typically, will fail. With the best will in the world it is hard to imagine 20 to 30 years in advance, and that may well be the life of this legislation, what circumstances might occur.

The principles are very clearly outlined. I think they are robust. For example, clause 12(a) states that where compulsion is necessary, the level of coercion used must always be the least restrictive possible. So we intrude or intervene in a person’s life as little as we must do, to achieve the ends—the outcomes—we are looking for. The views of the patient and the patient’s principal caregiver should be ascertained and taken into account. It is a very thoughtful approach. It is one that recognises that although these people temporarily are not in a good situation, not in a position to make decisions about their own treatment or well-being, it gives the maximum scope to engage them and their caregivers in their treatment and in the compulsion.

So I think this is a well-thought-through bill, it is well framed, and the Greens will be pleased to continue to support it.

RIA BOND (NZ First): I rise on behalf of New Zealand First and my colleague Barbara Stewart to speak on the third reading of the Substance Addiction (Compulsory Assessment and Treatment) Bill. New Zealand First does continue to support this bill as it enters the third and final reading here tonight here in the House. The members of the public will know from the first reading, the second reading, and the Committee of the whole House that this bill will provide a legislative framework for compulsory assessment and treatment of individuals with severe substance addiction who have a reduced capacity to seek treatment for themselves.

The harm associated with addictions does have a significant impact on New Zealand society. If a person’s substance addiction remains untreated there are costs to both society and the individual person. That has a knock-on effect, and that affects people like their family and their whānau. It hurts relationships with people who love them the most. Sadly, this addiction can also incur the penalty that is financial instability, which can lead to homelessness.

The New Zealand Drug Harm Index released in 2016 found that the estimated social cost of drug-related harms and intervention was $8.1 billion. That is $8.1 billion that has become a social cost to our society. It is glaringly obvious that in New Zealand the scale of illicit drugs presents a problem, and this does point to New Zealand having one of the highest drug uses in the developed world. Research shows us that alcohol, a legal drug in New Zealand, is associated with a high level of social harm and is the principal drug used by those seeking treatment for addictions. That came about during the submission period from the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists.

Therefore, as we have heard in the House tonight and previously, this bill will repeal the Alcoholism and Drug Addiction Act of 1966, and we have all said on this side of the House and on the Government side that this bill is needed to modernise it to fit within the 21st century so that it looks at the drugs that are in our community now. The drugs that are around us in our society are more harmful than what we have ever known before, and the impact on our community members and whānau is too high a price to not have this legislation modernised for today.

We have had robust discussions in this House, and I do say that I am aware that these actually occurred within the Health Committee too. I do, on this note, want to commend the Health Committee, which I did not take part in. It has done a fantastic job, along with advisers, in scrutinising this bill to make sure that it fits within what we need in New Zealand today and tomorrow. I think that the particular bill of interest here is not one that any side of this House took lightly at all. I know through discussion that there is an initial fear in Kiwis out there, and perhaps even in some of the members of the House, that we will go back to the old days of when institutionalised patients were, effectively, mistreated. I guess we have tried in great depth to ensure that this bill does protect the rights of the patient, with involvement of their whānau so that they are also involved in the care plan. So I and New Zealand First do think that this decision has not come about lightly. The bill is for the people out there who have no ways or means of understanding that they cannot take care of themselves. Sometimes in this House, members—as we have all discussed in some way, shape, or form—have to step up to the plate and realise that there is a real need out there in our community. Members have to step up to the plate and ensure that legislation here is fit for purpose for our community.

So New Zealand First will continue to support the broad intent of this bill. But throughout the process we have also had some reservations, and I think we have to gain some strength from this in that some of the reservations that came through actually were identified by the New Zealand Law Commission. The commission talked about things about the infrastructure and the service potential and the capacity of the mental health system to actually endeavour to—how is this legislation when it comes down to patients? We know already that throughout New Zealand, across all of our district health boards, they are running major deficits.

What is also happening, and I do not think it has actually been touched on here enough tonight in the House, or in previous readings, is the impact through the mental health care services, because the addictions and substance issues of our members in our community are not taken out and recorded as a standalone issue—they are dumped into the mental health system. So there is no clear, accurate way that the Hon Peter Dunne could say that he is expecting that maybe 40 to 60 people per year might be affected by this bill. I would like to go so far as to say, from speaking to the community sector, the mental health sector, and volunteers, that they expect this to be in the hundreds—the hundreds.

What I want to know with the reservations is: how could this little number of 40 to 60 per annum be an estimation, when we are looking at putting such important legislation together to help protect the future and current addictions that are so seriously harming our community? What I also learnt through asking the community and volunteer sector is that the issue is bigger than that.

At the moment, and it was only reported in the paper in the weekend, and it has got specifically to do with this particular bill—in the report we have a facility that was in Porirua that has never seen an upgrade in any way, shape, or form whatsoever, yet its new, modern facility is going to house only 14 beds. In 1992 this establishment was opened.

The Hon Peter Dunne, with the backing of his Government, has introduced this bill to the House and is not allowing for any more beds to open up to take care of the patients, who could be 40, 60, 200—whatever, because nobody knows. I just think that this is a gross oversight by this Government to implement a bill and get the support, as it has done, but we have not factored into the account here where these patients are going to go. Where are they going to go? There are no additional beds for them. There are no additional people specialised in addiction to substances who can actually help them through this process. Yes, they said tonight, from the Government side, 6 weeks. The Greens have pointed out 8 weeks. There is actually an extension, too, to patients particularly who need additional support. Where are their community support wraparound services going to come from? Where are they going to come from? That Government has sat there and not even answered that question right throughout the process.

I think it is a shocking indictment on this Government to introduce a bill like this and have no follow-up services or commitment that the associated costs, estimated in 2010, to be brought by this bill, $775,000—7 years ago. In today’s world this cost is going to be much more major than that.

So, yes, New Zealand First will be supporting this bill in its broad intent, but we are also going to be watchdogs in making sure that this legislation is fit for our community, that it is going to actually help people get the real services that they deserve when they cannot have a choice, by their addiction, to get or to find services by themselves that they can access readily.

In closing, we do say that this bill is needed. We have to address the issues that we have got in our society now. We have to address the addictions that people have, and I come across many people in my electorate who actually cannot help themselves. I think that although this bill has all the right intentions, there are major reservations as to how this bill is going to look and feel to the patient who actually has to go through this bill. I really feel that this bill will have a huge impact on the mental health sector and it will have a huge impact on the community and volunteer sector within the mental health sector. I think that this has been a gross oversight by the Hon Peter Dunne and the National Government. Thank you.

MELISSA LEE (National): Thank you so much for the opportunity to take a call on the Substance Addiction (Compulsory Assessment and Treatment) Bill. As a new member of the Health Committee, I would like to, first of all, start by commending the work that the committee has done. It does important work and I am only just sorry that I have not been part of the deliberations on this very important bill, but I am here to support the third reading of this bill.

This bill will help support the needs of people with severe substance addiction and significantly impaired capacity to decide on treatment to get better and to get the help that they actually require. Having actually had the experience of intervening on a friend who was impaired by drugs and who was very suicidal and almost homicidal, although that was many years ago, I can say it is quite a stressful thing for friends and family who are involved with people who have a drug addiction. I also have seen friends’ families break apart as a result of the meth addiction of their children. As a parent of a teenager, you always wonder whether drugs are going to be around them, and you are always frightened for your children.

So it is important for all of us, as New Zealanders, to support the vulnerable in our community, and a key way of doing this is reaching out and ensuring that those who have had long-term and high-risk dependency on substance abuse can be cared for appropriately, rather than receive the stigma and punitive punishment that they can actually endure currently. I agree with some of the comments that were made in this House earlier.

As other members have said, the bill originated as part of an extensive work undertaken by the Law Commission in 2010, and it will make significant and workable steps towards getting treatment for tough alcohol, drug, and other substance abuse issues. The bill will repeal and replace the Alcoholism and Drug Addiction Act of 1966, which is very outdated. So, without wanting to waste the time of this House, I commend this bill, which is really fantastic.

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

DENISE ROCHE (Green): I rise to take a short call for the Greens. You have heard from my colleague David Clendon earlier that we will be supporting this bill. Initially, we did have some concerns about the whole issue of compulsory treatment, but, on balance—and having gone through the select committee process and looked at the changes that were made and also at the reassurances that came through—the bill as it stands at the moment is a much better piece of legislation than the original, outdated 1966 Act.

I was not on the Health Committee, but I did read through some of the submissions, and I want to carry on with the theme that was raised by Ria Bond, which is actually about what other services are currently provided for the people who would be under a compulsory substance abuse treatment order. What we heard from the Capital and Coast District Health Board in its submission—it put it really quite eloquently, when it said that the current treatment is that there are mental health providers and clinics and centres, which are sometimes for people who are under compulsory orders, but those are specifically for mental health issues. Then there are residential treatment centres for people with addiction issues, but those are for patients, or clients, with substance abuse problems who are actually undergoing that treatment willingly. So where do you treat the people who will be under a compulsory order who are not actually that willing in the first place? Where do you put them?

The point that my colleague from New Zealand First made was that we have a mental health system that is frequently shored up by the not-for-profit sector, but it is woefully underfunded, and, in fact, the entire health system has been underfunded cumulatively over the last 8 years of this Government. So the question is: where do we put people? Then there is also the concern about how many clients there will be. How many people will be under a compulsory treatment order? The reason we should be concerned about that is the P epidemic.

The Greens were privileged to be at Te Tii Marae on the day before Waitangi Day and to be in that whare when the hīkoi—the march—of the community people who were marching against having P in their communities came through the pōwhiri and into the whare, and talked and put their take on the floor. The concern they have is that there is a scarcity of treatment options available, when you consider that even the Salvation Army, in its state of the nation report last week, is saying that P is the scourge in our communities, and that it is basically wiping out entire communities and families and is having a huge impact. It is a generational problem, and we are not seeing access—and appropriate access—to treatment either, when you consider that Māori are more impacted in this kind of area. There are some statistics. From 2015, a report showed that amphetamine and cannabis use was much, much higher—disproportionately so—in the Māori population. Similarly with hazardous drinkers, Māori made up 35.3 percent of all people seen by alcohol and drug addiction teams, while being 15 percent of the population.

So we have to wonder: will there be services that are culturally appropriate? Will there be services that are actually focused on prevention? That is the cheapest option, and that is the thing that is best for our families and communities, but that takes investment, and I challenge this Government to invest in our communities, and particularly in the regions. Thank you.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): I call Jenny Salesa—5 minutes.

JENNY SALESA (Labour—Manukau East): Thank you for this short call on the Substance Addiction (Compulsory Assessment and Treatment) Bill. Labour supports this bill. The intent of this bill is very worthy. It is indeed well past time that we replace the outdated Alcoholism and Drug Addiction Act 1966—legislation that is at least 50 years old—with a piece of legislation that reflects modern approaches to the treatment of severe alcohol and drug addictions, with current medical and health practices, while protecting the rights of our patients. We welcome this initiative as part of a suite of tools to reduce the harm to individuals, the harm to families, and the harm to our communities.

Compulsory treatment is a very serious issue, and it raises concerns—especially the individual human rights concerns of folks who will undertake this compulsory treatment. This bill, however, gives us tools to assist in situations where an individual is considered to have a severe substance addiction but is not capable of giving genuine consent for treatment of their addiction. It enables patients to have their overall health stabilised, their addiction treated, their rights respected, and their dignity restored, such that they can make informed choices about ongoing treatment.

Along with other members of the Labour Party, however, I have serious concerns about the implementation of this bill. We are concerned especially about the lack of resources, which is already evident right throughout New Zealand’s healthcare system. We are particularly concerned about the fact that our mental health services—and our addiction services, in particular—are really overstretched. We know this because of the underfunding of the health sector that we have seen over the last 8 years—underfunding of at least $1.7 billion.

Submissions to the Health Committee—that is a committee I do not attend as a committee member, but, in reading the summary of the submissions to the Health Committee, we can see that they raised doubts over the capacity of our current health system to be able to deal with the extra services and the extra staffing that they would have to deal with just to implement this new legislation in addition to what they already have to deal with. Counties Manukau District Health Board is one of the largest district health boards in New Zealand, and it covers the majority of the electorate of Manukau East, which I represent. It made a submission to the Health Committee that stated that “Specialist treatment interventions and programmes, including those provided on a compulsory basis, cannot improve the mental health of our population alone.”

We are mindful of the fact that implementation of this proposed bill may not—we hope—divert resources that should be deployed to the current mental health services and addictions sector, away from that sector’s focus on early interventions and more effective integration of the current primary health services as well as secondary care services.

The Ministry of Health must ensure that there is adequate service infrastructure in place to implement this new legislation. We already hear, and we know this from constituents coming through to our electorate offices, of the fact that community mental health services—

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.

The House adjourned at 10 p.m.