Thursday, 6 April 2017

THURSDAY, 6 APRIL 2017

THURSDAY, 6 APRIL 2017

Mr Speaker took the Chair at 2 p.m.

Prayers.

Business Statement

Business Statement

Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Acting Leader of the House): When the House resumes on Tuesday, 11 April, the Government will look to complete the Committee stages of the Fire and Emergency New Zealand Bill and the Māori Purposes Bill, and make progress on a number of other bills on the Order Paper. Wednesday, 12 April will be a members’ day.

CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka): I wonder whether the Acting Leader of the House can inform us why the motions appointing the Rt Hon Winston Peters to the Intelligence and Security Committee and appointing a new Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment, which were scheduled to be done this afternoon, have been removed from the Order Paper for today.

Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Acting Leader of the House): Can I assure the Opposition Leader of the House that those are matters that we will certainly get to as a priority, but we are a very busy Government.

Oral Questions

Questions to Ministers

Schools—Violence, Foetal Alcohol Syndrome Diagnosis, Support for Northland, and Education Support Workers

1. TRACEY MARTIN (NZ First) to the Minister of Education: Does she agree with the Ministry of Education’s National Director for Learning Support that schools in Northland should contact the police when primary school children threaten teachers and other students with violence?

Hon HEKIA PARATA (Minister of Education): Tēnā koe, Mr Speaker. Yes, I agree with the full quote that the ministry’s National Director for Learning Support made and the context in which it was given. For the benefit of the House, he stated: “I would certainly see suspension as being a last resort. If we’re talking about very violent behaviour, then that’s a matter that schools need to be discussing with police.” As per the Guidance for New Zealand Schools on Behaviour Management to Minimise Physical Restraint, released by the ministry in October last year, schools across the country should call the police in situations when a student cannot be managed safely and the imminent danger to students, staff, or themselves remains after all alternatives have been explored. As we expect in all situations, the police are the most appropriate people to deal with violence.

Tracey Martin: Is it acceptable that schools, on behalf of students in Northland, are having to wait for up to 12 months for a diagnosis of foetal alcohol syndrome, between 6 to 12 months for an attention deficit disorder diagnosis, and are finding it almost impossible to gain access to suitable support even after a diagnosis?

Hon HEKIA PARATA: This Government has increased funding for special education or for learning needs support by nearly 30 percent—up to $590 million. Schools in Tai Tokerau have the highest special education grant per child funding in the country and the highest per child staffing entitlement rate in the country. There are also opportunities for schools of the kind that have been reported in the media most recently to participate in other initiatives that are occurring in Tai Tokerau, which are all aimed at supporting every child according to the needs that they have.

Tracey Martin: In light of that answer, can she explain why there are now only 367 Ministry of Education - funded education support workers, compared with 502 education support workers in 2013-14, a drop of over 100 support workers?

Hon HEKIA PARATA: I cannot answer the member’s question because I do not know where those numbers come from, but what I can tell—[Interruption] What I can tell the member, and perhaps the member’s own party would like to listen to the answer, is that the ministry has nearly 40 specialist staff in Tai Tokerau dealing with children with additional needs. The ministry also provides funding for approximately 22,500 hours of behaviour teacher-aide support to schools in Tai Tokerau. The two resource teacher of learning and behaviour clusters employ 51 resource teachers of learning behaviour, which is an increase. Additionally, 63 schools in Tai Tokerau have signed up to the Positive Behaviour for Learning programme, and it is available to many more up there, and we have formed six kāhui ako in Tai Tokerau.

Tracey Martin: Is it not a fact that the freeze on specialist Ministry of Education staff is now seriously impacting on schools’ abilities to access diagnosis and appropriate support?

Hon HEKIA PARATA: There is no freeze, and those members who keep insisting on that, in the face of actual facts to the contrary—it suggests mischievous carrying out of their responsibilities, because the facts are that Vote Education is now over $11 billion, when in 2008 it was $8 billion. The facts are that special education funding is now—[Interruption] Look, I know the members are not interested in actual facts, but these are those. Special education funding has gone up to $590 million, and the facts for Tai Tokerau are those that I have already outlined to the member.

Tracey Martin: Will the Minister commit to immediate emergency funding, perhaps from the $300 million underspent on the communities of learning, for experienced teacher or student support for Northland schools, which are reporting that staff are buckling under the pressure of severe behavioural or suicidal children, while her department works with other ministries to sort out what is an unacceptable situation?

Hon HEKIA PARATA: The underspend to which the member refers is precisely for the recruitment and appointment of expert teachers, so, yes, I will commit to that. I have already committed to it, our Government has committed to it, there is funding for it, and now we need the schools forming communities of learning to get on and appoint those expert resources.

Education, Ministry—Schools Funding, Education Support Workers, Consultant Spending, Annual Report Performance Measures, and Special Education Support

2. CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka) to the Minister of Education: Is she confident that schools are getting all the support they need to help every child succeed?

Hon HEKIA PARATA (Minister of Education): I am confident that schools have received more in support under this National Government to help their children succeed than under any other Government.

Chris Hipkins: Why did she allow the number of full-time equivalent education support workers employed by the ministry, who work with the youngest and most vulnerable, to be halved from 275 in 2008 to just 134 in 2015, according to the answer that she has supplied—her own numbers—through written questions?

Hon HEKIA PARATA: Then they will be factual. What I can answer is that I do not make operational decisions—

Hon Members: Oh!

Hon HEKIA PARATA: I guess it is a surprise to the Opposition, but that is how the Government works. The chief executive of the department makes that decision, and I trust that those decisions have been made in the context of delivering better outcomes. That is actually what we are seeing.

Chris Hipkins: Which does she believe does more to support students with the highest needs in our schools and early childhood centres: halving the number of education support workers who work directly with children or the 700 percent increase in the Ministry of Education’s use of consultants during her watch, taking the consultant spend from $4 million under Labour to $35 million under National?

Hon HEKIA PARATA: It is not a matter of what I believe; it is a matter of what we know, and what we know is that there is more funding going into every part of the New Zealand education system under this Government than there ever has been. We are also dealing—[Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! There is little point in continuing with the answer if the Opposition does not want to hear it.

Chris Hipkins: Was the fact that the number of students receiving special education communication services, behaviour services, or ORS-funded services within 90 days of referral are all declining the reason that the performance measure was removed from the Ministry of Education’s annual report altogether?

Hon HEKIA PARATA: No. At the risk of iterating, yet again, the facts, Vote Education has gone up by 35 percent. Funding for special education or learning support has gone up by 29 percent. Participation by young people with all kinds of needs has increased significantly. The way that young people are getting support in terms of education has changed from when the member is referring to, and it changes all the time.

Dr David Clark: Now for the question.

Hon HEKIA PARATA: And I am answering the question. We are seeing more young people participating. We are seeing them getting a better education. We are seeing them leave with more qualifications. We are seeing them go on to more tertiary options, and these are signs of success. Are there challenges within the portfolio in terms of kids with particularly high and complex needs? Yes, there are, and everyone in the system is working hard to meet those.

Chris Hipkins: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. That was a very long answer, but the question that I asked—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! You do not need to repeat the question for me, because I am going to invite you to repeat the question to the House.

Chris Hipkins: Thank you, Mr Speaker. Was the fact that the number of students receiving special education communication services, behaviour services, or ORS-funded services within 90 days of referral are all declining the reason that the performance measure was removed from the Ministry of Education’s annual report altogether?

Hon HEKIA PARATA: No.

Chris Hipkins: Did she say in her Budget bid last year “there is increasing demand for additional learning support. In most cases, these are capped appropriations and we can ration provision, …”; if so, is that rationing the reason why so many schools are saying that under this Government they are considering suspending or expelling students with behavioural or other learning support needs because they do not have the resources to support them?

Mr SPEAKER: There were two supplementary questions there. The Minister can address one or either, or both.

Hon HEKIA PARATA: I am going to address both, thank you, Mr Speaker. The answer to the first one is yes and the answer to the second one is no. We work with every school across the country to address their particular needs, and I think it is inappropriate to simply be recommending, as one principal in the media is, that schools start suspending students. There is a natural justice process in the event of particular violent acts and those should be followed by every school.

Chris Hipkins: If she does not want schools to suspend or expel students, why is the level of special education support provided to students who have been suspended or expelled so much significantly higher than those students who remain in a school?

Hon HEKIA PARATA: I think the member is conflating two things. There are students who are suspended for particular reasons and they have all gone through a natural justice process, and then they go into alternative education, and then they get particular support.

Chris Hipkins: No, they go to another school.

Hon HEKIA PARATA: But I am answering the first part of your question, which relates to a particular principal recommending that schools simply start suspending students, and the answer there is that would be irresponsible and they must follow the process.

Government Financial Position—Surplus and Crown Debt

3. SCOTT SIMPSON (National—Coromandel) to the Minister of Finance: How are the Government’s financial accounts tracking compared to Budget 2016?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE (Minister of Finance): The financial accounts are tracking along well. Currently, the Crown accounts for the 8 months to February are showing a $1.4 billion operating surplus compared with Treasury’s forecast of a $568 million surplus at the start of the fiscal year. This is also $912 million better than expected at the half-yearly update, which was released just before Christmas. The Government’s books are in good shape because we have shown spending restraint, improved the quality of our expenditure, and focused on the areas where we can make the most difference to people’s lives.

Scott Simpson: What is driving this higher-than-anticipated level of Government surplus?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: Higher tax revenues are the major contributing factor, with $3.5 billion more in tax collected in the first 8 months of this year compared with last year. In fact, tax revenues are 3.8 percent ahead of Budget 2016 expectations and 7.7 percent ahead of the same period last year. All categories have been growing, but company tax was the largest driver of this favourable result. Revenue is $551 million ahead of forecast. That is, of course, the return the country gets from a consistently growing economy that is responding to a strong economic plan.

Grant Robertson: Can the Minister tell the House whether or not the surplus number includes a calculation for the cost of the Kaikōura earthquake, and has he been updated on what the likely cost to the Government of the recovery from it will be?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: It does have some costs in it for the Kaikōura earthquake. There will be further costs. We are yet to refine, for example, the final cost of restoring the State Highway 1 corridor, and I will update members in due course as to the final amounts for those particular issues in relation to Kaikōura.

Scott Simpson: How is the strong financial position that he has spoken about helping the Government achieve its debt target?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: We are making good progress on achieving our debt target. Net debt currently sits at 23.5 percent of GDP. It does move around, and I think, in reference to my colleague opposite, there are some significant items of expenditure. But we are on track to reduce net debt to around 20 percent of GDP by 2020-21, which will improve the resilience of the New Zealand economy to withstand future shocks.

Fletcher Tabuteau: What is the total debt attributable to the Crown, inclusive of student loans, State-owned enterprises debt, and debt owed by councils?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: I am not sure that debts held by councils are attributable to the Crown. I know that some councils would prefer it that way, but that is definitely not the case. I would not want to give the indication that that was about to change any time soon. I do not actually have that exact number for the member today, but I can tell him that net debt, which is the net debt once the assets are deducted, is 23.5 percent of GDP currently.

Fletcher Tabuteau: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. It was a question related very much to the primary question. It was precise, it was concise, and the Minister has not answered it.

Mr SPEAKER: No, the Minister definitely answered it. He said he did not have that information to hand. That is not an unreasonable answer at all.

Scott Simpson: What options does the Government have in order to utilise strong Crown accounts and growing surpluses?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: As I have said, the Government’s priorities for the upcoming Budget are clear. We will be working on delivering better public services for a growing country. We will also be doing more work to build the infrastructure that we need in growing a modern economy, on top of what we are already doing. We intend to keep paying down debt as a percentage of GDP. Finally, we remain committed to reducing the tax burden on lower and middle income Kiwi families when we are able to. What we cannot do is look to fritter away the hard work completed to date, as I am sure my friend Mr Robertson would love to do.

Social Development, Ministry—Security of Client Data

4. CARMEL SEPULONI (Labour—Kelston) to the Minister for Social Development: Does she stand by her statement about the Privacy Commissioner that “we will listen to any recommendations that he has to make” about feedback on her Government’s approach to private client data collection from social services?

Hon ANNE TOLLEY (Minister for Social Development): Yes.

Carmel Sepuloni: How can she say she is listening, when this morning on Radio New Zealand she said “There is no proof that people will not seek help if they have to give their name.”, despite the Privacy Commissioner clearly stating data sharing “could impede vulnerable people’s access to much needed services and worsen already difficult circumstances.”, and one organisation reporting that not one of the 17 male survivors of sexual abuse they are working with would seek support if they knew the data was going to be shared?

Hon ANNE TOLLEY: Because the Privacy Commissioner’s comment was “could”, and in my discussions with the Privacy Commissioner he did not have any proof that people would not seek help; it is an assumption that they will not seek help.

Carmel Sepuloni: How can she expect New Zealanders to have confidence in her ministry’s client data-sharing approach, when 2 days ago her IT portal for storing this data had to be shut down because it was compromised, she said this morning she had no confidence in the system, and her ministry has an abysmal track record for breaches of private client information?

Hon ANNE TOLLEY: Firstly, I would say that the Ministry for Social Development deals with over a million New Zealanders, and does not have an appalling track record. That is not to say it has not had breaches, but it has a very good record of protecting over a million New Zealanders’ information. Secondly, I would say to that member: the reason I shut the portal down was that I am not confident in it, and, therefore, no New Zealander can be confident in it.

Carmel Sepuloni: Does she really think she has the confidence of social service providers and vulnerable people seeking support from these social services, given the data security breach and the findings of the Privacy Commissioner that have come to light in the past 72 hours?

Hon ANNE TOLLEY: I think it is very dangerous to link the two. First of all, the data collection will continue, but there will be no information uploaded until I am convinced, and the Privacy Commissioner is convinced, that we have a system that is secure. That is the responsible thing to do. However, when we talk about vulnerable New Zealanders, what they want is to be able to get access to the services that the taxpayer funds on their behalf. That is why we need the client data: to ensure that all the vulnerable New Zealand families and children are accessing the services that the Government is providing.

Carmel Sepuloni: Should not the Minister have made sure that the system for storing that information was secure before she pushed ahead with her Government’s data collection and sharing agenda?

Hon ANNE TOLLEY: I have said in this House and I have said outside this House that we will not be uploading any data until I can be assured, and I can assure New Zealanders, that the system that collects and hold the data is secure.

Carmel Sepuloni: Will she admit that the Government’s social investment approach was never about investing in people but about saving money in the short term by underfunding social services and putting up barriers to people accessing support, and will she acknowledge that this approach has long-term cost repercussions?

Hon ANNE TOLLEY: Well, far be it from that member to ever describe social investment, because it is quite the reverse. The whole social investment approach is by investing earlier and more effectively so that you get better long-term outcomes for people. That always costs more.

Social Development, Ministry—Security of Client Data

5. JAN LOGIE (Green) to the Minister for Social Development: Does she believe she delivered on her statement that “robust procedures would gather and protect the information” when referring to her ministry’s Individual Client Level Data Collection policy?

Hon ANNE TOLLEY (Minister for Social Development): Yes. As I said yesterday, it is absolutely vital that clients and providers have confidence that their information is being protected, which is why yesterday, after I was made aware of a technical issue with the portal system, I directed that a new IT solution be developed for the collection of that individual client - level data. As I said in the House yesterday, I have also directed that this new system be independently assessed, and I would welcome the Privacy Commissioner’s input as well. I have also asked that the Government Chief Information Officer be involved in this.

Jan Logie: When the Minister told this House “Of course, we are working closely with the Privacy Commissioner to ensure that clients’ privacy rights are protected.”, can she tell this House whether he was briefed on significant changes to the policy after first being consulted in June?

Hon ANNE TOLLEY: I do not have that information. What I have assured the House on, on a number of occasions, is that I understood that the Ministry of Social Development (MSD) was working closely with the Office of the Privacy Commissioner. The details of that I leave to the MSD people to work through themselves, but in my conversations with the Privacy Commissioner, we have traversed all the areas that he covered in his report. Three of the four recommendations I agree with, and I have put things into action to implement his recommendations.

Jan Logie: Did the Minister check the Privacy Commissioner’s view on such changes as collecting identifiable data for sharing and matching with other agencies instead of the initial proposal to use anonymised data for research purposes?

Hon ANNE TOLLEY: I cannot answer that question, as to whether MSD was talking to the Privacy Commissioner about that particular issue. I know that I have been talking to providers about that change in processes for almost 2 years.

Jan Logie: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. If you had listened to my question, you would have heard that I asked whether the Minister had checked, and her answer was that she cannot say whether the ministry spoke with the Privacy Commissioner.

Mr SPEAKER: No, no, the question was addressed. The Minister was saying, effectively, that she did not speak and that she is not sure whether the ministry had. That has addressed the question.

Jan Logie: Does she think it is acceptable to have gone ahead with this policy without having completed a privacy impact assessment when the Privacy Commissioner has said he expected it to have happened before they went ahead?

Hon ANNE TOLLEY: I agree with the Privacy Commissioner.

Jan Logie: On what date did the Minister see the first draft from the Privacy Commissioner, which her ministry received on 9 March?

Hon ANNE TOLLEY: Oh, I am sorry; I do not have in front of me—it is in the Hansard from yesterday—when I received a letter from the Privacy Commissioner, I think it was 10 March, with his initial findings. I then met with him several days later to talk through those findings. As I say, of his four recommendations, I do not agree with his first recommendation about using Statistics New Zealand and anonymised data, because, whilst that might give us the progress that is being made by NGOs, it does not give us the coverage, so we do not know that everyone who needs the services are actually getting that service. But, certainly, for his other recommendations, following that meeting, I did discuss with MSD working up an exemptions regime, as he has recommended in recommendation No. 2. I think, for recommendation No. 3, I have made sure that MSD has been very clear what the data is needed for and that it will not be used in order to be matched with any other Work and Income - type information. And recommendation No. 4 I absolutely agree with, which is why I shut the portal down yesterday.

Jan Logie: If the Minister read in the draft report, or knew, that MSD was collecting individual client data via spreadsheets, which the Privacy Commissioner says “lack inbuilt security protection and have been associated with significant data breaches”, why did she not put a stop to the collection of data rather than waiting for this week’s breach to happen?

Hon ANNE TOLLEY: Well, the member is assuming that I was aware of that level of detail. I have asked the chief executive of MSD to provide me with a detailed report of what happened and how this process was developed, because I did not, as a Minister, have operational oversight of it. But I agree with the Privacy Commissioner that that is not the correct way to develop a system like this, and as I have just said to the media, I am furious and disappointed that the agency seems to have taken shortcuts.

Jan Logie: How can the public trust the Minister to protect their privacy when she has been completely missing in action on core protections of privacy in terms of ensuring that the database system was able to protect their privacy, ensuring that assessment was done in the first place, and even finding out whether the Privacy Commissioner had been consulted on massive changes?

Hon ANNE TOLLEY: The public can have confidence because I shut the portal down immediately I became aware that it was not secure, and I have said that we will not upload any data until not only I but the Privacy Commissioner and the Government Chief Information Officer are content that it is a secure system. It is absolutely critical that it is secure and that people’s privacy is respected.

City Rail Link—Job Creation, Employment of Migrants, and Impact on Public Transport Use

6. SIMON O’CONNOR (National—Tāmaki) to the Minister of Transport: What employment opportunities are being created by the construction of the City Rail Link in Auckland?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Minister of Transport): Well, construction of the City Rail Link (CRL) project is already bringing economic benefits by creating hundreds of employment opportunities. It is estimated the project will see about 600 general construction workers employed and an estimated 1,600 jobs at the peak of works—

Tracey Martin: From where?

Richard Prosser: How many New Zealanders?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: —and the members opposite can apply, if that is what they need to do post-election. While the CRL is New Zealand’s largest transport infrastructure project, it is just one of many significant projects across Auckland. Others include the soon to be opened Waterview tunnel, the new East-West Link highway, improvements to State Highway 20 to the airport, and widening of the southern and northern motorways. These really big Government projects reflect the Government’s strong investment in Auckland. We continue to construct more by value than ever before, in order to respond to and support the strong economic growth we are seeing.

Simon O’Connor: How will the City Rail Link boost the use of public transport and investment in Auckland?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: With Auckland’s population predicted to grow by more than 700,000 people over the next 30 years, the CRL will play an important role in getting people in and out of the city with ease and boosting public transport use across the city. When completed, the CRL will double the capacity of Auckland’s rail network, provide two new stations in the central city, and benefit commuters whose travel times will be reduced very significantly. The Government’s commitment to the project has seen its delivery accelerated and it has provided more certainty for many large-scale private sector developments, which will pump renewed investment into the CBD, as well as creating many new jobs.

Ron Mark: Can he categorically rule out the likelihood of the employment of unskilled migrants over Kiwis, like has happened in the Christchurch rebuild where 1,800 unskilled migrants have been brought in since 2011?

Mr SPEAKER: The Hon Simon Bridges—in so far as he has ministerial responsibility.

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: What I can say is that there is a procurement process going on and let us see where that goes—the Government will not be involved in that. What I can guarantee the member is that not a single New Zealand First MP will be employed in the project. [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! There is just simply too much noise and interjection. If I need to start asking a few people to leave early for an early departure, I am happy to do so, but I would prefer not to have to.

Ron Mark: Can the Minister tell the House whether he has had discussions with his Cabinet colleagues and can he tell us where the unskilled migrant workers that they are planning to allow in are expected to be accommodated in Auckland, or is he planning on bringing in some migrant ships to accommodate them offshore?

Mr SPEAKER: Again, in so far as there may possibly be some ministerial responsibility—

Ron Mark: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I did ask: “Has he had conversations with his Cabinet colleagues over this problem?”.

Mr SPEAKER: That is right, but you asked a lot more than that as well; it was a very lengthy question. I am inviting the Minister if he wants to tackle the question he is welcome, but it is a long way from—

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: Well, I am really not certain what the member is talking about but if he is really angling for a job on the CRL, perhaps he can make the lunch.

Health Services—Auckland Typhoid Outbreak and Funding

7. Dr DAVID CLARK (Labour—Dunedin North) to the Minister of Health: Can he tell the House the source of the typhoid outbreak that killed a 52-year-old Auckland woman; if so, can he guarantee that the outbreak has been contained?

Hon NICKY WAGNER (Associate Minister of Health) on behalf of the Minister of Health: The source of this isolated typhoid outbreak is being investigated by the Auckland Regional Public Health Service, and I am advised that, clinically, the response is being handled very well and that health officials are confident that the outbreak has been contained. As typhoid is not endemic to New Zealand, at some point the disease has come from overseas.

Dr David Clark: After watching TV news and learning that his own officials were responding to a typhoid outbreak already nearly 2 weeks old, what precise actions did he take in the minutes that followed?

Hon NICKY WAGNER: The Minister has made it very clear that there are some lessons to be learned regarding the communications, but as I have said, the advice is that, clinically, the response is being handled well, and the Minister is pleased to hear that.

Dr David Clark: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. My question was really clear about the immediate action that followed this finding out, and that is the issue at point.

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I heard the question very clearly, but when you consider it is being answered by another Minister on behalf of the Minister, how could the Minister possibly know the precise action the Minister took after watching a particular news item? It cannot be answered any more accurately than it was.

Dr David Clark: Point of order. [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! If there is going to be continued interjections I am going to have to start asking particular members to leave. I have given my ruling on that. If the member wants to raise a fresh point of order, he is more than welcome, but it had better be a fresh point of order.

Dr David Clark: I seek the leave of the House to hold over the remainder of the questions for the next question time.

Mr SPEAKER: You cannot now do that, because you have started the question. You can certainly cease asking further supplementary questions if you do not think it is worthwhile—that is perfectly appropriate—but you cannot now hold over the supplementary questions associated with question No. 7 now that you have accepted that you have started question No. 7.

Dr David Clark: When he found out about the typhoid outbreak on 31 March, what assurances did he immediately seek from health officials that relevant health organisations in the area were being communicated with about the outbreak?

Hon NICKY WAGNER: I cannot answer that directly, but what I can tell you is that there will be a thorough debrief afterwards, and that questions around both the source of the outbreak and the response will be properly reviewed.

Dr David Clark: I seek leave to table a paywalled document that makes clear that the chief executive of the Whānau Ora commissioning agency said that her organisation had not been contacted about providing messages to the public a week after the event.

Mr SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table that particular document. 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.

Dr David Clark: Who is responsible to this House for the health funding spent on dealing with the typhoid outbreak?

Hon NICKY WAGNER: I think that will be decided through the thorough debrief afterwards, where the questions will be looking at the sources about the outbreak and the response and who is responsible.

Dr David Clark: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. How can that possibly be true? She is responsible to this House for the spending of the House; that is the role of the Minister.

Mr SPEAKER: I accept the point the member is making, but the Minister has answered that way. That is the way she has chosen to answer the question. The way forward now is for the member to follow up with supplementary questions.

Dr David Clark: Does the Minister, then, take responsibility for the fact that the Auckland Regional Public Health Service’s funding has not kept pace with population growth in Auckland under his watch?

Hon NICKY WAGNER: I know that the member is new to health, and he may not be aware that normally—[Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! [Interruption] Order! A legitimate supplementary question has been asked. The Minister would be well advised to address it without the comment that she started her answer with. We might then all be able to hear the answer.

Hon NICKY WAGNER: The member may not be aware that in Auckland, it normally handles about 30 cases of typhoid every year. It does it efficiently and effectively.

Dr David Clark: Point of order.

Mr SPEAKER: I will invite the member to re-ask his question, but I would be grateful for less interjection from my immediate left.

Dr David Clark: Does the Minister take responsibility for the fact that the Auckland Regional Public Health Service’s funding has not kept pace with population growth in Auckland under his watch?

Hon NICKY WAGNER: That is not true. I have pointed out that every year Auckland manages about 30 cases of typhoid efficiently and effectively.

Dr David Clark: I seek leave to table material showing that the Auckland Regional Public Health Service’s funding has not kept pace with the population growth in Auckland under the Minister’s watch.

Mr SPEAKER: I just need the source and date of the document.

Dr David Clark: The source is the Parliamentary Library. It was sourced yesterday from the Parliamentary Library.

Mr SPEAKER: I will put the leave and the House will decide. Leave is sought to table that information from the Parliamentary Library. Is there any objection to it being tabled? There is not. It can be tabled.

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

Point England Development Enabling Bill—Ngāti Paoa Provisions

8. MARAMA FOX (Co-Leader—Māori Party) to the Minister for Building and Construction: What efforts is he taking to ensure the rights and interests of Ngāti Paoa are being provided for through the Point England Development Enabling Bill?

Hon Dr NICK SMITH (Minister for Building and Construction): The bill is part of Ngāti Paoa’s Treaty settlement and enables them to have a marae and housing on land that has been grazed by cows for 30 years. The site is of huge cultural significance to Ngāti Paoa, and was reported in the 1820s to be the site of the most intensive Māori settlement in New Zealand. The bill will result in an area of 18 hectares no longer being fenced off for grazing, two hectares being used as a marae for Ngāti Paoa, 12 hectares for 300 new homes, and an additional four hectares for amenity and recreation. I think it is unfair for people to cry foul over Ngāti Paoa using land for marae and housing when the same people have been silent for 30 years over the land being used for grazing cows.

Marama Fox: What reports has the Minister read recently in support of the Point England Development Enabling Bill?

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: I was very encouraged when the bill was unanimously supported in Parliament, when it was introduced. I particularly agreed with the comments that the bill is an important Treaty settlement for Auckland, that it is a win-win for both the community and iwi, and the same person saying that housing and a marae is a much better use of the land than grazing cows. The same member also described the bill as “fantastic” and “exciting” for Tāmaki Makaurau iwi. I am surprised that that member has now been vetoed by his colleagues.

Phil Twyford: Why will he not adopt Labour’s plan, which would offer Ngāti Paoa Tāmaki Regeneration Company land for their housing project and would offer Ngāti Paoa shared governance of the Point England Reserve and land for a marae, but would leave one of Auckland’s best expanses of open parkland as parkland for future generations to enjoy? [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! Mr Bishop, if you interject again in question time, you will certainly be getting that early shower.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: The member forgot to mention that the open parkland has had 18 hectares fenced off for grazing cows for 30 years. Why the member thinks it is OK for the reserve to have grazing cows but not for Ngāti Paoa to have a marae, and why that member who constantly asks for more homes to be built would much rather have cows grazed in Auckland, has me lost.

Marama Fox: Given the provisions of the Point England Enabling Development Bill, does he agree with the chief executive of Ngāti Paoa when he says: “By opposing the legislation, Labour is opposing a Treaty settlement bill for the first time in the history of the Treaty settlement process. All other iwi in Tāmaki Makaurau support this transfer. Opposing the bill pits the Labour Party against mana whenua.”?

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: Yes. I do agree with the chief executive of Ngāti Paoa that it is sad that Labour has not maintained that broad support for Treaty settlements. But I think what is of further concern is that all the iwi of Auckland—

Peeni Henare: No, they don’t.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH —have joined—yes they have. They have been in contact expressing deep concern that grazing cows is now viewed by the Opposition as more important than Treaty settlements and affordable housing. [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! [Interruption] Order! Mr Faafoi—equally, the same warning. You have continued to interject. If you do again, you will get the same treatment.

Primary Sector—Export Trade Barriers

9. BARBARA KURIGER (National—Taranaki—King Country) to the Minister for Primary Industries: What announcements has the Government made to help support our primary sector exporters succeed in overseas markets?

Hon NATHAN GUY (Minister for Primary Industries): Trade Minister Todd McClay and I recently announced new funding of just over $53 million to help support our primary sector exporters to overcome trade barriers. The funding was announced as part of the Government’s Trade Agenda 2030, and it will increase the Ministry for Primary Industries’ (MPI’s) presence in European and South-east Asian markets; establish an export regulatory advisory service to help small exporters navigate complex regulatory environments; accelerate work on priority non-tariff barriers, which are a major issue for our primary sector exporters; and expand MPI’s economic intelligence units, which will help exporters identify market opportunities.

Barbara Kuriger: Why is accelerating work on non-tariff barriers so important for our primary sector exporters?

Hon NATHAN GUY: That is a good question. While conventional tariffs are a major barrier, the export of our goods is also affected by other measures such as quotas and technical standards. A New Zealand Institute of Economic Research study estimated that New Zealand exporters face around $6 billion in non-tariff barriers each year, with much of this in the primary sector. This funding will help create a flying squad of experienced market access officials, who will engage with their overseas counterparts to help gain easier market access for our products.

Barbara Kuriger: How will this funding support existing and emerging markets for our primary sector exports?

Hon NATHAN GUY: My thoughts are with the Edgecumbe farmers and households up there right now, who are dealing with a major flood event. This agriculture town is based very much on the primary sector and they know that we export to around 130 countries. This MPI funding will help ensure that we can continue to diversify our export profile. MPI, indeed, holds a wealth of different information on different markets. The economic intelligence unit will be an important source of information for our exporters to identify new market opportunities—and, of course, with MPI increasing its footprint in the new South-east Asian markets, such as Vietnam—and it will also strengthen our relationships in the very important European markets as well.

Disability Care—Cessation of IDEA Services

10. POTO WILLIAMS (Labour—Christchurch East) to the Minister for Disability Issues: Does she stand by her answers to supplementary questions on 23 March 2017?

Hon NICKY WAGNER (Minister for Disability Issues): Yes, in the context that they were given. However, I would like to make one correction. I am advised that last year IDEA Services received almost $220 million in funding, not $151.9 million, which I stated previously.

Chris Hipkins: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. If a Minister becomes aware that information they have given to the House is incorrect, there is an obligation on them—in fact, a requirement on them—to correct it at the first available opportunity, not to wait until somebody asks another question and then use that question as the basis on which they correct their answer.

Mr SPEAKER: The member is absolutely correct. There is an obligation on Ministers, whenever they answer questions, subsequently realising that it is not correct, to come back at the earliest opportunity to correct that answer. In this case, it has been done very belatedly via another question being raised. The member needs to consider whether he thinks it is serious enough to lodge a breach of privilege, and then I would have to consider it in the light of judging whether it was deliberate and whether it has seriously disadvantaged accountability to the House. I have reminded Ministers many times that they might get some figures wrong. They are expected to return to the House as soon as possible to correct those figures.

Poto Williams: When she was asked “Does she accept that IDEA Services Ltd faces limited funding and pressure on its services, requiring it to cut its disability support services by 5 percent”, why did she answer that IDEA Services has an increase in funding, and was it an increase for the provision of disability support?

Hon NICKY WAGNER: The funding for IDEA Services has increased from just over $183 million in 2008 to just under $220 million last year. That is why I said it has had more money.

Poto Williams: Why does IDEA Services quote in a letter to families, dated 4 April 2017, that underfunding of over $500,000 in the 2016-17 year and no offer of increase for the coming year means it cannot continue to provide services and has been unable to renew the contract with the Ministry of Health?

Hon NICKY WAGNER: I am incredibly disappointed that an organisation like IDEA Services, which says it cares for our vulnerable, disabled people, has been so irresponsible as to cut services without notice. I have been advised by the Ministry of Health that it was informed only last week that IDEA Services did not intend to renew its contract, after previously indicating that it would. It also gave no notice to its clients and, what is worse, IDEA Services refused to agree to a temporary 3-month contract to allow arrangements to be made to look after its clients.

Poto Williams: I seek leave to table a letter from IDEA Services to families of clients, dated 4 April 2017.

Mr SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table that particular letter. Is there any objection to it being tabled? There is not. It can be tabled.

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

Poto Williams: What does the Minister say to Diana, whose daughter waited 18 months for a social skills course, which has now been cut; or Shannon, who says “I shudder to think what the next few months will be like.”; or Francesca, who has two autistic children and says that before IDEA Services’ help came along 2 years ago, they were in crisis?

Hon NICKY WAGNER: I say that IDEA Services is being totally irresponsible. We all know that change can be difficult for some people and their families, and particularly for this cohort of clients for whom routine and security is so important. It is just not acceptable that IDEA Services has refused to allow a transition period and, what is more, told its clients only after it had cut the service.

Poto Williams: Would the Minister now like to correct her answer to the supplementary question “Has IDEA Services received sufficient funding from the Government to cover minimum wage increases over the past 6 years?”

Hon NICKY WAGNER: No, I would not. The member is confusing two different issues. In late March IDEA Services decided to change its business model and relinquish 5 percent of its contracts. It was working with the Ministry of Health, and it agreed to work together responsibly to transition its clients. Today we are discussing IDEA Services cancelling the contract without notice—without notice—either to the Ministry of Health or to its vulnerable clients. On top of that—[Interruption] That was after the contract was cancelled. What is more, it turned down the opportunity offered by the Ministry of Health to allow it to take care of its clients and transition them. It is appalling.

Smoking—Nicotine E-cigarettes

11. MAUREEN PUGH (National) to the Associate Minister of Health: What recent announcements has she made regarding nicotine e-cigarettes?

Hon NICKY WAGNER (Associate Minister of Health): [Interruption] I am sorry, I am overworked today. [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! The question has been asked; the answer will be given.

Hon NICKY WAGNER: Last week I announced Cabinet’s decision to allow the sale of nicotine e-cigarettes and e-liquid—to make it liquid—with appropriate controls. The controls include restricting sales to those 18 years and over, prohibiting vapour in smoke-free areas, and restricting advertising to in-store only. This ensures that cigarette smokers have access to low-risk alternatives while we continue to discourage people from smoking or vaping in the first place.

Maureen Pugh: What are the next steps for the legalisation of nicotine e-cigarettes?

Hon NICKY WAGNER: The Ministry of Health will work with stakeholders to establish the quality and the safety standards and look into ways of allowing emerging tobacco and nicotine delivery products to be regulated as consumer products into the future. It will be presented to Cabinet in July.

Drugs, Illegal—Medical Cannabis Legislation and National Drug Policy

12. JULIE ANNE GENTER (Green) to the Associate Minister of Health: Will he recommend his Government change the law so that New Zealanders with terminal illnesses using medical cannabis are not at risk of being raided by the Police and prosecuted?

Hon PETER DUNNE (Associate Minister of Health): Patients using approved cannabis-based products, such as Sativex and other approved non-pharmaceutical grade cannabis products, are not at risk. For those choosing to use raw cannabis or unapproved cannabis-based products, I have received a number of assurances from the Commissioner of Police that small-scale use by the terminally ill is not a priority, and that approach is consistent with the emphasis on compassion set out in the Government’s 2015 National Drug Policy. I have considered the compassionate access scheme implemented in New South Wales. However, following very frank discussions with the Australian delegation at last month’s United Nations Commission on Narcotic Drugs meeting about the workability of such a scheme, I have concluded that New Zealand’s more pragmatic approach based around the pillars of compassion, proportion, and innovation that underpin the National Drug Policy is the more appropriate course to follow.

Julie Anne Genter: So rather than changing the law to reflect the fact that we think that it is acceptable for sick people to use cannabis to alleviate their suffering, is he suggesting that people should continue to break the law hoping that the police will not pursue them?

Hon PETER DUNNE: I make two points in response. Firstly, there is huge distinction to be drawn between raw cannabis and cannabis-based medicinal products. The Government has no interest in making any legal change, nor does any other party in Parliament, as far as I am aware, to the status of the raw cannabis plant. With regard to cannabis-based medicines, the best advice I would give any patient who feels they might benefit from such a medicine is to talk to their general practitioner and their specialist about accessing the pathway that is in place. They can view that at the Ministry of Health website; it is a very simple pathway to follow and if it is determined that that is the best treatment available to them, then it can be made available to them. For people who choose to go outside that system, then they do run the risk, particularly if they are using the raw product, but, as I said earlier, I have been assured by the police that they will adopt a compassionate approach.

Julie Anne Genter: Without a clear legal framework or a register for patients, how will the police be able to judge who is a legitimate medical user and who to be compassionate with?

Hon PETER DUNNE: The member raises a good point, and it was one that I pursued with the Australians when I discussed the matter with them. The absence of a register is actually no salvation in this regard because they find exactly the same problem with the register in New South Wales in determining who is a legitimate name to be included upon it—and bear in mind in the New South Wales case you can include up to three other people as supporters. But they have also found that a number of people who are suppliers, when confronted by the police about being suppliers, say that they supply only to patients with terminal illnesses. So the whole thing has become, essentially, unworkable. I think the pragmatic approach that we have here, provided it is exercised with compassion, is the far more prudent course to follow.

Julie Anne Genter: Without a law change, how can he ensure that terminally and chronically ill patients in New Zealand will not find themselves in court for using cannabis to alleviate their suffering?

Hon PETER DUNNE: I did not hear the first part of the member’s question, but I think what she was seeking was some clarification as to how we can protect people from the potential risk. I come back to what I said in response to the earlier supplementary question. The very best step that anyone who feels that they would benefit from a cannabis-based medical product can take is to talk to their general practitioner about accessing the pathway set out so clearly on the Ministry of Health website. People who resort to just growing a bit in the backyard or talking to a mate and getting some from them do run some risks. If they have genuine health issues, my absolutely strong advice is to talk to their general practitioner about accessing the pathway that is currently available.

Urgent Debates

Social Development, Ministry—Report of Privacy Commissioner into Collection of Client-level Data from NGOs

Mr SPEAKER: I have received a letter from Carmel Sepuloni seeking to debate under Standing Order 389 the Privacy Commissioner’s report Inquiry into MSD Collection of Client-Level Data from NGOs. The release of the report is a particular case of recent occurrence. The report deals with the activities of the Ministry of Social Development, for which there is ministerial responsibility. The Privacy Commissioner raises serious concerns that the collection of NGO client data will “deter some people who are most in need from seeking support or assistance”. The commissioner recommends that the ministry take an alternative approach that is not inconsistent with privacy principles. Having carefully considered this application, I believe it requires the urgent attention of the House. I therefore call on Carmel Sepuloni to move that the House take note of an urgent matter of public importance.

CARMEL SEPULONI (Labour—Kelston): I move, That the House take note of a matter of urgent public importance. We are here considering and debating urgently today the inquiry that has been undertaken by the Privacy Commissioner on the Ministry of Social Development’s collection of individual client - level data from NGOs, because of the fact that there are damning recommendations in the Privacy Commissioner’s report against the Government, and because the Government, a year ago, despite being warned—despite having all the social services out there telling the Minister that this was not going to work, telling the Minister that collecting this data would deter people from accessing their services or from going there for support, telling the Minister that this was not the right thing to do—the Minister ignored all of those voices. The Minister ignored all of the experts in the field, not only the social services but academics advising against it, and people who were accessing the social services for support saying that they would not go to those social services if this went ahead. The Minister ignored all of that and now here we are, and she is trying to fix it after the fact.

The biggest issue that comes out of the Privacy Commissioner’s report, I think, is that even though the Minister has said that this client-level data collection will be all about making social services more effective, it will not make it more effective; it will deter the most vulnerable people from accessing support. The Minister has gone ahead and said: “No, people won’t be put off.” She has even said publicly that this is not sensitive data that is being collected. She said that on Radio New Zealand this morning. Well, actually, if a woman goes to a women’s refuge with her children and all of their names, their addresses, and their dates of birth are then passed across different ministries in association with having gone to the women’s refuge for support, then that is sensitive information.

The Minister has said that it is not sensitive information and that it will not deter people from accessing these services, and yet we see in the report that a provider who deals with male survivors of sexual abuse had 17 of its clients say that if this data was to be collected and shared in the way the Minister is proposing, then they would not go to that service for support. How can she say that it will not deter them from accessing support, when we have got all the evidence to show that it actually will?

I think one big statement in this report that we have to take on board is that the Privacy Commissioner has said that the Government’s agenda of collection of individual client - level data from NGOs is actually not in the public interest. I think that is a really important note to keep in mind, because, actually, everything we do in this House should be in the public interest. So when the Privacy Commissioner tells us it is not, then we need to hold up and check ourselves, and think whether, actually, we should go ahead with this.

The problem is that the Minister did not think this through carefully from the start. There was no privacy impact assessment. So here we have the Privacy Commissioner having to undertake an inquiry, after the Minister has already started it. Now she has said that she is going to hold up, with regard to the portal—that she has shut it down because there have been security breaches. But she went ahead with this already. It is not like the information is going to be collected from July. There are budgeting services and other services that were already expected to collect this information, as of last year.

We see in this report too, which was timely, that the Privacy Commissioner has pointed out the fact that if the ministry is to do this, then we need to make sure that whatever portal—however we hold this information, we need to be assured that it will be secure. The report came out yesterday, and just the day before, we saw that the portal is not secure. The Minister is now trying to tell us that it is not her fault, that she is annoyed at whoever created the portal and gave her the assurances that it was safe. But, actually, the buck stops with the Minister. She cannot blame it on the people who created the portal, because she is responsible for it. She should not have gone ahead with pushing ahead with this agenda if she did not know that she had the systems in place to protect the information. We saw in the last couple of days that there have already been breaches.

The problem is that the Minister has given us assurances in the House, time after time after time, that the ministry has all those measures in place to assure the public that their data will be protected. But how can anyone in here, let alone out there in the public, believe that, when we have seen privacy breach after privacy breach under this Government’s watch?

It is not just through the IT systems where we see breaches. We have seen people being able to access other people’s information through Work and Income kiosks. We have even seen the former Minister for Social Development purposely—on purpose—leak the information of two solo mothers, in this House. So how can we trust that Government with any client-level information? The Minister is trying to say here that she can assure us that there will be no level of matching the data collected here with anything else, like Work and Income. No one believes her. We do not believe her at all. It is about the fact that people will be deterred from accessing the services. It is also about the fact that they do not have the systems in place to be able to provide an assurance that they can protect people’s confidentiality and privacy.

It is also really interesting to see that the Privacy Commissioner has said that the data they are looking to collect will not actually assist them with being able to provide any better services than what they could do if that data was anonymised. So he has actually said that it does not need to be collected in the way that they have asked. He has made it really clear that it could be anonymised information that is run through Statistics New Zealand, through the Integrated Data Infrastructure, and that way people’s information would still be private information. It would still be protected, and the Government could get the information that it wants.

My real concern here is that the Minister is trying to say on Radio New Zealand and through the media that it is about coverage. She is trying to say that it is about making sure everyone has access to the services that they need. But I actually think that the truth is that it is about denying people access if the Minister or that Government think they have had too much help from social services. They want to be able to draw a line and say: “Actually, you’ve had your quota of help. Go away. Help yourself.”

That is not the responsible thing to do, given we know that in many situations families do have to seek the support of more than one social service, for a range of reasons but usually because they have such complex needs that they cannot get them met by just one social service. The Minister is trying to be a bit sneaky here, making out that it is about providing more effective services. But it is not about that; it is about cutbacks.

I want to move to that because I think that this is one of the big points that needs to be made from this. The Government, not just the Ministry for Social Development but the Government—and this is Bill English’s pet project—has been pushing ahead with its social investment approach. We know it is heavily underpinned by the collection of data—data like we are talking about here. This really throws a spanner into the works, with regard to the Government’s social investment approach. It has been pushing ahead with this social investment approach, and if you read anything from Bill Rosenberg or Michael Fletcher or anyone who knows anything who has written about the Government’s social investment approach, you would see that it is not about long-term outcomes. There is no cost-benefit analysis, in terms of social costs or financial costs for us as a country, moving down the track. It is about short-term cost-saving measures.

This illustrates that social investment approach very clearly. It is not about ensuring that families are better off in the long run; it is about the Government’s attempt to save money by cutting funding to the social services and cutting access to social services in the short term, so that in 1 or 2 years’ time it can say: “Hey, look, we’ve saved a couple of million dollars here.” Meanwhile, down the track, we are going to have to spend more money because the families who need support are not getting the support that they need under that National Government.

The three things that I have raised so far are, firstly, the big issue that people will be deterred from accessing social services; secondly, that the data the Government is seeking to get through this system is not necessary, as the Privacy Commissioner has said that, actually, it can get just as useful information if it is anonymised; and thirdly, that it does not have the security measures in place to be able to collect and store this information. This move from the Government is not in the public’s interest at all. That is the most important thing.

I want to go back, again, to the fact that we have seen so many social services come out concerned about this move. They have their backs against the wall because they have, basically, been held to ransom by that Minister with regard to their funding, and have been told “Like it or lump it.”, with regard to the insertion of these provisions into their contracts. Important services, like the Women’s Refuge, are told: “We don’t care if you think this will deter women and children from coming to you for support. You will give us that information regardless, or you will not get the funding.” What choice do these organisations have but, in many instances, to just say yes, because they know that they provide such important services and that they have to exist despite the fact that they are going to be expected to pass on this information?

The final point that I do have to make about the Privacy Commissioner’s report is that he has pointed out that because of the conditions in which the Minister and the Government are expecting this information to be collected, it actually risks that information being skewed and unreliable. That is because you will have a whole lot of people, firstly, who do not want to go and seek the support despite needing it. Secondly, you will have organisations that are not necessarily going to report on every case, because they are worried about the fact that they could share this information and it could be passed on. The information you would want the Government to have be reliable is at risk of not being reliable because of the unreasonable expectations that the Minister has placed on these organisations.

She has ignored the budgeting services. They went ahead—they were the first ones to have this put in their contracts last year. She has ignored the Women’s Refuge. She has ignored the addiction and mental health organisations that have raised concerns about this, and problem gambling services that have an issue about this. She has ignored it to her own detriment, because now we have here a report that states really clearly that, actually, the Government should not be able to push ahead with this, given the concerns that have been raised.

We had been raising concerns about this as soon as it came to light last year. I will not put all the blame on the Minister for Social Development, because we do have to acknowledge that this approach is all part of the bigger social investment approach of the Government, and the person behind the bigger social investment approach is actually Bill English. The big data-grab agenda is all about Bill English. So it is not just the Minister who is at fault here; it is the leader of the National Government who is at fault here. That is not leadership—when you do not do the checks and balances before you follow through with an agenda. It is a clear case that not only the Minister for Social Development has failed here. The leader, our Prime Minister, has actually failed in this regard as well.

Hon ANNE TOLLEY (Minister for Social Development): I make no apology for wanting to make sure that the most vulnerable in our communities get the services from the Government, which the taxpayer funds, that will help them live better lives. I make no apology for that. I went to a meeting with a group of NGOs working in a small poor rural district a couple of months ago, and the telling thing for me was that as they talked about an individual family, they asked people in the room to stand up to represent each of the agencies that was working with that family. There was a room of something like 30-odd people, and something like 18 people stood up as they called the roll call of the agencies working with that family.

I do not know about anyone in this House, but I sat there thinking this family had high, complex needs. Some people might call the family dysfunctional, but there were six children in that family and all of those people in that family deserve to get the services to help them live better lives. But how could they deal with all of those agencies parked up their driveways, all with good intentions, trying to give the services to them? This organisation that was talking to us had formed a group that got together, shared information, and designated one person to develop a relationship with that family and to organise all those other agencies.

What I am describing is the way that children’s teams work around this country. What I am describing is the way that many iwi social services are working around this country. I am describing the way Whānau Ora works around this country. In order to do that, and to work in that way, which we know is effective and we can prove is effective, we need to be able to share that information. So this is not something to be afraid of. It is not to be used as a weapon. It is not to be used as a way to punish people. This is a way to share information so that families can get the help they need without having to have that sort of complex assistance adding to their dysfunction.

This Government spends $330 million every year on social services out in our communities. Hand on heart, I cannot say that that $330 million is effective, because I have no way of judging that. In fact, family violence is on the increase. The number of children in State care is increasing. The number of children being abused is still increasing. The number of families that are in dysfunction is still increasing. So that $330 million every year is clearly not effective, and the Privacy Commissioner, in his summary, makes a point—[Interruption]

Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! The member has already had a very high-volume, 15-minute contribution. I would appreciate it, if she is going to have another one—she gets another right of reply; oh no, she does not, thankfully. But anyway, later on in the night—[Interruption] I am on my feet. I am on my feet. You can, at some stage, seek whatever you like. The House will be in charge of its own business. However, the member made a very strong, impassioned statement. It is being responded to. She has had her go. The odd, well-timed, well-intentioned interjection is part of the play of the House. I suggest that she stick to that convention.

Hon ANNE TOLLEY: The Privacy Commissioner states in his executive summary that “it is not only legitimate but important that Government takes steps to ensure the efficacy of any programme it funds. It needs good information in order to do so.” So the question then becomes: what information is required?

I agree with the Privacy Commissioner’s first recommendation, which is that if we were looking only for the effectiveness of the programmes, anonymised information may well be enough. Unfortunately, that is not all we are interested in. We have heard a lot about the people who might not come forward. There are assumptions that people might not come forward if they know that their information is going to be shared—not their personal information, but the details of who they are and the shape of their family—with the funder, which is the Ministry of Social Development (MSD), or, as it will be in the future, the Ministry for Vulnerable Children, Oranga Tamariki. But nobody has talked about the people who are getting no services and no coverage whatsoever, and nobody is talking about the family that I have just been talking about, where 18 different agencies were providing services to that family. That does not make sense. That is not a good use of taxpayers’ money and, actually, it is not helping the most vulnerable people.

So what we would like to do, and what we are proposing to do, is to gather information on who NGOs are working with, so that we can see that we have good coverage. You cannot do that with anonymised data, so, unfortunately, in my discussions with the Privacy Commissioner, I have tried to explain to him that we do need to know whom we are working with. I have said to him that if Statistics New Zealand can provide a way to give us that information, I would welcome that. Unfortunately, to date, it has not been able to do that.

His second recommendation I have certainly accepted, and I have asked MSD to find a way to create an exemption. His recommendation is that it must ensure that our “information collection practices do not deter vulnerable individuals from receiving necessary help.”, and nobody wants to deter people who need help.

So, yes, we are designing into this system an exceptions regime, so that NGOs—and I have to say, most NGOs that I have talked with receive not only Government funding but also receive much philanthropic funding. So there are opportunities, and I have talked with some NGOs that have said: “It is very simple. You only want information on the people whom the Government is funding. We have opportunities to work with people in a different way, and we may well take advantage of that.” But I have heeded the recommendation of the Privacy Commissioner, and we are developing an exemptions regime for a certain percentage.

His third recommendation is that we “must ensure that the purposes for collecting, holding, using, and disclosing information are specific, relevant to [the] functions, and clearly conveyed, and the information is necessary to achieve these purposes.” That is incredibly important, and I have asked MSD to make sure that people know exactly what we intend to use this data for.

So it is not for matching, and it is really mischievous of people to go around telling vulnerable people that their information is going to be shared with Work and Income and they might lose their benefit. That is outrageous. It is absolutely outrageous to say that to people, because there is no intention—absolutely no intention—to share that information in that way. It is designed to make sure that we have the right people receiving the right services at the right time.

Sue Moroney: And to deter them from getting them.

Hon ANNE TOLLEY: Oh, absolute nonsense. We want—

Sue Moroney: That’s what it is.

Hon ANNE TOLLEY: You would not be talking about coverage, and you would not be talking about identifying gaps and duplications, if you wanted to deter people from getting services. We want to help our vulnerable families, unlike those people sitting over there, who do everything they can to stop people getting these essential services. Those members are full of talk, and when it comes to what is actually happening on the ground, they are absent. They love making a noise, but they hate actually going out and doing the work themselves.

Then the fourth recommendation of the Privacy Commissioner is to “ensure that its security procedures for holding, using and disclosing ICLD are robust, well-documented and transparent.”, and I agree with him, 100 percent—100 percent. That is why I said to MSD, “This is unacceptable. This is not acceptable. You’re going to close down all of that portal and you are going to start again.”, because none of this can be achieved if we do not have security of the private information of these people.

So I want to say that this Government is absolutely—the evidence is clear that by using good information, intervening early and effectively in families’ and in children’s lives, but, more importantly, working collectively not just with NGOs but also with Māori organisations and iwi, I am confident that we can make a difference in New Zealanders’ lives. I am confident we can do that. We are seeing that already with organisations like the children’s teams making huge changes in families’ lives, but they do that only where they share the information. If I refer to the two family violence trials that are happening currently—one in Christchurch and one in Waikato—the essence of what those trials are showing is that the sharing of information shows us a much broader picture.

One of the stories from the children’s teams is pertinent, I think, in that they found 12 different agencies had been working with this family over a period of time—quite a lengthy period of time. Yet it was not until that child was referred to a children’s team, a lead professional was appointed, all the other agencies were cleared out, and a relationship was developed with the family that we actually found that at the heart of the dysfunction was family violence. So sharing of information leads to better decisions about what services are needed for those families. Social investment is a way of working that is proving to be effective with our families, but it is only as effective as the information that it is based on, because if you have got only half the story, you can only ever give half the answer. In fact, I would suggest that you cannot give even half the answer, if you have not got all the information.

Finally, I would say we have some superb NGOs in New Zealand. They do a tremendous amount of work and there is no intention to cut back any of the $330 million that MSD spends every year on community-based services. But we do need to know that everyone who needs the services is getting the services that they deserve that will make a difference for them, and in order to do that we need to share data, and in order to share data we need to have the trust and confidence that that data will be respected and will be protected. Thank you.

JAN LOGIE (Green): I have got to say that I read this report, which I think can be fairly characterised as a damning report, with a lot of discomfort, and it raised many questions for me. Some of the questions are about how we got to the point we are at at the moment, and other questions are about where we go next. So I just want to address some of the questions that were raised for me by the report, about how we got to this point.

What this shows us is that, in the words of the Privacy Commissioner, a system was put in place prematurely, without adequate consideration of privacy risks or mitigation of those risks. And it is not as if the Opposition and the community organisations that were being told they had to do this had not raised concerns about these issues. We have been, since at least October last year, and we have had in response from the Minister for Social Development constant assurances that there is nothing to see here, that Opposition members and community organisations and the public could have absolute confidence in the roll-out of this individual client data information-sharing, that we should just trust in the process, and that the Ministry of Social Development (MSD) was on to it.

Well, this report tells us that, actually, we are validated in our concerns—that already there has been a privacy breach, and that the basics of oversight were not done. The Privacy Commissioner said that he would have expected a privacy impact assessment to happen before this process was initiated, in order to consider what the privacy risks might be and how they could be mitigated. But that work is still not completed. This is something that was started in March last year, and we have had assurances that this Government is all over it and that it is holding privacy concerns and keeping strong oversight of that.

Yet the absolute first step was never done, and has still not been done. The Privacy Commissioner was briefed on the intention for this programme in June last year, and the Privacy Commissioner was told at that time that there was going to be an ability for sensitive services to opt out of sharing this individual client data and that it was going to be aggregated data for research purposes. Then somehow, between June and December, the actual plan changed significantly, to the point that in December it became clear that the policy intent was then for individual client data to be able to be used for sharing and matching with other agencies. And this is quoting from the Privacy Commissioner’s report—this is not me being mischievous; this is not a misrepresentation of what the policy is. And we—I will speak for myself—have never insinuated that that may have been matching or sharing with Work and Income. It was with anyone, because the initial intent was that it would be anonymised data for research purposes, and that changed. It does not seem as if the Privacy Commissioner, who we have been told has been kept in the loop along the way on this, was told of that change, which is a fundamental one. It is a completely different policy with significantly more privacy risks. It does not sound as if he was told, and if he was—well, we can gather from the Minister’s answers this afternoon that the Minister never checked to see whether the Privacy Commissioner was told or what his response to those changes might have been.

So we have a very significant issue, and I would say it is one of competence for a Minister. We have a Minister who has come to this House repeatedly giving us assurances that the privacy of individuals would be protected, and yet she did not ensure that a privacy impact assessment was done, and she did not check to see whether the Privacy Commissioner had been informed or what his response was to a massive, significant change in the policy. She cannot even have found out the method for collecting the information in that first stage, because surely—surely—the fact that MSD was collecting information through a spreadsheet would have raised alarm. Then, I would have thought it would raise alarm to hear that MSD was planning on collecting individual data information via spreadsheet. And then, if we will just give her the benefit of the doubt for not having asked that question—which, again, is a competence issue, but just say we let that go—she got this report, or surely would have asked around some detail of that data collection in that initial stage from her briefing, or expected that from officials, and found out that the Privacy Commissioner said that this is not secure and identified significant risk, yet she waited until there was a breach before she stopped collecting that information.

This was despite significant clear, direct warning that the method that was being used was not secure and not safe. That is a massive confidence issue, and I think it should be worrying everyone in this House, as well as the public, because if we are to have faith in the process going forward, if we are to have faith in the protection and the well-being of New Zealanders, then we need to know that the Minister who has oversight of such significant reform knows what questions to be asking and will be making sure that she is getting the right answers. If she does not know what questions to ask, if she is not actually making the effort to ask those questions, then how can we be sure that there is going to be safe implementation of such a radical policy? We cannot be sure.

And that brings up some of the other issues that we are seeing, and the inconsistencies I heard from the Minister earlier, where she was saying that, yes, they need to collect the individual data, because without it they cannot be sure that people are getting the right services. She quoted examples of the children’s teams and Whānau Ora, as if those systems do not have information-sharing capability at the moment—they do. There is no actual translation of how that could translate to knowing whether an individual is getting the right service if that information is going to some data analyst sitting in an office in Wellington, and they still have not given agencies an assurance that there will be no adverse consequences for people from that information being shared.

It has identified that there will be the ability for MSD to share that information with the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Justice, and the Ministry of Education. Within MSD, the Minister also mentioned Oranga Tamariki. We know at the moment that people are not accessing healthcare—I have been told of several examples of victims of domestic violence not accessing healthcare services because they are scared of reports going to Child, Youth and Family, and losing their kids.

So here we have a very valid concern that people will potentially not access services if information is being shared in that way. Yet the Minister has given us no assurance that that will not happen. It has not been said. We are hearing that it is about making sure that services are not being duplicated or that people are getting the right service. That gives an indication that, actually, if that is to be relevant or meaningful, they would actually intervene if they found an individual was not accessing a service, and go to them and tell them “We think you should be accessing a service.”, or, if someone is accessing many services, they are going to go in and try to reduce the number of services they are accessing. If people have chosen to access those services, then that is an adverse outcome, I would suggest. The Minister is saying that it needs it for the information to be meaningful, but now it is going to bring in some exemptions—but if it is not complete information, then, again, how is it meaningful? If it is saying that it is not going to collect it all but it needs to know whether everyone is accessing it and whether the services are going in the places they need to, but it is only partial information, then, again, how is it meaningful? How will it achieve the goals that the Minister is saying it will? Again, it raises significant issues of competence, and we have no ability to be secure that people will have their rights protected.

DARROCH BALL (NZ First): Before I begin, I just want to pick up on a couple of things that the Minister for Social Development said during her speech. One of them was that she talked about vulnerable kids and how important it is that the organisations support those vulnerable children and find the best way of doing that. Nobody in this House is going to disagree with that. The disagreement that we have as a party—and as a collective Opposition, I guess—is the process by which the Minister wants to achieve that. It is the fact that since day one of this new implementation process and all of the overhaul and legislation going through the House that the Government wants to do—we have said from the start that we are concerned with the processes that the Government is going through, and how on the one hand the Minister can stand up, with what have been proven to be empty words, trying to convince us that everything will be OK with the data collection specifically, and then the results are obviously quite the opposite.

One of the things that the Privacy Commissioner actually said in his report was that the Government runs the very real risk of not only losing the trust of the clients who want to use the services of the Ministry of Social Development (MSD) but, actually, the people of New Zealand losing trust in the Government—and that is exactly what has happened.

The second thing that the Minister said was that “none of it can be achieved if they don’t have security”, and she was mentioning the data collection or the system that they were using, and that is why she shut it down. She said that none of it can be achieved if they do not have security, and if she is saying that today, that means she must have known that it was the case previously. So why has it got to this point in the first place? If she knew that security was of paramount importance, if she knew the consequences if that security were breached or if that security were questioned, then why did she not go and ensure that the ministry—and all her officials in it and everyone else throughout the ministry—went through the processes that ensured that this situation could not occur?

I do not think it is any coincidence—well, I guess it is more of an irony—that the day the Privacy Commissioner released his report was the exact same day that there was a privacy breach that occurred. I think that just highlights the entire issue. I think it is a very important issue, which the entire Opposition has been talking about for months, and this is a good opportunity to speak about it.

This whole, entire situation is just a culmination and a manifestation of the utter arrogance of the Government. It establishes and shows just how out of touch and disconnected the Government is—especially the Ministry of Social Development and the Minister for Social Development—with the reality of the provision of essential services at the grassroots. It has been mentioned before, but just a few weeks ago Rape Crisis came out and said that it is not going to accept any more funding if this data collection keeps going, because of the fact that it knows that the most vulnerable people it works with will not give their data and that it will not be able to provide effective services to those people. That is the reality, the day-by-day reality, that those people on the ground are dealing with. What this example shows, and what this situation that we are talking about today shows, is that the Minister and the ministry and this Government are so far out of touch with the reality of what is happening on the ground today—every day.

The entire premise of what the Minister stood up and said about data collection—and I am sure it is what members of the National Party have been given notes to talk about—is that no matter what they say, this entire thing is just ideology. If we have a look at the actual facts of the matter, if we have a look at the consequences of where things go wrong and the processes where things go wrong—because they have gone wrong already—you can see that it is not based on fact. It is just ideology. The biggest problem that this Government has is that the data-collection processes and the ideology with which they are moving forward are the absolute foundation of the social investment approach. It is using the social investment approach carte blanche across the entire social service, and that, in itself, is based on ideology and not on facts.

What the Government members like to try to hide behind is standing up in the House every day and saying how well they are doing with their Better Public Services targets, how they are achieving them, and rattling off a whole heap of information and data, with no context whatsoever. When you start digging deep down a little bit more into the Better Public Services targets they mention, you can tell that they are failing. If this philosophy of the Government had been actually working over the better part of the last decade, then why are the most fundamental things that are intertwined into the social fabric of our country failing? I am just going to list a few of them: youth crime is up; homelessness is up; child poverty is up; youth unemployment—the “neet” rates are increasing exponentially—is up; house prices and living costs are up; domestic violence numbers are up; and child abuse is up. If this philosophy was working, if this social investment approach was working, if this approach that this Government has to social services and the provision of social services was working, then why are all of the fundamentals in the “bad” columns up?

But do we hear about that stuff? No, all we hear about is the targets. If the targets were working so well, then why does this Government not actually get them audited? Why does it end up setting them itself and reviewing them itself, and then Government members stand up in this House and say how much they actually achieved?

Today, before I came into the House—because I pre-empted, a little bit, the urgent debate—I asked the Parliamentary Library to gather the number of privacy breaches or complaints that have been reported, just over the last 8 or 9 years. Just reported ones—just reported ones. This is in the media, so this is just the tip of the iceberg of what has happened. You can see it is quite a large stack of papers. It is in the vicinity of 40 to 60 breaches or complaints over the last 8 years. If the Government was very serious, was taking this data collection seriously and ensuring and understanding, like the Minister stands up and says, the importance of the security of that data collection—with the history that MSD has of not being secure, you would think it would want to get it right.

Just in the last couple of minutes, I would actually like to go through the most important part of the report that the Privacy Commissioner has released, and that is the conclusion. He has seven points, and I will just briefly go through a few of the most important ones. The first one, he says, is that “Implementing a significant new information gathering policy without sufficient evidentiary basis and without adequate consultation amounts to a serious deficit in the policy development process.” That is the first one that he says in his conclusion.

The second one is: “My view is that MSD has executed the collection … prematurely without adequate consideration of the privacy risks involved and appropriate mitigation of those risks.”

The third one goes on to say that this policy that the Government wants to implement is a new direction for the Government, and it needs to proceed with caution. There was, again, an inadequate development process through this entire process.

One of the most important points—there are seven, but one of the most important points is where it says that “the success of MSD’s policy is in jeopardy.” This entire policy is in jeopardy. “The reach of these consequences are not limited to MSD and could threaten individuals’ overall trust of the Government”, which is what I was saying before. Like I said before, it is a bit too late for that.

There are a number of issues that, unfortunately—I guess the most unfortunate part is that New Zealand First and the other Opposition parties have stated from the start of this entire process that we were concerned with the way in which the Government was approaching the big changes that it wanted to make, for the right reasons. We stated that we had issues with the process and that we had definite issues with the data collection, and the extent and the purpose of that data being collected. Unfortunately, it has come to a head this week. We have had a privacy breach, and we have had the Privacy Commissioner come out with some very, very serious concerns.

This is not a bad report; it is an ominous report for the future direction that the Minister and the ministry want to take social services. I think that the Minister needs to sit back and have a real rethink about the entire direction of the social investment, but, in particular, the data collection part. Thank you.

Hon ALFRED NGARO (Minister for Pacific Peoples): Is it—just checking. Yes? Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker—I was just a bit unsure whether it was my call. But I am honoured to take the call this afternoon, addressing this issue with this debate. This debate has been raised because there are concerns. It is a valid debate that has to be had because it is to do with the issues around the care and concern of our communities. It is a valid debate—that is why we are here today. It has been raised, and there are concerns in regard to information that is required.

I just want to remind us that with this debate, we have been talking about the genesis of this debate—the whole theme and thrust of the social investment approach. At its heart, and at its core, it is about two key things. The first thing is about data and evidence. We want to know that the fact is that we are asking the right questions. If we are investing or if we are putting taxpayer funds into the appropriate approach, whatever service it may be, do we know we are getting the right return? That is a question that every single New Zealander would want us to be held accountable to, and that is absolutely the right thing.

The second thing about the social investment approach is that it is about investing early. In other words, early intervention and prevention is the key to ensuring that we address those issues of concern, and that is at the core heart. So regarding the concerns that have been raised about the social investment approach, I think and I believe that all New Zealanders who are listening here today will agree that those are appropriate questions to ask. That holds us to account and makes sure that we are asking the right questions. But, more importantly, are we using taxpayer funds, which are given to us to be held to account, appropriately and in the right way? That is critically important as well.

There has been some talk about the fact that in this, and especially the issues around the Privacy Commissioner, which he has raised—I want to just remind the House, and those who are listening, that this relationship with the Privacy Commissioner has been one that we have welcomed, and we have ensured that the Privacy Commissioner has been a part of the process and also engaged in all parts of this development. We know that in December of last year he was invited to a workshop with other key officials and other key stakeholders. We talked about the importance of the approach that we were taking. We have not discounted the issues that the Privacy Commissioner, by right, in his role of responsibility, has taken. He has asked us to ensure that we are accountable. He has asked us to ensure that we protect the privacy of that information and that we have taken it seriously, hence the reason for the report. We have welcomed the report. It has identified four key issues. The Minister for Social Development has talked about those issues, three of them in particular, which we have addressed. We have talked about them and we welcome them, and we think that they are absolutely important.

I know that my colleague and friend over there, Mr Darroch Ball, has actually gone out to the library to seek information about breaches. But one of the things he may not have done is gone out and talk with the people in the community—the key stakeholders, the providers. I have been out there to talk with them. Why? It is because it is not just about sending officials out; it is about the face-to-face conversation. Why? [Interruption] That is right—you may not want to hear it, because it did not come from the library. You may not want to hear it, because it came from outside of your Google and Wikipedia. This was a face-to-face conversation to talk about the issues that we are taking. We talked about Oranga Tamariki. We talked about the approach. Was there a concern? There were no concerns with where the Government was going. We talked about the inclusion of the voices of young people—having an opportunity where their concerns could be heard. For the first time, under this Government, we have an NGO that has young people who are at the heart of this, so that they can have their concerns right at the heart of Oranga Tamariki. Then we also talked about the importance of them engaging, as the whole of New Zealand is—looking at what is important. It is a “whole of” response that we took.

Yes, I will admit that the issue of concern that was raised—and I will put this in context—was about client-led information. People wanted to know what the information is for. What is it going to be used for? As we began to discuss and talk about this, there were similar concerns that were raised by the Privacy Commissioner in regard to who will use the data and how it will be used. There were concerns by other NGOs, who said: “Well, will people stop from sharing their data if they know that they will not sign the privacy waver?”. They had valid questions to ask. So what was important, and what has been done by both the Minister and the department, was to walk step by step through that with the people. No one disagreed with the intent, or the direction that we are going in. No one disagreed.

But the fact is that we need to know that we are holding ourselves to account. We need to know that the services that we deliver—let us think about Diane Robertson from Auckland City Mission. I talked about this at one of the NGO meetings. In her research, she talked about the 100 clients that she had. She talked about the client data that came out of that, in which they found out that in one case, with one family, there were 22 organisations that they had to contend and deal with. In the end, because there was a lack of information, there was a lack of appropriate response. They did not get the help that they needed. Surely that is enough for everyone in the House to be able to say this: we need the right information. But the concerns are right: we need to do it carefully. We need to step through this appropriately. We have done that. We are doing that. So for all the talk and all the discussion here—from the face to face with NGOs in the community, the only response that I have had back is this: just give us assurance. Give us assurance so that we are confident and know that the data that we share is going to be used appropriately.

The member over there, Darroch Ball, talked about 80 breaches in 8 years. You have got to say, if you then went and did the research on how much data is shared—you would go into the tens, maybe even the hundreds, of thousands. You have had 80 breaches over 8 years—that is 10 a year. You can do the fearmongering and you can talk about the issues, but let us go back to the heart of what this is actually about. The heart of this issue is about this: are we doing the right thing, in the right place, at the right time, for the people who ask us to serve them? And are we doing it in a way that we hold ourselves accountable, as a department, as organisations, and, dare I say this, even to providers? Are we doing the right thing to serve those who are most in need?

We know that there are a number who have come and shared those concerns, and I welcome that the Minister has taken the lead in ensuring that she has immediately addressed three out of the four concerns, and is continuing conversations around that. That is critically important as well. This is a solution that we feel is important. It is giving us the data that is vital for us as well. We know that there are 136 providers who have already signed up to this approach. They have been invited to upload the data. [Interruption] There are 10 at the moment—10; that is right—who have come along to upload this information.

But that is what we are saying—when we noticed that it was not quite right at that moment, we shut the thing down. So what do you have to say to this? When we found that there was one that was wrong, the response by the Minister and the department was to shut the thing down and make sure that we got it right. Why? It was because we wanted to give confidence regarding the concerns that were raised.

We believe that we are acting responsibly in what we are doing at the moment. We know that the Minister also has had conversations with those who have had concerns about the special sexual violence services. In their case, they have had those concerns—how has she addressed this? She has addressed this by allowing for a period of a year, so that they can continue to again work through those concerns step by step.

No one disagrees with the intent. No one disagrees with what we are trying to do, which is to make sure we have the right information and to ensure we provide the information service at the right time for the right purpose. I have heard no one at all disagree with that. What we are concerned about in this debate is to make sure that we have stepped through all of those concerns. We welcome that. We are working through that. We think that is absolutely important as well—

Hon Member: What do you think we’re having an urgent debate for?

Hon ALFRED NGARO: Well, that is why the urgent debate is here—to provide for that provision as well. I think the work that we are doing at the moment is critically important. We are working through—

Carmel Sepuloni: Round it up, Alfred. You know you have nothing else to say.

Hon ALFRED NGARO: Well, the member may think that, but these are the face-to-face conversations we are having in communities up and down the country. We are talking to the people, and this is what they are sharing. We did not send officials; we went along ourselves. The Minister has also gone along and talked to different community groups—those who have had concerns. We have addressed them. We are walking through it with them, so you cannot say that this is a Government that is out of touch, as has been commented. You cannot say that this is a Government that is not stepping and walking through those concerns. In fact, you would have to say the opposite. We do not go to Google and we do not go to the library to get information. No, we do not. We go out, we meet our stakeholders, and we talk to them about the concerns they have. We know that at the moment the concerns are there. We are being responsible as a Government to ensure that we walk through those concerns with them. If there is a breach, then we immediately shut that breach down until we have addressed it in the right and appropriate way.

We are continuing to listen to the concerns. We are working with the Privacy Commissioner. We have got the report; we are working through that. So we believe that we are acting responsibly. We are doing all the right things that are appropriate. I welcome the approach that the Minister has taken, which is the appropriate one. We are confident in what we are doing. Again, I want to reiterate this: the heart of this issue is about getting the right data and the right information to make the right decision. I confirm this debate.

GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central): Where you find incompetence, arrogance, and ideology meeting, you will find this National Government. That is what we have learnt from the Privacy Commissioner’s report today. This is a shambles. The Privacy Commissioner, an officer of this country’s people, has made a report—and I do not think I have ever seen one more damning from that office. For the Government and Alfred Ngaro to stand up and say “You can’t say this report shows we’re out of touch.”—that is just what it shows, Mr Ngaro.

Community organisations right around New Zealand have been raising concerns about the individual client - level data collection from day one and no Minister—no member of that Government—has been prepared to actually listen to that. Instead, they barge on with their ideological approach to social investment, which I will return to shortly, and nothing can stop that, because it is all they have got. It is all they have got after 9 years of social problems growing around them. All they have got is this approach. Anne Tolley says: “It is growing. All I’ve got is this, and I have to carry on no matter what the damage is that I’m doing.”

It is very important for people listening to understand exactly what we are talking about today. The individual client - level data approach makes the provision of personal, identifiable client data a requirement for receiving Government funding for these organisations, and there is no ability to opt out. Just think about that. The names, the addresses, and the contact details of vulnerable people and their children are being collected, and there is no ability for a community organisation to say: “That’s not appropriate for us.” So Alfred Ngaro says: “There’s 100-odd organisations that have signed up to that.” They had to—they had to do it. What kind of control-freak Government are we dealing with here that says—

Hon Ruth Dyson: A nanny State—a police State.

GRANT ROBERTSON: Yes, exactly. It used to complain about a nanny State. This Government has caused the Privacy Commissioner to issue the most damning report I have ever seen his office issue, because this Government is perpetuating on these organisations some of the most damaging actions that they need to take to get funding, and that is a disgrace.

I want to be absolutely clear too about what the Privacy Commissioner has said. The Privacy Commissioner has said that his view is that requiring the information to be collected in this way is excessive, disproportionate to the Government’s legitimate needs, and is, therefore, inconsistent with information privacy principles. That is it. It is fundamental. The programme is out of control in terms of the basic values around privacy that New Zealanders hold dear. The Privacy Commissioner goes on: “As the policy currently stands, individual clients are required to share their … information.” There will be negative consequences. Individuals may choose to stay away from seeking help at all. Alfred Ngaro and the Minister have both said: “Oh, that’s just people’s fears. That’s not real.” It is real.

My colleague Stuart Nash has got just one example of how real this is. An organisation based in Napier called DOVE delivers a number of programmes aimed at giving perpetrators of domestic violence strategies to modify their behaviour. Some of these people are referred by the courts, but others self-diagnose and undertake the programmes because they want to improve themselves. DOVE’s management has told Mr Nash that it believes the Ministry of Social Development’s (MSD’s) new policy requiring them to disclose clients’ details will dissuade a number of clients from accessing its services.

This is an organisation doing exactly the work we want to see done, and it is telling the Government that the people who would come to it will be dissuaded. The Privacy Commissioner is telling the Government that people will be dissuaded from getting the services that they need. And Alfred Ngaro says it is listening. It is not listening. It is refusing to listen to the very organisations, like DOVE in Napier, that are trying to do the right thing by New Zealanders. That is arrogance. That is incompetence from the Government, and, unfortunately, it is what we have come to expect from this Government.

The Privacy Commissioner went on to say that one of his fears is that people will actually become more invisible to the Government as a result of this, rather than more included, because people will avoid having their names collected or organisations will find ways of making sure that they do not collect the data. So people become more invisible. It is perverse. It goes against the outcomes that the Minister and Alfred Ngaro have told us today they believe are important.

I want to talk briefly about the Minister’s response today around the question of the security of data and the portal that the MSD has. It is ridiculous for the Minister to stand up today and try to claim the moral high ground—that she shut the portal down once she found a breach. Where was the work before the portal was set up to ensure that it met the rules that the Privacy Commissioner himself set down for the Government? It did not test it. It stuck it up there. Unbelievably, organisations have been asked by MSD to provide the information on a spreadsheet. Get a bit of Excel out, send it in to the Government. That is not going to be secure. Anybody could tell you that, but the Government forged ahead, because the Government has got nothing else on the go. It is all about this approach; this is the only way that it thinks it can get it through.

Any New Zealander who has been following the news in the last couple of years knows that this Government’s record around privacy is appalling. The Office of the Privacy Commissioner received 121 data breach notifications in the past financial year. Judith Collins, a few years ago, actually said “We need to do something about this.”, but Amy Adams, most recently, has told us that the laws are robust and no changes are needed. Think about the breaches that we have had just in the last couple of years: MSD—multiple breaches—ACC, the Earthquake Commission, Housing New Zealand, the Medical Council of New Zealand, Immigration New Zealand, the Ministry of Justice, and the Southern District Health Board. These are all public agencies with significant data security problems. This Government has a problem when it comes to protecting the privacy of New Zealanders, and it is in denial. It is refusing to acknowledge that.

That portal has been shut down after the fact. The Minister cannot guarantee New Zealanders today that that information, which has been brought in from all of these agencies, can be protected. She said she does not trust it and neither should New Zealanders. Well, that is the situation the Minister is in, having already implemented the programme. That is a disgraceful way to go about this kind of work.

The Privacy Commissioner has an excellent section on page 37 of the report entitled “How could MSD have done better?” I want to quote from it: “For a policy of this size and significance I would have expected MSD to take a precautionary approach, clearly identifying its purposes, considering the full range of options to achieve these purposes”. It did not do it. For something as fundamental as capturing the names and addresses and the personal data of people, it failed to take that precautionary approach.

The Privacy Commissioner goes on: “MSD has not clearly articulated its objectives for collecting [the data] … Nor has it explained how the data it receives … will achieve its aims … This failure has negatively impacted on the trust and confidence of NGOs and the people who will be affected by the policy.” It is an absolute failure. It is a failure for the most vulnerable in New Zealand, who need these services. The agencies who work for the Government have told it they will not access services under these circumstances, but it does not listen. It is out of touch, it is arrogant, and it is, in this case, totally incompetent.

The Privacy Commissioner goes on: “I would also have expected MSD to identify and mitigate risks early on including by undertaking a thorough privacy impact assessment prior to implementing contractual changes and information collection processes. It is disappointing that a privacy impact assessment still has not been completed (as at 4 April 2017)”. Alfred Ngaro stood up and told us that the Privacy Commissioner has been involved all the way through. He has been calling for a privacy impact assessment, and the Government has not done it, and, as at 4 April, it still has not done it.

Every member of this House wants to make sure that the most vulnerable New Zealanders get the protection and the support that they need. In order to do that, we need a Government that is sensitive to the privacy needs of those people and that is competent in what it does in going about its work. This report today is evidence that it has completely failed those vulnerable New Zealanders. It has been incompetent, it has been arrogant, and it has been driven by ideology. That is why this Government has got to go.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): I call Marama Fox—5 minutes.

MARAMA FOX (Co-Leader—Māori Party): You know what? I really, really want to work with this Government to support the establishment of Oranga Tamariki in a way that is beneficial for all New Zealand—I do. I know that the members of the Opposition also want to work to secure the future of our most vulnerable children. There are just a number of things that give us grave concern, and this is one of them—the sharing of information.

The Minister spoke about Whānau Ora being an example of where information is shared, but, let me tell you, the clear difference is that the Whānau Ora navigator comes and sits with the whānau and asks them: “What do you want? How can we assist you? How can we make that happen, and then whom do we need to get involved in order to do that and navigate the bureaucracy that has become our system?”. That is clean, because it works with the whānau, and if there is information to be shared, they are fully aware. It benefits their purpose, and they understand what it is going to be used for. What is happening here is a collection of information that is going to follow those people around forever, and I am not clear—it is not clear to me—what information they are asking for. Is it just their name, just their address—but, even then, is it coming from somebody, like they have pointed out, who said: “If I had known that my name would be passed on to other people, I would not have come.”?

Last week I had the opportunity to travel with the Justice and Electoral Committee to Australia and attend the Royal commission of enquiry into the institutional response to children who had been sexually abused. We had a moment to speak with the chief commissioner of that inquiry—which has been happening for 5 years—and he said that, on average, if a male has been abused, it takes him 30 years to build up the courage to present and tell their story. On average, if a female child has been abused, it takes them 20 years to front up and tell their story.

We talked about the statute of limitations being moved. If there is more pressure being put on people who are voluntarily trying to fix their own pathways because of the sustained abuse that they have had in their past and that information might inhibit them coming forward, then that cannot happen—and I know that the Minister has said that we going to put that section on hold. Well, on hold for what? On hold for how long? I do not want to be overly damning, because I actually want to go and help, but we need to be on the same page, and sharing information from one agency to another when it is to the detriment of those people who are involved is not something that we can sign up to.

There are a number of objections that we have had along the way—and I know the intent and the heart of the Minister is very real. I know that. I have sat and spoken with her, and I get that, but there is definitely a difference of opinion on how we come to the end point. It starts with the name—the Ministry for Vulnerable Children, Oranga Tamariki. The logic behind that name would have us call the Ministry of Health the “Ministry of Sick and Dying People”. The logic behind that name would have us call the Ministry of Education the “Ministry of Dumb Folks Who Need Some Learning”. There is no logic behind that.

Surely we must be aspirational, and be aspirational in the information that we share. If saving a child is at the heart, then the whānau who surrounds them also is at the heart. We are tarring people with a brush for risk profiling so that we can come in and save them from themselves before they have even presented with an issue. Have some faith in our people. Stop breaking families apart. Put support around them. That is what Whānau Ora is. That is what we advocate for. And that is what we are asking the Minister to do. Thank you.

POTO WILLIAMS (Labour—Christchurch East): During the last session, my general debate speech raised this very issue that we are debating today. In that speech, I talked about how Rape Prevention Education and Wellington Women’s Refuge had successfully negotiated a stay where they would not be required to provide the level of information that other services would be required to for a further 12 months—and in the words of the Minister—so that they could ensure that they would get the system right for that sensitive information that Rape Prevention Education and Wellington Women’s Refuge would have to provide. So that leads me to ask the question: if that information is really sensitive, is it still going to be sensitive in a year’s time?

What I was really concerned about was what I heard today from the Minister in response to this very, very real urgent debate—that the Minister appears to have a real lack of understanding of what happens in the real world with providers delivering services to real people. I raised Rape Prevention Education, but I also want to raise my own experience of having run a community outreach service, which was right on the main street of Henderson—I have spoken about this before—where it would take several times for women going past our shopfront before they would actually come in the door.

What that spoke to is that it takes a lot of courage for people to actually own up to the issues that they have and to seek that help—to reach out and get help—but particularly when it comes to issues of family violence and sexual violence, because the mamae that people have, the shame that they hold, is there for a long, long time, and it is not rational. It is not rational. When I have done tours of the country talking to community organisations, they have told me—every single one has raised this as a matter of concern—if you cannot establish a relationship of trust with your client, you are unable to work effectively with them, and you cannot establish a relationship of trust if they cannot even come in the door. You have to be able to be that safe place for people to come in and disclose their most intimate of issues.

One particular service said to me that they provide services to teenagers and young people in high school—people who do not have the age of consent. How, then, are they going to be able to consent to provide their information to a party, which is then going to hand it on to the Ministry of Social Development? This particular service—and I will not name it—deals with young people who disclose issues of family and sexual violence, which under the rules of the Ministry of Social Development will require their parents to sign off the notification for that information to be passed on to the Ministry of Social Development. In some cases, those parents are the ones who are perpetrating the abuse upon these children. So that is not going to work.

I have been hearing those stories up and down the country, and when I last spoke about this issue the Hon Jo Goodhew challenged me and said to me that you would only be required to give information that you would give to your local school. Let us see what that information is. The information is: name, date of birth, iwi, ethnicity, address, the details of your children, and the services that you access. When you are going to school the services that you access are educational services. If you are actually receiving mental health support, or support from the community for alcohol and drugs, and you are a parent and you are disclosing that you need that support, then there is a very real fear in people who access these services that that information will then target them as being risky parents.

That is a very real fear. It may not be rational, but in terms of what is going to be required by the Ministry of Social Development it is creating fear, and we cannot allow that to happen. We have to have trust in our relationships if we are going to work effectively with people. This does not allow for that to happen, and I for one am really grateful to the Privacy Commissioner for actually raising this concern with us. Thank you.

JOANNE HAYES (National): I want to take a very quick call on the importance of sharing information when it comes to the protection of our vulnerable children and people who are within the system. I can say that I have the experience of working in an organisation where the sharing of information was absolutely critical. However, the systems that were in place at that time never allowed for that to happen. We had too many people keeping their hands around the information, and, therefore, the people who were actually losing from the whole situation were the ones whom the issues were affecting.

When we start looking at the right time, the right place, and the right types of people who are delivering the services, those are the things that underpin the reason that this Government is doing what it is doing. Our Minister and this Government took the responsible pathway. When it was learnt that there was a breach in the system, she shut the system down. I have seen on many occasions, from the other side, when I was working out in the community, the many things that went wrong when it was not shut down when it should have been.

Therefore, in the short contribution that I have today, I want to talk about this and to support the process that we have gone through, which has worked very, very closely with the Privacy Commissioner, the Minister, and the group of people within the Ministry of Social Development to make sure that we get this process right. Shutting down that system was getting it right. Sharing information is getting it right, because at the end of the day, with agencies all understanding the same story of the client, it means that that client does not have to relive the trauma that they have been going through by having to repeat it 18 to 20 to 22 times. It is that that is actually off-putting to clients.

I have met some of those clients. I have sat in the room and I have listened to them. What they have said to me is that they are really hōhā with the way things are going for them. So without any further ado, I support what this Government is doing. May we keep going, as this responsible Government, dealing with the situations that need to be dealt with. Thank you.

The debate having concluded, the motion lapsed.

Bills

Resource Legislation Amendment Bill

Recommittal

IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North): I move, That under Standing Order 311 the Resource Legislation Amendment Bill be recommitted for consideration by the Committee of the whole House in order to consider amendments made to Part 1 of the bill, “Amendments to the Resource Management Act 1991”.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): There is no debate on this.

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

Ayes 58

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

Noes 63

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

Motion not agreed to.

IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I just want to clarify the National Party vote. We could not hear Mr Ross on this side of the House.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): No, it was very clear. I heard it and the Clerk recorded it. I have announced the result.

Third Reading

Hon Dr NICK SMITH (Minister for the Environment): I move, That the Resource Legislation Amendment Bill be now read a third time. This bill is a critical part of the Government’s programme to increase the supply and affordability of housing, to grow the economy with more jobs and higher incomes, and also to improve New Zealand’s environmental management. The bill is a second phase of our reform programme that began with a major bill in our first term, but for which we were unable to get progress in our second term because we were unable to secure a parliamentary majority. It is a significant milestone that today we will pass this 250-page bill involving 40 substantial changes and over 700 specific provisions, after multiple rounds of technical advisory groups, public consultation, and negotiations with other parties in this Parliament.

Parties opposing this bill are doing New Zealand a disservice. In the Committee stage they quibbled at the edges, they tried to manufacture myths, but they have been unable to mount any credible argument against the substantive reforms in this bill—in fact, they barely mentioned them.

This bill introduces national planning standards, so as to simplify the 80,000 pages of resource management rules and policies, more than 1,000 pages per council, which make the RMA a nightmare for New Zealanders to navigate. A country of 4.7 million people cannot justify that level of bureaucracy. It makes common sense that we have standard zonings, standard ways of measuring things like the height of a building, standard definitions, and a standard format for our plans.

The bill radically changes the way plans are written by introducing a new streamlined and collaborative process. This matters because it takes on average 7 years currently for a council to complete a new plan, and that is just too slow to address the sorts of water and housing issues that our communities face. We know that this new streamlined process works because our Government has used it in writing new plans for the major cities of Auckland and Christchurch through special legislation. The overwhelming message is that the process was robust, the plans were better, and the results were achieved in a fraction of the time.

I am equally appalled that members opposite are opposing the addition of natural hazards to the matters of national importance. Earthquakes, floods, cyclones, tsunamis, and landslides are not things to play politics with. The recent quakes in Christchurch and Kaikōura, the floods in Auckland and Northland earlier this year, and the flooding of Edgecumbe today are reminders of the significant natural hazard risks our country faces. This change was recommended by the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Building Failure Caused by the Canterbury Earthquakes, because planners had been so diverted by the more politically correct requirements of the current Act—the Resource Management Act (RMA)—that those hazards were overlooked. Every responsible member of this House genuinely concerned with the well-being of our country should be backing the inclusion of this important requirement into the most central part of the RMA—its purposes and principles.

One of the biggest issues facing our country right now is the supply and affordability of housing. I am gobsmacked at members opposite who demand that this be addressed and then come down to this House and oppose the very measures that will make a real difference. Report after independent report—be it the Productivity Commission, be it Treasury, be it the OECD, be it The New Zealand Initiative, or be it the Property Council—make plain that it is the supply of land that is at the core of the issue. The numbers speak for themselves: the cost of building an average 170 square metre house in Auckland has increased from $120,000 25 years ago to $360,000 today—a threefold increase. But the cost of the average section has, in the same period, gone from $53,000 to $530,000—a tenfold increase. You cannot pretend to be serious about improving the availability of housing unless you are prepared to address the price of new sections and the reform of the very Act—the RMA—that governs their creation.

This bill introduces a new specific requirement on councils to free up land supply. It removes appeals on resource consents for residential development. It reverses the presumption in favour of subdivision. It removes the double-charging system of development and financial contributions to a single, tighter regime. This will help bring the cost of sections down.

This bill is also a help in getting the roading, the rail, the water, the telecommunications, and the electricity infrastructure built to support our strongly growing economy. It will speed up the process for designations and consents. The changes to the Public Works Act—giving more generous compensation to affected landowners, but also including a financial incentive to be able to do so earlier—will help get the infrastructure that our country needs more quickly.

Another important issue that this bill progresses is that of water quality—in enabling national regulations requiring stock to be fenced out of waterways. Only three of our 16 regional councils have any rules on this. National rules are a sensible way forward, backed up by the instant fines in this bill. Members opposite cannot cry foul in any credible way over the state of our waterways when they then come down to the House and vote against these practical measures.

There are also environmental gains in the new provisions that will require offshore platforms to have decommissioning plans. There have been expensive experiences overseas where petroleum companies have exhausted the oil and gas and have then left the huge cost of decommissioning to the taxpayer. This bill addresses that problem.

The bill also tackles the problems of those thousands of unnecessary consents that cause so much frustration and cost for constituents. I have got an example right now in Nelson of the Rutherford Street Kindergarten moving just 100 metres up the road to new premises, and the parents in the kindy committee having to fundraise for over $50,000 of resource consent and related costs. I could bore this Parliament for hours with examples of minor projects like decks and carports actually costing more to get a resource consent than they actually cost to build. These issues are addressed in this bill with the power for a council to be able to waive the need for the consent, the new 10-day fast-track process for minor issues, and the ability to resolve boundary infringement rules—issues that can only be resolved with the consent of the immediate neighbour.

The iwi participation arrangements in this bill are about making existing provisions in the RMA—in sections 6, 7, and 8—more workable. It will enable councils to work out practical ways for iwi to participate in the process and help the system to work better by getting early involvement. The law is plain that decisions on plans and consents remain with the councils and that councils cannot be forced into agreements. There are many councils that already have such arrangements and they are proving to work well for both iwi and resource consent applicants as a consequence of greater clarity about who to consult and what issues are of importance to iwi.

There are dozens of practical provisions in this bill that will reduce bureaucracy and red tape. It tackles the problem of the RMA being used by councils to duplicate the issues that are already regulated in other statutes, like building insulation standards, telecommunications regulations, fishing rules, workplace safety requirements, or hazardous substances rules. We need a regulatory system that leaves no gaps but which also avoids double-ups. The changes to the Reserves Act and the Conservation Act align notification periods and enable joint hearings so that we will not have the two separate processes debating the same project.

I need to conclude by acknowledging the mountain of work that has gone into this bill over many years. I particularly want to acknowledge Amy Adams, the former Minister for the Environment, who during the last term of Parliament put huge work into its provisions; Scott Simpson, who worked tirelessly in chairing the Local Government and Environment Committee; Te Ururoa Flavell and Marama Fox and their team in the Māori Party, who have worked so hard to find compromises; and to Tim Bennetts and George Riddell in my Beehive office; as well as the teams from PCO and the Ministry for the Environment.

The passage of this Resource Legislation Amendment Bill is a significant milestone for this Government. It delivers on reforms planned and promised over many years. It will make houses easier to build and more affordable. It will reduce unnecessary red tape and bureaucracy for Kiwi homeowners, for farms, and for businesses. It will help our country build the infrastructure to support a growing economy. It will ensure our country is safer by better managing those natural hazards. This bill is a litmus test for MPs as to whether their intent is playing politics or doing what is right for our country. I urge this Parliament to pass this complex but very necessary reform.

CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. In 2011 the Standing Orders Committee made some determinations and recommendations to the House around the reading of speeches. One of those was that the Speaker is the sole determinant of whether someone should be allowed to read a speech. But the other was that a Minister should be given greater latitude to read a speech where they are dealing with matters of a technical nature. I have not interrupted the Minister, because I recognise that the sole right to determine whether someone can or cannot read a speech is yours, but if a Minister is going to use their right to read a speech in order to read out a litany of abuse against other members, then that is going to bring the principles that the Standing Orders Committee discussed and—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): I thank the member for his points. I am the sole determinant, as you identified, as to the reading of speeches. The Minister, in clarifying the position that the Minister has been involved in under his name, has some latitude to read from his notes, and that has always been an accepted practice in this House. I look very closely at the reading of speeches, and I am now going to call the—

Chris Hipkins: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Is this a new point of order?

Chris Hipkins: It is a new point of order.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Chris Hipkins—a new point of order.

CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka): Can you clarify the basis on which Ministers are allowed to use prepared—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): No, no, I am the sole determinant—

CHRIS HIPKINS: —speeches to insult other members.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Well, if there has been some insult to a member, I did not actually pick that up. [Interruption] This is a debating chamber, and there has been a robust debate over the last couple of days in the Committee stage. There have been no points of order brought up about insults against other members. I have looked very closely, and I have presided over much of the Committee stage, and I listen very carefully to the debate. That is my ruling.

Hon DAVID PARKER (Labour): We heard it again from Minister Nick Smith, and I think it has got to be said that the reduction of the many dimensions of the housing crisis to the vilification of planning in the Resource Management Act (RMA) is just politically dishonest. Blaming the RMA and planners for the tax biases and the inequality that has driven homeownership in New Zealand to the lowest level since the 1950s—for over 60 years—is just wrong. Blaming the RMA and planners for the pressure caused by having amongst the highest rate of economic migration into a city is just wrong. Planners cannot be held to account for the shortage of motorway space in Auckland.

The truth is the RMA has been in force since 1992. In 2004, when the RMA was enforced, there were 34,000 consents for new houses in New Zealand. In 2016 that went down to 30,000. In Auckland the drop was more extreme. It went down from 12,000 in 2004 to 9,000 in 2016. That was a decrease of 25 percent, disregarding population growth, which had gone up by about 20 percent. So the per-capita drop in housebuilding over that period, under the RMA, was more than 30 percent. Over that same period housing cost increases—not land costs; building costs—increased by 96 percent, and the average house size increased by 21 percent. The RMA did not cause those problems, and has not caused those problems. I think it is true that those facts dismantle the severity of the blame that is attached to the RMA for the housing crisis. So this means that this appalling RMA amendment bill, which is now being pushed through, cannot be justified by the housing crisis.

That does not mean that there have not been silly RMA rules under plans that have constrained the supply of land. It has been the Labour Party policy for more than 5 years to fix that through a national policy statement under the RMA. That was always open to the Government. That is still open to the Government, and it has never properly pursued it. There are other things that are needed—

Hon Dr Nick Smith: We did it in November.

Hon DAVID PARKER: What was that?

Hon Dr Nick Smith: The urban development.

Hon DAVID PARKER: Oh, your ineffective attempt in November, after 8 years in power—the Minister has just proved the fallacy of his own logic. He said: “We’ve done it in November.”—under the existing RMA. He does not need this amendment to do it.

I heard the tripe that we got served up in respect of freshwater quality. Of course we need national guidance in respect of freshwater quality that is better than the polluted sludge that we have been dealt with by the current Government. Of course we need rules about fencing. That can also be done through national guidance under the existing RMA. If there was a problem with the detail of that, why did the Minister not fix that in the last 8 years? And if that was all this bill was doing, we would have no objection to it.

But there are so many other terrible parts to this bill, which is why if this bill passes through—with two votes from the Māori Party pushing it over the line by one vote—then it will be because this is just such an appalling piece of legislation, following a terrible process where the select committee process has been abused and where the normal rules of Parliament have been taken advantage of. Pushing this bill through without a decent Committee debate was one part, and now the Government is trying to get it through tonight so that the political embarrassment to the National Party and the Māori Party is minimised.

I want to deal with one of the issues relating to the Māori Party. The Māori Party said that it opposed the National Government having the right to knock out anti-GM rules and plans. The current law in New Zealand is that the release decision for a GMO is taken by the Environmental Protection Authority, and that is the safety decision. We say the clinical decision for medical uses of GMOs should be for clinicians, not councils, but the existing law does allow, and should continue to allow, economic decisions to be taken by local councils, such as the council in the Hawke’s Bay, which says that for economic reasons—which can be challenged by anyone in its planning processes, including through appeals to the Environment Court—it does not want GM plants in its area for the next 10 years. That is legal at the moment.

Minister Smith hates this. He is not brave enough to come to this House and pass an amendment to make the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act—the empowering legislation—a code. He wants to give himself a ministerial override power that knocks those rules out by regulation, which is one of the many Draconian regulation-making powers that take power off local democracy and giving it to the Minister.

The Māori Party is supporting that. It came along and said it had fixed it with a provision that said that that regulation-making power to knock out rules and plans could not be used in respect of GM crops. Well, what does that mean? The word “crops” is not defined in the legislation, so, as the Minister quite rightly said in the Committee of the whole House stage, “crops” will be given its natural or literal or ordinary meaning. That meaning, as the Minister read out, in the dictionary is that crops are the produce of plants such as cereals, fruit, and vegetables—not pasture, not grass. So the Māori Party members are now running around trying to tell everyone “Well, it includes grass. It includes trees.”, and then they show the fallacy of their own logic by saying “Look at the Forest Rights Registration Act. Crops include trees.” Well, in that Act there is a definition that says that for the purpose of that Act a crop includes a tree. It actually goes the opposite way. The fact that there is no such definition here goes to the point that in this legislation “crop” just means crops—as the dictionaries say, the produce of plants like cereals, fruit, and vegetables—and not trees and not grasses. This will be visited upon the Māori Party, and it has been shown to be hapless in respect of this issue.

There are some other problems with this. You know, you can go too far with this. The issue of property rights and the balance between that and controls and plans is a very valid one. The Productivity Commission report that came out last week backs, essentially, what the Labour Party and, actually, the ACT Party are saying in respect of urban development issues—that you need urban development agencies, you need a decent national policy statement, you need to get rid of the urban boundary and replace it with decent rules around infrastructure and financing, that is very close to what the Greens are saying too, because we are all logical in our economics and the New Zealand First Party—

Hon Members: Ha, ha!

Hon DAVID PARKER: Well, we are. It is the Luddites in the National Party who have got this completely wrong.

Anyway, the Productivity Commission is not actually saying that what is being done here is necessary. It is not saying that we should do away with the rights of people to have a say in respect of a subdivisional application. You know, the opponents to that included not just people who thought that they should have a say if they are close to a subdivision, it included the airports and the quarries who say that if they do not have a say in a subdivision close to them, then there will be reverse sensitivity concerns into the future, and in 10 years’ time someone will say: “Oh, we’ve got a house here now. We shouldn’t have an airport. It’s too noisy or dusty to have a quarry. Please shut down.” Those sort of nonsensical outcomes and future costs from the planning system are caused by this.

They also say that not having appeal rights—and these are developers saying this—in respect of a subdivisional application is nonsense, because you are encouraging councils to impose excessive or stupid conditions and not letting anyone have a remedy. So is that going to drive down the cost of housing or is it going to increase the complexity of council conditions? Use your common sense, Hon Nick Smith, because we know the answer is that it is going to make things worse.

There are lots of other problems. The problems in respect of the Reserves Act, I do not have time to go through. There are some good provisions in here in respect of the Public Works Act—even some of the provisions around national guidance. I do not quite like the way the Government has done them, but we could have gone along with them if it was not for the glaring problems that there are in other parts of this.

This does include various routes for Draconian ministerial powers to override local democracy. We all agree there should be standard templates and definitions, but when you draft those powers so widely that they go to the substance of conditions, you are going too far, and that is what the Government has done here. It is what National often does; it actually does not believe in local democracy. It always thinks it is right and everyone else is wrong. You cannot delegate these things to councils and then give these powers to the Minister. It is just wrong.

The many other faults in this bill have been touched on only superficially in the Committee stage debate because of the way in which that was run. There is a need to change Standing Orders so that bills return to multi-parts if they are complex and are dealing with lots of things, because otherwise these issues do not get properly debated, and there are—

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

SCOTT SIMPSON (National—Coromandel): It is a real pleasure to stand in this third reading debate on the Resource Legislation Amendment Bill, because it has been a long, slow road to get to the point where we have been able to achieve, under this bill, the 40-something most significant changes to the Resource Management Act since its inception in 1991. Back then, in 1991, the new Resource Management Act of that year brought together more than 50 pieces of planning and resource management legislation to provide the Act that we have today. It has been much amended along the way through, so this phase two reform of the legislation, which was promised by the National Party at the last election, is important and I am very pleased that we are going to achieve that today.

It has been a huge piece of work for the Local Government and Environment Committee, and I want to thank members of the committee for their diligent and hard work. I want to thank the committee staff and officials, our ministerial advisers, and, not least of all, I want to thank the submitters—the over 700 submitters who took the time and effort to give us the benefit of their views and opinions on it. I particularly want to thank the 137 submitters whom we heard orally during the submissions on the bill.

There has been lots of talk and posturing—political posturing—by members of the Opposition on this bill. They have been highlighting what they see as difficulties and complications. But the simple matter is this: the very reasons that those members opposite oppose this legislation are the reasons that this Government and our support partners want to advance it and have it passed. It is because these are the issues that are important to ensuring that we get job growth; that we get more housing; and that we have a smoother, faster, more efficient resource management system, and these changes in this bill achieve that in a way that has not previously been the case. There will be a reduction in fees and costs, a speeding up of process, and, overall, New Zealand’s planning and environmental management is going to be improved. This is a very significant piece of legislation. It is a good bill and I support it and commend it to the House.

MEKA WHAITIRI (Labour—Ikaroa-Rāwhiti): Tēnā koe, Mr Assistant Speaker. Tēnā tātou katoa. I am happy to take a call, and I just want to thank our chairperson, who has just resumed his seat, for taking about 3 minutes on a very comprehensive bill.

Hon Member: Two.

MEKA WHAITIRI: Oh, 2; was I being too generous?

Ron Mark: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. Can you give some guidance? This is a very contentious bill and the Government is clearly under pressure, we know, but my question to you is this: is it acceptable in this House for the person who chaired the entire process to take only 3 minutes of a 10—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): The member will sit. That is not a point of order. Members can take as much time as they wish. That is a tradition of this House. I am calling Meka Whaitiri.

Iain Lees-Galloway: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): The clock is ticking and it has not stopped, so I am calling Iain Lees-Galloway.

Iain Lees-Galloway: That is my point of order—a member from New Zealand First interrupted our member and she should not be penalised for that.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): No; well, I am listening very closely, but on these points of order that have got nothing to do with the process of the House, then the clock continues, and I am the sole judge of that. I call Meka Whaitiri.

Chris Hipkins: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I think if—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): I will not be penalising Meka Whaitiri.

Chris Hipkins: Thank you. Right. That was my—

MEKA WHAITIRI: Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker. I want to respond to the chairman of our select committee, Scott Simpson, in following his acknowledgment of the submitters. I want to say that, of the very broad range of submitters who came in front of the Local Government and Environment many of them were opposing, including Local Government New Zealand and a great many regional and district councils. We had major land developers, including Fulton Hogan; we had major corporates, including Fonterra; we had infrastructure owners including airport and quarry owners; we had all environmental non-governmental organisations; and we had the New Zealand Law Society, and numerous others. Even among those who purported to support the bill, some were guarded in their words. They used words like “We support the intent of the bill.”, before criticising much of its detail.

I also listened to the Minister’s opening address in this third reading of this important piece of legislation, and I follow on from the point around streamlining planning processes through national templates, and definitely around standardising terminology. I listened intently to the Minister’s reasoning for why this has been brought in this bill, but then he stopped. I was hoping the Minister would explain standardising templates and terminology and then extend himself into the content and the planned provisions themselves. That was the bit that I was hoping the Minister could explain: why he feels the need to take those decision-making powers from democratically elected councils. That was what I was hoping that I would hear, but he never gave that.

So what is the upshot? The upshot is that local and regional plans are now out. Instead, a National Government’s plans—propped up by the Māori Party—are in. So every council around this country should fear the communities and the environmental groups that it represents. Even the National Party members’ children and grandchildren should have real concerns around the protection of our environment, which is what the Resource Management Act (RMA) is doing. My colleague David Parker spoke about new section 360D and the overarching broad-based powers, and for me and for many listeners, I do not think we got a justifiable reason for them from the Minister. This is a fundamental issue with this bill as I read it. I never heard from the Minister why he requires that amount of power in this bill. That sends a clear signal to councils: “We don’t trust you to do it yourself. We don’t trust you to actually set these boundaries.” Of course we want clean water—and, actually, the Government can start by actually raising the standard of water quality from wadeable to swimmable. We could do that—we do not need this. You could do this tomorrow—but, no, you do not. We have given the Minister the powers to override local plans. It is a sad day in this country when we do that.

The Minister also made some statements during the debate in this House that this bill helps to not only streamline planning provisions but take out the confusion. In an article in New Zealand Farmers Weekly today Gerard Hutching stated that, actually, the debate for this particular legislation is so important to New Zealanders that it is even watched overseas. He made the point that the law that we are passing will create a mess. They are his words: “a mess”. His article says: “It creates a lot of uncertainty which will have to be cleaned up.”—that quote was made by the Federated Farmers president, William Rolleston. That is what he said when he watched the debate on this bill while he was over in Rome.

So there are actually National Party supporters who have real deep concerns with this bill. It is not going to lead to clarification and clarity for people out there in New Zealand; it is actually going to lead to a lot of confusion. Mark my words: I believe it is going to lead to litigation and, when it goes to court, as the Minister well knows, they are actually going to take the debates from this House when proving their case. I want to just take the House to that point, because when we were asking the Minister or the Māori Party what was meant by the definition of “crops” we actually got two different answers. We got that it was restricted to cereals, fruit, and vegetables.

Marama Fox: That’s not what he said. Stop lying to the public.

MEKA WHAITIRI: That is what we got from the Minister. The Māori Party came back and said: “Actually, no, it includes grasses and forests.”

Marama Fox: You are lying. Clarify.

MEKA WHAITIRI: So when those parties—yes—

Grant Robertson: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I apologise to my colleague Meta Whaitiri but Marama Fox’s repeated interjection that she was lying is outside of the Standing Orders—

Hon Dr Nick Smith: She just said: “Not true.”

Grant Robertson: There are many, many Speakers’ rulings on that, and I ask it to be withdrawn.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Before I deal with that matter, I am going to ask Nick Smith to stand, withdraw, and apologise for interjecting during the point of order.

Hon Dr Nick Smith: I withdraw and apologise.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Marama Fox, did you use those words?

Marama Fox: Yes, I did. I withdraw and apologise.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): A bit of, you know, seriousness might have helped. Before Meka Whaitiri starts again—I was going to interrupt her at the 2-minute bell, but just to indicate that the clock is running about a minute behind time. On the advice of my predecessor in the chair, there were what he regarded as frivolous interjections earlier, and 1 minute will be added to her time at the end of her speech. So she actually now has almost 4 minutes to go.

MEKA WHAITIRI: Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker. As I was saying, I heard in this House two definitions when asking members to define the exclusion clause that the Māori Party presented in the House. I heard two different versions, which is not going to help those parties whose only recourse to challenge the Minister’s overarching plans is to seek remedies in the court. That is where debates in the House are going to be clear. The point I am making is that there is some confusion, and it will not lead to clarity, as the Minister purports.

That then leads me to the Māori Party, which will have to stand and be accountable to the many kaitiaki around this country. In fact, one just returned back to the Napier port, having sailed out on the Te Matau-a-Māui to protest the seismic ship. The Māori Party is going to have to stand and defend its position of supporting a piece of legislation that will allow the Minister to override regional and local plans. That is it—I cannot say it any more simply. It is going to have to defend that position.

But when I listened for the reason why the Māori Party, in its secret deals with the National Government, is supporting this bill, we got told it was for iwi participation plans. That was the gain. Again, in this House I heard from the member from the Māori Party that it included not just planning but also consenting and monitoring—and I thank the Minister, Nick Smith, for getting up and clarifying that iwi participation only involves planning, at the front end. It does not involve monitoring and it does not involve consenting, because, he said, it remains with the council. [Bell rung] Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker—2 minutes.

This is the humbug that we are getting from the Māori Party for its support of this plan: iwi participation plans, which were already in the RMA. Over 124 hapū and iwi already have some arrangement with local councils. In fact, 83 percent of all councils throughout New Zealand have some sort of arrangement with local hapū and iwi, be it through a memorandum of understanding or joint planning committees. So when you pull back the argument and the justification for what deal has been done here, it is not obvious. There has been no gain for iwi Māori, because many of them have them already. That was a point made here earlier. There is confusion around how much input iwi are going to have through this clause. The Minister has clarified it: all you are getting is what you already have. How is that a gain? How is what you already have—what was already there, but you are getting it now—a gain? That is where the Māori Party is going to be held accountable.

I do want to acknowledge the work of the Local Government and Environment Committee. I want to also acknowledge the officials who supported the select committee. The committee had screeds and screeds of submissions—700 submissions—and over 130 submitters appeared before the committee. It was a very complex bill that we had to endure, so I do want to acknowledge the work of the officials in supporting us. But there is a real concern I have when we are doing any contentious definitions and terms in legislation, as to whether it is the role of our Parliamentary Counsel Office to make that determination or whether it should be done at the select committee. I believe it should be done at the select committee level. In too many instances in this bill that did not occur, and that is unfortunate.

But this is a bill that Labour is definitely not supporting, because the Minister has not outlined the support, and I—thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker.

DAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): I rise on behalf of the ACT Party in opposition to this bill. Minister Nick Smith, when he said that housing affordability is a major problem, was absolutely correct, and the Minister’s diagnosis of that problem—that it is primarily caused by the price of land—is absolutely correct. We have become a country that is 0.80 percent urbanised by area and yet—and yet—has a chronic shortage of land on which Kiwis are allowed to build, and, as a result, chronically expensive sections that are changing—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! I am going to ask the member to sit down. I will let him start again. I should have indicated to the House—because it is on a note in front of me—that this is a split call and only a 5-minute call, although there might have been some other arrangement. But just to make it clear, of the time the member does not use, the rest of the 10 minutes is available to a National Party member.

DAVID SEYMOUR: Just to clarify, would you like me to start again?

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Well, yes, if the member wants to. I mean, it is easier to do it that way. I will just—if the member will resume his seat. Actually, when it is a split call, it is an unusual arrangement. That is, the member can speak for as long as he wants to for up to 10 minutes, and then the next speaker gets the balance of the time. But it has been indicated to me that there is an expectation on part of the National whips that the member will take only 5 minutes.

DAVID SEYMOUR: OK. Right, well, on that basis, Mr Assistant Speaker, I rise on behalf of the ACT Party in opposition to this bill. The Minister, when he stood up and identified housing affordability as a major challenge facing this country, was absolutely right. Not only that, his diagnosis of the problem was absolutely correct: we have a crisis of a lack of land on which Kiwis are allowed to build. We are a country that is 0.80 percent populated by area and yet has found itself with a shortage of land on which Kiwis are able to build. As a result, there are sky-high section prices, which is the main driver of housing unaffordability, which is tearing apart not only the social fabric of New Zealand but is creating major economic liabilities as well.

That is the point at which we agree, but after that we depart, because this 18th amendment of the Resource Management Act (RMA) in 26 years will not do nothing for housing affordability, it will not do nothing for the supply of land and the building of new dwellings, but it will be so close to nothing that the Minister will have wasted 2½ years of his ministerial time and much of this House’s time in bringing a bill that is two steps backward for each one step forward.

The fundamental problem with the Resource Management Act is that it is a long list of requirements that councils must consider when they take a role under the Act, which means that they end up producing ever more complex plans and ever more complex requirements, which stifles New Zealanders from using their property. The fundamental problem with the Act is that it does not assume that people can do what they want with their property so long as they are not harming others. It assumes that people can do with their property only what they are allowed to by the Act and by the bureaucrats who act under it. That is why we have a fundamentally underperforming property market. That is why we have a difficulty with housing affordability in New Zealand. But this Act will not address any of that. It will not change any of the underlying principles. All it will do is tinker, just like the last 17 amendments to the Resource Management Act.

Telling councils that they have to do it faster, and that they have to use national planning templates is not going to remove the fundamental problem that they are forced to consider so many ephemeral concerns when they decide what you can do on your own property. Worse than that, the introduction of Mana Whakahono ā Rohe is actually going to make the RMA worse.

I was talking about this on Newstalk ZB last night, and I got a phone call just afterwards, saying “Kia ora, David. I’d like to talk to you about your comments on Newstalk ZB.”, and I said “Oh, OK.” He said: “You’re absolutely correct. These requirements do not only affect Pākehā, they affect Māori too.” He said to me: “I don’t want to have to go, cap in hand, to my cousin, the elite from down the road, who has an agreement with the council that puts his rights ahead of mine.” Make no mistake: not only does this bill privilege some people over others by birth, it introduces an additional layer of bureaucracy to all New Zealanders who wish to use their property.

We have reformed our planning laws four times in this country—in 1926 with the Town-planning Act; in 1953 with the Town and Country Planning Act; again in 1977 with the Town and Country Planning Act mark 2; and in 1991 with the Resource Management Act. You will notice that the frequency of updating our planning laws is about every 25 years, and if the next Government in New Zealand is serious about allowing people to exercise their property rights, use their land, and build housing for the next generation, then it will not have Nick Smith tinkering on the 18th amendment in a 26-year-old bill. What it will do is introduce, as the Productivity Commission has said, a brand new, total replacement bill that will replace the RMA, which has become completely unworkable. That is why the ACT Party proudly opposes this useless amendment. Thank you.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): I would just say to the member that that last sentence had far too many commas in it.

ANDREW BAYLY (National—Hunua): I am not going to continue discussion around this bill. I have heard my colleague Nick Smith here. I think this bill delivers a lot of very good stuff—12 key amendments—and on that basis I do support it. [Interruption]

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! Order! On my left, please—

Kris Faafoi: He’s lost his mojo.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Kris Faafoi!

JULIE ANNE GENTER (Green): When I first did my training as an urban planner, I actually thought that there were huge opportunities across the political spectrum. I really thought that, because what most people want in New Zealand, I think, is the same thing. They want towns and cities that have affordable, decent housing, that have parks and amenities, that are easy to get around, and that have access to shops and jobs and all the things that people need to live a good life. They want to do that in a way that protects our natural environment and enhances it because that is what is really important to people. That is all entirely possible to achieve, because some of the problems our towns and cities are facing right now are actually the result of bad planning rules.

So, on the one hand, you have the people who are maybe on the more green, left side of the spectrum, who want to see better public transport for people, more walking and cycling, protection of the environment, and ensuring people have affordable housing—they want those outcomes. Then you have the people on the right side of the spectrum, who claim to want to get rid of bad regulations and make it easier for developers to build what they want to build and easier for people to do business.

The reality is that the solution is the same for both of these. There are a number of really bad planning rules that contain onerous regulations, inhibit development, cause unaffordable housing, and also create terrible car-dependent environments, or, you know, areas where you just have swathes of houses that are nowhere near the jobs that people need to get to, which causes terrible traffic congestion. That means people are reliant on cars to get around; they suffer from all sorts of health problems as a result of that, and we have climate change as a result of that.

Here we are with this opportunity. Across the House we could probably have found a lot of common ground to make positive changes to the Resource Management Act (RMA) that would genuinely benefit New Zealanders and create the types of towns and cities that we want to live in and protect the environment. Sadly, the National Government has squandered its opportunity to lead that sort of cross-party inquiry into how we could fix the Act. Rather than having a royal commission of inquiry, as was recommended by one of the Act’s original architects, Sir Geoffrey Palmer, Minister Nick Smith declined because he thought that would hold up the process too long. Well, that was 2½ years ago. We are only going to have the bill passing today, but the bill does not make any real improvements to the Act; if anything, it makes it far more complicated.

The Resource Management Act is already 806 pages. This bill is 215 pages long. So we are going to have an Act of Parliament that is close to 1,000 pages when the two are consolidated—when this amendment bill passes. Nick Smith’s legacy is a bill that makes the RMA incoherent and inaccessible—even more so than it already is. It is legislation that means that people are going to have to pay planners and lawyers to just even try to begin to understand, and it is going to be very difficult for people to participate in the process. That, I think, is the fundamental problem with the bill as it is right now. It does not achieve our fundamental goal of protecting the environment, and it also makes it hard for people to do things that they want to do in our towns and cities. We could actually get wins across the board and improve it in both of those ways, but that is not what the Government has decided to do.

When I was out campaigning in Mt Albert during the by-election, housing affordability and transport were, very clearly, the two largest issues on people’s minds. While everybody acknowledged that housing affordability is an issue because lots of people want to live in the inner suburbs, Nick Smith and David Seymour will have us believe that the answer to the problem of expensive sections in the centre of the city is to enable more far-flung development hours away from where the jobs are. That is not going to solve people’s transport problems. That is not really going to solve their housing affordability problems, because if you have an affordable house that is nowhere near jobs and you have to spend 2 hours a day commuting and spend lots of money and every person in your family has to own their car—well, you have completely undone the benefit of having a cheaper house, because you are spending so much money on petrol and you are spending so much time in traffic.

The issue is that in places like Mt Albert land values are very, very high and lots of people want to be there. We need to find opportunities for there to be more intensive developments there, but that does not mean high-rise. I am not talking about towers; you do not need that. They are just three-or four-storey—the kind of beautiful art deco developments we had before the Town and Country Planning Act. In the 1930s we actually built really beautiful apartments in Auckland that make nice homes, and we could do it again, but we have to change some of those underlining planning rules.

The way that the Green Party proposes to do that is a national policy statement or environmental standard on urban design that would ensure that people are allowed to build townhouses and apartments in those parts of the city where more people want to live, and that is going to solve our housing affordability problem. But people living in those areas need to participate in that process and feel like they are on board with it. That is what I heard, out doorknocking in Mt Albert—that people are happy with more development happening in their neighbourhood if it means that their kids can afford a place to live near them, but they do think that the community needs to have some say and have a proper participatory process that should be led by the Government. That is something that we would like to see.

Nick Smith’s ultimate straw man argument against anything the Opposition has said about this bill is that we are opposed to housing affordability because this is the only way to get housing affordability. Well, I say to you, Minister, that there are four factors affecting housing affordability in Auckland. Your Government could have addressed pretty much all of them, and this bill does nothing to address any of them.

The No. 1 factor is the tax advantages that are given to property investors. Investors made up 44 percent of house sales in Auckland in the last year. So almost half of the sales are going to property investors, not first-home buyers. That is because we do not have a capital gains tax. So it makes sense. If you already own property, why would you not just put more of your money in more property? That is not good for our economy in the long run, and it is not fair. Why should somebody who has held on to a property for a couple of years be able to keep hundreds of thousands of dollars in profit they have made and pay no tax on that when people going to work every day and earning a pay cheque pay tax on their income? It is just not fair.

If the National Government had instituted a capital gains tax, not only would we have seen less house-price inflation—because New Zealand has had the worst house-price inflation of any OECD country, probably because we do not have capital gains tax, and everybody else does—

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! I am going to ask the member to resume her seat and interrupt her and ask her to now come back to focusing on the bill. I think she has been running on capital gains for a couple of minutes now, and it is not part of this bill.

JULIE ANNE GENTER: OK—fair enough, but there is no question that the lack of a capital gains tax is a key factor in the lack of housing affordability.

The second factor is foreign capital, which is driving up house prices. Places like Vancouver, which have instituted a foreign-buyers tax, have seen a 16 percent drop in prices. Vancouver is a very similar situation to New Zealand. Simply by saying that the problem is about supply completely ignores some of the major factors driving house-price inflation in Auckland and in the rest of New Zealand. That has to be dealt with, because otherwise we are not going to solve our housing affordability problem.

The third problem is, of course, that we have practically zero legislation protecting renters’ rights. We do not have a warrant of fitness on rental properties. So the people getting away with tax-free capital gains also do not have to invest in their properties or look after their renters.

Finally, of course, the Government should directly be increasing the supply of houses. What we would like to see is an approach to resource management that solves this intractable problem that we seem to have. It is entirely possible to do that. We could simplify the Act, we could make better legislation that protects the environment and enables better public participation, and we could have the Government leading master planning of neighbourhoods that enable more homes—but not just homes, because it is not just homes that we need. We need homes in neighbourhoods that have access to jobs and shops and schools and parks. People do not want to live in a subdivision full of McMansions where they have to commute for hours. The market is failing to provide what we need, in part because of bad regulation and in part because of a lack of central government leadership.

I really believe that if the Minister and the National Government had been serious about solving the problems with the Resource Management Act, they would have taken a more cross-party approach and they would have got the experts in through a royal commission of inquiry, and then we would not see this bad legislation being passed by only one or two votes. There would be a broad base of support, and that would provide more security to those developers and those people doing business, but, most importantly, to the citizens of this country who care about the natural environment and who care about housing affordability and who care about the future design of their towns and cities and want to have input into it.

We can do it once, we can do it right, and we can invest in the infrastructure we need to support housing affordability and fantastic green neighbourhoods that are good for people, good for the planet, and, of course, good for business. That is what people can vote for this September—vote for a change of Government, because this Government is not going to deliver on anything. It has proved that in the last 9 years.

GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I do not wish to disagree with your ruling, but I want to raise a point of order under Speaker’s ruling 136/4, which is a ruling of Speaker Algie from 1961 that states: “Members must confine themselves to the general principles of the bill as it emerged from the committee.”, and also Speaker’s ruling 137/4, which is a ruling from Acting Speaker Harrison that states: “The third reading is an occasion for drawing attention in passing to amendments that were defeated but not for a lengthy discussion on matters …”.

I think it is important to raise those two matters now, partly because I intend to do it in my speech and I want to get a clear ruling from you. Julie Anne Genter raised questions around housing affordability in Auckland and did go through those points in some detail. The Minister for the Environment, in introducing the bill and throughout the debate, spoke about the reason for the bill being the housing issue that New Zealand is facing. I would have thought that that is actually within the general principles of the bill.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): All right, the member can resume his seat. I understand that there are matters of interpretation in this, and I was not, unfortunately, in the Chamber for the Minister’s speech. That is a factor in how people can reply, but I think 2 minutes on the capital gains tax was too much.

RON MARK (Deputy Leader—NZ First): I rise on behalf of New Zealand First and, in particular, my colleague Denis O’Rourke, who saw most of this bill through the Local Government and Environment Committee process, and I trust that I will do him justice by taking his slot.

I want to start by making it very, very clear to the House that New Zealand First is not going to go through this election talking about bottom lines, except for on this matter. We wish to make it very, very clear as a party that if any party in this House today debating this bill, and voting for it in particular, wishes to be in Government with us post—23 September, they will have to accept that we will repeal this bill. I am saying it again: New Zealand First is making it very, very clear that if this bill passes in this third reading, those parties that vote for it—if they wish to be in Government with New Zealand First post—September 2017—had better accept that this bill will be repealed.

When New Zealand First first spoke to the Government, we said we were willing to cooperate on any amendment, any change to the resource legislation, so long as it was aimed at simplification, so long as it was aimed at reducing delays, so long as it was aimed at reducing costs, so long as it was user friendly, and so long as it did adequately provide land for housing, but without compromising the Act. We said that those things would be subject to a number of things, such as our belief and our adherence to the principle of there being one law for all, regardless of race, creed, or ethnicity.

Marama Fox: That’d be nice. When will that happen?

RON MARK: We said that we would preserve sections 5—I will get to Marama Fox soon. We said that we would preserve sections 5, 6, and 7, but with climate change as a matter of national imperative, subject to preserving district, city, and regional council democracy, and not undermining that in the same way that this Government did in 2013 with the local government amendment bill. We said we would support the bill so long as it ensured adequate land for housing without compromising the Act, and with no excessive resorting to crude, executive ministerial powers of the like that this bill now entrenches, especially when it comes to overriding local democracy and the people’s view of how the resources within their territories should be used, should be managed, and how development should occur.

Those were the fundamentals of the ground that we laid out in an offer to assist this Government, should it choose to engage with the Rt Hon Winston Peters. But it did not. Where are we now? We are in a situation now where we are watching—oh, and one of the other things that we made very clear in this debate along the way is that we are going to get rid of the Māori Party through the election process, because people will see, through this legislation, exactly what they have got. They have got a Government that is now in an outrageous situation where this House is, by the thinnest skin of majority, going to pass legislation because the tail is wagging the mongrel Government dog like a lamb—like a lamb.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): No, no, the member will resume his seat. I just want to warn the member that though this is a sensitive debate—it is a debate where there are strongly held views on both sides, but, and I say this as a loving owner of dogs, it is not appropriate to describe a Government in that way.

RON MARK: Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker, for your guidance. It is interesting that the Assistant Speaker should raise the issue—

Hon David Bennett: Why don’t we hear Shane Jones give us the real oil?

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! David Bennett, can you please just try to control yourself, especially using words like that.

RON MARK: Thank you. I am going to take the cue about this being a sensitive debate, and I am going to make the observation of how bizarre we are. New Zealand First often refers in this House to “Pepsi-Coke governance” and “Pepsi-Coke legislation”, and we have another one of these Pepsi-Coke moments, where Labour is championing against something that it, we would say, did in the past. I go back to 2003 and I can go back to 2004 when this very same Government railed against Labour for doing the very same sorts of things.

Let me just, for the benefit of the Māori Party, which is so in love with its new friends over that side, read out a quote: “I turn now to some of the loopy provisions that provide for the protection of ancestral landscapes. We—New Zealand First, ACT, and National—ask members opposite to tell us what an ancestral landscape is.” It goes on to say: “I ask members to look at the fiasco at Ngawha Prison and the conduct of Ngāpuhi. What will this bill do to remove the ‘brownmail’ that is going on in New Zealand, whereby Māori organisations object, as of right—right through [the process]? I am happy to table the documents that confirm that is going on. This bill will make it worse, and that is bad for race relations, bad for the environment, and bad for the economy—and this bill does absolutely nought in that regard. I come now to the dirty tricks part of the bill.” That was the Hon Nick Smith on 6 May 2003, speaking against the Labour Government, which was ramming through Resource Management Act amendments.

But wait, there is more—on 14 December 2004: “Then we come to some of the detailed issues. Why is it that members opposite are going to amend the Resource Management Act to make Māori iwi authorities into public bodies? That is a revolutionary constitutional change. I am sure Clayton Cosgrove has not been telling his constituents in Waimakariri that he is off to Parliament saying that Ngāi Tahu is no longer a private body but a public body that will have regulatory powers normally restricted to publicly elected bodies—and that is a step”—get this—“that is a step backwards that takes us further down the road to having two standards of citizenship in this country.” Who said that? Nick Smith. The Hon Nick Smith—

Chris Hipkins: That’s because he’s a hypocrite.

RON MARK: —in his Pepsi-Coke moment of attacking Labour, which was passing similar—in fact, we would say in New Zealand First, the exact same—measures into legislation.

Chris Hipkins: A hypocrite, Nick.

RON MARK: But he was not finished there.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! The member will resume his seat. Chris Hipkins will stand, withdraw, and apologise.

Chris Hipkins: I withdraw and apologise.

RON MARK: There is more. But wait, there is more: “Nor do we see anything in this bill that will enable us to address the huge and growing problem of iwi holding communities to ransom and effectively asking for”—wait for it—‘brownmail’ in order for the projects to proceed.” Not brown male—m-a-l-e; this is “brownmail”—m-a-i-l.

This is precisely what New Zealand First has been trying to tell the Hon Mr Nick Smith, the Minister who has brought this debacle to the House. This Minister should stand up and withdraw the bill and apologise to the nation, because this Minister campaigned on those words of “brownmail”, on Māori entities being—look at me, Mr Smith; I am trying to help you—made into public bodies, usurping the democratic rights of the citizens, the districts, and the regions of New Zealand.

Mr Smith, there is a word that nobody is allowed to use in this House, but it is ringing in my ears right now as we sit here in the third reading waiting for the votes to be passed. The irony of all of this is that this bill will only get through because the Māori Party is supporting the man who knows that it is going to “brownmail” the rest of Aotearoa. In every development, in every consent, in every opportunity where someone is trying to free up land to build a house, in will come the iwi with a non-mandated—well, now with a statutory power, assisted by the Minister, with his new overriding powers to override the objections of Federated Farmers, of the chambers of commerce. He will put his weight behind those Māori entities that he is cementing into law.

There is one line that rings in my ear. New Zealand First stands for equality. New Zealand First stands for one nation, for one people, for one law for all, and it is our belief in this Parliament that the fundamental principle of democracy is that we are all created equal in God’s eyes and nothing in legislation will ever change that, no matter how many flip-flops Mr Nick Smith makes.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): I am going to Marama Fox, but I just want to make it clear that this is a call that has been substituted from the National Party and is, therefore, a 10-minute call, not a 5-minute call.

MARAMA FOX (Co-Leader—Māori Party): I find that last contribution quite ironic from the man who was the chief Treaty negotiator for Ngāti Kahungunu ki Wairarapa—quite ironic. I will leave it there, because he is my cousin.

Kris Faafoi: Have you figured out what a crop is yet?

MARAMA FOX: Yeah, I have. In fact, we said it yesterday, and you voted for it under my Supplementary Order Paper (SOP).

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): And the member will—she does know not to talk to—

MARAMA FOX: Sorry, Mr Assistant Speaker. My apologies. The Labour Party supported and voted for my SOP, which stipulated that there was a carve-out for crops. The Māori Party supports the amendments within its SOP on the understanding that, as negotiated with the Government, they preserve the regions’ ability under local plans to regulate all types of GM crops in their territories, including forestry and grasses and any activities involving the growing of GM crops, whether for commercial or other purposes.

In fact, if you look up the Forestry Rights Registration Act 1983, there is a definition of “crop”—supplied by the member, the lovely Steffan Browning. A crop is “a single crop … of 1 or more species:”, or multiple crops, inside the definition in the Forestry Rights Registration Act. We have the agreement of the Minister to include grasses and forestry. In terms of crops, we would have preferred to align the wording with the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms (HASNO) Act but it was under the guidance of the GM movement itself that the word “crop” be used. This is not the place to debate whether GM this and that—

Iain Lees-Galloway: Yes, it is.

MARAMA FOX: No, because that is the HASNO Act, and, under the Environment Protection Authority, if you want to bring any GM anything into this country, that is the place you go to have that determined. This SOP is to determine whether or not a region can declare itself GE-free, and that is exactly what it does. The Opposition members can cry to their heart’s content, but that is what it does. So I would like to commend this bill to the House, and I do so on behalf of the party. Thank you.

GARETH HUGHES (Green): Kia ora, Mr Assistant Speaker. Ngā mihi nui ki a koutou. Kia ora. Look, I do not think it would be a surprise to the people of New Zealand that when National is putting a bill about the environmental protections of New Zealand, it would be a bill that is anti-environment. I do not think it would surprise anyone in New Zealand that a bill the National Government was putting on the Resource Management Act (RMA) would avoid and take away local people’s right to have a say about what happens in their towns and communities. I do not think anyone would be surprised by that. I am definitely not surprised by the anti-environmental positions coming from the pro-pollution party.

If you sum up very, very briefly what this legislation does, it does nothing to help greenhouse gases. In fact, climate change still cannot be considered under the RMA, because National voted against Eugenie Sage’s amendment. This bill gives the Minister for the Environment—Nick Smith currently; who knows how long he is going to last, though—the power to reach into communities to fast track consents, to override local decision-making. This bill limits citizens’ rights to know what is happening in their communities and what councils are deciding on their behalf.

This bill does absolutely nothing to deal with the real issues facing our housing crisis in New Zealand. That is an absolute smokescreen, a straw man argument used by the Government. This bill does not address the important issues facing our country when it comes to the dire, dire housing crisis.

The thing I want to focus on, though, is how this bill affects a small part of, and amends, the Exclusive Economic Zone and Continental Shelf (Environmental Effects) Act. You see, this bill, in its 200 pages, changes quite a few different pieces of legislation, but this has flown relatively under the radar, and it is deeply troubling. It is deeply disturbing. I think it paints quite a strong picture of or gives insight into the current National Government.

What this amendment bill does is it takes the ability, currently held by the Environmental Protection Authority, to set a decision-making body to hear consents for things that happen in our waters, and—guess where it goes, that power to appoint those decision makers. It goes to Nick Smith. The Minister is grabbing the control, and I will tell you why. The reason it is happening is that Nick Smith and National did not get their way. It was a law they passed. This is a relatively recent law, only 4 or 5 years old. They thought they would smooth the way for their friends in the seabed mining industry, and for the New Zealand Transport Agency to build those gargantuan Basin Reserve flyovers, but, because they did not get their way, they are changing the law. They are going to change the way these panels are formed, because National did not like it when independent experts came up with a different outcome from what it wanted.

I think this is a salutary lesson for the country. What happened when Trans-Tasman Resources wanted to mine 50,000 tonnes of the seabed and did not get its way—National is going to change the law. When Chatham Rock Phosphate wanted to mine in our most productive fishery—and the fishing industry was opposed and presented compelling evidence as to why to an independent decision-making committee—it ran to the Government, and National is changing the law. When the family carers fought the Government for 10 years through the courts, what did this Government do? It went and changed the law so that they could not have their day in court. When the Basin flyover was rejected by independent experts, what happened? National is changing the law to make it easier. When Anadarko was upset with protesters in boats, who might wave banners in front of their offshore oil installations, National changed the law, under urgency, to make it not happen.

So here, you see, is a pattern. When its friends in some particular industries do not get their way, National changes the law. It is not just that. When other industries’ law changes are not in their interests, National will dole out public money. When Tīwai had National over a barrel, it called up John Key, and John Key gave it $30 million to keep the Tīwai smelter going. So when it did not get its way, it got taxpayer money. We saw the same with Skycity—taxpayer largesse once again.

What you see summed up in this legislation—with the powers taken from an independent decision-making committee and given to the Minister to decide who those people are—is a pattern of crony capitalism, a Government that is governing in a crony capitalist fashion. Look, there are a lot of reasons why you can object to this bill—here is just another.

PEENI HENARE (Labour—Tāmaki Makaurau): Tēnā koe, Mr Assistant Speaker. I want to pick up on one of the points made by the green member—the member from the Green Party, sorry—

Hon Members: Ha, ha!

PEENI HENARE: —you can take offence—and other members across the House, and that is one of a failed democracy, a failed democratic process. The member Gareth Hughes just talked about how the Minister for the Environment is now taking control. He is trying to expedite processes to meet their own ends.

When I think about that democratic process—this particular bill does have one other stage. It has one more stage, once it passes its third reading here in this House: it will go on to the Governor-General for the Royal assent. I hope that in that process, she has some common sense. Some of the questions being asked in this House today are not being answered by this Government, and I question whether or not any common sense exists—whether on that side of that House or, indeed, in the final process of this bill when it goes to the Governor-General.

Iain Lees-Galloway: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I regret interrupting my colleague, but I think that what he just said, which I do not really want to repeat, was a breach of Standing Order 118. I think it is an important point of principle that we, as members of the House, do not do what the member just did. I ask that you—he probably needs to withdraw and apologise.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): No, the member is absolutely wrong. It was a quite proper reference.

PEENI HENARE: Thank you very much. Look, the democratic process is all-important to our people. The people outside these four walls are looking upon this institution to make sure that we get it right, and, in this instance, I argue that we have not.

I am disappointed that the Māori Party members are not in this House defending their position. They talk about GM foods—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): No—sorry, the member will resume his seat. He must not draw attention to the absence of members, especially when it is—it is also inaccurate, now.

PEENI HENARE: I am reminded of the hard work done by a group of people on what is known as Wai 262. It was a claim made to the Waitangi Tribunal on which a very good report was given. The recommendations from that report are very clear about genetic modification. They give a Māori perspective on the GM matter, which is a very serious one for this country. Sadly, the Māori Party did not consult with those experts, nor did it even look at Wai 262 when it considered its position on the GM matter with this bill. They have gone and supported it, and now what they have done, sadly, for the rest of the country and for Māoridom in particular, is they have thrown a dummy to the people. They have actually, with two concessions, agreed to support this particular bill through the House, without looking at the entirety of the actual bill.

There are other things in the bill that, I am sure, our people would be concerned about. One of those is Part 4. I take the Green Party’s point, made last night during the Committee stage of the House, about Part 4 of the bill, which actually gives far too much power to the Minister for the Environment for those who are looking to apply for a licence or to renew a licence for mining in this country. I daresay that those people who are now out protesting, out on the ocean, the seismic testing that is going on out there, as mentioned by my colleague Meka Whaitiri—I bet you those people will not be very happy with the support of this bill and to see it go through. Part 4 has not even been mentioned by the support parties of this Government, and it is of huge concern to me.

I also want to talk about housing. It was mentioned by the Minister at the beginning that in order for us to meet the housing demands and the housing pressures of this country we must make significant reforms like this, and, in part, I do agree with that. I do. However, it must go through a robust debate—with consideration from right across the House, but, more importantly, with a bipartisan approach across this House, to make sure that it has the full support of this House. Why? Because we represent electorates across the country—mine, in particular, in Tāmaki Makaurau where the housing crisis is felt at the moment, and has been felt for a number of years now. We are screaming out for more homes. However, we do not think that we should be conceding proper process and robust legislation just in order to meet that demand.

In conclusion, we cannot support this bill.

JOANNE HAYES (National): I stand to commend the Resource Legislation Amendment Bill to the House.

Carmel Sepuloni: Chicken.

Grant Robertson: Mr Assistant Speaker.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): No—

Kris Faafoi: Which one?

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Well, probably both of you, but actually Carmel Sepuloni, I think. [Interruption] Sorry—was it Carmel Sepuloni who used a poultry term?

Carmel Sepuloni: Yes.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Yes, right. The member will withdraw and apologise.

Carmel Sepuloni: I withdraw and apologise.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): And a warning for Mr Faafoi for bringing me into the debate, especially in reference to poultry.

GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central): In the late 1980s and the early 1990s in New Zealand, the National and Labour parties both put together the Resource Management Act (RMA). Sir Geoffrey Palmer, on the Labour side, and a person who is about to become a significant player again in the environmental landscape in New Zealand, Simon Upton, were the two architects and authors of an Act that is the greatest balancing act of any piece of legislation that has been before this Parliament. It has balanced together the rights of local communities and local people to be represented on the most important decisions about them and their community, with the importance of sustainable development and management of the environment. It was, and is, a remarkable piece of law. Of course it is flawed. Of course it has got problems. Of course it has needed amendment over the years. But in its principle, it is a piece of law that has done something that is very difficult to do around the world.

Tonight, by the barest majority, the National Government is going to tear up what that law is about. I would go so far as to say—and it was called crony capitalism by Gareth Hughes earlier on today—that this is borderline corruption. In fact, it is corruption. The National Government is bringing a morally bankrupt, corrupt bill before the House. What this bill does is draw the Minister back to being the person who is now responsible for things that were in the National Development Act in the 1970s. It has put Nick Smith, the Minister for the Environment, in a position of taking power away from those at the local level and centralising that back with him—be it about plans, be it about national policy statements, or be it about this brand new tool, this national planning statement. If there is a definition of “corruption”—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): OK, I am now going to interrupt the member and draw his attention to a set of Speakers’ rulings, on page 55, in relation to the word that he is using, and indicate to him that he should not continue to use that word, except in the most proper motion.

GRANT ROBERTSON: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. In the course of you undertaking that ruling—which, of course, I respect—around about 20 seconds of my time has been deleted. I would request that that be returned to the clock.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): I am not proposing to do that. Members do not get extra time for time taken to correct them for things that they do. Otherwise, of course, debates could be never-ending.

GRANT ROBERTSON: The National Government is bringing forward today a piece of legislation—let us make this absolutely clear—that takes away from local communities and regional councils the rights that they have had to determine their own future, and centralises that power back into the hands of a single Minister. In other countries, when the central government goes in and takes rights and power away from local government, we call it a banana republic. That is what it is.

I am sorry to say to this House that the actions of this Government are corrupt, because it has not taken this process through proper parliamentary scrutiny. It got a bill that it could not get passed, so it did a deal with the Māori Party. We faffed around in the House with the bill being reported back and then coming back out for its second reading. We still did not debate it properly. The Māori Party and the National Government got together and did a deal, and there was a 400-page departmental report that no member of the public got to comment on. No member of the public got to comment on a 400-page document that fundamentally changed their rights. It changed their rights in terms of what goes in a plan that a regional council creates—their rights to submit on that. They did that—the National Government, aided and abetted by the Māori Party, did that, and did not go back to New Zealanders. They did not give New Zealanders a chance to actually comment on it. How is that not corruption? How is that not a corruption of the process of this House?

This is a disgrace. The National Government will get this bill through, and Nick Smith will be able to tick it off at some point in the future and say: “I did it. I passed the resource management amendment bill.” Well, it is a disgraceful bill, the bill that is in front of us today. It is a disgraceful bill, and Nick Smith—I will give him this. He can sure bring people together. He has managed to bring Fonterra and Fish & Game together. We have been trying to do that for years, on this side of the House. Nick Smith did it. He has brought together Local Government New Zealand and iwi, who are scrapping away all over the country on different rules, because they all think this is a terrible piece of legislation.

It will create confusion. It will create difficulty. It will be amended again and again. It is unclear, it is muddled, it is confused. Like owners and their pets, it is the Minister and his bill starting to show the same characteristics. This is an incredibly poor piece of legislation.

I do not believe that the members of the National Government, who have sat meekly through this bill, really support it at all. They do not really support it at all. They have been inundated with emails. Alastair Scott, fresh out of Kelburn, has been inundated with emails from people—

Alastair Scott: That’s me.

Jono Naylor: Over here.

GRANT ROBERTSON: Oh, the wrong one—I get them confused. It is easy to do, because neither of them have offered anything of any value in this particular debate.

They have been inundated with emails from members of the public who are telling them not to pass the bill. Those emails might happen to be ones that I do not agree with—they might happen to be ones on a topic that I do not agree with. But their constituents are telling them, and they are worried—they are genuinely worried. Alastair Scott, fresh from Kelburn, on his way to Wairarapa—Jono Naylor, well, he is saying goodbye, so it does not matter—he should be worried, because right through the Wairarapa, from the Fish & Game people to the Forest and Bird people to the farmers of Fonterra to the people who have been emailing him with their concerns about issues within the bill, they are all marking this day. They are marking this day as a tragic one for New Zealand.

In the remaining couple of minutes available to me, I want to pay tribute to a few people. I want to pay tribute to the staff of the Ministry for the Environment, who have had to put up with this nonsense from their Minister. Their Minister has put them in a terrible position. The people who work in that department actually care about the environment, they actually want to do something positive, and they have been forced to work on this. I feel sorry for them. The other people I want to pay tribute to are the hundreds of New Zealanders who submitted on this bill, who care about the environment, who care about getting the balance between how we involve people in decision making and how we have sustainable management.

I want to credit my own colleagues on this side of the House—and I include in that the Greens and New Zealand First as well—who have worked hard over many, many months to try to find a way to talk some sense into the National Government members. They have consistently offered to actually come up with legislation that will make the improvements that are needed to the RMA, that will help actually address the housing crisis, and at no point have the National Government members been interested in taking up those offers. Over those many, many months people like David Parker have led the charge from this side of the House, and then over recent days my colleagues who are here tonight, and others who have worked hard.

The National Government, with the Māori Party—through a deal that actually will not serve Māori well at all—will pass this bill, but this is an incredibly sad day for New Zealand, a corruption of process, and a bill that makes very little positive difference to the way in which New Zealand’s environment will be managed. I am incredibly sad that the National Government thinks that this is some triumphant moment for it. It is not. It is actually about taking something that National and Labour worked on together over many years, and trashing it—and trashing it in the name of an incompetent Minister, who has completely failed New Zealanders and now leaves many of his colleagues exposed in the election in September. This bill is an absolute disgrace.

IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. Under Standing Order 41, I move, That strangers be ordered to withdraw. This is so that in the event that this debate reaches the vote, the vote may be taken without any risk of undue influence over the members voting.

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

Ayes 58

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

Noes 63

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

Motion not agreed to.

MATT DOOCEY (National—Waimakariri): I commend this bill to the House.

DARROCH BALL (NZ First): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I could be wrong about this, but just looking at Standing Order 40 on page 28—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Yes, the member is wrong. He will resume his seat. The question is that the motion be agreed to.

Darroch Ball: A point of order, sir.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Sorry?

Darroch Ball: A point of order.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Well, I have looked at Standing Order 40. There is only one thing there. It is a question of a Minister being present. There are two.

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

Ayes 61

New Zealand National 59; Māori Party 2.

Noes 60

New Zealand Labour 32; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 12; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Bill read a third time.

The House adjourned at 6.01 p.m.