Thursday, 10 August 2017

THURSDAY, 10 AUGUST 2017

THURSDAY, 10 AUGUST 2017

Mr Speaker took the Chair at 2 p.m.

Prayers.

Business Statement

Business Statement

Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Leader of the House): When the House resumes on Tuesday, 15 August the Government will look to complete the Enhancing Identity Verification and Border Processes Legislation Bill and progress a number of other bills on the Order Paper. On Wednesday morning the House will sit under extended hours for the first readings of the Ngāi Tai ki Tāmaki Claims Settlement Bill and the Heretaunga Tamatea Claims Settlement Bill, and the third reading of the Ngatikahu ki Whangaroa Claims Settlement Bill.

The House will rise on Thursday, 17 August at the conclusion of the adjournment debate, and the dissolution of the 51st Parliament will occur on Tuesday, 22 August. The Governor-General will summon the 52nd Parliament to meet following the election.

Oral Questions

Questions to Ministers

Immigration—Student Fraud and Policy

1. RON MARK (Deputy Leader—NZ First) to the Minister of Immigration: Does he stand by all his statements on immigration fraud?

Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE (Minister of Immigration): Yes. In particular, I stand by my statement in the House on Tuesday that this Government takes any type of visa or immigration fraud very seriously. We have invested heavily in verification and risk resources to stamp it out. We have also passed legislation that makes residence class visa holders liable for deportation, were it established that any of the information provided on their application was false, fraudulent, or misleading.

Ron Mark: How can he expect New Zealanders to believe that he has taken immigration fraud seriously in the student market, when the labour inspectorate in New Zealand employs only 54 officers for the entire country at a time when the Government-promoted work visa approvals have gone through the roof, reaching 226,000 in the 2016-17 financial year?

Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE: The size of the labour inspectorate is not driven by the number of work visas issued, but I should note that the number of staff working in that area has increased by two-thirds in the last 2 years. I have asked them to work more closely with the immigration compliance team, which has also got more resources, and they have created what I think is something of a synergy, resulting in greater prevention, detection, and prosecution of visa irregularities.

Ron Mark: If the Minister is so pleased with the work of Immigration New Zealand in its overseas offices, why then did his offshore staff, between 1 May 2016 and 19 May 2017, approve the entry of 261 Indian students, only to have them deported by his onshore staff after they detected fraud in the documentation?

Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE: Well, it would be nice to think that because this Parliament passed rules and laws, nobody broke them, but I am afraid it is a reality of human nature that where there are rules, people bend and break them. That number has to be set against the more than 100,000 students who studied in New Zealand during that same period, and I think that is not a bad hit rate.

Ron Mark: Is the fact that fraud updates from March 2017 in Manila, Beijing, Shanghai, and Hong Kong identified fraudulent document concerns regarding 224 applications in the Philippines and 73 applications in China not evidence that he has not been taking immigration fraud seriously over the past 9 years?

Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE: No, it is not, because what the member asking the question has not told the House is that they were prima facie questions about whether or not fraud might have occurred. In over 170, I think—178 of those examples—none was detected.

Ron Mark: How can he possibly say he has been taking “immigration fraud very seriously” over the past 9 years, when a Chinese national gained a student visa despite being rejected by US authorities on numerous occasions and flagged by Australian immigration and border protection, yet his department did not know anything until it received an intelligence notification about a national security concern? How did that guy get in?

Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE: Well, I do not have the details of that particular example, but it is a single example of one of over 800,000 people who came here after having successfully applied for a visa. Again, I do not think anybody should take from that anecdote that there are widespread problems.

Ron Mark: I seek leave to table a series of answers to Official Information Act (OIA) requests from the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment, dated 31 July 2017, regarding fraud updates by each Immigration New Zealand office.

Mr SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table that OIA release. 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.

Economic Outlook—Reports and Productivity

2. MELISSA LEE (National) to the Minister of Finance: What reports has he received on the outlook for New Zealand’s economy?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE (Minister of Finance): This morning the Reserve Bank released its official cash rate (OCR) decision and the latest Monetary Policy Statement (MPS). The bank’s MPS highlights New Zealand’s strong growth prospects, stating that “Annual GDP growth is expected to average 3.4 percent over the next two years”. In addition, the bank forecasts unemployment to fall to 4.5 percent, while wages continue to rise faster than inflation. This picture of steadily improving economic performance is a testament to the hard work of New Zealanders over recent years and the confidence businesses have to grow and expand.

Melissa Lee: How does the Reserve Bank’s OCR decision today affect homeowners and families?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: By leaving the OCR unchanged at 1.75 percent, homeowners’ mortgage rates will remain lower for longer. The Government’s fiscal constraint and sensible economic management is a key contributor to keeping homeowners’ and families’ costs under control. I have to say, what you would not want to do at this stage of the cycle is impose extra taxes on the economy that increase the cost of their daily essentials, like petrol, fruit, or vegetables. That would have the potential to stall economic growth and push up not only interest rates but also the cost of living.

Melissa Lee: How do New Zealand’s economic growth prospects stack up against the other developed countries?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: New Zealand continues to have one of the fastest-growing economies in the OECD. The OECD’s June economic summary for New Zealand forecasts economic growth of around 3 percent this year, because: “A strong recovery in business investment, ongoing strength in tourism and the recent increase in dairy prices should support growth.” This compares with the expected lower growth rates in the UK of 1.6 percent, the US of 2.1 percent, and Australia of 2.5 percent. New Zealand’s performance, of course, is no accident; it is all about a strong economic plan that delivers jobs, higher wages, and lower cost of living increases for New Zealanders.

Melissa Lee: What reports has he received on the risk of rising costs of living for New Zealand households?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: As ever, the Reserve Bank remains vigilant for the risks of potential inflationary pressures. I have seen a number of reports just in the last day or so that have identified a number of risks that the cost of living could increase quite dramatically with policy change. For example, there is one from Horticulture New Zealand, which says: “Extra costs on growers of fresh, healthy fruit and vegetables will make healthy food more expensive. This seems incongruous with policies around alleviating poverty … ”. There is another one from Federated Farmers, which worries about a substantial extra tax on electricity, food, and exports. Of course, if these worries came to pass, that would push up inflation and, of course, require the Reserve Bank to push up interest rates to reduce inflation.

Grant Robertson: Has he seen reports of the Reserve Bank Governor saying that the most important thing for the New Zealand economy is for our productivity to grow, and how has that played out in the last year, given that output per hour worked has fallen, even by the revised figures of Treasury and Statistics New Zealand?

Hon STEVEN JOYCE: The member may not be aware, but I think almost any economist would tell him not to look at one year’s productivity figures, because it is truly a case of—how could we describe it—trainspotting. But, in terms of productivity, it is a long-term challenge for New Zealand. That is why the Government invests significantly in innovation through business R & D in Callaghan Innovation, which has lifted our R & D performance by something like $350 million over the last 2 years—that is, $350 million annually—and also by giving businesses the confidence to invest in the sort of equipment that allows them to increase their productivity, and not slapping them with ridiculous taxes every 5 minutes, as is the practice of the Labour Party.

Transport, Auckland—Funding and Auckland Transport Alignment Project Report

PHIL TWYFORD (Labour—Te Atatū): My question is for the Minister of Transport: does he think Aucklanders should have the opportunity to contribute to the cost of the city’s transport projects—[Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! [Interruption] Order! I invite the member to start his question again. [Interruption] Order! I have asked for cooperation from my right. I now not only ask it; I am expecting it.

3. PHIL TWYFORD (Labour—Te Atatū) to the Minister of Transport: Does he think Aucklanders should have the opportunity to contribute to the cost of the city’s transport projects, or does he think taxpayers throughout New Zealand should pay all the costs of Auckland’s growth?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Minister of Transport): The member may be interested to know that they do have the “opportunity to contribute”. It is called petrol taxes and road user charges, where they [Interruption]—no; uh-uh—already contribute some $1.2 billion per annum. I do not think, though, that it is right to double down on that and put something like a more than $10c—actually probably much more, given it is over $100 million a kilometre for Phil’s “tram plan”. It will be prone to cost overruns, just keep taxing and spending. On this side of the House, we think that we can, with a strongly growing economy and with carefully managed budgets, deliver large, record-breaking projects in Auckland and all around New Zealand without more taxing and spending and taxing and taxing.

Phil Twyford: Will he confirm that the Auckland Transport Alignment Project report, due out later this month, estimates an additional $2.9 billion is needed in the first decade because of faster than expected population growth?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: It is a confidential report I am sure the member has not seen, but what I can say is that we are really confident that with the strong economic growth in Auckland and around New Zealand, we can continue to see petrol excise and road-user charges revenue go up. We have got a strong Budget process—we have seen that in unprecedented new capital over the next 4 years. We can carefully manage that and continue to deliver and deliver without a whole lot of new taxes—I think two or maybe three in the last week, and we would love to see how many more there will be from Labour before election time.

Phil Twyford: I seek leave to table the Auckland Transport Alignment Project’s yet-to-be-released report, which details the blowout in transport spending.

Mr SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table that yet-to-be-released report. Is there any objection to it being tabled? There is.

Phil Twyford: Simon, it’s here. You can have it, mate.

Mr SPEAKER: Order! Leave was sought; leave was denied. That is the end of the matter. [Interruption] Order! [Interruption] Order! Mr Bridges and Mr Joyce are here to answer questions, not to interject when the questions are asked.

Phil Twyford: How does he intend to pay for the funding gap this Auckland Transport Alignment Project now estimates at $5.9 billion for the first decade, given that his Government has rejected every proposal from Auckland Council for additional funding sources?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: I note that this is a report that has had extensive independent work from Auckland and Government officials, without Ministers or the Mayor and the council involved, and I think that is probably why it says that light rail to the airport is not needed in the first decade. Unlike what Phil Twyford says, I am very confident that we can do the job that is required. We have already got strong revenue—

Phil Twyford: How? How? Where is the money?

Grant Robertson: Show us the money, Simon. Show us the money?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: Well, I am telling you; I am telling you if you want to hear it—from petrol taxes and the road-user charges, more than we thought and more coming in the forecast. We have got strong Budget growth and we also, of course, will expect to see the council contribute more.

Mr SPEAKER: Order! [Interruption] Order! There is no point in carrying on when the Opposition does not want to hear the answer to its own questions.

Phil Twyford: Why did he not tell the public, when he announced last week that he was bringing forward $2.6 billion worth of projects, how he plans to fund that, or is it just another unfunded election promise?

Mr SPEAKER: Order! [Interruption] Order! To one or two, this is the last warning.

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: Coming from the party that will not even tell the people of New Zealand how much a water tax is going to be, this is a bit rich. But let me explain very simply—last week, for example, $260 million from the Crown and future Budgets and capital already announced make it quite clear we have got the confidence to close the gap. To go through, the petrol taxes—

Phil Twyford: You’re paying with confidence.

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: No, no. The petrol taxes, the road-user charges, which already see revenue growth much stronger than anticipated and more to come, and also, of course, through the Budget—we are very confident now about our plans. We do not need a whole lot of new taxes—two or three already in this week—to do a good job.

Phil Twyford: Given that Labour has offered a regional fuel tax, targeted rates to capture value uplift, infrastructure bonds, and paying our fair share through the National Land Transport Fund, why will he not be honest with New Zealanders and tell them where he is going to find the money to bridge a $5.9 billion funding gap? [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I want to hear the answer.

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: I, as I always am, want to be incredibly honest to the Opposition and the people of New Zealand. Under that party over there, there will be compulsory opportunities to contribute by Aucklanders all over the show. We have already seen two taxes from them this week, possibly a capital gains tax as well. It is tax and spend, and tax some more. On this side we manage our budgets responsibly, and we do not need all the new taxes that we know Aucklanders and New Zealanders do not want or need.

Mining, Marine—South Taranaki Bight

4. JAMES SHAW (Co-Leader—Green) to the Minister for Economic Development: Does he support the mining of 50 million tonnes of seabed in the South Taranaki Bight where blue whales feed?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Minister for Economic Development): I do not think it is a question of support, but we respect the independent decision of the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA). We have seen it make decisions against this company and other mining companies before and we have respected those, and this decision we will respect as well. What I would say, though, to the member is that it is not as if the EPA is a soft touch on environmental matters. As I say, it has declined it, and here we have seen 109 very stringent environmental conditions, including 2 years of environmental research that is required by the successful applicant before it can even consider mining. I would also note the very strong economic benefits that come from this project for the people of Taranaki.

James Shaw: Is the Minister comfortable with the fact that untried and untested seabed mining has been given go-ahead by a divided decision-making committee, where the committee chair had to use his casting vote in order to grant the application?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: Oh, I do not accept that at all. I think that it has seen these sorts of things happen around the world. I think it is a very rigorous process where the EPA is weighing the environmental effects and the economic benefits, and I think the conditions imposed here show it has done that very carefully indeed.

James Shaw: What is the Minister’s response to submitters’ and NGOs’ concerns that today’s approval does not have a full understanding of the exact impact that seabed mining will have on the South Taranaki Bight?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: I think that it has been through a very strong process. Of course, we are in an appeal period now. I have already seen reports that there will be appeals, so let us see that. But I would say to the member that I appreciate that he is trying to get his Green brand back after thoroughly trashing it over the last couple—

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

James Shaw: You cannot blame him for being a bit defensive. Is the Minister not concerned that the views of experts and over 13,000 submitters were ignored in approving this seabed mining application even though the full and long-term impacts are not known?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: Look, I think, you know, my position is very clear. There has been a very thorough, lengthy process here that has involved—as the member is saying, quite rightly—a huge number of submissions. Those have been weighed very carefully. It is a 351-page decision that has been made. You know, I think that to try to argue that the environmental concerns—which are real—have not been accounted for and weighed carefully is wrong when you consider, as I say, the 109 conditions that have been imposed here, including 2 years of environmental research before the project can even begin.

James Shaw: Should the job of the Environmental Protection Agency not be to protect the environment, rather than the interests of a mining company?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: I think that the environment is, obviously—as we know—incredibly important, and we must protect it. But what is also true is that we are always having to—if we go to do anything in our physical elements—weigh these things. What we have here, I am told—and I believe that the submission process has borne it out—is some $300 million a year in exports and 1,000 jobs, with most of them in Taranaki. I am sure—indeed, I know, and I have been advised by officials—that that is being weighed very carefully against the environmental effects, and strong conditions have been put in place to safeguard the environment.

James Shaw: What is the Minister’s response to the fact that a South Taranaki research project this year won a Green Ribbon environmental award for its work on a previously unknown reef that now lies in the path of waste contamination from this seabed mining venture?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: I am sure that the EPA has weighed up all of the evidence in relation to the physical environment throughout its very thorough process.

Early Childhood Education and Schools—Funding

5. CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka) to the Minister of Education: Is she satisfied that after 9 years of a National Government all children and young people are receiving all the support that they need to succeed in education?

Hon TIM MACINDOE (Associate Minister of Education) on behalf of the Minister of Education: I am satisfied that this National-led Government has made a significant investment in the education of our children and young people. This financial year our investment in education amounts to over $11 billion, the highest ever investment in public education. However, we recognise that there is always room for improvement, and we continuously explore options to achieve that.

Chris Hipkins: Why does he believe that schools are getting all the support that they need to offer the best education for every New Zealand child, when so-called voluntary donations from parents have increased by 50 percent since National came into office?

Hon TIM MACINDOE: The Government funds State-integrated schools to provide a good public education, and since 2008, when that member’s party left office, Vote Education has increased by around 41 percent to a record $11.6 million dollars. When it comes to donations, parents have always been able to contribute to their schools but no parent should feel compelled to pay a donation; it is voluntary.

Chris Hipkins: Why does he believe that early childhood education (ECE) providers are getting all the support they need to offer the best education to every New Zealand child, when 70 percent of early childhood education providers have increased fees to parents by an average of 29 percent over the last 5 years?

Hon TIM MACINDOE: That member has made similar claims in the past, and I am happy to assure the House that ECE funding has increased every year for the last 10 years. There has been no cut in funding, as he is implying; funding has more than doubled in the period since the 2007-08 financial year. Per child ECE funding in New Zealand is among the top third in the OECD. We are very proud of that, and, as a result, we have the highest level of participation in early childhood education in this country’s history.

Chris Hipkins: Does he accept that the increase in early childhood education costs that parents face is down to the fact that per child funding for early childhood education has been cut, in real terms, every single year the National Government has been in office?

Hon TIM MACINDOE: I entirely refute the member’s assertion. I point out to him that early childhood education providers are receiving an additional $350 million of operational funding over the next 4 years in this year’s Budget. That will provide a further 31,000 early-learning places over the next 4 years. The number of children coming into early childhood education is increasing. The number of providers is increasing. This is a need that is seeing more children than ever before being prepared to enter their primary education years, and it is a great success story for the education system.

Chris Hipkins: If all of that is true, why do the Government’s Budget documents show that affordability for early childhood education in New Zealand has declined by 6.6 percent, as revealed in this year’s Budget documents?

Hon TIM MACINDOE: All of that was true.

Freshwater Management—National Policy Statement Changes

6. BARBARA KURIGER (National—Taranaki - King Country) to the Minister for the Environment: How will the Government’s changes to the national policy statement on fresh water, to be gazetted today, improve the recreational and ecological health of our lakes, rivers, and aquifers?

Hon Dr NICK SMITH (Minister for the Environment): For the first time in New Zealand we have a requirement on councils to improve river and lake water quality for swimming, and a requirement for councils to set regional targets and to report to their communities on progress so that we can achieve that 90 percent goal by 2040. Secondly, the new national policy statement (NPS) strengthens the requirement on councils to control nutrients, like nitrogen and phosphorus, and specifically how they must set limits to prevent harmful algae. Thirdly, the NPS introduces new ecological health requirements, with councils being required to take specific actions if the macroinvertebrate community index drops below 80.

Barbara Kuriger: What parallel measures is the Government introducing alongside the NPS to help councils achieve improved fresh water quality?

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: The Government’s national regulations on issues like stock exclusion and forestry will help contribute to the national policy requirements for better water quality. The stock exclusion regulations will require 56,000 kilometres of fencing, and will progressively apply to dairy, pig, beef, and deer farms, depending on their topography, but will also ensure that it is practical so that we are not making farmers fence in areas where it is impractical. The new forestry regulations that were gazetted this week support better environmental management of the 1.7 million hectares of plantation forestry, and cover activities like ground preparation, thinning, earthworks, and river crossings. The Government is also supporting councils with these targets by investing a further $44 million in river and lake clean-ups this week.

Barbara Kuriger: What is the estimated cost of meeting the 90 percent by 2040 swimming targets, and on whom will this cost fall?

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: The target is going to require that a thousand kilometres of waterway be improved to a higher recreational grade each year. Our clean-up projects that we have done to date indicate a cost of about $70,000 per kilometre. That means that this policy will cost $2 billion over 23 years. The cost will fall on farmers, councils, as well as the Government. The stock exclusion regulations are estimated to cost a bit over $300 million. The requirement on councils to upgrade their waste-water treatment systems will also contribute. The Government to date has committed over $400 million to support councils and communities in this work.

Health Services—Access, Demand, and Funding

7. Dr DAVID CLARK (Labour—Dunedin North) to the Minister of Health: Why did he say yesterday in the House, “I do not need to check with DHBs around that”, when asked if he was sure about his claim that every other district health board is currently “managing to deliver the operations that are needed”?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN (Minister of Health): As I said in the House yesterday, I do not need to check with district health boards (DHBs) around that, because it is a fact that we are delivering 50,000 more operations than 8 years ago.

Dr David Clark: What assurance will he give that IT glitches, like the one that stopped medical professionals accessing patient letters this morning at Counties Manukau for 2½ hours, are not impacting on delivering the operations that are needed?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: That sounds deeply operational. I am surprised that at this time of the political cycle the member is not trying to raise his game to a more strategic and political level, but be that as it may; I will go back and ask a question about that. At the same time, I will be able to assure him that there is an extra $470 million of money that has gone into Counties Manukau, as well as a lift of 4,500 operations at Counties Manukau, an increase of 34 percent compared with 8 years ago when that crowd was running the system.

Dr David Clark: I seek leave to table a message to Counties Manukau DHB staff relating to clinical letters being unavailable to medical staff for 2½ hours due to an IT glitch this morning—to help the Minister out.

Mr SPEAKER: I will put the leave. Leave is sought to table that particular letter to staff. 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.

Dr David Clark: Does he believe there are enough hospital beds for patients to meet demand pressures when at the beginning of August, 2 weeks ago, Middlemore Hospital was at 116 percent full capacity in medical, surgical, adult rehabilitation, and health of older people wards, with 358 patients going through the emergency department in one day and 52 patients left sitting waiting for an in-patient bed?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: Of course, history shows I always have to check that member’s numbers, but, be that as it may, of course winter is a busy time in our hospitals. It has been an especially vicious flu season, despite 1 million vaccines being distributed, but the member will be really pleased to know that, actually, we do have the capacity in our DHBs to absorb this sort of situation.

Dr David Clark: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I will assist the Minister again. Actually, one of them was 128 percent over, and I have the—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! [Interruption] Order! If the member is now seeking to raise a point of order, then he does it. What is the point of order?

Dr David Clark: I seek leave to table an internal email detailing just how overfull the Middlemore Hospital was.

Mr SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table this particular internal email. 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.

Dr David Clark: After 9 years in Government, what is he doing about the fact that the most recent figures show that once eye injections, skin lesion removals, and other quick operations traditionally done outside the hospital setting are removed from elective surgery figures, year on year fewer elective surgeries were being done in Counties Manukau?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: I find that extremely doubtful. I am not sure where the member is going with this line of questioning. These are very important operations. If he removed every important operation they were doing at Counties Manukau, none would be being done. Across the system as a whole, even if you removed these very important eye injections and skin operations, some of which have to be done under general anaesthetic, we are still doing 30,000 more operations per year than when that crowd was managing it.

Dr David Clark: After 9 years, how much longer will people have to wait when he says “[T]here is no doubt that in health there is always more to do.”, when all the wards in one of our largest hospitals in New Zealand are fully staffed and are in need of close to 70 extra beds before patients arrive each day?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: I think the member needs to just reread his question in his mind, because, frankly, the whole thing just does not make sense, but, despite that, what I would say is that 9 years on, across the hundreds of services that our health system provides, you would struggle to find more than a handful that are not performing better than 9 years ago. There are 50,000 more operations, 150,000 more appointments, and 7,000 more doctors and nurses in the system, and, yes, maybe from time to time the IT system might go down for 2 hours at Counties Manukau. If he thinks that is bad, he should try the IT system in Parliament for comparison.

Dr David Clark: After 9 years, what does he say to clinicians across the country who are pleading for their hospitals to be given more operating theatres, more specialist doctors, and more funding; and is this the “health system that’s the envy of the world” that he envisaged?

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: The member needs to start becoming a bit more positive about New Zealand and our health system, because, actually, it stacks up pretty well. I can tell you that if you look at the facilities we have built in health across the country—$1 billion of health rebuilds in Christchurch, West Coast is being done, Dunedin is next, 6,900 more doctors and nurses in our hospital system, 50,000 more operations, and 150,000 more specialist assessments. What I would say to those specialist doctors is that if this guy was ever running the health system, they would be in really big trouble.

Mr SPEAKER: Order! We do not need to go there.

Transport, Auckland—Funding and Fuel Tax

8. JULIE ANNE GENTER (Green) to the Minister of Transport: Does he agree with the Prime Minister’s reported statement that there is no need for a fuel tax to pay for Auckland’s transport?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Minister of Transport): Yes, I agree with the Prime Minister’s statement that we do not need a regional fuel tax. We do not need that additional opportunity to contribute. That is because this Government has shown that with a growing economy, if we manage the country’s finances well, we can do large projects across the country—not just in Auckland—without new taxes and certainly without cancelling projects like the new East-West Link State highway project, which would be a disaster for congestion in Auckland.

Julie Anne Genter: So in that case—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! No, we just need “supplementary question”.

Julie Anne Genter: Supplementary.

Mr SPEAKER: Supplementary question—Julie Anne Genter.

Julie Anne Genter: So in that case, how is he going to pay for the extra $2.6 billion in accelerated transport projects for Auckland; is he going to scrap existing projects, or is he going to raise fuel taxes? Where is the money going to come from?

Mr SPEAKER: There are three questions there.

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: I think there are a couple of things to say. Firstly, it is not, of course, all up to us. The council also has to contribute—

Grant Robertson: Yeah, but you’re stopping them doing that.

Phil Twyford: They want to.

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: —and it has got a variety of options there that it can do, which do not require the big new taxes that Phil and Grant love so much. Secondly, I think that if you look at our books and the situation we are in, we have got a strongly growing economy. That means much more fuel tax and road-user charges coming in, and there are forecasts for much more, as well. On top of that, of course, because we have managed the Government’s books so well over 9 years we have strong capital, as indicated in this Budget—some $32.5 billion, actually, over the next 4 years, with $12 billion of that in transport alone. There is headroom there to do a really effective job—to continue doing the big projects but also good management of a strong economy.

Julie Anne Genter: So which budget is it going to come from, the National Land Transport Fund or general taxation?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: I think what you have already seen from this Government is a mixture of these things. But I would repeat what I have said: the land transport system is delivering very strong revenues that allow us real headroom to get in and deal with the growth that we are seeing, not just in Auckland but all over New Zealand. But, also, as you saw from that rail announcement we made on the weekend, there is $267 million, I think it is, from the Crown. Look, that is not at all difficult to digest—those kinds of significant rail projects—when you have got a strongly growing economy, when you balance your books, and when you manage the finances well. We do that on this side of the House.

Julie Anne Genter: Can he confirm that if the extra $2.6 billion for Auckland comes from the transport budget, it will require at least a 5c per litre increase in fuel tax right across the country?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: I do not think that that is necessarily true. As I say, I think that from a variety of sources, both here and in Wellington, and the petrol taxes and the land transport system across New Zealand, we have got real headroom in this growing economy to do big projects. We are already doing it with the City Rail Link, with East-West, and with the Waterview Connection, and, as the Auckland Transport Alignment Project programme makes clear, there is more to come.

Julie Anne Genter: I seek leave to table a Treasury and Ministry of Transport (MOT) report that shows that in order to raise just $50 million extra per year for the transport budget, a 1c per litre increase is needed nationwide on fuel tax. [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I just want to check—is that report that the member is seeking to table readily available on the net?

Julie Anne Genter: It says it is “in confidence”. I think we received it under the Official Information Act.

Mr SPEAKER: I will put the leave, and the House will sort it out. Leave is sought to table that particular Treasury-MOT document. Is there any objection? There is none. It can be tabled.

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

Julie Anne Genter: Given National is already facing a $4 billion shortfall to pay for Auckland transport projects, does he seriously expect us to believe that he can fund an extra $2.6 billion worth of projects without new taxes?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: I do not accept that at all. If you look at it, it is, what, $24 billion, possibly more, that is required. We are already $20 billion of the way there. Two-thirds of that is coming from central government, and, yes, we have got headroom to do a bit more. But, of course, we will also need to see the council find some opportunities to contribute, because I think it is important that it is a team effort, and I think the council understands that.

Julie Anne Genter: I seek leave to table the yet-to-be-released Auckland Transport Alignment Project report, which says the additional revenue from a fuel tax is not enough to plug the gap—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! Leave is sought to table that particular document. Is there any objection? There is objection.

Transport, Northland—Brynderwyn Hills Road Project Funding and Timing

9. RON MARK (Deputy Leader—NZ First) to the Minister of Transport: How much was originally funding by the New Zealand Transport Agency to complete the Brynderwyn Hills Road improvements; and how much is it now?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Minister of Transport): The original funding was $16 million, but the total cost now is $20 million, with a benefit-cost ratio of two. I am advised that the increased cost is mainly due to two large slips and a significant weather event in December 2014, which required two large new retaining walls. I am sure the local member will welcome this additional—albeit, in the scheme of things, relatively small—spend in Northland to make an important stretch of road more resilient, reliable, and, most importantly, safe.

Ron Mark: If the Brynderwyn Hills road improvements were originally funded for $16.9 million and planned to be completed by summer of 2017, why has his Government failed to complete the project on time and within that funding allocation?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: As I said, two large slips and a significant weather event in December 2014 are, I understand, primarily—in fact, almost substantially entirely—the reason for that, I think, relatively small increase in cost.

Ron Mark: Has he received any letters from locals regarding safety concerns in Northland about a poorly planned lookout in the Brynderwyn Hills, which is a safety hazard on a stretch of road that is already—[Interruption]—we do not have it in Wairarapa, mate—a high-risk zone for car accidents; if so, what is he going to do to address those concerns?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: Oh, I am uncertain about the correspondence. I receive a huge raft of it, and much of it is highly congratulatory in nature. What I can say is I agree entirely with the member that this is a road that has a bad safety record. I think that is why it is important that we get on—whether it is $16 million, $17 million, or $20 million—and do this work, and I am in entire agreement with the member about that point.

Ron Mark: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I am seeking your assistance. I did not quite hear the Minister’s answer. Did he say he had received no letters?

Mr SPEAKER: Order! No you did not. What the member needs to do is listen. The question was a very, very lengthy question—far longer than it needed to be—and the Minister has addressed it.

Ron Mark: Well, I seek leave to table a letter that was sent to the Minister on those safety concerns, which he just said he never—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! We do not need any further information. Leave is sought to table that particular letter that the member referred to in his question. 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.

Ron Mark: Is it not a fact that the Bryndynwyn Hills road improvements are not—

Hon Members: Brynderwyn.

Ron Mark: —OK—a priority for his Government, which is why the project has not been completed on time and the work was not accelerated?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: As I have said, it is a priority. The reason why there have been the delays that the member referred to and the increased cost is, as I say, a significant weather event—I mean, this is what happens. Our commitment to the whole corridor is, in fact, shown by the massive investments we have made in Pūhoi to Warkworth. That is well under way and going very well, despite some who—as the member knows—try to pretend it is not. There is also very significant work being planned starting in 2019 from Whangarei through to the port. I think it is about a $400 million or $500 million investment. This is a massive investment in the nation-building work that we are doing on that corridor.

Horticulture Industry—Economic Contribution and Reports

10. ANDREW BAYLY (National—Hunua) to the Minister for Primary Industries: What reports has he received on horticulture’s contribution to New Zealand’s economic and social well-being?

Hon NATHAN GUY (Minister for Primary Industries): I have received a report showing that horticulture is a significant contributor to New Zealand’s economic and social well-being. It is a $5.6 billion industry; 5,500 commercial fruit and vegetable growers farm about 127,000 hectares and provide 60,000 jobs. Successful intergenerational family businesses provide safe, healthy food for everybody. They use sustainable production practices that look after the land for future generations.

Andrew Bayly: What is the outlook for vegetable growers in the Franklin area of the Hunua electorate, and what potential challenges do they face?

Hon NATHAN GUY: A good proportion of our vegetable sector is located on the fertile soils around Franklin. Much of this sector supplies New Zealand’s domestic market with both fresh and processed products, and is valued at approximately $2 billion. Onions, in particular, have grown to be worth around $112 million. However, today I have received a report that shows that a charge of 10c per litre could double the price of onions. This would have a massive implication for consumers up and down the country.

Maureen Pugh: What is the outlook for growers in the West Coast-Tasman electorate, and what potential challenges do they face?

Hon NATHAN GUY: The outlook for growers in this electorate is very strong under a National-led Government. The wine industry, for example, is on track to reach $2 billion of exports by 2020. Arable horticulture and viticulture account for around a quarter of all land that is irrigated in New Zealand. Of course, 1 litre of wine requires about 900 litres of water to produce, on average. A charge of 10c per litre of water would mean $75 per bottle extra, on average. A water tax is basically a tax on food and on consumers.

Environment, Minister—Statements about Water User Charges

11. Hon DAVID PARKER (Labour) to the Prime Minister: Does he have confidence in Hon Dr Nick Smith?

Hon PAULA BENNETT (Deputy Prime Minister) on behalf of the Prime Minister: Yes, and particularly his statement that Labour needs to come clean and state how large its new water tax is going to be.

Hon David Parker: Supplementary question. [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I am just going to get a little bit of cooperation so I can hear the question.

Hon David Parker: Thank you, Mr Speaker. Why does he stand behind the Hon Nick Smith’s serial exaggeration, given that Dr Smith was ridiculed at the Environmental Defence Society (EDS) and elsewhere for his thousand-fold exaggeration of water royalty revenue, which he said—[Interruption]—which he said—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I am having trouble hearing it. I am going to invite—

Hon David Parker: Can I repeat my question please?

Mr SPEAKER: Yes, and I do not want the level of interjection I am getting from my immediate right.

Hon David Parker: Thank you, Mr Speaker. Why does he stand behind the Hon Nick Smith’s serial exaggeration, given that Dr Smith was ridiculed at EDS, and elsewhere, for his thousand-fold exaggeration of water royalty revenue, which he said would be $600 billion, twice New Zealand’s total GDP?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: Mr Speaker—[Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I managed to get some silence for the question to be asked. I now require silence for the answer to be heard.

Hon PAULA BENNETT: I would think that there is a really easy way for us to work our way through this issue at the moment, and particularly from the honourable member, whom I will quote from Morning Report this morning. He described himself like this: “I have been involved in water policy for decades, and I would consider myself one of New Zealand’s experts in resource pricing.” So I would think: give us your number—give us your number. How much?

Mr SPEAKER: Order! The question has been answered.

Hon Dr Nick Smith: Is the Prime Minister aware that the agricultural industries of New Zealand use 6 trillion litres of water per year, and at the rate of 10c per litre, suggested by Mr Nash, that indeed works out at $600 billion per year?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: Yes, I have seen reports of that, and I think that if there is general debate in this House, which is a healthy thing, to actually have a number—if Opposition members would simply say how much they are going to tax the water, we would get our way through this nicely; give us your number.

Hon David Parker: If Nick Smith thinks royalties on resources are a bad idea, has he raised with the Prime Minister or the Minister of Finance the idea of abandoning the hundreds of millions of dollars of oil and gas royalties that the Crown collects every year?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: I do not see the similarity in those. But what I will say quite clearly is that if the Labour Party members are so keen on this new tax, and they are concerned about people who cannot afford food, why do they not tell them how much their food and fruit and vegetables are going to cost because of this policy. [Interruption] It will be tough—tough for them, Chris.

Mr SPEAKER: Order! It will be tough for the member if I ask her to leave the Chamber before question time finishes.

Hon David Parker: Why does he allow Nick Smith to undermine confidence in our dairy industry by inventing wildly exaggerated water royalties, when he knows they are false and unreal?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: If that self-contained expert would like to actually tell New Zealand how much tax they are going to put on water and how much those prices are going to go up for them—for those farmers, for those horticulturalists—which will mean that milk, fruit, and vegetables will cost more in their weekly groceries, then we could well and truly get through this argument. Come on!

Hon David Parker: Does he agree with New Zealand First, then, which said today that a royalty on water would mean $18 cabbages, given that that would require using about a million litres of irrigation water on every cabbage?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: Those who have been around a little while know, in politics, that if you do not fill in the detail, others will do it for you. So why do you not come clean on what your water tax will be?

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I apologise, but over the din I had not realised that Mr Prosser was calling for a point of order. I remind members that points of order are heard in silence.

Richard Prosser: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I simply wanted to point out that the Prime Minister has no responsibility for New Zealand First policy statements.

Mr SPEAKER: I certainly accept the Prime Minister does not have responsibility, and he is possibly even grateful for that. But on this occasion the question itself is not out of order, and I invite the Deputy Prime Minister, if she wants to complete the answer, to do so.

Hon PAULA BENNETT: I imagine that New Zealand First is responding to a policy that was put out yesterday with no detail behind it and that can genuinely be raising the costs for everyday New Zealanders. When you do not put detail in, others fill it in for you—Politics 101. [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I think I have been to my feet about six or eight times. It is getting to the stage when I will find somebody who will not be here for the rest of the afternoon. It would be very sad to see somebody miss a very important valedictory later. [Interruption] Well, Mr Robertson, instead of just nodding your head, cooperate, please.

Hon Dr Nick Smith: Does the Government think there is a difference between a resource like gold, on which we charge a royalty and which is a fixed resource, and a resource like water, where New Zealand has 500 trillion litres of renewable resource each year?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: I would think there would be quite a key difference between a renewable resource and one that is not. [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Order! The same warning I gave to my left-hand side also applies to my right-hand side.

Hon David Parker: Well, then, does he agree with his coalition partner David Seymour, who said today that “National’s weakness and inaction on water has allowed Labour to fill a political void”?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: If only you had filled the void, I say to the Labour Party, because what you have done is just left one a mile long.

Hon David Parker: Why, after 9 years in Government, is National hiding from the public its own views on water royalties until after the election—is it because it is hiding its secret plan, or is it because it knows the public do not trust Nick Smith, or National, on dirty rivers, royalties for bottled water, the housing crisis, or his many other examples of ineptitude?

Hon PAULA BENNETT: If that member thinks that Labour has literally put out a policy yesterday—what it has done is left a whole lot of unanswered questions so that, actually, the public are now concerned about what the cost will be of the produce that they need each week to survive on.

Broadband, Ultra-fast and Rural—Progress

12. BRETT HUDSON (National) to the Minister for Communications: What progress can he report on the roll-out of the Ultrafast Broadband and Rural Broadband Initiatives?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Minister of Transport): Today I have released the latest quarterly broadband update, which shows that deployment for phase one of the ultra-fast broadband (UFB) programme is close to 80 percent complete and phase one of the Rural Broadband Initiative (RBI) is complete. This means that almost 1.2 million New Zealand households and businesses now have access to ultra-fast and rural broadband nationwide. Today’s update also shows that the UFB build is now fully completed in 22 cities and towns across New Zealand, and as the roll-out gathers pace many more Kiwis will soon have access to this world-class fibre.

Brett Hudson: How are the broadband programmes tracking against the Government’s targets?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: We are fast approaching our target, which is for 1.5 million households and businesses to be able to connect to UFB by 2019 and for 85 percent of New Zealanders to be able to connect by 2024. The update also shows New Zealanders’ strong demand for UFB, with the number of households, businesses, schools, and hospitals connected to UFB increasing by 12 percent in the past 3 months alone. The first phase of RBI delivered faster broadband to over 300,000 rural households, businesses, schools, and hospitals outside of UFB areas. I look forward to making announcements soon about the areas that will receive coverage under the second phase of RBI and the Mobile Black Spot Fund.

Standing Orders

Standing Orders

Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Leader of the House): I move, That the amendments to the Standing Orders set out in Part 2 of the report of the Standing Orders Committee on the Review of Standing Orders be adopted, with effect from the day after the dissolution or expiration of the present Parliament. Today’s debate, of course, completes the standard triennial review of the Standing Orders, looking at the procedures and practices of the House and how they can work more effectively. This year’s recommendations cover changes to rules and practices in a number of key areas, including a reorganisation of the House’s select committees, a change to the way the House debates international treaties, and a number of suggestions for improving the lawmaking process.

I would like to begin by making the observation that many overseas parliaments do not in fact review their rules regularly. While a specific issue may lead to a review or a rule change, I believe that our process illustrates real value in frequently making improvements based on cross-party consensus.

One of the underlying themes to emerge from the review of the Standing Orders is the growing status of the Business Committee, notably since the review of the Standing Orders in 2011, as a way, a mechanism, or a process by which the Government and other parties can make the best use of House time to advance measures with broad-based support. I entirely welcome this. The National Government thinks it is an excellent development that is allowing the Parliament to evolve and to innovate in its processes, and to be more relevant to its members and also to New Zealanders.

Further to this, the Standing Orders Committee noted that there are many ways for the Business Committee to promote better lawmaking: rewarding the use of inclusive and robust pre-legislative processes by the Government, refereeing Supplementary Order Papers to select committees, and arranging the Committee stage of bills. As we have seen during the 51st Parliament—

Hon Trevor Mallard: You mean referring, not refereeing.

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: —referring, sure—the efficient use of available House time and mechanisms such as extended sittings have seen a relatively low use of urgency. I note that there is significant potential to consider other types of business through extended sittings, including other non-controversial bills and special debate. I hope to see greater and more varied use of the procedure in the future. I would note, in that regard, that over the last month we have used extended sittings to good effect, I think, literally every single week, and that is allowing Parliament to do more and to progress more of the programme that the Government has. I think that is good for everyone.

I welcome the Clerk’s intention to produce a Business Committee handbook, to help both committee members and members generally to make the most of the Business Committee’s powers to innovate. That is an important point because, of course, it will not just be the members of the committee; it will be all members of the House who will be able to put forward ways of doing things in relation to particular bills, but also more broadly, potentially.

Further to this, can I also add my appreciation to the members of the Business Committee for their constructive engagement this term. I think it has been, in my experience both as deputy leader and now as leader, very constructive. It is one of those things that people outside, of course, do not see, but it is, in some ways, Parliament at its best. That does not mean that everything gets through it, but we work constructively together across the parties, and that has been a good balance of Government progressing its programme, but also members of other parties getting to do and say things that are important to them. I think, for example, of the debate on climate change as a very good example, and I note the contribution that the member Kennedy Graham made to progressing that.

I am pleased that the Standing Orders Committee gave more formal consideration around the procedures for the Committee of the whole House stage of bills. It was during this Parliament that a precedent from the 1960s was drawn upon to seek leave for debate on two interconnected bills to be taken together as cognate bills, which has since been used to facilitate legislation on which there is broad agreement. Many of the suggestions agreed to by the committee will aid us in ensuring that the House functions as an effective legislature. These include—and I will not go through all of them—that the structure of bills should not be formally linked to the arrangements for debate, arranging for the Committee stage to consider a bill as a whole, establishing a practice of determining themes for debate during the Committee stage of a bill, removing the limit on the number of speeches for individual members in the Committee stage of a bill, and requiring amendments to be lodged at least 24 hours before the Committee stage commences.

All of those things, I think, are good, and show that the Business Committee—and, ultimately Parliament—is working together and evolving to stay relevant to members, but also to the wider public. I look forward to these arrangements being trialled frequently during the 52nd Parliament, with a view—as the report makes clear—to them becoming the default position and rules in the future.

However, I recognise that the review of the Standing Orders is also a balancing act requiring give and take between Government and non-Government parties. In this vein, can I once again thank all members of not only the Business Committee but the Standing Orders Committee for their diligence and time throughout this process. With those comments, I commend the report to the House.

Hon TREVOR MALLARD (Labour—Hutt South): From the time that the committee deliberated on this report until about 10 days ago, I anticipated that this would be, effectively, my valedictory speech. How times have changed.

This is the worst and the least ambitious review of the Standing Orders I have ever seen.

Hon Simon Bridges: Oh, what a joke. What a bad joke from a bitter old man. What a joke.

Hon TREVOR MALLARD: Well, it is better to be a slightly bitter, slightly elderly person than a lazy Minister who did not read the submissions to the committee and who had to read a speech in the House today. He clearly had not read through the speech, which someone else had written, and he could not even tell the difference between “referring” and “refereeing”. He is the laziest member of the Standing Orders Committee that I have ever seen, and he put Mr Speaker in an awful position as the chair of the committee, because Mr Speaker had to consistently remind him of the different objectives of the executive and of the Parliament. Mr Speaker had to explain the differences to Mr Bridges time and time again. In the end, of course, Mr Bridges reminded me of Dr Gromyko—“Dr No”. To every positive suggestion put forward by submitters, Simon Bridges said no. That is why later this year they will either reconvene the Standing Orders Committee or pass sessional orders to make many of the improvements that were suggested by the submitters and were ignored by the committee.

Some of the things that are very important involve making this place more family friendly. Some of them, I accept, are administrative; they are in the hands of the Speaker and of the Parliamentary Service and of the Office of the Clerk. There are some that will involve changes to the Standing Orders, and some of them will involve changes to electoral law. I think we can learn a lot from some of the European MMP Parliaments as to ways of having temporary replacements for members who are on family leave. I look forward later this year to sitting in that Chair and having the brand new baby Prime and the yet-to-be born baby Allan coming up and giving me a cuddle, because we have become more family friendly in this House and we will be more welcoming of children here.

On the question of the prayer, the committee says that there will be consultation; it recommends consultation. I think there should be too. I think it should be brief. The current parliamentary prayer is not appropriate for the type of Parliament we have become and I think it is important that we change it, and soon.

Under Labour, select committees will go back to being creatures of the Parliament and not rubber stamps for the executive. There will be many more Opposition majorities and Opposition chairs of committees so that they can work through the legislation and give a proper parliamentary opinion rather than being a place for people who are greasing up to the executive in order to try to be Ministers going forward. We have had too much of a history of that recently—people who do not do their jobs as chairs of select committees because they want to become Ministers—

Dr David Clark: Tell us what you really think.

Hon TREVOR MALLARD: Well—the next point I want to make is that this Parliament and the last couple of parliaments have had very poor pre-legislative scrutiny. We want to encourage Governments to do better consultation. We want to get back to having things like green papers and white papers. We want draft bills available with reasonable periods. We think the Government should be rewarded for doing the right thing. We are already doing quite well with having our extended sittings, but one of the things that we should be doing is saying that if a Government does the right thing before the legislation is introduced, then it should have the right to go to an extended sitting without having to have permission and without the select committees being shut down. So if Governments do the right thing they get an easier track through the House, with the non-relevant committees also sitting.

I think there should be a trade-off. I think we do not need, now, urgency in its normal form within this Parliament. If we get a proper track working then I think we should save urgency for items that are actually an emergency, where we do have to do something in a hurry: natural disasters, maybe urgent revenue changes, sales tax changes, or similar things. I think for that there should be a 75 percent majority. The Government should be able to convince the Parliament—a supermajority of the Parliament—that in fact there is something that is very urgent rather than using urgency as a lazy approach to avoid proper scrutiny in select committees and to try to do a bit of catch-up when the Government has not been working well.

That sort of approach would put a bit of pressure on Oppositions. If there really was an emergency—

Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: When I was in Opposition under you guys—

Hon TREVOR MALLARD: Well, the member will not be in Opposition under us because he is—

Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Was, was.

Hon TREVOR MALLARD: He was, and, Mr Deputy Speaker, I think that in that time we had not done our wonderful changes to be able to go back and sit on Wednesday and Thursday morning through extended sittings—something that the current Mr Deputy Speaker has been in the Chair for and has guided the House through really well. I think it should not be reserved only for Treaty bills and other non-contentious issues; my view is that Parliament could make a lot more progress and be a much better place if, while members are here and not sitting on select committees, they could be nutting out the nuts and bolts, especially of the Committee stage, and make some real progress. We need to have, also, some better systems for sending urgent legislation off to select committees.

So I want to finish how I started. This is an exceptionally disappointing report. There have been many submitters who came to the committee who have indicated that they felt their submissions were a waste of time and that Ministers on the committee had not read their submissions, and clearly had not read their submissions when they were being heard. As a result of that, this has been an opportunity wasted. But I just want to make it absolutely clear that those big ideas will be picked up in November.

GARETH HUGHES (Green): Kia ora, Mr Deputy Speaker. Ngā mihi nui ki a koutou. Kia ora. I rise to speak on this, the adoption of the Standing Orders Committee’s report. One of the problems identified in the committee was how much of parliamentary jargon is totally misunderstood by the public of New Zealand. When we talk about the Standing Orders, all we are talking about, basically, is the rules of Parliament, and I agree with part of the jargon-busting recommendations of the report—let us call them the rules of Parliament instead of the Standing Orders.

Look, the report notes we have got terms such as Supplementary Order Paper, which no one has a clue what it means. We should call it what it is—an amendment paper. We have got other things—cognate bills. No one knows what they are. Let us just call them what they are, associated bills. A personal bugbear is when the Speaker rises and says: “Does this stand part?”. It makes no common sense that, actually, what the Speaker is saying is “Should this be included?”. Why can a modern Speaker in the future with future non-jargon rules not say exactly that?

Also, I have never in my time in Parliament seen such a blistering speech from the Hon Trevor Mallard in response to the Leader of the House, Simon Bridges.

Hon Simon Bridges: Well, you haven’t been here long enough then.

GARETH HUGHES: I have been here for three terms, Mr Bridges, and I have been through this committee myself a few times. The fact is that it was outstanding and incredible—the allegations—and I guess we saw the proof in the pudding with the Minister’s speech, which was basically read verbatim, and I question whether in fact he wrote that at all. Maybe he could go to the House and update us.

But the fact is that this is a chance—one that happens only every 3 years, every triennium—to update Parliament’s rules. It is a fantastic opportunity to modernise this, and I think I agree with the Hon Trevor Mallard that we have not taken that opportunity. Sure, there is a little bit of tinkering, a few changes around the margins, but not the substantive transformational change that could modernise this House. We see a million New Zealanders who do not vote. So many hundreds of thousands never tune into this House or see the relevance in their daily lives. I have got a vision that this House could be more open, more relevant to New Zealanders. We could modernise it so people can not only participate in politics in the Parliament, but partake in their democracy, and that is exactly what we should be debating.

Some of the changes we support—the intent of consulting and making it a more family-friendly Parliament. It is something that is sorely needed. It is something that I have experienced as a father who has raised two kids in this House over my parliamentary career—the challenges you have as a father. We have seen the challenges, particularly for mothers in terms of young babies and feeding. We have made some improvements but—as you can see with the former Green MP Holly Walker’s book outlining the challenges she faced as a young mum and a member of Parliament—this House does need to up its game to support families and make sure that this, the House of Representatives, is, in fact, representative of all New Zealanders, including young mums and young dads.

In terms of the select committee changes, these are pretty rational in terms of reorganisation and minimising the numbers. It makes sense to put the Law and Order Committee and the Justice and Electoral Committee together. A key change, and this flows on from the Standing Orders review of the last Parliament, was the new expectation that select committees will comment and report on the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act section 7 reports. We get this information, and it is important that it is actually included in the report and, I think, debated by members, because it is crucially important that parliamentarians discuss issues of human rights as we consider legislation.

Now, the area that I am particularly passionate about is the broadcasting rules. I entered Parliament at about the same time as this new rule was brought in that video footage from Parliament could not be used to satirise, ridicule, or denigrate MPs. The irony is that this rule—this law change—came in at about the same time that the internet and YouTube were taking off. The whole point of the internet is that people can create content. They can mash together content. They can use existing footage and content, and repurpose it, not just to have a laugh—though, there is a lot of good quality content out there. But this is a democratic principle that goes back thousands of years to ancient Greece of the importance of the public to be able to satirise those in positons of power.

So, I believe this has had a chilling effect on the public democratic discourse in the country. The fact that people could have been brought in front of the Speaker and had a complaint laid against them because they had grabbed a bit of footage from the Parliament’s YouTube channel and repurposed it, or had a bit of a laugh and added commentary, is, frankly, out of date and anti-democratic. So this is an incredibly positive step forward. Look, I urge the public to get involved and to satirise their parliamentarians—their decision makers. It is an important part of our democracy, and that is also why we need to update our copyright legislation. This was one barrier against it; our current Copyright Act is another.

So there is huge room for improvement, as the Hon Trevor Mallard talked about—a huge number of issues that we could have addressed, but we have not in this report because it is tinkering in a few marginal changes. Urgency is a particularly important one. All members in this House would have seen legislation passed under urgency when it did not have to happen that way. It should happen only in extraordinary circumstances, and I personally would support that recommendation for a 75 percent majority.

But the biggest thing is that technology is fundamentally changing the way that the public is interacting with politicians and their democracy—all of this is ignored in the report. We should be having the conversation that was recently opened by Max Rashbrooke in his recent report into how democracy is changing and how we can open up access to political debate. We should be having the debate about how we can use new technology; how we could get the public to crowdsource legislation, as is happening in other countries; how we could update and modernise our referendum and petition laws to allow people to harness the power of the internet—basically, how we can, as a representative body, actually more actively, transparently, and openly represent the people of New Zealand so that their views can be heard in this House. We could be a pioneering country in terms of the opening up of our democracy by utilising new technologies as part of our political decision-making and legislative process. There is a huge amount of work that we could be doing.

Look, let us have that conversation next term. We could be one of the most modern, open, and transparent Parliaments in the world. It is not going to happen as a result of this report—despite some of the positive changes—but I am really excited about having that conversation next term about how we can have an open, transparent, and modern parliamentary democracy in New Zealand. Kia ora, Mr Deputy Speaker.

DENIS O’ROURKE (NZ First): New Zealand First will vote in favour of the motion, because some progress is better than none. This has been a long process, it has been a very interesting process, and it has been one that, I think you could say, has resulted in slow progress towards many of the things that a lot of us would have liked to see. But slow progress is better than none. The other thing that struck me about it was the, I think, unusually large number of submissions from members of the public. They were very interesting, because it shows how the public sees the Parliament and how it works. So for that reason I was particularly interested in hearing those people and reading what they wrote. I appreciate their input, and it is a little bit sad that some of their better ideas have not been incorporated.

I would have to say that I agree with Trevor Mallard when he said that the reason for progress being much slower than it should have been is that the Government members, and, in particular, Simon—yes, yes, Simon Bridges over there—said no so many times. He is the “all-no-ing” Minister—not the “k-n-o-w-i-n-g” type; just the “n-o-ing” type of Minister—who said no far too often, mostly because he actually did not understand, or want to understand, the reason why some of the better ideas were being put forward, and I think that is very sad. We need consensus on this committee to make progress, and he threw his weight around a little bit and made sure that not enough progress was made. I think that really is sad, and I would like to see that change in the future.

However, I would have to say that the main thrust of New Zealand First’s approach to this was to see that there were changes made as far as the standing committees were concerned. I am pleased to say that I think we got about 95 percent of what we sought. So we are pretty happy with that, but there is one exception to that, and that is why I say 95 percent. That one exception is—and I want to particularly emphasise it—that the Government was very intransigent when it came to the question of the allocation of chairmanships of standing committees. It was an absolute, total no, when that approach is utterly inconsistent with the principle of proportionality, which has been used in other parts of the very same report—

Hon Simon Bridges: Don’t worry, Denis, we can make you a chair next time.

DENIS O’ROURKE: —when it comes to allocation of members to committees, in particular. Now, Mr Bridges has just been interjecting with some more of his negative nonsense, and that is to be expected. That is what he is basically there for, and he did a good job of that, so I have to congratulate the “all-no-ing” Minister for his input as far as that is concerned. But I did want to go through the rest of the report as far as the standing committees are concerned, because there have been some major changes, which we at New Zealand First very much approve of.

First of all, we approve of the reduction in the number of standing committees from 13 to 12 and we approve of the subject areas, which have been rearranged as well. I think that this is a more rational grouping of subject areas than we have had before. It actually brings it significantly up to date and allows for better integration of those subject areas with each other, and I will come to that again in just a moment.

The other important issue, as far as this is concerned, was the number of members who would be allocated to the standing committees, and with 96 seats overall to be provided, it means eight per committee. That is the right number. It is difficult to decide what is too big and what is too small. It is important that they not be too large, because then their effectiveness would be reduced, and yet, at the same time, they need to be representative. The allocation will be on a proportional basis, unlike the committee chairs, Mr Bridges, but nevertheless, as far as the committee membership is concerned, it will be on a proportional basis, and that is good to see. It does mean, of course, that with 120 members, even taking the Ministers out of that consideration, there may be some members who will miss out on a standing committee. But, of course, they could still substitute in or substitute permanently or temporarily for other members, so that is not such a big consideration.

Turning to the grouping of the subjects in the standing committees, for us this was quite a big issue, because we actually found it quite difficult in the current term of Parliament to be properly represented at some of those committees, and to have the right people there at the right time. I think this grouping will make that much better. So the first one is the Economic Development, Science and Innovation Committee, which will, as always, be a busy committee that straddles everything from business development, Crown minerals, innovation, broadcasting, communications, and so on—very wide ranging. When it comes to the second one, the Education and Workforce Committee, this is a very important change, because in the same standing committee it puts industrial relations and also education, training, employment, and immigration. These things are actually very closely linked. The most important link there is between education and training, on the one hand, and the workforce, on the other. We in New Zealand First think it is very important in the future that there be more attention paid to the streaming of people through the education system into appropriate workforce positions, with the appropriate qualifications.

The Environment Committee is the third, and that includes, of course, the very important issue of climate change. So that is going to be a busy committee as well. The Finance and Expenditure Committee is No. 4. No. 5 is the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee. No. 6 is the Governance and Administration Committee, which will now include local government, which is currently inappropriately placed elsewhere, and I think it will be much better placed in the Governance and Administration Committee. Its current grouping—the Local Government and Environment Committee—might have had some genuine relationships with each other, but I think it is much better placed on that committee.

No. 7 is the Health Committee, and it is always going to be very busy. It is such a huge area to cover, with health. In the Justice Committee there have been some major changes with the grouping of constitutional and electoral matters, and also human rights, justice, and the courts, but now also crime and criminal law, police, and corrections. Grouping those into the same committee is very intelligent, because it actually means that the whole field will be covered, and it will not be piecemeal between a number of other committees. So it is very, very welcome to see that happening.

The Māori Affairs Committee will continue to stand alone. It has always been a busy committee, and I think it is going to be busy for years to come. The Primary Production Committee has the usual things in it, but now it has got racing in it as well. There was some discussion about where racing should go. It could have gone in a number of different committees, but I think it is probably quite well placed there in the Primary Production Committee. No. 11 is the Social Services and Community Committee, and, finally, No. 12 is the Transport and Infrastructure Committee, and that is going to be, of course, a very busy committee as well. So they are all going to be busy but now with better integration of the different purposes for which each committee will do its work. Industrial relations will no longer be grouped with transport and instead it goes up and into the Education and Workforce Committee, where I think it is much better situated.

We in New Zealand First, as I have said, are very happy with what we particularly wanted to achieve, which was a reorganisation of the standing committees, and we have seen that. We have seen a better grouping of the subjects for those committees. It will mean that we will all be able to work much more efficiently and effectively in those committees. For small parties, in particular, this will be a much better set-up.

There are many other subjects that one could cover. Obviously, I will not have time to do so. The only other one that I could perhaps mention is the recommendation for international treaties. I think that is a good step forward, so that now there is a process for debating those, and in return the first reading of the bill will be taken without debate. So the Government will not be losing any time, but the Parliament will be more democratic and the public will be better informed for that process. We will be voting in favour.

Motion agreed to.

Bills

Employment (Pay Equity and Equal Pay) Bill

First Reading

Debate resumed from 8 August.

ALASTAIR SCOTT (National—Wairarapa): I rise in support of the Employment (Pay Equity and Equal Pay) Bill for a number of reasons, but the primary reason is that I have an interest in this bill. There was an implication from the Opposition that crusty old white guys like me do not particularly have much of an interest in this, but I do, because I have two daughters—two capable daughters—and I expect them to be treated as equally, fairly, and reasonably as my sons. For that reason I have a strong interest in this bill, and I commend it to the House.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the Employment (Pay Equity and Equal Pay) Bill be now read a first time.

Ayes 60

New Zealand National 58; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Noes 59

New Zealand Labour 31; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 12; Māori Party 2.

Bill read a first time.

Bill referred to the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee.

Bills

Commerce (Cartels and Other Matters) Amendment Bill

Third Reading

Hon JACQUI DEAN (Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs): I move, That the Commerce (Cartels and Other Matters) Amendment Bill be now read a third time. This bill is an important action under the Business Growth Agenda to assist in improving the competition regime to protect consumers and also to promote innovation. The bill amends the Commerce Act of 1986 to allow pro-competitive collaboration between firms, while also deterring hard-core cartel behaviour. The bill clarifies the scope of the prohibition in relation to cartel conduct. It specifically prohibits price fixing, market allocation, and output restrictions between competitors. To ensure the bill encourages collaboration, the bill also includes two new exceptions: a collaborative activity exception and an exception for vertical supply agreements.

The collaborative activity exception replaces the current joint venture exception, and enables businesses to assess for themselves whether a proposed collaboration falls within its scope. It asks whether the collaborative activity has a legitimate collaborative purpose, and whether a cartel provision is reasonably necessary to achieve that purpose. The exception for vertical supply arrangements ensures that vertical supply arrangements within a vertically integrated company are exempt, except where they have an anti-competitive purpose. Where businesses are unsure whether an activity might risk breaching the Act, the bill also introduces a clearance regime for collaborative activities. Businesses will be able to apply to the Commerce Commission to seek clearance for their arrangements, which will provide businesses with greater certainty when needed.

The bill also makes a number of other amendments to the Act, including retargeting extraterritorial jurisdiction provisions, introducing a new regime to regulate overseas mergers, and amendments to improve the efficiency of the Commerce Commission’s authorisation process. The bill transitions the competition regime for international shipping from the Shipping Act of 1987 into the Commerce Act. In addition, it includes a new targeted exemption for specified international liner shipping activities, such as vessel sharing. The introduction of the new exception will mean that ocean carriers will have certainty that specified shipping activities, such as coordinating of sailing timetables and pooling of vessels, will be exempt from the prohibitions in the Commerce Act against anti-competitive agreements. The exception should reduce the compliance costs for ocean carriers by providing greater certainty, but continue to provide protection to New Zealanders against anti-competitive conduct. It will come into effect after a 2-year transitional period.

There are many people to thank in relation to this bill. The previous commerce Ministers, Simon Power, Craig Foss, and Paul Goldsmith, are also responsible for this bill. I also thank the members of the Commerce Committee for their work on and contribution to this bill, plus the many individuals and groups that made submissions as part of the policy and legislative processes that led to this bill. I commend the bill to the House.

CLARE CURRAN (Labour—Dunedin South): I am going to be brief. This is the third reading of a bill that has been around for about 5 years since its first reading. It has been through four commerce Ministers. Labour supports it, and I want to acknowledge the Minister who just spoke to us, Jacqui Dean, who has actually finally pushed this through, and not only that but has also listened to industry—which identified issues with vessel-sharing agreements—and has come up with a solution that is largely supported in this House. It has had a few changes since the Commerce Committee.

Labour is disappointed that the Government went soft on criminal penalties and missed the opportunity for a new definition of anti-competitive conduct in section 36 of the Commerce Act. We have a number of valedictories tonight. We want this bill to get through. It has been on the Order Paper for long enough. We believe that there is support across the House to get it through. It should go through in the 51st Parliament. We support it. We should pass this bill in this Parliament, so I commend it to the House.

MELISSA LEE (National): Thank you for the opportunity to take a call on the Commerce (Cartels and Other Matters) Amendment Bill. As the previous speaker, Clare Curran, said, it has been a while since we last debated this important bill, which seeks to enable companies to collaborate their activities where it will enhance and promote competition and efficiency. Hopefully today we can manage to see the end of this bill, because it has been a long time coming.

The Commerce (Cartels and Other Matters) Amendment Bill amends the Commerce Act of 1986 to allow pro-competitive collaboration between firms while also deterring anti-competitive cartel conduct, and I think that is an important aspect. I would like to acknowledge the hard work that the current and former Ministers of Commerce and Consumer Affairs Hon Craig Foss, Paul Goldsmith, and Jacqui Dean have all done towards the passage of this important bill.

This bill was first introduced to the House on 13 October in 2011, and was referred to the Commerce Committee after its first reading on 24 July 2012. The committee, under my predecessor as the chair of the Commerce Committee, Jonathan Young MP, received written submissions from 32 submitters and heard 16 oral submissions on the bill. The committee reported the bill back to the House on 13 May 2013. The second reading was completed on 26 November in 2014, and today we are continuing its official passage through the House.

Supporting strong capital markets in New Zealand and around the world provides a vital source of finance to help our businesses grow, create jobs, and support Kiwi families. They are central to improving the financial well-being of all New Zealanders and to the welfare of the nation as a whole. National firmly believes in supporting New Zealand businesses to be the best that they can be in both domestic and international markets. This bill, as an important part of the Government’s Business Growth Agenda, ensures that we continue to help business compete in a fair and productive New Zealand economy.

Anti-competitive behaviour and increasing costs of production affect the attractiveness of companies doing business in domestic and international markets, while consumers have to pay higher prices—consumers hate paying higher prices, particularly on things like fruit and vegetables. I think having higher taxes would mean we would actually pay more for vegetables and fruit. But I digress.

Cartels harm our consumer industries, and it is important that our law is fit for purpose to support good business practices and financial markets in our country. The existing law currently has criminal sanctions and other punitive measures in place that are unsuitable for modern commercial relationships where companies and industries want to work to build wider ideals of the services they provide. We as a Parliament should rightfully assist them by cutting redundant red tape in the interests of good business and commercial practice. This bill actually does that, and, as other members have said, I am interested in getting this passed today, so I commend the bill to the House.

Dr DAVID CLARK (Labour—Dunedin North): The Labour Party will run a relentlessly positive campaign to restore the Kiwi Dream. This bill is a bit watered down. The amendments to section 36 of the principal Act that Clayton Cosgrove put forward should have been amended. But the Parliament has dragged its feet for too long, so we are just going to support this bill, and I recommend it to the House.

BRETT HUDSON (National): It is a pleasure to rise in support of the Commerce (Cartels and Other Matters) Amendment Bill in this, its third reading. It certainly does appear that this bill is likely to pass into law. It is a good thing and well-looked forward to. Unlike the promise from the member across the way, Dr David Clark, about being relentlessly positive, this party, this Government has been relentlessly positive and relentlessly ambitious for New Zealanders for the best part of 9 years, and we will be working hard to secure their confidence for another 3.

But on to this bill—the bill is about supporting, deepening, and broadening capital markets for New Zealand. It is a simple reality that New Zealanders do not necessarily look to put their personal capital into areas that help to diversify and, particularly, grow new parts of our economy. New Zealand does have a reliance on foreign capital, and it is important that our capital markets and our capital functions give confidence to domestic and international investors, and, indeed, encourage them to look to New Zealand as a place for investing their money and achieving the returns that they seek with that. If we can encourage more investment—both domestic and, particularly, foreign—then we will get the opportunity to broaden and deepen our capital markets. Importantly, we will give the necessary to new parts of our economy to continue their growth.

I could give an example from the sector that I come from, for instance, the technology sector, particularly in information and communications technology, which is an area where we have seen some stunning companies and stunning products and services. That is a huge contributor now to our diversified economy, but one that still suffers from, shall we say, a level of under-investment. We could do with more, and it is important that we permit structures that will encourage investors to participate, particularly where we are enabling pro-competitive collaboration, which this bill will do.

I was particularly impressed to see—just before I wrap up, because no one needs to take too long on this bill—that there was an element of international shipping where New Zealand is somewhat of an outlier in our regulation of that. This bill will bring it into the purview of the Commerce Act and will improve regulatory oversight and transparency in that area. This is a bill worthy of Parliament’s support, as well as the consideration it has had. It will improve investment into New Zealand businesses, and it will improve our economy. I commend it to the House.

BARRY COATES (Green): Tēnā koe e Te Māngai. I rise to speak about the cartels bill before us. I have heard the Government members say that they are “relentlessly positive”.

Hon Clayton Cosgrove: That’s us.

BARRY COATES: Oh, and Labour is “relentlessly positive” too. On this bill, we see the only thing that is relentlessly positive is in the advantages for big business in completely gutting the most important provisions of this bill. We think that this bill is far too soft on white-collar crime and far too soft on fraudsters who rip off our economy and make consumers pay too much for their goods and services. We think this bill, far from cracking down on cartels, will actually enable cosy deals between dominant companies that disadvantage consumers and disadvantage small and medium sized enterprises in our economy.

Let us go through a few things. Firstly, this bill, as it went through the Commerce Committee, had the provision that cartels would be criminalised, but only for hard-core cartels. The bill was very carefully worded to just identify that it was hard-core cartels that would be criminalised. Part of the justification put forward by the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment—echoed, I should say by the Commerce Committee in its report—is that, it said, tough penalties make it easier to detect cartels. It said cartel members themselves do not operate cartels when there is a threat of jail time. It is a significant deterrent. And what we heard was that all OECD countries have criminal sanctions in their cartels legislation. We would be stepping outside of the regulatory framework of the countries that we should be operating with in order to share information and have a common regulatory framework that would get to grips with these insidious cartels, which are so dangerous for the economy.

In 2015 then commerce Minister, Paul Goldsmith, introduced a new Supplementary Order Paper that would remove criminalisation from the bill. So the Green Party tried to find out why that had happened. We thought that maybe there was substantive new research that might have come to light to say that criminalising cartels was not a good idea. There might have been some substantiation to the idea that criminalisation would not be in the advantage of the economy overall in providing fair competition. What did we find? We found that it had been a political decision—bitterly opposed, I should say, by Australian competition authorities, who complained that this would bust a hole between Australia and New Zealand’s regulatory regime around cartels.

Where did this political decision come from? Well, unfortunately, there was all too little information. What we did see was the fingerprints of some very strong lobbying by big-business interests. Should we be surprised that this Government would cave in to big-business interests in weakening the provisions on monopolies and cartels? I do not think it should surprise anyone. That is what we have seen in what it has done over 9 years of Government.

So we oppose the weakening of this legislation in other ways, as well. New section 31(1)(b), inserted by clause 7, says: “the cartel provision is reasonably necessary for the … collaborative activity.” So that means that you can set up a collaborative activity, and you can have a cartel associated with that collaborative activity, as long as it is “reasonably necessary” in order to support that collaboration. That is a huge gap in what this cartel legislation will actually be achieving.

I think we can probably see the rise of collaborative activities that take advantage of new section 31(1), inserted by clause 7, or new section 31(2)(b)—that collaborative activity “is not carried on for the dominant purpose of lessening competition …”. So, collaborative activity is fine, as long as it does not have the dominant purpose of lessening competition. It can be ancillary; it can lessen competition as a result of the collaborative activity, as long as it is not the dominant purpose. In terms of a loophole in this bill, that is an enormous loophole.

Thirdly, in new section 65A, inserted by clause 12, there is clearance, which means a free pass and a permission to engage in collaborative activity. Clearance will be granted if collaboration will not have the effect of substantially lessening competition. So it can lessen competition; it just cannot do it substantially—whatever that means.

So in these provisions, we have seen the Government drive an absolute truckload through this legislation. We have seen it gutted, and, from the Green’s perspective, we have supported this legislation from the beginning—right through the process. But at the time that National started gutting this legislation for the sake of its big-company mates, we said: “No. It doesn’t meet the minimum standards that cartel laws should.”

It is out of step with other countries internationally. It is out of step with what we should be doing in order to have decent laws on competition in this country. And I would like to pay tribute to Clayton Cosgrove, who submitted a very good amendment to this legislation saying that, actually, one of the areas that does need to be fixed is section 36 of the Commerce Act, and that we should be moving from a purpose test on a dominant market position to an effects test. That would have made a big difference. But did the Government accept that? Sadly, no.

Time after time we have seen the Government go soft, in terms of big-company interest and the lessening of competition. What we heard Simon Power say in 2010 when this whole process started was that cartels protect inefficient producers, creating a drag on the economy and a burden on businesses and consumers who buy their products. What we see is legislation that started out with a strong position from the then Minister, Simon Power, went through the Commerce Committee, had the full support of all the political parties through the Commerce Committee, and was then gutted.

We will oppose this legislation. We do not think that this bill is worthy to go through. It is a slap in the face to the consumers, to the small to medium sized enterprises, and to the people who trust our regulatory system to stop abuses of competition. This is one of the reasons why our productivity is 30 percent lower than Australia’s. It is one of the reasons why our workers get paid 30 percent less than Australians do. We have very, very poor competition, as is repeatedly said by the Productivity Commission. It keeps on saying that, as a small society, New Zealand needs to have very strong competition policy. The Government has absolutely failed to meet that test through this legislation. We will oppose it. The Greens will champion fair competition. We will protect consumers. We will support small and medium sized enterprises. We will stop white-collar crime and dirty money from flowing into this economy. Thank you.

RIA BOND (NZ First): I am pleased to rise on behalf of New Zealand First and my fine colleague Fletcher Tabuteau and take a call in the third reading of the Commerce (Cartels and Other Matters) Amendment Bill. I want to say that New Zealand First supported this bill at its first reading in this House and going to the select committee stage. The Commerce Committee—a very fine-working select committee—worked really hard on ensuring that we made good amendments to this bill, to strengthen the bill in order for it to be fit for purpose.

I do not want to take too much time and go over what previous speakers before me have said, but what I do want to say is that when the Minister came through with a Supplementary Order Paper and dumped it on this bill, it actually made this bill become toothless. It actually reacted like, I guess, a grenade on this bill and actually ruined it. So on that basis, and the fact that this bill is not fit for purpose and is not going to be providing the very protection from cartels that it should be, New Zealand First will not be supporting it. Thank you.

SIMON O’CONNOR (National—Tāmaki): I am sure there is no collusion going on with these short calls—some sort of agreement seems to have broken out. So in the interest of that, I will attempt to do something different to show our independence. I do not want to run foul of this bill in its third reading.

I am very pleased to speak to this Commerce (Cartels and Other Matters) Amendment Bill in its third reading. I have been very fortunate to sit on the Health Committee—which I seem to be relatively well-known for, for a variety of reasons—but I have also had the pleasure of sitting on the Commerce Committee, which provided a welcome contrast. I want to pick up on something the last member, Ria Bond, just noted: that, actually, the select committee has been incredibly cooperative in working through this bill.

Part of it, too, has been working with different Ministers. As you would probably appreciate, Mr Assistant Speaker—apologies, Mr Assistant Speaker; I am not meant to bring you into the debate—there are differences in each Minister, and that has actually, I think, contributed to a robustness in this piece of legislation. I want to acknowledge Minister Dean for the work that she has done to pick up the portfolio more recently than not, and for bringing this bill, which has been around for a while, to a conclusion. So to Minister Jacqui Dean: thank you for your work and leadership in this regard.

Before Minister Dean was Minister Goldsmith, and before him was Minister Foss. As I said at the start, each Minister brings a slightly different perspective. I think, in a paradoxical way, this has actually strengthened the whole process to enable us to get to where we are today. I am actually quite pleased that—you know, we have been ribbed, for want of a better word, and in some ways continue to be, across the House at the moment. This has been a long process, but I think it is one that has been quite correctly followed. I think it is really good that today, with a spot of luck and without pre-empting the vote, we are going to bring it to a conclusion.

It is no surprise that this bill sits in, sort of, a wider framework for the Government around matters of commerce and around consumer affairs. The select committee, most recently, has also gone through the patent attorneys bill—now an Act. There are slightly different elements, but they are related—again, it is about how we continue to have fair and proper competition. You hear from me and other members, particularly of the Government, about wanting to see a continually strengthening economy—that we are trade-focused and we are going to reduce the red tape. Well, actually, it is legislation like this that makes a difference.

We had also had, recently, legislation around those—I think it was the piece of legislation around countervailing duties and dumping. Again, these are all small—I was going to say small cogs, but I do not think that is appropriate; they are actually significant cogs in a much wider machine. We have also had a bill introduced around financial services.

Here we are, talking about people potentially working in a cartel space. We are also looking at how we construct our commerce systems, if you will, to be—as I was talking about with the Minister earlier—centred around the borrower. In terms of this particular Act, we are dealing, well, with cartels.

Dr David Clark: Sort out section 36.

SIMON O’CONNOR: I actually thought section 30 is probably the most interesting, initially, because it indicates what cartels are. I think that one of the things that is easy, in debates, is to get a bit lost in what the specifics are, with the wider viewpoint. When we are talking about cartels—particularly for those who, I am sure, are riveted at home; perhaps including my father, which is a worry—the cartel provisions are around, primarily, three areas. They are articulated in section 30A, which, for the member who just interjected—

Dr David Clark: What are they?

SIMON O’CONNOR: —is before section 36. They are price-fixing, restricting output, and market allocation. I think most of us, when we think of cartels and why there is a piece of legislation being put forward, will think of cartel behaviour primarily around the price-fixing. Having worked in the insurance area for a number of years, it was always quite critical that we were not price-fixing, and were never to be seen to be doing so as well. Without—I hope—crossing any boundaries, you always made sure that you were, effectively, never in the same room with a competitor, lest you be accused of somehow colluding and bringing things together.

So, in the first instance, it is cartel activities around price fixing. The second is around restricting output. I think it is probably quite intuitive to most of us that you can affect the price by affecting supply. So if you have decided to buy whole container of widgets, the public desires two containers of widgets, and you decide to give out only half, then you have involved yourself in restricting output there.

Then there is the whole element around market allocation. So that is what we are talking about here. As has been noted, this bill has been debated since about 2011. But as I think you can probably understand, Mr Assistant Speaker and others, there is a complexity in all of those three areas that needs to be well looked at. One of the things we do not want to do, in trying to seek the good of stopping cartel behaviour, is stop proper, legitimate behaviours.

In fact, there are plenty of instances where businesses rightly work together, where they actually rightly share information in order to work more cooperatively. One of them—and this bill looks at it—comes up around the maritime industry. I think, for the first time, we are beginning to regulate quite strongly on any cartel behaviour around maritime trade. But one of the things we want to be really careful of is not affecting—I would suggest probably the most critical one actually is trade into the Pacific. Having lived in the Islands for a few years, you certainly appreciate there is almost a singular ship, but multiple providers sending supplies to Fiji, or New Caledonia, or Samoa, or the like. What this bill does is say: “Look, those shipping groups and agencies shouldn’t be in cartel behaviour, but we recognise that they also have to cooperate.” Again, it is just a small illustration of why legislation like this takes a little bit of time—a bit like this speech.

Why these things take a little bit of time is that you absolutely have to get it right. So we definitely do not want cartel behaviour occurring in between our trade and in the maritime sector going into, for example, the Islands. But at the same time we want to make sure that legitimate business practices occur. Again, to illustrate that—at the moment it is very normal, with one ship going to the Islands, that multiple ship users, which is probably a very ineloquent way to put it, but those who are sending their products north can actually talk and discuss, work out their timetabling together, and so forth. So that makes a lot of sense.

The other area that has got a lot of traction here today has been around the whole reason why we have chosen not to criminalise cartel behaviour. I think there has been a lot of robust discussion around that, and that has been very welcome. You would expect it in this House, and you would expect of the Opposition in particular. As one who sat on the committee and listened to and talked to the various Ministers, I say that when you have a system in the civil area that is working, you keep it. I know it is a rather simplistic way to look at it, but basically the civil regime is working at the moment for managing cartel systems.

Hon Jacqui Dean: Big fines.

SIMON O’CONNOR: Yes, substantial fines, actually.

Hon Jacqui Dean: $6 million.

SIMON O’CONNOR: The Minister says it is $6 million. So I think, actually, it puts a bit of context in there, that OK, if it is not in the criminal regime, we are not talking about this simply being a light-handed slap on the wrist in the civil system. In fact, when you are up into fines of $6 million you are talking something quite substantial.

I think also—and look, I am no lawyer—adding more things into the criminal code almost for the sake of it is not necessary, nor appropriate. I think we do that carefully and cautiously. So I think fundamentally in this space we have achieved the right balance. As I said at the start, it is working within the civil structure and so we need to keep it there at this point in time. I mean, any Government, present or future, can always reserve the right to relook at that. In fact, one thing I would be interested in, post the enactment of the bill because it does not substantially affect it, is whether or not there are regulatory powers to make those changes. I suspect anything like that would take some work, through the usual legislative process.

We have made a number of amendments within the bill. This is particularly to create the understandable exceptions that are required. I mentioned a little bit earlier about collaborative activities, and tried to illustrate them somewhat in the maritime area. You have also got the whole vertical supply agreement side of things, and that is effectively a manufacturer who sells directly online, but is also selling to a retailer. A little bit, you could imagine, is someone who—

Hon Jacqui Dean: Pro-competitive.

SIMON O’CONNOR: Well, it is pro-competitive but it is also trying to appreciate that we want to stop—as I probably keep repeating—cartel behaviour.

Hon Jacqui Dean: That’s right.

SIMON O’CONNOR: Absolutely. But we need to recognise that there is a rightful complexity to how people conduct business these days. So if someone is, again, making again, widgets, we absolutely want them to be able to sell them to various retailers out in the market.

Dr David Clark: What about section 36?

SIMON O’CONNOR: But we also want to be able to have them sell them on, say, TradeMe and the like.

I am conscious that I have only really got to section 30. I know my colleague across the House wants me to get to section 36. I do not think that in the 5 seconds left I can get through all the clauses, but I commend this bill to the House.

MICHAEL WOOD (Labour—Mt Roskill): Thank you for the opportunity to speak on the Commerce (Cartels and Other Matters) Amendment Bill. In my comments this afternoon I want to reaffirm Labour’s support for this bill. I want to talk through some of the reasons for that, but there is a real clamour arising in this House, and I think on the streets of the country, to hear about section 36 of the principal Act and to hear about Clayton Cosgrove’s Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) 408. So in my comments a little bit later I want to touch on that because I think it was one of the real missed opportunities of this bill, to make sure that we have law in this country that is really fit for purpose, that is not there just for the big guys, and that gives the little guy a fair crack of the whip.

Labour’s basic position on this bill is that our starting point here in New Zealand is that we have very, very weak competition law—very, very weak law. It needs to be substantially improved to give consumers the protection that they need from over-mighty monopolies and oligopolies, and from people who play fast and loose with the rules with the significant market power. It also needs to be made fairer for the small businesses—the men and women of our country who form a significant part of our economy, who are employers of large numbers of people, but are often really up against it. One of the ways in which they are often up against it is that they have got these big guys operating in their sectors that have such significant market power.

So what Labour says about this bill is that it helps. It moves us in the right direction. It puts in place some clearer and better rules. But we could have done so much better. My colleague Simon O’Connor, who just spoke on the bill, went through some of the key aspects of the bill, and these are things that Labour does support. We have got some clearer rules around the definitions of cartels. We have got some clearer rules around some of their practices that we do want to ensure are not encouraged and are in fact discouraged—practices such as restricting outputs, so they are controlling the supply and, therefore, the price of goods, potentially, in the market place. That is one of the ways in which big companies can have the biggest impact on consumers and on small businesses.

One of the things that the Labour Party also wants to comment on in respect of this bill is that, I mean, we have really seen some sheer athleticism and speed from the Government benches on this one. I have been sitting here, and it is like Usain Bolt has been running through the Chamber. The Government started this one back in 2012 when it received a report from a select committee on this issue—at the request of the Minister at the time, I might add. It has taken 5 years to progress the bill through the process to the stage where we are, with, what, 4 sitting days to go. We might actually get this bill over the line, depending on how the speeches go tonight and depending on how long they go on for.

I guess this does speak to a broader concern that we have got that this whole area—my colleague Mr Cosgrove, in his earlier speeches in respect of this bill, actually spoke about this. Often this Government does seem to have really downplayed the importance of commerce legislation. It is kind of seen as maybe a bit technical and wonky but, actually, it has very real-world impacts in terms of consumers, in terms of small businesses, and in terms of the confidence that people have to invest in the business sector and in our market places. So we think it could have done a much better job of that.

I will give the Government this, though: it has moved far quicker on this one than it has moved on matters like multinational tax, than it has moved on the housing crisis, than it has moved on properly funding health and education—things that the next Labour Government will really rip right into.

One of the areas that the bill seeks to address—and this was one of the starting points—is ensuring that we have some rational rules in respect of the shipping and civil aviation sectors, bringing them into the Commerce Act regime. One of the things that we in the Labour Party do support is having reasonably consistent rules across different sectors of the economy. We support that from the point of view of legal fairness. We support that from the point of view of simplicity. We support that from the point of view that if you are a consumer or you are a business and you feel that a wrong has been done against you, there is a relatively simple process and a consistent set of rules sitting up there in the legislative framework that you can go to, to get some relief. So we think that does make some sense.

What the bill does do is make some differentiation between what is termed pro-competitive, collaborative behaviour and hard-core cartels. That is obviously quite a fine distinction, but it is an important one because it does recognise, I think in a reasonably pragmatic way, that companies do not always exist in splendid isolation and that there sometimes are market conditions where it can be appropriate for there to be a degree of cooperation between companies that does not necessarily lurch over into monopolistic, oligopolistic, or cartel-like behaviour. That distinction between the hard-core cartels, where you have got real cartel-like behaviour and real collusion on things like price, and sensible, pragmatic collaboration that does not go into that area is very important.

I might note on that one that of course we have seen over the last month or so some really concerning signs coming through about what might be happening with our major petrol suppliers in New Zealand, where there is significant evidence from the investigation that Minister Collins launched that there may be a degree of cartel-like behaviour between some of those companies in the mechanism that they use to set prices. What the Labour Party has said is that instead of just pushing that out to the back of beyond, which is what this Government has done, there should be an immediate Commerce Commission inquiry into that, because that is a very good example of the way in which cartel-like behaviour can potentially have a huge impact on consumers. Now, we need to wait for the full facts of that one to come out, but we say: let us get an investigation going into that as soon as we possibly can.

I want to turn to proposed new section 36, as I know that people out there have been waiting for this one. This was from a very important SOP, which we really regret was not picked up earlier on in the legislative process, from Clayton Cosgrove, who of course was previously a very, very effective Labour spokesperson for commerce. I want to acknowledge him in the House. He gave his valedictory speech in the House last night, and he is extremely experienced in this area and has done some great work. What new section 36 would have done would have been quite important, because what we have got at the moment is that you have to prove intent. If you are looking to prove whether or not cartel behaviour has occurred, you have got to prove intent—the mens rea in the law. Were they actually thinking and planning up here that they would collude? Of course, that is actually notoriously difficult to prove. It is notoriously difficult to get inside the minds of people who might be making these decisions.

So what Clayton Cosgrove’s SOP 408 would have done, which we would have liked to see in the bill and which would have significantly strengthened protections for consumers and small businesses, was say that, well, it is not just the intent that matters; actually, it is the impact—actually, it is the impact. If we can see that there has been behaviour that is in the nature of collusion and we can see that it has done damage downstream, whether it is in the form of elevated prices for consumers or whether it has been smaller competitors knocked out of the market—that impact, if we can conclusively prove it, should actually be enough. We should not have to go through the legal hoops of trying to make a window into the souls of men, as Elizabeth I said, of trying to prove some sort mental process that went on inside the heads of people in boardrooms when decisions to collude may have been made. So we regret that that was not picked up by the Government, and that is something that the next Labour Government would be keen to look at.

The final quick comment I want to make is that the other thing that we regret in this bill is that the Government, through Minister Goldsmith, intervened in the process to remove the criminalisation of cartel behaviour. We strongly, strongly regret that, because we say that if this issue was important enough to put up from the Government benches, to spend 5 years making our way through it—if it is that important to our economy, if it is that important to our small businesses, if it is that important to our consumers, and if we have potentially got big businesses that are taking advantage of their market power to line their own pockets, quite frankly, and to make unreasonable profits at the expense of others, then that, to me, is behaviour that should have criminal sanction.

We on this side of the House stand on the side of the small guy, of the small-business owner, and of the consumer, and if they are getting ripped off by people who are engaging in collusive practices, then we do not see why that should not be criminal behaviour. It just stinks a little bit that sometimes the kind of white-collar activities do not get the same kind of sanction that people at the other end of our society consistently face if they break the rules. So we thought that was a real shame.

I did note in some of the papers that that change by Minister Goldsmith was welcomed by the ACT Party, and that of course is entirely consistent with its position in respect of always looking out for the big guy—we had it in the House the other day when we spoke about Uber and other companies who are not paying their fair share of taxes in New Zealand, and that outraged Mr Seymour. Well, this is exactly the same thing. It is letting the big guys get away with it. When they do wrong, they do not face the same sanctions that other people might.

So in winding up my comments at this particular time, I would like to say that the Labour Party does support the general intent of this bill. It is an improvement on where we were, but we could have done so much better, and we look forward to doing that after 24 September. Thank you.

KANWALJIT SINGH BAKSHI (National): Thank you for the opportunity to support the Commerce (Cartels and Other Matters) Amendment Bill in its third reading. This Government has been working for the past 9 years to make sure that the consumers benefit from the laws that are being passed through this House. Some of the points I would like to touch upon first of all, are those laws that have passed and are benefiting consumers in the long term. There are improved financial reporting requirements, and so far 90 percent of New Zealand businesses no longer need to produce full financial accounting. That is helping businesses to do what they are best at. We do not want them to just sit in front of computers or file papers. We want them to go out and do the business that they are best at.

We have also strengthened the capital market and created more opportunities through crowdfunding. We have got many small investors who do not have real opportunity because they do not have big money, but through crowdfunding they can collaborate and have good capital, and they can invest in start-up companies that are looking for some capital investment. We have also tightened the regime for those providing financial advice, because those small investors are at risk. We do not want them to make a wrong decision in investing somewhere on the wrong advice from a financial adviser who advised them to invest somewhere, and then lose all their capital. We want to ensure that the advice given by the financial advisers is appropriate and helpful to them.

We have introduced standardised reporting for the KiwiSaver funds, allowing a more informed comparison. They are required to give what kind of return they are giving in comparison to others, so that the investors feel confident. If investors do not get the proper return, they can move on to some other KiwiSaver fund so that they can have secure funding and good return on their investment.

We have progressed our commitment toward a single economic market with Australia. This is very important because we are a very small economy in comparison with Australia. We want to ensure that with a single regime there is benefit to our small businesses by filing less paperwork and having more access to the bigger market, so that they can have better access to Australian markets. Some of the bills that have been passed by this House are helping the businesses.

We have improved intellectual property settings, which allow innovative local companies to grow. The other day I had a visit from a company from Dunedin that has patented an instrument that is helpful in detecting gases through a laser. That is a very innovative product is selling very well in New Zealand and they are going to launch that product in Australia. So we want to talk to those innovative companies and help them have access to the market.

This bill, which has got some major provisions, will help competitive behaviour for the companies, which benefits the consumer. One example I would like to quote is that when we travel from New Zealand to other parts of the world, the code-sharing between the airlines has really helped the competitive nature of that. I remember when I came to New Zealand in early 2000, it used to cost about $3,000 to travel to India. Now it has come down to almost $1,500 to travel to India. That is because of the competitive nature—we have got those proper laws in place.

This bill has provision for a penalty regime, whereby if the Commerce Commission finds that somebody is doing something uncompetitive in business, then there are penalties. For example, recently we saw that the Commerce Commission imposed $6 million on Air New Zealand because of its uncompetitive behaviour in freight movement. We have given an exemption for maritime so that they can work together, because, as I said, we are a small economy. We do not have too much freight movement in the Pacific in particular. We want to ensure that the importers as well as the exporters get best benefit out of the pricing, and they can collaborate in ship movements so that one vessel can take all of the products together of those importers and exporters.

For individuals a penalty with a limit of half a million dollars can be imposed, whereas there is no limit for corporates. The Commerce Commission can decide whatever amount it wants to impose for unruly behaviour, and that can help a more competitive nature. In fact, as I said, going back to the shipping on the Pacific Island route, there are some dedicated shipping companies between New Zealand and the Pacific Islands that operate on a thin margin to provide essential services. Many of these routes are serviced through vessels that link slots and share arrangements, which would be permitted by the block exemption. That is important because we want to ensure that our importers and exporters are not harmed by this.

Overseas acquisition is another area that is very important for us because what happens is that if a company merges overseas, the consumer over here can be affected. We want to ensure that if such mergers take place, the Commerce Commission has the tools to look into those areas and ensure that those mergers are not going to affect the New Zealand consumers. For example, we can see that many of the online television companies are providing content to consumers. We want to ensure that the consumers and the viewers in New Zealand have access to those markets and that there is no monopoly on such events, particularly the sports events.

A strong capital market provides vital sources of finance to help our businesses to grow and create jobs. These are central to improving the financial well-being of New Zealanders. We want to ensure that we have proper laws in place so that the financial market can grow. We firmly believe in supporting New Zealand businesses to be the best they can be in both the domestic as well as international market. We want to ensure that they have got those facilities. The Commerce (Cartels and Other Matters) Amendment Bill promotes economic growth by enabling broad competitive collaborative between firms while also deterring hard-core cartel conduct. It is a very important bill and I commend it to the House.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the Commerce (Cartels and Other Matters) Amendment Bill be now read a third time.

Ayes 93

New Zealand National 58; New Zealand Labour 31; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.

Noes 26

Green Party 14; New Zealand First 12.

Bill read a third time.

Bills

Maritime Transport Amendment Bill

Second Reading

Hon JACQUI DEAN (Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs) on behalf of the Minister of Transport: I move, That the Maritime Transport Amendment Bill be now read a second time. The bill has three parts, which provide for, firstly, managing the risk of alcohol and drug impairment in the commercial maritime sector; secondly, international compensation arrangements for maritime incidents causing marine pollution; and, thirdly, miscellaneous provisions, including improving access to shipping services to the Chatham Islands, and improving access to shipping services to other offshore islands. I want to thank the members of the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee for their work on this bill. I also want to thank those who took the time to make a submission on this bill. The committee’s report includes many sensible recommendations that will help to ensure the bill achieves its worthy objectives. I understand the committee worked hard and collaboratively on this bill.

The most significant proposal in the bill addresses the risks associated with alcohol and drug use in the commercial maritime sector. A new Part 4B to the Maritime Transport Act will more effectively manage these risks. Maritime operators will implement their drug and alcohol management plans by incorporating relevant requirements into employment agreements. New maritime rules will establish requirements that concern the content of, and procedural requirements for, drug and alcohol management plans, procedural requirements for random drug and alcohol testing, and other related matters.

As reported back, the bill contains several changes that will help to ensure the effective implementation of the new system. The 1997 Protocol to the Convention on Limitation of Liability for Maritime Claims (LLMC) substantially increases the limits of liability under the LLMC claims arising from maritime incidents causing loss or damage. Sections 86(3), 87(5), and 88(2) of the Act currently refer only to the LLMC. The bill amends these provisions to also reference the protocol. The bill, as introduced, included an amendment to replace section 86(4) of the Act, which specifies claims that are not affected by the LLMC. While the new provision was intended to more directly reflect language contained in the LLMC, submissions on the proposed change identified legal and technical issues with taking this approach. As reported back, the bill therefore excludes the proposed amendment.

The bill gives effect in New Zealand law to the Supplementary Fund Protocol, an international oil pollution compensation fund. New Zealand’s accession to the protocol, which Cabinet agreed to in 2014, will provide for an additional tier of compensation available to deal with the damage caused by oil spill damage from tankers. The bill also contains miscellaneous measures to improve the operation of existing provisions in the Act and address minor anomalies by way of amendments. These include improving the flexibility of empowering provisions for the making of rules under the Act, allowing regional councils to retain fees from infringement notices issues for breaches of maritime rules, enabling territorial authorities to transfer responsibilities for harbour works and maritime activity, and clarifying that powers transferred to a public authority can be varied or can be withdrawn.

Miscellaneous measures also include improving access to shipping services to the Chatham Islands and other offshore islands by easing the restriction on the use of foreign-registered ships to carry freight between these places and mainland New Zealand, clarifying that the Director of Maritime New Zealand may issue guidelines consistent with ballast water convention requirements and processes, clarifying the definition of “marine protection conduct” for the purposes of marine protection rules, and extending on board limitation of liability provisions to remote pilotage. The miscellaneous measures also include an amendment to section 33M of the navigation by-laws to facilitate space launch activities. This will enable launches over water to be carried out safely from a maritime standpoint.

The amendment will allow regional councils to make navigation by-laws to control the use of ships in areas affected by space activities, and was prompted by a submission on the Outer Space and High-altitude Activities Bill.

The bill includes other minor and technical changes, including transitional arrangements which I have not explicitly covered. However, these changes are set out in the committee’s report. They are consistent with the bill’s aim of improving the efficiency, effectiveness, and safety of the maritime transport system.

It is with much pleasure that I present the second reading of the Maritime Transport Amendment Bill. I am pretty sure that the speeches to follow will be much more absorbing. However, I commend this bill to the House.

Mr SPEAKER: I thank the honourable Minister for her delivery of that. In accordance with a determination of the Business Committee, I call on Lindsay Tisch to deliver his valedictory statement.

Debate interrupted.

Valedictory Statements

Valedictory Statements

LINDSAY TISCH (National—Waikato): I rise to deliver my last speech in this Parliament. After 18 years as a member, my career now comes to an end. I have had an interest in politics since my school days, last century. My parents were involved, and this influenced my participation. We listened to the Budgets huddled around the radio. I vividly recall election night 1972. While I was meant to be at a function, I spent much of the evening in the car with my girlfriend at the time listening to the 1972 election results on the radio. I have spent much of my working life working for the National Party in various roles because I believed—and, indeed, still believe—that it offers the right direction for New Zealand.

I have not always agreed with everything, but I have always been one of those loyal to the cause. My active participation in party affairs started in the mid-1980s and carried through until I was elected in 1999. In the late 1980s the political spectrum changed. The right moved to the left; then the left moved to the right. The right, I think, has now gone right, and the left is left—and thank goodness for that.

Following the referendum on the electoral system when it changed to the mixed-member proportional system, MMP, I became the party president in 1994, and during my time set in place the structures and rules on how National would operate under MMP. It was also at this time, Mr Speaker, that you were elected in a by-election, following the resignation of Ruth Richardson. I managed the party’s 1996 election campaign—the first under MMP—and the biggest challenge was an attitudinal one: to put the party vote ahead of the personal vote or candidate vote. Hence, I coined the slogan “First Tick National”.

MMP has done away with the power of provincial areas, which has now moved and is influenced—very much so—by the urban sector. The political landscape has changed and so participation in party politics has waned. I am fortunate to have had a solid support at all levels during my party and my political career.

In the party I worked with many whom I regard as salt of the earth, pragmatic, focused, and dedicated. President Peter Goodfellow is one, and I thank you, Peter. I wish you, the board, and the team every success in the campaign. Andrew von Dadelszen, my regional chair, has the challenge of keeping the central North Island blue. To Jason Howarth, the Waikato electorate chairman, and Tim van de Molen, our candidate in Waikato: all the best. I am sure you will do well.

I acknowledge with gratitude the people of the Waikato region who have voted for the party and me and have elected me by majorities of such dimensions as to make me feel small. In the Waikato I have had the privilege of working with a team whose energy is outstripped only by their enthusiasm.

Mr Speaker, it is a great personal thrill to me—and I trust that you will permit me the liberty of referring to them—that many from the Waikato are in the gallery this afternoon. My long-serving staffers Debbie Sankey, Toni Grace, and Maxine Viggers, along with her husband, Stephen, have been the nucleus of a great team. Here in Parliament, Margaret Hunter, Suzy Klement, and Jane Nixon have kept me focused on the role, deciphered my handwriting, and have rescued many an email from the deleted box. I say thank you for your talents, your support, and your inspiration. By your active participation in the parliamentary process, and in the commitment by which you live and work, you have made democracy come alive and shrugged off the notion that politics is not another highly entertaining spectator sport.

The participation of family in public affairs depends in large on the tolerance and encouragement of wives, husbands, partners, or spouses. My family has played a crucial role in my political development and involvement. The girl in the car in 1972 is here today: my wife of 43 years, Leonie. Leonie, you stood by me through all the challenges and sacrifices of political life and I say many thanks. My daughter, Andrea, her husband, Dallas, and their children, Maya and Luca, have continued to take an interest in the political process. Two-year-old Maya, when asked “Where does Lindsay work?”, states: “In a castle.” They are still trying to get here from Christchurch at the moment so, unfortunately, they have missed being here.

When I first arrived here, to my horror, there was a computer on my desk. I did not know how it worked. It was Andrea who saved the day when she taught me how to switch it off, rather than my switching it off at the wall. Why would you go to “Start” when you want to turn it off? Technology is not my forte. But then the younger generation, Generation Y, have the future ahead of them. My son, Karl, his wife, Hani, and little Lidia, living and owning businesses in London, are watching today. And I say thanks to you from this side of the world. I tell you, when grandchildren arrive the world view changes.

On entering Parliament in 1999, along with me came another seven members—The Magnificent Seven, plus one. The eight of us became known as the “millennium club” and met every Tuesday night to chew the fat. Our intake was close-knit and we became close friends. Only Anne Tolley remains, and I thank you, Anne, for your friendship and the whiskies we have shared together on numerous occasions—do not drink when I am gone. Ha, ha!

We all have our priorities and prejudices, and one must come to one’s own conclusion as to what is best according to criteria and consensus. I have placed much emphasis on the role of representation. It is often said that politics is people, and representing constituents and their concerns has been rewarding and satisfying.

On the economic stage, the 102 kilometre Waikato Expressway, of which 96 kilometres is in the Waikato electorate, had its genesis in 2008 when I convened a meeting of Waikato mayors with the Leader of the Opposition at the time, John Key, at the national Fieldays. The result is for all to see, and when it is finally completed it will be a major economic investment in the Waikato region.

In my maiden statement, I stated that the clean-up of toxic waste on Mount Te Aroha was a priority, and while this mountain is no longer in my electorate, it is pleasing that the contaminated site has been addressed.

To be part of a Government that encouraged the production of movies has been quite remarkable for the economic development of the Waikato, especially in Matamata, where I live. I am often referred to as the MP for Hobbiton. I am one of the few who can walk into a hobbit hole without bending down.

I have mentioned the role of the representative, and alongside this is the role of legislator. The two roles are interrelated. I have immersed myself in the activities of this Parliament and have found enjoyment and satisfaction from that involvement. The Business and Parliament Trust is an organisation that has wide support from the business community. The involvement of the corporate sector alongside parliamentarians is quite unique, and I have been a trustee and board member for 15 years. I encourage you to attend the seminars, guest speaker evenings, and the corporate attachments plus field days to the corporates, showcasing how we each operate. Sir John Goulter, the chair for many years, was farewelled last night. I thank you, John, for your commitment as a driving force for the trust. To the team of Mike Fokker, the CEO; new chair, Peter Griffiths; and trustees, I wish you continuing success.

A highlight in a recent policy decision has been the travel assistance programme for school visits to Parliament. I would encourage members to inquire about the financial assistance available from the secretariat. I had a school from Huntly here on Tuesday that had assistance through this scheme.

In January 2004 I was sent to Beijing to represent the New Zealand Parliament at the Asia Pacific Parliamentary Forum, APPF, the parliamentary equivalent of APEC. I had no idea what this was about. My wife and I had to find our own way into the city. Our ambassador did not even know I was coming, but we made it. This was the start of a very rewarding dialogue and association over 12 years for me and the parliaments of the 26 eligible countries. Some of you in this House have travelled with me, and I am sure the exchange of ideas gave members a wider and better understanding of the issues and challenges facing other democracies and how New Zealand is looked to for guidance in many areas.

After two visits to the Russian Federation—first to Moscow and Saint Petersburg, and then, secondly, to Vladivostok—and the annual meetings with their delegations, the Speaker of the Duma, the Parliament, presented me with a medal, which entitles me, should I ever wish to live in Russia, to not need to pay any tax. Leonie is not keen; she would rather stay in Matamata. It was recognition of the high respect our Parliament has on the world stage.

I have chaired the New Zealand - German Parliamentary Friendship Group, which we re-established as a stand-alone group from the European Union Parliamentary Friendship Group to acknowledge the important role that Germany plays in Europe and our strengthening ties. We have hosted visiting delegations and I have been a guest, along with the Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung in Berlin. To my German colleague Volkmar Klein, in the Bundestag—thank you for your friendship and trust. The ties between our countries, I trust, will continue to grow.

I have served this Parliament as a presiding officer for 9 years, both as an Assistant Speaker and a Deputy Speaker. It has been a great honour to serve. I have learnt to respect the institution of Parliament—something quite separate from the political activities of politicians and political parties. Very few appreciate or understand this institution that is Parliament. The 21 years that we have had MMP representation has changed the culture of this place. There is no doubt that we have broader representation and that is good, but in my view the power has shifted to parties to have legislation progressed, and this House has become a House more of political parties and less of a House of Representatives.

There have been many humorous occasions during my time presiding. In the early days when I wanted the House to settle down I would stand and boldly say “I’m standing.”, to which there were some unparliamentary comments, and laughter. So I changed the terminology and I have said for many years now “I’m on my feet.”, and there has always been silence.

The biggest challenge for me was the Committee of the whole House stage dealing with the Local Government (Auckland Reorganisation) Bill in May 2009, which lasted 33 hours, in which I presided for 26½ of those hours and had to deal with 30,000 amendments. The Hon Rick Barker on his return from overseas was a welcome addition to the Chair, and it is good to have Rick here. It was a cat-and-mouse game, where spreadsheet technology was being used—and I think Mr Robertson had something to do with that—to produce thousands of amendments. The Government had to be careful about moving closure motions, as it needed the Minister’s amendments to be drafted and lodged first. The Opposition’s amendments could be lodged right up until the closure was accepted.

The Opposition began deliberately collapsing the debate in order to prevent the Minister lodging an amendment to block its amendments. The Government had to continue putting up speakers on a bill it wanted to close down. On a practical level, simply keeping on top of the volume of amendments and where they came in the bill was a major challenge. I resorted to using colour-coded stickers indicating the status of each batch of amendments.

The House rose after its third reading at 9.42 on Saturday night, after some 33 hours in Committee; 30,046 amendments were lodged, 16 agreed to, 946 defeated, and 29,084 were ruled out of order. I grouped the amendments, which allowed me to rule them out in their thousands, but this provoked the Opposition, and the Speaker was recalled twice. Fortunately, he supported my ruling. The taking of such a controversial bill through all stages under urgency and the use of technology to swamp the Committee with amendments did not produce an entirely satisfactory result. While the Opposition certainly flexed its muscle, the public perception of Parliament was not enhanced by the time spent voting. The consensus seemed to be that the focus on amendments rather than on debating the issues represented unnecessary time-wasting.

Debate is an acceptable delay tactic, particularly when a bill has not gone to a select committee and is being considered under urgency. The Opposition has very few options available to it other than delay. The lodging of thousands of computer-generated amendments just at the conclusion of each debate in the Committee was a smart political tactic, but one that could ultimately bring the House into disrepute. The Standing Orders Committee has dealt with this, and we are now seeing a more reasoned, focused debate in the Committee of the whole House. The use of extended hours, as we saw this morning, has reduced urgency periods. The tabling of documents, not the telephone directories that Gerry Brownlee used to table, and themes for debates are all moves to improve the quality and functionality of Parliament. I encourage this process and evaluation to continue.

I have presided for 1,378 hours, representing over 30 percent of House time, over my 9 years. Presiding gives one a great opportunity to view and experience behaviour and the many different styles that members have. It has improved, I would have to say, with the advent of the television live feeds. I have viewed the role of a presiding officer as a referee in the game and have tended to play the advantage rule, bearing in mind that this is a debating chamber for debates, and not a speech contest. There is also no television match official, the TMO. I have ruled as I have heard it, or seen it.

We are a House of common thinkers, each supporting our individual views and values. Whether a liberal or conservative, we are New Zealanders all, so who will ever forget the uplifting waiata filling this Chamber when I announced the vote on Louisa Wall’s Marriage (Definition of Marriage) Amendment Bill? To date there have been nearly 1.6 million views on YouTube. It was quite unforgettable and uniquely New Zealand. The Telegraph in Britain posted footage of Parliament breaking into song after the debate, saying: “Good on New Zealand. They get everything right—Lord of the Rings, plus their House of Commons Deputy Speaker, Lindsay Tisch, playing a cameo role sounds exactly like Murray out of Flight of the Conchords.” That may be my legacy here.

Many have helped me in this place, and in particular those in the Clerk’s Office, with whom I have daily contact. David Wilson and the Clerk’s Office are the guardians of the political processes and the protectors of the democratic process. Parliament is not here for the executive’s dictates; it belongs to the people. It is the scrutineer of the executive. To David, Andie Lindsay, and your highly motivated and very professional team, I say thank you for your guidance and support, and to David McGee and Mary Harris and those who served the office in their time, my grateful thanks.

It has been a pleasure and honour to work with you, Mr Speaker, and your predecessor Lockwood Smith, along with your staff, and particularly the unflappable Roland Todd. My fellow presiding officers—it has been a great relief, Trevor, not to have to pull you up on points of order. I am grateful to have worked with former Prime Minister John Key, and to Prime Minister Bill English and colleagues I say thank you for your friendship, for the opportunities, and for the commitment you make to New Zealand. I wish you all a successful and rewarding campaign. I thank all those who make Parliament function and who have been so generous with their time and advice to me. Thank you to those who have served here with me, from all sides of the House, for your friendship, good humour, and often fierce debate.

With an election pending, I am reminded of what I said in my maiden statement. The American politician Dick Armey, when asked “How does it feel to have people give you power?”, replied: “No, the people have given us responsibility. We are their servants. They retain the power.” Mr Speaker, colleagues one and all, I bid you farewell.

[Applause]

Hon JO GOODHEW (National—Rangitata): E Te Mana Whakawā, e ngā iwi, e ngā reo, e ngā mana, tēnā koutou kua tae mai nei ki te manaaki i te kaupapa o te rā nei, nō reira, nau mai, haere mai!

[Mr Speaker, to the tribes, voices, and authorities, and to you collectively who have arrived here in support of today’s topic, therefore welcome, come hither!]

To the many peoples—all voices, all mountains, all rivers—thank you for coming to support this auspicious occasion. Welcome, welcome. I begin this, my last speech in the House as MP for Rangitata, with pride, having been part of something very special for 12 years, and still with the passion for the things that I care about. As such, today I have some stories to tell, some messages I want to record in Hansard one last time, and, of course, some thankyous to deliver.

I leave here having been part of the huge “class of ‘05”: 12 years the parochial MP, first for Aoraki then for Rangitata; 5 years a Minister; and one of the renowned East Coast blondes. I arrived in this place determined to be a fantastic electorate MP. I would later realise that I was up to the task of being a Minister, but I never wanted to be PM. I am a team player and I relished being part of such a wonderfully strong and talented National Party team.

My maiden speech recorded that water was a major issue in my then seat of Aoraki. That speech also recorded my huge respect for, and support of, volunteers—more on both soon. I was elected on 17 September 2005, having campaigned for 10 months and knocked on 12,500 doors across the seat. Delegates questioned me before my selection, and they did not hold back, even asking: “Who will cook for your husband and children?”. I was not long into my time as MP before our teenage daughters asked me to stop cooking meals at the weekends to leave for them for sitting days; they informed me that they preferred their father’s cooking. You know, it took me a while to get over that, but I did.

Later in the campaign I had help out door knocking from two fabulous women, Anne Steele and Robyn Hewson. They got me out of bed when I was almost too tired to go out and keep going. It has been the commitment of tireless volunteers just like these two women that has kept me going through the tough times and encouraged me when the going got rough. The 2005 effort paid off, and on election night we recorded a 13,000 swing in the candidate results. I have always thought that timing is everything, and whilst the swing back to National was strong that year, I would spend my first 3 years as an MP as an Opposition backbencher. I was disappointed at the time, but, on reflection, it is actually the best way to start a political career.

Campaigning and being seen does bring challenges. Our Ford Falcon was sign-written and also had my photo on it. Supportive up until then, this was a step too far for our teenage daughters. How embarrassing to be taken to rowing in that—that is, until one of their friends dubbed it “the Jo-inator”. Apparently, it was suddenly quite cool. Huge boundary changes made 2008 another tough campaign. When 80 percent of the territory and 40 percent of the people change, you have a lot more work to do. I was welcomed by the people of mid-Canterbury, and I thank them for that.

Some MPs get to experience a local issue that makes people take to the streets against the Government. In my case, it was the statutory management of Hubbard Managed Funds and Aorangi Securities and the later failure of South Canterbury Finance (SCF). The taxpayers of New Zealand shouldered the burden of paying out SCF investors, but the people in the electorate took the issues personally. I got through that by hearing everyone out, respecting their strongly held views even when not agreeing with them, and not hiding away. I was certainly the stronger for that experience.

There have been many amazing opportunities afforded to me as an MP and a Minister, and I will share some of them because they have a wider message. Like most MPs, I have opened a few conferences and buildings. I have opened quite a few dementia units, including one in a prison. I am not sure how I feel about having my name on the outside of dementia units. Dementia touches almost every New Zealander in one way or another, and it robs people of precious years. New Zealand needs to acknowledge, plan for, and learn to deal with this as respectfully and sensitively as possible.

I opened, on behalf of the then Minister, both the Timaru and Ashburton Ministry of Social Development (MSD) Community Link offices. The Ashburton site would, on 1 September 2014, become the scene of tragedy when my constituents Peg Noble and Leigh Cleveland were, quite literally, gunned down doing their jobs. I would return to that site as Minister for the Community and Voluntary Sector to open Ashburton Community House. Out of that tragedy a strong community, while still mourning, dusted itself off and combined its efforts to fund-raise and turn the building into a wonderful facility for the people. Out front stands a carving that marks the loss of Peg and Leigh.

I proudly presented New Zealand’s seventh report to the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women to the UN in 2012. I was questioned for 4½ hours by a 25-person committee, dedicated to pushing New Zealand to do more in this space. The committee was certain that New Zealand would be better off with gender quotas. I still totally disagree with that approach, and, for myself, I would be absolutely mortified if I suspected I was ever chosen for a role because I was anything other than the equal to the male candidate, or even better.

New Zealand has more to do in this space, but much to be proud of. I think there are a number of ways we can move the dial for women and girls, including one that I think we can do for ourselves. The female of the species is wired differently to the male, so we need to recognise what in that creates hurdles for us in achieving equality of outcomes. Some of the hurdles are literally innate—not put there by others. Before I get shouted at for blaming the victim, hear me out. We need to understand and confront our own unconscious bias, make it conscious, and then deal with it. When I automatically think to myself that I do not have all the skills required to apply for the job, I need to recognise that neither does the guy next door, but he will apply, intending to learn on the job. When the performance review rolls around, I should not take the oft-times approach and expect that my skills and value will have been recognised already, instead, I need to do what guys do and describe my value to the organisation on a regular basis so that there is no doubt. Sometimes we need an internal rewire to compete on an equal footing. It is only one of a number of fronts we should tackle, but it is an important one.

I wish the media focused on attitudes, intentions, and results instead of labels when it comes to bridging the gender divide. Who gives a continental whether I label myself a feminist or not? Let deeds speak for the determination to shift the dial towards equality. Prime Minister Bill English has been the driving force behind the social investment approach. We know that women are grossly over-represented in domestic violence statistics. Women and girls who do not achieve in education will likely become part of a low-income family. Teen pregnancy can lead to poor outcomes for that woman and the child or children. So who cares if Bill English labels himself a feminist? Under his and Paula Bennett’s watch, teen pregnancies dropped by 57 percent. The approach is to get in early and help women to change their path and achieve their potential.

To all of those out there who cry poverty, and think how much better off these families would be with more money, I say that we are the Government that raised the benefits for the first time in 43 years. But a dysfunctional family with an extra $50 in their hand a week will still be a dysfunctional family. They need so much more than money. That is where the social investment approach comes in.

I was patron of the Goodhew Class SO 3/14 Limited Service Volunteer (LSV) course at Burnham Military Camp. You know, I was moved to tears by the stories the participants told me about how their lives were changed by that experience. I know there are others in this debating chamber who have been patrons as well. That course, however, was only the start for them. Without employers willing to take them on afterwards, without training for them to go into, a golden opportunity could well have been lost.

As Minister for the Community and Voluntary Sector for 5 years I had innumerable chances to recognise and thank New Zealanders for their efforts to enrich our communities and help others less fortunate than themselves to achieve community goals and projects—our largest workforce. I am proud to have, amongst other things, developed the Government Position Statement on Social Enterprise, and then launched a cross-agency working group to further promote it. Social enterprise allows social or environmental objectives to be achieved using a social enterprise or business approach. It is not a new approach, but there are many more examples of it today. I ask you to think of Pomegranate Kitchen, Eat My Lunch, Wilding & Co, Kilmarnock Enterprises, and Patu Aotearoa and think of businesses that are literally making a huge difference. The more social enterprises that flourish here in New Zealand, the more social and environmental objectives will be achieved without the Government getting involved, and certainly not getting in the way. Discerning spenders want to support those approaches to achieve the outcomes that they believe in.

As senior citizens Minister I had enormous frustration when hearing older New Zealanders described as a looming natural disaster—a grey or silver tsunami, or even a landslide at times. This characterisation diminishes older New Zealanders. We often speak of young people fulfilling their potential. Well, it is time we did more to encourage older people to fulfil their potential across their whole life.

For those who would like to keep working—and I emphasise this; for those who would like to keep working—there could be flexible hours, mentoring or training roles, and leave without pay for retirement travel and then them going back to roles where they feel respected and valued. I am tired of hearing that the workforce is ageing and all will retire at once. To employers, I suggest they offer an alternative for those who want to stay in the workforce.

My food safety portfolio gave me the scariest moments. New Zealand has an enviable reputation for food safety technology and practices, but things can still go wrong. In late 2014 a threat to contaminate infant and other formulas with 1080 was received. A huge Police and Ministry for Primary Industries response commenced, called Operation Concord.

When Prime Minister John Key, Nathan Guy, and I faced the cameras early in March, we knew significant protections were in place. When I was asked to give a message to mums and dads, I urged them to keep using the formula, even though I knew that if I was wrong, a child could die. There is no antidote or treatment if 1080 is consumed. The Police got their man—amazing work. The whole supply chain is now better protected from threats of a similar nature, and consumers now know to check products they buy for tampering.

At Christmas 2015, frozen berries contaminated with hepatitis A hit the headlines. Tracing and the recalling and additional testing of imported product followed, and my message on this front is simply that country-of-origin labelling gives no assurance of food safety, or otherwise. Almost every single one of those frozen products was already labelled with its country of origin. It is not so long ago that New Zealand apples were also contaminated by a worker with hepatitis A. So the answer is to have health and food safety officials working closely to identify and trace food-borne illnesses fast. Excellent traceability systems on the part of producers are essential and country-of-origin labelling is a marketing tool that works only when the country of origin has a great reputation, which is exactly what New Zealand has.

I worked hard to progress the National Environmental Standard for Plantation Forestry. The gestation was far too long, but worth the wait, I believe. This will reduce, by thousands, the numbers of consents required each year.

Back to water—New Zealand has certainly woken up to the value of water. At the heart of the issue is the need to look after our fresh water and use it wisely and efficiently. We have an abundance of fresh water. Now the focus is on repairing degradation that has happened over many decades and preventing further lessening of water quality. The National Government is the first Government to have the intestinal fortitude to tackle thorny issues like allocation, reliability of supply, quality measuring, cleaning up of poor-quality fresh water, requirements to exclude stock from waterways, and mapping a path to restore degraded waterways.

One last thought for the primary sector: it is high time New Zealanders woke up to the importance of genetically modified organisms to our future in the fields of health, plant, and animal genetics, and, through that, environmental protection. Gene editing can help us cure cancers, eradicate wilding pines as well as four-legged pests, develop grasses that assist us to reduce methane emissions, and so much more. The debate has to be less about fear of the unknown, and more about safe and proven science.

So what am I proud of? I absolutely loved the electorate work, and people tell me it showed. The people of the electorate encouraged me to connect, and I feel connected to them. I have relished meeting regularly with leaders, businesses, non-governmental organisations, schools, rest homes, and individual constituents, because I believe I needed to know them to represent them. I have shared their celebrations, their tribulations, sought solutions for them, listened to their stories, and advocated for them. What a privilege it has been.

I will proudly claim to have been part of the team that progressed the social investment approach. It was a team that was not afraid to measure the cost of unfulfilled human potential in not taking action. It was not afraid to insist on measuring whether actions taken really worked. In targeting where resources can effect the most change in lives, we get to do what we came here for: make a difference.

From the time I came to Parliament I have often held the aged-care responsibility. In the Opposition health team under Tony Ryall, I rose to his challenge. He exhorted every one of his health team to know their particular issue better than anyone else in this Parliament. I held forums across the country, inviting all stakeholders, and I asked what had been going well and what we could do better. In September 2007 the document discussing options was launched by leader John Key. Entitled Choice Not Chance for Older New Zealanders, there followed many hundreds of submissions. Then came the policy launch: more money for respite for exhausted family caregivers, and unannounced spot audits in rest homes, eventually leading to all audits being put up online for the public to see. Over time there was extra money for dementia care, and that resulted in a 25 percent increase in the number of beds. A standardised assessment tool was implemented and accelerated. So that is why it was a very proud day for me when the National Government announced that more than $2 billion over 5 years would recalibrate the pay rates for caregivers, so that their work was given the value it deserves.

Time is running out, so a couple of very brief messages: New Zealand, plant more trees—lots more; build more wonderful buildings using our timbers; use engineered timber to build tall, strong buildings. I was delighted to read page 3 of the Dominion Post today and to see that Sir Bob Jones is leading the way, with a 12-storey timber building.

In the health sector, I am a strong believer of the quality and safety markers, and that it really matters. It does not just save money and resources; it saves lives. All practice should be best practice.

Thankyous: to former party president Judy Kirk, who believed I could win—thank you, my friend. I thank president Peter Goodfellow; the board members; regional chair Roger Bridge; and former regional chairs Ailsa Smail and Kate Hazlett for their friendship and support. To my current and former electorate chairs Allan Booth and Mark Oldfield, and campaign chairs John Rushton and Mark Oldfield: you have had great committees doing a wonderful job for me. I thank you. I really appreciated the farewell party last weekend.

To former Prime Minister John Key: thank you for the opportunities you gave me, first as junior whip and then as Minister. I made the most of them and had an amazing time. I will always know I was part of a caucus led by an amazing Prime Minister, who helped New Zealand recover from huge adversity with his unfailing belief in New Zealand, New Zealanders, and a positive and exciting future.

To Prime Minister Bill English, who now gets the opportunity that he undoubtedly earned and is superbly equipped to accomplish: I wish Bill and all the candidates for this election well in the contest of ideas, so you can continue to deliver what we have started to achieve, and what we as a nation are capable of. I hope, come 23 September, that the people of Rangitata elect young and energetic Andrew Falloon.

To my “class of ‘05” classmates—good buggers all—Wednesday nights after 10 p.m. will never be the same. To friends who are here today: there will be more time for us now. Thank you for hanging in there.

An electorate MP struggles to be effective without great electorate agents: Don McCully, Janet Bates, and Robyn Hewson; then came Annette Ireton and Barb Aitken; now Alison Driscoll, Tracey Miron, and Robyn Hewson. Robyn still has my back, all those years after helping me doorknock. I have been blessed. Thank you all so much.

To the Wellington crew: first, Heather Henderson, then Elizabeth Neilson, Micheal Warren, Annette Ireton, Susan Palmer, and now Erin Taylor—what a time we have had. To my “SPS Supremo”, Rebecca Tane, and the whole “Ministerial Gonzo” team that you knitted together: those 5 years were incredible. I learned so much from you all. Thank you. I am honoured that so many of you are here today.

If things are not going well at home, it is impossible to do your work well. Thanks to the incredible support of my husband Mark we have made the juggle work. To our daughters, Abi and Harriet in the gallery, and Emily in London: thanks, guys, for cutting me enough slack to do my job, for making me so proud of you, and for making sure we kept talking to each other. Happy birthday, Harriet and Emily.

I grew up on a farm. Dad and I would drive round the sheep in the little truck, the radio always on the Parliament station. Maybe I was brainwashed there, or maybe it was just entertainment for us both. My mum and dad, Bruce and Winnie, have found a myriad of ways to support me. Dad just retired from the electorate executive at the last AGM. Mum and Dad, I cannot thank you enough for all of the ways you and our extended family have helped me.

Once upon a time, an experienced MP warned me against telling anyone that my maiden name was McCully. It is OK, Murray. I have been my own person and I do not think it turned into a burden. But perhaps that is because I do not have a scary nickname—that I am aware of.

People have asked me what I am going to miss. I will miss the people in this Parliament. No matter what your role is, I thank you for your cheery smiles, your warm greetings, your help, and your courtesy.

I finish with the whakataukī that has never been so true to me as now:

He aha te mea nui o te ao?

He tangata, he tangata, he tangata.

[What is the most important thing in the world?

It is people, it is people, it is people.]

Nō reira, tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou katoa.

[Applause]

Waiata

STEFFAN BROWNING (Green): Kia ora tātou katoa. As I farewell this place I again give my acknowledgment to this House, those who have gone before, the tangata whenua of this region and, indeed, Aotearoa.

I acknowledge my parents—both no longer with us; Ivan passing away in 2006 and Alice unfortunately just a week and a day before the election that brought me here. I would have liked them to be with me during this phase, and my late half-brother Trevor, also. And a very fond memory to my beautiful friends who have passed away—too many from cancer; part of my theme today.

Mr Speaker, I wish to acknowledge you and your work in your role, and my cross-party colleagues, especially those whom I worked with on the Primary Production Committee. I especially want to acknowledge my son Jordan, who has travelled from Melbourne for today, as did his brother Jamie for my maiden speech in 2012. I love you both and I am looking forward to spending more time with you and your wives, Leah and Dannielle, my grandchildren, Seneca and Ada, and those to come.

I am humbled by those people who have come today: my partner, Birte, my whānau, friends and colleagues, and experts and acquaintances from the sectors and campaigns during my two terms here, including Meredith. Thanks for keeping a sharp shirt on my back when I tired too often of ironing at 1.30 in the morning.

Thanks also to those who could not be here but have been such a supportive part of my parliamentary time: Holly, Brendan, Marion, Philippa, Susie, Meriel, Hana, Deborah, Kyra, the Van Pallandts, Bob, Jen, Kerry, Tim, Ally, Ali and Nozz, Franzi, James, Mark, and, of course, Damien at the Grovetown Pub. Pam Nichols, your huge help during previous campaigns is of particular note. Thank you all. Thanks to those whom I have stuffed up on and missed out. I love you all.

My fellow Green MPs, I acknowledge you all: our fantastic predecessors and my colleagues now deeply engaged elsewhere, Holly Walker, Kevin Hague, and Russel Norman. Wow, we have collectively done some good stuff. We have a huge amount to be proud of, often at huge personal cost. I acknowledge the passion, the skills, that drive you all.

To the great Green team in the party, the great staff, and the great volunteer crew reaching out to other New Zealanders, particularly in this very difficult election phase, inspiring hope for a great future together, you are putting so much in. That work is so important, and I admire you hugely.

Of super significance here have been my executive assistants, starting with Angela McLeod, Dianne Parker, Tara Forde, Frances Mountier, Julian Borman, Tim Onnes, and, to finish, Tracey Gallagher, and most of you are in the gallery today. You have all gone on to great things. To the other Greens parliamentary staff in Bowen House, your skills, support, and commitment to change are hugely valued. I look forward to some celebration with you later.

I acknowledge the parliamentary support staff, the cleaners, the feeders, the library, the messengers, HR, security, the receptionists, ICT, the travel office staff, the Chamber staff, and those I have omitted unfairly. You are fantastic, and I really do appreciate you and your collective work to keep this place functioning well. I saw some of you, cleaners and security, in the middle of the night all too often—a work habit that I have not quite overcome. The Greens will continue to try to get fair pay for your important but all too often undervalued work.

To my leaders, Metiria, James, and Russel before—well, we have had our moments, as could be expected with my just slightly anarchic and just somewhat passionate expression of my interests and world view. I admire you all for what you have been passionately committed to and what you passionately strive for.

Metiria, I want to acknowledge your personal sacrifice, as you have recently been so harshly judged for what is real life, real survival, real whānau care, and, effectively, youthful real-time decisions. You have been hammered by the media and those who just do not know what it was like—what it is like. For those in poverty, those who are learning, who are striving, or those who cannot, but from places of difficulty, often intergenerational, that is hard, and it further aggravates the injustices that we here all know should be behind us. Metiria, I understand you all the more. Metiria, you have been courageous. You have given a lifeline of hope to those who need it the most. We can reverse the growing income and wealth gap in Aotearoa New Zealand and eliminate poverty and the harm that flows from it. Thank you, Metiria, James, and my colleagues, who are committed to these changes.

And then there were my moments of notoriety—it is coming—moments of parliamentary time that felt so hard and so unfair. The most striking encounter with the doubters, the risk-averse, or overly confident consumers of very narrow interpretations of science, or just plain industry-fed scientific propaganda, was when I curiously put homeopathy and Ebola together. Wow, didn’t the sky fall for Steffan Browning!

What I was not able to articulate at the time was my love of science and my openness to the advances of science, in time, possibly being more able to measure and explain and accept the mechanisms that may be at play with homeopathy—see, I have not learnt. I note the acceptance and widespread use of homeopathy in Europe, including some State support of homeopathics, and by British royalty. I cannot pretend not to have seen significant effect in a non-placebo situation with one of my own children. I cannot pretend not to be aware of Brazil and Cuba’s use of homeopathic nosodes for effective use in some epidemic situations. Check it out.

There are many whom I respect but who may not share my view or experience. However, science is a wondrous discipline. We should be hesitant in our discounting of longstanding practices that do give safe benefit, although are less understood. I give my respect to the gallery and media beyond when the issues are well researched and the community is accurately informed. Our Government agencies are struggling with the ability to select and use the independent science and treat with appropriate caution that of the agrichemical industries. So there is another side to it.

Cancer increasingly eats through our communities, from the very youngest to everyone. Our health Minister is being laughed at by cancer charity bosses because he wants New Zealanders to believe we have got a health system that is the envy of the world. But the Minister is not on his own. Some of us are not laughing but crying, sobbing, because of the unnecessary rise in cancer perpetuated by other ministries that are doing everything to continue, and increase, the use of a probable carcinogen through the streets and parks and food of New Zealanders. Chemical cowboy country. The machinery of government is broken. There is no pesticide reduction strategy. Successive Governments have allowed the Ministry for the Environment, the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI), and the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) to run amok with numerous new pesticide registrations and very few withdrawals.

All of you but the Māori Party and the Greens voted for an extension of data protection to new pesticide applications from 5 to 10 years, keeping those who care in the dark about those toxic formulations. Minister Smith will not tell us which of the 75 percent of the over 90 probable carcinogenic glyphosate herbicides have the adjuvant polyethoxylated tallow amine in them, which magnifies the toxicity inherent in glyphosate hundreds and even thousands of times and is now banned in Europe. We cannot find out. Chemical cowboy country.

Our Ministry of Health relies on the EPA for guidance on carcinogenic substances, yet the EPA and MPI are sucked into the vortex of an echo chamber of agrichemical industry science acceptance and speak. Our communities are awash in cancers, but our EPA chose to dismiss the finding of its own authority, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC)—the world’s gold standard in carcinogen classification—when IARC found that the EPA’s friend Monsanto’s product glyphosate was a probable carcinogen.

My proudest parliamentary achievement was this 183-page critique of the EPA’s review of the seemingly inconvenient IARC finding. I question why the New Zealand Government ignored the advice of the IARC’s 17 international expert scientists and used a retired New Zealand toxicologist who had previously underplayed the risks of cancer from the now banned DDT and endosulfan pesticides. Why? Chemical cowboy country.

I want to acknowledge the huge part played by my very dear friend Jodie Bruning in writing and researching my critique—Jodie Bruning of Ritedemands.org.nz; that is spelt R-I-T-E demands.org.nz—and those many scientists who support what we did. Some are here today.

We point out that the New Zealand EPA does not consider the full formulation of these Roundup-type herbicides as actually used. Our critique outlines how the other overseas agencies that our EPA chooses to align with—such as the US Environmental Protection Agency, the European Food Safety Authority, and the Joint Meeting on Pesticide Residues (JMPR)—also selectively use unpublished industry selected and supplied science, such as Monsanto’s.

Our EPA is wrong when it accepts JMPR advice when its glyphosate working group was chaired by two men with serious conflicts of interest, as part of International Life Sciences Institute (ILSI), primarily funded by chemical companies including Monsanto, but our EPA listens to that. ILSI specialises in designing industry-friendly risk assessment methods for incorporation into regulations worldwide. No wonder we have problems.

And it gets messy here in Aotearoa New Zealand too. The once chief executive and managing director of PGG Wrightson, described as an outspoken advocate of genetic engineering and all over Monsanto, got PGG Wrightson involved with the GE grasses and also GE trees. He now heads our EPA, which is the very agency that will decide on releasing GE trees and grasses—the two crops, along with the William Rolleston - linked GE animals dominating New Zealand’s GE research and promotion activity. William Rolleston in science funding at the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment, and Allan Freeth, the chief executive of the Environmental Protection Agency, make the independence of science and regulatory control absolutely questionable. That chief executive chose not to accept the world’s gold standard in cancer classification, by doing a sham review that is probably illegal in New Zealand law. It is like the Wild West with Monsanto advocates at the helm, and cancers are running amok. Chemical cowboy country.

Auckland Council—note, Mayor Phil Goff—used the EPA as an excuse to introduce the probable carcinogen-based herbicide into new areas where 1 million people reside, 1 million people of your city, just to save dollars. And you knew better. But what is the real cost when our friends are getting cancer at younger and younger ages? What is the cost of neurotoxicity and endocrine disruption? Possibly the biggest epidemic facing our country is the fallout of pesticide use—cancer, through to antibiotic resistance—yet Governments are letting the Monsantos make the calls.

I could have easily done another huge speech about the huge work I have done on biosecurity: oysters, myrtle rust, Theileria, great white butterfly, velvetleaf, fruit fly, and kauri dieback disease. I have been deeply through each of those, generally pre-empting the MPI’s ponderous approach. I predict that myrtle rust—and I am very sad about this—and kauri dieback will be defining issues for the future New Zealand landscape.

I negotiated the foreign charter vessels legislation as the last bill of the last Parliament to speed fishers out of slave-like conditions sooner. I negotiated to remove the excesses of the Food Bill, and got genetically modified foods included as a possible food safety issue. I continue to expose the lack of enforcement of GM food labelling regulations since 2003.

I have worked for the artisan food producers who are increasingly put out of business because of ridiculously high MPI demands and compliance costs. That same MPI paranoia meant that most raw milk producers stopped their businesses from selling their nutritious milk to the public. I grappled with the complexities of the Fonterra executive’s attempt to get Fonterra exposed on the stock market. The same executive stymied my attempts to keep the Kaikōura cheese factory open and transition to a more sustainable and very best value organic production.

I have supported efforts trying to set an organic standard in regulation. I have hosted the release at Parliament of the New Zealand Organic Market Report 2012 and the launch of the United Nations International Year of Family Farming in 2014. My bees campaign resulted in thousands asking the EPA for a reassessment of bee-killing neonicotinoid insecticides, used unnecessarily on most commercial seed. Chemical cowboy country. The rapidly expanding honey industry needs you all to make some hive-density regulation to quickly curb the spread of both disease and crime.

At about 8 p.m. on 13 November last year I made a Facebook post: “Sorry to see the world’s biggest seismic blasting ship the Amazon Warrior off my beach, Rarangi in Cloudy Bay tonight. Hiding from Wellington’s protestors today, this ship has been allowed in by energy and resources Minister Simon Bridges as part of National’s deep-sea oil gamble. Spoiling our super moon viewing, this ecological thumper needs moving on out of New Zealand’s EEZ.” That is what I said, Simon. I have never had so many Facebook shares—2,037—following the incredible earthquakes that night—

Mr SPEAKER: The member has 2 minutes to complete his speech.

STEFFAN BROWNING: —as that ship headed out on its dirty mission. Good on you, Russel Norman, for chasing it and getting into the water in front of it, just as I did earlier this year in front of the clam boat that MPI has now allowed to thrash the seabed off that same beach. We are not going to stop fighting the unsustainable practices of the National Government.

I have consistently tried to get the National front bench to more humanely assist the quake victims of North Canterbury, Kaikōura, and Marlborough. I worked with Tina McIvor against a second carcinogenic, neurotoxic and ozone-depleting methyl bromide fumigation operation at Port Tauranga, right through to winning in the Environment Court. Now the focus is on the current sloppy fumigation practices there. Chemical cowboy country. This is another EPA disaster, following its sham reassessment of methyl bromide for increasing log fumigations. The chair of that panel was, 6 years later, the methyl bromide fumigators’ lawyer I faced off with. Chemical cowgirl country.

Cutting right across—what a great Green moment when my country of origin labelling of food bill was pulled from the ballot. Sue Kedgley’s petition of 30,000 had championed COOL—country of origin of food labelling—years before.

The vote at first reading was 120 for and just one mean-spirited ACT vote against. Meaningful support really could have had COOL passed before Parliament rises next week. However, this Government has stymied the progress of this great Green bill. We hope for better in the next Parliament.

What is my future? I have not been searching for my next life phase, but the issues that brought me to Parliament are unlikely to be—

Mr SPEAKER: Order! I am sorry to interrupt the member, but the member’s time has expired.

STEFFAN BROWNING: Kia ora, my friends and colleagues. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

Waiata

Mr SPEAKER: I understand that the family of the Hon Annette King is now coming into the gallery, so if those supporters who have supported the last speaker could move from the gallery I would much appreciate that. [Interruption] Honourable members, the family has assembled. I call on the Hon Annette King to make her valedictory statement.

Hon ANNETTE KING (Labour—Rongotai): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I could not start before the grandson arrived.

Where to begin? It has been 33 years since I was first elected—11 elections, nine leaders, 15 portfolios, 985 speeches in this House, so many debates, so many challenges, so many stories, and so much fun. I have often asked myself how “Skinny” Robinson from the small South Island town of Murchison ended up in a place like this. So, like with any good yarn, you have got to start from the beginning.

I joined the Labour Party in 1972 following the victory of Norman Kirk and the third Labour Government—a Government that was full of ideas, passion, and hope. I joined in Hamilton. I went to my first branch meeting, and I was immediately made the secretary. That is what happens in the Labour Party. Throughout the 1970s I did most of my party work in Hamilton. I was instrumental in setting up a new branch in Hamilton East called the “Trendy Leftie Club”. It was called that because the Prime Minister of the day, Rob Muldoon, called everybody who was in the Labour Party a “trendy leftie”. For our inaugural meeting we invited the up-and-coming leftie of the day: Richard Prebble.

Hon Members: Ha, ha!

Hon ANNETTE KING: It is possible to get things wrong in politics. It was Richard Prebble, the then Minister of Railways, who, when I excitedly told him that the Waikanae railway station had just been painted, said “Ah! That means we’re gonna close it.”, and he did.

But my real political activism started in March 1974 when I joined around a thousand school dental nurses, in white starched uniforms, red cardigans, veils, and seamed stockings, and marched up Lambton Quay to Parliament in support of a pay claim. I was petrified. But I have never forgotten a carload of young blokes who called out as we passed them: “Hey, hey, you Waikato sheilas—best looking in the bunch.” I can tell you, it put a real spring in our step that day. We had waited years for a pay rise. With the support of Dan Long and the PSA, we walked away that day with a 24.4 percent pay increase from Norm Kirk.

Carmel Sepuloni: Great.

Hon ANNETTE KING: Yes, it was great—an increase of $8,000 in today’s money. It was unprecedented at that time, and I can tell you that the Silver Fern railcar rocked and rolled its way back to Hamilton that night, with the help of a few bottles of golden sherry.

I learnt from that day the value of leadership and courage—leadership from people like Maggie Morgan, Pam Horncy, and Sheila Brown. Pam and Maggie are those two who have dressed in that uniform up there tonight. It showed me the value of standing up and fighting for what you believe in and the value of belonging to a union. Now, 43 years on, I am ashamed we still do not have pay equity in New Zealand. Women have waited long enough. No more excuses, no more half-baked measures, no more litigation. It is time for us to once again lead on women’s issues. Our country used to be a leader. There is so much more that we need to do.

In 1981 I shifted to Wellington. I packed up my old Chevette, the TV, the dog, and my young daughter, Amanda, and I headed to new challenges. I joined the Mount Victoria branch of the Labour Party, and I was immediately made the secretary. That is what happens in the Labour Party. It was there that I met the formidable Kath Kelly and her husband, Pat. I also met Helen Kelly. She became my babysitter. One of the sadnesses for me is that I leave this place and Helen Kelly is not sitting here with us.

I worked on Fran Wilde’s campaign, and it was with her encouragement, along with Helen Clark, that I put my name in for the 1984 election. The party had decided that we needed more women in Parliament, because we were sick of being tea ladies, Mr Joyce. We wanted to make policy, and we wanted to make decisions. Before the 1984 election women made up 8 percent of Parliament—8 percent. It then increased to 15 percent—the biggest increase ever. And 33 years on it is now 31 percent. That is not good enough. All political parties need to commit to making this place truly a House of Representatives.

I supported MMP, because I saw it as a way to achieve diversity and fairness in our voting system. It has changed the make-up of this House, but we have still got a long way to go. President Jim Anderton selected me for the seat of Horowhenua, but I never expected to win. I called myself the accidental MP. We had never held that seat before, and I was swept in on the popularity of David Lange with a majority of 447. We put together a fantastic campaign with 1 month to do it in—after the calling of the “schnapps election”—for 14 July, Bastille Day, and the result was a political revolution. The campaign was short, it was sharp, and it was furious. It was led by my long-time friend and campaign manager for all but one of my 11 campaigns, Lloyd Falck and his wife, Marea. Lloyd, who is larger than life, was my chief of staff for 9 years, and Marea my electorate secretary. I owe them so much.

It was during that campaign that I met the 8-year-old Darren Hughes. He was Lloyd’s neighbour, and, yes, he was already a political junkie, delivering my pamphlets. He will deny this, but both he and his brother Bryce curtseyed when they first met David Lange. Darren is one of the most talented people I have ever met, and this House is the poorer for him not being here.

They used to say the softest thing about Ann Hercus was her teeth, but she was the person who gave me my first break in Parliament after the 1984 election. She put me on her working party to establish the first ever Ministry of Women’s Affairs and she made me chair of the Health and Welfare Committee. I was a real novice, up against the wily old fox Venn Young, who was the former Minister, and he gave me a real lesson in the art of politics. I quickly learnt that you had to hold your nerve if you were going to survive in this place.

I was also put on the Finance and Expenditure Committee. I was the only woman, and I was scared stiff, because sitting opposite me was a line-up of heavy-hitting former Ministers led by Rob Muldoon. I did not open my mouth for 6 weeks. After a while I got enough courage to ask a question, and I cannot remember what it was, but I can still see Muldoon fixing me with that stare and saying: “Who’s she?”. I quickly learnt you need a sense of humour if you are going to survive in this place. I did have an odd relationship with Muldoon. He was the person who said I had put the horror into Horowhenua. But just before the 1990 election I passed him in the old billiard room, and he grunted, and he said: “I hope you win.” He often got things wrong.

For the first 3 years I was seated next to Trevor Mallard. We have fought and scrapped with each other for over 33 years, but he is one of my oldest mates, and a passionate politician. I will always remember the day when we had shifted seats to sit behind the front bench for Trevor to speak. He was speaking with volume on full when his front teeth, which were attached to a plate in those days, flew out of his mouth and landed on Richard Prebble’s shoulder. He leant forward, he grabbed them, he put them back in his mouth, and he carried on speaking without taking a breath, or hesitation.

It was a tradition back then for two new members to propose the Address in Reply to the Speech from the Throne. I was chosen to do the Address, and Jim Sutton, my old mate, was chosen to do the Reply. It was not till afterwards that Mike Moore told us there was another tradition: those who were chosen usually lost their seats—and we did, in 1990. But, as they say, we came back. We came back as the retreads of 1993!

The years between 1984 and 1990 were both distressing and exhilarating. We became a deeply divided caucus and party by the end of 1990. I am not going to dwell too long on those years, but the fourth Labour Government made some of the most significant changes seen in New Zealand—economic, social, and constitutional. Rapid and radical economic changes included removing agricultural subsidies, removing controls on foreign exchange, introducing GST, removing import tariffs, corporatising many of our State assets, and much more. It took my dear old Dad years to forgive the changes we made to the Post Office, a place he had worked for 40 years, and it was not until Kiwibank was opened that he felt his money was safe again. There were changes that were needed, but not enough thought was given to the consequences on families and communities, and some of those consequences are still with us today.

But there are highlights I do want to remember. Homosexual law reform, 1986—I believe one of the most courageous politicians in this House was Fran Wilde. She withstood the vilest of campaigns against her and her family, and I was proud to stand with those who voted in support of reform. I was told that I was going to lose my rural seat in the 1987 election if I voted for reform; I increased my majority. I learnt that you can only ever vote with your conscience. There is no such thing as a collective conscience in your electorate. The old adage “To thine own self be true” comes to mind. And there are many more reforms that are needed in this area, particularly for transgender people, who continue to be discriminated against.

You know, we too often forget some of the reforms of the fourth Labour Government—over-shadowed by those economic changes. They were reforms such as the Children, Young Persons, and Their Families Act, thank you, Dr Cullen; fully abolishing the death penalty; this one is amazing, making rape in marriage a criminal offence; the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act; Homestart to help people buy their first home—what a novel idea; Treaty claims dating back to 1840; and, of course, nuclear-free New Zealand. Today the nuclear-free policy is owned by all New Zealanders, something most people are proud of. I believe that our nuclear-free stance, the failure of Britain and the US to condemn the bombing of the Rainbow Warrior in Auckland harbour, and our refusal to send troops to Iraq without a UN mandate were some of the actions that have led to New Zealand having a more independent foreign policy today.

A little-known story, however, is the part I played in restoring diplomatic relations with France after the bombing of the Rainbow Warrior. After the 1987 election Peter Dunne and I were made parliamentary under-secretaries. Cabinet decided that we needed to get our relationship with France back on a better footing. It decided to send the lowliest ranked member of the executive—me—to reopen dialogue. I was dispatched to Paris to meet their Minister of Foreign Affairs. She spoke in French, I spoke in English, and I have not a clue what we talked about. But the message was clear: New Zealand was giving France a silent one-finger salute—I will not do it—while at the same time showing we had forgiven, but not forgotten.

In 1989 I was elected to Lange’s Cabinet. Well, that lasted 7 days before David Lange resigned. I do not think I was the reason. I became a Minister in Geoffrey Palmer’s Cabinet, and later Mike Moore’s. I had responsibility for immigration, youth affairs, employment, and was the Minister assisting the Prime Minister with responsibility for caucus relations. Dark clouds were already gathering over the caucus, and as a peacemaker I turned out to be an absolute failure.

As Minister of Employment I had to front up to the media every month to announce the increase in unemployment figures, and they were rising at an alarming rate. It was a political nightmare. You Ministers have it easy these days. But from my 1 year in that role came one of the highlights of my political career: the setting up of the community employment development unit, the brainchild of Garry Moore and a number of other fantastic community development workers, including the late Parekura Horomia. It was an agency that was outside the Department of Labour, and I have to say it caused the then Secretary of Labour a lot of angst. But many of the economic and job opportunities that started under that policy endure today—think Whale Watch Kaikōura.

In 1990 I lost the Horowhenua seat by 624 votes. There is nothing more devastating to a politician’s ego than to be defeated at an election—rejected by your constituents. But, on reflection, it did me good. With the help of Steve Maharey, who had just been elected to Parliament, I got a job as the CEO of the Palmerston North Enterprise Board, a business and economic development agency. I learnt the value of small business as a generator of jobs in New Zealand, and I met two people who were very influential in the next steps of my political career and are now lifelong friends: John Harvey, who became my press secretary, and his wife, Dr Judy McGregor, someone who has fought for equal opportunities all her adult life. They took over the publicity for my re-election in Miramar in 1993. Their bumper stickers remain the best I ever had: “Miramar Needs A King”. The other one was “A King for Miramar”, and they worked, because I won the seat back for Labour at that election.

John and I had many adventures in my 9 years as a Minister in Helen Clark’s Cabinet, like the time John convinced me, when I was Minister for Racing, to ride a horse out the front of Parliament dressed as a jockey—by now I was hardly “Skinny” Robinson. Several of us, including Helen Clark, Darren Hughes, Rick Barker, Damien O’Connor, and Paul Swain, owned a race horse during the 3 years I was Minister; it was called Bowen Arrow. It was well-named because it could only run straight and it was scared of corners. The damn thing never won a race until we got rid of it.

The fifth Labour Government—1999 to 2008—brought the next set of progressive reforms in New Zealand, many of which endure today. I must credit Helen Clark for the many opportunities and challenges she gave me over the 9 years I was in her Government and Cabinet: health for 6 years, transport, police, State services, justice, and food safety. I must thank Michael Cullen for giving me funding in every one of those portfolios. In fact, my colleagues used to say “follow the money” when I got a new portfolio. Not only was Michael an outstanding Minister of Finance, he has a keen sense for the ridiculous. He often used to send me little notes in the House. I have kept them all, and most of them are not for publication, but I will always remember the one he sent me on the day I was authorising the irradiation of peanuts. It read: “Nuts to be irradiated, Labour Women’s Council happy”.

I held the food safety portfolio for 9 years and the work undertaken by the New Zealand Food Safety Authority, Andrew McKenzie, and his staff was world leading. I regret that the Government dismantled the agency at a time when the rest of the world was responding to consumer demand for food safety, transparency, and independence from food producers. I hope there will be a rethink by the new Government.

The health portfolio remains my passion and my greatest challenge. People often say that health is a hospital pass; actually, it was a privilege. The people who work in health are the most committed of any I have ever met. We have had some outstanding leaders in medicine, in nursing, in midwifery, and in many of the allied health services. I was fortunate to have an outstanding Director-General, Dr Karen Poutasi, and a strong Ministry of Health to advise me. After we came into Government we set out to tackle the inequities in health that had emerged after the health experiment of the 1990s. We were becoming a “care-less” society. With the help of my associate Ministers, Ruth Dyson, Steve Chadwick, and Tariana Turia, we set in motion many reforms to re-establish a public health system focusing on preventing disease.

We developed long-term strategies, such as the Primary Health Care Strategy, which endures today—well, at least in name. It set out the direction to make primary healthcare services more accessible and effective, particularly for those who historically had missed out on such services. It focused on both financial and non-financial barriers, and it needs to happen again.

There are many challenges in health, and I urge the incoming Government to address as soon as possible the growing crisis in mental health. Mental health has always been the Cinderella of health. What we are seeing now is a repeat of the 1990s, which led to the Mason inquiry and the need to double funding, to train, and to increase the mental health workforce.

One regret I do have is that we still do not have affordable dental care for adult New Zealanders. Dr Clark, I expect you to deliver that.

I was fortunate to attend the annual World Health Assembly for 6 years, and a lasting achievement was New Zealand being one of the leaders for the UN Framework Convention on Tobacco Control—a set of policies that have helped to save millions of lives around the world.

I married Ray in 2000, and I took him with me on my first assembly in Geneva. Rodney Hide, the perk-buster turned perk-taker, labelled it a “golden honeymoon in the Mediterranean”. Ray’s response was that if Rodney thought that listening to dozens of speeches on the evil of smoking was erotic, he had a very strange life indeed.

It is often said that bricks and mortar are not important, but I can tell you that they are when it comes to hospitals and health centres. We set out to rebuild hospitals from Kaitāia to Invercargill, many of them under threat of closure. Murchison was to be closed, and I got a phone call from Dad. He said: “You can’t close Murchison. I was born there, you were born there, and so was your sister.” It was rebuilt under my gentle guidance, and I got to open it as Minister of Police.

I do have to admit to one major failure in the health portfolio—and I am sure Hekia Parata will relate to this. Helen Clark told me that as Minister of Health, I had to talk to Parekura Horomia and convince him to lose weight. I went to Pare’s office and I said: “The Prime Minister said you need to lose weight. You’ve got to go on a diet.” His response was unprintable. I said: “You’ve got to join Weight Watchers, Pare.” There was another outburst of bad language, and then he said: “OK, OK. I’ll join, but only if I can do it by correspondence.” The impossible we did immediately, but I have to say that miracles took a little longer.

The police portfolio brought some particular challenges: the Bazley report into historical police conduct; the recruitment and training of 1,200 extra police, as per our agreement with New Zealand First; an increase in pay for police officers—and Greg O’Connor was a skilled and relentless union negotiator; he will go well in this place—and the passage of the new Policing Act. We have an outstanding police service in New Zealand, and many of the changes in attitude and practice were led by Howard Broad, Rob Pope, and Lyn Provost, three commissioners who brought vision and ideas and what I called head and heart.

There was one thing I was not prepared for as Minister of Police, and it was a bad case of shaver’s rash that I got after 100 UK recruits kissed me on the cheek at the police college when I welcomed them to New Zealand. It was the closest I ever got to an operational matter. My one regret is the manner in which the Urewera raids of 2007 were carried out. Although the Minister of Police has no involvement in operational matters, I have gone to Tūhoe and I have made my peace with their people.

In 2008 we were back in Opposition and I had two stints as deputy, first with Phil Goff and then Andrew Little. Phil Goff is one of the hardest-working people I have ever met. He is the original “Energizer bunny”. I left him in charge of the health portfolio when I went overseas, but I only did it once. My staff begged me to never do it again. He demanded everything that was on the internet for every oral question that was asked. We sat together in this House for 20 years, and we are good mates.

Andrew—Andrew, you brought unity to our caucus and renewal to our front bench. Look at this line-up. The average age is 47 years—I have not added what the Government’s is. But I have to tell you, the front bench is brimming with talent. And, Andrew, you have ensured our next caucus will be made up of close to 50 percent women.

Jacinda, I am so proud of you. I have a feeling that you are going to lead the party for years to come, and you are going to be one of our most loved and effective leaders and Prime Ministers.

I have been privileged to represent the Miramar-Rongotai electorate for 24 years, including the Chatham Islands, a unique part of New Zealand. The Chatham Islands are very independent, and proud of their islands, and they are also very innovative. They were asked to provide land for a nuclear test monitoring station by the UN as part of the international Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty. They responded that the only land available was at the airport, 20 minutes from town, and, unfortunately, there was no reticulated power there. There is now, and half the cost was paid by the UN.

My electorate is one of the most diverse in New Zealand and a sanctuary to new settlers and refugees from many parts of the world, and I have been proud of New Zealand’s commitment to receiving United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees - mandated refugees. They make a fantastic contribution to New Zealand. In 2001 our Government welcomed 40 unaccompanied minors from the ship Tampa to New Zealand. They had been rejected by Australia. That was a proud moment. I want the next incoming Government to make us proud again—double the refugee quota.

Rongotai is the home of creativity, ideas, and jobs arising from the film industry—old factories were turned into studios and workshops. I say to my colleagues opposite, it was the fifth Labour Government that kick-started the film industry in Wellington, contrary to popular propaganda.

Rongotai is the home of social housing. If any Government wants a good model, look no further than the partnership between our Government and the Wellington City Council that resulted in warm, dry, affordable apartments for the most vulnerable citizens.

I leave this seat with a sense of achievement—Wellington has only had to wait 50 years for its new hospital—but also with a sense of sadness. But it is tempered by the fact that Paul Eagle will become the next member of Parliament for Rongotai.

Hon Christopher Finlayson: What about me?

Hon ANNETTE KING: I know my cousin Chris Finlayson would want a recount if he was to win.

Many things have changed in the intervening 33 years. The bars have all but disappeared. The all-night sittings have gone. Gambling schools have closed—although I still owe Jim Sutton $60. Time-wasting procedures in this House have been done away with. The Parliament now sits more days of the year, and Bellamy’s food is healthier. When I arrived, we were offered two roasts a day, and I set about putting salads on the menu. Muldoon went on TV and he complained. He said: “There’s this woman in Parliament, and she’s put salads on the menu, and it’s not good for you.” And there are now enough toilets for women. That was not always the case. This is a better place for members, for their families, and for staff.

So in conclusion, it is time for me to go. I had 15 years in Government and 15 years in Opposition. I have now been informed that I am the longest-serving woman member of Parliament. That officially makes me the “Grannie Annie” of the House. The people I have met, the places I have been, the chances to make a difference—it has been a privilege.

It is time to acknowledge and thank those who have been with me over 33 years. To the Labour Party—you gave me the chance to be an MP. I would not be here without you. To members and supporters—thank you, particularly my Labour electorate committee chairs Peter Noble; the late Mike Herne; Peter Franks, the longest serving of them all; and Eileen Brown. To my electorate staff—the formidable late Tilly Hunter, Marea Falck, Robin Boldarin, Bill Nairn, and Sophia Shanks. My patient and talented parliamentary team—Jennifer Rose, Emma Williams, and Angela Bray, who made today possible. I could not have done it without you, Ange. They all have one thing in common: they know my PIN number, and they know where to find things that I have lost. And Jenny happens to know my bra size. She was once dispatched on urgent public business to buy me a new one.

My loyal friends, who have stuck with me even when I have forgotten to phone them—and my four closest are here today: Mary, Jenny, Marie, and Liz. My family—Dad, who is now 95 years old, who will be watching. I hope I have done you proud, Dad. My late Mum, who loved politics—she watched everything I did and said, and she would phone and tell me whether she liked what I was wearing, or whether I had enough curl in my hair. I hope it looks all right today, Mum.

To my two wonderful sisters—Raelene and Pauline, and their husbands, Bill and Pete. They were forced to work on all my campaigns.

To my new family, gained when I married Ray—Christopher, Daniel, Ben, their partners, and my four step-grandchildren, who do call me “Grannie Annie”.

To my daughter Amanda: I am so proud of you, darling. I hope you have forgiven me for the times I put politics ahead of you. You married a good Aussie bloke, Tim. He is my favourite son-in-law, and you gave me my grandson, William, the most beautiful boy in the world.

And, finally, to my husband and lover, Ray—after 18 years, yes, we are still on our honeymoon. When I told you on our first date that I never intended to marry again, you replied: “I didn’t know I’d asked you.” We have been laughing ever since. I think I am the only person who asked to look at your teeth before I would marry you. You are my best friend.

Finally, to my colleagues—people often think politicians do not like each other. It is not true. I have liked and respected many colleagues from all sides of politics—many I call friends, who have made life in this place enjoyable, fun, and, at times, challenging. I respect those who have the courage to put themselves forward in an election, to be open to scrutiny and criticism, and to be accessible. Where else in the world would you meet your member of Parliament at the fish and chip shop on a Friday night in their slippers? I do believe people come here wanting to make our country a better place.

I cannot finish without a special mention to my Wellington colleagues: Grant, “Chippy”, Kris, and Trevor. We have been a great team, and I am sorry, Peter, but we intend to paint the whole of Wellington red at this election—

Hon Member: Dreams are free.

Hon ANNETTE KING: —ha, ha—and with a good tail wind we want to take Wairarapa as well.

Finally, to the fantastic staff who make this place work: thank you. As MPs we are so well served by caring and professional people.

A person who exemplifies commitment to this place by our staff is Sheryl Grace, our senior security officer, who is retiring in September after 38 years of service. Congratulations, and thank you, Sheryl, wherever you are.

So, Mr Speaker, it is goodbye from me—over and out.

[Applause]

“Bread and Roses” sung

The House adjourned at 6.28 p.m.