Thursday, 1 March 2018

Volume 727

Sitting date: 1 March 2018

THURSDAY, 1 MARCH 2018

The Speaker took the Chair at 2 p.m.

Prayers.

Speaker’s Rulings

Chamber, Lobbies, and Galleries—Photography

SPEAKER: Yesterday evening, a point of order was raised about photography in the Chamber. A photograph of the Chamber was taken and then posted to Twitter by the Hon Iain Lees-Galloway. I will remind members and staff that photographs may be taken in Parliament only with my permission. Publication compounded the breach. I intend to consult with the Business Committee about updating the 2011 protocol around photography, which probably pre-dated a lot of the current forms of camera, but in the meantime, members and their staff should abide by the existing rules.

Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (National—Ilam): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. While you go to consult the Business Committee, was it a breach of privilege or not?

SPEAKER: No.

DAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): I seek leave of the House to move a motion without notice but with debate—

SPEAKER: The member will resume his seat. We haven’t come to the part where members can do that yet.

Business Statement

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Leader of the House): Thank you, Mr Speaker. Today, the House will adjourn until Tuesday, 20 March. In the week of 20 to 22 March, the House will consider the third readings of the Education (Tertiary Education and Other Matters) Amendment Bill and the Customs and Excise Bill, and the committee stage of the Taxation (Annual Rates for 2017–18, Employment and Investment Income, and Remedial Matters) Bill. On Tuesday, 20 March, as agreed by the Business Committee, there will be a debate on the report of the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee on the Pacific Agreement on Closer Economic Relations treaty, the first reading of the Parihaka Reconciliation Bill will take place on Thursday, 22 March, and Wednesday, 21 March will be a members’ day.

Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (National—Ilam): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. Does the Leader of the House intend having large numbers of Ministers—up to eight at a time—coming into the House to talk out bills where there is almost unanimous agreement in the House that they should pass?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Leader of the House): Well, that’s eight times as many members as were present on the Opposition benches in the House last night during those debates. I think the House’s democratic process might be enhanced if the National Party did a little bit of work from time to time.

Points of Order

New Zealand Winter Olympics Team 2018—Congratulations

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Minister for Sport and Recreation): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I seek leave to move a motion without notice congratulating New Zealand’s Winter Olympians.

SPEAKER: Is there any objection to that process? There is.

Ministerial Statements

New Zealand Winter Olympics Team 2018—Congratulations

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Minister for Sport and Recreation): I wish to make a ministerial statement to congratulate the 2018 New Zealand Winter Olympics team.

SPEAKER: Just to make it clear, there was objection from David Seymour to that process.

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: As the Minister for Sport and Recreation, it is my pleasure to congratulate Zoi Sadowski-Synnott and Nico Porteous on winning the bronze medals at the 2018 Pyeongchang Winter Olympics. It was an honour to represent the Government at these games.

Annelise Coberger won New Zealand’s first ever Winter Olympics medal in ski slalom at the 1992 Winter Olympics. After waiting 26 years to build on that amazing achievement, these two talented young New Zealanders became the youngest New Zealand Olympic medallists across both summer and winter games. They were part of our biggest ever Winter Olympics team, one that doubled its medal target and also achieved a further four top-five finishes.

Collectively, these results reinforce the strength and depth of our snow sports high performance system. The Government is proud to invest in this, through High Performance Sport New Zealand and through Sport New Zealand’s investment in high performance training facilities. In the lead-up to the Winter Olympics, this included the installation of a landing bag at Cardrona, to enable our international freestyle athletes to trial and perfect their amazing tricks. Both Nico and Zoi specifically told me how much this had helped them hone their performances.

New Zealanders can be extremely proud of Zoi, Nico, and the whole New Zealand team. Not only were their performances exceptional, but their humility and gratitude for all the support that they had received were made clear at every opportunity. As a team they backed one another at every point, and I want to congratulate Chef de Mission, Pete Wardell, and all of the New Zealand Olympic Committee crew for their role in making success happen.

I also want to make a special mention of the Wells family, who have been the backbone of snow sports and freestyle skiing in New Zealand for many years. The family have had to endure their share of heartbreaking injuries over the years, and, sadly, this happened again this year for Jossi and Byron Wells. But the Wells family were there to support all the other team members throughout, and I know that they will continue to be a big part of our teams in future years.

I’d also like to take this opportunity to mention our three-strong New Zealand team for the Paralympic Winter Games taking place this month, between 9 and 18 March, and wish Adam Hall, Carl Murphy, and Corey Peters all the very best of luck.

Kiwis achieving excellence on the world stage is a source of national identity, pride, and inspiration. This year’s Winter Olympics team have achieved an exceptional result and we congratulate them wholeheartedly.

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN (National—Northcote): On behalf of the National Party, I’d like to join with the Minister for Sport and Recreation in congratulating our Winter Olympians on a historic result in South Korea. Two bronze medals—our first Winter Olympics medals for 25 years—is something for all New Zealanders to celebrate. I think it reflects the growth of winter sports in New Zealand but also the extensive investment in high performance sport that has been made over many years, led by my predecessor in the role before I took it on, Murray McCully, who invested and made the case extensively for Government investment in the high performance sports network.

It was good that the Minister was able to attend the Winter Olympics in South Korea. They would have been buoyed by the Government’s support. But I want to especially congratulate our two bronze medal winners, Zoi Sadowski-Synnott and Nico Porteous. Zoi won bronze in the big air snowboarding and Nico won bronze in the men’s ski half-pipe. They are both young people from Wānaka, representing their country at the highest level and bringing a huge amount of pride to all New Zealanders.

I also want to note that the Paralympics are being held later this month. Of course, there will be a strong New Zealand contingent there. We wish those Olympians all the very best for success in South Korea as well.

FLETCHER TABUTEAU (Deputy Leader—NZ First): I rise on behalf of New Zealand First to add our congratulations to the team that went and participated in the Winter Olympics. New Zealand has been a long and passionate competitor in the Winter Olympics. Of the near 3,000 competitors that attended the event, New Zealand sent 21 athletes who made the grade, which, in and of itself, is an amazing feat. There were 102 events, and New Zealand competed in 13.

But this is a wonderful opportunity to acknowledge the achievements of Zoi Sadowski-Synnott and Nico Porteous—both bronze medallists, teenagers who have been so passionate in their competition and representing New Zealand overseas. I congratulate them and finish by offering a quote from the pair, which I really appreciate: “I’m … going to keep being myself and … continue to work hard and [ski].” Sadowski-Synnott agreed: “I hope everything stays the same; I hope it’s all normal.” It’s an amazing statement. It summarises the Kiwi attitude of such high performance athletes who want to come home and just want to get on with a normal life. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

MARAMA DAVIDSON (Green): It’s so cool to be able to add the Green voice to the congratulations for our Winter Olympics team, who have just come back from Pyeongchang, and it was super cool to watch, actually, both Nico Porteous and Zoi Sadowski-Synnott winning in the Olympic runs that they did.

Zoi, for example, needed to get a good score for her third run—three out of three—to be able to qualify for a medal. She did a fantastic second run and then she had a bad land in her third run, but her first two runs were so fabulous that they were enough to carry her through and win her that amazing bronze medal. It was the first bronze medal after, I think, it was a 26-year drought for New Zealand at the Winter Olympics—a 16-year-old from Wanaka.

I also watched Nico Porteous’ Olympic run. Now, that stuff should not be humanly possible. The way he went flying through the air, freeskiing, half-pipe—it should not be possible for someone so young.

So I’m pretty proud of our whole team. I’m really proud of our New Zealanders. I share the enthusiasm of my colleague James Shaw, who is a skier and snowboarder. He is a bit more excited about the Winter Olympics than other sports.

Just to finish off, I want to emphasise thanks and acknowledgment of the support team and the whānau, and what they have to go through in getting there and supporting their young members for these events. I only have, by comparison, my young boys’ rugby teams at Manurewa rugby club on a Saturday, and I find that pretty stressful.

So massive congratulations for all the support around all of our athletes and Olympic winners and bronze medalists. Kia ora tātou.

DAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I’d like to draw your attention, if I can, to Standing Order 3, which gives a number of definitions, including the definition of “leave of the House”, which says it may be “granted without a dissentient voice”. You clearly had a dissentient voice giving leave for this motion and gave leave anyway. With that in mind—

SPEAKER: No, no. Order! If the member listened occasionally, he would stay up with things. The Minister made a ministerial statement. He did not require leave. The only effect of the ministerial statement was that one party, which is much smaller than the rest, missed out on an opportunity to contribute.

Points of Order

Leave to Move Motion Without Notice—South African Property Rights

DAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I seek leave for a motion without debate that this House condemns the South African Government’s effective dissolution of property rights and the rule of law.

SPEAKER: Is there any objection to that? Yes, there is.

Oral Questions

Questions to Ministers

Limited Service Volunteer Programme—Government Initiatives

1. MARK PATTERSON (NZ First) to the Minister of Defence: What progress has been made on the coalition Government’s commitment to expand the Limited Service Volunteer Scheme?

Hon RON MARK (Minister of Defence): Great question. Last Friday, I attended the sod-turning of a new youth development facility at Whenuapai air force base, allowing the construction to get under way. The $10 million, 120-bed facility will be completed later in the year and will support vital youth development programmes, such as Limited Service Volunteers (LSV) courses, service academies, and the New Zealand Cadet Forces. I wish to thank the Hon Scott Simpson and the chair of the Foreign Affairs Defence and Trade Committee, Simon O’Connor, who took time out of their busy schedules to accompany me to celebrate the occasion, and I wish to acknowledge the apology from Louisa Wall MP, who was with us throughout the morning but had to depart early before the sod-turning ceremony took place.

Mark Patterson: What further plans does the coalition Government have with the Limited Service Volunteers scheme?

Hon RON MARK: In this term of Parliament, the coalition Government will be doubling the number of trainees going through Limited Service Volunteers courses from 800 to 1,600 persons annually. This new facility is a significant first step in that uplift, with many more announcements to come. Can I take the opportunity to thank my immediate predecessor, the Hon Mark Mitchell, who fought hard for the LSV scheme and contract to his Cabinet colleagues, who cut numbers, cut funding, and closed down the youth development facility at Trentham. Mr Mitchell’s work has provided us with a great springboard for achieving our targets. It’s a shame he didn’t win the leadership. [Interruption]

SPEAKER: Order!

Mark Patterson: How successful is the Limited Service Volunteers scheme?

Hon RON MARK: Good question. As a patron myself of the Limited Service Volunteers scheme, I have seen firsthand the amazing work done by Defence Force personnel in partnership with the Ministry of Social Development and the Ministry of Education in developing these young people. The scheme is hugely successful, and participants come away from the course with increased self-esteem, self-discipline, self-confidence, motivation, and a desire to work. Based on 2016 figures, 81 percent of LSV trainees completed the course and 52 percent were off the benefit within 16 weeks after graduation. That’s why it is in the coalition agreement.

Mark Patterson: What other social development initiatives involving the Defence Force will the coalition Government progress this term?

Hon RON MARK: Along with the doubling of the Limited Service Volunteers scheme, the coalition agreement secured the launch of a pilot of the Youth Employment Training and Education initiative, involving the Defence Force and targeted at youth between the ages of 15 to 17 not in education, employment or training.

Hon Shane Jones: “Neets.”

Hon RON MARK: The “neets”. This Government will not abandon the 92,000 “neets” as the previous Government did. We will operationalise these policies because this coalition Government is determined to help young New Zealanders to turn their lives around and succeed.

Prisons—Crime Reduction and Prison Population

2. Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Leader of the Opposition) to the Prime Minister: Does she stand by all of her Government’s policies and actions?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN (Prime Minister): Yes.

Hon Simon Bridges: Does she agree with her Minister of Justice that “There is immediate pressure now” in relation to the prison population, and why is her Government stalling on the Waikeria build, given that immediate pressure?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Yes, I do agree with the Minister of Justice, and we’re working through decisions around the work that’s required for Waikeria Prison, which is in a pretty shocking state thanks to the last Government leaving it to the last minute.

Hon Simon Bridges: How, then, can her Government commit to 1,800 new police, when the Chief Executive of the Department of Corrections, Ray Smith, said today that it’s “pretty obvious” that the policy will definitely lead to a higher prison population?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I would argue that it very much depends on the way that your police force is deployed. What we know is that under the last Government, there was a serious reduction in the amount of community policing. In my own area—and that’s just one example—community hubs were closed down and community policing suffered. We’ve agreed with our coalition partners that we need to reinstate that community-based policing, and that’s what we plan to do.

Hon Simon Bridges: When her Minister of Justice said, in relation to lowering the prison population, “We’ve got a number of things we’re going to have to do to get that under way”, what exactly are those things?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I’m happy to give some examples. We’ve talked about, for instance, the use of Rangatahi Courts and drug and alcohol courts, some of which were trialled—great outcomes but never expanded by the last Government. One really concrete thing is that we know that there are people who are ready to be released that haven’t been—for one reason, and that is because the housing crisis means there’s nowhere for them to be paroled to. There are concrete examples of where that has happened. Our prisons are the most expensive form of housing in this country, and it makes absolutely no sense. That’s why we’re having to clean up their mess.

Hon Simon Bridges: Well, does she agree with the Minister of Justice when he said that looking at laws such as the Bail Act, the Sentencing Act, and the Parole Act would be part of lowering the prison population?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I’m pleased the member’s raised the Bail Act, because he left a number of misconceptions yesterday in this House. As I pointed out, when the Bail Act was passed by the last Government, they made an assumption that that would increase the number of remand beds by 250. Remand beds have increased, while we have a static crime rate, by 4,000. The biggest increases are in areas that the Bail Amendment Act didn’t even touch. So it’s had a general effect that they never anticipated, so it’s our job to look at it, and the stats tell the story.

Hon Simon Bridges: Well, does she think that just reducing the number of prisoners magically means there is then an automatic reduction in crime, and, if not, what are her Government’s actual plans to reduce crime?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: The member has assumed that we don’t have the ability to keep the public safe whilst also ensuring that we explore all of the options available to prevent crime. That includes making sure that we address unemployment, material deprivation, isolation in our communities, mental health issues, drug and alcohol addiction—all of them things, I have to add, that were severely neglected by that last Government.

Hon Simon Bridges: Well, does she not agree, then, with what was said at the select committee by her officials: that a big part of the reason for this increased prison population is taking family violence seriously?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: The implication this Government doesn’t take family violence seriously is offensive. Of course we do. But, as the stats prove, the 4,000 increase in remand actually has had nothing to do with some of the areas that that Government thought they were targeting, which shows it’s our job to go back and have a look at it. But we are, at the same time, focused on preventing crime and preventing harm, and that’s what we’re all about.

Hon Simon Bridges: In light of both the Secretary for Justice and Chief Executive of the Department of Corrections saying this morning there is no Government target to reduce crime, does she have any plans other than to reduce the prison population, which does nothing to stop crime and victims happening in the first place?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: This Government has firm plans to bring down unemployment levels, to bring down poverty levels, and to reduce the prison rate. I point out that that last Government had a target to reduce reoffending, and failed miserably, and has left us with a situation where we have one of the highest rates of imprisonment in the Western World, and, quite frankly, it’s shameful.

Hon Simon Bridges: Isn’t the reality that this Government is looking to lower the prison population without reducing serious crime and victimisation, and is soft on crime?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: No.

Economy—Minister of Finance’s Trip to South Korea and Singapore

3. KIRITAPU ALLAN (Labour) to the Minister of Finance: What discussions did he have on economic issues on his trip to South Korea and Singapore?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Minister of Finance): In South Korea I met with the economic adviser to the President and the Vice Minister of Strategy and Finance—

Hon Steven Joyce: Where are the slides?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: —and in Singapore the Ministers of finance and national development and the secretary of the National Trades Union Congress. I know you’re jealous, Steven. In addition, in both countries I met with investors who have interests in New Zealand or have expressed some interest in doing so. A feature of the discussions was the close alignment, of this Government’s programmes with the priorities of our partner Governments. In South Korea, this was evident in their shift to a people-centred economy, and in Singapore, in the planning that they are doing around the changing nature of work.

Kiritapu Allan: What specific policy approaches did he discuss in relation to the economic implications of the changing nature of work?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: Singapore has developed a sophisticated plan to support businesses and workers—

Hon Steven Joyce: This is like “What I did in my holidays”. This is great! The new innovation: “No, really, I did do some work.”

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: —through the disruption of new technologies and the changing patterns of work. You’re going to have a changing pattern of work, Steven—that’s right. This included many elements similar to this Government’s plans around the future of work, such as more funding and innovative opportunities for training and retraining and long-term industry planning, all of which is backstopped by a tripartite approach to these issues.

Kiritapu Allan: How will this feed into the Government’s approach to these issues?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: Building on the outcomes of the Future of Work Commission, this Government is focused on ensuring that the economy is prepared for the impact of rapid technological change. That’s why, among other things, we have invested in the fees-free initiative, it’s why we are rolling out a range of youth employment programmes, and it’s why we are backing more innovative approaches to lifting productivity, such as high performance engagement. We are also committed to a tripartite approach to these issues. I have already met with the chief executive of Business New Zealand and the president of the Council of Trade Unions to explore how we can further develop this, and we will have more to say in the near future about this approach.

Budget 2018—Capital Allowance and New Capital Expenditure

4. Hon STEVEN JOYCE (National) to the Minister of Finance: Does he still intend for all new capital expenditure in Budget 2018 to fit within the $3.4 billion capital allowance as stated in the 2018 Budget Policy Statement?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Minister of Finance): As the member knows, final decisions on the Budget are still to be taken. It is my current intention that all new capital expenditure in Budget 2018 will fit within the capital allowance.

Hon Steven Joyce: Further to the statement in paragraph 77 of the Provincial Growth Fund Cabinet paper that “the majority of the fund is likely to be capital expenditure”, can he confirm that at least $1.5 billion of the $3 billion Provincial Growth Fund will be set aside in the Budget 2018 capital allowance, as per Treasury guidance?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: As the member knows, and as the acting Minister stated yesterday, there are Budget-sensitive issues involved in answering that question, and he’ll just have to wait. [Interruption]

SPEAKER: Order!

Hon Steven Joyce: Now that the Government has cancelled the proposed public-private partnership (PPP) for Waikeria Prison, can he confirm, following the statements of the chief executive of the Department of Corrections this morning, that at least $1 billion will be set aside for the new 1,500 bed facility in Waikeria from the capital allowance in Budget 2018, or is it his plan that the Government just tag and release convicted prisoners?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: I reject several of the premises in that question, but the member will just have to wait for the Budget.

Hon Steven Joyce: Following the concerns raised on the weekend that the 100,000 affordable KiwiBuild houses would not, in fact, be affordable, is it his intention to increase the $2 billion capital envelope in Budget 2018 to allow for land to be leased from the Crown or shared equity proposals as options to make KiwiBuild homes more affordable?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: The member will just have to wait and see for the Budget, but I can assure him that this Government is actually committed to building affordable houses, through the KiwiBuild programme, unlike his Government was.

Hon Steven Joyce: Following his decision to rule out a PPP for Dunedin Hospital, will he commit to allocating $1.2 billion to $1.4 billion of this year’s Budget 2018 capital allowance to the construction of the new Dunedin Hospital, as promised to the citizens of Otago?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: The member will just have to wait for the Budget, but what I can reassure him of, and, indeed, all New Zealanders, is that this Government is committed to investing in capital expenditure to the tune of $42 billion over the next five years, $10 billion more than his Government ever was planning to spend.

Hon Steven Joyce: Does the Minister realise that the $1.5 billion from the Provincial Growth Fund, the $1 billion for the Waikeria Prison, and the $1.4 billion for the Dunedin Hospital already add to $3.9 billion, which is more than the $3.4 billion capital allowance he’s left for himself—and that’s before any other capital projects are considered—and does he intend to disappoint either Minister Jones or the CEO of Corrections—

SPEAKER: Order! The question is already too long. There’s been a question asked—

Hon Steven Joyce: It’s nearly finished, Mr Speaker.

SPEAKER: Well, the member might be, but it was a—[Interruption] No, no.

Hon Gerry Brownlee: Point of order.

SPEAKER: Well, a question’s been asked. Does the member want to withdraw it?

Hon Steven Joyce: No.

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: The member will just have to wait for the Budget, but what I can tell him is it will take more than one Budget to make up for nine years of neglect by that party over there.

Housing—Cost of a KiwiBuild House and Trade Training

5. Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE (National) to the Minister of Housing and Urban Development: Does he stand by all his statements on the proposed Kiwibuild programme?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD (Minister of Housing and Urban Development): Yes, in the context in which they were given.

Hon Michael Woodhouse: When he stated, “We’re going to build 100,000 affordable homes for young Kiwi families to buy.”, what was the Minister’s definition of affordable?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: Our definition of affordable for KiwiBuild is that we’ll be building houses in Auckland under $600,000, and at a lower price bracket in other markets around the country.

Hon Michael Woodhouse: When he stated, “You are probably going to have a household income I would guess $60,000 plus to buy a KiwiBuild property straight up.”, is the “plus” he referred to plus another $54,000, as illustrated by Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) advice that a first-home buyer would need to be earning $114,000 to purchase a $500,000 KiwiBuild house?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: The MBIE advice was based on a particular set of assumptions—for example, a $500,000 cost, a 10 percent deposit, a 25-year repayment term, and a 5.8 percent interest rate, which is actually higher than people are paying currently on a fixed term. I note that CoreLogic estimated last year that nearly half of all first-home buyers in Auckland are buying houses over $750,000.

Hon Michael Woodhouse: Will he now ask for that advice to be updated given that he himself has accepted that the best case for Auckland is a $600,000 KiwiBuild price point, and that would increase the earnings requirement to around $130,000 a year?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: Well, as I’ve said, the MBIE advice was based on a very particular set of assumptions that I don’t think were necessarily useful.

Hon Michael Woodhouse: In light of his statement, “We’re going to throw open the doors of the polytechs; we’re going to massively increase apprenticeships in the construction trades; we’re going to grow the local workforce.”, how many more trade training places have been established by the Government this year?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: We’re looking at a number of options to increase the capacity of the construction sector. We’re going to be recruiting overseas for skilled tradespeople. We are going to increase trade training and apprenticeships, but I’ll tell you this: we aren’t going to sit around wringing our hands like the last Government, who did nothing to grow the construction workforce for nine years.

Paul Eagle: What other statements has the Minister seen on the KiwiBuild programme?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: Well, I have seen one curious statement that the housing crisis is only a crisis for those unable to find a house and that the real problem is a failure to communicate, which will be news to those people sleeping in cars at night. That statement was by the new Leader of the Opposition, Simon Bridges.

SPEAKER: I’m now going to warn the Government that that sort of patsy—it took a little while to work it out, because it wasn’t until the end that it became clear from whom it was, but that sort of patsy is out of order and will not be tolerated in the future. As a result of that, the Opposition will have two further supplementary questions.

Hon Michael Woodhouse: Does he stand by his statement “Ah, yes.” when asked whether he staked his job on the success of KiwiBuild?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: Well, I would take the member more seriously if he offered to resign when we’ve built 100,000 houses by July 2028.

Census 2018—Accessibility and Online Forms

6. GOLRIZ GHAHRAMAN (Green) to the Minister of Statistics: How is this year’s census different from previous years?

Hon JAMES SHAW (Minister of Statistics): The 2018 census is running a digital-first approach, which means encouraging people who can to complete their census forms online. Statistics New Zealand’s target is to have 70 percent of census responses collected online. More than half a million people have already completed their census forms online, and, Mr Speaker, you might be pleasantly surprised to learn that there have been more online responses from people aged 65 and over than from people aged 15 to 25 so far.

SPEAKER: I’m not quite sure what the member’s saying.

Golriz Ghahraman: Is this the first census that has been available to complete online?

Hon JAMES SHAW: No. The 2006 and 2013 censuses had an option to be completed online also. The online response rate for the 2013 census was 34 percent. However, these censuses were run as a traditional paper-based census, with an option to complete forms online, so a 34 percent response rate was considered a success. This time round, it’s an online census with the option to use paper forms. With a focus on a digital-first strategy, Statistics New Zealand aims to achieve a 70 percent online response rate.

Golriz Ghahraman: What if I don’t want to fill it out online?

Hon Members: Oh!

Hon JAMES SHAW: You can tell members of the Opposition will be very keen on the answer to this one. Anyone who would prefer to fill out a paper form can do so. The census contact centre is open and is taking requests for paper forms. Forms will be posted out and people can take part once they receive them. Anyone can request a paper form by phoning 0800 CENSUS or 0800 236 787. Paper forms can also be ordered through the census website.

Golriz Ghahraman: What if I’m overseas on 6 March?

Hon Members: Oh!

Hon JAMES SHAW: Clearly the Opposition is not terribly interested in the census this year. [Interruption]

SPEAKER: Order! The member is.

Hon JAMES SHAW: As the census is a count of everyone in New Zealand on census day, anyone who is not in New Zealand on census day does not need to complete a census form.

Golriz Ghahraman: Why is the census so important?

Hon Members: Oh!

Hon JAMES SHAW: Again, while members of the Opposition may not be terribly interested, the information that is collected in the census helps us to understand more about the people who live here in New Zealand. It helps with making decisions about where our schools, our kōhanga reo, our hospitals, and our houses need to be. It helps with decisions around public transport and roading. Councils, iwi, community groups, and businesses all use census information to help work out the core needs of their area and to make the case for improvements to their communities. We would encourage everyone in New Zealand to make sure that they do fill out their census forms on the 6th.

Hon Gerry Brownlee: If someone has filled out their census form already, as the Minister has today indicated many people have, and then they get on a plane or a boat and leave the country on the 6th, will there be a mechanism whereby they are able to recall their information so his census is accurate?

Hon JAMES SHAW: If anybody has any doubts, they can ring the contact centre. As I said, that number is 0800 CENSUS and I thank the member for his question and the opportunity to make sure that he can clarify that. It does reinforce the point that if anybody wants to fill out their—[Interruption]

SPEAKER: Order! Order!

Hon JAMES SHAW: If anybody wants to fill out their form online, the thing to do is to fill it out as if knowing where they’re going to be on the 6th, rather than where they are today.

Hon Gerry Brownlee: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. Does he consider that last statement to be rather unfair on those who might win Lotto between now and then?

SPEAKER: No, no, no, no, no. I think we’ll leave the member’s optimism out of it.

Golriz Ghahraman: Supplementary, sir?

Hon Members: Oh!

Golriz Ghahraman: This is a good one. What steps is Statistics New Zealand taking to ensure the elderly and those with disabilities are able to participate in the census?

Hon JAMES SHAW: [Minister waiting for quiet]

SPEAKER: No, I think we’ll be waiting a long time. We’ve got a valedictory at 4 o’clock, so I think the Minister had better answer now.

Hon JAMES SHAW: Statistics New Zealand is working with organisations and groups representing people who may require support to complete their census forms online. They’ve produced a step-by-step guide, easy read and large print versions of the census letter, and also videos in New Zealand Sign Language. Statistics New Zealand has the support of organisations such as SeniorNet to provide guidance and free computer use for people over the age of 50 to fill in their census at over 70 learning centres across the country. If people are unable to complete their census forms by themselves or without the support of a family member, friend, or carer, then the Statistics New Zealand field teams will follow up after census day and provide support and assistance to people who need that help to fill out their forms.

State-owned Broadcaster—Independence

7. MELISSA LEE (National) to the Minister of Broadcasting, Communications and Digital Media: Does she believe it is important for State-owned broadcasters to be independent?

Hon CLARE CURRAN (Minister of Broadcasting, Communications and Digital Media): Yes, Labour campaigned on a stronger public broadcasting service and believes in the importance of independent media.

Melissa Lee: Would the Minister consider a State-owned broadcaster to be acting independently if a ministerial staff member featured as an independent commentator on a Radio New Zealand programme discussing Government policy?

Hon CLARE CURRAN: Could the member repeat the question, please.

Hon CLARE CURRAN: That’s an operational matter for the State-owned—

SPEAKER: No, no, the member will ask the question again.

Hon CLARE CURRAN: State-owned broadcasters, as do any other broadcasters, make their own decisions about who they have on their programmes.

Hon Gerry Brownlee: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. This is a very serious and important question, in fact, and I think that the Minister might want to think again about the answer that’s just been given—perhaps even the question asked again, so the Minister can be quite clear about what has happened here.

SPEAKER: I think we’ve had two cracks at it, and I think if we put the two answers together—that it’s an operational matter and that the organisations make their own decisions—the question, if not answered to the member’s satisfaction, has been addressed.

Greg O’Connor: What work is the Government currently doing that would strengthen the independence of State-owned broadcasters?

Hon CLARE CURRAN: I recently announced work being done on the potential formation of a public media funding commission, which will be subject to Cabinet approval. The commission is intended to act as an independent, non-political voice for media organisations that are in the inevitable but difficult position of holding to account Governments on which they depend for funding. This policy is in contrast to the former Government’s policy of severely underfunding public media.

Melissa Lee: In light of a previous answer, does the Minister believe a State-owned broadcaster would be acting independently if a ministerial staffer was featured as an independent commentator on a Radio New Zealand programme discussing Government policy, if it wasn’t made clear that they were a political staffer in a ministerial office?

Hon CLARE CURRAN: Media organisations make their own determinations as to who they have on their programmes.

Melissa Lee: In light of the answer, will the Minister be asking the Prime Minister for an explanation as to why a political staffer in the Prime Minister’s office appeared on Radio New Zealand’s The Panel on 12 February, introduced as a representative of Senate Communications, when she has not actually worked there for several months?

Hon CLARE CURRAN: No.

Melissa Lee: What will she say about this questionable independence when she catches up with Radio New Zealand head of content, Carol Hirschfeld, at their next informal breakfast meeting?

Hon CLARE CURRAN: Apart from the fact that that’s a ridiculous question, having a meeting alone does not breach the independence of State-owned broadcasters. Editorial independence, which is outlined in section 13 of Radio New Zealand’s Act and section 28 of TVNZ’s, does not preclude responsible Ministers from meeting with the broadcasters informally or formally to stay informed of their progress.

Melissa Lee: As a Minister of broadcasting, she has an interest in what is actually happening at Radio New Zealand. Did she know that there was a staffer from the Prime Minister’s office masquerading as an independent commentator on a Radio New Zealand programme?

Hon CLARE CURRAN: I have no responsibility for that.

Melissa Lee: I seek leave to table a transcript of the opening statements of Radio New Zealand’s The Panel from 12 February 2018.

SPEAKER: Is there any objection to that document being tabled? There appears to be none. It may be tabled.

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

Melissa Lee: I seek leave to table evidence proving that the RNZ panellist introduced as a consultant from Senate PR is, in fact, a contract staffer at the office of the Prime Minister, the Rt Hon Jacinda Ardern. [Interruption]

SPEAKER: Sorry—and was at the time in question?

Melissa Lee: Was?

SPEAKER: I want it to be made clear—

Melissa Lee: She was, I believe.

SPEAKER: On 12 February. Is there any objection to that evidence being tabled—and I want to make it very clear that’s a very high test. Is there any objection to that? There appears to be none.

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

Provincial Growth Fund—Tree-planting Programme and Waipapa Roundabout

8. JONATHAN YOUNG (National—New Plymouth) to the Minister for Regional Economic Development: Does he stand by all the decisions and statements he has made regarding the Provincial Growth Fund?

Hon SHANE JONES (Minister for Regional Economic Development): Yes.

Jonathan Young: Is he aware that construction of the proposed Waipapa roundabout on State Highway 10 is already planned as the third new project for Northland by the New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) from the National Land Transport Fund for the years 2018 through to 2021?

Hon SHANE JONES: The announcement pertaining to the Waipapa plan is a project that was referred to me by the NZTA, and I hope they get started as soon as possible.

Jonathan Young: How does that answer line up with paragraph 63 of the Provincial Growth Fund Cabinet paper, which makes it clear that the fund is not designed—and I quote—“to fund activity that will take place anyway”?

Hon SHANE JONES: That refers to the fact that the project was brought to me by the chief executive officer of NZTA—into my office—where he identified that they most certainly would not be funding that project within the next financial year.

Jonathan Young: Is the Minister aware that the Waipapa roundabout project is only 4.7 kilometres from his house, and did that proximity have any impact on the decision to include the project in the initial list announced last Friday?

Hon SHANE JONES: Given that I’ve walked the distance many times, it will come as no surprise to the House to know that I am domiciled in Kerikeri, near Waipapa, and of course that never crossed my mind.

Hon Kelvin Davis: Is he aware of how many people have crashed and how many people have died at that particular intersection?

Hon SHANE JONES: I have an idea of who I’d like to see crash, but that’s another matter.

SPEAKER: Order! Order! No, the member will resume his seat. He will address me as he answers, and he will answer it in a proper manner.

Hon SHANE JONES: When NZTA brought that proposal to my office, I had not a doubt in my mind that they had been through the processes of identifying danger, efficiency, and safety as a part of the tourism highway—admittedly, identified under the planning of “Northland Inc.”—over the last couple of years.

Hon Gerry Brownlee: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. With all due respect to the Minister, he didn’t answer Minister Kelvin Davis’ question.

SPEAKER: He addressed the question.

Hon Gerry Brownlee: Well—no, but he did not at any point make a comment about the safety issues that Mr Davis raised. It would just help us to know if every other black spot round the country can dip into his provincial fund as well.

SPEAKER: Well, I’m going to deal with this one first and say that I was listening to the answer. The Minister referred to safety. That’s all he had to do.

Jonathan Young: In regard to paragraph 63 of the Provincial Growth Fund Cabinet paper, and following his press release last Friday where he said, “We are finalising an agreement with the Landcorp to plant 1 million trees this winter and another million trees next year - about 2,000 hectares in total”, is he aware of the Landcorp annual report for 2016-17, which states, on page 27, “The land and environment plans have identified further areas of forestry. As many as 1,000 hectares may be planted in each of the next three years.”, and are these the same trees?

Hon SHANE JONES: The Landcorp chief executive officer is currently in discussions with Ministry for Primary Industries officials. They are a land-use enterprise. They have been told, “You can forget about selling any more Landcorp farms.”, and I can assure the member, I can assure the House, that once those commercial negotiations have been complete, a full public statement will be made as to where the trees are and how many there will be.

Earthquake Commission—Resolution of Outstanding Christchurch Earthquake Claims

9. Dr DUNCAN WEBB (Labour—Christchurch Central) to the Minister responsible for the Earthquake Commission: What steps has she taken to speed up the fair resolution of outstanding claims relating to the Christchurch earthquakes that occurred seven years ago?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS (Minister responsible for the Earthquake Commission): Yesterday, I announced the appointment of Dame Annette King as the interim chair of the board of the Earthquake Commission (EQC) and Christine Stevenson as an independent ministerial adviser to speed up the resolution of outstanding claims in Canterbury. Both Dame Annette and Christine are committed to speeding up these claims, because, after seven years, people need to be able to get on with their lives. They will bring a fresh set of eyes to the challenges in Canterbury, and following a meeting with the EQC chief executive, I am confident that by working together, progress will finally be made.

Dr Duncan Webb: What work will the independent ministerial adviser undertake?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: Today, I have released the terms of reference for the work of the independent ministerial adviser. This work focuses on improving the management of claims, what constraints there are, and how we fix these. These are crucial areas of focus that I believe will make a difference to processes at EQC, and for the people in Canterbury. I’m expecting to be able to be kept closely informed of progress on this work and to report back in four to six weeks.

Dr Duncan Webb: What other work has she commissioned?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: Alongside the changes I’ve already discussed, I’ve asked Treasury to lead an independent, accelerated audit of claims and liabilities and responsibilities on remaining claims. When seen as a package, these changes all come together to ensure remaining claims in Canterbury are resolved fairly and swiftly, because people simply cannot wait another seven years.

Mycoplasma Bovis—Cost

10. Hon NATHAN GUY (National—Ōtaki) to the Minister of Agriculture: Does he stand by all of his statements and actions?

Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR (Minister of Agriculture): Yes.

Hon Nathan Guy: When he said in the House on 14 February that industry hadn’t been approached for financial assistance to deal with the M. bovis cattle disease, is he now aware that industry has been formally approached to fund about $11 million in operation costs?

Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR: I am aware of discussions that have taken place. I’m aware that there are figures on the table. They are subject to a Cabinet process, and I’m not in a position to comment on them.

Hon Nathan Guy: With just 30 days to go until an eradication decision is reached by him on M. bovis, what advice has he received on the likely costs of full eradication?

Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR: I’ve seen a number of costs that have been bandied around. None have been confirmed, and until we have accurate information on the likelihood, the risks, and the extent of the disease and its possible eradication, I’m not in a position to comment on them. They will be before a Cabinet process, and we’ll be sharing those decisions with industry so that they buy into what we will be doing.

Barbara Kuriger: In light of information from the annual review of the Ministry for Primary Industries, at today’s Primary Production Committee, what is the Minister’s delegated financial authority in respect of biosecurity?

Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR: There’s a vote for primary industries, and within that there are appropriations across a large number of areas and responsibilities. They will not change. We are having business units, as announced before Christmas. They’ll be set up, they’ll be focused, to achieve a lot better outcome than had been achieved by the previous Government in the areas of biosecurity and food safety, where that member oversaw a system that you could drive a boat through—a boat full of cars full of marmorated stink bugs. We’re going to change that. We have turned them around and we will turn them around.

Barbara Kuriger: It wasn’t the answer I was wanting, so the next question is: how has the Minister exercised his delegated financial response to the ongoing Mycoplasma bovis crisis?

Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR: I’ve had the benefit of some support from the Associate Minister of Finance—he believes, so far, very well.

Defence Force—Funding

11. Hon MARK MITCHELL (National—Rodney) to the Minister of Defence: Does he stand by all his statements?

Hon RON MARK (Minister of Defence): I’ve said some pretty outrageous things in my time, so I’d have to say yes, mostly, except for those things that I’ve changed my mind on.

SPEAKER: I just want to remind both members that we’re talking about ministerial statements.

Hon Mark Mitchell: Does he stand by his ministerial statements?

Hon RON MARK: Yes, I do.

Hon Mark Mitchell: Does the Minister stand by his statement, “We need a massive injection of funds. We need to be out to 2 percent of GDP in relation to defence expenditure.”?

Hon RON MARK: If I recall correctly, that was a comment that was made about New Zealand First’s policy and that was a recognition that New Zealand First has not resiled from its policy. But I think I went on to explain that the Government’s policy is something different.

Hon Mark Mitchell: In light of that answer, is the Minister committed to the Defence Capability Plan 2016?

Hon RON MARK: That’s a very good question, and I thank the honourable member for that. One of the things that we are very proud of is that this coalition Government has agreed to the commitment to uphold the previous Government’s commitment to a $20 billion spend on the capability plan. We just intend reviewing that plan, to ensure that it’s still set right and that it’s on target, and we will achieve those goals and objectives that we set.

Hon Mark Mitchell: Does the Minister expect our New Zealand defence forces to reduce personnel costs?

Hon RON MARK: I don’t expect anything in that vein, and I would, at this stage, be talking to my coalition partners around funding. As the member knows, we’re in that Budget round process. New Zealand First is committed to providing the men and women of our defence forces with the resources they need to do the job—sorry, the Government is committed to providing our men and women with the resources they need to meet their commitments internationally, that we send them to do.

Hon Mark Mitchell: Is the Minister aware that New Zealand defence forces, under the new Government, are moving into a position where they have to moderate demand for strategic initiatives?

Hon RON MARK: No, I’m not aware of that at all.

Tertiary Education—Vocational Education

12. JO LUXTON (Labour) to the Minister of Education: What concerns does he have about the future provision of vocational education in New Zealand’s regions?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Minister of Education): The latest forecasts suggest that without significant change, the institutes of technology and polytechnic sector will see 50 percent of their institutions in deficit by 2020 and 80 percent in deficit by 2022. There is an appetite for change to modernise and grow the sector and make it fit for purpose for learners in the 21st century, and this Government is committed to not only preserving foundation and vocational education in our regions and cities, we also want to see the range of opportunities expanded.

Jo Luxton: What changes has he announced today that highlight the Government’s commitment to a more collaborative approach to tertiary education?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: Today, I announced that the Government is scrapping the widely disliked process of competitive funding for training at levels 1 to 4 on the qualifications framework, which forced tertiary education providers to bid against each other for a dwindling share of funding and created needless instability within the sector. Scrapping this useless process gives providers greater funding certainty, allows them to properly plan and develop programmes, and, most importantly, allows them to focus on what they should be focused on, which is getting outcomes for students.

Jo Luxton: How is this Government’s approach to the vocational education sector different from past approaches?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: This Government will collaborate with those in the sector to deliver a future-focused and robust vocational education system. Previous inaction and the lack of forward planning have left some polytechnics in serious financial difficulty. We will not be taking the approach of allowing these public institutions to fall over, as was the previous approach.

Erica Stanford: Does the Minister have concerns about those vulnerable young people who are looking forward to vocational learning and gaining new skills but have had this educational opportunity torn away from them as he carries out the union wish list by closing charter schools? [The Speaker stands]

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. The trouble with that is if you allow the question to be completed and prevent a Minister from answering, you allow the assertion to go unanswered.

SPEAKER: And that is a problem. But another problem I have is if I allow clearly out of order questions to continue—the member is a new member, and I will give her the benefit of the doubt that she didn’t know what she was doing, because otherwise she would have been disorderly and in a lot of trouble.

Hon Gerry Brownlee: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker.

SPEAKER: We’re not doing a relitigation now, are we?

Hon Gerry Brownlee: No. We’re not relitigating at all. It would be helpful though—I mean, you’ve given a lot of instruction in the last couple of weeks to Ministers about answering questions. It would be interesting to know the bit of that question that was particularly out of order. Was it the intonation and the excitement at the end of it that was part of the fury that some people in New Zealand are experiencing over that particular issue, or was it talking about the issue itself, or the allegation that the Minister was doing exactly what the Minister’s doing?

SPEAKER: Right. We are now moving on to Government orders of the day, No. 1.

Standing Orders

Sessional

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Leader of the House): I move, That the following sessional order be adopted:

ePetitions

(1) Despite Standing Orders 364 and 365, and subject to paragraphs (2) and (3), a petition may be started, signed and presented either in hard copy or in electronic form.

(2) The Clerk will accept a petition in electronic form only if it is hosted on the Parliament website and meets the requirements of that website.

(3) Standing Orders 361 to 371 apply to petitions in electronic form, except that the application of those Standing Orders is modified to the extent necessary to enable the hosting of petitions on the Parliament website.

Petitions have been a feature of the New Zealand parliamentary democracy since our Parliament was established in the 1850s, and they have been part of the Westminster system almost from its origin. Petitions allow citizens, individually and in groups, to draw Parliament’s attention to matters of concern to them and to ask the House to take action. All petitions are guaranteed consideration—[Interruption]

SPEAKER: Order! There are far too many members talking and wandering around.

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: All petitions are guaranteed action by being referred to select committees, and they are an important link between the Parliament and the people.

In recent years, Parliament’s rules about petitions have become out of date as technology has changed. There is an increasing desire amongst members of the public to be able to have ePetitions. At the moment, the Parliament relies, effectively, on a workaround, which is that ePetitions are presented to the House as a petition of one person asking that the House take note, on behalf of that one person, of a petition signed by many other people. The unfortunate reality about that system is that the wording of the original ePetition often doesn’t ask the House to take a particular course of action.

What this process that we’re now putting in place will do is it will enable the Clerk to approve the wording of the petition in the first place. In approving the wording of the petition, it will ensure that it is clear what course of action the House of Representatives is being asked to follow. By making that clear in the petition, the petition will give better consideration and it will allow the Government to be clearer on how it will respond to the Parliament’s report on the hearing of the petition.

So this is, ultimately, bringing the New Zealand Parliament in line with best practice and similar practices in other places around the world. Where it has been trialled in other places, or implemented in other places around the world, it has often resulted in an increased number of petitions, but it has also often brought to the attention of the Parliament or the legislature—depending on where in the world it is—issues that often might not have been forefront of mind for the members of the legislature but that are clearly front of mind for a significant number of citizens. So it will undoubtedly enhance our democratic process.

When presented, electronic petitions will proceed through the same select committee process as any other petition does. I want to make it clear on this side of the House that the expectation that the Government members have agreed is that petitioners will be given the opportunity to be heard at select committee where they have put forward a serious and credible petition. I think that the ability to ensure that we do get serious and credible petitions through this process will be enhanced by having the Office of the Clerk working with the petitioner to make sure the wording of the petition is right in the first place.

If we then get a significant number of people signing that petition, I think that is something that the select committees should consider when they’re deciding how much time to devote to the petition. Clearly, a petition that is from a smaller number of people might not get as much time—although, I think it should get some time—as a petition that is signed by a large number of people.

It’s a pretty fundamental right that citizens have to petition their Parliament, and I think it is well and truly time that we brought our procedures around that into the 21st century and allow that to be done electronically and online.

JAMI-LEE ROSS (National—Botany): Mr Speaker, thank you. The National Party also supports this notice of motion. It does bring the petitioning system into the 21st century and allows for online petitions to be followed through on the parliamentary website. I thank the Minister Chris Hipkins for his long-winded explanation about the need for a greater democracy in the parliamentary system with the online petition system that is being established. I know we’ve been spending time recently dragging out bills, and he did a fine job of doing so in his speech just now.

We support this, but I do want to highlight a couple of comments that I also made at the Business Committee: that we do want to ensure that there is still the opportunity for members of Parliament and members of the public who have engaged in an online petition where they’ve sought support from members of the public for an issue or for an action, and they haven’t quite followed the parliamentary system, to still print out those petition signatures and have those presented in hard copy. If we’re talking about increasing democracy, allowing New Zealanders to have the opportunity to petition the Parliament, if there has been a petition that has been carried out, either with or without support from members of Parliament, in an online fashion—as often is the case when members of the public who feel passionately about an issue go and launch an online petition—then they wish to present that in hard-copy form, they should still be allowed to do that. I make these comments because that’s some feedback I gave to the Clerk during a Business Committee discussion, and I do want to put on record that that is something that must still continue.

So this is a good move. It moves the Parliament in the right direction of moving into the 21st century with online petitions. I hope it leads to more New Zealanders taking part in the parliamentary process. As long as there’s still other avenues for New Zealanders there, it’s a good move.

CLAYTON MITCHELL (NZ First): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I rise on behalf of New Zealand First to support this motion. It’s a very sensible move that the Government are putting forward. It’s about direct democracy and enabling people to have their say in an easier fashion. As was already said by the member across the House Jami-Lee Ross, ePetitions, or electronic petitions, now that we’re going online—it is the 21st century and we want to make it very, very clear and easy for people to participate.

The petitioning of Parliament—asking for the democratic process for the Government to take action is exactly what those petitions do, and I just want to take the House’s time to outline a couple of petitions that have created actions and legislation that is, hopefully, going to take its place.

We had Sean and Cody Roberts petition the House a number of years ago when their father was killed in an accident caused by a foreign driver. Their petition was asking for the Government to consider the need for foreign drivers to actually apply for a New Zealand driver’s licence when they get here, but the action was not followed. A second petition was raised—and it was using iPetitions, which is an online format—that then was printed off and then put to the House by Judy Richards. Judy Richards lost her son, Rhys Middleton, in a similar accident with a foreign driver who had been here for a short amount of time—over three months, in fact. This petition is asking for the action of a Government to actually bring in legislation to make sure that if those foreign drivers are here for a shorter period of time—longer than three months, that is—they sit a driver’s licence, and that action is taking place right now. That action, actually, has got Mark Patterson, one of our New Zealand First MPs, to put a member’s bill in his name looking to take action on those sorts of things.

That’s how important democracy is in this country; that’s going to be further helped to move through in this House in a speedy fashion. There is a process that people do have to follow when it comes to those ePetitions, and the paper online versions with signatures will not be removed. We believe that this is an absolute democratic right of people to be able to engage. There are a number of petitions in the House right now.

We commend this moving forward. We thank the Business Committee for enabling us to sit up here and speak on this today. To some people it doesn’t matter but to very many of us, it matters a lot. So thank you to the House for the time.

CHLÖE SWARBRICK (Green): E Te Māngai, tēnā koe. Tēnā koutou e Te Whare. I rise on behalf of the Green Party in support of what we think is a brilliant motion. This is something that is really cool, basically and in summary.

I fundamentally believe personally, as does the Green Party, that accessibility and transparency are two different things. New Zealand consistently ranks really highly when it comes to transparency, and I believe there was a report released last week that spoke to exactly that. But transparency—being able to go on to Parliament’s website, and seeing what’s happening—is a very different thing to being able to understand what is actually happening. I’ve had many people, in my very short time as an MP, tell me that they feel as though they need a law degree or a degree in economics to be able to wade through what they perceive as very technocratic jargon and waffle.

Accessibility is about ensuring that people are able to engage properly, and that’s what we believe this here—these ePetitions—will allow people to do. Why this is so fundamentally important is because democracy is not something that happens just every three years with a general election. We believe that it is crucial that people are able to speak to and engage with Parliament outside of those general election cycles, particularly about things that they are passionate about and that they feel as though this Parliament may potentially be neglecting.

ePetitions also—what is being proposed—will provide certainty around form and around process, as was mentioned previously by the Hon Chris Hipkins, because there will be that back and forth and to and fro with the Office of the Clerk to ensure the certainty around that formulation of the petition itself to ensure that there are no hiccups along the way and that it is eventually tabled in the House. I think a lot of Kiwis are currently actually engaged with third-party petitions, which are available online, and probably aren’t aware of how much of a work around this is, as was mentioned by Chris Hipkins—about the fact that this is a very convoluted and actually messy process, whereby we end up having ePetitions presented in paper form in the name of one person, and in the name of multiple people.

So it’s time to enter the 21st century, in gist. New Zealand’s actually quite late to the game on it, despite considering it in 2014. We saw the USA and Canada do it in 2013, and the UK doing it in 2015.

I find myself—quite peculiarly—agreeing with my colleague across the House, Jami-Lee Ross, about how it is incredibly important here that we see that this is a parallel process that happens in tandem with those other forms of paper petitions to ensure that we are not excluding people, because, fundamentally, democracy is about access. So, in summation, the Green Party are very proud to support this motion.

Motion agreed to.

Bills

Health (National Cervical Screening Programme) Amendment Bill

First Reading

Debate resumed from 28 February.

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN (National—Northcote): It’s great to be able to take a short call on this bill—a very straightforward bill, and up front National will be supporting it. It’s really a technical change to the Health Act 1956, specifically looking at Part 4A, sections 112A to 112ZP. And, of course, the cervical screening programme that we have in New Zealand is something that is absolutely vital for maintaining the health of women across the country. It was instituted following the Cartwright inquiry back in the late 1980s, which for ever changed the face of New Zealand medical practice.

The changes that we’re seeing today, which I presume will go unanimously through the House in this first reading, are really just modifying the processes that are used around access to the register. So currently it’s a very bureaucratic process. What happens—as has been described in some detail, I hear, by my colleague Dr Shane Reti—at the coalface, in terms of the administrative rather than the clinical side, is that the clinicians or the practice nurse or the midwife have to actually request access to the register. So they’ll see a patient before them, and then they have to make a call, literally a phone call, to someone who is in charge of the register locally, and have the information about the patient before them downloaded from the register and then faxed to their practice. Now, that sounds pretty much antediluvian. I don’t know that there’s that many people these days using faxes. Certainly there’s a few—I’ve been known to use one myself from time to time—but, you know, what this amendment will do is allow the clinician to actually look up the register electronically, and, of course, that is a much more efficient and, actually, is a safer way of providing care. I mean, it seems unbelievable in this day and age that a clinician should have to waste valuable clinical time waiting for a fax to come through following a phone call.

The other thing that it does is it removes the need for the Director-General of Health to give approval for designated persons who might have a valid professional interest in accessing the register who seek that approval. So currently, you know, you might be a health worker working with the Pacific Island community in South Auckland. If you want to access the cervical screening register you have to actually be signed off by the Director-General of Health on an individual basis. What this amendment today will mean is that those health workers with an absolutely legitimate interest will be covered by this legislation, and they will then be able to access the register. Privacy concerns, of course—you know, they are paramount. No one’s privacy will be compromised, but it’s just about making things function in a far more efficient way.

The one point I would make is that this legislation here could easily have been rolled into an omnibus amendment bill, and it’s disappointing that it hasn’t been, because I’m sure this Government has a very busy legislative agenda. We haven’t seen signs of that, necessarily, so far—I hear there was a large group of Ministers called down to the House the other night to filibuster on their own bill—but I’m sure there’s more legislation coming. I mean, in the health area, in the 100-day programme they’ve focused on medicinal cannabis. They’re having their mental health inquiry. I would have had some suggestions around screening programmes that I would have thought could have been very good to actually bring to the House.

So we’re dealing with a small amendment to the cervical screening programme, which we could deal with in five minutes. I would have suggested to the new Minister of Health perhaps some legislation around the bowel screening programme—perhaps legislation that wouldn’t allow him to artificially delay the roll-out of the bowel screening programme, for political purposes, across the country; or maybe some legislation to prevent him from cutting $20 million of funding of rare diseases medicines, about which, of course, the Minister backtracked on a promise last week; or maybe some legislation to hold him to account for delivering the doctor in Pātea he promised in the election campaign, but has subsequently forgotten about; or maybe even some legislation that makes the Government honour its promise to investigate a third medical school.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Come back to the bill. Come back to the bill.

Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN: But, anyway, back to this issue here. Look, it’s a very succinct issue. I think the fact that actually we’re spending House time debating it just reflects the absolute poverty of the Government’s agenda in health—not only in health, actually, but right across their portfolios. I mean, it’s quite clear that when such a minor technical matter, which all the House is going to vote for unanimously, and which could have been dealt with in terms of an omnibus amendment bill, is a matter that the Government’s bringing into the House, just four months into their term of Government, it shows that this is a Government already, after four months, out of ideas. But we will be supporting this bill.

JENNY MARCROFT (NZ First): Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. It is my pleasure to speak on the Health (National Cervical Screening Programme) Amendment Bill on behalf of New Zealand First. I’d like to mention Associate Minister of Health Genter’s comments last night about the strong controls that will come over the register following this piece of legislation, and I’d also like to mention Dr Shane Reti giving us his practitioner’s perspective that this legislation will, in fact, create a better tool for the screening programme. I also would like to thank the member for his detailed account of the actual tools that are used in the process of taking a smear. That was highly enlightening for those that maybe haven’t yet had a smear, or maybe will never have one. I’d also like to comment on Dr Coleman’s contribution that the cervical screening programme is, in fact, vital for maintaining the health of women in this country. That is why we are debating this issue and this piece of legislation today.

Essentially, this technical update on information sharing on the cervical screening programme is a very good and necessary and common-sense piece of legislation. The bill will amend Part 4A of the Health Act 1956 to enable health professionals who provide services to women along the cervical screening pathway and screening support services—those staff—to directly access information from the register for the purposes of conducting their work. So just what is the National Cervical Screening Programme register? Well, this essential database stores the screening histories, cervical smears, colposcopies, and HPV results of women who participate in the programme. It will facilitate, also, the recall in women and the monitoring of the programme performance.

The National Cervical Screening Programme, set up in 1990—seems like an eternity ago now—aims to reduce the number of women in New Zealand who develop cervical cancer and the number who die from it. Let’s just take a look at those numbers now. If we look at the worldwide statistics—528,000 new cases of cervical cancer worldwide in 2012. It’s the fourth most common cancer in women internationally—266,000 deaths due to cervical cancer. Now, if we drill down into the figures from New Zealand, the incidence of cervical cancer has been declining steadily in New Zealand, and that is thanks to this screening programme. In 1999, there were 71 deaths in New Zealand from cervical cancer; in 2013—that’s the latest data that we have—there were just 54 deaths from cervical cancer. That’s a 31 percent decrease. The rate of death from cervical cancer in 1999 in the general population was three women in 100,000; by 2013, the latest data we have, it almost halved to 1.7 in 100,000.

But when we look at the statistics for Māori and Pasifika, they have a higher rate of receiving a cervical cancer diagnosis and a higher rate of dying from the disease. In 2013, the rate of death from cervical cancer for Māori women was four per 100,000. The number of women in the general population who received a cervical cancer diagnosis was 6.3 per 100,000, but for Māori women it was 12.7, and that was in 2013.

So why are these changes necessary? At the present time, when the smear is taken in primary care, they need to wait for clinical information to be faxed to those practitioners. Now, I don’t know, but I certainly haven’t been faxed in a very long time. Nil by fax in our household—we don’t even have one gathering dust in the garage. So it’s time for this technology change, and in doing this piece of legislation, we will update this technology to enable, a far more efficient service so those practitioners can access that information.

We’d just like to note that this look-up access to the register will mean that health providers that are working along the cervical screening pathway will be able to access that information through their computer in their place of work. They’ll be able to log on to the register, they’ll be able to put in their username and password, and they’ll be able to view, but not amend, the information. Now, that’s a very important point—not being able to amend that clinical information on those women involved in the programme.

New Zealand First noted that there was no mention of researchers in the policy statement—the general policy statement—and it wasn’t until we really looked at the bill that we noted that researchers were included there, so we needed to ask the Minister for a response on that. Her response was that researchers will not gain direct access to the register as a result of the bill. In fact, the situation for researchers does not change as a result of the bill, and we’re pleased about that, along with the Privacy Commissioner’s statement that it is satisfied the proposed amendments are consistent with the principles set out in the Privacy Act 1993 and the Health Information Privacy Code 1994.

So what are the barriers for women having regular smear tests? Many are scared. They’re afraid of the result. They simply forget—it’s not really something you really want to think about too often, but it is a high priority and we do need a reminder. It’s very important that we have that first smear test and become part of the register, because it really is a wellness programme.

Also, too, women can encourage each other. We can support each other so that we make sure we have a smear test. I’d like to point to a lady, Talei Morrison from Rotorua—she has started a Facebook page encouraging other women in supporting each other to make sure they have this potentially lifesaving test. For 10 years she didn’t have a smear test because of a bad experience, and now she’s found out she has stage four cervical cancer. She’s started up a Facebook page, and it’s #smearyourmea, and this campaign is sweeping around the country. What she is doing through her kapa haka programmes that she has worked on for years—she’s encouraging whole haka teams to gather together. Usually there’s about 25 women in a haka team. They all get together and they go and have their smear tests, and that way they are supporting each other. They’re also encouraging the men to support each other. So I’d just like to note the support that is out there for women who are currently facing, as Talei is, stage four cervical cancer, and to support her in the work she is doing spreading the word.

So, in summary, New Zealand First will be supporting this bill. Amending the law to allow this access, this look-up access, to the information and the results in cervical screening scans is a very positive step. The manager will retain administrative and audit control over granting secure access to the screening programme register, and we note, too, that a new offence will be created against any person who would amend the register without authorisation. So those safeguards are in place, and we’re pleased to see that. In brief, New Zealand First will support the Health (National Cervical Screening Programme) Amendment Bill. Thank you very much, Madam Deputy Speaker.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Just before I call the next speaker—I thought the member coped admirably, but there is quite a lot of noise in the galleries as people file in for quite an exciting event later on. I ask the galleries to respect the fact that we are doing normal business in the House and people are speaking, but the speakers also need to be aware that people are filing into seats.

Hon NICKY WAGNER (National): Thank you very much, Madam Deputy Speaker. I’m very pleased to support this bill. It’s just another example of the work that National did in Government now coming to fruition. Basically, it’s a pretty simple amendment. It amends the Health Act 1956, and it is to modernise the process of managing clinical information. It will assist the staff of the National Cervical Screening Programme register, health professionals, and support staff who provide the clinical screening services to women.

So what it will do is it will give real-time, direct access to information from the register, and, as the previous member, Jenny Marcroft, has noted, it has privacy safeguards around that. To have better, sooner, and more convenient access to vital screening information will benefit women, of course, but also the health professionals and the whole health system. Direct access will increase the efficiency and effectiveness of screening for prevention, for investigation, and also for treatment, and I’d like to thank Dr Shane Reti for explaining to us in his speech last night how direct access to information will practically assist GPs and other health professionals and improve the investigation of screening process.

National supports this bill. We are pleased to see our work that we did in Government coming to fruition, and it will have a positive effect on women’s health. Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker.

LOUISA WALL (Labour—Manurewa): Tēnā koe e Te Māngai o Te Whare. Tēnā koutou katoa. It is my pleasure, also, as a member of the Health Committee, to support the Health (National Cervical Screening Programme) Amendment Bill, but I do want to take the opportunity just to take us through the pathway to the formation of the National Cervical Screening Programme, because, as we’ve noted, it was as a direct consequence of the Cartwright inquiry in 1988, where there was general recognition that patients’ rights had actually been completely ignored and there were unethical research practices related to the treatment of women who had cervical cancer. It also led to the creation of the Health and Disability Commissioner, so it was considered a watershed moment in our history.

As part of the formation of that National Cervical Screening Programme, one of the objectives set out in Part 4A, section 112D(b), of the Health Act is to “inform women and the community of the risks, benefits, and expected … health gains from participation in the [National Cervical Screening Programme];”. I draw that to our attention because from the departmental disclosure statement it’s clear that this bill will enable “National Cervical Screening Programme Register staff, health professionals who provide services to women along the cervical screening pathway (such as smear takers and laboratory and colposcopy staff and associated administration staff), and screening support services staff”—and this is the bit that I think we all should just reflect on—“to directly access information from the Register for the purposes of conducting their work.”

Now, I guess the question is how do you access data currently? What is the process? I heard my colleague Dr Jonathan Coleman talk about the bureaucratic issues with regard to the current bill, but I think we should be balancing bureaucracy with safeguards. I do want to highlight a contribution from the Associate Minister of Health, Julie Anne Genter, when she introduced this bill. She said, “The only existing regulations made under Part 4A of the Act, the Health (Cervical Screening (Kaitiaki)) Regulations 1995, are retained as a result of this bill, and their provisions will continue to apply.” From my perspective, that, actually, is the only issue that I have, because the National Kaitiaki Group was established to approve of consent to use Māori women’s data, and the National Kaitiaki Group, in approving the use of Māori women’s data, did so based on the following principles, and that was the principle of the sanctity of te whare tangata [the womb], the need for culturally appropriate protection for the taonga of protected information, and the need to ensure that protected information is used for the benefit of Māori women.

I think it’s really important that we reflect on, I guess, the authority that this kaitiaki group has, because under regulation 6(2) of the Health (Cervical Screening (Kaitiaki)) Regulations it says, “The function of the Group shall be to consider applications under these regulations for approval to disclose or use or publish protected information and to grant approval for such disclosure or use or publication in appropriate cases.” The reason that I bring this up is because the substantive changes in this piece of legislation do relate to section 112J, and in section 112J, as described in the bill, there now seems to be a lot of power given to the National Cervical Screening Programme manager; under this piece of legislation, in fact, they will be able to authorise the use of data.

Now, it’s granted that a lot of the authorisation can be seen to be in relation to individuals—so these are specific people who have been provided with cervical screening services—so that seems to be an appropriate designation. In new section 112J(3) and (4), it also will enable the authorisation “for the purpose[s] of research”—so I want to pick up the comment of colleague Jenny Marcroft—and also “for the purpose of enabling the compilation and publication of statistics that do not enable the identification of the women to whom [these] statistics relate”.

So the reason that I bring this up now—and, obviously, our select committee will consider it—is that, in fact, in 2002, there was a review of the kaitiaki guidelines, and that review was inspired by the 2000 Government inquiry into the Gisborne cervical smear issue. That occurred because there were lab results in the Tai Rāwhiti-Gisborne area that failed to identify hundreds of women who had abnormal smears, and so, as a direct consequence of that Government inquiry, the review of the kaitiaki regulations was facilitated. What I want to highlight in that review report is this—so the review of the Health (Cervical Screening (Kaitiaki)) Regulations 1995 report was published in March 2002. I quote from that report. It says, “Balancing the protection of aggregate Māori women’s cervical screening data with the need to [use] data so that the National Cervical Screening Programme can be monitored and evaluated to ensure it is safe and effective for Māori women.”

At the heart of treating the data as a taonga was also, I believe, an implicit responsibility for Māori women themselves to protect that data. And I’ve talked to a few people who were involved in that Gisborne inquiry and those that were involved in the review of the kaitiaki guidelines, and it would interest the House to know that Māori women were sceptical about participating in the cervical screening programme, because actually being detected meant for some that they were labelled as being promiscuous. We have to talk about that, because the reason the kaitiaki group was formed in the first place was to say to Māori women, “Do not be whakamā about participating in this programme. It isn’t about your behaviour; it’s actually about detecting a cancerous growth that, actually, we can treat.” So, to overcome that whakamā, the kaitiaki group was instituted so that Māori women would actually have faith and confidence in the cervical screening programme.

So I just hope that the Minister is clear, and I do want to acknowledge the Minister Julie Anne Genter, because I have spoken to her about this issue and she is very clear that the intention of this piece of legislation is in no way to undermine the role of the kaitiaki group. And I think that if the House is really clear that that is the intention and purpose of this bill, then we will, as a House, be able to progress this piece of legislation through the House and it be guaranteed to us that all the changes that we are making actually are for the benefit not only of the women individually but of Māori women collectively because of the formation of that group in 1995. Kia ora.

Dr PARMJEET PARMAR (National): Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. I’m taking a short call to support the Health (National Cervical Screening Programme) Amendment Bill in its first reading.

If you look at the amendment that this bill brings to the Health Act, it’s actually a very small amendment, but it brings a very significant value to this Act. With this amendment, what will happen is that all the health professionals that are involved in providing the National Cervical Screening Programme will be able to access the National Cervical Screening Programme register. So when we talk about these health professionals that will be able to access this register, we are talking about general practitioners that are taking smears, we are talking about nurses that are taking smears, we are talking about lab staff—that is, testing specimens for cytology, HPV infection, histology. And also we know that some individuals—some women—have to undergo a colposcopy as well. So those specialists doing colposcopies and the staff around them will also be able to access this National Cervical Screening Programme register.

Yes, access is there, but the way they access the information currently is quite cumbersome. So it is going to make the access and also the delivery of the service much more efficient. And this register, the National Cervical Screening Programme register, actually is central to the success of the National Cervical Screening Programme, because all the test results are reported to this register. This register holds the information about women enrolled in the National Cervical Screening Programme and also the history of their smear tests. So this needs to be held in a very professional manner. So that’s why I want to emphasise that by bringing this amendment, it will be only health professionals that are involved in the National Cervical Screening Programme that will have access to this register.

The other thing to note is that it is going to create an offence if people access the register when they are not authorised, because adding, deleting, or amending any information on this register can cost lives. This register is to support the programme to reduce and also to help detect early signs of cervical cancer so that the mortality rate from cervical cancer can be reduced. The other thing that I want to emphasise is that the access to this register will remain an auditable activity. So that’s really important.

We know that the cervical smear test is quite effective. There are different ways it can be done, and all those tests are proven, but still, in some communities, the uptake of this test is quite low. And that’s why we want to send a very clear message out there that, with this amendment, the information is still going to be secure and it’s going to be available only to health professionals that are providing cervical screening services. So, overall, it’s a good bill. It’s going to make the delivery of the test efficient, and I support this bill and commend this bill to the House. Thank you.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The next call is a split call—five minutes each with a bell after four minutes.

ANAHILA KANONGATA’A-SUISUIKI (Labour): Tēnā koe e Te Māngai o Te Whare. It is an absolute privilege to stand and speak to this bill. I want to begin my speech by reading out the cover page of the report of the Parliamentary Review Committee regarding the New Zealand Cervical Screening Programme, dated June 2015. It reads, “Pay heed to the dignity of women”. And if you turn the page, it also reads, “The first human was a female whose body was moulded out of earth by the god Tāne. Tāne’s mother Papatūānuku advised him, ‘Go to the soil at Kurawaka, there to go about your work. There the woman can be found, untouched, select and sacred, for she possesses the essence of humankind.’ Nā Tāne”—it continues—“ko Hineahuone, te wahine tuatahi ki te ao. Ko Tāne tēnei e whakahā ana i a ia; ka matihe a Hineahuone, ka ora mai. Nō konā te kōrero, ‘Tihei mauri ora’ ”.

In December 2017, according to Statistics New Zealand, 59,610 live births and 33,339 deaths were registered in New Zealand, resulting in a natural increase of 26,268. I say that because, as a nation, our future relies on the health of women. Our kōrero today is about the Health (National Cervical Screening Programme) Amendment Bill, which amends Part 4A of the Health Act 1956 to enable the National Cervical Screening Programme. May I remind the House that in section 112A of the Health Act it sets out the National Cervical Screening Programme’s purpose, and I think it’s fitting that we remind the House of its purpose. It reads, “The purpose of this Part is—(a) to reduce the incidence and mortality rate of cervical cancer by providing for the continuation of the [National Cervical Screening Programme] … ; and (b) to facilitate the operation and evaluation of that national cervical screening programme by—(i) enabling access to information and specimens by the persons operating [in] the programme; and (ii) enabling access to information and specimens by screening programme [evaluations] … appointed to evaluate that programme.”

I speak about that because the previous speakers have noted that this could have been rolled into an omnibus bill in terms of the intention of this Government. For this Government, what we talked about was being transparent and being evidence based. We have heard evidence today from the honourable doctors that even a slight error in information will lead to a loss of life. I want to acknowledge the Minister yesterday when she spoke about what the current section 112J means—that it expresses the authorisation of the Director-General of Health. It continues on to 112C and 112E, and can, in some cases, be required for some people to perform their functions within the screening programme pathway. What this amendment also does is to have access to this information. But the reason why we are led to this is that it was important, in terms of the Cartwright inquiry, that we put sufficient measures in place to ensure safety of information.

In concluding, what this bill also does is put in accountability—in accountability, a new offence has been introduced for amending the register without the authorisation. So not only does it enable easy access but this bill also provides accountability in terms of if the information is mismanaged. I support this amendment bill to the House. Thank you.

ERICA STANFORD (National—East Coast Bays): Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. It’s a pleasure to speak to the first reading of the Health (National Cervical Screening Programme) Amendment Bill. I’d just like to acknowledge all of the people that are here today sitting up in the gallery. I know that they’re not here to listen to me, but I would like to acknowledge the fact that this is a really important bill for women, and I’m pleased that they’re here to hear about it. I would also like to speak to all of those women who are watching on Parliament TV today because of the importance of this bill, and if I may speak in plain language to explain to them what happens now compared to what will happen under this bill. I won’t speak perhaps in as much plain language as Shane Reti did last night; I think everything that needed to be said was said.

But what I would like to say is that I think that women probably don’t realise what happens now when they go to see their primary health carer. When they go now to get a smear test, the way that their doctor gets information on their results and their previous history of results is very cumbersome and something you would not expect in today’s world with the technology we have available. What happens now, when you go to the doctor, is that they have to look up your previous results, and the way that they do this is that they ring the registry. They make a phone call and someone there looks up the results, prints them out—and sometimes this can be up to 20 pages or more—and then faxes them to your doctor or your doctor’s surgery.

Now, I haven’t received a fax probably since 1994, and it may be that doctors’ surgeries are the last place to still have faxes for this very reason. But what it means is that it’s such a cumbersome and long process that, often, doctors will skip it because it takes such a long time and it’s so cumbersome. What that means for women who are about to have their test is that if they have had unusual smear test results in the past, there needs to be a specific type of test that has to be done. If that doctor doesn’t have that information available to him, he may not do the test that is required, and this compromises the health and safety and early detection of cervical cancer in women. That’s why this bill is so very important, because it just goes to the heart of the safety and well-being of women.

I think that most people would have assumed that doctors could already just tap into the register and have all that information available to them, like they do with so many other things. I took my daughter last week to a specialist, who tapped into a system and looked up her previous results at the snap of a finger. I think most women would be quite surprised to learn about the reality that exists today with their doctor having to go through this very long, cumbersome process, which they often may not do, because it is so long and cumbersome.

This bill will save lives; I have no doubt about it. I would like to acknowledge Julie Anne Genter and congratulate her for bringing this important piece of legislation to the House. I think that’s probably the second time I have congratulated her this week. The bill is a straightforward yet sensible, effective bill that is somewhat overdue. It’s a very good piece of legislation, and I commend it to the House. Thank you.

Dr LIZ CRAIG (Labour): Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. It’s an absolute privilege to speak to the first reading of this bill. I think that while on the surface what this bill seems to be about is just technical amendments to Part 4A of the Health Act, which governs how we access data from the cervical screening register, it’s actually also about trust. It’s about that trust that women place in our health system when they turn up for their screening, and what they’re expecting is the best possible care.

What they’re also expecting is that if they do have an abnormality, that that abnormality will be picked up and it will be treated in a timely manner. I think the problem is, unfortunately, for many women in our country in times past, this hasn’t always been the case. Our current screening system is actually informed by two previous historic inquiries. The first of those inquiries, many of us know, was into the unfortunate experiment that happened at National Women’s Hospital and the Cartwright inquiry in 1988. But then, secondly, there was a more recent review of under-reporting of cervical cancer and cervical anomalies coming out of Gisborne. Both of those have completely informed how we manage our current cervical screening programme.

So what I want to do briefly today is just go through—

DEPUTY SPEAKER: I’m sorry to interrupt the member. Can I just ask the people in the gallery to respect the fact that the business of the House is continuing. I know you’re all taking your seats, but the member is trying to speak.

Dr LIZ CRAIG: Thank you. What I want to do just briefly today is talk about the origins of our current screening programme and then take you through what this bill intends to do to improve it. I think the first thing to remember is that in New Zealand about 160 women every year develop cervical cancer—and 60 women die. What we also see is really large inequalities. Rates are much, much higher for Māori and Pacific women than for European women.

But what we also know is that cervical cancer usually develops very, very slowly, and so often you’ve got many years where you’ve got anomalies that can be detected by cervical screening. So what we can do is we can pick those up early, and we can go in and treat women so that, in most cases, the cancer doesn’t develop and they get a total cure. But to do that, what we’ve got to do is we’ve got to screen early and often. What the current recommendations are is that for women who have ever been sexually active, they start their screening at 20 years of age, and they go right through with three-yearly smears right up until when they turn 70. If they’ve had any previous abnormal smears, then they have those much, much more frequently than that.

But those recommendations haven’t always been so clear, and this is where we look back to the Cartwright inquiry, back in 1988. What happened back then was there was a paper published in a medical journal, and it talked about an experiment that was run out of National Women’s Hospital, where some doctors of the day contested the idea that cervical anomalies progressed to invasive cervical cancer. So they followed through a group of women to see what would happen, and that experiment was conducted largely without the consent—

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Would the member please address the bill.

Dr LIZ CRAIG: —the bill?—

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The bill.

Dr LIZ CRAIG: —yep—or the understanding of what was happening. So, as a result, the recommendations coming out of that inquiry led to the establishment of our modern cervical screening register in 1990, and that register’s aim now is to reduce these incidents of invasive cancer by running a high-quality screening programme.

What we’re going to be looking at today is the changes that this bill will make, and what they relate to is the information held in the cervical screening register. The problem we’ve got at the moment is that the legislation was originally put in place back in the 1990s, and it’s very restrictive in terms of who can access information held on the register, largely because we didn’t have the modern IT systems that we have today.

What it says at the moment is, for example, smear takers in primary care still need to have that information faxed to them if they’re wanting to look up cases on individual women. If colposcopists and laboratory staff want to access information, they have to get the direct authorisation of the Director-General of Health. The reason for faxing is because emailing isn’t considered to be a secure form of communication. I think the problem of having an open-office environment, where you’ve got bits of paper rolling off a fax machine—I’m not 100 percent convinced that that’s a more secure way of communication, but that’s what has to happen at the moment. This is where this bill comes in.

What the bill directs is that smear takers, colposcopists, and laboratory staff can have direct access to look up the cervical register so that they can have that direct access to the screening information. There would also be access granted to those that are directed by the Ministry of Health and district health boards to follow up women who are not responding to their recall notices. And so being able to have access to that information on hand, so that they can know when the woman last had her smear and what the smear history was, is very important for those conversations.

All the protections that currently exist, in terms of those who can access the register, in terms of being granted access provisions, being prohibited from revealing data on individual women—all those privacy protections—are still in place around the bill. So what that means is we’re expanding access, which will greatly enhance the efficiency of the way that the register operates, but, at the same time, the privacy protections are still in place, as is the ability to do evaluations using registered data. It also has that information being available to researchers so that we can identify who’s not turning up and being screened and how we can follow those women up.

So, in summary, the bill brings the practice of cervical screening into the 21st century by granting direct lookup access to many more people on that screening continuum, but it also protects the privacy and the direct access of that data. I therefore commend this bill to the House. Thank you.

HARETE HIPANGO (National—Whanganui): Mr Speaker, with the leave of yourself, I invite that the members’ address on this piece of legislation be deferred to the next sitting of the House because, understandably, there’s a much more compelling matter that is to be addressed before the House.

SPEAKER: Well, I would like the member to keep going until 4 o’clock, which was the agreed time. Thank you.

HARETE HIPANGO: Accordingly, Mr Speaker, with your leave, it is a healthy matter that I rise as the last National Party speaker to address and take a brief call in the House in the first reading of the bill.

It’s also quite appropriate in this instance to address the House in the vein and vernacular of a smear and disclose campaign as I speak to the bill, whilst also reflecting on what led to the National Cervical Screening Programme—an unfortunate experiment. The Cartwright inquiry of 1987 to 1988: the watershed moment in patients’ rights, not only in New Zealand but globally, leading and paving the way towards a patient-centred healthcare system and establishing a system of accountability to patients.

The implementation of a successful national cervical screening programme in New Zealand has led to a dramatic reduction in deaths from cervical cancer. However, currently the process to access information from the National Cervical Screening Programme register—[Interruption]

SPEAKER: Order! Order! Please. There’s a lot of noise.

HARETE HIPANGO: —for those dedicated health professionals who provide services to our new—

SPEAKER: Order! I will now interrupt the member. In accordance with the determination of the Business Committee, I call on the Rt Hon Bill English to make his valedictory statement, but note that the matter that we were just discussing is set down for further consideration on the next sitting day.

Debate interrupted.

Valedictory Statements

Rt Hon BILL ENGLISH (National): The Parliamentary Library tells me I’ve spoken 1,000 times in the House and answered or asked 2,000 questions and answers. I suspect I’ve made probably about 10,000 interjections, 23 of which were witty. Enough of the numbers.

The strongest feeling I have today, in this last speech, is gratitude. That is gratitude for the opportunities that I’ve had and for the many people I’ve served with but, most importantly, for the many moments of connection and witness to the lives of others, which I believe is the deepest privilege of public life—to see the joy of their achievement, to see the courage in their suffering, and to be grateful for the strength and the wisdom given to me by so many.

I can say, today, that it almost didn’t happen. When I was the National Party candidate in 1990 for the Wallace electorate, and not really that well-organised, I had a brilliant plan to lodge my nomination form at the electoral office at 4 o’clock, one hour—a whole hour—before the deadline at 5 o’clock, in Gore. About 11 o’clock in the morning, I visited the Christie household—Richard and Julie—to get them to sign my nomination form, and on the way out, one of them casually mentioned that they’d heard on the radio the deadline was midday.

I whipped round to the electoral office. A very stern lady said to me, “Yes, it’s midday, and there are no exceptions.”, and I found myself stranded in Gore with enough signatures but not the deposit. I had no cheque book and no card. I stood paralysed in the middle of the street, and then had a brainwave and ran into my bank, the trustee savings bank. I walked up to the cashier and I said, “Give me $200 cash—now.” She started asking a few awkward questions that I couldn’t really deal with, like “Do you have a cheque or a withdrawal form?”, I said, “No.”, and she went off and got the manager. As it turned out, the manager was a member of the National Party—as many of them were—and he said, “Look, just give him the bloody money. We’ll sort it out later.”, and I got round to the electoral office, literally, at 11.55 a.m.

If the manager had followed the rules, if any number of other things were to have happened, the new MP for the Wallace electorate would have been Dougal Soper, Labour, because I wouldn’t have appeared on the ballot, and I would have spent the rest of my life driving trucks in the outback of Australia.

I know I’m meant to be here, because a year or two after that—my large rural electorate used to have a lot of single-track gravel roads. One day, I was on the back road from Dipton to Mossburn, doing 120 kilometres an hour because I was late, as always. I came over the brow of a hill and right in front of me was a farm truck. I want to thank Mike Heenan, our near neighbour, because we both pulled the steering wheel the right way, and I ended up with a car that was a write-off, but still alive.

I could take you through all of my accidents, because there were a number of others. All I can say is that some of the political accidents I ran into were also from going too fast, that’s for sure.

When I first came here, Sir Robin Gray, who was the member for Clutha at that stage, said to me, “Never forget where you come from.” Well, you could never forget where Sir Robin came from because he had a very thick Scottish accent—that was where he was from.

Of course, where we come from is principally our families. My background, which I brought to politics, was rural and Catholic, and, in some respects, was an interesting mix that gave me as much familiarity with binder twine as with the beatitudes, and a love of shearing as well as a love of Latin. And then I married into the Scanlon family. Well, we had some things in common—faith and family—but they have a completely different tradition of New Zealand. Migrants from Samoa and Italy—theirs was a totally different world in which they lived, which we just called “town”, which was a generic word for anything bigger than Dipton.

But there’s not much that happened in these two families that didn’t happen to every New Zealander, because Mervyn and Norah English, who have passed away, and George and Jean Scanlon, who are here today, between them raised 25 children. Can I say, I am pleased you did not all accept the invitation. My children have 66 cousins, so far.

I remember the discussion with the officials when we were arranging the swearing-in when I became Prime Minister. They said, “Well, you can have the large one with the officials and the important people, and we’ll put out a whole lot of chairs and fill the room, or you can have the small family one.” I said, “Well, I think we’ll have the large family one, thank you.”, and 80 of them showed up on the day.

But what I learnt from these families is the grit and the effort that it takes to start in a new country, and the pride of hard-earned achievement. I want to thank them all for their constant support when I know there must have been times when they saw me on TV and weren’t quite so happy with what was said. But I do like to think that when I was at my best, I represented the best of them.

Of course, every family has its secrets. I was always pretty interested in politics. I can recall in 1987, in the Wairarapa seat, Reg Boorman held it by one vote on a recount. I found out that just on 7 o’clock, one of my sisters, who lived in the electorate, went in and voted Labour for the first time in her life. For those of you who knew my mother, you would know that to tell her would have been to destroy her. So we never did tell her, and now I’ve got it off my chest.

So that was my background with the families, but also from Dipton, or, to be more correct—for those who might be tuned in from Dipton—Dipton West. You won’t all be—

Hon Members: Ha, ha!

Rt Hon BILL ENGLISH: Well, there is a sign that says Dipton West. When I was being brought up, the town people lived in Dipton and the real country people were Dipton West. That’s how it was.

In my world, Sir Brian Talboys loomed large as the member for Wallace—followed by Derek Angus—and at quite a young age, I decided that I wanted his job. Unfortunately, I never grew up to be 6 foot 4 and as eloquent and as charming as Sir Brian, but I certainly enjoyed his company, because he lived in Winton the rest of his life after he retired from politics.

But I have to say, I never tired of representing the electorate. I never tired of its shifting beauty of the landscape. I must have flown from Wellington to Invercargill and back a thousand times, literally, as I counted up a marvellous display of the vibrancy of our landscape. You looked out the window and it was never the same through those thousand trips, and I always admired the laconic determination of the people who make that place such a productive part of New Zealand.

So some of my views about politics were formed by events prior to coming to politics. I was farming, and I remember going to a large protest meeting in Lumsden that was addressed by now Sir Roger Douglas. I was hoping a couple of years later, when I found myself by myself in his office on a Sunday morning, eating Kentucky Fried Chicken and giving him advice as a Treasury official on the flat-tax package, that he wouldn’t recognise me—and I don’t think that he did.

But the lesson from that time, which was a time of severe impact on my community, was that New Zealand should never get into that situation where the only choice—and it was the only choice—was massive, disruptive, and damaging restructuring. And I’m pleased that years later, when I had the opportunity as a policy maker, we acted in a way that meant we could avoid that kind of disruption.

The other lesson was that to achieve that, you let people see what actually happens. If you’re a small, open economy, they need to be able to see the prices. I was farming. We were getting wool and meat subsidies, supplementary minimum prices, which enabled us to pay the then 20 percent interest rates. It was all quite misleading. It’s better to back people so that they can make the changes that they need to make.

If I can point to a contrast in my time, when the first freezing works closed in Southland, at Ocean Beach, it was a massively difficult and disruptive event. A couple of thousand people were out of work. The last one that closed, in Mataura—I can remember working with Tracy Hicks, the Mayor of Gore, to get ourselves set up to deal with the fallout, and there was none. People went and found jobs. This was in the 2000s. Our community had become resilient and capable and able to deal with the pressures and changes, and I’m proud of them for that.

Of course, I had in that community my own National Party volunteers, and I want to thank my four electorate chairs who are here today: Graham Drummond, Ailsa Smaill, Kate Hazlett, and Nigel Moore. We all know, as MPs, that our volunteers are the beating heart of political activism. In the National Party, the electorate chairs do the meetings—and the miles, in a large rural electorate—and I want to register my appreciation for them.

I also want to thank the National Party and its recent presidents Judy Kirk and Peter Goodfellow and Greg Hamilton, who, along with Steven Joyce, rebuilt what was a shattered organisation in the early 2000s into the successful, well-organised, and functioning political body that it is now.

I thank also the thousands of volunteers, particularly those who showed up at the 2017 election. It was a pleasure to show up in that campaign and find that after three terms in Government, when a party has usually run its course and lost its energy, that had not happened. That’s what leaves us with an Opposition of strength and spirit.

Can I, in that context, congratulate my successor, Simon Bridges. Simon, you have my full support. You have the qualities to be a very effective political leader, and I know that the discussions we had in our caucus in the lead-up to this changeover have meant that you have the best-possible start.

One of the funny things about politics is that you get to know people without necessarily being their friends. I can still remember at our first caucus meeting in 1990, when we handed out the silver plates, a couple of senior members of my party leaving the caucus room and greeting each other outside the caucus room—and I just happened to see this in a moment—in a way that indicated to me that despite their long years of service together, they didn’t really know each other that well in a personal sense.

I’ve been fortunate to have had some real friends who’ve come through with me—that is, Nick Smith, Roger Sowry, and Tony Ryall. We all started together as part of an intake of 37—a colourful bunch, I have to say. We were kind of the secondary school students, I suppose, or certainly regarded that way. The four of us have had opposing views on everything, from conscience issues to leadership coups. The real test, though, has been 27 years of family holidays together, where we’ve managed to create a tradition for ourselves and our families that keeps us bound, whatever our political views.

I can recall Nick in our 1990 caucus, which still included Rob Muldoon, giving a speech as part of his campaign against the—well, to shrink MPs’ superannuation. He’s not so sure about it now, but when he was 18, it all looked pretty straightforward—sorry, 25. When he sat down, Rob Muldoon stood up and said, “Well, some doctors make you well, and some doctors make you sick.”

He didn’t just pick on Nick, though. One day I got in the lift, and he knew my mother reasonably well—who was one of the few people that he was a bit scared of, I think. And he said to me—in his accent—“How’s your mother?”, and I said, “She’s fine, Sir Robert.”, shaking in my shoes. And he replied, “Pity you weren’t.” So that was it.

And I can remember Roger standing in the House, arguing against the bill that was going to allow for the invalid’s benefit to continue to be paid to paralympians. Don McKinnon, as Leader of the House, did a deal in the middle of the speech where we switched sides and we were now going to support the bill, and, without blinking, Roger changed his speech halfway through in support of the bill. Now, those of you who know Roger know he’s not usually that flexible and reasonable.

One of the most enjoyable nights I ever had in this House was with Tony Ryall, who, in the boredom of a long session of urgency, came in the door mimicking a certain MP and we had to guess who it was, which we did correctly. So he went back round and kept coming in and did a fantastic job—including, Mr Speaker, that kind of threatening, bikie gang - type thing that you used to do back in the early 1990s. You’re such a grandfatherly sort these days.

Through the 1990s, actually, most of my focus was on health, where I’d become a parliamentary under-secretary in 1993, which I regarded as very important, and I was actually involved through to being the Minister in 1999—so, six years. It was a tumultuous period as we moved to MMP, and I want to recognise the leadership of Jim Bolger through that time. It was about as tough a political environment as you could possibly have. He woke up one morning to find that a number of his MPs, including a Cabinet Minister, had gone off to found another party—rather surprising, and a bit of an indictment on the whips, I suppose. He was then followed by Jenny Shipley.

The strong impression I have from that time in my role was that that was when we were having the deinstitutionalisation—that ugly word—of our mental health and intellectually handicapped children services. Gore Hospital still had a psychopaedic ward when I became the MP in 1990, and I found myself, both as an MP—as all MPs did—but particularly as a Minister, working with the abused and the traumatised, the victims and the perpetrators. This included the families involved in a mass shooting at Raurimu, where a young man who was being treated as part of our mental health services shot six people up in Raurimu, and I had to visit his mother and him. What I learnt from that is the Government can do harm, particularly to the most vulnerable, if it’s not incredibly sensitive to their needs.

I was proud of the new forms of health provision that were fostered then. Māori and Pacific providers took off. Some of them are here today, actually—people I worked with then, including Tariana Turia, before she got into politics—and now they have become, many of them, the basis of Whānau Ora. It gives one a great deal of satisfaction to think that something that happened 20 years previously turns out to be useful as a basis for further progress later.

Hospitals were a big issue—small, rural hospitals, which, in the early 1990s, still had surgeons in them. Some of you may remember the Hands Around Our Hospitals protests in Balclutha—a town of 5,000 to 7,000 people marched against the closure of the hospital. I recall being under a bit of pressure in a Grey Power meeting in Gore, and I lost my cool and said, “We should bulldoze the bloody thing and build a new one.”, and, actually, that’s what we did. I’m proud to say that in the South, all of the small health services outside of Dunedin and Invercargill hospitals are in community ownership, and I have to say they’ve never been better run, more stable, and more secure for their communities.

The idea that Government has to run everything to make it work is simply wrong, and, in small communities, it is almost certainly not the answer to have third-level managers running your services for you. If I had one shortfall on that, it’s that I didn’t manage to get the Queenstown hospital into that structure, because it would be a much better facility than it is today if it wasn’t in public ownership.

All of this now, of course, seems a long time ago—particularly to my children, who are sitting in the gallery. I realised a couple of years ago that they don’t know everything that happened. One day when I was at home, I came down the stairs and into the kitchen, and my kickboxing-trained son said to me, “Surely not.” I said, “What do you mean?” “Surely, you are not the skinny old white guy in that boxing fight on TV.” He had, coincidently, happened to turn on Sky TV and there was a rerun of the 2002 Fight for Life. For politicians who think no arguments have been had before, that was about raising money for youth suicide, which had affected my family very directly.

That was a fantastic experience. My coach was Chris Kenny, and when I went out to his gym in Tītahi Bay, he was keen to get in the ring—and he wasn’t a young man; he was an older guy—and spar. I said to him one day, “Chris, why are you so keen to get in the ring?”, and he said, “Mate, it’s cos you’re a Tory and I want to hit you.”—which made you look a bit gentle, Mr Speaker. He did say to me, “I don’t think I’ve ever met a National-voting person in my life.”, and I was it.

I did go out there one day and he had two of these young guys there for sparring. One of them hopped in the ring, and he was a very organised and, clearly, expert fighter and gave me the odd pop here and there—pretty restrained. Then he hopped out and the next one hopped in and took to me, in a pretty devastating manner, actually. I said to him, at the end of a shortened round, “Mate, what’s going on?” He said, “Well, that’s my brother, and he’s in the Commonwealth Games team. I didn’t get in and I’m a bit hacked off about it.”

So there were a couple of lessons out of that, and I went home with a headache and a blood nose on my shirt that night. One lesson was politicians get blamed for everything—that’s for sure. The second one, though, was it turned out—and I mean this in a reasonably serious way, actually—to be a great practice run for the 2002 election and the period beyond for me, because the composure that I learnt under the tutelage of this hard-core Labour supporter about how to stay composed while you’re taking the punches made all the difference to the capacity to lead my party through a very difficult period. And that’s just one of many examples of the way in which, I think, those of us in public life can be inspired unexpectedly.

I have to say, though, I was grateful for the opportunity to get back up again in 2006 and join a fantastic team. Under John Key, along with my colleagues Steven Joyce, Gerry Brownlee—Murray McCully was there—Paula Bennett, and others, it was a pleasure to go to work every day, and I must compliment John in his absence. As I’ve said before, he was almost as good as he said he was, some days. But he did have a relentless optimism, which was not just in front of the TV camera; it was in dealing with every person, every day, on every detail, about every issue, and I think it had, in my view, an effect for New Zealand in raising its confidence about its ability to handle the world as it was.

And, of course, the world as it was was pretty messy. Can I also acknowledge the efforts of Gerry Brownlee through the Christchurch rebuild. As a finance Minister, the danger, of course, is an open cheque—who knew what would happen? There was never a moment when I didn’t know that Gerry was getting a balance of what needed to happen with what it cost, but, more importantly—and I think this is a testament to his character—he never once mentioned his personal circumstances, which I discovered, years later, were very difficult. A remarkable tribute to a sense of selflessness that was required to do what he did.

I used to worry a bit when he argued with the engineers, I must say. They would say this—and here was the engineering report about the liquefaction—and Gerry would go, “No, that’s a load of rubbish. Don’t believe that.” An excellent education at St Bede’s—I’m sure that’s what did it.

But that was in the financial crisis, and my job was to understand what was going on, to understand what the decision makers were doing—and, of course, it was a global crisis, so that meant global decision makers—and to help explain to New Zealanders how we were going to find our way through what looked to be very difficult circumstances. Now, of course, the main decision makers turned out to be Reserve Bank Governors. Now, if there’s people put on earth to make finance Ministers look interesting and charismatic, it’s Reserve Bank Governors. I think Graeme Wheeler may be here today—he knows what I mean.

Now, that made monetary policy interesting. I won’t bore you with monetary policy, but there were a few interesting—

Hon Member: Oh, go on!

Rt Hon BILL ENGLISH: Well, there’s a few interesting details. The staff who get you a cup of tea and look after you in the Bank of England are middle-aged men who wear pink jackets. It’s quite striking. The other thing that’s striking is that the chief adviser on monetary policy to Ben Bernanke, who, basically, made the decisions that mattered, was Bill English, who was 7 foot tall—not me. I did get a text from an American friend of mine, very excited to find out on the front page of the New York Times that the Federal Reserve Governor was listening to my advice.

Well, I met all these people, and occasionally I gave them advice, but one of the most touching moments was with Mario Draghi, the Governor of the European Central Bank in incredibly difficult political circumstances. We were scheduled for a 20-minute meeting that ran on to about an hour. One of his staff came in to stop it, and he felt like he had to explain, so he said, “This is the only person who’s come in here in the last six months who hasn’t tried to tell me what to do.” And I think that’s part of the New Zealand way of exerting influence: to listen, to engage—because, in fact, we don’t matter most of the time—but, in fact, people occasionally listen to us when we say something.

My job was to also raise debt. We were running up debt in New Zealand to pay to keep our benefit levels up, to keep our services running, and to rebuild Christchurch, and so I had to go out and tell our story. There was one moment, though, where I got a bit frustrated. After about three nights on planes, while talking to some 28-year-old in Boston, I think it was, who indicated he wasn’t particularly interested, really, I said to him, “Do you know where New Zealand is?”, and he said, “Yeah. On our list it’s between Netherlands and Namibia.”—which is not actually correct. It’s between Netherlands and Nicaragua.

But you don’t have to go that far to have a problem. I went to Australia as part of this, and I remember having a quite intense discussion with a group of people, all about the New Zealand economy. They were reasonably interested and quite engaged, and on the way out, one of them patted me on the back and said, “Mate, it’s great to know things are going OK in Tasmania.”—a reminder of how small New Zealand is and how important it is that we have a positive story to tell to the world, because it is a financial reality that we borrow money from them, and we need that to keep ourselves going.

In all these endeavours, I’ve been supported by excellent staff who were capable and good-humoured, and any politician who’s worth their salt knows how important staff are. I’ve worked with dozens of people, but there were some who were core, particularly through that period—Eileen O’Leary, Craig Howie, Paul Dyer, Grant Fleming, Matt Burgess, Cam Burrows, and Grant Johnston—and before that, in Opposition, in the tough times, Tim Grafton, Sue Foley, Bevan Graham, and Jason Eade. I’ve always enjoyed working with the staff. I always think that the best way to get the best product, the best decisions, in politics is to be open to anyone telling you what they think, because everyone’s got something that you should listen to.

I’ve also worked with many excellent public servants. Sometimes they’re really useful. When I was Minister of Health, my office got a panicked call from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, who told my receptionist, “The Minister’s kids are out on the roof of his house.” They were just over the fence from Bolton Street, where we were living, and my kids had indeed gone up, opened a window, climbed out on to the roof, and were sitting there sunning themselves—while the public servants had their hearts in their mouths—and they all got back in safely. But they did a lot of other useful things, as well.

Hon Paula Bennett: The kids?

Rt Hon BILL ENGLISH: Oh no, not my kids. Actually, I’ve been looking at the Wellington rents lately, and all I want to say is it’s not always going to be free!

One of the mild frustrations of being a finance Minister is that you get involved in a whole lot of things that people don’t understand about because it’s not of media interest or you’ve got the wrong label, and particularly that was the case for me. One of the areas where I spent an enormous amount of time—from which I’ve gained great satisfaction—is work with Māori and with the iwi leaders group. It was intense, and we developed, in what I think typifies New Zealand’s flexible constitutional development, a practical and pragmatic solution to the idea of Treaty partnership, without the courts and without too many academics. Actually, none have shown any interest whatsoever in this. Even though they write books about it, they don’t know what’s actually happened. But 8.5, the Cabinet committee room, which the new Government will now be familiar with—the only other people who came in there, apart from us and the officials, were the iwi leaders group. It was the most efficient, focused, and accountable process I’ve been part of in Government in the whole 27 years, and it gives me great optimism, actually, for New Zealand. I thank Amohaere Houkamau for her commitment and integrity over 9 years supporting this process and liaising with the Māori Party.

In fact, when you look at events around the world, I’m increasingly of the view that New Zealand’s ability to deal with cultural difference is going to become a strategic advantage, not just to us but relative to the rest of the world. We see deep, sophisticated cultures such as Europe struggling with issues that we have grappled with intensively for 30 years. I want to acknowledge the work of Sir Doug Graham and Chris Finlayson and Jim Bolger—in particular, those three—around the settlements, and Chris’s extraordinary effort in recent years.

You know, I’ve been going to Waitangi for 27 years. I’ve seen the Governor-General spat on and the flag tramped on, felt the palpable threat of violence, and seen the head-butting—some of it pre-emptive and very impressive, I must say, and I’m pleased I never had to learn how to do it quite like that. The reason it’s manageable now is because much of the tension has been dealt with—not buried, but dealt with—and I want to pay tribute to the iwi leaders.

In another lesson—another inspiration—we were about to sign an agreement, and one of the kaumātua said he’d spent the night walking the street. I asked why, and he said it was because of the burden of responsibility of giving up the grievance and being accountable to future generations for that. And you realise the courage of these people, who, in a multigenerational context, made a decision that is good for them but even better for New Zealand.

I want to acknowledge that generation who made the settlements but also the generation that’s come after them, who are such impressive, bicultural, bilingual, organised, focused people, but, most particularly, with a strong sense of purpose. In that context, can I also acknowledge the Māori Party. We worked on some pretty tough issues for a long time. I think it was a political mistake on behalf of Māoridom to vote them out. They’ll learn, they’ll re-learn, and they’ll change again, and I’m pretty sure of that. They don’t want to go back to the way it used to be—but Tariana Turia, Pita Sharples, and my friend Te Ururoa Flavell, who’s here today.

For those of you who may not have noticed, the other focus I developed as a finance Minister, and would have put a lot of time into as a Prime Minister, is social investment. Why does it matter? Well, I referred earlier to the harm I’d seen done in the 1990s by Government institutions to so many people, and we’re now—20 years on, going on 30 years on—going to have a royal commission into all of that, which will tell us what we already know. But the conclusion will be this: Government looks after the weakest worst. It does the worst job for the weakest, and I’ve never understood the argument that the structure of delivering a service matters more than the people to whom you deliver it.

You know, at the core of my belief—and it comes from Catholic theology and, to some extent, National Party principles—is the utter integrity of the individual person, their importance, and our obligation to them to ensure that they can realise their aspirations and their full humanity, and much of what Government does does not do that. That’s a shame, because I’ve never met a person, in 27 years, who had no hope—never, not one—including the worst of our offenders, and I’ve met them. There’s always some hope. In fact, often that’s all they have.

So that’s why I, in my small opportunity to do so, injected into the Public Service, at least, the word “customer”—mainly because they hate it. They don’t like that word. Who thinks they’re a customer of government? Well, in the real world, they have choices, they have preferences, so why can’t someone with multiple disabilities have choices and have preferences? Why do they have to put up with what we give them, or what some professional group says is the way the service should be, and why say that you can’t do something different because it might undermine the integrity of the service? Well, what about the integrity of the person? What about them? Actually, that’s who we are here for, and my sense of that over 27 years of public service is stronger, actually, than it’s ever been.

I used to tell this story, which I’ll tell again. It’s from the Auckland City Mission, which tracked a hundred families. They interviewed them every couple of weeks for a year, and they created this case study. It was a solo mum with a child with disabilities, and after everything she did in two weeks, she said at the end of it, “Absolutely stuffed. I’ve visited 23 agencies. There was one that treated me with respect, knew my story, helped me, gave me a cup of coffee. It was Instant Finance.” We’re getting outdone on compassion by the people who charge 37 percent a month.

You know, that’s telling, and if there’s anything I want to leave as a lesson here, it is the dangerous complacency of good intentions. There’s too much of it in New Zealand—that, somehow, if you say you mean well, that’s going to make a difference. Well, actually, it can cause damage, because you’re not actually talking about what actually happened. The services we provide are not about us; they’re about those people. The only measure of it is whether it changes their lives—whether we reduce the misery—but we have a system built still too much on servicing that misery.

So, social investment will roll on because ideas are powerful. Knowledge is powerful—more powerful than Governments. Now people know it can be different—enough of them—and I want to compliment, particularly, those brave public servants. We had a fantastic time doing some of the hardest stuff, because it’s hard to do, and I must say, if it was as easy as just giving money—I used to think of this as a Minister of Finance. If I believed every claim made to me and my predecessors about the benefit of the next $100 million, there’d be no problems in New Zealand—none. They would have all been gone 20 years ago. The fact is most of those claims are wrong, because the people claiming it’ll make a difference have no idea, and they never go back and see whether it made that kind of difference.

So I think, as you can see, I’ve never quite lost my energy for that one. Really, the only regret, I suppose, I have after 27 years is that we were ready to do some good stuff if we’d been re-elected, but that’s politics. You get great opportunities without having to earn them, and they can be taken away just as easily.

I could go on. The temptation of a valedictory is to give the policy speech that you thought you could have all given, summarising everything that you wanted to say, but I’m not going to do that.

I just want to finish with a few remarks, particularly acknowledging my family, who are here today. Mary, my love, I can’t put into words what I owe you for your strength and support and keeping me anchored in our family. To you and to Luke, Thomas, Maria, Rory, Bart, and Xavier, this was our adventure—[Drinks water] excuse me; they told me not to do that—particularly 2017 and the campaign, where I discovered that our rule of having no politics at home hadn’t worked. That was our rule.

We shifted the family to Wellington and made a couple of rules: no politics on Sunday, go home for tea every night—so I have not eaten in Bellamy’s for 20 years—and we don’t talk about politics when I get home because there’s plenty of other stuff to talk about. I discovered that, actually, they’d been reading the paper, surfing the internet, and had developed political views of their own, some of which are wrong. But it’s our togetherness that matters, and the great gift of me leaving politics will be that we can re-craft that sense of togetherness.

I want to just finish with a quote from James K Baxter that I’ve always liked. It’s from his poem called “New Zealand”, where the first line is

These unshaped islands, on the sawyer’s bench,

Wait for the chisel of the mind,

On March 13, when I officially resign—it feels like you leave the building about six times when you’re going; six last times—it will be 10,000 days since I was elected, and I want to acknowledge my brother Conor, who pointed that out to me. Ten thousand days since I was elected, and I’m satisfied that, every day, I took my turn at the chisel.

Waiata

[Applause]

The House adjourned at 4.47 p.m.