Thursday, 9 May 2019

THURSDAY, 9 MAY 2019

THURSDAY, 9 MAY 2019

The Speaker took the Chair at 2 p.m.

Prayers.

Business Statement

Business Statement

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Leader of the House): Today, the House adjourns until Tuesday, 21 May. On that day, the annual review debate will resume, and the Climate Change Response (Zero Carbon) Amendment Bill will receive its first reading. Wednesday, 22 May will be a members’ day. On Thursday, 23 May, the Ngā Rohe Moana o Ngā Hapū o Ngāti Porou Bill (No 2) will complete its passage through the House, and the Privacy Bill will be read a second time.

Visitors

United Kingdom—Parliament, Welsh Affairs Committee

SPEAKER: I’m sure that members would wish to welcome members of the Welsh Affairs Committee from the Parliament of the United Kingdom, led by the Chairperson Mr David Davies, who are present in the gallery.

[Applause]

Oral Questions

Questions to Ministers

Question No. 1—Education

1. JAN TINETTI (Labour) to the Minister of Education: Is he confident that recent incentives for teacher recruitment and training will address projected teacher shortages in coming years; if so, why?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Minister of Education): Yes. The Ministry of Education’s forecasted estimates of the number of additional teachers needed to meet demand are based on nothing additional being done to address teacher supply in the meantime. They show that, for primary, the gap was forecast to be closed by 2023, but, for secondary, we would need 2,210 additional teachers by 2025. What the Government has put in place since it came into office will provide funding to attract an additional 4,000 primary and secondary teachers over the next four years, and that does not include the 1,500 teachers who have been supported to undertake refresher training.

Jan Tinetti: What other claims has he heard in regards to the number of teachers needed to meet demand?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: It has been claimed that up to 8,000 additional teachers are needed by 2025 using that same forecast data. It appears that calculation has been done by adding together each year on top of the other, which is wrong. These annual figures are not compounding. If a single role is not filled for two years in a row, we don’t need to recruit two additional teachers to fill the one role. As I’ve said, with the ministry forecast estimates of the number of teachers needed based on nothing being done to address supply for primary, that gap would be closed by 2023 in any event, and, for secondary, the gap is around 2,210.

Question No. 2—Prime Minister

2. Hon PAULA BENNETT (Deputy Leader—National) to the Prime Minister: Does she stand by all her Government’s statements, policies, and actions?

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Deputy Prime Minister) on behalf of the Prime Minister: Yes, in their context.

Hon Paula Bennett: Does the Government have a policy to build 100,000 affordable houses over 10 years?

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: Yes, on behalf of the Prime Minister, it most definitely does.

Hon Paula Bennett: Then why in recent days has the Prime Minister been reluctant to actually verify that it will be 100,000 houses over 10 years?

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: The reality is, in many businesses, getting the start-up is not so easy at the beginning, obviously. For example, in the Second World War, before the Battle of—[Interruption]

SPEAKER: Order!

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: Thank you, Mr Speaker. Before the Battle of El Alamein, we hadn’t won one battle and thereafter we didn’t lose one. And we will get going on this project. Of course, we are reconsidering it, and when we have made the decisions, we’ll announce them. The target of 100,000 over 10 years is easily achievable.

Hon Paula Bennett: Why, if she is confirming today that they are keeping the 100,000 target within 10 years, has her Minister been backing away from that target rapidly in the last few days and she herself in previous days has been reluctant to confirm it?

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: On behalf of the Prime Minister, I think, if you’re looking at the housing situation in this country, you’ve got to look at the problem holistically. Whether it’s tenements or housing, the greatest construction charge on right now is happening under this administration—the highest in a record 44-year performance. In that setting, KiwiBuild has got to be reconstructed as well.

Hon Paula Bennett: Is the Prime Minister aware that 1,000 State houses were completed in the 2017-18 financial year, practically double that of any previous year for which records are available, and that all of these houses were initiated under a previous National Government?

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: On behalf of the Prime Minister, I most definitely can’t confirm the premise behind that question, but I can say this: under that administration that she spoke for, 6,500 State houses were sold.

Hon Paula Bennett: What does she say in reply to the Deputy Prime Minister, who in January stated, “The reality is there are many in this Government who are seriously … committed to ensure we do meet our targets. I am going back to former Governments, where practical men who had never been to university, and women, decided they would get on with the job and get it done—and get it done we are.”?

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: On behalf of the Prime Minister, most definitely I agree with the Deputy Prime Minister’s statement, which was not just aspirational but the intention is to make this country great again.

Question No. 3—Housing and Urban Development

3. Hon JUDITH COLLINS (National—Papakura) to the Minister of Housing and Urban Development: Does the Government continue to pledge to build 100,000 affordable homes over the next 10 years, through its KiwiBuild programme, as stated in the Speech from the Throne?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD (Minister of Housing and Urban Development): There has been no change to the pledge since the Speech from the Throne. As I said yesterday, Cabinet will consider the KiwiBuild reset in June, and it’s inappropriate for me to speculate on what Cabinet may or may not decide. What has changed is that the housing market and the programme need to respond. When we came to office, we stopped the sale of existing homes to foreign buyers and we closed tax loopholes, and we know that this has had an impact because first-home buyers now make up 24 percent of the market and wages are now growing faster than house prices.

Hon Judith Collins: Then why did he tell the media yesterday that the target was like American nuclear ships: it is a “neither confirm nor deny situation”?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: Simply because we said that we would review the KiwiBuild programme and, in fact, the entire housing programme. Cabinet has yet to make decisions, and it’s inappropriate for me to speculate on what Cabinet may or may not decide, but, meanwhile, we are getting on with building affordable houses, State houses, and housing the homeless.

Hon Judith Collins: What responsibility does he take for the design of KiwiBuild that he took to Cabinet in December 2017, which he has now told us has to be reset?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: Of course, as the Minister, I take responsibility, but this is not an easy thing to do. If it was easy, perhaps the former Government might’ve had a crack at it. It’s a difficult thing. No Government in 40 years has tried to do what we are doing, and that is work with the private sector to build affordable houses.

Hon Judith Collins: Is it acceptable for him to sign contracts worth around $700 million for housing and then, when these contracts start falling over, to, essentially, explain that he’s going to have to reset and is just learning on the job?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: Well, first, I don’t sign the contracts. Second, those contracts are not falling over; they are delivering affordable houses.

Hon Judith Collins: Can any policy that doesn’t include a target to build 100,000 houses really be called KiwiBuild when the first words of his first press release that he put out on KiwiBuild were “The Government’s KiwiBuild initiative will deliver 100,000 affordable houses over the next 10 years”?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: We are not deterred by the teething problems that KiwiBuild has faced. We are committed to building affordable houses. We will do everything in our power as a Government to turn the market around, to give young Kiwi families the opportunity they’ve been denied for the last decade, and we’re not ashamed about working with private industry to deliver those outcomes.

Hon Chris Hipkins: What reports has he seen on recent positive changes in the housing market that affect potential first-home buyers?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: When we came to office, we stopped the sale of existing homes to foreign buyers and we closed the tax loopholes that turbocharged property speculation. We know this has had an impact because first-home buyers now make up 24 percent of the market, the highest share of the market since 2007, and overseas buyers have dropped by 81 percent. I’ve seen reports recently that wages are now growing faster than house prices. This compares to 2016, when house prices rose 16 percent and wages rose just 1.8 percent. This Government’s sound economic management means that mortgage rates are as low as they’ve been in a very long time.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: How could the overseas buyership have dropped by 81 percent when the previous Government claimed their influence to be only 3 percent?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: Well, the previous Government denied that overseas buyers were having any kind of—

SPEAKER: Order! Order! I’ve sort of worked out there’s no responsibility for that, and the maths is a bit questionable too, frankly.

Hon Judith Collins: So how many of the first-home buyers over the last 18 months that he’s referred to have accessed the HomeStart programme established by National rather than the KiwiBuild programme established by himself?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: Well, I think it’s pretty obvious to most people that the HomeStart programme has been going for a while, and we support it. The KiwiBuild programme is just getting off the ground, and believe me, KiwiBuild, HomeStart, and all the other things that this Government is committed to doing will make a massive difference, because we are standing up for young first-home buyers in a way that that Government never ever did for nine years.

Hon Judith Collins: Does the Minister stand by his statement to media last year, when questioned on the design of the KiwiBuild programme, that he offered to “stake his job” on its success, and if he does, then has he offered his resignation to the Prime Minister yet?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: I have not, because I’m utterly focused on getting the reset of KiwiBuild right, and I take a lot of pride, as do all my colleagues in the Government, in what we are achieving across the whole housing programme. We’ve got more than 2,000 new public houses built since we’ve been in Government. That is a huge achievement. We have increased the amount of emergency and transitional housing. We stopped the sell-off of State housing that that Government was doing. That Government reduced the number of State houses by 6,500 in the middle of a housing crisis. We’re committed to increasing the stock of State housing by 6,500 in our first four years.

Question No. 4—Workplace Relations and Safety

4. KIERAN McANULTY (Labour) to the Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety: What changes to employment law came into effect this week?

Hon IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety): The most substantial parts of the Employment Relations Amendment Act came into force on Monday. These changes rebalance our employment relations system by reinstating workers’ rights to tea breaks, restoring the balance in collective bargaining, restoring protection for vulnerable workers, and limiting 90-day trials to businesses with fewer than 20 employees. This Government is delivering for working people and putting a human face on capitalism.

Kieran McAnulty: Why make the changes?

Hon IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY: This is a Government that believes that everyone deserves a fair day’s pay for a fair day’s work, and these changes will help achieve that. They achieve the right balance: providing strong safeguards and rights to workers while maintaining certainty and flexibility for employers.

Kieran McAnulty: What further changes are planned?

Hon IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY: Next week, the Education and Workforce Committee is due to report back the historic Equal Pay Amendment Bill. We are well under way on increasing the minimum wage to $20 per hour. Officials are doing excellent work to progress fair pay agreements and film industry changes. Alongside this, the Government is supporting businesses through R & D tax credits and the Provincial Growth Fund. This Government is building a productive, sustainable, and inclusive economy that delivers good jobs, decent work conditions, and fair wages.

Question No. 5—Finance

5. DAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT) to the Minister of Finance: Does he agree with Baker Tilly Staples Rodway that Tax Freedom Day 2019 is five days later than when his Government took office because taxes have grown faster than the economy, and what plans, if any, does he have to reduce the tax burden faced by New Zealanders?

Hon Dr DAVID CLARK (Associate Minister of Finance) on behalf of the Minister of Finance: No. The Government is acting already to reduce the pressure on New Zealand families and businesses through the $5.5 billion Families Package, through putting an end to unnecessary secondary tax, through the introduction of the R & D tax credit, through making the tax system fairer by targeting multinationals, and through cutting ACC levies to save businesses and their customers $100 million over the next two years; while, at the same time, increasing investment in our roads and rail, rebuilding our rundown hospitals and schools, investing in our regions, and investing in more police, more nurses, and more teachers to fix the deficits and the mess left after nine long years of neglect.

David Seymour: Is the Minister denying the most basic mathematical fact that the percentage of GDP taken by Government is now higher than it was two years ago?

Hon Dr DAVID CLARK: One reason the tax take is growing is because more people are employed under the coalition Government than under the previous Government. That has boosted PAYE returns. Another reason is that companies are generating higher profits under this Government. One reason for a rising nominal tax take is because of more economic activity.

David Seymour: Does the Minister believe that it helps New Zealand’s competitiveness to have Government taking a larger share of the economy than key trading partners such as Australia and the United States?

Hon Dr DAVID CLARK: If the member is now advocating for a tax system like Australia’s, that is indeed interesting to me. It means, obviously, that he’s now in favour of a top personal tax rate of 47 percent, and he’s probably also advocating for a capital gains tax.

Question No. 6—Transport

6. Hon PAUL GOLDSMITH (National) to the Minister of Transport: What major transport projects, if any, have been delayed, significantly modified, or cancelled since his Government took office?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD (Minister of Transport): As the member knows, the prioritisation of projects is a matter for the New Zealand Transport Agency based on the priorities in the Government policy statement. However, I’m able to advise the member that no major transport projects that were under construction have been cancelled. The New Zealand Transport Agency re-evaluated 12 projects, including the East-West Link, which would have cost an eye-watering $327 million per kilometre. Instead, motorists will see upgrades like median barriers and intersection upgrades and shoulder widening being rolled out across 670 kilometres of our State Highway network to save lives.

Hon Paul Goldsmith: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker.

SPEAKER: Yes, I’m not surprised.

Hon Paul Goldsmith: I asked, “What major projects”. He told me there were 12, but that’s not very helpful.

SPEAKER: Well, I think the Minister—I don’t really want him to expand, because the answer was longer than necessary, but if he got directly to the answer for the areas for which he is responsible, he would be more helpful to the House.

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: The list of projects that have been re-evaluated include: Whangarei to Te Hana, Cambridge to Piarere, Pokeno to Mangatarata, Piarere to Tauriko, Waihi to Omokoroa, Te Puna to Omokoroa, Katikati Urban, Tauriko West, Ōtaki to north of Levin, Pētone to Grenada, and the Melling Interchange.

Hon Paul Goldsmith: So what new major transport projects that have been designed to reduce congestion on our roads have been started since his Government took office?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: We have filled the $5.9 billion hole that the last Government left in Auckland’s transport plan, which includes projects like Mill Road, rapid bus services from Pāuanui to the airport, and the Eastern Busway, and Penlink, which are all funded and due to go ahead. We funded and futureproofed the City Rail Link in Auckland, after the last Government didn’t even adjust its costings for inflation or leave a contingency. The Transport Agency is now actually fulfilling its regulatory responsibilities to keep the public safe on the roads. Our Government is getting on with fixing the long-term issues in transport to save lives and get our cities moving again.

Hon Paul Goldsmith: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. Again, I asked a simple question—“What new major projects have been started?”—he didn’t list any. He listed existing ones that hadn’t been started.

SPEAKER: I think he listed one road project, and I’m not going to get into trying to establish, from the Chair, whether a project is a new project or not. The Minister is responsible for his answer.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Can I ask the Minister: on becoming the Minister responsible, in his first month, with respect to the much-vaunted four-lane highway between Whangarei and Te Hana, how many dollars had been allocated to that plan?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: Well, that’s very interesting. The answer to that question is that the National Party had promised a four-lane expressway from Wellsford to Whangarei that would have cost $5 billion—more than the entire transport spend in one year—and not a single dollar was budgeted for.

Hon Paul Goldsmith: Does he have any sympathy for Kiwis stuck in traffic, who have seen 12 major projects delayed or downgraded but not one new project actually started?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: Well, here is the number of roads that are being built: the Manawatū Gorge replacement route, Mt Messenger Bypass, the State Highway 1 loop road in Northland, the Matakana link road, the Awakino tunnel bypass, the Gills Road upgrade, and the Horsham Downs link road. The difference between our two polices is that we’re investing billions of dollars across the entire transport system instead of pumping 40 percent of the transport budget into five handpicked, gold-plated expressway projects, which is what that Government did when it was in office—highway projects that carried only 4 percent of vehicle journeys.

Hon Paul Goldsmith: Speaking of gold-plated—

SPEAKER: Order!

Hon Paul Goldsmith: Sorry, Mr Speaker. Have the light-rail projects from City to Māngere and City to North West, for which he announced $1.8 billion seed funding in May 2018, been delayed, reset, or recalibrated?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: The light-rail projects in Auckland, which are part of our Government’s commitment to building modern transport systems in our major cities, relieving congestion and giving people genuine choices to move around our urban areas—those projects in Auckland—are to be considered by Cabinet and they will be considered, but they are part of a commitment that we have to fix the urban transport systems and the deficit in infrastructure that we inherited from that party.

Hon Chris Hipkins: Could all of the roads promised by the previous Government have been funded within the context of the Land Transport Fund over the next three years or within the current term of Parliament without any increase in fuel tax, as has been claimed by some?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: The promises of State highways that were made by that party in the lead-up to the last election—

SPEAKER: Order! Areas for which the Minister’s responsible, please.

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: It would not have been possible to fund the projects that the member refers to without a very significant increase in fuel taxes and road-user charges. The Ministry of Transport advised the former Government that it would have taken a hefty increase in petrol taxes and road-user charges, and the former Minister Simon Bridges received that advice on the eve of the last election.

Hon Paul Goldsmith: Is the reason that the release of the business case for the light rail down Dominion Road has been delayed because they can’t find anybody to come up with a strong business case that stacks up?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: No.

Hon Paul Goldsmith: Does he agree with Auckland councillor Mike Lee’s assessment “Mr Twyford’s version of light rail is KiwiBuild on wobbly wheels.”?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: Well, it won’t surprise the member to know that I don’t agree with Mike Lee, but I’m sure that the member understands there are literally dozens of cities around the world right now who are building rapid transit systems, including light rail—six current light-rail rapid transport systems are under way in Australia alone—because all of these cities are building modern transport systems that give their citizens genuine options, congestion-free options, and provide mobility and access to the things that they need, and these are issues that the Opposition doesn’t even want to hear about.

Hon Julie Anne Genter: Can the Minister confirm that the most effective way to improve travel speeds on the road network is to improve the travel speeds of public transport, and that has been demonstrated in cities all around the world—the only way to help people get around on the roads is to improve rapid transit? [Interruption]

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: I can.

SPEAKER: No, before that occurs, I’d like the members who interjected during that question to stand up. [Several members stand] Right, OK.

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: I can assure the member that it is in fact an established principle of transport planning that the speed of public transport has a direct correlation to the speed of traffic, because the better public transport services are, and rapid transit, the more likely people are to leave their car at home, take the train or the bus, allowing the motorways and the roads to move more freely. That is a fundamental tenet of our transport policy, and it’s why we’re committed to building rapid transit infrastructure and modernising public transport in our cities.

Question No. 7—Commerce and Consumer Affairs

7. WILLOW-JEAN PRIME (Labour) to the Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs: What recent measures has the Government announced to protect consumers?

Hon KRIS FAAFOI (Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs): The Government has fast tracked measures to protect consumers in their dealings with both banks and insurers. We’ve released two options papers seeking feedback on proposed measures to address issues with conduct and culture of financial institutions and with insurance contract law. Proposed options include a ban on target-based remuneration and incentives, imposing new legal duties on financial institutions, and ensuring products sold to consumers are fit for purpose and sold to the right people. This will be supported by new and improved enforcement tools.

Willow-Jean Prime: What are these measures in response to?

Hon KRIS FAAFOI: The measures come in response to the recent reports by the Financial Markets Authority and the Reserve Bank of New Zealand that showed there were major issues in the life insurance sector and poor conduct and culture in the banking sector that needed to be addressed. In addition, when we came into office we found our insurance contract law is outdated and reform is long overdue for both consumers and for the sector itself. The Government is committed to making sure that the financial services sector is delivering good outcomes for consumers.

Willow-Jean Prime: How soon will these changes be made?

Hon KRIS FAAFOI: The Government wants to provide adequate time for consultation and analysis with stakeholders while, at the same time, moving the reviews quickly so we can reduce harm to consumers. If changes are warranted, the aim is for legislation on financial conduct to be introduced by the end of the year and separate legislation on insurance contract law is to be introduced—

Hon Gerry Brownlee: Best Minister in the Government.

Hon KRIS FAAFOI: —next year. You might need some insurance for your income soon, Gerry, so you might want to listen. This work sits alongside our other legislative changes to the financial services sector, such as the Financial Services Legislation Amendment Bill, and it reforms the consumer credit contract laws. The Government is committed to putting consumers at the heart of decision making so that they can get the best financial outcomes—

Hon Gerry Brownlee: Outstanding—top Minister.

Hon KRIS FAAFOI: —including those who might need some income insurance very soon.

Question No. 8—Police

8. CHRIS BISHOP (National—Hutt South) to the Minister of Police: Did he make the statement to TVNZ in December in regard to the Matthew Dow petition seeking the urgent introduction of random roadside drug testing “there’s a discussion document that’s been approved by Cabinet that’s going out to the public early next year”, and if so, on what date did Cabinet approve the discussion document?

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Deputy Prime Minister) on behalf of the Minister of Police: In response to media questions on the road toll and drug-driving, including the one with TVNZ on New Year’s Eve, I confirm that Cabinet decided to undertake public consultation. This Cabinet decision was made in September. Cabinet has approved the consultation document, and its release is due shortly.

Chris Bishop: Is it correct to say that a consultation document like the Minister has just said is the same as the discussion document he mentioned on New Year’s Eve?

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: On behalf of the Minister, words do matter, but sometimes you can be too picky with words.

Chris Bishop: Why has the discussion document—or consultation document, to use the Minister’s words—not been released yet, when he said it would be released early next year?

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: On behalf of the Minister, did he mean early this year or early next year, because next year hasn’t arrived yet. [Interruption]

SPEAKER: Order! Both sides.

Chris Bishop: Why has the discussion document on roadside drug-testing that he told TVNZ on New Year’s Eve 2018 would be released early next year—i.e., this year—not been released yet?

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: On behalf of the Minister, what happened was that getting ready for the release, a tragic terrorist event happened on 15 March in Christchurch, and it so happens that the head of road safety for police, Mike Clement, is also the head of police operations in Christchurch with respect to that terrorist event. That’s why it was delayed, for a very obvious and understandable reason. It will be released shortly.

Chris Bishop: How on earth can the events of Christchurch involving a deputy commissioner that have nothing to do with roadside drug-testing have delayed the release of a document that he just told the House was prepared and confirmed in September 2018?

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: On behalf of the Minister, for the most obvious reasons. While a document might be prepared, its continued refinement may still be central to the Government’s thinking. Can I say that why Mr Mike Clement is important is because he heads the police road safety campaign, and, having said that, can I say the previous Government, since 2009, had done nothing—including two Cabinet papers that the Hon David Bennett took on drug-driving—and they deferred and made no decisions at all.

Chris Bishop: Does he think it is acceptable that when Cabinet approves a discussion document on the very important issue of roadside drug-testing, the Government, nine months later, has not released it to the public, despite telling the family of a particular individual killed last year on New Year’s Eve that it would be released early next year?

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: On behalf of the Minister, the statement made to the family was always intended to be performed on. It will be performed on. It will happen, but the fact is we had a tragedy: the terrorist act on 15 March this year. That is understandable, but what is not understandable is the appalling misuse of someone’s misery for narrow, venal political points.

Alastair Scott: I seek leave of the House for the Land Transport (Random Oral Fluid Testing) Amendment Bill in my name to be set down as the first members’ order of the day on the next members’ day.

SPEAKER: Is there any objection to that? Yes, there is. It will not be set down.

Question No. 9—Regional Economic Development

9. Hon PAUL GOLDSMITH (National) to the Minister for Regional Economic Development: Does he stand by all his statements and actions?

Hon DAVID PARKER (Minister for Economic Development) on behalf of the Minister for Regional Economic Development: Yes.

Hon Paul Goldsmith: Does he stand by his statement in the December 2017 Cabinet paper outlining the objectives of the Provincial Growth Fund (PGF) that the first objective is “Increased jobs (with a focus on high quality jobs) and sustainable economic development over the long term”?

Hon DAVID PARKER: Yes, and I’m pleased to, again, advise the member that the Provincial Development Unit officials who contacted PGF funding recipients in February to gather data about job creation tallied 560 new jobs as the most accurate and up-to-date figure as at that date.

Hon Paul Goldsmith: Is he satisfied that the only answer his officials have provided so far to me and the public showing the number of sustained new jobs created by the fund relates to a third of the projects and lists only six jobs?

Hon DAVID PARKER: I am aware of the member’s press release to that effect yesterday, which said “The one straight answer we’ve had from the Provincial Development Unit shows that with a third of the projects counted just six permanent, sustained jobs have been created”—it is such an absurd accusation I’m surprised that the member was willing to put that out under his name. To give but one example, the Ruapehu Alpine Lifts have 37 jobs during construction, and the wider economic effects of that one project alone will be far more than the miserable six jobs that he thinks the New Zealand public is stupid enough to believe is the total.

Hon Paul Goldsmith: I seek to table an email from Jarred Griffiths to Ash Patel with a table which shows exactly that—six sustained new jobs.

SPEAKER: It’s not publicly available?

Hon Paul Goldsmith: No. It’s dated 11 February 2019.

SPEAKER: Right. Is there any objection to that email being tabled? There appears to be none.

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

Hon Paul Goldsmith: Why are his officials refusing to release the latest figures on the number of sustained new jobs created so far?

Hon DAVID PARKER: The member tries to suggest that jobs that are contractors who are building new infrastructure or new buildings are not jobs. They are sustainable jobs in that industry. Those contractors employ people who are working on these projects that would not have occurred but for the PGF involvement.

Hon Paul Goldsmith: So he thinks, halfway through a term relating to a $3 billion fund, that even if we went with his upper estimate of 500 jobs, including contractors, part-timers, and people who have done—

SPEAKER: Order! Question.

Hon Paul Goldsmith: —perhaps, one hour, it is a good return on that investment?

Hon DAVID PARKER: No, that’s not what I think; what I think is that the member favours tax cuts for the rich and hard right austerity for the regions. That’s why the provinces withered and social problems grew under his watch. We’ve got a lot of work to do to fix that laissez-faire neglect, but we’ve started and it’s going well.

Question No. 10—Infrastructure

10. CLAYTON MITCHELL (NZ First) to the Minister for Infrastructure: What recent announcements has he made regarding the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission, Te Waihanga?

Hon DAVID PARKER (Attorney-General) on behalf of the Minister for Infrastructure: The interim infrastructure commission within Treasury has published a pipeline of major infrastructure projects that are coming to market in the next three years. The information on those first 174 projects included in that pipeline are worth over $6 billion, and this will provide confidence to the private sector to invest and gear up for the efficient delivery of these projects. The coalition Government has listened to what the infrastructure sector has been advocating for for many years, and the new commission will be fully operational by the end of the year.

Clayton Mitchell: Wow. That’s fantastic. What information is included on the infrastructure pipeline?

Hon DAVID PARKER: Initially, the pipeline includes 174 projects from five capital intensive agencies: education, health, the New Zealand Transport Agency, the Defence Force, and corrections. These include replacement of the Dunedin Hospital for over $1 billion, the Manawatū Gorge replacement route project, and a $275 million replacement of critical infrastructure at Auckland City Hospital, Starship, and Greenlane Clinical Centre. It contains information as to the cost range of the project as well as estimated time frames for procurement and construction. Over time, the pipeline will be expanded to include projects from all central government agencies as well as local government and large private sector projects. The commission will be providing long-term visibility of our county’s infrastructure needs.

Clayton Mitchell: Fabulous news. How will this help deliver better infrastructure and improve the well-being of New Zealanders?

Hon DAVID PARKER: The pipeline information will give the infrastructure market greater confidence about the timing, sequencing, and scale of infrastructure projects so it can gear up capacity and capability to deliver. We inherited a serious infrastructure deficit, and we’re focusing on ensuring that our investments are in the right projects at the right time. New Zealanders rely upon this high-quality infrastructure to ensure they can run their businesses efficiently and to underpin their quality of life, so the establishment of the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission and the publication of this prototype pipeline will help infrastructure be delivered in a timely and cost-effective manner.

Question No. 11—Land Information

11. Hon DAVID BENNETT (National—Hamilton East) to the Minister for Land Information: Why did she decline the application for OceanaGold in cases 20171062 and 201810122 to purchase 178 hectares at Waihi when the Associate Minister of Finance concluded the project would “create substantial and identifiable benefit”?

Hon EUGENIE SAGE (Minister for Land Information): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I declined because it was my judgment that using productive rural farmland to establish a long-term tailings reservoir containing hazardous mining waste did not create a substantial and identifiable benefit for New Zealand.

Hon David Bennett: When she concluded that the acquisition of the land would enable more mining and therefore more emissions, which could encumber New Zealand’s transition to a net zero emissions economy, will this new test be applied to other applications to the Overseas Investment Office (OIO)?

Hon EUGENIE SAGE: The test is one of substantial and identifiable benefit to New Zealand. I considered that in the context of what is a sustainable economic benefit. So, yes, potentially, whether it contributes to carbon emissions and our net zero target could be considered.

Hon David Bennett: When she said “It is difficult for an economic benefit to be truly substantial if it is not sustainable. The nature of the proposed investment in non-renewable resource extraction is inherently unsustainable.”, then has this test been applied to the over $5.2 billion worth of applications to the OIO since she has been Minister?

Hon EUGENIE SAGE: I’ve been the decision maker in 35 applications under the Overseas Investment Act. I’ve approved 31 of the applications and declined four. I have applied the criteria in the Overseas Investment Act to the best of my ability.

Hon David Bennett: How can the Minister determine that the application had only a moderate economic benefit when the Associate Minister of Finance found that the export value of the gold from the land would be 1,610 years’ worth of the dairy export value from that farm?

Hon EUGENIE SAGE: The Overseas Investment Act provides for two Ministers to make separate decisions. What is a substantial and identifiable benefit to one person may not be to another. Where the two Ministers make different decisions, the Act requires that the application is declined.

Hon David Bennett: Is the fact that the company spent $373 million in New Zealand in 2016 a substantial and identifiable benefit to that Minister?

Hon EUGENIE SAGE: It is certainly a benefit, but in the context of sustainable economic development, the risk of major tailings impoundments, which change productive, food-producing land into a permanent site for the storage of hazardous waste, is not a substantial and identifiable benefit. It creates significant risks, both economic and environmental.

Hon David Bennett: Why did she use the Hauraki district average wage of $23,000 as part of her justification for claiming that further mineral extraction would not generate a substantial and identifiable benefit when the Associate Minister of Finance said that the $120,000 average mining employee’s wage was evidence it would?

Hon EUGENIE SAGE: The decision was about whether the purchase of the land would create a substantial and identifiable benefit. In this case, it’s turning productive land into a site for the long-term storage of hazardous waste—that is not a benefit.

Question No. 12—Health

12. Dr SHANE RETI (National—Whangarei) to the Associate Minister of Health: [Uses New Zealand Sign Language] [Firstly, I’d like to acknowledge New Zealand Sign Language Week.] Does she stand by all her statements and actions?

Hon JULIE ANNE GENTER (Associate Minister of Health): Yes, in the context they were given.

Dr Shane Reti: What actions did she take in defence of proposals for disabled people having shower times reduced to 30 minutes to reduce costs?

Hon JULIE ANNE GENTER: I was very clear with the ministry that there were to be no cuts to services, and so the proposal they discussed with providers was not carried out.

Dr Shane Reti: What does “medically fragile” mean when one proposal to reduce costs was no referrals for under-fives unless medically fragile?

Hon JULIE ANNE GENTER: I can’t speak to the detail; that would be a document that was written by the Ministry of Health. What I can say is that the plan that was discussed by the Ministry of Health with providers was not considered acceptable by myself or the Minister of Health, and we put an end to that plan.

Dr Shane Reti: How would disabled people eat when one proposal to reduce costs was removing meal preparation from all disabled packages?

Hon JULIE ANNE GENTER: That’s why the cuts are not going ahead, because we didn’t think it was acceptable, and I made it very clear to the ministry that my priority is to ensure disabled New Zealanders receive the best support possible, and that this support is allocated in a fair and consistent manner. Frankly, the difficulties that the health system is struggling with, in terms of not having enough funding to meet demand, are because of nine years of neglect under that last Government, where there were not sufficient increases to the health budget. That’s a matter of public record.

Dr Shane Reti: Can she confirm, then, that the extra funding for disability support services in last year’s Budget was largely swallowed up by regulatory and compliance costs, including pay settlements, as stated by the service’s chief executive?

Hon JULIE ANNE GENTER: What I can say about last year’s increase is that it was the largest increase percentage-wise since 2007—a 31 percent increase on previous years’ increases. There’s more money going into the health system than there would have been under that National Government. The previous National Government’s cuts to health funding—in real terms, compared to the growth in population and the growth in demand—are the reason why we are having this sort of conversation right now. [Interruption] You have to take some responsibility.

Bills

Education Amendment Bill (No 2)

Third Reading

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Minister of Education): I move, That the Education Amendment Bill (No 2) be now read a third time.

The bill improves the quality of New Zealand’s public education system. It clears away a series of bad decisions that were driven by ideology rather than evidence, and it puts the emphasis back on a quality public education system that puts children’s interests at the heart of decision making. This bill ends the previous Government’s policy of lowering the school starting age to include four-year-olds. It requires private schools to be safe places for students, in line with the requirements on State and State integrated schools. It ensures that the Teaching Council, in making decisions on matters related to the profession, makes those within the context of Government policy.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Adrian Rurawhe): Order! Sorry to interrupt the member. Order! Can members take their conversations out to the lobby; I’m having trouble hearing the Minister’s speech.

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: It removes the provisions relating to communities of online learning, it postpones the commencement of new planning and reporting requirements, and it makes clear a much fairer and more robust process around a university’s name change.

I want to turn first to the issues around cohort entry. The bill changes the settings for cohort entry so that only children who have turned five can attend school as part of a cohort. It also provides for more flexibility for parents by providing eight entry points per year instead of the current four per term. This change undoes one of the most damaging components of the last Government’s decision to remove the right of five-year-olds to start school the day after their fifth birthday. That was a decision made by the last Government and supported by the current Opposition spokesperson for education—and I congratulate her on her apparent elevation in the House this afternoon.

This Government does not consider that young children under the age of five should be attending school. It is too young and it can be damaging. This is consistent with the advice that was provided by the Advisory Group on Early Learning in 2015—a group established by the last National Government to give them advice on what was in the best interests of the child. That group was very, very clear that children should not be starting school before the age of five. The age of five is already young by international standards. Many, many other countries have a school starting age of six. That is the compulsory starting age for students in New Zealand, but most students start at the age of five, and that is young enough.

So the Government has restored the previous guarantee that young people cannot start school before the age of five. It has been supported by the Principals’ Federation, by the Institute for Early Childhood Studies at Victoria University of Wellington, and by others who want to see decisions around children starting school, around the transition from early childhood education to schooling. They want to see those decisions made based on evidence—based on evidence of what is in the best interests of the child—and that is what this Government is going to be doing.

The bill brings the requirements around private school registration into line with the requirements that exist right now for State and State integrated schools. They must be safe places physically and emotionally for students. The private schools themselves support these changes, and I welcome their support for those changes. This means that we have additional levers to intervene where a private school might not be providing a physically and emotionally safe place for students. The concern raised by the Opposition during the committee stage of this debate was that we didn’t need this provision because there was no evidence that it was required right now. One of the reasons that we’re putting it in place is we’re not going to wait until something happens before we clear up what is clearly a loophole, a gap, an anomaly in the law. We want to ensure that private schools are held to the same standard as State and State integrated schools. As I indicated, the schools themselves want that, and I welcome their support for it.

The bill makes changes to the matters that the Teaching Council will have to consider when it makes its decisions. This Government has restored the right for teachers to elect the majority of members to their own professional body—something that was taken away by the last Government. The last Government says that this somehow undermines the independence of the Teaching Council—it does not. The council still operates completely independently. They have to consider Government policy; they do not have to follow Government direction. They can ultimately decide to do something different. They are absolutely at liberty to disagree with the Government. They are absolutely at liberty to criticise the Government, and they will do so with the credibility of the profession, because the profession are the ones who are electing them.

Under the last Government, the entire Education Council—well, they didn’t even call it the Teaching Council—was hand-picked by the Minister of Education. That was not going to be a credible and independent voice for the teaching profession. We have fixed that by allowing teachers to elect the majority of members on that council. Members opposite asked, “Well, what’s a practical example of where this power might be used?”, and the example that I gave them is a very pertinent one at the moment. One of the things that teachers and principals are talking about is the level of compliance that they are currently subject to, and the Teaching Council has a role to play there. So if the Government, as part of negotiations, says, “Look, we want to work with the teaching profession to reduce compliance, to reduce the amount of paperwork that’s required”, and we issue a policy statement to that effect, then we do want the Teaching Council to take that into consideration. We do want them to consider how they could reduce compliance and paperwork for the teaching profession. I don’t think that that’s in any way infringing on their independence or autonomy, because they’ll ultimately be the ones who make decisions about that, but they should have to consider it.

The bill repeals provisions relating to communities of online learning, to talk through—those provisions had not yet come into law, and, thus, we are stopping them from doing so. Communities of online learning were basically an option for a student to enrol directly in an online learning provider that did not have to teach to the New Zealand Curriculum, did not have to employ registered or qualified teachers, and allowed kids of any school age to be sitting at home behind a computer rather than attending school. That is not something that this Government is willing to sign up for. Where children are engaged in online learning—and online learning is a brilliant resource—they should be doing so within the context of our existing education system. This does not stop small schools from accessing online learning in any way; they can do that now. It does not stop students who are home-schooled from accessing online learning in any way; they can do that now. This bill means that schools will not be able to offload those students who are a bit more difficult and who have additional and complex needs and say, “Not our problem anymore. They can enrol in an online provider and sit at home rather than be in a school”. That’s not good enough, and our Government is not willing to tolerate a system that would have allowed that to happen, and that is why we are removing those provisions.

Two final changes that this bill introduces: it defers the new planning and reporting framework for school boards until 1 January 2023. At this present point in time, when we are considering wide-ranging changes to the way schools operate, it would be unfair to place on those boards and principals who are engaged in that process the additional burdens of compliance and dealing with new strategic plans, implementation plans, and annual reports in the middle of that potential big shift in the way the education system operates. We want them constructively engaged in that discussion, and then, ultimately, whatever changes are made around schools planning and reporting can be consistent with that. I want to be clear: the Government’s not made any decisions about what those changes might be, but we don’t want to require schools to go through one big change, only to then potentially change it again within a year or two down the track.

So we’ve listened to the feedback that principals and boards have given us, which is that they want more time, and the amendment being put forward in this bill gives them more time. The status quo prevails for a bit longer. Finally, this bill introduces a much more robust process around a university’s name change. It means that the House will ultimately be the decider of any name change, rather than the Minister acting alone. We recognise that many of our current universities were established by an Act of Parliament, and, therefore, it should be the Parliament that determines whether or not those provisions can be changed, and the names of those institutions can be changed. This is a good bill. It reinforces our quality public education system. I commend it to the House.

Hon NIKKI KAYE (National—Auckland Central): I am not pleased to have to speak and oppose a piece of education legislation to the House. I’m on the back of, as I’ve said before, 70-odd meetings across New Zealand, and a big message from the education sector is, where possible, they would like to have greater cross-party agreement in education. I acknowledge the thousands of teachers that have been at paid union meetings, some of them this week, and the hard work that they do.

But the reality is we do have to oppose this legislation. While we may have supported one Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) within this legislation, we are opposing it on the grounds, actually, for what the Minister mentioned at the beginning of his speech. This is an incredibly ideological piece of legislation, and I’m going to walk members exactly through those areas of ideology that have been driven by this Government.

The first issue is the issue of cohort entry. Again, let’s look back at the history. The Hon Hekia Parata, under the former National Government, recognised the real issues being raised by new-entrant teachers who saw the disruption in their classrooms for not having a decent cohort entry policy for New Zealand. What we recognised was very pragmatic, and it was very much about recognising that not a one-size-fits-all approach works for children and for families and that, actually, when you get across New Zealand, there are some children who, for their emotional well-being, it makes sense and whose parents’ circumstances mean that, potentially, at the most—at the most—a group of children may start up to eight weeks before their fifth birthday.

Now, for many children, the reality is it would have been a couple of days, maybe a week, but that isn’t the case for this Government. They don’t back parents. They don’t support working parents. They don’t realise that, actually, for some children, that may make sense. I get all of the media and all of the spin that the Government’s put out that this is about a whole lot of four-year-olds starting before their fifth birthday. The reality is, under our law now, parents have a choice and they don’t have to put their child into school until much later. This was about recognising that for a small group of parents and children, that made sense. So at a principled level, it doesn’t matter whether it’s partnership schools and they scrapped them because they don’t like the diversity that exists, it doesn’t matter whether they’re putting up Tomorrow Schools reform; it’s all about a one-size-fits-all approach in education, and it’s all about not backing parents. That’s why, at a principled level, National was concerned with where they were going for cohort entry.

I do want to acknowledge, though, that at least they haven’t scrapped cohort entry—that, actually, cohort entry will remain as a result of this legislation. They’re not completely getting rid of it, despite some big statements that the Minister has previously made. I do want to acknowledge that there will be more options in terms of cohort entry mid-term, as well. However, it still doesn’t change the fact that a group of parents across New Zealand, in my view, are being denied the right, because their school may take up cohort entry, to have their child start at the age of five.

Anyway, the second core issue in this bill relates to, in my view—as I said before in the committee stages—a core difference between National and Labour. National believes that there are huge changes and disruption coming in education. We believe, as a result of the future of work, it is critical for young people to be able to understand computational thinking. Here’s our record. Our record is $200 million invested in ensuring that schools have access to uncapped data and fast connections across New Zealand. Now here’s the deal: we also understood we needed to mandate the digital technologies curriculum with that, so that children weren’t just spending a whole lot of time on screens; they also had access to quality curriculum. But the key part of that is there are a whole lot of children in parts of New Zealand that don’t have access to specialist subjects, whether it’s mathematics—and I am looking at Minister Salesa there—or whether it’s the issue of other languages like Pasifika languages and Te Reo.

The reality is digital technologies, via quality supplementary learning or potentially virtual learning networks, offer huge opportunities for young people. But the reality is that this Government doesn’t care. The reason we know that they don’t care is they have put up a piece of legislation without any other alternative regime. The reality is that this would have kicked in and provided other contestability to organisations like Te Kura. It would have provided additional opportunities to organisations like the Virtual Learning Network.

But the reality is that this Government doesn’t care, because they have not provided anything else as an alternative. My sadness is that not only does it deny a group of young people additional opportunities in rural areas; it also denies opportunities to some of our most disadvantaged families. The reality is if the Government was so ideological about virtual schools, when the reality is that this would have provided additional subject learning in certain schools, then it should have provided an alternative regime. National is very focused on ensuring that that happens, not just in the next couple of months but over the next 20 to 30 years.

The next area in this bill was around private schools. The reality is, again, we have an intensely ideological Government. National recognises that, actually, we need a very strong State system. It’s about 85 percent of our education provision. Private schools, integrated schools, and partnership schools make up a very small proportion: about 15 percent. The reality is there is no parliamentarian in this House that wouldn’t support a change that would do something to improve a situation where you have children’s safety at risk, so of course we would support any regime that would strengthen that. All we asked during the select committee process was, “Where is the evidence that there is a whole range of reasons to change the law?” Now, the Minister’s answer is, “Well, we’re not going to wait for the evidence; actually, we’re going to pass the law to make sure that if a situation occurs in the future, we can, effectively, close down that school.” There are also strong arguments that we can actually do that now. So, again, there was a lot of fear in the sector that this may be something a little bit more sinister, a bit of a closed will of private schools. I think we got more clarity in the select committee process.

The next issue that I do want to raise is around the name change issue. Can I take a moment to acknowledge my parliamentary colleague Nicola Willis. She did a fantastic job. She’s a great example of a local member of Parliament who fought an issue that was providing a huge amount of angst for thousands of young people out there—and older people—who have degrees, that were worried about this name change. I do want to acknowledge that the Minister listened, and he made the right decision. But also, through the select committee, we heard from the likes of Sir Geoffrey Palmer the need to tidy up this area of the law. So while we can’t support this bill, because of the deep ideological issues in many other areas and the fact that it snuffs out future opportunities for many children in disadvantaged areas and rural areas, I do want to put on the record in this House that we have supported that amendment—and I acknowledge Dr Shane Reti and the work that he’s done on it as well—because, from my perspective, National is very pragmatic when it comes to education. What I hope that people see in the future is that we are part of a party that believes in doing the right thing, that believes in making pragmatic changes.

I want to leave you with this: we oppose this legislation, and what we are hearing on the ground—whether it’s the issue of collective bargaining not being resolved and the Government wasting money in a range of other areas, whether it’s the issue of scrapping partnership schools and the many emails that have come into our inbox and the people that we have met from the families that have been affected, whether it’s scrapping communities of online learning, or whether it’s ideological changes to cohort entry—is a growing number of New Zealanders and families that are saying to me they thought they were going to get a Labour Government that was going to invest heavily in education. They thought they were going to get a Labour Government that was going to do the right thing for a number of communities, particularly Māori and Pasifika children, particularly children growing up in rural communities. They were sorely wrong. What they have is an ideological Government that is absolutely focused on their ideology, not in doing what is right for children in New Zealand, and more and more people are waking up to that. That is why we oppose this bill.

Hon JENNY SALESA (Associate Minister of Education): Thank you very much, Mr Assistant Speaker, for this opportunity to speak on the Education Amendment Bill (No 2) at its third reading. I thank the member who has just spoken, the Hon Nikki Kaye. One of the things that the honourable member said when she started her speech was that we do not get it and that we do not care and that we’re not listening to teachers or the students—and that, apparently, we’re not into cross-party agreements. But I do want to remind the Hon Nikki Kaye that one of the first things that the Hon Chris Hipkins did last year, before we actually even launched the Kōrero Mātauranga, the national conversations, and the first of the national conversations was held in Christchurch, was reach out across to our Opposition members, including the Hon Nikki Kaye, and I do recall seeing her in Christchurch, as well as several other members of the National Party. That is, of course, the ideal: if we can get cross-party agreement on something as important as our education system, we know that that would be then an education system that is long-lasting and is enduring. The education system that we have right now, Tomorrow’s Schools, was introduced under Labour 30 years ago, and we know that 30 years later it is not fit for purpose.

The Hon Nikki Kaye also spoke about the students who are disadvantaged, those from lower socio-economic areas, and I can speak from South Auckland, being an MP from South Auckland, where the majority of our students are Māori and Pacific. One of the reasons why it is really important that we get it right, one of the reasons why the Ministry of Education, together with the Minister of Education and three Associate Ministers of Education, have gone out to consult with and to get over 55,000 people’s comments and advice, is to make sure that we get it right.

Now, back to this Education Amendment Bill (No 2). I wholeheartedly support it. We acknowledge the Minister the Hon Chris Hipkins for his work. I’d also like to acknowledge the Education and Workforce Committee for their work in getting us to this point. I’d also like to thank the Parliamentary Counsel Office for their work in drafting the legislation. I’d also like to mention two Supplementary Order Papers (SOPs), Supplementary Order Paper 220 as well as SOP 224, because they will address two things. They will ensure that for the reporting requirements, in order to give schools more time to account for the review of Tomorrow’s Schools, we actually give them a little bit more time before all of those changes come through, and, second, that we clarify the rules around a university changing its name.

Now, during the second reading of this bill just yesterday, the Hon Nikki Kaye, the former Minister of Education, also spoke about the many, many meetings that she has held. We have also held many meetings across Aotearoa as well, because, as I said earlier on, we are there to listen. We are there to listen to everyone, from young kids, from young people, to their parents, and to caregivers. I held many meetings with Pacific people as well as our ethnic communities, because it is important to me to ensure that we get it right for the next 20 to 30 years. Why? Because when you look at the demographics of students right now, when you look at those who are currently in preschool right through to the end of year 13, we see that about 50 percent of the total population in schools are made up of Māori students, ethnic community students, and Pacific students. So the reality right now is that that is the majority of our students in year 13 down to preschool.

This particular bill is about ensuring that we require private schools to be safe places for our tamariki, for all of our students. The Education Act 1989 does not allow the Secretary for Education to consider students’ safety when considering private school registration applications. I’ll give you an example that we are well aware of that happened a year or so ago, where—and this is actually covered in the departmental briefing to the select committee—and I quote, “significant concerns [were raised] about the safety of students at a [certain] private school … ERO raised concerns about [the] health and safety … [in this particular] private school over a number of years. [That] school … continued [, however,] to meet the registration criteria over this [period of] time. Following [a particular] incident where a student was seriously injured, a multi-agency investigation (involving the Ministry of Education, … Oranga Tamariki)”—as well as the police—“also found further … concern about the physical and emotional safety of students at the school.” The Ministry of Education suspended the school’s registration under section 35K over a period of a year. The school was asked to provide more information, but the Secretary for Education was still not able to address it in any major way. So this particular proposal in this legislation would ensure that if anything like that is to happen in the future, the Secretary for Education can put a lot of things into place to ensure that our students remain safe: that they are safe both physically and emotionally. Private schools are really supportive of this, because it is important that we ensure all of our students are safe.

With regard to cohort entry: this bill changes the requirement for cohort entry so that our tamariki can start school in cohorts, but only after they turn five years of age. When you look overseas, when you look at other countries, the average age for entry into school is six years old. There are some countries whose average age is seven years old. So actually allowing our students to enter schools at five years of age is already really, really early. But what we believe the previous Government wanted to do is that one of the things that they talk a lot about is that they put students, our children, at the centre of their decision making. But at the same time, they also want our students—our young, young kids—to enter school so that parents can get back to work sooner, because they are worried about lost productivity.

As the Hon Tracey Martin covered yesterday—as well as the Hon Chris Hipkins earlier on in his contribution today—we are also focused on ensuring that our young students are at the centre of learning, but we are absolutely into making sure that our young children can enter school after they turn five but that there is the opening and that cohort entry for our students actually allows our parents to still make a choice after they turn five to enter school.

So the Education Amendment Bill (No 2) will ensure that early childhood education subsidies—including the 20 hours free, including Ministry of Social Development childcare assistance subsidies—are still in place.

We also expect that the proposed changes under this bill will improve the school experiences for all of our new entrants. The changes will give parents more flexibility. It’ll give schools more manageable cohort sizes, and it will reduce the cost of keeping children in early childhood education centres.

In terms of the Advisory Group on Early Learning in 2010, one of their recommendations—they were pretty adamant about this—is that we should ensure that there should not be any downward push on school starting age much earlier. This is actually an advisory group to the previous Government. In fact, their recommendation was “that a play-based curriculum offers the best learning experiences for our tamariki.” I absolutely commend this bill to the House.

DENISE LEE (National—Maungakiekie): Tēnā koe e Te Mana Whakawā. I’d like to acknowledge New Zealand Sign Language Week and the fantastic effort by my colleague Dr Shane Reti in his signing earlier this afternoon. There are a number of us MPs in Te Reo classes, so perhaps we can expand that to signing classes as well. It would be a fantastic idea.

Hon Member: Kia ora.

DENISE LEE: Kia ora to you too.

This particular bill—I’ve had the disappointment to speak on it a couple of times this week. And here we go on the third reading. The disappointment is because it’s quite simply a crude dismantling of previous National Party reforms—that’s straight out what it’s about. What we see here from the Government is not even a veiled attempt to try to mask the raw ideological grabs at important educational institutions and to go ahead with a messy, what I’d call, hodgepodge of random ideas that are ideologically driven and based—almost obsessively so. So what we’ve got here is a straight out reduction—and this is the biggest irony of the bill—of the independence of the Teaching Council. I’ll say a little bit more about that later as to why that’s so ironic. They are deliberately burdening private schools. Many have asked why; what is the reason behind that? It’s a little unclear but, none the less, a deliberate burdening of private schools.

Annoying and confusing parents as to when their kids can start school—that’s a deliberate move. To try to explain that away in other ways—it’s not happening. It hasn’t been convincing. This will confuse parents and, quite frankly, annoy them.

Finally, scrapping communities of online learning. Now, during the committee process, for which I was involved, this probably didn’t make up so much of the debate as other members in regards to the independence of the Teaching Council did. But the passage of the bill’s debate this week has really kicked up some interesting stuff for communities of online learning. What we’ve seen is that the communities of online learning providers such as the Virtual Learning Network (VLN) didn’t have the conversation before this has happened to them. That’s of real concern. Furthermore, when you look into what they’re asking for and look at their submissions, what they’re asking for is incredibly reasonable. They just want clarity. They had a direction for where they were going under our Government. Now there’s no direction at all. The direction that they have been given—which is a non-direction—is because we’re told that we need to wait for the context of all the current reforms that are happening in education. Well, if you look at those current reforms, it’s a massive list.

We’ve got Tomorrow’s Schools review. We’ve had the scrapping of national standards. We’ve got cancelling of charter schools and rushing into the questioning of NCEA. We’ve even had—maybe not on the massive, big top of the list, but we had it none the less—a very botched, failed attempt at banning music and dance teachers from calling themselves teachers. There’s been a raft of educational reforms and attempts at reform.

So, in that context, the Government is asking the communities of online learning providers to chill out, wait, wait, and wait and see what happens. The Minister of Education himself, in the chair during the committee stage, admitted that work needs to be done on this. Well, that’s not good enough. That’s not good enough for providers, and it’s definitely not good enough that, in the context of debate again this week, we had a very flippant attitude from Ministers sitting across the Chamber right now and other MPs in regards to both communities of online learning and the work that they do—phrases such as “throwing kids before computers” and “putting them on screen times” and “five-year-olds on screens”. We even had VLN say, in their submission, “It’s very disturbing to hear Ministers debating this bill in parliament talking about Mathletics, Reading Eggs or Khan Academy. These are web based software platforms and applications …”. They are not online learning which providers like VLN provide.

So you’ve got a flippant attitude which denotes that this Government has driven obsessively on to a hodgepodge of ideologically driven reforms. We don’t agree with it, we stand against it, we stand for providers who want certainty, and we also stand for parents who want choice as to when their kids start school. We oppose this bill.

Hon TRACEY MARTIN (Associate Minister of Education): Kia ora, Mr Assistant Speaker. Let’s just start with cohort entry. So, yes, that’s quite right—the members opposite are quite right—this Government is undoing what the previous Government did.

Last night, I referred to the regulatory impact statement that was around the implementation of cohort entry. It was provided to the select committee at that time on 5 May 2016. I believe that last night the Opposition said there had been 18 submissions on the amendment bill No. 2—the bill we’re discussing now—16 unique submissions, two that had been done twice. There were 1,852 submissions received on the amendment bill No. 1—1,852 New Zealanders submitted on the things that the previous Government was going to put in. Seventy-nine percent of those submitters disagreed with the lowering of the starting age. Did the Government of the day—the National Government—listen at all to those submitters? No, they did not. Did the Government of the day—the National Government—listen to the expert advisory panel they had put together? No, they did not—no, they did not.

Here is the regulatory impact statement on the implementation of cohort entry, from 5 May 2016. Here is part of what is in that statement: “there is an emerging risk … to an increase in government expenditure due to children spending longer in early childhood education (ECE) … In terms of ECE costs, we estimate that the value of the saving”—of option D, the option chosen by the previous Government and the option we are undoing today—show a saving of ECE money of $11 million. This was not about children. This was never about children. I would urge the members of the Opposition to go and talk to the Brainwave Trust, to go and talk to them about the research that they have done about the importance of children being children for as long as they can.

I want to now pick up on the concept that we have; it’s just been articulated by the member who just resumed her seat. Last night, Simeon Brown raved against the requirement that private schools have to be safe both physically and mentally, and around the emotional well-being of our students. He raved against it. We’ve just had Denise Lee take her seat saying that it was the deliberate burdening of private schools. Mr Brown last night said, “Where is your evidence? Where is your evidence?” Ms Lee has just articulated that she has literally no idea why that’s there. Can I please read from the departmental briefing to the select committee that Ms Lee sits on?

The departmental briefing to the select committee that Ms Lee sits on—which, apparently, she may not have read, because she doesn’t realise this is in it—says that in the past three years there have been at least eight complaints to the Ministry of Education relating to student safety in private schools. There has been one serious incident where significant concern about the safety of students at a private school was identified. The briefing note reads: “significant concerns about the safety of students at a private school were identified, ERO has raised concerns about health and safety matters at the private school over a number of years. The school had continued to meet the registration criteria over this time. Following an incident where a student was seriously injured, a multi-agency investigation (involving the Ministry of Education, New Zealand Police and Oranga Tamariki) also found further cause for concern about the physical and emotional safety of students at the school.”

Now, I’m not sure—does Mr Brown sit on the select committee?

Hon Members: Yes.

Hon TRACEY MARTIN: But Mr Brown asked for evidence. Mr Brown last night asked for evidence of why we would be wanting to bring private schools to be safe places for our children. Ms Lee said that she understood there was no reason to do this but that it was a deliberate burdening of private schools. I am highly concerned for what is happening on the Opposition benches of that particular select committee.

Let’s talk about the communities of online learning. Let’s just go back to what is the reality of this situation and why, literally, there needs to be nothing created. Let’s remember that the communities of online learning have not started. Nothing has started. The Virtual Learning Network has not had any contract under the community of online learning, because they literally haven’t started. How long has the Virtual Learning Network been doing what the Virtual Learning Network does?

I’m going to say this, too. I find it fascinating that Ms Lee mentioned the Khan Academy—the Khan Academy—and Ms Lee sort of pooh-poohed that the Government would think about the Khan Academy. The Khan Academy was the argument the previous Government used for charter schools! The Khan Academy was brought over—I’m fairly confident they were brought over here. Simon Bridges, I believe, was sitting on the select committee—or he subbed in or something—at the time that they came to explain Flip learning and how children don’t literally need to go to school; they can just go and be on the computer, and should they need to find an answer, somewhere there’d be a “teacherery” sort of an adult around. They justified charter schools with the Khan Academy. Boy how times change. That’s all I can say.

Communities of online learning were never needed in the way that they were implemented. That is the reality. There are communities of online learning now. The Virtual Learning Network is one of them. They are currently working. What was needed, and here is the thing, was a funding model to support them. What was needed was the fact that schools had to take either from their operations grant or they needed to provide a teacher for a point 2 or whatever to trade off against those classes. So did the last Government decide to fund communities of online learning? No, they did not. No, they did not. They didn’t provide any funding model for it. They decided to privatise it. So rather than support the current schools that are actually in NorthNet and HarbourNet and using the Virtual Learning Network, they decided to privatise it.

One of the other reasons they wanted to move to a community of online learning was around Te Kura, which is the correspondence school. It now has this enormous role. Why does Te Kura have this enormous role? Because too many of our children are being put out of our schools and placed on Te Kura. Too many of our children are not being supported well enough for their learning needs inside our school and are being excluded, and yet the previous Government, even seeing those numbers starting to rise, made no attempt to actually better resource alternative learning—for example, alternative education. Not a dickie bird—haven’t had a substantial rise in any of their income for a large number of years.

So people need to calm down. Our children will continue to learn online. There will be numbers of students who will be Skyping out, and at Mahurangi College, for example, we Skyped out around about 15 students. One particular student, level 3 Te Reo Māori but wanted to make sure that that was the dialect of her particular iwi, so we Skyped her into the East Coast.

There is a great capacity inside of this part of the education system, and this Government will literally work with the education system to create what that is, because the previous Government did not. They did not consult, and I find it interesting that Ms Lee again talks about one submitter who was not asked their opinion and therefore this Government didn’t take what they wanted to be the case into account, when 1,852 people submitted when these things were put into place and no school, no State school—because Ms Whalley will tell you that they are a school and their schools were consulted and so on. So I’ll give the Government this. They went out to those that they wanted to, who would give them the answer that they wanted, and then that was who they consulted with. But the rest of the education sector did not want communities of online learning. What they wanted was the financial resourcing to support them to expand what they already had, perhaps create a staffing component called a mentor teacher, because it’s very difficult for those students to stay focused and self-moderated and self-motivated when they are doing Skype learning. It is one of the challenges and one of the reasons why what that previous Government did put in place would have been a disaster.

SIMEON BROWN (National—Pakuranga): Thank you, and it’s always a pleasure to take a call after the Hon Tracey Martin, as she takes a seat. I appreciate the opportunity to take a call on the third reading of the Education Amendment Bill (No 2). The previous speaker, the Hon Tracey Martin, had a lot to say about the contributions from Denise Lee and myself on this particular bill, but I’d just like to touch on two of the issues this bill covers. Firstly, to rebut some of the points that she’s made in regards to private schools, she’s pulled up an example to argue for the case here, but the regulatory impact statement says, “There is no evidence that the level of bullying and other forms of physical and emotional harm is better or worse in private schools than in State or State integrated schools.” The fact of the matter is we’re making a decision here based upon no actual information to compare between private schools, State schools, or State integrated schools. The Government has decided to simply put in place something in the registration criteria without actually having any evidence and without actually looking at all of the issues which need to be addressed here on a wider scale.

Secondly, I’d like to touch on the clauses in here which have regard to the Teaching Council. We were only a few months ago debating in this Chamber the Government’s desire to reform the Teaching Council to ensure that teachers were in control of the Teaching Council, and they passed legislation saying this was going to ensure that teachers’ voices were in control of the Teaching Council. And here we have another bill coming through this Parliament, absolutely taking away that power by giving power to the Minister of Education at any time to issue a statement of Government policy relating to one or more of the Teaching Council’s functions. That is not something about which Chris Hipkins said, “Well, it’s just ‘having regard to’ ”. If you look at the actual legislation, it is “must have regard to” when it is performing its functions as the Teaching Council.

So this Government may be wanting to stand up and try to brush over the fact that what they have done is they are taking away the powers they once said they stood up for, and what the Post Primary Teachers’ Association (PPTA) even submitted to the Education and Workforce Committee saying that they do not accept this as being something which should be done and saying this completely undermines the Teaching Council’s independent status, which they said they wanted.

Denise Lee: The union!

SIMEON BROWN: Yes, Denise Lee. The PPTA—not exactly the greatest friends of the National Party. The people who supported the union mates on the other side of the Chamber, they’re saying this undermines the Teaching Council’s independent status. So on one hand the Government say they’re giving the Teaching Council back its independence, which the National Party tore away, and on the other hand they are taking and undermining that independence which they once sought and they once championed. So the National Party opposes this piece of legislation.

CHLÖE SWARBRICK (Green): E Te Māngai, tēnā koe. Tēnā koutou katoa e Te Whare.

On this, the third reading of the Education Amendment Bill (No 2), I would, firstly, like to acknowledge my predecessor in the education portfolio for the Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand, Catherine Delahunty, who, with both our current Associate Minister of Education and Minister of Education, the Hon Tracey Martin and the Hon Chris Hipkins, worked on the former Education and Science Committee to build consensus on a number of issues which now actually form a lot of the platform for the education policy that this Government is now progressing in. This obviously included the inquiry spearheaded by Catherine Delahunty into dyslexia, dyspraxia, and autism spectrum disorders in the compulsory school sector, which the Government is now mightily committed—as per the confidence and supply agreement with the Green Party—to implement.

Turning to this piece of legislation, I can’t help but obviously acknowledge some of the points that have been raised, obviously, primarily, by members of the Opposition. The Hon Nikki Kaye, the former Minister of Education, called this Government “ideological” when it comes to the education sector. This is a sentiment that was echoed by every other National Party MP who has stood so far to speak in this debate, and it is a sentiment that has been stated multiple times throughout every single reading of this piece of legislation. So I turned to the dictionary to offer this House a definition of ideology, and, if I may quote, it is “as based on or relating to a system of ideas or ideals.” Fundamentally, it’s essentially about values.

So I’m really wondering if it’s the former Minister of Education genuinely trying to tell me that the National Party is absent of ideology, and thus the values that inform their policy around education. I don’t think that that’s the case. I think that the National Party also has ideology when it comes to the education sector. There is a difference between our ideologies, obviously, as represented by the Opposition’s opposition to this piece of legislation, being most fundamentally that we on this side of the House believe that education is a public good and that it should be protected, resourced, and encouraged to flourish.

But I also really want to drill down into that catchcry of ideology that the Opposition turns to so frequently as a rhetorical flourish, because there is a difference between ideology and dogma. Ideology is about values, but dogma is about being blinded by those values, and a great example of dogma actually comes from the former National Government’s ignoring of all of the submissions that came before the select committee that actually implemented the changes which this piece of legislation is now undoing. So I’m really quite confused as to how the National Party can attack this Government for being in favour of values and for wearing them on our sleeves and saying how they’re informing the policy decisions, somehow presupposing that the National Party is completely devoid of those values and that ideology and, meanwhile, maintaining dogma and not listening to submitters and members of the public, who overwhelmingly opposed the policy that those members pushed through, which this piece of legislation undoes.

So too, the opposite of dogma is consultation, whereby you listen to critique and to constructive input, and you improve, in turn. This is exactly what the Government is trying to do through the Education Conversation, which the National Party has been invited to engage in. It’s been mentioned by previous speakers that 30 years ago, this side of the House implemented the future of education at that point in time, and we now have an opportunity to evaluate that because it’s no longer fit for purpose.

So, turning to the core things that this bill actually does—which I think have been well canvassed, but it’s important to put on the record for the sake of Hansard the Green Party’s supreme support for all of these brilliant policy points—the first thing that it does, as was mentioned by the previous speaker, Simeon Brown, is it ensures that the Teaching Council acts in accordance with or makes its decisions relating to the context of Government policy, with that being the decisions that are made relating to the teaching profession. It was mentioned by Simeon Brown that this side of the House has spoken about the revocation of democracy on that Teaching Council by the former Government, and for those who may be listening at home, I really just want to clarify what we meant when we said that. What we meant when we said that was that the former Government literally removed elected members from the Teaching Council and, instead, replaced all of those members with nominees of their own. If that’s not ideological, I’m not quite sure what is.

What we’re saying here is that we’re going to add another layer of public accountability and transparency by making sure that the general public is aware of what the Teaching Council is doing, because it must be in line with Government policy. It will be up to the Government of the day—whether it is National-led, Labour-led, or, heck, even Green-led—to justify that to the general public and, therefore, actually be open to far more critique and change their policy in turn.

The second thing that this piece of legislation does is ensure that private schools are held to the same standards as our public schools in this country when it comes to providing a safe space for students, whether it’s physical or emotional, and I genuinely can’t get to the heart of the opposition that the National Party has to this. I’ve listened to their points of debate throughout this third reading, and, so far, all I’ve heard is that they are concerned that there is somehow no evidence—which was completely dispelled by the Associate Minister of Education the Hon Tracey Martin—but then, it’s somehow that it excessively burdens private schools to need to provide a safe space, physically and emotionally, for their students. I’m concerned about that—I’m deeply concerned about that.

We’ve also heard from Simeon Brown—and we heard the evidence in our select committee, the Education and Workforce Committee—that there’s no evidence that bullying is better or worse in public or private schools. Well, surely that’s a reason to hold them both to the same standards. Also, surely that’s a reason to ensure that we’re actually being proactive here to make sure that we don’t end up with an unsafe situation whereby the Government would have to intervene. That, surely, strikes to the heart of the principles that the National Party should be in favour of.

Thirdly, this piece of legislation removes the empowering provisions for communities of online learning. This has been confuddled somewhat by the statements made in public, particularly by the former Minister of Education the Hon Nikki Kaye, about how we’re somehow removing any chance for young people to engage in online learning or education. Again, totally untrue. Online learning existed prior to the empowering provisions for communities of online learning. When the former National Government actually implemented them, it was critiqued by a number of stakeholders for being a hasty and rushed piece of legislation. So by removing them, we are simply ensuring that, moving forward, we end up with a really robust framework for the future of education, which is being facilitated through the Education Conversation, which the National Party is involved in.

Fourthly, cohort entry. Now, this is perhaps the most controversial—or, at least, what the National Party has tried to make controversial—part of this piece of legislation. We are somewhat removing the opportunity for cohort entry but are allowing for two entry points throughout the school year. Given that there are thousands of schools in this country and only 50—that’s the evidence that the Education and Workforce Committee heard; only 50—have decided to take it up, I can understand the National Party’s position around choice. You know, that kind of makes sense, but it’s not choice for parents. It’s choice for the board of trustees, and we have heard enormous amounts of evidence to the fact that kids are actually better off and learn better when they enter education later.

I’m conscious of the very limited time that I have left. I just want to speak, finally, to Supplementary Order Paper 224, which implemented into this piece of legislation the requirement that any name change of any university is no longer a decision that is to be made just by a Minister of Education but it is to be made by the entirety of this House, this Parliament. I think that that’s a democratic provision, and I think that it’s fantastic. I for one never went to Victoria University of Wellington, except to do a summer school, but I can absolutely understand the feeling that alumni of that university had when that conversation was occurring.

So let’s get on with it. Let’s ensure that we are actually engaging in a cross-partisan manner on the future of the education system and that we stop with this fearmongering. The Green Party commends this bill.

Dr SHANE RETI (National—Whangarei): Kia ora, Madam Assistant Speaker. The National Party will oppose this bill because, fundamentally, in our minds, this is another example of Government knowing best. For example, if this bill is passed, some children who would have been able to enter school before the age of five will, clearly, be unable to, and this is the Government saying, “We know your child better than you do.”

This bill reduces your options as a parent, and, surely, we all know children who hadn’t turned five but who were well ready to go to school. In fact, we could posit that another way. I mean, are there Government members here today who are saying they have never known any children who had not turned five who were ready for school? Or we could reposition that question again: are there no Government members, over the past few years, who have sent their children to school before they turned the age of five? That would be an interesting hypothesis to test.

I think, generally, the closer decisions are made to the affected person, the better those decisions are, be they patients, be they industry, or be they polytechnics, farmers, or students. This does the reverse. This places the decision making further away from parents and further away from students, and we strongly oppose this.

Now, we have said no to this part of the bill, and we have said no to having less parent choice, but we said yes to the university name change legislation, and I want to acknowledge Nicola Willis, who has championed the fair process on this matter. Yes, it did come to the House in the committee of the whole House stage and it didn’t go through the initial select committee process, but a petition to the House did have 35 submissions that were quite thoughtful. If we look at those submissions and look at the views that we formed, it wasn’t clear, and it isn’t clear, that a university council could actually make a name change. It wasn’t clear, and it isn’t clear, that the Minister actually had discretion to make a name change. So we agreed that this area needed to be tidied up and that it should be the purview of Parliament—we agree with this.

So I say to the Government: take this as a signal, a signal that the Hon Nikki Kaye and myself are pragmatic and can collaborate and will collaborate on legislation that is reasonable. But also take this as a signal that what is unreasonable, we will fight, and we disagree with increased central control of schools and teachers.

And so on that note, we are opposing this bill. Thank you.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): I understand this is a split call. I call the Hon Clare Curran—five minutes.

Hon CLARE CURRAN (Labour—Dunedin South): Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. I’m pleased to take a short call on the third reading of the Education Amendment Bill (No 2), in this, thankfully, third reading speech, trying to inject some sensible evidence-based discussion into the debate on a couple of points.

I have listened with increasing dismay. I’ve actually listened very carefully to the language being used by the Opposition on this bill: we’re ideological; they’re pragmatic. And yet what it seems to be, when you boil it all down, what the guts of their opposition is to this bill, is that they’re miffed. They’re miffed that the bad law and bad policy decisions are being unwound. I remember, in her second reading speech, the Hon Tracey Martin said that we’re not unwinding everything that the previous Government did, only the bad bits. So what this bill does is unwind the bad bits. Nikki Kaye, particularly, is quite miffed about that, in her—as I wrote down when she was giving her speech earlier on—frenzied Orwellian opposition, which runs counter to the actual evidence-based approach that this Government is taking to it. So what this bill does is it improves the quality of the New Zealand education system, it marks the end—and this is where the miffed bit comes in—of a previous era, and it’s a new approach to maintain the integrity of the public and of our education system.

So, quickly, with regards to the cohort entry, I won’t go over all of the details of what that does, but what I do want to emphasise is the evidence-based approach, that it’s consistent. So the Government, frankly—and I think the public agrees—does not consider that children under the age of five years should be attending school. It’s too young and it can be damaging, which is consistent with the position taken by that Advisory Group on Early Learning in 2015, and both the New Zealand Principals’ Federation and the Institute for Early Childhood Studies at Victoria University of Wellington—that auspicious organisation—among others, expressed support for putting the school starting age back to five years of age. An evidence-based approach is very important.

On the requirement on the new registration criterion for private schools, requiring them to be physically and emotionally safe places for children, again—and I won’t labour the point—this was an issue where the Opposition opposed for the sake of opposing it, couldn’t really come up with a reason why, but said that, somehow, it wasn’t necessary. What officials told us is that there is a gap in the law that needs to be fixed, which is what this piece of legislation does. It’s important that we’ve got a safe environment, and examples were given—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): I apologise to the member. I’ve set the clock up for a 10-minute speech, so you’ve got one-minute left.

Hon CLARE CURRAN: Thanks, Madam Assistant Speaker. The current provisions in the Education Act 1989 do not enable the Secretary for Education to consider student safety when considering private school registration applications or to effectively respond to concerns about student safety through means other than suspension after they’ve been registered. Inserting the new registration criteria would give the Secretary for Education the power to take remedial actions proportionate to the issue if there’s a concern that a private school is not a safe place for students. Well, if that’s not a gap in the law that needs to be fixed, I don’t know what is.

This Government is preserving the integrity of our education system, based on sensible and pragmatic evidence with a belief system and a set of values.

Hon TIM MACINDOE (National—Hamilton West): Kia orana, Madam Assistant Speaker. The Hon Clare Curran seems to be obsessed with the idea that the Opposition is miffed. Well, I acknowledge that member has more reason than most in this House to feel miffed, but I can assure her that we’re not miffed about what is happening; we are, nevertheless, exasperated on behalf of the public of New Zealand and particularly parents of children of school age that—[Interruption] There’s an incessant banter going on—well, banter, no; that’s possibly a bit flattering—going on from the other side of the House. I haven’t actually heard a word of it, but I’d be grateful, perhaps, if the member may have the courtesy just to stop for a moment. Madam Assistant Speaker, I believe that that member has not stopped speaking the whole time I’ve been on my feet. Is that acceptable?

Marja Lubeck: I’ve got so much to say.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): Order! Order! I know it’s Thursday afternoon, but yeah, please. Thank you. Carry on.

Hon TIM MACINDOE: I have completely lost the thread of the sentence that I was on, because of that incessant interruption.

The point I wanted to make was the exasperation we feel on this side of the House is because no New Zealanders voted for these measures at the last election. One of the really frustrating aspects of being in Opposition is to hear a coalition of three disparate parties who didn’t have a coherent sense of policy framework or even the idea that they would form a Government come out of an election which they didn’t present these ideas to the public with and now say they have a mandate to deliver them. Well, what we have, therefore, is a bill that, as I say, the public of New Zealand haven’t voted for and which, frankly, demonstrates hypocrisy, because you have got a Government that is trying to deliver measures that they say are in the best interests of the public and particularly of children, and yet really what it’s all about is greater ministerial control and taking away the choice that should be in the hands of individual schools and their boards of trustees and, in particular, parents.

Now, I want to make a comment on cohort entry. I might be slightly out of step here, because I do acknowledge the point that some people have made that for many children, starting school at or just below this age of five is not the right thing. But surely it’s about recognising to the needs of families, in particular. I started school when I was four, I was a couple of weeks away from my fifth birthday, and it was the right thing for—

Michael Wood: Look how it turned out

Hon TIM MACINDOE: Thank you. It was the right thing for my parents. I understand why they wanted to get rid of me at the earliest opportunity. My wife and I made the decision for our own children that they wouldn’t start school until they were nearly six, because we believed that that was best for them, and, in fact, they’ve turned out remarkably well and both have gone on to achieve extraordinary well. So my point is let’s not take away from parents the right to choose, and, in particular, let’s acknowledge the fact that for many parents it’s an economic necessity apart from anything else. There are so many families now, where the parents need to be able to go to work, that if the child is just a little bit short of his or her fifth birthday and it works for them, let that happen.

I don’t want to take a long call. The reasons that the National Party oppose this bill have been well articulated by my colleagues on this side of the House. We can’t stop it, because the numbers are against us, but let’s just remind ourselves that nobody voted for this bill at the last election.

MARJA LUBECK (Labour): Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. Just to continue from the comments made by the member who just sat down, Tim Macindoe, perhaps we didn’t put it forward to the public at the time that private schools should have the same safety standards as we see in State schools and State integrated schools, but I wonder how many parents of those children in private schools actually know that different standards and requirements apply when it comes to the safety of their students in those schools. So sometimes we need to be proactive about these things, and that also goes to the comments that the member Simeon Brown made several times with regards to the evidence he would like to see before we can make changes when it comes to keeping students and staff safe.

It has been said already, and there is evidence with regards to the need for this, but, even if there were no evidence, would we have to wait until there is an accident or an incident and then start to legislate? It would seem that it’s very much like the National Party’s way of operating: wait till it all turns to custard and then start fixing it up—hence the housing crisis and many other issues we’re dealing with.

But, look, I really just want to say a thank you to all the individuals and organisations that have taken the time out to come in and put their case forward at our select committee. In total, 18 provided submissions. The officials also have done a wonderful job in helping us draft the bill, providing context, and answering questions that may have arisen from those submissions.

During the stages of this debate, we have discussed most of the main topics at length, so I don’t want to drag this out any longer than I need to. But I didn’t make a mention yet in any of my speeches of the Waitakere Area Principals’ Association submission, and I think it is worthy to just finish off with something that they had to say about the communities of online learning: “We concur with the words of Jan Tinetti, who, in a speech during the first reading of this Bill, said ‘it’s [the repeal of the legislation] not taking away from our really big provider, our Te Aho o Te Kura Pounamu, or the Correspondence School—business as usual for them—and our virtual learning networks—business as usual for them’.”

So nothing actually changes in that regard, despite a lot of the misinformation that we may have heard during some of the stages in this debate. It’s my delight to commend this bill to the House.

NICOLA WILLIS (National): I rise to give my final speech on the Education Amendment Bill (No 2). I want to start on a positive note, because this bill does contain one good thing. The good thing that it contains is a reform to the process by which universities may change their name. This reflects recent events in New Zealand where one of our—if not our most—premium universities, Victoria University of Wellington, decided that it would go about changing its name. Unfortunately, the university council attempted to make that change without the support of its community, with a significant proportion of students and alumni opposed to that change and with staff divided on it.

We at the Education and Workforce Committee heard submissions about, in fact, the ambiguity in the law as to whether or not the Minister of Education could approve or disapprove that change. Minister Hipkins did a good thing: he rejected that name change proposal. The Victoria University council should be acknowledged: they too did a good thing and dropped the proposal. But what this change in the law does is make it very clear for the future that if any institution is to change its name, it will require a resolution in Parliament.

I think it’s appropriate that universities, which are creatures of statute, should be accountable to the members of this House, on whom it will be incumbent in future to ensure that no name change can occur unless it is genuinely in the interests of a university and its community.

However, I move to the more negative aspects of this bill, which are unfortunately the reasons why we must oppose it. In doing so, I just first want to ask the question of members opposite: is this the best you’ve got in education? Is this the best that we are going to see? Because I do not think that parents—that mums and dads—when they’re thinking about what they want from schools, what they want to see improve for their children, are thinking about amendments like this.

First, we have the cohort entry policy. We’ve had all sorts of claims on the other side, but let’s be very clear: National absolutely preserved the rights of parents to choose the age at which their children started school. It has been the case in New Zealand that children don’t need to start school till their six, historically. National preserved that position. However, what we did do was we extended the choice by saying that we wanted to preserve the idea that anyone by their fifth birthday can start school. So we will allow for cohort entry so that a few children might start a few weeks before their fifth birthday.

So it is incredibly disingenuous of the members in this debate to have claimed that we were forcing children to start school before their fifth birthday. We did no such thing. What we did was provide an additional choice to some parents, who may, for example, have had an older sibling at the same school and wanted to do one drop off not two, or who may, for example, have observed that one school was doing a great job of embracing principles in Te Whāriki, the early childhood curriculum, was embracing play-based learning, or would be a good place for their child to be.

Parents and children have different circumstances, and they should be recognised by allowing parents to make the decisions that are best for their own children—a principle that the opposite side of the House simply refuse to uphold.

Then we move to the issue of the Teaching Council. This is petty, because what we have here is a backflip from a Minister who campaigned on giving autonomy to teachers in the running of their professional institution but then received advice from his own officials that in doing that he was putting at risk the public interest in terms of aligning the work of that council with the needs of the education system. He gave with one hand; he took with the other, and this is where he takes it, by saying that he will direct that council through Government policy statements. We oppose that.

Finally, before I sit down, I just want to talk about communities of online learning and what the removal of the provisions for these communities of online learning represents. What it represents is this Government’s failure to in any way create a framework or a foundation for the huge advancements that are happening in digital learning, that are happening with online platforms. Instead, they have removed a provision which would have allowed for new things to evolve. What we say on the side of the House is, actually, the Government has a role in ensuring that new innovations can take place so that we can embrace the best of online learning for our children into the future.

This bill is pure politics. It’s not about delivering for kids; it’s about unwinding sensible provisions by the former National Government. It does nothing on the issues that really matter. It does nothing, for example, for the hundreds of children waiting for early intervention support. It does nothing for the children who are not getting what they need out of their schools. We should judge this Government not by what it says but by what it does, and this bill is something we thoroughly oppose.

JAN TINETTI (Labour): Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. I am absolutely delighted to be the last speaker in this third reading of the Education Amendment Bill (No 2). I’m delighted in this bill because, as we have heard here this afternoon, particularly from this side of the House, it doesn’t undo everything that was passed in the original education amendment bill—just the stupid things, as my colleague Tracey Martin said.

Today, this bill is coming through and will pass, and it makes seven changes to the Education Act—seven critical changes. While we’ve heard—and we’ve just heard—that they may not be the biggest changes, I think they actually are. I think, if you ask the parents and the children—those young people that are starting school—you will find that they think that those changes are actually big. I think, if you talked to the principals and the teachers, you would find that they think those changes are big.

Now, out of those seven elements, I actually only want to talk about two, and I want to only take a short call here this afternoon because, actually, a lot of my colleagues on this side of the House have said most of it for me. But the two areas that I want to talk about are the communities of online learning and the cohort entry. So I’ll start with the communities of online learning.

It came in in the education amendment bill that was passed in 2017. But, actually, it hasn’t come in, because it wasn’t supposed to enact until the end of this year. So it’s interesting that we’ve heard a lot of argument on the other side here about how this is going to impact on Virtual Learning Network—who are absolutely fantastic and wonderful and amazing providers—and Te Kura. But it doesn’t come in until the end of this year, and they’re operating now, so how does it impact? It doesn’t. This means that they will be able to be part of the discussions that we have in the future.

In fact, what the original amendment bill did do is that it had the potential to set up an environment that was actually quite damaging and dangerous for young people. In fact, at the time there were a wide number of concerns that were raised. In fact, we heard from the Hon Tracey Martin that there were 1,852 submitters to the original amendment bill back in 2017. I think it was 79 percent—I know it was in the high 70s—were anti - these changes. Now, the fact that we only had 18 submitters, I think, in this last bill tells me that those people that were anti in the first place are very happy that we’re actually repealing that piece of legislation now.

So I just want to read this bit here about the original communities of online learning (COOLs)—there was no requirement for a COOL to use the New Zealand curriculum, teachers did not need to be registered, and children of any school age were allowed to attend a COOL instead of a school. Any age—that means any child from five years old could go to a COOL, an online learning environment. Now, while that might not sound that bad for the children that are coming from isolated areas—those children can attend kura now that are in isolated areas—where it becomes particularly disturbing is the number of children that are unable to be sustained in the physical schooling system from the age of five because supports had not been put in place year, after year, after year. So this Government has had to pick up a system without the appropriate learning supports to be able to sustain children with severe behavioural or learning needs. We’ve had to pick up a system that has been completely underfunded.

The answer from the previous Government was to put those children in front of a virtual network—to put those children in front of a COOL. That is why we are actually getting rid of this piece of legislation now and looking at the future—bringing in all of the educators and the parents of children who need that provision and listening to them in a proper way, and consulting in a proper way rather than just using it as a political distraction to say that we are dealing with those children who can’t sustain schooling. I know children as young as five who have been excluded from school and who still haven’t been back to school four years later because the supports have not been available.

I now want to talk about the cohort legislation. This is the bit that I am really excited about. I am excited that we are finally listening to the advice from the Advisory Group on Early Learning from 2015—the advice of the then National Government’s Advisory Group on Early Learning. I’ve spoken about that in my previous speeches here. I was a member of that particular group, but I take my hat off to those other people who were on that group: amazing academics in early childhood education and wonderful practitioners in early childhood education, who understand child development better than anybody else I’ve ever had the privilege to have a conversation with in this space. Those people said very clearly that we cannot let young people start school before the age of five. Even five can be considered very early on a global standard. Now, when we’ve heard it can be just as long as eight weeks, actually, eight weeks in the life of a five-year-old is quite a length of time and actually can make a big, huge difference in the development of a child.

Now, as a former school principal I know that when children start school, there is a triangular relationship between the school, the parent, and the early childhood provider. It is really important that we listen to all of those providers, but it is also really important that we bring our professional expertise to that conversation as well, because I’d say that out of any parent that I’ve had with children starting school at the age of five, probably about 95 percent of them would have told me that their children were ready at four, because we all know that all of our children are brilliant. I’m not being facetious; we all know that all of our children are brilliant, because every child is.

But my professional side, to me—the knowledge, the skills, the expertise that I bring, along with the knowledge, the skills, and the expertise that the early childhood teacher brings—I must put that first and foremost. The evidence-based research that I am privy to, I must put that first and foremost because that is in the best interests of the child.

That is what this bill is about here, today. As I’ve said before, we are putting some great wrongs absolutely right here, today, and that is why I am absolutely delighted to commend this bill to the House.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the Education Amendment Bill (No 2) be now read a third time.

Ayes 63

New Zealand Labour 46; New Zealand First 9; Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand 8.

Noes 57

New Zealand National 55; ACT New Zealand 1; Ross.

Bill read a third time.

Bills

Trusts Bill

Second Reading

Debate resumed from 8 May.

Hon MARK MITCHELL (National—Rodney): Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. It’s a pleasure to take this call on the second reading of the Trusts Bill. Of course we support this bill. The reason why we support it is because the Hon Amy Adams and her team did all the work on this bill. This is her bill. It’s an outstanding bill and it’s in the spirit of what the National-led Government was trying to achieve and that is making our legal system easier for people to use and easier for people to understand. So this is a great bill.

It’s great to see that the best the new Government—actually, I shouldn’t say “new”, we’re 18 months into it now aren’t we—can do is come up with the Ombudsmen (Protection of Name) Amendment Bill. I can’t believe it. That’s the best you can come up with? Keep our bills coming through.

This is a good bill. I want to acknowledge the Hon Amy Adams and the fantastic work that she has done to get this bill finished, completed, handed over to the incoming Government who have had the good sense to bring it into the House, not only because it’s a good bill but because the Government doesn’t have any legislation of their own to bring into this House. That’s a sad state of affairs—18 months in, where’s the legislation? Faaf, sort it out, there’s got to be something going on.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): Order! You will refer to the honourable Minister in his full title.

Hon MARK MITCHELL: Sorry, Madam Assistant Speaker. It is a very good bill. This is a good bill because it simplifies trust law, it explains trust law. When you think about it there’s a lot of Kiwis, actually, that are involved with trusts, with family trusts—it impacts a lot of people. It’s actually a very good thing that both trustees and beneficiaries now are going to have a much clearer and a much better idea of how the law operates and what their responsibilities are under this law. I’m very happy to commend this bill to the House.

GINNY ANDERSEN (Labour): Thank you very much, Madam Assistant Speaker. Thank you to their member who’s spoken, as well. It’s a great privilege to be able to speak on the second reading of the Trusts Bill, and before anyone claims any glory I think it’s important that we name and acknowledge all of those that have had a role in developing this much-needed piece of legislation.

So it is true that this bill was introduced in August 2017, but off the bat can I please note that the proposed reforms are largely based on the good work and recommendations done by the New Zealand Law Commission back in 2013. It’s important that we have that research done and that good work done in order to inform policy and legislation, such as the bill before us right now. So I would like to acknowledge the work of Amy Adams and the previous Government, and the Law Commission in terms of where this bill has got to today. I would also like to acknowledge the work done by David Goddard QC who was a really good help and assistance to the committee in a particular technical area, and gave further insight and help to develop and modernise this important piece of legislation.

In addition to that, we had two lawyers on board. We had Dr Duncan Webb and the Hon Christopher Finlayson, who helped form a subcommittee within the committee, with expertise to be able to make sure all the proper work was done. In doing that, we received 34 written submissions, and 14 of those presented to the committee—and there was a range. The submitters included those from the judiciary, professional organisations, and interested groups and individuals.

When we’re talking about trusts, it’s important to acknowledge just how prevalent they are in New Zealand. The estimated number is between 300,000 and 500,000 trusts, ranging from professional to family trusts. You only need to take a look at the annual declaration of pecuniary interests to see how prevalent trusts are to members even in this very House. Trusts are a key part of our infrastructure, so it’s very important that that legislation is up to date, and that’s exactly what this bill does.

Let’s just take a very quick look at the main issues with the current law and why this bill is needed. There’s a clear lack of understanding in the general public around how trusts work and the fact that we are requiring lawyers to act, at times, when it would be easier if the law was just clearer to understand. So in order to not have things get progressed to court in an unnecessary way, it’s important that we modernise this legislation. In saying that, it is at least 60 years since the trusts legislation has been updated, so we can understand how there would be a big change over that period.

The second point I’d like to make is how the current legislation does not reflect how trusts are working in practice right now. It is narrow in scope, and it is making it far more difficult to draft trust deeds. Trust administration is overly complicated when it doesn’t need to be so, so making changes to trusts can often require having to use lawyers and for it to be more expensive to the average household than it should be. Dealing with simple administrative matters often requires application to the courts when that shouldn’t be needed. So what the bill does is it updates and modernises what we have. It will make trust laws easier to access and understand by replacing the Trustees Act 1956.

The bill sets out the core trust principles and clear rules about how trusts should be managed, so that trustees can clearly understand what is required of them, and also of the beneficiaries, so that they can understand their rights. The main change that this bill includes is a description of the key features of a trust and how it will operate, and it spells out the duties of those trustees. There are clear rules when the trustees are required to act, and when, also, they are required to provide information to beneficiaries, so that beneficiaries are able to enforce the trust when they see that it is fit. Practical and flexible trustee powers will be able to make sure that the investment in the trust is done in the most appropriate way, and it also makes the important rule, which can be contentious, about removing and appointing trustees without having to go to court if not necessary. So in terms of a time when we would like to see things not proceeding before a court, it will provide a far more flexible piece of legislation that is workable in daily life.

The ability to hold property for the benefit of somebody else in a trust is still an important one today, and this is because trusts, as I’ve mentioned, are so important to very many New Zealanders. Some trusts hold the family home for the use of future generations, some become trustees through a will, and others set up a trust for a corporate structure purpose. But it’s good to see that this bill is supported across the House, as already mentioned.

The Trusts Bill will be of significant benefit by supporting our wide and varied use of trusts in New Zealand, but it’s also important to mention that the bill is a modern statute that is fit for purpose in the 21st century. It’s an ambitious bill because it seeks to keep alive much of the common law that has developed over many centuries. This bill will allow the courts to interpret the bill in the light of common law, but it also adapts and responds to a modern and changing society and looks at the many different ways that trusts are being used, and it enables the average New Zealand family to access and utilise a trust without having to draw upon unnecessary resources to go before the courts.

I am pleased to be a part of this process. It’s a good bill. I’m pleased it’s supported across the House, and I commend it to the House.

CHRIS BISHOP (National—Hutt South): Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. I am very pleased to take a call on this Trusts Bill. This bill is a long time coming, and we’re only at the second reading stage, but I know it’s going to receive the unanimous support of the House, I think, and it will pass into law. Actually, the second reading does mark somewhat of a milestone for the House, because this bill started life as a review of the law of trusts. Now, I have to admit to the House that I have a particular aversion to trusts law. When I was a good, hard-working law student at the—

Chris Penk: Equity—urgh!

CHRIS BISHOP: Chris Penk is talking about equity and sounding very pleased behind me! I won’t just use a particular term I was going to use to describe him. Mr Penk may be enamoured with equity and trusts, but I have to admit to the House that when I was a very hard-working law student across the road at the Victoria University of Wellington law school, I was not. But it is undoubtedly true, notwithstanding my lack of prowess at the law of trusts and equity, that it is an extremely important part of the law in New Zealand. I think I read somewhere—it might have actually been during the passage of the bill and the consultation document by the Law Commission—that per capita, we have the most number of trusts anywhere in the world. I know my colleague Harete Hipango will have some views on that, and I look forward to her contribution.

We have a large number of trusts in New Zealand, and the law is extremely important, but for a long time the law has been a mess—it really has. That’s what prompted the previous National Government to do a very large-scale reform of the law and try and have a new Trusts Act, which would replace the old Act and bring all the law together, clarify—I don’t know if you’d call it a codification, but certainly something close to it. We went through this long process and there was a lot of consultation done.

Just at this moment, I do want to pay tribute to the hard-working team at the Ministry of Justice, and I have the privilege of actually knowing in a personal capacity a couple of the people who worked on that project. Can I say for the record of the House that that has taken up some degree of time over the last few years. If I was a public servant and I got asked to work on a very complicated and long project involving the law of trusts, I’m not sure I would stay in my job, but these very hard-working public servants in New Zealand put their noses to the proverbial grindstone. Honestly, it has been a quite large undertaking. They have helped get us to this point, but also they have helped us in the select committee.

We were very well served on the select committee by the Hon Christopher Finlayson, who is something of a trust expert, and he subbed in on the Justice Committee and did a very good job alongside the other members of the Justice Committee. I also want to pay particular tribute and acknowledge Dr Duncan Webb from the Government parties, the member of Parliament for Christchurch Central. Dr Webb is also a very noted lawyer with a background in trust law as well. He was not a permanent member of the Justice Committee at that point, but he started subbing in for other Labour members. He added quite a lot to the process as well, and now, of course, he is a permanent member of the very hard-working Justice Committee. You know, often members say “Oh, we’re a very hard-working committee.”, but I can honestly say, in the case of the Justice Committee, that is definitely true.

Look, this replaces the Trustee Act 1956, as I made mention before, and the Perpetuities Act 1964, to make it more sensible and clarify and codify some provisions of both those Acts. There’s going to be time, I know, in the committee of the whole House to go through it blow by blow, so to speak, but I just want to commend the bill to the House and, as I said before, say thanks to the hard-working officials who helped us with this process. Thank you.

MARK PATTERSON (NZ First): Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. I rise to confirm New Zealand First’s support for this second reading of the Trusts Bill. I actually share Mr Bishop’s potential lack of enthusiasm for the dry, technical details of the Trusts Bill. This is painstaking stuff, and I absolutely commend, as he did, the officials and everyone that has been involved in bringing this to the state that it is now. Of course, long overdue it is, repealing the 1956 legislation, and 1956—I’m not sure what that means to you, but for me 1956 is all about the All Blacks beating the Springboks for the first time in that historic series, with Kevin Skinner coming off the bench, or coming out of retirement in the third test at Lancaster Park, and Peter Jones scoring the—

Chris Penk: Did he have a trust?

MARK PATTERSON: —winning try at Eden Park—I’m sure they did have trusts, because that was the year that this bill came in, so they would have availed themselves of that.

But that shows you how long ago that was. I remember my father—the reasons why that’s relevant—got brought up on the knee hearing those stories, and they seemed an age ago, but yet we’re still operating in this modern economy under rules that were set up when a modern society like ours could hardly be envisaged. Of course, it is a fundamental building block to our legal and our financial system. We have some 300,000 to 500,000 of these trusts, and, of course, goodness knows how many trustees and beneficiaries are a part of that. So this will be a bill that affects a wide number of people, and, of course, they’re very important, and—I even know as myself, and as Ginny Andersen pointed out in her contribution—many of the members of the House have trusts; I have them, I’m part of an intergeneration family business. I’ve got a couple of daughters. I will be looking very carefully when the day comes when they start bringing boys or girls maybe, in this day and age, home. A trust is part of that to make sure that we can safely transfer that good work that’s been done by generations before through to the next generation, and hopefully beyond.

Of course, there’s all sorts of—that’s in a family or business trust, but they go up to, you know, we’re looking at Māori land trusts, we’re looking at unit trusts, charitable trusts, which play such a cornerstone in our society. So within those submissions—we had 34 of them, 14 oral, and I would like to, as others have, acknowledge David Goddard QC as the independent adviser. I know he’s also advising the Parliament on another bill at the moment, and I can attest to how skilled he is. So this bill sets out to simplify the system and put it in plain English, and I think that’s really important because those 300,000 to 500,000 trusts—the people that are the beneficiaries or trustees aren’t necessarily financially or legally literate. They’re often maybe in a time of grief or something, when they’re seeking to address the issues with the assets and transfer of wealth. Through these trusts they can often, I would imagine, feel overwhelmed; they’re faced with legal situations that they may not understand, and they are really, really important decisions that they’ll be looking to make.

So anything that we can do to clarify and put into plain English is very, very important indeed. That’s exactly what this bill sets out to do, and we know that this was initiated by the Law Commission in 2009, and I think it took through to 2013 for it to come out as a report, and it came to Parliament as a draft report in 2016. I would, in all fairness, acknowledge the previous Government, the Hon Amy Adams, for the work that she did getting it to the point that she did. So it does a number of important things. It clarifies the management of information and the communication of that information, and how that has to be disclosed to beneficiaries. It gives flexibility and trustee powers so that we can execute investment decisions more efficiently. It updates provisions around agents and how they can assume trustee powers, and it gives some more options for appointing trustees and taking out of the court system some of those steps. It also takes out the perpetuities, and I think that incorporates the Perpetuities Act 1964, and there is the 125-year provision, which puts a deadline—quite a long one I might say.

So there are a number of really important, key elements that have come in this bill. The Justice Committee has gone through and tested that, making sure it’s fit for purpose, and I commend the Justice Committee for doing that, and the Minister of Justice for continuing to shepherd this bill through the House. It is an important bill. It will affect a lot of people. It will simplify things. It will save a lot of money and complexity with legal fees, and it will also, by default, unclog our court system as well through minor issues that can be dealt with potentially outside the court system. So it’s a very positive bill, one long overdue, and one that I’m glad is receiving good support from the Parliament and, certainly, enthusiastic support from New Zealand First. Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker.

DENISE LEE (National—Maungakiekie): Kia ora, thank you very much, Madam Assistant Speaker. It’s a pleasure to take a call on the Trusts Bill, the second reading here. They are an essential part of our system, with around 300,000 to 500,000 trusts operating in New Zealand—that’s a big number. Ordinary New Zealanders use trusts on a daily basis—the former speaker Mark Patterson referred to the number of members of Parliament that do—and they form the economic backbone of the commercial and social sectors here in our country.

So what we had before was an unnecessarily complex set of laws, and it’s quite difficult to navigate the scattered sense of what those laws were doing for trusts. We want to make sure that the law is now practical and usable and sensible for families and businesses that need to, as I mentioned before, manage their day-to-day affairs, and have confidence that they can be guided and have easier to resolve disputes should that be the case. So while I’m not on the select committee that reported on this bill, when I read through some of the material it was quite clear to see that they made improvements to the bill, and they are to be commended for it. They made what may seem like simple changes for definitions like “lacks capacity” or “power of appointment” or “default duty” or “mandatory duty”, and they may seem simple and clear, but they’re very important, because these terms take away the vagueness in legislation

So where there is potential for conflict to arise when you get to practical application of these terms, we’re now seeing, from the passage of this bill and from the good work of the Justice Committee, we now have much more clarity and guidance on matters that, as I’m saying, are currently unclear—we’ll now have that certainty. So we support this to its next stage. The committee has done some good work and certainty, clarity, and clear guidance are always a good thing. Thank you.

JAN LOGIE (Green): Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. I rise to offer the Greens’ support as well for this Trusts Bill at its second reading, and I’ll keep it as a relatively short call. I think the complexity of this bill has been well covered in terms of the debate so far, and the fact that this arises out of Law Commission work that happened over a four-year period and that this was legislation introduced by the previous Government and has unanimous support in this House—it’s pretty clear that there is support for it to proceed smoothly, and it’s not a controversial piece of legislation.

I will re-echo the point made by others that the Law Commission has estimated that there are 300,000 to 500,000 trusts in this country, so while it’s not controversial, it is significant, and has relevance to a huge number of New Zealanders. I do want to just make that point as well, as has been mentioned, that there’s many members in this House—even though I’m not one of them, and I understand that around at least three quarters of members of this House in the register of pecuniary interest have an interest in a trust, and that in this country there’s a trust for every 12 New Zealanders. That’s compared to one to every 34 Australians and only one to every 294 people in Britain. So it’s obviously a very significant player for us in financial arrangements as a country.

It is important the legislation reflects the times that we live in and is easy to read, and the primary purpose of this bill is to update it. The Trustee Act hasn’t been updated since 1956 and the Perpetuities Act, which it also amends, hasn’t been updated, I understand, since 1964. So it’s absolutely proper that we do that and make it easier for people to understand.

I would just like to put on record that for the Greens this legislation is also a bit of a missed opportunity. We would have ideally liked to have seen the transparency introduced into this legislation, because we know that there is the potential for trusts to be used to hide wealth and to reduce tax liability for some people, and we would have liked to have seen a register or registration, which could have been done in a way that wouldn’t have created a massive cost burden, in our view, and that had been recommended by the Law Commission in 2012, but apparently, subsequently, was ruled out because of concerns about cost and industry push-back. For us, sometimes that push-back is an indication of need rather than a reason not to do something.

I would also say that, for us, there is a question to be asked about why capital gains generated by trusts are not taxed at the trust rate. You know, if we are really going to get to the heart of inequality in this country then we need to look and guard against people hiding wealth and avoiding taxation through legal means, to make sure that everyone in this country pays their fair share and that we share the wealth fairly in this country.

With those caveats around this being a missed opportunity, I hope that there’ll be opportunities for us to have that conversation at a later date, and we do absolutely, along with everyone else in this House, support the legislation.

CHRIS PENK (National—Helensville): Thank you very much, Madam Assistant Speaker, and thanks to all others who have already contributed on this bill. It’s clear that there is wide support among the House for it, which is positive. The history of it has already been rehearsed by others. I don’t intend to re-traverse that ground, except to say that I think it’s clear that the finished product—if I can call it that; not withstanding that we’re at only the second reading—does reflect high-quality work by a large number of people.

The introduction to the bill makes a good point about the fact that many key aspects of trusts are currently set out in the common law, and this is a good reason for a bit of legislation now to provide some clarity. There is a good reason, historically, for the fact that it is the common law rather than statute that sets out a lot of the rules regarding trusts. Of course, it’s a creature of equity. The separate justice stream, if you like, as opposed to black letter law that was a more strict view of justice that the courts would decide. Equity, in the sense of fairness, would be applied in certain situations so that ways of understanding the holding of property, for example, could be understood in ways that didn’t reflect necessarily the strict legal ownership. So that’s the history of it. That’s the reason why often trust law is encapsulated in the common law, but, sadly, that means that often-times it’s difficult for those who are trustees to understand exactly what the rules are, how they apply to them, and to be able to meet their strict duties accordingly.

So this is a good thing: striking a balance between prescription and flexibility, as the bill itself says. I won’t make a long contribution. There might be an opportunity later on, perhaps in the committee stage, for that. But I will just note that law students up and down this land may rejoice when they see the phrase under clause 16(5), “The common law rule known as the rule against perpetuity is abolished.” Anything with the words “common law rule” and “abolished” in the same sentence is generally going to be well looked upon by law students—and perhaps many lawyers as well for that matter—so for that reason and the others I’ve stated, and indeed as others have also said, this is a good piece of proposed legislation and we are happy to support it further.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): I understand this is a split call. I call the Hon Clare Curran.

Hon CLARE CURRAN (Labour—Dunedin South): Thanks, Madam Assistant Speaker. Interesting little contribution just before. Not having studied law, the arcane sort of things that make law students happy is some interesting to hear about. Why we’ve got this bill is a lack of public understanding about trusts, what they are, how they work, the implications of transferring property to them, and the rights and obligations of everyone involved. The Trustee Act is outdated. I think we’ve well traversed that—1956. It doesn’t reflect how trusts are working in practise. It’s narrow in scope. It makes it difficult to draft trust deeds, and trust administration is overly complicated. Making changes to trusts or managing unforeseen circumstances is difficult and often expensive, and dealing with simple administrative matters can often require an application to the courts.

It’s interesting, this, because a number of people have mentioned the sheer number of trusts in New Zealand: somewhere between 300,000 and 500,000. If you look at them, most trusts have a minimum of two trustees, and some more than that. So we’re likely to have around a million people in New Zealand who are trustees, which is quite a lot of people, and yet we’ve got such outdated legislation, so kudos to the Hon Amy Adams for kicking off this piece of work and for the Law Commission for doing it.

It’s also interesting—I had a bit of a look at some of the earlier Law Commission reports on this where they said that trusts are, interestingly, very popular in New Zealand. In fact, there’s almost like a trust movement and it’s called the trust industry, which advocates for trusts. Because they’re so easy to set up—

Hon Phil Twyford: Is it a trust itself?

Hon CLARE CURRAN: It could be a trust itself. They’re easy to set up and the system in which they operate—you know, there is a favourable tax environment for them. Interestingly, another comment that was made was that it’s a bit of a status thing to be a trustee, apparently. Who knew? The fact is that all those reasons that I read out at the beginning as to what the problem with trust law is means that it’s certainly overdue for an overhaul.

In the time I’ve got left, I just want to mention one thing that I’ve been reading about, and obviously, if I speak in the committee stage, I’d like to speak more about it, and it goes to the liability issues for trustees. The big debate that went on—as I understand, and I wasn’t in the select committee—was around the measure of gross negligence and the views on whether or not that should be considered, how it should be defined, and who should be liable and under what circumstances. The Law Commission had recommended including gross negligence in the restriction on an exemption in indemnity clauses. They took it out, then they put it back in again, but there were a lot of submissions on this, as I understand it. Federated Farmers and Rural Women New Zealand submitted that the trustees of a trust often bring very different skill sets and experience to their trustee roles. They could be both professional and lay trustees.

They’re concerned about trustees being held to a standard of behaviour beyond the relevant individual skill set under the exemption and indemnity clauses, and were concerned that uncertainty about the meaning of “gross negligence” would make it hard for trustees to get insurance for such liability. How the select committee dealt with that was to—the term “gross negligence” isn’t defined in the bill. It’s not a commonly used legal phrase. So to clarify the intent of the bill, they recommended inserting a clause 40A to provide guidance on how the court is to consider gross negligence. It sounded as if this was one of the main issues—I’m not sure—from those who were on the select committee, and that it was a good issue, which looks as if it’s had a good outcome. I hope we’ll hear more about that in the committee of the whole House stage. This is an overdue piece of law reform, and I commend it to the House.

TIM VAN DE MOLEN (National—Waikato): Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. I’d just like to start by acknowledging my colleague Chris Penk, who just spoke and who reminds me of my young children, who have their lovely little cuddly toys, and they treasure those things like you would not believe. When they’re holding those, all is well with the world, and so it is for me when Mr Penk is talking about legal matters in this House.

Now, this piece of legislation we’re debating today was brought forward initially by the former Government—a great piece of legislation looking to update and modernise some of the trusts law. On this side of the House, we know about business, we understand some of those challenges, the need to adapt and to evolve—and, quite frankly, 60 years since this came into law; it is well and truly time to be updated.

Now, there’s one particular aspect within that that I wanted to touch on, and Mr Penk alluded to it as well: clause 16, which took out the perpetuity clause in relation to trusts, and his comments around how law students would be particularly excited by that. I note that it was replaced by a finite period of 125 years as the life of a trust. I think that’s an appropriate level. It talked about that being sufficient to allow for all matters to be wound up in due course and with due process. So 125 years, of course, is quite a duration. Although, I read an interesting article just recently, and in that article—it was a science-based article talking about the longevity of the human race, and the comment in there was that the first person to live to be 150 years old has already been born. I hope it’s not Winston Peters. But in that regard, there is, I guess, the need to perhaps modernise this as we continue. I just thought I’d chuck in that little fun fact on a Thursday afternoon. But aside from that—

Greg O’Connor: Ha, ha!

TIM VAN DE MOLEN: —I’ll wrap it up there. I’ve seen lots of interest on the other side of the House. Mr O’Connor has finally woken up and joined the debate, so I welcome him at that point. We’ll be hearing shortly from Harete Hipango, who will cover off the finer remaining details on this piece of legislation for our side of the House. Thank you.

PAUL EAGLE (Labour—Rongotai): Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. It’s good to be in the House talking about this bill. Look, a lot of it’s been covered. It’s always great to see a piece of work that has the whole of the House’s support, despite some troublemakers trying to pretend it doesn’t and all the reasons why. But it’s been interesting listening to this. I’ve just learnt that there are more trusts in New Zealand than there are sheep, because there seem to be so many trusts. Everyone’s got one—I haven’t. Many on this side of the House haven’t. But, look, it is the second reading. It is overdue. It’s 1956—the only other bit of law I’ve seen around that era that needs a good shunt is the Adoption Act, which I’m looking at closely. But I digress.

I just want to thank the Justice Committee, who seem to have pulled together a cross-party group there with Dr Duncan Webb; the former member the Hon Chris Finlayson; help from an independent adviser, David Goddard QC; lots of submitters—34 of them, and 14 who came in and actually gave a presentation. So I’ve learnt a lot there.

I think it’s important to get to the guts of it. It’s going to replace the current legislation, really to ensure that it’s accessible, and when I saw that word I thought, “Absolutely.” Laws that are modernised so people understand their rights and obligations are a great thing. Even better, a bill that supports them to resolve their disputes both inside and outside the court system—fantastic. So a bill that makes the core trust law’s principles much clearer is a really good thing—plain words, and it incorporates core principles currently only found in common law. That’s good. Secondly, it is making the day-to-day administration of a trust a whole lot more easy, and that’s good.

The one thing—and it’s a short call to finish—and I thought this pertains to many New Zealanders, and that’s around how they relate to property. It’s the ability to hold property for the benefit of someone else in a trust, and that’s still a very important one today. Trusts are still relevant. Some use trusts to hold the family home—many in here, actually, but others have covered that; I won’t be mischievous. I think, therefore, it’s going to be of significant benefit to Kiwis wealthy, and on this side of the House, those who are not so wealthy, who will benefit. I commend this bill to the House.

HARETE HIPANGO (National—Whanganui): Kia ora, Madam Assistant Speaker. I stand to take a brief call before the House this afternoon. I’m mindful that it has been some months since I have spoken, and would seize the opportunity to address the House, first and foremost, to acknowledge that this week is New Zealand Sign Language Week, and the importance of ensuring that our deaf and our mute communities’ voices are not silenced, and to engender in them a trust that their voice is heard.

Furthermore, I first spoke to this bill at the first reading of the House. That was back on 5 December 2017, and in commenting to the House, I indicated that this is a worthy piece of legislation. I ended off that segment by commending this bill to the House as a trustworthy piece of legislation, and I shall continue to do so. I acknowledge the Justice Committee, although I’m not a member. I do substitute into that, and I sat in on a session when there was discussion around this bill. I hearken to the words of my former colleague, the Hon Christopher Finlayson, who made a worthy contribution and a trusted one, of course, in relation to this. As is recorded in Hansard, I reflect that the Hon Finlayson said, “it’s of critical importance that the law on the subject [of this] is clear.”, and that the Justice Committee has enough time to “carefully and thoroughly analyse the law,”—which they have done—“because this is literally a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,” hearkening to the fact that it’s been 60 years since this law has been reviewed and it is long due for that review.

The bill is not a complete codification of trust law, although it strikes a balance between prescription and flexibility, and that’s noted in the report from the Justice Committee back to the House. Without going into greater detail around that, I just hearken to—and I always, certainly, reflect on—the eloquence of my colleague, Christopher Penk. Chris’ father, Stephen, was the registrar at law school when I was a student, so it’s quite special that I’m standing and serving alongside Christopher when we speak to the law. My colleague has a very robust intellectual legal analysis and an articulated eloquence in his comprehension of the law. Mine is somewhat more pragmatic and practical, and I say—because I do take a short call—that the three main objectives of the bill are set out to be clear and accessible core trust principles, it ensures more efficient trust administration, and it simplifies and clarifies the role of the courts in relation to trusts.

Now, the Justice Committee’s report back to the House, in terms of going into the detail, which is too long for me to address the House on today—but to say that that has been a thorough and comprehensive study and analysis. I have just highlighted that that analysis is talking about clarifying definitions within the Trusts Bill, soon to become law; replacing clauses, inserting new clauses, amending, deleting—all about clarity and consistency, with the recommendations to avoid ambiguity. Again, the consistent thread running through their recommendations is around clarity and consistency. Providing guidance to ensure that the legislation is clear on how the court is to consider and interpret the law.

Bringing a brief call to the House, just to share that trusts are one of the most complex legal relationships, and this is reflected in the detail of the oversight and the review of the law. In saying that it’s the most complex legal relationship, it’s also indicative that the difficulties and the complexities around the trust law has, at times, enhanced the complexity to human relationships, and either the function or the dysfunction associated with the responsibilities as to how the trust law has been administered.

In closing, again, mindful that we are coming to the end of the evening and the end of the week before the House, but tragically there was news that broke this afternoon. It would be remiss of me not to acknowledge the family of Lance Corporal Nicholas Kahotea, the family of the New Zealand SAS, his whānau, his family, at the loss of a son, of a brother, a husband, a loved family member, and brother in arms.

The Trusts Bill before the House for its second reading—I commend that to its third reading and the passage of this into law. Thank you.

GREG O’CONNOR (Labour—Ōhāriu): I’d just like to start by complimenting the courage of one of the previous speakers, Tim van de Molen.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Well, you can’t actually do that.

GREG O’CONNOR: I can’t compliment him?

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Well, you can’t talk about people’s courage.

GREG O’CONNOR: Oh, well that’s—thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Personally. You can talk generally.

GREG O’CONNOR: Well, I’ll leave an adjective out of it. I’ll just say that Mr van de Molen mentioned that he was part of a party that understood business—the inference that they are quite business savvy. I thought that’s quite insightful to do that in a week when it’s quite clear that his party paid out a billion dollars more than they needed to in relation to South Canterbury Finance because of some very poor business understanding and decisions. So for a Friday afternoon, I thought it was quite an interesting observation to make. It brought some of the, perhaps, amusement that he was looking for with his crack around the Rt Hon Winston Peters—that had already been used. Perhaps that’s why there wasn’t quite the raucous laughter that you were expecting on that crack.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: No, but it would be great to come to the bill.

GREG O’CONNOR: But I will get to the bill, if I may. Just some things belie the opportunity to comment. If I may go to the bill. I was lucky enough to be a member of the Justice Committee that considered this bill. We bring life experience to our committees, and I was actually quite pleased to have the opportunity and, perhaps, the understanding as to what we were trying to achieve with this bill; having once been appointed as a trustee to a foundation—rather a large foundation—which was, shall we say, not in great shape as a result of some of the very failings which this bill is attempting to fix. It was as a result of, really, a poor understanding by the main trustee at the time of just what his obligations were. The fact was that all the information that we required to get the trust back up and running was in a laptop for which we had no access to because the trustee had actually passed away, unfortunately.

So it was actually interesting to sit through this process and have a context against which to work and to understand. And I very much admit to being a layman. I sat in awe of much bigger brains than my own sitting between the ears of Dr Duncan Webb, certainly the Hon Chris Finlayson, and David Goddard QC. So I sat in awe as those learned gentlemen did actually put some common sense and endeavoured to make sure that the sort of deficiencies in the bill were fixed to avoid the situation I had previously found myself in.

Even down to understanding what a trust is and who trustees are—I think that’s something that’s belying the large number of trusts that New Zealanders own. You’ve heard the figures, given that New Zealanders, proportionally, are very large users, beneficiaries, or trustees of such trusts, how little understanding there is of them and how much faith we have in the system. Again, that just shows the understanding of why this bill does need to be updated—simply because they are part of our way of life, and even just understanding what an express trust is. It means that—

Alastair Scott: What is it?

GREG O’CONNOR: I’m pleased you asked that, the soon-to-be redundant member for Wairarapa. It’s a fiduciary relationship, i.e. a relationship involving trusts, in which a trustee holds or deals with trust property for the benefit of the beneficiaries or for a permitted purpose. I hope, Mr Scott, that that satisfies your clear curiosity, which has remained alive, even late into this sitting week.

You’ll also be pleased to know the trustee is accountable for a way that the trustee carries out the duties imposed by the trustee by law. I hope Mr Scott—again, having shown an interest in this—that I’m not going too fast and you’re keeping up. I’m sure any questions you want to yell across the House, with the indulgence of Madam Deputy Speaker, I’ll endeavour to answer as I go through this presentation.

The trust is created by or under an enactment—still with me, Mr Scott?—by a person, the settler, who clearly and with reasonable certainty, and subject to any formalities prescribed by any enactment. I think you’ll understand why it’s important. But again, all levity aside—and this is an important part—the settler who clearly and with reasonable certainty, and subject to any formalities prescribed by any enactment, indicates an intention to create a trust. I think that’s important. It identifies the beneficiaries or the permitted purpose of the trust and, importantly, identifies the trust property. So I think, again, I hope I’ve been able to, in the short time allocated to me, satisfy you and others listening on the importance of this bill. But, as I say, it was a privilege to sit through the select committee—certainly to have the context I did in the need for good trust law, so that those who are the beneficiaries can have some faith in the system. I have no hesitation in recommending this bill to the House. Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker.

Bill read a second time.

Bills

Building Amendment Bill

Second Reading

Hon JENNY SALESA (Minister for Building and Construction): I move, That the Building Amendment Bill be now read a second time.

I’d like to thank the Transport and Infrastructure Committee for all of their work and consideration of this bill. I’d also like to thank all our New Zealanders who took the time to make submissions, as well as to provide their insight and feedback on this legislation. Everyone in this House of Parliament knows why we need to be able to act swiftly and effectively to manage buildings in extreme circumstances. The topic of this bill, when you drill down to it, is about protecting lives and people’s livelihoods. We need systems in place that can cope with extreme situations that our country can face, such as natural disasters like earthquakes, and can also show vulnerabilities in our buildings. The Building Amendment Bill steps in to fill gaps that exist in New Zealand’s management of buildings in an emergency and, in the processes of investigating significant building failures.

This bill amends the Building Act 2004 in two ways. Firstly, it introduces new powers to create a clear and balanced system that can manage risks buildings can pose to people and property from responding to recovery following a significant emergency. Secondly, the bill provides the central building regulator, which is the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE), with a clear set of powers to investigate significant building failures. This lets us learn lessons from and to improve our regulatory system. These amendments to the Building Act are informed by our past experiences, in particular the lessons that we’ve learnt from both the Christchurch and the Kaikōura earthquakes. These events showed us the hard way exactly why being better prepared is so vitally important.

The Building Amendment Bill recognises the central importance of making sure that our buildings are well looked after, of making sure there is a process that comprehensively manages them during an emergency, from start to finish, and of making sure that the buildings are safe and that we learn from any building failures that may occur. The central importance of this bill was acknowledged by those who submitted during the select committee process. Submissions agreed that the core of what this bill is meant to achieve, whilst drawing attention to areas where it could be improved, is really why we should improve our Building Act 2004.

During the course of consideration by the Transport and Infrastructure Committee, the bill underwent changes to address issues raised by both submitters and by the select committee themselves. I will summarise these. The first modification I will take you through—

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Can I just interrupt the member to remind her that she should not be reading her speech. The second reading is not the time when speeches are read. We had the Hon Stuart Nash the other day put his notes aside and make an excellent speech at the second reading stage.

Hon JENNY SALESA: Excellent. So the three main categories that the Building Amendment Bill will address are these: first, when there are urgent works on buildings in order to save lives, the Building Amendment Bill should absolutely ensure that that is addressed; second, when there are works on buildings that have economic businesses, we should ensure that, as we are making sure that the buildings are made safer, we provide the least economic disruption while those works are being done; and third, we should ensure that, as we are strengthening the buildings, we’ve taken into consideration that we’re saving lives—that they are fit for purpose long term, meaning that, as we make sure that our buildings are strengthened for earthquakes, yes, we save lives and, as we strengthen those buildings, we ensure that the quality that is put into those buildings makes it so that they last a very long time. Many of these buildings are Government buildings; so it is in our interest as taxpayers—and many of them also are buildings that are owned by council; so there are also ratepayers that are affected by this. So, as we strengthen these buildings, it is in all of our interests, both as taxpayers and as ratepayers, that we ensure that they are strengthened and that they last a long, long time.

Another new section was added in response to the select committee as well as to the submissions that were made, which will clarify the powers and who should exercise those powers, because, when emergencies like these arise, we have councils who have powers; we have the emergency defence force, who also have powers; and we have the MBIE, which has some powers over buildings. So this Building Amendment Bill is to ensure that, when those buildings are being strengthened, we know exactly who is responsible for what. So a new section has been added to ensure that we do not remove the possibility of a follow-up investigation.

One of the things that we saw in Christchurch was that there was, to give you an example, a particular building that needed to be strengthened; however, there was a building that was in the front, and in order to access and strengthen the building at the back, we had to actually get the agreement of the owners of the building at the front. What this legislation does is put that aside, and it ensures that whoever it is, be they owned by a private owner, be they owned by council, or be they owned by Government, that all of those issues of ownership are put to the side and that we focus on ensuring that we strengthen our buildings and that we also ensure—one of these buildings could have fallen on people—that people’s lives are indeed saved.

In terms of the section on determinations, which are legally binding, we also wanted to make sure that for MBIE, on matters of doubt, should there be any dispute that arises, there is the clarity of the legislation, and that it’s reworded so that it provides positive descriptions of the conditions for when a determination can apply. The draft legislation actually described when determinations did not apply. So the changes were made so that it was positive and clearer.

The bill also proposes to fix unworkable time lines in terms of compliance for dam owners. Presently, dam owners have a responsibility to provide classification and certification of their dams to the regional authority. The time lines for compliance in this section, however, are not workable in many situations. So a new clause has been inserted to resolve this, clarifying the wording in the bill. Finally, the wording was fixed so that the terms are more consistent, such as replacing the term “an individual” with “an owner or an occupier”.

By way of conclusion, these recommendations build on all the work that has been done so far by the select committee, as well as by those who presented to the select committee. The recommendations stay true to the original intent of the bill. We’ve refined the language; we’ve addressed concerns and clarified the purpose. The select committee process has been invaluable, and I thank all of the members for their hard work. I commend this bill to the House.

ANDREW BAYLY (National—Hunua): Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. It’s a pleasure to be talking on the Building Amendment Bill at the second reading. I think it’s just useful to remind ourselves that we, the National Party, will be supporting this bill because, of course, it is our bill. We introduced it, we did all the hard work, but I do take a moment just to congratulate the Minister for actually steering this bill through, which is the first that she’s steered through Parliament since she became the Minister for Building and Construction.

This is a very important bill because what it is seeking to do is deal with the issue of when there is a big seismic event or some issue where there is substantial building failure—and we’ve seen some of the examples of that; we’ve seen the issue with Statistics House following the Kaikōura earthquake, where we saw floors collapse. This was quite a significant issue where the footings were not wide enough—normally, they’re required to be 50 millimetres. With the movement of the building in an earthquake and also with some of the variations in how buildings are constructed, which are not actually perfectly square, that 50 millimetres, which is meant to be a tolerance level in the event of a seismic activity, often is reduced down to, maybe, 30 millimetres, and when you have a big seismic event like we had in Kaikōura, which rocked that building, that’s when we see the examples of those floors coming off. Interestingly, when that happened, some of the floors had been fixed up, but there were a couple that hadn’t, and those were the ones which failed.

Also, we’ve seen it in some other situations as well, and I think what this is doing is allowing for the learnings to come out of those occasions. So the key powers—and they’re set out in new section 207D of the Building Act, which states that, first of all, what we want to do is to learn from these failures. The second is about informing decisions about the performance of functions and duties of what’s undertaken under these powers, and the third thing is about helping, basically, with new designs and the way we should deal with it. That has been an issue, and the issue, actually, to be very specific, is that, in many cases, when we’ve had these events, officials—and when I say officials, I’m talking about not only building officials but emergency people, and this Act actually changes both the Building Act as well as the Civil Defence Emergency Management Act. What it does is allow relevant authorised officials to be able to go in and inspect the building.

Now, often this is during a period of absolute mayhem, if I can use that word, immediately following a disaster where you have some of the significant earthquakes we’ve had in New Zealand, unfortunately. So these are the powers to allow people to go in, look at the issues, and do it. And, of course, there’s a contradiction and sometimes conflict with the rights of the building owner and also the tenants of those commercial buildings. So you’ve got officials wanting to close them down perhaps and you’ve got owners wanting to keep them open and people who own businesses are torn between making sure that their businesses survive but also keeping their staff safe. So this bill deals with this, and actually what the amendment bill does is it actually introduces three categories.

We have an “urgent works to remove or reduce risk”. So this is where we’ve had catastrophic failure, and Statistics House is a classic example. No one should have been allowed to go back in there and we needed to make some changes, that area needed to be made safe, and that is what’s covered under “urgent works to remove or reduce risk”—section 133BU in clause 12, Madam Deputy Speaker—I know you watch these bills very keenly. There’s a second category, which is “important but not urgent”, and again there’s a sort of a cascade as we work our way through. So these are works that are required, and it might be protecting pedestrian ways, related to a building, or they could be made safe, but the building itself may not be. And then there’s a third category, which is “works necessary in the long term for the long-term use and occupation of the building”. And where we ended up with those categories is, I think, a reasonable sort of bounds around what the rights of officials are to be able to go and do things, but also it is sort of monitoring and protecting the rights of tenants and owners.

I think one of the issues that we did discuss in the Transport and Infrastructure Committee during our select committees process—and, again, like the Minister, I want to acknowledge those who submitted—is the issue of getting rights to the information that’s gleaned or obtained during this process. There’s two issues related to that. The first one is: who should that information be shared with? The bill actually covers that. It gives quite a lot of power to the CE to be able to give out that information to parties that he or she thinks are relevant—when I say CE, I mean the chief executive being able to pass on that information to the extent that it’s necessary.

But there’s an issue around protecting rights, and, of course, any of these sorts of things—once you get out in the public domain—can have a serious impact on the value of buildings. Therefore that’s again, sort of, an area of conflict that we had to try and steer our way through, and I think where we’ve ended up—again, I hope we’ve got to the right spot on that in terms of making sure that information around a building is only shared with those people who have an absolute need for it and that should be shared with, and not shared in the open domain of public good, because that’s not always relevant to people.

The other aspect is the ability for people, particularly in relation to people where death may have occurred or even where injury in a building has occurred—what are the rights of the individual family, in most cases, to be able to access some of the information that is obtained or even the reports that are produced by the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment component? And that, again, is a little tension point because at one stage we’re trying to learn from those failures, but on the other side you’re now crossing into the bounds of civil prosecutions, that type of stuff. There is an issue in this, and it was quite a thorny issue for the committee, which was around those people who had family members or whatever directly affected—should they be entitled to such information?

I think where we’ve got to is a situation that works; namely, that information can be obtained under the Official Information Act, and there is the right of families to seek judicial review on information, but the grounds, as most of the lawyers in Parliament will know, around a judicial review are reasonably limited. I’m just trying to find it here. The grounds are that it was unlawfully or unreasonably or procedurally defective in the way that the information was gleaned. That is a high test for a family who may have been in a situation where they’ve seen family members injured or they have died. I think that’s a bit of a tension point for this bill. We tested the bounds of whether they should be entitled to more information on a confidential basis, but that’s something the committee worked through. I think we’ve ended up in a reasonable space in it, but it’s one that we will continue to test and consider as we work our way through the next stage, the committee of the whole House.

But I think this is a good bill in terms of trying to deal with those problem buildings that have been damaged and, as the Minister said, also other infrastructure assets such as dams etc. I think we’re making progress. It’s good to see this bill coming through the House and progressing over time.

Hon PHIL TWYFORD (Minister of Housing and Urban Development): Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. It’s great to be able to take a call in this second reading debate on the Building Amendment Bill, one of a long line of amendments to the 2004 Building Act, which, if I’m not wrong, for the most part attract cross-party support. It’s an ongoing evolution of the Building Act with a great number of bills over the last decade or so that have been designed to fine-tune our building regulatory system to make it more responsive to the consumer and to encourage a construction industry and development industry that is more responsive to demand.

This particular bill seeks to distil some of the lessons from the Kaikōura and Wellington earthquakes and the Canterbury earthquakes in relation to buildings after an emergency and investigations after an emergency in order to learn the lessons. So those are the two main kinds of provisions in the bill: management of buildings after an emergency, and investigating building failures.

Some important work has been done by the Transport and Infrastructure Committee, I think, in trying to provide some clarity, really, about the powers that are exercised by a responsible person, which, as Andrew Bayly remarked, we’d often think of being a local government official, or sometimes a police officer, who would go into a building after an emergency. The select committee recommended with, I think, the helpful submissions from a number of people that it would be good to insert a new section—new section 133BNA—to give a responsible person or to give a police constable the clear power to enter a building or land for specified purposes, and it sets out a number of subsections there.

The responsible person may enter a building or land for a number of purposes for the purpose if exercising a power under various provisions—for example, to keep people at a safe distance or to protect the building, or for the purposes of urgent work to remove or reduce risks or works for the long-term use or occupation of the building. Clarifications and examples were also inserted by the select committee to better illustrate three different categories of when different powers to direct works to be carried out would apply: urgent works to remove or reduce risks, works to remove or reduce risks to economic disruption, and works for longer-term use or occupation of the building.

I thought there was also, in the reading, interesting material about the select committee’s deliberations on what, for example, could have been different in recent emergencies if these powers were in place, and we do have the recent example of the Kaikōura earthquake in 2016. These powers in the bill could have been used to manage buildings, both in Kaikōura, where there was a state of emergency declared, but also in Wellington, where there wasn’t, and where a local—what they call—transition period was put in place. In Wellington, the transition period may not have been needed, as it was only required to manage buildings, but the powers in this bill—the new powers that are proposed—would have provided a much better way to manage the situation.

Transition periods under the law provide extraordinary powers that can interfere with personal and property rights, and, again, Andrew Bayly made the point that in a situation like this, when you’ve got a building and there’s been an emergency, it may not be safe to go into the building. Officials want to go in and ascertain the extent of the damage and make a judgment about whether or not the building should be red-stickered, for example, or whether other restrictions should be put in place. That could have a major impact on people running businesses from that building or, indeed, living in those buildings. The select committee, I think, gave quite a lot of thought to how in this bill property rights in that kind of example could be protected. So it provides a framework for recognising those rights and it contains checks and balances—as you’d expect—to ensure that the proposed powers are used appropriately.

It puts in place a set of overarching considerations that need to be satisfied before these powers can be exercised. Of course, protecting human life and safety has to be paramount, but, nevertheless, if you believe that these powers need to be there—which I think everybody in the House does and everybody in the select committee did—then it’s appropriate that there are some criteria and some restrictions around the exercise of those powers.

There were some other interesting reflections that came out of the select committee. I understand that submitters from the defence agencies raised concerns that the powers in this bill might allow unauthorised persons access to restricted buildings, and that was a real concern for the defence agencies who came along to the committee. A related concern was that the requirement for building owners to provide information about the building could potentially reveal any security vulnerabilities in that building.

So as a result of that the committee have proposed the addition of a provision where a person exercising these powers in relation to a special category of building—for example, one that is home to a security agency—must exercise the powers in accordance with instructions given by the officer in charge of that building. So basically, it’s a carve-out of a kind for the security agencies. Diplomatic buildings also were raised at the select committee, and whether or not access to embassies and consulates would have some unintended consequence. So a provision is proposed so that there will be operational guidance that will be developed with the help of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

There are also, of course, other kinds of buildings that hold sensitive information, such as the courts, the Ministry of Justice, the Department of Corrections, and the New Zealand Police. Again, operational guidance for the exercise of these powers will be developed with the assistance of those agencies.

So it’s great to see cross-party support across the House for this bill. Finally, I want to acknowledge the work of the Minister for Building and Construction, Jenny Salesa, not only for this bill but for the great leadership she’s provided recently with the announcement of the accord that the Government has announced with the construction industry to tackle many difficult and deep-seated productivity issues in the construction industry, and for her whole legislative reform package that’s tackling some of the most challenging but most important issues in relation to risk and liability, workforce development, and product certification—really important work. Thank you.

ALASTAIR SCOTT (National—Wairarapa): Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. The Building Amendment Bill is supported by both sides of the House. I certainly support it, fundamentally because it’s a National Party Bill. The work was done in the previous Government—

Hon Phil Twyford: You’re so tribal, Alastair.

ALASTAIR SCOTT: Oh yeah, damn right—damn right. It is good to see the other side of the House supporting what is, fundamentally, a National Party bill. I tell you what, it’s not the first bill that they’ve supported that’s been all National Party work, and it won’t be the last. There will be another bill, I’m sure. I’m going to bet the next bill that they will support, which has come from this side of the House, will be the drug driving bill—I bet you, it’s going to come and they will support it.

Hon Phil Twyford: It won’t look anything like your bill.

ALASTAIR SCOTT: It will be stolen, it will be picked up, and it will be adopted by the Government and they will claim it as their own.

But we come to this bill—

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Please, please.

ALASTAIR SCOTT: The previous speaker, Phil Twyford, and Minister Salesa have—in fact, picking up on Minister Salesa’s example, it was a very good example of why we need this bill: she gave the example of an affected building, a dangerous building being, basically, landlocked, if you like, behind other buildings, and to get access to that building we need the cooperation and powers to enter both buildings to solve the issue. That’s what this bill does, it gives certain people certain powers which override the interests of the building owner. It overrides the ability of someone to say: “Keep out of my place, this is my castle, you’re trespassing”—and that’s the right thing. The right thing is to override that fundamental right, because the building in question is a risk—a high risk, a medium risk, a lower risk, there are three cascading types of risk mentioned in the bill. So that is important that those fundamental rights are overridden for the benefit of the community as a whole. That’s the first part of the bill. In the Transport and Infrastructure Committee, we clarified some of those powers and some of the people that were able to do that work.

The second part of the bill relates to what happens after the event and what we can learn after the event. Again, it gives certain people certain powers to compel agencies or landowners or engineers or architects to hand across certain information to enable the investigators to understand what went wrong in the buildings that we’re talking about—the buildings that are falling over. There have been a number of buildings in Christchurch and in Wellington, over the years, without this legislation, but, thankfully, with the cooperation of those landlords or the building owners, to allow investigators to come in, but it has not been an absolute. This bill makes it absolutely clear that those owners have to give up to furnish information to investigators so that they may learn the cause of, for example, Statistics House down here in Wellington, on the port.

So it’s a very good bill. Two parts, as I say, and it will be as Minister Twyford says, I’m sure, an evolving bill, with lots of amendments through the corridors of time. No doubt there will be further amendments as we work out whether the balance that I talked about earlier is right or about right—some people will say it’s not quite right, and we may end up discussing that further in committee stage. But at this point, in my view, it is in very good shape, and I commend it to the House.

MARK PATTERSON (NZ First): Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. I rise on behalf of New Zealand First to confirm our support of the Building Amendment Bill during the second reading. When we look at, as has been traversed before, this amendment to the Building Act of 2004, it has two separate parts: the new powers to manage buildings in an emergency, and putting an end-to-end response to a recovery and clarifying some of those powers. Of course, that allows the Ministry of Business, Innovation, and Employment, as the central regulatory authority, a clear set of powers and guidelines for it to manage and investigate damaged buildings. We have learnt these lessons—obviously, through the select committee process we’ve gone through the actual detail—in real time, unfortunately. We’ve had significant events—of course, Christchurch and Kaikōura earthquakes—but there have also been other things that probably haven’t been quite as high profile: the collapse of the roof of Stadium Southland under snow. So it’s not necessarily a major seismic event that would trigger the clauses in this bill.

So I commend the Transport and Infrastructure Committee for going through this bill. Actually, I wasn’t on that committee but when you go through it, it’s actually quite a complex bill—there are a lot of implications. We’ve just been talking about privacy and the likes that come into play, and there’s been a wide-ranging discussion in how we can tidy these provisions up and tidy this bill up—of course, under the wise stewardship of Darroch Ball, my colleague who chairs that committee with his Mensa-level IQ, so I’m sure that he has done a good job in helping assist this process.

Just looking at the first part of this bill, in terms of managing buildings during and after an emergency, it gives the Minister some powers to take direct action, and it clarifies the use and timing of those powers. It also gives special requirements around heritage buildings. I think there’s 4,400 Category 2 buildings and just over 1,000 Category 1 heritage buildings. This is a major issue in New Zealand, it’s something that New Zealand First actually has a lot of concern around: the earthquake standards—many of these buildings do not meet code, and particularly in our rural and provincial areas, the economic revenue that can be gained from them, especially the commercial buildings, doesn’t actually make it economic to bring the buildings up to code. There’s a lot of buildings—and I see the member for Whanganui here, who would know this very well, there’s a lot of historic buildings, I’ve been up there and seen them myself in looking at this very issue in part of bringing a members’ bill forward. We have many, many of these buildings around, of course, in Southland and Invercargill as well, particularly.

So we are very vulnerable, particularly in a seismic event, because we’ve got a lot of buildings that are just not economic to do up under the current provisions and we are running the clock down in terms of the time lines. There’s going to be the potential for buildings to be just walked away from at the end of a 15- or 25-year period, and we need to do a little bit more, I think, thinking around how we can avoid that, and New Zealand First certainly has been. This is, essentially, the ambulance at the bottom of the cliff after something like that does happen. So we have clarified a number of these powers and the requirements around consultation.

In terms of the investigating building failures, either that have or could have resulted in serious injury or death and assisting in determining a cause, there’s a number of parts to this: securing a site, clarity around the rules about entering the property and carrying out inspections, requiring provision of information to MBIE, and also the sharing of the information—and we have traversed that a bit tonight. We’re going into property rights and privacy provisions. It has been quite a delicate act. I’m sure the select committee has been well exercised in trying to land this in just the right place.

And, of course, it goes back. I think we started this process back in 2015 with a public discussion document, and it’s worked its way through the system. There were very substantive submissions to the select committee process, from the likes of Local Government New Zealand and Christchurch City Council—and haven’t they learnt their lessons the hard way. And, of course, the royal commission and their findings has been leaned on very heavily through this select committee process. As we heard, even the Ministry of Defence has had some input. So it just shows you how wide ranging this is.

Actually, one of the issues that came up through this is dams—you know, what do you do with dams and evacuations, where you’ve got a dam that may be damaged and someone’s got to make a call at that very moment as to whether that is a safe situation. And it gives those powers. Also, within that, it does clarify the immunity from civil proceedings for constables if it can be demonstrated, of course, that they’ve acted in good faith.

So there are a number of provisions of this bill. I commend the select committee under chairman Ball for the work they’ve done in going through this—this is an important piece of legislation—and Minister Salesa for shepherding it through. There’s a lot of work being done in that wider area, and I’m pleased that she has put some priority on this, and, as such, New Zealand First look forward to supporting this through the committee process. Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker.

MATT KING (National—Northland): It is a pleasure to take a call.

Nicola Willis: This will be good.

MATT KING: No pressure! I was on the Transport and Infrastructure Committee and did a lot of hard work on that select committee. There’s a lot of good people on there. This is the end result of that.

I’d like to acknowledge it’s quarter to 6 on Thursday—knock-off time. You’ve managed to maintain your concentration right till the last minute. I recognise that because you’re a large-electorate MP, so you’re a hard worker and you’ve done long hours. So I acknowledge that.

I’d like to acknowledge Minister Phil Twyford, the Minister of Housing and Urban Development, for getting up and speaking a couple of calls ago. I note that he’s not the Minister for Building and Construction, because he’s not building any houses; he’s just buying them. But all credit to him. I just had to get that in.

This is a small, significant bill. Of course we’re supporting it, because it is a National Party bill, work of the previous National Government. So of course we’re supporting it.

Sometimes good legislation like this comes out of terrible experiences like we suffered in Christchurch and Kaikōura, where the lessons learnt from these disasters mean that we have to change the law because we learn the lessons and we learn how to do things better. This bill creates a robust process to manage buildings in the event of an emergency before, during, and after, and it comes out of the Christchurch and Kaikōura earthquakes. Those earthquakes and the aftermath of that highlighted the deficiencies that we have in our law, and so on the select committee we got to listen to both the Christchurch City Council, Rangitīkei District Council, Wellington City Council, and also Local Government New Zealand, along with a number of other submitters that provided us with some good feedback so that we could create a good law.

So that allowed our emergency services and our authorities, and gives them the teeth, to actually act and do the proper job. So when things are constantly changing and there are competing priorities at play, occupants want to have access to the property and retrieve their belongings, and this gives some rules around that. Engineers who have to make critical and crucial decisions with very little information—it allows them to do their job. And property owners have to deal with significant damage in a valuable asset, so they also need to know where they stand. This sets out some good ground rules so that everyone knows where they stand and where they are.

So it’s a good piece of legislation. There may well be some more amendments, but I see it as a good piece of legislation. It’s well worthwhile, and it’s a no-brainer that it’s supported across the House. We’re all going to benefit out of it, so I commend this bill to the House.

MARAMA DAVIDSON (Co-Leader—Green): Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. The Greens will absolutely support this Building Amendment Bill, which is a new system for managing buildings after an emergency. It immediately took me back to when I was working at the Human Rights Commission in the Auckland office. Our Christchurch office building got locked up—well, for years—and people had left their desks and had left the building as is and could not go back inside. I recall the difficulty of trying to manage that process. This is, from what I can see, exactly what this bill is trying to do better on. I mean, everything changes with those earthquakes, with natural events, with incidents, and the purpose of this bill primarily goes to risks to public safety and risks to public property. So I’m thankful for the opportunity to speak to this and relate it back to what I myself can recall around the time as a colleague of Christchurch staff who had to try and manage that whole process. There, I guess, the bill also tries to pick up on the balance and the tensions between building owners, occupiers, and tenants, and public safety and safety to property.

So this bill provides for that new system to be able to be flexible enough and respond to everything being turned upside down, and allows for those investigations of building failures to take place. That was actually the problem was that it was trying to streamline. And the reason why our staff couldn’t get back into their offices was because we were waiting for the investigations to take place, to actually figure out what was going on; whether anybody at all could even go in and retrieve everything—computers, documents, their stationery, even their personal belongings—waiting for those processes to happen, and a lack of clarity around who could even do it.

Actually, and on that note, I was quite interested to know who the responsible person is who gets to exercise the powers that this bill is wanting to provide. So the new processes for buildings affected by emergency works to address those safety concerns, and new powers to bridge the immediate response work with the completed recovery work and how that even comes together. It involves allowing for responsible persons exercising powers to investigate, to see what works need to be completed, to assess the safety of the buildings and the risk to public safety. So it is in section 133BJ of this bill—which talks about the management of buildings in designated areas—it sets out who may exercise those powers under this new management process. I just wanted to put on to the House—for interest, also—that those sorts of responsible powers, of course, will come to people like the relevant Ministers or “On direction by the Minister, by the territorial authority that is responsible for the designated area”. So those are the local or regional authorities, but it also could include the Civil Defence Emergency Management Act officers and those can be controllers and recovery managers. Responsible persons who could exercise those powers could also, I guess, end up with controllers and constables and directors of civil defence emergency management groups. So it’s most definitely not just a loose definition of saying, “Someone is responsible”. There are clear—and we didn’t quite canvass that tonight in the House—definitions of who those responsible persons are.

I also picked up that the provisions under this Building Amendment Bill would also protect heritage buildings and there has been—after Kaikōura, Christchurch—discussion, of course, about whether marae, if they are registered, come under heritage protection. So this bill would apply to marae as well. Now, that’s going to be interesting if we are ever faced with a situation of, again—because, and other speakers have mentioned, while the bill gives some clarity as to balancing those powers of property owners and tenants with public safety, actually, at the heart of that will be how they manage the relationships to have that conversation—this is what’s going to happen, making sure everyone’s on board so that we can streamline those new processes and those investigations to happen in a way that will have a better outcome for everyone concerned, in a way that won’t cause further confusion and disruption.

I don’t know where it is, but there’s a principle of limiting the disruption to the owner or tenants’ operations as much as possible. So the bill tries to be balanced and reasonable, tries to get the job done, and tries to keep public safety and the protection of property at the core, while keeping a check on any response being proportional to the incident—to the earthquake, to the natural disaster—and to what has actually happened to the building. So it’s really well-thought-out—and I’ve only just skimmed a small part of it, but really well-thought-out.

I must congratulate the select committee for working through these incredible details, the submissions that allowed for some amendments and further clarity to be made to the bill that has come back in second reading, and for taking on board the concerns of submitters and the logic and the insight of submitters to be able to make it a better bill, I think, that has come into the House today. So I’m really pleased to be able to support this and to continue the debates. Whether there are any further changes, particularly around balancing the sort of private property and public safety aspects, is what I’ll be listening to hear, and contributions later on in the committee stage from the Minister as well. Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker.

TIM VAN DE MOLEN (National—Waikato): Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. It’s a pleasure to rise and take a call on the Building Amendment Bill, noting that it’s really looking at tidying up some of the legislation, creating a set of rules in which we might be able to work more thoroughly, more efficiently, and more safely after an emergency. Of course, in my electorate of the Waikato, we’re #blessed to not be particularly subject to seismic shocks, but there are other regions, of course, that have been—Canterbury and Kaikōura most notably. So with that, it’s important to make sure that we have the right rules in place.

I didn’t sit on this committee for the duration—I was there for the submissions at the start of the first day and then for the final day at the end, so I sort of caught both ends of it, as it were—but I was also impressed by the submitters through that process. The territorial authorities—Christchurch City Council, for example—and also other submitters, such as Spark from an infrastructure perspective, were very collaborative and very happy to go away, work together, and provide some input to the committee, which was gratefully received as well. So I’d like to acknowledge them for their contribution.

There was one aspect that I just wanted to bring to the attention of the House today. It’s not a concern as such but perhaps an area that might be tidied up with a Supplementary Order Paper, maybe, in the committee the whole House stage. Under new section 133BV “Works to remove or reduce other risks”, inserted by clause 12, it talks about if there is a disruption and a responsible person has to go in and make some changes or create a set of rules or rope off an area, as it were—and I think that’s under new section 133BR, around a safe distance—there’s several requirements of them before they can do that, such as, 10 days before they do that, notifying the owners of the building or the occupiers of the damaged building that they’re looking to rope off, as it were, and also owners and occupiers of other buildings, and owners and occupiers of critical infrastructure whose use is disrupted by that safety zone being put in place.

One aspect there: I just wonder whether that should also include “land or property” rather than being specifically restricted to neighbouring buildings. I use the example of perhaps an urban car-park, where it doesn’t have significant buildings or critical infrastructure on it but the use of that property right would be impacted by having a safety barrier placed on it in relation to a neighbouring building. I just wonder whether that’s perhaps something that might be able to be considered, because I note that in previous sections—133BT—it does talk about buildings and land as separate distinctions, but then it doesn’t include that in 133BV. So I think perhaps that’s one area that the Minister might like to consider and determine whether or not it is appropriate. Again, I reiterate I didn’t sit through the entire process, so perhaps I’m missing part of that, but that’s one area that I would like to see tidied up.

Aside from that, though, I think this is a very good piece of legislation. It looks to put some good rules in place to ensure we can manage emergencies more safely and for everyone’s benefit as best as possible. So I commend it to the House.

PAUL EAGLE (Labour—Rongotai): Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. It’s a pleasure to be talking on the Building Amendment Bill—the second reading.

Hon David Bennett: Why do they always give you the last slot, mate?

PAUL EAGLE: And here he is. It’s always the most intelligent and the best looking who get the final say, but anyway. I commend this bill to the House. There we are.

Debate interrupted.

The House adjourned at 6 p.m.