Tuesday, 16 June 2020

TUESDAY, 16 JUNE 2020

TUESDAY, 16 JUNE 2020

The Speaker took the Chair at 2 p.m.

Karakia.

Speaker’s Statements

COVID-19—Acknowledgments

SPEAKER: Before I go to general business, I just would like to acknowledge the fact that this is the first time the House has sat in its normal form since the beginning of the COVID period. I want to place on record my thanks to all members of Parliament for their tolerance during this time. I want to thank the Leader of the House, the shadow Leader of the House, and both senior whips for the work that they’ve done, and to acknowledge the COVID committee and the work that it did. I think it’s been recognised internationally as doing work that was very important and meant that we had a balance of accountability with safety in a way that I don’t think any other country actually managed during this period.

I would also like to ask the Clerk of the House and the chief executive of the Parliamentary Service to pass on to staff my thanks for the work that they did during the period. I think that there was, especially within electorate offices, a lot of new demand and intensive demand, which was handled generally very, very well. Thank you.

Oral Questions

Questions to Ministers

Question No. 1—Finance

1. TAMATI COFFEY (Labour—Waiariki) to the Minister of Finance: What reports has he seen on the New Zealand economy and our response to COVID-19?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Minister of Finance): In its weekly commentary released yesterday, Kiwibank economists said that “The worst-case scenarios were now off the table, as we have wound back social distancing measures much sooner than most economic forecasts and downside scenarios.” Not everyone is quite as optimistic as that. The ASB economists noted the New Zealand economy was faring a little better than most expected. The ASB senior economist Jane Turner told the New Zealand Herald that New Zealand’s hard and early approach meant a stronger economy over the second half of the year than ASB and other forecasters had initially expected. Our swift and decisive response to COVID-19 has put us in a good position compared to the rest of the world. However, the impact on New Zealand from COVID-19 economically will still be significant as the rest of the world struggles with lockdowns and low confidence.

Tamati Coffey: What reports has he seen on the international context for the New Zealand economy?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: The BNZ economists yesterday described the global outlook as “a gale-force headwind”. New Zealand is an outward-facing exporting nation, so we will always be affected by any global downturn. The BNZ said given that exports account for almost a third of our GDP, the prevalence of COVID-19 across the globe will continue to be a limiting factor on our economic expansion. The Government will continue to cushion the blow for our businesses and workers while we rebuild the economy.

Tamati Coffey: What reports has he seen on unemployment as a result of COVID19?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: Many economists have revised down their predictions for unemployment on the back of economic activity being better than expected due to our move to level 1. Westpac said on Friday that it expects unemployment to peak at 8 percent, not 9.5 percent as originally predicted, and the OECD has also picked an unemployment peak of just under 8 percent in its new forecast this week. If we look across the Tasman in Australia, the Reserve Bank Governor there has revised his previous 10 percent unemployment forecast down to an 8 percent peak. So we are expected to track along the same lines as Australia when it comes to unemployment. This Government is keeping New Zealand moving through our investments in education and training, particularly in trades training and apprenticeships, but we must recognise there will be tough times ahead, and the Government will continue to support people through that.

Question No. 2—Prime Minister

2. TODD MULLER (Leader of the Opposition) to the Prime Minister: Is she confident her Government has the systems in place and the competence required to increase the number of people in jobs and grow the economy through infrastructure investment?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN (Prime Minister): Yes. As a Government, we are focused on creating jobs and growing the economy through a number of avenues, not just infrastructure. We’re making law changes to speed up planning processes, investing in apprenticeships, opening up international markets through trade, supporting the agricultural sector to create clean, green food to sell to the rest of the world, and investing in research and development, amongst many other initiatives.

Todd Muller: Why, almost six months since her finance Minister announced a $12 billion New Zealand upgrade infrastructure programme to—and I quote—“increase the size of the economy”, do recent answers to written questions show only $11 million has been spent on transport projects?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I’m happy to give an update on the transport projects again, which were only announced in—if my recollection is correct—February. They include State Highway 58, where the New Zealand Transport Agency is in negotiations with builders there on stage two. That’s expected to be up and running in August. They’re opening registrations of interest for the Tauranga Northern Link, Penlink, and the State Highway 1 Papakura to Drury South. They’re working with two short-listed parties on who will deliver the shared pathway across the Auckland Harbour Bridge, and geotechnical testing is already under way for Ōtaki to north of Levin to assist with the design process. If the member wants to ask about projects beyond transport, I’m happy also to give him an update on our investment in the regions, the clean-powered public service, and school infrastructure investment, which is all under way as well.

Todd Muller: How many of the 11 shovel-ready projects that she announced yesterday will have spades in the ground by the election?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I think the important point here is that we are reducing down the time—[Interruption]

SPEAKER: Order! The Prime Minister is a very small distance away from me, and I can’t hear her.

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: We have reduced down the potential delays in those projects—which sometimes could delay completion by up to one to two years—to something in the order of, potentially, 70 days. I would have thought that the member would support the fact that those 11 projects will be expedited. They still do need to go through a process, so whilst I won’t give a start date, they will be considerably reduced than what they otherwise might be.

Hon Chris Hipkins: Is she confident that those projects she just mentioned will start faster than the Pūhoi to Wellsford roading project, which took seven years between announcement and work actually getting under way?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Actually, it wasn’t just the Pūhoi to Wellsford; under the last Government, the Auckland western ring route took four years from the time it was announced till the time it started; the Wellington Northern Corridor—again—four years from announcement to the start; Christchurch motorway projects, seven years from the time they were announced to the time they started. I’m proud not only of the significant investment we have made but also the fact that we are cracking on with infrastructure projects—not just roads, but health and education—that will make a difference to New Zealanders’ jobs and lives.

Todd Muller: So is the Prime Minister saying that despite being announced yesterday as shovel-ready, there will be no projects with spades in the ground come the election?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: No. I did not say that. [Interruption]

SPEAKER: Order! I’m not sure which member it was, but just keep me out of it.

Todd Muller: I repeat to the Prime Minister: how many of the 11 shovel-ready projects that she announced yesterday will have spades in the ground by the election?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: For some of those projects—for instance, those that are dealing with significant water shortages—it will enable earthworks to start in a matter of months if it passes through the process. Again, I would point out to the member that this is on top of the New Zealand upgrade investment. It is on top of the most significant investment in infrastructure: $45 billion over a forecast period. This is on top of the $3 billion that we have said we’ll put in through the COVID-19 Response and Recovery Fund, and it is on top of what the last Government failed to do, which was invest in infrastructure.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Do any of these transport projects include the following three in an advertisement up North this week: moving the Auckland port to Northport, a floating dock at Marsden Point, and moving the New Zealand Navy to Marsden Point—all claimed by Shane Reti in an advertisement this week in Northland?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Obviously, if the member wishes to float ideas amongst his team, he is welcome to do that.

Todd Muller: So when Phil Twyford announced “Unitec deal marks major KiwiBuild milestone” 813 days ago, on 25 March 2018, should the public have expected the development to have started by now, rather than be added to her reheated list of 11 shovel-ready projects yesterday?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: The member well knows that any housing project would usually go through a significant Resource Management Act process. What the Government has announced is a shortening of that considerably. And while we’re on housing, I’m happy of course to again announce in this opportunity that we are now up to 4,670 public housing places under this Government—and that is under usual processes—and it is well over our expectation, then, of delivering 6,403, and, again, we’ve announced another 8,000 houses as part of our COVID recovery and response, which will generate up to 4,000 jobs.

Todd Muller: Why should New Zealanders believe in her Government’s ability to deliver jobs and grow the economy through infrastructure when, despite promising to finish the Auckland light rail in 2021, the project has no plan, delivery partner, business case, costing, consents, or route?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Because under this Government, we got unemployment to the lowest in a decade; because under this Government, we have started work on Penlink, State Highway 1 Papakura to Drury South, Northern Pathway, Tauranga Northern Link, and State Highway 58; and because under this Government, we have started work on 200 full or partial school rebuilds. We have already initiated 1,283 approved projects under the New Zealand Upgrade Programme for schools, which was only announced in February. They’ll know that, because we are already undertaking the projects we announced and getting things cracking to generate jobs for New Zealanders.

Todd Muller: If her Government is competent to get people into jobs and grow the economy, why has it only built 395 of the 10,000 KiwiBuild homes it promised to deliver by 2021?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I welcome the chance to point out that we have built more houses than any Government, including that member’s—including that member’s—since the 1970s: 4,670 public housing places; another 8,000 funded by this Government. That will generate 4,000 jobs and homes for Kiwis. We inherited a housing crisis; we are getting on with fixing it.

Hon Dr Megan Woods: Is the Prime Minister aware that our 395 KiwiBuild houses built over this term, in addition to the 700-odd that are under construction, far outstrips what the previous Government achieved in terms of 104 affordable houses over nine years in Government?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: A hundred—roughly—houses is exactly why we inherited a housing crisis. We have built more houses as a Government than any Government since the 1970s, and we stand proudly on that record.

Todd Muller: To the Prime Minister—

Hon Shane Jones: Lazy Opposition.

Todd Muller: —when she said—

SPEAKER: Order! Order! No, it’s no good looking behind. The member will stand, withdraw, and apologise—blatant and stupid.

Hon Shane Jones: I withdraw and apologise.

Todd Muller: To the Prime Minister, when she said, 559 days ago, that the Government’s $100 million Green Investment Fund would bring “cash and know-how to the table to partner with business to develop a clean, green future for everyone.”, would she have expected the fund to have made an investment by now?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Oh, stay tuned.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Can I ask the Prime Minister, with respect to the four-lane highway from Warkworth all the way to Whangārei, did she inherit a situation where the National Party had already committed to doing that—

Hon Gerry Brownlee: No, not a legitimate question.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Well, how would you know? How would you know, eh?

SPEAKER: Order! Order! The member—

Rt Hon Winston Peters: The least-qualified guy in this Parliament—

SPEAKER: Order! The member will resume his seat. Mr Brownlee, you know that there’s only one person who makes that decision and it’s not you, and you certainly don’t do it from there and you certainly don’t do it when the question’s being asked. I’m going to ask Mr Peters to start his question again.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Could I ask the Prime Minister, with respect to the four-lane highway between Warkworth and Whangārei, did she and her Government inherit a committed plan from the previous Government to do that, or a plan that says that they’re now committed to it—as was in the advertisement this week from one Shane Reti?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: For the most part on these projects, we inherited press releases.

Todd Muller: Is it not a fact that when it comes to growing the economy, the hallmark of her Government has been a complete failure to deliver, and her team simply doesn’t have the acumen to plan, build, and drive this country forward?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: No.

Question No. 3—Environment

3. GINNY ANDERSEN (Labour) to the Minister for the Environment: How does he propose that fast-track consenting will help the COVID-19 recovery?

Hon DAVID PARKER (Minister for the Environment): Mr Speaker—Mr Speaker?

SPEAKER: The Hon David Parker.

Hon DAVID PARKER: Thank you, Mr Speaker.

SPEAKER: Sorry, I was just looking for the member—he’s got more distant.

Hon DAVID PARKER: Oh, thank you. I still look the same. The Government’s No. 1 economic priority as we recover from the COVID-19 global pandemic is to create and retain jobs for New Zealanders. Over 45,000 New Zealanders have lost their jobs as a consequence of the COVID crisis, and it is of critical importance that as many New Zealanders as possible can return to the workforce as quickly as possible. The Government plans to introduce special legislation today to support New Zealand’s recovery by fast tracking resource consenting and designations so that job-rich projects can gain approval as soon as possible—faster than through the standard Resource Management Act (RMA) process. This will bring forward the construction projects, often by months and sometimes by years. This bill helps provide New Zealanders with jobs and incomes, and supports the economy to recover from the effects of COVID-19.

Ginny Andersen: How will the fast-track legislation work?

Hon DAVID PARKER: There are, essentially, three parts to the fast-track process to speed up projects and bring forward jobs. Firstly, there are 11 named projects that are referred directly to an expert consenting panel by Parliament. The panel will set appropriate conditions for the projects before they can proceed. The second track applies to applications for other private or public projects. Applicants must provide information to the Minister for the Environment on how the project meets the criteria specified in the bill—in particular, employment. Selected projects will then be referred by Order in Council to panels for consideration. The third aspect is the ability for the New Zealand transport authority and KiwiRail to undertake repair maintenance and minor upgrade works on existing infrastructure and road and rail corridors as permitted activities, subject to certain conditions.

Ginny Andersen: How will the fast-track legislation ensure that environmental protections are maintained and Treaty of Waitangi commitments are honoured?

Hon DAVID PARKER: While extraordinary times such as this require extraordinary measures, environmental outcomes ought not to be sacrificed. While these projects are being advanced in time, environmental safeguards remain. Part 2 of the RMA, including the recognition of matters of national importance, will continue to apply. RMA Treaty principles and Treaty settlements will be upheld. Finally, the fast-track law is a short-term intervention that will repeal in two years. It’s not part of the wider review of the RMA. That comprehensive review led by retired Court of Appeal Judge Tony Randerson QC is expected to report back soon, and I expect to release that in the next few weeks.

Question No. 4—Finance

4. Hon PAUL GOLDSMITH (National) to the Minister of Finance: What steps has he taken, if any, to ensure Government spending has clear outcomes and delivers good results?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Minister of Finance): As a Government, we are constantly assessing the outcomes and results from our investments. This includes the regular monitoring of core investments by Cabinet committees and oversight from the Cabinet Priorities Committee. In terms of my own responsibilities, all Budget proposals are assessed by Treasury before being approved, and agency monitoring arrangements are regularly undertaken by Treasury and assessed by the Auditor-General. One example of this is the programme of baseline reviews which has assessed agencies such as the Ministry of Social Development (MSD) and Defence, and is currently looking at Justice and the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment. A further example is a specific team that is working on supporting the delivery of commitments made under the COVID-19 Response and Recovery Fund in light of the large investments involved and the need for rapid implementation.

Hon Paul Goldsmith: What follow-up actions has he taken to ensure the $12 billion spent on the wage subsidy went to those who genuinely needed it, since his ministerial colleague Carmel Sepuloni’s office said that they were not interested in the wage subsidy fraud figures?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: In respect of the second part of that question, that’s not an accurate reflection of Minister Sepuloni’s view. What the Government has done is put in place a team of 104 investigators who have currently undertaken 6,749 audits, 491 of those have been referred to MSD for investigation, and, thus far, the amount paid back to the fund as a result of all of this and the voluntary refunds amounts to $158.2 million.

Hon Paul Goldsmith: Has he heard of some businesses delaying invoices so that they met his wage subsidy extension threshold, and, if so, what steps has he taken to ensure the integrity of that nearly $4 billion programme?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: The audit process that’s under way for the first phase of the wage subsidy scheme will be continued in the extension phase. The vast bulk of New Zealand businesses have done the right thing—made sure the wage subsidy has been passed on to their employees. Where that hasn’t happened, we have said that we will follow it up and chase those people down.

Hon Paul Goldsmith: What outcomes did the education Minister tell him were expected by spending $87 million to send internet modems to high-decile schools for kids who didn’t need them, to arrive after they’ve got back to school?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: Again, the member seems to think that the idea that we might actually facilitate all New Zealand children to keep learning through a global pandemic is somehow a bad thing. Clearly, the member doesn’t seem to think it’s important that our young people are actually able to learn. The programme supported a large number of young New Zealanders to be able to continue their learning. It’s an important programme, and the idea that we shouldn’t try and somehow or other actually improve digital access for young people—it just surprises me the member would want to go there.

Hon Paul Goldsmith: What does he say to the parents at my local school in Epsom who worry about how we’re going to pay for all the Government spending and debt his Government’s taking on and who then see 88 modems turn up after the lockdown, when the school thought they might have needed two, two months ago?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: What I have been advised by the Minister of Education is that the Ministry of Education relied on advice that came from schools as to where there needed to be the delivery of technology. But the member does need to be a little careful about how he might explain to Mr Seymour’s constituents in Epsom what’s going on in spending when he and his party continue to say that they would spend and spend more. He could answer the same question himself.

Hon Paul Goldsmith: How can New Zealanders have confidence that the $3.2 billion he’s announced for rail since coming into office will yield better results than the $9 million spent on the Napier to Wairoa line, which has had a grand total of six trains in six months?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: I think it’s relatively rich to hear that side of the House talk about rail. What we inherited was a rail system with 50- and 60-year-old engines and wagons, and tracks that couldn’t be used—all over New Zealand. I’m extremely proud, on behalf of all three parties that make up this Government, that we’re actually investing in rail, and—to quote the Deputy Prime Minister—it’s back on track.

Question No. 5—Economic Development

Hon JUDITH COLLINS (National—Papakura): Thank you, Mr Speaker. To the Minister for Economic Development—with your indulgence, Mr Speaker—congratulations to the Minister on his promotion. Does he stand by—

SPEAKER: Order! Order!

Hon Judith Collins: I asked for indulgence.

SPEAKER: I am very tempted to cancel the member’s question. I’ll think about the punishment as we go on.

5. Hon JUDITH COLLINS (National—Papakura) to the Minister for Economic Development: Does he stand by his 1 April statement, “That’s why we are now developing a pipeline of infrastructure projects from across the country that would be ready to begin as soon as we are able to move around freely and go back to work”?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD (Minister for Economic Development): Yes, and that’s why the Government has already announced some of this pipeline, including the Minister of Housing’s public housing construction programme, the additional $1 billion for rail announced in the Budget by the Minister for State Owned Enterprises, and schools up and down the country with school improvement projects under way, and the Minister of Transport informs me that there are more than 40 State highway projects under construction across New Zealand right now. A number of Ministers, including the Ministers of transport, health, and education, are continuing work on the projects that were announced in the New Zealand Upgrade Programme. Overall, I’m advised that Budget 2020 forecasts around $14 billion in net capital expenditure in the year ended 30 June 2021.

Hon Judith Collins: How many, if any, of the 1,924 projects put forward by the Infrastructure Industry Reference Group are shovel-ready right now?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: The member would have to ask the Minister of Finance that question, because he’s leading the assessment and decision-making process around those projects.

Hon Judith Collins: Then how many new projects have begun now that we are back at work and able to “move around freely”?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: As I said to the member earlier, there is a long, long list of projects in the Government pipeline of infrastructure projects, including housing and roads and schools and health and rail—far too many to take up all the time of the House recounting.

Hon Judith Collins: Then will he table the list?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: I’d have to see how long it took to compile it. Because the list is so long, it might not be a good use of the House’s time.

Hon Judith Collins: Do any of the 1,924 projects put forward by the Infrastructure Industry Reference Group need the fast-tracking consent in order to proceed, and was he thinking of those when he put out his press release on 1 April?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: No, I don’t believe any of them need the Resource Management Act fast tracking to proceed, but many of them will probably benefit from it.

Question No. 6—Regional Economic Development

6. MARK PATTERSON (NZ First) to the Minister for Regional Economic Development: What recent milestones has the Provincial Growth Fund achieved?

Hon SHANE JONES (Minister for Regional Economic Development): Mr Speaker, this answer might be a tad longer, given the extent of the popularity of the growth fund. The Nelson Food Factory opened its doors last week and announced it was partly related to the $778,000 Provincial Growth Fund investment. It provides a collaborative and supportive environment, and it will house businesses of particular relevance to the sitting member known such as the Mad Melon, processing and bottling watermelon juice; Little Beauties; and Fresh2U. To show that we are working on areas that are neglected such as the Tai Poutini and other such far-flung areas, we are rolling out and creating jobs to the level of 30 local people on the Kawatiri Coastal Trail. The final thing I would say is that at the end of April 2020, $2.8 billion of the fund has been committed to specific sectors or projects, $1.4 billion has been contracted, $544 million has been paid to recipients, and 557 projects have been contracted.

SPEAKER: Before the supplementary is asked, I’m going to ask the member whether he reflected on the local member in that answer.

Hon SHANE JONES: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker.

SPEAKER: It’s a straight question—it’s a yes or a no.

Hon SHANE JONES: No, I’m taking a point of order.

SPEAKER: Well, I’m—actually, I was first and, therefore, you will respond. The member will respond to my very simple question.

Hon SHANE JONES: Sir, I agree with you. I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker.

SPEAKER: All right. Point of order, the Hon Shane Jones.

Hon SHANE JONES: I agree with you, sir, that I have to be judicious in my language, but that member is pretty rough and pretty wide and pretty ripe and colourful with his language, and if he dishes it out, he has to be prepared to accept it.

SPEAKER: Yes, and one does not reflect on members in the way that that member did then. It is totally inappropriate, he knows it’s inappropriate, and, as a result of that, we’re going to move on to question No. 7.

Question No. 7—Health

7. Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE (National) to the Minister of Health: Will he accept all the recommendations of the Health and Disability System Review; if not, which recommendations will he be rejecting?

Hon Dr DAVID CLARK (Minister of Health): The Health and Disability System Review is a thorough and thoughtful piece of work, and I want to take this opportunity to put on record my deep and sincere thanks to the panel and the Māori Expert Advisory Group for their mahi and insight. Cabinet has accepted the case for reform and the direction of travel outlined in the review—specifically, changes that will reduce fragmentation, strengthen leadership and accountability, and improve equity and access and outcomes for all New Zealanders. That means we are committing to an ongoing programme of reform to build a stronger health and disability system. As the member will understand, change of this scale will require legislation, which will be subject to the usual processes. Decisions on individual recommendations will be taken to Cabinet over coming months and into the next term of Parliament.

Hon Michael Woodhouse: Does he believe the public has a right to know prior to 19 September which of the substantive recommendations the Government would implement if it was in a position to do so after that date?

Hon Dr DAVID CLARK: Cabinet has accepted the direction of travel in the report, and therefore the recommendations contained in the report will be worked on and worked up for legislation, but it will be the privilege of the next Government to put into place the recommendations that it agrees with, and the member knows how that process works.

Hon Michael Woodhouse: Would it have been in a position to do so—to put those recommendations to the public—had the Minister not refused to accept the report in March because his “singular focus was on the health response to COVID-19”?

Hon Dr DAVID CLARK: I think it was appropriate that the Government was focused on COVID-19 during the period, and the results of that singular focus have meant that we have been very successful in our response to COVID to date. However, now that we are at alert level 1, I have received the report and turned it around in a little over three weeks, which for a report of this size and substance is a very quick turnaround for Cabinet to agree to the direction of it. Now the public can access this report, read it for themselves—so can the political parties—and if the member wishes to have a briefing from the lead author, I can arrange that for him.

Hon Michael Woodhouse: Does that singular focus indicate that he is incapable of doing more than one thing at a time?

Hon Dr DAVID CLARK: I won’t reflect on whether that is the case for the member himself that leads to that question. Obviously, we have priorities and, as a Government, we have prioritised responding to the COVID situation. The results there speak for themselves. Now that we’re at alert level 1, we have agreed that it’s a good time to receive this substantial report, which indeed does indicate years of neglect have had a deleterious effect on our health system—nine long years of neglect by that Government. Now, we have a report that maps out a way forward and it’s up to every party in this Parliament to take a view on it, and if that member objects to some of the findings in here about greater accountability, better outcomes for New Zealanders, then he’s free to say so.

Hon Michael Woodhouse: Will he commit to no increase in health bureaucracy as a consequence of any changes?

Hon Dr DAVID CLARK: This report is focused on producing better outcomes for New Zealanders. As a Government, we have grown the health sector. We have now 1,700 more nurses in the sector than when we took office, and 900 more doctors in the sector. We have 600 more allied health workers. We want to make sure that it’s a system that delivers for New Zealanders. We will have fewer DHBs as a result of this report, which recommends that we move to that situation where we plan for our regions, and then, over time, work out how we have fewer of those structures in place.

Hon Michael Woodhouse: Is his comment in the previous answer “We will have fewer DHBs” an indication that the Government has already committed to that recommendation in the Simpson report?

Hon Dr DAVID CLARK: The Government has, as I’ve outlined previously, agreed to the direction in the report. If the former Minister believes that we should have more DHBs, I believe he’d be on his own with that one.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: As a matter of precedent, how many DHBs were to be reduced under the previous policy that he inherited from his predecessor in his portfolio?

Hon Dr DAVID CLARK: Well, when I inherited the DHB sector from the former Government, it was very much a status quo situation. There seemed to be no indication that they wanted to reform it. All they wanted to do was starve it of funding and reduce the services available to New Zealanders. We had an independent report done that showed that New Zealanders had higher barriers to care because of the underfunding of that previous Government.

Question No. 8—Tourism

8. Hon TODD McCLAY (National—Rotorua) to the Minister of Tourism: What advice, if any, has he received on the number of jobs that will be saved by the Tourism Recovery Fund, and how many jobs have been saved so far?

Hon KELVIN DAVIS (Minister of Tourism): Over the last two weeks, we have announced $1.5 million of funding for Whale Watch Kaikoura, which helped save 40 jobs. We announced $4 million of funding for Discover Waitomo, which helped save another 40 jobs. Those businesses keep their communities alive. Protecting them means protecting the many jobs and businesses that rely on their survival. This funding is the start, and I look forward to making more announcements, helping more businesses, and protecting more jobs and more communities in the weeks to come.

Hon Todd McClay: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. That question asked what advice he had received and, then, how many had been saved. He answered the second part, not the first.

SPEAKER: The member can say something about whether he’s received advice or not.

Hon KELVIN DAVIS: The advice I’ve received is that the Government’s whole package has provided billions of dollars in support, not just to tourism but to all businesses, and has saved thousands and thousands of jobs.

Hon Todd McClay: Was any modelling done on the number of jobs to be saved by the Tourism Recovery Fund prior to its announcement, and, if not, why not?

Hon KELVIN DAVIS: I’ll repeat what I just said then: that the work that the Government has done, in its totality, as well as for the tourism industry, will save thousands of jobs.

Hon Todd McClay: Why hasn’t he considered tourism-specific, direct financial support for tourism businesses to save jobs—like National’s tourism accelerator programme—that will help hundreds and hundreds of businesses who are struggling?

SPEAKER: Order! No, I’m going to ask the member to repeat the question without the assertions.

Hon Todd McClay: Why hasn’t he considered tourism-specific, direct financial support for tourism businesses to save jobs—like National’s tourism accelerator programme—that will help hundreds and hundreds of tourism businesses?

SPEAKER: No, that’s not a question. There’s an assertion sitting in there which obviates the question. The member has had two goes.

Jamie Strange: What recent announcements has he made on the allocation of funding from the tourism recovery package?

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

SPEAKER: Is it to do with this question?

Hon Gerry Brownlee: It’s just a point of order.

SPEAKER: Well, OK. But unless it’s raised immediately, I couldn’t see anything wrong with that question, which was a bit of a difference from the two before it.

Hon Gerry Brownlee: Well, I am referring to the two before it. I’ve thought very carefully about the way you ruled there, and it would seem to me that if you’re going to say that the assertion that was used in the question by the Hon Todd McClay is out of order, then, surely, the answers, which are supposed to—according to the Standing Orders—have a mirror effect from the Hon Kelvin Davis, would also have been out of order. He spoke about saving thousands of jobs, without any reference to it at all.

SPEAKER: That—

Hon Gerry Brownlee: Sorry, have I not made that clear?

SPEAKER: I’m somewhat at a loss. The Hon Kelvin Davis didn’t answer the questions because I didn’t let him, so the member’s totally irrelevant. We’ll go back—Jamie Strange.

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

SPEAKER: Oh, Mr Brownlee, the other—the member will resume his seat. The other point that I will make is to remind the member—and I accept that he’s said he was thinking slowly—that he has a requirement to take a point of order immediately, and he didn’t. He—[Interruption] The Deputy Prime Minister will withdraw and apologise.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Well, I withdraw and apologise. I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. My point of order, sir, is you were taking a comment from Mr Brownlee, and—you’re right; you put your finger on it—he just was too slow. So he should have been ruled out.

SPEAKER: Yes, and the member is going to withdraw and apologise again. I don’t need that sort of support. That was the point that I was making, and he shouldn’t support me in that way either when I’m on my feet or when I’m sitting down.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: I withdraw and apologise.

SPEAKER: Right.

Jamie Strange: Thank you, Mr Speaker. What recent announcements has he made on the allocation of funding from the tourism recovery package?

Hon KELVIN DAVIS: Over the past two weeks, we have announced $4 million to Discover Waitomo, $20.2 million for New Zealand’s 31 regional tourism organisations, and $1.5 million for Whale Watch Kaikoura. We’ve helped 557 businesses through the tourism transitions programme and announced that Mayor Steve Chadwick and Grant Webster will chair the Tourism Futures task force, and there will be much, much more to come.

Jamie Strange: What reports has he seen that suggest alternative funding plans to support the recovery of the tourism sector?

Hon KELVIN DAVIS: I’ve seen reports that suggest funding one-off projects over four years, but this does nothing for those looking to pivot their businesses to the domestic market. It won’t protect our strategic assets and it won’t save jobs—

SPEAKER: Order! I think I know where this is going, and it is out of order. I will just say to members that they should know that as well.

Hon Todd McClay: What advice, if any, has he received on the number of tourism businesses that will benefit from the strategic assets protection programme?

Hon KELVIN DAVIS: We anticipate there will be about 60 businesses that would be considered strategic tourism assets that would need to receive some form of support.

Hon Todd McClay: Why is he happy to only support 60 businesses through that programme and not the thousands of other tourism businesses who are struggling and not being supported?

Hon KELVIN DAVIS: That goes back to the broad support that the Government has put in place since COVID-19 hit these shores. The Minister of Finance announced some $12 billion in support, initially, through the wage subsidy support, through various tax measures, and through the small business cash-flow scheme. Tourism businesses, along with many businesses across New Zealand, have received much support from this Government throughout the COVID response.

Hon Todd McClay: Well, is he aware that his Government’s programme is four times the cost of National’s tourism accelerator programme, to help 10 times as many tourism businesses, and shouldn’t he be doing more to help these struggling tourism operators and their staff right now?

Hon KELVIN DAVIS: Well, I’ve just outlined that we have helped many, many tourism operators. The difference between our two packages, and I’m very glad that he raised it, is that we’re getting $400 million out the door within the next couple of weeks, whereas the Opposition’s proposal was for $100 million—so $25 million a year for four years—and nobody knows exactly what it’s going to achieve and no media have even picked it up. I don’t even think anyone in the country is aware that an announcement—

SPEAKER: Order! That—I mean, I know it was an Opposition question, but—

Hon Grant Robertson: About?

SPEAKER: —yes—and I think people should take care about asking questions for which this Minister has no responsibility, or they’re likely to get that back again.

Hon Todd McClay: It’s not clear what he has responsibility for. Why has he only—

SPEAKER: Order! Order!

Question No. 9—Revenue

9. Dr DEBORAH RUSSELL (Labour—New Lynn) to the Minister of Revenue: What action has the Government taken to help ease the impact of COVID-19 on taxpayers’ end-of-year assessments?

Hon STUART NASH (Minister of Revenue): The Government has taken decisive and considered action to support taxpayers through the COVID-19 pandemic. To ease financial stress for taxpayers, we are changing the rules around write-offs for tax debt. Inland Revenue Department’s end-of-year automatic income tax calculation process for individuals is currently under way and expected to run until early July. It is the annual wash-up which results in people either having tax to pay or receiving a refund. For the 2019-20 income tax year, this Government made a decision that tax payable up to $200 will be written off. The usual threshold for writing off tax is $50.

Dr Deborah Russell: How many taxpayers will be affected by the increase in the write-off threshold?

Hon STUART NASH: Increasing the write-off threshold from $50 to $200 will reduce tax bills for approximately 149,000 taxpayers. Writing off those amounts of tax may not seem huge to everyone, but it can be significant for someone experiencing financial stress. In the 2018-19 year, for example, around half of those who had a tax bill up to $200 were earning less than $60,000 a year. We’re doing everything we can to help households as we move into the economic recovery phase post-COVID-19.

Dr Deborah Russell: What other relief will be of assistance to taxpayers for the end-of-year tax process?

Hon STUART NASH: The changes to the IRD systems under the Business Transformation process in 2019 allowed for most individual taxpayers to have their end-of-year tax assessment calculated automatically. The auto-calc process has meant that people have already started receiving their tax refunds. As at 10 June, there have been 2.3 million assessments carried out—that’s 1.3 million more customers than at the same time last year. To date, the IRD has paid out over $610 million in tax refunds and over $30 million has been written off. Once the process is complete, Inland Revenue expects to issue refunds in excess of $650 million as part of the individual income tax assessment process.

Question No. 10—Transport

10. CHRIS BISHOP (National—Hutt South) to the Minister of Transport: Has he read the text of the 29 February 2020 email from the office of Rt Hon Winston Peters to him on Auckland light rail; if not, why not?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD (Minister of Transport): Yes.

Chris Bishop: Why did he not read it to prepare for question time on 11 June 2020, when I asked him about the email?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: That’s not the question that the member asked me in the last question time exchange.

Chris Bishop: Why did I not—why did he not—[Interruption]

SPEAKER: Order! I think that’s even.

Chris Bishop: Why did he not read the email before question time on 11 June 2020, when I asked him to read out the text of the email?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: Because it’s not in the public interest to release the content of communications that are necessary to maintain the effective conduct of public affairs through the free and frank exchange of opinions during the cross-party consultation process.

Chris Bishop: How did he know it wasn’t in the public interest to disclose the contents of the email on 11 June, when he hadn’t read the email before 11 June?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: Well, I had read the attachment to the email, but not the email.

SPEAKER: Question No. 11—

Chris Bishop: No—supplementary.

SPEAKER: Oh, sorry.

Chris Bishop: Sorry, Mr Speaker, I was reclining in my chair. Does the attachment to the email contain a statement of position from the New Zealand First Party on the Auckland light rail project?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: Yes.

Chris Bishop: Does the attachment to the email that contains a statement of position from New Zealand First indicate that the New Zealand First Party does not support the project being considered by Cabinet?

Hon PHIL TWYFORD: Well, as I’ve said to the member about five times now, it’s not in the public interest to reveal the content of that message.

Hon Gerry Brownlee: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I wonder if the Minister would be kind enough to explain to the House how you can not open an email but still read its attachment.

SPEAKER: Well, I’m sure what we can do is arrange for the member to be briefed on that. I know every now and again, both of us have issues with our computers, but I’m sure we can get an explanation for him as to how sometimes other people print things off and give them to people, or things like that.

Question No. 11—Employment

11. Dr SHANE RETI (National—Whangarei) to the Minister of Employment: What groups do his employment programmes target, and against what outcomes will he measure their performance?

Hon WILLIE JACKSON (Minister of Employment): The employment programmes that I’m responsible for primarily focus on young people who are not engaged in education, employment, or training, alongside members of our communities who have had historically poor employment outcomes. To answer the second part of the question, last year I launched the Government’s employment strategy, where we measure the outcomes of our programmes through the objectives of this strategy, which include building a skilled workforce, supporting thriving industries and sustainable provinces, supporting an inclusive labour market, preparing for a changing nature of work, and building modern workplaces for a modern workforce. For example, through the lens of an inclusive labour market, I’m looking to see if there are improvements for those who have had historically poor outcomes. Over the past 2½ years, we’ve seen the lowest unemployment rates for Māori in over a decade—a clear indication we’re measuring outcomes against the strategy and that our programmes are making a difference.

Dr Shane Reti: Which of his six employment programmes target non-Māori over age of 24 who live in the regions?

Hon WILLIE JACKSON: Our programmes cover all people—Māori, Pākehā, Pasifika. All the programmes are targeted towards special groups, but they’re open to everyone, apart from, obviously, our new Māori Trade Training that has come in.

Dr Shane Reti: What is his best estimate of the number of people who are ineligible for his employment programmes?

Hon WILLIE JACKSON: I can’t give you that estimate at this time, but if you want to put the question in writing, we’ll come back to you from my office.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Can I ask the Minister, as to his employment programmes targeting various areas, do any of them, for example, target moving the navy from Auckland up to Marsden Point, moving the floating dock to Whangārei or Marsden Point, or, for that matter, moving the Port of Auckland to Marsden Point, as Mr Reti claims in an advertisement in the newspaper in Whangārei this week that he is engaged in?

Hon WILLIE JACKSON: Yes, I think some of our programmes cover that area.

Dr Shane Reti: How many years will it take for Mana in Mahi to place the 35,000 people the Prime Minister said had applied for the unemployment benefit, given the current placement rate of 350 per year—how many years?

Hon WILLIE JACKSON: We don’t have that number at this stage, but what we do have is we have a very successful Mana in Mahi programme—as that member knows—with an 80 percent success rate, and this is a programme that everyone should be proud of, particularly that member across the House.

Dr Shane Reti: Supplementary.

SPEAKER: No, there’s no more National supplementaries.

Marja Lubeck: How are his employment programmes contributing to positive outcomes for New Zealanders?

Hon WILLIE JACKSON: In August of last year, I launched the Government’s employment strategy, which is to deliver a productive, sustainable, and inclusive New Zealand. So in my time as employment Minister, we have had the lowest unemployment rate in over a decade, the lowest Māori unemployment rate in over a decade, the highest employment rate for Māori since records began, and the lowest underutilisation rate in over a decade, and through those employment programmes, I have oversight of over 4,000 New Zealanders who’ve been engaged and connected to qualifications—

Hon Shane Jones: He Poutama Rangatahi.

Hon WILLIE JACKSON: —and employment—yes, He Poutama Rangatahi, that Minister Jones supports. But it’s not just about these individuals; it’s about the positive impact on families and communities that that member should be proud of but, sadly, doesn’t seem to be because he comes up with these ridiculous questions every week.

Marja Lubeck: What do the outcomes from He Poutama Rangatahi mean for regional communities?

Hon WILLIE JACKSON: They mean a huge amount to regional communities, and we must continue to focus our attention on improving outcomes for our rangatahi, particularly in our provincial and rural communities. For example, I’d like to share with the House the difference that the Mangatoa Station Forestry and Ecological Restoration Project has made for the community in Kaikohe. We have 27 rangatahi who were not engaged in education, employment, or training who began that programme, and upon completion, all 27 are in continuous employment. When you consider that more than a third of people who participate in it have been expelled from school, 10 percent have criminal convictions, these programmes are clearly making a positive difference for not only our young people but for the whānau and the community that Mr Reti represents.

SPEAKER: Just before we go on, I did indicate to the National Party that they had none left. That was my count, and it was supported on my right. But if people do think that I am wrong, I’m happy to have another one, and it’ll come off tomorrow if I’m correct.

Dr Shane Reti: When you stated in this House that 81 percent of people in Mana in Mahi do not return to a benefit, over what time frame is that?

Hon WILLIE JACKSON: In terms of that time frame, we find that over the next six months, they’re not going back, and we’re monitoring them very closely. It’s been incredibly successful, this Mana in Mahi, but we monitor these people all the time, and at the moment in terms of Mana in Mahi, over the following six months there’s been no return to benefits.

Question No. 12—Health

12. Dr LIZ CRAIG (Labour) to the Minister of Health: How is the Government responding to the Health and Disability System Review?

Hon Dr DAVID CLARK (Minister of Health): Today, I released the Health and Disability System Review, which is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to tackle the long-term challenges our health and disability system is facing. The review confirms what I think the COVID-19 global pandemic has shown us all: we have a very good health and disability system. But it also found that our health and disability workforces are under considerable stress and that our system is complex and fragmented. This review sets out a path towards a better, more sustainable health system with clear lines of accountability, one that is more responsive to the needs of local communities. Cabinet has accepted the case for reform and the direction of travel outlined in the review—specifically, changes that will reduce fragmentation, strengthen leadership and accountability, and improve equity of access and outcomes for all New Zealanders.

Dr Liz Craig: So what are the key findings and recommendations of the review?

Hon Dr DAVID CLARK: The review has made a series of far-reaching recommendations. They include shifting to a greater focus on population health, creating a new Crown entity—provisionally called Health New Zealand—focused on the operational delivery of health and disabilities services and financial performance, reducing the number of DHBs from the current 20 down to eight to 12 within five years, creating a Māori health authority to advise on all aspects of Māori health policy and to monitor and report on the performance of the system, and greater integration between primary and community care and hospital specialist services. Local planning must drive decisions. Our health and disability system needs to better understand the real needs of the community and when and where services should be available.

Dr Liz Craig: So what are the next steps for implementing the recommendations of the review?

Hon Dr DAVID CLARK: Reforming our health and disability system is a massive undertaking and it will not happen overnight. Meaningful change and improvement will take concerted effort over many years. Decisions on individual recommendations will be taken to Cabinet over coming months and into the term of the next Parliament. Cabinet has agreed that a small group of Ministers should drive these reforms. That will be led by the Prime Minister and will include the Minister of Finance, myself as Minister of Health, and Associate Minister of Health Peeni Henare. I will also be appointing a ministerial committee to provide ongoing expert advice on implementation and improving system performance and equity of outcomes, and an implementation team will also be set up to lead the detailed policy and design work. It will be administered by the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet.

Budget Debate

Bills

Appropriation (2020/21 Estimates) Bill

Debate resumed from 4 June on the .

Hon ANDREW LITTLE (Minister of Justice): I want to begin by saying how proud I am to be part of a Government that is successfully facing one of the biggest crises and catastrophes that has faced this country, and indeed the entire world. What a proud reputation we’ve established for New Zealand. Little old New Zealand in this corner of the world is now able to claim that we have eliminated COVID-19 in our communities, in our streets and our towns, and our businesses and our households are safe for now—but the risk remains. And the way we continue to manage this particular challenge is to continue to be careful and cautious, and that’s what we’re doing.

The great thing is, of course, that the starting point for this Government was one where we had near record-low unemployment; we had near record-low Government debt, in terms of ratio to GDP; we had just committed $12 billion of investment in infrastructure; and we had new investment in education, particularly in skills and training as well as in health services and facilities. This is a forward-thinking, far-reaching Government that was doing all of this even before we were afflicted with COVID-19.

And then, in January and February, the word came through that a pandemic had broken out in China, and we had to start making some decisions. But we did it in the right way. We were cautious, we listened to the evidence, we took advice, we started closing off our borders to parts of the world where the risk was greatest, because we are a country of travellers and we are a country of hosts to travellers—that’s what’s built our tourism industry that is used to hosting 3 million to 4 million people a year. That’s where our biggest risk was, and this Government was smart and sharp and focused on what the issue was and made decisions accordingly. And, of course, I have to say none of this was made easier by a country that was still reeling from nine years of neglect from the previous administration. So our decisions had to take that into account as well as the long-term future prospects of this great country of ours.

And, you know, I look at our Prime Minister, Jacinda Ardern, and I look at my Cabinet colleagues, and indeed all the members on this side of the House, and you look at the challenges that this Government has faced: a terrorist attack, volcanic eruption, drought, and then, this year, the COVID-19 pandemic that we had to face along with the rest of the world. It required resolute action, and it got it. And it got the right decisions at the right time, and we went hard and we went early, and we are reaping the benefits of that now. Look around the world, see what’s happening to other countries—it’s not a pretty picture. But with the leadership of Jacinda Ardern, with the assistance of our Director-General of Health, Ashley Bloomfield, and all of the other experts, and the scientists, and the others who were informing us and informing our decisions, we took the crucial decision and New Zealanders now are safer as a result.

I said it to this House a few weeks ago—possibly more now, because I’m kind of losing track of time with what we’ve had to go through—but the question on the lips of voters in September this year will be “Did you keep us safe?” And I know all members in this House, as we get around our communities and do our meetings, members on this side, members on that side, we are all hearing the same message. New Zealanders are saying, “You kept us safe. Keep keeping us safe. Don’t make rash decisions, don’t give in to the nattering nabobs of negativity.”—as Spiro Agnew would have called them—“Make sure you keep this country safe.” That’s what they’re saying, and that’s what this Government is doing. We’ve won the battle of COVID-19, but it’s not over yet. Just today, there were two new cases from across the border, but because of our testing and our border management regime, they were picked up and—once again—we’re swinging into action to keep our people safe again.

Now, we’ve got another big battle, another big challenge, and that’s the recovery—because this has been tough. This has been tough for New Zealanders—it’s been tough for New Zealand business owners, it’s been tough for workers in those businesses, it’s been tough for families, and it’s been tough for elderly people, and now we’ve got to focus on the recovery, and that’s going to have its own challenges as well.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): And can I just ask the Minister—focus on the Budget?

Hon ANDREW LITTLE: I was just coming to the very point. Great minds think alike, as they say, and I was just about to say that’s why this Budget is so important. It reflects those commitments, but, actually, this is a Budget that says we are prepared to commit and take the action of $50 billion to get the recovery going.

Now, as the Minister of Finance said just a short while ago, the commentary is already changing. There is already confidence returning to the economy—Kiwibank yesterday said that the worst case scenarios are off the table—but we still need this public investment in infrastructure, in income support, and that’s the stuff that we’re doing. So we’ve extended the wage subsidy by eight weeks to protect those jobs—we’ve put $3.2 billion into that. We’ve put $400 million into the tourism industry, because this is going to be a long time for that industry to recover. We have to be real. And I know members opposite—the reality is they are equally as concerned as us about that industry. But this isn’t going to return to pre-COVID conditions any time soon, and we’ve got to support that industry, because eventually the borders will open and the travellers will return, and we have to have something for them to return to—an economy that is robust and is growing.

We’ve got the loan scheme for small businesses—$1 billion now signed up to through IRD to support small businesses and to support their cash flow. We’ve got the Lunches in Schools programme that’s going to not only feed 200,000 kids but generate more jobs to boot. Eight thousand new public houses—they’re the houses that you live in, not the houses that you drink in—are going to be built. That’s going to be a stimulus as well. There is another $3 billion in infrastructure projects on top of the $12 billion that was committed to last year, $36 million in a redeployment package to assist the regions, and there are decisions already being made in Northland, Hawke’s Bay, Rotorua, and Queenstown Lakes. Eleven thousand environmental jobs are created as well, because in restoring the economy we can’t just ignore what’s happening in the environment as well, and we’ve got long-term challenges there as well.

I want to finish by just spending a couple of minutes on an area that’s important to me, and that is what we’re doing in the justice system, because that’s important too. So we’ve got changes to our Family Court system. We’ve actually allowed parties going through the very painful and emotionally upsetting event of a marital or partnership separation to now get access to legal advice from the outset, a Family Court system that is resourced and equipped to help them navigate that very difficult time through a very tricky system. So we’ve reinstated that. We’ve put in place Family Court liaison staff to help people—just there to assist parties to get through the process, know what help and support is available, know where to get the counselling, and know where to get other advice and support so they can navigate their way through that very tricky time in their lives. That’s been long overdue and that’s now happening, and there will be other commitments in that system as time progresses.

And then the other is in our community law centres. What an amazing job they do, there to help people who wouldn’t otherwise have access to legal advice or access to the justice system. So more money is going to our community law centres because you can predict—with what is happening with the difficulties that people are going through with their residential tenancies, with their employment, with what’s happening with income support—a lot more people are going to need a lot more advice, and they would be able to get it through a recharged, re-supported, and highly charged community law centre network. So that is going well, as well.

What we do in that system, the support that we provide people, whether it’s in their employment, through the extension of the wage subsidy scheme, through the regional investment programmes that we’ve put in place, through the reviewing and reallocating some of the Provincial Growth Fund money, this is a country that is on its way on the journey of recovery. We are not there yet, and it will take time, but this is a country that can look back on the last few weeks and the last few months and say we had a hell of a challenge but we met that challenge and we supported each other. We supported each other through the health crisis and now it’s time to support each other through the economic crisis and the economic rebuild—and we will do that. This is a country that has proven that, when it’s hard up against it, we pull together, we work together, we cooperate, we collaborate, and we make the difference. This is a time to celebrate what we’ve done, but not to rest on our laurels—to be thankful for the leadership that we have had, to be thankful for the investment that has been put in through this Budget as we recover and get back on our feet again.

Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (National—Ilam): Madam Speaker, you warned the previous speaker, the Hon Andrew Little, that he should bring his speech back to the Budget. The problem here is that this is a Budget, four weeks on from its delivery, that is massively out of date and out of step with what this country needs right now. It’s very hard to look back and debate the merits of this Budget when it is so short on information, on encouragement, and on projection of a positive future for New Zealand. We have a Budget that was produced by a finance Minister who just one week before lockdown stood in this House and told us everything was OK, there were no dark clouds on the horizon, no need for anyone to worry, and that when the Budget was delivered, a few weeks’ time out from that point, they would see that there was a bright future ahead.

Well, what about the thousand people a week—a thousand people a day, I should say—who’ve been going on the job seeker benefit since lockdown? What about the thousands of people who are not eligible to go on the job seeker benefit because they have received a redundancy from their workplace? What about the tens of thousands of people who’ve lost casual work? What about the tens of thousands of people who’ve lost part-time work? Those people aren’t recorded in statistics, but they’re there and they are real. Add to that the tens of thousands of families whose primary income has been slashed as a result of the COVID-19 response. They are the people who will certainly say with some gratitude that we’re lucky to have dodged the bullet that was the worst possible eventuality from COVID-19 spreading throughout our community.

But I’m sorry to tell the previous speaker that when it comes to election day, they’re unlikely to be still saying, “Thank you very much for what you did. I’m going to vote for you for that.” They’re more likely to be saying, “Will I still have a job? Will my family members still have a job? Will my family still have income? How long will it be before we’re able to securely wake up in the morning knowing that our household income is going to be coming in?” Those are the questions that will be asked in 14 weeks’ time. And what we see in this Budget is a $20 billion slush fund there for the Government, presumably to use during the campaign period to salve some of that concern. But New Zealanders are not silly. They will know that if money is received as a benefit, it has a very, very small, if any, growth effect on the economy. So there is no doubt that expanding the domestic economy is going to be the challenge that Governments need to answer, or prospective Governments need to answer, in the coming campaign. And they’ll all turn back to this Budget and look at what the projections are for debt, and there will be a discussion about how well that debt is incurred.

Today, we’ve heard the Government in the House talking about their infrastructure plans, how they are going to build all these wonderful infrastructure projects that will create jobs up and down the country. The problem is all 11 of those projects that were announced today and that are part of a bill that is being rushed through the House today—ironically, rushed through the House; three years almost into a Government and they are finally getting to a legislative position to deliver some infrastructure—were announced a long time ago. Some of them would have been delivered by now had there not been a change of Government. But very few of them—very few of them—will have the big effect of creating long-term jobs unless they are followed up by more. That is the challenge that sits out there for all political parties ahead of us.

If we look back to other times when there’s been a tough, difficult economic period, then it is generally infrastructure that is the answer. It is the purchasing, effectively, ahead of time of intergenerational assets that provide the opportunities for an economy to expand in the future. And remember that an economy is not some nebulous thing. Certainly, it’s impossible to put your hand on it and say, “This is an economy.” It doesn’t come in a paper bag. You can’t grab it off a bookshelf or a shop shelf. It is what’s happening to you in your life, and the lives of all those 5 million New Zealanders who at the moment are wondering just what the future holds. It’s all about what they are able to do, what they are able to purchase with the dollars they earn, with the opportunities that come from the work that they do. An economy is a dynamic thing that everyone who gets up in the morning and does something contributes to, and at the moment, we are seeing massive contraction.

Later this week, we’ll find out just how much that contraction has been and we’ll be able to work out what the annual contraction would mean, and, from that, some of the extrapolation of what that will mean in job losses, I think, will be even further exacerbated. So with all due respect to the previous speaker, who spoke about the leadership that the Government has given and headed towards a recovery, there is nothing yet that can give any New Zealander confidence that this is a Government that knows how to handle that.

What we observe is a huge separation in the minds of New Zealand voters between the Prime Minister as an individual and the party that she represents, the party that she leads. That party is seen largely to have let her down. The reality is they’ve let all New Zealanders down and it is a further reality that they are led by the Prime Minister. So separating the two is not going to last and there will be, I think, that turning back to say, “What is it for me when I cast my vote? Will I still have my job? Will my family still have my job? Will my family income still be there?” Those are the questions that will be asked.

And today we sort of heard a speaker, earlier in question time, talking about how the Government’s put up loans for small business, and we were told that there’s been a billion dollars’ worth of those loans taken out. It might be easy to say, “Well, it’s a billion dollars against the 140 billion that the whole country is going to go into debt over.”, but that billion dollars has to be paid back. So the idea that simply being able to borrow money at a good rate means that employment will be sustained for people because businesses are jobs, jobs are income—and if those businesses have to recut the cloth so that they can afford to pay the loans back, that inevitably will fall back on smaller, less, or however you want to put it, employment opportunities within their particular enterprise.

There was then the claim that this Government has produced 8,000 public houses in the last three years. Well, the saddest thing is that of those public houses, there was an ongoing programme from what was Housing New Zealand, what is now Whānau Ora, and that there is a natural expectation around that. Further, nearly half of the 1,600 they claim to be specifically introduced by this Government, 800 of them were previously consented or under construction at the time of the last change of Government. These people are not good at infrastructure. They are not good at delivering. They are brilliant at announcements. They are amazing at standing in front of a camera and pronouncing what should happen. They are absolutely convincing on all of those scores. But it’s like their snake oil: take it home, try to drink it, it’ll probably knock you over. It’s got nothing to it; it doesn’t work. And that’s exactly what the country is being sold by this current Government.

We heard Mr Little just saying there, “Aren’t we lucky to be led by a Government like this?” Well, the 5 million New Zealanders got behind the effort to prevent COVID19 coming into this country. Those same 5 million people now want to get behind an effort to get the country back into a reasonable shape so that we do have security around jobs, security around family incomes, security around the futures of all the young people that will be coming into the workforce next year. And they are not going to simply say, “Thank goodness for all the announcements that have been made. I hope that they get delivered on.” They will look to delivery records, and this Government does not have one. They are bad for delivery. They are not focused on the economy, and their list just proved it. The National Government will deliver.

JAMI-LEE ROSS (Botany): Thank you very much, Madam Speaker. This is an interesting time to be speaking in a Budget debate. This is now the 10th Budget that I’ve had an opportunity to speak in since being here in the House, and the unusual nature of this Budget debate is I’m struggling to identify what the alternative remedy would be to what is actually being outlined by the Government. The difficulty in this situation that we all face is, yes, this was a Budget that was delivered in haste off the back of rapidly changing economic circumstances. It was a Budget that delivered huge amounts of borrowing, but would the alternative that may have been proposed if there was a National-led Government in place be any different?

The reality is that the last time we had massive economic upheaval, through the global financial crisis and through the Christchurch earthquakes, the same remedies were proposed at that very point in time. There were mass job losses off the back of those economic events. There was a considerable increase in borrowing that the State did when it came along and said, “We have to invest in the economy to keep jobs going.” There were a lot of jobs being lost and there were a lot of people who went on to welfare. The same circumstances are, in fact, in place, and the difficulty with this Budget is trying to identify what would be done any differently.

I am struggling to identify what the alternative remedy would be. Simply saying “We’ve been there before and we can deliver it better.” is not one that I think is very sellable. In fact, the very people who were doing the delivery 10 years have now all left. John Key’s no longer here. Bill English is no longer here. Steven Joyce is no longer here. They were the ones—

Chris Penk: You’re still here, Jami-Lee—you’re still here.

JAMI-LEE ROSS: —that were doing the delivery. I’m not there either, Mr Penk—thank you very much. You might not be if you keep writing books, as it turns out. I think we need to really look critically at this Budget and ask ourselves what would be done any different. There wouldn’t be anything different; in fact, this is the very prescription that Governments around the world are following. Jobs are being lost, Governments come along and invest, and Governments come along and identify infrastructure projects, fast track them, and try and do the best they can by people to keep jobs going, to keep people in employment, and to ensure that there are New Zealanders out there who still have hope and opportunity. I think when people go into the ballot boxes later this year, they’re going to ask themselves, “What’s there in the future for me?”. But there also going to ask, “Is there anything different on the other side of the fence?”, and I can’t say that there is much difference.

When I look at some of the projects which are being delivered, now there is a valid criticism here that many of the things that have been announced recently, including before the lockdown, were plans that were in place already. There were plans that were announced by the previous Government, but when I look at things like what was announced earlier this week such as SkyPath, that’s something that Dan Bidois said during the by-election campaign. That is something Labour’s picked up and they’re running with it. You can’t complain about that. The Unitec housing development—that’s something Nick Smith announced in the last Government. This Government’s now picked it up and is running with it, and good on them. The rail electrification out to Pukekohe—that’s something that was announced during the last election campaign. Labour’s picked it up and they’re running with it. It’s hard to disagree with what the Government’s actually doing, and it’s hard to make speeches in the House in opposition to what they’re doing when, in fact, the prescriptions they’re proposing are ones where, if we really boil it down, there’s actually bipartisan support for them.

I have to say there are questions on delivery that the Government has. If there are failings of the current Government, it’s that the housing hasn’t been delivered as fast as it could have been, the housing hasn’t been there in place for New Zealanders that need it, the rail works aren’t exactly going as fast as they’d expect—and good on them for trying to do more. But they haven’t delivered in that particular area, and I can’t say we can see any appreciable gains yet for the massive mental health funding that was put in place a couple of years ago. But would the policy prescription be any different if the blue team was in place? The answer is no.

I have to say also that many of the roading projects announced earlier in the year are, in fact, ones which we can honestly say now that the House is united on. There’s the Northland State Highway 1 upgrade, which that I’m sure Shane Jones pushed for considerably, which appears to be going ahead. There’s the Penlink project—I saw Mark Mitchell in the House before—and that seems to be something the House is united on. The Mill Road project in South Auckland that’s going to be going ahead—again, a project that the House is united on. There are many other roading projects as well.

The difficulty with this Budget debate is we’re trained in this Parliament to try and be for everything or against everything, but there isn’t much difference between the two policy prescriptions that are out there. We may hear more during the upcoming election campaign from the National Party and we may hear more from the Labour Party, but so far, both sides are saying the same things, and that’s actually not a bad thing for New Zealanders. It’s not a bad thing for New Zealanders that we are united in this Parliament on borrowing for more infrastructure spending and we’re united in this Parliament on ensuring there are more jobs for people so that they can have hope and opportunity in Government investing in those areas, and this fiction that we seem to entertain through a Budget debate where one side is doing everything perfectly and one side’s doing everything absolutely wrong is a fiction—that isn’t actually the reality.

I have to say that if the Government could be criticised on some other areas, it’s that they haven’t turned their minds and eyes to a range of risks that are on the horizon. We’ve heard a lot about a trans-Tasman bubble. We haven’t seen much in the way of plans or delivery on that yet. If there’s something we need to turn our minds a lot more to in the future, it’s how we do work closer with our longstanding partners that we’ve been moving away from over the years. If the Government’s looking at a trans-Tasman bubble when it comes to travel, they should also be looking at even more integration with Australia. We can benefit more by working much closer with Australia.

We also need to turn our minds to how we can work closer with the likes of the United Kingdom and the likes of the United States. I’m very concerned that over the past 10 to 15 years, our country has been moving further and further away from traditional trading partners like the US and like the UK. We have started to put all of our economic eggs in the one basket, with that being the China exporting basket, and now they’re in a situation where we know that there are risks there on the horizon if we place too much trust in the regime in place in China—that we will have further economic problems, because if this virus that we’ve seen and the handling of it in China has told us anything, it’s that we have to be more diverse in our trading opportunities and we have to be more diverse in how we look at the rest of the world.

So I say to Labour and I say to the Opposition that if they’re looking at our foreign policy and our exporting opportunities and our strategies in the future, we must stop putting so much hope and opportunity in the China trade basket. We have to look at working closer with the UK and start looking closer at working with the United States. If there are opportunities to further integrate our defence forces with Australia, we should be looking at those types of opportunities.

A glaring hole in our legislative framework when it comes to boosting the regions is also the way in which we have constraints in place by way of the Resource Management Act and the way in which local government is not incentivised to ensure that there is growth and there is opportunity in the future. So when it comes to policy programmes that this Budget will be funding and when it comes to future policy work that the Government is intent on looking at, I would say they should be directing their officials and directing efforts towards how we can unlock economic opportunity in the regions and around the country by ensuring we change that legislative framework when it comes to investment, we change the way we incentivise local government, and we change the way they look at infrastructure.

The options for the future are almost solely based on infrastructure spending to support further job growth, but we won’t get that infrastructure spending being delivered long-term if we continue to have constraints in place. The short-term COVID19 response measures that are being legislated for which are allowing fast tracking of projects are good, but that’s not sustainable long-term. The very fact that we have to legislate in this House to deliver greater infrastructure because there are too many constraints suggests that our whole model isn’t set up correctly. It suggests that if we are to deliver economic growth for the future and if we are to ensure that there are fewer constraints to job creation and infrastructure building, then we should be looking wholesale at those legislative frameworks.

Finally, I want to say to the Government that I hope that they are more cautious when it comes to borrowing in the future. They are borrowing to ensure growth and to ensure infrastructure spending, but it has to be targeted and it has to be done well. If there are opportunities in the regions where we can take local government, where we can take community partners, and where we can ensure that investment gets into those projects, they should be looking at doing that, rather than just assuming the Government can do everything and should be the be-all and everything when it comes to this country.

It’s hard to disagree with much of what’s being delivered when this was the same policy prescription 10 years ago. It’s hard to disagree with much of this Budget, and I hope New Zealanders ensure that we continue to grow as a country in the future.

JOANNE HAYES (National): Thank you, Madam Speaker. I’m very happy to stand and give my 10 minutes’ worth around Vote Māori Development in this Budget because I was quite disappointed in some of the areas that the Government missed out on—they missed an opportunity.

So everybody knows it was $900 million for this Budget, and it should have been—it was a post-COVID Budget for Māori. So much so, in fact, that Māori took it upon themselves to actually set up their own areas to look after their whānau, and they set up their own stops, their own COVID-19 stops so they could look after their whānau. I think the 1918 flu epidemic was a big signal to them and they didn’t want to see that happen again. So when I start to look at this Māori development Budget allocation of $900 million, I hear the words and the voices of the many Māori economic development leaders who have come out and said that this Government has missed a great big opportunity in growing the economy.

We have talked about this—I have listened in this House on a number of speeches around who is best to be able to deliver a strong and growing economy, and it is the blue team. I’m afraid I disagree with what the previous speaker, Jami-Lee Ross, said—that we were very similar: the red team, the blue team. But it is actually the blue team that actually delivers a strong, a very strong economy.

In saying this, I think that many of the Māori whānau that were out and about looking after their particular areas, their rohe, during the COVID-19 lockdown, were quite disappointed. I was getting emails, I was getting texts from whānau who were saying, “Where are the Māori Ministers? Why is it we just hear a dump of $45 million and then silence? Why is it that there are only little wee Facebook flashes and then that’s it?” They wanted to see more and more of the Māori Ministers who, I’m afraid, did not—did not—show up and face up to the issues that Māori whānau were actually facing during that time.

Questions around Māori Development in the 2020 Budget were around: is this enough to actually keep growing in terms of the needs of Māori? Because the need for Māori is growing every day. There are employment issues, there are businesses going to the wall. Has this Government given enough in their Budget?

One of my whanaunga, who is a leader in Māori economic development on the coast, said that this was a Budget mainly for welfare and education. It had nothing to do with actually moving the Māori economic development dial further to grow the economy.

Pre-COVID, the Māori economy was $50 billion and growing. I would hate to think what that Māori economic development growth is like now. I believe it has taken a hit. There are concerns around the growing numbers of Māori unemployed; 17,000 Māori unemployed has been quoted. If we look closer to it, there most probably will be much more than that.

I want to talk a little bit about the other areas within this particular Budget, because I believe that some of the Budget items have not been realised, and will be lucky to be realised in this next 12 months. Let’s look at the $109 million for the promotion of Māori language and culture through direct funding of the broadcasting entities. Now, we all know that the Māori media sector shift, a document, has only just been released by the Minister. I believe that that $109 million is the one that will be aligned to that particular strategy.

Why would a Minister go ahead and do that? Why would she put some money in something when, really, she has no idea about what kind of feedback she’s going to get from those that are in the Māori media? Why would you do that—$73 million to discharge the departmental responsibilities of Te Puni Kōkiri? Is it an administration fund? It is an administration fund—that’s what it is at the end of the day. And, at the end of the day, are they doing what they say they’re doing?

There is $37 million for assistance to whānau for Māori housing providers—for Māori housing providers. What have they got? What impacts will this, post - COVID19, have on their workforce? I don’t think that this Government has actually taken that into account. I really don’t. I don’t think that there is enough of a workforce out there to actually help our Māori into redeveloping their homes, refurbishing their homes, or even building new ones, and is $37 million enough for that? Has this Budget been even or well-thought-out in divvying up each of the sectors?

Then, of course, we have the $40 million to fund Māori development initiatives to meet economic—well, I’ve already spoken about that because this is not enough to meet economic, cultural, land development, technological, health aspirations, including Māori digital technology, and rangatiratanga funds. Honestly, that is a drop in the bucket when you come and you start to pull all of those sectors together. It a shame, actually; again, another missed opportunity.

I also want to talk a little bit—and it would be remiss of me not to talk—about the Whānau Ora budget: the $137 million that was given to Whānau Ora. On the day that the Budget was announced, I was interviewed by Māori Television and they asked me what I thought about it. And I said, “Well, it’s a great amount of money.” However, I could only see two areas where the actual funds had been tagged. One was for commissioning agencies and one was COVID-19, yet there was a glaring gap in between. That ranged between $10 million and $20 million. I said, “Well, what’s the plan for that?” I don’t there is a plan, only for the Minister to be interviewed by the same Māori Television and asked the same question, and he too agreed that there was no plan. He didn’t have a plan for the excess of that funding and that’s very, very shameful. It’s a competency issue. Is the Minister competent enough to be able to run that particular portfolio?

I’m reminded of the start of 2020, when there was a great big—I suppose raruraru, let’s say that—raruraru between the Minister, Whānau Ora commissioning agencies, Whānau Ora providers, and we’ll call them the “Dames Group”. They came out and questioned the Minister as to why he was giving over funding that he had tagged from the 2019 Budget to Whānau Ora commissioning agencies and why he was giving it to non - Whānau Ora commissioning agency providers. And he said, “Well, I’m the Minister. I can do that.” They weren’t exactly the words that he should have actually said. Then there came all of these issues from the “Dames Group” around his competency and they felt aggrieved enough to take a Waitangi Tribunal inquiry into the state of Whānau Ora under this Government.

This is very shameful on that Minister for doing that—for putting at risk all of those providers and whānau, to be honest. To top it off, the Prime Minister was asked to step and help to sort it out because it was getting very, very, very—a lot of tension between the parties, where the Minister’s name was being asked to resign because he was so incompetent of being able to manage that particular fund.

I can say that at the end of the day, when it comes to the Māori development portfolio and Māori development in the Budget, this Government has missed a great opportunity to be able to move the Māori economic development sector dial to actually grow Māori business in this country. Eight million dollars were shared for Māori tourism. It was shared amongst Māori tourism and a few other organisations. There is just a drop in the bucket if that; it’s only a half a drop in the bucket. The Māori tourism sector is highly successful. It’s a highly successful sector. And they need to be able to support their whānau by having access to more of that Māori development budget. Remember, at the end of the day, if their businesses are thriving, people are being employed, the economy is growing. And that’s what this Government has actually missed: the whole area of growing the Māori economic development sector.

Before I close my contribution today around this Budget—really at the end of the day, there is something I want to acknowledge around the issues that have been bubbling up overseas and here in New Zealand around Black Lives Matter or, in New Zealand’s case, Brown Lives Matter. It is going to actually reshape race relations in this country and overseas. And I just want to acknowledge some of the issues that have been brought up through that. I think that, you know, for a Government and parliamentarians we need to keep that in the back of our minds. We need to have it there at the forefront. Thank you.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: I call Louisa Wall. This is a split call.

LOUISA WALL (Labour—Manurewa): Tēnā koe e Te Māngai o Te Whare. Tēnā koutou katoa. I’m incredibly proud to belong a Labour team, and particularly with our finance Minister in the House. Through Budget 2020 he has prioritised $50 billion—I’ll say that again; $50 billion—to lead us through a response to COVID-19. And lest we forget the 22 New Zealanders who have died, the 1,506 New Zealanders who were infected by this deadly disease, two of whom were announced today. We have zero in hospital, and we have 1,482 who have recovered. And through that Budget appropriation, I specifically want to highlight the $500 million that we have invested in our health system. It’s incredibly important to highlight that investment, and, obviously, the leadership of Mr Bloomfield, who’s become a bit of a celebrity. It is “Team Health”, with the support of “Team Aotearoa New Zealand”, the 5 million of us who ensured that we have no community transmission. Having no community transmission means that that investment, actually, is valuable, and it’s valuable in these ways. What we did is invest in testing, and I can attest to the fact I was tested, and within two days of having that test, in Manurewa, my electorate, I got a text message to say that I did not have COVID-19.

We also invested in treatment facilities that we would’ve all needed had we got it. So our intensive care capacity was bolstered. We trained our staff. We ensured we had appropriate facilities. Then there’s the prevention aspect of that $500 million—in an investment in our public health units—to ensure that we’re able to do contact tracing. We invested in self-isolation facilities to make sure that all those Kiwis, our citizens, our residents coming home, were isolated for those 14 days. And we also invested in communications assistance. During this troubling time we had over 5,000 calls every day and we were able to respond to them.

We need to put this in a global context. So, globally, 7.7 million people have been infected, with over 428,000 deaths. But the biggest impact globally has been on us cutting our borders—closing them, cutting them, saying we can’t let anyone home unless they’re a citizen or a resident. For us, closing our borders could result in a $16 billion deficit to our tourism industry. I’m not sure if many of us know, but that’s how much we get as a country from tourism. And it specifically has affected 180,000 full-time equivalents. And so I do want to focus on our investment in our business owners.

We needed to invest in our business owners, the $12 billion, because they employ 1.6 million New Zealanders, who needed to continue to be paid. We didn’t want them to be beneficiaries. Actually, we wanted them to be supported by their business owners—their employers—and so we as a Government chose to do that. And I want to acknowledge our workers, and particularly our essential workers, who have kept, I would say, our home fires burning. In Māoridom we have a term called our “ahikā”. They are the people that got up throughout this whole crisis—our essential workers, our clinicians, our social service providers, our food suppliers, and amongst all of that, our iwi and our other community leaders, our Pacific community leaders, our ethnic community leaders, who did so much to ensure that the trauma of this disease that was killing us—we actually mitigated those consequences.

And we’ve got much to do. And the reality is this Budget will provide the resources, I believe, to initially respond. And I know my colleague the Hon Grant Robertson will talk about the recovery aspect and then the rebuilding aspect of this Budget. That’s what we’ve done—we’ve created a framework for us to recover and to rebuild as 5 million people, New Zealanders—Team Aotearoa New Zealand. Part of that rebuilding, for me, is reimagining, because there are areas that will be decimated. And I guess this provides an opportunity, like most disasters, where we can learn from what we’ve done in the past and actually reimagine what the future could be. So I say to our business owners, to our workers: kia kaha koutou. We’ve got more work to do and we can only do it if we work together. Kia ora.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: I call Kieran McAnulty—

KIERAN McANULTY (Labour): Thank you very much, Madam Speaker. You know, it has been a great privilege—

DEPUTY SPEAKER: —and he has four minutes and 25 seconds.

KIERAN McANULTY: Oh, thanks very much, Madam Speaker. As I’ve been going around the Wairarapa electorate over the last couple of weeks, something has struck me, and that is the absolute confidence that the general public have in this Government, and that is as a response to both the Budget and the successful—

Matt Doocey: You need to get out of Wellington.

Hon Scott Simpson: You need to get out more.

KIERAN McANULTY: —response to COVID-19. And my opponents on the other side of the House heckle. They can’t even do heckling in unison. This is a display, yet again, of what we’ve seen from this side of the House. National’s response to this Budget has been somewhat of a pantomime. One bloke could stand up and say, “We should spend more.”, and another bloke could stand up and say, “But what about the debt?” They aren’t even unified in a position of opposition because they know, deep down, that this Government has succeeded where most other Governments across the world have not.

As I sat there on the Epidemic Response Committee post this Budget, I reflected on the position that the Opposition took to the response to COVID-19. They said we should be like Australia, and yet Australia continues to be in a position where they themselves cannot open up the borders between states. They said we should have been like Singapore, and yet we know that they, unfortunately, have seen exponential growth in cases after opening up their economy. They even said that we should be like Sweden, and then one week later they stopped talking about Sweden.

The fact is that this Budget is evident every single day. If the Opposition members bothered to go out and about in their electorates, they would hear from small-business owners that said it was the wage subsidy that kept them open, it was the wage subsidy that managed to keep their staff on, so that now that we are opening up, they are ready to put rubber on the road and they are ready to hit the ground running. That is certainly the case in the Wairarapa. If the members wish to come and spend their money in South Wairarapa, in Greytown, Featherston, and Martinborough, they would see retail, they would see hospitality, and they would see accommodation places booming because people are able to do so, because, as the Prime Minister said right at the start of this response: “The best economic response was a successful health response.” Act hard and act early and this is what you’ll see.

That is what Professor Sir David Skegg said to the Epidemic Response Committee: that New Zealand was the only Western nation in the world with an opportunity to eliminate COVID-19, and the Opposition scoffs. I remember in her contribution to this debate on the Budget, Judith Collins said that New Zealand did not act fast, and did not act hard, and did not act early. That is despite the fact that we closed our borders to foreigners 21 days after our first case—it was 56 in Australia, it was 51 in Canada, and it was 60 in the USA. So for Judith Collins to stand in her response to this Budget and state that and fail to back it up with facts, I think that sums up the Opposition’s response to this matter.

You can also see the same point if you look at how long it took to get lockdown in place: 27 days after our first case, it was 54 in the UK, and 55 in France. And, of course, the timing of the first economic package—what this Budget has built upon 19 days after the first case. I acknowledge the work of the finance Minister, the Hon Grant Robertson, in putting together a package that has saved jobs and saved businesses and kept economies like that in Wairarapa going, and then followed it up with the response in the Budget: an extension to the wage subsidy which the Opposition continues to scoff. I invite them to talk to small businesses—

DEPUTY SPEAKER: I’m sorry to interrupt the member. I call the Hon Grant Robertson.

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Minister of Finance): It’s a great pleasure to rise in the debate, and my member—my member?—my fellow member on this side of the House—

Kieran McAnulty: What a marvellous member.

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: Exactly. I won’t go there. My colleague was just reaching a crescendo and then—

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Cut off in his prime.

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: —you cut him off at the knees, as it were. Few would know. But it is a pleasure to stand in reply in this debate today, and to acknowledge all members who have spoken in the debate. This is the opportunity that the Minister of Finance has at the end of the Budget debate to be able to respond to a few of those who have spoken before me. I do need to address some of the issues raised by the Opposition in their speeches. I couldn’t agree more than with my colleague Kieran McAnulty about the fact that there were a range of views expressed by the Opposition. Some said we were spending too much, some said we were spending too little. Some members said that in the same speech.

One of those was the Hon Paul Goldsmith, who managed to say that we were simultaneously opening up too slowly, moving too fast, not spending enough, spending too much, not helping small businesses, helping the wrong types of small businesses. It was a confused offering, but I did note that Mr Goldsmith managed to attend the launch of Nick Smith’s campaign in the weekend and played the piano. The song he chose to play was “Rocket Man”. I do think that’s probably appropriate in many ways, because it has a very long chorus, which many of you will know: “And I think it’s going to be a long, long time.” And I think it’s going to be a very, very long, long time before Mr Goldsmith finds himself on this side of the aisle.

But he’s not alone in that. Todd Muller also had a very important speech at the weekend. Many have noted the upside down flying of the tino rangatiratanga flag. That’s well known as an international distress signal, so he was reaching out across the aisle to the Labour-led Government, to the New Zealand First Party and the Green Party, who formed this Government with us to say, “I need your help.” He clearly did, because all of the ideas in his speech were ones that this Government has put in place. In fact, Mr Muller even reached back into history for that and said that it was Michael Joseph Savage who’d done a tremendous job of pulling the country out of the Great Depression. So I can only agree with Mr Muller that it is a Labour Government supported by New Zealand First and the Greens that is the right Government to get us through the other end of this crisis.

In Budget 2020 we sought to build on the response phase of our plan to deal with COVID-19. I do want to again place on record our thanks to the team of 5 million, but to some pretty important members of that team—our essential workers, and, in particular, within our essential workers, a hard working group of public servants who kept the Government going during level 4. One of those groups of people were the people who put together the Budget. It was put together without actually being able to be physically in their offices, but they managed to do that, and I do want to put on record the incredible efforts of those public servants.

Another group are the staff members from the Ministry of Social Development who have processed the applications for the wage subsidy scheme so quickly that some people could not believe it. Some people have been paid for the extension of the scheme within six hours of applying. Madam Speaker, I know you’ve worked closely with those officials and they work hard, and they were absolutely brilliant in these circumstances. When we compare that response to the rest of the world, we can see that we got money into the pockets of New Zealanders, gave cash flow and confidence to businesses and supported people to be able to put food on the table. That $11 billion that has ended up being paid out of the first phase of the wage subsidy scheme is something all New Zealanders can be proud of, the fact we looked after one another in a moment of crisis. I think it is something we will look back on with pride indeed. In addition to that, obviously, we’ve now seen the Small Business Cashflow (Loan) Scheme being developed to make sure there is working capital for our businesses to spend on paying the rent and the utilities or just to give the confidence that they can pay their bills, and the various tax measures that have been put in place to ease that burden and give tax refunds.

Something we haven’t talked about enough, I believe, is actually the support we’ve given to the aviation industry to keep flights going for our exporters, in particular. We did run the risk in the early days of this that we were not going to have air routes available for our freight. The Government stepped in. We’re supporting more than 50—I think towards 100—flights now a week that actually has made sure we’ve had those air freight routes. That’s been well and truly welcomed by those in the export sector.

But as my colleague Louisa Wall said, this Budget began the focus now on the recovery and the rebuild phases. It is vitally important that we do not allow New Zealanders to be left behind in that recovery. It’s why we extended the wage subsidy scheme. It’s why we put in place the COVID income relief payment to cushion that blow of the loss of work on those people who have lost jobs as a result of COVID-19. And it’s why we’ve now got the focus on the industries and the sectors that will grow the jobs that we need in the rebuild: that is in infrastructure, that is in construction, that is supporting our small businesses.

It’s amazing that we talk about the big numbers, the billions in a Budget, but often it is those small things that make a difference. The fund we’ve established for small and medium enterprises to offer e-commerce to put themselves on a website, to get themselves online are practical things that small-business people want. The fact we’ve already got people working in the Jobs for Nature Fund, people out there supporting us in pest control, making sure that we’re looking after our streams and our rivers. We can do practical things that actually create jobs in the moment, as well as the big picture things like construction and infrastructure that take us forward.

But also in the tourism sector—and we’ve had a lot of questions and conversations about the tourism sector. The tourism sector is going to be affected for some time. I want to give credit to my colleague Kelvin Davis, who has exhaustively consulted and listened to that sector and established a fund that is now being used to protect our critical assets like the Waitomo caves, like Whale Watch Kaikoura, but also to support—he said today—550 businesses to transition themselves to a new era, to focus on domestic terrorism, to look at what they can do to repackage the offering that they have. That is, again, practical support, keeping people in work, helping to create new jobs.

There is support for horticulture, for agriculture, for the arts and sports, and I do want to mention that, because those sectors are the ones that bind our communities together. They also offer jobs and employment to thousands of New Zealanders. But we saw at the weekend, with the start of Super Rugby Aotearoa, the way in which our communities come together around the sports, around arts, and we have supported those organisations so they know they have income, which has dried up from their usual sources of sponsorship and of the community trusts that support them. All of those sectors are getting support.

But the one that I want to spend a bit of time on, because it highlights the link between the recovery and the rebuild for the long term, is the investment in skills and training—the fact that out of this crisis we have emerged with a policy that creates free apprenticeships across the board, and creates free trade training in areas as diverse as community care and mental health, right through to manufacturing and construction. That’s legacy building. That’s what will make the difference, and it’s what didn’t happen after the global financial crisis (GFC), because after the GFC what we saw was people bailing out, not having their apprentices, letting them go, not taking on more people. We’re not going to let that happen, so that’s why we’re putting in a subsidy to support employers to keep their apprentices on. It’s why we’re boosting the trade academies and we’re giving opportunity across the board. In the construction sector we know that matters, because after the GFC, when the recovery came, there wasn’t the skilled labour force that was needed. We’re not going to let that happen. We’re investing in the future of New Zealand to make sure that we have the skilled staff we have as we begin our recovery.

As we look to the future of what we can do in our rebuild, we do want to rebuild this country better. We want to make sure that as a country we take seriously the challenges that have always been there but have been highlighted more than ever in this. That includes in inequality. It’s why initiatives like extending lunches in schools out to 200,000 students matters. It’s why it matters that we make sure that we have lifted benefits by $25 per week and doubled the winter energy payment.

There is more to do in all of these areas, just as there is in our sustainability agenda, and just as there is in making New Zealand more productive, but this Budget is one that responded to a one-in-100-year shock. It did so with a very large sum of money, but it was the rainy day we had been saving for. We put the umbrella up to make sure that we protect all New Zealanders. We will come through this strong. We will come through it with an economy that is more productive, is more sustainable and is more inclusive, and we will do that in a way and at a pace that other countries won’t have been able to do. That brings me back to the very beginning to thank all New Zealanders for their work and to ask them to support our recovery and rebuild as well.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the Appropriation (2020/21 Estimates) Bill be now read a second time.

Ayes 64

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

Noes 56

New Zealand National 55; ACT New Zealand 1.

Bill read a second time.

Appropriation (2019/20 Supplementary Estimates) Bill

First Reading

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Minister of Finance): I move, That the Appropriation (2019/20 Supplementary Estimates) Bill be now read a first time.

Bill read a first time.

Bills

Climate Change Response (Emissions Trading Reform) Amendment Bill

Third Reading

Hon JAMES SHAW (Minister for Climate Change): I move, That the Climate Change Response (Emissions Trading Reform) Amendment Bill be now read a third time.

E Te Māngai, tēnā koe. Tēnā koutou e Te Whare. In 2018 not too long after we got into Government, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change published a report on what it is going to take to limit global warming to below 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. Staying below that 1.5 degree threshold, the report said, is the best chance that we have of avoiding the worst of the climate crisis. But there was more to it than that. The report provided us with absolute clarity on the challenge that we have ahead of us. Specifically, it said that we need to cut carbon dioxide emissions in half by 2030 and to get to net zero carbon emissions by 2050. There was a seismic shift in our understanding of what our children would inherit if we do not act.

When that report was published, we had 12 years left to make the necessary emissions reductions. But we don’t have 12 years any more. Now we have only 10, and soon it will be nine. With nearly three decades of inaction behind us, we came into Government at the last possible moment before the window of opportunity to change course closes for ever. That is why we have spent the last three years putting in place the institutional framework to bend the curve of our emissions downwards, something that has never happened before in our country. Once passed, the reforms contained in this bill will be a critical part of that framework.

Before I touch on the role it will play, I want to spend a moment reflecting on how we got here. It’s a journey not started by me, I might add, but by the previous Government. Five years ago, they realised that a cap and trade system without a cap was failing to deliver on its primary purpose of cutting pollution. It has been accepted for decades that a well-designed system for pricing emissions needs to be a central part of any Government’s climate policy framework. Now, what we’ve had until now has neither been well designed nor a part of a broader policy framework. Some might have wanted to throw it out and start again from scratch, but, as the old saying goes, a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. So, instead, we chose to take the emissions trading system and to fix it. From now on we will have a clear, transparent, and predictable set of rules for emissions pricing, which will drive investment into low-carbon solutions to cut pollution.

Change is a collective effort. There are hundreds of people both inside and outside of Government who have worked on this bill. But there are a few people who I’d like to thank in particular: first, the stellar team at the Ministry for the Environment, who, led by the Secretary for the Environment, Vicky Robertson, have worked under astonishing pressure to get this bill to a place where it can bring about lasting change. They worked alongside the equally stellar team at Te Uru Rākau and the Ministry for Primary Industries—led by Julie Collins and Ray Smith—to develop the nearly two dozen Cabinet papers that form the basis of this legislation.

I’d also like to acknowledge and to thank the advisers and the private secretaries in my office, past and present, who have guided this bill every step of the way and supported me and my colleagues with a great deal of skill and even more patience. Then there are the thousands of individual New Zealanders, environmental organisations, farmers groups, businesses, iwi, and hapū that took the time to submit to the Environment Committee, ably chaired by Dr Duncan Webb, as well as the members of that committee themselves. The sum of that work is that, finally, there will be a sinking lid on the pollution that we put into the atmosphere. There will be, finally, a proper price on pollution. And we will now, finally, play our part in tackling the climate crisis and we will do so in a way that is fair and is transparent and is affordable.

I will be the first to admit that the emissions trading scheme is a vastly complex system. However the premise is actually pretty simple. A carbon price, if high enough, provides companies with an incentive to reduce pollution whenever doing so would cost less than paying for permits to pollute—what we call emissions units. In other words, when it works, it encourages businesses to innovate and to invest in solutions. Together with the introduction of transitional mechanisms like a price floor and a cost containment reserve, the price of carbon will not only be sufficiently high to incentivise investment but predictable enough to give companies the confidence that they need to make those investments.

There are bound to be people watching what we do here today who will be wondering why we’re passing this bill at a time of profound economic crisis, and some of those people are in fact sitting in the seats opposite. Now, I can give everyone here and everyone watching an hour of their lives back by telling you that the sum total of the National Party’s contribution this afternoon will be “now is not the time.” Well, now is precisely the time to be passing this bill. I said at the beginning of my speech that we have 10 years to cut our emissions in half, and that shortly drops to nine. And if we kick this bill into the long grass for yet another year, that drops to eight. But the size of the effort doesn’t reduce. We still have to cut the same amount of pollution, whether we do it in eight years or nine years or 10 if we get started today. Every year of delay makes the effort harder and more expensive than if we just got on with it right now. Those calling for delay, as they always do, are in fact calling for higher costs and greater economic disruption.

Now, for decades we have been told that we must choose between the environment and the economy, and that is, and has always been, a false choice. A zero-carbon economy will help to create cleaner and more vibrant and safer communities in every part of our country. It will connect our towns and our cities with frequent and fast trains and buses and roads free of congestion. It will create green jobs that pay people enough to provide for their families and to put a roof over their heads. It will support innovation and new investment in clean-tech, high-value industries. And the Opposition wants to delay all of those things for yet another year on top of the 30 years of delay that we have endured so far.

We have the zero carbon Act; the Climate Change Commission; the first set of emissions Budgets; the first national climate change adaptation risk assessment; the billions that we are investing in rail, light rail, buses, walking and cycling infrastructure; the billion trees programme; the Green Investment Fund; climate impact assessments on Government policy; climate-related risk reporting for large companies and organisations; the electrification of the Public Service car fleet; the end of new offshore oil and gas exploration; and now, finally—finally—we have a limit on emissions and a proper price on pollution.

I can confidently say that in a single term of Parliament, we have done more to stave off the climate crisis than the past 30 years of Governments combined. Perhaps I can put it like this. When we came into Government, we had a choice: continue down the high-pollution path towards the climate crisis, leaving our kids to suffer the consequences, or create something better, an economy and a society that is more equitable, more prosperous, and more innovative—all within planetary limits. This bill and every action that we have taken that preceded it is a result of that choice, the choice that we made to build a better future. And today, that future is closer within reach than it has ever been before. Nō reira, tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou katoa.

Hon SCOTT SIMPSON (National—Coromandel): Thank you, Mr Speaker. Look, I don’t doubt the sincerity or the dedication that the Minister brings to this debate, and, in fairness to him, it is his political life mission to reduce the impacts of climate change—not only here in New Zealand but around the world—and I give him credit for that. And I give him credit for his passion and his dedication and his commitment to that role. We share that on this side of the House, and we have done for a very long period of time. But what he rightly says, in terms of his third reading speech on this bill, is that the impacts will be costly and have a negative effect on New Zealand families, on New Zealand businesses, and on the New Zealand economy at the very time when we are confronting, as a nation, the worst economic crisis of the last 100 years. What we are saying on this side of the House, notwithstanding the Minister’s blithe discounting of it, is that now, actually, is not the right time to be doing it. Now is not the right time to be foisting extra cost on struggling businesses.

This is the problem with the ideologically pure and driven Greens who have pushed this through with the support of New Zealand First and the Labour Party. They are going to hurt New Zealand businesses at a time when they can very least afford to be hurt even more. What we’ve had now is the greatest number of job losses ever being recorded in New Zealand: 40,000 job losses in the last month alone. New Zealand businesses are hurting, and what does this bill do? Well, it puts a price higher on carbon than has previously been the case. There is already an impact on New Zealanders’ wallets and their back pockets in a way that could not be worse at this time right now. So what we find is that this bill, amongst other things—and it’s a big bill, it runs to 300-odd pages, it’s a very complicated bill with many moving parts, all sorts of detail in it, and much of it will be unfamiliar and unfathomable to many New Zealanders. But the bottom line is, as the Minister says, it puts a price on pollution, and that, of itself, is not a bad thing. It’s just a question of timing.

So what do we find, amongst other things? Some of our major industrial businesses are going to be hit by the decision to reduce the free allocation of credits. Those are businesses like New Zealand Steel, like the aluminium smelter, like the O-I glass manufacturer in South Auckland, like our fertiliser companies, like the oil refinery up at Marsden Point, and like a number of other businesses who, if they are not profitable, if they are not sustainable in our economy, guess what! We’ll be buying those products, importing those products, from countries overseas with a worse emissions footprint than anything that occurs here. And we will be exporting jobs and importing carbon products or products that have been produced in a less efficient way from overseas. That’s carbon leakage, and that actually does nothing, absolutely nothing, to solve the issues that confront the globe.

What’s more, this bill gives effect to the first-time pricing of agricultural livestock into the emissions scheme at farm level and fertilisers at emissions processor level from 2025. There’s a sword of Damocles that hangs over the agricultural sector, because, if the Minister for Climate Change and the Minister of Agriculture don’t feel that there’s been sufficient progress made by 2022, which isn’t very far away, they’re going to move that forward. And that will mean that New Zealand farmers, who already compete against subsidised products from pretty much every other primary producing country in the world, already have a difficult job in terms of exporting their product around the world. They are going to have an extra handbrake put on them. I just can’t see the sense of that at this current time. Farmers, actually, are doing very well. They’re already low-emission producers by world standards, and they do a great job and have done a great job over a long number of years. There are a number of examples that the Minister, during the committee of the whole House stage—and I credit him with engaging with the Opposition in a very full and detailed way, and actually that worked, I thought, very well. I thought the committee of the whole House debate was a good one, and I wanted to acknowledge and thank the Minister for engaging fully in it.

But already, since the announcement of the Supplementary Order Paper and the regulations that go with this bill, carbon price has moved up. So it was at about $25, or a little bit under, for most of the last 12 months or so, but, today, it sits at $31.40. Already, that’s having an impact. So at the committee of the whole House stage, the Minister conceded that at $25 a tonne currently that works out for a litre of petrol at the pump, New Zealanders are paying about 4c a litre into the emissions trading scheme contribution. But at $35, the Minister conceded that that moves up to 9c a litre. Now, that might not be a lot to many people. It may not be a lot to many people. And I suspect, actually, that’s not enough to probably change driving behaviour. But all it does is add to the cost of living of New Zealanders at a time when we can least afford it. It’s not of itself going to be sufficient to change behaviour. Indeed, the Minister has indicated that the price needs to go up vastly higher than the $35 that is currently mooted.

I want to just refer to the issue that has been highlighted since this bill came back to the House. That is the plight of the South Island winter tomato growers who currently produce tomatoes during the winter, and they have a real issue because, even at $30 a tonne, it looks like many of those growers are not going to be able to produce tomatoes in the South Island during winter months. The reason why is because they heat their hothouses with coal. Of course, coal is a greenhouse gas evil, and that is something that needs to be changed, but is now the right time to do it? These are businesses that are looking for mitigation options. They’re looking for help and assistance from the Government, and it seems there is none. There’s a lot of talk by this Government of a just transition. Well, the just transition in the case of South Island tomato growers will be that they just don’t grow tomatoes. It’ll be as simple as that. And what will happen is that the demand for tomatoes in the South Island during the winter will be met by other producers who will ship their product around the countryside by fossil fuel - carrying vessels or trucks or trains or whatever. They will shift product around and actually defeat the very purpose of this bill, because the emissions will be ultimately higher. Then the Minister, when he was confronted with the concerns and the criticisms of the South Island tomato growers, he said, “Well, we’ve got a Green Investment Fund.” The fund was set up recently—actually, a couple of years ago—the job, which is to assist companies to adopt low-carbon technologies, to help them finance that. Well, as of today, a hundred million dollars allocated to that fund in Budget 2018, not one single cent invested so far. Not one single cent. They’ve got flash offices, they’ve got a team of nearly a dozen high-paid executives, many of them who, pre-COVID, spent a lot of time tripping around the world, probably adding to the carbon emissions. But have they made any investments in the sorts of things that the Minister has promised the South Island tomato growers? Not one cent.

So National is not going to support this bill at this time, not because we don’t agree with the broad principles, because we do, but it’s a question of timing. In a post-COVID environment where it’s going to be our primary producers who are going to need to lead an export economic recovery for New Zealand and New Zealanders, surely now is not the right time, no matter what the protestations and the blithe dismissal of the Minister in terms of his tin ear on the needs and the concerns of New Zealand business people and New Zealanders who are trying to conduct their day-to-day lives against the most dramatic economic crisis that this country has seen in living memory, probably for more than 100 years or so.

So I do take issue with the Minister, and when he just dismisses, as this Government so often does, any criticism and just dismisses it blithely, then I think that that is treating New Zealanders and New Zealand business people with disdain and disrespect. I think they deserve better than this from a Government that is supposed to be caring, kind, and putting teddy bears in the windows. So look, thank you, Mr Speaker. We oppose this bill at third reading.

Dr DUNCAN WEBB (Labour—Christchurch Central): Tēnā koe, Mr Speaker. Look, I give that speech a D. I give it a D, because that’s really what typifies it. I don’t think there’s any deniers left over that side, but I have my suspicions. But the next D I see there is, yet again, delay—delay, delay, delay, one more day, one more year, one more decade, one more lifetime. That’s where we would be if we did it the way they would like, but the time absolutely is now. And the fact of the matter is that it’s not time to delay, not time to deny, not time to defer and deflect, to turn our attention elsewhere.

The time is now to look clearly and urgently at the problem which is before us, and it is a problem. The fact of the matter is that carbon costs. The illusion is that it doesn’t because it’s spread thinly—thinly geographically and thinly over time. But every carbon emission is costing us and it will cost us our livelihoods, it will cost nations their land, and yet they would have us delay. The time is not to delay. The time is for action. And look, I know there’s concerns out there, and it’s entirely unsurprising when we have a significant change that there’s anxiety.

Only the other day, Saturday in fact, I was on a street corner in Christchurch talking to people, talking to my constituents. At street corner meetings, I imagine we know, we get a full range of people, and an older guy, a bit older than me, probably a boomer, came up to me, and he made all of the arguments in succession.

“Not now. Our current circumstances dictate—we’re in the middle of an economic crisis.” We’re always in the middle of some situation. There is always a reason to do nothing. It takes courage to say further delay is wrong; we must act now. In fact, in this crisis, in this economic crisis, is exactly the right time, because we are in times of change. Let us take advantage of the fact that there are people out there who can redeploy, who can shift our economy to a low and ultimately no-carbon economy.

“We can’t make a difference. We’re tiny. We’re less than 1 percent.” Now, that’s another trick, another philosophical trick, where if we break ourselves up small enough, into small enough units, no one can make a difference, and together we drown. So each of us, each 1 percent, each 0.5 percent, has to take their load. And what’s more is we should take more than our load, because we have been emitting more carbon than just about any other nation in the world per capita for decades. That’s why we should be lifting more now than some of our neighbours, and we’re better placed to do so.

“Too fast, it’s all too fast. Let’s just defer it a bit more. Give us more time to transition.” Well, there are two things to say about that. The first is that this has been on the books since 2008 and we’ve done nothing. It’s had no effect. The other thing is that we’ve got a 50-year time horizon to get to carbon zero. So let’s not think we’re being hasty. Let’s think we’re taking the first tentative—gingerly stepping down a very long but very important road.

“The system hasn’t worked.” Well, it hasn’t worked, because it was broken. It wasn’t designed correctly, and that lot knew it and they didn’t fix it. They sat on it, they watched it, and they twiddled their thumbs whilst the fires kept burning. This cap and trade system—a cap and trade system with a cap and trade—is one that will work.

Look, I want to touch on one which, you know, has raised some genuine concern in some communities. And that’s the fear that there’s going to be too many trees. I want to recognise this and recognise the fact that there are rural communities, in particular, which are anxious about this. The first thing to note is that we have fewer trees now, fewer forests now than we did in the 1990s. And this system, the 2008 system and the illusory credits that were out there, in fact, led to deforestation in the long term, led to fewer forests. Now, we do want the right forests in the right place; we don’t want to see forests planted on good, productive land. But this is not, and forests are not, the way ultimately to a zero-carbon future. The way to a zero-carbon future is through good progressive technologies, and that’s what this does. This bill is nudge politics at its best. It’s saying we need to recognise that carbon costs and that we need to put those costs where they are properly borne, on the sector which emits that, so that the sector changes, so that they make rational decisions about the costs that they’re imposing on others here in New Zealand and, in this case, around the world.

“Wait for the science.” is the other one. That’s another delay. “Let’s just wait. Something is just over the horizon. They’re working on it. Solar panels will get better. We’ll genetically modify our cows not to emit methane.” Well, if that’s the approach we take, we can take that one for ever as well. It is just delay in disguise.

“It will stop economic growth.” That, as the Minister for Climate Change said, is the biggest fallacy. If we look at countries that have achieved reductions in carbon, they are the countries with the highest growth. They have harnessed technology and they have managed to do this in growing economies. And whilst Treasury projections in respect of this bill see a modest reduction in GDP, in fact history would suggest that this will be a huge boost as we enhance our productivity, enhance our energy efficiency, enhance our transport networks, and so on. So this is, in fact, a great and timely piece of legislation. It is a big bill, and, as was noted, it’s a complicated bill.

Hon Nathan Guy: 724 pages.

Dr DUNCAN WEBB: It’s 724 pages of absolute progressive green gold, and I absolutely endorse it. It is a money bill. It’s a bill which deals with finance. It isn’t a finished work. It will never be a finished work. A machine that is this important, this complex, and this valuable requires ongoing maintenance. So do expect to see it back here like you would with any piece of legislation which is critical to the working of our economy and our country. This is a bill which creates a market, and I’m surprised that the Opposition are not supporting it, because it is a market-based solution to an environmental problem and it’s a huge leap forward.

I want to say this. Being part of passing this legislation along with the other climate change legislation is a highlight of this term of Parliament. I’m very proud to have been part of it. It’s been a real privilege. I commend it to the House.

Hon JACQUI DEAN (National—Waitaki): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I’m very pleased to rise to speak in the third reading of the Climate Change Response (Emissions Trading Reform) Amendment Bill, and very pleased to reconfirm National’s position, which is in opposition to this bill. Duncan Webb was—

Hon Nathan Guy: Who?

Hon JACQUI DEAN: Well, exactly.

Hon Nathan Guy: He went down in the list.

Hon JACQUI DEAN: Exactly. Duncan Webb, chair of the Environment Committee considering this bill, gave us what he thought was a grade of D that we should be ashamed of, far from it. We are very pleased to stand in this House. We absolutely accept the nomina of D—D for “delay for very good reason.” It seems to have escaped this “Government of kindness” that we are, in fact, heading towards not a recession but something much worse than that, and we will find out a little later this week how soon and how badly our economy will dip into depression. And what is the industry that is keeping this country’s hopes alive? What is the industry that is going to be that industry which carries New Zealand through some very tough economic times in the next year, two years, three years from now? Well, of course, we know what it is: it’s agriculture.

Duncan Webb—and I was surprised that Duncan trotted out this argument when he said that New Zealand is emitting more per capita than any of our neighbours. Well, yes, but there’s numbers and then there’s numbers. And maybe what Duncan hasn’t considered, or maybe has forgotten, is that New Zealand’s emissions profile, of course, is skewed, because around 50 percent, more or less, of our emissions come from methane. Those methane emissions come from those very animals in that very sector of our economy which is the sector which is going to enable the next Government to be able to support the social spending that we are going to so badly need over the next few years. The fact that Duncan Webb, firstly, didn’t seem to realise that New Zealand’s emissions profile was so very unusual is a little astounding, given that he is the chair of the committee, but the fact that he would choose to use that figure as an argument for ploughing ahead with this emissions trading bill, which will impose cost not just on agriculture—but, of course, those costs will flow right through our society—is a little puzzling. So if anyone gets a D, I award it to Duncan Webb.

Duncan Webb also said that this is the right time “because we are in times of change.” Yes, we are in times of change, Duncan Webb. We are about to move into the greatest economic hardship that this country has seen in 160 years. If that fact has passed you by, then I would suggest that you and your Government and your coalition partners think again about the impost on bringing agriculture into the emissions trading scheme (ETS) by 2022, by 2025, at farm gate level, at processor level. We would suggest that the Government and its coalition partners think again, and think again about the importance of agriculture on our economy and how critical it is that we have an agricultural sector that can face the future with some confidence—some confidence—because no other sector can.

Tourism can’t. Tourism is on its knees. And, Mr Speaker, I’m cognisant of the fact that I’m straying a little wide of the bill, but the point I am making here is that National’s suggestion, National’s—

Hon Member: Idea.

Hon JACQUI DEAN: National’s idea—thank you; that word is important—is that we delay for a year so that we get a sense of just how badly our economy is performing, and then make a decision about bringing agriculture into the ETS, even more so than it is now.

The Hon James Shaw, I want to thank the Minister for his engagement with all parties in the House, and particularly—and Scott Simpson acknowledged this—James Shaw’s contribution to the committee stage of this bill was really very impressive. He has an in-depth knowledge of his subject and is very passionate about emissions trading; it is his reason for being here in Parliament. National has no argument with that. Our point—and James Shaw is quite right: we were always going to be arguing on the point of delaying this for a year—is that this is not business as usual, and yes, Duncan Webb and the Hon James Shaw, there is a wrong time to bring agriculture, methane emissions, into the ETS, and that wrong time is now. Further, I would say to James Shaw, who asked the rhetorical question: “Why are we passing this bill at a time of profound economic crisis?”—indeed, James Shaw, why are we? Why are we putting this cost impost on that very sector of our economy who are the ones who will bring us through this very tough time in front of us? We don’t know what that looks like. We don’t know how hard it’s going to be. We don’t know how many people are going to become unemployed, lose their jobs, lose their livelihoods, lose their homes, lose their businesses. We don’t know, but we do know that it is going to happen. So why would any Government propose to impose more cost at that time? We say no. We say delay.

James Shaw also put forward the argument that every year of delay we make the effort harder. To the contrary, Minister. When we are considering methane emissions and the impact of agriculture on global emissions, a delay of a year gives that industry a whole year to continue developing the science and the technologies so that we have an ETS system which is led by science. Our agricultural sector is very aware of the impact their emissions are making in New Zealand. What are they doing about it? Well, they are investing in science. They are investing in the very technologies that will reduce those emissions. Give them a year—give them another year to work on those technologies.

I read just a couple of days ago that there is now a breed of cattle which is shown to have less in the way of methane emissions compared to others. Well, that’s very exciting, because what it will lead to is a breeding programme—just as we do when we’re looking for any quality in animals, there will be a genetics programme of breeding which will get us closer to the science which will allow agriculture to enter the emissions. What we’ve got now is a tax. We are literally contemplating today a tax on that very industry of agriculture, which is the industry that is going to bring us through this post-COVID world.

So yes, Duncan Webb, yes James Shaw, I am very proud to stand up and give a D—D for delay, D to allow the agricultural sector to find the science to comply with climate change regulation. I am very proud to stand here today as a rural National MP who is in touch with the farming sector. I was at farmer meetings yesterday. They are very concerned about the essential freshwater package. They are very concerned about that national policy statement for biodiversity. They are very concerned about getting their meat processed. They are very concerned about their own futures, and they know that they are the sector that will prevail in getting through this post-COVID world. Do not saddle them with extra cost at this time. National opposes this bill for that reason.

MARK PATTERSON (NZ First): I rise to support this Climate Change Response (Emissions Trading Reform) Amendment Bill on behalf of New Zealand First. I too have a D to throw around that last speech by Jacqui Dean—and that is “disgrace”. It’s the National Party, you went over there—Paula Bennett went over there to Paris—

Hon Nathan Guy: Oh, we’ve heard all of this before. It’s like a broken record.

MARK PATTERSON: —and signed us up to a set of targets. Well, OK, I’ll move on from that and I’ll move on to the speech from Todd Muller on Sunday, where he admonished previous National Governments and previous Labour Governments for not moving fast enough on this very issue. In the very first opportunity that he’s got to walk that talk so that he can lead this country—or at least lead his party—he’s failed at the first hurdle. That, in my way of thinking, is a disgrace. This is an incredibly important issue. We do have to make our 2030 targets, we have committed to them, and we can’t afford to just kick the can down the road for another year—that’s 10 percent of the time that we’ve got left to meet those 2030 targets.

New Zealand First’s view on this has always been that we must do our bit as international citizens. We must address this issue ourselves. We had, in the previous Government, a scheme where you could buy emissions offsets from offshore—many of them turned out to be fraudulent. That is just not the New Zealand way; we’re cheating ourselves and we’re cheating, essentially, the planet. If everyone starts doing that, we’re getting nowhere. So we’ve got to do our bit, and that’s very much been New Zealand First’s attitude all along. We will not stand for delay.

So this bill, as the Minister for Climate Change said, it’s an incredibly complex piece of legislation. One of the main features, of course, is the cost containment reserve with the floor and the cap. That cost containment reserve is a little bit like the Reserve Bank, perhaps, being able to print a little bit of money to bring the currency down just so we can manage that, and I think that is a worthy mechanism within this bill: to make sure that that transition that businesses are going to make can be a fair one.

Our major industries actually have responded. Fonterra have committed to phasing out their coal-powered stations—(a), because it’s the right thing to do and they know they have to do it, but, (b), because their competitors are. FrieslandCampina, the big Dutch dairy company, has made an even stronger commitment to make decreases. So if we’re not in that game, we’re not going to be competitive in the long term. We had Mr Simpson talking about, actually, the tomato growers, and how they were going to be disadvantaged by that. Well, maybe he should have taken a bit more notice of Ecogas Ltd, who got $700 million in funding from the Provincial Growth Fund (PGF), and they had teamed up with T&G Global to produce biogas to power up their hothouse. That is the sort of innovation that putting a price on carbon—and a realistic price—and setting that band that companies know that they have to respond to, that is exactly the example and sort of behaviour we’re trying to drive within this scheme.

Of course, under the previous administration, we had the unit price for carbon going down to $2 or $3 per unit, which sends no signal whatsoever. If we were allowing ourselves to open up, as we’ve heard previously, to those international units, the price would swing wildly and businesses would not know where they’re going. So we do need to send those signals, and this bill does that.

Of course, Jacqui Dean touched a lot on the farming side of things, and she didn’t seem to quite understand—I saw that in the committee of the whole House stage—it’s the He Waka Eke Noa, where the farming sector has come together and are designing their own scheme, which will kick in around 2025, that recognises that the issues for agriculture are different. In the main, we’re talking about methane, which is a flow gas. There is some good reason for the industry to be able to have some more time to design that system so that it is fair and things like, maybe, riparian planting and sequestration from soil and things can be built in.

I was at Invermay, just out of Dunedin—just by the way, this Government saved that sheep genomics team from being disbanded. I was looking at their sheep-breeding programme there and their methane-capturing boxes that they put the sheep in. They’re breeding sheep that are more methane-efficient, and they’re seeing some quite consistent lines in terms of room and size and how that plays out in terms of methane emissions. So there is good stuff happening. Jacqui Dean alluded to lines of cattle that they’re now starting to identify. So genetics is a big issue.

Feed additives—and, of course, the PGF, once again, has invested in the red seaweed processing, and that’s showing some promise; as is the 3-NOP. We’ve got the vaccines that, of course, are being developed in a world-leading facility out at Massey, which is the international centre for developing vaccines. We’ve got grasses, of course, being developed with GE technology and fodder crop. So there will be some other tools there; whether we choose to deploy them or not is a matter for another day.

But, also, there is some opportunity in this. If you’re thinking of absolute production, I think that’s where the National Party get let down a little bit in their agricultural space. It’s actually about value. This Government’s done a lot of stuff around trying to increase value. I actually had the Beef and Lamb New Zealand people in, this morning, giving a briefing on their Taste Pure Nature, country-of-origin provenance brand that they’re working with the industry to develop. It’s been very successful so far; about a year in, and exceeding expectations.

What a story we have to tell. We are leading the world on some of this stuff that I just outlined earlier. We have got a story that consumers will want to hear and will be prepared to pay a premium for. Our farmers can be proud of what they’re sending offshore. From that side of things, there is incredible opportunity, and we should not shy away from that.

So, I guess, when we were looking at it, one issue that we did have was some concern around, maybe, the lack of levers within this bill to limit forestry offsets. As Duncan Webb alluded to in his contribution, we do not want to have runaway forestry. We can’t make forestry offsetting so profitable that it envelops large swaths of hill country; we absolutely understand the potential for that to happen if this gets out of control. So we do have to have that in there.

Of course, there are the social and economic measures that the Climate Change Commission has taken into account. Minister Shaw has absolutely assured us that that is where that mechanism sits to place some limit should they be seen to be getting out of hand with the forestry offsetting, so we are watching that. Of course, there is a review coming up, and I think that’s with the Climate Change Commission, and that’s something that they will have to, I think, keep a weather eye on.

Finally, this has been, as referenced earlier, an incredibly complex piece of legislation. I think it is six years in its gestation. So could I commend the officials that have been involved in this. It’s been a herculean effort.

Finally, the Minister, as well, Minister Shaw, for your efforts in this, you have used your adept political skills to, at least, get this side all together. I think, actually, if you asked them behind closed doors, the National Party want to support this too, but they have decided to take a political position, which is incredibly disappointing, given the importance of acting in this space. So congratulations, Minister Shaw, on getting this across the line, as it is a massive task. New Zealand First will support this bill through to law because it is, quite simply, the right thing to do. Thank you.

ERICA STANFORD (National—East Coast Bays): Well, Mr Speaker, if taking a political position by opposing this bill today is going to save Kiwis huge costs of living, potentially their jobs, then I’m happy to take that on. Mr Patterson has spent quite a bit of his speech today talking about Todd Muller, in fact, and his speech on Sunday. I’ll tell you what Todd Muller did on Sunday: Todd Muller stood up for everyday Kiwis and what will be, potentially, the worst time of their lives, and what we are doing today is standing up for those Kiwis to make sure that their cost of living, their gas, their electricity, their basket of groceries won’t be increasing at what will be the worst time in many of their lives.

Now, look, listening to the Government speeches today, you would think, by listening to all their posturing today, that what they’ve done over the last three years has been some monumental effort at wrestling down our emissions, but the reality is, over the last three years, they’ve only gone in one direction—and it’s not down, it’s up. I’ll tell you why that is. That’s because they haven’t put in place a single thing to wrestle down our emissions, not a single policy in place to do a single thing. Now, Minister James Shaw today was very cute when he came out and said, “I’ll save you an hour of your time”—

Matt King: He’s cute!

ERICA STANFORD: What he said was cute, I should say. “I’ll save you an hour of your time and tell you what National speakers are going to say.”, and he wasn’t wrong. But his very flippant way of dismissing our point won’t sit well with Kiwis who are now paying an extra 4c a litre at the pump, who are going to be paying more for their food, more for their electricity, more for their fuel, and watch their cost of living increase. His whole speech was so high and mighty, talking about eight years and ten years and the effect doesn’t reduce, and every year of delay—and while he was saying all this, I was sitting here thinking to myself, actually: where have all the delays been in the last three years? The delays have been in the introduction of electric vehicles into this country. We had, what, about 87 electric vehicles in the Government fleet at the beginning of their term? I think we still have that exact same amount, despite their promises to increase that by a third or a half. They’ve done absolutely nothing in three years. You want to talk about delays? There’s a massive delay.

Shall we talk about delays in terms of the Green Investment Fund—the only thing that they won in the negotiations in creating this unholy mess of a Government? What happened to that? Not a single cent spent in the last three years. You want to talk about delays? Let’s talk about the Green Investment Fund delays. All of those companies out there who are sitting waiting for that cash—nothing. We could talk about green tech investment—nothing. It’s very rich from the Minister to talk about this side of the House, delay, delay, delay, when he’s sat on his hands for the last three years and hasn’t put in place a single policy that has had a real impact on emissions, and we have watched our emissions over the last three years grow and grow and grow. What he’s done is set up a working group, and yep, we agree with him—that’s great—but what has he done to wrestle down our emissions in three years? Not a single thing.

And Chlöe Swarbrick, she yells from the other side of the House while Scott Simpson is talking. “Oh, so we’re going to screw future generations?”, she interrupts.

Chlöe Swarbrick: I was asking, “What about them?”

ERICA STANFORD: In the last Budget we just listened to, we’ve got $140 billion of debt for our future generations. You want to talk about screwing future generations? Let’s talk about that Budget. And, by the way, in that Budget there wasn’t even anything that was remotely going to help the environment, apart from a few jobs killing some wallabies—

Chlöe Swarbrick: $1.1 billion.

ERICA STANFORD: For shooting some wallabies? Awesome. Well, I’ll tell you what in that Budget—nothing. There was not a single cent for electric vehicles. There wasn’t any big increase of the Green Investment Fund, which we haven’t even spent a cent of. There wasn’t any hydro investment. There was nothing. Want to talk about green investment in our future? Well, that Budget was a massive fail.

And Dr Duncan Webb, always my favourite—time for action! The time is now! In his very clever speech, full of Ds—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Adrian Rurawhe): Come back to the bill.

ERICA STANFORD: Name one thing—back to the bill, Mr Speaker, I will. I’ll stop all my rebuttal. It’s very easy because they get me so riled, but I will continue on with it. The advent of the global pandemic has changed everything. When we look at this bill, we need to look through a different lens. We’re living in a different reality, and that reality for Kiwis is an increasingly difficult one. We’ve made it very clear at second reading that we cannot support the bill at this time. All we’re asking for is 12 months so we can have a much better idea of what our future holds. The reason for this position is entirely reasonable. It’s reasonable given the times we find ourselves in. We’ve got to look at the conditions that we’re probably going to pass this bill in that we have today. It’s important to do this, because this bill will increase the cost of living. It’ll make things tougher for companies to operate in this country, it’ll mean companies will shift offshore, it’ll mean that we will import products rather than produce them here. Fuel costs will rise. A trolley of groceries—the cost of that will rise. Everything that is reliant on the transport sector will rise.

The conditions of our new reality are constantly evolving, but so far we know we’re probably going to lose 140,000 jobs by Christmas—the worst economic crisis in over 100 years, and it’s a time when we are handing out billions in wage subsidies. And then there are more additional wage subsidies. Hundreds of millions in redundancy pay that the Government are paying. We’re lending businesses more to survive, we’re seeing benefit numbers swell, we’ve got charities and food banks that are swamped, we’re fast tracking bills to spend hundreds of millions on shovel-ready projects. We are in uncharted territory, and for the most part, while we’re COVID-free, the rest of the world is in a very different position. We heard Grant Robertson today say that—in question time, about the global downturn—we heard about the fact that this downturn is going to have an impact on our export revenue. And just how big is that hit? We don’t know yet. But the effects of the lockdown on our economy mean that we’re only just starting to feel the effect of that, and people are hurting.

We’re going to be spending, with this bill—without doubt—more on groceries, more on fuel, and more on electricity. The cost of living is going to go up. The Minister said today, and he’s said also in committee stage, that he was OK with this because now is the right time. He’s fine with that. Well, Todd Muller, Mr Patterson, and this Government—sorry, I should say this Opposition, soon to be Government—are not OK with that, because we’re quite happy to stand up for Kiwis who are doing it tough out there. A lot more of them are going to be doing it a lot tougher in the coming few months. We’re quite happy to stand up for them and say now is not the right time. We need more information, and a few months more so that we can get to grips with the true reality of this.

I talked, certainly, in the committee stage about the removal of the fixed price cap. The cap was initially put on to make it more certain for businesses to operate—they had more certainty. We started at about $12.50 and it increased to $25, where it was sitting up until just recently, and this gradual increase gave businesses and the public certainty. But the changes in this bill, we’ve already seen, as Mr Scott Simpson pointed out: the cost is now up to $34 or something. What this does is just put more uncertainty and more cost on businesses at a time when businesses are trying to figure out whether or not they can even be in business, whether or not they have to lay off staff. This is the last thing that they need. We heard from a number of trade-exposed industries in select committee, and I spoke about them at committee stage, and they quite clearly said to us that this bill is not giving them certainty—in fact, quite the opposite. We can’t imagine a world that we would live in without steel, aluminium, and concrete—all of those industries that create emissions. As much as James Shaw likes to get up here and tell us that, well, there are technologies and they’re coming, well, actually, they’re not here and they are costly and they are some way off. We have to protect our trade-exposed industries in New Zealand, because what we don’t want to be doing is shifting jobs offshore and importing products that are going to be manufactured overseas in a much more environmentally unfriendly way with more emissions.

Our policy was always not to phase out these free allocations of units until other countries in our region were doing a similar thing. Now, we are in a position with COVID where we are, for the most part—apart from today—COVID-free, but the rest of the world are doing it really tough, and I find it hard to believe that countries in our region won’t be putting additional costs and strains on their high-emitting industries in times like this. So we will most likely be doing this on our own, and the Minister failed to, at committee stage, tell us how this would be beneficial to New Zealand and why these jobs and these industries just wouldn’t be shifted overseas.

These are uncertain times. We’ve only asked this bill be delayed for 12 months so that we can have a much better idea of the exact impact on our economy and on our people. And that is why Mr Muller—on Sunday—and the rest of the National Party are standing up for those Kiwis and those people who are doing it really tough.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Ruth Dyson): Before I call the next speaker, can I apologise to the member who’s just resumed her seat? I omitted to give you the two-minute warning bell. It didn’t impact negatively on you, but I apologise for that.

Dr LIZ CRAIG (Labour): Thank you, Madam Speaker. It’s an absolute pleasure to stand in support of this third and final reading of this bill, because what this bill does is put in place a comprehensive framework that’s going to allow us to meet our targets under the zero carbon Act. So without further delay, I commend this bill to the House.

Hon DAVID BENNETT (National—Hamilton East): It’s an absolute disgrace from the Labour Party if they think that this is the best that they can put forward in this Parliament and can spend only one line on the bill—in an election year, one line on their flagship legislation. That truly shows what they believe in. They’re not there for New Zealanders, and they’re not there for the environment at all. They’re only there for themselves and their petty place in this part of politics, and they do deals with the New Zealand First Party and the Green Party to make that happen.

Marja Lubeck: Says the hoarder of toilet paper!

Hon DAVID BENNETT: Is there something you want to say over that side of the House?

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Ruth Dyson): Feel free to refer to the bill in passing, Mr Bennett.

Hon DAVID BENNETT: Sorry, Madam Speaker. It’s just that sometimes those interruptions from that member are quite valuable, and I was looking forward to another one today, but unfortunately we missed out on her valuable interruption to our debate.

My colleague spoke very well in her speech and pointed out that this is about the cost of living on New Zealanders. And I see over there we have the Minister trying to be the Minister for Employment—or whatever he does—that understands—

Marja Lubeck: Who are you?

Hon DAVID BENNETT: Don’t bring the Speaker into the debate, OK? Now, that member over there should be really taking and doing something for the people that actually need help out there. And he always talks in this House about looking after those people that are most vulnerable—those people that are at the bottom of the heap—and what are they doing here? Putting more costs on those very people. The very people that will become unemployed have to pay more. That is what the Labour Government is doing. The Labour Government is hurting businesses that are needed at this time to provide employment and opportunity for people to get out of the hole that we are in as a country.

This bill is going to hurt farmers, who are going to be the backbone of the economic recovery for New Zealand going forward. And that really shows the problem that we have with the New Zealand First Party because the New Zealand First Party will come into this House and, over the next few months, will go around the country saying that they are the farmers’ friend—this is their election campaign. They’re nodding. That’s what they’re going to say: “Trust us and there will be none of these things happening.” Well, if the New Zealand First Party was so thorough, so trustworthy, so dependable, they would not let that review clause be in this legislation. This legislation puts off the big decision around agriculture to next year. Where was Winston Peters and his protecting the farmers when this debate came up in Cabinet? Why didn’t he stand up and say no to that clause? He didn’t.

Hon Scott Simpson: He was having a snooze!

Hon DAVID BENNETT: No, I don’t think he was asleep. Mr Peters is generally a very active member of that Cabinet. I’m sure he read every paper that was in front of him. But Mr Peters agreed with the Labour and Green parties. Mr Peters didn’t stand up for farmers when he had a chance, and I say we can’t trust the New Zealand First Party, the Green Party, or the Labour Party, because to put that in the legislation is because they intend to do it over time; they intend to bring agriculture into the emissions trading scheme (ETS). The only point they’ve put that in there is so that they can go around in election year and try and convince people to vote for them under false pretences, as they always have, because they’ve never been there for farmers, they never will be there for farmers, and they’re only there for themselves.

In fact, we heard from Mr Patterson—was it?—about trying to protect farming from forestry invasion, you know, and how he wanted to see a review of these things. They put the rules in place that created the forestry distortion that’s out there in the agricultural sector. They created the exemption for forestry. They put the money into forestry, and now they’re saying we’re going to have a review at some point—the review that hasn’t happened before the election, and a review that will never happen, because their dear leader has made a promise around a certain number of trees that have to be planted. And I say to the Government parties—and they’ll laud this agreement with the agricultural sector and say that they came to some agreement—if they really stood behind an agreement, there would be no need for that sledgehammer that could come down next year. If there was agreement with genuine, binding interests, there wouldn’t need to be any of that in this legislation. The reality is—and we know what the reality is—that there is no genuine agreement on that side of the House to partner with farmers and farming organisations. It is only being used—it is only being used—by those parties to try and mitigate at this point in time.

The Green Party will shake their head. Now, the Green Party came into this House many years ago, when they were in Opposition, and told us how principled they were—how everything they did would be based on principle. And I’ve got to give James Shaw credit; he was probably the best Minister I’ve seen in answering questions in the Chamber during the committee stage on this bill. He did it in a very good way, but he didn’t answer the questions and he didn’t give the full facts. The full facts are that the dairy industry had been the one industry that never got those entitlements that other major industries got from day one. The New Zealand dairy industry has been paying from day one, for 15 years, and I know James Shaw had to check that with his officials, and he found it was true, because he didn’t know that at the time that he was speaking in the committee. The dairy industry has been paying. They have been paying over all those years, when all those other major industries have had a free ride. And now, on top of that, they’re going to be told that they’re going to be brought into the ETS as farmers as well. It’s not fair.

There is no independent audit process that the Minister talked about; that is just an illusion. All we have is a commission—a commission that is appointed by the Government, a commission that will make its decision—and this will not be an independent audit process as to how well farmers have done. This is purely a political decision that will be made by the Green Party, the New Zealand First Party, and the Labour Party pre-election. After the election, the National Party will take a different approach. We will look at science and practical things that actually work, and we will be there to work alongside the businesses and farmers of New Zealand, because everybody understands that there are goals that need to be achieved. Our markets have moved, our consumers have moved, our public have moved, but we need to move with them as an industry, in a way that we can do that, and that is the secret to get that balance right. And that’s what the National Party wants to see in this field, and we wish that the other parties would do that.

If they really did trust those producers out there, that they now are so happy to see producing to keep this country alive, if they really trusted the people that they are so indebted to at the moment to pay the bills, why then did they create a playing field which is uneven and creates a situation where there is uncertainty on those businesses and those farmers? Those businesses and farmers face uncertainty every day in the weather. They face uncertainty every day in their international prices. They do not need a Government putting more uncertainty on them. What they want from a Government is a plan that is practical, reasonable, and achievable under science-based mechanisms. That’s what they want, and that’s what they demand, and instead what they have got is a political power play which holds off the big decisions for next year and, in the meantime, tries to distort our economy and put more costs on those very people that are the most vulnerable in our community, and that is a shame on the Labour Party, and all they can say is one sentence in response to this bill.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Ruth Dyson): The next call is a split call. Jamie Strange.

JAMIE STRANGE (Labour): What a negative speech over there, and I think that highlights why that party is in Opposition and this party is in Government, because we’re aspirational about the future. I commend this bill to the House.

Hon NATHAN GUY (National—Ōtaki): Thank you, Madam Speaker. I was waiting for that member, Jamie Strange, to finish off his contribution by saying “be kind”, because that’s certainly the mantra that we’re hearing over the other side of the House at the moment. What a very weak contribution from that member, from—where is he? Hamilton? I think he’s on the list. [Interruption] Oh, Waikato, Waikato. You would have thought that his constituents up there in the mighty Waikato would have wanted to have heard from him about this very important bill—very technical—and Mr Strange I would have thought wanted to tell his constituents that this bill is a very long and complex bill. In fact, it’s two parts: it’s a bill itself and a Supplementary Order Paper.

We debated this through the House recently, 724 pages. It’s a massive bill. [Interruption] I’ll get on to the trees in a moment, Mr Webb, that you’re so keen to see engulfing rural New Zealand. There’s a few of them here that have been harvested and when there are mistakes in this bill, it’ll all come back to haunt you because you were the chair of the select committee and you like to think that you were across all of the detail—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Ruth Dyson): Feel free to leave me out of the debate. You’ve been here a while. You know that you’re not allowed to bring the Speaker into the debates.

Hon NATHAN GUY: Yes, Madam Speaker, I didn’t mean to bring you into the debate. Thank you for reminding me. I was actually just alluding to the fact—not you, but the chair of the Environment Committee, which is Mr Webb.

What I also want to talk about is James Shaw, the Minister for Climate Change, because when we went through the committee stage—I want to commend him for the fact that he answered questions incredibly well. In fact you, Madam Speaker, were in the chair at the time and you also nodded just then. So I just want to have a token of appreciation through to the Minister to say that thank you for enduring to answer all of our questions on this side of the House. I felt that the debate as part of the committee stage was fulsome. We learnt a lot from your answers and actually a couple of times you referred to your officials and I want to acknowledge them and the work that they did through the select committee. I just feel that this bill, being so technical, deserved to have some more time through—not the committee of the House, but we met through the COVID lockdown and it’s pretty hard, when you have a bill of this detail and magnitude, to be able to actually understand it via a computer screen.

This bill underpins the zero carbon bill. This is really where the rubber hits the road. I’ve already mentioned that this is a very complex and technical bill and it wouldn’t surprise me, because it has been rushed through the select committee, that there will be errors. At some point it will be back into the Parliament to make some changes. I hope there isn’t, but it wouldn’t surprise me. Having been here 15 years, I know from time to time when bills are rushed through a select committee process, they have to come back into the Chamber to be tidied up.

There’s three important aspects of this bill that I want to talk about this afternoon in its third reading. The first one is the impact on agriculture, the second one is the impact that it’s going to have on consumers here in New Zealand, and the third part, importantly, is the impact that this bill will have—and we’re already seeing it play out in rural communities—with the billion tree programme.

So the first point is the impact on agriculture and I was pleased to see that the agriculture industry stood up and said, “Let’s work together with the Government.”, and they came up with an accord that meant that there isn’t going to be a tax at processor level because that is not going to change behaviour inside the farm gate. It will just be a crude measure that won’t change any behaviour. As a result of that, Government worked alongside industry and said, “Yes, the accord is a good measure.” But probably those that signed up to the accord in the agriculture industry didn’t realise that there was a part that was slipped into this Supplementary Order Paper that says, “Hold on, if farmers and industry leaders don’t do what they say in farm environment plans by 2022, the Minister for Climate Change and the Minister of Agriculture will basically have the power to enforce a processor levy on farmers at that point in time—in 2025.” That is not going to change behaviour from one farm that might be doing the right thing to the other farm over the boundary fence that is not doing so well in terms of the environment.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Ruth Dyson): Your time has expired. Thank you.

Hon Nathan Guy: Madam Speaker.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Ruth Dyson): So—

Tim van de Molen: I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Ruth Dyson): Sorry, were you doing a point of order, Mr Guy, or—I’m confused.

Tim van de Molen: I am doing a point of order.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Ruth Dyson): The clock’s on zero, but Mr Guy was calling as well.

Tim van de Molen: Well, I have called a point of order.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Ruth Dyson): Point of order.

TIM VAN DE MOLEN (Third Whip—National): Thank you, Madam Speaker. The issue we have here is that it was a split call called. Because Mr Strange’s contribution was only 15 seconds, Mr Guy is entitled to the balance of that time, and whilst you had five minutes on the clock, actually, he is entitled to a full nine minutes and 45 seconds for his contribution.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Ruth Dyson): What Standing Order is that?

TIM VAN DE MOLEN: That’s Standing Order 48(3). The last line is of particular relevance: “the next speaker gets the balance of the time.”

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Ruth Dyson): Can you tell me again what Standing Order you were referring to?

TIM VAN DE MOLEN: Sorry, it’s Speaker’s ruling 48/3, by Speaker Mallard in 2017, and Mr Guy has a very comprehensive contribution to continue making in this instance, I’m sure.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Ruth Dyson): Your interpretation of it has never been the way that it’s been interpreted for my brief time in this House. My reading of both the Speaker’s ruling that you refer to and the Standing Order, which is Standing Order 121(2), is that that time can be allocated in the way you describe if it’s by agreement, and you’ll know that on contentious issues there is often a 10-minute call split by agreement. That isn’t the case. In this instance, there’s five minutes allocated to each speaker, and the Hon Nathan Guy has used up his five minutes.

Hon Nathan Guy: Point of order.

Tim van de Molen: Madam Speaker—

Hon Nathan Guy: A point of order—Tim.

Tim van de Molen: —it’s very clear—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Ruth Dyson): Could you guys work it out which one’s going to call for a point of order? It’s too hard for me to choose.

TIM VAN DE MOLEN (Third Whip—National): Well, thank you, Madam Speaker. It is very clear that Speaker Mallard ruled that is the case—the next speaker gets the balance of the time. There is no mention in it whatsoever about a requirement to have agreement on that particular point.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Ruth Dyson): There is a process for challenging the Speaker’s determination, and the way that you are doing it is not appropriate. Is there another speaker?

Hon NATHAN GUY (National—Ōtaki): I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. I seek leave of the House to finish my contribution in the next four minutes and 40 seconds.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Ruth Dyson): Leave is sought for that purpose. Is there any objection? There is objection. Are there any further speakers?

JO LUXTON (Labour): Thank you, Madam Speaker. It’s a pleasure to stand and take a short call on this piece of legislation. Can I begin by commending the Hon James Shaw for bring this piece of legislation to the House and shepherding it through. I would just like to finish off by saying everything that I would like to have said has been said, and so I commend this bill to the House.

ANDREW FALLOON (National—Rangitata): Well, thank you, Madam Speaker. I suppose the pressure is all on me now that, unfortunately, Nathan Guy could not finish his contribution. I, unfortunately, didn’t sit on the select committee that considered the Climate Change Response (Emissions Trading Reform) Amendment Bill, but I have enjoyed listening to the debate this afternoon and, indeed, I enjoyed a lot of the committee stage as well. I just want to echo my colleague Nathan Guy’s comments in relation to James Shaw throughout that process. He sat through, I think, all of it and answered a lot of questions that we had on this side of the House, and I’d like to commend him for that.

But I just want to run through a couple of the contributions that we’ve heard from the other side this afternoon, and the first one of those that I heard was from Duncan Webb. Duncan Webb, I thought, made an interesting contribution when he said “Forests are not the way to a carbon-free future.”—forests are not the way to a carbon-free future. I thought to myself: well, tell that to Shane Jones. Tell that to Shane Jones who, as Minister of Forestry, has led an overseas investment on a scale that’s unprecedented in terms of forestry investment to specifically invest solely in forests, for more forests in New Zealand. And I’d like to ask that member, and perhaps we can catch up afterwards about it, about what it is or why is it that he thinks that if forestry should not be the future for a carbon-free future, then why is it that we’re seeing so much new forest go into places like the Wairarapa? Why are we seeing new forests go into places like Marlborough, where there has just been a sale recently for more forests to go into Marlborough?

He also touched on an interesting point, I thought, where he said, in his argument against delay, that we shouldn’t delay because technology is happening. Well, I actually agree with him on that. Technology is happening, but it’s not here yet, a lot of it. There is a lot of fantastic stuff happening, and some of those things have been touched on in the House this afternoon. One of those is around a higher-fat ryegrass. Another one of those is around an algae or seaweed which has the potential to reduce methane emissions amongst cattle. Those things are really, really positive. But the problem is that those things haven’t happened yet. They’re not out there on our farms happening now, reducing those emissions.

So the problem that we have on this side of the House with this bill is that you’re leaving farmers in a position that they cannot escape the additional cost. They can either decrease their herd sizes. They can decrease productivity. They can, I suppose, do less and that will mean that more people around the world will go hungry, or it’ll mean that other nations around the world increase their productivity, and I’ll come back to that in a minute.

Now, the problem with that is that if you’re not giving farmers a pathway, all they’re doing is putting a higher cost or lower production. And the problem with lower production, if all we’re doing is exporting that food production around the world, is that’s actually going to cause higher global emissions, because, if members opposite hadn’t realised, although we have relatively high per capita emissions in the world, we actually have very efficient farming processes in this country. So it means that if we produce less food—at the moment, we produce enough food to feed about 40 million people around the world—and that food production is exported around the world, less efficient farmers will be producing it, and that means that global emissions will go up.

The other problem we have with it is that it’ll make New Zealand poorer. So if we’re producing less, if we’re exporting that production around the world, it’ll mean that we here in New Zealand are earning less from what we produce, and that’s being talked about in the context, this afternoon, of potentially 140,000 or 160,000 job losses. That was a point that Duncan Webb touched on when he talked about: why delay—why delay? Well, the argument, actually, Duncan Webb, is because we are in unprecedented economic circumstances—unprecedented economic circumstances—where Treasury project that we’ll lose between 140,000 and 160,000 jobs around the world.

So I ask members opposite: where will those jobs come from? Where will those jobs be created—those between 140,000 and 160,000 jobs projected to be lost by the end of the year—

Hon Nathan Guy: That’s here in New Zealand.

ANDREW FALLOON: —where will those jobs—exactly, that’s here in New Zealand. Where will those additional jobs be created?

Hon Nathan Guy: Wilding pines.

ANDREW FALLOON: Because it’s not actually all—well, wilding pines. Potentially, wilding pines are an option. Wallabies, of course, and I was a bit disappointed about Chlöe Swarbrick’s views on wallabies, actually, because I thought they were these, you know, cuddly animal welfare advocates, and, of course, these wonderful creatures down in Waimate—I’m sure my colleague Jacqui Dean won’t agree with me, of course, because they are, unfortunately, a massive pest in the area. But here’s the Greens putting up these green jobs, these wonderful green jobs, to go out and destroy wallabies, which I found a bit disappointing from Chlöe Swarbrick.

James Shaw in an earlier debate—I think it was in the committee stage—was quite disparaging of National’s position, which was, of course, to delay the provisions in this bill by 12 months. He said that the position of delay could be made at any point in our recent economic history. That was, essentially, his point. I think I’ve summarised that accurately. That says to me, actually, that he doesn’t quite understand or fathom the unprecedented economic circumstances that we currently find ourselves in, because, of course, maybe 10 years ago, maybe 20 years ago, if people had called for delay, then that might have been unreasonable, but now it’s not. Now it’s absolutely not. We are losing—

Hon David Parker: And it’s not, and it was the same party.

ANDREW FALLOON: We are losing, Mr Parker, between 140,000 and 160,000 jobs out of the New Zealand economy before the end of this year and you are talking—

Hon David Parker: No, we won’t.

ANDREW FALLOON: You are talking, Mr Parker, about—

Hon David Parker: What a doomsayer.

ANDREW FALLOON: —about—well, I’m sorry. They’re the Government’s own projections from Treasury that 160,000 jobs will be lost before the end of this year. They’re the Government’s own projections.

Hon David Parker: No. The member missed question time.

ANDREW FALLOON: If you want, Mr Parker, to contradict those, if you want to come up and say that they’re wrong, if you want to say that Treasury are wrong, you’re welcome to do so, but they are the Government’s own numbers.

Now, Chlöe Swarbrick called out earlier in the debate that we are opposing this bill. She said that it’s opposition for opposition’s sake. Nothing could be further from the truth, Ms Swarbrick. We stand for jobs, we stand beside farmers, and we stand in support of the economic contribution that they make. And the reason I make that point is because I was talking to a friend of mine recently who’s about to lose his job, unfortunately. He said, “I was looking in the paper and every job that was available was on a farm.” Every job that was available was on farms. And he’s the sort of guy—he’s a pretty practical guy—who’ll probably go out and get a job on a farm. Good on him for doing that, but there’s a lot of people out there in the position that won’t be able to do that.

For a long time to come, probably for at least the next 12 months, we’re going to be in a position where tens of thousands of New Zealanders are losing their jobs. Unfortunately, the Government’s not creating the jobs, doesn’t have a plan to create jobs, and a lot of the jobs that exist are on farms. And the Government’s response to that—or at least the Green Party’s response to that—has been “Oh, but what about green jobs? What about green jobs?” Well, I’ll just ask the Government this. They’ve been in Government for nearly three years. Where are those green jobs? Where are those green jobs that they said they would create? Where are those green jobs that will employ between 140,000 and 160,000 New Zealanders before the end of the year? I’ll tell the Government members opposite: they don’t exist. The jobs that exist right now are on farms. They’re on dairy farms, they’re on crop farms, and they’re on pig farms. They’re on farms all across this country and it’s that industry that can take up the slack. It’s that industry that can get out there and employ people.

This bill has the potential to cause great harm. This bill, all it does to farmers is it sticks them with more cost—sticks them with more cost—and if you talk to any business owner, any farmer about where they will pull that cost back from, it tends to be staff, because a lot of our farmers are price takers. Mr Parker knows this. A lot of our farmers are price takers. They can’t just stick another dollar, stick another $2, on the cost of what they produce. For a lot of them, if they have to pay out another $100,000 a year, another $150,000 a year, what it means for them is fewer people on their farm employed—fewer people in their business employed. That’s what this bill has the potential to do: to lose those jobs, to lose those jobs that we’re going to need over the next 12 months. For that reason, we oppose it.

CHLÖE SWARBRICK (Green): E Te Māngai, tēnā koe. Tēnā koutou e Te Whare. It is a pleasure to rise as the second Green speaker on this Climate Change Response (Emissions Trading Reform) Amendment Bill. I just want to refer to that final speaker who has just taken his seat—Andrew Falloon, who I have a lot of respect for across the House—and the fact that he quoted “unprecedented economic circumstances”, which is something we’ve heard a lot about recently. I want to ask Mr Falloon and the rest of his National Party colleagues whether they have heard about climate change because what we have here is a situation where insurers are backing away from South Dunedin homes and insuring those. They should talk to farmers about the increasingly unpredictable seasons that they are facing as a result of global warming. Or in fact, they should just speak to experts. We’ll just look at the data around mass migration or exacerbation of conflict driven by droughts and famine by climate change.

The Climate Change Response Act 2002 is the same age as this year’s new voters. For 18 years, for their whole lives, they have had a dysfunctional law which has allowed emissions to rise and our planet to warm. This Act first came into force 18 years ago to ratify the Kyoto Protocol, which was built on the agreements from a whole 10 years before that in 1992 called the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, or UNFCCC for short, which committed countries around the world to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The Kyoto Protocol of 1997 accepted, firstly, that global warming was happening. And secondly, that, and I quote, “It is extremely likely that human-made CO2 emissions have predominantly caused it.” The Kyoto Protocol recognised the basic premise of common but differentiated responsibility. That is that we all share the same atmosphere, but different countries have contributed different amounts to its warming and have a differing ability to change that. Many so-called developed countries have built their wealth off of the exploitation of our shared natural environment and therefore have a greater responsibility to draw down our carbon activity. It was not then immediately clear how we would go about drawing down this carbon but, as a wealthy country, Aotearoa New Zealand had an international obligation, and we recognised that in law.

Six years later, in 2008, the final year of the Clark Labour Government, the emissions trading scheme was introduced into this legislation by amendment. The emissions trading scheme was meant to be that “how” part of the puzzle. It’s basically a market which puts a price on the limit of carbon. It prices what economists call externalities, allowing companies to factor in the real cost of their commercial activity. It was an attempt to mitigate, or at least try to end, the privatisation of profit and socialisation of cost—money made off the back of grabbing scarce natural resources through pollution and that everybody else collectively paid to clean up. But then there was a global financial crisis and, in 2008, a change of Government.

The first action of that new National Government in the climate change sphere was to expand a programme of what is called free allocation. Free allocation is something that many people a whole lot smarter than myself—researchers and experts, a whole lot more informed than many in this House—have spilt a lot of ink on. But the simple explanation is this: the emissions trading scheme means that polluters pay for their pollution, and they are limited in how much pollution they can produce. But unfortunately, this story is, of course, not that straightforward. It’s actually probably rather reflective of the lobbying power of those already wealthy and powerful, but their arguments that they shouldn’t pay for their pollution were reflected in a concept of free allocation. It gives our most polluting industries an allocation of those emissions trading scheme units for doing nothing except exorbitantly polluting, supposedly so that they can be incentivised to reduce that polluting. That is not a just transition. It is corporate welfare. But after being elected, the 2008 National Party Government froze that annual generous grant of free allocation, which was originally supposed to be a sinking lid. It meant that even as technology developed and industries got more carbon efficient and, thankfully, began producing less carbon, they continued to get the same free ride. So even the National Party, who so often invoke the free market, should know and recognise that that is a messed up and significant market distortion.

I am incredibly proud of the work that our Green climate Minister, James Shaw, has put into fixing this. We are thawing free allocation from National’s attempts to freeze it in time, and we will be wrangling it down. This is just the latest in a huge series of work that the Greens in this Government have undertaken to mobilise Aotearoa’s potential for climate action. It builds on decades of advocacy, activism, and mahi of community leaders and of scientists. Firstly, with regard to this, our Green Minister, James Shaw, put the 1.5 degrees Celsius target of warming into this very Climate Change Response Act. We created the independent Climate Commission to hold us to account on that path. We’ve committed to carbon budget every five years as a stepping stone to that carbon neutrality. This is just another critical step in recognising that the economy exists within the environment, jobs happen on the planet, within the atmosphere.

Many have noted that we are in the midst of the greatest global economic downturn in generations. But for a long while before that, we recognised that the system was already broken. We do not fix that by going back to business as usual, and we sure as anything do not fix it by going back even further than that. The National Party have banged on a lot in their contributions today about the potential debt that future generations will carry as a result of the necessary investments, which I note they haven’t proposed an alternative to, that this Government is making right now. But out the other side of their mouths, they are willing to steal from those future generations breathable air, clean water, and a stable climate just to kick the can further down the road. And at what cost? [Interruption] When do the excuses run out, Mr Bennett? It has been 38 years since the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and last year, during the reading of the zero carbon amendment on the same Climate Change Response Act that we are amending today, the now leader of the National Party, Todd Muller, heckled me for pointing out the disconnection between this House and the lives of those that we are making decisions about right now. My response is well documented.

The kids born alongside the Climate Change Response Act 2002 are this year celebrating their 18th birthday. Many of them have marched in the streets in their tens of thousands, calling for stronger climate action for a stable and predictable future. And now they have a vote and they will shape our democracy. And they are watching.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the Climate Change Response (Emissions Trading Reform) Amendment Bill 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.

Urgency

Urgency

Hon DAVID PARKER (Minister for the Environment) on behalf of the Leader of the House: I move, That urgency be accorded to the introduction, first reading, and referral to select committee of the COVID-19 Recovery (Fast-track Consenting) Bill.

The use of urgency for the COVID-19 Recovery (Fast-track Consenting) Bill is to enable it to come before the House today when it would otherwise not have been available until next week. It will be considered by the House entirely within normal sitting hours. Having the bill read the first time provides some time for it to be considered by a select committee. There is, however, a need to get this bill enacted quickly. It is one of the range of measures that will help to rebuild the economy after the COVID-19 pandemic.

The bill identifies 11 infrastructure projects to be fast tracked through the consent process so that they can get going much sooner than would otherwise be possible. I will outline those projects plus some other tracks under the bill in more detail when we discuss that bill, but overall, it will reduce the duration of consent processes, which will enable projects to start significantly earlier than would otherwise be the case.

With limited House time available before the election, in the view of the Government, it’s essential that this bill go to select committee now so that it can benefit from urgency, which is the House’s own fast-track system. Delay until after the election of the passage of this bill would nullify some of its effects and delay a significant boost to the economy post-COVID. I ask the House to support the urgency motion.

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

Ayes 63

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

Noes 56

New Zealand National 55; Ross.

Motion agreed to.

Bills

COVID-19 Recovery (Fast-track Consenting) Bill

Introduction

Bill introduced.

First Reading

Hon DAVID PARKER (Minister for the Environment): I move, That the COVID19 Recovery (Fast-track Consenting) Bill be now read a first time. I nominate the Environment Committee to consider the bill. At the appropriate time, I intend to move that the bill be reported to the House by 29 June 2020 and that the committee have authority to meet at any time while the House is sitting (except during oral questions), during any evening on a day on which there has been a sitting of the House, and on a Friday in a week in which there has been a sitting of the House, and outside the Wellington area, despite Standing Orders 191, 193, and 194(1)(b) and (c).

The COVID-19 Recovery (Fast-track Consenting) Bill is part of the Government’s response to support New Zealand’s recovery from the economic and social disruption caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, so that we can create jobs and rebuild our economy. The Government has taken urgent action to support people and the economy against the effects of COVID-19; however, the unemployment rate is rising. Although I disagreed with Mr Falloon in his earlier contribution on a prior bill as to the prediction as to how high unemployment is going to go, which I think is now a bit out of date, it is true that over 45,000 people have newly accessed the jobseeker benefit during the COVID-19 lockdown and since. The Government is making significant investments in infrastructure to bring forward those investments so as to get the economy moving and people back into jobs, and this bill will ensure that the resource management system supports this investment by speeding up resource consenting and designation processes under the Resource Management Act (RMA) to get projects started as soon as possible.

The bill lists 11 projects that will progress first and have a high level of certainty of being approved. These include drinking-water storage, housing, cycleway and rail upgrade, and roading projects. Those named projects are located across the country, from Kaikohe to Queenstown. Of course, the select committee can recommend adding or subtracting from this list after it receives submissions, or potentially it may move projects to the second track. One example might be Te Pā Tāhuna housing project in Queenstown, which may be delayed due to the fall-off in tourism demand. If so, another Queenstown project, such as a bypass to address Queenstown’s gridlock, could be added to the list.

Fast-track legislation has been used before, after the Canterbury earthquake, and the Hurunui/Kaikōura Earthquakes Recovery Act 2016 was another that modified resource consent processes to help those communities recover from the devastation wrought by the earthquakes. While wider public participation and appeal rights provided for in the standard resource consent processes under the RMA are appropriate in normal circumstances, they don’t provide the speed urgently needed now. In our view, however, positive environmental outcomes don’t need to be sacrificed, so this bill modifies existing RMA provisions so as to process to significantly speed them up whilst retaining environmental safeguards. Part 2 of the RMA will still apply to fast-track projects under the legislation. Furthermore, when the panel makes their decision, they’ve got to continue to apply the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi, and Treaty settlement obligations will also be upheld.

The bill enables the establishment of expert consenting panels. These are convened by a sitting or retired Environment Court judge, who also appoints the chairperson for each panel and its members. These panels will consider the projects listed in the bill or those referred to them through an Order in Council. Panels will be responsible for considering and determining resource consents and designations for those projects. They will have similar powers to consenting authorities, which are normally councils, followed by Environment Courts, under appeal, under the RMA. Panels will be chaired normally by a sitting or retired Environment Court judge, but, on occasions, a senior RMA lawyer could be appointed in that person’s stead. The panel will have a minimum of three commissioners, and include nominees from the relevant local authorities and local iwi authorities. Each panel is expected to include resource management expertise as well as technical expertise in relation to the project and its effect, and each panel will include expertise in tikanga Māori and mātauranga Māori.

The new bill speeds up the time frames to consent applications and designations that would otherwise be publicly notified and for which service would be served on affected parties. It’s expected the panel will normally take up to 25 working days from the date it receives feedback from specified stakeholders. That time frame can be extended to 50 days for more complex or larger projects. The fast-track consenting process will then, therefore, be significantly faster than standard RMA processes for complex projects. The processing time for such applications is often many months—sometimes years, if a decision is appealed to the Environment Court.

There are three tracks for projects to be progressed. The first is the projects listed in the bill; I’ve already referred to them. On those, the panel’s function is largely limited to imposing conditions. The second track applies to other public or private projects. A person with an eligible project can apply to the Minister for the Environment. The Minister consults other Ministers, and if satisfied overall that the project meets the purpose of the bill and the eligibility criteria, the project can be referred to the fast-track process panel via an Order in Council. The bill is intended, in that case also, to speed up processes whilst providing environmental safeguards through the application of Part 2 of the RMA, including the recognition of matters of national importance. The Minister for the Environment will have a broad ability to decline applications to use track two, and those instances are laid out in the bill. Track three relates to permitted activities on existing infrastructure. This third track under the legislation enables some Government agencies, and perhaps, in the future, local government, to undertake smaller-scale works on existing infrastructure without a resource consent. Those agencies have a clear role in delivering public benefit. They’re subject to a high level of scrutiny in public-private organisations, and normally have governing legislation that requires environmental considerations and other safeguards.

New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) and KiwiRail holdings are being permitted to carry out repair, maintenance, and minor upgrade works to their existing infrastructure within the road and rail corridor. The bill sets out which activities can be undertaken and standards which must be met when carrying out those works. These provisions will enable NZTA and KiwiRail to start work on their existing assets quickly after the bill is enacted, reducing the lead-in time to get routine projects started and getting people across New Zealand working on this large number of smaller jobs. The bill also enables Government agencies Kāinga Ora and the Ministry of Housing and Urban Development, as well as local government, to access these track three provisions if confirmed through an Order in Council. Again, all actions under this legislation must be consistent with both the principles of the Treaty and Treaty settlements. This aligns with the Crown’s obligations under the Treaty. Applications for the fast-track processes must include information on the impact of the project on Māori and on Treaty settlements. Iwi authorities will have the ability to nominate a member to each expert consenting panel for projects within their areas of interest, and panels will be required to seek comments from iwi on all projects referred to them for consideration.

To support New Zealand’s recovery from the potential impacts, we do need to speed up resource consent processes, and this is necessary to get people employed. This justifies limiting normal rights of public participation and the normal appeal right to the Environment Court on the merits. This is, in effect, being replaced by a single-step process headed by, normally, an Environment Court judge. There will be targeted consultation. Panels will receive written submissions from nominated organisation peak bodies—from business and environmental groups, for example. There will be no requirement for the panel to hold a viva-voce hearing, but they will have the power to hold one if they consider it necessary. Given the importance of the objectives of this bill, I believe that these temporary limits to wider public participation are appropriate.

This bill is a necessary response to the social and economic effects of COVD-19. It’s a short-term intervention to support our recovery. It’s not the long-term response to the fundamental issues that need reform in the RMA—that’s being done through a process led by Tony Randerson QC, former Court of Appeal judge.

Hon Nathan Guy: You’ve got the report, haven’t you?

Hon DAVID PARKER: No, I actually haven’t got the final report, but I’m expecting it within weeks and will release it soon thereafter.

This bill, I think, is worthy of the support of the House, and I commend it to other parties.

Hon SCOTT SIMPSON (National—Coromandel): Thank you, Mr Speaker. Look, the National Party will support this bill to select committee, and we do so for a number of reasons but not without some questions that we would like answered as we go through the process. Broadly, we think that the process adopted by the Minister is one that is not a bad one, but, as I say, we have got some questions. Essentially, this bill follows on from a similar process to ones that were used during the National Party - led Government, particularly in response to the Canterbury and Kaikōura earthquakes, but earlier a similar process was used for the speeding up of the creation and building of the Pukeahu national memorial and also the construction of the Arras Tunnel. So those processes are actually not completely unique and unusual to this House. I think members would agree that when legislation of this sort has been used in the past, it’s been used wisely and for good purpose.

But we do have some questions about this, and the Minister sort of touched on them towards the very end of his speech. That is really a much wider root-and-branch, fundamental relook at the whole resource management system, the legislative framework upon which it is based, and the future direction of it, and he’s indicated that he’s still waiting for the report from retired Court of Appeal Judge Tony Randerson. It seems unusual—notwithstanding the intervention of COVID—that someone of the standing of Tony Randerson QC would not have delivered his report in time and in full to the Minister, and it’s hard to believe that, actually, that work has not yet been completed. Why is there delay on that process, because, actually, that goes to the core of what this is all about? So we would say that if the Government and the Labour Party actually do support significant and substantial Resource Management Act (RMA) reform, then why not use this opportunity to deliver lasting change right now when it’s needed as it has never been needed before?

The Minister’s gone through quite a bit of the detail of the bill, and, of course, he’s had the opportunity to work through that bill over several months now, in detail which the Opposition has not been able to do. We received notice of this bill this afternoon. At 1.20 p.m. the Leader of the Opposition and myself received the email and a copy of the bill. The bill runs to some 80-odd pages. It’s a detailed piece of legislation, and I won’t kid the House: I have not read the full detail of this bill, as such, at this time. So when we get it to select committee we will want to investigate the levers and the measures that are put in place under the bill in some detail, and we are hopeful that the Minister will allocate sufficient time for the select committee to actually do its work in a thorough and diligent way.

Yesterday, when the 11 projects were announced, it became clear, actually, that the 11 projects are something of a compromise—in fact, quite a big compromise. That’s now clear to those of us who have been waiting and looking forward to this legislation, as I say, for some considerable time, because it was back in early May that the Minister wrote to my colleague Judith Collins, who was at that stage our party spokesperson on RMA reform and planning, and promised that a copy of the bill would be available as soon as it had been drafted, and yet we only received it at 1.20 p.m. this afternoon, which indicates that either there were enormous problems with the drafting, or there were incredible difficulties within the coalition negotiations of the Government parties. And the Minister probably needs to answer which one it is: was it a drafting issue or was it a coalition negotiation issue, because the sense that we get on this side of the House is that it’s been another example of the poor old Greens having to swallow a big fat dead rat—another big fat dead rat, and the issues—

Hon Nathan Guy: No, they’ve swallowed asphalt.

Hon SCOTT SIMPSON: Well, they’re probably getting used to digesting them, because they’ve had to swallow so many. It seems that they’ve long since forgotten the party of principle that they used to be. Where’s Catherine Delahunty these days? Where’s Sue Bradford? Where are those people that used to stand on the Opposition benches and talk about their undisputed faith and commitment to principle? Actually, we find that as soon as they get into Government and even close to being in decision making, the principles go out the door.

So the 11 projects that the Minister has highlighted appear to be compromise projects. All of them have been previously announced. There’s not a single new project there. At a time when unemployment is at its highest level in recorded history in our nation, when something like 40,000 jobs were lost in the last month, it seems strange that a piece of legislation designed like this piece of legislation is to create jobs, to create momentum, to help with a post-COVID recovery is only going to, on the face of it, produce 1,200-odd jobs, and even then, we’re not sure how long that will take to get ready. The term “shovel ready” is often used, but we heard in question time today that shovel ready actually probably means not a single spade in the ground even remotely close to before we go to the polls in September of this year. So we’ve got some really big questions to ask about this. What about the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission that the Government went to such an extraordinary length to set up, to create, to establish, and has completely bypassed in this process? Surely it seems sensible to have engaged with the Infrastructure Commission as part of this process.

Another area that concerns us—and if the Government was really keen on achieving cross-party support for this exercise, it would maybe invite the Leader of the Opposition to be part of that process—

SPEAKER: Order! Order! I apologise for interrupting the member—it’s kai time. I will resume the chair at 7.30.

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

Hon SCOTT SIMPSON: Well, thank you very much, Mr Speaker. And yes, I was talking before the dinner break about the potential role for the Leader of the Opposition for selecting projects that are going to be part of this amended RMA quick process—the fast-track process. The Minister in his first reading speech made it clear that he was hoping that there would be cross-party support for this bill across the Parliament, and we have indicated that we are prepared to support the bill at its first reading, through to select committee, and that we want to have an opportunity to scrutinise it. It’s a bill of some 80-several pages that was received by the Opposition as late as 1.20 p.m. this afternoon—

Hon Member: What time?

Hon SCOTT SIMPSON: At 1.20 p.m. this afternoon, and not actually presented on the Table of the Parliament until after the urgency motion had been prepared. So there’s been almost no opportunity for the Opposition to scrutinise it. Of course, the Government member introducing the bill, David Parker, has had an opportunity to spend a lot of time looking at it because he’s had to negotiate his way through the very delicate machinations of New Zealand First and Green Party politics. What we do know is that this bill, in terms of the 11 projects indicated so far, has been an utter compromise, and these are very cold, stale projects. Every single one of the 11 has been previously announced. What we do know is that they have probably been scrutinised to the point where the Green Party has had to eat another big, fat, dead rat in order to provide support for this bill.

We are going to support it, but we have got some questions. We want to know why the Infrastructure Commission wasn’t involved in this process, and why wouldn’t the Government want to take advantage of the opportunities provided by the Infrastructure Commission that they have set up, that they created only a few months ago? Wouldn’t this be the logical sort of bill for them to be involved with? We also are keenly awaiting the Tony Randerson report—the review of the RMA process. We can’t understand why the Minister is delaying the release of that report. He indicated that it would be another month or two before that report is made public. We think that’s terribly convenient as we run into the election on 19 September.

I just want to conclude my comments on this bill by referencing a press release that Alan McDonald from the Employers and Manufacturers Association has released after yesterday’s announcement of the 11 significant infrastructure projects. He says, “However, this is yet another workaround for the problematic Resource Management Act, highlighting once again that the Act is now no longer fit for purpose and needs to be replaced to create new, fit for purpose legislation that enables growth and protects the environment.” He says the current Act fails on both of these tests. Our suggestion to the Minister is if this bill is a good bill—and we think that it has some merit, at least; we’d like to scrutinise it further—then why not make it permanent? Why not make it easier for all projects to be consented in a way that is going to fast track every single RMA consent?

Dr DUNCAN WEBB (Labour—Christchurch Central): Tēnā koe e Te Mana Whakawā. Thank you, Mr Speaker. Look, I am gratified and heartened by the fact that Mr Scott Simpson and his party are going to support this bill to select committee, because I think there’ll be some really good work there.

You only have to look at the purpose section of this bill to see that its purpose, its function, is actually of critical importance at this time, and I know that the Environment Committee will work very, very hard to get this bill improved, to listen carefully to stakeholders, and to make sure that it’s workable, because this is actually about the current crisis. This isn’t about the need to review the Resource Management Act, which we all accept—and, in fact, which this Government has started on—it’s about ensuring that projects which are ready to go can be undertaken. It’s about employment growth and economic growth, but the good thing about it, really, is set out in clause 19, which is about not necessarily the listed projects, which have already been examined, but the projects which may be referred to this special procedure.

It’s really important to recognise that it’s not a free-for-all; it’s a careful process where the Minister will have to consider a number of matters, not just economic benefits but—let’s be honest, in the current situation economic benefits, employment, and the economic knock-on effects are very important—also the social and cultural wellbeing of the communities, and also the environmental impacts, including climate change. In terms of these referral projects—the projects which people are, essentially, invited to put before the Minister for this fast-tracked process—there’s a real encouragement that they are projects which have much wider benefits, including, for example, managing natural hazards and including the impact of climate change.

So, look, I’m really looking forward to sitting on the select committee and working cooperatively with the National Party and, of course, the coalition partners, but working through to make this bill ready to get to work before Parliament rises so that these projects can, in fact, start and the impediments can be swept to one side. We can not only create employment but also improve our infrastructure, improve our environment, and, really, improve the lives of many New Zealanders. An excellent bill by David Parker—I commend it to the House.

Hon JUDITH COLLINS (National—Papakura): How would the member who’s resumed his seat, Duncan Webb, know it’s an excellent bill? I’m sure he didn’t see it until this afternoon as well. He certainly is in a situation—as we all are over this side—of not having had the opportunity to see this bill until 1.20 p.m. this afternoon?

Hon Scott Simpson: That’s correct.

Hon JUDITH COLLINS: So it was 1.20 p.m. when a copy was sent through to my colleague, Hon Scott Simpson, and our leader of the National Party—Leader of the Opposition, Todd Muller—to have a look at.

On 5 May this year—what’s that, about five weeks ago?—I wrote to David Parker and I asked him if he could please forward us a copy of the bill as soon as possible, because he’d certainly been speaking about it in the media. I also asked about the select committee process and how long the select committee would have to review this, because media reports had said that there was actually going to be a one-week process, which is absolutely disrespectful to all of those groups who have a good contribution to make in this.

What has happened in the last five weeks? Well, everything that we hear is that there has been a dysfunction within the Government around trying to get the Greens and New Zealand First and Labour all on the same page for this bill. When I wrote to David Parker, I indicated that the Opposition would like to be able to agree with the bill, but we would need to see it. I also made some suggestions around the time that the select committee would take. But I also made some suggestions about whether or not, given the financial and supply chain effects, that could occur over many years following the starting of some of these projects, that it would be useful to have the Leader of the Opposition actually be in the room when these decisions are made about which of these projects are going to take the resources, the person power, the actual supply chain issues, but also the money that would be spent.

I’ve looked at the 11—mere 11—projects that are listed as going to be the projects that this bill is going to affect, a mere 11. Eleven out of the 1,924 projects directed to the Infrastructure Commission, which the Government set up to advise them on infrastructure—11 only. When I look at these, several of these are ones that I know quite a lot about, actually. One is the Papakura to Pukekohe rail electrification, and as MP for Papakura, I of course am very happy to see that there. What I also know, because I was there, is that three years ago this was announced by the then National Government, where it was announced as a project which would be started and completed within this term of Government, if we were elected. So what we’ve seen, though, is that all these projects were put on hold by the Minister of Transport, Phil Twyford. So they didn’t even get started. So it’s a bit rich to come and say, “Well, we need to get them all consented.” There’s been plenty of opportunity to get them started, and nothing’s happened.

Then we have the other Papakura to Drury State Highway 1 improvements. Well, the only improvements that have gone on in that State highway, anywhere near Papakura, have been under the National-led Government, which took a long time for this to happen because it covered 22 bridges that had to be rebuilt on the Southern Motorway while the Southern Motorway is operating. It also had the extension for a lane each way on both sides of the motorway, plus a cycleway and, really, these were safety improvements as well that were needed. That took around $280 million to get that done. It took time because it was operating, but there is nothing to stop this Government from starting the consenting processes for the extension from Papakura through to Drury. They could have done that, but again, all on hold.

Then there’s another one here that I know something about: the Unitec residential development. That’s the big KiwiBuild one that Phil Twyford—oh why is it always Phil Twyford?

Hon Scott Simpson: He got promoted!

Hon JUDITH COLLINS: Phil Twyford, who has today been promoted to number four in the Labour Government—Labour-led Government, number four. It’s amazing. It’s amazing, the opportunities available at number four.

Hon Member: Meritocracy.

Hon JUDITH COLLINS: Meritocracy. Clearly, it’s because he obviously represents a group underrepresented in the Labour caucus. Anyway, it must be people who understand about transport and housing. Well, Phil Twyford announced 5,000 KiwiBuild homes in the Unitec residential development. That was a hiss and a roar announcement all announced three years ago. And what has happened? Or nothing much? Nothing much at all. In fact, what we said at the time was, “Well this is going to be interesting because the whole of the waterways in that area, that part of the Unitec development in the Point Chevalier area, or Western Springs area, has this issue with storm water and sewage not being separated.” So that all has to happen; that’s about a billion dollars. I don’t see that in here as being in here—

Lawrence Yule: It wouldn’t be; it’s not thought through.

Hon JUDITH COLLINS: —in the projects that need to be done.

Hon Scott Simpson: Conveniently.

Hon JUDITH COLLINS: I don’t think that’s going to be happening, Mr Yule or Mr Simpson.

Hon Scott Simpson: Conveniently omitted.

Hon JUDITH COLLINS: Conveniently omitted.

Well, that actually has to happen because you’ve got—what he’s proposing—5,000 households. Well, that’s more than 5,000 people, all adding to the issue that is in that area of Auckland of no separation between sewage and storm water. What happens when it rains in Auckland—and it often does, as we all know—is that the sewage goes right through on to the Meola Reef on Point Chevalier and it pollutes the water, and I would have thought that the Green Party would still have some sort of semblance of respect for that, but apparently not. So I would like to see what would happen there. Catherine Delahunty is actually sorely missed in the Green Party at the moment, and I have no idea what she would be thinking about that.

There are all the other things that we could be talking about: the Britomart East upgrade, the Wellington metro upgrade programme—all of these things, all of which, by the way, have already been announced. This has become the Government of announcements: making an announcement one day, waiting for another year, making another announcement, and then, just before the election, making another announcement.

Having had a look at this bill, we are going to support it to select committee, and my view is that the Minister has lost an opportunity. He could have sent this earlier to us under a draft or embargo where we could have looked at it more thoroughly and possibly improved—well, we would have definitely improved it. But he chose not to. He had an invitation from us to do that, to involve us, and he chose not to. He chose to ignore every opportunity to work cross-party on this, and then today he turns up saying, “I think we would like the Opposition’s support.” Well, this is the same Minister’s office who told media, and who, of course, told me, that the National Party had to support it. Well—a bit difficult to support something you haven’t seen, a bit difficult to understand it. This Minister’s view is—and he stated it in select committee—that it’s no different than the Kaikōura legislation that National brought through.

Hon Nathan Guy: Which Minister was saying that?

Hon JUDITH COLLINS: That was Mr Parker, actually. He said—so he’s, basically, copied the Kaikōura legislation. It’s sort of his words—very close to that.

Hon Scott Simpson: Cut and paste.

Hon JUDITH COLLINS: Cut and paste the Kaikōura legislation and then added into this. But he’s missed the opportunity.

So with the review of the Resource Management Act (RMA), that has been going on for a whole year and that was supposed to have come back to him with its report—oh, it was about three weeks ago. We still haven’t seen that. Now we’re told it’s not available or he hasn’t seen it either. I wonder how much he hasn’t seen. But when I think about that, wouldn’t it be the opportunity now, if he had any—any—conviction at all that this new piece of legislation that he needs to bring would actually do the job, why wouldn’t he wait and put it all in the one? And the answer must be he doesn’t think it’s going to do what it needs to do.

So the National Party is going to support this to select committee. We will be asking the questions. I know that my colleague the Hon Scott Simpson and the rest of the team from the National Party on that select committee will be asking difficult questions, hard questions, and actually the right questions, because this is something that should have been done years ago. If a Government can’t get their developments through, what hope for private developers? What hope indeed?

Hon Scott Simpson: None, zero.

Hon JUDITH COLLINS: No hope. And that is an admission of massive failure by a Government that did everything it could to stop a National-led Government from ever changing the RMA in the way it needed to be changed.

ANGIE WARREN-CLARK (Labour): Thank you, Mr Speaker. It’s a real pleasure to rise. Why do we need this bill? Quite simply, we’re in extraordinary times and we need to rebuild our economy. What are we not going to do? We’re not going to sacrifice the environment in order to get these projects completed. I therefore commend the bill to the House.

Hon JACQUI DEAN (National—Waitaki): Thank you, Mr Speaker. National will support this COVID-19 Recovery (Fast-track Consenting) Bill at first reading to select committee. I note that it was shortly before question time before copies of this bill were made available to the Leader of the Opposition and our environment spokesperson, Scott Simpson, which has left very little time for members of this side of the House to have a good look at the bill. Such a short speech by the Government member, which is surprising, because you would think they are so proud of this bill, but maybe they haven’t had a chance to read it either. I was doing a little bit of research as I was waiting for the full 10-minute call of the member opposite, but that was not to be. Thirty seconds went by, and here I am on my feet, but I’m very ready and willing to make a contribution.

We do support this bill. It is eerily similar to the legislation that so effectively allowed infrastructure after the Canterbury earthquake and Kaikōura earthquake—to allow the infrastructure to take place. I think particularly about the Kaikōura earthquake because it was an effectively singular event, with a number of aftershocks, of course, causing just catastrophic damage to the roading network in particular. I’ve always been full of admiration, in the few times I have gone up and down State Highway 1 through the works, as to how very quickly the sweeping, descending bridge was constructed. It started with a good consenting process, and I think, having seen the response, particularly along that coastal road, which needed to be brought back up and running, that forms the basis for our support.

However, I do have, as do my colleagues, just a few questions around this COVID recovery bill—well, apart from the fact that we really haven’t had an opportunity, having been occupied by debating the climate change bill, to look at it, which I don’t think is great process. I’m looking forward to a very good select committee process, because I would expect that the Environment Committee will open for submissions, will hear what people have to say. This is exactly the kind of bill, which deals with large amounts of Crown funding, which is going to need the opportunity for a range of people to have a view, and I fully expect that the select committee process will allow for that. Well, I would’ve expected that, but I’m not entirely convinced that the passage of this bill is going to be any better than some of the other COVID response bills and other pieces of legislation like the forests trading bill, which have proceeded through the House with unseemly haste. So I do hope that won’t be the case here.

I’m going immediately to Schedule 2 of this bill, where there are 16 listed projects. Those are projects that, effectively, have gotten over the line. There is a variety of projects in there, a number relating to projects in Auckland, and Judith Collins has outlined some of the detail around that. There is a papakāinga development in the Chatham Islands, there is a Picton ferry terminal redevelopment—all good projects, but it just makes me wonder a little bit about: why are there only 16 projects in Schedule 2? It just seems that while the Opposition might’ve had only a very few hours—let’s see, eight hours, maybe, from the time I’m on my feet—to have a look at the bill, the Minister for the Environment has been developing this bill, I’m assuming, for quite some time. So I’m very curious as to why there are only 16 listed projects in this bill.

A question was raised which I think is worth just examining a little more closely, and that is: why is it that the Government, with the full support of Treasury, established the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission in 2018, a couple of years ago? I was having a look at the website and got a bit into it, but what I can see so far: the Infrastructure Commission is there to—what every Government says—provide good infrastructure. All of that’s all good stuff, because we know that infrastructure is very important, and we have an opportunity now post-COVID to build some really robust, good infrastructure. The Infrastructure Commission itself doesn’t build the infrastructure, but it provides a framework and criteria against which various projects can be evaluated. So it’s a planning function, from what I can see. There needs to be a long time frame for a planning function, and it looks like the Infrastructure Commission has a 10-year planning time frame and a 30-year planning time frame. That’s very acceptable, because that’s what local government is required to do as well.

But what puzzles me is: where is that rigour and that planning and that vision in this bill? I can’t see it, and that is why I’m so very interested in the select committee process. That’s why I think we need a good select committee process, so that those submitters—and there were many who submitted to the establishment of the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission—have, then, the opportunity to come along to the Environment Committee and make, effectively, if you like, a cross-submission on this COVID-19 Recovery (Fast-track Consenting) Bill. I think that their input will be valuable in terms of—they had a look at the Infrastructure Commission in terms of planning, what was required, what are the resources, how does it fit in to the country’s agenda and the Government’s agenda versus 16 already-announced listed projects which are already embedded into Schedule 2 of this bill.

Given that there are a vast number of infrastructure—I could think of a number of infrastructure projects that I would like to see progressed in New Zealand. Given that there are, I guess, over a thousand of those projects, why did these lucky, fortunate 16 win the lottery and find themselves in Schedule 2—

Matt Doocey: Eleven.

Hon JACQUI DEAN: Eleven? Well, yeah, it’s interesting, isn’t it? Well, see, there’s another confusion: my colleague is saying 11, but I’ve got Schedule 2 here in the bill. Schedule 2 sets out 16 listed projects with the name of the project, the entity authorised to undertake, etc., etc. So there we go. There is another question where we will need some time in the select committee to clarify, because I too have heard 11 and I’m reading 16. So—what is it?—“marry in haste, repent at leisure.”

I do hope this bill, through this process, is not going to fall victim to that, because National does support, in the first reading, this bill, but as I do say, we have quite a few questions to ask, and I very much look forward to a robust and very satisfactory select committee process, because if the Government does not provide for that, then it is absolutely failing in its duty to craft good legislation. I’d argue, and I’m sure my colleagues would argue, that tinkering around with the Resource Management Act (RMA), as David Parker has already done once this term, is not effectively going to give us good planning legislation. I acknowledge this is a post-COVID measure and we support it on that basis, but I very much think that the Minister should be giving the bulk of his time to doing what he undertook to do, which is a review of the RMA as a whole.

Hon EUGENIE SAGE (Minister for Land Information): Tēnā koe, Mr Speaker. The Green Party is supporting the COVID-19 Recovery (Fast-track Consenting) Bill to select committee, and speakers from the Opposition have queried the role that the different parties in Government have played. That seems to be ignoring the way in which MMP operates, and the benefit for New Zealand of having three parties in the Government bringing different perspectives and making changes to a bill before it goes into Parliament to actually improve that bill. So I’m very proud of the work that the Green Party has done and acknowledge Minister Parker in being able to engage in that dialogue to actually strengthen the bill.

This bill is needed because of the huge social and economic disruption which COVID has caused, and this Government—in terms of ensuring that the team of 5 million moves into that recovery phase—is investing in infrastructure and it’s investing in nature-based jobs. I was up at the Craigieburn Range just last week, talking there to some folk who’d been guides down at Franz Josef, were made redundant by their guiding company, and were now working to control wilding conifers; $1.1 billion in the COVID recovery package in the Budget is going into nature-based projects.

Hon Dr Nick Smith: That’s not in the bill.

Hon EUGENIE SAGE: No, it’s not in the bill, Dr Smith, but why I’m talking about it is because this Government has an integrated response to economic recovery and to the disruption caused by the pandemic. So the Green Party recognises that this bill, which will have a two-year life, which will self-repeal after two years, is necessary to ensure that some of those infrastructure projects which have a public benefit can get going more quickly than they would if they went through under the Resource Management Act (RMA). So, yes, it does fast track development, but, as previous speakers have noted, there are some infrastructure projects which are listed in the bill, and some of these, like the SkyPath, which will enable cyclists and walkers to get to and from the North Shore in Auckland, are projects that the Green Party has strongly supported—similarly, with the Britomart station project, which will enable the City Rail Link to work much more efficiently when it starts operating its services. That’s another one of the projects that is listed to go through the fast-track process, and it will provide at least 40 jobs just through that Britomart project.

Some members of the Opposition have queried why there’s just a shorter list in the bill. The bill provides for the ability for the Minister for the Environment to recommend an Order in Council to accept applications for other projects to go on the fast track to be considered by an expert consenting panel and to have decisions made within about 50 days for some of the larger projects.

So the Green Party here was concerned about the safeguards for that decision to recommend an infrastructure project to go on the fast track, and so this bill is very different from some of the proposals we saw under the previous Government for fast tracking, which would have allowed the Hon Dr Nick Smith to make the recommendations himself. With this bill, before the Minister for the Environment can make that recommendation for an Order in Council, the Minister must have considered the application under a number of criteria, which I think are in clause 19—whether there are economic benefits for communities or industries affected by COVID, the social and cultural wellbeing of current and future generations, whether the project would be likely to progress significantly faster by using the fast-track process, whether the project is going to have a significant public benefit, like generating employment, increasing housing supply, contributing to a well-functioning urban environment, and providing infrastructure to improve economic employment and environmental outcomes and to increase productivity.

One of the other criteria is that it could promote the protection of historic heritage or could strengthen our environmental, economic, and social resilience, including to natural hazards and including to the impact of climate change. So there are some safeguards built into the decision by the Minister to recommend an Order in Council that a further infrastructure project, beyond those that are listed in the bill, could go on that fast-track process.

And the Green Party will be very interested in submissions by the public to the Environment Committee, ably chaired by Dr Duncan Webb, as to whether those criteria and other safeguards are adequate, because we do have a fundamental concern that this bill, in order to ensure that decisions are made more quickly, does not enable individuals to make submissions in the same way that they are able to on any resource consent which is publicly notified by a council. But there is an ability for the Minister for the Environment, when he or she is making recommendations for an Order in Council, to nominate organisations and specific individuals whom the expert consenting panel should invite to make submissions. It’s recognised that national organisations—environmental NGOs, for example, like the Environmental Defence Society or Forest & Bird—may well be amongst those organisations which are invited to make submissions on behalf of a wider group of stakeholders.

So, again, it’s safeguards like this, safeguards like the fact that the expert consenting panel—which stands instead of a council in making a decision on an application—must take into account and consider matters under Part 2 of the RMA. That’s all of the issues of national importance in section 6, other matters in section 7, and the Treaty provisions in section 8, and everyone exercising any decision-making power under the bill must ensure that they act in a way that is consistent with the Treaty of Waitangi and with Treaty settlements. So that means that the panel must have decisions on these projects which are consistent with Te Tiriti. So that’s an important safeguard, as are the other provisions around consultation with iwi authorities. So here the Greens will be very interested in public submissions to the select committee on whether iwi and hapū think those Treaty provisions are adequate, and whether the references to Part 2 are also adequate. The bill does make some changes to information which needs to be provided in an effects assessment in the schedule to the current RMA, but, again, a lot of the issues that those effects assessments cover are set out in the bill. But is that an adequate safeguard?

So we do have some concerns, particularly over public participation and the restrictions on that, but we recognise that, for some of these really important infrastructure projects to get under way, where they have significant public benefits and where they can create more jobs to assist our team of 5 million in getting on that recovery track to ensure that those who have been made redundant are able to find new jobs, there is a value in having projects being considered more quickly, subject to adequate safeguards.

So the other change here, compared to the RMA, is that there’s no access to the Environment Court, but there are still appeals on points of law against the panel’s decision, which can be made to the High Court and the Court of Appeal. So it is a truncated period for submissions, but we’ll be very interested in the recommendations of the select committee. Thank you.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH (National—Nelson): I have rarely witnessed such a complete surrender of the Green Party as I’ve heard from that Minister’s speech right now. If a National Government had introduced this bill, the Green Party right now would be going apoplectic, and if I’ve heard an apology from the Green Party for a Resource Management Act (RMA) reform bill, that certainly was it. Let’s cut to the chase: this bill radically reduces the information that’s required for a resource consent, it radically cuts the amount of public consultation, it radically reduces the appeals, and if the Minister who has just spoken had reread her speeches over the many years of RMA changes, she would realise the degree to which the Green Party has chucked its principles under the bus with this bill.

This bill represents the level of muddle and chaos within the Government around critical resource policy. Here’s the most extraordinary part: right now, we have got a 240-page RMA reform bill that’s been through nearly nine months of process that puts in more public consultation and that undoes the very reforms that would enable us to be able to build infrastructure. It undermines the capacity for us to get houses built and, at the very time this Government is slowing down and making more complicated the RMA, suddenly, it introduces this massive bill under extraordinary circumstances.

Now, let’s be clear: this bill was only provided to the Parliament at 1.30 this afternoon. The Government is proposing a select committee process—remember, the normal select committee process is six months. I remember moving a motion in this House—in fact, I’ve got parts of the Hansard on an RMA reform bill associated with the Canterbury earthquakes where I reduced the select committee process to four months, and the Green Party said it was a constitutional outrage. So I say to the Minister of Conservation that if it’s a constitutional outrage to reduce it from six months to four months, what is it when you reduce it from six months to 14 days—to two weeks?

I’d love that Minister in the Green Party to give an explanation as to why we’ve had this extraordinary change of approach and change of spots. Let’s just put the Greens’ principles very simply: if it is a Labour-Green Government that is wanting to bypass the RMA processes, that’s a good thing, but if it is a National Government, then they are opposed. That is as shallow as their principles are.

But there are problems with this bill. Why would we say in the law that if the private sector wants to get on and build some houses, they’ve got to go through all these steps and processes, but if the Government wants to build the houses, oh, they should be able to bypass them? Can some member somewhere in the House tell me what the logic of that is? Members on this side of the House say that we want to make it easier for everybody to be able to get on and build the houses that New Zealand builds and not just the State housing department.

I’d love the member Eugenie Sage to read her speeches on the special housing Act legislation. [Interruption] Yes, actually. There are over 14,000 houses that have been built in those special housing areas. It’s one of the reasons that so many homes have been built over the last five years. But why was it—

Hon Eugenie Sage: Oh, rubbish—rubbish!

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: Well, I’d be happy to take it to my own electorate, where we have had to open a new school because we have got thousands of homes.

In fact, here’s what the Mayor of Auckland said. The Mayor of Auckland said that half the new houses built in 2019 in Auckland were in special housing areas—that’s 4,500. But what did Eugenie Sage say when we wanted to shorten the RMA processes to be able to build more houses? Eugenie Sage and the Green Party fought that bill at every stage.

Then, let’s go back to the first of the RMA reform bills that provided for specifically fast-tracking infrastructure. We set up a board of inquiry process. We put it in the law that those decisions had to be made in nine months. How do members think Transmission Gully got consented in nine months? How do people think that that wonderful Waterview Tunnel got built in nine months? So where were members opposite like Shane Jones and like Damien O’Connor when the previous National Government wanted RMA reforms to enable those sorts of projects to proceed? They all trotted off to the Noes lobby and vigorously opposed it. So I say to the Shane Joneses who previously voted against such changes and I’d say to the Damien O’Connors: what has changed?

So we on this side of the House do think there is a case for reform, but we do say this: why should it just be the projects that this particular Government chooses to be able to get the reduction in RMA processes? Why should others not be able to benefit from it? Why shouldn’t the Waitaha hydro scheme on the West Coast? Why shouldn’t the southern link road in my own community? Why shouldn’t the project that’s been championed by Matt Doocey for the motorway north of Christchurch, the Woodend bypass—why should that not be part of it? We on this side of the House say that they should not be picking and choosing. These reforms and the accelerated process should not be a matter of playing favourites, but should provide a streamlined and fast-tracked process for all projects and not just the favoured few.

The last point I would want to make on this bill is in respect of the poor process: 80 pages of law, 200 clauses, and being tabled today after 1 o’clock. Everybody knows caucuses meet at 10. The Government did not even have the courtesy to provide this bill before caucuses such as ours and others were able to discuss it, and when we look at the 264 clauses in this bill, how many members of this Parliament really believe we are going to be able to give adequate scrutiny to that in the two-week select committee process? This is going to end up like another dog’s breakfast, like that tax bill we discussed about three weeks ago. That was the one where Minister Nash told us it did one thing, and we found out afterwards that it did something very, very different—something that was extraordinarily incompetent and something I’ve never seen in 30 years within this Parliament.

The truth of this fast-tracked consenting bill is it just shows how vacant the Government is more generally in terms of its approach to resource management. They’ve now been in office for two years and nine months. All they have done in those two years and nine months is make it harder for people to get resource consents to build the infrastructure, the houses, and the other things that will enable our economy to grow. You can’t for two years and nine months slow the boat down, pass reforms that make it more difficult, and then suddenly, three months out from an election, change your tune.

The part that has been absolutely consistent about the National Party is that we have championed reforms of the RMA to get the infrastructure built that New Zealand needs. We cannot go on with this chaotic, muddled approach of swimming one direction one day and a different way the next. That is why National is to choose to support this reform bill, but we do challenge the Government and say that we should not be playing favourites.

We need a robust process. Getting projects properly and efficiently consented is not just important in times of the COVID emergency—

Hon Shane Jones: Yeah, I agree.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: —but is actually important all the time, and that’s why I say to Shane Jones, who’s suddenly agreeing, why is it then that his party voted against every RMA reform bill in the previous National Government? The truth is that for Shane Jones, for the Green Party, and for the Labour Party, they have one set of rules in Opposition and a different position in Government, and I’m proud to be part of a National Party that has consistently argued for these sorts of reforms. They should just be provided fairly.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Adrian Rurawhe): This is a split call. I call the Hon Damien O’Connor—five minutes.

Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR (Minister of Agriculture): Thank you, Mr Speaker. Look, I’m not going to take too long to speak in support of this bill. I’d just like to clarify a few things and I guess the confusion that might be in the minds of some people who may have agonisingly listened to that previous speech. The reality is that the National Government has talked and talked and talked about this Resource Management Act (RMA) all its time in nine years of Government, and it did nothing. And what I will say is that my colleague the Hon David Parker has been committed to improve the RMA. This bill is doing that. We walk the talk and National talked the talk, and that’s about all they will do. The difference between that party and why we couldn’t support it is that we cannot trust the National Party with anything, even the facts—even the facts. And I would trust David Parker with my life; in fact I have. And I know—[Interruption] I have. In fact, I know he will shepherd this bill through to get the right outcomes for New Zealand in a time of need.

ERICA STANFORD (National—East Coast Bays): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I’m happy to contribute to the first reading of this COVID-19 Recovery (Fast-track Consenting) Bill. This is a bill that, as previous members have already mentioned, we’re going to support to select committee because, in general terms, it’s not a bad bill. Frankly, potentially, we would have done something similar in a similar situation—potentially, we would have gone further but, potentially, we would have done something similar.

Indeed, we were in a very similar situation to this in 2009, with the global financial crisis. We found ourselves with a huge amount of unemployment and the need to stimulate the economy, and we fast tracked infrastructure. We can now look back on some of that visionary work that we did in the roads of national significance—incredible, visionary, legacy projects that created thousands of jobs.

Now, we don’t have a problem with the concept per se; as I said, we did a similar thing. But the problem is not about the concept so much as it is about the projects. These guys have got a $20 billion slush fund and huge borrowing capacity, and they’re facing, potentially, by the end of the year, 140,000 people out of work. So, in a way, they’ve done the right thing to fast track some projects, like we did after the Kaikōura earthquake and with the global financial crisis, so you’d expect some really good, grunty projects that create thousands of jobs. We’d expect vision. What have we got? Well, we’ve got 11 projects—and while they’re not, in themselves, necessarily, bad projects, they’re not going to create the employment and the appreciable benefits that we need in these extremely difficult times.

Let’s just compare and contrast, for a minute, National’s roads of significance, fast tracked under legislation, to what we have in front of us today. Roads of national significance: the Tauranga Eastern Corridor, a massive legacy project; a project in this bill: the Pētone cycle and walkway—now, I’m sure that that’s a great project, but in terms of great legacy, visionary projects and the number of jobs that that’s going to create, these two things are just worlds apart. Roads of national significance: the Auckland Victoria Park bottleneck, the State Highway 1 complete game-changer project; in this bill: the Papakura to Pukekohe rail electrification, which, you know, we did the rest of the Auckland network and this was announced that we would do the rest of this project. Look, it’s a nice-to-have and it’s a good thing, but if you compare and contrast the two, they’re completely different in terms of their scale and their vision.

And then, of course, there’s the Unitec residential development, the project that began under the National Government and then reannounced by Phil Twyford in 2018 and now rehashed, re-baked, reannounced under this bill as if it’s something brand new—so this whole “Hey, here’s something I prepared earlier.” This isn’t a project that’s going to create more jobs; these are jobs that had already been announced. There’s no contractors sitting at home going, “Great. A whole big, new project for me.” This had already been announced.

The rest of the projects are a disparate list of upgrades and road widenings. These are not projects that will create the thousands of jobs that we need. The number of jobs that it’s said to create is—what?—1,265; Air New Zealand laid off 4,000 jobs alone. We’re talking 40,000 jobs that have been lost already, and these 11 projects are nothing compared to what we need. But there’s more than that. These projects aren’t game-changers. I mean, they’re not terrible, but they’re not visionary or legacy. We don’t just have to consider whether or not these projects will create jobs—and, sure, some jobs will be created by these 11 projects that I’ve already talked about; there won’t be that many—but they’re projects that need to deliver wholescale appreciable gains for a lot of people.

If you take my community, for example—I’m the MP for the East Coast Bays. Tens of thousands of people from my electorate and surrounding electorates drive in hours and hours of traffic, both ways, every day, and the big game-changer for my community is a second harbour crossing. But what do we get? We get a cycle and walking path under the harbour bridge. Now, look, it’s something we supported, it’s not a bad idea, but it’s hardly visionary, game-changing, legacy stuff that’s going to create thousands of jobs that we can look back on in years to come and say, “We did that.” and “Look what we did.” I mean, it’s a nice-to-have, and we support it and it’s great but it’s not visionary and it’s not legacy. If this Government was serious about delivering wholescale, game-changing, legacy infrastructure, and fast tracking that, then we would be looking at a second harbour crossing and some really big legacy projects, not a SkyPath.

As I said earlier—I’ve only got a few seconds left—we will support the bill through to first reading. We’ve got serious problems with the two weeks that I’m going to have in my select committee to go over this bill compared to the normal six months we would get. But given that—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Adrian Rurawhe): Order! The member’s time has expired. This is a split call. David Seymour—five minutes.

DAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I rise on behalf of ACT in opposition to the COVID-19 Recovery (Fast-track Consenting) Bill. Resource Management Act (RMA) reform is one of the most important policy issues facing New Zealand. And yet, this bill amounts to a surrender and abdication by the Government, saying it’s too hard to fix so we’re just going to let a few favoured projects through before the election.

People need to get a sense of the scale of this bill. The Government’s press release says it will create 1,185 jobs. Well, we heard from Eugenie Sage that there’s actually still going to be extensive consultation, and I wouldn’t mind having a wager. I’m going to take a bet with Eugenie Sage from the Greens on the one hand and the Labour Party on the other about whether there’ll be more jobs created building these projects or involved in the consultation. The Green Party want to tell you there’ll be more people involved in consulting 11 projects than the jobs created from building them. That’s the reality, and we need to reform the RMA more substantially for a number of reasons. Here’s one: the price of a median section in Auckland in the period we’ve had the RMA has gone up 900 percent. That’s compared with inflation of 60 percent over the same period. That’s the legacy of the RMA.

Hon Stuart Nash: Such a cynic.

DAVID SEYMOUR: And the member here says it’s so cynical. I agree with Stuart Nash: it is cynical, and he should be ashamed because he’s one of the few people in the Labour Party with some character. But what has he done to improve this legislation? Nothing. What a shame.

That’s why the ACT Party is opposed to this bill, because New Zealand deserves better. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Adrian Rurawhe): I call Kieran McAnulty, five minutes.

KIERAN McANULTY (Labour): I think we all know that the reason the ACT Party is opposing the bill is because they want to have a two in front of their name when they get to election night. That is a task that’s going to be tough, because that will involve the total of doubling their support. I think it is a shame that political parties are using this as a platform on which to try to score cheap political points. The other side of the House have said that they’ll support it, and then spend nine and a half minutes telling us why they don’t like it. Well, why don’t they like this Government? The fact is this bill is necessary. This bill will bring projects forward that will benefit the economy—exactly what the Opposition are calling for this Government to do. Frankly, this bill will directly benefit Wairarapa, so I’ve absolutely no reason to oppose it. I commend this bill to the House.

LAWRENCE YULE (National—Tukituki): This is an extraordinary bill at an extraordinary time, done in an extraordinary way. This House and this side of the House never saw the bill until 1.20 this afternoon, have had no time to scrutinise it. We’re now in urgency for the first reading. The Government parties themselves are taking one-minute calls at best on a significant change that really is to try and win votes at this election. Now, National will support the bill to the first reading. We’ve made that clear. But let’s be really clear about all this does. All it does is allow some enabling legislation for a few pet projects that the Government has to get over the line.

It’s important that we understand the process that’s being followed as the post-COVID response put up by the Government. Nearly 2,000 projects were put before the Government that were meant to be shovel-ready—that is, you can put the shovel in the ground—hopefully, before the election. My understanding is that 40 percent of those projects were rejected by the Government as being shovel-ready and about 60 percent are going through the second phase—60 percent. Then we heard today, under questioning from Todd Muller to the Prime Minister, “Would any of those actually have a shovel in the ground by the election?”, that the answer was clearly no. Even the Prime Minister couldn’t bring herself to say no. But the answer was clearly no, because she just moved completely around answering it both times. If she had a project, she could have said what it was, but there isn’t one. And the reality of this is that 2,000 projects, hundreds of billions of dollars in requests, the Government can’t deliver anything like that and certainly can’t deliver anything in the time frame. So what it’s doing today under urgency is bringing in some legislation that fast tracks some—11. Well, 16, depending on where you look.

But I want to bring the House’s attention to the scale of some of these projects, or should I say the lack of them. Project LP09 says “Construction of 14 affordable … homes in Auckland.” Project LP10 says “Integrated papakāinga development of 6 homes”—six! This is one of Labour’s and the coalition Government’s, and the Prime Minister’s Government’s key strategies, and two of those projects, between them, build 20 houses. So, in the schedule, 20 houses. We don’t know and have never seen—and the Hon Shane Jones probably does know, but we have never seen what is in those 2,000 projects—what is in those 2,000 projects that have been submitted. If we’re passing legislation with a schedule which includes two projects to build 20 houses, then we are seriously underestimating and missing an opportunity as to what we could do.

I want to acknowledge what David Seymour’s just said, because what he really hit on was the opportunity that New Zealand has and how we’re being held back by the Resource Management Act (RMA). I heard the Hon David Parker say, “Just wait. We’re bringing changes to the RMA.” This side of the House, through the Hon Nick Smith and others, have tried to reform the RMA over the past decade, and it hasn’t gone too well, because we couldn’t find support from that side of the House. And now, tonight, when they’re in power, they’re rushing something through that deals with 11 projects—11 projects—of which two of them build 20 houses. It’s revolutionary, this stuff—20 houses, included in the schedule.

You see, the problem is that while we support it, we don’t think it goes far enough in terms of the scale of the projects. And then the Minister says, “It’s OK. We’ll just put an Order in Council through and you can apply for new projects.”, or there’s a process where you can apply for new projects. OK. Now, in theory, that’s OK, but if that’s the case, I would argue, why put any projects in here at all? Just allow a system that says a list will be drawn up. But in this we have the Minister saying these are Government-led projects. And I come back to what David Seymour said, quite rightly, that there are thousands of private sector projects out there that are not even thought about. These are just the Government pet projects.

The National Party and some speakers, including the Hon Scott Simpson, have said that if this Parliament seriously wants a fast-tracking provision—and it’s limited to two years at the moment, but one can make an argument, it could be for longer or the Greens might have to come back to their philosophical differences. But if it was to be longer, then the Parliament should have some right to decide which of those projects are supported, not just the Minister.

So in terms of our side of the House supporting this, we do. But if we’re going to do this properly, there could be some projects in the future which demand the support of all the political parties in this House, or the majority, rather than just the Minister of the Government at the time. And if that was the case, some of this could carry on.

This Government has been in power for two years and nine months. I want to come back to what the Hon Dr Nick Smith said. The special housing areas that he ushered in, in the last Government, were fundamentally important. Why were they fundamentally important? Because they actually worked around the traditional RMA thinking and they focused areas, councils, communities, developers on building houses. And they did. Private sector developers built thousands of houses because of special housing areas. That in itself showed up that the RMA had big problems, and today it’s no different.

The Hon David Parker said he’s coming back to the RMA reforms. It is the view of this side of the House that the RMA is one of the biggest handbrakes on the development of New Zealand, the ability to build anything, and the structures—

Hon David Parker: Why didn’t National fix it in Opposition?

LAWRENCE YULE: National did try. You know that, Mr Parker. National did try, but it didn’t get the support of the Parliament, and you people—the Opposition at the time—opposed it.

I also want to finish in the last couple of minutes by talking about where this could go if the Parliament properly thought about it. I listened to the Greens and the Hon Eugenie Sage talking about this being a short-term thing and we’re only doing it to create some jobs. We need to be really careful in terms of when we pass legislation like this, for projects like this, that we are creating the maximum number of jobs, and I’m not at all convinced in this schedule that we are. We’re passing legislation to allow a streamlining of the RMA, but ultimately I haven’t seen any measure of the maximum number of jobs they’ve created.

The Green Party on the other side, also under its climate change bill—and we just passed that through its third reading; emissions stuff this afternoon. How do you expect New Zealanders are going to build extra hydro stations, extra wind farms, extra solar farms with the current RMA legislation? As I’ve previously said, and as the Hon Shane Jones will know, I don’t know what’s in those lists, but in those lists that’ve been provided across New Zealand, there will be hundreds of projects that are way more inspirational than are listed on this schedule. If the idea is to be shovel-ready, let’s be shovel-ready, but also let’s be inspirational.

In my last minute, I also understand that in this list, the 2,000-odd projects that were submitted, there were hundreds of projects—hundreds of millions of dollars on the waters and other things—which have largely been bypassed at the moment. Most of those things don’t actually require RMA changes. They just need the cash and the approval to make it happen.

So, in closing, we will support this bill. We think in times of need, you need to make some changes. But I do reflect on what the Hon Dr Nick Smith said. In the previous Canterbury earthquake legislation, he reduced the select committee period from six months to four. In this case, the select committee is two weeks and I don’t think that’s acceptable. I know there’s an election coming. I know the Government wants shovel-ready projects. But, as I conclude, I doubt that any single project will be started by the election. All we’re doing is rushing something through this House and through the Parliament, and I think the chances of making mistakes are high. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

Hon SHANE JONES (Minister of Forestry): Tēnā tātou katoa. Before I start this speech, I want to clear the air. I want to acknowledge today that a remark I made within question time has caused considerable disquiet amongst some of my colleagues in the House that in some way I was trivialising or demonising those folk who may from time to time suffer mental hardship. So I apologise. At no point did I ever imagine that I was deliberately attacking the member who sits in Nelson. I largely see him as one of the more—

Hon Dr Nick Smith: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Adrian Rurawhe): Order! Order! I’m just going to make this ruling first, and hopefully I’ve taken care of that. The correct way of addressing such issues, Mr Jones, is to seek leave to make a statement to the House. You do not use your contribution to this. It is bound to create disorder, and by implication of what you have said, I don’t blame the Hon Dr Nick Smith for wanting to take a point of order. I’ll hear his point of order.

Hon Dr Nick Smith: I find it grossly offensive that a man would make any such accusations in this Parliament without a skerrick of evidence. It reflects very poorly on the Minister and on the Government.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Adrian Rurawhe): I agree, and the member should stand, withdraw, and apologise.

Hon SHANE JONES: I withdraw and apologise. I shall now move on to my speech, but my remarks will be recorded.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Adrian Rurawhe): No, no, no. Once you’ve withdrawn and apologised, that’s it. You do not comment on the ruling or what has happened. You go on to your speech.

Hon SHANE JONES: Thank you, David Parker, for correcting the long record of failure by Nick Smith. Thank you, David Parker, for bringing forward a piece of legislation that has been attacked by Nick Smith in infamy as he rests under the shadow of failure for nine to 12 years. Thank you, David Parker, for bringing a set of reforms that were thwarted under the last Government by the Māori Party and the belief of Nick Smith that he could treat Māoris like lackeys and they would vote for his version of a resource management reform process that diminished the role, the status, of his coalition fellow travellers.

The reason that the Resource Management Act failed in the time of Nick Smith is because he had a very diminished, impoverished, and prejudiced view about his fellow travellers. He sought to bully them. He sought to monster them.

Hon Dr Nick Smith: I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. Not five minutes ago, this member had to apologise for offensive remarks. He has subsequently accused me of treating Māori New Zealanders in a way that I find offensive. He’s gone on to accuse me of being a bully and other comments that I think are not appropriate in the context of the debate.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: I don’t need any help. I came in as that was happening. What I would say to the member is we are speaking to the first reading of a particular bill, and I would ask the member to focus on the bill, and not on individual members of Parliament.

Hon SHANE JONES: This piece of legislation has been brought forward by one of the greatest parliamentarians of my time, in contrast to other Ministers for the Environment, including the member who has taken offence to the most modest—most modest—of critical remarks. The last nine years shows a littered trail of failure, of dashed expectations, and, quite frankly, betrayal to the business and the economic estate. It has taken David Parker to bring forward a mix of a remedy which shows how hopeless and useless the old Minister for the Environment, Mr Nick Smith, used to be—the man who went on RNZ National trying to justify how much cow dung was in the water and that human beings, perhaps very closely related to him, could drink it. That was his contribution.

Now, this bill is actually an overdue development and will fast track a host of infrastructure developments. I am happy that Nick Smith with his colleagues have found it within themselves to vote for this bill. This bill, no doubt, will go through a challenging process before it is finally passed, but what it acknowledges in the post-COVID environment is that this side of the House is able to cobble and sustain a coalition of support, unlike that side of the House. That side of the House promoted suggestions and amendments, but could not command a majority in this House.

The Minister for the Environment of that time, drinking too much water riddled with cow dung, as reflected in most of his comments to this House, could not cobble together a sustainable majority to pass. The only thing he was able to pass were the honohono agreements. The honohono agreements is close to the word—actually, I won’t say it in Māori for fear of being set down, but it means to procreate. The only coalition he could get together was to worsen the brown tape in the Resource Management Act. The honohono agreements hand over powers of gatekeeping to unelected, irresponsible small cabals from the iwi community.

Now, we love Māori participation on our side of the House, but we want it to be responsible to drive the development of our nation. We do not want the separatism agreed to by the former Minister for the Environment as he sought to seduce the sadly but gladly extinct Māori Party. Now, I accept that he thought the best way to make improvements was to sell out the soul of the Resource Management Act to buy six months more of power. That is a tawdry—that is a—

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! Order! The Standing Orders are very explicit that you cannot imply in your speech that anyone is under the influence from outside.

Hon SHANE JONES: I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. When the former Government was in the unholy alliance with the Māori Party, Mr Dunne, and Ken from Epsom—

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Is there a point of order here?

Hon SHANE JONES: The point I’m making is that it cannot be suggested that I am asserting anything untoward when coalition parties—

DEPUTY SPEAKER: That is arguing with my ruling. That is not a point of order.

David Seymour: I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. As you well know, it’s unparliamentary to refer to a member by anything other than their title or name, as that member just did to me. But I also say, I may represent Epsom, but originally I’m a Northlander, and as the member’s going to find out, we Northlanders don’t like oafish dickheads.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Well, that is not particularly helpful in all of this, so if I could just continue with—the original point of order that the member took isn’t a point of order; it is a debating point. I just ask the member to focus on the bill that’s before the House and try and keep within the Standing Orders.

Hon SHANE JONES: I apologise for referring to the political doll of Epsom as Ken. However, let me now come back to the essence of the bill. It enables overdue projects to be consented via (1) the passage of the bill and (2) a process where the Minister may, through Order in Council, refer projects to an august body led by a jurist comprised of people including an iwi representative. So the suggestion that my speech is not touching on the elements that comprise the heart of this bill is unfortunate. However, in going forward, it’s important that the Māori dimensions of this bill be not allowed to spread as they did in the time of the former Minister for the Environment to thwart and overwhelm the actual thrust of simplifying resource management statutory consents to drive economic activity whilst still recognising the importance of the environment. In fact, I look forward, as this bill works its way through the House, to inviting that small group of unelected Māori relations of mine to come and see the various projects in Aotearoa that may or may not find their way through this bill.

This bill is a tremendous response to the COVID—post-COVID, should I say—environment. It has been carefully considered. It has been developed by obviously the best environment Minister since Geoffrey Palmer, although the bar in the last regime is not very high to pass. So our party will support this bill. Our party wants to see both grey and green infrastructure proceed. Our party believes that it is very important that we address the overarching issues pertaining to water, water storage, water resilience in provincial New Zealand. We accept that these are matters of considerable sensitivity to various members of Parliament and elements and stakeholders in our community.

But this is a day of celebration. After nine years of earlier attempts to change the Resource Management Act, this bill delivers a profound set of changes. No broken promises, no exaggerated rhetoric—such a thing would be quite foreign to myself. This is going to deliver, obviously, infrastructure projects, but who knows what projects will find their way to the Minister for the Environment? Who knows what projects will be passed in this expeditious manner? This shows that this Government is cutting red tape. This Government is not bowing down to the privileged over-preening interests that thwarted the last Government. The Minister for the Environment of the former regime will pass as the worst Minister for the Environment that the history of New Zealand has ever seen.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the COVID-19 Recovery (Fast-track Consenting) Bill be now read a first time.

Ayes 119

New Zealand National 55; New Zealand Labour 46; New Zealand First 9; Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand 8; Ross.

Noes 1

ACT New Zealand 1.

Bill read a first time.

Bill referred to the Environment Committee.

Hon DAVID PARKER (Minister for the Environment): I move, That the COVID19 Recovery (Fast-track Consenting) Bill be reported to the House by 29 June 2020 and that the committee have authority to meet at any time while the House is sitting (except during oral questions), during any evening on a day on which there has been a sitting of the House, and on a Friday in a week in which there has been a sitting of the House and outside the Wellington area, despite Standing Orders 191, 193, and 194(1)(b) and (c).

The reasons for this, I think—or the need for Parliament to use the powers that Parliament has to shorten the select committee period—have been traversed by others in the debate already. The powers of Parliament to order a shorter select committee period are there because, on occasions, it is appropriate to have shorter than the normal six-month period, and I suggest to the House that this is one of those occasions. Although the Opposition are incorrect or out of date in their assertion that unemployment is going to go up by about 160,000 people, relying upon estimates that were prepared at a time before we got COVID-19 under control in the relatively short period of time that we did, relative to other countries, it remains true that unemployment has risen sharply as a consequence of COVID-19. And we’ve seen major parts of the economy shut down, particularly in international tourism, which has resulted in a rise in unemployment, and the number of people on the jobseeker benefit has so far increased by around 45,000 people.

It is an imperative, in the view of the Government, that we bring forward infrastructure projects, most of which, but not all of which, will be funded by central government or central government agencies, and if we can bring forward the start date for those projects, that money will be spent into the economy, and a large part of it is spent on the wages of the people who are employed on those projects.

David Seymour: What else?

Hon DAVID PARKER: “What else?” the member for the ACT Party asks. Well, the other things that money is spent on include subcontractors, engineering services, allied services. The money is also spent into the economy. Of course, there’s a multiplier effect because—

David Seymour: Contractors aren’t wages. Keep trying.

Hon DAVID PARKER: Actually, this shows the ignorance of the ACT Party in basic economics, when they deny those basic propositions. And, for a party that pretends to be economically literate, that somewhat must sadden the predecessors of his who formed the ACT Party.

In terms of precedents for a shorter select committee period, the Kaikōura earthquakes resulted in a need for a cut through of the Resource Management Act processes in respect of the services that needed to be reconnected, namely State Highway 1 and the main trunk railway line, plus associated works, that were so damaged in the Kaikōura earthquake. The Government of the time did that through cut-through legislation, and that legislation was bespoke, as this is. It was similar to this legislation, and it had a very short select committee period. I recall that because I was on that select committee. I can’t recall the exact period, but it was a week or so. If we didn’t put this to a shortened select committee period, this would not come out of the select committee period until Parliament rose for the election. The effect of that would be to cause a delay of some months, because, of course, once Parliament rises, we have an election period of some six weeks. Then there’s the return of the writ before Parliament can then—

Hon Shane Jones: A formality. A formality.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: I’m not sure that that is helpful to the speaker.

Hon DAVID PARKER: —sit again. As a consequence, there would be a delay of some months before this legislation could be reconsidered by Parliament. We think that that would be undesirable in the circumstances because it is important that we employ as many people as we can in alternative employment given that they have lost employment through no fault of their own as a consequence of the COVID-19 virus. For those reasons, I support the motion that I’ve already read out, which allows, essentially, two weeks less one day for the select committee to report back to the House on 29 June.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH (National—Nelson): So the Minister has moved that Parliament be given only 13 days—that is that this bill be reported back Monday week. Now, we’re not talking about a simple bill; we’re talking about a bill that spans out to 249 clauses, 79 pages, and when did Parliament get to have a look at this bill? After 1 o’clock today. And the Minister justifies this incredibly concentrated process on the basis of COVID-19. But here’s my question: didn’t COVID-19 arrive three months ago? What’s happened in the last three months? Why is it that inside the Government, the squabble between the Labour Party, the Greens, and New Zealand First was allowed to have three months to work out what their policy position is, but the Parliament is given less than two weeks?

Here’s my problem: across the House I have revenue Minister Stuart Nash. He introduced one of these COVID bills. He told us what was in the bill, except it was wrong—it was completely different. Parliament faced the enormity of passing a bill completely different to what the entire Parliament thought was in it.

Hon Stuart Nash: No it wasn’t.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: Yes it was. The Minister says it’s not. What actually happened was a bill that provided for an IRD loan scheme worth hundreds of millions of dollars, and the Minister across the House—doing a similar matter of urgency—did not even know or read what was in his bill. This is a far more complicated and bigger bill. Now, members on this side of the House are sympathetic to ensure that it is passed through the House prior to the election. We want to see these projects advanced. We want to see, actually, many more able to enjoy a fast-track process of consenting under the Resource Management Act. But what we find offensive and wrong is that, I’m sorry, 13 days of scrutiny of such a complicated piece of law is a joke. The idea that the public is going to be able to have any realistic input into a bill that only came into the public arena this afternoon, that by Monday week the select committee’s going to have to call submissions, hear submissions, hear officials, and report back to the House in 13 or 12 days is just not credible. I’ll make a bet: there’ll be mistakes in it; it’ll be a hash—

David Seymour: No—no!

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: It’ll be like the tax law. Well, I have to tell you—I say to Mr Seymour: if there is any area of law that is complicated, it’s the RMA. When you’ve got 70 pages of it—

Hon Member: Too complicated.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: Too complicated, and I agree with the member—too complicated. But the idea that we can pass 130 clauses and get all the detail right is asking for trouble, and is going to result in mistakes, and mistakes around major infrastructure projects involving millions of dollars of cost for taxpayers’ money.

So I just ask the next Labour speaker to explain why Parliament’s being given 12 days when the Government’s had 100 days. This issue’s been around for a very long time. The nature of the COVID emergency didn’t just come up yesterday, it didn’t come up last week; it’s been an issue grappling our country since March. It is disrespectful to the parliamentary process to allow such a short period. It is perfectly possible to have this bill passed prior to the general election without the nonsense of select committee process that’s being recommended with this motion.

DAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): Thank you, Madam Speaker. I rise in opposition to this motion to shorten the select committee process for a bill that is, well, let’s see, some 83 pages, 160 clauses, to be consulted on with the public in a couple of weeks. I want to put an argument that I think members on the Government side of the House might actually have some sympathy with, and it’s this: a shorter consultation period actually favours the rich. It favours the well-resourced. It disadvantages the people who are not rich and don’t have good resources, and let me tell you how that happens. You see, this committee is going to be given a—

Hon Chris Hipkins: I thought ACT was going to abolish the RMA.

DAVID SEYMOUR: We’re hearing from the Minister of Education, Chris Hipkins of Remutaka, that it’s somehow relevant that ACT wants to abolish the Resource Management Act. And he’s correct: ACT would like to replace the Resource Management Act with much better legislation. But that’s not the point I’m making, and if Chris Hipkins from Remutaka would listen a bit more and talk a bit less, he might get an education in spite of himself.

As I was saying, this rushed process disadvantages poorer New Zealanders with less resources, and it advantages the rich, well connected, and well resourced. And how does that happen? Well, there’s only 14 days for the select committee to report back. That means if they’re going to hear from any actual New Zealanders from outside of this Parliament and outside of the civil service and the bureaucracy, then they’re going to have to call for them to make their submissions, let’s say, in the next five or six days, so that the select committee has time to actually hear them, then think about what they’ve said, and report back to this House in 13 days.

So let’s ask ourselves who is going to be best prepared to make a submission within the next five or six days. Well, it’s not going to be “Main Street”, it’s not going to be the average New Zealander, because the people that know about this bill and already have opinions—you only have to search the internet. Google this bill, and what do you find first? Russell McVeagh. Russell McVeagh have opinions on this legislation. They’ve read the Cabinet paper. They presumably are reading the legislation right now, since it was released so late, only a few hours ago, earlier today. Their clients will have an opportunity to have an influence on this bill. And who else is out there with commentary? Well, Bell Gully. In fact, all of the “big four” law firms have already started work on this bill.

So what this rushed process is doing—and I think members in the Government benches should really think about this—by legislating at such a rapid rate is they are creating a system where people who retain the best lawyers and the best lobbyists and the best consultants have a chance of influencing the outcome. The average person, who’s proud to be a New Zealander, who’s grateful we live in a democracy, who is grateful to live in a country where we each get to send our representative to this House, where each of us is asked and has the opportunity to comment on legislation it makes—they’re not going to have a show. They’re not prepared. They haven’t read the Cabinet papers. They haven’t read the legislation. Most people didn’t know this was happening, and why should they, with their busy lives? But the highly paid lawyers and lobbyists retained by the rich did.

This is an extraordinary proposition for a Labour Government to foist on New Zealand. I think they should seriously consider if they want to keep legislating in this way. It’s part of a wider malaise that has occurred throughout this COVID-19 crisis. The sequence that applies to the COVID-19 Public Health Response Bill, and to this bill, and to other legislation that’s been rushed through under urgency, goes like this: the crisis occurs, and the Government is behind the eight ball when it comes to doing the policy work. They haven’t done the analysis. They don’t know what the answers are. And then, even if some of them figure it out, they can’t agree across their coalition partners. We saw that on the issue of rates regulation for commercial leases. And then, if they’ve finally all managed to agree and stop squabbling amongst themselves, they’ve got to get the legislation drafted, and then they’ve got to do their PR on it. Then they finally bring it to this House, where the people sent by the public of New Zealand—who actually pay the bills—get to scrutinise it, and that’s the last thing on their list. Because they have been so slow in developing the COVID response, and so insipid in the responses that they give, those people who actually want democracy find that their part of the process gets compressed. There’s no opportunity for anybody, other than those highly engaged lawyers and lobbyists retained by the wealthy whom I mentioned earlier, to seriously understand what this bill means and to then consider how such changes might affect their community or their business. We’re, basically, for all intents and purposes, suspending the participative democracy that we’re all so proud of and grateful to have in New Zealand.

Once the legislation actually gets to select committee, once the call is made for select committee considerations, people have only a few days to do all of it. Overwhelmingly, they’re not going to do it. But even if people, with busy lives, who have jobs and maybe kids and all sorts of things going on, managed to get a submission in on this 83 pages of legislation, well, then, they find themselves in a position where they’ve got to struggle to be heard. The poor members on the Environment Committee, if they’re lucky, are going to have a couple of days sitting in urgency hearing one submission after another, trying to compute what people are saying, work out how it is relevant to the bill and what sort of changes they might make to change the bill to improve it, and, of course, they are simply not going to have the time to do it. Why? Because they won’t have had time to get advice from their officials at the Ministry for the Environment—because they’re part of the process, too. They won’t be able to loop those guys in.

So the prospects of positive changes from this bill coming out of the select committee process are almost nil. I’d put it to this Labour-led Government that it would be more honest to have just said, “We aren’t going to do a public consultation.” What they could have said is, “Look, there’s no meaningful opportunity for people to participate, and the opportunities to participate in such a rapid process are inherently inequitable because it’s only those who can afford to retain specialists, lawyers, and lobbyists, who are highly networked, who are actually connected enough to do this at the speed it’s happening.” The Labour Party should say, “We don’t like consultations that aren’t meaningful; we think that erodes trust in the democratic institution of Parliament. And we certainly don’t like processes that are inequitable. The whole foundation and point of our party was to stand up for the working people.”—who are much less likely to have any opportunity to be represented in this process the Labour Party’s created. They should have said all that, and said, “We’re just going to be honest, we don’t really care about public consultation or participatory democracy. We’re just going to rush it straight through under urgency, all three stages, wham, bam, thank you, Madam Speaker.” That would have been more honest from the Government. Thank you, Madam Speaker.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: I don’t think you should bring the Speaker into that.

Hon JACQUI DEAN (National—Waitaki): Thank you, Madam Speaker. In fact it’s not 12 days or 13 days, if you count today, by which this bill has to be returned to the House. In fact, it’s eight working days, and the bill is returned on the ninth day. That is unacceptable. That is an unacceptable proposal to bring to this Parliament by a Government that has got very, very fond of this truncated process for legislation, which has far-reaching consequences for New Zealand.

I echo my colleagues who question that a bill which was notified to this side of the Chamber at about 20 past 1 this afternoon only, we question how we can possibly, as parliamentarians, undertake a good process. I see Duncan Webb on the other side of the Chamber—

Hon Member: Doctor.

Hon JACQUI DEAN: —the unfortunate chair—

Dr Duncan Webb: Oh, that’s unkind.

Hon JACQUI DEAN: Which bit, the doctor or the unfortunate? It may be both. He is the unfortunate chair of the Environment Committee, who somehow has to—how inconvenient it must be to fit in with those processes of the select committee scrutiny. I’m imagining that Dr Webb will call for submissions on the 17th, tomorrow, that is if the committee is going to call for submissions, because there has been one example of legislation which has been to this House in the last six weeks where there was no submission period.

So we have eight days for the bill to be returned on the ninth. In that time, we must call for submissions. How long do we give the public of New Zealand to have a say on this bill? I raised in my first reading speech the uncertainty, the potential doubling up, and the potential conflict between the responsibilities of the Infrastructure Commission and the truncated process, as proposed in this COVID-19 Recovery (Fast-track Consenting) Bill. In that, the Infrastructure Commission, which was established in 2018, has a very strong role in providing the planning framework for infrastructure projects in New Zealand. Indeed, it has—and I googled it—a number of projects that are in various stages through their consenting, scoping, business case, and all of those processes that large and not so large infrastructure projects must go through. So the question that I want to ask throughout the committee process, I want to ask the officials, is how many of the fortunate, 11 projects or 16 projects, depending on who you talk to, in Schedule 2, how many of those are under active consideration by the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission? That’s a valid question.

I might not be the only one to want to know the answer to that question. There could well be a submitter who has concerns, who has an interest in watching what is happening. Will they get an opportunity to not only ask the question—so it’s one thing to appear before the committee. It’s one thing to appear before a Zoom session of the committee, but it is quite another to expect the officials who are receiving their submission, no matter how hurriedly thrown together it will be—and it will be because we’ve seen it before in the previous months. But what kind of a response are these submitters expecting to get from the officials who will be working—as we now know from previous experience in the Environment Committee—long into the evening and, indeed, over the weekend, one supposes, to fulfil the needs of their political masters?

So we’ve got eight days and I’m assuming that Dr Webb will be calling for submissions tomorrow. And I do invite him to stand up and take a call. And I would expect that the chair of the Environment Committee would get up to make a call to clarify just how he proposes to run this eight-day process. Because not only does he have to call for submissions, hear the submissions, then we have to—

Dr Duncan Webb: If you yield I’ll do it now. If you yield I’ll do it now.

Hon JACQUI DEAN: All in good time, my friend. All in good time. Not quite finished.

Then we have to hear from our officials who have to be given the opportunity to provide robust analysis. Surely that is a critical part of the process, or does this Government not care about that? Are they so secure and arrogant that these niceties of democracy are far beyond them, because that’s the way it’s beginning to look from this side of the Chamber.

So then we have parliamentary counsel, who will be sitting nervously by as we speak just anticipating that they will again be trying to draft legislation within this ridiculous—ridiculous—eight-day time frame so that we can then present the bill to the House.

What kind of a bill are we going to end up with? Will it mean Supplementary Order Papers in later stages? No, it won’t. If I think that through, it won’t, because there will not be time for the officials to have another look at the bill and determine whether or not they have got it right. No, what will happen is that further down the line this Government will have to come back to the House with its tail between its legs with an amendment bill to tidy up and fix it, that’s what’s going to happen, that’s exactly what’s going to happen. This is for a bill from a Minister who has had at least three months to contemplate what post - COVID-19 would look like, and yet at the eleventh hour has produced a bill, brought it to the House, and then provided the most truncated of processes for the select committee.

So please, please, Mr Duncan Webb, let’s hear you take a call and tell us what a wonderful process we are going to get out of this.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the COVID-19 Recovery (Fast-track Consenting) Bill be reported to the House by 29 June 2020 and that the committee have authority to meet at any time while the House is sitting (except during oral questions), during any evening on a day on which there has been a sitting of the House, and on a Friday in a week in which there has been a sitting of the House and outside the Wellington area, despite Standing Orders 191, 193 and 194(1)(b) and (c).

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.

Motion agreed to.

Sittings of the House

Sittings of the House

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Leader of the House): I move, That the sitting of the House today be extended into tomorrow morning for the committee stage of the Arms Legislation Bill, the second readings of the Electoral (Registration of Sentenced Prisoners) Amendment Bill and the Land Transport (Rail) Legislation Bill, the third readings of the Privacy Bill and the Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission Bill, and the second reading of the Public Finance (Wellbeing) Amendment Bill.

Motion agreed to.

Bills

Arms Legislation Bill

In Committee

CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): Tēnā rā tātou katoa. Members, the House is in committee on the Arms Legislation Bill. I remind members that the House has agreed to trial the removal of the four-call limit in the committee stage. I encourage you to keep your contributions focused—five minutes is not a target—and relevant to promote good interaction with the Minister in the chair. We have the ability to take short calls and have a series of questions and answers between members and the Minister. You can be confident that you will get a number of short calls. I add that if you yield to the Minister, you will get the next call.

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Leader of the House): Following discussions across the House, I seek leave for all of the provisions in the bill to be taken as one debate.

CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): Leave is sought for that purpose. Is there any objection? There is objection.

Part 1 Amendments to Arms Act 1983

Hon STUART NASH (Minister of Police): Thank you very much, Mr Chair. The objective of this legislation is to ensure that firearms do not end up in the hands of bad people, of people who would seek to do harm to our citizens and our community, to restrict ownership to good law-abiding citizens, and who can argue with that?

The “privilege” clause states that it is a privilege to own a firearm, not a right. That is what a fundamental purpose of this bill is about. This legislation will keep guns out of the hands of gangs and will significantly increase penalties for gun crime, and I cannot understand why the Opposition would oppose a bill that ensures that gang members and prospects could not get a gun licence. And I cannot understand why the Opposition would not back a bill that significantly increases the penalties for gun crime. I’m assuming we’re going to find out why they would oppose this, but, for the life of me, I certainly cannot figure it out.

Even though it is not in the bill, I want to make one thing perfectly clear: we will set up an independent arms authority to manage this legislation. This was recommended in 1997 by Justice Thorp. Police will still be responsible for enforcement, but a separate agency will manage the legislation. So the policy, the licensing regime, will be managed by an independent authority.

I also want to thank New Zealand First, in particular Ron Mark and Clayton Mitchell, for the hard work put in. We all worked constructively, in good faith, and I think we have ended up with a piece of legislation which is actually long overdue, and I thank Mr Mark for the work that you’ve put in, sir; it has been fantastic. The select committee, very ably chaired by Deborah Russell, heard submissions without fear or favour and came up with a whole lot of recommendations that, again, I think make this legislation much more workable, and I thank the select committee and I thank the chair, Deborah Russell.

Finally, what I would like to say is that this legislation is long overdue. Perhaps—just perhaps—if we had taken up the recommendations of Justice Thorp in 1997, we would not be here today. As a consequence of that, as a consequence of Justice Thorp’s foresight, a man certainly before his time, I want to dedicate this legislation to the former Justice, Sir Thomas Thorp. Thank you very much.

BRETT HUDSON (National): Thank you, Madam Chair. Well it’s quite interesting how the Minister, Stuart Nash, started there. Apparently out of the blue there’s going to be an independent authority to administer the Arms Act and the Minister claimed this was a recommendation from years ago, from the Thorp Report. Why then, Minister, didn’t you have it in the Arms Legislation Bill to begin with? If you think it’s such a great idea and it came from so many years ago, why has it not even appeared in the bill now? It certainly didn’t appear in the bill as it started. I think the Labour Party, at least, were nowhere near as committed to the idea of an independent authority for this as the Minister has claimed in the House tonight. I’ll also add, given he raised it—it may not be in the bill, but he raised it—it’s quite, how shall we say, arrogant for the Minister to claim there will be an independent authority.

I’ll just for the record say—not necessarily a bad idea; we’ve got a lot of empathy for this idea and we will discuss this as a caucus ahead of the election and reach a position. But here’s the arrogance of the Minister: he claimed it’s going to happen. Well actually, it can’t happen before 2.5 million or more New Zealanders vote on who should be the Government after 19 September, including 250,000 licensed firearms owners who he’s just putting more cost, rules, and regulations on, and New Zealand First have sold down the river, as we’ll see as we progress through this debate tonight.

The other claim the Minister made: he said about this bill, it is going to keep guns out of the hands of gangs. Well, here’s the thing. There are no firearms prohibition orders in this bill. There are lots of provisions about the rules around whether a law-abiding person should be allowed to have a firearms licence. And here’s the evidence: the Minister sat on a select committee in the last term of Parliament, they’d heard evidence out of Australia that 90 percent of offences involving firearms are undertaken by people that don’t have a licence, and that’s borne out in everything we see and hear in the media in New Zealand as well. The gang members committing offences with firearms aren’t licensed. They’re certainly not licensed for the semi-automatic rifles they’re still using, nor the pistols that they’ve been using.

So this trash that this bill—the way it’s currently written—is going to keep guns out of the hands of gang members is pure tripe, pure tripe. But now I’ve responded to the points the Minister opened with, I think we should actually move on to some provisions in the bill.

I see a last minute—this is like so usual for this Government, right—this last minute Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) dropped on the House this morning, no opportunity for the Opposition here to understand the changes that are in it, because some are simply drafting improvements, I’m sure. But now we have to go through all of that—dissect them all and determine that there’s not some sneaky, underhanded additional rules being placed on law-abiding firearms owners that we haven’t been told about. But one of them was a small concession to New Zealand First so that they can go to the hustings claiming they found a spine and actually looked to stand up for firearms owners: pest control.

We’ve been calling—we called for an expansion for pest control for farmers back in the first bill, after 15 March. We called for that. That lot, including New Zealand First, voted it down. They refused to support it. Now—

Rt Hon David Carter: Who was on the select committee for New Zealand First?

BRETT HUDSON: Well, who was on the select committee for it? Who was?

Rt Hon David Carter: I don’t remember!

BRETT HUDSON: I don’t remember!

Andrew Bayly: I know! I know!

BRETT HUDSON: Oh, there you go! There we go. So we do have a change though. No, no, in fairness, we now do have a change. Buckling to the pressure of many emails, New Zealand First have negotiated a change to expand the pest control exemptions for the use of prohibited category firearms. But here we go, it’s got a bit of a gotcha to it, because in order for people to be able to use them—farmers and other sorts of rural and other related sorts of enterprises—for those owners to be able to use them, or their employees, they have to prove a significant detrimental impact to their business from the pests. So presumably they have to let them breed for a while, destroy a bit of crops or farmland, and then they’ll be able to prove to the police that actually they’ve got a need. There’s no need for that level of hurdle to be placed in the provision.

I would draw the Minister’s attention instead to my SOP 449, my SOP which is far simpler and more worthy for these hard-working New Zealanders. It simply has it that a person who is the owner of rural zoned land—because they don’t have to be farmers; we have things such as lifestyle blocks in this country, some of them very large, some of them not put to productive farming or agricultural use. But the pests don’t care. They don’t just walk in to farming and agricultural land. So in my SOP 449, proposed new section 4A(1)(fa) inserted by my proposed clause 8(2A) states, “a person who is the owner of rural zoned land, or their employee, and who requires a prohibited item for the purpose of controlling wild animals or animal pests on that land:”—nice and simple, no requirement to have to prove some material business impact, some loss of, I guess, potential revenue and/or profit to satisfy the police, because until, and if, this independent authority came into effect, it would be the police. And we know, because we’ve all heard the stories about pest control exemption applications since that first bill last year, they have been scarcer than hen’s teeth to acquire. Tough, tough conditions. Why? Because the police don’t want people to have them.

So when you put a condition, Minister, in this provision that requires the applicant to prove a significant detriment to their business, that is simply providing an excuse for them to be turned down and that is exactly what’ll happen. So, Minister, I would like to hear how you believe with that—in fact, not believe, show us, tell us. We want to know how it is that that will not be a handbrake, a barrier to farmers and other rural zoned owners and users being able to access the firearms that they need to control the sorts of pests they face. They could be Canadian wild geese. They could be wild goats. They can be wallabies. There are any number of pests that require the ability to take rapid action.

I just want to move on, before allowing the Minister to have his first crack at answering, on another part within the same Part 1, which is about sport shooting, because I notice that is, sadly, lacking from the deal that New Zealand First crafted and it is something that every sport shooter has been calling for. Now these sport shooters are commonly—the vast majority people that also tend to shoot pistols and they shoot other sorts of sport shooting, some of which include firearms or capacities that are now prohibited. The International Practical Shooting Confederation three-gun competition is the most common. It’s not the only. There’s the Service Rifle Association. There are others.

Now, it was acknowledged—even in the first bill, actually, but it’s been acknowledged even since then—that the pistol clubs are the best managed and run clubs in the firearms community. They have the strictest rules. They are absolutely adhered to. There is no reason, no reason, why—largely the same people, but there’s no reason why—people who belong to such clubs should not be able to continue their traditional sporting exercises, which include, in many cases, either firearms or capacities which have since been prohibited.

So my SOP there simply allows for a person who is a bona fide competitor in a target-shooting sport that is governed by a legitimate international sporting body, and where the rules of the discipline provide for the use of semi-automatic firearms or shotguns, and a member of a target shooting club that holds a certificate of approval issued by the commissioner. So there we go: we’ve got the same broad rules that apply to Pistol New Zealand that could apply to other shooting disciplines which include now prohibited firearms and/or items and capacities. And we know, and know with faith and confidence, that the people that would participate and have participated in the past are the most disciplined and the most law-abiding because they’ve always had the most to lose and because the rules that are enforced by Pistol New Zealand require them to act properly and also rule out tyre-kickers—to use a phrase; it’s probably not the most accurate phrase, but to rule out those cowboys, if you will—because they require people to participate in a set number of competitions per year to be able to keep their endorsement to use pistols now but what also used to include some firearms that are now being prohibited.

So, Minister, I would like to know why it is you refused a very similar request from New Zealand First. The wording of what they asked for might have been somewhat different, but the intent was the same. Why rule out well-run clubs and organisations with strong disciplines and rules, people who have shown themselves to be the most law-abiding firearms users because they’ve always had the most to lose and they treasure the sport that they have been able to participate in. So, Minister, I’d be very keen to hear why—or if, in fact, you would support my SOP, but if not, why not.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): I’ll let the Minister answer.

Hon STUART NASH (Minister of Police): I’m going to answer the questions put to me and certainly address the Supplementary Order Papers (SOPs) tabled by that member—that’s SOP 449 on pest control and SOP 450 on sport shooters. I just want to make one thing clear before I start. Keeping in mind the aim of this legislation is to keep the guns out of the hands of the bad people, and, as that member alluded to, I think in his opening sentence, how the bad guys get these guns is by stealing them off the good guys. If we remove these guns from our communities, by and large, they can’t fall into the hands of the bad guys. So what we want to achieve here is to limit the number of people who actually have access to these guns.

So let me talk about farmers; let me talk about SOP 449. What the member has alluded to is that every farmer should be allowed to go out and buy one of these guns. Now, keep in mind, these guns are primarily designed to kill people. Let’s be honest about that. These guns are not primarily designed to kill goats or possums or rabbits or pigs or deer. The AR-15 is the civilian equivalent of the M16—it’s the civilian equivalent of the M16. That’s what these guns are designed for. So what I want to talk about is pest exemptions.

Now, the last speaker, Brett Hudson, got it wrong. The farmer does not need to wait until their business has been detrimentally affected to a significant extent until they can obtain an exemption. What they have to do is prove that, in fact, this would be the case. So what they will do is they will get a pest management plan signed off by the relevant territorial authority that says they have a pest management plan, and the only way to deal with this is through a prohibited firearm. Now, how we arrived at this was by talking to a group who, I think, understands the issues pretty well. We canvassed them. We talked to them. We looked at what the regime may be. That organisation is called Federated Farmers. Now, when we talked to Federated Farmers, we said, “What sort of regime do you think would work?”, because initially in the bill, we said you had to set up a business. Federated Farmers submitted to Finance and Expenditure Committee. Ron Mark put forward a very good submission, and we looked at this and said, “You know what? That actually makes sense.” What Fed Farmers said makes sense. What Ron Mark submitted, that actually makes sense. If a farmer has a real pest control problem, and that farmer has signed off and worked with the territorial authority to actually state yes, this is the best form of pest control, then they can have a prohibited weapon. Of course, they’ve got to enter the prohibited firearm regime, but, of course, that’s what we’d expect them to do. The last thing we want is for every farmer who thinks they have a rabbit problem and needs one of these to be able to access one, which is what that member’s SOP number 449 says. Hence the reason why I do not support SOP 449.

Now let’s talk about sport shooters. Let’s talk about sport shooters. I’m the first to agree, from what I am told, pistol clubs manage their ranges incredibly well. They’re good law-abiding citizens, and they do a good job—they do a good job. And we’ve worked with them, we’ve had a look at their regime. In fact, that’s the model we set up the whole regime around ranges on. They do a very good job, but sport shooters, if we gave this exemption for a person who is a bona fide target sports competitor in an internationally recognised discipline and who is a member of a target shooting club offering training—this is what this thing wants to do—there is no limit on the number of people who can do this. Keeping in mind there is no Olympic and no Commonwealth discipline that requires these prohibited firearms—no Olympic, no Commonwealth discipline that requires these banned firearms—even if we limited this to three-gun competitions, it would still amount to around about 2,000 licence holders, 2,000 licence holders. What we have said is, “You know what? We want to remove these guns from our community.”

Now, I remember when I brought this up in an answer to an oral question in the House, and I got laughed at. So we went away and researched this. There is no reason why the National Rifle Association, under the SOP from that member, could come over here and set up a bona fide club and a bona fide competition—a bona fide club and a bona fide competition. We don’t have the ability to prevent that if the member’s SOP came into force. That is the reason why we have said no to this. We have said no to this, keeping in mind we have all made a decision because we all voted against the first legislation that said we wanted these firearms out of our community, because we do want these firearms out of our community, and to get them out of our community, this is what we need to do.

We debated this long and hard. The select committee looked at this and debated long and hard, I know this. They considered the submissions, and, in the end, I believe they have fallen on the right side of the objectives of this legislation. Hence the reasons why I will not support SOP 449 on pest control and I will not support SOP 450 on sport shooters.

DAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): Thank you, Madam Chair. There’s so much the Minister has said already that needs to be answered. He has created an entanglement that I suspect will go on for some hours. But just so people at home are fully aware of what happened at the beginning of this debate—and I think it’s important for our democracy that people understand these procedures—the Labour Party asked if they could do this debate all in one go, put it on fast track, “get this debate done as one part”, Chris Hipkins asked. He said that he’d arranged it in discussion with the other side. Well, he certainly didn’t ask me, but what it sounded like is the National Party agreed to it too. So we would’ve had a fast-tracked debate on this tonight again—

Brett Hudson: That’s not strictly true, David—that’s not strictly true.

DAVID SEYMOUR: —and the National Party agreed to that. They’re saying now they didn’t, except here’s the thing: we didn’t hear any voices objecting when Chris Hipkins asked permission for a fast-tracked debate. So that’s point number one. It’s proper that if firearm laws are worth doing, they are worth doing well.

Number two: Stuart Nash, the Minister in charge, said he thinks that Deborah Russell did a great job of chairing this legislation through the Finance and Expenditure Committee. Well, I am a member of the Finance and Expenditure Committee, and let me put it on record in the Hansard that the way members of the public were treated—argued with, abused, harangued—by somebody in a very senior position, a highly paid chair of a select committee in Parliament whose job is to facilitate the public giving information to elected officials, was nothing short of disgraceful. We got so much feedback and we heard so much about that, and I personally, on a number of occasions, had to intervene—

Michael Wood: I raise a point of order, Madam Chairperson. It is my view that the attack that is unfolding upon the chair of the select committee is not consistent with the kind of arguments that should be raised in the committee stage of this debate.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): Well, in fairness, the Minister raised it, and I take David Seymour’s comments as responding to that. I mean, I won’t allow him to go on at length, but it’s an argument, it’s a discussion, that was opened by the Minister.

DAVID SEYMOUR: I want to just respond to one thing Michael Wood has just raised in that point of order. I’m not attacking Deborah Russell. In fact, on a personal level, I quite like her. But I am attacking the behaviour, and I am calling out the way that members of the public were treated, because I think that’s wrong, and I think it needs to change. As you’ve said, Madam Chair, the Minister did raise it, and I think it’s important that it be put on record that that was not the experience of many members of the public. I did, as a member of the Finance and Expenditure Committee, have to intervene on behalf of members of the public who felt attacked by the chair, and many of them thanked me for it. That is true.

Number three: the Minister said—and we haven’t even got to the arguments about the bill or this part of the bill yet.

Dr Duncan Webb: You haven’t got to any argument yet.

DAVID SEYMOUR: We’ve got to things that were raised by the Minister, and I think Duncan Webb’s right: we haven’t got to any argument; we’re just raising things that the Minister raised. The Minister said this bill is, fundamentally, about keeping firearms out of the hands of bad people, and the problem with that argument is that there is almost nothing in this bill about bad people.

It’s worth going to the origin of this legislation, because this Government was not legislating in this area at all, had no intention to, for the first 18 months it was in power. The fact of the matter is—and people need to know this—there is nothing in this legislation that would have stopped the Christchurch terrorist doing what he did. The problem that arose was that the law as it is in place should have been followed, and we now learn that it was not, or at least we have it speculated. Of course, the thing this Government should’ve done is waited for the royal commission it put in place to diagnose the problem before the Government attempts to give its solution. And when we look through this legislation, it has a large number of new laws and restrictions placed upon law-abiding firearm owners, far outweighing anything that is imposed upon people who are illegal.

Then we heard the logic—this is number four from the Minister—that, actually, he is targeting illegal firearm owners and bad people, but how did he say he intends to do it? This explains much of what we find throughout the legislation: that, actually, the Minister’s intention is to take firearms off law-abiding people because, if they don’t have them, nobody can steal them. Well, here’s a thought about that difficulty or that proposition: how is it possible that criminal elements somehow manage to get ingredients for a billion bucks’ worth of P into New Zealand every year? Well, I put it to you, Madam Chair, and I’d put it to the Minister that part of the reason is this country only has one container scanner. Last I checked, there are more containers coming into New Zealand than can be scanned by one container scanner. It must be true because, for one thing, there’s more than one port, and they all have containers coming in. So could it be that the fundamental problem with the Minister’s strategy that he has raised is that the theft of firearms from licensed firearm owners is not the only way that criminal elements can get firearms? In fact, it may not even be the major way that they get firearms.

Then the Minister said, “Well, the problem is these firearms are guns designed to kill people—that’s why they’re being prohibited.” That’s number five. What’s interesting is that a .303 is a firearm that was designed to kill people—that’s the whole purpose of it; designed for the war—

Dr Duncan Webb: It wasn’t very good at it.

DAVID SEYMOUR: —and the fact of the—well, the member Duncan Webb says it wasn’t very good at it. Well, I think people that fought in those wars were probably very grateful to be equipped with them. But a point is they haven’t done anything about the firearm that really was designed to kill people. Although, I have heard that there are good pictures available of the current Minister of Police using such firearms, ironically.

The next problem that we have is the enormous burden that is placed upon people who wish to use firearms legally. In spite of the fact that nothing in this legislation is going to actually make us safer, except by the Minister’s hope that if he takes everyone’s firearms away then no one will have them and QED, no bad people will have them either. The problems are that this bill puts huge burdens on licensed firearm owners, and ineffective ones at that.

This bill puts in place a register. This bill invades the doctor-patient relationship. This bill places onerous restrictions on clubs that will backfire, because their intention, we can understand, is to ensure that people who have clubs operate them well. We can understand why they might want to do that, but the problem is that if they make it too onerous and clubs cease to function the way that they have in the past, and people find themselves with even less of an incentive to form clubs and use firearms in a safe location, they’re going to go bush, and they’re going to do things that are even more dangerous.

Then I think we’re up to point six so far—just talking about the points the Minister raised that are erroneous. He said he wants to dedicate this legislation to Justice Thorp. Well, that’s nice. What’s interesting is that Justice Thorp said a register would not work unless they got 90 percent compliance. Well, I hope the Minister is going to stand up and tell us what sort of level of compliance he thinks the register will achieve, because if it’s over 90 percent—and it’d be helpful if he could provide some examples of countries around the world that have achieved 90 percent—in that case, maybe he could say it’s going to work. But I suspect that he won’t be able to provide those examples, and he’s dedicating this legislation to Thorp, even though Thorp’s own report and words would tell us his legislation will not work. I hope to return to the specifics of the bill in future speeches.

Dr DEBORAH RUSSELL (Labour—New Lynn): We heard an extraordinary number of submitters during the select committee stage of this bill. As it turned out, all the hearings were recorded, and that recording is available, so people can see for themselves the truth of how it was conducted. I stand by my chairing of that committee.

BRETT HUDSON (National): Thank you, Madam Chair. Well, now I get to respond to the comments of the Minister in the chair, the Hon Stuart Nash, on my Supplementary Order Papers (SOPs). I think he should probably start by actually reading the regulations that exist under the previous legislation, because that did have a limited pest control exemption in it and the police created regulations to manage that. They’re not in the primary legislation; they were added to it. And they require a pest control management plan to be in place by the territorial authority. So the firearms can only be used in an area where there is a valid pest problem, where the pest is of a sort that might either require or genuinely benefit from that sort of firearm. So the notion that my SOP 449 would allow any farmer, including a farmer that just might want to shoot some bunnies, to get hold of a prohibited category firearm is just blatantly showing that the Minister doesn’t understand his own bill, he doesn’t understand the existing legislation, and it would appear he hasn’t bothered to read the regulations that police have been merrily making to give effect to the powers under that existing legislation.

Now, the other part is I think the Government—possibly this Minister, although it’s not actually in his portfolio—now should apologise, it appears, to the America’s Cup contestants and, in fact, remove some of the visa exemptions or processing they’ve done recently, because of the Minister’s statement that in order for something to be a bona fide sport it has to be included in the Commonwealth Games or the Olympics. I’m not sure they race America’s Cup class yachts in either the Olympics or the Commonwealth Games. To say that only a shooting event that is undertaken at either the Commonwealth or Olympic Games is worthy of participation domestically or internationally is, quite frankly, astounding and offensive not only to shooters in New Zealand but indeed our neighbours and others around the world. It is not an Olympic classification that gives some legitimacy to any sport because to take that approach would say that any sport that is not on the current rota for the Olympic Games or Commonwealth Games is somehow less worthy.

The Minister also missed a point on that sport shooting that, fundamentally, the people that he acknowledged that are so well disciplined, so well managed, and so well behaved, and are part of Pistol New Zealand are the same people, particularly in the International Practical Shooting Confederation three-gun discipline. I know this, because I’ve visited a number of ranges and clubs. I have seen them participating in their sport. The range that is used for that sort of sport shooting that would now use prohibited category firearms is the same range that is used for other still legitimate and lawful pistol shooting. So to somehow create a second tier, to somehow allude to them being different or different ranges, is simply not reflected in the experiences of shooters every week, in some cases for those that practise for international competition every day across the country.

But in the acknowledgment that we can have confidence in the rules, the governance, the behaviours, the discipline that Pistol New Zealand has—to acknowledge that that is legitimate and worthy merely highlights the fact that that’s exactly what I’ve said should be done to allow the use of now prohibited category firearms or capacities.

The example the Minister made about the National Rifle Association (NRA) is quite laughable for a couple of reasons. One is that not one of us in New Zealand should be afraid of the NRA or any other international lobby group. I think we’re all a bit—

Hon Member: Huh! OK.

BRETT HUDSON: Well, if the Minister’s not stronger than they are, he should think very seriously about vacating his seat in the Beehive because, I tell you what, there wouldn’t be anyone on this side that wouldn’t be prepared to stand up to them. But the point he missed, saying the NRA could just waltz in and start up a club, is in the SOP 445. It says it has to be certified by the commissioner.

Sitting suspended from 10 p.m. to 9 a.m. (Wednesday)

TUESDAY, 16 JUNE 2020

(continued on Wednesday, 17 June 2020)

Bills

Arms Legislation Bill

In Committee

Debate resumed.

Part 1 Amendments to Arms Act 1983 (continued)

BRETT HUDSON (National): When we concluded last night, or paused last night, I was referring to comments the Minister had said about potentially the National Rifle Association coming over and setting up all these sports clubs and ranges, and I pointed out that in my Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) it says that the said club or range has to be certified by the Commissioner of Police. So I have a series of questions about these SOPs.

Hon STUART NASH (Minister of Police): Last evening, I think the last speech was David Seymour’s, and he made some points that I quite rightly think were a little bit offensive, and there’s one that I want to deal with first and foremost. Mr Seymour said there is nothing in this bill that would have stopped the Christchurch terrorist from getting his weapons. Now, Mr Seymour may have forgotten, but, in this House, every single member of Parliament except the member from Epsom voted to get rid of these weapons. In this bill, if the member from Epsom had read it, he would see that there is a comprehensive list of what determines a fit and proper person to own a firearm. What I would say to Mr Seymour, and what I would say to people who heard that statement and thought, “Goodness me, is that true?”: it is fundamentally not true at all.

On 14 March 2019, any member of the public could have wandered into a store and bought an AR-15 and bought two 30-round magazines. Any—

Rt Hon David Carter: You had to have a licence.

Hon STUART NASH: No, sorry. The honourable member is right. You had to have a firearms licence to be able to do that. Any member who had a firearms licence could have walked into Gun City and bought an AR-15—or any store—and bought two 30-round magazines. Today, it is impossible to walk in to a gun store, a gun shop, or a sporting store and buy the sort of weapons used by the Christchurch terrorist to kill 51 Kiwis. In this bill, we have tightened up what constitutes a fit and proper person, and that Christchurch terrorist would not fit the criteria for fit and proper. So when Mr Seymour said there is nothing here that would prevent what happened in Christchurch, he is wrong—he is wrong. So I want the people of New Zealand to know the firearms environment has fundamentally changed.

The second thing that Mr Seymour said when I said that Justice Thorp recommended an independent firearm authority in 1997 is that this wouldn’t work because Justice Thorp also said that for a firearms register to work, you would need about 90 percent compliance. He asked me as the Minister how I can guarantee 90 percent compliance. Well, there are two things I would say to Mr Seymour. First of all, I trust good law-abiding citizens to obey the law. And, Mr Seymour, if they do not obey the law, then they face a fine of $10,000 for failing to provide information required for the registry, and they face a fine of $20,000 or up to two years in jail for intentionally providing false information to the registry. So Mr Seymour talks about good law-abiding citizens, and I believe good law-abiding citizens will obey the law, because if they don’t, they face up to two years in jail or a $10,000 fine.

The other thing I would say is that in this country, it is a legal requirement to register your car. It is a requirement in this country to register your dog. So why is it so offensive to ask people to register their guns? Why is it so offensive, if we require them to register their car and their dog, to ask them to register their guns?

The second thing I would say in terms of compliance with the register is what we have said is we are going to take a soft-touch approach to this. So the register, we have said, will take up to three years—up to three years to be implemented. But then what we have also said is there’s up to five years for people to actually become part of that register. And how do they become part of that? Whenever they touch the system, they’re supposed to be part of the register. When they buy a firearm, when they trade a firearm, when they buy ammunition, when they buy a part, then they become part of the system.

Mr Seymour said we are putting massive cost, an imposition, on firearms owners. No, Mr Seymour, we are not. This will be easy to do. In fact, the model we have talked about is registering your car. If Mr Seymour thinks it is a massive imposition to register your car, then maybe, Mr Seymour, this will be an imposition. But I think the vast majority of Kiwis understand why you’ve got to register your car, and I understand, Mr Seymour, that over 85 percent of New Zealanders understand why you’ve got to register your firearm.

Dr Deborah Russell: Eighty-five percent?

Hon STUART NASH: Eighty-five percent believe it’s right to register your firearm. This is not going to provide massive imposition. In fact, what we have said in the bill is that police have also got to take a light-touch approach. So it’s an informative, it’s an educational, one. They’re not going to go in there and go, “You haven’t registered your firearm—$10,000.” We have actually said it’s an instructional process. We’re making it as easy as we possibly can to register your firearm.

Then Mr Seymour said we shouldn’t be doing this, because the bad guys don’t get their guns from stealing it; they get it through shipping containers. Now, there is no evidence whatsoever that that is the case—no evidence. In fact, we heard at a select committee hearing a couple of years ago that that isn’t the case. But even if it was the case, is that a reason not to put this bill in place? Absolutely not. Mr Seymour, what I would say is sometimes you’ve actually got to stand for something, and, by opposing everything, you end up standing for nothing.

What I would say is I’m incredibly proud of what we are doing in terms of ensuring that New Zealand is actually a safer place. Mr Seymour did ask: “Is New Zealand a safer place because of this?” What I would say is we have taken nearly 60,000 firearms out of our communities that are primarily designed to kill people. If they are still out there—if people did not participate in the buy-back—then they face up to five years in jail. They are now criminals, and they face up to five years in jail.

The interesting thing is that when we undertook this and there were interviews with people who handed their firearms in, they said, “We sort of get this. We get what you’re doing—we get what you’re doing because of this.”

Hon Scott Simpson: What a hopeless defence of this bill—what a hopeless defence.

Hon STUART NASH: If Mr Simpson wants to go to his people in the Coromandel and say we are no safer because of this, well, good luck to you, but I tell you, you’re against the tide of public opinion. And I also, Mr Simpson, want you to go and say to your people, “And don’t worry about registering your dog, and don’t worry about registering your car.”

This is making our community safer. It is not providing huge amounts of imposition. It is doing what Justice Thorp said we should have done in 1997, and it’s about time.

DAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Wow! Sometimes you see a Minister in committee who is calm and relaxed and on top of his brief and you know that he’s going to have an easy run through committee, and then there are times like now. I didn’t realise that Stuart Nash had clearly been up all night thinking about my speech that I gave at 9.30 last night, but evidently he had. I’d like to ask him a couple more questions about his response, because he clearly listened to my speech. I said, “Look, you know, it’s true. Justice Thorp said you needed 90 percent compliance.” I didn’t ask him about car registration; I asked him about firearms. There was actually a really simple, specific challenge that he should be able to answer: where in the world have countries actually achieved that level of registration compliance? That’s what matters. We could talk about cars all day, but this is not the “Car Registration Bill”; this bill is to do with offering to register firearms. So which other countries have managed to register firearms to 90 percent or more? That’s the question for the Minister of Police.

The second question for the Minister—he said that I am claiming that firearms come in through containers; they might be exported illegally from overseas. Well, I didn’t say that. I just said that if the Minister thinks that stopping all law-abiding Kiwis from having firearms is going to stop criminals getting them—and he didn’t deny that, because the other thing I said is that seems to be his policy. He didn’t deny that that’s his policy. He seems to think that there are no firearms coming in illegally in containers or any other way. Well, really, the onus is on the Minister to show that he knows how he can stop firearms coming in illegally at the border. If he can’t do that, then all the punishments he’s putting on law-abiding firearm owners aren’t going to work. So the onus is back on him. Is he sure that there are no illegal firearms being illegally imported into New Zealand? I’d love to hear what the Minister has to say about that.

Then the next point I’d make to the Minister is that he said—well, actually, we’ll come back a little bit to what privilege meant. But he said that this law is going to change the fit and proper person test. Well, that’s interesting, because by extension, what he seems to be saying is that the Christchurch terrorist was a fit and proper person under the previous laws. Well, if that’s what the Minister is trying to say, that’s an extraordinary thing. So my next question to the Minister is: did he think that the Christchurch terrorist was a fit and proper person under the old laws? If that’s true, then maybe changing this law will help. But I think the real problem is that a guy who wasn’t a fit and proper person got a firearm licence and wasn’t even interviewed. I’d love to hear the Minister answer that question. Was he a fit and proper person under the old laws? That’s the question we want to ask.

Finally, the Minister got up and said, “Well, actually, this bill changes the law so that a person couldn’t get a firearm like they did on March 15.” Well, I think the Minister’s got confused between his bills, and this happens a lot, actually. Stuart Nash has done this before. People will recall when Stuart Nash accidentally passed the wrong bill just a few weeks back. The thing is, for people at home, that the bill that banned semi-automatic centrefire rifles was the one that was rushed through last April. This bill doesn’t do that. This bill actually, and I think it’s a good thing, at least in its Supplementary Order Paper, says that in limited circumstances, more people will be able to get semi-automatic centrefire rifles.

So there are four questions there for the Minister. I look forward to him calmly answering those questions, because I suspect it’s going to be a long morning. There you go, he’s turning to his officials to get advice right now. Thank you.

Hon RON MARK (Minister of Defence): Thank you, Madam Chair. Look, I rise to take the first call on behalf of New Zealand First on this legislation—fairly interesting. I want to thank the Minister of Police for acknowledging New Zealand First’s role and making some adjustments to this legislation.

Brett Hudson: Very minor. Tiny adjustment.

: But I do have to, on the back of some of the speeches last night, address some of the assertions. I’ll start with the first one about the complaints around the changes to pest control and the adjustments being made on the back of representations made by the New Zealand First caucus to the Minister and to the Labour team. Mr Hudson might well think that those changes are insignificant. He might well think that it’s created a degree of bureaucracy that he thinks is unnecessary.Hon RON MARK I just say to Mr Hudson, being a landowner myself, I can tell him of a block of land in Canterbury. I can tell Mr Hudson, unfortunately, I do get notifications from the regional council which advises me on my pest count. I do get notifications, and that document is very useful and will be useful in future for any farmer who’s been told by the—

Brett Hudson: You shouldn’t have to prove a material financial detriment.

Hon RON MARK: Mr Hudson, listen, just listen—listen. Mr Hudson, so any regional council writes to a farmer, a high-country farmer, and advises them that they’ve conducted a pest count on his property, and they’ve identified that he is in excess of what is permissible and instructed him to move forward and produce a pest management plan. That’s what’s happening now. What we have done here is made a change that removes a whole bunch of bureaucracy and allows those farmers to actually say, “Yeah, look, here’s the regional council evidence. Here’s the instruction from the regional council telling me I’ve got to sort out my wallaby count, sort out my hares, my rabbits, sort out my goat count, whatever it is. And I’m off now to the police to get a permit to actually buy a restricted firearm so I can deal with this.” Because in the high country in Canterbury, those ranges, you can’t deal with it with any other weapon; it has to be a centrefire semi-automatic.

Brett Hudson: Sold out the firearms owners. Sold them out.

Hon RON MARK: I can only say, Mr Hudson, amid all your chipping and carping in the wind, that Federated Farmers are very pleased. So if that member truly is a supporter of Federated Farmers—

Brett Hudson: They won’t be. They won’t in practice.

Hon RON MARK: If that member’s truly a supporter of Federated Farmers, he should just shut up and listen to Federated Farmers on the radio this morning. Listen to Federated Farmers.

And then I’m looking across at Mr McKelvie, who seems, as always, as a former mayor, a very rational person. But his presence in the House does remind me of one thing. It’s interesting hearing how the National Party, who supported the first tranche of firearms legislation, is now saying that they don’t support this tranche. And it’s really interesting the topics that they’re pulling out. I’m going to give credit over there to David Seymour, because David Seymour has one thing that the National Party doesn’t have, and that’s consistency.

Back in 2017—and I’ve got a copy here for Mr Hudson to take away and read—Kanwaljit Singh chaired a select committee inquiry into how firearms were getting into the hands of gang members. Mr Hudson’s team included Ian McKelvie, included Kanwaljit Singh Bakshi, and included Alastair Scott actually. If I look at the list on the back—and I am going to take a little bit and seek another call—included Ian McKelvie, Maureen Pugh, Lindsay Tisch, and Jonathan Young. Here were some of the recommendations: that the law be amended so firearms dealers’ licences required to sell or supply ammunition be registered. Registering ammunition, that’s what the National Party were advocating when they were in Government. Registering firearms, that’s what the National Government were advocating when they were running the country. The only people who voted against that was New Zealand First, and we were lambasted by the National Party for being irresponsible.

Brett Hudson: And now they’ve folded. And now they’ve folded.

Hon RON MARK: “Now they’ve folded.”, says Mr Hudson. Who made these recommendations? This legislation contains every recommendation that the National Party put forward, and now they’re voting against their own recommended legislation.

Mr Seymour’s consistent—Mr Seymour’s consistent. He’s going to be in the wilderness, in oblivion. All the people who vote for ACT will see him sitting in the Opposition saying consistently the same message. I’ll give him credit for that. There’s no deviation. The National Party, by this record, flip-flops like a jandal on Bondi beach, doesn’t it?

Brett Hudson: What about your minority view, Ron?

Hon RON MARK: It says definition—it wants to alter semi-automatics, the access to semi-automatic firearms; effectiveness of licensing and training; criticises it; and then talks about firearms prohibition orders—what happened to that? Never happened. It makes for an interesting read when you look at it. One of the claims in this report that the National Party chaired, led, supported by the now Minister, Stuart Nash—I’ll give Mr Nash this credit: what Mr Nash said he was going to do in this legislation, he’s doing. The National Party supported firearms registration. The National Party wanted it. Ian McKelvie sat on the committee and voted for it, so too did Maureen Pugh, and, so too did Jonathan Young, and they took that report of theirs to their caucus, which included everybody who’s sitting here today—almost everybody—and passed it through their caucus. So all I’ll say to the National Party is that you’ve got your dream—you’ve got your dream. This piece of legislation does everything that Ian McKelvie and Jonathan Young sitting there—hi, Jonathan—said they wanted to do in 2017. So stop playing the games with the firearms owners. Stop playing games with them.

And let’s talk about New Zealand First. New Zealand First—[Interruption]—well, Mr Jonathan Young says that. New Zealand First has always pledged to play a responsible role in Government. We get plenty of accusations from people, and we have always supported—for 23 years, we fought against National’s arms amendment bill No. 2, National’s arms amendment bill No. 3, and National’s inquiry into arms. We fought against them all. This time we have got one thing that we believe is going to fundamentally change the way firearms legislation is run in this country. We have got into this a promise from the Labour Government. Now, we would have liked it, Mr Nash—

David Seymour: Labour Government.

Hon RON MARK: From the Labour team—thank you, David. We have got a pledge that in the first months of us coming back to the House, if we’re in Government, we will put legislation on the table. This legislation, quite frankly, is going to change. I don’t know what the hōhā is about. This legislation will change within months of coming into Government, as we seek to introduce an independent arms authority, which will take over. Wherever you read in this bill right now “the Commissioner” and “Police”, that will change.

Brett Hudson: You won’t be there, Ron. You won’t be there.

Hon RON MARK: Put your money on it—put your money on it. Put your house on it—put your house on it.

We will change this legislation in the first few months of the next Government, whomever we’re governing with. And, if the National Party wants to come to the coalition negotiation tables, then you’re welcome. But we will change this legislation. Labour has committed to changing it. Labour’s committed to an independent arms authority, removing the functions of writing the law and enforcing it—separating it, taking the role and responsibility, the issues that Mr Seymour’s talking about, out of the hands of police: determining who should have a licence and administering those licences.

New Zealand First believes that, fundamentally, the system is broken. It’s hard to argue with four Cabinet Ministers and nine MPs and keep a stable, coherent, reliable, responsible Government in the white hot heat of 51 people dead and 50 more wounded, and thousands of people—it is hard to argue against that emotion.

David Seymour: Oh!

Hon RON MARK: It’s hard, Mr Seymour. Try it when you’re in Government. Oh, you’ve never been there—that’s right—and never will be.

Brett Hudson: Well, that’s not true.

Hon RON MARK: But when we’re sitting in coalition negotiations, Mr Hudson, looking across the line, all I’m going to want to hear from Mr Hudson is no more flip-flopping. Say what you mean and mean what you say. Give us the independent arms authority that we seek. Give us that complete review of this legislation, the post-implementation review, which Mr Nash has committed to, which will be done in three years, not five, to ensure that everything that’s said about this piece of legislation, the reason that’s here, is it actually happened. And where we have identified failures, we address again. That is our pledge to the firearms owners of New Zealand, whom we’ve always—I’m looking at Hon Judith Collins, and I know she’s always supported sane, sensible firearms legislation. And I know that she will support a post-implementation review of this. I know that she will support an independent arms authority to take over the control—

Brett Hudson: He sold them out.

Hon RON MARK: —of the firearms administration and the writing of the firearms law of the future. This is not my final contribution, Mr Hudson, there’s more.

Hon JUDITH COLLINS (National—Papakura): Oh, thank you, Madam Chair; what an excellent choice. Well, it was very nice, all those lovely things said about me, but not about my colleagues, by the Hon Ron Mark. Yeah, I would support this if it was sane and sensible legislation, but it’s not, and, given the fact that the Hon Ron Mark has stated very clearly that should New Zealand First help to form the next Government, this will be one of the very pieces of legislation that’s changed, why are we voting for it now? The answer is because it is actually not up to it. So he’s giving us the argument right there.

Now, I have been very supportive of the first tranche of changes into the arms legislation, because I felt something needed to be done on these. I’m also very supportive of the firearms prohibition orders that don’t seem to have made it through to this bill. We have argued for a very long time in the National Party that the criminals are the people who we should be going after when it comes to firearms, not the law abiding farmers who happen to have firearms to control pests. They are not the people who are going around committing these atrocities—they are not the people—and yet why is it that this Government, with all of its ability to get legislation through because they have the numbers in Parliament—and they have the tremendous goodwill that we gave them for the first tranche of firearm reforms—why is it that the two, are, let’s say, unable to actually bring forward the firearm prohibition orders, which would actually target the gangs, target the criminals, target the stockpiles of guns, ammunitions, and even, in some cases, grenades and other explosives in gang headquarters? Why is that? The answer is because the law-abiding people of New Zealand are a far easier target.

I agree that the police should not be the people in charge of the administration of the Arms Act, and I agree with that for this very reason: police are not administrators; they are A-type personalities who like to deal with crime and sort that out and prevent crime. That is their mandate from the people of New Zealand. Where they have failed—and it’s very clear that the Minister must have known about this failure well over a year ago—is in the administration of the Arms Act. That is not to say that every arms officer in the country wasn’t doing their job, but it’s pretty jolly clear, from what we’ve now seen in the media, and elsewhere, that one particular one certainly wasn’t doing his job.

And that’s because the arms legislation and the arms rules and the way it’s administered are not seen as a career path in the New Zealand Police. One doesn’t go and become an arms officer because it’s a move through to become the commissioner. This is a job that is at the end of a career, and it’s basically put on the side.

We can’t have the New Zealand Police in charge of an area of administration where they are not up to the task, and that is because it has not been a priority, and it should have been a priority. That is a failure, and it’s a failure in the administration to have not addressed this earlier. Having said that, Parliament has always given this role to the police—for many, many years; at least the decades that I’ve certainly looked at. It’s time for that to change. This does not change in here. This bill does not address this. It’s not to say—I don’t wish to dismiss the excellent work of the New Zealand Police, but, actually, in the administration of this Act, it has failed, because it is not actually an administrator—it is not a role that it is comfortable with.

This bill does not address the issues my colleagues have raised. It does not address the issues that the New Zealand public, the law-abiding New Zealanders who have firearms for their work and also for their sport, have raised with us. This bill is a cheap, shoddy piece of work that the Minister the Hon Ron Mark has already said would be up to be reviewed straight after an election. Well, I can tell you, Madam Chair, that it will be up for a review because it will be our Government that’s doing it. And he knows that I will want firearm prohibition orders, and he knows that our Government will not sit by and let criminals have access to guns while law-abiding people are having to prove why they should have to have this access.

This is an important bill for us to not support. It’s an important bill for us not to support because it is shoddy, it is rushed, it does not have the full support of Parliament, and it does not have the support of the people.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH (National—Nelson): I want to focus on Part 1 of this bill and the failure of the Minister to be upfront with New Zealanders about the background of this bill and the awful tragedy that occurred in Christchurch on 15 March last year. I was gobsmacked to read this week that the licensing of the madman who killed 51 people on 15 March did so and received a firearms licence against the law of the day. Now, for this bill that we’ve debated, and the previous bills that we have promoted, this Parliament had a right to know what went wrong with that man getting a gun licence.

So my first question to the Minister: when did he know that police failed the old law in vetting the issue of the gun licence for that individual? I am at loss as to how a man applies for a firearms licence in Dunedin, the law requires that a close associate or family member vet for him, and someone at the other end of the country, in the Waikato, who’s only met him on the internet, provides that verification. We’re not talking about a failure of the law; we’re talking about the failure to do the basics right, and that is what is at the core of that tragedy. So my first question to the Minister: when did he know? Simple question, Minister.

Hon Stuart Nash: I’ll answer it then, now. Sit down, I’ll answer it.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: I’m happy to yield.

Hon STUART NASH (Minister of Police): Madam Chair, thank you very much. I think, Mr Smith, it was 19 March. I think it was 19 March, but it was certainly around that date that police themselves put out a press release saying that they believed all the processes were followed. Now, what we have seen on the front page of the New Zealand Herald yesterday is an aggrieved ex-officer who came out and said, without any evidence, that he does not believe the process was followed. So what we’ve got is the police saying they do believe the process was followed. So I heard about a week after the Christchurch terrorist killed 51 people that the police believed the proper process was followed.

Ms Collins made a couple of points I would like to reiterate—or answer, I should say. Ms Collins stated that a police officer who is an arms officer, or who is administering the Arms Act—that’s not a route to be the Commissioner of Police, and why would anyone want to do it? That was her inference. Well, the Minister is a former—

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Ruth Dyson): Sorry to interrupt the member.

Hon Dr Nick Smith: I raise a point of order, Madam Chairperson. The process of yielding is for the purposes of answering the specific question of when he knew.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Ruth Dyson): That’s not a point of order. The Hon Stuart Nash has got the call and he has up to five minutes. You understand the new process of to-ing and fro-ing, that speeches are no longer limited to five minutes. You can take shorter speeches, have your question addressed. If you feel the Minister hasn’t addressed your question, you’ll have another opportunity to raise that in your next call.

Hon Dr Nick Smith: No, no, that is not—the process of yielding is to enable the Minister to specifically address that question. He is entitled to continue his call in respect of the issue of which I yielded on; he is not entitled to then hop off and just take a general—

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Ruth Dyson): The Hon Stuart Nash.

Hon STUART NASH: Thank you, Madam Chair. What I would say to the former Minister of Police Judith Collins is she is well aware that some of our most effective community officers are those who are ingrained in the communities and have been there for ever. Not everyone wants to be the Commissioner of Police. I think those officers who are out there every single day administering the Arms Act actually do their very best. They are committed to getting this right. I also agree with Mr Ron Mark, though, that, in fact, putting this into an independent authority is in fact the right thing to do, and it’s why we’ve committed to do that.

A couple of questions from Mr Seymour. Mr Seymour asked me if in fact the law as it stands, as opposed to the legislation in front of ourselves, is not fit for purpose. Well, Mr Seymour, it’s not. That’s why we’re here. Have a look at clause 36. Take a look at that. Under that, the Christchurch terrorist would not have received his current licence. It’s why we are here today, because the 1983 legislation—

Brett Hudson: The police didn’t know that, Mr Nash.

Hon STUART NASH: —is not fit for purpose, Mr Hudson. It’s why we are here today. The other thing I would say—

Hon Dr Nick Smith: I raise a point of order, Madam Chairperson.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Ruth Dyson): I hope it’s not the same point of order.

Hon Dr Nick Smith: I wish to refer to Speakers’ ruling 56/2, and you may want to refer to it in the Chamber. I’ll read to you what it says: “When a member yields to another, the member given the floor may refer only to the matter raised by the member yielding. A member yielding yields the member’s time to the other member.” It’s quite explicit, that when I agreed to yield to Minister Nash, it was specifically about the question of the timing. The Speakers’ rulings are very, very clear, and I ask you simply to enforce the rules of the House.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Ruth Dyson): Quite correct. So the Minister’s time is up.

ANDREW BAYLY (National—Hunua): Thank you, Madam Chair. This is obviously a—

David Seymour: I raise a point of order, Madam Chair. I think it is helpful to have this discussion as we adapt to new rules. I was under the impression that if a member yielded to a Minister in this discussion, then that member would also receive the next call. In fact, I think it was either yourself or the Hon Anne Tolley who said as much at the beginning of this committee stage last night.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Ruth Dyson): In order to be given the call, you have to seek a call.

ANDREW BAYLY: —very testy debate—and quite rightly so, in my view, given the significance of this legislation. I just want to return to the question that my colleague the Hon Dr Smith just raised. I don’t actually believe that you have answered the question, Minister Nash, because the allegations around the police checking the terrorist Mr Tarrant’s application, the allegations around the appropriateness of those checks, has been up for a debate and swirling around the public, obviously, since 19 March, which is what the Minister just referred to.

If you did know about it on 19 March, my first question to you, Minister, is: given that that is over a year and these allegations have been in the public domain for all that time, what have you done about it? Have you actually—

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Ruth Dyson): Sorry, could you please not bring the Chair into the debate, Mr Bayly.

ANDREW BAYLY: OK. Has the Minister, in fact, undertaken any investigation as to what actually occurred so that we could be definitive on it? If that is the case, it would be excellent to take the opportunity today to talk about whether, in fact, the process did break down and Mr Tarrant actually ended up getting a licence when he ought not to, because that is very unclear and having things in the media is very, very untidy and inappropriate given this debate today.

The other thing that I want to talk about: last night, when you introduced this bill, you said, and you made this claim, that this bill would keep New Zealanders safe and “We’re going to keep guns from the hands of bad people.” You asked why we weren’t supporting this bill. Well, it’s pretty clear, Minister: the current Act that’s in place is a result of delays in terms of publicising the prices that would be paid to people who return their weapons and just the whole chaotic process that happened. You know that only 56,000 automatic weapons have been handed back in; there is an estimated 250,000 out in the market right now, swirling around, all across New Zealand. That is an incredible amount. You’ve only picked up 20 percent of all the estimated number of items.

I see you shaking your head. We do know that every automatic weapon that had to come into this country had to be imported through an import licence, and therefore there are records that show—even if it’s within 10,000 or 20,000—that there are probably 250,000 of these automatic rifles in circulation. You have, as a result of this past bill—the Minister’s reactions have only captured 56,000 of it. It is a miniscule amount.

One of the principal reasons why we have an issue with this bill is that it is unsuccessful. It has been unsuccessful. This bill won’t help much more, because what this bill does is it targets farmers, it targets sports clubs, it targets those who want to do competitive shooting, and it targets people who just want to own a rifle and operate appropriately—and also part of that is gun collectors. The whole intent of this bill is about those who will act lawfully, who do act lawfully; what it hasn’t dealt with is the issue around gangs and those who can get these types of arms and use them for bad circumstances. That is the reason why we don’t like it.

The last thing that I want to just pick up on in this short contribution is this, somehow, glorious wave of people from New Zealand First coming in and saying that they’re going to solve it. My question to you, Mr Mark: where were you in the last bill, when we were trying to change things around sporting arrangements? In fact, if you had been involved in the last Finance and Expenditure Committee, which I haven’t seen you in, Mr Mark—I’ve never seen you at a meeting, Mr Mark. Somehow it’s “Ronnie-come-lately” trying to say that “We’re going to save it.” Why didn’t you turn up to the select committee? In the select committee, we had actually talked about an independent group to monitor firearms licences. If you want to try and say it’s your idea, you should have turned up to the select committee, Mr Mark. It’s not your—[Time expired]

Hon Dr NICK SMITH (National—Nelson): I want to return back because the debate we’re having on Part 1 and this entire, vigorous argument about appropriate gun laws comes back to that awful tragedy that occurred on 15 March 2019 in Christchurch, in which 51 New Zealanders lost their lives. The entrée for determining what is the right legal change must first be to establish what occurred, and it’s not that difficult. Now, I ask the question: the murderer in Christchurch, did he get his gun licence appropriately under the old law? A pretty basic question.

What we have found out is that in November of 2017, that individual got a gun licence, but only this week we have found out that the checking of the referees did not occur according to the law, and I just simply want to know what the truth is. It’s very simple, and I actually find it quite appalling that 17 months after that tragedy, basic, important facts about what occurred are not being disclosed. So I’m going to ask the Minister again: were the proper referee checks carried out on the gunman who killed all those people in Christchurch? What is alleged this week is that the referee checks were people that the gunman had had an internet-based chatroom with—really?

Fifty-one New Zealanders lost their lives as a consequence of police not doing their job of vetting that man under the existing law, and why that matters is that there is all this effort and work about rewriting the law and, actually, it was a failure of the old law that brought that tragedy to New Zealand. The requirement of the Minister in the chair, the Minister of Police, is very, very simple: who was the referee for Mr Tarrant? Was it, as alleged, an internet chatroom friend from more than a thousand miles away and at the other end of the country, because if that is true, why has this Parliament—which, over the last 18 months, has debated arms laws extensively—not had access to that most basic fact.

There’s a piece of paper in the police department that will show the paperwork of who the referee was. Does the Minister in the chair know who the referee was? It’s a very simple question: who was the referee that provided the evidence to police in November 2017 to issue him with a gun licence—does he know?

Hon Stuart Nash: Do you want me to answer the question?

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: It’s very simple: does he know—yes or no?

Hon Stuart Nash: Do you want me to take the call?

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: No, no—the last time you wouldn’t answer the question. Just answer the question—yes or no—does he know who was the referee for Mr Tarrant’s gun licence issued in November 2017? It’s a very basic question.

Hon Stuart Nash: Do you want me to take the call?

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: Well, in answer, does he know?

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Ruth Dyson): I think it would be really helpful—

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: I’m happy to—

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Ruth Dyson): —if members tried to address the legislation that we’re considering.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: Well, actually, it’s fundamental to the—

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Ruth Dyson): Sorry, it’d be really helpful if you didn’t talk over me. Could you please resume your seat. You’ll have the rest of your call.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: Well, the last time I did that, you took the call off me.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Ruth Dyson): That’s correct, because you didn’t take it. It’s not helpful to the process of the committee for the member and the Minister to have a cross-bench conversation. If the Minister wants to answer the question, he can stand and take a call, and that’s the process that the House has agreed to, and that’s why we’ve surrendered the four-speech limit. So you can have as many calls as you like and keep asking the same question. It’s up to the Minister to determine whether he answers it or not, but it is expected of a Minister to answer it.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: I’m happy to yield to the Minister, providing the Chair will enforce the Standing Order that he’ll keep to the answer that is required and the call is returned to myself. If the Chair gives that reassurance, I’m happy to yield to the Minister to answer the specific question: did—

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Ruth Dyson): OK, if the member could just—

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: —he know—

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Ruth Dyson): If the member could just resume his seat, and I want to correct the assertion that Mr Seymour made on the same point. During the debates in the House, a member can yield a part of their 10-minute speech—their one 10-minute, allocated speech—in order to have a specific question addressed. The process during the committee stage is different. With the four-call limit removed, members should not yield, but, rather, a series of short calls enable questions to be answered, and members can be confident they will have multiple short calls.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: There is a very important question pertinent to Part 1 as to how the murderer in Christchurch got access to his firearm. The law of the time required a referee. What we know is that a police officer has alleged that the referee was not a family member nor a close associate, as required by the law, but a person who lived more than a thousand miles away and who had only met the killer via an internet chatroom. That is extraordinary, and what is even more extraordinary, I would say to Mr Seymour and others in the committee, is that Parliament has spent months debating arms laws, but it has not had access to that very basic fact.

We asked the Minister—and I’m just going to keep asking the Minister because I say that we owe it to the memory of those 51 people who lost their lives—for the answer to the very basic question: was the referee for the killer in the Christchurch tragedy a person who lived a thousand miles away and who had never met the killer? Why that is so pertinent is because it would show that that tragedy was not caused by a flaw in the law, but was caused by the law not being followed.

So while we can have all of the debate about the provisions in Part 1, if this Parliament is to be true to the memory of those 51 people, we owe it to get to the bottom of the facts of what occurred and we owe it to ensure that we go after the failures that occurred that resulted in that tragedy because of the old law being breached, in the event that that was the justification for the issuing of that gun licence that was pertinent to the killer gaining his arsenal of weapons, which he used so abhorrently on 15 March. So, again, I say to the Minister in the chair that he’s got access to the information. He should share it with the committee.

A very simple, pertinent point, and that is: who was the referee who enabled police to issue that gun licence, and was the issuing of that gun licence done lawfully? I would contend to the committee that it could not have been issued lawfully if it was for someone who had only met the murderer via an internet chatroom, and someone—

Michael Wood: Completely irrelevant.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: Well, Mr Michael Wood interjects that he thinks it’s irrelevant. He thinks it’s irrelevant as to how the killer in Christchurch got to get a firearms licence, because it’s only through getting a firearms licence that he was able to get the arsenal that enabled him to kill 51 people. I would say to the chair of the select committee—who’s far more interested in ramming legislation through than getting it right or in protecting future New Zealanders—that he has been negligent. Mr Michael Wood has been negligent in his duties as chair of the select committee and in not wanting the answer to that question.

I ask Mr Michael Wood: does he know who the referee was for the Christchurch murderer to gain a firearms licence in November of 2017? He doesn’t want to answer the question. New Zealanders want the answer to the question, and whether it be the chair of the select committee or the Minister of Police, I say this: what are they wanting to hide? How can they look New Zealanders in the eye and say of the most open and transparent Government ever—we know there’s a piece of paper in the police department that will very simply answer the question as to who that referee was. Before this Parliament advances legislation of this sort, we need that answer because we need to know and we need to be absolutely confident that in the arms laws that we are passing, we are fixing the errors that let that tragedy occur in Christchurch. I say that the Minister in the chair has been negligent in the 15 months after that tragedy in not being able to answer that very pertinent question, and I invite him to do so now.

Hon STUART NASH (Minister of Police): Yet again, we’ve been debating this bill now for over an hour and, yet again, we have heard another speech, which was about a 10-minute speech, on something that has absolutely no relevance to the legislation before us. I would also say that when that member asks what have I done to deal with the issues, Mr Nick Smith, we are here debating the solution to what the issues were. I will answer Mr Smith’s question yet again, but for the very last time.

Mr Smith has been a member of this House for a long time. Mr Smith is also very aware that there is a royal commission at the moment that is looking at how that terrorist obtained a gun, a licence, and his ammunition. Mr Smith is also very aware that as a Minister and as a member of Parliament, first of all, I have no access to what the royal commission is deliberating. They have not put out a draft report, they have not put out a report, they have not released anything. It is not the place for a Minister of the Crown to second-guess what the royal commission is going to come out with, because I do not know. It is the royal commission that is looking at the answers to your questions, Mr Smith.

Now, one thing that I would request members to do is—we’ve got about another half an hour on this section; can we at least—after an hour and a half of general, third reading speeches, it would be good to talk about stuff in this bill, or is it the fact that you agree with the bill to the point where you’ve got no contention and, therefore, you don’t want to talk about the bill? Mr Smith asks what is the solution to the issue we’ve found ourselves in. The solution to the issue we’ve found is this piece of legislation, Mr Smith, and let’s debate this legislation going forward. That is my request. Thank you very much.

BRETT HUDSON (National): Thank you, Madam Chair. I’ve been impatiently waiting, but, you know, we all have our faults. I just want to traverse—because there were comments the Minister of Police made in his two contributions prior to this last one that I wish to touch upon. But, first, an earlier comment from Mr Ron Mark, who waved around a piece of paper like Neville Chamberlain—because he has sold firearms owners down the river—and said, “Oh, National are flip-flops.” What he didn’t say was that New Zealand First’s minority report in that inquiry report said that they would oppose all of these measures, including a registry, and what are they doing? They’re voting for it—they’re voting for it. The “Jandal Party” are voting for it. Well, there we go. There is no consistency over there. Of course, they’ll only get to vote for this round, because there’s every chance they won’t get to vote on an amendment in the next Parliament.

The Minister said that this bill would keep those firearms out of the hands of New Zealanders, particularly criminals. Mr Seymour correctly pointed out that it was the first bill in April that addressed that. The Minister said that the fit and proper person test gets new elements in this bill. Well, actually, the advisers told us in select committee that it was simply codifying the elements that are already in the police code for a fit and proper person test. So what is it, Minister? Is it new, or is it simply codifying, as we were told, in legislation the rules that already apply?

The Minister then had the gall to—or, no, maybe it was an astounding revelation. He said new section 24A(1)(j), which is about the patterns of extreme behaviour—he said that would have stopped the Christchurch massacre. Well, what is in the public domain is that the police only became aware of that after the events, so therefore the inclusion of that couldn’t possibly have prevented that happening. But perhaps the astounding revelation we’ve learnt today is that the police were aware of that pattern of behaviour, or what they considered a pattern of behaviour, before 15 March but they felt they didn’t have the authority under law to reject a firearms application from that guy. If that is the case, that is an astounding revelation which should have been in the public domain. Actually, I don’t think it is. I have confidence in what has been publicly reported to date. The police didn’t know until after the event, and therefore the change that the Minister claimed would have prevented it most certainly would not have. There’ll be more to say about that fit and proper test when we come to Part 5. I was just responding to comments and claims the Minister had made in this part in his contribution.

So my questions I do have for the Minister, specifically on my Supplementary Order Papers (SOPs) in Part 1, which I was finishing last night and got the last 20 seconds of this morning—firstly, on the pest control. The Minister last night said, “Nah, it’s all about territorial authorities’ pest control plans.” If that is the case and that is, in fact, what the regulations are today for commercial pest control, Minister, and you don’t want to adopt my SOP—I think that’s a mistake, by the way. My SOP applies to all owners of rural-zoned land, which would accept the fact that they’re not all farmers or productive owners of land. But pests are still a problem on that land, and, what is more, pests do not respect fences and borders, so if the pests grow on one piece of unproductive land, nothing’s going to stop them going to the farm next door and creating havoc and damage there. So, firstly, Mr Nash, you should accept my SOP on the basis that it does have a legitimately broader application to owners of rural-zoned land.

But even if you refuse on that basis, then do one thing—do one thing to give confidence to those that own and work the land, and that is remove the words “that have detriment of significance”. As you yourself said, this is all about pest control issues and plans approved by territorial authorities. If that is the case, if that is truly the case, then the words “detriment of significance” are unneeded, and all they do is pose a potential bureaucratic hurdle that those farm owners and workers will have to jump over and through just to get the tools that they actually need to help control pests on their property.

I also have questions on Part 1 on my SOP for sport shooting. The Minister last night said, while it’s not the sort of sports shooting I was referring to—International Practical Shooting Confederation, the three-gun stuff, the Service Rifle Association stuff—the Minister last night—[Time expired]

JAMI-LEE ROSS (Botany): Thank you, Madam Chair. I’ve tabled an amendment to the Minister’s Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) 511 that I hope he may be willing to answer some questions on. Then I hope I may be able to speak to it further. I’d like to ask the Minister of Police for the rationale behind why quite invasive impacts on people’s personal medical details, which could potentially go back many, many years, are included in this legislation. I’ve proposed, in a tabled amendment, that there be some deletions within his SOP. They’re namely around the requirements for an applicant to provide the name of their doctor and their contact details to police when making an application, and also the requirement for police to notify an applicant’s medical professional should they be ones that get a firearms licence. Those are contained within clauses 34, 35, and 36. Later in the SOP, in clause 83, there’s a requirement for a medical practitioner, if they have concerns about a licence holder, to inform police around those concerns. There’s also no requirement in there for the medical practitioner to inform the actual licence holder themselves that the medical practitioner has made such a notification to police.

This, on the surface, I say to the Minister, feels like an intense invasion into the private medical details of individuals. It also would act as a disincentive for people—and, we know, mostly men that are licence holders, who may be more likely than others to withhold their background when it comes to their medical information. It would act as a disincentive for people to seek help in the system. And I say to the Minister: these are intrusive powers. These are powers that go far and beyond what any person would normally want to have to offer. And these powers could go back many, many years. Imagine a situation where a 50-year-old man decides he wants to get into shooting because it’s a passion he’s wanted to pursue and was able to later in his life. Imagine the situation where that individual, through their teens or in their twenties, suffered from depression or suffered from some difficult circumstances in their life. That background could be held against them in the future when they seek a firearms licence. And I imagine an answer might come back which suggests, “Well, look, there’ll be limitations on how far it can go back.” and, “Well, the police will be reasonable in this.” But, within the requirements for the police commissioner to issue some guidance notes and advise health practitioners what they can actually notify the police on, there’s very broad powers for the commissioner to put in pretty much anything he wants around what a health practitioner should provide to police by way of a notification.

Disincentivising people—licence holders—disincentivising men, who, we know, don’t inform or seek help, to get assistance when they need it. Disincentivising licence holders to be upfront with their doctors about what they might be going through in their life I would suggest is actually, overall, detrimental to the public health and detrimental to the mental health and mental wellbeing of licence holders in general. Yes, it’s important that we consider these matters, but these types of intrusive powers which enable police to delve into the medical records of individuals seeking a licence and the ability for a health practitioner to, behind the back of a licence holder, inform police about what a person might be going through, I suggest to the Minister, are powers that shouldn’t be there and go far and above what is reasonable.

If we’re to consider these types of issues, we have to consider the context of existing powers and other pieces of legislation. I mean, the Civil Aviation Act at the moment requires similar requirements there around people who are seeking a pilot’s licence or people who do have a pilot’s licence. I know, as someone who does hold a commercial pilot’s licence and knows many people in the aviation sector, that those types of requirements act as a disincentive to those pilots to seek assistance, and they withhold things from their doctors. Do we really want all the licence holders out there to be withholding personal struggles or personal difficulties that they’re going through because of legislation like this? I wonder if the Minister has an answer to that particular question.

HAMISH WALKER (National—Clutha-Southland): Thank you very much, Mr Chair. I just want to reflect on a few of the Minister’s comments, especially around my colleague Nick Smith, who’s raised a very sore point with the Government. Mr Smith was raising the point of the fact we had a horrible, horrible, one of the worst days in New Zealand’s history, 15 March last year: 51 lives destroyed, many families ripped apart. The community of Christchurch went through a bloody tough few weeks.

The fact that this happened 15 months ago and then the Minister, in his previous speech, said, on 22 March, about a week later, he had a report from the police which stated all processes were followed. The Minister then said we had to find a solution to what the issues were. A solution to why a terrorist went on a spree which resulted in New Zealand’s worst day.

Now I’ll put it to the Minister: the solution to what the issues were—you are the solution; you are the issue, Minister. You are the issue. The fact is that this policeman, a long-serving police officer, came out in various media organisations in the last week stating that the proper processes weren’t followed. Now, according to these reports, he raised this the following months—two months later—to the New Zealand Police, and the most open and transparent Government, the very police Minister, has the cheek to sit here and say he knows nothing about it. It’s a disgruntled police officer.

CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): Order! It won’t take much for the member to get his contribution so far in order and relevant to the bill. We’re doing Part 1, so if he can make those points and make them relevant to the bill—it won’t be difficult, and he’ll be in order.

HAMISH WALKER: Thank you, Mr Chair. Just on Brett Hudson’s Supplementary Order Paper (SOP), especially Part 1—

Brett Hudson: Good SOP.

HAMISH WALKER: It’s a very good SOP. My question is, to the Minister: can he put his hand on his heart and say that he didn’t know? Because this very police officer raised these concerns to the police two months after the fact. And, in the meantime, the Government has gone after law-abiding citizens, a quarter of a million of them, who are very caring people. They are responsible. They undertake extensive training to get their gun licences. They care for their environment because without the environment they wouldn’t be able to go hunt. Yet the Government has attacked these law-abiding citizens the last 15 months, and the police Minister didn’t disclose the fact that proper processes weren’t followed.

In the meantime, the celebrity Prime Minister goes over to America and tells everyone she’s banned high-powered firearms. Yet the most open and transparent Government haven’t disclosed the fact this proper process wasn’t followed.

The National Party—I think my hard-working colleague here Brett Hudson—put up a very good bill last year to give police the ability to search for illegal firearms on gang members. Police can stop a gang member and search them for illegal firearms. Yet the Jacinda Ardern Government voted it down and spent the last 15 minutes going after very responsible, caring, law-abiding citizens, being gun owners.

So my question is, to the police Minister, tell this House, tell the law-abiding citizens out there, the gun owners, that he truly didn’t know about the very fact that the proper process under the old law wasn’t followed. That’s my question to the Minister.

Hon STUART NASH (Minister of Police): I’m not going to answer those questions again, because I think I’ve answered them about four times, but I will just make one correction to the member Hamish Walker. The man who makes the allegations is not a police officer; he’s a former police officer and has been a former police officer for quite a long time. But, yet again, we get another five-minute speech that doesn’t mention anything in the bill.

Jami-Lee Ross talked about health practitioners. We actually believe—this goes also to Mr Seymour’s Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) 458 and Mr Hudson’s SOP on this as well. What we do believe is that currently Police is not maximising the opportunity to draw on the knowledge of health practitioners to enable early identification in the consequential management to the risk of self-harm, of death, by firearm. I had a meeting with Rural Women New Zealand, and they talked about the fact that one of the greatest fears they have is when their man disappears to the back of the farm in tough times and doesn’t return. Now, what we’re doing here is we’re not obliging health practitioners, we’re not saying they must contact police whenever they have concerns; it says they should consider contacting police. In fact, as I think Mr Hudson alluded to in his second reading speech, what we’re putting in place at the moment is actually no more than is in law anyway. What we want to do, and what we’re asking the police to do, Mr Ross, is actually notify the health practitioner that their patient does have firearms.

But this isn’t about relitigating anyone’s past and looking at a mental health episode that might have happened 20, 30, 40 years ago and saying you’re not fit and proper. This is actually using what we believe is information to determine if someone is fit and proper, but it is not a way to say that someone cannot have a licence. It’s about managing the licence process. When the original bill was submitted to the House, it was tougher. The Privacy Commissioner had a look at this and he made some strong recommendations, which I do believe were picked up by the select committee; so I think where we’ve landed on this is actually the right place. The reason I say that is because most suicides by firearm are rarely preceded by attendance at a mental health service or a hospital for self-harm. For a person who is undergoing a mental health episode at that point in time, firearms make is of significant concern. So what we’re saying is the doctor should consider contacting police under certain circumstances—that’s all.

Hon RON MARK (Minister of Defence): Thank you, Mr Chair. I would like to take another call for New Zealand First. Look, it is interesting sitting here and listening to this conversation as it unfolds right now, and I guess, if there’s one thing that it does reinforce, and it doesn’t matter where the contributions are coming from in the House, there is clearly concern around a number of aspects of this bill. New Zealand First made no secret of it. We very publicly—and recently, on the black and white—

David Seymour: You’re still voting for it.

Hon RON MARK: Well, that’s right, Mr Seymour, because, you know, ultimately, at the end of the day, one is charged with the privilege and responsibility of delivering stable, coherent, capable, reliable government, and in doing so, and as the member knows, when he was in a coalition Government, at times he had to do things to support the Government that he may not necessarily have 100 percent agreed with. But you do your best as a constructive member of the Government, as Mr Seymour did when he was in Government, and holding a privileged position, to do whatever you can—your caucus does whatever it can—to change.

I think the greatest thing that the New Zealand First caucus has achieved is actually getting the independent arms authority now on the table. We would have liked it to have been passed before the House lifted on 6 August, but, clearly, things such as COVID and a range of other things have worked against us, and we are determined, and we have a commitment from Labour—I’m looking for the same commitment from National—that, post-formation of a Government, we will continue with a pledge that the Labour caucus has given us at this point in time, and given us absolutely faithfully, and the Minister has repeated in his opening comments, that we will establish this independent arms authority.

The comments that have been made, and the questions that have been asked right now by the Hon Nick Smith, and a number of others, I have to say, are fair questions, aren’t they? They’re fair questions. And it does raise this question, overall, about the level of confidence and competence that the Police have demonstrated over a period of time in the administration of good firearms legislation, and about their ability. And one of the submissions that kept reappearing and reappearing—and I went back through the submissions, Mr Hudson—was people’s concern about the ability of the police to interpret the Act as they saw appropriate, and implement it the way they saw appropriate, and adjust the regulations through the Regulations Review Committee, which, actually, the Opposition played a part in as well, by the way, as they saw appropriate, and to make changes.

Now, all of this is leading to—and this debate today is reaffirming that there has been an undermining of confidence now on the part of firearms owners in the police’s ability to do this job, to the point that you now, actually, face down the line non-compliance issues through people just simply not having confidence. We cannot go forward as a nation with firearms legislation and with a situation between police as the enforcers and, actually, the people who help write the legislation and advise the Minister, when things are in the state that they currently are in for the firearms owners. So that reinforces a position that New Zealand First had to talk about, going back to what Justice Thorp originally offered up in 1997. And we think, actually, on balance, he was right. Do police necessarily want to go with that? Probably not. Do police think they’re capable of carrying on administering the law? They probably do. But, actually, that’s not the point. This House decides, and Labour has agreed, and I thank them for that agreement.

Brett Hudson: Put it in the bill.

Hon RON MARK: Well, that’s a good question, Mr Hudson. So it isn’t in the bill. And it would’ve been in the bill, but we don’t have it in the bill, but what I have is an iron-clad pledge and a promise that we will attack that legislation as soon as we get back.

But my message to Mr Hudson and to others who want to criticise New Zealand First is: fine, but don’t give us 12.7 percent when the Council of Licensed Firearms Owners conducted a survey of who in the firearms fraternity actually voted for New Zealand First—12.7 percent; 12.7 percent. So nine MPs and four Cabinet Ministers are expected to win their way on that. Well, it doesn’t work that way. But let’s see what we get.

The campaign issue will be around sporting shooters and their ability—

David Seymour: I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. I’m really eager to get on to debating the amendments proposed in the parts of this bill. I can’t see how voter support in certain organisations and what the campaign of the election is are relevant to parts of this bill. Now, I don’t mind if this debate goes on all morning, so long as I get to debate the actual amendments and the parts of the bill. If he wants to keep on going on that way, we’ll have the political debate in the committee, but I just want your assurance we’re going to get to the actual content that the committee is supposed to be debating.

Hon RON MARK: Mr Chairperson—

CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): No, I’ll make a ruling, thank you. There are aspects of what the member has said that are absolutely correct. I have been listening very carefully to the contribution, and I have to say relevance is becoming an issue on both sides. I gave the—

David Seymour: Not in the end—

CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): Let me finish. I gave the speaker who spoke before the Hon Ron Mark, Hamish Walker, some encouragement around that. I thought the member the Hon Ron Mark’s contribution has mostly been in order, but it’s a difficult situation when you’re in the Chair of balancing out the entirety of the member’s contribution where, at the end of it, you might think, “Well, that was 60 percent relevant.”, etc. So it’s really up to this committee: the committee has it in its hands. The member has 49 seconds remaining, and he does, actually, have the ability to bring what he has said thus far in order.

Hon RON MARK: Thank you, Mr Chair. So the question around the firearms registration system, which has been hotly debated here, and in the amendments to the Act—it’s fair to say that in the past, we have argued against such a thing. And other members on that side of the House have voted in favour of such a registration system. The point is, we are now putting into this legislation a mechanism that will delay the implementation of that registration for three years, and there will be a post-implementation review. That post-implementation review, New Zealand First hopes—

Brett Hudson: So we waste the money and then say it didn’t work.

Hon RON MARK: —well, we’ll insist—will look at all of the arguments that have been put here tonight and look at the original objectives laid out by the police and espoused by the Minister—[Time expired]

DAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): Thank you very much, Mr Chair. As I’ve just raised in a point of order, I’m very eager to get on to debating the parts of the bill. However, I think the reason it’s been so difficult to do that—

CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): Sorry; are you raising a point of order now?

DAVID SEYMOUR: No, I thought you gave me the call; but it’s a call. No, sorry—I’m taking my call, yeah.

CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): No, it’s just that you started off by talking about a point of order.

DAVID SEYMOUR: I referred to a point of order I made earlier. I apologise for any confusion.

CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): Yes, and that’s been ruled on. That’s why I’m asking.

DAVID SEYMOUR: Yeah, yeah—and I just mentioned it, you know. I wasn’t trying to relitigate it or anything like that.

CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): Don’t do that.

DAVID SEYMOUR: No, I would never dream of it, Mr Chair. We are very eager to get on to the details of the bill. One of the reasons that’s been so challenging is that the Minister in the chair, the Hon Stuart Nash, started with a range of, frankly, irrelevant content that’s had to be responded to and mostly refuted, and then the New Zealand First member Ron Mark has got up and talked about a whole lot of politics that are not actually relevant to the bill. Nevertheless, it does need to be responded to. What I’d say to the New Zealand First member is that I acknowledge it’s unparliamentary to call people by other than their title or their full name, but I did like the description of his behaviour, on this legislation, as “Ronnie-come-lately”, because the fact of the matter is, we’ve got a New Zealand First party that voted for the first tranche, is now voting for a register of all firearms, is now voting to invade the doctor-patient relationship in relation to firearms, is voting to put damaging regulations that will kill many clubs, and is saying that it’s OK—in the way that, unfortunately, in our country, abusive spouses sometimes say, “We’ll be different next time.” If you vote for New Zealand First, they’ll be different next time. That’s the message that he’s trying to get across.

I’ll also put a series of questions to the Minister that he so far has not answered. They’re questions that need to be answered, coming out of this debate that’s arisen throughout the discussion. One is: can he be sure that it’s going to be effective to take firearms off law-abiding firearm owners, which is what he said is his intention, if there is still going to be illegal importation of firearms? He hasn’t given us that guarantee. He hasn’t addressed that question.

I asked him, could he tell us what countries have achieved 90 percent compliance with their firearms register. Because that was the real test. He was up all night thinking about my speech. He gave a flaming response to it this morning—first thing, as soon as he got his feet under the desk this morning—but that’s the simple question: the matter of fact. He talked about cars; we’re not here to debate cars; we’re here to debate firearms. And where in the world have they had 90 percent compliance with a register that’s been effective? It might interest the Minister to know that his department, the Police, recently released an OIA request which found that over half the firearms seized by police have the registration markings ground off them. That’s interesting, isn’t it? Tells you something about the real world out there and how effective a register might just be. So that was a question I wanted him to answer.

But the other question I had for the Minister that he hasn’t answered at this stage is a question around: does he believe that the law, as it was on 14 March or in the months preceding, when the Christchurch terrorist got his licence, made the Christchurch terrorist a fit and proper person? And this is important to this bill, because the Minister in his opening address said we are changing the definition of a fit and proper person so that the Christchurch terrorist could not have got a licence. Well, my question to the Minister is simple: was he a fit and proper person, according to the law, when he did get a licence? If he wasn’t, then changing the law is not going to help much; it just means he would have been breaking different laws. I don’t see how that helps those people slain in the worst terrorist incident in our nation’s history. It’s a waste of time.

Interestingly, he may have answered the question with “I don’t know.” when he said, “I’m waiting for the royal commission.” If that really is his answer, then I want to ask the Minister of Police: what is the point of legislating now if he doesn’t know what problem is he’s trying to solve and he knows he doesn’t know because he said he’s waiting for the royal commission to tell him? And, finally, I want to ask: does he believe the Police press statement on March 19 or does he believe the allegations in the press? He’s avoided that question. He hasn’t actually said which one he believes.

But I want to get to Part 1 and specifically new section 1A(2)(a) within that part, in clause 5, and that says that the regulatory regime—[Time expired]

MICHAEL WOOD (Senior Whip—Labour): I move, That the question be now put.

BRETT HUDSON (National): Thank you, Mr Chair. I have some questions to the Minister of Police on my Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) on sports shooting exemptions. Last night, when I first introduced this and the Minister of Police responded then, he raised issues, saying, “Well, it would allow lots more people to have exemptions to use prohibited firearms. It’s not really a sport, because it’s not in the Olympic Games or the Commonwealth Games.”, and he also said, “Oh, the National Rifle Association (NRA) would just be able to come here and set up clubs and we wouldn’t be able to stop them.” Well, I’d just like to challenge the Minister on that. I have some questions for him to actually consider and answer.

The first part is: is the Minister actually aware that most—not all but most—of the individuals who participate in these sorts of sport shooting events that might use prohibited category firearms, such as the International Practical Shooting Confederation three-gun competitions and the Service Rifle Association competitions—there are others but they are the predominant ones. Is he aware that most—admittedly not all—of those people are people that, for instance, are pistol users and hold B-category endorsements, so are already subject to, and followers of, the conditions which he has acknowledged in this committee, in this debate this morning, who are reliable and trustworthy and can be depended on to hold and use their firearms appropriately. They’re the same people. So it doesn’t introduce 2,000 more people that could possibly have prohibited category firearms or some sort of restricted firearm. It actually is a much smaller increment. So what, Minister, is the evidence that the risk profile would change substantially to not warrant such an exemption?

On the matter of the legitimacy or validity of the sporting competitions: on what grounds is it that a sport or a sporting code specific discipline is only legitimate if it is part of the roster of events at an Olympic or Commonwealth Games? I hold that that is a complete fallacy. It is a straw man, for one thing, but it’s a complete fallacy to put forward. There are many sports. There are certainly many disciplines within sporting codes that are not part of the Olympics or the Commonwealth Games, but they are very real and they are particularly very real to the participants of them, many of whom are able to compete for world championship medals and trophies. They hold them as valid as any other world championship, medal, or trophy. So on what grounds can it be argued that a sport is not a real sporting competition if it’s not in the Olympics or the Commonwealth Games? I contend that it isn’t a basis for argument and, therefore, it’s not a basis to refuse to have this sort of sports shooting exemption in this country.

The third point the Minister made on the NRA coming over and setting up clubs—I highlight for the Minister’s attention my SOP. It says that that must be certified by the commissioner. I’ll put it as a question: does he have confidence in the ability for the commissioner to make reasonable determinations on what should be certified? I know I do, and I’d certainly hope that he would too. And if not the commissioner today—because it is the police that are administering the Arms Act today and if this bill passes—but into the future, would he have confidence? Would he expect to have confidence in the head of an independent body that might administer the Arms Act to likewise make certifications under appropriate grounds?

So, actually, Minister, each of the three points you raised as to why the sport shooting exemption shouldn’t be approved I think I’ve answered, and I’d like you to come back with responses to my questions, because, in the face of that, I can’t see any reason why any member of this committee, except maybe the Greens, who have always been staunchly opposed to firearms, would vote against it. I’d certainly look across to Mr Mark. Here’s an opportunity for New Zealand First to vote for an SOP that will actually give firearms owners one of the things that I’ve called for. Stand up and be an independent party; vote in favour of it. We’ll win. The firearms owners will get what they deserve, and that’s democracy in action. It’s actually MMP in action, Mr Mark. So here’s your opportunity. Let’s do this.

Hon STUART NASH (Minister of Police): Thank you very much, Mr Chair. David Seymour gave another five-minute speech. I don’t think there were any questions there relevant to the bill; so I’ve got nothing to say—

CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): Order! It’s the Chair that makes that determination, not the Minister in the chair.

Hon STUART NASH: OK. No questions worth answering there. Mr Hudson, I did talk about your Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) last night, and what I will do is I will reiterate the points I made last night. But the other thing I would say is I used the example that, in fact, there are no sports in the Commonwealth Games or the Olympic Games that use banned firearms. I did not say that if they are not part of the Olympic Games or the Commonwealth Games, they are not a sport. I just used the example.

Now, one thing I would say is keep in mind the purpose of this legislation, and the purpose of the bill beforehand is to ensure that we remove these firearms from our communities. It’s why we voted; it’s why, Mr Hudson, you voted; it’s why your party voted to remove these firearms from our communities. Now, as we know, every single exemption we put in place—it would put one in place with regards to pest control—just chips away a little bit at that; it just opens up the door.

Now, we turn to pest control. I’ve talked about your SOP on that a couple of times as well. We have said that if, in fact, there is a bona fide reason for a farmer to have to use these weapons for pest control, we’ll give them the exemption. Now, in terms of the sport shooting SOP, there are numerous international competitions and events that use these prohibited firearms, as the member has alluded to himself. We estimate that, even if we have an exemption just limited to three-gun, let alone all the other competitions, there would be around about 2,000 exemptions. So what Mr Hudson’s SOP recommends is that we open this exemption up to every bona fide international competition—

Brett Hudson: All of them are pistol-holder licences.

Hon STUART NASH: No, that’s not true, Mr Hudson.

Brett Hudson: They have to be to compete in three-gun, Minister. One of the guns is a pistol. They have to hold a pistol endorsement.

Hon STUART NASH: No, we’re talking about your SOP, Mr Hudson, which talks about opening this up to every single bona fide international competition. What that does is it opens the door to anyone who wants their AR-15, their AK-47, or the other banned firearms back so they can compete. The aim of this legislation, I must say, is to remove these dangerous firearms from our communities and, Mr Hudson, the SOP 450 would open not a crack in the door but a massive gap to allow a whole lot of people through, because if we said that any bona fide international competition that used these banned firearms would get an exemption, we would see thousands of applications for people to have licences for banned firearms, and that goes against what we are trying to achieve in this bill. In fact, I believe it would fundamentally erode the basic principle behind this bill. So just to clarify once again, Mr Hudson, I will not support your SOP 450, for the reasons that I’ve outlined.

JAMI-LEE ROSS (Botany): Thank you, Mr Chair. Thank you to the Minister for answering my questions relating to health notifications. I’m not persuaded by his arguments, and I do believe that what is going into this bill by way of his Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) 408 is an attack on the private, confidential relationship between a doctor and the licence holder. I think, Minister, this will be detrimental to the mental health of the very people that the Minister is trying to assist. I did hear him when he said that he’s spoken to rural women, and there are real concerns out there. I did hear him when he said they’re looking. The Minister sees this as an early detection opportunity to try and assist people.

Well, Minister, this, in fact, will act as a disincentive to people seeking help. We know already that, for the people who are most at risk when it comes to mental health and detrimental elements of their own mental wellbeing, putting in place a legislative requirement where doctors can abuse that relationship—behind the back of the licence holder, as it turns out, as well. That individual’s love and joy, which might be pistol shooting, it might be going out hunting once a month—the risk to that person’s love and joy and livelihood being taken away if they open up with their doctor about how they’re feeling, that is a detrimental risk that actually will harm people and will lead to people not seeking assistance. It will lead to people further hiding the challenges they want.

The Minister’s Government is pouring nearly $2 billion into providing greater mental health assistance to New Zealanders. The Minister’s Government is trying to put in place better primary health services in this area, only to then go and say to all of the licence holders that if you open up to your doctor and you tell your doctor how you’re feeling, and your doctor is a cautious doctor who thinks, “Goodness, if I don’t go and tell the police about this, then, if something happens, I’m going to be held liable.”, that is going to see licence holders say, “No, I’m not going to share my feelings. I’m not going to open up. I’m just going to keep hiding it.”, which is the very problem we have with men in this country killing themselves, because they don’t open up. They keep it confidential. They keep it quiet because they fear the ramifications.

I say to the committee and to the Minister that if we actually want to help those men, providing more services and getting more education in front of them is the way to go. If the real concern there is that if doctors have information that is going to actually save lives, and there’s a real and present danger and threat to someone’s life—let’s say someone goes into the doctor and says, “Hey, I’ve got a firearm at home. I think this afternoon I’m going to go and do something to myself.”, there’s already a legal ability for the doctor to do something to notify emergency services. There’s already the ability for doctors to do something if they feel there’s a real and present threat to the person’s life and safety and there’s a danger to others. Saying to all the licence holders out there, though, “The legislation is going to require you to shut your mouth if you want to hold on to your firearms.”, that is going to hurt the overall outcomes that we’re seeking.

It will also create a culture within shooting clubs, within the firearms community, where they’ll say to their mates, “Hey, you know what? If you are feeling a bit down, talk to us. Don’t talk to your doctor, because if you talk to your doctor, then something might happen. You might lose your firearms. They’ll go and tell the police. The police could make you go and undertake further medical treatment.” That is a fear that will be existing within the firearms community. There’ll be little boys out there who see their fathers who are involved in shooting clubs, and their fathers will say to their little boys, “Hey, be careful. Don’t talk to your doctor about how you’re feeling, because later on down the track, your doctor might go and tell the police.”

Whether we like it or not, there’s a distrust between police and the firearms community. I know police are trying to do the right thing, and I know the firearms community think they’re trying to do the right thing as well to ensure that they can enjoy their sport in a free and fair and reasonable manner, but there is that distrust there. By allowing an invasion, an attack on the private, confidential relationship between people and their doctors in a way which probably will have no appreciable benefits, but actually lead to people shutting their mouths about how they’re feeling, I say that’s a bad change to this law that shouldn’t go ahead. If the Minister, however, does want to pursue this further, then I at least ask that he considers inserting into his SOP the requirement for a doctor to at least inform the patient that they’ve made the notification to the police, and that’s on my tabled amendment. If a doctor is going to exercise that ability to breach the confidentiality, they should at least tell the licence holder too.

IAN McKELVIE (National—Rangitīkei): Thank you, Mr Chair. I thought it was never going to happen. It’s a great pleasure to take a call on Part 1 of the Arms Legislation Bill in the committee stage. But, before I get on to the points I want to raise on that, I need to raise some issues that the Hon Ron Mark raised, because he was giving me a psychoanalytic test of some sort, I think, and I just need to defend the patch a little bit. Because if you go back in time, he spent a lot of time talking about the arms inquiry 2015-16 parliamentary time, a very competent inquiry run under the stewardship of Kanwaljit Singh Bakshi. It took a lot of time to consider a lot of issues that are now being dealt with to some extent in the course of this bill. It made a report back to the Minister at the time. Some of those things were acted on; some of them weren’t. I reject his criticism of that inquiry. I think it was very well run, and I think the results were appropriate at the time.

What’s transpired since then is that we’ve had some extraordinary actions take place. We’ve had two bills brought to the House, one under significant urgency and this one ill-considered and under further urgency. The Hon Ron Mark himself said this bill is not appropriate, yet he is supporting it. So what we’re doing here is pushing a bill through Parliament that, frankly, has got very little support in Parliament and is going to be altered the moment the next Parliament sits. I don’t follow that at all. I think that’s a very flawed policy.

So the other issue that’s been raised by the Minister, in fact, when he opened the address last night and talked about the fact that we’re removing guns from the crims in New Zealand—we’re not removing guns from the crims at all. If you look at the police statistics on this when we were presented with the information at the beginning of this bill, they estimated there could be as many as 250,000 of these arms in our community. What did we do? We collected 56,000 of them. So on the basis of the information we were given, there could well be 150,000 of these guns still out there. Now, those guns have not been handed in, they’ve not been surrendered, and they must be still out there. They are inevitably going to fall into the hands of criminals because if you want to sell one, who are you going to sell to? You’re not going to sell it to a licensed gun owner, because you can’t. So the whole system is flawed.

So we’ve got a bill in the House that’s based on flawed information and that Ron Mark himself—who spent a lot of time in the course of his address to us, this last address to us, talking about 1997, which is a New Zealand First trait. They go back that far usually. He spent a lot of time talking about the Thorp report. That was 1997. The world’s moved on dramatically since then. So I want the Minister to justify to us why we are pushing a bill through in significant haste with ill consideration, and we’re going to change it the moment we have a new Parliament sit. I think that’s extraordinary. I think the Minister should justify to us why he’s wasting Parliament’s time with a bill that’s arisen from a process that’s clearly flawed. And now we have all sorts of stories out there about how the licensee, in fact, got his licence and how many other people in New Zealand have achieved or got licences under the same circumstances. It would be very interesting to know that.

The other thing I want to talk about in this short time on Part 1 is the issue that Brett Hudson has raised in the course of his Supplementary Order Paper, and that’s the issue that came up a number of times during submissions of pests and agriculture and the potential to use these types of guns for the elimination of those pests. Now, we listened to a number of submissions from Federated Farmers and others on this very issue. I, obviously, have a gun licence; I’ve declared that before. I’ve never used a gun that’s fired more than five shots at a time. In fact, if I fire five shots, I’m almost sitting down on my seat by the time I get to the fifth one, because I’m getting a bit older and it’s quite difficult to get them all out there, particularly with the steel ammunition we’ve got to use these days, because it’s terrible stuff. It’s brutal. But I do think that it’s a useful addition to the bill, but the problem is it’s not really going to achieve, in my view, the result it wants to achieve. That’s been raised a number of times by Brett Hudson. So I’d like the Minister to very quickly tell us how many times he thinks this clause that they’ve introduced around pest control will be used and what the demand for it is going to be as we move forward.

So I’m disappointed with the process we’ve gone through. I think it’s just not helping the cause at all.

Hon STUART NASH (Minister of Police): Thank you very much, Mr Chair. I’ve spoken, I think, four times on pest control, and I’ve answered all those questions. But to Mr Jami-Lee Ross, I need to answer some of the questions that that member’s put forward, and, in doing that, Mr Ross, I’ll also address Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) 447 from Mr Hudson. But I’ll come back to Mr Ross’s questions.

SOP 447 wants us to put “immediate threat” in terms of when the doctor must consider informing the police. Under the status quo—

Brett Hudson: I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. I would’ve allowed this to go, because, obviously, you’re in control of relevance, but the Minister, by using the words that he’s going to debate my SOP, SOP 447—that’s a Part 5 SOP. I won’t have the Minister debate the—

CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): No, that’s not correct, actually. It alters Part 5 of the principal Act. It’s in Part 1. So e noho.

Hon STUART NASH: Look, I’ll put yours aside, Mr Hudson. Mr Ross, we thought long and hard about this, because you are right: there is a fundamental relationship, there is a confidential relationship, between the medical practitioner and the patient, and that is sacrosanct. You know, the patient has to be able to trust their doctor that they are going to do the right thing. Under current legislation—principle 11 of the Privacy Act 1993, and in the Health Information Privacy Code 1994—a health practitioner may disclose information if they believe “on reasonable grounds that the disclosure is necessary to prevent or lessen a serious threat to public health or [private] safety”. That’s what exists in the law at the moment.

The bill is seeking to reduce the threshold for notifying police to deliver a better outcome for firearms licence holders. We worked closely with the Privacy Commissioner on this and what it would look like, and we also worked closely with the medical fraternity as well, just to ensure that we got that part of it right as well. So what the bill provides is that a medical practitioner “must consider”—and that word is “consider”—“notifying the Police” if they consider “that the health condition of the licence holder is such that, in the interests of the safety of individuals or the public, the licence holder should not be permitted to use or possess a firearm; or, should only be permitted to use or possess a firearm subject to any limitations that may be warranted by the health condition of the licence holder”.

Now, under clause 83, new section 91, if you have a look on page 106—you mentioned the fact that a doctor may not go to police or may consider being more conservative in his and her approach because they open themselves up to liability. What we actually did is remove the health practitioner’s liability in this case, simply for the reason that you’re talking about—the reason that you mentioned, Mr Ross. The other thing we did is that we said that if a health practitioner notifies the police that they believe someone is of sufficient state that the police need to deal with that—their licence needs to be removed or revoked or suspended—then the police have to go to someone independent of that medical practitioner. So, in essence, if the police decided to act on this in a way that meant that the firearms licence holder lost their licence, then that licence holder would be notified and an independent practitioner or expert would then come in and do an assessment as well. So the way the regime is set up—and this was mentioned under consultation with the Privacy Commissioner—is such that there’s a degree of independence from the doctor who has made that initial complaint if police want to carry this through and revoke or suspend the licence.

So we think we have got that balance right in terms of (a) protecting the privacy of the individual, (b) protecting the safety of the individual and our community, and (c) providing a level of assurance to the medical community that they won’t be held liable if, in fact, you know, in hindsight, a call they made might have been the wrong one. It’s the reason why we put the word “consider” as opposed to “compel”, and it is the reason why we removed that liability from the medical fraternity.

KIERAN McANULTY (Junior Whip—Labour): I move, That the question be now put.

Hon MARK MITCHELL (National—Rodney): Thank you, Mr Chair. I just want to put a few facts, as I see them, on the record, and I do have some questions for the Minister in the chair, the Hon Stuart Nash, as well. I want to acknowledge the fact that he is standing and taking calls and responding to the questions that are being put to him.

I spent the better part of a decade of my own life involved in anti-terrorism operations overseas. As we saw—

David Seymour: Undercover.

Hon MARK MITCHELL: —maybe I should say “preventing terrorist acts overseas.” One observation that I made immediately when we saw the tragedy unfolding in Christchurch last year was that, without doubt, there were going to be red flags that were there in terms of identifying the person involved and the fact that they shouldn’t have been able to obtain firearms legally. Now, in my mind, he probably would have tried other illegal avenues to try and get his hands on black market weapons. But I felt very strongly that there would be red flags there in terms of—and we heard some information come out initially that the gun club, where he had actually been going down and using the firearms, had flagged up to an agency that they had concerns around the person’s mental state.

We’ve now had a retired police officer—and I acknowledge the fact that we don’t know whether it’s a disgruntled employee or whether it’s a police officer, and I want to acknowledge their service—that has come forward with a genuine concern around the vetting process and the process that the alleged offender was subjected to in terms of being able to gain access legally to firearms. I would ask the Minister—because I know that the Hon Nick Smith has put this to him several times, and I know that he has made an attempt to answer it—are you taking seriously the information that has come forward from this person? They have been a serving police officer. Is the Minister taking some proactive action now in verifying and looking to see whether or not, in fact, there was a system failure around the vetting? This is critically important.

Look, the reality of it is that it doesn’t matter how good the system is that you have in place; there is always risk of human failure somewhere in it—there’s no doubt about that. That leads me to my next question to the Minister, which is that, in my view, even as that tragedy was unfolding—and I know the arms officers in the police have copped a bit of criticism throughout the debate, and I acknowledge that, because they’ve got to be held to the highest standards and an arms officer’s job is critically important for making sure that that vetting process is done properly and that they are making sure the community is protected from someone of poor character actually getting access to firearms. But I would ask the Minister: what was done in the 24 hours to 48 hours afterwards by the Government—by himself as Minister, and the Government—to analyse and look at the process and what had gone on and to react quickly to make sure that there was a response to make sure that the country wasn’t put into a situation similar to that in the following 48 to 72 hours? Because we know, historically, if you look around the world, copycat attacks can very quickly follow an act like that.

So I’m very interested to hear from the Minister what the Government’s response was initially and what has led them to bring this legislation into the House, because by bringing this legislation into the House, you would have to assume that the Government and the Minister have actually discovered that there were weaknesses in the system. That’s what you’re saying. You’re saying that, by bringing this legislation into the House, there were weaknesses in the system—what were they? What were the weaknesses? What was highlighted in the review that you should have immediately undertaken within hours of the tragedy starting to unfold? What were the weaknesses that were highlighted? Why has the Government responded in the way that they have?

We haven’t supported it. I’ll tell you why: because, to be honest with you, I don’t think that the real threat to this country and the safety of our citizens lies in law-abiding sport shooters that belong to firearms clubs—I just don’t. I don’t think the risk to our people and to this country lies in people that are undertaking pest management and eradication—I just don’t. I feel very strongly that the threat to our nation, to our people, and to the public is from organised crime and gangs.

I was in Taradale, late last year, where gangs had firearms on the street, and we averted, just by good luck rather than good management, a tragedy—[Time expired]

MICHAEL WOOD (Senior Whip—Labour): I move, That the question be now put.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the question be now put.

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.

Motion agreed to.

The question was put that the following amendments in the name of Jami-Lee Ross to the proposed amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 511 in the name of the Hon Stuart Nash be agreed to:

in clause 34, delete subclause (2)

in clause 35, new section 24, delete subsections (3) and (4)

in clause 36, new section 24B(1)(e), replace “; and” with “.”

in clause 36, new section 24B(1), delete paragraph (f)

in clause 83, new section 91, after subsection (2), insert:

(2A) If a health practitioner makes a notification under this section, they must, within 3 working days, inform the licence holder in writing that—

(a) the notification has been made; and

(b) the reasons for the notification.

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

Ayes 2

ACT New Zealand 1; Ross.

Noes 118

New Zealand National 55; New Zealand Labour 46; New Zealand First 9; Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand 8.

Amendments to the amendments not agreed to.

The question was put that the amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 511 in the name of the Hon Stuart Nash to Part 1 be agreed to.

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

Ayes 65

New Zealand Labour 46; New Zealand First 9; Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand 8; ACT New Zealand 1; Ross.

Noes 55

New Zealand National 55.

Amendments agreed to.

CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): David Seymour’s amendment to clause 16 set out on Supplementary Order Paper 456 is out of order as being inconsistent with a previous decision of the committee.

The question was put that the remaining amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 456 in the name of David Seymour to Part 1 be agreed to.

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

Ayes 57

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

Noes 63

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

Amendments not agreed to.

The question was put that the amendment set out on Supplementary Order Paper 449 in the name of Brett Hudson be agreed to.

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

Ayes 57

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

Noes 63

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

Amendment not agreed to.

The question was put that the amendment set out on Supplementary Order Paper 450 in the name of Brett Hudson be agreed to.

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

Ayes 57

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

Noes 63

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

Amendment not agreed to.

CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): Brett Hudson’s amendment to clause 36 set out on Supplementary Order Paper 446 is out of order as being inconsistent with a previous decision of the committee.

The question was put that the amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 457 in the name of David Seymour to Part 1 be agreed to.

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

Ayes 57

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

Noes 63

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

Amendments not agreed to.

The question was put that the amendment set out on Supplementary Order Paper 454 in the name of Brett Hudson be agreed to.

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

Ayes 57

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

Noes 63

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

Amendment not agreed to.

CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): Brett Hudson’s amendments to clause 53 set out on Supplementary Order Paper 445 are out of order as being inconsistent with a previous decision of the committee.

The question was put that the amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 448 in the name of Brett Hudson be agreed to.

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

Ayes 57

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

Noes 63

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

Amendments not agreed to.

The question was put that the amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 458 in the name of David Seymour to Part 1 be agreed to.

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

Ayes 1

ACT New Zealand 1.

Noes 119

New Zealand National 55; New Zealand Labour 46; New Zealand First 9; Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand 8; Ross.

Amendments not agreed to.

The question was put that the amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 451 in the name of Brett Hudson be agreed to.

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

Ayes 57

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

Noes 63

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

Amendments not agreed to.

The question was put that the amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 447 in the name of Brett Hudson be agreed to.

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

Ayes 57

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

Noes 63

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

Amendments not agreed to.

A party vote was called for on the question, That Part 1 as amended be agreed to.

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.

Part 1 as amended agreed to.

Part 2 Amendments to other enactments

A party vote was called for on the question, That Part 2 be agreed to.

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.

Part 2 agreed to.

The question was put that the amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 511 in the name of the Hon Stuart Nash to Schedule 1 be agreed to.

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

Ayes 64

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

Noes 56

New Zealand National 55; ACT New Zealand 1.

Amendments agreed to.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): David Seymour’s amendment to Schedule 1 set out on Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) 456 is out of order as being inconsistent with a previous decision of the committee. David Seymour’s amendment to Schedule 1 set out on SOP 457 is out of order as being inconsistent with a previous decision of the committee.

A party vote was called for on the question, That Schedule 1 as amended be agreed to.

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.

Schedule 1 as amended agreed to.

The question was put that the amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 511 in the name of the Hon Stuart Nash to Schedule 2 be agreed to.

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

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.

Amendments agreed to.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): David Seymour’s amendment to Schedule 2 set out on Supplementary Order Paper 457 is out of order as being inconsistent with a previous decision of the committee.

A party vote was called for on the question, That Schedule 2 as amended be agreed to.

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; Ross.

Schedule 2 as amended agreed to.

Clauses 1 and 2

BRETT HUDSON (National): Well, we’ll start with the title, shall we? There really is only one appropriate title for this bill, and that is the “Arms (New Zealand First Sells Firearms Owners Down the River) Bill”—because that is precisely what they’ve done. There have been so many contributions pointing out across the first and second—

Kieran McAnulty: I raise a point of order, Madam Chairperson. The Speakers’ rulings and Standing Orders are very clear that any proposed amendment to the title of a bill cannot be used to make a political point, and I would argue that the proposal made by the member opposite is doing exactly that.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): The Standing Order makes it very clear that that is the responsibility of the Chair. I thank the member for his advice, and as the speaker has only just begun his speech—I think he’s in his second, possibly third, sentence—I will consider what he’s saying in the light of that Standing Order.

BRETT HUDSON: Thank you, Madam Chair. There have been a number of contributions. It started, of course, with the first and second readings, but throughout the committee of the whole House members have pointed out the concerns for firearms owners about where the bill gets it wrong, and where it goes too far. I’m not going to go through all of them, but principally they’re saying it doesn’t do anything about genuine criminal activity in gangs but it puts a whole lot of extra cost, regulation, and rules on law-abiding firearms owners. New Zealand First, who have long held the position that they were there for firearms owners, had ample opportunity, including the deal they struck with Labour just before the debate in the committee of the whole House—they had the opportunity to actually deliver on what firearms owners said they wanted and needed, and they failed spectacularly to do so. We’ve got a pest control exemption expansion that’s got an enormous fish hook in it, that in effect, as the Minister in his contributions has admitted, isn’t necessary but has refused to take out.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): Well—

BRETT HUDSON: It is about significant detriment. It’s getting to the point of why we need to change the name of the bill.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): Good.

BRETT HUDSON: They haven’t done anything about clubs and ranges. They haven’t done anything about sports shooting. They haven’t done anything about opposing the register that for years they’ve said they opposed. They haven’t done anything to actually address the concerns that firearms owners have been telling them and us for years. That is why I think the more appropriate bill name reflects the failure of New Zealand First to put into action the words they’ve mouthed for years and actually stand up for firearms owners. The “Arms (New Zealand First Sells Firearms Owners Down the River) Bill” is a perfect title that describes what has transpired over the course of this bill’s passage to date.

On the commencement date, we learnt in this debate—and, again, it’s a bit of a part of the deal that was struck just before the bill entered the committee of the whole House—to our surprise, that it is New Zealand First’s intention—and, in fact, this is actually the Labour Party’s intention as well. If, and it’s a pretty big “if”, they were returned to Government—and it’s an even bigger “if” if New Zealand First was actually able to be part of that—the first thing they’d do is amend the Act again because they’re not happy with it, and there are some other changes they want to make. So you’ve got to wonder why it is we are persisting with the whole screed of commencement dates we have to various provisions here in clause 2 when so much of it is anticipated to change, if not the day after the election, we imagine, if we hold them at their word, pretty soon thereafter.

So it makes no sense at all to have an Act that’s commencing upon Royal assent or has elements that will commence in a shorter term when it is the express intention of two of the governing parties to further amend the Act in a substantial way. In fact, New Zealand First members in their contributions have indicated it’s not just to insert the Independent Arms Administration Authority to replace the police as the administrators of the Arms Act but, in fact, that they intend there to be further review and amendment just after the election to revisit some of the things that they didn’t bother arguing for this time, such as sports shooting. That could possibly be a change, a significant change, around the registry and could, hopefully, be reducing the obligations on clubs and ranges. But what they do suggest very strongly is that these commencement dates no longer make sense. Instead, what would be more sensible is a commencement date of three years after Royal assent. That gives time for the policy work to be done, an amendment bill to be drafted, and, hopefully, that’s a bill that’s drafted with the assistance of National and ACT together in Government.

DAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): Thank you, Madam Chair. I rise on behalf of ACT for this very narrow and purposeful debate about clauses 1 and 2, the title and commencement.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): It doesn’t have to be that narrow. Just looking at Speakers’ ruling 112/6, which gives some latitude to summarise and make concluding remarks.

DAVID SEYMOUR: Madam Chair, with that encouragement—

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): But that’s not a wide brief, OK?

DAVID SEYMOUR: All right. Well, strangely, what I wanted to talk about was the word “legislation” and particularly the role of the rule of law in this legislation and whether it’s appropriate to call this an Arms “Legislation” Bill when, actually, new section 1A(2) set out in clause 5 on page 13 here says that “The regulatory regime established by this Act to achieve those purposes reflects the following principles: (a) that the possession and use of arms is a privilege;”. Now, I want to ask the Minister of Police how it is consistent with the rule of law to say that having firearms is a privilege. You see, if it’s a privilege, then it’s something that a person is lucky to have—maybe that they should feel grateful for and that can be taken away from them at a whim, perhaps the whim of a police officer or other enforcement officer of the State.

This stuff really matters, because in a society where we have the rule of law, anybody—people that some might see as the lowest of the low, people that others might see as the highest of the high—has the right to look at the law of the land and say, “I have rights. I have rights to my property. I have rights to be treated under due process.” So does this Arms Legislation Bill really do that? If anything, by saying it’s a privilege to have firearms it departs from the principle that every New Zealander has equal rights under the law and says, “Actually, we’re not talking about legislation; we’re talking about privilege, something that can be arbitrarily taken away at a whim.” I quote F A Hayek, who said that if freedom means anything, it is the ability to make choices for oneself without concern for arbitrary coercion by another or others. As Hayek wrote in his excellent trilogy that I’m sure you will have read, Madam Chair, Law, Legislation and Liberty, it is impossible to separate the three concepts.

I need the Minister to tell us: is he really committed to the rule of law where firearm owners actually have some rights, or do they give it all up and should they just be grateful for what their local arms or other enforcement officer will let them have? That’s critical. And it matters not just to firearm owners. It matters to everyone to know if the Government is committed to the rule of law, and if the Minister is not committed to the rule of law, he should take “legislation” out of the title of this bill.

Now, Madam Chair, I hope I haven’t taken your encouragement too widely. I’d now like to talk about the commencement part of the clauses. The commencement is usually rather mundane so far as pieces of legislation go. It’s not too often that a committee of the whole House gets up on its hind legs and excited about commencement. But somehow, mysteriously, this Government has decided by changes to the commencement to make a policy issue out of commencement. And what is the substance of that commencement change? They’ve decided that this register is going to come into effect not after two years but after three. You have to ask why anybody could possibly think that a register in three years is a good idea but a register in two years is a bad idea. That’s what we’re being asked to believe by this Government and this Minister. New Zealand First have tried to take the credit for this delay. I can see the billboards now: “Vote New Zealand First and get bad law one year later”. That’s the promise of this change to the commencement clause.

But we know from when New Zealand had a register that it didn’t work. In 1982, when this Government—not this Government but an earlier one—commissioned a report, what did that report say? Well, one of the things it said was that of the nine homicides that happened in the previous year, none of them—not one of those nine homicides using firearms in 1981—were helped to be solved by the register that New Zealand had. That’s why in 1983, my birth year—this is how long ago it was—we got rid of a register. We can look around the world and refer back to the select committee’s report on what the effectiveness of registers is and we can’t find any evidence that registration works, and as I mentioned earlier, we’ve recently learnt from an Official Information Act request—not the information they want to give you; the information the law requires them to give us—that half of all firearms, illegal firearms, confiscated by the police in the past five years have had their serial numbers ground off. What use is a register then?

But the problem with a register, whether it’s in two years or in three, is not just that it’s ineffective in solving crime; it’s dangerous. We have seen, and it’s a great shame, many leaks of Government data in recent years. Now, perhaps the Minister is going to get up and say, “I acknowledge this problem, but give us an extra year and we’ll fix it. We’ll do what no other country’s done, what New Zealand’s previously abandoned, and what seems very dangerous.” But it’s dangerous because this Government seems to leak information like a sieve. Let me give you one example. There was a poor old pensioner who had a bit of trouble filling out his superannuation forms, and that somehow became public. There was a list of people who had tried to get involved in the celebration of 250 years since Captain Cook arrived, and their information leaked.

Some of these things are almost amusing but when it is a list of where every firearm is and its type and where it’s kept and who owns it, up and down this country—a steal-to-order list for criminal elements. There’s the great irony: one leak away from a steal-to-order list for the criminal elements. That’s the difference between a firearm register and a disaster: one Government leak. This Minister comes to the House and says, “The problem with illegal firearms is that people steal them off law-abiding people, so law-abiding people can’t have them.”, and then he says, “We’re going to come into this House and create a register that is one leak away from being a steal-to-order list for the most dangerous people in this country.” This Minister’s policies are part of the problem.

So I say to this committee and to you, Madam Chair, and especially to our fine Minister from Napier: it doesn’t matter if the register comes into being in two years or three years, it’s ineffective and it’s dangerous. What really matters is that it never comes into effect at all. That’s what’s at stake if we’re going to have a political debate. That’s what people—licensed firearm owners and non-licensed firearm owners who want to live in a safe society alike—should be considering. They should be asking: do we really want to put our trust in a Government that tries to tell you an ineffective and dangerous firearm register will be safe in three years but not in two? That’s what they’re asking you to believe. I hope that the Minister will come to his senses, take “legislation” out of this bill, because it’s nothing to do with legislation. In fact, it’s an affront to the rule of law—making firearm owners the only people in the country that are legally legislated as being privileged. Thank you, Madam Chair.

IAN McKELVIE (National—Rangitīkei): Thank you, Madam Chair—I’ll work very hard for this. I don’t want to spend a lot of time on the title of this bill, but I do want to comment on my colleague Brett Hudson’s naming of the title, because I think, frankly, that if I had my way, that title would be shoved in a box and put in cold storage somewhere for quite some time. But I do want to very briefly allude to why the title of a bill is important, because the reason it’s important is because you go to the website or whatever you used to do—you’d go out to Hansard, I suppose—and you find the title of the bill and you look up the information. You really go to the title of the bill to find out what that bill contains. Unfortunately, in this case, this bill contains some very confusing and, in my view, misleading information. So, effectively, what it does is you go to the bill, you look up the title, you find out what’s in the bill, and you’re extremely disappointed, and you’re disappointed for quite a number of reasons. First of all, it’s difficult to understand. Secondly, it contains a whole lot of facts and matters that I think are extremely difficult to follow.

I want to very briefly comment on a matter that the last speaker, David Seymour, raised, and I want to comment on it because I think it’s very relevant to where we’re at in life in New Zealand at the moment, and that’s the matter of privilege. Frankly, I think it’s a privilege to be alive. I think life is a privilege, and I think everything in life’s a privilege, actually, and if you look after it, you don’t have to write it down. That’s how life is. That’s how we should live, frankly. It shouldn’t be written down in legislation—extraordinary. It’s a privilege to eat—well, is it? I don’t know. We’ll have that in legislation next. I think that’s the concern I’ve got about things like this, because I—

David Seymour: It’s a privilege to fish.

IAN McKELVIE: Absolutely. Well, it is a privilege to fish, and it’s even more of a privilege if you can catch one—that’s the real challenge. But I do think that we take, I suppose literally, licence with some stuff. So I have difficulty with the title of a bill for that reason, because often what’s in the bill has got no relevance to the title of the bill.

Anyway, I want to get on to the commencement, and I want to deal with some issues that, again, were raised by a New Zealand First representative in Ron Mark. He talked a lot about the way the bill was constructed and how his party had made some magnificent changes to the bill, but, actually, he then talked about the fact that this bill is not relevant and we’re going to renew it when we come back to Parliament. The reason he did that was for the reason I alluded to in my short discussion on the title: because there’s so much in this bill that doesn’t make sense that it’s going to have to be rewritten when it comes back to Parliament. The commencement date and all those things that follow from it are also very confusing.

I want to briefly touch on the register, too, because that’s been a discussion that I’ve seen take place in this Parliament, in my time in the Parliament, and there’s no firm conclusion on how you would run a register. There’s no firm conclusion on how you’re going to operate that register. Of course, we’ve now got the register being delayed for three years. That’ll give us time to sort it out, I suppose. But many of the submitters at the time talked about the register and talked about the fact, as the previous speaker alluded to, that this place leaks. Not only does this place leak but most of our Government departments leak in one form or another. There were some very real concerns expressed by submitters at the time about the fact that a register would not necessarily be secure, and you can only surmise that that’s why they’re taking three years to design and put in place a register. Of course, by that time, there will be many, many more guns in New Zealand, because this bill doesn’t stop the sale of guns, and those guns will all be around the country and they won’t be on the register.

So the whole thing is flawed in every which way you look at it, and I think that the commencement date of this bill—it probably would save us all a lot of hassle if the commencement date of the bill was actually put back for three years and we reviewed the bill before we reintroduced it in the following Parliament, because it is very untidy.

Now, we’ve talked earlier in the debate about the fact that we supported the first tranche of legislation, and New Zealand was in a position which was extremely unfortunate. I absolutely agree that some of these guns should never be part of our society. They have no place in society, in my view. But nonetheless, the people that own guns and collect guns and operate in this sector are exactly the same as everybody else. They’ve got the same rights as everybody else in New Zealand. So I think that the commencement date of this bill puts those rights at threat, because, effectively, it’s staging—you might call it a confiscation of rights, but I don’t know whether it is, because I think if we took the bill in its truest sense and it settles down in due course, unfortunately, people accept what’s been taken from them, and I think that’s very unfortunate.

BRETT HUDSON (National): Thank you, Madam Chair. I was moved to speak again on this title and commencement partly because of your notification of Speaker’s ruling 111/4 but also Mr Seymour’s contribution on the name of the bill and, actually, just on something that Mr McKelvie raised.

But I just make the point first on—Mr Seymour mentioned leaks around registry and steal-to-order lists. Well, he did forget to mention the police SAP fault which led to licence holders being able to see all sorts of information about other licence holders, including the details of those prohibited firearms that they weren’t supposed to have. So it’s already happened, actually, Mr Seymour.

Mr McKelvie’s point about firearms not making it on to the register: well, the Government chose a certain buy-back scheme which they were warned would have lower compliance, and as a result there are up to 180,000 prohibited firearms still in circulation. Now, they’re held unlawfully and that’s bad, but they’re there, and they will never, ever, ever go on to a registry, which makes that intensely, intensely flawed indeed.

But the main point I wanted to stand and talk about was—Mr Seymour raised the issue about firearms ownership being a privilege in the purpose statement of the bill. It is true that in the purpose statement the Government has attempted, at least, to say that the ownership of firearms is a privilege. But I am pleased to say, and I’ve been waiting some time for this moment to say it, for firearms owners around the country, that the good work in the Firearms and Expenditure Committee has fundamentally changed that to the effect that it needed to, and that is in the issue of a firearms licence, clause 35. It’s to do with section 24 of the principal Act, “Subject to subsection (2), a firearms licence must be issued by a member of the Police to an applicant if the member of the Police is satisfied that—” and its fit and proper person criteria. It is the same fundamental criteria—a couple of tweaks—that has applied since 1993. It’s a restrained right, but it’s still a right. So firearms owners that have long held that as long as they are fit and proper people, they have a right to have a firearms licence—well, they do, and this bill ensures that they do. So my message to them is: ignore the purpose statement. It’s not the principal place of interpretation for the bill; the actual clauses are. Look in the “Issue of firearms licence”, look in what will be section 24 but it’s clause 35 of the Arms Legislation Bill. If you’re a fit and proper person, they must give you a licence. It is a restrained right, but it is a right you have for being a good and proper person.

DAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): Thank you, Madam Chair, and I want to thank Brett Hudson for reminding me of the leak during the firearm buy-back process using the Government’s SAP programme. But in fairness to me, it’s actually difficult to keep up with the number of leaks with this Government. I suggest, maybe, actually, what the Government should be doing is establishing a register of its leaks rather than a register of firearms—then we could all keep up.

I also acknowledge that the point Brett Hudson makes about how the “must issue a licence to people who are a fit and proper person” was a change made in the select committee, and a very good one. The fact it wasn’t there originally tells you what sort of attitude this Government has towards licensed firearms owners. They wanted to make it so that even if you passed all the legal tests, you couldn’t have it.

On the commencement, I want to just talk about the sequence of events here. The commencement says that it’s going to come into play after a given period of time. Now, in recent times, this Parliament has actually had some quite novel arrangements around commencement sections. For example, the End of Life Choice Act only comes into force if deemed voted to be so by the New Zealand public at a referendum, taking place at the election. I think there’s an opportunity for the Minister to actually be a bit creative and say that the legislation here shouldn’t come into force until after we’ve had the benefit of the royal commission, because we had a back and forth debate in here earlier where it was asked, “Does the Minister really know if he’s solving the problems that led to our nation’s tragedy in Christchurch?” Does he know that the rules that already exist have been enforced?” The Minister, having been challenged several times, stood up and, effectively, said, “I don’t know.”

Now, Stuart Nash is a very able politician. I remember him campaigning in Epsom in 2005, so he’s smart enough not to say, “I don’t know.”, but anyone watching could say that’s the fact of the matter. He said, “I don’t know. I’m waiting for the royal commission.” Now, the royal commission may answer—and I think the Minister is saying “will answer”—critical questions about whether the previous laws were fit for purpose, whether they were followed, and, by extension, whether the changes in this Arms Legislation Bill actually solve the problem.

There’s an opportunity here, for instance—the Minister could amend the commencement clause, if he wanted to, to say, “This legislation comes into force at such time that Parliament is satisfied it’s addressed the findings of the royal commission.” That would be a sensible thing to do, and there’s a number of ways that such a commencement clause could be done. It could be done by leave. I can’t speak for the National Party, but they’re generally fairly constructive folks; I think they would give leave—ACT certainly would—for this legislation to go back to a select committee that would review it in light of the royal commission.

Brett Hudson: We’ll support that.

DAVID SEYMOUR: Yeah, well, the National Party’s saying already—I mean, they’ve only just heard the idea but it’s so good that they’re supporting it already. And, you know, that select committee could actually look hard at—you know, given what the royal commission’s told us, because the royal commission’s got former Russell McVeagh lawyers on it; it’s a high-powered, expensive thing.

We want to make sure that we use its findings to make better laws, surely. We could actually say that this law doesn’t commence until Parliament’s satisfied with the legislation addressing the issues arising from the royal commission report on our nation’s tragedy in Christchurch. Then Parliament, you know, putting aside the election—because it’s not a political process but a law-making process—we could actually have a select committee, and that select committee could have a mandate, instructions from the House, to go and say, “Does this law measure up, given what we now know as a result of the royal commission?” I think that would be really smart. It would be innovative. It’s the kind of constructive thing that I know that Stuart Nash really believes, and I hope he’ll get up and say he’s going to commit to alter the commencement clause so we can actually have another look at this bill after we know what’s in the royal commission. Thank you, Madam Chair.

A party vote was called for on the question, That clause 1 be agreed to.

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.

Clause 1 agreed to.

The question was put that the amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 511 in the name of the Hon Stuart Nash to clause 2 be agreed to.

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

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.

Amendments agreed to.

The question was put that the amendment set out on Supplementary Order Paper 456 in the name of David Seymour to clause 2 be agreed to.

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

Ayes 57

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

Noes 63

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

Amendment not agreed to.

The question was put that the amendment set out on Supplementary Order Paper 458 in the name of David Seymour to clause 2 be agreed to.

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

Ayes 1

ACT New Zealand 1.

Noes 119

New Zealand National 55; New Zealand Labour 46; New Zealand First 9; Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand 8; Ross.

Amendment not agreed to.

A party vote was called for on the question, That clause 2 as amended be agreed to.

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.

Clause 2 as amended agreed to.

House resumed.

The Chairperson reported the Arms Legislation Bill with amendment.

Report adopted.

Bills

Electoral (Registration of Sentenced Prisoners) Amendment Bill

Second Reading

Hon ANDREW LITTLE (Minister of Justice): I move, That the Electoral (Registration of Sentenced Prisoners) Amendment Bill be now read a second time.

This bill amends the Electoral Act 1993. The purpose of the bill is to enfranchise and better facilitate participation in the electoral system for people in or recently from prison—those sentenced to sentences of less than three years.

I want to thank the Justice Committee for their consideration of the bill—in particular the chair, the Hon Meka Whaitiri, and in fact all members who sat on the committee to consider this bill. I know some were a little concerned that they sat throughout part of the lockdown period and took submissions, but I think the number of members of the public who responded to the bill is very telling. So the committee received 2,578 written submissions from interested groups and individuals, and heard oral evidence from 86 submitters through video and teleconference, and I think what is clear also is the number of those submitters who supported the bill was at 78 percent. That’s pretty unusual, actually, because, in a reasonably controversial bill—or at least a bill around this place that is regarded as controversial, especially by members opposite—78 percent of submitters supported the bill, which means that 22 percent were opposed, and the members opposite, no doubt, were representing that particular view.

Of the 78 percent who wrote to express strong support for the bill, of those in support, over 500 submitters commented on the bill upholding human rights. The reality about this bill is that it is a grounded and a very fundamental principle, and that is that you must have a right to have a say or to elect those who are going to run the country that you are freely exercising your rights in. If you are in prison at the time of an election and sentenced to less than three years, you are going to leave prison before the next election and re-enter society as a free person, and the principle is that you must have a right to have a say on those people who are governing the country that you’re going to be a free citizen in. That’s the underlying principle—it’s about upholding democracy.

Now, there are those who argued—submitters and others who argued—that the bill doesn’t go far enough. They wanted that right to be extended to all prisoners, and that’s not the principle we adopted. We adopted the principle that those who are in prison at the time of a general election and who are sentenced to less than three years and who will be released ought to have a say on those who are running the country that they are going to be released into. There was a very good set of submissions from Andrew Geddis and Graeme Edgeler, who commented on the arbitrary nature of the voting disqualification, and their argument was that that’s why the disqualification should be removed at all.

To the extent there is a disqualification—and it was before 2010—that re-entered our statutes in 1993, when the then National Government, with the then Minister of Justice, the Hon Doug Graham, now Sir Doug Graham, argued that the old disqualification was not justified on any grounds and that there ought to be an acceptance that those prisoners sentenced to a sentence of less than three years ought to have a right to have a say on those running the country that they’re going to go back into. That’s what this bill does.

The change made 10 years ago was never properly justified, and that was confirmed by the Hon Chester Borrows in his submission—a former senior National MP who, without giving too much away, clearly intimated that there was a problem when the governing party of the day 10 years ago championed that law. He was uncomfortable with it and he’s come clean and said that, and I’m pretty sure there’ll be members opposite, even today, who will be uncomfortable with it, but they won’t be allowed to say so. But there is a good reason to change it, and that is that we need to value our democratic principles and democratic rights as citizens.

Of those who submitted against the bill, there were some important arguments raised. There were some who were just opposed to prisoners voting, and that’s not what this bill is about. They said, “Well, you’ve broken the rules of society. You should have those rights and privileges withdrawn from you.” Although the reason you get sentenced to prison is that you forfeit the right of freedom of movement, the right of freedom of association, and some rights of freedom of speech—you have a lot of rights taken off you—you don’t actually stop being a citizen. No matter how bad you’ve been or how ugly you are in terms of your behaviour, you don’t stop being a citizen, and, in a sense, what this bill does is restore that cherishing of that right as citizens.

Some argued that giving prisoners the right would be hurtful to victims. There’ll be plenty of victims who will say, “That person caused me harm egregiously and has gone to prison. Why should they have the same right as I do—the right to vote?”, and I think the important thing there is to say that the purpose of a prison system doing its job is the corrective actions: taking somebody who has caused harm, calling them to account, and assisting them with their behaviour change so they turn out to be a good citizen. So that’s what this bill is seeking to do.

What I might add as I’m crediting the select committee for the work they’ve done is to note that the committee heard 18½ hours of evidence. They did a tremendous job, and, as I say, I know some of them were concerned—including the Hon Nick Smith, who seemed to want to have his level 4 lockdown period and have to do nothing. But, actually, as other select committees did, they used the technology. They were able to do their job as public representatives and engage with the public on this particular sort of issue, and so here we are.

Over 400 submitters submitted that allowing prisoners to vote would have a rehabilitative effect—there’s a judgment call there—and participating in the electoral process will be a way of building engagement and investment in society. The reality is that of people who get sent to prison, most of them come out, and we want them to come out with a positive attitude as a citizen towards the community that they’ve previously caused harm against. So this, if it helps, and maybe it does—but, in any event, it goes back to the important, cherished right to vote. Ensuring that our electoral system engages all communities is vital for a healthy democracy, and equally so is ensuring that our laws uphold all New Zealanders’ fundamental rights. That’s why this Government is committed to ensuring that people who will be re-entering their communities within the length of a parliamentary term will be able to have a say on who governs them.

I should also note the ruling of the Waitangi Tribunal. They investigated this very thoroughly, and, like the Attorney-General in 2010, who at the time said that this was inconsistent with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act, the Waitangi Tribunal said not only was it inconsistent with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act but it breached rights under the Treaty of Waitangi. We either value these important constitutional documents, or we don’t. We can’t sort of mouth off constitutionalism—like the Hon Dr Nick Smith does every now and again—but actually, in reality, not respect constitutional rights and constitutional norms. So this will have a rehabilitative effect on those important constitutional documents: the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act and the Treaty of Waitangi.

This bill will go some way to addressing a law that is presently unjustifiable and that causes a significantly disproportionate effect on Māori, because it doesn’t just take away the right to vote; it takes away the right to be on the roll. It deregisters voters, because the reality is they seldom ever come back on to the roll, and that’s what the Waitangi Tribunal pointed out—that if you are a Māori and sentenced to prison, under this law you are 11 times more likely than a Pākehā to be permanently removed from the roll and, therefore, denied the right to vote. That’s how insidious this law was—never justified, never proper—and now it’s being rectified.

I just want to talk about the one issue that did come up in the deliberations by the select committee related to whether or not prisoners going back on the roll should go on the unpublished roll. We have an unpublished roll. It is there for very good reasons, as it is about the safety of some voters. The bill as previously drafted, I accept, actually gave a virtually automatic right for prisoners, if they elected to go on the unpublished roll, to go on. That wasn’t the original intention.

Officials have given advice to the committee that it is possible to correct it. It was unfortunate that the committee could not reach agreement on that correction, but I will be introducing a Supplementary Order Paper that will correct that so that there is no automatic right for a prisoner going back on the roll to go on the unpublished roll. They have to meet the same test as anybody else, and it has to relate to their personal safety and security. So that will happen. There is also an obligation on prison managers to communicate very clearly to prisoners about enrolling so that that is clearly understood. On that basis, I commend the bill to the House.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH (National—Nelson): National opposes this bill on principle. We oppose it in respect of its impracticalness. We also oppose it in terms of the appalling parliamentary process that the Government has used again today, in urgency, in ramming this legislation through.

We come from a very practical perspective in respect of what happens when someone goes to prison, which is that they lose freedoms. They lose the right to go wherever they wish, the right of association, and the right of being able to receive information. It is absolutely proper—as in the case of the UK and as in the case of most democracies—for people, while they are serving their sentences in prison, not to be able to vote. It is part of the punishment for breaching the laws that make for a civilised society. Members opposite have argued—and the Labour Party came to the select committee and said that even people like the murderer in Christchurch should be able to cast a vote—that it is their basic freedom and human right. Well, we disagree. That individual, who killed 51 people, has removed the right of others to vote.

But it’s not just appalling offenders of that sort. At the select committee, we heard evidence that to go to prison in New Zealand, you actually have to be pretty bad. The number of offences that a person needs to commit to end up behind bars averages 24 convictions. This sort of soft line from Labour that someone’s committed some minor offence and they end up in prison and they remove their democratic rights is a gross misrepresentation of the position. Our law and our judges send people to prison only when they have, multiply and on many occasions, broken the law of this land, and members opposite are so focused on the rights of the prisoner and the offender that they forget every time about the rights of the victims. We heard from victim after victim at the select committee of people who have taken lives who will now get to vote in the 19 September election, but their victims will not get to vote, and that caused offence.

I remember from my period as Minister of Corrections about how impractical it actually is for people to be able to vote in prison. Members opposite need to explain: are you going to be able to have candidates’ meetings in prison, and are prisoners then going to be able to claim they have a right to free access to information and get on the net? Many of those prisoners may have, in fact, committed porn offences and other such offending. The reality, and what I found as Minister of Corrections, is there is almost a universal view from our prisoner managers that, actually, there are all sorts of practical problems with trying to have prisoners fully participate in our elections. There is far more to elections than just filling out the form. It’s about engaging with the public and it’s about learning what the policies and the issues are, and that is not compatible with prison.

I also want to talk about the absolutely appalling process around this bill. I take offence at Minister Little saying that I was not prepared to spend 13 days under lockdown working on this bill—

Kieran McAnulty: It’s true.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: —because I didn’t want to work. The member says that that’s true. Well, I want to tell the member what I was doing in lockdown. I’ve been a constituency member of Parliament for my community for 30 years, and I have never been as busy, working from 7 in the morning to 10 at night, dealing with hundreds of constituency cases, life-and-death issues—issues like people with COVID-19 who are not able to get personal protective equipment for the carers of them, people who couldn’t get tested when they should have been tested, and people that needed access to foods that were essential to their life. Madam Speaker, you say that it might not be relevant to the topic, but I tell you it is relevant to the debate and the process that’s occurred with this bill, because it was wrong that when New Zealanders were in lockdown and when members of Parliament were legally confined to staying in their homes, the Government’s priority was rushing into law the right for prisoners to vote.

What a warped—what a warped—sense of priorities, and it’s worse than that. The Justice Committee delayed its consideration of the sexual violence legislation, and this is about the rights of rape victims to get a fair trial. Well, that wasn’t a priority, nor was the bill about protecting first responders: ambulance officers, police, and others that work on the front line. Oh no, members opposite said, “We’re going to defer that bill—that’s not important.”, but when it comes to the rights of prisoners to vote, this was something that the select committee had to do under urgency, and it rammed it through this Parliament during the period of lockdown.

In other words, at the very time when 5 million law-abiding citizens were being required to stay in their home—effectively, under house arrest—the top priority for the Government was our criminal offenders being able to get a right to vote, and let’s not pretend that there is any great principle in Labour’s position on this. They simply see it as a cheap, easy way to change the rules to make their re-election on 19 September a little bit easier. This is a cheap, dirty way for them to score several thousand votes more. I make no bones about the fact that members on this side of the House prioritise the rights of victims ahead of the rights of those that criminally offend, as compared with members opposite, who always put the rights of criminals ahead of those that are victims of crime.

Now, when this bill entered its first reading, I raised the issues about clause 8 of this bill and the unpublished roll. Let’s remind ourselves what this bill says. It says that if you are a prisoner—a criminal—you have an automatic right to go on to the unpublished roll, but if you’re a victim of crime and if you’re a law-abiding citizen, you have to apply and you have to meet statutory criteria. When I pointed that out at first reading, the Minister of Justice said that I had it all wrong. He did his best to ridicule me and challenge what I had said. Actually, at the select committee, the officials accepted that what we said was absolutely correct, as did a number of legal experts.

I say to Government members and I say to the Green Party, what is possibly in your head that somehow you think that people who commit crimes should have greater legal rights than those who are law-abiding or who are victims of crime? That is morally repugnant, and that part of the bill—

Matt King: Unbelievable.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: —is just plain wrong. As my colleague said, it is just plain unbelievable.

The last point that I want to make is that this issue of whether prisoners are allowed to vote or not has been debated many, many times over in this Parliament. I think it was the Kirk Government—prior to the 1970s, it had always been that if you were in prison, you couldn’t vote. That Labour Government, a bit like this one, thought they could get some easy votes by changing the law prior to the 1975 election. It didn’t work. They got biffed out and the law was reversed, and it’s gone back and forward. But why is Parliament doing this law under urgency?

This isn’t a new issue. This issue was debated in 2008. We’ve had four electoral reforms in the interim. Why is it that just a few months out from the election, under urgency, the Government is ramming through this electoral law?

The last bit with which I have got huge difficulty is this. National, in its nine years in Government, with every Government electoral bill, took the view that we would not advance law changes on simple majorities and without consultation with parties opposite. It is not right that the governing parties rig the laws for the next election to make their re-election easier. We observed that principle, we consulted, and we actually changed a number of bills to ensure we had that. This is simply the Government again trying to distort the laws to make it easier for their re-election. It’s a bad process, it’s badly principled, and we will oppose it every step of the way.

Hon MEKA WHAITIRI (Labour—Ikaroa-Rāwhiti): E Te Māngai o Te Whare, tēnā koe. Otirā, e ngā mema katoa o Te Whare nei, tēnā tātou katoa. I’m pleased to take a call on the Electoral (Registration of Sentenced Prisoners) Amendment Bill, and can I first start by thanking the 2,580 submitters—2,580 submitters—made up of individuals and organisations who submitted on this bill.

The Justice Committee, of which I am the chair, spent 18½ hours in hearing oral evidence—

Hon Dr Nick Smith: During the lockdown—during the lockdown.

Hon MEKA WHAITIRI: —so I do want to commend the clerks of the House in that we heard 18½ hours from submitters on this piece of legislation—and, yes, we weren’t the only select committee hearing during lockdown—but I want to commend those submitters that took the time. I want to commend the clerks and the advisers, and I also want to commend the committee members, who at the time of COVID were facing a lot of challenges in their electoral offices. I’m not doubting that, and the previous speaker has raised that, but we turn our minds to this particular bill.

To remind the House, the bill is essentially three clauses—clauses 5, 7, and 8—and we will scrutinise that during the committee stage. But, essentially, clause 5 is around disqualifying who this bill doesn’t cover. So it doesn’t cover those in life imprisonment, it does not cover those in preventive detention, and it doesn’t cover those serving terms of three years or more. Clause 7 ensures that the prison officers work with eligible prisoners before they are released so that they are enrolled to vote, and, of course, clause 8, which the former speaker just mentioned, is around the unpublished rolls.

I heard the Minister of Justice say in this House that in terms of that particular clause, he is bringing in a Supplementary Order Paper. We as a committee talked and debated that particular clause very closely. The advice was given to the officials. Labour members of this committee agreed to those changes and the National members did not, but the bill that the Minister presents here is a reflection of those thousands of submitters and those hours of oral evidence presented to this House. Without further ado, I am pleased to recommend the Electoral (Registration of Sentenced Prisoners) Amendment Bill to the House.

SIMEON BROWN (National—Pakuranga): Thank you, Madam Speaker, for the opportunity to take a call on the Electoral (Registration of Sentenced Prisoners) Amendment Bill. For those listening, the House is sitting in extended hours on a bill which gives prisoners the right to vote. This is the priority for the Government coming out of a lockdown. Prisoners, those who are locked up for what they have done—the fact that they have committed crimes against victims in our country—are having the right to vote given to them, rushed through this Parliament as we head into the 2020 election.

I don’t try to be cynical, but that’s incredibly cynical of this Government to be spending the last few weeks of this Parliament in extended hours giving prisoners the right to vote. This Government has been in power for almost three long years. They’ve had three years to address this issue, but here we are, three months before an election, giving prisoners the right to vote as they seek to get their coalition of voters together prior to this election.

I’m proud to be on the National Party side of this argument and to be opposing this piece of legislation, because we take a principled view that those who commit crimes in this country, those who commit crimes worthy of being sentenced to prison, lose a number of their rights. They lose their right to freedom of movement, they lose their right to freedom of association, and they also lose their right to vote and participate in the democracy whilst they are in prison. They commit their offences in full knowledge, knowing that that is what will happen if they commit a crime. Ignorance is no excuse before the law. So I’m proud to be opposing this piece of legislation.

The second point I’d like to make is how this Government not only is rushing it through before an election but whilst the country was in lockdown. Whilst New Zealanders were fighting COVID-19, a pandemic the like of which we have not seen for a hundred years, and whilst New Zealanders’ lives were being transformed—people were losing their jobs, their livelihoods, their businesses; losing everything that they had—the Government was ramming this bill through the Justice Committee. Most other parliamentary business was put on hold during COVID-19.

Most other select committees put their business on hold. I sat on the Education and Workforce Committee and we had a number of pieces of legislation before that committee, but it was non-urgent in the light of COVID-19, and we did not continue progressing that legislation. Chris Hipkins, the Leader of the House, said that Parliament would not continue to push ahead with non-urgent pieces of legislation, so what was urgent about this? Did this have something to do with COVID-19? Did this have something to do with New Zealand’s response to the pandemic and helping New Zealanders get through COVID-19, helping restore jobs in our economy, or helping ensure that people had livelihoods to look forward to, to protect people’s futures? No. The only reason why this bill was pushed through during COVID-19 was for one simple reason, and that was to ensure that it could pass prior to the election.

That brings me back to the point of why has the Government not progressed this earlier. If this is such an important piece of legislation to be using Parliament’s extended sitting hours to be pushing this through now in the lead-up to the election, why did they not deal with this earlier? Why did they not sort this out sooner? Why did they not sort it out before the local government election last year? Or does it not matter because the Government’s not up for re-election in local government elections? Maybe it only matters when Labour Party politicians’ jobs are on the line.

The next point—

Hon Maggie Barry: So cynical.

SIMEON BROWN: Yes, I am a little bit cynical of the Government’s intentions around this piece of legislation. Who couldn’t be? I think most New Zealanders are, because during lockdown, submissions were open, and during lockdown, submissions closed. During lockdown, the committee was hearing submissions. During lockdown, this was the one priority the Justice Committee was continuing to progress through Parliament. Now, I find it incredibly, incredibly cynical that that was their number one priority. I want to echo the words of my colleague Dr Nick Smith, who made the point of the number of constituent queries and the issues which were affecting his electorate. Not one person was coming to my office or calling me up, emailing me, or whatever else, getting in touch—well, they couldn’t come to my office because we were in lockdown. But they weren’t getting in touch saying, “Oh look, I just hope, Simeon, that you’re prioritising prisoners voting right now.”

Dan Bidois: How many queries did you get?

SIMEON BROWN: Mr Bidois, I got no queries—no queries during lockdown with people coming to my office and saying, “Simeon, I just hope the Justice Committee is focusing on making sure that sentenced prisoners are registered and are able to vote in the upcoming election.” But that’s what the Government was prioritising whilst New Zealanders were fighting for their livelihoods.

I do also want to make the point that Nick Smith made around the number of convictions it takes to be sentenced to prison: an average of 24 convictions to go to prison—an average of 24 convictions. We’re not talking here about people who went a little bit over the speed limit. We’re not talking about people who may have committed some low-level offence. We’re talking about people who committed a substantial number of offences and who have been sentenced to prison.

The Sensible Sentencing Trust said in their submission that it was asserted when this debate began that it would not apply to prisoners who are incarcerated for serious and/or violent crime, and it would only be applicable to those prisoners who’ve been sentenced to three years or less. They put to the committee a very important point. In the fiscal year 2018-19, prisoners sentenced to three years or less, who would be now eligible under this bill—there were 6,657, of which 1,929 are in for serious violent crimes against the person. I just want to raise that point here, because we’re talking about people who’ve committed serious violent crimes. Under this bill, not only do they get registered but they also get the opportunity to be put automatically on to the secret roll. They get additional privileges which the victims of those crimes don’t get.

Last year, the Government statistics showed there’s been a 9.6 percent increase in victimisations here in New Zealand. This bill does nothing to put those victims anywhere into this debate. The select committee heard from victims, it heard from people who have had serious crimes put against them, and they’re shocked to see that those people who perpetrated those crimes are now going to be given additional rights during their time of imprisonment and will be given special privileges upon their registration.

I find this bill to be something which this Government clearly has an agenda to support in the lead-up to the 2020 election. Issues around electoral law, issues around registration to vote, and issues around our constitution should be issues which are dealt with in a bipartisan way. They should be dealt with in a way which is done with reasonable periods of time so that full consideration can be given to the debate and full consideration can be given during the select committee period. They should be done at a time when people are able to fully engage in that debate, because I dare say there are many, many, many victims of crime who were unable to submit because they were focused on their livelihoods, on their jobs, and on their businesses and would not have even been aware that this Parliament was ramming this bill through during the COVID19 pandemic. The National Party continues to oppose this bill and we’ll continue to oppose it through the remaining stages here in the House.

MARK PATTERSON (NZ First): Thank you, Mr Speaker. New Zealand First rises to support this bill, and, in doing so, to acknowledge the 2,578 submissions that went before the select committee, 86 of which gave oral evidence, 78 percent of which—or 2,000—expressed strong support for this bill. Five hundred of those submitters acknowledged that it was a bill that upholds human rights, and over 400 submitters said that allowing prisoners to vote would have a rehabilitative effect.

I think it’s worth reflecting on this, because this is the core of this bill. Former National Prime Minister Bill English described prison as a moral and fiscal failure, and one of the efforts that the Minister of Corrections, Kelvin Davis, has been putting in within this term of Parliament is to up the rehabilitation rates and help to transition prisoners back into society, because while there is a punitive element to it—and there needs to be, actually—we need these people to be coming out of prison ready to re-engage in civil society, and this bill, by re-enfranchising them and giving them a connection to the democratic process, is part of that effort.

I would like to reflect that this bill merely returns us to the former status quo, as was passed under the Bolger Government of 1993, in the 1993 Act. The status quo that we have now is only in place because of a member’s bill by Paul Quinn in 2010. If the members opposite in the former Government had been so convinced that this was a huge priority for them, they would have put that through as a Government bill, but they did not. So the catastrophising that I’m hearing from the other side is completely overblown.

I would acknowledge that this bill has had some very high-level support through the select committee process. The Law Society has advocated on behalf of this bill. In fact, to quote the Law Society, “The Law Society generally supports the Bill, having opposed the restriction imposed by the Electoral (Disqualification of Sentenced Prisoners) Amendment Act 2010 … that disqualified all prisoners from voting. The 2010 Act was subsequently … the subject of the first ‘declaration of inconsistency’ [with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act …] made by a New Zealand court.” So the courts, the Law Society, and even the Auditor-General of the day, when the 2010 member’s bill was passed, spoke against this bill, saying it was a breach of the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act.

So New Zealand First supports this bill on the basis that it assists transitioning prisoners back into civil society, and a more decent society. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

CHRIS PENK (National—Helensville): Thank you, Mr Speaker, for this opportunity to speak to the Electoral (Registration of Sentenced Prisoners) Amendment Bill. This is a difficult area. This is an area in which we have considerable intersection of constitutional rights, including electoral rights, as well as a lot of issues that affect many other areas of society. So I want to take it very seriously in acknowledging some very key points made by submitters on both sides, to be fair, albeit ultimately, of course, I support the position that this side of the House has taken in relation to maintaining the status quo and not changing the electoral law at this stage.

The discussions about criminal justice often reflect a narrow view whereby submitters or, indeed, politicians tend to emphasise the purpose of criminal justice that is most important to them. Deterrence is a legitimate aim of the criminal justice system, so is punishment, so is rehabilitation, and so on. Like every other aspect of criminal justice, this proposal has a complicated relationship with those, but let me state clearly for the record that I think that probably very few people in this House believe that there is a good deterrent effect to be had either way by amending the electoral law in respect of prisoners. I don’t believe that many people would be more likely or less likely to commit a crime on the basis that they would be able to vote more frequently or at an earlier stage, and so on.

But I do think that the aim of punishment—even though that term is rather heavy—is a valid aim, of course, of our criminal justice system, and there is a symbolic element of that. The removal of the electoral right for the period that a person is incarcerated is symbolic of the fact that the person has divorced themselves from the rule of law such that they have failed to follow the law of the land made by those who have been duly elected in previous elections. So it’s not a mere matter of punishment for the sake of punishment; there is a direct, logical connection between the act of saying that a person should not be able to vote while they have been imprisoned for committing crimes against the State and, indeed, against their fellow New Zealanders in a previous period and at a previous juncture.

In that context, it’s significant that people who have been incarcerated for any period of time, including beyond the three-year mark but also up to the three-year mark, have often dozens of different offences against their name, which would indicate a repeated denial of the electoral or constitutional mandate, the so-called social contract that we are governed by, which are the rules of this place, for better or worse and whether we like it or not, on the basis that we have the opportunity every three years to change the Government or, indeed, to reconfirm it—or re-elect it, as the case may be—and, of course the quid pro quo is that we play by the rules of the game. So for those who have not played by the rules of the game to be able to continue to elect a referee, if I can strain a sporting metaphor—here we are in New Zealand and it’s compulsory, of course, to get some sort of vaguely rugby-related reference in there—it seems, to me, a bit stretched.

A couple of other issues I think do deserve and require the serious attention of the House. One is the Treaty of Waitangi angle and, specifically, the tribunal’s finding in relation to the law as it currently stands. I do want to acknowledge that it is a problem for this country and, indeed, for those of us who sit in this House, if we take the problems of the country seriously, that there are a disproportionate number of Māori in our criminal justice system. However, to me, it seems appropriate that this be addressed by this House and by the Government of the day in relation to the underlying factors that lead to crime, as well as criminal actions themselves in the moment—frequently expressed as causes of crime versus crime itself. So in policing, in the practice of convicting in a court of law, and, of course, in sentencing, the law should of course have no disproportionate effect on any person relative to the outcomes that have transpired on the ground.

But I think it’s a mistake to say that because we have these prior difficulties whereby we have a disproportionate number of a particular ethnicity in prison, we should change the law or we should take that into account in the law that applies to those people. I believe that those are separate issues within the criminal justice system, but I do want to acknowledge that a number of submitters did make points about the disproportionality, at least on a numerical basis, and, of course, the constitutional implications from that.

I’m less persuaded by the argument that the law has been said to be inconsistent with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. That may be so, but, of course, this legislature is in the business of making law—indeed, that’s exactly what “legislature” means. So it’s consistent with my views more generally on the right or the desirability of our senior courts to be pronouncing on the suitability of laws in this place, such that I would be troubled by the thought that we legislate here to keep on side with the judiciary, who, rightly, apply laws and, rightly, consider human rights implications, but who do not have the role within our constitution of deciding what legislation ultimately is appropriate, given all the factors at play that of course we must take into account here.

It’s worth noting that a large number of the submitters who were in favour of the bill actually would have had it go much further and to say that if you’re going to have those who have been incarcerated for less than three years voting, then, actually, logically speaking, we should allow it for prisoners who have been incarcerated for any length of time. Of course, that’s a perfectly logical argument, and I think it probably speaks to the political dimension of what the Government-related parties have been grappling with, such that they have reached a compromise, I believe—and I use that term “compromise” not in a particularly kindly fashion but also just to reflect the reality that they’ve had to, basically, come to something that will get across two different views on either side of the Cabinet table, or the Government table more generally.

Really, I think there’s a good argument to be had for saying that prisoners should either be able to vote or not be able to vote, according to whether it is, as the Waitangi Tribunal would have it, a matter of proportionality for the Māori population, or if it’s a matter of New Zealand Bill of Rights Act consistency. So why we have this strange halfway house whereby prisoners with up to three years’ worth of incarceration should be allowed to vote but not those who are in longer makes no sense in terms of the arguments that we’ve heard from the other side of the House today.

If we were being logical, and going with the argument that we’ve heard previous to today from those on the Government side, whether it was through questioning at the Justice Committee or other advocacy in this House, the logical outcome would be to say that, well, if we want people to be able to vote so that they are having a say indirectly on the laws of the land at the time they are released, then the logical thing to do is to say that prisoners should be allowed to vote in their last three years of their sentence. So we’ve got an anomaly with the bill that’s now in front of us for its current reading that says, in fact, what we’re going to have is a bill that says it matters when you were convicted as to the number of elections, potentially, that you will vote in, but if you were convicted for more than four years, you won’t get to vote in the last three years of your sentence. So that argument doesn’t stand up in terms of what has actually been put forward.

I do just want to touch on a couple of other issues that have been made at various points of the debate, a little bit today and a little bit of previous engagement as well. One is the point about enrolment on the electoral roll. I think it’s a good one, and the select committee members on both sides of the select committee table were in agreement with points made by those who say that, well, if we want people to reintegrate into society after they have been released and to be fully functioning, fully participating members of society, then they should be re-enrolled automatically. That was not a contentious point among the committee, so I think that is a thing that we are able to agree on.

The Minister has emphasised it from the angle of the Treaty of Waitangi. I would say that as a matter of double jeopardy, we don’t want to continue to punish people after they have been at Her Majesty’s pleasure. They’ve served their time, they’ve done their time, and they can move on, but until such time as that’s taken place, it’s not appropriate.

Other arguments in relation to the unpublished roll I think are fair, but we should have an equal system whereby everyone is judged on a criterion of safety for that.

SPEAKER: I thank the gallant member for his contribution.

CHLÖE SWARBRICK (Green): E Te Māngai, tēnā koe. Tēnā koutou e Te Whare. I think it’s really important, firstly, to contextualise this Electoral (Registration of Sentenced Prisoners) Amendment Bill. What this bill does primarily is reverse a change that was made under the former National Government in 2010, notably by way of a member’s bill in the name of Paul Quinn, a former National Party MP. But this bill reverts us mostly to the status quo that New Zealand electoral law was at in 2010, that being having an arbitrary level of serving a prison sentence of under three years meaning that you have the opportunity to vote.

I just will front-foot the fact that of course the Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand will be supporting this. We have always supported the human rights of New Zealanders to engage in our electoral system. We also currently have a member’s bill in the name of Golriz Ghahraman, Green MP, which would take this further to instate the rights of all prisoners to vote, to have a say in the society that we will seek to ultimately reintegrate them back into.

I want to address a few of the points that were raised by members of the Opposition, and I really have to ask them if they genuinely believe this stuff or if they’re just attempting to rationalise this position of opposition. The first one: I want to shout out across the aisle to my contemporary from the Auckland University law school, Simeon Brown. Neither of us, I believe, actually went on to practise law, but Simeon has the same level of understanding that I do with regard to criminal and advanced criminal law, that being primarily academic. On that point, you heard from the member Simeon Brown that, apparently, folks who are committing crimes are somehow going to contemplate whether they are going to have the right to vote when they’re deciding to commit this crime. Interestingly enough, that was a point that ended up being contradicted by another speaker of the National Party, that being National MP Chris Penk, who said that that equation wasn’t quite a calculus that came across people’s minds when they were committing crimes.

The other thing that I just really need to ask the member Simeon Brown—who, I’d note, I’ve actually come to speak to in his office about something such as drug law reform and different approaches to it, noting that our criminal justice system is broken and tackling with these very deep social issues. He made the really interesting statement that, you know, these people who commit crimes deserve to have the vote taken away from them. But even Mr Simeon Brown, who I sat in law school with, will understand that two people can commit exactly the same crime but not receive the same punishment. That is why, Mr Speaker, as you rightly called out, I offered across the Chamber the point to Mr Simeon Brown that he should be reflecting on how sentencing operates, that being, in this country—for those who aren’t aware—you go before the courts to be found guilty or not guilty of a crime. If you are found guilty of that crime, you then go through a process known as sentencing. In sentencing, you are to be considered within the context of aggravating and mitigating factors. Those aggravating and mitigating factors are largely things such as access to familial support. They are things such as having a home to go back to. They are things such as the ability to enrol in education or to have an employer that will stand by you.

By any other name, these particularly mitigating factors are, in essence, a semblance of support or, arguably, privilege that certain people have access to and others don’t. This is a really core, fundamental point for us to reflect on about continuing to perpetuate intergenerational injustice and trauma, as our criminal justice system has continued to do and therefore failed communities on—particularly Māori—for so long. So I find it really rich to be hearing about something such as the rule of law so frequently being invoked by speakers such as Chris Penk, because, in fact, you can have two people who have committed the same crime, and one of them may go to prison and the other may serve home detention or receive some other form of sentencing. So I really just need the National Party Opposition to reflect on that.

The other point that has been bandied about is around the purpose of prison, and the argument so far progressed by the Opposition is that this is about some furthering of that form of punishment—that people don’t deserve to participate in society, in the social contracts, because we’re punishing them. But, ultimately, regardless of whether you think the purpose of prison is purely punishment or not, you have to reconcile that with the reality that prisoners will ultimately get out, and surely it is far better that they have a stake and an investment in the society that they are seeking to reintegrate back into.

The other argument that’s been raised rather flippantly—and I think is rather disingenuous and quite sad—by members of the Opposition is the point that this is somehow about this Government seeking to rush through all of these new voters to get them on the roll in time for the 2020 general election. I did a wee google and I found out—you know, this is publicly available information, which I’d absolutely suggest that members of the Opposition look into should they like to seek out some evidence, for once—that there are currently registered an eligible 3,772,100 voters in Aotearoa New Zealand. This bill will enable approximately 1,900 people the ability to vote. If we break that down, that is 0.05 percent of the population. Even if they all were to vote for one party, we would be very far away from getting that party anywhere near close to over the 5 percent threshold.

I also think it’s important and quite pertinent to touch on the issue of process, not the least because the Opposition seem to be speaking out both sides of their mouths on this. One of them is that they actually progressed this electoral reform through in 2010 without support from the then Opposition, those being the parties now of Government. But they also have neglected to mention that this bill progressed through its typical select committee process. There were over 2,000 submissions and, in fact, 18½ hours of evidence heard by the Justice Committee—I’d mention, ably chaired by the Hon Meka Whaitiri—it is also an issue that has gone before the High Court and has been considered by the Waitangi Tribunal, and I think it is really actually important that I highlight and echo the sentiments raised by my colleague from New Zealand First, Mark Patterson, with regard to how this was the first law in Aotearoa New Zealand, that I am aware of, that received a declaration of inconsistency with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990 from the New Zealand courts.

There is simply not a leg to stand on for the Opposition in opposition to this legislation, except for continuing to bandy about this bizarre, perverse ideology of so-called criminal justice that does not actually seek to remedy any of the problems that are deeply held in our society but continues to punish, isolate, alienate, ostracise, and traumatise folks who, ultimately, we will need to bring back into our communities.

So the Greens are proud to support this Electoral (Registration of Sentenced Prisoners) Amendment Bill today. I just want to leave the House with one question, because what we are still doing today is not going, in our view, anywhere near far enough. We are still placing that arbitrary three-year line on who will be able to vote and who won’t be. The question that I have for the House is: what level of neglect, what level of reduction in human rights, is acceptable? How many human rights are we willing to take away? How many human rights do prisoners enjoy, or should they enjoy, as members of society, as New Zealanders? So, with all of that said, I invite the next speaker, which I assume is from the National Party, to make their contribution and, I hope, address a few of those points.

DAN BIDOIS (National—Northcote): It’s a pleasure to rise and take a call on the second reading of the Electoral (Registration of Sentenced Prisoners) Amendment Bill. I’ve had the privilege of sitting on the Justice Committee for this bill in the middle of lockdown, and I must say, I found myself often at times listening to submissions, wondering why we’re here at this time, in the middle of lockdown, when I’ve got constituents messaging me about losing their jobs, and their businesses closing, and here we are talking about the right to vote for prisoners. I think that says a lot about the priorities of this Government.

National has had a longstanding opposition to this law, and we heard that from a select committee submission. I can’t remember the name, but he gave a really good, long-term view of the issue with prisoners’ voting rights over the course of the last few decades, and, yes, we have had some longstanding opposition to this topic. To rationalise it—and the member that just spoke, Chlöe Swarbrick, wanted to see what the rationalisation was for National’s position—it’s pretty simple. If you do a crime, you should do the time that is associated with it, and that time means that you should have certain rights and obligations removed from your livelihood: the right to free movement, the right to association, and the right to vote.

I listened to that member’s speech and I heard not once recognition of the victims of those that have been impacted by those prisoners that are serving in our prisons today. We heard from submissions of those victims—people who have suffered extreme cases of sexual violence—and they were disgusted that we were discussing a law that was giving these people more rights at a time where those victims are still hurting today. I remember vividly, in lockdown, listening to a lady who had suffered extreme sexual violence. It was decades ago, and she’s still suffering the consequences of that prisoner’s actions. So, yes, this side of the House does rationalise that in the case of people committing crimes, we should take away certain rights and obligations that free members of society should have, and they should do the time associated with that.

Now, not only did we have with the substance of this bill but we also had an issue with the process. As this House will be aware, we had a shortened select committee process for this bill, in the middle of lockdown, when most of my community in Northcote were worried about other things to do with their livelihoods, to do with jobs, and to do with incomes. It was not acceptable for there to be a shortened select committee process for this law.

But don’t take my word for it; take the word of the submitters, many of whom were also acknowledging the fact that this was a shortened select committee process and were not happy with the fact that that was the case. We heard from people like former prisoners. We quizzed them and we said, “Well, are you happy?”—are the submitters happy that this is a shortened select committee process in the middle of lockdown—and they said no. So here we are discussing a law that has had undue process by the democratic process in this House, and select committee submitters said that.

So what else can we talk about today? Well, I’ve heard a lot about the impact on Māori. We had submissions—quite well-written submissions—about the disproportionate impact that this has on Māori. I acknowledge the disproportionate amount of Māori in our prisons. Several of my extended whānau have served in prison. But this law is not the solution that’s needed to that challenge. Let me give by way of example other alternatives that already exist today that could be considered as a way to remedy that, and that is around skills training and education. We already, in our prisons, have a deficit of skills of our prisoners. That is why our prisons offer things like release to work or skills training, to give these—

SPEAKER: Order! I think we’re getting a bit of a general treatise about prison reform, and I’d now like the member to come back to this bill. I’ll say at the same time that the repetition that I’ve been hearing from the different speeches has become tedious.

DAN BIDOIS: Thank you, Mr Speaker. So what I’ve been saying is that with what already exists under the law, can we work on educating prisoners on the importance of voting, because that is what it’s going to take for prisoners to come out and integrate into our society. We already do it with other programmes relating to skills, so why don’t we do it with this? So that is what I mean, Mr Speaker, and that was raised by one of the submitters in the select committee.

National opposes this bill. We oppose it because we believe that if you do the crime, you should do the time, and there’s this sense of not acknowledging that victims are also a part of this. Where was the victim’s voice in the design and presentation of this law that we are debating today?

This process has been terrible. The fact that we were in lockdown, when members of Parliament had far more important issues facing constituents, and here we were talking about a law that serves no other purpose—from my side of the House—than to shore up base votes for the Labour Party.

We heard that 1,900 people will be allowed to vote at the next election—

Chlöe Swarbrick: 0.05 percent.

DAN BIDOIS: —and, Chlöe Swarbrick, you’re arguing that we extend that to all prisoners.

Chlöe Swarbrick: Yes.

DAN BIDOIS: So if we take your advice, then it’s actually a massive impact. So you’ve just contradicted yourself there.

As I said, the process for this law has been terrible, at a time when jobs are being lost, when incomes are being halved, and when businesses have been closing, I cannot believe we’re discussing this law. We oppose this bill.

Dr LIZ CRAIG (Labour): Thank you, Mr Speaker. It’s a pleasure to take a brief call in support of this bill. It’s a really important bill, and I commend it to the House.

ANDREW FALLOON (National—Rangitata): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I rise to speak on the Electoral (Registration of Sentenced Prisoners) Amendment Bill—

Chlöe Swarbrick: Come on, Falloon.

ANDREW FALLOON: —I’ll get to you, Chlöe Swarbrick—and I do so noting that this bill was last debated on 18 March. Now, some months have passed since that time, but for those who don’t recall, that was, of course, at a time when New Zealand was in the early stages of the grips of COVID-19, and so what we had was the Government seeking to ram through—[Interruption]

SPEAKER: Order! Order! Could I ask members—members are having conversations over there that are sitting four or five benches apart. Stop it.

ANDREW FALLOON: So what we had was this Government seeking to pass through this Parliament, not measures that would assist in the public health response, not measures that would ensure that we come out of COVID-19 in a good economic situation, and not measures that would assist in job creation, but, instead, a bill that would give prisoners the vote. That carried through, actually, throughout select committee. It was a truncated process. The select committee was held during lockdown, where submitters had to be heard via a Zoom call rather than in person, and for those reasons alone, this bill represents an affront to the democratic ideals that we hold in this Parliament.

Tens of thousands of Kiwis are losing their jobs. Businesses are struggling, many are closing, and yet this Government is making it a priority—

SPEAKER: Order! Order! I’m going to warn this member early. There are a certain set of lines that I’ve now heard probably about 10 times because members are going back to them. They’re to stop and we are to focus on the bill.

Hon Michael Woodhouse: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. A couple of times you have mentioned repetition in debate, and that is true when it comes from the same member. But is it your ruling now that a member who has not at this stage participated in the debate is prevented from raising the issues that are important to that member just because it has been raised—

SPEAKER: I’m happy to deal with it. There have been many rulings in the past that repetition goes across a debate, not just within a speech. I was getting in an early warning for this member.

Hon Michael Woodhouse: Can you reference that? Could you provide the reference—

SPEAKER: Yes, there’s a very good ruling from Assistant Speaker Mallard at one stage—I can’t remember the debate—but it was at a time when the Hon Phil Goff was in the House. I think it was the fifth time a particular set of lines had been used, and in that particular case it was because he was the fifth member to read the explanatory note.

ANDREW FALLOON: Yet this Government are making a priority out of passing legislation to give prisoners the vote. This is an extremely confused piece of legislation. When people are sentenced for a crime, they give up certain rights in our society. Some of those have been touched on this morning. They are the rights of freedom of association, freedom of movement, and, of course, this Parliament has determined several times—for at least a portion of prisoners—also the right to vote. This is where this bill is confused, because it doesn’t actually give all prisoners the right to vote; it limits it to only those who are sentenced to a term of imprisonment of less than three years.

I’ve been sitting here for some time during this debate and I read through the debate on the first reading speeches, and nowhere has any MP opposite actually put forward the reason for why it should be restricted to three years. I can completely appreciate Chlöe Swarbrick’s point of view that all prisoners should be allowed the vote, and that’s a valid point of view to have. But nowhere has any MP opposite put forward why three years should be the case. The best we have heard came from Clare Curran in the first reading speeches, where she said the threshold of a three-year jail sentence means that those prisoners will be able to vote on the Government that will be in power when they are released. Now, that defies logic, because the same could be said for any prisoner who’s given any length of sentence if they are to be released in the three years prior to an election—that they should be able to vote in an election when they are going to be released within the three years subsequent to that. An example would be that if someone was sentenced 20 years ago to prison and they’re due for release next year, the logic behind Clare Curran’s statement would be that that person should be able to vote in the upcoming election in September.

In an earlier debate, Chlöe Swarbrick, in one of the reasons for her support of this bill, said that prisoners are treated differently depending on the sentence that they’re given. She identified, I think, home detention as one of those. But I just want her to reflect on the fact that this bill does exactly what she doesn’t want. This bill does determine that voting rights will be given to people, depending on their sentence. If someone’s given 37 months in prison, they won’t be able to vote, but if someone’s given 35 months in prison for the same crime, they will be able to vote.

Chlöe Swarbrick: It’s better to have something than nothing.

ANDREW FALLOON: So it’s better to have something, she says. Well, actually, what Ms Swarbrick is doing is voting against the very ideals that she claims are the reasons that she’s voting for this bill. This bill does exactly what she doesn’t want—it treats prisoners differently depending on their sentence.

The Government have failed to answer the logical questions of why this bill is needed. They’ve failed to answer the logical questions of why three years is the line that’s drawn. It’s a confused bill, made a priority by this Government at a time when this Parliament should be devoting its attention to far more important matters.

Hon Aupito WILLIAM SIO (Associate Minister of Justice): I strongly commend this bill to the House because I believe that all citizens have the right to vote if they meet minimum standards and if they so choose.

SPEAKER: The question is—

Hon Nathan Guy: Mr Speaker.

SPEAKER: —that the—

Hon Nathan Guy: Mr Speaker.

SPEAKER: Oh, the Hon Nathan Guy.

Hon NATHAN GUY (National—Ōtaki): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I’m here, up the back of the Opposition benches.

SPEAKER: I’ve been there.

Hon NATHAN GUY: Yes, yes. I was once here too, about 15 years ago—in fact, in this seat just here—and in a matter of months, I’ll be saying goodbye to this House for the final time.

But I’m not here to give my valedictory this morning, under urgency; I’m here to talk about a very important bill that we are debating in urgency. I guess the first question I would put to the House is—

SPEAKER: We’re not in urgency.

Hon NATHAN GUY: Oh, we’re not in urgency? OK. Thank you for clarifying that—an extended sitting of the House, I think, is the correct term. For those in the public who might be used to tuning in at 2 o’clock on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday to listen to the Parliament, this is an extended sitting session because the Government feels that this bill is very important to see passed before the general election, and we would argue the fact that we have some grave concerns about this bill.

In fact, it’s been interesting listening to the debates this morning on this particular bill. On one side of the House, we have the Government proposing human rights and talking about discrimination against Māori, and on our side of the House we say that, well, actually, when a criminal has been sentenced to serve in prison, their freedoms should be taken away from them. We know that the State actually determines what happens in society with taxpayers’ money—funding for schools, hospitals, roads, and the like—and of course voters have the choice: if they don’t like the mandate that they’ve given to politicians and the Government of the day, every three years they can indeed vote. We know there is a general election coming up on 19 September, but why on earth should a prisoner that’s costing society about $100,000 a year be given the right to vote?

Now, I remember Paul Quinn, who was in this House—a real character—and I catch up with “Quinny” occasionally. He had a louder voice than me. He proposed a change that went through the Parliament under the National Government, and here we are yet again. It’s sort of like déjà vu—and I heard Nick Smith talking about this earlier in this contribution—right back to the 1970s, when there were changes and different stripes of Government coming in. So now we find ourselves debating this mere fact now.

I was interested to hear from those that have sat on the Justice Committee about this process and a real debate about the three years, because this bill allows a prisoner that has been sentenced to less than three years the ability to vote—that’s, on estimations, about 1,900 voters. Now, why three years—or why at all—and that’s been something that’s been well traversed in this Parliament this morning. But I think that is a fair question. Why three years? Because when you think about a prisoner that’s been sentenced for three years—and those listening might think, “Well, that’s perhaps not a harsh sentence for someone—imprisoned for three years.”, but let’s give some examples. Those are likely to be sentences for sexual assaults, robberies, family violence, and other sexual-related offences. So these are criminals that have been apprehended, have gone through the sentencing, and who are now in prison. Taxpayers paying for them to be in prison, and should they be given the right to vote? We on this side of the Parliament say no, because their freedoms have been taken away from them.

The next point that I wanted to make was one that was, I think, traversed a little bit earlier on, which was about the aspect that prisoners are given the right to vote, but what about victims—what about them in this debate and their consideration? It was an important point that I wished to make, which is to do with clause 8 of this bill, which is the unpublished roll. So prisoners, under clause 8, are given the automatic right to go on the unpublished roll, but those victims that they have harmed, in some of these sentences, don’t have the automatic right to go on the unpublished roll. They have to, indeed, apply. Now, that, in my mind, is a matter of fairness. That doesn’t sit squarely with me that, indeed, that process is fair.

Can I talk about one aspect in this bill that I actually do support. Those listeners will be thinking, “Well, that’s fascinating. National’s standing up here opposing this bill.”, but we do support one aspect of it which means that those prisoners, after their term of imprisonment, will be helped by corrections staff to fill out the necessary paperwork to re-enrol, to get on the roll to be able to vote. Now, we know that for some people in prison, numeracy and literacy is an issue for them, so I think it’s fair and appropriate that corrections staff will be holding their hands—not literally—and helping fill out the form for these prisoners when they reintegrate back in society, so they know that they will be eligible to vote. Otherwise—let’s face it—that will be a challenge for some of these former prisoners to be able to re-enrol. We know that getting around the paperwork and the bureaucracy is an important part, and that is one aspect of this bill that the National Party does support.

Summing up my comments now, we have some grave concerns about this bill. We feel that it’s been a rushed process, particularly through COVID-19. We’ve heard various contributions from our side of the Parliament this morning and this afternoon, saying—

SPEAKER: Order! The time has come for me to leave the Chair at the end of this extended sitting.

Debate interrupted.

The House adjourned at 1 p.m. (Wednesday)