Wednesday, 10 March 2021

WEDNESDAY, 10 MARCH 2021

WEDNESDAY, 10 MARCH 2021

The Speaker took the Chair at 2 p.m.

Karakia/Prayers

Karakia/Prayers

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jenny Salesa): Mālō e lelei. Ke tau lotu. ‘E ‘Otua Mafimafi, kuo mau taa‘i mālie ‘i ho‘o ‘ofá mo e ngaahi tāpuaki hono kotoa. ‘Oku tuku homau lotó ka mau hū atu ke ke malu‘i ange mu‘a ‘a e Kuiní, mo tataki homau ngaahi fatongia ‘i he Fale Alea ‘aki ‘a e poto Faka-‘Otua, ‘ofa pea mo e ‘ulungaanga malū, ko e ‘uhí ko e mo‘ui mo e melino ‘a e fonuá. ‘Oku kole atu ‘a e ngaahi me‘á ni ‘i he huafa ho ‘aló pē ‘e taha ko Sīsū Kalaisi ko homau fakamo‘uí, ‘Emeni.

Petitions, Papers, Select Committee Reports, and Introduction of Bills

Petitions, Papers, Select Committee Reports, and Introduction of Bills

SPEAKER: No petitions or select committee reports have been presented, but Ministers have delivered papers.

CLERK:

Cadastral Surveyors Licensing Board of New Zealand Annual Report 2019/2020

Mercury NZ Limited Annual Report 2020

Arts Council Toi Aotearoa, Creative New Zealand’s Statement of Performance Expectations 2020/21.

SPEAKER: Those papers are published under the authority of the House.

The Clerk has been informed of the introduction of a bill.

CLERK: Commerce Amendment Bill, introduction.

SPEAKER: That bill is set down for first reading.

Oral Questions

Questions to Ministers

Question No. 1—Prime Minister

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

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN (Prime Minister): Yes. In particular, I stand by my decision to create a strong and stable Government with a cooperation agreement with the Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand. New Zealanders voted for stability and certainty at the election, and that is what this Government provides. As a Government, we’re continuing to support New Zealanders, including through our recent announcements, including, for instance, to provide school lunches to an additional 88,000 students in 322 schools and kura, and also to guarantee that every New Zealander will have free access to the Pfizer vaccine; that we’ll support businesses through the Resurgence Support Payment; that we’ll provide free period poverty products to all primary, intermediate, secondary school, and kura students; that we will bring in Matariki and celebrate it from 24 June next year as New Zealand’s newest public holiday; that we will conclude our deployment of New Zealand Defence Force staff in Afghanistan by May 2021; and that we’ll put in further efforts to protect Māui and Hector’s dolphins—just a snapshot of some of the announcements as a Government we’ve made in recent times.

Hon Judith Collins: Oh! So does she stand by the commitment she made 10 months ago that New Zealand would have a travel bubble with Australia as soon as it was safe to do so?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Yes.

Hon Judith Collins: Why, after 10 months, has she failed to deliver a travel bubble with Australia when her tourism Minister has admitted “things are really dire” for areas like the West Coast of the South Island?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Because we haven’t considered it safe to do so.

Hon Judith Collins: Will she deliver on her most recent plan, re-announced in December last year, to open a trans-Tasman bubble by the end of March this year?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: The member will be aware that since we talked about that, we’ve had, for instance, the Holiday Inn cluster in Melbourne, which, unfortunately, caused them to be in a five-day lockdown. There was the Mercure Hotel quarantine cluster in Brisbane in March. We’ve had the Grand Hyatt hotel on 3 February and a number of other cases over in Australia; likewise, we’ve dealt with our own situation. I think it’s fair to say that we have from the beginning worked on the premise that we would have a whole-of-country approach where we had joint decision-making around the opening of a bubble. Since then, what we’ve seen is a different approach taken by Australia; that leaves open for us the ability to take a different approach. What it will do is create a bit of an uncertain environment where travellers may indeed be stranded in either country if there is an outbreak. We want to make sure that as we work up what an open bubble would look like in that arrangement, we have plans around how to deal with those scenarios.

David Seymour: What is stopping the Government of New Zealand from simply opening the border to travellers from Australian states that have had no active cases for 28 days, mirroring the way Australia treats its border in relation to us?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Something very simple: that we can’t guarantee that those states that have been COVID-free operate a completely closed border—in fact, they don’t. So we’ve talked about this before as being one of the challenges. If we were dealing with states that had entirely closed borders and were free of COVID, it would be a no-brainer, but we have flow between those states. Western Australia, for instance, is probably a good example which would be most like New Zealand in the way they operate, but other states where we have a high frequency of travellers, they don’t. So it does add complication for New Zealand that does not exist for Australia.

Hon Chris Hipkins: Can the Prime Minister confirm that some of those states who have the longest periods of time that are COVID-19 - free are not providing quarantine-free travel for New Zealanders arriving in Australia?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Yes.

Hon Judith Collins: What criteria is her Government using to determine if a travel bubble is safe?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: We set out that criteria some time ago. Of course what’s primarily important for us is whether or not there is a community outbreak or not, and so on that basis, actually a number of the states where we would have high-frequency travel have just come out of periods where they’ve been dealing with community transmission in the same way that we have just come out of a scenario. You can see that the way that we’d originally intended to work has changed for both Australia—and, therefore, we’ll need to adjust on our side as well. Where they are opening up but attaching different criteria like, for instance, pre-departure testing, it’s obviously free for us to consider or not whether that’s a way we’d choose to operate instead as well.

Hon Judith Collins: Why is someone arriving from Canberra—which hasn’t had a COVID case for eight months—required to spend two weeks in isolation, denying another Kiwi or essential worker a managed isolation and quarantine spot?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Look, all the way through this I have at various points had the Opposition tell us that we needed to open up our borders. At every point there will have been an example of that, and, ultimately, that is utterly the imperative of the Opposition. Our job is to make sure that when we make a decision, that we have a good health basis for it, that we can make sure that we give as much certainty to travellers as we can, that we have a plan in place for if there is an outbreak, including for what happens to stranded travellers, and that we don’t do something we then try and reverse. We can’t unscramble the egg—once we open this we need to be able to stick to it in some form.

Hon Judith Collins: Is she then saying that the Australian Government is wrong to have unilaterally opened its border to New Zealand travellers?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: It’s wrong to say they unilaterally have opened their borders. On most occasions, different states have taken different approaches. That has been a complicating factor, but it’s not insurmountable.

Chris Bishop: The Federal Government have opened it.

Hon Judith Collins: Well, why are people returning—

Rt Hon Jacinda Ardern: Queensland opened at a different time—

SPEAKER: Order! Order! Both of you stop it, please.

Hon Judith Collins: Why are people returning from Australia taking up 40 percent of our scarce managed isolation spaces, when Australia has now gone longer without a community case than the entire country of New Zealand?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: The reason they closed to us was because we had an outbreak, and, equally, we would want to be able to maintain the right to close to them when they have an outbreak—as they did over Christmas; as they did in March.

Question No. 2—Finance

2. Dr DUNCAN WEBB (Labour—Christchurch Central) to the Minister of Finance: What recent reports has he seen on the New Zealand economy?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Minister of Finance): The New Zealand economy continues to perform ahead of expectations. This is in part driven by our strong export performance, with near record high terms of trade. One recent report that highlights this is that Fonterra has lifted its 2021 forecast farm-gate milk price range with the mid-point increasing to $7.60 per kilo of milksolids. This price lift is good news for our rural communities. It means that the cooperative will contribute more than $11.5 billion to the New Zealand economy.

Dr Duncan Webb: What other reports has he seen on the New Zealand economy?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: Well, the construction sector continues to go from strength to strength. Yesterday, Statistics New Zealand revealed construction sales reached $19.6 billion in the December quarter. That’s up $897 million, or 4.8 percent, from the December 2019 quarter and follows a $1.6 billion, or 8.9 percent, year-on-year increase for the September 2020 quarter. The growth in construction sales is driven by home-building and construction services, which include trades such as plumbing, electrical, and carpentry. This is great news and builds on Statistics New Zealand’s report last month that construction jobs rose by 21,000 people annually.

Hon Carmel Sepuloni: What reports has he seen on the impact of a strengthening economy on the numbers of people exiting a main benefit?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: An excellent question. The Ministry of Social Development (MSD) has reported that benefit numbers trended downwards for the first two months of this year. Despite the challenging environment, there have been more people coming off the benefit and going into work in the last three months than in any December to February period since the year 2000. The Government has boosted its employment services, and I want to congratulate the Minister for Social Development and MSD for their excellent work in increasing significant investment in upskilling and training.

Question No. 3—Infrastructure

3. ANDREW BAYLY (National—Port Waikato) to the Minister for Infrastructure: What are the 15 shovel-ready projects being re-scoped, and why has construction only started on less than a quarter of shovel-ready projects?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Minister for Infrastructure): The 15 projects I mentioned in question time yesterday are currently subject to commercial negotiations, and it would not be in the public interest to comment on them in detail at this time. As I said yesterday, many of these projects are likely to go ahead, but are the subject of due diligence at this time. In answer to the second part of the question, 205 projects have been contracted. This gives the construction industry certainty that the projects will go ahead. There is an expectation that the projects must start construction within 12 months of the contracted date, which is still to come for many of them. Again, I would note for the member, when we called for projects for the Infrastructure Industry Reference Group in April last year and announced those projects in July last year, economists were expecting mass unemployment and a potential collapse of the construction sector. Thankfully, that scenario has not eventuated, and in many parts of the country the construction sector is, in fact, at capacity.

Andrew Bayly: Why are 15 shovel-ready projects being re-scoped when they were approved by the Minister of Finance and the Minister for Infrastructure as shovel-ready only just months ago?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: It’s interesting that Mr Bayly would be so cavalier with taxpayer money as to not want due diligence to be done on all the projects that we fund. This is 15 projects out of over 200 projects which have been contracted. As I said in my primary answer, I expect many of them will go ahead very shortly.

Andrew Bayly: Why do 156 shovel-ready projects still have no shovel in the ground 11 months after the shovel-ready projects were announced?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: As I said in my primary answer, in April last year we had projections of unemployment up towards 20 percent. That did not occur. We now have extra workers in the construction workforce. We have a pipeline of work. Mr Bayly should celebrate the success of New Zealand’s construction sector and the fact that the Government has a set of projects ready to go, working with the sector to deliver them.

Andrew Bayly: What were the failures in the ministerial decision-making process for the $3 billion shovel-ready scheme that has resulted in the 15 projects being re-evaluated—

SPEAKER: Order! I’m going to give the member a chance to start his question again, and within order.

Andrew Bayly: Were there failures in the ministerial decision-making process for the $3 billion shovel-ready scheme that has resulted in the 15 projects being re-evaluated, given the first selection criteria mandated that the projects would be starting within six to 12 months?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: There were no failures in that regard.

Andrew Bayly: Why did the shovel-ready funding allocate $100 million into a feasibility study into a pumped hydro scheme that won’t have shovels in the ground until 2023 at the earliest, and how many shovels does it take to do a feasibility study?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: That project and the member’s attitude to it exemplifies exactly what is wrong with the approach that the Opposition is taking. This is a scheme that can revolutionise the way in which we deliver sustainable energy in New Zealand and their reaction to it tells you all you need to know. You stay in the 19th century, Mr Bayly—it’s fine.

Question No. 4—COVID-19 Response

4. Dr LIZ CRAIG (Labour) to the Minister for COVID-19 Response: What is the Government doing to ensure continual improvement in COVID-19 response?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Minister for COVID-19 Response): Continual review and improvement has been an integral part of our COVID-19 response. Yesterday, I announced the establishment of permanent advisory group, led by Sir Brian Roche, to formalise this commitment as part of our ongoing commitment to improvement. The Government’s chosen an aggressive elimination strategy in our COVID-19 response, where containment and closure of any active cases in the community remains the key priority. It allows New Zealand to continue to enjoy freedoms that elsewhere in the world don’t exist, while we roll out the largest vaccination campaign in our history.

As new variants spread across the globe, it’s more important than ever that we are constantly refining, adapting, and tightening our border and our approach. This year, we began pre-departure testing, we mandated mask use across the country on public transport, we introduced day zero testing for those arriving in the country, we limited more movement in our managed isolation facilities, and we’ve been upgrading ventilation systems, to name just a few of the improvements that have been made this year alone. We want our systems to keep changing and improving as our knowledge base continues to grow.

Dr Liz Craig: Who is on the Government’s COVID-19 Independent Continuous Review, Improvement and Advice group?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: The group will be chaired by Sir Brian Roche, who has extensive governance leadership and business experience. It will also include Rob Fyfe, bringing senior business leadership experience; Dr Debbie Ryan, who has decades of public health service, with a focus on Pacific health; Professor Phillip Hill, an epidemiologist with expertise in infectious diseases and research; and Dr Dale Bramley, who brings a broad public health and governance experience, along with a Māori health perspective.

Dr Liz Craig: What were the Government’s priorities in deciding the membership of the COVID-19 Independent Continuous Review, Improvement and Advice group?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: We wanted to keep the group relatively small and nimble. We also wanted to ensure that the membership allowed for a continuation of the work around reviews that’s already been done so far—reviews of contact tracing and testing systems, in particular—and we also wanted to have a group that would provide a degree of independence, contestable advice to Government so that we could continue to drive that process of continual improvement.

Question No. 5—Prime Minister

5. DAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT) to the Prime Minister: Does she stand by her statement regarding the Government’s response to COVID-19, “What I’ll set out over the course of this month is how we anticipate transitioning from the restrictions that we have”; if so, when will a full and comprehensive plan be announced?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN (Prime Minister): Yes, I stand by the full context of my statement, where I said, “What I’ll set out over the course of this month is how we anticipate transitioning from the restrictions that we have, things like limits on gatherings and our alert-level system, shifting from that to the vaccine.” Providing information is something we’ve been doing and will continue to do. The member will know we’ve publicly released the resurgence plan, the alert levels framework, our business support plans, and, of course, our elimination strategy, but, as a Government, we’ll continue to build on this. Earlier this week, we announced that every New Zealander will have access, for instance, to the Pfizer vaccine, and today we announced the sequencing framework so that all New Zealanders will know where they sit in that vaccine roll-out. We will continue to give as much certainty as we can to New Zealanders in such an uncertain global environment.

David Seymour: What information was in today’s vaccine announcement that wasn’t known 10 days ago?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: We have put more detail—including the expectation of when we expect those in higher-risk environments and what we determined to be those high-risk environments—out in the public domain. It wouldn’t be known, for instance, that we intend to treat those 65 years and over within South Auckland as being in those categories of high risk up in the higher parts of our vaccine roll-out.

David Seymour: Can the Prime Minister understand why some people might think today’s announcement about Pfizer was actually a bit of a fizzer?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: No, because I think every New Zealander understands that as fast as we are receiving the vaccine, we are moving to prioritise the roll-out around those who are in the highest-risk settings. So I think they fully know and understand why we have prioritised those who are at the front line, who are at the greatest risk of coming in contact with COVID, and I think they also know and understand that from the middle half of the year, we will be rolling out more broadly to the remainder of the public. I think that information we have reiterated, but in between time, we now have provided greater clarity around the sequencing before we get to the middle of the year.

Chris Bishop: Why are the three component parts of the IT system required for the vaccine roll-out still under development and not ready to go?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: The last Government never built a national immunisation system, and we have had to build from scratch. We do have a system that’s able to support the vaccine roll-out. That is not the issue—[Interruption]

SPEAKER: Order! Can I just ask members to stop shouting down the Prime Minister. Interjections are meant to be rare and reasonable.

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: But if the member is implying for a moment that we are unable to roll out a vaccination programme to New Zealanders because of IT issues, that is not true.

Chris Bishop: Why is the inventory management system that actually tracks where the Pfizer vaccines are in New Zealand not ready to go?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: We do have inventory management systems. We also have a system to make sure that we know who has been vaccinated. What we are building is an integrated system that will allow, for instance, people in different places—so GPs’ clinics and pharmacies and so on—to work through an integrated system, and that is being built. None of this will or is stopping our roll-out. We already have a system that is recording our vaccinations as we go. It is not an impediment.

David Seymour: Does the Prime Minister stand by her position expressed earlier in question time that we cannot open our border to any Australian state because people entering New Zealand from that state may have recently been in another state that has COVID?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Can I get the member to repeat the first half of the question? I didn’t quite catch it.

David Seymour: Certainly. Does the Prime Minister stand by her position expressed earlier in question time that the reason New Zealand cannot open its borders to any Australian state is because people entering New Zealand from that state might come from a state where there is COVID?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: That is not how I would summarise what I was saying. I’ve said that there have been outbreaks in Australia, and of course that has caused complication. Then, secondary to that, it has been suggested that we could simply in those scenarios just not travel between ourselves and that state. The point I was making is that often in those outbreaks, those borders are remaining open—in fact, in the places where they haven’t been doing that and they have remained closed, they often do not have a direct route of travel to New Zealand, nor have opened to New Zealand.

David Seymour: Why doesn’t the Prime Minister have confidence in the rules that every Australian state has used to successfully prevent interstate transmission to date?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Oh, this is not a slight on the management of different states. They themselves would acknowledge, though, that often by the time a case is identified in one state—I’ll take the Northern Beaches example—it has often already, through no fault of anyone, moved into another state. So I just think that’s the reality of a mobile population.

David Seymour: Will any transition plan the Government produces include vaccine passports for New Zealanders who are vaccinated to travel internationally, and, if so, when does she expect those to be in place?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Well, actually, I think what’s been recognised by the international community is that rather than individual states designing their own vaccine passport, which we then would want to make sure were accredited in other parts of the world, we actually already have a system in place through the International Air Transport Association that would be able to provide that mechanism. So that’s been developed at an international level. We are staying in close contact as that work is done, and, no doubt, we’ll be inputting into that as other countries are as well.

David Seymour: Will any transition plan that the Government releases include a plan to be included in a business travel network—as has been developed by countries such as Taiwan, Singapore, and Australia—and, if so, when would she expect something like that to be in place?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Again, for those—you know, Australia hasn’t done that to date, and most countries who have often don’t have an elimination strategy like we do. I think, to be clear for the member, the goal at the moment that we are all working towards is a situation where as many New Zealanders as possible are vaccinated. So we move from a position of the border being our protection to us individually carrying our own protection. The member’s suggestions around what might happen in the in-between time—so much of that relies on the data and science around transmission when you’re vaccinated, and one of the issues we have is that data and science is incomplete. We know that it has an effect, but we know it will vary, depending on vaccine. So there’s a high amount of variation at the moment, which will be very important for New Zealand to understand because we are a bit different in that we have an elimination strategy.

David Seymour: If vaccines don’t turn out to comprehensively protect us from COVID-19, what plan B does the Government have other than the tools it’s used to date?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I think, to be fair, again, we need to start talking about this as the vaccine not being an end point; it will be like the flu. So that means that we will annually have to make sure that we have a rolling vaccination programme so that we are providing vaccines that deal with variants and so on because this is not going to go away for some time. So, ultimately, the way that we will all deal with it is: (a) we have to get as much global access as possible—variants will continue to emerge so long as the world is not vaccinated; so that has to be part of our plan as well—and (b) make sure that our own population then has access and uses the vaccine.

David Seymour: Point of order, Mr Speaker. The question was about what other measures would be taken if the vaccines were not effective. The Prime Minister gave a number of answers about how she would promote use of the vaccine, but the question assumed that the vaccine had been used. The question was actually what would happen if the vaccine didn’t solve the problem—what other measures would be taken—and that wasn’t addressed at all.

SPEAKER: I was listening carefully to the answer and I was thinking about that. But I think the answer was that other vaccines would be used, as opposed to the vaccine.

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I’m happy to clarify.

SPEAKER: If the Prime Minister wants to elaborate, that’s fine.

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I’m happy to clarify. My reference to the use of vaccine for variants was that the greatest thing that puts at risk a vaccine strategy is the emergence of variants. That of course is problematic if we don’t have enough access to vaccines globally, quickly. That is why we have to make sure that we are only safe if everyone is. We have to participate in providing access to vaccines around the world and keep vaccinating our populations globally.

Question No. 6—Conservation

6. CHLÖE SWARBRICK (Green—Auckland Central) to the Minister of Conservation: Will she commit to the target adopted by the Hauraki Gulf Forum of protecting at least 30 percent of the Hauraki Gulf Marine Park?

Hon KIRITAPU ALLAN (Minister of Conservation): I thank the member for Auckland Central for the question. I can confirm that the Minister for Oceans and Fisheries and I are focused on finalising the Government response strategy to the Sea Change plan, which will set out actions that central government can take to improve the health and the mauri of the gulf. I understand that the Hauraki Gulf Forum passed a resolution in May 2020 calling for at least 30 percent of marine protection in the gulf. Throughout the course of 2020, Government agencies engaged with multiple stakeholders, including the 32 iwi that have rights, interests, etc., in Tīkapa Moana; environmental NGO scientists; and recreational and commercial fishers. The Government response strategy will include proposals to significantly increase marine protection in Tīkapa Moana, with a carefully considered suite of marine protection sites that include at-risk, ecologically valuable, and representative habitats and ecosystems in the gulf, while also supporting customary rights.

Chlöe Swarbrick: What is her response to the recent comments by Ngāti Manuhiri chairperson, Mook Hohneck, who, on a scale of one to 10, ranked the state of the Hauraki Gulf currently at “four and we’re declining very rapidly”?

Hon KIRITAPU ALLAN: I acknowledge the comments of Mook and his colleagues, who have worked for many years on the restoration and the mauri of Tīkapa Moana. Mr Hohneck will be very mindful to the fact that there are multiple people that have been engaged over many years and that we are getting to a point where there is such buy-in into the protection of key areas within Tīkapa Moana to an extent that I think was perhaps invisible only a couple of years ago. We are, as a Government, in a position where we will almost be about to make some announcements about the nature and extent of the Government’s response. But he will be pleased, as he has been engaged—as we will be—to get to that end point pretty soon.

Chlöe Swarbrick: Does she support the protective measures taken by Ngāti Paoa on Waiheke Island to declare a rāhui around the island’s waters?

Hon KIRITAPU ALLAN: We, as a Government, always support whānau, hapū, iwi, community stakeholders at any level taking proactive measures to protect the taiao, the moana, and Ngāti Paoa are certainly no exception. As the member will be aware, the application has been made under the Fisheries Act, which my colleague Minister Parker has responsibilities for. I understand that consultation is currently open, closing soon, to which he will then make a determination on the nature and state of that particular application.

Chlöe Swarbrick: Does she support the initiative of the Noises Trust working with iwi and Auckland Museum to protect and restore the moana around Ōtata Island—the Noises—and what help is her department providing with this?

Hon KIRITAPU ALLAN: I must acknowledge the work of Rod, Sue, and the entire whānau based over there in Ōtata Island. They’ve been out there for many years, and I know that they have constructively engaged with mana whenua over the course of the last decade to really restore some of the mātauranga and worked alongside the science to, I guess, protect the ecological characteristics of that area in the Hauraki. The Department of Conservation has engaged in a close relationship and is very keen to collaborate with the Neureuter whānau—not so good with my Swiss pronunciation. But we’re really keen to engage with them, have been engaging with them, and will continue to do so, particularly once the Sea Change response has been formalised.

Question No. 7—Whānau Ora

7. TĀMATI COFFEY (Labour) to the Minister for Whānau Ora: What recent announcement has he made about Whānau Ora supporting whānau affected by the recent changes in COVID-19 alert levels?

Hon PEENI HENARE (Minister for Whānau Ora): Recently, alongside the Minister for Social Development, the Hon Carmel Sepuloni, we issued a press release detailing various support systems and packages for whānau to assist them through the COVID-19 alert level changes. Collectively, we confirmed that funding is allocated to social services, community, iwi, and Whānau Ora partners to provide a final support base on needs identified by whānau. We know that Whānau Ora worked with at least 19 Māori and Pasifika providers in Tāmaki-makau-rau to get assistance and information to whānau. Whānau Ora also implemented targeted communications through their networks and workforce so whānau had clear direction about alert level guidelines and public health information.

Tāmati Coffey: What other support has been provided by Whānau Ora to respond to the impacts of COVID-19?

Hon PEENI HENARE: Through Budget 2020, this Government secured $72 million for 2020-21 so that commissioning agencies are able to support whānau with the immediate and medium-term impacts of the pandemic. With this funding, Whānau Ora providers rapidly mobilised their support networks to support over 326,000 whānau members. Whānau identified affordability of food, rent, electricity, and other basic needs as an issue. To respond to this, over 250,000 essential support packages were provided to whānau throughout the country. Availability of learning devices and internet access was also an issue, and Whānau Ora providers distributed devices to assist in online learning and assisted whānau to remain connected. The repeated COVID resurgences and associated lockdowns also caused a heightened level of stress for whānau in Tāmaki-makau-rau. To respond to this, Whānau Ora providers supported whānau to address mental health wellbeing.

Tāmati Coffey: How is Whānau Ora ensuring that whānau understand what they need to do at various alert levels?

Hon PEENI HENARE: Whānau Ora providers have trusting relationships with whānau in their communities and have daily contact with them. Because of these strong and trusting relationships, providers are able to impart information in a way that is clear, personalised, and easy to understand. It is my privilege and the honour of this Government to support them to do that.

Question No. 8—COVID-19 Response

8. CHRIS BISHOP (National) to the Minister for COVID-19 Response: Will the Australian travel bubble that was agreed by Cabinet in principle and announced on 14 December 2020 be up and running by the end of the first quarter; if not, why not?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Minister for COVID-19 Response): In answer to the first part of the question, the timing around the opening of the travel bubble is a dynamic thing, and I cannot guarantee it will be open by the end of the month. In answer to the second part of the question, common agreement on both sides of the Tasman about how, why, and when the safe travel zone could be suspended, and the implications of that has not been agreed.

Chris Bishop: On what date can New Zealanders expect the implementation of a travel bubble with Australia?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: I haven’t got a specific date for that. We will do that when we are in a position to do that.

Chris Bishop: What are the remaining areas of disagreement between the Australian Federal Government and New Zealand that are holding up the bubble? [Interruption]

SPEAKER: Order! I am going to give the Opposition a further supplementary. People mustn’t interject, no matter how provocative the questions are. Chris Hipkins will answer it.

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: The member clearly didn’t listen to the answer given to the “other Leader of the Opposition” a few moments ago, when the Prime Minister, I think, was very clear that one of the big shifts has been that we haven’t been able to reach a common understanding for a joint decision-making framework, and therefore we have to plan based on more of a unilateral decision-making framework when it comes to suspension of the safe travel zone—a decision that could impact between 8,000 to 13,000 New Zealanders a day if travel returns to the level that it was before COVID-19.

Chris Bishop: When was the issue that he’s just referred to, of New Zealanders potentially being stranded in Australia if a border was to close, first identified as an issue in the talks, and what progress has been made to resolve it?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: As I have already indicated, as a matter of public record, New Zealand and Australia were negotiating to a joint decision-making framework. It was the Australians who have indicated that that is not the way they wish to proceed, and, therefore, we are having to recalibrate our response accordingly.

Chris Bishop: Why doesn’t New Zealand, then—given the failure of the joint decision-making framework and the move by Australia to a unilateral framework, why doesn’t New Zealand, then, just do something unilaterally and open the borders to Australians?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: There are still some issues to work through, including the fact that when we remove quarantine at our end, there will be a massive increase in the number of people travelling across the Tasman every single day, and we have to be in a position to provide some certainty about what will happen for those people in the event that the safe travel zone is suspended. It could well mean we have tens of thousands of people unable to travel home, and we need to be clear about what will happen in those circumstances.

Rt Hon Jacinda Ardern: Can the Minister confirm that despite the fact some of the positions of our counterparts in these talks have changed, it has been a completely amicable set of discussions, and that, ultimately, we totally accept on both sides that we’ll make our own decisions based on our own strategies and public health plans?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: Yes, I can confirm that the conversations have been amicable, full of goodwill, and very constructive, in fact. I can also confirm that different states in Australia are making different decisions about how to approach a safe travel zone with New Zealand, and, presently, only two Australian states are offering quarantine-free travel from New Zealanders arriving in Australia.

Question No. 9—Pacific Peoples

9. BARBARA EDMONDS (Labour—Mana) to the Minister for Pacific Peoples: What actions did the Government take to communicate with Pacific communities during the recent alert level changes?

Hon AUPITO WILLIAM SIO (Minister for Pacific Peoples): The Ministry for Pacific Peoples moved quickly to provide updated alert level information in nine Pacific languages. This was done by translating language-specific fact sheets, providing live updates through social media channels, and producing videos with alert level information. Key information was communicated through all Pacific radio stations, and Pacific stakeholders were contacted and provided with all relevant videos and channels.

Barbara Edmonds: What specific engagements have taken place to communicate to Pacific communities?

Hon AUPITO WILLIAM SIO: The Ministry for Pacific Peoples and the Ministry of Health have implemented a joint approach to Pacific community engagement, which is aligned to the Government’s Unite against COVID-19 campaign. The overarching purpose is to empower Pacific communities about COVID-19 and the upcoming vaccination programmes. Just prior to the alert level changes, we delivered a nationwide Pacific Zoom fono that had 600 in attendance to discuss key information around vaccinations with Pacific clinicians and experts. Last week, during the alert level change, we held 14 regional Pacific language fonos delivered in our nine prominent Pacific languages. These reached our Pacific leaders and communities across the country to get out the key health messages and address questions regarding vaccines. We plan to continue these engagements regularly throughout the year as we roll out the COVID-19 vaccine.

Barbara Edmonds: What were some of the issues raised during the engagements with the Pacific communities?

Hon AUPITO WILLIAM SIO: Questions were raised regarding what support measures were available to people, the safety of the vaccine, who is eligible to receive the vaccine, how to stop the spread of misinformation, and general health-related questions, which were all addressed by Pacific clinicians and Government agency staff. We intend to continue holding meetings with Pacific communities on a regular basis as we work through the alert levels and with the vaccine roll-out. We’re also planning on the public release of frequently asked questions and answers that were gathered during the community engagement, and we’ll share that information through different platforms and mediums and directly with stakeholders.

Question No. 10—Prime Minister

10. KAREN CHHOUR (ACT) to the Prime Minister: Does she stand by all of her statement, “We always hear about New Zealand being a great place to raise a family—and that’s certainly true. But we can always do more”?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN (Prime Minister): Yes. I made this comment as part of a wider statement about making New Zealand the best place in the world to be a child. This Government remains committed to improving the wellbeing of Kiwi kids. That’s why we’ve developed, for the first time, an all-of-Government strategy focused solely on improving the lives of all children, the Child and Youth Wellbeing Strategy, and we’ve set ourselves bold and ambitious child poverty targets. Already, we’re providing free and healthy school lunches to 88,000 students in 322 schools and kura across the country, we’ve increased the incomes of around 96,000 sole parents by an average of $132 per week, we’ve extended free and low-cost GP visits to 56,000 13-year-olds, and we’ve provided our Best Start payment to over 100,000 parents of newborn babies and extended paid parental leave. Under this Government, we’ve seen one of the largest policy-driven falls in child poverty in a very long time, but there’s also more to do.

Karen Chhour: Has she seen the video produced by Mothers Matter, released today?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: Unfortunately, no, I haven’t. But I would say to the member, if she chooses to put on notice any specific subject matter, I will always do my best to come to the House prepared and able to answer.

Karen Chhour: What does she say to the statement from Mothers Matter that “many women are encouraged to leave just hours after birth despite our government’s commitment to a full 48-hour minimum funding per birth”?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: We know that we have, of course, minimum expectations, but one of the things I think we’ve been particularly focused on as a Government is how we can, overall, improve the maternal health and wellbeing of our mums. I do think the support that they receive immediately after birth is an incredibly important part of that, and I would also say the contracted six weeks’ worth of midwifery care as well, as well as Well Child/Tamariki Ora. So if there are examples of where people are not getting that standard of care, we should know about that and do something about it.

Karen Chhour: What urgent actions will the Government take this year to address the appalling rate of maternal suicide in New Zealand?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: This, as I’ve just reflected in my answer, was one of the things that when we were working on our mental health plans and the huge investment we made in the 2019 Budget. Specifically, mental health care for our new mums was part of the conversation we had, and so it would be prudent to have Minister Little perhaps update you on some of that work. What I can tell you about it from a child poverty and wellbeing perspective: we’ve started rolling out—first in Rotorua—a programme specifically that works intensively with our new mums. So it’s based on nurse-family partnerships. It’s in the home. Rather than it being ad hoc, it can be as much as weekly. It tries to form a relationship between new mums and our professional healthcare providers so that they can identify early on if additional support is required. We’re looking to roll that out across the country, but in Rotorua, we’re hoping to see really great results.

Hon Louise Upston: Why, then, did the Minister for Children today in select committee confirm that there’d been no investment in the first 1,000 days in this term or the previous term of Parliament?

Rt Hon JACINDA ARDERN: I imagine the member is not correctly paraphrasing the Minister for Children. Of course, in terms of the first 1,000 days, I’m happy to share with the member that we have created, for the first time—brought back since the National Government in the 1990s got rid of the child payment, we brought it back in the form of Best Start. We extended paid parental leave, we increased the family tax credit, we increased benefit rates for families—and of course that directly affects children. And, for the member, I would say perhaps she’s unaware that the Best Start payment is precisely orientated to the first three years of a child’s life for the very fact that the first 1,000 days is so important.

Question No. 11—Housing

11. NICOLA WILLIS (National) to the Minister of Housing: Does she have confidence that taxpayers are getting good value for the money being spent by Government housing agencies; if so, what was the total cost incurred to make videos promoting the Progressive Home Ownership scheme?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS (Minister of Housing): In answer to the first part of the question, I do have confidence that taxpayers are getting good value for the money being spent by Government housing agencies. For example, I think it is value for money that they are overseeing the largest housing build programme in a generation, that will see over 18,000 new public and transitional houses built by 2024; supporting more than 1,000 people who have been sleeping rough or in overcrowded conditions during COVID-19; improving the quality of our housing stock; and rental reforms to better protect renters, and I think there is a particular value for money in the ongoing work developing new initiatives such as the Government’s Progressive Home Ownership Fund, a scheme that is helping families otherwise locked out of homeownership into their own homes—just a small snapshot of our many achievements in housing. In answer to the second part of the question, the Ministry of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has produced five videos promoting the Government’s $400 million progressive homeownership scheme, at a total cost of $10,628.20, plus staff travel costs of $670.84. This sum does include the $1,311, plus GST, spent on the video I posted on Twitter on 23 February.

Nicola Willis: How can she justify spending more than $11,000 on a promo video for a scheme that has only housed 12 families?

SPEAKER: Order! I’m going to ask the member to rephrase the question.

Hon Member: “Does she.”

Nicola Willis: Does she justify spending more than $11,000 on a promo video for a scheme that has only housed 12 families?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: I will stand by spending $10,000 on a scheme that is going to help 1,500 to 4,000 families into homeownership who are otherwise locked out of it. I note that there have been other commentators that have talked about the value of telling real people’s stories in video. I quote: “Housing New Zealand advises me that the video was developed as a tool to tell the story of Housing New Zealand to a variety of audiences. Furthermore, Housing New Zealand’s business is complex, and telling its story”—[Interruption]

SPEAKER: Order! Order! I’m going to hear the rest of this answer with only the Minister contributing.

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: “Housing New Zealand’s business is complex, and telling its story helps the people, community stakeholders, and organisations it’s worked with get a greater understanding of what Housing New Zealand does.” The author of this, of course, was the Rt Hon Bill English, when defending $11,000 spent producing one video.

Nicola Willis: Has social media feedback on the “game-changer” video been largely positive or largely negative?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: I don’t count my Twitter counts. What I am more interested in is the 1,500 to 4,000 families who are otherwise shut out of homeownership that our Government’s investment is going to help. I suggest that member get out into the real world and talk to some of the families being assisted.

Nicola Willis: Can she confirm producing her promo video involved a specialist videographer, a drone, and two staff members?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: What I can confirm is that in the course of a—[Interruption]

SPEAKER: Order! I think that’s not an appropriate comment about a member.

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: What I can confirm is that in the course of a one-hour visit to a family that had been helped into homeownership, I spent approximately three minutes doing a piece to camera. Drone footage that was already on file with HUD was cut into it. What I suggest is that member start focusing on the real issues in housing and move beyond some sideshows.

Nicola Willis: Can she confirm there are more than 11 officials working full-time on this scheme that has only benefited 12 families?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: I can confirm that we, as a Government, are putting resource into progressive homeownership, and, furthermore, what I can confirm to that member is there have been 166 places contracted for progressive homeownership. Twelve families have already moved in, three more families are moving in next week, and 13 more families will move in by April, and this is performing better than we said it would. We said that the first two schemes would produce 100 places—[Interruption]

SPEAKER: Order! Order! Members ask the questions. They’ve got to decide whether they want them answered or not, and if they are to be answered, they have to be answered in a way that can be heard. Now, the Minister does not have a wee voice. She has quite a strong voice, and I am having trouble hearing her over the hubbub from my left. Once again, the rest of this supplementary answer will be heard in silence.

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: Thank you, Mr Speaker. If I can pick up where I left off, we said in the initial press release that went out there would be 100 people helped by the first two providers; 103 places have been contracted. The original Cabinet paper said 300 places would be contracted in the first two years. We are only about five or six months into it and we already have 166 of those places contracted. I suggest that member move on to the real issues in housing and move beyond sideshows. [Interruption]

SPEAKER: Order! I’d just taken away the final supplementary from the Opposition because of the interjection from the Hon Judith Collins at the beginning. I’m now giving them that one back, and another one, for the two from my right. When I say something is to be heard in silence, it is to be.

Nicola Willis: Is she planning on guest starring in any more slick videos promoting Government housing schemes?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: I think that member is betraying her true colours and the fact that she belongs to a party that has absolutely no ambition to help people locked out of homeownership into homeownership. I am proud of the scheme that we have put into place, and I certainly am planning to continue promoting it.

Nicola Willis: How do taxpayers benefit from a $10,000 video promoting a scheme most will never access?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: I take the member back to the comments by the former leader of the member’s party, Bill English, when he talked about spending $11,000 on one video. What I suggest is that that member get outside of her ivory tower and speak to some real people.

Question No. 12—Diversity, Inclusion and Ethnic Communities

12. IBRAHIM OMER (Labour) to the Minister for Diversity, Inclusion and Ethnic Communities: What supports were in place for ethnic communities during the recent alert level changes?

Hon PRIYANCA RADHAKRISHNAN (Minister for Diversity, Inclusion and Ethnic Communities): The Government has provided support so that our diverse ethnic communities have clear guidance on the alert level shifts and what they need to do at that particular alert level. We disseminated information about COVID-19 in a number of languages through various channels and formats, including social media. On Tuesday last week, I held a Zui with the Director-General of Health, Dr Ashley Bloomfield, and a number of ethnic community stakeholders to address questions they had around COVID19. The Government has also been engaging with individuals, organisations, and employers from our diverse communities to make sure they have the social and financial assistance they need to stay safe when COVID-19 alert levels change.

Ibrahim Omer: What steps is the Government taking to ensure the information is accessible?

Hon PRIYANCA RADHAKRISHNAN: The Government has set up a multilingual information network that shares important Government information in various languages to ethnic communities. This network also relays feedback and insights from the communities they engage with to help us improve the material we share and the ways in which we communicate. This includes videos and fact sheets in multiple languages. In order to meet the diverse needs of our communities, we know that we need to tailor our messages in a way that’s relevant to them. The Office of Ethnic Communities has also recently launched a survey to better understand the impacts of COVID-19 on ethnic communities. This is open until 26 March, and I encourage anyone from an ethnic community across Aotearoa to contribute to that survey.

Ibrahim Omer: What additional support has been provided to ethnic communities?

Hon PRIYANCA RADHAKRISHNAN: The Ministry of Social Development continues to check in with ethnic community organisations and social service providers to ensure they’re well placed to meet the needs of their communities. The Government has also funded community connectors to work specifically with these communities so that they’re able to access information and services from across Government agencies. To date, the Office of Ethnic Communities has granted over $116,000 from the Ethnic Communities Development Fund to specifically support COVID-19 initiatives. This Government is committed to ensuring all New Zealanders have the information they need in order to keep safe from COVID-19.

Motions

No Confidence in Speaker—Leave Declined

Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE (National): Point of order. I seek leave for members’ notice of motion No. 4 in my name to be set down for debate forthwith.

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

General Debate

General Debate

Hon JUDITH COLLINS (Leader of the Opposition): I move, That the House take note of miscellaneous business.

Well, the Prime Minister of Australia, Scott Morrison, has today been asked by the media in Australia about a travel bubble with New Zealand, because Australia now has fewer cases of COVID-19 than New Zealand. This is what he said, and I’m going to say this verbatim: “Well, that’s a matter for the New Zealand Government. … If the New Zealand Government doesn’t wish Australians to visit New Zealand and spend money in Queenstown … that’s a matter for them. … I’m happy for them to open it up as soon as the Prime Minister would like to do that. … Australia is open to New Zealand and has been for some time … That is benefiting our economy. … But if Australians can’t go to Queenstown, I’m hoping they’ll go to Cairns.”

So we’ve heard today from the Prime Minister of New Zealand that it’s just not safe to do this; it is very dangerous to do this—it is outrageously dangerous! And yet seven out of eight states in Australia have not had a community case in over 37 days—37 days. Let’s just run through some of these. So we all know that Victoria had its issues, 12 days since they last had a case; 37 for Western Australia; 52 for New South Wales; Queensland, 54; 76 for South Australia; Tasmania, 211; 221 in the Northern Territory; 243 in the Australian Capital Territory; and how many in New Zealand? Eleven—11 days. We’re the worst performing against the Australian states, of any of them, and this Government says we’re not allowed to have the Australians here.

Why would we want the Australians here? Well, it’s this thing called tourism. And I know that Stuart Nash doesn’t care about tourism. He’s been up to tourist operators. He’s told them they just have to pivot. Well, pivot where? They’re not going to be able to “pivot” in Franz Josef Glacier, they’re not going to be able to pivot on the West Coast, and they’re not going to pivot in Queenstown. Where’s this pivoting going? It is now no less safe for people to come from Sydney to Queenstown than it is for us Aucklanders to go to Queenstown, and this Government won’t accept it.

And how much money do these pesky Australians spend on tourism? They spend $60 billion—$60 billion. That’s almost as much as the debt that this Government’s already racked up. It’s $60 billion. And how much is the New Zealand tourism industry worth? Well, not much at the moment. What was it before COVID-19? It was $17 billion—just $17 billion. Imagine if we could get some of that $60 billion to New Zealand, keep Queenstown going, keep the West Coast going, keep Franz Josef going, keep these people in work; isn’t that what we need—isn’t that what we need? We hear from the West Coast that 80 percent of businesses are closing. That’s what they’re looking at.

And Stuart Nash, who loves to have a big swag around the place, telling people what he’s going to do—what’s he actually done? He’s told them to go and pivot. Well, pivot yourself, Stuart Nash. Think about the fact there are people who are trying to actually get this job. Just pivot; pivot and get out.

Hon Members: Ha, ha!

Hon JUDITH COLLINS: We hear from tourist operators all over the country that they are actually closing their businesses, and the Labour Party might laugh, because we all know they don’t like businesses, but actually how about thinking about their staff? How about thinking of the fact that these people are losing jobs? How about that? And with those jobs, often their homes.

We’ve already got a Minister of Housing who is starting to make Phil Twyford look like a genius, absolute genius, and that is clearly not the answer. She likes doing videos, but she can’t get a progressive home scheme through. This party, this Opposition, will hold the Government to account on this. Open the borders, let people in, because sure as hell we’re losing them to Australia. We’re losing them, and this Government has no answers for being able to grow the economy. All they’re relying on these days, and I love the irony of it, are the farmers—the farmers! The only people that this country can rely on to bring in the export dollars, and this Government does everything it can to bash them around. Thank goodness for the farmers, because the tourist industry needs a new Minister.

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Deputy Prime Minister): There is the speech that launched Chris Luxon’s leadership campaign—right there, ladies and gentlemen. I ask members to picture the scene: National list MP Chris Bishop wakes up in his Hutt Valley compound. He’s fully clothed, surrounded by empty curry containers and handwritten affirmation notes: “You are a good person, Chris Bishop”, “My colleagues value my knowledge, even if they don’t say so.” He opens up the curtains; the sun is shining. “Exactly as I predicted last week,” Chris Bishop says. “Now, I’m not saying God doesn’t have any original ideas, but that was my idea first.” He looks at the clock as it ticks from 6.59 to 7 a.m. “Only yesterday I was saying 7 a.m. would follow from 6.59, and here it is happening today.” At this point, I do want to interrupt the story to thank Julie Anne Genter for introducing me to the word “epiphenomenalism”. This is a word that, essentially, is based on the kind of metaphor that the foam of the ocean thinks it’s responsible for the movement of the waves. Chris Bishop—epiphenomenalist.

Now, returning to our story, Chris Bishop starts scrolling through his text messages as he wakes up: Nicola W, Nicola W, Nicola W, Des Gorman, Nicola W. He opens the latest message from Nicola Willis: “Fancy a plot—I mean coffee?” Chris Bishop thinks, “Just yesterday I thought ‘Fancy a plot—I mean coffee with Nicola Willis.’ ” He then looks at the next text message: Peter Goodfellow, National Party President—something fishy here. The message reads, “Talofa, Chris. You’re invited to a select viewing of the National Party’s election review, working title ‘Nightmare on Ponsonby Road’. It’s R rated, so please don’t bring Simeon Brown. Fair warning, Chris: you feature quite a bit, staring into the abyss, quietly wondering where your future has gone. Kind regards, Peter. PS: Do you think ‘Night of the Electoral Dead’ is a better title?”

I’ve actually been given the warning label for the review, which is on top of the sole copy available for reading in the National Party’s caucus room, and it reads this way: “Viewers may find some content offensive or accurate. Contains images of political death spiral, disunity, leaks, awkward walkabouts, $4 billion holes, multiple leaders, policy on the hoof, policy flip-flops, calls for open borders, calls for closed borders, relentless negativity, Denise Lee being hung out to dry, and a 25 percent result.” Nothing says alternative Government like disunity, leaks, and poor behaviour, and that is apparently what the National Party review document said.

Although who would know? Because the most open and transparent Opposition in New Zealand’s political history won’t even let their MPs have a copy. Now, Judith Collins said today, “I think the fact that MPs are allowed to read it is a great concession.” That’s what the Opposition of New Zealand is currently telling the public. Judith Collins this morning said that the report included both honest mistakes and deliberate mistakes. So the question we have on this side of the House is: who made the honest mistakes and who made the deliberate mistakes? I think you’ll find it’s those who get to read it are the people Judith Collins views as making honest mistakes, and those who made the deliberate ones don’t. It’s a high-trust environment over in the National Party right now—desperate, divided, and disunified.

On this side of the House, you’ve got a united, focused, and compassionate Government. On this side of the House, we’re focused on the issue of keeping New Zealanders safe from COVID. This week, we made the announcement that all New Zealanders would get the Pfizer vaccine—every New Zealander—for free. That is the leadership that this Government can provide. We are also focused on growing the economy, making sure that we lift not just our primary sector but our manufacturing sector; that we invest in the economy of the future. Mr Bayly likes to laugh at the idea that we actually might have 100 percent renewable electricity in this country sometime soon. That’s the 21st century, Mr Bayly. That’s what growing an economy is about. But it’s also a compassionate Government, and I want to thank all members on this side of the House for their role in supporting initiatives like food in schools, like making sure period products are provided. This is a Government that includes everybody.

MATT DOOCEY (National—Waimakariri): I remember a time when this Government used to talk about mental health. Question No. 1 to the Prime Minister today: what actions and policies does she stand beside? Not one mention of mental health. And do you know what is cynical about a Government? It’s when they sit on a report for months—a progress report that was critical of their mental health presentation. And do you know when they released it? On Friday. The day of the tsunami warnings and the level 3 lockdown announcements—the progress report of the Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission that was set up to scrutinise this Government. And let’s not forget, this Government, they rode into power in 2017 on the back of many people’s pain, on mental health, and they promised a lot and they raised expectation, and they’ve failed to deliver.

Even the chair of the Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission, Hayden Wano, said the recently released mental health progress report stated “People in the community and on the frontline are concerned at the lack of a visible plan and worry [Government] investment is ad hoc, too slow, and not targeted in the right areas.” The mental health community was quoted in this report saying, “You announce money, our communities are thankful for money, but money’s still not gone out. And they keep saying to us, ‘Well you’ve got the money’. We’ve got no money.”

So it’s about time this Government owned up that all they’re doing is announcing money; $1.9 billion they announced in Budget 2019—$883 million of that was for Vote Health for mental health services. How much has that Government spent to date? Two hundred million dollars of that. Not only did they fail to deliver, they can’t even spend the money—announcing new services that they can’t deliver. And what we heard today in the select committee with the annual review of the Ministry of Health: skyrocketing waiting lists for child and adolescent mental health services across the country. Here we have underspends of hundreds of millions of dollars while they sit and watch waiting lists for mental health services skyrocket.

There we have a Government that raised expectations and failed to deliver to the people of New Zealand. This Government rode into power on the back of pain and mental health for many New Zealanders—promised big, raised expectations, initiated a $6.5 million inquiry. Thousands of New Zealanders attended those sessions and told their heartfelt stories—38 recommendations. You know how many of them have been implemented?

Hon Scott Simpson: How many?

MATT DOOCEY: Five—five. And do you know what those five are? An office, a commission, a strategy, a group, and a working group. That’s the five that have been completed. Where are the new services that you raised expectation for and you promised New Zealanders? The flagship front-line mental health service—$455 million, the roll out—where are we two years later? Thirteen percent of GP practices. The GPs are crying out for this service, but what do we have? Announcements of funding but failure to deliver. Hundreds of millions of dollars are underspent while waiting lists are skyrocketing.

Yet, when they get their first progress report from the Mental Health and Wellbeing Commission that was criticising their progress, the Minister sits on it for months and, on a day when we had the tsunami warning, a day where Auckland was coming out of level 3 lockdown, they push out that report quietly. Where are the patsies on mental health this week? No; crickets—silence. That’s why their heads are down, because they know they’ve promised a lot and delivered very little in mental health. Shame on them for promising vulnerable New Zealanders, politicising mental health, and now when you look, like the track record, again you’ve failed to deliver.

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS (Minister of Housing): You know that it’s an Opposition in trouble when we’re seeing the very characteristics that are being displayed on the other side of the House. We know; we’ve been there. And we’ve said many times, we all know the National Party scene—“Let’s all go to the cafe and pretend we’re united.” I remember that very well. So expect to see great swaths of them walking around the building together.

We had the release, or not the release, yesterday of the National Party review into its election campaign. As my colleague the Hon Grant Robertson talked about, we’ve had the fact that there is a PG rated version of this—there needs to be parental guidance for any of its MPs to read it. But this morning, the leader of the National Party, Judith Collins, went even further and turned it into a whodunit when she said that there are MPs who behaved badly and who are still in the caucus. So the question becomes: who are those badly behaved MPs that are still walking the halls of the National Party? One of the other things she did say was “We wouldn’t have the copy sent out, because it’s not written for that.” It’s one of those reports that is written not for reading! I’m not sure what it was written for—just to look at but not for reading? That’s it.

But let’s get back to this whodunit. Who are these badly behaved MPs that consigned the National Party to a shadow of its former self and are sitting on the opposite side? Are they sitting amongst us in this Chamber at this very time? I think that this whodunit calls for a Nancy Drew - type figure to come in to solve this. We need that kind of super-sleuthing, supernatural power that will get to the bottom of this. There are many contenders. Will it be Louise Upston? Will she be the Nancy Drew of the National Party? Will it be Nicola Willis? No. Will it be Nick Smith? Will he be the Nancy Drew? I’ve given this some long and hard thought, and I think there is only one person to be the great mate of the Hardy Boys when it comes to getting to the bottom of who it is who consigned the National Party to the position that it’s in now—and that is the real Leader of the Opposition.

Hon Member: David Seymour.

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: That’s right—David Seymour. He is the man for the job—to be the Nancy Drew for the National Party. He’s the person who will understand who it is that caused the trouble, caused the rot, on the other side. And while he’s at it, he might like to have a chat to Andrew Bayly about his obsession with shovel-ready stuff. I can’t work out whether it’s because he’s desperately trying to dig himself out of the positon that the National Party finds itself in or that he’s just so accustomed to the holes that National seems to keep digging for themselves. But he does seem awfully obsessed with shovels! Two days in a row he’s come to this House and he’s gone on and on about shovel-ready projects. I think Mr Bayly has a shovel at the ready. But what we do see, all joking aside, is an Opposition that is showing all the signs of being obsessed by the sideshows, obsessed by itself—which, of course, could be a sideshow—and not focusing on the issues that are important to New Zealanders.

What we have on this side of the House is a Government that is united and is focused on the things that matter to New Zealand. It’s focused on keeping COVID at the border, not letting it in, unlike the Opposition, who can’t decide whether they want to open the border, shut the border, open the border, or shut the border and are continuing to play that game. What we have is a Government that is focused on making sure that we are building back our economy, and we are seeing the fruits of that. We’re seeing the ratings agencies upping our credit rating. We’re seeing unemployment not anywhere near the levels that commentators were predicting as we went into lockdown nearly a year ago. We are seeing success, and we’re also seeing a Government that is determined to get on with addressing the big issues that we are facing—issues like child poverty—and we’re seeing that the work we put in in our very first days in office in 2017 is starting to improve the indicators around child poverty.

We are addressing the big issues like how we decarbonise our economy, and, what is more, we are making sure we’re looking out for New Zealanders. We’re not obsessed with ourselves. We’re not obsessed with sideshows. We allow people to read reports and we’re getting on with the job, because this is what New Zealanders need as we come out of one of the worst epidemics that we have seen in our world.

NICOLE McKEE (ACT): I’d like to draw members’ attention to some upcoming events—there are two of them, really; they’re hot on the calendars of responsible firearm owners. The first one is the roar, which is nearly upon us. As the weather starts to cool between March and May, we have an estimated 190,000 hunters that go into the Ngāhere, looking for those elusive stags. And, second of all, we have coming up: duck-shooting season. On 1 May, just that weekend alone, we have an estimated 100,000 hunters that will go out for opening day. Both are great recreational and outdoor sports. Both are a part of New Zealand’s heritage.

There are great benefits to hunting—the obvious ones, of course, are that we can get lean and fresh meat, good food, and, of course, we have people out there exercising. The elderly are supported because there is an abundance of meat that’s often given to them by other hunters for their freezers. And, of course, there are the mental health benefits of being outdoors, as well as controlling the pests.

But we’ve got a problem this year. New Zealand Police have advised the firearms communities that they have extensive delays in licensing, and those delays are bigger than the individuals themselves had realised. There are 9,800 firearms licence applications and renewals in backlog. The delays are totally out of control. We were told back in December 2020 that the backlog was there and that there was a promise to fix it, but the complaints are still coming in. Police have advised that it is going to take four to six months to process a firearms licence application, when once upon a time it took four weeks. What we are being told now by members of the community who are getting in touch with us is that it is taking well over six months for an application to be processed, and many more are telling us that it has been over 12 months for their applications to be processed.

Police will blame COVID; they’ve also blamed the changes in legislation. Those, of course, were foreseeable problems. The reality is many people missed out on the roar last year. They missed out because we went into COVID lockdown. This year, many more are going to miss out, not because of COVID but because of the incompetency of its administrative agency. Fish & Game will, from tomorrow, start selling game bird licences. And, on 28 March, people can start erecting their maimai and start putting out the pegs and their stands. While some game bird areas are open for months, there are a few that are actually only open for weeks. People have to now decide whether or not they go about purchasing a permit for a day, whether they purchase a permit for a season, whether they go out there and peg their maimai or not, whether they extend an annual invite to friends and to their family.

I mean, simply, there is an unknown remedy to the delays or the concerns. One really would have to question whether this Government is only concerned with protecting the mallards of this country! [Interruption] But wait there’s more—

SPEAKER: It’s all right—it’s all right. It first happened to me in 1983; Mike Minogue did it. I’m used to it.

NICOLE McKEE: There are also dealers out there that are trying to bring in components that are needed for these people to be able to go outside and take part in their activities, and they are struggling to get the newly required permits to bring this stuff in. So not only have we got the delay in the licences, we’ve got the delay in the components as well. These delays are totally unacceptable. We’ve got businesses and families being repeatedly affected.

What this boils down to is we’ve got a broken firearms licensing system, and it needs to be fixed. So ACT challenges this Government to fulfil their promise. I quote the Hon Stuart Nash’s release of 16 June 2020, where he says—and I quote—that “[We] agreed to establish an independent entity to take over firearms licensing and administration.” It is needed, and we are still waiting. Thank you.

ARENA WILLIAMS (Labour—Manurewa): Mr Speaker, you’ve heard today from Government members who are united and focused on getting on with the job of guiding Aotearoa through an unprecedented time in our history, because this Government has managed the books carefully prior to COVID-19, and, thanks to the efforts of the team of 5 million, our COVID-19 response has cushioned the blow to New Zealand and put us in the strongest position possible to build back. That unity and steadfastness, that has put the Government in a position to offer leadership in what has been one of the most trying times in New Zealand’s history, is exactly what has been exemplified by our communities in Aotearoa during the alert level changes. And, you know, it’s particularly shown in those communities of South Auckland that have been at the heart of the most recent outbreak of COVID-19.

South Auckland is a buffer zone for New Zealand’s border. Its people work at the port, the airport, in managed isolation and quarantine facilities, and in supporting services like laundries and kitchens which make them work. More than 100,000 travellers have come through MIQ in the past year, not to mention other risks managed at our border in that time, and it’s South Aucklanders working hard to make that happen for all of us. Further, I want to congratulate everyone in South Auckland who has stepped up to beat this virus. It’s taken a lot for the team of 5 million who have supported their friends and neighbours and workmates to get through this and keep going. Kia kaha koutou e te whānau o South Auckland.

[Be strong, all the families of South Auckland.]

Just this week, we announced that we’ve secured enough Pfizer vaccines for every New Zealander and laid out details of our vaccine roll-out plan. We’ve also opened New Zealand’s first large-scale vaccination clinic in South Auckland. The clinic will look after contacts of our border workers, and it’s great to see the next step in our strategy to protect all New Zealanders being taken in South Auckland. I’m so proud of our local South Auckland healthcare workers for rising to the challenge of rolling out the largest and most intensive vaccination programme that the healthcare sector has ever embarked on, and particularly for helping us to ensure that whānau are at the centre of the strategy.

So where is this Government taking its cues? It’s from people like the community-spirited leaders in the Pacific community, like David Letele, or Buttabean. He’s been a professional boxer who’s been reaching out to South Auckland communities, specifically the Pacific community, with humorous videos to spread the healthcare messages that we most need those communities to hear. He’s been backing up that work by reaching out to local businesses like the Manukau Pak ’N Save to back his food bank to deliver more than $10,000 worth of assistance to families in need in South Auckland, and I commend that community spirit. It’s from the steadfastness in the commitment to neighbours supporting neighbours of places like that Rawiri Community House in Manurewa, which has empowered local people to reach out to the people who live on their street to support them with face-to-face interactions and the kind of solidarity that comes with recognising where there is need and where cooperation can be lent.

This Government has taken its cues from the Kiwi number eight wire attitude of the Clendon Pride Project, who had 72 families come to them in need in the last lockdown, has reached out to every single one of those families to provide not only the immediate support they needed but also the support they needed to break down some of the toxic stress factors that they are seeing in those whānau. And it’s from the whānau-centred approach of the Manurewa Marae, who are using their local kūmara vine to identify those kaumātua in our communities who are most at risk and the family who supports them, because it’s not just about those kaumātua who need to be vaccinated, it’s about making sure that their whānau can support them and are well and healthy to be able to do that.

I want to mihi to all of those community leaders. From them, this Government has taken our cues of kindness, our cues of community-minded leadership, and the kind of leadership which is needed to get through this health crisis.

We’re always working hard to support New Zealanders who are working and running businesses as well as families and communities, and, of course, there’s more to do, but I want to highlight that our strong response in protecting community jobs and businesses is about accelerating our recovery and putting us on the track to building back better. It’s so important for those communities, especially in South Auckland, and I commend the efforts of those people working on it today.

SPEAKER: I call Eugenie Sage.

Hon EUGENIE SAGE (Green): Tēnā koe, Mr Speaker.

SPEAKER: The Hon Eugenie Sage—I apologise.

Hon EUGENIE SAGE: Pardon?

SPEAKER: I dropped the honorific—the Hon Eugenie Sage. We’ll start again.

Hon EUGENIE SAGE: Tēnā koe, Mr Speaker. So, in just over 45 minutes, the first of the races between Luna Rossa and Team New Zealand’s Te Rehutai starts. I’m not known in this House for following sports, but these magnificent boats I do watch, because these foiling monohulls, they fly, and also because of the commitment of the Team New Zealand team to an improvement in the health of Tīkapa Moana / Te Moananui-ā-Toi—the Hauraki Gulf: the leadership of Blair Tuke and Peter Burling in establishing the Live Ocean foundation to really champion an improvement in marine management, oceans management, not just around Aotearoa but internationally as well.

As a very good programme by TVNZ’s Sunday showed last weekend, while the television screens, when they’re focusing on the boats, show the magnificence of Rangitoto and the sparkling waters of the Waitematā Harbour, underneath the waterline, it’s a very different story. If anyone hasn’t watched “Troubled Waters”, I do encourage you to, because the gulf does look stunning to those international audiences, but now, it supports less than 45 percent of the fish biomass that it did in 2025. Crayfish are functionally extinct. We have lost all of our big snapper. It means that there are expanses of kina barrens, because the snapper that would have eaten the kina, that were big enough to, aren’t there any more.

As successive reports on the state of the gulf from the Hauraki Gulf Forum have shown, there’s been a continuing decline in fish. Trevally numbers are now 86 percent of their historical levels, snapper are 83 percent, and sharks, which are a key, top predator, are 86 percent of their original biomass. We’ve got problems of sediment from subdivision, but we’ve also got historically huge overfishing, both by the commercial sector and the increasing pressure from an increasing population of recreational fishers being able, with things like jet-skis, to access parts of the gulf that they couldn’t before.

We’ve got all of this pressure on the gulf, and yet 0.3 percent of this 1.2 million hectares in Tīkapa Moana is protected in no-take marine reserves. So I was very interested in the response that the Hon Kiritapu Allan gave to Chlöe Swarbrick’s question when the Minister said that the release of the proposals and the Government response to Sea Change would include significant marine protection in the Hauraki Gulf. It needs to be significant. It needs to build on the efforts of community organisations. It needs to build on the efforts of iwi. The rāhui that Ngāti Pāoa are proposing around Waiheke Island going out to 1 nautical mile is closing that area to the takes of tipa, or scallops; kūtai, or mussels; kōura, or crayfish; and pāua. Stocks of those shellfish and of crayfish have declined markedly, and the rāhui by Ngāti Pāoa is an effort to restore the health of the gulf there.

The Government response to Tai Timu Tai Pare, the first marine spatial plan—Sea Change—that was launched in 2016, needs to be comprehensive. It needs to follow that objective of the Hauraki Gulf Forum to protect 30 percent of the Hauraki Gulf Marine Park. It needs to overhaul fisheries management so that we see stocks being allowed to restore. It needs to outlaw bottom-contact methods like bottom trawling and like dredging, so that the seabed can recover. The Green Party strongly supports that goal of the Hauraki Gulf Forum and also its ambition to restore 100,000 hectares of shellfish beds so that their filtering capacity can restore the clarity and the clean water in the gulf.

There have been significant efforts by people like the Neureuter family, the Noises Trust, working alongside Ngāti Manuhiri, the Auckland Museum, Ngāti Pāoa, Ngāti Whatua, and others. The abundance that you see on Otata, one of our first predator-free islands—wētāpunga; large numbers of skinks and geckos—and yet underwater, you’ve got the kina barrens.

The proposals that come out in response to Sea Change need to include a protected area around the Noises, around Hauturu—a nature reserve at Little Barrier—to recognise that, on land, we’ve invested so much in restoration, protection, and the elimination of predators that biodiversity flourishes but we need to invest that same commitment in what happens in the marine space underwater. The Sea Change proposals were a start. I really look forward to the response.

Hon PEENI HENARE (Minister of Defence): I appreciate that most of the eyes of the country won’t be fixed on this House at this point in time, but I do want to acknowledge Team New Zealand and their efforts to bring back the America’s Cup, to keep it here with us—and I want to acknowledge you, sir, as well as the late Rt Hon Mike Moore, the first Minister for the America’s Cup—and who, as noted by my colleague the Hon Eugenie Sage, currently sail out on the waters in front of his place. Can I acknowledge his whānau, because I recall it was around Waitangi week that we lost the Rt Hon Mike Moore, which wasn’t that long ago, and we remember him and his whānau during this time.

These are interesting times. I want to turn now, with your indulgence, to te reo Māori so that this particular message is aimed at the heart of my people. E te Māngai o te Whare, ka tahuri atu ahau ki roto i te reo Māori. Ka tiro atu ahau ki te mate korona kua pā ki a Aotearoa i roto i ngā tau, ki roto i te tau kua pahure ake nei, ki roto i ngā marama 12 kua pahure ake nei.

Mai i te herenga ki te wā kāinga i te tau kua pahure ake nei, kua pakari nei mātou o te Kāwanatanga i ngā mahi a ngā ratonga hapori puta noa i te motu whānui. Ki roto i a au o Tāmaki Makaurau, ko Whānau Ora tēnā. I te rā nei ki roto i te wāhanga uiui i kōrero atu ahau mo te rahi o te pūtea hei tautoko ake i ngā mahi o ngā ratonga Whānau Ora. Ka mutu i whakaritehia e mātou o te Kāwanatanga i ētahi pūtea hei tautoko ake i ngā ratonga hauora Māori i roto i te motu whānui.

Koinā te āhuatanga ki roto i te tau kua pahure ake nei, nā, ka tahuri mai ki tēnei wā tonu. Ko te aronga nui o te ao Māori ana ki te rongoā o tēnei mate arā te mate urutā. I tēnei wā tonu i te rā nei, i kōrerohia mātou, i whāki mātou o te Kāwanatanga i te āhuatanga o te mahi wero rongoā, o te mahi haukoti i te mate urutā ki roto i ngā marama e tū mai nei. Arā ko te rongoā e kōrerotia nei ko te vaccine. I te rā nei i kōrero mai te Minita mō te wāhanga tuatahi, arā te hunga kei te mura o te ahi. Rātou kei te mura o te ahi e mahi ana ki roto i ngā wāhi papa rererangi, i ngā wāhi taunga waka.

Nā i tēnei wā tonu ko te aronga kei te wāhanga tuarua. Ki roto i te wāhanga tuarua e meangia ai e te Minita i te rā nei, ko au anō tētahi e tautoko atu ana i tōna pāpāhotanga, anā ko te aronga nui ko te Tonga o Tāmaki-makau-rau, ko wā tātou kaumātua kuia, ko wā tātou tāngata kua pā wētahi mate hauora ki roto i ngā tau, arā ko te mate hukahuka, arā ko te mate manawa. I tēnei wā tonu e tautoko atu ana mātou o tēnei Kāwanatanga i a tātou ki roto i te wāhanga tuarua. Anā ko ā tātou kaumātua kuia, anā ko te hunga kei te Tonga o Tāmaki-makau-rau, anā ko te hunga kua pā tētahi mate, arā pērā i te mate hukahuka, i te mate manawa. Nō reira ka kapohia e mātou i te tini o tāua te Māori i roto i Tāmaki-makau-rau, kia kaupare ake ai i te mate urutā ki roto i ngā marama me ngā tau kei mua i a tātou.

Ka mutu ko te aronga ki roto i te wāhanga tuatoru, i te hāwhe tuarua o tēnei tau, anā ki te rahi o Aotearoa e tauwhanga mai ana. Nō reira koirā te aronga nui i tēnei wā tonu.

Ka kite atu ahau i roto i te mineti whakamutunga o taku kauhau mō te rā nei—e aro pū atu tēnei kōrero ki te hunga kua rangahau i ā rātou kōrero i runga i te Pukamata, ki runga i ngā taumata kōrero hē kua kitea, arā ko te hunga e meingia ana te iwi Pākehā, “anti-vax”. Ko tāku atu ki te iwi Māori: tiakina ō koutou whānau, tiakina ō koutou whakapapa, whāki atu i ngā kōrero tika ki tēnā, ki tēnā, ki tēnā o tātou ki roto i ō tātou hāpori. Kaua e whakamataku i te tangata. Me tukuna atu i ngā rangahau tika a te hunga kei roto i te ao hauora ki wā tātou whānau.

Ka noho ahau ki te taha o taku kuia, ā, taihoa ake nei. Ko tāku atu ki a ia, anei te tikanga o tēnei rongoā. “Anei te pai o tēnei rongoā. Ko te mahi o tō whānau kia tiakina i te whakapapa kua whakaritehia nei e koe.”

I roto i ngā hēkona whakamutunga, ka kī atu ahau ki ngā whānau, tiakina ō koutou whānau, tiakina ō koutou whakapapa, tiakina Te Ao Māori.

[To the Speaker, allow me to speak in the Māori language. As I reflect on the coronavirus that has afflicted New Zealand in recent times, in the year that has passed, that is the last 12 months.

From the confines of my home base in the past year, we of the Government have strengthened the services within the community throughout the entire country. In my electorate of Tāmaki Makaurau, Whānau Ora is one. Today during question time I spoke about the large amount of money that has gone into supporting the provision of Whānau Ora services. The Government also invested money to support Māori health services across the whole country.

That was the situation last year. Now let me bring us back to today. The major focus of the Māori world is the pandemic vaccine. At this very time, today, in fact, the Government announced the details of the vaccine roll-out, to end the pandemic in the coming months. Yes, I am talking about the vaccine. Today the Minister announced the first phase, the roll-out for front-line workers. This includes people working at airports and ports.

Currently, we are concentrating on phase two. Today, according to the Minister, whose announcement I support, the focal point is South Auckland, our elderly men and women, and those who have been afflicted by serious illness in the past, such as diabetes and cardiac-related issues. At this time the Government stands by everything we are doing in phase two. This includes supporting our elderly, the people of South Auckland, and those who have chronic illnesses such as diabetes and heart-related conditions. Accordingly, this is how we will gather up thousands of Māori who reside in Auckland, thereby warding off the pandemic in the coming months and the years ahead.

Finally, the focus of the third phase that will take place in the second half of this year is for the rest of all New Zealanders. That is the focus at this time.

Let me note, in the final minutes of my address today—this message is firmly directed at those who conduct their research on Facebook and other false sources, that is the cohort known by Pākehā as “anti-vaxxers”. My message to the Māori people is this: take care of your families, take care of your genealogy, and provide correct information to everyone in our communities. Do not scare people, but instead direct our families to the informed research of the health experts.

I will sit with my grandmother very soon. I will inform her what this vaccine is all about. “Here are the benefits. Your whānau is tasked with protecting the genealogy that you created.”

In the last seconds, I wish to plead to the families to care for their families, to care for their genealogy, and to care for the Māori world.]

ERICA STANFORD (National—East Coast Bays): Thank you, Mr Speaker. This Government has made a very conscious decision to constrain the space in managed isolation and quarantine (MIQ), thereby having to juggle returning Kiwis, emergency returnees, critical workers, and split migrant families, but it is has been their absolute inability to manage these competing interests that has seen film stars’ nannies, bands, and children’s entertainers manage to jump ahead of the queue that everyone else is having to wait in, and that’s causing so many problems. This logjam at the border is further exacerbated by the glacial pace that this Government has taken on opening up the trans-Tasman border that would see 40 percent of our rooms in MIQ opened up—that’s 1,800 rooms that could be used, and all we’ve had from the Prime Minister is a tease: “Oh, we’re opening it, we’re not. We’re opening it, we’re not.” All we want to do is what Australia has done, and just get on with it.

All of these issues at MIQ are significant because we have a crisis that is unfolding in New Zealand, in our own backyard. Migrants who have given up absolutely everything to be here have been separated from their partners and their children for a year due to the border closure and the plagued MIQ system. They are here because we need them. They are our skilled maths teachers, they are our nurses, our engineers, our tech experts, and our construction workers. And we invited them to come here. In 2019, this Government spent $600,000 marketing to them to say, “Hey, come to New Zealand because we need you.” But the message now is all very different, despite our Prime Minister stating in May last year that she would make it a priority to get these split migrant families back with their families. Nothing has been said and nothing has been done. The Government’s deafening silence rings so very loudly in these migrants’ ears. It says, “We do not want you; we do not value you. Go home.” That’s what this Government is saying to them.

The Minister of Immigration, Kris Faafoi, had the perfect opportunity to start this process of reunification in June last year. We know this because he was briefed multiple times by his officials on the heart-breaking anomaly where our migrant nurses who came to New Zealand just prior to lockdown were unable to bring their families to join them whereas the 500 nurses who have come in since the borders closed have been able to bring their loved ones here. So, for nine months, he has wilfully ignored the desperate pleas of these nurses who have not been able to hold their babies, for up to 15 months in some cases.

And, while this is an unbearable situation for those nurses, this is not a great situation for New Zealand either. We are critically short of nurses. In fact, my colleague Simon Watts tells me, in the annual review today for the Counties Manukau District Health Board, they said they are 150 nurses short. That’s just one DHB; that’s not the entire aged care sector as well. We are hundreds and hundreds, if not thousands, of nurses short in this country, and we are also, on top of that, about to head into the largest vaccination programme in our nation’s history, which we will be likely to have to repeat year on year.

Now, more than ever, we need a strong health workforce. If these migrant workers leave, which they are starting to do, we will have to replace them with more migrant nurses, who can bring their families and who will be out of action for 12 weeks while they complete their registration course. It makes sense to keep the migrant nurses in New Zealand. Reunite them with their families. Not only is it good for New Zealand, it’s the right thing to do. And the Minister knows all of this. He’s chosen to ignore the problem, and it’s not until pressure from the media—and the Prime Minister, embarrassingly, having to step in over the top of him and direct him to find a solution—that he does anything. And my guess is, true to form, this Government will do the very least that they possibly can. They will select a very small subgroup of nurses, the smallest one they can find, grant them and their families some visas to travel, and then proclaim that as some job well done by our kind and generous Prime Minister. But anything less than a solution for all of the migrant nurses trapped in this horrific situation will be a failure.

Migrant workers in New Zealand who are torn apart from their families have been waiting patiently on this Government, on Ardern’s promise, for a year, but, in the last 12 months, there has been nothing. There is no plan for the next 12 months, and, while that maths teacher from the Hutt stands in front of his students this week, he will be thinking of his own two boys that he has not seen in a year. The migrant nurse who works in NICU for the Waikato DHB, who cares for our prem babies, goes home each night and cries for her two children, aged three and five—or two and four when she left. The Prime Minister regularly calls out other countries for their treatment of migrants. She cares desperately for the child of a terrorist. But, for those migrants who are here contributing in New Zealand whose children are suffering, she does and says nothing. As it turns out, kindness doesn’t extend to everybody.

Hon JAN TINETTI (Minister for Women): I’m not sure the other side are very aware of what their situation is over the borders. One moment they want them closed; one moment they want them open. They sound very confused. It must be very confusing for the public of this country to hear their arguments over there, and also their lack of complete awareness around the pressures that are being put on managed isolation and quarantine. Maybe they need to do some better research or find some better research than what they currently have.

In a week that started with a wonderful International Women’s Day celebration, I’m absolutely delighted to be able to stand here and contribute to this general debate as part of a Government that has put us in a strong position in our COVID-19 economic recovery and rebuild. We have always said as a Government that the strongest economic rebuild will come from a strong public health response, and we are so seeing that in what is happening now. We moved very quickly. We moved quickly, just over a year ago, to put in supports for over 1.8 million workers in this country with the wage subsidy, and we also invested billions in the economy through infrastructure, training, and creating jobs. Thanks to our team of 5 million, we have been put into a good place, and we are in a better place than most other countries in this world.

But, as Minister for Women, I want to also focus and make sure that women are part of that recovery and have a strong focus in that recovery. Our New Zealand women have been absolutely amazing throughout our response to the pandemic. We have seen women who have led the charge: women scientists, healthcare workers, people at the front lines in essential working positions, innovators, and community organisers—the majority of whom have actually been women who have stood up and faced this pandemic head-on.

We also know that, for those women, many of them have had a disproportionate burden that has been put on them by taking on a disproportionate load with childcare and home responsibilities, domestic chore responsibilities. For all of those women in this country, I say a huge thank you for everything that they have done. Quite a lot, their work has gone unnoticed, or their work has been undervalued in the past, and I think it’s about time that we stand up and say thank you and we value everything that they have done for this country.

We know that women who already face barriers are more severely impacted by this pandemic, but these trends are not new. They have been well recognised in the past. We know that in past labour market shocks—such as the global financial crisis or the Christchurch earthquakes—women have been disproportionately impacted. This Government is not shying away from that. We want to focus on putting women back at the centre, and we are delivering for women.

We have passed, through the last term of Government, equal pay legislation that delivers record pay settlements for female-dominated workforces to ensure that women are being paid fairly. We have extended paid parental leave from 18 to 20 weeks. Recently, I was excited and proud to acknowledge and announce free period products into schools. This Government has proved that the gender pay gap can be narrowed and, in fact, get to the point where we can completely close it. We have, through the Gender Pay Gap Action Plan, delivered the biggest drop in public service gender pay gap in 17 years, and now it’s at its lowest ever recorded of 9.6 percent.

But we realise and know that there is more to do. In that, I want to acknowledge my predecessor, the Hon Julie Anne Genter, for the work that she did to achieve that. We know that there is far more work to do in this space, but we are making sure that we are putting women front and centre. Our strong health response and economic response has put us in the position to do just that. Making sure women are more economically resilient will be an important factor in this commitment to building back better.

Hon Dr AYESHA VERRALL (Associate Minister of Health): This Government can give New Zealanders confidence that we will remain safe from COVID-19. It’s confidence built under our elimination strategy, drawing on our decisive early action and our continuing efforts to keep it out and to stamp it out. That’s why we have proven ourselves to be one of the safest countries of the world with respect to COVID and why we’ve been able to sustain high economic performance in the face of a global pandemic when many other countries have suffered.

In the last week, we’ve announced two important parts of our continuing plan to keep New Zealanders safe. We have secured access for all New Zealanders to the highly effective Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine, and today we have announced our plan for the vaccine roll-out. Today I want to talk about how these vaccines keep us safe, how we have sequenced our vaccination roll-out plan, and what we can anticipate in the future. The Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine has consistently shown strong results in clinical trials. We knew from the first clinical trial that it offered really strong protection against hospitalisation. This is really important. Look around the countries with large outbreaks and you see hospitals getting overwhelmed. We know that, by access to this vaccine, we can prevent a crisis in our health system.

But there are also other threads of evidence that are important to think about as well. We’re seeing early signs in the evidence that the Pfizer vaccine protects against infection and, therefore, reduces a person’s ability to transmit the virus. This is a hard-to-measure part of the vaccine, but there are a variety of different pieces of evidence coming in. For example, initial evidence from the UK found that there was an 86 percent reduction in infection for recipients of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine. Similarly, early published but not peer-reviewed results from Israel show an 89 percent reduction in infection. Both symptomatic and asymptomatic cases were measured. These sorts of results suggest that the vaccine recipients may not be able to transmit the virus, and it gives us the sense that it may be possible to achieve herd immunity through use of the vaccines.

Another point about the Pfizer vaccine is that we had a number of good vaccines to choose from, but I’m particularly pleased we chose the Pfizer vaccine. It has shown consistent high efficacy. The other vaccines that we had choices from are also good but some have had to address questions about their efficacy in the elderly. I can reassure seniors in New Zealand that this has performed consistently well. For example, Public Health England reported that, for people over the age of 80, there is an 89 percent vaccine efficacy for the Pfizer vaccine.

Today we announced our sequencing plan. It is a balanced plan. It uses the vaccine strategically to block the virus’s entry into the country by vaccinating first border workers and their families, then healthcare workers. Next we move on to those at high risk of catching COVID because they work or live in high-risk settings like aged residential care or other congregate settings.

I also want to talk about the practicalities of our roll-out of this, the largest vaccination programme in history. We know when we embark on this roll-out that there are groups that our health system has traditionally under-served. It would be a tragedy if we got to the end of our programme and we hadn’t addressed their needs. I want to acknowledge the work of my colleagues Minister Henare and Minister Sio in making sure we think carefully about how we reach them. I note that we’re rolling out the vaccine using Māori and Pacific providers early on in the sequencing framework to make sure that we are addressing the needs of older people from Māori and Pacific communities who are less likely to be in aged residential care. We’ll be using a variety of settings: GPs, workplaces, community testing centres, and will complement this with top-shelf information technology for the vaccine register and stock management.

There are threats when it comes to this virus, but we now have a picture of a hopeful way out of it. Yes, there are uncertainties ahead. I think a lot about the risk of emerging variants, but I, like the Prime Minister, share the hope that we will get to a situation where managing this virus will be like the flu. In doing so, we’ll also lead our community’s collective efforts to fight COVID, and I ask my fellow New Zealanders to recommit to our fight to unite against COVID by getting a vaccine.

SHANAN HALBERT (Labour—Northcote): He aha te mea nui o te ao? He tangata, he tangata, he tangata—what is the most important thing in this world? It is people, it is people, it is people. I’m so grateful that, under the leadership of our Prime Minister and our Deputy Prime Minister, they have kept people at the centre of our COVID recovery plan.

Today I want to acknowledge Aucklanders, my community, people of Northcote, who have suffered in the last couple of lockdowns. They’ve had to stay home, stay in their bubbles, look after their family, and teach their kids. It’s not easy for those families but they understand that we do it because we need to keep safe and keep our families safe from COVID-19.

It is not a time for us to be complacent. It is not a time for us to decide whether we want to open the borders or whether we don’t want to open the borders. We need to ensure that we have a strong, stable plan in place. That’s what this Government has, and that is what they are rolling out.

Fifty thousand people—our border workers, our managed isolation and quarantine workers, their households, and their whānau—are under way with immunisation, and this will finish by the end of this month. Four hundred and eighty thousand front-line health workers—my partner, an immunologist, somebody who is at high risk amongst all of their colleagues in Auckland—will also be rolling out soon. That is no small feat. That is important work. But I do say to all of our people at home, to my community, to our people of Tāmaki-makau-rau, in Auckland: listen to our experts, go to trusted sources, and challenge misinformation that is out there.

I want to acknowledge Northcote’s very own Dr Dale Bramley, who has been appointed by our Minister to the new advisory group for COVID-19. We are very, very proud of him on the North Shore.

As we go through this one-in-100-year event, this pandemic, it presents us with the opportunity not just to recover but to build back better. I’m so proud that myself, Vanushi Walters in Upper Harbour, and possibly my friend across the room Simon Watts, present fresh faces in the North Shore—MPs that are able to get on with the work and demonstrate work that has people at the centre and invests in our community. Northcote is a shining example of the things that we’re doing.

Our housing developments—and we’ve waited so long in Northcote, since the Clark Government, to push through the Northcote housing development. So my colleague here who grew up in our local community Barb Edmonds, talks about Taurus Crescent. Last week, nine families recently moved into our public homes—their warm, dry homes in our most deprived area on the North Shore. That is part of a housing development in the Northcote electorate of over 1,500 homes—public homes, affordable homes, and those at market sale. Now, that’s very, very important. Part of our job under Labour in this Government was protecting those public houses—not selling them off—protecting the planned stock, and even increasing the number of public houses to 475. On Taurus Crescent, by the end of the month, I’m going to be there opening another 20 houses alongside our Minister. So one of the important things for the Northcote electorate and across our community is building back better.

I’ll also go into transport, because under the National Government there was a $5.9 billion hole in Auckland’s transport infrastructure. As the chair of Labour’s transport and infrastructure caucus committee, I ask: where was the investment during the last National Government? They question us on a whole bunch of stuff, but the reality is a $28 billion package in Auckland’s transport plan—that is under this Government, that’s about building back better, and for people on the North Shore, that’s about the northern expressway and getting more people on public transport to address our climate change priorities.

Those are the things that matter, that’s why they voted for Shanan and why they voted for Vanushi Walters, because they want people at the centre and that’s what we’re going to do. So we’re going to build—

SPEAKER: Order! Order! Order! The member’s time has expired.

The debate having concluded, the motion lapsed.

Bills

Girl Guides Association (New Zealand Branch) Incorporation Amendment Bill

First Reading

SPEAKER: The honourary Dr—no, just ordinary Dr Duncan Webb.

Dr DUNCAN WEBB (Labour—Christchurch Central): Tēnā koe for that, Mr Speaker. I move, That the Girl Guides Association (New Zealand Branch) Incorporation Amendment Bill be now read a first time. I nominate the Social Services and Community Committee to consider the bill.

I just note that it is apposite that we are looking at this bill about the Girl Guides Association on the week of International Women’s Day—a nice touch; not what I’d planned. It’s also interesting that given that I was dishonourably discharged from the Cubs down at South Brighton, I’m not sure I’m the best person to marshal the bill through the House. But, as I said repeatedly to our akela, I will do my best.

The purpose of this bill is to clarify and confirm the powers of the Girl Guides Association of New Zealand Inc. so that it can deal with its assets freely, and this includes the disposition of property which has been gifted to it on trust. There’s an argument that under the 1942 Act, some dispositions may be inconsistent with the requirements of section 6 of that Act, but this bill will put it beyond doubt that the association can sell or otherwise dispose of its property, provided it’s consistent with the objects of the association. The objects of the association are relatively lengthy. They’re set out in the association’s constitution, but they do include: “To advance education by the special training and instruction of girls of New Zealand in the principles of discipline, loyalty, good citizenship, and service for others and by the development of their character”, and those certainly are good objects.

But a little bit of history, and I think it’s important here that we do give this some historical background, particularly where we talk about a particular piece of land that is concerning here. The girl guides and their forerunner, the Peace Scouts for girls, already had a presence in New Zealand in 1908. This was due to the work of Lieutenant Colonel David Cossgrove, who started the scouting movement in New Zealand. [Interruption] Yes, Mr McAnulty, but I don’t believe related to any former members of this House.

Lieutenant Cossgrove served in the Boer War with Baden-Powell. He was a headmaster at Tuahiwi, which is just outside Christchurch, and he brought the Scout movement to New Zealand. He had four daughters, and the youngest was Muriel. They were living, of course, in a country which had already won the vote for women 15 years earlier, and Muriel asked for a girls’ equivalent to Scouts. So it was 1908, a year before girls in Britain made the same request, that Cossgrove organised the Peace Scouts for girls, and I did smile when I saw that the junior branch was called the fairy scouts. Names have been changed.

In keeping with the progressive nation that this country is, that was two years before the formation of the girl guides in Britain in 1910, and the British organisation was formally incorporated by royal charter—which is a little unusual—in 1922. So in 1928, the Peace Scouts became Girlguiding, and the New Zealand association joined the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts—probably the first ever WAGGGS group—as a founding member. I do want to recognise that at about this time, there were some groups that were modelled on the Girl Guides Association in the UK as well, including in Auckland, which was led by a woman by the name of Wilson—I think it was Lucinda and Bertha Wilson.

At that time, though, the Peace Scouts was an unincorporated association. It held various assets and properties, leading to some legal complications, which are not dissimilar to another organisation I’m familiar with. In light of this, its status as a body corporate was created by the passing of the Act we’re now concerned with, the Girl Guides Association (New Zealand Branch) Incorporation Act. Just looking at what they did back in sort of the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s, to become a second-class Scout, a girl or young woman had to demonstrate skills in knotting, signalling, compass work, lifesaving, and first aid, and she had to trek, bike, ride a horse, or row a boat for five miles, and produce reports on where she had been and what she’d seen. As I’ve said, I think things in girl guiding have changed. The girl guides’ membership peaked in 1965, when there were 33,000 members. In 2019, there were about 10,500 girls, aged five to 17, in guiding. So that leads us to where we are today.

Some of the association’s long-held properties have become uneconomic to hold, and the association’s finances have become, whilst not parlous, a little strained. So clause 4 of the bill replaces section 4 of the principal Act to clarify that the association has the power to dispose of property of all kinds, including kinds that have been held on trust. Clause 4(4) of the bill makes it clear that the power to sell or otherwise dispose of property set out in clause 4 will override any limitation set out elsewhere in the Act, including section 6, where it states that “Despite section 6 and any statutory trust that it recognises, this section applies even if the trust terms would not, without this section, permit the disposition of property.”

It’s appropriate here to note that the reason that the bill is now before the House is because the association holds property in Waitakere, Auckland, known as Otimai, and it intends to dispose of that property. That property was gifted by a trust deed to the association’s predecessor by the Wilson family—in fact, by Lucinda and Bertha Wilson—way back in 1929. I think it was Lucinda, in fact, who was very instrumental in getting girl guiding off the ground back in the 1920s.

I also want to recognise that the Wilson family do have existing family members. Bill Wilson is one of them—formerly of Wilson and Horton—who has taken an interest in what’s going on with this property. So that was gifted by trust, and the objective of the trust was that the property be held upon trust to permit the same to be appropriated, used, and enjoyed in perpetuity under the name Otimai as a training home for girl guides and so on.

Now, that leads us to the problem that the words “in perpetuity” suggest that it’s not to be disposed of. The Girl Guides Association’s recent attempt to deal with Otimai exposed some internal inconsistencies in the Act, and here we are cleaning that up for them. I do want to acknowledge that the original proposals to sell the land did meet with some opposition and dissent, but this process is an absolutely transparent one. The bill will be going to select committee for a full submission process, and anyone who wants to be heard—absolutely I’m confident, given the excellent select committee and chairmanship of that select committee, that it will be properly considered and heard.

So various options have been explored for dealing with Otimai, but the fact of the matter is that it’s a loss-making enterprise, and it’s not feasible for the girl guides, in their view, to hold on to that property. So because it’s not financially viable, it’s in the interests of the Girl Guides Association of New Zealand and its members that it’s sold and the proceeds are reinvested back into the association. So the bill will, in essence, enable the association to make decisions which are in the best interests of the girls and young women that it serves. Whilst this generous gift of the Wilson family is recognised, it was given over 90 years ago, and the way the world operates, the activities that are engaged in, and the circumstances of the Girl Guides Association have changed.

I will note that I was looking for some girl guide biscuits to table, but it appears that they’re much harder to come by. I was going say that I was going to try and table them, even though they’re available on the internet, which I’m told is in breach of Standing Orders, but I was going to give it a go by leave.

But, anyway, the bill does provide well-needed clarity and a degree of liberty for the association to deal with its assets as it sees appropriate so that it’s not open to criticism or objection in dealing with land. This is the only way this can be dealt with because of the nature of the trust and the nature of the legislation by which the Girl Guides Association was incorporated, so it won’t be constrained by the terms of this very old trust deed or other trust deeds, in fact, and it can deal in property in an appropriate way. It won’t be constrained to hold it in a manner which no longer serves a purpose for this modern organisation. So I’m hopeful that members here will support this bill through to select committee, where it can receive some very careful consideration, and I commend the bill to the House.

MAUREEN PUGH (National): Thank you, Madam Speaker, and I thank the member Duncan Webb for that history of the Girl Guides Association. I think we must have googled the same information because I have exactly the same to present today. So the Girl Guides Association (New Zealand Branch) Incorporation Amendment Bill does seek, as the colleague across the House has said, to make a minor change to the Act to sell Otimai, which is a property they hold in the Waitakeres in Auckland, and they want to apply the proceeds of that sale to Girl Guides New Zealand’s general operations.

This bill is unusual in that it is a private bill, and they don’t come into this House very often, as members would be well aware. Private bills are commonly used in this House for matters relating to trusts—for example, lands held on trust for community use. There are other things such as changes to the trustees’ administering of a trust or the validation of scholarships allowances provided by a private trust, and the board matters are for private and not general legislation. So almost a privilege to be speaking on this private bill today, and, as we’ve noticed, a private bill supersedes members’ bills. So that is why it has gone straight to the top of the Order Paper. That’s why any amendment to a private Act must be introduced as a private bill and will appear ahead of members’ bills.

So the history, as we’ve heard, began after the Sea Scouts were established over in the UK by Lord Baden-Powell in 1907. That’s because one of his colleagues that served with him, Lieutenant Cossgrove, served in the Boer War with him and brought the Scouts idea back to New Zealand. As Duncan Webb has said, he was a schoolmaster in Christchurch. He was blessed with four daughters and they wanted—or the youngest one, especially—a girl’s version of the Scouts. So that is how it happened here in New Zealand.

They were called the Peace Scouts for girls, and in 1908 were established and well ahead of the UK, as well. Twenty years later, it actually became the girl guides. New Zealand was a founding member of the World Association of Girl Guides, and we are still among 150 countries that belong to the association. Their mission is to empower girls to take action to change their world. They hold national and international camps, they take part in training, and they have leadership development. There are a variety of other activities that the guides programme and all their programmes are tailored to achieve across a range of age groups.

For instance, they take on science experiments to learn about STEM: science, technology, engineering, and maths—so maybe we should have the girl guides advising the Minister of Education. They learn how to lead a healthy lifestyle. They do fund-raising for causes they care about, and, of course, we all know of the famous girl guide biscuits, that traditional consistent recipe that has been sold for many years as one of their key fund-raisers.

They look after communities by doing clean-ups and they plant trees and they work with other community groups. But, of course, they also love getting into the outdoors, and that is one of the key things that they challenge the girls with. But one of the key features that they’re very proud of is that they have fun.

I imagine that there are not too many women in this House now that would have joined girl guides. I was part of a break-off group that wasn’t actually girl guides, but we’re going back a few years now. It must have been a country thing, a rural thing.

But what we’ve heard today is, quite rightly, the drop in the membership of girl guides. One of the things that I believe has been the cause of that is because back in around 2007—I couldn’t get an exact date—the Scouts became co-ed. The girls were invited to join Scouts, and so the two organisations almost created that competition between themselves. Then there was other competition for membership, such as sports groups and extracurricular activities and school activities. So we’ve seen the numbers of guides decline over time, and, of course, with the drop in membership comes the drop in income. That has led to the situation with Otimai in that the Girl Guides Association have found themselves the owners of property and are in charge of property that is very expensive to run and maintain.

But I just thought as a comparison with girl guides—if any of you remember Scouts and one of the big fund-raisers they used to do—when I was putting these notes together, I recalled with some fondness they would tow a trailer around town and knock on doors and collect empty drink bottles because they could cash them in. So that was a major fund-raiser for Scouts. We had a local bottling plant, and so they would buy back their empty bottles—a great fund-raiser.

My folks had a dairy and I would work in the dairy. On the weekends, we had this enterprising young man that would come in and he would sell us his four or five or six bottles, and he’d swap that for lollies. In those days you could get four wine gums for a cent, so, actually, their bottles went a long way. But what we didn’t know was this enterprising young man was going around to the garage where we stored our empty bottles and bringing them back around the front and selling them to us several times a weekend. I don’t think he was a Scout.

But the land that we’re talking about today is tied up with the Girl Guides Association (New Zealand Branch) Incorporation Act that went into law in 1942. It governs the girl guides and, as Duncan Webb has mentioned, there are two clauses in there that have caused conflict, which has led to the bill being in the House today: sections 4 and 6.

The Wilson family donated the land, and, unfortunately, the trust deed that the Wilson family set up has the clause “in perpetuity” in it, so it created a bit of tension between the girl guides Act and the trust deed that gifted the land to the Girl Guides Association. The Otimai land, of course, is now running into disrepair and costing girl guides a lot of money, and in order to clear it up they had a couple of options. They could have taken this and got a court ruling on it, but there was no guarantee of the outcome of that and it was going to be an expensive exercise. So the simplest way was to bring it to Parliament and have the Act amended.

It is the intention of the National Party to support this bill, but to select committee, because there are a few things that we just need to be careful about and make sure that we have a bit of oversight over. The reason I’m a little bit cautious about it is because I’ve seen other national bodies that have relied on fund-raising, they have relied on communities to buy property, to run it, to maintain it, to train their leaders and their supervisors, and then, as populations go up and down, head office will step in if it does go into decline and they will sell that property, and although it has been bought by local funds and fund-raising, they have no legal ability to prevent the sale.

So I think what we’ve got here is an opportunity to ensure that this bill is fine-tuned so that it includes some safeguards for local communities if local land is going to be sold. I think that is a very responsible position for us to take. We want to hear from girl guides from across New Zealand, because this is, in effect, their property that the Girl Guides Association wants to sell. But I also think it would be appropriate for us to invite any descendants of the Wilson family to share their views on the disposal of this land.

So we will support it to select committee, and then we will work with the submitters and take guidance from them about whether we support this further, because I think it would be a travesty if we enabled legislation that enabled a head office of a national organisation carte blanche to go out and sell property that really is the property of its members. Although they may be elected to those roles, I think it is responsible for us to ensure that any sales are agreed to by the whole membership.

We support it for first reading. I commend the bill to the House.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): The question is that the motion be agreed to.

ANGELA ROBERTS (Labour): It is my honour to take this call for this simple piece of very enabling legislation. The Girl Guides Association (New Zealand Branch) wants to discharge its duty to promote the welfare of the New Zealand branch in the best interests of the girls and young women it serves, and has been asked to serve in statute. Recently, the association has attempted to do just that. To ensure the long-term viability of the girl guides in New Zealand, they have sought to dispose of long held and beloved property that has become uneconomic to hold. They aren’t in the financial position to afford the luxury of holding property that operates at a deficit.

In attempting this, they have discovered that, as we have already heard, there is inconsistency between section 4 and section 6 of the Act. This bill clarifies the powers of the Girl Guides Association (New Zealand Branch) Incorporation Act 1942 to allow it to dispose of property that it deems “necessary or desirable for promoting the welfare” of its organisation and the young women it serves. I appreciate the concerns that have been raised, but we can be confident that the Girl Guides Association will use these powers wisely. We know that the Girl Guides Association is steeped in tradition. It has proven over the years to also be nimble and remain relevant to young women in New Zealand over many decades and generations.

I didn’t need to google this association, because I stand proudly here as a woman who has been shaped by my time as a girl guide—

Glen Bennett: Got your badge.

ANGELA ROBERTS: Badges! My love for the bush came from the opportunities afforded by a really enthusiastic girl guide leader. That troop leader, she packed us off to camp in all weather, all conditions, with such enthusiasm that we embraced it. It was wonderful. My parents provided me with wonderful opportunities throughout my childhood, but going camping in the bush wasn’t one of them.

So the equity of access and opportunity provided by the association is one that I’m really, really proud to say that I was able to enjoy. Being prepared was pretty important. We learnt planning and execution with precision. It meant our mess tent ran smoothly. It meant that even as we slept under the very rare Waikato downpour in our canvas tents—yes, I’m that old—we remained warm and dry.

The first time I experienced the power of international relations was in 1982 at Jamboree in Rotorua, when I spent a lot of time talking to women for the first time, for me, from other countries. The confidence that comes with testing yourself physically and emotionally, and the satisfaction you feel when you finally get to drop your pack after a six-hour tramp is powerful. I’m pretty sure my ability to persevere through adversity was partly honed while learning to dig the perfect latrine. My camp blanket and the badges that I sewed upon it were so treasured that I buried my dog in it. Today, there aren’t so many latrines being dug. There are a few more space camps and tech camps and eco-warriors and leadership expositions. The opportunities to experience community service are still there.

Another example of a nimble and progressive association that I need to bring to the House does regard our beloved girl guide biscuits. As the member suggested, after six years of selling door to door, it was decided it was no longer a viable proposition, but I’m pleased to report to the member for Rongotai that they were able to pivot, and you can now pick up a packet at your local supermarket at the moment. So grab a packet or two—we’ll see you at caucus, OK?

I urge you to support this simple bill so our beloved Girl Guides Association can continue to develop resilient women who serve and lead for New Zealand. I commend the bill to the House.

Dr ELIZABETH KEREKERE (Green): Kia ora. Tēnā koe e te Māngai. GirlGuiding New Zealand has been a staple of communities across Aotearoa since it was established in 1907. From the beginning, they have always been far more than purveyors of fine biscuits, much as we have loved those biscuits over the years. They offer a range of programmes for Pippins, Brownies, Guides, and Rangers, under their vision to “empower girls to take action to change the world”, as noted by my colleague Maureen Pugh. They provide a “supportive place to grow confident, adventurous girls who are ready to be tomorrow’s leaders”, and this is so they can “contribute to their communities and form friendships in a safe and positive environment”. One particular programme of theirs I was very interested in was for National Conservation Week, where girls learn about the environment in their communities and what they can do to contribute to society.

Since the Greens have a core value of non-violence, we also commend the girl guide movement for their longstanding commitment to peace and the theme they chose of “Stand Together for Peace” for World Thinking Day 2021. That is a particularly appropriate theme, as WAGGGS, or the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Skites, Scouts—not “Skites”; I think that’s not a girl guide brand. WAGGGS and the World Organization of the Scout Movement have been nominated for the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize. They were nominated by a Norwegian MP from the Scout Movement because—and I quote—“At a time when our world is threatened by so many international challenges, be [they] climate, wars or the pandemics, … We need to offer young people a chance to rally around a set of common values and the belief in service, not only to one’s own community, but to international society.”

Most organisations in this country can do a remit and change their constitutions at their annual general meeting. It is quite standard for legal entities—be it a constitution, trust deeds—or for anybody who owns property to be able to dispose of it, regardless of how that property was obtained. Whether they bought it themselves or whether they fund-raised, it is now theirs. For GirlGuiding New Zealand, however, to dispose of their own property to do their own work, they need our help. This is a simple and practical bill, and I commend it to the House. Kia ora.

ANGIE WARREN-CLARK (Labour): Thank you, Madam Speaker. It’s a real pleasure to stand today and talk on this bill, and I’m really grateful that this will come to the Social Services and Community Committee. I think, in light of the contribution from our colleague Maureen Pugh across the House, we’re going to have a very interesting and worthwhile select committee process. I also want to acknowledge your thoughts in saying to the wider community that we’d love to hear from girl guides, because actually we really would, and it will make it a much more thorough and enjoyable process if we can hear from those girl guides. So thank you, Maureen, for your contribution.

However, I have to acknowledge my colleague Dr Duncan Webb. Now, Dr Duncan Webb noted that it was International Women’s Day this week, and it’s a happy coincidence, but I want to acknowledge and recognise the member as an ally to women and for bringing this bill to the House. Often what happens is we have women bringing bills specifically about women or girls to this House. So I just want to acknowledge the member Dr Duncan Webb for doing this private bill.

Kieran McAnulty: Good on you, Dunc.

ANGIE WARREN-CLARK: Yeah, thanks, Duncan—Dr Webb, I should say. Now, I was not a girl guide—

Simeon Brown: Neither was I.

ANGIE WARREN-CLARK: I’m pleased to hear that, Simeon, although I’m sure you were allowed to be. I was not a girl guide, and let me tell you a very sad story about why I was not a girl guide. I wanted to be a Scout. I wanted to be a Scout because there were all sorts of exciting things that happened, and I really didn’t feel that guides met my needs. So I went along to talk to the local scouting club, and they denied me access because I was a girl. I was a young girl and I got denied access. So, instead of going back to girl guides and going, “Hey, I got denied access. I’m back here.”, I sulked, and I didn’t join girl guides either.

Kieran McAnulty: That’s the spirit.

ANGIE WARREN-CLARK: Thank you; it isn’t really the spirit at all. Actually, looking back, looking now at the mission of girl guides, I’m looking at it going, “Really, I think I really missed out on something amazing.” You know, this mission to empower girls to take action to change their world—hey, I’m all about that. I’m all about that. I volunteered across a whole pile of organisations. So I just would like to acknowledge that for those young people out there who are interested in joining the Girl Guides Association, it’s a modern organisation now, and I encourage you. I also want to encourage people to go online to girlguidingnz.org.nz if you want to volunteer to support the girl guide movement. There are often lots of opportunities to do these things, and I’d really like to encourage people to do so.

Essentially, this bill does—I’m still having some difficulty with my eyesight, so I still have things blown up. [Holds up oversized printout of bill] This bill is a one-page bill. It’s not very extensive. It does exactly what it says it should do on the cover, and that is to give this corporation the power to dispose of property. Essentially, it’s a private bill because it needs to be a change to the legislation to support that.

So I think it’s going to be a particularly interesting piece of legislation to work on. I would like to encourage the member Dr Duncan Webb to perhaps table some girl guide biscuits at our select committee process. We’re all very keen on the old girl guide biscuits, so that’s a shout-out to Dr Duncan Webb to table some girl guide biscuits for us. But, essentially, this bill helps and enables the organisation to continue to operate in a way that is financially viable for them. It is a very small change in legislation, but it’s actually quite meaningful, and, as a consequence, I think we will give the select committee process all its due energy and time, and we will, if need be, make it better. We look forward very much to hearing from the submitters in regards to this bill. I commend it to the House.

KAREN CHHOUR (ACT): When I was looking at this I was quite excited—not that I was involved with girl guides, but for seven years I volunteered with a similar organisation that deals with youth cadets. These programmes are so important for our communities. They bring children together from lots of different demographics, and they learn to play together and interact with each other in a way that sometimes schools don’t provide, because of the different demographics. Schools tend to have the same people, whereas this combines children from lots of different areas and allows them to become friends. They encourage our children to become good citizens, to have confidence, and to become our new leaders—our next leaders that may be standing here one day. It gives them a sense of belonging, and it’s a place where they know that anyone is welcome, and that they are safe and that they have a place that they can go where they can just be themselves.

So I think the Girl Guides Association provide such an important service for our communities. So when an organisation is held back by a law that takes away the power to make decisions that are in their best interests, I think we should be having a look at that.

I’ve been to Otimai. I’ve even stayed at Otimai on a leadership course with St. John Youth, and it is a wonderful, beautiful place. But it is large, and it is expensive, and if they can no longer afford to maintain this property, I don’t see why a law should hold them to that. So ACT will support the first reading of this bill.

Dr TRACEY McLELLAN (Labour—Banks Peninsula): It’s my pleasure to take a call on this bill, the Girl Guides Association (New Zealand Branch) Incorporation Amendment Bill—quite a mouthful. I think it’s fair to say that this bill seeks, essentially, to help the Girl Guides Association do what they do best: help our young women learn and grow, without unnecessary legislative burdens. I too bet that everyone in Aotearoa New Zealand has had some form of contact with this fabulous organisation, whether as a member, as I can very proudly put my hand up and recall—as well as my colleague based in Taranaki - King Country, who painted us several lovely pictures of her very fond memories of being a member. Perhaps we remember the organisation from being a team leader when people were needed. There were plenty of people who did help out and guide and help our young women to develop and flourish. Perhaps we remember being a patron, or simply a consumer of the much-mentioned fantastic girl guide biscuits.

Going back a step or two to that concept of team leader, listening to other people talk and recall some of their memories just reminded me of what a good thing my mum had going on. She was a volunteer for the Brownies and she volunteered to assess the cooking badge and the washing badge, and almost every day after school I can recall some person at my house cooking a sausage and an egg and washing socks. My mother didn’t volunteer for many other organisations, but it has just dawned on me that she had this one pretty well sussed out.

If we get back to this bill and what it’s doing, it’s a minor change which will actually be of major benefit to the organisation. It is, essentially, correcting an inconsistency and allowing the girl guides—as other people have already said—to dispose of what is at this stage an unviable sort of asset.

I just reiterate again that this asset in particular includes the property at Otimai which has been used by the guides, apparently, since 1927 and owned since 1944. Many, many thousands of New Zealand women no doubt do hold cherished memories from their time at camps and events at this property, but we remember the girl guides is a charity, and it’s important that they have their ability to free up funding and reinvest as they see fit.

When you think about this minor change which will be a major benefit to an organisation, eventually correcting an inconsistency in allowing the girl guides to dispose of their assets, it’s very on-brand. This Government consistently seeks to introduce sensible legislation that allows businesses and charities alike to thrive, and this bill is just another example of that.

So I think it’s fair to say that we wish the Girl Guides Association a long, sustainable future. This bill, again, goes a long way to ensuring that the organisation remains one of Aotearoa New Zealand’s most beloved and valuable institutions, and on the basis of that I am happy to commend this bill to the House.

GLEN BENNETT (Labour—New Plymouth): Kia ora koutou. I rise with enthusiasm to support the Girl Guides Association (New Zealand Branch) Incorporation Amendment Bill. In my hours of research preparing for this short call this afternoon, I looked into our family history. A long history we have, and I looked at my grandmother and my great-grandmother and my mother and our family, and I discovered that none of us, including myself or my brothers, have been members of the Girl Guides Association of New Zealand, and I apologise for that. We were busy doing other things, but I’ll get to that later.

So why am I standing here in support of this bill? What information and what knowledge do I bring to the House this afternoon?

Angie Warren-Clark: Your love of the girl guide biscuit.

GLEN BENNETT: Our love of the girl guide biscuits. I have to mention the girl guide biscuits, because it seems like a requisite we all have to do in this bill today. But I’ve been part of many community organisations over the years, been part of many volunteer groups, many charities, and a number of incorporated societies and trusts, and I know the challenges that they face. I know the hardship and the struggle to get volunteers in this day and age. The financial challenges when it comes to finding a treasurer who’s willing to put their hand up, or be the last person who comes into the room that afternoon and they’re, therefore, voted on as treasurer. There’s the financial challenges; there’s the volunteer challenges, which is time. We’re living in a society where we seem to be very time-poor, or that’s the narrative that comes out often, and it’s a challenge to find leaders. It’s a challenge to find leaders willing to give their time, willing to run groups like the girl guides and to be committed to the trust, to be treasurers, and to do those types of things.

Hon Simon Bridges: Why didn’t I join?

GLEN BENNETT: So we need to do all we can—well, we’re hoping to change legislation shortly so that you can, but anyway we’ll get there shortly. But we need to do all that we can to ensure and enable volunteers are able to do their work for free for things like allowing assets to be freed up in terms of finances. So that is why I think we should be supporting this piece of legislation and why we should be supporting the girl guides.

Now, for me, I was busy growing up in the Salvation Army, and while we were busy doing our community work and wearing our uniforms, blowing our trumpets, and singing in the choir, I do note that the girl guides were busy volunteering, doing their community service. They were tramping and camping. They were, I’m guessing, building fires and having damper by the fire. They were doing their community service, fund-raising with those delicious biscuits, sewing badges upon badges upon badges on blankets—well some people were, and others had less, but that’s another story.

So the girl guides’ mission—which we’ve already heard a couple of times this afternoon—is a wonderful mission. It’s “to empower girls to take action to change their world”, and we live in a society where we all need to be taking that up in terms of how do we empower each of us to change our world. So I think it’s amazing that the girl guides are after all these years, not only in New Zealand but around the world, doing what they can to change their world, which obviously changes ours. So I want to say thank you to Dr Duncan Webb for bringing this private bill to the House, ensuring that the girl guides can enact their mission and can ensure that volunteers have time and space but also the funds and resources to serve the young women of New Zealand.

Being a member of the community services and community select committee and social services—and I’m the deputy, so I should know what it’s called, shouldn’t I?—I’m really proud that we’re going to be able to discuss this and unpack it more. Not the biscuits, but this piece of legislation. It’s been nice to see many members of the select committee in the House today, and I look forward—we have a morning tea roster, don’t we?

Angie Warren-Clark: We do.

GLEN BENNETT: Challenge—hopefully—accepted as to what will that morning tea roster be when it comes to us unpacking this piece of legislation.

So, for me, I am a supporter of the community sector, I’m a supporter of our wāhine, and I want to support this piece of legislation. I commend this bill to the House.

Hon SIMON BRIDGES (National—Tauranga): Thank you, Madam Speaker. It’s great to speak on this bill about the Girl Guides Association, and to help the girl guides in this way. It’s very hard running a volunteer organisation, as we’ve just heard, and to do good and also do well by your members. So this bill helps the Girl Guides Association economically in terms of rearranging things and land and the like.

I wasn’t a girl guide, although I see the Scouts—I was a Scout—and the girl guides were both founded by Robert Baden-Powell, I think that’s right to say. I still have very fond memories of being a Scout and the little games we played and things we did and learning the promise. I promised to do my best, to do my duty to God and to the Queen, to help other people, and to keep the Cub law. The Cub law—no, I can’t remember that, to be honest, but—

Angie Warren-Clark: What about the—[Imitates Scout salute]

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: Yeah, I had a toggle and the salute to the akela, who was a—I was going to say she was a kind woman. Actually, she was a battleaxe, but let’s not go there—she might be watching. But I learnt a lot, and the same was true of the girl guides: good values, and that’s for sure.

Of course, we know about the biscuits and the girl guides. I suspect, actually, that if you talked to most New Zealanders, they probably wouldn’t know a lot about them and their values and the purposes and so on, which we’ve heard about from other members, but they would remember and know the biscuit. We’ve actually still got some from their latest fund-raising effort at home. I’ve always found they’ve got just the right sweetness, just the right doughiness, and just the right crunch. They’re an excellent biscuit. I don’t know about where they’ve gone recently, where they’ve now got a chocolate bottom—probably the only thing about me, growing up, that wasn’t chocolate. But, anyway, we won’t go there.

I think this is a good bill. It’s good to practically help the girl guides rearrange their position so that they can be viable into the future.

ANNA LORCK (Labour—Tukituki): It gives me great pleasure to talk on this bill today, because my Great-Granny Pam—it would be remiss of me not to talk about her. When my Granny Pam passed away at the age of 97, I was given the memorabilia of her being a girl guide, and I have a story to share with you from much of her memorabilia, because she collected every single cutting during her time as a girl guide. She was a captain of the girl guides.

I would like to take you back to the summer of 1960 in Hawke’s Bay, where the story begins. “Girl guides spend successful week under canvas. Girl guide activities in Central Hawke’s Bay reached a peak during the past week when a special camp was held near Waipukurau, the first of its kind ever held in the district. It was a test camp to allow Mrs P Hewitt”—that’s my Granny Pamela Hewitt—“the commander and captain, to qualify for a camper’s licence. Twenty guides and four guiders pitched their camp last Monday on Mr N J Hewitt’s property.”—that’s Great-Granddad Norm—“Girls were present from Waipawa, Otane, Flemington, and Waipukurau troops.”

Now, the story goes on, and I won’t read it all to you, but there were a few snippets that I thought you would enjoy. One under the subheading “Spirit and principles”: “The very point of having a camp is to keep the spirit of the camp alive, and many tangibles that were concerned with”—including how to pitch a tent. Alongside that was how to ensure that the camp ran smoothly: “Under Mrs Hewitt’s direction, the girls all enjoyed a very active and varied programme. The call for cooks and firelighters went out each day at 6.45 a.m., and this was followed by the flag-breaking assembly at 7.40 a.m. and breakfast followed. The camp inspection”—now, we can imagine that was a very serious part of the day—“was taken part at 10 a.m., followed by a range of activities, and then they had a camp comfort to enjoy until tea at 5.30. A general clean-up followed, and then camp prepared for the night. The final activities of the day were singing around the campfire at 7.30 p.m., with lights out at 9 p.m. A tea hike by the river and an organised expedition were among the great attractions for the guides.”

That was my story, and I’ll carry on with the debate—thank you, Madam Speaker.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): Order! Just before the member does, it would be good if the member were to refer to some of the contents in the bill at hand. Thank you.

ANNA LORCK: Yes, I will—I absolutely will. I just thought it would be good to take you back to January 1960, in Waipukurau.

So, if we talk about the reason for the bill, I also spent today speaking to a friend of mine who has two daughters in the girl guides, and she was talking about the reason for why we need to ensure that the bill goes ahead, because it’s all about the health and wellbeing and sustainability of the girl guide movement. When she talked to me about this, the thing that she told me was that there are approximately 7,000 members in New Zealand at the moment—

Hon Simon Bridges: How many?

ANNA LORCK: —and of those—yes. The membership is “strong and steady”, were her words, and it’s because of this, she said, when I talked to her about the olden days and how things were done, that they still have those same values. It’s those values that we must sustain in the whole movement of the girl guides to ensure that everybody has an opportunity to continue with it.

Motion agreed to.

Bill read a first time.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): The question is, That the Girl Guides Association (New Zealand Branch) Incorporation Amendment Bill be considered by the Social Services and Community Committee.

Motion agreed to.

Bill referred to the Social Services and Community Committee.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): I declare the House in committee for consideration of the Holidays (Bereavement Leave for Miscarriage) Amendment Bill (No 2).

Bills

Holidays (Bereavement Leave for Miscarriage) Amendment Bill (No 2)

In Committee

Clauses 1 to 5

CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): Members, the House is in committee on the Holidays (Bereavement Leave for Miscarriage) Amendment Bill (No 2). A reminder that the committee stage is a chance for an examination of the detail of the bill and the effect of its provisions. It is also an opportunity for engaging in discussion with the member by taking short calls and asking questions. Members, we come first to the debate on clause 1. This is the debate on the title.

GINNY ANDERSEN (Labour—Hutt South): I seek leave for all provisions to be taken as one debate.

CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): Leave is sought for that purpose. Is there any objection? There appears to be none. Therefore, the question is that clauses 1 to 5 stand part.

GINNY ANDERSEN (Labour—Hutt South): Thank you very much, Mr Chair. Currently, the bereavement leave provisions in the Holidays Act 2003 are ambiguous in their application to miscarriage. Employees are presently entitled to three days’ bereavement leave on the death of a child, but it is unclear whether this would also apply when a pregnancy ends in miscarriage or in stillbirth. This ambiguity means that an employee’s entitlement is left at the discretion of the employer, and in some families’ cases, they have not been able to take much-needed time to grieve. My bill makes a very simple change. It allows families certainty that they have a legal right to access bereavement leave following a miscarriage or stillbirth. This bill removes the ambiguity by making it clear, at the unplanned end of a pregnancy by miscarriage or stillbirth, that this constitutes grounds for bereavement leave, and that the duration of the leave should be in line with the entitlement after other deaths within the immediate family. I encourage members now for the opportunity to ask further questions or raise issues in relation to the member’s bill.

JO LUXTON (Labour—Rangitata): Thank you, Mr Chair. This is my first opportunity to have a chance to speak on this bill, and can I just acknowledge Ginny Andersen for bringing something so important to the House. Whilst it’s not a large bill, the impact of this bill is huge. For so many women out there, this will mean so much, and not just for women, actually, but for their entire families, their spouses, and all those that may be involved. So thank you for bringing this to the House.

I just have a quick question. I wasn’t actually on the Education and Workforce Committee when we had any of the submitters come before the committee, and so I just had a question. I note that the wording around—you took out the wording “confirmed pregnancy”, and so I’m just wondering if you would be able to talk us through the underlying reasons for this change with regard to the mother’s knowledge of the pregnancy. It would be really great to hear a bit more about that.

GINNY ANDERSEN (Labour—Hutt South): Thank you very much to the member. Yes, indeed, there was a recommendation in relation to clause 4(2) to clarify that proof of a pregnancy would not be required for an employee to take bereavement leave, and this relates to existing provisions. It was noted that the duty of good faith that’s found in section 4 of the Employment Relations Act would still apply to any application for bereavement leave, and this duty requires employees and employers to behave in a way that fosters a responsive and communicative employment relationship. So those same principles of a good employment relationship would apply in the same instance.

Mr Chair, could I please also take the opportunity to congratulate Team New Zealand on winning the first race while we’ve been talking.

MARJA LUBECK (Labour): Tēnā koe e te Mana o te Whare. And also congratulations to Ginny Andersen for being at the committee stage of her very important member’s bill here.

I was indeed a member of the Education and Workforce Committee in the 52nd Parliament that heard 37 submissions on this bill, and it is fair to say that all submissions were either in all-round support for this bill or of the intent of it. We did hear some very heartfelt personal submissions from people on circumstances they had to deal with, like, as my colleague mentioned before, having to deal with ambiguity in the law and also with the discretion between an employer and an employee or negotiating some leave during a very difficult period in their lives.

We made some changes in the select committee, one of them being the wording “confirmed”, as my colleague Jo Luxton previously mentioned. I’d like to ask the member in the chair a little bit further with regards to this particular issue, because some people might argue that removing any proof of a miscarriage from this particular bill could leave a gap. I would argue it’s not, but I would like to hear perhaps what your thoughts are on the existing obligations between employers and employees that would deal with such an issue. Thank you.

GINNY ANDERSEN (Labour—Hutt South): Thank you very much for the question. This was raised a couple of times during submissions and wider commentary on the bill. It’s interesting that currently when an employee would apply for bereavement leave, it’s unlikely that they would be required to show a death certificate. So on the same basis the bill does not propose that proof is required.

I guess I would just like to note, and further to the member’s point, that while this bill makes quite a small technical change in the legislation, what’s been very interesting is the wider discussion around women’s reproductive rights and the conversation in and around childbirth, bereavement, miscarriage. So many women have come forward and used it as an opportunity to tell their own stories and ones that have just not been told before. I think that’s partly associated with the stigma and the shame, quite often tied wrongly to miscarriage and stillbirth. Part of that, I think, exists in our previous laws that have made onerous requirements to actually have time to grieve. So while this change enables both men and women or partners to have time to grieve, I think it also has facilitated a wider conversation around something that’s previously been, I guess, somewhat left in the shadows.

NICOLA GRIGG (National—Selwyn): Thank you, Mr Chair. It’s a pleasure to rise in support of this bill. I commend the member for bringing it before the House. I think it does provide a very important clarification that it brings to the law surrounding bereavement leave entitlements. It makes it clear that the unplanned end of a pregnancy by miscarriage or stillbirth constitutes grounds for bereavement leave for the mother and her partner or spouse, and that that duration should be three days. But can the member just clarify what other people may qualify for that leave?

GINNY ANDERSEN (Labour—Hutt South): Thank you very much to the member. Yes, the definition of the relationship requirement was extended. The initial drafting of the bill that I undertook hadn’t fully contemplated the reach of where it would go to. So that has been extended, and it is understood that it’s right that parents planning to adopt a child and parents having a baby through surrogacy should also be entitled to bereavement leave on the unplanned end of a relevant pregnancy, and it seemed only right and fair that that right should be extended to those parents and that they would be no different to a biological parent in being able to access this right.

MAUREEN PUGH (National): Thank you, Mr Chair. I just have a question for the member in the chair this afternoon, Ginny Andersen, to talk about the commencement date. Now, I understand from the bill that it is the day after which it receives Royal assent, but I wonder if the member has given any consideration to extending that out for any length of time, given that this is going to be another cost on business.

The reason I ask that is because this afternoon I’ve just heard four hotels on the West Coast have now been extended into hibernation. That means we’ve got 40-, 50-odd staff that are now without jobs. We’ve got businesses that can’t afford to stay open, and adding this extra cost on to those businesses at this particular time—I have no problem with the intent of the bill, to support women who have miscarriage. I’ve been in that position myself, and I know that it does take time to recover. But at this time, with the strain on business, I just wonder if you have given consideration to pushing out the commencement date. Thank you.

GINNY ANDERSEN (Labour—Hutt South): Thank you very much to the member Maureen Pugh. No, there hasn’t been a proposal to change that commencement date, and, interestingly, through the employers who submitted and those who engaged with the process, many of those give bereavement leave as of now, even though it’s not a legal requirement. So what we did find as part of that good employment relationship between an employee and employer was that this more often than not does occur in a good working relationship. There were only rare occasions where they were not being accessed. So all this bill would do is give people the certainty that if they’d been through a miscarriage, they had the ability to apply.

From the examples that we’d had—I’ll go back to that initial section 4 of the Employment Relations Act—there is still that good faith working arrangement. I would see that to be working in a way that an employer would want a good, reliable employee who is in a good, fit mental and physical state to be able to continue at their duties, and that may mean taking some time for bereavement leave. While that might be a short-term cost for a small business at an incredibly difficult time in New Zealand’s history, the long-term benefits of having a steadfast and loyal employee would pay off in the long term.

MAUREEN PUGH (National): I thank the member for her response. I just point out to the member, though, that when this bill was being debated and the submissions were being heard, we were in a very different place in this country. Businesses were in a very different place in this country. The strain that has gone on them over the last six months has been quite incredible, and I think, as a matter of good faith, it would be incumbent on us, as a Parliament, to take note of that stress that is on business, and perhaps push out the commencement date.

GINNY ANDERSEN (Labour—Hutt South): Thank you very much to the member Maureen Pugh and I take on board fully your comments in relation to small business. I acknowledge readily that there has been an inordinate amount of pressure that the Government has responded to. And I know for a fact that through the wage subsidy, in rounds one, two, three, and four, those businesses continue to receive support in the areas they need to. Saying that, many have been in a position of a really dire time. I’d like to balance those concerns of small businesses with those of families in New Zealand—with those mums and dads and families who have gone through lockdown, who have had babies, who have had miscarriages in one of the most unprecedented times in New Zealand’s history. So while I appreciate, yes, businesses are under pressure, so are many New Zealanders in their day-to-day lives, and it’s important to have the compassion and the understanding so that our people can grieve and get on with life in a timely way. And what is good for people is also good for business.

KIERAN McANULTY (Labour—Wairarapa): In light of this debate being reframed in terms of cost, could the member enlighten the committee, in her view, what cost it would cause on those mothers that are unable to, by right, have access to bereavement leave if this bill was pushed out, as members opposite are suggesting?

GINNY ANDERSEN (Labour—Hutt South): Thank you very much to the member. Look, I think it’s very difficult to quantify that in a financial sense, and I think that goes to the heart of the debate. The submissions we received from those women and the partners of those women who were unable to take leave were that they had long-term psychological trauma as a result of having to go back to work on a day and come back from work and clear out the nursery and fold away the clothes, and then go back to work the next day. I had stories of women who had had a miscarriage while travelling home on the train, and who had to continue to go to work that day and had to go back home on the train. The embarrassment, the trauma, and the pain that that caused was, I guess, unable to be quantified.

So I believe that that balance, taking into consideration humans and the way that we need to be compassionate in order to be a good, fully functioning society, shows through this bill that we want to have an economy that’s not just turning over a profit. That bit reflects the full wellbeing of our people.

BARBARA KURIGER (National—Taranaki - King Country): Thank you, Mr Chair. I just want to take a short call on the bill and again commend the member for bringing this bill. I was actually the spokesperson for women in the last Parliament when we actually went through the process of the—I wasn’t part of the committee and the submissions, but when we were trying to put the finalisation of the bill together. There was just a couple of points, and the member did clarify one before, around surrogate parents, but I just wanted to clarify and make sure that the public—you know, it’s been a while. The first reading version of the bill used the term “spouse”, but it excluded the possibility that the father was no longer the spouse. So just reconfirming that, really, rather than a question.

The second thing is we did spend a bit of time clarifying that the parents who experienced the end of a pregnancy due to an abortion were not eligible for bereavement leave. So I just thought, given that we’re in a new Parliament, the 53rd Parliament, it’s just worth clarifying those two things, because there was a lot of work across parties actually spent getting those couple of things right.

GINNY ANDERSEN (Labour—Hutt South): Thank you very much to the member. Interestingly, as well as COVID happening since this bill received its first reading in the House, we’ve also passed legislation specific to abortion and removing that from the Crimes Act. So I think it’s well raised by the member that we clarify that this bill excludes abortion. I, as the member in charge of the bill, was very keen for this not to become tied into the wider abortion debate, which has subsequently taken place. The recommendation also that we received was that it would be clear that abortions are excluded from the bill and that it was specific to miscarriage and to stillbirth. We sought, and I was very happy to receive, support from all parties within this House on the basis that we would focus on the areas of the law that we could change in agreement, and I’m pleased to be able to continue to do that.

NICOLA GRIGG (National—Selwyn): Thank you, Mr Chair. Just one more clarification from me, if I may. Really pleased to note the select committee clarification that it should apply to both known and unknown pregnancies, but I just wondered if the member could flesh out: is there any onus of proof on parents who have suffered this kind of loss?

GINNY ANDERSEN (Labour—Hutt South): No, I do not think there is a requirement—I think we covered that at the beginning. So New Zealand is different, in the sense—I think we’re one of the first countries, from the research I’ve undertaken, to actually pass legislation to enable bereavement leave to be taken for miscarriage. Most other countries enable it for stillbirth, which is 20 weeks-plus, or in some countries more. So we’re one of the very few countries in the world, from what I can understand, that would enable bereavement leave to be taken for miscarriage. That in itself raises some medical difficulties, because quite often a woman can have a miscarriage without even knowing initially she was pregnant, and it’s only at the point of miscarriage that it’s realised that there was a pregnancy. So the requirement in the bill is that there’s no need to have proof of pregnancy, such as a doctor’s note or a pregnancy test or such thing. It’ll be clear as a result of having a miscarriage that you were pregnant, and that is what is required. But there is no requirement to have written proof to prove to your employer that you were pregnant.

Clauses 1 to 5 agreed to.

House resumed.

CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): Madam Speaker, the committee has considered the Holidays (Bereavement Leave for Miscarriage) Amendment Bill (No 2) and reports it without amendment. I move, That the report be adopted.

Motion agreed to.

Report adopted.

Bills

Harmful Digital Communications (Unauthorised Posting of Intimate Visual Recording) Amendment Bill

First Reading

Debate resumed from 29 July 2020.

CHLÖE SWARBRICK (Green—Auckland Central): I stand to take the Green Party’s call on the Harmful Digital Communications (Unauthorised Posting of Intimate Visual Recording) Amendment Bill. I hadn’t intended to speak on this piece of legislation when I walked into the House today, but I note that my colleague Jan Logie is bound up in other business at present. I just wanted to add our tautoko to the point that we support this bill, particularly going through to that select committee stage to test the application of it.

Just to be really clear on how this legislation operates, it does so by simplifying the test that presently exists when it comes to harmful digital communications, particularly in what is colloquially referred to as revenge porn. At present, my understanding is that the Act operates by way of requiring that the person who is sharing the material has to have an intent to cause harm, it must have an objective standard of harm caused, and the victim must have actually experienced that harm, obviously where the burden of proof on those exists within the present court system as status quo.

The new offence, however, involves a simpler test where it is assumed that the sharing of an intimate visual recording is always harmful. It therefore enables that burden of proof to be shifted in such a way that those who have been through what is becoming an even more, unfortunately, commonplace experience of particularly younger people in this online world to operate in a culture where we take slightly more responsibility for that which we are posting, particularly if it is those intimate recordings of others. The Greens support this bill through its first reading and look forward to a rigorous debate at the select committee stage.

GINNY ANDERSEN (Labour—Hutt South): Thank you very much, Mr Speaker, for the opportunity to speak on this member’s bill in the name of Louisa Wall.

The full name of the bill, Harmful Digital Communications (Unauthorised Posting of Intimate Visual Recording) Amendment Bill, is better known as revenge porn—when you have postings either on social media or online of images which can be harmful. One of the challenges that we face is a continually evolving space of technology and a continuing evolving space of society and how we as lawmakers keep pace with the challenges that that continual change provides. It is opportunities like members’ bills—and I congratulate Louisa Wall for being very vigilant in this space, particularly in the rights of women—that allow us to make sure that the law reflects and protects those who need it.

I’d just like to quickly reflect on some of the findings from NetSafe in relation to image-based sexual abuse, and that’s to look at the types of abuse that happen online so that we’re aware of the nature of the problem that Louisa Wall’s bill proposes to address.

Overall, 5 percent of adult New Zealanders said they have personally experienced image-based sexual abuse, and it is far more common in terms of those aged under 30. In general, men and women were equally as likely to experience image-based sexual abuse, and about 4 percent had someone threaten to share their intimate pictures or videos online, and this was more common among those under 30 years old.

They’re interesting statistics, which I think we need to focus on and keep remembering that these are challenges that the next generation are grappling with. As good lawmakers, it is our duty to make sure that the law reflects those challenges that young people—men and women—are having to deal with.

Of those questioned under the NetSafe survey, 3 percent said that the intimate content had actually been shared online. This was far higher amongst 18- to 29-year-olds and those who did not identify as heterosexual. Also, those who identify as Asian were the ones that came through in that report.

How is this bill responding to the issue of revenge porn, or posting intimate images online without consent? This bill makes it an offence for a person to post an intimate visual recording of another person—and quite rightly so. For the commission of the offence, the person posting the digital communication must either have known that the victim had not expressly consented to the posting or had been reckless as to whether the victim had done so.

This goes right to the heart of the question of consent, and it takes it into an online forum. It’s incredibly important that we have an ability for young people to know that it is not acceptable for someone you know who has an intimate recording of you to put that online without your consent. So if anything can be communicated through this bill, it’s the importance for people to know that the law is there to protect those and to protect your rights and your privacy as well.

This bill increases the current penalty for imprisonment from a term not exceeding two years to a term not exceeding three years, to rectify the severity of this form of sexual abuse. It’s important to acknowledge too how much it’s important to our persona, our job prospects, our ability to make friends—you name it. All of those things follow you in terms of your online persona, and so we need to go to lengths to make sure that privacy and their personal integrity is protected as we increase in a growing digital age.

I’d like to conclude by saying that revenge porn is currently covered by the broad offences of posting harmful digital communications, but what we need to do is increase the strength of that existing law and bring it up to speed. We know as a fact this Government has placed a real focus on breaking the cycle of family violence and sexual violence while better supporting survivors. We’ve done a lot in that space, and I like to think that Louisa Wall’s bill is yet another element of increasing that overall response to family harm. Thank you.

NICOLE McKEE (ACT): I take this call and rise on behalf of the ACT Party in support of this bill. ACT originally opposed the primary legislation when it went through, due to the wide principles that could be used to restrict communications, and the chilling effect that this would have on freedom of speech. We thought, back then, that amendments could have been made to the Crimes Act and that that would have been suffice. But seeing as that primary legislation was going to go through, we thought that we would put in Supplementary Order Paper 93 because we actually had an issue with intimate visual recordings not being captured by the primary piece of legislation. We saw then what the Government sees now: victims in despair, humiliated, and suffering mental health issues. When the member across the floor there referred to 5 percent of New Zealand adults being victims of online image-based abuse, that’s 170,000 people—that’s huge. The reality is that we have also had 407 prosecutions since 2015.

A Stuff article reported a couple of weeks ago on a case where an outdoor instructor was convicted for secretly filming an intimate encounter. Judge Maree MacKenzie recorded the effects of the case on the victim, when addressing the defendant, by saying—and I quote—“It has left a permanent scar. It was distressing and as she says it was the most painful and traumatic experience of her life. Amongst other things she feels devastated by the invasion of (her) privacy, particularly when her boundaries had been made clear to you. The victim impact statement reveals the incident has had a catastrophic impact on her mental health and well-being. It has impacted all aspects of her life to the point where there are trust issues with men, and it has impacted her views on relationships. It has altered her perception of the world.”

It is a pity that it’s taken six years to get to this point, but fantastic for the victims that we’re here now. We further acknowledge and support that this bill will enable the courts to issue the removal or takedown orders of revenge porn recordings. Revenge porn was a reality before the primary legislation was enacted in 2015, and even more so now in 2021. More than a deterrent, this bill acknowledges the impact of harmful digital crime on the victims, and in that case we support that and we commend this bill to the House. Thank you.

VANUSHI WALTERS (Labour—Upper Harbour): I’m proud to stand and take a call in support of this bill. I first want to thank my colleague Louisa Wall for her work on this issue and actively addressing what is a significant area of harm for many. This is a bill about making it clear that posting a digital communication comprising intimate visual recordings of another person without their consent is an offence.

Over the last week, I’ve been speaking to individuals about the upcoming legislative programme in the House, and mentioned this bill and some of the horrific examples of posting intimate recordings that have occurred in New Zealand and overseas. My most frequent response was “Seriously—isn’t this already an offence?” Unfortunately, the answer at present is “Well, maybe.”—maybe. The reason it’s a “maybe” is because of the high and largely subjective threshold for establishing a breach of the current Harmful Digital Communications Act. Under the Act, posting offensive material is an offence only where three parts of a test are met, and those parts are: where the person posts a digital communication with the intent to cause harm to the victim, where posting the communication would cause harm to an ordinary reasonable person, and where posting the communication actually causes harm to the victim.

Women’s Refuge chief executive Ang Jury commented on this high threshold after the refuge conducted a study researching the links between domestic violence and suicide. She said, “This is a subjective and arbitrary determination of whether an offence has occurred, and needs to be reviewed.” This call for change was also echoed by Tess Upperton in her dissertation on revenge porn, where she writes, “The offence is too broadly worded to provide a strong deterrent to perpetrators of revenge porn, as its focus is on the outcome rather than the act itself.”

But let’s stop and think about the inherent impact of posting intimate recordings online. Speaking to this bill last year, Minister Little talked about it being not just excruciating embarrassment and humiliation; it is anxiety, it is depression, and it can cause a person’s life to be turned upside down. Let’s be clear: shame is not just a more exaggerated form of embarrassment. Embarrassment is regret clothed in the company of others; shame feels knitted to our very bones and is often most deeply felt when you’re in isolation.

Under the new proposed section of the test, it would be about taking the action to post an intimate recording and knowing the victim hasn’t consented, or being reckless as to whether they have consented, to its posting. In other words, the change recognises the inherent harm of the act of posting intimate recordings without consent.

I want to speak briefly about the assumptions that are too often made about the radius of consent. Consent to one act doesn’t mean consent to a second. Consent to taking or sharing a recording of an act doesn’t equate to consent to it being shared further. Consent to being in a recording does not transfer ownership rights to a recording. So why has society allowed this for so long? We’ve grown from roots that have historically shamed women for sexual activity—actually, both consensual and non-consensual. In this context, blurring the radius of consent seems to matter less, as moral judgment follows regardless. Here’s where we have more work to do. Every act has an ecology. For those posting intimate recordings without consent online, they are indeed individually responsible. But we have work to do to ensure that the culture we promote in schools, at workplaces, and online makes it clear that shaming by use of intimate imagery is never permissible. I hope soon, if asked “Surely that’s already an offence?”, instead of saying “Maybe”, we can simply say “Of course it is”. I commend this bill to the House.

Dr EMILY HENDERSON (Labour—Whangārei): I rise in support of this bill, and I want to first congratulate member Louisa Wall for another step forward in the protection of women and, in fact, all people from sexual harm. And I rise also as a member of a Government who have already taken some very strong steps, and this is—as my colleague, Ginny Andersen has just said—another little brick in the wall we are building against sexual harm being done to people in our community.

When I look at this bill, there’s two lenses through which I view it. The first is as a mum, and a mum of teenagers. The fact is that the world has moved on somewhat from when we were young, and the unfortunate fact is sexting and the solicitation of intimate pictures and recordings is very, very widespread, even among children as young as 12 and 13. These kids are not in any position to understand just how long term the consequences may be of having taken photos of themselves that are really intimate. Nor, frankly, are many of the people who solicit them able to really take cognisance of what it might do to the girl who they are now annoyed with or have fallen out with when they then go on and post those things online. They are not cognisant of the harm they do. And we know how vulnerable and, in fact, how limited is the teenage brain. I think it was Nigel Latta who said teenagers are wrong in the head, and he was right. As a mother, I can say that every day.

The other lens through which I view this is as a Family Court lawyer. Now, in the Family Court you constantly see couples who are irrationally angry with each other as part of the grief process that they go through in separation. That is a state in which rationality and kindness and respect for others does not often get a look-in. The number of cases in which recordings or pictures made in a consensual circumstance are then taken and weaponised, we know from the research done, is not a small number. In fact, one of the figures that’s been quoted by NetSafe is about 5 to 6 percent of New Zealanders, which is about 300,000 people. That’s an awful lot of harm.

So it is very, very timely that, as my colleague Vanushi Walters has said, we move away from a framework in the old legislation six years ago which was still requiring a high threshold of harm and effectively putting the onus back on victims to show that there was deep damage done to them. It was, in a way, a form of blame, and I am delighted to see it go.

So I just want to look precisely at the areas of the law that are going to be changed here. So section 22 under the old Act says there must be an intention to cause harm; that harm must be a reasonable consequence of the act for the ordinary, reasonable person in the victim’s position; and finally, it must cause actual harm. But when we’re saying harm, the definition is extremely high. It is “serious emotional distress”. That’s a high threshold added to what is already a high threshold, given the need for a reasonableness of consequences and actual consequences to be proven.

The fact is that, while some judges, thankfully, as my colleague on the other side of the House has pointed out, do recognise the immense harm that is done by these behaviours, some don’t. And there are instances of judges not taking seriously and not considering the harm done to be of a high enough standard. And for that reason, it is an absolute delight to look at section 22A, inserted into the Act by clause 4 of this bill which would simplify matters to remove the requirement of any intent to cause harm—remember those stupid teenage boys not thinking seriously. It would remove the requirement to prove any harm. It makes it clear consent has to be free and informed, and the defendant doesn’t have to have known there was no consent.

Hon SIMON BRIDGES (National—Tauranga): National supports this bill. Intimate visual recordings, as this bill euphemistically calls them, are a modern phenomenon and a huge concern. National agrees that where such recordings are posted without consent of the person in the recording, that should attract a criminal penalty. This, of course, was already at a level, an offence, in the current law of the land, the Harmful Digital Communications Act. But that Act required, as I understand it, proof of intent to harm. And there’s an argument—in fact, I think it’s right to say that that bar is set too high.

Like the last member, I actually want to speak as a member of Parliament, a local member of Parliament, and also as a dad, fortunately, with very young children—this is not an issue before its time. I can say, in my electorate, at intermediates, at high schools, I know this is an issue because I’ve been told by the leadership of those schools. Images and recordings of young people are made—and like the last member said, really young, we’re talking 12-year-olds; I’ve been told of these instances, and in quite significant numbers at certain times—and then there is a threat, there is blackmail. The cases I’ve been told about, say, by leadership in the schools, are for sexual conduct or other favours in return for these publishings or postings not being published, or these images not being published or posted.

I’m going to make a plea to our young—they may say I’m an old fogey, but rarely, if ever, is it a great idea. In fact, I’d say it’s a really bad one to let others have intimate images and recordings of yourself. In friendships, in relationships, look, we know that when you’re young chances are—I hate to break it to you—they’re not going to last. But I do know this: thanks to this bill, if you do—if anyone does say they’ll post it, or worse, if they do post it, it will very soon, no ifs, no buts, be a criminal offence. I’d suggest you go to the police, actually. They will help you and solve this with respect to your dignity and your privacy.

I want to say congratulations to the member opposite, Louisa Wall, on yet another member’s bill in this House. She has the luck of the devil, it seems to me, with her many members’ bills drawn out of the ballot. As I say, the luck of the devil; I’m not sure how she does it. I don’t always agree with the positions she takes in the bills that she puts forward. And I think there’s a danger, as I say, with respect to the member—because I don’t want it to turn into this glossy, friendly thing—that sometimes she can be intolerant in the name of tolerance in some of the bills that she puts forward, but I do want to say this: I do think she’s an incredibly strong member of Parliament. And I do think, as they have overseas—actually, I think it’s The Spectator magazine that has “Backbencher of the year”. She will have won it by now, and she’s, you know, potentially in it. I personally think I may also be in it for bringing The Wiggles to New Zealand, I think, in the next month or so. That’s a pretty strong contender, I would have thought. But congratulations to her, once again—

Hon Member: I hope you get good tickets.

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: Hamilton, I think, on 26 March. But I digress. I do want to say congratulations to the member on a good law that will improve the law on what is not just a topical issue but an important one.

WILLOW-JEAN PRIME (Labour—Northland): Tēnā koe, Mr Speaker. Otirā, tēnā tātou katoa. Can I first start my contribution this evening by also acknowledging the member Louisa Wall. I have been involved in discussions around your development of this bill from the very beginning, and I was reading some of the Hansard from last year, actually—it’s been on hold until this point, so it’s great to see it back in the House. But the Minister of Justice at the time, the Hon Andrew Little, described this as a well-thought-out, deeply principled, well-crafted, well-drafted member’s bill, and I know that when you brought the issue to our attention, we were grappling with some of the challenges of modern society and of technology, where you talked about high-profile cases. But what alarmed me in doing research for tonight’s speech was not just those high-profile cases but the many, many cases that perhaps many of us are not aware of, and just how widespread this issue actually is.

I agree with the Hon Simon Bridges that the member Louisa Wall is a very passionate and strong advocate, and I think if you manage to convince Louisa to take an issue on your behalf and then you have the luck of the biscuit tin, your issue is probably going to get over the line. So I do want to acknowledge you, Louisa, for that, and I want to repeat that this is a well-thought-out, deeply principled, well-crafted, and well-drafted member’s bill. So I am really pleased to be able to stand here this evening in support of it.

I was startled by the information that, according to NetSafe, 6 percent of New Zealanders—that number is 300,000 people—have had intimate images or recordings shared without their consent. I have not been one of those people, but I put myself in their shoes and thought about what that must feel like. As I went on to read the description of the impact, the trauma, that this can cause for people, I think we can actually all feel that, even if we haven’t experienced it, and it would only be heightened by actually experiencing it.

So why we support this bill: obviously, we believe that revenge porn is a form of abuse of somebody else, and that is the message that you gave to us when you were presenting the issue and saying why it needed a solution. In the legislation as it currently is, the threshold to prove the impact that it has had on you is so high. As we can see from some of the statistics, since the Act came into force in 2015, just 196 people—this is in 2020, so it might be a little bit outdated—had been convicted, and 87.8 percent of those convictions were men, and that was for everything under that Act, not just the specific intimate images.

So what does the bill do? Revenge porn is currently covered by the broad offence of posting harmful digital communications, which is created by section 22 of the Act, but under the current law, there is a requirement for the perpetrator to have intended to cause harm. The victim has to prove that they have suffered harm of serious emotional distress, and as we have heard in the debate tonight, there have been varying judgments from judges in terms of that in meeting that threshold. However, what this bill will do is accept that the posting of intimate images without somebody’s express permission—informed consent—is in itself a harmful act, whether that was intended by the perpetrator or not. So that changes it significantly, and I believe it will catch a lot more people. I heard one of the things in here, where to one person it could just be a joke, but to the other person—the victim—it’s caused serious harm.

So we support this bill because it is going to make it clear that the act of posting it without somebody’s permission is, in itself, a harmful act, and therefore they will be caught by the Act and the offences and the penalties within the Act. So I commend this bill to the House—and congratulations.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Louisa Wall—five minutes in reply.

LOUISA WALL (Labour): Tēna koe e te Māngai o te Whare. Tēnā koutou katoa. And can I firstly acknowledge all colleagues across the House, and thank you all very much for the opportunity for this bill to be passed tonight, and then be referred to a select committee, which actually will enable victims and others who are interested in this kaupapa to make submissions about how relevant it is. And I’m also expecting additions to the bill. And I say that because the area that we’re talking about is evolving all the time.

And so as part of, I guess, my trying to understand the issue, I went and visited Associate Professor Wayne Rumbles and his team at Waikato University. He leads the Technology in Legal Education New Zealand project, which is funded by the New Zealand Law Society. The interesting thing about that engagement is that he absolutely supports this bill, but he was quick to highlight that there are missing elements in terms of digital communications, digital technologies, and specifically around deep fakes. And I wonder how many of us know what a deep fake is. Well, if you’re on TikTok, you will have seen it recently because Tom Cruise has been seen to be doing a whole lot of things, and the reality is it’s not Tom Cruise: it’s synthetic media. It’s artificial intelligence. And so the issue that we have, actually, is about how those platforms can be used to abuse.

And at this time I feel like I must acknowledge the Hon Judith Collins, because, in fact, this bill was her bill when she was the Minister of Justice. And in 2012 it was National who created the regime, and they did anticipate harm, which is why, within the Harmful Digital Communications Act, there were provisions to ensure that harm wasn’t perpetrated. Unfortunately, it just wasn’t fit for purpose. Just as we saw with the issue with our Māori wards bill, it wasn’t fit for purpose. It had an intention, everyone was clear that we knew we had to mitigate harm, but we have created a threshold that’s too high.

I guess I stand here also as a proud woman and a proud female member of this Parliament. And the reason I say that was—Willow-Jean Prime won’t know this but—I actually submitted this as part of White Ribbon in 2019, and I did it deliberately to end all forms of violence against women and girls. I think because of the kaupapa it was picked. It isn’t the devil that picks my bills, Simon Bridges, it’s our atua. And I have to say that every time I’ve put something in that needed to be debated in this House, it got picked. And so therein lies, I guess, an opportunity for all of us to do things that the community need, the community want, because ultimately, from my perspective, it is about our children, and it is about ensuring that they can use digital communication safely.

And I’m also anticipating that we need more education in this area. I actually don’t want to criminalise people. I want to change their behaviour. I want people to know that if you don’t have consent—no consent means no consent, don’t post it. If you do, then you’re actually committing a crime. I don’t want people to go to jail, but I think the other aspect of this bill—and we’ve had two cases recently that Anna Leask has highlighted, and at the moment a woman in Christchurch had to take civil court action to have a sex tape removed from the internet; six months later they’re still investigating. They’re yet to decide if the man will face criminal charges. Well, under this legislation it actually becomes crystal clear, and so the police need these tools as well.

But overall, I’m hoping that we can use this technology for good, not for bad. I do think, as I said before, there are aspects of this bill that are deficient. I look forward to those who are interested in this area making submissions. I particularly want to hear from principals and young people about how we can better educate them. Because the phenomenon of taking images of yourself and sharing them, including having sex, is now a form of foreplay. And Simon’s right, our kids are in a really vulnerable position if they don’t realise that by doing that those images may be around forever. And so we need a lot of work to ensure that our kids are safe and that our legislation is actually fit for the future. Kia ora.

Motion agreed to.

Bill read a first time.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The question is, That the Harmful Digital Communications (Unauthorised Posting of Intimate Visual Recording) Amendment Bill be considered by the Justice Committee.

Motion agreed to.

Bill referred to the Justice Committee.

Bills

Unit Titles (Strengthening Body Corporate Governance and Other Matters) Amendment Bill

First Reading

NICOLA WILLIS (National): I move, That the Unit Titles (Strengthening Body Corporate Governance and Other Matters) Amendment Bill be now read a first time. I nominate the Finance and Expenditure Committee to consider the bill.

Let me begin by paying tribute to the people whose hard work has contributed to this bill receiving its first reading in Parliament today. The Hon Nikki Kaye, my former colleague and previous MP for Auckland Central—Nikki worked tirelessly on this bill. She heard the concern of the many people in her electorate struggling with the practicalities of body corporate rules, and she didn’t just lend an ear to their concerns, she got on and drafted changes to the law. I want to acknowledge the Hon Dr Nick Smith, who kicked off the 2016 review of the Unit Titles Act that Nikki’s work drew upon, and the Rt Hon Judith Collins, who looked after this bill as National’s previous housing spokesperson. Finally, and most important, let me acknowledge the many people who’ve contributed to the drafting of this bill, whose feedback and views are reflected in its provisions: the body corporate chairs, the inner city residents, the property managers, the prospective buyers, and many more.

This bill updates and modernises the 2010 Unit Titles Act. That is the law governing the building developments where multiple owners have a unit title and there is shared ownership of common areas. This bill will make life easier for thousands of people currently living in multi-unit dwellings and it will open the door for thousands more people to choose that type of housing in the future, because the current Unit Titles Act 2010 is no longer fit for purpose.

It was designed at a time when apartment living was still relatively new. To give members a sense of that, in 2010 multi-unit housing developments, adjoined townhouses, and apartment blocks made up around 15 percent of new houses. Fast forward to 2017 and that number was 40 percent. It continues to grow and it must continue to grow. And in practice, because the current law is archaic and outdated, it is creating headaches for owners and prospective buyers. It is preventing people from choosing apartment living.

I want to acknowledge that this area of the law is complex and most Kiwis are not familiar with it at all, but do not underestimate its importance. It is relevant to a problem affecting all of us: our housing shortage. Members of this House know that housing has become, over successive Governments, our biggest policy failure as a nation. There is no physical reason New Zealand should have some of the most expensive housing in the world. It is simply the result of the policies we have in place across zoning, planning, infrastructure, and Acts such as this one. We do not lack for the land. We do not lack the desire for housing. What we need is for our cities to be able to grow up and out. And I would put to members that multi-unit dwellings of the sort this bill deals with are an essential part of that.

We are starting to see, as I said, more high density dwellings. Well, we need to see even more. In New Zealand today, around 6.1 percent of dwellings are multi-unit. That compares to Australia where it’s more like 10 percent, the UK where it’s around 16 percent, and Canada where it’s 32.5 percent. Of course, there’s a lot of things behind that. But the bottom line is we need to make it easier for people to choose this kind of housing. And right now, many people say they won’t even consider looking at purchasing an apartment or a unit in a body corporate because of the vagaries of the Unit Titles Act. Bodies corporate are repeatedly listed as a major reason why people choose to buy houses over apartments. In fact, things have got so bad that some developers are choosing to bypass the Act entirely by creating bespoke legal structures.

So what are the worries that this bill aims to address? It aims to address the worry that people have about being burned by undisclosed future repair bills. There are too many horror stories about the financial and emotional devastation that apartment owners face after buying an apartment that is later found to have a major building issue. This bill aims to address the worry about being ripped off by excessive fees from body corporates for things that people dwelling in those buildings don’t want. And this bill aims to address the complexity of currently solving potential disputes and issues. In short, this bill will make sure the Unit Titles Act serves current owners and prospective buyers much better.

Let me just take a moment to detail some of the specific provisions. The first area is around improving the information disclosure regime to prospective buyers of units. As I’ve said, people tell terrible stories about what goes on in the current regime—body corporate committee members mysteriously selling their units just before a report comes out confirming their properties are leaky. Right now, people buying a townhouse or apartment are not entitled to the detailed information they may need, in the pre-contract disclosure process, around issues such as weather tightness and earthquake strengthening. And while owners are required to disclose what they know about their apartment, it’s possible they won’t know the issues with the broader building in which that apartment is contained. They may not even know, for example, that their body corporate committee is doing an investigation into seismic issues.

This bill makes for a simpler regime and requires bodies corporate to endorse information as correct, and it entitles the buyer to more access to financial records, past copies of body corporate general minutes, and details of insurance cover. This bill will also strengthen the governance arrangements in relation to a body corporate. It restricts to 5 percent the number of proxy votes a single person can hold in a body corporate to prevent the unfortunate practice that has arisen of proxy farming. It also allows for more fair division of the costs of utility interests based on use, i.e., so that those living on the upper floor of an apartment building pay more for lift repairs.

The bill aims to increase the professionalism and standards of body corporate managers. It’s estimated that bodies corporate manage annual levies of around $1 billion, as well as $1 billion in annual long-term maintenance funds and deposits. That’s a big responsibility. Sector professionals need to have clear rules as to their obligations, which also allow for flexibility and creativity in their building, operating, and maintenance procedures. This bill requires body corporate committees to comply with a code of conduct to be prescribed in regulations and sets out the specific requirements of how body corporate managers must conduct themselves, including disclosure of conflicts of interest. Finally, this bill looks at long-term maintenance plans and the arrangements there, which many people currently operating in bodies corporate say have become unworkable, unwieldy, and require too much recourse to special resolutions for moderation.

I acknowledge, in presenting this bill today, that it is important we strike a balance between the benefits of any additional compliance requirements we place on bodies corporate and the costs they may impose. We need to get that balance right. And I acknowledge that many with a direct interest in this law may want to see amendments to the bill as it’s presented today. I very much look forward to discussion with other parties, the public, and those operating in this sector about how we can strengthen this bill at select committee, allowing, for example, medium residential developments between 10 and 30 units to opt out of some of these obligations by special resolution.

I have received some suggestions from the Associate Minister of Housing (Public Housing), the Hon Poto Williams, around what she would like to see to improve this bill, and I look forward to examining those suggestions at select committee. Let me commend members of this House who’ve indicated their support for this bill. You are allowing pragmatism to win the day. We mustn’t let perfect be the enemy of the good when it comes to reform in this important area of the law. Yes, this is a technical series of amendments, but this is a very important step in solving New Zealand’s housing emergency and giving New Zealanders more choices on where and how they live. I commend this bill to the House.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The question is that the motion be agreed to. As we’ve got less than five minutes to the dinner break, I will leave the Chair for the dinner break and the House will resume at 7 00 p.m.

Sitting suspended from 5.56 p.m. to 7.00 p.m.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): The House is resumed. When the House rose for the dinner break, we had just finished the first speech in the first reading of Unit Titles (Strengthening Body Corporate Governance and Other Matters) Amendment Bill. The question is that the motion be agreed to.

GREG O’CONNOR (Labour—Ōhāriu): It gives me great pleasure to speak on the Unit Titles (Strengthening Body Corporate Governance and Other Matters) Amendment Bill—again, one of those bills that, on the surface of it, looks like it’d be fairly technical but, actually, it is a bill for our time, and I congratulate the member opposite, Nicola Willis, for having it drawn. So often, when members’ bills come here, they’re relatively simple affairs that are really designed to attack one part of a bill or one deficiency, but this is something that obviously—and if anyone had heard Ms Willis’ speech, they would’ve heard that it has had several iterations. It’s had something of a journey to arrive in this House and has been through several sets of hands. Congratulations on having it drawn, and certainly it is a bill that now has its time.

The face of, particularly, our inner cities, but even, increasingly, as we go out into the provinces—people are living differently, either by choice or by being forced to do that. In Wellington and most other cities, we have the national policy statement which was released last year. That national policy statement, essentially, requires councils in certain circumstances, certainly where the applications come or arise where they are close to public transport, within 10 minutes’ walk of rapid transport—then the councils must consider applications of up to six stories and with variations thereof. So it certainly means that a greater proportion of our population are going to end up living above ground, and it is really those above-ground arrangements, not exclusively, that this bill is to address, because, certainly, to live in shared space—shared arrangements, shared buildings—of necessity, there simply needs to be the sort of cooperation that this bill and the Act it amends are meant to remedy.

The other thing that will happen is that, as we now seek to reduce our carbon footprint, much of that, obviously, will pertain to transport. In any city here, on any day, New Zealand starts the world moving, and if you go every two-hour block around the world, there are a large number of cars that turn on and spew forth into our atmosphere. There is an absolute recognition that that cannot continue, and that will require us to learn to live in close quarters, even as we have experienced COVID. That in itself has brought us closer to home and made us understand we have to learn to cooperate a little better. However, cooperation is often—and anyone who’s been involved in any of these group activities will know it often only takes one or two on either side to ruin it for everyone. So that is why you do get regulation like this that becomes absolutely necessary.

So what does it actually seek to do? Really, to improve the information disclosure regime to prospective buyers of units, and as MPs with offices, we all have had terrible stories of constituents coming in who have ended up buying into an apartment block, buying into something administered by a corporate governance regime, body corporate regime, and finding out that, all of a sudden, they’d inherited a leaky building, inherited the need for new lifts, inherited all sorts of needs. Unfortunately, really, no one has been really able to be held responsible for that, until we get legislation like this that ensures that at least—and this is one of the provisions here—the minutes of any meeting can be examined and must be able to be examined. Terrible to find out that, yes, there has been a corporate meeting that has decided, “Yes, we’re going to have to spend a considerable amount of money on this building.” but somehow there was actually no record of that.

So, as you look through the bill, you’ll see some of these things that, on the surface of it, may look like common sense, but it is absolutely necessary to give protection to, really, all parties, not just the purchaser but actually those that are selling to make sure that they can’t actually be accused of having pulled the wool over sellers’ eyes, because there was the information able be collected. Just, interestingly, in preparation for speaking tonight, I was speaking to someone who related their own, probably typical, experience of having a building which they purchased stand-alone or there was some shared space and there was subsequently an apartment built. That shared space had drawn them into the body corporate, and all of a sudden that apartment that was built became a “leaky”—that terrible word that’s entered our lexicon—and they found that they were actually then responsible for the costs of the apartments, even though theirs was a relatively stand-alone affair with only shared costs, or “shared” being some parking areas. That, for them, began a very expensive exercise for that particular person to ensure they came free of that.

Again, it’s quite interesting when you get an anecdotal case like that. It’s good to look at the legislation, see if it is covered, and it pretty much would be covered, because one of the provisions of this bill is apportionment to ensure that if you’re—and the previous speaker, the sponsor of the bill, mentioned about living on the top floor of a building where, of course, the lifts, ensuring that they were working well, had full access to them. There’s certainly no way that someone who actually didn’t even avail themselves of that should be paying the same cost as those who live on the top floor. Again, this bill will give opportunity.

Now, I will say, as the first Government speaker on this bill, that we will certainly be supporting this to select committee, and I’m fortunate, I’m pleased, that the member chose the Finance and Expenditure Committee, of which I’m a part, to examine this bill—

Chlöe Swarbrick: Great committee—great committee.

Nicola Willis: Great committee.

GREG O’CONNOR: —because—great and hard-working and well-led committee, can I say, in deference to my junior whip here, from whom I may need leave at some stage. So, certainly, this ensures that we are looking at such apportionment, and it’s absolutely essential that we go down that path.

Even another very interesting part of this bill is the fact a quorum—who would’ve thought that you would have to ensure that bodies corporate actually had a quorum, but, actually, you do. It also addresses the matter of proxy voting. Again, those parades of people that come to our electoral offices, often there have been—and I won’t, sort of, cast too many aspersions on those who perhaps—and one incident I know where they inevitably held their corporate meetings when there was an All Blacks game on to ensure that, probably, those people may not have actually had the time or interest in attending the meeting. So to ensure that there are basic meeting requirements around ensuring that there is a quorum—also just ensuring that no one shareholder, that the person cannot act as a proxy for more than a certain proportion of the ownership—again, all these basic things, but when you look at this bill, you suddenly see, in the absence of these provisions, just why we have had so many problems and why we do get, as I say, this parade of people to our electorate offices looking for this.

So, I think this is, again, one of those bills, certainly, whose time has come. Just previous to this, there was some commentary on my colleague Louisa Wall and her luck at getting bills drawn at the right time, which I—Louisa’s here at the moment. Perhaps she always put it down to the fact that it was the time for each of those bills that needed to be debated. So perhaps it may well be, and I’ll give it to Ms Willis to say, that perhaps this bill’s time has come—again, congratulations on having it drawn, and I’m looking forward to being part of the debate on this bill at select committee. Again, as I say, we are going to be voting for it to go to select committee. I think there’s one or two little improvements we can make, and I’m looking forward to being part of that. So I certainly commend this bill.

CHLÖE SWARBRICK (Green—Auckland Central): E te Māngai, tēnā koe. Tēnā koutou e te Whare. In standing to support this bill on behalf of the Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand this evening, I want to acknowledge the forebears that brought this piece of legislation to the House, to the hands of Nicola Willis, who, I must say, has done an incredible job in collaborating across the Chamber to ensure that we get this to the Finance and Expenditure Committee—a mighty fine committee it is. I need to acknowledge my predecessor, the former MP for Auckland Central, Nikki Kaye. I know that she held an immense amount of mana and respect in this space in particular.

But, of course, this is a huge issue for Auckland Central, and I note even within the Finance and Expenditure Committee, we have the chair, Dr Duncan Webb, who represents Christchurch Central; of course, Nicola Willis is a list MP based in Wellington Central. I believe that the Minister of Finance, as the member for Wellington Central, has a direct interest in this. So I’m hoping that us who represent cities—where places are becoming and abodes are becoming more dense, as my colleague Greg O’Connor put it here, in order to minimise sprawl and make housing more affordable—are incredibly engaged in progressing this legislation and improving it through the process of public engagement.

With only five minutes to contribute tonight, I want to acknowledge that a number of the issues have already been canvassed, including particularly in the contribution by Nicola Willis. But, fundamentally, the current law is not fit for purpose. The unit titles legislation, the Unit Titles Act, has a number of fish hooks and loopholes, and this manifests in a huge number of problems. The units, for example, to which these titles are afforded, range all the way from small town houses, where there may be a handful of different unit titles, through to heritage buildings and apartment blocks, but also pertain to commercial buildings. Importantly, this doesn’t only pertain to apartment blocks.

There are issues with disclosure, as has been noted, with maintenance, with disputes resolutions, with fees, but also, importantly, with some conflicts of interest. Some of the problems that start to emerge and that I’ve heard of from not only members of the electorate but also from my friends and my family—and myself, in digging into these prospective apartments—are that sometimes it appears as though issues inside of apartment blocks, as they already exist for those unit owners at present, are not investigated for the potential that more costs might arise by virtue of the need to invest in something like a long-term maintenance plan, or, potentially, disclosure, or lack thereof, to prospective buyers. This is a case that I have seen with a number of heritage apartments in the instance of asbestos, where there is some recollection, potentially, that when these buildings were produced, there may have been asbestos used, but there isn’t the inclination or the interest in investigating it, which creates a problem not only for those present owners and the maintenance that is being postponed, where issues may arise further down the track, but also for those potential prospective buyers.

It also poses a number of issues where a few people—those who will proverbially go down with the ship of the building—decide to wait, see out their time, however long it may be that they will live in that apartment, and block progress of maintenance plans. On the flip side of that, there are some people who do what is colloquially known as, as the member Nicola Willis noted, proxy farm, where they go about a process of, effectively, capturing a number of votes and forcing some process, progress, or changes which can end up binding a number of members who live within that block, being lumped with bills that they cannot afford. These are a number of the issues that are starting to bubble up and have been for several years now.

I do have one question that I think will be really important to investigate as we go through the select committee process, and that is a discussion point raised to me by an expert, a lawyer in this area, who asked about what should be in the primary legislation—that is, that that has, currently, parliamentary oversight and that we can rigorously debate and investigate but it takes a long time to change, as has been evidenced by the progress of this legislation—and what should be in the secondary legislation, in the regulations, that can be a lot more flexible but don’t and aren’t afforded that same level of parliamentary oversight.

The Greens are proud to support this because it is one critical tool that will enable more people to get into a diversity of different living situations, but it’s important to note that this is only one tool; there is a number of others that must be investigated and applied to solve the housing crisis in this country. Kia ora.

ANAHILA KANONGATA’A-SUISUIKI (Labour): Thank you, Madam Speaker. It’s a privilege to stand here to contribute to the Unit Titles (Strengthening Body Corporate Governance and Other Matters) Amendment Bill. I want to acknowledge the sponsor of the bill, Nicola Willis. Thank you for your due diligence and your energy in bringing this to the House. As we know, it’s come through many hands of leaders who were in this Parliament; so I want to acknowledge, as the member has just acknowledged, Nikki Kaye, and, of course, members have acknowledged Nick Smith and, of course, Judith Collins.

What this bill does—actually, I need to say that I live in an apartment block, and I have no idea; I’ve never attended a body corporate meeting. I’m the person that gives a proxy to someone to go and speak on my behalf, and before getting into—

Dr Duncan Webb: You’re the reason for this!

ANAHILA KANONGATA’A-SUISUIKI: So I think I represent the future of New Zealand: New Zealanders who live in apartment blocks and have no idea about bodies corporate until you get into it. Just over a year now I’ve been living in an apartment; I’ve not been to a meeting yet.

So I want to acknowledge this bill, which will address and bring in safety for those New Zealanders who live in apartments. We know that the time when this legislation first came about—the Unit Titles Act in 2010—most of those times, living in apartments was not a regular thing to do. It was relatively uncommon here in New Zealand, but, you know, fast track 11 years and that’s where we’re going, because we are needing to provide homes for New Zealanders. On that note, I’d like to acknowledge our bodies corporate, and I’d like to acknowledge the chair of the apartment block that I live in, that I call home. Thank you for always voicing the owners’ opinion and sticking up for our rights. So I want to acknowledge those people who make the effort to go to meetings.

This is an example of how community voices become public, they involve a lot of academic people, a member picks up the bill, has lots of discussions with the Government of the day, and then it is part of our, the Labour Party’s—we campaigned on this, that we would look into it, and this is where we—I’m obviously speaking in support of this bill, and we are going to support this bill to select committee with the intention of making it better. As we know, for every bill that goes to select committee, that makes it better. So I look forward to seeing the journey of this bill through the House. As I have said, I’ve got a personal interest in this being done really well. It provides an example of where we as a Parliament can work together—can work together even though we have disagreements and differing opinions. We can work together for the betterment of New Zealanders.

So in my apartment block there’s 42 apartments. Like I said, I’ve never been to a meeting before, and I like how this bill intends to require the sellers to disclose information about a unit to potential buyers. It will prevent the body corporate from entering into service agreements for longer than 24 months. That’s two years; that’s a long time. So I like that, because we all like to know—one of the biggest things that we ever buy in this country, for a majority of first-home owners, is buying a home—is buying a home. And when we do buy a home now—as I said, before it was uncommon to be living in apartment blocks, but it is now the normal thing to be doing. First-home buyers will be looking at purchasing apartments, and it is one of the biggest ever investments that most of us get to make.

It is the intention of the bill—and I know that the member will agree with me, asking everybody out there to contribute at select committee so that we make the select committee improve on the bill—that it will contribute to protecting future homeowners, because apartment buildings are homes, from unfairly inheriting something that was out of their control, and yet we here in Parliament have an opportunity to make it better. On that note, I commend this bill to the House. Mālō.

BROOKE VAN VELDEN (Deputy Leader—ACT): Thank you, Madam Speaker. I rise on behalf of the ACT Party in support of the first reading of the Unit Titles (Strengthening Body Corporate Governance and Other Matters) Amendment Bill.

I don’t own my own home. Like most New Zealanders, though, I share the dream of homeownership. I’d like a three-bedroom weatherboard house with enough room for a dog and maybe a garden, and enough surface level problems to justify a weekend trip to Bunnings! But I can’t see that happening any time soon, not with house price increases the way that they are. Unfortunately, for many of us, that dream has slipped further and further out of reach. New Zealanders on a good income are getting left behind, let alone those on an average wage or even the minimum wage.

So, instead of looking to buy or live in homes on sections with a piece of land, more and more people are looking for an alternative. They’re looking to live in apartments, town houses, and units. More people are looking to the style of living that we’ve seen in Tokyo, New York, or even London. Apartment dwelling is more than just uni students wanting to be close to university buildings, friends, and bars, or young professionals reducing driving time to work; apartments are permanent homes with a sense of belonging—a place to raise a family—and more families are going to be doing this going forward.

There’s an estimate that over 145,000 New Zealand households live in apartments, and that number is going to double in only 20 years. These people will live in homes that are considered unit titles. More people living under unit titles would not usually require Parliament’s attention, if the law was actually working. Unfortunately, it’s not; so Parliament has to act.

ACT supports this legislation to the select committee because Parliament should spend time on things that matter to the people that elect us. When people buy a property in a unit title, they want to know what they are buying into—how does the body corporate operate; what maintenance issues has it identified; and how does it plan to maintain them in the future? Once you own that property that is part of a body corporate, you want to know that it will keep maintaining the property well, that it will fix what needs to be fixed, and that it will use your money carefully. Often, there are conflicts within bodies corporate about how to do this. Investors, for example, might have different interests from long-term owners who are retirees. There needs to be a clear and transparent process for making decisions when people have different views about how a property should be used and maintained. I know of one battle between retirees of a certain age and younger people who wanted to use their Airbnb to help pay their mortgage. There needs to be a clearer process for how those kinds of issues within apartment buildings can be resolved.

This bill seeks to improve governance for existing owners and disclosure for potential new owners. For that reason, it deserves to be examined by the select committee. However, we don’t want this well-intentioned bill to place greater costs on people than the benefits they get from following this law. Normally, there is a regulatory impact statement to assess the costs of a new law. Because this is a member’s bill, rather than a Government bill, we have not seen a regulatory impact statement. If there is a cost added to a homeowner under this bill, it should be spent to benefit the owner and their property, rather than simply an added cost just for the sake of a new regulation and complying with a new parliamentary law. I would ask the Government to provide a regulatory impact statement for this important piece of legislation—an idea that, arguably, the Government should have provided as its own bill.

What is certain is that this Parliament needs to turn its mind to the rules of unit titles, and I urge MPs all across the House to join ACT MPs in supporting this first reading so all of the public can have their say at select committee. Thank you.

GINNY ANDERSEN (Labour—Hutt South): Thank you very much, Madam Speaker. It’s a privilege to be able to speak on the Unit Titles (Strengthening Body Corporate Governance and Other Matters) Amendment Bill. I acknowledge the bill brought to the House in the name of Nicola Willis. The important thing to mention—and I think this issue comes up quite a lot because we’re seeing an increasing number of homes being built that are utilised in the form of unit title—is that the member’s bill proposes to introduce proportionate utility costs and a code of conduct to body corporate committees to enable that enactments can require long-term maintenance plans and a yearly audit of those plans for those complexes that are larger than 10 units.

We know that right here in Wellington, and particularly in urban centres such as Auckland, there are multiple instances where people are paying quite hefty body corporate fees. We’ve also seen this particularly occur as there have been requirements for earthquake strengthening, sometimes with those holders of unit titles being faced with some bills that are close to the value of the property in order to enable that earthquake strengthening work to take place. So it requires sellers to disclose information about a unit to potential buyers and prevent bodies corporate from entering service agreements for longer than 24 months.

So, in general, Labour will be supporting this bill to select committee because it’s important that we do hear from submitters. As part of the previous Governance and Administration Committee, we did hear petitions and submissions from those people who were under unit titles. So I think that it’s important to be able to continue the ability for people to have their say and to come to Parliament, and I look forward to the select committee process being able to do that. Labour supports the reform of the Unit Titles Act. The member’s bill makes some of the changes that we would like to see. However, there are some details that need to be addressed in the select committee stage—and that is exactly what that part of the legislative process is for: to identify those issues and look for areas that can be strengthened.

Look, there has been a lot of development in this space, when you think of the old quarter acre section and how New Zealand used to look and how much that has changed over time. There is no doubt that there is a requirement for the legislation to change in order to accommodate how we make sure that those people who are owners of those properties are still looked after in terms of a modern context. We know that buyers do need to be protected and the Act needs more transparency in the planning and the fundamental maintenance of projects. So improving that disclosure regime to prospective buyers will also be key in supporting and incentivising buyers of unit titles. In essence, there is a clear view that owners should pay for what they use, with better proportionality when it comes to imposing those service costs. It’s quite often that there are hidden costs that are not made clear to those owners when purchasing an apartment in a building.

So why do we support this bill? In essence, Labour supports the reform of the Unit Titles Act because of the changes that we think do need to be made in this space. We acknowledge the fact that owners should pay for what they use. Also, some additional areas that the member’s bill could still do some work on—I think it’s important to flag now, because those are areas that submitters can also bring to the select committee. It would be good to also specify whether this would be a blanket approach or subject to agreement by body corporate committees. In addition to this, it would also be good to elaborate on how proportionality might be forecast when disclosed to buyers; how is that communicated in those types of sale-and-purchase arrangements? It would be important to discuss how proportionate utility costs might affect decision-making processes such as how owners contribute to the body corporate decisions in the services that they have little or maybe even no interest in. And, finally, it is important to acknowledge the likelihood of disputes over proportional service costs or how these disputes will be dealt with. So they are the sorts of details that members on this side of the House look forward to the select committee process nutting out over time. I commend this bill to the House.

SHANAN HALBERT (Labour—Northcote): E te Māngai, tēnā koe. I speak in support this evening on the unit titles amendment bill, and I too acknowledge Nicola Willis for the work that has been done around this. As a newbie in this House, you tend to learn a bunch of things as these sorts of bills come in front of you, and this particular bill speaks to me, as an Aucklander, with the growth pains that we are experiencing and the challenges, as a large city, in the large developments that we see all around us.

I note, right across from my house, in little Willow Avenue, is a development of 12 town houses, and, just down the way, there is a major development in Zion Road, with 49 apartments in a single lane road. Our concern, as a local neighbourhood, is around the infrastructure and both the ability to deal with the population growth that we have but also that we have infrastructure that supports those developments. When I looked into this bill, it actually gave me a sense of comfort, Nicola Willis, because it spoke to my community and it, too, would enable them to have a sense of comfort that there are better controls around the quality of housing and the quality of developments that are rising up within our community.

This bill introduces the proportionate utility costs, but I also like the idea of having a code of conduct in place, and I look to my journey. I heard from my fellow member Anahila about her journey and living in apartments, and I too spent 15 years, when I moved to Auckland, living in apartments. I thought for a moment: did I ever think about the landlords or the owners or how they cared for me? I didn’t question it, in fact; I simply paid my rent. I aimed to be a first-home buyer, but I let others take responsibility, effectively, for the facility that I lived in. At times, I had broken lifts. At times, I lived in apartments that were leaky. That’s the reality of many, many Aucklanders of my generation. When I look to this law back in 2010, that was a long time ago. Auckland has changed. Auckland has grown. We have much larger developments going up in our community. So I do support the need for a better code of conduct.

When I look to the long-term maintenance plan requirements, I also support that too. It’s something we require for any public facility. It’s something that we require for schools’ facilities—10-year maintenance plans—to ensure that the quality of that facility is good for the people that are working, learning, or living within that, and I see housing as no different. I talk quite often—and I spoke today in the general debate—around how proud I am of our programme of housing in Auckland under this Government, in putting people at the centre. So this particular member’s bill does speak to that too. It does put people at the centre and enables that there’s adequate checks and balances, I guess, to the quality of housing that Aucklanders are living in. More and more people in Auckland will be living in town houses and in apartments as we grow, as we grow, and as we grow some more.

So, for that very reason, I would like this bill to go through the select committee process. I think there’s merit in ironing some of those kinks out and having broader discussions around the maintenance plan requirements and around what’s included in that code of conduct—how we care for people and how we ensure that we have quality housing standards, including those being warm and dry. I also support this bill to go through because it does give my community some sense of satisfaction that people care about the large-scale builds that we’re experiencing under the unitary plan. Thank you very much to the member for putting this forward. I commend this bill to the House.

TIM VAN DE MOLEN (National—Waikato): Thank you, Madam Speaker. As the building and construction spokesperson for National, I’m happy to take a call on what is another quality member’s bill proposed by this side of the House. We’re used to seeing these sorts of bills put forward by National; so it’s great to see widespread support for this debate tonight—and especially going to the select committee process. And I’ll just acknowledge the comments earlier from Anahila Kanongata’a-Suisuiki, who mentioned that the select committee process always manages to improve a bill. I’d just encourage her to remind her senior ministerial colleagues of that, too, given their propensity to use urgency to bypass that process of late.

Anyway, coming to the unit titles bill in front of us. We’ve heard a lot of consideration from members throughout their contributions tonight around why this is an important piece of legislation, and it is. Apartments are becoming an increasingly important housing option and provide capacity for further density in our urban environments, which is an important part, in my view, of where we need to be getting to—building up more so than out. When we look at our pretty significantly large footprints in our urban centres, we need to ensure that we’re maximising the potential within those boundaries by going up. But—and this is the challenge for a lot of people—the current system raises a lot of questions. It raises a lot of red flags. And whenever you have uncertainty, people will, naturally, shy away from it. So, for a lot of people, buying a residential property, apartment or house, is the most significant asset purchase they will make. And also because of that, it’s something they’re not particularly familiar with doing; they are not particularly experienced with buying and selling properties and exactly what sort of things they need to consider when they’re conducting their due diligence around a potential property purchase.

Of course, in the current situation, the volume of information you can access when looking to buy an apartment is actually very low. And of course we saw some changes to the real estate Act a number of years ago, now requiring disclosure to be made of any known problems, and also that is an expectation placed on vendors; they must disclose any information they have. But, of course, if they’re unaware—which can, as we’ve heard tonight, be the case with apartment properties—then you can end up with someone buying a home that they have maxed themselves out to do as a first-home buyer and then suddenly being confronted with an unaffordable maintenance bill to upgrade any particular aspect that has arisen as the result of some long-term maintenance plan that hasn’t been funded fully. Because, interestingly, and I was amazed to see this in the Unit Titles Act, currently there’s a requirement to have a 10-year plan—that will be extended to 30 as proposed under this bill—but there’s also a requirement, section 117, that there must be a long-term maintenance fund unless the bodies corporate, by special resolution, decide not to have a long-term maintenance fund. Right, so that seems a little bizarre that actually there’s no requirement to have a fund for these long-term maintenance issues. So that’s something I would expect we’ll hear from submitters on during this process as well.

But we’re also seeing the evolution, I suppose, of different construction methods. We’re seeing an increasing focus around modular or prefabrication construction, and I think, over time, we will see more people looking for the ease, the convenience, and the cheaper purchasing price—particularly in the current market—that an apartment can offer, or a property and a unit title can offer. And that’s all good stuff. Of course, we need to see Resource Management Act reform to enable more construction of these types of properties, and I encourage the Government to continue their proposals in that space, and we have plenty of advice to share or suggestions to make in terms of getting that in the right space.

Look, just a couple of the key points I want to touch on in my last minute here. As I said, that disclosure is a key concern for a number of potential purchasers. So improving the information disclosure regime is absolutely vital. And, you know, that really, I think, potentially comes to the core of the issue for a lot of people. They don’t know necessarily what they’re buying and what it looks like as an ongoing commitment for them. So I’d also just like to at this point acknowledge John Gray, the president of the Home Owners and Buyers Association of New Zealand, for the work he and his organisation have done, which has been significant, on this. I appreciate the time he shared with me sharing some of his insights. So they’re proposing having a building survey done on all existing buildings so that you know your starting point, right? And, for a lot of people, that gives them straight away a lot more certainty. So I look forward to seeing discussion on that through the process, as well.

The other one around the professionalism of body corporate managers and codes of conduct—that’s all good stuff; and planning and funding the long-term maintenance—that’s a biggie. So I think there’s some really good points here. We’ll see some change. I encourage submitters to get involved with it and look forward to seeing it progress. Thank you.

ANGIE WARREN-CLARK (Labour): Thank you, Madam Speaker. It’s a real pleasure to rise and take a five-minute call on this bill. I would like to acknowledge and recognise you, Nicola Willis, for bringing this bill to the House. I think it’s, as we’ve heard previously, a bill that has now come in full time to this House. I would just like to say, however: there have been four lots of hands, yet we still have the Unit Titles (Strengthening Body Corporate Governance and Other Matters) Amendment Bill. Let’s work on the title, shall we?

Look, I do want to congratulate you, and often when we’re in this House we learn things. I remember at law, a long, long time ago, looking at bodies corporate, and looking at this Act—the principal Act, the original Act in 2010, the Unit Titles Act—I was gobsmacked to discover that there were some very fundamental things lacking in that Act; absolutely gobsmacked. I did not comprehend that this bill lacked basic definitions—basic definitions—for example, what a chairperson is of a body corporate. So I want to acknowledge that this a long time coming. The legislation is—gosh, but it’s only 11 years old, right, and it is so dated, this legislation.

Look, we will be supporting this bill to select committee. There is a lot more broader work to be done in this area, but I certainly take the point that the member has made: don’t let perfection get in the way of good. I acknowledge that. I think that there are some good aspects to this bill. I think there’s going to be a lot of work to be done, but I do want to say that this is probably one of the most substantial members’ bills that I have seen in this House in my short time. It is well thought through and there are a lot of areas that have been covered.

So certainly, for me, just having a little bit of a deep dive into some of the clauses that I find personally of interest—and I know that my good colleague Dr Duncan Webb will be developing some of this at select committee; it will be an interesting process—new section 113 in clause 14, the decision making of the body corporate to keep written records: who would have known? There could be hundreds and thousands of dollars’ worth of assets that are being managed by these bodies corporate—

Hon Member: Millions.

ANGIE WARREN-CLARK: —millions, even—and written records aren’t required? That is outrageous, I think. New section 114A in clause 15: the body corporate is to comply with a code of conduct, and while that code of conduct may be addressed in the principal legislation, it’ll also be addressed in regulation. To me, a code of conduct in these kinds of matters is absolutely fundamental—it’s absolutely fundamental. Imagine—and we’ve heard anecdotally some of these stories—people selling a property because they’re aware that it’s become leaky or seismically unsafe. We’ve heard those things, and they make the money and then it’s sold onwards. Some of these codes of conduct and codes of behaviour are so very important. New section 114B in clause 15, conflicts of interest—now, that to me is of great interest: conflicts of interest as on the body corporate. Managing the financial role, and I think of this like a trustee managing a financial role, versus being an owner of a property and having benefit—these are things that need balancing and working through. New section 114G in clause 15, the definition of a body corporate manager—that will be interesting; a job description, perhaps.

But finally, in my last 30 seconds, I have indicated that we will be supporting this bill. I think of my retired mother-in-law, who has downsized to a lifestyle village. It’s leased, but it’s also operated by a body corporate, and I think this bill will help and support her to live well. Thank you; I commend the bill.

Dr DUNCAN WEBB (Labour—Christchurch Central): Thank you, Madam Speaker. I must say, when I picked up this bill, a shiver went through my spine.

Hon Members: Ha, ha!

Dr DUNCAN WEBB: Oh well, you may laugh but, no, in my time as a lawyer dealing with earthquake claims, the worst cases of all were body corporate cases where you had extremely complex building problems, technical building problems—

Hon Gerry Brownlee: Lawyers’ failings!

Dr DUNCAN WEBB: —and extremely—well, there was someone else who failed Christchurch then, Gerry Brownlee. But here, what we have is an attempted fix. And I must say, seeing as we’re on the topic of lawyers, I wonder if perhaps this has not come straight out of a lawyer’s notebook, because it does strike me as something of a list of “to dos”, when a lawyer zapped through and said, “Here’s a whole lot of things that I’ve seen go wrong with bodies corporate.” Now, that’s not altogether a bad thing, and I certainly agree and commend Nicola Willis on bringing this topic to the House. But I do sometimes wonder if these have not been, kind of, not addressing the matter as a point of principle but rather as a list of detailed and technical amendments.

I thank the member for seeking to refer this to the best, most gifted, most cooperative, and most hard-working committee in the House, the Finance and Expenditure Committee, but the matter does have to go to a vote. The indefatigable Clerk was referring me to the Standing Orders. Apparently, we can’t debate the motion, but we still have to vote on it. So don’t count all your chickens before they’re hatched on that particular number.

But look, I do want to point out here that there’s a danger that we simply put another layer of rules on an already complex piece of legislation.

Hon Simon Bridges: I laugh in the face of danger!

Dr DUNCAN WEBB: Because, of course, we all know what the National Party want to do with regulations, don’t we: put them on a bonfire. And yet here we have a piece of legislation which has, at least from my count, at least three, on a cursory glance, additional regulations. Now, regulations certainly have their place. And we know, you know, the Regulations Review Committee, another fantastic committee, recognises the quality of those regulations, but I do have some concerns that we’re simply going to impose more obligations.

You’ve got to remember that many body corporates are simply small groups of individuals who are not particularly proficient in reading complex legislation, let alone subsidiary regulations, codes of conduct, and so on and so forth. So body corporate regulations should be intuitive. And if you look at the conflict of interest rules, an area in which I have a particular interest, you can’t be a member of the body corporate committee—and I’m glad Nicola Willis is taking notes for her reply, because this is exactly what I’d like her to reply to. So you can’t sit on a body corporate committee if you have an interest that is particular and not shared with every other member. So if the committee is considering a leak which is in your unit and the one next door but not the other four, you have a conflict of interest and you can’t sit on that committee. Now, is that the case or not? Now, I’m not entirely sure, but absolutely these things need to be discussed at select committee, but there is a real danger that we just have a hotchpotch fix-up.

So I think there is a fair bit of work to be done in committee. Even the membership and voting rules, you know. Yes, we need clear voting rules and we need clear rules around proxies. But I’m fearful that we might have gone a bit too far and just be making rules not quite for the sake of them, but for a very small number of cases where rules which are by and large workable have been abused. Now, the Unit Titles Act itself has broad ranging dispute resolution mechanisms, and that’s certainly something that also needs to be looked at, because we’ve got to accept that recourse to the High Court is not good for everyone in every instance, and in many cases it’s far too expensive.

Perhaps that’s where we should be looking. Rather than trying to write a rule for every possible twist and turn of human nature when you’re living—and we know that neighbour disputes are the worst disputes of all, because that’s what unit title disputes generally are, and you really can’t write rules for all of those situations. So, yes, it’ll probably come to the Finance and Expenditure Committee, but if it does I’m sure we’ll have a great time looking at it, making it a better bill, and seeing what happens to it from there. Thank you, Madam Speaker.

NICOLA WILLIS (National): E te Māngai, tēnā koe. I want to thank members across the House for your indications of support for this bill this evening. It is special and refreshing to see support from the ACT Party, the Labour Party, and the Green Party, and to have agreement that it is now time to reform our outdated Unit Titles Act. In fact, we’ve seen some fantastic contributions tonight that give me great heart that the select committee process for this bill will be a thorough, substantive exercise.

In fact, I haven’t very often seen such levels of passion as we just saw from Duncan Webb. Not even on matters of tax have I seen him get so passionate, and I am very much looking forward to sitting with him around a table where he is the one arguing against complexity in regulations and excessive regulations. These are words that sing strongly to me, and so we will have a meeting of minds on that, Mr Webb.

I also want to acknowledge the tributes to the Hon Nikki Kaye that have been shared in the House tonight. There is no doubt that this is a very substantial piece of work that she’d brought together, and it is my honour to be shepherding it at this juncture.

It’s a reminder that Parliament can be a place where MPs make contributions that work together to advance reform. This is certainly an area where that is overdue, and I want to recognise the contribution of members from a variety of perspectives who see the need for this reform.

Greg O’Connor, thank you for flying the flag for Wellington. These issues are very real here, and I’m sure Greg O’Connor—like me—has been lobbied by inner-city Wellington and others who see this as vital.

Thank you, Chlöe Swarbrick, for continuing to speak up for Auckland Central apartment-dwellers who wish to see this reform, and I acknowledge your point that there is decision making to be made about how much of this reform sits in the primary versus the secondary legislation.

Thank you, Anahila Kanongata’a-Suisuiki. You are, I think, the only apartment-dweller that spoke tonight, and that is very important because it keeps it real—acknowledging that not every apartment-dweller wants to turn up to body corporate meetings and read every minute. That’s something we need to keep in mind as we deliberate on this bill.

Thank you, Brooke van Velden, for the ACT Party’s contribution. I think Brooke speaks for many when she acknowledges that New Zealanders of tomorrow want to keep the dream of homeownership alive, and apartments are a really important part of keeping that dream alive.

Thank you, Ginny Andersen. I agree with you that this is a bill where we will have to listen hard to submissions to make sure we’re getting things right.

Thank you, Shanan Halbert, for an Auckland perspective. I think that I will take your words more to my heart when you say this bill is a comfort to you, whereas Duncan Webb saw it as a shiver down his spine. I am happy to be a comfort to you and to the Labour Party, as you may need me in the future in terms of coming up with good ideas for what you should be doing. On a number of matters, I am able to offer you some good ideas, so let’s just start with this one and see where we go.

Angie Warren-Clark, thank you for your contribution. I’m going to think about your grandmother, I think it was—your mother—as we progress this bill, because this is certainly something that needs to work for all generations and people in all sorts of circumstances. I take your tip on the title, but I urge you to come up with a good suggestion, because it’s difficult to summarise the sheer breadth of this bill.

Look, I want to end on the note of encouraging those listening to this debate or reading the Hansard who think that people in this House haven’t got it quite right or that we’re misunderstanding things. Please, we want to hear your views: make submissions. The Finance and Expenditure Committee will deliberate seriously on this bill. As I said at the beginning, it’s very important to me that we get the balance right between trying to create benefit for those who are living in these kinds of dwellings at the moment or who wish to buy them and also not creating too much additional cost and complexity. I don’t want to be leading a bill that does that, so let’s get that balance right.

We need to hear from those who are dealing with this in its practicalities, and I very much look forward to the select committee process. Thank you to all members for your support.

Bill read a first time.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): The question is, That the Unit Titles (Strengthening Body Corporate Governance and Other Matters) Amendment Bill be considered by the Finance and Expenditure Committee.

Motion agreed to.

Bill referred to the Finance and Expenditure Committee.

Bills

Misuse of Drugs (Medicinal Cannabis) Amendment Bill (No 2)

First Reading

Dr SHANE RETI (National): I move, That the Misuse of Drugs (Medicinal Cannabis) Amendment Bill (No 2) be now read a first time. I nominate the Health Committee to consider the bill.

It’s a pleasure to speak to this bill in my name, the Misuse of Drugs (Medicinal Cannabis) Amendment Bill (No 2). Two years ago, this Labour Government said at the first reading of their medicinal cannabis bill, this bill will “make medicinal cannabis more readily available”. Unfortunately, this has failed. I do not see one single new medicinal cannabis product enabled by their bill on the shelves for New Zealanders over these past two years. Other failures of incomplete policy are a failure to educate GPs. Patients and industry experts tell me that they are at the mercy of expensive cannabis doctors, who are now selling low-quality cannabis gummies online in New Zealand, and cannabidiol, CBD, still needs to find an affordable and accessible pathway. What we have got is not at all what New Zealanders wanted or expect from a medicinal cannabis framework, or what I believe this House envisaged.

So how can this member’s bill help? Let me set the objective for this bill. I bring this member’s bill in my name to the House tonight in full knowledge that legislation and regulations have already been passed, but in the belief that they can be made better. In this knowledge, we are asking that this bill be sent to select committee for whatever the best parts are to be considered.

Here is a one-sentence summary of what brought us to this place. In July 2018, Labour and National presented their medicinal cannabis bills, which went head to head. Labour passed all the details to regulations that were still to be determined, and we drafted the detail into this bill for public and parliamentary scrutiny, and we committed to retail products on the shelves in one year. Two years on, and there are no new medicinal cannabis products on the shelves from this legislation. Two years lost, one in forming the regulations and one in complying with them, and no hope in sight for immediate relief. The promise has fallen far short.

I will draw three features from my member’s bill around how the existing framework can be made better. Here are six proposals from the bill for how retail accessibility and affordability can be accelerated. The first is positioning of low-dose medicinal cannabis products on the over-the-counter framework. Secondly, provisional consenting from Medsafe. Thirdly, follow-up clinical trials—phase zero, phase one, and phase two only. Fourthly, controlled importing of approved quality, low-dose product. Five, GP prescribing without specialist co-signing. And six, pharmacy dispensing, as is done in the US.

We also need to tighten up regulations around licence eligibility and locations. It is wrong that an inmate who is currently in prison for a serious offence such as murder is eligible for a medicinal cannabis licence and that active gang members can be employed in the industry. It is also wrong that medicinal cannabis can be grown beside a wāhi tapu and a school.

Here are suggestions, then, from this bill, tightening up the regulations to make this framework more enduring. For licence holders, there must be no history of a serious offence, no history of controlled drug habituation, and no associations adverse to the intent of the bill. This is very similar to what Australia does. For employees, they should not be currently addicted or habituated and not currently an active gang member. There is a very clear and overwhelming association between gangs and the drug trade. The Attorney-General has formed an interpretation on this point that while there is a clear connection between gangs and drugs, the prohibition on their employment is not a proportional response to the rights of freedom of association. I disagree, and I suggest we put this to the court of public opinion—if they think active gang members should be employed in the medicinal cannabis industry. Finally, locations where medicinal cannabis can be currently grown are wrong. It should not be allowed to be grown alongside a wāhi tapu, school, or residential area.

In summary, it’s disappointing that after two years, there is still not affordable and accessible access to medicinal cannabis products in New Zealand. As the sponsor of this bill, I have the privilege of selecting the speakers amongst a caucus completely, unanimously behind this bill. I’ve asked the Hon Simon Bridges and Chris Bishop to offer contributions as key people in getting this bill here tonight, and I thank them and my caucus colleagues.

To conclude, in progressing this body of work, I believe we have contributed usefully to the debate on medicinal cannabis, and I commend this bill to the House.

Hon SIMON BRIDGES (National—Tauranga): When I was Leader of the Opposition I was faced with a situation where the Government was doing nothing on medicinal cannabis, and many New Zealanders were contacting me—it was a huge issue on the television, on the radio, all the time there were worthy cases of people in pain who couldn’t get the pain relief that they wanted. I was, I’ve got to be honest, somewhat sceptical. I wondered if this was a Trojan Chlöe Swarbrick horse for decriminalisation, and that’s what was really going on here. But I did accept that there was a need for a regime of medicinal cannabis.

It was—and is—of course, no different than the many other ways that we medicate, whether morphine—a class A drug, of course—or others in our medical and health system. But I knew that what I also wanted was a regime that was robust, that was serious, that wasn’t—as so many bills, member’s bills that come before this House are—just a slogan with nothing really behind it. So what was I to do in this situation? Well, I asked Dr Shane Reti if he could go away and do this, and can I say to the member who’s brought this fine bill and done this piece of work forward—he was at that stage in somewhat obscurity, not too far in front of Jami-Lee Ross in this Parliament in the pecking order, but I asked him if he would go away and do the work on this. A bill to devise the scheme that makes up this bill, a legal one, but, more than a slogan, something that was truly robust, taking best practice from around the world.

Dr Reti came back with what I think is, and I don’t say this simply to flatter him in the House, but one of the best pieces of work I’ve seen in politics, can I say, at least from a politician. He did an incredible job on this, he looked globally, he went to the United States where he had a number of significant medical and political contacts, and he put together this brilliant piece of work. We presented it, the media, they could not find fault, and the stakeholders accepted the worth. I don’t think there was a criticism there, frankly, out in the public, and David Clark laughs. That’s because I’m coming to what he did, which was three-fifths of not very much.

Hon Dr David Clark: This is absolute nonsense.

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: And that is that, well, the member has got to speak if he’s going to say that, we look forward to it. It was better than what a thousand officials in the Ministry of Health under Dr David Clark came up from. Because, in the end, a long time after, actually, Dr Reti had shamed the Government into doing something, this Parliament passed a Government law that was a skeleton, at best, with no bones on it; unlike Dr Shane Reti’s bill, that had the substance, that had the robustness here, and did the job, and he presents that bill to the House.

I’m not going to go through the detail of the bill. It’s there, people can read it, Dr Reti has referred to the seven pieces—

Chlöe Swarbrick: Have you?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: Well, the member over there, Chlöe Swarbrick says “Have you?” and she probably thinks she’s funny, but the reality is she’s boring when it comes to drugs. She only has one agenda, and that’s to free it up and get more on the streets. That’s her view, it’s not my view, actually.

And I say I’m not going to go through the detail, but this is incredibly well thought through, the detail is there that isn’t in any of the Government’s work. I say to the members opposite, there’s only one Minister in the House, one member of the executive, or two if I count Mr Tirikatene over there, I urge them to take this on actually, to support this. Because if they did that, they wouldn’t just have a slogan. They just wouldn’t have a skeleton without the flesh on it. They would have something of substance, that’s robust, and that would give New Zealand a world-class medicinal cannabis regime we could be proud of.

Dr LIZ CRAIG (Labour): Thank you, Madam Speaker. I’d just like to start by acknowledging Dr Shane Reti and the work he’s put into developing this comprehensive bill. I think access to medicinal cannabis was an incredibly important debate that dominated my first year in Parliament, as well as many of us here in this House. Unfortunately, I can’t support this bill, and I’d like to spend a little bit of time explaining why. As I’ve said, it is a comprehensive bill. There is a lot of work that has gone into it. It runs for 29 pages, with a lot of description around how the scheme should be set out.

But there are two parts in the first couple of pages, which, I think, for me, highlight why I can’t support the bill. The first, I guess, is the title; not so much the Misuse of Drugs (Medicinal Cannabis) Amendment Bill, but the (No 2) bit that follows on, because I think that (No 2) bit—I’m not a lawyer but my understanding is it is because you’ve had a bill with exactly the same name occurring before you’ve had this bill. I think the issue that we’ve got is that this same bill was introduced back in 2017, and there was a big focus back then on access to medicinal cannabis.

We had a huge number of submitters come and speak to us as the Health Committee. I think, looking at it, we had 1,786 written submissions on this bill and we heard 158 oral submissions. For me, the thing I remember the most was some of the submitters that came and talked to us about their wanting to access medicinal cannabis—particularly, older people, some who had really, really severe arthritis, and they were in pain day to day and they wanted to be able to access something that would potentially transform their lives. I remember parents coming and talking to us, they had children who had intractable seizures, and access to medicinal cannabis products had the potential to actually transform their child’s life and their life. The message they gave us is: you need to go faster; don’t dilly-dally around—you need to get on with the job. That’s one of the messages that remains with me and, I think, it is one of the reasons why I would have significant concerns on starting again from scratch.

So just a brief recap about where we got to. Just to start with, as I said, the bill was introduced in December 2017. As the select committee, we received it after its first reading in January 2018. We considered this bill for quite some time, reporting it back in July 2018, and then debated in the House and then the bill was passed in December of that year. One of the main modifications there was in recognition of the fact that it would be a little while, while we developed up these regulations, and so there was a defence included in there. Part of that debate was: rather than having somebody with a terminal illness, changing that to people eligible to receive palliative care would then have a defence if they were using cannabis that wasn’t approved under the scheme because the scheme wasn’t yet in place.

So then, once the bill was passed, the ministry started to develop up those regulations and put that time into that. So then in July 2019, there were four weeks’ public consultation around the regulations and also the standards so that the public got to have a say, and then that was considered, and the final regulations were released in December 2019 and then due to take effect on 1 April last year—which they did. We’ve now had the medicinal cannabis scheme in place, and in that time we’ve also established the Medicinal Cannabis Agency so that they are the ones administering this scheme. So there is a lot of work that has already gone into where we are today.

So, basically, under the scheme, you can only get medicinal cannabis products on prescription from a medical practitioner. If you are a manufacturer or an importer, you have to provide evidence to the Medicinal Cannabis Agency that you meet those minimum standards, which is incredibly important. And people who work in the industry have to hold a licence or they have to work for somebody who has a licence, and that licence is quite particular about the things you can do—whether you are commercially cultivating cannabis, manufacturing, or supplying the products.

I think this is where one of my concerns about the current bill is. A lot of people would have made significant investment in what they’re thinking about: setting up a business. They’ll be looking at what the current regulations are. They’ll be buying their land. They’ll be investing in R & D. They’ll be working towards manufacture of a product.

The problem we’ve got is the regulations of medicinal cannabis are very, very comprehensive, but so is Dr Shane Reti’s bill. So the question is: what happens if there are differences between the two and does that introduce uncertainty for people who have probably invested significant amounts of money in developing something out to match the current regulations?

So just some of the examples just looking at who can hold a licence under the current regulations. There is a range of things: you’ve got to be under 18, you can’t have had any prior offences under the Act, and you can’t have had a licence revoked for various reasons. So, basically, there is a range of things that prescribe who can hold a licence. When we come across to Dr Reti’s bill, there is quite a significant overlap between some of those criteria, but there are some other criteria. So in determining whether a person is suitable to hold a licence, the director-general may consider the connections and associations that person has with other persons who may have the ability to influence the conduct of the person. Now, if I was the Director-General of Health, I’d be struggling a bit with quite how to enact that. Some of the other criteria: it can take into account a person’s previous business experience or any other matters that the director-general considers relevant. Now, if I were a manufacturer who was investing a lot of money in working out how I can develop up my products in line with the regulations, if it came down to any other matters that the director-general considers relevant, that would introduce quite a significant amount of uncertainty into my application and my business planning.

So I think the issue we’ve got is that if we’re going to have a comprehensive new bill coming in and trying to weave one part in with the other, we’re going to end up with uncertainty in the sector, which will be a considerable issue for people that are quite far down the pathway already.

I think the other issue around the bill is just looking at the enactment. This is where I got a little bit confused, because in the explanatory note, clause 2, the commencement clause “provides that the Bill comes into force 12 months after the Bill receives the Royal assent.” But then if you go across in the bill to the commencement, it says the Act comes into force six months after the date in which it receives Royal assent. I’m not quite sure, again, what one does if you’ve got different dates. But for me the issue is thinking back to those submitters who were saying to us, “Look, we’ve just to get on with this. We need some products that we can use that are safe and that are effective. Please get on and hurry up because, you know, we’re in need of a product that can relieve our pain and our children’s distress. We want to get on with it.” I think the problem is that if we’ve now got this bill coming through the House, and on average it probably will take six to nine, up to 12, months before it gets passed, and then we’ve got a further period where the bill may come into effect 12 months after the date—or six, I’m not quite sure which. That just adds, again, further delay and it pushes things further and further out in terms of when people may get products.

So I think that the argument has been made here: could we not weave the best parts of one bill in with the regulations from the other and see where we get to? But I just think that that process—I’m not even sure how one could quite do that. It would be quite a complex thing to try and work out at the select committee process which parts you would include and which parts you wouldn’t, but then how would you actually then amend what was already in place?

So I think the issue we’ve got is that we need to consider one scheme or the other. Part of the reason why I went through the time frame and gave you a bit of a history of the previous journey we’ve been on is just to reflect that to do it properly, it does take time. We needed to have that time for the select committee to hear all of those submitters, to listen to what they had to say, but we needed then for the ministry to go away and develop up those regulations, then we needed that time to consult, we needed that time for them to be refined, and then for the regulations to be put in place. We then needed that time for the scheme to be put in place and we needed that time for manufacturers to look at what was in front of them and then, basically, make their business cases accordingly. So I think where we’ve got to now, after all of that time, is we’ve got a comprehensive framework as laid out in the regulations, and I look forward to seeing some of those new products coming across the line. So, unfortunately, I can’t support this bill. Thank you, Madam Speaker.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): The question is that the motion be agreed to.

CHLÖE SWARBRICK (Green—Auckland Central): E te Māngai, tēnā koe, tēnā koutou e te Whare. In starting this contribution tonight, I need to address the fact that with some of the points made by previous speakers, most notably perhaps the Hon Simon Bridges, my blood is boiling, particularly because of the way that there has been a complete asphalting over the history that has got us to this point.

First and foremost, the Hon Simon Bridges alleged that the National Party put this on the agenda last term, completely neglecting the reality that in the term prior the Hon Julie Anne Genter had a bill pulled out that I then inherited in the subsequent term which I was having conversations at the time with Dr Shane Reti about in rooms which then led to this place. And he is aware of that, he knows that, and so too does Chris Bishop.

The other thing that I would say is that to try and—and that also neglects the reality that Metiria Turei had a bill that came before this House in 2009; 10 years ago. It also neglects—and I’m gutted to hear Dr Shane Reti talk about how there was somehow this competition of ideas between National and Labour, neglecting the fact that his bill has the literal title of No 2 because my bill came first. On top of that, there is the point that was made by Simon Bridges about how I am boring on this subject. And I’m not sure if that’s because I’d really like to engage in the nuance and the complexity and the evidence, but I’m happy to have that dialogue with the National Party any time.

So it will come as no surprise to Dr Shane Reti that the Greens are not supporting this bill tonight, and he knows that because he didn’t approach us to talk to us about it, which means that he’d probably done the numbers and realised the way that the chips were going to fall. But just for anybody who is listening tonight to the debate that’s occurring in the Chamber: that’s not what the process looks like in this place when bills are known to be going through the process to be passed and the numbers are being done to accumulate their passage through the Chamber.

But on top of that, the major reasons that the Greens are not supporting this is because, in substance, it represents a highly pharmaceuticalised, commercial model, which will not increase access, nor improve affordability for patients. But also actually, perhaps worse than that is perhaps a point of difference for the Greens in this debate tonight, and is actually something that I want to acknowledge the Hon Dr David Clark for really listening to me on and engaging with me on when he was the Minister of Health in the development of what is now the medicinal cannabis regulations, which was to explicitly focus on the injustices caused by cannabis prohibition, particularly noting that a majority of New Zealanders will have used cannabis—80 percent of New Zealanders by the time they’re 21 will have used cannabis, but there’s only a small proportion of New Zealanders who carry a criminal liability for having done so.

So what we want to do in creating a legal framework is not set up a system that perpetuates those injustices, particularly when marginalised demographics are those that are targeted under prohibition. So we explicitly made it so that those who had former convictions would be able to work inside of the industry, not necessarily hold the licences but to work inside of that industry. And here I can’t give a better example of the slow progress when you wait for expungement of criminal convictions than the 1986 homosexual law reform, which finally decriminalised homosexual acts between men in consensual relationships, but it took more than 30 years for us to expunge those convictions, by which point many of those who held those convictions had passed on. Waiting to do the justice bit until after you’ve dealt with the politics of today simply isn’t good enough.

The other thing that I think needs to be noted and that I will applaud Dr Shane Reti on is the fact that there is in here a really good thing in greater education for prescribers and for GPs. That is something that absolutely needs to be picked up. But fundamentally, and this was exposed in a parliamentary written question that I put to the Minister of Health Andrew Little, under section 35E of the Misuse of Drugs Act 1975, which was put in place by virtue of the medicinal cannabis laws that we passed in the last term of Parliament, there is a requirement to review the efficacy of medicinal cannabis regulations within two years of their passage. I have it on record that that is to be reviewed and completed by 18 December at the end of this year.

Obviously there seems to be, by virtue of the comments that some parliamentarians have made in the media, appetite to continue discussing this issue, and I hope collaborative effort can continue.

BROOKE VAN VELDEN (Deputy Leader—ACT): Thank you, Madam Speaker. I rise on behalf of the ACT Party in support of the first reading of the Misuse of Drugs (Medicinal Cannabis) Amendment Bill (No 2). This bill seeks to amend the Misuse of Drugs Act to provide for a medicinal cannabis scheme that is more robust than what we have under our laws. Currently in New Zealand, we do allow for the use of medicinal cannabis. We don’t prosecute if somebody grows their own cannabis for medicinal use, but what we don’t have is a robust framework to allow access to the medicinal products beyond growing your own plant, those that are cultivated to a high quality and regulated standard in a controlled environment and are approved as medicines that can be sold and dispensed in pharmacies. What this bill seeks to achieve is a safe market for medicinal cannabis products. It would create an environment where those who manufacture medicinal cannabis products will not be able to be located within 5 kilometres of residential areas or 1 kilometre of schools, and products would not be able to be advertised to the public.

Medicinal cannabis has high levels of support in New Zealand. It’s because so many people have a personal story. They know somebody who has suffered, and they know that if they developed a condition or the condition deteriorated and the medication that they were on was not enough, they’d want another option, something else to help them cope. There are many New Zealanders who live with chronic pain and suffer from seizures that could lead more fulfilling lives by being able to access medicinal cannabis products. These New Zealanders want to do the right thing. They don’t want to grow their own cannabis plant or get it online. It’s not something they do. ACT believes in the inherent dignity of every individual New Zealander. We need to provide more choice for New Zealanders who want another option.

This bill would create a safe environment where a person’s health problem can be alleviated, even if only a little, in a safe, controlled, and familiar way, like other medicines that they may take for a medical condition from the local pharmacy. ACT will support this bill at first reading so the public could have their say at select committee. Thank you, Madam Speaker.

ANAHILA KANONGATA’A-SUISUIKI (Labour): Thank you, te Mana Whakawā. It’s an honour to again speak, for the third time tonight. I know that people love hearing my voice. It’s the Misuse of Drugs (Medicinal Cannabis) Amendment Bill (No 2). I want to take this opportunity to acknowledge the sponsor of the bill, Dr Shane Reti. The first select committee that I was part of was the Health Committee, and I had the privilege of experiencing how Dr Shane Reti is very diligent and is passionate about his area of health. I want to acknowledge him for that.

However, I am speaking opposing this bill. I feel that I did leave the select committee halfway through the shepherding of the Government’s bill in the last term, so I didn’t really quite get to the end. But, just listening to all the contributions tonight, I get a feeling that this bill seeks to establish a medicinal cannabis scheme that already exists. That’s why I’m a bit confused. The member can correct me later on in reply, but, again, I think the medicinal cannabis scheme is now up and running, and a range of further medicinal cannabis products will be available over time.

I acknowledge one of the last speakers, Chlöe Swarbrick, who gave us a history of the conversation about cannabis and how we arrived here today. What did concern me—because I am respectful of the member—was the way he talked about how active gang members will be able to be suppliers of medicinal cannabis. I just want to know: how do you identify an active gang member? How do you identify them? I know that there is some register that people refer to—how do you identify? Anybody could be a gang member, who goes to work full time or whatever. I’m concerned about the general swiping of gang members who could be—yeah. So I was a bit concerned about that.

Then, one of their speakers spoke about how it was a huge issue for them in the last term. In 2017, it became a huge issue. I know from memory that National supported the Government’s bill, up to the point where the conversation was about loose-leaf cannabis. From memory, I think National did support the Government’s bill at first reading and through conversations at select committee, but through that conversation something changed. Something changed, and I think that was confirmed by one of their speakers, who said that it was a huge issue—it became a huge issue to them at the time.

You might correct me, Madam Speaker, but I’m a bit confused. I think that there is—

Chris Bishop: Yeah—well, that’s pretty obvious.

ANAHILA KANONGATA’A-SUISUIKI: The reason why I say that is I believe that we already have an established medicinal cannabis scheme.

I want to acknowledge Dr Liz Craig, who was also confused with the commencement of the bill. It talks about six months, and then it talks about 12 months. It’s still confused about that. But that doesn’t take in the fact that thousands of New Zealanders have had this conversation. We’ve all had the conversation in the last term, and up to now. We’ve got a scheme already established.

I want to acknowledge this bill. Shane Reti did talk about the bit where there’s card holding. Cards will be issued to medicinal cannabis users, and their carer would also be provided with a card. I want to acknowledge him for that, because that provides some accountability. Even active gang members might be able to hold a card as a carer to one of their children—so there goes the point where active gang members may be defunct.

Anyway, I stand in opposition to this bill, but I have due respect to the member. I continue to hold respect for the member, but, unfortunately, I cannot support this bill. I therefore speak in opposition to this bill to the House. Mālō.

Hon Member: Labour call?

Hon Member: Take it Chris.

Hon Member: Sarah.

Sarah Pallett: Madam Speaker.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): Chris Bishop.

CHRIS BISHOP (National): OK. Madam Speaker, thank you very much. The interesting thing about the last two years—fair to say a pretty vexed issue before the Parliament of the last two years—of medicinal cannabis and personal use of cannabis and possible legalisation is this Government has trumpeted their own scheme, and one of the reasons why we’re told that we can’t vote for this bill in the Parliament that Dr Reti went away and worked on is that the Labour Government has their own scheme. We just heard it from the previous speaker, Anahila Kanongata’a-Suisuiki, that “The regime’s in place. We’ve passed the regulations.” Well, here’s a question for the House and for the Labour Government: where are the products? Where are they? Because four years in to this tawdry administration there are no medicinal cannabis products available. So where are they?

There was a great hullabaloo in the last Parliament about this progressive step forward. David Clark, in his ill-fated time as Minister of Health, talked about how we were going to get medicinal cannabis, and people in pain who had arthritis were going to get access to it, and it was going to be fantastic—widespread availability. And we said, “Well, that sounds good, but you produced a shoddy piece of legislation that just leaves all the work to the officials—all the work subcontracted out to the Ministry of Health officials to do the detail, to do the actual grunt work that’s required when you’re passing legislation.”

We said it would be a failure, and Dr Reti, under instruction from Mr Bridges, went away and in four weeks did more work and more substantive policy to advance the cause of medicinal cannabis in New Zealand than the Government has done in four years, and the result is this bill that we’re debating. He went to the United States. He went and consulted with the experts, and by himself he drew up a more substantive and comprehensive piece of policy that met with more approval from medical experts and medicinal cannabis lobbyists and people who know what they’re talking about in this field than David Clark was able to produce in three hopeless years as the Minister of Health.

And now we find, six months into this useless Government’s regime, that the regulations have been passed, they’ve set up the administration, but where are the products? They’re not there. So a Government that trumpeted and sang from the rooftops about how we were going to get wider access to medicinal cannabis, and easier access, and went up and down the country and talked to all the stakeholders and talked to all the people who are desperate for access—the Government has failed them. They’re in Government till the next election; they’ve got another 2½ years. But I’ll make a prediction now: the roll-out of medicinal cannabis in New Zealand will be slow and it will be bad.

What the Government should do, if they knew what they were doing and they actually had some expertise on the subject, is they should vote for this bill. This bill fills in the gaps of the legislative lacuna that the Government has put in place. We heard, from the speaker before, all these trivial objections. She clearly hadn’t read the bill—basically reading out some poor Labour Party research unit’s attempt at rebutting the bill—and said, “Oh, I don’t know who’s a gang member, so we don’t know how to vote for it.” Well, the reason that’s in the bill is because Dr Reti says if you hold a medicinal cannabis licence, you shouldn’t be a gang member. That wasn’t in the Government’s legislative regime. And the previous speaker says, “Oh, well, how do I know?” Well, here’s a clue: it’s the gang lists that Poto Williams, the Minister of Police, administers. It’s the gang lists that Simeon Brown’s been banging on about in the House for the last six weeks. There is a gang list; that’s how you find it out.

So the purpose of this bill is to increase access to medicinal cannabis and accelerate it, and if we’d passed it two years ago when it was lodged by Dr Reti we would have medicinal cannabis on the shelves right now. It is to the Labour Government’s eternal shame that this tawdry Government did not adopt it at the time. We advanced it in good faith. We said to the Parliament, “There’s actually a widespread consensus around access to medicinal cannabis; let’s get it over and done with. Let’s pass it, and let’s increase access.” Instead, four years into this hopeless Government’s regime, we’ve got no products on the shelf. Shame on you.

Dr GAURAV SHARMA (Labour—Hamilton West): I rise today to take a call on the Misuse of Drugs (Medicinal Cannabis) Amendment Bill (No 2). I want to start by first acknowledging Dr Shane Reti, who is my colleague not only in Parliament but also as our previous careers—both being general practitioners. I also want to acknowledge Chris Bishop, part of the Health Committee, which I am on now, as well.

Chris Bishop: He’s a good member—a very good member!

Dr GAURAV SHARMA: Thank you. The bill seeks to establish a medicinal cannabis scheme that already exists. The Government has already established a medicinal cannabis scheme, which was the No. 1 bill, hence why we’re talking about the No. 2 bill. In December 2017, we introduced the Misuse of Drugs (Medicinal Cannabis) Amendment Bill, which, first of all, sought to introduce a medicinal scheme to enable access to quality products; secondly, to introduce a statutory defence for terminally ill people to possess and use illicit cannabis; and, thirdly, to remove cannabidiol from the schedule of controlled drugs. In December 2018, after careful consideration by the Health Committee we passed this bill, including a statutory defence inserted specifically for people eligible to receive palliative care.

In July 2019, the Ministry of Health began a four-week public consultation on the proposed regulation and standards for medicinal cannabis. People have had their input into this. In December 2019, the final regulations were released to take effect in April last year. As planned, the medicinal cannabis scheme came into force last April with its purpose to improve access to quality medicinal cannabis products for patients.

By this time, the medicinal cannabis agency had been established to administer the medicinal cannabis scheme. Under this scheme, the medicinal cannabis products are only available to patients on prescription from a doctor. Manufacturers and importers are required to provide evidence to the medicinal cannabis agency that they consistently meet minimum requirements standards of quality before they can be supplied.

People who want to work in the industry need to hold the medicinal cannabis licence, as Dr Liz Craig just talked about, or they need to work for a person or company that holds a licence. The licence will specify the types of activities that a licence holder may carry out, such as a commercial cultivation of cannabis, manufacturing or supply of medicinal cannabis products.

The Misuse of Drugs (Medicinal Cannabis) Amendment Bill (No 2) as proposed by Dr Shane Reti was intended to provide a medicinal cannabis scheme, but it already exists. The scheme already exists and went through due diligence, after two years of going through a process in this House. The No 2 bill would cement the primary legislation features of the medicinal cannabis scheme that already exists, which must remain flexible because we want the experts to keep pace with the emerging industry techniques that are coming out and to respond to these. The Government remains committed to increasing the availability of quality medicinal products and thus making these products more affordable for people.

In contrast, the National Party, however, appear stubbornly attached to a bill that would take us backwards rather than helping to ease people’s suffering. National is unfortunately behind with this, as it is with other bills in the House.

Under this scheme, medicinal cannabis schemes are only available to patients on prescription from a doctor at the moment. Manufacturers and importers are required to provide evidence of the medicinal cannabis agency, that they consistently meet the standards I just talked about.

National supported the Government for the bill in the first reading, but then pulled out from the bill and proposed its own version of the bill. As a member of the Health Committee this year, I want to acknowledge that the bill has already gone through a Health Committee process. It’s already gone through a public consultation process.

I want to acknowledge the former Minister of Health, David Clark, who was just here a few minutes ago, because he was talking about how 25,000 people would benefit from this under palliative care who could be using these medicinal cannabis products under the already existing legislation that went through the House last year.

The No. 1 bill by the Government is compassionate legislation that is making a real difference to people living with pain and nearing the end of their lives. People nearing the end of their lives should not have to worry about being arrested or imprisoned in trying to manage their pain at the same time. So in conclusion, I would just like to say that the bill already exists; that is the No 1 bill, and it went through a comprehensive consultation process before the National Party decided to introduce another bill with the same name, just putting a No 2 at the end but not much significant change. Thank you.

Dr ANAE NERU LEAVASA (Labour—Takanini): Thank you, Mr Speaker. It is a privilege again to speak to this amendment bill No 2. But like my colleagues, Dr Gaurav Sharma, Dr Liz Craig, I just want to acknowledge Dr Shane Reti—I think it’s the whole collegiality of being in the medical field as well, so ngā mihi to Dr Shane Reti for the work he’s put into this bill.

Just up off the Zoom session with my Pacific peer group, which is a group of medical doctors that discuss such matters specifically to our Pasifika and our community in South Auckland, and this is one of the topics that was discussed, briefly discussed, and is such an important thing. Because, I guess, an experience that we have in South Auckland, and I guess just in the whole medical community that we see, we see a lot of our multiple comorbidities, chronic-care patients, and those who are on palliative care as well. And we see the struggle that we have to manage with our dear patients in regards to pain relief, and the pain team that are involved, the palliative team that are involved, and a number of specialists that have to juggle a number of medicines to help with our patients. So that’s why, when it came to late 2017, when the principal bill was introduced, there was the delight from my colleagues, including myself, that there was another form of medicine that we can use in our tool kit to help families and those patients in the suffering of loved ones.

The principal bill, that again we look at, again with my colleagues that have expressed—currently, like the notion goes, the medicinal cannabis scheme does exist at the moment, and it enables access to quality products. And I know that Mr Bishop has mentioned, “Where are the products?”, but I do, you know—these sort of products do take time. And there are two products that have been verified not too long ago, 5 March, and there is a couple of the Tilray products that are going to be going through the process, but they’ve been verified by the ministry. There is also the Sativex spray as well that is currently available under prescription.

So with the current bill, thirdly, it removes cannabidiol from the schedule of controlled drugs. And again, I say this, this bill that tries to amend the principal bill, the scheme that currently exists, and I see that it is fit for purpose at this time.

With the new technology we see, with new research, the evolvement of medicines. I believe the proposed new amendment will be too restrictive. This, the principal bill, needs to be allowed to be flexible so that we have expert regulators that can keep up with these evolving medicines, technology, and research. And I feel like this new proposal would restrict that.

It is already available for patients via prescription. Yes, I acknowledge that there is still education to be done for those who do prescribe. In my clinic in Māngere, we do assign one person who has that special interest, and I know that other clinics have done so, so that there is at least one clinician who keeps up with all the changes in research as well, and provides for the clinic. So I acknowledge that there are other clinics that are trying to do the same in order for patients to access these products.

Thirdly, I will talk to the loose-leaf cannabis, as this amendment would restrict that. And again, if my electorate of Takanini would know that when it came to the referendum, you know, in terms of speaking to the other cannabis referendum, I was opposing that referendum. But when it comes to medicinal cannabis and our discussions with our community, the vast majority supported this bill when it was first introduced, and, on our talks about what the provision is like with the current scheme, they still support that as well.

So, when I see this bill and the amendments, I acknowledge what Dr Reti is trying to propose, but I still think that the current bill, as it stands, is still fit for purpose at this time, and that’s why I oppose this bill. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

SARAH PALLETT (Labour—Ilam): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I rise to speak to the Misuse of Drugs (Medicinal Cannabis) Amendment Bill (No 2), and I’d like to begin, also, by acknowledging my Health Committee colleague Dr Shane Reti. Thank you for your work on this, and I’m sorry, but I can’t support this bill. It’s a really interesting one for me, because this bill seeks to establish a medicinal cannabis scheme that I feel already exists, but the proposed new scheme isn’t a better scheme. It does appear to be a worse scheme and a backwards step. This new scheme would, sadly, remove the flexibility that we need to keep pace with an emerging industry, the flexibility that we need to enable new businesses making medicinal cannabis to succeed. Obviously, enabling new businesses to succeed, especially in a new field such as this and in Aotearoa New Zealand, is really important, as we know.

More important, though, in my opinion, is that I feel that this bill—and I’m most concerned—would increase suffering. What we currently have in place enables people to access cannabis for pain, but, as has been described earlier, it can be extremely hard to access. We recognise that, but, unfortunately, what I see before me is a bill that would make it harder. Now, we know that there is extremely strong evidence that medicinal cannabis provides substantial benefit to some people experiencing pain, people for whom opioids like morphine and codeine just don’t work—people like my late mother. My mother passed from metastatic breast cancer that had spread through her bones, and she was in an enormous amount of pain for the last few years of her life, but the pain that she experienced towards the very end, the last few months of her life, was intolerable and unrelievable. Most clinicians standing here today will be aware of quite how painful some of the conditions that your patients will experience can be, and you’ll also be aware that, sometimes, no amount of morphine or opioids can touch the sides of the pain that they’re experiencing. Ironically, a drug such as cannabis, even though we would consider it to be lighter in its effect, and certainly has fewer side effects, can be much more effective.

So people like my mum, at the end stages of her life, need access to the best, most effective, safest pain relief, without the fear of being arrested or charged with an offence, because that fear does inhibit access. I can say that with confidence because my mum, while she was experiencing the pain that I can only describe as intolerable, both for her and for us watching, did not accept the cannabis that was offered to her unlawfully, because at the time it was illegal for her to use it and she would’ve faced prosecution and become a criminal, in her own mind and in the eyes of the law as it stood at the time.

The legislation currently in place introduces a statutory defence for people eligible to receive palliation so that they can use illicit cannabis without fear of prosecution. In short, the purpose of the scheme currently in place is to improve access to quality medicinal cannabis products for patients on prescription from a doctor, and manufacturers and importers are required by the Medicinal Cannabis Agency to consistently meet minimum standards of quality before they can be supplied. Whilst we get our domestic manufacturers to get production of the quality and quantity we require, we have people that can’t wait, and they won’t be criminalised.

Dr Reti’s bill represents in my mind a backwards move in a House that I feel needs to keep moving forwards, and, therefore, I am sorry but I can’t commend this bill.

LOUISA WALL (Labour): Tēnā koe e te Māngai o te Whare. It is a pleasure to do a bit of a retrospective, as the chair of the previous Health Committee in the 52nd Parliament, with Dr Reti as my chair; this was our first bill, the Misuse of Drugs (Medicinal Cannabis) Amendment Bill. It was a pretty intense process, a lot of people who came to talk to us shared stories about their vulnerabilities and the fact that they wanted access to medicinal cannabis, as opposed to other pharmaceuticals, to relieve their pain.

So I want to take the opportunity, actually, to commend Dr Reti. I mean, what we did was create a mechanism to develop the regulations and then to develop, through the Medicinal Cannabis Agency, a process where we could have New Zealand made medicinal products made available to New Zealanders. That was the purpose, and that remains the purpose. I detect the frustration about the process, but the reality is we have the Medicinal Cannabis Agency, and as Dr Reti and I discussed today, they are currently assessing 33 New Zealand-based applications, but they may still be six to 12 months away. But within that context, having Dr Reti’s bill go through doesn’t actually make sense. But there are aspects of this bill that I think have merit, particularly his focus on looking at the process for GPs to prescribe medicinal cannabis.

Who knew that the Ministry of Health and hospital specialists actually had to approve a GPs prescription or prescribing for their patients to be able to have access to medicinal cannabis. I found it really interesting, I looked at a woman called Karen Oldfield who works for the Medical Research Institute of New Zealand, who had published a report in 2020. So she surveyed 76 GPs, and of those, 42 of those GPs’ patients wanted access to medicinal cannabis, so 55 percent. But, in fact, only 14, or 33 percent, of that 42 got the medicinal cannabis prescription. When they asked the GPs why, they said because it was too expensive, because of that special approval I noted, and also because of a lack of strong evidence. But what evidence did they need to be able to prescribe? For 84 percent of those GPs, they said they needed a Pharmac-approved and funded cannabis product.

So we have a system—some people are frustrated, but I actually do think, in commending Dr Reti for the amazing work that he did, there continues to be an opportunity, as a member of the Health Committee, to engage with the Medicinal Cannabis Agency about providing our doctors, our GPs, and our pharmacists, with the education and tools that they need to listen to the patient voice. Because it’s pretty clear patients want medicinal cannabis, we want New Zealanders to develop those medicinal cannabis products for our people, and then ultimately to export them to others around the world who think that medicinal cannabis is a better option for them. Kia ora.

Dr SHANE RETI (National): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I’ve listened to the discussion and I’d like to thank all members very much for their contributions. I’d like to respond to some of the statements that have been made.

Dr Liz Craig had concerns around the eligibility for licence holders, and offered the comment that taking into account the associations of people that may influence the licence holder may not be reasonable. Well, that’s straight from the Australian regulations. They figured it out that you can have an undue and unhealthy influence on a licence holder and that that needs to be managed. She talked about the open-endedness of saying the eligibility of licence holders could be at the discretion of the director-general. Much health legislation has that. Look at pretty much all of the COVID legislation at the moment. She talked about frustrating delays. We committed to have product within 12 months of enabling our bill.

Chlöe Swarbrick wanted to talk about the title of the bill—said that No 2 was just a reproduction of her bill No 1. That’s incorrect. Her bill also was titled the “Other Matters Bill”; this is titled the No 2 bill because the Government of the day had the No 1 bill and so this was in contrast to what was being offered, so she has that wrong. She’s also rewriting history with her review of the discussions and negotiations we had. We can put those discussions on the table if you really want. We can talk about who came with a mandate to negotiate and who didn’t, but I’d suggest we don’t.

She talked about what the bill has as maybe being a pharmaceutical model. Look, we view medicinal cannabis as being a drug like any other drug. You’ve heard me say that we believe that it can be placed on the over-the-counter framework. Some people believe it’s a food, for goodness’ sake, so we need to be reasonable here. However, it is a drug like any other drug. It has a dose response curve. It goes through Medsafe, and we were facilitating advanced procedures through Medsafe.

Brooke van Velden got it. She got the key points and actually identified some of the detail around locations. Anahila, thank you for your contribution.

SPEAKER: Order!

Dr SHANE RETI: She struggled—member Anahila; MP Anahila—

SPEAKER: Kanongata’a-Suisuiki.

Dr SHANE RETI: Thank you. I want to thank her for her contribution, but she struggled with identifying a gang member. That’s not hard at all. Look at all the firearms legislation. Furthermore, the bill itself says: “is not a member of a gang as defined in section 4 of the Prohibition of Gang Insignia in the Government Premises Act 2013.” So it’s all there, how to do that. Dr Sharma said the scheme already existed. No, it doesn’t. Where is the product? Further speakers and colleagues in the select committee, thank you for your contributions, but if this is working so well, again, where is the product?

This bill puts in a range of provisions that strengthens the medicinal cannabis framework. We’re proposing tightening the regulations for licence holders and employees. We’re proposing tightening regulations for where medicinal cannabis can be grown. Is there anyone in this House tonight who really thinks it’s OK to grow cannabis beside a wāhi tapu? I’m sorry, I do not. Many of the unintended consequences and overlooked issues could also be addressed in select committee. We’ve talked about GP education. We’ve talked about low-dose CBD and the hurdles and difficult pathway it has to come to New Zealanders. Clinical research is another area that hasn’t been discussed.

Before I make my final summation, I want to acknowledge the wide range of experts who contributed intellectual and industry knowledge to the formation of this bill. I want to acknowledge the Massachusetts health commissioner, Kay Doyle; the Massachusetts health director of Government affairs, David Lakeman; New Hampshire Senator, Jeff Woodburn; New Hampshire health commissioner, Nick Toumpas; Colorado director for marijuana, Andrew Freedman; the New York commissioner of health, Dr Howard Zucker, and his team, Esti Alonso, Erin Hammond, Josh Figuera; the Pharmacy Guild of New Zealand—they contributed a lot in how we figured out how we could actually dispense this. I’d like to thank the Royal New Zealand College of General Practitioners; MCANZ, the Medicinal Cannabis Awareness New Zealand, and Shane Le Brun have all been very helpful. I would also like to finally acknowledge Sarah Gwynn, who was the drafting agent with PCO, who did an awful lot of work—you can see this is 29 pages—and she really helped finesse the detail, and it wouldn’t look like this tonight without her help. So I want to thank all of those people.

In summary, we’re seeking for this bill to be referred to select committee. We believe there are parts of it that can make the current framework that we have more robust and better. New Zealanders urgently need access to affordable medicinal cannabis, and this bill would build on the work that has already been done. Let’s give New Zealanders who are suffering pain and harm another tool in their tool box to relieve their suffering. I commend this bill to the House.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the Misuse of Drugs (Medicinal Cannabis) Amendment Bill (No 2) be now read a first time.

Ayes 43

New Zealand National 33; ACT New Zealand 10.

Noes 77

New Zealand Labour 65; Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand 10; Te Paati Māori 2.

Motion not agreed to.

SPEAKER: Just while the Clerk’s adding up the votes—and I’m going to look straight ahead so I’m not being seen to look at anyone—I want to remind people about the rules for eating and chewing in the House. People are allowed to sort of have the occasional lolly, but they’re not allowed to eat their dinner, and they’re certainly not allowed to chew gum in the House.

Bills

Contraception, Sterilisation, and Abortion (Safe Areas) Amendment Bill

First Reading

SPEAKER: We now come to the next bill, which is the Contraception, Sterilisation, and Abortion (Safe Areas) Amendment Bill in the name of Louisa Wall. I want to indicate that I have been approached and have declared this bill a conscience vote, and therefore there will be personal votes on this and, as a result of that, the normal arrangements for order of calls do not stand.

LOUISA WALL (Labour): I move, That the Contraception, Sterilisation, and Abortion (Safe Areas) Amendment Bill be now read a first time. I nominate the Health Committee to consider the bill.

Tēnā koutou katoa, tēnā koe e te Mangai o te Whare. Tēnā koe, Dame Margaret Sparrow. Tēnā koe, Terry Bellamak. So why do we need safe areas, or 150-metre zones around abortion facilities? I want to quote Shaniqua. Shaniqua participated in the Stuff 2019 investigation into the Abortion Legislation Bill, and she said: “On the day of the procedure, there were Christians lining the entrance to the hospital protesting against abortions. The Crimes Act was a favourite for them to throw at us young women having to go past them. The ‘hallway of shame’, as I would learn it was dubbed by the nurses inside. They were harassed as well … I remember being so scared. It was tough enough having to make this decision … and spent weeks in absolute terror, crying, thinking about life and what it would look like if I had a baby, then crying again because I couldn’t even keep a goldfish alive for three weeks … For years I really did believe I was a murderer. I can see everything for what it is now, and I do hope for young women going through this that their experience is vastly different from mine.”

I also asked the library to look at the history of what I want to term “condoned violence against women”. It was very interesting, because they provided me with quite a few quotes from a woman called Alison McCulloch, who wrote a book called Fighting to Choose: The Abortion Rights Struggle in New Zealand. In the 1980s, McCulloch notes, “Although in the early 1970s there had been harassment of doctors, arson attacks, threats and pickets, particularly around the Auckland Medical Aid Centre in Auckland and often by unknown perpetrators, it wasn’t until the late 80s that direct action to shut clinics and physically prevent women from accessing them moved to the forefront.” And during the 1980s and 1990s, she noted that the Women’s National Abortion Action Campaign wrote of patients being photographed as they went into clinics, having their number plates taken down, and subsequently seeing placards bearing their names. The Sunday Star-Times reported several cases of harassment, including that of a 26-year-old patient who was recognised by a protester and who returned from the clinic to find her mother waiting with a Catholic priest. Some women were subjected to phone calls, visits to their homes by anti-abortion activists, and threats that their families would be told.

Why do we need safe areas? Well, actually, the game’s changed. Abortion is not a crime. It was in the Crimes Act; it’s not any more. Abortion is a health issue between a woman and her doctor. So women have rights, actually, as patients. So if we look at the Code of Health and Disability Services Consumers’ Rights—the code applies to both public and private facilities and to paid and unpaid services. So if you look at those rights. Right number one: you must always be treated with respect. Right number two: you should never be discriminated against or harassed. Right number three: the services you receive should respect your dignity.

So within the context of this bill, there are, obviously, New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990 considerations about civil and political rights that we as New Zealanders have. I want to focus on section 9, and that’s the “Right not to be subjected to torture or cruel treatment”. I guess by definition, can you say that women are being re-traumatised because they’ve made a decision and have to run the gauntlet with people calling them murderers and showing them pictures of dead fetuses? Is that cruel and degrading? Well, actually, I say it is. So ensuring economic, social, and cultural rights, we should look at—and this is the definition; it include the rights to adequate food, housing, education, and health. I think that, if you look at section 28 of the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act (NZBORA), there is, I believe, a case to be made about dignified access to health, which is not listed in NZBORA. But it’s relevant, because, from a social and cultural rights perspective, reproductive rights absolutely have been reinforced by the United Nations and also by the World Health Organization, which defines reproductive rights as, the “rights … on the recognition of the basic right of all couples and individuals to decide freely and responsibly … the number, spacing and timing of their children.” They also include the right of all “to make decisions concerning reproduction free of discrimination, coercion and violence.” And women’s reproductive rights may include the right to legal and safe abortion.

I also think, if you look at what Shaniqua said, that, actually, the rights of workers have been completely nullified. They’ve not even been considered within the context of workers every day at those abortion facilities having to go into those facilities and do their job. I found it really interesting on WorkSafe’s website that they have Violence at work: customer service areas, and I like their definition, because it says, “Violence can take many forms – ranging from physical assault and verbal abuse to intimidation and low-level threatening behaviour. Violence or threats of violence are never acceptable.” So I think there are two dimensions to this bill: one is, obviously, the woman or the pregnant person who’s trying to access a health service; and the other, actually, is the workers at those facilities. And I know through talking to Jill Ovens, who is involved with the midwives and also other representatives of our New Zealand Council of Trade Unions women’s caucus, and particularly the New Zealand Public Service Association Inc., that they have huge concerns for their workers, and they will be making submissions on this bill.

I just finally want to highlight that the Australians have dealt with this issue. They have safe areas in their bills, and there was a case that went to the Australian High Court, and it was about the justified limitation of that 150-metre safe area. And this is what they noted: “To force a political message upon another person is inconsistent with the human dignity of that person. While there is an interest to be protected in fostering free expression and political comment by members of the community, the Court argued that this is not to be interpreted as putting an obligation on anyone else in the community to receive such messages. Moreover, the court ruled, a safe zone does not unfairly and unequally put at a disadvantage the views of the anti-abortion movement. In terms of content, the Court pointed out the safe zone is completely viewpoint neutral. No views about abortion, pro or con, can be expressed within them.” And therein lies the issue. We’re not limiting people’s ability to express themselves. This isn’t a freedom of expression issue. What we’re saying is within a 150-metre zone of accessing a health service, nobody has the right—nobody has the right—to question a woman’s right to choose abortion as a health service, or a pregnant person’s right to choose abortion as a health service. Fundamentally, it’s our bodies—women’s bodies; it’s our choice—women’s choice. Kia ora.

NICOLA GRIGG (National—Selwyn): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I rise to speak in support of this Contraception, Sterilisation, and Abortion (Safe Areas) Amendment Bill. I commend the member Louisa Wall for bringing this important issue before the House. Kia ora, Louisa. I want to preface my views firstly by saying, “Yes, I do understand people who take a certain viewpoint have the right to express those views.” But I would counter that right with the need to ensure respect, safety, and dignity towards women who have chosen this medical procedure. In my view, it is not for the people outside of that woman’s decision-making process to foist their views and beliefs on that woman.

To choose to terminate a pregnancy, for whatever reason, is absolutely nobody else’s choice but the woman who chooses to make it. Further to that, it is one of the most enormously difficult decisions a woman may make in her lifetime.

I have been, frankly, disgusted in the past, running around Hagley Park, where I have seen large groups of, at times, vocal, intimidating protestors shouting, chanting, and waving placards outside the Christchurch Women’s Hospital. To make matters worse, they had children with them—little kids holding up signs saying, “Abortion is murder.”

That is why I feel so strongly in favour of this bill. If done right, it will create legislation that will create safe zones outside clinics and hospitals. If these safe zones can reduce harassment, hate speech, and intimidation that these kinds of protestors aim at these extremely vulnerable women, then that is the right thing to do.

I’m the National Party spokesperson for women, and I do see it as my role to advance the rights and protections of women. In my view, if we as legislators can do that, then that’s what we should do. I commend this bill to the House.

Hon DAVID PARKER (Attorney-General): Thank you, Mr Speaker. Can I also thank the member Louisa Wall for bringing this bill to the House and thank the National Party spokesperson for women, Nicola Grigg, for her contribution. I was at secondary school in the 1970s, when these events were very, very fraught. I was educated at a time when not only was abortion a fraught issue but so was contraception education—in fact, I was at school at a time when we couldn’t be taught about contraception. I, luckily, lived in a household where my mother was active in the Abortion Law Reform Association of New Zealand, and I’m well-grounded in these issues. I believe it is a woman’s right to choose as to whether she has a child or whether she terminates a pregnancy. I am pro-abortion; I have been all of my adult life. I was one of the first people in the Labour Party—actually, it was a time when I was unsuccessfully standing for the leadership of the party—to publicly advocate for the removal of criminal sanctions on abortion in the Crimes Act. I mention all of these things because I don’t want to be positioned as anti-abortion. But I do want to say that, whilst I’m supporting this bill at first reading, I do think there is a proper question to be asked as to whether the provisions of this bill go too far in their limitations on freedom of expression.

In my role as Attorney-General, I am the guardian of civil liberties. I exercise that role largely through reflecting the advice that is given to me by very careful consideration of those issues that comes through the Ministry of Justice, who service this House, through me in respect of New Zealand Bill of Rights Act assessments with respect of every piece of legislation. Now, I abhor the intimidation of women—I abhor the intimidation of women, particularly when they’re in a vulnerable situation, or staff that, as Louisa Wall has said, are legitimately going about their duties to perform what is a very valuable albeit difficult social service that we need in society. None the less, the advice that I have received, which I reflect in the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act vet that I have tabled in the House, suggests that the drafting of this limitation of freedom of expression goes further than is necessary to achieve the purpose which it seeks to achieve. I agree with the purpose which it seeks to achieve. I have made some suggestions that have been worked up as according to the advice that I have received from the department as to how it might be limited in a way that meets the purpose of the bill whilst not infringing the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act protections that are all so important.

I haven’t made a decision as to how I’m going to vote in the second and subsequent stages on this bill, but I do invite the select committee to listen seriously to the issues that will be available to the select committee from officials and to see whether there is a way in which the purpose of this legislation can be achieved without infringing the principles of the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act.

Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE (National): Thank you, Mr Speaker. Some years ago, I was asked by a group of young people what issue would cause me to cross the floor and vote against my own party, and the answer was easy. It was if my party took steps to undermine New Zealanders’ freedom of speech and freedom of expression. Now, we are in a conscience situation, so that’s not going to happen, and I’m very confident that in the future it wouldn’t, either.

But for the record, I just want to say how much compassion and concern and sympathy I have for any woman who is going to have to go through a termination, and the idea of running a gauntlet, however peaceful and quiet, of people holding signs, often with the most distasteful and disgusting images on them—I absolutely condemn that behaviour. But should it be a crime?

Freedom of expression is deeply enshrined. I respectfully disagree with the sponsor of the bill—Louisa Wall—and I congratulate her. I do think this is a freedom of expression issue. So the question for me is: does this bill go too far in curtailing the rights of people, however objectionable their views are, to express them? And on the face of it, I believe it does.

Now, some provisions I think are fine. The questions of intimidation, interference, and obstruction are probably unlawful anyway, and to the degree that that could be a belt and braces approach, I think I could support that. But communicating with or even standing silently, expressing a view with imagery, even if it causes emotional distress, could go too far. Does simply standing in a safe zone expressing those views constitute a breach of this legislation, and who decides what constitutes that breach?

The Attorney-General has quite rightly said that he has a New Zealand Bill of Rights Act vet that says that this isn’t consistent with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act, albeit it’s a bit of a flip-flop, because when the previous bill came in, the Attorney-General’s advice was that it didn’t. Now, I’m particularly concerned about the term “objectively” in clauses 9.1 and 9.2 of his vet. It’s almost an oxymoron—objectively causing distress—and who is to say what causes distress? What causes me distress may not cause someone else distress, and so by its very nature that’s going to be subjective.

So this is a considerable conundrum for me, and the conundrum is this: if I feel so strongly about the rights of people to have their views and express those views, should I then oppose this bill at first reading and prevent members of the public from coming to a select committee and doing just that? On balance, I have decided that the answer to that question is no, and, therefore, I will be supporting this bill at first reading and encouraging it to go to select committee. Now, that support will end at the end of the process if my concerns are confirmed and those infringements on behaviour, however distasteful, do breach section 14 of the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act, and if the committee isn’t able to make sufficient improvements to it, I think that would be the end of my support.

But I think there’s another reason why this is actually an important conversation that we should have. Later this year, we are going to be considering other legislation in the wake of the royal commission report into the Christchurch terror attacks. There are 44 recommendations and the Minister responsible for that—Andrew Little—has said that two of those recommendations are on hate crime and hate speech. I think this is going to be a test of the attitude that will be introduced, the Government’s response in that regard, and the degree to which freedom of expression is going to be curtailed. So I see this as an important, early sojourn into a very difficult conversation that this House is going to have to have over the next year to 18 months.

So, with that, I do have a series of concerns about it, but if I am to be truthful to those principles of freedom of speech, I need to let New Zealanders speak. Therefore, at first reading, I’ll be supporting this bill.

JAN LOGIE (Green): Thank you, Mr Speaker. Firstly, I want to offer my congratulations to the member Louisa Wall, and I hope that a little bit of your ballot mojo rubs off on me sometime in the future. It’s a real pleasure to rise and, hopefully, sort out some unfinished business in this House tonight. I will be voting alongside all of my Green Party colleagues in support of this bill.

From my perspective, we’re not debating this bill because people disagree with abortion. Possibly even more pertinently, we’re not debating this bill because people express their opposition to abortion. If this passes, people will still be able to bait me and infuriate me on social media. They’ll still be able to hold protests and public meetings or prayer sessions to express their opposition to the bodily autonomy of women and pregnant people. They’ll even be able to hand out baby dolls and display wildly misrepresentative photos of abortions in public and call pregnant people murderers. It’s just that these activities might have to be 150 metres down the road away from the pregnant people, at a time of crisis, needing to access a health service.

The rights of anti-abortion activists, from my perspective, are absolutely not being curtailed; they’re just being moved along a bit. What is being limited is their ability to target people trying to access, or working in, abortion services. These are private medical decisions, and we should all be able to make them, as the High Court in Australia put it, “without haranguing”.

I really just want to recognise that for some pregnant people, having an abortion is not a stressful experience. For them, going through that gauntlet will probably be the most stressful part of the process. But that is not universal, and there is no way of predicting that.

I have supported people through abortions under general anaesthetic where they were pregnant as a result of rape when they were unconscious. The degree of trauma in that moment, through that period of time, was extreme. We heard in the select committee of people where it was a deeply, deeply wanted pregnancy but they had to choose to end it to be able to prevent further pain. Do we really, in this House, want to sanction the targeting of people in those moments of their life with messages of hate, messages that misrepresent them as murderers, and those that convey a message from society saying they are judged? I do not believe that is consistent with freedom of speech or a decent society. I absolutely hold the right for people to hold those views but not to target them at people at a time of really personal need.

I also just want to take a second to say: imagine if we changed the context of this away from an abortion. Imagine if this was about someone having anxiety and their therapist’s location was known and regularly surrounded by a group of people who believe anxiety was a sign of possession by the Devil and that that view was once, pre-science, generally accepted by society. So that person with anxiety probably had a degree of ambivalence around their own experience of that illness. Those people targeting them would be drawing attention to them and the fact that they had anxiety—making that public; undermining their right to privacy. They might be offering to cast out their demons—surely a peaceful act; an expression of a world view. But, really, can we consider it that when it is targeted at that individual? I say no.

BARBARA KURIGER (National—Taranaki - King Country): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I am a proponent of free speech and freedom of speech, but I support this bill, because I draw the line at targeted protest against individuals. You know, would anyone get away with this sort of behaviour anywhere else, targeting individual people? There is a place for protests at Parliament. There is a place for protests in the street. But, in my view, there is no place for targeted protests against individuals, particularly when they are in a vulnerable situation.

I understand that there are some questions with this bill around the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act, and I was really pleased to see David Parker before putting his concerns out on the table and saying but he’s going to support this bill through the first reading, because what I hope—and I’m not an expert by any stretch of the imagination around the bill of rights Act, but some people in this House are, and there’s an opportunity to make this absolutely right.

We talked before, and I think Michael Woodhouse mentioned that we are going to start perhaps going through some of the things around freedom of speech around the Christchurch situation. Now, already in front of my committee are submissions coming in on a bill around live streaming of objectionable material. So we’re already going to start to get people coming in talking about freedom of speech in that area. Of course that was an abhorrent event, but freedom of speech is going to be really large when we talk about that bill as well. So it’s a big thing that we are going to be doing.

I’m no fan of the latest cancel culture that’s around. There are a lot of people around that would cancel a whole range of things and there are a lot of things that are quite—what offends one person doesn’t offend another person.

Look, I know that there’s people in this country that are anti-abortion; I know there’s people in this country that are pro-abortion. And it’s already been said that everyone’s got a right to express their views, but abortion—the law has been passed, it is no longer a criminal act under the law, and, on that basis, I think that people will still hold their views, but to target somebody when they’re in a stressful state, when they’ve already probably been in a stressful state—for many of them—for a long period of time, and they are going in for a private appointment is targeting a particular individual. Even if we’ve got concerns around the bill of rights Act, ethically and morally, that’s not something that I perceive, as a human being, that other human beings should be doing.

So I’m not going to draw out the length of this speech tonight, but just to say let’s take this to select committee. Let’s go through those bill of rights issues. Let’s see if we can tidy up any concerns that people have under that bill around this one, and, yeah, let’s sort this out, because it’s not appropriate to be targeting individuals.

SARAH PALLETT (Labour—Ilam): Thank you, Mr Speaker—thank you, Mr Speaker. I rise in support of the Contraception, Sterilisation, and Abortion (Safe Areas) Amendment Bill. Once again, we find ourselves discussing a bill by my wonderful colleague Louisa Wall, and I congratulate her on all her work bringing it forward to this place. As Jan Logie just said, this isn’t a discussion about the rights and wrongs of abortion, but, I would go on to say, about the fundamental right of people to access lawful healthcare or to provide lawful healthcare without being harassed, intimidated, or threatened, or feeling fearful.

This House has completed many debates on abortion. It was a long, thorough, and challenging process, and abortion is now sitting firmly as lawful healthcare and no longer in the Crimes Act. Accessing abortion care and providing abortion care as a health practitioner are lawful activities. Now, I do understand fully that people disagree that it should be lawful healthcare or even be provided at all, but it is, and the matter is settled.

People do have very strong feelings on this issue, and I fully acknowledge this. Some of these strong feelings find expression in protests outside abortion clinics, and these protests can take a number of forms. They can involve posters or models of questionable accuracy and varying levels of gore. The provision of information can be distributed that is, in my experience, often fact-bereft and upsetting, and there can be louder protests with high emotions—chanting, singing, sometimes hymns, abuse, and sometimes upsetting language of a vile and abusive nature. Many of the protesters would argue, perhaps, that they are only there to peacefully express their objection. Others might perhaps argue that their purpose is to change the minds of the people accessing healthcare that they themselves disapprove of. Some might say that they only wish to pray for the folk accessing healthcare or for the providers of healthcare.

I speak here as an ex-convent girl of many years, and someone whose mother was a Sunday school teacher: to pray for someone can be an act of enormous kindness, but can I refer to Matthew 6, I believe, where they say, “And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, who love to pray standing in the street corners to be seen, but go to your room, close the door, and pray to your Father, who is unseen.” You don’t need to pray directly in front of me, or the person—and I apologise; I am not referring to you, Mr Speaker. One does not need to pray directly in front of another person that they wish to pray for for their prayers to be effective. They can be effective silent and far away from the person that they are directed towards. If you consider that you need to pray loudly in front of the person for whom you are praying or one is praying for, especially if it’s because they are committing actions that you disapprove of, perhaps one might want to consider whether the intention is prayer or performance.

If your intention as a protester was to change the mind of the person on the way to accessing healthcare, I have some news: it doesn’t work. We know that sidewalk counselling serves only to traumatise already vulnerable people whose medical and social history can’t be known and shouldn’t be known by a bystander. As for the people who claim to be peaceful protesters and who would disagree that fear and intimidation experienced by women and healthcare providers is a reality, I would refer them, perhaps, to incidents such as that experienced by the Hon James Shaw, who was assaulted violently on the street by someone who had strong feelings about abortion care provision. In 2000, in Christchurch, a man was found to have tunnelled underneath the abortion clinic at Lyndhurst with the intent of burning it down. Anonymous threats have been made to people who work at Southland clinic saying people who work at the clinic are legitimate targets. And the rangatahi who were actually mounting a counter-protest to the protests that you mentioned, Nicola Grigg, at Hagley Park were threatened with death only last week. I quote: “I’m going to bring a gun and blow you up.” It’s not OK.

I do understand that some would argue vehemently that we are limiting—

SPEAKER: Order! The member’s time has expired. Before I call the next contribution to this debate, I am aware of the fact that I have not heard from anyone who is opposing—while I’m on my feet, everyone else sits down—the bill. I’m going to call a member. If there are members who oppose the bill, could they please give me a note to indicate that, so if there is to be some balance in the debate, we get it.

DAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I rise on this conscience vote, on behalf of myself, to support the first reading of this bill, but I note that all ACT MPs have adopted the same position of supporting this bill at the first reading. I want to also make a preliminary comment that I doubt there are many members in this House who can claim to have given as full-throated support for a woman’s right to choose on this issue as I have. I was one of very few members of Parliament who voted for model A as recommended by the Law Commission. I believe that the law that this Parliament passed is actually too restrictive. I believe that not because I am pro-abortion, as some people who email me seem to think, but because I am pro-choice, and, more specifically, I do not believe it is practical for the State to improve matters around abortion—in fact, it is probably one of the most evil and futile and actually counter-productive things the Government can do, to deploy its apparatus to try and force women to take pregnancies to term against their will. It’s completely nuts. So that is why I oppose prohibitions on abortion and I’m very happy to support this legislation today.

But it is also true that I have had a bit of a role in ensuring that safe zones are not part of the legislation as passed, just as the Law Commission originally recommended that there be no safe zones in this legislation, because they said that it was futile. And, actually, the principle of opposing prohibitions on abortion is exactly the same as the principle for opposing prohibitions on free speech. It’s not that we like the bad things that some people say; I detest the odious ogres that have been described standing outside abortion clinics. I’m not sure what else I can do to ensure that none of them are very likely to ever vote for me. However, I do believe that while they shouldn’t be saying it, it is a greater evil—and the Attorney-General alluded to it—to have a Government that is allowed to decide what you can and can’t say. There are people who have stood up in this debate and said, “Oh, but this is an exception.” The difficulty with standing for a principle like free speech is that it is a principle. Once you say, “We’re prepared to make some exceptions”, the challenge is to actually explain where someone in that position would stop making exceptions. Nobody has got up and explained where they would stop making exceptions—that’s what people can never do once they abandon principles such as free speech.

So where does that leave us on this legislation? Well, the ACT Party has looked very carefully at the drafting that is here. There are parts that we agree with. We agree that a prohibited behaviour should be intimidating, interfering with, or obstructing a woman going to seek an abortion. Now, arguably, that’s redundant—and the Law Commission said it was redundant because we already have laws against doing all those things—but we agree there should be a law, and we don’t mind if this law reinforces that with safe zones. But we take the same position as the Attorney-General who spoke earlier that the word “communicating” is a step too far. A ban on communication, even in a small area, is an erosion of the principle of free speech, that we will all regret eventually having admitted it.

So my position, and that position of ACT MPs, is that we want to see this debate happen. We want to see this bill go to select committee and be properly examined. We’re prepared to continue supporting it so long as we have that word “communicate” removed. That’s in line with the Law Commission. That’s in line with the section 7 report from the Attorney-General. That’s in line with the principles of this country that is built on free speech. And it’s also in line with having safe areas that stop intimidation, interference, and obstruction of women who are seeking what is perfectly legal healthcare.

If the later stages of this legislation do not remove that prohibition on communication, then we will argue that a prohibition on free speech is no better than the prohibition on abortion that we, thankfully, removed in this House last year. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

ANAHILA KANONGATA’A-SUISUIKI (Labour): Kia ora e te Mana Whakawā. Thank you for the call to speak on this, the Contraception, Sterilisation, and Abortion (Safe Areas) Amendment Bill. Obviously, we have to acknowledge the sponsor of this bill—Louisa Wall—for her courage in always bringing issues of contention to the House. And then I stop there.

I think this bill is problematic, and the speaker who has just finished, David Seymour, shepherded a thing that is now an Act, the End of Life Choice Act, and somebody chooses to end their life, but there’s no places that say “This is where the end-of-life people go.” So the problem is that this is a health issue and it should remain in the health area where the health Minister or the chief executive provide areas that don’t say “Abortion clinic here”, because it then says that this is a target for the erosion of their freedom of expression of rights.

So that’s the point where I come from, and I want to acknowledge Ronji Tanielu, who is the social policy and Parliament person in the Salvation Army New Zealand, Fiji, Tonga, and Samoa territory, because he and I have had conversations about this. I know, I was here last year when—this bill is trying to rectify a mistake that this didn’t pass last year; so it’s trying to rectify that. But I challenge the House, why don’t we rectify it somewhere else, where there is no big target bullseye to come and protest. So, I think, I don’t know whether my maths is right, what is the length of the debating chamber, 60 metres? Multiply that by three, why don’t you just go the whole hog and say—I want to go back to the general policy statement where the member said “All New Zealanders deserve to have the right to access health services with their safety, privacy, and dignity protected.” Why not? Why not do that? We can end our life, there’s no place that says, “Ending life here, come and protest, stay 150 metres away from the door.”

I want to acknowledge the Attorney-General who spoke today, and the bit that I got from his speech was that his role is to protect civil liberty. Well, I encourage you to continue to do that, because I know, earlier, that you have concluded that clause 5 of the bill appears to be inconsistent with the right to freedom of expression affirmed in Section 14 of the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act, and I want to encourage you to that point, Attorney-General.

I’ve heard speakers today in the House say, “This is not an abortion issue.” Well, if it’s not an abortion issue, why is it in the Contraception, Sterilisation, and Abortion (Safe Areas) Amendment Bill? We should not have a place where people protest if somebody makes a choice to have an abortion. I’m a woman. I’ve had three children. I’m a mother of five in total—to five children. And I don’t like those pictures that get sent to us. It’s actually traumatising and it has a lasting effect. Once you open it, you can’t unsee it—once you open it, you can’t unsee it. And nobody can say that doesn’t affect them.

But my point is that we should be providing all New Zealanders a right to access to health services with safety, privacy, and dignity protected. This bill, I firmly believe, is the erosion of the freedom of expression. Someone across the road from the House had just said a member just said, “When will it stop?” I think it should stop today, I think we should look at providing safe places for every New Zealander, woman, child, man, every gender there is. I think we have the fundamental right to do that, but not at the expense of the erosion of our freedom of expression.

Therefore, I know I speak for very few in this House, this bill will go through into select committee, and I will challenge everybody out there to come and talk from that point of view, that we should provide safe places for every New Zealander, whether you’re getting your leg chopped off, you’re ending your life—

SPEAKER: Order! The member’s time has concluded. I call the gallant member, Chris Penk.

CHRIS PENK (National—Kaipara ki Mahurangi): Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. I take the opportunity, unusually, perhaps, as an approach, by agreeing with a number of the things that have been said by those who are voting another way than me on the bill. I agree with Louisa Wall that this is, fundamentally, not a question of support or otherwise for the practice of abortion; indeed, the question is somewhat more narrow than that in scope. This House last year, I think it was—it seems like longer than that, but it was relatively recently that the House discussed more substantive issues in relation to that practice, and its collective mind was determined at that point. This is not an opportunity to relitigate that one way or tother.

I also want to agree with the previous contributor, Anahila Kanongata’a-Suisuiki, who said, effectively, that she did not endorse any of the following practices in relation to those who would provide abortion services: arson, death threats, tunnelling under a clinic for an evil purpose, assault, potentially inciting violence; although I don’t know if that was specifically raised. I also don’t condone those things, and neither does the law already—all those things being against the law as it currently stands.

I do acknowledge that there is a category of activity that is covered by the bill that is not necessarily, or at least not conclusively, already prohibited by the law. I do acknowledge that, at least in the sense that the intentional infliction of emotional distress exists as a tort, a civil wrong, but it doesn’t exist as a crime. So I do wonder, in an echo of a point that, I think, a previous contributor was seeking to make, if harassment or the intentional infliction of emotional distress is something that this House wishes to outlaw, then it should do so consistently, perhaps using that same test of, for example, communicating in a way that might objectively cause distress to a reasonable person, or might be—anyway, that test, in any case.

I do also want to agree with the remarks made by the Attorney-General in relation to the issues raised in relation to freedom of speech, as outlined in his New Zealand Bill of Rights Act report. He’s noted that he’s voting for the bill, at least at first reading, but doesn’t guarantee support, I think, beyond that, he said. The point that is made in his report regarding the fact that the bill goes further than is necessary to achieve its stated purpose is, I think, a very good one. His report is intellectually honest on this point, and it’s rigorous in examining freedom of speech or freedom of expression issues. His particular point, I think, has not only theoretical weight but, actually, one very important practical implication that I do wish to bring before the House.

He raises in his report the question of the word “communicating” being a very broad one. So just to be clear, the definition of “prohibited behaviour” includes communicating with, among other things, a person “in a manner that an ordinary reasonable person would know would cause emotional distress to a protected person”. There is no exemption in this provision for the father of the child—there’s no exemption. I would like to believe that that’s an oversight in the drafting, and I would urge, respectfully, the member who is the sponsor of the bill to understand that she is, whether she knows it or not, moving in a direction to criminalise a conversation that would be had, for example, in a car outside an abortion clinic by the father of the child.

I think the male population of New Zealand has much to answer for. We do not, as a general rule, or certainly not consistently, provide good behaviour oftentimes as fathers and prospective fathers. I am ashamed of my sex’s role in some of the societal problems that we face as a nation, and I make no bones about that. That’s been a line that a previous politician in this House has used in slightly different form, and it didn’t go well for him. But nevertheless, I think it’s important to acknowledge that and to place on record that, as I say, fathers in this country have not always been anything like impressive in relation to the role that they see themselves playing and, indeed, do play in relation to the upbringing of children. I think this bill does nothing helpful in that regard, and I respectfully but very seriously urge the member to make or endorse a change that would take place at select committee to rectify that very serious error.

LOUISA WALL (Labour): Tēnā koe. Tēnā koutou katoa. Firstly, I just want to thank people for the engagement tonight. It was thoughtful, obviously, and it was principled. And I do think that we, as a Parliament, need to have these discussions in ways where dialogue can happen. So I want to acknowledge all the contributors to the kōrero in the House tonight.

The select committee is going to have full rein and scope to assess all the information that comes before it. And, as I did with marriage equality, I won’t sit on that committee; I’ll make my submission. But, in fact, I think the process will take care of itself, and New Zealanders will make submissions, and we will hear from them.

Freedom of speech is interesting because if you look at it by definitions, and there may be others, it says, “The power to express one’s opinions without restraint.” And, for me, therein lies the issue, because we’ve had recent issues. Stuff have decided that actually, no, there are some things that they’ve said historically that were racist. There are other contexts where we may say, “This is a form of historical violence against women, which is sexist.” So there’s a history about these activities that needs to be considered, because I do consider this historical violence against women, and I don’t consent to receiving information you may want to receive, or you may want to communicate to me.

I mean, I think that has been the theme tonight as well, about women’s consent, people’s consent, to posting digital images which may compromise them. Well, I think if you asked a lot of women who were having an abortion whether they consented to receiving information that could be an interesting pathway forward, because therein lies, I guess, the balance of different rights and different interests, and who are the powerful in different situations and who are the vulnerable—who do we as a society, as parliamentarians have to protect.

We’re actually not limiting the expression of people’s opinions about abortion, but what we’re doing is trying to create a safe zone, a safe area, where after all those deliberations have been made, and women with their husbands, families, have made the decision, they don’t need any more information, they’ve made it. You can input information as they’re navigating through that process, that’s fine, but I don’t think anyone has the right, once that decision has been made, to try and change that person’s mind. And there, for me, is the heart of the debate here tonight.

So I look forward to the select committee deliberations. I want to wish the Health Committee all the best in that deliberation. And, obviously, there may be some members of Parliament who choose to make submissions.

But finally, can I acknowledge the Hon Ruth Dyson, the Hon Tracey Martin, the Hon Amy Adams, Barbara Kuriger, and Jan Logie. There are some heroes in this House and there are some heroes who have left us. But, actually, this is about a legacy of women across this Parliament working together to eliminate violence and the oppression of women that has happened for far too long. Kia ora.

A personal vote was called for on the question, That the Contraception, Sterilisation, and Abortion (Safe Areas) Amendment Bill be now read a first time.

Ayes 100

Noes 15

Abstentions 2

Motion agreed to.

Bill read a first time.

Contraception, Sterilisation, and Abortion (Safe Areas) Amendment Bill be considered by the Health Committee.

SPEAKER: The question is, That the

Motion agreed to.

Bill referred to the Health Committee.

SPEAKER: The House stands adjourned until 2 p.m. tomorrow.

The House adjourned at 10.10 p.m.