Thursday, 25 March 2021

THURSDAY, 25 MARCH 2021

THURSDAY, 25 MARCH 2021

The Speaker took the Chair at 2 p.m.

Karakia/Prayers

Karakia/Prayers

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jenny Salesa): Ke tau lotu. ‘E ‘Otua Māfimafi, 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 ange ‘emau fua fatongia ‘i he Fale Aleá ‘aki ‘a e poto Faka-e-‘Otua, ‘ofa pea mo e ‘ulungaanga malū, ko e ‘uhí ko e mo‘ui mo e melino ‘o e fonuá. ‘Oku mau kole atu ‘a e ngaahi me‘á ni hono kotoa ‘i he huafa ho ‘aló pē ‘e taha ko Sīsū Kalaisi ko homau fakamo‘uí, ‘Emeni.

Business Statement

Business Statement

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Leader of the House): Thank you, Mr Speaker. Today the House adjourns until Tuesday, 6 April. Legislation to be considered in that week will include the first readings of the Incorporated Societies Bill, the Mental Health (Compulsory Assessment and Treatment) Amendment Bill, and the Social Security (Subsequent Child Policy Removal) Amendment Bill; the committee stage of the Financial Market Infrastructures Bill; and, on Tuesday, the remaining stages of the Ngāti Hinerangi Claims Settlement Bill. Wednesday is scheduled to be a members’ day.

CHRIS BISHOP (National): Will the Government agree to set down members’ notice of motion No. 8 as the first order of business for the next members’ day?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Leader of the House): Let me just check which one it is. No.

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

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

SPEAKER: Petitions have been delivered to the Clerk for presentation.

CLERK:

Petition of Kate Slankard-Stone requesting that the House urge the Government to use all available means to pressure the Israeli Government to end the detention of Palestinian children and ensure that Israel acts in accordance with international human rights standards

the petition of Bridget King requesting that the House initiate a select committee inquiry into the death of Bradley King

the petition of Sam Vincent requesting that the House recommend that the Government create a pathway for Uyghur refugees to resettle in New Zealand.

SPEAKER: Those petitions stand referred to the Petitions Committee.

Ministers have delivered papers.

CLERK:

New Zealand Artificial Limb Service Statement of Performance Expectations 2020-21

New Zealand Blood Service Statement of Performance Expectations 2020-21 and Statement of Intent 2020-24

KiwiRail Statement of Corporate Intent 2021-23

report of the Intelligence and Security Committee on the activities of the Intelligence and Security Committee in 2020

2020 annual report of the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service and the Government Communications Security Bureau

the Government response to the report of the Health Committee on the petition of Lucy McSweeney.

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

Select committee reports have been delivered for presentation.

CLERK:

Report of the Education and Workforce Committee on the Holidays (Increasing Sick Leave) Amendment Bill

reports of the Intelligence and Security Committee on the:

2019/20 annual review of the Government Communications Security Bureau

2019/20 annual review of the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service.

SPEAKER: The bill is set down for second reading.

The Clerk has been informed of the introduction of bills.

CLERK:

Crimes (Robbery) Amendment Bill, introduction

Synthetic Urine (Prohibition on Importation, Supply, and Acquisition to Pass a Workplace Drug Test) Bill, introduction

Biosecurity (Information for Incoming Passengers) Amendment Bill, introduction

Secondhand Dealers and Pawnbrokers (Electronic Records) Amendment Bill, introduction.

SPEAKER: Those bills are set down for first reading.

Oral Questions

Questions to Ministers

Question No. 1—Tourism

1. Dr JAMES McDOWALL (ACT) to the Minister of Tourism: Does he stand by all of his statements and actions?

Hon STUART NASH (Minister of Tourism): Yes, in the context they were given and undertaken.

Dr James McDowall: Does he stand by his statement that, “There is scope for a fresh look at existing levies”, and, if so, does this include the international visitor levy (IVL) and bed taxes?

Hon STUART NASH: Yes to the first question. To the second one: there’s a whole lot of work going on in this space at this point in time which I’m not prepared to divulge.

SPEAKER: No. Order! Order! I know the member cannot be required to do a yes/no answer, but I think there is an obligation for the Minister to answer in the House at least as well as he has on public radio. The member will answer the question.

Hon STUART NASH: To the first part of the question: yes. To the second: I have on public radio noted the fact that I am looking at the IVL—bed taxes, no.

Dr James McDowall: Does he believe that increasing tourism taxes or levies would result in more or fewer tourists coming to New Zealand?

Hon STUART NASH: I think I’ve been very clear in a number of places that there are some areas of this country where the social licence was being eroded due to the fact there were too many tourists.

Dr James McDowall: Can he guarantee that any new bed taxes would not be paid for by New Zealanders?

Hon STUART NASH: As mentioned, I’m not doing any work on the Government implementing bed taxes.

Dr James McDowall: Which does he think best helps the struggling tourism sector: more tourists or more taxes?

Hon STUART NASH: If it was that simple, it would be a hell of a lot easier, but I have given a number of statements around how I see the tourism sector in a post-COVID world developing, and it is not more tourists; it is higher value tourists spending more money—however, New Zealand delivering on an experience.

Question No. 2—Finance

2. ARENA WILLIAMS (Labour—Manurewa) to the Minister of Finance: What reports has he seen of how the economy is performing a year on from the decision to move to alert level 4?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Minister of Finance): Today is the first anniversary of the move to alert level 4. At that time, there was significant concern about the long-term impact on the New Zealand economy. A year on, New Zealand’s economic activity is in fact in line with pre-COVID levels and well ahead of forecasts in the Budget and the pre-election fiscal update. The economy is also continuing to hold up well compared to our international counterparts. In the December quarter, economic activity was only 0.9 percent below where it was a year ago, compared to 1.1 percent down in Australia, 3.2 percent down in Canada, 4.9 percent down across the euro area, and 7.8 percent down in the United Kingdom.

Arena Williams: What reports has he seen on New Zealand’s economic performance since this time last year?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: Earlier this month, the International Monetary Fund released its latest report on New Zealand, praising the economic response from the Government in the past year. They specifically commented on the size and scope of our economic support and how it helped avert a much steeper decline in economic activity and employment. In New Zealand, our unemployment rate is currently below 5 percent, and a peak of only 5.3 percent today. It will bump around a bit, but it will be well below the near 10-plus percent levels we were being told about. I can also tell the House today that the number of people on a main benefit is continuing to drop. Our figures out today show 20,244 fewer people are on a main benefit compared to the start of the year, and in just the last week of numbers, 2,388 people left the jobseeker support payment to go into work.

Arena Williams: What has been the impact of Government support on economic activity in the past year?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: A report from Statistics New Zealand released today found that three out of four New Zealand firms had received COVID-19 - related financial support from the Government last year. The report said the assistance was one of the key things businesses used to help stay afloat last year. The delivery of that assistance in a timely manner ensured cash flow and confidence that was a real concern a year ago today.

Question No. 3—Prime Minister

3. Dr SHANE RETI (Deputy Leader—National) to the Prime Minister: Does she stand by all her Government’s statements and actions?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Deputy Prime Minister) on behalf of the Prime Minister: Yes, particularly the Government’s decision to incentivise investment into the construction of new homes and fund the vital infrastructure needed for new housing like pipes and transport links. New Zealand’s housing crisis, as we’ve said many times in this House and beyond, has been decades in the making and there is no quick fix. It’s an issue that will take time to turn around, but our package of urgent but also long-term changes will increase housing supply, relieve pressure on the market, and, we hope, make it easier for first-home buyers.

Dr Shane Reti: Under the housing policy she announced on Tuesday, if a New Zealander has a mortgage across two properties, one which is a new build and one which isn’t, will their interest be tax deductible?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: Sorry, can the member just ask that question again?

Dr Shane Reti: Sure. Under the housing policy she announced on Tuesday, if a New Zealander has a mortgage across two properties, one which is a new build and one which isn’t, will their interest be tax deductible?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: On the matter of interest deductibility, the detail of the policy is now subject to the normal Inland Revenue tax consultation process.

Dr Shane Reti: Has she, then, received a Cabinet paper providing detailed analysis on the impact of removing interest deductibility?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: On behalf of the Prime Minister, I think that, if the member listened to the previous answer, what we have announced is the framework and the decisions that will guide interest deductibility being removed. We now get into the detail of that through a consultation process with people who’re affected. This is, indeed, the normal way in which major changes to the tax system are made.

Dr Shane Reti: Will she guarantee that no further business costs will be removed from standard expensing practices as this policy does?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: I can say this to the member: that the reason that this loophole was closed was in part because those people who are owner-occupiers cannot do what investors can do in the property market. There is no intention to do that in any other industry.

Dr Shane Reti: How does she respond to Business New Zealand’s accusation that the Government are being misleading by characterising tax deductibility as a loophole and that there is no reason for this decision and that it will stall business investment—

SPEAKER: Order! Order!

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: On behalf of the Prime Minister, I reject that assertion by Business New Zealand. What I would say is that this Government came in on a promise to New Zealanders to be able to fix the housing crisis. We have proposed solutions. We recognise that this is not an easy issue. It will take a long time to fix, but one of the things New Zealanders want is for first-home buyers to have a fair go. That means needing to make changes. The interest deductibility changes are part of that.

Dr Shane Reti: Can she name any one of the 17 child poverty measures of material hardship that she is targeting that is not directly affected by rising rents, and, if so, which one?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: Well, obviously, issues of housing costs are essential when it comes to all of the measures of child poverty. That’s why, when we look at the top three measures above the 17, they do before - housing costs and after - housing costs. Clearly, housing costs are a significant part of the income of families and, therefore, the support for children. Addressing child poverty, again, requires a number of different measures, some of which are about lifting incomes, some of which are about making sure more houses are built, which is part of the package announced the day before.

Dr Shane Reti: Why then did she write, in answer to written questions, that none of the 17 indicators measuring material hardship are directly impacted by rising rents?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: I just said to the member, housing costs are an important feature of addressing child poverty.

Question No. 4—Housing

4. GINNY ANDERSEN (Labour—Hutt South) to the Minister of Housing: What reaction has she seen to the new supply side measures announced as part of the Government’s housing package on Tuesday?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS (Minister of Housing): I’ve seen a range of comments about the Government’s $3.8 billion Housing Acceleration Fund, and other supply side measures announced on Tuesday, from a number of stakeholders, both in the media and to whom I have spoken directly. Shamubeel Eaqub said the acceleration fund and the Kāinga Ora land programme are “big deals” and that “the infrastructure money will be welcome in many fast-growing or small communities that can’t afford new infrastructure”. Master Builders CEO, David Kelly, said, “The Government is [now] seeing housing as a key part of our critical infrastructure.”, and “provision for infrastructure funding to support … homes and developments is also a positive step.”

Ginny Andersen: What reaction has she seen from local government representatives?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: I saw a comment from the chair of Local Government New Zealand, Stuart Crosby, who welcomed the $3.8 billion fund and emphasised that infrastructure is key to releasing land for development. Mayors across the country have also been supportive. Auckland Mayor, Phil Goff, said that, “The cost of infrastructure, rather than the availability of land, is the major constraint Auckland faces in increasing home building”, while Nelson Mayor, Rachel Reese, said the announcement was a game-changer, and there is now potential for a lasting solution.

Ginny Andersen: What reaction has she seen from developers?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: Shane Brealey from NZ Living said that the acceleration fund will “Help move infrastructure along at a faster pace than otherwise, which is a good thing”. I’ve seen other comments from a developer saying the fund is a good start, but it needs to be coupled with work on planning constraints and land supply. I have good news—the supply side package we announced will work to free up land, with Kāinga Ora having funding to undertake strategic land purchases, and by putting expectations on councils in return for funding.

Question No. 5—COVID-19 Response

5. CHRIS BISHOP (National) to the Minister for COVID-19 Response: Is he satisfied with the management of the COVID-19 vaccine roll-out, and will the Government set an official target of how many New Zealanders should get the COVID19 vaccine?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Minister for COVID-19 Response): Broadly speaking, yes. Yesterday, we recorded nearly 3,500 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine being administered. That number continues to increase on a daily basis. The scale-up has continued this week—17 additional vaccine sites have come online. We expect to have around 50 vaccination sites operating across the country by early next week. Our plan at this point of the vaccine roll-out was to ensure that we were scaling up sustainably, and we are working carefully to make sure we don’t run out of vaccines towards the middle of the year before we start to get the big deliveries of vaccines in the second part of the year. With regard to the second part of the question, the Government’s goal is to ensure that all New Zealanders who can get a vaccine have access to that vaccine by the end of the year.

Chris Bishop: Will the Government set a formal target and a date to achieve that target for the percentage of the adult population to receive a COVID-19 vaccine, like 26 countries in the OECD have done, and, if not, why not?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: No, not at this point. Our goal is to ensure that everybody who can have a vaccine—and at this point, that’s the adult population—has access to a vaccine and gets a vaccine. We’re working hard to ensure that they have good information so that when they are offered a vaccine, they take it. Our tier 1 vaccine experience indicates that the take-up rate is very high—well over 95 percent at this point. If we continue to get that kind of take-up as we move through the rest of the sequencing framework, we’ll be very, very happy.

Chris Bishop: Well, in light of that answer, why did the Government set targets for the measles vaccine and the flu vaccine, and why won’t it set a target for the COVID-19 vaccine?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: One of the things that’s better understood is around the efficacy of the measles vaccine; we know a bit more about what we’re dealing with there. We know more around what’s required to get herd immunity with the measles vaccination campaign. We don’t yet know all of that information around COVID-19.

Chris Bishop: Why is the Government not publishing daily updates of the number of people vaccinated against COVID-19, like other countries do, and will they begin to do so?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: Yes, the plan is certainly—in answer to the last part of the question—to start releasing daily updates when we get to the point where the vaccine programme is scaled up. In the meantime, we continue to release regular updates on the number of vaccines that are being administered.

Chris Bishop: Why does the latest available public information show that New Zealand has administered just 0.56 vaccinations per 100 people while Australia has administered 1.21 vaccines per 100 people?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: The key point, and we’ve always stressed this, is not when we start the vaccination campaign but when we finish it. We are scaling up our vaccination campaign in a way that ensures that it is sustainable, that we won’t have people standing around because they’ve run out of vaccines. We’re making sure that people will be able to get their second dose of the vaccine three weeks after they get their first dose, and we’re making sure we are doing this all safely.

Chris Bishop: Why has New Zealand administered only 41,500 vaccines when we have a supply, according to the Government, of over 300,000, and shouldn’t New Zealand be going as hard as possible?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: As I have indicated in my earlier answers, if the member had chosen to listen, we are making sure that we are administering the vaccines in a way that ensures that we don’t run out of vaccines towards the middle of the year. We want to scale up sustainably so that we keep scaling up, so that we’re reaching a peak vaccine delivery at the time when the large bulk of vaccines will start to arrive in the second half of the year.

Question No. 6—COVID-19 Response

6. Dr TRACEY McLELLAN (Labour—Banks Peninsula) to the Minister for COVID-19 Response: How have New Zealand’s COVID-19 health protection measures improved over the past year?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Minister for COVID-19 Response): It was a year ago today that New Zealand moved to COVID-19 alert level 4, where we would stay for five weeks in an attempt to eliminate the virus from our shores. A year on, we continue to deal with the effects of the pandemic, but our means of responding to the virus continue to be refined and improved over time. That’s included a constant review of our testing strategy to make sure it’s fit for purpose and to identify any risk and any cases swiftly and appropriately. We’ve got thorough and ongoing expansion of our contact tracing system to ensure that we’ve got the flexibility and the capacity to track cases and their associated contacts in a timely manner, and we’ve got regular improvement of our infection prevention and control measures to restrict unwanted transmission.

Dr Tracey McLellan: What have been the key lessons learnt on improving our health measures?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: As we reflect over the last year, it’s important to remember there was no rule book when we started this and a lot was not yet understood around the COVID-19 virus. So one of the key lessons for everybody involved is that we’ve had to continue to be agile and responsive, open to learning new things, and honest when things haven’t necessarily gone according to plan. We’ve always been looking for ways to continue to improve, and that’s what we will continue to do.

Dr Tracey McLellan: How has New Zealand’s health system response to COVID-19 compared internationally?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: Anyone watching the news in the evening will know that the effect of COVID-19 around the world continues to be a devastating one, something that we have largely been able to avoid here in New Zealand, although, of course, we remember those who did lose their lives to the virus early on in the pandemic. Around the globe, we see the ongoing effects of COVID-19 and the very beneficial position that New Zealand has been placed in because of our elimination of the virus. Our response has been ranked as one of the best in the world by both Bloomberg and the Lowy Institute. On average last year, we had the fewest restrictions and the most freedoms of any country in the OECD.

Dr Tracey McLellan: How have these measures benefited New Zealand?

Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: We see on a daily basis thousands of New Zealanders going about their day-to-day lives, engaging in the sorts of activities that other people around the world dream about: Homegrown, the America’s Cup, a packed Hagley Oval to watch the Blackcaps. These are the sorts of events that other countries around the world simply can’t enjoy at the moment that New Zealanders are able to enjoy. I do want to say these are not the result of good luck; these are the result of a very strong, dedicated team of public health people up and down the country, who are combining their collective efforts with those of the team of 5 million to keep COVID-19 out of New Zealand.

Question No. 7—Agriculture

7. Hon DAVID BENNETT (National) to the Minister of Agriculture: Does he stand by his comment in regards to horticulture worker shortages, “The Minister of Immigration has indicated … that at this stage there is no capacity to bring in any more RSE workers”; if so, has he asked Cabinet colleagues what progress has been made on the Pacific COVID-safe travel zone?

Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR (Minister of Agriculture): In answer to the first part of the question: yes. In answer to the second part of the question: as agriculture Minister, I’ve taken part in discussions about that in Cabinet. But, ultimately, the responsibility for the establishment of any Pacific bubble lies with the Minister for COVID-19 Response, the Honourable “Chippie”.

SPEAKER: I think if I allow that, I’m going to have to allow everyone to do it. So the Minister will correct himself.

Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR: Sorry—the Hon Chris Hipkins.

Hon David Bennett: If the Minister has had discussions in Cabinet, has he supported any Cabinet papers this year about a Pacific Island bubble?

SPEAKER: Sorry, has he?

Hon David Bennett: Supported any Cabinet papers this year about a Pacific Island bubble.

Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR: I think everyone in Cabinet would like to see a bubble open as quickly as possible. But, as the Minister said in his previous question, our priority is to keep New Zealanders safe from COVID, which is arriving at our border every day, and we have a responsibility for that first and foremost.

Hon David Bennett: Point of order, Mr Speaker. It was a very simple question: has he supported any Cabinet papers this year?

SPEAKER: Yes, and the question was certainly addressed.

Hon David Bennett: Why hasn’t he prepared a Cabinet paper this year for a Pacific bubble, when the horticulture sector has been seeking such?

Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR: Because the horticulture sector doesn’t have a responsibility to look after all New Zealanders.

Hon David Bennett: Really? OK. What is the latest date that the Government will announce a Pacific bubble to give the necessary Recognised Seasonal Employer (RSE) scheme workers, so that the horticulture sector can have confidence in planting crops and the process they will go through in the next year?

Hon Grant Robertson: Point of order, Mr Speaker. The Minister being asked the question is not the main member responsible for matters of travel bubbles.

SPEAKER: Yes, I can understand the point that the Deputy Prime Minister is making. I will, however, take some responsibility for shortening this question from one which was much longer, and, in doing that, I did give an undertaking that I would be liberal in my interpretation. Therefore, I’ll ask the Minister to answer the question. Maybe ask it again.

Hon David Bennett: What is the latest date the Government will announce a travel bubble with the Pacific Islands, so that horticulturists can have security to know that they will have the staff for next season?

Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR: That is for Cabinet to decide.

Hon David Bennett: How will Cabinet decide, if the Minister won’t advocate to his colleagues that there should be a Pacific bubble?

SPEAKER: Right. Well, that question is out of order.

Hon David Bennett: When the Minister said, on 17 March, that “We’re going to run a robust quarantine system in this country, regardless of where people are coming from, because the risks out there are [so] significant. The fact that we haven’t been able to open … a bubble across the Tasman is because there’s still uncertainty around the management of COVID in both our countries,”, then, with recent announcements of an imminent trans-Tasman bubble, how has he advocated for consistency for RSE workers in a Pacific bubble to meet the shortage of workers in the horticulture sector?

Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR: I think Cabinet has been aware of the pressure in the horticulture sector. That is why they approved 2,000 workers into this country at a time when there was huge pressure on managed isolation and quarantine (MIQ). Cabinet will make decisions around the trans-Tasman bubble. If there is any capacity at MIQ at that point, then I’ll be advocating for some of those spaces to be available.

Question No. 8—Social Development and Employment

8. RICARDO MENÉNDEZ MARCH (Green) to the Minister for Social Development and Employment: What is her response to the findings of MSD’s Experiences of Money Management in the Youth Service report that payments are often inadequate, and that compulsory money management may lead to further debt, stigma, and hinders our young people?

Hon CARMEL SEPULONI (Minister for Social Development and Employment): I welcome the report. The report was commissioned following the Welfare Expert Advisory Group (WEAG)—when they recommended abolishing compulsory money management for young people receiving a benefit aged 16 to 19. The report provides further information on what was detailed in the WEAG report and includes the perspectives of service providers and young people. The Ministry of Social Development is now looking at those findings and will provide me with additional advice on potential ways forward, including any operational and fiscal implications, and those will need to be worked through carefully. As indicated in the Welfare Expert Advisory Group report, or the Cabinet paper that followed the WEAG report, this is part of our medium- to long-term plan.

Ricardo Menéndez March: Does the Minister believe rangatahi on the youth benefit have enough left on their payment card after living costs to cover basic expenses?

Hon CARMEL SEPULONI: I think that we’ve been really clear that income adequacy in the welfare system is an issue across the board. What this report highlights is that the payment card doesn’t necessarily work in the way that it was potentially intended, particularly for young people.

Ricardo Menéndez March: What does she say to the young people who are left disempowered and with as little as $7 in hand due to the universal compulsory nature of money management that comes from the youth payment card?

Hon CARMEL SEPULONI: That we are doing work on this; that we’ve outlined a plan for addressing it. I will also note, though, that the report does say that for some young people, money management does work. The area that they were most concerned about was the payment card and the constraints of where and how they can use that. I think one of the groups in particular who were struggling with the practicalities of having a payment card were young people who live rurally.

Ricardo Menéndez March: What new actions in the short term will the Minister take to further lift the incomes of young people who face skyrocketing rents?

Hon CARMEL SEPULONI: We did move quickly. Last year, we increased benefits. We have indexed them to wages, and so we will see another increase on 1 April. That is more than what it would have been if we were still set to the Consumers Price Index. We do still need to do more in the income adequacy space for those on welfare, and we’re committed to doing that.

Ricardo Menéndez March: Will she listen to the young people and researchers in the ministry’s report who called for more control over their money?

Hon CARMEL SEPULONI: I am certainly considering the findings of the report and look forward to further advice that I will receive from the Ministry of Social Development.

Ricardo Menéndez March: Will she direct her ministry to stop docking young people’s benefits, as sanctions have been shown to be ineffective and harmful?

Hon CARMEL SEPULONI: We have addressed two of the sanctions. One that was discussed today was the subsequent child policy, and also the repeal of section 192. We are committed to reviewing excessive sanctions, and that is ongoing work. As I’ve said, there are two that have already been addressed. That doesn’t mean that there’s not more to do in the welfare system to uphold the dignity of those who have to access welfare support.

Question No. 9—Revenue

9. BARBARA EDMONDS (Labour—Mana) to the Minister of Revenue: What reports has he seen about the proposed change to interest tax deductibility for existing residential rental properties?

Hon DAVID PARKER (Minister of Revenue): I’ve seen a number of positive reports. Commentators and economists have recognised that removing interest deductibility for investors in existing rental properties will tilt the housing market in favour of first-home buyers, new housing, and the wider productive economy. Greg Ninness of Interest.co.nz said the response was “gutsy” and the timing of making such a change is perfect, with interest rates at record lows. Making this change at this time will “help ensure that those investors who remain in the market are better capitalised”. The International Monetary Fund had warned about the risk of unsustainable house prices to our wider economy and recommended a response that differentiated between investors and first-home buyers. The ANZ have said they will now look at changing capital requirements for investors in existing homes. All of these reports give me confidence this change will result in more of our existing homes being bought by people who live in them.

Barbara Edmonds: What reports has he received from industry leaders on the change to interest deductibility rules for existing residential rental properties?

Hon DAVID PARKER: I have received direct feedback from CEOs and chairs of a number of NZX-listed productive economy companies. They all congratulated the Government on this change. They think it’s good for the economy, good for exports, and good for society. They think it will work.

Barbara Edmonds: How will the proposed changes to interest deductibility rules for existing housing benefit the wider economy?

Hon DAVID PARKER: Stephen Bennie of Castle Point Funds was reported in the New Zealand Herald as saying that international investors were previously expecting interest rate hikes by the Reserve Bank to calm the residential market. This change to deductibility rules is seen by the market as reducing the risk of interest rate hikes, which would have affected everyone, including homeowners—all of them—and exporters.

Hon Michael Woodhouse: Does he agree with reported comments from Findex senior partner Scott Mason, who said in the Otago Daily Times yesterday, “Removing interest deductibility for most landlords is a significant and unprincipled amendment to the tax system.”, and, if not, why not?

Hon DAVID PARKER: No. I think he’s wrong.

Barbara Edmonds: What reports has he received on the proposed interest deductibility changes as part of the Government’s response to the housing crisis?

Hon DAVID PARKER: I saw reports this week saying the Government needed to act swiftly and decisively on the housing crisis, and I’ve seen reports from the same people this week saying the Government’s acted too swiftly and decisively on housing reports and that we should slow things down and keep them as they are. To do that would risk a housing bubble. The Government is on the side of renters, first-home buyers, owner-occupiers to investors in new builds. Some people say housing costs too much but then oppose every move to address it. It appears highly leveraged speculators have the Opposition on their side.

Question No. 10—Housing

10. NICOLA WILLIS (National) to the Minister of Housing: Can she confirm that neither the final design nor the criteria for the Housing Acceleration Fund have been decided on by Cabinet, and by what date will that scheme result in a single new house being built?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS (Minister of Housing): With the announcement this week that we’ve secured $3.8 billion for the Housing Acceleration Fund two months ahead of the Budget, we can begin engagement with stakeholders about the next steps, alongside working with Kāinga Ora on accelerating their large-scale projects. As I made clear to the member yesterday, I’ll be taking the final design and criteria for the fund to Cabinet by the end of June, but in-principle decisions about the fund have already been made, and work is well under way to understand the pipeline of projects that could be funded. In answer to the second part of the question, as I also outlined to the member yesterday, the intent of the fund is to create build-ready land for new housing, and investments will begin to be made in the second half of this year. I expect to see new houses enabled by this infrastructure under construction in 2022.

Nicola Willis: Why is it that despite having 2,367 Government housing officials working for her, she has failed to publish anything about how the fund will work beyond this one-sided piece of A4 paper?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: All the documents that sit behind this, in a substantial body of work that sits behind this work, have been proactively released. I suggest the member reads them, because she’s clearly confused. Meanwhile, on this side of the House, we’re still waiting to see a single press release from the Opposition about it.

Hon Grant Robertson: What lessons did the Minister learn from previous Government attempts to invest in the infrastructure side that underpins housing?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: While we were doing the work to put together this fund, we certainly looked at previous infrastructure funding attempts. In particular, as a group of Ministers, we took good notice of the Housing Infrastructure Fund that was launched under the previous Government. It was around a quarter of the size. It was only going to be administered as repayable loans to councils who already were reaching their debt ceiling, but one of the things that we were most interested in about this, and we were keen not to replicate, was that this funding was never tied to any agreement by councils or developers to develop the land for housing. One of the things that we did note: this was launched in 2016, the first project for the fund was announced a year later, in July 2017, with the first funding approved another year later, in June 2018, and not a single project has been completed to date.

Nicola Willis: Why does the Government need yet another three months to finalise this idea, yet it was able to progress 50 pages of new tax law within three days?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: Because we certainly don’t want to replicate the debacle that the previous Government did with the Housing Infrastructure Fund—not a single project completed to date.

Nicola Willis: What is the basis of her claim on Monday that this scheme will result in 80,000 to 130,000 houses being built, and why is this any more believable than the Government’s back-of-the-car promise to build 100,000 KiwiBuild homes?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: I think, if the member does take the time to read the documentation that sits behind this, what she will see is that there is quite detailed modelling of the number of houses that may be enabled: 80,000 to 100,000. Furthermore, specifics are given around the large-scale project land that will be there in terms of the 18,000 of State-enabled houses, and a further 11,000 of market houses. And as for the swipe re KiwiBuild, as I say to that member frequently, we’ll put our 794 houses against their 100 affordable houses over nine years any day of the week.

Nicola Willis: Does the Minister understand there are shovel-ready community housing projects ready to go, up and down the country, and why won’t she use Government money to get spades in the ground, building those houses tomorrow?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: That member needs to decide: does she want buy-ins or does she not? She seems to criticise them when Kāinga Ora do them. I have outlined to that member on a number of occasions the programme of work we have under way with community housing providers. I am not prepared to see the 77 buy-in rate we have seen from community housing providers over the last two years. I know that member has an aversion to building houses, because that is the party that she belongs to.

SPEAKER: Order! Order! I’m just going to caution the member about ascribing that sort of motive to a member.

Nicola Willis: Point of order, Mr Speaker. I seek leave for the Minister to table the extensive documentation—

SPEAKER: Order! [Interruption] Order! Order! Look, the member has been around these buildings for a very long time. I’m considering whether I should—[Interruption] Right, the Hon Simon Bridges—it must be Thursday again, is it? [Interruption] Well, I’m speaking. One of us speaks at a time, and when I’m standing up, it’s me.

Hon Simon Bridges: I was having a chat—I wanted a chat with my friend.

SPEAKER: You were speaking—no, it might be my new hearing aid, but I can hear the member right up here. So he needs to learn—

Hon Simon Bridges: Turf me, then.

SPEAKER: No. I know the member wants to go—that’s the problem. He wants to go every Thursday, and I’m just wondering whether I should reward him or not. I think I’m going to punish him by making him stay here until the end of question time. Going back to Nicola Willis’ point, I think she knows she’s being disorderly. If she does it again, she will suffer the consequences.

Hon Gerry Brownlee: Point of order, Mr Speaker. I think what my colleague was really asking was that if the Minister has relied on some documentation for the answer, and I think it may not have been worded in the way it should be.

SPEAKER: Sorry, if your colleague really thought that, she would have done it.

Hon Gerry Brownlee: Well, no—

SPEAKER: No, she’s been around a very long time, Mr Brownlee. She knows how to do it, and I think that when she asked for a big pile of documentation and she looks at what the Minister’s quoting from, even that would be disorderly.

Hon Gerry Brownlee: You reckon so?

SPEAKER: I do.

Hon Dr Nick Smith: 386.

SPEAKER: Dr Smith, do you want to have a go?

Dr Nick Smith: I seek under Standing Order—I don’t think you think that ministerial accountability is very important. The Minister has said that there is a heap of documents. Standing Order 386 says that where a Minister quotes documents relating to public affairs, a member may, by point of order, require the Minister to table the documents.

SPEAKER: OK, the member will sit down. I saw the Minister with a very small number of sheets of paper in her hand. I think even the member’s imagination wouldn’t call that a heap of documents—all right?

Hon Dr Nick Smith: That’s what she claimed—that’s what she said.

SPEAKER: I’m going to ask the member: was she quoting from an official document?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: No.

SPEAKER: Well, that was pretty clear.

Question No. 11—Immigration

11. INGRID LEARY (Labour—Taieri) to the Minister of Immigration: What recent reports has he seen on the additional 2,000 Recognised Seasonal Employer workers brought in under a class border exception to support the horticulture and wine industries?

Hon KRIS FAAFOI (Minister of Immigration): I am happy to report that 2,012 Recognised Seasonal Employer (RSE) workers have entered New Zealand: 775 from Samoa, 70 from Fiji, and 1,167 from Vanuatu. As of Saturday, 20 March, the last 155 of these workers departed managed isolation and quarantine for their places of work in the horticulture and winemaking sectors. I would like to acknowledge the considerable efforts of the industry peak bodies who have worked alongside officials to successfully bring this group across the border in time for seasonal peaks. We acknowledge the difficulties the sectors continue to face, and we are in constant contact with them. The 2,012 RSE workers that have been brought into New Zealand is the largest group of economic exceptions allowed to enter New Zealand while our COVID-19 border restrictions are in place. The demand for RSE workers needs to be balanced with the demand from New Zealanders returning home and other border exception requests, but we are pleased the 2,000 workers approved in December are now working here in New Zealand.

Ingrid Leary: How will these workers support our economic recovery from COVID-19?

Hon KRIS FAAFOI: As I said in my primary answer, this is the single largest economic-based class border exception that the Government has been able to provide to date. This is in recognition of the horticulture and winemaking sectors being amongst our largest export sectors, with total exports valued at $6.5 billion in the last financial year. These sectors also employ around 38,000 New Zealanders, many in regional New Zealand. These seasonal workers will enable the work that New Zealanders continue in the sector. We thank the sector for their assistance in bringing these 2,012 workers in over a 3½ month period, but we also acknowledge the difficulties that they face with labour limitations.

Ingrid Leary: What other economic exceptions to our closed border is the Minister aware of?

Hon KRIS FAAFOI: As of 17 March this year, 1,577 requests for other critical workers have been approved, representing close to 6,700 workers. Workers in the research and development sector top the list, with 1,920 approved workers, representing just under 30 percent of the total, while 1,348 approved workers in the primary industry sector make up just below 20 percent of the total. At the same time, 4,501 critical health workers and their dependants have had their requests approved.

Question No. 12—Police

12. NICOLE McKEE (ACT) to the Minister of Police: What actions, if any, have been taken to speed up the process for the approximately 10,000 people caught in a firearm licence application backlog?

Hon KRIS FAAFOI (Minister of Justice) on behalf of the Minister of Police: Police issue online reminders to people to apply for their licence well ahead of time. Police currently have a number of licence applications to process due to both COVID-19 delays and new licensing reforms and processes. Police have brought on board more staff to help with the backlog, and they have been prioritising applications for those who need their licence for work and for renewals first. Duck season begins in May, and police are working hard to clear as many renewal applications as possible before this time. Those who do not have their licence before the season starts can still take part if they are supervised by a current licence holder.

Nicole McKee: Is she concerned that current Government processes are stopping firearm owners who are trying to become legally licensed from actually being legally licensed?

Hon KRIS FAAFOI: On behalf of the Minister, as I said, there are COVID-19-related delays. Also, with a new regime that was introduced with the new legislation, a more rigorous test is taken by police to make sure that people are fit and proper people to have a firearms licence. As I said, more staff are being brought on to try and process the applications that are currently on hand, and we hope that we are able to clear that as fast as possible. As I say, if people are concerned about the upcoming duck-shooting season, they are able to continue to undertake that practice if they are supervised by a current licence holder.

Nicole McKee: Will the Minister consider providing temporary extensions for delayed licence applications, similar to what was done in response to COVID-19, to assist processing licences and participation of law-abiding owners in the roar; if not, why not?

Hon KRIS FAAFOI: On behalf of the Minister, I believe that question may be based on some legal advice that the Council of Licenced Firearms Owners have had recently. I would say to the member, though, that that type of measure is not possible, because the types of action taken as a response to COVID were narrow and are not available to the Minister at this stage.

Simeon Brown: When the Minister says that licence holders should apply well in advance, does the Minister mean that those licence holders whose licences expire next year should reapply now so they can take part in next year’s roar or duck-shooting season?

Hon KRIS FAAFOI: I understand that those people who have to have their licence renewed get about four months’ warning that their licence is coming up and needs to be renewed in that time frame. I understand there are some delays which are a little beyond that, but if they do want to take part, as I said, in the upcoming shooting season, they’re most welcome to continue to do that if they do that with friends with a licence.

Special Debates

Local Issues

SPEAKER: Members, we now come to a debate about local issues arranged by the Business Committee under Standing Order 80. I just want to say to members that I have had some people who have approached me asking to split calls. This is, however, a one-hour debate with a maximum time of five minutes, and there is therefore no reason for calls to be split.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH (National): Mr Speaker, I want to highlight the failure of the Government in respect of the issue of first-home owners in the Nelson community, because what was advanced by the Government this week, rather than helping first-home owners, has actually resulted in taking them nowhere. On Tuesday, in the Government’s housing announcement—

SPEAKER: Order! I’m going to interrupt the member now, and make it clear to him that what was agreed at the Business Committee was that this was to be a debate on local issues, not on the effect on a particular area of a general Government policy. This is the only warning that the member is getting.

Chris Bishop: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker.

SPEAKER: A point of order, Chris Bishop, remembering this comes out of the debate time.

Chris Bishop: I’ll just make the point and ask you, as the debate goes on, we’ve got 12 calls on this. It is somewhat tricky for members to raise genuinely local issues that do not have some impact on the Government, and I think Dr Smith was well within the bounds of raising what was agreed at Business Committee, around raising genuinely local issues, and the reality is sometimes those local issues will have an impact on the Government, and oftentimes the local issue will be asking the Government to do something.

SPEAKER: I’ve indicated what the story is, and if that’s what Dr Smith does, that’s fine. Dr Smith.

Hon Dr NICK SMITH: The biggest issue in my home community is in terms of housing. And what we have seen in the last 12 months is a collapse in the number of people being able to access support under the first-home scheme for first-home owners. Let me give a moment of the background to the issue and to why it is so important. When the scheme was introduced on 1 April 2015, over 400 people living in Nelson and Tasman each year were able to access assistance with a grant of up to $20,000 to be able to buy a home. Now in 2015, the average price of a home was $380,000 and the house price cap, at that time, was $500,000. The great concern I have is that while 2,500 people in Nelson and Tasman have been able to buy a first home with that scheme established by National in 2015, the numbers last year plummeted. Last year, we saw a 40 percent decline. We saw in the Budget the amount of money set aside for assisting first-home owners in Nelson and Tasman decline by 40 percent and by over half a million dollars.

Now, would any member of this House reasonably think that Government reducing support for first-home buyers at this time was a reasonable thing? What is blatantly obvious is that with the huge 20 percent increase this year, a 16 percent increase on the previous year in house prices, the fastest rise ever—

SPEAKER: Right, Order! Order! The member will resume his seat. I made it clear.

NICOLE McKEE (ACT): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I’d like to take this short call to talk about my area of Rongotai, which is also the eastern suburbs of Wellington. It spans Miramar, it spans Island Bay, even into areas of Brooklyn, and including the mighty Chatham Islands. But what I’d like to speak about today is the roadworks that are occurring around the eastern suburbs at the moment. At the moment, the New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) have started a seven-week upgrade on Ruahine Street, which is the main arterial route, State Highway 1, out of the Mount Vic tunnel towards the airport. It’s been, and can be, extended at very short notice, including any closures that they want to do, or, in fact, any extensions of time that they want to do.

Now, having been living in the Rongotai district for some period of time now, and having four children belonging to the Wellington rugby club, it’s actually quite imperative that they do do something about Ruahine Street, because trying to get out of those rugby grounds on a Saturday afternoon is a bit of trouble. However, one would say if you want to actually not go down Ruahine Street, go around Evans Bay. But the problem is that around Evans Bay Parade, there’s roadworks, and if you want to get to the airport, you can only take these two main arterial routes, unless you’re willing enough to go up over Mount Vic.

Now, once you get to the intersection at St Patrick’s College, you then have the roadworks on Cobham Drive to deal with.

Kieran McAnulty: Now this is a local debate.

NICOLE McKEE: This is a very local issue. The route to Parliament, via the airport, when it’s finished, will look great, but I expect there’ll be quite a few MPs that will be missing flights because they’re going to struggle to get there. So my question is why do we have two main arterial routes being operated on at the same time? Is it because NZTA and Wellington City Council don’t know how to confer with each other, or is it because we don’t have that many tourists coming through to use our airports?

At the end of it all, it’s going to look nice, it’s going to look great, and it’s going to keep people safe—it’s going to allow multi-modal transport options—but the thing is, it’s not actually addressing the real issue that we have in Rongotai. We need a second tunnel. We need four lanes. We actually need to make sure that we prioritise that our politicians can get to the airport and get back in time in order to be in the House, and we can do this as long as we have the roads. So while we have cycle lanes and we’ve got walkways, those that turn up at Wellington Airport are unlikely to pack their suitcases on the back of an e-bike and try and get into town.

It is more important because we also have the Kāpiti airport closing down soon, which means we’re going to have more and more people coming through Wellington Airport trying to get their way through all of these roadworks to hit the city. What we’re seeing is huge delays in trying to get out of the Rongotai area and getting into the city. In fact, last week it took me 45 minutes to go from Hataitai to the motorway, and that’s no more than 7 kilometres to get there.

There is a paper due—there is hope, because there is a paper due—about getting Wellington moving. It’s due in May—due in May this year. But I have a fear that when it comes out, we’re going to be waiting 10 years for the council and the Government to say, actually, yes, we do need to do something about the transport problem, and, you know, in fact, we do want people coming to the capital and visiting our city and not spending all of their time sitting in a car at traffic lights or at roadworks. The Government actually needs to back getting Wellington moving now.

If we are going to prepare for e-vehicles, a suggestion I have if we don’t push through a second tunnel is that we put battery stations all the way along State Highway 1 and Ruahine Street, because they’re going to run out of battery while they sit and wait in the roadworks. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

JAN LOGIE (Green): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I know my colleague Julie Anne Genter would love to get up and respond to that, but, instead, I am going to talk about the place I live, which is Porirua, in the mighty rohe of the mighty Ngāti Toa. Our harbour is the shining jewel of the entire coast, I would say, and Tītahi Bay a mecca of surf call for this entire region. It’s a stunning place.

But ever since I’ve become an MP, or even before, the health of our harbour has been an absolutely hot topic. There are people who remember supplementing their daily food with kai moana from the harbour. But now we’re seeing the silt rise before our eyes. We’re seeing people in waka ama get rashes from the pollution in the harbour. We are very rarely hearing of anyone who would dare to collect food from the harbour and eat it, and it is causing pain.

In most recent years, Tītahi Bay has regularly been closed for swimming because of contamination. There was recently a little nipper surf lifesaving event that got shut down when parents noticed faecal matter in the water with their kids. We’ve heard of used toilet paper turning up on the streets in Mana. These things are all connected, because our water system is not coping with the increase in development, and the development and the projects have not protected the waterway from the runoff of the land. Half of our waste-water pipes are in poor or very poor condition. Honestly, it’s a tragic situation for the jewel in our coast.

People in the community have been raising concerns about this for years. The estimated cost of upgrading it is $1.8 billion, for a community with only 57,000 ratepayers. It’s well beyond, I think, the entire total of what Government’s indicated it might put into the three waters project. There’s a sense of urgency in our community about doing this. Now there’s a plan for a new, fancy 2,000-house development on the hills opposite Plimmerton, on the doorstep of a wetland, connected to a wetland system, that the Minister recently signed off after an external hearing panel through the streamlined Resource Management Act process that doesn’t have appeal rights passed to him.

Iwi and council, I acknowledge, supported this application. I’ve got to say, councils—it feels as if there’s a bit of a conflict of interest here, because they’re desperately looking to expand their rating base—right?—with these challenges in front of them, and housing provides that option. But our harbour and our wetlands and the health of our environment are at stake from these developments. Iwi and council both said they supported it on condition of the monitoring and expert processes to protect against runoff and to be protective of our environment. But I sat through some of the hearings on this proposal, and what I heard was example after example, in our area, of monitoring and enforcement not being done, and that resulting in the harm that we are seeing around us. There’s a huge amount at stake here.

There was a group of volunteers who have been helping rebuild Taupō Swamp catchment, a really stunning place. They put in hundreds of hours. They put in their proposal to the hearing, opposing it with really clear reasons of concerns, lack of infrastructure around the lack of protection and monitoring from the runoff from new developments, particularly the model that’s being proposed, and it wasn’t reflected in the report. They wrote to the Minister to ask to be heard, to give their side, so he would get full evidence, but he chose not to meet with them and approved this, because there’s so much pressure to get more housing. But we cannot provide more housing if it’s going to take away the ecosystem that keeps us all alive.

INGRID LEARY (Labour—Taieri): I’d like to talk about ambulance wait times, particularly in rural electorates. Emergency workers talk about the “golden hour”, which is the critical time between when someone has an accident or gets injured and when they can receive medical treatment, and that is the hour that makes the difference, often, between life or death. We’ve had a lot of press lately in the Otago Daily Times, and I’ve had people come to me, as their MP, saying that they’ve had accidents, they’ve been waiting for up to 2½ hours, sometimes ambulances don’t come, and in 2013, in my electorate of Taieri—in Kaitangita, which is a rural area—we had a 69-year-old woman who died waiting for an ambulance for more than an hour and a half for a 12-minute ride. So that’s causing a great deal of anxiety in my electorate. It is characterised by the fact we have a lot of seniors and a lot of disabled people.

In fact, the first petition that I received for this House was from a constituent from Mosgiel called Pauline Latta, and she had had it signed by more than 50,000 people calling for full funding for St John Ambulance. Now, I commended that petition to the House, not because I agree that St John should be fully funded—I don’t think that’s the answer—but I do think that it drew attention to the issue of rural ambulance services and wait times.

They’re not isolated incidents; they’re becoming more and more frequent. Just recently a 91-year-old Balclutha woman was left lying in her garden after she cut herself. After numerous calls to the emergency services, she ended up having the police come and take her to a medical centre. And so that’s really stressful, not only for her but for others who might find themselves in the same situation.

Now, some people are saying that double-crewing and changes to St John crewing is the problem. In fact, I agree with the double-crewing changes which mean that emergency workers go out in pairs. We’ve heard that it’s best practice and that it’s needed for safety, but it does have implications, and it’s a bit complicated when it comes to crewing because you’ve got paid workers and you’ve got volunteer workers, and now you’ve got the requirement for double crews.

To cut a long story short, what that has meant in my electorate is changes to Milton, Balclutha, and Lawrence. The very small community of Lawrence is feeling really anxious and undervalued because it fears it may lose its station, Balclutha has got changes to crewing, and in Milton, the changes have led to a petition signed by about 3,500 people, which is a lot of people for a really small, rural town. The scenario that could play out is, for example, if the two Balclutha ambulances were tied up on other calls, it could conceivably mean a six-hour round trip to get someone, say, from a road accident to Dunedin Hospital, or it could be that a volunteer may not be able to administer pain relief—although I know St John are working on upskilling their volunteers—and, as I said, it could mean that small stations like Lawrence would close.

So the reason for this pressure is there are more calls on St John. I’m told by St John that they dispatch 440,000 ambulances per year and that that is increasing 3 percent per year annually, and I think that those reasons are also because of the stress on our primary healthcare system. So what is happening—and I’ve spoken to ambulance officers about this—is that sometimes they’re tying up emergency services by sending ambulances to people who have not been able to get on to a waiting list to see a doctor or it’s taking five or six weeks, and so they end up going in an ambulance to the emergency department. Or they’ve had a condition which was not an emergency, it didn’t get medical attention in time, it has become an emergency, and so they need to rush to hospital.

So what are the solutions? Well, I don’t think full funding is a solution. I can say that we have already increased funding to St John. So they’re paid 72 percent by the Ministry of Health and ACC, and that was increased in 2020 to $46.36 million over four years. But I do think there’s an appetite out there for some more funding to assist to get more paid staff, and I certainly know that we discussed this at the Labour conference last year. What I would like to see, as the MP for a mixed rural and urban area, is a bigger nuance in how we deal with ambulance services and, in fact, all medical services for our rural areas. I’m delighted that our Minister of Health is pushing forward urgently the health reforms, and I just want to make sure that those communities—seniors, disabled, and rural communities—get their voices heard in this debate.

DEBBIE NGAREWA-PACKER (Co-Leader—Te Paati Māori): Thank you, Mr Speaker. An issue that’s come to us in Te Tai Hauāuru is Te Atawhai o Te Ao released the W’akatika report, completed by a lot of our Awa Whanganui whānau: Dr Rāwiri Tinirau, Dr Cherryl Smith, Sister Makareta, and a few others. A lot of the survey refers to the fact that 93 percent of Māori are receiving and are affected negatively by racism. This is in the backdrop of us receiving news today that 50 percent of what our counter-terrorism are dealing with is actually white supremacy. Where it comes to at a local level for us is that here we’re imploring, and, in fact, lobbying, that “Where are we as part of helping our local communities that are dealing with racism?” Māori wards we heard from this House referred to as apartheid. We actually heard other leaders here saying to stop talking about racism all the time, but for us locally as Māori, it’s become a real issue.

We had recently a horrible example in Kāpiti Coast District Council, where one of our kura from Ōtaki, Te Kura Kaupapa Māori o Te Rito, experienced some of the most horrific racism that children should never ever have to have. They were there enjoying and sharing their culture, their haka, and actually got put down by some of those who are well-known in the lobbying group for National Front white supremacists, saying, “Why do we have to listen to this monkey language?” This is something that I bring to this House—and you know how I feel about the monsters on the walls—and that we on the floor have the opportunity to be part of resolving. What we have seen is in fact a disease of racism being spread to our tamariki that should never ever be spread to anyone generally.

In fact, what we are saying is, at a local level, if you read this report, they are talking about some of the solutions. One is acknowledging and not denying that this is something that we contend with—certainly, leaders should never deny that in this House—and also talking about some of our children that are experiencing the harmful brunt of racism at a young age and that all children should be learning about anti-racism—in fact, some of our adults should be learning it as well—at a young age, and what we can do in this House to de-weaponise racism and stop, effectively, what our children, who we’ve been here to protect, in Aotearoa should not be contending with.

What we really want to do is highlight the aspects of the racism and where it comes from, and what we in Government can do to stop it, whether it be police profiling, whether it be spy agencies that are sitting there focusing on kaupapa that has suddenly become about Māori gangs where, effectively, the worst issue was with our white supremacy and our white gangs.

SPEAKER: Order!

DEBBIE NGAREWA-PACKER: Look, the other part of it too—

SPEAKER: Order! I am now going to ask the member to narrow back to the local. She’s made a couple of local references within a very general speech.

DEBBIE NGAREWA-PACKER: Sure. So one of the things that we have done, in talking to the school and talking to the kaiako and the rangatahi, is actually imploring to tono to them to come here and to meet some of us and to actually see what it is that we are doing in the House to actually stop racism, and how we work together. The other thing is we want to give them great experiences of leadership and show by example in this House. So we are imploring—there is a local aspect to this, Mr Speaker—that we in fact are seen as leading a different culture and, in fact, showing how we are all responsible for bringing about a better resolve.

The other part of this, too, is being able to come across what the report—and I do implore that everyone that hasn’t got a copy of W’akatika do get a copy of it. We have some in Te Paati Māori corridor. What I do want to be able to talk to, through you, Mr Speaker, is the fact that we are in an amazing time in 2021 where we can bring about some effective change, where we can be absolutely championing and be relevant to our rangatahi. I do ask that if there is anyone here that is part of the Ōtaki community, part of our Whanganui Awa community, part of our Taranaki community that are contending with the aftermath of the racism that they’ve had to experience—and that can be such as the Hobson’s Pledge—we actually work together to lead by example and show what we can do in this House. Kia ora koutou.

TODD MULLER (National—Bay of Plenty): Thank you, Mr Speaker. In 1995, when the Tauranga City population reached 80,000, the second emergency department was opened: Tauranga accident and emergency on Second Avenue. Fast forward to 2021, our population is 155,000; the population of Pāpāmoa, a critical, key part of my electorate, is close to 30,000; and Tauranga City still has their emergency department and one other accident and emergency centre. Hamilton City has 170,000 people, an emergency department and three other accident and emergency after-hour care facilities. Tauranga remains with its single one, despite the fact that the population of my city has almost doubled in that time.

We have 5,000 local Pāpāmoa residents who have signed a petition asking for a new accident and emergency centre in Pāpāmoa. It is expected that the residential area of Pāpāmoa will become as large as the city of Nelson. It is seriously under-invested for people—particularly older people, but also younger parents with young kids—who, after 5 o’clock at night, need to get to a doctor. In a Pāpāmoa context, they’ve got to hop in the car and travel 45 minutes to get to the accident and emergency centre in Tauranga Hospital, and this is a community of 150,000 people in the wider city and over 30,000 people in Pāpāmoa. This is simply not good enough.

The community of Pāpāmoa deserves after-hours healthcare resources that can assist elderly people, younger people with families, and the community after 5 o’clock at night. I think it is a fair request. It talks to a view that I have seen in this growing community that there’s been a lot of focus from the local council to ensure that the houses get put up—very much after the population turns up—but there is very little amenity. Quite frankly, my community deserves more than this.

In the spirit of this debate, I will yield now for another speaker.

GINNY ANDERSEN (Labour—Hutt South): Thank you, Mr Speaker. It’s a great opportunity to be able to stand here as the elected member for Hutt South and fight for the Flyer. The Flyer, if you’re not from the Hutt area, or even the Wellington region, is the incredibly valuable bus service that used to run from Lower Hutt out to the airport. Unfortunately, that service no longer exists. But due to a strong local campaign, over 2,100 submissions were provided, and I must say, too, both local MPs—the list MP and the constituent MP—have both been working very well together on this one because we recognise across the board, no matter what party you’re from, that this is a good service to have.

It’s a good service, and the people of the Hutt deserve this service because, through their rates, they pay for it. Through their rates, they pay each year for public transport. So I ask you, Mr Speaker, on behalf of the people of Hutt South, how is it fair if you pay your rates each year but only the Wellingtonians get to receive the benefit of an airport bus service. That does not seem fair to those people in the outer regions of the Wellington area. So that is why we need to have it funded.

It’s also important for accessibility. So many times, if you’re expected to travel from, say, Wainuiōmata to the train station to catch the train into Wellington and then get a bus from the Wellington train station to the airport, that’s four changes—four changes. If you are someone with accessibility issues, if you are someone over 65, if you are a mum or a dad with a buggy and a couple of bags, that changeover each time is virtually impossible. So what has been made through this taking away of this service is the fact that it is making air travel less accessible to those people who cannot afford an Uber, who cannot afford a taxi, and so that is why we need it.

So let’s unpick this a little bit, because it’s all very well and good to be the local MP and stand up and say that we want to fund a service, but when we unpick the reason why the Hutt Valley Airport Flyer is not operating, it actually goes right back to the bottom of PTOM, or what was introduced back in 2013 by the then National Government, which was the Public Transport Operating Model, and that model was actually to increase the commerciality and reduce the amount of Government spending in public transport. But in that model that was introduced, I think, by Steven Joyce back in the day, it actually had some unintended consequences, and one of those unintended consequences was to drive down wages.

From my point of view, part of the crisis that we saw in public transport—particularly around bus drivers and their wages and conditions in the whole Wellington region over the last few years—is a direct result of that PTOM, because what happens is it’s a race to the bottom. It’s a race to the bottom for contractors, who then cherry-pick the most economically viable routes, and guess what? The Flyer route from the Hutt Valley to the airport was not perceived as being as economically viable, and so that is the one where people are failing to get a public service. That is where we need to be looking at a better model for the future.

So it’s heartening to see that Minister Wood, as the Minister of Transport now, has earlier this month indicated that he would look at changing that PTOM, and it’s under review, as obviously—

SPEAKER: Order! Order! I’m going to terminate the member’s speech because she has recently gone well away from the local.

SIMON WATTS (National—North Shore): Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. I know that every member of the Parliament will be slightly biased, but I must say, as the member for North Shore, that it is a very beautiful and stunning place. Our beautiful beaches, our business community—life is good but could be so much better.

Today, I’d like to talk to you about Lake Road. Lake Road is a key arterial route in and out of Devonport peninsula. It is a road that is a key connection for the people of the North Shore to get into Auckland City and around the wider North Shore. Some 32,000 people every day use this road, so it is a road that is significant.

Look, congestion on this road is not unique to this road; it is an issue across Auckland. But particularly for the people that live on the North Shore, congestion on Lake Road is a significant factor. Auckland Transport has spent the last two years, and over $2 million, doing an assessment of options around solutions for this problem. However, what is frustrating is even though the solutions are available, the funding has not been made available to them. Some of the solutions that have been raised because of the lack of funding really only address the symptoms but not the true root cause of this problem.

What I can say is that in terms of the solutions, we must deal with the growth that we are seeing across my electorate in the areas of Belmont, Bayswater, and Devonport, and therefore the solution needs to be sustainable and one that does consider and cater for future generations.

This project needs to be done once and done properly. We cannot afford to have band-aid solutions put in place in order to fix it, and the reason why I bring it to the House is because we need action and not more talk on this issue. Over the last year, and with all the particular lockdowns, our business community has struggled, as have many of our families, and I know more and more people are looking for opportunities to avoid the challenges that come with congestion. They don’t want to be sitting in their cars for so much time.

Tragically, Lake Road is also a dangerous road. In the last fortnight, it was highlighted when we had the death of a cyclist who was actually cycling in the cycle lane. That tragic passing has spotlighted on us the importance of coming up with a solution. To that person’s family, we grieve for the senseless loss of that man, and I know I speak for the whole of the North Shore when I raise that.

There have been 28 serious crashes in the last 10 years on that road, 10 of them involving pedestrians and cyclists. This road has got a number of dangerous areas. There are three major schools on this road, Takapuna Grammar, Belmont Intermediate, Belmont Primary. This affects the families of all the people who live in this part of the Shore, whether it’s getting your kids to school, whether it’s driving to or from work—people are spending more time in this traffic and less time on the things that really matter.

We have to get travel times down, and there’s no longer time to wait. We need to get solutions in place to deal with this issue. We need to expand the capacity of Lake Road. We need to ensure that we can cater for high-capacity public transport, and we need to make sure that that is put in place fast.

This is a road that has national significance, and deserves to be treated as such. Auckland Transport and local government alone do not have the resources that deal with this problem. We need intervention at central government on this issue.

The Hon Michael Wood, Minister of Transport, how about you come for a visit to the North Shore? You and I could go for a drive down Lake Road, and I can show you myself what the desperate problem is and the need that we have within our community. Now is the time for action.

KAREN CHHOUR (ACT): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I have major concern about the quality and safety and value for money in Auckland Transport (AT) road renewal works in the Upper Harbour - Unsworth Heights area. This work is delivered by Auckland Transport and their contractors, funded partly by ratepayers and partly by taxpayers via the New Zealand Transport Agency. Many residents believe the work is simply not necessary, as the existing asphalt surface is fine. Twenty years ago, when the housing area was developed, the developers were required to lay asphalt, but now AT are laying chip seal in these very lovely residential areas. It appears the work is done to a very poor standard and is already failing in many locations. AT have failed to manage quality and safety and have not delivered value for money with these works.

It has been brought to my attention over the last few months that many residents are not happy with AT’s performance. In my area, it seems a very high percentage of roads have been selected for resealing, much to the confusion of the residents living in said streets, who don’t see the need for the work. They are not happy with the safety issues from loose chip. They are not happy with the bitumen—road tar, as I know it—melting and being tracked into their homes, and they are not happy with the apparent waste of money. While this is not my area of expertise, I have listened to the residents’ concerns and looked into the issue. I found that AT made a decision in 2014 that would adapt a policy to downgrade all suburban roads from asphalt to chip seal where they carry less than 10,000 vehicles a day. This would include most Auckland residential streets. This sounds good in theory because, as I’ve been told, the chip seal is a quarter of the price of asphalt. But upon investigation, it appears the other costs may outweigh the savings.

I’ve seen comments from multiple sources—including media articles and social media, as well as in person—where the people are expressing their concern from many angles. The roads are noisier. There seems to be loose chip for months and, in some cases, up to two years after the work is complete. There’s injuries from slipping and falling on the loose stones. Cyclists have stated that it’s dangerous, as stone chips are being flicked at them from passing cars. Stone chips collect on the side of the road, where they are trying to ride. Children can no longer play on their scooters and bikes and skateboards, as they come to abrupt stops when hitting the loose stone. Parents have noted that kids are getting hit by loose stone when walking to school. It gathers in driveways and in the grass. Mowing lawns is no longer safe, with reports of broken windows from flying stones. There are many complaints about chipped or broken windscreens and paint damage to cars.

Another common problem is stones getting stuck in the car disk brakes, scratching the disks, which means they have to be skimmed, at some cost. One expensive event of damage was a brake pad sensor, costing around $200 to repair.

In a time when people are struggling to pay their bills and feed their children, the added pressure when these kinds of costs hit them are enormous and must not be swept under the carpet any longer. Residents are asking if this is safe for their environment when stones are being washed down the stormwater system. Will this cause issues in the winter months by clogging the pipes and causing flooding? How much of this is going out to sea? A petition has been started and has 1,600 signatures and climbing. I am asking for AT to look into the quality, safety, and value for money issues and report back to our community.

GREG O’CONNOR (Labour—Ōhāriu): I’d just like to talk today about Te Ara Tupua. Now, this is something that actually every member in this House and anyone who works in Wellington is going to actually enjoy, even though it’s highly pertinent to my Ōhāriu electorate. Because my Ōhāriu electorate, each of you here, if you come into Wellington you’ll fly over it. You’ll see the mighty Mount Kaukau reaching into the sky. On your left you’ll see the mighty Whanganui-a-Tara / Wellington Harbour. But if you look down, you’ll see a piece of road between Pētone and Ngauranga Gorge which is a very long neglected part of Wellington—neglected, on behalf of my own electorate, because it means in an electorate that has 17 kilometres of coastline, there is actually no access for any of my electorate.

So those who’ve lived in Wellington a long time will be used to coming down Ngauranga Gorge. They’ll remember the blood from the Ngauranga freezing works sort of delta’ing out into the harbour. They reckon the eels there were so big at one stage that they made the Loch Ness monster look like a whitebait. But those days have gone as have the days of going out towards Pētone, where even a heavy dew would bring a great swathe of dirt into the harbour—again, greying the harbour. Those days have gone, but still, if you drive that stretch of road, it’s, as we would say, a piece of coastline only a mother could love. The road is obscured from the sea where often there’s fish out there, there’s birdlife. Those on the rail line reading their papers can actually look out and get a good view, but nobody has access to what is actually a very nice piece of coastline.

So I’d like to speak about something very positive today, which is there’s going to be actually a boardway access there that’s going to be built. It’s going to be multi-purpose. It’s going to actually ensure that as global warming and rising sea levels affect us, there’ll be a bigger barrier, which will save the rail, ensure that we have that rail access. Again, that piece of coastline—in fact, in the 1855 Wairarapa earthquake it rose one metre. That could perhaps be why it’s been ignored for so long.

But we now have Te Ara Tupua, which is going to be a shared pathway, and it’s going to be more than a cycleway, more than just somewhere where people can walk. It’s actually going to give access to the harbour. There’s going to be islands off there. It’s going to be something that even those in the House here who maybe often enjoy Wellington Harbour on the rare time they’re able to escape from this House—it will actually increase access there, right around to Pētone. And I know, Mr Speaker, you yourself are often a user of that route, and you may stop every so often and enjoy the ambience of that new route that will happen. So this is a joint initiative between Waka Kotahi, Hutt City Council, Wellington City Council, Greater Wellington Regional Council, and the Taranaki Whānui, and also, of course, KiwiRail.

I’ve noticed with these speeches today that there’s been a lot of negativity, a lot of those who are pointing out the terrible things about their electorates, their regional areas, but this is one here—I’d just like to brighten the debate perhaps on a Thursday afternoon and say, “Good things can and are happening.”, and that this is something that is a long neglected part of Wellington. It will actually join up—and, again, it will benefit many around Wellington. For those who know Wellington, Red Rocks right through to Pencarrow there’ll be a cycleway, and this will complete that.

So again, as we found through COVID, look after the people, the health of the people, and everything else will follow. This is, again, something that at a time in Wellington is looking—we’ve heard those talking about “Let’s get Wellington moving”—a bit of negativity. This is something that is going to be very positive, something that certainly those in my electorate, those young people particularly who like to catch a fish, like to get out of the electorate, get down there and enjoy that magnificent Wellington Harbour will now have the opportunity to do so.

So I’d just like, in the time left to me, just to reflect, on the joy of a Thursday afternoon, on behalf of the great Ōhāriu electorate, that one thing that will result from this will be access to our waterfront at a time when the world is rediscovering its water. My fine Ōhāriu electorate is now joining that trend. We’re going to be able to discover our water and enjoy that magnificent piece of water out there—Whanganui-a-Tara / Wellington Harbour. So thank you for this opportunity to speak on behalf of my electorate here, Mr Speaker.

Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE (National): Thank you, Mr Speaker. Could I begin by wishing the member for Taieri all the best for solving the ambulance issue in South Otago, and I trust that she will join me in keeping the Government’s feet to the flames on the issue that I want to talk about. Four years ago next month, the previous Government approved the indicative business plan for the complete rebuild of Dunedin Hospital. The options included renovating what was already there; we decided not do that, the best thing to do was to completely rebuild it. Our preference was for it to be in the centre of the city and near the University of Otago. I have to say that that decision was made under some pretty fierce pressure from locals led by Labour Party members like David Benson-Pope and the local MPs, David Clark and Clare Curran.

Now, David Clark petitioned this House to get the previous Government to commence Dunedin Hospital by the time of the 2017 general election. I’m paraphrasing but I recall Ms Leary’s predecessor, Clare Curran, saying, “Well, you know what? We have built quite a few hospitals in New Zealand. We know what we’re doing. We should just get on with it.” Well, four years later, the detailed business case still has not been approved by Cabinet. Four long years, and the good people of the South are still waiting to know when their hospital build is going to commence.

Six weeks before the last election, in 2020, Cabinet did an extraordinary thing. It approved the detailed business case for Dunedin Hospital in principle. Now, as far as I can tell, that is unprecedented, because a detailed business case in principle is called an indicative business case, and that had been approved four years earlier—three and a half years earlier at that point. I’m pretty sure that announcement was a way of inoculating the people of the South, keeping them quiet during the election campaign, and giving the impression that more progress was being made on Dunedin Hospital than what was actually being made. My sources are telling me that there is a huge battle going on in the background between Treasury, the Ministry of Health, and probably Cabinet on the scope, size, and cost of the rebuild of Dunedin Hospital.

We had public meetings, about 18 months ago, where the partnership chair for the rebuild, the Hon Pete Hodgson, talked about the number of beds in the hospital being more than we currently had, but not as much as what would be required if we simply extrapolated our population growth and ageing.

Well, I received some information from the Minister of Health yesterday, which talks about the proposed number of beds for the complete rebuild, and it makes for startling reading. Now, firstly, there are more intensive care and emergency department beds, and that will remove a bottleneck at the entry to the system, but the bottle itself isn’t getting bigger. There are very few extra beds from what we currently have. And I know from experience that what we currently have is fewer than what we used to have. And in respect of the children’s ward, the paediatric ward, it is going to be smaller, not bigger. None of this has been revealed to the people of the South, and I think they need to know that the hospital build is not going to be materially larger than what we need, and we already have significant capacity constraints in servicing the needs of the people from the Waitaki south.

Frankly, I would have thought that in the face of that, the local MPs would have been banging on the door of the Minister of Health. Well, I now know, thanks to what Mr Little has told me, that Dr Clark, Ingrid Leary, Rachel Brooking, and Invercargill-based MP Liz Craig have not made a single approach to Andrew Little since he became Minister of Health.

Hon Member: Not one.

Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE: Not one. No meetings, no emails, no letters, and no correspondence into the Minister’s office about this very important issue. Now, the Minister himself did spend a day on 11 December—

Ingrid Leary: Point of order, Mr Speaker. I have made submissions on the Dunedin Hospital; verbal submissions to the Minister of Health.

SPEAKER: Order! Order! The member will resume her seat. That is not quite a point of order. I know the member is a new member, but that is the sort of thing which could possibly be taken up in the debate or by way of a personal explanation. She has, I think, effectively, done that, albeit in an inappropriate way.

Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE: Thank you, Mr Speaker. I look forward to Ingrid Leary and her Labour Party colleagues joining me in keeping this Government’s feet to the flames and finding out when, how big, and how much Dunedin Hospital is going to be rebuilt by. Because I know that if this had been a National Government that had dragged the chain for three and a half years, the good people of the South would be being led by those Labour MPs into marching in the streets. That is exactly what they should be doing now and making sure that the Government does the right thing.

TERISA NGOBI (Labour—Ōtaki): Thank you, Mr Speaker. It is a real privilege and honour to take a call and be able to talanoa, talk about, the beautiful and mighty Ōtaki electorate, and while it’s really hard to highlight just one positive thing—because that’s what we do in the Ōtaki electorate; we only do positive—there are so many things. We’ve got the Paraparaumu Kaibosh, which makes sure that food waste doesn’t go into landfill. We’ve got the Waikanae River, which is an iwi-led initiative thanks to the $8.5 million of the Jobs for Nature fund. We’ve got the Ōtaki Māoriland Film Festival, which is indigenous films and is happening right now, up until 28 March. So, if you haven’t been along, please come along and have a look at one of those films in Ōtaki. And then, of course, there is the shovel-ready funding that allowed for the first phase of the Foxton River Loop Reserve. But today, Mr Speaker, I would like to talk to you and the House about the Free Tongan Church upgrade on Bruce Road in Levin.

The Free Tongan Church was one of three churches that received—altogether it was $1.5 million of the $9.5 million that the Minister for Pacific Peoples, the Hon Aupito William Sio, closely and very strongly supported by the Minister of Finance, the Hon Grant Robertson, initiated for 27 churches, and our Ōtaki electorate, in Levin, got three churches done from that.

Anahila Kanongata’a-Suisuiki: Malo Ōtaki.

TERISA NGOBI: Malo Ōtaki, yes. And those other churches, just to name them, were EFKS and also Samoan Methodist Church. So the Free Tongan Church received $461,000 of that, which they are really grateful for.

I had the opportunity to go there on Monday with some of my parliamentary colleagues just to see what this church looked like to now. I’ve been really honoured and privileged to also know Saane Tovo, who, along with her recently deceased husband, Laukau Pouli Tovo—I hope that pronunciation is right—over some 40 years ago founded the Free Tongan Church in Levin. I had seen what it looked like previously, about three or four years ago, and it was run down and you’d need a few jackets to go in there. It was pretty, pretty poorly. We walked in to have a look, and the builders stopped and allowed us in—so it’s not quite finished—but I can’t put into words the emotion and mauri that you felt as soon as you walked in with that Tongan community, Saane Tovo and the rest of the congregation there. It was beautiful. It was emotional, and I can’t, like I said, put it into words.

There were kids running around so excited—and, again, the church is not even finished. They were so excited that they were running around hugging everybody. They even hugged me and my parliamentary colleagues. They don’t even know us but they were super-excited about being able to go into a really warm, dry church. Also there was a moment when I saw Saane hugging—if I get that name right—another leader in that area. There was just a moment where we all saw them come together and they hugged and they cried, and I can tell you there was not a dry eye in that church. Even the builders were there crying. It was absolutely beautiful.

So I just wanted to also say that this isn’t about investing in a church or a building. This is more than that for that Tongan community. This is more than that for Saane Tovo and the Tongan community of that congregation. This is about having a warm, dry space for them to come together not just to worship but to educate their children, to make sure that their language stays alive, to make sure their traditions stay alive, to invite other people that are non-Tongan in as well to educate them around the Tongan community. So that $461,000 that was invested was not just invested into a building; it was invested into a community—it was invested into a community outside of the cities, a community that’s regional, that doesn’t ask for a lot but are so grateful for that little bit that they got. So, again, thank you to the Ministers but to this Government for looking outside and making sure all diverse communities are included and accounted and supported. Mālō ‘aupito.

CHLÖE SWARBRICK (Green—Auckland Central): E te Māngai, tēnā koe, tēnā koutou e te Whare. I’ve had the absolute privilege since this past election to represent my home of Auckland Central, and in this debate today, in my contribution, I want to discuss a really pertinent issue. People probably know that Auckland Central contains the city centre, the city. We’re reaching out from Herne Bay across Ponsonby, we go all the way back up to Newton and Eden Terrace, stretching across Grafton, bordering on Parnell, close to my friends here in the ACT Party. But we also extend across the Waitematā, across to Waiheke and Aotea / Great Barrier, and a number of other amazing islands therein.

The thing that connects all of Auckland Central is that Waitematā, and I’m sure you’re probably aware that, over the past few months, the Waitematā has played host to a big old boat race. Now, that big old boat race is something that has seen the engagement of the team of 5 million. It’s seen an immense amount of skill on display with Peter Burling and the rest of Team New Zealand. We’ve seen New Zealanders engaged by virtue of the investments of New Zealand On Air and obviously the Government making sure that this is free to air. We’ve seen coordination from local and central Government to ensure that infrastructure was there for folks to be able to engage. And, if I may make the point, this big old boat race managed to engage people across demographics, even folks like a grizzled Greenpeace activist, who took me out on to Tīkapa Moana to join a flotilla for Mauri o te Moana, who was telling me all about the wonders of the technological advancement that that investment in the America’s Cup had provided.

Now when it comes to the Waitematā, we saw what happens above the waves. We saw how beautiful it is across the Hauraki. But what we did not see on that televised, beautiful, and obviously incredibly successful race, was what happens below the waves, where we are seeing ecological collapse. I want to draw a parallel between what led to the success of Team New Zealand, because I’m often thinking about the quote, “Luck is what happens when preparation meets circumstance.” In a situation like that race, it took all of that preparation, from the team, from Aucklanders, from the rest of New Zealand, from Auckland Council, from ATEED—now Auckland Unlimited—and all of that investment to create that preparation. But the circumstances could have changed with something as literal as the wind deciding to blow in a different direction. We could apply that same methodology of preparation being necessary to achieve success, to the ecosystem below those waves in Tīkapa Moana. We’ve had the Hauraki Gulf Marine Park Act for over 20 years in this country, and in the time that we have had the Hauraki Gulf Marine Park Act in place, we have seen only 0.3 percent of the Hauraki Gulf be protected. International experts—and domestic experts and researchers as well—alongside those engaged in mātauranga Māori tell us that we need to protect at least 30 percent of that national taonga if we want to be climate resilient, but if we also want to make sure that that biodiversity is not lost for ever.

In line with other contributions from, particularly, the Government side of the House, I don’t want to paint a picture that it’s all doom and gloom, because there is, in fact, some immense leadership that is under way from those in the community. We have, for example, off the coast of Aotea some pretty nasty stuff happening in the form of dumping. But we’ve seen local mana whenua—particularly organised by Kelly Klink, who is a formidable force of a wahine toa—standing up to take Auckland Council and Ports of Auckland through the legal system. We’ve also seen Ngāti Paoa issue a rāhui for one kilometre off of Waiheke Island to protect four taonga species, four signal species, for the health of Tīkapa Moana. And what we have in all of this is a recipe to unstick the process that has seen us issue report after report after report and watch decline. That is the key to success in mātauranga Māori. That is the key to success in planning and executing it.

SPEAKER: Simon Court—a very short call.

SIMON COURT (ACT): Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. I’m here today to talk about water quality issues in Te Wai o Pareira / Henderson Creek in my home suburb of Te Atatū, my electorate of Te Atatū. This is an awa which is heavily used by recreational organisations: Multisport, Waka Ama, Waitematā rowing, the Kenley Water Ski Club, Sea Scouts, and, just downstream, the Taikata Sailing Club. What I’m asking for is urgent action from Auckland Council to monitor the water and measure the water quality right now, to put that data on their Auckland Council Safeswim website, and I’m also asking Watercare, the council-controlled organisation that has responsibility for managing waste-water networks, to carry out urgent improvements to the waste-water network to fix these regular overflows from their network that make recreational use extremely dangerous for those users. There are very large diameter pipes that collect waste water on the transmission network from Upper Harbour and from other parts of West Auckland, and they all end up at a low point right by these clubs and the boat ramp at Taipari Strand. There are regular waste-water overflows. There are landfill discharges—

SPEAKER: Order! The time for this debate has expired.

Bills

Local Government (Rating of Whenua Māori) Amendment Bill

Third Reading

Hon WILLIE JACKSON (Minister for Māori Development) on behalf of the Minister of Local Government: I move the local government rating of whenua amendment bill now be read a third time.

SPEAKER: All right. That’s not quite what the drill sheet that I have says.

Hon WILLIE JACKSON: Apologies, Mr Speaker. I present a legislative statement on the Local Government (Rating of Whenua Māori) Amendment Bill.

SPEAKER: That legislative statement is published under the authority of the House and can be found on the Parliament website.

Hon WILLIE JACKSON: I move, That the Local Government (Rating of Whenua Māori) Amendment Bill be now read a third time.

Tuatahi e tika ana ki te poroporoaki ki te wahine toa a Annie Aranui. Nō reira moe mai rā e te māreikura. Piki atu i te ara poutama ki waenganui i ō tīpūna okioki ai. Nō reira e te tuahine ahakoa kua haere koe, ka noho tētahi wāhi ōu ki waenganui i a mātou. Nō reira e te tuatahi moe mai, moe mai, moe mai rā.

[Firstly, it is only correct that I farewell a strong woman, Annie Aranui. Rest in peace, oh noble woman. Ascend the stairway to heaven and rest amongst your ancestors. Thus, oh lady, leave us with the knowledge that a part of you will remain amongst us. So, you pioneer, rest, rest, rest in peace.]

I pay tribute, first of all, to a lady who died earlier in the week, Annie Aranui, a huge supporter of this kaupapa and one of our regional commissioners for the Ministry of Social Development. She has played a part in advancing the kaupapa in terms of Māori in Kahungunu, particularly with this type of legislation, and supporting young Māori. Also today I speak on behalf of the local body Minister, Nanaia Mahuta, who has got business but asked me to support, and tautoko, and I’m happy to do that.

I was shocked and surprised to find out that the law relating to rating Māori land is largely unchanged since 1924, apart from the prohibition on selling Māori land for unpaid rates, which was passed in 1968. Nothing has changed in almost 100 years, so change is long overdue. So I’m proud that as a Government we’ve been able to remedy the situation and bring the rating law for Māori back into the 21st century.

The bill sits in the wider context that this Government is enabling Māori land owners to develop and benefit from their land, where they wish to do so. I’ve been involved myself in the ture whenua, and we have deliberately tried to open up access for Māori who have been at times crippled with all the different landowners in terms of Māori land. So the opening up, in terms of ture whenua, has been an integral part of the work that we are doing as Māori Ministers and in terms of opening up whenua. We’ve previously legislated to improve the operation of the Māori Land Court, and this has certainly helped in terms of our Māori communities.

The bill is also very important in terms of local authorities. We are delighted that no local authorities have submitted against the bill. While, nationally, we’ve been on a long journey to improve Māori Crown relations, local authorities are also walking their journey with iwi and hapū, as we come together. This bill removes some of the obstacles so that we can enjoy that journey in terms of Māori and local authorities working together.

For too long, rates have framed Māori land as a problem for local authorities rather than an opportunity, and for too long, Māori attitudes to their local authority have been framed by pressures to pay rates on land, from which they derive no economic benefit. This has resulted in Māori keeping their distance from local authorities rather than engaging with local authorities to see what can be achieved in partnership with each other.

Now, this bill removes a loophole which allows Māori land that was arbitrarily reclassified as general land in the late 1960s from being sold by local authority - abandoned land or rating sales. While the number of such sales are small, they continue to this day, and it’s not acceptable in this era for this practice to continue. It also gives authority for chief executives to write off rates that in their opinion—his or her opinion—cannot reasonably be recovered. The Commissioner of Inland Revenue has long had this power in respect of Crown taxes, but for some reason, no similar power has been available in respect of rates. The lack of this power has led to the level of rates arrears on Māori land being substantially distorted in public reports. An original debt of $1,000 becomes $3,500 before it is statute barred for collection, under the rating Act, at which point local authorities then write the debt off.

Public reports of the level of rates outstanding on Māori land give quite a false impression of the amount of rates unpaid, because the majority of the outstanding amount is penalties, not the rates that have been originally assessed. Sensible use of this power by local authority chief executives can do much in terms of improving the relationships between Māori and authorities. We’re looking forward to seeing how those relationships pan out, because there has been a level of resentment from Māori in this area, who have felt prejudiced by the different authorities. But we think that this bill opens up the opportunity for those relationships to become a lot healthier.

The bill makes unused Māori land non-rateable. Much Māori land is inaccessible, being entirely landlocked, as I said earlier, with no legal access at all, or with access either by sea only or by paper roads, that provide no practical access. So it’s almost impossible for the owners of these properties to obtain any benefit from local authority services, and, of course, the resentment becomes major within Māori communities. For me, I think it’s a great thing because we’re going to see regional development at a different scale. We’re going to see iwi development, and it complements this strategy that we’re trying to roll through.

Hon Simon Bridges: That’s optimistic.

Hon WILLIE JACKSON: I know that’s hard for Mr Bridges to contemplate, having been exited from his iwi. They are, effectively, providing conservation estate to the nation; making this land non-rateable is the only fair thing to do.

Hon Simon Bridges: They’ve been telling me what you’ve been saying.

Hon WILLIE JACKSON: The rates rebates scheme was designed in the 1970s, Mr Bridges, to provide financial assistance to low-income homeowners—you know, those homeowners that you forgot about. Given that the Crown Māori relationship at the time, it’s not surprising that it made no provision for the communal ownership of Māori land and the possibility of multiple homes being built on one block of Māori land. That was the sad part—that there was no recognition of the Māori way of living at the time. This has meant many homeowners on Māori land are not able to access this assistance. However, it’s not acceptable in this day and age that low-income homeowners on Māori land should be disadvantaged in accessing this entitlement.

In 2018, the House recognised the special circumstance of retirement village residents when it passed the Rates Rebate (Retirement Village Residents) Amendment Bill. And it’s appropriate that having recognised the special circumstances of retirement village residents, this House also recognises the circumstances regarding the plight with regards to homeowners on Māori land.

Local authorities and Māori should stand side by side. This has always been our hope as a Māori caucus and as a Labour Party—that we will have authorities standing side by side, and this type of legislation adds to the legislation like the Māori wards legislation, in bringing a more democratic and a more fair society and councils that will operate for everyone.

I can think of no people who have greater interest in the success of local authorities than our people who hold mana whenua over the land and the local authorities in the district. They’re the only people that are not able to up sticks and go elsewhere if they don’t like what is happening in their community, so they’re part and parcel, as mana whenua, of that rohe. So this really gives them this opportunity.

The bill implements a number of pragmatic measures to resolve rating issues amongst Māori, which I’m sure everyone in the House would resolve—rating issues relating to whenua Māori. But it also tries to clear impediments to the relationship—and this is particularly important—between local authorities and Māori. In the long run, that may be its most important contribution to our future.

So I’m glad as a Minister, as part of a Māori caucus, that this sort of kaupapa has come through. I want to thank, on behalf of the Minister, the Māori caucus and, in fact, all Ministers, our Government, those who have contributed to the preparation and passage of this bill. We look forward to local authorities now working with Māori to successfully implement the bill for the benefit not just of Māori but of all our communities—of landowners, of councils, Kiwis everywhere. It’s something that we are so pleased to tautoko, and support, and I thank you for this opportunity and I commend this bill to the House. Kia ora koutou.

SPEAKER: The question is that the motion be agreed to.

CHRISTOPHER LUXON (National—Botany): Mr Speaker, thank you for the opportunity to talk on the Local Government (Rating of Whenua Māori) Amendment Bill. I also just want to acknowledge Minister Mahuta for the way in which she did engage at the committee of the whole House stage and answered a lot of questions, and we had a good engagement as we went through that, and I really did appreciate that.

National fundamentally opposes this bill, and the reason for it is fairly straightforward. There’s some merit in the bill when you actually go through the detail of it, but, frankly, when you get into it, not much. And that’s what I really want to talk a bit about today, because there’s not a lot of added value or real incremental benefit to what we’re doing here over what can already be done. And I think it is a little bit about how more comprehensively could we solve the problem of productivity of land—not just Māori but also general land across the whole country. And I do want to unpack that and put on record a little bit why we’re opposing this bill. When you boil it down, there’s sort of two big component parts to it. One is, really, how do we get more utilisation, occupation, and also development of Māori land? And the second part is how do we adjust some rating legislation that affects Māori land specifically?

If I just take the first one, and we talk about Māori land and productivity, that’s actually a goal that we would support. But in the National Party, we support improving productivity across the whole of the country. We know that that’s a big problem for us. We know that productivity is the single biggest thing that we can do to improve our collective standard of living. And, as a result, we’re very supportive of that. And so anything that improves Māori land benefits and productivity and utilisation is good, but, equally, so is what can improve general land use as well. And I think that’s the fundamental question we still don’t understand after engaging with the Minister—is, fundamentally, why does this just look through a Māori-only lens if it could be looked at through a local government or a national lens? Why wouldn’t we want to talk about the impacts that sit with general landowners as well? We want, fundamentally, all unproductive land to be available, to be utilised, and to be productive—it’s important for everybody. It’s not just Māori that have situations of unproductive land, who own land collectively, and who could benefit from rates remission.

There are farmers across the country—we talked about it in the second reading and in the committee stage as well—who are fundamentally invested in indigenous biodiversity, they’ve taken waterways land, done riparian planting, there’s lots of general land use for trees, there’s large families with multiple dwellings on farms as well, and so the question, fundamentally, is why aren’t the benefits and incentives that we’re talking about in this bill being extended to everybody across this country? And I just still don’t fundamentally understand why the Government comes at it through a much narrower lens of just looking at this through Māori land, rather than saying, actually, there’s an opportunity to actually solve a problem across the whole of the country, so why don’t we go do that? Why don’t we fundamentally look at doing something bigger, bolder, and braver as a consequence? So we don’t, fundamentally, I guess, understand why we can’t move this across to all general land-owners. Why does it have to be specific to Māori land only?

Second point is that when you look at the ratings legislative changes, a lot of it fundamentally can be done today. There are some good minor little tweaks in here around sort of land block origins—certainly what the Minister just referenced around the sale of Māori land or inadvertent sale of Māori land to general land through the 1960s. There’s rates remission at the beginning of a development and land being excluded if it’s in an emissions trading scheme. But the two sort of major components are fundamentally the aggregation of multiple blocks into a single block so that there is lower uniform charges that can be applied to that land, and the second piece to link to that is also the separation of a block into dwellings so that rates rebates can be applied for, and that’s a good thing, because a lot of people aren’t really accessing the rates rebates programmes across the country.

And the other piece is that a CEO in a local council can actually write off those rates arrears. And they’re the two big bits. But when you look into it, it turns out that the aggregation and the separation of blocks of land, the adjustment of uniform rates, and also the write-offs can all be done under existing legislation as it exists today. And there are good examples of councils and mayors that are doing it today. We had Lawrence Yule talk about it in the first reading. He says, “I’ve been a mayor where I’ve remitted those rates, so I know it can be done. I’ve been a mayor when we have put the uniform charges together on several properties, so the rates per property have been reduced. It can be done.” And likewise, there was a quote from Maungakiekie-Tāmaki Ward in Auckland, who just sort of said, “Nearly all the changes proposed are already delivered by Auckland Council through its rating policy and Māori land rates remission and postponement policy.” And so that’s the kind of question that we’ve got as the second question: what is the fundamental added value or incremental benefit that we’re getting from this piece of legislation? So that’s kind of important, because what’s the point of going through all this process if, at the end of it, we’re delivering very little marginal benefit to actually get the goal that we’re trying to create, which is greater productivity?

The third thing I sort of wanted to say is that we’re essentially coming at it through a very, very narrow lens. We’re looking at it just through the lens of rates write-offs and, fundamentally, aggregation or separation of blocks of land. Actually, when you dial it back and say, again, what’s the problem that we’re trying to fundamentally solve, which is about utilisation and productivity, you get back to root cause and you discover that there are a lot more legislative constraints and impediments that are getting in the way of that land being unlocked and unblocked.

And it was interesting, when you go back through it—there’s real issues—and you talk to a whole bunch of stakeholders about it. There are things like the definitions and meanings of owner and descent relationships, issues around collective ownership in whānau trusts, issues around sale, gift exchange, and mortgage of individual freehold interests within landownership and the authorities who do the governance arrangements and the court jurisdictions that exist. These are also things that are contributing to that land fundamentally not being utilised as it should. Different governance bodies and the administration of estates, dispute resolutions, Māori Land Court, Māori Appellate Court—there’s a whole bunch of other issues that could be addressed that are constraining the ability of land. It’s not just in rates remission that’s the only thing that’s causing that land not to be used to be productive. And I guess our thinking is why wouldn’t you want to come back and dial it a step back and actually go back and do a repeal and a replace of Te Ture Whenua Maori Act to deal comprehensively with that fuller set of legislative constraints and impediments that are sitting there?

And I guess the final point for us is actually that we had a good exchange with the Minister about this, but essentially, there was no understanding or definition or work that had been done on what are the financial costs in an aggregate sense for the councils through this rates remission process. And that’s important, because you sort of want to understand how much potential costs can be transferred from one set of ratepayers to another, because those costs are fixed in a council set-up and they have to be paid for by somebody, and they get paid for by other ratepayers. So, while excluding and remitting rates from one group, we end up transferring that cost through to others. And there was no real comprehensive thinking around that or decent answers that we seemed to get.

And I think, most worrying of all, we go through this whole process, introduce a very incremental bill that does very little, that’s not much more than existing legislation, and there is no measures or targets of what we’re shooting for as success, and there’s no clarity on how we’re actually going to measure whether this has been successful or not. And we had that question in conversation with the Minister, and there was really no answer for us there.

So, fundamentally, we look at it and you go, yep, it looked promising as a set of goals, but, actually, there’s very little incremental benefit here that we are looking at. And really, when you look at it, we’re fundamentally unclear as to why can’t we extend the provisions and the benefits and the incentives here that we’re proposing for Māori land across general landowners, and why wouldn’t we want to do that? I think the second big thing, as we talked about, is the ratings that can be done today. So what’s the point of going through all of this stuff for a piece of incremental, very little added value legislation, when, if you were really bold, we could do something quite fundamental to remove all that legislative impediment and constraints that are actually sitting there. And again, on the cost side: why wasn’t there any decision or any conversation about the costs? There was nothing in any of the regulatory impact statement, the departmental statements, or Cabinet papers—there was no reference to cost, fundamentally, and there was no understanding of how that cost burden will be shifted between people.

So, really, I mean, it seemed promising. We are very supportive of improving productivity in this party, but when we look at this bill on balance, it doesn’t do anything over existing legislation. We know that councils and other mayors are doing it across the country. They can make it work—the existing legislation—to unlock those benefits. Why wouldn’t we expand the brief and the remit of what we’re doing here? So we continue to oppose this bill. Thank you very much.

TĀMATI COFFEY (Labour): Thank you, Madam Speaker. This is the third reading of a bill which has taken a long time to find passage through this House. Can I just refer to some things that the previous speaker, Chris Luxon, said, which is that there are some things in this bill which aren’t as—there’s this narrative coming from the other side that, actually, councils already have this ability to be able to write off arrears, and for that, I just want to point out to those people that are listening, that, actually, that is done in an incredibly haphazard way all around the country.

Some councils are incredibly on to it. They understand that, actually, this is a burdensome problem for Māori land owners, and they understand how big rates can get on land, and, actually, that there is no relief in sight—it can be quite problematic, and, actually, a stumbling block to progress.

So while some councils—and they should be congratulated for doing that—have absolutely picked that up and run with it, there are some councils that don’t do a very good job of it at all, and that is part of the reason why we’re even standing here in this Parliament today debating this particular piece of legislation.

Can I just take a moment also to talk about the importance of whenua Māori when we look back on the history, on the encyclopaedia of Aotearoa New Zealand, from the start to now. Actually, whenua Māori has gone through a very turbulent time: much land has been stolen, much land has been lost, and what that means for Māori land owners is that the remaining bits of land that we have left are incredibly special; they are a taonga and they connect us to our ancestors that have passed. So I want to acknowledge that, and probably also put it on the record that it’s for that reason that we feel so passionate about this.

The ratings of Māori land have been used, actually, by this House, by our Government, to smoothly transfer land from Māori hands into other hands. Actually, that’s a problem, and for that reason, that’s why we are so passionate about this. We want to see this go through, and we want to be able to unlock whenua Māori all across the country.

There is a saying that we have in Māori: Nā te whenua, nā te wahine, ka mate te tangata. It means that it is because of women and it is because of land that men die. And never was a truer word spoken: if we look back on the New Zealand Land Wars, a lot of that was because of the passion that Māori have for their whenua—because of land, because of women, men die. There should be an addition to that, and I would propose that it should say, “Because of burdensome rates, Māori lose their land.”, and that’s exactly what we’ve witnessed over successive Governments here in Aotearoa; our history is littered with examples of this. In the past, the Government has set the rules, as I’ve said, which have smoothly facilitated the transfer of Māori land. Therefore, it’s only right that this Government, in this day and age, here in 2020, reverse some of those past wrongs.

What we’re going to do is we’re going to allow chief executives to be able to write off rates arrears and free up Māori land owners to better utilise their land. And I did hear it from the other side when the member was talking about “Why can’t we just do this for everybody?” And that’s a fair point: why can’t we just do it for everybody? This particular bill wasn’t brought in specifically for the everybodys; this was brought in in the previous term by the Minister for Māori Development, and, actually—

Hon Simon Bridges: Oh, so it’s race-based? It’s race-based law?

TĀMATI COFFEY: Well, it is; it is. And anybody that thinks that, actually, we shouldn’t be having something like this is ignorant of that history of our country, and should probably pop along to a local school next year when we roll out history in schools, to try and learn about some of the history of this country.

Can I talk about, since the member for Tauranga is speaking so loudly—let’s talk about what life is like back in the Bay of Plenty. Now, we have approximately 240,000 hectares of Māori land; it’s the highest proportion in Aotearoa New Zealand. In Rotorua, 18.9 percent of our whenua is Māori land; in Tauranga, 11.8 percent; in Whakatāne, 16 percent; and in Ōpōtiki, 10 percent. Of approximately 5,378 Māori land blocks, more than half of those land blocks are ungoverned. There is no governance structure over the top of them. Therefore, it makes the land blocks underutilised and underdeveloped. This bill will help to unlock the land by removing the shackles of rates.

I support this bill because I support it as part of the broader initiatives that we are moving through this House, in terms of the initiatives to support Māori land owners to be able to use, develop, live on their land, as well—initiatives like the ones that were announced earlier this week—to be able to assist Māori land owners with things like services, getting infrastructure, getting water, getting roads to our land blocks, so that, actually, Māori can be part of this conversation.

As we talk about a housing crisis here in New Zealand, actually, I’ll tell you where there is lots of land: Māori land. But, unfortunately, a lot of that land is burdened with rates, and this bill will look to turn that around. So for that reason, knowing that this is part of a broader suite of reforms that our Government is passionate about putting through, I commend this bill to the House. Kia ora.

Hon SIMON BRIDGES (National—Tauranga): I spoke at the second reading and I said all that I wanted to say on this bill, and some more, frankly. I used every second of those 10 minutes. So I don’t intend, necessarily—unless the other side starts baiting me for more—to use the full 10 minutes. I do, though, want to make three points.

The first one is really about what’s in the bill, to the extent that there is much in it, because I agree with Christopher Luxon: there’s really not much substance in this bill. I was thinking about it. It’s like one of those sandwiches in the tuck shops, where they push all the meat to the front, but you get to about the second half of the sandwich and there’s nothing in it, right? I mean, it’s just Vogel’s with a little bit of margarine and nothing—it’s a slogan. It’s window dressing. It’s the chance for people like Tāmati Coffey to get up and pretend that he’s doing something in the Bay of Plenty, when the reality just isn’t that.

Tāmati Coffey: You’re not doing anything. What are you doing?

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: Well, it’s a little bit hard in Opposition, but let’s stick with this.

So there’s not much substance to this bill. It is in relation to non-rateable Māori land and the rates remission in it. But, you know, again, that lack of meat in the sandwich, when, again, it’s been pointed out—the likes of Lawrence Yule, a member of Parliament in the last Parliament—you could already do it all. You could already do it all. So that’s really just the first point here. This is a bill, for what it’s worth, that’s a slogan, that’s a front, but, actually, behind it, you could already do it all. There’s not a lot here.

Except that I will acknowledge the extent that the Tāmati Coffeys of it—because I presume, you know, in speaking, he’s seeking, as is Willie Jackson, as is every other member of the Government who speaks to this bill, to try and say it does do something; there really is an engine in this car to get it moving. What it does do, in truth, is provide for different treatment between a Māori land owner and another landowner in precisely the same circumstances. Again, colleagues on this side have made the point that, actually, it’s not just Māori land owners that have underutilised, underproductive land with ownership issues and governance problems and all the things that are the purported reason why we’re giving—I’m sorry to say it—special treatment to one category and not the other: Māori land owners over all other landowners. They’re not going to today, to me, because they’re probably getting ready to go home in 45 minutes, but so often on the other side of the House, what we hear when we say that sort of thing is, “Well, that’s racist. That’s dog-whistle politics.”—all of these things. No, it’s not. It’s actually just pointing out that in this bill—the extent that it does anything new is it’s special, differential treatment for one group over others in exactly the same circumstances, and I don’t like that.

Tāmati Coffey made a couple of telling points—I’ll come back to the other one, but he made one very interesting point, and it’s a point worth acknowledging. He ran through the numbers of Māori land proportionate to other land in the Bay of Plenty, and the one I jotted down, in Tauranga, the area, really, that Todd Muller and I both represent, 12 percent of land—I think it’s 11.8—is Māori land. I accept his point. That’s a lot of land that’s Māori land in Tauranga. Yep, we all agree so far. But here’s the thing that happens as a result of this bill, if this bill does any real work and is worth anything. Here’s what’ll happen: the Māori land owners no longer pay rates, and so the kiwifruit orchard next door ends up having to pay significantly higher rates. By the way, I know that’s the process they’re starting to go through at the Bay of Plenty Regional Council as they consider some of these issues. And sorry—call me old-fashioned; call me racist, even, if you want to; call me a dog whistler—that’s not right. So I kind of don’t reckon this bill actually fixes much. To the extent it does, though—I accept that this side’s going to go out there and trumpet how amazing it is—actually, it’s wrong.

That’s the other point that I wanted to make, and that’s that it doesn’t do the hard mahi it should. It doesn’t actually—it’s trite, isn’t it, but it’s the whole thing around “Give someone a fish; feed them for a day. Show them how to fish; do it for a lifetime”. This is kind of “give a fish”. Yeah, we’ll get rid of your rates, but, actually they’re not the driving—that’s not going to make land productive, when there’s ownership and governance and complicated issues. Actually, what’s required for that, to feed the village, to get them fishing over time, is more serious, considered, structural Te Ture Whenua Māori land law reform. The reality of that, the tragedy of today, this bill that I accept the Parliament’s going to pass because Labour alone has the numbers, is the missed opportunity of not doing what should be done.

What should be done is pick up the bill that I think has been in Chris Finlayson’s, then Te Ururoa Flavell’s, name, and now, in fact, is in the cake tin ballot in the name of Gerry Brownlee, Te Ture Whenua Māori Bill, land reform bill, and pass that. Because that’s not just pushing the meat to the front of the sandwich. That’s not just mucking around and doing some of the easy stuff so that for a little while, Tāmati Coffey’s—well, he doesn’t have any constituents, but those with constituents—Rawiri Waititi’s constituents feel good for a little while. Actually, we could do some stuff that made them more productive, more efficient. Utilise their land. Grow kiwifruit, do honey.

Todd Muller: That’s right.

Hon SIMON BRIDGES: Frankly, have—I don’t know about in Tauranga, Mr Muller, but—space ships, or rockets, I should say, like they do in Māhia, going up—whatever they want, but which at the moment can’t be done because the law is arcane and, actually, I accept, in many ways, through its function, oppressive.

Tāmati Coffey said one other thing. He said that, well, you know, effectively, this Parliament—I think was the claim; colonisation back at—what was it now? My maths isn’t very good. Let’s go 1860s, 1870s. Well, it took the land, and that was one injustice, so let’s, kind of, write that over, tip the seesaw this time, and make everything right. Well, you know, Tāmati Coffey, that’s kind of not the way to go. That’s, I think, very reductive thinking, regressive thinking, that ends up, in trying to fix things up, creating other injustices, a sense of unfairness amongst other New Zealanders who end up paying more rates, who end up seeing the special treatment that certain people, Māori land holders who know how to work the system, do better than others. Actually, what should happen, what I hope one day will happen, is we do real Māori land reform that actually really delivers productive, efficient landholdings around New Zealand.

ARENA WILLIAMS (Labour—Manurewa): Tēnā koe e te Māngai o te Whare. Thank you for this opportunity to speak on a bill which would bring more Māori land owners to the table to be able to realise the potential of their land and not be hindered by substantive, historic ratings bills which were racked up over a long time and have held them back from coming to the table to create governance entities which would manage and own their land and allow those landowners to move forward and to create things on it for the benefit of themselves and further generations.

I have three points that I want to talk about. The first is about reducing rating barriers for the owners of Māori land who want to use and develop their land as being something which actually allows councils to collect more rates in the future, because as it stands currently, when Māori landowners aren’t able to come to the table and create these governance entities because of historic rating bills, they don’t ever use land, and there’s nothing for councils to be able to collect rates from. The second point I want to talk a little bit more about is why this is just Māori land—and Māori land, for the purposes of this discussion, is that legal meaning of Māori land and general land, which are two very different creatures in our system of tenure. The third is about whether councils can do this already, and that’s in reply to some of the contributions of the members opposite that this bill does not go far enough to addressing some of the concerns.

But first, in the face of criticism from the opposite members about this bill being haphazard and not going far enough, I want to acknowledge the contributions of two groups of people who have spent 30, 40 years advocating in this space for changes to Māori land and changes to allow local government to rate Māori land more effectively. The first is Kenneth Palmer. Professor Palmer retired in 2015 after 46 years as a barrister, academic, and writer. His books, Local Government Law in New Zealand, Environmental and Resource Management Law, and Local Authorities Law in New Zealand, have become the key texts for practitioners in local government in their respective fields. His work is respected at all universities in New Zealand, is regularly quoted by the bench in the Environment Court and High Court and the Court of Appeal in these matters. He is our leading light in this field, and he is someone who has dedicated significant time as a barrister and a volunteer in advocating for a more fair system of rating Māori land.

It’s that honesty and integrity and selfless advocacy that the bench have recognised him for in 2015 when he retired, and they acknowledged his work when he took the case on behalf of the Mangatū Incorporation in Tūranga, which succeeded in the High Court and the Court of Appeal. That case concerned the unfair rating of Māori land under the control of the Mangatū Incorporation, and from those cases, the set of Mangatū principles for fair valuation were created.

The point here is that through volunteer advocacy in the work of lawyers who are taking a public interest case, we relied on our court systems to create principles that local government could rely on to fairly evaluate the value of Māori land for rating systems. Back then, it was groundbreaking that Mr Palmer took the view that Māori land should not have the same value for rating as general land due to the restrictions of sale. That’s an important point here. The reason why Māori land has different rating systems as determined in our courts is that there are restrictions on who the land can be sold to and how it can be governed. If you are the owner of Māori land, you may be one of thousands, and you can only sell your interest, however small it may be, as a first resort to someone who shares whakapapa with you to that land, to its original owners.

So the potential for developing that land in a commercial way really comes down to agreement of those owners—perhaps thousands, perhaps tens of thousands—and the efficacy of the governance systems put in place by those owners. That’s why our courts, over 20 years, have had to develop this law to ensure that there is fairness for the rating systems here, and that’s why I’m proud that on this side of the House, we’ve come with a practical, sensible way to implement the recommendations of people like Kenneth Palmer, who have spent many years of their career advocating for such a solution, to allow Māori land owners something akin to fairness in the land ownership system and in our tenure system, which is in itself a colonial construct.

The other people that I want to recognise in this debate are the Mangatū Incorporations themselves. They are my family of Tūranga. They hold land holdings the size of Auckland. They have vineyards, sheep and beef farms, productive forest, and they hold the lands of significance to Te Aitanga-a-Māhaki and the many tens of thousands of descendants who whakapapa to that iwi. They have direct exporting relationships with a number of countries, and they have an innovative farm-to-plate system which allows them to export directly into economies like Canada. They are a significant player in our economies and our primary sector industry. They are also a group which has spent an incredible amount of time, effort, and money in clarifying the law in this area. The best we can do in this House is to acknowledge those 20 years of work from that business and the 20 years of work from the lawyers who have done it voluntarily by coming with a sensible and practical solution to those problems about how to rate Māori land fairly.

I’ll turn to my points about how councils might reasonably expect to be able to now collect more rates from Māori land under the present legislation which is proposed. The problem here is that Māori land, with no ownership structure, is not open to rates, that rates cannot be collected in those structures, and so what this bill does is provide a practical solution for Māori land owners to come together and say, “What was in the past is done. We will now move forward. We will contribute in the way that all other landowners do.”

My second point about why is this just Māori land: now, the member from Tauranga would have us believe that this is a race-based policy. Look, he’s a lawyer. He understands that general land and Māori land are very different creatures in our legislation, that Māori land sets out specific criteria about who can own it, how it can be owned, and how it can be used. Those are the reasons why we need special rating laws which set out how local councils should grapple with that special nature of that land, not because it is owned by Māori. There’s no suggestion on this side of the House that Māori land owners who own general land should have any special treatment.

The third point I want to make, just briefly, is whether councils can do this already. I want to quote the well-known Wellington lawyer who is an advocate for local authorities on rating issues here, Mr Jonathan Salter. He said, “the general perception amongst local authorities about the rating of Māori land is that it is an issue which lives in the ‘too hard’ basket. Many local authorities now acknowledge the sensitivity of rating Māori land in the context of the Treaty of Waitangi but find the statutory provisions in Part xiii of the Rating Powers Act extremely difficult to implement in practice … the local authorities which appear to have achieved the greatest degree of success are those which have established sound liaison and goodwill with the Māori in their districts.” I quote Mr Salter because this House needs to give clear direction for how local authorities are meant to implement those rules, and it’s important for lawyers to be able to give clear advice, both to local authorities and to Māori land owners, about how those rates will be affected.

It’s a mess now for local authority. We’re doing no favours under the current system by providing so much discretion to local authorities that they simply do not know how to rate Māori land fairly and in a way which will allow them to collect more rates in future. That is why I’m so proud to commend this bill to the House and to honour Professor Palmer and the work of the Mangatū Incorporation.

Dr ELIZABETH KEREKERE (Green): Tēnā koe, Madam Speaker. Tēnā koe e te rangatira, Nanaia Mahuta, mō tō mahi tipuna i tēnei Whare.

[Thank you, Madam Speaker. Thank you, esteemed woman Nanaia Mahuta, for your great achievement in this House.]

I stand to take a short call, to note that the Greens support Te Pire Whakatikatika Kāwanatanga ā-Rohe (Rētitanga o te Whenua Māori) [the Local Government (Rating of Whenua Māori) Amendment Bill]. I wish to note that Aotearoa is 268,000 square metres and all of it is Māori land—all of it is whenua Māori. It was removed from us by a range of means, including theft—as Tāmati Coffey pointed out—and legislation, which systematically broke down communal ownership to individual title. One example is the Native Land Act 1924, upon which the Local Government (Rating of Whenua Māori) Amendment Bill is based.

As defined by Te Ture Whenua Maori Act, we have 5 percent of freehold Māori land left—5 percent of the whole country. So no amount of hiding behind the principles of partnership, participation, and protection can disguise the fact that this Government is clearly in breach of a Treaty that the Crown signed which gave us undisturbed possession of our lands. To add insult to injury, though, we got charged rates for keeping the little land we had left, and 30 percent of the Māori freehold land that exists is in Te Tai Rāwhiti. So this has a particular impact on my whānau, including those that Arena Williams pointed out. We’re not talking, of course, about prime real estate. Much of it is inaccessible and unusable. Much of it is fragmented, and rates arrears are a barrier to whānau consolidating the land back to larger blocks.

I look forward to a complete overhaul of Te Ture Whenua Maori Act and acknowledge that we will continue to go through incremental changes across multiple pieces of legislation until that is done. So, in the meantime, we welcome this bill that will remove rates as an impediment to the use and development of whenua Māori by its owners. Land blocks that are entirely unused will be made non-rateable, and existing rates arrears on those blocks will be written off. Our land which has been set aside under Ngā Whenua Rāhui kawenata will also be made non-rateable, and this has been a very long time coming.

We also support that the process of local authority chief executives granting rates remissions for the development of whenua Māori will be made consistent across the country, because, in the committee of the whole House, I identified my concerns about Māori engaging with their local councils. This is very inconsistent across the country. Iwi and hapū organisations often struggle to make headway with them, let alone small groups of owners or even huge groups of owners who are scattered all across the country and around the world. We hope this bill does make it easier for the owners of whenua Māori to engage with their whenua and access the Whenua Māori Fund.

We hope that that will give life to the hopes and aspirations of their whānau, hapū, and iwi—to call home whānau from across the country and the world because they’ve got land where they can build houses and develop their papakāinga, to create economic independence and sustainability and, alongside our rūnanga, our iwi trusts, our kura, our marae, our organisations, providers, and our businesses, to contribute to the collective health and wellbeing of all Māori. Nō reira, I commend this bill to the House. Kia ora.

SIMON COURT (ACT): Thank you, Madam Speaker. The ACT Party supports the development of Māori land, and we understand how complex it is when there are so many complex ownership arrangements. We also support the development of housing on Māori land and to modernise the rating legislation which affects Māori land in collective ownership, but this bill lacks ambition to solve the underlying problems. It is an inefficient way to regulate the issue that it’s trying to solve and it will come at significant cost to local authorities. The reason that the ACT Party believes this bill lacks ambition is because it hasn’t accurately and correctly defined the problem that needs to be solved and it hasn’t addressed the underlying complex relationships between multiple landowners and their competing objectives, which is the main reason why this land has not been developed and has not become productive and is not returning any benefits to its owners.

While this bill may go some way to relieving historical debts, which may seem difficult and very challenging to some groups and some extended families, particularly when some individuals have been prepared to play their part in paying but others haven’t had the means, they’re very complex interpersonal relationships which this type of legislation cannot hope to address and solve. So instead of that, it takes a much less ambitious approach. Rather than challenging the people who own the land to be a part of solving the problem, it says “We’ll take this one issue away. We hope that makes you feel better, but you can keep your problem.” That’s from an outsider’s perspective looking in, but that appears to be where this legislation has led us.

It’s also very inefficient, because not only does it create a regulatory instrument just to deal with one group of landowners, that then forces local government to essentially set up their own internal regulatory and administrative process to engage with these landowners, understand what the criteria are for them to apply for an exemption or a remission of their rates, and then to work its way through council’s own finance and administrative and governance process so that local councils and their ratepayers can at least have some smidgeon of confidence that there’s been an adequate process around it, although the outcome is not in question.

The Government intends that very large amounts—although the Minister couldn’t offer us an amount—of outstanding rates are remitted. It’s not giving local government any kind of out, and so, really, this will be yet another burden on local government administrators and managers and ratepayers to manage an administrative process which they didn’t ask for, but, again, like so many things central government does, it doesn’t just impose costs and regulatory burden on individuals and businesses; it always catches local government in its net.

And then we come down to the costs, not just the costs of administering this legislation but also the opportunity cost, because this land which remains unproductive and which has incurred rates that are subject to the legislation that require a rates remission—if you think about the huge infrastructure deficit which the Minister of Local Government has confirmed to us is somewhere in the region of $110 billion for three waters infrastructure alone over the next 30 years. We haven’t had a stocktake of the roading and other connectivity infrastructure and what that deficit might be. That deficit is between the amount that central and local government has to spend, or has signalled it will spend, and actually the condition of their existing assets, which, in many cases, are so run down that they’ll need to be replaced entirely—but, if not, at least patched up for the interim. So that infrastructure deficit for water assets is $110 billion over 30 years. We can only imagine the deferred roading projects—those wonderful projects, like roads of national significance, that the last Government gave us—some of which are still under construction, but many, like the East-West Link, which was a fantastic project to unlock Auckland, supported by mana whenua groups because it was the one project that would solve some of the worst environmental problems in the south-east catchment of Onehunga—

Hon Julie Anne Genter: Zero evidence for that—zero evidence.

SIMON COURT: And if you think about how much these projects cost—

Hon Julie Anne Genter: Benefits are lower than the cost.

SIMON COURT: —and what the benefits are to communities—because some of those benefits are non-monetary, and I would have thought that the member here, the Green Party member to my left, understands that there are many benefits that are non-monetary: social, environmental, and community benefits.

Hon Julie Anne Genter: You don’t believe in economics now?

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): Order! The member will not bring the Speaker into the debate.

SIMON COURT: Thank you, Madam Speaker. So, again, the costs and the opportunity costs from sacrificing these rates amounts which will be remitted, and what that means for local government and their ambitions for infrastructure to unlock development—because it’s no doubt that many of these titles in collective ownership will have, the people who have that ownership will have, ambitions for their land, but those ambitions can only be realised through better connectivity, better infrastructure, and so that is one of the reasons why we need this rates money. The Government, through the Minister, was not able to explain how they’re going to make up not just the infrastructure deficit but this cash hole—this cash hole. No doubt that burden will fall unfairly on many other ratepayers.

I want to reiterate: the ACT Party does support the development of Māori land by Māori and for Māori, including the development of housing on their land, whether it’s in individual Māori ownership or collective ownership, and we do applaud the intention to modernise the rating legislation, but unfortunately it only applies to one group of ratepayers, not all of those long-suffering ratepayers around New Zealand, who now find the unfair burden of rates increases falling upon them because of the very poor decision-making in the past by local government officers and a wilful blindness from many in leadership roles in central government, with those responsibilities.

So, in closing, what I’d like to say is the ACT Party supports it, but we believe that property should be treated equally under the law, and this bill does not appear to treat the property of certain groups of people equally. In fact, it gives them unequal opportunity to avoid paying historical costs that other ratepayers have to pay. These rates fund local government infrastructure. Local government is going to miss out, and until the underlying issue of collective ownership and the stresses and strains between large groups of people, which, I can only reflect on, must be the most complex body corporate arrangement ever—and we know how difficult it is to get bodies corporates in places where they have weathertightness issues and other issues around shared driveways. You know, one party won’t agree to install the duct for the fibre up the driveway. I can only imagine how complex and difficult it is for land that’s in shared ownership, in this context, to be advanced for development. I don’t think this bill will do anything to advance that.

So, for that reason, the ACT Party will not support this bill, but we do look forward to engaging further with the Government, with local government, and with other parties across the House on helping these landowners unlock their land for development, become more productive, and enjoy all the benefits of landownership and homeownership. Thank you very much, Madam Speaker.

PAUL EAGLE (Labour—Rongotai): Thank you, Madam Speaker. It is always a privilege to speak late on the last sitting day of the block. I always find myself in this slot, actually. [Interruption] And I always find myself battling the members of the Bay of Plenty and Tauranga; it is just a common occurrence.

Hon Member: When you’re not in the Chathams.

PAUL EAGLE: When I’m not in the Chatham Islands, of course. But I’m here—

Hon Simon Bridges: Some of us have got to hold up this Parliament, Paul.

PAUL EAGLE: Someone has got to do the mahi, as they say, and not get the treats.

But we’ve heard just a whole lot of stuff with a sinister undertone—it is this race-based issue. No one wants to say it. I’ve had to come in late in the piece and expose it, once again, to say that is what the other side are most concerned about.

But, funnily enough, when we were talking only a couple of years ago about the Rates Rebate (Retirement Village Residents) Amendment Act 2018, no one had a problem with our seniors and oldies, but the minute—

Hon Member: Aww.

PAUL EAGLE: Yeah, I know; I hate to bring it up. It is horrible when you bring things like that up, because suddenly there is some embarrassment. But that is my role: often I have to bring the hard news just before the time is up.

We’ve heard for everyone—general law; conservation land; bigger, bolder, braver. We’ve heard everything. I thought some people were going to break into another maiden speech for a minute there! But, no that is not the case, because this is really important.

I went through the various notes—and they are good notes—and you get all sorts of things, and I think, “How unfair.” You know, the bill removes a loophole—a loophole, da, da. I know on that side of the House, they are all about closing those loopholes, but here is one which allows Māori land that was arbitrarily reclassified as general land in the late 1960s from being sold by a local authority, abandoned land, or rating sale.

So, there you go, there are so many examples here that I’m not going to continue with, because I’ve said enough. I can only but commend this bill to the House.

TODD MULLER (National—Bay of Plenty): Look, thank you. Well, that really was the highlight of the week, I think, listening to that succinct summary.

Greg O’Connor: Until now!

TODD MULLER: You’re too kind, Mr O’Connor! Look, I think the National Party have traversed the reasons for our opposition very effectively. Of course there is Māori land that is unproductive, as there is unproductive land elsewhere in the country, and of course it is challenging for Māori land owners to have rates applied when the land is unproductive. But we posed the question to the Minister through the committee of the whole House: what is the constraint of the current model? She couldn’t answer it. We asked how many local rūnanga or hapū have turned up to councils with a package saying, “Hey, could you give us rates relief and assist us as we aim to reset this land in a more productive way?” She couldn’t answer it. It is our view that this piece of legislation doesn’t work, isn’t needed, is preferential when it doesn’t need to be, leaves other landowners that have unproductive land off the table, and is only going to add more division to what is already becoming quite a sensitive conversation in this country. We need to bring the best of ourselves to these conversations, not rush through poorly thought out law when, as we have all said in this House, the greater challenge to te Ture Whenua—that is what should be front of mind, that should be where the work is, and it’s a great disappointment that, yet again, the Government has chosen the easy, short, one-line win as opposed to the hard, comprehensive, and fundamentally changing solution.

So we’ve made that point very clearly—very clearly—very articulately, and in the context of Thursday afternoon following Paul Eagle’s gargling of the antiseptic spray, it’s probably time for us to step down from debate. We oppose it, and we’ve opposed it all the way through, and the reasons are clear.

Dr DUNCAN WEBB (Labour—Christchurch Central): Kia ora, e te Mana Whakawā. It’s a pleasure to stand. I’m very surprised the Māori Party chooses not to take a call on this piece of legislation, which directly affects the interests of Māori. But I’m very happy that our members, our excellent Māori caucus, have spoken so well and so carefully and so comprehensively on this matter, and I commend the bill to the House.

SHANAN HALBERT (Labour—Northcote): Tēnā koe, Madam Speaker, and what a wonderful Thursday afternoon. I hope that we leave at the end of this parliamentary set knowing that we have achieved something and that we’ve made a difference in the lives of our people in Aotearoa. I’m particularly proud to be a part of this Government. We’ve heard this week about the massive investment in housing across the country, and I’ve just finished an interview on Radio Waatea this week, a weekly slot that I have, where we talked that through and talked about the aspirations and ambitions—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): Order! Order! Can I ask the member to address the bill that is before us.

SHANAN HALBERT: Thank you, Madam Speaker. What is important to understand is that by 2050, the population of Māori in this country will be 22 percent. We need to ensure that we are not in the same position as a community—socially, economically—as we currently are. It’s to the benefit of our country that we address the disparity, and unlocking whenua Māori is an important part of doing this for our people, and this particular bill is another step in this Government’s removing barriers for Māori to meet their aspirations and achieve the things that they want to. So without further ado, I commend this bill to the House.

RAWIRI WAITITI (Co-Leader—Te Paati Māori): Madam Speaker, I seek leave to take a call.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): Did the member call a point of order?

RAWIRI WAITITI: Oh, point of order, Madam Speaker. I seek leave—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): We’ll just get it right. Rawiri Waititi.

RAWIRI WAITITI: Yes. I seek leave to take a call.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): Leave has been sought. Is there any objection? There is no objection. Rawiri Waititi.

RAWIRI WAITITI (Co-Leader—Te Paati Māori): Oh, what lovely people. Kia ora tātou. Kia ora tātou i tēnei rā. Tēnā tātou kua whakawhāiti nei i runga i te āhuatanga o tēnei o ngā pire. Kua rongo atu awahau i ngā kōrero o ngā taha e rua, ā, kua rongo atu anō hoki i te nati o te kakī o tērā o ō koutou tāngata i a au mō te kore e haramai i te wā tika. Engari rā, kei te tino tautoko mātou i tēnei. Engari he mea iti noa tēnei i runga i te huarahi tika mō te whakatōpū nei me te whakanui i ngā whenua Māori. Koinei hoki te hiahia a Te Ururoa Flavell i roto i ōna rā. Ko tōna hiahia mō Te Ture Whenua Māori, ko Reipa e aukatingia i a ia i tōna mahi engari kei te mihi atu rā mō te iti nei o tēnei o ngā pire kia whakatikatikahia i ngā reiti e ngaua kinotia i wā tātou whenua Māori i roto i ngā tau maha ki muri nei. Koinā hoki te take kei te tū au.

Kei te tū au, anō hoki ki te kōrero i ngā kōrero tika, hāngai tō, ki ngā mahi e reitingia e tākengia i wō tātou whenua. I whakatūngia te Kōti Whenua Māori i te tau 1865. Ko tōna mahi matua he whakahaere i ngā utu whenua Māori mō te Karauna. I te 1882 ka ara mai te Native Lands Ratings Act ki runga whenua Māori, ka kitea i te rerekētanga a ngā reiti ki runga i ngā whenua Māori ki tā te whenua Pākehā. Toru rau paiheneti te kaitā a ngā reiti ki runga whenua Māori, atu i ngā whenua Pākehā. Ka tiki ake awahau i ngā kōrero o taku tipuna a Tuta Nihoniho i roto i tōna haka i tuhingia i te tau 1870.

Pō ngā rā, pō ngā rā!

Ka tataki mai te Whare o ngā ture ka whiria.

Te Māori ka whiria.

Ngau nei ōna reiti, ngau nei ōna tāke, āhaha.

Tē taea te ueue.

[Greetings, all; greetings on this day. Greetings to all gathered here for the purpose of this bill. I have heard the opinions of both sides, and have also heard the rebuke from your colleague for not arriving on time. However, we fully support this bill. But this is only a small step on the correct path for the consolidation and increasing of Māori land. This was the wish of Te Ururoa Flavell during his time. His aspiration for the Māori Land Act was thwarted by Labour at the time; however, I still acknowledge the small step forward in this bill which seeks to rectify rating issues that have badly affected our Māori lands in the past. This is the reason why I am standing.

I also stand to talk directly and specifically about the rating and taxing of our land. The Māori Land Court was established in 1865. Its main role was to organise payments with regards to Māori land on behalf of the Crown. In 1882, the Native Lands Ratings Act was passed, and it highlighted the difference in ratings of Māori and Pākehā land. Māori land rates were 300 percent higher than those of Pākehā land. Now, let me refer to the message of my ancestor Tuta Nihoniho, delivered in the haka he composed in 1870.

The shadows fall, the shadows fall!

There is chattering in Parliament.

And Māori are being plaited as a rope.

Its rates and its taxes are biting.

Its teeth cannot be withdrawn.]

I did mention in the first reading of this particular bill that while the changes in this legislation present a huge step forward and will benefit many Māori land owners, we must not stop here. Te Paati Māori’s vision is the reassertion of our mana motuhake and our tino rangatiratanga over our own affairs, our own people, and our own lands. This bill is a positive step forward, and put forward and championed by Te Ururoa Flavell and Te Paati Māori as part of Te Ture Whenua Maori Act reforms. And I do want to acknowledge at that particular time Labour’s resistance to that particular bill. I also want to acknowledge though that this is a step forward, because this is actually a section of that particular bill that we are addressing today.

And so I mentioned a haka that was written by my ancestor Tuta Nihoniho in 1870, where he talks about:

The shadows fall! The shadows fall!

There is chattering in Parliament.

And Māori are being plaited as a rope.

Its rates and its taxes are biting.

Its teeth cannot be withdrawn. Alas!

The land will be destroyed!

The laws are spread-eagled—not Paul Eagle—over it!

Nā ngā mema rā te kōhuru,

Nā te Kāwana te kōheriheri.

Ka raruraru ngā ture,

Ka raparapa ki te pua tōrori.

[The members have done this black deed,

And the Governor has pulverised us.

The laws of the land are confused,

For even the tobacco leaf is singled out!]

And that was written in 1870. And today we are able to address part of this Act that continues, or that continued, to steal lands from Māori.

And so we do justice by our ancestors who signed the Treaty of Waitangi. We do justice by the many who shed blood over this land to hold on to it. So Te Paati Māori is proud to stand here today and support this bill, but we are expecting to go further than that.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): The member’s time has expired.

JOSEPH MOONEY (National—Southland): Thank you, Madam Speaker. We acknowledge that collecting rates on Māori land has been a longstanding challenge for both councils and kaitiaki of whenua Māori. However, this bill does not provide any new solutions for rating authorities; it sidesteps the fundamental issues of Māori land, which require reforming Te Ture Whenua Maori Act 1993, and the Government has never assessed the economic impact of this legislation before, during, and after introducing the bill to the House.

Any council can already remit rates for any land they want, so long as they have a rates remission policy. The parts of this bill that relate to rates remissions are not easy. The bill ignores those councils that have already introduced respective rates reduction processes with the ability to write off historic rates and arrears. This, effectively, penalises councils who already have these systems in place.

National is worried that this bill would establish a rates remission regime favouring one group over another. While National is supportive of the bill’s intent of turning unproductive Māori land into productive land, the communal ownership nature of Māori land remains an issue in itself that a rates remission regime may not remedy. National also has concerns over the discretionary powers introduced by the bill. These will allow council executives to write off historic rates and arrears, without any built-in accountability mechanisms to report on the processes and procedures required to exercise those powers.

On the matter of writing off unrecoverable rates, I ask the Government for the benefit of their wisdom on this question: where a person has received an interest in the asset, is it not only reasonable that they also receive any liabilities associated with that asset?

Beneficiaries of non-Māori land may also find that their estates are inherited with debts owning. As a matter of basic fairness, that is problematic. It also sidesteps the fundamental issues of Māori land which require reforming Te Ture Whenua Maori Act 1993.

The bill does some things that don’t need doing, but doesn’t do the hard things that redress the fundamentals of Māori land issues. The bill sidesteps those real issues. The Government needs to first settle Māori land tenure issues through Te Ture Whenua Maori Act 1993 before addressing appropriated rates issues. The policy intent of this bill would be best served through a comprehensive rewrite of Te Ture Whenua Maori Act 1993. This is because, as drafted, the bill fragments existing whenua Māori legislation.

I note that Labour, the Greens, and New Zealand First opposed Te Ture Whenua Māori Bill in 2017. “There has not been a case for change as to why the 1993 Act does not work because, as Meka Whaitiri said, there are any number of Māori trusts and incorporations that are doing perfectly fine. They are doing very well. We have got a $40 billion Māori economy under this Act,”—those were the words of Kelvin Davis at the first reading of the bill. Labour opposed Te Ture Whenua Māori Bill because they felt that it did not help small Māori land owners, but the new bill does not distinguish between small Māori land owners and large land owners. It gives a general rate exemption to all Māori land.

The Government has never addressed the economic impact of this legislation before, during, and after introducing the bill to the House. The Cabinet papers on the bill fail to quantify the value that writing off rates would give to local economies. Crucially, this bill falls short of creating effective initiatives for the development of Māori land. I find it troubling that the Government has not considered the economic impacts of this bill on local economies. It must also be remembered that it is not just Māori land owners who have unproductive land, who own land collectively, or who may benefit from rates remission. The present bill is a solution in search of a problem.

National acknowledges and supports the policy goal of unleashing the productive potential of Māori land. Whenua Māori lies at the heart of Māori communities and the Māori economy and it has the potential to create much more value. Therefore, I invite the Government to work with us on a bipartisan basis to amend Te Ture Whenua—

Simon Court: Multi-part—multi-party.

JOSEPH MOONEY: —multi-party, thank you for that contribution from the ACT Party—because the multi-ownership nature of Māori land remains an issue that in itself a rates remission regime cannot remedy. Let us do the hard work in this House.

JO LUXTON (Labour—Rangitata): Thank you, Madam Speaker. Look, I’m going to take a very short call, because everything that needs to be said has been said by my colleagues on this side of the House. I congratulate the Minister the Hon Nanaia Mahuta for bringing this to the House, and I commend this bill to the House.

Dr DUNCAN WEBB (Junior Whip—Labour): Point of order, Madam Speaker. I seek leave of the House that the vote on this motion be put.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): Any objection to that course of action? There is objection. This debate is interrupted and set down for next sitting day. The House stands adjourned until 2 p.m. on Tuesday, 6 April 2021. Good afternoon.

Debate interrupted.

The House adjourned at 5.05 p.m.