Wednesday, 10 May 2023

WEDNESDAY, 10 MAY 2023

WEDNESDAY, 10 MAY 2023

The Speaker took the Chair at 2 p.m.

Karakia/Prayers

Karakia/Prayers

SPEAKER: E te Atua kaha rawa, ka tuku whakamoemiti atu mātou, mō ngā karakia kua waihotia mai ki runga i a mātou. Ka waiho i ō mātou pānga whaiaro katoa ki te taha. Ka mihi mātou ki te Kīngi, me te inoi atu mō te ārahitanga i roto i ō mātou whakaaroarohanga, kia mōhio ai, kia whakaiti ai tā mātou whakahaere i ngā take o te Whare nei, mō te oranga, te maungārongo, me te aroha o Aotearoa. Āmene.

[Almighty God, we give thanks for the blessings which have been bestowed on us. Laying aside all personal interests, we acknowledge the King, and pray for guidance in our deliberations, that we may conduct the affairs of this House with wisdom and humility, for the welfare, peace and compassion of New Zealand. Amen.]

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

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

SPEAKER: No petitions have been delivered to the Clerk for presentation. A paper has been delivered for presentation.

CLERK: 2021-22 annual report of the Transport Accident Investigation Commission.

SPEAKER: That paper is published under the authority of the House. Select committee reports have been delivered for presentation.

CLERK:

Reports of the Petitions Committee on the petition of Debbie Port and the petition of Margaret Brough

report of the Regulations Review Committee on the complaint about a specialist optometrist scope of practice and associated prescribed qualification made under the Health Practitioners Competence Assurance Act 2003.

SPEAKER: The report of the Regulations Review Committee is set down for consideration. No bills have been introduced.

Oral Questions

Questions to Ministers

Question No. 1—Finance

1. Hon Dr DAVID CLARK (Labour—Dunedin) to the Minister of Finance: What recent reports has he seen on the New Zealand economy?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Minister of Finance): In the Crown accounts for the nine months to the end of March released this week, the operating balance before gains and losses—or OBEGAL—recorded a deficit of $3.4 billion. This was $2.5 billion higher than had been forecast in December’s Half Year Economic and Fiscal Update. Compared with the same period a year ago, the deficit for nine months to March 2023 was lower by $4.7 billion. We know that 2023 is going to be a challenging year for the global economy, and we are not immune in terms of New Zealand as to what happens overseas. The Government’s accounts will be affected as the economy cools, and we are doing our bit to both restrain spending and responsibly manage our finances while looking after New Zealanders. The upcoming Budget has required tough choices as we respond to the deteriorating economic conditions. The Government will take a balanced approach that is responsible and looks after those who are the most affected by changing economic conditions and recent weather events. I’m glad this popular question is back in the House.

Hon Dr David Clark: What else did the report say about the impact of the economy on the Government’s books?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: Core Crown tax revenue was 2.7 percent below forecast at $83.6 billion. This was mainly due to lower than forecast GST returns and corporate tax revenue. However, this was partly offset by core Crown expenses being 0.8 percent below forecast, at $92.5 billion, with lower core Government expenses, COVID-related health expenses, social security, and welfare expenses all being lower.

Hon Dr David Clark: What did the report say about the Government’s debt position and its impact on the economy?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: Net debt was 19.1 percent of GDP, below the forecast of 20.4 percent of GDP, mainly due to market conditions affecting the financial portfolio of the New Zealand super fund and ACC. Our debt levels are among the lowest in the OECD and well below the Government debt ceiling of 30 percent of GDP. This ensures that we are well positioned to deal with the impacts of Cyclone Gabrielle and any other future economic shocks.

Hon Dr David Clark: What other reports has the Minister seen on the New Zealand economy?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: An extremely good question. Statistics New Zealand has reported that the New Zealand Activity Index, which is a broad and timelier measure of activity in the economy, rose 1.3 percent in the March quarter from the previous period a year ago. Activity indicators were up for electronic card transaction activity, heavy and light traffic movements, but had eased in terms of manufacturing activity, grid demand, and job advertisements. As I’ve said previously, New Zealand starts in a position of strength to face the challenges ahead. We have unemployment near record lows, and public debt levels well below those of other countries that we compare ourselves to. We know many New Zealanders are doing it tough, but the Government is focused on working hard to support them in the here and now while also investing in the public services and infrastructure that we need to grow our economy sustainably.

Nicola Willis: As he looked at the deteriorating Crown accounts this week, did he have a moment of reflection to think, “If only we had been more prudent last year and not spent so recklessly, then I would have room to deliver tax relief and respond to the cyclone this year.”?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: I always take time to reflect when I receive the Crown accounts and work my way through them. And one of my reflections, on reading this one, was that this would be a terrible time to introduce large-scale tax cuts as the National Party would do.

Nicola Willis: When did he or his officials last meet with the international credit rating agencies, and how concerned is he that, given his fiscal blowouts, they will downgrade New Zealand’s credit rating, adding even more pressure to the cost of borrowing for New Zealanders?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: We meet annually with the credit rating agencies, and so we did that last year and we will do that this year. I am confident that the New Zealand economy is resilient and robust. Despite the National Party’s desire to be relentlessly negative, to talk down New Zealand and talk down our economy, I have a great deal of confidence in New Zealanders and the resilience of our economy.

Question No. 2—Justice

2. NICOLE McKEE (ACT) to the Minister of Justice: Does she stand by her statement that she is taking a “victim-centric” approach to justice, and is this victim-centric approach compatible with the Government’s justice policies?

Hon DAVID PARKER (Attorney-General) on behalf of the Minister of Justice: Yes, which is why, on 21 April, the Government announced a series of practical changes to give victims more rights and support in the justice system. The package includes legislative changes regarding penalties for sexual violence against children, litigation abuse, and family proceedings, and giving greater input to victims of sexual violence around name suppression decisions, three pilot programmes to improve safety and help victims of serious crime navigate the court system, strengthened support for child victims of sexual violence, and improving victims’ views being provided in bail decisions. In addition, $3 million in funding for victim support and $2.2 million in additional funding will be provided to the Victim Assistance Scheme.

Nicole McKee: Does she believe that scrapping longer sentences for repeat violent and sexual offenders, as the Government did when it got rid of the three-strikes legislation, is consistent with taking a victim-centric approach to justice?

Hon DAVID PARKER: There is no evidence that three-strikes legislation worked. One of the more shameful examples of its application was in respect of someone who was challenged intellectually but, none the less, felt the effects of three-strikes law in a way that was probably wrong and unjust. And on this side of the House, we believe that it is important that perpetrators of serious crime are held to account and were appropriately imprisoned, but those sentencing decisions should be left to the courts.

Nicole McKee: How can she defend the Government’s policy to not build any more prisons, when there has been a 121 percent increase in serious assault victimisations resulting in injury since January 2017, with the number of victimisations increasing year on year to December 2022?

Hon DAVID PARKER: I think it was the Minister of Finance in the last National-ACT Government—and a former Prime Minister—who said that New Zealand’s then penal policy was a fiscal and moral failure, and parties that would take us back to that fiscal and moral failure would be making a mistake and would not be protecting New Zealanders from harm.

Hon Paul Goldsmith: How can this Government claim to be victim-centric when National revealed more strangulation offenders than victims were helped by the $20 million strangulation initiative in Budget 2020?

Hon DAVID PARKER: That statistic is, of course, no surprise at all to anyone that thinks about the fact that it’s a new offence.

Nicole McKee: How can she reconcile the Government’s goal to reduce the prison population by 30 percent with her victim-centric approach, and what message does this send to the victims?

Hon DAVID PARKER: The Government’s had no such target.

Nicole McKee: Does she believe that the Government’s first job is to keep law abiding New Zealanders safe from criminals, and, if so, will she support ACT’s policy to invest in building an additional 500-bed prison to ensure—

Hon Marama Davidson: That’s how to keep people in danger.

SPEAKER: Order! The Hon Marama Davidson will stand, withdraw, and apologise.

Hon Marama Davidson: I withdraw and apologise.

SPEAKER: I’ll ask you to ask the question again.

Nicole McKee: Thank you, Mr Speaker. Does she believe that the Government’s first job is to keep law abiding New Zealanders safe from criminals, and, if so, will she support ACT’s policy to invest in building an additional 500-bed—[Interruption]

SPEAKER: Ah, sorry. The Hon Marama Davidson will leave the Chamber.

Hon Marama Davidson: Point of order.

SPEAKER: Now please.

Hon Marama Davidson: I thought we were allowed to—

SPEAKER: Members have the right to ask questions—I remind the House that.

Hon Marama Davidson withdrew from the Chamber.

Nicole McKee: Should I start again, Mr Speaker?

SPEAKER: Yes, please.

Nicole McKee: Does she believe that the Government’s first job is to keep law abiding New Zealanders safe from criminals, and, if so, will she support ACT’s policy to invest in building an additional 500-bed prison to ensure there is sufficient capacity for dangerous criminals to be kept from continually harming our communities and from creating more victims?

Hon DAVID PARKER: In respect of the second part of that question, no.

Question No. 3—Energy and Resources

3. GLEN BENNETT (Labour—New Plymouth) to the Minister of Energy and Resources: What is the Government doing to improve the energy efficiency of New Zealand homes?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS (Minister of Energy and Resources): Since its launch in 2018, the Warmer Kiwi Homes programme has played a key role in our Government’s action to lower power bills and make homes healthier for New Zealanders and their families. Low-income families, young children, and older Kiwis are especially vulnerable to the impacts of living in cold, damp homes. Since coming into Government, we have now completed more than 110,000 installations of insulation and efficient heat sources.

Glen Bennett: What has the Government’s Warmer Kiwi Homes programme achieved to date?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: Through more than 110,000 upgrades delivered since 2018, Warmer Kiwi Homes is directly assisting households to manage cost of living pressures by offering grants of 80 percent of the cost of insulation, and up to 80 percent of the cost of a heater. This made it far more affordable and accessible for homeowners to make their homes warm, dry, and healthy, and reduce their spend on power bills. Households are not only more efficient; homeowners report an overwhelming increase in comfort and satisfaction with their homes.

Glen Bennett: What energy-efficiency benefits does the Warmer Kiwi Homes programme provide?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: Motu’s independent review of Warmer Kiwi Homes found that the programme was delivering better outcomes, with homes being, on average, 2 degrees Celsius warmer, 89 percent of homeowners reporting less condensation on windows, and around half of homeowners noticing a reduction in dampness. Not only were homes warmer and drier but they’re also more energy-efficient. People and homes upgraded through the programme experienced an electricity reduction of 16 percent through the winter months, supporting households to spend less on their power bills.

Glen Bennett: What health benefits does the Warmer Kiwi Homes programme provide?

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: Warmer Kiwi Homes also improves health outcomes for New Zealanders, contributing to fewer doctors visits and hospitalisations being required, which research finds equates to over $15 million per year saved in avoided hospital costs.

Question No. 4—Prime Minister

4. CHRISTOPHER LUXON (Leader of the Opposition) to the Prime Minister: Does he stand by all of his Government’s statements and actions?

Rt Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Prime Minister): Yes, particularly this Government’s $300 million boost to the New Zealand Green Investment Finance fund to accelerate the uptake of low-emissions technology and mobilise private sector capital into new businesses and jobs. Green Investment Finance has invested in electric vehicle charging infrastructure, solar-powered projects, and electric buses, reducing emissions by up to 710,000 tonnes. These investments will generate returns that can be recycled into other projects.

Christopher Luxon: Is it fair that someone on the average wage is paying $1,600 more in income tax because of bracket creep, when their real wages have actually gone backwards because of his Government’s economic mismanagement?

Rt Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: Of course, I note that, overall, real wages have been trending upwards under this Government. The member may choose to pick a particular point in time, and of course we acknowledge that the current inflationary environment is putting families under pressure. That is exactly why the Budget is focused on—it is a no-frills Budget, focused very much on the issues that are of concern to New Zealanders.

Christopher Luxon: Why has he inflation-adjusted benefits, inflation-adjusted New Zealand super, and inflation-adjusted the minimum wage but refuses to inflation-adjust income tax brackets for hard-working, middle-income Kiwis?

Rt Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: I’ve never said that we wouldn’t make adjustments, in time, to income tax brackets. I note that people move up income tax brackets because their incomes are increasing, and inflation has led to a driving up of New Zealanders’ incomes because of rising wages. I note they’ve risen much faster under this Government than under the last National Government.

David Seymour: Does the Prime Minister understand that if your incomes are rising due to inflation and so is the cost of things you’re buying, you can’t actually buy more and you’re no better off?

Rt Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: I note the longer-term trend under this Government is that wages have been rising ahead of inflation. I do note that we are currently in an environment which is very challenging for New Zealanders.

David Seymour: Does the Prime Minister understand that after-tax wages last year rose 6.2 percent versus inflation of 7.2 percent, so the hard-working people who pay the taxes, who pay the bills for this place, actually fell behind by 1 percent last year, and, if so, what’s he going to do about it?

Rt Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: The member might like to take a look at the latest statistics and, of course, there will be more coming. At any given point in time, there will be fluctuation between those two numbers, but if you look at the longer-term trend, this Government’s track record stacks up very well.

Christopher Luxon: So when he said income tax thresholds will need to be adjusted for inflation, but just not yet, how much inflation will be enough before he will finally give Kiwis a break?

Rt Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: I note that adjusting tax brackets right now has the potential to keep inflation higher for longer. Pumping the sort of money into the economy that National’s tax plan would do would ultimately result in higher inflation for longer. It would mean Kiwi households paying higher interest bills on their mortgage for longer.

Christopher Luxon: So when he just said he was ruling out tax relief because it has the potential to be inflationary, has he considered choosing tax relief over evermore wasteful Government spending, given his Government is already spending an extra $1 billion each and every week?

Rt Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: As has already been well noted by economists—reputable economists—actually, the Government has been placing downwards pressure on the overall level of Government spending, and that will have a flow-on effect to broader economic measures.

Debbie Ngarewa-Packer: Does he stand by his Government’s refusal to support a ban or moratorium on seabed mining in our own domestic waters, despite his Government backing a conditional moratorium in international waters?

Rt Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: I absolutely endorse the decision taken by the select committee to hold an inquiry on those matters so that we can make sure that all of the issues and the potential ramifications of decisions in this space are properly canvassed.

Debbie Ngarewa-Packer: What is his response to the more than 20 hapū, iwi, and environmental NGOs who have sent him an open letter, and the 40,000 who signed a petition calling on him to support my member’s bill and ban seabed mining?

Rt Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: I would encourage them to channel their energies and efforts into submitting to the select committee.

Debbie Ngarewa-Packer: Why is he kicking the can on seabed mining to a select committee inquiry when seabed mining applications have been rejected by the High Court, the Court of Appeal, and the Supreme Court?

Rt Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: I think the select committee inquiry is a good way to canvass all of the relevant issues, including all of the consequences of potential decisions that we could take in this space.

Debbie Ngarewa-Packer: How can you refuse to support this bill to enable it to be debated at select committee when seabed mining has been consistently rejected by all the courts in Aotearoa, by tangata whenua, coastal communities, environmental groups, farmers, fishing interests, and the public at large?

Rt Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: Because I think the select committee inquiry is actually a good way of dealing with those issues.

Christopher Luxon: Isn’t the real reason he won’t deliver tax relief and is considering a capital gains tax and an inheritance tax and a wealth tax because his Government is totally addicted to spending and taxpayers are paying the price of that addiction?

Rt Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: The member is just making things up. In fact, I have specifically—

SPEAKER: The Prime Minister well knows he cannot make that sort of statement about any member. I will say that the question—for which I counted at least five assertions and three legs—is probably going to generate such a response. I think we’ll leave it there, eh.

Christopher Luxon: Is it the case that he wants a capital gains tax but he won’t tell the public, or is it that his Ministers want a capital gains tax but he won’t tell them no?

Rt Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: It is the case that I have made a commitment to honour the commitments we made in 2020 at the general election, because, unlike the previous Government, we won’t say we won’t do something before an election only to do it after the election, as they did when they specifically ruled out increasing GST and then went ahead and did it anyway.

Christopher Luxon: So will he rule out a capital gains tax while he’s Prime Minister?

Rt Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: The member needs to get some new material. He asked me this question yesterday, and I’ll give him exactly the same answer, which is our tax policy will be very clear before the election.

Question No. 5—Housing (Māori Housing)

5. SORAYA PEKE-MASON (Labour) to the Associate Minister of Housing (Māori Housing): What progress has the Government made towards delivery of housing for Māori?

Hon WILLIE JACKSON (Associate Minister of Housing (Māori Housing)): When we came into Government, the housing challenges whānau Māori were facing were incredibly significant. As a Government, we took action and we set ambitious goals. So I am proud to stand here today and advise the House that we are delivering. Through the Whai Kāinga Whai Oranga programme, we have contracted and approved 1,018 homes for delivery, and at the end of March 2023, of the 1,000 homes to be delivered, we have approved and commenced building 1,018. Of the 700 homes for repairs and maintenance, we have approved and delivered up to 415 across the motu, and of the 2,700 sites requiring infrastructure support, we have approved up to 1,615.

Soraya Peke-Mason: How does partnership with Māori provide better housing outcomes for whānau?

Hon WILLIE JACKSON: Partnership is always incredibly important, as the House knows, and this Government has heard loud and clear that iwi, hapū, and other Māori entities are in a position to drive locally led solutions. All that is needed from central government is to enable this shift to occur. The value of the partnerships with Māori is driven by the Government acknowledging that it cannot achieve these housing outcomes on its own. Through testing one of the pathways with iwi-led prototypes, we can drive better housing outcomes for whānau. We can do this through delivering Māori housing to a scale and at a pace that has never been achieved before and taking a by Māori, for Māori approach to support and enable iwi and Māori to succeed through partnership and co-design.

Soraya Peke-Mason: How are these homes creating transformational change for whānau?

Hon WILLIE JACKSON: Increasing the number of affordable housing for whānau Māori will also support other indicators of whānau wellbeing, including proximity to their marae and, for many returning to their ancestral whenua, the chance to reconnect with wider whānau. In Te Tairāwhiti, through Whai Kāinga Whai Oranga, iwi are prototyping a rent-to-own housing delivery model on whenua Māori at pace and scale. The key to their housing programme is that whānau who will receive their new-build homes must undertake a housing literacy course to learn how to look after their home, commit and attend a te reo Māori course, and commit to support marae and community events. In this approach, the housing delivery is a key piece that drives transformational change for whānau.

Soraya Peke-Mason: How is the Government’s investment in the delivery of Māori housing supporting efforts to respond to recent weather events?

Hon WILLIE JACKSON: Through established place-based partnerships and funding provided by Whai Kāinga Whai Oranga, Kānoa, and iwi-funding relationships, iwi have been able to drive a quick response to the recent weather events. In 2022, Toitu Tairawhiti Housing Limited and Kānoa built a construction facility in Gisborne, through a joint venture with an established off-site manufacturing firm, to accelerate the delivery of housing in Gisborne and the wider East Coast. When the recent extreme weather hit, the construction facility, supported by the Gisborne community, was in a ready position to build temporary cabins for displaced whānau quickly. That site is now building at pace and starting to transport cabins to various sites. The Māori housing strategy is just going so well, and I want to compliment all our Ministers, and particularly Minister Megan Woods, who’s been leading it for us. Kia ora.

Question No. 6—Finance

6. NICOLA WILLIS (Deputy Leader—National) to the Minister of Finance: Does he stand by all of his statements and actions on tax?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Minister of Finance): Yes, in the context in which they were made and undertaken.

Nicola Willis: Has he considered that a responsible, non-inflationary way to provide working Kiwis tax reduction would be to pay for it by stopping wasteful Government spending?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: We are always taking a look at how we can reprioritise and save money, and the Prime Minister’s already given a number of examples of that to this point. It is always important when looking at the balance of a Budget to be able to say how you’ll pay for the things that you want to do.

Nicola Willis: Why won’t he reduce spending on consultants, comms advisers, and pet projects to allow New Zealanders to keep more of what they earn?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: Well, it’s interesting the member raises that, because while I—and we’ve already stated in the House that we do want to see spending on consultants and contractors come down. The member needs to answer a fairly basic mathematical question: how it is that the $400 million she has identified, which has already now been used to pay for two National policies, will somehow or other fund ongoing costs of billions of dollars of tax cuts. It doesn’t add up.

Nicola Willis: When he rules out significant tax reduction in this Budget, does he consider that inflation adjusting tax thresholds or introducing a tax-free threshold would be significant?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: The Prime Minister has indicated in his pre-Budget speech that the Budget will not contain major tax reform. In any Budget, it is important to make sure that the numbers do add up, that you can explain how you pay for things—and on this side of the House, we make sure that we can do that. All parties at the election will be judged on whether they can do that.

Nicola Willis: Can he explain why he is struggling to understand how the Government could deliver $1.8 billion of tax relief, yet he very happily found more than $9 billion in last year’s Budget to add to the operating allowance?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: Firstly, tax cuts, and the tax cuts that the member is promoting, will be ongoing. They are always there; they are baked in. On this side of the House, we have continued to prioritise investment into health, investment into housing, investment into education, investment into supporting our lowest-income New Zealanders. This is not some zero-sum game for the member. If the member wants to propose those tax cuts, she has to explain what programmes will be cut.

Nicola Willis: Why is it that under his reign as finance Minister, the Government is spending $52 billion more every year—a 69 percent increase—and yet we still have deteriorating results in our health services, our education services, and a ram raid every day?

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON: The Government is extremely proud of the record that we have had in making sure that unemployment is at record low levels. We have been fiscally responsible to the point that our debt levels continue to be among the lowest with countries that we compare ourselves to. Through this period of time that we’ve been in Government, we’ve also had to deal with the COVID pandemic, a period of time where we did spend money to make sure that New Zealanders stayed alive and to make sure that New Zealanders stayed in their jobs. During that period of time, the National Party constantly called for us to spend more money during that period of time. I’m proud of what we have done through difficult times, and we will continue to support New Zealanders through difficult times.

Question No. 7—Foreign Affairs

7. IBRAHIM OMER (Labour) to the Minister of Foreign Affairs: How does the early entry into force of the free-trade agreement between New Zealand and the United Kingdom build on the enduring relationship between the UK and New Zealand?

Hon NANAIA MAHUTA (Minister of Foreign Affairs): There’s significant positive momentum across the relationship between New Zealand and the United Kingdom. This includes trade and economic cooperation, people-to-people exchanges, progress in science and technology, collaboration in defence and security, joint efforts in addressing climate change, and engagement in the Pacific region. New Zealand continues to pursue the important benefits of the global free-trade agenda, especially in the face of changes such as rising cost of living, protectionist tendencies, and vulnerabilities in supply chains. The early entry into force of the UK free-trade agreement (FTA) on 31 May is welcomed, and we want to ensure that New Zealanders are fully capable and able to capitalise on the opportunities of the agreement.

Ibrahim Omer: How does this agreement contribute to New Zealand’s resilience and growth?

Hon NANAIA MAHUTA: We know that one in four New Zealanders’ jobs depend on trade, which are enhanced by strong bilateral relationships. This gold standard FTA between New Zealand and the UK will support economic recovery and growth. Notably, it will continue to reinforce an already strong relationship by expanding market access, boosting goods exports, generating GDP growth, reducing costs for exporters, and creating job opportunities. The FTA provides a framework for enhanced relations that are positive for New Zealand exporters and economic growth as we navigate the years ahead.

Ibrahim Omer: What are the environmental commitments included in the agreement, and their significance?

Hon NANAIA MAHUTA: One of the reasons why we refer to the UK FTA as gold standard is the significance of the environmental commitments and the importance of balancing economic development with environmental protection. In doing so, New Zealand and the UK demonstrate a mutual commitment to sustainable trade practices and their responsibility to address global environmental challenges. The inclusion of these commitments reflects a broader shift towards more environmentally conscious trade agreements. It sets positive examples for future trade relationships. It’s evidenced with New Zealand achieving a number one ranking in last year’s Sustainable Trade Index.

Ibrahim Omer: How does the agreement strengthen the relationship between Māori and the British Crown?

Hon NANAIA MAHUTA: There is an indigenous chapter in this particular agreement, and it’s the first of its kind. It’s called the Māori Trade and Economic Cooperation chapter. It acknowledges the unique relationship between Māori and the British Crown and provides a framework for cooperation that respects and recognises Māori interests. It ensures that Māori perspectives, culture, and economic aspirations are considered in the context of the trade agreement, promoting inclusivity, and recognising the importance of indigenous rights and partnerships in international trade. This is groundbreaking, to secure indigenous recognition in an FTA. We will continue to learn, prosper from, and innovate this approach.

Question No. 8—Education

8. ERICA STANFORD (National—East Coast Bays) to the Minister of Education: Why didn’t she at the earliest possible opportunity correct her answer on 22 February where she stated, “I can categorically tell that member that the Ministry of Education is responsible for the data. I have no say over that”, given she stated yesterday that “my staff verbally informed me after question time on 22 February that members of my staff had been in correspondence with the Ministry of Education regarding the timing of term 3 attendance data release”, and why did her staff ask the ministry to release the attendance data after her attendance announcement?

Hon JAN TINETTI (Minister of Education): To the first part of the question, because even with that knowledge, I stood by my answers in the House on 22 February that attendance is the responsibility of the Ministry of Education. I did not sign out the data or approve the release date. To the second part of the question, a key purpose of why the Government has increased the frequency of attendance data reporting is to raise awareness about the importance of attendance. It wouldn’t have been uncommon for the ministry, in consultation with their Minister’s office, to time the release to be able to promote a positive message about this turning around.

Hon Michael Woodhouse: Point of order. Thank you, Mr Speaker. In relation to the second part of the primary question, the Minister gave an interesting commentary about the importance of attendance data, but did not address the question about why her staff asked the ministry to release the data when it did.

Hon Grant Robertson: Speaking to the point of order, Mr Speaker—I mean, I’d hesitate to say something which is in your domain. But the full answer—while the member quoted the second part of the Minister’s answer, she definitely addressed the question in the final part of the answer.

SPEAKER: I’m not sure that the Minister has, so I’m going to give Erica Stanford two extra questions.

Erica Stanford: Thank you, Mr Speaker. In relation to the first part of the answer she just gave, does she understand that she is responsible for the actions of the staff in her office, and when they informed her that they had, in fact, been involved in the timing of the release of the data, why did she not immediately come down to the House and correct her answer?

Hon JAN TINETTI: I stand by the first part of my answer, which is that even with the knowledge, I stood by my answers in the House on 22 February. That attendance data is the responsibility of the Ministry of Education. I did not sign out the data or approve the release date.

Erica Stanford: Point of order, Mr Speaker. My question was around does she understand that she is responsible for the actions of her staff, and, if so, why didn’t she correct her answer—and none of that was addressed.

Hon Grant Robertson: Speaking to the point of order, Mr Speaker. Questions framed with does somebody understand something are very, very open, and the member gave an answer about her understanding.

SPEAKER: I don’t think I can help the member any more than the two extra questions that I’ve given. It’s the way, you know, you—I suggest asking a question that has just one leg to it—one part.

Erica Stanford: Is the Minister of Education responsible for the actions of her staff when they emailed the Ministry of Education to delay the release of the attendance data?

Hon JAN TINETTI: I do take responsibility for the actions of my staff.

Erica Stanford: In light of that answer, why is it that the Minister of Education, being responsible for the actions of her staff, did not come down to the House and correct the answer to her question when they told her that they had, in fact, been involved in the release of the data?

Hon JAN TINETTI: Because at the time, I felt that my answer still stood and was correct.

Erica Stanford: Wasn’t her announcement yesterday, asking the Ministry of Education to produce a schedule of when attendance data would be released, a way of her directing blame to the Ministry of Education when emails show it was her office that determined the release date of the term 3 data to coincide with her political announcement?

Hon JAN TINETTI: No.

Erica Stanford: Why, then, is she now calling for a release of the timetable from the Ministry of Education when a timetable was already provided to her on 4 November, which clearly sets out the dates for release of attendance data for terms 3, 4, and 1?

Hon JAN TINETTI: I have asked the Ministry of Education to consider putting those dates on to the website.

Erica Stanford: Point of order, Mr Speaker. I seek leave to table a briefing from 4 November, released to me under the Official Information Act, from the Ministry of Education containing that schedule of release dates.

SPEAKER: Leave is sought for that purpose. Is there any objection? There appears to be none. It may be tabled.

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

Erica Stanford: Whose authority were her staff acting on when they sent an email on 9 February to the Ministry of Education, stating that “FYI, The Minister’s office are looking to potentially release the Term 3 attendance data early next week.”, when the Ministry of Education schedule from 4 November was clear about when they wanted to release the data prior to the new year?

Hon JAN TINETTI: I was unaware of that email when I came to the House on 22 February.

Erica Stanford: Point of order, Mr Speaker. I don’t believe that my question was addressed around whose authority they were acting under.

Hon JAN TINETTI: I don’t know. [Interruption]

SPEAKER: You’re lucky I wasn’t on my feet. Well, it’s now answered. Have you got any more supplementaries? Thank you

Question No. 9—Police

9. VANUSHI WALTERS (Labour—Upper Harbour) to the Minister of Police: What progress has been made on ensuring Police constabulary staff is more representative of New Zealand’s population?

Hon GINNY ANDERSEN (Minister of Police): I was incredibly proud to attend last week’s graduation of Police Wing 365, which marks the significant milestone of 1,000 policewomen added to our police service since 2017. The number of front-line women has increased almost threefold, as fast as overall numbers, since we came to office. This is a fantastic achievement. As well as being committed to delivering 1,800 more police, we’ve been committed to ensuring our front line is more representative of the community it serves. This has meant a total increase of 57 percent front-line women.

Vanushi Walters: What other improvements have been made to ensure our front line better represents our communities?

Hon GINNY ANDERSEN: It’s not just an increase in policewomen that is helping our front line better represent the communities they serve; there’s also been significant growth in ethnic diversity in our police service as well. Since 2017, the number of sworn Māori policewomen has grown by 39 percent; Pasifika, 77 percent; and the number of Asian policewomen has grown by 152 percent. Diversity on our front line is not only a “nice-to-have”; it is a must. We know our communities respond better when they see themselves in their police service.

Vanushi Walters: How are policewomen represented across the organisation?

Hon GINNY ANDERSEN: It’s not just in new female recruits that are graduating that it’s improving; the representation continues. There has been an increase in policewomen right across the ranks. The number of policewomen holding the rank of senior and senior sergeant is now just over 350, representing a near 50 percent increase. There’s also been a doubling of policewomen holding the rank of inspector or higher, and in the highest levels, including the Governor-General’s recent appointment last month of Tania Kura to the role of statutory deputy commissioner, the highest rank ever held by a policewoman in the history of our police service.

Vanushi Walters: How is the Government ensuring the police front line represents the growth in New Zealand’s population?

Hon GINNY ANDERSEN: As well as being representative of the diversity of our communities, it’s also important the police service is represented by the size of our population. Our commitment to 1,800 additional police officers is vital to ensure that we have a police service that is large enough and growing to keep our population safe. When we came into Government in 2017, there was one police officer for every 548 New Zealanders. Five years later, we have more police in our communities, and there is one police officer for every 488 New Zealanders. That’s a significant improvement. More front-line capability means police have the ability to respond and to resolve crime.

Question No. 10—Education

10. TEANAU TUIONO (Green) to the Minister of Education: Noa’ia ‘e mạuri. Does she consider the Government has done enough to address the concerns of teachers striking today?

Hon JAN TINETTI (Minister of Education): This Government values the important contribution our teachers make, and we are working with the sector to address their concerns and lift the educational outcomes of our students. Following facilitated bargaining earlier this week, the Ministry of Education has made an offer for the secondary teachers’ collective agreement. Detailed information on the nature of the offer is available on the Ministry of Education website. I understand that the Post Primary Teachers’ Association (PPTA) executive are currently considering the offer, and that facilitated bargaining will resume if the offer is not accepted. Now, I’m not going to get ahead of those processes, and, therefore, do not believe it is in the public interest for me to pass judgment on whether the offer addressed the concerns raised in bargaining. For the area schools’ collective agreement, as I am not party to the bargaining, I cannot comment on the specifics of negotiations.

Teanau Tuiono: Does she agree with principals and teachers striking today that there is an urgent staffing crisis in teaching, with schools unable to recruit new positions?

Hon JAN TINETTI: I am advised that retention rates on the teaching workforce are broadly in line with historical retention rates of around 87 to 88 percent. There has, however, been an increased level of movement within the profession, rather than a net loss of teachers to the overall system. I do know that it is harder in some subjects, such as science, technology, engineering, and mathematics subjects, and in different locations, to recruit teachers into those areas. That is why we put a $24 million package in place in September last year to address those shortages.

Teanau Tuiono: How does she respond to the PPTA staffing survey, which found that, on average, one in every four schools cancelled classes, and one in every two schools had to transfer courses or classes because of the teacher shortage?

Hon JAN TINETTI: I really very much welcome that survey, along with other data that we are collecting in this area. It does help inform where the pressure points are and helps inform our response to that, so that we can get this right. Our teachers are important. It is important that we do support them. It’s also important that they are supported to enable our young people to thrive.

Teanau Tuiono: Does she believe that it’s acceptable that some secondary school teachers are picking up second jobs on evenings and weekends to keep up with paying the bills, because their salaries haven’t increased in line with inflation?

Hon JAN TINETTI: To the first part of that question, no, I don’t think it’s acceptable that teachers are picking up second jobs because they are under so much pressure. Having said that, that is why I’m so adamant that we need to get to a settlement soon so that we are getting money in the pockets of our teachers, but also the conditions are being well sorted for them.

Teanau Tuiono: Does she acknowledge that area schools are facing particular difficulties recruiting staff, and, if so, what steps will she take to ensure that teachers in our rural communities are recognised for the work that they do?

Hon JAN TINETTI: Area schools form a unique part of the New Zealand education system, and it’s one that many of us—I would imagine all of us—in this House value in a great way, because of the rural communities that they tend to serve, but also the special nature of the communities that they serve as well. That is why bargaining is continuing at this point in time, and I am looking forward to, hopefully, getting bargaining settled very soon to make certain that we get the conditions right for those teachers.

Teanau Tuiono: Does the Minister accept that the teacher shortage crisis is directly related to teachers’ pay and conditions?

Hon JAN TINETTI: It’s a lot more complex than that.

Question No. 11—Broadcasting and Media

11. MELISSA LEE (National) to the Minister for Broadcasting and Media: Does he stand by all of the Government’s statements and actions on New Zealand’s broadcasting and media sector?

Hon WILLIE JACKSON (Minister for Broadcasting and Media): Yes, absolutely.

Melissa Lee: Does the Minister agree with the comments of his Cabinet colleague the Hon Kiri Allan that “There is something within the organisation that will not and has not been able to keep Māori talent and that is a question that I think deserves some deep reflection.” in relation to RNZ?

Hon WILLIE JACKSON: Minister Allan’s comments were made in a private capacity. I won’t be commenting further on that. I’ve said before that I’m backing RNZ to deliver for New Zealand audiences, and what they do is entirely up to them. They are an independent Crown entity.

Melissa Lee: Is the failure by RNZ to release the full transcript of the comments by the Hon Kiri Allan, combined with the Minister’s office delaying an answer to an Official Information Act request by my office, a sign that “the most open, the most transparent Government that New Zealand has ever had” simply cannot handle the reality that it is interfering in the future of New Zealand’s public broadcasters?

Hon WILLIE JACKSON: No, and I support RNZ’s right to make their own decisions.

Melissa Lee: Does this issue and the Ombudsman’s recent censure of the Minister in his Māori development portfolio that he is acting “contrary to law” mean there is a pattern of behaviour in this Government against releasing official information in the public interest?

Hon WILLIE JACKSON: No, and that was a stupid question.

SPEAKER: I’ll give the member an extra question.

Melissa Lee: Thank you. Was there correspondence between his office and the office of the Hon Kiri Allan relating to the RNZ farewell transcript; if so, what was the nature of this?

Hon WILLIE JACKSON: No correspondence whatsoever.

Question No. 12—Environment

12. MARK CAMERON (ACT) to the Minister for the Environment: How many farms utilised intensive winter grazing practices in 2022 on land with a slope of over 10 degrees, and what percentage of those farms, if any, are currently compliant with intensive winter grazing regulations?

Hon DAVID PARKER (Minister for the Environment): Intensive winter grazing done poorly can result in many tonnes of sediment per hectare polluting waterways each year. An increase from a 10-degree slope to 15 degrees roughly doubles the sediment loss; an increase to 20 degrees triples it. I don’t have the number or percentage of farms conducting intensive winter grazing on slopes greater than 10 degrees, but I have been informed that farmers are increasingly avoiding slopes greater than 10 degrees. This has been confirmed to me by councils, farmers themselves, and media articles in Farmers Weekly. Regional councils are responsible for assessing compliance with the intensive winter grazing rules. I am, though, advised that those practices are improving as farmers change their practices to meet the permitted activity pathway. Councils and sector groups are working with farmers to continue this trend.

David Seymour: Point of order, Mr Speaker. This is a question on notice about some very specific information the Minister’s had hours to find out. He says he doesn’t have it, but I think the House deserves an explanation of why the Minister was unable to get this information. He hasn’t actually said that.

SPEAKER: That’s the purpose of supplementary questions.

Mark Cameron: Can the Minister confirm that since 2021, his department has spent more than $7 million of taxpayer money to employ 12 FTEs—fulltime-equivalent employees—on freshwater farm plan regulations, yet it is still not complete; if not, why not?

Hon DAVID PARKER: Off the cuff, I can’t confirm or deny the exact number. It is correct that the farming sector, in order to avoid evermore prescriptive regulations controlling inappropriate practice, desired the development of farm environment plans, particularly freshwater farm plans. The Government has been advancing that in cooperation with regional councils and industry leader groups.

Mark Cameron: What would he say to farmers who, without freshwater farm plans, had to fork out an estimated average cost of $3,000 to obtain a resource consent in order to comply with intensive winter grazing standards during a time of near record high farm inflation?

Hon DAVID PARKER: I would say that when the member asked me a question on 1 September 2022; he asked me if I was concerned that there were going to be an estimated 10,000 resource consents necessary. I can advise the member that, so far, 311 have been applied for.

Mark Cameron: After backtracking on sowing dates and pugging depth regulations, will the Minister now also consider backtracking on intensive winter grazing slope requirements, or is he going to continue with these requirements, knowing that many farmers cannot be compliant with those?

Hon DAVID PARKER: In work that was coordinated with industry groups including Beef + Lamb, Federated Farmers, DairyNZ, plus the relevant regional councils, we did change the sowing date and pugging rule so as to make it more practical. I call that progress. In respect of the limitation on slope: no. As I’ve said, if we were to make it a permitted activity to have it at higher slopes, we would be doubling or tripling the loss of sediment, or could be, per hectare.

Appointments

Assistant Speaker

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Leader of the House): I seek leave to set aside Standing Order 29 and to appoint the Hon Poto Williams as Assistant Speaker until the end of Thursday, 11 May 2023.

SPEAKER: Is there any objection to that course of action being followed? There is none.

Standing Orders

Sessional

Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Leader of the House): According to a determination of the Business Committee, I move, That Standing Orders 148 and 150 be suspended and the following rule adopted:

Procedure for personal vote

(1) In a personal vote,—

(a) the bells are rung for the period set out in Standing Order 149:

(b) the Speaker directs the Ayes to go to the right, the Noes to the left, and abstentions to the Table:

(c) the doors are closed and locked as soon after the bells have stopped as the Speaker directs, and the Speaker then restates the question:

(d) all members present within the Chamber or the lobbies when the doors are locked must vote or record their abstentions:

(e) the Clerk counts all votes and abstentions and records members’ names:

(f) the Speaker declares the result to the House.

(2) Members may observe the voting in any part of the Chamber and in the lobbies.

Motion agreed to.

General Debate

General Debate

Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS (Minister of Housing): I move, That the House take note of miscellaneous business.

I love me a movie trilogy. The classics are all there: The Godfather parts I, II, and III; the original Star Wars trilogy—you can’t beat it—Back to the Future I, II, and III, a personal favourite. But where the wheels always come off is when they try and squeeze out that fourth part of the franchise, and that’s what we’re seeing from the Opposition benches: Back to the Future Part IV, starring the protagonists: gloomy Christopher Luxon and his sidekick, negative Nicola Willis. Here they are, set—intent—to take us backwards; back to a dystopic future where benefits are cut and frozen; where the winter energy payment is scrapped; where there are cuts to health; where there are cuts to education; where, once again, social housing is gutted and flogged off; where, once again, minimum wages are frozen and workers go backwards. This is the plot line of Back to the Future IV. What we have is central characters that constantly talk down New Zealand. They talk down our economy and they talk down the work of hard-working Kiwis in the process.

In the opening scene of this fourth part of Back to the Future, it starts with gloomy Christopher Luxon jetting off to London, and what does he do there? He goes there and he starts attacking New Zealand businesses. He calls them soft, says that they’re the reason that New Zealand can’t get ahead, and continues to bag New Zealand. From there, this movie, the plot line is set: that we have a constant line of negativity, a world where 60 percent of their social media posts are all negative. Imagine such a dystopic world, if you would.

One thing is very clear: the central theme within the plot that we have here is there are no new ideas and their only policy is to undo all the progress that has been made in the previous episodes of this franchise. This is something more of a horror movie, so I was considering whether this was more the fourth part of the Blade trilogy, given the number of cuts that were going to be there. But it also occurred to me it could be part of the Mission Impossible trilogy, the fourth one, because in this plot line the central protagonists, gloomy Christopher and negative Nicola, seek to spend $400 million over and over and over again. They tell us that it can fund every idea that they don’t have. This is something akin to the magic porridge pot.

Over on this side of the House, instead what we have is a Government that is seeking that third series, that third trilogy—always the best in a trilogy, in my mind—where we have the central character, a Chris Hipkins - led, Labour-led Government that will continue to make progress in New Zealand, continue to invest in New Zealand, continue to undo the damage and deliver for New Zealanders. On this side of the House, the protagonists know that many New Zealanders are doing it tough, but they are doing their best to keep costs down, and the Government is on their side. That, I think, is the episode that New Zealanders will be voting for when it comes to October.

I just want to look in a little detail at some of the policy we’ve had from the National Party in recent times. One was kicking tenants out of their houses as a way to cure homelessness. Their housing spokesperson, Chris Bishop, told us that he’d been advised from organisations working with the homeless that this was a good idea. There has been intensive research to find out which organisation—he won’t tell us. So I’m going to suggest it is the homelessness organisation that is caring for Michael Woodhouse’s homeless man from the last election.

Hon NANAIA MAHUTA (Minister of Foreign Affairs): We started with movie themes, so let me just take a song from the King himself “There’s so much trouble in the world.” There are so many challenges facing Kiwis at the moment, and the Government has not lost sight that in challenging times, we need certainty. We need a focus on the things that matter and we need decisive leadership.

In particular, I want to acknowledge the regions and communities affected by the most recent bout of heavy rain and, in particular, the Whangārei region, the local boys’ high school, and to the whānau who have lost their dear loved one. Our sympathy from this House is with you at this sad time.

It’s important for our Government to continue to tackle the issues impacting on the lives and livelihoods of whānau and their communities around the country. On the economy, we remain ambitious for the country to pursue free-trade agreements (FTAs) like that of the EU and UK FTA, which will deliver increased benefits to our exporters, strengthen the resilience of our economy, continue to build the credibility of what we send to market, and sustain jobs for our people here in Aotearoa New Zealand.

In housing, Labour has delivered nearly 12,000 State homes since October 2017. We’ve got a plan to make sure every New Zealander has a warm, dry, safe place to call home, whether they rent or own. The plan we’re implementing is about cutting red tape, funding housing infrastructure to get land built faster, investing in new public and transitional housing, and working intensively with local councils and iwi to make that happen and make it real for their communities. There’s no quick fix to the housing crisis, but we’re pulling every lever we can and we’re starting to see cut-through that will benefit people now, immediately, and ensure a more secure future.

It’s tough for many kaumātua heading into winter right now, and the winter energy payment will make a huge difference. We’re doing our bit to keep costs down, to bring inflation down, and we have a plan to get New Zealand back on course. We understand just how important it is to invest in education—and to continue to lift the minimum wage, which currently sits at $21.20 an hour—with targeted trades training and all apprenticeships are free, with more than 215,000 people upskilled. We continue to take action so more families can get a fairer deal at the supermarket as we ensure kai is more affordable. We’ve introduced the Families Package and the biggest boost to household income in a decade for thousands of whānau who previously were making choices between household bills and kai.

And what do we hear from the other side? What do we hear? Negativity. Christopher Luxon and the National Party are relentlessly—relentlessly—negative. In fact, it’s like a record playing scratchy again and again and again. They’re constantly talking down New Zealand, constantly talking down our economy, constantly talking down our education system, constantly talking down our health system. We need to know that actually they have a plan, but we don’t hear it because all we hear is negativity. It’s just not going to happen.

On housing, National would make it easier for families living in rental properties to be shown the door. National wants landlords to be able to once again terminate renters’ tenancies without giving a reason, reversing Labour’s policy that balanced the rights of renters and landlords. There are a number of legitimate reasons to end a tenancy and the rights of landlords are protected to terminate a tenancy under a range of justifiable reasons, not willy-nilly as the Opposition would have it. This includes where a tenant has engaged in anti-social or illegal behaviour, or is at least three weeks in rent arrears. That’s pretty fair and it’s protected under the Residential Tenancies Act, and it’s fair for a tenant to know why their tenancy is ending and have the opportunity to dispute it. We know that there are plenty of great landlords offering excellent rental accommodation—come on, National, have a heart for those struggling to find a rental—and we want to ensure that responsible landlords are cared for too.

Every day, we hear nothing from Christopher Luxon except a long string of complaints and twice as long from his deputy, Nicola Willis. In April, more than 60 percent of National’s online posts were negative, attacking others. No solution. Every day in the media and in Parliament, they are relentlessly negative. So we need to ensure that we continue to remain focused on the things that matter, to help whānau make ends meet and to get ahead, and we know that there is more to do. We’re going to get on with tackling the issues that matter to people on a day-to-day basis and give people a greater sense of dignity and security in this difficult time.

CHRIS BISHOP (National): Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. Well, Megan Woods is meant to be the Minister of energy. That was about the most low-energy speech I’ve ever seen to lead off the general debate from the Labour Party. Her heart wasn’t in it, and you can see the fire in their eyes going out.

As the weeks go by, you can see the energy dimming. You can see that they are staring at 14 October and wondering what is going to happen, and they know in their heart of hearts that the Government’s time in office is coming to an end. The reason they know that is because they are falling apart. You can see the tension in their eyes and you can feel it in the Chamber.

The Government started this term with 65 votes, and they’re now down to 62. Add on the Greens: they started with 10, and they’re now down to nine because Elizabeth Kerekere has defected.

And what a week Chris Hipkins has had. He got on a plane to London and he probably sat back in his business class seat, turned off his phone, and said, “I might watch a movie and just relax a bit. I’ve got a long way to the King’s coronation.” He would have hopped off that plane at Heathrow, taken the old phone off flight mode, and his phone would have just bounced around the cockpit, because it would’ve gone bzzt-bzzt, bzzt-bzzt. He had the chief whip on the line: “Please call immediately.” He’d have had his chief of staff on the line: “Must talk immediately. Something’s happened.” He’d have Willie Jackson: “Boss, please call. Something’s gone wrong.” He’d have all of his MPs calling.

I’ll tell you who didn’t call. I’ll tell you who there was no missed call from on his phone when he took it off flight mode after landing: no missed call from the Hon Meka Whaitiri to explain to him, as Prime Minister, why she was leaving the Labour Party and defecting—as it turned out, a little bit by accident to the Speaker and to the public—to the Māori Party. We’re still yet to get the call. We’re all actually a bit none the wiser, and they’re yet to have a conversation.

Then we get to the events surrounding the Hon Kiri Allan, who decided that it was acceptable to turn up to a Radio New Zealand private function and make remarks criticising Radio New Zealand. We are yet to know exactly what she said because Radio New Zealand won’t release the transcript of what she said, and we heard that Willie Jackson’s defence of that in the House this afternoon was to say that it was a private function. Well, Ministers are always Ministers, and for the Minister to turn up and say that it’s acceptable to not release that is wrong.

This Government is a shambles. Whether it’s Meka Whaitiri, whether it’s Kiri Allan, whether it’s Elizabeth Kerekere, whether it’s Marama Davidson, the incompetent Minister of homelessness who can’t actually get money out the door to help homelessness—and we’ve all forgotten about the Hon Stuart Nash, who, of course, was thrown out of the Cabinet in disgrace only a few weeks ago.

I think Chris Hipkins is on to his sixth or seventh or eighth Cabinet reshuffle in about the eight weeks he’s been Prime Minister. We’ve now got the Hon Jo Luxton, who’s been pushed up into the ministry. Glen Bennett will soon be a Minister—the guy who’s no longer going to be the MP for New Plymouth. Tangi Utikere is sitting there as the whip. He’s awaiting his turn to enter the ministry.

What is happening is the Government is falling apart, and we’ve made it really clear in National today that the coalition of chaos that would ensue from a Labour - Greens - Māori Party Government will not take the country forward. The Māori Party believe in having a separate Māori Parliament, in having a parallel criminal justice system, and in stopping full and final Treaty settlements. They don’t believe in having one person, one vote. They don’t believe in that basic Kiwi value of equal suffrage—of one person, one vote—and equal citizenship, and today’s Māori Party is not the Māori Party of Tariana Turia and Tā Pita Sharples. They are different. We cannot work with them in Opposition.

So as the Government falls apart, as the Government loses Ministers and MPs, and as the Government descends into chaos, we are making it really clear for New Zealanders the choice. A vote for the Māori Party is a vote for three more years of chaos; it’s a vote for Labour, the Greens, and the Māori Party. Only a strong party vote for National can change this country and get it back on track.

Hon KIERAN McANULTY (Minister for Emergency Management): Thank you, Mr Speaker, as I wait for the smattering of claps after that appalling speech—a shocking speech, actually. If that is the future of National Party, I don’t think this side of the House has anything to worry about. No wonder that member lost his seat. What a shocker!

He had five minutes to outline to the country what his party is going to do for New Zealand, and he didn’t give us jack. He didn’t give us one little bit of policy. He can’t dispute that; we all listened to the speech. It is a fact. Not one policy, not one indication of what they want to do for New Zealand. All they did was prove the point that the Hon Megan Woods and the Hon Nanaia Mahuta said in their contributions: that they are utterly negative. All they do is bring people down, and try and drag the reputation of the country down to try and bring the mood of the country down, so that people will think “Maybe it is time for a change.”

Well, the question is: a change to what? A change to a party that’s platform is simply to roll back what this Government is doing—

Hon Mark Mitchell: Absolutely.

Hon KIERAN McANULTY: —to roll back the support for workers, to roll back—and Mr Mark Mitchell, who hasn’t done a successful point of order in the five years that I’ve been in Parliament, says, “absolutely”, confirming the point that I’m making: that they do not stand for workers. They do not stand for small businesses. They do not stand for rural communities. Everything that this Government has done for the betterment of this country, Mr Mark Mitchell has confirmed—on behalf of his party—that they will roll it back.

There are workers in this country—minimum wage workers—who are $250 a week better off because of this Government. Every single time we brought in a measure to look after workers, they voted against it. There are sole parents in this country who are nearly $200 better off a week, and they voted against it. They voted against the winter energy payment, which elderly people in this country are fully dependent on to keep them warm in the winter, and they have ruled out confirming it to the country. So make no mistake, the ACT Party are going to get rid of it. Any future Government that involves the ACT Party is going to get rid of the winter energy payment, and the National Party have refused to commit to it. So every person that is dependent on the pension in this country will know that a vote for National or ACT will mean a reduction in what they receive. It is only a matter of a couple of weeks after that—

Andrew Bayly: They will get a tax cut.

Hon KIERAN McANULTY: They are saying that you will get a tax cut. Yeah, 100 bucks a week—sorry, 100 bucks a year. A hundred dollars a year: $2 a week—$2 a week. Andrew Bayly paints himself as the saviour to senior citizens. Just because he is one, doesn’t mean he’s their saviour. Two dollars a week will mean nothing, and it is certainly nothing compared to what this Government has done for our most vulnerable people in this country.

Instead, they want to scaremonger. They want to start division in this country by talking about “one person, one vote”. Well, I have got one question. Their leader owns property in Auckland and Wellington, and at the last local body elections got more than one vote. How is that one person, one vote? Do they care about it? No. Do they want to scaremonger because it involves Māori? Absolutely.

So let’s just roll into what it is that they’re actually trying to talk about, and the affordable water reforms is a perfect example. For 4½ years, they have scaremongered, they have whinged, and they have moaned. They have said it’s asset theft. They have said all sorts of stuff. They finally come up with a policy, and what is it? The status quo.

Four years of whingeing and they come up with the status quo, completely ignoring the fact that this country needs to find $185 billion. Completely ignoring the fact that councils have said they can’t do it by themselves, and completely ignoring the fact that there is clear evidence to show that unless we reform this fundamentally, ratepayers, especially those in small rural councils, will face bills that they cannot afford. But have you noticed one thing? They are not talking about that because they know they can’t win that argument. In fact, they know they have lost. Every single time I’ve asked them to produce their numbers, they’ve gone quiet.

What do they talk about? Racial division, and scaremongering about Māori, and scaremongering and redefining what commitments the Crown made in Te Tiriti o Waitangi; ignoring the truth. Just because something is inconvenient doesn’t mean it isn’t true. That’s what they want to talk about, because they know deep down that what New Zealanders care about are bills that they can afford and keeping rates down, and they can’t compete. Nothing they’ve said adds up, because they won’t produce their numbers for one simple reason: they don’t have them, or they don’t add up. How’s that being up front to New Zealand?

Hon JAMES SHAW (Co-Leader—Green): Thank you, Mr Speaker. Let me start by acknowledging the whānau of the young boy who lost his life in the floods yesterday. I think every parent expects that when they say goodbye to their children in the morning when they go to school that they will see them again later that evening chatting about their day at school. So I just cannot imagine the loss that that boy’s family must be feeling right now. I know that the thoughts of everybody in this House are with them, their family, their community, and their school as well. Of course, I do also want to acknowledge the front-line services who have responded yet again and put their own lives on the line yet again, in response to this latest event.

I have to say that sitting in the chair for the last 15 minutes, listening to this debate, I find it utterly dispiriting. I want to pick up on something that Mr McAnulty just said about the speech that Chris Bishop gave before him, which is that not only did Chris Bishop spend his entire five minutes trashing the Government, and not talking about what vision the National Party has, he didn’t even acknowledge the fact that we are facing yet another state of emergency in our largest city, or the fact that we have just lost our 16th life to extreme weather events during the course of this year alone. The idea that New Zealanders are interested in this Punch and Judy show and are more interested in the game of politics than they are in what’s happened to their flood-damaged properties or to the lives of their children or to the stress that our front-line responders are under—I’m actually appalled at the myopia and the desperation to win and to be in Government merely for the sake of it, without any positive vision or any acknowledgment of what it is that people in this country are facing—it absolutely appals me. It is why I am so committed, I have to say, to ensuring that we are able to continue in this Government after October of this year, because the idea that we have a Government who is only interested in being in Government for the sake of being in Government absolutely disgusts me.

As I said, this is the third state of emergency that we have faced this year—that our largest city has faced this year. The mental toll that is being extracted upon people in Tāmaki-makau-rau Auckland, Tai Tokerau, Tairāwhiti, Hawke’s Bay, and so on is extraordinary. We have known for years and years that one of the consequences of a changing climate is that those extreme weather events that we’ve always had become more frequent and more severe. What that means is that we haven’t yet finished recovering from the last one when the next one hits, and that has been amply demonstrated once again this week. So I do want to acknowledge the stress and the strain that people who have already lost their properties or been displaced or lost family members must be feeling right now.

Yesterday, we heard that the cause of all of this—from the ACT Party—is drains; that, actually, the problem here is drains. I have to say that that is kind of like victim blaming drains rather than actually looking at the cause of the storms that are overloading the drains in the first place. It is absolutely true that our drains and our stormwater systems aren’t up to it—that’s because they’ve been under-invested in over the course of the last four decades and beyond. They do need upgrading, and the Government has been working for five years on a plan to ensure that there is investment in upgrading our stormwater systems, and the ACT Party and the National Party have spent five years opposing that plan. So to say that the problem here is the drains, and then to say they’re opposed to the solution to that is as absurd to everybody out there, as I hope it is to people here today.

The other thing that the ACT Party want to do is they want to dismantle the very framework that this House agreed on to deal with the cause of climate change in the first place, and to restart the oil and gas industry, at a time when we know that we cannot burn 80 percent of our known reserves if we are to have any hope at all around the world of keeping global warming to under 1.5 degrees.

So I have to say that I am appalled at the state of this debate and I would urge the members of this House to focus on the issues and the challenges that New Zealanders are facing right now—first and foremost in Auckland right now with the challenges from yet another extreme weather event from climate change. Nā reira, tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou, tēnā tātou katoa.

Hon RACHEL BROOKING (Minister for Oceans and Fisheries): Noa’ia, Mr Speaker, acknowledging Rotuman Language Week this week. Like the last speaker, I do also want to acknowledge the family and friends of the year 11 Whangārei boy. I’m the mother of a year 11 child, and I can’t imagine the pain that they’re going through.

I’d also then like to start with going back to question time, and the amount of positive things I heard about that this Government is doing. Some of them include Warmer Kiwi Homes—we heard this from Hon Megan Woods. More insulation, having warmer homes, does some double duty and that’s what I want to talk about today: the double duty that this Government is doing. So that is that people get a warmer home and they get lower electricity fees, and we have fewer hospital costs and visits as a result.

We heard about the Green Investment Fund and the double duty that that can do. We heard about the Māori housing initiatives and amount that’s coming in there, and we heard from Minister Nanaia Mahuta about the free-trade agreement with the UK and its early entry into force. We heard about the indigenous chapter; the first of its kind in one of these agreements. Then we heard about the increase in diversity of police—I think there were some others that I missed as well, but that is a lot of good things that this Government is doing.

This is my first general debate now since becoming part of the Government formally as a Minister. And I want to congratulate Jo Luxton today being sworn in, and she will be a fantastic customs Minister. One of my portfolios is oceans and fisheries, and I was able to speak in this House last week at both question time but also in the annual review debate about some of the work that’s going on in that portfolio. That includes the Fisheries Industry Transformation Plan—that’s a draft plan for fisheries for the 1.45 billion wild caught fish industry that New Zealand has. The consultation is out to 11 June—my plug in there—and what we’re wanting to do with this industry is do more and better with the fish that we catch; not intending to catch more fish.

Then also in this portfolio there’s the aquaculture strategy. This is an ambitious programme to develop low-carbon protein. We’re wanting to get that industry to $3 billion of export money—not immediately, of course—and there’s a lot of work going in there into looking at open ocean farming and other work that we can do.

I also have delegations into waste and environment, where of course we’ve got the Waste Minimisation Fund and Plastics Innovation Fund with a focus on diverting waste. Again, we’re talking about double duty. A decrease in waste leads to a decrease in emissions. This is true from two main ways. One is, of course, if we’ve got organic waste that’s creating biogenic methane and that’s a problem in terms of climate emissions. But also, if we can recycle things like aluminium, using recycled aluminium uses 90 percent less energy than making new aluminium. So that’s a huge energy saving.

There’s a lot of work to do in this portfolio for a low-emissions and circular economy, but it’s something I’m very excited about. Of course, we’re doing a lot on climate change. I’m very proud that this Government has done that first emissions reduction plan. We have the hypothecated fund from the emissions trading scheme with the CERF—the Climate Emergency Response Fund—and there are many, many initiatives in that, including the Clean Car Discount. This programme has doubled the number of EVs—electric vehicles—coming into New Zealand in just the one year and saved 1.4 billion litres of petrol, and all the emissions that go with that.

I want to note, of course, that the ACT Party doesn’t want us to do anything on climate emissions.

Simon Court: Yes we do.

Hon RACHEL BROOKING: Well, the focus from the leader is on adaptation, which is important as well. We have to do both.

Also looking towards the future, I want to note that, of course, we have the FIFA Women’s World Cup coming up. Dunedin is the only host city in the South Island, and you can see games from teams from the Philippines, Switzerland—Switzerland will be hosted by Dunedin—the Netherlands, Portugal, Japan, Costa Rica, Argentina, South Africa, Vietnam, and, of course, our very own New Zealand team. This is obviously in July; if you are in Dunedin, then you can come to the brilliant stadium which has a roof. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

Hon MARK MITCHELL (National—Whangaparāoa): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I too would just like to acknowledge the tragic death of the young boy up in Whangārei. I acknowledge all of the people involved in the rescue and recovery of him, and acknowledge that the whole community up there will be hurting, and encourage us and remind us all that we should be respecting his parents and family. There will be lots of speculation and people wanting to comment, but we should be led by them.

I want to address the sanctimonious speech that the leader of the Green Party made in the House, lecturing the rest of us when they’ve got their own issues, which I think they should be focused on and dealing with. Today, in question time, when a member of the Opposition raised a very important question to the Government around public safety, the co-leader of the Green Party decided to mock that to a point, Mr Speaker, that you felt she had to leave the House.

SPEAKER: Order! The member should not bring the Speaker or any of my rulings into this debate.

Hon MARK MITCHELL: Thank you, Mr Speaker. What the co-leaders of the Green Party should be doing is, quite simply, this: they should be standing up and addressing this Parliament and explaining what they’re doing around domestic violence—one of the portfolios they hold. What are they doing around homelessness—one of the portfolios they hold? There is nothing being done. From the policing perspective, domestic violence is going through the roof. It’s one of those issues that continues to increase.

Jan Logie: You supported Te Aorerekura. You supported the work.

Hon MARK MITCHELL: Sorry, Jan Logie—support what? Of course, Jan Logie is saying we support the work. When she was the Minister, of course we supported the work—of course we did. We want to see a reduction. We want to see a reduction in domestic violence. The point being this, Jan Logie, your co-leader that now has the portfolio has done nothing, and we see domestic violence rising. Do you know what the numbers are? Go and have a look at the numbers, Jan Logie; you’ll be embarrassed and you’ll be ashamed, and you should be talking to your co-leader and telling her to front up to this House. Instead of us getting sanctimonious lectures, they should be fronting up and explaining to the House why they’re failing.

In terms of the policing portfolio, this is this Government’s priority: when they came to have to appoint their fourth police Minister—the fourth police Minister since I’ve had the portfolio—Prime Minister “Chippy” Hipkins sat around the Cabinet table and he asked for volunteers. This is what happened: all his senior Ministers, at the top of the table, suddenly were looking at their papers! They had other things to keep themselves busy. Give credit to Ginny Andersen, one of the newest Cabinet Ministers there, down the end of the table, who put her hand up and said, “I’ll have a go.” Chris Hipkins said, “Great. We’re going to appoint Ginny Andersen, my newest Cabinet Minister, with very little experience, to the police portfolio.”—in a time when we’re experiencing the worst lawlessness we’ve seen as a country. Then he rushes down to speak to the press gallery, but he didn’t actually think that through very well, because he got down there and he said, “I’ve just appointed Ginny Andersen as our police Minister. She’s got lots of good police experience.”

But, of course, the gallery started probing that. They said to him, “What is that experience?” And he had to stop—and we’ve seen this happen before—“Well, I wasn’t expecting that question. I don’t have a pre-formulated answer.” He came down to the House to speak to our press gallery to tell them he’d just appointed a new police Minister that had police experience and he had no idea what that was. That shows just how much thought, or how much attention, was given to the appointment—an appointment that, I think, is very important when we’re facing a 33 percent increase in violence crime, a 41 percent increase in victimisations, and an over 500 percent increase in ram raids. They’re dealing with a 60 percent increase in mental health. They are stretched—that thin blue line is stretched. And I’ll tell you one thing: they get tired and fatigued with hearing politicians getting up in the House and talking about 1,800 new police. They do not feel that they’ve got reinforcements on that thin blue line at all.

So I take umbrage to a Green Party leader coming in here and lecturing us about what we’re focused on and what we want to do, when we are laser focused behind Christopher Luxon and holding this Government to account. They are fast becoming a shambles. They are a chaotic coalition, whether it be Labour, whether it be almost being bowled over by Meka Whaitiri running so fast the other way, or whether it be the Green Party with their own members calling each other cry-babies, and a member leaving.

By the way, Mr Kieran McAnulty, who decides to stand up and have a go at Chris Bishop—who delivered an outstanding speech and actually got a clap from his own colleagues in acknowledgment—when he finished his speech there wasn’t one clap. Everyone was looking down.

Andrew Bayly: No teamwork over there.

Hon MARK MITCHELL: Absolutely. We are focused on holding this Government to account. We’ll continue to roll out our policies, and we’ll fight hard—

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

RACHEL BOYACK (Labour—Nelson): This year, it feels like every speech I give in this Parliament is timed alongside a severe weather event in my electorate of Nelson. We’re seeing a massive increase in the number of heavy rain events and storms in Nelson. Over the weekend, we had weather warnings for Nelson and Tasman, with a handful of households being evacuated and damage to our critical infrastructure. Yesterday, we had more heavy rain, and, last night, people in the suburb of Atawhai reported creeks that were rising, and rising rapidly. Late last night, our teams from Fire and Emergency, police, and council were out clearing culverts and checking properties to ensure people were safe in their homes. My thanks to our local civil defence teams and Tasman Mayor Tim King for their proactive communication with me last night so that I could pass on important safety messages to concerned residents. Can I also acknowledge the family and schoolmates of the young boy lost in Whangārei yesterday—arohanui.

People across the country and in my electorate of Nelson are feeling anxious. People are worried that there are more rain events on the way. People who are feeling concerned or anxious and would like to speak to someone, please, I urge you to text or phone 1737 at any time of the day or night to speak to someone. There is nothing to be embarrassed about for reaching out for help.

What we are seeing across New Zealand is climate change in action. Climate change is real and it is happening now. I am proud that this Labour Government is putting in place real policy and making real change, with support from the Green Party, to drive down our emissions. We are making real change in improvements to our country’s transport emissions, thanks to the work of our Government and transport Minister Michael Wood.

Meanwhile, the other lot can’t make their mind up about whether they’re driving their car forwards or reversing it. National’s on-again, off-again relationship with the Clean Car Discount took another turn for the worse recently as they abandoned electric vehicle incentives and signalled they would increase New Zealand’s emissions by 3.4 million tonnes. It’s like they can’t figure out whether to put their foot on the accelerator or the brake. They’re stuck bunny-hopping along the road like a learner driver in the 1990s. They cannot be trusted to make the hard decisions to make progress on reducing emissions. All the evidence shows that National cannot be trusted to take any action on climate change. Their climate policy might as well be denial. They have not announced a single policy designed to reduce transport emissions, and they continue to try and weasel their way out of any meaningful climate action. It’s time for them to front up and tell New Zealanders what they would do to cut emissions, or just admit their policy chest is as empty as their promises.

We’ve heard today again in the general debate, and we know that Christopher Luxon and National are so negative and keen to talk down New Zealand, like he did in the UK last week, and they’re struggling to accept that the Government’s clean car programme is an overwhelming success, exceeding expectations by 240 percent in the first emissions budget period. The Clean Car Discount is specifically designed to change behaviour by providing a discount on electric, hybrid, and low-emissions vehicles funded from a fee on higher-emitting ones. Over 100,000 Kiwis have benefited from this support to transition to cleaner, cheaper vehicles. It has doubled the number of electric vehicles coming into New Zealand in one year, and it’s exceeding emissions reduction forecasts in saving New Zealanders from buying 1.4 billion litres of petrol. That is real change in action on climate change.

Labour will continue to back Kiwis to choose low-emission vehicles and alternatives. Our Clean Car Discount scheme has been a success, with the highest number of electric vehicles on New Zealand roads ever, and later this year in Nelson, unlike my colleague Tangi Utikere’s claims, Nelson will have the highest number of electric vehicles in the regions in New Zealand. I’m proud that this Labour Government is putting its foot on the accelerator to drive down New Zealand’s transport emissions so that we can secure and protect our environment and the climate in New Zealand for future generations. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

SIMON COURT (ACT): New Zealand is in the middle of a cost of living crisis. There are mums and dads I’ve seen in my local supermarket taking things out of the trolley and putting them back on the shelf because as they fill the trolley they realise that they’ve blown the family food budget for the week. I’ve got a family member who works in a tyre shop. He tells me “Dad, you wouldn’t believe the number of people that come into the shop putting their tyres on buy now, pay later; even people driving nice cars who look like they’ve got decent jobs.” People are having to make choices about how they spend their money. That’s what Kiwis do when their budgets are crimped.

When we think about farmers who are making good money selling stuff overseas but whose input costs, whether it’s diesel or fertiliser or labour or red tape—the regulatory cost of having to apply for consents just to plant crops, which is another imposition this Labour Government has put on the productive sector, that’s all adding to the cost of living.

Now, incomes in New Zealand rose by around 6.4 percent last year, but inflation by 7.2 percent. Kiwis are going backwards. They feel it in the pocket. What causes inflation? More money being spread around the economy but not enough goods and services being produced for people to use and consume. And the Government has a role in that. Government spending increased from $87 billion to $139 billion in the last six years. That’s an increase of over $60 billion—60 percent in six years. But inflation only went up 20 percent. All that extra Government spending is adding to inflation.

Where did it go? Well, the Government’s spending another $200 per person per week, on your behalf, taken from Kiwis’ tax, money from their wages, and from business profits. Think about the bike bridge; nothing got built, but $50 million was spent on designing, consulting, and testing the waters. Auckland light rail: they’ve spent $100 million putting a business case together, drawing lines on a map, and maybe another $100 million before they’ll finish that business case. Nothing is likely to get built this decade, if ever. Let’s Get Wellington Moving: well, they managed to deliver a pedestrian crossing for $4 million that’s slowing down traffic.

Now, Labour and the Greens have both boasted in the House this afternoon about how they’re using the money from the emissions trading scheme to fund their pet green projects, whether it’s subsidising people to buy Teslas—$80,000 cars—through the Climate Emergency Response Fund. I’m not quite sure what kind of emergency that’s designed to respond to. Or the Green Investment Fund, which James Shaw boasted he’s put another $300 million into—of money that’s been collected from the emissions trading scheme—to fund things like replacing boilers in businesses that could afford to do it themselves or subsidising New Zealand Post, a State-owned company, so they could buy electric scooters and electric vehicles for their staff to truck around in while their competitors, who deliver packages faster and more efficiently than New Zealand Post, have to go and raise their own money just to buy new trucks and vans. They don’t get the benefit of this slush fund.

Now, Labour’s policies have pushed up the cost of everything: fuel, electricity, cars and utes, interest rates. They are feeding inflation. And when you look at the emissions trading scheme and the money raised from that as one example, over a billion dollars a year raised that could—could—go back into Kiwis’ pockets instead of going on to these pet green projects.

What would ACT do instead? Well, with about a billion dollars a year or more, we would issue a carbon tax refund to Kiwis. So because they’ve paid for their emissions, we think we should reward them for having done the right thing. We’d give them back about $250 per person per year, maybe $750 per household, so they could make choices about what they spend their household budget on, whether it’s on energy or whether it’s on buying a new heat pump or actually saving up for a set of tyres. That’s the difference between ACT and this current Labour - Green Government. We would let Kiwis keep more of what they earn and we’d let them make choices about how they spend their own money.

GLEN BENNETT (Labour—New Plymouth): Kia ora, Mr Speaker. As a member of the Labour Party and the Labour Government, I’m always proud to stand in this House and to talk and be open and honest and lean into the challenges that we do face. Because we face challenges as a nation, we face challenges as a global community, and we know that there are things that we need to address and we must address. I’m glad to be part of a party and a Government that’s willing to lean in—not lean out, but lean in—and address those hard issues. Someone once said that being negative only makes the journey more difficult. You may be given a cactus, but you don’t have to sit on the cactus. I think I’ll leave that where it is for now and maybe allude to it a bit later on.

But what we constantly seem to be hearing in this House, what we constantly seem to be hearing as I listen to politicians, is going on and on, being negative. Christopher Luxon and the National Party—so often, they have things to say. When I’m in New Plymouth and in my electorate, there are challenges that we face and we talk about so often, but it’s around how do we find solutions. Because I don’t see the vision. I don’t see the plan for our future. I’m grateful to be part of a Government that sees a plan and has a plan.

When we come to housing—and we’ve had conversations about that this afternoon in this debate—I don’t want to be putting the fear into our renters. I don’t want to be, as winter approaches, making renters feel that they may have to move on or that we can just throw them out at our will. I want to ensure that we have good tenancy policies, we have good, warm, dry homes, because everybody—everybody—deserves a place to call home.

I was doing the numbers recently, looking at our social housing build in New Plymouth and in Taranaki. Can I just say that between 2010 and 2017, before this Government came into being, two—two—houses were built through Housing New Zealand or Kāinga Ora in New Plymouth. Only two. Between 2018 and 2022, that number went up to 15. I’m really grateful that our Minister of Housing has had conversations with myself, with members of our community, and I’m really excited. There are already 45 units being built in New Plymouth as we speak. We’ve got another 100 on the go that are planned for, being consented as we speak, so, by the middle of this year, we’ll potentially have more than 140 houses being built in New Plymouth—140; remember, two between 2010 and 2017—because everybody deserves a place to call home.

I just want to allude and come to—because Port Taranaki was, I believe, the last port to export live animals, and before I was elected, this was something that I was challenged on by members of our community. How could we, as a community that is so much a rural community who supports our farmers, be actually doing this to our animals? I was really surprised to watch Newshub several weeks ago, and the spokesperson for animal welfare, Nicola Grigg, announced that she was going to bring live animal exports back, and made this amazing statement that it’s just like: “It’ll be a farm on water. That’s fine. It’ll be lovely—a farm on water.” I believe that we need to ensure the best practice we have for our animal welfare.

For us here in the Labour Party and for us as a Government, we’re doing our best to ensure that we protect not only our animals and the care of our animals but also our reputation around the world, because we need to make sure that we pivot and ensure that we have ourselves in a position that is competitive as we come into the 2030s, into the 2040s, and into the 2050s. People are demanding—people are demanding—that when it comes to the way crops are grown, when it comes to the way that animals are bred and cared for, that the standards have changed. The standards have changed. I want to make sure that we protect our animal welfare, we protect our reputation around the world, that we are the breadbasket of the world that conserves but also has high-value, quality food that is sold to the world that not only supports those around the world but supports us as a nation.

I am glad to be part of a Government that has a vision, that is looking forward. I know, as I said at the start, we have a lot of work to do, and there are challenges that face us every single day, but I am so grateful and so excited to be serving in a Government that is making sure that we are ready for the challenges that face us, and we are finding solutions. Being negative only makes the journey more difficult. You may be given a cactus, but you don’t have to sit on it.

CHRIS PENK (National—Kaipara ki Mahurangi): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I want to talk about cyclone recovery. The cyclone-hit communities of New Zealand want to talk about cyclone recovery and they want the Government to talk about cyclone recovery. But they’d much prefer for the Government to actually do something about cyclone recovery, because the Government can do almost anything but it has chosen so far to do almost nothing.

And when I say the Government can do almost anything, I refer to the fact that in this House, the Labour Government, with the support of the National Party on the bill itself, and including as to process, supported legislation that would give very broad-ranging powers to the Government to change all kinds of primary legislation—all kinds of laws to sweep aside the red tape, to reduce the bureaucracy, to allow solutions to be made for cyclone-hit areas of this country. And as at last night, when I last checked the relevant website, there had been no such Orders in Council produced by the Government all these weeks later.

Hon Louise Upston: Not any?

CHRIS PENK: That’s right, the Hon Louise Upston. I confirm for you today: none whatsoever. So it’s the lack of action, but it’s also the lack of clarity; it’s the lack of transparency.

There have been instances of Government support announced, and that’s been welcome—quite rightly so—from the community right up until the point in which it becomes clear that, actually, the delivery of that which has been announced hasn’t been forthcoming. There’s been a lack of criteria, a lack of clarity about who it is within the communities, for example, of Hawke’s Bay and surrounding regions—Gisborne likewise, and other areas will have been the same—with chambers of commerce given money by central government, asked to distribute it, but without any kind of clarity about where it should go. And the sad thing is that has caused angst locally. It’s put those chambers of commerce in a difficult position, to be passing to their members and non-members alike amounts that they deem to be appropriate on the vaguest of criteria. Naturally, there is resentment, naturally there are shortfalls, and naturally people are asking for answers. They’re asking for support, not just in the announcement but actually in the delivery and in the certain delivery at that.

The mental wellbeing of those in cyclone-hit communities is deteriorating. I don’t wish to make this a partisan political point, and, so far, we have been very supportive as an Opposition on measures that the Government has taken in good faith to improve the wellbeing and the lives of people in cyclone-hit areas. But we cannot ignore the fact that communities on the ground, whether that’s individual households or businesses, are so badly affected and now, with more than 11 weeks having passed with so little certainty, so little to hang their hat on, so little on which to make decisions for their future going forward, they are feeling severe mental strain. The cracks are showing, and it is desperately urgent that these people receive the support that they deserve from the Government that they have supported through their payment of taxes in good faith all these years. They deserve that help now. It is now time for the Government to step up and give that.

Yesterday, we saw the release of the report by Boston Consulting Group in relation to horticulture in the Hawke’s Bay. I emphasise it’s in that region alone—obviously hugely significant for that region, a major part of their regional economy, but with effects that will be felt for “New Zealand Inc.” as well as very broadly in those communities. Not just the growers themselves, of course, but the workers, the suppliers, all the local economy that’s intricately connected with the successful operation of those businesses. And that’s, of course, before you start talking about the horticulture affected in other areas of New Zealand, be it Gisborne, Coromandel, Northland, and so on—Auckland, too, including my own electorate of Kaipara ki Mahurangi.

Without the decision-making certainty about whether land will be commercially viable, whether it can be used for certain purposes, not only are the weeks and months of inaction costing the ability to clear the land but, actually, for planting decisions now that will bear fruit quite literally in a year’s time or a bit under a year. These decisions are time critical. These decisions must be made by Government. They must rule in or out certain areas as soon as possible so that the people on the ground can do what they need to do in order to make the planting decisions, to actually get on and do it, because otherwise we are staring down the barrel of, for example, in horticulture within the Hawke’s Bay region, $3.5 billion between 2024 and 2030. So we need these decisions to be made.

The lack of representation through ministerial leads in the area with the demise, in a ministerial sense, of Stuart Nash and Meka Whaitiri isn’t helping. National Party candidates and members are advocating the Government needs to get on and make these decisions.

TĀMATI COFFEY (Labour): Thank you, Mr Speaker. For the benefit of the member that just resumed his seat, Chris Penk, who said that this Government has done nothing for the cyclone recovery, I just need to point out—

Chris Penk: Almost nothing.

TĀMATI COFFEY: Oh, almost nothing. Here we go. If almost nothing means an initial $250 million for Waka Kotahi and local councils to assess and fix the roads, that must be almost nothing. If it’s $74 million for affected farmers and growers to clean up and re-establish their businesses, almost nothing; $75 million for businesses with immediate costs and clean ups to be distributed by local delivery partners for affected regions, almost nothing; $5 million into mayoral relief funds up and down the coast; $65 million in civil defence payments and more. The member leaves, but, actually, we’ve done a lot, and I hope that he’s gone and heard that.

It has been a really tough time for those people up on the coast, and we do need to focus on those issues. But, unfortunately, when we look around the Chamber, there’s a whole lot going on. I want to start my contribution with what the Hon Dr Megan Woods started with at the start of her contribution. She talked about a few films, she framed it up, talked about Star Wars and Back to the Future. I want to talk about Frozen. That’s right, it’s a classic. And if you haven’t seen it, you need to see the movie. It really is awesome. Boy meets princess, falls in love, has a dance, he turns out to be a psychopath but that’s a whole different story. In amongst the winter wonderland that is Frozen, you have talking reindeer, singing snowmen, but a line in a song which is a classic, and that line is: “The cold never bothered me anyway.” What a song, what a line: “The cold never bothered me anyway.” What a lie as well.

Actually, the cold hurts. The cold makes you sick. The cold can send you to hospital. The cold can be very, very harmful for the health of Kiwi families up and down Aotearoa, which is why I’m super perplexed by the fact that the National Party have got a policy in place which is all about ensuring that landlords can get rid of their tenants without a brass razoo of a reason. No-reason evictions; just, “You know what, if I’m feeling like it, I’m just gonna kick you out.” And they don’t have to give a reason. Kick them out on to those cold streets over the course of the winter, that is detrimental to the health of Kiwi families, which is why we on this side of the House stand united against that policy: making sure that landlords don’t have the ability to be able to kick out Kiwi families into the streets for no apparent reason. It really does baffle me.

It’s part of the reason I’m so proud that on this side of the House we’ve done so much—so much—to be able to support those people who are inevitably renters. And we’ve seen so many of them, especially in Māori families—so many families haven’t got the privilege of homeownership, so they have to rent; that’s what they have to do. And a policy which enables landlords to be able to kick those renters out on to the street without a reason absolutely dazes me.

On this side of the House, we’ve been focused in our term in Parliament on building State homes, so that we can get people off the streets that have found themselves homeless, for whatever reason, into safe, warm accommodation. We’ve changed the conditions, the regulations, around houses to make sure that they’re warm and they’re safe for families to be able to live in. We have an unprecedented house-building programme going on all around the country, and I know it because in my city, in Rotorua, we are seeing the houses going up, and we are seeing people moving out of motels and into those safe, warm, dry houses. And what we’ve done is we’ve also purposely strengthened the position of renters in our communities. And making sure that, actually, landlords don’t have the ability to be able to kick out tenants for no apparent reason, because it’s the right thing to do. The fact that the Opposition think that that’s a good idea means that they’re thinking, I don’t know, maybe with their financial backers in their back pocket. We know that, you know, there’s a lot of people—

SPEAKER: Order! The member cannot make that kind of accusation in this House. He will stand, withdraw, and apologise.

TĀMATI COFFEY: I withdraw and apologise. What I’m trying to say here is that it absolutely baffles me that the Opposition have come to this House and brought this terrible policy which is going to see thousands of Kiwi families up and down the country potentially evicted for no apparent reason. It’s not right, it’s not fair, and on this side of the House—the Labour Party—we stand united against that very, very dumb policy.

SPEAKER: Order! The member’s time has expired. The time for this debate has expired also.

The debate having concluded, the motion lapsed.

Bills

Prohibition on Seabed Mining Legislation Amendment Bill

First Reading

DEBBIE NGAREWA-PACKER (Co-Leader—Te Paati Māori): Tēnā koe e te Māngai. I move, That the Prohibition on Seabed Mining Legislation Amendment Bill be now read a first time. I nominate the Māori Affairs Committee to consider the bill.

It’s an honour to rise on behalf of my people and Te Paati Māori to speak to the first reading of my member’s bill, the Prohibition on Seabed Mining Legislation Amendment Bill. It’s an honour to be able to bring this ban-seabed-mining debate, not only for the nation to see but for the world to see today.

The bill aims to put in place a nationwide ban on seabed mining consents within Aotearoa exclusive economic zone (EEZ) and coastal waters governed under the Resource Management Act. It also seeks to retrospectively withdraw existing seabed mining consents and prohibit the ability for exploration rights for seabed mining under the Crown Minerals Act. It was crafted from the experience that our iwi have had in dealing with the existing legislation and the first application in Aotearoa to mine the seabed. It was an application seeking to mine millions of tonnes of iron, titanium, and vanadium from 66 square kilometres of seabed between 22 kilometres and 36 kilometres offshore from Pātea for 35 years, in the EEZ, by dredging up millions of tonnes of the seafloor, extracting the mineral, and dumping the unwanted sludge back into the sea, smothering the surrounding area with a sediment film which would spread all the way down from Taranaki to Wellington, affecting marine life, biodiversity, and Māori.

Since 2011, across National-led and Labour-led Governments, Ngāti Ruanui and Ngā Rauru have spearheaded the fight against seabed mining. From our iwis’ perspective, seabed mining is a violation of our kaitiakitanga, and as defenders of the ecosystems, we are gravely concerned it will affect everything. This is a part of who we are, where we are, and it must be protected. Concerned with the impact of seabed mining, our communities took this battle—many who are upstairs: Uncle Tūranga Pito, Auntie Joyce, my pāpā, Auntie Laura, Mary-anne, all our whānau, Rachel, Reimā—all have been a part of protesting, filling busloads to make sure Parliament and their communities know how they felt.

They were supported by the South Taranaki local diving club, who set up ocean videos so we could qualify and quantify the marine life in the South Taranaki Bight, who established a proactive education programme so that we could connect and see and appreciate what’s going on in our reefs; our party in South Taranaki fishing clubs; farmers who helped fund billboards opposing seabed mining; communities and leaders, such as Jacqueline Dwyer, who helped fund-raise; and concerts to help fund our fronting the legal battles. Scientific evidence was compiled with cultural evidence, an inclusive fusion that made for compelling and precedent-setting court cases. It’s been a true grassroots movement, which catapulted my being in Parliament and, indeed, this member’s bill.

It’s been the grassroots that has spent tens of thousands of hours and hundreds of thousands of dollars, and these grassroots are not amateurs in this sector; they are people from Taranaki, who have more experience in the oil and minerals sector than any other region and any other peoples in Aotearoa. This battle has taken them to every court in this nation, resulting in successfully winning in the High Court, the Court of Appeal, and Supreme Court, as the applicant, Trans-Tasman Resources, continuously failed to deliver material evidence on how their proposed project would not adversely affect our moana. Despite having a decade to prepare scientific evidence, this applicant still has not been able to provide any, because it simply does not exist.

The opposition to seabed mining has been strong. There were 13,000 submissions presented to the Government opposing seabed mining, with only a handful in favour. We have also delivered 40,000-signature petitions to the Government. It is clear the public do not support the Government’s stance on this. Ocean advocates from across Aotearoa have called on this Government to urgently ban seabed mining. More than 30 hapū and iwi, environmental NGOs, KASM—Kiwis Against Seabed Mining—and Greenpeace Aotearoa have called on the Prime Minister to support my bill, and, as KASM highlights, we already know an enormous amount about seabed mining. The Government does not need an inquiry to understand that this industry would trash our moana; it’s abundantly clear.

Iwi don’t want it, our community doesn’t want it, the public doesn’t want it, nor does the technology sector. The argument that seabed mining is critical to the energy transition is nonsense. Most battery makers and industry users reject these arguments. BMW, Volvo, Google, and Korean battery maker Samsung have all vowed not to buy metals produced from deep-seabed mining until the environmental risks are comprehensively understood. There’s a growing global movement to end seabed mining within France, Canada, Pasifika nations—Tuvalu, Fiji, and Nauru calling for a moratorium to which, in response to our own Government’s support of the conditional moratorium in international waters, we cannot fathom for the life of us how Labour today is able to face themselves.

It is hypocritical that Aotearoa, this Government, has supported a conditional moratorium in international waters due to extremely limited scientific knowledge, yet last week would not do the same for its own domestic waters. We need to ban seabed mining now, and to delay it sends the message to Aotearoa and to grassroots that we are open for business. Our ocean is home to over 90 percent of life on earth, it is our biggest ally in the fight against climate change, and every second breath we take comes from the ocean. Damage to it will impact livelihoods of billions and affect our grassroots, affect our mokopuna, for ever. The risk of unproven technology outweighs any supposed benefits, and this Government is prepared to allow us to be guinea pigs. Applicants can’t provide evidence. The technology is untested and untried.

And, I guess, what we’re really concerned about is the fact that the Government is still creating and allowing this huge amount of space to bring about further applications. What you should be doing is investing more time and information in sustainable sectors, the blue economy, clean energy. This climate crisis is upon us; our nation deserves better.

This bill provides certainty. It ensures, once and for all, that measures are in place that will prevent our environment and our mokopunas’ future from being compromised from this barbaric activity. This bill is very specific: it doesn’t affect the gas and oil industry, as has been proposed. It has one retrospective applicant, and anything that you did want to change could have been done through a Supplementary Order Paper, so it’s disappointing to see Labour’s stance on this.

I guess, you know, what we are seeing is the same Government that continued the foreshore and seabed, and that’s really disappointing. Our whenua was stolen from this Government in 2004 and I’m disappointed to see that that’s where we’re going again. A Government that campaigned on taking strong action on climate change surely has a moral obligation to lead the world away from potential ecological disaster and stand for supporting my bill.

I’m standing here as the smallest party asking for the support of all parties in Parliament. The Government has a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to stop this dangerous industry before it starts. It’s not the time to cop out and vote down my bill in favour of a weak inquiry. What concerns us is if we delay this, we actually may have people come in and lower the benchmark, and lower the benchmark that so far has proved that the EEZ regs and the test that we helped create—these people upstairs helped create the EEZ regs. It just takes one party to come in and lower that benchmark, and then what we have done is open up a door that you cannot close. And we have lived the consequences of the fracking from the oil and mineral sector. We have lived with the clean-up. We see the regs abandoned.

So Ngāti Ruanui and Ngā Rauru, in our unapologetic Māori movement, will not stop until seabed mining is banned in Aotearoa once and for all, and Te Paati Māori stands and represents the true kaitiaki: tangata whenua. We have the strongest environmental policies of anyone in Parliament and we will continue to fight for our taiao mō ake tonu [environment for ever].

Now is the time for transformative action. You have the opportunity to show not only your own people but the world that you are leaders in this sector. To slide across and wait for an inquiry is just delay, and we need certainty now. Nō reira i te āhuatanga o tā tātou kaupapa i mua i a tātou, kia ora rā.

[So, in the sense of our subject that is before us, thank you.]

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

Hon DAVID PARKER (Minister for the Environment): Madam Speaker, thank you for the call. I rise to explain why the Labour Party is voting against this bill. It is true that we in Government have concerns about the potential environmental effects of seabed mining, and we don’t dismiss the concerns of the member in that regard, but we can’t vote for this bill.

The member Debbie Ngarewa-Packer, who has just taken her seat, said that the intention of this bill was only to apply to ironsands. That’s most clearly not the intention of this bill, and, indeed, the third paragraph, or the third dot point, says that the policy intention of this bill is to retrospectively withdraw existing seabed mining consents and exploration rights under the exclusive economic zone (EEZ) Act and the Crown Minerals Act. Crown minerals, most obviously, include gas.

It has been clear from the start of this bill that the effect of this legislation would have been to, amongst other things, close down the Māui platform, and it would have done that retrospectively, it would have done it without compensation, and it would have done it without any transition period. Now, what would that have done to the country? Well, from the Government’s point of view, it would breach an undertaking that we gave to the oil and gas sector at the time when we banned the granting of new offshore exploration permits. We said that we would allow existing acreage to continue to be explored and developed, so it would have been in breach of that undertaking.

Additionally, it would have threatened the security of supply of our electricity in the short to medium term. Now, we’re doing very, very well as a country to transition away from our reliance on fossil fuels. We are getting ever closer to the 90 percent renewable electricity target that the prior Labour Government set, when I was Minister of energy and climate change in the period prior to 2014 to 2017—prior to the election then. We set the 90 percent target, and since then, the proportion of electricity that is coming from fossil fuels has been decreasing.

What it would do in the meantime, though, is we still do need gas—particularly in a dry year. We still have a dry-year risk, when we don’t have enough hydro stored in our lakes. To generate the electricity that we need to keep the lights on, we need to use gas. That will not be the case for ever, but it is still the case for a while yet.

In addition to that, gas is relied upon in the Taranaki region, as well as other parts of the North Island, for the dehydration of milk. The transition towards renewables to substitute fossil fuels for the dehydration of milk, which is one of the major uses of gas, is not yet complete. The production of urea currently relies on the use of natural gas, as well. So the industrial consequences—never mind the fairness aspects—the economic consequences of terminating all of those consents would have been substantial and, in our view, wrong, as well as in breach of the undertakings that we as a Government gave to the industry when we banned, or when we said there would be no further block offers for offshore oil and gas.

So what are we doing? Well, we accept that there are issues here. For me, one of the biggest issues is, if there is a genuine concern—as I do think there is—about mining at sea, if we can coalesce with the Pacific around a solution to protect the Pacific from deep-sea mining, then, effectively, we will be protecting a big part of the world’s oceans. That is one of the issues that should be considered by the select committee and the inquiry that we have requested the select committee to conduct. I wrote a letter—[Interruption]

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Poto Williams): Order! Order! I apologise to the member. I’m having difficulty hearing the member’s contribution. If I could ask respectfully for your contributions coming from the other side of the House to just lower the volume. That would be great. Thank you.

Hon DAVID PARKER: Thank you, Madam Speaker. With regard to the terms of reference that I proposed to the select committee, it’s a matter for them. But we suggested that there be an inquiry which presented an overview of seabed mining operations and proposals—that would include the ones that are, obviously, of concern to the Māori Party—looking at opportunities, as well as costs and risks, of the seabed mining industry; comparing other methods of obtaining minerals like land-based—and I thank the member for her contributions in respect of the likes of lithium and the comments that she made about some of the major users of and producers of electric vehicles are saying that they’re not going to use sea-based mining to obtain those minerals.

How seabed mining is managed internationally and in New Zealand—I think the committee should have a look at that to see whether, if seabed mining was to continue in some form, the regulatory settings are up for it, or whether it shouldn’t—and how domestic regulatory settings are performing, including under the Crown Minerals Act, the Resource Management Act, and the Exclusive Economic Zone and Continental Shelf (Environmental Effects) Act 2012.

Whether any change to domestic regulatory settings should apply to the coastal marine area, the EEZ, the extended continental shelf, or all of them, the prospect of any change of regulatory settings being supportive of Pacific countries and considering their own positions on seabed mining—in respect of that issue, it is an issue that I find difficult or I think is difficult for Pacific countries. We know how difficult it is for a country like New Zealand to properly measure and control the effects of deep-sea mining, as evidenced by the chain of court decisions that the member referred to in her contribution. We’re a pretty sophisticated and large country, relative to the size of the environmental ministries in Pacific Island countries, and, if it’s difficult for us, it must be even more difficult for those Pacific countries. I think it would be good if the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade gave consideration to that and the advice that they will no doubt give to the inquiry if the select committee wants to hear from them.

Then, finally, recommendations for maintaining or updating New Zealand’s domestic regulatory settings, which could include the sorts of measures that the member seeks.

But I would make it clear now that were we to agree those sorts of changes in the future—and I’m not saying we would, but were we to do so, there is no way we would contemplate resiling from the agreement that we had with the oil and gas industry that they can continue with their existing rights in the Taranaki offshore basins.

So that explains why the Government is unable to support this bill. It’s not for us to ensure that a member’s bill is in good shape to be considered. If there was a minor part of this bill that was problematic, yes, that could be fixed at select committee. But the very intention of this bill, as explained in the general policy statement, is to retrospectively withdraw existing seabed mining consents and exploration rights under the EEZ and Crown Minerals Act, retrospectively without compensation, and, from the point of view of the Labour Party, that would be a bad thing to do.

STUART SMITH (National—Kaikōura): Thank you, Madam Speaker, and welcome back to the Chair. It’s good to see you there. I’m very pleased and surprised at the Hon David Parker’s contribution. I think it was very measured and well considered. For many of the same reasons that he’s outlined, the National Party will not be supporting this bill.

I think that bans are almost always the wrong solution. If the ban is the answer, you have to go back and look at the question. We have adequate—more than adequate—processes to deal with environmental challenges and issues when we exploit resources, and exploit resources we do. Our very standard of living is totally dependent on the resources industry. Almost everything in this room that we touch, in some way, has a fossil fuel either as a part of the make-up of it or used in the manufacture of it. For example, the varnish on the walls has got quite a substantial amount of petroleum in it. So those sort of things are vitally important to our standard of living.

As the Hon David Parker said, this bill would send a massive shock wave through the international community, particularly the sovereign risk that in New Zealand has always been seen as very low until the oil and gas exploration ban, which did send a massive shock wave through the international community. So much so that, in fact, I’ve been told from companies trying to raise funds for other projects, nothing to do with the oil and gas sector, that they weren’t going to be supported by independent financiers because they see the sovereign risk in New Zealand now, as a result of that ban, as too high for them; they would rather invest their funds elsewhere.

The closedown of the Maui platform was mentioned by the Hon David Parker. That would certainly be a massive issue. We, with the oil and gas ban, ensured we burnt more coal. The rest of the world has lowered their emissions by going away from coal, and using gas; we in New Zealand have gone the other way. With the oil and gas ban, we don’t have the supply of gas to do away with coal. The units in Huntly that we use to generate electricity with coal run on gas as well. We simply don’t have the supply of gas for that option to be utilised. [Interruption]

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Poto Williams): Order! I apologise to the member. Respectfully, to the members of the public present in the gallery, I do have to hear the contribution of members on the floor, so I respectfully ask if you could just lower your voices, so that I can do so.

STUART SMITH: Thank you, Madam Speaker. We do need gas and will need gas to keep the lights on, as the Hon David Parker said, well into the foreseeable future. In fact, while we’ll need less of it, it becomes ever more important as we rely on unreliable energy sources, such as solar and wind.

But ironsand was what was particularly mentioned by the member promoting the bill. Iron is used in everything from white goods, all through our manufacturing. Wind turbines have a major part used in their manufacture from ironsand.

Offshore seabed mining is quite common in other parts of the world. Aggregates, for example, in Europe—there was, last year, 65 million tonnes of aggregates taken from the sea, and that grew by over 10 percent, and that’s a trend that’s been going on for some time. In South Korea as well, 16 million tonnes. Those sorts of things are happening all the time.

When we look at all of the royalties that we’re receiving from minerals, over $182 million in royalties from minerals, which includes oil and gas. Also, ironsand, we receive a substantial amount of coastal and ironsand royalties of over $1 million. These things are not unsubstantial.

The very community that is actually promoting this—and good on them for bringing it forward—they will be the ones that will also be affected by the downturn in the economic activity in those regions.

The Leader of the National Party, Christopher Luxon, said today that we would not support Te Paati Māori. This sort of policy is exactly why we would not. We know that we are looking forward to a chaotic coalition, and that is—[Interruption]

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Poto Williams): Order!

STUART SMITH: While the members might not like it, then they should think very hard about what they’re putting forward in their members’ bills. Thank you, Madam Speaker.

Hon PHIL TWYFORD (Labour—Te Atatū): Thank you, Madam Speaker. My contribution’s going to be a bit different to the one you heard from Stuart Smith over the last five minutes. I’m not here to mount a defence of seafood mining or the extraction of hydrocarbons and fossil fuels from the seabed around our coastline. I want to acknowledge the member Debbie Ngarewa-Packer for bringing this bill to the House; also, to acknowledge that the intent of this bill, to wean our economy off fossil fuels and to adequately protect the seabed around our country, is in tune with a growing number of people in our society here and abroad, and it is part of a powerful global movement to change the way that we live on this planet. That, I think, deserves respect.

The House has heard the Hon Minister David Parker set out the Government’s position on this bill. We won’t be supporting it at first reading, and, as someone who’s proposed a few bans in his time, including members’ bills that were voted down by the Government of the day, I have some sympathy with the member. But we’re not voting against this bill today because we’re not concerned about the environmental protection of our seabed. We’re not voting against it because we’re not committed to a just transition to a decarbonised economy—we are. We’re voting against it because how you do it matters, and we believe that there’s a better way to proceed.

I’ll, hopefully, have a minute at the end to talk a little bit about the proposal that Minister David Parker has made to the Environment Committee, which I serve on, that we should look at a select committee inquiry into seabed mining, but let me just say a couple of things about the bill itself. What it does is put in place a nationwide ban on seabed mining consents within the exclusive economic zone (EEZ) and our coastal waters. It shuts down the ability to apply for exploration rights for seabed mining under the Crown Minerals Act, and it retrospectively withdraws existing seabed mining consents and exploration rights under the EEZ Act and the Crown Minerals Act.

Now, there are three reasons why Labour is not supporting this bill tonight, and the first is that it would have serious adverse implications for the country’s energy supply. Our reading of the bill is that it would revoke 14 existing petroleum permits. Around 70 percent of our country’s petroleum production comes from offshore, but more importantly is what it would do to gas production. Three offshore fields—Māui, Pohokura, and Kupe—produce about half of our natural gas, which goes into our domestic network from Taranaki. Shutting down those fields would have significant implications, and immediate implications, for the gas that we use in New Zealand, not only for the peak generation of electricity that our system is currently dependent on in dry seasons and in times of peak electricity demand but also domestic and industrial activity that relies on gas. So the bill would see an 80 percent decline in our production of LPG, and we would need to immediately find new ways of generating that gas or import it until satisfactory alternatives were found.

There would be severe economic implications in terms of a retrospective and immediate shutting down of those exploration rights. As David Parker pointed out, our Government was very, very careful to ensure that we were banning future exploration of oil and gas, not to revoke those existing permits or do it retrospectively. It would have significant implications for investment in this country if we did that.

Then there are a number of other implications for customary marine title and Treaty settlements as a result of this bill, were it to be enacted. Our view is that we need to consider this seriously. We need to consider the issues in the round. We need to do it in a way that’s transparent and engages the people of this country in a proper, properly informed conversation about the future of seabed mining, and I’m intending to be part of that discussion at the Environment Committee. Thank you.

SIMON COURT (ACT): New Zealand is known internationally as a responsible and sustainable nation, which other countries look up to because of the way we’ve been able to manage our natural resources. That is why New Zealand has supported developing regulations to manage the risk of deep-sea mining in places like the Pacific, in international waters, where nations are not able to extend their own environmental controls into those areas which are not subject to national governance, like our economic zone is. But ACT will oppose this bill, not because we do not wish to see an exploration of all of the environmental effects, to understand the pros and cons, but because banning this activity would have significant social and economic knock-on effects, particularly to regions like Taranaki, which have blossomed as a result of the energy developments that have taken place over the past decades. This bill—[Interruption]

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Poto Williams): Order! I apologise to the member. Would you resume your seat. I’m sorry to say to members of the public in the gallery that I have respectfully asked that you keep your comments and your voices low. If you continue to interject, I may have to ask you to leave the gallery. This is my final warning to you. I do this respectfully, knowing that you must know that I have to, as Speaker, hear the comments and the commentary from the members in the Chamber, which I cannot do if you are making interjections from the gallery.

SIMON COURT: Many companies have invested heavily in exploration and development in our waters, and they have received lawful permits and consents to do so. This bill would, effectively, strip them of their property rights without any compensation, which not only is unfair but would undermine the rule of law in this country.

Furthermore, this bill would risk cutting off New Zealand’s natural gas supply, which would threaten our energy security at a time when it has never been more important. With gas being a crucial energy and manufacturing production source for our country, it’s essential we do not limit our options for its production. Seabed mining also has the potential to unlock phenomenal energy and mineral resources that can help transform our environment in other ways. It can make our country self-sufficient when it comes to some of these minerals. Banning this activity is not a sensible or sustainable option for New Zealand. Instead, mining for energy and minerals provides high-income jobs in regions like Taranaki, so that a young person who might not have finished school, who might not have got the best start in life, can still aspire to be one of the highest-earning New Zealanders if they work in the energy sector—for example, in Taranaki. Those workers can provide for family and extended family with the income they earn from working in these sectors, and I am sure there are people here in the House and in the gallery who have friends and family members who work in energy and resources either here in New Zealand or in Australia and who know exactly what I am talking about. Now, like the former Prime Minister who announced a ban on oil and gas exploration, those who advocate for prohibiting a lawful and well-managed activity while taking advantage of all the modern benefits that delivering those minerals and resources and gases does to our society risk being seen—they risk being seen—as ignorant and self-righteous.

Now, it is important to note that we already have a whole range of environmental controls and protections in place for the environment and marine mammals in places like the South Taranaki Bight. New Zealand engineers and scientists have demonstrated, for over 50 years, the capability to carry out mineral and petroleum developments in the marine environment while ensuring those impacts are well managed. We have a strong regulatory framework that ensures any activity in our waters is subject to rigorous consenting processes and that companies must demonstrate they can operate safely before any permits are granted. A ban on seabed mining is an excessive and unnecessary response to what are genuine and valid concerns about the risks that this activity might have on the environment. That’s why, instead, we should focus on ensuring our regulatory framework is robust and that companies undertaking this activity are held to the highest environmental standards. We should work to ensure that any proposed activity is subject to a fair and transparent permitting process, where evidence and information can be submitted, tested in court, to determine whether the activity is acceptable in terms of its risk to the environment.

That’s why ACT welcomes the opportunity to scrutinise proposals to explore and develop resources in the marine environment, so that we can evaluate those effects. ACT is confident these activities should be able to proceed in a controlled and safe manner. That’s why we oppose this bill.

PAUL EAGLE (Labour—Rongotai): Kia ora, Madam Speaker, and it’s good to see you back in the Chair. It’s my privilege to take a call on the Prohibition on Seabed Mining Legislation Amendment Bill. I too want to, like my colleague Phil Twyford, who’s left the House now but made a point to the member who’s brought this to the House, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer, to say that her strategic intentions on the nature of the bill are commended. And I, too, want to join Phil Twyford in supporting his comments.

We know now that the Labour Party won’t be supporting this through its first reading. The essence of supporting those strategic intentions versus the implications of what the proposed bill will do have been well traversed. I think it’s worth just noting some of the background on this matter, and we know that the Government is engaged in an ongoing international discussion on deep-sea mining. Seabed mining is usually referred to internationally in areas beyond national jurisdiction, including as it relates to the Pacific. I’m not a member of the Environment Committee, but I’m aware—and you’ve heard from the Minister who opened the speaking on this that he’s asked the select committee to conduct an inquiry into seabed mining.

One of the good news points is that the views of the member and others will have the opportunity to be input into that process, and that will look at an overview of the seabed mining operations and proposals. And that’s good because there are many, many strong views on this issue. I know that, being the electorate member for a coastal seat in Wellington here, there has been feedback from constituents who want to have a say on the issue. They contextualise this around climate change, around some of the issues to reduce fossil fuels and a whole range of other issues.

So the timing of an inquiry is spot on. That inquiry would also consider the potential risks and benefits, and whether the changes—and we’ve heard about those in terms of the domestic regulatory framework—are needed; would encompass all of the seabed areas within our jurisdiction and namely the territorial sea known as we know, the exclusive economic zone, and that extended continental shelf.

I just want to note for a minute that the Minister the Hon Nanaia Mahuta, back in late 2022, announced that New Zealand will back a conditional moratorium on seabed mining in areas beyond the national jurisdiction until environmental rules supported by robust science can be agreed on internationally. I’m hopeful that the inquiry will allow those views to initiate discussions, if not a firm discussion, and make some impact internationally.

Our international position doesn’t require the Government to change its domestic approach to seabed mining, but having backed a conditional moratorium, it is timely to examine our own regulatory settings. So the member’s really activated—ignited—some conversation here. Those concerns about the environmental impacts of seabed mining do need to be considered—let’s be frank about that—along with the potential role that minerals recovered by seabed mining could play in New Zealand’s transition to a decarbonised economy.

So one of the things that we’ve heard about is the unintended consequences. I know, for example, that there are some implications for customary marine titles and Treaty settlements. I’m sure the member is aware of these too, so I’m hopeful that those are covered in terms of the inquiry under the select committee process.

I’m confident that we will get to a position here that takes into account what the member’s intentions are, but does a whole lot better without impacting some of those unintended consequences—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Poto Williams): Order! The member’s time has expired.

Hon EUGENIE SAGE (Green): E te Māngai o te Whare, tēnā koe. The Green Party is very pleased to be supporting the Prohibition on Seabed Mining Legislation Amendment Bill. I mihi to Debbie Ngarewa-Packer for bringing this bill to the Parliament and for the very long and strenuous journey that she, Ngāti Ruanui, environmental organisations, community organisations, like Kiwis Against Seabed Mining, Greenpeace, the Taranaki-Whanganui Conservation Board, and coastal communities in Taranaki have taken, and for all of the mahi that they have put into resisting the efforts—successfully so far—of Trans-Tasman Resources and its application to take millions of tonnes of sediment from the seabed.

We are within a whisker—if Government members were supporting this bill—of stopping the reckless pursuit of minerals in the ocean. We are within a whisker of protecting the oceans, recognising the huge role that they have in regulating the climate and absorbing excess heat and excess carbon dioxide, and putting a line in the sand that Aotearoa New Zealand stands for healthy oceans, not the rapacious pursuit by multinational corporations of private profit by bulldozing the ocean floor, suctioning up millions of tonnes of sediment, and then discharging that just to seek minerals that you can also get on land and that we could get by recycling and recovering minerals from electronic waste.

One of the reasons the Green Party supports this bill is that all of the mahi to date has been done by the community. It has been done by iwi and hapū, Ngāti Ruanui, community organisations, and individuals in resisting applications to date. The Government needs to take action and not leave it to the community and to iwi and hapū to shoulder the burden of protecting the oceans against deep-sea mining. [Interruption]

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Poto Williams): Order! Order!

Hon EUGENIE SAGE: I find that the arguments being put forward by Labour members that the reasons they are supporting an inquiry isn’t because of the provisions in this bill—it neglects that select committees have a fundamental role in reshaping bills in response to public submissions. If this bill was supported at first reading, the public would be able to have their say. Bills that are introduced into this Parliament emerge from it much changed after the select committee process. It is not as if this bill automatically becomes law, as a number of Labour members have implied. It could be changed in select committee to deal with that retrospective issue.

Instead, we have an inquiry. The Green Party will participate constructively in that inquiry, but given that the Green Party, alongside the community, has been fighting for more than 12 years to protect our oceans from deep-sea mining in Aotearoa’s waters, this bill could have taken that burden away and put it on the Government to say, “We are taking action to protect ocean health.”

There are so many opportunities to recover and recycle precious metals from all electronic waste that currently goes to landfill and to take steps towards a circular economy, rather than doing what ACT is proposing, which is to allow deep-sea mining to really get started in Aotearoa. We should note too that Aotearoa is one of the countries, like those in the Pacific, where these multinationals, like the minerals company DeepGreen and others, think that they can do prospecting and then try and convince the people that there’s going to be a lot of economic wealth, and continue with that really exploitative approach to the oceans.

This bill is an opportunity to say that the oceans around Aotearoa matter, that all of the marine life that enjoys those oceans matters, that coastal communities and iwi and hapū matter, and that tikanga matters, as the Supreme Court found with the appeals. These things all matter. If this bill goes to select committee, there would be an opportunity for the public to have a say. Te Paati Kakariki strongly supports it. Kia ora.

ANGIE WARREN-CLARK (Labour): Thank you, Madam Speaker. It is a pleasure to rise and speak on the Prohibition on Seabed Mining Legislation Amendment Bill. Before I commence on that part of my speech, I’d just like to offer my condolences to the young man who has lost his life in Whangārei and to the entire community of Whangārei. It’s a tragedy that we’ve had this happen.

I want to mihi and acknowledge Whaea Debbie Ngarewa-Packer for bringing this piece of legislation to the House. I know how important this piece of legislation is to you and to the wider community. It’s important to me too. I want to acknowledge as well that even though we are not supporting this piece of legislation, as the Hon Phil Twyford said, this is really important and we need to work on a way forward.

This bill would override existing mineral permits and consents. It would do it immediately, it would do it retrospectively, and it would do it without compensation. This bill proposes a nationwide ban on seabed mining within the coastal waters of Aotearoa, which is the 12-kilometre zone within the exclusive economic zone—the EEZ—which is 200 kilometres out, and to the wider continental shelf.

It is no surprise the Labour Party believes in just transitions. We have made undertakings in regards to those who currently hold those permits. However, the issue of seabed mining is significant. It is serious and it requires deep and thorough consideration by this House, and the community is calling for it, and even though we don’t support the bill—and it’s mainly because it is a member’s bill and not the right place—this House needs to address this matter and, therefore, we need to have the inquiry. We need to hear from every person who wants to make a submission in regards to this matter. We want to hear from all the voices across the motu, and the thing with that is that truly then we can bring in the research, we can bring in the experts to give us the advice, we can have a broad set of terms that we in the select committee get to make.

I encourage the member to come to select committee for the drafting of those terms, because certainly for me, as a fisherwoman, and as a woman who considers I am born of the sea and part of the ocean and it is part of what we do, it is so important that our terms of reference are appropriate for this inquiry, that they are broad-reaching, that they have a depth that thinks about not only us here in Aotearoa but also our Pacific neighbours and also the very complex science and the difference about the leakage and all of the things that we have heard in this House.

So I want to mihi to you for bringing this legislation. For me, this is one of the reasons I came to Parliament—to care for our oceans and to take care of what our generations to come need to do. Therefore, it is one of the issues that I’m so absolutely delighted that your bill has been pulled from the ballot and that we get to have that debate.

Now, as I say, the inquiry needs to be thorough and it needs to be really clear, and there is lots of science that we need to know about. But let us remember it is the Environment Committee that is looking at this, so our foremost consideration needs to be the environment. Our foremost consideration needs to be our oceans. It needs to be the outcome for our oceans and we need to look across the world for the research and science that tells us whether this should continue or not. I think I know the answer, but I think we need an inquiry to give good recommendations to Government. I cannot commend this bill, but I thank you.

Hon SCOTT SIMPSON (National—Coromandel): Thank you very much, Madam Speaker. Having a bill drawn in the ballot is always an exciting thing for a member of this House, and none less than the member Debbie Ngarewa-Packer, who has had this bill drawn. But as previous speakers have indicated—and it was Stuart Smith speaking on behalf of the National Party—we’re not going to be supporting this bill for a variety of reasons. Now, he elucidated as to a range of reasons that would impinge on some international treaties, obligations, but also the potential negative environmental impacts of a broader scale that this bill, if passed, would have on our beautiful natural environment. But we on this side are going to support the proposed Environment Committee inquiry into seabed mining, and we are going to do so for the very reasons that the Environment Minister, David Parker—and Phil Twyford also—spoke about, because, actually, we think this is a debate of public interest. Issues relating to seabed mining do need broad discussion and involvement in a nationwide discussion about the pros and the cons that confront us when we talk about seabed mining.

So we accept, on this side, that there are a range of strong views relating to seabed mining. Previous member Paul Eagle said he represented a coastal electorate. Well, I do too—in the Coromandel. We take our marine space in the Coromandel very, very seriously. We take what happens in the marine space very seriously, particularly the degrading state of the Hauraki Gulf, for instance, which is so important to so many people that come and visit my area but also those that live in my area. So we think that a parliamentary select committee inquiry will be useful in advancing a debate on this whole issue, so that’s why we are going to support that.

But I want to just focus on a matter that has been before this House now for more than 5½ years. The previous member, Angie Warren-Clark, said she came to Parliament to protect our oceans. Well, I put it to that member that if she was serious about her intent to protect the ocean, she would have convinced her colleagues by now, surely, to have supported and brought forward the Kermadec/Rangitāhua Ocean Sanctuary Bill. It has been wallowing on the Order Paper of this Parliament for 5½ years. During the last Parliament—during the last Parliament—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Poto Williams): Relevance, Mr Simpson—relevance, Mr Simpson.

Hon SCOTT SIMPSON: Pardon?

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Poto Williams): Relevance to this bill.

Hon SCOTT SIMPSON: Relevance? Well, the relevance to this bill is the protection of the marine environment, the protection of the seabed, and the protection from seabed mining of the Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary. So, for 5½ years, a bill has been sitting on the paper, and here’s the Order Paper. It’s sitting here at No. 21 on the Order Paper, still wallowing there, awaiting a second reading in this House. For the previous Parliament, there was a parliamentary majority, had the Greens chosen to support my colleagues in the National Party, and that bill could have been passed.

So I don’t buy for one minute—I don’t buy for one minute—the words that come from the Green Party on marine protection, and I don’t buy for one minute the words that come from Angie Warren-Clark on her heartfelt intent to protect the marine space, when they will not pass the bill that would give the planet the fourth-largest marine protected area on the globe. Now, if they were really serious, that’s what they would do.

Hon Gerry Brownlee: Guess who else didn’t support it?

Hon SCOTT SIMPSON: Well, there were a number—I think it was the Māori Party that didn’t support it as well. And so if they were really keen about protecting the marine space, protecting the seabed, let’s have a go at the Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary. It’s part of our exclusive economic zone, and to protect that from seabed mining would provide the planet—planet Earth—with the fourth- or fifth-largest marine protected area on the planet—and the Māori Party didn’t support it, the Greens didn’t support it, and the Labour Party haven’t supported it. What I say to them is: shame—shame on them for not supporting the Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary.

Hon Gerry Brownlee: Be fair—it wasn’t those two.

Hon SCOTT SIMPSON: It wasn’t these two. It was a previous iteration—it was a previous iteration—but the iterations of the Māori Party are changing so quickly and so flexibly, day by day—who knows?

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Poto Williams): Order! Order! Order!

Hon SCOTT SIMPSON: We aren’t going to support this bill, I don’t commend it to the House.

STEPH LEWIS (Labour—Whanganui): Thank you for the opportunity to take a call on the Prohibition on Seabed Mining Legislation Amendment Bill.

Hon Gerry Brownlee: It’s the House who grants that—no problem.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Barbara Kuriger): Order! Mr Brownlee.

STEPH LEWIS: I congratulate the member Debbie Ngarewa-Packer on having her bill drawn from the ballot, and for the work that she has led on this issue. I understand that one of the reasons the member drafted this bill was as a result of the Trans-Tasman Resources application to mine ironsand from the seafloor off the coast of Pātea. I want to acknowledge the feedback that I have received from the people in my electorate, the Whanganui electorate, on this issue. They’ve expressed concern specifically about the Trans-Tasman Resources application: that they have not carried out proper due diligence on the environmental impacts of sucking up the seabed, extracting the iron from the sand, and depositing the remaining sediment back into our sea.

I’ve been told by my constituents that they are concerned what the impact would be of the sediment drift on the delicate ecosystems in our area. There is no research that I personally am aware of to show what impact the noise of that mining would have, or the expelling of that sediment would have—back into the sea—on the endangered Māui dolphins, which reside off the Taranaki coast. I’ve heard from local fishermen and mana whenua that they are concerned about the impact of the sediment drift on their ability to fish, to gather and collect and eat kai moana from off the coast of Taranaki.

Questions have been raised about what changing the mineral composition of the environment would have on the ability of aquatic plants to grow, and, again, what that would mean for the fish and other kai moana to find food off the Taranaki Bight. I’ve heard concerns from our locals that the community of Pātea and the South Taranaki district would see little economic benefit if this mining goes ahead, because many of the workers would likely be flown in and flown out. Few, if any, jobs would go to locals and profits likely back over the Tasman to Australia. As a local MP, I have heard those concerns. I have heard what the local community want to see in respect of this particular project.

However, as the local MP, I am also acutely aware that, unfortunately, the way this bill has been drafted means that if it became law tomorrow, our oil and gas fields off the coast of Taranaki would be turned off. The bill would revoke 14 existing petroleum permits in offshore waters located in the Taranaki Bight, of which nine are mining permits and six are exploration permits. This is because it makes activity prohibited if it’s a mining activity, and mining activity relates to the seabed likely to contain mineral deposits, including fuel minerals such as coal and petroleum.

At the moment, around 70 percent of New Zealand’s petroleum production comes from offshore petroleum permits and licences off Taranaki. These permits and licences would be revoked but are critical to ensuring the security of New Zealand’s energy supply. Three of these fields—Māui, Pohokura, and Kupe—produce about 50 percent of our natural gas, which goes into our gas network from Taranaki. So shutting down would have a major impact on our gas network and local employers like Fonterra.

The shutdown of these oil fields would also result in declining production of LPG here in Aotearoa, so we would either need to find somewhere else to produce LPG or import more. In 2018, our Government prohibited any new grants of offshore oil and gas exploration permits. In doing so, we did honour existing agreements, to protect existing jobs.

We are working with the sector through the national energy centre to transition the workforce and economy over time, but we can’t support a bill that would revoke those existing mineral permits and consents immediately, retrospectively, and without compensating parties. That would decimate the local Taranaki economy. But I hear your concerns, and, as you have heard from my colleagues in this House today, we have announced there will be a select committee inquiry into seabed mining to properly understand the impacts this has on our ocean. In October last year, we signed and backed a conditional moratorium on seabed mining in nearby jurisdictions. I want to say again—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Poto Williams): Order! The member’s time has expired.

DEBBIE NGAREWA-PACKER (Co-Leader—Te Paati Māori): Twelve years—12 years—this House has had time to get this together. For 12 years, these people have been resisting and doing everything at their own cost—their own hours, their own dollars, their own researchers, their own cultural integrity—and this is what the House comes to. Labour, who nationalised Māori minerals, gas, and petroleum without any compensation to Māori, is now, today, arguing why they don’t support us. We’ve had to sit here and listen to you saying we need more public input; yet there were 13,000 submissions. I could tell that some of them today didn’t read any of them, because if they had read them, they would have seen that the very oil companies who you’re sticking up for today, Steph, were the people who actually proposed this activity too. I put to you that you’re not prepared for this debate. Yet our people have been doing 12 years—12 years—on their own fighting this.

You guys got in and you promised my people—when you went around, you eyeballed them and you told them this would be their nuclear-free moment. You made decisions that ended that sector, and you’ve backtracked because of polling. Backtracked—don’t even bother nodding to me. You sit there and the Minister is saying comments like “If we’d had more time, we could have had this tracked, and we would have made more time to do this. The intent of the bill wasn’t clear.”—rubbish! Rubbish! You could have gone back there and changed that.

You could have gone to select committee, and I’ll be honest: I don’t care who owns this bill. I don’t care. Te Paati Māori hasn’t come in here for kudos. We’re used to you guys taking our bills and owning it; that’s not what this is about. This is about you taking ownership and showing our communities that you’ve got their back, and you haven’t.

What was this other kōrero we had? We had “regulatory environment”. I kept hearing all through this debate that it’s about inconvenience, the loss of profits. Oh, the royalties! Well, ask our whānau—this one over here saying there are tons of opportunities in Taranaki—ask us where those opportunities are, as we clean up the mess after these extractors have gone; raped and pillaged our backyard. Ask them where the royalties are, because there are no rights to Trans-Tasman Resources. They have no property rights. That is such a red herring. I’ve never heard such “caroopa” in my life, and the reality is there is no onshore connection with seabed mining. It’s not even a fossil fuel.

I feel insulted that I’ve had to sit here and listen to you all pretend you understand what’s going on here—you don’t. It’s been insulting to our people that we’ve had to watch these amateurs sit here and talk about things they have no understanding of. I cannot believe—thank you. Thank you to Te Pāti Kākāriki. Thank you to you, who gets it.

Our intelligence as Taranaki has been insulted today. We would be better off, what, leaving it to these self-serving capitalists—the 2 percent who own 50 percent of our wealth—who are sitting here telling me what we need to do and what’s best for Taranaki? How dare he! E kī! E kī!

[Is that right?! Is that right?!]

Where are we today, whānau, when we show the world that it’s OK to protect the international waters, but your own people don’t matter? Your own people—a Government with the largest mandate, a Government with the largest Māori caucus. And I know we get on with so much—I know we get on with so much. When I heard somebody to my right saying, “And this is why we don’t support you and why we won’t do business with”, well, you remember that on 15 October, because don’t you dare ring me—sitting there saying to me.

We come here with passion for our people. We don’t come here to be apathetic and lethargic. Where is your spark and your spike—where is it? Where is your kaha for your people?

I sat there and I thought to myself, “What is it that you’re saying? Someone said that there are property rights; someone said that seabed mining is a fossil fuel.” We have just been in a debate, which my people have witnessed, where everyone, bar one, has been completely out of their depth. And if that’s what we have to get to, to get to an inquiry after 12 years, where they have won three court cases—the New Zealand law has determined this, my friends. They have already made and set the precedents, and you are telling me you need more information. What could you possibly have to learn that the High Court, that the Court of Appeal, and that the Supreme Court hasn’t already determined? What could you possibly, possibly have to learn?

We do a lot of work together, but I am going to put it to my colleagues today, particularly to my colleagues in Labour—because you know what the foreshore and seabed did to us. You know why you moved that. I put it to you that you are a real disappointment to our whānau. Don’t come knocking on that door. And I’m really disappointed that we have to do this today—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Poto Williams): Order! Order!

Waiata

A party vote was called for on the question, That the Prohibition on Seabed Mining Legislation Amendment Bill be now read a first time.

Ayes 13

Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand 9; Te Paati Māori 2; Kerekere; Whaitiri.

Noes 106

New Zealand Labour 62; New Zealand National 34; ACT New Zealand 10.

Motion not agreed to.

Bills

New Plymouth District Council (Perpetual Investment Fund) Bill

Second Reading

GLEN BENNETT (Labour—New Plymouth): I move, That the New Plymouth District Council (Perpetual Investment Fund) Bill be now read a second time.

The New Plymouth District Council (Perpetual Investment Fund) Bill was considered by the Governance and Administration Committee. Their report was unanimous in recommending that the bill be passed and I hope the bill can continue to progress with the support of all parties in this Parliament.

I want to thank the members of the Governance and Administration Committee for their work, also, too, the Department of Internal Affairs for their advice. And also, I want to say a special thankyou to the four submitters who submitted on this bill. I’d also want to acknowledge the New Plymouth District Council for their work, for their process in this, particularly Neil Holdom, the Mayor of New Plymouth, for his leadership, and councillors, and I also want to make special mention of Greg Stephens, who is an adviser at the council who has worked hard on this piece of legislation. I also want to say to the ratepayers and to the residents of the New Plymouth District: thank you for your engagement in recent years around getting this piece of legislation to where it is today.

The council has clearly placed a lot of work into this bill such that the committee did not need to make any changes or redraft any of its provisions. I know the council is very proactive in the Perpetual Investment Fund and is also in its financial assets to help to promote the wellbeing of the New Plymouth District community, without having to rely too strongly on our ratepayers. So it is great to see the mahi given the tick of approval here by the committee, and the bill being back in the House for second reading.

Now, I really want to go back and just recap on what this bill is about and what it does. It’s here to protect the—it’s such a tough one to say—Perpetual Investment Fund, or let’s just call it the PIF; it would make it a whole lot easier for me right now. The bill limits the area it can be used for within the New Plymouth District and also puts in place statutory controls to make sure that the PIF continues to be used in a perpetual manner and is not spent today at the cost of our future communities.

I particularly want to note the committee’s support of the council’s request for a small exemption from one of the provisions of the Local Government Act 2002 for the PIF. Usually, councils buying or selling shares in ports or airports of New Zealand have to undertake rigorous community consultation through their long-term plans. However, it is pleasing to see that the committee agreed to support a small exemption for this investment fund because, clearly, those types of investments are not community assets like the local airport or port. The four submitters all raised interesting views that the committee considered. The committee’s report canvasses these issues well.

I want to speak to one aspect that I’m going to pick up on around the select committee’s report. It’s in relation to the governance deed. Now, the governance deed provides the current structure for the management of the PIF and is an agreement between the council and the PIF guardians—the council-controlled organisation charged with the management of the PIF. Council has advised me that the bill is not intended to replace the governance deed. Instead, it provides a separate set of requirements that exist and operate alongside the terms of the governance deed.

In particular, the bill will provide a higher level of legal framework with additional requirements that will need to be alongside the governance deed requirements. For example, clause 7(1)(b) of the bill provides the council with the authority to take a larger than normal amount of funding from the PIF where this can be justified on the basis of current and future community wellbeing. The council will still then need to undertake its internal processes through the governance deed, which will require a 75 percent supermajority vote of the councillors. The council may choose to amend the governance deed to ensure it comprehensively reflects the requirements of the bill in due course. I hope that the record is therefore clarified that this bill does not include any provisions to remove the governance deed and it would remain in force if this bill passes.

This PIF is significant and I’d like to update the House on that this afternoon. As of the end of April, it was worth $349.7 million. I also want to congratulate the council on recently retaining its AA+ credit rating with Standard & Poor’s (S&P) global rating. S&P’s report makes very clear how important the PIF is to the New Plymouth District Council’s financial performance on behalf of its community, and that reiterates to me how important it is for Parliament to help the council to protect the PIF for the future and for future generations.

Now, why is this fund so important? Well, New Plymouth District has a population of more than 84,000 people. I would like to mention and just notice that Rachel Boyack has sat down next to me in the House and it is the sunniest place in the country—

Angie Warren-Clark: Oh, controversial.

GLEN BENNETT: The second year running, thank you, Angie Warren-Clark from the Bay of Plenty. This comes up many, many times and I can just factually talk about National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research Ltd, who, of course, does the research and the science. Back last year, there was a total of 358.6 hours of sunshine in New Plymouth during the month of January in 2022, which was an all-time sunniest record for New Zealand!

Teanau Tuiono: Wow.

GLEN BENNETT: Yeah, OK. It was pretty interesting—vaguely.

I also want to acknowledge current MPs from the Labour Party who were brought up in New Plymouth. I want to acknowledge the Deputy Prime Minister, the Hon Carmel Sepuloni, who came back to New Plymouth Girls’ High School recently with the Mayor of Wellington, Tory Whanau, and from the press gallery we also had Jo Moir—all old girls of New Plymouth Girls’ High School. It was wonderful to have them there. Also, the Hon Andrew Little grew up there, along with Liz Craig. I know she’s in Invercargill—a long way from home, but I know she is looking at property to move back there shortly, maybe. And, of course, Angela Roberts, another wonderful, fine—

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Mr Bennett, I’ve just looked at the bill, and the genealogy of the party does not really appear in here. So in the 2½ minutes left to you, I wonder if we could just devote a little bit of time to the bill, please.

GLEN BENNETT: Mr Speaker, I appreciate your guidance. I get very excited about the New Plymouth District and the electorate of New Plymouth; I can’t help myself sometimes.

With the PIF, in terms of investment, to ensure this is a mighty fine city and region, we have our award-winning coastal walkway. We have Puke Ariki. We have the Len Lye Centre - Govette Brewster Art Gallery. We have our Te Rewa Rewa Bridge. We have our magnificent airport and gateway into our region.

Angie Warren-Clark: Juno Gin!

GLEN BENNETT: We have Juno Gin, thank you very much, Angie Warren-Clark, who has been there. We have Pukeiti. We have Pukekura Park, which, again, investment from the New Plymouth District Council ensures award-winning festivals such as the Festival of Lights that runs every single summer. We also have the WOMAD festival, an international festival, along with our wonderful surf beaches—Surf Highway 45—our Waitara River, our wonderful sites of significance like Te Kohia Pā, and, of course, our Taranaki Maunga. And the reason I mention all these places and all these spaces is because they take investment. They take money to ensure that they are kept up to a standard, that we are constantly moving with the times, ensuring that New Plymouth is the most livable city in New Zealand; not only the sunniest but a place for all people to enjoy.

So this legislation is around looking to the future. It’s ensuring, as I said earlier, that it’s not just for this generation to use now and to spend at will but it is to ensure that it is secured for generations to come so that we can continue to develop our parks, continue to develop our cultural heritage, continue to develop our swimming pools, our roads, and our infrastructure to make sure that New Plymouth continues to be the most wonderful city to live in.

I’m grateful to be able to shepherd this bill through the House, and I want to thank the committee again for their hard work to consider the PIF bill. And for those who took their time submitting on this bill, it is a real privilege and a pleasure—and tonight, I don’t know if the champagne bottles will open, because I know we’ve got a few more stages to go through, but I know that people in the New Plymouth District are grateful that we can protect this fund. I gladly commend this bill to the House.

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

BARBARA KURIGER (National—Taranaki-King Country): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I want to acknowledge Glen Bennett for shepherding this bill to the House. I also want to make a point on some of the previous points that Mr Bennett just made that Taranaki is a very parochial place, and it’s partly because, I think, we had so many boundaries that were hard to get out of, for a number of years we just joined together and did what we needed to do.

I have to say on the sunshine hours’ one, it’s a pride thing to have but I have felt, in terms of the last few months of this year, very lucky to be based on the west coast of the North Island of New Zealand, because I realise that people north and east of us have been suffering tremendously.

I will just make note that when we’re talking about assets in Taranaki, David Bennett—the other Mr Bennett in the House at the moment—just brought to my attention to remind people that Taranaki is now part of the Chiefs, and I look forward to the game at the newly reformed stadium, which has actually been having earthquake strengthening for the last few years. So when we talk about things that the New Plymouth District Council is able to achieve, along with the Taranaki Regional Council, that’s one of those assets.

So National supports the intent of the bill to ensure sustainable long-term revenue for the people of New Plymouth. It’s a small bill. It will place reasonable statutory direction and control of the fund, ensuring it remains sustainable and delivers benefit for ratepayers. It has been endorsed by the council. I would also like to make mention of Mayor Neil Holdom and his council in New Plymouth, and also declare that I’m a ratepayer of that council as well. So, in speaking to this bill, I just want to make that very clear.

I wasn’t part of the Governance and Administration Committee, but I do know that this piece of legislation has undergone the full select committee process, and we will continue to support this bill.

So the object of the bill, which is to provide financial sustainability to the New Plymouth District, is aligned with National’s vision for a local government of devolved power, and councils maintaining diverse and sustainable revenue streams to deliver for their ratepayers.

While there are no current plans for amalgamation, the New Plymouth District Council have expressed a desire to ring-fence this fund for their own ratepayers. I will talk a little bit more about that in terms of submissions, shortly. But it wants a sustainable revenue stream to deliver for the ratepayers. I guess, when I think about that from a wider perspective and some of the legislation that’s being put forward over recent times around various entities in other bills, such as the water bills and things, we do actually have to think about what our councils are going to look like in the future. We support our councils to make those decisions, but this is a protection if you put all of that in the context of what we’ve recently been experiencing.

The people of New Plymouth own the shares that they sold to create this fund and they should be able to reap the benefits of that. But what I will say is that it is designed to be a scheme that will benefit the whole community.

It would be remiss of me to not talk about one submitter’s concerns, because I think they need to be put on the table. One submitter opposed the provision of the bill which would limit the benefits of the fund to the current district boundaries because he felt that it may cause disparities amongst ratepayers. That’s a fair question. I commend the committee for giving a fair hearing to the submitter. He had proposed amendment of that provision to account for future changes to the district area. I think that question actually is a good one for those who distribute the funds just to keep in mind in the future in terms of what they’re doing—is it going to benefit ratepayers? I think the point in time when it would benefit ratepayers is when the fund went into a deep hole or if the council needed some extra funding and they had to dip into the fund to actually support what goes on in the community in the future. But, hopefully, with proven investment, that won’t happen and they won’t have to dip into that fund to fund basic requirements and they’ll be able to use it to expand on what’s going on in the community.

The New Plymouth District Council established this fund in 2004 and it was to operate as a sustainable perpetual fund. This means that the money released from the fund should be lower than its earnings so that the fund’s capital base remains the same or grows. The opening balance was $259 million, but during the 2008 global financial crisis, the fund lost around $113 million in value over a five-year period. To recover this loss, the New Plymouth District Council reduced releases and increased rates. This bill aims to prevent those sort of issues from happening in the future. Although the fund has recovered since the global financial crisis, the bill does aim to prevent that, and Part 2 of the bill addresses just how the fund would be managed. Good management of this fund should ensure that it continues to be an alternative source of revenue and it can subsidise rates in the New Plymouth District.

It also says that the fund would be managed and used for the social, economic, environmental, and cultural wellbeing of the New Plymouth communities. I believe that the concern that the submitter brought to the committee—this was the worry of that person. I think it’s clearly listed in the documentation that that is the intent, and we hope that the investments go well in the future to allow that to happen.

But it still does, as part of this piece of legislation, allow the fund to be tapped into if there is a genuine crisis. We all know we’ve seen a few of those over the last while. If they’ve not been pandemics, they’ve been cyclones; we’ve seen cities recovering from earthquakes. Who knows what we’re going to be facing in the future. So touch wood that things will progress well for New Plymouth, but one never knows, so it’s always good to have a bit of a nest egg in place, just in case.

So clause 4 of the bill does define the “New Plymouth District” as the area delineated in section 35 of the Local Government (Taranaki Region) Reorganisation Order 1989. When I think about 1989, it reminds me of one of my areas in my electorate: Whangamomona. I represent the only republic in New Zealand. There was a bit of a concern about the reallocation of those boundaries, and so Whangamomona now has its own mayor, in a fun sense, and has a republic day every two years. But it sent a clear message in 1989, and every couple of years, that republic still continues to send that clear message.

The bill would restrict spending from this fund to the district area. So that is clearly defined in the Act. It does not provide the flexibility to account for potential future change to these boundaries. The committee said, “We asked whether such changes would create any difficulties if the bill were passed. [And] New Plymouth District Council told us that it has previously dealt with geographically limited funds, and is confident that it can manage [this] in an effective way.”

So, in supporting this local bill, as part of the National Party and as a Taranaki person, I want to commend this bill to the House and thank the select committee for the work that they did. Thank you.

RACHEL BOYACK (Labour—Nelson): Thank you, Mr Speaker. It’s a pleasure to rise in the House this afternoon to take a call on the New Plymouth District Council (Perpetual Investment Fund) Bill—the PIF bill.

As a member of the Governance and Administration Committee, it was a pleasure to hear what was a very small number of submissions on this bill and to be able to engage with the New Plymouth District Council and the member who has sponsored the bill through the House, my colleague Glen Bennett; it was useful to be able to talk through and hear from them about the benefits of the PIF to the New Plymouth community. I think many of us sitting around the table of the committee, and perhaps some of us in the House, were a little bit envious of this fund. It is a significant fund that does allow a significant amount of investment into the New Plymouth community.

I note one of those organisations that receives funding from the council is the TSB Showcase concert venue in the middle of New Plymouth, which I have fond memories of as a former member of the New Zealand Youth Choir; it was where I performed for the first time with the Youth Choir, in New Plymouth. I’m not sure if Marbles restaurant receives funding, however, but I do have fond memories of heading along with a bunch of hungry 20-somethings at the buffet there at Marbles restaurant in New Plymouth. Every so often, the waiting staff—they were dressed in a Greek theme—would do a whole lot of dancing throughout the restaurant, and we would then sing our way into the night on the karaoke machine. As I say, these are the types of investments that this fund can make into the New Plymouth community which enables the economic and social fabric of the New Plymouth society to thrive. I am very envious of their PIF fund.

Myself and the New Plymouth MP do have a little bit in common. One of things we have in common is having to constantly remind people of the difference between New Plymouth and Palmerston North. I was lucky enough to go to high school in Palmerston North, and many people around New Zealand often get those places confused. What I can say—look, they both have an “N” and they both have a “P” in the title of their names, and that’s about where it ends, the similarities between Palmerston North and New Plymouth.

As a proud MP from provincial New Zealand, who has grown up and spent the large majority of her life living in provincial New Zealand, it’s always enjoyable chatting to my colleague Mr Glen Bennett just about the similarities between Nelson and New Plymouth. But I would say: we are the sunshine capital of New Zealand, and I was pleased to present Mr Glen Bennett with a little box of sunshine, earlier this year, filled with products from mighty Nelson, which—I’m sure Mr Speaker would agree with me—is the sunniest part of New Zealand, it being his tūrangawaewae as well.

The other thing we share is that we are due to have a coastal shipping link started later this year between New Plymouth and Nelson, and, just like this bill and the Perpetual Investment Fund supports the economic prosperity of New Plymouth, so too will that coastal shipping route.

I’ll spend some time just focusing somewhat on the bill. As I said we had five submissions; there were excellent submissions.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Only took four minutes to get here.

RACHEL BOYACK: That’s a record, Mr Speaker! I think it is important to talk through some of the history and the fund itself. It was established in 2004 from the sale proceeds of the council’s shareholdings in Powerco. What did happen, though, which I think the New Plymouth District Council and the bill’s sponsor have done a very good job of explaining well to the committee, was it was not managed sustainably, so it lost around $113 million in value over five years. That was following the 2008 global financial crisis. That gave cause for concern to the council and the community about the ongoing financial sustainability of the fund.

What the bill does is it requires the council to use the PIF for purposes that are primarily for the benefit of current and future communities of New Plymouth, as defined by its current boundaries—and I’ll make some commentary on that a little bit later. It requires the council to have independent financial managers that make best-practice investment decisions to maintain or increase the value of the PIF over time and avoid prejudicing the council’s reputation. It ensures that the council can only reduce the real value of the capital of the PIF where circumstances arise that warrant doing so. I just note the comments from the former speaker, Barbara Kuriger, just around that being in some type of emergency situation whereby there could be a need to tap into that fund.

It’s very important, and the New Plymouth District Council made that very, very clear about their view that they needed to ensure that ongoing financial sustainability of the fund. And that’s important; when you’ve made a decision to do something such as sell assets in a company like Powerco that has an ongoing dividend and income application, essentially, to the council, you need to ensure that you don’t then have a sugar hit of funding that then depreciates away and you’re no longer able to continue investing in perpetuity. It’s prudent that there’s some removal of that management of the fund away from, for example, councillors—not suggesting they wouldn’t have the best interests of the fund in their approach—to those who are financially sound managers so that you can ensure that you’ve got that expert advice. It’s certainly something that the committee completely agreed with.

I will just make some notes about the submitters who opposed the provision in the bill which would limit the benefits of the PIF to the current district boundaries. That submitter felt that this could cause disparities amongst ratepayers. Now, the particular point this submitter made during select committee hearings was that if there were to be some form of merger in the future—now that was an if, but there are always potentials for council mergers to occur around the country. The submitter made the point that if there were to be a merger, you could then have a disparity between ratepayers that were within the current New Plymouth boundary and those that are not but could be part of some form of merged council.

Now, my perspective and the select committee’s view was that, given that this fund has come from the initial investment in Powerco and the decisions made by New Plymouth District Council for the benefit of ratepayers within that district—it’s certainly my view, and I believe the committee agreed with the council that that should be ring-fenced for the benefit of those people that have contributed to that fund in the first place. That’s not to say that in a hypothetical situation, if there were to be some form of merger in the future, that the council was not stopped from coming back to Parliament to potentially change that at some point in the future, but, ultimately, that would be a local decision to make.

On that note, it is just worth reminding the House and those who may be watching that this is a local bill. So this is a bill put forward by the council where they have undertaken the consultation necessary in order to get the bill to a point to bring to Parliament. Unless there is something that is of concern from a legislative point of view or from a Standing Orders point of view, our role as a select committee during this process is to ensure that submitters have the opportunity to be heard and that the council itself, in taking the bill through the process, has heard those submitters and has followed an appropriate process. So I am comfortable with the decision that the New Plymouth District Council has made. I think it’s the right one.

Now, my colleague Mr Glen Bennett in his speech, and we have in the select committee report, as well, about the governance deed—and that may be a matter we have to have some further conversation about as this bill progresses through the House, which, as a member of that committee, I’d be very happy to have that.

I do also want to note that the New Plymouth District Council also did an excellent job leading to this process to look at a number of other options. I don’t have time to traverse them, unfortunately, because I have taken some time to speak about the wonderful provinces of New Zealand—New Plymouth, Palmerston North, and Nelson. This is an excellent bill. I commend the council on their work. I commend my colleague Glen Bennett. I thank the submitters. I commend this bill to the House.

IAN McKELVIE (National—Rangitīkei): Well, where would you start after the last three speeches, talking about the great places they live? I could start by saying, “Palmerston North, the sunshine capital of New Zealand.”, but I won’t. Ha, ha! I thought that would draw a bit of a—but we are, without a doubt, the wind capital of New Zealand.

Anyway, back to the important issue of the bill. The bill, of course, spent a little bit of time in the Governance and Administration Committee, and was pretty much passed with very minimal change. So I think one of the observations I’ll make before I start to talk about some of the other factors about this bill is that we have a lot of these sorts of bills come through the House, and I think there must be a better way of dealing with these issues than spending time in the Parliament on what, effectively, are very local issues. Of course, we’ve got other bills coming through on this very day that concern single families, and I think there must be better ways of dealing with this than putting them through the onerous select committee processes and running through a significant time in this House. I think that it’s time we had a look at those opportunities, and, of course, we’ve got one or two other bills in the Governance and Administration Committee at the moment where there are some questions as to whether they should have come to the House or not, and those will be resolved in the next few weeks. So I think there is an issue with the number of bills we bring through here.

Of course, this fund is, effectively, the product of a bill. It wasn’t initially, but it was put there. I want to speak about how these funds came about, because I remember, at the time, New Plymouth had a very, very—well, I suppose he was an outgoing mayor, Peter Tennent, and he had the foresight, which a lot of councils don’t have, to actually retain the investment that the New Plymouth District Council—or city council, I suppose, at the time—had had in Powerco. Some of the other councils in my area disbursed those shares to the shareholders who, effectively, were the ratepayers, who promptly sold them.

I think I go back to my time in local government where the councils were busy selling off rubbish dumps and what were called rubbish dumps in those days, which have graduated to be landfills, to recycling centres, to whatever. Those are all now privately owned, and I think that’s a great shame. I think this fund here is a great example of what can be achieved by a community having the foresight to retain an asset that then can be paid out. I know that there are other councils around New Zealand at the moment having significant debates about the, I guess, strategic assets that they hold and what should happen to those, and there’s a great rush to sell them. I’m very opposed to selling those assets, because I think they’ve got much more good for the collective community than they have by being dispersed, and, in our case, for the Powerco shares, hocked off for about 1,200 bucks a household.

Imagine the good—and I know there has been a bit of talk today about the loss that this fund suffered but, actually, it’s not really a loss, because all that money was dispersed to the city council who then subsidised the rates. Now, you could argue that’s a dumb process, and I think probably proved in hindsight that it was a dumb process, but, none the less, that money is still in that community, so it isn’t going anywhere; it just didn’t still exist in this fund. So I think there are some questions you can ask about the way these things operate, and we’ll never get it right. I don’t think, as I said earlier, it necessarily needs to be the prerogative of Parliament to put these Acts in place. I think local communities should be able to manage these things themselves without them becoming Acts of Parliament.

This will probably, no doubt, come back, and the very issue that has been raised by all of our speakers around the submitter who lived outside the boundary and wasn’t so much concerned about a merger as a boundary change. In the Manawatū, of course, we went through a boundary change between Manawatū District and Palmerston North City not that long ago, and if a bill like this had been in place, the piece of land that went to the Palmerston North City from the Manawatū District would not be eligible for the funds to be applied to it even though it’s part of the Palmerston City. Rachel Boyack outlined the reasons for that, and they were pretty good reasons, really, for the same reason that we dispersed the shares and were sold off individually, those people, effectively, didn’t get the benefit of those shares in their hands; the city council or district council chose to keep them, put them into an investment fund, and invest it for the future of that region.

It is quite a parochial area, Taranaki, and I’ve got no claim to it other than my wife comes from South Taranaki, and, of course, we saw some members of the South Taranaki community in here earlier making quite a lot of noise; she’s much quieter than that. But I think that they also have a fund like this, and when you go to Hāwera and see the facilities that they’ve managed to put together in a small community like Hāwera as a result of, effectively, that investment fund that they created out of the same sale as this one we’re talking about, it’s quite significant. I think it just proves the value of those things to a district. Anyone who went to Chester Borrows’ funeral would have seen that massive asset where that funeral was held, which was exactly the result of an investment from a fund like this.

Just to go back in history, and I talked about Peter Tennent earlier. It seems ironic that when this fund was set up, the first thing it did in the land of milk and honey—or milk and oil—was to go to Tasmania and invest in a dairy farm. Ha, ha! Quite extraordinary, when you think about it. They had all the dairy farms in the world in Taranaki, so they go off to Tasmania and shove a whole lot of money into Tasmania. Luckily for them, they got out of that, but only by the skin of their teeth. So I think that’s what actually led to the formation of this Act to some extent, because I think the investments were seen as being pretty odd for a place that’s entirely—well, almost entirely—reliant on the oil industry and dairy cows to a large extent anyway, to suddenly—and a bit of think-big stuff—invest in a whole lot of dairy farms in Tasmania.

I guess that’s the sort of thing that these kind of laws or Acts, effectively, endeavour to protect. But you can’t protect everyone from humans, and humans do strange things at times. So that was a bit of the background to this investment fund. I do think that these things—as I’ve said a couple of times—are of great value to communities like Taranaki, and I congratulate them on bringing this bill to the House and getting it passed, and, hopefully, enabling it to protect this investment for the future of that district.

We had four submitters, I think it was, that submitted in the course of this bill. It was pretty well put together by the New Plymouth District Council and there was plenty of precedent for it. There are other investment funds around the country that are controlled by bills like this, so it was a pretty straightforward decision for the council to support the formation of it. So I think that the future of investment funds like this is probably to provide facilities and amenities for those communities that probably should never be funded out of rates. So if you think about the drive to get, I suppose, councils to concentrate on their core—what some people would call their core—activities around water, roads, and libraries, and one or two things like that, the facilities that get provided in these communities from funds other than council funds have great value to those communities. They have that value for two reasons. One is because they don’t put a whole lot more demand on the ratepayers, and it enables those communities to have those amazing facilities that I talked about with respect to Hāwera, actually, but New Plymouth’s obviously got plenty of them as well, and some of them will serve the community for many years to come.

So I think, as I said earlier, that these bills would be better if they didn’t have to come to Parliament. I accept the reason this had to come to Parliament, because they wanted to change what, effectively, was an Act of Parliament anyway. So I wish the New Plymouth District Council all the best in the future with this.

I think one other thing I really need to point out as well is that, effectively, the management of this fund is totally independent from the district councils or the—I’d better be careful what I say about elected members, hadn’t I, but from the fingers of elected members. I think that’s very important as well, from that perspective. I don’t think we get elected to Parliament or to councils, for that matter, to end up running investment funds. That’s not why we’re there. So I think it was a very wise decision of the New Plymouth District Council to make sure that that fund is managed in a professional manner. We’ve seen with other big funds in New Zealand that when they’re managed well, and there’s no reason why they shouldn’t be managed well, and managed for the long term, they become very sustainable and very valuable to those communities.

So I think this bill is a good one, and I know it will support New Plymouth well, and I look forward to it making its way through the House, or the rest of its way through the House. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

SIMON COURT (ACT): Thank you, Mr Speaker. ACT will support this bill. ACT believes that local government should be in control of its own destiny, and that if New Plymouth District Council have been effective guardians and stewards of investments made in the past, then they should reap the rewards of it.

This is an example—this investment fund—of local governments’ intergenerational thinking, decision making focused on long-term sustainable outcomes. And it’s a credit to the New Plymouth District Council and to those who have managed the investment fund—at arm’s length, may I say.

But one of the advantages of this fund is that it has paid out over $240 million to the New Plymouth District Council since 2004. That’s $240 million which has been used to offset potential rate rises and to cash flow, borrowing, and debt that’s enabled the district council to invest in infrastructure and all kinds of facilities that the town of New Plymouth benefits from.

The things that make New Plymouth and the Taranaki region wealthy are things that it’s good to invest in: energy, natural gas, manufacturing, farming, and tourism, of course, because New Plymouth is a great place to visit. And one of the reasons it’s a good place to visit and a good place to live is because of the investment in infrastructure; not just roads, not just pipes but also that social infrastructure like art galleries and libraries and other facilities the people of New Plymouth benefit from.

But I think it’s important to note that these investments have been managed independently of elected members. It has not been individual councillors or a majority of councillors deciding what to invest in. That decision making has been outsourced to people who are competent at investment. That is why I was surprised to hear the member Ian McKelvie suggest that councils should still be investing in rubbish tips. Well, I had an experience working at a council, having to clean up after their rubbish tip investments—over 50 years of dumping rubbish in the harbour or in rivers or in the back of someone’s farm—and I don’t know if councils are the right people to be building and investing in rubbish tips. Now, of course, local government needs to use waste management facilities, and, fortunately, the private sector provides the best waste management facilities in New Zealand—permitted and consented and operating safely. We don’t need council to get involved with that.

But again, thinking that elected members know what to invest in is what has led to some absolutely disastrous investments. When we think of Auckland Council owning airport shares that haven’t returned a dividend for years. Auckland Council, where I live, owning Ports of Auckland—100 percent. A council that is so cash-strapped, they even proposed cutting access to the Auckland Art Gallery, to taking paintings away, maybe even selling them for a bit of cash. That’s why local councils should not be involved in using ratepayers’ money to invest in things like ports and airports that don’t pay a return when councils desperately need to use their capital to invest in other infrastructure and services.

It would be fair to say that New Plymouth District Council’s outsourcing of its investment to the Perpetual Investment Fund is the best example we could hold up right now to show why councils should simply focus on the important things. Invest in infrastructure, invest in those social amenities like pools and libraries, for example, that the communities rely on. But in order to do that, they do need cash flow. In this case, for New Plymouth District Council, it comes from their investment fund. But there are other opportunities for other councils. Now, I don’t agree with Mr McKelvie that councils should be investing in rubbish tips, but it’s true that there are other ways to raise revenue.

What ACT would propose is if other councils wanted to get even close to what New Plymouth has managed to achieve, they should consider doing things such as applying user charges to the supply of water, which is still a mystery in places like Wellington City—where as a temporary resident spending 30 weeks a year here as a visiting MP from Auckland, I notice that there is drinking water running in the streets. When I asked my landlord when I first moved to Wellington why is there chlorinated drinking water running in the streets, he assured me it couldn’t be and that it must be groundwater coming out of the hill, because no one would let chlorinated drinking water run in the streets for what he said would be at least the 15 years he’d seen it running down the road. But it turns out that it was, because in Wellington they don’t meter the water and no one in Wellington pays user charges for the water that they use.

It shows you this huge difference in the competence and the aspiration of organisations like New Plymouth District Council, when you compare them to the performance of others around the country. I do really feel for my friends and colleagues who live in Wellington City and have to live under the current regime, which isn’t delivering infrastructure and, in fact, is putting people at risk of even having lamps fall off street lights on to their heads as they move around the city.

So I think it’s important to reflect that long-term decision making; what to invest in, whether it’s investments—as New Plymouth District Council has outsourced to their investment fund—or infrastructure that is desperately needed for the community, local government needs to be thinking long term. And it can only do that when the playing field is clear; when the runway is clear of obstacles. Unfortunately, this Government has actually put more obstacles in the way of local government achieving its objectives, rather than removing them.

When we think about applying—forcing, even—co-governance on the Canterbury Regional Council, Environment Canterbury, through to the aborted attempt from one of their members to introduce a local bill to force a completely unweighted and undemocratic representation arrangement on the Rotorua District Council.

Or if we think about the future of local government, the inquiry that the Government has set up which produced a report that is so full of woke nonsense you’d think that it has been written by a group of undergraduates at university in their first term of learning about local government, it’s an appalling prescription for what should be institutions charged with supercharging their community aspirations when it comes to economic and social development. Because that’s what New Plymouth District Council has done by outsourcing the management of investment to the Perpetual Investment Fund, reaping $240 million in returns over the past 20-odd years, keeping rates down and providing sufficient headroom to invest in infrastructure.

Now, that’s why ACT will support this bill. It’s a good bill and we look forward to seeing more great things the next time the ACT Party takes our bus to New Plymouth to hold a public meeting—we expect to hear great things about what’s going on in New Plymouth. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

STEPH LEWIS (Labour—Whanganui): Thank you, Mr Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to rise and take a call on the New Plymouth District Council (Perpetual Investment Fund) Bill, or otherwise known today as the PIF bill. I’d like to begin this afternoon by congratulating my colleague Glen Bennett, and my neighbour—we share a boundary just south of Ōpunake, on the Taranaki coast there, in the South Taranaki District; a beautiful part of the country. But congratulations, Glen, on shepherding this bill through the House, your work is really good. I also want to acknowledge the work of the Governance and Administration Committee in considering this bill and hearing from submitters. And I also want to acknowledge Glen for his work with the district council to bring this bill to Parliament so we can see the wonderful work that they are all doing in New Plymouth.

I’ll continue, as many speakers before me this evening have done, and link back to my connections to New Plymouth. In fact, when I was in what was then called form 1, at Waverley High School, we hopped on a bus and went all the way to New Plymouth and competed in the Smokefree Stage Challenge. So we spent the whole day in New Plymouth, which to us, coming from Waverley, was pretty big smoke, and competed against the other high schools across the region in the performing arts known as Smokefree Stage Challenge, so there was a great deal of fun. And I want to acknowledge that this PIF does go a long way to contributing to the community in New Plymouth and the assets in New Plymouth that we consider iconic, including things like the TSB Festival of Lights, which happens at the start of each year, over the summer period.

I’ve had the good fortune to go up to the Festival of Lights myself. I took my daughter there a couple of years ago on our summer break and wandered round the park in the dark with her toddling along—as she was then—looking at all of the light installations in awe, and also trying to play on the park and climb up slides that were far too big for her at the time. And I’m not quite sure how we managed it, but, wandering around in the dark in the park there, we somehow managed to get lost. But it’s assets like that that are a real benefit to communities like New Plymouth—to the Taranaki region as a whole.

As an MP who’s also based in Taranaki, I know how much that assets like that even contribute to the whole region. They draw in people from outside of the region. We benefit, in South Taranaki and Whanganui, from people travelling from Palmerston North, which has had a couple of mentions tonight, all the way through my electorate, through Whanganui, up through Waverley, Pātea, Hāwera, Eltham, Stratford—you get the picture, indulging in the beautiful Taranaki Arts Trail. Some might veer off and go around the coastal highway and indulge in the scenery that way. Then, they get up to places like the TSB Festival of Lights, which, as I said, is an asset that New Plymouth is able to put on as a result of this PIF fund—

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Probably time to indulge us in the bill now, Ms Lewis.

STEPH LEWIS: —and that’s why it’s important that we, as a Parliament, take steps to ensure the longevity of this fund so it can continue to contribute to the New Plymouth community and, as I said, even to the wider region as a whole for years and years to come.

As some of my colleagues across the House have said this evening, the fund wasn’t always managed as well as it could—and perhaps should—have been. We saw it losing around $113 million in value over five years following the global financial crisis. So through this bill, what we want to ensure is that we don’t see a situation like that occur again. We really do want to ensure that this fund is around for generations to come, because it has done some tremendous things—that they’ve been able to achieve.

So this fund was established as a result of the sell-off of the New Plymouth shares in Powerco company, and, like I say, they’ve been able to invest in some incredible assets across the region. May I make one suggestion, which perhaps my colleague the member of Parliament for New Plymouth, Glen Bennett, might like to take back to his electorate and the fund managers could maybe consider: install a few more electric vehicle (EV) chargers across the city. As someone who has recently purchased an EV, it’s a bit challenging having to wait in the queue to use the EV charger at New World in New Plymouth. So I would encourage them to consider maybe putting that on the agenda for future investment with the fund, potentially, to benefit the community.

The heart of this bill is ensuring that future investment is absolutely for the benefit of the New Plymouth community. That is really important to make sure that we continue to identify key strategic assets that benefit New Plymouth, and that is what this fund does. That is why I take great pleasure in commending this bill to the House. Thank you.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The time has come for me to leave the Chair for the dinner break. The house will resume at 7 p.m.

Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7 p.m.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Poto Williams): Members, the House has resumed. Members, before the dinner break we were on the New Plymouth District Council (Perpetual Investment Fund) Bill, and I understand we are up to call No. 7.

SORAYA PEKE-MASON (Labour): Tēnā koe, e te Mana Whakawā. I am pleased to take a call on the New Plymouth District Council (Perpetual Investment Fund) Bill. Firstly, I too would like to commend my colleague Glen Bennett MP for his sponsorship of this bill. New Plymouth sits in the Te Tai Hauāuru electorate, where I am based as a list MP. While I live at Rātana and was raised in Whanganui, I have strong ties to Taranaki through my whakapapa, whenua, and where close whānau still live.

You know, over the years I have heard some pretty mean things about the New Plymouth District Council, but what I want to do is I want to take this opportunity of acknowledging the great work of the former mayor Andrew Judd, who calls himself a recovering racist—more importantly, though, the wonderful work he has done supporting Māori wards, bringing to light the depth of racism. I have heard the calls of many ratepayers over the years who simply could not pay their rates while I served in local government. This bill can go some way towards supplementing those rates that they struggle to pay, and benefiting the communities in the New Plymouth region.

Clearly, something needed to be done to ensure the Perpetual Investment Fund’s (PIF’s) original intent of being a sustainable fund to annually subsidise the general rate is achieved—its original intent. It is sad to see the loss of some $113 million in value over five years. I’m grateful for local government long-term planning process, for it was after this process the council landed with this bill. In 2021, council officers during their long-term process reported on introducing a local bill based on benefits to those living in the current district boundary, those providing legislative protection to its capital base, and benefits back to the community in perpetuity. I want to acknowledge the work of the council officers. They work hard, they work diligently, and are passionate about what they do. Sometimes they are not recognised for the contribution that they make to our communities and to local government.

Due diligence was exercised and alternative options were considered, including doing nothing, which was not an option as it would not achieve the legislative protection on the capital base. Council has also considered other local legislation, including the New Plymouth District Council (Waitara Lands) Act 2018. Community consultation closed on 17 June 2022, with 52 written submissions received. I extend a thankyou to all those in the communities who have made their submissions to this process. I have seen and know personally the effort and sometimes the anxiety that goes into making those submissions, particularly from our flaxroots people.

I want to acknowledge the New Plymouth District Council’s efforts and their submissions in particular. “The Bill ensures the PIF continues to benefit our community”. How do they do this? By setting an annual release to be used to subsidise general rates. In 2022-23, the release was some $10.4 million, therefore reducing the total rates required by around 8 percent—8 percent; that’s huge—a saving of some $163 per year per ratepayer, significance in savings. The release enables council to provide a level of service higher than what they could afford through rates.

“The [bill] acts as a key cornerstone for our financial position, providing ‘halo’ benefits.”—as another part of the New Plymouth District Council’s submission—“It means [that] Council has financial assets larger than … external borrowings, reducing the costs of borrowing and”—as mentioned by my colleague Glen Bennett—supports a “AA+/Stable/A1+ credit rating.” This is significant.

It also “embeds the lessons of history while being flexible for the future”. What does this mean? It means the council of the day must be satisfied the flexibility of the fund achieves a better outcome for the wellbeing of both current and future communities. We are all about the future and the future generations. We are making decisions that impact on them. This is important. This is important to me. It also means it cannot be used to simply keep rates down to gain political advantage, “ensuring … it can be accessed following a significant natural disaster or other unexpected event.”—and I do not need to emphasise that any more than the current environment, if you look at it, that we live in today.

To avoid any further losses, it is important to ensure the real value of the capital must be protected and that any reduction be considered under justifiable situations. It is to that end that I want to emphasise a submission from New Plymouth Perpetual Investment Fund Guardians Ltd. They support “the intention of the bill to provide statutory provisions to ensure the real capital value of the fund is maintained”—it must be maintained and/or increased—“and … ensure [it] continues to be used for the … New Plymouth District community, in perpetuity”.

Of particular relevance to this, it is outlined in clause 8, where it provides that investment decisions are to be made independently of elected members’—really important—conflicts of interests and their interests. The clause provides additional assurance on the independence of New Plymouth Guardians to manage the PIF in the best interests of New Plymouth District Council. The case in point here is it provides that investment decisions are to be made independently of elected members.

As per processes, a recommendation was received from the Governance and Administration Committee recommending the bill be passed. This bill will help grow communities; it will help reach their dreams and aspirations, so it’s a big congratulations to everyone involved in bringing this bill to the House. Well done, again, to my colleague MP Glen Bennett. Well done for sponsoring the bill. Lastly, absolute heartfelt congratulations to the ratepayers of the New Plymouth District Council. I commend this bill to the House.

TEANAU TUIONO (Green): Thank you, Madam Speaker. I rise on behalf of the Greens to support the second reading of the New Plymouth District Council (Perpetual Investment Fund) Bill. I have been listening with great interest to the various contributions around the House before we broke for dinner, and many of the people reflected on their relationship with New Plymouth and also their relationship with the Taranaki region as well. But during one of the calls, which was taken by my colleague Rachel Boyack, she pointed out that there are some geographically challenged people who didn’t know the difference between New Plymouth and Palmerston North, and that was reflected a bit around the House today.

So just to reiterate the difference, in Palmerston North we have the majestic clock tower there in The Square, where we measure the greatness of the mighty Manawatū against the linear trajectory of time. But, of course, New Plymouth has many outstanding features as well, and as I was listening to the many contributions earlier, I was reflecting on my first time in New Plymouth, when I was spending some time with my mate Taipuni Jason Ruakere—who now sits on the pae, often, over at Pūniho Pā—and a number of the Taranaki whānau. I remember them taking me out surfing for the first time, and you would think that because I’m an Islander from an island surrounded by the ocean, I would be a good swimmer, but that would just be an assumption. I had to learn a quick few lessons. But the heart of that community and the heart of that district—the majestic Taranaki maunga—and the commitment to that community is something that I think we can all reflect on and celebrate in terms of the Taranakitanga.

The purpose of the Perpetual Investment Fund and part of that history has been traversed tonight as well. I did like the contribution from Ian McKelvie because he did put it into some historical context, which made it a lot clearer for me. Going back to 2004, there was Powerco shares—I think that was what they were called—and instead of flicking them out and getting a one-off payment to the ratepayers, the foresight of the people running the district council at that time meant that they set up instead this Perpetual Investment Fund in 2004 to make sure that it could do good things, great things, for that community. That’s a good thing that we support, as Greens, as well—appropriate decision-making, making sure that you look after the community—and that fund is still here today.

It did hit a bump in the road during the—well, a big bump in the road, and I think we all felt it at the time, which was the 2008 global financial crisis. The original opening balance was $259 million, and then the financial crisis happened and they lost $113 million in value over a five-year period. So the purpose of this piece of legislation is to try to ring-fence that to make sure that the—I guess the way that I’m seeing it is it’s trying to futureproof the fund so that it actually does the things that they intend it to do, around making sure that it supports the sustainability, and making sure that it does the best things for ratepayers in that region.

There was one submission—I did have a read of it and I did hear contributions from around the House, and I think it was a valid concern around what happens if district boundaries change, because who knows what’s going to happen in the future as to whether there will be an amalgamation or a divvying up, or whatever. But I do reflect on what was discussed in the select committee via the reports around how, potentially, you could come back to actually address that particular aspect in the future. But leaning on the experience within the district council itself and its being able to sort of manage those differences, it can manage the movement of this stuff as well.

Also, I’m reflecting on what was said just before around clause 8. It is making sure that the management of this fund is independent—always very, very important—of those who are elected into positions of authority who have the power as well, and how important it is to be independent when you make those decisions. So that’s my contribution tonight, and the Greens support this bill.

ANGELA ROBERTS (Labour): Thank you, Madam Speaker. I hopefully rise to take a call on this bill, and I will join my colleagues in congratulating Mr Bennett in his ability to shepherd the New Plymouth District Council (Perpetual Investment Fund) Bill through the House.

It’s wonderful to hear everybody across the House struggling to be the one who has the closest connection with New Plymouth, but I’ve been a ratepayer there for a very long time and I remember when those Powerco shares got sold. It was really controversial at the time because, funnily enough, people were concerned that the fund might not make any money.

Sadly, in about 2013, when there was a massive drought in Tasmania and the farms that we invested in there—Mr McKelvie did point out there seemed to be some slight irony when you’re coming from the middle of dairy country. There was a massive drought in Australia and there was also the global financial crisis, and millions and millions of dollars fell out of that fund.

Alongside that, as we’ve also heard, the council realised the intention of that fund, which was to supplement the pressure on rates increases. So that ate away at the fund as well. That was problematic, and those genuine concerns—it was interesting because when we talked about Powerco, that was our local power company and there were two reasons why people were concerned. One was—it’s a long time ago now, but it’s interesting to reflect on the concerns as they were on the day—that the community owning those assets and having a steady return on investment that comes with owning a power company, versus the risk of buying, I don’t know, a dairy farm in Tasmania.

But the other important idea about community involvement in that decision making and the concerns, quite rightly, about the council’s ability to manage those funds. There was a lot of “I told you so” nearly 10 years later when some of those risks and some of those concerns bore fruit. So it is really good to see those lessons being learnt and the council taking its job very, very seriously and taking a long time to consult with the community, consider all of those alternatives, to come up with what they believed was the best way forward.

Of course, there’s two main aspects to the legislation. One is about how the fund is managed and how it is applied, and the second part being about the independent financial management. One of the wonderful things about the piece of legislation in clause 7: it talks about how it is applied, and the idea that the Perpetual Investment Fund (PIF) will be managed and used for the social, economic, environmental, and cultural wellbeing of New Plymouth communities is a wonderful sentence to read out.

We’ve just had a conversation in the dinner break, actually, about our world-leading living standards framework and the idea that while the critical thing—we need to have income in order to invest in our communities, whether that be rates or the return on our Perpetual Investment Fund—we need that cash, absolutely. But what we do with it is so important. For me, this is the highlight of this piece of legislation: the fact that they will be required—those independent financial managers aren’t just looking at the stock numbers going up and down and what the return is on investment; it’s actually what we do as a community to invest in all of our community in the New Plymouth District. That’s really, really exciting to me.

How do we make sure that it isn’t just about rates reduction but about taking those wonderful opportunities to invest in all aspects of our community for our wellbeing? We talk about growth and we’ve often talked about growth being about GDP, but, actually, growth of our communities involves their wellbeing. I’m really, really pleased to see this, and I think this goes to prove yet again how ground-breaking the New Plymouth District is and the Taranaki region is at really leaning into those just transition challenges. I think this is another really good example of how the legislation they put forward is really, really progressive.

Then the other thing, of course, is that independence. We know that the mayors at the time when there were challenges about, “Should we be selling up those dairy farms? Should we be hanging in there?” and at the very least a distraction from their core business, which was about focusing on what they did with the return on that investment.

So I will acknowledge—a lot of people have acknowledged—one of the biggest challenges that came through from the community was around the implications of potential boundary changes. That submission came from people who live on the boundary, the New Plymouth District. The boundaries to the North are in a wonderful part of the country, Tongapōrutu and Mokau on that beautiful west coast. I guess the community there straddles a couple of iwi—it’s a pretty competitive patch, actually—and they also straddle a couple of districts. So they’re very aware of the significant changes that can happen when you are potentially popped into another district and another district’s ratings or the return on the PIF. And I think that was a really, really valid question to ask.

Everyone’s assuming that the potential situation where that may have come up would be if there was a consolidation of those three mighty councils in Taranaki into one super-mighty council in Taranaki. But, of course, there are simply boundary shifts that can happen as well. So whether a council got bigger—so the decision a council then has to make about which constituents in that council miss out on the fund—or what happens if the council boundaries shrink and now you’ve got people who technically sit outside that council who will continue to actually have that investment that they’ve made over the generations being protected.

It is a really valid concern, and the council have told us that they’ve previously managed—dealt with—geographically limited funds, and maybe what it does is it means that what happens to those funds is really invested in a way that isn’t a very short-term, “let’s do a rates rebate”, because that’s really difficult. You know, my rates are different from your rates because you live on this side of the old council boundaries. But maybe it is that they are encouraged and incentivised to invest in things that will actually benefit everybody in the council.

But maybe there’s a bit of a flow-on effect. There are people outside of the New Plymouth District Council who benefit in an investment. We’ve heard today: WOMAD, the Festival of Lights, and all sorts of other aspects. Our libraries, our swimming pools get enjoyed by people who aren’t technically ratepayers or technically those who’ve contributed to the Perpetual Investment Fund. So I really like the potential that this legislation frames up. Most people look at these pieces of legislation and they think about triple A ratings, which are important but I like to look at the potential of humanity being involved in the decision making around here.

I note this is a local bill, as opposed to a member’s bill, and it’s really great that our wonderful friend Mr Glen Bennett has been able to shepherd it through the House. Like I say, I was there when those Powerco shares were first sold, and those investments and those hard lessons have been learnt by our community. It’s really great to see that the council has been honest and forthright and, frankly, confronted the shortcomings that came with the original way that that fund was managed and the challenges that presented. I think they have been really courageous in being honest about what they needed to do to improve things.

So it makes me pretty happy as a ratepayer, actually, to be standing here and supporting the PIF and the significant financial asset being protected and enhanced and making sure that not just me as a ratepayer but my mother, my mother-in-law, and my children are all going to benefit—and their children. And it is for that reason that I’m really happy to commend this bill to the House.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Poto Williams): I believe this is a split call. The Hon David Bennett—five minutes.

Hon DAVID BENNETT (National): Thank you, Madam Speaker. Well, I must admit I’m going to take a different sort of tack even though we are supporting the bill. You know, many times, councils and local communities give up assets that they shouldn’t give up. And I want to just use the Waikato as a little bit of an example and then translate it back to this. The Waikato Regional Council once owned a significant share of Tauranga port, and for their great wisdom they managed to sell it for bugger all and invested that in a fund for bugger all, when the actual port is now worth a lot of money.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Poto Williams): Is that a new parliamentary word, is it, “bugger all”?

Hon DAVID BENNETT: Well, it was bugger all they got compared with what it is worth now. And so that was the reality of what they did there and then. When we were in Government, 20 years later, we set up the fibre network through New Zealand and Auckland had its own one, Christchurch had its, and there had to be another company to give some competition and so we created one in Hamilton. Hamilton was the first city to get fibre in New Zealand. It was ultra-fast fibre. We made sure that Hamilton could have Taranaki and Tauranga in the contract and they could create a new TrustPower-type model that would be a company that would add value to the community. And we gave them that opportunity. We gave them that and then they sold it. They sold it for a couple of hundred—$800 million or something a few years later. Madness, absolute madness that was done by that community group because that business isn’t about just the money. It’s not the capital that’s there; it’s actually what it can do for a community. If it’s a corporate that’s of decent size like that, it can actually sponsor things, it can actually be a corporate player, it can be a Gallagher like in Hamilton where it actually gives some money back. Now all we’ve got is a fund that’s run by somebody in America, and the money comes back to a group of people that want to spend it on things, I hear, like cultural, social, environmental, and economic. Maybe take out three of them and just leave economic—would have been great.

But, you know, the reality is that these funds are a loss. They are an actual loss on capital. If that money is utilised, not only do you get the profit but you actually get the capital that could have been there in the business. And so I know it’s great to say these things are cool and we support them and all that, but the reality is these hurt communities in many ways when, if the community had held the asset, they could have done much better. Like look at Taranaki Powerco, whether you make that into an environmentally friendly green power company in the future or whatever you want to do with it, it’s still got a huge future ahead of it. It’s better than having it in a capital fund where you spend it on social, cultural, environmental and maybe some economic things.

And so, personally, I think these types of enterprises are a great failure and a missed opportunity for many of our communities that don’t want to take the risk of running an asset. And that’s fine, but there’s other ways you can manage that without the community having to run that asset. But don’t give up those assets. We did it in the Waikato around the Tauranga port shares. It was the worst thing the region’s ever done. We managed to get the region back growing because we built the expressway, but if we hadn’t have done that, we’d be back where we were.

Second thing was Waikato gave up the ability to have ultra-fast fibre that it could have created a business through the central North Island. That would have been a really significant business that they could have made into something even bigger and better. And they sold that at the wrong time and they missed out on that opportunity of having a business plus the dividend.

So I say to the communities: be careful in these kind of situations. The dividends are great; it’s fine. OK, you’ve got to be careful where you spend them. But you actually miss an opportunity if you give up the capital of the business as well, because that’s where you can actually do something really constructive if you’re looking at a green economy going forward or something like that. And a lot of the time, people get scared. They fear that they can’t manage these things. They give them up on the basis that it’s going to be too much liability for them. Devolve it to someone else that is a professional in that area to do that for you and you will actually be able to have the best of both worlds. You’ll be able to have that business that can be part of your community and you can have the dividend that you actually use, rather than just a fund which gets lapped up in other places.

Dr ANAE NERU LEAVASA (Labour—Takanini): Noa'ia 'e Mḁuri. Madam Speaker, kia orana. It is a pleasure to take a call on the local bill—the New Plymouth District Council (Perpetual Investment Fund) Bill, second reading, sponsored by my colleague the great MP for New Plymouth, Glen Bennett, which he says is the sunniest place in New Zealand. I’m from Takanini, so the things we have there is the home of the ANZ netball Robinhood Stars netball team. But I know many have said their relationship in terms of Taranaki. To be honest, I don’t have a close relationship. All I know is the local MP—I know the resident and list MP Angela Roberts, but I know it’s a great place because I looked at the list of All Blacks that they’ve produced as well—Waisake Naholo, we have a couple of the Barrett brothers who’ve played there, also we have Chris Masoe. So many other All Blacks that have done great work in our rugby system as well.

It is always great to see that there is a genuine relationship between local council and their local MP as well. And I want to acknowledge the awesome and hard-working effort of Glen Bennett as well. As a former local board member in South Auckland, it is very important to maintain those relationships with our central government colleagues in order to advocate and help our local communities, despite the political landscape in that area. And this is just a great example of that—the local MP doing his bit in shepherding this bill through the House.

This is my first time speaking on this bill. I don’t have the great privilege of sitting on the select committee—the Governance and Administration Committee—but I just want to acknowledge their work in the process of this legislation.

Just to reiterate the background of this bill—and I know many have, but just for the thousands who have tuned into Parliament TV, I just wanted to share that history with them. We know that the—

Hon Member: It’s like an All Blacks game!

Dr ANAE NERU LEAVASA: Yes. The Perpetual Investment Fund—or the PIF—was established on 9 November 2004, following the proceeds of selling their shareholding in Powerco Ltd. That has therefore provided a sustainable fund where the annual release has helped to subsidise the general rates for that community. If it’s working properly in terms of the medium terms of releasing that money, it is to make sure that the capital value is there to grow, and also to subsidise the rates. However, we know in the global financial crisis, following that crash, this PIF had lost $113 million in value over five years, which subsequently led to the council considering its options, leading to this bill.

I know that the NPG—or New Plymouth PIF Guardians Limited—which is the council-controlled organisation that manages the PIF, were one of the submitters who came through during the process. I think it was five submitters that came through. It’s not about quantity; it’s about the quality of submissions that came through. The district council, the NPG, Glen Bennett himself, and a couple of the other submitters commented on the different clauses to make sure that they had their voices heard. I just want to comment on the different clauses that make this bill the right way to proceed.

I know that clause 7 sets up the two principles in order to make sure this bill does what it’s intended to do. We’ve heard about the investment that this fund does in terms of the social, economic, environmental, and cultural wellbeing for our community in New Plymouth. Cultural because, again, we talk about rugby—that’s part of the social-cultural aspect of the community. And if that—

Anna Lorck: Football.

Dr ANAE NERU LEAVASA: Oh, football. Yes, that’s right. Just to acknowledge the Women’s World Cup that’s coming up in Aotearoa New Zealand, and the many communities that’ll be supporting our women, wāhine toa, during that process. [Interruption] Yes.

Clause 4 in terms of the boundaries—and we heard from our colleague from the Green Party Teanau Tuiono talking about making sure that boundary changes may happen in the future, but we saw that the district council did comment that they have managed it effectively and can do so if that was to happen as well.

Clause 8 of the bill is really important because we have NPG, the guardians, also supporting this clause because the clause sets it out to be independent, making decisions on the fund independent of the politicians or personal interest regarding the time period of releasing that fund. So it’s really good that the district council and the guardians that manage this bill through the select committee process have supported this clause to go through.

So that’s my connection to Taranaki, New Plymouth. I commend this bill to the House.

ANDREW BAYLY (National—Port Waikato): Thank you, Madam Speaker. I haven’t been on the Governance and Administration Committee, but I have been asked to talk on the New Plymouth District Council (Perpetual Investment Fund) Bill. First of all, I just want to acknowledge Glen Bennett for bringing the bill through the select committee process and, obviously, steering it through the House. The first thing everyone seems to be saying is what their connection is to New Plymouth, in Taranaki. Just for the record, the Baylys arrived in New Plymouth in 1842, on the Amelia Thompson, and many of my family live there. There are Bayly Roads in Taranaki! And, in fact, some of the early All Black teams had Baylys in them—talking about rugby. At one stage, the Taranaki rugby team was, I think, near majority made up of Baylys, but anyway. I’m going to stop there, because I could carry on. There have been mayors of Taranaki—whatever.

But, having said all that, my real connection to this, which I only just found out—I was talking about this earlier on. Prior to coming into politics, I had a business merchant bank, and a long time ago—it must have been 2008—we had an approach from a small fund called Taranaki Investment Management Ltd., who came to us and said, “We would like you to look at whether we should buy some farms in Tasmania.” This is a true story, and I’m only revealing it because I have been asked to talk on it. Anyway, they came to us, and we said, “Well, fine. We’ll do an analysis of it.” They were asking us whether they should buy the farms. So we said to them first of all, “Well, why don’t you provide us with all the due diligence material you’ve got.” They said, “No, we’re not going to do that. You’re going to do your own desktop review, and we want you to come back and tell us what you think.” So we did that, and I remember—I had a couple of people working on it—looking at long-term weather patterns for Tasmania. I remember ringing up stock agents in Tasmania to talk about access to cows, looking at genetic stock, where they were going to sell the milk to—all those sorts of things. We eventually compiled a brief, in terms of a business assessment, whether they should buy the 25 farms.

When we went back to present the findings to Taranaki Investment Management Ltd., we said, “Broadly, our conclusions are as follows: the first thing is you’ve got a relatively small fund”—and I forget what it was; $250 million—“and you’re proposing to spend most of that money buying one particular asset in one particular area. So, first of all, in terms of good funds portfolio management, that’s not a really desirable outcome. What you should do is diversify, and this is very large. So that’s our first big concern.” The second thing we said to them was, “We are concerned that you can buy this asset but how do you get out of it? How do you sell down your shareholding? That’s the big question. Who is going to go and buy 25 dairy farms in Tasmania—if you hold them for five, 10, 15 years? So there is a real risk about buying this significant asset.” And the third thing we said was, “If you get past those two things—and, by the way, our recommendation is you don’t—our price estimate is”—I can’t quite remember the figure; I don’t know whether it was $110 or $1.10 per share; I can’t remember—“but if you’re going to buy it, pay no more than, let’s say, $1.10 per share.”

Those were our three pieces of advice—I remember giving it—and, at that point, the investment management team said to us, “Well, thank you very much for what you’ve done. Very useful, very helpful. I’ve just got to tell you that not only have we committed to buying the farms but we’ve also agreed to pay, I think, $1.40 per share.” It was certainly much more. And, at that point, I thought, “Wow, substantial risk.” Now, I look at this bill and I have concerns about what this bill is about. First of all, it is described as “the PIF is a long-term fund … managed and applied for the social, economic, environmental, and cultural wellbeing”—of course, that’s all set out in clause 7. My first point is: to me, that seems a really weird definition. And it’s a weird definition in a sense that, if you are going to pay the money in the form of a dividend—and I don’t know why the bill refers to “releases”; it seems the most absurd definitional usage of the word. If you are going to use that distribution from the fund, why would you be transferring it in the form of allowing the council to offset rates? Because one might argue that that’s not necessarily meeting that requirement. So the first thing is the purpose statement in it.

The second thing: I’d have to argue that the way that the fund has been set up and defined in this bill is very unclear, and if I was a director on this fund, I would have a great deal of difficulty personally, because it states that “the PIF should be managed and applied with the intent of”—and this is the important bit—“maintaining or increasing the real value of its capital, unless the Council considers, on reasonable grounds, that [the benefit of investment outweighs the loss and the reduction in the capital of the PIF is best to achieve that outcome]”. Now, if you’re a fund manager—and I note that they’ve got Mercer managing this fund—“maintaining” and “increasing” are quite different. If you’re maintaining a fund, you’re going to put your money into low-security investments such as Government Treasury stock. The investment strategy around maintaining a fund is absolutely different from what you might do if you’re going to have a perpetual fund where you’re trying to use dividends or distributions to fund other social, economic, environmental, cultural wellbeing things. The investment strategy lacks an absolute clarity. And, personally, I find this bill very, very woolly. I think, if I was a director and asked to go on this entity, I would be looking at this and saying, “Who the hell drafted that?”

The third thing I’d have to say to you is that there is no definition—from what I can see—around dividend policy. I looked at what the dividends have been over the last few years. Sorry, I’ve only had the chance to do this quite recently—in the last 10 minutes, actually—but the level of dividends that have been paid out has ranged from $22 million down to $5 million. So having clarity for the investment fund to know what the policy around the release—or, in fact, the distributions—is, I think absolutely essential, because, working backwards, until you know that, you cannot know how to manage your investment decision-making and the nature of investments you’re going to have in there.

The fourth things that’s missing is that it doesn’t talk, really, about risk. It doesn’t provide absolute clarity around risk, and so we’ve ended up—and fine; the bill will go through—passing a bill which, I think, in time will prove to be actually quite deficient. Who has the ability to refine this up and grip it up to make it useful for the people who have actually got to manage this fund, I’m not quite sure, and maybe the select committee has worked through that, but it’s not evident from the documents. The other thing is, and I think I heard Barbara Kuriger early on talking about it, it does seem strange—the three options that the council looked at, to set this framework up for this bill, are that they lay out the three options. I’m just not quite sure why we ended up coming through the House and whether, in fact, it’s because, principally, the New Plymouth District Council didn’t believe that they could manage and work within the framework of requiring a 75 percent approval and therefore wanted to rely on the legislation. I’m not quite sure. I didn’t hear the arguments from the select committee members for why this is actually required, and maybe I missed that, and I apologise if I have

But this bill—fine; it’s going to go through—I actually think has got a huge amount of deficiencies in it, but it will, hopefully, get to an outcome which will mean that there is a long-term fund that offers long-term benefits to the good people of New Plymouth.

JAMIE STRANGE (Labour—Hamilton East): Thanks, Madam Speaker, for the opportunity to take a call on this bill, a final call for the night on this bill here. I’d like to begin by acknowledging the previous member, Andrew Bayly, for his speech and the fact that he talked about having All Blacks and mayors—because his lineage is only getting better as the member serves in this House, and maybe there’s still hope for the member to become an All Black one day. You never know—you never know what may—I see maybe not as much optimism as I maybe have. I’d like to also acknowledge Glen Bennett, the MP for New Plymouth, for bringing this bill to the House. And I’d like to acknowledge the work that he does for the people of New Plymouth and, hopefully, the residents also acknowledge his work.

So, basically, as we’ve heard, the bill, this relates to the Perpetual Investment Fund—or the PIF, as has been used in this House tonight. If we just go back to maybe—oh, I don’t know, basically a few months ago when the council were looking at this bill. From how I understand it, some councillors were concerned about the potential of amalgamations of councils. And so therefore they, basically, put up a motion to say “We want this bill. Well, basically, we need to pass a bill to ensure that this money is protected for the specific region around New Plymouth.”, because they were worried about the amalgamations. Other councillors said, “Well, there’s no rush. We don’t have to do this because there’s no amalgamations on the horizon.” So the council had that internal debate and the councillors voted eight to five to continue progressing this bill; that was on 22 August 2022. So the bill then came to the House through the mechanism of Glen Bennett, because those changes that the councillors wanted to make needed to go through legislation.

Now, I mean, I personally don’t see any sort of future work in the near future around amalgamations, but people will always argue the benefits of amalgamation in terms of shared services, and then people will also argue the benefits of having that local voice. And it was a similar argument around the affordable water reforms that we had as a Government—the benefits of the economies of scale, in terms of water, and then others arguing the importance of the local voice. Generally, as a society, we sort of meet somewhere where most of the people, you know, sort of accept it, and it seems like a similar sort of process happened here.

So we have heard tonight about the benefits of these sorts of funds in terms of social, cultural, environmental, and economic. Most of us who are MPs here would have these sorts of funds in our region. I think of the Waikato region, the likes of Trust Waikato, WellTrust, and D. V. Bryant Trust, who invest across a range of areas in society and they genuinely do benefit society.

I would like to touch as well—because I’ve heard a lot about the cultural, environmental, and social—on the importance of the economic aspect of that. The Taranaki region is a strong economic region of New Zealand. I have never lived there myself. I’ve never even had family there. In fact, my family, basically, came to New Zealand 1840, set up in Nelson—actually set up in Collingwood and—

Angie Warren-Clark: We’re probably related.

JAMIE STRANGE: There we go; we probably are.

Hon Member: All Blacks.

JAMIE STRANGE: That’s why we’re so intelligent. We almost had an All Black. One of my cousins was recently selected to the All Blacks but rolled his ankle. He’s only 28, so he’s probably got a better chance than the honourable—than Andrew Bayly. I called him “the honourable” there; I gave him an upgrade.

So, look—where was I? I was talking about the economic benefits of the Taranaki region. Now, I would encourage the Taranaki region to continue looking for partnerships across particularly the North Island and to grow their economic areas. We heard from the ACT member earlier tonight in terms of some of the strong aspects of the Taranaki economy. And I would like to encourage leaders in the Taranaki region and those who are administering this fund for economic benefits to look outside their region. I know: imagine, traditionally they tend to look south to Wellington or east to Palmerston North or, you know, they look at their port in terms of coastal shipping. But I would also encourage the Taranaki region to also look north as well for various opportunities—

Ian McKelvie: We could run a port in Palmerston North.

JAMIE STRANGE: An inland port in Palmerston North? Provincial Growth Fund—excellent fund.

We’ve heard about the “Golden Triangle”, the Auckland, Hamilton, Tauranga triangle, as it’s affectionately known, which is 50 percent of New Zealand’s population, 52 percent of the GDP, and 57 percent of all building consents. But I’ve started talking about, and I’ll mention it in this House tonight, about the golden diamond—so the golden diamond from that triangle—the Auckland, Hamilton, Tauranga triangle, and heading down through the middle of the island. I recently had a meeting at the Hamilton City Council with the economic development unit and encouraged them to continue fostering a relationship with the Taranaki region. I think there’s some excellent benefits in that region for economic development in terms of that golden diamond sort of heading down through the island there. And I think that Taranaki are probably already sort of seeing that. I think in 2013 they sided with The Chiefs, which I think, based on this year’s performance, was a good move in hindsight for them.

So, look, I’d just like to sort of, I guess, sow that seed and espouse the benefits there of the Taranaki region continuing to look north in terms of connection for business, in terms of connection for tourism, and the movement of people, the movement of products. I understand that there’s work being done around coastal shipping too, and, in terms of that relating to this bill, the PIF, one of the pillars is economic. So, you know, it’s important that they continue to take an economic lens in the decisions that are made in terms of the investment.

I’d also like to touch on broadly, as the previous speaker did, in terms of the investment of funds. Now, a lot of the funds in New Zealand have a portion of their fund—often a large portion—invested overseas. I understand the reasons why. It diversifies the funds. In effect, you could argue that it de-risks the fund to a point. But I do believe there’s an opportunity for some of these social funds here in New Zealand—and, as I said, most regions have them—while they will always have a portion overseas, to consider bringing a little bit more onshore.

Now, I’m talking about, for example, funds having a relationship with the likes of Kāinga Ora, and investing and building houses with the Government. So, you know, they could negotiate probably something like a 5 percent return on that investment. It’s a safe investment because it’s investment with the Government. So pulling some of that money offshore and bringing it into investments with the Government, then that money gets used twice. So in the example of Kāinga Ora, the money gets used once to build housing and then, secondly, with that 5 percent return, or whatever it might be that the Government gives the investment fund, they can also release that as a dividend.

I’d also encourage some funds to look at what they can do together as well. Now, I’m not sure how many other funds there are in the Taranaki region, but there are often benefits in terms of scale. Now, funds can do their own thing as well, but then a portion of their fund could also be connected to other funds. There’s a small example of this up in Hamilton recently, where we’re building a regional theatre up there, an $80 million regional theatre. I’m told it will be the best theatre in Australasia, actually, with 1,300 seats, so you’ll all have to come up next year when it opens. But this was funded through a number of funds coming together, as well as Government, as well as council coming together. And as we know—what’s the phrase?—items can be bigger than the sum of their parts; that as we look to come together, then we can achieve quite significant things.

I see my time is running out. I certainly commend this bill to the House. I believe it will pass, and if it passes the third reading, the council will then get their wish to move on with this. I commend this bill to the House. Thank you.

Motion agreed to.

Bill read a second time.

Bills

Annie Oxborough Birth Parents Registration Bill

First Reading

CHRIS PENK (National—Kaipara ki Mahurangi): I move, that the Annie Oxborough Birth Parents Registration Bill be now read a first time. I nominate the Governance and Administration Committee to consider the bill. At the appropriate time, I intend to move that the bill will be reported to the House by 19 July 2023, and that the committee have authority to meet at any time while the House is sitting, (except during oral questions), during any evening on a day on which there has been a sitting of the House, and on a Friday in a week in which there has been a sitting of the House, and outside the Wellington area, despite Standing Orders 193, 195, and 196.

This bill is the Annie Oxborough Birth Parents Registration Bill. The law specifically relates to Annie, a constituent of my Kaipara ki Mahurangi electorate. Annie has had a number of different names throughout her life. Therein lies the story parallel to such other deeply fundamental questions about personal aspects that we will consider tonight: where she comes from, who her family might be, and therefore who she is.

While the bill is ostensibly specific to Annie only, there is potentially wider significance. I’m aware of many other Kiwis—and others around the world, for that matter—who have faced the same difficulties and distress. This law change will not directly help their situation, but by shining a light on the plight of those adopted away from their birth parents without the informed consent of anyone involved—that is to say, the birth parents and the child herself or himself—the passage of this bill will help them indirectly. A broader look at this area of law and policy is needed, in my view.

Annie’s story, then: Annie Oxborough was adopted as a child, and the identity of her birth parents was removed from her—young and unmarried as they were—just as she was physically removed from them. Annie has subsequently formed a relationship with her birth parents, and is seeking now to have their names added to her legal birth certificate to formally register her biological and legal parentage. As it happens, her original birth certificate, pre-adoption, did not include the name of her biological father, as this was not provided at the time of her birth. In any case, neither Annie’s original birth certificate nor her legal post-adoption birth certificate provide a true and accurate account of her lineage. This private bill would rectify the issue and provide to Annie the right to have your biological heritage reflected on her birth certificate.

So what, you may be asking, happened? Well, Lisa Clarke was born February 1971, the biological child of Susan Cox, née Clarke, and Scott Sinel. Lisa was subsequently adopted. In accordance with the Adoption Act 1955, a new birth certificate was issued in December 1979 at the Magistrate’s Court in Auckland. In that, Lisa Clarke had become Angela Joy Marshall, being the legal child of an adoptive mother and adoptive father. The child’s name was subsequently changed to Ann Joy Marshall, known as Annie, by deed poll by her adoptive parents in June 1976. Annie married in 1990 and changed her surname to Oxborough.

Both of Annie’s adoptive parents are now deceased. As an adult, Annie was eventually able to contact and form a relationship with her biological parents. Annie seeks to replace the names of her adoptive parents—now deceased—on her birth certificate with those of her biological parents, so that the record of her birth represents a true account of her lineage. To cut a long story short, but I note to assure the House that the requirements of a private bill have been met, this bill is the only legal mechanism that exists by which Annie can achieve, in a certain fashion, this outcome.

The way that the bill would do this is to instruct the registrar-general to record the names of Annie’s biological father and mother on her birth certificate as her two parents, in accordance with section 24 of the Births, Deaths, Marriages, and Relationships Registration Act 1995. In this respect, it is not dissimilar to the Paige Harris Birth Registration Act 2022, passed relatively recently by this House in the name of Louisa Wall, in unanimous fashion. I point out that Annie’s biological parents have consented to this step being taken.

I wish to acknowledge a number of key figures who have been involved in the formulation of this bill. First, actually, the journalist Duncan Garner—who interviewed Annie Oxborough on his show, and I understand has spoken to her more recently too—who encouraged Annie to take steps to address this situation, which had clearly troubled her all her life. He suggested that my colleague and friend Todd Muller might assist Annie. He, in turn, contacted me as the local member of Parliament for Annie. I acknowledge also the team who assist in Parliament—they assist in providing legal advice, drafting, and so forth—as well as my staff colleagues Jo Irain, in particular, but also Cheryl and Emily at the electorate office end.

Other parties of this House have very generously indicated in advance of today’s first reading that they will support the bill, at least today, and that’s all that I could have wished for, because I’m confident that if you have the opportunity, colleagues, to hear directly from Annie herself the story of her life as it relates to this matter, you will be more than happy to continue to support this bill at subsequent stages.

I also acknowledge those who have reached out to me already, inquiring about the implication of this law for their own situation. As I started by saying tonight, for those people, this bill will not do everything, but at least it may do something.

Finally, of course, I wish to acknowledge Annie herself. I salute her courage, from cold-calling strangers in the phone book to ask if they might be her parents—with no better guide to her own origins than the similarity of surname—to telling her story in the present day to strangers, including me.

Colleagues, I thank you for joining me, and listening to Annie tell her story. Today, it is a story being told through me, but on another day, I very much hope that she will tell it to you herself. So please now let us help Annie write a chapter of her life story that is happier than the first chapters have been. I commend this bill to the House.

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

GLEN BENNETT (Labour—New Plymouth): Kia ora, Madam Speaker. I want to, firstly, thank Chris Penk for his contribution and for bringing this piece of legislation to the House, and in what he has already said in terms of this being the only legal outlet to bring about the effective change that has been asked for. In the 21st century, sometimes we wonder—you know, it would seem simple, in a stroke of a pen to make a significant change like this, but, actually, it isn’t. So, again, acknowledging Chris Penk in terms of shining a light on some of the challenges that can potentially be unpicked in times to come to ensure that there isn’t the challenge or the trauma that people have to go through when they want to make a decision like having their birth parents on their birth certificate.

Now, in my family, my mother was adopted and has been through the experience of searching, looking for her birth parents. It was a different time. My mother was born in the early 1940s, and it wasn’t until her mid-30s that she actually started looking to see if she could find her birth parents. It wasn’t until later on that she was able to find her birth mother, but no record of her birth father. So, for me, I have, I guess, in a different way lived through the challenges of what was back in the day closed adoption and the challenges that closed adoption brought. And also around the feeling, often, of the State, of church organisations that for some reason thought the best idea for a child was for them not to know their lineage, not to know their whakapapa, not to know the history of who they are.

So, for me, I stand here as someone who knows half my story or maybe close to three-quarters of my story, but there is a gap for me in terms of who I am and my history. So as I look at this Annie Oxborough Birth Parents Registration Bill, I’m glad to stand and support it and to encourage us, as a House, to move forward and support what happens.

Chris Penk has made quite clear what this does in terms of Annie being able to have her birth parents’ names on her birth certificate. I think it’s something that we need to celebrate, because it’s not easy going through the process of discovering, seeking, looking, finding who you are, but it’s also the next step to then actually want to have that recognised under law, to have your name and your birth parents’ name actually registered on a birth certificate for the State to understand.

I won’t say a lot more, because I believe that we just want to get on and support. I imagine if, Annie, you’re watching, we, as a House, want to—I know on this side of the House, we want to support your journey. We hope that, as you take this next step, that you will continue to grow and flourish as you have, as you’ve explored who you are, your identity, but also now having that recognised.

So I’m sure there are many people in this House, and I’m sure there are many people around Aotearoa New Zealand—maybe even a couple of people watching tonight—who can fully understand and connect with what this is and the joy but also the challenge that adoption brings. So I support the Annie Oxborough Birth Parents Registration Bill and I commend it to the House.

Dr JAMES McDOWALL (ACT): Thank you, Madam Speaker. It’s a pleasure to rise and take a brief call on the Annie Oxborough Birth Parents Registration Bill and say that ACT will be supporting this, joining other parties in this House. I appreciate Chris Penk for providing a good history of how we got to this point and some background into Annie’s journey.

I think, though, the overarching point of this bill—and if I refer to a statement from the biography, or from her book, which is that her life’s mission is to correct the law of the past and get archaic, outdated, and cruel regulations changed. And I think it’s fairly obvious that this is probably not it for the broader people that this issue affects, but it does make a difference. It doesn’t create a legal precedent, but it does fix the situation that Annie is in. It raises awareness and puts the spotlight on the issue so that perhaps Parliament in future can look at proper reform, because there will be many others in New Zealand in similar circumstances. It’s not particularly reasonable to say that for every single person—that legislation on a per-person basis is the answer long term. Certainly, there probably needs to be some law changes here.

It’s particularly important around historical adoption in the “baby scoop” era, where it says that, at one point, 76 babies were being given away each week in New Zealand. Historically, over 100,000 adoptions have taken place, and those children—now adults—don’t have that legal right to actually have the biological parents put on their birth certificate. So here we are, in Parliament, doing a bill like this.

So I won’t take up more time of the House just to say ACT supports this bill, we support Annie, and we wish her well in her journey. Thank you, Madam Speaker.

RACHEL BOYACK (Labour—Nelson): Thank you, Madam Speaker. It is very much a privilege to take a short call on the Annie Oxborough Birth Parents Registration Bill. May I begin by acknowledging the member taking this bill through the Parliament, Chris Penk, and thank him for his work, and I also acknowledge Annie. It must be quite strange to be listening in to a group of strangers in the Parliament talking about your life in such a detailed and intimate way, and can I acknowledge Annie’s strength in speaking out publicly, writing a book about her journey, and taking this step to right a wrong that occurred in her life. As a member of the Governance and Administration Committee, which will consider this bill, can I just assure Annie that we will treat this bill with the care and respect that it deserves, and we will treat her story well and uphold her mana throughout this process.

Having been on the committee that took through the Paige Harris bill last year, it was a humbling experience for us all, and there are times in this Parliament when we take through bills like this that are deeply personal for individual New Zealanders. Can I just acknowledge the comments from the previous speaker, James McDowell from the ACT Party, who has made, I think, absolutely accurate comments and wise comments about the need for broader law reform. I don’t think anyone in this House would hold a view these days that this type of approach, when a young woman had a baby out of wedlock and had her baby taken from her, should ever happen again. I think that all of us acknowledge that that was wrong. It shouldn’t have happened and Annie should have been able to stay with her birth parents, and I think all of us in this House would feel very strongly about that.

The Government is working on law reform in this area, but it does have complexities and it does have real challenges around the historical wrongs that have occurred. In my electorate, I’ve recently had a constituent come to see me who doesn’t have his full story. He has used tools that are available now, like AncestryDNA, to do his own detective work and has managed to find some siblings, but there is still a lot of his journey that he does not know, and I couldn’t begin to imagine what it must feel like to not have all of your story available to you and to have had that taken from you.

So I do want to acknowledge Annie and thank her for bringing this to Parliament. We shouldn’t have to do these things through the Parliament, but that is the only way at the moment. We will look after your bill, we will look after your story, and I look forward to being able to progress this as quickly as we can for you so that at least part of your story can be corrected in the history books. So I commend this bill to the House.

TEANAU TUIONO (Green): I rise on behalf of the Greens to support the Annie Oxborough Birth Parents Registration Bill. I’d also like to join others around the House in thanking the member Chris Penk for bringing this bill to the House and for outlining the breadth of the bill but also the narrowness of the bill and how it will specifically correct this circumstance of Annie Oxborough but also understanding that it opens up a wider conversation about those who were impacted who continue to feel the impacts of finding out that they’ve been adopted but that their parents were coerced into adopting them out.

This bill will enable Annie Oxborough to register the name of her birth parents on her legal birth certificate in the place of her adopted parents. All relevant people associated with this private bill have given their consent for this action to take place. Ms Oxborough’s birth parents, with whom she has formed a relationship, are fully supportive.

I remember when the Paige Harris bill came through the House, as well, and how people try to do everything with the tools that they have and then they run out of those tools and we find ourselves discussing these types of very, very important issues in the House as well. That’s what’s happened in this case with Annie Oxborough. So I would also like to acknowledge her bravery for stepping forward, for telling her story, and also her commitment to get it this far as well. I’m sure that it will encourage others to speak out as well.

I think it’s really important for us to remember and to hold the trauma for many people who this will resonate with as well. As I was thinking about this bill, I was reading through one of the witness statements from the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care, in particular of people who had gone through the St Mary’s Home for Unwed Mothers, and the many young mothers who were coerced to give up their children, without their permission—the trauma that must still be there for those mothers, and the intergenerational trauma continuing on for those children who are trying to find their story, because life is about if you’re going to stand on your tūrangawaewae, if you’re going to stand on your whenua—and I look at it from that perspective, as a Māori—it is about knowing that whakapapa, it is about knowing the connection, how you are connected back as well. If that story is missing for you, then people go searching as well.

So I want to acknowledge the trauma for some of our parents, for some of the people who are searching out there as well, but I also acknowledge the bravery and that journey towards healing in terms of the trauma that was impacted upon, particularly on the children and the descendants of the parents.

I look forward to hearing more about this bill, and, like with others around the House, we acknowledge Annie Oxborough once again and also all the members for being very receptive to this type of legislation, and we commend it to the House.

TĀMATI COFFEY (Labour): Thank you, Madam Speaker. Can I acknowledge, actually, the heaviness with which I’m sure Annie and her family have traversed bringing this bill to the House. Can I thank the member Chris Penk for bringing it to the attention of Parliament. Can I also agree with the member from the ACT Party that this keeps happening. We had the Paige Harris Birth Registration Bill come before the House. We had to send that through to a select committee process, and all that needed to happen was that a name needed to be put on to a birth certificate. It seems like a very quick administrative fix, but the fact that it needs to take parliamentary time, House time, in this House seems absolutely ludicrous to me, and here we are again having to go through a very extreme process to be able to fix something that needs to be fixed. But does it need to be fixed through this House like this? Can we find a better way to do this? I should think that we should be able to do that.

I’ve got to say, just tonight I was having a conversation with somebody who brought up to me the fact that he and his partner this year got married, and while that’s all good and well, the marriage certificate was presented to him and it said “groom and bridegroom”. He sat there and looked at it and said, “But I’m not a bride, and there’s no bride in our relationship.” But the certificate is apparently so fixed that it has bridegroom on it. He took umbrage with that and he said, “But I’m not; I’m just a groom, so could we just have that on there?” They said no. So there may be another bill that may have to come to the House to try and correct something which, again, should not take the time of the House to be able to fix these little things.

But they are big things, because we as New Zealanders, we do rely on our identification, we do rely on these things like birth certificates, marriage certificates, death certificates. They are important, but I truly believe that we shouldn’t be taking time in the House to be able to fix something that seems at the outset such a simple fix. I will pursue that one, and I will also look to support this one. I hope that Annie gets her justice, and I hope that she gets it soon so that we can continue to focus on the bigger issues that bring us to Wellington and into Parliament as well. So I commend this to the House.

Hon Dr DAVID CLARK (Labour—Dunedin): Thank you, Madam Speaker. I too look forward to supporting this bill, and I want to acknowledge the comments made by many around the House who have expressed their sympathy with Annie Oxborough’s situation, and their desire to support this change, recognising the importance of identity.

I wanted to relay something of a personal story, actually. My mother was adopted a generation before Annie Oxborough. I note that I am of a similar age to Ms Oxborough, and this is a story of a generation before, but not completely dissimilar. My mother was part of an adoption at a time when these things were done discretely and secretly. She felt that that left her—I talked to her earlier about this, earlier this evening, and I hope I’m using her words right—at sea or without an anchor. There’s something about being dislocated when you are an adopted person.

Later in her life, after her adoptive mother had died, her adoptive father shared with her some information about her adoption that was sufficient for her to trace some of that history and reconnect with her birth mother—the last name of her birth mother, the age which the mother was when she was born, and in which town she was living at the time or registered in. With that information and a good deal of detective work, going through both Births, Deaths and Marriages; processes; newspaper articles; and the like—I can remember travelling as a child around the South Island with my parents as they did the detective work, essentially, to find that connection. Then, eventually, that led to a reconnection with my mother’s birth mother, who then I, as a child, came to know and developed a connection with.

And that was pretty special. I know it’s very, very important to my mother, for her identity and for that connection, to understand everything from medical history right through, but also, you know, where certain personality traits come from or other connections, coincidences—it’s all tied up with identity. And that was really important to my mother. For her, it was really important that it wasn’t something she wanted to do while her adoptive mother was alive—it didn’t feel right. The time was right to do it later, but it was an incredibly important journey. And I, as it happened, then have developed connections with those birth parents—with her birth mother and with her subsequent husband. I actually have had the privilege then, only recently, two years ago, on the 13th of this month—so in three days’ time, two years ago—of burying my mother’s birth mother and, as I’m a Presbyterian minister, conducting the funeral service. And I, prior to that, conducted the funeral for her subsequent husband. So we have become very much a part of that family and of their story, and have felt privileged to know the other siblings—you know, half brothers and sisters—and their families. And it has felt like such a privilege and a wonderful connection to have.

So I can relate to some of the story I’ve heard about Annie Oxborough’s quest to have identity affirmed. I know it’s been so important in my own family, through that adoptive connection, to better understand the connections of the family, to build those connections, and just to the sense of identity.

I am delighted that there is work progressing, that the Ministry of Justice is leading on adoption law reform that will address some of these issues with time. I’m not sure that it will actually address Annie Oxborough’s case directly, because it may not be retrospective in its effect, but it’s good that we are doing this work as a Government and as a Parliament. This identity question, we all know, is so important, and it is really good to be able to stand today to support this bill. It’s, for one person, incredibly important. It may not seem to the wider picture that we’re solving the bigger picture, but, actually, for this one person, this will be incredibly important. And it’s also symbolically important for others in similar situations—to let them know there are avenues for properly being identified according to your history, your family, and your connections. So it’s with some pleasure that I support this bill to the House.

IAN McKELVIE (National—Rangitīkei): It’s a pleasure to take a short call on the Annie Oxborough Birth Parents Registration Bill. I think it’s great that Chris Penk could bring this bill to the House. But I find that if you live in this House for long enough, you’ll agree with everyone in the House on something, and I found myself agreeing with Tāmati Coffey on just about every issue he raised tonight. It might have taken 12 years, but I’m agreeing with him.

I think that, you know, having sat on the Governance and Administration Committee that passed both the Paige Harris Birth Registration Bill and the Births, Deaths, Marriages and Relationships Registration Bill, which allowed people to change their names on their birth certificate—their sex on their birth certificate, actually—I’m of the view, and I guess that I’m one of those people who is fortunate enough to think I know who I am and think I know who I’ve always been, but, obviously, a lot of people don’t. I can’t imagine what it would be like not actually knowing who you are for a fair bit of your life. That is what has happened to Annie, obviously, and I think it’s pretty cool that this Parliament can fix that for her.

But quite aside from that, I do think that we have to find ways of avoiding—and I spoke on a bill earlier in the night on the same issue. Here’s where I agree with Tāmati Coffey: I think we do have to find ways of dealing with these issues without having to bring these bills to the Parliament every time it happens. There will be numerous people in New Zealand in exactly the same position as this. Some would probably be like me and probably don’t even know what my birth certificate looks like, but some people do care about this sort of stuff, and we have to account for that in the course of what we do here.

Actually, in the course of the Births, Deaths, Marriages and Relationships Registration Bill, there was some discussion about the fact that there are a whole lot of other things that need to be dealt with in the course of birth certificates, and this was one of them—not this particular case, but the fact of adopted people wishing to register their rightful parents or their real parents on their birth certificates. So I think there’s got to be a way of this Parliament doing some work on this and resolving it.

Of course, there are some issues in that very same Births, Deaths, Marriages and Relationships Registration Bill which weren’t resolved at the time, and that related to overseas people coming to New Zealand. I think that with respect to this, the same thing will apply here. So there’ll be exactly the same issue in this instance, given, especially, that we adopt a lot of overseas children in New Zealand. So it’s quite an issue for those people as well, I would imagine, or it will become an issue for them as they get older, or it may become an issue for them.

So I think there’s quite a few challenges in how we deal with this, but I do think it’s worth doing some work on it, because we take a lot of time in this Parliament on these bills. I’ve never worked out what it costs to run this place, but it wouldn’t be cheap. I’m not saying that these people aren’t worth spending the money on—in fact, some of these bills might be a whole lot more relevant than some of the bills that we put through in good faith as a Government—but I do think there’s an opportunity for us to look at these issues and to change the way we go about it. So I look forward to the discussions on this. I’m sure it will be resolved, and it’s good to see the Parliament united in the view that it needs to be resolved. So that’s probably all I need to say on this bill, and no doubt we’ll have an opportunity to take this further at a later date. Thank you, Madam Speaker.

ANGIE WARREN-CLARK (Labour): Thank you, Madam Speaker. Before I commence, I’d just like to say it’s nice to see you in the Chair. I am delighted to be speaking on the Annie Oxborough Birth Parents Registration Bill. It’s a matter I think that we all in the House are concerned about. I want to acknowledge the member Chris Penk for the work that he’s done and the sensitive brief that he has given us of the life of Annie and her desires to see this bill come to pass.

I think this is a great example of when the House comes together on a matter that we consider important. We’re not yelling at each other. We’re not being nasty to each other. We’re all getting on, doing something that is significant and important, and while that may be to just one person, it is extremely significant to her life and her life’s history. I can only begin to imagine the yearning and the desire that she has to know her whakapapa and to find it and now to have her parents recorded on that birth certificate. So I think that’s simply an important thing to do.

But, however, I do agree with other members—gosh, it’s cumbersome to have to come before the House and use the House in this manner to change a birth certificate. We surely can do better. However, this will fix the matter for Annie Oxborough.

Now, I just wanted to make mention of—so I’m a member of the Social Services and Community Committee. Now, in the 52nd select committee, we had a number of women come before us to talk to us about the forced adoption process. Frankly, it was heartbreaking. The stories that those women told us and the children who came before us as well who were affected—it was devastating to hear those stories. I want to acknowledge their courage as well. So Mrs Maggie Wilkinson, Mrs Hamilton, and Ms Sumner, who came before us with that petition, I want to acknowledge them in this House today. What we were able to do with that piece of work—and I think it’s worthwhile mentioning—is that that particular circumstance of forced adoption was then placed into the abuse in care royal commission of inquiry so that those women and children had the opportunity to come before the organisation and to speak their story. We look to see what the outcome will be for them. Nevertheless, I think it’s important to say that.

I’m also particularly interested to read Annie’s book; I think it looks like a good read. Like most members here, I have my own adoption story from family. I was born in 1971, so it was something pretty common in that era and continued to be so until the 1980s. So, as a consequence, I think many of us have adoption stories of family members, etc.

We need to fix this. We’re working on it. It’s coming along. But I do think that time in this House is being taken for an important matter for Annie, and I do hope that we don’t need to continue to do this going forward. But, with that, it is my great pleasure to commend this bill to the House.

ANAHILA KANONGATA‘A (Labour): Noa’ia e te Mana Whakawā. It’s an absolute privilege to stand here tonight to speak on the Annie Oxborough Birth Parents Registration Bill. I’d like to acknowledge the member whose brought this bill to the House, Chris Penk. Thank you, Chris Penk, for bringing this to the House.

This Annie Oxborough Birth Parents Registration Bill is really important. I can never understand and can never know what it’s like to be Susan Mary Cox; to have a child with the birth father, Scott Geoffrey Sinel, 50 years ago, and, 10 months later, be registered another name and not know the name of their child and where their child is. I would never know that.

I’d want to say today that, regardless of what we say here today, it is a celebration Annie Oxborough has got her day in law today. It’s a first step to making it real.

I want to acknowledge that in December 1971, the birth certificate of Annie Oxborough was Angela Joy Marshall. In law, it says that “this birth certificate is the legal source of identity for Annie Oxborough” at the time, 50 years ago.

I want to acknowledge the leadership of Annie and her determination, and her determination to share her experience. I haven’t read her book, Where the [F٭ck] is My Mother?, but I want to commend her leadership for that. All Annie seeks to have is to have her account, to have her lineage recorded in her identity.

On that note, I don’t want to hold us any further. I want to commend the bill to the House. Mālō.

CHRIS PENK (National—Kaipara ki Mahurangi): Thank you, Madam Speaker, for the opportunity to make the final contribution at this, the first reading. I also thank members of Parliament all across the House from different parties who have spoken very thoughtfully and very respectfully. Rachel Boyack made that point about treating the story—which of course is so deeply personal to Annie and also her parents—respectfully, and that will mean a lot to her, I’m sure she wouldn’t mind me saying on her behalf.

I do also wish to say that no disrespect is implied to those who have, in many cases, done a wonderful job of bringing up the child of another person, and there are all kinds of different situations and circumstances and experiences that New Zealand children have had over the years in these scenarios. And that feeds into the complexity of what we’re covering today. I think the complexity of the situation—perhaps Annie’s is relatively straightforward. Certainly if her adoptive parents were still alive today, I think that might have made it a more difficult decision to bring this bill to the House. I don’t say that I wouldn’t have done it, but nevertheless I’m conscious that there are many different players involved. And I think whatever decisions we make on any individual bill, and also, of course, the broader question of reform, the key is that we treat everyone with the respect they deserve throughout that, where intentions have been good.

The Green Party member Teanau Tuiono made, I think, a really valuable point, which is that there are different cultural perspectives to which New Zealanders will approach the subject—many different ethnicities, faiths, and the lack of faith or no stated belief. Of course, we live in a very pluralistic society in New Zealand in 2023, so it’s important to acknowledge that different approaches will be taken to this. But, of course, in this House in general terms, we make laws that affect all the population, and it’s relatively unusual—indeed, the private bill along with the local bill is the exception that proves the rule that we don’t usually make the law specifically relating to one person.

So just a brief reflection on that. Others, for example, Mr McDowall from the ACT Party, have rightly noted that it would be impractical, for reasons of the sheer number of New Zealanders involved, for every such matter to come to the Parliament. And others made a similar point acknowledging the time and the money involved in doing that. But to the extent that this shines the light on a broader question, I think that it is time and money well spent.

So I do wish to end on a note of reflecting on that theme—that is, we are doing a thing for one person at one time, and I am sure that Annie is deeply grateful to the House for that, and certainly I regard it as a privilege to be able to do that in the role that I currently have as her local MP, but I conceive of it as almost a diamond shape. So we’ve started with Annie herself, we’ve broadened it out to the fact that this may ultimately affect the life and situation of many others, but at its conclusion I do want to bring this back to Annie. And that’s appropriate too to keep her at the centre of the story.

From here, assuming that the bill passes its first reading—and I understand, from expressions of support around the House, that it will—it will go to the Governance and Administration Committee. There it will be in the very good hands of chair Ian McKelvie and the other members, who I know work diligently on all kinds of matters—that’s the nature of that committee. I will say that while, of course, I hope and, I think I may say, expect that this bill will ultimately pass, I don’t know where this ends more broadly. And it’s not very often that a member of Parliament says that they don’t know where a thing is leading that they bring to the House. I’m approaching the subject with some nervousness and some humility in acknowledging that, but I think, nevertheless, in my heart, if I may say that, as well as in my head, this is the right thing to do in this moment and that I hope that it will lead many of us to a good place.

So, for that reason, again, I thank all those who have spoken tonight in support. I thank those who have helped us get this far. I thank, in anticipation, the Governance and Administration Committee, those who have helped in various different ways discussing a number of aspects associated with the bill, and, of course, Annie herself. Again, we salute your courage, Annie. We will look forward to remaining in touch with you, hearing more directly your story. But in the meantime, I commend this bill to the House.

Motion agreed to.

Bill read a first time.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: The question is, That the Annie Oxborough Birth Parents Registration Bill be considered by the Governance and Administration Committee.

Motion agreed to.

Bill referred to the Governance and Administration Committee.

Instruction to Governance and Administration Committee

CHRIS PENK (National—Kaipara ki Mahurangi): I move, That the Annie Oxborough Birth Parents Registration Bill be reported to the House by 19 July 2023 and that the committee have authority to meet at any time while the House is sitting (except during oral questions), during any evening on a day on which there has been a sitting of the House, and on a Friday in a week in which there has been a sitting of the House and outside the Wellington area, despite Standing Orders 193, 195, and 196.

Here I conclude my referral motion.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Does the member wish to speak to the motion?

CHRIS PENK (National—Kaipara ki Mahurangi): Thank you, Mr Speaker—only briefly, to say that the reason that I have suggested the report-back date that I have voiced, and have, I think, tentative agreement for from the other side of the House, is simply for two reasons. It’s a relatively short period of time. One is that because the law only explicitly refers and relates to one particular person, I don’t think it will take longer than the, roughly, two months that I’ve suggested in order to do that, and the other reason is that by having a report-back date of mid-July, there’s a fighting chance that we’ll be able to pass this law before the end of this Parliament, which will be, if nothing else, a cause for some satisfaction, I think, and as much certainty as possible in this situation. Annie’s parents are alive now—her birth parents are alive now—and it would be wonderful if before too much longer, they were to have the opportunity to see this passed into law for their own sake as well as that of their daughter, Annie.

Motion agreed to.

Bills

Employment Relations (Extended Time for Personal Grievance for Sexual Harassment) Amendment Bill

Third Reading

IBRAHIM OMER (Labour) on behalf of Marja Lubeck (Labour): I move, That the Employment Relations (Extended Time for Personal Grievance for Sexual Harassment) Amendment Bill be now read a third time.

It’s a pleasure to kick off the third reading of Marja Lubeck’s Employment Relations (Extended Time for Personal Grievance for Sexual Harassment) Amendment Bill. Marja Lubeck inherited this bill from the Hon Dr Deborah Russell when she moved to be a Minister. I want to begin by acknowledging and thanking both members—Dr Russell and Ms Lubeck—for all the work they have done in bringing this bill into the House. I had the privilege of being a part of the Education and Workforce Committee that considered this bill. We heard from 43 strong submitters of interested groups and individuals.

Everyone is entitled to a safe, healthy workplace that’s free from all forms of harassment and bullying. However, it’s important that safeguards and processes are in place for those who experience any forms of harassment in the workplace. The purpose of this bill is to amend the Employment Relations Act 2000 to extend the time in which someone can raise a personal grievance for sexual harassment from 90 days to 12 months. It aims to improve the personal grievance process for victims of sexual harassment by allowing them more time to consider what has happened before deciding whether to raise a personal grievance, offering a more survivor-centric approach. In the Hon Dr Deborah Russell’s words, this bill makes only small improvements but it will have large implications.

It’s important to note that this change would not apply retrospectively—[Interruption]

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Mr Doocey, just a little bit quieter please—I’m struggling to hear.

IBRAHIM OMER: —and the employers will not be required to amend existing employment agreements, thanks to the transitional provision inserted in the bill in the committee stage.

At present, an employee who has experienced sexual harassment in the workplace has 90 days to raise a personal grievance. This is not very long, and it’s not reflective of how sexual harassment plays out in the workplace. Victims of sexual harassment often take a prolonged period of time to come to terms with their experience and report it. Delays to reporting can be attributed to embarrassment, lack of understanding of what happened, self-blame, fear of what others will think, and shame. Further to this, there is an inherent power imbalance in the workplace, placing victims in a very vulnerable situation.

Zoё Lawton, who brought this issue to the Hon Dr Deborah Russell’s attention, described this imbalance very well, stating, “It’s really hard to speak out when the person who is bullying or sexually harassing you is paying your salary and controlling the type of work that you do, without, of course, risking your career.” By extending the time to 12 months, we are actually giving individuals more time to make such an important decision.

During the select committee process, we had 43 strong submissions on this bill. Many of the submissions listed individual accounts of workplace sexual harassment and how the 90-day time frame was insufficient for someone to process what had occurred. For example, submissions from the Public Service Association Women’s Network shared four accounts of workplace sexual harassment. All accounts described a similar situation of older, charismatic employees or employers sexually harassing younger women. All four accounts described the initial difficulty of understanding what had occurred and how they felt like they could not make a complaint, with one submitter describing the 90-day time limit as a “scary target”.

There were many other stories detailing similar sentiments from individuals and organisations. The most common defence of sexual harassment is that the employee has not raised the issue with their employer on time. In cases of sexual harassment, 90 days may not be enough time to raise a complaint. It’s important that employees have time to consider what has occurred and they feel safe to raise it with others. This bill will ensure that they have time to process and to proceed in a manner which best suits them.

Finally, I wanted to touch on the importance of this bill for minorities. What will this mean for minorities and those who come from migrant and refugee backgrounds? We know that the rates of individuals experiencing workplace sexual harassment is higher for minorities. On top of this, people who come from these backgrounds are often told not to speak out against employers or those in positions of power. This is a cultural thing.

In summary, it’s imperative that victims of sexual harassment have time to consider what has occurred and to feel safe to raise it with others. This bill will ensure that they have time to process and to proceed in a manner that suits their families. The current deadline imposes an arbitrary deadline on victims of workplace sexual harassment and makes it less likely that they can formally raise concerns about the behaviour of their colleagues. This bill improves the personal grievance process for victims of sexual harassment by allowing them time to consider what has happened to them before deciding to come forward. This bill will significantly impact workplace cultures of silence towards sexual harassment. We as a House must do whatever we can do to support this strategy and ensure that employees feel safe at their workplace.

At the end, I want to acknowledge and thank officials from the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment; the Office of the Clerk; the Parliamentary Counsel Office; and the members of the Education and Workforce Committee, who worked collaboratively and constructively on this bill. Finally, and most importantly, I want to thank all the submitters who submitted on this bill and those who courageously shared their stories.

For about four to five years, I was a union organiser, and every day when I was out and about visiting workplaces, one of the things that I saw was how common sexual harassment is, either from colleagues or from people sometimes—often—that people trust with their lives and the people that they trust at their workplace to work with. Often, they work in very dark places, and how scary it can be for the victims to actually open their mouths about it.

Throughout my time as a union organiser, I got to know that sexual harassment is quite serious. It’s something that a lot of victims keep to their hearts and they suffer in silence. So I’d like to thank Dr Deborah Russell, who listened to one of the victims and decided to take on this bill, and Marja Lubeck, of course, for stepping up and taking on the bill once Dr Russell stepped up to be a Minister. The reality is that this is going to make a difference for thousands of victims of sexual harassment by giving them time to prepare psychologically, to prepare physically, and to step up and to raise the issue if they need to.

So this is a good bill. I hope that all political parties across this House come together to support this bill, because at the end of the day we are talking about the victims, people who often can’t speak up for themselves. So this is the right thing to do. I urge every political party to support it and that tonight we pass this bill into law. Thank you, Mr Speaker. I commend this bill to the House.

CHRIS PENK (National—Kaipara ki Mahurangi): Thank you, Mr Speaker. National does indeed continue to support the bill, the Employment Relations (Extended Time for Personal Grievance for Sexual Harassment) Amendment Bill. I assure Mr Omer that our starting point, which had been that it is important to consider the particular situation of people who are alleging sexual harassment is properly considered by this House and that a case has been made for the law change that has been brought forward—first by the Hon Deborah Russell, as she now is—

Hon Scott Simpson: Dr.

CHRIS PENK: —in the neighbouring electorate. Excuse me. Dr Russell, indeed.

Hon Scott Simpson: Hon Dr.

CHRIS PENK: Well, I got the honourable, thank you, Mr Scott Simpson—Hon Scott Simpson.

Anyway, it was brought forward by my neighbouring MP, and now it’s in the name of Marja Lubeck, who’s a list MP based in the same electorate as me. I acknowledge them, as well as, of course, importantly, the courage of those who have come forward to seek this law change and anyone who in a workplace or elsewhere has suffered, at the hands of another person, sexual harassment or similar unacceptable behaviour. It goes without saying that such behaviour is unacceptable, and in addition to passing this specific law, the House condemns such behaviour in no uncertain terms.

So as we have heard from Mr Ibrahim Omer, the bill extends the time in which a person has the opportunity to bring forward a personal grievance in relation to sexual harassment. There is a balance, as always, between finality and opportunity. We want to maximise the opportunity for people to have access to the law, but there’s also a value in the law that says at some point it should be certain how a matter rests. So what we’re doing is drawing the line in a different place and saying that it should be as much as a year rather than just that 90-day period within which someone can come forward.

“So why should sexual harassment be treated any differently?” I suppose, is a reasonable question. The answer—we’ve heard it actually outlined tonight—is that the evidence indicates, particularly in relation to matters where sexual harassment has taken place, that a person, for whatever reason—and it might be shame, strange as that might seem to someone outside that context, that might be felt by the person who has suffered as the victim, or it might be other circumstances of vulnerability, in addition to the fact of them having suffered that action—for example, precarious or insecure work conditions, immigrant status, or other particular situations of vulnerability.

So National continues to say that we believe this is a well-conceived law. We think that it’s had good discussion in previous stages and, indeed, at select committee. We thank those who have been involved in that process, and we commend the bill to the House.

ANGELA ROBERTS (Labour): It is an absolute honour to stand and take a call on this third reading on the Employment Relations (Extended Time for Personal Grievance for Sexual Harassment) Amendment Bill. As somebody who is relatively new to this House, to see this member’s bill come through from the Hon Dr Russell and then through our Education and Workforce Committee, and then, of course, Marja Lubeck taking it into her safe hands—to be able to have been a part of this process has been an honour, because this is going to have an impact on workers’ lives and that’s really, really important.

We heard so much in the select committee, as Ibrahim Omer alluded to, from some really brave voices who came to our select committee, their individual stories, and from those representatives from unions who came and shared their stories and those voices of our most vulnerable workers.

Sexual harassment often happens when there is a significant power imbalance, and we know that that power imbalance is more likely to happen when you are in precarious work and you don’t know if you’re going to get another shift, when you are poorly paid and you cannot afford to be fired because there’s nothing in the bank to tide you over till you get another job, or you’re a migrant worker and you’re reliant on your employer for the opportunity to even be in this country. We know that we have vulnerable workers in workplaces where the culture is one of silence, and the idea of, “Just suck it up; it’s the way things happen around here.” is a really damaging environment for people to work in.

I particularly note our young workers, and I feel really sad to think that young workers are coming into the workforce and they start their lives contributing to our economy, being taught that it is absolutely appropriate that they are to be exploited. That’s not a great way to be teaching our young people to participate and see themselves in our economy as workers. They should be valued and they certainly shouldn’t be exploited.

We heard so much—and I think I spoke about it last time—about this bill being about time, and that 12 months will allow so much more to happen, for justice to be sought and served, for some amount of healing, hopefully, to happen and trauma to be dealt with and realised, and having time to process; to understand that, actually, no, the behaviour is never acceptable. But even noticing and knowing what is unacceptable can take a while to process, and then what you’re going to do about it. I think when we walk away from here, this won’t be a bill that is just popped up on the shelf, but it is something that we have to enable to happen and make sure that workers can really use to empower themselves, and part of that will be about education.

It really concerned us when we heard from one of the unions—it was Unite, actually—who’d done some significant work in understanding and getting some evidence about what workers knew and thought about personal grievances and what their experiences were. I think this should be reflected upon by our education system, by those who are employing our young people into the workforce, because when they surveyed people, 80 percent didn’t know at the time that that behaviour was unacceptable, that there was a potential grievance there, that they were being treated badly; 45 percent still didn’t know in retrospect; no one under the age of 20 knew what a personal grievance was at the time they were harassed—no one under the age of 20. That is significant and we need to empower these workers.

I think that’s one of the great things about this bill, and once it passes into legislation we need to make sure we shout it from the rooftops. This is a really clear signal to our young people that they are valued not as dishwashers and floor sweepers and baristas, but as people who have something to contribute and who deserve to be valued and respected and protected. We need to educate them about what this is and what the process is when things do go wrong—because inevitably they will—and what a personal grievance is and how to get involved in that process to make sure that it doesn’t do more damage than doing nothing. Ninety-three percent of those who had experienced sexual harassment never lodged a personal grievance, and you need to ask why. We know that part of it’s cultural and educational. They didn’t know what was possible until they had support, and they need that time. I think that’s a really, really important part of this legislation.

Another reason is the response from their employers. You know, you reach out to a workmate or to a supervisor about some behaviour elsewhere in the workplace, and so often it is not adequately investigated—quite possibly because the person they reached out to also had something to lose. There was a price that they were going to have to pay for putting their neck on the line and standing up against people who were behaving badly.

We hear so often—and it isn’t just our most vulnerable workers—in the workplace, “I don’t want to be branded as a trouble maker.” That is a completely unacceptable way of framing up such behaviour. Actually, employers—those responsible for the welfare of their staff—should be really pleased with this bill giving them the space to actually do what so many of them want to do, and that’s get it right and make sure that these things are remedied and that they can care for everybody in their employment.

This is an important bill. It may seem small, but it is important and it sends a signal not just to those who have experienced sexual harassment but also the perpetrators. It lifts the bar a bit. It makes sure that we are being very clear about giving people the space to seek justice. We hear about the individual examples from many of the submitters and it’s so taboo, often, for people to speak out. There is the shame, the guilt, and the way that becomes a part of your identity as a worker, as a staff member. Like I say, I think that is even more important when we’re talking about young people coming into the workforce.

It was a reality check that we got from all of those submitters about why it was hard, not just because they had to process it in their own minds but they then had to have conversations with other people. They didn’t want to be trouble—that mind-set that it’s too much trouble: it’s real, but it’s emotionally and mentally complicated. We know that by giving people the space to process it, to reach out, to seek help means that the resolution in the end—and the ability for people to move on—is really, really important. It’s an uncomfortable topic. And again, more time, more space, will help to mean that we end up with issues being resolved in a much more satisfactory way. That isn’t just about punishment and justice but it is about the victims ending up in a place where they can also move on.

It has been a pleasure to learn about this process of a member’s bill and, like I say, it was very humbling to have such a topic be supported coming through the House. We’ve had a lot of different people involved and it’s really great to hear support from across the House for something so important. It is really nice when we can stand together and look after our workers and value them as people and as contributors—not just financially but as humanity—to make sure that we end up with a stronger and healthier workforce as a result. It is because of this that I am very, very happy to recommend this bill to the House.

PENNY SIMMONDS (National—Invercargill): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I’m pleased to stand and speak in support of the Employment Relations (Extended Time for Personal Grievance for Sexual Harassment) Amendment Bill in this, its third reading. Like others, I recognise the Hon Dr Deborah Russell, who first brought this member’s bill, and then Marja Lubeck, who took it further.

The bill has quite a straightforward purpose, and that is extending the time for an employee to raise a personal grievance alleging sexual harassment from the normal 90-day period of a personal grievance, to one year. It does this through several amendments to the Employment Relations Act 2000. The bill was examined by the Education and Workforce Committee—which I am a member of—with very minor changes to the retrospectivity of the bill.

We all acknowledge that sexual harassment is completely unacceptable in any context at all—and particularly in the workplace, where there is an imbalance of power. Particularly, a number of people have acknowledged how when people’s livelihoods are dependent on the incomes that they are earning—and particularly in the environment that we’re looking at at the moment, with the cost of living crisis—it’s a very stressful time for people safeguarding their livelihoods.

But we believe that it’s incredibly important that this legislation gives victims of sexual harassment the time and the safety to be able to speak up. Often, for victims of sexual harassment, it isn’t safe for them when they have fears about their job and fears of where things might end up. They often don’t feel safe until they perhaps have a new manager or have gained a new position elsewhere out of that particular work environment. So it can take time for a victim to feel that they are able to take that step of raising a personal grievance.

I know a lot of talk has been made about the most vulnerable workers, and that’s absolutely appropriate, but I was also reminded that Dr Deborah Russell, when she first introduced this, spoke about how prevalent sexual harassment was amongst the legal fraternity. So I think we should acknowledge this is something that can occur very widely across a range of professions and a range of workplaces.

So giving victims of sexual harassment in the workplace the time to be able to be in a safe situation themselves, to be able to bring forward a personal grievance in this way is incredibly important. We see this bill giving that extension of time, improving that personal grievance process for victims of workplace sexual harassment by giving them that sufficient time to consider what has happened to them, to get themselves in a safe space, and to be able to come forward. Indeed, we want all victims of sexual harassment to feel that there is that additional support within the personal grievance process for them. So, with that, I commend the bill to the House.

VANUSHI WALTERS (Labour—Upper Harbour): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I’ll join my colleagues this evening, commending first the members the Hon Dr Deborah Russell and Marja Lubeck, who have both ushered this bill through the House.

I think there’s a myth that there’s a decision-making point when a person goes through a traumatic experience: that once they’ve got the information they need, they then get the support, they see their options, and there’s a decision-making point. If you’ve supported people through making a complaint in this area, you’ll know that’s not how it plays out.

I worked in YouthLaw Aotearoa for nine years, and about 40 percent of our work was in the employment space. I sat next to young women between the ages of 16—sometimes younger—and 18, and provided them with information about their rights in this space. What always struck me—it’s not something you forget—is the intensity of moving from information to a decision to do something about it.

The first month is usually talking to your friends. For a lot of these young people, that’s how they’d spend the first month, sometimes the first two months. The next month is maybe deciding whether you’re going to tell anyone else, like a parent or an older person you trust. Sometimes it takes several months.

The next month, maybe two, maybe three, is looking for information. First, it’s just whatever you can find online. Maybe, if you’re resourceful, you then find some help like YouthLaw to find out what your rights are. And then, only then, starts the long journey of decision about whether you’re actually comfortable making a complaint.

That’s not the end of the journey, of course, and there’s a lot of trauma that young people experience after they make a decision to complain—if they do indeed do that. I’ve sat next to a young person who decided she wanted to move forward but couldn’t bring herself to sit in the room as she went through a mediation. So her father, also extremely traumatised by his young daughter being subject to sexual harassment, sat in the room with us in her place while she was on the phone. These are long, drawn-out situations with complex decision making where decisions change frequently.

Having said that, I do believe that we do need to draw a line. The idea of having a statute of limitations is not a new one; it’s been around actually since ancient Greece, where at that stage every law was subject to a five-year statute of limitations except for murder. As the law evolved in the 17th century, we started to see it in British law as well. But in truth, we’re still working out exactly where to draw the lines on every single crime. Historically, there’s been a focus on the nature of the offence and the time period at which evidence may be reasonably lost.

But there’s been an assumption in the assessment of where the line should be drawn. The assumption is that the individual who might make the complaint has decided not to, or they’ve been negligent in failing to turn their mind to whether they ought to be making a complaint. That is simply not the case in terms of any kind of inappropriate sexual touching. Colleagues have mentioned reasons tonight: shame, fear, guilt, avoidance—these are all very live issues—uncertainty in how you’ll be perceived. Again, it’s not a linear decision.

I wasn’t privileged to be on the Education and Workforce Committee as they considered this bill, but I have read through the submissions and I understand the committee considered 43, hearing evidence from 10. So I would just like to reflect on one of the submitters in particular: the Human Rights Review Tribunal. So a lot of these young people I talked about who would come to YouthLaw—if they were outside the period of raising a personal grievance, that wasn’t their only option; they still did have the option of pursuing a mediation under the Human Rights Act. The Human Rights Review Tribunal spoke to this and said that they agreed with the idea of extending the provisions for personal grievance so it matched with the de facto provisions of accessing mediation provided for them by the Human Rights Commission.

But they actually also pointed to two reasons why a person, at any age, may want to select the personal grievance option as opposed to going down the Human Rights Commission route. Firstly, they said that it provided a space where you had particular expertise about how to progress those issues. They also pointed to the fact that there was significant delay in the Human Rights Review Tribunal process. I believe they pointed specifically to a case where there was over two years in terms of a decision that one of the complainants was waiting for.

So when young people would come to me, and they were within the personal grievance period, and they’d ask me, “Which route should I go down?” I would often say to them, “You should go down the route of raising a personal grievance.”, because while it takes some time to come to a decision that you want to raise the issue, those young people don’t want to be trapped in a space where they’re consistently in trauma for years and years. So, many of those young people within the period would absolutely opt to go for a personal grievance.

Importantly—maybe as a tangential issue—the Human Rights Review Tribunal also raised the issue of consistency with the Limitation Act, which, interestingly, does apply to courts but doesn’t apply to them as a tribunal. It’s not necessarily in the space of this bill, but I raise it because it’s occurring to me more and more—the more time I spend in the House—that there are many really live issues in our legal system that are raised tangentially that we really ought to pay attention to as we’re progressing bills through the House. They shouldn’t die on the cutting floor, if you like. We need to make sure that we pay attention to the other very valid issues that are raised. So that was a really fascinating submission for me.

I wanted to comment on one other submitter. So there was a submitter called the Ministry of Men’s Affairs—who I understand are a community group; they aren’t actually a ministry—and they did not support the bill. They considered that an extended time frame to raise a personal grievance for sexual harassment was not warranted in comparison with other personal grievances—for example, as race or other forms of harassment, which they said could be as difficult to deal with and raise with an employer. Now, I actually think that that’s a reasonable argument. In fact, other submitters put the same argument to the floor. But, again, that’s not an argument not to extend the period to a year; that’s an argument to this House that perhaps instead of leaving this on the cutting floor, we should consider “what next?” What next, who else might not be complaining because they cannot make those complex decisions within the time frame as well?

The same group also argued that a period longer than 90 days would risk people not being able to remember relevant events properly or that witnesses would no longer be available. This is not a new issue for tribunals and courts to deal with. This is a question of evidence that really does need to be put to the Employment Court. As the Human Rights Review Tribunal pointed out, it’s not untested that you would use evidence of someone who had waited that one year. It is currently happening at the Human Rights Review Tribunal.

So, in my last minute, I would just go back to that issue of point of decision. I think too many times we reflect on decisions that complainants might be making in a very linear way. Again, that is simply not the case; it does take longer to do. I do very much commend the changes that we’re making here today, but I would challenge the House to say, “We need to be constantly asking, ‘What next?’ ” And we need to constantly be asking, “Are the time frames, are the limitations that we’re setting on each of these significant laws accurate?”

So, once again, I would thank the members who brought this significant bill to the House, which will make an enormous difference to many people who otherwise wouldn’t complain. I commend the select committee for their very diligent work on this bill and all those who took the time to submit on the issues in front of us, but also the issues we should be considering, and I commend this bill to the House.

CHRIS BAILLIE (ACT): Thank you, Mr Speaker. It’s a pleasure to speak on the third reading of the Employment Relations (Extended Time for Personal Grievance for Sexual Harassment) Amendment Bill.

It’s great to hear the fantastic support for this bill for the victims of workplace sexual harassment—often, but not always, women. No doubt, we’ll hear from the Green Party expressing the same outrage and sympathy for the women involved. But the irony isn’t lost, and it should never be forgotten by the public that these are parties that recently condoned and supported violence against women. It just seems that if you do agree with their agenda or ideology, then you’re OK. But if you don’t, you’re on your own.

However, ACT has no such agenda or bias, and we support everyone—whether we agree with them or not—and we support this bill. The bill amends the Employment Relations Act, extending the time available to raise a sexual harassment personal grievance from 90 days to 12 months. It only relates to sexual harassment and not any other forms of personal grievance.

As you might expect, the submissions varied in opinions. Some thought the time frame was too short, some thought the time frame was too long, and some thought the time frame was just right—spot on. Some thought it should be extended to all personal grievances. But we think this bill has got it about right.

The personal grievance process, by nature, leaves a lot up for interpretation and, unfortunately, it is easily abused. Every employer will have examples of the process being used in an unjustified way, whether it’s the waitress who filed a personal grievance because she was told to smile, the painter who thought it was OK to use a work van on the weekend, or the cleaner who thought it was OK to steal. We hear all the time from the left about the so-called imbalance of power, which I think is a silly phrase. Of course there is: one side is paying the other to do a job. One side needs to be able to tell the other side how they want things done and when they want things done.

But if there is an imbalance of power, the pendulum has well and truly swung in the other direction. I know of a recent case where a young man—25 years of age—went through a case manager at the Ministry of Social Development and managed to get a job in the kitchen of a restaurant. All the interviews were done and a contract was signed. He was immediately given a relocation payment of $5,000—just $5,000 straight into his account. He didn’t turn up for the first two shifts, turned up for the third shift, worked for two hours, went on a break, and didn’t come back. He rang two weeks later saying that he actually worked four, not two, and wanted to know where his money was.

Like I said before, the pendulum has swung too far. Employees must be protected, but any abuse of the system must be treated just as seriously as the offence itself. Lives can be and are regularly ruined by false accusations.

ACT supports this bill, but we do advise caution. Emotions, perspectives, and relationships all need to be taken into account. I’m reminded of when I was at college 45 years ago, and every lunchtime a group of girls would walk past the driveway on their way to the canteen. For reasons we couldn’t work out, a particular young man—15 years of age—would find an apple, or find some other missile and throw it in the direction of this group of girls, and at one particular female, and he often connected. It seemed like odd behaviour back then, and would no doubt be harassment and classed as bullying and at least misogynistic today, but they’ve been happily married for 33 years. We should never forget that humans are funny creatures. This bill makes sense and ACT commends it to the House. Thank you.

HELEN WHITE (Labour): This is a bill that’s interesting in terms of our changing attitudes to things like sexual harassment. So I take issue with the last speaker, Chris Baillie, with regard to what’s going on here.

I want to talk about my experience as an employment lawyer. Over time, that changed. When I first started, I was quite young myself, and I remember I had a woman as a client who had been quite severely sexually harassed. She was very beautiful, actually. When we went to court, it was something of an amusement to the man who had harassed her that she was taking the case, and he continued to consider it a joke.

I had a friend who worked at one of the big firms—and, actually, many of you would know the lawyer involved, and I’m not going to name him, but he invited my friend out to lunch. She thought she was going to a lunch with everybody else, and, actually, she was going to lunch with him alone. He was a lot older than her, and he was in a position of power. What do you think it does to a woman like that who’s just starting her career when she thinks that all the value that she holds in the firm, all the sway that she holds, comes from what she looks like and comes from somebody who is actually predatory? That kind of behaviour was tolerated in my profession, and it was a major impetus for our re-examination as a profession—that kind of behaviour—when it came out after the Me Too movement.

I have said earlier, in another speech on this bill, that I also suffered from those kinds of confusions as to what things were. I went along to something where somebody accused another lawyer of sexual harassment, and my first thoughts were, “Damn it, why is she raising that?”, because I saw it as a harder case to plead than other ways of getting a hold of the situation. I’m ashamed of that, because she was right: it was sexual harassment that was going on. It was things like getting her to bend over in a short skirt to sign a piece of wood when she was out as a lawyer. It was things like writing condescending notes about how the other lawyer’s wife had a better car than she did. It was absolutely sexually based discrimination, and I wanted to shut it down and go on another pathway because I was also subject to a system where that was too hard to do.

Now, I can tell the member who spoke about us missing the point that I don’t miss the point, but I can tell him that, actually, as we go through this journey, we will have to examine some of the damage that we do to people when we do things we think are innocent but are not. They hurt people. These are actually quite light-hearted examples in comparison to the trauma that I have seen while I was acting as a lawyer. These are at the light end of the scale, because there are a lot of darker things that have happened to people, and they are traumatised. As a result of the kind of trauma that they go through, they don’t necessarily identify those things in the way that you might if you had a bit of perspective, a bit of time, and time helps get that perspective.

So I’m supportive of moving the date in a case like this, but I’m also supportive of it because it’s a signal. It says, “We know you get traumatised. We know our society’s confused about these things. We know there are mixed signals, and you need time to work through this process and be able to take a case.”—and that’s a really important point and it balances the other things about time limitations.

I’d also remind the member who spoke that there have been issues on time limitations on sexual matters for a very long time. If you look at the movie Spotlight—which I watched recently—one of the problems with the exposure of sexual assault in the Catholic Church was that, in America, they had a time limitation on those cases. It was a very short amount of time; it was something like five years. So you’ve got to be very, very careful in this area, when you’re dealing with such great trauma, that you don’t actually limit the time if you possibly can and that you give as much time as is possible. So I’d say this is a mild form of that approach, and I’d just consider those issues of time limitation—definitely, as my friend Vanushi Walters said, something that we should really re-examine in these areas.

I wanted to talk for a minute about the work of a woman called Mary Koss, because Mary Koss did some work in 1987—she was in America and she was a researcher, and what she did was she revolutionised the way that we identified sexual assault and sexual harassment by asking women about those experiences without attaching those words, because if they were asked directly, at that point, whether they had been harassed or sexually assaulted, they said, “No”. But if you asked them about their actual experiences, the experiences they had were sexual harassment and sexual assault, and rape—and they were not identifying them as such, because they didn’t have the language, because they didn’t see it as such.

The horrifying thing about the work of Mary Koss—which actually did have ramifications for lots of us thinking about what these things are—is that she says, even as late as last year, we haven’t changed the stats: we still have the same alarming amount of sexual harassment in our society. So we have to change something else. We’re identifying the problem better than we were, but we actually are going to have to work on this; this is a work in progress, because many people suffer this kind of sexual assault.

Now, I did employment law as the first 25 years of my career for a really good reason. I’m really proud of it. I did that work because I knew that, in our lives, employment is such a big deal. It’s so important to our wellbeing; it’s the way we earn a living and it’s the way that we actually manage our lives independently of others. I know that even my friend in ACT agrees with doing that. He thinks that people should stand on their own two feet—well, work is actually a really important platform for doing that, and so work has to be something that we take really seriously. People are entitled to work without harassment, they’re entitled to decent work, and they’re entitled to well-paid work. Those are all really important things because they drive wellbeing, and they’re at the heart of why I am in the Labour Party.

So that is what I’d like considered here: that we aren’t tinkering here. We’re talking about one of the very important platforms that we have in our lives to make sure that we can pay for our kids, that we can do things on our own, that we can make reasonable choices, and that we can house and clothe ourselves. That’s how important work is.

So I think that’s something that, actually, the Labour Party and the ACT Party should have in common: that absolute commitment to decent work in our society. But the thing that that is going to require is a recognition that work is also a vulnerable space, and that these kinds of powers—of going and holding an employer to account if an employee is abused by something as serious as sexual abuse—are really important fundamentals in building a decent society. So I commend this bill to the House.

JAN LOGIE (Green): Thank you, Mr Speaker. It’s a pleasure to rise and take what I expect will be a fairly short call on the Employment Relations (Extended Time for Personal Grievance for Sexual Harassment) Amendment Bill, which was initially in the name of the Hon Dr Deborah Russell, and now I understand it is in the name of Marja Lubeck.

We’ve had quite a lot of discussion about the importance of this, and I do just want to start off by referencing the research done by the Human Rights Commission in the last year around the prevalence of sexual harassment in order to give us a bit of a sense of the scale of the problem. We’ve had trouble with that in the past because, actually, part of the problem that’s being recognised by this bill is the difficulty people have in talking about this. But in Aotearoa, last year, the research shows that 30 percent of working people have experienced sexual harassment in the last five years. That’s a pretty significant problem right across all of our workplaces. The people most impacted were young people—54 percent of young people—and bisexual and disabled workers, where 67 percent of them have been experiencing sexual harassment in their workplaces.

This is a really challenging issue for us as a country, and it’s been referenced by other speakers that we need to acknowledge the impact of these offences in our workplaces. They cause mental and physical health impacts—anxiety, depression—and people have trouble sleeping and trouble eating and they’re questioning themselves. That’s a result of the abuse but also it’s a result of the stigma and the difficulty of talking about these issues, and—I would say as well—the difficulty of a pathway to resolution.

We’re not very good at providing pathways to resolution for this, and I want to pick up where the previous speaker Vanushi Walters was saying that we have two systems that were mentioned. So there’s the Human Rights Commission pathway, which has had traditionally that 12-month time frame for reporting, and then we’ve had the employment process—the personal grievance process—where, previously, you had to get your complaint in in 90 days. Now that’s been evened up to be consistent across those two areas. We also have the criminal court—and this House, I’m hoping now, is very, very aware of the problems and the huge barriers for people to enter into that process and get a good outcome, with an outcome being satisfaction in terms of a hope of resolution and recognition—and then we also have WorkSafe as another avenue for addressing sexual harassment.

This bill—and I want to acknowledge Zoё Lawton, who kind of initiated this in her conversations with Dr Russell, I think, and her advocacy, and part of that advocacy was recognised in a consultation that was initiated by the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) in 2020. This was an idea that came out of that consultation that was initiated in 2020 and can be seen, I think, in the summary of submissions. The submissions closed in March 2021. I was part of the conversations in initiating this consultation through MBIE around our processes for addressing sexual harassment, harassment, and bullying.

The reason we initiated that inquiry was because the feedback was just overwhelming—in the wake of the Me Too movement and the stories from our law firms that were all over the media at the time—that we did not have a functioning system that people had confidence in to be able to address the harm in their workplaces, let alone prevent the harm in their workplace. So that consultation was initiated, and submissions closed in March 2021. I’m pleased—at least, I guess—that today, in May 2023, we are passing a member’s bill that delivers on one of the issues that was raised in that consultation.

There is work to do. I think, as Ms Walters said, “What’s next? What’s next?” We have initiated work to work out what’s next, and we just need to make sure that we don’t keep doing what—and this is not specific to this Government; this is a pattern right through our history about things coming up in the media, people spilling their guts to try and get recognition of our system failure and make change for themselves and for others, and we start work, because we are affected and impacted by those stories. Then those stories go out of the media and the attention shifts, and we don’t make the fundamental changes that we need to make. And there are many, in terms of the conflicting systems that we have.

I do want to point out the points that Vanushi Walters, again, made that quite a lot of submissions raised: that, actually, 39 percent of New Zealand workers who have been surveyed had experienced racial harassment in the last five years—so it’s even more than sexual harassment—and that we had levels of bullying that were 20 percent of workers who had experienced bullying frequently in the last 12 months. That is happening right now.

One in five people in our workplaces are experiencing bullying, and we have not extended the periods for them to come forward, even though we know the dynamics and the impacts of those forms of abuse, and the processes that people need to go through in their thinking and understanding of it themselves—let alone talking it through with others—and finding a pathway are very similar to sexual harassment. I definitely believe we need to be doing that work. Enough said. The Greens are happy to be supporting this bill.

TERISA NGOBI (Labour—Ōtaki): Noa’ia ‘e Mḁuri. Happy Rotuman Language Week, and also acknowledging New Zealand Sign Language Week. So thank you, Mr Speaker. It is always an honour and a privilege to take a call in the Chamber of change as the member of Parliament for the beautiful Ōtaki electorate, and on this members’ day.

In 2019, Statistics New Zealand recorded that one in 10 workers feel discriminated against, harassed, or bullied at work. We know that Asian and Māori ethnic groups both reported a rate of discrimination, harassment, or bullying of 13 percent, while Pacific and European ethnic groups had a rate of 11 percent to report. We know across all of those ethnic groups that women have higher rates of reporting in terms of experiences of discrimination, harassment, and bullying than men in the workplace. That is why this bill is critical.

I will lend my voice also of thanks to the Hon Dr Deborah Russell, and now Marja Lubeck, who’s bringing this kaupapa through the House. We know the member Marja Lubeck is a staunch and long-time advocate for good and safe working conditions here in Aotearoa New Zealand.

This bill will improve the personal grievances process for victims of workplace sexual harassment by allowing them time to consider what has happened to them before deciding to come forward. It amends section 114 of the principal Act to extend the period within which a personal grievance may be brought to 12 months instead of the 90 days where we are currently at. The 12 months is for those with personal grievances that involve sexual harassment.

Currently, with an employee only having those 90 days to come forward and report sexual harassment, this gives the employee limited time to process what has happened. We’ve heard tonight the many traumas that come with sexual harassment, the time that it’s going to take the person who has experienced that to work through that trauma, to find support, to get the tools to be able to get the support to work through that, and then finally—and hopefully—report that bad behaviour and sexual harassment within their workplace.

But, unfortunately, we know that, more often than not, victims of sexual harassment don’t come forward. Again, we’ve heard others talk about how there can be a whole raft of reasons, including feeling shame or ma, victims not feeling that they have a safe space to do that and, again, victims of sexual harassment that don’t feel they have support to do that.

Then those that do find support or those that do get to the place where they feel they can make a personal grievance and report sexual harassment in the workplace, quite often that’s taken them some time. Again, they might have needed to get counselling—that takes time. They might have needed to work within themselves to work through some of that trauma just to get to the stage where they can actually report—that takes time. Like we’ve heard from others, some of them don’t know what that means or how to go about it—that takes time. So by the time some of these brave people are ready to report, it’s too late. That 90-day period is so limiting that they’ve missed the boat and an opportunity to have their voice and put a wrong right.

So while it is currently 90 days, it absolutely makes sense to make sure that we shift that, and, for me, this is the major part of the bill that I think is good—that we shift that to that 12-month period to make sure they have got time to get themselves to a place where they can feel safe and be in a safe space to report, but also to get the support they need, because we also know that once someone has the tools and the courage and the support to report, that isn’t the end of the story; that’s just the beginning. They have to be able to have the support, the stamina, and be in the right place to be able to continue with that personal grievance.

I wasn’t part of the Education and Workforce Committee who worked through this, the Employment Relations (Extended Time for Personal Grievance for Sexual Harassment) Amendment Bill, but I do want to thank the committee for the work they’ve done on this bill. I understand the committee were unanimous with the recommendations that they put in this bill when they passed it, including the time period in employment agreements.

Clauses 4 and 5 of the bill would amend sections 54(3)(a)(iii) and 65(2)(a)(iv) of the Employment Relations Act, respectively. These sections require employment agreements to refer to the time period within which a personal grievance must be raised. The bill would replace, as I spoke about before, the reference to 90 days with the relevant periods.

The Education and Workforce Committee recommended that the clauses in the bill specify the two different periods that would apply, depending on the nature of the personal grievance. So, as we’ve heard before—and we heard Jan Logie talk about—12 months for those personal grievances who experienced sexual harassment, and 90 days for the other personal grievances that employees would bring to the workplace.

This legislation is part of the Labour Government’s plan in improving women’s working lives. And we heard Ms Helen White talk about how important that is and what workplaces mean—you know, how work helps our families, especially our women, in terms of making sure that we can live and support our families and support our tamariki, our children.

You also heard, at the start, I quoted some of the stats around what that shows for women in comparison to men, who are far more likely to be sexually harassed in the workplace—bullied and discriminated against. We know that women have a far different experience in the workplace than our men counterparts. So this Government’s work in Te Mahere Whai Mahi Wāhine has immediate to medium-term, and then long-term actions to address barriers to women’s employment.

This bill was another piece of work that supports improving the working lives for women here in Aotearoa New Zealand. Further, this Government is doing some work on reducing the gender pay gap, and we’ve already started to see some of that with the Public Service at its lowest they’ve ever been on 28 November 2021, at 8.6 percent. Again, this bill builds on furthering some of that work.

Everyone should feel safe when they go to work. They should feel supported in their workplace, and that is what this bill is about. It ensures employees who experience sexual harassment in the workplace have a fair and reasonable process and it allows time for these employees to report.

We’ve heard from others tonight about the struggles to even get to the place where you can report. That’s why it was a little bit disappointing to hear the ACT member Chris Baillie, I guess, downplay some of that as bad behaviour. Sexual harassment, or any kind of bullying or harassment or discrimination in the workplace, is not just banter and it’s not just kidding around. You know, we heard, again, the high rates of women that are affected by this and that experience sexual harassment. The trauma that’s behind that is not just some words and that’s it; that they do a personal grievance and it’s finished. That trauma stays with them for a really long time.

Words really hurt; they cut deep. I feel that we need to make sure that we remind ourselves of that, and that also the words we use in this House cut deep, so reminding ourselves that—well, I said earlier—the majority of people who do experience sexual harassment in the workplace are women. That is somebody’s daughter. That is somebody’s wife. That is somebody’s mother. That is somebody’s sister. That is somebody’s someone to them. We have to remind ourselves of that. So not only do those words and feelings cut deep in the workplace, it cuts deep here, too, and we have a responsibility to make sure we remember that and that our words have real meaning to it.

I want to finish my contribution by also saying that if there is one out there that is experiencing harassment, sexual harassment, bullying, or discrimination in any kind in the workplace—or if you know someone who is and you see it and they are experiencing sexual harassment, discrimination, or bullying, be brave and stand by them and support them to make sure that you can help them to get the support they need in the first instance and, if they are ready and strong enough, help them to be able to report that.

I also want to finish my contribution by talking about some of the places you can go to. There are many organisations, and, hopefully, you will see some of your local ones out there. But I wanted to just highlight a couple here. So Safe to talk—it’s a sexual harm helpline and its number is 0800 044 334, or you can text them on 4334. Then there are local Victim Support, local Women’s Refuge. Obviously, if it’s life-threatening, you should ring the police, and also the police are there to be able to connect you with Victim Support and other organisations that can support you. And, of course, you can text or call 1737 if you are seeking counselling as well. Kia ora, Mr Speaker.

Hon SCOTT SIMPSON (National—Coromandel): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I appreciate the opportunity to take a call in the third reading of this bill as the parliamentary sitting day comes to an end in a few minutes. In doing so, I want to acknowledge, as others have done, the initiative taken by the Hon Dr Deborah Russell for, in the first place, having the foresight to put this bill into the ballot and then having the good fortune to have it drawn from the ballot and then subsequently taken over in its later stages by Marja Lubeck.

I also want to acknowledge the, I think, very good debate that’s taken place here tonight. Sometimes this Parliament acts in a way that many people would see as petulant, childish, and sometimes irrelevant, and then occasionally there are opportunities when this Parliament actually makes some very good and positive changes and the debate is well informed, it’s measured, and it’s respectful from across the House.

I want to, in that context, particularly single out Helen White’s contribution this evening; a contribution that was made from years of experience as a practitioner in the employment law area, and clearly from someone who knew what she was talking about and was able to relate well, I thought, to the debate tonight. So I commend her for her contribution.

Although sexual harassment is never acceptable in any context, sexual harassment that occurs in the workplace is particularly objectionable. That’s part of the reason why, on this side of the House tonight, we are, with enthusiasm, supporting this bill at third reading, because the issues that occur in the workplace, the dynamics that occur in the workplace are different to many other situations of day-to-day life. There are often power imbalances and there are often situations that are difficult and challenging.

The overwhelming number of victims of workplace sexual harassment are, of course, women. But it’s not uniquely women who are the victims. I can well recall years ago in a previous life when I was a middle-manager in a company and had to try to deal with a situation where a young male employee was being harassed by an older senior female manager within the organisation. At the time, it was a real issue, because, back in those days, companies and businesses literally—literally—did not have the skill set, the mechanisms, the policies, or the processes for dealing with a situation of that sort.

I can remember it being a very challenging and difficult situation not only for me as a middle-manager trying to negotiate a way through that and ultimately finding a resolution to it but for the people involved, for the young man who was involved in this situation where there was an absolute mismatch of power dynamics. It was a serious, serious matter. These days, from time to time, when we’re having a debate of this sort, I think about that particular situation, because that’s not, I suspect, completely unusual even in today’s world.

Regrettably, I’m also old enough to remember a time, when I first started working, when it was commonplace to go into a male-dominated workplace—and I’m thinking maybe of a mechanic’s workshop or an engineering workshop and what have you—and there would literally be wall-to-wall photographs and images of naked women in various poses and what have you, and even businesses that would hand out calendars each year as some kind of promotion. Well, fortunately, the world has moved on and those sorts of practices are now utterly unacceptable—as is sexual harassment in any way, shape, or form in the workplace.

It’s for that reason that we on this side of the House support this legislation and we thank and congratulate the Hon Dr Deborah Russell for bringing it to the House. I am very happy and proud to support this legislation.

SARAH PALLETT (Labour—Ilam): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I rise with some solemnity this evening to add my small contribution to the previous debate. I agree with the member opposite, the Hon Scott Simpson, who spoke of the respect with which this debate has been treated. I also want to add my thanks and gratitude to the Hon Dr Deborah Russell and to Marja Lubeck for bringing this bill to the House. But I also want to make mention, too, again, of Zoë Lawton, whose blog, I believe, was the genesis of this bill following the Colmar Brunton poll that we have been talking about as we’ve moved through Parliament with this bill.

We’ve heard that the purpose of this bill is really simple: we’re trying to extend the time available for a personal grievance that involves sexual harassment from 90 days to 12 months, but only for a personal grievance relating to sexual harassment.

I also want to thank the submitters on this bill, and I’m going to talk a tiny little bit about some of the themes that were brought forward, just really expanding on what’s been said before. I’m referring to one community group who said they didn’t support the bill because they felt that this would risk people not being able to remember relevant events properly, which is an interesting perspective, because in my first reading speech, I talked of my experiences, my personal experiences, of sexual harassment, and I can only say that I remember in precise detail being harassed when I was 17 years old—which is many, many years ago now. I remember what I was wearing. I remember where I was sitting. I remember what was said. I could almost tell you the smells. And that was harassment; it wasn’t assault.

Sexual harassment is really significant—it has a profound effect upon people. We’ve heard that 31 percent of women and 5 percent of men said, when asked in this Colmar Brunton investigation, that they’d experienced harassment. The most common reason for not reporting I’ll go into in a little bit, but 39 percent of them said that this experience affected their emotional and mental wellbeing, and 32 percent said it affected their job or career prospects. It’s not a small thing—it really isn’t.

I’m not going to speak for very much longer, because I’m conscious that it’s the end of the day, but I just want to read a blog post from the #Metoo blog that Zoë Lawton put forward. One blog post read: “To the guy who wrote: “How can so much ‘behaviour’ occur yet it is only reported and recorded when the momentum starts”—she says—“are you actually serious? I have personally experienced, and I have witnessed other female lawyers experience, the harsh repercussions of speaking up … laughed at or humiliated … denied work … pushed out of a job … bullied and stalked.” Then she said: “I realise at the end of this post I have carefully worded it so as to not identify myself at all.” She adds, to the people who wrote and brought this forward, “You are so brave.”

I would add: “Every submitter is brave.” Zoë Lawton is brave. This House is brave to bring this legislation forward, and I commend it to the House.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: This debate is interrupted and set down for resumption next sitting day. I congratulate members on some very thoughtful and collegial lawmaking this evening. The House stands adjourned until 2 p.m. tomorrow.

Debate interrupted.

The House adjourned at 9.58 p.m.