Parliamentary debates: Wednesday, 29 April 2026

09:00

Thank you, Madam Chair. Last night, we had a really helpful back and forth with the Minister around what kind of transactions would be covered by reporting entities and by people who may report suspicious activity. It was very helpful to hear from the Minister that the provision at new section 40A, amended by clause 8, I think she referred to, and at 39A(b)(i), amended by clause 7, came from feedback from the industry. I’m interested in this power for people who may report suspicious activity and whether that should be a requirement on them.

Section 67A in the original Act is the powers that relate to things like gold, silver, jewellery. You might envision a situation with shops that are trading in physical goods, where a person is transacting large amounts of money but over a longer period of time than one transaction that might give rise to suspicion. My question was, for the Minister—that’s not what I’d anticipated, because the old Act does provide for provisions that relate to trade in gold and silver. But this “may report suspicious activity” wasn’t, I thought, a higher requirement or something that a requirement would be put on the sellers of these to provide information to the supervisor around suspicious activity. Can she just clarify whether her new section 40A steps back the requirement on sellers of these goods to report suspicious transactions or whether that is a new power that provides a way into the scheme, which is I think what she said last night.

My other question is around her clause 7. We were on (ii) last night when we were—the questions are around at what point we are capturing the suspicious activity in a transaction that relates to one of these things which is mentioned in the actual legal Act. Any transaction which is covered by those Acts is illegal. The anti - money-laundering provisions step further into those transactions where you might need to report something that is suspicious or you might need to report something which would lead to illegal activity but is not in itself illegal.

But the wording of (ii) seems to be now a higher standard than what it was. “Reasonable grounds to suspect”, and just these offences, is a broader definition than simply “a suspicious activity”. The natural meaning of “suspicious activity” is being limited here. The things which you have reasonable grounds to suspect are leading to those illegal activities. “What is the extra power here?”, is the question. Any sort of transaction which you reasonably suspected was to aid transactions which were prohibited transactions under the Misuse of Drugs Act, like dealing, would be illegal in and of themselves, so what is it extra here that is being asked of people who are either reporting entities or these extra people who are dealing in the things which are set out at 67A of the original Act?

I think where we got to last night was a little bit of a better understanding about those Acts being the things that will give rise to the grounds for suspicion, but not necessarily what is extra from stepping back into a transaction or stepping after a transaction has occurred for the proceeds of a crime. Both of those parts of the transaction are meant to be captured by international obligations under anti - money-laundering arrangements that we make with the rest of the world. Are our obligations that are owed to the international community being met here by what I think is a tightening up of the definition of “suspicious activity”?

I’m sorry, Minister. I’d just point out to members that we’re not very tolerant of repetition. I note that that member asked a very similar question last night. But if the Minister is happy to take a call—the Hon Nicole McKee.

09:04

Thanks, Madam Chair. I was about to say that I think I did cover this all last night, but I’ll just give a little bit more if it helps the member. There is now the requirement that if somebody presents with over $10,000 to purchase something, a suspicious activity report now needs to be filled out. Now, before that $10,000 limit was put in, a lot of these agencies were already giving suspicious activity reports, but once we had the $10,000 limit, they weren’t required to do so. Effectively, we are putting in the ability for these agencies to be able to continue to deliver a suspicious activity report. It won’t expand on obligations for the current reporting entities.

As I’ve mentioned, it was requested by industry. To give examples of some of the businesses that might be caught up in this, it includes auction houses—like Turners, for example—or any dealership for either new or used motor vehicles. But mainly we have changed this purely because industry had asked for it. These people used to be able to give SARs—the suspicious activity reports. We’re basically saying if they want to continue to do that, we’re allowing them to do it. We’re not mandatorily making it that they have to, but they’ve requested that ability.

Of course, what comes with that is the anonymity, the ability for them to be able to report but still keep confidential their own reporting system, I guess is what we’re saying. With a suspicious activity report, they can report to the police, to the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU), to say, “We’ve had somebody come in with $12,000 cash. We think that it might be drug money, but we’re going to report it, and then we will just step back.”, because it will ensure, through SAR, that their details are kept confidential, therefore keeping them safe. This will allow more people, as I mentioned last night, to be able to give those SARs to the FIU.

09:07

Thank you, Madam Chair. It’s good to have the further opportunity today to continue to work our way through this bill, particularly in the context of it being one of two bills and there being the potential for items covered in either to be conflated or confused through the process. It is good, and I thank the Minister for both her time last evening in the limited time we had to get started on working through this, the second of the two bills, but also to continue stepping through that this morning. Appreciating your guidance, Madam Chair, on needing to maintain the forward momentum and moving through the bill rather than duplicating questions.

On that note, I’m really keen to move forward down into clause 11, which deals with the amendments to the annual anti - money-laundering and countering the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) report, specifically looking at clause 11(3), inserting 60(2)(d), where it speaks to providing “any sector-specific information required by the AML/CFT supervisor under rules made under section 156B”.

The question here, really, is around the sector-specific terminology and whether there’s a risk or a potential risk here in allowing reporting entities to not, in effect, write their own reports but potentially to create the reporting structure by which they’ll be held accountable. Obviously, if you were dealing only with good operators, then that wouldn’t be a risk at all, or the risks would be far more minimal. But the nature of this bill, which is to comply with those international obligations we have but also to ensure that we are creating a framework that catches and prevents money-laundering and illegal transactions and transacting—then the concern would be that if you’ve got a less than fully honest or a dishonest operator, the ability for them to provide that sector-specific information could, potentially, unfairly weight the scenario to their benefit.

Therefore, it could make it very difficult for the bill to capture their activity with any degree of illegality, because they know their area of operation better than anybody else, and they have, effectively, structured the rules and guidelines around how they’re going to operate, but also, more importantly, how that’s going to be monitored or measured for breaches enforced.

Really, the question to the Minister on that is: what thought has gone into preventing that happening around that provision of sector-specific information by the sectors affected by this clause in the bill? Is there a monitoring or review provision there to keep a watch on that specific element of this bill? Was there any specific advice received around whether that was adequate framework to not just detect, because that would be a retrospective step, but to actually stop people being able to evade this component, this function of the bill by creating, in effect, their own report card that they can comply with but that allows them to continue activity that would be legal or less than desirable?

09:11

Thank you, Madam Chair. The reporting structure is going to be set by the Department of Internal Affairs (DIA), and the annual reporting requirements are currently prescribed within regulations. This amendment is going to allow greater flexibility for the supervisor to issue rules in areas where it’s different or better information might be required. The DIA may add in sector-specific rules depending on what that sector is. For example, if we think about the virtual currency area, that’s always evolving, so it’s allowing the DIA to be able to set rules as things change.

The reporting entities themselves cannot pick and choose what they will be reporting on; it will be set by the DIA, and they may alter those requirements by sector. They might say the banks, for example, might have one rule that they have to abide by, and a lawyer might have something else because their dealing with it is a little bit different. It’s allowing the DIA to be able to move these rules as things around us, the modernisation of organised crime and how quickly they manoeuvre, also change.

09:12

I move, That debate on this question now close.

That’s very optimistic of you, Mr Bates. We’re not quite there yet.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I’ll confess to being an optimist too, and an optimist who wants to continue the forward momentum through the bill, but, at this stage, as far as Part 1, clause 13, replacing section 64, which is where we get into the subject matter around the “chief executive of AML/CFT supervisor may make codes of practice”.

Specifically, I wanted to look at subsection (3)(a) and (b) of the replaced section 64, in clause 13. What we’ve got here is, for context, “The purpose of a code of practice is to provide a statement of practice that assists reporting entities to comply with their obligations under this Act, regulations, notices, and rules.” Then we step into (3), where it says, “Before making a code of practice, the chief executive must consult”, and then struck out is “any persons, or representatives of the persons, that the chief executive thinks will be substantially affected by the code of practice.” That has now been replaced with 3(a), which reads, “the persons or bodies that the chief executive considers may be affected by the proposed code of practice;”. The shift from “thinks” to “considers” in and of itself, is arguably immaterial, but it is a change. I’m curious to know what the thinking is behind the change of shifting that from “thinks” to “considers”. Is that something that came through in official guidance? Is that, in the Minister’s opinion, a weakening or a strengthening of the regulation or the new clause?

Also here, there’s the addition of 3(b), which lists “The Minister.” It adds the Minister—the chief executive must consult the Minister. For me, that’s an interesting change, because it could be argued that that puts the Minister in a position, depending on the number of codes of practice, of needing to—I wouldn’t use the words “micro-manage”, but potentially needing to be consulted a lot more than they would have under the previous terminology.

It also puts the Minister in a position of needing to be across all of the detail all of the time, because it’s spelt out in black and white in the legislation that they have to be across that. That also runs the risk of slowing that process down, and the issue there would be, as the Minister has explained in previous answers this morning, the need for this legislation to be nimble and efficient and effective to keep pace with the speed of change that we’re seeing both in trading and in technology. Adding this extra step and this additional ministerial responsibility does, in my mind, pose the risk that the legislation is therefore less nimble and less able to pivot to meet the rapid pace of change that we’re seeing and likely to see an increase in.

The question to the Minister there is: does the Minister think that will slow down the ability for legislation to be match fit in a rapidly changing environment? More broadly, I guess, where did the notion of adding the Minister into the list of entities that needed to be consulted come from? Was that a thought of the Minister’s, or was that something that came through in official advice? A detailed question but a drafting question here is why ((3)(a) and (b) needed to sit separately, and whether or not the Minister could simply have been added as an addition to the list of (3)(a). By singling out the Minister and making it separate and standalone, it certainly caught my eye when I worked my way through questions in the legislation. I’m curious to know why that needs to sit out and separate from (3)(a) where it could simply have just been an additional word at the end. Those are my questions on that clause.

09:17

Thank you, Madam Chair. I think I’ll just take this opportunity, first of all, to speak to Amendment Paper 573, which is on the Table. It’s the only Amendment Paper that I’ve put in place here. I just want to explain that this Amendment Paper is taking some clauses in the bill that we discussed last evening out of that bill and placing them into this bill. It was a transfer of clauses from one bill into another, and, effectively, it’s removing some aspects that are in regulations, because we are putting them into the Act. I thought I’d just explain Amendment Paper 573 that’s been put up from the Government.

Speaking to the member’s question on clause 13: having a Minister involved with oversight is not an unusual thing. I think, most importantly, this is about the codes and the guidance. The guidance is not going to be binding on people; it is just guidance. These are the codes of practice, and they’ll remain in secondary legislation; they won’t come forward into the Act, because they need to be moveable.

Where did this come from? I’m advised that the Economic Development, Science and Innovation Committee amended consultation requirements in order to make it consistent and simpler, as the codes are not binding instruments, then they are closer to the guidance. Amendments that you will have seen within this paper actually came out of the select committee and I thank them for their consideration and for making the bill simpler as a result.

09:19

Thank you, Madam Chair. I appreciate the Minister bringing the committee’s attention to her Amendment Paper slotting in new clause 17A. The censures—she’s right. I’ve had a look at where they were in the creature of regulation—where they might have been if you were a body like the Financial Markets Authority. Obviously, one new supervisor needs a legislatively empowered single exercise of its soft power to give instructions. What that’s like, though, is really different across lots of different public entities, and I’m keen to understand that from the Minister. What were these modelled on? Are these like Inland Revenue’s powers? Are they more like the Privacy Commissioner’s powers? Because they’re not censures that have an associated enforcement infringement fee or a fine. They don’t seem to have a public record element, either. Often, a feature of censure notices or advice-finding guidance is that it is public and so there is a precedent-setting element of it that makes it fair and it builds public trust in them. Is that what’s intended here? That could be something that’s intended here, but that would be provided for in the regulation.

A second species of question about these censures is: what were they before? Is this tidying up a problem in the regulation in that we did have either the Reserve Bank of New Zealand or the Department of Internal Affairs, but I suspect it was the Financial Markets Authority, providing guidance to businesses that wasn’t necessarily empowered by a piece of primary legislation about anti - money-laundering compliance. In the case which I’ve raised with her, where a fintech was notified multiple times—what were those notifications if they weren’t censures? What was the legal status of those? And are we tidying up a problem in the law here which is real—that if you have an agency giving guidance, somebody on the receiving end of the guidance should be able to clearly see whether that is binding, whether it’s enforceable, whether it constitutes an infringement?

We get ourselves into the same sort of issue here, because I can’t see that her new powers create a, sort of, stick element, with the carrot of being offered some helpful guidance. I want her to help me to understand: is that coming in the regulation or are these meant to be a softly, softly, soft power? In which case, which other agency has a similar power that she’s based these on?

09:22

Thank you, Madam Chair. Clauses 17A and 17B set out on Amendment Paper 573 are creating a new supervisory power to censure. This is because we were, effectively, seeing that we will create guidance and expect the agencies to operate within those guidelines, but if they don’t, then—as the member had pointed out—where was the stick? The stick is the ability to censure, in writing, those agencies that are not complying. The supervisor would be able to issue a notice of intention to issue a censure, and the person who receives it will have 10 working days within which to respond to that. What formal warnings that we’ve had do not have much of that deterrent impact, but the next layers of the court-ordered enforcement options significantly do.

I don’t know so much if it’s more “softly, softly”. I would see it more along the lines of: the Department of Internal Affairs will be coming out, they’ll be issuing guidance; we need to allow the agencies the ability to figure out how to work within that guidance, and if they’re not, issue a censure; and if they continue to not fulfil their obligations, then there can be court-ordered structure after that. It’s more about just helping them get through what it is that they need to do in order to comply.

09:23

Thank you. Just a quick question on that: is this intended to relate to licensing requirements, then? Is it the case that someone who has been censured might lose their licence to operate, say, the Financial Markets Authority might have already given the fintech in question two different kinds of operating licences? Is it professional conduct rather than infringements that you’re relying on, and so you might assume that the regulations would then tie that to licensing? Or is it the case that someone could have been censured five times in the same year and would still be able to operate under a licensee?

09:24

It’s a very good point that the member raises, and the Economic Development, Science and Innovation Committee raised something similar. They basically said that they had concerns that censures are typically penalties that follow evidential findings on conduct. They wanted the provision amended to instead introduce censure as a separate sanction with a robust process for issuance, and that takes into account the natural justice requirements, but the formal warnings will also still stay in place. We have made these amendments—based, again, on excellent select committee suggestions.

09:25

Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you to the Associate Minister of Justice for those answers on those previous questions. Continuing to move through and coming to Part 1, clause 20, “Section 131 replaced”, where we go through the functions. Just to step through these, because there are a number of functions that the anti - money-laundering/countering financing of terrorism supervisor needs to take, and I just wanted to step through each of these and have some questions specifically about those.

The first, being new section 131(a), is “monitor and assess the level of risk of money-laundering and the financing of terrorism, including through providing risk assessments and intelligence to the Commissioner and reporting entities”. That seems to make sense, but we’re looking at all of this, sort of, shopping list of responsibilities that previously were held by three entities and are now going to be the responsibility of a single entity.

There’s kind of, as we step through these responsibilities, two questions—the first being: how do these differ, or do they differ, from the previous responsibilities of the three entities? And secondly, when you merge and reword a number of responsibilities, there is always a risk that some may have failed to be included, or that the rewording or restructuring of those responsibilities and the way in which they are accounted for changes the interpretation or the reality of what is included in the—for want of a better term—shopping list of responsibilities.

To move to new section 131(b): “monitor reporting entities for compliance with this Act and regulations, and for this purpose to develop and implement a supervisory programme: (c) provide timely and up-to-date guidance to reporting entities to assist compliance with this Act, regulations, and rules: (d) investigate reporting entities and enforce compliance”—

The member can assume that we can read this.

OK, excellent. That is great. So, then, the questions really are around the inclusions in clauses (a), (b), (c), (d), (e), (f), (g), (h), (i), and (j). The question, to come back to it, which I framed at the top of this contribution, was: how do these differ from what was previously accounted for, given that what was previously three separate functions is now rolled into one? How does that differ? What assurance does the Minister have that nothing has fallen out in that consolidation process? And, also, what wording changes are there that could potentially cause confusion or provide opportunity for someone to claim confusion in their interpretation of what is included in this bill?

09:28

Well, when we’re trying to cut red tape and make things easier, we certainly don’t want any confusion. I feel confident that we have mitigated that within this bill. The status quo still stands within this clause, but there have been three additions that have been made for the single supervisor. The additions include direction that the guidance for reporting entities should be timely and up to date, and assist with their ability to comply with the law; a requirement to engage with industry to identify and mitigate unintended consequences—which the member spoke to before—of the entire anti - money-laundering and countering the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) system; and mandating to assist New Zealand to meet its international requirements under the AML/CFT regime, as well. So just those three additions; everything else is still the status quo, just moved into the single supervisor.

09:29

Thank you to the Associate Minister of Justice for that excellent answer. Moving into clause 21(5): here, it talks about—(5)(ba): “require any person whom the AML/CFT supervisor reasonably suspects has knowledge of a possible contravention of this Act or regulations to attend a meeting”. What we’re talking about here are actions that can be taken for non-compliance. What I’m wanting to, I guess, get a sense of here is what the degree of power that this bill provides is.

The first part of clause 21(5)(ba) says this Act compels a person to “attend a meeting (including via an audio or audiovisual link)”. That could be as simple as a telephone call—or a Teams or Zoom or whatever is the video format of the day—with the supervisor to answer any of their questions that they have around the records and documents, or to provide the additional information that the investigator would need in this instance to see whether where there’s smoke, there’s fire, or whether this is a “nothing to see here” scenario. One of the questions from me around this point is: what happens and what powers does the bill give the supervisor in an instance where a person is requested to meet and declines that request? What would be the next step, and what power does this bill give the supervisor for non-compliance?

Another scenario would be that a meeting is agreed to and attended, but the questions are insufficiently or incompletely answered, and the provision of proper records and documents isn’t met, in the opinion of the supervisor. What would the next steps be at that point? In clause 21(5)(ba)(ii), it goes on to say that the request would be to “provide any other information that the … supervisor considers necessary or desirable for the purposes of performing or exercising its functions, powers, or duties”. Again, what would happen if the person being asked to provide that information disagreed and said, “Yes, I have that information, but I’m not prepared to share it.”? If they didn’t attend a meeting at all, or if they didn’t respond to requests for a meeting, what power does the supervisor have? Can they summons that person to a meeting? Is it equivalent to a summons power? Do they need to take proceedings elsewhere to compel that person to come to a meeting?

The question, really, is around what tools and powers does this give the supervisor to make requests for meetings? What steps can they take if those requests are ignored or if those meetings are not attended? And then, what happens within that environment if the person or organisation persons refuse or are unable to provide the information requested? What would a scenario be, in that example, where someone says, “Yes, I have that, but I’m not going to provide it.”? Or, if someone is sort of more of a shoebox receipt keeper—and I would hope that not many people are these days, but if this was the example—what would happen if the person had goodwill and intent but was unable to provide sufficient evidence as requested by the supervisor through a lack of attention to their own accounting records? In each of those scenarios, what powers does this bill give the supervisor to address the questions that I’ve raised around that new section?

09:33

Thank you, Madam Chair. I think, if you look at clause 21, section 132 amended, it’s amending the powers. Of course, there is consequence if you give powers that are not able to be fulfilled, but the scenarios that the member has put to me are operational scenarios that I certainly cannot answer sitting here, because you don’t know what the scenario might be.

I think what would be, perhaps, important for the member is the improvements, again, that came from the Economic Development, Science and Innovation Committee as a result of this. They were a little bit worried, as well, about people being compelled to have to answer in a situation where a supervisor might just turn up. The select committee requested, and we have added into here, the ability for that individual to have a lawyer present at the meeting and be able to end the meeting at any point. That sort of speaks to what the member was asking about: what if a person just says, “No, I don’t want to give you that information.” Well, we’re allowing them to end a meeting; we’re allowing them to have a lawyer so that they can be represented, but I can’t speak to exactly what the scenario will be, because I don’t know what the situation is.

It won’t be a one-size-fits-all, but the powers allowing the supervisor to be able to request the meeting—this needs to happen very fast. We are all aware that dirty money moves very quickly through our systems and can leave the country very quickly, as well. Allowing these powers allows the supervisor to be able to, hopefully, stop money leaving the country, especially if it’s been taken out of people’s bank accounts. How they work within that will depend on the actual scenario that they’re facing and what information has or has not been garnered.

09:35

Thank you, Madam Chair. Useful contributions about the search powers that start here, from clause 21 through, and there are a few questions about this. The Minister is right to point to the work of the select committee on this. Getting this right will be really important to the longevity of the scheme.

One of the difficulties in this is that the codes do the bulk of the work, so you’ve got search powers that are associated with codes. Any contravention of the code—anything that, later, unelected people can decide is in contravention of the Act—then gives rise to requirements powers. They’re not summons powers, but they’re requiring someone to come to a meeting and then to be searched. That is something that we should legislate for. Every party in the House agrees that we need a very robust regime, but we should do it in full cognisance of what we are creating here, which is a regime where codes give rise to search and to seizure. That is why we are particularly interested in this and why a good going-over with the Minister is called for.

On clause 21(8), the new (3A) inserted after section 132(3), I want to understand what the extent of the access to records and documents mentioned there is. Firstly, any person can be required to hand over documents, but does that mean any person who is reasonably connected to those documents? To whom does this apply in, say, a banking situation where you have some staff who are professionally engaged in compliance with anti - money-laundering? They are one category—obviously they are included. Then you have one category of staff who are engaged in client-facing work where they collect records. They are probably included. Then there are staff who are not engaged in either compliance or client-facing work. They are probably not included. What is the scope of who can be requested to requisition documents?

My next question is around the regulation-making powers. I just want the Minister simply to answer: can the regulations also prescribe a punishment? The regulations can set out very, very broad categories of things—we’ve gone over that with the Minister; it’s her section 64. There is no punishment for not coming to a meeting and there is no punishment for not making available these documents in a timely fashion in the primary legislation, but the codes do allow for the setting of rules in relation to the rest of the Act.

That’s important, because they’re not specifically set out in the primary legislation as something we anticipate the codes to do, but the general, catch-all nature of the codes means that you can anticipate what might happen if this did become a problem in future. You can imagine, if it became market practice not to come when required to come to a meeting, or if it’s just something that slipped, as in the situation the Minister has outlined where money is moving fast and time is of the essence, the requirement sort of lagging in market for two or three days when we’re actually talking about minutes and hours. Would it be the case that the regulator, the Department of Internal Affairs, could establish in the code either hard punishments, related to not coming along to these meetings or answering the phone, or soft punishments that were more associated with a higher administrative burden for other positive access to the scheme that is required for licensees?

09:39

Thank you, Madam Chair. In answer to the member’s first question, require any person reasonably suspected—that is any person. That is any person at all that the supervisor feels may have some knowledge of transactions or what’s occurring. The reason why it’s any person is that you might have a business, and you might have an outside business—such as a law firm or an accountant or someone else who may hold information—and not even realise that there is crime occurring. We need to be able to access any person.

The ability to compel a meeting is common and it has similar regulators—for example, the Financial Markets Authority in section 25 of the Financial Markets Authority Act 2011; also, the Commerce Commission at section 98(1)(c) of the Commerce Act 1986 has it that the supervisor must inform any person questioned under the new power of their right not to answer as well. Of course, we put in those other pieces around it, allowing a lawyer and a person to be able to end a meeting.

The member asked whether or not punishment could be put in the regulations. The answer to that is no. Punishment will not be put into guidance either. It’s an expectation; it’s guidance. It’s guidance telling industry how they can operate within the law, how they can cut some red tape, mitigate risk, and what risk it is they’re able to mitigate. It’s not coming in over the top and saying, “And if you don’t do this, you shall be punished.” That will be set out somewhere else and, of course, the punishment can be anywhere. The punishment could also be under the Crimes Act, and the New Zealand Police may enforce that. That’s why it’s difficult for me to answer absolute specifics, because we have a wide variety of avenues for the supervisor to go down, including the newly acquired censure that they will be able to issue. Instead of going straight to police, they’ll be able to work their way through and give knowledge to the industry as well.

09:41

Thank you, Madam Chair. Moving through into clause 23, inserting new section 133A, there’s a heading here: “Power to enter dwellinghouses”. This one really is interesting to me because it says that a “supervisor must not enter a dwellinghouse to conduct an on-site inspection except”—and it goes on to explain the circumstances in which that would be possible: with the consent of the occupier or with the granting of a warrant. That’s not the part that I’m really questioning; the part that I’m questioning is around the use of this term “dwellinghouse”, and that’s for a number of reasons. I’m not a lawyer, but, to me, “dwellinghouse” would suggest you’re talking about a place of residence. If we look at conventional and established business practice, then we could rightly argue that people work in offices and live in houses. I’ve lived in all sorts of different houses; I’ve never called any of them a “dwellinghouse”. I’ve also, at times, worked from home. So I’ve often been based at home doing any number of different roles or jobs, at which point you could have argued that there was as much resource material and information in my possession in my “dwellinghouse”, if that’s what we decided to call it, as there would have been in my office. At times, there’s, in fact, been more information available about what I’m doing and what I’m working on in my home than there has been in what would conventionally have been called my office or my workspace.

Now, the other thing that this doesn’t account for is that in a world—and in a country—where we have a huge number and massively high proportion of small and medium enterprises, businesses, and start-ups, there will be a number of people who live and work in the same space, either because they’re working from home or because, in some cases, they may buy or rent a facility that provides a space to work downstairs and a space to live upstairs, or vice versa—it doesn’t matter which floor they live and work on, but that can be a cohabitated space. So is that a dwellinghouse or is that an office or is that a factory or is that a plant?

The other thing is that in a world where we increasingly can carry around in our pocket access to and as much information as you could potentially need to mount an investigation, you could also argue that, at times, someone’s car or someone’s backpack has as much information and as much access to the kind of information you would want to be investigating or prosecuting as a potential breach of this Act.

The Minister has spoken about the speed at which this happens, and I don’t think any of us are in any doubt about the need for speed—to use that terrible slogan—but in instances like this, the need to be able to move quickly. Now, dwellinghouse to me doesn’t say futureproofed legislation; it feels to me like a very clunky old-fashioned term, which risks excluding a number of locations, sites, and opportunities to be able to access and find the information that could be key to being that the handbrake—to use another word often used in this Chamber—on that speedy process of transacting.

The concern for me would be that the term “dwellinghouse” doesn’t sufficiently capture the number of places and spaces that information may be readily available and could be the missing piece in the puzzle. So, really, the question is: why the choice of the term “dwellinghouse”; whether the Minister gave any consideration or whether there were any other recommendations for better terminology or language; and whether you could argue that a car could be a dwellinghouse if you are potentially living in your car or working out of your car. As one of my colleagues has pointed out, there are a number of working people living in cars in New Zealand at this point in history, so would that be counted as a dwellinghouse? Would their car and the contents of their car be excluded under this legislation? By what I’m reading, you could argue that it is. So, really, the definition and whether there’s any consideration to how many environments this definition excludes from the reach of the supervisor.

09:46

Thank you, Madam Chair. Dwellinghouses are known throughout several pieces of legislation, so we use “dwellinghouse” because it’s already used and it’s therefore consistent. But it would only be used after other approaches have been tried—for example, if a request to produce documents is then denied, there would be the ability to go into the dwellinghouse. It would not be reasonable if the same information was available at a non-residential location. There has to be reasonableness about entering into a dwellinghouse.

All other locations, except marae, are already included. The dwellinghouse previously had been excluded and it shouldn’t have been. So this makes it clear that the only exception now is actually a marae. That’s the only exceptional place. I do note, once again, that the Economic Development, Science and Innovation Committee actually looked into this, queried about whether or not they needed to make it more robust, and decided that they were happy with where it landed and there was no need to change it.

09:47

Thank you, Madam Chair. I want to move on to the next section, which is clause 26. I think this particular part is quite a meaty chunk of the legislation and this is to do with the national strategy and work programme. I want to check with the Minister, first, that with the new system, the Minister in the chair is the Minister in charge of anti - money-laundering and countering the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT), but the ministry in charge is the Department of Internal Affairs (DIA).

What I couldn’t see in the definition of Minister and ministry of AML/CFT is what happens when the Minister, for example, is not the Minister of the DIA. How would that work in terms of—are you the Minister that’s referred to in clause 26, new section 149A, “(1) The Minister must adopt a national strategy AML/CFT”, and how would you then interact with DIA if the Minister relevant to the AML/CFT is not the Minister of the DIA? That’s my first question.

The second question is in—I’ll stick to this one because I have questions later on around the levies, which is also a big part of this bill, but for the time being, my second question is in new section 149C, inserted by clause 26. It talks about “Duty to review national strategy after Financial Action Task Force evaluation”. We’ve spoken about this briefly and then, in the regulatory impact statement, there is the idea that the next mutual evaluation is in 2028. Would I then assume that the review is after that particular period—so after 2028?

09:49

Thank you, Madam Chair. Thanks to the member for his first question for the morning. Yes, the Minister in charge will be the Minister in charge of AML/CFT, and that currently sits under the Ministry of Justice. Those that are doing the operational work will sit under DIA. They are the group. It’s just the same as when there were three supervisors—the Financial Markets Authority, the Reserve Bank, and the Department of Internal Affairs—it still sat under a Minister who was involved in justice, because we are talking about dirty money here; we are just utilising a different agency to enforce the law.

With the mutual evaluation, yes, and the reason why we’re going to review it is because, once we’ve had that mutual evaluation, there may be considerations that we have to make changes, so we want to have a look at what the evaluation will tell us—that we’re on the right pathway or that we could improve it by doing something else. That’s why we will have an evaluation of the strategy and how it’s working, based upon the mutual evaluation that the Financial Action Task Force gives us. That begins—2027-28 is when we will have that evaluation. Once we’ve received it, that’s when we will start to look at the strategy and say, “Have we nailed it?”, “Have we met our international obligations?”, “Is there anything we need to change?”

09:50

Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you, Minister, for that response. Can I just check, because one of the things the Minister mentioned yesterday is the fourth piece of legislation that’s coming—before the mutual evaluation 2028, but it’s coming, possibly, next year. Will there be sufficient time for the strategy to be implemented and embedded and then the mutual evaluation?

09:51

I’m advised that, yes, there will be, as long as we don’t muck around and actually get these passed—any time really soon would help the country with their mutual evaluation.

I move, That debate on this question now close.

I think there are still some areas of this bill that can be explored.

Madam Chair.

Sorry—brain fade.

Dan Rosewarne.

Dan Rosewarne—sorry. My apologies to the member.

Thank you, Madam Chair. It’s my first question in the Chamber since being sworn in again, and it’s definitely interesting not being worried about closure motions but actually going through this bill. I want to thank the Minister for her detailed answers and rounding out the understanding of the bill.

Now, clause 26 prompted my interest, especially with the Green contribution over there, so I have a similar line of questioning. Introducing sections 149A to 149D, essentially, creates a new strategic backbone for the anti - money-laundering and countering the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) regime. It’s a national strategy adopted by the Minister, followed by a regulatory work programme issued by the ministry. This is significant overdue reform. For too long, AML/CFT settings have evolved in a piecemeal fashion, often driven by external evaluations or operational pressures rather than a coherent domestic strategy.

A published national strategy provides clarity of direction and prioritisation of risks, which is good for holding agencies to account. The requirement to consult affected persons before adopting the strategy and issuing the work programme is particularly important, in my view. It acknowledges that the AML/CFT obligations have real economic and social impacts and that effective compliance depends on early engagement. However, the success of this framework will depend on substance, not form, and a strategy that is aspirational but vague will not provide any meaningful guidance. Likewise, a work programme that lists activities without timelines, ownership, or cost implications will not deliver that transparency.

There’s also an important constitutional dimension. While the national strategy may direct agencies, it must not undermine the statutory independence, particularly of the Commissioner of Police, as explicitly recognised in section 149A(4). In my mind, the committee should therefore view these provisions as accountability mechanisms. If done well, that will anchor the supervisors’ expanded powers in a publicly visible plan that Parliament, reporting entities, and the public can actually scrutinise.

My questions are around what level of detail the Government expects the national strategy to contain, regarding priorities and sequencing, and how progress against the regulatory work programme will be reported to Parliament beyond the summary publication requirement. Thank you, Madam Chair.

09:54

Welcome back to the member, and thank you for your first question back in the Chamber. The national strategy is done in such a way that, because we are levying industry, we want them to be a part of the solution. We’re basically saying, “We’re going to levy you, but what do you need to make it work well for you?” These new sections—149A, D, E, F—are all setting out the fact that we need to have a national strategy that is agreed to by industry in order to move forward.

Section 49D requires the Ministry of Justice to issue a regulatory work programme in order to implement the strategy. New section 49E requires the Ministry of Justice to report annually on their work programme and the levy and to set key elements of each annual report. I will again go back to the select committee and thank them for the work they did here. They actually wanted to have a clause within the bill that details where the money is being spent and how it’s being spent, so that there is accountability.

New section 49F requires the ministry to review the levy funding three years after the levy regulations are made or significantly amended so we can see whether or not we’ve landed in the right spot, that the contributions from different industries are the right amounts, and, more importantly, that we’re able to, together, combat organised crime.

09:56

Thank you, Madam Chair. Continuing to move through the bill, and thanking the Minister for that last answer, which was great—it got us to where we are now, which is clause 26, inserting new section 149B. This is around the publication of a national strategy.

Now, really, I’m looking at this in the context of the Minister’s earlier answer around the need to cut red tape, and that’s a term we hear a lot from certain parts of the House. The concern I have with that statement, in the context of section 149B, is that it talks about adopting a national strategy under section 149A, and then it talks about amendments or replacements to the strategy and what the Minister is compelled to do.

Paragraph (a) talks about presenting a copy of the strategy of the House—that’s pretty straightforward; notifying the adoption, amendments, or replacement in the Gazette—once again, that makes the information available; and publishing the strategy on the internet site maintained by or on behalf of the ministry. All of these talk to making that information available for people to find. That’s good. People do need to be able to find what the national strategy is. But what it doesn’t speak to and what it seemingly omits—and so my question to the Minister is whether this is the case—is that there doesn’t appear to be a consultative process there.

If your objective is to cut red tape, surely those who would understand the frustrations, or the supposed frustrations, with the red tape best are those affected parties who the red tape gets in the way of. Without spelling out in law that those communities need to be consulted with, the risk is that, with the best of intentions, the red tape may remain; may, in fact, get worse; might get better. There’s really no formal consultative process with community or stakeholders that I can see spelt out in this bill that ensures that, whilst the strategy is able to be published, is able to be shared, is able to be widely discoverable, it necessarily reflects—or, certainly, no one is compelled to ensure that it reflects—the needs, the wants, the requests of the sectors that the strategy is actually for.

The question to the Minister is: if that is not part of the process in section 149B, is it hidden somewhere else in the bill that I’ve missed? There’s a very good chance that it is. If it’s not hidden somewhere else in the bill, is she concerned that there isn’t a facility within this bill for industry and operators to inform a strategy that is the national strategy for them? If that’s the case, is there a risk that, actually, the best of intentions to facilitate and make easier the administrative and compliance process for organisations and entities could, in fact, be more difficult by way of a national strategy that doesn’t reflect the hopes, desires, dreams, requests, demands of the sector?

What facility is there for community and stakeholder engagement in the shaping of the strategy; and, I guess, also, out of interest, what requests, and via what mechanisms, have asks for change come to the Minister so far? I imagine it would be interesting to know if it’s feedback from industry that has compelled this change, then, what is the ongoing mechanism to capture the feedback from industry about (1) whether the change is working, and (2) whether the change needs to change more in the future to be more reflective of creating a safe but de - red-taped environment for those organisations and entities to operate?

10:00

Thank you, Madam Chair. I can assure the member that the consultation groups involved in the national strategy have been very wide, very broad. This has been ongoing for a while. We don’t usually put in legislation who exactly it is that you’re going to be consulting with. I’ve never seen that in legislation—where it’s actually detailed. And if it was, I would not want it detailed on there because we have, like I have mentioned many times, emerging technologies, emerging groups. So you want to be able to capture everybody who could be involved and need to have a say.

I’m really proud of the way that the Ministry of Justice have conducted their engagement on the national strategy plan. They have finished their consultation with industry; they, now, are preparing what they think a national strategy will look like. Of course, this has been worked with industry in order to remove that red tape and, by goodness, we’re certainly going to do it. And it’s going to relieve a whole lot of red tape for so many New Zealanders out there who don’t even realise that they’ve been caught up in the anti - money-laundering system; and, at the same time, strengthening those agencies to be able to conduct business and open it up a bit better for them. So they are involved—well and truly involved. I would like to just give my appreciation to those industries, the banks, the real estate agents, the lawyers, the accountants—all those that have been involved in what will, ultimately, be New Zealand’s best anti - money-laundering strategy that we’ve had since we’ve been in this regime.

10:02

I move, That debate on this question now close.

I think we are getting towards the end of this debate, but I will take some further questions, as we move forward, from Lawrence Xu-Nan.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I did indicate to you, Madam Chair, before, that I want to move on to the levy sections. I’m looking at clause 30, “New sections 155A to 155D inserted”.

Now, I just want to check with you, Minister—this is the first time I’m actually seeing a new acronym: CRIS; I have not seen a “cost recovery impact statement” before. I want to check a couple of things with you. Noting in 155A(3)(a), (b), and (c), it talks about “a portion of the costs incurred by the Ministry” and “a portion of any additional costs” and “the full costs of collecting the levy money.”, which I understand. Can I just check if that is consistent with what we’re seeing on page 5 of the CRIS, which is the recommendations for a partial cost recovery for the regulatory system rather than full cost recovery, citing that a lot of this is part of public good, which should be factored into a budget line for an agency. I want to check with the Minister if there’s any work that’s being done on—I know that will fluctuate—but has there been any work done on what would be considered recoverable where that portion would be considered recoverable from a private sector levy and will be considered as a baseline for the agencies itself?

Now, Minister, you mentioned before that there’s also going to be a different, sort of, tiered system. I think, yesterday, you mentioned that banks that have the highest risks, will, potentially, incur the greatest levy. Can I just check if that is to be interpreted under new section 155A(6)(a), which, for example, is “the regulations may specify class or classes of reporting entities that are required to pay a levy.” I wanted to check if that is also consistent with what we’re seeing on page 10 of the CRIS, on high-level cost recovery models, which talks about individual levy amounts will be set by revenue risk band. Is that something that is, although not stated explicitly—those words—in the legislation, is it still the intention of the regulation that, potentially, is proposed on those individual levy amounts based on revenue risk band rather than fixed percentage?

Last one. This is just purely, purely, out of interest. It’s new section 155D, which says the Minister must consult the persons in 155D(1), but in 155D(2) it says, “A failure to comply with this section does not affect the validity of the regulations.” I’ve seen that particular phrase come up a couple of times in other legislation around the making of regulations, but I want to check, Minister, from a drafting perspective: what would be the difference of having (1) say “Minister must consult” and if it failed to consult it doesn’t invalidate the regulations; then, if (1) just says the “Minister may consult”, and leave it up to the Minister’s discretion on whether consultation will happen or not? I don’t know if it’s simply semantics or drafting preference, but I thought that was an interesting observation. Thank you.

10:06

Thank you, Mr Chair. In speaking to clause 30, new sections 155A to D—the setting of the levy and what’s recoverable. Yes, in answer to the member’s question about 155A(6)(a), which states, “the regulations may specify the class or classes of reporting entities that are required to pay a levy:”, that is where you’re quite right. It’s to set out exactly what industry will be paying; what percentage of the levy. What is well-known, I think across the Chamber, was, in the past, the three supervisors were unable, or they didn’t have the resource to be able, to really capture or interrogate where dirty money was flowing—the anti - money-laundering system. What’s become very clear, in consultation, is that industry have told us, effectively, that they are very keen to pay a levy if it reduces red tape on people; it stops them having to do the same things. But they also said to us: “Could you, please, ensure that you fund the Financial Investigation Unit, because having them and the ability for them to prosecute will also make life easier for industry.

How this is going to look? I’m still waiting on that advice. Who’s paying what? What amount? How is it going to work? What amounts are going to what cost recovery? What’s very important, though, is that the cost recovery is reasonable, that it’s not excessive, and it is on the part of the public good. I think what’s very important for the member to understand is that the agencies or the levy is not paying for the entire system. Government’s contribution is still there. Government will still be paying for the amounts that are for the public good as well. So it’s not that we’re taking everything from industry and expecting them to pay—Government will continue to pay their fair share.

10:08

Thank you, Mr Chair. Great to be discussing the levy, which I said was the guts of this bill. Congratulations to the Minister for bringing in these new powers for levying the industry to pay for a service which is really valuable to them.

I want to ask her about new section 156E. I appreciate that she is in the process of consulting on who pays and who doesn’t, but this is a very broad power about when she has decided who pays and who doesn’t, then the chief executive being able to exempt people who would otherwise be caught by her net. I want to bring the Minister to that section, particularly because it is useful for the committee to understand how broad that power is. In this Act, there are no provisions in the primary legislation that govern the chief executive, in terms of either a purpose or value statement, about why the chief executive would make an exemption or a class of transactions as an exemption.

So this is not only who pays but what kind of transactions are within the anti - money-laundering net is also being provided for as an exemption power here. That’s a really broad power because you would usually either have a class of persons who were operators within a system or you would have a class of types of activities, and those are usually, you know, the types of activities that you would prohibit in criminal sanctions, is the way that we draw the net there. But, in this case, you’ve got both kinds of powers for the chief executive to cut out of the system at a later date. That seems really broad. Is the intended design here that the chief executive—is this merely futureproofing? If it was just futureproofing, then that’s really useful for us to understand, because if the operating environment doesn’t change too much in five years, then you might say, well, we wouldn’t expect lots of uses of these exemption powers, particularly the class exemption powers. But if they’re not about futureproofing—if they are, say, because you would anticipate larger entities behaving in different ways to smaller entities or more kinds of political pressure being exerted on a given industry, say, like real estate and more political attention being provided for real estate—is that the intention of the class exemptions?

That would be different because, you know, it’s up to any given Government of any given day to look at a particular industry and say, “We think there is a real risk here and a systemic risk to our national reputation, and so we want to focus on this.”—but you wouldn’t usually do that via a class exemption. We’ve had some useful debate in this committee about how you would set that national strategy to do some of that, sort of, values-based decision-making, not via this mechanism, which is the exemptions powers. If the Minister could give some attention to that, that would be very helpful.

I also want to ask her about new section 156G, inserted by clause 32. This also relates to the exemption powers, but it’s making notices around, then, parts of transactions. I want to ask again about what the status of those notices is. Are they secondary legislation? Are they part of the code? What are they and what is their enforceability? I have some more questions about the rule-making powers further for the levy, but will stop there for now.

10:12

The ability to issue an exemption has always been there within the law. The reality is that without guidance on how these entities are to operate, a lot of exemptions haven’t actually been issued. However, since I’ve been in the chair as the Minister in charge of the anti - money-laundering and countering financing of terrorism (AML/CFT), we have now started to issue some exemptions.

To give the member an example, just off the top of my head—a class exemption that was given recently was to the insurance industry. It’s unlikely that you’re going to see dirty money laundered in trying to pay for the car insurance or the house insurance, so they had asked for an exemption for certain parts or certain activities that they have. This is just allowing the status quo, which is to allow an exemption, either as a class or, perhaps, for a single business, but that requirement must be met by ensuring that there are certain qualifications that are met within the application that would allow an exemption to take place. If they don’t meet those requirements, they will not be eligible for an exemption.

10:13

I move, That debate on this question now close.

The member has suggested she’s got some more questions. I would suggest she put them all into this.

One contribution? All right, Mr Chair. I’ll prioritise the question I had about the matters which relate to rules. Are the matters that relate to the rules, Minister, that you’ve set out at your new section 156H, inserted by clause 32, then intended to apply to the exemption notices? You have helpfully given us that it’s not just about futureproofing; it is about our values judgments and based on risk—say, at any given time, the insurance industry is not in the gun. We accept that; that makes sense.

Are, then, the powers that set out the values judgments that you’d make—and I’ll bring your attention to new section 156H(e) at the top of page 23, which is unfair advantages for reporting entities and disadvantages to others; those are the sorts of value judgments that are made, which are in the primary legislation, for the setting of your codes and your national strategy. Do they relate to the exemption notices? Because the exemption notices look to me like they don’t have any sort of values-based propositions for how you would grant an exemption, and yet you have access here to a set of values judgments for the codes, which are helpful.

I also want to ask you about the transitional provisions. The movement from the three regulators to one regulator would always have encountered some administrative difficulty—not only in terms of staff but also of data. Can we just focus on the use of the data and processes for gathering information? Is it the case, in these transitional provisions, that all of the data held by the Financial Markets Authority and the Reserve Bank of New Zealand move over to the Department of Internal Affairs (DIA) and don’t trigger any oversight from—that would otherwise trigger provisions from in the Privacy Act or the Policing Act? Does information that the Police hold in the Financial Intelligence Unit also get shared in this way at transition, and is it necessary for the data held by DIA in its former capacity as regulator for a part of the anti - money-laundering system to also transition its data?

The reason I ask is because all of that probably gives rise to obligations under other Acts. Does this transitional provision for data exempt any other provisions arising, or is it the case that there is still potential liability arising at that point of transition?

10:16

The member points out, I think, paragraph (e) and paragraph (h) in new section 156H, inserted by clause 32, which is processes for making rules and notices. While there’s some about exemptions, it’s actually all about making rules and notices within that particular section.

When it comes to data sharing, I mean, there is already data sharing that occurs. As I’ve mentioned earlier, members from the Financial Markets Authority and the Reserve Bank are on the Department of Internal Affairs team, so not only will there be information but there’s a lot of knowledge up in these heads that will still be contributing to a really robust anti - money-laundering and countering financing of terrorism system that’s going to cut red tape and make it easier for Kiwis to operate.

I move, That debate on this question now close.

The question is that the Minister’s amendments to Part 1 set out on Amendment Paper 573 be agreed to.

10:19

Apologies, Mr Chair. Just a quick question on the Associate Minister of Justice’s new clause 10: are there any technical redundancies that would have arisen, but for this provision? The Minister has been very helpful at outlining the value of the information in people’s heads, but also the skills and expertise involved in this work. This is a niche field of practice globally, and it is hard to recruit to New Zealand for these globally important skills. Are there people who will have lost their roles given the move to the Department of Internal Affairs and a single regulator, or is it the case that all of the expertise has been soaked up into DIA and that new team will operate, just within a different part of the Public Service?

10:20

Schedule 1, inserting new Part 3 into Schedule 1 of the Act, clause 9, transfers both employees and information as is specified. This particular Schedule 1, new Part 3, also extends provisions under the Public Service Act 2020 to affected employees at the Reserve Bank and the Financial Markets Authority. The provisions are no less and no more generous than provisions that would apply to transfers between two public sector agencies.

Thank you, I appreciate the Minister’s answer. At clauses 12 and 13, is the effect of those provisions to save all of the exemptions and class exemptions that exist? Are notices under the Financial Market Authority’s practice guidance-making powers—do they all carry over, given that they now no longer have a role in the administration of the anti - money-laundering countering financing of terrorism system?

10:21

I hope this one answers that question. Revoked powers cannot be used to update and reissue regulations, only end them. These provisions will allow time for the development of new rules and notices to replace the regulations, while removing the ability to make new regulations with revoked powers. I’m hoping I’ve answered the member’s question, in that respect.

I just want to carry on with the concerns about employees. My colleague Arena Williams asked a question about clause 10, the technical redundancy, and the Minister answered with clause 9 but I nevertheless think that particular question is answered. I just wanted to direct the Minister’s attention to clause 11 of Schedule 1, where the employment of the transferred employee is to be treated as continuous employment under any Act. I’m just wondering about how that’s going to work with what we know have been significant concerns around holiday pay and the calculation of holiday pay. I just want to know if the Minister received any advice about whether the particular entities that have all been merged have got backlogs of issues with holiday pay—which we know exist in many entities—and to what extent that was taken into consideration as to how those backlogs of calculations around holiday pay were to be treated, given they’re all in one entity now, which might have different sets of rules.

There’s a whole lot of sets of complications there. Did the Minister receive any advice on that? Are there any particular special arrangements having to be made to ensure that employees are not worse off because of back pay, holiday pay calculations that might have differed between the various agencies?

10:23

I think I answered that specifically just in the last answer that I gave, which is the extension of provisions under the Public Service Act, and provisions are no less or no more generous.

I understand my colleague will come back to that question. I’ll just ask the Minister quickly, while I’m on my feet: her new section 13; I think I’ve understood her correctly in that all of the class exemptions remain in place under that provision. What is the situation when the national action plan comes into effect? Does the national action plan supersede exemptions or notices made by the Financial Markets Authority, given that they will no longer have a supervisory role under the anti - money-laundering and countering financing of terrorism net.

10:24

This is a transitional schedule, so what we have in place now for rules stays in place until they are amended. The national strategy plan is what we will move to as we go forward, and anything that comes out of that—the guidance—will supersede anything that was there before.

With respect, Minister, you haven’t answered my question. I agree around the no more, no less. But I asked if you’d received any advice on that, particularly with respect to holiday pay, because it is a vexed issue.

10:25

When you’re looking at these different organisations, I’m not responsible for them. In regard to how they do their pay, that would go to their Minister because it would probably, I expect, come out of their budget lines. I am looking, in this piece of legislation, to how we can remove the red tape for New Zealanders and make it work for them; how we can get agencies such as our banks, our real estate agents, and our lawyers to be able to operate.

The conditions around who’s being paid what if there’s a redundancy, if there’s not a redundancy: my understanding is that the majority of these people have moved into this particular area. I also understand—and I hope this helps to answer the member’s question—that those who have been taken off anti - money-laundering are now into other areas within their departments, so there’s no need for a redundancy. They’ve just been moved elsewhere. My understanding is that the transitional provisions are really just moving from the three into the single, but details around redundancy I’m not aware of because, as far as I know, no one has been made redundant as a result of this.

10:26

My question was about holiday pay entitlements and the vexed issues around holiday pay. The Minister has answered around redundancy. I still want to know if the Minister received any advice in particular relating to holiday pay for the employees who were transferred.

I move, That debate on this question now close.

10:28

I move, That debate on this question now close.

10:29

Kia orana. Good morning, Mr Chair. It’s a pleasure to ask the Minister in the chair, the Hon James Meager, some questions on this bill. It has seven parts, and the way in which the Labour Party will be approaching this is for each of the parts, which is actually quite discrete, because as a regulatory systems bill—an omnibus bill—this does come to the Parliament from time to time, and so it’s quite discretely managed in that particular sense.

This particular part is seeking to amend the Government Roading Powers Act 1989, and there are just a couple of changes. One of them is a new power that provides for the agency—in this respect, that is the New Zealand Transport Agency Waka Kotahi—to undertake the closure of some of the State highway networks. Now, while I say “State highway networks”, it’s very clear in this bill that it relates to a State highway. I guess there is a possibility there that if it was perhaps at a junction where two State highways meet—which is not uncommon in this country—there would still be the provision to close, but that would relate to the singular highway, so there would need to be two forms of approaches there. That’s the first question for the Minister: just some clarity around that.

At an intersection where safety is deemed an issue, the intersection relates to when it’s just one State highway and then, perhaps, a local road that comes in on that. The authority to close the State highway would obviously exist—the local controlling authority would have responsibility over the local roading network and could take what steps it wishes to around that. Just some clarity in that space, I think, would be really, really helpful.

I think it’s also worth hearing from the Minister around what specific circumstances he believes would justify the use of this power. What I think no one would argue with is that when there are real and pressing safety needs, the powers exist for the agencies, whoever they might be, to take steps to ensure that things are safe for everyone—for other road users, for those who are, perhaps, responding to an incident.

Where new section 61AA(3), inserted by clause 4, comes in—which is around the requirement for the agency to basically form a notification process—it says that notification must go through to “the New Zealand Police, Fire and Emergency New Zealand, and relevant ambulance services as soon as practicable of any action taken”—the action to close. Do we infer from that, Minister, that when it comes to safety, it relates to an issue that involves the police, Fire and Emergency New Zealand, or ambulance services? Is it perhaps not the case that, for example, if there was some environmental impact that caused the requirement for a road to be closed, there should be a requirement to notify beyond those three statutory components there, or not?

I guess the other question is whether it’s expected that the notification—I get that it says that it needs to happen as soon as practicable, of any action taken, but what drives that practicality? Obviously, people do—and agencies do—need to be given the tools to be able to make these decisions and these calls pretty promptly and pretty quickly. Certainly, you wouldn’t want to see circumstances where they’re trying to work through a phone tree before certain things need to happen, but does the Minister have some thoughts around what his expectations are as to when that notification period should kick in?

10:34

Thank you, Mr Chair. I just think in terms of “as soon as practicable”—that will be context specific, depending on the emergency that is occurring or the safety steps that need to be taken. You’d have to judge it on a case by case basis—and there’s a long, I guess, statutory history of what “practicable” may or may not mean—but I would imagine it would be as soon as the New Zealand Transport Agency are able to contact the relevant emergency service. It might be all three emergency services. You might be contacting, in the normal course of events, others beyond that, but I think the situation is that you can’t give an answer now. It would be context specific and I would trust the agency to use its judgment on the case.

10:35

Thank you, Mr Chair. I thank the Associate Minister of Transport for his response around that. When we’re looking at that new subsection (1) around the actions that the agency may take, there are three particular actions that the agency may undertake. Firstly, they may “stop” traffic on a State highway—that’s fine. The second action is “divert”. The third is “otherwise control”. I’m just interested: what is the “otherwise control”? You either stop, you divert, or you allow to go—maybe that is what the “otherwise control” component is about. I’d like some clarity around that.

The other question I have is around safeguards. Closing a stretch of New Zealand State highway, whether it’s State Highway 1, State Highway 2, or State Highway 3—let’s stick with State Highway 1, the main highway that runs from north to south in this country. Being able to ensure that there is a swift movement of people, freight, and other things along that; it is really important that it is able to be productive. Certainly, what we do hear is that when the agency is required to undertake some works or what have you, it’s not a big chunk of State Highway 1 that gets, effectively, shut down for an extended period of time, although there are occasions where there are things that happen—weather events, more often—where there is a requirement for parts of the State highway network to be shut down.

What safeguards exist to ensure that the power to close—which is quite a significant power; this is not a circumstance where the police are looking to manage the movement of traffic through, perhaps, say, an emergency circumstance where there may have been a crash or something similar. This is for the State highway to be closed for a period of time, and that causes significant inconvenience to many people. If we all reflect on holiday periods when the State highway network is extremely busy, where there is some obstacle or barrier to swift movement along the network, that does cause some frustration, but these things need to be safe. In circumstances where alternative routes are required to be taken, that does add significant time. It adds significant costs at the moment, as this country is facing a fuel crisis, as well. These are the sorts of things that need to be considered.

What safeguards are in place to ensure that the closure of parts of the State highway network is not done without having sufficient oversight? There is a requirement for the agency to notify those three statutory roles there, but there is nothing in here that identifies what that particular threshold is. Yes, it is to do with closing a State highway and for it to be for the protection and safety of the public—and that could create a whole range of different options, within that particular formula—but how can there be some confidence that this is not going to be a power that is utilised freely for reasons other than what is absolutely essential when it comes to safety considerations?

10:38

Thank you, Mr Chair. I’ll run over—not run over; that’s not a good term. I’ll run through a few of the questions from Tangi Utikere. Just in terms of the question about some examples of when the power might be used, some of the examples I have been provided would include, I think, things the member has referred to: potential risk of landslide, avalanche, bushfires, or other severe weather events or disasters. The power here, essentially, for the New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) is analogous to that power which exists with road-controlling authorities that have their own networks. The NZTA doesn’t have the equivalent power at the moment, so we’re providing them with that.

In terms of the question around what happens at the intersection of two State highways—I think the question was around State highways and local roads. There will already be pre-existing agreements between local councils and NZTA on the agreed maintenance boundaries between those councils, so I would just encourage and assume they would be working together on that.

There was a question about what “otherwise control” traffic would mean. Of course, you’ve got—I’m heading back to first-year law here—“stop, divert, or otherwise control traffic”. If you wanted to maybe reduce the speed with which traffic goes through a certain area, rather than stop traffic completely, or divert traffic to a completely different road, there’s an argument that if you didn’t provide the ability to otherwise control, in theory, some clever cookie could argue you’re not allowed to reduce the speed of traffic going through that road at that time to be able to, maybe, manage a partial blockage of the road where you’re cleaning that up. That would be where “otherwise control” comes into that.

Finally, what guard rails or safeguards exist for, say, the closure of State Highway 1? Without giving away my address, I live on State Highway 1, so I’m very interested in the limited closure of State Highway 1, whether that’s where I live or around the country. I would just point to the existing safeguards that are provided both in this amendment and the Land Transport Act generally, which is that the New Zealand Transport Agency can only exercise the power if it considers it appropriate to do so for the protection and safety of the public. Once that consideration of whether or not the public needs to be protected and kept safe is made, that power would presumably no longer become available. I’ll get some advice, but possibly there is a longer-term ability to close or control State highways that isn’t immediately available in times of emergency.

10:41

Thank you, Mr Chair. I’ve got a couple of questions in Part 1, and they’re about the notification of closure. I was just wondering whether it would be useful for the territorial local authority also to be included in that list. In terms of the other one—and maybe I’m not clear on this—but whose responsibility, if anyone’s, is it to update the navigation system many people use, which is Google Maps? Will it just get updated because it finds that people are not going that way, or could one be more proactive, especially if it’s a planned closure, and actually update Google Maps?

I know that they do accept information from the general public, but my understanding is that there are faster ways to update Google Maps, by a trusted authority. If you change the entrance to a rural property to somewhere different, you can update that yourself, and they will eventually correct it, but I think there must be a more effective mechanism for local authorities. I just think that this hasn’t quite got into this portion of the 21st century yet. I do have a further question on restrictions on use of motorways, but that’s separate.

10:42

I think there’s an open question as to whether or not you would legislate the requirement to update particular mapping technologies—Google, Apple, whichever map you use. From memory and from experience, it happens quite quickly already. I’d have to probably dig quite deeply into what the processes are that both territorial authorities and the New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) follow in terms of updating and providing warnings online. I know NZTA provides road closure warnings on its website. I’d have to check the technical details of how those flow through into mapping systems. It’s probably beyond the scope of primary legislation to direct, because, of course, you could then get into the situation of legislating that something happens when it is already happening and just putting yet another burden on NZTA at a time when they’re trying to deal with the issue there and then, which could be a landslide or something similar.

In terms of notifying territorial authorities, again, it’s a reasonable question to raise. This section essentially limits it to the emergency services in order to allow them knowledge of where they can and can’t get to. If they are having to respond to an emergency themselves, knowing that a road is closed and that they will have to take a different route is very important to them. Providing that requirement to notify as soon as practicable is important. Of course, under the normal operating procedures of NZTA and road-controlling authorities, they would be communicating around road closures anyway. I don’t know if we need to put that in the statute, but it’s certainly a valid point to raise.

10:44

Thank you, and thank you for your responses there. I do look forward to finding out a little bit more about whose responsibility it is. If you think about those ambulance services, I don’t know, but I would imagine they’re using the same mapping systems that everybody else is to see where there are blockages or slow-downs or things like that. I’m sure that would be worth looking at.

The next clause, clause 5, which amends section 82, talks about pedestrians on “infrastructure that is designed for pedestrian use; and located on the motorway”. I just wanted a little bit more information to check that “pedestrian” includes somebody using a mobility scooter or a wheelchair. Often, pedestrians and cyclists are lumped together in infrastructure. Does this mean infrastructure that is designed for pedestrian-only use, or does it include shared use? When it says, “located on the motorway”, does that mean the roading corridor, does that mean an overbridge, or whatever? I would really like to know a little bit more about that, because pedestrians are not advocated for as often as they should be in the transport system.

10:46

Just to go back to a question before from Tangi Utikere around long-term closures: under the Transport (Vehicular Traffic Road Closure) Regulations 1965, agencies can undertake road closures under that regulation, but they have to give 42 days’ notice to the public. These powers allow the road closure to take place before utilising those existing powers for, maybe, longer-term road closures to fix a substantial issue with a road. There is pre-existing ability to undertake road closure, just not at short notice.

Not having been on the Transport and Infrastructure Committee, I haven’t had an opportunity to examine this bill. Some thoughts have occurred to me on it now, in this committee of the whole House stage. We’ve all become, alas, too familiar with road closures in recent years, particularly due to the impact of weather events, and so on. It has made me think of a particular incident that occurred before children—BC—so it was a long time ago. I recall my husband and I getting stopped on State Highway 1, and it was actually to do with, I think, a firearms incident. It wasn’t a New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) closure; it was clearly a police matter or something like that. It was quite legitimate, being stopped; there was no problem with it. We could see the reason for it—the public safety reason.

What I wanted to ask the Associate Minister of Transport—because I don’t know and don’t understand that—is to what extent the powers that are available here now, through this bill, to NZTA, are analogous to the powers that are available to the police to close a State highway and analogous to, I presume, the fire service, in some circumstances, and so on. To what extent do those agencies have the reciprocal duty here to notify NZTA and so on? I’m just looking to see that we’ve got sort of analogous powers sitting here, because, obviously, a little bit of consistency in the law is a good thing.

10:48

I think one of the issues that we’re trying to solve here is that, as I understand it, the New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) has previously relied on powers under the Policing Act to stop or control roads. There are, I think, some clear issues with that; that it’s not necessarily a policing issue that may be needed to control a road. In times of emergency or to fix a slip, the appropriate power would lie with NZTA. I’m not sure what the reciprocal responsibilities are on the police to notify other authorities. I can probably get some advice on whether or not there are reciprocal duties. The idea of all of this is to try to align it as much as possible.

Just to Celia Wade-Brown’s point on closure notices: I’m advised that closures are published through the New Zealand Transport Agency’s official systems, which are then consumed by third-party platforms via intermediaries. The member’s nodding and understands that, so she’s a step ahead of me. What I understand is that it basically happens all automatically. They suck the information out of one bucket and put it into another so we can all read it on our devices to make sure we get the quickest way home.

10:49

Thank you, Mr Chair, and thank you, Minister Meager, for those answers. It’s one of those subject matters that you think, maybe, there’s not much in it or that it doesn’t necessarily have lots of nuance, but when you start asking questions and then hearing answers from the Minister, all sorts of other scenarios spring up.

I just had a couple of very quick questions. Given what you’ve said so far and how that works both in the context of the analogous kinds of powers that the New Zealand Transport Agency would now have in relation to other organisations and the types of scenarios or contexts in which that could be used—so if we think of regions where they’re absolutely reliant on that single transport corridor, how will impacts on freight and other emergency access be assessed properly before exercising this power, unless it was an absolutely rigid emergency situation?

Then, Minister, if significant decisions are being made under urgency, which I should imagine they would be if it was to be an emergency situation, is there any requirement for any kind of post-decision review or any subsequent public reporting on the closures that were made? Is that part of the thinking? That would certainly help flesh out that picture a bit more fully. Thank you.

10:51

I’ll just touch on the question from Celia Wade-Brown just around that offer around advocacy for pedestrians, particularly wheelchair users. I guess the purpose of this clause is to fix an issue where pedestrians currently aren’t allowed to use pedestrian infrastructure within roading corridors. “Pedestrian” could include an individual wheeling a bicycle, but generally if you are on a bicycle, you are entitled to use the roading infrastructure as it is so they wouldn’t be counted as a pedestrian.

Thank you. I thank the Associate Minister of Transport for his responses, and my colleague Dr McLellan’s right: those responses lead to more questions. Very interesting indeed. Can I just ask the Minister about the agency’s requirement to notify the New Zealand Police, Fire and Emergency New Zealand, and the relevant ambulatory services. When we talk about notification, there are often requirements that need to be taken. Whilst I understand them—and I thank the Minister for explaining “as soon as practicable of any action taken under subsection (1)”; I understand that—what is the actual sort of notification process? Is it that there’s a formalised process where this needs to be in writing? Is it just that there is a conversation—you know, you happen to be talking to a New Zealand Police officer who might be heading down towards the closure of the road and letting them know that’s how it is? I mean, how is this information captured?

Because when it comes to agencies and notification, there is a whole sort of array of different opportunities that might exist there, but not only that: this also goes to the point that Dr McLellan has asked around the reporting mechanism, if there is one at all. For example, if it’s determined that Fire and Emergency New Zealand is the appropriate agency that needs to be notified under this particular clause, is there a requirement for the agency to explain why it is that the stretch of State highway network has been closed, and for what period of time?

There’s nothing in the bill that indicates the requirements around notification. Is it just that the agency simply has to let one of those three parties, or agencies, know and that’s it? Is there an expectation that they need to—for example, if the agency contacts the New Zealand Police and tells them on the Tuesday morning that this stretch of State highway is closed, are they expected to indicate that it’s going to be closed for three days, 10 days, two weeks, whatever? Is there a requirement for them to notify the same agency, statutory agency, once the closure is no longer actually in place and the State highway network is fully operational again? Or is it just as it would appear: that all the New Zealand Transport Agency needs to do is just let one of those agencies know that “Yep, we’ve closed the State highway” but there’s nothing further?

So just a bit of clarity; there surely must be some expectation about the nature of communication, and I get that you don’t want to perhaps be as prescriptive in primary legislation around all the steps that need to be taken, but what can the community expect in circumstances where either the New Zealand Police, Fire and Emergency New Zealand, or the relevant ambulance services have been informed or notified that there is a closure under this clause? What would that look like?

10:54

I think the member’s last sentence probably captures it. I think it would be difficult to prescribe in too much detail the exact requirements for notification, particularly in a situation where you’re looking at an emergency, to protect safety and people, and there is need for flexibility. There are existing processes for the New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) to communicate and notify other agencies about things that are happening, and I would trust and encourage them to continue those processes.

I’ll just note for the member and for the public that the requirement under section 61AA(3), inserted by clause 4, is to notify the New Zealand Police, Fire and Emergency, and the relevant ambulance services. You’d generate an expectation that all of those services would be notified upon a road closure; just for the avoidance of doubt there.

I’ll try to keep the answers shorter and succinct because I’m wary of creating too much extra work for Mr Utikere at this time of the morning, but he did follow up on his colleague’s question around post-decision reviews. We were getting into a back and forth about judicial review. You know, if people are concerned about decisions made, there is the ultimate review of judicial review, but the Government and NZTA, through its own internal business processes, can choose to review internal decision-making from time to time as part of their normal business practice. I would put it in their hands as an operational matter that they would be in the best place to determine whether or not they need to undertake reviews of significant decisions based on the context and the impact of those decisions at the time.

10:56

Thank you. I’ve just got some questions in relation to the answers you had for clause 5 on the section 82 amendment. I guess it’s in relation—because the answers that the Associate Minister of Transport was giving were in regards to cycles, which I think is covered, from memory, around section 84 of the Government Roading Powers Act, where basically they’re excluded from motorways unless it’s allowed, which has to be, obviously, stated. This is actually around pedestrians, and I guess the question’s more around wheelchair users, who, in my understanding, are defined as pedestrians, but then it goes further. I think we need to know about people on roller skates, skateboards, scooters, and e-scooters—which aren’t defined as pedestrians; they are defined as vehicles—and whether they would be excluded from those pedestrian infrastructures, which I think is quite important when we see the amount of people that are now on e-scooters, whether they are actually allowed to go on to pedestrian infrastructure when they’re defined as vehicles, not pedestrians.

While there was an answer around cycles, there was no actual answer around wheelchair users—my understanding is that they are pedestrians—but then also people on roller skates, skateboards, e-scooters, and scooters, and all those are actually defined as vehicles. So I’m just wondering: what is the ruling on that, and, actually, will they be restricted from infrastructure that is designed for pedestrians and therefore completely excluded from that motorway corridor?

10:58

I think we could go down a rabbit hole of finding every kind of box that has wheels that you could get around on in public, but for the avoidance of doubt, a wheelchair user is a pedestrian and would be entitled to use pedestrian infrastructure. Good news for the member: there are changes coming for the usage of things like bicycles for young children and e-scooters—to be able to use them on footpaths.

My advice would be any infrastructure which is designed for pedestrian use, albeit a footpath, or an overbridge, or even a cycleway along a busy road that might be a dual use—you know, along the Ashburton Bridge, you’ve got a bit of a side part to the bridge on State Highway 1 where you can both walk and cycle across or walk your bicycle across if you choose to do so and take into account the beautiful vistas of Canterbury. I’d just say take a common-sense approach to what counts as a pedestrian and we’ll go from there.

10:59

Thank you, Mr Chair. Following on from that point that the Associate Minister of Transport has made, the pedestrian aspect, I get that, but what’s captured here in clause 5 (e)(i) is that the piece of infrastructure is “designed for pedestrian use;”. So there’s no requirement for the infrastructure to actually be utilised or used for pedestrian use, but rather just in the design phase. Is it possible that this will capture pieces of infrastructure that initially might be designed for a particular purpose and actually the operational aspect of the infrastructure is quite different from what it was designed to do?

11:00

I think the member could just analyse the clause and determine that if a piece of infrastructure was designed for pedestrian use, it is able to be used by pedestrians when it is located on a motorway. I think the clause speaks for itself. I don’t know if there’s much more technicality needed for that. Just to close it off, there was a question earlier on about whether police have a reciprocal duty to also report or to make other agencies aware of road closure. The Policing Act enables police to temporarily close roads if they believe there will be public disorder, danger to the public, or serious offences committed. There is no legislative requirement for the police to inform other parties. However, they do regularly communicate with the New Zealand Transport Agency and other emergency services, obviously, to enable the safe and swift passage of those services.

11:01

Madam Chair, thank you.

Keep it really short because we’re homing in now. Just quick questions.

That’s fine. Actually, this is just my last question, unless the Associate Minister of Transport gives an erudite answer that requires further analysis, but he’s indicated he’s not going to do that. When the decision is taken by the agency to close part of a State highway or part of the State highway network, there must surely be some sort of hierarchy or delegation within the agency where that decision is taken. Is it the Minister’s expectation or understanding that internal processes will dictate who within the agency can make those determinations and that there’s no issue around some mixed messages in that space?

Yes.

11:02

Thank you, Madam Chair. I’ll speak to the Amendment Paper (AP), which is before the committee now and which makes a number of changes. Some of them are quite technical and administrative. This is AP 574, which has, I think, been published online a number of days ago. It makes a number of technical changes, but it also makes some what I think are substantive changes when it comes to talking about the digital driver’s licence provisions in this bill. Essentially, what these changes will do is recognise existing operational practices to authorise third parties to access driver licence photographs for register maintenance and licence card production. Essentially, at the moment, in order for you to get a driver’s licence, you have to provide a photo. Normally it’s done on site. Then, in order for that photo to go physically on to a card, that photo has to be provided to the people who produce the card, obviously in order to put the photo on the card, print the card, and get the card. All is well; you’ve got your licence.

Now, in going through the digital version of this, the new amendments to the existing statute will enable that process for the digital version of this. An individual’s photograph will be able to be provided to the digital driver’s licence provider in order to be digitally stuck on to the digital card so that you then digitally have that in your digital wallet. We’re going to be saying “digital” a lot over the next hour or so. That, essentially, was made clear in the bill as introduced.

Given that we are maintaining physical drivers’ licences, it should be made clear to the public that even if we create the framework for digital licences and we introduce digital licences, the physical licence stays in New Zealand, and every New Zealander has a right to use their physical licence. In the same way that we provide the authority for third parties to use the photograph to digitally put on the digital licence, we are also replicating that provision in the physical licence production part of the bill just to make sure that they are consistent. That’s the main change that comes through on the AP.

The second part of that is that there is a reference currently in the bill to requiring consent to provide your photograph when getting a licence. Now, the view is that requirement for consent is not required, based on the fact that you cannot get a licence without providing the photograph. The choice is: provide a photograph to get your licence or don’t provide a photograph and choose not to have a licence. It’s, essentially, a—I can’t remember the word when it’s one choice or the other; a dichotomy, di-something, bi-something—

Binary.

A binary choice, right? Thank you, Mr Utikere. You either provide the photo and get the licence, or you don’t provide the photo and you don’t get the licence. The requirement to provide consent for a photograph in order to get your licence isn’t needed, because it’s part of the process itself, so we’re just removing that unnecessary reference to consent and ensuring the scope of that authorisation is explicit and appropriate.

The other amendments in the AP that I’ll go through are changing the commencement date, when we get to the title and commencement; some savings provisions for maritime regulations to make sure they stay in force; consequential amendments to navigation by-laws; a clarification relating to seafarer employment—

They’re in different parts.

Yes, but I understand we’re going to be voting on the AP in this part, unless the Chair can correct me.

Yeah, we will be voting on the amendments as they relate to Part 2.

OK. Well, I can come to those amendments as they come up in each part. Just to round it off, there is another element around seafarer employment agreements, and inserting a definition of “information system”. Apart from that, I look forward to the very concise, short debate on this part.

11:06

Thank you, Madam Chair. Thanks to the Associate Minister of Transport for the explanation around the Amendment Paper, which I’ll come to in a moment. One of the, I think, most significant changes in this particular part does relate to the ability for an electronic driver’s licence to be on the cards. The Minister himself, I think, has identified that this is not going to mean that it happens overnight, but it provides the legal ability for an electronic driver’s licence to come into being. One of the real concerns that the Transport and Infrastructure Committee did hear about were privacy considerations and optionality. I think the Minister has sort of touched on this briefly, but I do think it’s none the less important to put the question to him, which is: what assurance can the public have that that optionality does actually exist?

There are always circumstances where if you end up wanting to utilise an app for something, that choice comes with particular incentives that really do reward or benefit those that go on that particular avenue, as opposed to those that perhaps get in a line and line up and all of those sorts of things. What’s really important here is that we’re talking about a licence that permits anyone in this country to legally drive on New Zealand roads. What guarantee or assurance can he give the community at large that that optionality is going to remain but also that it’s going to be treated equally as well. I’m not talking about the privacy stuff—we’ll come to that because there are real concerns that have been expressed around that—but my first question is just around the optionality and what assurance the Minister can give that we’re not going to get 12 to 15 years down the track and suddenly the scrum is screwed in favour of digital as opposed to those that might want to continue with the physical optionality.

11:08

Yeah, I think it’s worth raising and repeating again that there’s nothing in the bill which removes the ability or the right to have a physical driver’s licence. Those in the public who do rely on physical drivers’ licences, or other physical forms of ID actually, should be assured that they will maintain that right. I would need to think of some examples of where there would be significant impact of some sort of fast-track queue where you might use a digital licence or a digital ID compared to a physical one. I could imagine a lot of people use their drivers’ licences to prove their age or prove their identification. Actually, a driver’s licence is there to prove that you have the ability or the legal right to drive a vehicle, but it is used—and widely and commonly used—as an age verification tool or another identity verification tool. I don’t do much clubbing these days. I haven’t been to Palmerston North nightlife in quite a while—

You’re missing out.

I am missing out, but there’s plenty to do down in Timaru. Maybe we could go on an exchange someday, but if the queues were somehow quite long at the local bar or club in Palmerston North and there was a bouncer who was physically checking IDs and there was some sort of fast-track pathway where you scanned your digital ID on some sort of digital-checking machine and that released some sort of high-spec futuristic barrier to allow you into the VIP part of Tangi’s nightclub, then I think those are decisions that businesses would make, but I can’t envisage much happening in the world where there would be a significant disadvantage to those who have a physical driver’s licence or a physical form.

I think the main takeaway is that there is nothing in this legislation, nor in the Government’s programme, that jeopardises the ability for people to use their physical drivers’ licences. There is huge advantage to digital drivers’ licences. We spoke about this in the second reading quite a bit. For example, for those of us who are slightly more absent-minded or who do a lot of travelling and their driver’s licence either sits in their pocket or sits in their truck, if you were to absent-mindedly leave your driver’s licence in the—I’m not going to say which part of my truck, but let’s say a secure area of my truck. If you were to need to produce it for some sort of other purpose—not for driving your truck, because obviously it’s in there—it would be helpful to have that driver’s licence digitally with you for a lot of purposes, including the ability to get a rental vehicle, including the ability to prove your ID in a Government agency or wherever it is. So there are huge amounts of benefits to having a digital driver’s licence that will come from this framework, but I think any fears around being displaced would be misfounded at this place.

Dr Tracey McLellan. I’m just going to make the comment that I’d be really grateful if members in the committee didn’t sort of take advantage of the scope that the first part of the answer to that question became, so let’s keep to—

11:11

Absolutely. My question is a genuine one in response to the Associate Minister of Transport’s very good response that he’s just delivered. It just raises the question to me, and it may be somewhere, but you talked about having a physical licence and therefore also having a digital licence. I’m assuming you can’t have both, but maybe that’s an incorrect assumption. What is there to prevent, therefore, someone using that as a form of identification or a form of ability to lease a car or whatever, and someone else fraudulently using the physical licence also? If you’ve got any thoughts around that basic sort of area—and I can see that you’re getting some advice, but any further information on that?

I think it’s part of just making sure that—because this is about public confidence, and no matter what happens, any kind of changes, particularly when we’re digitising something that, you know, well before the age of 15, people start thinking about having their driver’s licence. It’s quite a momentous and really important part of most adult lives, and so when anything changes what generations have come to expect as normal, it will raise some concerns. There will be members of the public, and rightly so, who will apply a level of scrutiny that might not necessarily apply elsewhere. Anything of that nature would be greatly appreciated to inform this process.

11:13

There’s nothing in the bill that establishes a framework for recognising digital licences that stops you having both. All this bill does is sets up the framework to allow digital drivers’ licences, in particular, to be recognised. We have quite a unique situation—quite a weird situation, really—where we can recognise digital drivers’ licences from other jurisdictions under our existing framework but not our own. For example—and the officials can correct me if this one is wrong—I understand that we can recognise digital licences from New South Wales as being valid forms of identification or driving ability or legality, but we can’t do it for our own, so this bill establishes the framework to be able to legally do that.

There will be further Government work to actually implement drivers’ licences themselves. Then I think there would be good questions as to if you are to have a driver’s licence on a device, how many devices can you have that on? It might be that for security reasons that you’d want that only on one device that is accessible only to the person through biometrics or through some sort of security, but of course the ability for people to steal identification or to share identification with other people for nefarious reasons exists under the current situation whereby you might have a driver’s licence which is lost or stolen and you have to order a replacement licence, then all of a sudden you’ve got two versions of that same licence floating around there.

The ability to have both a physical one and a digital one doesn’t necessarily solve that, but, in theory, it should make it a heck of a lot more difficult to do, because you would need to have not only control of the physical device where the digital ID exists but also the ability to access that device. Then there could be a decision made that there is ability to remotely wipe the identification from that device so that if it was ever stolen or hacked and made available, it could then not be used in that form.

There are a whole lot of safeguards that can be put in place in the future, when actually rolling these out, but, for now, the framework put in place simply recognises that we are going to move to a system where we can have digital licences, and regulations and decisions made about what that looks like and how that is done will be made at a later date.

11:16

Thank you, Madam Chair, and thanks again to the Associate Minister of Transport for his answers. I think that’s actually a very good response around the ability for, potentially, a road user or a licensed driver to have both of those. It might allay some of the issues about leaving physical copies in the truck or wherever that might be.

I just want to indicate that Ponsonby Intermediate have arrived in the gallery, and a special shout-out to them. This is really important, because the folk who are observing this debate will probably be the beneficiaries of this particular piece of legislation. For their benefit, we’re talking about drivers’ licences in New Zealand and the ability for them to be electronic drivers’ licences—

Once a teacher, always a teacher.

—once a teacher, always a teacher—rather than having physical licences as the only way forward. Welcome to the Parliament.

The question that I have in relation to the Amendment Paper that the Minister has tabled or has previously circulated relates to clause 55. It’s about the ability for the agency to provide a third party with a copy of the imagery and the data that’s stored, but, actually, it’s only the image, as we understand it. Now, this is scoped out by allowing for the purpose to be the maintenance, the creation of the driver’s licence, etc., but when we start talking about a third party, we really do start to kind of open up the gates a little bit there.

My question for the Minister is: again, what safeguards are in place to allow for a third party to be considered as appropriate for managing that information? I know the Minister has previously talked about the storing of images and the like. Obviously, that is important for an electronic driver’s licence to be produced, but are we talking about just one third party or is it in the sense that there could be more than one third party utilised for that purpose?

11:18

Well, at the risk of getting Mr Utikere into trouble for acknowledging those in the gallery, I would also like to welcome anyone who might be here who might benefit from these law changes in the future, particularly those from Ponsonby.

I’d like to say to Mr Utikere, in terms of the Amendment Paper, all this does is, essentially, codify the existing practice. The agency already provides photographs to third parties in order to physically produce the cards. The New Zealand Transport Agency doesn’t itself have a large card-printing machine or manufacturing facility, as far as I’m aware. They outsource that to specialists who do that kind of stuff, in the same way we do with a lot of physical assets that the Government produces—you know, passports, drivers’ licences, and all these kinds of things. All the safeguards that are required for determining who should or should not be a third party are those safeguards that already exist within existing procurement policies, contracts, privacy legislation. All of the existing statutory frameworks that apply to the procurement and production of drivers’ licences will be there as well.

I should note, for any aspiring drivers who may or may not be listening today, that they will notice that in the windscreen of some of the vehicles that maybe their parents drive there are little paper stickers that may be in the top corner or the bottom corner. These tell people that their vehicle has got a current registration or a current warrant of fitness—actually, no, the warrant is in that corner, and the rego—or that it is up to speed with its road-user charges.

This bill also removes the requirement to physically have that little bit of paper in the corner of your window. That might sound a bit weird to have to have a little bit of paper that tells people that your car is registered and that you’ve got the right amount of road-user charges on your vehicle in a world where a lot of that stuff is available digitally. I’ll tell you what, I’ve been on the receiving end of an infringement notice for improperly displaying a bit of paper in the corner of my windscreen and being subject to a $200 fine for that—albeit, not of my own making. I will admit that some issues with the postal service to receive that physical bit of paper—

Because you’re shutting all the postal services down.

—potentially had cost me $200. It’s nothing to do with that, Mr Utikere. For some reason, the little bit of paper could not be delivered to my address, which sits in the middle of Timaru, but I’ll get into that with my local delivery services as to why they could or could not deliver me a tiny bit of paper to put in the corner of my truck.

In saying all of that, this is supposed to solve that problem. Agencies have access to all that information already; there shouldn’t be a need, and you shouldn’t be subject to a $200 fine for not having a teeny-tiny bit of paper in the corner of your windscreen when you’ve done all the right things, you’ve gotten your truck registered, you’ve got the right number of road-user charges, the agencies already have the information. In this day and age, to require an individual to put a tiny bit of paper in the corner of their vehicle and then be subject to upwards of a $200 fine and then further infringements for not paying that fine we think is outdated and not in keeping with modern practice. We’re going to remove that requirement. If you want to stick a little bit of paper in the corner of your window, feel free to do so, but after this bill passes, you’ll no longer have to do so.

11:21

Thank you—yes, we support that. Optionality is important, and we’ve talked about this whole pile of stickers, potentially, on windscreens. We support that—no problem at all.

One of the issues I have signalled is around the access to private data. One of the changes—which I think is a good change, actually—relates to the ability for the holder of a driver’s licence to provide their mobile number as a way of contact, and the like. I think that is a sensible way. In select committees across the board at the moment, we’re constantly talking about having to update notification processes, and it’s common practice for email addresses and mobile numbers to be utilised, so we have no problem with that.

What it does do, Minister, is it introduces into the mix an additional level of personal information that people are handing over and putting into the system. When it comes to personal mobile numbers, when it comes to email addresses, what certainty is there around ensuring that information is protected? We’ve talked about the imagery and who can access that. As we’re starting to see an increase—or we will under this bill—in the number of mobile numbers and email addresses that will be utilised as an identifier or a point of contact, which I accept is a very good move, that does need to be balanced with the concerns that have been expressed to the Transport and Infrastructure Committee about privacy of information and the data that’s being captured. How is that going to be accessed, and how will it be protected from being misused, or inappropriate or unauthorised access to it?

Running the risk of hearing from the Minister that the member has answered his own question, it may be that there are processes and systems in place within the agencies and that there are expectations around that. I do think it is reasonable, given that there are some concerns out there around the access to private information and the data being retained and held—new data and new information—to ask how the public can be assured that access to that information is going to be for the appropriate means and won’t be unfairly authorised or, indeed, unfairly accessed.

11:24

Well, the member may have asked and answered his own question, but I will say that the Privacy Act provides some pretty strong protections, generally, for personal information. The member, I think, was in Parliament when they passed the Privacy Act 2020—I’m not too sure. Either way, the member would be aware of the strengthened provisions in the most recent version of the Privacy Act, including increased fines and, essentially, accountability for agencies that get it wrong when they misuse or mistreat personal information. There are a range of protections within the Privacy Act, and there are a range of protections within the statute that I will get some further information on.

I would add that digitising drivers’ licences will actually provide an enhanced level of privacy for people. Yep, you’re going to be providing information into a system, which is tightly controlled and tightly monitored as to who can use it, but, at the same time, you are going to be receiving a whole new range of privacy protections. For example, when you’re going to the Palmerston North nightclub, and you’re handing over your driver’s licence, your physical ID, to the bouncer, that contains a whole lot of information on that little card beyond just proving that your face matches the age on the licence. There is a whole lot of stuff on that card that you might not want the particular bouncer to know, including, I believe—I don’t know if my licence has that, but I’m pretty sure some licences have maybe the physical address for where the individual comes from. It might have their donor status; it might have the driver’s licence number itself.

If you move to a system where you’ve got a digital driver’s licence and there are trusted checking framework systems in place where you can, through trusted, verified apps—maybe Hospitality NZ might have an app or maybe there might be a general app where you can simply tag the two phones together in some sort of ID-checking process—at that point, the only information that you have transmitted to the bouncer on the door of the nightclub would be that you are of age; you are the person who is verified to have this identification, and you are of age. You’re not transmitting any other personal information (a) to that bouncer individually themselves or (b) to the institution that may hold that information.

I think that’s actually a huge improvement on protection of privacy. It means that when you’re now being asked to provide your identification for purpose A, you’re not disclosing a whole range of other information that you might not actually want people to be privy to—particularly strangers. You might not want the bouncer on the door to know, if you are someone who doesn’t want strangers to know where your address is. I think being able to provide the precise information that that establishment needs without going any further actually has some additional protections for privacy.

11:27

Thank you, Minister Meager. I won’t comment on the night life in Palmerston North. It’s been a long time since I’ve had to—

Yeah, we’ve learnt all about that, and we have guests in the gallery.

That’s right. The Minister has touched on one aspect that hasn’t been referred to yet, and it is donor status. At the moment, the physical copy of the driver’s licence can indicate the fact that someone is a donor—well, it indicates the donor status by choice. We assume that that would be the same for a digital or an electronic licence. We are assuming that the timely access to that clinical information is not going to be compromised by virtue of the fact that someone has an electronic or a digital driver’s licence as opposed to a physical one. The first question for the Minister will be just around that.

My other question is—and this is sort of picked up in clause 21, which introduces new section 30UA. This does relate to the immediate suspension of a licence for significant health and safety reasons. When you go to subclause (3) of that, it talks about the time upon which the suspension comes into effect. When someone has an electronic or a digital licence, the surrender of that licence is perhaps much easier to do as opposed to a physical copy, which relies on either the licence, I guess, being taken from someone at the roadside or in circumstances where they are near a law enforcement officer, or on the individual surrendering the physical copy, if that’s what’s needed, themselves.

Can the Minister just perhaps identify that there is still going to be some consistency around the suspension of a driver’s licence, and are there any loopholes if someone has an electronic or digital licence as opposed to a physical one, when it comes to the ability to give effect to the suspension? It might be that—actually, no, I won’t share what my views are, because that might answer the question. I’ll let the Minister answer it.

11:30

I mentioned before that I was going to give some examples around privacy; I will do that and I’ll address those other two questions as well. So the question before was around requiring mobile numbers for digital drivers’ licences and the certainty about information being protected. So there are requirements that the information is shared only with the appropriate security protocols in place. The previous Government passed a trusted digital framework law and there are regulations that are in place and can be made around setting conditions and requirements for providers of apps—that may be information-checking apps, and different security classifications. That’s all existing at the moment. So the system is in place for a trusted digital framework and so the digital driver’s licence will work within that kind of framework to ensure that the appropriate security protocols are in place.

Data is subject to New Zealand Government Protective Security Requirements, Privacy Act safeguards, New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) privacy policies and guidelines, and third parties can only use data to the extent necessary to provide contracted services, and must not transfer, store, or make available NZTA data outside New Zealand without written consent. There are strict contractual obligations to secure accreditation; there are international standards around that, and also, they’re regularly audited. There are a wide range of policies, practices, and statutory provisions in place—guard rails to protect data.

Just on the donor question: it’s a really good question and we’ve struggled in our country for many, many years with our donor rates. One of the issues with donor registration is that for a long time—and it is still the case—even if you have donor status on your driver’s licence, it is still up to your loved ones and your families whether or not they’d give permission for your organs to be shared with others who may need them. My colleague Mr MacLeod has a member’s bill to help address some of those issues around how what you say you want to do with your organs on your driver’s licence should be what happens, but we know there are some ethical complications in there.

Putting all that aside, there is a wider issue of accessing that information. Where is that information stored? I don’t think the digitisation of drivers’ licences will change that too much, because whether or not you have to find the individual’s personal physical licence or whether or not you have to access their phone, often these decisions are being made at pace in short periods of time with high levels of stress and emotion around them. So, ideally, there would be a system which doesn’t rely on a physical licence or a digital licence to acknowledge that an individual is a donor and has expressed their wish to be a donor, and that the register of that information is accessible to the appropriate health professionals without them needing to rifle through someone’s handbag or find the keys to their truck or try and get into their phone to determine their donor status. Regardless of whether we digitise drivers’ licences, I think the question of access of information of donors is a wider one to be addressed through both this system but the wider reforms to organ donation.

Finally, to the question of: are there any potential loopholes in the system around surrendering licences? Well, if there were, I would probably not highlight them immediately, in public—I can’t think of any. If there were some loopholes that were brought to our attention that needed to be remedied before the end of the committee stage, we could do so. As far as I am aware, this sets the framework up to allow those licences to be surrendered, and the process of rolling out drivers’ licences would provide for that ability to surrender a digital licence in the same way that you could surrender a physical licence. Now, how that is practically rolled out would be up to, I guess, the agency that is actually providing the digital driver’s licence, but there are many jurisdictions overseas who have done that. I could think of some examples that you could do: it could be an automatic revocation of the licence from the system, removal of authorisation, temporary prevention of access to the particular app that holds that information. There are a whole wide range of things that are beyond this bill and would be for the implementation phase.

11:34

Thank you. That final point that the Associate Minister of Transport’s touched on about revocation as an option: is it an opportunity, given that there is an increasing reliance—and this has been introduced through this bill—to have electronic email addresses, identification, or, indeed, mobile numbers for text messaging and the like, that the revocation process could be a little bit smoother and enhanced as a result, whereas the revocation can take place in the system and the notification to the person doesn’t necessarily rely on the mail system but, instead, could be easily sent by way of electronic means or via text message. I mean, there’s nothing in the bill around that, but would that provide some equality between having to rely on the fact that someone has to present to the police station or to the local New Zealand Automobile Association, or whatever, and physically surrender as opposed to a blanket opportunity to revoke, if warranted, and then the notification is a little bit smoother rather than waiting on things to come more slowly?

11:35

Yeah, I think that’s right, and there is an irony in having to physically surrender a driver’s licence by delivering it to someone without, necessarily, the ability to do that legally because you can no longer drive. If anything, it should make that process more straightforward and simple.

The question is that the Minister’s amendments to Part 2, set out on Amendment Paper 574, be agreed to.

11:36

Thank you, Madam Chair. I’d like to have a look at clause 63. This is about an amendment that allows for people to be paying a toll. We will just sort of delve into this a little bit. This talks about the name, address, and the electronic address or the email address if someone does hold one, and anything that leads to the knowledge as to identification of the person in charge of the vehicle at the time. So this is basically about liability and recouping costs of a toll payment. Of course, we don’t have that in the Manawatū because of the toll-free Te Ahu a Turanga.

Well done.

Well, thank you. I’ll take that.

The issue around photo capture is important because we’ve talked about the images being captured and into the system—this is a question: are there any circumstances in which that information could be accessed for the purposes of a driver fulfilling other aspects of responsibility for being a driver? So, you know, there’s a driver’s licence that has an electronic image that’s captured: could that be utilised in any other way, digitally, to assist with identification for other responsibilities around toll or infringements or anything like that?

11:38

Just in terms of a general approach to privacy, you can only use personal information for the purpose for which it was collected. So, assuming that the collection of the photograph in the first instance has—albeit, it could be a wide range of purposes, but a limited one, if the collection fell outside of those purposes, then it could not be used for those purposes without explicit authorisation to do so. So the answer depends on whether or not the existing collection of the information does or doesn’t allow it, but, essentially, it’s kind of similar to the back and forth we had a while back in that if the purpose of collecting the photograph is to use it for other means, then that would have to be made explicit at the time of collection; if it’s not, then it would be restricted.

11:39

When I look at clause 64, this is a little bit unusual because it seeks to validate declarations that had already been made back in time. So this is seeking to, basically—it applies to a declaration that a road is a State highway, that was made on or after 1 August 2008 and before this bill sort of kicks in once Royal assent is given, so the question, really, is around the retrospective requirement for validation. Why is that necessary and what risk of legal challenges kind of prompted this provision? The Associate Minister of Transport has indicated that he is just seeking some advice—

That’s correct.

—which I do appreciate. As part of that advice, I think what would be quite helpful is an estimate as to how many declarations the Minister believes might actually be made under this provision, because we are talking about actions that may have been taken that, by virtue of this bill being passed—it, effectively, validates either a declaration made at the time or retrospectively applies something to a part of the State highway network. We do see this from time to time in legislation, where there are often bespoke requirements, where things are fit for purpose and they need to be given effect to, but in terms of passing a law that validates previous actions that have been taken—or maybe not even actions but just the mere fact that they have been established over time, and now this bill will validate them in some particular formal fashion—it is important to understand that.

If the Minister is in a position, once he has received that advice—it may be, I don’t know, that this was something that could have been prevented, or it may be that because of the changes that have been advanced, this is a consequential change that needs to happen to give effect to the status of something after 1 August and before 2026.

11:41

I am getting some advice. There is a bit of extra information requested in that question, so I will allow the officials to provide some information if we can. I’m aware that neither Mr Utikere nor I were around on 1 August 2008, so probably neither of us knows the background to that particular date, but we’ll try to get that information as we can. If there are no other questions in this part, with the Chair’s indulgence, I will address it if we do happen to move on to the next part.

Point of order. I seek leave for us to move to Part 4, following which to return to Part 3.

Well, we can either return to Part 3 or I can allow you to discuss your particular questions around Part 3. Do you have other questions around Part 3?

Actually, no, it’s just relating to the answer to that.

OK, I will allow the answer and the member a follow-up question during Part 4, if that is required.

Point of order. That’s fine, but it’s just that it might relate to the vote being taken on Part 3, as to whether Labour supports or votes against.

OK—OK. The member has no more current questions on Part 3? I’ll just take a little bit of advice.

With the leave of the committee, I seek approval to move on to Part 4—just suspend Part 3 for the moment until we have the answers—and then go back to Part 3.

No, it’s too complicated.

OK. I don’t have approval for that, but I’ll go back to what I said originally: I will allow the member to traverse some of Part 3 in Part 4. I call the Hon James Meager. We may well have the answer!

11:43

With the miraculous provision of time and a little bit of creative extension, I have received some information from my officials. The provision in clause 64 is intended to be retrospective and to remedy a technical error to validate a matter understood and intended to be lawful, and I refer to the Legislation Design and Advisory Committee guidelines about the appropriate use of retrospectivity. It fixes an error with the definition of “road” in past amendments to the Land Transport Management Act and validates the State highways that have been declared since this error happened. The error dates to the repeal of section 60 of the Government Roading Powers Act in 2008.

11:44

Thank you, Madam Chair. I thank the Associate Minister of Transport for his answer. On that basis, the Labour Party will be supporting Part 3.

The question is that the Minister’s amendments to Part 3 set out on Amendment Paper 574 be agreed to.

11:45

Kia orana, Madam Chair. It’s great to move into the maritime space now. We’re still waiting for ferries around here, but it’s still great to move into the maritime space.

The interesting thing with this particular part is that it, basically, seeks to, as I understand it, Minister Meager, bring New Zealand into a space where we are consistent with our international obligations elsewhere around the world. I think that is a commendable place to be in, and it’s a good thing we’re heading in that particular direction.

When we’re looking at the statutory duty around entering into seafarer employment agreements, can the Minister just identify what his perspective is on any issues in terms of rolling that out, to ensure that it delivers on the outcomes that the Government and others are expecting of it?

11:46

No, I don’t see any issues with it. There is an amendment around this in Amendment Paper 574, and I just wanted to clarify the reason for that amendment.

When we look at clause 67, we’re going to be replacing “seafarer employed to work on the voyage” with the slightly more complicated definition of—but it will all make sense in a second—“person on the voyage who is a seafarer within the meaning of paragraph (a)(i) of the definition of that term in section 2(1)”. Essentially, the intention of this is to capture individuals who are seafarers but who are not employed in the traditional sense, and still provide them with an employment-related agreement. Those are individuals such as cadets.

I will just refer to my previous notes, just so I can get that absolutely crystal clear. The amendment clarifies that the requirement to enter into a seafarer employment agreement applies to seafarers who are engaged for hire or reward but who may not be employed under a typical contract of employment. That’s when those cadets come into play there. It just provides a little bit of extra protection for our many wonderful cadets, many of whom I had the pleasure of engaging with over the weekend at our Anzac Day services and who will also be the recipients of, I’m sure the member would agree, excellent use of taxpayer investment into seafarer training throughout our country.

11:48

I thank the Associate Minister of Transport for that and certainly that clarity covering cadets and others who might actually fall in that particular category who are not covered by an employment agreement, or thereabouts. We’re certainly very happy to see that, and the protections, also, beyond that for seafarers is really important from the Labour Party’s perspective, as well.

How does the Minister anticipate that Maritime New Zealand will be able to continue to monitor and enforce the compliance around recruitment and placement in service, and the provisions that will be introduced? It’s great that we’re bringing ourselves up to spec and up to international standards. New Zealand has always been seen as a leader in the maritime space, so this will continue to underscore the significance and important aspect that that brings and that it does provide.

How does he anticipate that Maritime New Zealand, who is charged in the regulatory space with delivering a lot of what this will be asking for—and that’s no easy feat—will not just monitor and oversee things but will ensure that the enforcement of these conditions, and also compliance, will follow—that they’re able to do exactly that?

11:49

Maritime New Zealand have an incredibly strong reputation with the sector, in terms of being the regulator in this space, having recently taken on some of the WorkSafe responsibilities as well. That’s actually been really well received by the sector. I think they appreciate having an agency that deeply understands the ins and outs of seafaring and takes a proactive, education-first approach to regulation. We are a country that depends very strongly on its maritime sector and on the health and welfare of our seafarers, particularly those who base themselves in and around Timaru at PrimePort, one of the best ports in the country, albeit that we have excellent ports around New Zealand, including those on our east and west coasts. I’ve got very high confidence that Maritime New Zealand can deliver the statutory obligations that they are required to deliver.

11:50

One of the changes that has been made through the select committee process is around the maximum penalties. What, obviously, is important in any legislation is that, where there are provisions that allow for deterrence or for some form of sanction, they are appropriate. The specific changes that have been outlined in this particular bill, for example, if we’re looking at clause 72A—this is around “Infringement offences relating to navigation bylaws”, which replaces “ ‘$1,000’ with ‘$3,000 for an individual or $12,000 in any other case’.” That is what we would consider an appropriate ratcheting-up of those infringement levels. What I think is always important—although New Zealand, as we know, can make its own sovereign laws in this country—is if we are looking to be a key player and to be pulling our weight as an international participant in the maritime space, my question is: how do those sorts of infringement levels compare with other parts of the world to ensure that we are consistent on the international stage?

11:51

I think you run into difficulties, sometimes, when you are looking at infringement offences and penalties and drawing on comparisons to other parts of the world, because, of course, not everyone in the world operates in the same regulatory and trust environments. The penalties needed to deter poor behaviour in New Zealand might be different to the penalties needed to deter behaviour elsewhere. I think, in general, the changes that this bill makes in terms of increasing those infringement fees, both to keep up with general inflation over time and to actually send a strong message that we take our maritime by-laws seriously, are good ones. I think it’s also worth noting that the Transport and Infrastructure Committee has also recommended to clarify that body corporate infringement fees, which are actually higher to those applying to individuals, can apply to breaches of navigation by-laws. Of course, that provides the ability for those infringements and fees to be applied to companies, essentially, or organisations and not just individuals.

11:52

Yeah, I thank the Associate Minister of Transport for that because I think the proportionality aspect between individuals and bodies corporate is an important distinction and an important consideration. My question to the Minister: there are a number of changes that relate to clause 81—I’m going to come back to clause 80, which is about the powers that are given over to the Director of Maritime New Zealand in a moment—but there are a range of infringements or unsavoury acts that might be taken, whether by the bodies corporate or individuals, and so the ratcheting-up of those levels, as such, are quite significant.

For example, let’s just pick clause 82. This is “Section 65 amended (Dangerous activity involving ships or maritime products)”. The sorts of thresholds that are going to be changed are replacing $10,000 with $50,000 and, in addition to that, replacing $100,000 with $1.5 million. These are significant changes. The Minister has talked about that difference between individuals and bodies corporate, but it would be interesting to hear from him whether he thinks that the differentials or the thresholds that have been identified there—I’m talking about clauses 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, and 86—are satisfactory. I won’t go through the actual offences unless the Minister would like me to go through that? No. He’s nodding his head, so I won’t. I don’t think the Chair wants me to either. You get the drift. It would be helpful to understand the level of comfort around there. Those are significant increases in thresholds that have been promoted there as well.

One of the interesting aspects is around trying to serve as a deterrent, and I agree with the Minister that there needs to be some caution around looking to other jurisdictions, and I accept that. I guess the issue that I’m trying to get to here is whether we are serious about being an international player, because our track record certainly indicates that, in the maritime space, we have always been a world leader, and these changes that sort of align with the reforms of Maritime New Zealand certainly help with that as well. The protections that have been put in place for seafarers absolutely will help in terms of lifting how we’re seen, but how comfortable is the Minister that despite the fact that we’re not going to delve into different jurisdictions and what they might have as their thresholds, actually these are an accurate and adequate reflection of us being taken seriously on the international stage when it comes to maritime responsibilities, considerations, and deterrents that may be utilised from time to time?

11:55

Thank you. Very confident to highly—somewhere in that range. The penalties are set using the ministry’s effective transport financial penalties policy framework and tool. Now, that’s a framework which is intended to take a systematic approach to supporting the process for setting more consistent and fit for purpose financial penalties, which are the fees and fines imposed by a court for offences across the transport legislation. The ministry has a framework tool that’s looked at what the existing penalties were. It’s decided that they clearly weren’t significant enough to act as an adequate deterrent—and not only deterrent but a punishment for wrongdoing.

We’ve got to be clear about this. The best way to avoid being culpable to paying these fines is to not undertake the dangerous behaviour in the first instance. That’s what we’re trying to address here. We don’t want to go into all the offences detail by detail, but they are generally safety related, right? They are offences against dangerous activity, unnecessary danger, and communicating false information, which affects safety. Those are all things that impact the health and wellbeing and welfare of our seafarers and also of our maritime space. I’m very confident that the ministry has looked at the existing penalties, has used its framework tool, which I’m sure would incorporate analysis of what equivalent jurisdictions use as well, and has come up with a right figure to put into the legislation to carry us forward into the future.

I would close off on that by just reiterating what, I think, the member said at the outset, which is that a lot of what we’re doing in the maritime space is to, I guess, meet some of our obligations to agreements that we’ve committed to in the past. Of course, under our system of law, the only way for us to really meet those obligations is to incorporate them in domestic statute, so that’s the process that we’re undertaking now.

11:57

Thank you. I agree with the Associate Minister of Transport. We wholeheartedly support the efforts that have been taken to uphold and to signify to the rest of the world that we are serious about maritime matters, because they are important. Advancing that through domestic legislation is something that we do support.

Minister, I did indicate that I was keen on looking at clause 80. This is around the powers of investigation of the Director of Maritime New Zealand. This, I think, is, on the face of it, a really sensible move, to allow the director some suite of powers to investigate a few things when it comes, again, to safety. One of the, I guess, common themes throughout this bill is that it is about safety, whether it’s in terms of road and rail—well, we’ll get to rail; we haven’t got there yet—or in terms of maritime.

One of the things that we have had a look at and that this bill does introduce is this amendment that allows for the director to go about investigating anyone that holds what’s defined as a “maritime document”. Again, it’s kind of like a driver’s licence. We sort of take from that that this is a document that permits a set of responsibilities, for someone who’s qualified, and, of course, qualification is left over to the sector to determine that, but also through regulation. In a circumstance where the director has what are reasonable grounds—that is always a bit of a catch-all, although there is a fundamental baseline there—to suspect that the holder has failed to comply with any of those requirements in section 17, it basically hands over to the director a set of powers to go and do some investigation. Well, the fact that this section has been introduced does kind of give rise to the fact that this is what is needed. There is, obviously, a bit of a gap here at the moment, but is the Minister comfort—there’s no gap there?

Some. It allows for electronic services.

OK, there needs to be some clarity around that, but is the Minister comfortable that the reasonable grounds threshold is the appropriate one? I know he has a legal background himself, so he’ll be very familiar with this, but in terms of putting this into primary legislation, does he have any concerns—I think it’s important to have this power—that the threshold is at the right level?

12:00

Thank you, Mr Chair. I think the member started by referring to clause 80. So just for the avoidance of doubt, the summons power which is in clause 80, in new 58(3), is pre-existing; this change requires service to be provided electronically. So that’s what clause 80 does. Then in reference to clause 79, which looks at amending 54A—and apologies, there were five or six different bits of legislation that I had to pull up, so I’m just looking through 54A. We’re replacing existing 54A(1)(b)(i), which has the threshold of evidence “there is belief”; so 54A(1)(b)(i) currently says: “believes that the maritime document holder has failed to comply with any conditions of a maritime document;”. The new (i) says: “has reasonable grounds to suspect that the maritime document holder has failed to comply with any of the requirements in section 17;”.

Now, my very limited legal experience and knowledge would lead me to conclude that the test for “reasonable grounds to suspect” is a lower threshold than “belief”. Belief has a slightly higher threshold because you’d have to demonstrate actual belief or the reasonable grounds to believe it exists—whatever the test behind it is; I can’t quite recall where I’m sitting in first- or second-year law at the moment. But lowering that threshold to “has reasonable grounds to suspect” just allows the director that additional ground to more easily undertake investigations, particularly in an environment or an area where perhaps the documents being held by some mariners or maritime entities aren’t quite as readily available or consistent or up to date as what they might be in some other parts of our legal framework. So that’s what that change in 79 does.

12:03

Kia orana, Mr Chair. Thanks to the Associate Minister of Transport for that. It’s an interesting analysis of the belief vis-à-vis the “reasonable grounds”. Does he think that there’s anything that’s needed in addition to that, or is it more around the ability for the director themselves to land at a particular space where they think that, actually, that “reasonable grounds” threshold has been met?

Sorry, repeat the last bit, I was just reading the—

Sure. Is he comfortable that, I guess, as worded that’s all that’s needed? Or is there a requirement to have any additional guidance for the director in exercising their mind as to whether or not that threshold has been met?

I think in statute that’s all that’s required, and I’m sure that Maritime New Zealand, when executing these powers, will take the appropriate internal advice or legal advice as to what the appropriate steps would be.

12:04

Thank you, Minister Meager. Speaking of that—and clause 80, which, as you said, requires electronic summons—and then looking at the subsequent clauses and the changes made to them, how does that expansion of electronic service and that notification mechanism improve access to justice, I suppose, for seafarers or for operators in practice? What were the sort of considerations? I mean, I suppose it’s a twofold question. The electronic summons in and of itself raises a new set of considerations, but it wouldn’t have been done, I presume, without good reason—and that would be to make the system more efficient, somehow. Can you just provide some more details about how the ability to use the electronic summons would improve the system? And were there any fish-hooks, were there any considerations during this process—

[Singing] Were there any fish-hooks?

—that have kind of highlighted—I’m sorry, I’m distracted by what sounds to be some sort of singing. Were there any fish-hooks or any considerations? We know that the electronic notification and other justice contexts have proven not to be as simple and straightforward as they might seem on the surface. So a little bit more information would be great.

12:05

Thank you, Mr Chair. It is, essentially, just a modernisation of the summons part of the statute in the sense that—you know, there is an argument that if you don’t explicitly allow for electronic summons, then any attempt to do so would be declared invalid and so would prevent the administration of justice, or in this case the investigation of the director. So it is, in essence, just a modernisation of the existing system, to bring it in line with other systems.

The member’s right to bring up these issues; anytime we try to digitise or make something electronic, the same issues tend to pop up over and over again. But we have, I think now, quite a long history of how electronics summons, electronic service works, particularly in New Zealand; particularly in a—I was going to say a land-based context, but particularly, I guess, in a maritime context; perhaps the ability to do electronic summons or service would be even more important because you may need to provide that to a ship between port A and port B, and physically providing that at the time may be quite difficult in order to access it. So it’s, essentially, just a modernisation process, and I haven’t had any issues drawn to my attention that would cause me any concern.

12:07

Can I turn to clause 92(4). This is an interpretation amendment, and, often, interpretation clauses are very, very important; they can often be quite benign as well. But this one is seeking to ensure that what’s captured there is the various declarations made around international conventions, protocols, or agreements that New Zealand as a country may enter into. So I’m just curious to understand from the Associate Minister of Transport what—because that will already be contained. I mean, the ability for New Zealand to be recognised as a party to different things that it agrees to, through the appropriate mechanisms, will already be captured. So I’m just trying to understand: what is the Minister seeking to ensure that’s clarified as a result of that particular subclause?

12:08

The intention of this one is to ensure that once a convention is declared by Order in Council under the Maritime Transport Act, subsequent amendments to the convention of which New Zealand is the party are automatically included without requiring further Orders in Council. So it’s basically saying that where we sign up to one of these conventions—which are quite specific, actually—the conventions must relate to protecting the marine environment from pollution and we must already be a party to the convention. If there are amendments to the convention in future, which presumably we must agree with, they will be automatically included rather than have to go back through the Cabinet process.

The question is that the Minister’s amendment to Part 4 set out on Amendment Paper No. 574 be agreed to.

12:09

Thank you, Mr Chair. Well, the committee comes to rail. What’s been really interesting is members of the Transport and Infrastructure Committee have become acquainted with the Transport Accident Investigation Commission. What this part is seeking to do is to tidy up, and, I guess, clarify, some of those aspects around safety; a lot of the driving forces around safety and who takes care of what.

That naturally asks the question, well, how do we ensure that there’s no duplication of things being done when it comes to actions taken under this particular Act? The register of licences, all of those sorts of things—again, we’re talking about the electronic address. This is a consistent theme that the Associate Minister of Transport has kind of indicated, and I assume that his responses will carry over into this part and into subsequent parts, as well.

When we’re talking about things like the preparation of a safety improvement plan that’s cited under clause 107, the new section (1A), those are things that the experts turn their minds to. A lot of people often think they’re experts, but, actually, this is a very discrete piece of work, and the work that those individuals do—they’re highly qualified and they have their particular focus, which is important.

My first question to the Minister is: what safeguards or protections are in place to ensure that there is no duplication of things? I mean, if we’re looking, in parallel, at an NZTA context, all of that investigatory power generally happens under the New Zealand Police. Yes, there are subsets under that, but they’re still under the New Zealand Police.

In terms of railway incidents or accidents that might be investigated or thereabouts, there is the provision for appointment of inspectors under new section 72X. How is the Government ensuring that there is no duplication of services, particularly when there are multiple agencies who might be involved in a particular incident? If we think about a rail incident, that might involve coastal elements; that could, foreseeably, involve Maritime New Zealand. If we have parts of the State highway network that are involved because it’s near a bridge—I don’t know; these sorts of things—how is there an ability to avoid duplication?

12:12

With the avoidance of giving some intrepid law professor inspiration to create some sort of nightmare-fact scenario where a train crosses a bridge and collides with a boat, causing an oil spill, which causes a heavy vehicle to slide across the road, and then you’ve all of a sudden got a confluence of agencies investigating a number of accidents—I think the core issue is probably well put.

We have a number of different agencies that investigate and inspect a number of different parts of our transport system. When it comes to the Transport Accident Investigation Commission, their role in this process is not a fault-finding role. It is a role to investigate what happened, to investigate what went wrong, and to investigate what could be improved in the system. The Transport Accident Investigation Commission—or TAIC, as I’ll refer to it—takes an overall, kind of, stewardship role in putting aside the finding of fault and looking at exactly what happened and what could be improved to stop that happening again. Actually, I’d encourage any member who’s interested in this area to go and look at TAIC’s reports that they do on accidents: they’re incredibly well written, and they’re incredibly straightforward. They are—dare I say it—in plain English, and they do a really good job of highlighting exactly what went wrong.

There are also other agencies whose role it is to investigate accidents and to perhaps find fault, and to perhaps look at whether or not further enforcement action needs to take place. There is always going to be a sense of crossover in those spaces, because some of those agencies will be asking for the same kinds of information from the same kinds of people. In the case of TAIC, there is some incredibly good work being undertaken with the use of artificial intelligence to help streamline that process, whether that is looking through decades of previous reports to find similar fact scenarios and to provide some insight into the outcomes for those; helping to produce reports that are obviously always finalised by a human eye. Some of the work that TAIC’s doing in that space is to really rapidly reduce the amount of time it takes to undertake an investigation and to do a report, which gives them capacity and scope to do more investigations and more reports.

What that leads me to is the question the member raised: what guarantees can we give that there won’t be duplication in these processes? Well, the best we can do is try to define clearly what the roles of each of those agencies are and, when there is overlap in the information-gathering process, perhaps encourage them to work together as much as possible to reduce the impact on, sometimes, an individual who is the victim of an accident or involved in an accident having to be interviewed by three different agencies. Being able to use that information and share that information across agencies would be a good thing to do.

In this case, the member referred specifically to clause 107, the rail investigation powers. I’ll just clarify, for the avoidance of doubt, that in this particular clause the change required is that you are already able to provide a safety improvement plan. This is just clarifying that issuing an improvement notice under clause 110, which is a new section, won’t prevent the ability to provide or to require a participant to prepare a safety improvement plan. The suite of changes here is to essentially give rail investigation the same kinds of powers that we have in land transport in order to issue non-disturbance orders, to preserve a scene, and to provide information. It’s just so that when we are undertaking investigations into rail incidents—which, sadly, there are far too many of in our country—we can do so with assurances that we’re going to have the best available fact situation to determine a result.

12:16

Thank you, Mr Chair, and I thank the Associate Minister of Transport. That scenario he painted of rail, car, ferry, bridge—well, there’s no possibility of that happening, because this is a Government that cancelled the rail-enabled ferries. That’s not a predicament. Nicola Willis wanted to send that by text!

Anyhow, I do agree with the Minister on one thing, and that is on the Transport Accident Investigation Commission. They do some fantastic work, and one of the things that the Minister will be aware of is, in the Transport and Infrastructure Committee’s report back to the House on another matter—and this just touches on this—there is some concern about what happens with the recommendations that they actually do present. At the moment, they kind of get laid on the table and there’s no momentum behind it. So I’m pleased to hear the Minister indicate the value of that commission, and we certainly agree that there needs to be some weight around that so that when they’re doing things like this—investigations that they will undertake under this particular bill—the possibility of future repeats is lessened as a result of something actually happening with the reports.

I want to ask the Minister about these new powers—because they are new powers around entry and opportunity to inspect and all of those sorts of things. There are homes that are marae all around the country. How can there be some certainty or guarantee that homes and marae—you balance that with the rights and opportunities to get the information that’s needed. We come across this from time to time, where the search and surveillance requirements—and I note that this is a bill that does actually amend parts of the Search and Surveillance Act 2012, as well. How are those new powers balanced against the private property rights of homes or, indeed, communal rights of marae? Because, freakishly, if we have a look at the number of incidents that happen around the country, they are very close to those sorts of places and locales. How are these new powers, which are important, balanced against the rights of folk going about their daily business?

12:18

Yeah, this is new section 72D of new Part 2A, inserted by clause 110. I know the Transport and Infrastructure Committee made some recommendations for changes to make it crystal clear that the powers to enter vehicles, buildings, or places only apply to those owned by rail personnel or used in rail activities, and to limit the scope of the power. For the avoidance of doubt, those powers are to be used only for the purpose of carrying out an investigation of a rail accident or incident.

Built into the statute are some guard rails and some limits as to the kinds of premises that can be searched under the statute. There are also the wider protections provided in the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act in terms of, when you interpret those provisions, you’re supposed to interpret them in a rights-consistent way. Regardless of what people think about how the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act should or shouldn’t be applied, the protection against unreasonable search and surveillance is contained within that piece of legislation, as well, which would also apply here.

In terms of specific application to places like marae or communally owned or inhabited properties, you’d have to, again, take it on a case by case basis and apply the powers that are available under the law to those places. The underlying fact remains that the powers are serious powers, and they are to be used to investigate very serious rail accidents with the idea of finding fault or culpability and preventing these things from happening in the first instance, or ever again, and, also, providing accountability for those who may have caused those accidents. So there is an important purpose and reason for doing this. Those powers won’t be used lightly and can’t be used lightly under the statute, with the wider protections of search and surveillance, and also, even further than that, you’ve got general common law protections around privacy and around unreasonable search, as well.

I think that those three things combined should give the member assurance that they’re only to be used in specific circumstances. A wider commentary on whether or not they generally protect places like marae and other communally inhabited places would have to be looked at, depending on the fact scenario.

12:20

Thank you, Mr Chair, and thank you, Minister Meager. I have a couple of quick questions that may at the offset sound like they’re not connected, but they’re certainly connected in my mind, so hear me out. When the Minister was providing that answer, it kind of struck me to ask whether this applies only to the network that’s owned by KiwiRail. I was thinking about the smaller operators when we were talking earlier about the increasing penalties. Normally, when that happens, there’s an overview to make sure that the compliance burdens are proportionate to smaller operators, and in listening to the Minister just provide that answer, I suddenly thought that perhaps I’m barking up the wrong tree in terms of assuming that there are smaller operators. I know that there’s certainly Mainland Rail and a couple of things in the South Island, but that points me to the wider question: does this only apply to the network as owned by KiwiRail?

More importantly, my question before I was distracted by that thought was this: with the additional exercise of these enhanced powers, so to speak, what sort of training and oversight mechanisms does the Minister envision, or has the Minister had discussions about, that will apply to enable inspectors to be able to do that enhanced work more—well, to be able to do that enhanced work, full stop. But will they be able to do so with the degree of skills and the level of expertise that will make the difference between having a piece of legislation on paper and having the implementation of it actually work—so any information around that or the advice that the Minister has received in that direction.

In that vein also, whilst we talk about these changes as being sort of modernisation, technical changes, or a chance through an omnibus bill to improve a system, what sort of evidence shows that they will actually improve safety outcomes? That’s the gist of all of these changes in this part, more so than just simply adding an additional layer of process.

Thank you. That was one weird question at the beginning that may have just been in my mind, and a specific question about those extra skills and whatever kind of resourcing or training needs to go into making that possible.

12:23

To address the weird question, no, it’s not just KiwiRail. It’s all rail participants and rail personnel, and so you may have those small spurs that do go into a bit of private land, which would be subject to these investigation powers.

I’ll just touch on the final point around private premises and marae that was raised before. I’ll point members to section 72H, I think it was, or is it actually—

The power of entry?

Yeah, it’s the power of entry. I’ll find the clause as I am rifling through my notes, but, essentially, you will only be able to go into private premises or marae with the consent of the owner, or a warrant. It’s new section 72E in clause 110. You actually will need the consent or a warrant to do so, and so it’s not just the application of these search and surveillance powers, but you’ll actually have to get a warrant if you don’t have consent to enter.

Then, in and around the question around training and oversight, the Transport Agency already undertakes these investigations for land transport purposes, for roading network purposes. There are training systems in place for their investigators, and it would just be an extension of that to, I guess, some members of the same team or maybe a particular team to investigate for rail, as well. There may be some situations about rail that would make it—you know, you might have some specific different types of training, but the equivalent powers exist in other areas, and so it would just be an extension of that programme. In terms of analysis on whether or not this will improve safety, I understand there’s some analysis in the regulatory impact statement, if the member is interested.

12:25

Thank you, Mr Chair, and thanks to the Associate Minister of Transport for that. Obviously, the warrant powers are important because that means that there is a rationalisation process that the issuing officer needs to turn their mind to before determining that there is justification to enter private property—homes, marae, and the like.

Just one more question from me on this at the moment, which is in relation to new section 72F in clause 110. This is notice of entry, and this is about a circumstance where the inspector seeks to enter the place, the vehicle, or the building, and does so; he or she needs to make some effort to locate the person who’s in charge and is unable to do so, and, as a result of that, he or she is then required to leave some information behind. Now, there seems to be a very base level of information, which is the identity of the inspector, the electronic address or email for the inspector, the date and time of entry, and the reasons for entering. There’s an additional one there to the electronic address, which is “and any other contact information the inspector wishes to provide;”. I see that that is optional. It could be a telephone number, I guess, or it could be whatever, but is it that the email address is sufficient, and the additional context is there so that the inspector could think about what is warranted and what is not, given the circumstances of the entry?

Point of order, Mr Chairperson. I seek leave for the committee to pause its consideration of this bill, move on to consider the Ngāti Hei Claims Settlement Bill, and then resume consideration of the Regulatory Systems (Transport) Amendment Bill once it has concluded its consideration of the Ngāti Hei Claims Settlement Bill.

Is there any objection to that motion? Leave is granted.

12:31

Thank you, Mr Chair. A very brief call on the title of this bill, this being the only opportunity we have to give a general call, and to ask the Minister for Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations more generally about the policy of this bill. People who are watching may be confused about why we can move so fast on a bill like this, but it is a reason to celebrate and a reason to commemorate every passage of every Treaty bill. This one is significant. Ngāti Hei are part of the overlapping and collective settlements that exist within their rohe, but they are their own significant part of it, with interests extending around the Coromandel area and Hot Water Beach.

I’d just invite the Minister to reflect on the significance of this bill and the importance of what we have just been through, which is a committee of the whole House stage moving quickly because everyone in the House agrees with it. I will not get an opportunity to take a call at the third reading, and so can I also congratulate those people who have worked tirelessly to come to not only those collective settlements for their rohe in the Marutūāhu claims settlement, but also for this iwi in its own right to stand on its own two feet and to have a settlement which will be significant, not only to the generations now who get to witness the passage of this bill but for all of their uri in the future. It is an important part of the country, a beautiful part of the country, they are its kaitiaki, and may we wish them the best for the passage of the bill.

12:33

Well, thank you, Mr Chair. Obviously, it is a very exciting prospect that this stage that we’re at is sort of a technical phase. We’ve had the first reading some years ago, and we’re looking forward to the final, third reading of this settlement bill for Ngāti Hei coming soon. As is mentioned, Ngāti Hei are an iwi that trace their origins to Kupe and Te Arawa waka on the eastern seaboard of the Coromandel, between Onemana and Whangapoua, and out into the islands. This is a settlement that is part of the broader Hauraki claims. There are about 12 different settlements across the Hauraki that we’re working our way through, so this is a very exciting prospect that we’ll be looking to conclude in the next few weeks.

12:35

I’m very excited to make a contribution on this important bill. Just in terms of Part 6, in clause 115, which amends Schedule 2, there’s obviously a transition going on between post and other methods of informing citizens of what’s going on in their relationship with Government. I guess there are two aspects to my question. One is this adoption of the term, in clause 1(4), “notice is sent (a) by post is … treated as having been given at the time the notice would have been delivered in the ordinary course of the post:”. That suggests that there is an ordinary course of the post, but the fact of the matter is that letters put in our dear old New Zealand Post postboxes can now sometimes arrive in three days, sometimes 10, and sometimes, sadly, not at all.

I was just interested to know why the decision wasn’t made to give a clear date, because that is actually a sliding scale. The worse New Zealand Post gets, the longer “ordinary course” will be. We’ve seen New Zealand Post closures around the country recently. They have, over time, been rolling back deliveries to households and extending out what “ordinary course” is. It used to be pretty much the next day in the same city, and now I think it’s something like five days, so I’m interested to know what “ordinary course of the post” actually means.

The other thing, again, in terms of providing information or giving notices—whatever you want to call it—to citizens; I see that electronic notification is there. But it seems to be—and I’m just going to invite the Associate Minister of Transport to kind of explain exactly what this is—because it’s not just by an email, for example, saying, “Your road user charges have been updated or have expired.”, or whatever the case might be, but it’s by access to some sort of portal, it appears. This is in clause 115, Schedule 2, new clause (1)(ca): “sending an electronic notification to the person that states where they can access the notice electronically”, which seems to be an odd leap. Why not just tell them, “This is notifying you of the fact.”, rather than saying, “Click on this link to go to this portal to enter your details to get the information that I could have given you anyway.”? It does seem that you can’t actually just email them, like sending them a letter. You’ve now got to—well, at least if you’re using subclause (ca), by having this portal. Why have we got this system of clicking on a link through, and what exactly is meant by it? Is this something we’re moving to immediately, or is this just kind of a belts and braces in case we want to go down that road? Thank you.

12:39

Thank you, Mr Chair. Just to address the member’s first point: the wording in clause 115, amended Schedule 2, subclause (4)(a), is a repeat of the wording in the existing subclause (4) of Schedule 2. All the amendments do is repeat that wording in and around “ordinary course of the post” and then adds on the electronic service provisions. The existing requirements for “ordinary course of the post” are already in the legislation. It will, of course, depend on where you live, rural addresses, etc., so it’s not appropriate to put a specific number of days in the Schedule.

In terms of the second point around whether this is belts and braces, I would think that, yeah, it is belts and braces. I can imagine a world where your electronic notice doesn’t come by way of email with a PDF attached, but it could come by way of a notification through a New Zealand Transport Agency app or some sort of application where you get a notification that says, “Here’s your receipt for your road-user charges bill that you’ve just paid online.”, and it can be accessed in your wallet, or here or there. I think that just provides a couple of options for electronic delivery to be undertaken.

I think at some course, whether that’s in the near future or distant future, all of these issues around electronic service—and I know there is guidance and there is legislation existing for electronic service—will have to probably be updated across the board to take account of new ways of delivering notifications and services and updates. For this one, the thrust behind it is just to make it easier for people to receive notifications that, say, their road-user charges haven’t been paid, combined with the ability to no longer have to put that little sticker—it’s not even a sticker; it doesn’t have any stick on it, but it’s just a bit of paper—in the front of your vehicle, and to move to a more modern system. I would agree with the idea that it’s a bit of belts and braces and a bit of futureproofing.

12:41

Thank you, Mr Chair. Just one final question in terms of notifications, and I’m now looking at clause 115(4)(b). It’s always a tricky one when you’re using an electronic communication and you press send and the bundle of information passes through a series of systems, because once it gets out of, say, New Zealand Transport Agency’s (NZTA’s) system, it will then go into an internet service provider’s system, and whilst these systems are extremely reliable, they’re not perfect. There are instances where it gets into an internet service provider system and then it just disappears, or some error occurs and it never gets further.

Why, in this legislation and in this clause, has the Associate Minister of Transport decided to have a rule which says that the thing is delivered when it leaves NZTA, rather than when it arrives at the recipient’s system? If you think of it in the New Zealand Post example, it’s deemed to be delivered as soon as it goes in the postbox, even if the letter is lost and never arrives at the address, because, in fact, that person won’t be notified. But this seems to say, “You are notified. You’re deemed notified as soon as we push send on our computer.”, even though it never arrives in your inbox, or other app or whatever it might be.

I just would be interested in the Minister’s comments on that. I see that there’s some advice coming his way, and so that would be useful to understand.

12:43

I think that the intention is to be analogous to physical mail in that the New Zealand Transport Agency doesn’t confirm that the letter is received by the individual, because it’s not practical to do so. It deems it as being received—as the member pointed out before—at the time at which it would have been delivered in the ordinary course of mail.

Having been on the receiving end of a registration notice which should have been received by my person and it wasn’t received one way or the other, and then the implications of failing to put that little bit of paper on my front windscreen were felt firsthand, I’ve got lived experience of what happens when you don’t receive the particular bit of paper in time. But I can say to all of those out there who are worried, enforcement agencies are very sympathetic to explaining the reasons behind a failure to display tiny bits of paper in the front windscreen of your car. If you explain the reasons behind that about the difficulty in receiving said bit of paper, they are generally more than happy to waive the particular infringement notice. Although, I suspect, if it became a repeated pattern, they may not be so sympathetic.

12:44

I move, That debate on this question now close.

The question is that the Minister’s amendment to Part 6 set out on Amendment Paper 574 be agreed to.

12:46

Kia orana, Mr Chair. These are sort of the catch-all provisions in this particular part where there are quite a few of them. A number of them relate to airports, and so this is the first time that aviation—I’m sure the Associate Minister of Transport will approve—has sort of made an entry into this Regulatory Systems (Transport) Amendment Bill, given his interest in the area.

When we’re looking at the provisions that relate to the various airports that are identified there, the first question for the Minister is just the rationale around the policy change. I know it’s meant to provide some consistency in terms of operation, and also actually tweaking, as I understand it, some sort of oversights when the previous legislation was making its way through.

Now, that naturally bodes the question to the Minister around how we can make sure that this can be futureproofed to ensure that these sorts of things don’t have to wait until a regulatory standards bill makes its way through the Parliament. I guess that, when it comes to the various airports, they might be quite discrete in that particular sense, but in relation to clause 120, which leads to the new Schedule 1 for Auckland Airport, we are talking about a number of airports that are strategically of significant importance to the transportation system within this country.

My first question is on that policy rationale for aligning the airport companies’ provisions with what was, at the time, a sense of older frameworks. It is going to be retrospective in terms of the change there to section 4(7) of the Regulatory Systems (Transport) Amendment Act, which is being amended by Schedule 1, but what was the operational or legal risk if these changes were not going to be validated? Because, effectively, that’s what it’s doing. It’s retrospectively validating what was an earlier course of action to allow the functionality of the airport—well, the two airports: Auckland under Schedule 1, and Wellington under Schedule 2. I mean, we’re talking about the period from which it’s come into force, which will be 5 April of last year, and so it was well over 12 months ago. That’s the first question for the Minister.

12:48

Thank you, Mr Chair. I think it’s worth just explaining some of the background to this fix. Clause 119—which is the one the member is referring to—corrects a numbering error which unintentionally disapplied sections of the Civil Aviation Act 2023 when it was brought into force in, I assume, 2023. Those sections contained a power that the airports require in order to set charges for aerodrome activities, along with other powers that were never intended to be excluded. I’m advised that that error won’t have any practical effect until such time as, for example, Auckland Airport wishes to deal with land or is registered as an airport operator, and so it hasn’t had any impact to date. However, the ability to tidy that, I’m sure, unintentional error—which happens from time to time when legislation is passed—can be remedied through this bill, and the reason for applying it retrospectively is just to make sure that that error is, effectively, corrected from the date on which it was introduced by the Civil Aviation Act 2023, which was 5 April 2025.

12:49

I thank the Associate Minister of Transport for that clarity. A number of airports around the country have interests that are, effectively, owned by the local authority and councils around the country. That is quite a common approach for airport companies, certainly in New Zealand. Given the changes to both Schedule 1 and Schedule 2—well, actually, they are both changes to Schedule 1, but they appear as Schedule 1 and Schedule 2, which kind of does beg the question: why could you not just put both of them into one schedule? But that was not the initial question I was seeking to ask the Minister.

It’s actually around the level of consultation that was taken, particularly with local authorities, in leading to this point or getting to this particular change. Many of them, as we know, are shareholding or controlling authorities, and so it is important to understand what that is before I move on to Schedule 3.

12:50

Thank you, Mr Chair. I think you’d have to direct that question to the drafting wizards who know more about legislative design in this case than I do, but I’m sure there was a very good rationale as to why we needed to have a new Schedule 1 as well as updating Schedule 2 to reflect the insertion of Schedule 1. I’m sure there will be some distinction about having to have separate subject matters in different schedules that smarter people than me can explain.

12:51

Thank you. I’ll move on to Schedule 3. This is back in the maritime space, and this, again, relates to the provision of international conventions and obligations or treaties that New Zealand as a country does sign up to. As I’ve said previously, Associate Minister of Transport, we certainly support those.

It’s important that New Zealand is not just pulling its weight but is seen to be compliant and consistent in terms of our international obligations. When Parliament seeks to insert a provision that basically says, “Moving forward, if there are any changes to conventions that New Zealand as a country is a party to, we’ll basically just insert them.”, this is the mechanism to insert that opportunity. There is, I guess, a practical question around the ability of the Parliament to scrutinise that opportunity. So my first question to the Minister is: how does the proposed new schedule as outlined in Schedule 3 in the bill aid or support the ability for parliamentary scrutiny when various conventions are being considered and adhered to?

12:52

The intention behind this Schedule 3 is, as the member pointed out, to make it a more streamlined process for conventions that New Zealand is (a) party to, or (b) has become a party to the amendment or revision before, on, or after the amendment Act came into force. Essentially, it’s to allow for a smoother transition of amendments to conventions that New Zealand is already a party to and has already agreed to implement in its statute books, and, presumably, has also agreed to amend, as a party to that convention, to be incorporated automatically.

Now, there will be processes by which the Parliament can scrutinise that. I’m sure the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee could open a briefing on a particular amendment to a convention to have a look at what the amendment did. I will take some advice from, maybe, members of the Regulations Review Committee as to whether or not such incorporation, because it’s done under the original—my understanding would be the original convention. There was a previous debate we had in a previous part around this very provision where it was implemented by Order in Council, and so rather than having to go back through the Order in Council process again, you could do it automatically. So I’d have to take some advice from the likes of the Regulations Review Committee as to whether or not that could be scrutinised through their process and whether or not that could be a disallowable instrument—I think that might be the term—but I’d have to get some more clarification on that.

Of course, Parliament is the master of its own destiny, and if it decided that it didn’t like that particular convention being implemented as part of its domestic law, then it could itself choose to legislate against that particular provision from being implemented. I’m not sure whether that’s best international practice, but Parliament ultimately retains that sovereign power to do so.

I will put the questions to New Schedule 1AA and Schedules 1 to 4 together.

New Schedule 1AA and Schedules 1 to 4 agreed to.

Point of order. I seek leave for the questions around clauses 1 and 2 to be put immediately.

Apologies to the Minister. The time for reporting back is set by the Standing Orders and not by the House. The time has come for me to report progress to the House.

Progress to be reported.

14:02 · to the Prime Minister

E tautoko ana ia i ngā kōrero me ngā mahi katoa a tōna Kāwanatanga?

[Does he stand by all of his Government’s statements and actions?]

Yes.

Does he agree with the definition of a Unesco World Heritage Site that “World Heritage Sites are places recognised as having ‘outstanding universal value’. They are … deemed significant for their historical, artistic, or scientific importance.”; if so, why is it appropriate to mine in these places?

In answer to the first part of the question, yes.

How does he justify granting a prospecting permit in one of only three of New Zealand’s Unesco World Heritage Sites?

Well, we are very interested in developing more mining in this country because we need critical minerals to make the clean, green transition. We’ve got them in this country and we’re going to continue to explore them and develop all our natural resources.

Does he agree with the statement of his Minister for Resources regarding mining in a Unesco World Heritage Site that “we’re going to have to do trade-off politics.”, and, if so, does he think New Zealanders are OK with his Government desecrating a place without—

No. Reword it.

OK. Does he think New Zealanders are OK with his Government trading off a place with outstanding universal value for short-term, private profits?

Well, what I know New Zealanders are not OK about is not having high-paying jobs in regional New Zealand and actually banning oil and gas and mining projects, that ends up having Kiwis leave New Zealand to go to Australia to access those jobs in those sectors. We are going to make this country wealthier and more prosperous for everybody, and that means using our resources.

Has his Government departed from the commitment of previous Governments, first made under Sir John Key in 2012, that there would be no mining in World Heritage areas like the spectacular Te Wāhipounamu?

Again, we will find the balance, but we are prioritising economic growth in this country. We are going to get things done, we’re going to get this economy moving, and we’re going to offer high-paying jobs to people in regional New Zealand, and that’s a good thing.

If he accepts that mining is appropriate in a globally recognised World Heritage area, is there any piece of supposedly protected land in Aotearoa that is not open to mining?

Just remember, 30 percent of this country is in the Department of Conservation estate. We have very important national parks of very high environmental quality, and we’ll continue to protect those, obviously.

14:05 · to the Prime Minister

Does he stand by all of his Government’s statements and actions?

Yes, and particularly our income tax relief, raising thresholds for working New Zealanders.

How much does the average New Zealand family spend in their weekly grocery shop right now, and is that more or less than when he became the Prime Minister?

Well, actually, food inflation’s up 3.4 percent from memory; it was up 12.5 percent under his Government. Food price inflation exists, and, as I said to him yesterday, deflation is not good for an economy, but food price inflation—there’s more to do, but at 3.4 percent it’s better than 12.5 percent, which he delivered.

Well, does he stand by his statement in July 2024 that “food prices are falling really quickly”; if so, which food prices have fallen really quickly in the time he’s been Prime Minister?

Well, as I said, the general point about food inflation is it went up to 12.5 percent under his leadership; under our Government, it’s up over the last year 3.4 percent. That’s a good outcome for New Zealanders.

How much does the average New Zealand family spend on their monthly power bill right now, and is that more or less than when he became Prime Minister?

Well, again, that’s why I would say to the member, get in behind repealing the oil and gas ban, get in behind the fast-track legislation that’s generating an increase in renewables in this country. [Interruption] You know, you can cry crocodile tears, but actually back some stuff and actually come out and declare what you stand for.

That’s enough commentary, from both sides. Questions are heard and answered in silence. Answers should be given the courtesy of getting out before they’re barraged down.

How much does the average New Zealand family spend on home, contents, and car insurance each month, and is that more or less than when he became the Prime Minister?

Well, again, I’ll just say to the member, if he actually cares about the impact of the cost of living on New Zealanders, why doesn’t he propose some policy to actually come to the table with? Why doesn’t he support the rates cap? Because that’s a very big driver of the cost of living for New Zealanders. Why doesn’t he support fast track? Why doesn’t he repeal the oil and gas ban with us? And why doesn’t he actually just support extending prescriptions, saving healthcare costs for regular New Zealanders? There’s a lot that you could be doing, but you’re not.

How much does the average tradie or sole trader spend filling up their ute right now, and is that more or less than when he became the Prime Minister?

Well, the good news is that we abolished the ute tax. Remember that one? That was a special. We abolished the Auckland Regional Fuel Tax—if you remember that one—so it’s a lot less than it would have been if he’d stayed in power. We’ve actually cancelled Labour’s fuel excise hikes that were planned. We’ve kept that in place, frozen, but we’re progressing a rates cap—get on board with that. Why don’t you just support that very simple thought and idea?

How many more people are unemployed now compared to when he became the Prime Minister?

Well, as I’ve explained to the member before, the rule of economics is that if you increase Government spending by 84 percent, you drive inflation up to a 32-year high, you have 13 interest rate rises, you put the economy into slow-down, if not recession, and people lose their jobs. But in the last quarter, we are pleased to see that we’ve created thousands of new jobs for New Zealanders. That’s good, but we’re going to get the economy growing and that’s how we get people back into work.

Is the reason he can’t answer a single one of those questions about the day-to-day reality New Zealand families face under his Government, and instead resorts to blame and excuses, that he doesn’t know the answers or that he just doesn’t care?

Point of order.

Yeah, well, I’ll tell you, we have done more to support working—

Sorry, there’s a point of order, the Hon Shane Jones.

Sir, it’s a well-established tradition in the House that when moving from a general question to finicky pettifogging detail, you cannot expect the Prime Minister to have that detail. It’s laid out in Speakers’ rulings 197/2 and 197/4. Why are you allowing that level of exactitude to take place?

Well, I simply disagree with you with the interpretation of the question. I think the Prime Minister is well capable of answering a question as you describe it.

Well, what I can say to the House and to the member is that actually increasing taxes, as the Labour Government seems to have communicated to the Fitch credit rating agency, is not the way forward. That is going to be punishment on working and middle-income working New Zealanders—it’s a very simple fact. We now have stable rents in this country instead of them going up $180 a week. Is the member going to reverse interest deductibility? Is the member going to reduce the brightline test? Is the member going to increase the tax rate? Let’s hear some answers.

Point of order, Mr Speaker. I seek leave to answer some of those questions that the Prime Minister’s just asked me.

Well, I would put the leave, but it would interfere with the prescription of Standing Orders, which makes this question time: Opposition ask questions; Government answers them. If they answer in a rhetorical way, that’s probably a result of the question that was asked in the first place. Have you finished?

Yes.

Yeah, all good. We’ll move to question No. 3.

14:10 · to the Minister of Finance

What recent reports has she seen on the economy?

Last week, Moody’s Ratings released its latest review of New Zealand. It confirmed that New Zealand’s sovereign credit rating would remain at triple A—the highest possible rating—but it revised the outlook from stable to negative. Moody’s highlights that current global economic uncertainty presents downside risks to growth in New Zealand while inflation pressures persist. It says these factors may delay the Government’s fiscal consolidation—that is, getting the Government’s books back to surplus and bending the debt curve from going up, to going down. This comes after Fitch Ratings also changed its outlook for New Zealand to negative.

What do these recent changes in outlook indicate?

What these changes indicate is a risk to both ratings. Moody’s and Fitch will be watching developments closely to determine whether to move New Zealand’s ratings one notch lower, or to maintain the rating and revise our outlook back to stable. I’m advised that Moody’s typically shifts to a negative outlook when they see at least a one-in-three chance that a downgrade could occur and that an outlook is generally resolved over 12 to 18 months. This gives time to monitor how the fiscal position is evolving. Budget 2026 will be released on 28 May, and members will see the latest Treasury forecasts then.

What do these ratings reviews mean for the Government’s fiscal approach?

These reviews support the Government’s fiscal strategy of keeping a tight rein on spending, getting the operating balance back in surplus, and getting debt under control, all within the next few years. Being on negative outlook is, however, a warning that we need to stay on this course and demonstrate progress, even when global events make it more challenging, and it’s a warning to others who might want to spend more and borrow more that ratings agencies are watching carefully. The interest cost on Government debt is already around $9 billion a year. A credit rating downgrade would increase this interest bill further if debt increased, and even more so if New Zealand faced higher interest rates from being considered a riskier country.

How can fiscal consolidation be achieved?

Fair tax.

There are two possible fiscal strategies available for consolidation. As the member Chlöe Swarbrick points out, the parties opposite me prefer tax. Our approach is to keep a lid on spending, rather than increase taxes. Fitch makes this point explicitly in its review, saying that there is broad-based consensus across the political spectrum towards fiscal consolidation, although the consolidation strategy may vary. It says that the current Government focuses on expenditure constraint, and that is true. Over the last two Budgets, the Government has made a total of $44 billion worth of savings and reprioritisation. On the other hand, Fitch says that others would emphasise revenue measures to reduce the deficit—that means increasing taxes. People who have those plans should tell the country which taxes they’ll be increasing.

14:14 · to the Minister responsible for RMA Reform

What assurances, if any, can he give to the people of Tāmaki Makaurau that his RMA reforms will not impact the protection of the Waitākere Ranges?

There is special legislation in place for the Waitākere Ranges—the Waitākere Ranges Heritage Area Act 2008. The Act requires Auckland Council to give effect to its purpose and objectives when making plans under the Resource Management Act (RMA) that affect the area and to have particular regard to that purpose and objectives when making resource consent decisions in the area. The Planning Bill and Natural Environment Bill, which will replace the RMA, are currently before the Environment Committee for consideration. When those bills were introduced, it was acknowledged that not all consequential amendments to other Acts were included, and the committee, as I understand it, has been made aware of that fact. To maintain the intent of the Waitākere Ranges Heritage Area Act under the new planning system, consequential amendments will be needed, and the Environment Committee will be considering that as part of its scrutiny of the bills.

How can the Minister justify advancing planning legislation that, effectively, overrides the protections of the Waitākere Ranges Heritage Area Act 2008, and what specific safeguards, if any, will remain to prevent irreversible environmental degradation in the Waitākere Ranges?

I suggest the member, at the end of the night, goes back and reads the Hansard, because if she was listening she would find out that that’s not what I’m doing.

What weight has the Minister given to the strong opposition from local communities and mana whenua who are concerned that his RMA reform will undermine the Waitākere Ranges Heritage Area Act 2008, and why are these concerns not currently reflected in the Planning Bill and Natural Environment Bill?

Again, I gave a pretty comprehensive answer to the primary question, which was that there are a range of consequential amendments required—there’s around 100. It’s not just about the Waitākere Ranges Heritage Area Act; it’s about 100 other pieces of legislation that require consequential amendments, which the select committee will be considering. In relation to the first part of the question, my understanding is that there have been a range of submissions in that regard to the Environment Committee. The bill is in the hands of the committee.

Is there any chance that these changes might allow families with a horse paddock in Henderson, where they’ve been trying to build homes for decades, to actually provide those homes that would do a lot more for mana whenua and many others complaining than any of the carping we’ve heard in this question so far?

It is true that I have emails—

It’s true he doesn’t want any houses in his electorate.

No, that’s just—not quite so interfering.

It’s not true, either. It is true that I have had a number of emails around the Waitākere Ranges Heritage Area Act seeking that it be entrenched in law. I’ve also had emails from people who actually live there who wish to do simple things with their property, like subdivide to put another house on it, who find themselves unable to do that. What’s important is that the select committee—as I’ve said three times now—work its way through that, consider the consequential amendments made, and I look forward to the report back to the House.

If protections are weakened, and environmental harm follows, will the Minister accept responsibility for any irreversible damage to the Waitākere Ranges?

That question is highly speculative. There might be a different way that the member could ask that question.

Should the protections be weakened in any way, shape, or form, will the Minister accept responsibility for any irreversible damage to the Waitākere Ranges?

If the Government’s planning reforms work as intended, I will take responsibility for the abundant development opportunities that will land in this country. I will take responsibility for the renewable energy that will be far easier to build—the windfarms that don’t take six years to build. I will take responsibility for infrastructure projects not tied up in endless red tape to build transmission and roads and rail projects. I will take responsibility for the prosperity that we have been denied as a country because of the straitjacket of the RMA.

Supplementary? [Interruption]

The Hon David Seymour, and no one else.

Does he also anticipate taking responsibility for far more development opportunity created for Māori than the Māori Party could ever dream of creating?

No, no, the Minister has got no responsibility for that.

Mr Speaker, my question—

When the House is ready to give you the respect of the question.

14:20 · to the Minister for Regional Development

What recent announcements has he made?

Obviously, we have already announced the recommissioning of the 100 million litre tank and the diesel that will go into that tank, but we are also pursuing a strategy with a suitable regime, legislatively speaking, and a high-quality large event to lay out a road map and a strategy for hydrogen. That is something that will join the host of other announcements I’ve made in terms of geothermal, nuclear fission, and oil and gas. We are going, in our regions, to ensure that we have the supply of energy by using our regional resources, including hydrogen.

Does New Zealand have potential for hydrogen being a fuel of choice?

Being very interested in clean, green outcomes, I think it’s very important that we join with the different stakeholders in our community and explore the role that hydrogen can play in boosting our fuel resilience and our energy resilience coming off the afflictions associated with the Persian Gulf military conflict. It is important, however, that when people apply for innocuous prospecting permits, that they are not pilloried, they are not cancelled, and they are not harassed by opponents to mining when they are legally entitled to go and get an innocuous permit to learn about the potential of hydrogen and other minerals on the Department of Conservation estate—and watch this space.

I just remind members that filming inside the House is not something that’s permitted. Andy Foster.

No, that was it.

Oh, no more questions?

Oh, you can give me another one.

Yeah. Andy Foster. [Interruption] OK.

Mr Speaker, I’m told that we’d run out of numbers if I did that, so we’re leaving it there.

Three-second rule, son—missed it.

14:22 · to the Minister of Finance

Vinaka vakalevu, Mr Speaker. Does she stand by all her statements and actions?

In context, yes, including those statements I made in my discussions with the Fitch Ratings agency. I can assure members that I said the same thing to them in private as I say to New Zealanders in public.

Was she in the room when Barbara Edmonds met with Fitch?

No, but I wish I’d been a fly on that wall, because what it led the ratings agency to report was that the Opposition intends to achieve fiscal consolidation through additional revenue measures. I was surprised to read this because, of course, the capital gains tax which the Labour Party have announced, they’ve already said all of that money has been stitched up for doctors appointments—

Yeah, good—don’t push it too far.

So where would the extra revenue come from? Only you know, Barb. Good luck fixing your fiscal hole.

Are New Zealanders currently experiencing a cost of living crisis?

Yes, and events in the Middle East are playing a very significant role. We have seen the price of diesel almost double since that conflict began. Diesel is a fuel that powers not only vehicles but freight and a number of inputs into our economy, and it is correct to say that that will have an effect on the cost of living for New Zealanders. On the other hand, the effects of the events in the Middle East have shown that in the past couple of weeks we’ve seen that diesel price come down about 55c, which demonstrates that it is in all of our interests to see the conflict in the Middle East resolved as soon as possible.

How many families have actually received the full $250 that she promised them?

Well, as I’ve set out to that member several times—and I hope this time she’ll listen—National committed that the sum of our tax policies would deliver up to $250 a fortnight to families. We delivered on every single one of the commitments that underpinned that $250. Up to $150 of that would be delivered by the FamilyBoost payment—and I have been advised that more than 10,000 families have received that payment in a fortnight—and up to $100 of that would be contributed through our changes to personal income tax thresholds and changes to Working for Families credits. Now, that member opposed those tax reductions and opposed that additional income for New Zealanders. I’m proud that we delivered them actual cash into their bank accounts to help with the cost of living.

Does she stand by her statement that “This Government has got your back.” when 70 percent of workers didn’t get a pay rise above inflation in the last year?

Yes, because I’m not cooking up any secret taxes.

Is it having New Zealanders’ backs in a cost of living crisis when her Government is increasing the everyday costs through her gas tax, increases to car registration, the reinstatement of prescription fees, increases in line charges, and increases in council rates?

To pick one, we are introducing legislation to this House to cap rates increases, unlike that member who, again, opposes yet another practical measure to help with the cost of living. You see, the problem is that that member has an opinion on everything and a policy on nothing.

Question No. 7, Tim van de Molen. [Interruption] Just wait a moment, Mr van de Molen. [Interruption] That’s enough. Questions are heard in silence.

14:27 · to the Minister for Trade and Investment

What recent announcement has the Government made regarding the free-trade agreement with India?

On Monday, New Zealand signed a free-trade agreement (FTA) with India in New Delhi. This marks a major step forward in opening up one of the world’s fastest-growing markets for Kiwi exporters to their 1.4 billion consumers. Ninety-five percent of New Zealand’s exports face tariff elimination or reduction, almost the highest of any India FTA, and almost 57 percent of our exports will be duty-free on day one, increasing to 82 percent when fully implemented. The New Zealand - India free-trade agreement gives unprecedented access to India for Kiwi goods and services. This means that our businesses will be able to sell more, and employ more people, thus setting our businesses up to succeed and helping New Zealand with its goal of doubling the value of exports over 10 years.

What benefits will this agreement deliver for businesses and exporters across the Nelson, Tasman, and Kaikoura regions?

Well, many, but, in particular, for the New Zealand seafood industry and our top of the South—including Nelson fishers—one of the biggest wins in the agreement is seafood. Right now, New Zealand seafood exporters face tariffs of 33 percent in India, but, under the FTA, 90 percent of our exports in seafood will move to a zero tariff rate, phased in over seven years. We’ve also, for the first time, had a commitment from India in the FTA that perishable goods will cross their border and be cleared within 24 hours, meaning that fish and mussels and other things we produce will be able to be available to Indian consumers more quickly. The FTA means more high-quality New Zealand seafood will be exported to India, meaning Indian consumers will have choice over Australian and European fish and shellfish. Our seafood is better than theirs; Indians deserve to eat it.

What benefits will this agreement deliver for forestry businesses and exporters?

Well, the free-trade agreement is a big win for forestry and wood processors. The agreement delivers immediate tariff elimination on 95 percent of New Zealand’s forestry and wood exports on day one. Australian forestry exports, under their free-trade agreement, increased by 120 percent under their FTA in the first 12 months, while our exports during that period fell. The India - New Zealand FTA levels that playing field and more forestry—including processed timber, where value is added in New Zealand—will go to India, creating more jobs for Kiwis. This is great news for sawmills and wood processors from Northland to the central North Island; certainly Tokoroa, Kawerau, Te Puke, Gisborne, East Coast, all the way to Nelson, and many places in between.

What benefits will this agreement deliver for the mighty Hawke’s Bay?

Well, the Hawke’s Bay, along with the Bay of Plenty, Northland, Nelson, Southland—many parts of New Zealand are powerhouses of horticulture. This agreement delivers real wins for growers, particularly our apple trade. Right now, apples face a 50 percent tariff into India; under this free-trade agreement, that tariff rate will reduce to 25 percent, with an initial quota of 32,500 tonnes that matches our current apple exports to India. This quota will grow to 45,000 tonnes, or 300 million apples every year, over the next six years as our exports continue to grow. This is the first time India has included apples in a trade agreement, but it’s not just apples that will benefit; cherries, avocados, blueberries, persimmons also benefit, with full tariff elimination phased in over 10 years, giving our growers confidence to invest and create jobs.

Why sign an FTA which included the phrase, “nothing in this Agreement shall preclude the adoption by New Zealand of measures it deems necessary to accord more favourable treatment to Māori”, given that this language runs counter to the coalition Government’s approach that all New Zealanders should be equal under the law?

Well, that’s because that language is in many agreements, including the UAE agreement and the EU agreement that that member’s party voted for during this term of Parliament.

Point of order. That last statement is incorrect. Could I ask the Minister to prove what he just said about our party being on that side of that previous agreement on that clause?

Well, if that is the case, there’s a remedy the member should follow and a consequence for the Minister who made the statement.

14:32 · to the Minister for Māori Development

Does he support the proposal to cut roles from Te Puni Kōkiri, on top of earlier reductions; if so, why?

Decisions around staffing levels at Te Puni Kōkiri (TPK) are operational matters and are the responsibility of the Secretary for Māori Development, as chief executive. The member will be—well, at least should be—aware of section 54 of the Public Service Act 2020, passed when he was a Minister of the Crown, which provides that there is a duty on the chief executive of agencies like Te Puni Kōkiri to act independently on employment matters.

Since taking office, how many people have lost their jobs at Te Puni Kōkiri?

I am advised that, since around June 2024, there has been a net reduction of 25.4 fulltime-equivalent staff at Te Puni Kōkiri.

How can he defend further job cuts when Te Puni Kōkiri has just taken on new monitoring and Māori-Crown relations functions and is supposed to be holding other agencies to account for their performance for Māori?

You see, this is partly a question that can help me explore the differences between the member, whose modus operandi and party believe in massive, big government and spraying the cash bazooka, and the fiscal prudence that exists on this side of the House. We are not about the quantity of roles through Government but, actually, the quality of advice, and I’m very confident about the quality of the advice that the Ministry of Māori Development—Te Puni Kōkiri—is providing me.

Does he believe it is his role as Minister to advocate permanently for the expansion of full-time roles at Government departments he is responsible for, or to actually address Māori disadvantage and promote Māori economic development?

Definitely the latter is my role, and also to support the Ministry of Māori Development to actually deliver on its statutory role, rather than expand all roles for all New Zealanders and all Māori at the whim of a Minister. That is not my role.

Does he agree with Tama Potaka that “Anything less than an increase in power for Māori would signal yet another failure in respecting the Treaty”, and, if so, how does cutting jobs at TPK achieve this objective?

Again, the member confuses the citation of that great and diligent man Tama Potaka with the quantity or number of staff at a single agency, and I recommend that that member talk with Tama Potaka—great guy—at Copperfields after this debate.

Does he agree with David Seymour that population ministries, like TPK, slow down the business of Government, and, if so, is this the reason why he is slowly cutting staff, to prepare for TPK to be cut altogether?

I recall traversing this matter before; I’m not responsible for the views of David Seymour, and I recommend that the member actually checks the record to ensure that that is consistent with what has actually been said by David Seymour.

Is there any evidence that increasing the number of public servants employed in the back office of Government agencies addresses New Zealanders’ cost of living or income opportunities?

I am aware that there was an increase of about a third in the Public Service between 2017 and 2023, and, at this time, a number of health and wealth indicators in this country absolutely deteriorated—most importantly, for me, indicators such as the 2-year-old immunisation rate of Māori, which dropped from about 90 percent to below 65 percent. That’s why having targets in place and making sure that we work collaboratively across Government and with the agencies to meet those targets is absolutely important. Might I add and acknowledge the work of Minister Goldsmith and Minister Mitchell, who have seen a reduction in the number of serious persistent young offenders who are Māori from 784 to 594 in the last two years. Tēnā kōrua.

Does he admit that the latest job cuts prove the Government’s negative Māori agenda is ramping up, and for all his rhetoric about thriving whānau, the only things thriving under National are more cuts and misery for Māori?

Point of order.

Again, the member—

Wait on, there’s a point of order, and I think I can anticipate it, but Mr Jones?

Sir, you know as well as I do that Speakers’ ruling 196 makes that question completely out of order. That’s an unsubstantiated assertion about a negative agenda towards Māori.

Yes, that is strictly true, but, as the member has pointed out, I think, twice in this question time, where I have allowed questions that are of a political nature, political answers are given, and the Minister seemed very capable of doing that.

Two or three observations from me: the member again conflates an assumption and an absolute misunderstanding of the intention of this Government to deliver outcomes alongside, with, and for Māori, whether or not it’s in housing, health, education, or indeed resource management, Treaty settlements, social development, or a range of other matters. Let me tell you a short story: five years ago, some relations of people in this House sought to resolve the issues arising over 150 years with the Nelson Tenths, and the previous Government absolutely failed to deliver on their aspirations, and it took this Government to actually step up and deal with those concerns after 150 years. I’m very proud to be part of a Government that has dealt with the issues in the Nelson Tenths and Whakatū situation, and I look forward to seeing members opposite on the day we pass that legislation.

14:38 · to the Associate Minister of Agriculture

What recent announcement has the Government made about supporting farmers and growers?

On Monday, the Government signed a free-trade agreement (FTA) with India, in New Delhi. This agreement has been described as a once-in-a-lifetime deal, a landmark FTA, and historic. This agreement opens doors, and offers further opportunities to our farmers and growers. These are opportunities that have not previously been available. We know that our food and fibre is world class. This agreement will allow these products entry into a new market without significant barriers. This agreement will help grow our export returns and allow our farmers and growers better access to a market of 1.4 billion customers.

What benefits will farmers and growers see in the horticultural industry?

I would like to share some fantastic news with the member for Southland, which includes part of the Central Otago region, and let him know what this free-trade agreement will look like for some in his local area. Cherry growers, for example, will have tariffs eliminated from the current 33 percent down to zero over 10 years. In other parts of the country, kiwifruit growers will also see tariffs eliminated for kiwifruit within quota. This quota is set to grow over six years to anticipate growth in exports from our mighty kiwifruit industry. This makes kiwi exporters more competitive on the world stage. This is nothing but good news for an FTA that will bear fruit for our growers.

What benefits will our wine growers and exporters see from this agreement?

Thank you to the member for Waitaki, who is in an area of high growth for the wine industry. Tariffs on wine will be reduced from 150 percent to either 25 or 50 percent, depending on the value of the wine, over 10 years—plus a most favoured nation commitment. The most favoured nation clause negotiated in our agreement means that additional benefits negotiated with other trading nations must be extended to New Zealand, contingent on our agreement with India entering into force before others with more favourable wine commitments such as the recently concluded EU-India FTA. This will be worth tens of millions of dollars in extra exports for New Zealand businesses, and so we are working hard to make this happen. Cheers to that.

What benefits will our beekeepers and apiculture industry see from this agreement?

One thing we are absolutely sure of is New Zealand mānuka honey is a premium sought-after product overseas. The good news for Whanganui and other honey-producing regions is that tariffs on mānuka honey will be cut from 66 percent to 16.5 percent over five years. The India free-trade agreement is making New Zealand products, like mānuka honey, more competitive in an international market, and it offers opportunities that we have not previously had in one of the world’s fastest-growing economies. The beekeepers are buzzing with excitement.

Question No. 10, Ricardo Menéndez March. It’s very rowdy today, so we’ll just wait till the House settles itself and hears your question respectfully in silence.

14:42 · to the Minister of Immigration

Does she agree with the Union Network of Migrants that “migrants are not disposable workers”; if not, why not?

No person is disposable. However, our priority always must be job opportunities for New Zealanders, especially in times of economic challenge. I appreciate that there are some migrants who came to New Zealand for lower-skilled roles who are approaching the end of their visa, and wish to remain here. However, it was clear when they came to New Zealand that these were temporary work visas, and it is important that New Zealanders who are seeking work have the opportunity to apply for these jobs when migrants reach the end of their maximum continuous stay.

Does she agree that the stand-down period, which prevents workers from being able to remain in a job for the long term, contributes to poorer wages, lower working conditions, and poorer productivity as a result of employers not being able to retain them?

How the hell is that related to the primary?

No, but on this topic—

Hang on a minute. It relates to the answer given by the Minister, which, perhaps if you look at the Hansard later, you’ll see makes the question admissible. Ask the question again, please, Mr Menéndez March.

Thank you so much. The question was: does she agree that the stand-down period, which prevents workers from being able to remain in a job for the long term, contributes to poorer wages, lower working conditions, and poorer productivity due to employers not being able to retain these workers?

Point of order, Mr Speaker. Sir, that cannot be true. That man is reading off a prepared question which was not related to what her response was, and it’s certainly unrelated to the primary question.

No, it’s not—well, the only person who decides whether a question is valid or not is me. Mr Menéndez March, please ask the question again.

Does she agree that the stand-down period, which prevents workers from being able to remain in a job in the long term, contributes to poorer wages, lower working conditions, and poorer productivity due to employers not being able to retain these workers in the long term?

No, I don’t agree with that, but what I do agree with is that it is very important for New Zealanders to be prioritised for jobs, and I’d like to acknowledge the hard work of the Minister for Social Development and Employment, Louise Upston, and the Ministry of Social Development (MSD) for contacting New Zealanders who need work and job opportunities when people who are coming towards the end of their maximum continuous stay are required to leave New Zealand, giving Kiwis access to these jobs.

Does she agree with Val Scott, who has been teaching English for speakers of other languages, including pre - International English Language Testing System (IELTS) preparation, in New Zealand for 30 years, that “IELTS, along with many other similar testing systems, especially requiring band 6.5”—this is the case for migrant bus drivers—“are completely inappropriate for establishing the ability to settle in the country.”?

I do not. This is a standard of English that has been in place since the early 2000s, across multiple Governments, and it does ensure that migrants are able to settle well in New Zealand. I would also make the point that it’s only the primary applicant that has to have that level of English. Their partner and their children do not, and it is very important for that person to be able to live and integrate well into New Zealand society, and that is why we have such good levels of settlement in this country.

Is it not correct that she lifted those very requirements to one that is even higher for undergraduate students trying to start at university?

No.

Is it the Government’s intent that a migrant leave a role at the end of their temporary work visa?

Yes. The purpose of temporary work visas is to fill skills shortages where a New Zealander is not available. As migrants reach the end of their work visa, the thousands of potential vacancies provide a critical opportunity for New Zealanders to be first in line for jobs. Immigration New Zealand and MSD are jointly undertaking a work programme in this, and last year, Immigration New Zealand identified employers with employees coming to the end of their maximum continuous stay. They provided this information to MSD, who contacted the affected employers, and to date have filled 400 of these roles with people who are needing work. That’s 400 New Zealanders who now have jobs and are able to provide for their families and their future because this Government is committed to prioritising New Zealanders for work, including taking the hard immigration decisions that we need to ensure this happens.

Does she accept that she has different standards for multimillionaire golden visa holders who get the right to vote, make larger anonymous political donations, and buy multiple homes without having to sit any—

Oh no—no, sorry.

This is the English language—

No, I’m sorry. That question is—

Point of order.

No, there’s no point of order. [Interruption] There’s only one person speaking at the moment, and it’s me. That question is ruled out.

OK. Is it correct that golden visa holders are able to buy homes, make larger anonymous political donations, and get the right to vote without sitting any English tests?

Those things—

Point of order.

No, hang on. There is implication in that question, but it should be answered.

There are things in that question that are not linked. Any person who becomes a tax resident in this country has the ability to buy a house, and any person in this country becomes also a resident. What the member seems to be suggesting with his questions down the English language route is that there should be the same level of English language for all resident visa holders, and, if that is the case, a refugee who is a partner of a New Zealander should also face these higher English language requirements. If that’s what he is suggesting, then feel free to take that to the election.

Question No. 11—

Point of order, Mr Speaker. The questioner, in his question, insinuated that a foreigner without any status in this country nevertheless could make financial contributions to political parties. That statement is false. It’s outside the law, and he’s been here long enough to have learnt that, rather than make that foul insinuation and get away with it.

Well, I appreciate that and I understood that, and I was of a view that that answer would be coming from the floor and the member has now provided it.

14:50 · to the Minister of Transport

Does he stand by his statement regarding heavy vehicle weight limits that “there are sensible changes we can make that will lift productivity without compromising standards”?

Yes, I stand by my full statement, which is, “We need to balance that with safety and network impacts, but there are sensible changes we can make that will lift productivity without compromising standards.” The Government is exploring a range of temporary, targeted, and timely measures to support New Zealanders; this includes preparatory work to remove or suspend regulatory barriers that make it harder for businesses and communities to cope with global fuel shocks. Small increases in permitted loads for heavy vehicles could reduce the number of trips needed, saving time, lowering costs, and reducing fuel use.

How can he claim these changes will not compromise standards when he himself has acknowledged there is “no doubt” roads will suffer from heavier trucks, and such a change will put pressure on repairs and maintenance, and on former Minister of Transport Simeon Brown’s pothole patrol?

I think the answer is in the answer to the primary question, which is that we need to balance that with safety and network impacts. We’re doing the work right now, and no decisions have been made.

Does a proposal to lift heavy vehicle weight limits have the support of all three coalition parties given that, when asked whether he would veto changes to truck weight limits, one coalition partner has said, “Stand back and watch”, and, “We are not going to go down that pathway”?

The Government hasn’t considered any formal advice on the matters the member is referring to.

Does he agree with Winston Peters that weight limits “are put there for good reasons, because of potholes and bridge strength”?

Yes, in a general sense. It is undoubtedly true that heavy vehicles have an impact on the road. We are considering that matter right now, and, as I say—

Why did you make an announcement?

Well, we’ll make an announcement when we’ve made a decision. That’s generally how Government works. I know that member wasn’t in Government for very long and has maybe forgotten how the Cabinet process works, but generally, on this side of the House, we go through a process, we do the work, we take a paper to Cabinet, and then, when we’ve made a decision, we announce it. I look forward to making sure that we continue to be the ones doing the announcing and the decision making for a long time to come.

Should weight limit changes proceed, will he accept responsibility for safety and other concerns having been disregarded—concerns that have been expressed by members of his own coalition Government?

Well, as I say, the member makes a not unreasonable point that the impact of heavy vehicles has an impact on the roading network. We are considering that, and you’ve also got to balance it with the undoubted situation that we find ourselves in, or potentially find ourselves in. If the fuel crisis worsens, we might find ourselves in a situation in which it would make sense for trucks to do fewer trips, and thus improving fuel economy—

Rubbish.

Well, the member says “rubbish”, but that is definitely true. It is definitely true that if trucks are able to do fewer trips and take more when they do the same number of trips, that is good for fuel economy. It’s a simple matter of economics and maths. I know maths aren’t the Labour Party’s strong suit, as we get a daily demonstration of, but I invite the member to actually look at the facts.

Does the Minister share the concerns of a broad number of New Zealanders with the increased cost of fuel, and is it therefore the Government’s position that it will consider a range of practical measures to reduce the cost of fuel and the use of fuel, and does that include everything from electric vehicle licensing, through to more use of rail, through to reducing red tape on freight?

Yes, indeed. I have seen suggestions from some people that the Government should just do something, and then when the Government does decide to consider doing something, they don’t like that either.

Why is he prioritising regulatory relief for the trucking industry when ordinary New Zealanders are paying record prices at the pump just to get to work, drop their kids off at school, and put food on the table?

Well, this is a classic of the Labour Party genre, which is a series of fallacious assertions backed up with no policy of their own. As Minister, I am prioritising regulatory relief—in fact, the whole Government is prioritising regulatory relief for everyone.

As Minister of Transport, is it his understanding that food on the table more often than not comes on trucks, and, if that is true, will the Government have any communication plans to get that across to some of the simpler members of the Labour Party?

Well, Mr Speaker—

No—sorry. Just a minute—

Mr Speaker—

Question No. 11 interrupted.

14:56 · to the Associate Minister of Transport

What recent announcements has he made about land transport rules?

Recently, Minister of Transport Chris Bishop and I announced that New Zealand’s warrant of fitness—and with your indulgences, sir, I’ll refer to them as WOFs—and certificate of fitness A, which I’ll refer to as COFs, light vehicle inspection requirements will soon be significantly reformed, saving Kiwis valuable time and money. The changes mean that most light vehicles under 14 years old will move to two-yearly WOF inspections, up from yearly, and new vehicles will go to four years before needing their WOF. Older vehicles, motorcycles, and light rental vehicles will move from six-monthly to yearly inspections.

How much will this save Kiwis a year?

These are simple changes that will deliver massive benefits for Kiwis. The cost-benefit analysis done by officials shows that these changes are expected to deliver between $2.6 billion and $4.1 billion in net benefits to Kiwis over 30 years through reduced inspection fees, less time spent on compliance, and fewer unnecessary repairs. I know many people around the country, including people in this House, will welcome these changes, especially when many households are feeling pressure due to high fuel prices caused by the ongoing conflict in the Middle East.

When will these changes come into effect?

From 1 November, most light vehicle users will benefit from these changes, but it is important to note that the ongoing obligation to keep your vehicle roadworthy—including your tyres—in tip-top shape, continues. We all have an obligation to keep our vehicles roadworthy at all times, and there will be increased penalties and enforcement for people who don’t.

That concludes question time. We’ll just take a brief 30 seconds for those who have to leave the House before I call for the general debate to begin.

14:59

I move, That the House take note of miscellaneous business.

This week, Friday is Mayday, International Workers’ Day, a really important opportunity to think about the state of worker solidarity in Aotearoa and, actually, across the country. What we’re seeing right now is that while this Government wants to divide working people against each other by sowing division and misplaced fear, regular working people are actually uniting, coming together, and fighting back. This coalition wants us to blame our neighbour for a lack of jobs, homes, and adequate healthcare; for the failing state of flood protection and infrastructure that leaves the beaches polluted and homes filled with mud.

Winston wants us to blame immigrants. Look at his party’s—Mr Winston Peters.

The member cannot just use a name like that—

Thank you, Mr Speaker. Mr Winston Peters—

I haven’t finished speaking. The member must use a member’s full name.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. Mr Winston Peters wants us to blame migrants. Just look at his party’s rhetoric on Chinese people and on the India free-trade agreement. Mr David Seymour wants us to blame Māori. Look at the lengths that they’re going to remove te reo Māori from public places and undermine Te Tiriti at every step. They had their own ACT Party candidate advising the Minister and the Government on reviewing and removing Treaty clauses from legislation. The Prime Minister, Mr Luxon, wants us to blame beneficiaries for unemployment. Look at what they’ve done to remove the benefit from young people and create a host of new sanctions for how people are supposed to survive.

This Government is taking their hands off the wheel and choosing to maintain the hardship that ordinary regular people are facing every single day, while right in front of all of our eyes the wealthy few are hoarding more and more wealth than ever before. Ganesh Nana wrote about this last year in the household net-worth survey, where the wealth divide has become a chasm. People know this. They can see it; they can feel it. Nurses and police and cleaners and bus drivers and early childhood education teachers know that they are, effectively, paying more effective tax than the wealthy owning tens and dozens and loads of houses. They can see this. They’re not buying the line that the economic recovery is helping them, because they are feeling it every single day. One hundred and nineteen families and individuals on the rich list hold as much wealth as nearly half of all New Zealanders. People know that is wrong, and this fossil fuel crisis is another chance for the mega-rich to cash in on that and to exploit that while the system that they’ve designed squeezes regular people harder and keeps us reliant on fossil fuel.

Research released just yesterday showed that six of the biggest fossil fuel companies are making $3,000 per second in profits during a crisis where ordinary people are struggling—$37 million a day above what they made last year. People know this is wrong. People know this system is unfair. People know that it needs fixing because people also know that there is enough for everyone, but this Government, and multi-millionaires and billionaires, want us to believe otherwise.

At this election, then, we have a choice between working people having to work longer just to survive—to pay the bills, to get kai, to pay the rent, and to pay the power bill—while the rich get richer and richer, or we can finally tax the wealthy few so that everyone can have healthcare, affordable housing, and jobs that work for us. We can have an economy that works for working people, and a planet that sustains us for today and for mokopuna to come.

You can hear the objections of the people. Who are they working for? Whose interests are the people on the other side of the House working for when they are protecting the unfair systems that everyone else can see is wrong, and when they are protecting the wealthy few holding on to their wealth while workers—

Marama Davidson, you know that that’s a completely inappropriate line of debate—totally—making accusations like that, so that’s the end of that speech. I call on the Hon Nicola Willis.

15:04

It is a historic week. This week, New Zealand signed a once-in-a-generation free-trade agreement with India. This means more jobs, higher incomes, and more export opportunities. Our Prime Minister, Chris Luxon, in Opposition said it could be done, and he got it done. He did it with the support of my colleague behind me: the Hon Todd McClay, a negotiator for the ages.

At a time of global uncertainty, opening the doors to a market of 1.4 billion people is exactly the practical economic leadership New Zealanders need. What it means is new opportunities in job-rich industries, evening the playing field with those countries with whom we compete, making it easier for our exporters who produce apples, kiwifruit, sheep meat, wool, coal, wine, iron, steel, aluminium, and honey to reach that important market. But it has not gone unnoticed that there were naysayers along the way—that there were detractors. First of all, we had Labour, who said it couldn’t be done. They didn’t even have it on the agenda.

I do want to turn now to other critics, and, yes, those are my friends in New Zealand First, with whom we have agreed to disagree on this matter. New Zealand First are on the wrong side of history on this one, just as they were on the wrong side of history when they opposed the China free-trade agreement. Before we had that agreement, we only had $2.5 billion worth of exports to that market. Today, what is it? More than $20 billion. That is what a free-trade agreement can achieve. It can support jobs. It supports the regional communities New Zealand First say they care about but clearly don’t talk too often, because those regional communities know that the farmers want access to India, and they don’t like New Zealand First’s opposition to it. But, actually, what we really need to call out in this House—and I want to acknowledge Marama Davidson for doing the same—is the race-based scaremongering that New Zealand First have indulged in in opposing this free-trade agreement.

I want to call out Labour, because, actually, along the way, you too sidled up on the anti-immigration rhetoric.

No, I did not.

You were quite happy to sit back on that, but here, in particular, I want to quote a remark in Parliament that was made in public. I apologise in advance, because it will offend this House; it offended me. Let me tell you, it has offended New Zealanders of Indian descent up and down this country, who have been in touch with our MPs, in touch with our Ministers, and who are hurt and feel betrayed. That comment was that a free-trade agreement with India—so that our exporters can sell their goods and services there—would unleash a “butter chicken tsunami”.

Shameful.

Well, shame on you, Shane Jones. I enjoy working with you around the Cabinet table, but that kind of race-based rhetoric has no place in New Zealand politics. To those New Zealanders of Indian descent—actually, to all New Zealanders who are fair-minded and good-minded—I want you to know that we hear you and we back you. We know that the contribution that people from India have made to this economy has been, and will continue to be, immense, and they deserve to be respected for their contributions and not described in that way.

Now, it didn’t go unnoticed that Labour indulged in a bit of the anti-immigration speculation as well, but that’s the state of Labour today—

Point of order, Mr Speaker. That is the second time that that member has made an inaccurate and quite serious accusation against this party. It is not true, and it is, I think, deliberately misleading this House to accuse the Labour Party of sidling up to views we all find repugnant.

The member knows that there is a course of action he can follow for that. This is a debate, and where debating material is thought to be inaccurate, there is a remedy for parties to follow. I call the Hon Nicola Willis for her last 30 seconds.

That is the state of Labour today: bark at every passing car, have an opinion on everything, a policy on nothing. Their chickens are coming home to roost. They’ve made dozens of unfunded policies, and they’ve actually been caught out with these promises this week. In plain English, what they told the Fitch Ratings agency is that they’ll sort it all out with more taxes.

You weren’t in the room.

Well, they haven’t told New Zealanders yet. Deborah’s pretty shirty about it, but just you wait, it’s coming. Meanwhile: practical economic leadership, a free-trade agreement.

15:10

Is this a Government that’s going to give Kiwis confidence? Is that a Government that says to New Zealanders that they are focused on the things that matter? When they have an opportunity to talk about what this Government is doing, they make things up and they have a crack at their coalition partners. They have demonstrated what Kiwis have seen all through the last week, where they actually can’t get through one topic and one speech without having a go at each other. They got into bed with New Zealand First. Don’t cry about it now. The fact of it is that they knew exactly what they were getting into. Their polls have dropped, to the benefit of New Zealand First; they’re starting to panic, and now they’re having a crack at them. It’s not going to wash. It’s your own doing. You shouldn’t have signed up to it; you did. They’re your mates. Deal with it.

The fact of the matter is that New Zealanders don’t have confidence with this Government, because, for 2½ years, they’ve been blaming everybody else. Now they’re even blaming themselves. They’re blaming their own coalition partners to take attention from the fact that it was actually only a week ago that Christopher Luxon, under huge pressure, put up a confidence vote in caucus and almost lost to an empty chair. That’s how bad things are for Christopher Luxon. He was backed into a corner. He knew he was losing support. If it wasn’t for Stuart Smith getting lost somewhere in Marlborough on the way, then Christopher Luxon would have had a challenge on his hands. He stood up, he took the numbers, and from what I gather, and from what I’ve been hearing, double digits of his caucus voted no. There was nobody to replace him—no one to replace him but an empty chair, and he almost lost.

But I want to thank the members of the National Party for voting for Chris Luxon, because we’re very happy that he is there. We are very happy that he is there, because the more that New Zealanders see from Christopher Luxon, the less they like; the more they start to realise that this Government is empty—it has nothing. If it’s not written in front of them, they don’t know what to say. It was on display in question time today. Andy Foster got given an additional supplementary question from the Speaker and he didn’t know what to say, because no one had written it down for him. He just sat there like a deer in the headlights. Surely you would think, 2½ years after getting into Government, that they would have something to talk about, something to crow about when given a free pass—they didn’t take it!

How about those policies? Any policies yet, mate?

The one-termers are piping up. No wonder they’re worried, because they know that their jobs are nearly done. They know that when New Zealanders see that there are 32,000 thousand fewer jobs in this country, they know this Government has to take responsibility for that. They know, when there are 2,000 people leaving the country every week, that the Government is refusing to take responsibility for that. When 15 percent—that’s the number of business liquidations, that’s what it’s increased by; they have not taken responsibility for that. They refuse to take responsibility for the 18 percent increase in power prices. There are people in this country that are paying 100 bucks to visit the doctor.

We’ve come up with a solution to that. We’re going to use a capital gains tax to pay for three free GP visits for everyone in the country. What’s their answer? “No, I don’t like that. No, no, no, no, we’re quite happy with people paying $100 to go and see their doctor.” They’re crowing about making it easier to access prescriptions, but let’s not forget that they used to be free. They put the charges back on them, make it slightly easier, and say, “Aren’t we great?” Well, the answer to that is no—and more and more New Zealanders are answering that. That is why they are polling in the mid-20s, because people have had enough.

They’ve had enough of the excuses. They’ve had enough of the distractions. They’ve had enough of the infighting and the bickering. They’ve had enough of these empty National MPs who promised to fix the cost of living and have made things worse.

Fixed it up after you guys decimated it.

Earlier today in question time—it’s actually against the Standing Orders to change seats to heckle, but heckle all you like. You may as well make the most of the time you’ve got. What is it? Four months? Get into it.

Chris Hipkins asked the Prime Minister some simple questions today. How much has the average shop gone up for families? He pretended he didn’t know; he knows full well. He doesn’t want to admit—it’s $250, for the record. How much has the monthly power bill gone up? Again, he refused to talk about it. What about home, contents, car insurance? What about filling up the tank? All he had was excuses. All he had was blame. All he had was distractions. But that is all they have had for 2½ years, and New Zealanders are seeing through it. We know their days are numbered, and if you listen to Nicola Willis’s speech, she knows they are, as well. When they are so desperate that they are going to spend their first contribution to a general debate having a crack at their coalition partners because they are eating their lunch, you know something’s up. They know they are buggered, they know their time’s up, and, at this election, New Zealanders are going to have their say.

15:15

I’d almost take that last member, Kieran McAnulty, seriously, although for very different reasons he’s imagined. He does know what it’s like to lose his seat. He had one in the Wairarapa and he lost it at the last election. So to my colleagues who are out doorknocking and campaigning hard, who always believed when Christopher Luxon said we could do a free-trade agreement with India, and Kieran McAnulty—who’s actually given up on his ambition to lead the Labour Party at the moment because of a lack of policy—says he thinks you might lose your seat, good on all of you for standing up for what’s right for New Zealanders, getting out there and knocking on doors, and believing Chris Luxon when he said this Government would make our relationship with India a strategic priority and we would do a high-quality free-trade agreement with India in our first term.

It’s that kind of vision that the country has always had in trade and that we have brought in abundance, and the statistics have been very well canvassed. Can I say to all members, having had a very large delegation of New Zealand businesses, trade associations, and Indian New Zealanders who are so proud of what New Zealand has to offer the world, jump on a plane with a day’s notice and travel to India to witness the historic occasion of the signing of the free-trade agreement actually speaks wonders for the ambition of New Zealanders and how New Zealanders know that when something is good for them is done, that it is worth celebrating and celebrating quickly.

India is a nation of 1.4 billion people. For every single Kiwi, that’s more than 250 Indians, if my maths is correct. So, ultimately, what that means is that it’s a market that we have never had access to in this way before. It is now the most populous country in the world and we are in on the ground floor as they continue to grow their economy and become confident. Think of it: a country of 5 million people at the bottom of the world, and yesterday, when we arrived and signed on Monday—that was Tuesday here—that evening, on all of the television stations in India, wall-to-wall coverage of a little country called New Zealand that punches above its weight compared to many others, is opening up access for our exporters, and that does nothing but produce jobs that make New Zealanders wealthier.

We can hear from the Opposition, from the Labour Party, the solution to all of our problems is another tax; actually, it’s not. It is through growing the economy, giving Kiwis choices, actually allowing opportunity for New Zealand businesses, and leveling the playing field so that in a market like India with 1.4 billion people, Kiwi companies can not only compete fairly against Australians but they will beat them in that market—and against the Europeans and against the Americans. Against every single country in the world, Christopher Luxon, this Government, and the National Party backs New Zealanders and New Zealand businesses to do as well as they can.

Not New Zealand First. No, Todd, not New Zealand First.

Well, I mean, Damien O’Connor, who I have a lot of respect for because he flew all the way there and back with me at our invitation, is getting at New Zealand First, but not for the reasons that the coalition would say we don’t agree; we’re allowed to agree to disagree. It’s because he ruled out Labour and he ruled out Chris Hipkins from the next Government. So, all of a sudden, they’ve changed their tune, right? But I guarantee you, they’re still sending their gifts across from India.

Putting that aside, 1.4 billion people: we back New Zealand businesses to do well. The way to actually allow New Zealanders to do more is not to tax them more; it’s to allow them to create businesses to sell more, to do well overseas, to meet their ambition, and for the Government to go and join them. It’s a long list of things that we have succeeded in in this country, in India: sheep, meat, wood, forestry, kiwifruit, coal, dairy, a reduction of tariffs rates, or duty-free on day one. That seafood that we were talking about at question time earlier is significant. With 1.4 billion people, we don’t have to sell a mussel to all of them; we can just sell it to half of them. By golly, in Nelson—a seat that we’re going to take off Labour at the next election because of a hard-working MP who cares about them—if we could do that there, the people of Nelson would actually be wealthier. Do you know what we actually need in New Plymouth? A seafood industry, as well as a gas industry. Labour closed that city down. We’re rebuilding it but giving them more options. It’s a wonderful, wonderful thing.

Mānuka honey: unique to New Zealand—those Australians like to try to claim the word “mānuka” from time to time. Up in India, when people brought the gift of mānuka honey with them and gave it to some of their counterparts, businesses, and so on, you know what they said? “This is a wonderful product; New Zealand is the first country in the world to have a reduction of tariff rate on honey into India, and, actually, there are 400 million or 500 million people in India who are wealthy who will buy this; please produce as much as you can.” It’s good for every single part of New Zealand.

15:20

Tēnā koe e te Māngai o te Whare. While we see the opposite side of the House so focused on themselves and their own jobs and bickering amongst their coalition Government, they are failing to see the real issues facing their constituencies. Kiwis up and down the country are struggling with the basics. Yes, bills are up; yes, fuel costs more; but a sign of how bad things are getting is that many New Zealanders are now struggling to afford food.

You don’t need to look too far to see how bad it has gotten under this Government. Headlines like, “Northland residents using Afterpay to buy essentials amid cost of living crisis”. In Whanganui: “Food insecurity new normal as support agencies fight to stay open”; “Waged workers now lining up for food support as need surges”; “Budgeting services sees increased demand for food and financial support”. According to the New Zealand Food Network’s recent report, 33 percent of New Zealanders experienced some form of food insecurity last year—that’s one in three.

But if you dive a bit deeper, you see that it gets even worse; 68 percent of people who reported food insecurity said they were experiencing it for the first time; 48 percent of low-income respondents have experienced it, but so have 29 percent of medium-income families, and even 12 percent of high-income families. For Pasifika, the rate of households who have experienced food insecurity is 64 percent; for Māori, it’s over 50 percent; and for disabled people, it’s 82 percent. This is, quite simply, disgraceful. What the House needs to keep in mind is that this report is about 2025—and 2025, in case the Government members on the other side of the House have forgotten, is before the current fuel crisis.

Since the start of the fuel crisis, we’ve had food banks tell us that families are struggling to even be able to afford to access the food support that they need. They cannot afford to drive to the food bank. They cannot afford the bus ticket to get to the food bank. We’ve got organisations like the Kindness Collective, who do an incredible job serving children and whānau in need, who have experienced a 336 percent increase in demand for their services, while other organisations, like St Vincent de Paul, have seen a sharp rise in people being unable to pick up their food parcels. I visited Visionwest, in West Auckland, and it’s a similar situation. The demand from families needing food support is increasing, but people cannot afford to come and pick it up. We also had the Pacific Trust talking about the increase in demand. Many organisations across the country are supporting communities in need.

This is the reality of life under National: more and more people needing assistance, but who can’t even afford to get it. What was the Government’s response to that? Well, they mostly just cross their fingers and hope that it will all go away. They talked about “targeted” support, but they haven’t targeted these people in need. They see more and more people lose their jobs, seek assistance, and then kick them while they’re down. They ignore the struggles that Kiwis are going through. Christoper Luxon promised to fix the cost of living. The National Party promised to fix the cost of living. Instead, they have made it worse. Now, every third person you meet in New Zealand may have gone without food in the last year.

Everything costs more, the economy is weaker, and people aren’t just worse off; people are hungry. Our message to Kiwis is that the Labour Party is focused on what matters—on your job, on your health, on your home—so you can build a future for your family here; so you can afford to build your future here in Aotearoa. Kia ora.

15:26

“If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.” Those words are from George Orwell, and they are words that this House would do well to remember today.

The Broadcasting Standards Authority (BSA) made little sense when it was created, and it makes even littler sense now. Gone are the days of rabbit-ear television and adjusting the antenna. Yes, I am old enough to remember those days, when I was out flatting—

That’s hardly believable.

—and now we have everything at our fingertips—oh, there’s a few people in this room that remember that, too. The Broadcasting Standards Authority has become irrelevant. It has not only become irrelevant; if we just actually call it what it is, it has become a group of Wellington bureaucrats that are the taste police on content on the internet. That is what we are seeing. In my very humble opinion, and those of very many New Zealanders, this is an extremely dangerous precedent to set.

New Zealanders, as we know, are getting their media from all around the world now. We’re seeing it not just here in New Zealand; they’re getting their media from everywhere around the globe, and that is the beauty of the internet. When the Broadcasting Standards Authority was set up, the internet was not even a thing. For the Broadcasting Standards Authority to go out of their remit and, essentially, police the internet is actually a really scary thought.

Do you know what? It’s funny, because I look at the BSA’s own justification for its own existence, and it is so incredibly weak. The BSA claims its job is—and I quote from their website—“Overseeing and promoting broadcasting standards on behalf of New Zealanders”. But I think there is a more honest motto it could adopt: “War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength.”, because the BSA now looks more like something out of Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four than something that belongs in a modern liberal democracy.

Freedom of speech is not a nice-to-have, it’s not a luxury of a modern society, it’s not something that you get to pick and choose whether you like to hear something or you don’t; it’s a fundamental human right, and fundamental to every other freedom that follows on from it. It’s the underlying basis for freedom of religion, freedom to protest, and many more. If you take away speech, you take away it all. If you don’t believe in free speech consistently—if you only believe in it for the views that you agree with—then you don’t really believe in it at all.

It does not even matter whether someone is saying something correct. Often, I see my friends over in the Greens spouting off some kind of nonsense that surely nobody thinks is correct, and some may even say that’s helpful to New Zealanders. But as Evelyn Beatrice Hall famously wrote, “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.”, and I defend even the Greens and Te Pāti Māori’s right to have their opinions.

To me, the argument about whether the BSA needs to exist comes down to a simple question: do we trust New Zealanders, or do we believe the State knows better? Because right now, the BSA stands there as a podium of truth, deciding which views are acceptable for the public to hear and quietly snuffling out the ones that aren’t.

ACT trusts New Zealanders. We trust them to hear different viewpoints and to make up their own minds. We trust them to push back against the ideas that they disagree with. We trust them to argue, to debate, and to think for themselves. New Zealanders are not children who need to be coddled by the State or shielded from anything that might actually hurt their feelings; they are adults, they are citizens, and they are perfectly capable of handling speech that they don’t agree with at all. For the critics out there who say that removing the BSA will be a free-for-all; it won’t be. We have the Media Council. We have defamation laws here in New Zealand. Threats against violence—we have protections in place. The BSA is completely irrelevant now.

Yes, there will be speech that people don’t like. I’m sure some people in the House don’t like this speech right now. There will be opinions that offend and provoke, but that is not a flaw of a free society; it is the beauty of one, and a price worth paying. Abolish the BSA.

15:31

New Zealand is, at its core, a trading nation. We depend on value created from the land, the sea, the rivers, our fields, and from our ingenuity. The returns from our trade are not just numbers on a page; they are the lifeblood that finances our schools, our hospitals, our police, our defence force, and all the services that every resident and citizen expects. When trade succeeds, the whole country prospers, and nowhere is that clearer than in the mighty Waitaki. The newly inked free-trade agreement with India is truly great news for our farmers, growers, and fishers—the local industries whose world-class products are the pride of our region. From Oamaru’s historic precinct to the green heartlands of Waimate, through the high country of Mackenzie to the fertile slopes of Central Otago and the Upper Clutha, the benefits will be felt far and wide.

Let’s talk wine. Waitaki boasts many renowned vineyards and wine producers. This is a growing industry in the region. Until now, our wines have faced a staggering 150 percent tariff at the Indian border. Thanks to this agreement, those tariffs will drop to as low as 25 percent for many New Zealand wines, making our labels more attractive and competitive in one of the world’s largest and fastest-growing markets. This helps not just our vineyards but the bottlers, the packers, the exporters, and the hospitality workers who rely on the wine trade. Our cherry growers and other fruit producers, especially those cultivating the famed stone fruits, apples, and more, can now look forward to the progressive elimination of tariffs that once made it hard to compete. For example, as we heard earlier during question time, cherries will fall from a 33 percent tariff to zero over time, which means more money for orchardists, more opportunities for seasonal workers, and a real incentive for investment in new plantings and new technologies. The extra income generated flows back into our local economy, helping to fund our roads, community facilities, education, and health.

Sheep farmers and the red meat industry are at the heart of the Waitaki’s identity. With all the tariffs on sheep meat and wool immediately removed, our region’s fine wool and premium lamb can enter India duty-free. This will benefit not only our high-country farms but also our processors: Silver Fern Farms, at Pareora; Alliance Group, in Pukeuri; and BX Foods, in Oamaru. Each of these facilities provides jobs, supports families, and adds enormous value to our exports. Let’s not forget about Godfrey Hirst’s carpet factory in Oamaru, one of the nation’s leading wool processors, whose future will be made brighter by the extended access to a new market. Geraldine’s cropping, artisan foods ventures, and dairying and horticulture in our valleys also stand to gain. The Waitaki Valley itself, as an emerging wine region, and a very good one at that, will find new customers and a greater profile thanks to this agreement.

I want to directly address the concern that sometimes surfaces in conversations about trade and matters of immigration. Part of this agreement allows 1,670 high-skilled work visas to be issued to Indian nationals. These are targeted visas, designed to fill skills, and are not about opening the floodgates or changing the fabric of our communities. These skilled individuals can contribute to our economy, help our businesses grow, and, like so many who came here before, make New Zealand a stronger and more innovative place. Let’s focus on the facts and not the fears. This is about complementing, not overwhelming, our workforce. Waitaki is a large, diverse, and dynamic area, from the dairies of the East, through to the sheep and cropping of the heartlands, to the orchards and vineyards of Central Otago, and the Waitaki Valley of course, every part of the electorate—

It’s a beautiful electorate.

—it is a beautiful electorate—contributes to the prosperity of us all. Thanks to the India FTA—or “free-trade agreement”, for you, Mr Speaker—every part stands to benefit. Together, we’ll continue to build a region and a nation of opportunity, pride, and promise for the generations to come. As we say, we’re fixing the basics and building a future for the Waitaki. Thank you.

15:36

Thank you, Mr Speaker. The days are getting shorter and many Kiwis are getting colder, and, sadly, we know that energy hardship is now widespread. It was heartbreaking to hear from the Hidden Energy Hardship hui last week that 200,000 households in 2025 were not able to keep their homes adequately warm; 160,000 households could not pay electricity, gas, rates, or water bills on time more than once in the last 12 months; over 160,000 households put up with a cold house to keep costs down; and 100,000 households suffered dampness and mould.

This is shocking. I know Kiwis around the country would be outraged to learn that close to half a million Kiwis are suffering extreme energy hardship in this country, where we have the solutions at our fingertips. No one should be in this situation. I know how cold it can get in Ōtepoti Dunedin, a lovely place, but it makes me heartbroken to see kids in cold, damp homes with black mould throughout. That’s long-term hospitalisation and illness. How about this Government take action? We need a national electrification plan. We have every opportunity to become an energy independent nation powered by the sun, the wind, our geothermal resources, our great hydro lakes, and some biomass.

I had the privilege of attending the opening of the TOPP2 geothermal power station in March, a partnership between Tūwharetoa mai Kawerau ki te Tai Settlement Trust and Eastland Generation. They’re delivering electricity to power 13,000 Kiwi homes, as well as geothermal process heat for the Kawerau Industrial Complex. It’s an example of what could be possible with a national electrification plan: energy independence, building resilience, and freeing us from the inflationary pressures of imported fossil fuels.

How long will this Government refuse to accept that their fascination with fossil fuels is harming us? The Government is forcing extreme hardship on Kiwis by prioritising fossil fuels, which they should know by now creates high power prices and drives extreme weather events, just like Wellington suffered last week, and the Far North the week before, and Ōtepoti before that. Our people suffer thanks to this ill-prepared Government. You would think that it was blindingly obvious, but this is why we need action on climate, and a national electrification plan is just the thing we need. We are blessed with abundant renewable power sources, and yet, at the same time, businesses in manufacturing are closing, and people are having to choose between heating and eating.

This Government has already cut $178 million of funding from the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Authority, which provided funding for hot-water heating, low-cost energy-efficiency measures, an LED lighting scheme, and a community-focused outreach programme to target those hard-to-reach households. That cut has adversely affected just those households and whānau in energy hardship. It is not rocket science. This Government should work to empower people, communities, and businesses to end dependence on overseas fossil fuels, to cut bills, and to build energy resilience. A national electrification plan would do just that, but they’re doing the opposite.

Here are the three steps we need to take: we need to overcome the political inertia to fix the broken electricity market. The current electricity market simply incentivises coal; it locks in the dominance of the big utilities and disincentivises new-build renewables, including distributed generation. We need to support grid-scale renewables for households, communities, and iwi, because building fossil fuels for energy is the primary driver of catastrophic climate change. And we need to beef up energy conservation, which is so critical because the cheapest energy is that which we don’t use.

This Government is flailing about. They haven’t just run out of fuel; they’ve run out of ideas, and they hope that we don’t notice before 7 November.

15:41

Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. I had a prepared speech, but I’m totally distracted by that previous contribution and the load of waffle that we’ve just heard about electricity and electrification from the very people that were in Government when they wrecked the electricity sector in this country. But anyway, today is Wednesday, and today is also another free-trade agreement (FTA) day.

I want to focus on some positives and not spread any more doom and gloom—I think we’ve had enough of that. But in simple terms, the India FTA is a really solid win for West Coast and Tasman. The exporters in West Coast and Tasman are going to end up with big trade barriers being removed, and this is going to open up our electorate to one of the fastest-growing countries in the world and the market for 1.5 billion people. We’re a big player when it comes to exports, although we’re usually fairly humble about it. We’ve got Tasman’s forestry, apples, kiwifruit, wine, all bringing in well over $1 billion in New Zealand dollars into the national economy, but the FTA sees a reduction of about 95 percent of the tariffs that are impacted by those export products. For Tasman, that lines up well with what the region already does best: apples, kiwifruit, wine, forestry products, fish, and other high-quality food and fibre exports.

The India free-trade agreement is a genuine breakthrough for Tasman growers. For Tasman apple exporters, this is one of the biggest gains in the whole deal. Until now, India had a 50 percent tariff on imported apples; under the FTA, New Zealand apples get that cut to 25 percent within a quota, and, over time, that will come down. Also, the window for that quota is between April and August, which is the perfect time for our exporters. It’s worth noting that New Zealand is the very first country ever to secure this type of access for apples into India. Tasman is home to about one-quarter of New Zealand’s production of apples, and so this means our premium varieties are suddenly more competitive on Indian shelves because those tariffs are coming down. I want to take the opportunity of giving a big shout-out to Roxy. Roxy is a new variety that’s hitting its stride around the world, including in India, and that’s a new variety that was developed in Tasman over the past 27 years. That’s very cool for them.

Kiwifruit and wine are also going to do well out of the deal, and other products, including fishing. But, Mr Speaker, I know you’ll be very interested to know what this deal means for West Coast coal. Put simply, the India - New Zealand free-trade agreement is a great news story for West Coast coal industry, even though it’s not a game-changer. The deal means that West Coast coal can go into India duty-free from day one, and the reason they want our coal is because it’s essential for the Indian steel-making industry. So, before the Greens go booking a seat in an aerial coal bucket to start their protests, dropping the tariffs doesn’t suddenly mean there are going to be more mines or there’s going to be a big jump in production, but it does make our coal more competitive and it keeps our existing operations viable. That means a lot of security for that sector. After all, we cannot have solar farms and we cannot have solar panels and wind farms without coal.

For the coast, remaining viable is very important, and coal is worth about $350-$450 million a year, and the Indian market is worth an average of $150 million a year. I congratulate the Prime Minister, and I congratulate the Hon Todd McClay and all of the trade officials for the sterling work that they have done over the past couple of years. Some people said it couldn’t be done; some people said it couldn’t be done in the time frame. But what have we done? We’ve secured the FTA with India. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

15:46

There’s one issue in my electorate in West Auckland that everyone talks about, whether you’re chatting at the petrol station while you’re filling up, or in the supermarket car park, or on the doorstep, everyone is talking about the cost of living. People are in a world of pain. They want help and, understandably, they are mad as hell with this Government, because Christopher Luxon promised to fix the cost of living, but his choices—the Government’s choices—have made things much, much worse. People feel let down and abandoned by this Government.

I’ve just done a survey of my constituents and I asked them what was going on for them and their families. The results were striking. Some 1,145 people did the survey from all across West Auckland, and when I asked people what the most important issue for them was, they overwhelmingly said cost of living—48 percent said cost of living. That’s twice as much as the numbers for any other issue like jobs or health. Some 88 percent of the people who responded to the survey said they were “very” or “quite concerned” about the cost of living, and only 2 percent said they weren’t concerned at all; 24 percent of people said it was having a “severe impact” on them and their families; and 96 percent of people said it was having “some” or “a significant” or “severe” impact.

Now, my constituents cited overwhelmingly the difficulty in affording groceries, fuel, power, rent, and childcare on stagnant and insufficient incomes. They talked of living paycheque to paycheque, with some even skipping meals or going into debt to survive. But don’t take my word for it, here’s what some of the people actually said: “The cost of everything is so high we can barely afford to go anywhere or do anything. When everything from eating to driving to having a roof over our heads is so expensive, what are we meant to do? I’m so disappointed with the Government, and blame them for it.” Another one wrote: “Living is hard, saving is hard. Food prices are high, rates are high, power is high, petrol is high, wages are stagnant. My relations are heading to Australia where they believe they can buy a house within four years. People are losing hope.” Another person wrote: “My husband is jobless and I’m on maternity leave and money is so tight with two kids and a mortgage.”

A solo father wrote that he suffered a heart attack in 2024 and had five stents. He said: “It’s a struggle to get by on my $625 benefit each week. I’m boarding, which costs me $300, then my son’s school lunch, 60 bucks a week, and with the price of petrol I need to put in 100 bucks just to fill up half a tank. With doctors’ fees and having to buy essentials, I’m lucky to be left with $30 to get me through to the next week.”

Another person wrote that “The cost of living, fuel prices, poor access to healthcare, hard-to-book GP appointments, so people end up going to the emergency department, which leads to emergency departments being so clogged up, putting massive pressure on staff and long wait times at our local hospital. I’m a nurse in the ED and experience this every day.” That’s just a cross-section of what some of the people in West Auckland, in my electorate said.

Is it any wonder that people are feeling the pain? Is it any wonder that 2,000 people every single week are heading to Australia? Power bills are up 18 percent under National. Doctors visits cost $100 in some areas, including in West Auckland. Insurance is up, car regos are up, and groceries go up every single week while wages fall behind. The people of West Auckland need a Government that’s on their side and focused on one thing: helping people get ahead. Only Labour is focused on what matters—your job, your health, and your home—so that you can build a future in this country, and not in Australia.

We’ve already announced three free doctors visits, free cervical cancer screening, a plan to get easier doctor appointments, and a Future Fund, which builds your future here in New Zealand. Christopher Luxon promised to fix the cost of living, but he’s only made it worse. The only way to fix it is to vote to change the Government in November.

15:51

Madam Speaker, thank you very much. I rise on behalf of New Zealand First to talk about a really sacred cow today—

Oh, I like cows.

—called “climate change”. Before we go there, I just might like to add that we’ve had a lot of discussion about free-trade agreements today, and this latest one, I’m sure, is not particularly free, as we will find out as we get the detail. Nevertheless, let’s just switch to this: those that believe in climate change have told us that the science is settled, but anyone that understands science will know that science is never settled and there are disagreements about what is the truth in this whole climate cult.

Let me talk to you about subjective validation. You probably don’t even know what that is, but, anyway, it’s about when you decide that something is really, really right, and every bit of information you get validates what you already think you know. There’s also a thing called researcher bias, and we’ve seen plenty of that coming out in recent years. We don’t deny that climate change is real—that’s the thing—but we think it can be resolved with the right interventions, and we have time.

Social psychologist Professor Jonathan Haidt warns that modern society has developed harmful sacred cows. Those are ideological taboos that inhibit open inquiry and intellectual humility. I don’t see much intellectual humility coming from the other side of the aisle on this topic, and we need to think about that.

Wealth, technology, and adaptation are making the difference. Richer societies handle climate risks better than alarmist catastrophic narratives. We are currently observing a striking political and media shift, a rapid retreat from climate alarmism, across the world. Leaders who once led with the Paris Agreement and net zero rhetoric are now prioritising affordability, energy and food security, and economic growth. Those are our priorities, and that is how we will address climate change.

They’re facing up to the high costs of tiny climate change returns and of raising energy prices. Voter backlash against soaring energy bills is forcing a rethink of aggressive net zero mandates across the UK, Europe, the US, and beyond. UK’s well-intentioned climate policies have driven electricity prices to the highest levels in the Western world while delivering negligible climate benefits. As a result, these Governments and corporations, and even climate change advocates, are talking about rolling back this net zero commitment.

Bjorn Lomborg from the Copenhagen Consensus argues that this growing revolt doesn’t deny climate change but rejects policies that impose enormous economic costs for vanishingly small temperature impacts. Instead, he makes the case for a pivot towards innovation, energy affordability, and human welfare, rather than symbolic emissions targets.

Every single catastrophic narrative can be challenged. Twenty years after An Inconvenient Truth, Al Gore’s dire predictions haven’t played out at all. The world is greening, and do you know what? It has actually been there before. Data shows that nine times more people die from the cold as opposed to the heat. When I was younger, we had a global ice age coming at us. Oh, a few years later, actually, we were wrong. Climate-related deaths have dropped in the last century by 97 percent—97 percent. How have we achieved that? By innovation, adaptation, and getting smarter about what we’re doing.

One of these other ones is that the world is burning—I’m sorry, but, no, it’s not. It’s not burning. If you take a look at this little graph here, I’m happy to show you that. It’s from real evidence, and what it shows is that the number of these catastrophic burning events have dropped in the last hundred years, as have all of the areas burnt. Fact—sorry about that. Sorry to destroy your narrative.

Anyway, climate change is real, but I have complete faith [Interruption]—unlike you—that New Zealanders can adapt and innovate. I have complete faith, unlike other members in that party.

The climate change challenge is not going to end with us next week, next month, next decade, or next century. We have shorter-term challenges to actually focus on: adapt and provide resilience against disasters. Our party has—

The member’s time has expired. Thank you.

15:56

Thank you, Madam Speaker. This week is a good week. This Government has just signed a free-trade agreement with India. It is a momentous occasion because it presents substantial opportunity for New Zealand exporters. It is a huge potential game-changer for our economy when you think not just about the amazing food and fibre sector but about New Zealand businesses more broadly. They can take up this opportunity now to access the most populous country in the world—over 1.4 billion Indian consumers, who desperately deserve the opportunity to embrace New Zealand’s amazing products.

This free-trade agreement will give them that opportunity. It’s fantastic for sheep meat and it’s fantastic for horticultural products, for apples, for kiwifruit, and for grapes, as well. It’s amazing for seafood. There are so many areas in it that have been well traversed already, and I won’t go back over them, but the point is that the economic opportunity that comes from deals like this is meaningful.

When we’re in a situation where we’ve had some pretty challenging times as a country, we’ve had really high inflation and we’ve had Government expenditure out of control for a number of years—that’s all improving. We’re making some great progress there in terms of fixing the basics so that we can then get on board and focus on building the future, but the challenge remains that there is still more to do.

We see that presenting in people’s everyday lives with some of the cost of living pressures that they face and with some of the uncertainty that businesses face around the country from an investment-decision perspective on whether to act or not to act, and that’s why this Government is so relentlessly focused on growing the economic opportunity for New Zealanders, because doing that successfully helps to increase prosperity for all New Zealanders. Lifting wages, creating employment opportunities, driving investment, encouraging innovation—these are all things that New Zealand historically used to do so well. But it feels like—certainly over more recent years—that hasn’t been the case, and we are desperately focused on restoring New Zealand’s mojo in that sense and getting us back to performing like we know we’re capable of doing and capturing that opportunity for future generations.

That trade agreement has just now been presented to the House. It will go through the select committee process, and I’m looking forward to having that come before the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee. We’ll be meeting tomorrow, and, as we do with all treaty examination processes like this, there will be discussion around submission time frames. We’ll be welcoming contributions from the public to scrutinise the detail of this deal, because that’s an important part of the process too, to give confidence to the New Zealand public that we are indeed acting in their best interests. This deal will deliver the many benefits that we have been talking about in this House and out in the public, as well.

I look forward to that process over the coming weeks as we traverse that, before coming back to the House with the legislation to then give effect to it, and, hopefully, it will come into effect in only a few months’ time. I think that would be a magnificent opportunity and a very good way to wind down this parliamentary cycle, given that, only three years ago, we made the commitment, as the National Party, to secure a free-trade agreement with India. At the time, the Labour Opposition, then Labour Government—dark days, dark days—said it couldn’t be done, but, of course, we have proven that it can be. That has been delivered just this week.

That brings us a bit to the election choice later this year, as well, because I think there is a clear opportunity for New Zealanders, where they can either choose a Government that is fixing the basics and building the future or they can choose an Opposition that caused a lot of these challenges that currently need fixing and that didn’t deliver on promises. We just heard Mr Twyford get up and talk about what people in West Auckland are talking about. Well, I bet they’re talking about the lack of housing, the 100,000 KiwiBuild homes that the member was unable to deliver—just one of the many failed promises under the last Government. Labour opposes a lot of what we’ve been doing, but, ultimately, it comes down to a matter of perspective. Our view, very clearly, is that we want to enable New Zealanders to grow, to succeed, and to determine their own future and their own success. Less Government is better; whereas, on the other side of the House, Labour craves being wanted. They want everyone to be entirely dependent on them for their success for their future. We have greater ambition than that on this side of the House.

I can’t finish any speech without mentioning the mighty Waikato, of course. Our region is poised for growth. There is huge potential in the Waikato region. We have a fantastic rural sector—a lot of infrastructure going on as well, with the expressway, the airport, and, hopefully, a Great Walk coming as well. The opportunity is there, and we look forward to continuing to deliver that after the election later this year.

The debate having concluded, the motion lapsed.

16:02

I move, That the Carter Trust Amendment Bill be now read a third time.

I rise today to address the House on the third and final reading of the Carter Trust Amendment Bill. This marks the culmination of a very thorough legislative process, and it really is a privilege to stand here in support of a bill that encapsulates the spirit of Carterton, reflecting the values of the community, the compassion, and continuing to build for a stronger future.

I wish to acknowledge the robust process that has brought us to this point today. The drafting, the scrutiny, and the refinement of this bill has taken many hours of hard work and dedication from those involved. My sincere thanks go to the Carter Society for their unwavering commitment to the Carterton community in guiding this legislation. I’d also like to acknowledge the Public Trust for their stewardship over the last 129 years, and to St Mark’s Parish for their foundational support. To members of the Social Services and Community Committee, I give my thanks, and also to my parliamentary colleagues for the constructive debate and bipartisan support. Last but not least, I want to thank the Carterton community for their unwavering support of the Carter Trust and the Carter Society.

At the heart of this bill is the enduring legacy of Charles Rooking Carter. Carter was a visionary and philanthropist deeply invested in the wellbeing of Carterton. He devoted himself to public works, education, and the betterment of his adopted community. Carter recognised that the true measure of a town’s success was in how it cared for its most vulnerable, a conviction that led him to create structures for the community well before this was an expected obligation or duty in society. Carter’s contributions laid the foundation for the very vibrant community that we cherish today.

The inscription on his headstone, from 1896, reads “Carterton Borough was named in honour of Charles Rooking Carter. His benefactions to Wellington Province include the Wellington Observatory, the Carter Home Parkvale, Carter’s Bush at Gladstone, and many valuable books to Carterton Public Library.” This is just a fraction of what he was remembered for. Following his death, his will affirmed and formalised his commitment to build a home for aged men by establishing the Carter Trust. The assets, including land, funds, and household items, ensured the success of the home and its services, cementing Carter’s legacy as a benefactor of communal wellbeing. The Carter Home was established as a place of refuge and dignity for the elderly in Carterton, later known as the Carterton Home for Aged Poor Men. This home provided care and companionship for those who had contributed a lifetime to the community and now sought comfort in their later years.

To appreciate the impact of the Carter Home in the early days, we look to the documented experiences of residents from that time. James Cox was described as a permanent member of the colonial working class, who moved to New Zealand in 1880 and spent his life as an itinerant worker not willing to be housed. James’ personal diary, of some significant 800,000 words, documented his daily life until his death in 1925. Upon entering the Carter Home in 1918, James noted, “With sad resignation, now I am stalled here, I must make myself content.” We must understand that the standard care of the elderly in the early 20th century was known to be, at times, substandard and appalling. New Zealand had a disproportionately large adult male population with no family ties that was indeed ageing. This stretched the resources of society to deal with what to do with them in their later years in life.

The solution was old men’s homes, most of those controlled by hospitals or charitable aid boards or churches. A very grim picture has been painted of what went on inside them at times. They were usually located in rural areas, remote from shops and other social amenities, quite often underfunded, quite often understaffed, dirty, and those residents who, at times, were bedridden were sometimes quite neglected. In stark contrast, the Carter Home was run by a local couple, supported by a committee, and did not bear the slightest resemblance to the institutionalised care of the elderly poor described elsewhere. Rather, it was seen as a seventh heaven. The home was not crowded, and with a generous endowment from Charles Rooking Carter, the home had enough rental income to employ staff who cared for the residents. Basic clothing was provided, medical care was paid for, and transport by wagon, and later a motorcar, was provided for taking residents on joy rides, visits to the Carterton shops, rugby matches, and, of course, the good, annual A and P show.

Carter Home had a good reputation in the community, and local groups of volunteers would visit and put on evening entertainment for those in the home. The residents, with relative freedom of movement, were expected to do a few chores around the place, which could be done—and I quote—“at their pleasure”. Cox’s diary describes how undertaking these chores became integral to his daily life, helping in the gardens, sharing stories, and rediscovering community in his later years. James Cox’s diary reminds us that the Carter Home was, and remains, more than a service; it is a lifeline. His experience exemplifies the transformative power of community care, turning isolation into inclusion and hardship into hope. The legacy of Cox and others like him endures in the values that guide Carter Court today.

As the decades have passed, Carterton’s needs have evolved, and so did the Carter Trust. The transformation of the original home into Carter Court marked a significant step forward, reflecting advancements in elderly care and a growing appreciation for holistic support. The Carter Society, formed to oversee these developments, has continually adapted its services to changing expectations, ensuring the residents receive not only physical care but also emotional and social support. Today, Carter Court stands as a vibrant facility offering a wide range of services, from independent living units to high-level care. The society’s commitment to continuous improvement is evident in every aspect: staff training, resident engagement, and partnership with health providers. This evolution proves the society’s dedication to upholding the values set forth by Charles Rooking Carter.

At this point, I would just like to give a shout-out to the residents of the Carter Court, who may be watching right now. I was lucky enough to catch up with a current resident, who has been living there for the last 12 months, at a local Anzac Day rugby match recently, and he could not speak highly enough of the Carter Society, of the staff, and of the fellow residents, and such testimonials are echoed throughout Carterton. Families speak of the peace of mind they feel knowing that their loved ones are indeed in caring hands. Residents describe a sense of agency and belonging supported by the programmes that foster social connection and lifelong learning.

These stories affirm that the Carter Society’s mission is not only being fulfilled but continually strengthened. The passage of the Carter Trust Amendment Bill is not merely an administrative milestone; it is an investment in Carterton’s future. As our population ages and the demand for quality elderly care rises, our legal and organisational frameworks must keep pace. This bill provides the Carter Society with the flexibility and the security to meet those emerging challenges: expanding facilities, adopting new care models, or partnering with other service providers. The progress we celebrate today is the product of genuine collaboration. Community consultation has been a cornerstone, ensuring the voices of residents, families, and staff have been heard and respected.

I wish to also highlight the spirit of bipartisan cooperation that’s characterised the passage of this bill. Members from across the House have recognised the importance of the Carter Society’s mission, setting aside political differences to serve a common good. This unity reflects the best of our parliamentary tradition and the shared values that bind us as New Zealanders.

In closing, I return to the legacy of Charles Rooking Carter, measured not only in buildings or bequests but in lives touched and community bonds strengthened. The Carter Trust Amendment Bill honours that legacy, equipping the Carter Society to continue its vital mission for decades to come.

I extend my deepest thanks to all who have contributed to this journey: the Carter Society, the Public Trust, St Mark’s Parish, the legal advisers, the Social Services and Community Committee, and my parliamentary colleagues. May the Carter Trust and the example of Charles Rooking Carter continue to inspire us all. I commend this bill to the House.

The question is that the motion be agreed to.

16:12

Thank you, Madam Speaker. Throughout the passage of this bill, the legacy of Charles Rooking Carter has been highlighted at every step of the way, and deservedly so. There aren’t many people that can lay claim to the contribution that he has done and the foresight that he had at the time. Carterton owes so much, as does Wairarapa, to that which he bequeathed our region.

It wasn’t that long ago that I was walking around a nature reserve that was his land, which he gave to the people that is still freely available for everybody’s use, and, of course, the reason why we’re here today is to discuss the work that the Carter Society do and that they will be able to do as a result of this bill. The Carter Society do a tremendous job, and there are many families that are grateful for the support and the dignity that the Carter Society offer their loved ones.

I first had a conversation with the Carter Society about the need for this bill and the prospect of it progressing through the House, I would guess, four or five years ago, or possibly slightly longer. Nevertheless, what that shows is that they identified very early on the need for there to be some changes, and they knew—as is customary and, quite rightly, the case—that a local bill is shepherded through the House by their electorate MP. I acknowledge the work of the Hon Mike Butterick for what he has done to get this through and to bring other people in the Parliament alongside in support.

It’s not uncommon, Madam Speaker, as you would know, for a local bill to come before the House that makes a change that many people look at and think, “Why is this required?”, but it is. Even with the foresight that they had at the time, they might not have anticipated the changing nature of the need, the changing requirements of the care, or the changing requirements on those that provide the care, but the needs of the community are at the forefront of what the Carter Society wants to do here. It would be unfathomable for this Parliament to say no to a society that exists to care for those in need in their autumn years when, really, they are hamstrung by the way in which they were set up. They no longer have to go and seek permission to simply meet the needs of their community.

I think the simple premise is that the Carter Society, which is the last remaining community-owned aged-care provider in Wairarapa, which is up against corporate providers—and which have, in recent years, seen the provider in Martinborough and the provider in Greytown fall over—have to go through hoops that others don’t. It made no sense. It does, I think, bring cause for us, as parliamentarians, to reflect on whether there might be an easier way to do this when it is so clear-cut and when the case can be made that, through no harm or whatever else, the rules that were put in place at a time that might have been fitting are so now out of date. But these simple changes, which just make sense and aren’t controversial and which have the full support of Parliament, still have to go through a full process. Perhaps that’s something we could look at.

Nevertheless, the Labour Party fully supports this bill, as it has done its whole way through. We won’t be making full contributions, simply because—like we did in the committee of the whole House stage—we want to acknowledge the work that the society does. We want to acknowledge the changes that this bill does, but we don’t want to hold up the progression of this bill any longer than it needs to be. It’ll be a good day for the society and for Carterton when this is passed into law, and we look forward to that happening.

16:16

Thank you, Madam Speaker. As a resident of Carterton, and a list MP based in the Wairarapa, I’m pleased to support this bill at its third reading—its third and its final reading. This is going to be the last time we hear about it in the House, so, as I did before, I want to again put some thankyous out to Sharon Parker, who’s the chair of the Carter Society; Peter Croft, the treasurer, and the rest of the board; and also the staff and the volunteers at Carter Court—they do a lot of good work.

It is strange, as my colleague from the Wairarapa has also said, that we have to go through, in fact, a longer process than some of the bills rushed through in urgency over something that we actually all agree about. I’m not sure how we could amend the Standing Orders or other processes so that really non-controversial bills that still need some scrutiny and still need some input from the community, but they are, basically, where a good thing is done. Or maybe we should just enjoy the fact that we all agree and are supporting it, for a change.

I want to say some things about Charles Rooking Carter, who left his money to so many good causes. You’ve got the Carter Observatory, you’ve got the Carter Reserve—that beautiful bit of ecological wilderness that I nearly was late for the Anzac ceremony at Anzac Bridge because I was doing a bit of iNaturalist work at the Carter Reserve. He had a broad range of interests, he was also a champion for workers’ rights—what’s not to like? You’ve got reserves, you’ve got housing, and you’ve got long-term investments that have also created the land trusts in the Wairarapa, which really go a long way to help the communities.

Let’s look at what stands out about Carter’s Court today. In a landscape of, I think, just under 700 different retirement homes in New Zealand, Carter Court is a shining example of a community-led facility that is run for the community by the community, rather than for the shareholder. There are some much bigger questions that we should be asking about aged care, about contracts, about what proportion people pay for their own care depending on their situations, and what assets they may or may not hold, but I love that we have got a not-for-profit care home offering a range of accommodation options, and there are a number of different options, from independent living through to complete care, which means that you can age in place.

You can stay there with the people you’ve got to know in the town that you’ve got to know. It’s very convenient for getting to the medical centre, the dentist, the rail station, the cafes, the library. It’s not far from these places and there is a Carter Court van with wheelchair access and so on, so even if you can’t walk to the Carterton Club, you can still get there. It is a bit of a pay-in to Carterton that it’s a small town with quite so many facilities, but then I must admit that I am biased about Carterton.

Lastly, I just want to say that this bill ensures that Charles Rooking Carter’s vision continues, but in a contemporary form. Thank you to the Hon Mike Butterick, the Hon Kieran McAnulty, and all the other MPs who will be supporting the Carter Trust Amendment Bill.

16:21

Thank you, Madam Speaker. It’s my pleasure to stand on behalf of the ACT Party and support the Carter Trust Amendment Bill. It’s making just a few moderate changes in order to allow the winding up of the Carter Trust. Listening to members here speaking about Charles Rooking Carter and his ability to use his estate for the benefit and betterment of New Zealanders is quite outstanding. As the Minister who has oversight for the Public Trust, and also hearing that they’ve spent 129 years looking after this particular trust also, gives me some pleasure to see that they’re able to wind it up in such a good way, including paying $50,000 to the Anglican parish of Carterton.

To not prolong this any longer, I’d just like to say that we do support this bill. We commend the member for bringing this about, and also thank the Public Trust for 129 years of looking after this trust. Thank you.

16:22

I was watching very carefully. I had a meeting that I had to run down from, so I was like, “How close can I go?” I rise on behalf of New Zealand First to speak to the bill. I wanted to start off by congratulating the Hon Mike Butterick. Actually, Mike, I’ll congratulate you both for being an honourable now but also for the work that you’ve done on this bill. Well done. I really enjoyed just listening to the presentation you gave and the story and the background and the extra depth that you provided to that, so thank you.

I also wanted to congratulate the Public Trust for what is, essentially, 130 years of service to this trust—and I think it’s a fantastic service that they’ve given—and to the Carter Trust and the Carter Society for all their work, not only for what they do on a day-to-day basis but also the work that they’ve done before this bill even came to the House with Mike Butterick, and also the work that they have done with Mike to help shepherd this bill through the House, so I thank you all for that work. It’s great that we’ve got to this stage of a third reading today, and knowing that this is a piece of legislation which will go through today, will get the Royal assent, and then become law. I think that is always great to see, also, that it is with the unanimous support of this House, as it should be, because it’s something which is for the community benefit.

I did notice, if I look back to the discussions that the Social Services and Community Committee had, and every time, I think, we’ve seen a bill—whether it’s a private bill or a local bill—the question gets asked, “Did we need to have the time of Parliament taken up with this bill? Is it something that required Parliament?” Well, in this case, because there is a Carter Trust Act, which is the thing we’re amending, of course, it’s an Act of Parliament, so you actually need Parliament to amend it. So, yes is the answer to that, and, quite clearly, the select committee has said that they were satisfied on that matter because, being an Act, you need Parliament to amend that Act.

Look, I wanted to say just a few words about Charles Rooking Carter, as some others have. Every time I pass through Carterton, which is very, very regularly these days, passing the statue of Charles Rooking Carter, which has been there now for the last 10 or 11 years, who watches over the town of his name, it’s a reminder of the legacy that the man left to the Wairarapa, and to Carterton in particular. I think it’s a fitting memorial of gratitude to a man who had such an immensely positive influence on the early development of Wairarapa. The fact that we’re doing this bill today says that that influence continues through to this time, which is now 130 years after he died. So that is a really significant legacy.

We’ve heard the story: born in the UK, came here as one of the early pioneers, builder’s son, carpenter, man with a strong interest at a young age in workers’ rights, and then clearly developed that interest in care for older people as he went through his life. Clearly, he was a visionary and a man who was ahead of his time. He arrived in New Zealand in 1850 with his new wife Jane Robieson and walked through to the Wairarapa, as they did in those days. They were hard men and hard people as well. He continued to be a builder and built a lot of things, including part of building the predecessor to this building, which is here, the House of Assembly for New Zealand. As the community’s political representative, he represented the Wairarapa in the Wellington Provincial Council from 1857 to 1864, the General Assembly for Wairarapa from 1859 to 1865 and, of course, that legacy is honoured still in the name of Carterton.

He was a generous benefactor. We’ve already heard that he—we always called it the Carter Observatory rather than the Wellington observatory, but the Carter Observatory; that is his name. He was a generous benefactor to libraries as well, to museums, being involved in the Greytown Lands Trust and Masterton Lands Trust—again, a legacy which is still being enjoyed by the people of the Wairarapa today. In Carterton, he was involved with obtaining land for a whole lot of public works, police stations, cemeteries. We’ve heard the Hon Kieran McAnulty talking about the reserve that he walked through which is in the name of Charles Rooking Carter. So Charles Rooking Carter: builder, contractor, farmer, politician, and in this case a philanthropist and a generous benefactor to the community of the Wairarapa. He died in 1896, but his legacy is still there.

Right the way through this time, when he set up the will, the executor and the trustee was the Public Trust. That’s still the case today. This bill will change that so that that is no longer necessary. But, again, I thank the Public Trust for the work that they have done over that 130. His will established the home for “aged poor men”. The Hon Mike Butterick has talked about the great work that was done there and being a man ahead of his time, and the great work that is done now in its successor, which is the Carter Court, which has some 50 units. It provides also for aged care and respite care, so they do a great job. That is a long legacy which has gone all the way down from 1896 from Charles Rooking Carter’s will, through the Act of 1961, and is honoured again in the bill which we will pass today.

Likewise, the support for St Mark’s Anglican Parish in Carterton. Again, that legacy comes all the way through today, and then the upkeep of Mr Carter’s grave. Now, I understand that that was dealt with slightly differently, but there’s an undertaking to do that. Again, all of those things honour the legacy of a man who has contributed so much to the Wairarapa and to this region.

I’m going to finish there, but just to say that I think this legislation is a fine tribute to the legacy of a man who has contributed so much, and I want to commend this bill to the House and congratulate everyone involved in it.

This is a split call—Mike Davidson.

16:28

Thank you, Madam Speaker. I rise on behalf of the Green Party to speak in support of this bill. Actually, when I first saw it come up, the Carter Trust, as a Canterbury boy I thought, “Maybe this is the Carter family”, so I was quite interested to have a look at it. But, no, it wasn’t. It was obviously the Carter Trust from Wairarapa. Actually, I’ve not been to Carterton—apologies for that. So it’s actually been quite good to be in here and get a bit of a history lesson about—

You need to sort that out!

I know. I need to go there—Charles Rooking Carter and Carterton and Wairarapa. It’s been quite good and there’s been a lot of long calls on this.

Get over the hill!

Yeah. Ha, ha! I’ve heard a lot about the place, so it’s quite good. I won’t take as much time as everybody else, but I thought at least I’d get to a minute this time. I think last time I spoke, it was about 20 seconds. It’s actually quite good to see that, with the termination of this trust, there’s going to be $50,000 going to the Anglican parish, which is actually really good. I guess it speaks to some of the stuff that the trust has been doing over the time it’s been in existence and, actually, the work of other MPs prior that have been trying to do this work. I’d like to acknowledge Mike Butterick and the work he’s done to progress this, and I also acknowledge the promotion that he’s recently had. On that note, I commend this bill to the House. Kia ora.

16:29

Thank you very much, Madam Speaker. It’s a pleasure to rise and speak on the Carter Trust Amendment Bill in its third reading. It was an honour to be the chair of the Social Services and Community Committee who heard submissions on this and has helped shepherd it to this point. I just want to acknowledge the local MP, the Hon Mike Butterick, for his work and advocacy on this.

I’d just note that Charles Rooking Carter was an independent member of this House back in 1859 to 1865, representing the Wairarapa electorate. He was a very strong advocate of Wairarapa’s small farm settlers. Fast forward 167 years later, and we have a very strong representative member of Parliament doing the same thing. History doesn’t repeat itself, but it does rhyme.

In respect of Charles Rooking Carter’s legacy, I think we’ve heard a lot in the House about this, and I don’t intend to just cover it all again. He certainly made a very strong contribution to the Wairarapa, which is still being felt 170-plus years later. That’s why we’re here with the Carter Trust Amendment Bill. This is obviously enabling the Public Trust to distribute the Carter Trust’s assets and to continue the work and the vision that he had all those years ago to support people in their aged years with accommodation, and support those who otherwise would not have that support. That vision and that desire is still strong today. It’s still the intention to carry that on, but it needs to be modernised for the modern era, and that is exactly what is happening here.

I want to thank everyone who’s done the work to help guide this through. We’ve had some very good legal advice, great support from the clerks and from justice officials. I would say that it was appropriate for this bill to come to the House to be dealt with, given that the will had been amended, effectively, and the trust was changed. I do think there is work for this House to do—I think an omnibus bill, ideally—to be able to deal with bills of this nature more easily if there is consensus that they should be changed and it doesn’t need the attention of the House. That is a discussion for another day, but I think there is a willingness across the House to look at that, and something for this Parliament to consider, going forward.

In the meantime, I just wish to wish everyone success in the ongoing distribution of assets, the ongoing work that Mr Carter envisioned all those years. I commend this bill to the House.

16:32

I also was on the Social Services and Community Committee that looked at this bill, and I tautoko the things that people have said and the hard work of everybody involved. I also hold the portfolio for Labour that is about community and voluntary work. It is definitely something that I think our committee was interested in—that we have these bills that come through where we can see that the intentions of the parties and the need for our community and voluntary organisations and our philanthropists to be able to bring their intention to bear in a new environment is very real.

We really do need to look at the way that we can streamline the morphing of these intentions—not in any way to undermine what the intentions of the philanthropists involved were, but to enhance them and to enhance the wellbeing of our society. It’s not the first bill of this kind that’s come to our committee—in fact, we’ve got several at the moment. It is something that we’re taking seriously as a committee. It’s something where one of the people who came in on these bills I’m meeting with personally to talk about how we can change things, because it does seem like a really important piece of work. We need to think very carefully about philanthropy in this country. We don’t have enough people donating to our society in this way, and what they give is so rich and so important.

I look forward to being able to work collaboratively with the people who’ve been through this experience, and being careful about those intentions to come up with a better solution that is a systemic change, that might mean that we are able, as a Parliament, to do something to make sure that when money is left like this, we not only honour the people but we honour the intention and we honour the wellbeing that they are trying to imbue in our society. Thank you. I commend the bill to the House.

16:34

I haven’t had the privilege, until this point, to speak on this bill, so I’m really pleased to be able to do that in the third reading. Can I just acknowledge, as everyone else has, the Hon Mike Butterick and his sponsorship of this bill. For those of you at home who don’t understand how private bills work, they’re community bills that we don’t really see anymore and that often need our intervention to modernise them. It’s wonderful that members like the Hon Mike Butterick come to the rescue of these organisations. They’re usually quite old school, but set up for the right reasons, and we end up having to intervene in modern days, like we have now, to try to make them realistic.

We’ve heard, time and time again, about the reasons for the Carter Trust Amendment Bill. I just want to say, when they’re established, they’re established for the right reasons, and when they are changed to be able to terminate them, like in this particular case, it’s done for the right reasons. It’s done so the Carter Society can actually continue to operate as best it can, because it no longer needs to get the sign off and approval from the Minister of Health on every single occasion it wants to make a change, which we know was not the intention in the first instance.

I think this is where we come to as a National Party within the Government: we don’t believe in extra Government; we believe in limited Government. It is one of our values. Community organisations, philanthropists, and the societies and trusts that they establish and that go on to contribute to communities don’t need the Government. They haven’t, they don’t in the future, and it is wonderful to make sure that they’re independent and continue to be independent, so I am very, very supportive of this change.

Can I also just say, we hear a lot of times from the House—particularly from members opposite—that you must legislate to ensure that these things happen, because otherwise they won’t. I’m really buoyed by the fact that there was complete agreeance that the area within this bill about the protection or the care for the grave of Mr Carter would be maintained and cared for regardless of it being legislated. In fact, it wasn’t the intention of his will to have that be the case. Of course, I don’t think anyone would be so vain as to say that their gravesite must be maintained, but the community feels so fondly towards this individual that they would do that of their own kindness and their own sense of duty. I think that is important to note.

Philanthropy is alive and well. This is a wonderful organisation within Wairarapa, and it’s great to hear that there’s support around the House for the Carter Society and Carter House, and the genuinely deserving people that live in Carter House, and that there is longstanding support for Mr Carter that has gone well beyond the need for this particular bill. I think it’s brilliant that we’re here to debate it, that it’s in its third reading, and that this goes back to the Carter Society, who no longer need Government intervention, because that is the point that we are for today. With that, I commend the bill to the House.

Shanan Halbert—this is a split call.

16:37

Thank you, Madam Speaker. It’s my privilege to speak on the Carter Trust Amendment Bill. Just to open, can I acknowledge my colleague across the House Mike Butterick, MP for Wairarapa. Congratulations on getting to this particular stage, my friend. I know that both members’ bills and local bills in this House really speak to the direct needs of our communities across the country, and I know that one of the more recent bills that we moved through was not too dissimilar to this—the bill for Takapuna Boating Club on Auckland’s North Shore—where we just needed to make some technical changes in order to enable them to continue to serve our communities. It’s good to see this particular piece of legislation before us all in the House today.

Can I acknowledge, out there, the community and voluntary sector, particularly those that have a charitable status, and the work that they do to help our communities thrive, whether it be seniors or whether it be young people.

Today, Labour supports this bill as a set of technical but very useful updates that simplify the administration of a historic trust. I know that it will make a significant change and make things easier for the trustees and the organisation itself so that they will no longer need ministerial sign-off—albeit a minor administrative task. They will no longer have to do that, and, no doubt, that will save them days, weeks, months, and potentially years not to have to go through that process. On this side of the House, we’re very supportive of this bill today, supportive of the community and voluntary sector, and I commend this bill to the House.

16:39

Thank you very much, Madam Speaker. It gives me great pleasure to rise on the third reading of the Carter Trust Amendment Bill. Firstly, to acknowledge my friend and colleague—last time we considered the legislation, actually, at the committee of the whole House stage, Mike Butterick was just Mike Butterick, and today in the third reading, after the intervening period, he’s become the Hon Mike Butterick. He’s always been honourable to me, but it’s very well recognised for him, and it’s good to have this legislation—

Oh, yeah, he’s looking a bit cute—hug it out!

Don’t make me blush—don’t make me blush. I just want to recognise him for his leadership on this local bill, which, like many members in their previous contributions have said, is sort of an archaic process that Parliament has to go through just to, in this case, wind something up which has been a great benefactor to the local community, but we have to go through this sort of long, drawn-out parliamentary process to enable something that’s quite simple and a rather necessary fix and, actually, which, universally, political parties across the House actually agree with. So I think there are some learnings, potentially, for us as parliamentarians as to the way we operate in Parliament, and to consider whether that is the way we want to operate moving forward in the future.

One of the things that I thought was really interesting in the process and progress of the legislation was during the committee of the whole House stage—because for us, yes, whilst it is a local bill and you don’t filibuster the committee of the whole House, for many of us who haven’t been involved in the process involving the legislation, there needs to be an opportunity for us to gain an understanding of why it’s come to Parliament, what it’s trying to achieve, and what it’s going to deliver for the local community. That’s the viewpoint I took through the committee of the whole House stage when Mike Butterick was sitting in the chair.

A couple of questions I asked, and that I think I really want to tease out in this contribution, were firstly about: why are we here? What is the purpose and the background of what we’re actually trying to achieve with this private bill? It was about the bill being in relation to the Carter Trust Act from 1961 and that, effectively—and as Mike Butterick clearly outlined in his response to me at the time—that was now out of date and it was actually impeding the efficient operations of the Carter Court Care Home. Once you hear that sort of response, you get an understanding of, OK, I get why this legislation has had to come to Parliament, why we’ve gone through this process, and what we’re trying to achieve.

One of the interesting pieces I picked up when I read the Social Services and Community Committee’s report on the legislation was around the upkeep of Mr Carter’s grave, because, in their report, the select committee noted that the upkeep of the grave is not actually included in the legislation. I really wanted to know, to honour the legacy of Mr Carter and everything he’d done, why the upkeep of his grave wasn’t included. It was reiterated to me that the Carter Society has already given a formal undertaking themselves to continue to maintain the grave, and the select committee themselves were happy with that and satisfied with the assurance that they’d received. The obligation actually was in the original 1896 will, and then it was added in the 1961 Act. So the society will just continue to respectfully practise as to the condition of the scheme around Mr Carter’s grave.

The other one, and the final one, I want to touch on is around the impact on those residents who live in the care home. It would never be the intention of us in this House or with this piece of legislation to want to impact on their level of service or the level of care that they receive whilst in the care home. So I asked Mike Butterick, when he sat in the chair, around how the bill would affect the residents of the Carter Court Care Home, and whether any residents, for example, will face higher fees or reduced services. I was given the assurance by the member in charge of the bill that residents will see no negative impact. Fees for contracted long-term residential care are already set nationally under the Residential Care and Disability Support Services Act, and removing the updated ministerial power does not change what residents pay. I was really pleased to receive that assurance from Mike Butterick himself.

It’s taken a long time to get here, but I think we’ve finally reached the last hurdle. It feels like this has been a protracted and drawn-out process, but it’s been really well worth doing in the sense of getting to this point. I commend the local MP Mike Butterick for his leadership on it, for everybody involved in getting it to this point, and I’m really pleased to support this bill to the House.

16:44

Thank you, Madam Speaker. I rise on behalf of the Labour Party to speak in support of this bill at its third reading. They’ve been working on this for quite some time, and I’m really pleased to be speaking to it today; also, like everyone in the House, acknowledging the Hon Mike Butterick for bringing this on their behalf.

At its heart, this is modest, but it’s an important piece of legislation. It’s not trying to reinvent the wheel, and it’s not some kind of sweeping reform, but what it does is what we’re all often called to do: tidy up arrangements and align them with modern practice, and make sure the intentions of the past can still serve the needs of today. That’s exactly what this bill does. From time to time, this House is asked not to create something brand new but to be a careful steward of what has come before us. We’re also asked to look after legacies—legal, financial, and social, as well—and to make sure that they’re still working for the people that they are intended to help. That’s what this bill is about. It’s about stewardship; it’s about making sure a historical charitable arrangement continues to deliver real value to the Carterton community, and Labour supports that approach.

I also want to quickly acknowledge the Carter Society, which does tremendous work in the Carterton community. They have been working towards these changes for quite some time, and it’s good to see that effort now reaching the finish line. This is also exactly the sort of practical community-focused legislation that members’ days should be used for. It may not grab the front page, but it will make a genuine difference to people’s lives. For that reason, I commend the bill to the House.

16:46

I rise to take a call in support of the Carter Trust Amendment Bill in this, its final reading. I want to start by congratulating my colleague the Hon Mike Butterick, Minister for Land Information, Associate Minister of Agriculture, and MP for the Wairarapa—a champion of his Wairarapa electorate, a champion of rural and provincial New Zealand, and a practical man with a quintessential number eight wire mentality. Mike gets stuff done, and this bill is a shining example of what a dedicated local MP can achieve for their community—taking a complex, decades-old issue and navigating it through this House to a very sensible conclusion.

This bill is also about honouring a legacy and empowering a community to look after its own. Charles Rooking Carter was a man of vision, leaving a bequest that has supported the Wairarapa for over a century. However, times change, and sometimes legislation has to change with them. The 1961 Act has become a hindrance rather than a help.

As regional MPs, we know that community assets are best managed by those who understand them and their communities, and this bill does exactly that. By winding up the antiquated trust structures and transferring management to the Carter Society, we’re ensuring that the spirit of Mr Carter’s gift is maintained and, indeed, enhanced for the future. This bill futureproofs Mr Carter’s legacy.

At the heart of this bill are the people who call Carter Court Care home and the whānau who rely on it. What began in 1901 as the Carter Home for aged poor men, housing around 20 residents, has grown into significant community asset that now supports more than 100 people aged 65 and over. This bill puts governance where it belongs: closer to the community it serves so that decisions can be made promptly, transparently, and with local knowledge. By modernising the 1961 settings and removing unnecessary hurdles, the Carter Society can focus on what matters most: stable operations, quality care, and long-term planning. Above all, it provides continuity and certainty so that residents and their families can have confidence that Mr Carter’s legacy will continue to support the Wairarapa for generations to come.

This is a proud day for the Wairarapa, for the community, and it’s a testament to the Hon Mike Butterick’s persistence in delivering on his promises to his electorate. I am delighted to commend this bill to the House.

Congratulations to the Wairarapa.

16:50

I move, That the Modern Slavery Bill be now read a first time. I nominate the Education and Workforce Committee to consider the bill. At the appropriate time, I intend to move that the bill be reported to the House by 31 August 2026.

This bill has been the work of many, and it has also been many years in getting to this House and this stage of first reading. I think it was back in March 2021 when 100 businesses signed a letter asking for the Government to introduce modern slavery legislation. For myself, I’ve probably been working on this particular issue for the last three years—a lot shorter than many other members of the NGO community and those who have been advocating for action on modern slavery in New Zealand.

Now, it won’t be lost on anyone today that this bill has come to the House through a slightly different path, and I think it’s important to acknowledge that. This is the first time that Standing Order 288, as it is currently drafted in our Standing Orders, has been used to bring a member’s bill to the House, and I hope very much that it won’t be the last time that this happens. I think, often, when we can find common ground, and we can stand together on important issues, that is when we can truly make enduring change for New Zealand.

I want to acknowledge the parties that got us over that threshold, which we passed quite comfortably in the end: the National Party, the Labour Party, and the Greens. Thank you for standing with us to get this bill across the line, and thank you to those other parties that, hopefully, will support this bill moving forward. I have to also acknowledge my colleague whose name is also on this bill, Greg Fleming. Greg, ka nui te mihi ki a koe, e hoa, mō tō mahi i tēnei kaupapa. [Greg, many thanks to you, my friend, for your work on this initiative.]

This bill has a journey to go through in terms of the select committee process, but because it almost feels like we’ve been working so long on this, I feel I should at least acknowledge some of the people who have worked on it to date because it is a significant achievement. I want to acknowledge especially Rebekah Armstrong from World Vision, who I know will be watching this debate. I want to also thank the other members of World Vision, and also the young ambassadors, some of whom are present in the gallery today. Thank you for your very strong advocacy in this matter.

I also want to acknowledge Tearfund. Tearfund have been working on modern slavery and advocating against modern slavery for many, many years. I want to acknowledge legal experts Rebecca Kingi and Jacob Parry and, additionally, the members of the modern slavery leadership advisory group that was chaired by Rob Fyfe; the New Zealand Council of Trade Unions and the Public Service Association Youth, who have been actively campaigning on this issue; the Human Rights Commission; and also faith communities, such as the Anglican Church. This list of people indicates the broad support that this bill has in the community and the need for action on it.

What is modern slavery? Obviously, it’s something that this bill is opposed to. It’s some of the worst forms of conduct that an individual can conduct against another person: slavery, forced marriage, child labour, trafficking in persons, debt bondage or serfdom, forced labour or exploitative labour, servitude, and sexual exploitation. That’s the modern slavery that is covered in this bill, as defined by this bill.

Is it a problem in New Zealand? Well, unfortunately, it’s a problem around the world and also in New Zealand. There are 50 million people who are trapped in modern slavery globally, it’s estimated. Many of those people might be involved in supply chains that New Zealanders interact with. It’s estimated that New Zealand households spend $77 per week on products associated with modern slavery. I should also note that one in four of those people who are estimated to be living in modern slavery are children. Two-thirds of the people who are living in modern slavery live in our region, the Asia-Pacific region, and we know that we trade extensively with that region, and that we also have responsibilities and play a leadership role within that region, so it makes it especially important that New Zealand takes action on modern slavery.

Of course, I’ve been talking about this being a global problem. This is also an issue within New Zealand, as well, and it’s estimated that 8,000 people currently live in modern slavery conditions in New Zealand. One is too many, and so this bill is a good bill. It’s not a perfect bill, but it is a bill that will address these very, very serious and significant issues for people who are living through some of the toughest of times.

How will this bill go about addressing these significant issues that the world faces and, also, that New Zealand faces? It will bring New Zealand into line with comparable jurisdictions like the EU, the UK, and Australia, who already have anti - modern slavery regimes to address these issues. It would establish a statutory framework to require large businesses to report on their supply chains, and would also create a register.

Now, it’s important to note that this is about trying to find issues of modern slavery when they arise so that they can be addressed. It is not about finding modern slavery and then saying, “Well, that company is now blacklisted, and we’re not going to trade with them at all.” It’s actually about encouraging those companies to identify instances and actually address them, and that is how the important change to reverse these horrendous conditions for people is actually achieved.

This bill will also increase public awareness and support victims of modern slavery. It provides opportunities for review on the effectiveness of the bill, and it also requires consideration to set up a specialist body to combat modern slavery, and for a Minister to actually report on modern slavery as well. This bill is not toothless. There are consequences for those organisations and individuals that it applies to that do not comply with it. That’s in terms of offences and, also, with accessing public funds and public contracts.

I mentioned that this bill is not perfect. This bill was hard for us to draft because we did it as a member’s bill. We relied on the expertise of people outside Parliament, and we also relied heavily on our very excellent drafters within Parliament, but this is not a bill that has been drafted with the support of a ministry or an organisation who would usually advise on the drafting of a bill.

This is a bill that is very good. It’s a good bill, it will make a good law, and it’s the right thing to do, but it certainly is something where I know both myself and Greg Fleming will be encouraging the select committee to look at it in terms of the way it works, and in terms of the provisions that are incorporated within it; to look at its effectiveness; to listen—truly listen—to the submitters, especially those who will be impacted by this bill, and to make sure that this bill is something that is going to actually work for New Zealand. This is not to create work but to actually address the serious issues of those who are living in modern slavery. That is, hopefully, what the select committee will do. It’s actually a really big job for them, and so I thank the Education and Workforce Committee for taking on that role.

The intention of this bill is to also look at the consistency with comparable jurisdictions. We know that many of these large organisations that will be covered by this bill already report on modern slavery, and we don’t want to duplicate that unnecessarily, and so if there are ways of saving time, being efficient, reporting on similar things, and making sure that the organisations can utilise the fact that these reports are already being written in countries like, for example, Australia, then that is something that, I think, the committee should definitely look at.

This isn’t a bill that comes to the House with unanimous support. For those parties that may stand against the bill, I’d just say to them that it’s not too late to change your mind and support this bill. This is a practical bill that will address a very serious problem. There’s huge support within New Zealand businesses and with New Zealanders. I think the survey that was taken in 2002 showed that 81 percent of New Zealanders support New Zealand taking action on modern slavery. It’s supported by Business New Zealand.

This is not controversial; it’s the right thing to do. I say to New Zealanders: those parties that do vote against this bill—when parties tell you who they are, believe them. If they stand against actions like modern slavery, then you know that that is the type of party that they are and that they purport to be. It is up to them to—

Explain themselves.

—explain themselves to New Zealand if they decide to do that, but, again, the invitation to join us in this bill is still there.

My 10 minutes is up. I look forward to participating in the select committee process. I want to thank again the many, many hundreds, if not thousands, of people who have advocated for this change for a really long time. We’re not there yet, but this is a significant step forward, it’s a historic day for the New Zealand Parliament. I commend this bill to the House.

The question is that the motion be agreed to.

17:00

This is indeed, as my friend and colleague Camilla Belich has just said, a historic day, both in terms of how we have arrived here but, even more importantly, it is the legislation that now begins its journey at this point. Tēnā hoki koe, Camilla, mō te whānui me te roa o tō mahi i runga i tēnei kaupapa. [Thanks to you also, Camilla, for the breadth and length of your work on this initiative.] It’s been brilliant to work with you for the last year and a half now, so thank you so much for your support.

I do want to add my acknowledgments and my thankyous to those of Camilla. I want to start with my boss and my friend—that is, the Prime Minister—for the simple truth is that without his support and his urging on this issue, we wouldn’t be here today. This really has been a whole-of-Parliament process to get us here, and Camilla has laid that out in terms of us being able to use Standing Order 288 for the first time to actually be able to co-sponsor a bill.

But none of that would have been possible without the support of my caucus, and so thank you to my caucus—thank you to every one of you for giving me the chance to do this, and thank you, particularly, to the Prime Minister for the urgency that you have brought to this. I remember speaking to the Prime Minister many years ago about this before he came into Parliament, and I knew that this was a passion of his. For political reasons that have been well canvassed now, we weren’t able to bring this forward as a Government bill, and so the opportunity to bring it through the track that we have, and through to today, is something that he has been 100 percent behind and I thank him deeply for that.

To Barbara Kuriger, who moments ago was in the Chair: I wanted to thank her for agreeing to take the bill out of the member’s tin that she had had in there for quite some time so as to allow this bill to make its passage. In fact, that bill had its own genesis in the outstanding and long and dedicated work of Simon O’Connor. Simon, I know that you have stood in this House for 12 years and advocated on this matter, and I want to acknowledge the groundbreaking work that you did there and the foundations that you have laid that we now build upon.

To Alex Prendergast and Kaylee Hill, two remarkable students from just outside of Christchurch who, six years ago, approached their then very new and local MP Nicola Grigg with an idea for a member’s bill. That member’s bill became my member’s bill three years later, and that was the bill that has since been picked up by Minister Paul Goldsmith and is now making its way through the Government Order Paper. That addresses the inconsistencies in the prosecution of human trafficking both domestically and internationally, and it was working with those two students on that bill that opened, for me, the doorway into this far more substantive piece of work that is before us now. Thank you, Alex and Kaylee, for your vision and for your application. I really hope that the two of you do choose to serve in areas adjacent to this House, and maybe even one day here, because you certainly have proved that you have all that it takes.

To Selwyn Coles, my friend at Te Ana Tapu in Tāmaki Makaurau—it was about two years ago that he handed me a copy of his Master’s thesis that he had completed at the University of Oxford in pursuit of a Master of Laws, and his thesis topic was looking at the arguments for and against introducing a modern slavery reporting framework in this country. It was an incredibly thoughtful piece of work. He spent a year of his life on it, and it canvassed well all of the objections and doubts about the efficacy of the proposed law.

During the select committee process, I look forward to bringing that work of Selwyn’s forward because I don’t pretend—and neither do most of us here—that this is a silver bullet. There is no single action that can overcome and address the scourge of modern slavery, both here in New Zealand and, even more worrisomely, abroad, but it is an important part of addressing that evil. It does turn the attention of companies to their supply chains on a regular basis. It has been proven time and again, in our trading partners from Australia to the UK, Canada, and across Western Europe that when companies look for these things, they see things that they hadn’t previously seen. That is the fruit of this modern slavery reporting framework, and I thank, again, Selwyn for his work on that.

Camilla has already mentioned Rebekah Armstrong, Becky Kingi, Jacob Parry, and Clayton Walker for the incredible work that they did on the Modern Slavery and Trafficking Expert Practitioners Group bill. We acknowledge that this modern slavery reporting framework is but one part—a very important part—of that overall approach that addresses modern slavery here and in our international supply chains.

The other parts we are addressing, both as a Government and, in fact, in this bill—and this will come out in the select committee stage—is that we are looking forward to a conversation with the Human Rights Commission in terms of their possible contribution around the oversight and enforcement of this proposed framework. To that extent, I want to acknowledge Stephen Rainbow, Gail Pacheco, and also David Rutherford, the former Human Rights Commissioner, for the work that they have done on this and the counsel that they have provided. It’s been enormously appreciated.

To Claire Gray at Tearfund, thank you. I know that Claire wanted to be here today. I’m sorry you couldn’t be, Claire, and I know you’re watching online. Thank you so much for the technical expertise that you’ve offered and the constant encouragement. You’ve been brilliant.

To Matt Friedman at the Mekong Club; he’s been working in this area for over 20 years. It was my engagement with him and the firsthand accounts of the difference that these reporting frameworks have made across the world that really urged me to work harder and more urgently to bring this kind of legislation before our House.

I am reminded of a conversation that I had at Waitangi this year. Waitangi week is filled with challenging and wonderful and inspiring conversations. This one was of a different kind, in that it wasn’t looking at the normal issues of Waitangi week. Instead, it was a long dinner at CBK, down beside the helicopter terminal there, and I was with Jenny and Justin Duckworth. Justin is the Archbishop of the Anglican Church—

From Whanganui.

From Whanganui, that’s right—that fine electorate with that outstanding local, hard-working, seen-everywhere MP.

Justin and I have been friends for several years now and he is an advocate par excellence for all these kinds of things. He and his wife, Jenny, have passed this on to their daughter Maya, who works with Claire in advocacy work at Tearfund.

Jenny asked me a question. We were talking about this modern slavery reporting bill and the opportunity to bring it before the House using this bipartisan approach—and Jenny said to me, “You know, Greg, can you tell me honestly? You’ve worked in this space for years”—because for those who don’t know me, I worked in the community sector for 25 years before I came to serve here. She said, “All of this advocacy and all of this work that is done by thousands of young people, all this stirring that happens—does it really work? Does it really make a difference?”

I told her about what was coming up, what it was that we’ve been working on here, and what Camilla and I and my caucus had been driving through. I looked at her and I said, “The reality of it is, Jenny, that without that advocacy over the years of all those people”—all those people that we’ve mentioned here and the thousands of others that we haven’t directly named—“and without their work, we wouldn’t be here.”

So, yes, it does work. It really, really does. I oti i a koutou—you did it; we did it. I commend this bill to the House.

17:10

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I rise on behalf of the Greens to support this first reading of the bill. First of all, I want to acknowledge the victims of modern slavery and the linkages there between those that are pushed into forced servitude, forced labour, unfair and exploitative labour conditions, trafficking, and all of those horrendous horrible things which many have advocated to prevent and to stop and to highlight over many, many years. I’m sure I’m not the only member of Parliament that received the emails from World Vision, Tearfund, and others who support this, such as the Council of Trade Unions—I’ve got emails from them as well—and also from faith-based organisations and, of course, the Human Rights Commission.

To get to this point is an important step. I do want to acknowledge the two members who brought this bill to this place. Tēnā kōrua, Greg Fleming and Camilla Belich. I think this is bill No. 3 or 4, maybe—I’m losing track at the success of Camilla Belich’s ability to get things out of the biscuit tin.

That was the first time that this has happened under Standing Order 288, but I do note that there could have been another pathway for this bill to get to the floor. It could have come to the floor via a Government bill, but good on Greg Fleming and good on Camilla Belich for going around Brooke van Velden, who has been very busy in the area of workplace relations doing all the wrong things, eroding workplace relations here, there, and everywhere. Unfortunately, she did not have enough time at all to address the very basics of what people would expect to oppose modern slavery. I’m sure the House will look forward to the contributions from the ACT Party as they try to explain themselves out of this little corner.

This bill will require reporting entities to report on how they identify, address, mitigate, and remediate incidents of modern slavery. It will require the Minister to report annually on progress towards combating modern slavery and to issue guidance on reporting suspected incidents of modern slavery processes that Government agencies should follow in response. As the two speakers before me have said, it will focus on those big businesses, but I do note some of the comments that have been made: that when this is the pathway for legislation to get to the floor, members themselves don’t have the full backing of a whole Government department to help them to draft it, and the workload will be on the select committee to make sure that we iron out all the different bits and pieces of this legislation, and I expect there will be some—there will be some.

As was talked about earlier, there are issues around modern slavery with links to child exploitation, but I note that, actually, we’ve ratified some of the international agreements on that. So that has been taken care of in other parts, but how it links forward to this particular bill, I think, will be an important question, and there are also all the other international instruments that deal with trafficking of people, etc., etc., as well. These are issues that we will need to tease out at the select committee because we don’t have a Government Minister with the backing of a whole lot of officials to make sure that we can iron that out.

One of the questions I do have is around the scope, and I get it. You have members’ day, and the members’ bills tend to be as narrow in scope as possible to be able to get enough support to get over the line. One of the issues that we could be talking about as well is: why are we just looking at bigger companies when, actually, exploitation in the form of modern slavery can often happen within small businesses, and it could often happen in other circumstances which are not part of the supply chain? These are issues that we should be able to tease out within the select committee.

This is an important bill. This is an important step. I do want to, once again, acknowledge the two members for finding a very creative way to bring this to the floor—well done. It had to come to the floor sooner or later. It could have come with the full resources of the Government, but congratulations to those two members. We will be debating these issues on the floor and getting into more and more of the detail at the select committee to make sure that we can actually start the step to stopping modern slavery. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

17:15

Thank you, Mr Speaker. Before I start my speech, I just want to thank the organisations for the work that they do in this space. I know that it is a really hard area to be in, and I hope that you take care of yourselves with some of the things that you might be confronted with.

Let me be absolutely clear: modern slavery is a moral abomination. The exploitation of human beings has no place here in New Zealand or around the world. There is not a single person in this House who is soft on slavery. I don’t believe there is a single one, but that is actually not the question before us today. The question is whether this bill as it is drafted will meaningfully make a difference here in New Zealand, or whether it will simply make us feel like we have done something about modern slavery.

This bill is a near perfect encapsulation of what Milton Friedman warned us about when he said, “One of the greatest mistakes is to judge policies and programs by their intentions rather than their results.” I will say that there are really good intentions behind this bill, and I know both of the members that are involved have the very best intentions. Had you maybe come and talked to me about this, we may be in a different position, but I haven’t actually spoken to either member about this bill, nor have a lot of my colleagues. As much as we’re doing a bit of a “Kumbaya” here, and you feel like the ACT Party is out on their own, we actually weren’t consulted on it. What New Zealanders deserve from this House are not good intentions but actual good policy, and, on the evidence before us, this is not actually good policy.

First, the title of this bill certainly sounds very nice, and many New Zealanders out there will be thinking that we’re going to be doing something about modern slavery and we should be doing something about it. New Zealand already does have robust laws against slavery. In fact, it has been almost 200 years since slavery was abolished in New Zealand when we became a British colony back in 1840. Since then, these laws have evolved to a multitude of different offences. We have, obviously, got the Crimes Act, and the fact that this bill explicitly acknowledges that in its own definitions. There’s always a case for these punishments to be reviewed, especially if it seems like we are being too lenient, but this bill doesn’t do that. In fact, we know that we have modern slavery here in New Zealand, and we should be tackling that first.

There was just a case the other day—and most of you will be familiar about it—around the Thai massage parlour and the immigrants that were being exploited there. It’s absolutely horrendous, and this problem is happening here in New Zealand. We do have the labour inspectorate, who are doing a very good job, but it could be, actually, that we should be increasing our penalties and we should be coming down harder on what is actually happening here in New Zealand.

Under this bill, a company may not exploit a single human being. It could even be a model employer, but if it misses a paperwork deadline or files a deficient statement, it faces up to $200,000 in fines. This is around administrative or non-administrative punishment. This is not a policy built on a cornerstone of freeing victims; it is built on filling in forms and ticking boxes.

I know this bill is going to go to the select committee because it has the support of the other parties, and I’d be very keen to see the evidence that this bill actually makes a difference. We can’t just blindly follow other countries down a path because we think it is the right thing to do. We need to actually assess what is happening and whether it will have any actual impact here in New Zealand.

The other thing that I think is the most concerning point is that discretion is handed to the responsible Minister over what a company’s revenue is. This bill, as it states, is set to $100 million. A lot of us could probably agree that when a company earns over that, they can afford the administrative duties, and I think there is a good argument in that; but do we really trust that a future Minister, with the stroke of a pen, won’t actually change that to $100,000 or $10,000? That in itself is really concerning. I know the opposite side of the House have been arguing within other pieces of legislation around Ministers being awarded that power and when something should actually be Parliament’s duty to decide, and so I really do hope that the select committee look at that. We’re not really debating a $100 million threshold here; we are actually debating something bigger than this.

Finally, New Zealand is not the first country to run this experiment, and despite the ability to look at other jurisdictions, like Australia and the United Kingdom, it seems we’d rather be a fast follower than a smart follower. We can do better. We could actually tackle modern slavery, and we should be doing better right here in New Zealand first.

17:20

I rise on behalf of New Zealand First to speak on the Modern Slavery Bill which we, of course, will be supporting. New Zealand First has always advocated for the rights of the worker and we think this is an important piece of legislation. I do sincerely commend the members Camilla Belich and Greg Fleming for working together to achieve this piece of legislation, and acknowledge the members for talking about the fact that this is a starting point. This is an important starting point, but it is a starting point.

I reflect on 2020, when New Zealand saw its first slavery conviction in New Zealand and we were appalled. We found it abhorrent and we couldn’t believe that it happened on our shores. Moving on from that, over the past six years, we have seen a growing trend—and it is why I’m advocating so hard on our response to organised crime—where people are a commodity. As in any commodity used by criminals to make money, people have now become that commodity. Slavery is not new. It has been around for thousands of years, but we are a society that’s moved on and we should be judged by how we deal with this issue now.

I would like to personally acknowledge Dr Christina Stringer from Auckland University, who was a great educator for me when I first started working in this space. She was an incredible academic with a lot of wisdom in this space and wrote one of the first white papers on modern slavery and Governments’ response to it.

It is a complex issue, we acknowledge, and it is a complex issue because we want to ensure that our outcomes achieve the impacts. I do acknowledge the ACT member for talking about being judged by the outcomes of our legislation and not just that we have legislation, but I think it has been traversed clearly in this House that this is the starting point that we need.

It is recognised that reporting and accountability will be necessary, but I’m old enough to know that when we first introduced health and safety legislation, we fundamentally started with a reporting mechanism and a policy development. Over time, that legislation grew teeth, it grew strength, and it grew, most importantly, accountability for those who do wrong.

The challenge we have with modern slavery is it is complex. It has many forms. It is fundamentally abusing human rights and the individual’s rights for freedom, through coercion, through violence, through intimidation, and through a range of things where we take vulnerable people and make them our playthings, effectively. This is why I think it is necessary to bring the legislation forward. It is a good starting point.

We look forward to the select committee process. I think it is important to understand that we want to gain visibility in this process, and our reporting mechanisms have to ensure that we encourage transparency and reporting, so that those who do good, who delve into their supply chains, who audit, and who do all the right things should be commended for that effort, not condemned when they find slavery within their supply chain. That is an important balance we need to strike, or otherwise we will end up with perverse outcomes where we would be choosing to not see it rather than see it, report it, and therefore risk being held accountable for it being in your supply chain.

We’ve talked about the big businesses and how they have the capacity to deal with this. They also have brand exposure. They also have the risk that, when it is found in their supply chain, they will be condemned in the international markets and will be held accountable. But we want to ensure that those big businesses have independent strong auditing within their supply chains so that they are driven and incentivised to make sure that they weed it out, they look for it, and that they’re encouraged to do so.

I also look forward to working closely to deliver better outcomes around how we respond to the organised crime component of modern slavery, we recognise those bad actors that are manipulating human beings and that have some degree of anonymity within big supply chains, and we do more to weed out the slavery that is occurring in New Zealand. We recognise that there is domestic trafficking within New Zealand. We recognise that this is not just across borders but exploitation is a reality and we need a legislative solution that will deliver those positive outcomes.

I really do acknowledge and support the members for bringing this to the House. I think there is a good opportunity through a select committee process to ensure we have good engagement. Therefore, New Zealand First commends the bill to the House.

17:25

Tēnā koe. E tautoko ana, e tino tautoko ana i ngā mihi ki ngā mema Pāremata nā rāua tēnei kaupapa. Ki a koe, Greg Fleming nō te Rōpū Nāhinara, kōrua tahi ko Camilla Belich. Tēnā kōrua i tēnei mahi.

[Thank you. I support, I very much support, the acknowledgments to the members of Parliament to whom this initiative belongs: to you, Greg Fleming from the National Party, to yourself and Camilla Belich. Congratulations to both of you for this work.]

It goes without saying that we are not just discussing a bill; we are discussing the integrity of our nationhood. We often speak of Aotearoa as a beacon of human rights, and yet our daily lives are quietly fuelled by exploitation. The latest Global Slavery Index estimates that 50 million people globally are trapped in modern slavery, and 8,000 of them are right here in Aotearoa.

Look at our streets. Look at our tracks. We know that global entities—like China Railway Rolling Stock Corporation, which supplies the very buses and trains that make our cities go around—have been linked to alleged forced labour in international supply chains. When our own public transport is potentially built on the backs of oppressed peoples, we’re not just observers of injustice; we are participants in it. We cannot preach freedom while riding on the results of bondage.

This bill is our chance to say “Enough.” We’re not just following the world, contrary to popular belief; we are leading. Unlike the UK or Australian models, this bill introduces real teeth: director liability. This bill goes further by including penalties and liabilities for directors. If you profit from slave labour, the buck stops at the boardroom table. Thresholds for transparency: it targets large reporting entities with $100 million or more in revenue, requiring them to be transparent about how they identify, mitigate, and remediate incidents of slavery. Specialist oversight: it explores the establishment of an independent anti-slavery commissioner to lead this work with the enforcement power it requires.

For Te Pāti Māori, our support for this bill—and, yes, we absolutely support this bill—is a matter of mana motuhake. Slavery is the ultimate theft of a person’s authority over their own life. It is that antithesis of everything that we stand for: mana ōrite. We must confront the inequality that allows $8 billion worth of goods made with forced or child labour to enter our ports every year. No person’s mana should be diminished because they’re desperate to survive. Mana mokopuna: bringing an end to modern slavery will benefit mokopuna across the world, not just here in Aotearoa. We owe them a legacy of liberation, not a supply chain of suffering.

In conclusion, we hear the ACT Party. We hear that they will vote against this, preaching personal liberty. But Te Pāti Māori, in this House, we ask, whose liberty—the liberty of a business to ignore blood in its supply chain, or the liberty of human beings to live without chains? We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality. If one person is enslaved, the freedom of all of us is a hollow promise. It’s time to clear our conscience and our cupboards of slave labour. Te Pāti Māori absolutely supports this bill and we support the emancipation of all people. Tēnā tātou.

17:29

Thank you, Mr Speaker. Often when we hear that word “slavery”, it’s something that creates a really physical response in most of us. It’s something that we see as being horrific and horrendous, and often, we will think about it in terms of “We don’t hear of it and we don’t see it here in New Zealand, and so it doesn’t exist.”, and yet that’s not the case—that is not the case. We know, as the previous speaker and other speakers have said, that not only does it exist in supply chains and across the globe but the 2023 Global Survey Index recognised that there would be approximately 8,000 people living in modern slavery in New Zealand. That’s 8,000 people living on our shores who are living in the most horrific and horrendous conditions that we could imagine.

I want to say, firstly, a big congratulations to my colleagues across the House. To Camilla Belich and Greg Fleming, thank you for the work you have done, and congratulations on getting this bill to the point that we’re here debating the first reading this evening. As many others have said in this House, this is a start. I acknowledge that both of you have said that the bill’s not perfect, and we know that, but, hey, it’s more perfect than having nothing. Before that, we had nothing, we currently have nothing, and this bill is the start of us acknowledging and putting this right.

I also want to acknowledge before I move on, because I am talking about those two members—congratulations on the work that you have done to create history in Parliament. This is a really, really big day for Parliament. We have bypassed the ballot and we have used the Standing Order for the first time that enables this bill to go straight to first reading and then through to select committee. I’m really proud that we can stand here as a Parliament and do that, and so well done. Because I work closely with Camilla Belich in the workplace relations portfolio, I know the work that both of you have done, and I’m really impressed, because you’ve both been very tenacious in this. So congratulations.

I also want to say a big thankyou, as others have done, to all the NGOs and the lobbyists who have really, really made this a big focus in this Parliament. I have been to several events that they have run in this area to highlight just how big of an issue this is in Aotearoa New Zealand. I have grown my awareness over that time, and it is thanks to them, because I think, before all of this, I probably was one of those people that thought that this does not exist on our New Zealand shores. I think, if we’re all honest, there was a point that we came to believe, through their lobbying and through their activism, that we understood the rationale and the reason why this bill is so important for us to progress within this Parliament.

We’re talking about protecting vulnerable people, people who have very few other options in their life to get past this. They are being exploited because they’re in vulnerable situations that, in many cases, they are accepting, and it’s not on them; it is on people that are putting them into these positions in the first place. They have to be accepting because they can’t see any other options. Well, today we’re saying that we see them—we see them and we are prepared to stand up for them, and we are prepared to stand up with them. That is something that is, again, a very historic day for us, and it sits at the heart of all of our values in this Parliament.

I know we all come here to support people and to put people at the centre of what we do, and the fact that we can come together across the parties—well, most of the parties—makes this a really, really historic day. This is what’s good about politics. Sometimes people don’t see that; sometimes we don’t see that ourselves, but this is what’s good about politics. I look forward to seeing this bill progress through the House.

17:34

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I’m really pleased to be able to stand in support of this bill and to acknowledge both Camilla Belich and my friend and colleague Greg Fleming. When Greg talked to me about this bill potentially coming to the Education and Workforce Committee, I explained why that was a really exciting thing and something that I knew the committee would support.

I think we’ve got a very constructive committee, and I’ve really enjoyed that over the last couple of years, and one thing that we have all agreed on is our position against migrant exploitation. We’ve followed that really closely when we review Immigration New Zealand and where that’s going and the work that we’re doing around that. Now, that’s just a small part of modern slavery that’s addressed in this space, but it is something that I know we have followed closely. There are a lot of similarities and certain issues where, if we address this, we can certainly go in the right direction towards addressing migrant exploitation in general.

I just want to say, too, in terms of the select committee process—before I move on to some of my own reflections—that it’s something, in a wider sense, in the way we operate in New Zealand that I think the committee will be in some cases not surprised, and in some cases really disappointed, but also really inspired by our ability to make the change and what this is going to genuinely turn out to do. When we open for submissions, which we will do shortly, we really want to hear from a breadth of organisations, whether it’s NGOs and the people that have lobbied and advocated for years and years on this, but, as well as that, organisations that maybe are already doing this really well and can set an example and show us how this works and what we can do to make it right, or those that will be working with this—those large organisations—and how this would look for them. We want to make sure that something like this genuinely works and has sustainable outcomes, because that is what this is about. We don’t want opposition in the business world or in various sectors; we want this to be supported for all the right reasons.

That brings me to my point and my own personal reflection. We have these large organisations and we’ve talked about this in the bill. They have the resources to be able to do this kind of thing, and anyone that’s studied business understands—or anyone that hasn’t studied business should probably understand—the triple bottom line and corporate social responsibility, which is something I’m personally really passionate about. It is in a lot of our businesses’ best interests, if not all of our businesses’ best interests, to do what’s right by our communities and our country.

Unfortunately, unless we raise awareness and shine the light on this kind of situation, a lot of people can blindly purchase commodities in New Zealand not knowing the supply chain, and not knowing the impact that things have had in their path to our dinner table, to our frames when we wear clothes, or whatever it might be. When Kiwis buy products, they should know, and they deserve to know the origin of them. I was a high school student in the 2000s, and I watched China Blue—and this is no disrespect to the country mentioned in that title—but that was my observation when I was in fabric technology and understanding the clothes we wear, where they come from, and what that means.

Now, we’ve talked a lot about the 8,000 people, and no doubt there are more, sadly, that suffer modern slavery in New Zealand, but it’s the people around the world that we continue to enable to be in this position that we don’t believe deserve to be. When we’re buying products that facilitate and support modern slavery, whether it’s what we wear or what we use—we deserve to know that in order to call those organisations out, to encourage them to see it if they don’t see it where they’re just looking for the best possible price on behalf of their consumer. This is something that we absolutely deserve to address, and I’m really looking forward to doing that.

Can I also say, as well, that what I’m looking forward to, in addressing this through the select committee, is hearing the very real difference that it’s going to make. A little something closer to home: this is not just migrant exploitation, and this is not just supply chain but when I was managing a school bus company, I observed students in some remote communities, and some not-so-remote communities who were kept out of school for various reasons, and not travelling on the school bus when they should’ve been, who were then being, in some cases, used by their parents to work in spaces, whether they were illegal or not, for no employment. There was a benefit to them not being in school.

This happens in New Zealand, and it might not even be something that the police are necessarily looking out for or as a part of that 8,000. There are broader impacts of this piece of legislation, and we talk about this being the starting point—the baby teeth, maybe, when we’re talking about the teeth that this has. I’m pleased to be a part of it and I know our committee is pleased to be a part of it as well. With that, I commend it to the House.

17:39

This is a very important issue, and I would march in the street on this issue—but that’s probably not saying much, because I would march in the street on lots of different issues. Like my colleagues, I want to acknowledge Camilla Belich and Greg Fleming for their work and the historic use of Standing Order 288, bypassing the biscuit tin—this bill will go down in history for that, if nothing else.

I want to say something about the basic principle at play here. I was staggered to hear the ACT Party member saying they’re not even going to support a bill that’s only about transparency and disclosure of modern slavery—slavery—in supply chains.

I say to the people who are fans of free-market capitalism: if you want to have the free flow of capital around the world, then for goodness’ sake, do something about maintaining social licence for that, like actually protecting some basic ethical standards, which is what this bill does. If you don’t, then you risk losing public confidence and public support in the very system that you want. I think the Superannuation Fund had a little lesson in this recently when the High Court found that they had not actually met their mandated legislative obligations to ensure that the investment of the New Zealand Superannuation Fund should not be in things like Israel’s illegal occupation of the Palestinian territories.

What this bill does is it ensures that the supply chains that deliver products to New Zealanders should not rely on modern slavery. I wanted to just add to the debate a little bit of commentary about what we mean by modern slavery. Some colleagues have talked about the 8,000 people in New Zealand who suffer the most egregious forms of oppression, particularly in work, but internationally, what are we talking about? One of the biggest issues that campaigners have spotlighted in relation to modern slavery is the use of State-imposed forced labour in Xinjiang province in China. Xinjiang province produces about 20 percent of the world’s cotton consumption. The Chinese Government denies it, but campaigners allege and have produced evidence that there are hundreds of thousands, if not more than a million, people engaged in State-imposed forced labour in Xinjiang province. North Korea is another obvious example where there is mass forced labour in action.

The South-east Asian fishing industry, where hundreds of thousands of people find themselves in an industry which produces huge global seafood exports, including to the consumers of this country—they find themselves trapped at sea for months and months on end with no pay and their documents confiscated. In South Asia, there are many, many hundreds of thousands or, in fact, many millions of people who are trapped in debt servitude, bonded labour, child labour, and forced marriage, including in India, where this country is in the process of finalising a trade agreement. That, folks, is what we’re talking about—those are the big ones, internationally, where millions and millions of people find themselves trapped in servitude and bonded labour.

I’m looking forward to the discussions that we have at the Education and Workforce Committee on this bill, and I want to finish by saying that I suspect some of the most interesting discussion at the committee will turn on this issue of whether this bill goes far enough. Is it enough to impose transparency requirements, which is that businesses are required to report and disclose whether or not there is modern slavery in their supply chains, or should they—and this is the big issue internationally on this issue—be required by law to undertake due diligence—that is, to find out and prevent or remedy the harms caused by modern slavery? Ken Roth, the former director of Human Rights Watch, is one of the international experts on this, and he was in New Zealand only days ago. He argues that due diligence should be the target, not just disclosure.

17:44

Thank you, Mr Speaker. As has been said in this House already this evening, congratulations to the two members, our colleagues, who have brought this bill to the House this afternoon. I did try and attempt not to get up and make any political comment around that, though. However, unaccustomed as I am to making political statements in the House, I cannot sit here and not note that it is my colleague Greg Fleming, a member of the National-led Government and the National Party, that has actually got this to the House during our Government. Labour had the opportunity in 2021; they didn’t get it there. So well done, Greg, and well done to Camilla. I know that the two of you have worked closely to make this happen.

There has been much said of Standing Order 288, which has been used to make this happen, and I might just note that I think it’s a little bit like a mountain that’s about 288 metres high, to be able to use that clause. I’m sure it won’t become a regular occurrence, because it is a significant piece of legislation that’s enabled that Standing Order to be used.

Modern slavery is abhorrent. We know that, we all agree with that, we appreciate that, and we don’t want it in our supply chain. The question here is: how do you know when it is, how far do you go to make sure it isn’t, and what is the responsibility, in reality, on the companies that are going to be implementing this? I’ve shared, through the process, feedback to Greg Fleming as he’s developed the National Party’s contribution to this piece of legislation, having sat on the board of a company in Australia that was required by the Australian legislation to report under their version of what will soon be law here in New Zealand. It is a conversation that occurs around that table, of, “Have we gone far enough by visiting the factory in Vietnam? Do we actually know X, Y, or Z from that part of our supply chain in Europe? Are we sure the German manufacturers of the machinery we’re buying are clean?”

I think it’s going to be important for the process, through the select committee, through the passing of this legislation, and then the Government implementing it post that—hopefully, later this year—to be clear with business where that line is. A saying that, I suppose, comes in the court space often is that principles are expensive, and this is a principle that it is fair to have a cost on, but we need to make sure that cost is realistic, that we are clear, and that we can ensure it can be practically implemented. Every cost that is incurred increases the cost of the supply chain, and, ultimately, of the products that New Zealanders are buying. There is a way to do this and make it practical and ensure that cost is minimised but that the outcome is achieved, and I hope that no one takes offence or takes what I’ve just said out of context. It is about ensuring we get modern slavery out of our supply chains, but we have to make sure we manage the process of implementing that so that New Zealanders are not paying at the till more than they need to.

The teeth in this piece of legislation is around the director’s liability, so it will be interesting, and I’m sure the Institute of Directors will submit on that. Again, we don’t want to have the wrong drivers of director activity around the boardroom table, and being clear where that line is for directors and understanding their director’s liability—ensuring they are clear on how they make sure that they have not only complied with the letter but the spirit, at the same time as not going so far that it creates unnecessary compliance pressures on our companies here in New Zealand. It will be really important to the success of what I know is going to be a great piece of legislation on the book here as a result of the work that these two members have done. I commend it to the House.

In reply, Greg Fleming.

17:49

Thank you so much to every member of the House who has contributed to this. I appreciate the encouragement. I appreciate the already insightful comments on the bill. I particularly want to thank Laura McClure for her very thoughtful comments, and I want to observe two things: one is that I love it when we have “Kumbaya” moments in this House—that’s why I love Treaty settlement days most of all—but we are a debating chamber for good reason. When we debate things, and we debate them well and we debate them faithfully, we actually get better law and we get better policy, and so I think it’s good that we’ve got a party in here—a thoughtful party—that is not yet convinced by this. I accept—

You might convince us.

Yeah, exactly, and I heard Laura McClure very clearly when she said that it is not modern slavery that she is in any way anything other than completely opposed to; it is that she has doubts as to whether the proposed legislation will actually be effective. Will it be a good use of people’s time? Will it be a good use of businesses’ time?

That is the struggle I had myself. I was not immediately convinced by the merits of this legislation when I first saw it. That’s why, in my opening remarks, I mentioned my friend Selwyn Coles’ Master’s thesis and the work he did for that year at Oxford in really wrestling with that question—does this work?—and actually looking at dozens and hundreds of contexts around the world. His thoughtful conclusion was that, yes, it would add real value here in New Zealand, and it was that work that persuaded me to push on with it. I hear those concerns, and I look forward, over the coming months to addressing those concerns and seeing whether, come the third reading, we can, as a full House, be right behind this.

Phil Twyford, thank you for your comments. You weren’t able to carry on towards the end, but I appreciate that you started to drill down into wanting to see due diligence. That is precisely what I want to see through this—precisely. Absolutely. I want to see companies doing annual due diligence on their operations and supply chains, because it’s when they actually go to look that they identify things that they are usually horrified to find there. One recent example was from Country Road in Australia. As my colleague Carl Bates—the wonderful member for Whanganui—mentioned, regarding his experience on that board in Australia, there were a lot of doubters when the Australian legislation came in. Country Road did their check, and they were horrified to find that their main sock supplier did actually have a clear instance of modern slavery. They were able to address it because of the requirement on them of this kind of reporting.

Will you require due diligence, not just disclosure?

Absolutely. Let’s make sure that, through the select committee process, we require it in there.

To the select committee process, can I echo my colleague and friend Katie Nimon’s—who will chair the Education and Workforce Committee through this process—call for really thoughtful submissions. There has been a tendency during my brief time serving in this House where I’ve seen, often, quality and quantity get confused and conflated when it comes to select committees. The problem with that is twofold: sometimes, of course, this is what people are wanting to do. You end up crowding out the really thoughtful submissions, but, secondly, you end up slowing the whole process down. We don’t want either of those things in this case. We want to make sure that the very best submissions and the most thoughtful quality come through, and we don’t want to slow the process down, because—who knows?—we could be back here sooner otherwise. The sooner we can get this legislation in play, the sooner we can begin to seriously address modern slavery both here and, even more importantly, abroad.

On that, I want to acknowledge again—as I did in my opening remarks, and as did Camilla Belich as well—the extraordinary and relentless work of all those advocates we mentioned before. Without you, we literally wouldn’t be here. Those advocates include the likes of Rebekah Armstrong and Claire Gray, who represent World Vision and Tearfund. To those people who are passionate, can I encourage you to maybe look at sending your submissions to them so that they can collate them into really powerful, detailed, insightful submissions that come to our select committee. That would add the greatest help.

Finally, can I say that each time I’ve looked up here over the last hour and I’ve seen those words “Modern Slavery Bill” scroll along the bottom of the screen—“First Reading, Modern Slavery Bill”—I can’t believe we’re actually here. Kia ora.

The question is, That the Modern Slavery Bill be considered by the Education and Workforce Committee.

17:56

I move, That the Modern Slavery Bill be reported to the House by 31 August 2026.

Congratulations, both members. The time has come for me to leave the Chair. The House will resume at 7.30 p.m.

19:30

Thank you, Madam Speaker. I am standing to speak on the very first reading of the Financial Markets (International Money Transfers) Amendment Bill. As suggested by the title, it is very specifically about international money transfers. Now, I’ve had a read, obviously, of the notes related to the bill. I have to say, I am rising to oppose this bill.

I want to start by acknowledging the intention behind the bill. The bill is to make sure people understand exactly the components of the cost of what they are paying when they send money overseas, hence the international money transfer. Now, the intent sounds reasonable. Most New Zealanders would agree that they would want to understand the components of the cost that they are paying, but, ultimately, it is one final cost that they will be paying. Understanding how it is made up, component-wise and ratio-wise, I don’t think necessarily adds any benefit to people who are using this service.

However, the question we have today, and the reason why I oppose this bill, is that it’s not improving any safety measures with international money transfers. It is not improving any speed of making international money transfers, and it will not actually do anything to reduce the cost of making such international money transfers. On the contrary, if the bill goes through and it becomes law, the financial providers will now have to do the extra administrative work to provide the breakdown of the cost involved with making international money transfers. They will end up having to have additional staff, possibly, working on the cost, have people who are aligning to make sure that their cost component is actually following the requirements of the legislation, and therefore adding additional cost.

Overall, if this becomes law, we are actually asking for the financial service providers to be providing additional administrative costs. Therefore, ultimately, the responsibility of that cost will be borne by New Zealand consumers who will be using the service. Ultimately, I don’t agree with the amendment in this bill, because we are seeing that the impact of this bill is to add additional layers of rules, therefore requiring additional layers of costs, and therefore, ultimately, they will be passed on to everyday New Zealanders.

Now, if we think about how this works in real life for New Zealanders, the people who regularly need such a service to transfer money internationally to a different market would be a lot of people from the community that I work with very, very closely, particularly the migrant ethnic communities, some of whom work very, very hard. Like our Prime Minister said, they’re working hard in one job, two jobs, and three jobs to find and to save and, ultimately, possibly send the money overseas back to their home country to support their families. What these people want to see is that their money will be transferred safely, that it will be transferred timely, and at a minimal cost, because every single dollar that they pay for the bank’s service or pay for an international money transfer will be $1 less that their family members will receive on the other end.

It also applies to many New Zealand companies who send money overseas for their international suppliers, for example. They have purchased something from overseas and they will be sending money overseas, and therefore, every single dollar they are paying additionally for making the international money transfer will be $1 that they won’t be keeping as profit for the New Zealand company or to grow the business that they have in New Zealand.

Now, no matter the migrant community workers or the New Zealand businesses, they won’t want to see more complexity or more layers or burden that they need to go through. They obviously don’t want to see the higher fees caused by additional compliance requirements. Therefore, as a member of the National Party, when I talk to businesses, my understanding would be that this is not a bill that will be welcomed, because it doesn’t address or improve any of the key requirements that they want, which is safety, speed, and reduced cost. Therefore, I don’t believe this bill is fixing any basics that we have in New Zealand right now. It’s definitely not building any future for a faster, safer, and more cost-efficient service for international money transfers. Therefore, I do not support this bill. Thank you.

19:35

I rise on behalf of the Labour Party to speak in support of the Financial Markets (International Money Transfers) Amendment Bill at its first reading here. This is a practical bill, it’s a sensible bill, and one that could make a real difference to everyday New Zealanders. At its heart, this bill is about fairness, transparency, and making life a little bit more affordable for people who are already doing it tough.

Every day, people across Aotearoa send money overseas. They are sending money to support parents, children, brothers, sisters, and loved ones. They are helping with rent, food, school fees, medical bills, or simply doing what families do: looking out for each other. Very often, the people making these transfers are migrant workers, who are contributing hugely to New Zealand. They are our cleaners, our aged-care workers, our nurses, our hospitality workers, and many others.

Just contrary to the earlier contribution there, the communities that I’m talking to are looking at this bill with anticipation, particularly in South Auckland, especially Pacific communities, and our migrant communities that are the backbone of the local economy. They work hard, they pay tax, they contribute, and many quietly send a little bit of money to the Pacific Islands each week to help with family, but, right now, too many of them are feeling that they’re stung by fees they cannot clearly see. That is the problem this bill seeks to fix. At the moment, some providers advertise zero fees, but the real cost is hidden in the exchange rate spread. People think they’re getting a bargain, but they’re not, and they only realise later on that far less money has arrived than what they expected.

That’s not a properly functioning market. A market only works when consumers can compare prices, make informed choices, and know what they’re actually paying for. If the real fee is hidden, then there’s no real competition, and that’s not a fair deal. Thank you.