Latest news with #AMENDMENTBILL
Scoop
25-04-2025
- Business
- Scoop
Building (Overseas Building Products, Standards, And Certification Schemes) Amendment Bill — Third Reading
Press Release – Hansard Sitting date: 2 Apr 2025 BUILDING (OVERSEAS BUILDING PRODUCTS, STANDARDS, AND CERTIFICATION SCHEMES) AMENDMENT BILL Third Reading Hon CHRIS PENK (Minister for Building and Construction): I move, That the Building (Overseas Building Products, Standards, and Certification Schemes) Amendment Bill be now read a third time. I'd just like to start by acknowledging the debate that we've had previously in this House, and including in the Transport and Infrastructure Committee, about this legislation. I'd like to thank all who have supported it, which is, in fact, all the parties around this House. I think it's important where possible that we have a bipartisan basis to legislation that is so important to the wellbeing of Kiwis. I acknowledge and thank all those who have contributed to that; who have contributed positively by contributions and discussion, including that fundamental question around liability as was traversed at the select committee process. I'd like to thank the submitters. I'd like to thank the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE), who provided high-quality advice to me and to others and enabled us to be now at the stage of the third and final reading such that we can pass this into law now. A lot of the detail has been traversed already, and I don't intend to go over that ground again. In my comments on this, the final reading, I intend to briefly set out what, why, how, who, and when this policy will come into effect. First, on the subject of what the policy does, it's already the case that some 90 percent—that's 'nine-zero percent'—of building products in this country derive from overseas, so, in a sense, actually, it is a red herring to think about this as encouraging the use of overseas products to the extent that that already happens. It could hardly be more than it is. Perhaps that percentage will tick close to even to 100 percent, but, actually, there is encouragement for our local manufacturers and suppliers as well, and I will explain that shortly. Really, what we're trying to do is make it easier for products that are already coming into this country and currently face a very burdensome process to obtain approval through a number of different existing routes so that they will be able to be used in New Zealand homes, commercial buildings, and infrastructure too, for that matter, where it's relevant. So that's what the bill is aiming to do. Why it needs to do it? Well, first of all, we have an affordability problem in this country regarding building materials and, of course, the cost of construction more generally. It's increased some 40 percent since the year 2019, and, in fact, over time before that too, it's fair to note that the cost has been steadily increasing beyond even inflation over the last few years. For the purpose of introducing more competitive pressure and, therefore, putting downward pressure on the cost of construction materials but also thinking about the value we have of greater resilience in the event of supply shocks when overseas materials come from only certain overseas origin points, and also in the name of innovation for all the reasons that we want to encourage not only sustainable building practices but also other ways that we can have buildings of better, higher quality delivered much more readily and, therefore, affordably—so, for all these reasons, we say that the bill will be a useful addition to the tool kit, almost literally, of the builders. When I say builders, I mean tradies, designers, and architects, of course, and all those who administer the control system. As for the how: the way that this operates, as we've heard previously, there are three main levers that we're able to pull. One is to make it easier to use products that meet overseas standards, and these are standards by design that will be equal to or higher than those that exist already in this country—it's not an exercise in lowering standards. Second, streamlining the sighting of overseas standards and also requiring the acceptance of products that are certified overseas. So there are whole schemes that we are able to adopt, and we will do that on the basis of standards and certification systems from jurisdictions—be it whole nation States or on a State-by-State basis—that are credible and comparable. 'Credible' means that they have good, high-quality building standards—no less than those currently that prevail in New Zealand—and 'comparable' means that they are like New Zealand in the key ways that relate to the building products, be it in relation to UV light, be it wind or sea spray zones for coastal areas, be it seismic strength as that relates to the structural integrity of the products, and so on. Rima Nakhle: Reasonable. Hon CHRIS PENK: Thank you. My colleague and friend Rima Nakhle says that's reasonable. I'm inclined to agree—I agree with her agreement. As for the question of who, well, the decision maker in this case is a combination of the chief executive of MBIE and the Minister for Building and Construction. Obviously, that person and the person who is the Minister—currently me, but, obviously, at some future date that will be someone else. I'm not necessarily going to continue this role for ever, but for now, that's who we're stuck with. But that decision maker, whoever it may be, will have access to high-quality advice: a combination of the public sector through MBIE, industry—of course—and academia. We've got lots of ways of determining where the appropriate line is drawn in terms of the supplies that we are able to regard as trustworthy in this country and certify automatically accordingly. Other key players in this space include the New Zealand manufacturers who will actually have a benefit from this legislation. I know that might sound counter-intuitive in terms of making it easier for overseas standards to be met. But for the Kiwi manufacturers, who in many cases, are doing a great job innovating and producing products for our local market, to give them an opportunity to measure their work against overseas standards—for example, large jurisdictions like the European Union, or large single national markets like, for example, the UK or Australia, or states in the US, for that matter. If they are able to measure their New Zealand, good old Kiwi products against those, then immediately they're export-ready and export-attractive to those other markets. So we hope and expect to see a benefit for them, as well as, of course, the Kiwi consumer, with whom we are very interested. The other key player that I do want to mention in all of this are the building consent authorities. Roughly speaking, at the moment that is some 66 different councils, along with the outfit known as Consentium, which does the work for Kāinga Ora. For all of these, at the moment, they face, if not through the CodeMark route of product acceptance, and maybe with reference to the Building Research Association's appraisal, they otherwise have to determine, each and every one, facing liability of a joint and several nature in the event that something goes wrong, a determination of whether products meet New Zealand standards, and that's a huge burden for them to bear. It's an accountability, it's a responsibility, and it's a liability that they bear on behalf of their ratepayers. I think it's actually not particularly fair to them—and I'm pleased to have, I think, some nods of support from the former Mayor of Wellington. Local government around New Zealand, I think it's fair to say, is united in in wishing for the issues of liability that pose such a burden to them to be resolved. That's a larger piece of work that we are engaging in. We know that something must be done in that space for the benefit of all concerned. But for the purpose of this bill and this regime—as was pointed out by the select committee—we need to make it really clear that councils will not be on the hook for the failure of a product that's approved in this way, provided that it's installed correctly and is the right kind of product for the right kind of purpose, and, through the building consent system, they will have the opportunity to determine that. Finally, the question of when. On the passage of this bill, which I think will be not much more than an hour or so—I'm thinking it will be following the dinner break, but not much beyond that, hopefully—there will be a law under which there will be a framework with regulations able to bring in certification standards and regimes that will be, effectively, a rolling maul approach. So initially—and it might be as soon as, for example, June of this year, or maybe July, but certainly from that point onwards—progressively, it will be possible for regulation to be set out, published on the MBIE website, notified in the Gazette, where people can see what is allowed in this country. There will be tens of thousands of new products available very soon. I'm grateful to everyone who's worked hard to bring this policy to fruition and, indeed, to pass it into law shortly, and I commend this bill to the House. DEPUTY SPEAKER: The question is that the motion be agreed to. ARENA WILLIAMS (Labour—Manurewa): Labour supports this bill because we support competition in the building supply sector and cost reduction for homeowners. This is all about trying to pass on the benefits of overseas imported products into New Zealand to New Zealand consumers, as well as the builders who use them, without unduly burdening local manufacturers. The Transport and Infrastructure Committee has delved into those questions very deeply. We had the benefit of considering a number of really useful and well-thought-out submissions from the industry and so came to a position where everyone in this House could see a benefit in making this move. You know, making buildings cheaper, making the thing that costs between 16 percent and 24 percent, which is the building materials, cheaper we hope will have flow-on effects to not only homeowners who are trying to build new houses but also the small suppliers. So now, with these rules in place, I guess the onus is on the Government and on the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE), who will be working through these building system changes as system changes, to make sure that there is long-lasting effect not only on competition but on prices coming down and, if we are increasing the number of products available in the New Zealand market, that they are working well. I'm going to step through those. Because this is something that Labour really supports, because this is something that Labour wants to see working and driving affordability without compromising on safety or quality or local jobs, it's important that we canvass here what we will be looking for to satisfy ourselves that this is a change that continues to work. So I've got, sort of, three questions in my mind that I've used to judge this. The first is: does the change lower prices for consumers, not just for the profits of big importers? It was really useful to engage with the Minister for Building and Construction in the committee stage about this, because the Government's argument around this, and certainly what's been published online and is available to participants in this process as the bill has worked its way through Parliament, is that opening access to international standards in groups of products will improve competition and reduce prices. So I think that will have an effect. This was something, though, that the Government considered in the previous term in response to the Commerce Commission's market study, and at the time officials advised the Labour Government that these changes were not necessary and would not make that change. So we'll be looking really closely about whether that market impact is something that we see bearing out, but we do want to give it a go, because anything that drives competition, and lasting competition, in the sector is absolutely worth trying if the right kinds of safeguards are in place to make sure that we're not compromising on quality. Those savings, as well; they need to be passed on to homeowners. So what I would be looking for in this as a system change is whether this creates not only a different sort of market dynamic between importers—because we have two very large building companies in the New Zealand market that are vertically integrated and will be part of the existing market structure and will be able to use these rules, and then we have little importers around the sides. In a market that's structured in that way, for the little importers to gain the benefits that they would need to be able to compete with the larger players, there would need to be a significant lift in their ability to compete because of their new ability to bring in different products. So there is going to need to be significant change in the rules, then. We don't know that yet because we haven't seen what the regulations say, we haven't seen which standards we will be able to use, but that is something that we will be paying close attention to. On the back of that, I will be looking for whether this doesn't in fact do the opposite thing—it might entrench the market power of those two players that are established in our industry. That would be the worst possible outcome for competition, that you would have big importers that were able to import a bigger range of products, a bigger range of cheaper products, but not be passing those savings on to consumers because there wasn't the market dynamic that incentivised them to do that. I want to know, and still don't know, how the Government will be continuing to monitor what happens to prices in the industry. We had a great back and forth with the Minister in the committee stage about the role of the Commerce Commission and the role of MBIE in its monitoring, but it's not something that the New Zealand Government is well set up to do, to continue to play monitoring roles on prices for consumers in an industry that is specialised in this way. So it's the Commerce Commission's remit to do market studies as something that allows them to do that, but this Government has not launched any market studies, and so I don't think that will be the way that they use to monitor this. So we will be paying close attention at home. My second question is: does this change maintain high standards of quality and safety? It's got to be a bottom line for New Zealanders who are building new homes and the builders, especially the small builders, who are engaging with these changes in really good faith, that the quality standards, the safety standards aren't compromised. We really support this, because that's not what we understand the change to be. We've heard multiple times from officials that the standards being used in the new rules will be equal to or better than New Zealand's building standards. In fact, in many respects, many parts of the building code in New Zealand have lagged behind the rest of the world, so there is real opportunity to, in fact, improve the standards of products that are brought into New Zealand with these new standards. The third is: are local manufacturers getting a fair go? I hear the Minister when he says that being able to use more standardised, more internationalised rules will help New Zealand manufacturers who are exporters to export their products and to innovate for an international market. But in a New Zealand market where 90 percent of materials are already imported, most of the New Zealand manufacturers who—you know, the number, the actual bulk of the number of manufacturers are manufacturing for the New Zealand market; they're not competitors on the world stage. So we're thinking about those manufacturers that have already gone through the compliance in New Zealand not facing further headwinds with products that haven't needed to go through a New Zealand process, or those manufacturers who are in the process of going through the compliance process having to sort of do something from the start again. So I'll continue to be meeting with those manufacturers; they're doing a great job. There are so many great instances of Kiwi innovation in building supplies, especially those manufacturers who are building in recycling, building in innovations like using New Zealand's materials that we have here that other countries don't have to make better products than anybody else does. We need to make sure that, you know, it's them that are able to enjoy the benefits of further competition in the industry, because if we get this right, the competition dynamics of the large-scale companies will—you know, the market power there is something that they won't be able to exert over those smaller manufacturers. Look, so there's still these structural issues in the building system. This isn't a silver bullet, but it is a really, really useful change. It's a useful change, and it fits with Labour's vision for a competitive and high-quality building sector, because we want to bring the costs of building down, and so bringing the costs of materials down is a key part of that. But we need to keep in mind who we're doing it for. We're doing it for the first-home buyer; we're doing it for those people who are on the receiving end of new homes in New Zealand. We want them to be warmer, we want them to be drier, we want them to be better quality, and we want them to be more affordable. So if these changes don't do that, or if these changes make it worse, we should be willing and quickly back here to make sure that the market dynamics in the building system are working properly. We also have to look at the long-term competition impacts here and make sure that, actually, we're building out a system where, in New Zealand, we can get things built and that these chokeholds in the New Zealand economy of the duopolies and monopolies that exist within many of our supply chains aren't holding us back from being able to realise the growth that we should be experiencing. So Labour agrees with this, but it needs to go along with strengthening our domestic manufacturing sector and prefabrication of housing, and we also need to support innovation and ensuring competition. Thank you, Madam Speaker. Dr LAWRENCE XU-NAN (Green): Thank you, Madam Speaker. I rise on behalf of the Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand in support of the Building (Overseas Building Products, Standards, and Certification Schemes) Amendment Bill. The purpose of this bill is to amend the Building Act 2004 to remove barriers to overseas building products being used in Aotearoa's building products market. But I think, to look at it more broadly, I first want to touch on some of the key aspects that we discussed during the committee stage. Again, we would like to thank the Minister for this particular bill, the Hon Chris Penk, for being, as always, very engaging and very informative in the discussion during the committee stage. Just a couple of key themes as a part of that, I think one of the first and foremost observations on this bill is that a lot of the bill actually ties into how secondary legislation is going to present itself. I think it is by nature of that secondary legislation that we are able to see how beneficial this particular bill will be for communities and also for businesses, and also just for the everyday, ordinary people of Aotearoa. I think that is something that is quite important to mention—that, although the primary legislation that we have seen in front of us is reasonably robust, and we had a very robust discussion, we are looking forward to seeing the secondary legislation and how that will eventuate. In terms of this bill, there is a number of aspects that we discussed substantially, and the first one is around, I guess, the very focus of this bill, which is what sort of international opportunities this is going to be presenting by being able to look at some of the overseas standards. We discussed in depth clause 4 of this bill, and clause 6, and particularly the certification process of overseas products, and one of the things we had a discussion with the Minister on is around how this will look in terms of some of the overseas requirements and compliance with New Zealand requirements when it comes to things like sustainable building practices, which I will talk more about later. But I think fundamentally, as the Green Party's trade spokesperson, I was really interested in how this particular legislation is interacting with existing but also prospective trade agreements. And the one that I highlighted in this case and with the Minister, and we had a very good discussion around this, is the Agreement on Climate Change, Trade and Sustainability and how this would potentially interact with the Environmental Goods section of that particular agreement. One of the other things that we did also discuss quite a bit was around competition and potentially, actually, some of the nervousness that local communities may experience as a result of this bill. It is true that we are looking at broadening our ability to have more internationally aligned standards and recognised standards and schemes. But, again, there have been discussions during the committee stage, as well as, we see, through submissions, that local providers are interested, I guess—and also, in some ways, nervous and hopefully will be reassured by some of the conversations we had with the Minister—around the opportunities that this will have for local communities and local providers and what it means for their livelihoods. There's a genuine concern that they would be outpriced or undercut by some of the overseas competition as a result of this. Simon Court: That's what we're hoping. Dr LAWRENCE XU-NAN: I think it is really important for us to always remember that we are in this House first and foremost for the people of Aotearoa and for the people of Aotearoa's livelihood. And it is important for us to know that there are genuine livelihoods at stake over here. And I would assume that certain parts of the party who is sitting next to me, builders, etc., who very much may be affected as a result of this bill, would be sensitive and recognise, too, that particular fact. This is something that we have heard during the committee stage, and I think it is really important for us to highlight. The other part that I would like to highlight, in terms of the committee stage, is around how this would work with local government, and particularly when we're looking at the Building Consent Authorities (BCA) and whether there is going to be consistency with BCA and how they would potentially accept some of these standards, particularly for organisations and for, I guess, the workforce—how they will be able to navigate the two different schemes. Indeed, this is something we heard both from the submissions from local government but also from submissions from other, particularly peak, bodies within the community. I think, in this case, there was an Amendment Paper that was proposed by the Hon David Parker, which I think would have clarified very well some of these points we were discussing during the committee stage, and even the Minister himself during the committee stage—we had a very fulsome discussion around this, and hopefully the essence of what the Amendment Paper proposed would have been taken on board. But I understand that there's still possibly some uncertainty around that. But it is an Amendment Paper that the Green Party of Aotearoa, Te Pāti Kākāriki supports. This brings me to my final points from the committee stage, which are around sustainability and the healthy homes element. I think, again, with legislation like this, one of the conversations that we did have during the committee stage was, for example, what this means in terms of the interaction with the Green Star rating, both for commercial buildings but also for residential dwellings, and how this would allow us to really enhance and also expand on sustainable building practices, as well as being able to have some of that healthy homes. And hopefully, based on the responses that we have received, there is going to be some consistency with existing practice around this. The Minister has sort of, in many ways, reassured us at the committee stage that some of these are very much in consideration. So we are interested to see how that would eventuate as well. Finally, in terms of that, this is probably something, just jumping the gun slightly, that my colleague will also mention, probably at a later stage: when we were looking at clause 8, new section 25B, around building product specifications, there were questions that we had in terms of what sorts of things it would allow for really amazing domestic industries. I'm looking at the wool industry in particular when it comes to how they can be a part of this particular creation of, and cocreation of, the standards. I think that is something that really deserves highlighting, and particularly from a rural development and regional development perspective, which I'm sure some of my colleagues will talk a little bit further about later on. And, finally, I think, just to finish up, in terms of the broader conversations we had during the committee stage, there were a number of nuances that we were seeking clarification on, particularly around how the chief executive, the CEO of the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment in this case, will approve certain things and how they would also be able to review certain standards, and particularly overseas standards as they come up or as they change on the international stage. Finally, we would like to say that one of the reasons that Te Pāti Kākāriki actually supports this bill in the context of Aotearoa is because of the fact that we genuinely would like to see more warm and available housing for the people of Aotearoa, not just to own but also in terms of renting. We often forget renters as part of this conversation, and as we see more and more people in Aotearoa will be renting in the near future, this is something that is very much top of mind. We have yet to see, and we are looking forward to seeing, some genuine, tangible solutions and tangible manifestations of some of the Government's housing initiatives, because it's all very well painting a picture and saying that we are building X number of houses, but the fact remains that a lot of people in our communities are still without a home to live in. That is the very nature of the situation we're dealing with. For those who are lucky enough to be renting or to be even more privileged to be owning their own home, we're seeing that it is not necessarily affordable, and particularly for young people. One definition is that people should not be paying more than 30 percent of their gross income on their housing, whether it's rent or it's a mortgage, and we are not seeing that reflected in our communities. So, to finish, we would like to see a bill like this genuinely—genuinely—contributing to making our homes cheaper and also more affordable but, at the same time, warmer and also safer, because all of that is important. CAMERON LUXTON (ACT): Thank you, Madam Speaker. Well, it's nice to hear that the Green Party understands profit, in some ways; it's just a shame they think that you get it by protectionism. ACT is welcoming the passage of the Building (Overseas Building Products, Standards, and Certification Schemes) Amendment Bill. It delivers on something that ACT campaigned on throughout 2023, and can I say well done, Minister Penk, for picking up such a brilliant idea. Also, across the House, thank you to everybody in this House, for seeing some common ground on how we can actually improve the building industries' affordability in this country. We have been oppressing the building industry, in a way. We've been saying, 'This is what you can build with, and what you can't.', and every different town's going to have a different rule. But what we're doing tonight is liberating builders and tradies and designers, and the materials that they will be able to choose from and find from places around the world and overseas. I have been in the building industry for some time, and I've met many people who reached the end of their careers too early because they were sick and tired of the red tape and nonsense they were going through, trying to get products approved to be used in New Zealand. These are good people, who cared a lot about the products they were supplying to the community and knew that they wanted to use the right products. But they also just lost a little bit of the passion. When you get designers saying, 'Look, here's my design, but right now this will not include any RFIs coming back from the council, because I know I'm going to get them. I know it's going to keep coming, and the costs are going to keep coming in.', the prices just blew out of control, and I can think of a designer friend of mine who left the industry just out of sheer frustration with what we were going through. What I think this bill will do—well, it's not what I think. What this bill will do is allow some innovative and effective and affordable products into New Zealand in a scheme that is not wildly different. We will not be running two different schemes, as we've heard tonight. There is a recognised standard in New Zealand, a recognised certification scheme in New Zealand, that has been deemed to have been met when it's used in the correct manner—the building code that is CodeMark. There are already schemes that we have in New Zealand, that are already operating in this building Act, and what we're doing here is allowing the Minister to recognise schemes and certification methods—and the chief executive of the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Enterprise to recognise certain products from overseas—and say that they will comply with our building code. Now, I just wanted to touch a bit on the building code, because this is something that—you know, it's not in-depth stuff, but, basically, when you bring a product, it has to comply with specific elements of the building code. Our building code has things that you have to comply with, if your product is to do something. For example, when we have a plaster board crisis and you want to replace like for like, you have to be able to say it applies with durability, perhaps—I think it's clause B2 of the building code. If it's in a wet space, you might have to deal with the wet area, for which, I think—oh, jeez, I'm not going to go off the top of my head, but— Hon Rachel Brooking: Come on! CAMERON LUXTON: —these are the sort—oh, jeez! I don't want to get caught on that one. But I think this is the sort of thing that we will be complying with. Things like the famous clause H1, which we've been traversing in the Transport and Infrastructure Committee—about how the Minister has amended some of the changes to clause H1. These are the sorts of things in the building code that products need to comply with, and new building products that come in from overseas will need to comply with the building code. This is not a relaxation of the standard, and that is what the Minister has reiterated tonight. This recognises the fact that New Zealand is a trading nation and that we should be trading for high-quality goods so that tradies, designers, and people who buy the eventual product of a house or a renovated building—the people who go on to live in it, either renting or buying—can have affordable housing so that New Zealand can start going towards the country that we expect to be: a land-owning, liberal democracy, with products that match our acceptable solutions. This is a great change. I am sure it'll be applauded on building sites around the country, as tradies sit there and eat during their smoko and talk about what a great thing this Government is doing for this country. Thank you. DEPUTY: Members, the time has come for me to leave the House for the dinner break. The House is suspended until 7.30 p.m. Sitting suspended from 5.57 p.m. to 7.30 p.m. ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Maureen Pugh): Members, when we broke for the dinner break, we were debating the Building (Overseas Building Products, Standards, and Certification Schemes) Amendment Bill. We are up to call No. 5—the New Zealand First call. ANDY FOSTER (NZ First): Thank you, Madam Speaker. It's a pleasure to rise to speak in this debate, especially when it's one where, essentially, there is unanimity across the House. I think we've all said that we want the same thing. We've all said we want warm, dry homes for everyone, Dr Lawrence Xu-Nan said warm, available homes, and we all recognise that housing supply is an issue—to have enough quality housing to house adequately a growing population. Actually, it's interesting just to reflect on the growth of our population over the last few years. Until 2019, six of the seven highest ever net-immigration levels were the years between 2014 and 2019—six out of the seven—and then, of course, 2023 was stratospherically the highest, at 4½ times the long-run average. Anyway, leaving that aside, not only do we want homes but we also want homes built as part of well-designed, connected, supported communities with good infrastructure, because it's not just about building homes; it's about building in the context of a wider community and a place that's good to live. But they've also got to be not just warm and dry, but they've also got to be affordable, because we can have fantastic homes, but if nobody can afford them, that is not going to get us anywhere, and that's true of whatever part of the housing spectrum you're on—whether it's private housing, whether it's social housing, whatever. They've got to be affordable to somebody, because there is no magic money tree and, as a country, we need to make sure we get good value for money out of all of these things. I was interested that Cam Luxton—and it's always good to talk after Cam on building issues. He made the point about being a property-owning liberal democracy and that being really, really important, and I'd 100 percent agree with that. But it was interesting to see the reaction from the Green Party, which almost questioned that, and I'd just like to say that the value of being property owning, as opposed to property renting, is really, really important. If we think about our ageing population, we're now expecting twice as many people entering retirement to be living, potentially, on superannuation alone, with the hope that somehow people in that situation are going to be able to afford either rent or a mortgage, and that's a ticking time bomb and it's ticking quite fast. So having a property-owning liberal democracy is really, really important. We also need to think about creating, as I said, community. I think it's far, far better when we have people who are an anchor in a community, and the longer you stay in a community, generally the better. Now, whether that's a long-term rental and secure rental or whether that is owning a property, I think that gives you a lot more commitment to a community. But back to affordability. The fundamental problem here is that our housing construction is very, very expensive—we heard from the Minister, at least in introducing this bill a few months ago, roughly 50 percent more than across the Ditch—and that is really, really significant. Our materials are expensive. That's what this bill is all about. Our labour productivity, he has also said, has not improved since 1985. Now, if you look at the things that people build with these days compared to what they built with in 1985, some of them have changed. They must have improved productivity, and yet somehow our regulatory processes have squeezed that productivity gain out, so the net that is our building industry has not improved in its productivity since 1985. Cam Luxton, again, talked about liberating the building industry from red tape, and I would echo that and support that. Regulations: our regulatory regime often does not help. The way those regulations are administered often doesn't help, and we've all heard stories about a building site where building activity has to shut down to wait for the building inspector to turn up at some point in time. That time is really money not only to the builder but also to the clients at the end of the day. Our land is expensive. Our infrastructure to support housing development is also often expensive. As I said, there is no magic money tree, and if you start making a magic money tree and borrowing from someplace or subsidising from someplace, that is also a cost to someone, whether it's a rate payer, a taxpayer, or whoever else it might be. This Government is trying actively to reduce costs, but there is no silver bullet. This is one of many things that the Government is doing. This is about reducing the cost of materials and increasing competition in the product market. There's also work being done in speeding up consents, especially that disruptive asking for more information in prefabrication, although I note that Fletcher has had a bit of a problem recently and are not continuing with some prefabrication work that they were doing previously. So they're changing what a factory does. There is modular construction; the granny flats initiative, which, of course, came from New Zealand First in the first place; Resource Management Act changes; and also getting realistic development charges so that we don't overburden but we also don't cross-subsidise. Why is getting house building costs down important? Because there have been some people who've just said, 'Look, what we want to do is we want to drive the market down, because if we can reduce the cost of existing houses, that's a good thing, isn't it?' Well, actually, if you look at the numbers, what you can see is that the market peaked at the end of 2021 or the beginning of 2022, and at that point in time, we also had about 51,000 new houses being consented. The market subsequently has declined, at the bottom, at about 16 percent and, now, at about 14 percent. But what's happened also is there's been a slide in the number of building consents applied for, going down from about 51,000 to about 31,000. I think that those two probably mirror each other in some way or are related in some ways Trying to, essentially, hope that house prices drop when the cost of building the houses is actually increasing is a recipe for not building more housing. If we want more houses, that is not going to be the way that solves it. As the Minister said, the cost of construction is up about 40 percent since 2019, so those numbers don't work. Fundamentally, we have to get the cost of building down. This is about the building product part of that. It's about more competition from greater diversity of products, which is expected to reduce price, give greater diversity, and give greater choice. The Commerce Commission, as we've already heard, noted the lack of competition in some parts of the building product market, and they believe that greater competition will benefit consumers. Of course, I think the Commerce Commission is doing some great work across a whole range of different areas at the moment, and so I think we should hear that message. This bill establishes a new, easier, quicker compliance pathway for the approval of new products and product groups from internationally certified products and product lines, so it's not just picking things off the shelf from whichever country it might be; it's saying, 'Hey, this is a country whose certification process we trust.', and it's adopting those. It's a quicker pathway to adopting those certification processes. The bill anticipates adopting products and product lines only from countries where we have confidence in these certification processes. We've already heard that 90 percent of something or other—90 percent of building, whether it's products, product lines, the different products that we've got on the lines. I don't think it's the value of those products, but if it's 90 percent of something, we're already importing a very large number of building products and using them in our construction. So this just makes it easier for some more to come into our market. But the really important thing is that it is really essential that the quality of those products is as good as we already have. The Transport and Infrastructure Committee worked really, really well on this, as we normally do—our very collegial select committee—talking about the safeguards and the processes that are there, and I traversed this, comprehensively, in my second reading speech, because we all remember the leaky building crisis. We do not want to go there again. That was painful for everybody and very expensive for everybody. But what we heard through the select committee process that processes are now much, much more robust. Of course, there are changes to legislation as well, and we also have the safeguard of a highly skilled and qualified building advisory panel for the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment and for the Minister. What's good is that this bill does that, but also it includes protections for local government who can use these products which come through this scheme in good faith. If the product fails, it's not the local government's fault—it never was with leaky buildings, and it shouldn't be now—and now, at least, they're indemnified against that. They're not indemnified against failure to make sure that it's used properly, but they're indemnified against the product failing. What it doesn't do—and I raised this in my second reading speech—is provide safeguards to the end user, or end consumer, should the product fail. This is a place which I hope the Government would stand behind and say, 'Look, something's failed. We certified that. We approved that. We let that come in. We will help you with that and with getting things put right.' Just to finish off, this is a good bill. I think there's unanimity around the House. It's shortly to become law. It is part of a multifaceted response by this Government to New Zealand's housing challenge, and I commend this bill to the House. MARIAMENO KAPA-KINGI (Te Pāti Māori—Te Tai Tokerau): Tēnā koe, Madam Speaker. I rise to take a short call on this, and I made some comments through the committee of the whole House just around my own experience in that and what it means to build affordable homes and what it means to use your own product, to go into Aupōuri Forest and use your own trucking teams to bring your houses from Awanui to Te Kao—experiencing very similar outcomes, too, in places like Tākou and Ahipara. I raise these names because they are small Māori communities. They're tribal communities, and they have their own solutions. So if this product—this safe and better and quality product—comes true, we're going to pick it up and go with it and make good of it. We support this—we support this. Maybe I just want to make this final point, though, which is to say that none of what we're doing here interferes with the solutions that go on in terms of, say, the small communities that I've just referred to, because we got to build 16 homes without any interference—or not too much interference, let's say—from anyone else. When the chair, Andy Foster, referred to how the Transport and Infrastructure Committee is a good committee—and I'm not on it any longer, but we wouldn't want to mistake collegiality for agreeing in wholeheartedness on what comes through certain select committees. So I just wanted to say tautoko tēnei take [ matter ]. Tēnā koe e te Speaker. SCOTT WILLIS (Green): Thank you, Madam Speaker. We are also in support of this bill, but we do have some concerns and questions. If you indulge me, I want to tell a bit of a story because I have been involved in the construction of alternative buildings in the past. In 2019, running a non-governmental organisation, I did work with a whole lot of volunteers and a whole lot of sponsors to build New Zealands first climatesafe house. The purpose of this house was to address a very real issue. Somebody who was living in a caravan in a garage, whod been flooded multiple times, whose own home had lost insurance and needed somewhere to live. This was a situation of real hardship. It was thanks to the Otago Polytechnic actually, who wanted a good project to work on, and some creative people that we hatched this idea of building a modular, transportable eco-home that was self-sufficient, that could be moved when this particular part of the village becomes uninhabitable because it is flooded so many times. The idea of that was to use new building techniques, low carbon construction, low waste. There were fantastic donations from Formance who produce structural insulated panels (SIPs) based in Christchurch, uPVC windows. Otago Polytechnic, the Dunedin City Council, Eclectic Home Design, Naylor Love, DS Building, Fulton Hogan, Dave Littleton Engineer, BRANZ, Fisher & Paykel, Dunedin Roofing Systems, Logic Group, etc. Lots and lots of people who donated to make this happen. The thing that we were doing, however, was using new materials that the Dunedin City Council, the building consent team didnt know how to deal with, and the Polytech team of aspiring builders didnt know how to build with this new material. This is a real concern because we want to make sure that the new systems are understood. SIPs are a structural system. They are useful for the primary structure of the building and therefore everyone in it. Any short cuts in certification or any poor understanding in how it can be constructed can lead to problems. Alongside access to new materials, we also need training schemes. Ive been really impressed with Formance who have worked to help train people up on how to use SIPs, but are we going to have all of those training schemes provided for all the new materials that come in? Are we going to have systems to help our building consent officers to understand how things work? This bill makes it great sense when were thinking about claddings and linings, but we also need to be very much more careful if were thinking about structural components that need a different level of certification and compliance. I really want to make the point that structure—if we want to think about the Maslow hierarchy of human needs, the hierarchy has a structure. If we get it wrong, then there are problems. There are costs, there may be lives lost, etc. So I want to make sure that when were working on this were not doing it with shortcuts and were also thinking not just about the cheapest houses we can build, but what is the lifetime cost? Because we dont want cheap and nasty. We want affordable but cheap to run, affordable to run lifetime cost. So Im really, really heartened in the regulatory impact statement, the Commerce Commission has looked at strengthening code mark, for example, convening a critical minerals task force, the build ready scheme, building product information requirements, product substitution guidance, etc. These are really good recommendations. We want to make sure that we have we have products that are understood, and we have the skills in our community to make sure that they are used and employed appropriately and quickly. DAN BIDOIS (National—Northcote): Today is a good day; it is New Zealand's liberation day. And, no, I'm not talking about liberation in terms of tariffs. I'm talking about liberation from not being able to use overseas products for the building sector. It's a good day for tradies, for developers, for manufacturers, for those wanting cheaper, warmer, drier homes and buildings, and for our economy. There's just been a report on the news that after this bill is passed, it's forecast that 12,000 new building products will enter New Zealand's market. That is going to make it cheaper and easier to build in New Zealand. As has been mentioned in this House by the Minister, it's not just about compromising standards; the products—to be allowed in—will need to reach New Zealand's standard or better. But it will mean a more competitive sector, a more productive sector, and that is what we want in this country. Because the Commerce Commission has made it very clear: we have an unproductive building and construction sector, much like many different other sectors in New Zealand, whether it's airlines, whether it's energy, whether it's the grocery sector, the banking sector, the insurance sector. We are in desperate need of more competition across the board. We are going for growth in this Government: going for growth in houses, going for growth in productivity, jobs, economic growth, and I wish to thank the Minister, Chris Penk, for bringing this bill to the House, my fellow colleagues on the Transport and Infrastructure Committee for shepherding this bill to the stage, and officials. As has been mentioned, this is just one tool in the toolbox and it is a good tool, at that. So I wish to end my speech and commend this bill to the House. Hon KIERAN McANULTY (Labour): Thank you very much, Madam Speaker. Today's the sort of day that I wish more New Zealanders saw. In Parliament, we've just seen a bill that started under the previous Labour Government and was finished off by this one, and now we've got a bill that builds on the work that was done by the previous Government. The way things are going in politics around the world, it'd be nice for people to see this a bit more. But it actually happens more in Parliament than people realise. This bill makes sense. It is fair to say that the construction sector in New Zealand has had artificial constraints upon it. It has not been a competitive market, and the Commerce Commission report identified where those constraints were. This bill won't solve all of that, but it will help. And it's very timely, because today is the day that the annual consent figures have been announced. They showed that the number of building consents that were issued over the last 12 months were the lowest since 2012. That actually should be of concern to all of this House, that the construction sector in this country has had a massive hit. That is in part because we have seen a pause on Kāinga Ora builds, and a slowdown in community housing builds, and a slowdown in residential builds. We've seen more than 13,000 people that work in the construction sector lose their jobs, many of which have gone to Australia. So the previous speaker was right to say that this bill was not the silver bullet, but it will help. It will help because so often the cost of construction is linked to the cost of materials, and the cost of materials is linked to the variety of materials available. And so often, we've seen constraints in the market, such as consenting authorities dictating that a particular type of building material be used, even when there were alternatives available. That sort of behaviour does not help in terms of trying to keep the cost of building as low as possible. Whilst we support this, it's important to point out that we talked to the Minister during the committee of the whole House stage and sought his assurance that the regulatory powers available to him would be used if required to preserve local manufacturing. Because at the end of the day, this bill allows products that are manufactured overseas and certified overseas to be used with equal application in this country. Part of the reason that local manufacturing has struggled is because it hasn't been a competitive market. Yes, this will provide more options, but more overseas options. It's important that the Government takes that seriously, because there are local manufacturers who produce building products who haven't had a fair run, and we need to be assured that they will get a fair run under this. That it won't simply be overseas manufacturers getting access to the market and that have such dominance of the market that they will drown out or strangle local manufacturing. That would be counterproductive. It's important that consumers get a broader range, if possible, when it comes to building supplies, but it's also equally important that those supplies aren't all manufactured overseas. Now that is on the Minister, whoever that may be in this Government and future Governments, and we want to put on the record that that is a concern of ours. We obviously support the bill, but it's important that that be acknowledged and monitored. Because if this bill, in providing consumers more options, is at the detriment to local manufacturing, that is counterproductive. But nevertheless, we've said that, we're going to be monitoring that ourselves, and the Minister assures us that he believes that the bill has enough provisions in order to preserve that. We're not fully convinced of that. Ultimately, it comes down to what regulations they bring in and what powers are available to the Commerce Commission. Nevertheless, this is important. The New Zealand construction sector is struggling. We all know the reasons why, but this is a positive move and we support it. STUART SMITH (National—Kaikōura): Oh thank you very much, Madam Speaker. It's a great pleasure to speak on this bill, actually. New Zealand has a black belt in red tape, and a 'could do much better' in actual productivity in a number of sectors, and particularly in this sector. It's not down to the people involved in it; it is all the rules around it that make it quite difficult and slow. My colleague Dan Bidois said earlier there was 12,000 new products likely to come and I think that's a good thing. But as the previous speaker, the Hon Kieran McAnulty, mentioned, New Zealand product producers—or building product producers—will, I'm sure, compete. We don't know how good they will be at competing because they really haven't had much competitive tension in some parts of the market for products. So this is going to be a great thing. We often think that New Zealand's unique because we have strong winds, so we have to build structurally to account for the wind and seismic risks that we have in New Zealand. But that's not unique—that happens everywhere around the world. I think the fact that, under this bill—and I remember hearing the evidence in the Transport and Infrastructure Committee—that doesn't mean we're lowering our standards, not at all. We're just opening the market up and allowing other people to bring it in and not be held up by all the processes. And so I had a look at that, and that's great. The Minister for Building and Construction mentioned consenting, so actually I'm going to refer to that because I have here the median time for a building consent to be issued. I won't call out all the councils, but one of mine's not doing very well. Marlborough District Council: 12 days, it takes to process a building consent. Whereas at the other end of the scale, also on my patch, at Kaikōura, is half that: it's six days. So how can a very small council actually do that—process those consents—in half the time? I don't know how that is, but certainly there's some good lessons to be learnt around the place. Every day costs money and it's not just this part of it; all of those little inefficiencies in the process add cost and frustration, and it's time these things were brought to an end. That's why this bill is so important and I commend it to the House. Hon RACHEL BROOKING (Labour—Dunedin): Thank you, Madam Speaker, for this opportunity to take a short call on the Building (Overseas Building Products, Standards, and Certification Schemes) Amendment Bill—that is quite a mouthful, but we have heard some good speeches on this bill this evening, and it's good to see sensible legislation being considered in thoughtful ways by members from around the House. I want to just touch on a couple of things, and we heard from Labour's building spokesperson, Arena Williams, that when she was involved in going through the select committee process and the committee of the whole House process, she was looking at this bill with three different questions in mind. The first was: is this going to reduce the price for consumers rather than simply leading to a profit for people importing the new materials? We've just heard from the Hon Kieran McAnulty that it's very important there that that is monitored. That's something to keep doing after this bill passes. Another issue that Arena Williams was focused on is that health and safety and quality issue that the previous speaker, Stuart Smith, just referred to. The advice that was given during this process was that it will not be compromised, and that's very important. The third issue is: are local manufacturers of building products getting a fair go? We know, and we will have heard in many of the debates, about new products such as saveBOARD, which I'm interested in because it's made from recycled materials, and, of course, here on precinct we have a good example of it out the back of the building, protecting us from the work that is going on in that building site just next door to us. So it's good that we have these manufactured products in New Zealand, because whilst the previous speaker was saying New Zealand's not unique, we are uniquely far away from everywhere else, so it is very important that we have building materials here in New Zealand, and we might be able to make use of some products that other countries can't. But what is so important about this point is the settings that will be made in secondary legislation, in the regulations. We need to make sure that these regulations don't favour the international products over our locally manufactured projects. I think the Hon Kieran McAnulty put this very nicely when he said that they need to be getting a fair run. That's important, and I ask the Minister for Building and Construction to make sure that he does do this through the regulations and the regulatory settings, and, of course, Government Ministers who will be involved in the development of those regulations. Labour will be watching that closely. But, on that note, I do want to commend this bill to the House and congratulate the Minister for bringing it here. MIKE BUTTERICK (National—Wairarapa): Thank you, Madam Speaker. This very welcome piece of legislation is being introduced to the House by our very own 'Mr Fix-it', the Hon Chris Penk. While Minister Penk may not be Bob the Builder, he is however rebuilding our legislative framework, one plank and one nail at a time. This rebuild will actually have a significant and positive impact on the building and construction sector in this country. Because we know, right now, we're facing a market where the competition of the building products isn't working as well as it could and should be, and we have barriers that are preventing high quality overseas products from entering our market. So, this bill's about removing those barriers, increasing competition, and giving builders and homeowners more choice, ultimately driving down costs. This bill will recognise overseas standards and certifications, streamline the use of international standards, and accept overseas certifications for building products. Simply, this bill provides for more competition which means more choices, lower prices for building products. Increased resilience to supply chain disruptions so we can get products from more countries, and a quicker building process with fewer barriers and faster consenting. To sum it up, this bill's about improving the competition, lowering costs, and making the building industry more resilient. So this is just one part of our ongoing work to reform the building and construction sector to meet the needs of all New Zealanders. Can we fix it? Yes we can. Will we fix it? Yes we will. I commend this bill to the House. Hon DAVID PARKER (Labour): Thank you, Madam Speaker. I listened to Mr Foster's contribution and agreed with much of it. I think New Zealand's come a long way in reaching a cross-party consensus as to what are the main ingredients of a more affordable long-term housing market for both people who own their own house or people who rent. I want to respond to some of the comments that Andy Foster made. When we came into Government, land supply was terribly, terribly constrained in New Zealand, and there was an agreement within Treasury—and I think within the outgoing National Government—that the artificial scarcity of building opportunities was flowing through to the price of all houses, new and old, because markets clear at the marginal cost of the new increment to supply, and if the new increment to supply is held falsely high in its price, that flows through to all of the prices of the second-hand goods as well. Therefore, one of the main problems that we had in New Zealand was tight land supply, which was not just driving up the cost of a new house but also pulling up the price of all second-hand homes in New Zealand, or previously owned homes in New Zealand. So what do we do about that? Well, we massively increased building opportunities in New Zealand. In truth, some of the work had been done through the Auckland Plan process that Rodney Hide led the legislative framework for, and so there were more medium-density houses provided for in the Auckland market. We then took office, and we did three main things: we introduced a national policy statement on urban development, which vastly increased supply and made illegal some things that were driving up the cost of supply, including excessive rules relating to car park requirements and the like. We then, at the same time, had a piece of fast-track legislation that was enabling the consenting of lots of subdivisional opportunities to come forward, in a way that would not have otherwise come forward. We next, working, actually, in concert with the National Party under Judith Collins, legislated for what was called the medium-density residential zone directly through an amendment to the Resource Management Act (RMA). That also forced councils in high-growth areas to change their plans to bring forward more house building opportunities. Then, through the RMA reforms, we introduced spatial planning to give a signal to the private sector as to where the investment was likely to go next and also to make some more rational decisions for the expensive trunk infrastructure like new roads and railways and schools and hospitals—where those things are likely to be placed—in order to give some direction as to where investors should invest next. We started to reform infrastructure funding and financing, because that's a big part of the costs as well, and it's pleasing to see that that work's continued also under the current Government, with Chris Bishop recently announcing how you can have a levy for generalised infrastructure costs that are going to be imposed by a new area of development, which, if not paid for by that development, is, effectively, putting the cost to the council and other ratepayers. And that's wrong—you need to get those costs properly internalised via subdivision where possible. Now, I know the RMA reforms that we passed have since been repealed, but the Government is continuing with that part, the spatial planning reforms, because they are a necessary part of the picture. Then, in respect of house-building costs, you obviously need a workforce. We doubled the number of people who were being trained for apprentices and other trades courses, mainly in the construction sector, and that helped. We also built a lot more State houses, because one of the things that you need in any Western country is a mixture of private-sector housing but also some social housing, and that can be split in ownership between the Government and housing providers that are non-governmental. It's a little bit galling for us on this side to hear the Prime Minister today claiming that all these people came off the motels and placed in housing, because we on this side know that those houses were actually built by the Labour-led Government, who introduced more new public housing than any Government has done since the 1970s. Hon Paul Goldsmith: It's a tough business. Hon DAVID PARKER: Of course, that record is to be contrasted with the last two prior National Governments, which decreased public housing stock, both in total numbers but they also particularly reduced the numbers that were owned by the Crown—and I know, Madam Speaker, I'm doing exactly as Andy Foster did, recounting all of the complex things that need to be done to bring a housing market under control. Then, in respect of the house-building costs, you also need to address the cost of components for housing, and that's what this bill addresses by making it more easy to bring in products from overseas, creating a system for the specification to be registered and the mode of use of those new products to be brought forward. If there's one disappointment that I have here, it relates to how you actually make building consent authorities within council allow the incorporation of these products in a way that is not too time-consuming or expensive. I proposed an amendment at the committee stage that I was disappointed the Government did not support, because we know—and I think all of us know in this House—that one of the problems that we have in council planning departments, and this is caused partly through the incentives that they face because of the legal risk they face, but it's only partly that—they are requiring more and more and more paper, or the electronic form of paper, to be filed in respect of each consent application. Even where a product has been approved for use, the practice has become prevalent in the Auckland City, and I'm sure in some other consent departments around the country, where they require the method of use as well as the underlying specification for those products to be filed in every building consent application, rather than just referring to the product that has been approved. Now, that is wrong, because there are already obligations on the architects and the licenced building practitioners to use those products properly if specified, and they should not have to put all that additional detail in. Now, the answer that the Minister in the chair gave was that that's not required by law. Well, it's not required by law, but you can't beat City Hall, because when the City Hall asks you for those documents and you're the architect or the builder, what are you to do? The only way you can beat City Hall in that situation is through judicial review, which would cost tens of thousands of dollars and cause delay. Therefore, the architect or the builder is, effectively, forced to do what the council unreasonably asks—the council building consent department. They either go to the back of the queue or have a fight that they're not going to win anyway, and they end up paying the extra $300 fee for the extra information that the council's sought and charged them another hour of their own time for. They give up, they give in on every occasion, because if they don't, they face those additional costs and they go to the back of the queue, and it causes further delay and costs to themselves and to their clients. So it puts up the costs that are charged by the council to the applicant, puts up the applicant's own costs through delay, and also the costs that are being charged to the applicant by the applicant's advisers, be they builders or architects or engineers. I had suggested an amendment saying that where those documents had been filed, the council couldn't ask for them to be filed again, because I think we actually have to do something pretty directive here because otherwise councils will do what they are currently doing under the current law, and they'll continue to do it. So I was a bit disappointed that that very practical amendment was not favoured by the Government members, because we actually had an opportunity not just to introduce these products in a way that is efficient—that is, provided for in the book here, in a authorisation of those to be products to be used, as we did with GIB substitutes—we actually had the opportunity to go further and strip out this ridiculous repetition of what's being required by councils to be filed at great cost. I repeat again that just coincidentally in the last week, I had a very experienced architect with 50 years' experience—Malcolm Walker, who I know well—come to me and say that the architects in Auckland and the builders are just tearing their hair out at this ridiculous waste of cost with the council intruding into what really ought not to be their purview. None the less, we support this bill as being a helpful addition. Dr VANESSA WEENINK (National—Banks Peninsula): Thank you, Madam Speaker. It's an honour to be the final speaker in this third reading of the Building (Overseas Building Products, Standards, and Certification Schemes) Amendment Bill. So as many have traversed through this evening, this is an excellent piece of legislation that will allow greater competition through the introduction to the New Zealand market of a new variety of building products and other systems. This is going to be supported by the regulatory schemes that go alongside it. This means that the standards of the products coming in will be as high, if not higher than others. One of my colleagues across the House mentioned a building manufacturing company from my electorate called Formance, who make structural insulated panels which are excellent—apparently harder to get consent to be used in Dunedin than they would be to be used in Christchurch. Yet another of the crazy problems that we have in New Zealand where there's huge variation between regions of what is acceptable. So this is another area that we'll be attacking with different legislation, but under this piece of legislation, we will be massively increasing the options for the building companies, for the architects and designers. This will make a tangible difference to the costs of building in this country, which, as we've discussed, has been far too high for far too long. It's slowing down our economic growth. This is something that is a part of our plan for going for growth and we will fix it. We will get it done. I commend the bill to the House. Motion agreed to. Bill read a third time.
Scoop
25-04-2025
- Politics
- Scoop
Juries (Age Of Excusal) Amendment Bill — First Reading
Press Release – Hansard Sitting date: 9 Apr 2025 JURIES (AGE OF EXCUSAL) AMENDMENT BILL First Reading CARL BATES (National—Whanganui): I move, That the Juries (Age of Excusal) Amendment Bill be now read a first time. I nominate the Justice Committee to consider the bill. It is a privilege to rise in support of this bill, the Juries (Age of Excusal) Amendment Bill, which proposes a simple but meaningful change to increase the age at which New Zealanders may request automatic excusal from jury duty from 65, to 72. This is a targeted amendment to the Juries Act 1981, but one that carries wider implications for fairness, civic participation, and the evolving demographics of our country. At present, any person aged 65 or over may ask to be excused from jury duty either for that specific summons or permanently, and that request is automatically granted. This may have been appropriate several decades ago, but it no longer reflects the reality of life today. Kiwis are living longer, staying healthier, and continuing to contribute meaningfully to society, well past the age of 65. In fact, I need look no further than my own mum. She's passed that age—though, I should add, she certainly doesn't look it—and she's still working, still active, still capable, and still eager to contribute. The current law sends the wrong message that once you turn 65, your civic responsibility ends, that there is no longer an expectation that you contribute to the judicial system or share the burden of justice with your fellow citizens. That's not the message that we should be sending. We also know that it has practical effects. With so many automatic excusals from age 65, courts must issue more summonses just to fill the jury pool. That is an inefficient use of our administrative resources. It is time that we updated the law. The choice of 72 was not made lightly. A number of potential thresholds were considered. I expect and encourage the Justice Committee to consider this question in depth. The age of 72 reflects a considered and balanced approach. In New Zealand, judges must retire at 70 under the Senior Courts Act 2016 but may serve further on limited-term contracts up to the age of 75. That acknowledges their continued capacity while still maintaining boundaries. Most relevant to the proposal in this bill is the retirement age of the Ombudsman, which is set at 72. That informed the drafting of the bill. It is an example of a public-facing role that values and places value on experience, maturity, and sound judgment—qualities that are also vital in a jury. Internationally, though, there is a spectrum of age exemptions. In England and Wales, 76 is the upper limit for jury service, with those over 70 being able to seek excusal. In Scotland, people over the age of 71 may be excused upon request. In Australia, five states [ Music plays from Opposition member's phone ] and territories allow those aged 70 or over to permit permanent excusal. I feel like I've got my nana or grandad opposite me at the moment trying to use their cellphone! Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, the Australian Capital Territory, and the Northern Territory all allow those over the age of 70 to seek excusal on a permanent basis. Western Australia takes a stricter approach: those over the age of 75 are simply ineligible. In the United States, some states such as Hawaii, South Dakota, and Maine allow excusal from jury duty at the age of 80. So the age of 72 places us in the middle of a reasonable and global spectrum. It reinforces civic participation without placing undue expectation on our seniors, such as those who have just left the House! Let me be clear: this bill does not compel anyone over the age of 65 to serve; it simply lifts the age of automatic excusal, preserving the ability for any individual to still request an exemption if they have a valid reason. The proposal did not originate from an academic paper; it came from the front lines of our justice system. In October 2024, I visited the Auckland High Court with the Minister of Justice, the Hon Paul Goldsmith. During that visit, Ministry of Justice staff raised the issue directly. The volume of excusals of those over the age of 65 was placing strain on registrars and making it harder to fill the jury benches. It is a practical, sensible suggestion that they made; one that stuck with me and led directly to this bill. The bill makes a single, targeted change, amending sections 15 and 15A of the Juries Act 1981 to lift the age at which the registrar must excuse a person, on request, from 65, to 72. Anyone aged 72 or older will still be able to request an excusal, either for that particular summons or on a permanent basis. The expected benefits are twofold. Firstly, it broadens the pool of jurors, including New Zealanders aged 65 to 72 and it adds valuable life experience, insight, and maturity to our jury benches. Second, it reduces the strain on court administration. Around 47 percent of excusals are currently granted purely based on the age of the applicant. Even a modest reduction in that number would represent a meaningful improvement in court operations. It is a small but practical change, part of a broader effort to restore confidence in law and order in this country. As the member of Parliament for Whanganui—including Whanganui, South Taranaki, and Stratford—I regularly meet with constituents over the age of 65 who are still working, volunteering, running organisations, and making an impact. Their contributions are extraordinary. This bill says to them, 'We see you, we value you, and we trust you to play your part in one of the most important civic duties there is.', and that is jury service. I want to take a moment to acknowledge the hard-working Justice Committee, who, hopefully, following a vote in this House, will take this bill forward. I am confident that they will bring their usual rigour, insight, and care to examining this piece of legislation. While other issues have also been raised with me regarding our jury system and jury duty—and there have been a number through this process that constituents, that people who have heard about this bill since it was pulled from the biscuit tin have raised with me—this bill itself has a very narrow scope, simply reviewing the age of automatic excusal. It is a focused reform, and the committee's work will be vital in refining it further, and, as I said, exploring that exact age that would be appropriate in a New Zealand context today. This is a simple change; a change that reflects the evolving realities of New Zealand society. It updates our laws to match our demographics. It honours the role that mature Kiwis still play and it strengthens the fairness and representativeness of our jury system. I urge all members of this House to support the first reading of the Juries (Age of Excusal) Amendment Bill. Let us recognise the changing face of our nation. Let us share the responsibility of justice and let us send a message that every generation, including those over the age of 65, has a role to play in upholding the law. I commend the Juries (Age of Excusal) Amendment Bill to the House. ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Teanau Tuiono): The question is that the motion be agreed to. Hon Dr DUNCAN WEBB (Labour—Christchurch Central): Well, may I just congratulate Carl Bates who is in charge of this bill for speaking for 10 minutes on a bill that does nothing more than raise the age of excusal from 65 to 72. It's not a bad bill. I'll put you out of your misery; we're going to support it. But of all the ways in which we could make New Zealand better, this member has chosen to raise the age at which someone can tap out of jury service. That's it. Well, you know, you have another bill in the ballot. I hope you can do a little something a little more ambitious next time. Juries are important because it's the idea that ultimately, if we're in trouble with the law, we're judged by our peers. One of the important things about juries is that they're representative. So I'm absolutely fine with people up to 72 being compelled to be summoned for jury service. But I tell you what, if we really want to have a representative jury, we probably should look at the $31 a half day that they're paid, because if you're going to take a day off work, $31 a half day doesn't cut it. Or you could look at the fact that childcare is capped at $80 a day. If you want mums and dads to come along and serve on juries, and we do, we want to have a look at that as well and ensure that actual costs of childcare are covered and not just a token amount, or even as much as providing lunch. So if you get to serve on a jury and it goes over lunch, you've got to bring your own lunch. Now there are some pretty simple fixes, because the danger is—and we know this from juries, I've been in courts and seen juries selected—people who serve on juries are skewed towards people with spare time, people to whom it's interesting and they haven't got a job to hold down, or a child needs attention and can't be put in care. So we do actually already have a skew towards older people who've got time on their hands. So, yeah, we're very happy for this bill to go through. I'm pretty sure it'll get through the House. It probably won't trouble the Justice Committee for too long either, but if we're going to have juries that are truly representative from all sections of the community—not just those that can take a few days off—we really need to address the wider questions in juries as well. That's a job that I'd encourage the Government to do. Kia ora. CELIA WADE-BROWN (Green): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I agree with some of the points that have been made by the mover of this bill, Carl Bates. I've served on juries a couple of times—it's quite a tough experience—and I've also been excused once or twice. I felt the role of being a mayor, leading the long-term plan, probably was a reasonable excuse and they agreed. I also appreciate the fact that experience, life experience, and age is no barrier—we already have no maximum age for serving on a jury and I think that's great. It's quite interesting, if I heard the member opposite correctly, that you can't be on a US jury over 75. One could think they might be able to apply that a little bit more generally to important public roles, but I like the idea that there should be no upper limits—obviously, I like the idea that there should be no upper limits. But which generation is under-represented in juries? Is it the greyer generation that is under-represented in juries? I don't think so. My colleague from Labour, the Hon Dr Duncan Webb, made some excellent points about the fairly shabby remuneration for jury service and the difficulties of childcare, and, in fact, the sheer unpredictability of how long one's jury service might go on. It doesn't seem to me to have strong evidence as to whether it should be 65, 72, 103; whether there should be automatic right of refusal, if you like, at any particular age. But given our retirement age is 65—unless the member was suggesting that also move to 72—then why not pick an age that we already have generally accepted by the general population? I personally think that the Ombudsman and District Court judge ages and so on—of 72—I think that's a bit young. I think there's plenty of people who are capable of contributing well past that—not that I'm there yet. I note that, as far as I know, Grey Power doesn't have an official position on this issue but generally feel that retirees should be able to recuse themselves from jury duty. It's not the worst bill in the universe, but is it really the best use of our time for governance? Should we be sending it to select committee without a really clear case for the time and energy to be engaged in this? At this stage, we say we will not be supporting it. Dr PARMJEET PARMAR (ACT): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I'm taking this call on behalf of the ACT Party to support the Juries (Age of Excusal) Amendment Bill. I want to congratulate the member in charge, Carl Bates—great to see that your bill has been drawn and it's here for the first reading, and we really look forward to seeing the outcome of this bill going through the select committee process. I've heard from members from the other side that this bill is a very simple bill, and sometimes those are the kind of things we need to do. It's the simple things that can add efficiency, and that is what this bill is about, adding that efficiency to our justice system. As we have heard that 40 percent—47 percent actually of excusals are granted because of a juror's age; juror being over 65, the person who is summoned to be juror is over 65. And that creates a lot of work for the registrar because when they deal with so many excusals, they have to then approach more people. And sometimes—I have heard this—that the numbers of people, those who approached, are multiple times more than the numbers of people who are needed. So imagine the kind of admin work that is needed to ensure that our justice system is able to work in a manner that it should. And having people, those who are over 65, coming and serving as jurors and basically lifting the automatic excusal age from 65 to 72 actually creates that window where more people of that age bracket between 65 and 72 can come and be jurors. And of course, excusal will be available as the member in charge has described in his opening speech. That for some reason, medical reason or any other reason, if that individual cannot be a juror, those kinds of things will be taken into consideration. I have spoken to so many people who are summoned for jury service, and I have heard different kind of views. Views not about the actual experience of being a juror, but about them being summoned. So there is a lot of anxiety amongst people because all of a sudden when they see that they have to do jury duty—which is very important part for our justice system and it's our role as citizens, except some people, those who are exempted from that role—to serve as jurors when they are summoned. But then people have responsibilities: young families have children and then there are sometimes elderly people in the family to take care of, sometimes the job commitments are such that they find it really hard. So it's not excusals coming from only people who are over 65; there are a lot of other people applying for excusals as well on the basis of other grounds. So we can imagine the workload for registrar to ensure that jury benches have enough people to conduct the trial. And the trial needs to happen in a fair manner. And jurors should reflect our community. And we know that we are living longer and there are a lot of people out there after retiring at the age of 65, they would still like to contribute in whichever way they can. And giving them the opportunity to contribute by being a juror, I'm sure our people, our senior citizens would be really proud of doing that. It's really important to note that, yes, there are some examples from other countries, but our country, if you look at the population in that age group, the ageing population is increasing. So we need to take those factors into consideration as well. And there is a lot of desire amongst older people to do a bit of work, not full time maybe, but do a bit of work that they really like, and they really enjoy. And I'm sure that our seniors, they really want to be part of our justice system, make the contribution to make our communities safer. Because when people are on a jury, everything is based on facts. The evidence needs to be taken into consideration. There is no place for emotion in there. It all needs to be based on facts. So that experience of dealing with things, we know that sometimes it comes with age, and those are the kind of attributes that we can definitely utilise amongst our older people on jury service. So this is actually a good bill. It is to improve the efficiency of our justice system. And I really want to congratulate, again, the member in charge, Carl Bates, for bringing this bill to the House. The ACT Party commends this bill. Thank you. JAMIE ARBUCKLE (NZ First): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I rise on behalf of New Zealand First to support the Juries (Age of Excusal) Amendment Bill. I congratulate the member Carl Bates on this bill and how it's been put together. It is in fact quite simple. It increases the age from 65 to the proposed 72, and I think that, as the member has said in his introduction today, this is something we'll discuss at the select committee. And as I'm a member of the hard-working Justice Committee, it will be another bill that we will put our minds to—whether that age should sit at 72. The member has given some reasons around that, but the select committee process will also give the submitters the opportunity to look at that age and give some feedback, and I think that will be quite valuable. Just reading the existing legislation at the moment, I found it really confusing. At the moment in section 15(2) of the principal Act, the Juries Act, there is the term 'must excuse'. To me, from my Resource Management Act background 'must' would mean that you cannot sit if you're over 65. But then the existing legislation goes on to another section, section 15A(2), where it says that a written application will permanently excuse a person. So it seems that if you're already over the age of 65, you're excluded, but you can also write and be excluded, and I don't quite get the concept there, so it will be for officials to explain the current legislation and how that matches together and, if we use that same terminology in this bill, just how that actually works. I did want to tell a story about being on a jury, because it's something that I've always wanted to be a part of, and in my life experience so far, every time I get the call to jury service, I've been Marlborough district councillor or for certain reasons haven't been able to serve. I had the unusual experience on becoming an MP of being asked to be on a jury—prior to becoming an MP and obviously then being here as an MP and then trying to explain through writing some letters that I was no longer eligible because, as the Speaker and other members would know, we can't sit as jurors. It ended up being quite an episode because, as you write letters and wait for responses, and with the post and the way that worked it was right on the narrow edge of possibly having to be there. But I was like, 'I'm excluded. I'm excluded.' I couldn't use the excuse of being over 65, so that was something, but that was the story there. Hopefully, increasing the age to 72 means that with a few more runs on my age, I might finally get to sit on a jury one day. As the member in charge of the bill has said, there is a narrow scope to this and what it is actually asking, and I gather, after the story I just told, that there will be a number of people out there with similar jury stories and they may also possibly ask for the scope of this to be widened. But as we find through the Business Committee, the scope of what we'll be looking at will be the age increase. The member in charge of the bill has also said that just finding the numbers of people to sit on juries is harder, and I know sometimes they have to go through a number of different applications or requested a lot of different people before they can actually fill a jury. On that note, I commend this bill to the House. Hon ANDREW BAYLY (National—Port Waikato): Thank you, Mr Speaker. It's a pleasure to be talking on this bill. The first thing I'd like to say is that I don't have a conflict of interest. I just want to be clear about that. But I would like to offer my congratulations to Carl Bates for getting his first bill drawn from the 'biscuit tin', as he described it. It's always a momentous occasion, and it's wonderful that you've had that opportunity. I think it's probably unfair to say it's a pretty simple bill. It is in a sense, because it does raise the age. But I think the significance of this is that juries, at the moment, have a lot of trouble getting sufficient people to actually turn up, and it is actually dealing with a very practical issue. So I congratulate the member for thinking about this and working his way through the deliberations around the actual age group. But I think it is an important issue, and I think he should be congratulated from that perspective. The issue, of course, is whether 72 is right, or 70, or whatever it might be. I know that Mr Bates talked about the reference in New Zealand to judges at 70 but the ability to get a limited service contract up to 75, or Ombudsman, which you struck. There are other senior roles, but obviously the 72 is where you've landed, and that's what the Justice Committee will be thinking. And you've noted what's happened in Australia and America; we're obviously somewhere in between. Which are good references points to what I think the Justice Committee's going to have to deliberate on. I think where he struck the balance probably sounds right. I think the important thing that the member did highlight is, at the moment, by having an arbitrary 65 age limit at which you could automatically be excluded, actually does rob older people of the right to participate in our judicial system. I think it's a pretty important principle. What people probably don't appreciate is that the average life expectancy of New Zealanders has increased by broadly one year for every decade over the last 40 years; or in other terms, a month for every year that we've lived for the last 40-odd years. So bringing this into that scope recognises that people are living longer in New Zealand, as they are around the world. I think it is viable, and a good proposition, and I think, ultimately, I think we're going to get a better outcome. Because as the member expressed, what we draw on by inviting and allowing older people—not old, older—people to participate is they bring experience, they bring maturity, and, as he said, 'sound judgment'. So on that basis, I support the bill, and look forward to seeing it being debated in the Justice Committee. Hon GINNY ANDERSEN (Labour): Mr Speaker, thank you. I rise today to speak in support of the Juries (Age of Excusal) Amendment Bill. It's a modest yet meaningful change to our justice system. This bill seeks to increase the age at which a person may be automatically excused from jury service from 65 to 72. Sounds like a practical change to me, grounded in demographic realities and social expectations, and so we're OK with it. I mean, at its heart the bill recognises that society is changing. People are living longer, working longer, and also engaging in public life for more years than ever before. So the idea that 65 suddenly looks a lot closer now to me, and should the cut-off point of that be participation in in civic life, then that doesn't seem quite right. So something as fundamental as jury service; this seems to be outdated, so it's a good amendment. I'm interested to know or iron it out through the submissions process that the Justice Committee hear from many 73-, 74-, and 75-year-olds who might also want to participate. An interesting fact I've got here is that in the 2023 census there are actually 466,000 New Zealanders aged between 65 and 74, and that's a 35 percent increase on 2013 stats. So there's a whole lot more people who will be able to partake in jury service. There have been some reservations. We know that if we have more people from an older demographic, what impact that will have on juries. I'm sure there'll be lots of good submissions from places like the legal fraternities that come together to put their heads together on what the impacts will be on the justice system. We look forward to hearing those submissions and understanding what other impacts it might have. From a practical standpoint it also potentially has some fiscal benefits, fewer automatic excusals, and less delays potentially if there are issues around getting people for a jury. So this seems to be a good place to be. In terms of what it does for our justice system, it's not a radical overhaul in any way, but it does modernise the current system in a smart and thoughtful way, and it reflects today that people do stay engaged for a long time in their later years. We support this bill because we believe in participation, we believe in inclusion, and we also believe in a justice system that evolves alongside of the society it serves. I commend the bill to the House. RIMA NAKHLE (National—Takanini): Thank you, Mr Speaker. It's a pleasure to rise and contribute to this first reading of the Juries (Age of Excusal) Amendment Bill, a member's bill in the name of my good friend Carl Bates—the MP for Whanganui—who's sitting to my right. I'll tell you what: he's a right-hand man because he's a man of action. If I may, Mr Speaker, earlier across the House we heard someone struggle with their phone and the song 'This Is How We Do It' by Montell Jordan played over and over on their phone. And 'This Is How We Do It' in Carl Bates' style: when he sees a problem, it's a call to action to him to find a solution. My friend Mr Bates spoke about how when he was visiting a courthouse with the Hon Paul Goldsmith last year, there was kōrero from the staff there about one of the shortfalls is if only they could have more people that are more ready to participate in jury duty. Carl Bates saw that, heard that, and 'This Is How We Do It'. He wrote a member's bill straight away, and I'm so glad that this member's bill was drawn out of that biscuit tin that we refer to a lot in this House. Now, essentially, the principal Act with which this bill is seeking to amend is the Juries Act 1981—I was one year old when that was passed. What we've heard so far is what we're trying to do, and what Mr Bates is trying to push forward with, is that anyone; a person—we're lifting the age with respect to jury duty from when they can be automatically exempt from the age of 65 to the age of 72. I'm sure that my colleagues across the House, like myself, have been in a situation where people have shared their jury duty war stories, how much they've enjoyed participating in that civil duty where they've had a direct contribution to the determination as to whether someone was guilty of an act or not. It really is—for a lot of people that I've heard from—somewhat of a thrill in their lives. It saddens me to hear that our member across the House from the Green Party, Celia Wade-Brown, is not supporting this bill, which brings so many of our elderly and our wise people enjoyment as they are in their twilight years. I really appreciate how my colleague Carl Bates reflected on why the age of 72; what's brought him to this decision to push for taking up the age from 65 to 72. As he said, it's not arbitrary; it was quite a considered choice. In part of this consideration, he compared benchmarks here in New Zealand and he looked at the international examples. Thank you, Carl Bates, for reflecting on that and for sharing with us how you came to that Goldilocks sweet number of 72. I concur and I tautoko your conclusion with respect to that age. Also, I really appreciate how Mr Bates spoke about how this change will bring about efficiency with the administration of our court operation. It's quite an alarming figure that 47 percent of excusals currently are based on age. So being the man of action, showing that 'This Is How We Do It'—to quote Montell Jordan—he saw that problem, he researched it, and then he said, 'Let's make a change'. You put your heart out there when you put a member's bill in the members' tin. I'm very glad and privileged that my one was drawn out a few days after my maiden speech last year, and I know the feeling that there's something you're passionate about and seeing it progress across the House. I'm grateful that, so far, we've had support across the House—except for the Greens that, for some reason, feel that people don't want to contribute to society after the age of 65. My mother's in her early 70s and she says to me she'll retire when she dies. I don't like hearing it, but that's essentially what she says to me and that's the way that she's raised me. Finally, I'd love to quote the Lebanese poet Gibran Khalil Gibran: 'Seek ye counsel of the aged, for their eyes have looked on the faces of the years and their ears have hardened to the voices of life. Even if their counsel is displeasing to you, pay heed to them.' I commend this bill to the House. GREG O'CONNOR (Labour—Ōhāriu): I'd just like to say that I'm standing here speaking as the Labour Party spokesperson on courts, not as someone directly affected by this bill. I'd just like to make that quite clear right from the start. Also, I'm someone that is probably very unlikely to end up on a jury where I could be called, being an ex – police officer and an ex-MP. It would be the equivalent of me turning up with an RSA badge on my jacket. Any lawyer with challenges would very quickly isolate me out from the herd. So I say that to make sure there is no vested interest, no conflict of interest in speaking about this, a very sensible little change. Congratulations to the member Carl Bates for having this drawn. Of course, having sat through a few jury trials as the officer in charge of the case, some interesting things happen to jury trials as the trials go on, particularly if you get a homicide trial, a long robbery trial, or a sex trial that might go on for several weeks. The jury becomes a very important part of this—well, obviously, the most important part of it because they're going to make the final decision. But when you're sitting in a courtroom—and, actually, there's a lot of comings and goings but there are certain people that remain the same for all those weeks that a court case can go on. The officer in charge of the case will be one, the judge will be one, the defence will be one, and some of the court staff will be one; those people will be there and consistent. But that jury is sitting there, and everyone in the room, as others come and go, witnesses come and go, various other combatants—participants—in the trial, there develops a certain affinity between everyone in the room. And that's where maturity on a jury actually really does become quite important. And you'll see people look—they'll start looking at different people in the room. Good lawyers will know how to work jurors. Good prosecutors aren't allowed to, they have to be much more, shall we say, within the rules. They've got to make sure that they don't get involved in any of that. But a good lawyer you'll see will very quickly work out who's the juror that they need to work on. Often it'll be one of the younger ones and they will know full well and by two or three days into the trial everyone will have worked it out just by where the jury is sitting. Often, those first two or three days, they might even take different seats in the jury room. But after about two or three days, you'll find they're all sitting in the same place and that's when the games really do start in that courtroom. We shouldn't probably really be talking about games because we're talking about very real decisions that people are going to be making in response. But it is really a contest of wills, and the jurors are very important part of it. That's why it's so important to get people that are happy to be there. The last thing anyone wants on the jury, whether they're the defendant, whether they're the prosecutor, whether they're the defence, is someone who really does not want to be on that jury, who had hoped—they'd come along, they'd worn the right clothes, they thought that they would get challenged and they didn't. They've probably got places they need to be. And they are the people that most people don't want to have on that jury because they are more likely to influence the jury. They're more likely to make decisions that go against justice. The other thing around juries I'd like to say, too, is that I had a very good lesson: I used to be a detective in the Wairarapa—my very good friend Kieran McAnulty's territory, although I don't believe that we ever did meet professionally over there, Mr McAnulty. But one thing I learnt: we had great difficulty in getting jury decisions, and there was one particular lawyer who was very successful at getting them off. At one stage, we in the Wairarapa had 80 percent of the jury trials in the Wellington High Court were from the Wairarapa, that's how busy we were. And when this lawyer finally headed off to London on some junket that he never returned from, he said, 'Your problem over there, the reason why the juries will not convict is because every time during the trial it becomes quite clear that you as the detective know or have had previous dealings with the defendant. And as soon as you do that, a Wellington jury will instantly degrade the case down to something between the cop and the detective and it will diminish it in their brain.' He said, 'You guys should be taking your jury trials to Palmerston North, where the provincial people understand much more about the way things happen.' So I'll hand back over to—speaking of the provinces—the member from Whanganui, who will no doubt sum up this trial. But yes, a good little piece of legislation, and congratulations. CARL BATES (National—Whanganui): Thank you, Mr Speaker, and thank you for that commendation. Thank you to all the parties across the House that are supporting this Juries (Age of Excusal) Amendment Bill. There were some interesting contributions made, however, during that discussion, particularly from some members of the Opposition. I found the very first contribution from the Labour Party particularly interesting, because while noting that it was a narrow bill, while suggesting potentially that it was a little simple, while maybe suggesting that I didn't need to take 10 minutes to explain it, the member spoke for approximately seven minutes and didn't even address the one question that I asked in relation to the bill. So hopefully, during the select committee process, that member will be more focused on the question at heart, which is what the exact age should be: whether it should be 72 or if there is a more appropriate age. To that end, there's also sort of a suggestion that maybe it's not quite as meaningful as requiring the House's attention. And I want to thank my colleagues on this side of the House for acknowledging the meaningful role this bill will have; I want to acknowledge my colleague on the Justice Committee, the Hon Ginny Andersen, for also acknowledging that this is modest but meaningful. However, what is interesting is the number of speakers who sort of suggested that once you're over the age of 65 or 72, when it gets changed, no longer you have to turn up. Well, that's actually not what the law says, and that's exactly why we need to lift the expectation from 65 to 72, because people expect at the age of 65 that they no longer need to show up. That is actually not what the law says. The law says you have the right to request excusal. And that has resulted in far too many people thinking that they no longer have a requirement to deliver their civic duty of turning up and being on a jury. That is exactly why we need to address this small, narrow problem as part of our focus on restoring law and order in this country. What I found particularly interesting, was the Greens view which seemed to wander between 'We don't need age limits because that's ageist.' through to 'We should have jury duty at the age of 65 being allowed to say I don't want to show up because I'm 65 and I'm retired now.' I'd be interested in the Greens view on whether voters should retire at 65, because that's a civic duty. I'd be interested in the view as to whether or not the Greens think that criminals retire at 65, you know, or maybe some of their members, whether they should retire at 65 because it's a civic duty. I'm sure that's not their opinion, and so I am somewhat puzzled by the position they have taken on this bill, which is that 65 is OK and we should leave it at that and move on. But we might see how it goes at select committee. Hopefully common sense will prevail, and we will see that opinion change when this bill returns to the House later in the legislative process. I was, however, somewhat disappointed not to have a call taken by to Te Pāti Māori and be able to hear their perspective on the bill because I think that there is an important demographic that they often claim they represent as though none of us do. But, you know, clearly I'm here as the member of Parliament for Whanganui because there is a demographic that voted for me, including a demographic that they claim stake on. But it was unfortunate that we didn't have the opportunity to hear their position on this bill this evening. I want to just acknowledge my wonderful colleague Rima Nakhle, who referred to the detailed comparison and benchmarking I've done on this bill in proposing the age of 72 to the House. Maybe it is the accountant in me that did that work and looked at the numbers. The numbers that also reflect, as I said earlier, that 47 percent of excusals right now are simply on the basis of age. It is something that we will have the opportunity to address in this House. I want to thank those that are supporting this bill to select committee. Thank you for your contributions. I look forward to working with the Justice Committee as we delve into that age question in a little bit more detail. And, of course, I commend this again to the House. SPEAKER: The question is that the motion be agreed to. Debate interrupted. FIRE DRILL SPEAKER: The House is suspended until the bells ring again. We must evacuate the building. Everyone in the gallery must follow the instructions of the gallery and security staff. Sitting suspended at 5.32 p.m. JURIES (AGE OF EXCUSAL) AMENDMENT BILL First Reading Debate resumed. ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Maureen Pugh): Members, when the House suspended for the fire alarm at 5.30, we had not concluded the vote on the first reading of the Juries (Age of Excusal) Amendment Bill, so I will put that question again. A party vote was called for on the question, That the Juries (Age of Excusal) Amendment Bill be now read a first time. Ayes 102 New Zealand National 49; New Zealand Labour 34; ACT New Zealand 11; New Zealand First 8. Noes 21 Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand 15; Te Pāti Māori 6. Motion agreed to. Bill read a first time. ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Maureen Pugh): The question is, That the Juries (Age of Excusal) Amendment Bill be considered by the Justice Committee. Motion agreed to. Bill referred to the Justice Committee. Content Sourced from Original url
Scoop
25-04-2025
- Business
- Scoop
Employment Relations (Collective Agreements In Triangular Relationships) Amendment Bill — First Reading
Sitting date: 9 Apr 2025 EMPLOYMENT RELATIONS (COLLECTIVE AGREEMENTS IN TRIANGULAR RELATIONSHIPS) AMENDMENT BILL First Reading HELEN WHITE (Labour—Mt Albert): I move, That the Employment Relations (Collective Agreements in Triangular Relationships) Amendment Bill be now read a first time. I nominate the Education and Workforce Committee to consider the bill. I, first of all, want to thank Adrian Rurawhe and Marja Lubeck for bringing this bill to the House, and I have inherited it from them. This bill is, essentially, about making sure that New Zealand workers have enough to eat and can actually provide for their families. In New Zealand, we've had a real issue with keeping our wages up, and we've ended up with a gap between rich and poor that is a real concern. But I want to just go through how we got there before I go to how this bill tries to address that situation. In the mid-1980s to the early 1990s, the real wages of New Zealanders fell 25 percent. In the mid-2000s to 2010— Grant McCallum: Who was in power then? HELEN WHITE: Yes, I take the point from the speaker who just interrupted. He said, 'Who was this?' I think this is something that actually every—every—party in this House has to face. What has happened in this country, with regard to wages, has been a disaster for our people. It has ended up with a situation where people cannot meet their ordinary bills. In a cost of living crisis, we need to face that fact—all of our parties—and we need to put it right. So I'd like to continue. In the mid-2000s to 2010, there was modest growth of real wages, but there was much less growth of wages than there was of productivity. There wasn't a decent share of that wealth with the workers of this country. In 2023, we get the first real average, ordinary time increase—6.9 percent—and that's not perfect, but it looks like something is going right for workers in this country. Let's talk about what that really means in terms of wages. In June 2024, the median wage of a man in this country is $33.56. The median wage of a woman in this country is $32.08 per hour. The work that I did as an employment lawyer got me across a lot of different industries. I saw the difference for people who earned well and had all the respect that came with that and had all the self-dignity that came with that. I worked for industries like the Dairy Workers Union. The dairy workers earn good money, and they're about 98 percent unionised. It's a really good business, but it shares with its workers the actual profit in that way. Ninety-eight percent unionised meant good terms and conditions. That was something where the workers of this country participate in the wealth. But I also had other industries, which were not well organised and didn't have that kind of agreement, and some of those were the labour hire companies. They did not earn well, and as a result, the Government ends up topping up those wages. But also, people live in a state of constant insecurity. They're the people who go to the supermarket and can't necessarily get what they need to feed their families. It's a constant state of stress. What this bill does is say that, for people who are in a triangular relationship, which is a relationship where there is an employer—say it's the port—and then there's a labour hire company on site—say it's a stevedoring company—if they don't actually have a contract of their own, a collective agreement, but they're doing the same work as the port workers when they're brought in, they are entitled to ask to be on those terms and conditions that the primary employer is actually offering its own workers. It's just a way of making sure that workers doing the same work get the same pay. And what could possibly be wrong with that? An employer signed a collective agreement saying it can pay $40 an hour to its workers. If it brings in labour to do exactly the same work and they do not have the protection of that agreement, they should be offering the same money. And that's the difference between a decent wage and one that won't pay the bills. That's what is achieved in this piece of legislation, and I ask all the parties in this House to really consider that. Do we want a New Zealand where we've got a constant dipping down of wages to the lowest common denominator, or is it time for us to use what we have in this House, the ability to structure the way that people work in a way that means that people can work with dignity, they can pay their bills? That's what this is about today. It would make a difference to all those workers who are coming in in that second tier. It would make a difference to their families. We talk a lot in this House about self-responsibility. It comes up a lot. Well, I know that my life is a lot easier simply because I know that I have a decent income. It means I can pay my mortgage. It means I can plan for the future. The labour hire people who would be most affected by this—that's our cleaners, that's our seagulls, that's all those kinds of people who come in and top up in our medical areas. Often, it's our health workers. All those areas of sort of second-tier workers coming into a workforce which is already controlled and it is already a workplace where people are doing the same work—they will have a real bonus if you vote for this tonight. They will be able to earn the same money that that employer can clearly afford. It stops a use of contract labour which is not desirable from anyone's point of view. That use is to undermine the amount of wages that they share with their workforce. That's what it does. It stops that misuse. And it means that New Zealand workers can survive on their own two feet. They're doing the same work. That labour hire person is standing there next to someone doing exactly the same work, and they should be entitled to the same pay. It's as simple as that. So I ask you tonight to think about our role in setting the system up, making sure that people are on a level playing field, but I also ask you to think about whether you could make ends meet on the kinds of money we're talking about here. It is often the difference between $40 and minimum wage. That's the reality. What actually ends up happening is that, if people earn a decent amount, they have a decent KiwiSaver; we don't end up picking up the pieces in our criminal system, in our welfare system, and, actually, at the end of their working career, at the time of their retirement. So we will be doing this country a favour, but we will also be doing all the families and workers who depend on this work a favour if we just adopt this tonight. Thus, I ask you to support this bill to its first reading. Thank you. I commend the bill to the House. KATIE NIMON (National—Napier): Madam Speaker, thank you for the opportunity to speak on the first reading of the Employment Relations (Collective Agreements in Triangular Relationships) Amendment Bill. I read the title out because you could be forgiven for not knowing what this bill was about. The member who spoke prior to me, Helen White, talked a lot about increasing wages and really taking aim at labour hire companies. Really, this does something quite different to that based on what the bill is proposing. It's very, very niche, and if the purpose, based on what the previous speaker has said, is to increase wages, surely there are many other ways to achieve this other than targeting labour hire companies in such a way. It is our firm belief that this will have a far more perverse impact on small businesses. Yes, there might be large companies that make use of labour hire companies, whether it's a port, whether it's a mill. There are various reasons why companies engage with contractors, but at the end of the day, this is going to change the behaviour, the way the contractors operate, and that is going to have a strong onflow effect. I will just run members through it. This bill seeks to ensure that employees employed by one employer but working under the control or direction of another business or organisation—for those that don't understand what a triangular relationship is—are not deprived of the right to coverage of a collective agreement covering the work being performed for that other business or organisation. Now, that's making the assumption that those labour hire companies are then contracting out their workers to companies that have staff covered by a collective agreement. That's not always the case. But, of course, now those labour hire companies are going to have to change their behaviour, if this bill were to become law, in situations that aren't covered by collective agreements, because they're going to have to apply the same terms and conditions across all of the workplaces that they work with. The purpose of this bill, as is written in the bill but not obviously stated to us in the House by the previous speaker, is to provide greater security and rights to workers in such arrangements by ensuring that collective bargaining rights are extended beyond the direct employer in the employment relationship. So to hear that it's about driving up wages makes me think that this is a solution looking for a problem, as is often the case with members' bills from the opposite side. We just want to go through some of these potential perverse outcomes, which I think are really important to run through because I think it's important for people to understand. A very niche bill can only do one thing and that is take aim at an industry, and that is exactly what this is doing. That industry exists because there is a need for it. It is a need to serve businesses whose seasonal work ebbs and flows, whose contracts ebb and flow, and who need to take on contractors. All this is going to do is hamstring them and make our productivity more problematic, which is the opposite. So this is, as I mentioned, likely to disproportionately affect small businesses and employers who rely on labour hire contractors. That is exactly the opposite of what we want to do. ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Maureen Pugh): Order! If the Opposition members want to have a conversation between themselves, can they please take it out into the lobby, thank you. I'm sorry for interrupting the member. KATIE NIMON: Thank you, Madam Speaker. As we often get the chance to say, at the moment, National's values are of limited government and personal responsibility. And again, this bill is another step in the direction of overstepping government, getting involved in the relationship between the employer and the employee, which we do not agree on. More to the point, our focus on productivity and economic growth would tell us that we need to oppose this bill, because it's likely to impose unreasonable burdens on businesses. Now, again, what this is going to do is change the behaviour, the way we contract an event and the way we contract seasonal work, and all of these things are absolutely necessary to our economy—to our tourism economy, to our horticultural economy. Every time we engage in this kind of work, it is for a reason. The Opposition are trying to make it sound like people use contractors to get away with having to use proper terms and conditions for their staff—it is completely baseless. Come to Hawke's Bay for a summer harvest and see why they have to use labour hire contractors for the seasonal work. Go to a wonderful concert, whether it's at Eden Park in Auckland or whether it's a Mission concert in Taradale—these are seasonal event-based contracts that need this kind of employment relationship. Now, we always talk about the unintended consequences because these niche bills that aim to do one thing actually end up doing a number of others. As it stands, it means that if an employee is a union member and their work falls under a collective agreement that that employer is party to, the employer can be bound by that agreement and enforce that agreement against the employer, against the employer's preference, against the employer's structure of employment. Now it's going to then bring in those businesses into a collective agreement relationship, whether it's bargaining. A company that has no involvement in a third party's collective agreement or union arrangements then becomes involved. There are so many companies around New Zealand that do this as a service to our productive economy, to give employees freedom and flexibility, and, actually, in so many cases, the fact that they are working contract hours—they are working and earning more than others because they are on a contract arrangement. I would love to know the research behind the assumption that every person working for a labour hire company is earning significantly less. Because that is not the case. So at the end of the day—and we have made this very clear—this is not a bill we support. This is a solution looking for a problem, and all we see this doing is discouraging businesses from hiring workers through third-party organisations. It is taking aim at an industry. It will have a perverse impact on small businesses. It will affect the seasonal and event-based industries that we thrive on in New Zealand and that are the backbone of most of our economies, especially in the regions, and this is a very important thing for us to make clear. We do not commend this bill to the House, we do not recommend that it go to select committee, and with that I will take my seat. ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Maureen Pugh): The question is that the motion be agreed to. TEANAU TUIONO (Green): Thank you, Madam Speaker. I rise on behalf of the Greens, in support of the Employment Relations (Collective Agreements in Triangular Relationships) Amendment Bill in the name of Helen White, and I acknowledge the previous members who she received this bill from, as well. The Greens see this as a practical, targeted reform that addresses a growing issue in our workforce, which is the exploitation of workers in triangular employment relationships. I do want to agree with the member Helen White in terms of her comments around the inadequacy of the minimum wage and how wages are going down in real terms. We've just had the new minimum wage come in, and the increase is a measly 35c—it's a measly 35c; $23.50 is what that is. What are workers going to do with their 35c? Actually, what we should be talking about in this context—in all of the contexts—is the living wage. Here I want to acknowledge the Unite union. I had the honour and privilege of attending one of their Poverty is No Joke, 1 April, union gatherings. I'm sure some of the members on this side of the House were able to spend some time with them, talking about the living wage, as well. So I wanted to put my acknowledgment of that on the record. For those that don't know what the living wage is: 'A Living Wage is the income necessary to provide workers and their families with the basic necessities of life. A living wage will enable workers to live with dignity and to participate as active citizens in society.' So this is what we should be focusing on, folks. Under the current law, we have workers who are technically employed by one company but are based under the direction of another, often through labour hire firms. We heard some comments from both sides of the House about that. They can miss out on the protections of a collective agreement. So what that means, for the people that are listening, is that someone can do exactly the same job as their workmates, under the same conditions, and they might be excluded from union protections just because of who signs their contract. That's not right—that's not right at all. So this bill seeks to amend the Employment Relations Act to fix that. It does that in two ways, as I understand it. It expands the definition of employees who can be covered by a collective agreement to include those in triangular employment relationships. It seems straightforward and a sensible thing to do, to me. It also ensures that if those workers are union workers, they can benefit from the terms and protections of a collective agreement already in place at the workplace that they're directed by. So if you have a bunch of workers at a particular place and you've got one lot on a collective agreement, another lot come in and they're doing exactly the same job, surely for a hard day's work, a fair day's pay, they should be getting all the same conditions. It's this kind of pitting workers against each other which is why real wages are being driven down. That is something that this particular corner of the House—and I'm sure I can say that for the other Opposition parties as well—will oppose. This is something that falls within the ambit of our workplace policy, which is that we support legislative protection for people employed by labour hire agencies and preventing triangular relationships from being used to dodge workplace rights. That's the corner here: that people are going to try to find kind of nifty ways, via contracting, to not pay people properly. So this is what, I think, the member is trying to do, and that is something that the Greens will certainly support. This is, I think, also about equity. Labour hire and triangular relationships are disproportionately used in sectors that rely on Māori, on Pasifika, and on migrant workers, often low-paid sectors. So making sure that there are those protections in place is really, really important for Māori, Pasifika, and low-paid migrants. So we will be supporting this bill. Thank you. Dr PARMJEET PARMAR (ACT): Thank you, Madam Speaker. I'm taking this call on behalf of ACT on the first reading of the Employment Relations (Collective Agreements in Triangular Relationships) Amendment Bill, which is a member's bill, Helen White's bill. Congratulations for the bill being drawn from the ballot. We gave thorough consideration to this bill and we have concluded that we will not be supporting this bill. We are not supporting this bill because we know that this bill is actually not going to do what the member thinks; it is actually going to be contrary to what the member thinks. It's actually going to create a lot of implications for employers—and employees, as well. What this bill does is, basically, it just extends the powers of unions to third parties in triangular work relationships. What we note is that the policy statement of this bill says it 'seeks to ensure that employees employed by one employer but working under the control or direction of another business or organisation are not deprived of the right to coverage of a collective agreement covering the work being performed for that other business or organisation.' So here this bill actually really undermines the flexibility that we have in our labour market through triangular work arrangements that exist. Also, there is this assumption that somehow anybody who is employed should be in full-time and permanent employment; there should be no casual contracts and there should be no temporary filling up of positions. But the reality is quite different from both sides. From the employer side, sometimes employers need some positions to be filled on a temporary basis because there might be a sick leave that has come up, all of a sudden, and there is a position that needs to be filled that cannot be left without any person being at that position. For example, receptionists are important at businesses and some admin work people are important at businesses. And also, for employees, a lot of people become employees of labour hire companies only because they want flexibility. We know that people's circumstances vary. Some people might have responsibilities like young children or maybe an elderly person they're looking after. Or it could be just a matter of choice and that they don't want to work full time, nine to five, Monday to Friday, or seven days. That kind of flexibility should be available to employees and that kind of flexibility is available through the triangular arrangements that work. So this bill, as I said, is going to deliver contrary to what the member thinks. This bill is not going to deliver anything in regard to pay parity. But what it will do is it will create more cost for employees because if there is a claim, there are then two parties to deal with that claim rather than one party to deal with that claim. When there are two parties involved, we know it is going to take longer, it is going to be expensive, and there is going to be this big legal risk that the employee will have to go through as well. So we do not believe it's going to deliver for employees. As I've said, we know that it is going to deliver for unions, because this bill is just about extending the powers of unions to third parties. We see that there are a lot of potential economic and operational risks with this bill if it goes through. We also know that labour hire companies actually do a great job. They fill in that gap that is needed in the labour market. With this legislation going forward—if it goes forward—then some companies, to avoid or to mitigate this cost that I have talked about before of that extended period of dealing with the claim, instead of two parties involved, those who can deal with it in a quicker manner, now, with this bill, if it goes through, there will be three parties. So, obviously, the process is going to take longer. To avoid that there might be some businesses who would go out and try to hire staff directly instead of going through labour hire companies. So it's not going to actually help the labour hire companies that the member cited. Actually, it is going to provide a lot of disadvantage to labour hire companies because they won't be able to survive because there will be businesses not wanting to hire staff through labour hire companies. It's very important that flexibility is important, because what we want to see is—we want to improve efficiency. We want to improve productivity, and that comes with the flexibility that we have in the labour market. Making things rigid and making everything about unions is not going to improve efficiency and it's not going to improve productivity. So we need to be mindful of this, that unions, of course, they come in between the employer and employees. But employees can talk directly to employers if there are any issues, they don't need to always pick up the phone and call a third person to get involved to resolve any issues they might have with the employers. So we do not support this bill because this bill is not going to deliver what actually the member thinks it's going to deliver. Thank you, Madam Speaker. Hon MARK PATTERSON (NZ First): It's a pleasure to rise for New Zealand First on this particular Employment Relations (Collective Agreements in Triangular Relationships) Amendment Bill. New Zealand First always takes a very fair perspective on these bills. We agree with the member Helen White that's proposing the bill. We do want to see real wages rising in this country, but we also quite profoundly believe in flexibility in the labour market. So I guess we try to balance those two aspects out. We have modestly described ourselves as Switzerland in these issues between the great blocs of the left and the right. We have previously supported the primary Act that came to pass in 2019. I was actually on the Education and Workforce Committee when that bill came through and it was clear that we did have to tidy up these triangular employment relationships. That particular bill gave some accountability to the labour hiring company, to their workers, so that when they were contracted out they could not be badly treated and not have any comeback on the actual labour hire company. So it did clarify some of those terms and conditions. We're proud to bring that forward. We heard some pretty disturbing stories, as I recall, on that committee. Jan Tinetti was on that committee as well and that was a good bill. That was a bill that identified a problem and put forward a solution. However, we believe on balance this time that the flexibility in the labour market that contract work and that these labour hire companies and those arrangements add to the employment ecosystem; that's important. It's really important. There are businesses that need to scale up for short periods of time. We heard Katie Nimon talking about the horticultural sector. It is probably the biggest user of these types of contracts. That's an absolutely fair, and reasonable, and good thing to have within our employment relations ecosystem. So we don't want to add complexity into that, to add a three-way type thing where there's all of a sudden a collective agreement with a third party that's separate or in addition to the relatively simple mechanism that we have now where the labour hire company and the employee are the mechanisms that fit together, that's where the employment relationship is, and then they are contracted out separately to a third-party employer. So it is quite a simple arrangement now. We think this adds unnecessary complexity. We have not seen any evidence presented to date that this will add to wages, to what would be our primary driver if we were to support this to lift wages, because I think in a lot of times these temporary workers are actually paid—there's a premium. To get someone in at short notice, you actually have to pay a premium. So those workers are very valuable to those businesses that need some surge capacity, so often there will be a premium. So what actually is the evidence here is that some are paid in net. We are actually making some gains in adding this extra complexity. We don't think that bar has been crossed by the member in bringing this bill forward, as well-intentioned as it is. There might be a suspicion that, as some of my colleagues over here have alluded to, this is more about appeasing a union base and trying to gain them more influence—which is fair enough; they are the Labour Party after all—but it doesn't mean that we necessarily have to buy into that narrative or into that purpose. So on balance, we think this bill adds complexity to something that's relatively straightforward, if possible, for a not defined outcome. So New Zealand First will not be supporting this bill. Thank you. TAKUTAI TARSH KEMP (Te Pāti Māori—Tāmaki Makaurau): Tēnā koutou e te Whare. I stand this evening as the spokesperson for workers' rights for Te Pāti Māori but also as a wahine Māori and as a grandmother, a mother, and a daughter of a hapori who carries the weight of the country on their backs in the hospitals, on the building sites, in the factories, and in the fields. This bill, the Employment Relations (Collective Agreements in Triangular Relationships) Amendment Bill, might sound technical on the surface, but, make no mistake, it goes right to the heart of mana tangata: the dignity, worth, and rights of every worker across Aotearoa. Right now, too many of our whānau are stuck in the shadows of the employment system, not because they don't work hard and not because they lack skills, but because the system was never built to protect them. The bill seeks to change that. Let me put a human face to this issue. Let me tell you about Hēmi. Hēmi is a Māori labourer. He's employed by a labour hire agency. He does the same mahi as everybody else on the construction site. Every day, he walks on to the construction site run by a large firm—let's call it Big Build Ltd. Hēmi doesn't wear a different uniform and he's not doing easier work, but, in fact, he's hauling the same timber, pouring the same concrete, and taking the same risks as the workers directly employed by Big Build Ltd. But while those Big Build workers are covered by a union collective agreement with higher pay rates, proper cultural leave, and overtime compensation and safety protections, Hēmi gets none of that. Why? Because, he's technically employed by someone else. He is doing the same mahi in the same direction, and is treated as less than. That's the injustice, and that's exactly what this bill addresses. Under this bill, if Hēmi is a union member and he is doing work that falls under a collective agreement of the controlling company, then that agreement should apply to him. No more back doors for employers to undercut workers, no more tiered workforce, and no more treating contractors as disposable labour. Let me be very clear: this bill comes at a time when workers' rights in Aotearoa are under full-scale attack. Since this Government took power in 2023, we have seen the repeal of fair pay agreements, a move that stripped away collective bargaining power; they've brought back the 90-day trial periods for all businesses, allowing any employer to fire a worker without cause or consequence; they've proposed removing the right to challenge unjustified dismissal for those earning over $180,000, setting a dangerous precedent that links rights to income; and, more recently, they've introduced changes to the Recognised Seasonal Employer Scheme that will deepen the exploitation of migrant workers—workers who already face tough conditions in the orchards and the vineyards of this country. These changes will make it harder for those workers to leave abusive jobs or to speak out about mistreatment, trapping them in silence. These actions are not isolated; they are coordinated ideological attacks on the working class, on tangata whenua, on migrants, on women—on those with the least power and the most to lose. Because we believe in kotahitanga and collective strength and because we believe in a future where every worker—no matter where they come from or who they work for—has the right to dignity, protection, and fair treatment, to every Hēmi out there, this bill says, 'We see you, we value you, and we will fight for you.' Te Pāti Māori stands in full support of this bill, and we call on every member of this House to stand with the workers across Aotearoa. Tēnā koutou. Hon JAN TINETTI (Labour): Kia ora, Madam Speaker. I'd like to start by acknowledging my colleague Helen White and congratulate her on bringing this bill to the House; and, prior to her, my colleague Adrian Rurawhe who had the bill drawn from the ballot; but really, really want to acknowledge former colleague Marja Lubeck, who saw some issues in the triangular relationship and had this bill drafted to ensure that we were moving in the right direction. I'd like to just say that, yes, I was part of that select committee that the member the Hon Mark Patterson mentioned, and I think you're right about 2019. We did hear, during that time, some terrible, terrible stories around what was happening in that triangular relationship. We heard about people who were entering into workforces where they were alongside people who were on collective agreements, doing exactly the same work—exactly the same work—and earning less money but being treated, as the member rightly pointed out, with terrible conditions and much worse conditions. At that time we sorted that out, but there is still something missing—and that is the pay conditions. It is not right that two people can be working on the same work site and doing exactly the same job and earning completely different pay. That is fundamentally wrong in this country, and that needs to be sorted. If this bill doesn't go through tonight, then I would hope that members would collectively come together and think of a solution. Because it is absolutely wrong. To say that 'Oh, it's not really happening; companies aren't doing that.', that is wrong as well. We unfortunately have some companies—and I'm not saying all companies—who are going through and making the promises through collective agreement bargaining and then, unfortunately, using labour hire companies to then withdraw on their promises that they made throughout that collective bargaining time. That is fundamentally wrong. We need to protect our workers. We need to protect them to ensure that they have the same rights, the same pay as the workers doing the same job as them in the same company. Now, to say that 'The collective agreement is extending the rights of the collective agreement to all is just not right' is unbelievable to me. The collective agreement protects workers' rights and pay conditions. It stops the race to the bottom. It stops workers being exploited. Surely every single member in this House wants to see workers protected. Yes, we want to see growth, but we want to see the workers protected—growth not at the expense of workers. So I urge people to think carefully about that; I urge people to think that if this doesn't go through tonight, we still have a problem tomorrow and it still needs a solution. Thank you. GRANT McCALLUM (National—Northland): Thank you, Madam Speaker. Before I get to the matter at hand, I just thought it was appropriate to thank the member of the press gallery who's retiring very shortly, Claire Trevett. I think she's done a great job at servicing our democracy. So she's now got her name officially on Hansard. There we go. To the matter at hand— Hon David Parker: What did you say about the cow? GRANT McCALLUM: Ha, ha! No, I'm not going to say that, Hon David Parker—that's not the part that she would want in Hansard. Ha, ha! Very good, thank you—no. Look, let's get to the guts of the matter here. I find it really ironic that I'm standing here now after having the mover of the bill stand up and talk about the damage that was done to people's wages in the late 80s. Well, guess who was in power in the late 80s? Oh, that's right: it was the Labour Party. It was a Labour Government, and that is what the mover was referring to. At that point, by the way, they had compulsory unionism, and let's not kid ourselves here: this is, by stealth, trying to quietly bring back more and more compulsion around the union movement. So I just have to wonder: who actually wrote this member's bill? Ooh, might it be the Council of Trade Unions? I would have to think there's a high chance of that, wouldn't you? What are we going to achieve by actually bringing this in? Well, the member talked about the cost of living and the struggles that workers have because of situations like this. Well, actually, what affects the cost of living more than anything else? Inflation. When this Government came into power, the inflation rate was over 7 percent. That's what makes it hard for households to balance their budgets. The other thing that we had to deal with was high interest rates. That makes the mortgage payments high and high rents, and those are the sorts of things that will make a real difference to people, not just fiddling around with trying to bring back compulsory unionism by stealth. If we go back and think about that, you know, the challenges that we would have if we went down this track of trying to work out who gets paid what for what, in a lot of cases when you employ contract labour like that, you end up—because it's a short-term employment, you pay them more. That is so often the case; I've seen it happen many, many times. You've got to remember, also: who is actually going to be the group that's going to struggle the most with dealing with these issues, working out what they can and can't do? I'll tell you who it'll be: it'll be small business, because it's small business that struggle, that have to deal with more paperwork, more red tape. Of course, that is what the Opposition specialise in: bringing in things to make it harder for business and to introduce more red tape. That will not advance the cause of workers, and it will certainly not advance the cause of businesses. And guess what? Employees need successful businesses, and for a business to employ a contract worker, it means that they have to be doing well. You want your businesses to do well; you don't want to make it harder for them and make restrictions on them growing. So that is something we have to keep in mind—really, really important. But I just would like to remind everyone that we are in the Government that is focused on the things that really matter, which is growing the real wages of people and, as we've said, getting inflation under control and getting interest rates down. That is what is actually making a difference in this country, not bringing in this extra red tape so that we can then, by stealth, bring back compulsory unionism by stealth. That is not what we need in this country. Hon James Meager: No. GRANT McCALLUM: I certainly hear that support from this side of the House, and I thank the support of the other parties to do what we have to do with this bill, and that is to kick it back—back into the dim, dark past where it belongs. On that note, I do not commend this bill to the House. RACHEL BOYACK (Labour—Nelson): Thank you, Madam Speaker. It's a privilege to take a call on this bill tonight, and I want to acknowledge my colleague, Helen White, for bringing it to the House. I want to take a moment to just counter some of the comments that have been made from the other side, that, quite frankly, are just really, really wrong. So I might start, first of all—and I do acknowledge the member from New Zealand First, Hon Mark Patterson, and I acknowledge that New Zealand First have supported a bill that was brought by the Labour Party recently. I do acknowledge that. There's one particular area in his speech that I wanted to follow up on, and that was around the cost to employers, in that employers pay a premium for labour hire workers. They do. They pay a premium to the labour hire company. My experience having—and I'll get to some of the types of employers that use labour hire companies, because again, there's been some interesting facts presented from the other side that I'd say actually aren't factual. Yes, employers do pay a premium for labour hire workers. But that doesn't get passed to the worker. There's a ticket-clipping exercise for the labour hire company. And the experience I've had is talking to workers who are standing alongside permanent employees who are being paid less, but the employer is actually paying more for that worker because there is a percentage being passed on to the labour hire company. So that's the first thing. Related to that, I wanted to talk about the time frames that these people are working for these companies. I have spoken to workers, actual workers in my electorate, who have worked for the same labour hire company at the same large sawmill in Nelson for years—years. This is not about seasonal work. The seasonal workers in Nelson at Sealord are actually part of a collective agreement, for the record. So Katie Nimon could come and learn a little bit about that. But we're talking about large sawmills, working there for years, the sawmill paying more money than they would to a permanent employee through a labour hire company. The most recent examples of this in Nelson have actually been exploited migrant workers. So it was in the employer's interest to leave those people working for a labour hire company. Unfortunately, those workers are then unable to access the visas they need. So there's a whole system tied up here that actually leads to exploitation. So I just want to counter some of the arguments presented on the other side with actually what happens in the real world. Other members talked about choice. I've never, ever, ever talked to a labour hire worker—and I've talked to many of them—who doesn't want a permanent job, who hasn't asked the employer to be employed permanently. Hon Karen Chhour: I was a labour worker. Didn't want a permanent job. RACHEL BOYACK: Well, you often haven't talked to them! I've talked to lots of them in my electorate. They work in processing companies, they work in fish processing, they work for sawmills, they work in the horticulture sector. They want permanent employment. This is not about a choice. They go to a labour hire company as the choice of last resort. The last thing is that there's been a lot of comment about this hurting small businesses, and that it's going to add all this red tape. The member's been very clear: this only applies when a collective agreement is in place, and the majority of collective agreements are, at large, employers. It doesn't add any other, extra party to this. All it's doing is implying the same wages and conditions, so that John who's standing here working in the sawmill, and Jane standing next to him, doing the same job, get the same pay. Katie Nimon started to talk about, 'How dare we talk about lifting wages?'. Well, for goodness' sake! We're the Labour Party. We believe in people being paid a decent wage for a fair day's work. That's what we stand for. That's why I'm a member of the Labour Party. That's why I am a Labour MP. Because I fundamentally believe that if an employer can afford to pay somebody the same for doing the same day's work, they should do that. And an employer who's paying a premium to a labour hire company, literally for years, can actually afford to take that person on permanently and pay them the proper wages and conditions. Laura McClure: They usually do, when they're good. RACHEL BOYACK: The funny thing is, I've talked to so many of them and actually done this as a job for years. They don't. They actually don't. This law needs to change. Congratulations to Helen White, and I'd encourage Mark Patterson to maybe re-think New Zealand First's position, because I think you've made the wrong call on this one, mate, and I know we can get you there tonight. CARL BATES (National—Whanganui): Thank you, Madam Speaker, for the opportunity to speak on this bill this evening. Whenever we talk about employment law in this House—anything to do with workers, with businesses, with employment relationships—the Opposition couches it as 'We're for the worker, and everyone else isn't.' They couch it as 'A fair day's work for a fair day's pay.', which we agree with. The difference is we don't think we know exactly what that amount of money is for every employee in the country. We don't believe we should be getting in the middle of the employment relationship and telling the employee, 'Hey, this is what you should negotiate with your boss.' Nor do we think we should be getting in there and telling the employer, 'This is the way you've got to run your business.' Surprisingly enough, you can choose not to take a side in the debate. You can choose to be for New Zealand. You can choose to take views on what's right in terms of employment law. You can choose to determine what's right in an employment relationship in the context of what is right for a place we call home, for a place we call New Zealand. We believe that people have the right to make choices themselves, that businesses have the right to negotiate, and, ultimately, we want them doing this to the benefit of this country. We want productivity and we want growth in New Zealand, and this bill counters that. This bill goes against that. This bill adds red tape. You hear the Labour Party want to say, 'Hey, we don't know what that red tape is.' Well, all of a sudden, every small business in New Zealand that is providing some form of labour to other employers for a temporary basis has to go, 'Hold on a minute. What's your relationship with your employer? What's your relationship with your employee? Do we now have to pay our staff more because you've got some different relationship with your employees?' I'd be interested to know: if the Labour Party thought that those employees were earning more than the employees at the controlling employer's workplace, would it go the other way? Or does Labour have a one-way view on the cost of employment and a one-way view on productivity— downwards, of course—in this country? Earlier in this discussion, Labour couched this as being about putting food on the table. Do you know what? I'm getting a bit sick of the Opposition talking about their interest in the average New Zealander, when they voted against things that literally put money on the table of those employees in this House last year. Tax cuts, tax cuts and tax relief, for the average New Zealander who would have then been helped by, supposedly, in their opinion, this bill. They could have just avoided the complication that this bill would bring to this House and simply voted for tax relief and put more money in the pockets of the average worker. But no, they chose not to do that because they think that they know best. They think they know best for the employee. They think they can get their head into the game of every employment relationship in this country and make it not only more complicated but make the decision for business, make the decision for employees. On this side of the House we have a different view. We have a view that we need to create employment relationships in this country that can be negotiated between employers and employees and can help us grow the average wage, the average salary, the productivity of this nation. There is a role that flexibility plays for employees and for employers. There is a need for employment relationships that aren't fixed, that allow what they are calling controlling employers to have employees come for a season, for a short period of time; maybe sometimes that's for a long period of time—I don't know what the business decision or the employment relationship decision is behind that particular example, because I'm not trying to get in the heads of every employer in the country and tell them how they need to run their business. And I'm not trying to get in the heads of every employee in this country who chooses to work for one of these businesses—and it is a choice. It is a choice that they make, and therefore we do not commend this bill to the House. HELEN WHITE (Labour—Mt Albert): Thank you for the contributions that everybody has made tonight. I remember an employer coming to talk to me in my capacity as an employment lawyer, and they wanted to know what they needed to pay workers in New Zealand who they were employing for a short time. They, first of all, asked what they had to pay for their casual workforce. I told them 'Well, actually, there's the minimum wage, but you don't have to pay them anything extra.' They were shocked because, in Australia, they pay them 20 percent more and they have an award so people get paid on top of the award and then they get a weighting for being a casual. Then, they asked me what they would have to pay them for things like holidays. There was so little in the pot for workers in this country, I was ashamed and they were shocked—they were completely shocked at how little they had to pay our workers. I tried to tell a story from the 1980s through to now in New Zealand about what has happened to wage growth in this country. The only part of that that the current Government were interested in was a bit that didn't actually land on their watch. That was the only part they wanted to know about. That seems to me a little bit like arrogance, doesn't it? We are supposed to learn from history. We are supposed to learn what works and what doesn't. What did this country in, in a big way, was the Employment Contracts Act because it failed to recognise the reality of life, and, actually, it damaged New Zealand and New Zealand workers to such an extent that we are still mopping up—we are still mopping up. This was supposed to be a little bit of that mop up, because what it said was that workers doing the same work who were being hired by labour hire companies could actually opt to go on the same terms and conditions. We were told that it was complicated and it was red tape. Well, I'm sorry, how silly are people? That's not red tape. We have employment in this country, and it's pretty simple: you calculate the amount that you pay the hire company based on the terms and conditions you pay your own workforce. That isn't that hard. Our employers are pretty much smart enough to do that. That way, people who are doing that work can pay their bills. They can pay and, actually, the taxpayer doesn't have to top them up. That is actually what's really happening. There is this myth that somehow the National Party are the people who understand economics. This shows the problem with the myth—it shows the problem—because it's false economy if you underpay workers, if they never get a share of the wealth of the country, and it all goes offshore and it all goes to the 1 percent, then we end up with a mess of a country. We end up with crime. We end up with mental health issues. We end up with violence. We end up with all of those things because it is a very stressful place to live. It might not happen on somebody's farm that they inherited from their parents in the North—it might not happen there—and it might not even happen for their kids, but it's happening to our kids in this country. It's happening because they cannot pay their bills. So this was actually an attempt to do that tonight, just a little nudge that people are paid the same amount. It's not that hard. When I was once involved as a lawyer out at the steel mill, they had something called an equalisation clause. It worked in a very similar way. It said, 'If you come on site and you're a contractor, you should be paid the same amount as the people who are there.' Guess what! Actually, the world didn't cave in. We still made steel. People just got paid a decent amount. People retired better. We need to start being smart in this House and stop this absolute garbage, that fills the head, of an ideology that just cannot see past the word 'union', because that's what's going on. Thank you for listening to me. A party vote was called for on the question, That the Employment Relations (Collective Agreements in Triangular Relationships) Amendment Bill be now read a first time. Ayes 55 New Zealand Labour 34; Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand 15; Te Pāti Māori 6. New Zealand National 49; ACT New Zealand 11; New Zealand First 8. Motion not agreed to.
Scoop
25-04-2025
- Business
- Scoop
Regulatory Systems (Primary Industries) Amendment Bill — Second Reading
Sitting date: 2 Apr 2025 REGULATORY SYSTEMS (PRIMARY INDUSTRIES) AMENDMENT BILL Second Reading Debate resumed from 1 April. Hon ANDREW HOGGARD (Associate Minister of Agriculture): Thank you, Mr Speaker. It's good to be here for the second reading of the Regulatory Systems (Primary Industries) Amendment Bill. As has been covered by the previous three speakers on this bill, it is very much a technical bill looking to correct the odd spelling mistake, the odd punctuation mistake, and also small changes and evolutions over time in the agricultural sector. I'd just like to probably speak on three parts of this bill that relate to my work and just thank the Primary Production Committee for some of the amendments and changes they have made. First of all, this bill contains a provision to provide a regulatory mechanism for the recognition of methane inhibitors. Now, this was something that, previously, the Agricultural Compounds and Veterinary Medicines Act (ACVM) did not recognise. Obviously, when that bill was passed, these were a new thing, not known about, and so we had no place to register these to judge whether they were safe for food. This is particularly important because these inhibitors are often chemical compounds that are, in effect, changing the biology of animals, adding a compound to animals that naturally may not occur to try and get a lower methane response from the animals, but this poses a risk of contaminants left in products. So, very important that we have a framework that we can judge as to whether or not these products are safe. Now, there had been an Order in Council back in 2022 placing these methane inhibitors within the ACVM. This bill was intended to be the fix-up for that, sort of, temporary situation. We recently had to extend that Order in Council because it's taken a little while to get this bill over the line, so it's good to be here on the second reading, and hopefully we can quickly get this bill finished. So that's a good aspect of this bill. The second point I'd like to talk to is that within this bill, we had an introduction for the ability to have a temporary food standard or a New Zealand - only food standard. Now, this is obviously important in terms of the fact that, you know, we're part of the joint food system with Australia. It has many benefits. It enables our processors and producers of food to be able to export to Australia and vice versa not needing to change labels, not needing to change compositions. If it's good on one side of the Tasman, it's good on the other side of the Tasman. This provides a lot of benefit to our food producers and exporters here in New Zealand. However, of course, there may be things that we want to do that are very unique to New Zealand that the Australians may not be up for doing a standard on. So having this ability is important to New Zealand, because since we've gone into the joint system, we haven't had the ability to create our own independent food standard. Now, obviously, there was some concern that was raised as to whether or not this signalled a lack of interest from us in the joint food system, so there has been a change made to clarify that this is only for the situation where there is not an interest from the Australians in pursuing a joint food standard, that we would first work through the joint system to see whether or not there was that agreement. If we've explored that option and the Australians aren't interested, then we have that ability, just to give confidence to not only the food sector but to our trans-Tasman neighbours that we are committed to the joint system. Finally, I just want to talk on a change to the National Animal Identification and Tracing Act (NAIT Act). Now, there was going to be initially in this bill an ability for more data sharing from the NAIT system. This would've been useful in terms of, for police, being able to find stolen animals. Also, I can think of several situations where heifers escaped, ran up the road for a couple of kilometres, and ended up in someone else's paddock and they are left not knowing who these animals are. Being able to ring up the database and say, "Who do these belong to?" would've been particularly useful. Thankfully, a Facebook community group came to the rescue on that day. So there was a value in having this, but, obviously, there was a concern from some in the sector around privacy matters. I think it's really important that farmers have confidence in the NAIT system that their data is secure, that it is important, because NAIT is particularly important in terms of that traceability of being able to contain any diseases. So having that strong confidence from people is important. I guess, you know, the Ministry for Primary Industries will work on how we can proceed better in the future with that data-sharing capability and will work with the industry to come up with solutions there. So I'd just like to commend the Primary Production Committee for their fine work on this bill, and I commend this bill to the House. JAMIE ARBUCKLE (NZ First): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I rise on behalf of New Zealand First. We are pleased to support the Regulatory Systems (Primary Industries) Amendment Bill. As we've heard, it's a bill that fixes up a number of different Acts, lots of bits and pieces in different Acts. This tidy-up will make some statutes redundant and fix inaccuracies in existing legislation. New Zealand First is focused, and we're committed to delivering support for our primary industries. These industries are, as we know, the backbone of our economy, and we support, and have always supported, attempts to streamline regulations for sectors like the primary industries. New Zealand First wants sectors like agriculture, forestry, and fisheries to be both competitive and efficient, delivering to the world, as they do for us. In 2014, the Productivity Commission called for legislative maintenance, and this bill finally addresses that call. Our party is committed to a strong economy that grows from the foundations set by our productive primary industry. The New Zealand First coalition agreement with the National Party and our friends over on our right, in the ACT Party—we wanted to look at the different reviews around regulatory blocks and addressing them. So that goes forward in our coalition agreement, in addressing regulatory blocks. We are also about reducing those regulatory burdens for our primary industries. This bill modernises a series of laws managed by the Ministry for Primary Industries, making them work better and cost less for the taxpayer. The small but key changes the bill makes will help the Government agenda to trigger economic growth, and that is what this side of the House is about—economic growth and fostering more sensible rules to govern regulation. Finally, in one bill, what we are dealing with here actually goes across 17 different Acts and actually repeals five of them. This bill actually does a lot in one go. Plus, one aspect I did just want to talk on quickly is one of my portfolio areas around horticulture. The New Zealand Horticulture Export Authority Act—there's a small change here where, in circumstances where you would want to give an exemption or a waiver or a refund, especially for our exporters in times of disasters, and if we just think of Cyclone Gabrielle, people couldn't export for a year, this actually allows the ability to give that waiver, that exemption, or that refund, where, previously, you couldn't do that. So I again will commend this bill to the House and fully support it. SCOTT WILLIS (Green): Kia ora. Thank you, Mr Speaker. We are also in support of this bill; it's not a particularly contentious bill. It is something that makes sense. It's something that is tidying up, fixing up little bits and pieces, which is all very valuable. I do note that the member opposite, Jamie Arbuckle, who spoke just prior to myself talked about this as improving economic growth. Of course, economic growth on a finite planet is a nonsense and we do not support that sort of one-eyed focus on economic growth. We particularly prefer the idea of economic resilience and ecological restoration and social justice. These are things that are much more important and shape a whole world view rather than a simple fixation. So just to address my colleague's point about economic growth and the myth and the magical thinking that we hear from the other side. But not to rest on that, this bill is a very simple bill that addresses some small things, but we do have a few issues of concern—the Forests Act amendment to allow for the milling of indigenous timber felled before July of 1989, for example. We've got a few concerns. I would like to know how we are going to regulate that. What are the difficulties that might be presented in regulating this? What are the impacts of the nutrient decay within the immediate environment? How do we make sure we have a functioning forest with strong biodiversity? So that's one concern that we have noted. Another one is the Fisheries Act amendment, the removal of the Māori Land Court hearing requirement to establish taiapure instead of marine reserves. Replacement section 183 inserted by clause 160 allows for the Minister to recommend a declaration of taiapure-local fishery if satisfied that the relevant grounds have been met. We see in this that there are some potential Treaty implications and wonder whether this has been considered or what the Government will be doing to ensure that there's no breach of Treaty here. We've written to the Minister of Agriculture regarding both of these concerns. So if our concerns are resolved, we certainly will support further readings. But I want to make the point that this is important. We support the bill, but we do not support it wholeheartedly because we have concerns that we have asked to be addressed, and we are hopeful that the Minister will reply and will address our concerns and come back to us. I'll also note some positives in the legislation that we do particularly approve of. I'm supportive of the provisions to enable service by electronic means to a body corporate, for example, which is just a simple way of ensuring that we don't have to deliver everything by letter and is aligning things with what other agencies are doing. So on the whole this is pretty straightforward, but let's not run through it without addressing some simple things. I'll just repeat very simply: the two points of concern we have are the Forest Act amendment to allow for the milling of indigenous timber felled before July 1989, and the Fisheries Act amendment which sees the removal of the Māori Land Court hearing requirement to establish taiapure instead of marine reserves. So those are our two concerns that we have written to the Minister regarding, hoping that the Minister is going to address these concerns. If they are resolved, then we will be supporting this further. So those are the concerns we have. We're in general support. We would like to be in full support. Kia ora. MILES ANDERSON (National—Waitaki): It's a pleasure to stand tonight and talk about the Regulatory Systems (Primary Industries) Amendment Bill. Before I start, I'd just like to thank the Primary Production Committee. It was unanimously passed by the select committee, so the previous speaker should, I guess, reflect on that. The select committee went through this at the time, so we were in unanimous agreement around this bill. Look, regulatory systems bills, as we've heard endlessly tonight, come around time to time, and they really do just act as a tidy-up for various bits of legislation. Some of these pieces of legislation have been identified, quite some time ago, as troublesome or inconsistent, so we're clarifying and updating statutory provisions to give effect to the purpose of various Acts and their provisions, and we're addressing regulatory duplication, gaps, errors, and inconsistencies in drafting, etc., and ensuring that regulatory systems remain up to date and relevant. I'd also like to point out just one—there's so many of them, but one—example, I guess, which the previous speaker spoke about around horticultural levies and the ability, now, for those that are impacted by weather events or such like to have fees either returned or wavered so that they're not hit with a double whammy, if you like, when they're in crisis mode. With that, I think it's a pretty good bill, and I commend it to the House. Hon DAMIEN O'CONNOR (Labour): Mr Speaker, look, thank you very much. I'm just going through the bill for the second time. I wasn't on the Primary Production Committee, but I have been familiar with the process, which is generally a tidy-up and a request to the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) to ask whether there are any pieces of legislation that need an adjustment and an improvement. For the most part, they are non-contentious, and I think the select committee has dealt with this really well. But I do want to go through each of them because it is a core part of our wealth creation—arguably, the most important areas of our economy from a wealth-creation, economic-activity perspective—so it's important that we get it right. I'll just work through, as I can, the notes that I've made. The changes to the Agricultural Compounds and Veterinary Medicines Act: there's one here that amends the definition of "inhibitor" substances. The definition includes "agricultural compound applied … to plants or animals or [are put in] land". There has been a proposal from a Dutch company to have a nitrogen inhibitor that has been applied, actually, to animals and it reduces the methane—something that we're all looking for. They haven't actually applied, but they've been saying, for quite a while, that we should have this in New Zealand. But there has been a problem with the definition of "agricultural compounds", and so it's effectively a fertiliser put on the land. It might or might not reduce methane, but the inability to run the trials has meant that we're kind of stuck, and this bill will address that issue. Some might say it's great, but we have to be somewhat careful, because the company has been very enthusiastic about this. There have been some trials in pastoral systems around the world, but it's still uncertain outcomes, and whether we end up with a residue in our milk or in our meat products is something that should be looked at. So I hope and I trust—and in the committee stage of the bill, I'll probably ask some more questions here to get an assurance—that the select committee did look carefully at that issue and that allowing this substance—I think it's Bovaer—to be used in New Zealand, or trialled at least, won't actually result in some adverse or unwanted residues in our meat and milk. Can I move on to amendments in the Animal Products Act. It's dealing basically with who verify—as I say, it's not too contentious there, but it's really important that we do get these things right. The ability to export products that are not going out for sale but are going out for testing is a sensible adjustment and, as I say, some complex regulatory issues that we have. There's been much made of growth on the other side of the House. I do want to remind the House—the whole House—that, actually, when it comes to economic growth, as my colleague David Parker reminded me, economic growth under Labour Governments has been far greater than that under National Governments, on average, since World War II. Now, I wasn't here and neither was Mr Parker, but that is a fact. That is a fact, and we can stand quite proud here and say that, when in Government, we manage higher levels of economic growth than those on the other side of the House. These adjustments are to help drive that growth, and I'm sure, even with these improvements, the National-led Government still won't catch up to us. But, anyway, we'll work on that. Having poked that bear, can I come back to the Animal Products Act? One of the adjustments here—and these might seem like technical issues that are quite boring, but they are actually critical when it comes to selling safe, assured, high-quality products offshore into our markets. One around the Animal Products Act empowers regulations prescribed in relation to verification of animal material. The point is that, sometimes, the market requirements will be greater than the assurance programmes run in this country, and this will enable MPI to put in place and require that the products being exported might not require assurance programmes here, but they certainly require verification, and if we just sent them off without that, we would put our markets at risk. These are, as I say, technical issues. I'll be asking questions as to whether the parameters of that have been accurately assessed by the select committee. I'll go forward on to other areas. There's one around the draft codes of animal welfare, and they were basically developed by the National Animal Welfare Advisory Committee (NAWAC), an independent organisation, and generally they have to be notified when their own draft forms so that people can give feedback on that. It's a good process. The old regulations said that you had to do it in these certain newspapers, and we've moved on from that. These regulations will change the way that NAWAC and MPI notify. Good move forward, I say. Moving right on to the Biosecurity Act, where changes have been made, and we have import health standards. They are very strict and quite complex processes of enabling products to come into our country that might pose a risk to any of our primary production systems or industries, and so this will enable some flexibility because sometimes it does take years—literally years—to develop an import health standard that is robust. Once it's locked in place, if there's a need to change it, it's quite a complex process. This adjustment will allow some technical changes and then the reinstatement of an import health standard from the right places with the right adjustments as is appropriate to keep on with our growth perspective. Can I just come on to another. It's clause 88. It's off the back of Mycoplasma bovis when the suspected pathway for M. bovis coming into the country was being investigated—and it won't be the only case—but inspectors, or those investigating were very limited in their ability to seize information that might add to the case to either prove the pathway or take legal action against the person who might have imported or contributed. This adjustment here will make it easier for that information to be gathered. I'm not going into every other area—Mr Speaker. I know you'll be very pleased to know that—but can I just move on to one area, which is the National Animal Identification and Tracing Act (NAIT Act) area. There are adjustments to the NAIT Act. This is the Act that requires farmers to track and trace or to identify and then to notify all animal movements. And this was a nightmare, a particular nightmare, when it came to eradication of Mycoplasma bovis. Federated Farmers, in their wisdom or otherwise, had campaigned against NAIT when it was proposed in 2007, or thereabouts, and pushed back on it to the point where it wasn't implemented. The incoming National Government did implement NAIT, somewhat reluctantly, in the knowledge that, actually, the world was moving in that direction. But that reluctant implementation meant that farmers didn't really understand the why and hadn't put NAIT in place as it should have been. So when it came to MPI trying to track and trace animals for Mycoplasma bovis, it was a nightmare. The system has been improved. Farmers understand now why they need to do that, but there was a clause in this piece of legislation making technical adjustments that would have allowed the transfer or the sharing of some of the information gathered in the NAIT system to other Government agencies—a sensible proposition, I would have thought. But there's always been paranoia, unreasonable paranoia, by those in the farming sectors, led by Federated Farmers in the past—I'm not sure about now—saying, "Well, if you give that information to the Government, they're going to use it and abuse it." This is information about the number of animals they have and where they shift them. In my view—and there will be future incursions—the ability to share that information is critical. The select committee has obviously heard from submitters—I'm not quite sure who—that this is unreasonable and it impacts on our privacy, our ability to keep that information to ourselves. This Government will rue the day that it has changed this provision. With the proper protections, that information must be available across Government agencies when it comes to a foot-and-mouth or another Mycoplasma bovis incursion. So I'll be asking in the committee stage of the bill why the select committee, as a whole, decided to pull that out. There are many other issues, and most of them made very good progress in this bill. But there are some questions that need to be answered, and I'll be asking them in the committee stage. Kia ora. MIKE BUTTERICK (National—Wairarapa): Thank you, Mr Speaker. This omnibus bill aims to make our regulations more efficient and more effective, benefiting our primary sector—so what it's about. As we've heard, there are about 250 changes to 17 different Acts. Those changes might be small, they might be technical, or some of them, in some cases, straightforward, but they actually do make a big difference. We're talking about fixing drafting errors, clarifying procedures, and making various tweaks—big and small—that the industry has been waiting for. It's a bit of a spring clean and a bit of a tidy-up, as we've heard. Like a small boat in the ocean setting big waves in motion, those big waves—that's our primary sector, who are leading the charge for our economy. The Primary Production Committee have had a key role in examining this bill thoroughly, going through every detail and unanimously recommending all the amendments, and that's a big deal, showing that there's a willingness and broad agreement to make those changes. So I commend and thank the select committee for all their efforts. A few highlights from the bill: the Agricultural Compounds and Veterinary Medicines Act 1997 inserts a clause to allow for applications to register a trade name product if there's an end date for its exemption from registration. Another one, the Biosecurity Act 1993: this Act now allows for oral declarations at the border and gives authorised persons the power to seize unauthorised goods, containers, or packages. The Food Act 2014: new amendments require the Minister to check that certain conditions in New Zealand justify issuing domestic food standards before doing so, and definitions are aligned across various Acts. Those are just some of the changes, but, in essence, this bill represents our commitment to maintaining a modern, efficient, and effective regulatory system. It shows our dedication to supporting our primary sector and fostering economic growth without imposing unnecessary burdens. I commend this bill. Hon Dr DUNCAN WEBB (Labour—Christchurch Central): Look, can I say what a treat it is to stand up and talk about our primary sector. As the MP for Christchurch Central, their largest open space is Hagley Park, and there's not a lot of sheep there. I was at Kirwee the other day, where in the South Island Fieldays, and had a good walk around and a good old yarn. I saw the National Party tent miserably poked in the corner there with no one talking to them, but that was all right. I was having a good chat to everyone, and they were very happy to talk to me. But, look, can I just say that this is actually what regulatory stewardship looks like. It is the function of Government to go through and make sure that all of that legislation—technical legislation listed here in this bill—is up to date, fit for purpose, and future-focused. Going after Damien O'Connor, who has a prodigious knowledge of this area, I'd never be able to match it, but if this Government could focus on this kind of regulatory stewardship instead of worrying about road cones and red tape hot lines, we'd get a lot further. The Ministry for Regulation does do some good work, but it's been hived off on a little project of David Seymour's when what it should be doing is scanning the statute book for the best and quickest wins we can get in terms of tidying up things like the Agricultural Compounds and Veterinary Medicines Act, because if we can make our agricultural industry more effective by those small tweaks in an omnibus bull like this, where everyone wants to get together and say, "Yes, look, that's a good idea.", and, of course, officials—this is the stuff that officials love. There's someone at a desk deep in Ministry for Primary Industries who is overjoyed that finally, after years and years, we're solving the problem that's been causing them the headache for all that time. It's good that the Primary Production Committee—I hear it's a fun committee. It's great that they've done their work as well, because there is real value to be added on this kind of legislation, which is making sure the legislation is up to date and actually does its work. What we've got is the Labour Party, true to form, saying we're the party of workers, we're the party of industry, we're the party of agriculture, and we're the party of primary industry, and saying—[ Interruption ] Hon Member: Comedy hour. Hon Dr DUNCAN WEBB: Well, there's a wry chuckle in the corner—in the far-right corner—but the fact of the matter is: look at the record. Look at what we did in Government. Look at what we did with free-trade agreements. Look at what we did with Mycoplasma bovis. The primary sector did really well under the Labour Government and the Labour-led Government. So, look, we're very happy to see this bill passed through the House to tidy up these regulatory standards to make sure we have legislation and a regulatory framework that works for everyone. It makes New Zealand better, richer, safer, and more competitive. KATIE NIMON (National—Napier): Gosh, it is wonderful to have so many people just throwing all of their love for the primary sector out tonight. Look, as the MP for Napier, which is a large rural seat, just shy of 10,000 square kilometres—Wairoa district, Gisborne district, Hastings district— Hon Member: Where is it? Hon James Meager: It's in the Hawke's Bay. KATIE NIMON: Not the Hawke's Bay, James Meager; Hawke's Bay. Anyway, look, I think, as my colleagues have rightly mentioned, 250 amendments to 19 pieces of legislation just goes to show just how much impact there is across our legislation on the primary sector. This is the latest in a long line of regulatory systems amendment bills that we have brought through this House this term that tidy up a whole lot of things that, as you will notice in some of the points that have been made, really just delegate authority and change names. It's all futureproofing. It's futureproofing so we don't have to come through with every single piece of legislation here and write a new law and make a new amendment. So with that, I say this is a very, very practical bill that's going to back our farmers. It is going to get New Zealand back on track. With that, I commend the bill to the House. Hon RACHEL BROOKING (Labour—Dunedin): Thank you, Mr Speaker, for this opportunity to speak on the Regulatory Systems (Primary Industries) Amendment Bill. Now, it's very good saying that if there is a problem, fix it. This is a good regulatory process where problems are being identified and they're being fixed. So well done for everybody who's involved in that fine, fine work that we should be doing in this place. I want to talk about two different aspects of this bill—[ Interruption ]—if anyone can hear me, Mr Speaker? The first is a little bit of history around walking and the second is some changes to the Food Act. We see in the Primary Production Committee report that the Walking Access Act 2008 is going to change what is the Walking Access Commission to the Outdoor Access Commission. It's not all about walking, it appears, and I just want to note some whakapapa that I have to this to this agency. In the olden days there was the New Zealand Walkways Act 1975 and there have been great discussions about access to private land in the Queen's Chain. There was a press release on 4 August 2005 announcing a group chaired by John Ackland—members here might know his daughter-in-law Kate. It was an eight-member panel and, talking of daughters, my father was a member of this panel as a rural historian, and that— Miles Anderson: Kate's not his daughter-in-law. Miles Anderson: No. Hon RACHEL BROOKING: Oh, I'm being—I apologise for that. I thought she was. Is Miles Anderson going to correct me? Miles Anderson: Niece-in-law. Hon RACHEL BROOKING: Niece-in-law? Niece-in law. Thank you for that—good Canterbury farmers there. This group of individuals were sought to seek to clearly establish concerns of interest groups and the extent to which agreement can be reached on measures such as clarifying existing public access rights along water margins, establishing the location of gaps in the Queen's Chain and how they might be remedied, the establishment of a code of conduct, and protecting the security of landowners. The work, it was reported back in February 2000, and then from that we have the Walking Access Act 2008 and the commission that was established. So that is some involvement of my family in that particular issue. I want to move now to the Food Act and Part 9 amends the Food Act, and specifically clause 234 says that the Minister may issue domestic food standards. This is something that I'm sure we will traverse in the next stage of this bill, in the committee of the whole House stage. But I do note this clause allows for a food standard where it's not part of the Australia New Zealand Food Standards for either of two reasons—being both new section 404(1)(a) and (b) of the Food Act. And (a) is the standards "have been or are being developed under the Australia–New Zealand Joint Food Standards Agreement for inclusion in the Australia New Zealand Food Standards Code, but New Zealand has chosen, under an annex of the Agreement, to opt out of the standards;". And then, or (b) is that there's no such standard. I just want to pause here because I think I heard Minister Hoggard say before in his second reading speech that this change would only apply where the Minister for Food Safety is satisfied that there is no joint interest for such a standard to be developed, but that only applies to (b), not (a). And (a) is when New Zealand has specifically chosen to step out of those agreed standards. So there's no requirement there for there to not be a joint interest because obviously there is a joint interest and New Zealand has opted out. There has been a recent opt out of those standards, and I think it would be useful to traverse that and to inquire with the Minister of whether this change is actually quite a substantive change and illustrate some policy direction from this Government that they want to do more opting out of that standard. Of course, it is possible to opt out already, but that is an important policy discussion to have and it goes beyond simple fix-ups and tidy-ups of the legislation. So that's an important issue that we should discuss in the committee of the whole House. But as I said at the start: if there is a problem, we should fix it. There are many problems that this bill addresses and fixes. So I thank you for listening to my speech. DAVID MacLEOD (National—New Plymouth): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I'm pleased to stand as the 12th call, or the 14th speaker, on the second reading of this bill itself. I wasn't actually involved with the select committee process, but I do want to talk about that process. I do note that the bill was introduced to the House in the previous term, in June of 2023, with the first reading actually happening this term here, on 27 March last year. I also note that there were two submission periods that were brought forward, and that was as a result of, in the middle of the first submission period, there were 28 amendments brought forward, and, of course, it was appropriate for that to go back out for submissions on those amendments as well. The bill is all about making sure that we have an efficient and effective regulatory system. As I said previously, it's repealing five Acts, but it's also making 250 amendments on 17 other Acts. Obviously, a lot of work was put into this by the select committee, and it looks like a bit of an A-team when I look at the Primary Production Committee. I thank them for the work that they've done on this, and I commend the bill to the House. Thank you. Hon JENNY SALESA (Labour—Panmure-Ōtāhuhu): Labour supports the Regulatory Systems (Primary Industries) Amendment Bill. This legislation may seem technical on the surface, and I must admit it actually does seem technical to me, because I do not know that much about primary industries. However, it is an omnibus bill that is really important for the health, wellbeing, and safety of all of our people, our economy, and, of course, our environment too. This legislation is about fairness, it's about responsibility, and it's also about protection. All of these values are values that are dear to us on this side of the House. This bill will ensure that those who operate within New Zealand's primary industries do so with accountability and with integrity. This law, once passed, will strengthen the safeguards that we rely on to keep our food safe, our animals well treated, and our borders secure. It is in many ways a testament to the duty that we owe not only to each other but to the future generations of Aotearoa New Zealand. This bill is also about ensuring fairness and accountability in food and animal products regulation. One of the key amendments that we support in this bill is the provision under the Food Act 2014 and the Animal Products Act 1999, which allows the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) to withdraw services from those who fail to pay their debts. Now, to be clear, this is not about punishing those who struggle; it is about fairness. Regulatory services are really crucial for making sure that the food that we eat and the animal products that we export meet the highest of standards. So when some businesses fail to pay for their services, the burdens then fall on other businesses, and it is fundamentally unfair for responsible, hard-working businesses to subsidise those who do not uphold their end of the bargain. Now, in terms of strengthening our biosecurity, this is a matter of national interest, because biosecurity is not just about protecting our economy; it is also about safeguarding the very foundation of who we are as a country. This is why the clarification on notices of arrival of a craft or boats that must be given under the Biosecurity Act 1993 is really important, an amendment that this bill makes. We live in a world where biosecurity threats are increasing, whether it's foot-and-mouth disease, or fruit fly infestations or invasive species—and the Hon Damien O'Connor also covered this earlier on—that threaten our unique biodiversity and one where whoever is in Government spends millions and in some cases billions to address those issues. So, therefore, timely and clear reporting on the arrival of a craft is not just a bureaucratic exercise; it is a front-line defence, and Customs, together with MPI, also has a huge role to play in this. It ensures that our border agencies can act swiftly, preventing the threats before they take root in Aotearoa. We also strongly support the amendment that expands MPI's powers to seize containers, to seize packages, or anything that has held unauthorised goods. Too often, biosecurity risks do not come in obvious forms. Pests and diseases do not arrive in our country neatly labelled. They hide in the unforeseen corners of containers. They hide in packaging that is discarded carelessly or in residues that are left behind. So giving MPI the power to seize not just the goods themselves but the vessels or the containers that they come in is, indeed, a logical and necessary step. This bill is about fairness for responsible businesses. It is about protection of our people and our economy. It is also about accountability for those who are operating within our borders. It strengthens the systems that keep New Zealand's food safe, our farms thriving, and our environment protected. We commend this bill to the House.
Scoop
25-04-2025
- Politics
- Scoop
Oranga Tamariki (Repeal Of Section 7AA) Amendment Bill — Third Reading
Sitting date: 3 Apr 2025 ORANGA TAMARIKI (REPEAL OF SECTION 7AA) AMENDMENT BILL Third Reading Debate resumed from 2 April. ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Maureen Pugh): This is the third reading of the Oranga Tamariki (Repeal of Section 7AA) Amendment Bill. When the debate was interrupted, we were up to call number four, which is a National Party call. JOSEPH MOONEY (National—Southland): Thank you, Madam Speaker. I rise to speak on the third reading of this bill. This bill is aimed to help Oranga Tamariki focus on its primary duties, which is the care and protection of young people, making sure they are safe from harm. The key point, probably, I would make at the outset of this is that, ideally, the Government would have no role in raising children or taking care of children. But we want children to be in the care and protection of their own families, their own whānau, and their own communities. But, unfortunately, we live in a country where that is not always the case. And— Ricardo Menéndez March: Then why are you cutting funding for front-line organisations? JOSEPH MOONEY: Pardon? We live in a country where that is unfortunately not the case, and there are young people who are not cared for by their families and they are not cared for by their communities. And there is a backstop where the State has to, unfortunately, step in and take care of those children. That is the role that Oranga Tamariki does in very trying circumstances and in a very fraught and difficult area, but it's one that must be done because, at the end of the day, a society that doesn't take care of its children is no society at all. Every child deserves the same level of care and support based on their individual needs, with their safety and wellbeing put first before any other considerations. This is designed to ensure that Oranga Tamariki is entirely child-centric and is making decisions that ensure a child's wellbeing and best interests and that there's no confusion about that. Some concerns were raised about this. I'm going to address those briefly. The biggest concern raised in submissions at the select committee were about the removal of our strategic partnerships in statute as part of the repeal of section 7AA, and there was also a key concern raised by the Waitangi Tribunal when they did an urgent report on this bill. I want to make it clear that the Minister had made it clear throughout, including at the outset, that the strategic partnerships framework would continue with those iwi and Māori organisations that wish to do so. There would be no change to the existing relationship that existed under the legislation and that, if any other wanted to take that opportunity up, they could do so. However, the select committee listened to the concerns that it wasn't going to be encoded in statute and recommended that, in the repeal, that aspect of it be retained. The Minister agreed with that recommendation, and the bill we have before us today incorporates and retains that strategic partnership in the statute to address that concern that was raised by the Waitangi Tribunal and that was raised by submitters. I have to say there was a little bit of disappointing politicking from the Opposition, who voted against retaining that at select committee. They have the opportunity to support the bill, now, but I don't anticipate that they're going to do so, given the things they've been saying, which, unfortunately, haven't been based on fact. I'll just read a little bit of some of the provisions that are incorporated now in the retention of the strategic partnerships for the record. So it includes provisions such as "[providing] opportunities to, and invite innovative proposals from, those organisations to improve outcomes for Māori children, young persons, and their whānau who come to the attention of the department: (ii) set expectations and targets to improve outcomes for Māori children and young persons who come to the attention of the department: (iii) enable the robust, regular, and genuine exchange of information between the department and those [iwi and other Māori] organisations:". I was surprised that the Opposition would be opposed to that. Isn't this what it is all about? This is literally what it's all about. Rawiri Waititi: We should have left it alone. JOSEPH MOONEY: The other thing that has been—well, Rawiri Waititi said, "We should have left this alone.". The point here is that the strategic partnerships are being retained and are being kept, and it would be helpful, I think, if the Opposition were clear in their communications that this is something they support. The other thing that's been raised as a concern is a change in the reporting requirements. That was in section 7AA, but I'm going to go through the reporting mechanisms that Oranga Tamariki is subject to. And, actually, if you go through it, there are seven different reports. I'm just going to list those now. The Oranga Tamariki prepares and releases a range of regular reports including: (1), an annual report, which means their performance against standards agreed as part of their annual appropriations; (2), a quarterly report, which gives an overview of the progress Oranga Tamariki is making to talk towards its strategic direction—the report provides measures against the Oranga Tamariki outcomes framework and appropriations, which, among other matters, sets out how the agency is making a difference for children and young people, tamariki and rangatahi Māori, and their families and whānau—(3), safety of children in care annual report, which reviews and measures the findings of harm for tamariki and rangatahi in care; and (4), under section 44(8)(b) of the Oranga Tamariki Act 1989, the Minister for Children is required to report to Parliament every three years on whether existing legislation, Government policy, and other accountability documents are meeting the needs of children and young people, particularly tamariki and rangitahi Māori. In addition to those four reports, the Independent Children's Monitor is required to report on outcomes for Māori children, young people, and their whānau. So I'll go through those. The first report is that, at least once every three years, a state of the Oranga Tamariki system report must include an assessment of outcomes being achieved for Māori children and young people and their whānau. Secondly, there must be an annual report on compliance with national care standards regulations, which must include specific information relating to the level and degree of compliance with national care standards regulations for Māori children and young people and the impact of this on Māori children and young people and their whānau. Third, there must be an annual report on outcomes for Māori children and young people and their whānau, which must include an assessment of outcomes being achieved by the Chief Executive of Oranga Tamariki for Māori children and young people and their whānau and the impact of measures taken by the Chief Executive of Oranga Tamariki in improving outcomes for those Māori children and young people who come to the attention of Oranga Tamariki. In addition, the report must assess the extent to which practices within the Oranga Tamariki system have regard to mana tamaiti and the whakapapa of our Māori children and young people and the whanaungatanga responsibilities of their whānau, hapū, and iwi and the strategic partnerships Oranga Tamariki has with iwi and Māori organisations. And there is an availability matter for the Independent Children's Monitor to require information from the Chief Executive of Oranga Tamariki, to which the chief executive must respond. I think it's worth, also, just mentioning section 4 of the Oranga Tamariki Act, which did not change, has not changed, and will not change and includes provisions such as "The purposes of the [Oranga Tamariki] Act are to promote the well-being of children, young persons, and their families, whānau, hapū, iwi, and family groups by—(a) establishing, promoting, or co-ordinating services that—(i) are designed to affirm mana tamaiti (tamariki), are centred on children's and young persons' rights, promote their best interests, advance their well-being, address their needs, and provide for their participation in decision making that affects them: … (iii) are culturally appropriate and competently provided: … (c) assisting families, whānau, hapū, iwi, and family groups" at the earliest opportunity—[ Interruption ] ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Maureen Pugh): Order! It's getting a bit noisy and too often. JOSEPH MOONEY: So I'll go on. Section 4, which sets out the purposes of the Oranga Tamariki Act so that it must assist "families and whānau, hapū, iwi, and family groups, at the earliest opportunity, to fulfil their responsibility to meet the needs of their children and young persons (including their developmental needs, and the need for a safe, stable, and loving home): … (g) recognising mana tamaiti (tamariki), whakapapa, and the practice of whanaungatanga for children and young persons who come to the attention of the department: (h) maintaining and strengthening the relationship between children and young persons who come to the attention of the department and their—(i) family, whānau, hapū, iwi, and family group; and (ii) siblings:" and "promotes their … best interests and acknowledges their needs;". This is a sound, robust set of responsibilities that are encoded in legislation that that have specifically referred to the importance of whakapapa, the importance of whānau, hapū, and iwi, and the importance of strategic partnerships and Māori organisations. I frankly cannot understand the Opposition opposing this. With that, I commend this bill to the House. TANYA UNKOVICH (NZ First): Thank you, Madam Speaker. I rise on behalf of New Zealand First to speak to the Oranga Tamariki (Repeal of Section 7AA) Amendment Bill. It's a Government bill—part of the National-ACT coalition agreement—which New Zealand First will support. Now, as per the general policy statement, the intent of the bill is to enable Oranga Tamariki to renew its focus and to focus on the safety of the child above all other considerations. The Government is concerned that the introduction of section 7AA has led Oranga Tamariki to prioritise cultural factors over the safety and stability of children; hence, this bill was introduced into the House last year—in May 2024—so we've had about a year of this process. I was on the Social Services and Community Committee. There were a lot of passionate and emotional submissions, and it was quite an emotional time to sit through it—I'm not shy to say that. During the submissions process, there were a number of things which were summarised by the officials, and the themes that they summarised these submissions under were wellbeing and safety, Treaty obligations, evidence, legislation and practice, equality and equity. With those key messages, the focus of putting duty first and the safety and wellness of the child first is what has led to this bill. On behalf of New Zealand First, I will commend it to the House. Tākuta Ferris: Brilliant—two minutes. TANYA UNKOVICH: Yeah—good, eh? MARIAMENO KAPA-KINGI (Te Pāti Māori—Te Tai Tokerau): Tēnā koe, Madam Speaker. I stand to address the Oranga Tamariki (Repeal of Culture, Repeal of Custom, Repeal of Safety, and Repeal of Protections and Prosperity) Bill, soon to be lorded over all mokopuna and their whānau by a Government and their spokesperson who knows nothing about Māori culture. Culture not only keeps mokopuna safe; culture enables mokopuna to thrive, to flourish, and to grow and into fully expressed indigenous Māori individuals, exactly like the thousands that gathered peacefully and powerfully on the steps of Parliament to remind us that they are here and they are not going away. In August of 1840, just seven months after the signing of Te Tiriti o Waitangi, our very first tupuna was removed as a baby by colonial hands. The justification of this—listen up, people—to save a Māori baby from the so-called evils of the pā, the evils of our people. This is your and our shared history. This act that has set the tone for generations was at that time summarised by one simple term: uplift—a word coined by the coloniser to mask their statutory act of thievery. That word still stains Māori lives 184 years later—no surprises. The coloniser continues to use it to describe their theft of our children—a term that absolves them of accountability and then allows them to maintain the presumption that Māori are so inferior that we can simply be taken. This repeal affirms exactly that: our children can be uplifted from their whānau without legislative accountability of the Chief Executive of Oranga Tamariki. I'll say the words "Oranga Tamariki"—because I keep hearing it pronounced so poorly—to ensure these Māori children— Laura McClure: Point of order, Madam Speaker. I don't believe that this is relevant to the bill that's at hand. ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Maureen Pugh): That's my call. MARIAMENO KAPA-KINGI: Speaking to the point of order—this is my speech—[ Interruption ] Blah, blah. Right. This respect affirms exactly that our children can be uplifted, they can be removed; the legislated accountability of the Chief Executive of Oranga Tamariki can be removed. These Māori children remain within the safety of their Māoritanga, a safety that was recognised under section 7AA. Through the committee of the whole House stage, the Minister for Children volunteered her own story as if that would sanction this outcome. Sadly, all that showed us was how deep internalised racism runs and the harm it can cause. I offer that she do some work to get well. This racist rhetoric—this racist rhetoric—is destructive, unhealed trauma masquerading as care and protection. Clearly, the apology and crocodile tears from the Minister to the survivors of abuse in care— Hon Chris Penk: Point of order. ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Maureen Pugh): Point of order, the Hon Chris Penk. Hon Chris Penk: Madam Speaker, I hesitate to interrupt the member, but it's a clear breach of Standing Orders, apart from anything else, to imply, or actually suggest in outright terms, crocodile tears and fake news, as though to bring into question the integrity and the honesty of the member the Hon Karen Chhour in bringing forward her policy. And that's before we even consider the offensiveness of a diagnosis on a medical basis— ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Maureen Pugh): I understand the point of order. The member is correct, so I'll ask the member to resume but to tone it down, please. Rawiri Waititi: Madam Speaker, every day we hear that coming from the Government, and the Deputy Prime Minister in particular, where he talks about other members having their tongues flapping around in the wind and all of that type of stuff. That has never been pulled up. It's double standards and it's hypocrisy. ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Maureen Pugh): We we're going to resume, and we're going to treat each other with respect. Thank you, member. MARIAMENO KAPA-KINGI: Clearly, the apology and tears to the survivors of abuse in care is more fake news. Because, at the same time, of course, the same bill— ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Maureen Pugh): I just warned the member. We have just been through this. MARIAMENO KAPA-KINGI: Oh, I didn't—sorry, Madam Speaker— Hon Member: Point of— ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Maureen Pugh): No. MARIAMENO KAPA-KINGI: —I didn't name a particular individual. I was just making it a generic statement. ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Maureen Pugh): I'm just warning the member, we're getting very close to being disorderly. MARIAMENO KAPA-KINGI: This is nothing more or less than a direct attack and direct assault on our mokopuna and on us all for being Māori. As was stated back in 1840—and here we again in 2025, referring to the evils of our people. I have chosen to take this bill very personally. How could I not? I challenge every Māori in this Whare and every non-Māori—and part Māori, because I've heard that recently—that is responsible to and for mokopuna tamariki Māori, to check your privilege, to check your fragility, to check your white tears, to check your racism, and to check your sexism and misogyny and get some counselling and education and free your mind. This is what happens when you internalise the racism and thank the oppressor for the experience. All that's missing in this bill is a clause saying, "Thank you, massa." Te Pāti Māori condemns this bill—[ Interruption ] ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Maureen Pugh): Order! Order! MARIAMENO KAPA-KINGI: —and all its intent. Tēnā tātou. RICARDO MENÉNDEZ MARCH (Green): I think it's far more outrageous that the Government feels so much offence at the truth than the harm that they're causing to our communities out there on the streets who are bearing the brunt of this Government's policies. It's really, really telling that we're seeing a level of outrage here that is not manifested when we are seeing tamariki Māori sleeping on the streets— ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Maureen Pugh): Excuse me, I'm sorry to interrupt the member. When members are in the House, they are to be seated and not to conduct a separate conversation, apart from the member who is speaking. My apologies to the member—please resume. RICARDO MENÉNDEZ MARCH: That's OK. I go back to the main issue, which is that I think the Government members tend to feel far more outraged at Opposition members pointing out the truth than, actually, kids sleeping rough on the streets, keeping them stripped away from the communities that they belong to, and the gutting of funding to the prevention services that are actually supposed to help keep kids in their communities and in their families. To me, it's so telling because they have nothing but bumper stickers and vitriol to throw at us, when, instead, they could make an attempt to provide empirical evidence for why we need the repeal of section 7AA, something that has not been able to be produced by the Minister in charge of this bill, despite calls from the Opposition and from submitters for the Minister to front up with her so-called evidence to justify this bill. This bill is nothing but a dog whistle that aims to attack tamariki Māori and to not pay attention to the bridge that has been created by the Crown that has led to so many tamariki Māori being split from and detached from the communities that they belong to. [Authorised reo Māori text to be inserted by the Hansard Office.] [Authorised translation to be inserted by the Hansard Office.] We have a responsibility to stand against the attacks against Māori from this Government. We are here by virtue of Te Tiriti o Waitangi. We have a responsibility to fight back against policies such as this one, that do not serve and do not recognise the history of this country. Joseph Mooney: Then why did you vote against the strategic partnerships? Why did you vote against it. Oh, is the Green Party against strategic partnerships? RICARDO MENÉNDEZ MARCH: I keep hearing the Government member to my left, Joseph Mooney, talking about strategic partnerships. But at the same time, if this Government cared so much about strategic partnerships, they wouldn't be gutting funding for these very same strategic partnerships. It is absolutely distasteful for the member on my left to be talking about the very same thing they're undermining. They're undermining provisional services, they're undermining State housing, the very same thing that can help keep a family together if they have been in hardship. They're undermining benefit increases, the very same thing that gives families a livelihood and allows them to stay in a safe and stable home—things that have been spoken to us about by survivors of abuse in State care. These members just seem to have the report on their bedside table and not give a damn about it, or read it and simply ignore it. Because the things that this piece of legislation is doing is actually a disservice to the very same voices who came to our select committee and presented to the inquiries that led to reports that paint a harrowing picture of the realities that tamariki Māori have faced under our care system, that is supposed to keep them safe. This repeal of section 7AA, all it will do is invisibilise the very same gap that exists between Māori and the rest of us in the care system that is supposed to keep them safe. Joseph Mooney: That's completely wrong. RICARDO MENÉNDEZ MARCH: It's absolutely right. I'd like for the member to my left to try and take a call, and I'd be happy to yield my time if the member was able to actually produce any evidence in relationship to this bill, because all that we have heard is rhetorical commentary that does not justify this bill. And I think, to me, it says a lot when the Government members are so happy to brush sides with the likes of Hobson's Pledge, to the likes of campaigners who have been running a strident anti-Māori campaign—it says a lot that they're now pushing ahead with anti-Māori legislation that is not based on evidence, when, actually, their so-called anecdotal evidence that the Minister produced is not even in relationship to section 7AA. It's disgusting that we have a Government that, rather than address things like homelessness, rather than addressing things like income support—all the things that keep people in their communities—they're wasting our time in the House to repeal a piece of legislation that helps address the gap between Māori and the rest of us. This is a Government that cares nothing about inequities, nothing about outcomes, because even if they say they do, members of the public can see the papers that this Government produces, when it comes to their budget, when it comes to the figures that they're putting in and the support that they're giving to organisations. And it is the organisations on the ground that are calling out for help because they're having to close when there's no other option available—they're the very organisations that keep our tamariki safe. I am not going to buy the rhetoric from the Government's members, who are claiming that they actually care for tamariki Māori to be safe, when they're underfunding and under-resourcing the organisations that are supposed to do so. This bill is a disservice to the very same people doing the most to help our communities, and the Government is not on their side. PAULO GARCIA (National—New Lynn): Madam Speaker, thank you. The children that we are speaking about in this debate in this House this afternoon are children who have had to be brought into the care of Government because of the dire situation that they faced where they were. They are victims themselves, and suffered trauma in the environments where they have been. Children start off their lives with their families, and in the spaces where they live, they have had to be removed and put into the care of Government. It is sad that we speak so many words and we can say we are disgusted and we can play a lot of blaming each other across the House, but the fact remains that these children have had to be taken into the care of Government. The Oranga Tamariki (Repeal of Section 7AA) Amendment Bill seeks to improve the service that the Government provides in this very difficult situation for all children that come into Government's care. The repeal does take away section 7AA. However, the cultural considerations which are the focus of section 7AA, the methodology for maintaining the respect for cultural considerations in 7AA, have been retained in the Act. The bill does not prevent Oranga Tamariki from continuing and developing these relationships that they have already had and want to have with iwi, hapū, and Māori organisations. The object of that is clear: to make sure that the children get to stay connected with the greater family that they may be connected to. That is not repealed. The Independent Children's Monitor will have the opportunity to check on that and report on that. The reporting duties of the chief executive of Oranga Tamariki remain. It had gone through select committee consideration, and, by majority, the decision was to retain the requirement of the chief executive to report. The object of all of this is to protect the children who are already victims and who are already traumatised. We want them not to be continually victimised by the politics of the appearance of this situation. I commend this bill to the House. Hon WILLIE JACKSON (Labour): Thank you, Madam Speaker. I am really saddened to talk about this kaupapa. I regard it as one of the saddest bills that this Government has ever put through—this repeal of section 7AA. I want to mihi, though, to our lead, Willow-Jean Prime, who has done a great job, and also some of the kōrero that has come Te Pāti Māori and the Greens, who give the right view in terms of identity, because that's what people are talking about here: the loss of identity. The great civil rights activist Maya Angelou once said, "There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you." That's what survivors talk about—they talk about culture and being lost and not knowing the language. They look at people like Peeni Henare over here, "Doc" Ferris over there, and they see beautiful Māori language speakers, people who are well in tune with their culture, and there's something missing in them. There is something that they crave for. That was the genesis of this kaupapa. Survivors talk about their kuia passing and the refusal of caregivers to allow them to attend tangi. The inability to connect with other siblings because their caregivers wanted their privacy. And the perpetual questions in their mind were: "What is their name?", "What is their mārae?", "What is their hapū?", and "What is their iwi?" This is what has driven this kaupapa from the start. This is what, I suppose, has driven te ao Māori into, at times, hysteria—because we have seen survivors sacrificed, in terms of Government legislation. In 1986, we even had Pūao-te-Āta-tū, which was a ministerial advisory group led by the great John Rangihau, talk about this—talk about this—and plead with Government that there had to be a different way, in terms of treating our culture, in terms of treating kids. They said: "The Maori child is not to be viewed in isolation, or even as part of nuclear family, but as a member of a wider kin group or hapu community that has traditionally exercised responsibility for the child's care and placement." It was incredible work by the group, led by, as I said, the great John Rangihau, my uncle Tamati Reedy, my other whanaunga uncle Neville Baker, and my wife's relation Donna Hall, who all talked about why things had to change in terms of the system, and why babies had to be placed in the right families. I want to say to the Minister over there—Karen Chhour—I respect what happened to her, in terms of her upbringing. She brings her experiences to the table. I do respect that, Minister, in terms of what you have revealed—I'm not here to mock you today. But I am here to ask you to listen to what te ao Māori have been saying. The Minister has had some excellent advice, but it's hard to sort of work outside her own experience, which was not a fortunate experience at all. I hear her. I've heard her tears. I've watched her cry with regards to this kaupapa. I am, as I said, not here to mock you, Minister—I'm asking you to listen to what our people have said. Great people like Rangihau. Great people like Naida Glavish— : I think she did listen. Hon WILLIE JACKSON: I wish that member would just shush for a minute. Great people like June Mariu; my mother, June Jackson; the great Titewhai Harawira. These were incredibly important people who said—and this Minister has had this advice—that we had to tie our babies back towards their whakapapa. I want to say to the House, 25 years ago, I was probably of the same view as the Minister—I was probably of the same view as the Minister—that first and foremost we had to make these babies safe. That is still my view—absolutely. There are a number of us who had not seen the research, who had not seen what our experts were saying in terms of the importance of whakapapa, the importance of te reo. We hadn't seen that. When we saw that, we all came in behind. So I want to mihi to those kuia who that woman over there rubbishes—and rubbishes me. I'm trying to put on the table today how important this is to Māori. Why we had the June Marius, the Naida Glaviches, the Titewhai Harawiras, and the June Jacksons say that you had to tie these babies back—back to their whakapapa—so they're not lost, so they do not become statistics in terms of the nation. And I ask that Minister to not just bring her anecdotal stuff forward, which was incredibly important to her but is not in line with what te ao Māori is saying. That was recognised by the National Party and by the Māori Party, which was a kaupapa driven by Whaea Tariana Turia and accepted by the National Party— ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Maureen Pugh): Back to the bill? Hon WILLIE JACKSON: This is all part of the bill, Madam Speaker. Because this is what is being repealed. This is what is being repealed: an agreement between Te Pāti Māori and National Party that talked about the importance of whakapapa and identity, all repealed because of the ignorance of this Government—all repealed. The fear in our communities is that we could go back to where we were. The statistics show us that that once these babies are tied back to their marae, they're tied back to their whānau, tied back to their identity, they have a much better future and better opportunity. We all oppose this bill on this side of the House because of the risk of harm, the breach of Te Tiriti o Waitangi, the lack of evidence for repeal, a breach of children's rights, and the removal of the objective of reducing disparities and reporting on efforts to do so. The Waitangi Tribunal was absolutely clear that this was a breach of the Treaty and it posed serious harm to Māori tamariki. Repeal will destroy the trust that is being restored through partnerships based on Te Tiriti and undermine the ability for the Crown to continue to repair and improve relationships— Joseph Mooney: And the partnerships are in the bill. Try reading the bill, maybe—it might help. Hon WILLIE JACKSON: I'm not sure what the other side understands here. But we know that the ACT Party has no respect for the Tribunal and has no respect in terms of te ao Māori. But it has been clearly outlined by our people this is a breach of tikanga Māori—[ Interruption ] Sit down, you fool. ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Maureen Pugh): Order! That was unnecessary, Mr Jackson. Hon WILLIE JACKSON: Madam Speaker, I'm getting sick of these clowns on the other side. ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Maureen Pugh): You will withdraw and apologise. Hon WILLIE JACKSON: An apology is going to be tough, Madam Speaker, but I'll do that for you. I withdraw and apologise. Hon Kieran McAnulty: Point of order. Madam Speaker, it was quite clear in that instance, whilst I make no comment on your ruling then, that a member was interjecting whilst they weren't in their seat, which is clearly against Speakers' Rulings. If you are going to pull members up, quite rightly, for making commentary in response to that, you probably should have pulled the other member up for doing that. ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Maureen Pugh): Understood. I did not see the member standing, and my apologies for that, but I did hear a direct inference to an individual, which is different. Simon Court: Speaking to the point of order, Madam Speaker— ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Maureen Pugh): I don't think there's any need to, Mr Court. Simon Court: Well, Madam Speaker, if I may, the member has made the assertion that I was on my feet while interjecting. I was— ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Maureen Pugh): There's no need to continue, thank you. Hon WILLIE JACKSON: Thank you, Madam Speaker. So I'll go back to the Tribunal and the clear breaches in terms of this kaupapa—article 2, tino rangatiratanga. They've made it very clear it's an absolute breach of the Treaty. In terms of where we go, we're about to see a real change in terms of what's happening in terms of te ao Māori. Solutions to deep problems have been worked out between State departments and the Māori population. They've failed to serve by resourcing community groups to step up and solve these problems for themselves. Section 7AA obliged Oranga Tamariki to work with those community iwi, and removing it allows the State to seek the cheapest option. Now, I know they're saying that it's still there. It is still there— Joseph Mooney: It's still there, Willie. Hon WILLIE JACKSON: It is still there, Joseph, but it's not a priority anymore—it's not a priority anymore. There are other options. And that's the worry, I think, from so many of our people and so many of our community: that the Government has taken away the Māori priority and the Māori option. So I implore the Minister to continue with those relationships with iwi, to continue with those relationships with Māori organisations, and to reflect on what's happened with this, because it has so upset the Māori nation, te iwi Māori, Māori organisations. They don't know where they're going now. They don't know what the Government is going to do next, because something that has been thought about since 1986—that was put in by a National Party - Māori Party coalition Government—is now being removed. That was something significant that even people like John Key, Bill English, and Anne Tolley saw as incredibly significant. It's a sad day for this Government and for this country, to see something so important be removed, and I ask that Minister to reflect on what she's done. Dr CARLOS CHEUNG (National—Mt Roskill): I think we've heard a lot of different speeches from different parties. Obviously, none of us agree with each other, but I think there's one thing we all agree on across the whole House: we are here to fight for the best interests of our children—for our children in care. For me, as an immigrant, I understand that cultural identity is very important. I also want my daughter to learn Chinese as well, to get her to understand my culture as well. But I need to think about it: what is the most important thing for my daughter? I think it's love and care. I think this is the love and care I received when I first came to this county, and I received it from different backgrounds of people—people with different ethnic backgrounds. I think love and care is what every single child needs. We are talking about the best interests for children. I think love is without borders. It is unfair to label all Māori families that they can't provide love and care to Māori children. I think that is very unfair. So, with love, I commend this bill to the House. GLEN BENNETT (Labour): It's with rage that I rise to my feet this afternoon. In fact, to hear from a Government MP to say that they do this in love, I cannot fathom that—I cannot fathom that. This piece of legislation is not loving. This piece of legislation causes anger, causes strife, and causes more division. Carl Bates: Stop scaremongering. GLEN BENNETT: From across the floor, I hear that this is scaremongering. This is not scaremongering. It's like—what is it?—spare the rod, spoil the child. It's just outrageous that people would say this is something loving we're doing on behalf of this Government for Māori whānau throughout Aotearoa New Zealand. That is outrageous. It is absolutely outrageous. I think and I listen as I've participated over recent days on this piece of legislation. I think of the First Nations activist from North America, bell hooks, who sadly passed away. She said, "Love is profoundly political."—Love is profoundly political—"Our deepest revolution will come when we understand this truth." Love is profoundly political. To be political today and to show love is to stand up, to cross the floor, and to reject this piece of legislation. I challenge the member Dr Carlos Cheung, if he believes in love—as he just said—then he will cross the floor and vote with this side of the House to be political and to show love. Because this legislation is not loving. I find it fascinating as we hear the Government talk and speak on their laser focus on the cost of living; their laser focus on getting tough on crime. And what have we had in the House this week? We've had the repeal of the Plain Language Act and we had this, the repeal of section 7AA. To me, is this laser-focused on the cost of living? No, it is not. All legislation in this House has to be debated within the context of the legislation in front of us. But we also always need to look beyond it in terms of what is going on in the context of the timing; the context of what is going on in our society. That's why we have to consider the fact of the royal commission and the survivors of abuse in State and faith-based care. And if you read those 138, I think it is, recommendations—if you do nothing else, I challenge and ask people to read the whole of the document. But if you can't, that's fine. Read the 138 recommendations and what they say. Time after time you'll see in terms of cultural capacity, cultural understanding. We need to look at this piece of legislation with what else is going on, and that is one of them. Within that, I think it was recommendation 2, that was for the Prime Minister to make an official apology—and, thank you, he did. Part of that—and I was looking it up earlier—recommendation was the apology should acknowledge all survivors with specific mention of Māori survivors and their whānau, hapū, iwi, and communities. It goes on to say—and that's why the context is important as we debate this this afternoon—that it emphasises the need for culturally responsive care systems that recognise and incorporate Māori perspectives and practices. Now, this piece of legislation is taking away a tool from the toolbox. And I think and believe if we are looking at our most vulnerable; if we're looking at the challenges of those who are on the margins; if we're looking at the fact of our tamariki, our rangatahi, we need to consider every single tool we have in the toolbox to ensure their care, their protection, and their wellbeing. And the cultural understanding, a cultural lens, is key to that understanding. People might say, "Oh, he's just banging on again, doing his old thing." And yes, I will bang on again and do my old thing. But I know this well because I have been in this space as a caregiver, I have worked for many years and continue to live my life with young people who've been through the State care system. I was there at a time when this was not in legislation. I was there at a time when this wasn't even a factor that we really considered or even paid attention to. And I've seen the effects and implications of that. So this is a terrible day, and I challenge Government MPs to choose love, to cross the floor, and to vote against this bill. CARL BATES (National—Whanganui): Thank you, Madam Speaker. This afternoon, we have heard from across the floor an attempt to say that this is doing something which it is not. The speaker prior to me, Glen Bennett, literally said to be political and cross the floor, because that's what the Opposition is trying to do; they're trying to play politics with our children. This Government wants to put children at the centre of the decision making, and not politics. As a father, as an uncle, and as a community member, I commend this bill to the House. Hon PEENI HENARE (Labour): Madam Speaker, if you'll indulge me, I'll speak Māori in this part. [Authorised reo Māori text to be inserted by the Hansard Office.] [Authorised translation to be inserted by the Hansard Office.] I want to acknowledge the emotion in this debate and in this topic, and, rightly so, because we are speaking of the most precious taonga and the most precious part of Aotearoa New Zealand, and they are our children, our mokopuna. And I know members right across this House have quoted people like Dame Whina Cooper, who talks about the way that we raise our tamariki, for they will be the future of Aotearoa. I know that many in this House have spoken words, in particular the words of my ancestor Meri Ngāroto, who said: [Authorised reo Māori text to be inserted by the Hansard Office.] [Authorised translation to be inserted by the Hansard Office.] It is with those in mind that I heard the passion throughout the longevity of the passing of this bill. I want to acknowledge each and everyone for their perspectives. For my part, in the Opposition and as a proud member of the Labour Party, we stand by our opposition to this bill. We stand by it on the premise that was led by our wahine toa, Willow-Jean Prime, who made it clear and continued to come back to the evidence justifying why we continue to oppose this particular bill. I said in Māori that as a father and as a grandfather and as a matua who proudly calls himself a Ngā Puhi man, each and every one of us must continue to make their commitment in this House that we will protect our tamariki and our mokopuna regardless—regardless of what happens in this House and outside of the walls of this House. It's hard not to get so emotional. And if I'm honest with you, Madam Speaker, I've only ever cried one other time in this House. But this is one of those times where it feels like, you know, the dam might just break out of frustration, out of love, out of care, out of an acknowledgment that for much of the voice and debate in this House on this bill, I couldn't help but feel that sometimes our children's voices weren't being heard simply over the voices of adults in this Parliament. So I want to bring our attention back to that, that our tamariki and our mokopuna must continue to be at the forefront of everything that we do, not just this bill but every bill, because it impacts them and their future. In this, the third, reading of this bill, we've heard the evidence that's been presented to the Waitangi Tribunal, we heard the evidence that was presented to the select committee, and I want to remind New Zealanders that this particular bill can't be seen in isolation from the royal inquiry—and my colleague Mr Bennett and other colleagues from the House have referenced that inquiry—into the abuse that took place in State care. That is part of the platform of the opposition to this particular bill, because of what happened to so many tamariki, Māori and Pākehā, right across the country. We all sat in here and we heard at the release of the report the speeches made. That's the same emotion I feel today. It was the same emotion I felt on that same day. This can't be seen in isolation. And it's with that institutional memory of a whole generation that have been treated the way they had been treated is what continues to inform our debate on this particular matter and of course, our opposition. I'm proud to stand alongside members of the Opposition here today to continue to oppose this bill. I've heard members from the Government benches say that parts of it are still in the bill and there's still scope here for strategic partnership. I'm not going to relitigate those matters, but I will say this. For every kaimahi out there, whether you work for an iwi organisation, a community organisation, we say, "Kia kaha. We thank you for your mahi. We're here to continue to support you in your important mahi in our communities." And we say to each and every one of our tamariki who need these services, firstly, an apology—an apology because we can do better. And when I say "we", not just the members in this House, but our communities can do better, can do better by our tamariki. So I know this debate has got heated, and I hope that in my contribution, the last from the Opposition benches on this matter through the third reading of this bill, that I took the opportunity to remind my colleagues, all colleagues around this House, of the importance and the passion that we all express around this bill, and bring us back in my final two minutes to the importance of our tamariki. When I grew up, I was fortunate—and the Hon Willie Jackson made mention of it—to have had the cultural connection to my people, to my family, and to my language. As the first kohanga reo baby to become a member of Parliament and as the first kohanga reo baby to become a member of the executive, I carry that burden of the privilege that I was honoured to have. There's a song that reminds me of my upbringing, an upbringing that I enjoyed and loved in the caring arms of an entire family and community. And the song goes like this: [Authorised reo Māori text to be inserted by the Hansard Office.] [Authorised translation to be inserted by the Hansard Office.] It's a beautiful waiata. It's simple. It speaks of saying that despite my child and my mokopuna being playful, cheeky, I ask that you never lay a hand in anger on our mokopuna. That's the same plea I leave on the floor of the House here today for reflection for all members across the House, but more importantly for Aotearoa. We oppose this bill. MIKE BUTTERICK (National—Wairarapa): Thank you, Madam Speaker. I would just like to acknowledge that this bill has been a very emotive one, and I understand that, because it is about our most vulnerable—it's about our children. And as a parent and a father myself, the safety of a child in need should always be the priority. This bill will help Oranga Tamariki focus on its primary duties, which is the care and protection of those who are vulnerable, making sure they are safe from harm because every child deserves the same level of care and support based on their needs, and their safety and wellbeing put first before any other consideration. And this bill does not prevent Oranga Tamariki from retaining its current strategic partnerships or from entering into new partnerships with iwi, hapū, and Māori organisations. I commend this bill. A party vote was called for on the question, That the Oranga Tamariki (Repeal of Section 7AA) Amendment Bill be now read a third time. New Zealand National 49; ACT New Zealand 11; New Zealand First 8. Noes 54 New Zealand Labour 34; Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand 14; Te Pāti Māori 6. Motion agreed to. Bill read a third time.
