Hon MARIAN HOBBS (Minister for the Environment) : I move, That the Wellington City Council (Te Aro Reclamation) Amendment Bill be now read a second time. The bill has been reported back from the Local Government and Environment Committee with an amendment that I am advised is accepted by the Wellington City Council. I thank the members of the select committee for their careful consideration of the bill.

This is a small bill of just four clauses, dealing with a 1,500 square metre piece of reclaimed land known as Jack Ilottt Green, which is on the corner of Harris Street and Jervois Quay. It was once home to Wellington’s Circa theatre and is a very much-loved corner, not quite on the waterfront but just across the road from it. The site is the last remaining piece of land covered by the Te Aro Reclamation Act. Wellington always seems to be handling these fairly ancient Acts.

This Act required the council to sell or lease the land, by public auction, after at least 2 months’ notice and to use the proceeds to repay borrowings for the reclamation. That sounds familiar, except it is 100 years old. The council can sell or lease other landholdings not subject to the Te Aro Reclamation Act without a notified public auction. The bill before the House today seeks to remove constraints and allow the council to deal freely with the land in question.

I have sponsored this bill as I sponsor many local bills, because I do not believe that central government legislation, particularly that passed a long time ago, should unnecessarily hamper how local authorities deal with land under their control. I note that a member of this House, a former member of the Wellington City Council, issued a press release in which she said that this legislation was thought up “sneakily” by the city council. There is nothing sneaky about legislation that is put on the Order Paper, and is on the Internet for everyone to see. There was nothing sneaky about this legislation.

I met with people who were nervous about what might happen to Jack Ilottt Green, and I pointed out to them that under the existing legislation the land could have gone to auction, and no one would have had any control of what happened to it if it went to auction. This way there is some community control.

Some submitters to the select committee—I think they were the same ones who came to see me—were concerned that the bill could remove the council’s obligation to follow the decision-making requirements of the Local Government Act. The select committee agreed that clause 4 of the bill as introduced was unnecessarily broad in the discretion it gave to the council. The committee recommended that the council deal with the land in accordance with the Local Government Act. I have no reason to believe that the local council intended to do anything other than work under the Local Government Act, the Resource Management Act, and district plans. However, that amendment will maintain the intent of the bill by removing specific constraints on the council, while ensuring that any sale be publicly notified and the community be consulted. So I welcome the change.

I am aware of some of the very exciting developments involving that land that are being considered by Wellington city councillors. I look forward to them involving the community in their thinking about those developments. I encourage everyone with an interest to engage with the council so that the best solution is reached for that land.

Again I refer to a press release by Sue Kedgley, a member of the Green Party, in which she thunders that this will be an election issue. I would hope that we were not into antagonism yet again in Wellington, but that we were about working constructively together. In this case, it is central government working with local government to remove an obdurate way of working, but I hope in the future that all of the Wellington community will work together, rather than set up for a pitched battle yet again. Too much time and effort has been lost in this community by pitched battles. It would be good if we could work together under the Local Government Act.

The Wellington City Council has advised that it accepts the change to the bill, and I commend it to the House.

JOHN CARTER (National—Northland) : I rise on behalf of the National Party to support this legislation. It is a local bill and there is nothing controversial about it, at all. I commend the Minister whose name the bill is in for the work that has been done on it.

I have one or two things that are probably worthy of comment—[Interruption] Yes, there are. I am sure there are two things worthy of comment. Firstly, the Minister who spoke on this legislation has already made the comment—and it is worth reemphasising it—that the present legislation will indeed take care of any concerns expressed by submissioners who were worried that the council might be allowed to run away and do some hip hops or something with the money it received from any sale. That cannot happen under the Local Government Act or the bill, as they preclude any suggestion of untoward action by councils. In other words, councils will be as good or bad as they are in anything else they do.

The other thing of interest—and I mean this seriously—is that we need to consider, given that the foreshore and seabed legislation is before us, whether that legislation will have any impact on any of this particular land. The Minister is nodding her head and saying no, but one of the things we are not certain about is how wide the foreshore and seabed legislation is, and what impact it will have. As that legislation develops, we may well find—

Hon John Tamihere: It would impact on your mother.

JOHN CARTER: No, this is not a “mother” speech. Mum has not read the foreshore and seabed legislation, but she will be appalled by it when she does get to see it, along with all other mothers and fathers in New Zealand.

The problem we have with the foreshore and seabed legislation is that because we are uncertain exactly what it means, and because its intent needs to be a lot clearer, we may find that while we think that the legislation we are passing now is clear, gives direction, and comes under the auspices of the present Local Government Act, the foreshore and seabed legislation, when actually passed, may interfere in some way with the intent of this bill.

I tell the House that we need to put that qualifier on it. There are things in the foreshore and seabed legislation that we are uncertain of. We seriously do not know how wide the changes to the Resource Management Act will be under that legislation. Until the legislation is developed, those changes will probably not be known until such time as it goes through a court process, and that may be some years away. However, we might find that that bill will come back to haunt us with regard to this sort of legislation. It may well put restrictions, limitations, and impositions on local government, and, as a consequence, on this sort of bill, which I am sure the House will support.

Of course, the other thing we are uncertain of is just how wide and far-reaching the foreshore and seabed legislation, as put down by the present Government with the support of New Zealand First, will be with regard to foreshore issues, of which this is part. When we look at the wider issue, we see that once again we do not yet know. The issues around “cultural connection” are undefined. Nobody knows entirely what that means. We have to wait and see what those definitions mean. As we pass this sort of legislation, we should be bearing in mind that this other legislation that is before the House has wide ramifications and may well impose, restrict, or influence the outcome of the legislation we are debating today.

As the select committee that is dealing with the foreshore and seabed legislation grapples with those problems to try to get some clearer definition of the things that New Zealanders are worried about in the bill, and the fact that it might impact on their private property or interfere with their ability to enjoy an afternoon picnic at a beach—

Dail Jones: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. This speech is totally irrelevant to the bill before us. After all, this bill has a title, and therefore the Foreshore and Seabed Bill would not apply. There is nothing in this bill about the Foreshore and Seabed Bill, and I ask the member to return to the Wellington City Council (Te Aro Reclamation) Amendment Bill.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Clem Simich): It does concern a part of the foreshore. That is what the bill is all about. I am quite comfortable to let the member wander over the issue of the foreshore and seabed.

JOHN CARTER: If the member actually read this bill, he would see that it is about reclamation. The member may not know, but reclamation—

Dail Jones: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. Where in this bill is the word “foreshore” used? I would like to know that, because there is no reference to the foreshore in this particular bill.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Clem Simich): I have ruled on that point of order.

JOHN CARTER: Obviously, the member is a bit nervous about the foreshore and seabed legislation that he supports. He does not want anyone to talk about it, and that is why he is trying to shut down my contribution.

The point I am making to Dail Jones, who raised the point of order expressing concern and hoping that no one would notice that New Zealand First supports the Foreshore and Seabed Bill, is that so many things are unclear in the foreshore and seabed legislation. As we pass legislation such as this, the House needs to take into consideration the impact that that legislation could have on a bill like this one.

I say to Dail Jones, and to his colleagues in New Zealand First, that they should take great care as they support the foreshore and seabed legislation as to what impact it could have and what the detrimental effects might be. What impact might the term “cultural connection” in the Foreshore and Seabed Bill have on this sort of legislation? I think that is a reasonable question to ask. It is a debating point, and not one that tends to allow a restriction on the bill before us.

This is a very good bill. The House will pass it, and so it should. However, I just say that as we debate it today, we need to take into consideration all the other legislation that is before the House, and, in particular, the Foreshore and Seabed Bill. I believe that that bill is likely to come back and cause this House, and this country, some significant problems because of the way it is written and the impact it is likely to have. I say that we need to be aware of that. As we pass this bill through the House, the select committee looking after the Foreshore and Seabed Bill will surely want to consider those things with regard to this sort of legislation,.

Hon JOHN TAMIHERE (Minister of Youth Affairs) : It is with great pleasure that I stand to commend the Wellington City Council (Te Aro Reclamation) Amendment Bill to the House. It is not often that I differ with the honourable Dail Jones. I agree with part of his view that much of what John Carter contributes to the House is irrelevant. However, in this particular bill, I would like to indicate the following. Reclamations are clearly ruled on within the foreshore and seabed legislation actually, although they are not within its purview. I invite members opposite to actually read that piece of legislation but, with respect, it has no direct impact in respect of the particular bill we are talking about. This is one of those kinds of circuit-breaker bills that most politicians come to Parliament to actually pursue. That is why Dail Jones is so enthused with it.

This is a small bill containing just four clauses dealing with 1,500 square metres. It is a piece of reclaimed land known as Jack Ilottt Green. I appreciate that pretty soon there might be an amendment at the Committee stage to try to rename that land “Dail Jones Green”. The reality is that this is a very small bill. It has no impact on the Foreshore and Seabed Bill, notwithstanding the fact that it is subject to the Te Aro Reclamation Act of 1879. That is dealt with quite carefully and clearly with regard to the legislation on the foreshore and seabed.

The select committee did a sterling job in taking a significant number of submissions in respect of this bill—in all, I think there were two. After much debate, covering no less than 15 minutes according to the report, the select committee agreed that clause 4 as introduced was unnecessarily broad in the discretion it gave to the council. We have to be very careful in giving lots of discretion to councils, particularly in the Wellington region.

The committee recommended that the council deal with the land in accordance with the Local Government Act. This amendment will maintain the intent of the bill by removing specific constraints on the council, while ensuring that any sale be publicly notified. The community would therefore be placed on notice and consulted. This is a constructive change that we welcome.

As an Aucklander, I am delighted to speak in favour of a bill that is going forward to support the Wellington region. As a consequence, on behalf of my colleague Mahara Okeroa, who helped to represent the area, we commend the bill to the House for its second reading.

EDWIN PERRY (NZ First) : New Zealand First will support this bill. I speak on behalf of my colleague Mr Jim Peters who sits on the select committee that dealt with this bill.

I want to go back into a bit of the history of this bill. In 1874, the Crown granted 70 acres of land to the Wellington City Council in trust for the purpose of reclamation and public utility. In 1879, the Te Aro Reclamation Act gave the council the right from time to time to fill up and reclaim certain land on the Wellington harbour. The result was that over time since 1879 the area concerned became fully developed and now includes much of the present-day civic and commercial centre of Wellington. When the Wellington City Council decided to sell property it still owned in the area, there was some local concern and agitation about the purpose and the nature of the Wellington City Council’s property regime. A further consideration was whether the Tenths Trust had an interest under Treaty of Waitangi claims.

I want to touch a wee bit on the bill. The bill conveys to the Wellington City Council, firstly, the ability to deal with its land as it wishes, providing the relevant requirements of the Local Government Act 2002 are met with regard to the selling and leasing powers of the council. Secondly, the Local Government Act sets out from section 76 to section 90 the planning and decision-making processes required from the local authority in the course of its policy implementation. Thirdly, and particularly important, is section 78, which provides for community views in relation to decisions, and further sets out the procedures in relation to those decisions. Fourthly, section 82 sets out the principles of consultation, and section 83 provides for the special consultative procedure, which I think is very important to the bill.

New Zealand First supports the passage of this bill in its second reading. It also supports the ability of a local council to go about its business properly and legally with regard to its lands. Although section 81 provides for Māori consultation, the Tenths Trust has indicated that the reclaimed lands in question are solely within the province of the Wellington City Council.

SUE KEDGLEY (Green) : I agree with previous speakers that the amendments that have been made to this bill are a victory for parliamentary democracy and for the select committee process. Marian Hobbs, the Minister who sponsored this bill, said there was nothing sneaky about the bill, but the interesting thing is that she did not come to the Local Government and Environment Committee and hear the submissions on it. The submissioners made it very clear that they thought it very odd that the Wellington City Council had not even discussed the bill in full council. It turned out that the bill had been proposed by a subcommittee of the council, and that it had come to Parliament through Marian Hobbs without the full council having been made aware of it, even though the land involved is, as many have pointed out, very significant—small but very significant—and without the people of Wellington having been alerted to the fact that this legislation was about to come before the House.

I too became curious about this bill, and when I saw it on the Order Paper I rang the Wellington City Council, because, as the Minister pointed out, I was a councillor there for almost 8 years. I asked what the purpose of the bill was, and why the council had provisions in it that allowed a prize piece of Wellington real estate to be sold without the constraint of any other legislation. However, no one at the council was prepared to ring me back and brief me on the matter. As the weeks dragged on and I was unable to get any briefing, my suspicions were aroused. The fact of the matter is that this bill as introduced, which was slipped into Parliament without it having gone through the full council, would have enabled the council to sell this prize piece of land without the constraint of any other legislation. Basically, it would have allowed the council to sell the land secretly—without informing Wellingtonians—and literally to disregard all other law. When the city council was asked why it had included this particular provision—which, fortunately, we have now struck out—it could not offer any plausible explanation as to why it would seek to sell the land without any constraint, in a way that overrode all other legislation, including the Local Government Act.

That is why I consider that the council had sought to sneak this bill through. Fortunately, members of Parliament were not asleep on the watch. We were alert. We enabled submissions to be heard and we rectified the bill by requiring that the council, when leasing or selling the land, be subject to the provisions of the Local Government Act. That Act requires the council, when leasing or selling off the land, to consult with the community before doing so.

We have to remember that there has been significant concern about this land—as I know full well, having been on the council. Indeed, I can remember when we named it the Jack Ilott Green. We all stood around, and said: “Isn’t it wonderful that we’re going to name this wonderful little piece of land after one of the great benefactors of Wellington, Jack Ilott?”. All the city councillors were there and we all praised ourselves, saying: “Isn’t it wonderful? There is so little green land in Wellington, and here’s this lovely little bit of land named after Jack Ilott.”

It then emerged that the council, having gone through that naming procedure—to the great delight of Jack Ilott—wanted to sell the land and build a large building on it. The problem is that such a building would not only block views to the waterfront but would also mean a loss of public space, and would in fact cast a huge shadow over the whole of Civic Square. That prospect has created huge concern in the community. There has been a lot of debate about it. Basically, the community is saying—in terms of all the submissions I have seen and all the comment I have heard—that it wants to preserve this special piece of land. It feels that there is so little land in Wellington, and it does not want to see a large building overshadow Wellington’s very important and precious Civic Square.

So it seems to me that the council did what it did to try to get round the inevitable controversy that it feared—that is my assumption, anyway—would emerge if it were forced to consult on the selling of the land. It was really seeking legislation that would enable it to sell or lease the land without it being required to go through proper consultation or, indeed, being constrained by any other legislation.

The Minister said that I have thundered about the fact that the sale or lease of this precious green space would be an issue in the upcoming Wellington City Council elections. I have not thundered; I have simply said in my press release that I predict that the potential sale or lease of this precious green space would be an issue in the upcoming Wellington City Council elections. It is a prediction I am making, and I am not thundering it. I am not being divisive here; I am simply making a prediction. The reason is that there is strong support in Wellington for the retention of this land as a green space in the city. Certainly, the Green Party and our local campaign team running for the Wellington City Council will be launching a campaign to ensure that the land remains as green space.

We are very, very pleased that as a result of the select committee process, chaired by the Green Party co-leader Jeanette Fitzsimons—and I personally made a point of being on the committee—the offending provisions have been removed. We have now required the Wellington City Council to follow due process and consult with its community, and we have prevented it from being able to sell this priceless piece of land in a rather secretive and sneaky fashion.

HEATHER ROY (ACT) : As a Wellington-based MP, it gives me great pleasure to rise on behalf of the ACT party and speak to the second reading of the Wellington City Council (Te Aro Reclamation) Amendment Bill. This bill should be well supported by the entire House, because it allows the Wellington City Council to progress and go about its business unheeded. Previously, the council could not sell or lease the land without a notified public auction, and not less than 2 months’ notice of such an auction was required. The bill now removes this constraint, and that is exactly as it should be.

There has been quite some discussion about clause 4, which repeals and replaces sections 8 and 9 of the principal Act with the power for the council to freely deal with the land in question. ACT, because it thinks that the council should be able to go about its business unheeded, would support this. As we have just heard, the Local Government Act of 2002 will apply. Therefore, the consultation that Ms Kedgley spoke about will go ahead. I am not sure that we are entirely happy. ACT’s position on local government legislation has been well documented, and I would certainly hate to see the constraints previously imposed on the Wellington City Council removed and replaced by a completely different set of constraints. However, it is the right thing for this bill to be proceeding.

I think I should point out, just for anybody who might be in any doubt, that the Wellington City Council does have a very good record of consulting with its local community and fulfilling its obligations in this regard, even since Ms Kedgley has no longer been on the Wellington City Council. I think that Wellingtonians, in particular, need not fear that consultation will not happen. It certainly will.

It is good to see that Labour and the Greens are in favour of this bill. I think that, at times, Wellingtonians might well question the commitment that both of those parties have to progress locally. I refer very briefly to the progress of the bypass, which was talked about 30 years ago. In fact, the recent announcement that the bypass will happen had its beginning 30 years ago, and it should have been built at that stage. But the money was diverted by the then Minister of Works and Deputy Prime Minister, the Hon Hugh Watt. That money was diverted to “Spaghetti Junction” in Auckland where his voting base was. So it is good to see that the Labour Party is supporting, at long last, progress in this Parliament for Wellington.

I might say that Mr Darren Hughes over on the other side is being very vocal about this, but where has his commitment been to improving transport in the Wellington region since he has been in Parliament? I would say that it has been sadly lacking. In fact, six of the seven Wellington region MPs are Labour MPs, and they have been noticeably lacking in their support of progress in the Wellington region. It has been the list MPs living and being based in the Wellington region who have stood up for progress.

Hon Member: The Mount Victoria tunnel!

HEATHER ROY: That is right. My colleague has spoken up in favour of the Mount Victoria tunnel in Wellington, and I have been very vocal in my support of the bypass. Unfortunately though the seventh seat is the Hon Peter Dunne’s Ohariu-Belmont seat, and he campaigned quite hard for various things before the last election, but now that he is supporting—

Gordon Copeland: He is still supporting the bypass.

HEATHER ROY: Is he? Well, his support has not been very loud, I hate to say. His colleague in United Future has been much better at representing the Wellington region than he himself has. But anyway, back to the matter in hand. ACT New Zealand does support this bill. We do, perhaps, highlight the uncertainty that might come about over this piece of land due to the foreshore and seabed legislation, when it is a piece of reclaimed land that we are talking about, as was highlighted by my colleague from National, John Carter. But it is a move forward. We hope that the Local Government Act 2002 will not hinder the progress that this bill will make for the Wellington City Council, and for the benefit of Wellingtonians.

Ms Kedgley’s concerns about this area of green land owned by the Wellington City Council might well be an election issue in the local body elections in October this year. But that will be a case of democracy at work and, of course, it will be a very good issue for those contenders—those who we have yet to see put their names forward—to campaign on. In conclusion, ACT does proudly support this Wellington City Council (Te Aro Reclamation) Amendment Bill.

GORDON COPELAND (United Future) : The Hon John Carter of the National Party and you, Mr Assistant Speaker, in your very clear ruling, are quite right to say that this bill—the Wellington City Council (Te Aro Reclamation) Amendment Bill, does, in fact, link to the Foreshore and Seabed Bill. Would it not be a great thing if indeed the Foreshore and Seabed Bill did refer to the concept of “public domain”. I think it would relieve a lot of the uncertainty that John Carter spoke about if we just had those two simple words, “public domain”, back in the bill.

Why have those two words been taken out of the Foreshore and Seabed Bill? We all know the reason, do we not? Three members of the Labour Party could not make up their minds. Then two of them finally did make up their minds to vote against the Government and it had to turn to New Zealand First. New Zealand First, with its chest puffed out, breathlessly informed the nation that “public domain” was an American republicanism concept. Well, ha, ha! Let us tell that to the people of Auckland, who well know about the Auckland Domain, and try to tell it to one Gordon Copeland, Member of Parliament, born in Mapua, ex - 3-mile specialist who used to run his races on the Mapua and Motueka domains, both of which have been there since time immemorial. So much for the nebulous, ridiculous reason given by New Zealand First for dropping those words! I hope they find their way back into the bill.

Coming now to the issue at hand in terms of this particular bill, I would like to say that United Future will vote in favour of its passage through the House. However, I say to Wellington City councillors that they should proceed wisely, and certainly they should consider the original intent of the 1879 Act that the proceeds from the sale or the lease of the reclaimed land should possibly be applied to the reduction of debt on the city, especially if the land is sold. If it is sold, the city will be realising a capital asset. Therefore, ideally, the proceeds should be used as a general principle for the reduction of the city’s liabilities.

I express the hope that the councillors, especially in this election year, will consider that matter carefully, because, just like in a business or a family, selling some of the family jewels—and this land is a jewel of the city—-and frittering away the proceeds on somebody’s expenditure wish list, normally turns out to be a mistake, and a costly mistake at that. So I tell the people of Wellington that if they want to get their rates down, then, when they select their new councillors this year, they should vote for prudent people—and next year they should vote for United Future, because we will take GST off rates and leave, just for once, some extra cash in the pockets of every Wellington residential ratepayer. I think that all the people of Wellington would welcome that change. We support the bill.

LINDSAY TISCH (National—Piako) : I will take a brief call in support of this legislation. It has been interesting to hear the comments from Wellingtonians who have a vested interest in what the outcome of this legislation will be, and how it will affect those people who live in Wellington, and of course, the responsibility that the Wellington City Council will have once this legislation is passed. One of the points that has come out of it—and I think it is important—is that the bill will allow flexibility. It will allow the council to decide what is best for the land. But it is also interesting to note—and I guess this is a word of caution to those who may be seeking to be candidates in the local body elections—Sue Kedgley’s comment that this will become an election issue. So I guess there is some forewarning there for those who may be seeking to stand, certainly as to what their position is with this land, and whether it can be sold or leased, or whatever the outcome is likely to be. It is also important that the council take notice of the pending foreshore and seabed legislation, and that has been mentioned by previous speakers. The foreshore and seabed legislation will impact on this legislation, and the council needs to be very mindful of what the likely outcomes of that would be in the future. National is very happy to support this piece of legislation.

DAIL JONES (NZ First) : I seem to recall that towards the end of last year I had the opportunity to be on the Local Government and Environment Committee. I listened to some of the submissions on this bill, and got some idea of how the Local Government Act and suchlike would affect the land involved. I note with interest the confused view that has been given about the effect of the Foreshore and Seabed Bill on this legislation. Today, in 2004, this legislation amends the Te Aro Reclamation Act of 1879. The area concerned may have been the foreshore then, but I understand that today it is no longer the foreshore. The definition of the foreshore is very simple: is it a wet bit or is it a dry bit, and does the tide come up to Jack Ilott Green any more? If the tide came up and covered Jack Ilott Green, up to the high-water mark, then it would be the foreshore. But if it is a dry bit now and the tide gets nowhere near to it today, then it is not the foreshore. It is as simple as that—dry bits; wet bits. Most people can understand the difference between a dry bit and a wet bit. The National Party, it would appear, cannot, and the Greens and United Future have some difficulty with that, as well. In relation to the definition of foreshore and seabed, those of us who can tell where the tide goes up to at the high-tide mark know that that is a wet bit. Those of us who cannot understand that somehow think it is still a dry bit.

The area referred to in this bill is, from my understanding, quite some distance away now from the high-water mark area. Therefore, it cannot be affected by the Foreshore and Seabed Bill. It really is as simple as that. All that the National Party is doing is trying to be suspicious. United Future was going to support the Foreshore and Seabed Bill. It was the removal of three little words from the purpose clause that made it change its mind and not take a very unctuous position. The removal of three words from the purpose clause made United Future change its mind. That was not common sense; that was spitting the dummy. As far as anyone else is concerned, that was just a fit of pique on the part of United Future.

So I conclude by saying this land is a dry bit, and the Foreshore and Seabed Bill cannot apply to it. Most people who have any degree of common sense understand that fact. It is regrettable that neither the National Party nor United Future has any common sense with regard to the area referred to in this bill.

DARREN HUGHES (Labour—Otaki) : I want to join with other members of Parliament in welcoming the second reading of the Wellington City Council (Te Aro Reclamation) Amendment Bill, which was promoted by the Hon Marian Hobbs, in consultation with the Wellington City Council. The Hon Marian Hobbs does play an important role in coordinating the Wellington electorate members of Parliament, and as a group we certainly welcome the opportunity this legislation will provide for this piece of land. It is, of course, a small bill, with just four clauses. Mention has been made of Jack Ilott Green by other speakers. As my colleague the deputy leader of the House says, this is a small but perfectly formed bill.

Comment was made by the ACT list member, who I understand lives in Wellington, that not enough action is being taken on Wellington transport issues by Wellington electorate members of Parliament. The member clearly has not looked at the record of the effort and energy that Wellington members are putting into trying to address the transport needs of the region. Those needs are challenging, but we are trying to meet them. There are already runs on the board. The member said that nothing has happened, but of course if she is focused only on her small suburb—as I suspect she is—she would not know of the developments at Mackays Crossing that Winnie Laban, Peter Dunne, and I have worked very, very hard on, to try to make sure we help to make that part of State Highway 1 function as an entrance to the Wellington region. Unlike that member, who wants to talk down Wellington’s chances as a region, what we do as Wellington electorate members of Parliament is to stay positive about the transport and other issues confronting Wellington.

Finally, in closing, I note a very important event that has happened this afternoon. The member for Rotorua, Steve Chadwick, has had a granddaughter born, called Tiki. I am sure that members would like to join me in congratulating the extended Chadwick whānau.

• Bill read a second time.

NANDOR TANCZOS (Green) : I move, That the Clean Slate Bill be now read a second time. The Clean Slate Bill was first introduced into this House in March 2001. It was quite some time ago—during the last session of Parliament. I think it is fair to say that this bill has played an important role in spurring the Government into action. As a result, last week we saw the enactment of the Criminal Records (Clean Slate) Bill. It is fair to say that I take some pride that an issue that has been under discussion in this country, and even in this Parliament, for a number of decades has finally been dealt with by this House and resolved, at least partly in response to this member’s bill.

When I turn to the first reading of the Clean Slate Bill, I recall that the bill was supported by the Green Party, of course, and by the Labour Party, the Alliance, and United Future, which at the time consisted of only Mr Dunne. I have here a media statement from the Hon Peter Dunne. At the time when the vote was taken, his proxy vote was cast by the National Party against the Clean Slate Bill. So Peter Dunne put out a press statement and moved a point of order to amend his vote, so as to be in favour of the bill. At the time he said: “While my vote alone does not affect the outcome of last evening’s bill, United Future has supported the quashing of convictions for certain minor offences, and it is an important plank of our law and order and justice policy. While I may propose some amendments at a later stage, United Future remains strongly committed to the intention and spirit of this bill, which will go some considerable way towards promoting meaningful rehabilitation and ensuring people do not have to carry the burden of past mistakes for the rest of their lives.” I think that is probably the last time that Peter Dunne has mentioned my name—I will not say it was mentioned with approval, because I do not think it was with that, exactly—without an effusion of toxic bile spewing either from his mouth or from his computer keyboard.

It is a shame that those sentiments—Peter Dunne’s strong commitment to the intention and spirit of the bill—somehow became translated in the hands of the United Future representative on the Justice and Electoral Committee, Murray Smith, into opposition both to my bill and to the Government’s weaker version. We can put that down to the principle that Mr Dunne seems now to have adopted: that if the Greens are for something, he is against it. I think that maxim must have prevailed. It is a shame. It is hard to find a description of that. I do not want to be personal or to fall into making personal attacks, but that seems to me to be a singularly childish way of deciding policy.

So what does this bill actually do? It differs from the Government bill in a number of ways. The general thrust is the same, but there are a number of differences. My bill states that all convictions of a person become spent convictions after the period specified in clause 7, whichis 7 years, except where the conviction attracted a prison sentence of more than 6 months or a fine exceeding $2,000, or was a conviction for sexual offences, or was a conviction imposed against a body corporate. So a clean slate was to have applied after 7 years. I also made a distinction in my bill between convictions attaching to adults and to young people, although I recognise that the status of convictions in the Youth Court is different from other convictions. There was also a difference in the way that I approached dealing with information. My bill stated that no person would be required to disclose any information relating to a spent conviction, and no person could ask questions concerning a spent conviction. It made it an offence to try to force someone to reveal a spent conviction, or to subject someone to unlawful discrimination. In the end, the exclusions were somewhat broader than those in the Government bill. I think that is right, because my bill applied to some convictions that had attracted a prison sentence, whereas the Government’s Act applies only to non-custodial sentences. So it is quite right that the exclusions in it should be somewhat narrower.

At the time of the first reading, I recognised that this bill was not perfect. I said that we would probably support amendments during the select committee process. But I am still convinced that, broadly, the bill is right. If we look at some of the convictions that have resulted in prison sentences of less than 6 months, we can see many of them are extremely minor offences and are the kinds of offences that should rightly be captured by the clean slate legislation. There are things like careless driving, offences under the tax legislation, trespassing, disorderly behaviour, and offensive or insulting language. It is amazing to me that those offences have actually incurred a prison sentence, but that is the fact. Other examples are breaches of community service, unlawful assembly, and, of course, possession or use of cannabis. Those are the kinds of things that this bill was very much intended to capture. As far as those kinds of offences are concerned, we would say that if people have not been reconvicted after 7 years, they should rightly be able to put their past behind them and be treated as though they do not have those convictions.

When Mr Goff said he would be introducing a bill that applied to convictions that incurred a sentence of 3 months or less, I welcomed that. I thought it was a reasonable compromise. But in the end, the Government bill applied only to non-custodial sentences. I have to wonder where the change came from. I did not really see any substantial evidence presented to the Justice and Electoral Committee as to why the legislation should not apply to any custodial sentences, at all. That came about, I suspect, because at the time Mr Mapp indicated National might support the Clean Slate Bill if it applied to only non-custodial sentences. I have reminded him about that fact—[Interruption]—and I think he is quite hurt to be reminded about the speech he made at that time. But it seems to me that what may have happened is that Mr Goff introduced a bill that did not include any custodial sentences, perhaps in the hope that it might actually attract a consensus in the House and cross-party support. I think that was a good intention. If the bill had attracted cross-party support, that would have been a good thing. Unfortunately, the National Party’s final position was inconsistent with its original indication, and therefore, I think, the possibility opened that the Government could have included some custodial sentences. I regret that Mr Goff was never able to see his way clear to supporting that.

I think it is a shame that the Government did not support my bill, but chose to introduce its own bill in place of it. Mr Goff made the point that my bill was not very well drafted, but, of course, the resources available to a member go nowhere near to competing with the resources available to the Government. But I have sat on select committees, and I have seen them gut bills and rewrite them. I think it is quite feasible that the Justice and Electoral Committee could have done that in this case. I say that not so much for myself, because at the end of the day I am truly of the opinion that it does not matter whose name is on a bill, when the fact is that this Parliament is doing something worthwhile that has been needed for some time. But I do think that, in general, Governments of any persuasion should look at supporting a member’s bill when they support the bill’s intentions, rather than introducing almost identical legislation. I think it is good practice for members to be able to see their members’ bills through the House and passed into law.

This bill was welcomed all around the country when it was introduced. I have already pointed out that I received a stack of emails and letters. The folder I am holding now contains letters relating to the Clean Slate Bill, so members can see I received a substantial number of them. I think people welcome the fact that something like this bill has actually been passed into legislation. The intentions of my bill live on in what is now the Criminal Records (Clean Slate) Act. Although I accept that my bill will now be lost to history, I do take pride in my role in getting clean slate legislation finally passed into law in this country.

Hon PHIL GOFF (Minister of Justice) : The Clean Slate Bill in the name of Nandor Tanczos will not, as he has indicated, be progressing today. That fact does not reflect on the good idea behind the bill but reflects the fact that this Government has moved already to enact legislation that finally, in this country, allows a person who may have committed a less serious offence—normally as part of a youthful indiscretion—finally to put the past behind them.

I welcome the work that Nandor Tanczos has done on his bill, and his motivation and compassion behind it. He said he spurred the Government into action. I am not quite sure that that is exactly correct. The Labour Party manifesto in 2002 contained a provision whereby we would have clean slating of minor criminal records. We put that before the people of New Zealand. The people of New Zealand returned this Government for a second term and with a record level of voter support in the MMP environment.

There is a mandate for this type of legislation, in part because some 500,000 New Zealanders, according to the Ministry of Justice, will be affected by it. As Nandor Tanczos has said, a lot of those people have lived for many, many years with something that has preyed on their minds and caused them anguish and the fear of discovery. During the Committee stage of my own bill, I read a letter from a lady who 23 years ago had been convicted of a shoplifting charge. This is what she wrote, in brief: “This has been my one and only breaking of the law and one I regret on a daily basis. It does not go away. No one in my family has any knowledge of this record. My husband would be devastated if he knew, and more than likely should he find out this would put my 31-year marriage at risk.”

Like Nandor Tanczos, I have received literally scores of letters along a similar line from people in that situation. I deeply regret that there has been a lack of compassion with regard to this issue in some sections of the House. People have thought that there may be some political points to be scored by showing how tough they are and saying that people who committed an offence many, many years ago of a less serious nature should not be able to put their past behind them. I think of all the legislation I have passed in the justice area. Much has been tough, and much has resulted in people going to prison for much longer.

Dr Wayne Mapp: Oh!

Hon PHIL GOFF: Mr Mapp can scoff, but now people are being sentenced to 30 years, non-parole, for serious murders. To be fair to the Green Party members, I note that they supported that legislation. The worst offenders in this country should be treated in a tough and uncompromising way. But there are a lot of other people who have made mistakes in their lives. Some of the self-righteous members who have opposed clean slate legislation may well say that they have led blameless lives. Well, I do not think any one of us has led a blameless life. We have all made mistakes. Some people who have made mistakes have paid a price for that.

John Carter: Speak for yourself!

Hon PHIL GOFF: There is “St John”, or rather “St Hone” over there, who claims he should be exempted from that description. But it is human to err, and most of us have done it. Many New Zealanders—half a million—have paid the price and have been convicted, and at a certain point we have to say that when one commits a minor offence, it is not a life sentence. But many of these people have been serving a life sentence. A man rang my office a couple of weeks ago. He had just come back from Australia. Australia has had clean slate legislation for many years. He came back to this country, with a minor conviction from a couple of decades ago. He rang my office to say how much of an obstacle that minor conviction had been in his securing employment in our country.

I have heard members in this House oppose this legislation as though it is some radical and new measure that will undermine law and order in this country. Can I say how much that is nonsense. The United Kingdom has had clean slate legislation for 30 years. Has it caused chaos in England? No, it is regarded as common sense. This legislation is a measure that I think will have wide support around New Zealand.

Nandor Tanczos has raised the question of the threshold. I puzzled for quite a long time over the sort of threshold that I thought might be most appropriate. I am aware that, as the member has said, there are some people who have received prison sentences of up to 3 months—and again, that is sometimes a reflection of the past—for less serious offences, but in the end I decided that the least arbitrary threshold we could set for clean slating was a non-custodial sentence. A non-custodial sentence, by definition, is regarded as something that is imposed when the person is not a serious or recidivist offender. So in terms of having a clear and the least arbitrary threshold, I think that threshold is appropriate.

The Criminal Records (Clean Slate) Act originally had a 10-year period for non-reoffending, but I listened to what the select committee had heard in submissions, and the clear evidence was that after 7 years of non-conviction, one is no more likely than anyone else to be a repeat offender. The science suggested that 7 years is an appropriate time when one can say: “I have turned my life around. I am no longer an offender. I have had no more convictions. Please give me the chance to live down my past. Please give me an incentive, and recognition for the fact that I am now a law-abiding citizen.” I think the 7-year period is quite appropriate.

The legislation that has been passed is not about expunging the record. One cannot expunge something that has happened. It is about concealing a record, after the time has passed, when there is a need for transparency of that record. Of course, if a person reoffends, then the whole record will be exposed again, and appropriately so. But what we have also done is to look at particular exclusions. I think we have erred on the side of caution with the legislation we have passed. I have done that deliberately because we are—in this country, at least—entering new ground, to that extent.

What we have done is to exclude sexual offences, and certain very sensitive forms of employment are also excluded. But if we had made exclusions for everything the Opposition wanted, the legislation that has gone through would have had no impact at all. That was just a back-door way of trying to undermine the legislation.

I think we have the balance right, and I think history will demonstrate that. I think there are members in this House who have opposed this legislation who in times to come will look back at their words with a sense of shame, and wonder why they could not have put partisanship and politicking behind them. They will wonder why they could not have done something to show an ounce of compassion and decency, and a belief that it is quite possible for people who have broken the law in the past, often in their youth, to turn their lives around and become decent citizens, and say: “I have paid my price. I have met the sanction. I can now get on with my life.”, as people have written so movingly to me in recounting their own personal circumstances.

Finally, this bill has played an important part in the debate over clean slating. Once again I thank Nandor Tanczos for his initiative in bringing the bill through. Now that the Government’s Criminal Records (Clean Slate) Act has been passed, we are moving on to a new era in the New Zealand justice system. I think that is positive for New Zealand. I thank the member for his contribution, and I look forward to the law that has been enacted making a big change in the lives of literally hundreds of thousands of New Zealanders.

Dr WAYNE MAPP (National—North Shore) : A consistent theme that comes through from both the Minister of Justice and the promoter of the bill, Nandor Tanczos, is youthful crime—youthful indiscretion. I suspect the Clean Slate Bill, and indeed the Government’s Criminal Records (Clean Slate) Act, have been largely motivated by the proposition that a minor offence committed, let us say, under the age of 20, during one’s teenage years, should not follow a person throughout his or her entire life.

Both the Minister and Mr Tanczos, particularly when he introduced the bill some time ago, made extensive reference to youthful indiscretion, and that is a reasonable point. I think most people can understand that youthful indiscretions at the lower end of the scale should not follow a person for the rest of his or her life. National recognised this in its minority report in relation to the Government bill, when it referred to the greater use of diversion. We accept that those crimes, particularly under the Summary Offences Act, that can be dealt with by diversion ought to be dealt with by diversion. If diversion does occur, then such offences do not appear on a person’s record. So we do understand that proposition, and there are a variety of mechanisms to achieve that particular outcome. Had the Government, or indeed Mr Tanczos, introduced legislation to deal specifically with youthful indiscretion, they may well have achieved not just a majority, but a broad consensus in the Parliament. They did not, and that was the problem.

I wish to refer to clause 4 of the member’s Clean Slate Bill, which provides: “The purpose of this Act is to limit the effects of a person’s conviction for a minor crime in situations where that person is unlikely to re-offend.” If only that had been true in the balance of the legislation, because as soon as he included offences that were not just capable of imprisonment, but where imprisonment was actually imposed for 6 months, he took the legislation well beyond the category of minor crime. In New Zealand, 6 months’ imprisonment is handed out for quite serious offences, for example, burglary, assault, robbery, and fraud. Mr Tanczos mentioned careless use of a motor vehicle. Mere careless use of a motor vehicle cannot result in a 6-month jail sentence, because it simply does not attract such a penalty. Of course, careless use of a motor vehicle resulting in injury or death does, so that is quite a different issue. That would take the offence well beyond being a minor indiscretion. One has to do something quite significant before one would be charged with such an offence and receive a sentence of 6 months’ imprisonment. Careless use of a motor vehicle, without any further record, would not result in imprisonment, even if it resulted in injury. If, on the other hand, a person had a pattern of offending, such as consistently speeding and things of that nature, then a prison sentence would result.

So one of our fundamental objections to Mr Tanczos’ bill was that it went way beyond what he had contemplated. It was a fair point that he noted I had made those observations at the time of the legislation. He also noted that perhaps the Government’s bill took those comments at the time into account. I also stressed at the time the issue of youthful indiscretion, which of course Mr Tanczos did not mention. He knows that the two were linked together in my speeches and, as I say, that was the default in the Government’s legislation, as well.

This is an area where I believe all parties in Parliament understood there was a genuine issue: the youthful offender who was unlikely to reoffend, where there was a truly minor offence. I acknowledge that the youthful offender extends beyond the jurisdiction of the Youth Court, which stops at age 17. So it would include 18 and 19-year-olds, who would be dealt with through the District Court, in the full glare of publicity. I think all members would acknowledge that that is a particular age band where people ought to be able to move beyond their offending, if they can show a pattern of doing so. National’s solution, as indicated in the minority report to the Government’s legislation, which is now an Act, was greater use of diversion. So it is wrong for Mr Goff to get up, in his usual lecturing way, and take a platitudinous approach, saying that certain members will regret statements they had made. There was a way of achieving legislation that, I believe, would have had pretty broad consent. It would have had to be limited, however, to the youthful offender.

I want to conclude on one final point. The Minister, of course, also made much play about being tough on crime. He tends to talk tough. But I want to remind him of this one simple fact before he becomes excessively boastful, as he is wont to do. Under his legislation, and this is for the benefit of the junior Government whip, because it is quite clear he does not know this fact—

Darren Hughes: I was on the select committee.

Dr WAYNE MAPP: No. I tell the member he was not on the relevant select committee that considered that legislation. The fact is this: a rapist sentenced to 9 years’ imprisonment is now eligible for parole at 3 years. That is the reality—the absolute reality. In the past, that person could not have been released until 6 years had passed. I recognise there was a deficiency in the old legislation, and that there would have been an automatic release at 6 years. Mr Goff used to point that out consistently and regularly. Everyone anticipated that the law as introduced would have, at a minimum, provided for eligibility instead of automatic release on serving two-thirds of the sentence. Mr Goff completely negated the force of his then tough words by the law he introduced—sentenced to 9 years, eligible for parole at 3 years. Under no stretch of the imagination can that be considered tough legislation. It was not, it is not, and the public knows the truth of that. That is why, whenever Mr Goff appears at any public meeting on the issue, he is properly reprimanded by the public for having failed them.

It is with regret that I say Government members did not properly understand the core issue in the clean slate area—that is, the youthful offender. That is where they needed to concentrate their minds, because if they had done so they might then have been able to get broad consensus. Mr Worth, who is the ranking member of National on that select committee, specifically referred to diversion for youthful offenders. He did so for a reason, which was that we acknowledge there is a particular issue around that matter. Had it been the focus of the legislation, there might well have been support for it. That issue was not the focus. The legislation is therefore deficient, and that is why National did not support the Government’s bill and does not support Mr Tanczos’ bill.

DAIL JONES (NZ First) : I was a member of the Justice and Electoral Committee, which reviewed the earlier select committee’s consideration of this legislation when Parliament resumed in September 2002 after the July election. We looked at this member’s bill, the Clean Slate Bill, introduced by the Greens member Nandor Tanczos in conjunction with the Government’s Criminal Records (Clean Slate) Bill. Concerning the member’s bill we are discussing today, the select committee came to the conclusion that Nandor Tanczos’ bill should not be passed, and that is the conclusion the House is now considering. Strangely enough, there is no minority report on this bill, so it seems that even Nandor Tanczos at the select committee agreed that this bill should not be passed. The report states: “We recommend that the bill not be passed.”, and Nandor Tanczos was a member of the committee. So I really cannot understand why we are spending so much time on a bill that the select committee, including the member who introduced the bill, unanimously agreed should not be passed.

I note, just briefly, to add to what other members have said, that the bill states that if there is a crime of dishonesty, one’s employer will not be able to find out whether one is dishonest, as a result of this bill. If a person wants to travel overseas, and that person has committed a crime in New Zealand—this is regardless of what is in the Government’s bill, I should say—he or she still has to disclose that crime to an overseas country. If the crime is not disclosed, the person will be in trouble in that overseas country, as well. That provision applies particularly to travel to the United States and to drug offences, because that country is particularly strong in that area.

Members have taken quite some time on a bill that we have unanimously agreed we should not continue. It is almost a good example of why we should not have 120 members in this House. We should have New Zealand First’s policy of 99 members, because time seems to expand with the numbers of members available to fill it. New Zealand First does not support this bill. We will not be supporting it when it comes to the vote, and I do not intend to say any more. I have said enough in previous debates.

Hon RICHARD PREBBLE (Leader—ACT) : I rise to speak to a member’s bill from the Green MP Nandor Tanczos, who has produced a bill called the Clean Slate Bill. The idea behind the bill is to limit the effect of a person’s conviction for a minor crime in a situation, he says, where the person is likely not to reoffend. The member in his introductory speech made a great play of the fact that I, myself, had introduced a private member’s bill to have the same effect—I think, 1983, so that is more than 20 years ago. I have to say that that is true, so I am sympathetic to what the member is trying to achieve. It did appear to me in 1983 that a conviction is the mark of Cain—that, in effect, one has it forever. What motivated me in 1983—and members might not think of these things—was that when I first started practising law and I would ask a person: “Do you have a previous conviction?”, the person would say that, yes, they had been convicted a decade ago for something fairly minor. I would say: “We are under no obligation to give that information to the court, and when the police come in and read out the police records, the records are so bad, because they are manual, that the chances are, they won’t have it.” But, of course, the Wanganui computer changed all that.

Once that computer was introduced, convictions were never forgotten. The State could actually remember things in a way that prior to computerisation it could not. It occurred to me in 1983 that that was seriously changing the situation, and that it would be unfair if people who had committed relatively minor offences had those held against them forever. I made a visit to Britain for some other things, and saw that such legislation had been introduced. I think it was called the Offenders Rehabilitation Bill, or some similar name. I borrowed parts of that bill, and I introduced it. I remember that there was a great deal of media coverage of it.

What I found very interesting was that, contrary to Mr Goff’s experience, I did not receive very many letters. I looked carefully at the letters I received, and I found they fell into a number of categories. The first and biggest was of people who, having committed drug offences, wanted such a bill so that they could travel overseas. Well, there is nothing a New Zealand law can do—or Mr Tandor’s bill, or the law the Government has passed—to enable a person to lie when he or she fills out an application, and I guess that is one thing we have to keep on saying to young people in New Zealand who think it might be a good thing to smoke a bit of marijuana. We need to keep telling them that if they are convicted, it will prevent them from travelling in many places around the world, and a bill like Mr Tandor’s will not help. People should realise that. That was the biggest category of letters I received.

Nandor Tanczos: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I am sorry to interrupt the member’s speech. I let it go the first time—and I realise that was a mistake—but my name is Mr Tanczos, or Nandor.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson): That is not a point of order.

Hon RICHARD PREBBLE: I apologise to the member for mis-stating his name. Let me go to the next point. The next group of applications I received were from people who said they had suffered convictions but that those convictions were terrible misunderstandings, that the young boys had misunderstood their intentions, and that they thought it was terrible that the Boy Scouts would not allow them to be scoutmasters. They wanted to support my bill because it would enable them to do that.

Well, I was not sympathetic to that group of people, either. I then heard from people who said there had been misunderstandings about money, that they had not really taken it, or that people had misunderstood their intentions, and they thought it was wrong that they had to declare their honesty. I did not find any letter that seemed to set out a case where someone had been discriminated against.

I then looked at some other aspects. I have been an employer. Employers are entitled to ask these sorts of questions. The reality is that New Zealanders, on the whole, are pretty broad-minded. They realise that offences committed at the age of 18 should not be held against people when they are 28, especially if they can show that in the last 10 years they have not committed any offences. It is the case in many places that one is entitled to know about people’s records—not just employers, but also, for example, people in social organisations. I make the point also that although it may be hard, the reality is that our reputations are with us for life. They are things that people create for themselves. If people have made mistakes, they should be able to live them down. I am not attacking any MP when I say this, but we have members of Parliament who have strings of convictions.

Richard Worth: Who?

Hon RICHARD PREBBLE: Well, OK.

Sue Bradford: I’m one of them.

Hon RICHARD PREBBLE: Sue Bradford has put her name up. I was not naming her, but she has put it up. Her record has not held her back from being a member of Parliament. Indeed, I think she regards her record as a list of honour.

Sue Bradford: That’s right, I do.

Hon RICHARD PREBBLE: She does, and the point I am making is that that makes a nonsense of the need for this bill. As a result of the information I have received, I have reached the conclusion that this is something Parliament should not do. We ought to have more faith in our fellow citizens, and we ought to have faith in the basic good intentions of the average New Zealander. We also ought to uphold the general principle that it is not a good idea—and certainly not a good idea for the State—to pass a law that enables somebody to tell a lie. That is what this bill does. It enables people, when asked the question: “Have you ever had a conviction?”, to legally lie and say that they have not, when they have.

The more I have thought about it in the last 20 years—even though I am sympathetic to the sorts of arguments put forward—the more I have thought it is not a good idea. I do not think it is something this House should do. I believe that Parliament should say to people that the State cannot rewrite history. We can understand history, but we cannot rewrite it. For that reason, I am opposed to this bill and was opposed to the bill introduced by the Minister. I think, on balance, that passing laws of this sort will cause more harm than good.

MURRAY SMITH (United Future) : United Future will vote against the Clean Slate Bill, because the Criminal Records (Clean Slate) Bill that was passed recently has clearly superseded and overtaken it. I commend Nandor Tanczos for bringing this bill to the House. I have understood from members who have spoken that there is clearly some sympathy among parties generally for people who have picked up some convictions in earlier years and have to live with them for the rest of their lives. As the Justice and Electoral Committee report states, the Clean Slate Bill and the Criminal Records (Clean Slate) Bill were considered together by the select committee. Because the Criminal Records (Clean Slate) Bill was a Government bill, the committee concentrated basically on that, with the idea that the Clean Slate Bill would be discharged, as looks likely to happen. United Future did not support the Government bill—for reasons that are set out in the select committee report on that bill—and that was so because of key matters of principle, some of which are shared with this bill. There are some aspects of this bill that are preferable to the Government legislation, and which United Future leant towards.

Primarily, the principle behind both pieces of legislation is that people with minor convictions should not be plagued by them for the rest of their lives. When people are convicted of an offence, whatever it is, they suffer three penalties. They suffer the criminal penalty—in these cases, largely fines for minor offences, but maybe also community service. Then they are subject to civil remedies—they can be sued for compensation. They also have social penalties—in particular, the stigma that they carry with them, and the threat of publication of prior convictions—that haunt them for the rest of their lives.

It may well be, as Mr Prebble said, that the stigma, as far as employment is concerned, is more perception than reality. Certainly, New Zealanders are reasonably forgiving as far as old offences are concerned. But in a lot of cases, people bear within themselves the weight of the convictions they have, and cannot get on with their lives, because they know that it is something they incurred, and which haunts them. It may be that the matter of self-confidence and self-respect on the part of people who have become law-abiding citizens is more the cause for concern.

For some, the social penalties far outweigh the crime that was committed. They have become upstanding citizens. Some find they are impeded in employment because of those convictions, even a long time afterwards. Certainly, overseas travel is a problem. Prior convictions sometimes come back to haunt people on issues of social standing, such as running for public office, as the media get hold of some juicy titbit about something that happened 20 years ago.

United Future has considerable sympathy for such people, and certainly would like to see past convictions wiped, once people have proved themselves to be good, law-abiding citizens. Unfortunately, the Government legislation does not do that. This bill would do that, but the Government legislation does not wipe convictions, despite having the “clean slate” name. That legislation simply hides the convictions, so there is quite a difference between the two pieces of legislation.

The question is how the exoneration of convictions should be carried out. This bill has some positive and negative suggestions with regard to how that could happen, particularly in comparison with the Government legislation. On the positive side, the convictions were to be spent. Contrary to what Mr Prebble said, Mr Tanczos’ bill does not require or sanction lying. Under clause 8, the conviction would be spent. People would not be required to disclose their convictions, and under clause 8(1)(b), no person or organisation could ask questions concerning, or requiring a person to disclose, convictions. That is certainly a more honest approach. It allows non-disclosure and requires a person not to enforce disclosure, as opposed to the Government legislation, in which people are sanctioned to lie about the existence of their convictions.

The bill is also positive in so far as spent convictions do not revive on further convictions. So the issue of dredging up the past is less of an issue. However, there are also a number of negative aspects in the bill. Firstly, as alluded to earlier, 6 months’ imprisonment is too high a threshold. Secondly, individual convictions are to be wiped at the time they expire, so that people with a string of convictions would have them drop off the end, no doubt notwithstanding the fact that they continue to incur convictions. Receiving further convictions is not evidence that people are upstanding citizens who have reformed their ways and who deserve the consideration of having their convictions wiped. That would be a major impediment were this bill to proceed further. No application to wipe convictions is required, and I will allude to that when I allude to United Future’s alternative.

This bill lacks certainty, would be confusing, and its provisions would be difficult for the police to monitor. It restricts the power of the police to disclose full information to the courts, and it also lacks detail. Although select committees do improve bills, it seems to me that it would have been beyond the committee’s capability to entertain the work needed on this bill. It is too much of a skeleton, but that is not unusual when it comes to members’ bills, simply because members do not have the resources the Government has to put energy into drafting lengthy legislation.

So, in some ways, the policy direction of this bill is preferable to what the Government did. It wipes convictions rather than merely hiding them, and a person would have been able to honestly say, if that procedure had been adopted, that he or she had no convictions, whereas under the Government’s legislation, that person has to lie.

United Future, however, proposed a model that would have been far preferable, and would have met, in my view, all the objections of the other parties. Under the United Future proposal, the law would recognise that the clean slate scheme was a privilege, which was being given to eligible people because they had maintained a good character record. In order to convey that, a person would apply to have his or her convictions expunged. Following that, a certificate would be issued—which would avoid any doubt about the matter—to confirm that “in recognition of their good behaviour, the person’s convictions had now been expunged.” Any application for expungement would be sent to the police, who would have an opportunity to oppose the application for reasons such as the fact that the person had offended overseas during the interim period—now 7 years—or that the person was well known to the police, who therefore had good reasons for opposing any expungement of convictions. That would help to ensure that only people who truly deserved the expungement of their convictions achieved that.

Such a scheme would give people who did not want their convictions expunged, control over whether that occurred. I remember that one of my colleagues in the select committee, who is sitting in the Chamber, said she was proud of her convictions and would not want them expunged. Under the Government’s measure, she gets them hidden whether she wants that or not. The exemptions contained in the Government’s legislation could still be provided for by creating a historical record of convictions, which would be accessible by the exempt authorities, in the same way that legislation shows the historical provisions of Acts prior to their amendment. The record would simply be a historical record of previous convictions that the person had had but that had now been expunged.

The fact that the convictions were historical would also serve to encourage exempt employers to treat them more lightly. It would mean that once a person had completed the 7-year rehabilitation period, his or her previous history would be expunged, and even if the person reoffended, he or she would be truly starting with a clean slate. Under the exceptions in the Government’s legislation, the police and courts would know the full history for investigation and sentencing purposes, which would apply also in United Future’s legislation. It would be an easy scheme to administer, because although there might be a rush of applications at the early stage, we consider that they would then settle down to a regular trickle, and simply require the Ministry of Justice, when applications were received and approved, to transfer convictions shown on a person’s record into a history file.

In order to avoid mandating lying about the absence of convictions, we, along with Nandor Tanczos’ proposal, would have constrained the employer as to the questions that could be asked. In particular, any question would need to be framed in a way that specified that it excluded convictions that had been expunged under the clean slate scheme. Such a provision would be a simple matter to incorporate into standard employment application forms. That would have been a far preferable way of handling the matter, instead of what the Government has proposed, but we will oppose the bill because of the passage of the Government’s legislation.

SUE BRADFORD (Green) : I am taking the opportunity to speak briefly in the debate tonight because I am aware, as several speakers have already pointed out, that I am one of a select number of MPs who are personally affected by the Criminal Records (Clean Slate) Act, which resulted from my colleague Nandor Tanczos’ member’s bill. I have had to bite my tongue a few times during this debate, as, in fact, I am one of an even more select few in the House who has no desire to wipe any of my convictions from the public record. My criminal record started when I had just left school and was taking part in anti - Vietnam War demonstrations in Auckland, and there is no question that it hampered my career options earlier on, and later adversely affected applications for bail and sentencing outcomes in court. However, and at the same time, I have never resiled from what my convictions stood for in my personal and political life, whether they arose from the anti-war demos in the 1960s, the 1981 Springbok tour mobilisation, nuclear-free and women’s liberation campaigns, or later on from actions taken with the unemployed workers movement. I have no desire to be clean-slated, and I am just as proud of my convictions as I am of the other parts of my CV, like university degrees or job histories.

However, I am all too aware that for the vast majority of people with even minor criminal convictions, even one conviction can have a destructive and devastating effect on the rest of one’s life. Having worked in the unemployed and beneficiaries movement for 16 years, I am acutely conscious that people’s job prospects are instantly and negatively impacted, in most cases, if they do tell the truth or if their employer finds out about their past. Things like broken relationships, addictions and other mental health problems, and a general lack of self-confidence can also be a consequence in a long negative spiral.

So while I am grateful that the Government Act resulting from Nandor Tanczos’ bill will allow me to leave my convictions on the record and to release them to friends, the media, the courts, or employers if I so choose, at the same time I am even more delighted that many thousands of other people will, in the future, be able to lead happier and more fulfilling lives as a result of clean-slating.

To finish, I congratulate my colleague Nandor Tanczos on the outcome of all the work he put in on his original bill, and on achieving a significant change to the law with the help of the Government. I believe his member’s bill basically forced the Government into following up on an issue that various Governments have ducked for years. It is a fantastic achievement. The only pity was that the Minister was not prepared to work to improve Nandor Tanczos’ bill, rather than starting from scratch with a new one. Be that as it may, the main thing is that the objective of clean slate legislation has been realised, although many, many years later than it should have been.

It is also a highlight that this is the fourth Green Party member’s bill that has been passed into law or that has led to the Government adopting the same or similar provisions within its own legislation. Previously, Jeanette Fitzsimons’ Energy Efficiency and Conservation Act was passed in its own right, Rod Donald’s Local Elections (Single Transferable Vote Option) Bill was incorporated into the Government’s recent local government legislation, and Jeanette Fitzsimons’ Road Traffic Reduction Bill became part of the Land Transport Management Act. It is just a pity that a few other bills, like my own universal child benefit bill, which is coming up very shortly, and Ian Ewen-Street’s bill to reinstate a moratorium on genetically modified organisms, do not appear likely to meet with quite the same success. But I must not detract from what has been accomplished here. Once again, I congratulate both Nandor Tanczos and the Labour Government on their commitment to ensuring that many people who have minor criminal convictions in their past will now get a second chance at life.

Hon TAITO PHILLIP FIELD (Minister of State) : Tonight I am pleased to contribute to this member’s bill, because it deals with the very important issue of children in this country. First, I acknowledge the sponsor of the bill, Sue Bradford, a very good member of the Green Party. Her work in Parliament during this time has certainly proven her commitment to social issues that are very important to this country. I commend her for her efforts to recognise the needs of children. I also want to say that this side of the House is certainly committed to ensuring that we deal effectively with child poverty, hardship, and deprivation in our communities.

The Government will not be supporting this legislation, primarily because we believe we will be developing significant targeted initiatives in Budget announcements in the near future. Also, moves have already been made by the Government to improve the living standards of struggling low-income families, and, for that matter, middle-income families as well. In its last 4 years of power, the Government has developed policies and initiatives that have significantly improved the situation of low-income families and their children.

I know that there are continuing concerns about poverty in our communities. Recently, I attended a meeting of community groups in my own electorate of Mangere, who were concerned about poverty in our communities. Sue Bradford was present, and also a few others who are very much into developing social policy issues to help those struggling families. This Government has significantly improved the situation of those families, particularly if one considers Jenny Shipley’s 25 percent cut to benefits in the 1990s, which contributed to the demise of many of those low-income families and their children. Market rents increased the cost of accommodation and housing around New Zealand enormously, and were a major contributing factor to the poverty experienced in the community.

Those two areas contributed to poverty, and this Government has dealt significantly with them with the removal of market rents and the reinstatement of income-related rents. That not only made housing more affordable, but also contributed to a more stable situation for low-income families and their children. Not only were those significant achievements made in the first years of this Government coming into power, but benefit levels for low-income families havegradually been improved. Other initiatives, including fairer industrial laws with the repeal of the Employment Contracts Act, have resulted in the improvement of wages and conditions for low-income workers.

Progress has been made towards dealing with deprivation and poverty in our communities, and this Government will look to develop those initiatives further. This Government has signalled that in the Budget to be announced next week there will be an emphasis on dealing with poverty in our communities. Clearly, the assistance that will be given to low and middle-income families with children who are on benefits, as well as those in low-paid jobs, will be the emphasis of what this Government will be doing within the next 2 years. I am sure that that will meet the legitimate concerns of communities with regard to struggling families with children on low incomes.

Were we to accept this bill, it would cost about $500 million, and it would not alleviate poverty in our communities. In fact, it would put only a small amount of money into the hands of those who really need it. Even with the research that has been done on children in low-income households—in fact, one in three children have been defined as living below the poverty line—the reality is that we will end up paying another two-thirds of benefits to children who do not need them.

METIRIA TUREI (Green) : This bill is a godsend to those many hundreds, and even thousands, of low-income families in our country in need of financial support. It prioritises their highest need—that is, a boost to their regular income. The universal child benefit will not be income tested, but applied universally, so that families will not have to beg to justify their need. This legislation is focused on the children of a family, and makes some gesture to prioritise children and place them at the centre of policy making. It does not undermine the dignity of families by identifying them as the deserving poor, and it makes a real, tangible contribution to the efforts of those families to climb out of the poverty trap that many hundreds of them are in.

This Labour Government is turning its back on those families. It is turning its back on the 30 percent of this country’s children who live below the poverty line. It renders any Government rhetoric in the lead-up to this year’s Budget an insult to the needs of those families. Given that the National Party disgracefully abolished the family benefit in 1991, along with benefit cuts and other acts that attacked the low-income people of our country, we can only assume that on this matter Labour and the National Party agree that child poverty is not the national disgrace it is, but merely an expedient problem that they are prepared to put up with and do nothing about.

This Government will not even allow this bill to go to a select committee, where the needs of families and children can be identified and explored, financial implications considered, and the consistency between this bill and the New Zealand superannuation scheme established. The universal child benefit is one small step that we as a country can take towards eliminating child poverty. It will not cure all those poverty issues, but it will take the first crucial step to centre our economic policies on the needs of children and their families.

This legislation has received wide support from the New Zealand community—women, parents, and low-income families. Many community organisations, such as the Child Poverty Action Group and the Downtown Community Ministry, have done an extraordinary amount of work to assist families and support the measures set out in this legislation. The New Zealand Council of Christian Social Services, and even the Public Health Association, recognise that the measures in this bill are a necessary part of the strategy to end child poverty in our country.

The tragedy is that it is not just the traditionally understood low-income families who desperately need this measure, but also those in the middle-income earning band. It is that group that does not qualify for other targeted funding, such as the community services card, and it suffers extraordinarily. It is finding it harder and harder to make ends meet, and we saw some of the stark realities of that situation just a few weeks ago. This bill could signal a serious and real improvement to the problem of increasing poverty in our country. The question is whether the Government is concerned to end child poverty in our country. Clearly, it is not.

HEATHER ROY (ACT) : There is no doubt in my mind that the sponsor of this bill, Sue Bradford, is very well meaning in her attempts to address childhood poverty. Over the tea break I canvassed a few opinions on the family benefit. The first person I came across said: “I used to love having the family benefit. It was usually paid into the women’s accounts so that the men did not get their hands on it, and women would beaver it away. I used to spend mine on getting my hair or nails done when I felt like it. It was great, and I loved it.” The long and short of it is that the family benefit was never intended for that. It was intended to be spent on families.

The explanatory note in the bill states that its purpose is to restore a benefit that is necessary for the protection and development of New Zealand children. The shame of it is that this bill will not address that issue. A universal family benefit will certainly not achieve that. There is no way that childhood poverty can be addressed in that regard. This benefit is intended not only for low-income families, but also for every other family in the country, mine included. I have five children, and according to this bill, I would receive $15 for my oldest child and $10 each for the other four—that is, a total of $55 a week. I agree that for many low-income families that is a lot of money, but for families such as mine—there are a large number of them in the country, and I will come to that in a moment—it just is not necessary. I would rather that $55 went towards hip operations or looking after children who lived in poverty-stricken situations.

If this bill were to become law, 16,257 families with one child would receive the family benefit, 19,569 families with two children would receive it, 8,493 families with three children, and 2,304 families with four or more dependent children would receive it. That is a sum total of over 46,000 families receiving an income of $100,000 or more a year. I wonder how Miss Bradford feels about families such as these—and it would amount to quite a sum over a period of time—being given that amount of money, when there are much better places for it go.

The ACT party, of course, would much rather see a lowering of taxes across the board to compensate families in this way. It is much better that people have the money to spend on whatever is necessary for themselves than having the Government spending it on their behalf. It makes very little sense that these working families pay their taxes, then the money is filtered through various systems, and the social welfare department gives it back to them in a rather obscure way. The route itself is very costly, and it is hard to determine exactly what value of the money originally paid out in taxes would filter its way back to these families.

It is an unreasonable expectation that this bill will see the protection and development of New Zealand families, particularly poverty-stricken families. There is no assurance that those families will spend the money on their children. We know from when the family benefit was around previously that in many cases that was not the case. The wealthier families were more likely to dedicate that benefit to their children by putting it in bank accounts, or whatever, than the poorer families, who often spent it on things other than those that benefited their children.

For these reasons, the ACT party will oppose the bill. We would rather that the Government addressed the issue of lowering taxes in its Budget next week, rather than trying to find other ways of supporting families. There is little doubt that New Zealanders are by far the best qualified to spend the money on their own behalf, and that is certainly what we would like to see.

DAVID PARKER (Labour—Otago) : My call will be a very short one. I just want to record what the last member said. The suggestion that if poor people got a family benefit, they would not spend it in the interests of their children—

Heather Roy: I said some poor families.

DAVID PARKER: The member implied that, proportionately, rich people in receipt of the family benefit had the interests of their children at heart, while poor people did not. I suggest that when poor people go down to Countdown and try to buy good food to put in the stomachs of their children, they are even more aware of budget constraints. Those pressures are far more real for poor people than for wealthy people. I do not think that that comment reflects well on either that member or her party. It was a terrible thing to imply.

SUE BRADFORD (Green) : First of all, I would like to thank those parties—New Zealand First and United Future—that offered to support this bill to the select committee, so that it could at least be considered in the context of Government measures to support families and children. I am very conscious that these parties do not on the whole support Green Party initiatives, so I thank them for taking the time to really look at what I have been trying to achieve in putting this bill forward for public debate, rather than just acting on prejudice.

On the other hand, we in the Green Party have been under no illusions about the likelihood, ultimately, of Labour support for my member’s bill to reintroduce a low but universal benefit for all children. All along, I had a faint but real hope that the Government might at least see its way clear to supporting the bill past its first reading, given that all it does is reinstitute the family benefit that was lost with so little fanfare way back in 1991. The family benefit seemed to sink without trace in the era of massive benefit cuts and the Employment Contracts Act, yet the loss we experienced then of that pitiful yet significant $6 a week per child is still with us now, and in some ways having an even greater impact.

Just imagine if in 2004 we had a universal child benefit that families could capitalise on so that they could at least raise the minimum necessary to put the deposit on their first home. Just imagine if families who have to borrow money or go to the food bank most weeks just to put food on the table could at least buy another $25 or $35 worth of food to feed their children. Just imagine if we lived in a country that dared to treat our youngest and most vulnerable citizens with a fraction of the same respect that we afford our elderly through a universal benefit called superannuation.

I hope that all those people who criticised this bill because it is universal and not targeted just to families that they identify as poor will take a moment to ponder, even briefly, the fact that most parties in this House are more than happy to support universal superannuation—paid to everyone 65 and over no matter what their income or assets—while some of these same parties say at the same time that we cannot afford to offer all children and their primary caregivers the dignity and support of a very tiny $15 a week for the first child and $10 a week for the second. I wonder what that says about our comparative attitudes to people who are equally citizens of our country, one segment of which can vote but the other cannot.

I feel really sad tonight that a Labour Party filled with all sorts of well-intentioned people like Steve Maharey, Jill Pettis, Taito Philip Field, and David Parker, who have all spoken interestingly in this debate, cannot at a minimum allow us to take my bill to the Social Services Committee. If we had been given that opportunity, we could have looked at it in the light of Budget changes to family assistance and the benefit system overall—which, evidently, Dr Cullen is about to announce—received submissions, and opened up a whole public discourse in this area that would have been very useful and timely.

However, that is not to be. Neither Labour nor National have seen fit to support my bill, and this will be the last speech on the subject for a while at least. Nevertheless, I do not regret the priority that the Green Party has put on supporting me in putting this bill forward, and on making the ending of child poverty one of our key electoral policy targets.

I would like to finish by thanking all the community, trade union, and church organisations that have supported this bill, and by promising that we in the Green Party will continue to campaign for a society, and a tax and benefit system, that puts children and families at the front of policy making and not at the rear, and that works for equity and sufficiency for all our citizens, even those who cannot vote in elections.

CRAIG McNAIR (NZ First) : I move, That the Commission for the Family Bill be now read a first time. My intention is for this bill to replace the existing Families Commission Act of 2003. In speaking on the Commission for the Family Bill, I would like to thank those members who seem to have more pressing issues to address than to speak to their bills in the House this evening. Obviously, that has allowed my bill to move up the Order Paper very quickly. At the appropriate time, I intend to move that the bill be considered by the Social Services Committee.

Sadly, despite United Future’s best intentions in getting the Families Commission established through its confidence and supply arrangement with Labour, the compromises those members chose—and I highlight the word “chose”—to make with the politically correct liberal cabal within Labour has meant that this issue needs to be reviewed urgently. We in New Zealand First have two fundamental issues with United Future’s Families Commission Act.

I refer first to the definition of “family”. Definitions are important in legislation, as we all know, because when they are too broad or vague they become meaningless. The definition in the United Future Act is a clear sign of its capture by politically correct Labour. United Future will say that the definition is broad so as to include all types of family in New Zealand. However, we should ask ourselves this question: does it sound like the language of United Future to include such a wide description of families, or do we think it might just be Labour’s influence? This is the fate of a lapdog party forced to yield its values to its master. Why, on the one hand, would United Future spend so much time and money attacking the Civil Unions Bill, when, in the Families Commission Act, it has already opened the gate on those relationships?

Let me make it clear that we understand that there are different living arrangements out there. We do not have our heads in the sand. However, it is not our intention to support living arrangements that, quite frankly, stretch the imagination to consider them families. United Future—particularly Mr Alexander—will say that no children should be excluded due to the nature of their living relationship. We say that is the role of the Children’s Commissioner, not the Families Commission. We in New Zealand First know what a family really means.

Marc Alexander: What is it?

CRAIG McNAIR: The Oxford Dictionary would help the member. The definition of a family is defined in my bill as such, in clause 4, “Interpretation”. It means “a family group, including an extended family—(a) in which there is at least 1 adult member; and (b) in which the members have a biological or legal relationship”. That is unlike the definition in United Future’s Families Commission Act, which states in section 10(2): “In this section, ‘family’ includes a group of people related by marriage, blood, or adoption, an extended family, 2 or more persons living together as a family, and a whānau or other culturally recognised family group.”

Hon Member: It includes the cat and the dog.

CRAIG McNAIR: That is right; basically, it does include the cat and dog. That definition leaves open the possibility for policy makers to define what a family is, and we have mentioned that many a time. We in New Zealand First say that is not good enough. Parliament must make these decisions, not faceless bureaucrats.

Our second major concern with the Families Commission Act relates to the function of the commission. I would like to compare the functions of the commission in United Future’s Families Commission Act with those in my New Zealand First Commission for the Family Bill. Section 8 in Part 1 of United Future’s Act—which is equivalent to clause 12 in Part 2 of my bill—highlights the additional functions of the commission, and states: “(a) to encourage and facilitate informed debate, by any of the following persons, on matters relating to the interests of families: (i) representatives of government, academic, and community sectors; and (ii) members of the public:”. Members should compare that with clause 12(1) in my bill, which gives as the first additional function: “(a) to promote the status of families and the role of parents:”. We cut to the chase in this bill. It goes straight to the heart of the issues that families in this nation are going through.

There is no politically correct drivel in my bill, unlike another additional function in United Future’s Act, which states: “(c) to encourage and facilitate the development and provision, by Ministers of the Crown, departments of State, and other instruments of the Executive Government, of policies designed to promote or serve the interests of families:” Again, these functions leave open the possibility for direction from members of the executive of the Government at the time.

Peter Brown: This is United Future’s Act?

CRAIG McNAIR: Yes, that is right. I quickly want to read out the general functions in New Zealand First’s Commission for the Family Bill. Clause 12(1) states: “(a) to promote the status of families and the role of parents: (b) to ensure all policy development reflects the fundamental needs of families and their children: (c) to provide a family mediation service to support, promote, and develop the provision of marriage and relationship counselling services:”.

Peter Brown: Marriage!

CRAIG McNAIR: I know, it is amazing—we have used that word “marriage”. It goes on to state: “(d) to facilitate family support and parental education classes: (e) to improve co-ordination of government departments: (f) to receive and invite representations from members of the public on any matter that relates to the welfare of the family: (g) to increase public awareness of matters that relate to the welfare of the family: (h) to promote, in relation to decisions that affect the lives of the family, the participation of the family in those decisions: (i) to report, with or without request, to the Minister on matters affecting the rights of the family: (j) to inquire generally into, and report on, any matter, including any enactment or law, or any practice or procedure, that relates to the welfare of the family.”

I wonder why United Future members went quiet when I was reading out those additional functions. The reason is that they have heard it before, because I was reading out what they had in their manifesto. This is what they actually promised to the people of New Zealand. This is what Mr Alexander promised to the people of New Zealand, and all of a sudden he is quiet—he is not talking any more.

Barbara Stewart: He’s looking at his papers.

CRAIG McNAIR: He is looking into his desk. The functions I read out are what they promised the people of this nation. At the end of the day, all they could do was to come up with some liberal garbage. They did not have the guts to stand up for the supporters and people who voted them into this Parliament. That is a disgrace and an absolute outrage, and they will pay for it come the next election.

We are giving United Future and the other parties in this Parliament the chance to support something of substance. We have ensured that this bill is written in language they can understand. Marc Alexander, I think, can understand it, because it was in his party’s manifesto.

Barbara Stewart: They’re quiet now.

CRAIG McNAIR: Yes, they are very quiet. We have ensured that the bill is written in simple language. Unlike United Future’s Act, my legislation is littered with the words “families” and “parents”, as we have just heard, and “marriage”, as well. It does not have politically correct alternatives aimed at fudging the issues. We call on all parties that really support families, and do not apply just lip service to that, to support my bill. This is a chance to correct the blatant errors of the earlier Act.

In closing, I acknowledge my colleague Dail Jones, who in his maiden speech some 20 years ago made reference to the importance of having a families commission. I look forward to the support of the rest of the parties in this House.

Hon STEVE MAHAREY (Minister for Social Development and Employment) : I rise to speak on the Commission for the Family Bill, which obviously is the expression of Mr Craig McNair. I tell Mr McNair that that was the first time, I think, in the 2 years since he has been here that I have had the pleasure of listening to his exposition on families on behalf of whatever constituency he is serving this evening.

I think I should make it clear at the outset that the Government does not support this bill, for the very obvious reason that we have a Families Commission process under way. We have a piece of legislation that will ensure that in July we launch that commission. We will have commissioners who will have a very wide brief. And, of course, the Government has not put aside funding for Mr McNair’s dream of a Commission for the Family. So I am sorry to say we will be voting it down.

We should also note that Mr McNair’s speech this evening seemed largely tailored to try to antagonise the people from United Future. I did not hear a serious argument, and I could tell from the demeanour of such serious people as Barbara Stewart, whom I have enjoyed working with in this House, that what we were watching was a joke. The joke was an attempt to run at United Future a debate that said that those members are wrong because they have taken an inclusive approach to the family, rather than adopting a narrow definition such as the one adopted by Mr McNair in his bill.

I want to tell the United Future people that one of the most refreshing parts of working with them is that they came into the House not only championing families, not only arguing that families should be on the mat, but with a view that they wanted to include the wide range of families in this country within their legislation, and that is what they have attempted to do. They are inclusive. They are able to talk to all New Zealanders, as a result. They are not dividing New Zealanders according to one form of family, which is the only one that Mr McNair wants to talk to, and forgetting about everybody else. By the way, I tell Mr McNair, the majority of people do not currently live in the kind of family he is talking about. They live in other kinds of families as well, and United Future has had the guts—to use his word—to front up in here and put together a policy that appeals to that wider ranges of families, rather than coming in here and talking to just one particular group of people.

So I assume that what we are seeing tonight is not a serious effort to advance this argument. It really is just designed in a cheap way, which often goes on in politics—but I do not think it should on a serious issue like this—to tell the United Future members, who, facilitated by the Government, have made a very serious attempt to put the family on the political agenda, that somehow they are embarrassing, wrong, or whatever, and should be withdrawing what they are trying to do. I tell Mr McNair that I think this is a very serious debate. I think the family debate is one that this Parliament ought to be having. The fundamental institution of this country, of course, is the family, which we all come into.

But it does take a very wide range of forms. I shall give just one little example of why constantly harping on about the nuclear family might not be the wisest thing to do. Members should just think about the diversity of people we have in this country. Let us take the indigenous people—Māori. What is the most likely form of family, historically, amongst Māori? It is a form of family that often sees people raised by a biological member of the extended family; people may be raised by a grandmother or raised by an auntie. The family takes an extended form. There is not always a biological link, by the way—not in the sense that Mr McNair means. Children may not have an immediate biological link to their family; they may be raised by people who are quite a long way away from them biologically. It is a very different kind of family.

That is what United Future has had the wisdom to look at—that there are different kinds of families with different kinds of traditions, and all those families need to be part of any kind of commission that looks at what modern New Zealand society is about. What we get from Mr McNair is an argument that says, in effect, that if a person does not belong to the traditional nuclear kind of family, he does not want to talk to that person. That usually means, to use the kind of language he talks about—he says one is being PC if one talks about other kinds of families—that people like him do not like sole parent families. They usually say they are an inadequate kind of family, and if people happen to be in such a family, well, that is not the way things should be. That is the usual argument that comes from people like that.

I want to tell Mr McNair that a lot of people live in sole parent families, and the main reason that people in sole parent families have difficulties has nothing to do with the family form; it has to do with the amount of money that comes into the household. The research right across the world shows that if we can get the right kind of money going into those families, then they can be a successful form of family. I want to tell Mr McNair that no one on this side—

Craig McNair: Where did you read that?

Hon STEVE MAHAREY: I promise Mr McNair that I have read a lot more than he has. No one on this side of the House says that it is not a good idea—probably, it is the best idea—if a family stays together and the kids stay with their parents. But the fact of life is it does not always happen. That is what public policy has to allow for. It has to talk about that diversity of family, and make sure that the best outcomes for the parents and for the children come from all those family forms. We should not try to pretend that somehow we can shoehorn everybody back into one kind of family once again.

That is why the United Future people have been wise in the way they have gone about this issue. They want the best for all kids. They want the best for all parents. They want the best for all communities. They are not going to talk about one simple little section—no matter how important that section might be to the overall debate. That is why I applaud what the United Future folks have done on this issue. They have approached it in a way that includes every single New Zealander, and does not marginalise any of them. I think that later on in this debate, I am sure, I will hear the United Future members make their own case as forcibly as they should, and they will make it with the kind of dignity that this subject deserves—not the kind of constant laughter and undermining of the issue that seemed to go on around Mr McNair’s speech. Obviously, he has put this bill together merely to raise this debate today; it is not a serious effort to advance the cause of families, at all. I think that is a real shame, given that we are about to go into a major debate of importance about it. I would have thought he would do a little more work and give us a better debate this evening.

I return to the fact that the Families Commission will be up and running in July. That is the main reason, of course, that we cannot accommodate that particular commission—because we are already paying for one. I say to New Zealand First that our Families Commission has support right across the whole of the community from people who are interested in family issues. There were 58 submissions on that bill, and there was support for the bill right across those submissions. Major groups like Plunket, Barnardos, and Parents Centres have identified this particular process as the one that they want to support.

I am not quite sure what public pressure there might have been for New Zealand First to bring forward this particular bill. It would be interesting if maybe a later speaker could tell us where the public swelling of support was for the notion that we have a Commission for the Family of this kind. I have not heard it. It has not been on my desk. I cannot imagine that the United Future people, Katherine Rich, or anybody else have had people writing lots of letters saying they want an alternative commission, and want it to look like this proposal. It does not seem to be coming from people all over the community, particularly because all those people who might have written such letters have already made a submission in support of what United Future introduced.

Just to round off—

Dail Jones: Not another 2 minutes—this is rubbish!

Hon STEVE MAHAREY: I agree with Mr Jones about another 2 minutes being spent on this debate. We have just had to listen to 10 minutes of the New Zealand First member, and it worries me too, really, that we have to spend our evening talking about this particular bill, which New Zealand First would have known from the beginning was not a serious effort to put forward anything. We already have a Commission for the Family. This bill is just a device to try to bait the United Future people into feeling a little bit bad, or whatever, about the Families Commission. So I simply want to finish by saying that United Future has done an outstanding job of trying to put these issues on the map. Those members are way ahead of the debate that is contained in this particular bill, because they are prepared to take on the issues of 21st century New Zealand, and talk about how to have all forms of family deliver the best for kids, their parents, our community, and our society. I applaud the way that they have gone about it, and just repeat that the Government will not be supporting this bill.

KATHERINE RICH (National) : I do not doubt for one second that Mr McNair had good intentions in bringing this bill to the House, and that he meant well by putting this bill in the ballot, but I think that as members of Parliament we should always think very carefully about bringing bills of any kind to the House, because of the expense that is involved. Just keeping this Parliament going for 1 hour costs many, many thousands of dollars. I do not think that bringing a bill like this to the House was the correct thing to do, because we already have a similar initiative, which is well under way.

Our party does not support this bill. That will not come as a surprise to the many people who would have heard the debates about the initial Families Commission Bill, which was brought to this House by the Government. National did not support the establishment of the Families Commission, because although we saw that it had some worthy goals, we felt that its cumbersome structure and overly bureaucratic nature meant it would not deliver the things that many New Zealanders thought it would deliver. Yes, there has been support for the commission, now that it is to be established in July. Although there was a very robust debate and both sides put forward their views very strongly, we are now in a position where the Families Commission will be established, and I think any attempt to undermine that development, or sabotage it before it happens, is not particularly useful. We are at a stage now where money has been put aside, the process of putting together the commissioners is under way, and a lot of the people who are involved have taken on board the good intentions. So I think we need to work with that commission now, to make sure that the money is well spent and that it can at least try to achieve some of its goals, which I think everybody in this House would support.

We did have quite a bit of debate about the definition of a family, but I do not think the definition in this bill adds any greater clarity. There still will be a huge debate about what a family is, what constitutes a family. We will never get to a position where there is a heck of a lot of agreement.

But I think there are some good things in this bill that are worthwhile talking about. This bill intends to create greater public awareness of the importance of families, which I think is a good thing. It looks also to providing some practical services for families, so that there is somewhere for families to go to seek help with mediation, somewhere that promotes families, provides counselling, and does that sort of thing. Perhaps there is some merit in considering that. But these things could have been considered and put forward at the time of the initial bill. So that is why I think it is not a good use of time to spend members’ day discussing something that I think the country is well on the way to providing.

Just further to the definition of the family, during the debate on the other bill many people were surprised that the initial definition potentially could have included the likes of the Mongrel Mob and Black Power. When I first raised this issue, press releases were fired off saying that I had made “a silly claim” and I had missed the point entirely. It was very interesting that in the final parts of the debate that definition was tightened up. It was not just a concern of the National Party; it was a concern of many New Zealanders that there was not the clarity in that definition that they wanted.

I understand that the Families Commission will be looking at a wide range of research. One of the concerns we raised at the time was that it should not go into areas where the Ministry of Social Development is already doing a lot of research. Our initial argument against the Families Commission Bill was that there is a huge amount of family-oriented research going on. We felt that the Ministry of Social Development was already doing that. Groups like the Parenting Council, the Department of Child, Youth and Family Services, Parentline, Plunket, Parenting with Confidence, Triple P, and Parent to Parent are already doing a huge amount of work within the community to assist families and to promote the all-important role of the family as a unit within our community.

STEVE CHADWICK (Labour—Rotorua) : I am delighted to stand and speak to the Commission for the Family Bill today, and I certainly will not be supporting it. I think it is an incredibly naive bill from the member, who is not exactly branded with being a family man or having an in-depth understanding about family issues. I feel quite justified in standing up to say that, because today I have become a grandmother. I am a grandmother to a new member in my family, who is not legally part of my family at all but is my grandchild. And, by golly, I will be there to support that little girl right through her family life. That little girl’s mother is not married to my son but she is my son’s partner, and she is the mother of my grandchild. I am proud of the way that they have worked together to give this little child a wonderful start in her life, and a joyous beginning today. We as a family do not give a jot whether our children are married, are legally bound together, or have one adult member. We just know in our family that when one of our children sires a baby, that child belongs to our family, our whānau, and we will give it the love and support those parents need, and walk beside them in their life.

So I feel quite justified in standing here today to question why that member went to the effort, with good intentions—I think he is well intentioned—to put together a bill such as this that, it was very clear in the House, advocates a Commission for the Family to our Minister for Social Development and Employment. The member had every opportunity to work with United Future and to come together with that party to our Minister. We would have loved it if other parties had showed their support and had come in and worked with us on developing very robust legislation, such as we have now, but that member did not ever take that opportunity. He never pounded a path to the Minister’s door. He has not joined with other parliamentary groups that seriously consider family issues, such as the Littlies Lobby that holds regular meetings and looks at issues that impact on families and family support.

I find the actual definition in the bill simply silly. It is out of touch with reality today, in the contemporary New Zealand world. Why do families have to have members with a biological or legal relationship? What right does that member have to define what a family is?

Then we turn to functions. The member proposes 10 lofty functions for his commission, and all are rather peculiar. How could a commission for families improve the coordination of Government departments? For goodness’ sake! Has the member not listened to the Minister for Social Development and Employment, who stood here week after week talking about an all-of-Government approach so that we do build resilient families?

The member has one function in the bill that is about antenatal education. For goodness’ sake! Antenatal education exists now. What is the point of setting it up? I wonder whether the member himself knows how much it costs to go to antenatal education classes, how available classes are, and when to engage in classes. I think the member should be a little more considered when he tries to brand himself, as he said, with a bill that is not PC.

I say that this bill is a dismal failure. I urge the member, with his well-intentioned approach, to come and work collaboratively with us on putting some sense into the Families Commission that is to be launched in July this year. I would have thought that the right thing to do was not to waste the energy of the drafters and the Parliamentary Counsel Office, or the time in this House, but actually to put constructive criticism and input into the alliance that Labour has put together with United Future, under the leadership of Minister Maharey, to build something that will be durable and sustainable.

I think it is unfortunate that people get labelled. The member must realise that with a member’s bill, one gets labelled. I am very proud of being labelled with the anti-smoking bill, but I think it is unfortunate that Mr McNair will be labelled with this dismal bill.

SUE BRADFORD (Green) : There is not a lot more to say about this bill, but I must admit that as a member of the Social Services Committee, which not that long ago spent some considerable months hearing submissions and considering the bill that established the Families Commission, I find it extremely odd to be debating the first reading of the Commission for the Family Bill tonight. Members’ bills usually represent substantial drafting and political commitment from the members of parties that put them forward. I would have thought that Mr McNair and New Zealand First, as a minor party without the ability to create and implement Government legislation, would put their efforts into a somewhat more useful and creative policy initiative at this time.

However, I will make just a few points about Mr McNair’s bill. First of all, as others have pointed out, it is totally redundant. The Families Commission, for better or worse, is being established and will get under way in July. Although the Green Party did not support the Families Commission Bill, I have to acknowledge the thought and work that went into it from both United Future and Labour. I believe that anyone who cares about families and children, as the member’s party claims it does, should now work with the Families Commission and make the most of what has been achieved so that it does work in the future for the benefit of all families and children in this country. That is an obligation on any of us who support the kaupapa of families and children.

The second point I would like to make is around what appears to be Mr McNair’s key motivation in continuing to put his bill forward, his enthusiasm for establishing a different definition of family than that which evolved through the whole developmental process of United Future’s Families Commission Bill. Mr McNair seems to be oblivious to the many debates that took place in the select committee and in the House—and, I am sure, the many more debates that took place behind various closed doors—about the definition of“family” in New Zealand today. I have sat through many of them, and it is a very complex issue. Those discussions ended up with even a very morally conservative party like United Future agreeing that in this country in 2004 the nature of families is widely variable and does not fit at all with the kind of simplistic wording we see in this bill tonight. Mr NcNair’s bill is a most ill-informed and rudimentary attempt at a member’s bill, and I hope his next effort goes better.

As for the rest of the bill, the functions he puts forward are pretty much all contained within the Government legislation, apart from ones that are irrelevant, as Steve Chadwick pointed out, because they already exist. I have to agree with Steve Chadwick, Mr Maharey, Katherine Rich, and others who have said that this bill is basically wasting the time of the House. I would rather be debating a real policy initiative, no matter how much I disagreed with it, than wasting time on this bill.

DEBORAH CODDINGTON (ACT) : I am going to congratulate Craig McNair on the Commission for the Family Bill.

Clayton Cosgrove: The grand coalition!

DEBORAH CODDINGTON: Well, it is good to see a young member of the House who does not have the cynical, world-weary, “thumb-your-nose” view on any attempt to do something good that other members of this House have. I am serious. The ACT party is consistent, in that its members do not support any commission for the family, so we are not supporting this bill. But I do not see the need for other members in this House to say this bill is wasting our time. The last member who spoke criticised Mr McNair for wasting the time of the House. I would argue that her member’s bill would waste the time of the House, too, because it would be better to get people who are on welfare off welfare and out into work, than have them racking up more welfare and locked into dependency for the rest of their lives.

The purposes in the explanatory note of this bill are good.There are good things in this bill. There are things in this bill that everyone in New Zealand should look at if they are serious about the family. The family is the basis of a civil society. The family is what keeps a civil society together. If we do not have families that function well, then we do not have a society that functions well. What does it matter that this member is newly married and does not have children? I see a number of members on that side of the House who have no children, either. Does that disqualify them from commenting on legislation that seeks to protect the family?

Peter Brown: We’ll have to think about that!

DEBORAH CODDINGTON: They say they will have to think about it. I do not think so. If we were disqualified from speaking on legislation just because we did not have experience in various areas, there would be a lot of people in this House who should not be getting up and speaking. United Future members, I notice, in their legislation mentioned the word “family” in only six out of 60 clauses. Yet they say they are the party for the family. Their bill was really about building up and inflating the bureaucracy. It was all about superannuation for commission members, etc., etc. This is the exact reason why the State, the Government, should not be involved in the family at all until someone gets hurt. When someone in a family is breaking the law, that is when the State should step in to protect them. But the carping that has gone on tonight, under the pretence of debate, shows exactly why Government should not be involved in the family. Labour members are saying: “We support the family only when it is our bill. When it is your bill we don’t support the family. It’s all different. It is a waste of time.”

Clayton Cosgrove: The bus has left. It’s gone.

DEBORAH CODDINGTON: Clayton Cosgrove says he has missed the bus, so Clayton Cosgrove believes that the Government’s Families Commission is perfect. Well, we shall wait and see, when it comes in. I am sure there are parts of this legislation that could have improved Labour’s legislation by a long shot.

Steve Chadwick: Have you matched them up?

DEBORAH CODDINGTON: Has that member defined what is a family? Does that party know what is a family? Therein lies the problem of the State getting involved in trying to define what is afamily. According to that party, a “family” is anyone a person has some sort of spiritual or emotional connection with. If we get down to that level of definition it is “jokers’ wild”, because then the family means anything. If the Government concentrated more on ensuring that every child was a wanted child and that every child had two parents who, whether or not they stayed together, were financially, emotionally, and intellectually committed to the welfare and upbringing of that child, then family life in this country might be a lot improved.

Having a child is the greatest thing that two people will ever do in their lives. It is a gift. That Government, in the Budget that is coming out, will lock more and more families into dependency and welfare, and consign more children to the scrapheap of dependency on the State than anything else it has done in its term of Government. The Government will be a welfare Government. It will destroy the family even more than it has now. That is what those members should be ashamed of.

JUDY TURNER (United Future) : I rise on behalf of United Future to voice our absolute outrage at the time-wasting and game-playingthat the House is being subjected to by the sponsor of this bill. The credibility of the party that member represents was completely shot to pieces during the select committee process on the Families Commission Bill, which passed into law at the end of last year. When those members joined forces with the National and ACT parties to throw away the opportunity to propose changes to that bill, it was left to the Government and United Future to address the suggestions that were made by submitters. Most members are thrilled when their members’ bills are superseded and fast tracked into the House by a Government bill, and they work hard to make sure that their concerns and interests are, at least in some way, reflected in the Government’s proposal. But that was not so with the members of New Zealand First. Oh, no! They sabotaged the process, insulted submitters, and voted to return the bill with no commentary—not even a minority report outlining any concerns.

One would assume, then, that this member’s bill is significantly different and focused in a completely different direction from the commission negotiated by United Future with the Labour-Progressive Government, which is scheduled to be up and running by 1 July this year, only a few weeks away. The explanatory note of this bill outlines 10 functions and powers for this alternative Commission for the Family. Eight of the functions listed are covered in the legislation passed last year, and the remaining two would see the commission wasting taxpayer dollars on competing with and duplicating the work of the many parent educators, marriage counsellors, and family therapists already operating in New Zealand.

The bill has two parts. The first includes the normal preliminary provisions. The second has 22 clauses, half of which are dedicated to the nuts and bolts of the appointment and job description of the commissioners. One clause repeats the list of functions from the explanatory note of the bill, and then it goes on beyond what is in the explanatory note to reveal what appear to be rather vague, but extensive, powers for the commissioners. The bill does attempt to define the family. However, in doing so, it excludes large numbers of New Zealanders who are members of families, including orphaned siblings and step-parents who have not obtained legal guardianship of their partners’ or spouses’ children. I can only conclude that that was unintentional, because clause 11 of Mr McNair’s bill requires commissioners to have regard to and recognise family diversity—just like the original bill. Voters interested in this project will now be hard-pressed to understand why the New Zealand First members joined in the howls of protest last December, when the Labour - United Future version of the bill acknowledged the reality of family diversity. They will be left with only one conclusion, which is that New Zealand First is more interested in game-playing than it is in really supporting the cause of New Zealand families.

I say to Mr McNair that the New Zealand voter is not stupid. The proposed commission has neither a research function nor any requirement that policy advice be evidence-based. It appears that policy would be driven by suggestions made by anyone who was of a mind to make them, but it is unclear what mechanism would be used when conflicting advice had to be processed. This proposal gives commissioners the power to access confidential information from the courts, but then it is very unclear what the information could and would be used for. It certainly could not be used to challenge court decisions, because the proposal is clear that it could not be, and if the plan does not mean to duplicate the new powers of the Children’s Commissioner, then one can only guess at the intention.

This proposal has been in the ballot unchanged for nearly 2 years now, and if either of the New Zealand First sponsors who at different times have lent their names to the proposal had bothered to consult widely with family-focused organisations, or had at least measured their proposal against the submissions made on the existing legislation, they would have concluded that this proposal falls well short of the advice and recommendations of the huge numbers of groups that supported the notion of a families commission from the start. This bill seeks to set up an additional family service provider to offer mediation, education, and counselling. Instead of advocating for family services, this model would compete for Government funding alongside existing providers. The commission proposed by this member would end up pitting itself against the very organisations it should be advocating for.

CLAYTON COSGROVE (Labour—Waimakariri) : I rise to oppose the Commission for the Family Bill. In the words of my predecessor in the Waimakariri electorate, this member is a day late and a dollar short. Mr McNair sits on the Finance and Expenditure Committee with me, and I think he is a reasonable bloke, but I do not hold him responsible for this bill, as it should have been pulled. The senior members of New Zealand First—and I see Dail Jones, the Arthur Daly of New Zealand politics is here—hold the leadership role in that party. Dail Jones should have advised the new member to pull the bill. He should not have stuck the member out on a pole tonight—and I have some sympathy for Mr McNair, but for different reasons from Ms Coddington’s. I have some sympathy for him, and say he should not have been stuck out on a pole tonight and told, for the sake of political expediency, the politics of envy, and reasons to do with jealousy, to have a go at United Future because it got there first and worked constructively with the Government. Mr McNair should not have been stuck out on the ledge; he should have been told to pull the bill. So I do not hold Mr McNair responsible for this situation.

I think United Future deserves—as the Hon Steve Maharey said—a huge amount ofcongratulations on the way it promoted this policy. The Families Commission was a flagship policy for the United Future members. They came to the Government after the last election and said it was one of the flagship policies they wanted. They worked with us, and now we have a Families Commission. They deserve credit for that. The commission will become activated in July, and $28 million or more has been put up for that. It is a concrete step, rather than the flippant puffery that members hear from Dail Jones. I know members will hear that again tonight, because Dail Jones cannot resist getting on his feet and putting his foot in his mouth. He should have shown leadership and advised his colleague to pull the bill, but he did not. Perhaps if Winston Peters had been in charge of the New Zealand First members tonight—if one can put it that way—I think he would have advised the member to pull his bill. But they have the B team in the leadership role tonight, and they did not front up to do that.

I want to briefly address Ms Coddington’s comments, because it was the usual ACT diatribe from that member and the rest of the ACT team. I think she said that they would not support any legislation to assist families, except for their mates’ families. That means except for the families with Mercedes-Benzes and flash places in Remuera—

Hon David Benson-Pope: The ones who pay their GST.

CLAYTON COSGROVE: The families who pay their tax—some do; some do not—are the sort of families that party would support. Those members are not interested in what the Families Commission will do, which is to support those who need assistance, to reconstruct families where appropriate, to give advice, and to support families who are in need of that support. No, no—to quote from another colleague, the ACT party is interested only in the “big end”, the silver-plated end, of town. That is the group the ACT members represent, because they know they do not get their 2 percent of the vote—or is it 1 percent—from the battlers who need assistance. They get their support from the “big end”, or the silver-plated end, of town.

In summation, this bill is, as a few other speakers have said, a well-intentioned bill from Mr McNair. I will give him credit for that. But it is ill-advised, and when one is in this place—and I have not been here in Parliament very long myself—one does look to the senior people in one’s party for advice and leadership from time to time. I go back and say again to Mr Jones and Mr Brown that they should have shown leadership tonight, and advised Mr McNair that he had missed the bus. He was a day late and a dollar short. They should not have stuck him out on a pole, for the sake of political expediency, downright jealousy, and the politics of envy. All that has been accomplished tonight is that the New Zealand First members have vented their spleen by trying to have a crack at United Future. Well, I am sorry to tell Mr Jones and Mr Brown that the sad thing for those members is that United Future can stand up with credibility, along with this Government, and say it has done it—established the Families Commission—and that in July the commission will become operational, with $28 million in funding. That Opposition party can say it did not contribute to the debate on the Families Commission and did not put policy up, but had a crack at the issue at the eleventh hour. All that that has generated for the New Zealand First members, bluntly, is a degradation of their integrity and some humiliation.

DAIL JONES (NZ First) : I would like to congratulate Craig McNair on taking the Commission for the Family Bill on.

Clayton Cosgrove: You set him up.

DAIL JONES: I make the point—exactly what Clayton Cosgrove has just been saying—that I asked Craig McNair whether he really wanted to take this bill on, bearing in mind there is now a Families Commission Act, and he insisted on doing it because he supports the family and could see the errors in the existing legislation. Craig McNair was given the choice not to move this bill, but he insisted on doing it, because he is a family person and because the existing bill has grave deficiencies.

Clayton Cosgrove: You set him up.

DAIL JONES: That is your answer, I say to Mr Cosgrove.

Craig McNair is a family person, newly married, and we in New Zealand First are thrilled that our youngest member of Parliament should want to make a stand and draw a line in the sand as to what a family is, as set out in this bill and what a family is not, as set out in the Labour - United Future legislation. That is the line in the sand for New Zealand First. Now, it may be that the National Party, the ACT party, and some of the other parties do not in principle support this type of legislation, and that is fair enough, but if one is going to support this type of legislation, one should do it properly, and get a decent definition for “family”.

One should get a definition that states, as this bill does in its explanatory note—and I quote because Labour members have not read the bill, and I include Steve Chadwick and the Minister, Mr Maharey, in that comment—“A family is defined as a family group, including an extended family—(a) in which there is at least one adult member;”. For the benefit of Mr Maharey, I point out that “one adult member” includes solo parents. He is attacking this bill for not supporting solo parents. It does, in the words “one adult member;”. The explanatory note continues: “(b) in which the members have a biological or legal relationship.” Steve Chadwick has not read this bill, either. She said her grandchild would not have the benefit of this bill. Well, her grandchild will, because my definition of “biological” includes “my grandchild”. I congratulate Steve Chadwick and her family on having a grandchild today, but she has not read this bill, and her grandchild would come within the scope of this legislation.

The United Future party and the Labour Party have set this bill up from the point of view of it being a precursor to the Civil Union Bill. The definition in the existing Families Commission Act is perfect if one supports the Civil Union Bill—and clearly United Future does. Section10(2) of the Families Commission Act states: “In this section, family includes a group of people related by marriage, blood, or adoption, an extended family, 2 or more persons living together as a family, and a whānau or other culturally recognised family group.” That is a pretty wide definition, and subsection (3) continues it. There will be some great problems associated with the definition set out in the Labour - United Future legislation.

It was interesting to hear from Ms Turner of United Future. She was quite vitriolic about this bill. She seemed terribly upset. After all, when we look at United Future’s election policy, we see that she was criticising something that was in that party’s election manifesto. United Future went around the country saying it would establish a commission for the family “to provide a family mediation service to support, promote, and develop the provision of marriage and relationship counselling services.” That was United Future’s election policy, but tonight Ms Turner turned her back on the policy that was put in every letterbox that that party could possibly find. It is set out here, in United Future’s election policy, which Craig McNair will seek to table in the House at the conclusion of this debate.

May I say that of the speeches I have heard tonight I would have to congratulate Deborah Coddington on making the best speech of all. Even though she disagreed with the bill, I thought her speech far surpassed anyone else’s, especially that of Katherine Rich from the National Party. When one looks at the calibre of someone like Deborah Coddington—who can make a genuine speech on behalf of the family—and the calibre of someone like Katherine Rich, one knows who is the winner by a country mile.

The crunch of Deborah Coddington’s speech, which really rubbished that of Katherine Rich, concerned the fact that—and this was the thought that occurred to me—some members commented on what a cheek it was for Craig McNair to bring a member’s bill into the House but that it is a member’s constitutional right to bring to the House any bill that he or she feels like bringing to the House. Those other members may not like it, but a member may bring it in. Members may bring in an abortion bill, a homosexuality bill, a death with dignity bill—any kind of bill they like. It is their right, as members of the New Zealand Parliament, to bring in a bill whether or not other members of Parliament like it. It is a member’s constitutional right. The National Party does not support that constitutional right, and neither do the Greens. Although the Greens bring in some quite outlandish bills, we will never deny them the right to bring those into the House.

CRAIG McNAIR (NZ First) : In reply to the speeches I have heard tonight, I will start with what Katherine Rich said. She raised the issue of me wasting Parliament’s time in bringing this bill to the House. I will always feel that people should stand up for what they believe in, which is similar to what Dail Jones has just been saying. I believe that people should stand up for what they believe in, and not be ashamed for it. I want to acknowledge Deborah Coddington for believing that one should stand up for what one believes. She admitted that her party would not be supporting this bill, and that is fine. That is her right. But I want to thank her for believing in the right to be able to stand up and be counted.

I want to say how disappointed I am in the Minister, Steve Maharey, Judy Turner from United Future, Steve Chadwick, and others who questioned my intentions for this bill. They said that I did not have very good intentions. But, I ask, if one disagrees with somebody, does that mean that one has bad intentions? I disagree with Tim Barnett on most issues. Does that mean I think he has bad intentions? No. He may have very genuine intentions—and he does. I am sure he does. But we approach a lot of issues from different angles and different viewpoints, and I respect him for that. I have heard the most disgusting, outrageous speeches from United Future and from Labour, but especially from United Future. Judy Turner comes from a church community, which says one should stand up for issues like this. I have been put down for standing up for what I believe in, and I say that is, quite frankly, disgraceful. It is a real shame. I also take issue with what Clayton Cosgrove said. He said that I was set up. No—I was not. I went to Dail Jones and asked him if I could take on this bill. I am very passionate about it. I tell Mr Cosgrove that, quite frankly, I do not want his sympathy. I do not need his sympathy. I am absolutely 100 percent proud of this bill and of what New Zealand First is standing for.

I am very much looking forward to taking this issue back to the community I live in, at Rodney, and sharing with them the information as to who voted against, who voted for, and who said what. I will definitely even be telling them that at least the ACT party and Deborah Coddington respect somebody for standing up for what they believe in. I think that that has incredible virtue compared with how members on the Government side of the House want to talk about giving me sympathy or whatever, as Mr Cosgrove did, and use the excuse that I was hospital-passed this bill. That is ridiculous. I underline again and reiterate exactly what the general functions and powers of the commission in my bill are. Actually, I will read them from United Future’s manifesto, just to highlight again what I was saying, because they are exactly the same as those in my bill.

Peter Brown: It can’t be.

CRAIG McNAIR: I know. It is just unbelievable. The manifesto of United Future states that that its aims are to promote the status of families and the role of parents; to ensure all policy development reflects the fundamental needs of families and their children; to provide a family mediation service to support, promote, and develop the provision of marriage and relationship counselling—[Interruption] Shall I read from this, or shall I read from my bill? I want to know whether United Future members are voting against this. They are, and they seem proud of it. That United Future member was one who joined in the song with Steve Maharey, saying that I should not stand up for what I believe in. She even put out a press release quite a few months ago when the bill came out to say that we were venal. Yes, she remembers that, and I will bring out the press release for her if she wants. She remembers. She knows what I am talking about. I am not just throwing something around and saying a load of rubbish like some of the speeches I have heard today. It is a sad, sad thing to see United Future sticking up for legislation like the commission they have set up with Labour.

I want to continue with the general functions and powers of the commission in my bill, because I want to say how important these are compared to the PC drivel in the Labour - United Future Act. I seek leave of the House to table United Future’s 2002 manifesto.

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