JACQUI DEAN (National—Otago) : I move, That the Easter Sunday Shop Trading Amendment Bill be now read a first time. At the appropriate time I intend to move that the bill be considered by the Commerce Committee.

Very shortly after becoming the member of Parliament for Otago, I was approached by a group of Wānaka business people who asked whether I could help them. They felt they were in the middle of some kind of ghastly Groundhog Day situation where nothing ever changed. They felt they were in a situation where year after year many of them were prosecuted for trading over Easter, while just over the hill Queenstown had an exemption under the Shop Trading Hours Act Repeal Act 1990, and businesses there could go about their business and trade over Easter quite legally.

Wānaka is a busy tourist town with two peak seasons—one in summer and one in winter. It attracts visitors from around New Zealand and, indeed, from right around the world. Easter is an extremely busy time for Wānaka, and in particular every second year, when the Warbirds Over Wānaka International Air Show and the Race to the Sky events are held. They attract up to 100,000 people to the Wānaka district. That influx of people creates a hugh demand for retail services. That demand, which is met by Wānaka retailers, would be more happily met if there were not an anomaly in the law that sees them prosecuted for trading, but not Queenstown.

Queenstown, just over the Crown Range, has a general exemption from the restrictions on trading at Easter. I quote the Mayor of Queenstown: “This reflects our position as an international destination and a place where visitors and residents alike can enjoy many activities and events, which would otherwise be stifled by greater restrictions.” He added: “We receive no complaints about the flexibility that this offers businesses and the community, and it is exercised responsibly by all of the parties involved.” It is worth noting that the Queenstown Lakes District Council supports the efforts of businesses in Wānaka to be granted a similar exemption.

I seek to rectify this anomaly in the shop trading hours legislation, not only on behalf of Wānaka but also for Tauranga, Rotorua, and other centres with a significant visitor industry. This bill is by no means the first attempt to bring about some change in the Easter shop trading hours legislation, but I hope that now, in 2006, we can put an end to a situation that is outdated, inconsistent, and unfair. New Zealand now has a 24-hour, 7-day-a-week trading environment, providing goods and services in shops, in malls, and on the Internet. Our overseas visitors expect to be able to shop, and it is worth remembering that the tourism industry provides approximately $12 billion of New Zealand’s gross domestic product.

Our very lifestyles are changing and, as workday pressures grow, people now need, and like, to shop on weekends and holidays. Change, however, is not always easy. I remember back to when Saturday trading first came in—I was just a child, mind! There were fears that it was going to mean the end of family life and the end of Saturday kids’ sports. Well, neither of those things has happened. People merely take advantage of the increased opportunity to shop at their leisure. They go and watch the kids rugby, then go and warm up in the mall on the way home.

There are many other inconsistencies in the legislation as it stands, with some products being allowed to be sold, yet others not. That gives rise to the silly situation where the photography shop in Wānaka, which sells photo frames, must close, yet across the road the chemist shop, which also sells photo frames, is allowed to trade over Easter. When the Shop Trading Hours Act Repeal Act was enacted, garages, which then sold only automotive products, were exempt and allowed to trade. Now, 16 years later, a garage can sell books, stationery, magazines, gift cards, and chocolates—all the things that tourists and locals will buy. The trouble is that those are also the things that a bookshop sells, yet bookshops do not have an exemption under the Act to trade over Easter.

In the 16 years since the last amendment to the shop trading hours legislation I believe we have all moved on, and I believe that the time has come to put right the anomalies that currently still exist. The Easter Sunday Shop Trading Amendment Bill seeks to provide a level playing field for all retailers who may choose to trade over Easter. The bill is all about choice. The bill offers a real choice for retailers. If their district is included on the schedule they can, if they choose, trade on Good Friday and Easter Sunday. Within the bill there is no compulsion to trade. It is a matter for the individual business owner to decide. Retailers will make the decision on whether to open, based on whether they see a demand, on the costs, including costs in staffing, and on whether the day’s business will be profitable to them.

The bill does not in any way override the provisions of the Employment Relations Act or the Holidays Act. If an employee does not wish to work on Good Friday and/or Easter Sunday, that employee cannot be required to work unless he or she has agreed in an employment agreement to do so. Far from disadvantaging workers, Wānaka retailers tell me that people are lining up to work over Easter, and retailers have absolutely no trouble at all finding staff. It is good for us to remember that a lot of retail workers in tourist towns are young people who are there for the skiing or for the lifestyle, and who are only too happy to make a few extra dollars over Easter. We should also remember that many retail workers work part-time and value the extra hours they may get. So, we have willing sellers, willing workers, and we certainly have willing buyers.

It was interesting to me to read the comments made recently by the spokesman for the Catholic Church in New Zealand that if businesses wanted to open during the weekend, the Catholic Church has no particular issue with it. He added that in Rome itself Sunday is a day on which shops are open. To me it comes back to freedom of choice. If we want to trade, we should be able to trade. If we want to shop, or not, that is our choice, too.

I named Wānaka in the schedule to this bill because it is the people of Wānaka whom I represent. Tauranga is also named, as its local MP indicated Tauranga’s interest. I did not presume to add other towns to the schedule, but I know that the Rotorua, Kaikōura, and Hastings business communities are keen to be added to the schedule, and I am sure there will be others. Should the bill proceed to the Committee stage—and I hope it does—then those areas plus others can be added simply by way of an amendment.

There are towns in New Zealand that want to trade over Easter; there are other towns that would not thank us for the opportunity. I do not imagine that most retailers in my home town of Ōāmaru would decide it was desirable to open on Good Friday or Easter Sunday, unless there was a large special event in the town that drew thousands of people in, because it simply would not be economically viable. But for those towns in New Zealand with a significant visitor industry, like Wānaka, Rotorua, and others, Easter trading provides a boost to the income of the town and a service to the thousands of visitors there for the full range of visitor experiences.

I believe the time has come for us to put right the anomalies in the Shop Trading Hours Act Repeal Act, to recognise that tourism is a 365-day-a-year industry, and to recognise that tourism is one of New Zealand’s largest contributors to gross domestic product and goods and services tax. Now is the time to let tourist towns with a significant visitor industry go about their business without unfair, archaic, and unnecessary regulation. I urge members to send this Easter Sunday Shop Trading Amendment Bill to the select committee.

Hon MARK GOSCHE (Labour—Maungakiekie) : I started to listen to the member’s speech part-way through—I apologise to her for getting here a little too late to hear the earlier part—but I think it was along the lines of wanting to take complexity out of the legislation. So let us look at what schedule 2 in her bill actually does. It means that in Wānaka, businesses could open on these days provided they were within a radius of 25 kilometres from the postshop situated at 39 Ardmore Street, Wānaka. Now, if the National Party ever happened to get back into Government and went back to closing post offices and postshops as it did in the past, then what would happen under this “less complicated” legislation? Under this bill, in the Tauranga district, if a business were in the area within 30 kilometres from the chief post office—at least Tauranga has a chief post office—it could open on those days. What would happen if the chief post office shifted? Or what would happen if a business were 30 kilometres and 1 metre from the chief post office?

Dr Don Brash: Read the bill. You’re wasting our time.

Hon MARK GOSCHE: I am reading the bill. What would happen if one’s business were 30 kilometres and 1 metre away from the post office in Tauranga? If this bill is about clarifying matters and making them simpler, I think other members who follow me may have something to say about that—and those are the ones who agree with the bill! I do not agree with the bill. I have looked through—

Colin King: For any other reason?

Hon MARK GOSCHE: Yes, I will give members the reasons. I have looked through the many debates that this House has engaged in on these issues since I came here in 1996. I have done a search of Hansard on the computer, and it shows that time after time we have had this kind of debate, and time after time we have ditched such bills. I think this bill will go the same way as the others, even if it gets to the select committee.

One of the things I would like to ask the member is why, if she has the courage of her convictions, this bill does not include Anzac Day. All of the people who have promoted this kind of measure have talked about freedom—the freedom to shop. They say if tourists cannot come to New Zealand and buy a photo frame in Wānaka, the world will come to an end. If a tourist comes to New Zealand to buy a photo frame in Wānaka, we really have to wonder what sort of tourist he or she is. Tourists do not come here to buy a photo frame in Wānaka on Easter Sunday. They come here for much more enjoyable pleasures and a great many other things that attract people to this part of the world. So it is nonsense that our tourism industry will rise or fall on the ability of people to shop on the 3½ days that they cannot shop.

What this bill actually threatens are the rights of those people who work in or own those businesses and who do not want to work. The member says that those rights have been protected in the bill, but I tell her that her advice that Easter Sunday is a public holiday is incorrect. If she would like to move that amendment to the Holidays Act to make it a public holiday, I would be in favour of it, but I do not think the National Party would like a member’s bill from any of its members to make Easter Sunday a public holiday. It is not a public holiday. She should think about it again.

I come back to Anzac Day. Why do the people who have such a courageous need to put up members’ bills to allow shopping on Easter Sunday and Good Friday not dare to do that in relation to Anzac Day? Why do they not dare to go into the RSA and tell the old diggers—whom those members like to drink with and get their photo taken with on Anzac Day, and the members say how wonderful they are—why the freedom to shop should be allowed on Anzac Day and Christmas Day? I would like an answer to that. They do not have the political courage to bite that one off. Some members have tried to do so in the past, but the outrage from the RSA made them all withdraw. Yet again those members do not have the courage of their convictions.

I have the courage of my convictions to say I believe that for 3½ days a year our shops should be closed and our workers should be able to be at home with their families. That is what the law should be. There is nothing wrong with that. I have the courage of my convictions to say I respect the right of people to say a line has to be drawn. When I look at previous speeches I have made on bills of these sorts, I see I stand here as someone who is proud of the family values this country is based on. Those family values were not built on 7-day-a-week, 24-hour-a-day, 365-day-a-year shopping. But the National Party thinks the world will come to an end if we cannot shop and buy a photo frame in Wānaka, and the world will come to an end—

Darren Hughes: Except on Anzac Day.

Hon MARK GOSCHE: One cannot buy anything on an Anzac Day morning if one is in the National Party. It is too politically unpopular with the people that National members have to front up to once a year at the RSA.

Let us have a look at the other provisions in the bill. I want the member to tell us in her 5-minute reply what protection there is in her bill, if it becomes law, for those who do not want to work on those days. I want her to tell us where that provision is in her very meagre bill. I cannot find it. The bill is so unclear and badly worded that the way I read it, it is a nonsense to say that those people are protected and will have a right not to work. It is similar to the businesses that are forced by mall owners to open, even though they do not want to. I have rehearsed this argument in the House many, many times. Workers in this country should have the right to enjoy time with their families.

This Parliament has Standing Orders that prohibit people in this place from working on a Sunday—not just Easter Sunday but every Sunday of the year. Dr Don Brash, who barely ever shows any interest in this House and barely works at all, would not know whether the Standing Orders require him to come to work on a Sunday. He would not have a clue about the Standing Orders that state this Parliament does not have the ability to work on a Sunday. MPs on the Opposition side of the House want to legislate to say to shop workers—some of the lowest-paid workers in this country—that they have to work, but MPs will not work because our rules will not allow it. I have not seen any National member, in the 2 years since this issue was last debated, promote a change to the Standing Orders that would require Parliament to sit on a Sunday. How come it is good enough for shop workers, but not for us? How come Parliament prohibits itself from working on a Sunday, but the poor shop workers who are on the minimum wage in Wānaka and Tauranga have to go to work? They have to be at work so that the poor member over there can get a photo frame on Easter Sunday, and put in a photo of herself sitting at home and doing nothing. That is the absolute nonsense of those people. It is as though they are saying other people should work, but they will not. They will get photos of themselves sitting at home with their families, because that is what good family people do—they spend time with their families.

New Zealand society has changed dramatically. We have liberalised our labour laws and our shop trading hours—

Bob Clarkson: It’s all gone downhill.

Hon MARK GOSCHE: Bob Clarkson says it has all gone downhill. The member is absolutely right. We cannot hold family values when we are requiring whole heaps of people who have families to go out to work 24/7 and to be available to work flexibly at any time. In the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee, Bob Clarkson has talked about flexible working hours; he is very much in favour of them, but not for himself and his own mates. He will vote for this bill because he wants the shop workers of Tauranga to be made to work on Easter Sunday, while he is lazing around at home. That is the thing that absolutely amazes me about people who promote these sorts of bills. It is all about somebody else having to do the penance, having to go to work, and having to be there to serve in a shop because those members might die if they could not buy something for another 24 hours. That is utter nonsense. If we have a society that absolutely requires shops to be open 24/7, 365 days a year, and if our economy absolutely depends on it, we are in big trouble.

Seriously, this issue is about the right of workers to have time with their families. That is why I oppose this legislation, have opposed it in the past, and will continue to oppose it in the future. I have struck a line in the sand and said enough is enough. We have to have some decent working conditions for people who are expected to work 24/7 for all the other days of the year. This is a chance for members to actually put their money where their mouth is, and to vote for real family values that say we respect the right of shop employees to stay at home on Easter Sunday and have a day off, like the rest of us in this place. We always remember those who are serving food, cleaning, and nursing in hospitals. They do not get that day off, but they will tell members they support the right of shop workers to have that time off. Those people know what sacrifices they have made to be away from their families. Hospital and rest home care is absolutely vital and urgent—it is about life and limb. Shopping is not about life or limb.

PETER BROWN (Deputy Leader—NZ First) : That was a passionate speech. I respect Mark Gosche—he has his view—but he is wrong. This bill should go to a select committee, and the New Zealand First members will support it going to a select committee. We have promoted similar bills, as I recall, on more than one occasion in the past. We supported Steve Chadwick’s bill when she wanted to do much the same thing. But Parliament in its wisdom turned those bills down time and time again—which, New Zealand First believes, is fundamentally wrong. Obviously, we believe that people who work in shops should have some family time, and time at home. But we do not believe that we should impose that on them and say “thou shalt not work” because we think it is good to have time at home, or that nurses who are working should say shop people must not work. That is not right.

We think the time has come at least to allow shops to open on Easter Sunday. We have stronger reservations about Good Friday—I want to be honest. We did a survey in Tauranga some time ago, and the public clearly wanted shops to open on Easter Sunday, but they were not as keen to have them open on Good Friday. One of the principal reasons why they wanted shops to open in Tauranga and Mount Maunganui is that the port there is becoming a significant port, especially for cruise liners that often come in on a long weekend. The tourists get off, get into taxis or minibuses, and go for a long bus ride—past Rotorua, because the shops are not open—to Taupō. They spend all their money—their US dollars and what have you—in Taupō. That brasses off Tauranga people. They do not think it is fair that shops are open hundreds of kilometres down the road but shops cannot be opened around the port area. That is not fair.

Hon Damien O'Connor: Life’s unfair.

PETER BROWN: The member says that life is not fair, but our job here is to make it fair or, at least, to make it fairer. I invite the Minister to listen and to say that is unfair, and at least, to be prepared to make it fairer.

The view of the New Zealand First members is that each community is different. We would prefer this sort of legislation to be brought in, but to leave it to the local community—the local bodies—to determine whether they would want shops to open. Clearly Tauranga, Mount Maunganui, and Rotorua would, and I accept that Wānaka would, as well.

New Zealand First totally supports sending this bill to a select committee, but we believe there is a bit of tidying up to do—none more so than in the schedule at the back of the bill. We think it does not really make sense to define Tauranga district as being “within 30 kilometres from the Chief Post office Tauranga.” The chief postshop in Tauranga has shifted at least once and at least more than 1 kilometre. Does that mean that shops that were within the 30 kilometre area before the postshop shifted are now out of it? That is a little bit “Monty Python-ish”. We believe it would be much more practical to define the area in the way we define a voting area. It is much more sensible. People understand that definition, and they know that areas are changed only by sensible, rational thought.

We are hugely disappointed that this type of bill has not got through in the past. We hope that this bill will get to a select committee, be modified, and come back, and that shops will have the ability—if they so desire—to open on Easter Sunday. As I say, we regard Good Friday as being in the same vein as Christmas Day, and we would not support shops opening on Christmas Day. New Zealand First tends to regard Good Friday as a day of special reverence, but we think Easter Sunday makes for a long weekend. It is a holiday weekend for many New Zealanders—not all of them, by any means—and it is a holiday weekend for people who come here on cruise ships, or even in aircraft, to experience New Zealand. We think it is wrong to close up shops simply because we believe there is some concern for the workers in shops. It is quite easy to roster shopkeepers staffing shops, just as it is to roster any other activity. Many shops in New Zealand are operated by owner-operators.

SUE BRADFORD (Green) : First of all, I would like to make it clear that the Green Party caucus is taking a unified position on the Easter Sunday Shop Trading Amendment Bill, and will be voting against it tonight. I know I have spoken when similar bills have come before the House in the past, and I reiterate those comments. We have in front of us a bill that adds yet another layer of exceptions to the original Act, which is itself full of inconsistencies. To expand that ramshackle patchwork by adding two new districts only begs the question about the rest, and the bill fails to address the underlying questions about workers’ rights, the role of public holidays in family life, and the nature of sacred days in a country of mixed-faith heritages. The Green Party believes that if we are to overhaul the legislation around shop trading hours, we should do so comprehensively and fairly, taking all points of view and all parts of the country into consideration, and not go on attempting to change it at one or two localities at a time.

I turn now to the other reasons we oppose the bill. First of all, we see big problems for workers, in that employees are protected only in so far as they are able to negotiate protection into their employment agreements. The reality is that few would be able to do that and independently negotiate exemptions. This bill does not recognise the unequal bargaining power employers have when negotiating working conditions with their staff, who tend to be among the lowest-paid and least unionised people in the workforce. We strongly believe that no worker should have to work on Good Friday or Easter Sunday against his or her will. This bill does not provide any, or adequate, protection to stop that from happening.

Secondly, the bill makes assumptions about the place of family life in a culture that seems to value paid work and conspicuous consumption above most other things. Easter, Christmas, and the morning of Anzac Day remain the last days uninterrupted for most by the compulsion to work. They are a time when family life can be nurtured and when people can get together without the intrusion of work commitments. There is a lot of fine talk in this debating chamber about the importance of the family in holding together the very fabric of our society. If we are serious about protecting and nurturing families, then we should all stand up against the powerful forces of commerce, which quietly undermine the last few sanctuaries of family time. I look to United Future’s MPs particularly, when I say that. Given all their beliefs about the family, and in some cases about Christianity, I hope they will join with us in opposing the bill. Indeed, I am glad to hear that two of their members will be opposing it tonight.

After all, Easter, Christmas, and the morning of Anzac Day stand as the last significant symbols of resistance to a culture of unbridled consumption. We live as de facto consumers in nearly every aspect of our lives. We consume entertainment, education, health care, sport, politics, and even religion. All of that pulls apart the spiritual fabric that binds us together as people, both individually and collectively. In the words of American theologian Stanley Hauerwas, the problem is not that we have become consumers but that we can conceive of no other alternative ways of living, since we lack any practices that could make such alternatives possible. That is a crisis of the imagination, and it possibly underpins the reasons why the death on the Cross of one of history’s greatest figures deserves no more reverence than a suburban shopping mall.

Have we in this House lost any sense of the sacred? Easter is the most significant set of holy days in the Christian calendar. If the special and unique nature of the Easter period is no longer respected by society at large, some may say we should not even celebrate the day as a statutory public holiday. But the reality is that more than half the population continues to affiliate with the Christian religion. The law should protect the sanctity and special character of those 2 days, by allowing people to attend to their spiritual lives and attend worship without the imposition of work.

So, whether or not we are Christians and whether or not we have families, we six Green MPs join together in voting against this bill and in support of a future that respects the importance of family life, of traditional faith commitments, of workers’ rights, and of doing all we can to resist consumerism as the new, but oh so hollow, religion of our time.

HONE HARAWIRA (Māori Party—Te Tai Tokerau) : In September 1959 Te Ao Hou magazine included the following report of the Roman Catholic Hui Aranga that was held at Rānana, along the Whanganui River: “The weather was dreadful and the road almost inaccessible, yet there was an attendance of 900 and the programme, religious and social, was full and satisfying. Teams from Christchurch, Wellington, Otaki, Levin, Feilding, Hawera, Hastings, Kaiwhaiki and Ranana competed in action songs, Maori oratory, choir events, religious quiz, haka, poi, Rugby, tennis, table tennis and basketball.”

Every Easter, all over the country, that same kind of report appears in different newspapers as Māori return in their thousands to their home marae for a whole host of whānau activities. Anglican, Catholic, Rātana, and the rest, flock to their homelands to worship, enjoy one another’s company, catch up on the goss, participate in sports, feast, and be with one another. Māori people plan their big occasions around Easter, because they know it is a 4-day weekend. Those occasions include weddings, reunions, unveilings, and cultural festivals—you name it and Māori are doing it at Easter time.

The mokopuna are different, of course. They will play anything, perform anywhere, and go hard till they drop—as long as they get the hot cross buns and chocolate Easter eggs. They are a lot easier to please, but I know they enjoy having their cousins around, bludging off their uncles and aunties, and greasing around their grandparents for little goodies, as well. But for all that to go off successfully, Māori have to plan for months. Then they can enjoy some good-quality time with one another and still have time for the slow cruise home on Easter Monday.

Then, like Darth Vader swooping into shot, dominating the screen and bumming out the good guys, along comes the Easter Sunday Shop Trading Amendment Bill. Instead of cracking jokes, unwinding, and sharing time together, whānau will be faced with subtle and obvious pressures to work. They will get comments from their bosses, like: “Sorry, Mita, we’re opening tomorrow and you’re going to have to come in.”, or “Hey, Parekura, didn’t you go to that hui last year? We need you at work tomorrow.”, or “Look, Nanaia, we all have places we’d like to go to, but being committed to your career means you have to make sacrifices.”, or the big one: “No, Mahara, you don’t have to come in tomorrow. Your job’s safe.” Yeah, right!

Whānau are at the core of everything the Māori Party stands for, and that philosophy guides our thinking on this bill. Although the bill is focused on two particular towns, Wānaka and Tauranga, we know that others will follow. Indeed, MP Steve Chadwick wants to put Rotorua into the loop, and it will not be long before the ripples are felt right throughout the land.

The contribution the bill will make to our GDP is well recognised, but the Māori Party would argue factors other than just tourist dollars need to be considered as part of this nation’s genuine progress indicator. What will be the effect of the increasing pressure on whānau to work, when our workforce is already characterised by increasingly longer work days, and less time to take the kids to sport, look after the whānau, and just have time to think? Certainly, revenue will be increased, but will society be enhanced by this bill? Will the rights of those who are expected to work on those days be properly protected? Increased GDP is important, but no more so than those other factors.

Last week the household labour force survey came out. It highlighted some very sobering statistics, one of which showed that Māori are earning, on average, $4 an hour less than non-Māori. Instead of increasing the workload, perhaps we should be looking to increase the pay rate. Working more hours for a pittance, just to get by, does not enhance society; it only embitters those whom we treat so badly.

This House has the capacity to determine the times when we as a nation can honour whānau, and when we can preserve and respect the responsibilities and importance of family—rather than continually eroding the precious scraps of time we have left. When Sitiveni Rabuka took over Fiji, he shut down Sundays in order to improve the spiritual balance of his people. When I came to Parliament my wife told everyone I would be having Sundays off, for the same reason—so we could relax, enjoy the whānau, and recharge the batteries.

The Māori Party will not stand in the way of the Easter Sunday Shop Trading Amendment Bill going to the select committee, but we raise again the need for this House to give due consideration to the importance of family as the heart of the nation, and to protecting the little time we have to be with one another.

JUDY TURNER (Deputy Leader—United Future) : I just want to say, as I talk to the Easter Sunday Shop Trading Amendment Bill, that United Future has decided to treat this issue as a conscience vote. So my comments today are just that—they are my comments, my position—and I will be opposing this bill.

I want to make it really clear from the beginning that although I am a Christian and Easter is an important festival for my faith, that is not my reason for opposing this bill. My concern is that we have whittled away at public holidays—from when I was a child, when I do not think we had any trading on Sunday, at all—until they are down to 3½ measly days a year. I think if members had asked me a few years ago about this, I would probably have been less concerned about that, because during those days I had my three children at home, and we had lots of time together.

But as our children grow up and become teenagers—even before they leave home—and they start to get weekend jobs and holiday jobs, most of which are in retail facilities, suddenly our chances of spending time together start to disappear. Once children leave home it gets harder and harder to spend time with them. As my family has grown older, I have come to appreciate the 3½ days of commerce-free public holidays that we have left, and I feel a sense of needing to protect them.

Someone who has really influenced my thinking on this is Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, who is the Chief Rabbi in England. In his book The Politics of Hope he devotes a whole chapter to what he calls “public places”. He uses the example of public parks. The point he makes is that public parks make no economic sense at all. We leave a whole lot of space unbuilt on and not capitalised in any way, but that is not the reason we have them. We have parks because they do us good. That is how I feel about public holidays. They do not make economic sense but they do us good, and we are in grave danger, as we pass these kinds of amendment bills, of losing them and losing sight of what they are all about. Let me read a portion from his book:

“Every age has its characteristic preoccupations. For the past century and a half, one of the leading concerns of thinkers in the West has been to preserve for individuals the space to be themselves without interference from others. When that case was first made, in 1859 by John Stuart Mill, it had a mild and limited objective. Mill felt himself surrounded by the suffocating proprieties of Victorian England and felt that human creativity—what he called ‘experiments in living’—needed more room in which to develop. A century later, when Isaiah Berlin and Karl Popper came to formulate their views, the subject had become more grave. The enemy was now no longer Victorian busybodies peering into other people’s windows, but the totalitarian state and its crushing sacrifice of liberty and lives. As the twentieth century drew to its close, however, it would be fairer to say that we stand in the opposite situation. In today’s liberal democracies, it is not that we are too much together but that we are too much alone and seek to learn again how to connect with others in lasting and rewarding ways.”

It is in this context that some of us in this House see value in protecting the remaining 3½ days of commerce-free public holidays, so that getting together with friends and family is at least, on 3½ days, given a higher priority than commerce. The argument is that business folk have a right to conduct their activities when they please. Some of us, however, think that if we in this House are truly serious and sincere when we wax eloquent about crime rates, family breakdown, antisocial behaviour, and the absence of consistent values, as we all do at times, then we will all need to acknowledge that nothing will be resolved if we all act alone as individuals. Sometimes, just occasionally, we need to agree to put down our own agenda for the common good. It is the reason that we have conservation estates and marine reserves. It is why we have road rules. They are designed for our collective good; so are our remaining few public holidays.

The interesting fact about this proposal is that it pretends to be about creating exemptions for towns that have strong visitor and tourist components to their activities. However, it is very unclear which towns this does not apply to. As New Zealand promotes itself more and more as a tourist industry—and the town I live in is desperate to attract tourism dollars—it is very easy to see that this will be just a very blanket provision.

KATE WILKINSON (National) : I am delighted to stand in support of this first reading of the Easter Sunday Shop Trading Amendment Bill, to allow trading in the Wānaka and Tauranga districts on Easter Sunday and Good Friday. The current laws are a dog’s breakfast. Under the existing laws, certain shops are exempted from having to stay closed at Easter and Christmas. If they serve food or petrol they can stay open, and if they sell souvenirs they can stay open. A pharmacy or a shop in a bus station can stay open, and a garden centre can open on Easter Sunday but not otherwise. Furthermore, if a shop chooses to open on any of those days, it commits an offence and has to pay a fine of $1,000. So shops do choose to stay open, knowing that the trading figures more than justify the cost of the fine.

As the chief executive of the Auckland chamber of commerce has stated: “There is no better example of stupid lawmaking and collective political failure to fix bad law than the annual Easter Shopping conundrum.” He continued: “It is stupid to have a law on when shops can open or not open. It is even more stupid to have a law that says some shops can open and others can’t—let the market decide.” We have a wonderful tourism industry in New Zealand, yet Queenstown can stay open on Easter Sunday and Good Friday, but Wānaka cannot. Taupō is exempt; Rotorua is not. Whilst the bill refers to Wānaka and Tauranga, it also allows other towns to choose to tag along and join the schedule of exempted areas.

This bill is about choice—the freedom to choose, if one runs a business in Wānaka, to stay open, and the freedom to choose to remain closed. If we have personal, religious, or cultural reasons to keep Easter Day and Good Friday free from commercial activity, and free from running our shops or businesses, then we can so choose. If we choose not to shop, and to have a family day away from shops, then we do not have to shop. Nobody is forcing us to shop. Nothing in this bill is compulsory; nothing in this bill is mandatory.

It has been stated by the Family First Lobby that: “Public holidays are traditions. They create rituals for families, not based on shopping but on celebrating together, reconnecting, and making memories.” I do not disagree with that statement but, as the Listener reported, on Christmas Day that may well be true but at Easter it is not. Family unity is not put at risk if the local supermarket opens on a public holiday. Because of the ridiculous current law, 45,000 visitors to Auckland last month attended the Rolling Stones concert, yet they could not go shopping. They could go to the concert, but they could not buy a new outfit to wear to the concert.

If one objects to working on Easter Sunday or Good Friday, so be it. But the irony is that because the current law is ludicrous, many shop owners now flout the law. What does that mean? It means that labour inspectors are busy working on that “day of rest”, catching all those who choose to remain open. That is the irony of it. Wholesalers can remain open; retailers cannot. Goods can be purchased on the Internet, but not from physical shop premises. One can get a haircut on Good Friday, but not buy shampoo. One can rent a video or a DVD from a video shop on Good Friday, but not buy one. Newspapers are not sold on Good Friday, but the newspaper staff are working on the Saturday edition. Shops in Taupō can open; shops in Rotorua cannot. Shops in Queenstown can open; shops in Wānaka cannot.

Under this bill, towns can choose to avail themselves of that exemption. Alternatively, they can choose not to. Similarly, shop owners can always choose to open. Alternatively, they can choose not to open. Workers can choose to work on those days, or they can refuse to work. But then, who would not want to work, with the current Holidays Act regime?

This issue has been languishing. It is time it was resolved, once and for all. It is not a sin to buy goods on Easter Day or Good Friday; neither is it a sin to sell goods on those days.

STEVE CHADWICK (Labour—Rotorua) : I have to say that members’ day brings out the diverse views in this House. I feel slightly uncomfortable here tonight, with my colleagues on either side of me—but lucky Jacqui Dean. Her bill was pulled from the ballot; mine has lingered in the ballot since the day after the election. We thought we would be the first cab off the rank because we would get the bill in the ballot, there would be no others, our bill would be pulled out, and away we would go.

The Rotorua bill that I sponsor, though, I have to say, is a much more robust bill than the approach in this bill. It is more inclusive, I say to Jacqui. We are attempting to address the ridiculous geographic anomalies that exist in the schedule of exemptions. This schedule of exemptions, I think, was a pure issue of oversight in 1990. I am not blaming the members at the time; I do not know whether the legislation was rushed through. We were not here then, but Rotorua was simply omitted and left off the list. We have suffered for that ever since, and I must tell my colleagues here that we have suffered. The absurdity for us is that people can go right through our town and shop in Taupō.

Of course, Taupō voted against my last attempt to get shop trading legislation in the House, because it had an economic advantage enshrined in the law in 1990, and we have been unable to unseat that ridiculous anomaly ever since. But in the approach that we took in my bill we were actually less parochial. We realised last time, in the bill that I sponsored as a Rotorua local bill, that people saw it was just a Rotorua issue that I was trying to resolve, and every other area in New Zealand was not remotely interested, and so we lost that bill in the House.

This time, working alongside the district council, the chamber of commerce, Retail Rotorua, and the economic development unit, we proposed a bill that uses the long-term community plan for territorial local authorities as the mechanism to go out and consult their communities. If they agree to Easter Sunday trading only then can that be addressed. So any territorial local authority across the country could do that rather than picking winners. That anomaly drives the country to absolute distraction.

This bill is imperfect. It will allow only Wānaka and Tauranga to trade, and it also includes Good Friday. I know we have subsequently had advice from the Clerk of the House that other districts can add an amendment. Members can be sure I will be ready with Rotorua. But also, I think, adding Good Friday into the legislation does weaken its chances. We actually did survey the whole country with the help of the retail sector and the chambers of commerce and there was no mood across the country when it last came to the House—and times change—for Good Friday. That is the argument I am hearing in the House tonight—do not erode it away too much. So we understood that Easter Sunday was about the only day that people would accept for change if there was any mood, and that is all that I proposed in my bill. I hope that does not weaken the support for this bill tonight.

I will support this bill to select committee. Why will I? I am the MP for a tourism icon city and electorate, and we have been driven absolutely crazy ever since 1990. We supported Rodney Hide’s bill in the last term of Government, and I had no problem with that. As we say, one finds some strange bedfellows in an MMP environment and I found Rodney’s bill eminently sensible.

I would also like to point out that there is no protection for workers in this bill. In my bill that is languishing in the ballot—and it will probably stay there—we have the protections for workers that were proposed by the Green Party when they got the amendment into the last Easter Shop Trading Amendment Act that covered garden centres. We were pleased that the Greens got that amendment in for worker protection. That is not in this bill and that does concern me.

I will be launching a petition in the Bay of Plenty this Saturday. The petition will urge Parliament to consider legislation to fix the anomalous schedule of exemptions. The petition has the support of the economic development unit, Retail Rotorua, the chamber of commerce, and the district council. It was also resolved at every zone meeting of Local Government New Zealand, right through the country, that it too would support this bill. Good luck. I hope we get there. I never want to debate this again in this House.

JACQUI DEAN (National—Otago) : I thank Steve Chadwick, who is on the other side of the House.

Hon Member: Steady!

JACQUI DEAN: The member should not worry; it will not get too fulsome. Steve and I both have the same goal in mind; we just have a different way of getting there. We both want the Easter trading issue to be settled once and for all—I think we agree on that. But although Steve’s approach gets us bogged down in the local government process of endless expensive consultation, my approach is elegantly simple. My approach is that should the bill get to the Committee stage, which I really hope it does, then other towns with a significant visitor industry can be added by way of a Supplementary Order Paper or an amendment. That was always my intention with this bill. I named Wānaka because the people of Wānaka came to me wanting me to help them fix, once and for all, the ongoing Groundhog Day - like problem of Easter trading.

There has been a lot of interest from all around New Zealand in this Easter Sunday Shop Trading Amendment Bill. I have had messages, phone calls, and inquiries from many people. I have had inquiries from Napier, Hastings, and Central Hawke’s Bay, and I have had indications from Northland that it would like to be part of this bill. I have had messages from the Bay of Plenty, Dunedin, Wanganui, Gisborne, Nelson, Greymouth, Blenheim, Invercargill, and, of course, many from Wānaka. I remind those members of the House that this level of interest tells me that it is not just me and other MPs who want changes to this legislation; it is the retailers from around New Zealand. Business groups from around the country are looking to us to provide leadership on this issue, effect change to this archaic legislation, and, in the first instance, send this bill through to the select committee.

I refer to a piece of paper that plopped onto my desk one day, and being a new MP this tends to happen often—one gets landed with bits of paper that one does not quite know what they mean until one reads them. This one was quite interesting.

Hon Member: We often call them leaks.

JACQUI DEAN: Yes, thank you. This report from the Ministry of Justice provided some advice on whether the Easter Sunday Shop Trading Amendment Bill is consistent with the rights and freedoms set out in the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. I was really interested to read section 47 of the Holidays Act 2003, as advised. It states: “An employer may require an employee to work on a public holiday if—(a) the public holiday falls on a day on which, but for it being a public holiday, would otherwise be a working day for the employee; and (b) the employee is required to work on the public holiday under the employee’s employment agreement.” The Ministry of Justice report goes on to state that if employees do not wish to work on Good Friday and/or Easter Sunday, they cannot be required to work unless they have agreed to in their employment agreement. So I was very interested to read that from the Ministry of Justice.

I think the definition of Wānaka in the schedule works extremely well for Wānaka. There is a post shop in the middle of Wānaka, and in consultation with the Wānaka Chamber of Commerce we worked out that a radius of, I think, 20 or 25 kilometres from the post shop brought in all those retail areas that wanted to be brought in and included in this bill. So too with Tauranga. In consultation with local business leaders in Tauranga, they agreed that that was the area they wanted described in the schedule. I do not care how visitor districts are described in the schedule. It does not matter. What matters is that those areas that want to be included in the schedule are described in the way they would like to be described.

I take issue with the idea that family life is threatened by a few shops being open over Easter. Family life may be threatened by many, many things, but I have never seen family life threatened by mum, dad, and a couple of kids going to the shops for a coffee and a spot of shopping over Easter. I think there is a tendency to get a little bit too serious about this issue. I think it is very important for all of us to remember that they are only shops. They are nothing threatening or awful; they are only shops.

Thank you, Madam Speaker, for the opportunity to speak to this bill, and I hope that, once and for all, we can set this matter to rest. I would like to see this bill go to a select committee.