Subordinate Legislation (Confirmationand Validation) Bill (No 3)

I move, That the Subordinate Legislation (Confirmation and Validation) Bill (No 3) be now read a third time. There were just two issues, I think, raised during the Committee stage that I would like to refer to at this point. Mr Tisch raised some questions about the nature of the gambling levy and the reasons for some changes in policy, and on those issues I have undertaken to get the Minister of Internal Affairs to come back to him. Heather Roy and Gordon Copeland and others raised issues around the Alcohol Advisory Council levy confirmation, and I gave an undertaking that the Associate Minister of Health was looking at the issues raised in relation to that, particularly to the issues raised by the Distilled Spirits Association.

We move to the final stage, the third reading debate, of the Subordinate Legislation (Confirmation and Validation) Bill (No 3), which National, along with other parties in this Parliament, supports. I would like to deal with two issues, against the background of the fact that it is a great outcome—the bill has survived the Committee stage without amendment. It is clearly a testimony to the hard work of the Regulations Review Committee in seeing that this legislation was afforded an appropriate, and appropriately close, degree of scrutiny.

I would like to pick up the point that Dr Cullen has made in connection with these problem gambling issues. Although assurances have been offered, those assurances are not delivered on in a timely way. The position is really quite simple in connection with problem gambling. We have two indicators: W1, which is concerned with presentation issues, and W2, with expenditure or turnover issues, and an arbitrary weighting has been assigned. So the W1 weighting carries with it a 90 percent loading, and the W2, the expenditure or turnover indicator, carries a 10 percent weighting. The problem is, of course, that in looking at that first weighting—the 90 percent issue—there is an immediate problem as to how that class is to be properly defined. The possibility cannot be ruled out that in the calculation of the levy, it may very well be the case that included in that problem gambling group is also a substantial group that is affected by the curse of alcohol.

So not only is there an issue as to how the class is defined—the arbitrary nature of the class—but also there is the uncertainty of scope. I have noted what the Minister has said in connection with the assurance he has given, but I hope there will be a response, and a responsive response, within narrow time frames. That is the first point I wish to make.

The second point deals with issues arising under Subpart 2, and the validation of these payments. As other speakers have said, the situation has arisen where but for this validation, the Government might have been in the position of having to make very substantial repayments. So we spent a significant part of parliamentary time—perhaps not today, in the context of urgency, but in the context of the process of this bill—having to correct a major administrative blunder by patching work done by the Alcohol Advisory Council of New Zealand. That, quite clearly, underscores and highlights the need to re-examine and overhaul the primary legislation in its entirety, especially in areas relating to the levy.

From the perspective of entities such as the Distilled Spirits Association of New Zealand, the bill raises an important concern relating to ongoing poor internal processes, monitoring and advice tendered by Government officials on aspects of the levy and the rates, including the Alcohol Advisory Council, the New Zealand Customs Service, and the Ministry of Health. It is a pity that it was not possible to meet the needs of the Distilled Spirits Association of New Zealand by dealing in a substantive way with issues that it raised, which fall outside the scope of the bill.

A changeover from measuring the alcohol content of domestically manufactured and imported spirits, by way of proof litres to litres of alcohol, has not been authorised by the Act; neither has the splitting of spirits as a category into spirits over 23 percent alcohol by volume, and spirits with less than 23 percent alcohol by volume. What is happening here is that as a result of the slowness to reflect the concerns of entities such as the Distilled Spirits Association, the sector has been “unnecessarily” paying out around $2 million per annum in levies since 1986. That would amount to a total of approximately $36 million. It is a substantial sum. I also note the clear stated commitment of Minister Cullen to have these issues promptly addressed by the relevant Minister in his Government.

As I have said, National is supportive of this legislation. It is legislation that comes before Parliament each year. I simply note that it is appropriate from the perspective of the National Party that this legislation be enacted as soon as possible.

Bill read a third time.