New Zealand Guardian Trust Company Amendment Bill

I move, That the New Zealand Guardian Trust Company Amendment Bill be now read a third time. I introduced this private bill as the local member of Parliament for the area that covers the head office of this organisation—Auckland Central. I do so on behalf of the New Zealand Guardian Trust Co. Ltd, which has its head office in my electorate.

Briefly, this bill amends the New Zealand Guardian Trust Company Act 1982 to expressly authorise Guardian Trust to transact business with Promina Group Ltd and Promina’s subsidiaries and associated companies, to validate any business transacted with such companies on or after the commencement of the principal Act until the commencement of the bill as an Act, and to ensure that the principal Act accurately reflects Promina’s ownership of Guardian Trust.

As previously noted, the Commerce Committee has recommended by majority, with only minor technical amendments, that the bill be passed. It has also reported that the statements in the preamble have been proved to its satisfaction. Once again, I take the opportunity to thank the Commerce Committee and the House for their work on this bill. I commend the bill to the House.

National members have supported this bill. We have made some points about a lost opportunity to get it right.

💬 Darren Hughes: Oh, don’t be churlish.

The member should look on page 3 of the commentary, which states: “We note that in 2001 the Minister of Justice informed the previous Commerce Committee that such a review would be undertaken by the Ministry of Justice and completed by mid-2003. This review is now long overdue.” So the point I make is that while we support this legislation, an opportunity to correct it right through has been lost. When we look at the reason for the proposals, we see quite clearly that each time there is a change in the parent company, a trustee company must secure changes to its private Act to authorise it to transact business with its new parent company.

The situation has gone on and on, and this will happen again next year and the year after. Four trustee companies are mentioned in the bill. They will come back and will want to make the changes. National’s minority view indicates that while we support the proposal to approve the new parent company by Order in Council, we are disappointed with the decision of the committee not to support this initiative.

That is our position. We do support the bill, and if members over there did not object so much I might have had the chance to finish what I was going to say.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Clem Simich): I call Brent Catchpole.

💬 Jill Pettis: Nobody’s listening.

I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I take exception to the senior Government whip’s comment.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Clem Simich): I take that on board. I ask the senior whip to desist from comments like that when a member is starting a speech.

This bill, as explained in the Committee stage and in the second reading, is a technical measure that basically changes the ownership of the trust company from its previous owner to Promina, and gives the seal of approval for the company to operate its business as it has been operating till now.

The bill goes back to 1982 when the original New Zealand Guardian Trust Act was enacted. It was amended in 1989 and again subsequently. There are four private Acts that cover four different companies; the New Zealand Guardian Trust Co. is one of them. New Zealand First feels that requiring these companies to appear constantly before the select committee and go through the process to change the name of ownership is a waste of time and money. I note that the Minister’s third reading speech picked up on an issue I raised about priorities, but she may have missed the point, or miscalculated the cost of bringing these bills to the House and putting them through the select committee process. If these four trust companies change, time and time again, the cost in parliamentary terms adds up to a considerable amount.

Although there would be an initial cost of the work of officials on an umbrella Act, it would save the time and expense of the House and select committee debating these different Acts. So New Zealand First supports umbrella legislation to cover these four private Acts, because that would give the ability to seek an Order in Council, and for the measure to be signed off with the approval of the Ministers involved. It would make the process much easier.

I note that Stephen Franks has concerns about the Australian interest in these companies. New Zealand First is also concerned about the offshore ownership of all of the trusts, but by having them under umbrella legislation, all the issues raised by Stephen Franks could be covered. It would streamline the process for it to go through Order in Council, and we would not have to bring the particular organisations before a select committee and go right through the process.

New Zealand First will support such legislation, and we look forward to its being brought to the House in the very near future. We hate to see this matter drag on and on, with the Government not getting priorities right. It is costing the Parliament a considerable amount of money to just keep on repeating the process through the select committees. New Zealand First does support this legislation in its present state, noting that it was unable to make the changes in this legislation, because it would have to go through the process for each individual one again. It needs to be brought under umbrella legislation, and we will support that as well.

At the second reading and also in the Committee stage I expressed my apprehension that the Commerce Committee, in its examination of the bill, may not have taken steps to completely satisfy itself that the beneficiaries of trusts administered by New Zealand Guardian Trust will be protected following the passage of this bill by Parliament tonight. I must say that on both occasions I invited either members of the select committee or the member in charge of the bill, Judith Tizard, to try to allay my apprehension in that regard. No one endeavoured to do that, and that only increases my apprehension.

So I think that at this late stage of the bill all I can do is add my voice to that of the National Party, and of Lindsay Tisch, in particular, and say that it is time for the Minister of Justice to undertake a review of the statutory regime for companies in respect of the naming of current parent companies in trustee legislation in general. From my point of view that review now takes on a measure of urgency. It has been promised—it was promised by mid-2003. The promise has not been fulfilled; we are now 2 years past that date. I believe that unless and until that review is done, this Parliament remains exposed to the possibility that we have failed to protect the beneficiaries of those trusts.

Bill read a third time.

The House adjourned at 8.54 p.m.