Land Transport Amendment Bill

I understand that the commencement date is quite specific. However, there are some issues around that date that I think need to be noted at this time, for the purpose of informing those people who found themselves out of employment. Just prior to Christmas some 260 people found that they could no longer be employed. Here we are, passing a bill whose commencement date is upon its receiving the Royal assent, which will be some time after this urgency. We had 260-odd drivers who found that—

💬 Hon Harry Duynhoven: 234.

The number is 234; I stand corrected by the Minister for Land Transport Safety. Those 234 people had a long, cold Christmas, wondering about their future, and here we are now, starting to work our way through the Committee stage of this bill, and considering its commencement date, which is not until the Royal assent is given. I understand, also, that the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee deliberated on this point throughout this year, and that raises the first point. There was still time, in my view, to expedite this whole matter much, much more quickly, given the uncertainty for the 234 people who had found themselves out of employment. The select committee deliberated, and completed its report last week. The House could have gone into urgency last week. I ask members to consider this: 234 drivers out there are wondering what is happening; they have no understanding of the—

💬 Hon Clayton Cosgrove: Cut your speech short and we can get it passed.

The member who is interrupting is also delaying the process. These points are relevant. I want it to be recorded in Hansard that there was a lack of concern and a lack of earnestness and speediness by the Government in dealing with a matter whereby people, because of a blemish, because of a lack of consideration for something having occurred in a past era—given that this clause is the commencement clause—had lost their jobs. This House has not moved as rapidly as I believe it should have.

So we await the Royal assent. The issue I would like to raise is that those people are out of pocket. The select committee should have been concerned about retrospectivity, in terms of people getting some compensation.

💬 Dr Wayne Mapp: You can’t do that, actually.

We cannot actually do that? [Interruption] The issue, I think, is the matter of compensation for people who found themselves out of work. I am not sure that the date of the commencement of this bill—upon the Royal assent—allows for full consideration of that compensation aspect.

💬 Dr Wayne Mapp: It would be an ex gratia payment by the Crown.

I guess it is a matter that will be negotiated between the employers and those who lost their jobs. I am not sure that the clarity around the commencement date is sufficient to allow those people to seek the best opportunity for compensation. I know that the Minister had no intention of creating this situation whereby those people lost their jobs, but it is a matter of taking responsibility.

I just want to say that we are in urgency now. This bill could have been resolved last week. It could now have been enacted, and those people could have been given the opportunity to get on with having themselves reclassified. There are 234 people to process.

Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m.

I would like to canvass one or two points in summary of comments about the commencement date. The Land Transport Amendment Bill really sets out to correct some anomalies that occurred because of a retrospective piece of legislation. It impacted upon people who were in work. It impacted on them because of events that had occurred up to 40 years previously. As we talked about the commencement date, the Minister in the chair, the Hon Harry Duynhoven, became aware, prior to Christmas, of what the original legislation would do. That legislation came into force on 16 January. We have had time since then to correct it. I have to say that taxi drivers and bus drivers are not at the top of the wage tree. Over the dinner adjournment, I have been informed of a number of cases in which people have had to go to Work and Income to find support. They have been in real hardship. If this legislation corrects legislation that had a retrospective impact, the point I make to the Committee is that this commencement date should have a retrospective impact. That is the point I wish to make.

The Labour Government wants to champion the fact that it stands for the working person. As I said before, those people who are the drivers in these passenger services are not very far up the wage tree. The least we could do is give consideration to having a retrospective commencement date so that there can be a compensation element for the people who are able to pass through the hoops to be re-employed. I ask the Committee to consider that it is inappropriate to lock those people into a situation whereby they have been in hardship, without any consideration for a remedy to that. So I suggest making this date retrospective.

I have a couple of questions for the Minister in the chair, Harry Duynhoven, in relation to the commencement date. We are all aware that Parliament is sitting in urgency to deal with this legislation. Both the country and Parliament are well aware of the reasons for that. Some people have been—let us be honest—unjustly deprived of their livelihoods, and need to be able to get back into business. Of course, they cannot do that until this law takes effect.

Parliament, I would imagine, will be passing this law tonight, and it comes into effect, under clause 2, on receiving the Royal assent. I presume the Governor-General is available—perhaps not tonight, but certainly tomorrow—to enable this bill to come into effect on her signature. I would like an assurance from the Minister that that is his intent. Perhaps the Minister might like to comment on that.

💬 Hon Harry Duynhoven: I can give you that assurance—as soon as is possible. And if the Governor-General is here tonight, on Thursday we will be asking her to sign it.

I thank the Minister for that assurance. Therefore, I understand, people will be able to make their applications, say, as of next week. One would like to think that the Director of Land Transport would process the relevant ones expeditiously. As my colleague Eric Roy has made very clear, those people will have been without income from 16 January to, say, towards the end of March.

💬 Hon Harry Duynhoven: Those who were actually employed as taxi and bus drivers.

Yes; I say to the Minister that I understand that. One of the interesting issues Mr Roy raised was compensation for that 2-month period. Obviously, one cannot drive before one drives, so to speak—we cannot retroactively drive, because we cannot time travel. Having a retrospective provision could not conceivably change that. So the only way that people can be compensated, it seems to me—and it would be a relatively small number of cases; some people have had alternative work or taken a management role, etc.—is for the Government, in appropriate cases, to look at the question of ex gratia payments. That is a sovereign power that the Government has, and I realise that it is exercised sparingly, but from time to time it is actually exercised. I ask the Government to consider its powers and processes to pay an ex gratia payment in cases of real hardship due to what, to be honest, was an error of Parliament in passing the original law in the way it was passed. The basic intention of the law was right; there was one particular error, which we are now fixing today.

I want to make one point finally clear. National supports clause 2. We are supporting it because we do want the situation of the drivers who had their licences revoked, according to the effect of the law, to be fixed. That is our particular concern, and we will support the parts of the bill that deal with that particular concern. The parts of the bill that do not deal with that concern, we will not support. So I make it clear to the Minister that we will vote for this clause.

Clause 2 agreed to.

Clause 3 Persons convicted of specified serious offences prohibited from holding or applying for passenger endorsement