New Zealand International Convention Centre Bill

I move, That the New Zealand International Convention Centre Bill be now read a first time. I nominate the Commerce Committee to consider the bill. At the appropriate time I intend to move that the bill be reported to the House by 14 November 2013.

It gives me great pleasure to introduce this bill. This bill is first and foremost about investment, jobs, and growth for New Zealanders and their families. For years the tourism industry and the business sector have been seeking an international-size convention centre to be built in New Zealand to ensure that we compete with Australia and Asia and tap into the growing market of high-value business visitors. This bill shows that this Government is again delivering on not only that but its economic promise to create jobs and growth. The agreement signed last week between the Government and Skycity to build a world-class convention centre in Auckland will create jobs, boost tourism, and bring significant benefits to the Auckland and New Zealand economies—and all of this for little, if any, investment by New Zealand taxpayers. These benefits include a projected $90 million annual injection into the economy, an estimated 1,000 jobs during construction, and 800 jobs once it is up and running. It is estimated that the new facility will cater for 3,500 international convention delegates at any one time, and attract around 33,000 more delegates each year. It is yet another worthy initiative—one of many introduced under the leadership of this Prime Minister—to build a more competitive and productive economy for this country. It is very similar to an arrangement signed in 2001 to build a much smaller convention centre, one signed off under the Labour Government of that time and celebrated by the former Prime Minister Helen Clark and her then Minister of Tourism without any of the hysterical protest we see today from the Green Party or, indeed, parts of the Labour Party.

This bill gives effect to the New Zealand International Convention Centre and Licensing Agreement, including giving effect to the regulatory concessions, ensuring that agreement terms may be enforced as intended, establishing the protection of the names “New Zealand International Convention Centre” and “NZICC”, and ensuring that the land upon which the International Convention Centre is to be built cannot be used for any other purpose. The concessions granted in the agreement are applicable only to the holder of the Skycity Casino operating licence, and not all casino licence holders. The bill provides that the regulatory concessions may not be varied except by an Act of Parliament. In one simple amendment, the regulatory concessions provided under the agreement will be subject to the existing gambling regime. The Gambling Act will apply to the concessions and all gambling conducted under the concessions as if they were permitted under that Act. The concessions will therefore be administered, monitored, and enforced in accordance with the Gambling Act and any rules or regulations made under that Act. That is a very important point for this House to note.

Under the bill, a person will be prohibited from incorporating or registering any entity under the name “New Zealand International Convention Centre” or “NZICC”, and a person is also prohibited from using either of these names as the names of an organisation or building, and from trading or carrying on business under either of those names unless the person has authorisation from the Minister for Economic Development. The House should note that it is the Crown’s intention to grant to Skycity an exclusive licence to the New Zealand International Convention Centre brand as part of the agreement.

The bill provides for the following regulatory concessions for Skycity, and these take effect on the signing of the building works contract and will apply until 30 June 2048, unless the agreement is terminated prior to that date. These include an extension of the Skycity Casino licence, which is due to expire in 2021, out to 30 June 2048; an amendment to cover all of Skycity’s properties in Federal Street; an additional 230 pokie machines on the casino floor; an additional 40 gaming tables; a further 12 gaming tables that can be substituted for automated table game player stations, but not pokie machines; up to 17 percent of pokie machines and automated table games in restricted areas only being able to accept banknotes of denominations greater than $20; and introducing ticket-in, ticket-out and card-based cashless gaming technology on all pokie machines and automated table games at Skycity Casino.

The Government as part of this agreement has insisted on a number of significant harm minimisation measures to deter problem gambling and money-laundering. The agreement requires Skycity to implement these by the time the regulatory concessions come into effect. They are a predictive modelling tool that analyses data to identify players at risk of problem gambling; a voluntary pre-commitment system where players can elect to restrict the amount of time they play or the amount they spend; doubling the number of Host Responsibility specialists to deliver 24-hour, 7-day-a-week coverage; and the introduction of player identification requirements when amounts over $500 are being put on to or cashed from ticket-in, ticket-out tickets in non-restricted areas. The adoption of these measures does not affect Skycity’s ongoing obligation to comply with harm minimisation and anti - money-laundering obligations, which, again, is a very important point for this House to note.

An independent assessment by finance advisory firm KordaMentha has described the value of the concessions made to Skycity in exchange for the construction and operation of the convention centre as reasonable for both parties. Again, the 230 new pokie machines is exactly the same number granted to Skycity under the previous Government in 2001 for the development of the existing and much smaller convention centre. Overall, the number of pokie machines in New Zealand is falling by around 500 a year. This deal slows that reduction by less than 6 months. It is by no means clear at all that a marginal increase in the number of machines in one casino would increase harm overall, especially when the total number of machines across Auckland and New Zealand continues to decline.

We on this side welcome this bill being regarded as requiring a conscience vote. It will allow any remaining MPs in the Opposition who actually say that they see themselves as being in favour of jobs and growth to demonstrate that. By voting in favour of this bill, they can really say that they support jobs and growth. We look forward to their support. This measure is just one measure in a number that this Government has been proud to support as we focus on jobs and growth for New Zealand families. Our changes to the Resource Management Act, the Crown Minerals Act, legislation for ultra-fast broadband, the Employment Relations Act, the economic exclusive zone legislation, and so on have all been about creating jobs and growth in this country, while minimising social impacts. This Government lines up behind minimising the social harm of unemployment. New Zealand needs an international-size convention centre in our biggest city to be internationally competitive. A $402 million international convention centre in Auckland will do that, and will be a major asset for New Zealand for years to come. I commend this legislation to the House.

This casino bill, the New Zealand International Convention Centre Bill, is a disgraceful piece of legislation built off a dodgy deal done without transparency or accountability and off the back of morally bankrupt exploitation of problem gamblers. The epitaph of this Government is cronyism: make the deals with the vested interests, make the deals with its mates, and ignore New Zealanders’ interests.

Skycity is a business. It saw a chance to make some money. It saw a chance to avoid some costs. It saw a chance, and it went for it. Whatever I might think of that, it is a business, looking out for itself. Well, I have got a message for John Key: New Zealand is not some corporation that he gets to play around with; New Zealand is a democracy with a good reputation for transparency and accountability. New Zealanders expect honesty and accountability from their leaders, and John Key has failed to deliver honesty and accountability on this. New Zealand is not a corporation to be John Key’s plaything. He needs to respect New Zealanders’ wishes that we have an accountable Government, we have a transparent Government, and we have a Government that is upfront with its citizens.

This Government owes its citizens much more than dodgy, tawdry deals like this one. It owes its citizens some respect—respect for their interests and respect for the basic rules of democracy. That has been absent from John Key’s dodgy deal from day one. Let us start at the beginning, with the whole process of awarding this contract. The Deputy Auditor-General has done her report on this. John Key likes to tell the House that he has been totally vindicated by that report. He says that the Government was totally vindicated by the report of the Deputy Auditor-General—except for the fact that the Deputy Auditor-General says that the process for awarding this contract to Skycity was flawed, it was not transparent, and it was not even-handed. They are the words of the Deputy Auditor-General, and John Key tries to claim that this process was OK.

I can tell members of the House when this process went dodgy, when this process became non-transparent. It was when John Key wrote on the top of a briefing note on 24 August 2009: “Close off the Skycity angle.” That is what John Key wrote on that briefing paper, and from that moment on all the officials working on this process directed their energy towards Skycity, and no one else. The other bidders in this process were not given a fair go. The Deputy Auditor-General actually said that. She said: “we regard it”—the failure to clearly communicate the Government’s position—“as symptomatic of the lack of attention to procedural risks,” and that gives rise to concerns about “the fairness and credibility of the process.” That is the Auditor-General saying that the other people who were bidding to build this convention centre were not treated the same as Skycity. Skycity was taken out of this and taken away by the Government and dealt with differently. That is not the kind of fairness or transparency that New Zealanders expect.

The Prime Minister is donkey deep in this dodgy deal. In May 2009 he met with the chief executive of Skycity. In July 2009 his chief of staff met with Skycity officials. In August 2009 he told officials to close off the Skycity angle. In 15 October 2009 Bill English gets alongside the Skycity officials. Then by November 2009 it is another one of John Key’s mandates—he is there with the Skycity chief executive, finishing off this deal. No other bidder got those opportunities. They were afforded only to Skycity. This is a dodgy deal. This is cronyism. This is looking after vested interests. This is looking after the Government’s mates, not New Zealanders’ mates. This dodgy deal was wrong from day one, and the Deputy Auditor-General has been clear about that.

Then the Government comes to this House with a bill that binds future Governments into concessions to these people: 230 extra pokie machines, 40 extra gaming tables, cashless gaming machines, and ticket-in, ticket-out machines—a whole load of concessions. That is a whole load of concessions, which include a 35-year extension to the licence. Those concessions will increase gambling harm, and it is outrageous for Steven Joyce to stand up in this House today and say “We can’t say whether there will be an increase in gambling harm.” What the regulatory impact statement says is that we cannot say just how much it will be, but there will be an increase in gambling harm—there will be. What they estimate in this report is that there will be around an extra 8,000 potential problem gamblers because of this change—because of this change.

It is interesting to note that the Government had the option of amending the Gambling Act, rather than bringing in this new piece of legislation. The reason that the Government has not gone ahead with amending the Gambling Act rather than introducing this new piece of legislation is in the regulatory impact statement. What it says is that the Gambling Act’s purpose is minimising the harm caused by gambling. So the Government cannot amend that Act, because this bill would be against that purpose. That is why it cannot amend the Gambling Act. It is because the Gambling Act says that we should minimise gambling harm. This bill increases gambling harm, and that is why the Government has to do a stand-alone piece of legislation.

If nothing else, what that must tell New Zealanders is that this bill is about increasing gambling harm. The trade-offs that this Government thinks it is making between building a convention centre and an extra 8,000 problem gamblers have been accurately described today by Campbell Roberts from the Salvation Army. He has made absolutely clear that the harm minimisation measures in this bill are a joke. They are neither robust nor effective, and they do not represent any significant improvement on the current ineffective practices of the Skycity Casino. This Government is making gambling harm worse. It has introduced this bill today, which will get an extra 8,000 potential problem gamblers.

But, at the same time, Skycity is laughing all the way to the bank because it can extract the extra profits and it will not have to go through the process that other people in the gambling sector will. By having its licence extended, it means that it does not have to undergo the statutory renewal processes that it would have undergone in 2021 or in 2036. In doing so, not only does that save it money; it means that the public do not get to know what is going on in terms of what Skycity does. It removes the opportunity for local authority input. It removes the opportunity for public input into the licence renewal proposals for Skycity. On that point alone the Government members should hang their heads in shame—that they are prepared to extend the licence of Skycity so that the public and the local authority in Auckland will not be able to have a say.

This is shameful on all counts—the dodgy process and this bill that comes to the House that extends the licence that creates extra problem gamblers. We cannot even use the Gambling Act, because the Gambling Act says “reduced harm”, which is why Labour brought it in in 2003. That is why the Government is avoiding it today, because it knows that this legislation will increase gambling harm.

Today there is meant to be a personal vote or a conscience vote. There is no personal vote or conscience vote coming from the National side, and I can tell you why we know that. We know that there are members on that side of the House who understand the impact of gambling harm, who understand how it destroys families, who understand the damage that it does right across communities. In the past they have stood up against problem gambling, but today they do not. They are not exercising their consciences.

John Key has systematically and deliberately undermined basic New Zealand values through this dodgy deal. It is shameful legislation, and the National members who are today being prevented from exercising their consciences know this. This bill is morally wrong. This bill is morally bankrupt. The Labour Party is disgusted by this bill. Labour will not be bullied out of making changes to gambling law because of what this Government says. If Labour sees gambling harm when it is in Government, it will legislate to deal with gambling harm. John Key cannot get away with this dodgy, tawdry deal. It is morally bankrupt and the Labour Party is utterly opposed to it.

Well, the previous Labour Government has a significant convention centre under its belt. Helen Clark speaks from the past. She said that the Auckland Skycity has “pumped $140 million into its new Convention Centre, and Auckland City has rebranded and upgraded its conventions facilities.” She says it is a good thing. Mark Burton, who was the Minister of Internal Affairs at the time, said: “The potential gains from this are widespread—not only for Skycity but for the Auckland city and region, the tourism industry, and the whole of New Zealand.” Oh, my—have they not changed their tune! The Labour Mayor of Auckland, Len Brown, agrees, too. He welcomed the “significant opportunities that a national convention centre will bring to Auckland both in terms of jobs and wider economic growth.”

We understand very, very clearly that there are issues around gambling harm and harm minimisation. That is why we have placed upon Skycity a very, very strong obligation and requirement to introduce further, substantial harm reduction measures. In fact, Associate Professor Paul Delfabbro from the University of Adelaide, who works in the psychology department, recently described Skycity’s Host Responsibility programme as one of the most rigorous in the world.

It is important to understand that these things are also on the Government’s mind, and, because of that, there are very stringent obligations placed upon Skycity in order to minimise gambling harm. Under the agreement Skycity will have to introduce a predictive modelling tool that analyses data to identify players at risk of problem gambling, as well as a voluntary pre-commitment system where players can elect to restrict the amount of time they play or the amount they spend. Skycity will also have to introduce player identification requirements when amounts over $500 are being put on to, or cashed from, ticket-in, ticket-out machines in non-restricted areas. As well, it is doubling the number of Host Responsibility specialists to deliver 24-hour, 7-day-a-week coverage.

Arguably, Skycity will be better equipped to deal with problem gamblers because of this bill than it would be without it, because it will put into place industry best practice. I am not a gambler, but this place is full of gamblers. Right now there are bets going on in this House on who is going to be the winning horse wearing the red tunic, and games of Russian roulette are being played in the Labour caucus. But I want to say that this bill is going to be good for New Zealand, and at the same time we are going to minimise the impacts and the harm upon people of gambling.

Just before I call the next member, I advise the House that this is a split Labour call, and I will ring the bell with 1 minute remaining. I call the Hon Clayton Cosgrove.

Before I make my substantive comments in this speech, I want to make a personal comment. The personal comment is that, in respect of Skycity, I attended a corporate box function—as is well known. I want to say to the House in all seriousness that it may come as a shock to some people here, but, like other members, I have attended and received hospitality from Federated Farmers occasionally. I have received and attended hospitality from Sky TV occasionally, and, I have to say in seriousness, I have been to the annual function of Saunders Unsworth at some times over the years, although I suspect that the invitation may not come this year. I say in all seriousness that one engages with groups and entities as a member of this House, and one makes judgments as to the rights and sometimes the wrongs of those engagements with entities and groups. I take responsibility for both the right judgments and—hopefully, not that often—the wrong judgments. I take responsibility. But I say this: my vote is not for sale. My vote cannot be bought. My vote will never be bought. I say with respect to the House that my comments, I think, are appropriate before I get to the New Zealand International Convention Centre Bill.

The problem with this bill is the following. You can understand a private sector organisation like Skycity wanting to get the best deal it can under any legal circumstances. That is how businesses proceed in terms of maximising their profitability. The problem, though, is that even though John Key is a product of that same private sector where things are done differently and there are different processes—because there are commercial arrangements and private sector moneys involved—there is a big difference when you are dealing with public money, with legislation and regulation, and with taxpayers’ money, and when you are charged as a Government and as a Prime Minister with working in the interests of all people. And though John Key in his private sector capacity may even in a legal sense have been able to expedite decisions without a lot of due process, in a legal sense even without due process, to get the deal done, get it done fast, and move it ahead, the difficulty when you are a Prime Minister and when you are charged in Government with guarding the public purse and the public well-being is that you must have transparency, you must have openness, and you must observe proper due process, especially in tender processes. You cannot express a preference for one group against another. You must leave key decisions to be delegated to officials to keep them out of the sticky fingers of politicians and avoid some of the challenges and allegations that Mr Grant Robertson has put to the Government. You must observe those public sector processes.

The difficulty Mr Key has with this dodgy deal—and from the taxpayers’ point of view it is; you cannot blame the Skycity boys for having a crack and, forgive the pun, rolling the dice—is that he has failed to guard the well-being of the taxpayers. He has been criticised by the Auditor-General for a lack of due process, even though in his own mind he keeps telling himself that he was totally vindicated—though the Skycity report says otherwise. He has done this and done the deal, whether it be with the film industry at the cost of selling legislation, or whether it be this in a dodgy, non-transparent, and underhand way. He has done it simply for political motives and political motivation. The Government may cry jobs, and we are all in favour of jobs. It may cry that it wants to grow incomes for people, and we are all in favour of that. But you have got to do it openly and you have got to do it fairly. It cannot be a dodgy deal done at midnight with high-level Government ministerial intervention that has been deemed inappropriate. I will oppose this legislation for those reasons. Mr Key has to learn that he is a Prime Minister. He is not in the private sector. He is not dealing with his own dough or company dough; he is dealing with taxpayers’ money and taxpayers’ welfare. There is such a thing as the public interest, the taxpayer interest, and he is charged with guarding that. This legislation and his conduct fail those critical tests.

I think there are some things that I too should put on the record. I think in 2009 I accepted a couple of glasses of wine from Skycity at one of its lower bars, in 2011 I went to a test match as part of the Rugby World Cup with Skycity, and earlier this year, in 2013, I accepted a cup of coffee and a muffin with one of its lobbyists when we were discussing this legislation, the New Zealand International Convention Centre Bill. I am, however, reminded of the statement of the late California State Treasurer “Big Daddy” Unruh, and that is: “If you can’t eat their food, drink their booze, …”—there is another phrase that has to do with the relationship with women, which I will not read out—“and then vote against them, you have no business being [in Parliament].” That is the case. I just want to say that if people cannot have a proper policy discussion and at the end of that say “No, we disagree.”—as I have on a number of occasions with Skycity—and tell people that you are against something, and then come here and vote against it, then we have not got a proper democracy.

I am adamantly opposed to this legislation. My view is that gambling using any form of pokies was originally a mistake. I think that in allowing it, Peter Tapsell—probably without any right of legislation, without any right and proper regulation, back when he was Minister of Internal Affairs in the early 1980s—was wrong. I am still convinced that it is wrong. I voted the wrong way on the casino legislation when it was set up originally, and that is something that I am now ashamed of. It is my view that that casino should not have been set up, and my view that the harm that is caused to tens of thousands of families is something that this Parliament, and people of my generation in this Parliament, have to take responsibility for. What I will not do is support in any way legislation that will make it worse.

Pokies and gambling tables cause immense harm to families. People gamble much more, in some cases, than they can afford to. They lose their houses, they lose their families, and, in extreme cases, they lose their lives as a result of this evil. And for the Prime Minister to trade this loss of families, this loss of houses, and this loss of lives for a convention centre is, in my opinion, morally bankrupt, and the way that it has been done is, effectively, corrupt. The Prime Minister wrote on a piece of paper to finalise a deal with Skycity. He wrote on a piece of paper and breached everything that is ethical about having proper tenders and proper arrangements in making Government deals. The Prime Minister of New Zealand lowered the standards of our democracy, and the ethics and the integrity and the transparency that we expect in New Zealand, and this bill is a result of it.

And I say to Jonathan Young, who was the National Party speaker who preceded me, shame on you. Jonathan, I know that you know better. I know that you know that people will die as a result of this bill. I know, Mr Young, that in your heart and in your conscience you do not support it, and I say shame on you for standing up to support this grubby bill.

I call the honourable member Metiria Turei. Tēnā koe. Kei te pēhea koe?

Tino pai, Mr Speaker. Tēnā koe. “But gambling is not just the scourge of my communities. We all know that there are teachers, there are lawyers, and there are even politicians who gamble. So let us not say that this is a problem defined to one area, but across the country. It is also personal because I have had numerous constituents come into my electorate office in Onehunga in Maungakiekie, and I have seen the broken relationships. I have seen kids who have gone without the essentials, the broken families, and the broken relationships. It affects our communities right across this country.”—so said Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga last night in this House, and I agree with him. I agree with him 100 percent, and so do thousands of New Zealanders. So my plea to all of my parliamentary colleagues today is: “Do not vote for this bill.”—the New Zealand International Convention Centre Bill.

Today we have a rare opportunity to vote with our conscience on a bill that we all know grates so deeply, and it grates because it is wrong. It is wrong to sell the law to Skycity so that Skycity and no one else can make millions of dollars off the misery of problem gamblers, their families, their children, and their communities. It is wrong to use the authority of this House to excuse Skycity for 35 years from the Gambling Act, the Act that constrains the harm of gambling by stemming its growth. It is wrong to know that increasing gambling at Skycity will produce measurable, predictable harm to people who can least afford to be harmed but to choose to do so anyway. It is wrong to subvert the very foundation of our law—the law that says that we are all equal before it—to confer on Skycity a special privilege that the rest of us simply do not have. That is wrong, and there is no more simple way to put it.

People’s lives have been destroyed by gambling and by Skycity. Every few months we hear another story about another business that has gone under, about people who have become sick, their lives destroyed, who have stolen from their employers, have harmed or abandoned their children, and have even harmed themselves because of that place. So please do not use this one vote you have today to make Skycity bigger, more rapacious, and more damaging than it is already. We all have the power today to stop that from happening.

I would add to that a concern about the nature of Skycity. Today, in fact just a few moments ago, I saw a press report on Skycity and a comment that it made, where it is in effect threatening MPs today, saying that if MPs choose to deny this legislation and vote it down, Skycity will take its money—hundreds of millions of dollars, says Nigel Morrison—and spend it overseas. So it is effectively attempting to threaten MPs—

💬 Hon Trevor Mallard: Good riddance.

—good riddance, I agree, Mr Mallard—by saying that it will remove its business and take it elsewhere, in a deliberate attempt to use its financial power to influence the votes of members of Parliament. We are seeing that happen right as we speak today with this release from Skycity.

John Key would have us all believe, despite the fact that these gambling extensions breach the law and despite the demonstrable harm that they bring, that these extensions are necessary for Auckland to get ahead on jobs. Well, of course, Auckland, as we know, is much, much better than that. Aucklanders are creative, innovative, and imaginative, and they are better than this dirty deal of expanding a casino and placing a casino monument—plonked right in the middle of their beautiful city.

The other fallacy that John Key and Steven Joyce would have us believe is that jobs should come at any cost, but that is just simply not true. Not only are the numbers false—there are not those numbers of jobs that they say, and if you look at any of the reports it is clear that they are overestimating the jobs—but jobs do not come at any cost, and they most certainly must not come at the cost of 6,500 children who, Joyce’s own officials warn, will be harmed by this bill. That is 6,500 children who the officials say will be at risk of not being fed and clothed properly as a result of this bill. This is not my information. I did not produce this information. This is information that is in the Government’s own, albeit heavily edited, carefully redacted, and selectively released documents. It is information that it has produced and has known about.

The jobs claim of Steven Joyce is untrue. One need only look at the reports to show that that is the case. Even the $90 million claim that is being made by Steven Joyce is untrue. The Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment reports that its analysis shows that 72 percent of that money will go to Skycity through the hotel and through the convention centre. So very little of that $90 million is going anywhere near outside the Skycity boundaries.

Steven Joyce and John Key say that because we cannot know for sure exactly how many people are to be harmed or how they will be harmed by the increased gambling that this bill brings, the risk to those people or the risk of that harm is somehow irrelevant. Joyce claimed yesterday that the regulatory impact statement said that putting a precise cost on the potential increase is difficult. Well, yes, it does say that, but it also goes on to say why it is difficult to put a precise cost on the harms. It says: “Reportedly, only a fraction of those who are affected by problem gambling seek help and the cost of the intervention services is in any case only a fraction of the cost (harms) associated with problem gambling (such as suicide; family violence; children inadequately clothed and fed, and other examples of deprivation and poor parenting; costs to the justice system, to businesses, and to community groups of gambling-related crime, lost productivity etc.).” That is what it says in the regulatory impact statement.

All of those harms are identified as being real, and the risk of those harms being real. Yes, it is difficult to quantify the cost, but that does not mean that those harms do not exist. It does not mean those harms are irrelevant to this debate. In fact, it raises serious questions when this bill is proceeding knowing that those harms are a risk and when Mr Joyce today confirmed that he has made no attempt to find the real evidence behind that. No, he did not seek any advice about whether more children would be left in cars in the Skycity car-park, even though we know that that happens. No, he has not assessed the risk of increased fraud for those businesses that we know will suffer from theft and fraud—usually by people who own or are senior in those businesses—as a result of problem gambling. No, he has not sought any advice on the risk to charities—charities that not only receive funding from the members of the public but also receive funding from Government—of that money being stolen, when we know that more than 50 percent of the money that is stolen from charities is stolen to fuel problem gambling.

These are the facts that we know. This is the information that we have available to us, but John Key and Steven Joyce have deliberately refused to investigate that information because if they do not know, then they can pretend it does not exist. Yet that harm will be experienced by thousands of New Zealanders and, more important, by thousands of their children.

I am going to end by quoting a member of this House who fought against the 1997 Casino Control (Moratorium) Amendment Bill 15 years ago. He said: “We are talking about a problem that we all own. We cannot just sweep the problem under the carpet because we believe in free enterprise. We cannot just sweep the problem under the carpet because we think it is an individual’s right to throw the dice, to play blackjack ... We have a problem in this country, and it is the addiction of gambling. It creates havoc amongst families, be they Māori, be they Pākehā. It creates a problem, and we need a Parliament with the strength and courage to face up to that problem, and face up to it we will.”, and “We have a problem, and those people who vote in favour of this Bill are on the side of the angels, and those who vote against this legislation are on the side of evil.” Thank you, Mr Tau Henare, for those wise words.

Talofa lava. I want to acknowledge the Minister for Economic Development, Steven Joyce, for bringing the New Zealand International Convention Centre Bill to the House. We have heard the debate. The bill is a trade-off—it is a trade-off in terms of the positives that we get from jobs, from tourism, from opportunities, and from the economic benefits that this bill will produce. We also understand, and we know, that gambling is a legally permitted activity in this country and that there are some spin-off effects that are detrimental to some individuals and some families.

But let me talk about the benefits. It is a major asset for New Zealand because it will generate huge benefits—a projected $90 million annual injection into this economy, and that is an estimated 1,000 jobs. [Interruption] I challenge those opposite to come to Skycity and say to the bouncers down at Skycity—those who have jobs and are supporting families and are supporting their wives, families, spouses—that they want to talk to them about their jobs and about taking the jobs away from those people who have them. I challenge those members opposite to do that.

The 230 new pokie machines is only the same amount that was produced under the Labour Government. I acknowledge the Hon Trevor Mallard, who has actually said in this House that he did make a mistake under that legislation. I challenge others to make the same statement, because they are, in effect, voting against something that they voted for 10 years ago. But let us talk about the facts, because members opposite do not want to talk about the facts. Under Labour there were 6,700 extra pokie machines in 9 years—6,700—and under National we have decreased the number of machines in circulation around this country by 2,300. So we have decreased the ability for harm to be caused by decreasing accessibility to those machines for those who are being harmed by these machines by decreasing the number of machines across this country.

What are the measures to deter problem gambling at Skycity? Well, we know that it is introducing a predictive modelling tool, which analyses data to identify those gamblers with problems. It is also introducing player identification requirements—[Interruption] members know that—and some of those will be visual identification requirements. But it is a balancing act, as I said at the outset. Overall, the net benefits are positive for our economy, positive for our country, and positive for those who are getting jobs under this legislation. That is why I will support it in its first reading.

I rise on behalf of New Zealand First to speak to this first reading of the New Zealand International Convention Centre Bill. New Zealand First opposes this bill and everything it stands for unequivocally and in its entirety. We oppose this bill because it epitomises everything that is wrong about core governance of a nation from an economic standpoint, from an ideological standpoint, from a social good standpoint, and, perhaps as important as—if not, indeed, more so than—any of those, from the standpoint of the voluntary adherence by the Government of the day to the otherwise unenforceable, yet constitutionally fundamental and indispensable, convention by which those who hold executive office choose to maintain their subservience to the laws of the land, choose to maintain the ethos by which laws are made and upheld in accordance with the principles of democracy and the best interests of the common good, and choose to conduct themselves and to execute their responsibilities of their office in a manner uncorrupted by the temptations of material gain or regulatory and jurisdictional advantage—or not. They choose to conduct themselves and to carry out the business of Government in this manner, or they choose to not do that.

When Governments choose to depart from these fundamental conventions, it is the beginning of an insidious process of thought and the beginning of a very dangerous road that leads towards corruption and at the end of which lie the remains of societies that have traded democracy for the usurpation of power. It is a road that begins in the corruption of thought and ends in dictatorship. Fiji lies at the end of that road. So do Zimbabwe, Pakistan, and Egypt—only this month, Egypt. Half the nations of South America and West Africa have gone down that road, and none of them have ever truly come back. Is that what we want for New Zealand? Is that what we are going to allow? Is that what we are going to sanction for New Zealand—for the future of New Zealand—here in this House by passing this cynical and insidious piece of legislation? I say that in all seriousness. I ask all members, but particularly the members opposite on the Government benches, the members of the National Party, whether that is what they really want, and whether that is what they really want to allow.

I say again that this bill is the beginning of a process that culminates in the ending of democracy, and I suspect that those who are responsible for initiating it are not even aware that it is happening. I make this charge because this bill sends a message, and I make it because of what this bill is and what it does and what it represents, and because of the message this bill sends. What it says is that the law is for sale. The law here in New Zealand and the process of making law is for sale. Make us an offer, and we will change the law to suit! The Government can spin this any way it likes. It can dress it up any way it likes. It can plaster that pig with as much lipstick as it can stagger under the weight of, but the reality remains the same, and that reality is that our laws are for sale.

We have laws limiting the activity of gambling. We have laws that limit gambling and place limits on how much gambling can go on and where and when and by whom. We have them because gambling can, and does, cause harm, and as a society we have decided that we need to be able to limit that harm. We believe as a society that it is in the best interests of the common good to see to it that the harm that can be caused by gambling is minimised. Yet, through this bill, that impetus towards harm minimisation is being abandoned. Through this bill, with this bill, what we are doing—what New Zealand is doing, what the Government is doing, and what the Parliament is allowing to happen—is that we are deciding, arbitrarily, that the minimisation of gambling and the minimisation of the harm and the potential harm caused by gambling is not important any more. It is not as important as some other considerations—economic considerations, monetary considerations. Jobs are important. On that, I think we are all agreed. Industry and building and construction are important. No one is denying that. We need jobs for people. We need building and construction and major projects in the economy. That goes without saying.

But within that reality is another reality, and it is this. Even when we as a nation acknowledge that we need jobs and industry and construction, we still have this other reality, which is that we have problems with gambling in this country. We have problem gamblers and we have harm being done, and that is why we have laws pertaining to gambling. They are there in an attempt to minimise that harm, but through this bill, the Government is denying that reality. The Government is attempting to justify the changes in this law by referring to the jobs that will be created by the construction of the new convention centre and by referring to the revenue that it anticipates will be generated in the economy by having the convention centre operating and from the overseas visitors whom it will attract. And it is true that those things will happen. Building a convention centre will create jobs and it will inject new revenue into our economy, but that is not good enough. There are other ways in which jobs can be created and there are other ways in which Crown revenues can be enlarged.

Does Auckland actually need another convention centre? Have we as a nation actually asked that question? Auckland already has the Aotea Centre, of course. Whether having another one as a crucial element in the Queen City remaining competitive with the other 70-odd convention venues in our region is a matter for some contention. But if we do, in fact, need another one, someone has to build it and someone has to pay for it. So the question then is whether we should, as a nation and a Parliament, be changing the law in order to allow Skycity to build one for us free of charge in exchange for their being allowed to expand their casino by an additional 230 pokie machines and another 35 gaming tables. Does Auckland or New Zealand need another 230 pokie machines? I would contend that they do not.

It is true that some people use pokies responsibly and gain some enjoyment from doing that. But it is equally true that these machines are designed to make a profit, and that is what they do. Eight-five cents of every dollar that goes into a pokie, or thereabouts, stays in that machine. They are programmed and built that way. There is no getting away from that, but people play them anyway, because they are fun and exciting, and they come with the promise of reward, and that promise can be, and often is, addictive. As such, these machines have become a scourge in our pubs and suburbs and communities. We have problem gamblers in this country—far more of them than many people would care to admit. It is not a problem that is restricted to the poorer parts of New Zealand or to brown people or to the less well educated. Gambling addiction cuts across all socio-economic levels and all strata of society, all ethnic groups, and all levels of income.

I have had firsthand experience of being in a relationship with someone who was unable to resist the temptation of putting another coin in the machine. I watched as my best efforts to assist failed and a person who held a good job in a position of responsibility succumbed to her affliction just as progressively and just as destructively as the damage and decline experienced by an untreated alcoholic or drug addict. Gambling addiction destroys lives. It ruins livelihoods, it breaks up families, and it breaks up relationships. It is a horrible thing to watch and an even more horrible thing to experience. We do not need 230 more pokie machines. We need 230 fewer, and that would be a good start.

We most certainly do not need to tear down laws that have been put in place to protect the vulnerable because we have succumbed to the temptation of a promise of $400 million in the form of a convention centre. This windfall win, as it is being perceived and promoted, is no less a mirage than any other win on the pokies. Has this Government, I ask, been seduced by the promise of the bright lights and the flashing colours and the big dollars to be had from this exciting casino deal? I ask because there is a common thread. There is a common set of indicators in people with addictions. Drugs, alcohol, gambling—they are all the same. One of the most common early signs is denial accompanied by justification and minimisation. Smokers begin that way and so do drinkers. They say: “Just one more puff. Just one more beer. Go on, have a chaser with that. One more won’t kill you. Everyone else is doing it. The sun is always over the yardarm somewhere in the world. Just one more twenty. Ten more coins and that’s it. I’m not feeding the pokies anymore this week—well, tonight.” It starts that way and then every subsequent indulgence is justified by the one before it, and then there is full-blown addiction and a cycle of self-destruction that is inescapable. There is minimisation, justification, and denial. The psychology of addiction is very similar to the psychology of the corruption of thought.

Is there a parallel here? I ask the House and the members opposite to ask themselves whether that is, indeed, what they are doing and whether this is what is happening with their thinking: “Just one little law change, that’s all. Just a few more pokies. Think of the jobs. Think of the investment. Just one little law change. Go on, it won’t hurt.” I ask them to contemplate that, because do you know what? Once they have done it, the next time it will be so much easier—so much easier to do and so much easier to justify. They might say: “What law shall we sell next, I wonder?”.

The Prime Minister obviously understands the maxim that one should never gamble with more than one can afford to lose, and that is why he is whipping his caucus and their individual consciences into line. But I ask those members whether they have the intestinal fortitude to do the right thing here today, rather than the thing they have been told to do. If they vote to sell this law today, how will they justify not wanting to sell another one tomorrow? We are at a fork in the road. One way is the right way. At the end of the other is Zimbabwe. We all have a choice as to which road we will take and which way we will vote. We must live with the consequences of that choice.

I will be voting against this bill, as will my New Zealand First colleagues. I would urge the members opposite to choose very carefully whether they support this law or not and to vote accordingly while they still have that free choice in a free society. Thank you.

Sat sri akaal, Mr Assistant Speaker. Thank you very much for the opportunity to participate in the first reading of the New Zealand International Convention Centre Bill. I congratulate this John Key - led Government on achieving an agreement that is way better than what our Opposition predecessors tried to achieve in 2001. I am sure others have shared this to some degree earlier today. However, just to re-emphasise, this agreement that the National-led Government has formed with Skycity is better for the economy, better for Auckland, and better for New Zealand. With my clear conscience, I commend this bill to the House.

I understand the next call is a split call. The Hon David Parker—5 minutes.

Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker. I would appreciate a bell at 1 minute, if I could?

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Yes.

Thank you. This is the result of a backroom deal by our Prime Minister, done with vested interests.

💬 Le’aufa’amulia Asenati Lole-Taylor: It was a dirty one too.

A dirty one, someone says here. The Deputy Auditor-General inquired into the probity of this arrangement. I want to quote a couple of paragraphs from the Deputy Auditor-General’s report because we heard continual misrepresentation, including by National members today, that it was all in order. The Deputy Auditor-General concluded in the report that was done by one of her deputies that “The result was that one submitter was treated differently from others during the evaluation process.” Only one bidder for this project knew that regulatory holidays were available. Only one bidder knew that the Government was willing to change the laws so that they could get a break. No other bidder knew that, and that is why the Deputy Auditor-General concluded that this process was wrong.

That fundamental error was never fixed, and we will never know whether, had the prospect of regulatory holidays been conveyed to other bidders, we would have had others. There are lots of rumours around that Vector would have been interested in bidding. It faced regulatory risk around the revenues that it gets from its lines businesses. Vector may have been willing to subsidise a convention centre if it had certainty as to its revenue flows and if it had a regulatory change that took away its risks in the way this regulatory change being done for Skycity does.

There is another really shady thing going in here. There is a pretence by National that it was not warned. We know from the Deputy Auditor-General’s report—and again I am reading from it—that “The Treasury … noted that an important part of the standard PPP process was a market tender, which provided assurance that the taxpayer was receiving value for money. … Overall, the Treasury comments suggested that officials should think about other, more conventional, procurement approaches.” The Treasury comments were referred to in an email of 12 November 2009 that went to the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet from the Ministry of Economic Development. Treasury comments went to the Ministry of Economic Development, then from the Ministry of Economic Development to the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, and then the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, in addition, wrote a briefing note to the Prime Minister. None of those documents has been disclosed. Are we such a corrupt country that we cannot see what warnings were given to the Government by the Civil Service?

I raised this very issue with Steven Joyce when he was at the Finance and Expenditure Committee on estimates for the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment the other day. He said that they would be released in due course when the other documents were released. I checked today. They still have not been disclosed, because this seedy, underhand, irresponsible, disreputable deal is wrong and these notes from the Government departments to the Government told it that it was wrong. So, in addition to all of the problems with this casino deal—it is a casino deal; it is not a convention centre deal—that results in a convention centre being built on the back of gambling harm, the Government knew it was wrong for reasons other than gambling harm. New Zealand’s reputation as being a transparent country free of corruption is tarnished by this deal, and that tarnish cannot be undone.

I want to say a couple of other things. No Parliament can curb the sovereignty of a future Parliament. That means that future measures to remedy gambling harm are always within the jurisdiction of a future Parliament. We in the Labour Party say that we reserve the right to legislate for gambling harm in the future. That does not mean to say that that will be without cost to taxpayers. This deal with the Government effectively promises compensation to Skycity in respect of some future steps by a Government, and not all of that could be avoided by a future Government, despite the fact that future Governments might want to go the whole hog and reverse everything. That would come at a cost. But make no mistake: future Governments have a right to regulate for gambling harm. This bill reflects poorly upon the Government and I for one will be opposing it.

I rise and speak as a resident of Auckland, but also a resident of central Auckland, the place where this eventual convention centre will reside. I rise also as someone who lives in the area where Skycity is the most significant employer in terms of numbers. It was absolutely irresponsible of that member opposite to claim that not building a convention centre under the auspices of Skycity would have led people who are currently employed to losing their jobs. That was an outrageous statement to make. It is also outrageous to try to claim that this was the only option on the table. Let us not be naive. Labour has been opposed to this casino deal from the beginning. We have never been opposed to a convention centre being built. There is a very important, distinct difference there. Of course this side of the House wants to see decent economic development. Of course this side of the House wants to see Auckland thrive, tourism grow, and people being offered opportunities that a potential convention centre could bring. Did we want that to happen off the back of harm and misery? No, and that is why we oppose this deal.

Also, we cannot be naive and pretend that this was the only offer on the table. That seems to have been somewhat lost in this debate. In fact, before the Prime Minister had a chat with Skycity and realised that it was interested to the point that it might not cost him a pretty penny, there were several other deals on the table, including one from Ngāti Whātua and another from The Edge. Auckland Council put forward a proposition that we had the Aotea Centre, which could be better utilised, and we could expand the footprint of that centre. We could transport the arts side of the Aotea Centre to the St James—a beautiful jewel in the Auckland crown that is in desperate need of restoration. It is something that the people of Auckland have been crying out to happen for years, and, while it sits and crumbles in the centre of Auckland, we had a proposition on the table that could have seen a beautiful trade-off that would have allowed a convention centre and for that jewel in the crown of Auckland to be restored. Instead, the Government bought a crown of coin machines for Auckland. That was the trade-off that that Government decided to make.

I have been interested in the debate that we have recently seen around inequality. According to the OECD measures, the Gini coefficient, New Zealand is the most unequal it has ever been. One of the points that the IMF makes around inequality is that countries that live with deep inequality tend to have Governments that start making decisions on behalf of those who are most powerful rather than on behalf of the good of the country and the economy, and that is exactly what this deal represents. It was made on behalf of those who are powerful rather than those who cannot vote—in particular, kids. The Expert Advisory Group on Solutions to Child Poverty points out that problem gambling is correlated with child poverty, and, in fact, it exacerbates it. That is a point that has been made time and time again by the Problem Gambling Foundation and any expert who works on child poverty issues. If you want to support those who are most vulnerable, you do everything you can to remove problem gambling and, in particular, pokie machines.

Any Government that argues that it is happy to simply minimise harm, I think, is making a ridiculous argument. It is like saying that you would rather raise the speed limit, knowing people would die, and then simply minimise the harm by putting more gurneys in a hospital. It is a flawed argument, and it is a point that is right to have been made before now. Any Government that argues it would rather make that trade-off is trying to put power before people. This comes back to my main point. This deal demonstrates, I believe, the stark difference between National and Labour. We both want jobs—yes. We both want economic development—yes. But Labour would have conducted an open and transparent process that would ensure a convention centre that was a place of pride, not harm, and was about people, not pokies.

Debate interrupted.