Trade (Safeguard Measures) Bill

This part addresses, really, the miscellaneous matters, so I shall keep my comments necessarily short. But it is a pleasure to rise and support the Trade (Safeguard Measures) Bill. Labour, of course, supports trade safeguard measures.

💬 Hon Phil Goff: It originated under a Labour Government.

As my colleague the Hon Phil Goff points out, the bill originated under a Labour Government. We want to build a future for all. We want the kind of economy that works for all New Zealanders, we want to have a fair and just society where all can live in dignity, an environment that we can protect is something that we all want, and we want a nation that we can be proud of. All of those things align with having these safeguards in place. There is nothing too controversial in that respect. We think that the temporary safeguard authorities being abolished with no compensation for loss of office, as put forward in clause 26 and following, is therefore not something that particularly warrants a great depth of debate.

The transitional provision, on the other hand, is noteworthy, I guess, for the fact that this legislation has taken a while to get through the House. The existing Act, the Temporary Safeguard Authorities Act, goes back to 1987, I believe. It was subject to review under the Labour-led Government and the wide consultation that went with that. Of course, the bill, as we know, is the result of that work—for those who have just joined the debate. It produces compliance with the World Trade Organization obligations and it streamlines the process of responding to allegations of dumped subsidised goods on the New Zealand market, which is something that I guess will be welcomed by New Zealand manufacturers across the board. I mean, it is pretty hard to disagree with that stuff. The transitional measures provision will be enacted to try to make sure that the necessary powers are in place, that the temporary safeguard authorities have all the powers that they would have if this Act had not been passed, and that that all works into making, I guess, an orderly transition—the kind that we need as we shift from one set of rules to the other.

The bill is timely because it is important that it comes at a time when domestic spending is constrained. New Zealand needs to have the right tools to protect its businesses from globalisation and increasing competition, where appropriate. We heard yesterday the fact that non-primary exports are down. The Government produced figures showing that the domestic market is booming, and part of that, of course, is to do with the rebuild after the earthquake. There are some positive news stories there for the Government, but all the while our exports in the non-primary sector—you know, outside the dairy sector—dropped 6.5 percent in real terms last year, and that will be a worry for the Government, whether it is up front about that or not. It is a concern for any Government to see manufactured exports dropping.

The measures here, in so far as they protect against businesses losing out in the trade arrangements, have got to be a good thing. New Zealand businesses do need a fillip. They need all the support that they can get, particularly in a system and a regime right now where we know that those multinational companies that deal in New Zealand get away with so much. We know, for example, that Google declares less than 5 percent of its revenues out of New Zealand for tax purposes. Those multinational companies have at their disposal the tools that enable them to leverage their advantage, their existing scale, and so forth. New Zealand businesses need to have the kinds of provisions that make for a level playing field, and that ensure that trade is undertaken in a way that is beneficial to New Zealand. Trade safeguard measures are something Labour will support, so it is my pleasure to have had the opportunity to take a call on this bill.

Labour wants to build an economy that works for all New Zealanders and a fair and just society where all can live in dignity. This is a small step towards that, and that is why I am happy to support this bill.

I began speaking on this bill, the Trade (Safeguard Measures) Bill, some time ago. It is a very uncontroversial bill, and certainly the second part is uncontroversial. It is largely technical in its nature. It is really to replace New Zealand’s current safeguards regime with a new regime that is consistent with the World Trade Organization (WTO). That is something that we have been a vanguard on, as a country, in terms of our policies on free trade. In fact, we have eliminated pretty much all of the various tariffs and restrictions in order to enable people to trade into New Zealand. It stands us in good stead with regard to future free-trade arrangements that we might be making with other countries, in that we, in many ways, have already taken the tough decisions that have gone on in the past. So in the future it will be other countries that will have to be making those tough decisions, rather than ourselves.

However, as this bill quite rightly points out, there are some issues, even within a free-trade environment, that we want to be able to protect ourselves from and make sure that we are properly safeguarded from. The existing Act, the Temporary Safeguard Authorities Act 1987, has served us well. It has not needed to be implemented or enacted very frequently. That Act was subject to a review under the Labour-led Government. I think it was Lianne Dalziel, from memory, who enacted that, and it included quite a large amount of public consultation. This bill is really a result of the work that went on in that consultation.

Not only does this bill produce compliance with the WTO rules but it streamlines the process of responding to allegations of dumped or subsidised goods that might hit our shores. This is really the guts of this bill—in the first part but also, of course, in the second part, which we are talking about here. It ensures that we are well protected against that happening. Of course, we have a relatively open border that enables trade to occur. We would like to see free trade occur right across the world. If we had free trade across the world, we would not have many of the Third World poverty problems that we have at the moment—if those Third World countries were able to get their goods into developed markets. But we also want to make sure that we safeguard New Zealand, our manufacturers, and our producers against the dumping that could occur by a less-scrupulous importer that might want to bring in goods that would undermine our market. That was not what we intended our free-trade agreement to stand up to.

The purpose of this bill is to make sure that this precaution is put into place. It is more cost-effective. It removes the requirement to establish a temporary safeguard authority. Instead, it rolls that in as part of the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment—“MoBIE”, the long acronym—which is headed by the “Minister for Everything”, Steven Joyce, so that the ministry now takes that role, instead of the quaintly coined temporary safeguard authorities. Instead, we use that expertise inside the ministry so it enables it to be more cost-effective.

The bill is timely. It is important, at a time when domestic spending is constrained, that New Zealand has the right tools to enable our ability to expand into markets and ensure that we are well protected from less-scrupulous players that might want to come in here and dump their goods inside our relatively open borders.

This is a good piece of legislation. It is something, as I said before, that was initiated under a Labour Government. It was picked up by Simon Power many, many moons ago. Simon Power has left this place and gone on to other things. It has now been picked up, finally, in the sixth year of this Government—I do not know what else it has been doing—and we welcome its introduction and the need for this piece of legislation.

I must commend my colleague David Shearer over there for his politeness on this bill, the Trade (Safeguard Measures) Bill, because 6 years is exactly right—that is when this bill first came before Parliament. I guess what the passage of this bill through the House shows us is how long a piece of legislation can get stuck in the Parliament. I think this is the third Minister who has had charge of it. It started off with Simon Power, it went through John Banks, and now we are up to Craig Foss. I would challenge Minister Foss to get up and give us an exposition on what the bill is about and whether he has actually read it. Nothing personal, Mr Foss, but the fact is that this bill has taken so long to get through the House through all its stages.

In fact, I was just looking back through the speeches in the Committee stage when this bill was interrupted, which was in 2012. I was reading the speech by our former colleague the Hon Lianne Dalziel. The bill was actually introduced by her, in the former Labour Government, back whenever it was—2008. The bill was actually introduced by her.

It is quite a simple bill—it is quite a simple bill. You have got to ask yourself why, and what does it take to actually move a bill like this through the House quickly and get it off the Order Paper. We support it. We all support it—well, actually, I am not sure whether everyone in the House supports it. But it is no real drama. The question, really, that has to be asked is how this happened. The other question that has to be asked is how much it has cost. What has the cost been, not just through the processes of getting the bill through the House—

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): We are on Part 2.

We are on Part 2, but I think it is a pretty important question given that we are now in 2014. The last Committee stage reading was in 2012. The bill was introduced in 2009—well, its first reading was in 2009. It was actually introduced in 2008. I mean, seriously. It is a bit of a joke. It is a historical bill. It is a historical bill, and actually you have got to wonder whether it is out of date and whether anyone has actually bothered to read it tonight to work out whether it is still relevant.

Let us look at what the bill does in Part 2, because that is what we are discussing. It removes the requirement to establish temporary safeguard authorities. They are not very temporary, are they, if the Government has taken 6 years to remove that. It also enables the existing expertise of, get this, the Ministry of Economic Development—well, that ministry does not even exist any more.

I think you have got to ask yourself whether or not this bill is still relevant. In all seriousness, I do ask the Minister to comment on that, on whether or not the bill has been looked at for relevance tonight and also whether or not anybody has looked at the cost—whether it is in monetary terms or otherwise—of not enacting this bill in a timely manner. Surely if you are putting a bill through the House that actually removes temporary safeguards, then you would be thinking that you would have to do that reasonably quickly, and that if you do not, there would be some impact. So I would be interested to know just what the impact has been of not moving this bill through all of its stages in the House.

We are still in the Committee stage on Part 2 of this bill. I have to ask whether we are really going to get to the third reading this year or whether it is going to be another year or two before we actually get through all the phases of this bill. I think it is a good example of just how long it can take for a piece of legislation to get through the House under this Government.

I move, That the question be now put.

The question is that the question be now put. Those of that opinion will say Aye, to the contrary, No. The Ayes have it.

I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. New Zealand First has not had the right to speak on this bill at all yet.

That is not so, because this bill has been before the Committee before. We have already done Part 1. We are on Part 2. I have been presiding the whole time that we have been on this debate. The member has not taken a call. The Committee will decide whether a closure motion is accepted or not. We had a closure motion, and I have put it to the Committee. I will put it again.

I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. I just want it on the record that for the second time today New Zealand First, the fourth-biggest party in this House, has been declined the right to speak on a bill—

That is not a point of order. The member will sit. [Interruption] The member will sit. That is not a point of order. The Committee decided that a closure motion would be accepted. It was voted on, and it was passed. The Committee decides, not the Chair. The Committee decides whether a closure motion is accepted. That is the process of this Committee. That is the process we have just gone through. That is why I have just put it and it has been passed. We are now moving to the clauses.

I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. I stood as the Labour member was sitting—as she was sitting—

The member will sit. That is irrelevant. The next speaker who got to have the call was a Government member. A Labour member was speaking; the next call went to the Government member. I accepted the Government member. He moved a closure motion. I put it to the Committee. The Committee decided that the closure motion would be accepted. We have moved on. That is the process. We are now on the clauses.

Clauses 1 and 2