Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (CPTPP) Amendment Bill

I move, That the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (CPTPP) Amendment Bill be now read a third time.

The purpose of this legislation is to enable New Zealand to meet the obligations in the Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) trade agreement when the CPTPP enters into force for New Zealand. This will occur 60 days after New Zealand and at least five other signatories have ratified the agreement.

In order to implement the CPTPP, changes are needed to the following legislation, and I’ll list those. Firstly, changes are needed to the Tariff Act 1988, so that New Zealand can provide preferential tariff rates for CPTPP countries. The bill also provides for the imposition of safeguards on CPTPP imports if, for example, goods from another party are causing injury to domestic industry.

The second piece of legislation is the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act 1996. It will be amended to extend the comment period for technical regulations that are notified under the relevant provision of this Act from 30 days out to 60 days. Thirdly, the Legislation Act 2012 will be amended to lift investment screening thresholds for significant business assets from $100 million to $200 million for relevant investors.

Fourthly, the bill amends the Copyright Act 1994 to provide new rights for performers and additional enforcement mechanisms for pirated copyright works. The Patents Act of 2013 will be amended to provide a 12-month grace period for patent applications if inventors disclose their inventions to the public. The Trade Marks Act 2002 will be amended to provide additional enforcement mechanisms for trade mark infringements. And some changes will also be made to the Wine Regulations of 2006 to restrict the export of wine labelled “ice wine” unless it is made from grapes frozen on the vine.

As the Minister for Trade and Export Growth, David Parker, has outlined previously to the House here, the CPTPP will bring commercial, strategic, and sustainability benefits to New Zealand. For these reasons the legislation has this coalition Government’s support, minus one party. In terms of sustainability, the CPTPP goes beyond just reducing costs for business; it contains the most comprehensive outcomes on labour and environment that New Zealand has ever achieved in a trade agreement. These are legally enforceable for the first time. Suspensions and side letters negotiated since the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) have reduced the risk of investor-State dispute settlement being used. The CPTPP preserves New Zealand’s right to make laws to protect the public interest and our environment, and it upholds the Treaty of Waitangi.

Commercially, the CPTPP also matters. It gives New Zealand improved trading conditions with 480 million consumers across 11 countries, including four of our top 10 trading partners and four countries—Japan, Mexico, Canada, and Peru—where we do not yet have a trade agreement. This grouping already buys around one-third of New Zealand’s goods and service exports and we expect this to grow, creating more jobs and better standards of living for all New Zealanders.

Finally, the CPTPP is important strategically. At a time when we are seeing serious and growing challenges to the global trade environment, it is more important than ever for New Zealand to be part of an agreement that provides for a robust set of international trade rules in our region, as well as for New Zealand to be in a position to help shape and inform these rules into the future.

I would like to take the opportunity to thank everyone who’s contributed to the legislation: the previous Ministers involved in the negotiating of the TPP, but, more particularly, Minister Parker; the chair of the select committee, Simon O’Connor, and all other members of the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee; the Parliamentary Counsel Office; the officials; and members of the public and industry representatives who have participated in the various submission processes.

I’d also like to acknowledge the recent committee of the whole House and thank the New Zealand National Party and the New Zealand First Party for their work on, and their support of, this legislation. Lastly, I would like to again thank all the officials for their hard work and their dedication throughout the challenging negotiation process to deliver CPTPP—a comprehensive and progressive agreement for New Zealand. It is a tremendous achievement that they should feel very proud of. I commend this bill to the House and I move that it be read a third time.

Madam Assistant Speaker, thank you, and it gives me great pleasure to stand and speak in this debate. This is the second time this House has had a third reading on the vast, vast majority of this legislation, and I do want to commend the Government for the position they have taken on trade following the election, because when we had the debate on the original Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP)—I think it was in November two years ago; in fact, I think it was 15 November 2016 that this House had the third reading and voted on the TPP legislation—the majority was much thinner than it is today.

What I thought I might do, because this is something that this House has considered on many occasions and so many New Zealanders have paid more attention to trade and TPP than any other trade deal New Zealand has ever done, is talk a bit about the genesis of where the agreement we have before us today to vote on came from. It actually came from a strategy that Labour, when last in Government, saw some of, but it wasn’t until there was a change of Government, and we came in under National at the beginning of our time a decade ago, that actually the first steps were taken towards where we’ve arrived. You see, the Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership Agreement (P4) was between New Zealand, Singapore, Brunei, and Chile, and it was a very high-quality agreement—one of the better ones we had signed at the time—and the idea was that those four countries would come together and then look to bring America into the fold, into that P4, to have a trade agreement that would reach across the Pacific from Asia across to South America, North America, and down to New Zealand in the south.

In February of 2008, that strategy worked. The US joined the negotiation, joined the P4 for what had become TPP—the TPP negotiation was launched. In November of that year, Australia, Peru, and Vietnam joined the negotiation. In October 2010, Malaysia joined; in October 2012, Mexico and Canada; and then, finally, in May of 2013, Japan joined as well. And over many, many years of negotiation, finally the TPP was concluded and it was signed in Auckland on 4 February 2016.

The reason that I’ve gone through that is that a strategy for a small country like New Zealand to be able to do high-quality trade deals with very, very large countries is not straightforward; in fact, it’s not easy for us on the world stage. Indeed, the strategy that was developed by some of the best trade minds anywhere in the world, who sit in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, was to bring others into the fold to negotiate with us so that the large countries of the world that New Zealand absolutely needs a trade deal with would come to the party.

I think that the final vote and reading of this legislation today says that the National Government, over that period of time, was right to push ahead with the TPP negotiation and we were right to conclude it and sign it in the face of significant opposition from parties in this House and from people in New Zealand. I would say to those in Government who are now supporting it—the Labour Party and New Zealand First Party—that if we had not pushed on, if we had not concluded, if we had not decided to go onto the world stage to tell others that there was still a deal to be done, if TPP hadn’t been concluded, they wouldn’t have been able to make that speech today about the good of this trade deal and what it will deliver for New Zealand.

You see, TPP was a high-quality deal. Of any trade deal that we’ve had, it was our most lucrative deal negotiated and signed. It had safeguards in it. It was the first free-trade agreement with five countries that are of importance to New Zealand today or of growing importance in the future. We know it was a high-quality deal that was open to others, with safeguards that New Zealanders needed, because there had been very few changes made to it. And, as far as New Zealand’s access to these remaining countries with the revised TPP, there is no change. It was good enough in TPP and it’s good enough today—or the other way round; for the Government today, if the access that New Zealand has through the revised TPP is good enough today, then it must have been good enough in the original TPP because that access has not changed.

We’ve since then seen, as far as TPP is concerned, other countries say they believed it was high quality and they too wanted to join. I ask—this is a question but it really is a statement: if so many other countries were interested in the original TPP deal and that the revised TPP deal has “minor” amendments to it, then actually it was a high-quality deal that was in the best interests of New Zealand. Columbia, the Philippines, Thailand, the Republic of China, South Korea, Indonesia, Sri Lanka—all formerly said they intended to join the TPP. I encourage them to join the revised TPP that this House will pass today.

The original TPP had significant tariff reductions in it. Beef exports to Japan—we will have the lowest tariff of any country in the world. Our beef exporters will be competitive in that market. In kiwifruit, Japan is one of the most lucrative, most important markets for us. The tariff rate will fall away to zero. Under the original TPP, New Zealanders will sell avocados to Mexico, the world’s largest avocado producer. Then, in fact, as far as dairy was concerned, when the US was in there, it’s our number one dairy market. We had substantive gains there as well.

It had a lot of protections in it. The Pharmac model was protected. We’ve heard the current Prime Minister say that actually Pharmac was not up for grabs and that it was well protected, but as part of the negotiation there afterwards, that has been taken away.

The investor-State dispute settlement (ISDS) clause that concerns many in this House and many New Zealanders around the country—the original TPP excluded 80 percent of all foreign direct investment to New Zealand from ISDS under that agreement. As far as the revised TPP is concerned, it is correct that the new Government has signed an additional five side letters to exclude ISDS from those countries. It relates to 80.2 percent of foreign direct investment. So TPP excluded 80 percent of foreign direct investment; the additional five side letters that have been signed by this Government in the revised TPP means an additional 0.2 percent of foreign direct investment to New Zealand is now excluded. Is that significant? No, it’s not. But if that’s what it took to get New Zealand First and Labour to vote for a deal that is high quality and good for New Zealand, we’ll let them go out and talk about the importance of that 0.2 percent, because we are voting for something that’s important in this House.

We had a very long process both with the original TPP and the revised TPP. They were almost identical. There were public meetings around the country for New Zealanders to come and learn and have their say. The difference was there were more than 50 public meetings under the original TPP; there were far fewer under the revised TPP. But that’s not important. In both cases, the public was given an opportunity to have their say. There was a full parliamentary procedure for the original TPP, as there has been for the revised TPP.

The final thing I want to do is talk about how this deal arrived here today. When we had the third reading of the original Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement Amendment Bill, members of the Labour Party stood up and said it was a waste of time, it was over, it was dead, and we were wasting the House’s time. Well, actually, New Zealand officials and me as trade Minister got on planes and we visited countries in short shifts to convince them it was worth going ahead without the US. In a week, we visited Australia, Japan, Mexico, and Singapore. We then went on to Vietnam, Malaysia, and Chile. We held meetings in London with all of the countries. We went to Chile twice. Officials went to Japan on a number of occasions with the Prime Minister. We went back to Japan to convince them that this was a worthwhile deal to go ahead with, without the US.

We held a full meeting in Vietnam where New Zealand was asked to co-chair at ministerial level and where agreement was reached that we would try to get this there by the end of the year. Hundreds of our officials over a decade have worked on the original TPP and the revised TPP. There are far too many to be able to name here today. To all of them, everybody in New Zealand that has a job as a result of trade, who has a company because they trade and they export, owes them a huge debt of gratitude.

In particular, the two people I want to recognise and mention are David Walker, who was a chief trade negotiator over the TPP, who is now our ambassador in the World Trade Organization in Geneva, and Vangelis Vitalis, who came back from Geneva and spearheaded, on behalf of every single revised TPP country, the fight to make sure TPP would be delivered for New Zealand. It’s to them we owe the credit. It’s to them that New Zealanders have their jobs. I absolutely commend this bill to the House.

Malo ni, e Te Māngai o Te Whare. Tēnā koutou katoa. It’s my pleasure as a member of the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee to speak in this third reading of the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (CPTPP) Amendment Bill. Firstly, I want to congratulate Minister Parker for progressing this piece of legislation through the House, and also his officials. I want to concur with the Hon Todd McClay that this process actually started in 2005, so it’s been a long time in its gestation. But, can I say, today it has support mostly across the House. It was passed by a majority in the select committee, but I know that the Green Party, specifically, do not support this agreement.

What this particular bill does, essentially, is to amend the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement Amendment Act, which will enable us to ratify the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), which was signed on 8 March this year in Chile. In doing so, we will join Mexico, Japan, and Singapore, who have progressed their domestic legislation, and once ours goes through we need two more of our partners in this agreement—either Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Malaysia, Peru, or Vietnam—for it then to come into force, 60 days after that sixth country has ratified the agreement.

Throughout the process, I have to say, we have had a lot of submissions. So I want to acknowledge the 577 submissions that we received, and the 33 submitters who presented to the select committee.

The issue about whether we trade or not is a moot point. The reality is we have to. We have to trade because through our trading sector, we provide jobs and opportunities for our farmers, our agricultural sector, our horticultural sector, our manufacturers—

💬 Chris Bishop: We don’t have to trade.

—which essentially—“We don’t have to farm,” says Chris Bishop. It’s one of the things that we do. So the businesses that we have in New Zealand, essentially, now have access to a market that includes 480 million consumers. We, currently, in terms of our exports, are—it totals $70-plus billion per annum. So the opportunity that we see as a country through trade is, obviously, to service those consumers and to provide better opportunities for our business owners and our sectors in New Zealand that are employing New Zealanders and contributing to our country.

I do want to take the opportunity, though, to highlight some of the issues specifically that have been raised through this entire process about how trade necessarily needs to ensure that women are supported in the process, how indigenous peoples are supported in the process of trade, and how labour rights and wages need to reflect, I guess, everybody’s contribution to the process.

There are people who believe that the people who were doing all the work actually don’t share in the spoils of trade. The reason I choose to focus on that is that through that CPTPP coming into force, there will be the creation of specific committees that will look at those specific areas. How is the trade agenda benefiting women? How are women going to be part of this process? How can the CPTPP benefit indigenous communities? What are the specific opportunities?

I think, for me, that’s what makes this piece of legislation and this agreement comprehensive and progressive. For the first time, we actually will be deliberate in our attempts to engage with sectors of society that, historically, possibly have missed out, or their contribution has been underutilised, underestimated, and they haven’t benefited fully as others have. So I do think that this is a new day in terms of the significance of trade, and I particularly say all these things because a lot of the people who came to the committee doubted this agreement and that specific allocation of resources, or the opportunities that they would get through this agreement.

So I support this bill from a place of being hopeful, because I am hopeful that through this agreement all the people that submitted to us who have concerns about it—and I wouldn’t categorise all of them as anti-trade. I think most of them came with good intent, but they actually doubt the whole trickle-down theory of economics. From their perspective, too many people miss out, and so if we can make sure that everybody is a beneficiary of trade through this trade agreement and set a new benchmark for trade agreements, then I think we’ve achieved a lot.

So just finally, thank you to all those who have been involved in bringing this opportunity to fruition, because I know it’s taken, as my colleague the Hon Todd McClay outlined, many, many hours of work by many, many people, and so to all of those involved, I say congratulations. Thank you.

Thank you very much. I’m just contemplating what I’m going to say. The great thing is that I’ve got nine minutes and 54 seconds to work it out. I say that for a particular reason, and without taking away from the seriousness of this bill. We have well covered, as a House and as a committee, this Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (CPTPP) Amendment Bill. That’s the title of the bill, but as we know, the title once this becomes an Act of law is the Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP)—well, it will be then an Act. But we’ve well traversed it.

Like other speakers who have recently taken their seats, there are actually a number of people to thank, and there’s going to be no particular order in this. First and foremost, it is my thanks to the many people who, throughout this process, have submitted to bring us to this point so far. As I’ve probably belaboured far too much, it’s always important, Madam Assistant Speaker—sorry, rather than Madam Chair earlier; this was a really bad start, wasn’t it? This is a very particular bill. It is not the Trans-Pacific Partnership itself; that’s a 6,000-plus page document. It’s something that we had a national interest analysis on a good few months back now, and on which the public were, at that time, able to have their say. As the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee, we were able to hear and report back what were the major concerns to the Parliament, primarily so that, through the Parliament, the executive could understand what those concerns were. Fundamentally, trade agreements like this—in fact, any international agreements—are the exclusive domain of the executive. So I think it’s really important for the public to understand that it’s the rightful prerogative of the executive to undertake treaty negotiations, to decide whether to sign them, and then, as has been done, to bring them to this Parliament for discussion and, where possible, for the Parliament to feed back.

What we’ve been going through recently is a relatively small piece of legislation, this Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (CPTPP) Amendment Bill, which, in effect, allows this international treaty, signed by the Government, to come into force here in New Zealand. It’s probably not lost on people in this House, but it may be for some at home, that New Zealand simply signing an international agreement—it doesn’t matter if it’s a trade agreement, an agreement around copyright, around the law of the sea, or around nuclear weapons; we’ve dealt with, actually, most of those in the select committee so far—doesn’t necessarily bind it into New Zealand law, unless there is a domestic piece of legislation which puts it on to the books. And that’s what this piece of legislation is about.

So to those New Zealanders who have spent a good amount of time—often, they would feel, as they have said to me, repeating themselves through the process. They’ve had heartfelt and strong opinions, more often than not opposing this bill and opposing the trade agreement, which is, I’ll be honest—well, I don’t have to be honest; it’s all on the public record. I’m very much in favour of this trade agreement, even in its current form—

💬 Dan Bidois: That’s good to know.

💬 SIMON O'CONNOR: Yeah. As Dan Bidois from Northcote says, “That’s good to know”, as if there was somehow some doubt, but, actually, it doesn’t take away from the respect of listening, importantly, to those that had to speak and, where necessary, questioning one’s own thoughts and judgments. But through that process, I want to thank the many people who have spoken and, more recently, the almost 600 people who submitted on this bill. To be fair, the submissions were more on the concept of the treaty, the Trans-Pacific Partnership itself, than the technicalities of the bill, although, importantly, some suggestions were made, and we heard from just over 30 of those. So the first, sort of, round of thanks on this third reading goes to the New Zealand public who have made their voices heard. I hope that in some way the select committee’s report at least indicates to this Parliament what we heard and what the Parliament may want to consider in the future.

Thanks, too, goes to the select committee. I’ve mentioned in a few points during the process of this bill that we moved very swiftly to hear from submitters and to bring this back to the Parliament. The fact that, actually, we’re discussing this now, and that we’ve even reached third reading, is indicative of a cooperative approach from all the parties, regardless of their viewpoint—because I know there is at least one party up to this point, though one lives in hope that they might kick in in support. But, actually, regardless of where the final votes go, all the parties worked quite cooperatively in the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee to make sure that we could get this bill back before the Parliament. Otherwise, it could have been up till December. But I really want to stress, on the record and in voice, that the committee didn’t cut any corners and it didn’t expurgate the process. What it did was it just made sure that once the submissions were in, we prioritised hearing from New Zealanders and were able to move also quite swiftly to write up what we’d heard and, importantly, not slow the process down as we reached this third reading.

So thanks to those members of the committee, and to the Ministers, of course—and it is “Ministers”. It is important to recognise the current Minister, the Hon David Parker, and the work that he’s led, but I think it’s also important that we all acknowledge, actually—not just this side of the House—the work of Todd McClay, and before him Tim Groser, to bring the agreement to pretty much where it is now. I know it’s a debating point between what has and has not changed—I certainly don’t see substantial or material changes—but it doesn’t take away from what’s effectively a good agreement with New Zealand and 11 other countries.

Obviously, Ministers don’t act alone. I think it’s been very present to me—and I’m sure the other members of the committee, and hopefully this House—that it’s been the trade negotiators and officials who, to me, have been an absolute stand-out. I indicated very briefly in the committee stage last evening my thanks to them, but the third reading provides a better opportunity. The clarity of their thought and understanding to the select committee, I think, is a great credit to them, not just because it helps us as members of the committee to understand what can at times be a fairly complex system, but it shows the skills that they bring into the negotiation. So, on record, my thanks go to them.

Look, New Zealand has been and remains very keen to be one of the early ratifiers of this agreement. It has been signed off; that’s why we’re at this stage of the bill. Once we pass this piece of legislation, the Minister of trade—and it’s very specific—will instruct either the Sovereign or the Governor-General to ratify the agreement, and then it will be lodged, and, importantly, lodged here in New Zealand. New Zealand as a country is the lodgement country of those 12 interested CPTPP parties, and I think it’s both material and symbolic that New Zealand is one of the early adopters. It’s not purely altruistic. There are benefits to being some of the early signers—if you are amongst the first six, I think there are, if you will, added benefits. I won’t go into all of those, but there is benefit to that, and it probably begins to explain why we are moving as swiftly as we can, despite the fact that I have now taken up eight minutes. But that aside—

💬 Alastair Scott: Keep it up! Keep going.

💬 SIMON O'CONNOR: Oh no, we’ve got more to go; I was just sort of conscious of the—

💬 Hon Christopher Finlayson: Tim Groser could speak for three hours.

💬 SIMON O'CONNOR: That’s quite true.

💬 Hon Christopher Finlayson: All about himself.

💬 SIMON O'CONNOR: Very good. However, it’s good that New Zealand is signing very early, and I would expect—although I do not know—that the Minister will move swiftly after this third reading to talk to the Governor-General and move this through to ratification.

There’ve been a number of issues that have popped up from time to time around this whole agreement: the investor-State dispute settlement (ISDS) disputes. Look, I certainly sit on the side that says, actually, there is a place for these. I think there’s been a lot of fear and misunderstanding around them. They exist, these mechanisms, to protect New Zealanders as much as anyone else. I know it’s easy to blame corporates, but the long and the short of it is that if a New Zealander or New Zealand company invests money into another country, into another sovereign nation, which then does something, effectively, illegal—such as, I don’t know, nationalising those assets—I think a New Zealander would want to have some ability to claim back against that Government, in the same way that if we in New Zealand were to act against our principles, effectively, and take away the rights of a company or another individual, even if they were foreign, there should be some mechanism for that to be addressed.

There’s been talk around the Treaty of Waitangi. That’s always been strongly protected. It’s certainly part of New Zealand’s legal structure. It’s been protected right through this process, as too has Pharmac. I followed that relatively closely when I chaired the Health Committee. Pharmac’s always been protected. There hasn’t been any change there, and I don’t think anyone needs to worry.

I suppose the final part—and it remains a wider, let’s say, philosophical political discussion—is, really, are trade treaties fundamentally about trade, or do they become, I would argue, sticks or levers for other agendas? You can argue the merit of that or not, but there has been some talk in this whole process of whether trade agreements should be used to promote issues on climate change or gender or other things—a discussion for another day. But I just acknowledge and commend this bill to the House.

Kia ora nō tātou. The last speaker, Simon O’Connor, represented as someone who showed endurance and staggered over the line. He managed to fill 10 minutes of his allotted speaking time, much of which will soon be forgotten, but congratulations to him for signalling that this is an effort which enjoys the support of both sides of the House.

It’s good to see that spirit of amity being shown by the other side of the House, because there are so many improvements. I don’t mean to be provocative; it’s not really in my nature. There are so many improvements that have surfaced after the last 12 months and in the capable hands of Minister Parker.

💬 Chris Bishop: How many—how many?

Now, look, I don’t want to be diverted by these churlish questions. The reality is that side of the House picked up a concept initiated by Phil Goff. That side of the House picked up a concept championed by the Labour leader of that time, Helen Clark. It’s only appropriate that the consummation happens as a consequence of some good common-sense, practical advice from my leader and the leadership shown on the global stage by my leader supporting the steward of trade—trade that protects the sovereignty of Aotearoa, trade that protects the interests of New Zealanders. That’s why today the world is going to stare with great admiration—that the current Government has led the Parliament to a point where we can enjoy what we deserve: i.e., one of the nation States that is a signatory to this trans-Pacific deal standing up through the power of Parliament, and the two main parties joining together, and the other party accepting the virtue of the changes that have been made.

These changes represent a great deal of local wealth creation opportunity. In the area that I hail from, nigh on 25,000 people are employed in export-exposed industries. When the rules and the barriers are reduced, then the other provincial investments and the other provincial endowments that will grow over the next several years can flourish and there’ll be fewer barriers over the foreseeable future. It’s happening at a time when a fault line is emerging in terms of one of our great friends, America—not quite sure whether it’s actually going to commit to multilateralism, or is it going to screw up that playbook?

Naturally, David Parker, my leader Winston Peters, and the Prime Minister have spoken incessantly about the importance for a small, open trading nation like New Zealand to fight and defend the importance of these rules. Indeed, those rules are tested from time to time not only at a World Trade Organization level, but the rules that exist within agreements. And this agreement, irrespective of what the Auckland University might say or the mouth of Te Arawa Annette Sykes might say—they’re entitled to their views, but their views are now in the dust heap of history. Because the House has met—and, in fact, I joined forces with the Hon Chris Finlayson in Whangarei nigh on 18 months ago where we presented the upside of this proposal to a small group of business people and a large group of hapū concerned about things to do with the Ngāpuhi claim.

I may be taking a risk saying this, but I thought we were a reasonable duo. We had the Minister advancing the technical qualities of the deal, and I was there to pour oil and calm the waters. Now, I couldn’t calm the waters in so far as the eruption to do with the Kermadecs was concerned, and I couldn’t actually get all the hapūs on side, but I said to them, “When you go home tonight, hapūs, bear in mind that the people that belong to your hapū who work in the freezing works, who work in the forest, who work on the farms, who work on the fishing boats, and who work in those areas that generate foreign exchange, they’re the mouths, they’re the households that I was thinking about.”

Now, the fact that I should have been sharing that opportunity with the Hon Christopher Finlayson might get me in trouble with my leader, but let history record—let history record—that on that particular occasion I was not the most modest of the duo. Mr Finlayson was very modest that day. And when the tempers flared, he said “OK, Jones, although you’re meant to be in the Pacific, we’ll leave you to handle the rest.” Being a pononga, a loyal servant, of that regime—never to be repeated, I might, say for at least another nine to 12 years—I stood up and did some of the heavy lifting.

Anyway, jokes aside, this has been through a long period of gestation, and let us not forget that it started with four countries. Those countries were championed initially by Phil Goff, and the country unwisely tossed that particular Government out, and we suffered nine years. But that has changed and we’re now looking forward to the next nine to 12 years under the current administration as we watch the fruits grow as a consequence of us joining together and passing this piece of legislation. Kia ora tātou.

💬 Hon Christopher Finlayson: I’m available for consultation as from the end of February.

Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. I didn’t want to interrupt Mr Finlayson’s comments. I just thought I’d give it—

💬 Hon Ruth Dyson: No, we’d rather listen to him too, actually.

Would you—would you, madam senior whip! Madam Assistant Speaker, thank you for the opportunity to make comment on the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) ratification bill. That’s what it does: it ratifies the trade agreement that is so important. And, as the previous speaker has mentioned, it has taken so long to get to this point. Reflecting on the build-up to this point, those same speakers that have just spoken so positively on this bill were just not very long ago speaking so aggressively against it. It’s quite interesting—at least, “interesting” is an understatement—to see the swing in the political dial.

💬 Hon Willie Jackson: Oh, it’s different.

They say there’s a difference—Willie Jackson says there’s a difference, and I challenge him to stand up and even name the differences, because Minister Jones could not name the differences, though he too said there were some strong differences. There’s a couple of pages that acknowledge that. There are some minor changes, but the fundamentals of it are the same as what the National Government brought in—

💬 Chris Bishop: No, no. Willie says it’s different.

—under the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement (TPPA). And if Willie Jackson does say it’s different, then let him stand up and take a call and just describe in detail the big changes that the Labour Government has made to enable them and New Zealand First to vote for the ratification of this bill.

I too would also like to acknowledge all those people that have been involved over the years, as Minister Jones said, and hundreds and hundreds of people, thousands and thousands of hours, having to deal with the political swing from one pendulum point to another but still determined to make sure that this multilateral trade agreement takes place, because you can imagine how difficult it is to get, you know, quite frankly, more than one or two people to agree. It’s difficult enough getting agreement with your partner across the dinner table. Imagine how difficult it is to get a whole family together to decide on where to go on holiday. So I can just only imagine how difficult it is to get the 10 parties together to agree on the whole entire framework and agreement.

We talk positively about this trade agreement, and it absolutely is, but remember that in a negotiated agreement we must be giving something up in return for the stuff that we receive. It’s not all one way. It is good and, overall, the pluses outweigh the minuses, and that’s why we participate, and that’s why all those parties participate. That’s why in a bilateral relationship you can do certain things, but you can’t get everything done in a bilateral relationship. Often it’s useful to have a third party or a fourth party, in this case 10 parties, to be able to cross-subsidise—“cross-subsidise” is not quite the right word, but to be able to agree multilaterally to enable those two original parties to benefit from the agreement.

I’ll just give you one example. So, we know that we’ve got greater access to have our beef go into Japan. That’s because the tariffs in Japan—big tariffs—are going to be reduced over quite a long period of time. That hurts the Japanese beef producer, because at the moment they’re protected. New Zealand beef, though it’s competitive because we’ve a cheaper and effective and a high-quality product—we can’t get it into Japan because of the tariff structures that are in place. So the Japanese beef farmer is going to see more and more New Zealand product on the shelves in Japan. So that group is one of the losers in this trade agreement. Overall, that’s great for New Zealand, but we may not have been able to give a lot to Japan because we’re only a little nation. But perhaps the agreement has enabled Japan to sell more product into, say, Canada.

That’s a good thing, and I’m reflecting on, and I want to come back to, my point relating to the definition of ice wine. The definition of ice wine can now only be used for wine from grapes that have been frozen on the vine. Now, when you read that, you think, that is definitely a plus for Canada. So they’re going to win because of that clause. They’re going to win at the cost of New Zealand winemakers, because we can’t freeze grapes on a vine and really turn it into ice wine. When we see a dessert wine, it’s usually botrytised wine—that’s the fungus that shrinks the grapes to concentrate the sugars, and then you make the wine from that. But those grapes haven’t been frozen—certainly not frozen on the vine. But in Canada, they have a situation where you can get these dehydrated grapes late in the season and they’re frozen, which gives the grape a characteristic. Now, prior to this, we could call our botrytised wine or even a non-botrytised wine—a sweet wine, say—a New Zealand ice wine, because it’s just a name; it’s nothing specific, and there’s not a determination of what that means. But now, we are not—

💬 Dan Bidois: Sounds good.

It is a bloody good wine, actually. It’s sweeter than a rosé, but not a rosé. But now we will not be able to do that. Now, only those people who can produce this wine from frozen grapes on the vine—you can’t take the grapes off the vine and freeze them; they’ve got to be frozen on the vine. So that’s a win for the Canadians and a loss for New Zealand winegrowers. It’s a very small loss, but that give-up, that loss to our market place, is part of the give-up which enables us to have access to the Japanese beef market, for example.

So my point here is that multilateral agreements can have benefits that are not necessarily available in bilateral agreements. Now, bilateral agreements are very important as well—no doubt about that. As Minister Jones said himself, the Chinese agreement, the first free-trade agreement with China—pioneers in free-trade agreements, if you like.

My second point I just want to reiterate is that there are things that we have given up. There are things that other nations have given up. There are things in industries, in whole industries, that they are giving up because their tariffs will be reduced. Unfortunately, there are some countries that want to increase tariffs, and that is to protect and to surround and to put them in their own different parallel universe in a way.

💬 Dan Bidois: In South America.

Yeah, unfortunately, the Americans had that mentality at the time, and so I wonder—and it would be great if they could join the CPTPP, and there’s nothing to stop them, except for the fact that they would also have to give up some access, give up something, for them to join in the party. It would become a party of 11.

The Tariff Act is also affected, and, as I say, the tariffs are barriers to trade. It’s fantastic to see that the Labour Party and the New Zealand First Party are voting for this, because I recall, just a few years ago, when the Labour guys were voting against the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement, there was an ability for one or two of the Labour members to vote for the agreement. I think it was Mr Shearer who voted for the agreement. Mr Finlayson might have a better memory than me. Mr Shearer was able to vote for the TPP agreement, to cross the floor and support—

💬 Hon Christopher Finlayson: It was Goff, wasn’t it?

Was it Goff? Goff did—that’s right. Thank you. And that’s fantastic, but now it’s great to see that they’re all voting the same way that Mr Goff voted those years ago. It’s great to see the pendulum swing—that, essentially, 90 percent of us are in favour of this free-trade agreement. We know that it’s great for the economy. It’s great for all those people that Louisa Wall referred to. It raises the tide, it increases the economy, it creates jobs, and it is just simply a wonderful thing.

Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. I stand once again as the lone voice in this House maintaining a principled opposition to the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement (TPPA), to the Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement (CPTPPA), and to this legislation which essentially implements one and the same agreement.

I carry with a heavy heart the voices of the majority of New Zealanders who voted last election for political parties in opposition to this deal, and the overwhelming majority of those who turned up to the treaty examination process before the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee, to the bill’s forum before the select committee, opposing this deal.

We are a small nation. We need trade, and the Green Party is all for trade that serves the interests of New Zealanders and addresses the pressing concerns of our time. We don’t support a deal that marries our nation to a failed neo-liberal global order that Kiwis voted against this election. We were promised a transformed deal. We were told over and over again by the coalition parties that this was changed—that our democracy, our human rights, our workers’ rights, and our Treaty of Waitangi were now protected—and that all of those risks had vanished, and it turned out that that was mostly spin. We found out all too late that even the most egregious threat to our democracy, the provisions in this deal that provide for a system sitting above our law, giving foreign multi-national corporates the right to sue our lawmaking body—if we legislate in the interests of New Zealand over their profit margins, even the investor-State dispute settlement (ISDS) provisions in respect to the investor chapter, remain exactly the same.

So our ability to adopt transformative progressive change for New Zealand is under threat. There’s good reason we don’t let business sue the Government to protect its profits, because health policy, education policy, and environmental policy should focus on providing the best hospitals and schools and protecting our natural environment, not protecting the profits of an elite few. But that’s exactly what we’re giving away to foreign corporates today. They can hold these privileges over us and over future Governments. That’s chilling.

The only real change in respect of the ISDS clauses—and we’ve been told there’s been all of this real change—is that a few member States have signed side agreements, saying that their corporates, their investors, won’t access this. And we’ve been told over and over again that this includes Australia—that’s 80 percent of our trade—but we know that multinational corporations can use their bases anywhere to sue us. Australia itself found that out when it was sued by Philip Morris, using its Singaporean base. That could happen here, and it doesn’t even need to happen; it’s the fact that they hold that risk over our necks.

What’s particularly chilling, as a Green, is that in 85 percent of cases around the world where similar provisions have been used to stop progressive policy, it’s been to stop environmental protections. Yesterday, I proposed a change that would require at least a mitigation of this risk, that at least if new members are about to join this agreement, our Government would require them to sign side agreements. That was declined. The Government has said that it won’t be entering any new trade agreements that include ISDS clauses, an admission of the risk that these provisions do pose to us. So why not start now? At this moment in global history, can we really afford to give primacy to the profit margins of multinational corporations over the threat of climate change?

In fact, this agreement, if we’re talking about trade, isn’t all that much about trade—the trade of goods and services, which is what most people would think. I think most New Zealanders would be shocked to find that the overwhelming majority of the 6,000 pages of this agreement are not about trade; they are about protecting the privileges of multinationals. They allow them, in this data-driven economy that we live in today, to hold their data offshore to opt out of our privacy law. New Zealand has agreed not to regulate future unknown technologies. Who does that serve, and what does it have to do with trade?

Why are we buying into a system that has been proven to be dangerously deregulated, causing the incredible loss of the last global financial crisis? Even the protections that we did get, these changes that came via the suspended provisions, one of which is to protect Pharmac’s ability to regulate prices and quality of medicine in New Zealand—even that, we’ve been told by officials in the select committee, could go if new members join. Another one of my proposed changes was to bring the agreement back to the select committee if new member States are going to join, so that we will know the terms they are joining on. That was declined. So, today, this House is signing up to give up its parliamentary oversight of something as important as Pharmac.

Why are we upholding such a corrupt financial system that we have promised we would move away from? We have been told that the agreement is progressive and comprehensive because it has some workers’ rights and some environmental protections included in it already, and I do want to address that, because those provisions are expressed in such vague, such opaque, terms that they have proven unenforceable. Again, around the world, where exactly the same provisions have been in trade agreements and people have tried to use them to protect workers’ rights or the environment, in 48 cases only four have been successful. They are different to the detailed, enforceable, hard-law nature of the investor protections, and we know that. That is why this deal has faced such overwhelming opposition around the world, an outpouring of people on the street here in New Zealand.

We know that the EU member nations don’t agree to trade agreements like this. They don’t agree to ISDS clauses because their human rights protections, their commitment to climate action, sits above this kind of trade law and they won’t enter it. New Zealand should be placing itself among those nations who are seeking to find a fair way to trade.

Our hope and intention as the Green Party is that trade agreements like the TPPA or the CPTPPA—trade agreements that require this kind of legislation—don’t happen again, that this is the last of its kind. I will be working to introduce changes that require trade to be fair and require trade agreements to be entered into in a transparent and democratic way in future. They should be contingent on our ability to protect human rights, combat climate change, and do right by tangata whenua.

We need to make trade fair, fit to serve our 21st century purpose and concerns, with all the lessons of that failed neo-liberal system. But, sadly, today, with this bill, we are passing no ordinary trade law; we are giving up our democratically mandated sovereignty in this Parliament, giving it up to multinational corporates. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker, for the opportunity to add a few words of my own to the debate on the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP)—excuse me, the CPTPP, or the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership. I was going to note, actually—and have inadvertently made my first point, which is that that it seems like déjà vu all over again, in the famous words of Yogi Berra—it has been some time now that this nation and indeed this Parliament, certainly prior to my time of arriving here, has been debating this particular agreement and now the variation to it, or, according to taste, perhaps a new agreement based on the old one.

Much has been made of the different acronyms: CPTPP versus TPP versus TPPA, and so forth. I would actually like to focus on a few key words that have been associated with this agreement and the parliamentary process that goes along with that.

The first phrase that I would like to pick out is “export exposed”, which was used by a speaker in this debate recently to describe areas of New Zealand that are exposed to exports, and hence will be beneficiaries of this particular trade agreement. I might add that not only are such areas exposed to trade but the fact that they are able to trade well—an ability that will be enhanced by this agreement—is that they are, in fact, reliant on trade, too. It’s almost a truism to note that New Zealand, as a small country at the end of the world, is very reliant on its export economy, but, actually, we could go further and say that an area that is reliant on trade is New Zealand itself, because all areas of New Zealand are in turn reliant on those areas that are particularly engaged in trading commodities with other nations’ peoples. Briefly, then, the Helensville electorate is one such area that not only trades directly—various businesses are contained within its boundaries—but it is also reliant on the hard work of our cousins across this great land who also engage in exports, and thereby increase the common good, or the commonwealth, if I may use that term.

Focusing on the words “the agreement”, it’s tempting to say that at times the TPP and/or the CPTPP could actually more accurately be described as a disagreement, but that’s really reflective of a domestic political phenomenon as opposed to the way in which the agreement has been discussed, debated, and, ultimately, concluded by various nation States around the world, of which New Zealand is, of course, one. An agreement in international law is often described as a treaty. It’s international by definition, but it’s not dissimilar to a contract that private parties might enter into. Like a contract between individual persons, whether legal or natural, it is a meeting of minds, or perhaps a herding of cats—to pick up on the theme that a colleague noted earlier—given the difficulties sometimes and the complexity of the different nations and their respective interests, and, dare I say it, their respective politicians complicating matters when it comes to having an agreement come into force.

The complexity involved actually gives me an opportunity to note the hard work done by many people within this institution, and I refer to the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee staff as well as those of us fortunate to serve on it, and Ministers various across two parliaments now—or two executives, more properly—but also many who have engaged in the process very thoroughly and very passionately. I thank and commend all of those who have done so, on whichever side of the debate they have found themselves at any given time.

Some useful contributions, to my mind, were made in relation to the constitutional aspects by various submitters to the select committee but also those in civil society, who have engaged very diligently. I hope Mr Bruce King will not mind me mentioning him in this connection as someone who has advocated strongly and clearly for further parliamentary scrutiny than is currently the case for international agreements. My own views on that—I hope reflecting those of my party—are not only that in this case that’s not something we have an appetite for, given the benefits of the trade deal, but also, speaking personally, if there is to be a wider constitutional discussion and change regarding international treaties and the way they are entered into, which is, currently, essentially by the executive and signed off by Parliament, then that should be part of a broader discussion that we might have if some person or party intends to commence that.

The fact that it is a multilateral agreement I think is worth noting. It is literally across many different parties, and I’ve talked about the complexity of that. If we’re talking about, for example, New Zealand beef being a beneficiary of that, well, there have been many beefs that New Zealand has had with other countries and their respective negotiators, but our negotiators have acted very skilfully to maximise this country’s benefits and minimise this country’s costs. But it is, of course, in the nature of any kind of agreement, and in an international treaty no less so, that there is give and take. There are pros and cons. So when we talk about the consideration of this agreement, we talk not only of the way that the agreement is considered by this place in the sense that Parliament is scrutinising the bill, and giving it consideration in that sense, but also in the technical, legal meaning of the word “consideration” which is, in the context of a contract, something which is given up by one side in exchange for something given up by the other side or, in this case, sides—plural.

So there’s a formal requirement in a contract that something is given up—that’s almost by definition. Certainly, that’s what our domestic law states, although that can of course be circumvented by way of a peppercorn type of consideration. I should have looked up before I started speaking as to whether there are any literal peppercorn farmers in the Helensville electorate. This would have been a good opportunity—

💬 Greg O'Connor: You should have done a lot of things before you started speaking.

—to acknowledge them. But notwithstanding the feedback that I’m receiving in real time on my speech from one of the Mr O’Connors who inhabit this Chamber—“Mr O’Connor the Third”, perhaps—I will proceed with noting that New Zealand is indeed giving up something. That’s inevitable and natural in an agreement in which we are also gaining something. So there are pros and cons—literally, things that are for and things that are against—and it’s quite right that people engaging in the debate and discussion about the TPP, whether a political party or, perhaps, interested or even concerned citizens, but it is important that we all do acknowledge through the process that we will gain much and we will give up something. That, as I say, is not only inevitable but also natural and is not, in itself, something that we should fear or resile from.

My colleague Alastair Scott gave a very good dissertation on intellectual property in relation to wine—particularly ice wine—and it brought to mind the fact that a rosé by any other name would smell as sweet. So while there are restrictions, of course, in the way that we can talk about certain products that we formulate or products that we produce, so to speak, none the less the world will continue to turn in the way that our people will continue to produce these things and sell these things, offshore as well as onshore, and we will all be the beneficiaries of that.

Part of the benefit that we derive as a country is in relation to the fact that these industries are supported such that they can also provide, with the benefits of economies of scale, domestically. But also, of course, they’re paying taxation to our Government, and that’s revenue that’s needed for many different things that whichever Government of the day inevitably does need. So, through various forms of GST, income tax, and so forth, it’s a good thing in itself that we have a productive economy—“productive”, of course, in the literal sense that we are producing goods and services that those who are overseas wish to purchase from our people.

I will conclude on my theme of examining particular words because, of course, the words of the treaty itself are important. The words of the law that is ratifying the treaty are important as well. There are some suspensions, which is a point of difference, I note, between different parties within the Government, so it’s a suspension of disbelief, I suppose, as far as Labour and New Zealand First go, given the before and after analysis that we can provide in terms of their positions pre- and post-election. But also there are some aspects of the agreement that can and may come back into force. That detail has been well canvassed by other speakers before me in this debate, so I’ll leave it there, except to congratulate all those involved and say that we look forward to the benefits and we accept the costs of this agreement going forward.

This is a split call—five minutes.

Malo ni, Mr Assistant Speaker, in recognition of Tokelauan Language Week. As I rise to take a call on the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (CPTPP) Amendment Bill, I want to begin by addressing some of the rather flippant comments addressed to us on this side of the House by members opposite who have said that it’s been a pendulum swing, a swing in political something that I didn’t quite catch—indicating that it’s been a rather arbitrary decision made by this Government to now support the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) when we didn’t support the Trans-Pacific Partnership initially. I want to begin by saying that a Government—any Government, and this Government definitely—has the duty to govern in a way that we advance the status of our people to ensure that we further the well-being of New Zealanders and, of course, to be a good global citizen as well. So it wasn’t an arbitrary decision at all.

We had five bottom lines. There were reasons why we opposed the agreement that was previously ratified and signed by the previous Government, and I’ll get to that in a minute. I also want to point out from discussions with many people outside of this House some of the benefits and the importance of trade to the person on the street, to the average New Zealander. Now, the export sector in New Zealand sustains over half a million New Zealand jobs. It is an important driver of productivity, of employment, and of incomes in New Zealand. Research tells us that productivity per New Zealand worker is 36 percent greater if they’re in a firm that is exporting, compared to if they’re in one that isn’t. Independent economic modelling tells us that once the CPTPP is fully in effect, we’re expected to see New Zealand’s real GDP increase by $4 billion. The opportunity cost of not signing up is a $173 million decline in our GDP. So there is an argument there, of course, that signing up to this would be beneficial.

What we had an issue with previously was the cost that this would pose to New Zealand, and that’s where the five bottom lines came into play. Before I get into that—just very briefly—what does this bill do? Basically, it makes changes that are necessary for New Zealand to ratify the CPTPP as it is now, post-negotiation, by this Government. As others have also pointed out, of course, it’s a free-trade agreement that involves New Zealand and 10 other countries in the Asia-Pacific region.

Now, the bottom lines that I just want to touch upon: the first was meaningful gains in tariff reductions and market access, and that’s what we have seen. Tariffs will be eliminated on New Zealand exports to CPTPP economies, with a few exceptions, but it also means that our exporters are not disadvantaged when it comes to important, high-value markets like Japan that we haven’t previously had trade agreements with.

The protection of Pharmac continues, which is retained, and, incredibly importantly—and as I began—the duty of a Government is to look out for the interests of our people, and one of our bottom lines was the ability to restrict house sales to foreigners and to govern in our national interest. That was one that we stuck by and that this Government fought for and advocated for. So when members opposite claim that there’s not been much change, I refer you to the 22 suspensions within the CPTPP and, of course, the fact that we have passed the Overseas Investment Amendment Bill—which came into effect on 22 October—that actually allows us to do just that.

The fourth: upholding Te Tiriti o Waitangi. The clause was almost unheard of internationally because of the strong rights that it provides in terms of regulating for the benefits of an indigenous population here.

The final point: the investor-State dispute settlement (ISDS) clauses, which, of course, most of the submissions pointed to. Not perfect—the Government considers that we do have robust safeguards to protect Government’s rights to regulate and prevent the abuse of ISDS by investors but of course shares the overarching concerns about the fact that it even exists.

But I come back to the point that I made at the start: it’s about weighing the costs and benefits. Is it perfect? No. Are there significant gains for New Zealanders as a result of the renegotiated CPTPP? Yes. Is the opportunity cost of not signing up high? Yes. As such, I feel that this bill—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Adrian Rurawhe): Order! The member’s time has expired.

Today is a great day to be a member of this House, because today this House gets to reaffirm its commitment to free trade. When the rest of the world is looking at protectionism and rates of higher trade barriers, New Zealand is saying “No thanks.” New Zealand is going to say that we want a country that is open to the world, where our firms and businesses thrive internationally, and where our people have the opportunities to live in a globalised world that we live in today—opportunities like Lifestream International, which is a business in my electorate of Northcote. Lifestream will be able to take advantage of this bill to help them expand their global footprint even further, therefore providing far more income back to its New Zealand shareholders and staff.

Another company is Fraser’s Car Ltd, which is a company that sells Lotus replicas globally.

💬 David Seymour: Fraser, singular.

That’s right, and the honourable member David Seymour owns one of those vehicles. Thankfully, out of this bill, more people throughout the world are going to be able to have an opportunity to drive the vehicles from my electorate.

The benefits of the Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (CPTPP) are very clear from where I sit: up to $4 billion—bottom-line dollars—in our GDP, estimated by 2040. An extra $2.5 billion in exports is also predicted by 2040. Jobs and opportunities for all of our kids in the 11 countries that make up the CPTPP, nine of which I’ve travelled to myself—and I must say they’re fantastic countries, and I do hope New Zealanders get an opportunity to go on exchange and work in these countries and bring these foreign skills back to New Zealand.

I do want to acknowledge that this has been an effort of multiple Governments throughout the years, starting from Helen Clark’s time, back in 2005, right through to the current Government. I want to acknowledge the support from two parties of the opposite side of the House: the New Zealand First and Labour parties. I’d like to acknowledge all of the Ministers of trade—Minister McCully, Minister Todd McClay, and now Minister David Parker—for their commitment to this. I’d like to acknowledge the commissioners and everybody at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade for helping to push this through, particularly at a time when this trade deal could have fallen apart, when the USA announced that they were pulling out. New Zealand stuck in there. There were a lot of sceptics out there—of which, I was one of those sceptics—and I’m very happy that this Government and the effort of our public servants was steadfast to bring this to a conclusion today.

This is a unique agreement. Despite what the Green Party members say, this is progressive. It sets the standards for trade in the Asia-Pacific region. It lowers barriers not only for goods but also for services. So whether you’re a doctor or an engineer or a baker or a butcher, you’ll be able to take advantage of these countries and the opportunities that it has for our nation.

I do want to say—look, we need to get this done today and I’m very supportive of this bill. But in terms of the next steps, we do need to continue to build more trade agreements in the future, so I urge the Government to make sure that they’ve got a pipeline of trade agreements, because this country is a trading nation, as we know, but our future depends on reaching out to the globalised economy and making sure that we are integrated and positioned to take advantage of that.

The second is really making sure that we get the most out of this trade agreement, and that means providing information to all of our small businesses on the opportunities to trade in these countries, and making sure that we reduce the non-tariff barriers in particular. So I commend this bill to the House. Mr Assistant Speaker, thank you very much.

This is a split call. Five minutes—I call Jamie Strange.

Mr Assistant Speaker, thank you for the opportunity to take a call on the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (CPTPP) Amendment Bill. This certainly is, as the previous speaker, Dan Bidois, said, a very exciting day for this Parliament, because we are going to be one of the early signatories to this agreement. That signals leadership and, at a time when many countries are moving towards isolationism, we are moving more towards working together. I was particularly proud of the comments that our Prime Minister, Jacinda Ardern, made recently when she talked about some of the false promises of protectionism. She said international trade has helped bring millions of people out of poverty around the world, but she also noted that we must all work to ensure that the benefits of trade are distributed fairly across societies. This coalition Government have worked hard to ensure that all New Zealanders will benefit from this agreement.

New Zealand has a proud history around free trade. As many people will know, in 2008, we signed the first free-trade agreement (FTA) with China. The previous speaker asked about a pipeline of trade agreements. Well, there are many discussions going on in this space—discussions currently with the UK, the EU, and also India.

What this agreement does is it provides access to 10 key markets, including Japan and Canada. I’d just like to highlight a few companies from my neck of the woods who would benefit from this agreement—just a couple of companies from the Waikato region. So Gallagher Group, who are fairly well known across the country for fencing, technology, and security, will certainly benefit from this agreement; Company-X around software solutions; and Progressive Hydraulics around manufacturing hydraulic systems. This is about us as a country keeping relationships with other countries and building on new relationships, and our businesses will certainly benefit and all New Zealanders will benefit around this.

Early ratification means an immediate levelling of the playing field for New Zealand exporters in some crucial markets. A couple of these key examples—one of them is kiwifruit. New Zealand incurs a tariff of 6.4 percent into Japan. Chile, a key competitor in this high-value market, pays zero tariff because of its current FTA with Japan. So the coalition Government is excited that we will have an FTA with Japan which will help our kiwifruit exporters. The Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership will also immediately remove Australian beef exporters’ current tariff advantage over New Zealand in the Japanese market. This has resulted in a decline in New Zealand’s exports, and the loss of $53 million to the industry per annum. We’ve heard about wine today, so I’d just like to highlight some of the benefits in that area.

It’s very important that as a country we don’t move towards isolationism and protectionism, but move towards cooperation and working with other countries. As a small nation we’re absolutely dependent on trade. There’s only a certain amount of products that we’re able to produce—that we should produce—in terms of comparative advantage, so it’s absolutely vital that free-trade agreements like this are signed, that they continue to be signed, and that we continue to play our part in a global community. I commend this bill to the House.

I call David Seymour—five minutes.

Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker. I congratulate the member who’s just resumed his seat, Jamie Strange, on a very fine speech. I think in the quality of his presentation we can see a lot about the future of the Labour Party and its prospects. Well done to him. I want to join with almost all members of this House—I will get to the exceptions in a minute—in saying it is a great day. The history of free trade is a history of prosperity and of civility. As Adam Smith once said, you never see a dog voluntarily exchange a bone with another dog. To trade freely and voluntarily is to be human, it is to be civil, and to do it across international borders is to be peaceful.

As Frederic Bastiat said, when goods don’t cross borders, soldiers do. It’s important that we meet our friends around the world and trade value for value, and get stronger together. As David Ricardo pointed out—

💬 Hon Christopher Finlayson: Stop name-dropping.

—even nations that may not be particularly prosperous or productive are wealthier when they can trade with countries that have a greater opportunity cost than they do. Even Paul Krugman—if Mr Finlayson would like one more name-drop—was in favour of free trade before he completely lost his mind. But who is it in this House that is opposed to free trade? Well, Donald Trump is not here, but he has his allies in the Green Party. The Green Party think that it is an assault on the sovereignty of this Parliament and of New Zealanders to have a trade agreement.

Well, let me put it in perspective. Let me put three societies to you with a very similar economy and population to that of New Zealand. Let me give you Denmark, British Columbia, and Colorado. Now, I can tell you, even the Green parties in those states or provinces or countries are in favour of being integrated into a wider economic unit. The Green party in Copenhagen does not campaign on Denmark leaving the EU. The Green party in Colorado does not say that it’s an affront to the sovereignty of Coloradans to be part of the United States, you know. The Green party in Colorado are not separatists in the Trumpian fashion—they leave that to the Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand—and the Green party in British Columbia is not advocating that British Columbia should leave the federation of Canada to protect their sovereignty from trade. They’re all Green parties that are sensible—sensible Green parties that believe that trade makes us prosperous, that trade makes us peaceful, and that trade makes us human. They accept there’s a trade-off that, actually, a society has to have some common rules with other people across the seas or across land borders in order to have that civilising trade.

This is how absurd the position of the Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand is. They want a society of 5 million people to be separate from the rest of the world economically because they think it’s a slight on our sovereignty to have an agreement with more than 4 million or 5 million people—a totally absurd situation that no one in British Columbia, Denmark, or Colorado would take seriously for a moment, even in their Green parties.

On the other hand, the ACT Party is proud to have stood in this House, now, for 22 years and counting, so far, and been in favour of free trade with free people, trading value for value, getting stronger together, and making our world peaceful, making our world civilised, and making our world human through the voluntary exchange of goods and services under agreed rules. I’m so happy that the Labour Party, who only a few short years ago were pulling stunts about Chinese-sounding names, have all grown up. They’ve got to Parliament, and they’re supporting—

Order! The member’s time has expired.

Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker. In the generosity of spirit, maybe the Labour Party would give David Seymour the last call as he only got a split call. But—

💬 David Seymour: I could go another 10 minutes easy, mate.

Ha, ha! I just want to, first of all, congratulate the Hon David Parker on making sure that we got this legislation through the House as quickly as possible. We want the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) to be triggered and activated as quickly as possible because it is very important for Kiwis who are selling their services and products on to the global market to have a level playing field, and that’s what these high-quality trade agreements provide. They provide a level playing field for us.

I’d just like to go back very quickly, as it will be the last call I’m taking on this bill, and acknowledge—and we haven’t actually acknowledged him yet in this House—Sir Lockwood Smith. Sir Lockwood Smith was our first trade Minister in the National Party to actually begin the initial negotiations on the TPP. So I just wanted to make sure that he was acknowledged, and I remember standing in this House back in 2011, making my maiden speech and acknowledging him and the work that he’d done to get this TPP agreement under way. So it’s nice to be able to be standing in the House in 2018 and seeing that the original agreement that he started is now going to be passed today in this House.

I want to acknowledge Tim Groser, who took over the work from Sir Lockwood Smith—the Hon Sir Lockwood Smith, or the Rt Hon Sir Lockwood Smith—and he did an outstanding job. That’s when—

💬 Hon Christopher Finlayson: Dr The Rt Hon Sir Lockwood Smith.

Oh, Dr The Rt Hon Sir Lockwood Smith—thank you for that correction. I just want to acknowledge David Walker, who at that stage was the chief negotiator, along with Tim Groser. There were several times where that agreement almost fell over, and there were long days, long nights where they worked very hard to get the agreement back on track and keep it moving forward. So I want to acknowledge them and the role that they played.

Finally, I want to acknowledge the Hon Todd McClay, because when America pulled out of this agreement, it looked like the agreement was going to fall over entirely. I remember, clearly, going to a debate in Wellington, or it was a panel discussion, with the Hon Grant Robertson, and it was soon after the Americans had pulled out and the agreement had virtually fallen over. I said “Look, I prefer to see things with a glass half full, and I think there’ll be a way of being able to maybe get this agreement back on track if we can get some support from some of our partners.”, and Grant Robertson turned around and said, “Don’t be an idiot. Move on. Forget about it. You’ve failed. It’s all gone. It’s not going to happen.” So I’m very pleased to be able to stand in the House today and say that, actually, through the hard work of Todd McClay and his team from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade—and I want to acknowledge the Japanese Government and their Prime Minister, who lent his support to this and had a major role to play—there was life breathed back into the agreement and it was brought back online.

Finally, I want to acknowledge the Hon David Parker, because he has carried it on. He inherited that momentum. He inherited a 6,000-page agreement, and he’s shepherded that through and brought it back into the House for us to be able to pass it, as a Parliament, in its third reading today.

But I do want to make a couple of observations, because I’ve listened to some of the previous speakers who are wondering why we have taken the position in saying that, largely, this agreement has not changed, and there are a couple of reasons for that.

💬 Hon Christopher Finlayson: Because it hasn’t.

One is that—that’s right. It hasn’t. You just heard the Greens’ speaker get up and say that they are still firmly against the bill. They’ve been consistent in their position—

💬 Hon Judith Collins: Oh well, that’s a good sign, then. We’ll definitely support it.

—that’s right—on this, but their two biggest partners throughout the process in terms of trying to get this agreement through Parliament were the Labour Party and, actually, one of their best spokespersons, and someone who campaigned very actively, was Professor Jane Kelsey. Now, the Labour Party, of course, have changed their position on it, and that’s the responsible thing to do. With things like trade and national security, where we can, they should be bipartisan—there should be bipartisan agreement. But the funny thing is that the Labour Party’s two partners, the Greens and Professor Jane Kelsey, have said, “This is the same agreement. There’s been hardly any change to this agreement, and that is why we’re not going to support it.”

So when the Labour members stand in the House and say “Oh no, we’ve changed our position now. We are going to support it because we’ve been able to implement and make changes.”—no, you haven’t. In a 6,000-page agreement, there are two additional pages, and there are two changes to the name. It’s now “Comprehensive and Progressive”, and we still are yet to find out exactly what the “Comprehensive”—

💬 Hon Willie Jackson: I’ll tell you about them.

—“and Progressive” actually means. So if the Hon Willie Jackson is going to take a call, maybe he can answer those questions. I hope that he will.

The investor-State dispute settlement (ISDS) provisions—these are very common in just about every trade agreement globally. The ISDS provisions, by the way, have never been triggered by us. We’ve never actually had to use them. The only real trade disputes that we’ve had, for example, were, if you think back to when our exporters couldn’t get our apples into Australia. We went to arbitration over that, and, actually in every arbitration we’ve entered into, the finding has always been in our favour. So they actually work for us because, generally speaking, as a country and nation, we’re pretty fair in how we deal with people.

But the ISDS provisions—and what was lost on the Opposition was that, actually, they provided much greater protections for our own people, for Kiwi companies that wanted to export their services and their products into overseas countries as trading partners, because if they didn’t have the ISDS provision, which is an independent arbitration process, it meant that they had to rely on the courts and the justice system in those countries. Actually, we are very lucky here in New Zealand that we’ve got one of the best justice systems and the best courts and the best judges in the world. We are largely—in fact, on all the indexes we are right at the top in terms of no corruption and a very fair, open, transparent system.

💬 Hon Christopher Finlayson: Who appointed most of them?

Yeah, to a point—that’s true. The problem is that with a lot of the countries that we trade with—although that relationship is very important and we want to trade with them—actually, our people are carrying an enormous amount of risk, because often their own justice system, their own court systems, are not as transparent and are not corruption free. So that poses enormous risk to our people actually trading in those countries.

Let’s give you an example. If we had a New Zealand company that decided to go to a country where they made a big investment in property or plant—you know, hugely capital intensive—and then, all of a sudden, that Government decided to nationalise and seize the assets, then without the ISDS provisions, they’ve got no avenue, they’ve got no pathway to be able to actually fight that and dispute that. So the ISDS provisions actually provided us more protections than they took away. What have the Government done about the ISDS provisions? Nothing. All they’ve done in this agreement is said that if there’s a contract involved between the Government and another country, then that can’t be brought into any ISDS dispute. So, effectively, it means that, actually, our Government is just as exposed to the ISDS provisions—we’re just as exposed to the ISDS provisions—as we were in the original agreement. And, like I said, ISDS actually, more often than not, works in our favour.

So I just want to say that I just finally want to commend the bill to the House. These free-trade agreements are very important for us. I want to acknowledge Phil Goff, who put the Chinese free-trade agreement together. But it’s important—it’s very important—that there is bipartisan support across the House when we are working on and developing these free-trade agreements.

Lastly, I just want to mention the Korean free-trade agreement, and maybe a comment to the Greens and New Zealand First who, again, did not support that agreement. If you look at it now, the Korean free-trade agreement that was passed maybe three years ago is benefiting this country by tens of millions of dollars every year in our increased trade with Korea. If there was really an issue or problem with that free-trade agreement, then I’m sure that New Zealand First or the Greens would have stood up and they would have made a case against it, but there’s not. These free-trade agreements are very important to us as a small trading nation down the bottom of the world, and I commend this bill to the House. Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker.

Tēnā koe, Mr Assistant Speaker. I’m very pleased to be able to take this final call in this debate and in the passage of this piece of legislation, and, in doing so, I feel a small sense of poetry in that it was my successor as the member for Mt Roskill the Hon Phil Goff who, of course, was one of the integral political players in the development—

💬 Hon Judith Collins: Predecessor.

💬 Hon Christopher Finlayson: Predecessor.

Well, who knows what might happen in the future.

💬 Hon Judith Collins: Why? Are you going?

In many, many years. Phil Goff is a politician of considerable longevity, as should be clear already.

My predecessor, Phil Goff, was, of course, one of the politicians who was central to the negotiation of the original Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement (TPPA). I well remember discussions with Phil, when I was his electorate chairperson before becoming a member, during which I expressed my concerns in the fact that I wasn’t across the line in respect of the TPPA at that time. That was a position which was shared by many on this side of the House and, in fact, was shared by many across New Zealand and many internationally.

One of the points I want to come to in my comments in this closing speech is to say that for those of us who believe in the principles and the benefits of free and open trade, and I believe that the vast majority of members in this House do, and for those of us who see the benefits flowing through in a particular way through this agreement—and they are manifold in respect of market access, the lifting of quotas and tariffs, and economic benefits for New Zealand exporters—we can’t just ignore the concerns that the community holds about these agreements.

The concerns that were held by many at the time that the TPPA came to the fore were real ones. We had tens of thousands of New Zealanders who marched to express their concerns. We had public opinion polling which showed that it was a pretty even split across the country between people who favoured the agreement and people who didn’t, and, at a meta level, the concerns that people had at that time were that agreements such as the TPPA were agreements which potentially shaded out our democratic institutions and may contribute to growing inequality, and, indeed, that’s been the experience of many people in our community over recent decades.

The concerns about the TPPA were expressed more specifically at that time by the Labour Party. They were concerns around the right to regulate, concerns around investor-State dispute settlement (ISDS), concerns around control of our own land, and concerns around Pharmac. I am proud to say—and I said this in previous debates—that it was the Labour Party in this House which was in fact the only party that didn’t take a predetermined position at that point. We said, “These are our tests, these are our values, and we’ll judge the outcome of the negotiations by whether or not the agreement at the end meets those tests and meets those values.” At the time the TPPA came out of the negotiation process, we didn’t believe that that was the case.

When the new Government took over, only one year ago, one of the first things that we did was to get to work on this. The process was led by the Hon David Parker and the Rt Hon Jacinda Ardern, who went overseas and went to work, negotiating to try and deal with those concerns. I’m really happy to say that we made significant progress in all of those areas.

Let’s start with the right to regulate. To be fair, much of this was settled before the coalition Government came into power, but it’s my view that many of the protections around the right to regulate—particularly in respect of social services, health, and education—came about as a result of pressure that came from those who were concerned about those areas.

In respect of ISDS, we have made significant progress in terms of the side letters and in terms of exclusions to ISDS. It is the view and the position of the Labour Party that we would prefer that ISDS provisions were not in this agreement whatsoever. I just want to pick up on, actually, the very reasonable discussion that the Hon Mark Mitchell launched in this area. It is true that ISDS provides New Zealand companies who may be engaged in investments overseas, in jurisdictions where perhaps you don’t have total trust in the local justice system, with another avenue and, potentially, additional protections. That is a benefit to those private entities. The flip side is that those provisions can be applied within New Zealand, where we do have a justice system and where we do believe that justice system should be the one that governs disputes. That is the reason that the Labour Party prefers that ISDS provisions are not part of these agreements and will not negotiate for them to be part of these agreements in the future. But we made progress and have excluded them in respect of 80 percent of the likely flows of investment into New Zealand.

We made progress on the control of land, not through negotiations in the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) itself but by having a legislative process in this House that we got done in time before the ratification process kicked in, and that means that this Parliament retains its sovereign right to control the sale of our own land. That’s something the Opposition said could not be done. This Government did that, and I just cannot emphasise how important that is for New Zealanders that they do not need to worry under this agreement—that we have protected the sovereign right to control the sale of our own land.

In respect of Pharmac, it is true that before the coalition Government came in most of the protections for Pharmac had been achieved, after significant public pressure and pressure from the Opposition. But we still had to pay—the New Zealand taxpayer still had to pay millions of dollars per year for a monitoring regime—to have an intrusion into our Pharmac system. We’ve managed to negotiate that out as well. So progress has been made on each of those areas in which there were concerns.

We’ve heard a couple of times in the debate today and the debate earlier in the week that we should try and take the politics out of trade, and what I’ve argued previously is that is the wrong approach to take. If we make trade an elite technocratic project—if we say it’s not in the sphere of democracy and it’s not in the sphere of debate—then we will lose people. Members of this House should remember that the most significant event in the passage of the TPPA/CPTPP was, of course, the withdrawal of the United States, and that is because the man who was running to be President harnessed the rage of people who felt left out—who felt that agreements like these left them out and felt that their concerns were not being taken seriously. So what I say to members of the House, who do believe in free and open trade, is don’t pretend this is beyond politics. Don’t make it an elite project. We have to take these concerns seriously and we have to deal with them in a meaningful way, and I’m very proud of the fact that that is what this coalition Government has done.

I want to note, in particular, the role that the Hon David Parker has taken in this area. Beyond the CPTPP he has picked up the Trade for All project, which is about going out to New Zealanders and not just selling the benefits of trade—although of course we need to do that—but actually listening to the real concerns that people in the community have: concerns around sovereignty, concerns around loss of control, concerns around whether we are sharing the benefits of trade in a fair and equitable way with New Zealanders. I believe that it’s by having that debate, by listening to those concerns and bringing them in, that we will build more support and build consensus, rebuild consensus for trade and for future trading agreements.

So if I can end my comments by coming back to my conversation with my predecessor, the Hon Phil Goff. I’m happy to say that at the end of this process, with that consideration, with that discussion, with the changes that this Government has made to get us to the point of CPTPP, I’m very happy to be able to talk to my old friend Phil Goff and say that I agree that this agreement does have benefits for New Zealand and that we have addressed so many of the concerns that people held, and I am very happy to commend it to the House. Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker.