Canterbury Earthquakes Insurance Tribunal Bill

I move, That the Canterbury Earthquakes Insurance Tribunal Bill be now read a second time.

On behalf of the Minister of Justice and Minister for Courts, the Hon Andrew Little, I’d like firstly to thank the Governance and Administration Committee for its work in examining this bill during the select committee stage. I’d also like to thank everyone who submitted on the bill for their valuable comments and insights. Hearing and considering the views of the public is, of course, essential to developing effective legislation, and that feedback has helped guide the further development of the bill. I’m pleased that, in general, submitters were supportive of the bill’s objective.

The bill will establish the Canterbury Earthquakes Insurance Tribunal. This tribunal will be a specialist judicial body that provides policyholders affected by the 2010 and 2011 Canterbury earthquakes with a way to resolve their longstanding residential insurance claims with the Earthquake Commission (EQC) and their insurers, including Southern Response.

I’d like to give some of the background to the introduction of the bill and then outline the key changes that have been recommended by the select committee in the reported-back bill. It’s now been more than eight years since the Canterbury earthquakes of 2010 and 2011, and yet thousands of insurance claims arising from these events remain unresolved. That delay has left Cantabrians feeling weary and frustrated. The tribunal has been designed to address that by providing a fair, speedy, flexible, and cost-effective service, including a funded mediation service to the people in the region with outstanding claims, so that they can achieve some closure and move on with their lives. To ensure that policyholders feel empowered and in control of their situation, access to the tribunal will be homeowner-initiated. This means the decision to access the tribunal will be in their hands rather than driven by the insurers or by EQC.

The tribunal has been designed so that’s easy for policyholders to access. There will be no application fee to access the tribunal, and policyholders may choose to be represented by someone who’s not a lawyer, or they may choose to represent themselves. Detailed guidance will also be available to help people feel prepared and informed about what to expect at the tribunal. The tribunal isn’t intended to replace the courts or any other dispute resolution process; rather, it’s been developed as an alternative specific to the earthquakes in Canterbury, emphasising speed, flexibility, and cost-effectiveness. If parties have already filed claims in court but they haven’t been concluded, policyholders may apply to transfer the case to the tribunal. If the parties are using the Greater Christchurch Claims Resolution Service, they will be supported in applying to the tribunal should they choose this option.

Flexibility is a key element of the process. We know that the remaining insurance claims are often complex and that a one-size-fits-all approach would be unhelpful. For this reason, the bill allows the resolution process to be tailored to the needs of each claim. The tribunal will take a proactive approach to case management and will work closely with the parties to find the most appropriate way to resolution. The tribunal can set time frames for each stage of the process so that claims continue to progress without unnecessary delays. The tribunal has a number of powers to help it consider claims—for example, it will be able to appoint independent experts. These experts will play a key role in helping the tribunal to understand complex information and provide an independent view where there is competing expert opinion.

The tribunal process will include an independent and fully funded mediation service, as I mentioned. Mediation empowers parties to settle disputes themselves and can be a useful tool to narrow down the issues in dispute and provide a confidential environment for parties to speak freely. However, it’s also important to acknowledge that after eight years, parties may already have tried to settle their claims through other dispute resolution processes, and therefore the bill gives the tribunal the flexibility to decide on a case by case basis when mediation will be helpful and when it won’t.

To make sure the tribunal can deliver speedy resolution, the tribunal will not consider claims relating to onsold properties. Some legal issues emerging from these claims are novel and they may have no clear precedent, so the Minister considers that they’re more appropriately considered by the courts.

I will now highlight some of the changes to the bill that the Governance and Administration Committee has recommended. I consider that these will improve the bill’s effectiveness in helping policyholders resolve their longstanding claims. The committee has recommended that the purpose statement of the bill should include the word “fair” to reflect the policy objective of the tribunal to provide fair services and to comply with natural justice rules, while also being speedy, flexible, and cost-effective.

Based on submissions, the amended bill extends the date range to include Canterbury earthquakes from 31 July 2011 to 31 December 2011, so that those people who suffered damage in the 23 December 2011 earthquake may also apply to the tribunal. The tribunal will also be able to consider liability for damage from aftershocks and earthquakes that occurred after 2011 where some damage in a claim occurred before 31 December 2011. This will remove the need for parties to go through a separate process to resolve damage from earthquakes after 2011. The amended bill also allows for parties to comment on transfers between the courts and the tribunal, and vice versa, and to comment on the referral of questions of law to the High Court. In addition, the bill originally allowed the referral of questions of law only at the hearing stage, but the bill as amended now allows them to be referred at any stage in the process.

The committee also recommended some amendments to the parts of the bill relating to experts and evidence. One recommendation is that a new clause be inserted allowing the tribunal to bring separate claims together to hear technical evidence on similar subject matter at a special hearing with all affected parties present, provided all the parties to the claim agree. This means that a number of claims with similar technical issues can, if the parties agree, be resolved more efficiently. A further recommended change to the introduced version is that parties be allowed to use experts, except where the tribunal deems it unnecessary. This upholds the principle of fairness for policyholders, while ensuring that the tribunal retains the power to prevent the unnecessary use of experts.

On the matter of cross-examination, in accordance with the principles of natural justice, the committee has recommended removing the reference to the tribunal’s “absolute discretion”—as it was in the original bill—to permit cross-examination, as it’s not the intent of the bill for the tribunal to have absolute discretion over allowing cross-examination. The intent of the bill is to allow the tribunal to permit cross-examination where appropriate. However, the tribunal is not required to permit the cross-examination of any and every party, and it must not permit any unnecessary cross-examination.

Lastly, the committee has recommended changes to the status of settlements reached before the claim goes to a hearing. The reported-back bill now proposes that all settlements reached at mediation will automatically be recorded as a decision of the tribunal and will therefore be enforceable thereafter in the District Court. In addition, the bill now clarifies that policyholders may ask the tribunal to record a settlement agreement reached other than through mediation without needing the agreement of all the parties. This means that policyholders can choose whether or not to have their settlement enforceable by the District Court, and this again aligns the bill with the overarching objective to be homeowner-oriented.

The Minister intends to table a Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) that will clarify a few minor and technical amendments required for the tribunal to operate in line with its purpose. For example, the SOP will align the tribunal with the upcoming Courts Security Regulations and also clarify that parties may bring a support person, with the tribunal’s permission.

We want the tribunal to work for those people who are still waiting for their longstanding claims to be resolved. This was an explicit election promise of all parties who make up the Government to explore ways to find speedier, more flexible, and tailored means of resolution for Cantabrians, and we’re confident that with this bill and this tribunal, we’ve found a means for those Cantabrians still waiting for a resolution to achieve this in a speedy and efficacious way. I’m pleased that the bill was widely supported in its first reading, and we hope that this continues at this stage. So I commend this bill to the House.

Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. Well, it is a pleasure to stand and speak on the Canterbury Earthquakes Insurance Tribunal Bill, and I do agree with the Minister that we all want this to work. I can assure you that the National Party will be voting in support of this bill at second reading, but that may change if amendments that I introduce are not supported. We all want a fair outcome, and the sooner these things are sorted, the better. The thing is we don’t want to cause another wrong in the attempt to fix one that has gone on for eight years.

First, I want to talk about clause 5, which is defining which earthquakes will be covered. It was quite clear in the Governance and Administration Committee when we looked at that issue that that would cut a whole lot of people out with the date of 31 July 2011, given that there’d been a significant aftershock on 23 December of that year. So it was decided to extend it right out to 31 December 2011, and earthquake damage that occurred after that will also be part of what the tribunal can consider, as long as there’s been earthquake damage caused in that original period up to the end of December.

We had a lot of really good submissions, and it made the select committee’s job a lot easier. However, there are some issues, and I’d like now to talk about clause 10, “Bringing claim to tribunal”. At the moment, it is only the insured that can bring a claim to the tribunal, and I have very grave concerns about that as it is, effectively, one-way access to justice. So I’ll be introducing an amendment that will allow insurers also to lodge claims with the tribunal. Effectively, having one party to lodge a claim sets up a predetermined identification of victim and perpetrator, and I don’t think that that is what was intended with this bill, and my amendment will deal with that. We have to remember that insurers have actually paid billions of dollars in Canterbury. While they sometimes might be difficult to deal with, it would be pretty difficult without them.

I now want to talk about clause 11, and subclause (3) in particular, which is a bit confusing. It won’t allow proceedings to remain in the tribunal if the dispute has been settled between the insured and the insurer, or if there is some doubt in that. The drafters have attempted to clear that up. It doesn’t appear to me to be at all clear, and I’ll be putting in an amendment that’ll make it very clear that the issue arises when third parties are joined to the claim. That could be, for example, a builder who undertook repairs of a house that has been damaged, and that may be the person who undertook shoddy repairs, for example. But once the claim is settled between the insurer and the insured, it is not clear that the tribunal then has to continue judging that case to the point where everybody is dealt with and it’s discharged. It could easily be discharged, and the insurer or the Earthquake Commission would then have to pursue the third party in the courts. I think if you’re going to put a tribunal in to fix a problem, at least do it properly.

Clause 37(4)—this is one where I have significant issues—which is “Managing adjudication of claims and natural justice”. I’ll come on to cross-examination a bit later, but this bill was, effectively, the Weathertight Homes Resolution Services Act that was lifted and copied and pasted, effectively, into the earthquakes tribunal bill. That’s where the problems began, because what happened with the weathertight homes was a tort, and this is contract law. So those were some quite significant issues, which we’ll touch on a wee bit later as well.

But also, on the matter of having experts coming into the tribunal, in the case of the weathertight homes, the defendants were, in fact, the experts. This is not the case when we’re talking about earthquakes. Insurers and claimants rely on experts to put together their claims, and, effectively, not making it clear that experts can be used in the tribunal is actually, I think, also a natural justice issue. I’ll be introducing an amendment that will in fact help by limiting the number of expert witnesses in a particular discipline that could be used in the tribunal, and I think that will go a long way to dealing with that issue. But insurance companies themselves are not builders and structural engineers or geotechnical engineers and neither are the claimants, and it would be really foolish to have a tribunal where you only had an insurance company lawyer, a claimant, and a tribunal. Who knows what the damage is and how it’s caused?

Also, cross-examination. Now, cross-examination is a major thing in our legal system that’s a right, but in this case it is somewhat limited. Despite what the Minister said, in clause 37(4) it says, “However, subsection (3) does not require the tribunal to—(a) permit the cross-examination of a party or person”. Now, that is absolutely against the major tenet of our New Zealand Bill of Rights Act, and I’ll quote from our New Zealand Bill of Rights Act: “Every person has the right to the observance of the principles of natural justice by any tribunal or other public authority which has the power to make a determination in respect of that person’s rights, obligations, or interests protected or recognised by law.”, and yet this doesn’t allow it. It is quite clear in here that it doesn’t have to allow it. In fact, the onus would be the other way around—it almost certainly won’t allow it. I think that that is very dangerous, and I will be putting an amendment in to allow that. I’d be very surprised if the Government didn’t support that.

Clause 44(3), the tribunal’s decisions, was an area which, again, shows the foolishness of just cutting and pasting legislation, because, as I said, in the Weathertight Homes Tribunal, that was a tort, and torts allow for damages for mental distress, for example—general damages. That is not allowed in contract law. Fortunately, in the select committee, we worked on that and we actually got that chucked out of the bill. So that’s a very positive step forward.

If I can talk about, now, clause 55, “Appointment of members of tribunal”, it is a change that we made to have the chairperson have to have a practising certificate as a barrister or as a barrister and solicitor of the High Court for at least seven years. That’s great to have that person as the chair of the tribunal. However, the tribunal members, I believe, also need criteria, and I’ll be putting an amendment forward for that so that all tribunal members should at least hold a law degree and a minimum number of years’ practice experience, including litigation, or be another suitably qualified professional with arbitration experience and not have a history of advocacy on earthquake claims.

That’s really important, that last point, because there are instances in Christchurch where claims have been thwarted against the best interests of the claimant because of an agreement from their advocate on a success basis if the offer isn’t going to be high enough for them to achieve their fee. That has gone against the interests of the homeowners in Christchurch in some cases that I’m aware of, and I think we have to really ensure that the people sitting on the tribunal are suitably qualified to, hopefully, spot that sort of activity going on and ensure that the best interests of those claimants are in fact served by the tribunal.

So, as I said, we support this bill through this reading, but with caveats. I think the amendments are very reasonable, and I’m looking forward to the Government helping support those in the committee of the whole House. So thank you.

Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. It is with real pleasure that I see this Canterbury Earthquakes Insurance Tribunal Bill proceed through to its second reading. I must say that this is a real opportunity, and it’s an opportunity not to do as the previous speaker, Stuart Smith, would suggest and duplicate other tribunals, but to create something new, because the challenge in modern dispute resolution is to rebalance the huge inequalities between disputants, whether that be insurance companies and homeowners, banks and customers, or whatever it might be.

Mr Smith, the MP for Kaikōura, talked about natural justice, and I just want to say that natural justice is not simply all about procedure. It’s about enabling a correct, a fair, and a just outcome, and having a procedure which can effect that. In some cases—and we know this from the criminal courts already—cross-examination doesn’t get us there. In fact, it’s wasteful and it’s an inaccurate way to try and get to the truth.

So what we have here is a new kind of tribunal. It’s not a rehash, it’s not one out of the same mould; it’s one where experts can be used carefully but also kept in control so that the expense doesn’t drive away litigants who need assistance. I see also that the tribunal will have the power itself to inspect damaged properties and the like, and that’s a great innovation because there’s nothing quite like the tribunal receiving the evidence itself. So what we really are aiming towards is a tribunal that is tailored—tailored towards these specific circumstances.

It’s with some sadness that I note that there are still many hundreds or indeed, thousands of unresolved claims in Christchurch still with various insurers and the Earthquake Commission, but this is a significant step forward, and I note that homeowners will be able to transfer cases out of the High Court or other courts into this tribunal. I hope they will seriously consider doing that, because the tools available to this tribunal are quite different. They take into account the needs of the parties, and the managed mediation service, which is fully funded, taking away another barrier to homeowners who might not have the means to pay for mediation services—that’s another example of a situation where it can bring the parties together and work towards a resolution.

That’s not to say that there’s not still hard questions of law and hard technical questions which will face this tribunal. Any decision-making process imposed on the parties will leave some people disappointed. So this isn’t going to be some kind of panacea for everyone, but it does give us a new, a better, an alternative process—one that uses new tools—and I’m very hopeful that when this is in place, it can be seen as a new template, particularly for consumer disputes where there are massive imbalances of power, of wealth, and of knowledge in these disputes.

Can I commend the Governance and Administration Committee for its work. I think the bill’s in great shape. It looks like it’s a very workable piece of legislation, and I doubt that there’s much more work to be done on it at all. I commend this bill to the House.

Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. I rise in support of the Canterbury Earthquakes Insurance Tribunal Bill, and I support comments made by my colleague Stuart Smith just a little while ago. Firstly, I’d actually like to acknowledge not only the work of the Governance and Administration Committee members in deconstructing and reconstructing this bill but particularly the work of officials. We supported this bill in first reading, but our spokesperson in this area, Mr Stuart Smith, had a number of reservations and number of points that he wanted to raise with officials.

The reason I would particularly acknowledge them is they clearly demonstrated that they were prepared to listen to submitters and prepared to listen to the arguments from members around the table, and particularly from Mr Smith. We’ve seen a number of amendments recommended and incorporated through our report, including one that Mr Smith mentioned which was a source of major concern for us, which was the ability for the tribunal to award general damages, which could have permitted, for instance, compensation for mental distress. As Mr Smith has articulated, that would be bringing in elements of the law of tort into contract law, and that’s just not the way things are done, in New Zealand at least. There is an amendment recommended by officials and accepted by the committee that the tribunal can only award such damages as would be normally awarded by a court under general New Zealand law. So that addresses that particular issue, which, if not necessarily the greatest concern we had, was certainly a serious concern that we had with the bill.

As we worked through it, though, we noticed too in the regulatory impact statement, we were mindful—and we do support this. But we are mindful that while the tribunal will be instituted with the intention of speeding claims—and, actually, before I move further on this, I would make the point that the recommendation from officials to amend the definition for in-scope earthquakes to move that from 31 July 2011 to 31 December will in itself bring into the scope of the tribunal, potentially, up to I think around 47,000 additional claims. So that is a good idea. It also gives the tribunal some power to look at quake damage beyond that point if at least part of the damage had occurred in those eligible Christchurch earthquakes, which, again, supports the idea of the tribunal being there as an intent to help speed the process of claims, a number of which, of course—as you would well know, Madam Assistant Speaker—have been around for a very long time.

So that is all well and good. But, as the officials themselves noted in the regulatory impact statement, in terms of both available lawyers and also, particularly, experts, many of those individuals are already involved in court actions over quake claims and repairs and perhaps remediation claims as well. There are two elements there. One is potentially that there could be trouble managing a conflict of interest, or a potential perceived conflict of interest, if an expert or lawyer who has already been involved in a certain court action was to then potentially be involved in a tribunal case. But more fundamental than even those potential conflicts is simply the volume of people and the demands on their time. The officials themselves raised the very real risk that they saw that rather than speeding the process of claims, the tribunal, in the sense that it could at least create a larger funnel to accepting them, could actually end up slowing the process and causing these claims to potentially take longer than they might do, and that’s simply through the availability of sufficient numbers of experts to be able to work through those tribunal hearings in a timely fashion.

So we do bear that in mind, but on balance—well, not even on balance, actually—we supported this bill into select committee. As I’ve said, I acknowledge the work officials have done to support the committee to make recommendations. Mr Stuart Smith has a number of areas that he would like to strengthen further. He has signalled to the House today that he intends to issue a number of amendments in the committee of the whole House, and we will certainly support the bill getting through to that stage. So I’ll take this opportunity to commend the bill to the House.

Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. I rise on behalf of New Zealand First to support this legislation, to indicate our support, and, if I could, to thank the Governance and Administration Committee for the work that it has done, particularly Brett Hudson, who’s just spoken and who is the chair, and Ginny Andersen, Kanwaljit Singh Bakshi, the Hon Jacqui Dean—it’s always good to see the Hon Jacqui Dean’s name there when it comes to discussing matters such as this, because she brings her wealth of the local government whānau to the table in that respect—Paul Eagle, the Hon Peeni Henare, Jamie Strange, Dr Jian Yang, and Stuart Smith, who spoke right at the outset.

I’ve got to say, as one who’s got a large number of family in the Canterbury area who went through the earthquakes and some of whom struggled with the insurance issues that arose after that series of earthquakes, it is very pleasing to see this legislation here. New Zealand First supported the concept of this bill right from the outset. I have to say that listening to some of the heartache and the heartbreak that we’ve heard over the years, you could say it’s a bit disappointing that such an initiative wasn’t taken under the previous term of Government. But we are here, and so I guess we rejoice at this.

It’s taken eight years since the Canterbury earthquakes of 2010 and 2011, and thousands of insurance claims remain unresolved. This delay has left Cantabrians feeling weary and frustrated, and, sadly, we’ve heard of cases where people’s mental health has been greatly affected and their incomes and their ability to move on and get on with life have been hugely affected, and that is not something that sits easily on the minds of many, I know. The fact that this bill establishes a specialist tribunal and a fully funded mediation service to help the people of Canterbury resolve longstanding residential insurance claims is something that should be applauded.

The tribunal has been developed to be homeowner-initiated, to ensure the policyholders feel empowered and in control of their situation. The bill puts the choice to access the tribunal in the hands of policyholders by allowing them to apply to the tribunal, rather than insurers of the Earthquake Commission.

I’ve got to say that going through the select committee’s report, it is very clear to me—and I could look at a number of areas, and I’ve also had a look at the summary because, obviously, I’m not on the committee. There were 26 written submissions from individuals and organisations. Ten submitters presented orally to the committee. Sixteen supported the intent of the bill—the establishment of a tribunal—with most of those submitters suggesting changes to clarify proposals to ensure that they were workable. Eight submitters did not expressly support or oppose the bill. One submitter expressly opposed the bill because he believed the tribunal will not work and that it will be biased against policyholders—I’ll be looking forward to that submitter’s comments in a few years from now, after the tribunal has set about doing its work.

It’s very clear that the select committee has given this bill its full attention. As I go through the report, I’m looking at a range of matters discussed by the committee where recommendations have been made as to changes, and I’m anticipating that those recommendations are going to be picked up in the Supplementary Order Paper that the Minister said would be tabled come the committee stage. I think, looking at clause 5 and then going down to look at the application of the Act in clause 8, there are recommended changes there by the select committee as to eligibility criteria. The select committee, again, has recommended changes. The form of response, in clause 15—changes, again. Transferring proceedings from the court to the tribunal, in clause 16—the committee has recommended a number of changes in there.

All I would say, again, looking through the select committee’s report, is that I note that it would appear to have been unanimously supported, although there may be some reservations and some discussion yet to happen. I just want to congratulate the committee and thank them very much, and I thank the Minister for bringing the bill to the House.

Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. With regard to the Canterbury Earthquakes Insurance Tribunal Bill, National supports the bill through this stage, but we did flag a number of issues that will potentially be raised in the committee of the whole House stage. But the chair of the Governance and Administration Committee, Brett Hudson, has canvassed those, so I’m not going to go over them.

I do want to make a few comments, however, about the homeowners whom this bill addresses the concerns of and to note that it has now been a number of years since the Canterbury earthquakes and those families—and I’m seeing Christchurch-based MPs across the House who are very aware of the anxiety and sheer toll that being caught up in a tribunal process to do with your home creates. It creates a lot of stress and anxiety on those families, and the committee was always mindful, across the committee, of those stresses.

But I do want to talk about the consultation on this bill, and how it has been expressed to us that the limits placed on consultation may not have provided the breadth of views and experience that could have been really useful as this piece of legislation went through. So, for example, the Ministry of Justice consulted with Treasury, but not the Earthquake Commission themselves or any affected homeowners, or, indeed, insurance industry specialists. While we did hear from the insurance industry specialists in particular—whose views were very useful—it does seem that the breadth of consultation could have been broader and wider. However, in the committee of the whole House stage, we will make some comment about that.

I also just note that the regulatory impact statement stressed throughout the statement—and it did so several times—that the lack of consultation is thanks to the tight time frames. Well, is the House going to do this properly—is the Government going to do this properly—or are we going to have to come back again and make amendments to a piece of legislation that isn’t quite fit for purpose? I’ll quote from the regulatory impact statement where it says, “The lack of consultation has compounded the lack of data, which means Cabinet faces some significant unknowns,”—not ideal. While we do support this legislation, I’m mindful of the colleague sitting next to me, Jian Yang, whose comments around statistics and the New Zealand Census really highlight the fact that we should be able to rely on good quality data. It would seem, as is highlighted both in the census, which has got wide-ranging implications—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): Ahem.

—returning to the bill—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): Thank you.

—but also to this piece of legislation in getting what is the subject of this bill, the earthquakes insurance tribunal, right. Thank you.

Tēnā koe. Thank you. I’m very pleased to speak on the Canterbury Earthquakes Insurance Tribunal Bill. It’s a very good bill. There are over 2,000 claims from the Canterbury earthquakes still awaiting resolution. This is an initiative that was in the Labour Party’s election manifesto and I think it will go quite a considerable distance in helping resolve those claims, because, of course, the tribunals that we have in New Zealand are different from the courts.

A tribunal is an independent judicial body set up to deal with particular issues—in this case the earthquake insurance claims—and they tend to take a more informal approach in examining the available information, talking to the parties directly, and sometimes seeking more evidence to get the right outcome. So it’s not as adversarial an approach as you often get in the courts, partly because of the way the tribunal is constituted and partly because of the procedures that it will operate under. It is this focus on ensuring—and the amendment that the select committee made to insert “fair” in the purpose—that it is cost-effective and that it is speedy and that it is fair that may see, we hope, those very complex technical claims that have yet to be resolved being able to be progressed through the tribunal and brought to a conclusion.

Now, it was interesting listening to Stuart Smith and his concern about the fact that cross-examination won’t be a major feature of the tribunal’s proceedings. But that is one of the advantages of having a tribunal over the court—that more inquisitorial approach by members of the tribunal, the ability to have experts present, the ability for parties to either have people advocating on their own account or have them advocate for themselves. So it’s a genuine inquiry into what the facts are, what the potential ways of resolving those are, and moving on to make a decision, rather than the parties being engaged in quite an adversarial position where people get lawyered up and it’s often the weight of expertise and the procedures themselves that can weigh on the outcome. So here the focus is on getting to a good outcome and using good processes to do that.

One of the strengths, I think, of the tribunal will be the ability to access mediation. Where mediation is used in some of the other court systems like the Environment Court, where the parties actually try to think outside the box and where experts can be brought in to share their expertise, that can help progress to a resolution more quickly. So the mediation powers in this bill, I think, are quite significant. So is the fact that it is a process where the parties bear the costs themselves. There aren’t any fees to actually access the tribunal, so that means that it won’t be a barrier, as the court process can sometimes be, because parties don’t have the funds to resource lawyers to advocate on their behalf. So it is with this flexibility and less formal process than a court system, but a very fair process, that we should aim to get to the bottom of the backlog of 2,500-odd cases.

I think Mr Stuart Smith raised issues too about the fact that it can only be the policyholders and homeowners who can access the tribunal rather than insurance companies. There are other opportunities through the court process. That is, of course, still open to the insurance companies to take claims there. It has been a huge amount of stress on homeowners who haven’t been able to resolve their claims that has meant that the earthquakes have had a major legacy in terms of impacts on social well-being as well as the fact that people haven’t been able to move on with their lives, and that’s what this tribunal will help people to do.

I think that the quite extensive work that the Governance and Administration Committee has done in inquiring into the detail of how the tribunal process will operate and the amendments that have been suggested to the bill through the select committee process really strengthen the way the tribunal will operate. They seem very well-founded and sensible amendments, and this ability to bring in experts and for parties to call on experts themselves and not just rely on the tribunal to do that—some quite practical changes that are being recommended through the select committee process. The ability to refer questions of law to the High Court to ensure that the parties can comment on that before the tribunal does that, the need to have at least the chair who has a legal background—and I know the Opposition is saying that all members of the tribunal should have a legal background. But if you compare this tribunal with the Environment Court, for example, laypeople with significant expertise contribute a lot to that court, and laypeople with technical expertise, I think, will be able to contribute a lot to the tribunal.

The fact that mediation is going to be fully funded again removes that cost barrier, and it’s a fairer process all round. It’s providing another option to the one that already exists through the court system, and we really need to see these claims resolved. This bill, with the establishment of this tribunal, is a major way of doing that. So the Green Party commends the bill to the House.

The purpose of the Canterbury Earthquakes Insurance Tribunal Bill is to provide speedy, flexible, and cost-effective services for resolving disputes about insurance claims due to the Canterbury earthquakes. In principle, National supports the alternative measures to resolving outstanding claims. I understand there are about 2,233 outstanding claims. In principle, we support that. The concern is that this bill may not be able to achieve what it intends to do. It may not be able to achieve that speedy, flexible, and cost-effective process.

The reasons are, firstly, that for the tribunal to function well, we need experts and lawyers. But these experts and lawyers can be too busy to be available. Secondly, even if some of them are available, there is a possibility that they are already involved in some court process and, therefore, may not be able to serve in a tribunal because of the conflict of interest. Thirdly, the tribunal can always pass complex cases back to the court system. But we understand that many of these outstanding claims are complex, so in that sense, this may actually slow the whole process.

Finally, all the decisions made by the tribunal can be appealed. That means that there will be a double-up in terms of the process, because once the tribunal has made a decision and then it’s appealed and goes back to the court, it means a further delay. So it’s a long process. In that sense, we are concerned that this whole bill might not be able to achieve what it intends to do. Hopefully, during the committee stage, we will be able to improve this bill. Thank you.

It gives me great pleasure to speak in the second reading of the Canterbury Earthquakes Insurance Tribunal Bill. I want to begin by thanking and acknowledging the Minister of Justice, the Hon Andrew Little, for driving this manifesto commitment into legislation. It is long overdue and has been warmly welcomed in Canterbury. It’s 8½ years since the series of earthquakes started, and, finally, we’re giving Cantabrians an opportunity to have their outstanding earthquake issues resolved.

I want to commend the Governance and Administration Committee for the work that they’ve done. They’ve made a number of really sensible suggestions—probably prompted by submissions or discussion that they had amongst themselves—and I want to commend them for that. They added the word “fair” to the purpose. So the member who’s just resumed his seat, Jian Yang, talked about a “speedy, flexible, and cost-effective” resolution process, but the select committee added the word “fair”, and I think that’s an excellent addition. They extended the date range so that the 23 February 2011 quake could be included, they added the ability for parties to comment on transfers at more stages than the original legislation allowed, and they’ve expanded the opportunity for expert and technical advice.

With all the recommendations made by that committee—chaired by Brett Hudson, list MP from National—I think they’ve done a really good job. They’ve obviously thought about it and listened carefully to the submissions, which were almost unanimously in support of the legislation. I think the recommendations they made have improved it. I want this bill to make progress fast, so I’m going to limit my comments to those that I’ve already made, and I commend its progress to the House.

Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. I’ve been in this Parliament for about 18 months now, but this is my first opportunity in that time to take a call on a Canterbury earthquake recovery bill, despite being from Canterbury myself. So I’m looking forward to taking a very brief call tonight.

The Christchurch earthquakes, or the Canterbury earthquakes as they’re probably better described in this legislation, had a very profound impact on Canterbury, right across the region. As has been talked about this afternoon by my colleague Jacqui Dean, there have been increased levels of anxiety, and, unfortunately, we continue to see mental health issues across particularly Christchurch but also Canterbury.

Although not on the same scale of the catastrophic damage that we saw in Christchurch, there was, of course, other damage in other parts of Canterbury, in places like Kaiapoi and even some damage further south in my electorate—particularly around Ashburton. In fact, there was some damage to my parents’ house, and that resulted in an Earthquake Commission claim as well—joining many thousands of other Cantabrians.

So we join the Government in wanting to see a flexible and fast and—more than anything—fair approach in relation to claims. We do support the intent of this bill. As has been laid out earlier by Brett Hudson, we will be putting forward some changes at the appropriate time, but at this point we do support the bill. Thank you.

E Te Māngai, thank you for the opportunity to speak on the Canterbury Earthquakes Insurance Tribunal Bill. As a member of the Governance and Administration Committee, it’s great to see it at this point at second reading and to have such strong support across the House. Primarily, I’m pleased for the people of Christchurch that have waited a long time to have ongoing claims resolved.

While I may reside in the Hutt Valley now, I’m proud to say I was a child of Christchurch—in Cashel Street, I waited. That was really a long time for a lot of people waiting to have their justice served. So I’m so pleased to see, after eight years, Cantabrians are no longer having to feel so weary and frustrated and are having this option in front, and it’s good to see that it’s not such a combative process as what going through the court system can be. Through having mediation and having people able to go through and get a sense of closure so people can get on with their lives, mediation is a far more flexible tool to be able to suit the needs of each and every one of those individual claims that come forward.

So it’s good to see the tribunal’s been designed so it can be easily accessed by policyholders and that there’s no application fee—so no obstacles for people to get access to that. It’s not intended to replace the courts at all, but it provides another option for people to go forward when they’re not seeing it.

I will not speak too long on this bill. I want to acknowledge the fact that we heard some really good submissions from people, and we were able to have further scrutiny to make some subsequent changes to this bill. It allows a resolution process for those people in Christchurch to go forward, and, hopefully, enables there to be a higher rate of resolution than what we’ve seen in the past.

So, without further ado, I would like to thank all the officials that did great work on that, to commend Andrew Little for championing this through, and to acknowledge all of those Christchurch MPs for the hard work that they’ve done to champion this and make sure that we see some delivery in terms of an election promise made by this Government. Without further ado, I commend this bill to the House.

Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker, for the opportunity to contribute in the second reading of the Canterbury Earthquakes Insurance Tribunal Bill. As other members from this side have already mentioned, we will be supporting the second reading of this bill, and there will be some amendments coming through during the committee of the whole House.

I agree with all the speakers who have talked about the intent of the bill, and that is what should be happening. But there are issues that have come through because of some lack of consultation on the provisions which have been put into the bill, which are going to be problematic in the future. First of all, I would like to highlight that there was a lack of consultation, other than with the Ministry of Justice, which was consulted. Even the Earthquake Commission was not consulted when this bill was being formulated. Even in the regulatory impact statement, it says that lack of consultation has compounded to the lack of data, which means Cabinet faces some significant unknowns. So even though Cabinet is under dark clouds, how can we expect that this bill will be providing the fairness which was recommended by the select committee?

Another point I would like to touch upon is the system in which the lawyers and the technical people are being put on this tribunal. They are already involved in court cases and there could be a chance that there will be a conflict of interest. Those things could be addressed in this good-intentioned bill if we want to get this work through all of the systems. With these words, I commend the second reading of this bill.

I also am a previous resident of Christchurch. I also was—I look back now—privileged to spend three weeks, basically, in the red zone, in a sort of roaming troubleshooting role, basically, in the three weeks following the second earthquake. I know that I was privileged to understand just what effect this had on Christchurch. It was such a tragedy. The rest of New Zealand and the rest of the world sat and watched and put their hands in their pockets and had nothing but sympathy and sorrow for people from Canterbury, but then life went on. Like with all these tragedies, the low-hanging fruit was picked, the easy claims were dealt with, and slowly Christchurch came back to some sort of order.

That great word “munted” that has entered our lexicon now—it is no longer mentioned probably every day as being munted, but for those residents who haven’t yet been able to resolve their issues, it still remains munted, because they haven’t been able to move on. This bill is about allowing that to happen. The system that currently exists, which has the potential for these claims to go on and on for years, meaning that those people will remain in that state that I, basically, and many others moved and found Christchurch in in those days following the earthquake—but they’re still there. So this piece of legislation is really a piece of moving-on legislation, if you like. It will just allow a new system to ensure that those whose lives are pretty much stuck as they were at the time of the quake can actually get on and be part of, really, the recovery of a great city.

Those that are going and visiting Christchurch now will see that it has moved on for many. It is, once again, becoming the pleasant place to visit and to live in that it once was, and I’m sure it will be better in the future. Let’s just make sure that everyone gets an opportunity to be part of that recovery. So I have no hesitation in commending this bill to the House.

Amendments recommended by the Governance and Administration Committee by majority agreed to.

Bill read a second time.