Public Service Legislation Bill

We come to, as I understand, both the title and the commencement clauses of the bill in this debate. I note the process that this bill has been through, where we’ve had a 200-page Supplementary Order Paper tabled a couple of days ago, with the Government’s intent to put it into law, as to the appropriateness of sections like section 89 effectively coming into immediate effect. Now, section 89 of this Public Service legislation impacts on the redundancy entitlements of MPs—sorry, not MPs; that would be significant—of public servants. The question is whether applying that immediately—why would it not apply as per the time that the rest of the bill comes into effect? Why is the Government so keen to have those legal provisions that constrain the redundancy obligations of the Crown reduced?

I also wonder why it is that section 110 is being brought into effect earlier than the remainder of the Act. The commencement of this Act is quite significant, in that it is many years—32 years—since the State Sector Act came into effect. So why is it that there is the differentiation around those provisions? What the commencement clause says is that the bulk of the Act comes into effect on the date of Royal assent, with the exception of those redundancy provisions in section 89, and with respect of the sections in 110(1). I’d welcome a contribution from the Minister of State Services as to why that’s the case. My understanding is that section 89 is dealing with a situation where an employee is transferring between different Government agencies. Is it that the Government’s got particular departmental restructuring occurring, where the continuous service provisions are to apply? I would have thought the logic would be compelling for a continuity of entitlements that a person working in the Public Service has, that it would be desirable to have that come into effect more immediately. We’re talking about this bill impacting on tens of thousands of public servants.

I’d also be really interested to know, in respect of the six-month delay in section 110(1)—now, section 110(1) deals with the repeal of section 4C of the Act. So the question for the Minister is why it is that the date of which those new provisions in section 110—why are they being delayed to six months after the date of Royal assent? I’m assuming the Government’s intent is for this new Public Service legislation to take legal effect next Monday. That would be the GG—the Governor-General would sign off on the law change. These staggered commencement clauses need to be justified. With section 89, the proposal in the bill is that it will effectively come into effect any time that the Government wishes, that the executive would wish. So we’ve seen provisions where particular parts of a bill come into effect by Order in Council and the Order in Council has not been passed for years. And the existing law stands to—

I’m sorry to interrupt the member, but in accordance with the decision of the Business Committee, I will report progress to enable the House to resume for question time at 2 p.m.

House resumed.

The Chairperson reported progress on the Public Service Legislation Bill.

Report adopted.

The bill is set down for further consideration in committee following oral questions. Because of an agreement with the Business Committee, we will now break for lunch and resume at 2 o’clock for oral questions.

Sitting suspended from 12.56 p.m. to 2 p.m.

My question is to the Prime Minister: does she agree with the comments regarding shovel-ready projects made by the Rt Hon Winston Peters in a speech to the Wellington Chamber of Commerce that “I have the list, the whole list—why they are not telling you, I don’t know.”—

Order! Order! Order! It’s not quite the quote.

I beg your pardon?

It’s not quite the quote. The member has to quote the quote accurately.

I tell you what, I’ll read off your notes, not mine—how’s that?

I’m reading off the ones that were submitted, but carry on.