COVID-19 Public Health Response Amendment Bill

I move, That the COVID-19 Public Health Response Amendment Bill be now read a second time.

The COVID-19 Public Health Response Amendment Bill supports the public health response to COVID-19. The main purpose of the bill is to allow the Government to recover some of the costs of managed isolation and quarantine facilities through prescribing charges and regulations. There is a secondary purpose to reduce demand for managed isolation and quarantine from short-term travel.

The bill places four requirements on the Minister responsible for the administration of the managed isolation and quarantine facilities before they can recommend the making of this regulation. The Minister must be satisfied that the prescribed charges relate to the direct and indirect costs incurred by the Government for managed isolation and quarantine facilities, the charges recover no more than the estimated actual and reasonable direct and indirect costs of managed isolation and quarantine for the classes of persons being charged, that there is appropriate provision to grant relief from payment and circumstances where payment would cause undue financial hardship, and that the charges do not limit or are a justified limit on the rights and freedoms in the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990. These requirements ensure that the charges are reasonable, proportionate, and do not prevent New Zealanders returning to New Zealand.

The bill sets out a range of methods by which the costs of managed isolation and quarantine could be recovered. It allows for different charges for different classes of people, persons in different circumstances, different types of facilities, and different regions. These provisions provide flexibility in the future to use different types of facilities anywhere in New Zealand and will help ensure the charges reflect the estimated actual and reasonable costs. Under the bill, certain people who arrive in New Zealand and who are required to or elect to be in managed isolation or quarantine will be liable to pay a charge unless they are exempt.

The exemptions in the bill include diplomats and consular staff and their families, and official foreign Government representatives. Further exemptions can be made through regulation. This allows the Government to exempt classes of people where it might not be appropriate to charge or where a class of people is likely to be in a position where they are experiencing financial hardship and are unable to pay charges.

The bill also allows for regulations to enable the Minister or the chief executive of the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) to exempt, waive, or refund charges in part or in full. I consider waivers an important mechanism to assist anybody experiencing undue financial hardship or who is travelling because of other special circumstances, such as for compassionate reasons.

The bill also allows regulations to set the timing and manner of payment of the charges. It allows unpaid debts to be recovered through the courts if necessary. I intend for the regulations to allow for payment by instalment at the discretion of MBIE in cases of financial hardship. This type of payment arrangement would help people who might not be able to pay a lump sum, upfront payment.

In addition to the charging system, the bill makes two amendments in relation to orders made by the Minister of Health or the Director-General of Health under section 11 of the principal Act. The first amendment allows the Minister or director-general to make orders that impose conditions on people arriving in New Zealand. These conditions could include being registered to enter managed isolation before entering New Zealand. The Government is currently working on a system to ensure that anyone coming here has an allocated space in a managed isolation facility. This change supports a coordinated and orderly public health response to COVID-19, and this ensures our managed isolation facilities are just that: managed.

The second change clarifies that orders made under section 11 of the Act can require a person to undergo as well as report for a medical examination or testing. I also note that I have tabled a Supplementary Order Paper which makes minor and technical changes to the bill. All of these changes support this Government’s public health strategy to stamp out COVID-19 and to protect our communities over the longer term through a sustainable managed isolation and quarantine system. I look forward to further discussion in the committee of the whole House stage and exploring with the Opposition the sentiment that was coming through from the last speaker, Erica Stanford, that we can’t keep spending on these facilities. So I would like to know if there is a plan to no longer have managed isolation at our borders.

We also look forward to that discussion in the committee, because what has just been put on the record by the Minister of Housing is an utterly ridiculous and preposterous suggestion—that anybody would be making any suggestions at the moment that our borders should not be managed at a time when there is a pandemic of this nature affecting the country. While there will be questions about the quality of that border management, there is no question that, firstly, those people who want to return to New Zealand who have a right to, New Zealand citizens and residents, should be able to do so unimpeded, but recognising that in coming to this country, coming back to this country, having chosen to live away generally for quite an extended period of time, then there should be some contribution to the costs for the privilege of re-joining the team of 5 million. That is not an unreasonable position to take.

While the Minister gave a speech that would make a lot of people think that there were some hefty and serious charges coming, the reality is that it’s a schedule-based bill and that those charges are somewhat discretionary on the Minister, and the signalling so far has been that very few are going to be required to pay. One of the most annoying things about the Government’s position is that it is very much an attack on the productive sector of New Zealand. If a business person takes the risk, leaves these shores, goes to market, tries to establish a new line of sales that will be to the benefit of New Zealand, then when they return, they have to meet the costs, according to this Government, of their isolation, even though the benefit of their activity falls to the team of 5 million. The reality is that someone returning from a long life in the UK or Britain or anywhere in Europe, or anywhere else in the world for that matter, is coming here because they see benefit in returning home. The benefit accrues to them, and for them to be required to pay a relatively small amount of the $5,700 costs incurred by the taxpayer for each person going into managed isolation seems perfectly reasonable.

I don’t know how the Government can justify making people who are adding to the productive value of the country pay, and those who are coming here to take advantage of the COVID-free nature of the country, currently, not paying at all. I just really think that in the committee stage, there will be quite a teasing out of that. There are some other aspects of the bill that we find very useful. It is, as a mechanism for being able to enact our policy, a good bill, and we will be supporting it for that reason.

I think there is a limited understanding by New Zealanders about how long this may go on for, and part of that is caused because of the international situation being somewhat uncertain. For the Government to suggest that somehow an Opposition party is going to take a position on how long that might go on for is utterly ridiculous. Our point has simply been that in an environment where this may go on for quite some time beyond even the discovery of a vaccine—quite some time beyond that—therefore looking at some future date in the 2020s before our borders return anywhere near to what they were prior to the March lockdown, then why wouldn’t we want to have a more permanent regime that was going to ensure the costs that are borne internally by people who are contributing to the economy here are not spread or exacerbated or grown as a result of people wanting to come here to make their lives back in New Zealand—remembering, at all times, many of these people are people who chose to make their lives outside of New Zealand?

When it comes to the issues around seasonal work, particularly, you would say, some of the more highly skilled agricultural workers, when it comes to various other aspects of input into the New Zealand economy, then, clearly, having some flexibility about who should pay and where they should pay is reasonable. What is unreasonable is the Government’s outright position that a New Zealander leaving this country to travel for business purposes must meet all of their costs upon return. I think those are things that we will want to discuss further in the committee stage.

We also believe that there is a problem when people abscond from their quarantine. It seems to me that if there is no price on quarantine, then there is no value put on it by some people—very limited numbers, but when they go, they end up costing a heap. They will always get caught and they will always be a massive amount of expense chasing around after where they’ve been to protect the people who they’ve come in contact with. Well, why shouldn’t that fall as a charge on those people? It doesn’t seem to me that it’s unreasonable. And yet this bill, while it might allow that to happen, is silent on that particular issue.

We intend to put up a Supplementary Order Paper that makes it implicit that if someone absconds from managed isolation, they will be encumbered with the costs that are met by the taxpayer to ensure that their reckless behaviour does not unduly affect the rest of the community. There’ll be other matters that come up in in this committee process that’s coming, and we look forward to having those discussions with the Minister, but I state again: so far, $479 million has been allocated for the cost of border management right out to 31 December. You have to ask: if you translated that into community facilities, or something like that, what would the country be able to get for the $479 million? A great deal—we’d get a stadium in Christchurch completely paid for, you’d get all sorts of other facilities around the country covered off. It’s not an insignificant amount of money; it’s huge. Remember, just divide that amount of money by $5 million, and you’ll get a figure that is put on the head of every single New Zealander to meet the cost of this isolation. For the Government to have said that they will interpret the schedules of this bill to recover only about 2 percent of that cost, I think is somewhat reckless—I think it’s unreasonable and quite unfair for the vast majority of New Zealanders.

The other point is that we were told initially that the cost per head of managed isolation was around about $4,000. That’s already gone out by $1,700 to $5,700. As the facilities come under more and more pressure and there is a limited number of places to go, it is for anyone to speculate just how that figure, per head, might go and how much over the half a billion dollars for the next few months that big $479 million might go. If that figure’s annualised, we’re talking about over a billion dollars for managed isolation, and we all know that it’s going to be more than one year that this goes on; it could be many, many years, so as a sunk cost for the taxpayer of New Zealand, it is a massive problem.

Let’s be clear, though: asking people to pay, even if it’s through some payment scheme for some of their own managed isolation, does not prevent New Zealanders returning to this country. As long as they are open and they are able to come in and they are required to comply—not a problem. The problem comes when it comes to paying for it, and our view is that the individuals, the families, should be paying more of a contribution to those very large costs. I say again: $479 million allocated till 31 December—annualise it, and it’s approaching a billion dollars. This is not a small cost and is should be more widely shared.

I stand to commend the bill to the House, to acknowledge the Minister for bringing this piece of legislation forward, and can I also note the pretty widespread support across the House for the legislation itself.

Much of the debate from the Opposition so far hasn’t actually been focused on the legislation itself but on the regulations that the Minister has foreshadowed in the speech, which would set out the details of the charging regime, who it would apply to, what the amounts would be, and that kind of thing. So I just want to take a moment to respond to some of those comments, because what they reveal is that the Opposition’s position on this issue is totally shambolic, all over the place, and completely disorganised.

I sat on the Epidemic Response Committee for a period of time, where, at every twist and turn of the Government’s response to COVID-19, we had a National Party which was arguing, effectively, to loosen the borders and to loosen the controls that this Government so effectively put in place to beat back COVID-19. We had leaders of that party—I can’t remember which one, because there have been so many—arguing at different times that we should be opening up to China and other countries during our highly successful lockdown period. And now, in the debate about our border controls, we have them complaining about the fact that the Government is investing hundreds of millions of dollars in quarantine control to keep New Zealanders safe and, at the same time, arguing that we’re being too soft, but, at the same time, in the speech we’ve just heard from Mr Brownlee, arguing that we should have a looser and more generous regime for business travellers, for example.

What is clear to any New Zealanders listening to this debate is that the National Party’s position on this issue is totally confused, totally shambolic, and totally disorganised, just as their party in general is at the moment, and that it is this side of the House, this Government, and the Labour Party, which I represent, which can be trusted to keep New Zealanders safe as we rebuild and recover from COVID-19. I commend this bill to the House.

Ah—“shambolic” and “disorganised” says the member of the Government who is passing legislation in the dying days of their Government, knowing that this has been coming for months and months and months. The only reason we’re here is because the National Party put out a really solid, good argument for a number of weeks—possibly months now, even—saying that, actually, it’s fair and reasonable to expect people to pay some of the costs of their managed isolation. It pushed this Government—well, firstly, into a chaotic shambles. We had one side of the Government saying, “Oh, we need to charge everybody the full amount.”—Winston Peters—and we had the Greens over here saying, “Oh no, we can’t charge anyone; it has to be completely free.”

So don’t lecture us about “shambolic” and “disorganised” when the three parties across the House can’t even get their stuff together to sit down, sort themselves out, and come to a position on this that they can all agree on. This bill is an acknowledgment of the fact that they can’t do that, because all it does, as has been mentioned by a few people, is just set out a framework; it doesn’t go into any detail. They can’t go into any detail because they know if they do that they’re going to have a huge tiff on their hands between the guys over here and the guys over here who couldn’t, by the way, even sit together let alone come to an agreement on this bill. That’s “shambolic” and “disorganised”, I would put to you.

Now, I’d also put to you the fact that Michael Wood can’t get his head around the fact that all that Gerry Brownlee was saying was that, in fact, the proposals that this Government have put forward—not in this bill, but in their press releases and what the Prime Minister has said about who gets charged and who doesn’t get charged—are, in fact, shambolic and disorganised, because it’s unfair to say to some people “You have to pay.” and other people “You don’t have to pay.” If we’re going to put in a regime, it has to be well-thought-through, not shambolic and disorganised like the bits and pieces we’ve heard from this Government in their bits and pieces of press releases.

I want just to go back to the previous speaker, Megan Woods. You have come to expect from this Minister of Energy and Resources a general misunderstanding of the issues, and today—a complete fabrication and misrepresentation of what I, in fact, said. I was very clear in my first reading speech that we cannot continue to cover the cost of what will, if you extrapolate it out, be a billion dollars a year in bringing people home. I never at any stage said that we shouldn’t be quarantining people—as much as she’d like to believe that and go and have a press release about it; I was saying we cannot continue to meet that cost. It is huge. It is ballooning. As Gerry Brownlee said, we don’t know how long this is going to go on for.

It is reasonable to expect, like the rest of us, how we’ve all had some kind of cost that we’ve had to bear in this, whether it’s people who’ve lost their businesses, lost their jobs, lost their livelihoods, had to take out huge loans, or had to spend their retirement savings to prop up their business—everybody in this country has paid. Is it fair? No, it’s not fair. Grant Robertson made that very clear—this is not about fairness—when he said very early on in COVID it’s not about fairness, unfortunately. This whole thing is very unfair. But the practical reality is we cannot continue to spend a billion dollars a year. We have to put in place something that is as fair as we can get it to recover some of those costs, and that’s what this bill does, and which is why we’ll be supporting it.

I would also like to point out that the Minister in her first and second reading speeches glossed very quickly over the section 11 changes to the COVID-19 Public Health Response Act, which will be interesting. I’m looking forward to having her in the chair when we delve into these a bit. She said in her second reading speech that—clause 7(2) says, “Replace section 11(1)(a)(viii) with:”. In fact, that is already in the bill. There’s only one new word—well, there’s two new words: people must report for “and undergo”, because I guess there was a problem with people reporting for but not wanting to undergo a test. It also includes “of any kind”. So, previously, I guess, there was one type of test; now they’ve included any kind of test. So we’re going to delve into that a bit more. What does that mean? She didn’t mention any of that in her speech; she just glossed over the top of it.

And then the other part of section 11, which will just be interesting to go into—again, there was no detail given to us by this Minister about people having to register potentially for a quarantine place before they come into New Zealand. But new section 11(1)(a)(x), set out in clause 7(3), says here, “satisfy any specified criteria before entering New Zealand from a place outside New Zealand, which may include [having to preregister].” But what else could that mean? Could that mean having a test before you come in? Does it mean being vaccinated before you come in? It’s very broad: “satisfy any specified criteria before entering New Zealand”. It’ll be interesting to hear what the Minister has to say about those. There was no detail given in her speech. I’d be keen to know what those things mean, as I’m sure many New Zealanders would.

In the final couple of minutes—I won’t go on too long—I want to just remind the House that if you extrapolate this out, it’s a billion dollars, all of the cost of bringing people home. All this Government have told us that they would like to do is cost recovery of around about somewhere in the realm of $8 million. It is—I think that someone said—2 percent. It’s a drop in the bucket. The cost of administering the scheme alone—who’s exempt, who’s not, how much do you charge, when do you charge, cost recovery, and all those bits and pieces—would suck up most of that. We have to have a regime in place that is seriously recuperating the costs of managed isolation and quarantine in New Zealand. It’s the right thing to do, it’s a practical thing to do, and I commend the bill to the House.

I rise to offer New Zealand First’s continued support for this bill, and, like the other parties in the House—or the vast majority—acknowledge the framework that it delivers or brings to cover some costs of the managed isolation or quarantine facilities. This is quite a complex space. It is the right of New Zealanders to return, it is a right of citizenship, and it is a very complex issue with New Zealand Bill of Rights Act implications.

But New Zealand First are on the record as hoping that this would go somewhat further in terms of cost recovery for the New Zealand taxpayer. Those of us that are here and paying tax are up for a significant bill up against the backdrop of significant Government borrowing in this COVID response, and an economic downturn, so we are clearly on the record as wanting this to go a bit further in terms of the cost recovery. But we do acknowledge that those returning and seeking only to return for a short term, or those undertaking short overseas trips, knowing what the rules are before they leave, and the terms of engagement, and that being fully factored in to the decision-making process, that that particular set of circumstances is covered here, and appropriately so.

So New Zealand First will continue to support this bill. Thank you.

In my first reading speech, I talked about the risks inherent in hasty legislation being passed and the lack of a select committee process, and I note already we’re not through the second reading and we now have a Government Supplementary Order Paper on the Table that has made minor amendments to the bill. My question, really, is the degree to which further amendments might be needed, either before the bill is passed or, more concerning, after it.

I also expressed concern at the lack of rigour around its preparation, and I’ve now had an opportunity to review the departmental disclosure statement, and those concerns, actually, rather than be alleviated, they were concern. When we look at the regulatory impact analysis—well, actually, we can’t, because there wasn’t one. There were no regulatory impact statements provided to inform policy decisions that led to the bill. Has further impact analysis become available for any aspects of the policy to be given effect by this bill? The answer is no. For the policy to be given effect by the bill, are the potential cost-benefits likely to be impacted by the level of compliance or non-compliance? The answer, obviously, is yes. If people don’t pay their bills, there will be an impact. The question then is to what extent will the policy objective be undermined if people don’t meet their obligations. The answer to that question is: that depends, and it depends (a) on how much they’re charged and (b) how much non-payment is made.

Well, the answer to the question is almost certain to be: not very much. Because, as my colleague Erica Stanford has just pointed out, we are approaching a billion dollars of cost and this bill seeks to recoup about $10 million of that cost.

💬 Erica Stanford: Chicken feed.

It is chicken feed; absolutely, Ms Stanford. I was fascinated to note the comments from Mark Patterson of the New Zealand First Party, whose party actually supported a more comprehensive charging regime. Well, I say to Mr Patterson: join the National Party—no, sorry, I’ll rephrase.

💬 Erica Stanford: He already did that.

💬 Dan Bidois: It didn’t work out well.

Yeah, that’s right. We’ve been there. Join with the National Party in supporting amendments in the name of Gerry Brownlee that will do just that. I noticed that the New Zealand First Party has been very diligent in unhooking itself from the coalition over the last few months. It wants to portray itself as separate from and different to the Labour Party and the Government. Well, this is a really good opportunity, Mr Patterson, because this is actually what the New Zealand taxpayer wants. They want a more comprehensive charging regime, and the Government isn’t giving them one. The member’s party is part of the Government in coalition; so this is an excellent opportunity to both do the right thing and create the very separation that his leader desires.

I want just to touch again on the question of the section 11 powers that are being amended by this bill, because I do want to express further concern at what—and this is one of the reasons why I wanted to have a look at the departmental disclosure statement, because, clearly, the Government has had some advice that either the section 70 powers under the Health Act or the section 11 powers that we’ve already passed and that we’re now amending and tinkering with are not sufficient to require a person to undergo a medical examination or test, and to provide that an order might be required to satisfy that criteria. I don’t agree with that; I’m quite comfortable that not only section 11 of the COVID-19 Public Health Response Act provides that, section 70 of the Health Act also did, and that there was no need for the hasty passage of certain sections of the Act that we’re now amending again. But we don’t know what that advice was; we haven’t seen the advice, because the Government hasn’t released it, and that’s consistent with a pattern that has been right the way through the COVID response, from the Attorney-General, from the Minister of Health, and now from the Minister of Housing, which is, effectively, “Trust us; we know what we’re doing. We’re basing this on advice but we’re not going to disclose it.” And, once again, this most open and transparent Government is anything but.

So I maintain the concerns that I expressed in the first reading. I am worried that we’re already getting to the point where we’re making amendments to a bill that hasn’t been embarked on with sufficient scrutiny, and I worry that, when it is passed, we’ll be back here—obviously not in this term of Parliament, but at the earliest opportunity. When the National Party leads Government, actually we’ll probably dispense with it altogether and do what was necessary, which was to actually change, if needed, the Health Act, because that Health Act has endured. It was there to prescribe for what needed to be done in the event that there was a public health emergency or pandemic outbreak. Section 70 was, in my view, sufficiently robust to be able to provide for that, and, if it wasn’t, amend section 70. But we’ll have that opportunity to do that in October and November, and I look forward to it.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. It’s a pleasure to rise and speak in support of this bill, and, I think, to bring it back to what this bill is about, it is a public health response. What we’ve all experienced and what we’ve all learnt over the COVID crisis is that we do have to come together and take care of all of us, or else none of us will be safe from this virus and none of us will come out of this as strong and well as we would hope.

Also, to bring it back to the human stories, the Green Party has been proud to stand with our Kiwi whānau overseas who do wish to come home and live now in the face of this crisis, with their circumstances changing every day, with the stress of job losses, with the stress of visa losses, with immense anxiety of this virus itself and even just the logistical preparations to come home, and then they are then faced with the possibility of a $3,000 shock, an extra charge, per person, to even enter the country. What we’ve heard from people overseas are stories of families with multiple children, families who had thought at first that they would stay because they had employment elsewhere, and they might have faced an uncertain future if they’d moved back, but then they’ve lost their visas and now are in an extremely anxiety-riddled situation and they are faced with delaying their homecoming in a situation where COVID is rampant and their very health and safety is at stake. We weren’t willing to leave them stranded.

So this bill does put forward a framework for cost recovery, but it also, as the Minister has outlined, in regulations will exempt all Kiwis who were overseas at the time that the pandemic hit and wish to come home to live. It is a fundamental right of citizenship to be able to live in the country of your nationality, and we weren’t willing to put a price tag on a fundamental right. We don’t do that with any other rights. We don’t put up our fundamental rights for sale to the highest bidder and we won’t do that with this.

It does, however, strike a balance, as we’ll introduce in regulations, in that if anyone leaves New Zealand now, after the payment regime and after the quarantine regime has been made clear to them, and is coming back in, they will be expected to build the cost of their travel, whether it’s for business or tourism, into their trip. If Kiwis are coming home for tourism purposes, for a short visit, they will be expected to build the costs into their travels, but others will be exempt and there will be room for both a payment plan for those who need it and for compassionate exemptions, and that may mean people who are coming home for funerals, to take care of very sick relatives, or even for the birth of a child. The circumstances will be varied, so we won’t specify them, but there will be a compassionate exemption built into this as well.

We do think that that’s the right balance. We do think that fundamental rights will be upheld in this regime, and that it will reflect our overall COVID response as a Government, which was focused on science, on a public health response that is taking care of everyone, and one that is compassionate. So I do commend the bill to the House.

Well, if anything demonstrates the shambolic nature of this Government, it is this debate that we’ve got today, because just before, we had a member of the New Zealand First Party stand up and say, “Actually, we would like all people coming into New Zealand to be charged.” Now what we’ve heard from the member Golriz Ghahraman is “Actually, no, we wouldn’t like anybody charged. It’s their God-given right to return to New Zealand under a free-of-charge nature.” And here we have, in the middle of all of that, the Labour Party. They’ve had to manage the shambolic nature of that, and that is why we’ve got the bill that we have here today and we’re discussing it in its second reading.

Now, normally, in second reading, we’re discussing the outcome of the select committee and the submissions that were received in select committee and what changes were made as part of that process. Now, let me discuss this select committee report. There were zero submissions in that select committee report. We heard zero people in New Zealand and the impact that this legislation will have on them. I do raise that because this again outlines the shambolic nature of this Government. We are now in second reading. We should be discussing, in fact, the select committee process and the submissions that came from that to help inform the legislation and strengthen that; instead, we are here in urgency discussing this legislation and the shambolic nature of that, as we have outlined.

So, as I said in my first reading speech, this is an important topic for New Zealanders, both those living in New Zealand but also the one million New Zealanders living overseas. Of course, we’ve all had correspondence from New Zealanders home and abroad, and to and fro, whether you’re for it or against it. But what it comes down to is simple economics. We know that every person that comes home into New Zealand gets managed isolation for two weeks. They get put up in a four- or five-star hotel, three meals a day. They get catered for for all of their various dietary requirements. If you’re gluten free, they’ll give you gluten-free meals. You get Sky access. You get a change of your bed sheets every day. You get COVID tests, all inclusive. And that adds up to the taxpayer costs of about $5,700 per person.

As was outlined by Gerry Brownlee, that cost has skyrocketed. Already we’ve spent just under $200 million and the tune of just under $500 million between now and the end of this year. So that cost is going to skyrocket. If you think we’re going to be in this position for another year, that will add up to about a billion dollars of taxpayer funding for managed isolation. What we have said all along is that we actually think that if you’re coming home to New Zealand, you should bear the brunt of that cost and help recover that cost, because no matter how long you’ve stayed overseas—and I speak from experience, having lived overseas for seven years, having paid tax overseas, having not contributed to the tax take in New Zealand, and I think it’s actually very fair. I think most New Zealanders would agree: if you’re overseas and you come home, you should bear the burden of that cost instead of the New Zealand taxpayer, because that right now is what is being burdened.

The previous speaker, Golriz Ghahraman, spoke about the right to come home and the right to access your country—of course that right is intact. All we’re saying is that if you want to come home, you bear some of that cost, that burden. So I don’t think that, actually, your average New Zealander disagrees with that approach. I think that it is fair and reasonable to assume that if the taxpayer of New Zealand is having to bear the burden of that cost—it is a free and fair decision to come back at any time; you should bear that cost and help bear that cost for the New Zealand taxpayer.

My colleague was discussing, she and Simeon Brown, that, actually, this bill that we’re discussing has been watered down a lot. It is a lot about platitudes and being able to go out there and say, “Yes, we’ve made action on this.” But if you look at the numbers, you see loud and clear: the only cost that is going to be returned to the taxpayer from this legislation is miniscule. It’s $10 million. So here we have a bill that will cost the taxpayer, on average, a billion dollars a year, and we’ve got this bill that we’re discussing that helps recover $10 million of that cost.

💬 Simeon Brown: One percent.

One percent, as my colleague Simeon Brown says. So all we can deduce from this legislation is that it doesn’t make a big impact to the difference of the cost; this is the Government’s way of shoring up their offshore votes for the election.

💬 Hon Member: That’s right.

Right? To say to people, if you’re in London—it’s to shore up the London vote. If you want to come home, don’t worry; we’ll get you all these exceptions, all these exemptions. You won’t have to pay—you won’t have to pay the burden; it’ll be New Zealand taxpayers that will be paying the burden of this cost.

💬 Simeon Brown: They’re playing politics with COVID-19.

They’re playing politics, as my colleague Simeon Brown has said, with COVID-19.

So I think it’s a shame—a real shame—that in the second reading I cannot stand before this House and talk about some of the submissions that have come before and talk about the changes that came through the select committee process, because all we know is that there was zero submissions to the select committee process and that we’ve heard from zero—zero—people as part of that.

I look forward to the committee as a whole House. We looked to discuss the changes that National has proposed, and we hope that the New Zealand First Party, because they broadly want to see a strengthening of this at the border, consider and vote accordingly, because I think the New Zealand taxpayer deserves to have as much cost recovered, as part of this process, to protect New Zealanders but also to protect future New Zealanders, because, unfortunately, the cost of this burden will bear the brunt on the future taxpayers of New Zealand, not the current and not the ones overseas in London that want to come back and retire in New Zealand; they will be borne out of the future New Zealanders that, unfortunately, will be paying through increased taxes and increased rates going forward.

We will support this bill at this stage, of course, but we look forward to discussing and debating at later stages how to strengthen this bill. We commend this bill to the House.

This is a split call.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. After having to endure eight minutes of the last speech, just one suggestion for that member: I’d be more worried about the voters of the North Shore, if I were him, than the voters of the Northern Hemisphere—just a wee piece of advice for the member.

I’d like to acknowledge my colleague the Hon Megan Woods for navigating this piece of legislation through the House, because it does set up a framework for charging for those isolation facilities in New Zealand to keep New Zealand’s borders safe. There is a non-negotiable in that: anyone who comes into New Zealand will have to go into isolation for 14 days to make sure that we keep people on the other side of those fences safe, as the Government has put us in this position.

There are some situations, though, where there is some flexibility for compassion for people who can come back into the country. We’ve heard about instances where people might travel overseas to be tourists, and, of course, if they come back, then they should be forced to pay, via this piece of legislation, to cover their costs. But there will be some situations where people may have to be forced to travel for family circumstances, where there should be, and will be, compassion.

So I would like to thank the member, and for those who’ve worked on this bill, to make sure there is that release valve, because, unfortunately, people will be forced to travel either to see or look after loved ones, and then come back after this piece of legislation is passed. And, again, I think that is another way that our Government is showing compassion during very difficult times, and I commend this bill to the House.

I call Agnes Loheni—five minutes.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. In this contribution, we’ve heard in the House again about fairness. It is really rich for the Government members to come in on this bill and talk about being fair and about fundamental rights of New Zealanders wanting to return. Actually, New Zealanders overseas who wanted to return had plenty of time—they’ve had plenty of time to get back before the border restrictions began, and also there were repatriation flights put on as well that were organised by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade. So it’s actually rich for the Government members to say that we should be fair to those New Zealanders coming back in, when, as New Zealanders, we actually expected that the border quarantine facilities were going to be well managed to keep us safe—the New Zealanders who did their bit, who made those sacrifices. As we know, there are significant job losses that we are facing, significant debt, businesses collapsing. New Zealanders here made those sacrifices and so it is actually fair—they are asking for it to be fair and actually that they do not have to carry the burden of the cost for those New Zealanders who wish to return.

There are absolutely no fundamental rights that are being impinged upon here. We are not stopping them from coming back into the country. There are always costs to travel and having to return to a country, and we are not impinging on those fundamental rights, but New Zealanders are asking that we here, our families—and, actually, the future, because we know the debt that we are currently facing—are not being burdened with this extra debt. As we know, it’s been very clear and noted today in the House, it is about $5,700 per stay for a person to be in two weeks of managed isolation, which, as we’ve heard, is a billion dollars—a billion dollars annualised—and this Government only wants to recover about a fraction of that.

💬 Simeon Brown: One percent.

One percent. How is that fair? How is that fair to the families who are struggling right now to just put some food on the table? They’re worried about their job security. They’re worried about the ability to pay rent. They’re going to have to pay extra in petrol costs—particularly for those families on the margins, that extra in petrol costs, that extra in rent a week, is adding up. And here they are; they’re given a Government who wants to be compassionate to New Zealanders who return—we’re not stopping them from returning. They are absolutely entitled to return. What they want is some fairness in that they are not having to shoulder the costs of them being here in isolation. They’re in good accommodation. They’ve been fed well, my understanding is. There are security costs to that. There are also the health costs in managing those facilities and making sure that people are being tested.

At the end of the day, we want every single person that comes back into our country—whether they are a New Zealander returning or not a New Zealander returning, every single person coming back into the country places a risk on us here, and we want to make sure that those facilities are well managed. Clearly, it’s been a bit shambolic there from the Government as this started, but, actually, we think also that New Zealanders should be paying the cost of that. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I have family overseas in the Netherlands, where they now have hundreds of new cases of community spread come up again, and that is in sharp contrast to, of course, our coordinated and orderly regime that we have here in New Zealand to stay on top of this virus. But the Opposition arguments all seem to be centred around it being too expensive to keep this managed isolation and quarantine, and I do wonder if there have been discussions by the Opposition to actually getting rid of it. We have heard a lot about the cost, and they also have mentioned that they cannot continue to cover the cost of this managed isolation and of the quarantine. So I do wonder if they have plans to no longer keeping New Zealanders safe. Therefore, I commend this bill to the House.

Well, that was quite extraordinary. I can’t quite join those dots somehow—no one on this side is calling for not having quarantine; not at all. We understand that we need quarantine—absolutely need to get it right.

💬 Hon Member: Needed something to say.

Well, absolutely, and unfortunately they haven’t got it right yet—they haven’t got it right yet.

💬 Matt Doocey: Government bill and she had to make her speech up.

Yeah, ha! Well, exactly. We heard from my colleague Michael Woodhouse about the shortcomings in the process around drafting this bill—in fact that goes for a lot of stuff that the Government has brought up.

We heard, actually, last week, I think it was, Minister O’Connor in response to a question from my colleague Lawrence Yule about Recognised Seasonal Employer (RSE) workers and whether RSE workers returning to New Zealand, or coming into New Zealand, would be faced with the cost of quarantine, and he said that they wouldn’t have to worry about it. What does that mean? What does that mean? Does that mean they don’t have to do quarantine? Well, I would argue that probably they don’t if they’re coming from a country with no COVID. But we’ve got a name for that, it’s called “a bubble.” Actually, there’s a lot of people calling for a bubble now with Rarotonga, and quite justifiably so. Why aren’t they doing that? You have to wonder. The only conclusion that I can come to is that fear is the only thing they’ve got to run their election campaign on.

They’ve got nothing. They’ve failed to deliver on every single thing. You know, housing’s worse, child poverty’s worse, everybody’s got less money to spend. It’s all worse as a result of them. It’s quite a pity—it’s a great pity. One example is in the immigration area, they passed a bill under undue haste to allow the Minister to deal with a lot of immigration issues—took him two months to do anything, and they still haven’t done much with that bill. A lot of people are experiencing significant issues because of that. So they can’t deliver, we know that.

But I think one of the things that struck me through all of this—and we talked about compassion, that was one of the points made on the other side. I think there is absolutely no doubt that the Prime Minister does compassion incredibly well; so well, in fact, I’m reminded of a quote from the American author E B White, and he says, “[Her] words span rivers and mountains, but [her] thoughts are still only six inches long.” I think that sums it up—that absolutely sums it up: sums up the Prime Minister and sums up this Government. With that, I’ll leave that and commend the bill to the House, with reservations.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I think it’s first important to acknowledge that managed isolation is our number one defence protecting New Zealanders from COVID-19. I think, to date, the Government has paid the cost of that because of the importance of that to our country, but what we need is a fair and balanced approach. Just listening to the arguments on the other side, what I see absolutely reflects a lack of compassion. When we think about those who are returning to New Zealand, they are a very, very diverse group. I think of many people that have been overseas, established lives, had rental properties, businesses, homes, and what they’re having to do now is up-sticks everything and return to New Zealand, and the costs they’re facing are significant.

We need a framework that allows us to take that into account. We need a framework that allows us to take into account the fact that many people are returning temporarily, but they’re returning for the deaths of loved ones—either to be with them for a period beforehand, but also for funerals. We need to take into account the fact that many New Zealanders need to be having some compassion in that respect. However, there are also others who will be going overseas for business purposes or just to visit friends and family in future, and also the framework needs to make sure that they pay their share of the costs. So this is an important bill that creates a framework where we can decide and work out how we pay that fair share. I commend this bill to the House.

The result corrected after originally being announced as Ayes 117, Noes 2.

In Committee