India Free Trade Agreement Legislation Amendment Bill

Committee of the whole House

Thank you. I will start with the commencement. I do want to check, not so much when this—I’m assuming that the Order in Council date is going to be when the other remaining aspects of the agreement has been sorted. I do want to check: when this whole bill comes into effect, by Order in Council, does that also mean that the regulations I mentioned in other parts of this bill, overall, will also be—[Minister in the chair shakes head] No? OK, that’s fine. Thank you, Minister. That’s an easy question.

Then I guess I’ll move on to the title. I think it’s important to note that while this bill specifically, as the India Free Trade Agreement Legislation Amendment Bill, it has been something we’ve seen not only in the context of this free-trade agreement legislation but also other free-trade agreement legislation, where there is no effective way for this committee to be able to debate on the agreement itself in any effective manner. Yes, while we are here talking about how this is the bill and here is the national interest analysis, but it is a concern, and it’s not just in terms of this agreement; it’s in terms of, in general, how we look at international treaty examination—that a lot of the things that should be in scope, because, fundamentally, these sort of things, that the executive branch of our Government signed ourselves up to, does actually affect all of us. But we are not given a chance to be able to do that because the only opportunity for us to be able to examine an international treaty, whether it is a trade agreement or whether it’s any other forms of treaty, is through a select committee stage after the treaty has been signed by the relevant Minister. There is, effectively, no way that a select committee—

CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): So the member said you were going to ask something about the title.

I think that this title is inappropriate for this legislation because, although we are referring to the “India Free Trade Agreement”, there is no part of this debate where we are able to effectively debate on the India Free Trade Agreement. So I think a better title, if the Minister wouldn’t mind entertaining the committee, is that this bill is actually just the “India Free Trade Legislation” because there is no agreement to speak of, because we have not been given the chance to debate on the agreement.

That is part of the issue when it comes to our international treaty examination process, because when we had the international treaty examination through the select committee, and the Minister has mentioned during this entire committee of the whole House stage, on multiple occasions—and I do appreciate the Minister’s engagement, and the Minister has been very engaging in responding to questions around this bill. Everything that is to do with the agreement—to a certain degree, the Minister has been saying that this is outside the scope, despite the fact that it is part of the national interest analysis. At the same time, as I mentioned in my second reading, there was supposed to be a 15-sitting-day time frame for the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee to consider the agreement and were only given nine sitting days because the Minister wanted to push this through before the end of this Parliament.

So the recommendation that I’m making to the Minister is simply remove the “Agreement” because we have not been able to have a robust discussion or debate on the agreement itself.

Committee of the whole House

I move, That debate on this question now close.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the debate on this question now close.

Ayes 59

New Zealand National 48; ACT New Zealand 11.

Noes 62

New Zealand Labour 34; Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand 14; New Zealand First 8; Te Pāti Māori 4; Ferris; Kapa-Kingi.

Motion not agreed to.

CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): The time has come for me to leave the Chair. We will resume this committee again at 9 a.m.

Sitting suspended from 9.58 p.m. to 9 a.m. (Wednesday)