Public Finance (Fines Collection Costs—Budget Measures) Amendment Bill

Members, the House is in committee on the Public Finance (Fines Collection Costs—Budget Measures) Amendment Bill. Members, we come first to clause 1. This is the debate on clause 1, the title. The question is that clause 1 stand part.

Thank you, Madam Chair. This bill is named the Public Finance (Fines Collection Costs—Budget Measures) Amendment Bill because that is exactly what it does. Ultimately, that is the bill, which seeks to increase the amount which recoverable from the collection of fines from 10 percent to 14 percent and is very clear: what’s in the tin is what’s on the tin.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Well, I’m afraid I can’t agree with the Minister on that front: it doesn’t really tell you anything that it does. The Public Finance (Fines Collection Costs—Budget Measures) Amendment Bill sort of points loosely towards collection costs, but it certainly doesn’t actually say what the bill does, which is to increase costs.

You will no doubt have seen, and I’m imagining you’ll agree with, my Amendment Paper on that matter. My suggestion is that we actually do call it what it is, which is the “Public Finance (Increase of Charges for Local Body Debt Collection) Amendment Act 2024”, because that’s exactly what’s going on. We are increasing charges being imposed on local bodies, and I think it’s important to recognise that this isn’t the case that the Crown, other than the provision of a court service, which is what every citizen is entitled to have at their disposal—this isn’t the provision of any particular service. It’s actually a bit fatuous to say that this is a charge for services delivered, because the court framework is just a critical part of Government infrastructure. We’ll be starting charging people for parliamentary services next—it’s that kind of constitutional significance.

So, really, I think if we’re going to debate the title—and we are—then the appropriate title is to actually refer to the fact that this is a charge for the use of the judicial system as a means of debt enforcement, and we’re increasing it. You could, of course, just say that it’s a tax on local bodies—and we’ve said before, it’s, essentially, a parking fine tax. The parking fines are bad enough, but I know that, certainly in my electorate, Wilson Parking has a lot to answer for. But, in fact, this is of the same ilk in the sense that it’s adding an extra layer on top of the additional charges. So we really should call it what it is and not hide behind some weasel word “Public Finance (Collection Costs)”; it’s the “Public Finance (Increase in Collection Costs)” and that’s absolutely what we should be calling it.

Of course, we could call it, as I’ve said, a parking fine tax or a money grab, but I think I have heard come from the Chair from time to time that titles of that nature, whilst I think it was deadly serious, sometimes the Chair sets them aside as being perhaps ironic or something like that. But I know the wise Chair that we have now surely wouldn’t be doing anything like that. Certainly, an increase of charges for local body debt collection is absolutely straight down the line, and I hope that the Minister will, in fact, agree to that change.

Of course, I have a number of other Amendment Papers. I don’t think they’re on this clause at the moment, so—but you never know, I might have one there and I know some of my colleagues want to speak on this matter as well.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Look, I don’t want to disagree with my very learned colleague the Hon Dr Duncan Webb, but I do have a little bit of an issue with the word “collection” and also “costs”, actually, and I wonder if the Minister can explain why, in the title, the word “collection” would be appropriate.

When I think of the word “collection”, it involves an active activity; it’s about collecting; it is about doing something. Whereas, my understanding of this bill is that the Crown is really a passive recipient of money that is being gained through other means—I mean, certainly through the judicial process, as Dr Webb has alluded to. So I just am not sure that the word “collection” is correct. It’s possibly a little bit misleading, because it implies that there is some kind of active activity happening that is going to justify a change in the Public Finance Act. We must remember that the Public Finance Act is one of the key foundations of our financial system. It’s not something we do lightly. So if we’re going to have bills that change that principal Act, I do think they need to be accurate.

The other word that I actually have issues with as well is “costs”, because “costs” implies that there is a measurable evidence base for the retaining, rather than collecting, of the money that is being accrued. When I look at the cost recovery impact statement, it definitely says that there is no evidence for that. So trying to find what to call that would be something I’d like to ask the Minister. Is there a better word that basically describes what is happening? I don’t think “cost” captures it. Perhaps the word “levy” has been used. “Levy” isn’t accurate either, because it is a fee and that was discussed in the speech, and I’m sure we’ll come to that in the relevant parts, but I’m wondering, actually, if we just replace the word “costs” with “tax”, because that’s actually what is happening here.

So, although I haven’t tabled an amendment, I wonder if the Minister would consider changing the title to Public Finance (Fines Tax—Budget Measures) Amendment Bill. So we would take out the word “collection”, because, as I said, there’s no active collection going on, and take out the word “costs”. There isn’t anything that can be evidenced numerically; it is a retention of some money, and, therefore, in my mind, the appropriate nomenclature for that would be “tax”. So I do wonder if the Minister would please consider mine, even though I am very sorry that I didn’t manage to get time to table the amendment.

Look, I thought the member’s question was very good in terms of why not use the word “tax” rather than “costs”, and I’d like to explain to the House why the word “costs” is more appropriate. It costs the Government money to do activities, and the activity that it is doing here is collecting fines on behalf of local authorities and other entities, and that cost has increased over time. So, as part of good Government, it’s appropriate that we have a cost recovery model which ensures that the costs that it costs to run the service are recovered. This bill is doing that—exactly that. I just sort of feel like, in that last 30 seconds or a minute, I’ve explained why the last six years have been such an appalling waste of money by that last Government. This Government is bringing back appropriate expenditure, appropriate governance, and appropriate cost recovery models. That is exactly what this bill is doing. This small but important bill is another measure in terms of doing that so that we have better governance in New Zealand.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you for the opportunity to take my first call on this bill, the Public Finance (Fines Collection Costs—Budget Measures) Amendment Bill, in the committee stage.

I appreciate what this bill is trying to do in order to recuperate some of the costs generated by the court and by local authorities. Based on what we see here, in terms of the cost recovery impact statement, it is projected here that revenue through court fines is budgeted at $111 million a year by the Ministry of Justice, and the revenue from the filing fees—these are two separate fees we’re looking at. One is the fines recovered or the fines imposed, and the other one is the filing fee. Now, I would like to know from the Minister what sort of modelling he has done when it comes to the collection of the fee itself.

Now, the reason I mention this—and this is a little bit outdated; I can only imagine it has increased—is that the previous report said that Kiwis, and also, in this case, tourists—I would like to know how this bill would affect tourists. But Kiwis and tourists have evaded $156 million in unpaid fines over the past decade, and this is from 2009 to 2019. Across Aotearoa, district and regional councils have referred, at that stage in 2019, $471 million of fines to the Ministry of Justice since 2008, and 33 percent of those fines were never recovered.

So, based on the cost recovery impact statement and the estimated additional revenue from the proposed changes, I would like to ask the Minister: does this, first of all, factor in to the amount of fines that were never recovered in the first place? Auckland, of course, dwarfs other councils. In this report, $66.5 million of fines were left unpaid since 2008-09—so within a decade. So that’s a really important question. The second branch of that question is what I mentioned before: a lot of the time, these fines are incurred by tourists who will come to Aotearoa, and when they leave—and this goes to that—has that also been considered as part of the estimated additional revenue that has been proposed? So those are the first two questions.

When we are looking at this bill, it also talks about collection by not only local authorities but also other organisations, and I would like to know from the Minister what conversations have been had with other organisations who are also currently collecting some of these fees, and whether they have agreed—if they are either a State-owned enterprise or if they are indeed other agencies or private enterprises, etc.—whether any other organisations have OK’d the increase from 10 percent to 14 percent of the fee that is going to be retained.

So those are my initial questions. There are other questions on specific areas as well. But thank you very much, Madam Chair, for giving me the opportunity. But the question here is—

💬 Hon Members: Madam Chair!

Sorry, I still do have a minute and 26 seconds. Just to recap, the first question is around whether—

💬 Arena Williams: It could have gone to select committee.

It could have gone to select committee. The first question is around whether the estimated amount of revenue that is proposed here has factored in to the amount that is going to be lost from fines left unpaid, both by locals but also by tourists. Also, the second question is around whether other organisations agreed to this.

One of the things that I would also like to point out, which the Minister just mentioned before—I appreciate and understand that you’re trying to be fiscally responsible and trying to recuperate some of these costs—but may I also point people to the Vote Courts document that says, for support of the District Court, there is also an $8.5 million increase in the response to harm, as well as a $3 million increase to District Court funding and a tougher approach to sentencing.

So when we are looking at something like this, if you’re trying to balance the costs of the court and the estimate you’re using, they’re not actually recuperating it, because you have now just gone and spent it on all of these other things. I am also kind of interested to know from the Minister what his thoughts are on some of these rebalancing of the costs.

Before I take another call, I’d just like to remind members that this is a clause by clause consideration. It is not part by part, as you were probably expecting. So clause 1 is a more fulsome debate. I refer to Speaker’s ruling 127/1.

I move, That debate on this question now close.

As I’ve just said, it’s a more fulsome debate than a clause by clause debate. So we have got a bit more material, I think.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I do have an Amendment Paper on clause 1, so I would have felt quite aggrieved if I wasn’t able to speak to that. But old “Eager Meager” has attempted to—

💬 Hon Members: “Eager Meager”—“Eager Meager”!

My apologies, it’s James Meager, and I should use your full name. But that’s all right.

💬 Cameron Brewer: James “Eager” Meager.

James “Eager” Meager. But in all seriousness—

💬 Hon Rachel Brooking: Is that going to be the name of the bill?

I have got a suggestion for a retitle of this bill, but, no, that is not the name of the bill. I suspect he would like that a little bit too much. With all due respect to my colleague the Hon Dr Duncan Webb, who has also got an Amendment Paper—I know he made a suggestion and I know at the time when I heard it, I thought that was perfectly reasonable. To be perfectly fair, it’s gone in one ear and out the other, because I think I’ve got a better title.

Now, also with respect to my colleague Ingrid Leary, I thought she made a couple of good points which I hadn’t quite thought of. I’ve made a couple of notes here, because I particularly underlined the word “collection”. I have tabled an amendment, but if I had heard your comment beforehand, I may have thought about that twice because I do believe that “collection” is an active word, it is a doing word, and I’m not entirely sure that I necessarily would have chosen that, but it’s still a much better option than what the name is before us now.

So the other part that I think I’d like to make mention of is this concept of making money. So the amendment that I have before me is to replace clause 1 with “This Act is the Public Finance Making Money Off Debt Collection Amendment Act.” When I say, “making money”, I think, as has been mentioned in previous contributions during the various stages—which I know always feel like they’re lumped in together when we go through urgency, because they are all lumped in together, and we don’t get a chance to let that settle a bit and to have a little bit more thought as we go through this process. But such is the nature of urgency, and it’s always a bit of a conundrum, isn’t it, when we talk about “urgency”, because it makes it seem like it’s something that’s actually quite urgent and important, but this bill obviously isn’t in line with that.

Making money is in line with this because this is what it’s about. So I think that I disagree with the Minister when he says that what’s written on the tin is what it does. I think this “making money” part that I’m suggesting needs to have a more prominent position in the title of this bill. Now, when we talk about making money, obviously, if we look through the various documents that were imparted to support this bill, there was a table that said, I think, that it was $446,000 in its first year, which, you know—$446,000 is a little bit of money in terms of the Government’s budgets. It’s not a huge amount of money in the scheme of things. It’s certainly not up there with the $2.9 billion in tax cuts for landlords, for instance. But nevertheless, it is some money and I think because of that, in the title, it should say something along the lines of, as I’ve suggested, “This Act is the Public Finance Making Money Off Debt Collection”.

Now, the other thing that I would like us to think about when we think of what an appropriate title would be when we think of clause 1, is the fact that the existing 10 percent, along with the filing fee of $30, from memory—and remembering some of the things that are being raised are being raised by as much as, like, 83 percent. So the “making money” part here shouldn’t be understated. But that already makes the Government’s position as a debt collector, so to speak—or the Government’s position as using the judicial system as a means by which to collect debt—a little bit uncompetitive as it is. So I think the addition of “making money off debt collection” just specifies that a little bit more correctly that the Government is still in that business.

So I wonder if the Minister would consider that. I think it suits the bill a lot more and I’d be interested in hearing any other contributions from colleagues who may have other, similar ideas.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I just want to respond to the member, the list MP from Banks Peninsula. The tabled amendment was that the Act is the “Public Finance Making Money Off Debt Collection Amendment Act”, which could not be anything but what this bill is doing. It’s simply about cost recovery and about making sure that the system is able to actually pay the bills. Actually, that means ensuring that there’s enough funding. As it says in the general policy statement on the bill, which I assume the member hasn’t read yet, the increase is to ensure that fines “from amounts of fines recovered for offences” can be actually just covering the cost. I mean, that is ultimately what this bill is doing. So I’m not sure what the last Government did for the last six years, but clearly they borrowed, spent, taxed, but, actually, this is simply about making sure that the service—

Chlöe Swarbrick: What about localism, guys?

I’m not sure who that is screaming across the Chamber, but I did hear the question—

Chlöe Swarbrick: Oh, big boy, Simeon.

—and the answer to the interjection—

CHAIRPERSON (Maureen Pugh): Order! Refrain from getting personal with the remarks, please.

Thank you, Madam Chair. The answer to that question is that the Crown is providing a service for local government. It costs more money to run that service than it used to because of the inflation left behind by the last Government and so we’re ensuring cost recovery.

Thank you very much, Madam Chair. I do appreciate that you had a lot of choices there and you chose me, and I appreciate that. Thank you.

💬 James Meager: This sounds like leadership-thinking.

Keep it up. We’ve got all night. It’s all good; we’re in no rush. [Interruption] We’re in no rush—keep it coming. But it’s interesting that it does appear the Minister also wishes to keep this debate going, Madam Chair, because, as you know, and as many others know in this Chamber, if a Minister chooses to respond to a genuine query, like that as was proposed by Dr Duncan Webb, with a political comment, it only extends the debate. So if that’s how the Minister wants to play it, that’s absolutely fine.

I also have a genuine query. As much as I support the proposal made by the Hon Dr Duncan Webb, who always plays with a straight bat—he’s talking about an increase in charges for local body debt collection. It’s a fair cop. But what I’ve heard a lot from the Minister tonight is “cost recovery”. What I haven’t heard from the Minister tonight is the term “collection costs”, and I find that interesting. So I guess my query to the Minister is: if he really wants the title of this bill to, as he says, reflect what’s in the tin, would he consider changing the title of this bill to the “Public Finance (Cost Recovery) Amendment Bill”? I’ll explain why I don’t believe that what is currently there is appropriate, but why I think, in the spirit of trying to work together, that would be an appropriate title. Well, the first and most obvious point is that this is the justification that the Minister himself has used on a number of occasions. So, surely, if that is the justification behind this bill, then he may as well have the title reflecting that.

The issue that I have with the current title is that it’s got the inclusion of “Budget Measures” in there. Now, throughout the debate, in the first reading and up to now, this side of the House has made the point that this is a proposal from the Government to try and fill the gap that has been created by their tax cuts in the Budget. Pretty much every contribution from the Government has said “No, this has got nothing to do with that.”, and, yet, in the title, it’s got “Budget Measures”. So if they really do think that and it isn’t actually to do with the Budget, then let’s take that out and just say “cost recovery”, and then it will say what the Minister says that the bill says. We might still dispute it, but the whole point of the committee of the whole House stage is that in the absence of a select committee, the committee has got to try and find ways to improve it. At the moment, I don’t believe the Minister’s argument that the title reflects the intention.

In fact, I actually don’t think that if it were called the “Public Finance (Cost Recovery) Amendment Bill” it would either, but it would certainly reflect what the Minister’s saying about why this bill is needed.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

💬 Hon Member: How many parking fines have you had?

I do feel that I should correct the situation in the committee and admit to parking too long in Masterton once. So I’m not suggesting that the title be amended to “Sympathy for Overstayers”, but there are some ways that we could improve the title. I wonder if the title should be “Keeping Councils in the Dark about Increasing the Costs to Councils.” It’s been clear that local government—and presumably none of the mayors learnt of it till they read about it. I wonder if the Minister of Local Government or the Minister of Transport or somebody could have actually talked to them.

On the other hand, maybe it should be called the “Discouragement of Enforcement Bill”, because if we make it more expensive for councils to enforce—and it’s not only about turnover of parking; it’s also about safety. Let me have a look at the list, because we could put them all in the title, but we probably won’t. If it’s harder for a council to enforce parking on or near a pedestrian crossing, if it’s harder to enforce parking on a bus-only lane, if it’s harder to enforce inconsiderate parking, who’s going to suffer? Well, it will be the people that are most disadvantaged, that are generally ignored by this Government—people in wheelchairs, and children walking to school—having to walk out on to the road.

This bill could be called “Keep Local Government and Transport in the 20th Century”, because that’s the last time that some of those fees were increased. While I have immense sympathy for my colleagues on the right—maybe that wasn’t the best phrase—if they’ve ever received a parking fine, they can avoid it with better vigilance to time keeping and by looking not to block people, but the people most disadvantaged by a lack of enforcement would still suffer. So I’ve offered some alternative bill titles. I look forward to the Minister’s response.

Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you for your guidance, actually, just directing us to the fact that given that this is being done clause by clause, the title clause is the appropriate place for the more kind of wide-ranging debates, because there are some wider policy issues. This bill hasn’t been to select committee and we’ve got this only today, in parliamentary time, so there are a few questions I would like the Minister to answer. They’re quite serious questions.

The first is: how much does it cost the Crown to run this recovery framework, and how much of it is recovered through the existing system? So, basically, what’s the shortfall? Because you’ve talked about there being cost pressures, and, in an earlier speech, I suggested that it was actually just the Government looking for a bit of money because they’ve got a tight Budget. But you’re telling me that that’s not the case, so I guess I’m calling the Minister on this and saying, well, show me what the figures are. So what are the actual costs and what is the shortfall? I’d just ask two things first, if I may—so either my colleagues can speak, or you can respond.

The second thing is that I’m a bit perplexed, because in the regulatory impact statement—in the cost recovery impact statement—I understand why the 2024-25 recovery is slow, because it’s only half a year. But your 2025-26 recoveries of this additional 4 percent are $466,000 and across into 2028-29, that rises to $686,000, and, given that it’s a flat rate on parking fines and other fines, I can’t see where the revenue growth comes from because I can’t see that there’s more fines being imposed, unless the Minister is perhaps anticipating increasing the amounts of the fines—in which case, that money would be 4 percent of a greater sum. So if he could explain to me how he reaches that increased revenue, that would be good.

I do think that this is part of a wider framework, including increased court costs, so I do want to ask some questions about that. But in the spirit of having an exchange, I won’t go with that; I’ll give the Minister an opportunity to respond to those matters.

Thank you, Madam Chair, for allowing me to take my first call on this bill. I have three questions for the Minister, which I’ll then follow with some contextual statements and some figures on why I’ve asked these questions.

My first question to the Minister is: how many Ministers and how much time was spent on this bill in total in terms of drafting, in terms of meetings, and in terms of everything to do with this, the Public Finance (Fines Collection Costs—Budget Measures) Amendment Bill? My second question is: how many backbenchers and how much time was spent in total in meetings and consultations, and whatever other aspects there are of this Public Finance (Fines Collection Costs—Budget Measures) Amendment Bill? My final question is: how many officials and how much time was spent deliberating and drafting and working on this Public Finance (Fines Collection Costs—Budget Measures) Amendment Bill?

I ask that question, Minister, because according to page 9 of the regulatory impact statement, the additional anticipated revenue raised is meant to be $285,887. Throughout this time while we’ve been in the House, I have counted the number of backbenchers while we’ve been debating this, and I’ve counted the number of Ministers. Assuming that it takes about five hours to get through this process, we will have spent about $10,000 just debating this legislation alone.

So I’m really curious just to hear your figures, because I reckon it’ll end up costing $30,000 to $50,000 of hard-earned taxpayers’ money to pass this nothing bill—this bill that has no ambition and no substance. It’s an absolutely nothing bill, and we’re wasting time deliberating on it. So let me hear from you, Minister. Thank you.

Look, I thank the members for their questions. As they may be able to—oh, sorry, I’ll bring the microphone down. Is that better? Thank you.

💬 Hon Member: Stand up.

Oh, I’ve got to stand up—sorry, I’ll stand up. I’ll stand up straight—is that better? I should stop slouching, I’m sorry. Good questions there from the members. Obviously, this bill does one part of the changes that the Minister of Justice is proposing. The bill deals with the additional anticipated revenue from increasing the retainings based on increase to 14 percent from 10 percent on 1 July 2024.

As can be seen in the cost recovery impact statement, there’s also additional revenue from increasing the court costs and filing fees, additional revenue collected through increase to enforcement fees, and, as members will be able to read, there is a total on the bottom which outlines the total increased fees that this measure is increasing.

Ultimately, the reason for increasing the anticipated revenue from the retainings is because there is increased costs in recovering fines. As outlined in the general policy statement, the increase is to ensure that this can cover the costs, which have increased over time, and it will help recover Crown costs. That is good public policy, to ensure that good cost recovery is implemented across the activities that Government does. That is what this bill does.

Thank you very much, Madam Chair. I appreciate that a lot. I didn’t think I had a chance, because I’m not sure if you’ve noticed, Madam Chair, but I’m not the tallest bloke and Duncan Webb was standing right in front of me, but you picked me, so thank you.

While I’m still waiting for a response to what was a genuine and sincere proposal for an alternative title from the Minister, I do have a question. A question that, actually, I think touches at the heart of this and certainly at the heart of our concerns that we’ve raised, and that is what level of consultation was made with the local government sector.

Now, the reason I ask this question and that I’m so interested in this is it’s actually the exact same question that I asked the Minister during the committee stage of the water reforms repeal bill. I asked the question of the Minister, by my count, six times. You know what’s funny? He didn’t answer once. That was interesting because I had a suspicion throughout that the Minister actually hadn’t widely consulted the sector leading up to that on that specific proposal within the bill. As it turns out, it appears that that is the case.

So I think it’s important that the committee gets a response from the Minister around this, because, ultimately, it is the local government sector that is affected by this. We understand the rationale—whilst we do not agree with it, we get that the Minister wants to do cost recovery, hence my suggested alternative title. At the end of the day, it is the local government sector that loses out from this. They lose where the Government gains, regardless of the justification or the reasons.

Now, if it is indeed the case that the Minister hasn’t consulted with the local government sector, that would be a shame indeed. In fact, it would be an outrage to propose a bill under urgency as part of the Budget measure whilst they swear in their contributions that it isn’t part of the Budget or anything to do with tax cuts, even though it’s in the title—although I propose it shouldn’t be for that reason, but never mind; we’ve made that point.

What I’m saying here is the committee actually deserves to know the level of consultation with the local government sector. It may be, actually, that there has been considerable consultation—and that’s fine. It might be, as part of that consultation, that the local government sector has said, “Yep, fair enough. You gotta recover costs. We’ve also incurred costs, as everyone has in the current moment, but sure. Take 4 percent of what we would have got to cover your costs.” If that is the case, who knows, that might actually change our mind. But it’s important that the committee knows.

I refer the member who’s just sat down, the Hon Kieran McAnulty, to page 10 of the cost recovery impact statement.

I move, That debate on this question now close.

I’m not quite sure we’ve exhausted all of the questions on this particular clause.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I want to just pick up on something that the Minister himself brought into the debate around good public policy and cost recovery, and to question him about the evidence base. But, before I do that, this is a genuine point that I raise and a question to the Minister, and I bring this point because I note that, in a previous committee of the whole House stage in the Chamber today when a Minister in the chair was texting or was on the phone, the presiding officer felt that that wasn’t really engaging in the debate.

So I’m very grateful that the Minister has answered the subsequent questions. We haven’t heard answers on the original one. So I do have a question to the Minister. It’s not my primary question; it’s a little bit of a supp, but I would like to know if the Minister will continue to debate with us without going on to his phone so that we know he is engaging, because I think it’s really important. If we’re spending the money that my colleague from Dunedin in the Green Party—Francisco—has said is being spent, it’s really important that all sides of the House are engaged, including particularly the Minister in the chair.

My real question is around his statement that good policy making requires the costs to be recovered and that’s what he’s doing. There just doesn’t seem to be an evidence base. So I’m wondering what is the evidence base that is leading to this title of “Fines Collection Costs [Recovery]” of the policy before us. When I look at the cost recovery impact statement, it actually says that other options were “not proceeded with due to significant uncertainty around whether actual benefits would outweigh the loss of fees revenue. To progress this option extensive consultation and data collection would be required to determine whether it would be worth progressing and, if so, additional policy work would … be required.”

Now, my point is that it feels like we’ve got this the wrong way around. Surely, if this was something that the Government wanted to do, the first thing to do in a policy process is to collect the data in order to be able to get a baseline to be able to understand where the deficit is. This goes very much to the heart, I think, of what Dr Duncan Webb was asking. He was saying, “What are the numbers?” I’m saying, well, isn’t this in the wrong order? There has been a decision made, we can’t see an evidence base, and we have a cost recovery impact statement that actually says the information is not there.

So my question to the Minister is: how can this be good public policy—which is what he said and what he brought into the debate—and how can he say that there is an evidence base? Because what is disturbing to me is that viewers hear these words being thrown around a little about good lawmaking or good public policy, and they’re accepted on face value. But it’s our job, particularly in urgency and when there is no select committee process, to interrogate what the basis of the decision making is. I’m no closer to understanding the basis of that decision, because I haven’t heard from the Minister what the evidence is. He certainly hasn’t illuminated the numbers in the questions of Duncan Webb. I want to know, given that it’s actually in black and white here on the statement that there is no evidence, how could he make an evidence-informed decision, and, therefore, how can he say this is good public policy?

Now, there may be an element that I haven’t seen. Maybe there was some kind of statement made by officials at some point. Maybe there were some text messages between Ministers from different coalition parties. Was that the evidence base? I don’t know. Was it a conversation? Was it a coalition agreement? Because sometimes, in this House, we’ve been told that the evidence base is a coalition agreement. Certainly, I’ve heard in relation to, perhaps, say, Gumboot Friday, that the evidence base for that decision was a coalition agreement, and that seems to have been accepted. So if it’s a coalition agreement, I’d like to hear it, but I would then also like the Minister to say, if that’s the case, how does that make it good public policy? So there’s a logical framework here. There’s a logical train of thought. At each point in that logic, there seems to be missing elements.

I think, if we can get to that point, we may ultimately be able to find the answer to Dr Duncan Webb’s question, which is around what the actual numbers are. Without the evidence base underneath, I just don’t understand how we can do that. So if the Minister can clarify that and put those more sinister thoughts to bed, because, you know, I don’t know if it was based on text messaging or whatever, but I’d like to understand the public policy basis.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I think that that was a really good question that’s just been raised for the Minister to consider. Hopefully, whilst he’s looking through some information or taking some advice and we hear an answer about that—particularly about the evidence base and what constitutes good evidence—I would like to ask a question along the same sort of vein, I suppose.

If we go back to the title itself and think about “Fines Collection Costs”, it’s implicit within that that there are cost pressures. So I’ve got two questions. If we accept that it’s implicit that, therefore, there are cost pressures, given that there’s a need to address fine collection costs, as my colleague Ingrid Leary has just said, we still don’t know what the evidence of that is. In fact, in the—what’s it called?—the cost recovery impact statement (CRIS), it specifically says that that information is absent. You know, it doesn’t exist. So we don’t know what the basis of that is. So I really do think it’s going to be difficult for us to move on from this clause, which is important. It serves the purpose of being able to—as the Minister said, it should be about what’s written on the tin. So it’s incumbent upon us here, as members of this House, to be able to do what we can do to make sure that that turns out that way.

So when we think about that, the second part of that—and I don’t think we’ve really got to the bottom of this part either. So I’d also like to acknowledge, whilst we’re waiting for this answer, that I agree with the question that Ingrid Leary has posed and the Hon Kieran McAnulty has also suggested. Why is the “Budget Measures” part still there? On the one hand—we’re hearing all this contradictory information. I think that’s why it’s making it so sketchy. We’re hearing that this has got nothing to do with the Government having to make its tax cuts add up or having to fill in gaps in its budgetary hole, so to speak. But, on the other hand, it’s explicit in the title. So, on one hand, we’ve got this implicit implication that it’s to do with cost pressures that we don’t know anything about, but, on the other hand, it’s explicitly stated in the title.

I think, before we can move on, we really do need to get to the bottom of what that is, because when we look at the cost recovery impact statement, on page 1, just past the executive summary, it literally says, under “Constraints - Time and Budget Sensitivity”, “To support the Government’s Budget priority of finding $1.5 billion”. That is the purpose. Which one is it? We’re getting told one thing by the Minister in the Chamber tonight, because he’s trying to minimise its association with the Budget or, you know, the impetus for the need to find some money to prop up the Budget, but, on the other hand, all the way through the information, including in the title, we’re told otherwise. So I think that the Minister really needs to explain that before we can move on, and I’m sure other people have other questions along those lines as well.

I’ll just let the members know that that’s the third time we’ve had a speech about costs and cost recovery. Just warning the members that we are looking for new material.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I appreciate this is the first time I’ve been able to take a call on this Amendment Paper. I really appreciate the opportunity because it has got a really interesting title, the Public Finance (Fines Collection Costs—Budget Measures) Amendment Bill. That’s a bit of a mouthful. We do understand that in the House there has to be a title for a piece of legislation. What I’ve been thinking about, having had a look through this bill, coming to it a little bit late because we’re trying to rush this through urgency, as is usual with the crappy—excuse me, the poor legislation that we’ve become accustomed to.

We have here something that we are used to from this Government, which is a piece of nonsense. But let’s think about the title. There’s some really interesting amendments I see that we’ll get to later. I see that the Hon Duncan Webb has proposed that the title be changed. Replace clause 1 with “This Act is the Public Finance (Increase in Charges for Local Body Debt Collection) Amendment Act.” Now, that seems like a very sensible amendment, and I hope the Minister will consider that. But I think we’ve got options as well. I mean, there are more possibilities for a title that accurately represents this less than quality piece of legislation.

I note that Tracey McLellan in committee has also proposed an amendment. This amendment suggests replacing clause 1 with “This Act is the Public Finance (Making Money off Debt Collection) Amendment Act.” which, again, seems much more appropriate to what this bill is actually proposing to do. I personally have come up with another title, I think, that could be helpful.

I think I’d like us to consider the importance of the title, actually, because we do need to make sure that a title represents what is in the Act, what is in the amendment, because it has to mean something to ordinary people. So the title that I think—I think we should replace clause 1 with “This Act is the Public Finance (Further Impoverish Local Government) Amendment Act 2024”. I think that would be really helpful because we know what local government’s gone through. We know that killing three waters has put an incredible burden on ratepayers. We know that local government is not going to be bailed out by this Government.

But perhaps if we’re considering the title, why should we get to choose the title. I’m also really interested, and I’d like the Minister to tell us what type of discussion he’s had with local government about the title for this bill, which will take away money from local government. What discussions has he had and what suggestions has local government given for an accurate title for this bill? Because I think what we’d see would be something much more interesting than we’ve been able to come up with, and certainly with the title that the Minister has given us for a bill that is actually a piece of nonsense. It is, unfortunately, the work that we expect from this Government. But let us at least have an accurate title for this bill that tells us what it is. This is taking money away from local government. It is simply to fund tax cuts, and tax cuts for landlords. It’s not about ensuring a fairer system for anyone. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you members for your questions. The earlier question around cost recovery, page 3 of the cost recovery impact statement outlines how the expenditure in the appropriation for collection and enforcement of fines and civil debt services has increased from $43 million in 1998-99 to $58.3 million in 2022-23. During that same period of time, there has been no increase in the filing fee. There has been a small increase in the enforcement fee. The percentage of fines retained by the Crown has remained unchanged since it was in 1989. During that time, there’s been this thing called “inflation”, and particularly in the last three years there’s been a lot of inflation. So, ultimately, the point of cost recovery is to ensure that the public services that are delivering this service are able to raise the funds to be able to pay for it. That is what this bill is doing.

I just want to answer the question from the member who just sat down, which was the question of has the Government consulted on the title of the bill. It is not normal Government practice to consult on titles of bills.

I move, That debate on this question now close.

Dr Tracey McLellan’s tabled amendment to clause 1 to replace “(Collection Costs—Budget Measures)” with “(Making Money on Debt Collection)” is out of order as not being an objective description of the bill.

The question is that the Hon Dr Duncan Webb’s tabled amendment to clause 1 to replace “(Collection Costs—Budget Measures)” with “(Increase of Charges for Local Body Debt Collection)” be agreed to.