Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN (Leader of the House) Link to this
I move, That the Subordinate Legislation (Confirmation and Validation) Bill (No 4) be now read a second and a third time. I am very much obliged to the House for allowing the two stages of the bill to be read together. This is the annual bill that confirms a range of subordinate legislation—things, for example, like levy rates of various sorts—of a classical variety. The bill includes the issue of excise duty on petrol and road-user charges, it includes areas in agriculture, but, most important, it includes the confirmation of the annual adjustment on 1 April to benefit rates and New Zealand superannuation. Under law these changes have to be confirmed by statute by the end of the calendar year or, on 1 January, those rates revert to where they were on the previous 1 January.
Obviously, with the election being held on 8 November, the House is not likely to be meeting for very long before Christmas, so it would be quite difficult to get this legislation through, given that there will be an Address in Reply debate and so on before Christmas. I am sure that nobody in the House wants to go into the election campaign explaining the possibility that New Zealand superannuation rates—or, indeed, benefit rates—may be cut on 1 January. The bill has been to the Regulations Review Committee, where, under the excellent chairmanship of Dr Richard Worth, it has been given a clean bill of health. There are no strange things in it, and no peculiar forms of validation, so I am happy to support the bill.
GERRY BROWNLEE (National—Ilam) Link to this
I think Dr Cullen adequately describes what is in the Subordinate Legislation (Confirmation and Validation) Bill (No 4). I add that when it comes to the point at which any particular rate around excise is fixed, clearly any Government has an opportunity to change those rates at any time. But New Zealanders, particularly those who are in retirement, do have a right to certainty about matters relating to their income, and it would be the desire of no one in the House to give anything other than certainty that those payments will continue. We can be sure that Dr Worth and the people who sit on the Regulations Review Committee, some of whom are excellent members of this House—and some of whom are retiring, sadly for the House, so some of their expertise will be lost to it—have done their work, and we are assured that there is nothing untoward in this bill. It is a functional bill, and for that reason we will be supporting it.