Debate on Crown Entities, Public Organisations, and State Enterprises

The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) Link to this

Before we continue I remind members that the debates on the individual financial reviews should be relevant to their performance in the 2005-06 financial year and their current operations. A further 1 hour and 18 minutes remain of the 3 hours allowed for the debate. At the conclusion of this time the Chairperson will report to the House.

The list of the financial reviews that are available for debate is appended to the Order Paper. The question currently before the committee is that the report of the Health Committee on the 2005-06 financial review of the Canterbury District Health Board be noted.

Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN (National—Northcote) Link to this

In speaking to this review of the Canterbury District Health Board for the 2005-06 financial year, I think that when one is looking at this district health board it embodies a lot of the serious issues that are confronting the Government and, by implication, the public, in the management of the health service. A big problem we have in the health service currently is the issue of quality.

This district health board has had a lot of publicity in relation to the case of a young man—a 25-year-old—who turned up at accident and emergency in Christchurch with severe back pain. He was processed through accident and emergency, he saw multiple doctors, and he was turned away from that hospital only to go home and die in agony from a spinal infection, just a few short hours later. That, obviously, is a tragedy for that young man, his partner, and the family. It should never have happened. But what it does highlight is an issue we have of systemic failure throughout the health service.

The incident involving the Canterbury District Health Board, I regret to say, is not isolated. We have had numerous examples of other tragedies occurring throughout the health system. In fact, it is hitting the headlines on a daily basis. The Associate Minister of Health, Jim Anderton, was telling the House at question time today that the New Zealand health system is better than ever. Well, it is really hard to justify that statement, and I am looking forward to the Minister taking a call shortly, before announcing his retirement, to tell us how he can say that the New Zealand health system is better than ever.

We have a system that is confronted by innumerable challenges that this Government is clearly not up to the task of solving. If one looks at the industrial relations situation in the New Zealand health system at the moment, we have an unprecedented situation whereby the senior salaried doctors—the senior specialists—have announced today that they are calling a special stopwork meeting because they feel the situation in our hospitals has got so bad that they can no longer continue working under this regime. That is unprecedented. But it is not the only industrial action we have. We have had radiographers go on strike, we have had three strikes by laboratory workers this year, and we have a climate of continuous industrial unrest that the Minister of Health has been powerless to stop.

One could say that on the one hand industrial relations in the health sector is an issue in itself, but the problem is the flow-on effects to patient care. When one has a laboratory workers dispute, which the Minister is incapable of solving—that he is incompetent to solve—it means that fewer people are getting the operations they need. So when there is a delay there are no X-rays, there are no laboratory services, and the hospital pretty much comes to a stop. People do not get their surgery. That surgery obviously is delayed and it bumps people further down the list. Basically what happens is that the quality of care that New Zealand has come to expect is just not there any more.

When one goes back to the tragic tale of the young man who passed away after his assessment at Christchurch Hospital, one can see that there are many interwoven strands that lead to such a situation. There are laboratory workers on strike, short-staffing of doctors, too many doctors who are not familiar with our health system and culture in New Zealand, and underpaid nurses. There is an industrial climate and a hospital climate in which people are unhappy to be working, patients are consequently getting a lower standard of care, and this basically affects the outcomes for the patient.

It brings us to the issue of accountability. What we are seeing with this Government is a total dearth of accountability, and it is across all sectors, not just in health. We had the Minister of Justice stand up here today and his version of accountability in terms of dealing with gang problems in New Zealand was to say that we are passing legislation such as the Secondhand Dealers and Pawnbrokers Act—that is how we are going to deal with the gang problem. I think this is indicative of an administration that, first, does not want to take accountability, but, second, does not have the answers to the problems that are confronting New Zealanders. There is no question that health is one of those areas.

JO GOODHEW (National—Aoraki) Link to this

Like my colleague before me, I feel that this particular district health board is a window to the health system at the moment. I mean by that that a number of issues were raised in the financial review of the Capital and Coast District Health Board, and they give us a very clear picture of the hot spots in the health system at the moment. There have been some particular hot spots that I will lead in with, and one of those is around anaesthetic staff numbers, which reached crisis levels during the year. That is the very workforce that was reported on in the report.

We were told by the district health board that it is having huge difficulties in recruiting and retaining enough staff in certain workforce groups. We know how many New Zealanders are heading across the Tasman for better conditions and less tax; in fact, this seems to be having quite an impact on the Capital and Coast District Health Board, as it reported to us. There are issues around attracting specialists, and also mental health personnel. The problem is less so with junior doctors but certainly affects getting nurses.

The district health board also acknowledged that it has faced a significant financial challenge in recent years, but when looking at the many more billions—the extra $4 billion a year—that have been poured into the health system, we must wonder where the board’s extra funding has been spent, and we would suggest that it has gone to bureaucrats.

The district health board also mentioned, in terms of workforce, that it is having difficulties attracting a workforce to home and community-based care—we are talking about aged care now—and it is having to look at strategies to ensure that demand can be met. Although it is exploring some innovative new services it certainly is having difficulty, because even though there is low unemployment, that is a sector that is certainly low in morale, as well.

Another pane of glass in the window to the health system is the 2,500 patients who were referred back to primary care in this financial year, when the revised booking system came into effect. As the Health Committee, we had to recommend that the district health board carefully monitor the patients who were referred to primary care, to make sure they had adequate support—that is, that they were not left high and dry with no options other than to continue to suffer in pain. There was some suggestion that their referral visit to their general practitioner would be paid for. But that is not enough; these people had an expectation that they were going to get their surgery. They know that many billions of dollars are being put into the health service, and they are wondering why on earth they are suddenly being left high and dry without either their first specialist appointment or their surgery.

Like other hospital boards, Capital and Coast District Health Board has suffered its share of adverse events. Unfortunately, included in those adverse events was one that hit the headlines—that is, the care and treatment received by a 50-year-old man who died 40 hours after being admitted to Wellington Hospital. The post-mortem found that he died of respiratory failure and pneumonia. The really tragic thing is that he had received very poor care from both medical and nursing staff, as reported by Health and Disability Commissioner Ron Paterson, who advised that the case was not an isolated one. In fact, the gentleman had an X-ray taken that showed he had the early stages of, or was developing, pneumonia, but the X-ray was not read. Staff shortages were no excuse for the failures by Wellington Hospital to care for that man properly, according to Mr Paterson; I have to agree with that view. The hospital took it on the chin, but that case is yet another pane of glass in the window to the health system.

Hospital-acquired infections, generally considered to be adverse events, were reported by this district health board, as by other boards, and also medication-related errors. In fact, there were approximately 320 medication-related errors. This, indeed, is another symptom of an ailing health system.

Work is happening within this district health board in oral health, which is another interest of mine, but the board has found it extremely difficult to attract practitioners from oral health services in the community to look after the oral health of adolescents. This is a country-wide problem and certainly cannot be attributed to this district health board being rural, because in the main it is not. But it does highlight the effect that this Government is having on relationships within the health sector. I have spoken already about anaesthetists, but the issue relates to dentists as well.

Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN (National—Northcote) Link to this

Just to continue on from what my colleague Mrs Goodhew was saying, I say it is a massive issue for the public that $4 billion extra per year is going into the New Zealand health system since this Government came into power in 1999, yet we are not seeing any improved health outcomes overall. That is a major problem. Continuing on with the theme we were debating in the discussion of the Canterbury District Health Board, I say we need to have some real accountability from the Minister, and from his Associate Ministers, for what is happening in the health service. I certainly hope that the Minister in the chair, the Hon Jim Anderton, an Associate Minister of Health, will get up at the end of this series of speeches and take a call, because, as I said before, he tells us that the New Zealand health system has never been in better shape than it is at present. Clearly, it is not in such good shape, and that has been a theme throughout these speeches. If he wants to prove there is some accountability, the very least he will have to do is to get up and justify his position.

Accountability goes to the core of what we are missing in the health service. If we look at the Counties Manukau District Health Board, we see the situation where the chairman, Pat Snedden, who was appointed by the Labour Government, signed a contract for laboratory services where there was a major conflict of interest. Helen Clark, the Prime Minister, has said the chairman is responsible for that, but she has refused to endorse the chairpersons of the three Auckland regional health boards and express confidence in them. Clearly, they are accountable for what they did; the Prime Minister does not have any confidence, and the Minister of Heath refuses to express confidence, in them. We went out to Counties Manukau District Health Board just a couple of weeks ago, spoke to the chairman, Mr Snedden, and said to him that the National Party thinks he should resign from his post. The reality is that he is at the helm of that organisation. Mr Snedden said that he did not think he should resign, because the issue that arose regarding the contract was not his fault.

The problem we have is a lack of accountability. There is buck-passing. The Minister does not think he is accountable; he says the chairman is accountable. The chairman says he is responsible, but is not to blame. We have that culture basically interwoven through everything this Government does, whether it is in health or in corrections. The problem with the laboratory contract is that despite what the district health board chairs say, the end does not justify the means. They say there is no problem. They have been through a High Court action and were found to be wrong, but they say that at the end of the day they are saving the public $8 million of taxpayers’ money, so what they did is justified. That theme runs through this Government, as well. It thinks it can do what it likes, as long as it gets the results. Well, I say the Government is not getting the results and that attitude is not acceptable to the New Zealand public.

The debacle over laboratory testing has been an absolute scandal, and the fact that no one has said he or she is responsible for making a mistake and will be resigning is completely unacceptable.

Dr JACKIE BLUE (National) Link to this

I have a number of grave concerns about Pharmac’s performance, on a number of levels, and it is really difficult to know where actually to start. A lot of the difficulties relate to the fact that the agency has quite a strict financial mandate, which I will read out for colleagues. The mandate is “to secure, for eligible people in need of pharmaceuticals, the best health outcomes that are reasonably achievable from pharmaceutical treatment and”—this is the emphasis here—“from within the amount of funding provided.” Unfortunately, that phrase “from within the amount of funding provided.”, has become the gospel, the driver, for Pharmac. It has simply lost sight of the human factor when it is balancing the books. Countless men, women, and children have been denied access to medicine that would improve their health and quality of life. A study came out last year that looked at the difference between Australians and New Zealanders, and Australians have far more access to new medicines—in fact, to 58 more—than New Zealanders do.

To keep in budget, to keep to this financial mandate, Pharmac has a number of clever little business practices. They are all very effective; they stimulate competition and pit companies against each another. There is a lot of horse-trading behind the scenes, and that can often yield surprising results with the drugs being funded. All of that is to get the price down to the best deal. One much-loved tactic is just to stall and slow the process right down, so a drug can wait years for funding to improve. In fact, I tell colleagues that it takes 2 years for a drug to get funded, and often that tactic is used to stall the funding of the drug until a patent expires on a medicine, which allows cheaper generics to come through. In the meantime, New Zealanders have missed out on a crucial medication.

This was the case for Taxol last year, when it came through for funding. It had been on the waiting list as a breast cancer drug. It is very important in treating aggressive breast cancer. It had been on the funding list for at least 2 years, then suddenly in September or so last year it became funded. The reason was that its patent had expired and generics had come through, so Pharmac was able to drive a hard bargain and get a good price. Good on Pharmac! But, more important, women had missed out on access to Taxol as a very important chemotherapy agent used in breast cancer.

I think that this typifies everything that needs addressing. As an example, I am going to talk about statins. I sent out a press release last week. Statins are crucial medications that lower cholesterol levels and manage cardiovascular events. New Zealand has a high rate of cardiovascular disease; it is the No. 1 killer in New Zealand. Statins are used widely around the world, and there is very firm evidence that they prevent heart disease and death. New Zealand’s use of statins has lagged behind that of the rest of the world, and it has really been quite shameful. New Zealanders have suffered.

I went to a medical law conference a few weeks ago, and the chief executive from Pharmac held up a graph—he was really quite pleased with himself—that showed a huge gap from about 2002 to 2005 where New Zealanders were missing out on statins, and he admitted as much. People had suffered because of that. “But, look,” he said, “we have caught up.”, and the graphs converged from 2005. People died because of that gap, and he was actually a bit misleading. He said that from 2005 our statin access was similar to that of Australia, but he is wrong. It is actually quite different. Australians have unlimited access to at least five different statins, including one of the most potent statins available. New Zealand, in contrast, has only three statins available—two of which are quite restricted, and the list does not include the stronger statin that Australia has.

So I think the statin legacy that Pharmac has given us is quite a shameful legacy. A readers’ survey had also come through, where 7,000 New Zealanders on statin medication had their cholesterol checked. Only 25 percent were actually in the targeted area according to the guidelines. In other words, we have very poor control, in contrast to 51 percent of Australians. Our control is worse, which means that our protection against cardiovascular disease is reduced.

The next graph that Pharmac’s chief executive held up was a graph showing that we had been saving a lot of money in statins. I think, again, that that is false economy. People have died because of a lack of statins, and the money we are spending now we might as well throw down the toilet because our protection is poorer. I think Pharmac needs to come to terms with that. Cheap is not always necessarily best, and certainly access is important to New Zealanders.

Probably lots of backslapping goes on with Pharmac every time the Budget comes through, and every year it comes in under budget because of its financial mandate: it cannot spend over budget. Last year it came in under budget by $19.4 million, which is astonishing. Over the last 5 years a total of almost $50 million has been underspent by Pharmac. That money could have been spent for medicine access for New Zealanders—and was not.

Hon TAU HENARE (National) Link to this

I want to talk about the figment of people’s imagination, Te MāngaiPāho—

Hon DOVER SAMUELS (Minister of State) Link to this

First of all I want to thank the member the Hon Tau Henare. Let us not play politics about Māori Television. He was one of the ones who inspired the concept when he was Minister of Māori Affairs. I carried it on and it came to fruition.

He is quite right in regard to the premium presentation made by Māori Television in regard to Anzac Day. I think every New Zealander should be proud of the professionalism and the presentation that was made giving respect to the many of our tūpuna—many of our forebears—who went overseas and sacrificed their lives so that our country could be free in terms of expression and so we could regain and maintain our way of life.

I differ somewhat in respect of his comments regarding the contribution made by Television New Zealand in that I think Marae, , and are also very, very premium and very professional presentations. I think it gives a balance. Although we all have the same whakapapa and the same orators, I think it is appropriate and very useful that we get a balance from professional people who are involved not only in television but in broadcasting.

I also want to say that I am certainly very encouraged about the value, the attitudes, and the way that Māori radio has covered many, many of the issues that are relevant to Māori right across the nation. My whanaunga are at Te Hiku o te Ika. Although we are right up at the top of the island, of course, we get firsthand news in terms of Māori activities and Māori events.

I thank the member for his very valid contribution to the debate and also the performance of Te MāngaiPāho. Kia ora tātou.

Hon MARK BURTON (Minister in charge of Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations) Link to this

I want to take a very short call to echo the sentiments of both my ministerial colleague the Hon Dover Samuels and the member opposite the Hon Tau Henare, in terms of the positive comments they made about Māori Television’s coverage of Anzac Day. As a former Minister of Defence, I think it is pleasing to see that sort of quality coverage. It was consistent with the sort of coverage we saw after the tragic death of the Māori Queen, which again, I think, brought a new standard of coverage that was accessible to all New Zealanders. The feedback I still get—

Hon TAU HENARE (National) Link to this

First off again, in my most humble opinion, I say that Te Taura Whirii te Reo Māori is one of the most unloved, underfunded, and overworked of Crown entities. I say this not as a jibe against the Government but to declare that here we have a receptacle of New Zealand’s language—one of the official languages of New Zealand. The other official language is New Zealand Sign Language. Something that members of the House may or may not know is that the English language is not recognised as an official language of New Zealand. We think it is, but it is not recognised in any statute. So I just leave that there on the side; I think it should be.

I worry that the receptacle of the indigenous language of this nation is absolutely underfunded. It struggles on a daily basis to complete projects like the dictionary of New Zealand Māori, which is a first in relation to many, many indigenous peoples around the world. The commission cannot, by virtue of its financial situation, take money from what is known as Mā Te Reo and put it into the finalising of the dictionary project. As I suppose I was a prime mover, in my years as Minister of Māori Affairs, for the initial Mā Te Reo funding, I say to members that I was able to shoehorn that funding out of the Rt Hon Bill Birch. To the former Minister of Māori Affairs in the chair tonight, the Hon Dover Samuels, I must give congratulations on the job that he did when he was Minister in getting Mā Te Reo funding—in terms of keeping it and making it of some use to our language.

But I think we should be able to go a wee bit further than that in the future, and I am looking forward to the day when we look at Te Taura Whirii te Reo Māori as a receptacle, as an icon, of our nation’s language. It should be not only us looking at the commission and respecting it as such but also those across our waters, those across the seas, and thinking: “Yeah, maybe that is what we should be doing in terms of our language.”

I think a lot more Government organisations should be listening to, and following the lead of, Te Taura Whirii te Reo Māori. They, along with Government, set the Māori Language Strategy. Sometimes I think the Māori Language Strategy over the past few years has been a bit wayward. That is not because our Ministers are particularly dumb; it is because it is such a topic that we fall over ourselves in trying to do the best and right thing. I think sometimes we should leave it to the experts to figure out what our strategy should be, and we should get in behind entities like Te Taura Whirii te Reo Māori.

I will not speak for too much longer other than to say I hope that one day—whether it be in the time of this Government or the next—Te Taura Whirii te Reo Māori will be placed on a pedestal where the holder of the nation’s indigenous language should be, and be funded, staffed, and listened to, accordingly. The little mention that I made before of New Zealand’s other language—English—should also be recognised in statute—recognised as an official language of this country. Kia ora.

Hon DOVER SAMUELS (Minister of State) Link to this

Te meatuatahimāku kei te mihi atu ki a koe, e Tau. Nāuneiitū ki te whakanuiitōtātou reo rangatira itēneipō, kei te mihi atu. Kei te maumaharaahaui te wāi a au e tamariki ana, haere ahau ki te kura, harakau e mōhioana ki te reo Pākehā. Engari, pēnā e kōreroanaahaui roto itōtāua reo rangatira, āemarika, kuawepuwepungiaahau e ngā kura māhita.

[First and foremost I want to thank Tau, who stood up tonight to praise our chiefly language, and I acknowledge that. I recall the time when I was a youngster and went to school, I did not know any English. But when I spoke in our chiefly language I was strapped repeatedly by the teachers. Yes, indeed.]

I thank the member Tau Henare for his contribution. I am reminded of when I used to go to school, not so long ago. The only language I could speak was my own—taku reo rangatira. God help me if I was caught speaking my own language within the school ground parameters, because we did not have the anti-smacking legislation in that time. The teacher, Mr Simpson—I remember him very clearly—was a tall, very strong Pākehā, and he was the only Pākehā in the Whakarara Native School. When he said “Thou shalt not speak Māori.”, we had to listen to him, or otherwise it was the old tradition of six of the best. Every time he dealt to me, I got seven—he could not count. That was my initiation into the difference between the Māori language and the English language.

I concur that the Māori Language Commission has a tough job. It is not easy, especially when one is dominated by another language. I also say, as we commemorate Māori Language Week, that the theme this year is tourism and the Māori language. It is significant that when our manuhiri come across to enjoy our landscape and their wish is also to have an experience with Māori, they too get an experience of what the Māori language is all about. Perhaps that will convey to some of our colleagues in this Chamber how important Māori language is to this nation. Kia ora tātou.

CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON (National) Link to this

There is often a lot of hyperbole in this House, but I think it is fair to say—and it is certainly not hyperbole to do so—that the Justice and Electoral Committee’s report on the Legal Services Agency is very serious indeed, and that the agency is simply not working. Its financial review revealed a number of serious problems. I will run through some of the major ones, then focus on one. The first problem is the concern expressed by the committee that legal aid forms are if not unintelligible, then certainly far too prolix. There are some real concerns about the supply and quality of legal aid providers. There are some very serious concerns about the closure of community law centres. There are some concerns about the commitment of the agency to the Treaty of Waitangi and the work it is doing there. There are some very real concerns about the problem I intend to focus some time on: the assessment of cases.

In the last year a number of totally unmerited cases have caused a great deal of harm and concern to certain defendants. During the course of the hearing of the select committee, I mentioned one case that had been commenced against an elderly couple. The wife had multiple sclerosis. The husband had given up work in 2002 to help his wife, and they were sued. What is more, the plaintiff knew about the couple’s situation. The plaintiff was granted legal aid and commenced what could be described only as a hare-brained proceeding. It was struck out in the District Court, and Judge Crosbie said the case was so untenable that it could not possibly succeed. He said he struggled to see how any self-respecting lawyer could plead such junk against the defendants. He said the case lacked common sense and balance. Then the case went to the High Court on appeal—again funded by legal aid—and the High Court judge was of the same view. He said the plaintiff’s claim to a constructive trust in respect of the property owned by the second respondents had no merit whatsoever.

The claim had no merit whatsoever, so at the end of it there was an application under section 41 of the Legal Services Act that the successful opponents of the aided person be granted their costs by the Legal Services Agency. That application was filed in 2005, and it was dealt with. Unfortunately, it took 2 years for the matter to be considered by the agency, and it was concluded by the agency only after a hearing of the select committee into the agency. There is a happy ending to this sorry tale. In the last few days the agency has provided payment of the full amount claimed by the second respondents in that case. They were paid the full amount, but there was no apology, and no reasons were given by the agency.

The fact of the matter is that the agency was wrong to fund that particular plaintiff. The agency did not want to face a full review, as that would have resulted in the decision being reduced to writing and being available as a precedent for other claimants. The agency had a particularly hard time at the select committee hearing. It had no grounds not to pay the second respondents, and paying them was the right thing to do. So after 2 years, during which time the lady concerned had become quite ill as a result of her problems with multiple sclerosis, I am pleased to say that the agency did the right thing. Just in the last few days I have learned that it has paid the respondents in full.

That is one case where the agency did the right thing. What about the other cases, where people have had to confront mad legal aid - funded cases and expend huge sums of money? These are very serious matters. These are questions of justice, and something needs to be done to make sure that the agency has people who are capable of analysing cases at the very start, so that some of those cases are not legally aided. I suggest that the Minister read paragraph 10 of the select committee’s report carefully, because it said the committee was very concerned about this matter, and added: “Such cases are expensive and time-consuming for the legal aid system, the courts, and opposing parties.” I would like the Minister to explain what he proposes to do about this particular matter, because these are not anything other than serious questions of justice.

In all litigation there are three interests at stake. There is the undoubted right of the plaintiff to commence his or her proceeding, and, if indigent, he or she is entitled, subject to the criteria of the Act, to be legally aided. But there are other rights at stake, as well. There is the public interest in the swift and economical conduct of litigation, particularly where, as in the case I have mentioned, a person is being assisted to conduct that litigation because he or she qualifies for legal aid. The other interest is the right of the defendant. If someone is legally aided, it certainly behoves the lawyer for that person to conduct sensible litigation expeditiously and economically. It is a matter of grave concern—and it certainly was to the select committee—that that kind of abuse occurs.

So I think some questions need to be answered by the Minister. He should look at paragraph 26 of the select committee’s report, and I invite his comment on it. Has he ever seen an agency, whilst he has been a Minister—or, indeed, since he has been in this House—receive such a caning? The report states: “We consider that the Legal Services Agency needs to improve its performance significantly in a number of key areas. We are concerned that several issues we raise in this report suggest that the agency is not performing adequately. We are particularly concerned that many of these issues appear to be ongoing.” The committee has sent a warning to the agency that: “We intend to monitor this situation closely.”

This afternoon we dealt with three bills, and comments were made by Labour members about the cooperative nature of the work conducted by the Justice and Electoral Committee. That was quite right, not only in relation to those three bills, but also in relation to this financial review. I think it is fair to say that the Labour members on the committee were also concerned about the quality of this particular agency. Members will note that there is no dissenting report. These are matters of justice, and the issue comes back to what we said when we were debating the amendment legislation last year: eligibility for legal aid has been widened by this Government, so that over a million people are now eligible in this country. But the agency has not delivered. It is not delivering. It is too bureaucratic, it buries people in paper and in process, it does not cut to the chase, and it does not provide a very good service at all. It is underfunded, which obviously cannot help the agency. I do understand, in fairness to the agency, that it is underfunded and has to deal with minimal funds to the best extent that it can.

But it is not good enough for an agency such as this to have a report of such seriousness written about it. I went through the other reports, and I did not see another review of a Crown entity that was as critical as the select committee’s report on this agency. So the response of the Minister in the chair, the Hon Mark Burton, should be forthcoming on that. These are serious matters of justice and competency, and I fear that unless a strong lead is taken by the Minister, this organisation will continue to drift and a similar sort of financial review will be conducted next year. I warn the Minister that, as I said a few minutes ago, the select committee is seriously concerned about this body. It intends to monitor the situation very closely. But no organisation and no Minister responsible for an organisation such as this can be proud of a report that repeats, almost like a litany, that it is concerned about financial management, legal aid forms, monitoring, the availability of legal aid in rural areas, the closure of community law centres, and legal aid providers, and that it is very concerned about unmeritorious cases. What are the answers?

Hon MARK BURTON (Minister of Justice) Link to this

I am pleased to take a call in response. Firstly, I acknowledge one point that the member who has just resumed his seat, Christopher Finlayson, made. I think the Justice and Electoral Committee should be acknowledged in this Chamber as a committee that takes its work seriously. Certainly, all the evidence I have seen suggests, as the member said, that it is a committee where members, regardless of party, take the job seriously and work collegially. Obviously, there are differences from time to time, but I think they do an important job for this Parliament, and I want to acknowledge that.

The member who has resumed his seat raises some important issues, and I am not for a moment going to suggest that this agency is perfect in its performance. Clearly, it is not. But, equally, I want to say that it is well and good to take a particular case—the member spent about a third of his time on one particular case—in which, indeed, there was judicial criticism. Such criticism is relatively rare. It happens maybe once a year in an agency that has to look after thousands upon thousands of cases a year. It is one thing to highlight a particular problem with a particular case; it is another thing entirely to run and operate an organisation effectively that deals with many thousands of cases and applications every year.

There are a number of areas in which it is clear that there needs to be improvement. There will be, and are, clear expectations in terms of the agency’s coming year and the focus for that year in terms of key service delivery issues. There are a number of areas that clearly have to be enhanced, where organisational capability needs to be improved or enhanced in some respect. A good example of that is the strengthening in management of the agency’s information technology systems. I think the functionality of that, and its ability to meet some of the workload issues that have been highlighted concerning the increasing volume and complexity in those areas, is critical to doing that effectively and well.

The issues raised around continuing to monitor the quality, supply, and security of supply of legal aid providers are important. I have to say that the facts across the country are not as we often hear in this House, but there is no doubt that from time to time there are areas in which supply is difficult. In any specialist service provision, in a country like New Zealand that has 4 and a bit million people spread over a large land mass, there will always be problems of supply, whether we are talking about Government agencies or other professional services. That is simply a fact of life, living in the sort of country we do. The critical thing is that this agency must monitor and have the willingness and capacity to respond when issues are raised with it, and that is precisely what our expectation is.

There are areas where re-establishing an appropriate level of community legal services needs to be addressed in the coming year. I emphasise Northland and Canterbury in particular, following the termination of provider contracts. Such terminations are difficult issues, but I would ask the member who has resumed his seat whether he would have the agency simply ignore concerns and problems when they arise. That is not an option when delivery of quality service has to be maintained. But the challenge has to be risen to, in terms of re-establishing an appropriate level of community legal aid services, particularly in Northland and Canterbury. That challenge has been laid very clearly before the agency for the coming year. Again, part of the streamlining and improving of the service is the project to modernise legal aid management, granting, and information technology systems. Further work is being done now on the improvement of some of the paper systems, which the member referred to.

I acknowledge, however, that the agency has had a lot of new work to do in the last year, and I think it has certainly done well with a great deal of that. It is a year that has been dominated by the implementation of the new Act, and that has seen a significant increase in the number of those New Zealanders on low and modest incomes who now have eligibility. Several hundred thousand additional people have eligibility for legal aid who did not before. I make no apology, and this Government will make no apology, for making our first priority extending the access to legal aid service to low-income New Zealanders. That is what we have done.

I am not suggesting for a moment that that is all we need to do. Of course it is not. But that was the first priority. I think it is one that we stand by, because, frankly, it really goes to the sort of debate we all saw in 2005 around things like tax cuts. There are those in this House who would say that we should have the sorts of tax cuts that would deliver up to people in this House $100, $200, or $250 a week, and to low-income New Zealanders $5, $8, or $10 a week. This Government says that those who should be targeted should get the first access to tax relief, and that is what we have done. Unfortunately for members in this House, they got nothing. But the consequence of that is that modest-income families raising children are getting $100, $200, or, in some cases, $300 a fortnight in tax relief. That is about setting priorities. It is the same philosophy that drove the decision to make low and modest income New Zealanders’ access to legal aid service the first priority.

So are there challenges in the year ahead? Indeed there are. Quite properly, some of those issues have been raised by the select committee. But has this agency also done a great deal of good work in the last year? Yes, it has, and that too should be acknowledged.

Hon MARK BURTON (Minister of Justice) Link to this

I will take just a short call to put on record the appointment of Justice Lowell Goddard as the new Police Complaints Authority at a time when, as members know, the authority is facing considerable change. We have the bill before Parliament, which is now being progressed. It was delayed, of course, because we needed to see the result of Dame Margaret Bazley’s report on police conduct. That report has been issued. As expected it raised a number of issues and recommendations directly for the Police Complaints Authority—12 in total. Some of those fall to the new authority to implement in terms of administrative organisational procedures. Others will require statute and therefore will be incorporated in a Supplementary Order Paper to the bill that is currently in front of the House.

I simply want to put on record my high level of confidence in the new authority. I think we are fortunate to have someone of her reputation, competence, and focus at a time when the authority is going through a period of new development and change. I certainly look forward to the work that will be undertaken in the year ahead to get the Police Complaints Authority in place, in terms of the new requirements and provisions of the legislation we are working through now, and getting the authority fully functional in that new regime.

HEATHER ROY (Deputy Leader—ACT) Link to this

I rise to speak to the financial review of the Privacy Commissioner. I have absolutely no complaints at all, I have to say, about the Office of the Privacy Commissioner; I think it is a very well-respected office. The Privacy Commissioner is very well respected the length and breadth of this country, and certainly I have never, I do not think, heard any claims from the Government that are adverse to this. That brings me to the issue I want to raise under this heading as to why the Privacy Commissioner’s office has not been consulted on the next bill on the Order Paper.

The Office of the Privacy Commissioner, of course, works to develop and promote a culture in which personal information is protected and respected, and that is absolutely correct. The website of the office also states that the Privacy Commissioner’s office has a wide range of functions. Some of these include investigating complaints about breaches of privacy, running education programmes, and examining proposed legislation—my point—and how it may affect individual privacy, which is a very serious issue.

The bill I am referring to is the Social Security (Entitlement Cards) Amendment Bill. I wonder why a Minister such as the Minister of Justice, who prides himself on his thoroughness, has not drawn to the attention of the Government the fact this bill should have come before the Office of the Privacy Commissioner. At the Social Services Committee we investigated this bill in detail, and the Law Society gave us a very good submission on clause 5(2), which allows a microchip to be embedded in the SuperGold card—the smart card put forward by the Minister of Foreign Affairs.

It is interesting, of course, that the Minister of Foreign Affairs considers himself to be part of the Opposition, yet he is able to put forward a Government bill. It is a very interesting concept indeed, but that is what we have. I guess the Order Paper is so short these days that every bill is welcomed. But I think there is a real issue that needs to be addressed in this bill, and that is that clause 5(2) should be omitted. I propose to put forward a Supplementary Order Paper to omit this clause.

I would like, briefly, to go through the recommendations the Law Society made on this bill. The major recommendation was that the committee call for a general review of the principles governing the use of highly functional technology such as microchip technology on Government-issued cards generally, and that the matter be referred to the Office of the Privacy Commissioner. I heartily agree with this point that the Law Society has made. Technology that is not being widely used anywhere else—and, in fact, is not available for use on cards—will now be enshrined in law, setting a precedent that has not been through the proper process.

The proposed provision will allow information—the cardholder’s name, identifying numbers assigned, a coded number indicating the cardholder’s class of eligibility, and a couple of other things—to be carried on embedded microchips, which is a precedent we do not have at present. The Law Society stated that the prospect of microchips being embedded on cards issued by the Government raised a more general concern, due to the functionality that microchips can possess, including their ability to operate as radio frequency ID tags. This matter is a very serious one, indeed.

During the select committee process when the commentary on the bill was being put forward, the ACT party put forward a minority view, which was adopted by the New Zealand National Party and United Future. But the minority view went into the body of the report and stated that we were all very concerned about the introduction of clause 5(2) to allow information to be stored on an embedded microchip. The Government claims it has no plans to use this provision, which begs the question of why this clause is in this legislation in the first place.

ACT members believe therefore that the provision regarding microchips should be deleted, and, as I said, I will put forward a Supplementary Order Paper on that during the Committee stage of this debate. Clause 5(2) should be deleted from the legislation. It is our view that a more general inquiry into the use of microchips—particularly around the issues of privacy, which, of course, would rightly go through the Office of the Privacy Commissioner—is necessary before legislation allowing microchips is enacted. This would enshrine in law a precedent that does not exist at the moment. Who knows where this will go? We have had microchipping of dogs. Now we have microchipping of cards. Where does this matter end?

CHARLES CHAUVEL (Labour) Link to this

It is a delight to rise and speak to the financial review of the Privacy Commissioner.

Hon MARK BURTON (Minister of Justice) Link to this

Again, briefly, I will put on the record my support for, comment on, and acknowledgment of the performance of the Privacy Commissioner. I think Marie Shroff has done an outstanding job. I acknowledge the ACT member Heather Roy’s comments in that regard and thank her for them. Marie has taken a number of steps to further advance the work of the organisation in all areas, in terms of its turn round of inquiry and complaint, and its provision of information. Its reputation, both domestically and internationally, has enhanced the performance of the office.

I thank the members for their comments, although I note that Heather Roy spent a great deal of her time talking about something completely unrelated directly to the financial review. Be that as it may, I thank her for her positive comments.

STEVE CHADWICK (Labour—Rotorua) Link to this

I want to take a short call on the Fire Service Commission, really to congratulate a commission that is in a very safe pair of hands with Dame Margaret Bazley, because it was an incredibly impressive financial review this year.

One of the things I wanted to mention is that the Fire Service has the lowest rate of residential fires in the world, and that is to be applauded. The Fire Service is in good hands.

The only other comment I want to make is about the number of female firefighters in the service in New Zealand. We really are a bit concerned about this. Only 49 of 1,670 career firefighters are women. That is quite a concern and we raised it with Dame Margaret Bazley. She pointed out that the Fire Service has a positive approach to this, trying to make firefighting a career for women that is attractive to them, and to make them feel well supported. It was nice to hear that women are generally very well accepted by their male counterparts.

One of the other issues I will talk about quickly is the problem that the Fire Service is having now with increasingly more complex call-outs—in particular, for P laboratories, which creates extreme risk for the Fire Service. We want to congratulate the Fire Service on the way it manages this problem.

All in all, the Fire Service is in great hands. It has also stopped bringing in second-hand fire appliances from the UK, which was a practice noticed in the previous financial review that concerned us. It now has its full fleet replacement, which is properly managed. The Fire Service is a service in good heart.

GERRY BROWNLEE (National—Ilam) Link to this

I thank the Labour members for making their contributions short, although those contributions were somewhat numerous on a number of issues that probably did not need any comment, at all.

Most certainly the Electricity Commission does need comment. Surely, no more useless quango has ever been set up by any Government than this one. It was set up in 2002 because we had a crisis in that year with low lake levels and the potential for blackouts in some of our larger cities. Since the Electricity Commission took over, New Zealanders have paid for that every time they switch on the light. Every time New Zealanders turn on the electricity anywhere in their houses or businesses they pay for this particular quango. What has it achieved in its time in existence? It has achieved nothing less than a 48 percent price rise for electricity. That is what it has presided over.

The other thing that is really disturbing about this organisation is that it has completely failed to deal with some of the transmission deficit in this country. We cannot get all of the power capable of being produced in the South Island out of the South Island, because our transmission is not strong enough. Our largest city, Auckland, is under constant threat in relation to the security of its supply, because we do not have strong enough transmission going into that area. Although it might be easy to say that Transpower has mucked us up, the reality is that Transpower cannot do anything without the approval of the Electricity Commission.

Some in this Chamber will remember that last year the substation at Ōtāhuhu failed. A simple guy rope broke because a shackle failed. Ministers in the Government said: “Well, look, Electricity Commission, we want this fixed up, please.” Transpower came to the party and within a month it had a proposal to ensure that that would never happen again. Well, here we are 11 months later and the Electricity Commission still has not made up its mind as to whether that proposal should progress.

The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) Link to this

The time for the debate has expired. The debate on the performance in 2005-06 of the current operations of Crown entities, public organisations, and State enterprises is therefore concluded. I will report the debate to the House.

The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) Link to this

I move, That the report be adopted.