Points of Order

Hon DARREN HUGHES (Senior Whip—Labour) Link to this

I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I seek to raise a serious matter of order with you about the proceedings of the House. At the moment the Local Government and Environment Committee is meeting to consider the Resource Management (Simplifying and Streamlining) Amendment Bill. That committee has permission to meet when the House is meeting, as per a referral motion moved previously by the Government. But the House now finds itself in urgency, considering legislation that affects the lives of a third of the country’s people. It is a serious bill. It is serious due to the fact that the Government has us considering it under urgency. The concern that I have, Mr Assistant Speaker, is that the members of this House whom the House has decided are the best people in terms of their knowledge of local government, are forced to sit on a select committee, and cannot participate in this debate in the Chamber at the present time because the House is sitting concurrently with the select committee hearing. I think that that calls into doubt the ability of the House to consider the bill before it, and I wonder whether the Leader of the House would consider enabling the select committee not to meet while the House is meeting on a bill about local government.

Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (Leader of the House) Link to this

My understanding is that the committee is meeting until 10 o’clock. We are currently on the second reading of this bill. There are provisions that enable members who are on select committees to be substituted, if they are to make their 10-minute contributions in the House. I think it is a bit of a red herring to suggest there is any difficulty here. Parliament routinely does this, and anybody watching proceedings now will notice that the seats in the Chamber are not exactly chock-full—

Hon DARREN HUGHES (Senior Whip—Labour) Link to this

First of all, to make a correction, the committee is meeting until 1 o’clock today, so the committee will be meeting all through the morning, particularly when the House moves into the Committee of the whole House stage in order to consider this bill.

Secondly, no other select committees are meeting this morning, because committees cannot meet, at all, when the House is sitting, or sitting under urgency, apart from this particular committee because of a motion giving it the authority to do so. I do not contest that; it is absolutely correct that it is in order for the committee to be meeting.

The point the Opposition is making is that the benches are not full, as the Leader of the House has pointed out, because the very members most interested in local government in our Parliament, those who have been appointed to the Local Government and Environment Committee, are not able to be here because they are required to be at their select committee. So I am seeking, in terms of cooperation from the Leader of the House, for him to suspend that select committee so that those members can be present this morning.

Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (Leader of the House) Link to this

I have asked people to check on the intended sitting hours for that committee, but I think we have to be a little bit careful here, because the implication of what the shadow Leader of the House has just suggested is that no other members in the Labour Party, other than those three members, are interested in the Auckland governance bill. I cannot believe that.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Eric Roy) Link to this

I will deal with this one; I actually have enough information, thank you. I thank members for raising this. The first point is that the House has granted the permission, or the authority, for the committee to sit. I cannot overrule that, because the House has granted that permission. The member who raised the point, I think in a way, is making a plea to the Leader of the House to do something about what is happening on the select committee. The member who raised the point of order will also know that the whips have the ability to transfer personnel, and if there are people whom they wish to have in here, there are mechanisms for them to do that. It is not really a matter for the Speaker to rule on.

H V ROSS ROBERTSON (Labour—Manukau East) Link to this

I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. During the course of the contribution from Mr Brownlee there was an interruption. I know that Mr McClay is a new member, but he interrupted Mr Brownlee while he was speaking to the point of order. I refer the member to Standing Order 84/3; I think he has been here long enough to know that he should not interfere when someone is speaking on a point of order.

Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (Leader of the House) Link to this

I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. Subsequent to the issue being raised by the Opposition I have made inquiries, and I was correct. The Local Government and Environment Committee will sit until 10 o’clock this morning. At about that time we expect the Committee stage of this bill to commence, and those members will be free to participate. They will have no other impediment on them, and we look forward to the contribution they will make to that Committee stage.

Hon RODNEY HIDE (Leader—ACT) Link to this

I accept that point, but I also accept Mr Darren Hughes’ point that it is tough when his party has three members on the Local Government and Environment Committee who are obviously vitally concerned, and we will certainly be cooperating on this side of the House. But I also point out that if the Labour Party has 11 members campaigning in Mt Albert, that makes the substitution of those three quite hard for Labour.