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10. ANGIE WARREN-CLARK (Labour) to the Minister of Health: What recent announcements has he made about child and maternal health facilities? |
Hon Dr DAVID CLARK (Minister of Health): The Prime Minister's ambition is to make New Zealand the best place in the world to be a child. To support that, as part of the New Zealand Upgrade Programme announced two weeks ago, $83 million has been set aside for child and maternal health facilities. We're investing in neon... |
Angie Warren-Clark: How will patients at Starship hospital benefit from the New Zealand Upgrade? |
Hon Dr DAVID CLARK: Starship is home to New Zealand's only specialist paediatric intensive care service. They do amazing work there. They look after the most unwell children from all over the country, including those who need cardiac surgery and transplantation. So I'm particularly pleased that we are investing $25 mil... |
Angie Warren-Clark: Why is this investment needed at Starship? |
Hon Dr DAVID CLARK: Starship's PICU currently treats around 1,100 to 1,200 children each year. Demand has grown by 30 percent over the past three years and is expected to continue to grow. We need to act now to ensure that we have enough beds to care for these most vulnerable of patients. Construction work is planned t... |
Question No. 11—Broadcasting, Communications and Digital Media |
11. MELISSA LEE (National) to the Minister of Broadcasting, Communications and Digital Media: Does he stand by all his actions and policies? |
Hon KRIS FAAFOI (Minister of Broadcasting, Communications and Digital Media): In the context in which they were given, yes. In particular, I stand by my statement that New Zealanders must have access to a strong and independent public media service for the decades to come. This will ensure that New Zealand audiences wi... |
Melissa Lee: When was he first made aware of RNZ's plan for the axing of RNZ Concert and the removal of its broadcasting from the FM frequency in favour of a youth radio station? |
SPEAKER: Order! I'm going to let this question go but warn members that in future, when they're asking about actions and policies, the supplementary question has to relate to that. |
Hon KRIS FAAFOI: I was briefed by Radio New Zealand that they were working on a youth strategy in August and October of 2019. They brought their final proposal around the youth strategy and the impacts of that to me on 29 January of this year. As has been said publicly, I raised a number of concerns with them; most sub... |
Melissa Lee: Why did he say, and I quote, "It's not for the Government to decide what it's utilised for." in regards to the youth radio spectrum, when the Prime Minister has said, "[The new frequency] was always intended for youth radio and youth programming,"? |
Hon KRIS FAAFOI: Because that question that the member herself asked me at the select committee in June of last year pertained to frequency for both Māori and youth. In my reading of the transcript, I was saying that it wasn't for Government alone to decide how the spectrum should be used. Both of those 103 and 102 fre... |
Melissa Lee: Does he agree with the statement by former Prime Minister the Rt Hon Helen Clark that the Concert FM issue has been, and I quote, "handled disastrously"; if so, does he accept responsibility for this disastrous handling? |
Hon KRIS FAAFOI: It's very important that Governments keep away from operational decisions that public broadcasters make, and the decision to run a consultation with their staff around a youth network strategy was theirs. They have subsequently taken action to keep Concert FM where it is. The former Prime Minister is e... |
Question No. 12—Research, Science and Innovation |
12. Dr PARMJEET PARMAR (National) to the Minister of Research, Science and Innovation: Is the Government delivering improved outcomes in research and innovation? |
Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS (Minister of Research, Science and Innovation): Yes. In the two years we've been in office, we've delivered across a wide range of areas in research and innovation, but there is always more to do. An edited list of our highlights of things that we have done: we have invested $1.1 billion in a 15 perc... |
SPEAKER: Order! Order! You know, that is enough. The member gets a 10-minute speech later. |
Dr Parmjeet Parmar: How can she say her Government is delivering improved outcomes in innovation when New Zealand's ranking on the Bloomberg Innovation Index fell by five places this year to 29 in the world? |
Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: The Bloomberg innovation survey to which the member refers is measured across seven domains out of 100, all of which are weighted equally across that. It is important to note that this is a composite survey that doesn't only take into account innovation. The seven domains are R & D intensity, manufa... |
SPEAKER: Is there any objection to that? There appears to be none. |
Document, by leave, laid on the Table of the House. |
Dr Parmjeet Parmar: Why is she blaming the last National Government, because when she came into Government, New Zealand was 18 on the Bloomberg Innovation Index ranking, and now we are on 29 under her watch? |
Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: I think I gave quite a thorough answer to the initial question—that, in fact, what I'm saying is there are a range of domains that that is measured across. So I am going to go through some of those raw numbers in terms of that. So in 2013, the year in which Callaghan Innovation was established, 57.7... |
Dr Parmjeet Parmar: Is she at all concerned that New Zealand had the largest fall of any single country, making New Zealand the biggest loser in the latest Bloomberg Innovation Index? |
Hon Dr MEGAN WOODS: I am always concerned about where New Zealand ranks in the world, but I will reiterate again that that is a composite index the member has referred to. In fact, the area where it had its biggest fall was not one related to innovation, but that doesn't stop me being concerned. What I would also point... |
SPEAKER: Order! That concludes oral questions. |
FINANCIAL MARKET INFRASTRUCTURES BILL |
First Reading |
Hon GRANT ROBERTSON (Minister of Finance): I move, That the Financial Market Infrastructures Bill be now read a first time. I nominate the Finance and Expenditure Committee to consider the bill. |
This is the moment that the House has been waiting for. The Financial Market Infrastructures Bill establishes a new framework for the regulation and supervision of financial market infrastructures—or FMIs. FMIs are sometimes described as the plumbing of the financial system. They include payment systems which are used ... |
FMIs play an essential role in the sound and efficient functioning of the financial system and in the operation of the real economy. Many transactions in the financial system and all electronic payments ultimately rely on the operation of one or more FMIs. As a consequence, it is not uncommon for large FMIs to handle t... |
The operation of FMIs is often taken for granted, Mr Tabuteau, and unless the services they provide are disrupted, there can be extremely serious consequences if an important FMI fails. Failure to complete payments or other transactions or even a failure to complete these on time can subject the financial system or ind... |
The existing regulation of FMIs is limited. Parts 5B and 5C of the Reserve Bank of New Zealand Act establish information-gathering powers in respect of payment systems and the designation regime for settlement systems. However, the regime in Parts 5B and 5C is no longer fit for purpose. For example, in most respects it... |
The regime in the bill is administered jointly by the Reserve Bank and the Financial Markets Authority, except in relation to payment systems where the Reserve Bank will be the sole regulator. It also provides different treatment for the regulation of designated and non-designated FMIs. Designated FMIs are those that a... |
The new regime is tailored to the needs and systemic importance of individual FMIs. Designated FMIs are subject to a range of regulatory powers, whereas non-designated FMIs will be subject only to certain information-gathering and investigative powers. This approach focuses regulation on the most important FMIs while m... |
Under the bill, regulatory requirements for designated FMIs will be set—their standards made by the regulators. The power to set standards is designed, among other things, to allow standards to cover the matters in the global guidelines for FMI regulation, the Committee on Payment and Settlement Systems and the Interna... |
For the purposes of day-to-day supervision of designated FMIs, the bill provides the regulators with information-gathering powers and powers to oversee the rules of those FMIs. For example, changes to the rules of a designated FMI must be approved by the regulators, and the regulators must also require that the rules o... |
As a backstop to these measures, the bill also provides crisis management powers, specifically direction powers and a tailored statutory management regime for the operators of designated FMIs. Directions may require a designated FMI to take a range of actions to address problems. For example, under a contingency plan, ... |
The statutory management regime in the bill is the crisis management power of last resort and provides an alternative to normal insolvency processes such as liquidation, which are not suitable for managing the failure of a designated FMI, because this will disrupt the provision of essential services that they provide. ... |
As noted, the bill provides the regulators with a much more limited set of powers in respect of non-designated FMIs, and this reflects that these will not be systemic nor have access to the legal protections around settlement, finality, netting, and the enforceability of rules that are afforded to designated FMIs. The ... |
For clarity, it is worth noting the connections between the FMI bill and phase two of the Reserve Bank of New Zealand Act review. While they are separate matters on different timelines, there are connections in certain areas in particular crisis management. At a later point, after this bill is enacted, we may look to r... |
Finally, the bill contains a graduated set of remedies for breaches. These include criminal and civil penalties, enforceable undertakings, and remedial notices, which will require an FMI operator to take action to remedy a breach. While the operation of FMIs is often taken for granted on a day-to-day basis, they are vi... |
As noted, the IMF has expressed support for the approach reflected in this bill, and the bill closes an important regulatory gap in New Zealand by ensuring that these vital but often little noticed infrastructures are subject to effective supervision and oversight. In doing so, it marks an important step in supporting ... |
Hon PAUL GOLDSMITH (National): Thank you, Mr Speaker. It's my pleasure to speak on this, the first reading of the Financial Market Infrastructures Bill and to signal that the National Party will be supporting this legislation through—certainly at the first reading. We do want to—I mean, this was a piece of legislation ... |
That is a fairly light regulatory framework. We've had many visits from international institutions, such as the IMF over the years, which say we should regulate more in this area. And they said that again in 2016, and the previous National Government, of which I was a part, agreed with recommendations from the Reserve ... |
Then, secondly, an FMI which is identified as being significant could be required to be designated under a revised designation regime. And then, thirdly, the joint regulators would have enhanced regulatory oversight powers for designated FMIs, including the powers to set regulatory requirements, oversee their rules, in... |
Now, of course, the critical question is: in all these fine arrangements, have we got the details right? And this bill's been actually well signalled and well consulted over a number of years with the industry and so we have a reasonable confidence that the balance will be right. But we're interested, particularly, in ... |
I suppose the point that worries me slightly is that when we look at the regulatory impact statement from the Reserve Bank, they make the point that the nature of the analysis of the regulatory impact statement—which is where the officials sit down and work out whether the costs of a proposed new set of regulations are... |
It says, "The Reserve Bank requested cost estimates from [the] industry during … consultations but only one organisation provided such figures. … A full cost-benefit analysis would normally provide more certainty that the proposals … have a net benefit for New Zealand. However, given the lack of cost estimates, alongsi... |
So the upshot of that seems to be that they're really just having a guess as to whether the whole regime is justified, and so we will certainly be taking a great deal of interest in the select committee process, hearing directly from market participants to reassure us that this step towards greater regulation in this s... |
We need to actually see some numbers around that and have some real effort, because what often happens is that Government departments write a regulatory impact statement early on, at the start of a bill, and say, "Well, we haven't actually got the detail. We don't really know, but we'll come back and come up with somet... |
But, in the broader sense of the word, we're very supportive of the instinct behind the bill, and we're going to work constructively and collaboratively with the Government in the development of this legislation. Thank you, Mr Speaker. |
Dr DEBORAH RUSSELL (Labour—New Lynn): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I thank the previous speaker, Mr Goldsmith, for the support for this bill to work on it at the select committee stage. I will, I think, look forward to working on it. It is quite a technical bill, and I just want to speak about a couple of things in connectio... |
My guess is that the people listening at home—because, of course, there are lots of people listening at home to highly technical bills like this—may not know what those financial market infrastructures are. It is a technical term. Let me give an example of one of the types of infrastructures—one of the types of entitie... |
One type of financial market infrastructure is a payment system. It's a payment system that needs to operate smoothly and effectively, and it's a payment system that everyone needs to have a degree of trust in, to ensure that all transactions happen smoothly on an ongoing basis. For people watching at home, the payment... |
Settlement systems are financial market infrastructures. That's systems or arrangements for making settlement or for processing settlement instructions. So that's quite important. There's a large one, NZClear, which needs to be regulated. It turns out that the average daily value of transactions that go through NZClear... |
There are central counterparties (CCPs), which are entities which help to settle as a counterparty. So they become the buyer to every seller and the seller to every buyer. They, in effect, sit in between buyers and sellers, and it eliminates the credit risk to both parties. Again, that sounds like quite a complicated s... |
There are also trade repositories and central securities depositories—again, financial market infrastructures. |
So these are all quite technical entities, and, for most of us, the way that we come into contact with them is through the very basic one of a payment system, the EFTPOS system. But they are important to the functioning of our trading systems, to the functioning of our markets, and to the functioning of our economy. |
It was very clear that the IMF thought we really did need to review our rules around them and to improve them. The process of consultation on this started back in 2013. It carried on through into 2015. So this bill has been a long time in gestation in terms of the consultation that has gone on around it to make sure th... |
So it started under the previous Government. It is being progressed under this Government. I think it likely that we will reach agreement on it, particularly if we do attend to the issues that are raised in select committee. |
There is one issue I wish to raise, and it's something that is puzzling me, and I think it's going to irritate me right the way through this bill: "financial market infrastructures". That plural word is somehow just tweaking something on my grammar wonk soul. I guess I'll just have to deal with it, because it looks lik... |
Hon Judith Collins: No, I'm with you. |
Dr DEBORAH RUSSELL: I'm pleased to hear that my colleague the Hon Judith Collins agrees with me. Ms Collins, I'm sure that we will enjoy discussing it at length in the select committee process. I recommend this bill to the House. |
Hon JUDITH COLLINS (National—Papakura): It only seemed right that I should take the call on this matter, since peace has broken out across the House on it. Like the member who's just resumed her seat, the thought of "infrastructures"—it's a bit like everything now is apparently a "learning". It just drives me nuts. Wha... |
These are the big issues that Dr Deborah Russell and I will no doubt consider at length during the—[Interruption] Oh, and the Hon Ron Mark wants to say so too. He agrees with me and Dr Russell. |
Hon Ron Mark: I was just saying "Hi." and "Welcome back." |
Hon JUDITH COLLINS: Oh—hi, and great to see you too, the Hon Ron Mark. |
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