Parliament's to do list: Wednesday 6 March 2019

The usual question time today and then a debate on the government’s budget plan before non-government MPs get a chance to debate their own bills.

Question time - 2pm

Twelve questions to Ministers crafted to catch them out or support their achievements.

Supplementary (follow-up) questions follow at the discretion of the Speaker.

The questions have to be lodged with the Clerk’s office in the morning so they can be checked and are then published a couple hours before question time on Parliament’s website here.

Question time is streamed live on Parliament's website here.

Foreshadowing the budget - 3pm

What:

• Debate on the Budget Policy Statement

• Twelve speeches of up to ten minutes in length. The chairperson of the Finance and Expenditure Committee usually begins the debate.

• This is replacing the General Debate which normally takes place on a Wednesday. 

• The budget policy statement foreshadows the budget that Minister of Finance Grant Robertson will deliver in May. Its purpose is to show the basis on which governments make budget decisions. It also gives the Government a chance to say how well it believes the economy is going and will keep going with it in charge; the opposition can use it for a wide-ranging attack but debate must stay on the topic of the Statement.

Psychoactive-arbitration-litter-safety - Member’s Bills 5pm

Member’s days happen on alternate Wednesdays in the House (unless there is government business that has to happen first like the debate on the Prime Minister’s Statement which took up the first couple of Wednesdays this Parliamentary sitting year.)

Member’s bills are from MPs who are not Ministers and today the following bills are up for some time in the House:

• The third reading was proposed for the Psychoactive Substances (Increasing Penalty for Supply and Distribution) Amendment Bill in the name of Simeon Brown - but the MP has withdrawn his bill from the Order Paper.

• The Simeon Brown bill increased the penalty for selling or supplying non approved psychoactive substances from two years to eight years. National and New Zealand First had both voting for this bill thus far but indications are NZ First had now withdrawn support for the Third Reading. Pulling a bill voluntarily avoids a defeat.

• The second reading continued of the Arbitration Amendment Bill, in the name of National MP Andrew Bayly.  It seeks to: reverse the current rebuttable presumption of open proceedings (in line with overseas practice); resolve uncertainty regarding whether an arbitration clause in a trust deed would be binding. Every party but New Zealand First agreed to its first reading.

• National MP Scott Simpson’s Litter (Increased Infringement Fee) Amendment Bill’s second reading: increases the maximum fine for littering from $400 to $1000.
   

• The second reading of the Health and Safety at Work (Volunteer Associations) Amendment Bill from National MP Harete Hipango.
  
  Under the Health and Safety at Work Act volunteer associations that do not employ people are excluded from the rules applied to a person conducting a business of undertaking or PCBU. This bill would mean that volunteer associations that do employ people for less than 100 hours a week would not be considered a PCBU. Under the Act, PCBUs are responsible for the health and safety of their employees where reasonably practical, like making sure the workplace isn’t a health and safety risk.

See what the House manages to get through each day on the Parliament website here.