Some of the law changes it progresses are perfectly reasonable uses of Budget ugency but others are examples of ‘‘Christmas tree’’ urgency — hanging extra things on an urgency motion just to get them off the government books.
When this happens the Opposition usually sets out to punish the government by filibustering/placing under intense scrutiny (delete as you see fit) all its proposed legislation ... which in this case meant that the House, which usually adjourns at 6pm on Thursday, was still sitting at 10pm on Saturday.
The current Opposition did have a point though, as by late Saturday the whole thing was beginning to look somewhat ridiculous ... no more so than when the Patents Amendment Bill stepped to the plate.
When the government took urgency, two days beforehand, Leader of the House Louise Upston — as she is required to do — set out just why urgency was needed.
However, the Patents Amendment Bill was not in the slightest bit Budget critical — the best Upston could come up with was ‘‘The Patents Bill will fill a gap in the legislation and is a good-sense, widely supported Bill which was agreed to in 2020.’’
Yes, you did read that right: 2020. This very short Bill, which fixes a loophole in the Patents Act 2013, which in certain circumstances allowed patents to be applied for under the previous 1953 Act, was indeed signed off by Jacinda Ardern’s Cabinet.
It finally went through the select committee process last year, attracting the grand total of 14 public submissions. The economic development, science and innovation committee reported it back with unanimous approval and no amendment.
On last Tuesday’s Order Paper — Parliament’s agenda — it languished at 19th. Ordinarily it might have hit No 1 in the charts some time in July or August.
But come Thursday it had somehow become urgent Budget business and, by heaven, the opposition was going to put in under the blowtorch — including many, many amendments to a not terribly long Bill with which it had previously had no issue whatsoever.
The first sign of looming trouble came in the form of Dunedin Labour MP Rachel Brooking, who in her second reading speech not at all innocently noted ‘‘Now, I’ve got some questions that I will of course be asking the minister in the committee of the whole House stage’’.
‘‘It will be interesting to ask the minister for some examples — I’m telling him now so he’s got some time to think about it — of what the type of patent, the divisional patent, that applies that has been causing some upset for our entrepreneurs and for our inventors and people who make things, and how bad it is.’’
The relevant minister, Cameron Brewer, had almost certainly not been thinking of any such thing, but at least he had been given the courtesy of a heads-up.
Up next was Taieri Green list MP Scott Willis, who had actually been on the select committee, so his lack of any opposition to the Bill was a matter of record. Not that that was going to stop him from talking about it, at great length.
‘‘A fascinating Bill, a fascinating Bill for us to talk to tonight,’’ he exclaimed, convincing no-one.
‘‘We are happy to support this Bill. We wonder why the government decided it was so important to do under Budget urgency. Surely, they have something that they want to tell us about that. We’ll wait and see.
‘‘But we are happy that we are finally moving along, because we wanted to make that happen for quite some time, and what better time, really, to do it on a Saturday night in Wellington when we can all be here together,’’ he added, even less convincingly.
Sharing in the love was Act New Zealand Southland list MP Todd Stephenson, who thanked Willis for his contribution and claimed — somewhat dubiously, that ‘‘I don’t think New Zealand taxpayers would actually mind that we’re sitting here on a Saturday night, getting good value for money’’.
If you define value for money as being delving into the minutae of patent protection legislation, the taxpayer was about to receive a windfall.
It started with Brooking asking ‘‘if the minister can give some examples of the type of application that would have got through on the 1953 test but would fail under the 2013 test?’’
Everyone’s interest levels were by now primed to fever pitch, and Brewer was about to send them off the charts.
‘‘I have sought advice over ensuring that I can give the Hon Rachel Brooking an accurate example. I probably won’t be able to name companies or products, but we can name kinds of situations or scenarios to try and give her a clearer picture. There’s an example coming up that involves a feather duster, by all accounts, and we’re working on that now.’’
Willis then tried mightily to turn the House’s attention to an arguably more significant invention — the Hayes wire strainer from Ōtūrehua — but no-one was going to be deterred from learning more about feather dusters.
‘‘I’ve been promised some explanation, some example, that apparently is going involve a feather duster, and I have not had it yet, and I’m on tenterhooks here, minister—on tenterhooks,’’ Brooking lamented.
Teanau Tuiono, sitting in the chair, urged the minister to ‘‘give her the feather duster’’ and Brewer, grudgingly, agreed.
‘‘I was trying to avoid the feather duster example, but the officials have written it out in longhand here ... ‘Say I am the manufacturer of a feather duster, and my competitor puts in an application for patents for a feather end’ — that’s the feather end, isn’t it? — ‘that is pink or purple, and, secondly, a handle with a hole to hang it on a hook’.
‘‘So we’ve got two components there. ‘Clearly, these inventions should not get a patent, but it might under the old rules from 1953. As a feather duster manufacturer, I have to either stop manufacturing feather dusters’ — and I think feather dusters are making a comeback tonight — as a feather duster manufacturer, I have to either stop manufacturing my product or take a risk that I will be in breach of a patent. Here ends the lesson.’’
After this, Parliament’s tolerance for fluff expired, the Bill being passed despite Scott Willis straining mightily to make one final contribution on fencing technology.
