Chief Executive’s Report

I am pleased to provide the 29th review of the business and activities of the Trust to the year ending 31 December 2020.

COVID-19

COVID-19 impacted on the Trust’s operations. Parliamentary seminars, members events and Business Attachment programmes were all initially suspended.

Two of three Parliamentary seminars were rescheduled and held in between lock downs and the Dissolution of the 52nd Parliament and we managed to hold a Stakeholders function in December before Parliament rose for the year.

The Board held a virtual meeting immediately following the first lockdown to assess the likely impact on Trust membership and operations and at the August Board meeting, approved a process for corporate members impacted by COVID-19. Overall, the Trust has fared well.

The Board acknowledges the loyalty of its corporate members through the support given to the two parliamentary seminars and through renewing their membership at the end of 2020.

The result is that the Trust will move into 2021 in good shape which was not how the initial scenario was looking following the first lockdown.

2020 ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING

The Trust’s 28th Annual General Meeting was held at Parliament on 29 July 2020. Working within the ‘new normal’ our corporate members and associate members were given the choice of attending either in person or via Zoom.

The Rt Hon Trevor Mallard MP, Speaker of the House of Representatives, presided as President of the Trust and Peter Griffiths chaired the meeting.

The meeting ratified changes to the corporate membership of the Trustee Council and Board as outlined in the Chairman’s message and adopted the Annual Report in addition to an update on COVID-19 impact on Trust operations.

Gretta Stephens, Chief Executive of New Zealand Steel Limited was re-elected for a further term of three years.

Guy Waipara, General Manager Generation & Natural Resources from Meridian Energy was elected to the Trustee Council replacing Simon Mackenzie who was standing down at the conclusion of his term.

Darryl Stevens, Jennifer Nolan (Rio Tinto), Nancy McConnell (NZBPT Deputy Chair|Hawkins), Raewyn Moss (Transpower) and Stewart Hamilton (Rio Tinto)

Darryl Stevens with Hon Stan Rodger, a former parliamentarian who was visiting Parliament as a guest of the Speaker

TRUST MEMBERSHIP

NEW CORPORATE MEMBERS

The Trust’s Corporate membership stands at 70 members as at 31 December 2020.

This year we welcomed 4 new Corporate Members:

Microsoft Corporation (re-joining)

Synlait Milk Limited Guardians of New Zealand Superannuation Kiwi Property Group Limited

The resignations of DB Breweries, Refining New Zealand, OMV Limited, and Vodafone New Zealand Limited all took effect from 31 December 2020.

ASSOCIATE MEMBERS

There were no new Associate Member appointments in 2020. Nine Associate members retired from politics at the General Election.

A further 11 associate members were not returned to Parliament following the General Election. At the commencement of the 53rd Parliament the Trust has 42 Associate members.

PROGRAMMES

PARLIAMENTARY SEMINARS

Seminar attendees were equally appreciative that so many of our Members of Parliament and in particular Associate Members were able to attend the seminar lunch that precedes Question Time in the House, giving them the opportunity to speak informally with parliamentarians.

Volunteers at the Select Committee mock training session

SOME OF THE COMMENTS RECEIVED FROM ATTENDEES AT THIS YEAR’S SEMINARS WERE:

SEMINAR 1

“Very good range of topics and speakers. Broad based but not shallow. Introductory nut also very interesting.”

“Excellent and informative seminar content. Great to hear all the questions coming through. Networking was great, MPs at lunch and observing Question Time – brilliant!”

“Great day, high calibre of speakers, well organised.”

SEMINAR 2

“Good spread of information and I learned quite a few new things”

“Overall fantastic seminar- very interesting, entertaining and informative. No complaints.”

“Another excellent seminar, I am very pleased to have attended. It was an excellent complement to the first seminar”

Parliamentary Seminars are central to the Trust’s purpose in creating a learning environment whereby representatives and employees of our corporate members can come to Parliament and be addressed by Ministers, parliamentarians and officials operating at the core of our parliamentary and executive government systems.

This year we hosted 2 seminars attended by a total of 45 participants from 30 corporates and 3 tertiary prize recipients.

A full list of corporate attendees is given at Appendix 2 and seminar speakers is given at Appendix 3

BUSINESS ATTACHMENT PROGRAMMES

Two Members of Parliament completed Business Attachments in this reporting period.

Fletcher Tabuteau MP (NZ First) completed the final part of a Business Attachment programme with Deloitte Limited at the company’s Rotorua Regional Office before COVID-19 lockdown.

Simeon Brown MP (National) completed an Attachment with Foodstuffs which was started in the 52nd Parliament and completed following the General Election.

Louisa Wall MP had been accepted to undertake an Attachment with Coco Cola Amatil and Tim van De Molen MP had undertaken preliminary discussions with Air New Zealand.

Both Attachments were cancelled as a direct result of COVID-19. We acknowledge and warmly thank the above companies for agreeing to host Members of Parliament.

Exercising Government through Parliament seminar attendees

SEMINAR SPEAKERS

THE TRUST IS PRIVILEGED TO BE ABLE TO CALL ON A WIDE RANGE OF PARLIAMENTARIANS AND OFFICIALS WITHIN DEPTH KNOWLEDGE ON THE WORKINGS OF PARLIAMENT AND GOVERNMENT.

Speaker of the House, Rt Hon Trevor Mallard MP, speaking at the Exercising Government through Parliament seminar

Hon Jacqui Dean MP Rt Hon Winston Peters, Deputy Prime Minister Suzanne Townsend, Senior Policy Manager, Ministry of Education

EDUCATION

PRIZES IN POLITICS

The Trust’s policy of 2018 seeking an inclusive approach to recognizing more universities was realised this year with four universities now fully engaged in awarding prizes in politics. Each prize is valued at $1,500.

James Heath, Otago University Students’ Association President in 2019 was named the inaugural recipient of the University of Otago prize in politics.

The Trust’s prize is awarded by the University Council on the recommendation of the Head of Politics to a student enrolled in the Master of Politics programme who is engaged in research into the role of the New Zealand Parliament in governance, policymaking and the wider community.

Our partnership with the University of Canterbury continues with Eilish Espiner becoming the second Prize recipient. Eilish completed a Master of Policy and Governance with distinction at the end of 2019. Her thesis provided a critique of the global food system under sustainable development through the lens of empathy, animal rights and ecofeminism.

The University of Auckland has named Kiri Picard as their inaugural recipient. Kiri received an A+ for her dissertation entitled The Treaty of Waitangi Settlement process: Empowering Māori development or reinforcing the Crown’s dominance.

The University of Waikato has named Pheobe Slee, a graduate with a Bachelor of Social Sciences with honours in Politics as the inaugural recipient of the Waikato prize. A feature of the new prizes is that winners are invited to Wellington to either participate in a parliamentary seminar or have engagement with the Trust.

Both James Heath and Eilish Espiner attended our second parliamentary seminar where they received their awards from the Chair of the Board in the presence of Corporate and Associate members. Kiri Picard and Pheobe Slee will attend parliamentary seminars in 2021.

EDUCATION

Travel fund assistance for school visits to Parliament

TRAVEL FUND ASSISTANCE FOR SCHOOL VISITS TO PARLIAMENT

School Visits to Parliament were significantly affected with changing Alert levels and while some of the schools receiving funding through the Trust were able to reschedule their visits to Parliament, others had no option but to cancel their visits.

Bay of Plenty Year 9 students found the visit to Parliament both educational and inspiring. They were very fortunate that their Member of Parliament for Northland, Willow-Jean Prime took time out of her very busy schedule to come and see them and they appreciated their guide who was caring and amazing in showing the students how parliament works.

A full list of those schools receiving grants from the Trust are listed at Appendix 4.

SECRETARIAT

NEW ACCOUNTANT

Munro Benge Chartered Accountants Ltd [Shanan McKeown, Director] commenced duties as the Trust’s new accountants in January. A complete review of financial servicing and various upgrades has been undertaken resulting in the Trust financial systems moving to XERO accounting software. Some aspects of the financial servicing have now been brought in-house.

FINANCIAL SERVICES

As a result of internal changes at Westpac, we have lost our Business Banking advisor Audrey Chan who was always on hand to provide expert advice to the Board and Secretariat.

The Trust will now be serviced by the Bank’s Small Business and Client Service teams. I wish to place on record our appreciation to Audrey for her excellent assistance and support to the Trust over a number of years.

NEW WEBSITE HOST

Sparks Interactive Limited have been engaged as the new website host. As a result of ongoing technical issues, the decision was taken to redevelop the site on Drupal 8 which was identified as the best value for money option. The revised website is planned to go live in the first quarter of 2021. We continue to develop our social media presence with Facebook and LinkedIn.

COMMS INTERN

Liam Davies, a third-year media and marketing student at Massey University joined the Secretariat in May as our second COMMS Intern. Although a somewhat disruptive year, Liam worked on social media, a new publication on our corporate members for use by new MPs and concluded his internship by sharing a communications plan with the Board.

IT UPGRADE

An IT upgrade had been planned for this year. While COVID-19 delayed the procurement process, by the middle of the year we had retired existing office equipment and upgraded our systems to include the purchase of new laptops, moving Trust files and records into the Cloud and giving the Secretariat the ability to work remotely, if required.

THANK YOU

Firstly, I wish to acknowledge and thank the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Ministers and Members of Parliament who generously undertake speaking engagements informing our corporate members on Parliament and government and those Parliamentarians who attend our parliamentary seminar lunches and network with corporate attendees. The Trust could not achieve its key purpose without your active support and engagement.

Second, I would like to record my thanks to the Speaker’s Office, Office of the Clerk, Cabinet Office, Parliamentary Press Gallery and the Parliamentary Service staff for their assistance and support throughout the year. The Trust relies heavily on you all to help us achieve our mission. Finally, personal thanks to my colleagues Vasoula Kappatos, Tassie Wong and Liam Davies for their contribution to the work of the Trust during a pandemic crisis with challenges not previously encountered. The Secretariat has proved that it is robust in managing the ‘new normal’.

Darryl M Stevens MNZM Chief Executive

Thank you too to our Corporate Liaison officers, for promoting the parliamentary seminars to your company colleagues and coordinating nomination of staff wishing to attend.