Today is Members' Day, and it looks like Lynne Pillay's Waitakere Ranges Heritage Area Bill will finally receive its third reading. Unfortunately, that's probably the only substantive business the House will get to; the government is still engaging in blocking behaviour, pushing the Melanesian Trusts (Income Tax Exemption) Amendment Bill up the Order paper, and continuing the pointless committee stage of the Manukau City Council (Control of Graffiti) Bill in order to engineer a logjam and prevent progress on other bills. The immediate target of this blocking seems to be Chester Borrows' Wanganui District Council (Prohibition of Gang Insignia) Bill, which could go to committee against the government's wishes, but there are bills further down the Order paper they want to block as well.
Fortunately, they're almost out of second-reading private bills to talk out, which means we may be seeing some progress in a couple of Member's Days. But it is still looking as if they will have to adopt a few bills if they want to see them passed by the end of the Parliamentary term. And with the government's part of the Order paper beginning to look thin again, and no government bills due back from committee for a while, the government may have to do that to tide itself over until the Budget.
