Woolerton R Doug: State-Owned Enterprises (AgriQuality Limited and Asure New Zealand Limited) Bill — Second Reading 
Woolerton R Doug: State-Owned Enterprises (AgriQuality Limited and Asure New Zealand Limited) Bill — Second Reading 
[Volume:639;Page:9223] 
R DOUG WOOLERTON (NZ First) 
: 
 New Zealand First supports the proposal to amalgamate AgriQuality and Asure either now or in the future. As the speakers do their stuff we are starting to hear a few of the underlying problems coming out. I want to reiterate some of the things that Maryan Street said. One of them is that these demands are those of other countries. These demands are those of other Governments that will not deal with private enterprise. They will not deal with private contractors. They will deal with Government agencies— 
Hon David Carter 
: These are two State-owned enterprises. 
R DOUG WOOLERTON 
: Yes they are State-owned enterprises. We have spent a lot of time making sure that these countries overseas understand that these State-owned enterprises are actually Government organisations. That is what they are no matter what point one makes about them. They are controlled by the Government to one degree or another and their shareholders are Government Ministers. 
Mr Gordon Copeland’s amendment which New Zealand First intends to support is along the lines of: “If these countries overseas agree to private contractors or other agencies taking up meat inspection then they will be allowed.” Now there is negotiation on a continuing basis to try to convince overseas countries that we should be allowed to have private contractors or non-Government agencies carrying out these tasks. But they have not been approved as yet. The Chinese the Americans and the English demand that these things be done by a Government agency—be it a State-owned enterprise or other. That is the fact of the matter. Even Mr Gordon Copeland’s excellent amendment accepts and recognises that. 
The other thing that people should know is that there is not real competition between these agencies especially in the red meat business as the Meat Industry Association would have everybody believe. There is the potential for competition. When the Meat Industry Association talks about its submission it says it is concerned that the potential for competition is being removed. It is not competition that is being removed; it is the potential for competition that is being removed. I say as an ex-farmer and a person who advocates for farmers that that is not good enough. The potential for competition is not good enough—either there is competition or there is not. That is the honest way. 
If there is not real competition if there is only the potential for competition then it is in the Government’s and the farmers’ interest to do everything they can to drive down the cost on the enterprise that is supplying that service. That is precisely and exactly what this bill is about. Instead of having two organisations with some sort of phoney competition let us have one organisation. There will not be competition because the overseas Governments will not allow that to happen. Let us get the price down and let us get on with it. 
I get a little bit cheesed off quite frankly when people talk to farmers about phoney competition because farmers know what competition is. Farmers understand what competition is. This is certainly not competition as we all should understand it. I think that rather than what the National Party is saying this will be good for the farmers. 
Nathan Guy 
: You go out and tell them. 
R DOUG WOOLERTON 
: I will tell them. When the National Party fronts up to farmers and starts telling them the whole issue instead of part of the issue then we may get somewhere. I thought it was interesting that Nathan Guy just because it occurred to him thought that the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research Ltd should combine with another State-owned enterprise and that somehow or other that would give him better information regarding weather bombs. It is not the information regarding weather bombs that is lacking; it is the ability to do something about them. Again the National Party is holding out hope when there is none. 
Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m. 
R DOUG WOOLERTON 
: Before the House broke I was talking about the perceived competition that the Meat Industry Association is worried it will be missing out on and the perceived competition that the National Party is making such an issue of. Mr David Carter mentioned that he will be moving an amendment to clause 10. The Minister has evidently said that where the contract with the Animal Health Board for tuberculosis testing is able to be cancelled at the moment clause 10 makes sure that the Animal Health Board cannot cancel that contract even under a differently constituted State-owned enterprise which we are talking about here. 
I presume that everybody knows—but in case they do not I will tell them—that here we are dealing with another Government agency the Animal Health Board. So National is worried about competition between Asure and AgriQuality which are two State-owned enterprises dealing with a third State-owned enterprise and the Meat Industry Association is worried about the lack of competition. Well I tell members that there is very little competition in this area and as I said before where there is no real competition one has to make these enterprises as efficient as they can be in order to deliver a low-cost service—which is what is being attempted. Obviously it will be up to the managers to ensure that that happens and it will be up to us in Parliament to keep an eye on that. I am sure that between us and the farmers that will certainly happen. 
I will use the last minute or two I have remaining to talk about the people who are involved in this industry the people Mr Carter attempted to—not demonise but he did start to go down that track and to talk about them in terms of their being unionists. Let me tell members that these people are in a highly specialised field. They have to learn to identify shadows in a carcass. They have to learn to identify things that are not immediately obvious to us. In fact Mr Assistant Speaker people like you—and I say “you” advisedly—and I could not detect those things. However these people can and most certainly if they did not the inspectors in our overseas markets absolutely certainly would. They would reject our cattle and they would reject our meat and there would be horrendous cost to us as a country downstream of that. 
So I want to give these people—unionists or not—a little bit of praise for what they do. They work in bloody—and I am not using that as a swear word—conditions. They work often in cold conditions and they work in conditions where they simply cannot afford to make a mistake. So I give credit to them and I do that on behalf of the many farmers I know personally who appreciate what they do. I give that credit to them on behalf of myself and my party New Zealand First. These people are at the cutting edge of what we do in this country—that is produce extremely high-quality produce and extremely high-quality consumables for the world markets. 
We are right at the top end of world markets. We are not producing cheap cuts. Maybe once we did and maybe we were proud of that once but we do not do that any more. We produce high-end consumables for the most sophisticated markets in the world and I close by saying to those people—the meat inspectors and the people who are at the coalface of this industry—that we understand what they do and we appreciate what they do. New Zealand is the beneficiary of what they do and long may they continue to do it.