Woodhouse MichaelHon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE (National): Thank you Madam Chair. Before I make my contribution I would just like to acknowledge Matt Doocey's wonderful description of Dr Reti and I and put on record that it's probably me that will be the shortest-ever comparison with Richie McCaw in this country's history flattering though that is.I was very disappointed actually to hear the Minister of Health talk about Dr Reti's very sensible amendments as rigidly codifying" as if this is the proposed end of the story. In fact this is simply the start line. It's absolutely understood that there are many many other parts to the regulatory framework that are necessary to give effect to this licensing regime. What Dr Reti has done is put down some very very important baseline considerations and it's very disappointing not only that the Government isn't going to take them up but that they mis-describe what that Supplementary Order Paper 178 is in such a way.Now I'm going to change tack because there is a very important issue around this that I'm gravely concerned about particularly with the revelation that the Minister is not only not ruling out loose leaf but in fact tacitly saying that it's going to be part of the regime. Now for two years I was the Associate Minister of Transport with responsibility for road and rail safety and for three years I was the Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety and passaged the Health and Safety at Work Act 2015 through this House. While I was Associate Minister of Transport there was a terrible accident near Foxton where a truck ran into the back of a line of traffic concertinaed a car—it exploded—and two people were killed. I had to go on a TV show one Sunday night to explain why that driver who had THC in their bloodstream had not been convicted of drug-driving causing death.The reason is that the impairment framework for drug-driving is very different from alcohol. Alcohol takes a blood alcohol content and it's highly correlated with impairment. Therefore we know that if the impairment level is at a certain point somebody is impaired. Drug-driving is different. It requires firstly a per se evidence of impairment before there is a blood test and it's a very expensive blood test. Now my concern is that if we create a medicinal cannabis regime that includes the ingestion of loose-leaf cannabis—and even if it doesn't; if it's an oil or a pill or something it could still very much have a hallucinogenic property—we are going to have a significant challenge with people who are drug-driving on our roads.Now most people who are found to have been drug-driving usually after they've been killed in an accident or even if they're arrested have a combination of alcohol and drug in their system. Now I know as a former Minister of Police—because police told me this that they take a relatively least resistant path. If somebody is believed to have had drugs and alcohol in their system but they can prove that there's alcohol and they're over the limit they'll take that prosecution. It makes sense because they get the offence recorded in any event. So there is a great deal of under-reporting of the amount of drug-driving causing death or injury in this country if the driver is not killed. If the driver is killed a blood test will be taken and there'll be the confirmation of THC. The problem with this is that THC the presence of THC has a half-life of days or weeks. This is why we needed the impairment test. Now the problem I've got with endorsing smoking loose leaf under the licensing regime that we're covering is that we may create a massive risk on our roads that cannot be managed with the current land transport rules and the Land Transport Act. What disappoints me about this is that there apparently has been not one bit of consultation with the New Zealand Police with the New Zealand Transport Agency or with anybody else—with the AA who on their website point out that there is a defence to a drug-driving conviction if one can say they followed the instructions of their GP or the prescribing doctor.Now that is a nuanced position because of course there are many medicines that will have instructions on them that may say "Don't drive if you're taking this medicine." But it's actually a defence if the prescribing medical practitioner doesn't physically point that out and cannot prove that it has been pointed out to the patient and the patient ignores that instruction—that hasn't actually carried out the delivery of that instruction; just having the warning on the box of the medicine isn't enough. In fact the Health Committee in its consideration of Denise Astill's petition has heard a lot about the variations in the sorts of conditions where one should take a medicine. In that case it's epileptics.What I'm raising here—and the Minister should I think reassure the House that at least some consideration of this issue will be made even if it hasn't already been made because I have some confidence that we're going to need to come back to this House and change the Land Transport Act to tighten up the drug-driving regime because there will be a lot of people who could cause harm. Even if they're terminally ill they could well be capable of driving under the influence of THC only—because it's their prescription medicine however ingested—and causing harm on our roads and not having a significant amount of preventive education or prosecutorial process being put in place either side of this regime.It's just another example of where this licensing regime is half-baked ill-thought-through as part of the 100-day plan. We started with 59 words. We need more words because this isn't just about the advisory committee or the officials that are going to be sent away to do this regime. This is a much much broader issue that could raise questions of criminal liability in other parts of legislation and there is absolutely as far as I can tell not a single nod in this bill to give us confidence that it's even been thought through. So I'm going to be very interested in the Minister's and the officials' comments about that."