Jones Shane: Land Transport (Road Safety and Other Matters) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Jones Shane: Land Transport (Road Safety and Other Matters) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:671;Page:18028] 
Hon SHANE JONES (Labour) 
: 
 Tena koe. I am uncharacteristically using a modest voice. I shall correct that deficiency. 
As has been intimated to the Minister in the chair the Minister of Transport in broad terms Labour supports the Land Transport (Road Safety and Other Matters) Amendment Bill. Two particular areas have caused us considerable angst and I will talk about the first one. It relates to the blood-alcohol limit. The Minister in the chair made reference to the fact that as a consequence of his history and his physiology he was more than capable of absorbing the equivalent of three handsome glasses of vino without it impairing his ability to drive and without offending the regulations pertaining to people driving whilst having had a bit to drink. Quite apart from the lack of wisdom of a Cabinet Minister making such a statement when one believes one walks on water one can say virtually anything until such time as the forces of nature otherwise known as the electorate correct that misapprehension. 
The reason we were hoping we could find some common ground with the Government on this issue is that we felt that a lowering of the limit would send a message that would amplify throughout the spectrum of drinkers. As I have said earlier we know that there is an element of awkwardness in people making a transition. There would be hardly a member in the Chamber who has not been to a rugby game or to some other spot had a drink or three and then chanced his or her arm and driven home believing that he or she was not over the limit. 
We are very concerned about the young impressionable drinkers. They absorbed a new set of cultural standards and they realised that society—as reflected through their submissions and interaction with the Law Commission and as was evidenced through the media reports over the last dare I say 12 months—is repulsed by the notion that more and more of our young people are suffering as a consequence of not being able to handle their alcohol and of getting behind the wheel of a vehicle and creating havoc. All we have been saying is that had we taken that particular stance it would reinforce the message that New Zealand needs to hear. 
We heard from a whole host of parents and advocacy groups. We have only to read about such prestigious institutions as King’s College to see that there is an endemic culture. If we as parliamentarians feel disinclined to challenge that prevailing youth binge drinking culture then I think that is a very serious indictment. I do not personally believe that the current Minister of Transport wants to let that binge drinking youth culture go unimpeded. However I think he has missed a very good opportunity by not lowering the blood-alcohol limit. 
There are a variety of other things that we agree with though; I do not want to be too churlish. But I do not think that there is anything petty or unreasonable in challenging the Minister to suffer a road to Damascus experience have a change of heart and agree with my colleagues and me and with the work done by my predecessor Mr Darren Hughes who hopefully has the time to listen into these contributions. We are carrying on from work that he initiated. If we want to attack the element of our societal culture that either celebrates or remains indifferent to binge drinking then a good way to do it is to pass a regulation and cause young people or their parents or other role models to suffer as a consequence of not being prepared to change their ways. It sounds brutal but it tends to work in other spheres of life. 
It would be good to hear the Minister give the Committee an account as to why he has not taken on board the public’s concerns. I know that he lives by the polls. Of course he will die by the polls but that is another matter. I know that National members poll on a tediously regular basis. He has obviously taken a poll outside the Titirangi Golf Club up at the Auckland Bridge Club in Remuera down at the Waitemata sailing club and at the various other pursuits that this Minister who is unfortunately known in the north as the “Minister of Dead Ends” is up to. But I ask Minister Joyce to please tell us why. We will not attack him on his profligate approach to roads of national significance in this context—well not in this speech anyhow. We just want to know why he has not taken on board the concerns of and the appeals for leadership from mothers brothers sisters and schoolteachers. 
He should not hide behind the media and he should not hide behind the usual smug somewhat supercilious garb. He should come out and tell New Zealand why he is leaving this limit the way that he is proposing to leave it and why he is relying on goodness knows what kind of research which he has lumbered the police and various other agencies with. The majority of the anti - drink-driving advocates and garden-variety parents—and as I said vocational guidance counsellors ministers of religion doctors and people who operate our hospitals and the actual emergency wards—have all told us that we need to take every proactive step to stop the suffering of more young people their families and indeed innocent people. 
Not long ago not far from where I hail from a person in his middle age was so drunk that he wiped out a beautiful young woman and child and injured other people. People expect the courts to deliver a decision but the courts will deliver a decision only when the highest court in the land the sovereign court—Parliament—has spoken. The party on this side of the Chamber is making a very sensible plea to Minister Joyce to please change his stance to not hide behind more reports to trust in the instincts of the people who are at the front line dealing with this carnage and on these issues of life and death to not hide behind polls. 
This is the kind of thing that we would expect a senior Minister of the Crown to embrace and race towards exercising some leadership on. This is not some sort of shady commercial transaction that we have recently tried to pin on him—no. This is about simple God-fearing Kiwis being afraid that this culture of binge drinking is going unimpeded. No one has more power in this area than the Minister of Transport so I think it is right that we amplify the fact that he has remained impotent on the issue. 
It is not unreasonable for us to have a go. I know that advocates from sports clubs and from entities such as the Automobile Association will have a go at whichever Government might be in power over whether this is too heavy-handed but we cannot trade on the language of strategies such as Safer Journeys or in our case See You There—Safe As. The rhetoric is fine but unless we are proactive on changing the elements that make for safer driving and a safer culture I have serious concerns. 
An additional area that has concerned me is the disproportionately high level of negative statistics that come from our young people—by that I mean rangatahi Maori young Maori drivers. I have a fear that if we put up the age of licensed driving it will have a disproportionately negative impact on our young people. As the Automobile Association has said there seems to already be a different culture governing the decisions of many of our young Maori drivers. Te Puni Kokiri has long since stopped doing anything proactive in that stance as befits the approach of the current Minister of Maori Affairs and his party. 
This Minister has an opportunity to deal with the elements in society that disproportionately need leadership. They do not want to change their ways until such time as some State fiat forces them to change their ways. It could affect the pockets of our community and dare I say our people—te rangatahi Maori—who seem to be operating to a different set of cultural principles when they hop behind the wheel of a vehicle. I am not seeking to countenance that and I certainly do not want to give anyone that impression but I have seen it myself. 
If one indiscriminately changes the way that licences are to be obtained; if one does not take into account how the most vulnerable group who need the ability to travel safely and legally on the road in order to get a job or better training whilst they are young will be affected; and if one makes it more difficult for them then one is actually making it difficult for them to escape from the poverty trap that many of them find themselves in. 
A whole host of attack lines are coming out of the New Zealand media. We do not need to repeat them so early in the debate; the Minister knows what they are. We will amplify them during the course of this year. I come back again to this: a simple demonstration of leadership from this person who prides himself of being the unseen force behind the current senior Ministers—