Donnelly Brian: Hazardous Substances and New Organisms (Approvals and Enforcement) Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
Donnelly Brian: Hazardous Substances and New Organisms (Approvals and Enforcement) Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
[Volume:628;Page:813] 
Hon BRIAN DONNELLY (NZ First) 
: 
 Just for the edification of the previous speaker Dr Nick Smith the Education and Science Committee in the last Parliament scrutinised three pieces of hazardous substances and new organisms legislation. One of course was the GE legislation when the moratorium came off and the other two were more to do with toxic substances—such as this bill. 
As has been pointed out the bill is part of a raft of legislation stemming from the 1996 Act which was the brainchild of Simon Upton and which sought to establish a common framework to regulate the use of a whole range of dangerous substances and novel organisms. Prior to that these provisions were in a range of different Acts and he was trying to put them all under one umbrella. So it is a little bit preposterous for Paul Hutchison to complain about compliance costs because those costs flow through from the original legislation that was put in place by the National Government. It is a bit like the National Certificate of Educational Achievement (NCEA). National complains nowadays about NCEA but forgets that it was brought in by the National Government. However one of the things that was not anticipated by that original legislation is the provision in the bill relating to group standards. The group standards mechanism in the bill will reduce compliance costs and it is an endeavour to reduce those costs. The bill together with subsequent Cabinet decisions sets out a timetable for all the necessary measures that flowed through from the original legislation. The original legislation did not tie it all up. It had an expectation that further measures would be flowing from that—and this bill is one of them—particularly in response to the criticisms around compliance costs and the bureaucratic monster that Dr Nick Smith referred to. 
The key mechanism and the unique mechanism in this bill not anticipated by Simon Upton is that mechanism of group standards so that substances of similar types and characteristics can be treated as a group rather than as an array of different substances each monitoring its own set of regulations and controls. The outcome of this should be a more user-friendly less-bureaucratic and less-expensive way of regulating the use of hazardous substances in New Zealand and certainly it was recognised as such by most of the submitters. Nick Smith referred to the Act turning into a bureaucratic monster. Well if some changes had not been made to it in the previous legislation we would have had the ludicrous situation of farmers for example having to get handlers’ licences purely and simply to distribute or use Billy Peach flea powder on their dogs. So some of those problems have been eradicated. 
Although some submitters suggested that some changes be made and some suggested that the manner in which we have gone about developing the procedures flowing from the 1996 Act are flawed in fact one of the arguments was that we have not sufficiently used some international work in this particular field to springboard off; we have tended to try to recreate the wheel all for ourselves. Everybody agreed. There was not one group of submitters that did not agree it was necessary to pass this bill in a timely fashion. I guess for some of those who hark back to earlier times and wish we had gone down a different path the answer is to be found in  
Macbeth 
 in that statement he made that we are so steeped in blood it would be as tedious to go back as to go forward. As chair of the select committee that saw this legislation through in the last Parliament I want to thank sincerely the members of that committee including those who are no longer with us in this House such as Bernie Ogilvy and Deborah Coddington because the issues were extremely complex. I would have to say that the bill was about as arid as Ayers Rock or as dry as a fish’s proverbial. Nevertheless the committee members stuck with it. They made the effort to engage intellectually. 
I think the hazardous substances and new organisms legislation was put before the Education and Science Committee because of the GE legislation. Normally it would go to the Local Government and Environment Committee. But we know that that committee was chaired by Jeanette Fitzsimons of the Greens which was a partner to Labour but I think that they probably were not quite comfortable with putting it there so because we had the word “Science” in our title they shoved it towards us. However the members I must admit made a sterling effort to engage intellectually and they made some sensible amendments as we went through. For example new section 20A(2) inserted by clause 6 has been amended so that it is consistent with the items for which an exposure limit can be set as specified in clause 17. It is absolutely stunning stuff and I am sure the House agrees but it is critical for ensuring the safety of New Zealanders in using hazardous substances into the future. Nick Smith made a very good point about the example in England. The committee also tightened up some of the provisions. For example it recommended an amendment to ensure that importers who bring unapproved hazardous substances into this country will be required to pay the full costs of re-exporting those materials. Hopefully this will deter the fly-by-nighters who would endanger the well-being of New Zealanders. 
There was one issue that the committee was unable to fully resolve within the scope we had. It was an issue brought to our attention by vets and it was the conundrum they face in that some of the products they use are regulated by two and in some cases three different pieces of legislation. So they have three different regulatory frameworks but in most cases only two that they have to go through. Further work does need to be carried out on this particular issue by officials. Fortunately the vets themselves saw the implementation of group standards as the next best option so they were not dying in a ditch on the matter which they so sensibly brought to the attention of the committee. 
The second reading of this bill cannot be allowed to go through without a criticism of the management of the legislation. I believe that Nick Smith’s criticisms are somewhat justified. This legislation should have been passed before the election for it to meet the time frames and in fact a Supplementary Order Paper is now required to legitimise the actions of the ministry. This is simply not good enough and it arose purely and simply from poor management of the work programme. A timetable has long been established as to when things have to be done. Otherwise if they are not done within that time frame we will have periods of time when we have no protections whatsoever. The Government the Minister and the ministry officials all knew what that timetable was. It is simply not good enough for officials to drop legislation and then put pressure on select committees to meet their timetable. It is certainly not all right for the Government to set report-back dates that require members to attend through January in order to meet those dates. It is certainly not all right to set report-back dates that do not allow the appropriate scrutiny of the legislation by the select committee—something that we would not agree to especially with the sorts of complex matters that need to be scrutinised in legislation such as the bill we are discussing. So I believe we can concur with the criticism of Nick Smith that the timing of this legislation and the timeliness with which it was brought to the House can be justifiably criticised by the House and by members of the select committee. 
New Zealand First however is pleased that it has been able to make a contribution to the legislation. We believe that the outcome will be to make New Zealand a more manageable and safer environment and that has to be positive for our nation. In the end whilst members brought up some flaws in the bill I think it was unanimously agreed to by all parties on the select committee and I think that possibly will be the outcome of the vote tonight.