Faafoi Kris: Crown Entities Reform Bill — In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Faafoi Kris: Crown Entities Reform Bill — In Committee 
[Sitting date: 23 May 2012. Volume:680;Page:2347. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
KRIS FAAFOI (Labour—Mana) 
: 
 Thank you Mr Chair for the opportunity to speak to Part 2 of the Crown Entities Reform Bill. As I forewarned in my contribution to Part 1 this is where Labour’s relationship with National on this bill in terms of our support has to come to an end. 
Louise Upston 
: You’re not leaving us are you? 
KRIS FAAFOI 
: Yes we are. We are parting company. We are not going to hold hands any more on this bill because as Iain Lees-Galloway said and as Kevin Hague reinforced this is not a merger within this bill that we support. As I mentioned on Part 1 there were two agencies working in a fragmented way. We know there is sense and there are efficiencies in bringing those two—the Alcohol Advisory Council and the Health Sponsorship Council—together but in Part 2 the effective merging of the Mental Health Commission into the Office of the Health and Disability Commissioner we believe is not the right move. As Kevin Hague said this is not congruent. These two agencies do not meet the same purpose and we believe that there should be a real focus from the Mental Health Commissioner to stay focused on mental health issues. As a number of submitters to the Government Administration Committee said there was some concern that the Mental Health Commission is seen as proactive whereas the Health and Disability Commissioner is seen as reactive and therefore that the Health and Disability Commissioner’s office was not the appropriate agency to take on the new mental health and addiction monitoring and advocacy functions. That was one of the strong submissions that was made on Part 2 of the bill when it went before the select committee.  
As a number of speakers have already mentioned the Mental Health Commission started its life in response to the Mason inquiry back in 1996. It was set up in 1998 under the Mental Health Commission Act and it did have a sunset clause which was subsequently extended in the years of 2000 2004 and again in 2007. The date that it was meant to expire under the current legislation was 31 August 2015. That has now been brought forward to 30 June 2012. The departmental report said that by transferring the Mental Health Commission’s monitoring and advocacy functions to the Health and Disability Commissioner the bill would secure for them a permanent home in a resilient well-established Crown entity. We do not think that that necessarily is the best home for the functions of the Mental Health Commission. We believe that this agency should stay intact where it is at the moment. We believe that there is still work to be done in terms of what its functions are and what it sets out to do in terms of the short-and mid-term plans around mental health. So we do not believe that the Mental Health Commission’s best place is within the Health and Disability Commissioner’s office.  
The fact that the Mental Health Commission has been rolled into the Health and Disability Commissioner’s office has raised questions about the future long-term plans of this Government in terms of dealing with mental health issues. I guess that is another point borne out by the fact that this commission’s role is being rolled into the Health and Disability Commissioner’s functions which look at a very wide number of issues in terms of health issues that we have in New Zealand. So we do not support this measure in Part 2 to roll the commission’s functions into the Health and Disability Commissioner’s office.  
As I have said earlier in this contribution there is some sense in Part 1 and to the rolling of the functions into the new agency there. But in terms of this disestablishment of the Mental Health Commission in Part 2 we cannot support it. As Iain Lees-Galloway said we will need to have a positive outcome if we are going to take the action that is within this bill and we do not believe that there will be a positive outcome in terms of the delivery of mental health services for New Zealand and making sure we take a proactive role to support those people in our community with mental health issues. We do not believe that there will be efficiencies or positive outcomes in the mental health area in Part 2.