King Colin: Animal Welfare Amendment Bill — First Reading 
King Colin: Animal Welfare Amendment Bill — First Reading 
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COLIN KING (National—Kaikoura) 
: 
 The Animal Welfare Amendment Bill is a very appropriate bill to be considering because as a nation we have a huge number of animals. In actual fact sometimes it is a bit of a joke that New Zealand is known worldwide for having far more animals than humans. We are quite pleased about that however because as a nation we have a primary sector economy and that primary sector economy contributes to a first-class economy. So this bill is indeed timely. 
Sadly there is from time to time outrageous behaviour that does not do anything for New Zealand’s image and we need then to have a structured process of penalties in place for people who mistreat animals. That is what the Animal Welfare Amendment Bill refers to. It brings in a new regime of punishment for people who commit crimes of cruelty against animals. It is worth noting that previously the ultimate crime against an animal was wilful ill-treatment but there were very very few occasions when there was a guilty verdict in those cases. That was largely because it was very difficult to show that wilfulness. This bill introduces another category of reckless ill-treatment. I think that that is very sensible because reckless behaviour is something that can be quite predictable and a normal person will understand it. 
The bill effectively has two parts to it. There is the regime that sorts out the behaviour of reckless ill-treatment and there is the aspect that deals with how long a person who is judged to have committed cruelty against an animal is disqualified from owning an animal. The bill also talks about the contravention of a court order that prevents somebody from having an animal. 
This bill will attract a significant number of submissions and we in the Primary Production Committee will welcome them. The committee I believe is ideally situated to consider the submissions. We will certainly welcome them but we encourage those people who submit to do so within the context of the bill. I say that because we have quite a structured process within New Zealand of managing best practice. We have the common-sense behaviour of looking after pets in cities which is looked after by the SPCA or the Royal New Zealand Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. Then we have the National Animal Welfare Advisory Committee which rules and adjudges on what is considered best practice with regard to domesticated animals like sheep cattle chooks pigs and so on. So when those submissions come in and we consider them they will need to be in the context and the scope of the bill. 
On the bill’s first reading the Minister stood up and said that he would like to see it reported back to the House in a timely fashion. That report back will be on 20 April. We need to consider that once we finish this session—tonight or tomorrow or whenever it is; we are still in urgency—there is a 2-week adjournment. On that basis we will have to be pretty quick in getting those submissions in because there will be I am sure a large public interest in this bill. 
The regime of fines has been doubled effectively. It might be a fair point to make that doubling a fine does not actually remedy a situation. However I think that it does clearly lay out to the community and to society as a whole the value that we put on our loyal faithful pets and on those animals that we extract a living from. Effectively the penalty regime is raised from $125000 for a body corporate up to $250000. It sounds like a lot of money but the point that is of interest to me is that an individual can actually get a prison sentence but a corporate body just gets a larger fine. Nobody actually comes up for trial for cruelty in the latter case. 
There will be a lot of interest as I have said in this bill. I trust that those who are submitting on it will do so in the context of the bill because we are looking at a regime or structure of penalties for cruelty and on that basis alone I imagine that we will not try to get into a field where we say we should be able to do something or we should not. The debate will be about the aspects of a workable solution because judges have been criticised for not implementing the law; I have to say that until this bill came along it was virtually impossible for them to do so because it was so difficult to prove the wilful aspect of ill-treatment. So the introduction of a reckless ill-treatment category will greatly aid the whole process and I am sure we will see a lot more convictions for those people who should be treated as criminals. Thank you.