Kedgley Sue: Human Tissue Bill — Second Reading 
Kedgley Sue: Human Tissue Bill — Second Reading 
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SUE KEDGLEY (Green) 
: 
 The Green Party will be supporting the second reading of the Human Tissue Bill. I would like to speak briefly in my capacity as chair of the Health Committee. We gave this bill the same very objective consideration we gave the Health (Drinking Water) Amendment Bill. We approached the issue with a very open mind and we listened very intently to submissions. It was a very collective process and we came up with legislation and a report that we believe most responded to the issues and the submissions we heard. 
The Human Tissue Bill is an incredibly complex bill. In fact it is so complex that we asked the officials to put in flow charts to explain for example the consent process because we felt that most New Zealanders reading this bill would not be able to understand it. Obviously the whole issue of giving organs and tissues from deceased persons is a very emotional and sensitive one. We heard submissions on the one hand from intensivists who have to deal with this issue on a daily basis and on the other hand from persons whose children would stand to benefit from organs or would need them in the future. Those people have a very very intense interest in increasing the very tragically low rate of organ donation in New Zealand. 
I think that the select committee went about its consideration of the bill with an open mind. I can certainly say I did. In fact when we began to consider the bill I expected I would be supporting a mandatory organ donor register as the select committee had previously recommended. It really was only by listening to the submissions that I slowly came to change my mind. The reason I thought I would support an organ donor register was the reason that others have pointed out—namely the tragically low numbers of organs being donated in New Zealand and the awareness of the huge and escalating demand that there will be for organs in New Zealand particularly because of end-stage renal disease as a result of diabetes and because of end-stage liver disease. 
We noted that in America the number of people waiting for kidney organs alone has more than doubled over the past decade and that that country is seriously considering whether a rationing system should be set up. The issues being considered include whether the young should be given priority and whether older patients over the age of 70 or 79 would be accepted for organ donation. That is the level of debate being considered in America. Of course we can cast our mind to China. Recently I attended a lecture about the Chinese situation of organ harvesting whereby organs are taken from prisoners or from people who have been executed presumably because the demand for organs in China is huge as it is elsewhere in the world. Let us hope we never get to the stage that the Chinese have got to—harvesting organs from prisoners. 
There was a turning point for me. I suspect that it was also the turning point for Steve Chadwick who originally had a member’s bill calling for a mandatory organ donor register and that it was the reason she withdrew her bill. That moment was when the intensivists pointed out that there was no evidence at present that having a mandatory organ donation register or an opt-on one actually increased organ donor rates. 
The scientists said to us that if we were scientists we would have to have some demonstrable evidence that if we were going to introduce something pretty major—which establishing a register would be—it would work. They said that if scientists have to respond on the basis of proven evidence why should not politicians? Why should politicians go ahead and recommend the establishment of an organ donor register when in fact we do not have any evidence from registers that have operated in other parts of the world that they actually result in an increase in the number of organs donated? 
Given that our whole purpose as we debated that particular part of the legislation was to find a way to increase the number of organs donated in New Zealand that certainly gave me—and I suspect other members—serious pause for thought. Why indeed would we set up a register when at this stage there is no evidence that a register works? That is why we came up with what I think was a compromise which is that we will give regulatory powers for the Government to set up such a register if evidence emerges that it does result in an increase in organs donated. Ordinarily the Green Party is opposed to legislation that sets up regulatory powers for Governments to do quite significant things such as this but on this occasion we supported it. We felt it was a very sensible way through the dilemma we faced—namely that if strong evidence does present itself then a Government does not have to come back to this House but can act to set up a register using its regulatory powers but it does have to demonstrate that there is international evidence whereas at the moment the evidence is inconclusive. 
The other point that has not been mentioned thus far which also had a significant influence on my decision was the realisation that actually there is only a tiny tiny fraction of New Zealanders who could donate their organs. Sometimes when we listen to the debate on organ donation we ask why with 4 million New Zealanders are we not just handing over our organs? Why is there this problem of only 25 or 30 organs being donated? The truth is that there is only a tiny fraction of people who would ever be in a situation to donate an organ when they are deceased and that is because they would have to be brain-dead and they would have to have tissue in very good order and last year for example there were only 104 possible donors in New Zealand. So we are not talking about hundreds of people who are not donating organs. We were informed that because of the ability to keep people alive after accidents the number of people who are clinically brain-dead and who have the right tissue is diminishing which as the intensivists told us is one of the reasons that the numbers were not increasing. 
There are huge moral and ethical issues surrounding the whole issue of organ donation. We—certainly the Green Party—totally respected the views expressed by the Maori Party and in particular by Tariana Turia about the views of tikanga Maori and the need for whanau to have the final say over whether to donate the organs of a deceased person. We accept that there are completely different views and values around death and the taking of organs between Pakeha and Maori and other cultures and we strongly supported the Maori Party’s amendment that would have allowed whanau to have the final say over whether to donate an organ. We were very disappointed that the rest of the select committee did not support that. We are very pleased to hear that the Maori Party will be putting up that recommendation again. 
It seems to me that the situation is as Tariana Turia said—we end up here imposing what we could say is the Pakeha view of death and organ donation rather than taking into account adequately the sensitivities of different cultural traditions and I think that is a great shame. We tried very hard to achieve that. Officials worked with a Maori adviser and I thought we came up with an excellent amendment and I am deeply disappointed that it did not go through. 
Obviously there are many other complex issues in this bill. Overall we are pleased with it. We are particularly pleased with the way that informed consent is the fundamental underpinning of the entire bill and that it will not be possible to use tissue or organs without informed consent. So with some misgivings we are pleased to support the bill.