Lees-Galloway IainIAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North): That was an unenthusiastic contribution from the chair of the Health Committee. I have to say that this is an unusual Government bill in that it was introduced by the Government but the real impetus the real enthusiasm for this bill came from the Opposition—from right back on 18 February 2013 when the Government first decided that it was going to pursue this course of action of introducing plain packaging for tobacco products. That of course was a decision not of a National Government Minister—it certainly would never have been a decision of a National Minister—it was the decision of the Hon Tariana Turia. Of course really if we are honest about this the only reason that the Government introduced this legislation was its agreement with the Māori Party and boy oh boy has that Government dragged the chain on this legislation and taken every single possible opportunity to slow the process down. So more than 3 years—more than 3 years—after the Government first decided it was going to introduce plain packaging here we are not passing the bill not passing it into law not actually beginning the regime of plain packaging—but here we are at the second reading. My goodness what progress we have made in the last 3 years! Of course we all know why. We all know why and it is because this Government always prioritises business interests over the interests of the health of New Zealanders. It was concerned that its business buddies were going to sort of give it in the neck for actually doing something that the tobacco companies did not like. I have to say of course all of this is tied up in the business of the Trans-Pacific Partnership and free trade and investor-State dispute clauses and the threat that the tobacco industry continues to make that it will try to sue the New Zealand Government if this Parliament enacts legislation designed to protect the health of New Zealanders. I have to say that if I was an exponent of the Trans-Pacific Partnership—which I certainly am not. But if I was someone who was a backer of the Trans-Pacific Partnership and if I was someone who was an enthusiast for investor-State dispute settlement clauses I would be really hacked off with the tobacco industry right now. This is because the tobacco industry with its threat to sue the New Zealand Government if this legislation is passed is actually playing into all the fears people have about what will happen to this country if we sign up to the Trans-Pacific Partnership and if we pass the legislation enabling the Trans-Pacific Partnership. The tobacco industry—the Minister looks confused. The Minister is trying to figure out how this is associated with this bill. He does not do his reading if he does not understand it. This legislation if it passes will trigger the tobacco industry's suing the New Zealand Government under investor-State dispute settlement clauses. That is what people fear—this Parliament not having the sovereign right to legislate in the interests of the public health of New Zealanders because we fear being sued by the tobacco industry or by any other industry for that matter.Hon Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga: You want me to table the agreement?IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY: Sorry?Hon Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga: You want me to table the agreement so you can read it? It's carved out.IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY: So this legislation though Sam—The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order!IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY: Sam Lotu-Iiga Associate Minister of Health this legislation—the tobacco industry is threatening to sue the New Zealand Government if this legislation is passed. I am sure the tobacco industry will sue the New Zealand Government if this legislation is passed. That is why the Government has said that it wanted to put this legislation on the back-burner. It is more concerned about business interests. It is more concerned about the tobacco lobby than it is about the public health of New Zealanders. It is more interested in the lobbying from the tobacco industry than it is in the lobbying from people who are interested in the health of ordinary New Zealanders. Simon O'Connor said that this legislation is not going to be a silver bullet and that in his view lots of people out there think that this is going to be the silver bullet. I do not think anybody thinks this is going to be the silver bullet. Nobody came to the select committee and told us that this is going to be the silver bullet. What this is is the next logical progression in a long line of things that this Parliament and Governments have done over the last three decades nearly now to steadily eradicate the prevalence of tobacco smoking and the harm that tobacco does to New Zealanders. So we got rid of advertising we got rid of sport sponsorships we got smoking out of workplaces we got it out of pubs and cafes—all of that opposed by National by the way. Every single one of those steps was opposed by National and it was not until the National Government formed an agreement with the Māori Party that it actually started to agree with these types of steps. So I can see why perhaps some National MPs are confused and they think this is the silver bullet because they have only just realised that they should be on the right side of this debate and actually start supporting legislation that reduces the harm caused by tobacco. Of course it is not the silver bullet. It is just the next logical step and this Parliament and Governments have been on this pathway for a long time. It is great that National has finally caught up. We are all actually quite pleased about that and it is a shame really that we have not been able to advance this cause more quickly over the last 20 to 30 years because of the opposition that National has put up at every step when Labour-led Governments and parliaments where Labour has had the majority have sought to legislate in that direction. This is an important step. What it actually does is it gets rid of the last bastion of tobacco advertising. This has actually been a process that has taken quite a long time. We got rid of what everybody would think of as tobacco advertising a long time ago. We got rid of that insidious horrible ability that tobacco had to sponsor sports events which was just crazy because sport is all about health and there could be nothing that is more detrimental to the health of New Zealanders than tobacco so those two should never have gone together. Then of course we had the tobacco displays where tobacco companies could use the packaging for cigarette packets as a wall of advertising in dairies and supermarkets. We managed to get rid of those but of course that does not get rid of the fact that actually every time a cigarette packet is put out on the kitchen table where kids can see it that is a form of advertising as well. We do need to get rid of this and we can actually use those cigarette packets to deliver the message that we actually need young people to see which is that smoking is not cool. The packaging looks disgusting it is not the sort of thing that you want to show around in front of your friends and in fact we have got the messages on there describing to young people exactly what the consequences of smoking tobacco are and over the years it has all been successful. We have heard from National over the years we still hear from the ACT Party and we still hear from others that none of these things is going to be successful and none of it is going to make any difference but the truth is that we have seen a dramatic fall in the number of people who smoke. We have seen dramatic improvements in people's health but we have still got some way to go. There is still a significant but a much smaller minority of the population who smoke but it is still a significant proportion of New Zealanders who smoke and not only are they doing damage to themselves but they are putting an unnecessary burden on the health system all so that the tobacco companies can make a profit. So this is the next step as we head towards being smoke-free by 2025 but it is going to require a continued and sustained effort from this Government and the Governments that come after it. We had a period of a succession of moves to tackle tobacco. We had getting rid of the tobacco displays. We had increases in tax and that was great while Tariana Turia was the Minister. Sadly since Tariana Turia left and we have had a diminished Māori Party and a Minister who does not seem to show as much enthusiasm for this as his predecessor did the wind has gone out of the sails a little bit. This bill has been sitting on the Order Paper a long time and it is a long time since we have actually done anything to maintain that momentum and keep the pressure on the tobacco industry. So this is the next step. I hope that we do not have as long between the second reading and the third reading as we had between the first and the second because we do need to get on with this. We do need to keep the momentum up. Just because the Government does not have a Minister who has the enthusiasm that once existed in that Government it does not mean that we cannot keep the pressure on and keep doing this. Come on let us get this thing through as quickly as we can.