Shearer DavidDAVID SHEARER (Labour—Mt Albert): It is with great pleasure that we support this bill as well. It was a bill that was originally put together as the Minister said in 2006. It lay in abeyance for all of that time. The Government did not pass it through. But now with some amendments that it has made and prompted particularly by the possibility that we might enter into a free-trade agreement with the EU it has accelerated the importance and the significance of getting this bill through Parliament by the end of this year. Last weekend I was very privileged to attend the Air New Zealand Wine Awards in Auckland. I acknowledge Stuart Smith over there who was also in attendance and was one of the—what do you call them—grand masters of the New Zealand wine industry?Stuart Smith: A fellow.DAVID SHEARER: A fellow—thank you Stuart. I attended along with my colleague Jacinda Ardern and the member for Wairarapa as well. I will not go through everybody else because there were quite a few people there.But let me get back to the point. I think for me the most significant thing the most touching thing was that the people who were there had a passion for wine. They were not the people whom you would maybe associate with high society with tippling on wine. They were people who when you shook their hands had clearly been out in the vineyards for a while and had callouses on their hands. They were people who had grown wines tasted them and manufactured them. They effectively told the story of an industry that is an agricultural industry that feeds off our natural resources through our expertise and is now commanding the best prices in the world. It is truly a story about agriculture from the growing right through to the value-adding the marketing and the exporting—and it is obviously mostly exported. It really was I have to say a pretty sobering—ha ha! Sobering—that is a bad word for it. But there was certainly a—certainly a—Hon Dr Jonathan Coleman: This is quite rambling David.DAVID SHEARER: Yes. Thank you Dr Coleman. It was something that I felt quite privileged to be at to meet with these people who had contributed so much. As Minister Goldsmith said we are now looking at $1.6 billion worth of exports. They are aiming towards $2 billion by 2020. That is in just under 3 years. That is an extraordinary expansion and people would say that that is possibly impossible. But in fact in 1990 it was $100 million and now it is $1.6 billion so that expansion is pretty extraordinary.The other important issue around this was the fact that New Zealand wines do obtain the highest value. It is approximately $9 a litre for New Zealand wines around $7 a litre for Australian wines and a miserable $5 a litre for French wines which you would have expected possibly to have been higher. But New Zealand wines are in that high level. They are sought after—they are high quality and they are sought after around the world.The European Union (EU) trade deal that is coming up is significant for us. There are 500 million high-value consumers easily the highest value trading bloc that we will have the possibility of going into in terms of a market and a bloc that appreciates wine as well. The possibilities of being able to export wine into the EU without tariffs much more freely is a tantalising one and one that I think will push those exports of wine even further.This is an industry that therefore needs to be protected. The Marlborough sauvignon blanc as the Minister just said needs to be protected. It will be Marlborough and it will be sauvignon blanc. Likewise with Otago pinot noir—exactly the same issue. It is like champagne in that it can be called champagne only if it is grown within the district of Champagne in France. Even feta cheese can be grown only in a particular place within Greece.These are trademarks that need to be protected. They are important for exports and for keeping that value-added value up and for New Zealand having that designation of Marlborough sauvignon blanc or Otago pinot noir maintains the quality and ensures that no other wine growing area across the world—France for example grows much less-quality wine than we do—can somehow call their wine Marlborough sauvignon blanc if they ever wanted to do that.This is a bill that I think has got widespread support right across the House. I do not think there is anybody who would disagree that this is good for New Zealand it is good for exports and it is good for our wine industry. As I say I was particularly impressed by the way in which our wine industry has not just grown in numbers but also in terms of quality and the way that that quality is appreciated right across the world.The Air New Zealand wine awards—and I have got to say Air New Zealand does a terrific job in terms of promoting New Zealand wines both on their flights and also in getting behind this event—saw that the pinot noir that finally got the supreme award came from a 3.6 hectare vineyard in Otago. Although I have say there is a pinot noir from Marlborough that was highly recommended as well. Certainly Marlborough did extraordinarily well in terms of the awards that were handed out last weekend—the premium awards of the year in terms of wine.Like the previous speaker Paul Goldsmith we acknowledge what has happened in Marlborough: the challenges they have faced because of the earthquakes the challenges that they face now and the damage that they have sustained in the past couple of days. We wish them very well in terms of being able to get back on their feet and begin their terrific work that they have up to now been able to undertake.So with that I just want to note that this bill is a rather technical bill. It just brings into play the 2006 bill which has been as I say on the books and languishing there for a long time until the Government woke up to the fact that it probably needs to get it through. It will mean that there is a registration fee paid in order to be able to designate those wines. It will mean that opposition to that designation can be heard can be noted and dutifully be able to be considered. A third issue that is in part of this bill is that any terms or terminology that are offensive to Māori can be acknowledged and considered as well. I think that is very important too as we go forward.So with that I will finish early and say once again that Labour supports this bill wholeheartedly. It is a bill that Labour brought in in 2006 that the Government has sat on for the last 8 years. We want to see our wine industry growing as it has done over the past two decades and going from success to success. Once again I congratulate them on their fine work. Thank you.