Seymour DavidDAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): Well thank you Madam Assistant Speaker. I rise on behalf of the ACT Party in support of this bill and it's a pleasure to follow a medical doctor in this debate. I was worried that I might have to speak straight after Simeon Brown. I felt like Jerry Falwell Mr Moral Majority" had reincarnated and entered this House. You know as he leaned forward I could smell the sanctimony on his breath and a sense of unreality permeated Simeon Brown's speech. He said that under this bill there would be people smoking marijuana outside the school gates.Well let me reflect on the transition on this issue that another member of this House went through as she changed her mind on this issue of cannabis prohibition. That was Marama Fox a very dear member of this House and a good friend of mine who came in here in 2014. On this issue she was mugged by reality and she came to me a couple of years into her term and said "David I've changed my mind. Actually we have all these problems under prohibition now. There are already people smoking cannabis outside the school gates."Then Simeon Brown went on to say "Oh there's so many people being hospitalised because of cannabis." People are being hospitalised because of the prohibition on cannabis and the ridiculous cat and mouse game of the State trying to keep up with the very dangerous synthetic cannabis. That is the real scourge and the real danger out there.We've got to get a bit realistic in this debate. The debate is not about whether cannabis is good or bad. Personally I happen to think it's bad. I tried it once and all it did was make me very hungry and I didn't try it again. I think it's a bad drug. I think it's wrong that when we only have one mind through which to experience the world we would want to hallucinogenically alter that mind through the use of chemicals. I don't understand that. I don't think that cannabis is a good thing but I say to the Simeon Browns of the world: that's not the debate. The debate is about public policy. The public policy in place is not whether we moralise and sanctimoniously tell each other whether cannabis is good or bad; it's about the public policy of prohibition. This bill is a very small concession to those who are most vulnerable in our community who have the greatest ability to benefit from what in their view—and who am I to judge; as Simeon Brown might say "There but for the grace of God go I."—they believe that they can be palliated and helped by access to medicinal cannabis.I think it's important that in this House we dispense with the sanctimony we dispense with the unreality we confront what is happening out there right now under current public policy and we abandon the moralising; we actually ask ourselves "Will this bill make the welfare of New Zealanders better or worse?" I think it should be clear to people that come to this debate without prejudice and with a sober analysis of the fact that it's going to make it better for two groups of people. The first and the most obvious is that group of New Zealanders who find themselves near the end of their lives and suffering terribly or terribly ill and in need of palliation but the other group that is less obvious is those involved in the supply chain. As the regulations are made and it becomes possible to generate cannabis in a legal way to supply those very disadvantaged and vulnerable New Zealanders with what they want we also remove the underground black market in which some of the poorest kids in New Zealand are being subjected to growing up in households driven by the proceeds of a crime that is made a crime simply for the sake of it not for any benefit it has for other New Zealanders.So I conclude that we've seen the perfect contrast between unreality and reality but I'm proud to stand here on behalf of the ACT Party in support of this bill. Thank you Madam Assistant Speaker."