Flavell Te Ururoa: Standards and Conformance Bill — Second Reading 
Flavell Te Ururoa: Standards and Conformance Bill — Second Reading 
[Volume:633;Page:5170] 
TE URUROA FLAVELL (Maori Party—Waiariki) 
: 
 Tena koe Mr Deputy Speaker. Kia ora tatou katoa. As this bill has moved up the Order Paper a release issued from the Australian Government’s Department of Health and Ageing described the commitment of both Governments to the establishment of the Australia New Zealand Therapeutic Products Authority. Then last week the Associate Minister of Health Peter Dunne went to Sydney and Canberra I am told to discuss the development of a national medicine strategy for New Zealand—a New Zealand strategy in Australia. This new bill—third strike lucky—is yet another attempt at a trans-Tasman relationship. But for the Maori Party it is third strike out. 
As with many bills of this nature this bill initially appears to be merely a technicality. It amends the Standards Act and the Testing Laboratory Registration Act to improve the efficiency of the Standards Council and the Testing Laboratory Registration Council or Telarc. It also transfers authority to register certification bodies in New Zealand from Telarc to the Joint Accreditation System of Australia and New Zealand. Well that all sounds very good. The Maori Party as the independent Maori voice of this Parliament is absolutely committed to standards being protected maintained reviewed and improved. So the proposals to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of councils are welcomed. 
But many questions arise. The bill guarantees that a standard is set and met but there is no guarantee of a quality focus. Technically conformance to standards does not in itself guarantee a quality standard or improvement. But the bigger question that has been exercising our minds is the context of the Government’s programme of strengthening trade between New Zealand and Australia. This is a major area of debate that we as a nation need to be having. What will the nature of the relationship between the two jurisdictions be? What capacity will our Government here in Aotearoa have to retain our own independent processes of review of our domestic standards and protocols? 
A number of the submissions to the Commerce Committee as I understand it raised the irony of the bill going through before the Ministry of Economic Development’s review of New Zealand’s own standards and conformance structure is completed. Indeed a number of the submitters including the Construction Industry Council are of the view that given that nothing in the bill requires urgent attention it would have been prudent to wait until the recommendations from the ministry’s review were known before proceeding. 
But there is another element of course to the trans-Tasman relationship that the Maori Party wishes to raise in this debate and that is the aspect of consultation with indigenous peoples to achieve social responsibility to agree to specific standards and to guarantee the rights of tangata whenua as enshrined in Te Tiriti o Waitangi. There is a very real school of thought that suggests that the ceding of sovereignty to a trans-Tasman body not only limits the capacity of the New Zealand Government but also potentially enables the Government to abdicate its obligations to tangata whenua under Te Tiriti o Waitangi. And why would the Australians need to include any references to Te Tiriti o Waitangi when this Government is supporting the removal of any references to it from legislation here in Aotearoa? 
The other issue that is associated with the trans-Tasman alliance is its possible impact on current negotiations between Maori and the Crown relating to the use of native flora and fauna and their traditional applications. Hearings of the Wai 262 intellectual property flora and fauna claim are currently scheduled before the Waitangi Tribunal. As this House will be aware the Wai 262 inquiry has resumed in the Waitangi Tribunal under the chairmanship of Chief Judge Joe Williams. Judge Williams has set a timetable to complete the hearings by the end of March 2007. The inquiry will consider big issues for Maori—issues such as whether the Crown has an obligation to protect Maori knowledge and indigenous flora and fauna. Significantly for this bill it will also consider whether New Zealand’s obligations under any international agreements adversely affect New Zealand’s ability to protect Maori knowledge and indigenous flora and fauna. The Maori Party has reviewed some of the submissions to that body including that from Nga Ringa Whakahaere. They are increasingly concerned that the Crown and transnational entities are presuming to own regulate and use aspects of Maori cultural and intellectual property and the native flora and fauna species of tangata whenua. 
When we come to this Standards and Conformance Bill we have to ask the question whether the Government has consulted with its Treaty partner before signing trans-Tasman agreements. We ask the House today—and we will be interested to hear the Minister speak about it—whether tangata whenua have been or indeed will be specifically consulted. Tangata whenua as the partner of Te Tiriti o Waitangi must be engaged in decisions about whether to sign trans-Tasman agreements. Making sense of the Treaty in the context of this bill’s proposals would mean that tangata whenua would be consulted in developing and recommending specifications to minimise environmental risks and promote social responsibility and in developing standards by which we can properly measure genuine progress. When we took a call on this bill in the first reading we supported the bill going to the select committee in order to address issues of national sovereignty and Treaty obligations to consult. The parliamentary record reveals that these issues were not addressed or raised in any way. 
Summing up then a transfer of authority lessens our sovereign ability within Aotearoa to determine our own domestic standards and conformance. There are other wider and more important issues facing standards development in our jurisdiction than those dealt with in the bill and consideration of the bill should not be undertaken in isolation from these issues—issues such as Wai 262 and the Ministry of Economic Development review. 
 Two weeks’ ago after a closely fought 34 to 27 win at Eden Park in Auckland the All Blacks clinched the Tri-Nations for another year and completed the clean sweep over their trans-Tasman rivals. The match was full of drama and tension. If members recall the Wallabies dominated the lead for most of the match until our guys got going and then it was all on. Richie McCaw was spear tackled by Lote Tuqiri in the 45th minute in an ugly incident that commentators thought should have led to Tuqiri being sin-binned. Rocky Elsom looked to have knocked-on the ball but the try was awarded by the television match official. Indeed from my position as an armchair authority I might have been heard to mutter: “Where was the one standard for all?”. 
It is an issue that we cannot abdicate in any trans-Tasman relationship. Will aligning our functions with those across the Ditch mean a lowering of our current New Zealand standards? How can we assess and improve the overall quality of standards if we are not equal players? It is in light of these curly issues that the Maori Party will oppose the bill’s second reading. Kia ora tatou.