Tirikatene Rino: Food Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeTirikatene Rino: Food Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 14 May 2014. Volume:698;Page:17866. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]RINO TIRIKATENE (Labour—Te Tai Tonga): I am pleased to make a contribution on Part 4 of the Food Bill. I would like to pick up on the remarks that my colleague the Hon Damien O’Connor made regarding the power to enter premises without a search warrant which is conferred by this bill. I understand that the Primary Production Committee considered that and some amendment has been made but I am particularly interested in the provision that involves marae. I know that certain marae around the country are food businesses now. They have commercial activities or cafes or they sell food in their wharekai or across their marae facilities so they clearly fall within the ambit of this bill.I guess it is reassuring to know that the select committee I understand has taken consideration of the fact that it is not appropriate even though there may be good cause for a search warrant to be carried out—there may be some terrible gastric outbreak and to try to find the source of it a marae may come into the mix and it may be important that the authorities act quickly. I think that sensitivity does need to be applied particularly as we know that maraes do perform a lot of cultural practices for Māori whānau and hapū. I am particularly thinking of when a tangi is on. It would be insensitive for authorities to barge on to a marae and barge into a wharekai without a search warrant claiming at that particular time the powers they have under this bill when there are so many other things that are going on with the marae whānau. That is just in the event that there are customary practices tikanga and other things going on around a tangi. So I understand that under this provision they are not allowed to enter onto a marae without a search warrant when those sorts of things are taking place. We do commend that aspect.Otherwise there are wide powers conferred under Part 4 to the many different territorial authorities and all of the different charge officers and the like who will be performing functions under the Act. Obviously the functions have all been well thought through. But one thing that I think will be interesting to see operate in practice is the wide powers that are conferred on the chief executive of the Ministry for Primary Industries. If you go through the bill particularly in this part there are very wide decision-making powers that rest with the chief executive. Those approvals relate to documents facilities and persons and it is quite a large discretion. I would hope that the chief executive would have the right skills and the right advice being given in relation to all of these matters because it is a statutory power that they have and a lot rests on that role. I think back to the former Ministry of Agriculture I guess. The senior role used to be in the hands of the director-general. The director-general role was different from a chief executive - type role. The director-general generally had some sort of agricultural or agribusiness-type background. Obviously a chief executive is quite different. It is modern Government corporatisation-type State sector terminology.