Rurawhe Adrian; Simmonds PennyDEPUTY SPEAKER: Members before the dinner break we were debating the third reading of the Health (Fluoridation of Drinking Water) Amendment Bill. It's the National Party call—call No. 11.PENNY SIMMONDS (National—Invercargill): Thank you very much Mr Speaker. I don't think I've ever had the pleasure of speaking first in a session. So it is a great honour. I am pleased to be rising and speaking in support of the Health (Fluoridation of Drinking Water) Amendment Bill. I was on the Health Committee that heard the submitters to this bill I was very very pleased that the oral health clinical leader and deputy chief medical officer of the Southern DHB Tim Mackay was one of the submitters who spoke very very strongly as an advocate for fluoride being added to drinking water. I've known Tim for many years he has operated on our youngest daughter who has a disability and is a frequent user of the DHB dental services. Tim and I have spoken often about how difficult it is for the patients he sees and how heartbreaking it is for someone like him to seem many of these patients.Particularly for disabled young people and adults their teeth being in good order is something really really difficult to achieve. I think one of our colleagues talked about trying to get young people to brush their teeth for the duration of Happy Birthday". Well as someone who regularly has to brush my daughter's teeth getting halfway through "Happy Birthday" would be a major achievement. I think my colleague Ian McKelvie and I have talked often that for people living with a disability having their teeth and their feet in good order is actually a really really significant thing. It is significant for everyone but for anyone with a disability it's actually really critical to their quality of life. So over the years Tim Mackay and I have talked about the disabled people he has coming in to have their teeth dealt with but also some of the very very young children that come in and have to make use of the DHB dental services. As you sit—I was going to say in the "waiting room" but in a DHB it's not; it's a waiting corridor—in the waiting corridor you can just look along the corridor and see how many young children are suffering in terrible pain and nearly all of them and nearly all of those that are there with a disability are going to have to be operated on under anaesthetic. So not only is it a major thing for them but it is also a major cost. So I can see how it's going to be incredibly useful in terms of prevention of some of these young people and people with disabilities coming into the DHB dental care. There were numerous submitters to this. As my colleague Dr Reti has pointed out earlier: look it is a really sensitive area for many communities and many individuals. We saw that in the submissions and of course there were a number from the anti-fluoridation groups. But it is really important that we treat their fear and scepticism because it's real and genuine to them. So it's really important that we acknowledge that and that we speak strongly about the scientific evidence and the scientific consensus that is strongly in favour of fluoridation.So the 2014 report by Sir David Skegg of Otago University and also Sir Peter Gluckman concluded that there is compelling evidence that fluoridation of water at the established and recommended levels produces broad benefits for the dental health of New Zealanders. It is important that we keep pushing those scientific facts out there to try and ease people through the concerns.Now clearly my parents were well ahead of themselves because as a youngster I was on bore water and my parents every night before we went to bed gave us all fluoride tablets. That certainly paid dividends for me and my siblings. So along with the scientific evidence we have now got many many years of being able to see the benefits of fluoridation.And certainly there's enormous room for us to be able to make improvements and often in the health area the improvements are incremental. But when we look at only about 50 percent of people in New Zealand having access to fluoridated water we can see how quite major improvements in oral health and reduced tooth decay would be able to come about by having greater numbers of our population having access to fluoridated water. It is interesting that it is not only children and adolescents living with fluoridated drinking water but it also seems to lower that whole lifetime incidence of tooth decay right through out adult lives. So to be able to make such a difference in a whole population is incredibly important for us. I know that some of our colleagues have talked about the $600 million savings both to the public purse but also to private consumers. Yes that's incredibly important but I would have to say that the thought of young people not suffering through that terrible agony of tooth decay and also people with disabilities not having to suffer through that—and often you're talking about people who are non-verbal and so they can't necessarily tell you the pain that they are in.It was interesting to note that the bill doesn't mandate the use of fluoride. I think that given today's protests outside it's really important for us to make that clear: it doesn't mandate it but it places the decision-making power in the hands of the director-general. And of course the Supplementary Order Paper that had been tabled by Dr Shane Reti would have also required an extensive amount of consultation with local health officials had that gone through. I hope that the Government will still see the value even though they didn't support the Supplementary Order Paper that they will still want to see some level of consultation at the local level where people like Tim Mackay who are on the ground and are amongst the people that need it most will be able to give sensible advice.So not only is it not mandating but it also is not preventing local authorities that might want to fluoridate drinking water. They certainly should still have that option of being able to do that without the Director-General of Health being the one to initiate it. I think those two options are worth pointing out within the bill—that it is important for us to see that this is a level of choice for local communities to be able to have their say.So we're very pleased to be supporting a bill that is going to make a widespread and significant difference to the health of not only our young people but also adults. It is a bill that will have significant health benefits not just incremental. Therefore I'm very pleased to commend this bill to the House. Thank you Mr Speaker."