Dean Jacqui: Sports Anti-Doping Bill — In Committee 
Dean Jacqui: Sports Anti-Doping Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:634;Page:6143] 
JACQUI DEAN (National—Otago) 
: 
 I support this Sports Anti-Doping Bill. It is a great thing that we have a bill that really encapsulates what all of us must feel about the association of drugs with sport. I guess we have all seen examples of bodybuilders and weightlifters ruining their kidneys and falling victim to taking muscle-enhancing drugs. I do not know much about the drugs themselves but I do know the message that this bill is sending out to young people and young sportspeople in New Zealand. 
I understand that the bill will provide a framework that will allow New Zealand to comply with the World Anti-Doping Code. So the spirit of the bill reaches out well beyond New Zealand shores and brings us into line with the thinking on drugs and sport throughout the world. It is good that the bill retains the former New Zealand Sports Drug Agency and renames it more aptly and more appropriately Drug Free Sport New Zealand. I support the very clear message that the renaming of this agency brings with it. This of course is the organisation responsible for the rules that reflect the code in New Zealand. It is good that the bill also retains the Sports Disputes Tribunal of New Zealand renaming it the Sports Tribunal of New Zealand which is fine. 
National sporting agencies will be able to adopt the rules as provided in the bill through the anti-doping policies. The bill outlines the functions of Drug Free Sport New Zealand which will include consultation with Government sporting organisations local authorities the New Zealand Olympic Committee Inc. national sporting organisations and any other bodies on any matters concerned with doping in sport. So it brings me to the point of wondering why the Minister responsible for drug policy is undermining the very spirit and intention of this bill by not clamping down on the sale of benzylpiperazine-based products which are drugs that are also freely available to our young people. 
 How can it be that within our Government we have one Minister who is promoting a Sports Anti-Doping Bill that sends all the right messages to our young people but within that very same Government we have another Minister who is also concerned with drug policy and the message that that drug policy sends to New Zealanders—a message that absolutely without doubt irrefutably undermines the very spirit of this bill? It makes me wonder what it will take for the “Minister of Drug Policy” the Hon Jim Anderton to get off his hands stop looking up at the ceiling stop travelling overseas stop sending funny messages out to farmers and finally do something about tightening the regulations around benzylpiperazine in New Zealand. It is an embarrassment for the Government. It is so embarrassing! I mean on the one hand Government members are going out there with the Sports Anti-Doping Bill saying that it is sending all the right messages to young people but on the other hand they are saying that people can go down to their dairies and buy benzylpiperazine-based products. Where is the consistency in our message on drugs in New Zealand? 
I can tell members that as far as the National Party is concerned our message is extremely consistent on drugs which is why we support this bill. I believe we should be sending one extremely clear message to our young people. Whether it is rugby hockey or drama they are involved in I do not care; the message we should be sending to them from this Parliament should be very clear and very simple. It is that all recreational drugs or mind-altering drugs are bad. But what is this Government sending out? With the Sports Anti-Doping Bill it is sending out one message —a very good message I say to the Minister—but in our drug policy and in the Misuse of Drugs Act it is sending out a completely different waffly “Oh I’m not quite sure if it’s bad and is it doing any harm?” message. I think that that is entirely wrong.