O'Connor Damien: Food Bill — Third ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeO'Connor Damien: Food Bill — Third Reading[Sitting date: 27 May 2014. Volume:699;Page:18338. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR (Labour—West Coast - Tasman): I am pleased to follow the Minister for Food Safety and acknowledge many of the things that she has said—firstly about the thousands of people around the country who will be very pleased to see the passage of the Food Bill. It is not only large in size a bit like an elephant; its gestation period is about the same length. It is at least 10 years I guess since this was conceived in terms of the need to bring together all the pieces of legislation and to have some alignment for a country that still relies for its wealth on the production of food. Ensuring that everyone involved in every part of the supply chain knows what they have to do—and that is produce process distribute handle and sell safe food—is what this country still depends upon. In spite of all our efforts to broaden the base of our economy primary production and the production of food and fibre still drive our wealth creation for the most part.The Minister pointed out the reality that we are relying on a risk-based system. Labour is supporting the legislation but we are also cautious because in 1992 a risk-based system was introduced for health and safety. Without proper monitoring proper resourcing and proper policing of this legislation we could very well end up with some major mistakes that we as a country cannot afford to make. We have seen a few mistakes lately in the food safety area. They have cost us literally hundreds of millions of dollars in terms of our international reputation and the efforts to get back into the market. The dairy industry is still floundering in some areas particularly in the area of infant formula after what was an unfortunate botch-up if you will pardon the pun. So we support a risk-based regime on the basis that oversight monitoring and where necessary penalties are fairly and appropriately implemented.There were a number of issues as we worked through the bill and then the Supplementary Order Papers—issues like recall powers the power of entry and all of those things around what we deem to be low risk and high risk—for example sausage sizzles were not deemed to be high risk. The Primary Production Committee has twice of course teased through these issues and I think we did our very best to reach the right balance and ensure that we have a healthy system for producing food but one that does not cripple the good old Kiwi ways of sausage sizzles exchanging food and getting on and helping one’s neighbour as we should.The issue of country-of-origin labelling raised by the Minister herself has been a debatable point at the end of the progress of this bill. I introduced Supplementary Order Paper 440 not to do anything more than our Tasman neighbours but to do the same as them. The Minister pointed to an inquiry taking place in Australia and she implied that it is to discredit the regime that they have in Australia. There will always be the need for ongoing reviews and improvements. That does not mean to say there is no value incountry-of-origin labelling. Australia is committed to it. We should be committed to it under the Food Standards Australia New Zealand agreement but we have an exemption. We applied for an exemption to not have country-of-origin labelling.For a country that depends upon the ongoing process of producing safe and fine foods for the world’s most discerning customers the question is why we would not have country-of-origin labelling. We impose—and this bill continues with that—quite tight restrictions on people producing food to make sure that it cannot be contaminated and that it is free of any unwanted pests diseases organisms or anything that might affect people’s health. In doing so we impose a cost on those producers. The very least we can do is to give them the pride to brand their product “product of New Zealand” so they can expect and rightfully get a premium for that product. That is why we believe that country-of-origin labelling is part of a smart branding strategy for New Zealand’s products which should go to the most discerning customers in the world who are able to pay the premium that we need to keep our farmers and our producers viable.It is not easy. Around the world primary producers are either peasants or highly subsidised; in New Zealand they are not. For the good farmers horticulturalists and viticulturists in this country to make a decent return on their investments and their efforts they need to know that their efforts will be acknowledged not by some big supermarket chain that dictates where their products are sold but by customers who want New Zealand produce because it is safe and of high quality. We have missed an opportunity. Labour commits when we come into office on 21 September that we will set about introducing country-of-origin labelling in order to be alongside our Australian partners and not to give them an upper hand as we go to the world market selling produce that is very similar in some ways theirs marked “product of Australia” and ours not necessarily marked “product of New Zealand”.There were a number of issues that were in the bill and I will touch on them just briefly I guess while not wanting to relitigate them all. I think it is important to know that we as a committee went through most areas of concern.There was one issue with the purpose of the bill. Even at the latter stages we sat down and said that what we are trying to do with the bill is actually “to maintain New Zealand’s reputation as a producer and exporter of safe and suitable food.” That was not one of the objects of the original bill but time has moved on—10 years—in this area and in terms of retail supply and control through the world the dynamics have changed. Supermarkets do have more power and it is harder for producers even though they are from New Zealand with our good reputation to get out there and leverage a fair position. So we figured that and I guess committed to putting upfront the object of this new piece of legislation to endorse the production of food from the country.We also put in that “the Minister or chief executive must give the greatest priority to that of food safety and the protection of public health.” That is very very important for this legislation. It is not just about selling good food; we are concerned about public health as well.There were issues for example about the clearance of imported food—the concerns we still have around biosecurity and how the current system deals with food. Pork of course is the most topical one. We are importing almost half of the pork we consume in this country with biosecurity risks. How should those risks be addressed and how does that affect the producers in this country?As I said I spoke of the power to search and the concerns around civil rights issues with that. I do not think any one of the officials wants to charge in on any individual unfairly but it is necessary should we consider there to be a major food scare that we have the right to recall and to take action on that.The sale of food by small producers—I have talked about that previously. We need to ensure that small producers who are often at the front edge of innovation are able to get out there and sell their food in the domestic market trial their products and then maybe build to a point where they can become major exporters.Labour supports this bill. We welcome its passage finally after 10 years through the House. It did take the National Government a while to get into gear on this but it has provided an opportunity to go back and scrutinise the bill once again address issues of recall powers that were raised by the botulism issue improve the bill and pass it through this House. But finally we warn Parliament that this bill without proper oversight scrutiny and resources could fail us just as the occupation health and safety legislation did. We cannot afford for that to happen. We support the Food Bill to support the producers and to support this country.