Bishop ChrisCHRIS BISHOP (National): Thank you Mr Speaker and can I just start by echoing the comments of Minister Hipkins in relation to the team who do all the work behind the scenes in relation to the orders. I've been back on the Regulations Review Committee for a couple of weeks now and it's fair to say that the workload of the Regulations Review Committee has significantly increased from my first time on the committee which was now five to six years ago and that's due to the Minister of course and all the various orders. But it is a really important process and I just want to say I'm really enjoying working with Rachel Brooking from across the House and of course Chris Penk who would be here were it not for COVID restrictions. He's the chair of the committee. He's doing a great job and it's good to be with a bunch of lawyers talking about lawyerly things. I do want to talk briefly in relation to saliva testing which is in relation to the COVID-19 Public Health Response (Required Testing) Amendment Order (No 3) 2021. I believe that we will look back at some point in the future at saliva testing and the failure to roll it out more quickly as a gross failure of public policy in New Zealand. I think the situation is so bad that we will inevitably have to have an inquiry into what has happened. It's worth just remembering by way of background that the Sir Brian Roche / Heather Simpson review into testing at the border recommended to the Government in September 2020—so a year ago; just over a year ago actually—that saliva testing should be rolled out as a matter of priority". Those were their words and yet here we are a year later and we are finally getting it going and it was only until August—and that's the reason why this is relevant—that we had the amendment order presented or signed by the Minister to allow for saliva testing properly at the border. So that was recommended in September 2020 and nothing symbolises really this Government's inability to move quickly with innovation in science and the technology that is now available than saliva testing. Everyone knows that the nasal PCR tests are uncomfortable they're very expensive and they require a health professional to administer and anyone who's had one will know about the cumbersome process. Saliva testing is cheaper it's quicker and it is just as accurate as the nasal PCR tests and the fact that Dr Anne Wyllie who's been dubbed the spit queen for her work at Yale University has not been essentially an expert adviser to the Government here in New Zealand is frankly I think disgraceful. She's a Kiwi doing work at Yale University. She is basically the inventor of saliva testing in the United States and her work very quickly done after COVID entered the United States meant that the tests she created were granted emergency use authorisation by the Food and Drug Administration there in August 2020. It's now used in 40 states including by the NBA basketball league in the United States to keep their players safe—an amazing amazing piece of work by an amazing Kiwi out there doing great things on the world stage. She should be being consulted by the New Zealand Government to roll out saliva testing here in New Zealand. SPEAKER: Order! Order!CHRIS BISHOP: Yeah—I take your point sir. So this has been a very long and drawn out saga. It is as I've said I think really a shame that we have not had saliva testing earlier than now. This order is good in so far as it allows for it to happen and encourages workers who are at the border to get saliva tests if they'd like as a supplement to the nasal PCR tests every two or three days but we could do so much more. This order could potentially include the allowance of saliva testing in our public hospitals for example or in fact it could make them mandatory as a form of surveillance testing in public hospitals. There are people presenting at Middlemore Hospital with COVID symptoms who have to wait quite a long time before they get tested—that's on the public record. We could have a rule for example that everyone who turns up at Middlemore gets a saliva test as a mandatory thing. That could be a rule. We could make it sure that our public hospitals use saliva testing for their workers for example; not just for border workers. The order could and should include that. There are private hospitals in New Zealand right now using Rako Science's saliva test for their workers for the people who come to work and work in the private hospitals. Why can't we do that for our public hospitals? There's nothing stopping us from doing that and the attitude of the Ministry of Health towards saliva testing has been quite frankly disgraceful so far. So this is good in so far as it goes: using saliva testing at our border facilities at our airports at our ports and at our managed isolation and quarantine facilities as an option for workers being mandatorily tested. It's being belatedly rolled out at the Auckland boundary for people crossing the border but we could and should do so much more.Saliva testing is one of those things which I think you know we will look back on as I say in a couple of years and say that we really missed an opportunity there because as Dr Ashley Bloomfield says and the Prime Minister has said it's all about testing. You know the Auckland situation now is all about as many people as you can test as quickly as you can. The nasal test is expensive and it's cumbersome and it's time-consuming. Why wouldn't we want to make use of the technology that's available to us that we could use alongside the nasal PCR test and alongside rapid testing—which of course is not the subject of this order so I won't talk about it. So this is good. National will support that order and the other two orders which are very non-controversial and make a lot of sense. But we can and should do so much more when it comes to saliva testing. Thank you."