SpeechHon SHANE JONES (Minister of Forestry): I want to remind listeners that my senior colleague the Minister of Justice has simply identified the best way for the select committee to use its time. This referral motion—attacked by opposite members of the House introducing us to the mother tongue of double speak with a higher level of volume—need look no further than page 71 290 in terms of the bible of the House. It has never been an unusual event for either the period of time to be sharpened or the use of time to be made more efficient in terms of a select committee. Numerous are the occasions when select committees have been under time pressures for them to use that time very efficiently. That's all the Minister my senior colleague to my right has put before the House. Now Standing Order 290 enables a four- to six-month period. The motion then goes on and directs our attention to page 45 of the Standing Orders and follows a very well-trodden path a very constitutionally defensible practice in this House that other than when we are sitting in question time members on this select committee can utilise other occasions and other opportunities to hear from the New Zealand public. Now let's just trace the moral authority that the Hon Andrew Little is exhibiting today. In 2017 we hosted in New Zealand the general election. This side of the House won enough votes to hold the benches of Treasury. Therein lies the ethical and moral authority under the constitution for this side of the House to bring this bill forward. Any suggestion that the stance of the Minister of Justice lacks some constitutionally legitimate platform is utter poppycock. Go back to who enjoyed the electoral mandate who got most of the votes and then trace back to where we sit today. We have the mandate the moral constitutionally sanctioned authority to lead the country. And in leading the country what we have done is bring forward a bill but in particular this motion which enjoins fellow parliamentarians to use efficiently the time available—something that has been practised by former regimes. I direct the members on the other side of the House to page 45 and I direct them to page 71 and these are well-known and highly respected principles that enable Parliament to discharge its business to effect an outcome that was agreed to because of an election. There's no greater moral chain of thinking in a political sense than what I've articulated. So let me come back to why it's important that this particular motion be agreed to because we do want to ensure that New Zealanders have the opportunity to vote in the upcoming referendum as explicated by the Minister of Justice. Now no piece of legislation or no particular Act of the Parliament is static incapable of being improved depending on the vicissitudes of the time and we live in a time where New Zealanders do want to make a call about how far the law should continue to regulate the utilisation the consumption of certain drugs.Now whether the other side of the House find that offensive I totally accept their ability to exercise that vote of conscience. But in order for their conscience vote shared by other New Zealanders to come to pass we need the machinery which requires an endorsement by Parliament and that is why we are cleaving to what the Minister has put on the Table. This motion should pass. This motion represents no threat no offence to the established constitutional principles of our Westminster democracy. This is simply a continuation of what former regimes have done.Now there seems to be all of a sudden a constitutional attack on the role of select committees by the other side of the House. This motion of referral upholds the role of a select committee. Irrespective of how dreary you might find your time on a select committee the House devolves authority down to select committees and they operate depending on the bylaws to speak figuratively—the Standing Orders in this document I'm holding. So to suggest that because a select committee as a consequence of this referral motion ought not to be meeting and I quote in an area outside of Wellington or in an area some place within New Zealand"—it's absolute petulance. It is time wasting and it undermines the ability of the Government to deliver on its electorally mandated outcome. Against that the Opposition had their chance to eclipse that mandate. They failed because they failed to muster the numbers to get enough power in this House to pass legislation. That privilege fell to this side of the House and it is power that we will exercise.So let's come back to the merits of what the Hon Dr Nick Smith and others are saying. They're saying that by truncating the periods of time the locations of sitting somehow we are undermining established practice. That is wrong. There are numerous occasions—for fear of straying off what's really a narrow writ here for fear of straying off too far—where the House exercises enough authority over its own affairs and this particular issue requires the House to delegate down to the select committee for a period of time that this is how it will operate. It will operate in such a way that it will bring back machinery enabling us to host a referendum. Now they may say that referendum lacks legitimacy. Win the next election! You lost. You have no legitimacy over the power that was bestowed on this side of the House. Use your role in this select committee to be an effective Opposition. You had that chance. The ultimate sanction of power is winning power amongst New Zealanders. You failed to do that. You failed to do that.Hon Dr Nick Smith: Power corrupts.Hon SHANE JONES: Now I think I actually think that what—and he's a trained lawyer unlike the Hon Dr Nick Smith. Dr Smith he is a trained lawyer and all he's doing is enjoining our fellow parliamentarians to follow the Standing Orders. Now the Standing Orders give certain rights to that side of the House. But if they want the rights of democratic leadership then first they have to win the hearts and minds of New Zealand. The hearts and minds of New Zealand will be on display when they have a chance to vote yay or nay in terms of what ought to be the regulatory framework enabling people to use this type of drug. I'm not here to talk about the substance of the issue but to remind us that this is a very simple procedure. It's a procedure that is totally based on long-established constitutional principles but most importantly it enjoys the ultimate sanction and that is the authority of this side of the House to represent New Zealand—something bestowed upon us by an election. Now our colleagues on the other side of the House will have an opportunity to run that race again when this referendum which the Hon Andrew Little has brought to our attention is also conducted. So any suggestion that somehow today is a bleak and dismal day for parliamentary democracy is not only an exaggeration; it's a very sad reflection on how shallow the other side's understanding is of our constitution and it's a very trite and a very banal set of arguments. This referral motion upholds democracy and is couched on the constitutional fact that we won and you lost."