Rich Katherine: Misuse of Drugs Amendment Bill (No 3) — In Committee Third Reading 
Rich Katherine: Misuse of Drugs Amendment Bill (No 3) — In Committee Third Reading 
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KATHERINE RICH (National) 
: 
 As another National member speaking in this debate I too rise to voice support for the Misuse of Drugs Amendment Bill (No 3). A lot of good changes are being made in the bill that will assist officials in their battle against drugs like P which is surely one of the biggest challenges facing our community at the moment. As many members of the House will have also found when they spoke with the police and looked at the statistics I know the reason that we have had such an increase in violent crime in the country is largely attributable to the use of P. Although the names and ingredients of those drugs will change the issues of how to regulate and put in place legislation to control them will remain the same for successive Governments. The issue for us is to put in place good law that will do its best to control illegal drugs and to put in place a framework that makes it quite clear to people what is right and wrong. 
It was interesting to hear the Minister Jim Anderton talk about the bill because he got himself into a position whereby anybody who voiced any alternative to or concern with a provision was suddenly presented as being pro-drugs. The Minister does not have a monopoly on the concern about drugs in the community. The Minister is not the only member of Parliament who is concerned about what is happening in some of our communities as a result of various drugs. That does not take away our right to speak out about concerns about the law and to put forward some changes that we think will produce better law for the country. The concerns that we have voiced as a party basically related to the use of the affirmative resolution procedure. We totally understand the use of those procedures for illegal drugs that are classified as A B or C but we raised some concerns about the use of similar provisions when it came to substances that were legal. That was the main reason that we voted against Part 3. 
One of the points that the Minister did not address in any part of the debate was the apparent inconsistency in his thinking in bringing Part 3 into the main part of the Government’s bill. Although the Minister kept saying that it was a Government bill we all know that Part 3 was a result of the Minister bringing in Supplementary Order Paper 298 in his name—a large change to the law—and attaching it a bit like a patchwork quilt to another piece of law. On the one hand the Progressives say that we are in a situation where we need to regulate benzylpiperazine—one of those changes is to make it quite clear that those substances can be sold to 18-year-olds—yet on the other hand one of their main thrusts in bringing another bill to the House is to look at raising the age at which young people can purchase alcohol. On the one hand we are saying that 18-year-olds have the ability to make decisions to act responsibly and to apply their thought processes to the purchase of party pills and herbal highs but on the other hand we are saying that they are not responsible and they do not have the ability to make a choice when it comes to making up their minds about whether they want a glass of beer. I think there is a real inconsistency there. 
In my view we see hypocritical thinking and no logic when we look at the two main pieces of legislation the Progressives have brought to this Parliament. Basically they are saying different things about the ability of young people to make up their minds and apply their own thought processes to some decisions they make in their everyday lives. Although I challenged the Minister on that he was not able to get up and explain himself—to say why he was pushing for the age at which one can purchase alcohol to rise to 20 yet remained perfectly happy for people to stroll into a shop and purchase a party pill a herbal high or whatever else at the age of 18. Certainly there is a contradiction there. 
I think there are some great things in this bill. When we talk to customs officials and the police we find that there has been a huge amount of frustration about the inability of officials to be able to nab people who turn up at our borders with caseloads of cough medicines that contain ephedrine and pseudoephedrine. People were able to point to what looked like extraordinarily large quantities of medicines and to say that they were bringing them in for their personal use. Well no one involved believed that but the law did not give customs officials enough tools in their tool-box to be able to deal with those situations with greater clarity. So it is good that this bill lays out some very detailed specifications for how searches can take place and how they may be executed within officials’ daily procedures. We have lists in the legislation for everything from strip-searches to rub-down searches. There seems to be a lot of detail but in fact when we are dealing with people who will do whatever they can to get off a charge or who have lawyers who will do everything they can to get their clients off charges we need to be incredibly specific about the technical parts of this bill. So I am hoping we have done our work on this bill and that there will not be any loopholes when the legislation is fully in place. 
There are some good initiatives to make it easier for people to use needle exchanges and to not be in a position where they feel that the law does not allow them to carry syringes and take part in their own rehabilitation without being nervous about being charged for having or without having to demonstrate proof of why they have particular items in their possession. 
One of the things that is very clear is that we as a Parliament will continue to face these sorts of issues. The types of pills and drugs will change. The next generation and the scientists out there the backroom scientists who try to work out new combinations in order to get around these laws will continue to do so. The challenge for us is to keep ahead of them and to ensure that all parts of the public service do their bit to make sure we minimise the amount of drug use in our community. 
One of the things that this bill does not deal with is the issue of policing. I think it is a real shame that the police put in for additional resources in order to keep on top of methamphetamine laboratories and received only a small portion of the amount of resource they felt they needed to be able to keep on top of the problem. 
We have thrown up some interesting inconsistencies and I look forward to the debate on the second bill brought to this House by the Progressives. I will be asking them why they think it is OK that 18-year-olds can buy party pills and herbal highs but they are not trustworthy enough to buy beer or to make a choice about whether they want to have a glass of wine. It seems to me there is more concern about party pills and herbal highs than the Minister gives the public credit for. So there are some interesting inconsistencies on the part of the Progressives. 
I am glad to stand and support this bill. I think it will go some way towards assisting the Customs Service and the police to ensure they have more tools in their tool-box to deal with those New Zealanders who want to break the law.