Hague Kevin: Animal Welfare Amendment Bill — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeHague Kevin: Animal Welfare Amendment Bill — Second Reading[Sitting date: 26 November 2014. Volume:702;Page:911. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]KEVIN HAGUE (Green):When Sue Kedgley first raised animal welfare concerns in this House she was met with laughter. These were not considered to be important or serious matters. I report with pleasure that all members of the House speaking in this debate today at least with very few exceptions have at least considered these matters to be serious and I know that that was the tenor of the consideration in the Primary Production Committee. I did not have the pleasure of sitting on the select committee myself but I want to pick up several of the matters that my colleague Mojo Mathers has raised and also address a further one.One of the areas of concern for us is that the Ministry for Primary Industries continues to be the main agency responsible for enforcing animal welfare standards in farming. That creates a conflict of interest because on the one hand the agency responsible for animal welfare is also on the other the agency that is concerned with maximising farm production. That conflict of interest along with under-resourcing means that the Ministry for Primary Industries cannot be relied on to effectively monitor or enforce animal welfare standards especially on factory farms. Currently less than 1 percent of complaints about breaches of animal welfare standards actually result in prosecutions.The Government has already made it plain that it is not going to be addressing that under-resourcing problem by providing more resources. That very low level of prosecutions by the Ministry for Primary Industries and the lack of a proactive inspection regime for factory farms are going to mean that much animal suffering on such farms will continue to go unchecked unmonitored and unenforced. The Green Party therefore supports not only switching the responsibility for monitoring animal welfare standards away from the ministry but also increasing the resourcing for those functions.As my colleague Mojo Mathers has said the bill is a mixed bag and in particular a missed opportunity. Although there are some advances in the bill two of the most important areas—factory farming and animal testing—are largely unaddressed. Those diabolical appalling standards that exist on factory farms and result in a surge of concern from New Zealanders whenever those conditions are unmasked by usually surreptitious mechanisms from animal welfare activists—because otherwise New Zealanders would never get to see them—will continue. We are particularly concerned about the continued presence of economic impact and practicality in the matters that must be considered in the casting of regulations.Those matters remind me very much of occupational safety and health where we have adopted a regime that is based on making changes to make workplaces safer where they are practicable. What that regime has resulted in in occupational safety and health are shortcuts and failure to make necessary improvements to occupational safety and health because the company concerned would find them to be unaffordable. That is precisely what the dynamics will be that are played out as the regulations under this bill are cast. Farmers who engage in factory farming will continue to engage in those processes because they will find it unaffordable and therefore impractical and the economic impact will be too great for them to actually change their practices. So the suffering will continue unabated.There is no basis for animal testing of cosmetic products. The Minister for Primary Industries in his remarks at the beginning of this debate said that he was not even aware of whether it occurred in New Zealand. Well then for goodness’ sake Minister in your Supplementary Order Paper at the Committee stage ban it altogether.