Wall LouisaLOUISA WALL (Labour—Manurewa): Tēnā koe e Te Māngai o Te Whare. Tēnā koutou katoa. It's my pleasure to take a call in this the third reading of the Misuse of Drugs Amendment Bill. This debate is about summing up what happened before the committee. So as the Health Committee chair obviously it's my prerogative to initially congratulate the Minister of Health on yet another bill and also to thank the officials from the Ministry of Health and police who worked so diligently to produce this piece of legislation. I'd also like to thank the 95 submitters who were interested in this piece of legislation and also acknowledge that we heard from 24 submitters who presented to us as a select committee. I guess the premise of this piece of legislation was twofold. Firstly it was acknowledging that some synthetic cannabinoids these products that had previously been deemed to be almost legal substances weren't causing harm in New Zealand—I mean the whole reason we went through the psychoactive substances process was because we believed that there were some psychoactive substances that the public could procure. But essentially since June 2017 through the coroner's reports we were made aware that we have had 55 deaths linked to two dangerous synthetic drugs: 5F-ADB and AMB-FUBINACA. Through this piece of legislation those two synthetic cannabinoids are now deemed to be class A drugs. The definition of a class A drug is that they're very high-risk illicit drugs. I want to note that this House has been debating those particular products and I acknowledge Simeon Brown who's here in the House who had a bill that was looking to highlight I guess how terrible these synthetic cannabinoids were. To some degree we have acted swiftly as a Government to address that particular issue. So because of the lives that had been lost we've created a clear delineation in this legislation between the people who died who technically we would say were addicts—these were people who for what whatever reason decided to procure to possess and to consume these products. An alternative to those people dying from our perspective was actually providing an intervention earlier in the process. My colleague Michael Woodhouse tried to highlight that from their perspective this is decriminalisation by stealth but in fact it's not. What this piece of legislation now does quite explicitly in clause 6 which inserts new section 7(5) and (6) in the primary legislation is to reinforce that if you procure these substances if you possess these substances or if you consume these substances—historically we would have treated you as somebody who should go through our criminal justice system. The police would have prosecuted. This legislation makes it crystal clear that that group of people who are in fact the 55 people who have died—they are people who have addictions. Our response now as a Government is not to prosecute you and have you go through the criminal justice system and wait until you get into prison before we support you with therapeutic interventions. The response now is one that will be facilitated by a relationship between the police and the Ministry of Health to determine guidelines that actually say that the best place and in the public interest and for the public good—we now deem that you should be assisted and provided with those addiction and other services so that actually your life doesn't end up being one where you are recycled through the criminal justice system. What we do have to highlight is that in doing so we will address some of the inequities in terms of possession and prosecution. Because as we heard there has been an overrepresentation of Māori in the criminal justice system and possession of drugs has been one of the pathways into prison for some of our most vulnerable community members. So in enacting this piece of legislation we are really clear as a Government that that is not in the public interest; it is not a public good consequence of legislation that we support. So we're incredibly clear that the intention of this piece of legislation—as is the National Party the rationale for why they won't support it which I find a bit sad to be quite frank because the discussion and debate within the select committee traversed all these issues. I also want to put on the table that the issue about to prosecute or not to prosecute—we actually sought advice from Una Jagose who is our Solicitor-General. Actually from her perspective it didn't make any difference. It was an irrelevant framing of whether or not the police had the discretion to prosecute or not to prosecute. So we're really clear that obviously our position is we don't support prosecution if you fit that definition contained within section 7(1)(a) of the Act which is about procuring possessing or consuming these very harmful substances. The only other thing I really want to highlight is the other aspect of this bill which for us means that we now provide the police and customs with the tools that they need. They will have greater search and seizure powers to disrupt the supply of these synthetic cannabinoids. Why are we doing that? Because we need to reduce availability. In reducing availability and supply we hope to minimise harm and we will specifically punish the importers the manufacturers and the distributors of these synthetic cannabinoids. They're the ones who should go to jail. They're the ones who should pay the price; not addicts. So when I think about the balance contained within this legislation we've been incredibly deliberate. Unless we have a deliberate strategy about addressing who is providing these products and then unless we have a deliberate strategy about ensuring the people that consume these products—a lot of them vulnerable. We haven't really talked a lot about people who are homeless people who are used—you know they're the ones that this legislation will protect. I think the consequences of this piece of legislation actually are going to reap a lot of rewards for Governments in the future. Because what we know from our prison statistics is that unfortunately for some of our whānau who end up in prison that ends up being their life for the rest of their lives because of the rates of recidivism we have. So I think if we can fundamentally address the addiction and health issues before people get into the criminal justice system we can help them be rehabilitated in the community with their whānau.Actually I am hoping that what will happen is a compound effect because there will be some communities where there's more than one individual who will be undergoing some form of therapy some form of health and remedial engagement. There will end up being collectives and collections of individuals and whānau who are going through the same process. They will be able to talk about that process and they will be able to I believe as a community—or as whānau first but then as communities—address some of these underlying issues about why so many people are addicted and what role drugs and alcohol to another degree play in their lives. I think that the ongoing consequences of this piece of legislation we will be able to assess in the future. I think the biggest challenge actually is going to be: can we provide sufficient quality services to meet the demand that will be generated by this piece of legislation? That's probably the one thing that I'll concede. We did hear from the Ministry of Health that based on the demand for these services they may not exist in all communities and to the degree that they're needed. But at least this provides a basis for directing resources where we think they're best needed to meet the needs of those people who have addiction issues in our community and fundamentally that will keep them out of the prison system. Kia ora.