Wall Louisa: Crimes (Match-fixing) Amendment Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeWall Louisa: Crimes (Match-fixing) Amendment Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 02 December 2014. Volume:702;Page:995. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]LOUISA WALL (Labour—Manurewa):Kia ora Mr Chair. Thank you very much for giving me an opportunity to speak in the Committee stage of the Crimes (Match-fixing) Amendment Bill as Labour’s associate sport spokesperson. It is interesting given we are 54 days away from the beginning of the Cricket World Cup. In fact the reality of this piece of legislation is that on 1 March 2011 New Zealand knew that it would be co-hosting the Cricket World Cup because New Zealand and Australia made the only bid to the ICC the International Cricket Council so we knew concretely that we would be hosting this event at this time. So I think our questions about why it has taken this Government so long to implement a piece of legislation that globally represents a $440 billion industry are serious. There have been articles written since 2010 about match fixing as a serious threat to sport so this issue is something that the Minister for Sport and Recreation certainly should have had a grasp of and that this Government has known has been on our agendas both sporting and political for over 3 years now.For the relevance of this piece of legislation in terms of betting specifically on the Cricket World Cup we have to look at the 2011 Cricket World Cup. There was over £1 billion worth—that is $NZ2.2 billion worth—of betting on the 2011 Cricket World Cup. So this is an incredibly significant piece of legislation.Obviously that is the economic argument about why this piece of legislation is incredibly relevant but having attended the National Māori Sports Awards on Saturday night I note that there are also social and other benefits to sport and unless we actually get legislation like this right it undermines the integrity of something that is dear to all New Zealanders’ hearts. As an international sportsperson having played both netball and rugby for New Zealand I understand how important sport is. It provides aspirations for young people to want to represent their country and through that obviously comes a sense of recognition of hard work being part of a team and being successful. So from my perspective it is all those things that matter to me when I look at sport and the context of sport in New Zealand.It has a $5 billion value here at home but the bigger value is actually about children being able to play sport being fit being healthy being part of teams competing building character and a whole lot of other things. Having attended the FNDC Far North Sports Awards a few weeks ago I know that the dream that young people have to represent their country and the community solidarity around ensuring that those young people have an opportunity to fulfil their potential really for me are the most important aspects of this piece of legislation and the relevance to us here in Aotearoa New Zealand.We have 49 matches that will be played. Australia will host 26 games in 14 venues. New Zealand will host 23 games across 7 venues. So this is an incredibly important piece of legislation and it seems ridiculous to me that the sporting codes in New Zealand have not had an opportunity to have much input into a comprehensive piece of legislation. This is a piecemeal approach and this really does reflect badly I believe not only on the Minister of Sport and Recreation but on the Government’s lack of prioritisation of the importance of sport in New Zealand.I think there are some serious questions to be answered by the Minister given that we have known since 1 March 2011 that we would be co-hosting the Cricket World Cup. I have chosen to focus on cricket because it is one of the four leading codes here in New Zealand along with rugby league and netball. I was not a member of the Law and Order Committee but I know how passionate my colleague the Hon Trevor Mallard particularly is about sport and from our perspective not having the sporting codes involved to the degree we would have liked them to be is not about filibustering; actually this is serious business. We would have hoped that we would ensure that the specific voices—