Goldsmith Paul; Rurawhe AdrianHon PAUL GOLDSMITH (National): Thank you Mr Speaker. Thank you for the opportunity to speak here on the Improving Arrangements for Surrogacy Bill. National supports this bill going through to its first reading—to go through to select committee. I'm a little bit surprised that the member has sent it to the Health Committee; we would have thought the Justice Committee would have been more appropriate. I encourage him to think about that—we're obviously not going to have a chance to finish the first reading today—because ultimately it's dealing with questions of law that I think are more appropriate in the justice area but that's a debate we can have.So what we're looking at here obviously is I think a widespread conclusion that our surrogacy laws are antiquated and not up to speed with modern practices and technology and the way that the world works. So the proposal here from Mr Coffey—particularly in relation to the development of a surrogacy order through the courts and then enabling that arrangement that the intending parents automatically become the parents of the child and the surrogate ceases to be a parent of the child from the birth without going through the very complicated hoops that currently are under way. Then Part 4 providing that a person who is named as intending parent as a surrogacy order is also the parent for the purposes of the Care of Children Act—and therefore potentially liable for support if they change their mind. All these things are broadly sensible and worth the consideration of the select committee.The issue I suppose that we have and I was very glad to hear Mr Coffey at the end of his speech refer to the Law Commission report and the fact that the Government has asked for a thorough deep dive on what is an incredibly complicated issue from the Law Commission. It may well be—I'm not entirely sure that a member's bill is the appropriate vehicle for dealing with the issue given the complexity of it.This bill has 32 clauses it's quite complicated and requires very significant work from ministry officials and Government officials to look at all the cross-currents and permutations of every little change that is made and a lot of resources being involved. The normal course of events with members' bills is that a huge amount of resource isn't necessarily thrown at it and the risk is that we get something that is not well-thought-through.So you've got the Law Commission going out there looking at the issue looking at the complexity of it—all these things such as when does guardianship crossover to parents? What is an appropriate financial arrangement? We're certainly not in favour of commercialisation of surrogacy now that the member is talking about reasonable expenses. That is a very easy thing to say and a much more difficult thing to legislate in a way that doesn't in effect lead to commercialisation; so exactly how that is handled is a quite delicate task. Then are the implications of all sorts of complications that occur in the natural course of life: of people changing minds of the different aspects of surrogacy. The only point I'd make is that the logical thing to do would be—given that the Law Commission is in the middle of this work and will be reporting back sometime soon this year but we don't know exactly when it may well be that the sensible thing to do is to put this bill through the select committee but make sure that the time for consideration and submissions is substantially extended so that it includes the Law Commission report and we're not put in a situation where we have to put this bill through before the Law Commission report has come out and we've had the ability to look at what it has to say and have the benefit of that advice. And it may well be that when that comes through the Government itself decides that actually this is something that it wants to pick up and come up with Government legislation in the normal process and that may well lead to a better outcome. So it's a fluid sort of situation. We certainly recognise that the current laws aren't adequate and that they are over-burdensome and complicated for intending parents. So you know we have a huge empathy I suppose for the challenges that many New Zealanders who for all manner of reasons are not able to carry their own children and the desire to come up with arrangements that work for everybody. So there's definitely a problem to be solved here. The question is how best to do it and to recognise just the incredible complication in this area and let's just go about this in a careful and considered way. When we do get the opportunity to see what the Law Commission has proposed and unearthed we then can make a judgment as to whether this bill is one that could be tidied sufficiently to do the job or whether Mr Coffey as he suggested steps back and the Government itself steps into the breach. Either way the National Party is very keen and concerned to work constructively on this bill for the benefit of all New Zealanders. Like I say I do think just in conclusion—I don't need to sort of extend it forever—I would call upon the member to reconsider or at least perhaps engage with other members across the House as to the appropriateness of the select committee involved. We think it's probably better suited for the Justice Committee to consider. Thank you Mr Speaker.DEPUTY SPEAKER: Members this debate is interrupted and set down for further consideration next members' day. The House stands adjourned until 2 p.m.The House adjourned at 12.59 p.m. (Thursday)