Burns Brendon: Biosecurity Amendment Bill — Instruction to Committee In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Burns Brendon: Biosecurity Amendment Bill — Instruction to Committee In Committee 
[Sitting date: 17 November 2009. Volume:659;Page:7749. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
BRENDON BURNS (Labour—Christchurch Central) 
: 
 As a member of the Primary Production Committee which considered the Biosecurity Amendment Bill I am very pleased to make it clear that Labour is in support of the bill. Obviously it is about the front line for our biosecurity. We are a trading nation and our world would be entirely at risk should any species take hold here that could damage our farming-led economy. In my past life I used to keep bees and I was one of those who suffered under the incursion of the varroa mite. I offered to put a hive into Wellington from my then home in Blenheim and when the varroa mite arrived over that summer I was unable to take either the hive or the honey back to Blenheim at that time. So that is a very relevant example to me small though it might have been of how rapidly a species or a pest can impact upon our productive economy. 
I want to comment a little further around the issue of the job losses in MAF Biosecurity New Zealand and I suppose that the Labour Party finds itself in an unusual alliance with Federated Farmers on this issue. They have expressed deep concerns about those job losses because they know what the cost of a single pest incursion can be for this nation—for instance to our $10-billion export dairy industry. I also note the comments made over the weekend by the  
Guardian  
science writer about New Zealand’s reputation for environmental management. A fellow called Fred Pearce commented that our “100% Pure New Zealand” advertising campaign is rather thinly based; something of a “green mirage” I think was the comment that he made. That presents a vulnerability for this nation. We are a trading nation and everything that we export contributes to our livelihoods but at the same time we need to maintain a reputation for food integrity and product integrity. 
I have a real fear around the issue of reducing our border control now that 50-odd staff have gone. In my city of Christchurch I think half a dozen staff have lost their jobs. Yes we acknowledge and accept there has been some downturn in the imported car industry but we are told by no one less than the Minister of Finance that the green shoots of recovery are emerging again and obviously that would mean a bounce back in that car trade which had diminished over the last year. So what short-sightedness it is for the Government to take out 50 staff who could well have been used to improve our record to make sure that we actually do have a rather thicker green line of biosecurity staff to stop our risk of incursion because the costs of such incursions are absolutely horrendous. 
I want to quote from the latest edition of the Federated Farmers magazine in which Don Nicolson says that sustainability is the competitive advantage of New Zealand farmers and that we must put up and stand by standards that go beyond the minimum. I think that comment could well be applied to biosecurity. We have a very very long border. We have a very small number of staff whose job it is to make sure we are able to protect our product integrity against incursion by pests and here we are in an environment where for the saving of a couple of million dollars the Government has taken the axe to that thin green line. I think that is an absolutely reprehensible move. 
The other comment I would like to make is that there is an opportunity in situations like this. I am thinking of our friends in the South Pacific who have been devastated by the tsunami quite recently. I was in Samoa at the time of the Prime Minister - led delegation and it was put to me that Samoa cannot export bananas to this country. We import them from Costa Rica and from other nations in South America. We should be importing bananas from Samoa—from our friends and neighbours. Samoans are a huge and proud component of our population in New Zealand as I am sure our colleague from Maungakiekie would agree. Yet the Samoans are unable to meet the biosecurity standards that we have because of the operations of the single facility that they operate to try to meet food standards in New Zealand. They simply are unable to get the facility into production in a way that meets our requirements. 
If we had 50 surplus staff surely it would make some sense if only in terms of the foreign aid budget to use some of those staff in places like Samoa Tonga Niue and the Cook Islands to help to grow their economies because in the final result that would be good for New Zealand. It would be good if we are able to import food more sustainably from a closer neighbour not from an international corporation like Dole or Chiquita. That has to be good for us and that has to be good for our Pacific neighbours. Here was an opportunity—and in fact it was rehearsed with the Minister of Agriculture in the select committee. He did not seem to take hold of the issue probably because the decision had already been made and it had been taken from a cost accountant’s kind of mentality. It did not take into account that we have opportunities as well as costs when it comes to well-trained biosecurity staff. I suspect we will have to recruit people back if indeed the economy is back into a growth phase. So that move was very short-sighted and it is a disappointment in the background to this bill. Thank you.