Volume 683 Week 21 - Thursday 30 August 2012 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Volume 683 Week 21 - Thursday 30 August 2012 
[Sitting date: 30 August 2012. Volume:683;Page:4981. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Thursday 30 August 2012 
Mr Speaker 
 took the Chair at 2 p.m. 
Prayers 
. 
Business Statement 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (Leader of the House) 
: 
 Next week the House is in a 1-week adjournment. When the House resumes on Tuesday 11 September the Government will look to complete a number of first second and third readings on the Order Paper including the Biosecurity Law Reform the Patents Bill and the Land Transport Management Amendment Bill. 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD (Labour—Hutt South) 
: 
 Can I ask the Leader of the House whether he can be a bit more specific. To say “a number of first second and third readings” does not really help with the planning. 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (Leader of the House) 
: 
 Well I gave three specific bills that we will be progressing. As the shadow Leader of the House knows I do try in these adjournments to get an indication to other parties by Thursday of that week. I will do that this week. 
Motions 
Nancy Wake—100th Birthday 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First) 
: 
 I wonder whether I could ask the leave of the House to move a motion without notice regarding the 100th birthday of Nancy Wake the Allies’ most decorated female war hero. This is her 100th birthday today. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Just to get it clear the member is seeking leave for a motion to be moved without debate to commemorate that occasion. Is there any objection to that course of action? There is no objection. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: I regret the collective lack of preparation on this frankly. I move  
That this House 
commemorate the 100th birthday of the late Nancy Grace Augusta Wake and acknowledge her contribution to the Allied cause during World War II 
. She was the Allies’ most famous and decorated Second World War hero remembering that she was after all born in New Zealand of both Maori and European background. It is perhaps a matter of disappointment that we as a country have not acknowledged her in the way that France the United States Australia and the United Kingdom have. 
Motion agreed to. 
Questions to Ministers 
Living Standards Inequality—Prime Minister’s Statements 
1. 
METIRIA TUREI (Co-Leader—Green) 
 to the  
Prime Minister 
: Does he stand by his statement “what we are choosing is hard working New Zealanders who go out there day after day to try to support their families”? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (Acting Prime Minister) 
: 
 Yes because they deserve our support. 
Metiria Turei 
: How can the Prime Minister’s policies be helping hard-working New Zealanders when the household income report this week found that real incomes for the bottom two-thirds of households 66 percent of the country have dropped? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: As has been previously pointed out to the member there are many ways in which such a figure can be measured. If for example we took the measure in the years 2000 to 2005 we would find that that was the greatest area of disparity. Even though we have had the global economic downturn and we have had the great dislocation of the Christchurch earthquakes we still are not back to that level of disparity. To suggest that there is no support for people on lower incomes is also very wrong. 
Metiria Turei 
: How could the global financial crisis or the Christchurch earthquakes be at all responsible for his Government’s decision to give tax cuts to the top income earners in this country which has helped to drive the gap between rich and poor to the highest level it has ever been in New Zealand’s history? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: Seventy-six percent of all income tax collected comes from the top 10 percent of taxpayers. They have not been excessively advantaged. What I would say is that where people are losing jobs because of earthquake circumstances or because of the global financial crisis of course that will affect household incomes and it is a fact that those on the bottom end of the income scale usually are first affected. That is why we want a strong economy—to protect those people. 
Hon Tariana Turia 
: How can his policies be helping hard-working New Zealanders when a key finding of the household income report shows a decline in employment income for deciles 3 to 6—that is middle-income New Zealanders—or does he not think that middle-income New Zealanders are hard workers? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: Of course they are hard workers and that is why there is a considerable amount of Government support in place for people. We want to make sure that that support is complementary to the work that people do in the economy. That is a good thing. 
Metiria Turei 
: Is it not true that under his watch unemployment has grown and there are now more than 65000 unemployed people under National’s watch proving that his Government and he as Prime Minister are much better at losing jobs than they are at creating them? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: There have been many many new jobs created in the New Zealand economy under the current Government. What I might say to the member is that it is plain silly to deny that we have been living through very difficult international circumstances. New Zealand likes to look at other countries it compares itself to and it is a fact that we have come through these times in far better shape than many of them. And yes it is unfortunate that more people want work but the only way they will get it is by having a growing economy which that member’s party seems to want to ignore. 
Metiria Turei 
: If the Prime Minister is choosing hard-working New Zealanders and if the economy is apparently improving why is it that Work and Income has given out 134000 special-needs grants to working families who could not make ends meet in this last year nearly double the number in 2007? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: The conditions in our economy have changed during that time quite clearly but let me put it to you this way. The suggestion that somehow the Government is neglecting people on lower incomes is plain wrong. If we were to take someone with two children a sole parent working 25 hours a week at around $15 an hour they would receive a family tax credit of $157 an in-work tax credit of $60 up to $225 a week in accommodation assistance and a minimum tax credit of $106 taking their earned income of $17000 up to a total package of $45500. To suggest the Government is abandoning people in these circumstances is plain rubbish. 
Metiria Turei 
: How is his Government helping 16-year-old Peniata Junior Endermann who goes to school and works 20 hours a week in a cleaning job because his mum’s minimum wage job does not provide enough to support him and his three siblings? Is Peniata a hard worker? Is his mother a hard-working New Zealander? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: I do not doubt that they are hard-working New Zealanders and that they are making efforts to improve their own circumstances. If there is some aspect of Government support that should be available to that family I hope that member makes sure they get it because it is there. 
Metiria Turei 
: Is the Prime Minister saying that Peniata and his mum have enough? Do they not deserve a living wage? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: I most certainly have not said that. What I have said is that they should be commended for working rather than being abused in a political process and held up as some sort of sad example when they are making such a huge effort on their own behalf. It is unfortunate that they have come into contact with politicians who have absolutely no aspiration for them to improve their circumstances. This Government is in favour of people working and we support people who are working. 
Metiria Turei 
: Is it not the case that the supposed hard-working New Zealanders who he chooses are those who are the top income earners who got massive tax cuts from his Government who are the only group—the only group—in New Zealand to have enjoyed an increased income in the past year and many of whom did not even pay their fair share of tax? Are these people not the real chosen ones? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: This is the sort of carping nonsense that is going to take this country nowhere. Let us be very clear. I just gave an example of someone looking after their two children on their own working for 25 hours a week and earning $17000 a year from their work but getting total support that takes their income to $45000. That is not a Government advantaging people at the top end. It is a Government respecting people who work hard and want to get on with their lives. 
Social Development Minister—Statements 
2. 
JACINDA ARDERN (Labour) 
 to the  
Minister for Social Development 
: Does she stand by all of her answers to oral questions on Tuesday? 
Hon TONY RYALL (Minister of Health) 
 on behalf of the Minister for Social Development: Within context yes. 
Jacinda Ardern 
: If her answer to child poverty is work what policies has her Government introduced to address the fact that 40 percent of children in poverty are in the homes of the working poor? 
Hon TONY RYALL 
: This Government has worked very hard to make sure that we have an economy that can weather the winds of the international financial crisis. We have worked very hard to protect those who are working hard to get ahead and of course the Government has cut tax rates so that the vast majority of workers pay no more than 17.5 percent in tax. We also have a range of support available for them from Working for Families to in-work tax credits. 
Jacinda Ardern 
: If low interest rates have benefited families who are struggling as she has claimed does she accept that 70 percent of families living in poverty are in rental accommodation? 
Hon TONY RYALL 
: I think the member is probably confusing an answer to a different question. Of course lower interest rates are benefiting the many families who have mortgages but at the same time for those people who are in hardship this Government unlike many other Governments around the world has worked to protect these families as best we can. We have legislated CPI increases for benefit levels lowered tax rates and protected Working for Families. I would ask the member only to watch the television news every night to see what countries under financial pressure are actually doing and it is a lot lot less than this Government. 
Darien Fenton 
: Does she agree that every worker should have the income necessary to provide them and their families with the basic necessities of life so they can participate as active citizens in society; if so will she be supporting the Living Wage campaign? 
Hon TONY RYALL 
: Of course the Minister wants to make sure that families are in the best position that they can be. But I would say in respect of the second part of the question that member was in Government for 9 years and refused a $15 minimum wage. 
Darien Fenton 
: Has she asked her parliamentary cleaner what it is like to live on a minimum wage work long hours and struggle to support her family; if so what did she learn about the reality of poverty? 
Hon TONY RYALL 
: I think New Zealanders know that this Minister herself has come from a very hard experience as a young mother bringing up her own child and I think she understands those difficulties that families have. That is why this Government more than any other in the Western World has worked to protect those in the most vulnerable positions. When you look at what is happening in Europe where benefits and pensions are being frozen and cut this is a Government that has been determined to protect those people from the sharp edges of the recession. 
Jacinda Ardern 
: What does she believe is a living wage for a family of four with one parent in full-time work? 
Hon TONY RYALL 
: In respect of that specific question I think the Minister would reply that she believes that New Zealanders should get as much support as they can and work as hard as they can to do that. We have a system that provides support for those people who need it. 
Jacinda Ardern 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. That was quite a specific question. If the Minister was unwilling to venture an answer— 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Order! No the member asked for an opinion if I recollect correctly from memory: what does the Minister think is a living wage? When a member asks a Minister for an opinion like that there is no specific answer— 
Jacinda Ardern 
: He could have tried a bit harder. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: I accept what the member is saying that maybe he could have tried a bit harder but that is absolutely in the hands of the Minister. 
Jacinda Ardern 
: If as she has claimed the cause of poverty is not enough people in work the cause of unemployment is the global financial crisis and the answer to everything is welfare reform will her response always be a circular vortex of excuses? 
Hon TONY RYALL 
: The Minister’s answers will always be based on the fact that this is a Government that is determined to have a strong growing economy. It is only with a strong growing economy that we can support the jobs and the opportunities that New Zealanders want. This is a country that has gone from having a debt of $8 billion 3½ years ago to $72 billion in the next 2½ years. We have borrowed extensively to protect the most vulnerable from the sharp edges of the recession and have also used the taxes of working New Zealanders to do that. 
Better Public Services—Progress and Targets 
3. 
MARK MITCHELL (National—Rodney) 
 to the  
Minister of Finance 
: What progress is the Government making with its Better Public Services plan? 
Hon STEVEN JOYCE (Acting Minister of Finance) 
: 
 The Government is making excellent progress with the Better Public Services programme which is working to produce a more efficient and focused Public Service. Some weeks ago the Prime Minister announced 10 specific Better Public Services results on which the Government is determined to see real progress in the next 5 years. One of them for example is that in 5 years’ time we expect 85 percent of 18-year-olds to have National Certificate of Educational Achievement (NCEA) level 2 or its equivalent up from 68 percent now. The Government yesterday released two further action plans to achieve those results: one on how we will achieve that NCEA target and the other on how to ensure that in the next 5 years 55 percent of 25 to 34-year-olds will have a level 4 tertiary qualification or above. These are serious targets and also serious action plans for what are very important milestones for New Zealand’s future. 
Mark Mitchell 
: Are the targets the Government has set actually achievable? 
Hon STEVEN JOYCE 
: Well they are very challenging targets as was made clear in the Budget speech. Achieving these results will be demanding and in fact meeting some of them will be quite difficult but they are very worthwhile targets for New Zealand. For example if we can achieve our target of reducing prisoner reoffending by 25 percent in 5 years we are talking about 18500 fewer victims of crime each year. And when we set a target of 55 percent of 25 to 34-year-olds having a level 4 qualification or higher by 2017 that means an extra 17750 people over and above population growth and the increase we would expect from current policies to achieve qualifications at level 4 and above. These targets are very real very important and very measurable. 
Mark Mitchell 
: How will the Better Public Services plan contribute to New Zealand’s improved economic performance? 
Hon STEVEN JOYCE 
: The Better Public Services programme is working to ensure that there is a more efficient public sector and therefore less waste of taxpayers’ money. It will also help lift public sector productivity and therefore wider productivity across New Zealand. The programme also has broader and more important objectives of reducing long-term costs to the State. For example if we boost levels of skills and employment amongst young people not only will their own life prospects be enhanced but so too will New Zealand’s productivity be lifted. As the Better Public Services Advisory Group said reducing welfare dependency improving education health and environmental outcomes and creating a better environment for business investment and export success are where the real gains are to be made. 
Mark Mitchell 
: Are legislative changes involved in the Better Public Services plan? 
Hon STEVEN JOYCE 
: Yes. Today the Government— 
Grant Robertson 
: This really is quite painful. 
Hon STEVEN JOYCE 
: The Opposition hates hearing about targets and progress in the public sector. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Order! [ 
Interruption 
] Order! I accept that there has been some interjection but the Minister is somewhat the master of that in taking a little too long to answer. 
Hon STEVEN JOYCE 
: The reality is that members opposite do not want to hear these things. That is why they make it sound like it is taking a long time. These are very excellent initiatives. Today the Government introduced the State Sector and Public Finance Reform Bill which as my colleague the Minister of State Services Jonathan Coleman says delivers “the legislative grunt to deliver better public services”. Amongst other measures the bill provides for Government agencies to collaborate more organise themselves around results and share functions and services that allow them to better leverage the scale of the State sector. The bill extends the responsibilities of chief executives as they consider the collective interest of the whole Government not the narrow focus— 
Grant Robertson 
: I seek leave for Mr Joyce to table the rest of his answer. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: The member cannot seek leave for another member to table a document. I think the Minister has had sufficient time to answer however. 
Oil and Gas Exploration and Extraction—Jobs 
4. 
Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE (Labour—New Lynn) 
 to the  
Minister for Economic Development 
: Does he agree with the Prime Minister that “An extension of exploration and mining activities in New Zealand would certainly create jobs”; if so why? 
Hon STEVEN JOYCE (Minister for Economic Development) 
: 
 Yes; because increases in economic activity generally create work for people to do and the means by which to pay them. 
Hon David Cunliffe 
: How many jobs have now been lost or announced to be lost in the mining sector since National became the Government? 
Hon STEVEN JOYCE 
: I do not have that to hand but if the member is interested I can tell him that there have been some job losses and some proposed job losses. There is also very significant job creation going on including just a few weeks ago when I was in Taranaki where—[ 
Interruption 
] I appreciate that members opposite do not want to hear about economic growth in the New Zealand environment. In the Methanex area Methanex has just employed more people. In fact it had 500 more people working on Methanex’s Motunui plant to actually increase and get its methanol production up. Todd Energy is also investing in Taranaki. We have also had Todd Energy building a new power station in Taranaki and if we want to look beyond the oil and gas sector— 
Hon David Cunliffe 
: Point of order. 
Hon STEVEN JOYCE 
: Oh you do not want to hear about jobs Mr Cunliffe? 
Hon David Cunliffe 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. [ 
Interruption 
] 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Order! A point of order has been called. 
Hon David Cunliffe 
: The supplementary question was a very straight and factual one and it followed directly from the primary question which was on the question of job creation. The supplementary question was specifically on job losses that have occurred or have been announced. The Minister began by saying he did not have the information and then went into a long rant about— 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Order! The member was doing fine until he started using language like that. The Minister’s answer though in fairness did cover issues of employment and jobs in the mining sector. He said that he did not have exact figures on the jobs lost but he was able to identify several operations in the mining sector that had been employing more people recently. He was not attacking any other party. I do not think that that was an unreasonable answer. 
Hon David Cunliffe 
: Does the Minister stand by the Minister of Finance’s statement: “We are focusing on using our natural resources … and mining”; if so are the 12 percent decline in recorded employment in the mining sector and the hundreds of jobs lost in the sector the brighter future that the National Government promised? 
Hon STEVEN JOYCE 
: Well as I was just laying out there is also very big investment in the mining sector. What the member needs to understand is that we are in fact in a dynamic environment at all times and every business faces challenges. In the case of the oil and gas sector his colleagues in the Greens point out that we have pretty high prices. In the case of the coal sector we currently have pretty low prices internationally. Companies actually have to react and manage that all the time and that is what is happening in what is a very dynamic economic environment. 
Hon David Cunliffe 
: On what date will the natural resources chapter of the so-called Business Growth Agenda be released and can he confirm that this is now being rewritten in light of the cutbacks in Solid Energy push-back by mining companies over proposals to increase royalties cutbacks in jobs and production at BHP and the Australian resources and energy Minister declaring that the days of record commodity prices are over? Does that therefore mean that his strategy’s reliance on mining is a failure? 
Hon STEVEN JOYCE 
: No. And no it is not being written. I know that in the member’s cartoon world there is no point in investing in industries and developing industries but over here in the real world—not on “Planet Labour”—it is actually important that we encourage industry— 
Hon David Cunliffe 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. The question was a relatively straight question which asked whether the date of the— 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Forgive me. Order! Order! The member will resume his seat. Please do not treat the House like that. The member’s question was not straightforward; it went on and on and on. It contained a whole lot of assertions about failures in the mining sector and the member asked a further question right at the end. The Minister has actually answered very clearly. He said the document is not being rewritten if I heard him correctly and that was one of the questions the member asked. I think it was a very fair response. If the member does not want that kind of answer sharpen up his questions. He is capable of that—of asking far sharper questions. 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. If the Hon David Cunliffe’s term “rant” is out of order then how come “cartoon world” and “Planet Labour” are acceptable in this House from the Minister? 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Order! Very simply—I am very happy to explain to the right honourable gentleman. The Minister’s answer was to a question asked that contained a whole lot of assertions about the mining industry and contained at least three questions and under those circumstances the Minister can have far more licence in answering it. The use of the word “rant” is not ruled out except under a point of order. A point of order should use absolutely objective language and not that kind of accusatory language. It is very simple. The language involved when raising points of order is very different from the language involved in debate. The member should know that because he has been in this House a very long time. 
Hon Clayton Cosgrove 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. Can I just seek guidance because on that point you have ruled in the past—for instance in a question asked to this member—that the term “glossy” somehow allowed members of the Government to indulge in derogatory comments gave them licence to engage in derogatory comments about the Opposition. I like Mr Peters would like some consistency— 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Order! Let me assist the member. I just invite him to go back and look at the  
Hansard 
 as I do—as I do. Look at the context the way the words are used and what is created. It is dead simple. Members in this House have heard me require Ministers to answer when members ask straight questions. If the member thinks that his colleague’s question just then was a straight question well forgive me but we are on different planets because it was far from a straight question. 
Hon Clayton Cosgrove 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I just invite you not to misinterpret my point of order. 
Hon Damien O’Connor 
: Supplementary Mr Speaker. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: I call the Hon Damien O’Connor. 
Hon Damien O’Connor 
: Why should miners in Huntly and on the West Coast lose jobs to save money for Solid Energy when the company has wasted millions of dollars on a biofuels project that has failed and now threatens to destroy the high-value vegetable oil industry in New Zealand? 
Hon STEVEN JOYCE 
: In terms of biofuels projects and the like I think members will find they have come from a different time and a different Government—[ 
Interruption 
] 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Order! The House will come to order. The Leader of the House should know better than to be interjecting loudly beside an open microphone. That kind of interjection across the House is totally unnecessary. 
Hon STEVEN JOYCE 
: I think the point that was being made was that the biofuels obligation was created by the previous Government— 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: That’s right. 
Hon STEVEN JOYCE 
: —that is right—and it created expectations beyond obviously which was challenging for Solid Energy. To the member’s wider point I would respond that it is very tough when there is any change of jobs when a company has to change in response to the environment. The reality in the case of Solid Energy as we know is that the international coal price has affected things not just in this country but in Australasia as well. We are encouraging the board and management of Solid Energy to do the absolute right thing for their workers and for the business. 
Hon Damien O’Connor 
: How sustainable is an industry if assurances of capital investment mine expansion and job growth can be promoted to West Coast business leaders and 2 months later can be reversed to potential job cuts a freeze on capital expenditure and a rundown in infrastructure; or is this all about simply adding to the identifiable resource while costs are slashed so that the Government may attract investors for its asset sales programme? 
Hon STEVEN JOYCE 
: The member seems to have donned Mr Mallard’s tin hat. The reality of the situation is this— 
Hon Damien O’Connor 
: Answer the question. 
Hon STEVEN JOYCE 
: I am answering the question. I was responding to the member’s assertions at the end of his question. In terms of the first part of the member’s question it is a challenging environment that this company is operating in. International prices in a number of areas change and companies have difficult circumstances at some times and positive circumstances at others. Actually they have to work to respond to that situation. It is called being in business and it is challenging. It is difficult in the case of Solid Energy at the moment but the board and management are being encouraged to work through it. 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: What does the high and volatile New Zealand dollar mean for the future of mine activities in New Zealand given yesterday’s announcement by Solid Energy concerning hundreds of Spring Creek Mine job losses? 
Hon STEVEN JOYCE 
: In terms of the challenges that the company faces the biggest challenge by far currently is the international coal price. There is an impact as the member has noted in terms of the current level of exchange rate as well but by far the biggest aspect is international coal prices. Obviously those do fluctuate from time to time and the business is dealing with that but it is no doubt challenging for all the staff involved. 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: If the Government admits that the high dollar is causing serious problems for the mining industry highlighted yesterday by the announcement from Solid Energy why does the Government not support a monetary policy that would allow New Zealand to have a stable and competitive exchange rate thereby helping exporters as Korea Singapore and China have done? 
Hon STEVEN JOYCE 
: Firstly I did not acknowledge what the member said at the outset of his question. I said the primary aspect was in fact the international coal prices. But notwithstanding that the suggestion that New Zealand attempt to manage its exchange rate in the way the member proposes does not acknowledge the challenges that are involved and the risks to the New Zealand economy if you seek to do that. There is no ability to have a one-way bet on the New Zealand dollar. In actual fact you have to ask the member what he is seeking to achieve because although we have a high dollar relative to the US dollar currently we have a low dollar relative to the Australian dollar. In fact forcing or attempting to force the New Zealand dollar down further even if you were successful would of course exacerbate the income differences between New Zealand and Australia which would have other economic consequences. 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: If the IMF says that the New Zealand dollar is inflated by as much as 20 percent is it the Government’s intention to do exactly nothing about it? 
Hon STEVEN JOYCE 
: Well as I explained I think in the House last week the reality is that the value of a country’s currency is dependent over the medium term and over the cycle on what people think of the economic prospects of that country. So if you actually want to materially devalue the New Zealand dollar then you have to materially devalue the economic situation in New Zealand which I do not think and I do not think the Government believes is an appropriate way to deal with the challenges in the world today. The correct response is to help improve the competitiveness of the New Zealand economy and that means across a whole range of fronts including inviting capital investment to encourage businesses to grow inviting opportunities in the resource sector and right across a whole range of things. That is actually a more constructive and substantive response. 
Hon Damien O’Connor 
: What has changed in the last 2 months that reverses the outlook for West Coast mining from very positive to very negative? 
Hon STEVEN JOYCE 
: Well I cannot speak for those exact 2 months but over this year we have seen a decline in the coal prices internationally which has picked up and if the member wants to review perhaps the international markets for coal and what is happening with coal companies particularly in Australia then he will see very similar challenges there as he is seeing for Solid Energy on the West Coast and around New Zealand. 
Health Targets—Progress 
5. 
Dr JIAN YANG (National) 
 to the  
Minister of Health 
: What reports has he had on progress with the six national health targets? 
Hon TONY RYALL (Minister of Health) 
: 
 There is more good news from the Government’s national health targets published today. Our public hospitals have now achieved a new record for patients being seen in their emergency departments with 94 percent of patients discharged or treated in less than 6 hours. This is important because it is a measure of the performance across the whole of the hospital. All cancer patients received their treatment within the world gold standard of 4 weeks for the sixth quarter in a row. Finally district health boards this year have provided elective surgery for 153000 patients—that is 30 percent more patients in a year than under Labour. 
Dr Jian Yang 
: What progress has been made on the preventative health targets? 
Hon TONY RYALL 
: As you know this Government is very committed to preventive health measures throughout the public health service. All measures have improved in terms of the preventive health targets including more heart and diabetes checks which are up 3 percent; immunisation coverage for 2-year-olds has risen to a new record of 93 percent when it was only 67 percent a few years ago under the previous Government; and in relation to better help for smokers to quit of the 40000 patients hospitalised 94 percent were given help to discourage them from smoking the highest rate being at the Lakes District Health Board where 99 percent of all their patients in the last quarter were given help to stop smoking. I would like to thank all our hard-working staff who are working so hard to provide better front-line health services and preventive health services for New Zealand families. 
Transport Funding—Auckland Public Transport 
6. 
JULIE ANNE GENTER (Green) 
 to the  
Minister of Transport 
: What percentage of money announced yesterday in the National Land Transport Programme for 2012-2015 for public transport in Auckland will be paid for by the Auckland Council if any and what percentage will come from the National Land Transport fund itself? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (Minister of Transport) 
: 
 Kia ora. It is 46 percent and 54 percent respectively. 
Julie Anne Genter 
: What new commitments has he made to invest in much-needed public transport infrastructure over the next 3 years excluding rail electrification and the purchase of the electric multiple units which were committed to under the previous Government? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: I do not think that anyone should underestimate the cost of servicing the investment in those electric trains or in fact the whole of the public transport system. But what I would say is that we have in conjunction with the Auckland City Council and the transport authority up there currently got a central city access study going on that should produce a result looking at multi-nodal transport and the way in which the pressing problem of congestion as it is projected forward currently in Auckland can be dealt with. One of the things we look at of course is that four out of five Aucklanders answering surveys so far have said that for the foreseeable future they would expect to be using their cars for those journeys. So we do need to let that study run its course so that we do have a good basis of information on which to make our final decisions. The next aspect of the study of course will be to look at whether the— 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Order! 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: I am sorry. It is a fascinating topic as you know. 
Julie Anne Genter 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I wonder whether you could offer your assistance in interpreting the Minister’s answer. It seems to me that he did not actually say that there were any new commitments to public transport infrastructure— 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Order! Forgive me; I thought I did hear the Minister refer to various investments that related to public transport. In fact he went on at some length in relation to them I thought. The member has further supplementary questions. 
Julie Anne Genter 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I am sorry; my question was quite specific about infrastructure—what the new commitments to infrastructure were over the next 3 years. I do not believe that the Minister specifically addressed any infrastructure projects— 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Infrastructure does not relate just to the steel and the concrete and what have you. If I heard the Minister correctly he talked about plans that were being put in place that did require investment for study and that kind of thing. So that is investment in infrastructure even if it is not in the bricks and mortar. The member has further supplementary questions though. 
Julie Anne Genter 
: Would it not be smarter to invest in the transport modes that are growing rapidly rather than spending over a billion dollars on 4.5 kilometres of motorway which will not reduce congestion or protect the economy from oil shocks? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: Moving forward it is projected that traffic movements—that is motor vehicle traffic—into Auckland city over a very short period of time are going to increase by about 1.5 million movements on an annual basis. That is a very rapidly growing transport statistic and it is a choice being made by Aucklanders and yes we are investing in it. 
Julie Anne Genter 
: How can he be meeting the economic and transport needs of Auckland when his Government is throwing the lion’s share of the transport budget at a few low-value motorways that will not reduce congestion or get Auckland moving? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: That is the difference you see. We will just have to disagree because I think it will get Auckland moving. 
Julie Anne Genter 
: I seek leave to table  
The Fundamental Law of Road 
Congestion: Evidence from US Cities 
 a paper from the University of Toronto’s department of economics which categorically states that the fundamental law of traffic congestion is that new urban motorways do not reduce congestion. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Leave is sought to table that document. Is there any objection? There is objection. 
Julie Anne Genter 
: I seek leave to table the public transport patronage growth statistics from Auckland Transport which show it has grown over 30 percent in the last 4 years. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Leave is sought to table that document. Is there any objection? There is no objection. 









Document by leave laid on the Table of the House. 
Medical Equipment—Glucose Meters 
7. 
Hon MARYAN STREET (Labour) 
 to the  
Minister of Health 
: Is he satisfied that the changeover on 1 September to new blood glucose meters will go well for New Zealand’s 120000 diabetics who use them and what measures has he taken to ensure that it will? 
Hon TONY RYALL (Minister of Health) 
: 
 Yes that is what I expect. I do need to emphasise to the member that it is not a wholesale change for everybody with diabetes on 1 September. There is a 6-month transition. So every existing patient does not need to swap their existing meter until they can no longer obtain test strips for their old meter which is from 1 March 2013. I have received advice that the new meters have been thoroughly tested for accuracy and precision and these testing reports are available on the Pharmac website. I am further advised that the Diabetes New Zealand President Mrs Chris Baty has examined one of the new CareSens meters and is confident that “it is as good as diabetics have ever had”. 
Hon Maryan Street 
: What assurance can he give New Zealand diabetics that there will be sufficient supply of the new meters in New Zealand and that they will be efficiently distributed? 
Hon TONY RYALL 
: I am not aware of any concerns about that. We have a 6-month transition. Some of those meters are already available in New Zealand and I expect that with the significant concentration on this matter by Pharmac and others in the health service that transition should go well. That is certainly my expectation. 
Hon Maryan Street 
: What assurance can he give the Cannons Creek Porirua pharmacist Mr Kas Govind that the information required to educate his patients and staff will be available before 1 September which is Saturday because it has not arrived yet and today is Thursday? 
Hon TONY RYALL 
: I do not think we should have any worries about that because Pharmac is making some new online information available I think tomorrow and actually there will not be a stampede of patients to get support for monitoring this equipment. I think you will find that the functionality of the equipment is such that it will be very easy and straightforward to pick up. One of the real benefits of this new arrangement is that when people with diabetes had to get a replacement machine they had to go to their general practitioner get a prescription go down the road and get it filled by the pharmacist. Now they will be able to go directly to the pharmacist to get their replacement device. 
Hon Maryan Street 
: What support will be given to diabetics transitioning to the new meters and how does the Minister intend to monitor the effectiveness of that support? 
Hon TONY RYALL 
: One way I will monitor it is by the number of questions that the member offers to me in the House. They are no doubt a reflection of who she spoke to last. But we will monitor it of course by the feedback from those— 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. That was a straight question: “How will he monitor?”. It did not require an offensive answer and that was. I know by this Minister’s class it was not that offensive— 
Mr SPEAKER 
: No no. Order! I think the member’s point is fair enough. The Minister did not need to say that. It could be interpreted wrongly in an offensive way and that is unfair. I would ask the Minister to answer the straight question please. 
Hon TONY RYALL 
: I will be monitoring it by the feedback. No doubt those who have a problem will let us know. What I have to say is I take some comfort from the comment from the president of Diabetes New Zealand who said that she thinks the machine is “as good as diabetics have ever had” and a lot of effort is going into making sure the transition is as good as it can be over the next 6 months. 
Transport Investment—Analysis 
8. 
SHANE ARDERN (National—Taranaki - King Country) 
 to the  
Minister of Transport 
: What recent analysis has he seen on transport investment? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (Minister of Transport) 
: 
 I have seen analysis that in the 9 years between 1999 and 2008 the Labour Government supported by the Green and New Zealand First Parties spent just over $1.1 billion on public transport infrastructure and services. This analysis shows that in the 6 years between 2008 and 2015 the National-led Government will invest just over $1.7 billion in public transport and infrastructure. In 6 years this Government will increase the public transport spend by 50 percent more than the previous Government did in 9 years. This Government is committed to an efficient safe cost-effective public transport system and instead of talking about we are funding it. 
Shane Ardern 
: Does this analysis reveal anything about local road spending? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: Yes. It shows that over the same period the Labour Government supported by the New Zealand First and Green Parties spent around $930 million on the improvement of local roads and approximately $2.9 billion on the maintenance of local roads. This Government will invest over $3.9 billion in local roads between 2008 and 2015 a 6-year period. In two-thirds of the time this Government will do far more for improving the maintenance of local roads than the previous Labour Government. This Government understands the importance of those local roads and no local roading authority will get less funding in the 3 years ahead anywhere in New Zealand. The programme launched yesterday is one of the biggest allocations to roading infrastructure New Zealand has ever seen. 
Shane Ardern 
: What does this analysis show in regard to road safety? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: This is another piece of good news. It probably will not surprise the House to learn that it shows a very clear trend. You see the Government believes in improving the safety of our roading network. We are committing to reducing the road toll and reducing road accidents. The analysis I have been shown shows that this Government is investing almost $2 billion in road policing in the 6 years between 2008-09 and 2014-15. It is a strengthening of that budget in difficult financial times but it is well worth it because it does mean that New Zealanders will be safer and it compares very very favourably—$2 billion compared with the money spent over a much longer period by the previous Government. We need all motorists to drive safely and considerately and good roads will facilitate that. 
Transport Funding—Minister’s Statements on Roads of National Significance 
9. 
PHIL TWYFORD (Labour—Te Atatu) 
 to the  
Minister of Transport 
: Does he stand by all his statements on the Roads of National Significance? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (Minister of Transport) 
: 
 Yes especially when I called upon the member to name which of the roads of national significance his party would not fund. 
Phil Twyford 
: Does he stand by his statement after the downgrading of the Otaki to Levin highway that no further roads of national significance would be cancelled; if so how does he square this with the New Zealand Transport Agency saying now that the section of the Puhoi to Wellsford road of national significance north of the Omaha turn-off in Warkworth has been downgraded to a possible road of national significance? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: Anticipating the member’s question by virtue of the questions I was asked on the bridge coming across to the Chamber I made inquiries of the New Zealand Transport Agency which told me that that is not the case. 
Phil Twyford 
: I seek leave of the House to table this new map from the New Zealand Transport Agency titled  
Transport and Land-use Priorities: Auckland Region 
 which clearly identifies the Warkworth to Wellsford highway as a possible road of national significance. It is a new map. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Leave is sought to table that document. Is there any objection? There is no objection.  









Document by leave laid on the Table of the House. 
Phil Twyford 
: Has any assessment been done comparing the impact on Northland’s economy of spending $1.7 billion on a roading project that is not even in Northland with other options such as upgrading the North Auckland rail line more quickly and cheaply improving safety on State Highway 1 actually upgrading roads in Northland or a regional economic development package? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: It may surprise the member to note that people cannot get their goods out of Northland unless there are roads outside of Northland. It sort of makes sense that if you want to get from Northland down to some other part of New Zealand you need a road to get there. Eighty percent of all freight in this country is carried on the road. That is why we are putting the money into the road transport programme and the roads of national significance. Tell us which of the roads in the programme would Labour stop? 
Phil Twyford 
: Will he confirm that the proposed spend of $33 million on the Puhoi to Warkworth design and property purchase while downgrading Warkworth to Wellsford to being a possible road of national significance confirms that the project has nothing to do with improving Northland’s economy and everything to do with making it faster to get to the Prime Minister’s holiday home in Omaha? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: Well firstly I reject that last statement; I think it is outrageous that the member has been so stupid as to make it. Let me tell you this: the programme has always had the Puhoi to Wellsford road being designed the designations put on it the properties acquired etc. in the current land transport period. It will be built in the 2015-18 period unless we get a Labour Government which will can it. 
New Zealand Navy—Replacement of HMNZS  
Endeavour 
10. 
RICHARD PROSSER (NZ First) 
 to the  
Minister of Defence 
: Can he confirm whether or not the planned replacement for  
HMNZS Endeavour 
 will be built to internationally accepted military specifications? 
Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN (Minister of Defence) 
: 
 Cabinet is yet to consider any options for the replacement of the  
Endeavour.  
Richard Prosser 
: Can he tell the House which of the seven Project Protector vessels acquired for the navy were built to internationally accepted military specifications and which were built to civilian standard only? 
Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN 
: I can tell the member that of the Project Protector fleet the  
Canterbury 
 the offshore patrol vessels and the inshore patrol vessels were all actually built to commercial standards. They do a fantastic job and are internationally acclaimed for their work. No one has previously raised any issues around that. They provided great value for money and have been doing a good job. 
Richard Prosser 
: Does this Government have any plans to replace the commercially designed HMNZS  
Canterbury 
 with a more seaworthy military specification vessel given the number of performance shortfalls that have been identified since it has been in operation? 
Hon Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN 
: There has been a long remediation programme for the  
Canterbury 
 and it is basically going to be fit for purpose for the future but if you look at the wider picture it has got great sealift capacity and it is a very important part of our fleet. It actually brings some real extra performance to the game when we exercise internationally with partners such as Australia which greatly appreciate that capability that we have. 
Afghanistan—Prime Minister’s Statements about Provincial Reconstruction Teams 
11. 
Hon PHIL GOFF (Labour—Mt Roskill) 
 to the  
Prime Minister 
: Does he regret his statement about the Hungarian Provincial Reconstruction Team in Afghanistan; if not why not? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (Acting Prime Minister) 
: 
 No; because it was based on information provided to him by the Chief of Defence Force. 
Hon Phil Goff 
: What exactly did he as Prime Minister achieve by making disparaging remarks about Hungarian soldiers that the Government of Hungary has variously described as false malicious ill-advised and unfair; what did he achieve other than the ill will of Hungarian people towards New Zealand? Those remarks were widely reported and will be long remembered. 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: I am sure that there will be many people in Hungary who still remember New Zealand’s contribution to their own liberation not too long ago. Might I say that the work that the two services the New Zealand Defence Force and the Hungarian defence force do in their two respective areas is obviously very valuable to the reconstruction of those two areas and we respect that. 
Hon Phil Goff 
: Does he think that gratuitous insults from the Prime Minister towards Hungary and from Gerry Brownlee towards Finland will have enhanced the regard that those countries have for New Zealand and the likelihood that they will support our upcoming bid for election to the United Nations Security Council? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: I cannot speculate on what some other country might do with regard to a UN vote. 
Hon Phil Goff 
: Since he has criticised the Hungarians for not patrolling in the southern part of Baghlan and since his announcement that the Kiwis will patrol in those areas has he reconsidered his announced intention to have them patrol given that the Kiwi soldiers lack mine-resistant armour-protected vehicles without which they would be under extreme risk and would likely suffer further casualties? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: The member was offered a briefing on all these matters last week. He has not taken it up. It is not appropriate nor— 
Hon Phil Goff 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. There are two points that I would like to make to you. Firstly that is not an answer to my question. Secondly I have asked the Foreign Affairs Defence and Trade Committee for such a briefing and it has not been offered. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Order! The member’s point of order is perfectly fair that that is not an answer to the question. It may be that the Acting Prime Minister considers that it is not in the public interest to answer the question but he should indicate that rather than going into the answer in the way he did because the question was a fair question. So I call on the Hon Gerry Brownlee to now answer it. 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: I do not think discussing these matters in the House given the desire to protect the security of our soldiers in any theatre of war is desirable; nor is it in the public interest. I would point out that the member has been offered a briefing on this and has not taken it up. 
Hon Phil Goff 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. The chairman of the select committee knows that I have asked for that briefing— 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Order! The member knows that he cannot dispute the answer by way of a point of order but he can make a personal explanation if he feels that what the Minister has said is impacting on him and affecting him adversely. 
Hon Phil Goff 
: My point of order is this. The Prime Minister has publicly announced that we will be patrolling so it is not a case of security. That is not the reason why— 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Order! No no. That is not a point of order because none of us can second-guess a Minister if they invoke the public interest in not answering a question. We cannot do that and it is not appropriate to try to challenge that by way of point of order. 
Denis O’Rourke 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. [ 
Interruption 
] 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Order! A point of order has been called. 
Denis O’Rourke 
: Could you clarify that when answers are given to a member’s question they need to be answers for the benefit of the House and that questions cannot be answered by reference to offering a briefing to a particular member? 
Mr SPEAKER 
: I think in fairness on this occasion the relationship between the two issues is that the Minister has declined to answer what seemed a fair question from the Hon Phil Goff. The Minister has declined to answer it invoking the public interest as the reason for not answering it—the safety of New Zealand’s Defence Force. That is the Minister’s judgment alone and I cannot question that. In terms of the Minister then referring to offering a briefing the questioner is the shadow Minister of Foreign Affairs or the Opposition spokesperson on foreign affairs and it is not uncommon for senior Opposition members to be offered confidential briefings by Ministers in these kinds of circumstances. I think that is not unreasonable for that situation if that is the Minister’s judgment. Certainly as Speaker I cannot question that judgment. But it is not uncommon to offer a senior Opposition spokesperson a confidential briefing in those circumstances. 
Hon Phil Goff 
: When the Prime Minister promised that he would send New Zealand soldiers to patrol in Baghlan was he in possession of all of the relevant facts around the risk posed to the New Zealand soldiers particularly since the Minister of Defence has said that he was not that the Government was not and that of course New Zealand does not have mine-resistant armour-protected vehicles? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: Well the first point is that the New Zealand Government has provided to the New Zealand Defence Force in Afghanistan all equipment that it has asked for. Secondly I would say that I am the Acting Prime Minister and I am not briefed well enough to be able to answer that question. 
Hon Dr Jonathan Coleman 
: What reports has the Prime Minister had from the Labour Party in response to his offer to— 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I think we all know that the Minister has no responsibility for any Labour Party reports. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: I think that is a fair point. I realise the member tried to dress it up in the guise of “what reports” but at the end of the day the substance of the question must have some relationship to ministerial responsibility and as pointed out by the Hon Trevor Mallard the Minister has no responsibility whatsoever for any Labour Party reports. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. Just by way of assistance if the Minister of Defence really wants help he should ask: “Has the Prime Minister”— 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Order! No the member should not do that. [ 
Interruption 
] No the member should not do that. [ 
Interruption 
] Order! 
Hon Phil Goff 
: I seek leave to table a letter that I addressed to the chairman of the Foreign Affairs Defence and Trade Committee more than 2 weeks ago to which I have had no reply asking for a briefing. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Leave is sought to table that document. Is there any objection? There is no objection. 









Document by leave laid on the Table of the House. 
Hon Dr Jonathan Coleman 
: What response has the Prime Minister had from the Labour Party to his offer of a confidential briefing on all matters relating to the situation in Afghanistan an offer the Prime Minister made to the Labour Party over a week ago? What response has the Prime Minister had? 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE 
: Well disappointingly—it would seem from the tabling of the letter in the House just before that the Labour Party wishes to conduct this discussion in public—the answer is that no response has been received. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Question No. 12 the Hon Tau Henare. [ 
Interruption 
] Order! Members know that that is not good enough. We are better than that. 
Information and Communications Technology Targets—Progress 
12. 
Hon TAU HENARE (National) 
 to the  
Minister of Internal Affairs 
: What progress has been made in achieving better public services through all-of-Government ICT initiatives? 
Hon CHRIS TREMAIN (Minister of Internal Affairs) 
: 
 Excellent progress. Today the Government released the Better Public Services result 10 action plan. Result 10 is about delivering smarter faster and more convenient online public services. We have identified a group of commonly used transactions such as vehicle licences and applying for a passport and our goal is to have 70 percent of these transactions delivered online by 2017. Other key initiatives include the igovt identity service and today the Electronic Identity Verification Bill passed its second reading making good progress towards delivering the igovt service. I also announced today that the Government is taking the next steps towards a cloud computing model which will pave the way for improved services and whole-of-Government savings. 
Hon Tau Henare 
: What are the benefits associated with cloud computing? 
Hon CHRIS TREMAIN 
: Cloud computing is an exciting technology that will contribute directly to better public services and will promote innovation. The first set of cloud-based services will be office productivity services such as email and word processing. This will improve consistency and reduce barriers to collaboration between agencies. Cloud computing will also enable Government agencies to pay per use for information and communications technology products and services delivered through networks rather than investing large amounts of capital in their own information and communications technology server infrastructure. 
Hon Tau Henare 
: Mr Speaker—[ 
Interruption 
]  
Mr SPEAKER 
: Order! I want to hear this question. 
Hon Tau Henare 
: What are the next steps for cloud computing? 
Hon CHRIS TREMAIN 
: That is an excellent question. The Department of Internal Affairs will issue a request for proposal to provide onshore-hosted cloud-based office productivity services. In parallel a policy framework is being developed by the Department of Internal Affairs in collaboration with other agencies. The department will report back to Ministers by the end of the year. Cloud-based office productivity services such as email and word processing are just the first. There is vast potential for making further services available through the use of cloud and we will continue to work towards making more cloud-based services available. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I just want to make it clear that the Labour Party will not object— 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Order! I do not hear what the point of order is. [ 
Interruption 
] Order! I do not believe that this has got—[ 
Interruption 
] Forgive me. I will resume my seat and listen carefully. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: The House today has had an outburst of multipartisanship on the question of identity verification and computing matters and the Labour Party will not object if Tau Henare wants to seek the leave of the House to ask more questions— 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Order! The member will resume his seat. I knew this was not going to be a valid point of order but still I guess I can blame only myself. 
Urgent Debates Declined 
Foreign Affairs and Trade Ministry—Investigation into Leaked Cabinet Papers Relating to Proposed Changes 
Mr SPEAKER 
: I have received a letter from the Hon Phil Goff seeking to debate under Standing Order 386 the involvement of the Minister of Trade in the inquiry into the leak of a Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade Cabinet paper. An urgent debate cannot be granted on the basis of newspaper speculation. A case of recent occurrence occurs when a decision is publicly announced by the Government. The inquiry is ongoing. The accumulation of information in regard to an issue is not itself a particular case of recent occurrence nor does it require the immediate attention of the House. The application is therefore declined. 
Alcohol Reform Bill 
In Committee 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: The House is in Committee on the Alcohol Reform Bill. It is a decision on the age for the sale and purchase of alcohol from licensed premises. [ 
Interruption 
] Order! Would members who are having a conversation like to take it outside the Chamber. 
We are in the process of beginning the debate on the alcohol purchase age. The House is in Committee on the Alcohol Reform Bill. Following—[ 
Interruption 
] Members should listen to this. Following the leave granted by the House yesterday I remind members that this debate will take the form of an in principle debate on the issue of the age for the sale and purchase of alcohol from licensed premises and the issue of the purchase age will be decided at 5.30 p.m. by an election from the three options: 18 years 20 years and a split age. If this election does not produce a majority decision the option receiving the fewest votes will be eliminated and the issue decided between the remaining two options by a personal vote. The Committee will report progress at the conclusion of the voting and any amendments to the bill necessary to implement the Committee’s decision will be drafted by parliamentary counsel. 
The issue before the Committee is the age for the sale and purchase of alcohol from licensed premises. In the interests of fairness and participation in the debate members will get an opportunity for an individual 5-minute call.  
Hon TREVOR MALLARD (Labour—Hutt South) 
: 
 I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. I think in briefing the Committee you missed one relatively important point and that is to tell members of the Committee that as agreed by leave yesterday there will be only a 1-minute bell between the declaration of the first vote and the starting of the second vote and therefore members should not go back to their offices. 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: Thank you very much for reminding the Committee of that Mr Mallard—very much appreciated. 
In principle debate on the issue of the age for the sale and purchase of alcohol from licensed premises 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL (Labour—Christchurch East) 
: 
 I wish to address Part 2 of the Alcohol Reform Bill and I want to begin by talking about the fact that this is the only part of this bill that the Government wanted to have as a conscience vote. I think it is an important matter to debate. I really strongly object to the fact that this one part of the bill has been carved out for a conscience vote because it makes it look like age is the only problem we have with alcohol in this country. Age is not the only problem we have. There is an element of a problem that comes from the decision that was made in 1999 but I want to come back to that later on. 
I think what we have ended up with is the media very much focusing on how MPs are going to vote on the age when there are much more important issues that the media should actually be asking individual members of Parliament about. They should be asking individual members of Parliament what they feel about minimum pricing for super-cheap alcohol. They should be asking them about the closing time for off-licences. They should be asking them about the proximity of schools to off-licences. They should be asking them— 
Louise Upston 
: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. I understood that the debate was around the purchase age and the issues related to the three options that you mentioned at the start of this debate. 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL 
: Speaking to the point of order I am simply referring to the fact that this is the only part of the bill that the Government has allocated as a conscience vote. It is perfectly appropriate to have a discussion about the nature of the vote that we are about to have in the context of the Committee stage on this part. 
Michael Woodhouse 
: As you well know it is not the Government’s prerogative to decide what is and is not a conscience vote. That will be for the Speaker to decide at that time. The Business Committee has agreed that this is a debate on the age of purchase. Members know that we will have plenty of opportunity in the substantive Committee stage on the bill as a whole to debate those issues. I think it is an important point that we need to establish at this point in the Committee stage today that we spend as much time as we can on the question at hand which is the age of the purchase and sale of alcohol. 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: Can I just say to the Committee that the Speaker allocates the conscience votes and the member was actually talking about the process around the conscience vote. If the member wishes to use up her 5 minutes’ time doing that she is perfectly entitled to do so. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. This will be very brief but it is really just a request to members. We have a debate that is going to last 2¼ hours and unless there is a very good reason we should not have points of order. 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: Thank you. Can I just say to members that look I said right at the beginning that in the interests of fairness I want to be able to try to give at least every member one shot—5 minutes. So it is up to members how they use it because there may well be a considerable amount of speaking. 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL 
: What I was saying was simply this: if anyone in this Committee thinks that by changing the age we have solved the problems that this country has with alcohol then think again because we have not solved the problems at all. The Law Commission gave us a very extensive report. It gave us the evidence this Committee needs in order to have votes on different elements of the law and this is only one element of the law. 
I am supporting the split-age option and if the split-age option is not supported by this Committee by a majority then I will be voting to keep it at age 18. There is a very good reason why I want to do that. It is that I believe it is fundamental that the public of New Zealand does not think for one minute that we have dealt with the really hard issues with the issues that require the courage of people to stand up in this Committee and to speak from the evidence that has been brought to us by the Law Commission. I am afraid that the bill that we have before us as a whole does not quite do that. 
I do not believe that we can sheet home responsibility to the 18 and 19-year-olds of this country to say that they are the cause of the problem that we have today. I just want to remind people that there are issues that we have to take charge of and that we have to take notice of. When we see our emergency departments clogged up weekend in and weekend out by people who are both the perpetrators and the victims of violence; when we have people bumped off our elective surgery lists because we have got alcohol-fuelled crashes happening and ordinary people cannot get their operations as a result; when we have the victims of burglary who cannot get the police to come because they are busy dealing with alcohol-fuelled events in the centres of our towns and in Christchurch that is now the suburbs and no longer the centre of our town; when we see people lying on the side of the road vomiting into the gutter or when we have to clean it up in the street in the morning after; when we find broken bottles as my husband often does when he goes out cycling on a Sunday morning and of course it ruins the tyres; when we see all of those events and when we see our letterboxes kicked over we cannot say that this country does not share the problem that we want to sheet it all home to personal responsibility and that we want to blame the 18 and 19-year-olds of this country. 
The truth is that we cannot blame just them. It is true that pre-loading is a generational thing. It did not happen in our day. It was quite different because we had very regulated hours of trading and of course the pubs closed at 11 o’clock at night in those days. Pre-loading does not happen just with 18 and 19-year-olds but it does expose a problem that occurred I believe in 1999. It was something that I was not aware of at the time. I think we got it wrong in 1999 but I did not know how inadequate the law was in respect of the supply of alcohol. The law does not make it illegal to supply liquor to someone under 18. The current law says that it is an offence to buy alcohol with the intention of supplying it to somebody under the age of 18. It is an entirely flawed piece of legislation. What I believe this Committee needs to do is to split the age and to say that people who are drinking in supervised environments cannot have alcohol served to them if they are intoxicated. Supervised environments are better than unsupervised— 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: I call Denis Roche. [ 
Interruption 
] Denis O’Rourke.  
DENIS O’ROURKE (NZ First) 
: 
 Thank you Mr Chairman. I could not claim to be as good-looking as the other member. But thank you for the call. Of the three basic options on the purchasing age in the Alcohol Reform Bill—firstly 18 for both on-licence and off-licence premises; secondly 20 for both on-licence and off-licence premises; and thirdly 18 for on-licence and 20 for off-licence premises which is the split-age option—only one has no logic or credibility in my view and that is the split-age option. 
The argument that somehow young drinkers in on-licence premises are more responsible or better behaved there is specious. We can see them every night in every bar in every town misbehaving and drinking excessively in those places. The argument that somehow young drinkers in on-licence premises are likely to drink less there is also implausible and in fact the opposite may well be the case. There is actually no convincing evidence that behaviour is better or worse or drinking is lesser or greater in on-licence or off-licence premises. We simply do not know. But expert opinion does say that there is actually no reason to discriminate between on-licence and off-licence as far as age is concerned. 
The split age is not a useful compromise. I think it is really just a cop-out. So which age is appropriate then? I think we need to judge that by the magnitude of harm that is potentially going to come down upon young people and that refers to health issues to personal development issues and to mental well-being. I believe that the latest possible age for those reasons is the best and that age is 20 years. That has been the age of majority in New Zealand since the Age of Majority Act 1970. Twenty-one I think would actually be better personally but that is neither legally nor reasonably viable in New Zealand. So 20 is the correct age I believe for both on-licence and off-licence premises. 
 I do not think it is too much to ask that people aged 18 should wait another 2 years so that they can purchase alcohol wherever that may be. Arguments for relativity to other ages as a justification for 18 are also specious. Some people say that if you can join the army and fight for New Zealand at the age of 17 you should be able to buy alcohol. In fact the army is a highly disciplined environment where obedience and compliance are absolutely central whereas a high degree of disobedience and very bad behaviour is what happens with young people imbibing alcohol. 
There is a long list of ages in the law for imposing duties and conferring personal rights. I will give you just some examples. At the age of 14 years for example you are now legally a young person and you can babysit children. At 16 years you can sit a driving test and obtain your learner licence and you can get a tattoo without your parents’ permission. At the age of 17 years you can join the navy the army and the air force. At the age of 18 years your parents are no longer your legal guardians. You can make a will you can join the police and you can apply for an unemployment benefit. At the age of 19 you stop being eligible for free primary and secondary education. At the age of 20 you can adopt a child who is related to you. At the age of 25 you can adopt a child who is at least 20 years younger than you. 
The point is this: what happens in terms of the conferring of rights or the imposing of duties at other ages is completely irrelevant to the purchasing age for alcohol. They just have no relevance whatsoever. There is only one genuine criterion I believe for the alcohol age and that is what age is in the best interests of young people. My answer to that is 20 years because the later age creates more maturity. 
Hon TAU HENARE (National) 
: 
 Back when we changed the law on the purchase of alcohol from 20 years to 18 years I voted to have the law stay at 20 but was quite happy to have the law whatever it was. I have one thing and one thing to say: lay off the young people. Lay off young people and telling young people what to do as if this problem is about only young people. The figures that have been released by various organisations have said that binge drinking is actually not about young people; it is about all of New Zealand. It is about older people. I have talked to nurses and doctors in hospitals up and down this country and they have said to check out Friday night and Thursday night and see who comes in. It is not the young people who are coming in. It is the older people who are coming in all drunk and untidy with bruises on their faces and crusted spew all over the place. It is the older people. 
My message to this Committee is—and I take the point of the last speaker Denis O’Rourke—that we expect young people to toddle off to the polling booth every 3 years be responsible and choose a Government for the next 3 years. We expect young people if they want to to join the army and go across the world to defend whatever we say. We expect them to do a whole lot of things at 18. But they cannot have a beer? Give me a break—give me a break! It sounds like the debate about civil unions and marriages all over again—it does. 
The issue in this Alcohol Reform Bill of 20 years and the split age is nothing but a cop-out. In fact the split age is nothing but a cop-out. It is either 18 or it is not but you cannot have it both ways. And I say on behalf of all those people who are 18 are 19 or are just shy of 20 you can go into a pub you can buy your beer wine or spirits and you can partake of the very stuff—the very nectar of life—that everybody else can. 
Hon Lianne Dalziel 
: Nectar of life? 
Hon TAU HENARE 
: Yes it is—absolutely. Well some of the members should know better. This is what it is about. Why should we every 10 years or so change the law upwards or down? Who is it that suffers? It is the young people. We should stop right now blaming young people for the problems of this country. It is not their fault—it is not their fault. 
Mike Sabin 
: It’s not about blame. 
Hon TAU HENARE 
: Pardon me? 
Tim Macindoe 
: It’s all about blame. 
Hon TAU HENARE 
: Oh here we go—here we go. That is what you see. They cannot sit nicely like the Opposition! They just cannot do it. I want to thank the Opposition members for sitting in their chairs in their seats and acting like nice people. It should be 18. Why punish young people when it is a problem— 
Mike Sabin 
: Oh it’s about blame and punish now? 
Hon TAU HENARE 
: That is why it is a problem because even my own colleagues will not give me the respect that I deserve to have my 5-minute say. That is the reason. That is one of the reasons why we have such a problem in our communities. This is a serious matter and I am here to say: keep it at 18. I am here to defend the rights of those young people especially when older people in this Chamber—and especially when even my own colleagues will not give me the respect that I deserve. Here is a warning: if they think they are going to get a cool ride this afternoon they have got another think coming. 
KEVIN HAGUE (Green) 
: 
 The Green Party has devoted a lot of time to considering and analysing the evidence and arguments that have been made on the various sides of this debate. We believe that much of the support for raising the age has arisen from the inadequacy of other measures in the Alcohol Reform Bill but we do not believe that that is a good basis for changing this part of the law. Today 13 of us will vote to retain the current purchase age of 18 while Kennedy Graham will cast a proxy vote for 20. None of us support the split age that is currently provided for in the bill. It started out no doubt as a way to find a politically acceptable compromise between 18 and 20 in a politically hot debate between those two. But what has happened is that political solutions also have practical consequences and over the time that this option has been on the table members of this House have I think started to think through what those practical consequences have been or will be. That is why support for the split age has been steadily falling. 
Rather than being a common-sense compromise the proposed split age is actually muddled. There is no evidence at all to support it. It does not seem to have been successful anywhere. It has enforcement problems. It will force new drinkers into licensed premises where their role model for drinking will be the dysfunctional drinking culture of the rest of us. Of particular concern to me as a member who lives in a rural area is that it will create the likelihood of increased drink-driving as young people are forced to go to licensed premises that are some distance away from their homes in order to drink. 
This business of evidence is important to us. We believe in evidence-based policy and in approaching all drugs including alcohol in a consistent way with regulation appropriate to the harms caused. We are concerned to reduce alcohol-related harm as I am sure everyone is but New Zealand’s drinking problem is not specifically a youth drinking problem as Tau Henare has said. It is a problem of culture shared by us all. The issue has been cast as a youth problem to divert attention away from the wider culture and to facilitate the denial of older New Zealanders like me that we have a problem. That is called scapegoating. The evidence is that less than 10 percent of the binge drinking that occurs in New Zealand occurs in the young people we are discussing today—less than 10 percent. That drinking by young people is in fact on the wane. Drinking by 18 and 19-year-olds is in fact lower than it was before the age was dropped from 20. 
Denis O’Rourke 
: It’s not what the Law Commission found. 
KEVIN HAGUE 
: It is not what the Law Commission found but it is what the researchers found. If we approach the issues with clear heads ourselves and are not swayed by the moral panic around young people which characterises much of the public debate we must conclude that the problem is a broad societal one and solutions must address that. That is what public health thinking tells us too. Public health thinking says that if we want to change something we have more effective interventions by changing the norms of the whole of the population rather than trying to target a specific sector of the population. There is very solid evidence behind interventions to increase price restrict location and hours and restrict advertising and sponsorship. Those interventions will reduce harm across the whole population including the harm caused to young people. In fact they will be more effective than reducing the purchase age. 
Almost everyone says that they do not believe in prohibition but what this bill proposes is in fact to impose a form of prohibition on a particular selected group. That is just wrong. What we need to do instead is actually cast a balance between the freedom of individuals—between individual autonomy and harm reduction. If I at 52 can make a decision to engage in behaviour that causes me some harm why ought not the 18-year-old able to do that? Those who oppose that will say: “Well yes but you have got all of this experience and wisdom at your age.” But the reality is that Denis O’Rourke has already given a list of things that we already allow those 18 and 19-year-olds to do. 
CHARLES CHAUVEL (Labour) 
: 
 I want to begin by just acknowledging the Minister in the chair the Hon Chester Borrows. Mr Borrows chaired the Justice and Electoral Committee which heard all the evidence on the Alcohol Reform Bill and so I am delighted that he is in the chair today. I want to pay tribute to the way he chaired the committee. I acted as one of the two deputy chairs of the committee for the purposes of these hearings because we heard so many submissions that we had to divide up into two subcommittees in order to do them justice. What I want to do today is bring the debate back as much as possible to the evidence that was actually heard before the select committee because we ought to be basing our decisions in respect of this debate on that evidence. 
The point about this particular part of the debate is that the group that is being targeted here is not the problem. As we have heard from both Tau Henare and just now from Kevin Hague the claims that drinking amongst under 20s is now out of control since the lowering of the drinking age is just not borne out by the evidence. By pointing the finger at the under 20s it detracts from the real problem which is the binge-drinkers of all ages. It sends a message to all those heavy drinkers who are in denial about their behaviour that we have dealt with the problem—i.e. youth drinking—and so we do not need to change anything and that is patently wrong. 
The issues around binge drinking by some young people will never be solved or even helped by trying to restrict supply to 18 and 19-year-olds. If supply were the issue then there would be many many more young people drinking since the lowering of the age not fewer. As we have heard as I said from Tau Henare and now Kevin Hague that is not what the evidence shows. 
The issue is the culture price access and supervision—all issues that need to be dealt with in the next phase of this debate and hopefully will be whether or not by way of this Government bill or by way of Supplementary Order Papers put forward by my colleagues and me with the aim to strengthen the bill. Those proposals really are going to need to be considered as part of the whole solution here. 
 As my colleague Lianne Dalziel said it is wrong to single out age in isolation. We have to deal with issues like minimum pricing and restricting the number of liquor outlets and the hours they are open. All of these proposals would have a far greater impact on the problem of our binge drinking culture across all age groups than simply lifting the purchase age by restricting supply to 18-year-olds and 19-year-olds. 
Denis O’Rourke 
: It would help though. 
CHARLES CHAUVEL 
: I am being interjected on by Mr O’Rourke who did not participate in the select committee hearings and who knows nothing about the evidence. But never mind that—never mind that—let us just have grumpy and ignorant interjections— 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: Order! Can I just interrupt. Sorry to interrupt the member. Can I just say to members that when you are in close proximity like we are over here on the cross benches interjections can actually be heard through the mike and it muffles the sound. It is the convention that when you are in that sort of position you do not interject from that seat. 
CHARLES CHAUVEL 
: I know that many colleagues across the Committee are considering voting for a split age. Again the evidence does not support the split age actually producing any positive results. The Law Commission did not favour a split age. Another factor to consider is one that was raised earlier I think by Kevin Hague again. Young people in rural areas may live some distance from the nearest pub and taxi services do not operate in those areas. A split age is essentially lifting the purchase age to 20 for all young adults in rural areas. Also I want to say this—and I am sure the Minister in the chair will have a perspective on this—my partner is an ex - police officer. I have talked to him at length about this issue because he had a lot of experience in enforcing licensing matters. He tells me that the practical realities of trying to enforce a split age would be a nightmare for our already hard-pressed police. I do not want to put that on them. 
The evidence does show that we have to get tough on our binge drinking culture. There is no doubt about that. Everybody bar the industry itself who came before the select committee gave us that message loud and clear. But the way to do that is not to single out age not to make that the major issue and not to pretend that by stopping 18-year-olds and 19-year-olds or at least trying to stop them from purchasing alcohol we can make a difference. Raising the drinking age is not the way. We need to keep it at 18. 
TIM MACINDOE (National—Hamilton West) 
: 
 If this were an issue of simply preventing 18 and 19-year-olds from having a quiet beer we would not be having this debate today. What we are talking about is an issue of profound importance in our community. To those who say we are singling out young people and piling all the blame on them I say that is absolutely untrue. We are looking at protecting them from an aspect of their lifestyle our whole lifestyle that is doing enormous damage. 
There is nothing in this bill the Alcohol Reform Bill—not in my amendment not in any part of his bill—that will stop an 18-year-old or 19-year-old from having a quiet beer. On the contrary I stand with most members of this Committee in saying that is to be encouraged and I welcome them. I simply say however as a parent whose children have just passed through this age group that it was my responsibility and my wife’s responsibility to help educate our young people to learn how to drink responsibly and I hope that we have been able in a small way to do that. 
Hon Tau Henare 
: Oh you’re so good aren’t you! 
TIM MACINDOE 
: And I may be abused by my colleague on my left but I believe it is an important issue. So I rise today to urge all members of this Committee to support Supplementary Order Paper 280 in my name which is designed to restore 20 years as the minimum age—[ 
Interruption 
] 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: Order! [ 
Interruption 
] Order! 
TIM MACINDOE 
: Sorry Mr Chair I thought you were taking a point of order. It seeks to restore 20 years as the minimum age for all categories of liquor purchases in New Zealand and the overwhelming number of New Zealanders are urging us to do just that. 
Iain Lees-Galloway 
: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. Earlier in the debate you advised a member from New Zealand First not to interject on another member on his flank. There is significant interjection coming from Tau Henare. There seems to be some bickering going on between Jackie Blue and Tau Henare and I just ask that you apply the same convention to the Government benches as you do to the Opposition benches. 
Hon Tau Henare 
: I find it very difficult to interject from my seat because Tim Macindoe is sitting in my seat. 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: All right. That is one all. I have not given out a yellow card yet. 
TIM MACINDOE 
: Inevitably today’s debate focuses on the age question because that is what this clause is all about but I am a huge fan of the Alcohol Reform Bill in totality. There is a vast array of measures in it. This is just one aspect but it is an important aspect because it is an important age group. It is a problem that of course as Kevin Hague has said is multifaceted and from which none of us is immune but it is no less important for that. On the contrary today’s focus on the widespread harm that alcohol abuse is causing our children our grandchildren our school pupils our tertiary students and our young people is one of the most crucial issues that we must confront. That harm is very real very disturbing and very dangerous. We cannot avoid it. 
This debate is not a matter of blaming young people for New Zealand’s binge drinking culture; it is about trying to protect them from it. It is not about restricting their rights; it is about enhancing the rights of those who love and care for them to guide them in safe and responsible choices as they move into the adult world. It is not about shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted; it is about ensuring the horse is able to return to the stable fit to run again after surviving its burst for liberty and the pursuit of happiness. 
I am as I have said a big fan of the Alcohol Reform Bill. I am particularly pleased with some of the Supplementary Order Papers that the Minister of Justice Judith Collins has recently advanced to strengthen the bill. They add emphasis— 
Hon Lianne Dalziel 
: She didn’t strengthen the bill. She made it weaker. 
TIM MACINDOE 
: —particularly on parental responsibility which is directly related Ms Dalziel to the issue that we are debating today and that is why I mention them. They go hand in hand. We have to see all the measures as part of a package not each one on its own. But with the way this debate is structured today we are debating just one clause of it. 
 The  
New Zealand Herald  
has today summarised many of the issues well in its editorial but it has repeated the common mistake that we are talking about a drinking age. It is important to clarify for everybody listening that there is no such thing as a drinking age and there is no proposal to introduce one. It is a purchase age that we are talking about. Unfortunately the  
New Zealand Herald  
has reached an inadequate conclusion by making a bigger mistake and the big mistake it has made which I hope it will correct for its readers is that the Law Commission came down on the side of the split age option. 
It is true that in its initial report the Law Commission did recommend the split age proposal. Like the Law Commission when I first began considering this issue I too thought that the split age had a lot of merit. But like the Law Commission I have concluded on the basis of the evidence that there must be further moves than that. This change of position was set out clearly on page 258 of the final report which is this huge tome that I am holding. I hope as I say the  
New Zealand Herald  
will correct the mistake. I will reluctantly support the split age proposal today but only if my amendment is defeated. 
Dr CAM CALDER (National) 
: 
 Many of us may choose to sample a cleansing ale maybe a curvaceous aromatic red or a complex peaty Laphroaig single malt from time to time. Most New Zealanders partake responsibly. Sadly a significant number do not. The Alcohol Reform Bill is a multi-strand approach to minimise alcohol-related harms. The harms we are talking about are reflected in the crime statistics incidents of public disorder and the numbers filling our hospital casualty departments and wards. Alcohol is estimated to contribute directly to 1000 deaths a year and is a major driver of crime. It is implicated in 30 percent of all police-recorded offences 34 percent of all recorded family violence and 50 percent of homicides. 
Purchase age is just one of a number of strands of our reforms an issue upon which we MPs are privileged to have a conscience vote. We know that the purchase age itself will not be a cure or a panacea to fix the damage that alcohol causes in our society and we all acknowledge the need for a cultural shift in New Zealand’s attitudes. 
I acknowledge the fact that many young people drink responsibly and I acknowledge the fact that misuse of alcohol is not confined to the young. I do however support a rise in the purchase age to 20 at both on-licences and off-licences and there are a number of reasons for this. Crucially I personally have not observed any diminution in the level of alcohol-related harm since the purchase age was reduced to 18 in 1999. You could say that young people have had a 13-year trial to prove they could behave responsibly and the results speak for themselves. Working as a hospital doctor in the 1990s I spent many hours in accident and emergency attending to the victims of alcohol-related traffic accidents and violent assaults. Talking to colleagues who still practise medicine today I hear that this situation has only worsened. 
I admire the work that our uniformed policemen and policewomen do in our community and I have taken the opportunity to go out with police patrols on a number of occasions in Manurewa. Unsurprisingly alcohol was a factor in many cases that they attended. It is interesting to note that the Manurewa Youth Council and the results of my two surveys of the wider Manurewa electorate overwhelmingly support raising the purchase age to 20. 
I wish to acknowledge the Law Commission and I note that following a comprehensive review of international evidence about harm to teenagers from alcohol including four independent New Zealand public trials the Law Commission’s final recommendation was to return the purchase age to 20 for both licensed premises and off-licences. 
We have heard much about the rights of teenagers to access alcohol. The argument runs that if you can vote become an MP get married or go to war at 18 then why should you not be able to buy alcohol? The compelling argument is that voting becoming an MP or getting married do not normally lead to serious harm befalling the individual. Going to war of course is an exception but 18-year-olds are not sent off to war by themselves. They undergo rigorous training and are supervised by older colleagues. Interestingly enough to reduce the harm to them we do not let people go into casinos until the age of 20. 
The situation that pertains to New Zealand at the moment is that every 18-year-old has a licence to purchase alcohol with no supervision requirements and no restriction on their ability to supply alcohol to younger teenagers and children. It is very pertinent to note that a purchase age of 20 does not stop 18-year-olds drinking with adult supervision. We have a purchase age in New Zealand not a drinking age and it should be noted that as a parent when my daughters were younger I could take them into licensed premises and have a drink with them in supervised areas. 
Another concern I have is the neuroplasticity of the developing brain. Research indicates that for most people the maturation process involves a gradual shift from an instinctual brain response to a more rational one continuing well into the 20s. In other words a dose of alcohol in an 18-year-old has the potential to do more harm on average than the same dose in a 25-year-old. Delaying alcohol use decreasing the overall amount used before adulthood will reduce the variety of risks and it is also likely to impact upon the increasing incidence of foetal alcohol syndrome which is a serious and growing problem in New Zealand. 
NIKKI KAYE (National—Auckland Central) 
: 
 Last night we passed the first reading of the marriage equality bill. Members walked into this House and said they believe in equality. This bill the Alcohol Reform Bill focuses on rights and freedoms. I do accept that occasionally this Parliament does pass legislation that discriminates against people with regard to age. But as someone who values freedom I believe that the evidence must be there and the threshold must be high. 
Let me be very clear. I believe we need tougher alcohol laws in this country. I believe that New Zealand’s alcohol laws are far too loose. Most of us in this House believe that there needs to be a culture change in this country. Where we differ is how we do that. Where we also differ is in what the combination of policies are that are needed to reduce supply to minors restrict overall supply and improve enforcement. 
The rest of the Alcohol Reform Bill will be debated in the coming months. Today we are going to have a vote on one provision focused on a change to the purchase age. Last night thousands of young New Zealanders tuned in on social media and Parliament TV. Many of them have expressed huge pride in the vote last night. Some of them do not realise that within hours of Parliament empowering young people Parliament is now at risk of restricting the freedom of young New Zealanders. As I said before I could accept that if the evidence was clear that youth drinking had not been reduced since the age was lowered. Surveys taken between 1997 and 2010 show that under-18 drinking has dropped by over 45 percent. In 2006 Alcohol Advisory Council research found that 53 percent of 12 to 17-year-olds were drinkers but by 2010 that had reduced to 32 percent. That is a relative drop of 40 percent in terms of prevalence rates in the last 5 years. 
I want to be clear again: I believe in reducing youth drinking—I just believe that there are greater provisions to achieve that. I also want to be clear that if we look at the Alcohol Reform Bill those provisions focus on the restriction of supply with regard to convenience stores and dairies they focus on targeting young people in terms of advertising and restrictions around advertising provisions and they also focus on the falsification of ID. These are effective measures that target and restrict supply to young people. 
Probably one of the most significant things in the bill that in my view will reduce the ability of young people to get access to alcohol is the express consent provision. What does the overall evidence show again? Whom do most young people learn to drink from? It is their parents. Where do most young people get alcohol from? They get it from their parents and family members who are over 20. I say as well—and Kevin Hague pointed this out—that when we look at the proportion of young people and where they get alcohol from 92 percent get it from people over the age of 20. These are very clear statistics from the  
ALAC Alcohol Monitor 
. This is very clear evidence that rather than parliamentarians walking into this Chamber and in my view voting for discriminatory legislation that disproportionately blames 18 and 19-year-olds for a wider cultural issue in New Zealand you need to vote with your heads and vote for provisions that will make an actual difference in terms of the restriction of supply. 
I want to touch briefly on the split age. I believe it is confusing and could have serious unintended consequences. For rural kids where is their transport? Rural kids are being told that they need to go into town to drink. In my view that is going to lead to an increase in drink-driving and that is a serious unintended consequence. I also want to be clear that in terms of raising the age to 20 let us think about how this may undermine the rest of the bill. The rest of the bill is focused on provisions targeted at anyone who supplies to a minor without parental consent. Do we really think that 18 and 19-year-olds are not going to have unsupervised access to alcohol? The thousands of young people who are around the country in our universities are they going call mum and dad when they want to have a drink? Do we really think all of those 18 and 19-year-olds who are currently working will ring mum and dad when they want to have a drink? I believe that the split age law is confusing and could have serious unintended consequences but I also believe that if you can marry if you can go to war for your country and if you can be elected to this Parliament then you have the ability to be able to have a drink. 
Dr MEGAN WOODS (Labour—Wigram) 
: 
 I am very happy to take a call on this the Alcohol Reform Bill. It is fair to say that we are disappointed with this legislation. We are squandering a once-in-a-generation opportunity to really address the issue of alcohol harm in our society. But as other members have mentioned we will have the chance to debate that in coming months. The choice we have today is around the purchase age for alcohol and the three options that have been put in front of us. 
In coming to my decision on how I am going to vote I have considered the evidence because I consider that is what we need to do. We have had colleagues from around the Chamber talking about the evidence just not backing up many of the claims of those who want raise the drinking age back to 20—that is that drinking is a problem confined to that age group of 18 to 20. In fact what we have seen is drinking dropping amongst this cohort in the last 5 years. Many who support raising the drinking age point to neurobiological evidence and talk about the developing adolescent brain but one of the things about this legislation is that the age is just being used as a scapegoat and a smokescreen for the fact that many of the other measures that need to be taken—the tough calls—are not being taken. 
If we were going to have a real debate around the age of purchase or the age of drinking alcohol in New Zealand then we would have had a real debate about it. Instead what we have is just flippant comments about the neurobiological evidence. Actually the neurobiological evidence points to the fact that the adolescent brain develops up to the age of 25; 20 is just some arbitrary line in the sand. If you are going to put it there then you may as well put it at 18. There is no neurobiological evidence to suggest that 20 is any better than 18. It is not better. There is no evidence for that. 
Hon Member 
: Read the report Megan. 
Dr MEGAN WOODS 
: I task the member opposite and I invite him to take a call and point to the neurobiological evidence that shows that 20 is better than 18. He cannot because it does not exist. 
Then we have the other option of the split age. I say that if you think the drinking age matters then you need to choose to vote either 18 or 20. I think that we need to make a call on this and I will be voting to keep the drinking age at 18 because I do not think that raising it back to 20 is going to achieve anything in addressing alcohol harm in this country. The royal commission when it initially made its recommendations did look at a split age but it abandoned this by the time the final report came out and it abandoned it for a very good reason. That very good reason is because it is a political compromise not something that works anywhere else to actually address the issue of reducing alcohol harm in this country. Raising the age back to 20 or splitting the drinking age between 18 and 20 will do nothing to reduce alcohol harm in New Zealand. All it is doing is putting the onus for this problem back on young people and as previous speakers have said making scapegoats of them. 
We need to do better than this in this Parliament. We have an opportunity to really address this issue and we are squandering it. We need to do better for our country and we need to do better for our young people than making scapegoats of them. This is all it is doing; it is very convenient to raise the drinking age to 20 and think you have solved the problem. 
Mike Sabin 
: Purchase age. 
Dr MEGAN WOODS 
: But the reality is that nothing will change. Raising the age at which people can purchase or drink alcohol from 18 to 20 will not address the problems we have in this country. I urge members from all round the House to consider the evidence when they are making their vote. I have looked at the evidence and I will be voting to keep it 18. Thank you. 
COLIN KING (National—Kaikoura) 
: 
 It is great to see that this debate on the Alcohol Reform Bill is maturing that a lot of the heat is going out of things and that we are getting more to the norming and the performing stage of this debate. It is healthy that that occurs. I personally sat on the Justice and Electoral Committee only a couple of times and my position started off supporting a split age. I would just like to explain why I started off in that position. It was purely around the understanding that at the age of 18 youth at school could actually be seen as role models to younger ones at secondary school and could have a significant influence on those younger ones at college. So that is where I started from. I was looking at a split age: an off-licence purchase age of 20 and the on-licence purchase age remaining at 18. 
However the problem with drinking is a lot more complex than that. I have got to endorse the comments of those who have identified that. What really galvanised my thinking was the coroner’s report into four deaths that occurred within an industry that is close to my heart—that is the shearing industry. It was all around the behaviour of those who were taking the lead in the shearing industry. The older men were the ones who perpetuated the culture of heavy drinking. 
One particular case occurred in Southland. A young lad of 17 was at a function. He was given a hard time because of his hair length. There was no one there taking responsibility for that young fellow who was actually working in that environment. He jumped in a car drove off down the road intoxicated went off the road rolled the car into a ditch and drowned. If that is an argument for raising the drinking age then I think it is a knee-jerk reaction. 
Effectively the New Zealand Shearing Contractors Association has had to come out and actually start talking about changing the culture within the shearing industry because there is this old adage about working hard and playing hard. I mean you have got to remember that we have got youth there who are aged 15 16 17 18 and 19 and they are actually learning their skills. They are starting on a pathway that has proved very successful for many people. 
I have come to the conclusion that I will be supporting 18 years of age as a purchase age based on the principles that domestic violence drunken driving police time wasted managing violence outside licensed restaurants and nursing and doctoring time that is taken up managing the accidents and emergencies during the weekend are more representative of the overall problems that we face around alcohol. So whilst we are at this particular stage considering only the aspect of purchase age I want to speak on behalf of the enormous percentage of 18 and 19-year-olds who are acting responsibly. I would put out a challenge to the older people in New Zealand to step up— 
Hon Simon Bridges 
: You’re one of them Colin. 
COLIN KING 
: —that is right and I am very proud of that—and take responsibility for their behaviour because that is where the role models are and the examples are set. 
It is a fascinating time to be on one’s feet. This has been a very long and sort of complex debate—probably not aided by some of the comments coming out of the Law Commission which actually tended to simplify matters and just focus on the tobacco-type argument around preventing the consumption of alcohol which in itself would actually have a detrimental effect on other aspects of the alcohol industry like that of the production of wine in Marlborough where excise tax would actually really ruin it. 
Based on those arguments I do not see the evidence that people talk about as being consequential around the purchase age solving the problem. In actual fact I received a paper the other day from a South Island district health board— 
GARETH HUGHES (Green) 
: 
 Kia ora. Nga mihi nui ki a koutou. Kia ora. I rise to speak on the Alcohol Reform Bill in favour of keeping the purchase age 18. I want to outline my reasons: raising it is not fair raising it will not be effective and raising it will not deal with the real issue which is the serious cultural historical problem our country has with alcohol. I want to share some of my views because I think I have got a unique view. I am probably the only member in this House who still gets asked for ID for alcohol. I think it shows that the reforms made last time Parliament turned its attention to this issue have worked because when I was 16 and when the purchase age was 20 I could go into a pub. When I was 16 and the age was 20 I could still drink rocket fuel on the street. What we know is that we are cracking down on lack of IDs. We have got some room to go and in fact we could clamp down further on supply to minors. What we know is that since those reforms youth drinking has actually declined according to numerous studies. 
I want to also share—and you might not know this about me—that I used to be a barman across the road at the Back Bencher. There I saw the problem. It was not youth drinking. It was inappropriate drinking—inappropriate drinking no matter what the age was. There I saw regular alcoholism. I saw regular intoxication. I even saw MPs binge drinking and intoxicated across the road. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch) 
: Order! [ 
Interruption 
] Order! I do not think you should make that reference. I think that that is an inappropriate remark and I ask the member to withdraw it. 
GARETH HUGHES 
: I withdraw. The real issue is irresponsible consumption regardless of the age. 
Raising the age is not fair. On your 18th birthday you are given a raft of rights and you are given a raft of responsibilities. You can vote you can fight you can smoke you can gamble you can even get elected to a council as Jami-Lee Ross saw but under these changes you could not go and buy a bottle of wine to have with dinner. It is astounding that the student army volunteers in Canterbury under this proposal would not be able to buy a six-pack after a hard day’s shovelling. It is unfair it is discriminatory and it is scapegoating young New Zealanders. Like lowering the blood-alcohol level for under-20-year-old drivers it is easy to target the under-20-year-olds and ignore the real issue. It is easy to target young Kiwis and ignore the real problem. It sends this signal that we are dealing with the problems but we are not. It will not be effective in reducing harm. We know that 92 percent of problem drinkers heavy drinkers are over 20. It purposefully ignores the real issues which are price availability and the $70 million spent annually on alcohol advertising. Lastly it ignores the real issue which is our cultural problem. 
The split age will be confusing and it will not work. It sends the wrong signal and there is no evidence that it will work at all. It is going to benefit only the pub owners and encourage people to pile into town. In my city a third of the crime occurs in the “golden mile” mostly as a result of alcohol. Why would we want to push our young men and young women downtown into that environment where we know crime and sexual abuse is happening now because of alcohol? 
So in summary raising the age is not fair it will not be effective and it will not address the real problem. We are missing the chance to take a bold honest approach to the real issues facing our country but sadly all we are doing is scapegoating and discriminating against young New Zealanders. It is not fair. It is not on. 
IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North) 
: 
 I have listened to the impassioned contributions that members have made this afternoon. I have watched members interject on one another with considerable passion. I have read the pages and pages of media articles on this issue of the purchase age. I have read the hundreds of emails that I have received on this issue. I still stand this afternoon to speak in this debate without any enthusiasm for any of the options that we have before us this afternoon. 
Despite this vote on the purchase age once we have completed it today at the end of the day—this afternoon when we have voted—we will be no closer to dealing with alcohol-related harm than we were at the beginning of the day. This aspect of the Alcohol Reform Bill will have the least impact on alcohol-related harm. In fact I expect that it will have almost no impact on alcohol-related harm. I have tried to figure out what the best approach is to this option. Knowing that it is going to have very little effect I am tempted to vote for 18 because that is the status quo. I have listened to the evidence that people have offered for raising the age to 20. It is true that young people’s brains are developing. If we were going to work on that basis alone maybe we should set the purchase age at 25 because that would be the appropriate age—when young people’s brains have fully developed. That is not going to happen. So whichever one of these options we choose is an arbitrary decision. 
I have decided though that I am going to vote for the split age. The reason I am going to vote for the split age is not that I think 18 and 19-year-olds are the source of the problem. I appreciate that problem drinking occurs at all different ages. When the purchase age came down to 18 in 1999 I was 21 years old. I supported the drop to 18 because I thought it would be a good thing to make young people’s drinking legal—they would be purchasing in on-licences—and to try to create a more positive drinking culture. But the unintended consequence has been that very young teenagers are more able to get their hands on alcohol because 18-year-olds whom they interact with at school are able to supply that alcohol to those very young teenagers. It is on that aspect alone that my first preference will be the split age. I think we need to put a gap between people who are able to purchase alcohol and those very young teenagers who are drinking more and more. 
I would like to address this question of rural youngsters drinking. I do not think for an instant that this option is going to stop 18 and 19-year-olds being able to get their hands on alcohol purchased by someone who is 20 and older and being able to drink it outside of an off-licence. I do not think that 18 and 19-year-old rural people are going to have any problem being able to drink at home or at somebody else’s home alcohol supplied by someone who is 20 or older. My concern is those very very young teenagers and their ability to get their hands on alcohol. 
I appreciate that the sources of alcohol for youngsters are many and varied that 18 and 19-year-olds are just one source of alcohol for those youngsters and that this option is by no means the silver bullet. There is no silver bullet in this alcohol reform legislation. But this issue is the weakest one and it really has disappointed me that there has been so much passion so much debate and so much energy that has gone into this issue. I am aware that there are plans for tactical voting to ensure that one of the options gets through. I am certainly aware of the very strong “keep it 18” lobby. My hope and passion is that we see this same amount of effort go into the issues in the Alcohol Reform Bill that will actually make a difference. 
MIKE SABIN (National—Northland) 
: 
 In terms of the debate this afternoon on the purchase age can I just firstly acknowledge the Minister in the chair the Hon Judith Collins in terms of the wider reforms in the Alcohol Reform Bill. I also acknowledge the member Tim Macindoe for his Supplementary Order Paper 280 which I will be supporting. 
I have 17 years’ background in both policing and drug education and policy and I believe that to some extent I have had some grassroots experience in understanding the context of the problems this nation is grappling with. I will be asking members to raise the purchase age to 20 for two core reasons: firstly the biological and physiological side of the discussion and secondly in terms of culture change and empowering communities. 
In terms of the biology the adolescent brain is biologically quite different from that of a grown mature adult. The human brain is the most complex tapestry in the known universe. We are born with 100 billion neurons each capable of making around 10000 connections with one another and that is just as a baby. The changes in the brain are dramatic over the course of the adolescent years. That is the time that most of the change is occurring. It is the time that brain scientists will tell us the brain is most susceptible to harm. It is also a time when the brain is absorbing drugs and alcohol—in particular in terms of this discussion—eight times quicker and metabolising them some three times slower. 
The problems that can occur in an adolescent brain can lead to a far higher probability of ongoing problems in adult life not just with addiction but also in terms of overall brain function. Alcohol is a depressant in that it slows brain function. The first effect of alcohol is to impair judgment. The second is to lower inhibition and alongside that to stimulate dopamine and give a pleasure or reinforcement to that activity. Therefore what we are talking about is the first thing that happens to an 18-year-old brain which is that it is impaired it slows the judgment is altered and the activity is reinforced. In my view there is a big difference between an 18-year-old brain and a 20-year-old brain not just in terms of how it metabolises alcohol but also in terms of maturity of the individual their judgment their ability to make decisions and the influence of their peers at that stage. I believe that there is a difference between an 18-year-old and a 20-year-old and the long and short of it is that I believe the longer we can delay the uptake or certainly the heavy abuse of alcohol the better it will be for that individual. 
As part of the studies that I did looking at drug policy it was quite clear from examples in the United States since prohibition that as the purchase age rose the harm reduced and as the purchase age reduced so the harm increased. 
Just in terms of culture change and empowerment as a drug educator I spoke to some 150000 people around the country over 5 years. The overwhelming sentiment from the people whom I stood in front of was that the change to the purchase age that had occurred in 1999 was a major contributor to the drinking problems we have now. I do not necessarily agree that that is the case but it is the perception and that perception has become a very strong reality. Therefore a change in the purchase age will indeed have a major impact in terms of sending a message that culture change must occur. I believe that that message is very important. In terms of sending a message and empowering our communities by saying we acknowledge that this change has been a contributing factor—albeit I do not believe it is the only factor but it is certainly one of the big ones—and by changing it we are empowering a community that we will rely on in the time moving forward because the purchase age in itself is not the panacea. 
We will grapple with this problem for a long time yet. We need the public’s support to do that and they are looking to us in this Chamber today to give them the tools to say we acknowledge that this has been an issue and that changing the age is sending that message that is so desperately needed. As I say it will not solve all the problems but we need the public on our side. I want members to consider both the physical and biological impacts of alcohol and I want them to consider that we need parents and community on our side. I implore members— 
Hon PHIL GOFF (Labour—Mt Roskill) 
: 
 I intend in this part of the Alcohol Reform Bill to vote to lift the purchase age from an off-licence to 20 and to maintain the purchase age in an on-licence at 18 and I will go into the reasons why I am differentiating between the two. But what I want to say is that this bill gives us really a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to address a problem that every member of this House understands is one of the biggest social and economic problems facing our country. You know you can throw the statistics around. The Alcohol Advisory Council talks about $5 billion to $6 billion a year. The Ministry of Health talks about 1000 unnecessary deaths each year being caused by alcohol. What other abuse of a product would we tolerate happening in our society with that sort of cost? 
I want to talk about the human cost too. In part I draw on the report that we have from the Law Commission. We set up that report under a Labour Government because we wanted an evidence-based approach to dealing with the problem of alcohol abuse and addiction. I ask what the point is of setting up a report if you do not intend to follow the recommendations that it makes. In voting to lift the purchase age I am very conscious of the dangers of doing that. The real danger of doing that is that we can be very sanctimonious and say: “Hey we’ve dealt with the problem here. We’ve stopped those bad young people abusing alcohol and everything will be all right.” Everybody in this Chamber knows as well that alcohol abuse is not the sole preserve of the young. And everybody in this Chamber knows that when it comes to role modelling our generation have been very bad role models for those who are following through. 
I am influenced by the evidence-based approach of the Law Commission. I am equally influenced by the experience of witnessing my generation and how we abused alcohol and then of having kids who are now—thank God—safely in their mid-20s and of watching the abuse of alcohol in their generation. I am not prepared as a member of Parliament to tolerate any longer the level of harm and damage that is being done to our society when we have the opportunity to address that. 
A few months back I took up an invitation of an incredibly angry and frustrated doctor at the accident and emergency department at Auckland City Hospital. He asked me to go up on a Saturday night to get there about 10 and stay until about 5 in the morning and I would see what hospital staff had to deal with every day. I have got to tell you that while I was up there I saw that on a third of the admission forms that I looked at there were these large letters on the top “ETOH” which means it is an ethanol or alcohol-related illness or injury. I have to say that disproportionately they were young people who were coming in. We are witnessing the damage that is happening. We know the damage that is done to young people’s minds. I listened to my colleague Megan Woods and I am sympathetic to some of her points. Yes the brain continues to develop up to age 20— 
Hon Members 
: 25. 
Hon PHIL GOFF 
: —to 25—but the truth is unless we do something to stop younger people in the lower echelons getting access to alcohol now they are going to be damaged and the cost is going to be permanent. I know and my kids know from experience that when they were 15 and 16 they got their 18-year-old mates to buy alcohol and to give it to them if they could not get it out of their parents. Well they went to their parents’ liquor cabinet tipped out the gin filled it up with water and we discovered that some months later. You know it is funny in one sense but I saw some things with those kids there putting their lives at risk putting themselves at risk of violence and of sexual violation which I do not want to see happening. 
Lifting the age is not the only solution. If we think that is the only thing we are going to do we are wasting our time in this House. We have to change the culture. But it is a place to start and when the Law Commission says definitively to us and I want to read out the section that “one of the interventions with the greatest evidence of effectiveness is increasing the minimum purchase or drinking age.” I am bound to pay attention to what it has told us on the basis of the extensive and analytical work that it has done. This is a start. It is not the only thing we need to do. 
Hon ANNE TOLLEY (Minister of Police) 
: 
 I am pleased to take a call and speak to Part 2 of the Alcohol Reform Bill. I want to make it very clear that I am standing here in this House speaking as the MP for the East Coast not as the Minister of Police. I represent an area that runs from just south of Gisborne around to the end of the Matata Straights. It is an area that has a population that is split 50:50 between Maori and Pakeha. It is an area that has a very young population. It has got the best surfing and the best beaches in the whole of New Zealand I reckon but unfortunately it also shares some pretty bad statistics. When you look at the statistics in my area on things like youth crime youth unemployment family violence drunk and disorderly behaviour drink-driving and crashes and injuries caused by alcohol we are always either at the top or very nearly at the top. 
I agree with the previous speaker the Hon Phil Goff that the debate here today on age is not going to solve on its own any of that—any of that. 
Dr Jackie Blue 
: It’s a starting point. 
Hon ANNE TOLLEY 
: But it is a starting point and there is a massive bill in front of this House that puts into play most of the Law Commission’s recommendations which will start addressing some of those bad statistics. 
 As an electorate MP I have always maintained that I am the voice of the electorate. So with this very important issue I have canvassed my electorate and I am here standing in the House today and will vote in accordance with the will that I have ascertained from my electorate. I have done that in a variety of ways. I have surveyed. I have had little slips for people to fill in at A and P shows and craft fairs. I have been out and talked with groups at every opportunity. I have met and talked with young people in high schools and the Students Against Drunk Driving. I have talked to young people. I have talked to old people. I have talked to people wherever I can get hold of them. I have talked to them about alcohol and what they believe the law of the land should be doing to help them as parents as members of the community or as students address the issues around alcohol that cause so many of those bad statistics. 
Of course everyone has a view and almost united they are all concerned at the predominance of alcohol in our community. They are concerned at the predominance of it in the damage that is done with binge drinking and at the damage that binge drinking causes young people. They get into situations where they are unsafe for themselves and for others. People are concerned at the number of driving accidents that are caused by alcohol the unwanted pregnancies that are caused by alcohol our soaring sexually transmitted disease rates which are in part caused by alcohol and of course the assaults and family violence that are caused by alcohol. 
So overwhelmingly—in fact I think the response to my survey was about 4500-odd replies—80 to 85 percent of the respondents in my electorate have said “Please put the drinking age back to 20. Please put it back.” That includes interestingly enough young students who have said “Please help us. Please help us because so many of our friends have been injured and are unable to manage themselves and we rely on you as the lawmakers of this country to put into place laws that will protect us and our friends.” So I stand in this House today on behalf of the people in the electorate of the East Coast who have responded to me over these past 12 to 13 months that we have been talking about this issue to say overwhelmingly that the experiment of lowering the drinking age to 18 has not worked. It has not worked to save and protect our young people in particular and we should raise the drinking age to 20. 
MOANA MACKEY (Labour) 
: 
 One of the extraordinary things about this debate on the Alcohol Reform Bill has been the extent to which no matter how people are voting everyone seems to agree that raising the age will not really make much of a difference in and of itself. I agree because in terms of the tools available in my mind the age of purchase is the least effective and the least likely to make any difference despite the fact that it overwhelmingly disproportionately gets most of the attention. 
I want to read out an email that I got from a young woman whom I know very well who said that she would hurt me if I mentioned her name in Parliament so I will not. She said: “Moana as you know I don’t normally pay attention to politics but this drinking-age debate has me really mad. I don’t drink. I’m 18. It’s not for any particular reason that I don’t drink—I just don’t want to. I wish I could give a more scientific insightful answer so politicians could clone me but I can’t. But I am looking forward to graduating this year after 13 years of schooling with my friends. We’ve hired a beach house for the weekend and I was looking forward to my first glass of champagne with mates. Now apparently my elected representatives think that I need to be punished for the bad behaviour of others and maybe after today I won’t be able to do that. What the hell did I do to you guys? My dad drinks way too much. Are you going to stop all 52-year-olds from buying alcohol based on his behaviour? And you wonder why young people don’t engage in politics. Why would we when the only time we hear from you guys is when we are constantly being blamed for all the world’s ills without anyone bothering to talk to us?”. That is from a young woman whom I am very proud of and whom I know very well. 
I agree with all the concerns raised by people about the harm that alcohol does in terms of the brain development of young people in terms of accidents and violence and in terms of crime. But changing the age will not make a blind bit of difference to this. It will not at all. I have read a lot of research. I have read research from people who say: “Yes changing the age will make a difference. Here are two different case studies.” But what those case studies never mention is the different demographics of the communities that they are comparing and whether or not there are public health campaigns that are going on in one area that are not going on in another area. And overwhelmingly they do not mention a trend. They all look at a snapshot in time which does not show the overall trend in alcohol consumption and behaviour. This is a highly complex issue and I urge members away from assuming a causal relationship between alcohol and other factors that they may see happening. It is simply not that easy. 
But alcohol is more visible. There is no question about that. And should we be surprised when we live in the age of video and photo-capable mobile phones of YouTube and of Facebook? It is no surprise. When I went to a party I could have taken any number of videos or photos of dangerous teenage binge drinking but I would have had to carry my clunky camera with the clip-in flash or one of those on-the-shoulder video cameras and wait a week for the film to be processed. It hardly has the same immediacy that a mobile phone and Facebook have. So I urge members to take that into consideration when they think about how much more visible dangerous drinking is at the moment. 
What we need to do is we need to change the attitudes. That will drive the behavioural change. That will change the culture. I understand that it is counter-intuitive but the Alcohol Advisory Council’s own figures tell us that since the drinking age was lowered in 1999 when there was great concern that the number of young people drinking would increase because they would be able to get it from their 18-year-old mates in fact the number of young people drinking has dramatically lowered. It has dropped from 80 percent of under-18-year-olds in 1996 to 32 percent in 2010. We are seeing a cultural shift in that younger age group which has not been there before. Why are we not asking why that is happening and promoting that instead of messing about with this distraction which will not do anything except take our eyes off the ball? 
Why did that culture shift happen? It was not because the age was lowered. It was because when the age was lowered the public concern mounted suddenly a spotlight was put on an activity that before was ignored or tolerated and suddenly public health campaigns were rolled out. When I was at high school no one told me that we should not be binge drinking. No one told us that it was bad for us. There were no ads on TV. There were no public health campaigns. It was largely ignored and binge drinking was tolerated. When the age was lowered to 18 in 1999 that changed. Suddenly the attitudes shifted and that is what has made the difference. Changing the law in terms of the age of purchase will not do anything and I urge members to think about that seriously. 
I say to my colleague the Hon Lianne Dalziel that I heard that she did not have pre-loading in her generation. We did in ours; we just did not have a word for it. We now know that it is called pre-loading and we did it. It was around then and it was dangerous. 
The most important point I want to make to members—and it is a very serious point—is about the message that we send to young people. Too often in this Chamber young people are always the problem. We wonder why they do not vote. 
Dr Cam Calder 
: We’re not saying that. 
MOANA MACKEY 
: We wonder why voter turnout—that is the message that they are getting Dr Calder. I really appreciate sincerely your views on this issue but the reality is that of the 700000 problem drinkers less than 10 percent are under the age of 20. 
Dr JACKIE BLUE (National) 
: 
 I would like to acknowledge Tim Macindoe for bringing his Supplementary Order Paper 280 on the Alcohol Reform Bill to the Committee. I am firmly behind raising the purchase age to 20 and 20. I would like to acknowledge the Minister in the chair the Minister of Justice. Basically since the purchase age was dropped in 1999 it has been a failed experiment. The Committee has a chance to reverse that today and I sincerely hope that it does. It has been particularly harmful to youth although young people are not the whole problem. I acknowledge that and I will talk to that issue later on in my speech. 
Research that shows how youth are being harmed and the effect it has had has been backed up by research from the national New Zealand Alcohol and Drug Use Survey which analysed the data and the surveys since 1995. There has been a statistically significant increase in binge-drinking patterns especially among youth and especially among young women. There has been an increase in alcohol-related traffic accidents although admittedly Safer Journeys is addressing that to a good degree. There has been an increase in hospitalisations with alcohol-use disorders alcohol poisoning and assaults. The recommendation was quite clear: increase the purchase age to 20 no excuses because we have a youth-drinking alcohol-related harm problem among young people and it continues to increase. 
The 20-20 option is supported by experts by addiction experts and by health experts. You go and ask your accident and emergency doctors—and I acknowledge what Phil Goff said. I absolutely support that. Professor Sir Peter Gluckman our Prime Minister’s Chief Science Advisor supports the 20-20 option. The Law Commission initially supported a split-age option but once it looked at the international evidence talked to experts in New Zealand and got the best data it went to a 20-20 option. The public support is overwhelmingly 20-20— 
Hon Simon Bridges 
: Overwhelming. 
Dr JACKIE BLUE 
: Overwhelming. 
Hon Simon Bridges 
: Every electorate. 
Dr JACKIE BLUE 
: In every electorate. I have surveyed people in Mt Roskill and it is 20-20. Everyone has got an opinion and my gosh it is overwhelmingly in favour of 20-20. 
Dr Cam Calder 
: Especially in Hunua. Big support in Hunua. 
Dr JACKIE BLUE 
: Absolutely. The drinking age set as it currently is at age 18 means that the default age of drinking is lower—a couple of years lower and probably 16. All the health experts are absolutely adamant that the growing developing adolescent brain is vulnerable to alcohol and that is why an age of 20 is better than 18. There is no great science about it. Keep alcohol away from youth for as long as possible. It is a drug. It is a drug. It is a dangerous seductive drug. It alters the brain it impairs judgment it disinhibits and people make poor choices when they are drunk. 
 Alcohol has been used from time immemorial and that is why it is a legal drug. But if it was discovered for the first time in this century it would be banned or severely restricted. 
I agree that alcohol is not just a youth problem but we know that heavy youth drinkers become heavy older drinkers. That is why we have to turn it round at the youth stage because they become older drinkers. Although youth may think they are bulletproof and they can dodge health issues and not have an accident they will not dodge it when they get older. We know alcohol use is linked to cancers cardiovascular disease and stroke. Our health costs will increase and you taxpayers will have to pay for that. Yes I have heard the human rights issues that when you are 18 you can go to war you can vote and you can get married. But let us not forget that alcohol is a drug and it has been made equivalent to a class B drug in its effects like morphine or Ecstasy. I repeat if it was discovered for the first time this century it would be banned we would not be having it it would be restricted and we certainly would not have the laws that we have now governing it. 
The 20-20 option will not stop 18-year-olds drinking. Under adult supervision they will be able to do that so it is not banning drinking for 18-year-olds. Raising the purchase age is not going to be a silver bullet; we all acknowledge that. But this is part of a suite of changes where it will change the direction and change the culture. Raising the age will be a starting point and we have to start somewhere. We cannot go back to where we were and where we have gone. We must go forward and we have to increase the age. 
I want to acknowledge the public activism and the different campaigns. Part of that change will come with public activism. I acknowledge the FebFast campaigns which many of you in Parliament have taken part in. I would like to acknowledge the Hello Sunday Morning campaign in which high-profile New Zealanders took part where they pledged not to drink for 3 months. It was all about waking up on Sunday morning without a hangover clear in the mind getting a lot more work done and being more productive. Then there are the Dry July campaigns. There is a momentum out there and that is why the public support 20-20. To the constituent MPs: if you want to get voted in again vote 20-20. 
KRIS FAAFOI (Labour—Mana) 
: 
 As the member of Parliament for Mana my electorate takes in the entire city of Porirua. It is a diverse city and it is actually the youngest city in the country. Putting out that responsibility of making sure those youngsters get the best start in life is something I take very seriously. I do agree with all the members in this Committee that our drinking culture and our drinking attitude in New Zealand is a serious and complex issue but I do not think we are going to solve it with just a simple answer of lifting the drinking age to 20. 
Like most members of Parliament I think it has been difficult to clear our emails over the last couple of weeks. We have been heavily lobbied on both the Marriage (Definition of Marriage) Amendment Bill and the purchase age of alcohol in the Alcohol Reform Bill. I would like to thank people from both sides of the fence on this issue for making sure that they have let us know their opinions. 
Many in my community share a collective concern about the harm that alcohol is doing in our streets in our clubs in our pubs and especially in our homes. I am absolutely committed to reducing the harm that youth drinking is doing and making sure our youngsters are as safe as possible. But I do not think that changing the purchase age will make a major headway into changing drinking culture. 
I have canvassed my community and I have taken the opportunity to speak to our local police our local public health specialists other public representatives pub owners and of course members of the community. Although there is evidence within my community that youth drinking and the negative effects of that are a problem I do believe we have to face up to the issue that there is also a problem for those in their 20s those in their 30s those in their 40s those in their 50s and those in their 60s. I think it would be unfair to disadvantage 18 and 19-year-olds solely because of the drinking culture that we all have in New Zealand. 
I do not think that this issue alone—the purchase age of alcohol—addresses all of the complex issues that are before us when we look at alcohol consumption in New Zealand. I do think a lot of it will come down to changing our attitudes of personal responsibility as parents and as adults. Everyone in New Zealand will have to make sure that education is much better. What is acceptable in our streets our homes and our pubs and clubs must be better. Our expectations and most of all our attitudes must change. Our attitudes much change. Attitudes of people of all ages in New Zealand must change. 
I am voting to keep the purchase age at 18 but I will be looking at tougher measures throughout the rest of the bill. I do not think the bill as it stands takes issues seriously enough. I do think this is an opportunity that we should not miss to toughen up all the alcohol issues that face New Zealand. But most of all our attitudes must change. 
DENIS O’ROURKE (NZ First) 
: 
 First of all Mr Chairman—[ 
Interruption 
] 
The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch) 
: Order! I know that he member has had a call before. He is the only spokesman for New Zealand First and he will have this call. [ 
Interruption 
] Order! I am keeping track of who has calls. It is Denis O’Rourke. 
DENIS O’ROURKE 
: Could I begin by thanking other members for their various contributions which I think for the most part have been good-natured. I have enjoyed listening to the debate whatever people have said and whichever way they think. 
I cannot accept that the 20-20 option for the purchasing age—and it is the purchasing age and not the drinking age as some people seem to think—would not make a contribution to reducing the youth binge-drinking culture. It is the youth binge-drinking culture that we are concerned about with the purchasing age because that is what is relevant to youth—the purchasing age. Those members who keep talking about the problem amongst older people are simply not addressing the nexus of the issue. 
 The real issue is this: is a person more mature and able to handle alcohol at the age of 20 than at 18? The answer has to be yes. That is utterly undeniable and that is why I am voting for 20 and not 18. It is as simple as that in the end. Another thing is this: if there are many steps we need to take other than addressing the purchasing age then we should do that but that does not mean we should not address the purchasing age as well. That is what this debate is about. 
I want to refer now to what has happened in the past because I think we can learn from the past as well. First of all in the period 1881 to 1904 a period of 23 years the purchasing age was 16 years of age—in a period when there was high tolerance of the abuse of alcohol. In the following period of 6 years from 1904 to 1910 the purchasing age was raised to 18 years. But it was found that that age did not work so then in 1910 the age was increased to 21 years. That was maintained for 59 years until 1969—21 years of age was the purchasing age for that period of 59 years. It was not until 1999 after a period of 30 years that it was reduced to 20 years of age simply because that was the age of majority. In 1970 of course the Age of Majority Act had been passed. Then in 1999 for some misguided reason it was reduced again to 18 years of age. So after 89 years it was reduced to 18 years of age which has done nothing but cause harm since then. 
So if we are going to learn anything from history it is that previous generations found that the appropriate age for purchasing for most of that period by far was either 21 or 20 years of age. The lesson is simply this: lower ages have never worked and never will. The appropriate age for purchasing—and it is the purchasing and not the drinking we are talking about—is 20 years of age. That is currently the age of majority. The issue of other ages for other duties and other rights is completely irrelevant. This is a matter of judgment for us all about what is the correct age the most appropriate age for the purchasing of alcohol. 
I would remind some of those members who keep talking about evidence of one sort or another that the Law Commission in 2010 did in fact conclude that the reduction to 18 had resulted in greater harm to the young from alcohol. I know that my friends here in the Labour Party—some of them anyway—deny that. They talk about evidence and they produce it but that conclusion was made after a review of the evidence by people who knew how to do exactly that. 
So in my view and in the view of New Zealand First as a whole 20-20 is the correct option 20-18 is completely illogical and confusing and 18 has never worked and never will and we should not allow it to continue. However like many other members I do agree that addressing just the purchasing age alone is not enough. Many other things are needed too. That is something we will debate later. It is not for debate here and now as some members have tried to do. We need to look at penalties. 
MICHAEL WOODHOUSE (National) 
: 
 I purchased my first crate of beer out the back door of Heffs Hotel in King Edward Street Dunedin— 
Grant Robertson 
: Mine was at the Bay View. 
MICHAEL WOODHOUSE 
: —Bay View was it—in September 1981. It was the day of the third test between the All Blacks and the Springboks that famous flour bomb test. Mr Hague might have been there. I was watching the game at a mate’s place and it was my turn to buy the beer. Nikki Kaye was probably toddling around Auckland in nappies. 
I expect most people born before 1975 have a similar story to tell because in my adolescence it was easier actually to get alcohol from licensed premises and it was really hard to get it from family or anyone other than close friends. I think what has changed since the purchase age went down is that it has now become harder to get alcohol from licensed premises but easier for under-18s to get it from other sources. This is really important because in order to justify raising the age again we need to be sure that lowering the age was in fact the cause of rather than simply correlated with the alcohol-related harm. The Law Commission referenced several studies on increases in things like emergency department presentations violence and motor vehicle accidents but in most of those studies the data is for youth aged 15 to 19 or 15 to 24 so the studies include harm by those aged above 20 who are not affected by this change and those below 18. 
So my question is this: what benefit if any will a change in the purchase age for 18 and 19-year-olds have on our drinking culture? The studies do show that although the harm to 18 and 19-year-olds went up after 1999 it also went up in other age groups at the same time as other changes were being made like the introduction of beer in supermarkets. Correlation is not cause. 
Regardless of how I vote on this part I want to endorse the other policies in the bill that focus on youth harm and the most important one of those I think is the express permission that parents will need to get in order to allow young people to drink in their homes. I do not think that change has been given anything like the credit it deserves. I get the point young people make when they say that they are not the only age group that experience excessive drinking. But older drinkers with problems start as younger drinkers with problems and younger drinkers definitely seem to drink more and more regularly than a generation ago. 
If we are to make meaningful change we need to start with the young but I am convinced that the law changes will not do that. What we need is an attitude change and a culture change and I want to see our young leaders bringing about that culture change. We see it in smoking and in drink-driving and in a plethora of other youth issues. What I do not yet see is young leaders taking the lead in developing and driving that responsible drinking culture. I hear lots of platitudes about individual rights and harm minimisation and so on. Students at Otago University plead the case to enable 5000 of them to go to Hyde Street every year and get completely trolleyed. As long as they clean up after themselves they think that is all right. There are TV ads that say that getting completely smashed but not driving home is OK not that getting smashed in the first place is not OK. 
Our Young Nats have led the Keep it 18 campaign. I get their arguments about being old enough to fight fornicate vote etc. but not old enough to buy a beer at the end of a hard day’s study. They have reminded us about the National Party value of individual freedom. I want to remind them of that other National Party value: personal responsibility. So I say to Young Nats president Sean Topham and the other regional chairs: you are the future leaders of our party possibly of our country. Take leadership on this issue. Lead the change in the discourse amongst our young. Actively promote the message that alcohol consumption is normal but excessive consumption is not that getting trashed is dumb in the same way that smoking or drink-driving is dumb that messages on campus should be that the taxpayer is entitled to expect that their hard-earned taxpayer money which is funding students’ education is not thrown up against the wall of the Captain Cook Tavern every Thursday to Sunday. Show that sort of leadership and I will show support and vote to Keep it 18. 
GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central) 
: 
 I also grew up in the same city as Michael Woodhouse although he was a little older than me— 
Andrew Little 
: When did you buy your first beer? 
GRANT ROBERTSON 
: Well I bought my first beer Mr Little from a pub in Dunedin. I probably should not name it but I will. It was called the Waterloo Hotel in South Dunedin and I was a bit younger than Mr Woodhouse when I purchased that. At that point in life the purchase age was 20 as it was I think for Mr Little when he was probably growing up then and I was significantly younger than 20 when I was purchasing alcohol from that pub. 
Hon Tau Henare 
: What? You broke the law? 
GRANT ROBERTSON 
: I have privilege Tau so I can say that in here. But the point that I am making is that regardless of whatever the age is we are not actually going to be able to address the problems that arise from alcohol consumption with a focus on just the age. 
Binge drinking in New Zealand is a significant problem. I spent a period of time as the Labour Party’s health spokesperson last year and around the country I met many people who have to deal with the downstream effects of alcohol and of binge drinking. It is an enormously serious health issue and social issue for this country to face up to. And that is why I think that when we come to the other far more significant parts of this bill the Alcohol Reform Bill where we focus on the price of alcohol when we talk about the availability and accessibility of it through supermarkets and when we talk about advertising and sponsorship they will be the issues that we should be debating in depth in the detail and with the passion that we seem to be debating today the purchasing age because they are the issues that will make—all the evidence tells us—the biggest difference in terms of the way that people treat alcohol and in the way that people use alcohol in the future. 
It is not to say that the age has no impact whatsoever but I do not believe that by moving it from 18 back to 20 we will make the difference that members of this House seem to think. Those differences will be made by families and parents actually having sensible conversations at a younger age with their children about alcohol. That kind of difference will be made when we are honest about the effects of alcohol when we do not glorify it through the advertising and sponsorship arrangements that we have now and when we do have a serious conversation about minimum pricing rather than politicising the issue or trying to make it into some kind of nanny State taxation-type issue by saying that this is how we will make the biggest difference. 
When I talk to somebody like Dr Geoffrey Robinson who runs the detox unit at Kenepuru Hospital—who in fairness would support increasing the purchase age I am sure—what he also says though is that the most significant change in the 30 years that he has worked there is the availability of alcohol through supermarkets. That is the biggest change—the availability of cheap low-priced loss-leading alcohol sales in supermarkets. That is where I believe the focus should be. I think we should back young people in New Zealand to be able to take the decisions they take with the right information around them. I believe that we should keep the age of purchase at 18. It is a decision that we can support our young people in rather than sitting here in Parliament dictating to them in a way that—I am not allowed to use a word but if I were to vote to see this age raised given my experience at the Waterloo Hotel I would be that word and that would be a hypocrite. I am not prepared to be that and I will be supporting retaining the purchase age at 18. 
HOLLY WALKER (Green) 
: 
 As I rise to speak today I have not had a drink for 30 days. At the beginning of August I undertook to spend a month alcohol-free as part of a programme called Hello Sunday Morning; it was referred to in the Chamber earlier. The aim of Hello Sunday Morning and other similar initiatives like Febfast and Dry July is to encourage us to check our relationship with alcohol and to be reminded that we do not need it in order to live a fun social and fulfilled life by putting it aside for a while. Such movements are a direct challenge to the unhealthy drinking culture that we undoubtedly have in New Zealand. I believe they are the kinds of initiatives that with great leadership from our role models and our young leaders will help change that culture. 
And that culture does urgently need to change. We need to learn that we can celebrate and express love and joy and grieve and watch sport and go on holiday and relieve stress and come of age and bond with friends and strangers and dance and listen to music and stay out late and get to sleep and generally live happy fulfilled lives without drinking to excess and indeed without drinking at all if we prefer. 
Generations of young people are growing up in New Zealand learning the exact opposite from their parents from their friends from their communities from their sports clubs and from their heroes. We have an unhealthy harmful binge drinking culture in New Zealand which affects all age groups and all income levels. Young people learn to drink from their families and their communities and they learn very harmful habits. We need to change this culture but raising the purchase age will not achieve that change. In fact I think it will make it less likely that we will see measures to change that culture because the implication will be that we have dealt with the problem of youth binge drinking we have dealt with the problem of alcohol-related harm and we can all have a glass of wine and quietly forget about the problem. 
 But that is not what will happen. Changing the age will send a message that problem drinking is just a young person’s problem when in fact 92 percent of problem drinkers are over the age of 20. It will punish young people especially those aged 18 and 19 for a problem that is not of their making. These are people whom we consider to be adults in our society. They can vote stand for Parliament serve in the armed forces get married have children hold a firearms licence and sell and manage the purchase of alcohol. Yet we may say to them that no they cannot buy a beer and that simply is not fair. 
I know that many members of this House believe strongly in equality before the law and I ask those members to apply that principle to this debate just as many of them did last night. As long as our harmful binge drinking culture remains at all levels of society young people will look for ways to drink to excess and we tell them all the time in our glorification of alcohol that that is what they need to do to have a good time. Raising the age will inevitably see greater supply to minors and people who cannot legally purchase alcohol by themselves. 
On the other hand there is no evidence that lowering the purchase age to 18 as we did in 1999 has increased under-age drinking and supply. In 1997 the Alcohol Advisory Council’s annual alcohol monitor survey showed that 80 percent of 14 to 18-year-olds identified themselves as drinkers. In 2010 only 32 percent of the comparable age bracket of 12 to 17-year-olds were drinkers. That is a massive decrease. That same survey shows that the age at which young people start drinking has been increasing. In 2006 35 percent of young drinkers said they started drinking before they turned 14. In 2010 it was just 21 percent. 
Many members of this House believe strongly in evidence-based policy. We should listen to the evidence that the majority of problem drinkers are over 20 and that youth drinking has not been increasing since the purchase age was lowered and we should focus on measures that can change the culture of harmful drinking in New Zealand rather than simply be seen to do so. 
I want to turn now to the so-called compromise option that is on the table in this debate—the split purchase age of 18 for on-licence and 20 for off-licence. On first glance this might seem like a sensible compromise but in fact I believe it will only create further harms that will affect not only 18 and 19-year-old drinkers but also the rest of us. 
HONE HARAWIRA (Leader—Mana) 
: 
 Kia ora Mr Chair. Kia ora tatou katoa e te Whare. I will come back to Mr Tau Henare and Mr Simon Bridges a little bit later. I know that some of this stuff has been said before but I want to reiterate that I want to support it. Thirteen years ago the purchase age for alcohol in this country was reduced from 20 to 18. Within a few years it became obvious that although the new freedom was very popular amongst teenagers and the alcohol industry alcohol-related harm to teenagers had increased. 
In 2006 Matt Robson introduced a bill to put the purchase age back up to 20 but it was defeated following a last-minute announcement that the Government would hold a review of the sale and supply of liquor to minors. That review was very low profile and achieved nothing. Since then however alcohol-related harm to teenagers has continued and become increasingly alarming to many people particularly parents doctors nurses police hospital emergency department staff the judiciary and virtually all other health and social agency workers along with the majority of the general public. 
In 2010 the Law Commission initially supported the split age proposal so 18-year-olds could buy alcohol in pubs but you had to be 20 to buy it from liquor stores and supermarkets. However after a comprehensive review of all the evidence about harm to teenagers from alcohol the commission’s final recommendation was to return the purchase age to 20 across the board. Why? Because that review showed that the consumption of alcohol by teenagers was a significant problem for the well-being of all New Zealand youth and a contributing factor in rates of educational problems depression self-harm suicide vehicle accidents injuries falls drowning fire physical and sexual assaults reckless and unwanted sexual behaviour pregnancy and termination of pregnancy. On top of all that there was also evidence that since the purchase age was lowered from 20 to 18 there had been a greater level of binge drinking not just by 18 to 20-year-olds but also in younger age groups a greater level of public disobedience associated with alcohol consumption amongst youth and more young people killed and maimed on our roads as a direct result of alcohol abuse. 
A few months ago I did a tour around my electorate and other parts of the country seeking Maori views on this issue. What I found was that amongst rangatahi Maori only one 18-year-old thought it would be a good idea to raise the purchase age back up to 20. Mind you when I asked a number of 16-year-olds whether the purchase age should be kept at 18 or lowered to 16 funnily enough 80 percent of them thought it should be lowered to 16. But this decision is ours to make. 
Our first priority should not be the profits of the booze barons generated from the expensive television ads developed and specifically targeted at the younger drinker and from the sale of alcopops specifically brewed packaged and marketed to teenagers. Nor indeed should it be the votes of the 18 to 20-year-olds. It should be the health and well-being of our young people. Returning the minimum purchase age to 20 in both licensed premises and off-licences is certainly not the answer to all of the alcohol problems this country faces but it is definitely part of the answer. 
I would just like to go back to some work that the Hon Tau Henare the Hon Simon Bridges and I were engaged in in terms of the tobacco inquiry. That was about another issue another product but we were very concerned about the impact of tobacco on Maori and in particular on young Maori. One of the things we went after was tobacco companies in terms of the packaging and the display and the reason why was that we wanted to try to reduce tobacco’s impact on young people. Well no moves are being made against alcopops and the kind of advertising that is targeted totally at young people. Until those things are done we need to raise the age to a point where we know that fewer of our young people are going to be dying on the roads and dying from the damage done by alcohol abuse. And at some time in the future once we are old enough and mature enough to deal with all the other issues in terms of access price and availability we can come back to the issue of age. Until then kia kaha tatou ki te tautoko i te kaupapa. Kia ora tatou katoa. 
[ 
We must be strong in supporting the matter. Thanks to us all. 
] 
Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Minister of Consumer Affairs) 
: 
 I was on the Justice and Electoral Committee for all of the last term and into this term and I sat through all of the hearings on alcohol that we heard. I heard hundreds of submitters as deputy chairman I listened intently and I am absolutely convinced there is not a single doubt in my mind that we should raise the age to 20. I agree with the members in this Chamber who have spoken. I do not always agree with the Rt Hon Winston Peters but I agreed with him when he said lowering it was the silliest thing we ever did. It was the silliest thing and one of the silliest things this House has ever done. 
I will come back to the evidence because it is a great irony that the other side of this Chamber likes to talk about evidence when it suits them but actually the evidence here is completely for raising it in total. I want to say this first: raising the age to 20 across the board is by far and away the most popular thing across the country electorate by electorate. Other than maybe Chris Hipkins Nikki Kaye Gareth Hughes and a few pimply Young Nats that is what the vast majority of New Zealanders want. That is what the vast majority of New Zealanders want. This is not— 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: Order! Order! 
Hon Tau Henare 
: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. I take offence at being referred to as a pimply-faced Young Nat. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: I do not believe the member was. 
Hon SIMON BRIDGES 
: As I was saying this is not a liberal or conservative issue. If you go into central Auckland or central Wellington let alone to the East Coast or Tauranga the overwhelming majority of New Zealanders support 20 across the board. That is because they have common sense and that is because they are right. The evidence backs them. The evidence backs them entirely. 
I defy the other side of this Chamber and the members who are voting for other options to point to evidence that goes against my proposition that 20/20 is the way to go. Let me cite just a couple of things that stood out to me as I was on the select committee. First the No. 1 expert on this in the world a man by the name of Professor Babor who came along to our select committee from America—and he is the cited expert in the world on alcohol and alcohol-related harms—made it very clear that they could deduce that when they raised the age of drinking to 21 in America state by state suddenly the levels of harm and the deaths on the roads for 12 13 14 and 15-year-olds dropped entirely away. That is a very strong reason indeed for changing this. It is not about 18 and 19-year-olds as much as it is actually about 17 16 15 14 13 12 and 11-year-olds and the alcohol that they drink. I am not saying this will solve the world’s problems but it will make a difference. 
We have already heard much from a number of members about the neurology and the evidence but it is abundantly clear that adolescents cannot take alcohol and it has a much more harmful effect on their brains than it does for older New Zealanders. I say again to this Committee that this is popular this is what the overwhelming majority of New Zealanders in every single electorate in this country want and the evidence backs 20/20 all the way. 
Hon MARYAN STREET (Labour) 
: 
 Alcohol was not a big feature of my growing up. My parents drank very sparingly and when they did drink they were terribly careful because they did drink very sparingly. I was not in Parliament when this issue was last raised and put to the vote. As an outsider at that time watching parliamentarians vote on the issue I was firmly of the view that what was needed was education around drinking. Education was required and I thought that a lowering of the drinking age would provide the opportunity for that education so that we could get away from what used to be the 6 o’clock swill so that we could get away from immoderate drinking and so that we could learn to drink as other countries drink. I thought that this with a bit of time and a bit of education over time would alter our attitude towards drinking. 
I still believe in education as a critical component of addressing alcohol-related harm. I still consider education to be a critical component in turning round our dreadful behaviour in relation to alcohol consumption. I would love to think that education programmes could bring about more sensible drinking and somewhere inside me because I was an educator to begin with I still believe that. So my first preference in this instance is a split vote. I reject the argument that says it sends mixed messages to young people. Young people are entirely sophisticated enough to discern the difference between messages. So I do not accept the mixed message argument. 
What I do think is that licensed premises are more controlled environments or ought to be more controlled environments. We should be able to police them better we should be able to enforce the law better and we should be able to ensure that publicans and people who run cafes and nightclubs and so on do what is required of them as responsible hosts under the law. It is with pleasure that I have seen public restaurants and bars and so on punished in Nelson for serving under-age drinkers or for serving people who are intoxicated. It hurts them when they are punished and it does tune them up. If they lose 1 or 2 days’ income it hurts them. So when the law is enforced it can work. So I still prefer a split age as my first preference. However I have had to think long and hard about what I would do if that option failed. 
As the health spokesperson for the Labour Party I have been wrestling with this quite substantially. I cannot find a health professional or a health organisation that recommends anything other than raising the age to 20. I want to quote from a letter that the Royal Australasian College of Physicians sent to every member of the Health Committee: “Voting to raise the purchase age to 20 could in conjunction with other evidence-informed decisions regarding alcohol reform make a significant contribution to changing the culture of alcohol consumption in New Zealand.” 
On the basis of health reasons—and health reasons alone—should the split age fail I will vote for 20. I think that if I were to become the Minister of Health I could not look any health practitioner in the eye and say that I did not do everything I could to curb the harm that alcohol does. 
I do not think this is an anti - young person position to take; quite the contrary I think it is a pro - young person position to take. I could not in all conscience take on the health portfolio regardless of what the current Minister says—his conscience is not my problem; my conscience is my problem—look any health practitioner in the eye and say that I had not done everything I could. 
Dr PAUL HUTCHISON (National—Hunua) 
: 
 I appreciate the opportunity to speak on this bill the Alcohol Reform Bill. Firstly I would like to acknowledge all those organisations throughout the country that have spent so much time on agonising over and providing information on the purchase age and on the wider issue of minimising alcohol harm in New Zealand including the Law Commission. Secondly I acknowledge the good people of Hunua who have answered my surveys and given me their views which funnily enough have been a spectrum of views. 
Thirdly I would like to mention the unrelenting efforts of Professor Doug Sellman who reminds us that this is a public health issue and that it will take a suite of initiatives to sustainably reduce harm. He particularly reminds us that the human brain is susceptible to excessive alcohol right up to the age of 25 and probably beyond but that certainly younger ages are more susceptible. Indeed we have a very very worrying issue in this country where something like 60 percent of pregnancies are unplanned and we have a high rate of foetal alcohol syndrome. Nevertheless Professor Sellman’s five-point general policy direction that is included in that suite includes recommendations on the price of alcohol increasing the purchase age decreasing the availability of alcohol decreasing marketing and advertising of alcohol increasing drink-drive measures and increased treatment opportunities for heavy drinkers. Over time they need to be addressed like the tobacco campaign. But it will take time and it needs to be accomplished progressively and where there is acceptance. 
When it comes to the purchase age in my view the first thing that we should be doing is enforcing the law so that those who are under age now are strongly prohibited from purchasing alcohol in the pub or the off-licence. When I spoke to a class of high school students recently my hair literally stood on end as I heard them say that increasing the purchase age by law would make no difference whatsoever in reality and that they are drinking from the age of 13 and 14 throughout New Zealand. They said that they would be absolutely reactive if the law was being enforced more stringently than it is right now. They also said that the example set by adults is absolutely awful that adults need to clean up their own act and that they are very prepared and assiduous to demand zero tolerance on drink-driving but would like to see adults do the same. I note that the Law Commission suggested that the split-age option simply would not work. 
Finally another reason why I will be voting to retain the age of 18 is that I cannot see the fairness in the proposal that an 18-year-old might be required to serve their country in the theatre of war yet might not be allowed to have a drink at the local pub or purchase a dozen cans from a local store. This is a fundamental human rights issue and it was vividly brought home to me when I was a medical student and was arrested at the age of 18. The purchase age happened to be 20—and there were lots of other 18-year-olds—and I was taken home in a Black Maria. But it just seemed to me so profoundly wrong when at the same time I was also being required to go into a ballot to enlist for the army that could have led me to the Viet Nam War as happened to many of my colleagues. 
So I do not accept that increasing the purchase age alone is the factor that will make the big difference to minimise harm. Minimising harm will require a suite of initiatives and that is something that is going to have to happen progressively. 
TODD McCLAY (National—Rotorua) 
: 
 I am concerned about harm that is done by the use of alcohol in all aspects of our community but particularly harm that is done to young people. For me this is not an issue of rights fairness or equality. It is about changing attitudes about being responsible and about protecting people of all ages from harm but importantly protecting young people from harm. 
 I do not believe that at the age of 18 you are too young to be able to purchase alcohol or too young to be able to prove that you are responsible enough to consume alcohol. But what I do believe happens in our society is that far too many people of the age of 18 who are associating with those who are younger are not the role models that we need. Indeed we have heard from other speakers that their parents and those around them are not providing the right role models the right direction that they should have. 
Therefore I am a supporter of the split age for the following reasons. I have run a youth advisory committee in my electorate over the last 3 years. A group of outstanding young school people aged 17 and 18 have come together each year to talk about issues of importance to them. I have asked them to challenge me about some of my views in this area. Indeed I asked them about some of the things they see with their friends when they are out and about in our suburbs at night-time. What they have told me has concerned me greatly about some of the messages around alcohol that we are sending to young people. I accept what others who have spoken in this debate have said—that it is not just those of a younger age who are being harmed or causing harm with alcohol; it is people of many ages. But I do believe that many of the messages that we send reinforce the behaviour that develops and that has an effect upon New Zealanders as they grow into adults. 
When I challenged these young people on my youth advisory committee to say what is the No. 1 thing that we can do to protect younger people under the age of 18 from the harm of alcohol they said to me to put the age up. But at the same time they said they did not believe it was fair for them to be not trusted enough to go out and prove that they can be responsible. For that reason I believe a system where we have a split age where they can purchase and consume alcohol in an environment where there will be others who will be able to take some responsibility for them and to keep an eye on them is a very important way forward. It also means that at the age of 20 they can choose should they want to to purchase alcohol in a licensed establishment and those under the age of 18 will not be able to choose to accompany them. 
Having said that this is an issue as I said earlier about harm. I have consulted widely in my electorate of Rotorua and have received more than 4500 responses advertisements from newspapers and surveys about the views that my electorate has. Resoundingly as the Minister Simon Bridges said I have been sent a message that New Zealanders in provincial New Zealand in rural areas of New Zealand and in the cities and towns of my electorate are concerned about young people and alcohol and they want the age to rise. For this reason should the split age not come through it is my intention to shelter as many young people as we can of the age of 18 17 16 and 15 from the harm that alcohol does to help them to be more responsible and to help them to learn about alcohol so that they can be good citizens when they are older and not feature in some of the statistics we are so worried about. I will be voting for the age to rise to 20. 
I will not take the rest of my time because we have moments left and other members have not spoken. But can I finally just say to all those who have fought a campaign that it is worthwhile for them to have done so but they should be respectful of others’ views. This is an important issue to others. As the father of four children I have decided that what I want to do is have more responsibility for them. Thank you. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: This debate will conclude at 5.30 p.m. 
Hon CHESTER BORROWS (Minister for Courts) 
: 
 Thank you for the opportunity to take this final call. It was my privilege to be part of the Justice and Electoral Committee that considered this legislation the Alcohol Reform Bill when it came before the House last term. It was interesting to watch the history unfold as for the first time over a period of about 80 years the obvious traction from the public was to seek to constrain the supply and the sale of alcohol—something we definitely had not seen before. 
The number of propositions before that committee was very interesting to behold. One of them of course was around the drinking age of 18—the purchase age of 18 which of course we did confuse with the drinking age. The point was made as has been made by a number of people in the Chamber tonight that you can do so many things from younger ages than 18. People talked about for instance the age of consent for sexual intercourse being 16 being able to vote at the age of 18 being able to join the army at 18 and being able to purchase tobacco at a young age. The point that really needs to be made is this: most of the decisions that young people make at those young ages are the wrong ones. Would anyone in the Chamber really think that it is a really good idea to seek consent and go off and get married at 16 or to get married at 18; or to start having sex at an early age at 16; or to start smoking tobacco at 16? The trouble is of course that when those 18-year-olds go off and vote they all go and vote for the wrong party so those decisions are not good decisions that are made. 
The absolute claptrap that my until now good friend Tau Henare was talking about—well I do not know whether he was pleased to see me or whether he was trying to deal with a bit of crusty vomit. But that is the point about this. The decisions made around alcohol are incredibly emotive and not always based on a whole lot of experience. 
Those of us who were not in the House back when the laws were liberalised in 1998-99 are wondering just what on earth those members of Parliament thought they were doing. Apparently what they were trying to do was say that we could all go off and start drinking like the French. Well apparently the French are pretty good at drinking and their alcoholism statistics would tend to lead you along that line. But that is not the way that we deal with drinking within our culture—not that we have got anything to be proud of. And when you go to those hospitals those accident and emergency departments late at night or when you are working in the streets—no matter what your occupation may be—late at night what do you see? You do see increasingly numbers of young people who are the worse for wear for alcohol and it is increasingly earlier in the night that that happens. 
That does not mean that we did not go out and get drunk when we were young or when we were under 18. It was more difficult to do. It is very difficult too to think back on our times when we were young to the way we were drinking and try to compare it with today—not just the products that are available but the liberalisation of that law. When John Banks and Peter Dunne were out drinking and it was illegal to have liquor in the vicinity of a dance was there liquor in the vicinity of a dance? Of course there was. There were 50 guys sharing a crate of flagons out of the back of an old Vauxhall. It probably belonged to Phil Goff or Trevor Mallard. It is a totally—[ 
Interruption 
] You drank his beer for nothing. You were skiting about it. In any event we cannot put on— 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: Order! The time for this debate has concluded. An election will be held to agree the age for the sale and purchase of alcohol from licensed premises. Ring the bells. Members will go to the Noes lobby and give their vote to the Clerk for age 18 years 20 years or split age—on-licence 18 years and off-licence 20 years. Abstentions will also be recorded by the Clerk in the lobby. Proxy votes must be marked as such. Tellers for the election will be the clerks. 
Lock the doors! Lock the doors! Let me restate the issue. An election is being held to agree the age for the sale and purchase of alcohol from licensed premises. 
18 years: 50 
Ardern J 
Dyson 
Kaye 
Roche 
Ardern S 
Faafoi 
King C 
Ross 
Barry (P) 
Fenton (P) 
Lee 
Sage (P) 
Bennett D (P) 
Finlayson (P) 
Logie 
Smith L (P) 
Bennett P (P) 
Genter 
Mackey 
Tirikatene (P) 
Browning 
Hague 
Mallard 
Turei 
Carter 
Henare 
Mathers (P) 
Walker 
Chauvel 
Hipkins 
McCully (P) 
Wilkinson 
Clendon 
Horomia (P) 
McKelvie 
Williamson (P) 
Curran 
Hughes 
Norman (P) 
Woodhouse 
Dean (P) 
Huo 
O’Connor S 
Woods 
Delahunty (P) 
Hutchison 
Prasad 
Dunne 
Jones (P) 
Robertson G 
20 years: 38 
Auchinvole 
Hayes 
Ngaro (P) 
Simpson 
Bakshi 
Horan 
O’Rourke 
Sio (P) 
Blue 
King A (P) 
Parata (P) 
Stewart 
Bridges 
Lole-Taylor 
Peters (P) 
Tolley 
Calder 
Lotu-Iiga 
Prosser 
Upston 
Cosgrove (P) 
Macindoe 
Robertson R (P) 
Wall (P) 
Flavell 
Mahuta (P) 
Roy (P) 
Williams (P) 
Foss (P) 
Martin 
Ryall (P) 
Yang 
Graham (P) 
Mitchell 
Sabin 
Harawira (P) 
Moroney (P) 
Shanks 
Split Age: 33 
Adams (P) 
English (P) 
Lees-Galloway 
Tisch 
Banks 
Goff (P) 
Little 
Tremain 
Borrows 
Goldsmith (P) 
McClay 
Turia (P) 
Brownlee 
Goodhew (P) 
O’Connor D (P) 
Twyford (P) 
Clark (P) 
Groser (P) 
Parker (P) 
Wagner (P) 
Coleman (P) 
Guy (P) 
Sharples (P) 
Young 
Collins 
Heatley (P) 
Shearer (P) 
Cunliffe 
Joyce (P) 
Dalziel 
Key (P) 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: Members I have the result. The option with the most votes is 18 years. That option has not attained a clear majority of votes cast. A second vote will now be held. Unlock the doors. 
KEVIN HAGUE (Green) 
: 
 I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. The method we are using to determine this decision involves the exclusion of the least popular option. So I think members will need to know what— 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: I have a script. There is a chronology of events that take place. The doors have now been unlocked. Members will now vote between two options. The option with the fewest votes was the split age. That option is eliminated. A second vote will now be taken between age 18 and age 20. Ring the bells. [ 
Interruption 
] Order! I have a script. Members will go to the Ayes lobby to give their votes to 18. I need a teller for the 18s—the Hon Tau Henare. Members will go to the Noes lobby to vote for 20. I need a teller for the 20s—Louise Upston. Abstentions will be recorded by the Clerk. Proxy votes must be marked as such. Lock the doors. Let me restate the issue. A second vote is being held. In the Ayes lobby is the vote for 18. In the Noes lobby is the vote for 20. 
18 years: 68 
Ardern J 
English (P) 
King C 
Smith L (P) 
Ardern S 
Faafoi 
Lee 
Smith N (P) 
Banks 
Fenton 
Lees-Galloway 
Tirikatene (P) 
Barry (P) 
Finlayson (P) 
Logie 
Tisch 
Bennett D (P) 
Genter 
Mackey 
Turei 
Bennett P (P) 
Goldsmith (P) 
Mallard 
Turia (P) 
Browning 
Groser (P) 
Mathers (P) 
Twyford (P) 
Brownlee (P) 
Guy (P) 
McCully (P) 
Wagner (P) 
Carter 
Hague 
McKelvie 
Walker 
Chauvel 
Hipkins 
Norman (P) 
Wilkinson 
Clendon 
Horomia (P) 
O’Connor S 
Williamson (P) 
Cunliffe 
Hughes 
Parker (P) 
Woodhouse 
Curran 
Huo 
Prasad 
Woods 
Dalziel 
Hutchison 
Robertson G 
Dean (P) 
Jones (P) 
Roche 
Delahunty (P) 
Joyce (P) 
Ross 
Dunne 
Kaye 
Sage (P) 
Teller: 
Dyson 
Key (P) 
Shearer (P) 
Henare 
20 years: 53 
Adams (P) 
Goodhew (P) 
Mitchell 
Simpson  
Auchinvole 
Graham (P) 
Moroney (P) 
Sio (P) 
Bakshi 
Harawira (P) 
Ngaro (P) 
Stewart 
Blue 
Hayes (P) 
O’Connor D (P) 
Street 
Borrows 
Heatley (P) 
O’Rourke 
Tolley 
Bridges 
Horan 
Parata (P) 
Tremain 
Calder 
King A (P) 
Peters (P) 
Wall (P) 
Clark (P) 
Little 
Prosser 
Williams (P) 
Coleman (P) 
Lole-Taylor 
Robertson R (P) 
Yang 
Collins 
Lotu-Iiga 
Roy (P) 
Young 
Cosgrove (P) 
Macindoe 
Ryall (P) 
Flavell 
Mahuta (P) 
Sabin 
Foss (P) 
Martin 
Shanks 
Teller 
Goff (P) 
McClay 
Sharples (P) 
Upston 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: Members in the face of some interruptions I neglected to announce the numbers in relation to the first vote and I am sure they are of interest to the Committee. The option of 18 years of age received 50 votes 20 years received 38 and the split age 33. Hence the split age option dropped off. 
We now have had the vote on 18 or 20. The option for 18 has 69 votes. The option for 20 has 53 votes. The age of 18 is agreed to. Unlock the doors. 
Members that concludes our debate on the age for the sale and purchase of alcohol from licensed premises and I will report progress. Would members retain their seats till I have done that. 
Progress reported. 
Report adopted. 
The House adjourned at 6.08 p.m.