Mitchell MarkHon MARK MITCHELL (National—Rodney): Thank you Mr Speaker. It's a real pleasure to take a call on this the second reading of the Psychoactive Substances (Increasing Penalty for Supply and Distribution) Amendment Bill. I'd like to start by acknowledging the sponsor of the bill who brought this bill to the House and that is Simeon Brown. Every member of the House that comes to this Parliament is passionate about something right? We're all united by one thing and that is wanting to make our country a better place for the generations now and the generations in the future. He brought this bill to this House because he's actually deeply passionate about this issue. The passion was evident through the select committee process and with the submitters that came before the Justice Committee. He's already spoken to a tragic case of a young man that went far too early because he was in the grip of these psychoactive substances.I want to acknowledge the Minister of Health. He's taken the time to take a 10-minute call in this House on this bill. The thing that I want to address is the fact that in the opening of his speech and in the closing he said that We're not going to support this because we're only going to support legislation that's evidence-based." Now I could accept that because I actually agree. I think that having evidence and stats and figures that can back up policy decisions is very important and I was proud that when we were in Government that's exactly what we did. We were working very hard to make sure that we could gather even more evidence and data to support decisions that were being made. But if you are going to apply that rule across the board and if you're going to stand in the House and you're going to say that you're not going to support this bill of Simeon Brown because you don't have the evidence to back up that it will make a difference then don't bring legislation to us because you want us to support it and then when we ask for the evidence you can't provide it. It means that you're applying one rule to the Opposition in terms of members' bills and legislation that comes to the House and you're applying another rule to yourselves with a much lower bar.I acknowledge that we've got the Minister of Justice in the House tonight. I've made a public commitment to work with him in terms of the work that he wants to achieve. I don't doubt his passion and his drive to want to make genuine change for the better in our criminal justice system. However we had a meeting two weeks ago just before the recess where there's several Supplementary Order Papers (SOPs) that are going to be introduced into this House as one amendment in relation to the Family and Whānau Violence Legislation Bill. Now we are looking through that and we are going over it carefully and there's already areas that we've identified that although it hasn't been through caucus yet there's a high chance that we will support parts of it. SPEAKER: Order!Hon MARK MITCHELL: I'll come Mr Speaker—SPEAKER: Well get there.Hon MARK MITCHELL: I'm trying to address some of the issues that were raised by the Minister. I know that you gave him some scope—I'd appeal and ask—SPEAKER: And I've narrowed it down now. We've had one wide scope each and we're now getting back to the bill.Hon MARK MITCHELL: That's OK fair enough. So anyway the point is simply this: a lot of those SOPs there's no evidence to back them up and yet we've been asked to support them and yet the Government is advancing them as Government bills.SPEAKER: Order! I warned the member. Even if the SOPs were about this bill it's not the right time to discuss them—and the SOPs that the member's referring to aren't anything to do with this bill. It's not the time for a general discussion about Government practice. It is a second reading of a very specific very tight piece of legislation. The Hon Mark Mitchell on his last warning.Hon MARK MITCHELL: Thank you Mr Speaker. So I'm just working through the list here and I'm trying to address the issues that the Minister raised in his address to the House. In terms of saying that only a health-based approach is going to make any difference at all in terms of how drug dealers—and this bill relates directly to drug dealers people that are actually dealing illegal psychoactive substances. Actually yes you can have a health-based approach and yes that could sit alongside a piece of legislation like this but they should go together. You shouldn't be saying "No we're going to pursue just a health-based approach" and using increased penalties or saying that increased penalties isn't going to make a fundamental difference. How can you stand in the House and say this? Penalties act in two ways. One is yep you want it to be a deterrent. You want a prospective drug dealer to look and say "Actually you know what if I get caught doing this I don't really want to go to jail for two years. I want to remain free. I value my freedom." The other thing about penalties is this: as a country—if you choose to become a drug dealer if you choose to peddle harm in our community and you get caught then you're going to go to jail. There's going to be a penalty there for it. We're going to say as a nation "We don't accept that." I want to extend an invitation to the Minister. I want to say to him come with me on just about any day of the week to the North Shore accident and emergency department. Come with me we'll go together and I'll show you what the people that are in the A & E department in various states of—well some of them actually as we know actually end up dying. Others who are in early stages where they need some more minor treatment—come and see what the staff there at the A & E are actually dealing with. Come and see how many Kiwis—how many daughters and sons fathers and mothers are actually lying in the A & E because they have had an adverse effect or an overdose with these psychoactive substances. He says that the Police Association are saying that they don't have any evidence to say that this would make any marked effect. I was in Christchurch about three or four weeks ago. I was lucky enough to be briefed and hosted by Superintendent John Price  the outstanding area commander down there. At the time that I arrived in Christchurch there had just been 24 people admitted into the critical care unit at Christchurch Hospital because they had taken a bad batch of psychoactive substances. He said any tool that they could have to deal with it to deal with the dealers to deal with the people that are peddling this harm would actually be helpful for the front-line staff in the way that they are trying to apply the rules and they're trying to deal with this. So again I'd say to the Minister: actually get out there. Get into the community ask the people that are actually having to enforce the laws and are actually having to deal with it—Hon Dr David Clark: Ask them if extending the term will make a single scrap of difference because the health workers will tell you it doesn't. The health workers will tell you it doesn't—those people you just talked about it.Hon MARK MITCHELL: So the Minister again is challenging the fact; he thinks that this bill that has been brought to the House to increase the sanction to actually bring it in line with class C drugs—and tell dealers the people that are actually dealing and peddling this substance in our communities—he's trying to say that we as a Parliament should not be saying "Actually if you want to go out there and you want to deal these drugs if you choose to do that we're going to come down and we're going to have a harsh penalty. And you're actually going to be taken out of the community that you're creating the harm" and it gives the police the tool to be able to do that. So again finally I would just ask the Minister to reflect on three things. One is: yes a health-based policy should sit right alongside a punitive regime in terms of us sending a clear message and saying—and by the way Minister they're not choir boys and choir girls these people that choose to become drug dealers. They're actually people that enjoy generating the revenue from it. They prey on vulnerable people the same vulnerable people that we want to help—Kiritapu Allan: They're usually vulnerable—Hon MARK MITCHELL: —and they're very open and overt about it. Sorry what was that? What was that? I didn't hear that. OK well if you're going to interject at least make the comments so I can hear it so I can respond to it. Dr Deborah Russell: You don't have to respond—you can just ignore it.Kiritapu Allan: You don't need to respond.Hon MARK MITCHELL: I don't have to respond. OK that's fine. That's right—they weren't prepared to actually repeat the comment which says it all. The other thing Minister is that although you don't have the evidence base that you want from the officials if you're going to apply that rule then apply it to yourselves as well. Stop bringing legislation to us and asking us to support it when you have no evidence to back it up. Thank you Mr Speaker."