Hutchison Paul: New Organisms and Other Matters Bill — In Committee 
Hutchison Paul: New Organisms and Other Matters Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:612;Page:8935] 
Dr PAUL HUTCHISON (NZ National—Port Waikato) 
: 
 Thank you Mr Chairman for the opportunity to speak on this hugely important part of the bill. I hope that there will be opportunity for some repeated calls particularly because like Jeanette Fitzsimons I have put forward a number of substantial amendments which basically try to make this bill practical as well as scientifically rigorous. The Minister in her initial speech on this bill said that the Government decision in response to the Royal Commission on Genetic Modification should take place by providing a practical framework for proceeding with caution in the management of new and genetically modified organisms while preserving opportunities. Yet we have a bill that is essentially sadly a Clayton’s moratorium because with the combination of the case by case analysis the public consultation and the ridiculous widened call-in powers it is almost impossible for certain applications to have any hope whatsoever of getting in. That is particularly so when it comes to medium and high-risk research which is the area that the royal commission made absolutely clear is vital—in fact it used the word “critical”—that New Zealand makes sure continues. 
I will make some comments on the widened call-in powers. When I asked the Minister the other day why she included “cultural spiritual and ethical” she said it was because the royal commission had recommended that to happen. In actual fact the royal commission recommended as one of its major conclusions the formation of the Bioethics Council. That has been put in place particularly to address those issues at a higher level. Secondly it also supported the Maori consultation committee which is attached to the Environmental Risk Management Authority. Undoubtedly with those two underpinnings this bill addresses cultural spiritual and ethical issues probably more so than it needs to anyway. But then to add in this absolutely absurd suggestion of “cultural spiritual and ethical” in a scientific method to work out risk analysis is clearly right out of place. 
At the select committee Sir Paul Reeves was asked whether he could explain to us the principles of the treaty. He could not explain them to us. He had no way of explaining them to us. As people in my electorate have said is it right that the spiritual cultural and ethical values of one group be given more importance that those of another group? I think that Simon Power made the point that the spiritual values of one person in New Zealand may be totally different from those of another. In the electorate that I am so proud to represent there are Maori there are Indians and there are Chinese in large numbers and their values are clearly vastly different and hopefully will be addressed at a higher level by the Bioethics Council. 
So putting those provisions in the bill as my colleague Simon Power pointed out is only going to give a field day to the lawyers and it is going to impose absolutely impossible hurdles on those sincere applicants who are trying to progress science and are trying to progress instruments that will help humankind and the environment. Instead this Labour Government as usual cannot help but impose impossible compliance costs on just about every piece of legislation it sees.