Ewen-Street Ian: Biosecurity Amendment Bill — Second Reading Instruction to Committee In Committee Third Reading 
Ewen-Street Ian: Biosecurity Amendment Bill — Second Reading Instruction to Committee In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:609;Page:7043] 
IAN EWEN-STREET (Green) 
: The Greens will support this bill. We recognise that biosecurity is enormously important to this country. The greatest danger facing this country is not from invading armies but from invading species. 
I was very interested to hear my colleague Dr Paul Hutchison list some of the species that have invaded this country just recently. He is quite right. But what Dr Hutchison overlooks is that at the same time as he is concerned about biosecurity he is also a very proactive zealot in terms of promoting genetically engineered (GE) organisms. Obviously Dr Hutchison fails to recognise that those organisms are themselves alien species. We know that they are alien species because a natural species cannot be patented whereas a GE species can be. GE organisms are by definition alien species. We do not know what the long-term consequences of releasing them into our environment may be. We do not know whether they will be the gorse possums and rabbits of the future; we simply do not know that. 
We have only to look at the example of what has happened in Canada with GE organisms there. GE canola was supposed to be the saviour of Canadian agriculture but Canada found that GE canola which was designed to be resistant to herbicide—in particular to glyphosate which is the generic name for Roundup—escaped from the paddocks and got into roadside verges and gullies. Because it was resistant to Roundup it could not be killed with that so more toxic and persistent chemicals than Roundup had to be used to get rid of it. That created a major problem in terms of weed control and Canada finished up by declaring GE canola to be a noxious species. 
Phil Heatley 
: They created a monster. 
IAN EWEN-STREET 
: They did create a monster. 
Phil Heatley 
: Frankenstein. 
IAN EWEN-STREET 
: Frankenstein food. It is very interesting to listen to people in this House talk about biosecurity. The free-trade zealots like my colleague from ACT Mr Eckhoff are very keen on having free trade come into this country. Yet it is free trade and tourism that are creating the major problem for biosecurity in this country. People are tempted to open sea containers or to smuggle goods through on their person when they come in on aeroplanes. That is where the real problems lie in this country. 
In terms of the bill itself I am very pleased to see that people can now report unusual organisms on an 0800 number rather than having to go specifically to chief technical officers. I do have concerns though about the non-requirement to report unusual species that are legitimately in New Zealand under the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act. My concern is really about what I have just outlined with regard to GE organisms. Those organisms may well be legitimately in this country. They may have been approved by the Environmental Risk Management Authority and approved under the Act but what happens in a situation like the one the Canadians have had with their canola when those organisms start to appear in places where they should not be? It is the people who know their farms the vets and the stock agents who know when those species start to appear so they should be required to report all alien species and particularly GE ones. 
I suspect that if we do buckle under the free-trade pressure of the United States and destroy our own main economic base of providing clean green agricultural products then we will need to further amend this legislation. I can see the day coming when this legislation will come back to the House and we have to amend it to compel people to report alien species particularly GE ones. 
I have some concern about the phrase in clause 24 that refers to a person who knows or could reasonably be expected to know what an alien species is and where it should be. How do we judge whom those people are? Who does the judging? 
Phil Heatley 
: I’ve been “taken”. 
IAN EWEN-STREET 
: Phil Heatley knows; he will be the judge. That only compounds my concerns. 
Phil Heatley 
: I’ve been operated on. 
IAN EWEN-STREET 
: He has been neutralised! People will say that farmers could reasonably be expected to know whether an alien species has arrived on their property. That is perfectly true. North Island farmers may be able to recognise that the varroa bee mite has infected a beehive because they know how bees normally behave in that situation. But could a South Island farmer reasonably be expected to know what a varroa bee mite infestation looks like? 
Dianne Yates 
: They are very small. 
IAN EWEN-STREET 
: I am talking about the behaviour of the bees. Farmers vets stock agents and people like that are the front line of our defences. They are the eyes and ears of our defences. They will almost certainly identify things rather than Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry officials. I believe it is incumbent on the ministry to establish and maintain very good working relationships with those people because they literally are the eyes and ears of our defence. 
I will step to one side for a moment and mention the relationships between the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry and the people of west Auckland. The handling of the painted apple moth incursion up there was a debacle. Even when I use the most encouraging phraseology possible I cannot think that that was in any way a successful operation. Oh yes the ministry may have spent $90 million on the blanket spraying of west Auckland multiple times and it may have just about eradicated the moth but the public relations war with west Auckland residents has been largely lost. The ministry’s behaviour over that incursion was despicable. 
I turn now to the reduced notice period for aerial spraying. I support the basic rationale for that which is the idea that if something is invading a farm—let us say foot-and-mouth for argument’s sake—it is incumbent on the ministry or whoever is responsible for getting rid of it to do so as soon as possible. If that requires aerial spraying so be it. But to wait for 14 days before that can be done is simply ludicrous. We discussed that at some length in the Primary Production Committee I seem to recall. We talked about whether to have 1 day’s notice. The idea was that if one was spraying in remote areas one needed to give farmers the opportunity to go back to the homestead or to give people the opportunity to pick up their kids from school or to take the domestic pets away—that sort of thing. In the end we decided it was better to leave the provision with no specified notice period and to leave such notice to the discretion of the chief technical officer. 
I do have some doubts about that. I do not doubt the competence of the chief technical officers and I think they would demonstrate a degree of flexibility in introducing aerial spraying very quickly. But they need to be aware of the problems that can be incurred if they immediately spray houses domestic pets children’s schools and so on without any notice at all. I am sure that is not what is intended but I have a sneaky suspicion that maybe we need to do more in terms of specifying that. 
Overall I see the amendments in this bill as being very good but they tend to be like the ambulance at the bottom of the cliff. The best way to keep New Zealand free of alien species quite apart from not releasing GE species— 
Marc Alexander 
: Ban all trade. 
IAN EWEN-STREET 
: —is not to ban all trade but to be very careful about how we trade and with whom we trade. We simply cannot afford to have destructive species like foot-and-mouth the Asian gypsy moth the glassy-winged sharpshooter and whatever else cross the border in the first place. It is much easier to keep them out than to eradicate them after they arrive. In recent years biosecurity control at the border and at airports has improved out of sight. There is now something like a 100 percent inspection rate of people coming into the country and the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry calculates there is something like a 94 percent interception rate. We inspect 100 percent of all mail coming into this country. I have no problem with either of those two areas. 
I do have concerns about the present scheme of inspecting only 24 percent of the 400000 containers that come into this country though I am very pleased with the recent Government initiative to move towards 100 percent decontamination or inspection at container devanning sites. My concern about that proposal though is that the Government wants the owners of the devanning sites to look after the biosecurity issue. That creates a potential conflict of interest because on the one hand those people make their money by getting the goods out of the containers into warehouses and off to clients and on the other hand the biosecurity aspects will only slow that process down.