Sharma GauravDr GAURAV SHARMA (Labour—Hamilton West): I rise today in the House to take a call on the Sunscreen (Product Safety Standard) Bill. I want to acknowledge in the House Jamie Strange who just spoke before me as part of our Hamilton contingent. I actually thought it was David Bennett speaking. I didn't realise it was Glen Bennett speaking before. So I was going to acknowledge the other member of Parliament from Hamilton as well.I was quite impressed to see the passion Jamie showed in talking about this bill. Now we may not have a beach like Mr Muller's electorate. I do recall that the last time I put on sunscreen it was actually with both Jamie and David. We were at a community parade. We were all dressed up as clowns. I don't remember the SPF rating of the sunscreen we applied but I gather the point that Mr Todd Muller is trying to make here with the introduction of this bill.Now New Zealand and Australia currently have a shared sunscreen standard which comprehensively prescribes test methods for both broad spectrum and water-resistant sunscreen products—labelling requirements etc. Despite having a shared standard though both countries take a very different approach to application. In Australia I understand that the standard is mandatory which means that a product cannot go on to a shelf without meeting the standards whereas in New Zealand it is voluntary which is a bit surprising because there was recent testing done by Consumer New Zealand where they found 50 percent of the sunscreens that they tested failed to provide the claims that they had on sun protection. So out of the 10 that they tested five did not meet the requirements. As for Consumer New Zealand this wasn't the first time: some of the brands actually had tested negatively before that as well. So having brands test two or three times negatively is not good for the consumers—for our patients.One of the things that the Consumer New Zealand chief mentioned was that regulation has been due for a long time and I understand that's what Todd is trying to get at. But also I guess it's important to remind ourselves how big the burden of skin cancer is in New Zealand. As my colleague Jamie Strange mentioned we have one of the highest rates of skin cancers in the world. If you look at melanoma: 35 to 40 people per 100000 per year. That's one of the highest age-standardised rates in the world.Now limiting UV radiation exposure through sun smart behaviour is one of the key ways of preventing these cancers. I speak this as a medical professional in my past life. And if we can't ensure that the sunscreens that people are applying have the right SPF that they claim to have then how do you bring down these numbers? So in theory this actually makes really good sense and I think if we take a health-based approach we definitely would recommend this going to the Health Committee. But I guess the bill requires the Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs to recommend the setting of mandatory regulation under section 29 of the Fair Trading Act 1986 prescribing a product safety standard for sunscreen products.So I look forward to this bill going through the select committee stages. I also understand that the Ministry of Health themselves have proposed a different bill altogether which is the Therapeutic Products Bill which will be a little bit more comprehensive and will be looking at a few more broader issues not just the sunscreen itself. But until then we would like to see what the submissions are on this bill and we would like to hear from other members of the community and especially the medical community and obviously the consumers as well some of whom might have gotten skin cancer because they didn't take the right sunscreen which made claims that obviously weren't true.So as far as the bill goes I would like to support it in terms of a health-based approach to go through the select committee to the next stage to be discussed. I want to thank Todd Muller for bringing this to the House. Thank you.