Doocey MattMATT DOOCEY (National—Waimakariri): Oh good choice. Thank you very much Madam Speaker. It's a pleasure to rise on behalf of the National Party in support of the Health (Fluoridation of Drinking Water) Amendment Bill in its second reading. As you'll know the second reading is normally to debate pretty much the amendments to the bill discuss submissions and the departmental report after it's come out of select committee. I do note the Government is intending to send this bill back to select committee and probably the right way forward but a level of irony for a bill that's languished on the Order Paper for several years. I note it was in the select committee in 2017 and I look at some of our former colleagues on the committee membership. Barbara Stewart what a great lady she was from New Zealand First and Ria Bond. I also note Dr David Clark was there as the health Opposition spokesperson at the time well before he became health Minister and arguably the worst health Minister New Zealand has ever seen. I do note in 2017 the bill came before the House in its first reading. Excuse me to my colleagues who might find this a bit painful but I did notice the votes of the time. It got passed. There were 12 Noes—and that was New Zealand First; they had 12 in their party at that time—107 Ayes so it had quite comprehensive support. National Party voted 59 on that day. Oh those were the days weren't they—59! Let's hope we get back there one day—2023. New Zealand Labour Party 31; Green Party 13; Māori Party 2; ACT New Zealand 1; and of course United Future 1 as well.So with this bill fair to say I'm normally in the camp that you can't always protect everyone from the consequences of their own behaviour. And I'm not sure sometimes if it's always the responsibility of the State to intervene. But fair to say there are times I think when ideology is not the way forward and sometimes a Government of the day a Parliament of the day does need to lean in and I think this is one of those times. When we hear statistics that we only have 54 percent coverage of fluoride—and I think as we've heard across the House today there's very clear evidence of why we need to have fluoride in our water if not for the adults just for our young ones that know no better. So it is important. I know speaking about this bill today will sort of start to rattle the cages of the tinfoil hat brigade. And I'm sure we're going to get successive emails over the next 24 hours that are going to tell us the devils of fluoride. But I think overall we've got to follow the science. And it's quite right that we're going to pass this bill in its second reading and it is going to go back to the select committee for those tweaks of the Supplementary Order Papers.Although what is interesting the bill was originally about DHBs to make that decision on behalf of local people. Now we have a Government that's going to strip out DHBs and local decision-making. So now they're saying it's actually going to be the director-general Ashley Bloomfield. And you do have to wonder the poor guy what he did wrong. Arguably he's done pretty well over COVID and now he's been handed this big hospital pass and he's going to be responsible for signing off the fluoride in our water as well.One thing that has been silent today is: who is going to cover the cost? I see that was one of the issues that came out of the departmental report in 2016 and 2017. I think it would be very clear local authorities at this time would probably question whether they should. I think my colleague Penny Simmonds said it was about $144 million over about 10 years and I think that's a sizeable cost for most local authorities. I think of a small district council like mine Waimakariri just up the road Hurunui which is even smaller. So maybe that is something we can address in the select committee about who will cover the cost of that as well.Overall I think this bill's time has come although it does feel like it's a bit back to the future because all we're doing is talking to the bill and sending it to select committee. I do hope that once it comes out of select committee we can expedite it quite quickly because I think in this day and age the idea that we don't have fluoride in our water to protect the teeth of our young people–we've seen them presenting in acute presentations at our A & E. And overall we do know now more and more how oral health underpins a lot of our physical and mental health as well. So the right direction and let's hope we get it over the line pretty soon. Thank you Madam Speaker.