Robertson Grant: Royal Society of New Zealand Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Robertson Grant: Royal Society of New Zealand Amendment Bill — First Reading 
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GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central) 
: 
 I move  
That the Royal Society of New Zealand Amendment Bill be now read a first time. 
 At the appropriate time I intend to move that the bill be considered by the Education and Science Committee. 
Colin King 
: A very good committee. 
GRANT ROBERTSON 
: It is an excellent committee; I agree with the member. The Royal Society of New Zealand Amendment Bill is a private bill which is promoted by the Royal Society of New Zealand. The society is a body corporate that has operated in New Zealand since 1867 and is currently based in the great electorate of Wellington Central. The object functions and structure of the society are set out in the Royal Society of New Zealand Act 1997. 
The current object of the society is the advancement and promotion of science and technology in New Zealand. That in turn leads to the functions of the society. The first current function is to foster in the New Zealand community a culture that supports science and technology including—without limitation—the promotion of public awareness knowledge and understanding of science and technology and the advancement of science and technology education. The second function is to encourage promote and recognise excellence in science and technology. The third function is to provide an infrastructure and other support for the professional needs and development of scientists and technologists. The fourth function is to establish and administer a code of professional standards and ethics in science and technology for members. The fifth function is to provide expert advice on important public issues to the Government and the community. The final current function is to do all other lawful things that the society considers are conducive to the advancement and promotion of science and technology in New Zealand. 
This bill seeks to amend the Royal Society of New Zealand Act to incorporate the humanities into the object and functions of the society. It will also make several other minor changes that I will outline shortly. The society has approached me to be the member in charge of this bill as I am the member of Parliament for the electorate in which the society’s head office is located. As I have said the main purpose of the bill is to amend the Royal Society of New Zealand Act to incorporate the humanities into its objects and functions. This means for example that the functions of the society will be expanded to include the functions of fostering in the New Zealand community a culture that supports the humanities and of encouraging promoting and recognising excellence in the humanities. The definition in clause 5(2) of the bill says that the humanities include: “English and other languages history religion philosophy law classics linguistics literature cultural studies media studies art history film drama and American studies”. 
Specifically the bill adds to those functions that I read out earlier: “to foster in the New Zealand community a culture that supports the humanities: to encourage promote and recognise excellence in the humanities: to establish and administer for members a code of professional standards and ethics in the humanities: and to do all other lawful things which the Council of the Society considers conducive to the advancement and promotion of the humanities in New Zealand:”. The incorporation of the humanities into the objects and functions of the society will mean that many people involved in the humanities may be admitted as members of the society and that people who have achieved distinction in research for the advancement of the humanities will be able to be elected as fellows of the Royal Society. The society will obviously also be required to establish and administer a code of professional standards and ethics in the humanities as it currently does in relation to science and technology. 
The society’s decision to expand the objects and functions of the society to include the humanities was based on three main factors: a desire to integrate the structure and function of research in New Zealand; a recognition of the need to build on and integrate the complementary knowledge provided by different disciplines; and the fact that academies of scholars in other countries such as Canada and Scotland have academies that also range across the disciplines. It is fair to say that in recent times there has been a growing awareness among the pure scientific community—I defer to my colleague Moana Mackey who comes from that community—to work more closely with the social science community. Many members of the House will be familiar with the work of Professor Sir Paul Callaghan and Bill Manhire at Victoria University who have worked very hard to try to draw together what they call the “parallel universes of writers and scientists”. It is a little bit like that. For those of us from a social science background it is fair to say that the pure scientists sometimes have some difficulty in understanding where we are coming from—and no doubt vice versa as well. 
Shane Ardern 
: Venus and Mars. 
GRANT ROBERTSON 
: Scientists are from Venus and social scientists are from Mars; I thank Mr Ardern for that. It is true that the work that Bill Manhire and Paul Callaghan have done has been excellent and is mirrored in many other parts of our research sector. 
Before I came into this House I worked very closely with an organisation called the Centre for Sustainable Cities which is based at Otago University’s medical school. It brings together people from the pure sciences—such as physics and energy research—right through to people in the social sciences particularly those in the public health area and those who do research into housing. It is a very good way of being able to draw together and create an inter-disciplinary approach within our broad research communities. 
I think it is very timely that the Royal Society has chosen to come to the House to amend its functions to reflect the fact that the humanities are having an increased role and increased importance in the research community. It is only right too that it does this following on from consultation with the Council for the Humanities. A memorandum of understanding was signed by the society and the Council for the Humanities on 9 February 2010 to incorporate the humanities into the society. As is the nature of a body such as the Royal Society which is governed by statute this bill has come to the House now to get our endorsement for that process. 
As I mentioned at the start there are a couple of other elements to this bill that I would like to note. The first is that another purpose of the bill is to rename the academy council of the society the academy executive committee. This will be a matter of great interest to members in the House. The reason for this change is to avoid confusion between the academy council which was established to contribute to the achievement of the objects of the society by recognising and encouraging excellence and outstanding achievement in science and technology and contributing to the intellectual leadership role of the society and the overall council of the society which has a governing role. This means that the academy council of the Royal Society will after this bill has passed be called the academy executive committee and any potentially confused social or pure scientists will know the difference. 
The bill also amends the standard for the election of companions of the society to put greater focus on leadership and also to include the humanities now that they are part of the society’s wider functions. The final purpose of the bill relates to changes that were made to the council’s structure in 2008 by way of a wash-up provision to make sure that all of the constitutional changes that have been made are now reflected in the law. In particular the bill amends the election process for councillors of the society so that the process is consistent with a new council structure and it clarifies processes for councillors appointed by regional constituent organisations. 
To achieve the purposes of this bill we need to amend the Royal Society of New Zealand Act. This is a bill that should not generate too much controversy. I hope that pure scientists in the Chamber will be able to accept the arrival of the social scientists and see that they will now all be able to work together in harmony and ensure that we can support those research endeavours that are taking place right around New Zealand in many universities and other research institutions. I think this bill will make for a stronger Royal Society and I commend it to the House.