Goodhew Jo: Veterinarians Bill — Second Reading In Committee Third Reading 
Goodhew Jo: Veterinarians Bill — Second Reading In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:628;Page:890] 
JO GOODHEW (National—Aoraki) 
: 
 I rise to speak in support of the bill and to speak about the preliminary provisions. The purpose of this legislation is to protect a number of different interests: those of the public and also those of rural and provincial New Zealand. I understand that this legislation came to the House under the name of the previous Minister of Agriculture—and previous member for Aoraki as well—the Hon Jim Sutton and that it came in a particularly interesting manner. What happened after that was that it went to the Primary Production Committee. Thank goodness that the members of the select committee which was ably chaired by the Hon David Carter did an enormous amount of work—[ 
Interruption 
] Very good timing. 
I ask members to look at the preliminary provisions where they will see the start of a theme a theme where we see many new paragraphs and many struck out paragraphs. That theme continues throughout all the parts of the bill so no doubt I will refer to it again later. The vets were very interested in this bill. When I talked to my local vets they said they thanked goodness that this bill was coming before the House under urgency because they really needed to see that happen before Christmas. But what happened? When the previous Minister of Agriculture brought this bill before the House something did not happen: consultation with the sector. Because of that there was such a mess for the select committee to sort out that we were left with this document full of changes. 
Why is it so important that the vets have these changes? They tell me that they have large problems in recruiting vets for rural practice in New Zealand. We have heard from other members here today that it is common for women in particular who have trained as vets to go into urban practice. That is not really surprising. Urban practices deal with smaller animals and we also understand from others’ assertions that it is a more profitable type of practice. But that does not change the fact that New Zealand is so dependent upon primary production that we need to have plenty of rural vets—so much so that we know that one of the 10 submitters on the bill Massey University came before the select committee because it was so interested in making sure there are the essential numbers of vets. 
Our primary production industry needs rural vets and therefore we have before the Committee this legislation which may well make it easier for vets to be recruited from overseas for rural New Zealand. The provisions within this amendment allow for those sorts of things to be sorted out and for the establishment of a limited registration system—a system that we will see later now provides a registration period long enough to entice overseas vets to stay in New Zealand long enough to get their heads around what it is to practise in New Zealand. Vets certainly do not mind this legislation; they are very much in support of it. They welcome it and they certainly welcome seeing it come before Parliament before Christmas. 
I thank the Committee and continue to support the preliminary provisions in Part 1.