Hutchison Paul: Misuse of Drugs (Classification of BZP) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Hutchison Paul: Misuse of Drugs (Classification of BZP) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:645;Page:14760] 
Dr PAUL HUTCHISON (National—Port Waikato) 
: 
 Thank you Mr Chairperson for the opportunity to speak on Part 1 which deals with the amendments to the principal Misuse of Drugs Act and also with the amnesty provision. 
One of the words that I have heard emanating from Minister Anderton’s mouth repeatedly has been the question of having an evidence base and it intrigues me that the letter of 4 December 2006 to Jim Anderton from the Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs states: “The programme of research on benzylpiperazine (BZP) that has been undertaken has allowed New Zealand to take a strongly evidence-based approach …”. In actual fact we do not need to have the word “strongly” in front of it; an approach is either evidence-based or it is not. 
It is highly relevant that the only controlled respective trial on these side effects was undertaken by Professor Richard Beasley. The clinical trial was abandoned because he was concerned about side effects. I accept that Professor Beasley is one of the highly regarded international clinical trialists and I very much accept his judgment that it was ethically appropriate to abandon that trial but I believe that Minister Anderton ought to be very careful about saying that everything has a strong evidence base about it when clearly we have a lot of anecdotal evidence around us that still remains quite contentious—not only as to whether it does have an evidence base but certainly from a political point of view. 
That is the reason why I have put forward Supplementary Order Paper 181. I have not yet had time to discuss this Supplementary Order Paper with the Minister but I believe that he does not intend to support it. I think that that is very unfortunate because this Supplementary Order Paper proposes that there be a review by the Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs approximately 2 years after the Act comes into being. It is very important that that review actually does take place and that a formal process be required by Parliament to ensure that it occurs so there can be a response from the Health Committee. I was advised that it was appropriate to get the Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs to do that review. Although there has been contention among some of the parties as to the fact that the advisory committee’s decision of advice to reclassify BZP was not unanimous I believe that it is still the best instrument to use to make such a decision in that it has the experts who are relevant to this drug and it probably has the best knowledge of anyone in New Zealand. The point is that there was great concern that reclassifying BZP might drive the drug underground and I think we want to know both the social and medical effects of having this reclassification. 
I am deeply disappointed in Minister Anderton for failing to grasp a highly constructive suggestion that would help to ensure that further evidence is discussed by Parliament by law rather than Mr Anderton suddenly deciding that no we will whip through this legislation and we will not even bother looking at it in a formal way in years to come. There is no doubt in my mind that this must be— 
Hon Jim Anderton 
: What are we doing now? 
Dr PAUL HUTCHISON 
: No—the whole point I tell Mr Anderton is that it is very important that we look at the effects this legislation will have both from a medical point of view and from a social point of view. The Minister was not listening at the time but I am sure that he has heard the highly prevalent argument that the legislation may drive the use of BZP and related party pills underground. We want to know whether that happens. It will be great if that is not the case and it will be great indeed if this legislation is effective in reducing the use of party pills in New Zealand. 
I find it quite extraordinary that the Minister is not prepared to support a highly reasonable Supplementary Order Paper that is actually designed to assist the quality of this legislation. So I hope the Minister will review his thoughts on that. Once again just to go over the fact I think it is important to say that this legislation and the need for it have changed rapidly over the last 5 years. In 2004 the Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs said that the legislation was not necessary but it reviewed that position and ended up in the opposite direction 3 years later.