Shirley Ken: New Organisms and Other Matters Bill — First Reading 
Shirley Ken: New Organisms and Other Matters Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:608;Page:5341] 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY (Deputy Leader—ACT NZ) 
: 
 ACT will support this bill to the select committee. On balance we think it contains some very valuable progress on this issue. We do have some reservations about it and I will cover those in my speech. We recognise that the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act passed in 1996 in many respects puts New Zealand in a very advantageous position in terms of the Environment Risk Management Authority that we have. I do not think anyone anticipated—well I guess we always expected it—the level of concern at the marketing aspects of genetic modification (GM) and the impact that it will have on our economy. I think it was with quite some foresight even in the early 1990s that we took that step and I know many other countries around the world wish they had also had legislation of this nature on their statute book. 
That is not to say that we got it all right. I think we overdid the process just as we did with the Resource Management Act. We made some pretty tough situations for ourselves that were unnecessary and in many respects this bill picks up on those. I commend the Minister and the officials for bringing these amendments to Parliament so that we can hopefully on what is a critical issue for New Zealand keep a very streamlined process. 
I note as others have that the royal commission did not recommend a moratorium. I believe it was a mistake of this Labour Government to call for a moratorium. The ACT party opposed the moratorium. The royal commission did some very good work and some very important matters came to the public’s attention by way of the royal commission report. I think that its greatest role was perhaps to educate lay people on the issues associated with and the importance of the new biotechnology. That was a plus. However it was clear that the Labour Government which was dependent upon the Greens in the previous Parliament was captured by them in its political agenda so it used an old political trick of calling for a moratorium in order to park the problem. That is all that the moratorium was. 
The moratorium has cost the New Zealand economy dearly. Many of our top researchers in the biological sciences have left for opportunities off shore because their particular science was truncated by that moratorium process. That is regrettable; many of them will not return to this country. It is a big world out there with all manner of opportunities particularly for those who are highly skilled in the new biotechnology sciences. 
Equally I know a number of companies that have quietly left this country or have left processes that they had intended to carry out in this country using New Zealand researchers and facilities on subjects that would have been of huge benefit to this country. Those companies have just quietly gone away. They do not want publicity over it because that would just draw attention to them. I know that in the forestry sector major forestry companies that were doing GM work have relocated to the United States with billion-dollar projects and that work is now being carried out there. That has been a loss to the New Zealand economy. To think that as a country we could just stand still for 2 years and mark time and that the rest of the world would not move forward was a very naive position and I do think it was regrettable. 
The Greens were instrumental in calling for the moratorium and for the royal commission report and then when it did not say what they wanted it to—and they were ticked off by the royal commission for giving false evidence in essence for which they apologised to it; that was on their website—they said GM was a political line in the sand and that they would bring the Government down if it proceeded with such measures. This bill and something that will happen next week will be the test of the Greens because if they were sincere they would not support this Government’s Budget next week. 
Jeanette Fitzsimons 
: We don’t. We will move a motion of no confidence. 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY 
: I see; the Greens sit on the fence. If the Greens want to walk the talk—and they said they wanted to bring the Government down—they would vote against the Budget next week for supply and confidence but they are not prepared to do that. The Greens make all the noise promise their constituents that they are doing all that they can and make a threat but it is quite clear that next Thursday when we debate the Budget the Greens will sit on the fence. They will not vote against the Budget. That is the real test but the Greens are not prepared to walk the talk on this issue. Much of their talk has been well off the mark and I deeply regret that the damage done to the New Zealand economy by not making progress over the past 2 years in biotechnology is to a large extent a result of the hype of the Greens and of the emotive debates and campaigns that they have run—not just in this Parliament but up and down the country. 
There are some very useful amendments in this bill. To extend the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act to regulate and restrict human cells and the regeneration of animals not presently in New Zealand from tissue is important. Stem cell technology is a new area and I think we have to proceed very carefully with some of the provisions there. I note with regard to that provision that one could use tissue from moa to bring them back. Moa have been extinct for perhaps only 500 or 700 years so technically we could probably bring them back though I do not know what the Minister for the Environment would think about that. Technically one could bring the dinosaurs back but there is a difference between 500 years and 65 million years. 
Hon Marian Hobbs 
: They’re already here. 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY 
: The Minister is admitting that she is already here as a dinosaur. That is an interesting provision. 
The second key provision is to streamline the process of approving low-risk GM work within contained laboratories by providing for approval of such modifications on a project rather than an organism basis. That has been a huge source of frustration particularly to those doing work with strains of bacteria and the like where one has to get a separate approval for each strain of bacteria and one might be dealing with dozens or scores of different strains as part of one’s research. So the central thing is to approve the project and to let researchers in controlled laboratory situations bring in the strains required—and for that matter develop new strains—without having to go back for a protracted lengthy bureaucratic process on each one. That is certainly sensible. 
I think streamlining the procedures for the assessment and approval of animal or human medicines is also important. Comments have already been made about diseases such as cystic fibrosis and the options that GM science offers us for progress there. The Malaghan Institute of Medical Research and others are right at the cutting edge of research there. We know with regard to multiple sclerosis that the myelin work that was being done at Ruakura using modified calves was unfortunately held up by the moratorium and that is regrettable. Sufferers of multiple sclerosis and their families up and down the country are desperately looking to the cutting-edge research that seems to hold so much promise at this stage. 
I share the concerns expressed by the Leader of the Opposition the leader of the National Party with regard to new Part 4A inserted by clause 10. That part sets up a committee and imports the whole Maori consultation thing derived from the treaty provision into what is essentially a scientific bill that in this case relates to new organisms. There is a universal scientific method that transcends all cultures. People talk about Maori science and say that it is somehow different from the universal scientific method. Maori culture and tradition certainly can make a very valuable contribution to science but to suggest that Maori science is somehow different and should not be subject to the rigour of the universal scientific method which is based on the rational analysis of proven facts is highly spurious. It invites us to go down the path of what we have seen in relation to the Resource Management Act where a provision like that can be used on a leverage basis to delay and frustrate what should be a very straightforward process on a very complex issue.