O'Connor DamienHon DAMIEN O'CONNOR (Labour—West Coast - Tasman): As my colleague David Shearer said Labour will be supporting this piece of legislation. It is somewhat ad hoc I have to say. The original Act was actually passed in 2006 but was not able to be put into place and so what we are doing now is making amendments to that piece of legislation in an ad hoc way that deals with the particular issues—and that is progress I guess. But as we have seen in the House today we have another Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) from the Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs to tidy up a few things. So we hope that there have not been too many omissions.The Primary Production Committee did do its very best to cover all these things and to make sure that the intent of the original 2006 Act is being carried through in a somewhat more modern environment and one in which we have seen the rapid growth and progress of the wine industry. So we endorse the implementation of the original Act and intention but I raised at the select committee on a number of occasions the issue of missed opportunity. We are seeing actually with honey at the moment—mānuka honey which is something that I guess we have considered unique to New Zealand and something incredibly valuable and growing both in terms of its total export value and actually in the properties that are available across the whole health and medical area. So we should have had some reference to protect that very very valuable product. It is being developed in New Zealand and sold offshore without any protection at the moment and it is the same thing with much of the food that we are producing in this country at the moment.So the geographical indicators proposition and legislation as we will pass it through identifies the areas from which food and beverages are produced—no it does not. It actually just deals with wine but why not food? I asked that question until most of my colleagues in the select committee got tired of me asking it—you know why we should not. And it was because quite frankly we have got a Government that has sat on its hands over this will sit on its hands over mānuka honey and will sit on its hands over food production so that we will miss opportunity. The only reason as my colleague said that the Government has actually moved on this is that there is an EU trade deal. But we will not have an EU trade deal until we have addressed the issue of food geographical indicators and we respect their geographical indicators and we should have in place those of our own. So this bill is a missed opportunity for New Zealand once again by a Government that lacks the vision to see where we will be going as an export nation in the primary sector into the future 20 30 50 years out. We will be back in this House particularly if there is a Labour Government addressing these issues in food and in mānuka honey and in all of those other areas where we need protection for our producers and exporters but this Government refuses to step in.The bill as I say makes amendments around registration times—around protection of those. We have always assumed that Marlborough sauvignon blanc is something that we are proud of and that we have developed. But actually without this legislation it has no security in the international market place and indeed people are already asking questions because of the large amount of bulk wine supplied offshore which is bottled offshore with a Marlborough sauvignon blanc label on it but actually without the protections that I think we need to uphold that brand. Although this piece of legislation will not guarantee protection for the wine industry it is certainly moving ahead in terms of the production of the wine from an area and ensuring that we can put the label on it with some truth and with some integrity. As I say we will support the Minister's SOP. We cannot support the ones by New Zealand First as much as we like to work with them on many issues and share their criticism of the Government on most issues. On this particular one I think the select committee has worked through it. It is a tricky area using Māori terms and we believe that it should not just be the Geographic Board. I think these will be more important issues as we move forward as I say into the area of food—mānuka honey and others as we move forward. I think it is fair enough for us to establish I guess the precedent of having an advisory board where I think Māori terms will be a bigger part of our overseas exports. It is something that is truly unique to New Zealand. I think we are starting to appreciate that—Māori culture and all the history and the stories and in fact the wisdom that we are just starting to learn about. As we move forward we have got to ensure that we do not abuse or overuse it and that we have appropriate use of Māori terms geographical places or whatever.So I think that we are making good progress. We do not want to delay the passage of this bill. I think the select committee has done a good job. I would like to acknowledge the members of Government on that committee. They are as always under riding instructions from the Minister so they are a little bit restrained I have to say and it would probably be a smarter committee if they were allowed to do a bit more and work with the Opposition. But this is a good piece of legislation. I acknowledge that the Minister has finally got around to doing something. It has been sitting around since 2006. Labour welcomes the passage of this bill to protect the wine industry and all the amazing development that we have had there. But what the Government has missed is an opportunity to protect the food that we produce and things like mānuka honey which are at risk from people putting in place selling and exporting things around the world with a New Zealand label on them but they are of course not true to brand and they risk undermining our reputation. Some progress—but a missed opportunity.