Dyson Ruth: Human Assisted Reproductive Technology (Storage) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Dyson Ruth: Human Assisted Reproductive Technology (Storage) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
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Hon RUTH DYSON (Labour—Port Hills) 
: 
 I am delighted to stand and join many others from across the political spectrum who are speaking in support of the Human Assisted Reproductive Technology (Storage) Amendment Bill. I understand that there is a proposal to refer the bill to the Health Committee. Although I am pleased to be supporting the bill because of its contents I am particularly pleased about the proposal to refer it to the Health Committee as it will be very interesting for all members of the committee. 
The member who resumed her seat Dr Jackie Blue is a member of the select committee as is Kevin Hague who has also spoken in this debate. Mr Assistant Speaker Roy if I may refer to you and include you in the debate you are part of the select committee. I am sure you would agree that all the members of it will find this amendment bill and the issue very interesting. 
I have to say there is a downside to this bill being referred to the Health Committee. National Party members of the committee—Dr Paul Hutchison Mr Eric Roy Dr Jackie Blue Nicky Wagner and Michael Woodhouse—will have yet another excuse to deny my colleague Winnie Laban the opportunity to have her aged-care inquiry accepted by it. Frankly that is very frustrating not only for Luamanuvao Winnie Laban but also for the Labour select committee members for the Green Party select committee member and for the general public. We know there are some very serious issues in aged care around the country. On an almost daily basis we are now getting serious complaints about the quality of care about the training that is given to caregivers and about all sorts of issues— 
Michael Woodhouse 
: One needs to have relevance. 
Hon RUTH DYSON 
: I say to that member that this is a first reading speech. I recommend a page a day of the Standing Orders to any brand new member who thinks he knows the Standing Orders better than the Speaker because Mr Woodhouse has demonstrated yet again that he does not. 
The Health Committee will have yet another excuse for it not to look at these issues because this bill is likely from the indications of the speeches that have already been given to be referred to our select committee. I say to my colleague Winnie Laban that she needs to persist with her inquiry. She is getting overwhelming support from the public about the need to have an aged-care inquiry. I am sure that given every single party has spoken in support of this bill it will not take a great deal of the time of our select committee and we should be able to move back to the more pressing issue of the aged-care inquiry very early on in the new year. 
Kevin Hague spoke on this bill early on and referred to the deep emotions that surround these issues. He talked about the very complex medical and legal issues that surround the storage of sperm eggs and embryos. I can only wholeheartedly agree with him. This is not a straightforward issue that individual members and their parties are just for or against. There are a range of emotional medical and legal issues that we need to consider with a lot of caution and care but also with a lot of sensitivity towards the couples who are facing infertility to whom Dr Jackie Blue referred in her contribution. In my view she did that in a very sensitive and considered way and really reflected the views of those couples in relation to the issues that will be before the select committee. 
This bill does a technical tidy-up but for many couples and many people who submitted on the original legislation this bill will raise those emotions again. I am certainly prepared on behalf of the Labour team on the select committee to give our commitment to ensuring that no games are played with these issues and that we consider them carefully and cautiously. Because this bill is quite a small and technical bill I hope we can proceed with it at a reasonably rapid pace rather than trying to drag up issues that may be related but are really outside the scope of this bill which is quite narrow. 
The Minister of Justice’s advisers have clearly alerted him to a potential legal problem. My understanding from listening to the earlier contributions is that there has not been a legal challenge but in the same way that the Inland Revenue Department can find any number of potential legal challenges to the tax system the Minister of Justice has been alerted to a potential legal challenge in respect of the Human Assisted Reproductive Technology Act of 2004. It relates to how long sperm eggs and embryos are able to be stored. The issue boils down to this: when does the clock start ticking? The legislation says that they can be stored for only 10 years. The legislation came into force in 2004. Is that the day that the clock starts ticking on that 10-year storage length of time? Or does it take into account the 1 2 or maybe 9½ years that sperm eggs and embryos were already in storage prior to the Act coming into force in 2004? That is the question that this bill seeks to address beyond any doubt so that there cannot be any legal challenge to the legislation. 
Because I was in Parliament when those earlier debates occurred I am very confident that the select committee members did not intend there to be any challenge to the length of storage time. I particularly commend my friend and former colleague Di Yates a former member of Parliament from the Waikato who was very passionate about this issue and very committed to its progress in terms of legislative protection but also understood very well its detail. I am sure she would be of great assistance to the select committee if we wished to look at what Parliament intended during the passing of the 2004 legislation and what the Minister has now drawn to the attention of Parliament which is the potential legal challenge over the storage time. What I do not want is those deep emotional and complex medical and legal issues to muddy the waters of what this Parliament has indicated is a very straightforward clarification—not correction—of the original intent of the legislation. 
I am very pleased that the Minister has chosen to introduce this legislation. It is not at all clear whether he did so on the basis of advice from his officials or whether the advisory committee that is set up under section 35 of the Human Assisted Reproductive Technology Act of 2004 actually gave that advice. I did not hear the Minister allude to that in his introductory comments but if the advisory committee did not give that advice and if the Minister is acting solely on the advice of his officials I would say that the advisory committee would be feeling a little short-changed. It is set up under the primary legislation that we are proposing to amend tonight. It is an advisory committee with functions that are laid out in section 35 and the membership is described in section 34(4)(a) to (g) so it is not a committee that is set up at the whim of a Minister. It is set up by the decree of our Parliament under the primary legislation. I would be very interested if one of the first questions the select committee asked was whether this amendment bill was introduced on the advice of the advisory committee or on the advice of the Ministry of Justice. 
In any regard it is an important clarification to make. I look forward to you Mr Assistant Speaker and I being part of the select committee deliberations in the very near future.