Hutchison Paul: Psychoactive Substances Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeHutchison Paul: Psychoactive Substances Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 09 July 2013. Volume:692;Page:11778. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Dr PAUL HUTCHISON (National—Hunua):Thank you for the opportunity to speak on Part 1 of this Psychoactive Substances Bill. I think that all members of all parties agree on the main purpose of this bill which is indeed to regulate the availability of psychoactive substances in order to protect the health of and minimise harm to those who use them. That is the main point about this bill and it is a great pity to hear the porkies that I do hear from none other than Iain Lees-Galloway the drugs spokesperson for the Labour side when it comes to other issues.It was indeed the Health Committee that listened to the submitters and added the amendments in order to protect the health of the public and to minimise harm. They were not there in the original bill. After all there are tens of thousands of young people and not-so-young people who use these substances. For the young people their brains are growing and they are highly sensitive to these substances. The requirement of this bill for manufacturers and importers is indeed now to demonstrate minimal risk. This is novel and it is world leading but it requires the same rigour in testing as any other medicine to demonstrate minimal risk. I think it does indeed behove the Labour Party a mainstream party to recognise that that rigour of testing is required.No doubt the controversy and mischief of this bill does revolve around clause 11A which refers to the duty of the expert advisory committee relating to the use of animals when evaluating these substances. In essence no one wants to have animal testing if it can be avoided and the select committee did go to extensive lengths to arrive at an amendment that would not rely on animal testing if suitable alternatives exist. I think the members of the select committee worked hard at this. They worked consensually on this and they all voted for that amendment—they all voted for that amendment.The expert advisory committee recognised that in order to demonstrate that substances are of minimal risk in order to protect health and minimise harm it is likely that some animal testing is necessary although the amendment is worded so that it would be minimised and not done if at all possible. The expert advisory committee’s advice is backed up by best-practice mainstream scientific evidence from around the world. It is extraordinary that the Greens choose to follow best-practice scientific evidence when it suits them as in climate change but that when it comes to protecting the health of human beings and particularly young adults and sometimes children they say: “Oh no in Europe there’s no animal testing for cosmetics.”. But cosmetics clearly are not ingested; these substances are ingested. So we do have a difficulty in the credibility of the Greens. The argument is contrary to the aims of the bill which are to protect the health of and minimise harm to the user let alone the mechanism with which the bill has its intent and that is about completely demonstrating minimal risk.Sadly the Labour Party’s stand and vote on animal testing goes to the very heart of why the Labour Party is not fit to govern and why the Labour Party is in such a shambles at present. The Labour caucus has literally rolled the health team and its health spokesperson the Hon Annette King. It has literally made Iain Lees-Galloway feel extremely uncomfortable—or else he is not showing it in the House—as well as Louisa Wall. When it comes to the Labour leader Mr Shearer he should have supported his health team—we are talking about clause 11A. He should have supported science because he is Labour’s science spokesperson. So what has happened? Almost certainly the Mallard faction of the caucus has taken over and I do not know what has happened to Mr Mallard recently. I do not think he has suddenly become soft and cuddly. They have either rolled David Shearer or David Shearer is basically being utterly irresponsible and caving in to fringe science. David Shearer as the Opposition spokesperson on science and the leader of the Labour Party is clearly not demonstrating the responsibility he should for a mainstream party. I am very sad that the Hon Annette King who voted with her health team to support this amendment is now also caving in after the pressure of their dysfunctional caucus.I think that it is excellent that the National Government has gone to such lengths to bring out a scientifically based pertinent and appropriate amendment dealing with this controversial area.