Baldock Larry: Biosecurity Amendment Bill — Second Reading Instruction to Committee In Committee Third Reading 
Baldock Larry: Biosecurity Amendment Bill — Second Reading Instruction to Committee In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:609;Page:7060] 
LARRY BALDOCK (United Future) 
: We are discussing a very important bill on a very important subject. I just want to make a few comments about a couple of the clauses in Part 1 and specifically about clause 18 which reduces the notice period for aerial spraying from 2 weeks to 24 hours where a longer notice period would seriously damage the chance of containing or eradicating an undesirable organism. 
The Primary Production Committee considered that even 24 hours may be too long a period in some cases and recommended instead that the chief technical officer could reduce the current 2-week notice period to the extent necessary in order to avoid prejudice to the eradication of an organism. The committee drew on the experience of the discovery of the southern saltmarsh mosquito infestation near Napier in 1999 which required immediate spraying before the larvae matured and were allowed to fly and spread over a larger area. The organisms in respect of which a shorter notification may be given are organisms that are not already established in New Zealand or are restricted to certain areas and that have the potential to cause significant negative economic health or environmental problems. 
Of course we did not have a member on the select committee in the previous Parliament when the report was completed but after looking at this bill and being asked whether we would support it there were only a couple of things that we were concerned about. One of those was that the reduced notice period for spraying potentially gives the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry an arbitrary power without regard to the social costs. Accordingly we asked the Government to look at including a provision for ministerial sign-off to ensure that a degree of political accountability would be there with that decision. I express our thanks to the Minister and the officials who have taken that concern seriously and included it in Supplementary Order Paper 96 in the name of the Hon Jim Sutton which we will be voting on in a short while. 
Our concern is that in cases where the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry may have messed up by not acting quickly enough to control an outbreak—which occurred with the painted apple moth in west Auckland—people have to suffer the consequences by being sprayed on. The amendment we have obtained requires that the chief technical officer has to notify the Minister if he or she considers that the 2-week notice requirement for aerial spraying would significantly prejudice the chances of eradicating or containing the organism and if practicable acquire the Minister’s approval. Some will say that that constitutes a very minor change but it ensures a modicum of political accountability for the decision. 
We think that that new provision is of significance because it will mean that the decision is not made just by a Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry official but also by the Minister who is an elected representative of the people and who will therefore be prepared to take into account the social and political consequences of spraying people in their homes and communities. The Minister will also be accountable because he will have a greater awareness of the social cost of the action to be taken— 
Rodney Hide 
: Or she. 
LARRY BALDOCK 
: —or she will; I ask members to forgive me for showing any kind of gender bias there. So we ask the other parties in this House to vote for that amendment. 
I also want to comment on clause 19(2) which probably requires some explanation. It amends section 121 of the principal Act by extending the power to recover costs when a person fails to comply with a direction. In other words if a farmer with a suspected case of TB amongst his cattle is asked to muster them for inspection and does not then the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry can recover the costs of doing so. Supplementary Order Paper 96 contains an amendment that relates to that clause. It provides the power to examine organisms and it also does other things to establish the presence of a pest. It extends those provisions to pest agents as well. 
We in United Future believe that those additions to the bill are sensible amendments. We will be giving them our support and we urge other members of the Committee to do so also.