Warren-Clark AngieANGIE WARREN-CLARK (Labour): Good afternoon Mr Speaker. I'm delighted to stand as a member of the Health Committee to talk to this as the House has mentioned very important but somewhat non - fascinating or controversial issue the Health (Drinking Water) Amendment Bill. What is serious about this matter though however is the Havelock North situation and what happened I think fundamentally undermined our views and opinions of the safety aspects of drinking water.As many members have said in the House today we as a community were shocked by the nature and the effects of Havelock North the deaths that occurred and the 5000 out of the 13000 people in that community who were affected. It was a shock to me and I reflected myself on what I would do in a community if I couldn't turn on the tap for clean drinking-water. I believe that this is the crux of what this bill goes to. It's around moving forward on that inquiry to immediately fix some quite significant parts of the bill which will then feed in to the Three Waters Review.When I grew up I lived in a small rural community of Utakura. In Utakura we had a tank. We weren't on town supply as we call it. When it came to times like drought etc. it was somewhat common to find at the bottom of our tank dead rats and/or possums and things like that. I think as a younger person at the time we were quite robust and I don't recall becoming sick. Now as an adult woman I know—and having looked at what gastroenteritis is and actually looking at the fact that we have 100000 people affected by this—it's a horrible thing. It's diarrhoea and vomiting and low-grade fevers. And when our people are health-compromised this is a real issue—so our little people and our elder people are the ones who are most affected. But it's a pretty damn miserable thing to experience. So I'm very happy that we're actually going to be looking at this.Now the bill does intend as I said to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of Part 2A which refers to drinking water of the principal Act the Health Act 1956. But the key here is that it isn't materially going to affect any party or impose new or additional costs. So this is just—SPEAKER: I'm just going to warn the member that I have an expectation that most members will have read the explanatory note and don't need it read to them again.ANGIE WARREN-CLARK: Ha ha! Thank you sir. I will continue.So the reality here is that this bill is quite limited in what it does but it's also far reaching. In fact by changing the time frames for notification we're actually going to find a much more streamlined process. Finally just in conclusion I am looking forward to sitting on the select committee and hearing from the community and I also would like to note the good work that is happening in the three waters area—that's drinking waste and stormwater. I think that they are going to be the comprehensive aspects that we will look at in the future and whether or not that comes to our select committee—I'm not sure that will happen. But really in conclusion New Zealanders want and in fact deserve a higher assurance for the safety of drinking water and I think this is the first step to do so. I commend this bill to the House.