Bishop ChrisCHRIS BISHOP (National): Thank you very much Mr Speaker. One could be forgiven for listening to the Minister for COVID-19 Response and his remarks around how this is the logical next step it's all part of this well-coordinated Government approach to COVID and you'd be forgiven for thinking that this was all very well thought through. The reality is the exact opposite. This is a bill that was thrown together hastily in the last month or so basically at the last minute. It's been dropped on the Parliament with six sitting days to go before Christmas and the Parliament is being asked to put it through all stages under urgency with no public scrutiny whatsoever. And that just goes to show what a mad scramble the Government's response has been in the last six months. I will give the Government credit for their response last year we entered 2021 with freedoms that many other countries did not have and we should be proud collectively as a community about that. But what we cannot be proud of as a Parliament or a society is what we have seen in the last six months. This bill is emblematic of the Government's mad scramble basically making things up as they go.The COVID-19 framework was announced on Friday 22 October but the drafting instructions for the bill weren't issued until five days later. No New Zealand Bill of Rights Act analysis scrambled through the Cabinet and the various legislative processes. So hastily done that the legal advice for the section 7 report that didn't end up materialising says that the time frame was so short that it was not in compliance with the Cabinet Manual. This is not a bill that was put together in a comprehensive well thought through way.I want to address some of the remarks of the Minister in his speech. He said that there's a contradiction in the National Party position between arguing for vaccine certificates but voting against this legislation. That is a trite characterisation—with respect a very superficial and trite characterisation of the position. Because we had been arguing on this side for proof of vaccination since February. That's when Judith Collins first asked the Prime Minister about it and she was assured that the work was under way. Well as we now know that's actually not true. The work hadn't begun. Cabinet didn't actually authorise vaccine certificates to be developed until July and the Government didn't sign the contracts with the IT providers until a month ago. So we are on the record in favour of vaccine passes and vaccine certificates.The second thing he pointed to was this idea that we want vaccine certificates as a matter of urgency but we voted against the urgency. Of course the real point is that this is not an appropriate way to make extremely significant far-reaching decisions. We want things done quickly but we wanted them done quickly in July in August—not in late November 2021. We wanted them done in July and August when Delta first turned up not at the very tail-end of the Parliament for the year 2021 in a mad scramble to get things underway for Auckland and the rest of the country on 3 December when the country will begin to open up again. So a sensible competent Government would have been working on this during the year. They would have been developing the certificates and would have been developing the framework.As Dr Dean Knight from Victoria University of Wellington Law Faculty has said this bill is a constitutional disgrace. It should have been worked on for quite some time. And the reason for that is actually the reason highlighted by the Minister in his contribution around choice. He made the correct point which is that the decisions that some people make to be unvaccinated have externalities. He didn't quite phrase it like that but in economics terms that's what they are. They have externalities. My decision not to be vaccinated has a consequence not just for me—that's true in a personal sense—but it also has a consequence for the health system and for others because kids can't be vaccinated and there are other people who can't be vaccinated. And it's worthwhile having a debate about that.The level of intrusion on personal freedom and civil liberties because of the impact that a decision by an individual to not be vaccinated has is worthy of debate and it's worthy of ventilation. But the appropriate place to do that I'm sorry is not at 9 o'clock at night on a Tuesday with six sitting days to go while we try and figure it out and basically yell at each other about the bill for a while—that's not the appropriate place. The appropriate place is before a select committee with legal experts turning up with public policy scholars tuning up and with health advice and health experts. What the Government's saying through the very quick passage of this bill is that they know it all that they've got all the answers they've got all the solutions. Actually there's quite a lot of people out there in the public domain who don't agree with that. As you will have seen from people's email inboxes in relation to mandates and passports and things like that actually a lot of people don't agree with all of those particular measures. And all of that is not an argument to say that those people are right that is an argument to say that their concerns are worthy of respect they are worthy of discussion and they are worthy of listening to—not necessarily agreeing with but they are worthy of discussion debate and a voice. The whole point of the select committee process is to allow those concerns to be ventilated.But there's a further the point in relation to this which is that when you allow people the chance to be heard and to have their concerns addressed you can engage in a dialogue in which you can actually persuade people that what they are saying is wrong. I'm sorry the people who are opposed to vaccine passports their views will be entrenched and solidified by the very quick passage of this bill. I can see my inbox right now there'll be people emailing and they're going to be emailing backbench members opposite too including Tangi Utikere who's been here a year and decides to hand out free advice from the backbench of the Labour Party. Well thanks very much champ but I don't really need your advice. I'll tell you what Simon Watts who was the deputy CFO of a DHB doesn't need the advice from someone who doesn't understand the health system so thanks very much but we'll leave that one alone.So I'm telling the Government backbench now and Government Ministers as well: the people who are opposed to vaccine mandates and vaccine passports are not going to change their mind as a result of the fast passage of this bill. In fact it will be the opposite. You are actually just entrenching the divide in society between those who are opposed to mandates and those who are opposed to passports. A sensible competent Government that was trying to take people with them rather than divide them—trying to take people with them—would have moved expeditiously to develop the framework but then sent it to a committee for debate and discussion. Because I'll tell you the one thing about select committee processes it can shatter some myths and it can allow people to have their views heard and allows people to have their say. And actually you can do some persuasion through the select committee process.I believe in vaccination. I believe in vaccine certificates I believe in private property rights and I believe in free enterprise. I believe that in 2022 there will be businesses out there who decide to limit their customers to being vaccinated. They'll say You have to be vaccinated to enter my restaurant" "You have to be vaccinated to go to the Shihad concert down the road" or whatever. You know frankly I would probably agree with businesses doing that. I'll tell you what though there's quite a few people who do not agree with that and the very fast expeditious passage of this bill tonight without any public scrutiny whatsoever will not change the minds of those people. In fact it will just entrench them.Finally in relation to Mr Hipkins' remarks about the Opposition just wanting to give up: nothing could be further from the truth. Most of our 17000-word document is about the opposite of giving up. It is about adopting tools and techniques that other countries are using that we are not. I'll give you the example of rapid antigen testing. I can walk into a supermarket in Melbourne Victoria right now and buy a rapid test. It'll give me a COVID result in 15 minutes. Can I do that in New Zealand? No. Can I go down to Thorndon New World and buy a rapid test? Absolutely not. You know why? Because the Government's decided in its infinite wisdom that they should be banned—unless I work for Wellington Airport or Mainfreight or one of the 30 large corporates that the Government has deigned to give a rapid test to. Why can I not buy a rapid test? And actually it's not just me who thinks that we should be able to do this there is a variety of public health experts out there who agree with me as well—including the chair of the Government's own testing advisory group who came and told the select committee last week that what we've been saying about rapid testing was completely correct. That's in our document.So it's not about giving up on COVID it's about using modern tools and techniques like rapid testing and like saliva testing—I don't know like pulse oximeters for example as well. If you ask the Government you get four different answers to the same question as to whether or not people get pulse oximeters in home isolation. The answer is: we probably don't know. But Dr Bloomfield says one thing Grant Robertson says another Jacinda Ardern says another and Chris Hipkins says another. So there are sensible things we should adopt like that.This bill is a constitutional abhorrence and we will continue to oppose it on those grounds."