Williams PotoPOTO WILLIAMS (Labour—Christchurch East): As a member of the Health Committee perhaps I can give some clarity to the thinking that went behind some of the decisions that we made as a committee in bringing the bill back to the Committee of the whole House. Firstly I want to reference a couple of people whom I worked with for whom this would be a very pertinent piece of legislation. Firstly there was Richard. Richard was able to successfully get a kidney transplanted. Then there was my very dear friend Catherine Mary Jacobs who was on dialysis for a long long period of time and unfortunately died before she was able to have her kidney transplant conducted. Why I reference these two people I worked with is because they both came to needing kidney transplants because they were diabetic. They had long-term diabetes—a condition that actually resulted in the fact that they had renal failure. Richard was lucky enough to find someone to donate a kidney to him and he went on for many many years after that point to have a very fulsome a very rich and active life. My friend Cathy on the other hand although she had a donor was unable to then translate that into a transplant because of the financial implications upon that person who could have donated a kidney to her but was financially unable to do so. That is why we are here debating this bill because it would provide an opportunity for people like my friend Cathy to reach out to her family and friends to find people who were compatible to donate a kidney and for those people not to suffer any financial hardship because of it. Why that is important is because when we look at people with diabetes they are often people who are Māori or Pacific and there are increasing numbers of Indian people but particularly Māori and Pacific people who may be impacted financially should they choose to donate a kidney to their family member. This bill is really really important to that cohort of people. I want to thank not only the select committee for the work that it did on this but actually the officials too because when you read through the bill there is not a single section of it that has not been rewritten in some form. The officials have been instrumental in guiding us providing us with information and advice and then actually crafting this into something that has come back to the Committee in a decent form. I want to thank the officials wholeheartedly not only for that advice but for the drafting that they have had to do subsequent to that as well.Hon Christopher Finlayson: Thank me cos I arranged it.POTO WILLIAMS: And OK if the Attorney-General wants some thanks as well then great. The reason we are talking about the difference between compensation and financial assistance which is why we have changed the title of the bill goes back to my original argument. It is actually about ensuring that we can provide for the number of people who are seeking transplants in this country who may have somebody lined up to help them but for whom there will be an impediment unless they are able to be compensated for the wages or the income that they will forgo. It is not about going overseas to have transplants; it is about being in the New Zealand health system where you can have the appropriate safeguards and review of any of those procedures. Let us face it for people who have kidney donations particularly—because that is the bulk of the transplants currently carried out in this country—their life improves exponentially because they have had that opportunity. We really want to encourage people to donate and that is the whole purpose of the bill. Indicating on your driver's licence that you are an organ donor does not actually provide for that donation to occur because sometimes our whānau at the time of our passing make some decisions that may not have been what we would have decided if we had been able to. It is really important if you are going to want to gift your organs that you talk about this with your whānau before anything untoward happens and that your whānau your family are really clear about your wishes and how important it is to do that—for people like Richard and my friend Cathy.