McClay Todd; Rurawhe AdrianHon TODD McCLAY (National—Rotorua): Mr Assistant Speaker thank you and it's a pleasure to rise and speak in this debate. It is an important piece of legislation. It provides important tools to New Zealand's Customs Service to protect our border and to be able to push out through the 12-mile zone to make sure that where there are ships on their way to New Zealand or leaving New Zealand that could cause New Zealanders harm through the importation of illicit drugs or peddling drugs passing through New Zealand to other nations they will have the tools to stop these ships to hold the people on board to account and to take necessary action.Why is this important? If I go back and think of the evolution of drug trafficking in New Zealand over a period of time we have seen it escalate. Those who are bringing illicit drugs to New Zealand with the sole desire of profiting from the harm and misery they cause New Zealanders have found new and innovative ways to bring these poisons these drugs to the country. Indeed we were told when we sat on the Foreign Affairs Defence and Trade Committee that there's around $1.8 billion worth of social harm done every year in New Zealand to New Zealanders as a result of the consumption of illicit drugs.Hon Member: How much?Hon TODD McCLAY: There's $1.8 billion worth of harm. If we go back to 2015 and look at what was imported or at least what was confiscated by our Customs Service and our border officials—who work very hard on our behalf—customs and police intercepted 293 kilos of illicit drugs compared to 2014 which was just 105 kilos. So we're seeing as early as 2014-15 more than a doubling—almost a tripling—of illicit drugs being confiscated at our borders.In 2016 there was a whopping $875 million worth of potential harm restricted or stopped at the border when illicit drugs were stopped. Indeed at that time I remember saying when we were in Government that actually we needed to redouble our efforts to give the tools to our services to police our borders better. In 2017 that was $1 billion worth of harm—897 kilograms of drugs were stopped at the border. The vast majority was ephedrine for the manufacture of methamphetamine or P and also methylene dioxy-methyl amphetamine cocaine cannabis—a raft of drugs.Interestingly psychoactive substances started to show themselves again in the work that our police and our officials did so it was important to give them the tools. Of course when we had the committee stage of this legislation and I had an opportunity to talk I canvassed actually the origins of this legislation. It was introduced by the last Government the National Government and as we've brought this forward I'm very pleased that the new Government has decided to continue it to put it into law. It's a shame that it's taken more than a year because these new abilities and tools have been necessary for some period of time.So what will this allow our Customs Service to do? Well at the moment if they believe there is a ship coming towards New Zealand that is involved in the transportation the manufacture or the illicit control or possession of drugs they are really only able to intercept that boat or that ship when it comes into our territorial waters which is 12 nautical miles. Outside of that there have been questions raised based on other conventions we're in about exactly the legal jurisdiction we would have. Well what this legislation does is it extends the ability of our Customs Service out through the territorial waters into the contiguous zone of New Zealand up to 24 nautical miles offshore—so that's from 12 nautical miles to 24 nautical miles.There are a number of checks and balances we've put in place to make sure that these powers are used properly. Customs must have reasonable cause to suspect that drug-smuggling offences have been are being or are likely to be committed and in the case of a foreign ship the flag State of that ship have authorised actions in accordance with the drug-trafficking conventions that New Zealand has signed. We need to establish clear jurisdiction over drug-smuggling offences committed in international waters and this legislation also does this. It allows our officials to seize not only the illicit drugs and for any paraphernalia used to store or produce drugs to be forfeit but the ship itself can also be forfeit. So we're talking about controlled drugs or precursor substances.I think it was last year that we heard from our media that police and customs had intercepted boats on their way to New Zealand as they came up on the shore with significant amounts of precursors to manufacture methamphetamine—a horrible drug that does nothing but harm that poisons and that ruins lives all over New Zealand when it is sold and when it is consumed. Of course it's important that our officials through intelligence and other means were able to intercept them when they got on the shore but it would be much better if they were able to do so much further from shore so that we can ensure that there is much less chance of these poisons these drugs arriving here.I commend this bill to the House. I'm glad it's going through its third reading. It is an important piece of legislation. One of the previous speakers in this debate the Hon Tim Macindoe as the former Minister of Customs can be proud of having brought the legislation to the House. The previous National Government can equally be proud to have brought the legislation to the House. The House should know that it is doing an important thing to help protect New Zealanders by passing this legislation unanimously today to give tools to our hard-working border officials and to stop the merchants who peddle illicit drugs in New Zealand and who harm New Zealanders. Thank you.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Adrian Rurawhe): This is a split call of five minutes. I call Jan Tinetti.