White Helen; Williams PotoHELEN WHITE (Labour): It's a privilege to rise and take a call on this bill and I'd like to first of all thank and congratulate Rachel Boyack for bringing the bill to the House and I'd like to thank those involved in the institute for the work they do. I too was new at looking at this—I'm quite a new MP—and one of the things I've really enjoyed about the job is that it is just wonderful for your curiosity: you're always finding out new things and you're always seeing the incredible work that people are doing out there; it's an incredibly optimistic job in that way. This was an institute that was set up over 100 years ago and the seed funding was about the equivalent of $100 million. That's a lot of money and it went into the right place; it went into an area that is desperately needed in New Zealand society—the growth of our knowledge in the area of science. It cultivated the area of Nelson at the same time and it's brought very bright-sparky people to that area but that knowledge has been shared through the country. So I've seen some of the work in other places and I suspect it's work that was built on the work that was done in the institute. For example one of the privileges that I've had is to go to Ōpōtiki where there is a mussel farm that's been built offshore. It's been built with money from the Government and it's involved the iwi in the area and it's been built around really a partnership between all parties. It's led to very high quality work in a real attempt to meet the needs of that community. The mussels that are being farmed aren't being used to eat; they are being used for exactly this: the use of the shells to build products which will be based on the research of this institute which has discovered that the use of those shells can build up muscle and can repair from injuries. So that's gold to this country; that's an incredibly important thing and what I saw it doing was transforming a community a long way away from Nelson in an incredibly valuable way in this community. I don't think it's a coincidence that that too was a collaboration with the iwi and as things have evolved this organisation has also wanted to step up in its objectives and its structures so that it is doing that job. So we've seen an institute from what I can see that's moved away from some of the things it originally dealt with. It was quite important to things like the pit fruit industry and it was important in the area of hops and forestry and it's ended up evolving into something that is quite specialist in the area of protection of marine life the environment fresh water and sustainable primary industries. It's moved into that space and it's now an absolute world leader. It employs 300 people from 35 different countries and those people are working in a space which I think is interesting because it's independent; it's not beholden to anyone and it's able to do that work and be absolutely focused on research and that's an incredibly important job.It's got a strange structure in terms of its governance being with MPs and mayors of Nelson and Tasman so it's evolving in that space too. Adding an iwi member to the trust's board for the duration—it has chosen the duration that is the same duration as for the MPs and it's also got a board of directors. It's going to set out objects and I think that's an important thing—I'm a lawyer; I like to see things which are certain in that way. Originally the Act didn't set out the objects. It now will and those objects presumably are going to be broad enough to allow this evolution of the work that goes on and basically a healthy reflection of those needs that perhaps we need to move into spaces sometimes. There needs to be some room for an organisation like this to grow and not always resort back to changes through what was I think through the Attorney-General and the High Court—there have been changes here. So hopefully this is a setting for this very important institute which is robust and allows that institute to thrive and with it New Zealand will thrive because this is absolutely critical to our survival this kind of work. I just wanted to talk about a little bit of the other work that I can see is incredibly significant. I understand that the institute has made great strides in the area of using seaweed as a carbon sink. That's an incredibly important piece of work—I don't think you could get more important than that and the potential of it is quite incredible. And I also know that up in Auckland we've been grateful for the work that the institute's done with regard to an algae that spreads in the water. It's the method of trying to contain something that's actually a really terrible algae that can suffocate other marine life—that's been very helpful in Great Barrier Island to try and contain that. So it sounds like it's really got its work cut out for it as we hit a time of great challenge in terms of climate change and it is a place of learning and of people being able to come together and foster those kinds of ideas.I really like that it's not based in Wellington; I really like that it's based somewhere which actually is so elemental and it's going to foster a town like Nelson it's going to bring life to that town but it's actually presumably attracting people because it's such an area of natural beauty that the people who come to it the scientists who come to it—I bet they come because of things like the Nelson Lakes and I bet they come because of the beautiful waters of the Abel Tasman. So you know it's a beautiful idea and I wish I saw a little bit more of this focus on some of those regions and some of those areas as places where we could really foster that kind of work rather than all in our bigger centres because it's an important thing to spread that and it's an important thing to be that connected with nature. So I would like to commend those who are involved in bringing this Act into play here and to the Economic Development Science and Innovation Committee for having looked at this bill and done the work required. I am thrilled that today this will be passed and the institute will be on a strong footing into the future. I wish all of those involved—particularly the scientists that they will actually make the best use of the opportunity they've got and enrich our country and create one that's not only more productive but also one that's way more sustainable than it has been and that we will move into areas of sustainable primary production based on this kind of science. So I commend this bill to the House.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Poto Williams): I understand this is a split call—Joseph Mooney five minutes.