Penk ChrisSTATUTES AMENDMENT BILLFirst ReadingDebate resumed.CHRIS PENK (National—Kaipara ki Mahurangi): Thank you very much Madam Speaker. The Statutes Amendment Bill is probably about as exciting as it sounds. The Minister's explained already I think pretty well the general nature of these kinds of pieces of legislation. It's a pretty nondescript title: statutes amendment. Why?" I hear you ask "Why do we not have a better description something more detailed something indicating what statutes are being amended?" Well the answer I think is in the Minister's speech: some 42 bits of legislation that are being amended. I counted 41 actually incidentally. I did that Madam Speaker—and I know you'll be interested in this—initially by going through and counting the number of pieces of legislation; each one has its own part. By the time I got to about Part 5 I realised that if I looked to the end and saw that there were 41 parts and each one was a different piece of legislation then I could probably guess that there would be 41 pieces of legislation. Forty-one is a lot to count to and I'm now more than that number of years on this earth so I won't reflect any more deeply on—Barbara Kuriger: A diligent MP.CHRIS PENK: —the size of that! I'm a "diligent MP"—there we go!—says my colleague and friend Barbara Kuriger.Anyway as the Minister also said bipartisan in nature—I mean that's my word; I think he said "non-controversial". And in case those watching are wondering whether there is something of a risk that the House takes in bringing forward legislation—or the Government introducing legislation that the Parliament might or might not find controversial—there is a process that goes into these things in advance generally whereby we have the opportunity to consider whether we think that a change is basically policy-free so to speak it's really in the nature of making something clearer tidier maybe updating cross-referencing and so forth. So it is introduced to the House with some confidence by the Minister knowing that it will enjoy the support of the House as a whole and that a number of different items on our statute book will be updated and tidied up accordingly.I thought some of these were actually quite interesting. I know I haven't really sold it well so far—Todd Muller: No not really.CHRIS PENK: "Not really" says Mr Muller he of the sunscreen. It was interesting actually last week I think we had some quite extraordinary scenes outside on the lawn of Parliament and actually you know some quite well I'm going to say "tragic" scenes—I don't resile from that word because from a point of a view of a democracy as well as some individual harm that took place it was certainly tragic and indeed extraordinary. But on that day Mr Muller's member's bill in the realm of sunscreen labelling passed. So it was good to have some good news on that occasion Mr Muller. He's well placed to comment on that which is exciting having brought that bill to the House—genuinely helpful contribution.But anyway on this one we have some equally exciting material. Another thing that I noticed when I started going through these is that they are alphabetically arranged and I thought "Gosh they all start with 'A'". But actually that's the word "amendment"—they've all got "amendment"—funny that Statutes Amendment Bill—but bear with me amendment to Agricultural Compounds and Veterinary Medicines Act 1997—so that one starts with "A" so too does the Animal Products Act and so on. There's sort of almost a Sesame Street vibe so far. We've got my counting of the number of statutes and we've got the letters that they all start with. So I've obviously spent too much time in lockdown in isolation with a preschooler.Anyway so talking about then—and let's you know for the sake of something and giggles with six minutes to go until the dinner break I'm going to go through a couple of these as I think they're important and interesting; whether or not anyone else does is their affair not mine.So agricultural compounds and veterinary medicines: this talks about consolidating certain secondary legislation or published instruments. "Consolidating" in this sense actually means consolidating and not as used by the Government in the sense of consolidating rapid antigen tests that have been ordered by the private sector just trying to take responsibility for keeping their workers safe. "Consolidating" in that sense being something of a cross between the dictionary and the Communist Manifesto as meaning something other than what we would call "consolidating" on this side of the House. But in this case actually there is a genuine consolidation going on and that's revoking a couple of different pieces of secondary legislation and putting them together in a way that's more sensible in terms of being able to have those different pieces of content of the law be found in the one place. So that's all I can say really on the Agricultural Compounds and Veterinary Medicines Act.So the Animal Products Act then—and you can see we're proceeding slowly through the alphabet so it won't be a longer call than it needs to be. We're halfway in terms of my time if not the 26 letters; we're still on "A"; there's actually a lot of "A" to go! So anyway we've got at the moment the Animal Products Act in front of us and there's also the Animal Welfare Act not to be confused. We've got a Minister for Food Safety and director-general (DG) that being the chief executive of the Ministry for Primary Industries I understand. "Director-general" is a phrase that we've heard often in the last couple of years of course; the Director-General of Health is one particular DG but of course we've got other such officers across the machinery of Government. So he or she in this case—Barbara Kuriger: He.CHRIS PENK: —he in this case I'm reliably informed by Barbara Kuriger who knows about all things agriculture—has the ability to make certain instruments and publish those and so these are able to be consolidated.In the Animal Welfare Act there is a similar kind of thing there. There is a power referred to in relation to the Minister of Conservation—not to be confused with the "Minister for Conversation" which is of course the Prime Minister who's told us in question time today proudly that her side of the House as opposed to this side of the House cares so much about a particular issue; I forget what it was now probably cost of living. That's a key performance indicator for me by the way; every time I mention cost of living I get a tick in the box. Anyway I think she was talking about cost of living and to demonstrate how much she cared she said that "we've been talking about it for years." which I thought was really interesting the "Minister for Conversation" making her mark again. Anyway that's enough on the Animal Welfare Act.Moving now to the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering Financing of Terrorism (AMLCFT) Act. This is the dreaded AMLCFT regulations. But lest anyone should get too excited that some of the more onerous and anomalous requirements in that space are about to be done away with sadly I am bound to disappoint. The amendments in this space are more prosaic and I'd say less helpful—maybe that's unfair; they're probably helpful as far as that goes. But it's a sharing of information between different bodies NZLS—being the New Zealand Law Society—Society of Conveyancers and so on. So again as I said pretty exciting stuff.Skipping entirely past "B"—we've done the "As" and we're skipping past the "Bs"—and I see various members clutching—Todd Muller: To "B" or not to "B"? It's not to be.CHRIS PENK: —"It's not to be." says Mr Muller and I do enjoy that. Yes yes a very sweet reference there. We've got Shakespeare in the House.Actually talking of Shakespeare I'm going to—because Mr Muller has brought in the bard—go straight ahead to what I think is interesting about the Care of Children Act 2004 within this one. And we've got actually—I mean obviously very serious topic in itself; "tragic" indeed to use that phrase again—the difference between domestic violence and family violence. This was a subject that was traversed in the House a little while ago when legislation was going through to make some substantive updates to that legislation. But it also made a change in the terminology so that the shift that the Parliament thought fit to make was to change from talking about domestic violence and instead talking about family violence. The difference between it was said that the connotations with domestic violence was that it might be said that violence of that nature was merely a "domestic" in ordinary parlance—you know an argument between for example a married couple or those in a similar relationship civil union whatever—and that would be inappropriate if we were to minimise the harm that was being contemplated. So a serious point there. So in the context of the Statutes Amendment Bill it's updating that language and making a change that's really consequential on that previous change that had been made by the Parliament.My reference to Shakespeare is of course that classic line from Romeo and Juliet that a rose by any other name would smell as sweet. Yet balance that up against probably more of an Orwellian concept of the power of language from a cognitive linguistics point of view that the language shapes a thought and the thing that one can say one can contemplate and that which is not spoken of cannot be thought of. So we've got a sort of tension there Orwell vs Shakespeare—sort of a cage fight of great literary figures if you will. But anyway that's the Care of Children Act 2004. I've probably taken us as far away as I could probably get away with that one.Oh I'm just getting started but with only a few seconds to go—Todd Muller: Extension!CHRIS PENK: —not only in my contribution but in terms of the dinner break. I'm hearing a request for an extension of time; I think I'll spare us all that except to say that it's a good bill it's worthy work of Government and I commend them for bringing it to the House. We will be supporting the bill accordingly.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): Members the time has come for me to leave the Chair for the dinner break. The House will resume at 7 o'clock this evening.Sitting suspended from 5.55 p.m. to 7 p.m."