Bennett DavidHon DAVID BENNETT (National—Hamilton East): Thank you Mr Chair. When we come to Part 2 I'd just like to thank Minister Damien O'Connor for accepting the last amendment and the parties for voting for it because I think it gives a degree of comfort to this House that there will actually be a review and that was—Hon Nathan Guy: In 12 months.Hon DAVID BENNETT: Yeah in 12 months' time. So at least it won't be completely unfettered. There will be at some point a bit of a review.But when we come to Part 2 it's the amendments to the regulations and one of the big things in there is the insertion of the words or other locations" and a principal part of this bill is actually to deal with other locations. Now primarily you could see how it's been identified as a risk where there's a non - National Animal Identification and Tracing (NAIT) location that stock have travelled to and that's what the Minister is trying to deal with in this situation. However the words "other location" could actually have an extensive meaning—if you look at something like a calf club show at a school for example. Is that now going to be considered an "other location"? There won't be a NAIT requirement on that property. It's a calf club event at a local school. Will there have to be NAIT compliance for a transfer of animals there and back?That would actually be the sort of issue that could come up because it's not necessarily just a transfer from one farm to another. In the earlier speeches I noted that the Rt Hon David Carter made a number of references to inter-farm transfers. There may be different properties that the same farmer holds or leases or has stock transferring between and "other property" is intended to cover those. But there may be circumstances that the people in this room aren't aware of that could actually be genuine cases where that "other property" may actually become a very difficult or tiresome requirement. For example if there were a number of properties that had different titles or different farms—like a lot of farmers—Hon Nathan Guy: Oh contiguous as well.Hon DAVID BENNETT: Yes. A lot of farmers may have two dairy farms for example that are right beside each other and they may transfer stock from one property to the next.Hon Nathan Guy: And how's that going to work?Hon DAVID BENNETT: How would that work? Or if they had a runoff right beside their dairy farm that they were taking—Hon Ruth Dyson: Is this why you never introduced it?Hon DAVID BENNETT: Pardon? Is that member saying something? No she's not. That would be typical. And the other member beside her is laughing because he doesn't know when to vote in this House.So if we just take that example there's a runoff beside a dairy farm and the person takes their stock to that runoff for the winter for grazing and it may be used for maize or some other thing like that. Does that farmer then have to actually declare that movement and is that what was intended in the circumstance when it's really just taking stock through a gateway to the next part of their farming enterprise?Then you could get situations where there are lease animals. I think one of my colleagues raised the issue in regards to vineyards where there are animals—in that case sheep—that are taken around different vineyards in a lease-type arrangement. So is that intended to be covered as well?Now we understand the—Hon Kris Faafoi: What happened in the previous regime then?Hon DAVID BENNETT: Pardon?Hon Kris Faafoi: What was the situation in the previous regime?Hon DAVID BENNETT: Look that's a good question. What was the situation in the previous regime—and that's why we're doing this amendment around "other place". To that member I say that there's no problem with extending it to the other place—OK? So we're not voting against that. We're saying that that is—Hon Kris Faafoi: So you didn't do this in your nine years?Hon DAVID BENNETT: No it's not a matter of—the member is asking a question of whether it was done in the past. It hasn't been because this is what's being done in the bill. That's how legislation works and there's no problem with that at all. The question is defining "other place" and that is the issue because the bill hasn't gone through a select committee. There has been no robust process to actually look at those definitions. There has been no opportunity for members of the public and the farming community to come in and actually say whether that definition would actually work.So Mr Faafoi it's not a matter of who hasn't done what; it is a matter of getting it right now. That is the thing that—Hon Kris Faafoi: And that's what we're doing.Hon DAVID BENNETT: And they're not doing that because there has been no select committee process. It is simply a case where the Government has wished to push this through and it hasn't looked at that. So—Jamie Strange: It sounds like class sizes.Hon DAVID BENNETT: What's that member saying?Jamie Strange: It sounds like class sizes—all of a sudden you've discovered what we need to do.Hon DAVID BENNETT: Class sizes—talk about class sizes. There are no class sizes when the teachers are all on strike. That member is talking about class sizes when his Government has put all the teachers out on strike so I think he would be better to be quiet in this Chamber and to listen rather than to actually interject to distract people from the actual full impact of this bill that we're looking at here today.So there are some questions around what "other places" will look like and we're not trying to obfuscate the process here. We just want to make sure that it is actually done in a way that actually meets the requirements that are being sought.The Minister may have gone through all those options and may well have looked at that and got advice from his department as to what would be considered to be an "other location". We will look forward to him being able to explain that because this side of the House hasn't had that luxury. We haven't had the advice that he has had to the extent that he has had it and he may well have considered whether something like a calf club at a school is an "other location". He may well have considered if there is an adjoining piece of land that is used as a runoff with a different title that is considered to have a different NAIT number and that is now required to be registered for that movement. He may have considered those things but we don't know that and we request him to answer those questions so that we have that clarity and so that members of the public and the farming community know where they stand.With these unfettered powers that are being given out to NAIT officers farmers will now need to be able to understand what the requirements that they will have to satisfy are because potentially they could be in breach of them in a very quick manner because as soon as somebody comes on to their property they can ask for that search and surveillance right. It comes to a fundamental point of how we want NAIT to work. Nobody denies that NAIT needs improving. That's the point Mr Faafoi said before and nobody denies that at all. The question will be that NAIT will never work—it will never ever work properly—if it doesn't have buy-in from farmers.This is the heart of what's going to be the problem with what the Minister's doing today. Even if he thinks that it's just a temporary solution and something that needs to happen and that "I'm all-powerful. I can do this." and his department requires that this actually sends the wrong signal to farmers. It sends the signal that there will be a Draconian approach to NAIT going forward. NAIT will work and it needs to work in a different way in the future and that is only if there is buy-in from farmers because I can guarantee you that the next time we have an incursion we will be doing exactly the same thing. We'll be sitting in this House and we'll be saying "We should have done this. The legislation should have had this power. This should have happened." But if we actually have farmers working with the system and with the Government the officials and the department at the time then we will be much more effective.And 99 percent of the farmers have worked with the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) and are willing to go through that process now when it comes to M. bovis. That's the success of MPI at the moment and why we're looking at eradication rather than just containment because we know that the vast majority of industry are working with MPI. There will be some rogue cases but that's in anything in life. But when there is a system of Draconian measures that's planted on top of a community who we need to work with us to deliver results often you don't get that result. What happens is the opposite. People retrench and try and avoid the system.We don't want avoidance and with these Draconian powers it's going to encourage people to look at loopholes in the NAIT system. It's going to encourage people to look at avoidance of the NAIT system and it will achieve the opposite of what the Minister wants to achieve today for those rogue players. Those are the people who need to actually feel that the system works for them and that they can be part of it. Now that's something I wish the Minister had taken into account when he looked at the principles behind the policy he is enacting here today. I feel that he's going to lose a lot of credit now within the farming community. There will be people that—whether it's true or not the perception will be that this is heavy-handed governance. Whether that is true or not that is the perception."