Pugh Maureen; Leary IngridCHAIRPERSON (Maureen Pugh): Members the committee is resumed. When we broke for the dinner break the committee was considering the Misuse of Drugs (Pseudoephedrine) Amendment Bill. The question again is that Parts 1 and 2 and clauses 1 to 3 stand part.INGRID LEARY (Labour—Taieri): Thank you Madam Chair. First I'd like to thank the Minister the Hon David Seymour for his considerable contribution just before the break. I appreciate his comments that he thought some of the things were out of scope but actually I would put it to him that this was a bit more interesting and on point for particularly members of the public who are interested in this issue instead of going through a line-by-line analysis of the legislation. So I thank him for responding in a very sincere and genuine way to the questions that we put.I hope that in that spirit he will also consider a very genuine and sincere suggestion for an Amendment Paper which has been submitted. I'm sure the Minister has had time to read it. And this is about saying Labour agrees with the policy on the balance of considering public harm and the benefits that would flow from this bill. We do think it's a good idea to support it for all the reasons I've said before but there is one really critical area where we feel the risks could be mitigated and that is with appropriate storage. And these are the risks to the pharmacies the pharmacists but also to those who work in the pharmacies who don't necessarily have the same level of choice about opting into the scheme which the Minister has made very clear pharmacists can do.This Amendment Paper is in the name of my colleague the Hon Dr Ayesha Verrall. It basically proposes to replace clause 9 page 2 lines 23 to 25 with 9 Regulation 28 amended (Custody of controlled drugs) Revoke regulation 28(4)(e)." There's a whole explanatory note. I don't need to take up the committee's time with that. What I will do just briefly for people following at home is say the context is that the current bill in clause 9 removes any safe storage requirement for pseudoephedrine. We understand that pharmacists can opt into the scheme. So in some ways they may or may not be opting into any of the risks that that poses for people to ram-raid their shop or burgle their shop or their pharmacy or whatever. But also as I said before this is about the staff who work there. They don't have that choice. They have families to feed. And so this is about protecting them as well.I note in putting this amendment there on behalf of my colleague that we had comments from pharmacists who said they were constantly burgled when pseudoephedrine was on the shelves. One of them said 12 times per year and the select committee did ask advice around the storage of medicines and equivalent medicines—one could say "analogue" medicines—and we were told that with this kind of quantity codeine was a good comparator. And codeine in fact does seem to be under lock and key. So it would be appropriate in our view to make sure that pseudoephedrine has the same level of safety.This Government really needs to do everything it can to protect pharmacists and those who work in pharmacies from the risks of the declassification. So it is with real sincerity and an amount of pride actually for the work that we did as a select committee to tease out the issues to really understand the context understand what the real risks were about pseudoephedrine to the community—it's very easy to have moral panic and hysteria. We understand that now there seems to be a pricing reality with meth coming over the border that it is unlikely people will make pseudoephedrine at home. It is unlikely that they will go and shop around although we are very keen that the Minister will keep an eye on that for all the reasons named across the House. But I would like to see the Minister adopt this Amendment Paper.For us that would really seal the deal on being able to give full-hearted support to this bill instead of just the cautious enthusiasm for it. We want people to have the benefit. We don't want to stop people from getting pseudoephedrine because they have to go to a doctor or have it on prescription but we need to keep our pharmacists safe we need to keep their staff safe. Ram raids are still happening. This Government said they wouldn't happen when they got hard on crime whatever. Ram raids are happening and I hope the Minister understands the responsibility he has if and when there are ram raids if he doesn't adopt our Amendment Paper. So I'm very keen for the Minister to adopt it."