Mallard Trevor: Sports Anti-Doping Bill — First Reading 
Mallard Trevor: Sports Anti-Doping Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:628;Page:982] 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD (Minister for Sport and Recreation) 
: 
 I move  
That the Sports Anti-Doping Bill be now read a first time. 
 At the appropriate time I intend to move that the bill be referred to the Government Administration Committee for consideration. I want to thank the House for what I am sure will be a largely bipartisan or multipartisan approach on this legislation. That has been its history ever since my good friend John Banks showed leadership in this area in the early 1990s. 
New Zealand is considered by the international community to be a world leader in the fight against doping in sport. We were a founding member of the World Anti-Doping Agency and have been a strong supporter of the development of the code that seeks to harmonise international efforts to address doping in sports by establishing international standards and values which was finalised at the world anti-doping conference in Copenhagen in March 2003. Nations then moved on as members will be aware because a committee has been dealing with the Unesco international convention. That is something New Zealand is just about to officially ratify following the support of the Government Administration Committee. 
The world code is a set of anti-doping rules and principles that are accepted by most of the world’s international sporting organisations. Those organisations have responsibility for ensuring compliance with the code and enforcing it through their member organisations. I make the point that a few international sporting codes have still not quite come into line with the code and I encourage the relevant local national sporting organisations to work on their world organisations in order for that to happen. 
This bill was developed in order to allow all doping violations to be handled in a uniform manner in New Zealand. The current legislative framework comes from the New Zealand Sports Drug Agency Act of 1994 which was the work of John Banks. From memory—and this will surprise people a little—I think David Lange played a bit of a role in the committee that was involved in getting that agency set up at the time along with some other sporting matters. The advent of the world code in 2003 changed the environment we had for the previous decade. What we are trying to do is to bring our legislation into line with what is happening around the world. Therefore this bill will repeal and replace the 1994 Act. 
The bill does not contain the world code itself as the code does not lend itself to going into legislation nor does it incorporate it by reference. But it does allow for the making of rules that will interpret the code for New Zealand. The bill continues the Sports Drug Agency as an independent Crown entity with members who have knowledge and experience in law sports sports medicine sports participation and administration. I do want to acknowledge the work the agency has done. It has recently re-branded itself as Drug Free Sport New Zealand and there have been three exceptional leaders there in Sir Graham Speight David Howman who now has an international leadership role in the anti-doping area and Dr Dave Gerrard who as well as being a real athlete himself has shown technical expertise in this area along with Graeme Steel who is probably seen as the international leader in technical matters around doping in sport. 
The bill will make some changes that will allow for the public notification of the names of athletes who commit doping violations after the processes have been completed. There has been a tendency on the part of some sports to try to hush up some things in this area and I think the naming and shaming approach is important. The bill also allows for the implementation of blood testing something that was right at the edge of the rules. The bill makes that area a lot clearer. 
I make it clear that the bill and the sports anti-doping rules will not impinge on the rights or affect the obligations of members of the general public. No one will be randomly stopped when riding a bike down the road and asked to give a sample. The legislation will apply only to people who by their voluntary participation in sport are required by their sport’s anti-doping policy to comply with the rules. But people will have to be aware—and it is important that there are some reminders—that both within the participation season and out of season there are rules and people will have to be prepared to give samples if they are involved in sport. 
Hon Tau Henare 
: What about normal clubs—at that level? 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD 
: Theoretically at the club level there is an obligation for people to be dope-free. I think that is quite important. There was probably a previous history. Many members of the House who have been members of gymnasia found that in the 1970s and 1980s the attitude to the taking of drugs was probably quite different from that now. Drugs were quite openly available and almost certainly much more extensive use was made of them by club and possibly even school players in the past. I make it very clear that these rules apply to people who are in organised sport run under the auspices of national sporting organisations even at a club level. It is quite unlikely that they will be tested at that level because the focus will always be at the top level but the rules do allow for that sort of testing and people should be aware of that. 
The support of Drug Free Sport New Zealand and of the New Zealand Olympic Committee has been vital in this area. I think it is very important that our athletes who have shown recently how well they perform on the international stage can compete can be clean and can win. It is interesting that we seem to be doing a bit better internationally as the rules are implemented for international competitions. That probably says something about some other countries and their longer-term attitude. 
I will make two closing points. One is that an international debate is being held on whether the rules should focus on performance-enhancing drugs only. Therefore there is a discussion around marijuana and its use—whether that is something that is clearly not performance enhancing and whether it should be the subject of the testing. It is clear that the majority of positive tests in New Zealand are for marijuana which stays in the system for 6 weeks or more. We should have that discussion at some stage internationally and we should have it in New Zealand as well. 
The other point I will make is in reference to articles in a Sunday newspaper last week around the rider Lisa Cropp. I think we need to get some consistency around our testing and our rules and around the regulations and the courage of enforcement because it is becoming very clear that a very senior person in the racing industry has been cheating. She has been achieving records when she has been cheating and the authorities have been unable to deal with her. It is absolutely unfair that New Zealand records are broken by someone who at the time was using methamphetamine. That is wrong and it has to stop.