Stewart Barbara: Misuse of Drugs Amendment Bill (No 3) — Second Reading 
Stewart Barbara: Misuse of Drugs Amendment Bill (No 3) — Second Reading 
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BARBARA STEWART (NZ First) 
: 
 On behalf of New Zealand First I rise to support the second reading of the Misuse of Drugs Amendment Bill (No 3). As the Associate Minister of Health the Hon Jim Anderton has stated this bill has some very important aims. It will create new offences of importing and exporting precursor substances. It will create powers of search and seizure without warrant for ephedrine and pseudoephedrine. It amends the presumption of supply. Importantly it regulates the selling of benzylpiperazine and other party drugs. It also adds a Ministry of Justice official to the membership of the expert advisory committee among a whole list of other aims. 
All of these measures are absolutely essential. We in New Zealand First recognise the harm that is caused by drugs particularly methamphetamines. It is a growing and increasingly serious problem. We quite often read in the newspapers that the police are dealing with an increasing number of labs for the manufacture of methamphetamines. That is simply the tip of the iceberg. Far more of these labs have not been found. Despite the number of prosecutions and the dismantling of labs this continues to be a thriving industry. Unfortunately we have people who profit from other people’s addiction and they are the people who own many of the labs. We must praise the pharmacists in Rotorua who have gone out of their way not to stock pseudoephedrine at all in an attempt to ensure that it is unavailable in their town and we must acknowledge all of the other pharmacists who have taken these products off their shop shelves and put them out the back so that they can carefully monitor their purchase. 
There has been a big increase in the usage of methamphetamines both those manufactured here and those imported into this country illegally. Currently there is no offence relating to the import or export of precursor substances for the manufacture of illicit drugs. Customs officers who discover these substances cannot take much action at all under the current law. We on the Health Committee were told that the only charge that can be laid is a charge of possession because this is an area where the law has not kept up with the influx of designer drugs that are now available. This is further complicated by the fact that possession is impossible to prove in cargo and mail interception because no person is in physical possession or control of the particular substance. It is absolutely essential to close these loopholes and that is what this bill does. We need to ensure that customs officers and the police have the powers to detect effectively the presence of controlled drugs and take the appropriate action. 
It is time this House faced up to the fact that there is a tremendous amount of illegal and illicit drug use here in New Zealand. Drugs are illegal and illicit because they do incredible harm and no good whatsoever. They have no benefits for the people who use them. Instead these people become trapped and any control they have had over their lives is absolutely lost. What is the point of taking a trip and never leaving one’s room in one’s house? It is a total waste of time and money and worse still are the lasting after-effects. We in New Zealand First definitely do not subscribe to the view that illegal and illicit drugs are good for us; they simply are not. 
We definitely support the regulation of benzylpiperazine and other party pills that can be developed by these smart operators. The rapid expansion in the availability and use of these drugs requires urgent attention. We believe that Mr Anderton’s Supplementary Order Paper does not sufficiently address the problems created by the increasing use of party pills. We believe that this group of substances should be treated in exactly the same way as all other controlled drugs and included on the appropriate schedule. We believe that party pills should be classified as controlled drugs. We ask why we would want to test the water with both feet. There has been insufficient research into the long-term effects of party pills. It is extremely difficult to see how a substance used as a treatment for internal parasites in cattle can be beneficial to humans. Such substances cause an increase in heart rate blood pressure and body temperature hallucinations convulsions and respiratory depression. Why should these types of substances be classified as low-risk substances? They have no known nutritional or therapeutic use for humans so how can they be considered beneficial? They are definitely not dietary supplements in any way. We need more information on these particular party pills and their effects. We believe that greater caution is needed. We do not want to see a whole sector of New Zealanders 10 or 20 years down the track harmed by these party pills. 
The Health Committee saw some information from the customs area. Mr Williamson the manager of drug investigations for the New Zealand Customs Service said that the pills are central nervous stimulants and there is evidence becoming available now that suggests that they are toxic in content and damaging to the brain at high doses. Why are we ensuring that they are available to our young people in New Zealand? We have all read the stories of young people having adverse reactions to those substances. Some have mixed alcohol with them others may have taken their usual prescription medicines with them and others may have had more than the amount recommended on the packet. No one is really sure what has actually happened in some of those instances. 
The worst of it is that the lack of manufacturing requirements means that anything and everything can go into their manufacture. Like many other MPs today I received a letter from the Social Tonics Association. That organisation has stated: “There are a small number of operators particularly in the Christchurch region who do not value community safety. These operators are exploiting the currently unregulated market and producing low-quality products containing between 500 and 700 milligrams of BZP without labels or warnings. The level of BZP is two to three times higher than the dosages outlined as potentially dangerous by the Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs.” So they do not have a good effect on humans. 
We read in the newspapers of many negative experiences from benzylpiperazine. We read of a Christchurch schoolgirl who had been experimenting with these party drugs who has joined calls for a total ban. She was hospitalised and took a long time to recover from the effects of those drugs. We are concerned about the long-term effects of those drugs as there has been no research at all into those effects. Until the drugs can be guaranteed to be completely harmless we do not believe that they should be legally available for sale. We look forward to the expert advisory committee completing some further research into the particular harms associated with using these pills and we will also put forward a Supplementary Order Paper calling for these substances to be put on to a controlled schedule. We know that they are pouring into the country and we do not want to see harm resulting from them.