Delahunty Catherine: Royal Society of New Zealand Amendment Bill — In Committee Third Reading 
Delahunty Catherine: Royal Society of New Zealand Amendment Bill — In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:677;Page:693] 
CATHERINE DELAHUNTY (Green) 
: 
 Tena koe Mr Assistant Speaker Robertson. It is great to take a call finally on the third reading of the Royal Society of New Zealand Amendment Bill. It has been an exciting dynamic process to date. I was on the Education and Science Committee and I really enjoyed working on the Royal Society bill. One of the members previously referred to it as a farce. Well farce is a form of theatre and this is about the humanities going into the Royal Society. Farce often occurs in this House of Parliament. It is quite a normal part of our experience as MPs to witness and sometimes participate in farce. However this farce was more enjoyable. I am not sure that it was enjoyable for the Royal Society but it certainly was for some of us because we had some wonderful MPs some of whom are no longer in Parliament make glorious contributions on the nature of science and the nature of these debates. I actually enjoyed it because rather than abusing each other we were actually talking about something that is really important to everybody and in a way that was reasonably civilised. That is pretty unusual for this particular Parliament which is unfortunate because I think the public would like us to reach that level more often.  
Farce or not it was an interesting debate and I think the Royal Society members who presented at the select committee would have been astonished to see what happened to their little bill and how it turned into a cause célèbre. Grant Robertson did an excellent job of raising its profile. It was well supported by many members of the House and it played its part as bills do in the history of this House. Of course it was contextual and there were other things going on in the background but I do not think any party in this House can really accuse anyone of never making use of things such as bills to delay other bills etc. We all need to own what we do.  
Colin King 
: Oh! 
CATHERINE DELAHUNTY 
: We all need to admit what we do Colin because we all do things for perhaps less than pure reasons which brings me back to the bill. Pure science—it was really interesting meeting some of these scientists because the concept of pure science as Moana Mackey has said is somewhat outdated. People no longer talk about purity in science and in some ways that is a good thing. For a long time we have moved on from the idea that only the physical sciences only the pure sciences can be included in the Royal Society or any other kind of scientific endeavour. But there is something lost to science that this bill does not cover and that is the independence of science. As a person who spent many many years in front of hearings panels resource management hearings town and country planning hearings mining hearings etc. there is a real lack of independent science. Since the loss of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research—which I am old enough to remember and which actually made a real contribution in this country—what we struggle with is that the Crown research institutes and even groups like the Royal Society which are always looking for funding have to find money to allow them to do things that they want to do. In that process they often lose focus on the idea of public-good science and we had an example of that at the select committee today. Public-good science is not necessarily well served by this bill but the Royal Society does its best. It has actually brought up many good issues in this country not all of which the Green Party has agreed with. I think on the GE one you would have to say that we were robustly in opposition to the Royal Society’s position. However we do think this bill is important because we do think the humanities are inseparable from other forms of science.  
Having worked in social science having taught social science and having been involved in many many causes and things associated with the humanities I think humanity is always good to have. No matter what you are doing it is always good to remember that you are a human. It is good to remember that we are not living in an ideologically pure theoretical scientific universe; we are actually living in a universe where our humanity especially in science needs to be present. Otherwise we invent things like nuclear weapons. Otherwise we invent things like chemicals that have intergenerational capacity to destroy people’s lives. So it is very important that the humanities are included in the Royal Society’s work even though some of the scientists in a kind of—dare I say it—dualistic and patriarchal manner were a little bit nervous about it. But as Moana said the majority of them have already moved on. This bill was really about recognising what already is rather than breaking new ground. The ground was broken quite some considerable time ago.  
What I would be hoping for the Royal Society—and it would be interesting if we ever became a republic because what would you call it? Would you call it the “Republic Society”? It does not have quite the same ring to it. But it would be quite interesting. I would also be interested in whether we would change the word “fellow” and get a little bit more modern with that as well. What would we call it? I have got this strange addiction to the word “person”—that actually you could refer to people as “people” rather than having to give them a gender. But maybe I am a little bit advanced for the Royal Society and maybe it is impossible to distinguish between scientists; they all have to be given these obscure titles.  
Back to the Royal Society bill. I think it was a very interesting debate and I really enjoyed aspects of it but I do think that it is very important that the Royal Society continues to develop. For example in terms of matauranga Maori a form of science that the Royal Society has yet to really fully acknowledge—it is starting to—we really need to recognise that there are many ways in which science is expressed and not just in Pakeha terms. There are some exciting scientific projects going on in Aotearoa that I know people are involved in that include matauranga Maori and Pakeha science in a wonderful coming together in a very humanitarian coming together to deal with challenging issues such as toxic sites—which is one of my particular portfolios and interests—from both cultural perspectives. There is science in everything just as there is humanity in everything and the more holistically we approach these issues the more effective we will be in creating societies that are environmentally sustainable and fair. The Royal Society bill really did appeal to the Greens because it is about taking a more holistic approach to the whole thing.  
Apart from that I did witness some of the disquiet that some of the members had at the select committee but I do feel that they were expressing a minority view. I mean members of the Royal Society not members of Parliament. In fact for once everyone on the select committee agreed. There was a glorious calm a genuine interest in the issue and then we got to Parliament and into the House and everything went into its usual state. 
 It is very important that we acknowledge public-good science and that is one of the things that I hope the Royal Society will continue to do. But again as I said it is constrained.  
I just wanted to say that David Clendon and I are really thrilled to take a call at this point because we have enjoyed the ride we have enjoyed the process and we think that the Royal Society bill will go down in history as one of the more passionately debated bills of such import to the nation that we have ever heard. I am not being frivolous; I actually think that at the heart of this as I think another member said is that learning is what we are human for. We learn good things or bad things but if we do not have a focus on recognising that we learn all the time we do not advance as a culture or as cultures. Whether the Royal Society bill has really changed the culture I do not know but I do feel as if we certainly gave it a very very good airing. Thank you.