Reti Shane; Dean JacquiDr SHANE RETI (Deputy Leader—National): Thank you Madam Speaker. Pleasure to take a split call on this bill which fundamentally in the legislative statement says this bill amends the COVID-19 Act to incorporate what has been learned about the COVID-19 pandemic to date. I want to talk about what hasn't been learned. We have not been a learning enterprise during this whole COVID-19 response.I want to start with the Government's own independent Roche report on 1 June where they asked independent advisers to advise—and remember COVID Part II hadn't arrived yet; Delta hadn't arrived—and here's what they were told. They were told that the classification system that says close contact" and "close contact plus" and "casual contact" and "casual contact plus" was far too complex; it needed to change—immediately was the time frame—to close and casual. Did that happen? Has it happened? No it has not. In fact what happened was another category was created called "high risk". So it completely ignored the recommendations from the independent committee.They were told that ARPHS—Auckland Regional Public Health Service—which is the responsible body for managing the COVID-19 response in Auckland needed to increase by 25 FTEs within three months' time. They were even told what sort of classifications were required what sort of job descriptions. What I can tell from written questions to the Minister is clearly that did not happen before the 17 August outbreak was announced. They were understaffed so understaffed that if I look at the action report—so the outbreak started on 17 August—if I look at the action report No. 3 which is 3 September it talks here about the welfare of staff. So this is 18 days into the current outbreak. Here's what it says under "Welfare": "Monitor staff wellbeing—ARPHS response staff are tired and stressed from the demands of dealing with COVID-affected cases and contacts. (Many are in a distressed state.)" That's only 18 days into this outbreak. So I inquired a bit further of that with the Minister and asked him in a written parliamentary question that I got back last week "Is it correct that in the action report for 3 September 2021 less than 20 days into the current coronavirus outbreak it is reported that many ARPHS staff are 'in a distressed state'?"—"No the phrase was referring to COVID-19 - affected cases and their contacts."You've got to be joking; you have to be joking. Let me just read that again from the action report 3 September subsection "Welfare": "Monitor staff wellbeing—ARPHS response staff are tired and stressed from the demands of dealing with COVID-affected cases and contacts. (Many are in a distressed state.)" To the Minister "Were staff in a distressed state?"—no they were talking about affected cases and contacts! That's just not possible. What happened here was ARPHS were undermanned. They did not listen to the Roche report 1 June. They did not take on the 25 full-time equivalents as they were requested to do within three months. A shout out to the really difficult work that ARPHS is doing. They were also told to build the infrastructure. This is clearly a story around ICU infrastructure for another time because there are other things we can talk to in this bill which I do want to talk to.This bill talks to laboratory testing and we've already mentioned the abysmal case of saliva testing and I have a real concern that rapid antigen testing is going the same way. But I want to talk to the laboratory tests for the two Northland women who started off the Northland outbreak. What I don't understand is why the results were lost for 48 hours. For 48 hours their lab tests disappeared from the laboratory system. What happened here? I asked the Minister and asked him to explain that and said "Can you tell me what happened to those test results for those two women who first came into Northland?" He said "I'm advised both cases were tested in the late evening on 20 October." No they weren't. It was before lunchtime on 20 October—20 October was a Wednesday. The Minister is saying they were tested late on the Wednesday. No they weren't. I've got the date timestamp from the machine. At 11:58 that day the lab tests were in the laboratory—not just being picked up; in the laboratory—and they disappeared for two days.Now maybe it's just two days in Northland? No it's not. Because on the Friday they were able to do a lab test within 90 minutes. What happened to those two women's lab tests for those two days? The lab machine has caught you out. The date timestamp has caught out the Minister. We need to know the truth. There needs to be sunlight on what is happening with laboratory testing in Northland and you've been caught out with these two women. It's another story for another time.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): Before I call the next speaker could he clarify whether he is seeking the call that the Māori Party didn't take or whether he is seeking his 10-minute call.Tangi Utikere: My 10-minute call Madam Speaker.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): Thank you. I call Tangi Utikere."