Dean Jacqui: Misuse of Drugs (Classification of BZP) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Dean Jacqui: Misuse of Drugs (Classification of BZP) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:645;Page:14761] 
JACQUI DEAN (National—Otago) 
: 
 I rise to make a further point on Part 1 of the Misuse of Drugs (Classification of BZP) Amendment Bill to address the amnesty provision in clause 6 which provides a limited period in relation to the use and possession for personal use of benzylpiperazine (BZP). In the Minister’s Supplementary Order Paper 180 the period is to 1 October 2008 during which time it is illegal to sell or supply BZP but there is an amnesty period for those people who have BZP in their possession to be able to take it legally. 
That is not a worthy provision in the bill; it is a sop to those drug users who have had plenty of notice that the Minister intends to act on this issue. It is a soft unworthy Supplementary Order Paper. 
I will quote from a man called Matt Bowden from the Social Tonics Association. He is a man who is associated closely with promoting this $30-million-a-year industry. He himself acknowledges that it is not a good idea for people to go crazy now they have a bit of extra time. He says that people should take a few weeks to recover between parties and to make sure they are not overdoing it. 
That says two things. It says that now people have been given this out this amnesty they will stockpile BZP—whether for their own use we do not know. The gentleman from the Social Tonics Association also acknowledges—utterly acknowledges—that what we have here is in fact a dangerous substance. It is an acknowledgment that BZP is a dangerous substance and when the promoter the seller of that substance says that it is not a good idea for people to go crazy that they should take a few weeks to recover between parties and that they should make sure they are not overdoing it I think it really shows this Supplementary Order Paper for what it is. 
I will go to the proposed amendment in the name of Dr Paul Hutchison and say how sorry I am that I understand that the Associate Minister of Health Mr Anderton will not support Supplementary Order Paper 181 because a number of submissions to the Health Committee raised the issue of what happens when you drive a drug underground. The question raised a number of times through the select committee process was: “OK you are going to do this; you are proposing to ban BZP. What will happen?”. Well in my view Dr Hutchison’s Supplementary Order Paper addresses that very issue because it proposes to monitor the Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs—the very committee the Associate Minister of Health has been so careful to take advice from—and to utilise that very expertise and knowledge in order to do a review of the effect of this legislation. 
I would have thought that that was a sensible and pragmatic way to address whatever consequences there might be of banning BZP. And I would have thought that the Associate Minister of Health would welcome this Supplementary Order Paper with open arms instead I suspect of just walking away once this bill has been passed into law and saying: “Oh well there we go. That’s done; move on.” I am afraid that New Zealand society will not move on like that because we have a whole generation of young New Zealanders who over the course of the past 5 or 6 years have now come to understand that drugs can be legally sold in New Zealand and that it is quite acceptable to medicate on pills about which they know very little and about which we as a society know very little. 
We know anecdotally that a number of other so-called recreational drugs are being developed and are waiting in the wings. They will come on to the New Zealand market. I would have thought that a Minister who really cared about this issue would grasp the opportunity with open arms to have a review of the effect of this legislation.