Williamson Maurice: Smoke-free Environments Amendment Bill — Procedure Referral to Health Committee In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee Speaker Recalled  Speaker Recalled In Committee Procedure 
Williamson Maurice: Smoke-free Environments Amendment Bill — Procedure Referral to Health Committee In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee Speaker Recalled  Speaker Recalled In Committee Procedure 
[Volume:613;Page:9968] 
Hon MAURICE WILLIAMSON (National—Pakuranga) 
: 
 I am delighted to be able to take a call in this debate because for me the issue of the Smoke-free Environments Amendment Bill comes down to those of us in this Parliament who truly believe in the right of individuals to make choices compared with those of us who believe that the Government can dictate what we do in our own lives. 
I would much rather go to a restaurant that was smoke-free. I do not like cigarette smoke. I prefer not to be around it. But I would prefer by far to be able to make that choice myself; to be able to look around see that a restaurant has a sign up saying it is completely smoke-free and say: “Wow I quite like the idea of that. It’ll get my business.” But on the other side of the political spectrum in this House are those who say: “No we know what’s best for individuals. We are going to be dogmatic and have an across-the-party vote.” I know that a number of members in the Labour Party think this bill is nonsense but will Labour let the whip off and let there be a free vote? No it will not. 
So we come down to something that I think has some real substance to it. I want to hammer home this point of choice. I refer to the Returned Services Association. In my own case most of the old diggers in the Howick Returned Services Association have for many years told me they are Labour voters they support the workers and they vote Labour. That is all right; that is OK. I say to them that that is their choice that I have just come along to have a chat and that is fine. If members went to the Howick Returned Services Association tonight they would not hear them saying that any more. They have had a gutsful of this Government. 
Those old diggers were sent off to fight in a war the Government provided them with tobacco and they got hooked on it. They are addicted to it. That Returned Services Association club has done everything it possibly can to fix the polluted air in its club. It has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on an air management system that rips the air out from the bar areas and the restaurants and flicks it up through the filtering systems. I have seen it happen. One can light a cigarette and see the smoke just go whoosh and it is gone. Someone a couple of feet away does not get any of that smoke. The association has also set aside a part that is guaranteed to be smoke-free. It has also set aside a restaurant area as smoke-free. 
The association has surveyed its members; it has asked its own members. Members should remember that that club is not a public institution. It is not like a restaurant. It is a members-only club. It has asked its members what they want. If I recall properly 96 percent want the choice to smoke 
to remain. That is why I have moved an amendment in my name to section 12 in clause 6B. All that my amendment does is exempt the Howick Returned Services Association. I know that a lot of other members in this Parliament have gone for such an exemption for their own Returned Services Association clubs. 
But I want someone from the Labour Party to tell me why an institution that is a club should come under this provision. 
A person cannot just walk into that club off the street; he or she has to be a member or to be signed in by a member. It is a person’s choice to go to that club because of his or her membership. No one is compelled to go there. It is not like sitting on a bus or in an aeroplane and having to breathe somebody else’s air with smoke in it. A person chooses to go to a Returned Services Association club. Those people fought for their country. They were hooked on tobacco by the Government itself. Now what are we telling those old diggers? [ 
Interruption 
] No Jill Pettis is telling them she knows best. I can tell the Committee that not a single member of the Howick Returned Services Association thinks Jill Pettis knows best about anything but she says she does. 
All that I say to the Labour Party is that if it truly believed this legislation had merit it would take the whip off. Some of its own members are quietly sneaking around the lobby saying it is just a disgrace. This is the old centrist attitude of “We’ll take control of people’s lives. We’ll determine what they do.” There are a number of Labour members—I will not embarrass them by naming them but some of them are here today—who would simply love to have the freedom to vote against the bill. Ross Robertson the member for Manukau East whose electorate comes right up to the Howick Returned Services Association is always there telling its members he is their friend. They like him because a lot of them are Labour voters. Well I do not know whether Ross Robertson will get many invites back unless he does the decent thing and supports my amendment.