Shaw JamesHon JAMES SHAW (Minister of Climate Change): Thank you Mr Speaker. In this second reading debate I just wanted to pick up on a few of the points that previous speakers have made in their comments and to just reflect on them both for the implications of this bill and potentially for a wider regime.First of all I wanted to endorse some of the words of the Hon Gerry Brownlee in his comments in the beginning of this reading where he made a reference to the decision to impose sanctions even when it comes at some cost to one's self. The reason I wanted to endorse that was because that's when you actually get to know whether or not you're doing the right thing. If you're not prepared to impose sanctions because it could come at some cost to your own economy then you can be pretty sure that you are not doing the right thing. You have to be prepared to stand up in times of challenge and controversy not just times of comfort and convenience. One of the things that the Hon Gerry Brownlee also mentioned was in reference to bringing the General Assembly into the operative part of the bill. I know we will have an opportunity in the committee of the whole House to get into this a bit further but he did raise it in his comments in this reading where he said that the existing clause 8 already has adequate provision for the Minister to be able to consider thresholds. I understand his point. The challenge that we've got is essentially what it refers to—or what it does actually refer to—is the absence of sufficient United Nations Security Council action which draws attention to the part the UN system that is dysfunctional rather than drawing attention to the part of that is functional which is the General Assembly. As I said in my first reading speech it's the General Assembly that is the much more inclusive consensus-based body and it has condemned in the strongest possible way the war that Russia is committing on its neighbour Ukraine.The reason I wanted to raise this is because if we want a piece of legislation that reinforces the UN system reinforces the multilateral system we think that we should be trying to operationalise that in the text of the bill itself not just drawing attention to the component where it is dysfunctional and where it isn't working. After all as I said in my first reading speech it's the Security Council dysfunction that has been used as an excuse by any number of countries some of which we would regard as close friends and allies and deep trading partners to essentially opt out of the UN system and the multilateral system at all and do their own thing where they have wanted to. That's exactly the kind of the thing that we don't want to see more of. What we do want to see more of is New Zealand acting in concert with the international community and that should be our threshold; not a negative threshold of that system failing. So there was that point. I just wanted to endorse the words that the Hon Phil Twyford just made in his contribution just now as well where he also made explicit reference to the General Assembly.A couple of members have raised points around urgency and absolutely we support urgency in this case because it is clearly urgent. There's probably no better example of urgency that I've seen in this House. One of the ways that we have dealt with that recently in relation to COVID of course is to have a post-enactment review and that may be a way for this House to at select committee be able to draw on the views of experts having put this bill into place but to be able to say for the sake of improvements in the future and any amendments that we might want to make to it that we have that opportunity.The Victoria University law professor Geoff McLay today suggested that the regulations themselves could come back through the House in exactly the same way that we do with the COVID orders. So we've got a recent precedent where we have to act under urgency because COVID-19 is such a fluid situation and events change so quickly and the Government has needed to be able to move very quickly on those but there still needs to be parliamentary scrutiny at the same time. That would also be quite a good way of ensuring that there is parliamentary involvement and oversight as well.The final thing that I just wanted to say in this part of the bill is: this is a humanitarian crisis. There are international laws and norms that are being violated. There are potential crimes against humanity potential war crimes and potential acts of genocide that are being perpetrated. It is not the time for partisan sniping about what could have or should have or would have happened at some point in the past. It really isn't. I would just encourage members to focus on the plight of the Ukrainian people as they are being bombed and shelled and driven out of their homes rather than to score petty partisan points when frankly this bill is one that we are all completely united on and want to get passed and want to be robust. Thank you Mr Speaker.