Woodhouse MichaelClause 4 Section 2 amended (Interpretation)Hon MICHAEL WOODHOUSE (National): In an earlier intervention I indicated that there were two substantive parts to this bill. Actually there is a third and that is the bill's stated objective to amend schedule 2 of the Act so that cannabidiol and CBD products are no longer classified as controlled. I probably omitted to mention that because in fact this is the one part of this bill that I think we can live with. Indeed that was the intention of the previous Government: to make this particular change. So in addressing clause 4—a significantly amended clause 4 I would add because the Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) 177 in the Minister's name has significantly changed the definitions of both CBD product" and "terminal illness". I should just mention for the record that while we may not vote for this clause we certainly are quite relaxed about the change to schedule 2 relating to cannabidiols.Now the other part of clause 4 is a much more important clause both for the select committee the House and the submitters and that is the definition of the conditions that would give rise to an exemption from prosecution under the Misuse of Drugs Act which when the bill was introduced referred to terminal illness—"an illness from which a person can reasonably expect to die within 12 months". I don't envy people in for example Dr Shane Reti's position who have to determine whether or not somebody is in a situation of dying within 12 months and then communicate and articulate that to the terminally ill patient. But nevertheless that is what the bill required.Except now the Government has amended that definition possibly for the very reason that it would be quite difficult for a medical practitioner or a nurse practitioner to actually do that. Now when the Minister raised this in the second reading last week it did appear as though the change in the definition would constitute a relaxation because he talked about the term palliation and palliation in the dictionary definition is any medicine that does not cure someone. And that's certainly the case for palliative care but it is by no means the only case. In my second reading speech I mentioned the possibility that other medicines that have the purpose of palliation could equally come within the ambit of this if the patient also had chronic pain for example—things like arthritis diabetes Parkinson's and so on.We see now from the Government's SOP which I do appreciate the Minister sharing with me prior to this—what's today? Wednesday; it was Monday afternoon I think. That was certainly very helpful. I appreciate that. In the amendment to section 2 in proposed clause 4(3) at section 2(1B) the definition now is that if a person requires palliation and "in the opinion of a medical practitioner or nurse practitioner the person has an advanced progressive life-limiting condition"—life-limiting condition—"and is nearing the end of their life."That certainly rules out the sorts of conditions that I mentioned with some concern in my second reading speech that this could become a stalking horse for the decriminalisation of cannabis products. It definitely does that. In fact one could argue that it actually potentially tightens up the definition. Twelve months might have been arbitrary but at least it was something that a practitioner could hang his or her hat on. This is a slightly more focused terminal exemption because we are now saying they are nearing the end of their life. Now it depends on the individual situation whether or not you think 12 months is nearing the end of a life or 12 weeks but indeed it certainly doesn't constitute a loosening. And that was the view of Medical Cannabis Awareness New Zealand who issued a press release almost immediately expressing patients' concern around the definition of "palliation" as expressed in the SOP.This is where I have to say there is definitely an opportunity lost for the sort of collaboration that I thought could have been possible with this bill. And it's for this reason: MCANZ—Medical Cannabis Awareness New Zealand—were very disappointed that the sorts of conditions that they listed in their press release things like Parkinson's motor neurone disease amyotrophic lateral sclerosis etc.—these are quite terrible conditions but ones which it would not for most patients be considered that they were approaching the end of their life.And here's where the opportunity is lost because I reckon I would have been able to convince my colleagues to support a widening of the definition of the exemption from prosecution to include conditions like this—and it was certainly a conversation that we were having with the Green Party member Chlöe Swarbrick—if there was a sunset clause. So actually if this was a temporary thing—which is exactly what the purpose of the bill said: remember this was a compassionate measure until quality affordable products were available. Therefore by definition in the general policy statement it wasn't going to be an unlimited time frame; there was going to be a limit on the exemption. I reckon I could have convinced my caucus to widen the definition of the exemption from prosecution if we knew that it had a finite period.But our approach through the select committee about a sunset clause and directly to the Minister after the bill was reported back was met with a deafening silence. And that's really sad because there are a huge number of people who think they should be subject to the exemption and they're not. And they could have been. They could have been if we had acknowledged that the Government's goal of making this temporary was delivered by the agreement to a sunset clause.So I'm going to invite the Minister to reflect on whether or not he would agree even now to Dr Shane Reti's SOP 179 which is carefully crafted to make sure that it is a reasonable period of time—not too long that people become dependent on an illegal substance but not too short to make it unworkable. The Minister's 12-month time frame for the regulations to be put in place to provide for the medicinal cannabis scheme and then the 12 months that the industry has told us is the minimum time they would need to implement and develop the manufacturing processes plus another six months wiggle room because there's always slippage—his SOP does that. And indeed then we could support clause 4 where a terminal illness exemption prevailed.We want to have that conversation—the separate conversation—about decriminalising cannabis more generally in another forum but we are prepared to accept that if it means there's a good licensing regime and it's time bound we could live with a terminal exemption even with a broader scope if the Minister was prepared to support Dr Reti's SOP 179. There's still time there's still an opportunity for us to collaborate on this bill."