McKelvie Ian: Animal Welfare Amendment Bill — First ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeMcKelvie Ian: Animal Welfare Amendment Bill — First Reading[Sitting date: 27 August 2013. Volume:693;Page:13067. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]IANMcKELVIE (National—Rangitīkei): I came to Parliament to represent an electorateRangitīkei that is very dependent on the well-being of animals the welfare of animals and the health of animals to make its living. Interestingly I have spent much of my life involved in a sport and a business that are dependent on animals for their survival. I would go so far as to say that many of my best friends have been animals. That is because they can be trusted they are faithful they are sympathetic and they are always there when needed. There is the odd human who demonstrates the same traits.Shane Ardern: Name one.IANMcKELVIE: Exactly—name one. This bill is an enabler. It enables us to build a more competitive and productive economy. It creates suitable legislation to ensure that animals are treated well. We have become world leaders in welfare—in animal welfare—which we surely must be.I want to touch on three things. One is our pets. We own pets with confidence and this bill enables that. Did you know that 68 percent of all New Zealand households have a pet? That is an amazing statistic. There is everything from a donkey to a mouse from a cat to a bird. The fact that we have cats and birds as pets makes the call of GarethMorgan a little hard to follow until one realises that many of those pet cats that are supposedly loved by New Zealand citizens are then dumped in the wild. This is what creates most of our problem with our wild cats: the fact that people do not look after their pets properly. As I have said this bill is an enabler. By containing many of its tools in regulation it allows welfare standards to evolve more freely for societal expectations science current practice and technology. The world is evolving and changing so quickly that I can understand the need for this.I want to talk briefly about standards applying to the live export of animals. We must remember that the racing industry the thoroughbred breeding industry and the horse industry would not survive in this country at all were it not for the live export of animals. The dairy industry is exporting a considerable number of animals around the world at the moment with significant benefit to that industry. So as we work our way through the standards for live export we need to be very cautious that we do not compromise the good parts of that export industry.I want to talk briefly about fireworks. I do not like the way we let off fireworks around this country. I think that it is particularly relevant or pertinent when one talks about animal welfare in this country and I think that in the course of this bill we should deal with this issue to the best effect we can because there is no question in my mind that fireworks are extremely intimidating for animals. We have talked about psychoactive substance testing at length this morning. I tend to agree with most of what has been said although I did hear a fellow on a relatively well-known TV programme not very far from here a few weeks ago offering to test them on himself provided we paid him enough money to do it.Hon Ruth Dyson: He might have failed.IANMcKELVIE: I thought it was quite good actually. I think he would have failed the test at the time.I have got no problem with supporting this bill. I think it is fantastic. It provides clarity and the tools to ensure the integrity of our export industry. Finally the way we treat our animals measures us as a nation. If we can treat our animals well we can live at ease with our fellow human beings. Thank you.