Sosene Lemauga LydiaLEMAUGA LYDIA SOSENE (Labour): It's a real pleasure to be able to rise and take a call on this bill. It's the second reading of the Smokefree Environments and Regulated Products (Smoked Tobacco) Amendment Bill. As a member of the Health Committee I do want to acknowledge Minister Ayesha Verrall but also the members of the Health Committee and those who had to sub in and out of our committee at the time of our meetings. The bill as we have heard from a number of other speakers has three arms and in particular the reduction of retailers. I have heard a speaker on the other side of the House mention that she's not aware of how it has arrived at just 10 percent of the retailers in terms of the proposals. That is a bold move but it is required because smoking has become a normalised behaviour. We've heard our speakers on this side of the House who are really concerned with the goals that we are leaving our future rangatahi our future tamariki and certainly we want a smoke-free environment. In fact when you go out to the service industry many of the retailers many of the businesses now have smoke-free environments which are healthier. We've heard our colleague Barbara Edmonds talk about the sporting arenas where smoking behaviour is not acceptable. So when I hear other members of this House I want to challenge them that as parliamentarians we want to give good bills and legislation that help preserve the health of Kiwis. Now I've heard other speakers talk about their concern for retailers. We have to decide as parliamentarians: is it the economic wellbeing or is it the health and wellbeing of our rangatahi and tamariki and our current generations? And I want to acknowledge all of the members from this side that are really promoting and providing the summary as to why we are supporting this bill. We understand from the evidence that smoking rates for Māori are now at 19 percent down from 22.3 percent just a year ago 18 months ago and that's got to be a good thing. And one of the drivers of this success has been about the co-design of the Quit programmes and the amount of people 56000 that are no longer smoking and adhering to that because they're getting the right supports. I also was one of the members who attended the hearings in South Auckland and I do want to acknowledge whaea Catherine Manning who's up there and has been for a long time a strong advocate for our community with Māori and also strongly supporting Pasifika. I want to acknowledge all of the submitters that came along that day. We've heard that we had nearly 2000 written submissions over 80 oral submissions. They ranged from the elderly the people who have families and it was really gut-wrenching when you heard the tamariki talk about their previous māmā their previous uncle their previous pāpā who no longer had the quality of life and the effects of tobacco. We have the goal of becoming free of the devastating harm caused by tobacco and this bill is a step closer to smoke-free environments. I do want to acknowledge like my other colleagues have acknowledged The Hashtags. You know when we had the young people who came to Māngere and you've heard my colleague who's a very proud member of Māngere even though he's the member of Parliament for Takanini—we heard really loud and clear from those young people the 6-Bs as we've heard from Minister Aupito. They were bold and they were brown and they were brainy and they had a very clear message that it's got to be about smoke-free environments because Māori and Pasifika communities we suffer. We see that suffering week in week out when we go back to our homes and we see those who are absolutely addicted to tobacco. I also want to commend the Minister. Tobacco is no good for our communities. Smoke-free is actually a really good thing because many of our people who do not have that voice are trapped by tobacco harms. And on that note I commend this bill to the House.