Mallard Trevor: Crimes (Match-fixing) Amendment Bill — First ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeMallard Trevor: Crimes (Match-fixing) Amendment Bill — First Reading[Sitting date: 30 July 2014. Volume:700;Page:19762. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon TREVOR MALLARD (Labour - Hutt South):I am pleased after 27 years of working together that you are able to do that. Mr Assistant Speaker I do want to acknowledge your service to this Parliament and say that if this Crimes (Match-fixing) Amendment Bill is the last bill that you are dealing with it is something that is appropriate given the fact that you are yourself a proud parent of an international athlete. I want to acknowledge that acknowledge you and thank you.I am going to ask for a little bit of indulgence to wish a couple of teams all the best. I want to say that the Commonwealth Games team I think is going exceptionally well. I follow the cyclists and clearly what has happened is that in the last decade or a bit more as there has been less doping New Zealand athletes have been doing better and better at cycling relative to the rest of the world. I think that is something that is really good.I want to wish all the best to the Black Ferns who are about to enter into the International Rugby Board Women’s Rugby World Cup and say to Fi and the team: you are in Paris. When I last watched a World Cup it was in Edmonton and I know where I would rather be. Edmonton was an awful hole in the cold and the snow when the world cup was there. I want to wish Jackie Patea who is the second Wainuiōmata Black Fern all the best as well as Claire Kelly and Kat all of whom I was touch judge for over a period of years when they were playing in Otago. I sort of regard them as like my own kids. I have watched them grow and develop into great rugby players. To Linda Itunu who is my bodyguard on occasions—my plus-one for this year’s Steinlager Rugby Awards—I would just hate to be anyone who was tackled by her. She is one of the hardest tacklers I have ever seen.With a little bit more indulgence I would like to refer to another major sporting event a historic event that is occurring at the Hutt Recreation Ground this Sunday when Hutt Old Boys Marist play Wainuiōmata. One thing that we know is that this one is going to be so hard fought that there would never be any suggestion of match fixing in it. The people out there know that I have strong family links to the Hutt. Again I was a touch judge for several years for one of the Hutt teams and in fact not much over a decade ago I had to turn out for a senior second team in an emergency when the alternative was the coach who had concussion playing for them. I think it is fair to say that all I did was run up and down the 15-meter line asking them not to give me the ball but of course they did every now and again.There is a history of people going over the hill between Wainuiōmata and the Hutt. The earliest example I know of is Kara Puketapu who was a Wainuiōmata resident a very very good rugby player but unfortunately he used to play for Pētone. Currently there are the Risdon brothers Wainuiōmata residents—a prominent Wainuiōmata family both parents and grandparents. Piri Weepu actually played for Hutt Old Boys Marist before he played for Wainuiōmata and probably played more games against Wainuiōmata than he played for Wainuiōmata against the Hutt. So there is a history of people going over the hill. But for the first time these two teams are going to meet in a Jubilee Cup final. That is the premier final for Wellington and for Wainuiōmata it is our first time in that since the club was formed in 1946. So as a local resident as someone who has followed the team for a number of years and watched some great young men develop into great rugby players I want to wish them all the best and say notwithstanding my family contacts I will be calling out for Wainuiōmata.Just to make clear we are talking about a match-fixing bill the Crimes (Match-fixing) Amendment Bill. It applies to sport it applies to racing and notwithstanding the comments of the colleague to my left Andrew Williams it does not apply to the Ōhariu or the Epsom electorates. If it did apply I think it is fair to say that there would be some questions because people are going into a race saying: “Please don’t vote for me.” I would generally be absolutely opposed to that other than the fact that my very good friend and colleague Holly Walker in Hutt South is taking a very similar approach. I just want to say that I have therefore got slightly mixed feelings about people who are running in an electorate and are saying: “Give us the party vote but not the electorate vote.”The bill itself makes a minor but important change. It makes it very clear that match fixing is a crime. I think arguably looking at the face of the legislation match fixing is probably already a crime but what this bill does is put it beyond any doubt whatsoever and it is being done in time for the football under-23s and for the Cricket World Cup both of which are not far off as far as we are concerned.I do want to thank the Minister for Sport and Recreation for his consultation. Like most legislation in the sport area it is something that we do on a bipartisan basis wherever possible. Even though this is relatively minor it does do the trick and therefore we will be supporting it. I am very pleased that the Minister has chosen not to go as far as organisations like the International Rugby Board has gone in its draft rules. My view is that the draft rules of the board are nuts. To take an extreme example using Piri Weepu and his mum theoretically if I have a cup of tea with Piri Weepu’s mum I am not allowed to then go and bet on a sporting match because there is a relationship between him and his mother obviously and his mother and me—one of friendship—because that relationship would be caught by the International Rugby Board rules. I think that that is something that goes far too far.I regret that this bill has taken so long to get in. We knew from about October of last year that it was coming. I regret the fact that it has been relatively low on the Government’s priority list as far as passing it is concerned but we will support it. If there is a requirement—and I think there probably should be—for a shortened select committee period I do not think we need to do it as part of the motion in this House but we will facilitate it through the select committee after the election. I hope as a result of that it is passed before Christmas and the rules will be very clear before the cricket. I think as all of us know there is more money bet on cricket than any other sport in the world by quite a large factor. We support the bill we support our Commonwealth Games team we support the Black Ferns and we support Wainuiōmata. Thank you.