Wednesday, 15 October 2003

Wednesday, 15 October 2003

Wednesday, 15 October 2003

Mr Speaker took the Chair at 2 p.m.

Prayers.

Business of the House

Business of the House

Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN (Leader of the House): With regard to the discussion yesterday in the Business Committee and subsequent information, I seek leave for the Statutes Amendment Bill (No 3) and the Reserves and Other Lands Disposal Bill to be set down for their remaining stages tomorrow.

Mr SPEAKER: Is there any objection to that course being followed? There appears to be none.

Committees

Business of Select Committees

Membership

Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN (Leader of the House): I seek leave for Brent Catchpole to be a member of the Government Administration Committee for the purposes of its consideration of the Building Bill, but without the right to vote on any question before the committee.

Mr SPEAKER: Is there any objection to that course being followed? There appears to be none.

Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN (Leader of the House): I seek leave for Sue Kedgley to be a member of the Commerce Committee for the purposes of its consideration of the financial reviews of the Broadcasting Commission, the Broadcasting Standards Authority, Radio New Zealand Ltd, and Television New Zealand Ltd, but without the right to vote on any question before the committee.

Mr SPEAKER: Is there any objection to that course being followed? There appears to be none.

Questions for Oral Answer

Questions to Ministers

Education Act—Private Schools Conditional Integration Act

1. DEBORAH CODDINGTON (ACT) to the Minister of Education: How long have schools been given to respond to the Ministry of Education paper on the consolidation of the Private Schools Conditional Integration Act into the Education Act?

Hon TREVOR MALLARD (Minister of Education): Six weeks. However, the ministry met with major education sector organisations before the discussion document, and the peak bodies for those organisations involved were involved in discussions for some time before that.

Deborah Coddington: The Minister having overseen the closure of scores of schools in the State sector, and with hundreds more State schools under review, will he deny that the real agenda of this so-called review of the integration Act is to change the legislation to allow him to start closing integrated schools and further reduce choice for parents?

Hon TREVOR MALLARD: Yes.

Jill Pettis: Can the Minister please advise the House why changes to the Private Schools Conditional Integration Act are being considered?

Hon TREVOR MALLARD: We need to address the issues caused by having five Acts of Parliament dealing with education provisions. This was a matter highlighted in the Daniels case in the Court of Appeal recently. We need to modernise legislation to keep up with the times. The Act was introduced for a specific reason: to protect private schools that were in danger of closing in the 1970s. All those schools have now been integrated.

Simon Power: Should schools in the independent sector be worried about this initiative, given the track record of this Government of trying to destroy the independent tertiary sector and the independent early childhood sector; if not, why not?

Hon TREVOR MALLARD: I think the member should realise we are talking about integrated, not independent, schools.

Mr SPEAKER: The Minister was asked a question. Was there any?

Hon TREVOR MALLARD: The answer is no. I was trying to explain to the slow member why.

Mr SPEAKER: The member will now stand, withdraw, and apologise.

Hon TREVOR MALLARD: I withdraw and apologise.

Hon Brian Donnelly: Is the Minister satisfied that the fees that integrated schools charge are for property costs only, which the law allows, or does he believe that some schools are pushing the boundaries of the Private Schools Conditional Integration Act 1975?

Hon TREVOR MALLARD: The latter.

Deborah Coddington: Will the Minister guarantee that this review will not result in law changes allowing him to close integrated schools; if not, is this why the whole matter has been handled so stealthily?

Hon TREVOR MALLARD: No. The member should know that publishing a document that has gone to hundreds of people around the country, if not thousands, is not doing things by stealth.

Films, Videos, and Publications Classification Act—Review

2. STEVE CHADWICK (Labour—Rotorua) to the Minister of Justice: What changes is he intending to make to the Films, Videos, and Publications Classification Act and why?

Hon PHIL GOFF (Minister of Justice): A bill will be introduced, before the House rises this year, that will make a number of changes. Most important, it will dramatically increase the penalties for producing, distributing, and possessing child pornography. This is necessary to respond to, to denounce, and to deter the proliferation of child pornography through the Internet. It represents our position of zero tolerance towards those who would exploit and degrade children for sexual purposes.

Steve Chadwick: Will the bill include measures recommended by the Government Administration Committee with regard to covert filming and hate speech?

Hon PHIL GOFF: No. Both those things are important matters but they do not belong in censorship legislation. Covert filming should be made illegal, but it is more appropriately dealt with through privacy and criminal legislation. We have asked the Law Commission to report on that by January next year. Hate speech needs to be considered in the context of the Human Rights Act, alongside current provisions dealing with comments provoking racial hatred.

Peter Brown: Is it acceptable to have two homosexuals in charge of censorship in this country; if not, will the Minister consider replacing one or both of them in order to better reflect New Zealand society as against Labour Party structure? [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: Members are entitled to ask questions in silence.

Hon PHIL GOFF: I have no knowledge of, nor interest in, a person’s sexual orientation. I regard that as irrelevant to the job.

Marc Alexander: Does the Minister concede that had the Government acted sooner, individuals like Lower Hutt’s Kevin Edwards, who was caught with over 5,000 pictures of young boys being sexually abused, might now be doing more jail time than a mere 6 months, and does he intend to change the Act to ensure that individuals such as Mr Edwards serve their convictions consecutively, instead of concurrently; if not, why not?

Hon PHIL GOFF: I guess we could say that it would have been great if we had introduced the legislation 10 years ago. We did not. We are closely following other countries that have introduced similar legislation, as a precedent. What this legislation will do is increase the penalty for the production, trading, and distribution of pornography from a maximum of 1 year’s imprisonment to 10 years—that is a tenfold increase—and, for those in possession of child pornography, from a fine of $20,000 to up to 2 years’ imprisonment. They are both dramatic but, I believe, necessary increases.

Land Transport Management Bill—Policy

3. Hon ROGER SOWRY (Deputy Leader—National) to the Minister of Transport: Does he stand by his statement on the introduction of the Land Transport Management Bill that it “represents the biggest single change to land transport in New Zealand since the current system was introduced in the late 1980s.”; if so, why?

Hon PAUL SWAIN (Minister of Transport): Yes. The bill broadens the focus of the land transport management system to include land transport as a whole, introduces long-term planning, and enables new funding tools in the form of tolling and public-private partnerships.

Hon Roger Sowry: If the bill is so good, why, in his opinion, does the New Zealand Automobile Association believe that the Land Transport Management Bill has “an overall effect that will be bad news for the majority of New Zealanders”?

Hon PAUL SWAIN: Because, it is clear to me, it does not understand the bill.

Hon Mark Gosche: How has the bill addressed issues raised by submitters?

Hon PAUL SWAIN: The select committee has simplified the consultation requirements for organisations affected by the bill. It has included efficiency in the approval process for funding land transport activities, and it has introduced more flexibility into tolling and public-private partnership provisions, including an early conditional approval process for such schemes.

Peter Brown: Does the Minister not accept that the single largest issue facing land transport is funding, and that this bill will not address it, either by quantity, time-frame, or fairness; if he does accept that, will he tell us how exactly he will address those three areas?

Hon PAUL SWAIN: Yes, I acknowledge that. That is a good point. The issue is about funding. This bill is the start of making some improvements. It allows for tolling and public-private partnerships, but this is only the start of the work. The Government is doing a lot of work with the Auckland region, and there will be announcements about that later, in December.

Larry Baldock: Does the legislation reported back to the House this week signal the end of the changes to the land transport system in New Zealand, or does the Minister have plans for further legislation that might address some of the ideas and concerns expressed by submitters to the select committee on the Land Transport Management Bill?

Hon PAUL SWAIN: Yes. There are other changes, potentially, in the wind. Of course, this will depend on the outcome of the work that has been done between the Government and the Auckland region, which should apply to the rest of the country. We are looking at debt financing and other such matters, and at other aspects relating to tolling. There are some social issues here that have to be addressed. So all those things need to be taken into account. But if an agreed programme is announced in December, as we plan, there are likely to be further changes that need to be introduced next year.

Hon Richard Prebble: Does the Minister stand by the answer he gave regarding this bill yesterday—when he denied that at any time earlier this year he had said that this transport bill is the cost of having the Green Party control transport issues, because it was the price that Labour had to pay in order to get the Green Party to support a 4c increase in the price of petrol—given the fact that Business New Zealand has sent us an email today saying that is exactly what he told it earlier this year?

Hon PAUL SWAIN: The reality is that the bill has been brought forward to this House under MMP arrangements, with, primarily, the support of the Green Party, and I thank it for that work. But it is very interesting that a number of parties in this House want more money spent on roading, but will not support increasing the petrol tax to implement that. It is about time they start to work out that that is voodoo economics. One cannot spend more and tax less.

Hon Richard Prebble: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. The Minister gave an interesting answer in which he claimed that other parties are supporting voodoo economics. The question I actually asked him was whether it was correct, as he told business groups earlier this year, that this bill is the cost of having the Green Party control transport. That is the issue that he has not answered.

Hon PAUL SWAIN: This bill is not the cost of anything. This bill is a major step forward for the land transport system in New Zealand, and it has been worked through with the Green Party as part of MMP arrangements, and I thank the Green Party for its support for that.

Jeanette Fitzsimons: Can the Minister confirm that more funding than ever before is now available for land transport, and that the $3 million allocated to walking and cycling, for example, is likely to do far more to free up congested roads—by encouraging people to leave their cars at home rather than use them for short trips—than it would if it were spent on buying about half a kilometre of motorway?

Hon PAUL SWAIN: Yes, to both those questions. Firstly, there is more money available now for road funding, because of the support from the Green Party for increasing the tax on fuel, which every other Opposition party voted against. Secondly, it is important to know that in New Zealand about 30 percent of travel by car is for less than 2 kilometres, and the more we can do in getting people out of their cars and into walking and cycling the better, as it will help immensely with the congestion problems in New Zealand.

Hon Roger Sowry: Given that the Minister thinks the bill is a major step forward in addressing New Zealand’s transport infrastructure, is he concerned that Business New Zealand calls the bill “a red light for road users”; the Employers and Manufacturers Association says the bill is “almost hopeless”; the Auckland City Council says the bill is “only half the toolbox”; the Automobile Association says the bill will have the “overall effect of being bad news for the majority of New Zealanders”; and the Road Transport Forum says the bill is “designed to increase the extent to which the Government can fleece road users”—if he is not concerned about all those groups’ unanimous opposition to the bill, then what is concerning him?

Hon PAUL SWAIN: With respect, many of those groups had that same attitude as the bill went to the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee. The committee worked incredibly hard on it and made some very good changes, and, as a result, this bill is a better product. I also note there has been a lot of support from many of the regional mayors around the country, and I thank them for that. This is a forward-looking bill, not a backward-looking bill.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: As part of the cosy arrangement that the Minister has managed to effect with the Green Party, can he promise the Green Party cyclists a following wind; and, more particularly, why does he talk about voodoo economics when less than $1 out of every $2 that is collected for the purpose of construction, maintenance, and road safety goes towards that purpose, and what has he done about that?

Hon PAUL SWAIN: Firstly, everybody likes a following wind, but, secondly, the important point that the member maybe overlooks is the fact that that system of funding in New Zealand has been in place for a long time, and was not changed when that member was the Treasurer of this country.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: I seek to table the 1998 Budget where we began to implement a change.

Mr SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table that document. Is there any objection? There is.

Jeanette Fitzsimons: Has the Minister seen any comments made by former British Conservative Ministers whose Governments attempted to motorway their way out of congestion, about the lessons they learnt from this?

Mr SPEAKER: This is very, very wide of the original question. The Minister can comment very briefly.

Hon PAUL SWAIN: Very briefly, I have seen the comments made by a former Conservative transport Minister from England, who said that many transport Ministers around the world were often afflicted with “big projectitis” rather than promoting other forms and modes, a multimodal approach, including walking and cycling, to help with the problems of congestion in major cities like London.

Hon Roger Sowry: Is he concerned that the Automobile Association has also said of the bill that it “opens the way for more petrol taxes to be diverted from roading”; if so, will he support a cap on the amount of money that can be spent from the National Land Transport Fund on non-roading projects?

Hon PAUL SWAIN: No. The member still does not get it. The reality is that if we are going to fix New Zealand’s transport problems, we have to look across all modes. Simply trying to motorway our way out of the problem is not going to work.

Hon Roger Sowry: Noting that the Minister said earlier in the House that it was “clear to me [that the AA] does not understand the bill.”, was that why he rang the association after it had issued a statement criticising the Government, to berate the association and threaten it if it was ever to do that again?

Hon PAUL SWAIN: No. I am a very straightforward person, and I made that call because of that.

Hon Richard Prebble: I seek the leave of the House to table a document that establishes that the Minister said this bill is the cost of the Greens’ control over transport. It is an email to me from Business New Zealand, saying: “He has certainly said it to us in meetings we have had with him.”

Document, by leave, laid on the Table of the House.

Genetically Modified Food—Labelling

4. SUE KEDGLEY (Green) to the Minister for the Environment: Does she stand by her statement yesterday that “People have a choice whether they eat GM food or not. Any GM food is labelled.”; if so, why?

Hon MARIAN HOBBS (Minister for the Environment): Yes, because the statement is from my third reading speech on the legislation that came out of the New Organisms and Other Matters Bill, and I stand by all the statements in that speech.

Sue Kedgley: How can she claim that all GM food is labelled, when vast amounts of GM food that is sold in takeaways, delicatessens, and restaurants do not need to be labelled, nor does any GM food that contains unintentional levels of GM or that contains flavouring need to be labelled, and will she therefore apologise to the House for her misleading statement yesterday; if not, why not?

Hon MARIAN HOBBS: I believe that the New Zealand consumer has choice within the bounds of reality—first of all, that the GM presence can be proven. If there is no DNA in the food, one cannot prove either that it was there or that it was not there. And within the bounds of reality, in the sense that if there is any GM presence it is less than 0.1 percent, that might be two drops of vanilla in a tub of ice-cream.

Nanaia Mahuta: Why does the Minister think that a policy offering choice to people when it comes to genetic modification is important?

Hon MARIAN HOBBS: Genetic modification is a new technology that offers many possible benefits, and I think it is important we ask those questions. I reject the approach of opposing every application on the basis of some ideological belief that this research is wrong.

Dr Paul Hutchison: Does she accept the advice of Lord Robert May, who notes that 90 percent of the world’s wheat originates from conventionally bred irradiated wheat, a very crude form of genetic modification, and does she agree that the Greens will have been happily eating such wheat and growing it on their organic farms, but that her Government will continue to succumb to their pressure on a case by case basis, without public consultation, behind closed doors?

Hon MARIAN HOBBS: I cannot comment on either the eating habits or the growing habits of the Greens.

Larry Baldock: Does the Minister wonder about the apparent contradiction with regard to the huge concerns and fears expressed about GM food and the fact that new plant and food varieties have been consumed and enjoyed for years across this country, achieved through so-called conventional plant breeding methods that involve pollination, mutation breeding, cell selection, and induced polyploidy, which often technically achieve the same end result of a genetically modified organism?

Hon MARIAN HOBBS: I do see an inconsistency in picking on one production method versus others, because all foods have to undergo safety testing before they go on sale. On the other hand, people should also have the right to choose what they eat, which is what our policies of labelling are all about.

Sue Kedgley: Can she deny that the very large amount of food that is sold in restaurants, delicatessens, and takeaways does not need to be labelled, whether or not it is genetically engineered, and how can she therefore claim that people have a choice about whether they eat GM food when so much of it is unlabelled, and will she therefore apologise to the House for her misleading statement; if not, why not?

Hon MARIAN HOBBS: I repeat the comment I made before. I believe that New Zealanders have choice within the bounds of reality. Let us look at a restaurant, and talk about the bounds of reality, and consider that the restaurateur putting up a new dish has to be able to say, down to 0.2 percent of the dish, which part of it is from a genetically modified ingredient. In fact, our regulations state that people have the right to ask the proprietor whether he or she can assure them that that new dish, which he or she just put on that night, contains any genetically modified ingredients and have to trust what that proprietor says.

Sue Kedgley: Does the Minister agree that statements like the one she made in the House yesterday, her answers today, and her handling of the genetic engineering issue generally are one of the reasons why the Government’s poll ratings are dropping; if not, why not?

Hon MARIAN HOBBS: I could not possibly comment.

Immigration Service—Policy

5. Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First) to the Minister of Immigration: As Minister of Immigration, does she insist that her New Zealand Immigration Service operate on a policy of no surprises to her?

Hon LIANNE DALZIEL (Minister of Immigration): Yes, but it is probably no surprise to the member that it does not always work.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: If that is so, does the Minister consider it excusable that it took the Immigration Service 6 long months to investigate an attempt by one of her officials to obtain sexual favours from a woman applying for residency in this country, and that she learnt about it only 11 days ago; and how many other women’s dignity is she prepared to exploit due to her lack of control and knowledge and cover-up over what is happening in her own department?

Hon LIANNE DALZIEL: Firstly, I have looked at the reasons why it took 6 months to undertake the investigation, and although we would like to think it could be done more quickly, I am aware that the individual who was being investigated was absent from New Zealand for a period of time. But I would have liked to see it dealt with more quickly. Secondly, no, it is not acceptable that I did not know about it, and, thirdly, it is absolutely unacceptable that anyone approaching any Government official would be spoken to in that way.

Dianne Yates: Did the “no surprises” policy mean that the Minister was informed about allegations of corruption prior to it being reported in the media late last year, and what steps did she take as a result?

Hon LIANNE DALZIEL: No, again, I was not informed. When the allegations were made I immediately referred the matter to the Minister of State Services, requesting an independent inquiry into the specific allegations and into the procedures that the Immigration Service had in place for responding to allegations of corruption within its own ranks. The review and its recommendations, along with my feedback on the report, are being implemented, including a memorandum of understanding with the police.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Why is the Minister always the last person in this country to know, and why did she constantly and adamantly convey on the Holmes show last night that the “sex for residency” investigation was not, in her words, a criminal matter but a sexual harassment matter; and now, today, she concedes that officials should have involved the police; and can she explain the sudden change of heart in less than 24 hours, or are we to trust nothing that comes out of her mouth?

Hon LIANNE DALZIEL: Many complaints are made against immigration officials. The New Zealand Immigration Service investigates each and every one of them. Not all of them are genuine complaints. In cases where there is evidence of criminal offending, the police are involved. What I have said today, after reflecting on the matter, is that the Immigration Service not so much should have referred the matter to the police but should have concerned the police with the complaint, because it may have been possible to obtain sufficient evidence against him, which is a criminal standard of evidence rather than the civil standard that applies in an employment matter against this individual, as this has been done in cases involving bribery.

Dr Muriel Newman: Who does she hold responsible for the failure in this case to call the police, and what action has she taken to hold them to account for their decision since learning of this failure?

Hon LIANNE DALZIEL: There has been a change in staff at the Immigration Service since this matter occurred; there is a new general manager. I cannot hold the current general manager responsible for something that occurred last year. The thing that I want to make very clear is that many complaints are made against officers of the Immigration Service. As with members of Parliament, when there are complaints made about allegations of corruption, investigations have to be carried out.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Why is it that the Minister is always the last person in New Zealand to know, and was her continual refusal to treat the “sex for residency” investigation as a criminal matter another indication that she has absolutely no regard for women to be free from sexual harassment and exploitation in this country, but cares more about covering up the inadequacies and the so-called rights of, for example, the horrible fleabag who infected New Zealand women with AIDS, or the rapists and con men who happily live here, even though she has been told over a long time who and what they are?

Mr SPEAKER: The question was too long, but I let the member finish.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I think I should be allowed to ask a serious question of this nature without the moans and groans of people over there, namely, Ms Tizard. It is a serious matter, and I think that I should be able to ask the question in an environment where I can actually hear the question myself rather than have that groaning and moaning from so-called “femin-nazis” over there.

Mr SPEAKER: Two wrongs do not make a right. I do not like that term being used about a member of Parliament. I would like the member to withdraw that term.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: I withdraw and apologise.

Mr SPEAKER: I also say to the member that I do not want interjections while questions are being asked.

Hon LIANNE DALZIEL: No, I am not always the last to know. I have a report from my immigration officials on a regular basis, identifying complaints that have been made in respect of Immigration Service staff. The difficulty in this particular case is that there was an exception in that it was not reported to me because the reporting to me related to aspects of dishonesty. I do not believe that my officials tried to cover up for this particular set of circumstances. I think they tried to find an outcome that saw this matter resolved so that this person lost his job knowing that the higher criminal standard of proof would not have been met in these circumstances.

Corruption—Transparency International Survey

6. Hon PETER DUNNE (Leader—United Future) to the Prime Minister: What is her reaction to New Zealand being ranked the third least-corrupt country out of the 133 included in Transparency International’s survey on corruption, and how will she endeavour to ensure that New Zealand maintains a favourable anti-corruption ranking in the future?

Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN (Acting Prime Minister): With pleasure. It is a tribute to the work, over a very long period of time, of central and local government politicians, central and local officials, and their independent review agencies. In any instances of inappropriate behaviour we will continue to act swiftly to ensure that our reputation stays intact.

Hon Peter Dunne: In the light of that answer, does the Prime Minister consider that the granting of contracts worth $2.1 million by the Ministry of Health to anti-smoking lobby groups—requiring them to lobby members of Parliament in order to generate support for a member’s bill, the Smoke-free Environments Amendment Bill—will be viewed favourably by corruption watchdogs like Transparency International; if so, why does she come to that conclusion?

Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN: I doubt that the transparency watchdog would regard that as an instance of corruption; but it might regard it, perhaps, as inappropriate contracting. I do think that it would see an example of corruption in the situation, say, of tobacco companies buying support from political parties.

Dr Lynda Scott: Does the Prime Minister agree that this lobbying by smoke-free groups and the Prostitutes Collective was an inappropriate use of health dollars, which crossed the line from lobbying for health promotion to political lobbying; and can she assure the House that those contracts in support of Labour’s political agenda will not be continued?

Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN: My understanding is that the lobbying of MPs was not part of the contract for the Prostitutes Collective; it clearly was in the case of Action on Smoking and Health (ASH), and others. The Minister responsible has already addressed the issue. An inquiry is occurring to ensure that appropriate contracts are entered into in future. I note, of course, that general lobbying was part of the contracts signed previously.

Hon Ken Shirley: What specific action, if any, has the Prime Minister taken to address the public-sector corruption cases of recent weeks involving public funding of the ASH lobby, and the case of immigration officers who abuse their powers in attempting to gain sexual favours?

Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN: The latter matter has been dealt with by the Immigration Service and by the Minister in question time. In respect of the former matter, I do not regard it as an instance of corruption but as an instance of inappropriate contracting—to engage in behaviour that is not appropriate. It is much more appropriate to describe corruption as a situation, for example, where an outside person or body is paying a sum of money to a member of Parliament to be a member of Parliament. We look forward to the declarations that all members of Parliament will be required to make under the Members of Parliament (Pecuniary Interests) Bill, in that regard.

Hon Richard Prebble: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. The final statement made by the Acting Prime Minister is a slur on every MP. It is similar to the one he made earlier, which you also did not pick up, suggesting that political parties are being financed by the tobacco lobby. If one looks through the accounts put in by parties at the last election, no political party said it was getting any money from tobacco lobbying. That was a straight-out slur made by the Minister to have people think that other parties were being financed by the tobacco lobby, in order to justify his secret financing of ASH. Now he is suggesting that there are MPs here being sponsored—unless he is referring to the well-known sponsorship by the trade union movement of certain Labour MPs.

Mr SPEAKER: The last comment made by Dr Cullen was inappropriate, and I hope that comments on that matter will not be repeated. I ask the member to withdraw.

Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I had better withdraw for the fact that I have also made that accusation in this House, on three occasions, in relation to Mr Hide, and he has never taken a point of order to contest it.

Mr SPEAKER: No. I have asked the member to withdraw. I now ask him to withdraw and apologise.

Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN: I withdraw and apologise.

Jeanette Fitzsimons: Has the Prime Minister seen any reports that might change our ranking in the Transparency International survey—for example, reports on whether behaviour in the House today in relation to the smoke-free legislation might be influenced by tobacco companies?

Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN: I do notice that there are some rather obvious delaying tactics today. However, having been on both sides of this House, I would never describe delaying tactics in Parliament as a form of corruption.

Hon Peter Dunne: Can I take the Acting Prime Minister back to an earlier answer in which it was indicated that a particular activity is currently under investigation with regard to the Smoke-free Environments Amendment Bill, and, in the light of that answer, will the Prime Minister be instructing the Leader of the House to defer consideration of that bill until such time as the inquiry is completed; if not, why not?

Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN: Because the Leader of the House has no power to defer the consideration of that bill. It is a member’s bill on a members’ day.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: I seek to table evidence that the Labour Party took a huge sum of money from Fay Richwhite when Margaret Wilson was the president, as evidenced by David Lange’s testimony.

Document not tabled.

Hon Peter Dunne: In the light of the Acting Prime Minister’s previous answer, will the Leader of the House discuss with the sponsor of the bill whether it would be appropriate to set this matter aside until the inquiry he referred to earlier is completed?

Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN: I take it from the reaction of members that they have been completely uninfluenced by lobbying on behalf of the bill by members of ASH, so not only was the contract inappropriate, it also appears to have been a waste of public money.

Jeanette Fitzsimons: I seek leave to table in the House a letter from the British American Tobacco Co. Ltd to Mr Peter Dunne.

Mr SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table that letter. Is there any objection?

Hon Peter Dunne: I am quite happy for the letter to be tabled, but I would love to know what it says before I agree to the resolution.

Mr SPEAKER: Perhaps the member could say a little bit more.

Jeanette Fitzsimons: “Dear Mr Dunne, Paul Adams has asked me to send you the enclosed £100 to help pay for your away day. I do hope you will enjoy yourselves. If at all possible I would be grateful if you could get receipts, etc. Enjoy your visit to England.” [Interruption]

Mr SPEAKER: I think that that is the price of a McDonald’s! Leave is sought to table that letter. Is there any objection? There is. That is the end of the matter.

Gerry Brownlee: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I wonder whether the Leader of the House might give us some indication as to whether £100 translated into New Zealand dollars would be a big enough sum to be disclosed under the Members of Parliament (Pecuniary Interests) Bill?

Mr SPEAKER: That is not a point of order.

Paul Adams: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I would like it clarified that Paul Adams is my name, and I probably would not have £100, to start with, but I would not like members to think that that reference was being made to myself.

Mr SPEAKER: If the member is making it clear that that does not refer to himself, he can ask for leave to make a personal explanation. Is that what he is doing?

Paul Adams: Yes. I would like to clarify that the Paul Adams referred to in the letter that we have just heard read by the member of the Green Party is in fact a different Paul Adams to me. I would like to make that clear at this point in time.

Hon Peter Dunne: I wish to make a personal explanation regarding the matter that has just been tabled. That incident was in December of 1994, during the course of a private visit to Britain. I was hosted to lunch by Mr Adams, who worked for Rothmans—I think it was called at that stage. The £100 referred to was provided to make sure the cost of lunch was covered for my family and me during a private visit. There was no other involvement, and I would contrast that with the time-honoured practice around this town—which I suspect may have occurred as recently as the most recent lunch hour—where members of Parliament are hosted to private lunches by various lobbyists. It was in that category, and in that category alone, and any suggestion of anything to the contrary is simply malicious and untrue.

Mr SPEAKER: The member has made his statement. His word will be accepted.

Supreme Court—Appointment of Judges

7. RICHARD WORTH (National—Epsom) to the Attorney-General: Will she change the appointment process of judges for the Supreme Court to allow some form of cross-party consultation; if not, why not?

Hon MARGARET WILSON (Attorney-General): I intend to follow the practice of my predecessors and not politicise the appointment process.

Richard Worth: Would not a wise Attorney-General, conscious of her constitutional responsibilities and tasked with recommending the appointment of a bench of judges to the new Supreme Court and substantially a bench of judges to the existing Court of Appeal, see it as appropriate to secure a level of parliamentary buy-in for what are very significant appointments, and possibly for potentially long terms?

Hon MARGARET WILSON: This Attorney-General does not think appointments should be made to satisfy members of this House. What she will be doing will be following the advice she will be given by an independent body. The Attorney-General will follow the advice she will be given.

Hon Roger Sowry: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. Is the Minister answering on behalf of the Attorney-General or as the Attorney-General?

Mr SPEAKER: The Minister changed her expression halfway through.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. Parliamentary question time is not just for our benefit but for the benefit of the public, as well. How is the public to know what is going on when someone gets up and, in a lofty tone, refers to herself in the third person, as if she were Little Richard or something?

Mr SPEAKER: That is not a point of order.

Tim Barnett: Has the Attorney-General seen any reports on support for the proposed appointment process of judges to the Supreme Court?

Hon MARGARET WILSON: Yes. Recently members of the public were asked whether they supported the process I intend to follow—namely, that the new court be chosen by the Attorney-General on the advice of the Chief Justice, the Solicitor-General, and Sir Paul Reeves. The number who agreed with that was 41.6 percent, while 35.4 percent disagreed.

Stephen Franks: Does the Attorney-General’s advertisement last month for new High Court judges, which required them to have “knowledge of cultural and gender issues”, mean they must be cunning enough to at least pretend to share her politically correct agenda, and how will New Zealanders be assured that a failure to show the right kind of knowledge of gender issues will not disqualify applicants who think that equality before the law without regard to race, religion, gender, or status is more than an outmoded shackle of our colonial past?

Hon MARGARET WILSON: The Solicitor-General was responsible for advertising for expressions of interest. The procedure he follows and the criteria are those that have been used in the past, and I understand that all people will be considered and appointed on merit.

Richard Worth: When the Attorney-General said, in answer to a supplementary question, that she would be “following the advice” of the advisory panel, does that mean she will feel herself free to reject that advice if it does not suit her interests or judgment?

Hon MARGARET WILSON: No.

Stephen Franks: I seek leave to table the advertisement.

Mr SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table that advertisement. Is there any objection? There is.

Television New Zealand—Transmission Holdings Ltd

8. Dr ASHRAF CHOUDHARY (Labour) to the Minister of Broadcasting: What progress is being made on implementing the planned separation of Transmission Holdings Limited (THL) from Television New Zealand Limited in accordance with the Television New Zealand Act 2003?

Hon STEVE MAHAREY (Minister of Broadcasting): The legal separation will proceed as planned on 31 December 2003. The television and transmission businesses are already operating separately. Contrary to assertions made by Opposition members, not one cent is payable in tax to effect the separation; nor will any stamp duty be paid.

Dr Ashraf Choudhary: How are the television and transmission businesses performing?

Hon STEVE MAHAREY: Both businesses are performing well. TVNZ has provided a greater range of programming, in line with its charter obligations; has dominated ratings; and has generated record advertising revenue. On the transmission side, Broadcast Communications Ltd is becoming a major player in the telecommunications industry through its broadband partnership with Telecom, while TVNZ (Australia) is rolling out digital terrestrial television in Australia in order to maintain its strong financial position.

Katherine Rich: What is the total cost of separating BCL Ltd from TVNZ to create Transmission Holdings Ltd?

Hon STEVE MAHAREY: I cannot give the member that information, as I did not bring the total costs with me. It has not been done yet in full, because we are, of course, waiting until December. At the moment there are some costs that are incurred around this, and in December I will be able to give the member that figure.

Sue Kedgley: Given the loss of revenue to TVNZ that will occur when BCL Ltd splits off into a separate State-owned enterprise, why is the Government seeking a dividend of $7.848 million from TVNZ instead of allowing the company to reinvest that money into programmes?

Hon STEVE MAHAREY: There is, of course, no loss of revenue. These two companies are still answerable to the Government, and Transmission Holdings Ltd, as it will be called, will be paying money back to the Government. TVNZ itself is, in fact, running extremely well—as members know—from record advertising revenue coming in. It has made the choice to reinvest some of that back into the company at this time and to pay the dividend announced to the Government. We have agreed with that.

Katherine Rich: Was it the Minister or his officials who forgot about the potential capital gains tax implications of separating BCL Ltd from TVNZ, in light of the fact that these potential costs were flagged by Arthur Andersen in a 2001 report?

Hon STEVE MAHAREY: No one forgot. Officials raised this, as we said in the House at the time. During the process of separation, it seemed wise for us to take advice on this matter. I want to say to the member, who was one of those who thought the figure would be as high as $20 million, I think she said at one point, that we are not paying one single cent.

District Health Boards—Surgery Exclusions

9. Dr LYNDA SCOTT (National—Kaikoura) to the Minister of Health: What is the Government’s policy regarding a district health board’s ability to practise blanket exclusion of certain surgical procedures?

Hon RUTH DYSON (Associate Minister of Health), on behalf of the Minister of Health: District health boards were reminded earlier this year that Government policy does not—

Lindsay Tisch: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I do not want to interrupt the Minister, but there is something wrong with the sound. We cannot hear a word she is saying.

Mr SPEAKER: Perhaps the Minister could say a couple more words.

Hon RUTH DYSON: I am happy to, until the microphone starts working.

Mr SPEAKER: I think the Minister could move down to the front seat.

Gerry Brownlee: There is a nice one down the front there.

Hon RUTH DYSON: That member might be after the leader’s job, but I am not.

Mr SPEAKER: When a technical difficulty like this occurs, we just have to make the best of it.

Hon RUTH DYSON: District health boards were reminded earlier this year that Government policy does not allow for blanket exclusion of surgical procedures. The decision to establish a priority booking system for surgical procedures was made in 1996. That system requires that, regardless of the procedure, if a person’s need is high enough the procedure should be carried out.

Dr Lynda Scott: How are frustrated and angry general practitioners supposed to care for patients they know need surgery for symptomatic hernias, when this Minister continues to make misleading statements that deny blanket rationing of services is occurring, while at the same time every general practitioner in Waikato has been told they cannot refer hernia patients for even a first specialist assessment?

Hon RUTH DYSON: The member knows that is not correct and that if the person meets the criteria the procedure will be carried out.

Dave Hereora: Are hernia procedures still being carried out; if so, how many are being done by the Waikato District Health Board?

Hon RUTH DYSON: Yes, hernia operations are being done. Waikato has actually increased the numbers since 1998-99, from 468 per year to 557 in the 2001-02 year.

Pita Paraone: Notwithstanding her reply to the primary question, is it her policy to have the Hawke’s Bay District Health Board practise blanket exclusion by requiring Napier residents to go to Hastings for surgical and other health services; if not, why is there the determination to remove the last remnants of a once-proud health service in that city by not supporting the retention of the old hospital site and buildings?

Hon RUTH DYSON: While not all surgical procedures need to be undertaken in a hospital, generally it is preferable that patients travel to a hospital to have the procedure done.

Heather Roy: In relation to the funding of health board surgical procedures, can the Minister deny that the planned August deficit of half a million dollars for district health boards actually blew out to a deficit of $5.7 million; and what guarantee can she give that she will not deliver another blowout to over $100 million for the year, as has happened in each of the last 2 years?

Hon RUTH DYSON: No, I am not able to confirm that.

Dr Lynda Scott: Why has the Waikato District Health Board publicly stated that it has been performing elective hernia operations, when its chief executive officer has admitted that outpatient clinics can no longer afford to accept referrals for hernia repair; and exactly who is running the health service—the Minister or the boards?

Hon RUTH DYSON: I repeat that district health boards have been reminded that it is Government policy not to have blanket exclusion of any surgical procedures. The system—as I outlined in answer to the primary question—is that regardless of the procedure, if a person’s need is high, the procedure should be carried out.

Dr Lynda Scott: Who are New Zealand patients to believe—a Minister saying there is no blanket ban on hernia surgery or a board saying it cannot afford to see patients, let alone operate on them; and why are these patients caught like piggy in the middle, with the only certainty being that they will not get surgery?

Hon RUTH DYSON: If members of the public are considering which version they prefer to believe—the story from the member or from the Minister of Health—I would strongly recommend they believe the Minister of Health.

Dr Lynda Scott: I seek leave to table a letter from Jan White, the Chief Executive Officer of the Waikato District Health Board, which states: “I regret that we are no longer able to provide you and your patients with the treatments you desire”. This referred to a hernia patient.

Document, by leave, laid on the Table of the House.

Dr Lynda Scott: I seek leave to table a letter from the Minister stating that district health boards should not adopt blanket surgical policies of this sort.

Document, by leave, laid on the Table of the House.

Dr Lynda Scott: I seek leave to table a letter from Mr Denis Whittle, regional clinical director of general surgery, which states that only 42 elective inguinal hernia repairs have been done in the last 12 months. The patients were on the list and the board felt obliged to honour that commitment, but it will not do any more.

Document, by leave, laid on the Table of the House.

Public Health—At-risk Population Intervention

10. MAHARA OKEROA (Labour—Te Tai Tonga) to the Minister for Sport and Recreation: What is the Government currently doing to ensure at-risk population groups are effectively targeted through physical activity interventions?

Hon TREVOR MALLARD (Minister for Sport and Recreation): Sport and Recreation New Zealand is undertaking a major survey on the physical activity and eating habits of New Zealanders. The research moves beyond just documenting the physical activity and nutrition habits of New Zealanders, and focuses on why people do or do not engage in specific behaviours.

Mahara Okeroa: Why is the promotion of physical activity critical?

Hon TREVOR MALLARD: Physical activity reduces the risk of cardiovascular disease, some cancers, and diabetes, and has mental health benefits. In New Zealand, physical inactivity is associated with up to 3,000 premature deaths per year, coming close to smoking and poor nutrition as a modifiable risk factor for poor health. That is five times higher than the road toll. That is why I welcome additional physical activity by New Zealanders, and I want to ask Mr Peters whether it is true that John Kirwan has given him a phone call.

Corrections, Department—Emergency Response Unit

11. RON MARK (NZ First) to the Minister of Corrections: Does he stand by his reported comments that he was comfortable with a focused inquiry on the controversial former emergency response unit known as the goon squad; if so, will he instigate an independent inquiry by the State Services Commission into the corrections department’s handling of the goon squad affair?

Hon PAUL SWAIN (Minister of Corrections): I stand by my comments that I was comfortable about a tightly focused inquiry, but went off the idea of a select committee inquiry once I heard members of the Opposition using this as a political platform to attack the public prison service. However, I am currently considering whether there should be a further investigation of some sort. If that member has any new information on the matter, I encourage him to bring it forward. This will help me in my deliberations.

Ron Mark: On that basis, would the Minister be interested in evidence from a prison officer that alcohol confiscated by the emergency response unit was drunk at various emergency response unit parties, including at Mr Smith’s own home; that drugs that were confiscated from visitors to the prison simply disappeared and were never found again; that time sheets were falsified, costing the department thousands of dollars; that some prison officers in the emergency response unit refused to take part in what they considered were illegal operations in Dunedin, and have suffered the consequences since then in terms of their employment;—

Mr SPEAKER: That is sufficient.

Ron Mark: One more.

Mr SPEAKER: One more.

Ron Mark: —and that some prison officers were presented with affidavits regarding the death of David Rewi Haimoana that they were required to sign, and refused to sign because they contained falsities?

Hon PAUL SWAIN: I would be surprised if those allegations had not been looked into, certainly in the reports that I have seen. But if the member wants to bring them forward formally to me, with the evidence that goes with it, then this is a good time to be doing it, as we consider the options that we should take.

Georgina Beyer: What should be done by anyone who has any further information on the activities of the now defunct emergency response unit?

Opposition Members: He just said it!

Hon PAUL SWAIN: They should not pre-guess. As I have already said, people can contact me, or they can forward any such information to an outside agency, like the State Services Commission, the Ombudsman, or the Controller and Auditor-General. This information could be passed on under the Protected Disclosures Act, which provides protection to whistle-blowers.

Gerry Brownlee: In the light of the revelations from Mr Mark today that many of those involved in this sad incident have come under all sorts of personal pressure to shut up and say nothing, will the Minister give the House an assurance that should evidence come forward from prison officers it could be done on the basis of no prejudice, so that their careers are not wrecked and they are no longer subject to the sort of internal bullying that appears to be going on in this case?

Hon PAUL SWAIN: I have heard those allegations before about bullying, and they have been investigated. The vast majority, as I understand, have been declined. What I will say to the member, though, is that if information comes forward, with evidence to back it up, then I give that member the assurance that the people who bring it forward will be protected and their careers will not be affected.

Marc Alexander: Can the Minister give his reasons behind his Government’s refusal to allow the Law and Order Committee to conduct an inquiry into the activities of the goon squad, and do any of these concern the integrity of the Department of Corrections at a time when we are discussing the private management of prisons—the closing of them for ideological reasons—and given that there is a demand for a full and public accounting of the activities of the goon squad, why is the Minister seemingly complicit in protecting the shenanigans of a Government department?

Hon PAUL SWAIN: Well, it actually has nothing to do with the bill. This was a call for an inquiry—I think, made by that member. I thought that member made it in good faith, and he had the courtesy to come and talk to me about it. The major reason why I went off the idea was when I heard members of the Opposition try to use it as an opportunity to attack our public prison service. I object to that.

Ron Mark: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I have sat and listened to that spin line, and we are at the point now where I am going to seek your assistance, because I and that Minister are fully aware of a private conversation between him and me, where I gave him an absolute assurance that that would not happen, and by continuing to say that, he is misleading this House, and deliberately so. Also, he is aware that 3 years previously I had gone to the office of the Minister of Corrections personally and in a closed-door session sought such an independent inquiry.

Mr SPEAKER: Order!

RON MARK: For him to continue that line is to mislead, to deceive, and to lie.

Mr SPEAKER: I am not having any further comment. That is not a point of order, but the member made the point he wanted to make, and that is all right. I just want to say that had I thought the Minister was referring to him in particular, or anything like that, I would have jumped on it—immediately. The Minister referred to—[Interruption] He did not actually mention Mr Mark, did he?

Ron Mark: He said “that member”, looking directly at me, and numerous times publicly he has stated me.

Mr SPEAKER: I thought he said “members”. If the member gives me that assurance, I will accept it.

Hon PAUL SWAIN: I said “members”, but, speaking to the point of order, I say that the point that I have referred to in previous answers in this House was that member’s specific public appearances on television and on radio, where he has publicly attacked the prison service of New Zealand. That is not the excuse, in my view, to do an inquiry into this. If there is another method, or if there is new information, then we can look into it, but I have given him the reason why we decided we were not going down that track.

Mr SPEAKER: The member has a perfect right to say what he likes in this House on that particular issue, and the member has a perfect right to appear on television and elsewhere. That does not in any way influence what happens in question time in this way, and I do not think Mr Mark was committing any offence at that point.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I have just heard the Minster repeat an alarming statement. I thought that select committees in this Parliament were their own masters, and that when they have been authorised by Parliament they are subject to Parliament’s direction as to their terms of reference, times of sittings, and those matters. For a Minister to say that he is against a select committee inquiry, that he went off the idea, and that we would decide—namely, his Cabinet colleagues—is a serious challenge to the proper functioning of this Parliament and its select committees.

Mr SPEAKER: Just a moment. Just as Mr Mark is entitled to his opinion, the Minister is entitled to his, too. He can make that comment. That, however, does not mean the select committee has to take any notice of it.

Ron Mark: Since last week’s question to the Minister, has he seen the allegations made by prison officers that the reason the emergency response unit bosses—Smith, Kelly, and Bird—were not fired is that lies were told in the hostage-taking situation in 1997, and that “everybody had [bleep] on each other, so there was no way Tony Bird was ever going to be fired, because he would have turned around and blown the gaff on everyone, and Smith knew stuff. Smith had it all over Tony Bird, and Bird had it all over Rushton”; and are those allegations alone not sufficient cause for the Minister, in the order of protecting the integrity of the department, to order a totally, absolutely independent inquiry into the goon squad?

Hon PAUL SWAIN: The first point is that those allegations were made in 1997—2 years before the goon squad was established. Secondly, those allegations have been investigated. I am happy to table the formal response from the department, and for the member to have a look at it. If he has further concerns he should take them up with me. I seek leave to table the response to the allegations that were raised in the House last week.

Document, by leave, laid on the Table of the House.

Ron Mark: Given that those allegations implicate the very people who manage the Department of Corrections in Canterbury and the department here, at the highest level, why would the Minister place any credibility at all on an explanation given to him by those very same people, which, some would say, was an attempt to cover their own backsides?

Hon PAUL SWAIN: A huge number of allegations have been made in this House, and elsewhere, about these issues. Those allegations have been investigated, but it is not the first time that member has made allegations in this House that have been proved to be utterly false.

Ron Mark: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. These particular allegations have not been investigated. I seek leave to table a report in the Investigate magazine, dated September this year, which outlines the whole sorry affair.

Mr SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table that article. Is there any objection? There is.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. The Minister concluded his statement, in his last answer, by saying: “it is not the first time that member has made allegations in this House that have been proved to be utterly false.” That is not true. It should not be forming part of his answer, but, worst of all, it is not true. So he should be asked to desist from that line of answer, or put up or shut up.

Mr SPEAKER: If the Minister said the member was doing it deliberately, of course it would be out of order. I did not hear the word “deliberately” used.

Ron Mark: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I seek your guidance. The Minister in his answer stated that these allegations had been investigated. As far as I, and anyone else in the House, am aware, this report was made public only in September this year. There has been no investigation of this matter.

Mr SPEAKER: The member sought my advice. That is not really a point of order.

Customs Minister—Speech, Mangere

12. Hon TONY RYALL (National—Bay of Plenty) to the Minister of Customs: Does he stand by comments he made yesterday in a speech to Customs personnel in Mangere, Auckland; if so, why?

Hon RICK BARKER (Minister of Customs): Yes, because Customs staff are achieving excellent results in detecting and seizing illegal imports of drugs and precursor chemicals. Their efforts deserve every congratulatory comment I made in my speech yesterday, and I believe of every member in this House.

Hon Tony Ryall: What sort of “soft on drugs” Government is this, when this Minister lists his concern about the effect P is having on tourism ahead of the insidious effect this drug is having on child abuse, domestic violence, and murder rates in this country; and how can we take him seriously when he thinks tourism is more important than the effect P is having on New Zealand families?

Hon RICK BARKER: The member can take it out of context any which way he likes. This Government has a methamphetamine action plan. This Government has increased the category of methamphetamine from a class C drug to a class A drug. This Government has taken action. That is completely different from the previous Government, which, despite requests by the police for the Customs Service to take action, did nothing.

Luamanuvao Winnie Laban: Does the Customs Service have sufficient staff to deal with the current drug problem?

Hon RICK BARKER: The Labour-Progressive Government is increasing the number of Customs staff, at a cost, in the last Budget, of $1.9 million. I had the pleasure yesterday of inducting 11 new Customs drug staff, and there are five more to come, which brings the number of Customs drug investigators back to about where it was before it was cut by the previous National Government.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. The Minister was asked by his own colleague—and no doubt he prepared the question—whether Customs had sufficient staff. He made no attempt to answer it. He just gave us a diatribe on what there is now, as opposed to what there was in the past.

Mr SPEAKER: This is one occasion on which I agree with the member. He was asked whether there were sufficient staff, and that should be relatively easy to answer.

Hon RICK BARKER: We have increased the staff to the maximum level we are capable of at this stage.

Mr SPEAKER: The member was asked whether there were sufficient staff.

Hon RICK BARKER: I said that we have increased staff to the maximum we are capable of absorbing at this stage. Whether that is sufficient is a moot point, but we simply cannot increase the staff any faster.

Keith Locke: Does Customs’ reliance on analysis from overseas agencies, as the Minister mentioned in his speech yesterday, lead to serious mistakes when Customs strays into the political arena—as demonstrated in the Refugee Status Appeals Authority’s determination in the Ahmed Zaoui case, where the authority criticised the Customs officer who interviewed Ahmed Zaoui at the airport for wrongly claiming that Mr Zaoui was a member of the Algerian Armed Islamic Group, or GIA?

Mr SPEAKER: That is getting far too wide of the original question.

Keith Locke: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker.

Mr SPEAKER: The member was asked whether he stood by the comments he made in his speech yesterday.

Keith Locke: Yes, but the original question related to the Minister’s speech yesterday, which was in general terms. This relates to something that was in the Minister’s speech.

Mr SPEAKER: But this is a customs matter, not an immigration matter.

Keith Locke: Well, this is to do with customs. I am talking about what the Minister of—

Mr SPEAKER: The member is now irritating me slightly. I have ruled the question out.

Hon Matt Robson: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. Mr Locke asked whether it was in the Refugee Status Appeals Authority finding on Ahmed Zaoui that the Customs Service was heavily criticised for its treatment of Mr Ahmed Zaoui and the breaching of his rights. In my opinion, Mr Speaker—and I am asking you to reflect on it—the Minister of Customs and the Customs Service were implicated in the issue that Mr Locke has raised.

Mr SPEAKER: I do not want to be ungenerous to the member. I will allow the Minister to comment on the issue.

Hon RICK BARKER: I do not accept that member’s assertion that the Customs Service acts politically; it does not, and I do not accept the findings that the Customs Service was acting on an immigration basis. At the time, the Customs Service asked its questions under the Customs and Excise Act, which it is perfectly entitled to do.

Hon Peter Dunne: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I do not want to interrupt the flow of questions, but there seems to be something wrong with the amplification system. When various people speak, their voices are coming through distorted. Perhaps you can have someone look at that.

Mr SPEAKER: I am having a look at that matter.

Dr Muriel Newman: In light of the Minister’s answers relating to methamphetamines, what is his response to comments in this month’s Police Association News that describe his Government’s commitment to controlling the $400 million-a-year, gang-controlled methamphetamine crime industry as totally inadequate “petty cash” and “chicken feed”?

Hon RICK BARKER: I cannot agree with that, at all. I say to the member and to this House that this year the Customs Service put in a budget bid of $1.9 million. That was the maximum it thought it could handle. The Government gave it exactly what it asked for, and we are implementing the plan. We have seen a 300 percent increase in seizures of methamphetamine at the border. We have seen the seizure of 7 kilograms of cocaine at the border, and other seizures will be announced shortly. The Customs Service is doing an excellent job.

Hon Tony Ryall: Mr Speaker—

Mr SPEAKER: No, there will be no further supplementary questions from the National Party today.

Lindsay Tisch: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. On our calculations, Mr Ryall is entitled to another question. He has had his primary question, plus one supplementary question. There should be another supplementary question available to Mr Ryall.

Mr SPEAKER: The National Party has 16 allocated for today.

Lindsay Tisch: That is correct, and we have taken only 15.

Mr SPEAKER: The information I have from my assistant—but I take responsibility for that—is 15. However, I will be reasonable.

Hon Tony Ryall: How does he reconcile previous responses in this House that the Government is doing everything it can to deal with the methamphetamine epidemic in New Zealand with his pledge yesterday to try to accelerate the progress of the Government’s methamphetamine plan, when Jim Anderton, the head of the ministerial committee on drugs, told the public on television recently that this is not the kind of crisis that people are making it out to be?

Hon RICK BARKER: As the Customs Service and other agencies observe the actions and activities of those who seek to import illicit drugs into this country, we notice a change in their behaviour. We therefore have to adapt our tactics, strategy, and law to help deal with the increase in the supply of drugs into this country. I am very proud of the action we have taken thus far.

Mr SPEAKER: That answer was too long.

Question No. 11 to Minister

RON MARK (NZ First): I seek the leave of the House to table a couple of documents. The first is a transcript of an interview of prison officer Nigel French by Maureen Love and Barry Noakes, dated 13 September 2000.

Mr SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table that document. Is there any objection? There is.

RON MARK: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I distinctly saw the Minister shake his head and say “No”, whilst his learned colleague said “Yes”.

Mr SPEAKER: I heard a “No” said quite clearly, and that is the end of the matter. Please seek leave for the tabling of the other document.

RON MARK: The other document—[Interruption] The Minister asked for information, and I am attempting to give that. He is now denying it, so I will not bother. I will put it out in the media.

Questions to Members

Question No. 1 to Member

PAUL ADAMS (United Future): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. This is rather by way of clarification. We have had questions to Ministers, and are now about to have questions to members. Could you clarify for me whether the format is the same—that is, do we ask questions of the member as though we were asking them of a Minister?

Mr SPEAKER: No, I usually allow the member who asks the substantive question to ask the supplementary question.

Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee—Latin-American Countries

1. PAUL ADAMS (United Future) to the Chairperson of the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee: When does he expect the committee to report back on its inquiry into New Zealand’s political, economic, trade and cultural relationship with Latin American countries?

Hon PETER DUNNE (Chairperson of the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee): As chair, the question of when the committee reports back is not one for me to determine, but for the whole committee to resolve at a time when the inquiry has been completed.

Paul Adams: What were the terms of reference for the inquiry, and why were those particular terms of reference chosen?

Hon PETER DUNNE: The terms of reference are quite wide reaching, and, in effect, allow us to inquire into all aspects of the political, economic, trade, and cultural relationship with the countries of Latin America. They were chosen after consultation with members of the business community, and after discussion with the Latin American ambassadors in New Zealand, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, but they were ultimately adopted by the committee. They have been interpreted in such a way to allow the widest possible inquiry into all aspects of this issue.

Dail Jones: As a member who attends the trade section of the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee—and I am saying that because of any personal interest that might be raised as a result of this question in terms of the Standing Orders—I would like to ask if, in view of the fact that this is an inquiry into Latin American trade and there seem to be difficulties in getting more information in New Zealand, there is any possibility of the committee travelling to South America to be fully briefed on the issues involved?

Mr SPEAKER: The Minister cannot answer that question.

Hon PETER DUNNE: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. As the member pointed out, he is someone who attends the committee, and this issue has been one that we have discussed and raised with the Clerk’s Office. I submit to you that it is perfectly proper for me as the chair to answer to the House as to what actions we have taken in that respect.

Mr SPEAKER: I will allow the question.

Hon PETER DUNNE: As I indicated previously, the issue has been discussed within the select committee. There is a feeling that it would be beneficial for members of the committee to conduct the inquiry to some extent in person rather than at long distance. The difficulty we have is that at the moment the rules for travel preclude travel for select committees to destinations other than Australia.

Education and Science Committee—Teacher Education

2. BERNIE OGILVY (United Future) to the Chairperson of the Education and Science Committee: How long has the committee spent on its inquiry into teacher education?

Hon BRIAN DONNELLY (Chairperson of the Education and Science Committee): The committee has spent 11 hours 3 minutes hearing evidence during its inquiry into teacher education, and 1 hour 17 minutes in consideration—that is, a subtotal thus far of 12 hours 20 minutes.

Bernie Ogilvy: When does the chairman expect that the committee will be ready to report back to the House on this inquiry in light of the fact that the inquiry into decile funding for State and integrated schools has already taken some time?

Mr SPEAKER: The first part of the question can be answered.

Hon BRIAN DONNELLY: The precise answer to that question is: when it is finished. The committee has set no deadline for the completion of its inquiry, recognising the complexity of the issues before it.

Simon Power: Will the Education and Science Committee be calling for more evidence in its inquiry into teacher education; if not, why not?

Hon BRIAN DONNELLY: Yes. As occasions arise, the committee has the capacity within its own right to be able to call upon more evidence, and has already taken the opportunity to do so.

Primary Production Committee—Scampi Fisheries

3. LARRY BALDOCK (United Future) to the Chairperson of the Primary Production Committee: When does the committee intend to report back on its inquiry into the administration and management of New Zealand’s scampi fishery?

Hon DAVID CARTER (Chairperson of the Primary Production Committee): A very conscientious committee is working through a large amount of information. This is a substantial inquiry, and I am confident that the committee will deliver a credible and worthwhile report when deliberations are completed.

Larry Baldock: Will the committee’s report on the inquiry into the administration and management of New Zealand’s scampi industry now take top priority on the committee’s agenda, in light of the absence of legislation currently before the committee?

Mr SPEAKER: That is a matter for the committee to decide, not the chairperson.

Regulations Review Committee—Subordinate Legislation (Confirmation and Validation) Bill (No 2)

4. GORDON COPELAND (United Future) to the Chairperson of the Regulations Review Committee: How many submissions have been received to date on the Subordinate Legislation (Confirmation and Validation) Bill (No 2)?

RICHARD WORTH (Chairperson of the Regulations Review Committee): The committee has received five submissions on the Subordinate Legislation (Confirmation and Validation) Bill (No 2).

Gordon Copeland: In light of his answer to the primary question, can the chairman tell the House when public submissions to the bill will close?

RICHARD WORTH: Submissions closed on the bill on 26 September 2003.

Question No. 5 to Member

Question deferred.

Mr SPEAKER: This question is deferred automatically because Dr the Hon Lockwood Smith has leave from the House today and it will be asked tomorrow.

Masterton District Council (Mountfort Trimble Foundation) Bill—Postponement

6. Hon PETER DUNNE (Leader—United Future) to Georgina Beyer (Member in charge of Local Bill): Why has she sought to postpone the second reading of the Masterton District Council (Montfort Trimble Foundation) Bill under Standing Order 71(1)(b)?

GEORGINA BEYER (Labour—Wairarapa): In answer to the member, it was in order to assist progress on the Smoke-free Environments Amendment Bill.

Hon Peter Dunne: In making that trade-off, did the member consult the district council to obtain its approval, or was she acting as a result of discussion with the whips of her own party?

GEORGINA BEYER: I had an informal conversation with the Mayor of Masterton District about my intention to defer the second reading of the bill until 5 November, and subsequently left a telephone message for him when I had, in fact, sought that deferral from the Clerk of the House.

Jim Peters: Why should the good people of Masterton wait a further time when the bill has been considered by the select committee, submissions have been heard, and the final mind of the committee has been made known, merely because of a political device?

GEORGINA BEYER: I understand that according to the Standing Order quoted by the original questioner I have the privilege in this House to make that decision, as a member in charge of a local bill.

Social Services Committee—Families Commission Bill

7. Dr MURIEL NEWMAN (ACT) to the Chairperson of the Social Services Committee: When will the committee report back on the Families Commission Bill?

GEORGINA BEYER (Chairperson of the Social Services Committee): I am pleased to inform the deputy chair of the Social Services Committee that the bill is due to be reported by 12 November.

Dr Muriel Newman: Will the Families Commission Bill be reported back to the House earlier than originally scheduled; if so, why?

GEORGINA BEYER: I understand that that would be a decision for the committee to make. However, in my view that is entirely possible.

Katherine Rich: How many submissions objected to the wide definition of a family group used in the bill?

GEORGINA BEYER: I am unable to answer that question precisely; I do not have that information here. However, I can inform the member that the Social Services Committee received 58 written submissions on the Families Commission Bill. Submitters that we heard gave most support to the Families Commission’s role of advocacy and increasing public awareness of matters relating to the interests of families. Some submitters liked the bill’s inclusive approach to New Zealand families, in recognition of the diversity of families. Submitters also supported the research role of the Families Commission. To answer that member’s question, I would be happy to enlighten her on that at a meeting of the Social Services Committee, of which she is a member, tomorrow.

Transport and Industrial Relations Committee—Holidays (Four Weeks Annual Leave) Amendment Bill

8. DEBORAH CODDINGTON (ACT) to the Chairperson of the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee: When will the committee report back on the Holidays (Four Weeks Annual Leave) Amendment Bill?

Hon MARK GOSCHE (Chairperson of the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee): The Transport and Industrial Relations Committee is required to report back to the House on this bill by 1 December 2003.

Deborah Coddington: Has this report-back date been extended; if so, why?

Hon MARK GOSCHE: As I only became the chairman of the committee last Thursday, I am not aware of any extensions. That member has been on the committee longer than me; she should know.

Urgent Debates Declined

State Services Commission Report on Te Puni Kōkiri

Mr SPEAKER: I have received a letter from the Hon Murray McCully seeking to debate under Standing Order 376 the release of the State Services Commission’s report on its review of Te Puni Kōkiri. This is a particular matter of recent occurrence involving ministerial responsibility. The report relates to part 1 of a three-part review of Te Puni Kōkiri being undertaken by the State Services Commissioner. Although it has material that may be of interest to members and that they may wish to take a parliamentary opportunity to explore, I do not consider it requires the House to hold an urgent debate on it today. I therefore decline the application.

Hon RICHARD PREBBLE (Leader—ACT): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. This request has been put down on a member’s day, and I see you are telling us that this is not a matter that requires the attention of the House.

Mr SPEAKER: It must be urgent.

Hon RICHARD PREBBLE: Absolutely. I want you to reconsider that answer. This matter does not just concern my party. This is a report on about 200 questions asked by Rodney Hide. The report finds that many of the answers were wrong. But what is far more serious—and in the commission’s words, has “serious consequences”—is that the report states that those circumstances are serious, possibly indicating a lack of capability in the ministry to support the constitutional mechanisms by which Parliament holds Ministers, and therefore the Government, to account, and a systemic impediment to the business of Government, through the deterioration of the relationship between a Minister and his chief executive and senior officials. Why I suggest to you that this is urgent is that this report states that when members of Parliament put down a question tomorrow to Te Puni Kōkiri, there is no mechanism to ensure that the answer is accurate. In fact, the report states that the systemic failures are such, and the relationship between the Minister and his officials is so bad, that the officials actually suspended the report and called in the State Services Commission. I just want to ask you this question: are you saying, as Speaker, that it is perfectly satisfactory that the Government can table a report stating that Ministers can no longer answer questions about Te Puni Kōkiri? If members want to put down questions about that department tomorrow, we have no idea—including the Minister—whether the answer that is being given to us is true or false. I cannot think of a matter that goes more to the issue of parliamentary accountability. I fail to see why the inability of the Government to answer questions accurately is regarded by you as a matter of no urgency.

Mr SPEAKER: I tell the member that I looked at this issue. I had to decide whether there would be a special debate on it at this moment. I declined the application.

Hon MURRAY McCULLY (National—East Coast Bays): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker.

Mr SPEAKER: I have made my ruling, and I will not go into it.

Hon MURRAY McCULLY: I was not going to ask you to go into it. I was going to ask you to take the unusual step of, first of all, giving to us in writing the views that you have just expressed orally to the House. Members do have to make judgment calls about the matters they should trouble you with in relation to Standing Order 376—which matters create the unusual circumstances that require a snap debate. It would help me, and I sure it would help other members, if we could understand your reasoning in that respect.

Mr SPEAKER: Well, I have allowed more snap debates this year than, I think, in any other year. But that is because I regarded the applications as deserving ones. I said that this report relates to part 1 of a three-part review. Although the report has material of obvious interest to members and they may wish to take parliamentary opportunities to debate it, I do not consider the report requires the House to hold an urgent debate on it today. That is why I declined the application.

Hon PETER DUNNE (Leader—United Future): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker.

Mr SPEAKER: I will not have any further comment on my ruling.

Hon PETER DUNNE: I am not commenting on your ruling, but there is an issue that arises out of your ruling. I note particularly the reference in your ruling to words to the effect that members may wish to take further parliamentary time to debate the matter. I think it raises an issue as to whether the fact that this report was released on a member’s day raises the possibility of the general debate being used as a de facto adjournment debate, or whether, if this matter had been raised on a Tuesday or a Thursday, an adjournment debate would have been granted. I am not questioning your ruling, but I think the point about the proximity of the general debate to the issue is relevant, and I would be grateful for some assurance from you that, in determining whether an adjournment debate is to be granted, the fact that there is a general or other debate looming is of little relevance.

Mr SPEAKER: The member is perfectly correct on the last point about whether a general debate is looming. But there are numerous ways in which this matter can be raised in Parliament: by questions, in the financial review debate, and in the general debate if members want to use that. But I was not just referring to one particular thing.

Hon MURRAY McCULLY (National—East Coast Bays): I seek the leave of the House to have a debate on the matter set down in the question I submitted.

Mr SPEAKER: Leave is sought to have that debate. Is there any objection? There is.

Hon RICHARD PREBBLE (Leader—ACT): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I invite you to think about what you have just told the House. You told the House that you were rejecting the debate because there are other parliamentary opportunities. You were then asked by Mr Dunne what those opportunities were, and the first one you told us about was by way of asking a question. If you look at page 1 of that report, you will see the reason the State Services Commission has been called in is that Te Puni Kōkiri cannot give accurate answers to questions. We are now told that this matter should not be debated, and all the member had to do was to put down a question. Unless you can certify that those answers will be accurate, that appears to me to be an extraordinary piece of advice. We are told—and I have never seen this before—that the State Services Commission is taking over the administration of a State agency, because that agency cannot answer questions accurately to this House. Then we are told that we cannot debate that matter, and that we should just put it down in a question.

Mr SPEAKER: I will allow Mr Peters to say something.

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. Having heard Mr Prebble’s concern, I share it myself. We have a serious breakdown in democratic institutions in this country—namely, Parliament and its question time, and the ability of members of Parliament to hold the executive accountable. If that is not a matter of serious public urgency, I do not know what is. It is the first time in my career in Parliament that I have seen such an investigation come up with that sort of result.

Mr SPEAKER: It is an interim report from one official to another. It would be most unusual for an urgent debate to be given on it. I looked at the circumstances, discussed the matter with my advisers, and made my decision.

General Debates

General Debates

Hon PHIL GOFF (Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade): I move, That the House take note of miscellaneous business. In the last 24 hours we have seen the release of two public opinion polls—TVNZ’s Colmar Brunton poll and the New Zealand Herald’s DigiPoll. The consistent factor in both those polls is that the National Party has fallen, for the second time running. Perhaps it is worth reminding members that just 2 years ago the National Party stood at 40 percent in the polls. It has halved its support in this country at a time when one expects a party in Opposition to make progress. It is 22 percent in the polls. What we are seeing is the death knell of a once great and proud party.

National’s latest tactic of cosying up to New Zealand First and the ACT party is simply doomed to failure. Richard Prebble described them as the three tenors. The problem is that not only were they not singing in tune but they were not even using the same song sheet. The New Zealand Herald was a little bit closer to the bone on that. It described it as the coalition of the unwilling.

If one looks at this picture, it looks like a funeral. The politically terminal Bill English is in the middle of the photo, flanked on either side by the gravediggers. The truth is that ACT and New Zealand First are not doing that to save the National Party. They are endeavouring to cannibalise it, and that is exactly what is happening. If one looks at what is happening in the polls, there is no movement whatsoever towards the centre right. What is happening is that the vote on the centre right is being redistributed. The fact is that the three right-wing parties combined barely score 40 percent in the polls. That is 3 or 5 percent less than the Labour Party on its own. That is the product of 4, nearly 5, years coming up of a Labour Government that has been competent and capable by contrast to the parties on the other side.

It is said that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts, but in this case the whole is less than the sum of the parts. What has happened is that the ordinary New Zealander—the one-time National voter; the mainstream National voter—looks at a picture like that, looks at Bill English who is overshadowed on one side by Winston Peters, and Richard Prebble on the other side, and that is a turn-off to one-time National voters. They remember Winston Peters in Government and his utter inability to work with any other party. They know the Winston Peters of today. He is prepared to appeal to any prejudice in this country, however low, to try to get votes. They see Richard Prebble, the representative of the far right in this country, who does not share the values of ordinary New Zealanders, and, against 66 percent of the population, wants to bring nuclear ships back here. He wants to privatise what is left of the public sector, and the ordinary New Zealand voter will not have a bar of that, at all.

What is more, the people who are supporting New Zealand First, and the people who are supporting ACT, have totally contradictory attitudes. For ACT supporters who believe in their ideology, the thought that Richard Prebble would cosy up to Winston Peters is a turn-off. The people who support Winston Peters, seeing him cosy up to Richard Prebble, do not want a bar of that. We welcome that policy; it is doomed to failure.

The other problem of the National Party is that it is led by a failed leader. In 2000, as leader, Jenny Shipley scored 14 percent in the polls. Bill English said to his caucus that that woman had to go. Notwithstanding the fact that three times—it is almost biblical—he had proclaimed his loyalty in public, he said to his caucus that she had to go. Today Bill English is polling half, as preferred Prime Minister, as was polled by the person he replaced in 2000. No wonder he has no authority! He sacked poor Maurice Williamson for suggesting he should be on a performance contract, and for saying what everybody knew, which was that he was failing; he did not have the authority to sack Don Brash. He has no authority.

DEBORAH CODDINGTON (ACT): The Minister of Education has closed a record 96 schools since he has been in power from 1999. What is more, 300 more schools are under threat of closure. Why does that Minister want to close schools? He wants to save money. He wants to suck money out of rural and provincial areas and put it into Auckland to try to buy votes in Auckland where Labour desperately needs to get the voting up. He talks about quality of education as if he knows what is best for every child in New Zealand. He is a control freak Minister of Education. Parents, teachers, principals, and communities, not the Minister of Education, know what is best for each child in their area.

What is quality of education about putting a 5-year-old child on a bus for an hour and a half each way to get to school and back again? What is quality of education about that? What is quality of education about having a one-size-fits-all for every school in this country, having one sort of school that that Minister thinks would suit every single community? He wants to have one set of rules and apply them to every single school. Who would have ever thought that a Labour Government would be closing schools? That is the sort of thing that those neo-socialists accused the centre right of doing. They talk about the centre right wanting to privatise everything. [Interruption]

Rt Hon Winston Peters: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I am reluctant to interrupt the speaker. However, just because it is market day, there is no reason for that fishwife to shout, going on every minute, and every phrase is being interjected on by her. After all, she is a whip, and she should be asked to behave herself.

Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: Yes, I have called order. I ask members to give the speaker silence.

DEBORAH CODDINGTON: Labour is the party that is supposed to care about people. What do those arrogant Labour members say? Mr Mallard says to parents out there who want to choose where they send their kids to school that if they want to save their schools they should have more babies.

It is like the Minister with responsibility for Auckland Issues, who says: “If you can’t afford more money to get a warrant of fitness and pass an emission test, buy a new car.” She also said: “If you can’t afford to pay your rates, sell your house and move.” There is nothing about choice. How arrogant of the Minister of Education to say: “Have more babies.” to parents who want to save their schools. This is typical of the arrogant, patronising attitude of this Government.

Throughout New Zealand there is a rising clamour of voices of parents who are sick and tired of being shut out of their children’s education. Their children are the lost generation. Twenty percent of children leaving school are unable to read a bus timetable. Is the Government proud of that statistic? What sort of future do these children have? This Government does not care. It says: “Go and get a benefit. Go and sit on a benefit for the rest of your life. We will keep you, we will look after you, and we will buy your votes by sticking you on a benefit.” These children are from low socio-economic backgrounds. [Interruption] Of course those people do not care about education, because they can afford to send their children to private schools or move into the Auckland Grammar School zone, which has made property prices so high. But what choice do parents from poor families have?

The Minister of Education believes that poor parents cannot choose, and that families with low incomes have no idea of what makes a good school or makes a good teacher. If he believes that wealthy parents can choose, why does he think that poor parents cannot choose, too? If such people live in a rural town, they have no choice except to send their children to the one State high school or the primary school in the area. He says it is OK to close those schools, because he is fronting up. He sends me funny little emails late in the night to say: “It is all right, because I front up.” He did not go to Russell—

Hon Trevor Mallard: They’re all replies to the member’s love notes.

DEBORAH CODDINGTON: That is OK, then. It is okay to shut those schools, because he fronts up! Now, not satisfied with the State sector and with the Government schools, he will start on integrated schools. He cannot control the integrated schools, so he will change the Act so that he can close down and merge integrated schools and get more control over them. This is the Government’s do-gooder attitude, the “nanny State knows best” attitude.

I used to be on the board of trustees of Epsom Girls Grammar School, and I had to knock on doors to check that people were not putting up a dodgy address. Those parents would move heaven and earth to get from south Auckland into what they thought was a good school zone, but this Minister says no.

GERRY BROWNLEE (National—Ilam): I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. You will have to do something about the shrill cries from the junior Labour whip, Jill Pettis. I notice the varnish cracking at the rear of the Chamber and I have fears for the substrata of the building. You cannot sit there simply waving at her while she continues to defy you. It is most unbecoming of a whip.

Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: I think there have certainly been some interjections on all sides.

MARTIN GALLAGHER (Labour—Hamilton West): Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker.

Simon Power: Here come the heavyweights.

MARTIN GALLAGHER: That heavyweight over there, I understand, is currently looking at the numbers for the deputy leadership of the National Party. He will not take the poisoned chalice of the leadership, because he knows that the next leadership of the National Party will probably be a very temporary phenomenon.

But let me talk about a funny party that taught me all about ACT’s regional conferences. I am quite an astute observer of politics in this country, and I did not realise that ACT had regional conferences. I did not realise it had sufficient membership to be able to set up a series of regional conferences. I have to ask the National Party, under Bill English’s leadership, why Don Brash can, but Katherine Rich cannot, and Maurice Williamson is not allowed to say anything. Don Brash can go to one of those ACT regional conferences, which I did not even know existed, and I bet your bottom dollar that the Rt Hon Winston Peters did not even know they existed, either.

Simon Power: We didn’t know that this member existed.

MARTIN GALLAGHER: I would much rather be a backbencher from Hamilton West than the aspiring next deputy leader of the National Party faction of the Opposition. I would much rather be in this position, as a member of the Government, because there is no guarantee that that member will be even a deputy leader of the major Opposition party—which is what he aspires to. That is what is being played out in this House, day by day, and that is what is being played out around the country. We are seeing potentially a fundamental realigning of politics on the centre-right of the spectrum. Overnight we are seeing growing unease and panic on the National Party benches as those members face the facts.

The inheritors of the once-proud party of Sir Keith Jacka Holyoake are becoming the No. 2 centre-right party, and one can see the growing smugness and the growing smile on the lips of the Rt Hon Winston Peters—one can see it all the way. Of course he is not going to do a deal with the Nats. His “Three Tenors” appearance was somewhat temporary, extremely reserved, and extremely reluctant, because why on earth would he want to attach the bow of his party to the pack of losers that the National Party surely represents at this particular time?

Let us talk about Mr Brownlee and his somewhat wise words about the ACT party, but first I would like to know what Maurice Williamson has to say. I believe that Maurice Williamson has a great contribution to make to the politics of this country, but he has been silenced. The challenge to National Opposition members is: when will they allow Maurice Williamson to speak? How about a bit of free enterprise? They could let Maurice Williamson speak and his voice be heard in this debate. Gerry Brownlee is a bit worried that Ruth Richardson could be the future ACT contender in his seat of Ilam. This is the interesting thing: “If the people in the National Party think that we are going to increase the National vote by saying we are inextricably linked to ACT, then they have got their heads that far into the sand, all they can expect is their backsides to be kicked in the next election.”

Georgina Beyer: Who said that?

MARTIN GALLAGHER: Gerry Brownlee said that. Maurice Williamson, mind you—and I think this is a very good quote—said: “You know, there was little point in debating policies if National was never going to be in a position to implement them.” Do members remember him saying: “It is a bit rich to blame the assistant tea boy, while obviously the captain should carry the can.”? Let the tea boy come back on board; let the tea boy have his say! Why are they so scared of the tea boy? I would be more scared of ACT and Mr Hide. Quite frankly, I think Mr Brownlee has some words of wisdom for the National Party, because in his own way, Mr Brownlee is no fool. He can see the National Party—

Hon Trevor Mallard: I’m not convinced of that.

MARTIN GALLAGHER: I tell Mr Mallard that I will defend Mr Brownlee in this House, because I think he can see that this marriage, this courtship with ACT, is a one-way road to nowhere. What a demeaning thing that the once-proud party of Sir Keith Jacka Holyoake has to lower itself to go and search for the local telephone box in Christchurch, or wherever, to find an ACT party regional conference.

GERRY BROWNLEE (National—Ilam): That was a maiden speech from the member for Hamilton West, Mr Martin Gallagher. He could not come into the House to talk about the Supreme Court Bill; he could not come into the House and talk about the GE moratorium being lifted, and he could not come into the House and talk about the seabed and foreshore issues, because the Labour back bench is the most suppressed group of New Zealanders I have ever known. They are a group of New Zealanders put under a rock and not allowed to say anything, until the day they get the opportunity to come into the House and talk about the one thing they are scared of—the National Party.

Make no mistake about it—those people are making the sorts of decisions in Government that will see them slung out. We have in this country at the moment a Prime Minister who is the most deceptive person ever to occupy that high office. The most deceptive person to ever occupy the high office of Prime Minister is Helen Clark.

Jill Pettis: Oh, don’t tell tall tales!

GERRY BROWNLEE: They all start howling about how wrong that is, but most people cannot hear them, because they know it. The Prime Minister does not like the fact that the people of this country do not always believe her.

We have a media that, unfortunately, is often moved by the spin of the ninth floor, but to its credit, I am becoming increasingly aware that this is a Government that is not prepared to defend its own actions in the House. The largest constitutional change this country has seen in this decade—the removal of the right to appeal to the Privy Council—has been rushed through the House without any reference to the people, whatsoever. People will slowly start to wake up to that when they find that the judges who are appointed to the Supreme Court are the judges who have already heard their cases in the Court of Appeal, and will not want to overturn their own decisions, at all. If that is not a constriction of justice, goodness knows what is.

I want to make a couple of comments about the swagger that the Labour Party has on at the moment. Labour Party members are seen around the corridors, all thinking that they are about to get an LTD as there is a bit of a Cabinet reshuffle coming up shortly and their own circumstances are being regularly speculated about by their colleagues in the party. A number of them, such as Mr Gallagher, are making bids for ministerial seats. When a party gets a swagger on like that, it is only moments from a stagger. The one thing that will unseat this Government is the poverty it is inflicting upon New Zealanders day by day. Last week, I brought up in the House the issue of Statistics New Zealand stating that the average wage and salary earner in this country—most certainly including part-time work—earns only $337 per week.

Katherine Rich: Might as well be on the dole.

GERRY BROWNLEE: As my colleague Katherine Rich says, they might as well be on the dole. When people are feeling the pinch in their lives like that, with such low incomes and such little opportunity to aspire to things to which New Zealanders have always aspired—home ownership, for example, which is racing out of the reach of most low-income New Zealanders because of the Government’s poor stewardship of the country—they start to ask who cares about them. They will look at a Prime Minister who quite happily excuses her fraudulent activities around “paintergate”, who misleads the country over GE in “corngate”, who suppresses her Māori backbenchers and caucus from making the sorts of comments they want to make over the constitutional change relating to the Supreme Court. They will look at a Prime Minister who goes off to APEC this week to snuggle up to George Bush, in order to try to get a nice photograph, knowing full well that the President of the United States and his administration have no time for this Government, and have no intention of extending a free-trade agreement to New Zealand as long as it is in office.

People will work out that that means they will continue to have low incomes. They will continue to be made poor by this Government. Every week, New Zealanders are worse off than Australians by at least $250 per week.

RUSSELL FAIRBROTHER (Labour—Napier): That is the man who, on 25 November 2000, was quoted in the Christchurch Press as saying: “Jenny is in the view of the majority of caucus far better for that job [of National Party leader] than Bill is.” What was that article called? It was called “English boring—Nat MP”.

Gordon Copeland: I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. We are back on that faulty microphone again. Mr Fairbrother is completely garbled down this end of the House.

RUSSELL FAIRBROTHER: I thank Mr Copeland. Does the member want to hear that again? That is the man who said: “Jenny is in the view of the majority of caucus far better for that job than Bill is.”, and the article is called “English boring—Nat MP”. What has changed since? We see Gerry Brownlee yawning across the Chamber as his leader gets up and tries to expound. When the leader in the New Zealand Herald this morning states that National has been “internal navel-gazing”, I wonder whether Bill English is talking about the occupational hazard of Gerry Brownlee, whose navel-gazing must be something that he cannot avoid. I will tell members what that “internal navel-gazing” is. It is lack of—

Gerry Brownlee: I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. Would the member like a demo?

RUSSELL FAIRBROTHER: I see it every day. I would like the member to do his buttons up. Not only does he not have the belly for politics, he does not have the belly to sit in his own chair and listen to his own custard.

That is the party that 13 days ago, through the tractor driver Shane Ardern—with his tractor Myrtle, that great threat to biosecurity, which was not even clean before it polluted the grounds of Parliament—released a biosecurity strategy. It stated: “We will increase surveillance to ensure all containers that arrive in New Zealand each year are inspected.” I wonder where the National Party got that original thought from. It was not from Gerry Brownlee, or the judge who decided on his credibility. No, it got it from Labour’s policy. National recycled it, because Labour announced in August that it would implement the new Import Health Standard for sea containers, by which all sea containers are inspected. It looks as though National are a couple of months behind the eightball on that one.

What did the tractor driver say when he released National’s biosecurity policy 13 days ago? “We will increase fines”, he said. Labour increased fines for biosecurity offences in 2001, something the Nats were too scared to do when they were in Government. He went on about the inadequate funding of biosecurity. National funded biosecurity so poorly that the painted apple moth, the Argentine ant, and the varroa bee mite got in under National control, and we are spending a lot of money to keep them out. Fortunately, the New Zealand public is not fooled.

The headline in the New Zealand Herald today is “Big two lose ground”. I immediately thought of Gerry Brownlee and Simon Power, but I realised that the paper was not referring to Simon Power—it had mistaken Gerry Brownlee for two people. National is running at the same level it was when its leader skited after the election that he would provide decisive leadership to lead National out of the quagmire. His boots are still in the mud that Myrtle emerged from when she went up the steps of Parliament House. Labour’s rating has not even dipped as far as it was in the last election, yet National still descends—at the same rate as its leader—into the quagmire of Myrtle’s home ground.

What we have here is a party that has leadership and vision. We have a party that does not have time for internal navel-gazing, whatever that might be. We have a party that states what is good for the country, makes up its mind, and goes ahead with it. It is a party that states that this country is old enough to govern itself, and passes the Supreme Court Bill, which abolishes appeals to the Privy Council. It passes a bill so that we can have laws in this country that are made for people like Gerry Brownlee, and so that judges in Christchurch can apply the laws, knowing that our senior judges will interpret them correctly. I notice that no appeal happened in that case, either.

We have a country that states that genetic modification is the future of our agricultural products—if it is exercised cautiously. What did National do about that? Did it state that it had a different policy? No. Throughout that debate, yesterday and last week, National Party members said: “Me too.” They ridiculed the items in the schedules to the legislation and endorsed the policy, without offering an original solution, at all. No wonder biodiversity left Gerry Brownlee at birth.

Finally, I want to talk quite seriously about the parlous state of politics in this House. I came to the House 15 months ago, and I have spent them looking at a vacuum. Every day I am forced to look at the National Party across the Chamber, and it is absolutely pitiful.

JUDY TURNER (United Future): Today I want to talk about the fact that an individual’s place in society is hugely determined by his or her neurological functioning. Foetal alcohol syndrome, foetal alcohol effects, alcohol-related neuro-developmental disorders, static encephalopathy, and alcohol-exposed or alcohol-related birth defects are all names for a spectrum of disorders caused when a pregnant mother consumes alcohol. I would like to spend the 5 minutes I have in the general debate to raise members’ awareness of the immensity of this problem, and to suggest some interventions we need to consider in order to reduce the number of children born with alcohol-related symptoms, and to improve outcomes for those who suffer from an alcohol-related disorder.

At present it is estimated that an individual with an alcohol-related disorder will in his or her lifetime cost the taxpayer, at a conservative estimate, an additional $2 million. That money will be spent on his or her health problems, special-education needs, psychotherapy and counselling, welfare, and the use of corrections facilities. We can add to that the high cost to families of foetal alcohol syndrome children permanently dependent upon them, and the problems become even more urgent.

The symptoms are varied. Some individuals have a distinctive physical appearance and lower IQs, while others look normal but have permanent damage to internal organs, are unable to cope socially, and have learning difficulties. The biggest problem facing parents and caregivers is that most children can go undiagnosed for years. Families cope with children who have attention deficits, memory deficits, hyperactivity, difficulty in learning abstract concepts, low problem-solving skills, difficulty in learning from consequences, an absence of remorse for wrongs done, poor judgment, immature behaviour, and poor impulse control. Often these symptoms are put down to bad parenting. However, these children are not behaviour problems. They are the result of permanent, unchanging damage to the brain that can and should be diagnosed for the good of everyone involved.

Adults with foetal alcohol syndrome have difficulty in maintaining successful independence. They have trouble staying in school, keeping jobs, or sustaining healthy relationships. A report done in 1996 of more than 400 people with foetal alcohol syndrome, or foetal alcohol effects, reported that 94 percent had mental health problems, 80 percent were dependent for their daily needs, 80 percent had employment problems, 60 percent were diagnosed with attention deficit disorder, 60 percent were expelled from, or dropped out of, school, 60 percent were in trouble with the law, 50 percent had inappropriate sexual behaviours, and the list goes on and on.

Early diagnosis is extremely important. With early and intensive intervention a child can be helped immensely. Experts say that there is a small window of opportunity from birth to the age of 10 or 12. Those first 10 to 12 years cover a period when the greatest development of fixed neural pathways occurs. That is when alternative coping pathways are most easily built to compensate for the damaged areas of the brain. Identification or diagnosis is therefore imperative.

In New Zealand we need to set up a national registry so the Government can adequately plan for the associated problems from foetal alcohol syndrome. We need to train up diagnostic teams and learn from the wealth of overseas expertise in this area. The rates of foetal alcohol syndrome and foetal alcohol effects are estimated by the Ministry of Health to be considerably higher than the combined statistics of birth defects from Down’s syndrome, cerebral palsy and cystic fibrosis.

We need to take our parliamentary heads out of the sand and realise that foetal alcohol defects are not rare. We need to start targeting families with information about how preventable this problem is. Recent statistics tell us that last year 8,000 babies were born to teenage mothers. The Alcohol Advisory Council reports that 82 percent of teenage expectant mothers drink. The same report also highlights the fact that 36 percent of adult women drink during pregnancy. We need to do something.

MAHARA OKEROA (Labour—Te Tai Tonga): As a suppressed member of the Labour benches, I take this opportunity to share with the House some very illumining insights. I want to thank the honourable member Gerry Brownlee for the offer of a demonstration, but he can be assured that members on this side of the House will have to decline it on the basis of the observation that the honourable member’s navel is lost. It is lost in the unfathomable depths of over-indulgence.

We wait patiently on this side of the House for a kind of metamorphosis, because we were promised that the Leader of the Opposition would somehow change into a decisive, confident leader.

Simon Power: How suppressed is this member?

MAHARA OKEROA: No, I am not suppressed. But, we are waiting. The poll by Colmar Brunton Research Ltd for that member on the question of preferred Prime Minister goes like this, from the months of May to October: 7 percent, 7 percent, 6 percent, 9 percent, 7 percent, and 7 percent. Translated, that is 7, 7, 6, 9, 7, 7. If anyone wanted to put that into a spin, it would be called flat-lining; I call it a telephone number. Furthermore, National under Bill English has failed miserably—absolutely miserably—to capitalise on anything that has happened in this House in recent months. I consider that, politically, to be simply appalling. Let us take, as the honourable member mentioned, the Supreme Court Bill. That is a fact. It has passed; it is finished; it is there.

Gerry Brownlee: It’s a disgrace.

MAHARA OKEROA: No, it is not a disgrace. It shows us very, very clearly, without any cross-party political support, that that member would never be able to get traction even if he were a tractor—and I tell the member he is. I noted, as we went through the consultation hui on the foreshore and seabed, that we were graced in some way with the presence of several members of the National Party. But they really failed to get up and tell people exactly what they would have done if they were in power. They sat there and masqueraded in the sense—

Gerry Brownlee: I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. It may be the fault of the sound system, but I am afraid that in the way my ears heard those words, it was a most unparliamentary reference, and I would ask the member to withdraw and apologise.

MAHARA OKEROA: Masquerading is a perfectly acceptable term, I suggest to that member.

Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: I ask the member to continue, please.

MAHARA OKEROA: If I can concentrate for 5 minutes on one or two issues, I have to say that the foreshore and seabed issue was a magnificent chance for that party to try to get traction with the electorate. But it was a dismal failure. We are witnessing today a gradual diminishing of the vote—and it now sits at 21 percent. I therefore have to ask myself what has happened to the once-proud National Party and its whakapapa of political leadership. We have Holland. Someone else has referred to Holyoake. We have Marshall, Muldoon, Bolger—and Bill English. As advice to Bill English, all I can give is that common old phrase: “Beam me up, Scotty.”

Mark Peck, as an electorate MP in the bottom half of the South Island, has spent precious time addressing the issues of at least 143 people and families who wanted to visit and talk with Bill English. Mark Peck has given them that service, which, otherwise, would have been non-existent. I congratulate Mark Peck, because those people were unable to see their own MP, for whatever reason. Maybe the reason is that he does not have an office in Balclutha. I see that the honourable member Maurice Williamson has departed from the Chamber—unfortunately. I think his view is outstanding. He says—

Gerry Brownlee: I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. I have a couple of points. First, we try to be as indulgent as we can, in recognising that a back-bench Labour member does not get an opportunity to speak very often in this Parliament, but the issue of Mark Peck and industrial relations matters relating to his office should not be brought up in this House. Further, the reference to the absence of a member is also unparliamentary, and the member, even though he has not spoken often in his 4 years at Parliament, should know that rule. I suggest he does not bring up the industrial relations matter concerning Mark Peck’s office.

Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: Certainly, the absence of members cannot be referred to. The other matter is not a point of order.

MAHARA OKEROA: The honourable member Maurice Williamson made a very telling comment, which was: “I don’t believe that Bill is perceived by either the rest of the team or by the general public as leadership material. I don’t think Bill English has anywhere near the excitement, the charisma, the humour, the personality, the talent,” and so on. I think that is very telling. Not only is his party not even the natural party of Opposition any more, it is now obvious that he is not even the natural Leader of the Opposition. I have just one word of advice that I want to share with honourable members opposite.

Gerry Brownlee: This has been the longest 5 minutes of my life.

MAHARA OKEROA: I know that the honourable member’s life is not very long, but still! The dictionary is the only place where the word “success” comes before “work”.

SUE BRADFORD (Green): Next week on Sunday, 26 October, New Zealand officially observes something called Children’s Day. According to the Associate Minister for Social Development and Employment (CYF), Ruth Dyson, in a letter sent out to all of us today, Children’s Day is “an annual day set aside to celebrate our children”. I would like to challenge the Government to take some meaningful steps towards really celebrating our children, not just in words and colouring books, but also in dollars. The Green Party’s good polling this week—up 4.2 percent to 9.2 percent—comes not only on the back of our strong stand on GE but also as a result of our opposition to things like the proliferation of pokies in our communities, and our determination to end child poverty. Labour has dropped in the polls, and, again, I am sure it is not just on account of GE, but also because Labour is not meeting the expectations of the many people who voted for it, hoping that the rich-poor gap in this country would be closed, not widened.

The Room for Improvement: Current New Zealand Housing Policies and their Implication for our Children report, released last month by the Child Poverty Action Group, showed graphically that despite a growing economy and falling unemployment, poverty and overcrowded housing continue to increase. That report followed the revelation, only a few days earlier in the Christchurch Press, that large numbers of Christchurch children were being fed by their schools because they were suffering from malnutrition. The Budget this year was characterised once again by the absence of assistance for the children of New Zealand, despite earlier tentative promises from Labour that at least family support and family assistance would be restructured to provide more resources for families—sometime.

Mr Maharey has also been promising major reforms to the benefit system—sometime. The Budget offered nothing, again. How long do we have to accept this, while at the same time we seem to be able to afford to donate $34 million towards a rich man’s yacht race and to set up a $28 million Families Commission, replicating work that is, and could be, done elsewhere? Benefits have never returned to anything like the equivalent pre-1991 levels. The minimum wage remains at the miserable rate of $8.50 an hour, barely enough to support a single adult, much less a family. Income-related rents have been a tremendous boost to many families, but with the State housing waiting list topping 12,000 now, and with many still living in atrocious and/or unaffordable conditions, they provide only one part of the solution. Dr Cullen now presides over an “embarrassment of riches”, as the Sunday Star-Times put it this weekend. The forecast surplus has risen by a quarter to $5.6 billion in the year to June. While this money has been plunged into the Superannuation Fund, capital spending, and the repayment of debt, surely by next year’s Budget something can be left over for children and families.

I have a bill sitting on the Order Paper that legislates for a universal child benefit at the minimal rate of $15 a week for the first child, and $10 a week for second and subsequent children. If implemented, even at this pitifully low level, it would cost about $500 million or $600 million a year. I realise that Labour’s first reaction will likely be to veto my bill on the grounds of unaffordability. I call on Labour to have a serious think about what all our children deserve, and to think about not only reforming family support and family assistance, but also about providing a universal child benefit so that at least all primary caregivers will have a little more to spend on things like food, clothing, and school trips. The Government can afford it. It is simply a matter of priorities and of political will.

This morning our newly appointed Commissioner for Children, Cindy Kiro, gave a moving speech at a Littlies Lobby function here at Parliament. Ms Kiro said, among other things: “Why should we accept that children grow up in poverty in this country? I simply do not accept this premise. Every household in this country raising children and young people should have the support of our society to raise them.” I congratulate our new commissioner on her clear-eyed courage in laying down this challenge. I just hope that our Labour Government will listen to her.

GEORGINA BEYER (Labour—Wairarapa): It is tragic, really. It is tragic to watch the demise of a once-proud National Party—deluded, dejected, and all but defunct. It is lacking in leadership and searching in vain. Let me ask whether this scuttlebutt is true: which Auckland-based National Party MP will possibly be usurped and challenged in his or her seat by the current Mayor of Auckland, former National Party Minister John Banks? God help us if John Banks ever finds his way back into that party! It is my understanding that there are members of the National Party in the Auckland area who believe that his re-election might be the panacea to solving the Bill English lack-of-leadership issue. I suggest that if John Banks is not the answer, then perhaps National members might like to look again at the women within their caucus—to improve and upgrade women’s visibility and priority within the benches across the way, and to promote another woman and take us back to the days of Jenny Shipley. Those members are probably wishing they could go back to those halcyon days when they were once strong and proud.

What is it about Bill English’s leadership that prompts such thought or scuttlebutt—that there may be others who were once proud and had done well, like Mayor Banks of Auckland? Perhaps they should make some contribution. For those male members of the National Party who cannot fathom elevating one of their own women’s caucus members to a higher place in the leadership stakes, I tell them that I can offer Mr English the name of a surgeon who might be able to assist him to cross over in some way. I am sure that that assistance will be warmly welcomed, should it be the way he wishes to go.

This really is about the National Party’s policies—or lack of them. We can see how National Party members have cast their minds back to the halcyon days under their regime of the 1990s. Yes, policies from those days are the policies they regurgitate again and again. They are useless policies, simply because National has no idea what is going on—for example, in education. National has resorted to resurrecting old, failed ideas such as the reintroduction of national testing, removal of enrolment zones, privatisation of the education system, and beneficiary bashing to target truancy. Those ideas are from a National Party with no new ideas.

If National wants to make improvements it has to think forward and have vision. It has taken decades for the National Party to come up with those so-called new ideas so it is no wonder it continues to fail at the polls. All the policy ideas proposed for education are nothing more than tired old slogans from the policy failures of National’s last term in office. They have rightly been described as “crude and rather predictable conservative slogans”. The thin and lightweight document is very clearly tired, and devoid of fact or new ideas—zoning and privatisation? What an embarrassment!

The Labour-led Government is building a world-class education system whereby we will ensure opportunity for all, not just for the privileged few. Unlike National, Labour has moved on, replaced the failed policies of the 1990s, and rebuilt the education system in order to improve outcomes for all students. There was a lot to do. The legacy of the National Government did a huge amount of damage to our public education system. Our priority in Government is to build an education system that equips New Zealanders with 21st century skills—not something from back in the 1840s or thereabouts—and reduces underachievement.

We have invested in literacy, for example. In our first Budget an extra $24 million was injected into that area alone, and in the last Budget another $15 million. That is progress coming from this Government. We have invested in quality teachers. We have put 550 more teachers in schools, and $2.65 million in funding will be provided over 4 years to set up a working group of experts to develop a framework for best teaching practice. That is a lot more than that lousy, useless National Party across the way ever offered. National can only hark back to its failed policies of the 1990s; Labour invests.

SIMON POWER (National—Rangitikei): That was a fine outburst from one of the suppressed back-bench members of the Labour Party, who, along with Mahara Okeroa, finally got her say. They were finally allowed to talk in the House after being told to sit back there, keep quiet, swallow the dead rats, and vote for the Supreme Court Bill. They were told: “Don’t represent your people; just come to the Parliament and do as you are told.” I say to Georgina Beyer that she should not have vented her anger on us; she should have directed it at those Ministers on the front two rows of the Government benches.

I want to refer the House today to a fine and accurate piece of journalism. I refer to the local Victoria University magazine, Salient, where Michael Appleton, the editor of that magazine, recently completed an interview with the Prime Minister, Helen Clark. Let me tell members of this House that that was a stunning piece—a great piece—of journalism. I will read the concluding paragraph: “Clark is running out of friends. The media are more suspicious of her. She is burning bridges with the Greens, and United Future will be more at home on social issues with National than Labour.”—well, maybe not—“Interest groups are tired of being patronised by a Prime Minister who lashes out at anyone who criticises her.” That is precisely the theme that the New Zealand public—

Jill Pettis: You weren’t born when Muldoon was alive—obviously!

SIMON POWER: I tell the member that I was born when Muldoon was alive. What a very strange woman! Thank goodness we do not have to deal with her on our side of the House.

I have to say that that piece of journalism did extremely well. Helen Clark is quoted in the piece as saying: “I speak a lot about tolerance. We battle away at trying to promote attitudes that are tolerant, inclusive, and understanding.” But the editor himself disagrees with Miss Clark’s description of herself, and he goes on to say: “For all she talks about tolerance, it is quite clear she is a very intolerant person. She is very intolerant of people who have different political views from her. She is intolerant of Ministers whom she perceives as incompetent, and she is intolerant of journalists who criticise her.”

Do members remember when she accused the Greens at the last election of “descending to the gutter of the National Party.”? I thought that was a bit harsh on us, actually; it was not so harsh on the Greens. Do members remember when she described John Campbell as that “little creep” and as despicable and unethical? Do members remember when she labelled Wyatt Creech, one of the finest people ever to come to this House, as “a scumbag” and “a sleazeball”? Those comments were made by this tolerant Prime Minister, who says she promotes tolerance and understanding in her own party.

She is unwilling to debate with anybody on issues that matter. The Privy Council legislation was rammed through. It was major constitutional legislation change and it was pushed straight through this House. She was not interested in talking to farmers about the flatulence tax. She was not interested in listening to the backbone of New Zealand.

She is not alone in having odd views at the moment. The rumour circulating around Wellington is that Annette King is off. She has bought a house in Hawke’s Bay, and she is waiting for the current Speaker to head off to London so she can get that job and retire in the Speaker’s Chair before the end of this Parliament. I say to Annette King that she should come down to this House and tell us she is not retiring to Hawke’s Bay or waiting to be Speaker of the House. She has obviously been given the nod to be the next Speaker.

We want to know what will happen to poor members like Clayton Cosgrove. What will happen to Clayton Cosgrove? He is one of the suppressed back-benchers. He has been banished to the back benches by that fellow from Hamilton, who—well, no one seems to know exactly what that member does.

David Parker will be the former member for Otago at the next election—I can tell members now that that seat has gone. That seat at the next election will be held by National. That member’s minutes are ticking away.

Phil Goff, the man who single-handedly wrecked our relationship with Australia and the United States—who comes down here, vein-popping and screaming about what is going on, on this side of the House—is withering on the vine. There are no more barbeques, I say to Mr Goff—no more chances for the leadership—but just a sad, sad withering on the vine.

What will Helen Clark’s legacy be? How will Helen Clark be remembered by history? She likes to model herself on Keith Holyoake, who was a great National Party leader. Helen Clark may model herself on Keith Holyoake. Helen Clark might even think she can be like Keith Holyoake, but, in the words of vice presidential candidate Lloyd Bentsen, Helen Clark is no Keith Holyoake.

Hon MATT ROBSON (Deputy Leader—Progressive): Today is a members’ day, which reminds me that the last members’ day, 17 September, was a black day in this House. It was the day that the United Future party filibustered on the Smoke-free Environments Amendment Bill brought in by Steve Chadwick. The performance of Mr Dunne was an attempt to take up as much time as possible in order to stop the inevitable from happening. The inevitable that I am talking about is, of course, the fact that an overwhelming majority in this Parliament supports the health and safety measures contained in the bill. The overwhelming majority in this House is anxious to protect the often not-well-paid workers in the hospitality industry from the cancer-causing fumes directed at them in their workplace.

There is nothing unusual about the bill. Major cities and advanced nations around the world are well ahead of New Zealand in this field. Although it is, of course, fair enough that United Future opposes legislation it if wishes, it is a conservative party led by a man who was elected as a Labour MP, only to end up in Jim Bolger’s National - United Cabinet. It is a party whose members have made it overwhelmingly clear over the past 2 months that they would choose a National-ACT—possibly joined by New Zealand First—Government over our Labour-Progressive coalition after the 2005 election, if they ever had the power to choose. The filibustering started in August when we saw United Future working with its old ally National on the smoke-free environments legislation, which will protect workers—workers who belong to families but get no help in this House from the party branding itself as pro-family; workers who would benefit from 4 weeks’ annual leave so that they can afford to remain in the productive workforce while also having families; workers whom the pro-family party seemingly could not give a toss about.

Back in 1992 Mr Dunne told the New Zealand Herald that he wanted all members of Parliament to sign a code of conduct pledge aimed at restoring public respect for the institution of Parliament. But the reputation of Parliament not only has been damaged by filibustering, it has also been damaged by those who supported the ruthless programme of selling assets to any old foreign bidder, in the administrations of the 1980s and 1990s. Mr Dunne participated in the two administrations that did that. He participated in both sides, along with the ACT party leaders. He was part of an administration that sold public assets and ruthlessly broke firm electoral pledges, such as that on the superannuation surtax.

Parliament’s reputation would be enhanced if United Future and New Zealand First would tell the public whether they will support our coalition Government or a Don Brash – Richard Prebble coalition. United Future will not enhance public confidence in Parliament by filibustering and signing meaningless pledges about codes of conduct, but Parliament’s reputation would be enhanced if United Future and New Zealand First would tell us about their post-election intentions, before people vote. United Future does not in fact have the courtesy to tell voters whether it will support the Labour-Progressive coalition or a National-ACT alternative after the 2005 election. To divert attention from this issue, its leader has mused aloud about one day being Prime Minister himself, but the only real contest at the next election is that between our side and the looming Brash-Prebble—and possibly Peters—coalition.

The Progressive party leader, Jim Anderton, the chairperson of the ministerial committee tackling drug and alcohol abuse, will hold a public debate on Tuesday next week with the Green Party’s pro - cannabis legislation campaigner, Mr Nandor Tanczos. That is one of the real debates—the question of drug abuse, particularly amongst our young people. The Progressive party and the Greens are the two parties that will be campaigning openly at the next election to join with Labour in a coalition. The Progressives’ opposition to a liberal, easy-going, and “me first” drugs policy stance is not based on some abstract morality principle. It is a practical concern about the effects on young people of their abusing alcohol, P, cannabis, and tobacco, because young people are the most vulnerable in our society and need guidance, firmness, and leadership from their Parliament. Teenagers in Kaikohe or Gisborne, who deserve the respect of parliamentarians, need to be told firmly what they may not want to hear: “If you smoke dope, if you abuse alcohol, then what you’ll find when you are 20, and ready for a job or training, is that employers may not want you, because you haven’t got the right work habits, life skills, and attitudes.”

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First): The sorry record of the Minister of Immigration should be of serious concern to every woman in this country. Every bogus asylum-seeker, fake refugee, and overstayer in this country hides behind the skirts of Lianne Dalziel, and, to her great shame, she makes those people welcome. That Minister laughed in Parliament yesterday about a fake refugee called Mohammed Saidi who has preyed on not one but four New Zealand women since he came here. When one of those women approached the Minister for help, that woman was not helped in any way by this so-called champion of New Zealand women’s rights.

After the Minister laughed about the Saidi case yesterday, we approached one of the victims and asked her how Lianne Dalziel had helped her and how she felt about the Minister’s performance. She wrote back: “Dear Mr Peters, This is how we felt by the treatment of the Minister of Immigration: 1. Like the criminal, not the victim. 2. Frustrated by the lack of action and the lengthy gaps between my correspondence and hers. 3. Fobbed off with non-sensical replies. 4. Disillusioned at lack of justice. 5. Anger and disbelief at the rights given to Saidi. 6. Felt that Dalziel showed no genuine concern, and tried to play down the whole situation in case it became too controversial.” She states: “Questions I have for Dalziel: 1. Why wasn’t Saidi treated like Zaui when their situations are identical? 2. What happened to ‘the further investigations being undertaken’ on Saidi? (letter from Dalziel 2nd Dec. 2002).” Lastly, she states: “Latest on Saidi: He is now living with another ‘victim’ (no. 4) and he has not had any contact with his son, Jamal for seven months. Thank you and good luck,”.

Lianne Dalziel does not care about the women of this country. She cares more about HIV refugees who infect New Zealand women with AIDS. Every crook, fake refugee, and bogus asylum-seeker in the world can come here, because those people know that the Minister will hide them behind her skirts. The question I want to ask is how on earth did she become a Minister. Her performance is disgraceful. What did the women of New Zealand do to deserve a Minister who will not protect our borders from sexual predators from the Third World? What must this Government, which claims to be the champion of women’s causes, think of her and her woeful, inadequate response to women who seek her help and protection from her regular and injudicious use of her approval stamp? Does she ever give a thought to the horrors visited upon innocent New Zealand women, when she accepts every application from every piece of international flotsam and jetsam she lets into this country?

Why does the Prime Minister shield her from the scrutiny of those who expose her callous disregard for the health and well-being of New Zealand women? It is outrageous that anyone who tries to expose her for having failed so spectacularly is attacked as being racist, unfair, anti-immigrant, or an Asian basher. I have never seen such an incompetent performance. But, more important, literally hundreds and hundreds of women in this country have been abused in this way. I have given just one circumstance, and have read from a letter of evidence from a woman who went to Lianne Dalziel and was totally fobbed off, totally ignored. Yet here we are, years on, and still no investigation has been done properly. Mohammed Saidi is still here, and has been granted permanent residence by Lianne Dalziel. He is on to his fourth woman victim. What sort of country is this, when that sort of thing can happen in our society? It is a disgrace.

The Minister of Immigration should be downright ashamed of herself. She should be ashamed of herself, and the Prime Minister should call her to account or otherwise admit that they are aiding and abetting this victimisation of New Zealand citizens. Lianne Dalziel—

Craig McNair: Should resign.

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: Resign? That is too good for her. She should be paying a penalty back to those poor women, who are now looking after all sorts of kids, all and sundry—

Hon John Tamihere: Why is only one New Zealand First member in the House?

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: There you are! John Tamihere agrees with her behaviour, but that is no surprise. He thinks the whole thing is a joke. He thinks it is a laughing matter. He thinks it is a comedy. New Zealand First does not, and when we are back, within 2 years, in Government over there, we are going to stop this sort of thing.

The debate having concluded, the motion lapsed.

Privilege

Consideration of Report of Privileges Committee—Draft Report of Māori Affairs Committee

Hon MATT ROBSON (Chairperson of the Privileges Committee): I move, That the House take note of the report of the Privileges Committee on a question of privilege relating to an article published in the Sunday Star-Times purporting to summarise the contents of a draft report of the Māori Affairs Committee on its inquiry into the Crown Forestry Rental Trust.

Mr Speaker, the Privileges Committee has met on this issue, which was referred to the committee by you. I give an apology to the House for the delay. The committee was dealing with the other matter that was before us—on the question of citizenship. No tardiness was meant but, unfortunately, we were not as quick to rule on this issue, or to bring down recommendations, as we would have liked.

There are four key recommendations that we have put to the House. One is that the House take no further action on this question of privilege. That is not because there are not serious issues, but in terms of the evidence before the committee, in terms of what we were able to find, based on what was before us, we are not of the mind that we are able to take actual action against any particular individuals on the issue. But we have recommendations, because out of this hearing came some important issues.

The second recommendation is to you, Mr Speaker, and it states that we have asked the Speaker to “refer the issues raised in this report to the chairperson of the Press Gallery to deal with in accordance with the rules of the Gallery and to ensure that members of the Press Gallery are fully aware of the House’s confidentiality rules in respect of select committee reports.”

Thirdly, our recommendation is that select committees “clearly separate their procedures for obtaining responses to allegations made in evidence, under Standing Order 223, and the procedures for obtaining responses to adverse findings, under Standing Order 242.” The two separations there are these. One is where, in the course of deliberation on a particular matter by a select committee, there are matters that the committee wishes to put to an individual or an entity, because they have adverse statements with regard to that individual or entity—that is one step. The second step is the question, once a report is in draft, of a need to have comment from individuals or entities that are named in that report—that is a separate step to be taken. In this issue, there was a mixing up of issues of adverse allegations with regard to one particular individual—Sir Graham Latimer, the chair of the Crown Forestry Rental Trust—and the draft report itself.

Finally, our recommendation is that where the select committee seeks submissions on adverse findings under Standing Order 242, the confidential nature of those findings be made absolutely clear to anybody making such submissions—that is, of course, confidential until the report is delivered to this House.

The background to this question was that the Māori Affairs Committee, in the last Parliament and in this Parliament, was conducting an inquiry into the Crown Forestry Rental Trust. Subsequently, on 8 June 2003, in the Sunday Star-Times, a report was published, written by a journalist for that paper, Mr Jonathan Milne, which stated, first: “The report is understood to describe his fees—for just over 200 days’ work—as ‘grossly excessive’.”, then, later in the article: “The report will recommend the government abandon its policy of big, comprehensive Maori settlements, instead speedily returning forests to local Maori without waiting for wider grievances to be considered.” The wording of that article led the select committee to believe that a copy of the draft report was with that particular journalist.

When the Privileges Committee was seized of this matter, it saw that, first of all, two issues existed. One was the question of finding out from individuals whether they had any comments to make on adverse allegations. The second was the question of whether, in a draft report, there were any issues that should be commented on by any particular individual. I have already stated in the previous part of my speech that those are two issues that we have recommended should be separated out. Unfortunately, in this case they were not.

The Māori Affairs Committee, when it wrote to Sir Graham Latimer, did not state clearly to him that the matter was confidential. We accept that Sir Graham Latimer is an experienced person in public life. Nevertheless, we believe that a select committee should make it very clear, so there is no room for doubt, to any individuals or entities it writes to what they are allowed to do with the particular document that is sent to them. In this case, that was not done, and that was very important in terms of the findings of the committee. That is a criticism from the Privileges Committee of how the Māori Affairs Committee dealt with the matter. However, we are aware that all of us are able to sit on select committees, so we wish this finding to be a generic statement, and, in terms of the recommendations, we have written to all the select committees, pointing that out to them. We hope that is a positive outcome from this particular issue, and that greater care can then be taken in the future.

The committee heard from three people, two in person and one by letter. By letter we heard from Sir Graham Latimer. There were reasons why Sir Graham could not appear before the committee, and we accepted that. We heard in person from the Chief Executive of the Crown Rental Forestry Trust, Ms Karen Waterreus, and also from the journalist of whom the allegation of a breach of confidentiality was alleged, Mr Jonathan Milne.

Sir Graham Latimer wrote to us: “The Chief Executive informed me the reporter had explained they had advance copy of the Committee’s report. On that basis I agreed to be interviewed to discuss my views on the Maori Affairs Select Committee inquiry … I was interviewed via telephone … [for] approximately one-half hour.”

When Ms Waterreus, the chief executive, gave evidence, she stated that she was not quite sure what Mr Milne had said to her, and Mr Milne, in evidence, said he did not tell them he had a copy of the draft report. So we had two witnesses who were saying that, and Sir Graham Latimer was in the situation, if one likes, of his evidence being hearsay, in any case, through Ms Waterreus. So the evidence before us was that we did not have evidence that the draft report was in the hands of the journalist.

But we do not accept Mr Milne’s argument that the matters were in the public domain; they were, clearly, within the confidence of the committee. Therefore, we have recommended that the press gallery, through yourself, Mr Speaker, consider the effect of rule 23 of the press gallery rules: “No member of the Press Gallery shall—(a) infringe any of the Standing Orders of the House of Representatives”.

The four recommendations I put to members at the beginning of my speech are the four recommendations we are asking the House to accept.

JOHN CARTER (National—Northland): The National Party supports the recommendations of the Privileges Committee. We have taken a keen interest in this matter, because there are a number of obvious issues. The chairman gave a very good summary of the things we found were important to the Māori Affairs Committeee and to this House. Indeed, I think it is important to re-emphasise three or four matters, in terms of the points made by the chairman in his presentation. The recommendations are worth noting, and we should make sure they are put into Hansard.

We recommend that the Speaker refer the issues raised in this report to the chairperson of the press gallery to deal with in accordance with the rules of the gallery, and to ensure that members of the press gallery are fully aware of the House’s confidentiality rules in respect of select committee reports. That is very important. Obviously, there are a number of reasons why we would want members of the press gallery, firstly, to be aware of them, and, secondly, to respect them. When select committees are dealing with issues there are times when members of the public, in particular, bring before committees matters that are confidential to them, and it would be most unfortunate if the press gallery did not respect that confidentiality.

We recommend that the Māori Affairs Committee clearly separate its procedure for obtaining responses to allegations made in evidence under Standing Order 223 and its procedures for obtaining responses to adverse findings under Standing Order 242. Again, I think it is timely to remind all select committee members, and particularly the chairpersons, of their responsibilities. Often, new members on select committees may not be aware of their obligations in that regard. I do not think we need to point the finger at the Māori Affairs Committee in particular; it just so happened that on this occasion this event occurred in respect of that committee. However, any other select committee could have been affected, and there have been occasions when they have been. It is worth reminding members that they, too, have a role to play in this. A loose lip can often give members of the fourth estate the opportunity to put together a story that should not be available to them. We also recommend that where select committees seek submissions on adverse findings under Standing Order 242, the confidential nature of the findings be made absolutely clear to those making submissions. Again, in this case, we could have been far more explicit in that regard.

I think that the chairperson, Matt Robson, has already set out how he got into the inquiry—why the event occurred—and I do not intend to repeat that. But I think there are a couple of important matters that those on the Privileges Committee may want to consider a little further. In hindsight, in the hearing of evidence, it may well have been better if we had asked Sir Graham Latimer to come before us personally. He was unable to attend at the time, for a number of reasons. He did give us some information, but it may well have been far better for him, and useful to us, if he had come to the committee and been involved in the discussion. He made some comments on how he saw the situation, and that was useful to us, although, again, his comments did not set out clearly where the issue was founded.

I want to turn my attention to the one thing I think the committee was unable to find: evidence of the leak. There are two points of view on whether the journalist—Jonathan Milne, in this case—actually had the document, or whether he was being a very clever journalist. I think there is evidence to suggest it was maybe the latter, rather than the former. Something we all need to be aware of is that those people have the skills to pick up one or two comments from one or two people, and to put together a story. Here it was a case of a journalist asking a question of Sir Graham Latimer, and getting a line or two that then added to the view the journalist had. Suddenly, a story emerged that ended up, probably, being reasonably accurate, maybe to the extent that one could come to the conclusion that a leak had occurred—that a document had been given to a journalist when, maybe, it had not, at all.

The important thing that we as members of Parliament, in particular, should understand is that in respect of select committees, where there are confidential issues we must be very careful in any discussions we have with anybody to make it very clear that we will not discuss those matters outside the committee with other members of Parliament. Certainly, we should not talk to members of the press, whether or not they are members of the press gallery, because to do so would give them the opportunity to write stories about things that, at that stage, they should not be involved in or know about.

I tend to think that in this case the situation may well have been as I have suggested; we will probably never know. In the questions that we put to the said member of the press gallery, he was not able to confirm that he had the document. I think he did not want to confirm that he did not have the document because if he confirmed that, then of course that would perhaps affect his status. So he was sort of caught either way—one way or another. The fact was that we were not very clear on that point. The journalist concerned is the only one who will ever know whether he had the document, and we will probably never get to know that—although who knows, one night at a press gallery party we might find these things out, later on. One never knows.

The important point for us to take on board is that all of us have a responsibility with regard to such issues. The issue is that members of the public expect us to look after and protect them when they come before us to make submissions. Therefore, as responsible members of this House, we have to make sure that they know they can go away with confidence that their information will not in some way or another be misused or used in a way that they would not want to have happen. In this case there is a whole set of circumstances, which the report covers. I commend the chairman and those who have written the report. It is a very good report for us to consider. There are some lessons to be learnt from it, and as we go through this debate I hope that the House, particularly the select committees, and, indeed, the members of the press gallery, take those lessons on board, so that we can carry on doing the job that the public expects us to do.

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First): Standing Order 242 requires committees to inform any person of adverse findings and to give him or her the opportunity to make submissions. There is a booklet entitled Natural Justice Before Select Committees—a Clerk’s booklet—that makes it clear that draft reports are confidential, and that was sent to Sir Graham Latimer.

If members look at the Sunday Star-Times article, they will see that the article clearly points the reader in certain directions if one is inquiring as to the source of that article. Sir Graham Latimer was about to be severely criticised by the Māori Affairs Committee in respect of his and his colleagues’ handling of funds dedicated to Māori research in respect of forestry, in Sir Graham’s capacity as chairman of the Crown Forestry Rental Trust. If members read the article they will see, firstly, that it is pure damage control on the part of Sir Graham Latimer and, secondly, that it is intended to put the best possible spin on adverse facts that are about to become public. We have to ask ourselves who would be the possible source of the leak. For my money, I would say that it is the person who is painted in a far better light than he is entitled to be. If members look at page 5 of the Privileges Committee’s report, they will see that Sir Graham Latimer was interviewed via telephone and, from memory, he took approximately one half-hour—that is, 30 minutes. He was called by the Sunday Star-Times and told that there were certain matters that needed to be discussed, and he took a full 30 minutes for that.

I cannot disclose the report on the use of funding for Māori research in respect of forestry, because the Māori Affairs Committee is yet to report. I cannot disclose that, and it concerns me that the Minister of Finance, notwithstanding that, has acted on one of the recommendations in the report, which is yet to be tabled in this House.

I ask this question: can someone who has been the chairman of the New Zealand Māori Council since the early 1970s be ignorant of the requirements in respect of parliamentary procedure? I do not think so. How could a person be there as long as that, attend so many parliamentary select committees, and not know what the requirements are, particularly since the head of the organisation in question, the woman Karen Waterreus, chief executive of the Crown Forestry Rental Trust, stated on oath that she knew about the Natural Justice Before Select Committees booklet. However, on oath she could not recall exactly what Jonathan Milne had said to her. She could not state categorically whether Jonathan Milne had told her that he had a copy of the draft report. She told us that he conveyed sufficient information for her to think that he had a copy.

It is not too hard to speculate as to whence the copy of the report came from. I would put my money on it that the copy came from the person who is seeking to put the best possible spin on adverse facts in respect of his job as head of the Crown Forestry Rental Trust. This is a chairman, of course, who was being paid over $104,000 a year—$104,000 a year to head that trust. What he did to deserve that sort of money I do not know, but it has now been properly reduced down to $25,000. That payment of $104,000 a year is just one more example of how certain people have, in my view, abused Māoridom over the last few decades, and of how they have crushed any rise in young Māori leadership and done their best to conspire with both Labour and National over many years to pervert the development of Māoridom.

This issue relates to a Crown Forestry Rental Trust that has an income of $21 million a year, of which only $2.5 million goes to the Māori beneficiaries in whose name the money is claimed. All the rest has gone into a pyramid that has been built up and dominated by Sir Graham, and in an authoritarian way it has even demanded that all research be done by the people whom the trustees have built up. That is what they have done—that is, they have not let the Māori claimants get the money to do the research; they themselves do the research. Members should read the information that was released last year by myself during the pre-election campaign as to just how bad that is. I ask journalists, before they rush off to defend Sir Graham Latimer, why they do not defend the Māori beneficiary who is being ripped off here to the tune of $16 million a year. That is an abject disgrace.

Whilst we could not find evidence as to the leak in this case, I honestly think that the only possible place for the leak to emanate from is the person who had every reason to put the best possible spin on adverse information that is soon to be released.

Hon RICHARD PREBBLE (Leader—ACT): We are debating a report of the Privileges Committee. It is a report of a question that Mr Speaker referred to the Privileges Committee in respect of an article published in the Sunday Star-Times that purported to summarise the contents of a draft report of the Māori Affairs Committee on its inquiry into the Crown Forestry Rental Trust. The reason that a question of privilege arises is because under Standing Order 397(m) it is a contempt to divulge the proceedings of a report of a select committee contrary to the Standing Orders, and it is contempt to divulge it prior to its being reported to this House. The Privileges Committee has raised before as to whether it is a ruling we should sustain, but in this particular case it is a very bad breach.

The reason is that—and this is a reform that has occurred since I first arrived in Parliament—it has now been recognised that if a select committee is going to make an adverse report about an individual and say something about that person that is damaging to his or her reputation, then the concept of natural justice or basic fairness means that those points should be put to that person so that he or she can respond or maybe point out that it is an error, but at least respond back to the committee before it makes an adverse report.

In this case the committee had made some adverse findings, as the right honourable gentleman who preceded me stated, that Sir Graham Latimer’s fees for just over 200 days work were “grossly excessive”. That had been sent to Sir Graham. That is what was reported by the Sunday Star-Times. It actually reported matters that the committee had not reached a final conclusion on. From Sir Graham’s point of view he was deprived of the fairness procedures that this House wants, and he was deprived by a newspaper breaking our Standing Orders.

The next question we had in the committee was that the newspaper’s attitude to the Standing Orders Committee, I think, left a great deal to be desired. We had Mr Milne in front of us, and to say that he was not frank would be a reasonable way of describing his attitude. The fact that he had deprived Sir Graham Latimer of his fair trial did not concern him at all.

I, however, reached a number of interesting conclusions, and somewhat different from Mr Peters. I asked Mr Milne whether he had a copy of the report. If one looks at the comments, it is only a small part of the report that was published. It is pretty obvious what actually happened. It is pretty clear what Mr Milne, who is a young reporter of some enterprise—some cynicism, but some enterprise—did. He knew this was under way. The fact that Sir Graham Latimer’s fees were being looked at—how can I put it—had become common knowledge, so that did not make it very difficult to ring up the Crown Forestry Rental Trust and imply, and there is some debate about whether he did say he had the report, that he had the report. Mr Milne certainly left the impression with the trust and Sir Graham that the Sunday Star-Times had the report and it was going to print it unless he responded, and then he would not have his side of the story. That led Sir Graham to then send what information he had to the Sunday Star-Times, which of course then enabled it to print that part. Now that is, of course, a breach of the rules by Sir Graham.

Well, the committee decided that Sir Graham had actually punished himself far more than we could ever do. Because his expenditure, I have to say, does seem somewhat excessive. That is a very polite way of putting it, but I am not trying to put him on trial. His expenditure was all over the front page of the Sunday Star-Times, and that was a degree of publicity that he brought on himself. I do not think there is any requirement by the Privileges Committee or this House to put any further penalty on Sir Graham. I think he will be very, very careful about giving out a confidential parliamentary document again.

The next question is: what about Mr Milne? Well, it is an interesting question. Is it actually a breach of privilege to say that one has a draft committee document when one has not? I doubt it. It might be, but I doubt it. It is more of a problem that he has. The committee has not reached a conclusion about that, but I reached the conclusion that he never had the document. Then it is a question of journalistic ethics: whether it is a good idea to ring up people and say one has documents when one has not. Well, that is a question of what goes around comes around. The question of credibility is not just on MPs, it is also on newspapers and the like.

I do say this to Mr Milne. He has the potential, I think, to be a very good reporter. But he ought to think about those sorts of things. He should also think about the cynicism that he displayed towards the parliamentary process. I think he is one of those young reporters who think that good reporters are just cynical. Well, in my opinion, that is not so. Those are second-rate reporters. Really good reporters become enthusiastic. They look at the subject, and of course they are sceptical about information they are given. But they do not go around, just prior to the release of a report, being negative. They try to report the full story.

Mr Milne’s reporting would be a great deal better if he were to take a more rounded approach. But should we take a tougher stand towards someone who is now occupying quite a senior position—but still quite a young man? No, I do not think we should. Would we again be as lenient to Mr Milne? No, we would not. There are people who think that the Privileges Committee will not do anything. I have had a few of them in front of me over the years. That is a mistake as well. There are a lot of things we could do.

But I do say this again. For a newspaper to take away a person’s right to be able to correct a record, to actually violate fairness—even if we think all the things that Mr Peters thinks about Mr Latimer, and even if Mr Peters is right in what he thinks about Mr Latimer, which I suspect he might be—even the Graham Latimers of this world are entitled to a fair hearing. In that sense, that did not reflect well on the Sunday Star-Times, but I do not believe we should take any further action. The report itself, as they say, speaks for itself.

Debate interrupted.

Tabling of Documents

Mohammed Saidi

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First): I seek leave to table documentation supporting my speech during the general debate today

Documents, by leave, laid on the Table of the House.

Debate resumed.

Privilege

Consideration of Report of Privileges Committee—Draft Report of Māori Affairs Committee

METIRIA TUREI (Green): The Greens support the recommendations of the Privileges Committee in its report on an article in the Sunday Star-Times concerning a select committee inquiry into the Crown Forestry Rental Trust. Those recommendations are not particularly punitive. But none the less they give the select committees, members of Parliament, and the press gallery a timely reminder of the confidentiality of select committee draft reports. The Privileges Committee concludes that the Sunday Star-Times did breach the confidentiality rules of the House. As often happens in these matters, the source of the contents of the draft report apparently leaked could not be identified and therefore there was little punitive action that the committee could take against the reporter, the newspaper, or any of those identified in the newspaper story. This illustrates the point that the integrity of the select committee process is highly dependent on the integrity of those involved in it, and that this necessarily includes the media, and particularly the press gallery, which are instrumental in the exposure of our democratic processes.

The Privileges Committee did also look carefully at the information provided to Sir Graham Latimer and considered that the Māori Affairs Committee may have not been sufficiently clear that the information sent to him was strictly confidential. This has highlighted the need for select committees to be very clear about their own procedures in communicating with submitters and members of the public. In defence of the Māori Affairs Committee it must be said that both Sir Graham and Jonathan Milne, the reporter, are both experienced in the select committee process and know better than most how to best clarify any uncertainty they might have had over the confidentiality issues. Their choice not to take the utmost care reflects very badly on the integrity of both.

The Greens also support the comment of the Privileges Committee that members should be able to more openly discuss matters concerning select committee proceedings so that there is a better understanding of the vigour and variety of work done in select committee. There are many requests and letters and much information sent to select committees concerning important issues that cannot be publicly known or acknowledged unless taken up as an inquiry. This restricts the public’s knowledge of the breadth of issues select committees deal with. However, that said, the Greens agree with the Privileges Committee and will also draw a very clear, definite line at the release of draft reports before they are reported back to the House. So finally, the Greens commend this report to the House.

Hon PETER DUNNE (Leader—United Future): I want to look at this report from a couple of angles—firstly, from the perspective of what actually happened in terms of the release of the information, by whom, when, and how, and secondly, the issues that related to its subsequent publication.

I think it is clear from the report, and from the speeches that have already been given this afternoon, that an obvious breach occurred. The difficulty is pinning home the responsibility to any particular source, whether it be a leak inspired deliberately or accidently by Sir Graham Latimer, whether it be the proffering of the document by someone to Mr Milne, or whether it be simply good intelligence on his part. The reality is that between all of those possibilities the story got out and became clearly known. I do not think that the committee in its findings came to the judgment that there was no disclosure, or that there was no case to answer. I think it was more a case of the Scottish maxim of “not proven”. Those who would like to read the report as some sort of acquittal ought to be mindful that it was more a case of not proven than not guilty.

The first set of issues that arise relate to select committees themselves, and those people who choose, or are required, to appear before them. In that respect, the findings of the committee are timely—particularly with regard to the warning given in paragraph 3 on page 7 of the report that committees look closely at their responsibilities under Standing Order 223, and similarly under Standing Order 242 when adverse findings are required.

From just a cursory examination of a lot of the detail associated with this issue, it is arguable that the select committee itself was not scrupulous in the way it handled the material and the flow of that material back and forward. I suspect that what occurred there was as much a good-faith lapse as anything else. That matter was being dealt with allegedly in good faith. Sir Graham was provided with the material, answers were to come back, and in due course a report would be forthcoming. This is a timely reminder of what can happen when those sorts of informal practices break down, and as a consequence we get the situation we were exposed to in the Privileges Committee where the evidence was at best conflicting and confusing, and at worse, simply overlooked a number of key facts that were unable to be determined.

That leads to the second aspect of this issue, which is the question of the role of Mr Milne, and I think the same general provision applies. I do not know whether he had a copy of the report. I do not whether it was inspired speculation on his part in terms of the report he wrote that gave rise to this complaint. I do not know whether he had been tipped off by Sir Graham Latimer, or someone else, as to the likely content of the committee’s report, and that led him to draw the conclusions he did. However, whatever the reason, the action in reporting what occurred is not justified in terms of existing Standing Orders and practices. The excuses do not make it right for that to have occurred.

As the report points out, a draft select committee report was prematurely released. It was published, and as a committee, we were not satisfied with that course of events. Nor were we satisfied with the argument raised by Mr Milne that, because of the way the process was being conducted, essentially a lot of the material was either already in the public domain, or about to become in the public domain. It is a classic case of two wrongs not making a right.

In that regard, I do not blame Mr Milne altogether. I do not think that the correspondence of 16 September that the acting editor of the Sunday Star-Times, Mr Curry, provided the select committee was particularly helpful. It is referred to in the appendix to the report, although it is not tabled as such. I thought the tone of that correspondence was extraordinarily belligerent, and implied a feeling on the part of the newspaper that, having got the story by whatever means, its absolutely legitimate right was to publish that story—regardless of what Parliament’s Standing Orders might state or any other conventions that might apply.

That really brings me to the heart of the issue, which I think goes beyond Mr Milne and Sir Graham Latimer. The sanctions, such as they are, that we have imposed in the recommendation deal with this particular case. However, a much bigger case is at issue, and that is the implicit contempt, as I regard it, in Mr Curry’s letter for due process. “We got the story, we can run it, who cares?” was essentially the argument that was being portrayed. I think that attitude will prevail as long as this Privileges Committee and this Parliament find themselves hamstrung in terms of any action they take on breaches of this nature.

This is not the first case of its type, and I see Mr Robson nodding. He will know that we have dealt with other cases already in this parliamentary term where a similar conclusion has been reached, with a similar feeling of frustration around the committee table that we have not been able to do more. Every time the all-powerful Privileges Committee, as it is called, demonstrates that it is somewhat less than all-powerful because of the facts that come before it, it creates another door that people feel they can go through in terms of how far they can then push the boundary on what they report next time. There will come a point where this committee will have to draw the line.

As I said, in this case it is all very well, and I support the recommendation in particular regard to Mr Milne that we draw his behaviour to the attention of the press gallery and ask it to act as it sees appropriate. But until the Privileges Committee feels capable of drawing a very firm line and saying that that behaviour is unacceptable and will not be tolerated further, and the attitude of journalists like the acting editor remain, we will get those sorts of cases. We will always end up looking slightly silly, because we will be dealing with them after the event, when all the protagonists have run for cover and it is very difficult to get to the basis of what happened. We will have debates like this, saying that we think we know what happened, we think that was the evidence provided, but on the basis of what we are able to ascertain, we cannot draw any particular conclusion in defence of the ancient privileges of this House.

That is an extraordinarily unsatisfactory situation, and really what this case demonstrates is that for the Privileges Committee to continue to have relevance in the future, it will have to be in a position where it can do something to back up the conclusions it might reach. Otherwise, it essentially becomes little more than an effete disciplinary committee that has very limited powers and is disregarded accordingly.

Motion agreed to.

Bills

Smoke-free Environments Amendment Bill

Referral to Health Committee

Hon PETER DUNNE (Leader—United Future): I move, That the order of the day for the Committee stage of the Smoke-free Environments Amendment Bill be discharged and the bill be referred back to the Health Committee.

A party vote was called for on the question, That the motion be agreed to.

Ayes 50

New Zealand National 24; New Zealand First 11; ACT New Zealand 7;United Future 8.

Noes 68

New Zealand Labour 52; New Zealand National 3; New Zealand First 2;Green Party 9; Progressive 2.

Motion not agreed to.

Procedure

Hon PETER DUNNE (Leader—United Future): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. Before you put the House into Committee, I want to raise a matter that was canvassed the last time this bill was before the House. You will recall that on at least one occasion during the evening you were recalled to the Chair. On one occasion you were asked to rule on the scope of the debate. If I recall your ruling correctly, you ruled that because this bill was, one, being taken part by part, and, two, because it had some controversy attached to it and was not a Government bill, the widest possible debate should be allowed in the Committee. I want to confirm that that was the ruling you gave, that it still applies, and further, that you have advised the Chairperson of the Committee that that is your expectation.

Mr SPEAKER: I repeat what I said before. As we are going into debate on Part 2, which is a large chunk of the bill, of course there should be full debate on that particular part. After there has been a full debate, it will be up to the Committee to decide whether that debate will carry on. However, I did make that comment, and I expect the Chairs to take note of what I said.

Hon RICHARD PREBBLE (Leader—ACT): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I am sorry to keep doing this, but I think it is better that we have the advantage of your wisdom now, because I can see this matter occurring probably in the first speech. It is an interesting problem, and I am sure you know what I am going to say. What has happened now is matters that would have most certainly been canvassed in the second reading—had we known—have become known. So we now know that the Government paid $2.1 million—corruptly, in my view—to get members of Parliament to swing their votes. I am sure I would have been allowed to raise that matter on the second reading. Now we will have a situation that, because the Government has managed to keep it secret and did not tell us about it, when we raised it at the Committee stage, the Chair will then say: “Well, of course, you could have raised that at the second reading, but the Government kept it secret and did not tell you about it, and now you are not allowed to ask whether this is why Māori members in particular are voting in favour of this bill”.

Mr SPEAKER: I will rule here and now that that issue can be canvassed in the Committee.

PETER BROWN (Deputy Leader—NZ First): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. It is quite different from the points you have just heard. You might recall that towards the end of the last debate on this issue, I requested that you be recalled because of my concern about a member in this House referring to people as “health Nazis”, or some such term—certainly the term “Nazis” was there. You took the view that Mr Prebble took, and I quote Speaker’s ruling 44/2: “There is nothing which prevents a member from commenting, if necessary in severe terms, on the conduct of people outside Parliament, but the member should do so only if it is necessary for the argument being put forward.” You seemed to support that. There is another ruling, Speaker’s ruling 43/5, which states: “Temperate and decorous language should be used with regard to persons outside Parliament.” I personally take total exception, and I know my colleagues might not share my absolute concern, that we in Parliament can refer to people as “Nazis”.

Mr SPEAKER: The member has made his point.

PETER BROWN: I have a little point to make.

Mr SPEAKER: Well, hurry along, please, very briefly.

PETER BROWN: If it is good enough for us to be allowed to call people outside the House “Nazis”; people on whom we will impose responsibility by a majority vote on this bill, then it is good enough, in my view, to refer to people in this House as the Fuhrer, Gestapo, and goodness knows what else.

Mr SPEAKER: The member might think that, but that is not what the Standing Order said. There is a different approach when people are referring to members, than when referring to people outside the House. Members should be temperate, but on the other hand, members can say things about people outside the House. They must reflect on whether they are really wise to make those comments, but that is their judgment. As far as inside the House is concerned, it is a very easy matter to rule on.

Hon DAVID CARTER (National): I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. This is a completely different matter, and I ask for your guidance before you leave the Chair, so that we are not in a position where perhaps it may be necessary to recall you. In this particular section of the debate, I have worked hard with an industry and will present a large number of amendments—around 100—to the legislation. I intend to seek the opportunity to speak to a significant number of those amendments, because they are all quite individual, and I want your guidance as to the time that I would then be allowed before the question is finally put in this debate.

Mr SPEAKER: There should be a wide discussion held, but the member will not get a hundred calls or anything like that. He is entitled to only four, but whether he gets that number is a matter for the Chair and the Committee to judge. As I have said, there will be a wide debate. I declare the House in Committee for further consideration of the Smoke-free Environments Amendment Bill.

In Committee

Debate resumed.

Part 2 Amendments to Part II of principal Act

Hon PETER DUNNE (Leader—United Future): I raise a point of order, Madam Chairperson. I want to canvass with you, because I think it would be useful in terms of the discussion that has just gone on, your sense of how you will interpret the ruling given to the House by the Speaker relating to the time and conduct of this debate. We have already had drawn to our attention by one member the fact that he has a number of amendments to move on behalf of a particular group of organisations, and I know Mr Prebble has raised matters relating to the breadth of the debate. I seek your guidance as to how you will interpret the provisions in terms of speaking allocation, given those matters and also the Speaker’s ruling that we have just had the benefit of.

The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley): Certainly, the Speaker has given a very clear ruling that there will be a wide-ranging debate, and that is how it will be.

Hon PETER DUNNE (Leader—United Future): Part 2, which is rather confusing in its drafting, goes to the heart of many of the issues that the bill seeks to address. It deals with the insertion of a new Part 1, “Smoke-free workplaces and public areas”. That is the set of sections in what would theoretically be clause 3, but it actually inserts new sections 4, 5, 5A, 6, 6A, 7A, and so on into the principal Act; sections that will be at the core of this legislation.

One of the issues that drives this—and I want to relate to this right now, because I will come back later, if I may, in the debate on this matter—is the issue of air quality. As members will be aware, I have put Supplementary Order Paper 117 before the Committee, which has a number of proposed amendments to the bill to provide for an air quality standard to be applied, rather than the arbitrary ban that is currently proposed in this measure. One of the pieces of evidence that I cite in respect of the validity of air quality measures is the report by Gavin Fisher and Lou Reddish of the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research regarding air quality inside the Bream Bay Club at Ruakaka. This report has been dismissed as irrelevant, technically deficient, and various other phrases by both the Health Committee and, I think it is called, the National Health Advisory Committee, or some other equally grandiloquent title.

I note the comments by Mr Fisher in this morning’s Dominion Post that the dismissal of his evidence was grossly ill-informed, that he had never been invited to present any opinion in support of his view to either the select committee or the officials who had made the recommendations, and that he stood by the evidence he gave. In fact, he made the very telling point, I thought, that if one wants to have some view as to the level of acceptability of air, one has to have an air quality standard to start with. One cannot in isolation determine what is acceptable and what is not acceptable if there is no standard by which to measure it. If we read what the bill will achieve in having a total ban, we will see that it says there will be no smoking in bars, restaurants, clubs, etc., but it does not say, ipso facto, that the quality of air will be any better. It does not even draw that distinction, because it simply takes one end of the stick without looking at the other.

The National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research report demonstrates beyond any reasonable doubt that acceptable air quality can be achieved through a proper ventilation system. The amendments that I have proposed go to the heart of this by saying very clearly that the onus would be on bar owners and premise owners to determine whether they want to install the ventilation systems that would enable an air quality standard to be achieved and maintained. But the bill does not even give them that choice. It decides arbitrarily for them that nothing—forever—will be put in place that will give them the opportunity to test for themselves whether they can establish a decent air quality standard.

I received some material this morning from the United States that shows there was a significant loss of jobs in New York immediately after the introduction of the ban there, because premises simply closed down. The same happened in Manitoba and in other parts of the United States and North America where such measures have been applied. I find it ironic that, on the one hand, this bill is being touted as a measure that will improve workers’ safety and that, on the other hand, one of the immediate consequences of the implementation of measures of this type in other places has been worker unemployment. I would have thought that members of the Government, in particular, who have a professed and longstanding commitment to employment opportunities, would find it somewhat concerning that people will lose their jobs as a result of this legislation.

Dr LYNDA SCOTT (National—Kaikoura): As members will be aware, the National Party is having a conscience vote on this bill, but as I am a doctor and was a geriatrician, I saw the consequences all the time of what smoking does to New Zealanders. That is not just active smoking. It also involves passive smoking and what we now call second-hand smoke. Only 30 percent of New Zealanders smoke; 70 percent do not. A lot of people in that 70 percent would quite like to go down to the pub or the club, but the cigarette smoke puts them off. I conducted a bit of a survey in my electorate. Everybody wanted smoke-free restaurants. There was a bit more ambivalence about pubs and clubs, but the large majority of people certainly wanted smoke-free environments.

I will be supporting this bill, because we have to remember that strokes, heart attacks, and arterial diseases are the leading causes of death in this country and cost our health system a huge amount of money. People who have smoked in the past are just encouraged to go back to smoking when they go down to the pub, and if they have never been smokers, they do not stand the environment for very long. So 70 percent of people out there may decide they want to go down to the pub or club on a Friday or a Saturday night, if it is a smoke-free environment.

The Health Committee made considerable changes to Part 2, which is where the most significant changes are. One of the ridiculous things that had been put into the bill by a Supplementary Order Paper we changed was a provision to allow smoking rooms at schools. Most schools in New Zealand have gone totally smoke-free. To reintroduce a smoking room would have been ridiculous, so that provision was taken out and smoking is now prohibited at schools and early childhood centres. If we want our children to grow up healthy, we do not want their main role models—after their parents, teachers come next—smoking in the school environment. We do not want children to see smoking and think that it is cool, because it is not. It affects their health and will contribute to major ill health when they get older.

We also looked at dedicated smoking rooms in hospital care institutions, residential disability care institutions, and rest homes. Let us face it, if people get to a rest home and are still alive and still smoking, we should be kind to them. We cannot really kick people out into the rain to have a cigarette outside at that stage, so we were kind and generous and understood that situation.

Peter Brown: Why are you doing it in RSAs?

Dr LYNDA SCOTT: People who go to Returned Services Associations can still walk and get about. That is not quite so easy when one is in a rest home, so we allowed for dedicated smoking rooms in rest homes. Members will ask why we did that in hospital care institutions. The fact is that some people are absolutely desperate. I would like to see all people, especially in hospitals, not smoking. It is amazing how many people on their first visit to the coronary care unit, when a staff member walks in and says, “Stop the smoking right now.”, do so. But why should people wait until they get to the coronary care unit, which costs them and the country huge amounts of money, and which is a cost to their health? It is much better to give up now—and so many people have. Huge numbers of New Zealanders have given up smoking, and they are better off for it. We want to encourage that, and we want to encourage it in a social situation.

Originally two environments had been looked at, resulting from a division into smoking and non-smoking areas. That would have imposed huge compliance costs on a large number of businesses—small businesses that could not physically divide a space into two areas—so it seemed better to have a level playing field with all pubs and clubs involved. If we took clubs out, every business would licence itself as a club and it would be an utterly unfair playing field for pubs, so, because this legislation is trying to improve public health and the health of our nation, we have moved it forward.

I had a really good look at the issue of ventilation air standards. We went to the Australian Capital Territory where there is a ventilation air standard, and there is evidence that carcinogens cannot be removed. The other thing we were told in Australia was that everyone turns ventilation systems off. They are very expensive to run when hot air is being dragged out, and buildings need to be heated to a large degree in winter and cooled in summer. The Australians found when they audited ventilation systems that most had been turned off.

Hon RICHARD PREBBLE (Leader—ACT): I would just like to comment to the member who has just resumed her seat—

Dr Lynda Scott: Dr Scott.

Hon RICHARD PREBBLE: —Dr Scott, yes—that no ACT member of Parliament smokes, and I am not in favour of promoting smoking. But I find it intriguing that that politically correct committee, in exempting marae, ignores the fact that smoking by young Māori women is a significant problem. When I ask why that is, I am told: “That’s our home.” If one asks a returned serviceman what his home is, he will say it is the Returned Services Association. In the case of returned servicemen, Parliament provided them with free cigarettes during the Second World War and made them all addicts. Now we are turning our backs on them and saying that because they are returned servicemen we will be tough on them, but we are so politically correct we will ignore the problem with young Māori women.

I turn to a question that I have—[Interruption] I ask the member not to interrupt.

Hon Peter Dunne: I’m trying to help.

Hon RICHARD PREBBLE: The member is not helping me. I have a question for the promoter of the bill. She is also the chair of the Health Committee, and that is a clear conflict of interest. I want to know whether the member knew that the Ministry of Health was paying $2.1 million to lobby MPs on behalf of her bill. Did she know? If she did, that is a disgrace. If she did not know, why did she not vote for Mr Dunne’s amendment that the bill be sent back to the select committee, so it could have had Action on Smoking and Health (ASH) come before it to be asked why it did not tell the committee it was being paid by the Government to do that lobbying? I say to the Committee that, in my time in Parliament, I have never seen that. I think it is corruption. There is no doubt that it is against the public service code for—

Hon John Tamihere: The member has seen a lot about corruption.

Hon RICHARD PREBBLE: Did the member who is interjecting on me know about it? I want to know whether he knew $2.1 million was being spent. Did he know that the contract states: “Promote a supportive public climate for enhancing smoke-free environment protection in legislation”, “Engage secure support from the public and political networks”, and “Visit key portfolio MPs and Māori MPs”? That member is a Māori MP. Was he lobbied by ASH?

Hon John Tamihere: I can’t recall.

Hon RICHARD PREBBLE: Now he cannot recall. The amount was $2.1 million, and he cannot recall whether he got his share. Did ASH bring it in a paper bag, or does he get paper bags full of money so often that he cannot remember when they arrive? [Interruption] Koha, yes. Someone from ASH would have come and said: “I’ve got some koha for you here, Minister—our share of your $2.1 million—and we’d like your support for Steve Chadwick’s bill.”

I want ask Steve Chadwick whether she knew that these lobby groups, when they appeared in front of the committee, were paid political lobbyists—paid for by the Government? She is being silent now. Does she not think she has any obligation to the Committee?

I ask the member why we should support her bill when she is not even prepared to answer questions like that. She sat there as chair—apparently, she volunteered to stand down—but I ask whether she cannot see that that is a conflict of interest. Does she not see that her bill has compromised this Parliament? Where is the integrity of any MP who can vote for this bill, knowing that he or she may have been influenced by money being paid—I believe, improperly; I actually believe illegally—to ASH, the smoke-free environment group and the other Māori group.

I note that those groups were instructed to write letters to the paper, but did they say they were being paid by the taxpayer to do that? Did Steve Chadwick know, or was she just a tool? If she was a tool, why will she not take an opportunity—and why did she not take the first available opportunity—to set the record straight? Or is she so convinced of the political correctness of this cause that she believes the end justify the means—which, of course, is what the left always believes? Will she take a call and set the record straight.

Hon DAVID CARTER (National): I start my discussion by agreeing wholeheartedly with the comments that have just been made by the Hon Richard Prebble. In my work of patiently seeking answers from this Government about how much money the Ministry of Health has actually spent on lobbying MPs, I have come to suspect that the sum of $2.1 million is a gross understatement. I think that when further papers are finally provided, we will find that a significantly larger amount of money has been corruptly spent on trying to lobby members of Parliament to support a member’s bill. I think that that is a disgrace, and if Steve Chadwick as the promoter of this bill knew of that at the time, she should state it tonight in this debate. If she did not know about it, she should take the opportunity of clarifying that tonight in the Chamber.

I want to move to another point, and to a large number of amendments on which I intend to seek calls for discussion tonight. I attended a function in Christchurch last week for the Hospitality Association of New Zealand’s annual award dinner. About half a dozen MPs were at that function, and I was staggered by the depth of ill feeling towards the Government expressed by people who came up to take their awards. The ill feeling was not only about this legislation, but that was the focus, specifically, of their attention. It is hard enough in that industry to make a dollar. The competition is extreme, and many, many establishments will go out of business because of this stupid legislation.

Let me discuss my very first amendment tabled in the Chamber tonight. If members look at clause 6B, they will see that it repeals section 12 and substitutes a new section 12. I suggest that we vote tonight to add a new subsection to that section that will exempt the Little River Hotel on State Highway 75 at Little River. That is what the people of that establishment have asked me to do. I had written to that hotel last week and asked what the effect of this legislation would be on its business. The response was that it would probably put it out of business. Little River is a small community in the electorate of Banks Peninsula, and I will take note of how Ruth Dyson votes. I will note whether she is prepared to hear the pleas of her own constituents. Little River has a local school of around 100 pupils. The school is now under pressure, because Mr Mallard is about to rip the guts out of rural New Zealand by closing schools of that size. The other focus of that community is the Little River pub. I tell Ms Chadwick that I do not go there often, but I suspect that probably 70 percent of its patrons smoke. No patron of that hotel is forced to be there on any evening. They are there for the camaraderie and friendship they develop in that establishment—

David Benson-Pope: Camaraderie?

Hon DAVID CARTER: That is right. Does the member not understand that word? It means friendship, and that is what these people go for. It is a chance for them to socialise, to have a beer, and to enjoy a cigarette. Nobody forces them into that hotel, but if that member tonight votes against my amendment, he will threaten its very existence.

We have another amendment. The Kaikanui Hotel is at 67 Williams Street, Kaiapoi, in the Waimakariri electorate of Clayton Cosgrove. Let us see tonight whether he is prepared to support the plea that has been made by the proprietors of the Kaikanui Hotel in Kaiapoi. That is a larger centre—not as small a locality as Little River—but, again, the people there know what has happened in New York and in many states in the United States where this legislation has been brought in. It has meant a dramatic decline in the revenue taken by hospitality establishments—and that threatens the very viability of the Kaikanui Hotel.

KATHERINE RICH (National): I think that for many members on this side of the Chamber, the debate tonight is very much tainted by the knowledge that the Government spent $2.1 million lobbying MPs to try to get them to support a member’s bill. That has never happened before, and the Government will not explain why it did that. The member in the chair, who is the sponsor of the bill, has not taken a call to explain why that money was given, why there was an expressed objective that the task of the Action on Smoking and Health organisation was to lobby individual MPs on a member’s bill. Out in the streets, a lot of Labour members have said: “Look, I know you’re concerned about this, but this is a private member’s bill.”, as if somehow that takes away its significance. But now we know that it is not really a member’s bill; it is a Government bill in disguise, and the Government has taken $2.1 million from the taxpayer in order to lobby MPs to try to get them to support it. Richard Prebble has quite correctly described that as corruption. I can think of no other word to describe it.

Tonight we are discussing an issue that is more about freedom of choice—freedom to decide where we go and what we do. Yes, Governments will always play a part in establishing general regulations for conduct in this country, but they do not get involved in the minutiae of how we lead our daily lives. They do not say to people—except in this case—that they must eat San Bran and go for a compulsory jog every day. With this bill, the Government is getting into the day-to-day lives of New Zealanders, when most people are big enough to make up their own minds and make choices about their lives, with minimal Government involvement.

For this bill, I went and did a bit of research in my hometown of Dunedin. I went on a pub-crawl, of sorts, and spoke to a number of small business operators. They are described in the bill as proprietors of licensed premises, but they are small business operators. I spoke to non-smokers and smokers, to staff and publicans, and I could not find anybody who supported the bill. Some of those small pubs will go out of business as a result of this legislation—particularly small country pubs. Many that I have listed in an amendment I am putting forward say they will go out of business because of it. There is one small pub, the Vulcan Hotel in St Bathans, where sometimes in the middle of winter it is incredibly cold, whose clientele swear that some people could go out and have a near-death experience, simply because of going out for a cigarette. I suspect that those people will stay at home, and a lot of those businesses will be closed down as a result.

Let us remember that small country pubs, and a lot of pubs in towns like Dunedin, where I live, are focal points for their communities. They are meeting places for their local communities. That is what is at risk here. I remember speaking to one old chap by the name of Ron at the Waterloo Hotel. He said: “I went to war, and now I am wondering whether or not I should just have handed my gun to the Germans, because the country that I fought for is starting to take away some of the freedoms that I hold dear.”

Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m.

KATHERINE RICH: Before the dinner break I was talking about a returned serviceman called Ron, whom I met when I visited the Waterloo Hotel in Dunedin. Ron went to World War II, and he is now beginning to wonder what he fought for, because he feels he is having some of his basic freedoms and pleasures removed from his life. That is what has moved me tonight to put forward a list of amendments—they are set out on Supplementary Order Paper 154—in which I have listed a number of taverns and hotels that would like to be exempted from this bill. These include the Lauder Tavern, Glenfalloch Restaurant, The Chancellor Dunedin, Vulcan Hotel, Rydges Queenstown, Portsider Tavern, Wharf Casino, Nugget Point Resort, Aspen on Queenstown, Blacks Hotel, The Statesman, Heriot Hotel, Moeraki Tavern, Valley Lodge Hotel, Heffs Hotel, Cock and Bull Dunedin, Black Dog, Gardens Sports Tavern, Fitzroy Pub on the Park, Waterloo Hotel, Oriental Tavern, Greater Green Island Town and Country Club, Golden Fleece Hotel, Paddy’s Café and Bar, Famous Kellys, Frankton Arm Tavern, Grand Tavern, The Outback, Fraser’s Bar and Grill, St Kilda Tavern, Normanby Tavern, Dicey O’Riley’s, Bentley’s Hotel, Tippler’s Bar Café, North Western Hotel, and the Mosgiel Tavern.

Hon PETER DUNNE (Leader—United Future): I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. I apologise to the member who is seeking the call, but I want to clear up a matter that has arisen, I suspect, inadvertently, and it may well require the Speaker to be recalled. On 17 September, when we were last discussing the bill, the Speaker was recalled on the question of the scope of the debate. I want to quote from the ruling he gave then, because I think it is at variance with the ruling he gave this afternoon: “An instruction to take a bill part by part relates to the parts of the bill that are before the committee.” Members may recall that there was a discussion about how the bill was drafted. “I did rule earlier this year that the insertion of new parts in a principal Act is a factor for the Chair to take into account before accepting the closure, and the Chair should do that here.” The confusion is that if we look at the bill, the part we are now debating has parts inserted into it, and so too does Part 3, which we will get to eventually. When the Speaker ruled before the start of the debate today, he appeared to me to change his ruling to say that he certainly agreed there should be the widest possible debate on this part, not on both parts. Yet, when I refer to his ruling of 17 September, he makes the point that where there are parts inserted in a bill by a part, then that is scope for a wide-ranging debate. I apologise to Mr Woolerton, who I know is keen to take a call, but I do not think there is any option at this stage but for the Speaker to be recalled to clarify the intent of this ruling, and I so move.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): It is my understanding that the Speaker ruled earlier today that there should be a wide-ranging debate on that part. That is my understanding. His reason, as I understand it, is that we are on this part now. He gave an instruction to the House to take into account the fact that the debate is happening now, and his ruling was to do with the part as it now stands.

Hon PETER DUNNE: Mr Chairperson, I genuinely do not wish to delay things unduly but I need to be clear on this point. Is it your understanding that the ruling given by the Speaker today relates purely to the part he expects us to be debating today, but that it also relates to Part 3—when we eventually get to it—given his earlier comment that where bills insert new parts in a principal Act, it is a factor for the Chair to take into account before accepting the closure? If your understanding of the Speaker’s ruling is that it relates only to this part, and not to Part 3—whenever we get to it—then that matter needs to be clarified.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): It is my understanding that it would apply to any part where parts have been inserted. That definitely means the part we are currently on, and it may well also take into account Part 3, where parts have been inserted.

STEVE CHADWICK (Labour—Rotorua): I would like to take a call in response to some rather serious allegations laid by the leader of ACT about the lobbying of MPs, and particularly the lobbying of myself as the sponsor of this bill. I want to read out, for the record, a letter from the chairperson of Action on Smoking and Health (ASH) to the New Zealand Herald, which clarifies the position that “ASH is not an agent of the Ministry of Health, nor its employee”—that statement is in clause 27 of ASH’s contract—“nor an uncritical paid agent of the Ministry. The Government has never gagged ASH, but supports it to help reduce tobacco consumption, which is a 60 percent reduction since ASH was founded 21 years ago”. That is a wonderful record. “ASH does not always agree with Government. For example, we want cigarettes to be put under the counter, but Government is not ready yet for this. We opposed fines on smokers in bars in the current bill, and Government now agrees. Most of our Government contract funds this year were paid for media advertising to inform the public about the risks of cigarette smoke, just as the Government has paid for anti-smoking campaigns since 1948. ASH was created to work with the media and encourage strong publicity and policy on smoking. When this bill is passed we will focus on the high level of toxins in New Zealand cigarette smoke. We will need continued funding, Government or otherwise, to further reduce the tobacco road toll.”

I have not been personally lobbied by ASH, but as the sponsor of this bill I have certainly valued its support, just as I valued its support when I was in charge of a children and women’s health service in a hospital. I knew about ASH and Apaarangi Tautoko Auahi Kore long before many members in the House. I value their contribution to the reduction in smoking in this country—as I value the contributions from many other lobbyists, who give me as the sponsor of this bill very valuable information. These include Professor Alistair Woodward, the professor of public health at the Wellington school of medicine; the College of General Practitioners; Dr Diana North, medical director of the National Heart Foundation; and Hugh McAlister, a very respected cardiologist.

I have in my hand one of ASH’s very good political updates that gives information to all members of Parliament, so I hope we can continue with better-informed debate. As the member sponsoring the bill, I can assure the Committee that I welcome and value continued information from these lobby groups, and I hope they do not give up supporting all politicians so that we can have informed debate in the House. I quite accept the fact that the Minister responsible will look at the contracts to make sure we are not lobbied as members. I was very careful not to go out with tobacco industry representatives and have a paid lunch, and I was also very careful to tell the tobacco industry, which mercilessly lobbied me, that it would not be right or proper—as representatives of the Hospitality Association of New Zealand present in the gallery know—to have lobbying on the bill accepted once the Health Committee had written its report for the House. It would have been quite improper. I knew my boundaries as the member sponsoring the bill, but I hope that the Government continues its robust funding of those lobbyists, who have had a profound impact on the reduction of smoking in this country.

R DOUG WOOLERTON (NZ First): I for one do not care who has been lobbying the member. I can certainly say that Action on Smoking and Health (ASH) has been lobbying me. I like lobbying, and I think that lobbyists add to the House. They bring their biased point of view to any argument, and it is helpful to talk to lobbyists from both sides. But I hope that, in listening to lobbyists, I am not like the member who just sat down and who believes just one side of the lobbying. I think it is healthy to have cynicism on both sides, and therein get closer to the truth.

When I am contemplating this bill, I think back to my father. I think of my grandfather. I think of grandparents, male and female, and of people in the district I grew up with, and I wonder what they would have thought of this legislation. I wonder what they would have thought of liberalising prostitution and of the talk of liberalising marijuana, or, as it is euphemistically phrased, legalising marijuana for medicinal use. I think to myself that they would really wonder what sort of arena this Doug Woolerton had got himself involved in. They would wonder whether the lunatics had indeed taken over the asylum.

We have two—only two—legal drugs in this country. It has been that way in Western civilisation for hundreds and hundreds of years. One is tobacco and the other is alcohol. We have never promoted the health benefits of either, although the wine industry is wont to promote a glass of wine each day as beneficial for one’s health. I have no problem with ASH or anybody else promoting the message or saying that smoking is not good for one’s health. But I object most strenuously to the barring of cigarette smoking in all public places. The legislation bars smoking in all public places, except, of course—and this is where my mother, father, grandfather, and grandmother would really come apart—in prison. If people go to jail, they can have a fag.

Hon Peter Dunne: Or hospital.

R DOUG WOOLERTON: In hospital, also, as the member said, people can have a fag, but they cannot have a fag in a pub. In any other Parliament, in any other time, they would say that this ban was quite, quite mad, and that is what I think it is. I think it is a contradiction. I think it is intolerance to the highest degree, and I think it is quite, quite mad. In fact, the only way that it would be acceptable in any way to the public of New Zealand would be the way it has been promoted in this House—and I believe it has been promoted dishonestly.

The promotion says that smoking affects the smoker—and that it also affects everybody else. It is said that thousands of people are dying in this country through second-hand smoke. That is bunkum—absolute bunkum. Any person who has ever had a fag is in the statistics as having died because of smoking. If people had been smokers when they were 18 but had given up smoking years ago, their lungs would now be as healthy as anybody else’s. However, if anything happens to them, it is said that they have died because of smoking. Whatever happens to a person’s heart, foot, left leg, right leg, head, or whatever, is said to happen because that person was a smoker, so he or she goes onto the smoking statistics. That person apparently becomes a victim of second-hand smoke, and that is the only way that this Government can find to make this legislation even part-way logical and get it through this House.

The Government certainly would not get this legislation through if it banned smoking completely. That would be outrageous as far as the public is concerned. The Government could try to reduce the incidence of smoking voluntarily, which is what ASH has tried to do over the years, and, yes, there has been a reduction. But that is not enough for this Government. It wants to force its will on every man, woman, and teenager in this country—at the same time, I might say, that it is talking about legalising other drugs.

HEATHER ROY (ACT): I take exception to some of the things the sponsor of the bill, Steve Chadwick, has just said. I want to come back for a moment to the contracts that we have heard so much about over the last couple of weeks. The dishing out of $2.1 million to anti-smoking groups to lobby MPs to support smoke-free legislation is an abuse of power. There is no getting away from that. It is a blatant attempt at political manipulation and a misuse of taxpayers’ money.

My colleague David Carter said before the dinner break that he would not be surprised if the amount was actually more than the $2.1 million that Rodney Hide was quoting last week. We know that the groups Apaarangi Tautoko Auahi Kore, the Smokefree Coalition, and Action on Smoking and Health (ASH) have contracts that are very specific about what their duties are, particularly in relation to this bill, a member’s bill, and that lobbying is being paid for with taxpayers’ money. We know that in the last financial year $13.7 million was actually allocated to various groups for the specific purpose of reducing smoking in this country. That in itself is a good thing and will have beneficial health outcomes. But we know about only those three groups; how do we know that the amount is not in fact more than $2.1 million? It might be much closer to the $13.7 million that we know has been spent on lobbying.

We have all seen the T-shirts, the advertisements in the newspapers, and the long list of groups that are involved in the anti-smoking lobby. Most of them receive large sums of Government funding. It does raise more questions. We know about only the contracts with those three groups—ASH, the Smokefree Coalition, and Apaarangi Tautoko Auahi Kore. We do not know about any of the others, and I suspect—

Hon David Carter: There are lots more to come.

HEATHER ROY: I suspect Mr Carter is quite right. When the evidence comes out and we see the other contracts, what are they going to tell us?

I go back to the contracts. Mr Prebble read out what was in the Apaarangi Tautoko Auahi Kore contract before the dinner break, but there are two others. ASH is required to appear on television or radio, or in newspapers, at least 50 times a year, to publish and distribute “media and political updates at least six times a year”, and to “liaise with members of Parliament and political parties”—its people did not bother coming to me; I suspect they knew they would be wasting their time—“to raise awareness of tobacco-related issues and developments”. I move on to the Smokefree Coalition. I can see Steve Chadwick shaking her head; “What does that matter?”, she says. It matters because it is taxpayers’ money that we are talking about. The Smokefree Coalition is required to “create a climate of support for amendments to the Smoke-free Environments Act.” Well, it cannot get much more blatant than that, can it? It is spelt out very clearly in that contract that that organisation is to lobby MPs, to advertise, and to write letters to the editor, using taxpayers’ money. That is unacceptable. It is to lobby policy makers, make submissions, issue media releases, and write letters to the editor, as I said.

Just as bad is the fact that these supposedly independent interest groups, which always claim they are independent—and we just heard Steve Chadwick say they are independent, but who do we believe—are not allowed to criticise the Government. They are not allowed to criticise the Government without first discussing it with the Government, and vice versa. They have a very cosy little arrangement. Neither will say anything without first consulting the other. These groups get their stories right, then go out and say how independent they are. Taxpayers’ money has been paid in an attempt to silence these lobby groups.

It was different with Kit Richards. The Prime Minister, Helen Clark, declared it completely unacceptable within a public sector organisation for him, a Timberlands employee, to send an email to lobby groups advising them to target certain Ministers. What happened to Kit Richards? He lost his job. That was it—kaput. What is going to happen to the ministry officials who were responsible for formulating these contracts? Nothing. They will stay there on their cosy salaries, and they will stay there for a good long while yet, while this Labour Government is in power. Kit Richards lost his job, but, no, they are fine. We now have ministry officials paying interest groups to lobby certain MPs. It is a misuse of health funding, a breach of the public service code of conduct, and more rank hypocrisy from this Government.

PETER BROWN (Senior Whip—NZ First): I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. That was a very interesting speech made by the member who has just resumed her seat, and I wonder whether she would consider tabling that contract. I am certain we would all like to see it.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): The member cannot seek leave on behalf of someone else. He should look at Speaker’s ruling 1/5 and Speaker’s ruling 1/1 (Supplement).

Hon DAVID CARTER (National): I start by thanking Steve Chadwick, who sponsors this bill, for finally taking a call. I have spent many hours in this debate, and that is the first time she has taken a call.

I want to comment on the two points she raised. Firstly, she said she has never been lobbied by Action on Smoking and Health (ASH). Well, I will accept the member’s word, but I do wonder whether she regularly monitors her inwards mail, because I have had numerous letters from ASH asking to come and see me. The letters look like form letters that, I think, went to all members of Parliament. So I suggest that member just check the bottom of her in tray.

Secondly, she read a letter published in the New Zealand Herald from ASH in which, she claimed, the statement was made that the Government has never gagged ASH. That is wrong. I have before me the ASH contract, signed by the Ministry of Health and ASH, and clause 17 reads: “Neither of us may, during or after this agreement, either directly or indirectly criticise the other publicly.” If that is not a gag, I do not know what is. So do not let ASH continue with a whole lot of half-truths and mistruths, saying it was not doing the Government’s work, because it was.

Before the dinner break I spoke passionately about some amendments to the bill that I intend to put forward tonight. I actually wrote to a large number of hospitality establishments in Christchurch, when I realised how deeply they felt about this legislation. They spoke vigorously against the Government’s move—and it is the Government’s move—at the annual hospitality industry awards dinner last week in Christchurch. So I wrote to 350 establishments last Friday, and in those few days more than 100 responded and asked me specifically to put forward an amendment to exclude their particular establishment from this dopey legislation. They include places like the Embankment Tavern, Ferry Road, Christchurch.

Simon Power: A fine spot!

Hon DAVID CARTER: It is an interesting establishment. It is in Mr Tim Barnett’s electorate, and I take this opportunity of telling Mr Barnett that people from that tavern have rung my office and asked me to put forward this amendment on their behalf. They will be looking to that member to support the amendment. Mr Barnett came into Parliament to represent Christchurch Central constituents. That tavern is struggling in a difficult environment and it wants to be excluded from this legislation. It will be watching the vote cast by Mr Tim Barnett tonight.

R Doug Woolerton: There are a certain number of people he cares about, and he doesn’t care about the others.

Hon DAVID CARTER: That could be true. I will ensure, when the vote is cast, that the Embankment Tavern on Ferry Road, in Mr Barnett’s electorate, knows how he voted. Another establishment, Ciao Bella, on Victoria Street, one of the most enjoyable restaurant-bars in Christchurch—also in Mr Barnett’s electorate—has asked me to put forward an amendment to exclude it from this dopey legislation. It too will be looking for the support of Mr Barnett later on this evening. The Redwood Hotel, Main North Road, Christchurch, is, I think, in Mr Clayton Cosgrove’s electorate. I tell Mr Cosgrove that the Redwood Hotel wants to be excluded. I am prepared to put forward an amendment, and I certainly hope the local member, Mr Clayton Cosgrove, will be supporting it. Another establishment, the Valley Inn, at 2 Flavell Street, Heathcote, Christchurch, just happens to be not far from my office, and is in the electorate of Ruth Dyson. In fact, Ruth Dyson lived within 200 metres of this fine establishment. It may have been her local!

Katherine Rich: Not any more.

Hon DAVID CARTER: It may be. We have to give Ruth Dyson the chance. Now that I am telling her that the Valley Inn at Heathcote wishes to be excluded from this legislation, and now that I have agreed to put forward an amendment on its behalf, let us see how Ruth Dyson votes.

Hon PETER DUNNE (Leader—United Future): I want to pick up on a point that has been made by one or two of the earlier speakers about the nature of the contracts that have been entered into with various agencies, and I want to tell the Committee that the suggestion that some $2.1 million only has been allocated is well short of the mark. There is an insidious industry abroad here—

Dail Jones: I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. As I understand, Mr Dunne has spoken before on Part 2, and I should have got the call because I have not spoken before. I believe I am entitled to the call, or any other member who has not spoken before.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): The first point I want to make is that Standing Order 178 has been suspended until the end of this year, and possibly into March 2004. The second point is that, under Speaker’s ruling 23/3, I have already called Mr Dunne, and therefore he has the call. I have taken note that Mr Jones is seeking the call.

Dail Jones: I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. That Standing Order, as you quite correctly say, has been suspended, but, as I understand it, it has been suspended by the Business Committee to enable those people who are spokesmen on a particular issue to take consecutive calls.

Gerry Brownlee: Only.

Dail Jones: Only spokesmen. I am not sure that Mr Dunne is the spokesman on this issue; he is the leader of United Future, but I am not sure whether he is the spokesman. So to give Mr Dunne the call on that basis, when he is not the spokesman, or to give any other members another call, when they are not spokesmen, is not correct use, in my view, of the suspension of that Standing Order. I hope that members make it clear that they are spokesmen on an issue, when they want to take advantage of the suspension of that Standing Order, so that you are not confused.

Gerry Brownlee: I first want to say I think—[Interruption]

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): There will be silence when a point of order is being heard—Speaker’s ruling 16/6.

Gerry Brownlee: Well, there you go. I think it is quite extraordinary—and I want to express the gratitude of the Committee—that we do have someone in the Chair who does know the Standing Orders. It is actually something that a good number of members have commented on, and we do appreciate that.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): Would the member come to the point. [Interruption]

Gerry Brownlee: Hang on! I think we do have a slight difficulty. You have ruled; you cannot change that. However, the interpretation of the suspended Standing Order, the interpretation of the statement around the suspension, is something you might like to have another look at. It is designed to ensure that the Standing Order that says seniority in the House is to be respected, etc., is followed, whether or not a person has already spoken, but the suspension is also about recognising that minor parties’ spokespersons, who may have spoken before in a debate, have a particular interest, and should be given the opportunity to speak again. It was an act of generosity, I might say, on the part of the larger parties in Opposition, but we do expect that it will be interpreted correctly. But, as I say, we do thank you for your extraordinary command of both the Standing Orders and, particularly, Speakers’ rulings.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): Thank you very much.

Hon PETER DUNNE: Can I speak to the point of order, Mr Chairperson?

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): I have already ruled and I now intend to call the member.

Hon PETER DUNNE: Can I raise a fresh point of order, Mr Chairperson?

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): The member may raise a fresh point of order, but I have already ruled.

Hon PETER DUNNE: I am grateful for your having given me the call, but I am cognisant of the point raised by Mr Jones and others, and I think that, when I sought the call, several members were seeking the call. Before proceeding, I simply wish to seek your assurance that their rights to gain a call have not been compromised by your giving me the call in this instance—in other words, that they will get a call if they seek it.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): Thank you, Mr Dunne. You have made your point. I am the sole judge as to whom I call, and I have already indicated to Mr Jones that he will get a call.

Hon PETER DUNNE: Mr Chairperson, I point out that you place me in somewhat of a dilemma, because this is a wide-ranging debate, and Mr Speaker has already ruled that there should be the widest possible expression of opinion. I have spoken on this part before, and I have spoken not infrequently on aspects of this bill, and although I am keen to take another call—and if you insist on my doing so, I will happily do so—I do not want to infringe on the rights of any other members. So if you cannot give me an assurance that other members who are seeking the call will be accommodated, I feel that, in fairness to them, I have no option but to sit down at this point.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): If you wish to do that, you are perfectly entitled to so.

Hon PETER DUNNE: I am seeking guidance from you before I make my decision.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): The member does not have to persist in what is going on at present. If he does not wish to take the call, that is entirely up to him. But I have called the member, and I call him again.

Hon Ken Shirley: I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): I have already ruled on this. The member’s point of order had better be a fresh one.

Hon Ken Shirley: It is certainly a fresh point of order. I have just arrived in the Chamber, as you may have observed. I have come directly all the way over from Bowen House, and I am seeking an assurance that I have not wasted my time—that I will also get a call.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): You have not wasted your time.

Hon PETER DUNNE: Before that interruption occurred I was saying that the claim that has been made by some members—that the sum of $2.1 million advanced to Action on Smoking and Health and its ilk is a conservative estimate—is absolutely correct, because there is a thriving industry abroad here, which goes something like this: a person works for the Ministry of Health for a period of time, then fans out into one of these organisations and becomes a consultant, a specialist, an adviser, or so on, to that organisation, which then seeks funding from the ministry to promote its good work, in the way that we have seen. But it gets better. When international conference time comes around—and the World Health Organization is par excellence in terms of international conferences—look at who goes as part of the New Zealand delegation! It is wide and inclusive, so all these people who have just left the ministry to go and do good work for these struggling voluntary agencies, which the ministry ends up supporting, end up on the delegation. They end up on the delegation so that they can put on their CV for the next research grant application: “Attended the XYZ conference in an out-of-the-way place.” But it gets even better—

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): I am sorry to interrupt the honourable member, but I just say that interjections while members are standing are out of order, and they will not be tolerated.

Hon PETER DUNNE: It gets even better, and I will cite one example. Dr Murray Laugesen, who used to be an assistant director within the Ministry of Health here in Wellington, now resides in the exotic location of Waiheke Island and is a reputed international expert on these matters. He is at every conference that comes up. His name is all over these contracts. We see him popping up all over the show. When the Ministry of Health wants to consult an independent adviser on tobacco control policy, whom does it consult? It consults the Dr Laugesens of this world. It is not only incestuous; it is far more than $2.1 million—this is just the tip of the iceberg.

What we have here is an agenda that this bill reflects—and I say this with deference to the member promoting it, because I know she took it over from another member—that the members in charge of the bill are not even fully aware of. They are simply promoting legislation that has been drafted—not by the Government—by Government officials who have a vested interest and an absolute determination to rort the system to get their goals. They find a member who is prepared to take on the sponsorship of this bill, and we end up in this situation. So the revelations last week, shocking as they are, should not come as a great surprise. This practice has been going on for well over a decade. One has only to look at the constant traipsing of people to these international gatherings to see who they are, what they actually seek to achieve, and the frequency with which they pop up again in search of the next research grant.

The point that needs to be considered by the State Services Commission, and by the Auditor-General if he is involved in a review, is not just the specific contract but the whole culture that gives rise to this sort of behaviour, because it is insidious, it is deep, and it is sinister. What it is doing is causing the sort of situation we are seeing promoted in this bill—a situation where nonsense rather than common sense becomes the norm.

Before the bell rings, I want to congratulate Mr Carter on his thoroughness in the amendments he has moved. I hope they are well considered by the Committee. Equally, Katherine Rich put herself on the line by going around every pub in Otago to gain first-hand experience in this matter. That shows the dedication of those members. More important, as this morning’s Dominion Post featured and as a TV3 programme a couple of weeks ago featured, the more one goes out there and talks to people who are affected, the more one gets two reactions: first: “This is nonsense. It will not work. It will be ignored.”, and, secondly: “We do not support what is going on.” Parliament’s choice this evening is either to stand with those people, or to stand with the people on the consultancy gravy train and simply rack up further dollars in their interests.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): I call the honourable member Dail Jones.

GERRY BROWNLEE (National—Ilam): I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. I do not want to argue the issue, as I spoke before of your prowess in the Chair, but you will find that New Zealand First has had at least one call on this part so far, and, in the order of things, we would expect the call to return to the National Party so that we might rotate through the parties one more time.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): I thank the honourable member and say that I have looked at the proportionality. The National Party has had four speeches and New Zealand First has had one.

GERRY BROWNLEE: Do not get carried away by the polls, Mr Chairman! The fact is the National Party is four times as big as that party. I am serious about this. We are not going to have presiding officers start to make rulings on the basis of polling information, because it is spurious. I am a senior member of the National Party—a front-bench member. I have a contribution to make, and I do expect to be recognised very soon.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): Thank you.

DAIL JONES (NZ First): I am new to the way things are being done these days. Of course, when I was here in the old days, we would ask: “What’s a lobby group?” We had never heard of a lobby group in those days. We never had any money, and, as for giving money away to a lobby group, if a member had gone up to Sir Robert Muldoon and said that he or she wanted to give money to a lobby group to lobby for anything, well, that member would have been marched out of this place. The white coats would have come to take the member away. But now that I have come back here to Wellington, I find that the Government not only has set up lobby groups but has set up lobby groups so ex-Government officials can go out and lobby for Government policy. Is the Government not good enough to be able to do that for itself? It is not good enough to be able to do that itself so it has to try to get these lobby groups, by way of subterfuge, to try to fool members. I was probably fooled myself. I received a letter from the Quit Group. That is what the Government should do with this bill—quit it. I did not notice before, but I see from the letter now that the Quit Group is a charitable trust formed by the Cancer Society of New Zealand, the Health Sponsorship Council, and Te Hotu Manawa Māori.

R Doug Woolerton: Who are they?

DAIL JONES: I have no idea. “... Public money to reduce smoking in New Zealand.” In the letter the group told me I should support this bill. I asked what its authority was for me to do that. Its report, has a heading: “Socially Cued Smoking and Quitting. Preliminary Findings”—

Hon Ken Shirley: Who wrote the report?

DAIL JONES: Well, I opened it up and read in the introduction: “Tobacco smoking is a leading cause of preventable death in New Zealand. Ministry of Health, 2002. To counter this, an organised tobacco control programme has existed in New Zealand since the mid-1980s.” The report came out in 2002, but the programme started in the mid 1980s. It is a little out of kilter there. In brackets it states: “Laugesen and Swinburn, 2000”. I thought: “Ministry of Health, 2002; that has to be good.”, so I asked the library whether I could read that Ministry of Health report 2002, which surely must have volumes on the effects of smoking and second-hand smoke. The report has about 36 pages. I kept turning the pages—I will not do that now and take up time—and finally I got to page 25. This is supposed to be the definitive Ministry of Health report on the subject in terms of the report recommended to me. This is the authoritative document. This is what I am supposed to rely on as a result of this consultative group. It states: “Past exposure to second-hand smoke is estimated to be responsible for about 347 deaths per year in New Zealand. Second-hand smoke is therefore …”. We have an estimation, then we see “therefore …”. In a court of law people would be absolutely laughed out. I think in any sane place people would be laughed out. “Second-hand smoke is therefore the cause of death comparable to melanoma of the skin, about 200 deaths per year, and the number of people killed each year on the roads, 509 deaths in 1997.” Who is the authority? Woodward and Laugesen 2001. Here is another one: “Exposure to second-hand cigarette smoke increases the risk of heart disease and stroke; Benita at al 1999 Lung Cancer and Since.” They just quote other reports. That is the way this industry goes. One report just quotes another report. It just goes round in a circle. We never get any facts.

I went to the trouble of getting something written by Alistair Woodward and Murray Laugesen, How Many Deaths are Caused by Second-hand Smoke?. In the results section of the whole thing it states: “We do not know how total mortality varies with changing levels of exposure to SHS.” That does not stop them making a decision. They say that they do not know how total mortality varies, but that does not stop them making a decision. Again, in their methods they talk about: “Information on disease risks from SHS was sought by searching the scientific literature.” When people do a research they do it on actual cases. They do not go searching the literature, which other people have written, so that they can write about it. What a load of nonsense!

GERRY BROWNLEE (National—Ilam): This is a disgraceful bill that has been totally discredited by the allegations of corruption that surround it.

Dianne Yates: Rubbish!

GERRY BROWNLEE: We have just heard from the retiring member for Hamilton East—and we wish her well in her retirement. People in this country need to understand that this is a member’s bill. The Government, apparently, does not want anything to do with it. However, just like the prostitution legislation, the Government managed to go along to the people’s pot—the big pile of excess tax that it has taken out of the pockets of workers—and scrape up a big fist full of dollars, which it has thrown at Action on Smoking and Health and various other institutions that have gone around the countryside trying to lobby MPs into taking a particular position.

I say to any MPs in this Committee who have listened to that lobbying and now know that they were the victims of direct Government propaganda from the Minister of Health, and from this particular member, that they are participating in a very corrupt practice and should remove themselves from the voting register at the end of this bill. However, we know that they will not because underneath all of this is the big stick of Helen Clark saying to her caucus: “Do as I say or get out.” This bill is just not a reasonable bill. Now, I do not particularly like cigarette smoke. I do not choose to go into a smoky bar and stay there if I do not like it. I do not choose to walk around with a packet of cigarettes rolled up in the cuff my T-shirt, and do not particularly enjoy other people puffing their cigarette smoke into my face. But I do not need a bill like this that absolutely prevents people from participating in that activity in order to protect my best interests. I do not need that.

I want to talk about the purpose of the bill, which is relitigated under Part 2, “Amendments to Part II of the principal Act”. In new Part 1 we have this extraordinary statement: “The purposes of this part are—(a) to prevent the detrimental effect of other people’s smoking on the health of people in workplaces, or in certain public enclosed areas, who do not smoke or do not wish to smoke there;” Well, I will tell members something. When I arrive at Parliament on a Tuesday morning from Christchurch I do not want to get out of the cab and be assaulted by the cigarette smoke of all those who gather underneath the steps of Parliament outside the rubber door, smoke their cigarettes, blow their smoke all over me and everybody else, and throw their filthy butts on the ground. But that will be the effect of this bill in almost every workplace around this country. We will be in an extraordinarily grubby country as a result of this stupid legislation.

Hon Maurice Williamson: It is only their cigarette butts.

GERRY BROWNLEE: Yes, it is only their cigarette butts that they are throwing around, so Mr Williamson should calm down and show no excitement. I read on: (c) to prevent the detrimental effect of other people’s smoking on the health of young people who are being taught or cared for in registered schools, or early childhood centres.” There is nothing with that. No one wants to see a teacher in a classroom puffing away on a cigarette. No one wants to see the childcare person at the day-care centre sucking on a cigarette with the baby bouncing on the knee. But what about when those people have their break? What about when they go out and they want to have a cigarette? We cannot, on the one hand, say that smoking is a terrible addiction but, on the other hand, ignore the effects of that addiction. I do not want my children in the day-care centre suffering because a teacher at the day-care centre is so strung out for want of a cigarette in the car park or outside somewhere during a break in his or her day. If this legislation is going to put those people into really stressful situations, how will that advance the welfare of the children in their care?

Steve Chadwick: Ha, ha!

GERRY BROWNLEE: The member advancing this bill laughs. What fascinates me is that the member is actually laughing at the huge business community in New Zealand known as the hospitality industry.

CRAIG McNAIR (NZ First): I want to—

Paul Adams: I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. Has not New Zealand First already had two calls, before a return call to United Future?

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): I am looking at the proportionality of those speaking. New Zealand First is roughly half the size of the National Party, therefore it is within its proportionality to get this call. I have noted that the member is seeking the call.

Sue Kedgley: I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. You will notice when you look at proportionality that the Green Party has not spoken once in this debate.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): The member is absolutely right. I am sorry; I missed the member. But I will certainly make sure that that is rectified next time. I apologise.

CRAIG McNAIR: First of all, I look over at the other side, and I want to thank my party and my leadership for being allowed to be in a party that can actually exercise its conscience. I am very glad and proud to be in a party in which I can exercise my conscience either way on an issue as important as this. Unlike some other parties and certain bills, such as the prostitution legislation the great abstainer Ashraf Choudhary—[Interruption]

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): Running commentaries are out of order. Members should look at Speaker’s ruling 51/5(3).

CRAIG McNAIR: Unlike in other parties, where at the last minute members have pressure put on them on bills like the prostitution legislation, and where they are not actually allowed to express their freedom of vote, I am very proud to be in a party that allows us to do that. Earlier on I voted for all pieces of this legislation. However, as I thought about this bill—and this was a decision I came to by myself, with my own conscience—and as I thought about what it did—[Interruption] No, there was no leaning on me, and that is why, as I said, I am proud to be in a party that allows me to exercise my conscience. As I looked at this bill I realised how selfish I was, and I had to ask myself the question: who am I to impose my view?

I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. It is amazing—this is the first time in this Chamber that I have not been able to hear myself talk.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): I have called the members to order, and I ask them to desist. This debate appears to be rather raucous, and I have noted that—and I have noted the members who have made the most noise.

CRAIG McNAIR: I notice that running commentaries, as you said earlier, were going on and on. You actually did not pull the members to order in what I believe was a reasonable amount of time. I ask you to be more decisive on that, if that is all right, just as a suggestion.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): I take on board what the member said, and I am looking at someone very close to him.

Hon Maurice Williamson: I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. There is a very, very clear Standing Order in this Chamber that members cannot move from their seat in order to interject on a person speaking at a closer proximity. I would have thought there was a very immediate corollary to that, which says that a member cannot move from his seat so he can be closer to the people who are interjecting on him. This member has moved closer to the interjectors and is now complaining about them. I think that if you want to be fair you should make him go back to his seat and let him then resume his speech so that the members interjecting are not found to be closer to him.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): I thank the member for his fine contribution. The member is entitled to sit in any seat that has been allocated to his party. He is entitled to do that. I have ruled on it and I am not taking any more points of order unless it is about something different.

CRAIG McNAIR: I should not impose my will on other people, because I have never really been an avid smoker. I have smoked a cigarette here and there, and I probably have to admit that I have inhaled tobacco smoke.

Sue Kedgley: Was it cannabis?

CRAIG McNAIR: No, it was not cannabis. We have listened to different people speaking in this Chamber, especially the Green Party members. Sue Kedgley, who is sitting close to me, spoke about different smoking toys that she sees at $2 shops and places like that. As she was talking about that I thought: “OK, maybe you have a good point, people shouldn’t be selling those kinds of smoking toys in $2 shops and all that.” But then I thought back to the many articles that I have read about different MPs in the Green Party. One particular MP who has a half ownership in a shop does not mind selling organic P. One can buy organic P, bongs, or different things.

Simon Power: What are bongs?

CRAIG McNAIR: They are devices that people use to inhale certain kinds of drugs. I started to think of the word that we talk about outside the Chamber—inside the Chamber it is called the “h” word. The Chairperson knows about it; it is in the Standing Orders. I also started to look at the research on this whole issue, because research has been talked about a lot in this debate. It is very important that we listen to what the so-called experts—Action on Smoking and Health—are saying about second-hand smoke.

SUE KEDGLEY (Green): We have a lot of MPs in this Parliament who sound like King Canute trying to stem the turning tide. I might say that every effort is being made to filibuster and delay this bill. Every little trick in the book is being used. I want members to know that, as per usual, the parties that are trying to filibuster and delay this bill are completely out of touch with public opinion. The overwhelming majority of New Zealanders are counting the days until this bill is passed. Frankly, they are frustrated by the petty politicking that is taking place in this Chamber, and the efforts to delay and filibuster the passage of this bill.

We have heard a lot about Action on Smoking and Health and the horrors of that organisation and its lobbying. I want to talk about another form of lobbying, which I regard as equally horrifying, and that is the lobbying by the tobacco industry in New Zealand. We have this document that we actually know quite a lot about. George Thomson and Dr Nick Wilson analysed documents and produced a very, very exhaustive report, and I hope all members have read it—The Tobacco Industry in New Zealand: A Case Study of the Behaviour of Multinational Corporations. It reveals that the tobacco industry used every single trick in the book over the last number of decades to oppose every form of tobacco control, to try to influence the political process. It has tried to conceal evidence of the harm of cigarettes, even when it has had absolutely unequivocal knowledge of the harmful and addictive nature of cigarettes. It has tried to conceal the evidence of harm. It has objected to health warnings. It has misled the public about the very real issues involved in second-hand smoke, and so on and so forth.

Quite frankly I would like to see a State Services Commission report investigating this particular report. I would like to see the State Services Commission investigating the potential corruption of the tobacco industry in seeking to influence the political parties in this Parliament in seeking to undermine every effort to restrict the tobacco industry in New Zealand. Perhaps that is why we have a member of British American Tobacco here listening to the debate tonight, and a public relations representative from Philip Morris. No doubt they are absolutely enchanted by the arguments that some members of this Parliament are putting up tonight—the discredited arguments from the tobacco industry.

We do need to get a balance here. On the one hand we have a group that is lobbying to try to restrict the amount of tobacco that is sold in New Zealand, and on the other hand we have a whole industry that is trying to influence the decisions of members of this Parliament, and trying to sell as much as they possibly can of their product, which they know is addictive and harmful. If we had full disclosure of all political party contributions, then I think we could have a very, very interesting investigation of potential corruption in this regard. But unfortunately we do not have full disclosure so we will never know what—

R Doug Woolerton: I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. The last time I looked at Speakers’ rulings it was not the done thing to accuse anybody or any party in this Chamber of corruption.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): That is right. Members cannot accuse any party in the Chamber of corruption. There is a Speaker’s ruling on it.

SUE KEDGLEY: I am very well aware of that. I was making a debating point about my concern. I did not accuse any individual party or MP in this Chamber.

Peter Brown: I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. It is unacceptable to make a general statement and condemn everybody as guilty when she has no evidence whatsoever. We are sick of the Greens. When Nandor Tanczos first came to this House he said we were drunk under the influence, and he would not name anybody. That is an appalling tactic, and New Zealand First demands that she withdraws and apologises.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): Can I just say to the honourable member concerned that under Speaker’s ruling 23/4 it is not proper to make veiled threats of corruption. It is out of order. The member will withdraw.

SUE KEDGLEY: I will withdraw and apologise, but—

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): No—offence has been taken, and it can be ruled under Standing Order 117.

SUE KEDGLEY: It can, but there are also issues of debating points. I have already withdrawn and apologised. I have already done so.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): I require the member to withdraw.

SUE KEDGLEY: But I have already withdrawn and apologised. I have done it twice now. Everyone is getting very sensitive on this issue. They are quite happy to call—

Hon Peter Dunne: I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. You have just required the member to withdraw and apologise, which she has done.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): I have not called the member yet. I am conscious that some members try to break up other members’ speeches. They are only 5-minute speeches, and I will not tolerate frivolous points of order. If it is genuine, I am more than happy. I call the honourable member Peter Dunne.

Hon Peter Dunne: I have two points. Firstly, when hearing a point of order it is customary not to penalise the member who is speaking in terms of time, and I would assume that that would apply in this instance. Secondly, the point I was raising was that you had just required the member to withdraw and apologise for comments that she had made, and she did so. The convention is that the member then moves on. The member immediately proceeded to comment on the ruling that had just been given by saying that some people were pretty twitchy about that, and that was reopening the subject. She should be brought back to order and told that once she has withdrawn and apologised, that is the end of the matter, and she moves on to her next point.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): Thank you. The member had withdrawn and apologised, and she was called. She may continue her speech. She has 30 seconds to go.

SUE KEDGLEY: We do need to get this into perspective. We do need to realise that there is a deliberate effort to filibuster this bill, and that the overwhelming majority of New Zealanders strongly support the bill. Frankly, they are appalled by the efforts to undermine a piece of public health legislation that many doctors have said will do more to improve the health of New Zealanders than any other single piece of legislation in this Parliament.

Dr LYNDA SCOTT (National—Kaikoura): We were listening before to speakers telling us about the good old days.

Hon Ken Shirley: I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. I note your attempt at adherence to proportionality. However, I have been calling consistently. Since I have been here the National Party has had four calls. You have not called ACT once since I have been here.

Peter Brown: I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): No, I do not need any help with this. I say to the member that the National Party has had six calls and ACT has had two. That is directly in line with proportionality.

Peter Brown: I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. I do not mean to interrupt the doctor’s speech, but she has already had one call on this part of the debate, and there are others who have not had any.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): I can assure the member that the honourable member Dr Linda Scott has not had a call on this part, and under the suspension of Standing Order 178 she is entitled to have another call if the Chair so desires. I have made my ruling.

Peter Brown: She has had more than the one call.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): Not on this part. I am sorry. I stand corrected.

Peter Brown: Am I right again?

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): The member is right, and I apologise.

Dr LYNDA SCOTT: Dail Jones was talking before about the good old days. I have to say that recently I was on the Speaker’s tour to Japan and it really did take me back, because we were in a select committee room at the Diet and on the table were a whole lot of cigarettes.

Simon Power: How were they?

Dr LYNDA SCOTT: I did not bother to have one, but some of the members of Parliament did light up. That really did take me back to the days when even our workplaces were not smoke-free. I can remember those days and having to get in the car with my mum when she was smoking, and how dreadful that was. I think that New Zealand has come a very long way, because 70 percent of New Zealanders no longer smoke, and that is a very good thing.

I shall tell members a bit more about my mum. She suffered from every single complication from smoking that one could possibly imagine. First off, she had a heart attack, then clots from her heart attack went to her brain so that she had strokes. She tried her best to give up smoking, but she could not. It then got to the point where she had an aortic aneurysm—she was only in her sixties when all this was happening—and then they told us she would lose her legs if she did not stop smoking. But still she could not stop smoking. She died suddenly from another stroke before she could give up. [Interruption] It was not. It was the smoking. People have to understand that smoking is extremely bad for their health, and so is second-hand smoke. If we can stop any young person from smoking, that is a very good thing, and that will save this country millions of dollars in health dollars.

I am extremely disappointed about what we found out last week about the Ministry of Health contracts. Many anti-smoking groups and non-government organisations have had money for health promotion, and no one disagrees with that. No one disagrees with health dollars going to health promotion programmes. But they crossed the line. The State Services Commission has put out a lot of information stating that State sector employees cannot engage in political lobbying, especially political lobbying for Labour members’ bills, and certainly not the prostitution legislation or the smoke-free legislation. That is crossing a line, and the Ministry of Health contracts in 2000 and 2001 were changed to include that.

The Government used a whole lot of spin to try to pretend that the contracts from the 1990s were exactly the same, but they were not. Those clauses were added to lobby for the Smoke-free Environments Amendment Bill. I am speaking for this bill, but the fact is that that line should not have been crossed. They should not have been lobbying for a specific bill. They should not have been seeing MPs, especially the Māori caucus. Where are they tonight? Are they over there standing up for what they believe? We know that people over on that side of the Chamber do not believe in this bill, but they are not standing up for it. I am standing up on this side of the House giving my views and standing up for what I believe in and for my principles. Where are those members today? They are not here. They do not have anything to say. They are probably out having a smoke, but they will not come in here to stand up for the people who put them into Parliament.

Simon Power: Suppressed.

Dr LYNDA SCOTT: They are totally suppressed and totally whipped into shape by this Government. They do not have the courage of their convictions. At least we can vote according to our conscience, but those MPs cannot. They are whipped into line and told what to do, how to think, and they have to toe the line. This is Helen Clark’s bill. She absolutely hates smoking, and that is why we are here.

Simon Power: She’s not a happy person.

Dr LYNDA SCOTT: No, she is not really a happy person. The specific line that was crossed by $2.1 million of scarce health money going to political lobbying should not have been crossed. I hope that the Government will have a real look at changing that type of action. It knows that the State sector cannot do it, so non-government organisations are paid to do its bidding for this member’s bill, and it is just not acceptable. I shall tell members a little bit about why second-hand smoke affects people when they go into a pub.

Hon KEN SHIRLEY (Deputy Leader—ACT): This bill is obnoxious. It is all about nanny State going too far. I am a non-smoker and I always have been a non-smoker. In fact, everyone in the ACT caucus is a non-smoker.

R Doug Woolerton: Fools!

Hon KEN SHIRLEY: However, we oppose this legislation. I know that Mr Woolerton is the heaviest smoker in the Parliament.

Peter Brown: He’s given up.

Hon KEN SHIRLEY: I thought that he had put on weight recently. Be that as it may, this bill goes too far. The point has been made about the tobacco lobby. We know that internationally it has been a very heavy lobby. I put it to members that no one in this House has experienced that more first-hand than myself. I used to represent 100 percent of New Zealand tobacco growers, as the MP for Tasman when I first came into this Parliament in 1984. There were several hundred tobacco growers in the Motueka district, and it was a very thriving industry with two processing factories. One of the first functions I went to as a newly elected member was the Tobacco Growers Federation annual conference, sponsored by Philip Morris and Rothmans, and all the big international heavyweights were there.

I got up as an eager, young new member and gave a speech, and I made a prediction. I said that their industry was heading for the rocks for two reasons: the tariff protection would come off, and the health issue would be significant—though no one believed it in those days. I was literally invited to leave the meeting. I will never forget that experience.

But those two issues did come to pass, and we have come a long way since that time. I do believe that people should be educated against the health risks and problems, but that issue aside, this bill is no more than the nanny State going too far and seeking absolute control of people’s lives and intruding into their basic freedoms. Although I myself do not smoke, I would defend Mr Woolerton’s right to smoke. I would defend his right to smoke, even though he says he has given up. Has Mr Peters has given up also?

Rt Hon Winston Peters: That’s my business.

Hon KEN SHIRLEY: Mr Peters has not given up, by the sound of it, but perhaps one day, he will give it up also. But he is quite right: it is his business, and I respect it as his business. Down in Courtenay Place there are many places where people can continue to smoke. I am told that people can go down to Courtenay Place in the wee small hours—when I am tucked up in bed—where they can smoke, drink their whisky, and have a good time. I defend their right to do that. So, we have established that; that is very good.

However, what does concern me is the taint and ooze of corruption emanating from this Government. It is nauseating. When I look at what my colleague Rodney Hide revealed in recent weeks, it is appalling.

David Benson-Pope: Where is Rodney tonight? Is he back in Fiji?

Hon KEN SHIRLEY: Here is Mr Benson-Pope from Dunedin.

Peter Brown: The fountain of all knowledge.

Hon KEN SHIRLEY: The fountain of all knowledge! He is the joke of the Parliament. He cannot help himself; he has to start interjecting. For Mr Benson-Pope’s benefit, this is appalling corruption of public officials. And for the Government of the day, it is occurring on its watch. It is not as if it is a sole incident. We saw with the Action on Smoking and Health contracts, some $2,114,500 of public moneys being given by the Government, through agencies of the Government, to lobby groups to lobby for a particular outcome on what is meant to be a member’s bill but is looking more and more like a Government bill with each day. That is appalling.

I say to the member in the chair, Steve Chadwick, who is the sponsor of this bill, that she should be ashamed of herself. However, I would remind the Committee of the shop trading hours legislation. The funniest speech I have ever heard in this Parliament came from Steve Chadwick on that bill. She spent the first half of her speech saying why Easter shopping was appalling and should not be permitted, but should be totally banned, and then she said that there should be an exemption for Rotorua.

Hon MAURICE WILLIAMSON (National—Pakuranga): I start off by acknowledging Craig McNair’s speech—

Rt Hon Winston Peters: I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson.

Hon MAURICE WILLIAMSON: Give us a break, Winston. This is my first speech in months, and I get 10 seconds.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: I know, and I am here to help. I seek leave for Mr Williamson, because he is not being given a fair go, to have a 30-minute speech if he so wishes.

Hon MAURICE WILLIAMSON: Craig McNair said something interesting. He said he was grateful to be in a party that gave him the choice as to how he voted, and he also asked himself the question of how he would vote. I want to paraphrase that: I feel lucky that I have allowed myself to have a free choice on this issue tonight. I have asked myself the same question, and I have decided I will vote against this bill because I think it is a bloody stupid bill.

However, I also want to pick up on the comments made by Katherine Rich, who is a list MP, and who said she assiduously went through Otago doing a pub crawl, to find out what the views there were. I want to tell her that as a good constituent MP, I do not do that just as a one-off; I do that on a regular, regular basis. I crawl the pubs of my electorate at least once a week, making sure that I keep a finger on the pulse—I think I would call it that—of what my electorate wants. I want to bring up one example of what it wants. I have put in an amendment for this one example, so I hope Labour members listen to this carefully.

The Howick Returned Services Association came to me at my constituency office and said it desperately needed my help. The old diggers there are smokers. Lots and lots of them—

Jill Pettis: Are dying.

Hon MAURICE WILLIAMSON: I hear Jill Pettis. I thought Wednesday was her day for elocution lessons, so I do not know what she is still doing here. The old diggers in their 90s—she says they are dying; well, they got to that age—are smokers. What did the Howick Returned Services Association do to try to comply with all the lunatic laws that are coming around? It has spent a fortune on air conditioning systems that evacuate the air every so many seconds, and put purified air back down. It has a special end where no smoke goes, and the non-smokers can go down there. It has another end where, the moment that smoke comes out of your gob, it goes up into a machine and is gone. It has surveyed its members—let us remember this is not just a club where people can walk in off the street; this is a club for members or people who are signed in—and 96 percent said they wanted to keep the option of being able to smoke.

I have not done a formal survey of the club’s members, but I can tell the Committee, because of the reception I get there sometimes, that I would say that the vast bulk of them are Labour Party supporters. And are they dirty on the Labour Party members who are not going to let them have that choice any more! They are a closed group of club members only. They have spent a fortune on air purifiers. Many of them are addicted simply because they were forced into smoking when they were off fighting a war for our freedom—where is the irony in that? They went to war to fight for our freedom, and now we are telling them we are sorry, but we will take their freedom away. They are quite adamant that at the end of the lovely food hall where people can eat, there is a proper no-smoking area that is adhered to. People can go and have a meal without having smoke blown in their face. Another end of the bar is a non-smoking end, and the air there is as crisp and as clear as can be found anywhere. In fact, out on the Pakuranga highway there is more smoke from the fumes of cars than one would ever actually get from cigarettes. But what does this member, Steve Chadwick, and her Labour members say to those old diggers? They say: “We are sorry that you became addicted to something years ago. It is probably not even your own fault, because it was foisted on you when you were in the military. We are sorry that you happen to have lived to 97, because smoking kills—though it did not happen to get you. But now we will start to decide on your behalf what is right and wrong.”

I say that is a disgrace. The once-proud Labour Party should be ashamed tonight. I know there are members over on the Government side of the Chamber who openly say in the corridors of this Parliament that the Government is a disgraceful outfit, and that they are all being whipped into line. I think it is now time for them to front up. It is time for them to face up to this Committee and say they will not be forced into something.

I think it is fine to prohibit smoking when there are no other options. I think smoke-free aeroplanes are correct. I want to let members know I am not a smoker—never have been—and I do not like it. When people are in an environment where they do not have a choice, then I am happy for it to be smoke-free. The air on an aeroplane circulates around and around; the same air goes through the conditioning systems, and people end up smoking someone else’s smoke. But what if one wants to go out to a restaurant? I do not like smoke, so I particularly choose restaurants where there is either a non-smoking section or a light level of smoke in the air, and that is what the situation should be.

JILL PETTIS (Junior Whip—Labour): I move, That the question be now put.

PAUL ADAMS (United Future): This is the first time I have spoken on this bill.

Simon Power: Is this the real Paul Adams?

PAUL ADAMS: This is Paul Adams of United Future. I am very proud to be in United Future, the common-sense party. That is the party I am speaking on behalf of now. I hope to bring some common sense to the debate on the Smoke-free Environments Amendment Bill. I commend Steve Chadwick for the work that she has done on this bill. I am also a non-smoker, and there will be a conscience vote in our party on this legislation. As the debate has gone on I have had to weigh it up, but in the end I have had to look at this issue with my commerce spokesperson’s hat on.

I see that 388 deaths are caused by exposure to second-hand smoke in New Zealand each year. That is a symptom of smoking. But I find that in a lot of legislation that goes through this House—which United Future, with its common-sense policy, will stand against—people look at symptoms, and refuse to look at the causes of problems. Let us take cancer, something that is often spoken about when dealing with this type of legislation. We can deal with the symptoms of cancer all we like, but until we remove the cause of the cancer we have not removed the problem.

Rt Hon Winston Peters: Which is?

PAUL ADAMS: Smoking can be a cause of cancer, but my father has smoked cigarettes all his life and is now well into his 80s. He had a chest X-ray not so long ago, and there were no signs of any effects of his smoking over all those years. So I have had to look at smoking from a common-sense perspective.

If we are concerned with deaths in this nation, we should look at the problem from another angle. My dad drove all his life and, unlike his son, was a very careful and sensible driver, often driving 1½ to 2 hours only. He would pull off the side of the road to do what was correct in his time: take a refreshment. He would often go inside a building and, being a smoker, he would light up. Now, if this legislation goes through, he would go in and, instead of having a smoke, he would have a beer. He could have as high a blood-alcohol level as he is allowed, and—whoop-de-do—he would have saved people’s lives because he had not lit up a cigarette in the bar of the establishment, but had taken the time to have a few pints. He could then gleefully go back out on to the road, knowing that he had saved lives because he had refused to smoke. [Interruption] Members need to have a few good preachers in this place to stir them up a bit, and to get some common sense back into the place. That is what preaching is; it is common-sense. That is why people respond to it. So my old dad could go back on to the road with a system full of alcohol. [Interruption] I say to members of the Opposition that that really gets us going. They should keep it up. My old dad could go back on the road with alcohol in his system. Where is the common sense in that?

If we are really enacting legislation because we are concerned with the lives of New Zealanders, members should ask themselves whether it is common-sense that people who fought for the nation and who have laid down their lives for it cannot, in their latter years, go to their clubs and have a smoke. I will vote against this legislation, not because I am a smoker but because I believe it takes away the right of choice from people and is anti-business. Why should a business that has built itself up as a smokers’ bar—a cigar bar that people can choose to go into—have legislation come through that stands against it?

Hon Maurice Williamson: Hallelujah!

PAUL ADAMS: Did the member like that one?

Hon Members: Mr Chair!

PAUL ADAMS: I have not finished yet. Many things are detrimental to our health, such as being abused in the House, as many members do to each other. If members did that in the workplace, they would not be able to get away with it. But we somehow chose to come to this wonderful establishment and stand here getting verbally abused by those who stand against us, and we respond to it. But we have chosen to come here.

SIMON POWER (National—Rangitikei): That was extraordinary. I do not know whether I feel saved or whether I need a shower. The issues in this bill are serious enough for me to have raised them in my electorate of Rangitikei. This is the first time I have taken a call on this bill at all, in the entire time it has been before Parliament. I have been away from Parliament, but I have tabled an amendment today to exclude the Cheltenham tavern from the provisions of this bill. That is important for two reasons. I address these comments primarily to the member in the chair, because they are important points to make.

The Cheltenham tavern, also known locally as the “Chelty”, stands on the route between Feilding and Taupo, at the bottom of Vinegar Hill. The “Chelty” is a pub where local farmers and workers gather on a Thursday, Friday, and Saturday night to talk about the events of the district and what is happening in Government, and to reflect on the day’s work.

Hon Maurice Williamson: And three out of four of them smoke.

SIMON POWER: Four out of four of them smoke, I say to Mr Williamson. I say to the member in the chair that I called at that tavern—not unlike my colleague Maurice Williamson, who does a thorough job of canvassing the taverns in his electorate—not 2 weeks ago, to find that on the wall of the tavern was an article about the legislation that is being put forward by that particular member, and that the people in the tavern were furious about the legislation. They were absolutely livid. They had a very simple view, which was—if I may paraphrase it and speak in the first person—“I work 60 to 70 hours a week on farms as a labourer, a shearer, a docker, a manager, etc. When I have finished my work at the day’s end and I want to go and have a beer and a cigarette at the ‘Chelty’, no politically correct member of Parliament from Rotorua is going to tell me whether or not I can stand in my local tavern and have a cigarette, after a long week’s work.”

The members on the Government side of the Chamber—in particular, Damien O’Connor as Associate Minister of Agriculture—should listen very carefully to what those members of our community are saying. He knows that people on the West Coast think this legislation is just absolute rubbish. It is not that those people believe that smoking is not bad for them, but that they believe they have a fundamental right to make the choice about whether to have a smoke with their beer at the end of the day. They do not need politicians from the Government side of the House to tell them whether they have earned the right to have a cigarette with their beer.

As the local member of Parliament for those people, I propose an amendment—which I urge common-sense members on the Government side of the Chamber to vote for—that will allow the people at the “Chelty” to have a cigarette when they have their jug, after they have done the work that provides those members with the surpluses they need for their spending on ridiculous social programmes all around New Zealand that benefit nobody, other than the union people who put them here in the first place. Those members should remember the people in communities like that, who provide Government members with the surpluses they need to do their jobs. They have a right to have a cigarette with a beer at the end of a hard day’s work if they wish, and Government members should think long and hard about imposing on the backbone of this country the goody two-shoes, politically correct, flim-flam nonsense that we see in legislation like this.

I say to Steve Chadwick that those people know how to run their lives better than she does, and she should let them get on with learning how to run their lives in a way that makes them happy. She should not burden them with ridiculous legislation that is paid for by those people, who only want to enjoy themselves at the end of a hard week’s work. I say to Government members that this bill is a disgrace. It is an absolute disgrace, and Government members who favour this legislation will, for the reasons that I have outlined, be facing down communities like Cheltenham at the next election. I will be the first on the platform to remind the hard-working farmers and rural people of New Zealand what those Government members did to their pint of beer, at the end of a hard week’s work.

MARTIN GALLAGHER (Labour—Hamilton West): I move, That the question be now put.

PETER BROWN (Deputy Leader—NZ First): We have heard at least twice in this debate that the vast majority of the public will support this legislation. So why did the people who support it turn down the opportunity to give the public a referendum, as we proposed? If there is confidence that the public will support the bill, let us give them the chance to support it.

I listened to Dr Scott in her two contributions. She is way out of line, and clearly does not understand what this bill is all about. But at least she had the gumption to defend the bill. I do not hear anybody from the Government defending it. It was a very pathetic speech from the member in the chair, and she failed to address—

Hon David Carter: Inaccurate, too.

PETER BROWN: It was inaccurate, and she failed to address the questions that have been raised in this Chamber. I will put them to her right now, so that she clearly understands them. I will speak slowly, so that Steve Chadwick understands them clearly. My first question is this: did the member know that public money was funding the lobby groups that are lobbying MPs to support this bill? This Committee deserves to be given an answer to that question. If she knew that, why did she not disclose it when she was asked? If she did not—

Hon Maurice Williamson: The whip is telling her what to say.

PETER BROWN: Well, if she takes notice of the whip telling her what to say, she is less of a person than I give her credit for. If she did not know about the use of that public money, why did she not support the bill going back to the Health Committee, as proposed by Peter Dunne, in order that the lobby groups could front up to the committee? Those are three questions, and I ask her to take a call and address each one of them.

This bill is a disgrace to Parliament, and it is a disgrace to Government members. I wonder why Damien O’Connor sits there and supports such garbage.

Hon Maurice Williamson: He won’t support it.

PETER BROWN: Will he not? I would like to think that he will not, but he will sit over there on the Government benches and undermine the working people in this country—and he is a working man. This Government, right now—

Shane Ardern: A long time ago, Peter.

PETER BROWN: A long time ago? This Government is funding lobby groups to advocate that we stop smoking. I think that everybody in this Parliament would discourage people from smoking—even the people who smoke. We would not encourage people to smoke, but we do not believe in imposing our will on everybody. The Government pays money to the lobby groups; it pays the Prostitutes Collective between $50,000 and $60,000 a month to encourage prostitution. That is where this country is going—where this Labour Government is taking us. This legislation is an imposition on law-abiding citizens—the people who fought for this country in the war.

I ask members this: who will police this legislation? Will Government members go along to gang headquarters when people are having a cigarette there, and say to gang members that they will be taken to court and fined for smoking? But they will go next door to the Returned Services Association—

Hon Damien O'Connor: Read the bill.

PETER BROWN: Will Damien O’Connor go to the Returned Services Association? Will he walk in and tell people to put their fags out, or otherwise he will take the manager to court? Will he do that, or will he rely on someone else having the gumption to do so? Will Damien O’Connor walk into Returned Services Association premises where one or two people are smoking, and put the manager on the skids?

R Doug Woolerton: No, he won’t.

PETER BROWN: No, he will not. He will depend on someone else to put the pot on. Does the Government really believe that this legislation will be policed effectively in the little country areas and the little country pubs?

Hon Ken Shirley: It will be ignored.

PETER BROWN: It will be ignored. It is absolutely stupid to bring in something like this. It is absolutely stupid. Legitimate smokers, who have been law-abiding all their lives, will feel guilty—

R Doug Woolerton: And still are law-abiding.

PETER BROWN: And still are law-abiding—and have to go outside. But the gangs will not do that. They will show the fingers to this Government, and to anybody who wants to stop them smoking wherever and whenever they want to smoke. The only place where people can smoke in this country will be in the prisons. So law-abiding people, if they want to have a smoke indoors in some sort of comfort, will have to commit a crime and go to prison.

Hon Peter Dunne: Or they can go to hospital.

PETER BROWN: Or they can go to hospital. Does that actually make sense to any member sitting over there on the Government benches? Those members should take a call, instead of just sitting there and making inane comments. They should take a call and explain that. Is it reasonable that a guy cannot have a cigarette in Returned Services Association premises, but that if he commits a crime and is put in prison, he can?

DIANNE YATES (Labour—Hamilton East): I move, That the question be now put.

SHANE ARDERN (National—Taranaki - King Country): Who would have thought that we would stand here in the Chamber of this Parliament with a Labour Government that is going to abolish smoko? This trade union - funded Government is going to abolish smoko. Who would ever have thought that? How could one ever have considered that that would happen? Labour members should just think about what the descendants their forebears down on the West Coast of the South Island, where the Labour Party was born, are saying in the Hokitika pub tonight. This Labour Government is to abolish smoko.

To find out what the publicans and the real people of New Zealand think of this legislation, I went out to the Whangamomona pub. I know that the Prime Minister will know where that is—the first republic in New Zealand, the republic of Whangamomona. I asked the publican what he thought, and he said that the legislation was stupid and he would not prohibit smoking. Then I asked the patrons in the bar what they thought, and they said it was absolutely stupid and they would not stop smoking. They said they would ignore the legislation. I asked the horse in the bar what he thought—and he did not answer. So I asked the “republican” what the horse was doing in the bar, and he said that they could not tie him up out on the road because he runs away home, and then the patron has to stay all night because he has no way of getting home. So the horse is brought into the bar, but he had no view on this bill. He was the only one in that pub who did not have a view on this bill. All the rest were opposed to it. I thought that I needed to consult more widely, so I went to the Awakino Hotel and asked its proprietors. The Awakino Hotel was where the 1996 election campaign was run. Its proprietors said that this legislation would close them down; they would not be able to afford to comply with this legislation.

So then I thought that I had better come back into the metropolis of Stratford and ask members of the Returned Services Association what they thought of it. They said they had gone overseas—and my father’s name is registered there; he went with them—and when they were over there, the Parliament of New Zealand issued them with cigarettes to ease the stress. That is what happened to them, and most of them are now addicted. Some of them did not smoke before they went overseas, but the Parliament of New Zealand used to issue them with army cigarettes to ease the stress, and they all came back from the war as smokers—every single one of them. And they said that now the people they fought to defend are telling them that they cannot come into their Returned Services Association premises and enjoy a fag. Here they are in the Returned Services Association premises in Stratford, enjoying themselves and not causing any problems for anybody—not out on the streets causing mayhem like the group that the politically correct group in the Government supports. None of that! They are certainly not protesting naked in front of the Parliament, or doing any of that sort of stuff. They are there in the Returned Services Association premises looking after themselves and minding their own business, and the PC group in the Government is telling them that they cannot have a fag there. They said they have news for the Government: they may be old and small in numbers, but they can still vote that lot out. And if the Government goes ahead with this stupid piece of politically correct legislation, they said that is what they will do. They said the Government only needs to look at that to see where it will be going.

One of the comments earlier on was interesting, when one of my colleagues talked about the camaraderie of returned service people. The senior Government whip asked what the member meant. I know that if one is in the Labour Party one would certainly not know anything about camaraderie—that is for sure. But I also know that Labour members know about comrades. They have learned a lot about comrades over the years—not about camaraderie—and that is what this bill is about. It is about the comrades and the “sisterhood” uniting—for the first time ever, since they have been together—and they are coming up with this legislation to stop the old diggers in the Stratford Returned Services Association from going down there and enjoying a pint and a fag in the last few days that they will have.

My old father went away to the war in 1940 and came back in 1945. He was totally addicted to cigarettes. The monsoon visor in the old Vauxhall was so black that the tar used to drip on top of one. If I ever pulled it down and had a look underneath, then I could not hold my tea down. My father smoked pipes and cigarettes the whole time that I knew him, and I hated it. I absolutely hated that. As a kid growing up—sitting in the back of the old Vauxhall, waiting outside the Returned Services Association, with all the cigarette smoke in there—I hated that. Like most young people I flirted with a bit of cigarette smoking as a young person but did not keep it up for long, as I absolutely hated it. But I can see absolutely no reason for this stupid piece of legislation.

Hon CHRIS CARTER (Minister of Conservation): I move, That the question be now put.

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First): In the old days when Labour was in Opposition, I was used to hearing its constant refrain on every Budget night that the Government was taxing the working man’s pleasures. Labour members would get up and talk about the needs of the hard-working people of this country, and of the right of men and women to have a drink and a cigarette on a Friday night to ease their labours and their toils. Back then, Labour Party members understood working men and women—not like this bunch now, with their pristine hands and their prissy attitudes. Back then, Labour was a party that understood working men and women and their plight, but not this bunch now. They are arrogant, pseudo-intellectual, prying, snooping, attitude cops. That is what they are.

This bill is based on a lie. The member in the chair, Steve Chadwick, knows full well that air extractors would clean the air better than if we had an environment of no smoking at all. The National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research said that, and it is qualified to say it. It is true, but Labour has never been interested in the facts. How come Labour cannot put one statistic behind its argument?

Dianne Yates: We have your health at heart, Winston. We want to save your life.

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: Now that member looks like a serious cigarette smoker, does she not? But she is not, which proves my point.

My point is that if Labour cares about people, why does it not deal with obesity? In 1997, 11,000 people died from obesity-related diseases—about 20 times more than the spurious number that the member keeps putting up. What is Labour doing about diet and obesity? Nothing. We can pig out and eat all we like, but because Labour does not like smoking, it will stop people from doing what will be—in the environment about which we speak—a safe activity for all those who are associated with it.

This bill is based on a lie. The member in the chair, Steve Chadwick, knows full well that it is based on a lie, and that with regard to hotels and restaurants, there is no need for it if the appropriate air extractors are fitted. The member shakes her head. Is she a scientist?

R Doug Woolerton: No.

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: No. Is she an expert?

R Doug Woolerton: No.

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: No. What are her qualifications? What does she do? What makes her an expert? She shakes her head. I hope all the working people in Rotorua come out and punish her at the next election and send her on her way. People who think they can deal with working people that way, without regard for their needs, have, in my view, ideas way above their station. Why is it right that Returned Services Association members, who have put their lives on the line, will not be able to smoke—even though they might be almost unanimous in agreeing that they should be allowed to smoke—yet prisoners can? Is that not a perverted sense of priority? Prisoners can smoke, but war heroes cannot.

Brent Catchpole: They have freedom of choice, obviously.

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: Yes, they have freedom of choice, because this Government is soft on criminals and tough on hard-working, decent, taxpaying New Zealanders. Prisoners may smoke; war heroes may not.

Hon Damien O'Connor: This was your bill.

Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS: Here is the next lie. The member said this was New Zealand First’s bill. He knows full well that when Tukoroirangi Morgan introduced the bill, he had left New Zealand First and was supporting the National Party. The member knows that, so why tell a lie? Why not tell the truth? True or false: was Tukoroirangi Morgan in New Zealand First when he introduced the bill? Yes or no?

Under my leadership, he would have never even have had the bill drafted, because we believe in freedom of choice for all New Zealanders. We believe in the right of people, after a hard working week, to have a few of the working man’s pleasures. But, then again, those prissy people over there know nothing about workers. Most of them think that “manual labour” is the Prime Minister of Mexico. They have never done a decent day’s work in their lives, and it shows.

ROD DONALD (Co-Leader—Green): I move, That the question be now put.

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Clem Simich): I call Heather Roy.

Dianne Yates: She has already spoken, hasn’t she?

HEATHER ROY (ACT): I am lucky, I get to speak twice. There is one thing that has not been pointed out in Part 2—

Peter Brown: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I am sorry to interrupt the good member’s speech, but will you confirm that Heather Roy has had two calls, and that as we are all seeking more, the precedent will be allowed to all of us?

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Clem Simich): It is true, it is a second call.

Rod Donald: Speaking to the point of order, Mr Chairperson—

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Clem Simich): I do not need any assistance on this matter. Heather Roy sought the call. It is her second call, and I have given it to her.

HEATHER ROY: I hope everybody else gets the opportunity to speak twice, too. Part 2, clause 7, refers to new section 17(A), “Penalties”. No one has mentioned these, but I think they are very significant. There was a lot of discussion at the select committee about whether there should be penalties, and the Labour Government did not want any penalties. It wanted law, but that there be no retribution as a result of it. United Future members said they would not support the bill unless there were penalties. The Labour Government must be feeling a little disgruntled about this, I would have thought, because there has been a bit of a U-turn. Here we have a $4,000 fine for establishments that allow smoking within their premises. Originally, we were supposed to have a fine not exceeding $400 for any person not a body-corporate who lit up in any given establishment. An amendment was put forward—by the Green Party, I think—which does not want any individual to be punished for smoking in an establishment.

The Hospitality Association came out—yesterday, I think it was—stating that it was very angry, firstly, about the contracts with Action on Smoking and Health, Apaarangi Tautoko Auahi Kore, and the Smokefree Coalition. The Hospitality Association pays taxes and it has been lobbied against, so the bill will punish it. It will be the body-corporates, establishments, or premises, that will be fined when somebody smokes, but no individual will be responsible. That sends a very strong message to the country, does it not? People are not responsible for their own behaviour in New Zealand any longer.

R Doug Woolerton: It’s socialism.

HEATHER ROY: That is right—we are moving towards “the socialist republic of Aotearoa”, as Richard Prebble is so fond of saying. That is my first point. The other people who are very upset are members of Clubs New Zealand. There are 240,000 members of that association. It sent a letter, and I received mine yesterday—I do not know who else got one. [Interruption] I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. I am finding it very difficult to hear what I am saying.

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Clem Simich): Manners please!

HEATHER ROY: Yes, manners would be good. The first thing that Clubs New Zealand asked was why does the Government accept the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research report on vehicle exhaust emissions, but not its report on the air quality trials at the Bream Bay Club?

Peter Brown: That’s a good question.

HEATHER ROY: I thought it was an extremely good question.

R Doug Woolerton: Because it is selective.

HEATHER ROY: That is exactly right, I thank the member. Gavin Fischer is the leading scientist at the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research, and chairman of the Clean Air Society of Australia and New Zealand, so why is his methodology for the exhaust emissions report acceptable, but his methodology for the report on the Bream Bay Club not acceptable? What is the answer to that question?

Brent Catchpole: Another good question. Do they have the answer to that?

HEATHER ROY: No—well, I am coming to that. The third question is where is the Ministry of Health report that questions his methodology?

R Doug Woolerton: Tell us!

HEATHER ROY: It is non-existent. Roger Parton, the chief executive of Clubs New Zealand, said in a letter to me: “Is any member of Parliament prepared to give a public response to these questions?” Well, we have demonstrated tonight who is prepared to stand up here and give answers to those questions. This side of the House does—that side of the House remains remarkably silent.

Clubs New Zealand had one more question too, and a very important one: what part did anti-smoking campaigners have in the production of the ministry’s report, and if they had a part, how were they funded? They were funded by the taxpayer! The contracts with Action on Smoking and Health, the Smokefree Coalition, Apaarangi Tautoko Auahi Kore, and goodness only knows who else—which might amount to the best part of $13.7 million—have been paid for by you and me. The workers of this country have paid for them to lobby MPs and different people, and the clean-air standards people have been ignored.

Mr Dunne has put forward amendments that would give us a minimum air quality standard, which would have been a very sensible compromise. Everybody on this side of the House acknowledges that, but most of the select committee were adamant that it was not necessary. They took it as read that ventilation systems were not acceptable, but the compromise would have been to have a minimum air quality standard. If that is able to be met, then the ventilation system is obviously adequate, and that should have been perfectly allowable.

Hon MATT ROBSON (Deputy Leader—Progressive): I move, That the question be now put.

RON MARK (NZ First): When people look back on this bill, it’s passage will be characterised by misinformation, by tactics of deception, by tactics of deceit, by practices that the public are saying are corrupt, by bully-boy tactics, by intolerance—that wonderful word the Prime Minister uses so often; she often says how tolerant she is—by hypocrisy, and by stupidity and misguided priorities. Let us deal with the last one—misguided priorities. I would say to the member who has brought this bill to the House that if she is seriously concerned about saving lives—and she likes to tell me how concerned she is about my people—why does she not focus on the two issues that are affecting Māori, diabetes and obesity? More New Zealanders will be killed by those two conditions than by smoking, in spite of the concocted figures she likes to purport are figures that represent deaths caused by smoking.

Then there is intolerance. I am a non-smoker. I dabbled a little bit with smoking when I was at school, but quickly gave it up because I did not like it. Throughout my entire life I have not smoked. However, I live with, associate with, and socialise with good friends, people I know, people I have a lot of time for, who smoke. On the occasions I do not like their smoking, I simply ask them whether they would mind not smoking, and nine times out of 10 they are only too happy to stub out their cigarettes. Tolerance is a factor. I like going to places where people socialise, and if I go into a bar that is smoke-filled, then it is my choice whether I stay. The market on those occasions does dictate. These sorts of tactics are absolutely intolerable. It is intolerable to have a bunch of nannies and others—some of whom will never be nannies as long as their backsides point to the ground—ramming down the throats of people what they should and should not do.

Another factor is deception and deceit. One of the things I cannot stand is listening to Labour Party people who purport to represent working-class people. The facts are now—and everybody is talking about it out there—that this Chardonnay sipping, spa-bath collection of socialists have no more in common with working-class people than the Tories they criticise. Let us see why. In the old days there was a time when labourers, workers, would proudly stop for smoko. “Smoko” now is a banned word. Now those people have to stop for a cup of tea, or maybe to sip some Chardonnay. There used to be a time when shearers would knock off and go outside and have a fag. But, of course, that is different nowadays, because the fags Labour is interested in are totally different things altogether—and that is acceptable, but having a cigarette is not. That just goes to show, and it has been talked about, and I have heard the accounts here of what people have walked into in bars—[Interruption] I say: “Good on you, Chris.”

I went into the Abrahams bar in Lincoln Road—and Mr Robson should listen up, because it is on his illustrious leader’s back door—and there I met a man who is a jockey. [Interruption] I am talking fags and back doors; the member is getting confused. But it is in his own electorate, right? The young man, a jockey, said exactly the same thing that has been recounted by Mr Shane Ardern. He looked at me—he had a cigarette—and said: “Are you going to vote for this stupid smoking law or not?” I replied that I was voting against it. He said: “Good on you, mate.” I then told him: “Your local man here will be voting for it.”, and he said: “Well, yeah, but he’s probably never done a hard day’s work in his life, and he wouldn’t know what it’s like to get up at 4 o’clock in the morning, go and exercise and train horses, work a full day, then go down to the pub and have a beer and a cigarette with his mates.” But, of course, he will not be able to do that any more because these Chardonnay sipping, spa-bath socialists, who no longer go to smoko—they go to morning tea—do not understand that any more.

Those members have done more to attack working-class people through their taxes and levies—which they promised they would never do when they came to power—than any other Government in the past 9 years that they like to ridicule, and that is a fact. I say to those people that they should vote for this legislation, fill their boots, and have their day, because come the next election, I say to Steve Chadwick, when they have finally thrown the white towel we will have our day. All those blue-collar labourers out there, the working-class people, do not like what the Government is doing. They do not like being told how to live their lives, and they do not like the hypocrisy, the stupidity, or the deceit that is wrapped up in this.

KATHERINE RICH (National): I am pleased to take a second call in this debate, and to make the point that elephants never forget—and neither will New Zealanders when this bill goes through. I think it is high time that some members across the way went to visit a public bar and actually talked to people about this bill, and about its impact on their communities.

I have actually been doing a bit of a pub crawl around the Dunedin pubs, and the very interesting thing is to see posters of Mr David Benson-Pope and Mr Pete Hodgson on the walls, with bright lettering saying: “Give us our rights back.” It is interesting to talk to people this bill will have an impact on. A number of them said: “I have voted Labour all my life, but next election I will not forget this, and I am going to change my vote. I don’t like someone interfering with my life and my ability to choose. I work long and hard.” It is interesting to see how out of touch those members are with some of the workers they purport to represent. I say they should get off their butts, step inside a public bar, and have a drink. I doubt that they have even been to a pub in the last few weeks, because if they had they certainly would not be voting for this bill.

It is interesting that this change is being made in the name of safety—the safety of staff. A fascinating thing is that a number of pubs I visited do not have any staff. The people in those pubs say: “This is my home. Why should anybody tell me that I’m not allowed to do what I want to do in my own home?”. I tell members that when I visited the Greater Green Island Town and Country Club, the people there could not understand why this bill allows people to smoke in prisons, in hospitals, and on marae, but not in their community’s equivalent of a marae—their meeting-place for their community. They are not allowed to smoke in the Greater Green Island Town and Country Club. They will not forget this.

Let us look at some Otago pubs. They are focal points for the community—Foxy’s Lauder Tavern in Lauder. There is not much else there, but it is a place where people meet to talk with one another and catch up on things that are going on. In those communities there are no other places for people to meet and participate. Some of those people are going to stay at home now, rather than go out to their local community. What worries me is that, although we are talking about licensed premises and pubs, it is actually about businesses. Some of these businesses have told me they will shut their doors. Most of those that I visited said that between 60 and 90 percent of their patrons smoke. They choose to smoke. They go to these places to enjoy a bit of company and to talk with one another. It was very interesting to hear some of the comments made by some of the non-smokers in these places. They said that although they did not smoke and did not like smoke, with the ventilation system they barely noticed it, and they would defend the right of their friends to come in after a hard day’s work, to enjoy a drink, and to have a cigarette.

How did the Government ever decide that it had the right to get in and meddle with people’s lives, like it is doing today? What next! Is it going to prescribe what people eat for breakfast? Is it going to tell us we will have to wear matching tracksuits and all go for a walk around the block? This Government is meddling in the day-to-day decisions that most people feel they are able to make for themselves. Sure, Governments get in and look at regulations that determine how people live their lives, but Governments do not get into the trivialities of what people do. What will be next? Maybe there will be alcohol-free pubs.

The arguments that are now being used to ban smoking in pubs could equally be used to ban alcohol in pubs. One may laugh at that suggestion, but 20 years ago people laughed at the suggestion that smoking might be banned. It comes back to some of the old guys I have spoken to, who went to war. They say: “I fought for my country. I fought to have freedom in this country, and now they’re telling me I can’t have a cigarette. What next!”. A lot of these people are Labour voters, and I tell members opposite that some of those people are really het up about this. They are not going to forget. Jill Pettis says that some of those guys at the Returned Services Association clubs are just going to die, but most of them say they will be around for a couple of elections yet. They are determined to live long enough to change their vote, and for some that will be the first time in their life. They certainly will not forget this. We are defending those small pubs here today.

Hon MARK BURTON (Deputy Leader of the House): I move, That the question be now put.

PETER BROWN (Senior Whip—NZ First): I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. I draw to your attention that four people have spoken twice in this debate—Lynda Scott, Peter Dunne, Heather Roy, and Katherine Rich—and there are a number of areas in Part 2 that have not yet been covered. The look on your face indicates that you are wavering on whether we should stop. Many people want a second call, and some of them have not even had a first call, including my colleague.

Hon PETER DUNNE (Leader—United Future): I reinforce the point that Mr Brown has made, and I think you have been attempting to allocate the call on a proportionate basis throughout the evening and that is generally appreciated. I just note that for the two parties of roughly similar size—given a defection—the ACT party and United Future, Heather Roy has had two calls, Mr Prebble has had one, Mr Shirley has had one, making a total of four. For our side, I have had two calls, Mr Adams has had one, making it three calls. Mr Alexander has been seeking a call all evening. I think before you consider a closure, and I do not think you are on the point of doing so right now, you should bear in mind that partial inequality and seek to resolve that, as well, before you finally decide to curtail the debate on this matter.

ROD DONALD (Musterer—Green): As senior colleagues in this House ought to know, particularly Mr Brown who is on the Business Committee, the Business Committee has suspended Standing Order 178, and that was endorsed by the Parliament. That means that you have the discretion—in fact, the obligation—to ensure that calls for parties are allocated in proportion to their size, and to enable senior and in fact lead speakers for each party to have more than one call, without there being any obligation on your part to award a first, let alone a second, call to any other member from that party. I just remind you to apply that decision of the Business Committee, and I draw it to the attention of other members of the Parliament.

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Clem Simich): Just briefly in reply, I have a discretion and I have guidelines, but I certainly have no obligation. These matters rest with the Chair.

Hon MARK BURTON (Deputy Leader of the House): I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. Further to the original point of order—firstly, I was about to raise the point that Mr Donald well raised, but, secondly, there have been 33 calls, by my count, on this part. That is, by any measure, a very significant debate around this issue. I have been listening for some time in my room, and for some time in the Chamber. There has been considerable repetition in recent speeches. I think the closure motion is reasonably well put.

Hon DAVID CARTER (National): I raise another point of order, Mr Chairperson, for your consideration and it is not to do with the proportionality of calls. I have done a tremendous amount of work on this legislation and I tabled 97 amendments before the debate started. I was concerned that the Government would take the opportunity to truncate the debate, and I therefore raised this issue with the Speaker of the House before we went into the Committee stage. He made the point that it would be unlikely that I could expect 100 calls but he certainly suggested that the Chairperson at the time would take note of the considerable number of amendments I have put forward. Despite my calling constantly for the last hour, I have still had only two calls on this part.

LINDSAY TISCH (Junior Whip—National): I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson.

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Clem Simich): Does the member have something new to add?

LINDSAY TISCH: I want to bring it to your attention that my colleague the Hon Georgina te Heuheu has been seeking a call. She did defer earlier on to our senior colleague the Hon David Carter. The Hon Georgina te Heuheu has some new material. She has supported this bill, and it would be very interesting to hear her perspective. She has a contribution to make and I ask that you give her that consideration.

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Clem Simich): Thank you very much. It is important that members have their say. I do not need any help on that point of order, and there is no requirement for a ruling. I hear what you say.

Hon PETER DUNNE (Leader—United Future): I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. I want to raise with you the ruling given by Mr Speaker on 17 September 2003, which was: “There must be a very full and wide-ranging debate.” That was the Speaker’s ruling. Before the House went into Committee this afternoon, I raised a point of order with the Speaker to seek his reinforcement that that view still pertained to this debate. He gave the House an assurance that it did. When the House went into Committee and your deputy, Ann Hartley, took the Chair, I raised with her the same point of order, seeking her assurance that there would be a wide-ranging debate. She gave that assurance. I say in response to the point made by Mr Burton that the fact that 33 calls have been taken on this part, firstly, is not unusual for a significant piece of legislation, and, secondly, given the assurances given by the Speaker on two occasions and by the Deputy Speaker in her capacity as Chair of the Committee today, I submit to you that it would be entirely inappropriate to accept a closure motion at this stage. It would be an affront to the rulings that have been given on those previous occasions.

The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Clem Simich): I thank the member again for refreshing my understanding of comments and rulings that have been made. We will not close the debate yet. We have had 33 speakers, seven of whom have been those putting the question. That means we are really only at the 26-point mark, and 26 speakers is not wide ranging on a significant piece of legislation.

Hon GEORGINA TE HEUHEU (National): I have spotted up in the gallery behind me one of the Māori leaders in the anti-smoking lobby, and because he is there I have been motivated to stand and speak in this debate. As my colleague Lindsay Tisch indicated, I have been a supporter of this bill up until now. That, possibly, will come as no surprise to colleagues, because, as we know, smoking is a huge issue among Māori communities. It is a huge issue for Māori women, and, more worryingly, it is a huge issue for young Māori women and girls. At the 13, 14, and 15 year age group, smoking is increasingly becoming an issue of major proportions. Nobody would be surprised to learn that when this bill was resuscitated, I as a Māori woman MP was targeted, yet again, by probably all the lobby groups.

Hon Tony Ryall: Were you on the list?

Hon GEORGINA TE HEUHEU: I am advised that I was on the list, absolutely. I certainly expected I would be lobbied heavily. In fact, for the last few years I have been a supporter of the Māori lobby against smoking. I thought it was worthwhile to be supportive of the activities it has developed and run to discourage Māori from smoking. As a person in this Parliament I have always seen it as important to lend my support to those activities.

Earlier, when it was revealed that the Ministry of Health had made a huge payment to the smoke-free lobby groups, I was hugely disappointed. It is absolutely obscene that that has happened. To be honest, I feel absolutely had. I opened my doors to the anti-smoking groups, particularly those working in the Māori area. I was happy to give them time—probably more time than I have given other lobby groups on other issues—but I feel a bit betrayed. I want the person who is sitting up there at the back, in the gallery behind me, to know that I feel betrayed. It is likely that when those groups came into my office and lobbied hard for something on which there should be a strong lobby, they were in fact taking taxpayers’ money from the Ministry of Health—money that was being pushed their way by the Government and by the member in the chair, Steve Chadwick.

I would like Steve Chadwick to take a call to answer the allegations that have been put in this Chamber, because the matter does amount to corruption. I feel had, that as a Māori MP I willingly opened my door to the lobby groups, listened to them, and gave them good time. I have supported their activities. I went to Christchurch earlier in the year—

Hon Damien O'Connor: You did their contracts.

Hon GEORGINA TE HEUHEU: Were we the ones who asked those groups to go and specifically lobby MPs? No! Were we the ones who told them to go and lobby Māori MPs? Not at all! That member should hang his head in shame, as should those members opposite and the member in the chair. The member in the chair, Steve Chadwick, should let the taxpayers in Rotorua know she is part of a Government that willingly allows their hard-earned money to be used for lobby groups that push her cause. This is a member’s bill. She could not even get her Government to do it, yet it may as well be a Government bill because the hard-earned money of taxpayers has been used to lobby MPs.

Hon Damien O'Connor: Under the member’s contracts.

Hon GEORGINA TE HEUHEU: That Minister should take a call.

PETER BROWN (Senior Whip—NZ First): I raise a point of order, Mr Chairperson. I made a mistake a little earlier when I took an earlier point of order. I listed four people who I believed had taken second calls. I was in error, and I have been told that I should correct that at the earliest possible opportunity. I said Lynda Scott, Peter Dunne, Heather Roy, Katherine Rich, but there was one other, and I think it was David Carter.

Hon GEORGE HAWKINS (Minister of Police): I move, That the question be now put.

Hon RICHARD PREBBLE (Leader—ACT): The first thing I want to say to the Committee is that the privilege of being able to introduce a member’s bill is a very important one, and we now have a member who is in charge of this bill who is treating the Committee with contempt. Questions have been asked, and she has refused to answer them. She took one call and tried to brush off the fact that lobby groups have been paid $2.1 million dollars—

Hon Maurice Williamson: How much?

Hon RICHARD PREBBLE: An amount of $2.1 million has been paid to lobby MPs. She has not said to the Committee how deeply involved she was in this process. Before we went into Committee I described it to the Speaker as corruption. I believe that it is, and I say that the member has an obligation to the Parliament and the country to explain her role in it.

I want to say something else to the member. I received an interesting letter that came through the post and I am quite happy to table it and for people to look at it. It states: “For the last 10 years I have been fighting to get a fair deal for 850,000 smokers in New Zealand, who are now treated as second-class citizens. I am 73 years old and have smoked 40 cigarettes a day for over 50 years, it is costing me $120 a week, more than I ever paid on a mortgage or rent. When they decided that they were going to stop the younger generation from smoking I was all for it, until they made up their mind that it was going to be paid for by the existing smokers only. So that means 25 percent paying for it and 75 percent reaping all the benefits. … It is the successive Governments who turned my generation into nicotine addicts by dumping the tobacco products on them by the truckloads, during their war service, most of them still teenagers. Now we have to pay $27 for a packet of 50 grams of tobacco, $7 worth of tobacco, and a $20 fine, every time we buy one. While every other addict like drugs and alcohol, get all the help they need, only the smokers get to pay for their addiction. … I have got no quarrel with the genuine non-smoker, actually I wish I was one of them. But I have got a gutsful of those anti-smokers, most of them ex-smokers who were forced to give up, because they were lucky enough to have a job. I wonder how Helen Clark would react if all smokers decided to stop donating their blood. … In the last 10 years it has cost me my life savings of $60,000 on smokes, and the younger generation is smoking more than ever before.”

I would like to hear from the promoter of this bill, Steve Chadwick, as to why she is saying to this ex-serviceman that he cannot smoke in his home, the Returned Services Association, yet when it comes to Māori or prisoners she has said that they are exempt. I think that marae should be exempt, but I also think so should the Returned Services Association. I ask Steve Chadwick where her obligation and feeling is to Bert Rovers. Why is it that smokers are the only addicts who have to pay for their addiction? Government members lean over backwards for drug addicts and people with alcohol problems. But they are so politically correct, these second-rate academics, that they want to make a persecuted class out of people who fought for the freedoms that that member now enjoys.

But I now tell that member that she has an obligation to this Committee to explain how her Government gave $2.1 million to lobby groups, to lobby MPs. Not one member of Parliament was told by those professional lobbyists—the sleeze group—about this corruption of our Parliament. How much did she know about it? If she did not know about it, why does she not stand as the chairperson and say that this matter should be referred back to the Health Committee—let us have these lobbyists in front of us and let us have an explanation for their behaviour. She has an obligation to the standards of this Parliament. I do not know of this ever happening before. I know this Government is making us a Third World economic country, but now we are getting Third World politics as well. I seek leave to table the letter of the 73-year-old returned serviceman, Mr Rovers.

Document, by leave, laid on the Table of the House.

Hon TONY RYALL (National—Bay of Plenty): The irony of this bill is that the members who stand up and say that it should be all right to smoke cannabis say it is not all right to smoke tobacco. The member for Rotorua says that it is all right to smoke cannabis, but she does not want us smoking tobacco—cannabis is fine, but tobacco is wrong. This is the sort of country where one can go into a public bar in Rotorua and cannot buy a cigarette, but can buy a woman. Then one can go out the door and be able to smoke a cannabis cigarette. That is the vision the member for Rotorua is talking about.

I shall talk about the inconsistency of the Labour Party. Do members remember the scandal that erupted in mid-1999, when Nicky Hager’s book revealed that taxpayers’ money had been funnelled through a public relations firm to get people to write to newspapers and Ministers about the Timberlands sustainable forestry scheme? Do members remember the scandal when it was revealed that taxpayers’ money was funnelled through a public relations firm to get people to lobby members of Parliament? Helen Clark said that was a constitutional affront. She said it was outrageous that taxpayers’ money should be used to lobby political party members and members of Parliament. Do members remember the individual Kit Richards? He sent an email saying people should lobby Ministers. He did not say they should lobby Māoris; he said people should lobby members of Parliament about sustainable forestry. Helen Clark had that man sacked. She rang the State-owned enterprise and made it clear that he had to be sacked, and her argument was that taxpayers’ money should not be used to lobby members of Parliament.

Now we have discovered in the last week that $2 million of taxpayers’ money was funnelled through Action on Smoking and Health, the Smokefree Coalition, and a Māori health organisation to lobby Opposition MPs to support a bill promoted by Steve Chadwick. It is outrageous that that should have happened.

Progress reported.

The House adjourned at 9.55 p.m.