Financial Review Debate — Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry

I note that almost half the actual expenditure for the last financial year by the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry was for biosecurity services. I want to start by applauding the Minister—I feel quite weak at the knees, I am applauding the Minister—for the biosecurity strategy that was published in August last year. It is an excellent document. It gives us a scaffolding to take into account the increasing pressures on our biosecurity in the future. It is really good to have a framework for planning a risk management strategy.

I also want to give the ministry officials a bouquet. Theirs, after all, is a thankless task. It is an ongoing job where, if everything goes perfectly, nobody notices, but if something goes wrong, everybody notices. I know exactly how they feel—I used to be a party whip. I have noticed, and I am sure other people have noticed, that MAF Biosecurity by and large does an excellent job in a very difficult environment where things can always go wrong—well done!

At the top of my list of bouquets is the ministry’s move to 100 percent sea-container inspection. Sea-container inspection has been a gaping hole for many years. The 24 percent inspection rate that we had up until recently was diabolically bad. Only 14 percent of those were targeted inspections, and another 10 percent were random inspections. Given that we have in excess of 400,000 containers a year entering New Zealand, containers are a significant pathway for the incursion of pests.

However, with all the bouquets there must, inevitably, come some brickbats. The first of my brickbats this evening comes with regard to the accreditation process for inspectors of sea containers. The plan the ministry had was basically a good one. It was to accredit inspectors who would go to the devanning centres and the distribution warehouses, and inspect sea containers as they were opened. If the inspectors found something awry they were to notify the ministry, and it would swing into action—so far so good. The problem was the ministry did its accreditation by means of a multiple-choice questionnaire on the Internet. One of my researchers did the test in about 10 minutes, and he became an accredited sea-container inspector, without ever having seen a container and probably without knowing how to get into one, anyway. The inspection of sea containers is an enormously practical process, but there was not a single item of practicality in the test. It was such a simple test that there was a fully accredited inspector who turned out to be a Forest and Bird Protection Society member’s cat. So we have a cat that is an accredited inspector. I sincerely hope that some sanity has since prevailed.

The second brickbat I have concerns my old friend, the spraying of Foray 48B on the residents of Auckland and Hamilton in order to eradicate the painted apple moth and the Asian gypsy moth, respectively. My criticism takes two different streams. The first is that the ministry took so long to properly appreciate the severity of the painted apple moth infestation and the implications of it. For instance, it took ministry officials 2½ years to publish photos of the painted apple moth, so people knew what it looked like. It took 2½ years to restrict the movement of garden waste and other biological material. It also took 2½ years to set traps to delimit the infestation, and, worst of all, the ministry refused to let independent researchers have access to viable females in order to develop pheromones. I will not go into the details of that now, but there does seem to have been an element of personal jealousy in that process. To be honest, that is not good enough.

My second stream of my concern is with regard to the spending of $90 million on aerial spraying. In retrospect, I accept that the spraying seems to have been quite effective—leaving aside the need for it in the first place. The problem that I have has been the ministry’s attitude all the way through in respect of human health concerns related to the spraying, which has left a lot to be desired. Ministry officials have to bear in mind that the problem arose because of their inaction and delay in addressing the issue.

I thank the member for his contribution. He should have asked that question a moment ago. He now asks where the National Party is. It is a question we have all been asking, and I am prepared to give him an answer.

💬 Richard Worth: We are here.

There is one National member here. He has just woken up, so perhaps he will take the next call. Perhaps he may not do so, either. All the National Party has had to say about agriculture policy during the last year amounts to its official spokesperson criticising me for going off to the Cairns group meeting, when he presumably thought I should have been picking up drowned sheep in the lower North Island. I would like to know how many drowned sheep that member picked up. If he has picked up one, it would have been the most useful thing he has done all year. Even Federated Farmers bitterly criticised him for the foolish statement that we should not have been represented at the Cairns group meeting this year because there had been a flood in the lower North Island. That flood had been over for a week—or at least the rain had largely stopped for a week. But the National Party was more interested in scoring cheap little political points than it was in the interests of New Zealand agriculture.

I thank the member for his kind remarks in respect of the biosecurity strategy. They are well-deserved remarks. His kind words regarding MAF Biosecurity, which does a great job, frequently under very trying conditions, are well-deserved praise, and I have to applaud his wisdom in endorsing the move to 100 percent sea-container inspection. The member criticised the fact that a Forest and Bird Protection Society member’s cat was registered over the Internet as a final inspector of low-risk containers. He should not blame the cat; the cat did nothing wrong. But an idiot fraudulently misrepresented the cat and filled the questionnaire out as being from someone worthy of becoming an inspector. It took only 24 hours to catch out that stupid subterfuge. If that had been done by a real recipient of sea-freight containers, that recipient would have had to spend the next year getting its containers opened at someone else’s facility, and enduring the extra cost and extra delay arising from that. The system is largely self policing, and when people do not play the game and fraudulently misrepresent the situation, there is a price to pay. The price is that they cannot be inspectors any more. Their approved facility is no longer approved, their word will not be taken again, and any containers they import will be automatically judged to be high-risk containers, which have to be unpacked by expensive, qualified Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry quarantine personnel. So the member, in pointing out that foolish fraud by someone from the Forest and Bird Protection Society, has given me an opportunity to point out what happens to people who cheat with regard to the importation of sea-freight containers. I am grateful to the member for giving me that opportunity.

Finally, I do appreciate that the people who have been frequently sprayed, and whose suburbs and homes have been sprayed, with Bacillus thuringiensis kurstaki spray to ensure that we can see off the threat to the New Zealand environment and economy posed by, first, the painted apple moth and, second, the Asian gypsy moth, have done their country a service by putting up with that. I know that it is trying and that their patience has been tested, but hopefully, we are near the end and we will not have to spray any more in Hamilton for the Asian gypsy moth. Hopefully, beyond May, we will not have to spray any more in Auckland for the painted apple moth. But we will keep monitoring the situation for some time to come, and if we have to we will spray again, because New Zealand needs to be kept free of those threats.

Report noted.

Ministry of Education