Misuse of Drugs Amendment Bill (No 3)

I move, That the Misuse of Drugs Amendment Bill (No 3) be now read a third time. This bill updates our drug laws and makes them more responsive to licit - drug use trends in New Zealand. I know that all parties in Parliament understand the importance of such a measure. In particular, the bill will permit presumption of supply matters to be amended by Order in Council at the same time as a change in classification, subject to the normal affirmative resolution procedure by Parliament, which, of course, means that Parliament still gets to decide the issue.

The bill sets the presumption of supply amount for methamphetamine at 5 grams rather than the present default amount of 56 grams. It removes the ability for the classification level of a controlled drug to be decreased or a classification to be removed by Order in Council and the affirmative resolution procedure. That change to the select committee report was sought by the United Future party. The bill adds a Ministry of Justice official to the Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs. It creates new offences relating to the importing and exporting of precursor substances, which are ingredients like ephedrine and pseudoephedrine that are used in the manufacture of methamphetamine. It creates new powers of search and seizure without warrant for ephedrine and pseudoephedrine, and it allows controlled deliveries of precursor substances, which will deal to some of our drug dealers.

The bill retains the offence of possessing a needle or a syringe, but it puts the defence of where the needle or syringe has been obtained lawfully, into the principal Act. Currently, this defence is hidden away in regulations, where few lawyers with not much experience can find it. It moves the onus of proof from the defendant to the prosecution, as recommended by public health experts.

Finally, the bill adds a new restricted substance as part of the legislation, and regulates benzylpiperazine, the main ingredient found in party pills, as the first restricted substance in New Zealand under the terms of the amended legislation, and it almost certainly will not be the last.

Today I would again like to thank all members of the Health Committee for their valuable work on this bill. I know there have been complex matters to deal with. Committee members had to tackle the public health and legal issues within a relatively tight time frame, but it is a better time frame than the years it sometimes took previously to get these matters before the House. I know that some members would have liked a great deal more time to consider a number of issues arising from the bill, but against that I know that the majority of us here understand the need to move as quickly and practically as possible to respond to changing trends in the drug abuse scene.

Since I became the Associate Minister of Health and became responsible for the national drug policy, 3 years ago, the Labour-Progressive Government has put in place a sophisticated strategy to try to turn the tide against the harm caused by drugs in our country. This strategy includes getting very tough on the pedlars of very dangerous drugs, like the manufacturers and importers of methamphetamine and its precursors. Our strategy includes increasing the amount of public investment on reducing the demand for drugs through community-based education and action programmes. It also includes investing more in treatment services, because there will need to be more if we are to realistically expect significant numbers of former drug users to get back on their feet and live a drug-free lifestyle.

Our strategy includes investment in empirical research into the medical health and social and economic effects that drug abuse is having on individuals, on their families, and on communities in New Zealand.

To effectively turn the tide against the abuse of alcohol and drugs, we need to work on all fronts at the same time. I have to say that I think some of the squabbling about whether we should have more stick and less carrot, or more carrot and less stick, is not very productive. Effectively reducing the harm that drug abuse is causing is not an either/or matter. It is about central government, communities, local government, and families working together on all fronts as appropriate to reduce harm from drug abuse. This bill before the House fits with that multifaceted and balanced strategy. I recommend it to the House.

The National Party certainly does support the Misuse of Drugs Amendment Bill (No 3) as introduced, because it deals with the very concerning area of controlled drugs and the huge need in New Zealand to use every possible method to stop their very worrisome proliferation. I want to remind the House of how that proliferation has occurred. We learn from the Institute of Environmental Science and Research that New Zealand’s first methamphetamine or P clandestine laboratory was discovered in 1996. Since then the number of laboratories has dramatically increased, particularly in the last few years. Police found nine laboratories in 2000. In 2001 they found 41, in 2002, 147, and in 2003, 146 of them were closed. I think that gives us an idea of how dramatically the problem has increased in New Zealand for about 10 years, but has particularly escalated over the last 5 years.

I wanted to point that out, because in the 1997-98 era the Rt Hon Wyatt Creech thought that it was important—at that early stage, before the escalation had really occurred—to bring in the affirmative resolution process, in order to have a mechanism available to combat the proliferation that he, quite rightly, saw would occur. The Labour Government sat around for several years, before finally bringing in its amendment to the Misuse of Drugs Act, in about 2001-02. It certainly took quite some time to do that. So although Jim Anderton said that something should have been done in the 1990s, the evidence is that as recently as 2000 only nine clandestine P laboratories had been closed by the police in New Zealand. But that number has escalated logarithmically over the last few years.

Undoubtedly, the reason we are supporting this bill is the inclusion of the main provisions in Parts 1 and 2: the presumption of supply matters to be amended by Order in Council, the presumption of supply quantity for methamphetamine, the adding of a Ministry of Justice official to the membership of the Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs, the creation of new offences of importing and exporting precursor substances, the creation of powers of search and seizure without warrant for ephedrine and pseudoephedrine, and the measure allowing for the controlled delivery of precursor substances. The National Party is hugely aware of the illicit use of drugs and of their importation by highly sophisticated gangs, which are ready to change their methods and formulae in relation to those very dangerous controlled drugs. If a drug appears on the schedules, the gangs will come up with another one, and therefore it is necessary to use every method we can possibly find to combat the sophisticated nature of illicit drug manufacture and the lengths to which New Zealand and international gangs go in order to bring drugs into this country. That is a hugely serious and worrying concern for us.

But it is also hugely concerning that the Hon Jim Anderton brought in the amendment that has now become Part 3 of this bill, which also covers the affirmative resolution procedure that the Regulations Review Committee has pointed out must be used wisely by the New Zealand Parliament. I reiterate what that committee stated about it: “The amendment of primary legislation by an Order in Council is commonly referred to as the ‘Henry VIII’ clause and is regarded as undesirable, because it allows the executive the power to override Parliament. Such powers should be granted by Parliament rarely and with strict controls.” I also point out what the committee further stated: “In our view, the classification of restricted substances is a matter of significant policy that should be dealt with by primary legislation.” It is for that reason that the National Party is not supporting Part 3 as brought in, somewhat belatedly, by the Hon Jim Anderton. The proper consideration it deserves has not been given to it.

There is no doubt that the National Party recognises the problem of party pills and the use of some substances, such as “BZP”, or benzylpiperazine, as being one of great concern. But we have made a commitment to bring in well-thought-out, well-considered legislation within the first 12 months of the new Government that will very likely come into office within the next few months ahead. I think it is also absolutely important to reiterate that the affirmative resolution process should be used with great care, as the Regulations Review Committee has recommended. That recommendation has been ignored by the Labour Party, and by Jim Anderton and his so-called coalition party, the Progressive Party. I think that is very, very serious. I also think it is important to point out what the Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs concluded about benzylpiperazine. It stated that there was insufficient information available on which to base a recommendation to classify those substances in the schedules of the Misuse of Drugs Act 1975.

I again absolutely emphasise the fact that the New Zealand National Party does regard those substances as being a very serious issue. Many of us have children and teenagers who talk continually about the proliferation of party pills, herbal pills, and related substances, and there is no doubt that those substances are becoming logarithmically more available. It is because of the highly explicit nature of how they are being advertised now, and of how they appear to be being used by many young people in New Zealand, that Jim Anderton has woken up suddenly and said that we must do something about it—and what is being done about it has been brought into Parliament very much against the wise advice of the Regulations Review Committee.

It is also important to point out that the expert advisory committee did express concern about the increased supply of party pills through a whole variety of mechanisms—over the Internet, through countercultural retailers, and, more recently, through liquor outlets, service stations, and dairies. We want to make sure that well-considered legislation is brought to Parliament regarding that. Time and time again we see the Labour Government bring in hurried legislation, under urgency, just like today, that will undoubtedly have to be re-amended at a later time. That is why we believe it is so important to have well-considered legislation. I was deeply concerned to hear the Hon Jim Anderton make light of the affirmative resolution procedure and say it is not a serious procedure. It is a very serious procedure. Indeed, it goes to the heart of our democracy, and it is a great worry when we have the Labour Party and the coalition party, the Progressive Party, making light of that procedure.

The National Party does support the bill, but is very concerned about Part 3.

That was a rather confused speech made by the National Party spokesperson on health. Partly, it shows that there have been a lot of changes to the Health Committee.

I acknowledge at the beginning of my third reading speech the valuable contribution made by Lynda Scott. I know that this bill will probably be the last bill she is involved in. Lynda Scott was there when Wyatt Creech brought in his first amendment to the Misuse of Drugs Act, and she well understood about the Order in Council and the expeditious scheduling. I think it has been a confused issue ever since. Today’s debate by Opposition members has shown me how confused those members are about the value of the Order in Council mechanism. Wyatt Creech brought it in, very sensibly. We use it very moderately, understanding the need for flexibility and the ability to expeditiously schedule. Yet National has argued against the use of the Order in Council mechanism. It is quite bizarre.

This bill was a difficult one. It was very, very complex, actually, because of the statutory framework we are working with, with legislation on controlled drugs, then in came the issue of licit drugs with Supplementary Order Paper 298, which was referred to us in November. It was not a knee-jerk reaction. It was referred to us in November as a result of the Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs, not as a result of the Associate Minister of Health panicking and looking for answers out there, to please the electorate.

The Misuse of Drugs Act and subsequent amendments are rather out of date and do require a major overhaul. We do need to look at how we regulate both controlled and licit drugs. I believe that the Order in Council process showed it is still a robust mechanism and very useful in terms of expeditious scheduling. It does involve the House, it does involve Cabinet, and it does involve the select committee. I find it a rigorous process. It is not lightly used, at all. It was sad to see the Opposition, therefore, voting against Part 3.

There is a challenge to us about the mix of drugs, and we took it very seriously. I believe that members of the Health Committee, those who understood the original Misuse of Drugs Act, came up with a very sensible solution in terms of where we are in the electoral cycle. They knew that there was no way that our concerns about benzylpiperazine and where it stood in our public health framework would be addressed at this time in Parliament, and it was not good enough to say we would develop our own, stand-alone bill. I do not think that is a sensible solution, because it means yet another drug bill without our looking at the whole drug framework.

A lot of preparatory work was done. When we look at the way tobacco regulation and tobacco control were brought in, in 2003, we see that we have carried over those regulatory provisions into this bill. Members do not seem to have read this bill very closely at all. We have set up a second schedule of criteria that the Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs has to look at and take into account, before the Order in Council process is put in motion. We have put in some very sensible issues about the practicalities of enforcement requirements, and having the right incentives in place so that we do not push people into using another illicit drug that has come on to the market. We looked at sale and supply issues. Katherine Rich pointed out the very interesting issue that in this bill we are talking about restricting sale to 18-year-olds, and not promoting these social herbal highs to under-18-year-olds, yet a contradictory piece of legislation about the drinking age has been introduced. This bill allows a voluntary code, restrictions on the location of where sales can be made, and provisions for advertising, labelling, and co-packaging, as well as manufacturing standards.

I think we have done very, very well with this bill, given the complexity of the issues and the timing of the electoral cycle. I am proud to support this bill.

I rise on behalf of New Zealand First to speak to the third reading of the Misuse of Drugs Amendment Bill (No 3). I will say straight off that New Zealand First supports this bill, which might surprise some people on the Government benches. However, I have been asked, on behalf of my caucus, to extend our appreciation to the Health Committee, and in particular to the officials for the time they spent with the committee ensuring that it was totally informed about the many aspects of this legislation, and about the inclusion of legal and illegal substances in the same legislation.

New Zealand First was disappointed that the Supplementary Order Paper submitted by my colleague Barbara Stewart was not supported. However, New Zealand First did recommend that these groups of substances be treated in the same way as all other controlled drugs and included on the appropriate schedule. I note that during the earlier debate in the Committee stage the Green Party member made light of our suggestion, particularly in terms of products like Coca-Cola. I say to the Green member, and indeed to other members of this House, that if warnings were applied to the sale of products like Coca-Cola, then the general public would be aware of the dangers of the particular drugs contained in them. We believe that harm minimisation as a strategy does not address the issues and needs of those most at risk from abuse of these substances.

So while we support the Supplementary Order Paper put in by the honourable member, Jim Anderton, we view it as a first step only. New Zealand First believes that there should be no softening of drug laws for these new designer drugs. We believe that these party pills should be classified as controlled drugs.

We would have liked to see these substances guaranteed as harmless. We believe that until this occurs they should not be legally available for sale. We look forward to the Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs completing further research into the potential harms of these psychoactive substances. The manufacturers of these products claim that they are safe and that they are keeping people away from the more dangerous amphetamines. In fact, we believe that by creating a culture in our young people that it is acceptable, and even desirable, to take some pills to get high, we are increasing the number of our young people who would dare to try harder drugs.

The real answer to substance abuse is education against the pill-popping habit that party pills have so dramatically created. We are told that these products are safe if they are taken according to the instructions—that is, not to take them with alcohol, and to follow the recommended dosage. At best, this argument is flawed because a large number of people do not comply with these instructions. Even with prescription medicines, where the patient receives verbal instructions from the prescribing doctor, and then from the pharmacist, compliance is not always guaranteed.

Add this to the fact that these products are designed and promoted for use at parties, where alcohol is mandatory, and where there is pressure to take extra doses, and it takes a very strong-willed young person to resist. Compliance under these circumstances would be well below the pharmaceutical average. Because of that, we may see many more people hospitalised.

I was pleased to read in a recent letter from the Social Tonics Association that it is recommending limiting the amount of benzylpiperazine contained in each pill. That appears to be a sensible measure. We are aware that a small number of operators have been basically exploiting the unregulated market and producing low-quality products with variable amounts of benzylpiperazine, without warnings or labels. The level of benzylpiperazine can be two to three times higher than the dosages outlined as potentially dangerous by the Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs.

We are also very pleased with the new offences created by this bill. This bill has needed the attention of the House, as both the police and customs have needed the support of the law in their fight against the misuse of drugs, and this bill provides for that. New offences are created that will close the loopholes that currently exist. Any legislation that helps with the early apprehension of those involved in the misuse of drugs must be good for our country.

One of the other reasons why my caucus colleagues and I support this bill is that we are looking to the future, and in particular to the next generation of members of our families. We would like to think that we have been responsible for putting in place legislation that will help to protect the forthcoming generations from the dangers that the misuse of illicit drugs will cause to our young people. In conclusion, New Zealand First supports the passing of this bill.

I rise on behalf of the ACT party to speak to the third reading of the Misuse of Drugs Amendment Bill (No 3). We will be opposing this bill for a number of reasons, which I will come to. This legislation is very untidy. ACT would have liked to be in the position of supporting this bill as it stood in the first instance, with just Parts 1 and 2. We agree that there is room for great improvement with the control of possession and supply of dangerous drugs. The bill’s creation of new offences of importing and exporting precursor substances, creating powers of search and seizure, without warrant, for ephedrine and pseudoephedrine, and allowing controlled deliveries of precursor substances should in fact occur, and we agree with that. But we object strongly to Part 3, which was added at the select committee stage by Supplementary Order Paper.

It is was interesting to hear some of the comments from the chair of the Health Committee, Steve Chadwick, when she spoke. She said there was confusion on the Opposition side of the House, particularly on the use of the Order in Council and the affirmative resolution process. There is no confusion. We have talked about that long and hard. We had very strong submissions from the Regulations Review Committee, which, unfortunately, have by and large been ignored in the final instance. ACT is very unhappy about that. We thought the advice we received was very good, and we were most unhappy that the advice was not followed through.

As I say, we would have liked to support the bill. We did support Parts 1 and 2 through the whole process, both at the select committee level and also here in the Committee stage. But we cannot support the overall bill, because of the untidiness of the legislation and the time pressure that was put on for it to be passed. Here we are, yet again, in another period of urgency rushing through legislation that would have been much better, much tidier, and much more effective in the final outcome had that time pressure not been put on the entire process.

As I say, we would have liked to be in a position to support the bill but, in the final instance, it promotes draconian powers in relation to substances that may well be little more insidious or addictive than alcohol, nicotine, or many other harmful but not necessarily catastrophic substances. That should give us pause for thought. I refer to Part 3, which was added at the select committee stage. To be fair to Mr Anderson, it was very good that the Supplementary Order Paper came to the select committee in plenty of time so that the full parliamentary process could be gone through and submissions could be made. But I think the fact that it is tacked on to a very rigorous bill when it should have been a stand-alone bill is a retrograde step. I do hope that as time progresses, that will in fact happen so that the dangerous substances that, as everybody acknowledges, cause great harm to society and, particularly, to our young people can be dealt with properly, and the provisions in Part 3 can be dealt with in a proper and efficient manner.

When the Supplementary Order Paper first came to the select committee, it had a blank schedule. There is certainly no historical provision for that to happen, and for the committee members to have a blank schedule in front of them with no idea, except from guesswork, as to what exactly might go on it was unacceptable. To allay the committee’s fears, the benzylpiperazine substances were put on that schedule, and it did seem as if that was just a ploy to allay the fears of many select committee members.

As I say, the legislation was very untidy. This was acknowledged, and has been acknowledged further more informally by many members of the select committee. None of us were really happy with that process, and many of us felt that the officials were put under extreme time constraints in coming forward with legislation that would meet the time requirements, as opposed to the proper process being gone through, and good legislation that is rigorous and that can easily be upheld by the courts where the direction is to be given. That should have been allowed to happen, and did not.

Perhaps our biggest fears were those I referred to with regard to the Regulations Review Committee. The Regulations Review Committee has always given us very rigorous and very good advice, but, by and large, on this occasion this advice has been ignored. That committee said to us that it was unhappy about the use of the affirmative resolution process, and it warned that that process should not proliferate—something that, at the time, all the Health Committee members agreed with. It considered that there should be compelling reasons for applying the affirmative resolution process when primary legislation is being amended in respect of serious offences. The Regulations Review Committee also noted that the affirmative resolution process is justifiable in limited and exceptional circumstances, including where there is a need for expeditious change.

I note that I wrote a letter to the Health Committee in September 2002 outlining problems with, particularly, the sale and purchase of benzylpiperazine products by many young people, some as young as 12, 13, or 14, at places like Star Marts. At that time, the select committee did not seem to be the least bit worried about those products, and my letter was passed on to the Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs. I felt at the time that that was really just to pacify me. Suddenly now there is an Order in Council process in place. The nature of this matter has hardly, I would say, been expeditious. That is just one example of what can happen when the Order in Council and the affirmative action process is put in place.

The Regulations Review Committee also noted that although the affirmative resolution procedure allows a truncated legislative process, it considers that there are considerable drawbacks. In particular, the procedure allows significant matters of policy and principle to be dealt with in delegated legislation rather than in primary legislation. We have heard other parties raise this issue here today. It allows a limited time for select committee scrutiny—not the great time as in the normal process, as Steve Chadwick indicated—which may be insufficient for public consultation or for substantial consideration of the policy rationale. In short, it should be used in extreme or very limited circumstances only. The legislation now allows for this process to be undergone in many and varied circumstances.

In particular, I mention new section 4(1AA), inserted by clause 5(2). ACT finds it bizarre that people’s liberties will be able to removed by ministerial decree—the Order in Council process—while all the machinery of Parliament will be needed to reduce regulation. There are no historical precedents for this action at all, and to allow the extra regulation of substances by Order in Council but to have the downgrading, if you like, of those same substances or any other substances on a schedule allowed to happen only by the full machinations of the parliamentary process is really quite bizarre.

Quite how we reached that point is very questionable. We should either have the same process, both ways, or the full parliamentary process, both ways. Anybody who has any knowledge of the legislative process looking from beyond our own battlegrounds here today would find this absolutely extraordinary.

ACT New Zealand opposes this legislation because of many process matters. As I say, we would have liked to support the bill for the benefit that Parts 1 and 2 will bring to the control and supply of serious methamphetamine-type medications that have brought great problems to our society—we all acknowledge that. We think that Part 3 should have been stand-alone legislation, and we are very loath to see substances that have yet to be proven to be very harmful lumped in with very dangerous drugs. Most important, we worry about the proliferating use of the affirmative action process through Order in Council. For those reasons, we oppose this legislation.

I stand to support the Misuse of Drugs Amendment Bill (No 3) in its third reading debate on behalf of the Green Party, because in principle it does go in the direction the Green Party says that drug policy should go. At the same time, I acknowledge that it has been laced with a number of toxic adulterants, partly at the hands of the “UFO Party”, but the honourable Minister has to share some responsibility for the severe problems that remain in the bill. Before I go on to the substance of the bill, I would like to quickly address Mr Paraone’s comment about Coca-Cola. I agree that the labelling of Coca-Cola and some sensible restrictions on its use would be beneficial, but I am not sure that making it R18 would be particularly useful. However, I thank him for those comments.

We support the bill for a number of reasons. The first one is that it allows control of a range of substances that are currently unregulated. That can include any mixture, preparation, or article manufactured for the primary purpose of inducing a psychoactive effect. Of course, the bill has been introduced with benzylpiperazine specifically in that category, but it is open to other substances to be included. The bill addresses the situation of a growing industry that is currently unregulated, around which there are growing concerns, and that needs some regulations to be put in place. As the Hon Jim Anderton said, there is no evidence that benzylpiperazine causes a great deal of problems, but it is sensible to take a precautionary approach and put in place some sensible restrictions, just to dampen down its use a bit.

The bill adds a new schedule to the Misuse of Drugs Act. That was originally a Greens’ suggestion, and we are very pleased that it has been taken up. It has to be an amendment by way of inserting a new schedule in the Act, because otherwise we would need new legislation every time a new substance came to our attention. We already know for a fact that piperazines that are not benzylpiperazines—there are other forms of piperazines—are being sold in shops right now. Those piperazines are not included in this bill currently. We also know that other substances that are not even in the piperazine range of drugs are being sold, manufactured, and researched now. So we clearly need something that we can put new substances into fairly simply, and that is what this bill provides.

What does the bill do, in terms of restrictions? It puts in place things like age limits, restrictions on advertising, an assurance that there are quality manufacturing standards, and an assurance that there is adequate labelling, so that people can make properly informed choices. That is all absolutely sensible. The industry, which, by and large, has been responsible in the way it has dealt with the sale and manufacture of its products, has been calling for enforceable powers in that regard. There are cowboy operators, particularly in Christchurch, who have no regard for the voluntary code of the industry and who need to be brought into line. Gangsters are getting involved. That is the problem, and it gives us a taste of where the issue would go if we chose to prohibit the industry, rather than to restrict it by some sensible regulation. We would see an increase in gangsterism in the industry, and we want to avoid that. The Greens remain concerned about the unrestricted enforcement powers. There is no need for a search warrant, and there is no time limit, in terms of giving stuff back. Businesses could easily be put out of business on the whim of a health officer or police officer, and we think that that is a serious issue.

The Greens support the bill because it introduces some changes to the Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs, in particular by adding a Ministry of Justice representative. That is a much-needed change. That person can give advice on the justice implications of the classification of a drug as illegal. It is an area of expertise that has previously been lacking on the committee, so we welcome that. We remain concerned at two things. One is the confusion around the different criteria that the Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs applies when considering whether to schedule something as A, B, or C class, as opposed to D class. We think that that makes absolutely no sense. There should be one set of criteria. Substances should be looked at in accordance with all of them, and then the recommendations would simply drop out of that. The situation is entirely illogical at the moment. The other concern we have is about the lack of ability for either the Health Committee or the House to recommend amendments to notices of motion under the affirmative resolution procedure. This House needs to address that, because it means we must either reject or accept the Minister’s recommendation. For us to reject a recommendation would be a pretty substantial slap in the face for a Minister, and members are unwilling to do that without very, very good reason. But there may be good reasons to tweak a recommendation by a small amount, and there should be provision for that.

We support the introduction in the bill of a new offence around the import and export of precursors. We support that because the Greens actually said, during the reclassification of methamphetamine, that the Government needed to focus on precursors. We are pleased to see that happening but, once again, we are concerned about the enforcement powers and the provision of search without warrant powers around precursors. Search without warrant powers are draconian powers of search and seizure. They should be used very rarely and with real justification. When the Health Committee invited the officials to say why we needed to provide search without warrant powers, their explanations just were not convincing. The Greens are concerned about the proliferation of search without warrant powers made by this Parliament. It has happened in a number of Acts, including the Local Government Act, which has search without warrant powers relating to alcohol prohibition areas. Those things are, obviously, a breach of New Zealand Bill of Rights Act guarantees to be free from unreasonable search and seizure, and the Greens remain unhappy about that.

So the Greens support the bill, with some concerns. Before I finish, I will touch on some of the broader issues around the bill. Drug policy, like law and order, is a fruitful perennial for politicians. I end with a plea, really, for more evidence-based decision-making when it comes to policy making by this Parliament. I expressed concern already in the Committee stage and at the second reading about the “UFO” amendment that allows the Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs to recommend on evidence the reclassification of a substance if it increases the penalties, but not if it decreases them. I thank Heather Roy for her quite clear exposition of the offensiveness of that provision. It is a serious thing—it states that we will pay regard to evidence if it makes punishment more serious, but not if it reduces punishment. That is in line with the recently launched drug policy of United Future, which states that drug classification should be constantly reviewed and monitored to ensure it complies with the available evidence, but that the party will totally ignore any evidence that does not point to harsher penalties. United Future states that quite blatantly. I have never seen a party policy state so blatantly that the party will ignore evidence that does not fit its preconceptions.

My concern is that that unashamed contempt for evidence and information that does not fit United Future’s preconceptions currently influences drug policy in this Parliament, by way of the confidence and supply agreement with the Government. That is a serious issue for this country and this Parliament to think about. I know that United Future will be reduced to irrelevance after the election, so I am not really saying this to have a swipe at it. I am saying it more to members of the House and political parties in general. My hope, quite genuinely, is that political parties and members are genuinely committed to evidence-based decision-making, particularly when it comes to drug policy, and to supporting policies that work and can be shown to work—policies that reduce the harms associated with drug use. I would have thought that that, surely, was the goal of us all. I find it hard to believe that anyone at all in this House wants to increase the harms associated with drug use, but my worry is that often that is what we do, as an unintended consequence of ill-informed policy-making.

In that regard, I end by reinforcing the plea of the Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs, of a number of members of the select committee—it was echoed by Judy Turner from United Future—and of a number of members of the drug treatment world that the Misuse of Drugs Act be reviewed and overhauled. Again, I thank Steve Chadwick for her comments around the problems of that Act as it stands. It is a mess—an absolute mess. It is confusing, inconsistent, and fragmented, and we need to take that very seriously. The Greens hope that in the next Parliament we may see the development of a drug policy framework that is genuinely integrated, consistent, and, most important, based on the evidence about what actually works.

I rise on behalf of United Future to speak to the third reading of the Misuse of Drugs Amendment Bill (No 3). At this third reading I would like to take some time to reflect on why we are bothering to do this. There are those who believe that prohibition should give way to regulation, and that prohibition is a lost cause and a flawed approach to managing drug use and drug abuse in our country. I have been accused of being obsessed with cannabis prohibition—and I suspect that it is true. Maybe I have just spent too long in New Zealand classrooms, along with thousands of other teachers, and tried to invest my time and energy in helping kids meet their potential. Maybe I have grown tired of seeing some of our brightest become apathetic and throw away good years in favour of risk behaviours that see them cut classes, be inattentive when they are in class, and achieving at decreasing levels that are well below their ability.

They become vague, late, overly egocentric, and insensitive to others. Their parents and friends see outbursts and mood swings. At that stage, parents often believe they have a difficult teen. To those families we currently recommend harm minimisation. That sort of means that we will teach them how to work out what level of brain damage is right for them.

For a percentage of young people the situation will get a lot worse. Clinicians do not refer to this deterioration as addiction; they call it neurotransmitter deficiency syndrome. Authors Tom Scott and Trevor Grice describe it by saying: “If an individual’s vats containing the chemicals responsible for calm and moderation are nearly empty, and at the same time the vats containing the chemicals for irritation and rage are full, the chances of responding sensibly to a minor setback or a mild confrontation are much more remote.”

So does the law send a message? Yes, it does. Even if one chooses to ignore the message, the law establishes a commonly held disapproval of certain behaviours. All law is ignored and flouted by a certain sector of society. That does not make it irrelevant.

In a famous social experiment that was often referred to when I was at teachers college, a group of university students were employed to help with an experiment, unaware that their behaviour was the real subject of the experiment. They were put in white laboratory coats and asked to modify the behaviour of some other folk by way of an electric shock. They could not see their subjects, but they could hear their responses. Not only were they required to administer the shocks but also they had to increase the voltage for repeated wrong responses—actors were responding appropriately.

The outcome was that it was discovered that as long as this behaviour was sanctioned, they would continue to inflict pain and they would even go to the level of taking somebody’s life. One or two did query whether they should continue, but after they received affirming nods they kept going.

I mention this because legal sanctioning does have consequences in people’s choices and behaviours. We must be very careful about the legislative messages we send. However, I want to make it clear that United Future does not believe that prohibition on its own is the total answer, or the single strategy that will work. We accept that we need a raft of health and education strategies—and parent education in particular—to address the tragic loss of potential that we currently have in our nation.

Mr Tanczos claimed that cannabis does not kill. I want to tell members about a friend of mine whose funeral I went to not long ago. He was a very talented young man who did not stay around long enough to discover that he had just got straight As in his course at polytech. He was a talented artist. However, with his talent, he was mentally unstable and had some potential for mental health problems—very manageable ones, if he had stayed off the alcohol and the cannabis. However, he chose to ignore the support around him. For him, cannabis was a gateway drug, and he hanged himself in his parents’ garage.

The open casket at his funeral gave his friends the opportunity for a bit of a joke. They put a cannabis reefer between his fingers. They were not my kids, so I could not take it out, but I was angry, because they had overlooked the fact that one of the reasons we were there—one of the reasons he was in that casket—was cannabis. For me it is quite a personal issue, because I have seen too many young people whom I care about deeply whose lives have been detrimentally affected. We as legislators need to make sure that we send a very strong message. We need to keep the human face of drug abuse before us all the time.

I do not know whether this has happened to other members, but I have talked to parents who were relieved that their child had been arrested—appalled that they had reached the state in which they wanted their child to be arrested. Parents have said to me that their child’s life was saved because he or she went to jail. That is an appalling feeling for a parent, and having to sit through that with a parent is pretty appalling.

So we must make sure that we do not shy away from our responsibilities—that we do all we can in policy and in legislation to make sure that young people, who are our country’s future, are protected from their own poor choices at times and from the pressure they feel to be part of a group.

As I have said, we support Governments having the opportunity, through the Order in Council provisions, to respond quickly to a crisis in the drug world, and we are very happy about that. But, as the Regulations Review Committee recommends, we must use that mechanism sparingly. We were very clear that when a crisis is before us those provisions should be used. Downgrading a substance is not a crisis; it is a policy matter. We would like to see the public, not just the Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs, have a chance to submit on such matters. We do not believe that downgrading a substance constitutes the kind of crisis that would necessitate the use of Order in Council provisions.

I have looked up the expert advisory committee’s actual advice on party pills, because that has been a huge part of this bill. At the time when it made its recommendations, the committee believed that there was no suitable schedule in the Misuse of Drugs Act. It believed that the Minister for Food Safety should be requested to consider the appropriateness of permitting the chemical benzylpiperazine to be sold as a dietary supplement. It recommended that the Minister direct the Ministry of Health to conduct further research into the potential harms associated with the use of benzylpiperazine, and it recommended that the Minister direct the Ministry of Health to investigate the possibility of gathering prevalence data on benzylpiperazine via the introduction of routine toxicology screening by community laboratories.

Lots of recommendations came out that need to be followed through on, and we would be very supportive of seeing those recommendations followed up very quickly. We are keen to see the end of the legal nonsense that currently forces us, through time pressures, to regulate legal substances along with illegal substances. We think that this creates a whole lot of legal nonsense that will get us into trouble in the future. We are therefore very keen to see continue the ongoing work that is needed on this, but we are happy to support the third reading of the bill.

I rise with a little bit of nostalgia, which was created by Steve Chadwick when she mentioned that this bill will probably be the last major piece of legislation I will speak on in this House. I have thoroughly enjoyed being a member of the Health Committee. It has been one of the best parts of the time I have spent in Parliament. I will have my valedictory speech in which to say all these things, but I want to say now that working with Steve Chadwick was great. The members of the Health Committee have always tried very hard to work across parties, to get good legislation for New Zealand. Of course, at times one does not agree with a political part of a bill, but most of the time we have worked very well together. I have thoroughly enjoyed that time.

Steve Chadwick said that National had a confused position on this bill. It is not confused at all. The position has been very clear. We support this bill. We certainly support the affirmative resolution process to be used for class A, B, and C drugs. What we did not find acceptable was the way the Supplementary Order Paper was included as a new part, Part 3, “Restricted substances”. We know that this area has been complex. The select committee and the advisers grappled with it to try to find a way to fit it into the bill. Even the Associate Minister of Health acknowledged that it has not been a good process, and that we need a stand-alone bill. So I do not think there is anything unclear about what we have been saying today. It has been very clear indeed.

What concerns me is the Greens’ contributions to the debate on this bill. I was on the inquiry into cannabis, and I remember very clearly what Nandor Tanczos had to say during that inquiry. I see that he is supporting the process to regulate benzylpiperazine. Mr Tanczos was associated with a store in Queen Street where these drugs are sold. He knows a great deal about them. Yes, he wants the industry to come under legal auspices whereby it is controlled, because that would take other operators out of the business, leaving those who are legally selling these drugs to over-18-year-olds to make more money. He wanted cannabis regulated in the same way. He wanted it decriminalised and made available to those over-18-year-olds.

💬 Nandor Tanczos: That’s untrue.

I heard that argument many times. What worries me is that the Greens supported Labour during the time of the cannabis inquiry, and we know that the Green Party gets some of its vote from the legalise cannabis group. That party will continue to push for a softening of the law around cannabis.

Mr Tanczos has changed his mind. He has become a dad, and I think that does change people. When one becomes a parent, one starts seeing the world a little differently—

💬 Simon Power: Through sleepy eyes.

Yes, but I think he already had those. As parents, we start thinking about what the effects would be on our children. There is still a great deal of fear out in the community that a Labour-Green coalition would push to have a slackening of the drug laws.

Regarding the expeditious scheduling that we see in Part 3, there was concern expressed at the Health Committee that cannabis could be moved from the A, B, and C classification on to the list of restricted substances—that this legislation would provide a mechanism for that. Mr Tanczos talked about having the experts involved. We have the Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs advising the Minister at this point. The membership of the committee could be changed. The membership could be changed to comprise people who have a much more liberal view of drugs in this country. That would mean that we would see a loosening and a reduction in classification.

If that happened, I would be extremely worried, as would most mums and dads in this country. We would not want to see any change to the law around cannabis. I sat on that select committee inquiry. We went from one end of the country to the other, it cost a huge amount of money, and we came to the conclusion that there should be no change. But that was not the position of the Greens right the way though the inquiry.

National supports adding a Ministry of Justice member to the Expert Advisory Committee on Drugs. That was an oversight when we debated the first amendment Act. The process was set up by Wyatt Creech, and was brought in because of the Ecstasy and Fantasy issues at the time. Those drugs had been introduced into New Zealand, and the people who produced them changed the chemical structure just slightly in order to avoid the law. Everybody agreed that we needed a very fast process—we wanted it to be a 1-month process—to be able to put those drugs on to the schedule and to stop those who wished to prey on our young people and cause their deaths, all for the sake of money.

We fully support this bill, which provides for the regulation of the precursors of P methamphetamine. People can be prosecuted if they bring in large quantities of cold remedies, which have ephedrine and pseudoephedrine in them, to try to set up meth labs and produce P. P is the most serious drug issue facing the country at the moment. There has been a lot of effort to crack down on it. Just one tablet can cause significant harm. We saw a similar wave of the use of LSD in the 1970s. People saw too many of their friends end up in psychiatric hospitals due to the use of that medication. Talented young New Zealanders’ lives were ruined. Some survived, some committed suicide, but many had significant mental damage. Hopefully, people will see enough of their friends around them significantly damaged by P to ensure that, once again, it will not become a drug of choice amongst our young people, and they will realise the harm that just one tablet can do to them if they are susceptible.

The longitudinal studies that are being done on our young people in Christchurch and Dunedin are interesting. The Dunedin study is especially interesting, as it shows that genetic precursors mean that some people are much more susceptible to drugs and alcohol abuse when adverse events happen. One has to ask why some people get through them and others do not. It has been shown that the genetic predisposition of some people, plus an adverse event—that is, nature plus nurture, or the environment they are in plus their genetic make-up—are what make some people much, much more susceptible.

We fully support making sure that ephedrine and pseudoephedrine cannot be brought into the country in large supply. We support the change to the onus of proof in terms of people who have needles in their possession, to improve the needle exchange programme. We will be voting for the bill in its third reading stage.

As another National member speaking in this debate, I, too, rise to voice support for the Misuse of Drugs Amendment Bill (No 3). A lot of good changes are being made in the bill that will assist officials in their battle against drugs like P, which is surely one of the biggest challenges facing our community at the moment. As many members of the House will have also found when they spoke with the police and looked at the statistics, I know the reason that we have had such an increase in violent crime in the country is largely attributable to the use of P. Although the names and ingredients of those drugs will change, the issues of how to regulate and put in place legislation to control them will remain the same for successive Governments. The issue for us is to put in place good law that will do its best to control illegal drugs, and to put in place a framework that makes it quite clear to people what is right and wrong.

It was interesting to hear the Minister, Jim Anderton, talk about the bill, because he got himself into a position whereby anybody who voiced any alternative to, or concern with, a provision was suddenly presented as being pro-drugs. The Minister does not have a monopoly on the concern about drugs in the community. The Minister is not the only member of Parliament who is concerned about what is happening in some of our communities as a result of various drugs. That does not take away our right to speak out about concerns about the law, and to put forward some changes that we think will produce better law for the country. The concerns that we have voiced as a party basically related to the use of the affirmative resolution procedure. We totally understand the use of those procedures for illegal drugs that are classified as A, B, or C, but we raised some concerns about the use of similar provisions when it came to substances that were legal. That was the main reason that we voted against Part 3.

One of the points that the Minister did not address in any part of the debate was the apparent inconsistency in his thinking in bringing Part 3 into the main part of the Government’s bill. Although the Minister kept saying that it was a Government bill, we all know that Part 3 was a result of the Minister bringing in Supplementary Order Paper 298 in his name—a large change to the law—and attaching it, a bit like a patchwork quilt, to another piece of law. On the one hand, the Progressives say that we are in a situation where we need to regulate benzylpiperazine—one of those changes is to make it quite clear that those substances can be sold to 18-year-olds—yet, on the other hand, one of their main thrusts in bringing another bill to the House is to look at raising the age at which young people can purchase alcohol. On the one hand we are saying that 18-year-olds have the ability to make decisions, to act responsibly, and to apply their thought processes to the purchase of party pills and herbal highs, but on the other hand we are saying that they are not responsible and they do not have the ability to make a choice when it comes to making up their minds about whether they want a glass of beer. I think there is a real inconsistency there.

In my view, we see hypocritical thinking and no logic when we look at the two main pieces of legislation the Progressives have brought to this Parliament. Basically, they are saying different things about the ability of young people to make up their minds and apply their own thought processes to some decisions they make in their everyday lives. Although I challenged the Minister on that, he was not able to get up and explain himself—to say why he was pushing for the age at which one can purchase alcohol to rise to 20, yet remained perfectly happy for people to stroll into a shop and purchase a party pill, a herbal high, or whatever else, at the age of 18. Certainly, there is a contradiction there.

I think there are some great things in this bill. When we talk to customs officials and the police, we find that there has been a huge amount of frustration about the inability of officials to be able to nab people who turn up at our borders with caseloads of cough medicines that contain ephedrine and pseudoephedrine. People were able to point to what looked like extraordinarily large quantities of medicines, and to say that they were bringing them in for their personal use. Well, no one involved believed that, but the law did not give customs officials enough tools in their tool-box to be able to deal with those situations with greater clarity. So it is good that this bill lays out some very detailed specifications for how searches can take place, and how they may be executed within officials’ daily procedures. We have lists in the legislation for everything from strip-searches to rub-down searches. There seems to be a lot of detail, but in fact when we are dealing with people who will do whatever they can to get off a charge, or who have lawyers who will do everything they can to get their clients off charges, we need to be incredibly specific about the technical parts of this bill. So I am hoping we have done our work on this bill, and that there will not be any loopholes when the legislation is fully in place.

There are some good initiatives to make it easier for people to use needle exchanges, and to not be in a position where they feel that the law does not allow them to carry syringes and take part in their own rehabilitation, without being nervous about being charged for having, or without having to demonstrate proof of why they have, particular items in their possession.

One of the things that is very clear is that we as a Parliament will continue to face these sorts of issues. The types of pills and drugs will change. The next generation and the scientists out there, the backroom scientists who try to work out new combinations in order to get around these laws, will continue to do so. The challenge for us is to keep ahead of them, and to ensure that all parts of the public service do their bit to make sure we minimise the amount of drug use in our community.

One of the things that this bill does not deal with is the issue of policing. I think it is a real shame that the police put in for additional resources in order to keep on top of methamphetamine laboratories, and received only a small portion of the amount of resource they felt they needed to be able to keep on top of the problem.

We have thrown up some interesting inconsistencies, and I look forward to the debate on the second bill brought to this House by the Progressives. I will be asking them why they think it is OK that 18-year-olds can buy party pills and herbal highs, but they are not trustworthy enough to buy beer or to make a choice about whether they want to have a glass of wine. It seems to me there is more concern about party pills and herbal highs than the Minister gives the public credit for. So there are some interesting inconsistencies on the part of the Progressives.

I am glad to stand and support this bill. I think it will go some way towards assisting the Customs Service and the police to ensure they have more tools in their tool-box to deal with those New Zealanders who want to break the law.