Food Safety Law Reform Bill

I move, That the Food Safety Law Reform Bill be now read a first time. I nominate the Primary Production Committee to consider the bill. Today I present the Food Safety Law Reform Bill to the House. The bill marks an important milestone in putting the whey protein contamination (WPC)—or WPC incident, as it is commonly called—behind us. The House is well aware of the impact that this false botulism scare had on our dairy exports. The bill addresses the recommendations made by the independent inquiry into the incident that require statute change to implement.

This bill illustrates the Government’s commitment to ensuring the safety and suitability of food, which is vitally important for the health of consumers both in New Zealand and overseas, and our international trade reputation. It demonstrates a commitment to continuous improvement in the regulatory system that underpins the food and beverage industry. Food and beverage products make a significant contribution to our economy, accounting for 60 percent of our merchandise exports and generating $27 billion of export income in 2015. The industry is a large employer—domestically employing approximately 79,000 people. The bill aims to protect human health and maintain New Zealand’s reputation as a supplier of safe and suitable food both domestically and internationally by ensuring all steps have been taken to address the recommendations of the independent inquiry.

The bill will strengthen the legislative framework by applying changes across the three main Acts governing food safety: the Food Act, the Animal Products Act, and the Wine Act. The omnibus nature of the bill will help business by applying similar requirements under each of the three Acts where possible. For example, the bill puts some existing enforcement tools from the recently passed Food Act into the Animal Products Act and the Wine Act so that the regulators have similar tools available to encourage behaviour change and deal swiftly with operators who do not comply, irrespective of the food type. The inquiry recommended this approach.

One of the areas being strengthened is risk-based plans. These plans are the foundation of our food safety system, setting out how operators will take responsibility for their own risk-management processes. The bill will enable regulations to be made to set out which parts of these risk-based plans must be supplied to the regulator for registration. These provisions help address the inquiry’s concern that the regulator does not always hold full information on risk-management plans.

The bill strengthens the framework for food product traceability. Traceability and recall systems are crucial for businesses to be able to respond quickly during a food safety incident using methods that they and the regulators know will work. In addition, the bill clarifies some of the roles and powers of the Ministry for Primary Industries during a food safety response, including giving the ministry a statutory role in contingency planning.

The Director-General of the Ministry for Primary Industries will have a new power to require disclosure of information held by a party that provides services to a food business. The power is needed to make sure the specific situation that led to the botulism scare does not reoccur. The power will be able to be used only when identifying and responding to a food safety incident that may have serious health impact. The supplier of information disclosed under this provision will have immunity from criminal prosecution unless the information they provide is false. The bill makes clear that verifiers who check whether a business is complying with the obligations are primarily accountable to the regulator when carrying out their duties. This will address any criticism that verifiers can become too close to the businesses they are checking.

The amendments I have mentioned so far link to the inquiry’s commentary on what went wrong during the whey protein contamination incident and will improve the system as a whole. The bill also takes the opportunity to make some other enhancements to support modern business practice and help to futureproof our legislation. To that end, a provision in the Food Act that permits the Ministry for Primary Industries to use automated electronic systems is being replicated under the Animal Products Act and the Wine Act. The director-general will also be able to set the form and manner in which information must be provided to allow more electronic transactions.

In line with the Government’s aspiration for continuous improvement, the bill improves the clarity of some existing delegated legislative provisions to assist future decisions on the making of regulations and notices. This is an opportunity for good regulatory stewardship. The bill also provides for some technical amendments to harmonise similar requirements across the system, clarify the intent of some existing provisions, and correct minor errors of interpretation.

I consider the bill will enhance the delivery of safe and suitable food to consumers as well as protecting New Zealand’s wider trade interests and reputation. Although the botulism scare was a false alarm, we want to ensure that our legislative framework continues to prevent as many food safety incidents as possible and has the mechanisms and tools to deal quickly and effectively with any situations that arise. The bill is a further step in this Government’s ongoing programme to improve food safety legislation. We need a food system that supports innovation, drives value-add, and encourages more food businesses to export.

There were 38 recommendations to the Government from the inquiry into the WPC incident. The Government accepted them all. The bill and the proposed legislation complete the structural realignment necessary to learn from, make change in respect of, and move on from an incident that damaged New Zealand’s reputation but gave us the opportunity to be even better. I commend this bill to the House.

Labour will support this bill. We understand the need to make progress in our food safety regime, and generally the Minister for Food Safety outlined very accurately the details of the bill. It is, for the most part, a technical piece of legislation, but I have to say that I was concerned when the Minister said that this would, effectively, put the issue behind us—or words to that effect—that is, the whey protein concentrate 80 dilemma. It is costing us hundreds of millions of dollars at present. It was a major disaster not in terms of actual harm to people but in terms of harm to New Zealand’s reputation, and we will be paying a price for many, many years ahead.

What we had, particularly in the China market, was a first entrant advantage—the first country to sign a free-trade agreement with China. We were moving into that market with some momentum, particular in the area of dairy, but what this did was set us back big time. What we have seen in that market is countries like Ireland, the EU, and those who have caught up to us, and our advantage has now slipped.

The Minister referred to the independent report, and it is indeed sober reading. It was necessary and it has provided 38 recommendations. I acknowledge to the Minister that the Government is attempting to work through and implement each and every one of those. But if we can go back and learn—because, as I said, I do not think we can put it behind us, and I do not think we can say that just by the passage of this legislation we have made vast improvements. There is still, in my view, an issue of resourcing and an issue of independence in the food safety regime, and in the area of policing and implementation of the regulations there is still some, I think, conflict of interest when the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) is the one organisation responsible for so much across the primary sector: policy development, implementation of that policy, and then in the policing of that. You cannot stand up and hand on heart say “We have the best regime in the world.”, when there is so much conflict of interest in the way of the structure.

We have said that we will pull food safety and biosecurity out of that big monstrosity of the Ministry for Primary Industries and have them set up as independent agencies where they have the autonomy, the independence, and the resources to do their job, because New Zealand’s reputation—and, in fact, our future as an economy—depends upon the absolute implementation of the best and highest standards in the world in terms of food safety, food quality, and biosecurity. So we must learn from the mistakes of the past. I acknowledge that the Government has brought this legislation to the House. It is not an insignificant piece of legislation—in fact, you know in terms of size there is a lot of detail, and I am sure that the select committee is going to take quite some time to work through it all, and we will do our best to make improvements where necessary.

If I can go back to the report, it is important that we read the report, understand that the legislation was driven by the report, and ensure that what we pass through the select committee and back through the House gives effect to what has been recommended here. If we go back to, I guess, the summary of what happened here—in terms of MPI’s response, I do not want to read all of the summary here, but I quote: “The ministry had no single, coherent (or reviewed or rehearsed) crisis plan for a food incident that it could implement straight away after receiving notification of C. botulinum.” It is quite concerning really. It goes on to say that “The ministry deserves credit for many aspects of its response, but it should have had better-documented decision-making processes, used more rigorous science-based risk assessment”. We are told by Ministers, in particular the Minister for Primary Industries, time and time again that we have world’s best-practice biosecurity systems—

💬 Todd Barclay: That’s right.

—and that we have the world’s best food safety systems. That is right. The members over on that side have heard it time and time and time again. It is not the truth—it is not the truth—and what this report exposed was the faults in the assumptions that lay within MPI because of a Government that gave it a whole lot of responsibility by bringing a lot of agencies together and said: “Get on with it; you can merge your policy areas. You can bring your policing and monitoring regime into animal welfare, biosecurity, and food safety. We just need a kind of a standing army that has general skills, but no specialist skills.” What I know in biosecurity and what this report identifies in food safety is that we have not got enough of those specialist experienced people remaining in MPI to stand up and say, hand on heart: “We have some of the best systems in the world.”

The recommendations from the inquiry are fairly clear. It says it should revise the rules for non-routine reworking of dairy products, continue to strengthen its monitoring and auditing activities, finalising its food incident protocol, undertaking regular exercises—it goes on and on to identify things that we would have assumed were part of a world’s best-practice regime; it was not. One of the recommendations here says: “The law should be amended to give the ministry a specific statutory power to compel disclosure of relevant information (including test results) needed to respond effectively to a food safety incident.” The Minister points to the new powers that this bill will bring in and they relate to, of course, the area of IT and new technology, and the report identifies where the transfer of that information was not timely, not always accurate, and not always robust and science-based.

We need to ensure that the regulatory authority has the ability to find out any fact that it needs when it comes to incidents like this. We need to assure the world that we will continue to provide the safest, finest quality food to consumers, regardless of where they are—in Central China, into Europe, into the UK, or into South America. We need to assure each and every one of those markets. That will require more resourcing and more expertise to ensure that our standards meet and exceed those of all of those markets. The Chinese at the moment are getting particularly sensitive to some of these issues—I have no doubt in part because we have talked about initiating an inquiry into low-quality steel coming into the market. The Prime Minister is a bit sensitive about this. In fact, I think he has misled the country when he said that he was not informed about possible retaliatory action when we were talking about an inquiry into the quality of steel. I think there is a lot to be exposed in that area.

But the issue for food safety—as Zespri is finding out at the moment—is that we need to ensure that anything that we export from this country is top quality and safe. The issue with Zespri is not about safe food. In fact, in my view, it is just a non-tariff trade barrier—it is something that has popped up, and I would not in any way like to imply that Zespri is in the same boat or connected to what we are trying to do here. Being able to test appropriately, having the right science in place—and we did not have that when it came to this. The testing regime was deficient, the transfer of information was deficient, and the final decisions were, in fact, disastrous—not for human health but for our reputation.

So what we are doing in the House here today is introducing a bill that we hope will make progress in terms of reassuring our customers around the world and actually making our system more robust. But if the Government thinks that the passage of the legislation alone is going to make a huge difference, then it is ignoring the reality that within MPI there are too many conflicting objectives, in our view. And until food safety and biosecurity are brought out of MPI into separate independent agencies, we do not think the passage of this bill will entirely address the issues that were raised in this report. Labour will support the legislation but will be scrutinising it very, very carefully in the select committee.

That was a gem. It gives me a great deal of pleasure to rise to speak to the first reading of the Food Safety Law Reform Bill. I think that the previous speaker, although he was not entirely complimentary, actually did raise a number of issues that are absolutely relevant to this bill.

Of course, this bill comes out of the Food Act 2014, which was some 10 years in the making. It took a lot of work by the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI), by a series of Ministers, and by our broader food-related community to get that Act in place. As often happens when we get a piece of legislation finally through the House, something comes along and changes the course of that legislation or gives us the opportunity to review some of the things that were put in place in the course of the original legislation. The whey protein contamination incident of 13 September 2013 led to a subsequent inquiry that has given Minister Goodhew the opportunity to review the Act and come up with the Food Safety Law Reform Bill that we have in front of us now. So although it was a huge issue for New Zealand internationally, we received great credit for the way in which MPI did deal with this, in what were quite difficult circumstances.

So I think that, contrary to comment that we have just heard, we were done no damage internationally in the course of that process. In fact, we came out of it with some significant credit, and it has certainly given us a very sound base on which to go forward as we continue to put this new legislation in place. The whey protein contamination incident was significant enough to warrant an independent inquiry being held, and although the inquiry focused on the dairy sector the changes made in this bill will benefit all sectors of the food production industry.

The recommendations used to form the bill will lead to amendments to three Acts: the Animal Products Act, the Food Act, and the Wine Act. All of those are Acts that make a significant contribution to the New Zealand food industry. Food, of course, is certainly the biggest industry in New Zealand. It accounts for over 60 percent of our merchandise and some $27 billion of income, employs some 80,000 people, and is absolutely critical to the well-being of this country. So this bill, as it passes through the parliamentary process and comes out the other end, will be absolutely one of the key platforms on which we build our future as a food-producing nation and on which we secure the right of our food producers to export and participate in the international market. It is absolutely key to us that we have a sound piece of legislation that backs us, and, obviously, experience gives us a lot more credibility in this area.

I just want to perhaps also comment on the capacity of MPI, which in the last 2 or 3 years has grown significantly. As food, biosecurity, animal welfare, and the key issues that relate to agriculture become more and more complex, as the world pays more and more attention to where food comes from, how it is produced, and how it evolves, its job is hugely complex. I think it has played a great role in getting us to the point we have got to in the last 3 or 4 years with all those three major Acts, and it will continue to do so as we move forward.

I think we are in a pretty good space with this bill, and it will be very interesting to follow it as it moves through the Primary Production Committee and comes back to the House. New powers for the director-general enable them to decline plans and to compel disclosure, and certainly have given, I think, confidence to the whole industry and will create a very confident platform for us to move forward. This bill is a good, sound response to the inquiry. It puts the WPC80 incident behind us. I look forward to further debate taking place during the select committee process. Thank you.

Tēnā koe, Mr Deputy Speaker. E ngā mema o Te Whare nei, tēnā tātou katoa. I am happy to take a short call on the first reading of the Food Safety Law Reform Bill. Like my learned colleague the Hon Damien O’Connor said, Labour will be supporting this and looks forward to closer examination at the select committee.

This is an omnibus bill that seeks to make improvements and enhancements to three Acts governing the food safety system and strengthen New Zealand’s reputation as a supplier of safe and suitable food in the domestic and international markets. The bill was created largely to implement the recommendations from the Government Inquiry into the Whey Protein Concentrate Contamination Incident. From reading, quickly, the actual inquiry I notice that the recommendations—nine, in fact, were actually made. I thought it was important to bring the recommendations made by the independent review to the House to help enhance the purpose of this bill.

So the first recommendation talks about “the ministry, in consultation with the dairy industry and verifiers” in terms of revising “the rules for non-routine reworking that requires a product disposal request”. The first recommendation also talks about ensuring “the industry’s strict compliance with reporting times for product disposal”. It also talks about continuing to “strengthen its monitoring and auditing activities”.

The second recommendation says: “The ministry should continue its work to ensure readiness for a food safety response, including: Finalising its food incident protocol …; Undertaking regular exercises/simulations …; [and] Ensuring staff are fully trained …”. The third recommendation touches on food incidents: “In any food incident, the ministry should: Start, and document, a risk assessment …”. It should also “Document the use of statutory powers” and “Co-ordinate with all relevant parties to ensure a single integrated response.”

The fourth recommendation is that “The ministry should re-establish a group of scientific experts along the lines of the previous [New Zealand Food Safety Authority] Academy.” The fifth recommendation is that “The law should be amended to give the ministry a specific statutory power to compel disclosure of relevant information (including test results) needed to respond effectively to a food safety incident.” The sixth recommendation is that “The ministry should receive targeted funding to ensure it: Has the resources …; [and] Completes the much-needed reform of dairy regulations.”

The seventh recommendation is that “The law should be amended to make clear what tests must be conducted in accredited laboratories.” The eighth recommendation is that “Industry participants should be required to seek approval from the ministry when no accredited laboratory or validated method is available for diagnostic testing,”. Finally, the ninth recommendation is that “The ministry, the New Zealand Food Safety Science and Research Centre (in the process of being established) and laboratories should collaborate to establish, test and maintain: Mechanisms for sourcing controls …; A global register of accredited laboratories …; [and] Arrangements (including customs and biosecurity clearances) …”. These are highly technical recommendations, but they clearly come from people very committed to ensuring that in New Zealand we have the best world-class food safety system.

The bill makes multiple amendments in relation to food control plans, which are generally required for high-risk businesses that deal with food, such as restaurants. The botulism scare, which was touched on by previous speakers, absolutely damaged New Zealand’s reputation as a safe food producer on the international stage. It also exposed major failings in ministerial oversight, competency, and the Ministry for Primary Industries’ processes. As touched on by our spokesperson on food safety, Labour called for an independent food safety authority at the time.

When we look at these nine recommendations—they do talk about adequately resourcing the sector to ensure that we have the most robust systems, but in terms of the independency to ensure that not only do we have the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) laying down the policies, and also having some independent authority to ensure that we are implementing, policing, and monitoring correctly, none of the recommendations actually touch on that. I would be interested to hear from those submitters who may have a view on that particular point.

Labour would separate out the responsibilities, as I have touched on, to ensure that we do have an independent body to ensure a robust independence and that autonomy of decision making is upheld. Labour does not support the current situation, where MPI is both the regulator and the enforcement agency for food safety standards. We want to ensure that responsibility for food safety is clearly not compromised, and we want to ensure that reviews that are meant to be done are done.

The bill addresses the recommendations of the independent Government inquiry, like I have mentioned, of the whey protein concentrate contamination incident, and it needs statute change to implement. The bill makes improvements and enhancements to the three Acts. The bill itself is made up of four parts. The parts make amendments to the Food Act 2014, amendments to the Animal Products Act 1999, Part 3 talks about amendments to the Wine Act 2003, and, lastly, Part 4 talks about the consequential amendments to other enactments.

The key features of the bill are the new requirements for risk-based plans and programmes, where businesses are likely to see new requirements in relation to the form and manner in which risk-based plans and programmes must be supplied to the regulator. In addition, businesses will be required to provide copies of their plans and programmes to the relevant verification agency and retain copies. Another purpose of the bill is traceability and what is called recall regulations. New regulations under the bill would set new traceability and recall requirements that will apply when a food safety incident takes place.

Another part of the bill is stronger verification, where the bill clarifies that the primary accountability of recognised persons and agencies when carrying out their functions is to the regulator, and it enables information that is relevant to the competency of the accredited agencies to be passed to the regulator. The bill also provides for verification regulations to, where necessary, apply to businesses other than operators using risk-management plans and programmes.

Lastly, the bill talks about stronger enforcement. The bill updates the enforcement tools in the Animal Products Act 1999 and the Wine Act 2003 to bring them into line with the more recent Food Act 2014. This change standardises compliance methods across the food safety system. When a food safety incident does occur, the bill will give the director-general increased statutory powers to respond, require information, and inform the public.

The bill also modernises the food regulatory system by allowing for the use of automated electronic systems for service delivery and transactions, such as issuing export certifications and providing office assurances. Like I said, Labour looks forward to this bill being properly scrutinised at the select committee process. I commend this bill to the House.

It is a pleasure to have an opportunity to speak on the Food Safety Law Reform Bill, and I want to respond to a couple of the points made from the opposite side of the House a little later on. This bill is really a great step forward in our food safety management. It is an important area. As any person who has ever been involved in marketing would know, perception is really important to the value of a product, and we are very much an exporting nation and we really live and die on our market perception.

The bill makes changes to the Animal Products Act 1999, the Food Act 2014, and the Wine Act 2003 in order to improve their effectiveness. As has been mentioned, it addresses recommendations from the whey protein concentrate (WPC) contamination inquiry. But I do not agree with the assertion made by the Opposition that it has incredibly damaged our reputation. In fact, I take the opposite view. I think that the inquiry, our openness in these situations, and our really quick handling of this issue by coming forward with this particular bill enhances our reputation because it shows that we will actually deal with these things as they come along.

I actually had the opportunity to speak at two conferences in China on food safety, and spoke to regulators and companies in the market that are importing New Zealand milk products into the Chinese market. I know they were concerned about the WPC incident, but they were also very, very pleased that we were stepping up, we were honest about it, we were not trying to sweep it under the carpet, and that we got ahead of the whole issue and recalled the products and did not allow them to get into the market, even though it turned out to be a false alarm. I think that those sorts of things are really important. And if we look at the key features in the bill, traceability and recall regulations are a big part of that. So having something where you have got an issue—whether it turns out to be an issue in the long run or not—is not as important as being able to identify those products, and that is very clearly laid out in this bill, and then being able to bring them back from the market gives all those players in the market a great deal of comfort.

I also want to touch on the other assertion made, that the Opposition is not happy and it wants a duplication, in effect, of powers. It wants to have a regulated body that sits out on its own to put out the regulations and then another body to sit in judgment on them, because the Opposition is not comfortable with it. But that is an unnecessary and expensive duplication that really will not achieve anything other than bloating bureaucracy. Really, that is not what this is all about. We are wanting to get a good result here for New Zealand and for our food safety reputation. I am very comfortable with the way that is being handled at the moment.

The risk-based plans and programmes are really important, and I know with my experience in the wine industry with our wine standards management plan that all wineries had to complete—it is a really important document. Those plans will be very robust and lay out very clearly how things are handled, and I think that is vital as well. Stronger verification is a part of the bill as well, so I am looking forward to seeing it in front of the select committee and hearing from those submitters who have their take on how this will work. We will, I am sure, iron out any issues, which I am sure will be very few in number. It is with great pleasure that I commend the bill to the House.

I rise to speak on the Food Safety Law Reform Bill. The bill has some useful parts to it, but in some respects it is a bit of a public relations (PR) exercise as well. It is useful that the bill does propose some changes to the Animal Products Act, the Food Act, and the Wine Act, and reduces some duplication there.

It is important that the Government and the select committee that will be looking at this do look at the issues that came up through the botulism issue, and what those processes were. Mostly they were reasonably effective and require little change. But I notice in the regulatory impact statement that it pointed out that there was not a need for much change, but that the change was happening to show that the Government was doing something in response to the botulism thing. But what has happened is that we are going to have even more bureaucracy over small producers, and we have already got a problem with the Food Act as it stands.

In the last term we worked very, very hard on the Food Act, and with part of that stuff—and there are a number of members in the House here today who worked on that—the point was to remove the cost of compliance for small operators, to make sure they were not driven out of business. There is nothing that I can see in this bill that is in front of us that is going to actually help achieve that. In fact, with the harmonisation that is suggested in here, it is probably going to make those costs even worse and reduce the chances of small producers staying in business. We will have to look at that as it goes through the select committee process. Because of that and some other features, the Greens will be supporting it only to select committee. We will be looking to see what happens at that point as to whether we support it further.

The bill establishes requirements on the form, manner, and time frames in which food enterprises must provide risk-based plans and programmes to regulators—no real problem there. It establishes regulations to enable traceability and recall requirements to be met. That is critical; we must be able to recall food when it goes wrong. But this Government has gone over the top around some of that, particularly. I will use raw milk as an example. It is making it almost impossible for some small herd owners to stay in business in that niche opportunity, and niche demand, from some people who can only actually tolerate raw milk. The Ministry for Primary Industries has gone over the top—the Minister has gone over the top—with the regulations on that, which make it actually very difficult for people to access it or for farmers to supply it. There is no need for that to be the case. As long as there is appropriate traceability and recall provisions—that is all that was needed. But they have gone too, too far.

One area that we are concerned about is the possible removal of country-of-origin labelling provisions. We have those provisions—rather, Australia has those provisions. That is one of the only exemptions from the Food Standards Australia New Zealand arrangement we have, that great trans-Tasman arrangement. It would be great if we could also have country-of-origin labelling here. The Government is proposing in this bill to remove the word “source”. It says the claim of source is covered by other requirements in the Act. We actually do need to know what the source of food is. Consumers deserve to know. They must be able to make those decisions for themselves about what food they are eating and where it comes from. They are being left out, but big food business is being courted by the Government—or the Government is being subjected to big food business. They are the ones who say it is going to cost too much. But it is actually not going to cost too much. You would be lucky if it cost part of a cent per item at the supermarket to have country-of-origin labelling. We need country-of-origin labelling all the more as food is moved around the globe to the degree that it is.

I mentioned the new regulations of small business before, and we will be expecting to have submissions from small businesses that will once again be constrained by the regulations that will come out of this bill. It is important that we look after those small businesses and not just be worried about the commodities that are coming out through our dairy industry in low-value commodities. We are worried about the reputation around that, and yet we are not worried about enhancing our good local producers that New Zealanders want—that we all acknowledge we want.

While we are going down this course, you have to ask: where is the total diet survey that looks at the contaminants in New Zealand food, in the food that is on our supermarket shelves and at our farmers’ markets and other places? Where is the total diet survey that is meant to come out at least every 5 years? It is more than a year late. What is happening with this Government? It does not worry about pesticide residues in food but worries about its reputation for its low-value commodities. Why is glyphosate not being tested comprehensively? Why is that? The World Health Organization has pointed out that it is a carcinogen, we know that it is an endocrine disrupter at parts per billion, it is a neurotoxin, and yet this Government is not even looking for it properly in food and a number of other pesticides. When the total diet survey does come out this year, we can expect the findings in that to be spun. They will be spun, because normally they would suggest that there is next to none found with pesticides out of the tests that are done, but, in fact, nearly all conventional food—fruit and vegetables at the supermarket—has pesticide residues in it.

I am hoping that this Food Safety Law Reform Bill can address some of those issues too, that we can actually give consumers genuine confidence—not spin, not just PR—in what is in their food. So we will support the bill to the select committee. We will be looking at those aspects of country-of-origin labelling, small businesses—the impact on them—and also these other issues such as pesticides and whether our food is safe. We will be hoping to see those things addressed by submitters and by the select committee generally. Thank you.

I am pleased to rise on behalf of New Zealand First to take a reasonably short call in the first reading of the Food Safety Law Reform Bill. New Zealand First will support this bill’s referral to the select committee, and I stress that we support the bill only that far at this stage. We supported the Food Act, which this bill, obviously, will amend, along with, of course, the Wine Act 2003 and the Animal Products Act 1999.

I agree wholeheartedly with the comments from the chair of the Primary Production Committee, Mr McKelvie, on the importance of this sector to the economy overall in terms of the percentage of GDP that it creates and in terms of the number of people who are employed there. We are fully cognisant of the importance of that sector. We support the stated aim of the bill, giving life, as it does, to the recommendations of the independent Government Inquiry into the Whey Protein Concentrate Contamination Incident. This inquiry, of course, did not report in time for its recommendations to be digested as such and included in the Food Bill as it was then. We accept that some of those recommendations will require statutory changes—changes to legislation—in order to be implemented. But we are mindful of the possibility of fish-hooks being included in the fine print of changes that are made to laws that in other regards are honest enough in intent and construction.

💬 Hon Damien O’Connor: More like gaffes, with the National Party.

Quite possibly, Mr O’Connor. The explanatory note of the bill states that “The fundamental model of the current system is not being changed.” Well, we hope not, and it is the select committee process that will show us whether, in fact, that remains the case.

Reading from the debate pack that has been put together by the Parliamentary Library—and, I have to say, it is a very valuable and much-appreciated resource—we see that one of the key features of the bill is new requirements for risk-based plans and programmes. Well, as I recall, it was these requirements that were at the heart of many of the submissions on the Food Bill, and there was a good deal of debate around the detail at that time. We certainly hope that there will not be any great deviation from the consensus that was arrived at with regard to that position.

Another key feature of the bill is that it provides for traceability and recall regulations. This, rather vaguely, suggests that new regulations will set new traceability and recall requirements. Well, that could cover a very wide range of parameters, and again we will want to be certain that, in fact, the spirit of the Act as it exists will remain intact. There is to be stronger verification. This seems unlikely to present any gnarly issues, but, again, our continued support will be dependent on that being the case.

There will be stronger enforcement—that is the fourth point. Stronger enforcement is generally something that New Zealand First is wholeheartedly in support of—as you will know from our stand on law and order—provided, of course, that the stronger enforcement is not of laws and regulations that should not exist in the first place. So, once again, we will be examining the detail behind this with quite some close scrutiny at the select committee. It is not that we do not trust the Government; rather, we are somewhat gun-shy when we read comforting phrases such as—again, from the bill’s explanatory note—“The Bill also improves the statutory powers available for responses to food safety incidents by enhancing the Director-General’s ability to, when there is a serious risk to public health, require relevant information from persons who hold it.” It improves statutory powers and enhances the director-general’s ability—that could cover, again, a fairly wide range of activities.

Also, from the regulatory impact statement is this: “Provide a regulation-making power in the three food safety Acts to set requirements for operators to undertake mock traceability and recall exercises.” When we hear those comforting noises couched in the terms that they are in, again we are not cynical, but we naturally wonder whether such provisions may contain the potential for a Draconian approach to be taken by regulators in the absence or the failure of any suitably resourced and committed regulatory watchdog. So we will once again be very interested in examining in detail these provisions in the proper environment of the select committee and, of course, in reading and listening to, with great interest, the submissions of stakeholders from within the industry and, of course, the wider general public.

Then, of course, as my colleague from the Greens touched on, there is the matter of country-of-origin labelling, which does not fall under the purview of this reform bill but, it could be argued, could and should be very much within its scope. We will argue that point, as I am sure other parties from this side of the House will be doing, because country-of-origin labelling is certainly very much a food safety issue.

In spite of the protestations to the contrary and howls of outrage from the Government benches, this view is not about xenophobia or prejudice, or any other supposed crimes against political correctness. It is about caution, it is about due diligence, and it is about the simple common-sense acceptance that there are some countries in this world where standards are not what we would demand or expect and where practices are less stringent and less safety-oriented and where life is perhaps cheaper than the value that we ascribe to it here.

Food from some parts of the world is not as safe as we would prefer, and labelling food that comes from those places as being identifiably from those places is something that a great many people in this country regard as being very important. Indeed, many people from within the primary sector and the food production sector do share those concerns. There is a—

I am sorry to interrupt the honourable member. The time has come for me to leave the Chair.

Debate interrupted.

The House adjourned at 10 p.m.