Organ Donors and Related Matters Bill

Thank you, Mr Speaker. So I last spoke on 22 October, and at the time that I was speaking, I was just making a mention of Wairangi Te Rupe, my daughter by another mother, I guess you could say, who had had an organ donor replacement. I wanted to just bring the attention to the House again to that. This is a bill that has importance to me and our family. It’s important that we look at this legislation and the wide programme that we’re implementing in health. This is one of those parts of the legislative programme that sat for a long time with the Opposition—sat for a really long time with the Opposition—as a member’s bill and wasn’t picked up. There wasn’t the opportunity to progress it at that time, so it has now come before the House as a Government bill, and I’m very pleased about that.

While we are talking about organ donation, I want to urge each and every one of the people listening tonight and everyone here in this House to consider organ donation. As a person, if you come to this decision, I urge you to talk and speak with your family really clearly to explain and articulate your desire to share your organs. The important aspect of that—and this was clearly outlined to us in part of the hearings that we listened to—is that while we all think that we can donate our organs and we record it on our driver’s licence, unfortunately, upon our death, we are actually no longer able to do so, and it is the wishes of the family. So I just want to acknowledge that it is a conversation that may be difficult, but it’s one that needs to be had.

Now to the bill: this bill changes and amends two parts of the principal Act, the Compensation for Live Organ Donors Act 2016. People who are live organ donors—so those are the ones that are donating an organ; for example, a kidney—have not in the past been able to access compensation if they return to part-time work or they go back to work and then realise that, having donated, they’re not well enough to be at work and they go back off that work. They were unable to gain that compensation, and, as a consequence, that really did put a barrier in the way, or an additional barrier, to donating organs.

I’d just like to pause here and take a quick moment to acknowledge David and Anna. Now, David is the mayor of the Taupō community. He was very fortunate in that his wife was able to donate an organ to him last year, a kidney. I wonder, in terms of the legislation as it sat then, whether, as a family, they would have had both people off work at the time, and I wonder now whether this legislation would really have supported them to be able to afford to do this. I don’t know their circumstances financially, but it was a tremendous gift that Anna gave David and it is important that financially there are no barriers to do so.

The second change to the bill is the changes to the New Zealand Public Health and Disability Act 2000. Now, this bill is setting up the New Zealand Blood Service to be able to take on the new role within the organ donation and organ transplantation system. Essentially—most people have previously spoken about this—it sets up a system or an organisation that will, in fact, enable a better, more coordinated approach to organ donation. So it does a couple of things. It sets it up to raise the profile of organ donation, support clinical governance, coordinate donation and transplantation processes, and provide advice and information.

This is a small bill. It’s a bill that across the House has been pretty successfully discussed, and I think it’s really important. I think that it is a good piece of legislation and I commend this bill to the House.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. It’s a pleasure to take a short call on this, the Organ Donors and Related Matters Bill, a bill that, as the previous speaker has just said, is going to be supported across the House.

Fundamentally, this bill does two things. It sets up a national organ donation agency. Fundamentally, what that does is it transfers the care, responsibility, policies, and procedures and indeed some funds from Auckland District Health Board (ADHB), who have been managing the organ donation service to date. I want to extend our thanks to them for the work they’ve done in maintaining the service.

But the desire was to form a national organ donor agency. It was thought to be best sited inside an existing Crown entity, and the Blood Service was deemed to be the most suitable. I agree. In fact, if I recall, the headquarters of the Blood Service is about a hundred metres off Park Road, so within vision of ADHB. So it will be an easy transfer of policies and procedures to this organisation. The first part of the bill does that.

The second part really just seeks to make it easier to donate. The previous legislation said that the donor and recipient needed to be located in New Zealand, but in fact we want to be able to facilitate and support approved overseas donation programmes, so this legislation looks to change that. We found that there was some rigidity in how we’d set it up—I was fortunate to sit on the Health Committee when Chris Bishop’s excellent 2016 bill came through—and the 12-week period, which the compensation applies to, there’s some rigidity in that if you were to return to partial work and then that didn’t work, and you had to go back to full work. You’re sort of locked in. So what this bill does is allow for some variability of the compensation, depending on your ability to return to work or do reduced hours over that 12-week period. There’s no doubt that that Act’s been successful. In the first year, 100 people received full compensation for organ donation.

I just want to support the voices of others across the House and say, look, our donors are heroes. On one level, they’re kind enough to donate literally a part of them and give someone a different life and, we believe, a better life. So we’re very supportive of this bill, of this legislation, and again we congratulate those who bring this bill to the House and who actually initiated the organ donation member’s bill in 2016—I think that’s when it came through—and we’re going to support this bill further. Thank you.

Tēnā koe, Mr Speaker. As the Minister with purview over this particular organisation and this bill, I am really delighted to see this bill progress in the House with support from members right across this entire House.

If I can touch on a couple of mentions that the member Dr Shane Reti made in his contribution and endorse him in thanking those who do consider organ donation to be a part of their journey, whether live organ donation or deceased organ donation, but also the contributors who contribute to blood plasma and the bone marrow register—all important opportunities for people to give to others, to give to a cause greater than themselves.

Very recently, in fact, last week, we celebrated Paul—I’ll only call him Paul; I won’t refer to him by his full name. We honoured Paul for donating blood 600 times to the New Zealand Blood Service—something phenomenal, something that’s never been done before. I think that both parts of this bill will encourage more donation right across that entire spectrum, that we’ll see, in particular, Māori and Pacific peoples look towards donating blood, plasma, and consider themselves being on the bone marrow register, and also organs into the future.

Rightly, in order for us to do that, one part of the bill is actually to establish the organisation that all members have referred to in their contributions. I met with that organisation very recently, and there will be some opportunities and some challenges as the transition into the new organisation takes place, which is why I’m excited that this legislation will give them the platform to do that. Dr Reti is right in saying that it is a natural fit to merge both the organ donation side and the New Zealand Blood Service. For those familiar with the New Zealand Blood Service headquarters in Tāmaki-makau-rau on Great South Road, it is literally up the road. It will provide an opportunity for a far more seamless service, but, more importantly, the opportunity to strategise collectively into the future for what is an important part of our society, which is often unrecognised, often goes unnoticed, but is something that needs to be considered in its entirety as we look forward to our country being healthy, wealthy, and wise. That’s one part of the bill.

The other part, as members have already alluded to, is the opportunity to recognise those who do contribute to make sure that the compensation that’s due to them is far more fitting for the work life of the modern Kiwi, if you like. The full-time job aspect is, of course, part of that, but, also, Dr Reti quite rightly points out the ability for those on casual work, on different employment contracts, to be considered for compensation in this bill.

Just in my short contribution, I do want to acknowledge that the 16 submissions that came through and the work that was done by the select committee on this actually do lead to a far stronger bill as it proceeds through the House, and I look forward to no doubt more discussion being had as the bill progresses.

Finally, to both organisations as they go through this transition—the organ donation and the New Zealand Blood Service—we offer, I’m sure, on behalf of the entire House our support for the work that they’re doing and, of course, for the pathway that may lie ahead of them with respect to the New Zealand public and their ability to donate to these causes.

Just finally, a big thank you, of course, to all members on the way in which all parties have approached this bill. I look forward to it progressing through the House and to working with the New Zealand Blood Service and the organ donation service as they work through their integration over the next wee while. Kia ora, sir.

Bill read a second time.