Hazardous Substances and New Organisms (Hazardous Substances Assessments) Amendment Bill

on behalf of the Minister for the Environment: I present a legislative statement on the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms (Hazardous Substances Assessments) Amendment Bill.

💬 DEPUTY SPEAKER: That legislative statement is published under the authority of the House and can found be found on the Parliament website.

I move, That the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms (Hazardous Substances Assessments) Amendment Bill be now read a third time.

This bill improves the way chemicals are assessed or reassessed by the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA). The bill will improve efficiency, for example by enabling better use of information from international regulators, and it will increase transparency, such as by requiring the EPA to publish a work plan for reassessments. We rely on thousands of chemicals and industrial processes in agriculture and many other aspects of modern life. It is important that the EPA is able to effectively and efficiently manage these chemicals so that their benefits are realised while not compromising the health and welfare of our citizens or the environment.

As the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment noted earlier this year in a report about chemicals’ management in New Zealand, the rules about how the chemical can be used shouldn’t be static. We need to be able to adapt as new information comes to light. This bill will help the EPA to speed up both assessments and reassessments, for example, by making it easier for the EPA to make use of information from international regulators.

The bill has had broad cross-party support at all stages, including through the select committee process and during the committee of the whole House. On behalf of the Minister, I again thank the chair of the Environment Committee the Hon Eugenie Sage and all members of the committee and of this House, who have made thoughtful contributions to the consideration of this bill. I also thank the members of the public who took the time to make helpful submissions to the Environment Committee. I also want to acknowledge the advice of the Ministry for the Environment and the EPA, the advice from the Office of the Clerk, and the work of the Parliamentary Counsel Office.

To conclude, this bill will improve the efficiency and speed of assessments and reassessments of hazardous substances. This is important so we can quickly get safer and more environmentally friendly chemicals in use in this country and better control the use of older, less safe substances. The bill will also improve transparency, in particular by requiring the EPA to publish a work plan for reassessments. Therefore, I commend this bill to the House.

The question is that the motion be agreed to.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. It’s a pleasure to take a call on this bill. I have not been part of the process that the Minister Kieran McAnulty has just described, but National does support this bill. In our estimate, it is a bill worth supporting, because it’s really important that hazard classifications are accurate and up to date, and it’s equally as important for new substances as it is for substances that have been around for a while, for the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) to take another look at those. So National understands the rationale for what on the face of it seems to be a really practical bill. Anything that speeds up regulatory processes, albeit with due checks and balances and safety, has to be a good thing. It’s estimated that the Environmental Protection Authority is responsible for managing more than 150,000 hazardous substances under the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act, so it’s quite a significant role that they undertake.

I think the important thing that I have seen in terms of looking through the discussions that have been had on the bill, and the bill itself, is that, really, it enables better use of information from international regulators. This is important for the reason that, you know, if I actually think across, a lot of things that people are now starting to ask to be regulated to use fall into the environmental, climate change areas of where we operate with our agricultural systems. You know, we need to make sure that those substances are safe for our environment, safe for our country. But there’s something that always seems to come into question every time we discuss this: that if international regulators have had a look at some of these substances and they consider them safe for human use, its’s really good that our EPA is going to start taking some notice of those things as they cross borders. Actually, humans are humans wherever they may live, and if there is a safe human factor, then I think it’s hugely important that some of the background work that’s been done in other countries, if deemed to be safe across international regulators—that we are able to take account of it. We’re quite good in this country, at times, at reinventing the wheel, and, actually, we’re a small population compared to the rest of the world and we have other regulators that are much bigger and have much more resource in terms of being able to assess some of these products.

There are other improvements to the reassessment process, and it seems from reading this that some of the chemicals and substances that are being reassessed—it’s taking a very long time to be able to reassess those. We know from history that if we think about some of the chemicals and substances that have been used in the past and the issues that we’ve had with those, we certainly don’t want any more hold-up in terms of making sure that these are safe and environmentally friendly, and if the continued use of those is going on and we don’t have the ability to speed up the processes to assess them, then we certainly have a problem.

The EPA, for those who are listening out in New Zealand today, is the regulator that’s responsible for making decisions on whether to improve new hazardous substances. I’ve had a few conversations with people over the last little while about some substances that may be very useful for eliminating things such as—or lowering methane emissions from agricultural ruminant animals. You know, I think that speeding up the process and taking into account the human factors around those sorts of things is very important if we want to stay ahead of the world as a nation in terms of how we produce and how we are very climate effective now. If we have a regulator that is slow and unable to follow due process in a meaningful and timely manner compared to other parts of the world, we certainly risk getting left behind.

So those, really, I think, are the key points in this bill, and I don’t really see any point in labouring out another five minutes on it, because I think it’s very clear: let’s pass this bill. We don’t want to be the hold-up to any processes that might give us the opportunity to get some products in this country that might solve some of our other issues. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

Thank you, Mr Speaker, for this opportunity to speak on this bill amending the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act—the HASNO Act. The primary legislation, the HASNO Act, has an environmental purpose to it, and that, at section 4, is to protect the environment and the health and safety of people in communities by preventing or managing the adverse effects of hazardous substances and new organisms.

What this amendment bill—the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms (Hazardous Substances Assessments) Amendment Bill—does is it just deals with that part of hazardous substances; it’s not dealing with new organisms at all. And it is, as the previous speaker, Barbara Kuriger, just said, to improve those processes—the regulatory processes—that the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) administers. So they have approval processes for hazardous substances, and that is what this bill addresses.

I was on the select committee and I am on the select committee that addressed this bill. We did hear submissions on the bill about a year ago, so I’m very thankful for those people who took the time to make submissions, and to our advisers, and to the rest of the select committee that made a unanimous report. There were no differing views or anything like that.

So what the bill does is it enables the EPA to rely on international regulators. Those regulators have to meet some criteria that are spelt out in the bill, and it improves the reassessment process. And there are some technical improvements as well.

So I’m very happy to commend this bill to the House. It improves and it does some maintenance to an important piece of environmental legislation. Thank you.

Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. Absolute pleasure to stand as a member of Parliament for North Shore and as a member of the National Party on the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms (Hazardous Substances Assessments) Amendment Bill at its third reading.

💬 Simon O’Connor: Is that plain English?

Well, that’s a very good question Simon O’Connor, but not the purpose of this bill; we should stay on track, which I will endeavour to do. So as we’ve traversed already, and Barbara Kuriger has opened up our position on this, National continue to support this bill. It is an important bill in regards to improving the assessment of hazardous substances, as the prior speaker Rachel Brooking has acknowledged, and I recognise that she is a member of the mighty Environment Committee. I do want to acknowledge the members on that group, the Hon Eugenie Sage who is chair, Scott Simpson obviously on our side—he’s sad he can’t be here, I’m sure, in regards to this, but I said I’d carry on and make sure I raise that—and the other members, of course, for their hard work.

It was interesting when the prior speaker acknowledged—it was nearly a year ago, I think, that the select committee went through that process of public submissions, and gee, time flies, does it what when we’re doing what we do. Nearly a year has gone by, and I do want to acknowledge all of those members of the public who made submissions in regards to this to the Environment Committee and also the officials in the background that have worked so diligently in regards to the support and the preparation of an important bill. As Barbara Kuriger has noted, this looks to be—and obviously I’m not a member of this select committee but it does look to be a sensible piece of legislation dealing with important aspects in regards to hazardous substances.

It’s interesting that the prior speaker referred to the environmental purpose of that. It takes me back to when I was a young fella. I grew up on an orchard and my father is a horticulturalist, and you could imagine on an orchard you’d use a lot of pesticides and a lot of insecticides, a lot of chemicals such as that, a lot of hazardous substances, actually. So it did bring me back to the good old days of—

💬 Hon Gerry Brownlee: Bit of an explanation.

Thank you very much to the Hon Gerry Brownlee—good little snippet there; thank you. But it did take me back, and it does remind me of why it’s very important—Mr Speaker, you’re laughing and I’m laughing now too—that we’re reviewing such legislation and we’re continually looking at opportunities to improve it because, you know, those pesticides and chemicals do have issues. But I think the other aspect is the work that is in the linkage there in terms of the biodiversity of our waterways, and obviously the flow-through of those chemicals going into our waterways, the impact of that on plant life and animal species and the flow-through of that is important.

I also just want to, while I’m there, acknowledge the community groups out there that do a lot of work in regards to protecting the biodiversity of our waterways, and no doubt this legislation will help in terms of improvement around reducing the risks and issues that evolve in regards to that point.

The other aspect I want to cover in the short amount of time that I’ve got left is in regards to members of the chemical industry that are involved. I actually had the privilege to visit Chemfreight, a significant chemical and hazardous substance business in Auckland, actually near Botany, and I had the pleasure to visit there with Christopher Luxon, the leader of the National Party. We had a tour around this chemical freight business. They’re dealing with exactly the types of chemicals that are included within this legislation, and I just want to acknowledge the work that those individuals do to ensure that they maintain a high degree of standards and processes—and geez they’re fastidious in terms of the detail. And I think we would respect why they are so fastidious, because, you know, those chemicals are pretty dangerous and pretty serious if they are not managed appropriately.

But businesses such as that, I think, do operate under a significant regulatory burden and regulatory framework. And I say burden just for the point that I think there is an element—and this is maybe something for the Minister to consider in terms of the consistent application of enforcement around such legislation, because a number of those significant chemical businesses are absolutely complying with the legislation in the way in which they should, but there is a number of players out there that aren’t necessarily as professional, that are potentially not.

I think this legislation, in regards to an amendment, is to try and improve. I think we should be continuously assessing the opportunities that we have available in terms of making sure that everyone, particularly our business community, are playing on a level playing field. Often the legislation, such as the bill we’re discussing now, is all good, but where the rubber hits the road is in regards to the way in which that is monitored and enforced, and making sure that that is consistent. If that’s the one takeaway I could take from that business, and, I’m sure, many others, it is that that would be an area that would be sensible for the Government to review.

I think what is good also, and I won’t get into the detail of the prior bill that we are talking about, but in this case we’ve actually got broad cross-party support for a piece of legislation, which is good. I think that reflects the fact that the legislation in terms of the substance and its form—with the exception of the title, as was acknowledged right at the start—should deliver the requirements in terms of what is required.

The last aspect I want to talk on is just in terms of the overall amendments that we’re seeing within this bill driving a greater degree of efficiency in terms of the assessment and reassessment of processes for hazardous substances. I think, you know, that when we get the opportunity to stand up in this House, it’s often in regards to the increasing of regulatory burden and roadblocks and things that are slowing down and blocking our business community. And when we see amendments that actually bring greater efficiency to that process, I don’t know, it’s like when you go through a very long, cold winter and the sun comes out in spring. You know, it’s a bit like that. And I think in regards to this, it is good to see cross-party support in regards to initiatives that will bring greater efficiency around an area which, as we’ve noted, has significant positive impacts in terms of not only the health and safety of hard-working Kiwis but also in regards to our environment and our waterways.

So I’m very pleased that National, along with other parties, understands the rationale of what seem to be very much practical proposals within this legislation. We’re very much in support of the intent of this legislation on this third reading and want to ensure that when we look back on this in periods to come, it will be noted that we strongly support this bill. Thank you very much, Mr Speaker.

Tēnā koe Mr Speaker. Thank you. I’m really pleased to be standing and taking a short call on the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms (Hazardous Substances Assessments) Amendment Bill—a long name but a really good, useful little bill that does some really practical things.

I want to congratulate the Minister, the Hon David Parker, for bringing this legislation to us, and I also want to thank our submitters; the select committee, who were very unanimously in support of this bill; our officials, including the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) and the Ministry for the Environment, the Office of the Clerk, and the Parliamentary Counsel Office. These things take time to pull together but it’s a really good little bill that will do some real, real useful changes.

So it basically amends our primary legislation and it enables better information from similar international regulators, and that’s really important because it doesn’t duplicate the assessments already undertaken by those comparable international regulators. But it doesn’t say that we can just take any rules; it just says they have to be a comparable regulatory framework and the information needs to be readily accessible. That’s really important because we want it to be really transparent as to what assessments have been used.

There’s also a strict liability offence for $50,000 for a natural person or $100,000 for a company, and it also enables the EPA to temporarily restrict certain uses of hazardous substances, and this where there’s actual or likely danger to human health, safety, or to the environment.

So there are really practical, useful changes. It’s going to mean that the EPA are going to be able to get through their work a lot faster. We know there’s a backlog and they’re working at pace, but this helps. I commend this bill to the House.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. It’s a pleasure to speak on the third reading of the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms (Hazardous Substances Assessments) Amendment Bill—what a name. I just wanted to acknowledge my colleague Eugenie Sage, who I’m sure would have been delighted to deliver this third reading speech. She’s the chair of the Environment Committee and someone technological, so are the other members across the House who I understand have worked in a very collegial and constructive manner to get to this place where we can celebrate in some time the passing of this bill.

The intention of this bill is to reduce time, cost, and complexity of assessment and reassessment that can delay the introduction of safer chemicals as well as delay reassessment of chemicals in use that may not be fit for purpose. I think for a lot of us when we read the term “hazardous substance”, I think it can be quite nebulous, but there is a definition to it, which is basically chemicals, mixes of chemicals that can be explosive, flammable, corrosive, have the capacity to oxidise, and/or to be toxic to people and the environment. When we see the definition so clearly laid out it is why this bill has such a key role in ensuring that the assessment of the substances is fit for purpose. There are over 200,000 substances across the region that are considered to fit this definition.

There are several elements of the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act—HASNO Act—that are supposed to protect the environment and the health and safety of people. This bill focuses specifically on the assessment of these substances. While we do really support this bill, I did want to note a couple of points around some of the areas that we need to continue working on in order to have a really good regime. So one of those is around the need for more work in other areas to improve regulation and management of hazardous substances in the region. In order for this bill to be effective, what we say is that we need more funding and Ministry for the Environment (MFE) staff time too, and prioritise to simplify the regime, ensure agencies are clear about their roles and bridge major gaps, such as lack of track and trace systems, because sometimes one element is having a really good piece of legislation and the other one is then what needs to happen to ensure that the purpose of this legislation is met. The Environmental Protection Authority, the EPA, will play a key role.

There’s heaps of things to like about this bill. One of them is about enabling the EPA to make better use of information from what its counterparts overseas are doing and other trusted regulators in other jurisdictions. There’s other elements that we quite like, such as making it easier to update hazard classifications when the EPA has done a recent reassessment of a related hazardous substance, and also to have a simpler process for the EPA to update hazard classifications for substances and controls on them using information from international regulators, as well as, basically, allowing the EPA to temporarily restrict certain uses of hazardous substances.

These are all really important measures that we need to take. While we welcome the use of overseas data in order for us to have a good regime, I think that we also need to ensure that we are taking a very Aotearoa-specific context when these decisions are being made. We have a very unique ecology and so, therefore, decisions being made around what is hazardous and not needs to be made in the context of our own region.

It’s also important that we’re not relying on data and research that is produced by chemical companies themselves as a basis for assessing impact. I think it’s important that we also use independent and robust sources that have come through rigorous scientific methods. I mean, we can’t rely on, basically, the industry itself to tell us what is hazardous or otherwise. This is why we must continue using a broader range of information. Also, it’s important that we continue demanding more transparency from applicants and agrichemical companies. We should only be accessing data that is used by trusted regulators overseas.

So with that, we’re pretty pleased to support this bill. Again, we’re really calling on the Government to make sure this bill is as effective as possible. I know that the previous National speaker talked about how there is broad consensus on this bill. So now’s the time to ensure that our environment and our people are protected from substances that could cause them harm. Kia ora.

Kia ora e te Mana Whakawā. It’s always an honour and a privilege to make a contribution in this House. Today, it is the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms (Hazardous Substances Assessments) Amendment Bill, so I’m happy to make a contribution. What we’ve heard in the overview of this bill is that there are three amendments in this bill that it covers: one, it is about enabling the better use of information from international regulators; two, there are other improvements to the reassessment process; and, three, there are technical amendments.

Earlier this year, as the Minister has alerted us to, the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment noted that our rules around chemicals shouldn’t be static and that we needed to adopt new information as it comes to light. So the regulator, the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA)—this will make it easier for them. If there is a new hazardous drug that overseas regulators have deemed to be dangerous, then what the regulators here can do—the EPA—is actually makes changes in their assessment process so that dangerous hazardous substances are not used in New Zealand. So these amendments will modernise and make the Act agile enough for technology—new information—to be adopted by the EPA in approving hazardous substances or chemicals.

In that name, I just want to acknowledge the leadership of the Minister and the chair of the Environment Committee. This has been an example of where we can all come together and agree on something that’s useful and valuable for the country. I commend this bill to the House. Mālō.

Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. Hey, look, pleased to take a call on this rather long-titled bill, but an important one. Because everyone starts their speeches this way, I will: it’s called the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms (Hazardous Substances Assessments) Amendment Bill, in its third reading.

Despite the tone, we are very supportive of this bill; I had better assure Minister Parker of that. Humour aside, this is actually a good example of a Government bill which attracts the support, by the sound of it, of everyone across the House. For those watching, and certainly locals in my electorate, I often will point out that about 80 percent of legislation goes through this Parliament certainly with the support of the two major parties, National and Labour, and this is a really good example of that.

The third reading, of course—we are bringing this to a conclusion. As others have rightly noted, the select committee, led by Eugenie Sage, has done a very good job teasing this out, and it’s a very practical example of a select committee, I’d suggest, working strongly, confidently, and producing a piece of legislation that is pretty straightforward. And what it’s doing, fundamentally, is updating New Zealand’s legislation to allow the classification of hazardous substances to be done much more quickly and efficiently.

I’m not a chemist; in fact, I’m not a lawyer, not a doctor—not a whole lot of things. I can, in fact, fill out 3½ minutes telling you what I’m not. However, importantly, around hazardous substances, we’re talking things that are explosive, things which are flammable, things which are toxic, things which are eco-toxic, corrosive, and oxidising. And unbeknownst to me, the likes of hydrogen peroxide is actually an oxidising agent.

So long and short—which is possibly a little bit long, Mr Speaker—fundamentally, we are talking a grade of chemicals that are used day to day in New Zealand, or explosives, of course. I think that’s mainly in the mining and quarrying side, but it’ll also have elements within our defence forces. These are substances used each and every day to make our lives easier, and what this bill seeks to do is to speed up the process of how they’re assessed. And the fundamental change is to actually look overseas and see what other jurisdictions do, and, importantly, this bill makes it clear that those have to be, if you will, nominated countries, nominated agencies that we have trust in. And I think that makes a lot of sense. I would make the suggestion to the Government, and it’s been a policy idea of mine—and certainly discussed with my own colleagues on this side—that we should apply this thinking also into the health sector when it comes to the likes of pharmaceutical products or therapeutics.

I’m always amazed; with no offence to the likes of Pharmac and Medsafe, it would also be good to look at overseas jurisdictions and take a bit of a lead for what they do—you know, a drug in Afghanistan, America, or Algeria works just as good as it does in New Zealand, in my opinion, and we should take heed of what other countries do, in other words, to speed up the process, and that’s fundamentally what this one is doing here.

So people wanting to import or use hazardous substances—as I say, those which are explosive or oxidising, eco-toxic—will now be able to look overseas and provide that information to the EPA or the Environmental Protection Authority here in New Zealand. So I think it’s actually just a very pragmatic idea. It’ll be interesting to see how this beds in, I suppose. Like anything, it looks good and it is good, I think; the little rub could potentially be who or which countries, which agencies, get nominated. It would be my hope that New Zealand’s relatively generous in those interpretations. I would hate to see that the legislation, which is intending to make this more—I don’t know—malleable; is that a bad chemical-type pun? It could be, I don’t know—I’ll have to ponder that. Sorry—it’s one of those mornings! But, hopefully, this makes the system more malleable. I wouldn’t like to see it run down bureaucratically where all of a sudden in terms of jurisdictions like, I don’t know, the United States or Canada or the United Kingdom, we say, “Well, actually, even though we respect these authorities, we shouldn’t use them.” I would hope we’ll be quite generous in that space.

So, again, very pleased to recommend this bill to the House—good to see it moving through the third reading and look forward to seeing it implemented practically soon.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. It’s my pleasure to take a short call on this third reading. For those of us who live in rural communities, this is a really important piece of legislation because we not only live in a beautiful part of the world—wherever we are in rural New Zealand—but we’re very aware that we live in a working environment. We’ve heard from across this House that recognising this bill enables more nimble and responsive decisions to be made, not just about better protections for hazardous substances but also for new technology to be recognised and brought into play to assist us to make a just transition and make our primary industries more sustainable in the long term.

We have some significant legacy pollution sites around the country that this Government has committed to cleaning up. Ideally, this bill will help to minimise those legacy sites from appearing in the future. So I commend this bill to the House.

Thank you for the opportunity to make a short contribution on the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms (Hazardous Substances Assessments) Amendment Bill. As we have heard from other speakers in the third reading debate on this bill, the main purpose of the principal Act is to protect our environment and the health and safety of our people and communities by preventing and managing the adverse effects of hazardous substances and new organisms.

This is very important because of the speed of the industry—we don’t know what we don’t know, and it is really important in the kōrero and the mahi of the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) that they are kept up to speed, and that is true of WorkSafe as well. As we have heard, the bill is to amend the original Act, and, more to the point, to improve the assessment and reassessment of hazardous substances, and specifically to enable better use of information from international regulators. We are reliant in Aotearoa on that information and the comparative analysis by our international partners, but also to make those improvements to the reassessment process around the technicality of those amendments. The improvements will enable the efficiency by enabling better use of that information, and, where possible, increasing transparency.

This amendment bill will enable stronger decision-making about whether the controls do need to be updated and whether the substances that are currently used should no longer be used, and it will ensure we have the technical information that is appropriate.

At the moment, as we know, the current system can be time-consuming, resource-intensive, and lengthy, which has a cost in the long run. In terms of chemicals, we need to understand that the Government needs to have safer alternatives to existing chemicals, so we are reliant on the information that is enforced by the EPA. Delayed reassessments could mean that safety in the controls are not kept up to speed and may be unsafe for our citizens and can no longer be used. So it’s really important that the information is clear and concise and is evidenced-based, as per the international regulators.

Therefore, we need the bill to be passed, and I thank members across the House for their support to improve processes for assessing and reassessing particular hazardous substances. I want to acknowledge the Minister, the select committee members, submitters, and officials from the various agencies. I commend this bill to the House.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. It’s good to be able to rise and speak on the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms (Hazardous Substances Assessments) Amendment Bill at the third reading. As noted, this is something that we do support. It makes sense to be able to do this, as some of my colleagues and people across the House have commented on this morning.

We noted that the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) is responsible for managing a significant number of hazardous substances, and whether they go through the agriculture or horticulture area, construction, right across the many areas of New Zealand industry, there will be hazardous substances that are used, and, as a result of that, there will be potentially negative externalities for people who have to deal with those, for the environment, for animals, for our health. So being able to respond dynamically and quickly is something that’s very important.

We note that the EPA needs some amendments to enable quicker uptake of what is being used overseas to assess hazardous substances and make decisions about what should be approved and what should no longer be approved as new information comes to light. However, currently, the way of doing this is quite cumbersome, it’s quite time-consuming, and, as a result, it’s also costly. So you have there a mix of inefficiencies, you have expenses, and, at the end of the line, you have people, you have the environment, and you have businesses taking on costs, losing time, and exposing themselves to potentially more hazardous situations than they otherwise should have to. So amending the regulatory framework to be able to allow New Zealand to be more dynamic in that area is very important, and, as a result, we will be commending this.

It makes sense, as science progresses, that we will see an increase in new chemicals being produced and manufactured and available for use. So having a regime that enables them to be brought into the New Zealand environment is important. There is a lot of good information out there and a lot of good regulators out there, as well, that have done a lot of background work on stuff, and to be able to leverage that, I think, is definitely in New Zealand’s best interest. I think this bill understands that and goes a fair way to addressing that.

My colleague Simon O’Connor did raise a point around what other regimes we would view as comparable or like-minded or want to utilise in order to progress certain hazardous substances. I think that’s a fairly good point from him. Ideally they would be jurisdictions that have similar regimes to us, similar tests and controls to enable us to have that reassurance that the chemicals and substances that we are allowing for use in New Zealand are of a standard that we would expect. I think we’ve probably got a fair bit of literature and also commonality over previous or other arrangements where we can look to leverage off that.

There has been some concern raised about the current environment and how it can delay our responsiveness. I think that’s really important because we do live in a dynamic world, and we do live in an environment where other countries are also understanding that and they will have amended their regimes. So to see New Zealand now in that mould is very pleasing. I think it’s a good idea and we should be looking to apply this beyond what we’re doing here, to allow us to leverage off what other people have done in this space, not just when it comes to hazardous substances but you could look across other medical devices. We only need to cast our minds back to the COVID environment where we probably weren’t as nimble as we should have been to utilise what other healthcare regulators overseas were doing in regards to testing and different equipment that could be used. You could also apply it to what is happening with Gib board and whether some standards that are being used overseas could also be applicable here.

But it is good to see that that is happening in this space. So, on that note, I have reiterated, and I will continue to, that I think this is a good way to utilise the expertise that exists overseas to help save New Zealand time and resources that, frankly, we don’t have, and to create a more dynamic hazardous substances regime. It will benefit industry. It will benefit the public. It will support timely and appropriate hazardous substances management for all communities to effectively derive greater benefit from. So, on that note, I commend this bill to the House. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. The ACT Party supports the changes proposed in this bill. The problem to solve is to simplify the way that hazardous substances, pesticides, agricultural chemicals, and water treatment chemicals, for example, are assessed and can come into use in New Zealand. And that’s because, over the past few decades, there have been many, many advances in the type of chemical formulations that are used on our crops, in our water supply, and in manufacturing food, which means that the chemicals used today are far less toxic than the ones used in previous generations.

If we consider it wasn’t that long ago that in New Zealand we used to manufacture products like 2,4,5-T, like dieldrin, and like lindane that all contained extremely harmful dioxin compounds that cause cancer and birth defects and that are not easy to clean up and dispose of—those chemicals are banned and we now use a far safer generation of products to grow food, in industrial manufacturing, water treatment, and so on. But the next generation of products that are available are safer again, and our current hazardous substances and new organisms legislation has made it difficult to have older products, less safe products, reassessed and removed, and to bring new products into the market. It’s actually our growers who are asking for access to these products, asking for the system to be sped up. And so for that reason, ACT supports this.

What is missing from this particular piece of legislation, and it has been canvassed, is the opportunity to look at the new organisms component, which would give us a pathway, potentially, to solving some of our really serious environmental problems, like how we address emissions from livestock, for example. There are products in the market right now, like Bovaer, which, if fed to livestock, reduce their methane emissions. There are forms of ryegrass, for example, which are genetically modified, which would take up more nitrogen and actually improve the environment. And, of course, there are opportunities to use medical treatments which are commonly used in places like far-flung Australia, which involve genetically modified organisms to treat really rare but extremely deadly cancers.

So the ACT Party supports this legislation. We believe that it’s timely to simplify the process to reassess chemicals and to reassess hazardous substances so they can be removed from use if new, safer products are available. But we also urge the Minister and officials to continue work on liberalising the use of genetically modified biotechnology that is in common use in other parts of the world, and which would have great benefits for New Zealand consumers, for New Zealand primary producers, but, most importantly, for the environment we live in and for the future people of New Zealand. Thank you.

In the spirit of this bill, which is to make sure that we cut the costs of processes, I commend this bill to the House. It’s a great bill. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

Motion agreed to.

Bill read a third time.