Smokefree Environments and Regulated Products Amendment Bill (No 2) — Instruction to Health Committee

The question is that the amendment in the name of Dr Lawrence Xu-Nan be agreed. Oh, sorry, we haven’t had the debate.

你好吗。Kia orana, Mr Speaker. Thank you. It’s wonderful to be able to take a call on the amendment in the name of Dr Xu-Nan. Effectively, Dr Xu-Nan’s amendment will extend the period of time that this bill will be in front of the Health Committee. I think, actually, whilst we would prefer, I think, the full six-month opportunity for this, in this circumstance, having an additional period of time—I understand to be six weeks—will actually be, I think, quite sufficient in terms of what the Government was otherwise proposing.

I intend to just cover off why that is, and I intend to reflect on the experience that I had as chair of the Health Committee during the previous Parliament when aspects of this bill were in front of it at the time, but before I do that, I do want to just indicate that I understand that the chair of the select committee, or the select committee, has currently called for submissions on this bill. OK, that’s an instruction from the House in terms of this bill being referred to the Health Committee; however, it does concern me if there is a situation where the submission period for that bill is going to end, it might be, this coming week—I’m not too sure on that. It could be, it might be, it possibly is. We have a situation where this House has not actually given an instruction to shorten that time frame. Why then do we have a select committee that is currently calling for submissions?

I see that the chair of the select committee is here in the House today—he may wish to take a call to respond to this—but I just have an issue with the fact that currently members of the public will be submitting on this bill with the understanding that they actually only have until the end of the week to do that. Now, how presumptuous is that? This House has not issued a shortened time frame instruction. So—

💬 Sam Uffindell: And the committee hasn’t agreed to it.

What’s that?

💬 Sam Uffindell: The committee is yet to agree to it.

💬 SPEAKER: No, we’re not going to have that cross-House dialogue.

Well, the issue, as I understand it, is that the committee has not actually agreed to it. Well, Mr Uffindell, I know, and he will know—Chair Uffindell—that the chair is able to call for submissions; members of this House know that, but as does the period by which the submissions close.

The issue that this House currently has in front of it, of course, and that the community and the public should know, is as it stands right now, if there’s someone out there who goes on to the Parliament website and wants to submit on this bill, they should be under the impression that it is a full six-month period, because there is no instruction that currently stands from this House that indicates anything other than that. I do think—presumptuous as I might think it might be—that there is a little bit of an issue around that. If we are going out to the community, there will be community members and other individuals—and I’ll get to that in a moment—who will want to submit on this. We all know that they do often play to the time frame. There will be folk out there, submitters, who are working their butts off to meet a time frame that this House has not actually set yet. That’s an issue that I think does warrant contributions from members in that particular space.

This six-week period, I think, will be very, very helpful. What was really interesting is that the Minister moved a time period through to 31 October, which is, well, six weeks away or thereabouts—five weeks away. This extra time will allow for a fulsome opportunity for people to have their submission. When the Health Committee of the last Parliament considered an amendment to the Smokefree Environments and Regulated Products Act, what was really important was hearing from the community. We certainly heard from, actually, lots of rangatahi and lots of young people, and that was a really pleasing thing to do. I think this process, in terms of extending it by six weeks, will give young rangatahi and others the opportunity to submit if they choose to, rather than having that opportunity gone by the end of this particular week.

In my own electorate, I know that there are schools who absolutely have views when it comes to vaping. There are three particular components of this bill that I think we would hear from as a Parliament or a select committee around what those changes might mean for them and whether, actually, they go far enough or not. On this side of the House, we are of the view that, actually, the bill doesn’t go far enough. Giving people more time, which Dr Xu-Nan’s amendment effectively does, would allow those who wish to submit the opportunity to do that.

One of the interesting things that the select committee in the previous Parliament—and I accept that the previous select committee is by no means binding, but I do think it is important to provide some empirical experience around what happened when issues of this nature have been previously before the Parliament. What was a very clear indication from the community was—so much so that we had former parliamentarians come and submit to the committee around this—that the committee went away from this place and went out into the communities to hear directly from them. The community, I know, had the opportunity for the select committee to have public hearings located in South Auckland, at the Fale. I know that there were some that were scheduled in Canterbury and other places if they were able to take place, and it made it easier for people to not just submit, to take up the opportunity to speak to their submissions.

With a shortened period, if that’s what the Parliament determines, then it, basically, curtails that opportunity. I think that would be a real shame to, effectively, put in place limitations for an opportunity to hear directly out in the community. It’s not to say that we don’t do that here, but it makes it easier to hear firsthand from submitters in circumstances where it goes out in the community. What I would say is that a decision of the previous Parliament’s Health Committee in doing that was because we wanted to make sure that we heard directly from the communities where this absolutely would make a difference. When this bill talks about inserting early childhood education (ECE) centres into a sensitive zone consideration, that is really important. Giving ECEs—even though it seems the Government doesn’t want to give them anything at the moment—effectively an opportunity to feed into that process is really, really important.

This is a bill that also talks about the banning of the manufacture, sale, supply, and distribution of disposable vapes. Now, undoubtably there will be manufacturers, there will be retailers—because certainly that’s what we’ve heard from previously—that will be interested in this particular space. They’ll want to hear from that. Providing an opportunity, even if it is an extra six weeks, I think, would make a huge, huge difference.

Some of the issues that have been raised, even though this bill has been on the agenda—yet the instruction hasn’t been given—are community concerns around access and accessibility to the actual premises. One of the, I guess, interesting things previously is that we were able to get an understanding of actually how many retailers were out there. Now, there are quite a few. I mean, we all travel around the place. We just need to see from time to time in our own communities where they’re located. This additional time will also give them an opportunity to submit.

The issue that I have with the shortened time period is that it is just too soon. I think what Dr Xu-Nan’s amendment does is—all it’s doing—is extending the period to replace the words “31 October 2024” with “15 December 2024”. This means that it gives the community just an extra period of time to submit on something that they should not have not just a closed mind on but a submission date that has been closed by a select committee or a chair or whoever at the moment. I really am concerned that the signal that’s out to those who may wish to submit to this is one that says, “Actually, no, we’re going to stick to things closing later this week.” OK. The chair may extend that. I think that’s rather untidy when we have a situation where this is an operation that is, basically, not in line with any specific instruction from the House, but it is currently open for submissions. The six-week period will give members an opportunity.

I want to thank Dr Xu-Nan for putting forward the amendment. It’s not a wordy one, and I don’t say that as a criticism. I think it actually nails it down quite nicely that this is, from the Government’s perspective, a shortened period. It is not appropriate, and his amendment is one that provides not just the select committee but also the members who are on that committee time to consider things adequately. I am very happy to support this amendment and I hope that members from across the House will do so as well.

I move, That debate on this question now close.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I thought it was the “Hon Dr Kieran McAnulty” for a moment there, and I was a bit worried, but thank you very much for this.

I must say that Dr Lawrence Xu-Nan has, I think, struck a good middle ground. I mean, it’s clear that we’re deeply concerned about the very truncated select committee process. We do agree that the legislation and the objectives of it are something that we support, but the point is that we want people to have the ability to have a fulsome opportunity to make submissions. There will be submissions against it, I’m sure, but certainly what I’m hearing is that people would like to see the matters go further. I do think that in terms of the 15 December proposal, it isn’t asking for four or six months—it’s about six weeks more, I think—but what it does do is it gives people who perhaps aren’t professional submitters, if you like, the ability to gather their thoughts, put them on paper or on the laptop, and send them in.

I think there’s a real risk in having an extremely truncated report-back date that the Minister demanded, because she didn’t really ask. She just came to the House and didn’t give any reason, which I thought was quite outrageous. That very truncated report-back date and the report-back date that the deputy chair of the Health Committee has actually put out already, subject to the committee’s approval—the only people who can comply with that are people who, essentially, are lined up, ready to go, and have their thoughts in order already, and we know who that’s going to be. It’s going to be vested interests—the interests that that Minister is closely talking to on numerous occasions—and I’m deeply concerned about that.

I must say—and I see that the Minister of Justice is in the House—that there has been a tendency in recent times for Ministers to feel gung-ho and to have shortened report-back times, only then to realise that issues are a little more complex and that the select committees are actually really good at doing their job and have raised some issues that need addressing. Then the Minister, all of a sudden, comes back and says, “Oh, I know I said two months,”—or four months, or whatever it might be—“but can I have another month?” Now, that is actually quite undermining of the parliamentary process, and I do think that the lack of respect shown to select committees and the really diligent work that they do across the parties—Government members and Opposition members—is really undermined by this.

Lawrence Xu-Nan’s amendment gives the committee a relatively short but sufficient time to do a diligent job and, actually, I think Dr Xu-Nan’s amendment has got the wisdom of Solomon there because he hasn’t—perhaps as I might have—said to give us six months or five months. He’s actually kind of bought in to the Minister’s requirement that this is important legislation and that it should be on a slightly faster track than the six-month or four-month period that might be a little more normal. I think that’s very good, but at the same time, as I said, lay people, who are the mums and dads who are worried about their 13- or 14-year-old kid seeing the vapes in the shop down the road, or worried about the toddlers picking up disposable vapes and playing with them in the street—those are the people who actually have genuine and real concerns.

In my experience on select committees, you could listen to all of the fancy lobbyists, but every so often it’s someone who, perhaps unexpectedly, has an insight—a personal insight—from just ordinary human experience, and the light bulb goes off and you think, “Crikey! That had never crossed my mind. We need to address that gap in the law, or we need to make sure we go that little step further.” Those people aren’t going to be heard from if the Minister’s motion is passed as it stands, and so that’s why Mr Xu-Nan’s amendment is a good one. As I said, it’s 15 December—get it out of the way before Christmas. The public servants won’t be too excited by it because they’ll have work to do over the break, but then again, this Government is not too worried about that. They would probably want them in the office over the Christmas break, as well.

I won’t go on any further, but I do think that the amendment is a good one, and I think that the disrespect shown to the select committee by the extremely truncated period is concerning. The overall disrespect of select committees where that Government has just seen them as, essentially, their playthings to direct as they want is concerning. The actions by the deputy chair of the select committee in calling for a very, very truncated submission period is undermining of this House’s dignity and authority because it prefaces the very decision that this House is currently deliberating on, and I find that deeply concerning. With that, I very much support Mr Xu-Nan’s amendment and I absolutely do not support Minister’s Costello’s truncated report-back date.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. 大家早上好。我是新西兰国会议员Sam Uffindell. Happy Chinese Language Week, everyone.

I rise to speak on this, just in a short response—it won’t take up too much of this House’s time, Mr Speaker. I do note that the committee is yet to agree on that date—that two-week period. That has not yet been agreed to by the committee. Let’s just be clear on that.

I do appreciate that Duncan Webb called out, contrary to Mr Utikere’s assertion that it was the chair that had called for the submissions. He is correct: it was the deputy chair. The chair was not present in New Zealand at that time.

I will also say: like, we want to get this right; we want to get vaping regulations correct. If I cast my mind back to last year, the previous Government had an opportunity to and they got it wrong and the tobacco company—

💬 SPEAKER: Those are debating points about the bill. We need to talk entirely about—and closely and tightly to—the motion on the floor from Dr Lawrence Xu-Nan, which is—

The extension request. Yes, yes, yes. No, no, and we do note there are concerns about that. I will just say in regard to the concerns about the lack of period for submissions that the Health Committee has been conducting a briefing into youth vaping since early this year and we have heard a number of submissions come through on that. Vape-Free Kids NZ, the ministry—

💬 SPEAKER: Yeah, no, look, that’s all fantastic. I’m sure it’s very interesting, but we’re debating the motion. Please speak tightly to the motion.

Yes, Mr Speaker. Look, I do appreciate the concerns. We do want to have as good submissions as we can possible on this, but we will also work to ensure that we get good legislation into this House as soon as possible so that we can tackle the epidemic of youth vaping. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

I’m moving a new motion, so I just wanted to move that the motion be amended to remove the words “and outside the Wellington area” and “195”—

💬 SPEAKER: Sorry—say that again.

RICARDO MENÉNDEZ MARCH: I move that the motion be amended to remove the words “and outside of the Wellington area”, and—

💬 SPEAKER: Apologies to you—

RICARDO MENÉNDEZ MARCH: Do we have to finish this?

💬 SPEAKER: The mikes aren’t too clear—could you start again?

RICARDO MENÉNDEZ MARCH: OK. I move, That the motion be amended to remove the words “and outside the Wellington area” and “195”.

The reason why we are moving this is because this is a standardised phrase and the Associate Minister of Health, the Hon Casey Costello, is trying to capture all possibilities, should the situation arise that we meet during those sitting days outside of the Wellington area. The way I read this is to allow for things to move on in a way that just would not require the Business Committee’s agreement and that this would also allow for members to not be considered as absent for leave purposes should we be meeting outside of the Wellington area during sitting days, but there’s reasons why we want to remove them—there’s two things. We’ve had other bills in the past that do genuinely require us to be face to face with those communities, particularly bills that affect, say, communities where there may be really heavy language barriers or we need to meet particular cultural issues, such as Teanau’s member’s bill, or, for example, the Marine and Coastal Area (Takutai Moana) (Customary Marine Title) Amendment Bill that requires face-to-face engagements in communities like Northland.

In the case of this bill, I do genuinely think that there is nothing stopping us from meeting online on those sitting days and that it does not require members to actually travel outside of those sitting days to meet with those communities, and that we actually also have the ability to meet on days outside of the sitting period, and that if we want to do due diligence to the scrutiny of this legislation, there is nothing that should stop members from being able to meet completely outside of those sitting days—for example, meeting on Mondays or Fridays. As far as I understand it, by the rate that the Health Committee is going, most of the hearing days anyway will be during the two non-sitting weeks at any point. I think there is completely the possibility to be able to meet the deadline while not having to get members outside of the building to do that work outside of this place.

I think this is particularly important for parties that are smaller. We are particularly affected by having people be outside of the Wellington region to do select committee work when Parliament is sitting. It really, really affects our ability to fulsomely participate in the proceedings of the House. For that reason, we just want to sort of change those things because we just don’t simply think that they’re necessary. Should there be any hiccups or delays that require a reevaluation, this can just be discussed at the Business Committee anyway, but we think that, as a standardised procedure, we should try to avoid taking members outside of the Wellington region during sitting days, when we already know that we have duties to fulfil here during those days and we already have limited leave.

To repeat the key things that we’re looking for in this motion: the removal of the words “and outside of the Wellington area” and “195”, which is the relevant Standing Orders number. I’m looking forward to debating this motion and hearing constructive contributions from members across the House.

I move, That debate on this question now close.

Well, before you do that, I’ll have to say, members, that the question before the House, for debate, is that the amendment be agreed to. The amendment is now debatable together with the amendment in the name of Dr Lawrence Xu-Nan and the motion itself.

Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. I’ve already spoken on the motion, but I have not spoken on the amendment, so I’ll limit my contributions to that.

I do also wish to speak in support of the tabled amendment in the name of Rachel Boyack, which I’ll get to in due course. Specifically, in reference to the amendment in the name of Dr Xu-Nan, proposing that the report back is extended by a mere six weeks, I hold the view that this should be a full select committee process, but given this is the only amendment in front of the House that looks at the report-back date, I lend my support to this. The reason why we should look to have a longer report date is because of the public interest in this issue.

There is not a region in the country where vaping is not of concern, and I get the sense that there is a broad view amongst the House that we need to work together to look to take every possible avenue to limit the impact of vaping, especially on young people. If that is the shared view of the House, how can we realistically expect to do that with such a short report-back time? Even an extension of six weeks, as proposed in this amendment, wouldn’t give the public the full opportunity that a six-month select committee process would have done, and I think that’s regrettable, but at least an extension of six weeks would give people more time. It is entirely possible that if submitters had more time, the committee would be presented with alternatives that might achieve the Parliament’s stated goals in a better way. I’m not sure that ways that other countries overseas have dealt with this issue could be explored properly with such a short report-back time.

It is also of concern that if members of the public were to look at the select committee web page, it would show that submissions close at 11.59 p.m. this Friday. Now, it’s possible—unlikely, but possible—that this House could still be debating this referral motion at the end of this sitting period, which could potentially—

💬 SPEAKER: Can I offer the advice to the member that this debate is restricted to the motions on the Table, but also tempered by repetition, which is starting to come through very strongly. I think the member’s prediction, while interesting, is unlikely to occur.

As conceded, Mr Speaker, but the point remains that the current close date and time of submissions is merely a couple of days away and this House is still currently considering this referral motion. Perhaps I should have prefaced my comments by referencing the amendment that has been tabled by Rachel Boyack, which would have made those comments perhaps a little bit more relevant.

Rachel Boyack has a tabled amendment that moves that the motion be amended to add that the committee extend the call for submissions to allow the public a chance to submit. Now, I strongly support this amendment. This, of course, is a proposed amendment to an instruction to the committee, so it is entirely relevant for this House to consider such an instruction. It should be of concern to the House that the committee, which currently does not have an instruction for the House, have moved on the basis of a shortened submission process without an instruction. That should be a concern to all of us, because as it stands, in the absence of this instruction being passed by the House, the select committee has no other information to go on other than it being referred to it under a full process, a six-month process. Yet, despite that, they have decided to agree that, as stated on the website, submissions close 11.59 p.m. this coming Friday. Rachel Boyack’s amendment addresses that.

This House, given the decisions made by the committee, can have no confidence that it will voluntarily decide to extend the submission date. How can it? How can the House have confidence it would choose to do that when it’s already chosen to have a severely truncated submission process when there was no instruction to do so? This House cannot simply, even if it agreed to Dr Xu-Nan’s amendment, have confidence that it would extend the submission process out. The only way in which to secure that is for the House to vote in favour of this amendment. I commend Rachel Boyack for doing this. It’s entirely appropriate.

💬 SPEAKER: Can I ask the member to speak to the motion that’s on the Table. There is no motion on the Table from Rachel Boyack at this point. Please tighten up your contribution and resume speaking.

A point of order, sir. When a member submits an amendment to the House Office and they confirm that that’s been accepted, are members not to take, on that, that there is an amendment for debate in this House?

💬 SPEAKER: No, it needs to be tabled and it hasn’t yet been tabled. [Interruption] I’m sorry? That’s right. The member hasn’t had a call to move her motion. That’s the reference to tabling it. You can call that an arcane point, but it’s how we work. This whole debate is now becoming fairly repetitive, but the member will resume his speech.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. Point of order. Can a member move a motion as part of a yield?

💬 SPEAKER: No.

Well, it was worth a try, thank you. I will sit down and hope that she gets a call in.

I move, That debate on this question now close.

The question is that the amendment in the name of Dr Lawrence Xu-Nan be agreed to.

The question is that the amendment in the name of Ricardo Menéndez March be agreed to.

Point of order. Thank you, Mr Speaker. My point of order is on the fact that I did table an amendment on the table in the House Office and also sought the call to move that motion, an amendment on the original instruction to the select committee. It was signalled in a speech by my colleague, also. Yet, given that, I sought the call in order to move that and had not had an opportunity to take the call on either the original motion or any further amendment, and, further, had actually tabled it with the House Office to go on to the Table.

We’ve had previous points of order and rulings in the past about members’ opportunities to speak to the amendments that they put forward, and I would seek your guidance around the opportunity for members to actually put what are genuine amendments on the Table, seek an opportunity to move those, and seek an opportunity to have a contribution on amendments, because the usual practice is that, when something comes through to the House Office and is tabled, there is then an opportunity for members to speak to it. As the mover of the amendment, I did not have that opportunity.

Speaking to the point of order—

💬 SPEAKER: Briefly, I hope.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. Just a simple and brief point to direct you to Standing Order 128. On a straight reading of the rules between Standing Orders 123 and 128, where 128 says, “An amendment may be moved”, if moving means making a speech to the amendment, there is a rule here that says you may move it. A straight reading of Standing Order 128, in my reading, would say that Rachel Boyack was entitled to speak.

Well, that’s an interesting interpretation—it’s not one I agree with. There is a difference between a committee stage and a full call in the House. The Speaker heard nine speeches to the amendments, a total of more than two hours of debate on the matter. They’d mentioned a number of times that we were getting into repetitive territory and, therefore, made the decision to put the vote, which has now concluded, and that should end the matter.

Point of order. Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. There does appear to be some confusion, in terms of the distinction between a committee stage and a referral motion, and it’s quite possible that the ruling that you’ve just made might become a new Speaker’s ruling, and I hope, if that is the case, it provides some clarity. The concern, however, though, is that there is a higher requirement in an amendment to a referral motion that would be required in a committee stage, in that the member who is moving the amendment has to speak to it, apparently, in order for it to then be discussed. That was clearly not understood by us, and it wasn’t clearly outlined in the Speakers’ rulings.

I hope that, when it is looked at, it is, because what happened as a result of that—without disputing it; it’s simply providing an outline—is that the House was deprived of an opportunity, because of that requirement, of considering an amendment that was genuine and may well have actually got the support of the House. It’s quite possible that the two amendments that we voted on were opposed, as was the case, but the amendment that was referred to but not allowed to be considered or voted on might well have been accepted by the House, because it dealt with a decision made by a select committee that was outside the situation that they were dealing with—an assumption that a referral instruction would be passed by the House but yet hadn’t. Now we’re in a situation where the House will, if it did indeed hope that the submissions period would be extended, be relying on the goodwill of the committee without the opportunity to pass on that instruction.

Well, thank you for that contribution. I’m going to, firstly, acknowledge that there should be clarity for all members in the way in which the Standing Orders deal with these matters, and I will ensure that there is clarity brought around that, but the overarching point here is that accepting a closure is at the discretion of the Chair, in this case the Speaker, and that’s what I’ve done.