and vegetables to be labelled. I am calling on all parties in the
House to support it. Thank you very much,
Mr Speaker. The question
is that the motion be agreed to. I call Ian
McKelvie. Thank you. As a number
of firsts going to occur in the
parliament this afternoon. First of
all, I want to congratulate
the member Steffan Browning
on having the luck to draw a bill out of
the ballot, but there is three
other firsts involved in this. That
is the best speech I have ever made
the member make in
The second is I didn't ever think I would leave here
agreeing with Steffan Browning. He will leave here
before me with a bit of luck, but I
am not sure
about that either.
. The next first is he got through a speech without mentioning
and that is amazing. I want to congratulate him on that as well.
There is another one I
will get on the
There is another one I will get on
very interesting that I think sentimentaly many people in New
Zealand agree with and he's
outlined that in the course of his
speech a moment or two ago. The
National Party are going to support this, the
first reading, and there are a
number of reasons for supporting the
first reading and I
will get onto some of the challenges that we have
got with that in a
little while. First of all, I want to talk a bit
about the background of this.
First of all, I want to talk a bit about the background of this. The
Primary Production select
committee is a col Liege gel
select committee and we talk about a lot of
issues outside of sitting
hours. The poor Clerk has to listen to
us. This is what we often talk about
because one of or two members of this
parliament raised it. The
priest member is one of those. So, it is an issue that I
think is of interest to
New Zealanders. It is of interest to
a large number of our commercial
grower entities. I think it is
something that we will get to as we
move through the implementation or
the discussions on this bill. I was
rather intrigued with the title
the discussions on this bill. I was
The Consumer's Right to Know Food of Origin Food Bill. One could
have a committee stage speech on
the title, I would imagine, and no
doubt someone will. It is
an interesting name. I am sure that may well get
simplified in the course
of the process. It does as
Browning pointed out, sets out the requirements
to label the country of origin
of single component foods and the
interesting thing about
single component
interesting thing about single single
interesting thing about single component foods is they can have
additives in them but
they are additives that preserve
the foods and enabling I guess
those foods to be sold in a safe manner and types
of things I am talking about
are salt, water, sugar and a number
of other things like that. But
of course, making it a single
component food really plays right into the
Primary Production
sector in New Zealand and meat, fresh fruit, nuts,
grains, oils, et cetera are all things
we grow very well in New Zealand. Many of those
items are also imported into New
Zealand and the
two dominant supermarket
Zealand and the two dominant Zealand
Zealand and the two dominant supermarket changes in New Zealand
currently have their own versions, I
guess, of country of origin
labelling in place. Many
other organisations around New Zealand
do use a country of origin
destination in the course of what they do. So,
it is an issue that I think
is of great interest to us. It is
an issue that letter is used
by a large number of entities and a large
number of countries around the
world in. In New Zealand, of course,
we have many of the meat can
companies, branding their meat
with the New Zealand brand. With have the dary
industry doing the same thing. The
wine industry very
strongly orientated to New Zealand and
no doubt student Smith will talk
about that when he gets an opportunity
to
that when he gets his opportunity to talk on this bill. I guess
Scottish whiskey is the main
one. It is always scotch whiskey where ever it
is made as long as
they can get a licence the make it. That
is what this has been used for. This
issue often is confused with a food
safety issue. I am sure when JoGoodhew
gets up to speak she will have a view on.
That it is not a food
safety issue, it is an issue for people
and it gives them
gives them comfort knowing where their food comes from. I suppose the
most startling experience
I have had of that is when you
go to a supermarket in a place
like Singapore or even Taiwan
for that matter and you see the country of
origin, it is almost
priced by country of origin. Whilst I
don't think for a moment that
is a trade barrier, it certainly is an
advantage to some countries to
have their country's brand firmly
on the food. So country of origin
labelling will have an impact on price. There
is no doubt about that. It will
have an impact on what people
choose to pick off
pick off the supermarket shelf or the
pick off the supermarket shelf or
to buy their food, but it is pretty common around the world and it
seasonally is very influential in
many parts of the world. So,
the next issue I want to get
onto is trade and I have touched on that a
moment ago. I don't think there
is any way you could concede
that country of origin labelling
as any form of trade barrier. I think that
the select committee for doubt
will have significant discussion on that
issue and I am sure there will
be discussions to the
select committee on this bill. I don't think
it can be conceived as that and it
is practised in so many
parts of the world I think it is
logical it will just
world I think it is logical it will
natural process of food production. I want to talk for a minute
about costs and
costs and this is the interesting thing about member's bills when
they are drawn, of course, that the
Government hasn't done a lot of
research or the government
departments have done a lot of
research on the cost or
the ramifications of the
potential implementation of the conditions
of these bills and so there is a
lot of work to be done on this
and the select
select committee will obviously ask for
select committee will obviously ask select
select committee will obviously ask for a lot of information on this
as well. There are quite
a few things you could look at and
think there might be costs
involved. The other issue I think is really
important is how you designate what
qualifies to be labelled and what doesn't. So
ho how do
be labelled and what doesn't. So ho
have got to package it straight away it is set in the cost of
that cabbage. It is a fri louse issue
but nevertheless we have struck
that with a lot of learnion with
food. We end up putting a cost
on the producer and retail business that
others which we might not have. That
will be work for
the select committee to get through the
process as well. Another area is the one
offen forcement. There are
significant costs of enforcement
in anything we do in
New Zealand and there will be some cost
of enforcement in this case, too. I
don't suppose you would ever
need to go to a country of origin
labelling process if even was honest. But
not everyone is honest
so definitely there will be some enforcement
issues. I think the
other challenge for the industry will be
how the labelling works and whether it needs
to be consistent
labelling works and whether it needs
things that are pretty interesting and challenging for, both
the government who has to implement
this legislation so it gets through to
the third reading and certainly will
be for the select committee as
we move
move along.
An area that provides much of the food for New Zealand and just
have some empathy for the Bay of Plenty
and Edgcombe, particularly, I think
that area provides a lot of food for
New Zealand and currently
has had some significant flooding issues
and I, of course, come from an
area which frequently floods as
well. Of course, our
which frequently floods as well. Of
areas in New Zealand are low flood plains and, in fact,
right around the world, wherever you look in the
world, the best
are low and generally river floodplains.
floodplains. Always vulnerable in that risk. Mr Speaker, that is
a pretty brief summation of where I
think we are at with this bill Want
to congratulate the member
on drawing the bill. He has a
bit of luck frame. I was going to
say my glass is full
luck frame. I was going to say my
only half full. Congratulations. I think you have done pretty
well with that. So,
The
The National Party will be supporting this bill through to
first the reading and I look
forward to the discussions we have in
the select committee when time
comes. Thank you.
I
I am
I am very pleased to rise in support of this bill at its first
reading and can I also give my
congratulations to Steffan
Browning for bringing this bill to
the House and I am really pleased,
sir, that the Government
the Government will be supporting this bill and as a fellow member on