The NZ Greens Party’s position on draft Therapeutic Products Bill

February 10, 2023 admin Comments 0 Comment

In days gone by, 20 years ago, before they became “neoliberals on bicycles” the Greens were campaigning against an earlier iteration of this Bill as they did against genetic engineering.

What has happened?

They have gone over to the dark side.

——— Forwarded message ———
From: Kerry Peipi <Kerry.Peipi@parliament.govt.nz>
Date: Fri, 10 Feb 2023 at 9:05 PM
Subject: RE: Greens’ position on draft Therapeutic Products Bill
To: ….

Tēnā koe …,

The Greens have supported the Therapeutic Products Bill through to select committee because the current approach to regulating these products has some gaps that need to be addressed.

In short, this Bill is intended to give confidence to people buying therapeutic products that they are high quality and effective.

It will mean that products can’t make claims for therapeutic effects unless those claims are supported by robust evidence. For some safe, natural derived products, this will mean that they can still be sold but can’t be labelled as a treatment for health conditions.

We do have concerns about the Bill as it relates to rongoā; ancient holistic healing practices based on tikanga and mātauranga (for example: https://waateanews.com/2022/12/09/more-work-to-align-rongoa-with-therepeutic-products-bill/, https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/te-manu-korihi/480842/concerns-therapeutic-products-bill-may-overreach-into-maori-traditional-practices). We are looking forward to further work and consultation to ensure that rongoā is not impacted by this bill.

You can find a summary of the Bill here: https://www.health.govt.nz/our-work/regulation-health-and-disability-system/therapeutic-products-regulatory-regime

And for a bit more about our Green view, you can watch our spokesperson for Health, Dr. Elizabeth Kerekere speak to this Bill in the House here: https://vimeo.com/780950814.

The closing date for submissions on this Bill is 5 March 2023; I encourage you to have your say: https://www.parliament.nz/en/pb/sc/make-a-submission/document/53SCHE_SCF_BILL_130084/therapeutic-products-bill

Elizabeth is on the Health Committee and looks forward to hearing submissions from the public.

I hope that this has been helpful, thanks again for reaching out.

Ngā mihi nui,

Read more about the Bill HERE