The Health Committee has been urged to widen the 'social sharing' exemption in the Drug Overdose (Assistance Protection) Legislation Bill, with submitters warning the current wording could unintentionally criminalise ordinary behaviour among friend groups.

The member's bill, put forward by Green MP Kahurangi Carter, would stop low-level drug prosecutions when people call for help because of an overdose or acute drug reaction. If an ambulance is called, police could not charge people at the scene, and officers would not have grounds to search for evidence based on that emergency call. Drug dealers would not be protected. The bill does include an exemption for 'social sharing' — defined as gifting or sharing drugs between up to five people, without material benefit or avoiding material detriment (RNZ).

Emma Carroll, operations manager for drug checking service Know Your Stuff, told the committee in a personal capacity that the five-person limit should be raised to ten. Substances are commonly bought by the gram or point and shared within a social group of up to ten people, she said. Carroll also warned that friend groups who pool resources — cash, a meal, a ride, or traded favours — could be caught by the 'material benefit' clause and face criminalising ordinary social conduct (RNZ).

Know Your Stuff general manager Casey Spearin, appearing separately, pointed to findings from the Ministerial Advisory Group on Organised Crime that police drug seizures no longer affect levels of supply or use. Spearin also cited Canada and the United States as jurisdictions that already have similar good Samaritan overdose laws. A 2019 amendment allowing police discretion over drug possession and use was, in Spearin's words, 'not evenly applied across different communities' (RNZ).

Know Your Stuff estimated the bill could save 18 to 29 lives a year based on current overdose rates (RNZ).

Peer support worker Zoe Deans also appeared before the committee, testifying that fear of getting help compounds acute physical or mental distress relating to drug use (RNZ).

The bill was referred to the Health Committee on 29 April 2026 following a motion agreed to in the House (Hansard). The NZ Drug Foundation had published a media release the day before, on 28 April, expressing support for the bill ahead of its parliamentary debate (NZ Drug Foundation). Community Scoop covered the bill's first reading in July 2026, reporting its core principle as 'if in doubt, call for help' (Community Scoop.

The Public Health Communication Centre published a briefing on 9 June 2026 by Jacek Kolodziej arguing that good Samaritan overdose laws can help reduce preventable deaths from accidental drug overdose (PHCC). RNZ reported on 25 June that the Health Committee was hearing submissions on the bill during that week (RNZ).

The broader tension the committee faces is whether the bill's exemptions are drawn narrowly enough to keep political and public support while being broad enough to actually reduce harm. Carroll's submission on the 'material benefit' clause points to a genuine drafting problem: the line between commercial supply and social sharing among friends is not always clean, and a clause broad enough to capture a bag of groceries traded for a shared gram of something risks sweeping in conduct the bill was never designed to target.

Spearin's reference to the Ministerial Advisory Group on Organised Crime findings reinforces a longer-running argument in drug policy circles that enforcement-led approaches to supply have diminishing returns at the user level. Combined with his point about the uneven application of the 2019 police discretion amendment, it places the bill in a wider context of whether the criminal justice system is the right tool for managing drug-related harm at all. The committee will need to weigh those submissions against the political reality that any expansion of the social sharing threshold or softening of the material benefit test will draw scrutiny from those who see the bill as a step toward de facto decriminalisation.

What the select committee ultimately recommends on the five-to-ten person threshold and the material benefit clause will shape whether the bill can command majority support at its second reading.