Davis Kelvin: Reserves and Other Lands Disposal Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeDavis Kelvin: Reserves and Other Lands Disposal Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 01 July 2015. Volume:706;Page:5013. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]KELVIN DAVIS (Labour—Te Tai Tokerau): I would like to take a brief call in particular around clauses 7 and 48. I just want to cast my mind back to what must have been the first reading in the House in 2009. I did not really know what the omnibus bill was. I was just told it was non-controversial and to talk. So I did and I do not think I made particularly much sense. I basically repeated the lines that it was non-controversial and we should just get on with it. I was surprised when Sue Kedgley a member of the Green Party at the time then stood up and tore a few strips off me. I would be interested to know what the Green Party’s position is now.She said actually that this is not necessarily non-controversial. She said that you cannot take something like clause 7 which refers to the Auckland Council extending the Auckland Art Gallery—the land over which the extension is sought which is part of the reserve known as Albert Park and is vested in fee simple in the Auckland Council under the Auckland Improvement Trust Act—and then have clause 7(3) which goes on to say that the Auckland Improvement Trust 1971 prohibits the alienation of the whole or any part of Albert Park. I took her point really that we should not just pretty blithely say that it is OK for us just to fix up these mistakes. Auckland Art Gallery wanted to extend itself out into Albert Park and for that it just overturned the Auckland Improvement Trust Act 1971 which prohibits any alienation of the whole or any part of Albert Park. I thought that she made a very good point at the time.The same goes for clause 48 of the Reserves and Other Lands Disposal Bill which is about the Waikumete Cemetery. It says: “(1) The Waikumete cemetery land is a part of Waikumete Cemetery. (2) Waikumete Cemetery is Crown land classified as a local purpose” site and then in clause 48(3) it says: “In 1995 the Waitakere City Council without lawful authority disposed of the Waikumete cemetery land to a local authority trading enterprise.” We should not just skip over that as if it is non-controversial because you cannot have a council just dispose of some land without lawful authority to a local authority trading enterprise because that local authority trading enterprise in turn subdivided the Waikumete cemetery land and sold it to private owners as fee simple titles. So most of the land that was part of the Waikumete Cemetery has now got houses and flats and whatever built on it when really it was given for the purpose of a cemetery.So I would just like to make those two points. We can stand and say: “Look this is an omnibus bill and it is non-controversial.” but the reality is we are talking about land that was gifted for one purpose and now by this bill is going to be flipped over and used for another purpose. Just again I would like to acknowledge the lesson I learnt back in 2009 from the Green MP Sue Kedgley who said: “No don’t just treat this”—like I say—“blithely or like it really does not matter because it does matter.” We have to really give due regard if we are going to actually change the status of land that has been given for one reason and change the purpose and use it for another reason. Thank you.