Baldock Larry: Resource Management Amendment Bill (No 5) Electricity Amendment Bill (No 3) — Third Readings 
Baldock Larry: Resource Management Amendment Bill (No 5) Electricity Amendment Bill (No 3) — Third Readings 
[Volume:627;Page:22349] 
LARRY BALDOCK (United Future) 
: 
 I rise to speak in the third reading debate of the Resource Management Amendment Bill (No 5) and the Electricity Amendment Bill (No 3). 
Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7 p.m. 
LARRY BALDOCK 
: As I begin this third reading speech I want to pay tribute to a few people who I have had the pleasure of working with throughout the last 3 years on the Local Government and Environment Committee. First of all I thank the chair Jeanette Fitzsimons. Although I have disagreed with her on many occasions I have found her to be very hard-working and a servant to the committee. I appreciate all she has done for us during that 3 years. I have appreciated all the members of the committee and I have learnt a great deal from them. They have had many years of experience from which I have been able to draw. I have also enjoyed working with Ministers Marian Hobbs and David Benson-Pope in order to bring this bill to completion. United Future is particularly pleased to see this bill passed before the House rises for the election. 
I want to review United Future’s position over the last 3 years. United Future made it very clear early on—in fact in a speech I made in the first reading debate of the Resource Management Amendment Bill (No 2)—that we were very keen to see Resource Management Act reform become a major part of our work with the Government during this term. Reflecting back over 3 years I see that a number of things have been accomplished and have also changed. I remember 3 years ago when Winston Peters stood up a few months after the election and said that United Future would not be around for more than 3 months. Here we are 3 years later—we are still here and we have had stable Government. 
It is interesting. People say that imitation is the highest form of praise and now the leader of New Zealand First is talking about supply and confidence agreements. He has sat here for 3 years and watched how we have operated and he has learnt that he made the biggest mistake of his life in 1996 in the way he approached his relationship with the then National Government. Imitation is the highest form of praise and we have seen other parties in this House begin to adopt our policies. Even with regard to the Resource Management Act National has come out with policies that include three things that are already in the bill we are passing today. The National Party has virtually adopted our outdoor recreation and conservation policy and I guess that is high praise. We fully expect National to announce that it will adopt income splitting in its tax policy which is soon to be announced because it is such a good policy. It will not surprise us if National adopts it. New Zealand First has copied us also and not just in terms of our supply and confidence agreement. It has stolen our marine reserves policy almost word for word. ACT is about the only party that has not stolen any of our policies. That is because the ACT party does not have any policy; it just attacks everybody else’s and hopes that that will see it through. 
The passage of this legislation today is a statement about a number of things. It is firstly a very good example of how MMP can work. Despite the fact that only United Future is supporting the Government to pass this bill it is a fact that all parties—or nearly all parties; we did not see Ken Shirley very often during this process—have made positive contributions toward making this legislation what it is today. I think that is a tribute to the way that parties despite the debating that goes on in this Chamber do work together at the select committee table. Secondly the passage of this legislation is a testament to what can be achieved by a small party that works constructively within the rules of a supply and confidence agreement. Our supply and confidence agreement with the Government had only four requirements and no mention of Resource Management Act reform. The last 3 years however have seen significant developments in Resource Management Act reform so much so that we are dealing today with the Resource Management Act Amendment Bill (No 5). 
I take members back to the some speeches I made in 2002 and 2003. On 2 October 2002 speaking on the Resource Management (Controlled and Discretionary Activities) Amendment Bill I said: “… it is the view of United Future that the first priority is to get the main Resource Management Amendment Bill which has been languishing on the Order Paper for so long through the House before attempting to introduce even more legislative amendments.” Despite enormous criticism from the Opposition United Future did support the Government to get that bill moving and passed and then we were prepared to move on and work with the Government constructively to deal with other reform to the Resource Management Act. Speaking in the third reading debate on Tuesday 13 May 2003 I said: “When the 47th Parliament convened last year United Future made it clear to the Government that we considered the reform process of the Resource Management Act to be a priority. When it asked us for our support to pass this legislation which had been sitting on the Order Paper we gave our support.” 
We also indicated early on how important it was to us to deal with some specific issues in the legislation and we wanted to see the passage of the Resource Management Amendment Bill (No 2). We said it represented a first step rather than an end point. We believe as I said in a speech earlier today that the Resource Management Act will always need some reform. It will be a work in progress forever. It is a huge piece of legislation and managing the balance between environmental concerns and business development concerns will require constant monitoring. That is why United Future’s policy is that every 2 years there should be a review of the Act to see how it has worked—not necessarily the vast review that we have been through in the last 12 to 18 months but a review none the less to see whether any further fine-tuning or improvements can be made to the legislation. That is something United Future will continue to be committed to. 
In a speech during the second reading debate on 6 May 2003 I said: “One of the things we in United Future are very interested in comes from one of the recommendations referred to earlier”—which were the earlier recommendations in 1999 made by Simon Upton—“—that is that we may have direct referral to the Environment Court for projects of national significance such as power and road projects.” Members can imagine that United Future is very pleased that the Minister adopted my suggestion that rather than have direct referral as was originally intended we have direct referral as one of the tools that Ministers can use when they deal with the call-in powers. We thank the Minister for listening to our advice on that and bringing it into the legislation at the select committee stage. We believe it will enable the Minister to address the specific needs of each project that is of national significance to this country. It is important that the infrastructure in this country can be addressed in a timely fashion but not as National is suggesting by running roughshod over any environmental concerns. We must maintain that balance and that is something United Future will remain committed to. 
I also said way back then that when it comes to overriding private property right concerns in the national interest for things we want to preserve it was important that those should be paid for out of the national purse. Although that provision is not in this legislation I am pleased that Gordon Copeland’s bill—and members can be assured that Gordon Copeland will be back in the next Parliament; I intend to be back as well—which protects private property rights will be brought through the select committee process and back to this House for further debate. It is important if we are asking property owners to preserve something of national interest that the taxpayers of New Zealand make some compensation payment for that purpose to the property owner. That will lead to the success of another of United Future’s initiatives which we indicated way back then needed to be brought into the Resource Management Act. 
The passing of this bill today is evidence of United Future’s commitment to work little by little inch by inch at nudging the Government along. We are only 8 MPs but we are enormously proud of what we have accomplished in this 3 years with 7 of us being newcomers to this process. We believe we have a significant list of achievements and we are ready to go out into this campaign to let the people of New Zealand know what we have achieved. We believe that they will respond when they know what we have done—we have been terribly ignored by the press throughout this 3 year process as most people have noticed. When people know the truth about what United Future members have achieved such as this resource management legislation we will be returned to this Parliament with additional colleagues so that we can continue to serve the people of New Zealand.