Sage Eugenie: Environment Canterbury (Temporary Commissioners and Improved Water Management) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Sage Eugenie: Environment Canterbury (Temporary Commissioners and Improved Water Management) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Sitting date: 27 February 2013. Volume:687;Page:8267. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
EUGENIE SAGE (Green) 
: 
 I was very pleased to see that the deputy leader of Labour had adopted the title that we had proposed in terms of this Environment Canterbury (Temporary Commissioners and Improved Water Management) Amendment Bill the “Denial of Democracy Bill”. Our title adds “and More Irrigation Bill”. The current title of the bill reflects the spin that this Government likes to create around its dismantling of regional democracy and of environmental legislation. That is one of the reasons why 90 of the 95 submissions on the bill opposed it. The people in Canterbury want the right to vote and they are being denied that for 6 years. 
People in Canterbury want better water management. This bill does not deliver that because it promotes irrigation and it kneecaps water conservation orders. It has led through the Government-appointed commissioners to what Fish and Game has described as a very weak Proposed Canterbury Land and Water Regional Plan. Those commissioners have notified that plan and it is currently open for hearings. That will not deliver improved water management because it will not control the intensification of dairying on the Canterbury Plains and the increased pollution that that will result in. 
Nor as other speakers have noted is this bill about temporary commissioners given their long tenure. Why does the Government want commissioners and not elected councillors other than to promote irrigation? There is another reason and that is the very autocratic way the Government is going about the recovery from the earthquakes in Canterbury. If you had an elected regional council you would have another democratic body challenging the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority and the Minister for Canterbury Earthquake Recovery and their failure to genuinely engage with Canterbury people. But no we have these commissioners so you do not get that counterweight. 
I turn now to improved water management. If this bill was genuinely about improved water management that would mean that after nearly 3 years of the commissioners we would have had a reasonable flow in the Selwyn/Waikirikiri River instead of a largely dry riverbed. Improved water management would mean an adequate flow in the Rakaia River by reducing some of the abstraction from that river so that we do not have the risk of the river mouth of the Rakaia closing as it did last year. Improved water management would mean that outstanding rivers such as the Hurunui River and the Clarence River would be protected by water conservation orders rather than the kneecapping of that instrument that this bill achieves by completely changing their protection and preservation purpose by not allowing appeals to the Environment Court and by having them recommended by the regional council rather than a special tribunal. 
If this bill was genuinely about improved water management as its euphemistic title suggests we would see a stabilisation or a decline in the levels of nitrate nitrogen in our aquifers not an increasing trend as Environment Canterbury state of the environment monitoring has shown in a number of bores. If the bill was genuinely about improved water management it would mean that river flows in rivers throughout Canterbury would be sufficiently large and sufficiently variable—as is part of the natural character of braided rivers—so that we would not see more incidences of the toxic cyanobacteria algae as we have seen recently in the Hurunui River which are a definite sign that we are not getting improved water management. Improved water management would be about people in Canterbury having no fear of swimming in our rivers and getting some nasty stomach bug or coming into contact with toxic cyanobacteria algae. 
This bill is not about improved water management; it is about more irrigation and more water pollution. That is interesting when we have seen the former Minister of Local Government David Carter want more rigorous performance measures for local councils. This bill provides no objective measures of what constitutes improved water management in Canterbury. There are no measures of or limits to contaminants in waterways that one might expect as a measure of whether we are heading towards cleaner streams. There are no measures of improved water quality in the aquifers. So the bill’s title is a complete misnomer for the denial of democracy that it promotes the kneecapping of water conservation orders and the very different law that applies under this bill to rivers in Canterbury in relation to water conservation orders elsewhere.