Volume 622 Week 77 - Tuesday 14 December 2004 
Volume 622 Week 77 - Tuesday 14 December 2004 
[Volume:622;Page:17667] 
Tuesday 14 December 2004 
Mr Speaker 
 took the Chair at 2 p.m. 
Prayers 
. 
Visitors 
Socialist Republic of Viet Nam—Foreign Affairs Committee National Assembly 
Mr SPEAKER 
: I have much pleasure in informing members that a parliamentary delegation from the Foreign Affairs Committee of the National Assembly of the Socialist Republic of Viet Nam is present in the gallery. I am sure that members would wish that the delegation be welcomed. 
Points of Order 
Agent Orange—Health Committee Report 
RODNEY HIDE (Leader—ACT) 
: 
 I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I note that the papers presented included the Government’s response to the Health Committee’s report on its inquiry into Agent Orange. We understand that today is the last opportunity for question time. It would be helpful if through you the Prime Minister could perhaps provide to the House her response to this report particularly for those veterans who have been damaged by Agent Orange because we will not have an opportunity to put any questions on it. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: That is not a point of order. 
Doha Declaration—Motion 
LARRY BALDOCK (United Future) 
: 
 I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I seek the leave of the House to move members’ notice of motion No 2 in my name on the Doha declaration as a non-debatable non-controversial motion. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Is there any objection to that course? There is. 
Tabling of Documents 
Doha Declaration on the Family 
LARRY BALDOCK (United Future) 
: 
 I seek leave to table the Doha Declaration on the Family which was presented to the United Nations last Monday. 
Document by leave laid on the Table of the House. 
LARRY BALDOCK 
: I also seek leave of the House to table the text of the New Zealand delegate’s speech on the Doha declaration presented on December 6 at the 12United Nations. 
Document by leave laid on the Table of the House. 
Questions to Ministers 
Police Minister—Confidence 
1. Dr DON BRASH (Leader of the Opposition) 
 to the  
Prime Minister 
: Does she have confidence in her Minister of Police; if so why? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK (Prime Minister) 
: 
 Yes because he is a hard-working and conscientious Minister. [ 
Interruption 
] 
Mr SPEAKER 
: There was one interjection that was out of order and the member knows it. 
Dr Don Brash 
: How can she have confidence in the Minister of Police when the December edition of the Police Association magazine reveals that police communication centres have been experiencing serious staffing and technology problems resulting in 20 percent of calls from the public being lost in some centres? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK 
: As the member knows those centres are being reviewed. A report is due in March. Submissions were called for by the external panel which is reviewing the call centres and I note that when submissions closed on 10 December the Police Association had not made a submission. 
Rodney Hide 
: Does she accept that it is important not just for her to have confidence in the Minister of Police but for the police themselves to have confidence in that Minister and how can they have confidence in that Minister when five police officers are being pursued relentlessly through the courts simply because they assumed that the Prime Minister did want to get to the rugby on time and could confidence not be restored all around by the Prime Minister just accepting responsibility for the fact that she was in charge? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK 
: The member knows that it is not appropriate for me to comment on matters that are before the courts. The member also knows that the Police Minister has no jurisdiction over such matters. 
Rodney Hide 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: It had better be a point of order. That question was certainly addressed. 
Rodney Hide 
: My point of order is this: this case certainly does not apply to the sub judice rules like the Prime Minister explained before. That is incorrect. It is certainly OK for her to comment on this case— 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Please be seated. The member does not even know the Standing Orders and he should take occasion over the adjournment to read them. 
Judy Turner 
: Does the Prime Minister have any confidence that the Minister of Police is fulfilling his obligations under her Government’s Health and Safety in Employment Act when police communications centres are so understaffed that some employees have developed urinary tract infections because they are unable to take comfort breaks? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK 
: For all I know that may have been asserted in the material the Police Association is putting into the public arena. The external panel is quite happy to reopen the submission deadline if the Police Association would like to make a submission to that effect. 
Dr Don Brash 
: Can the Prime Minister confirm that it is her intention to sack the Minister of Police in the upcoming reshuffle given recent revelations of failure of the 111 call system strong suggestions that the police have been directed not to go looking for methamphetamine laboratories because they make the crime statistics look bad and generally low morale in the police force; if not just what further revelations are required for her to dismiss the Minister of Police? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK 
: I can advise the House that the Minister of Police is substantially more likely to have his job next week than the Leader of the Opposition. 
Ron Mark 
: How can the Prime Minister continue to have confidence in a Minister who cannot answer a simple written question asking him to tell New Zealand First the registration plate numbers of the police cars involved in the high-speed movement from Waimate to Christchurch or is he simply taking a lead from her the Prime Minister who has also refused to tell New Zealand First the registration plate number of the car she was travelling in? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK 
: I am not commenting on matters before the court and I imagine that the Minister is taking the same view. 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I would like to know just how the sub judice rule now extends to car registration numbers. This is an extraordinary confinement of the rule to knowledge in this House. All we have asked for is the car registration number. That could be obtained in other ways as well but we have sought it the proper way by merely asking for that information and we have received the reply that that information is sub judice. With respect if the car was being sold at this point in time then the marketplace would be entitled to know what the registration number was and it is not sub judice. So could the Prime Minister please answer the question properly? 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Let me tell the member that I am not here to judge whether the question was answered on the actual answer given. The Prime Minister is entitled to reply like that and she did but that does not mean to say that I am saying the reply was good bad or otherwise. She certainly addressed the question. 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. If that is the case unfortunately “rhubarb” becomes a satisfactory answer in this Parliament. All we are asking the Prime Minister is the registration number of the car that she was travelling in because certain matters relate to that that the public would be interested in. 
 To say that is sub judice and that that is an answer just tells me that we have a contempt here for Parliament and a contempt for parliamentary questions. I know it is an answer but it is an answer on the same basis as “rhubarb” would be. If that is the sub judice rule how did it go from being what it once was—that is if it did not relate directly to the case then it could be mentioned—to being narrow and restrictive when it comes to parliamentary democracy? 
Hon Dr Michael Cullen 
: The Prime Minister did not say the matter is sub judice— 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: She did. 
Hon Dr Michael Cullen 
: No she did not. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Order! That is the last time today. 
Hon Dr Michael Cullen 
: What the Prime Minister said was that she was not commenting on matters before the court. That brings the answer into the category where a Minister declines to answer a question on the grounds of public interest or other matters which the Minister herself has to be the sole judge of. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: The member is right; the Prime Minister did not invoke the Standing Order by asking the Speaker to rule the question out. She gave an answer and she addressed the question. 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. With respect I point out that the Deputy Prime Minister is not right. In a written answer to my colleague Ron Mark that is precisely what she said and she knows it. I am putting it on the record that she is pleading the sub judice rule—first in a written answer and secondly by inference in her answer in this House today. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: I am talking about an oral question that has been asked in this House and it was addressed. 
Rodney Hide 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: I am not entering into this argument any further but if it is a point of order I will be interested. 
Rodney Hide 
: It is. Is this not the point—that the Prime Minister is not prepared to answer and she can do that but she is just invoking the rule that she does not have to answer any particular question. It is not bringing in the sub judice rule; she is just not prepared to answer the question. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: The member does not raise a point of order. He is just wasting the time of the House. 
Dr Don Brash 
: Is the Prime Minister aware that new charges have today been laid against the officers who accompanied her on her high-speed dash across Canterbury in July; if so is she prepared to demonstrate her confidence in the Minister and her police by offering to give evidence at the trials of those officers? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK 
: I am only aware of what I read on the NZPA news screen and I repeat that I will not be commenting on matters before the court. 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: Is it not a fact that the reason why she will not give us via her Minister of Police in whom she has enormous confidence or herself the answer to the question of the car registration is that the speeds involved created significant damage to the vehicle she was in and even to the windscreen but in all that time she did not notice the speed she was going at all? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK 
: I have had no advice to the effect of the member’s question at all. 
Hon Richard Prebble 
: Could the Prime Minister advise us what standards she is following when she is indicating confidence in the Minister of Police? Is it the same standard that she followed when she savagely criticised a National Minister of Police and said he should be sacked over the failure of the police’s centralised computer system—INCIS—or is it a different standard when under her watch her Minister has been in charge of the police’s latest centralised computer system—the Comm Centre—for handling 111 and other calls where 20 percent of calls at many centres are regularly unanswered; and to give her a local example when a call was made from Molesworth Street which Parliament is in the communications centre did not even know where it was and sent the vehicle to the wrong address. Now if she following the same standard why is that Minister still a Minister? 
Mr SPEAKER 
: That question is too long. There are three questions the Prime Minister may address two. 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK 
: My recollection of the INCIS affair is that under a previous Government a rather large amount of public money went up in smoke. That is the first point. The second point is that the accusation in this case appears to be that not enough money is being spent. The third point I would make is the police do not always get everything right but generally they do. With the 111 system there have clearly been problems. That is why there is a review and I invite the Police Association to front up to the review and make a submission. 
Primary Health Organisations—Progress 
2.  
STEVE CHADWICK (Labour—Rotorua) 
 to the  
Minister of Health 
: Has she received any reports regarding the progress of primary health organisations? 
Hon ANNETTE KING (Minister of Health) 
: 
 Yes. There are now 3.7 million New Zealanders enrolled in primary health organisations—91 percent of the population. We knew primary health organisations were delivering cheaper health-care to many New Zealanders but after reading South Link Health’s survey of South Island primary health organisations released yesterday it seems that even greater reductions have occurred. Well over half the actual charges are less than the advertised fee or are free. I commend South Link Health’s members for their constructive approach in working with the Government to provide affordable primary health care. 
Steve Chadwick 
: Has the Minister seen any other reports regarding the future of primary health organisations? 
Hon ANNETTE KING 
: I have seen many reports. The only report that concerns the health sector however is the flip-flop by National’s leader and his ever-changing health spokespeople on what they would do with the primary health organisations. He has gone from asking what they were last year to saying they would be gone by lunchtime this year. Meanwhile his spokespeople have ranged from scrapping them to revisiting the matter. But who knows? One gets dizzy from looking at their twists and turns and their flip-flops. [ 
Interruption 
] 
Mr SPEAKER 
: If members interject they must expect a response. [ 
Interruption 
] The member is about to leave the Chamber. I will not have him make comments like that. He should be quiet. Supplementary question— 
Judith Collins 
: Judith Collins. I haven’t had my hair done like the Hon Annette King so there’s no excuse. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: I apologise. 
Judith Collins 
: Is the Minister aware of a primary health organisation in the Hawke’s Bay District Health Board area offering special tax-paid taxi rides for people of Maori and Pasifika descent which are only available to other New Zealanders based on need; and is she happy that that district health board insists on race-based assistance for some races but needs-based assistance for others? 
Hon ANNETTE KING 
: Can I suggest the member has a perm. In answer to her question— 
Mr SPEAKER 
: I know this is getting into the Christmas spirit but just reflecting on hairstyling I want to say that the last bit of Brylcreem I had in my hair was when I was about 9 and I still have quite a lot left. I call the Hon Annette King. 
Hon ANNETTE KING 
: No I am not aware of it. If the member would like to provide the information I will certainly look at it. I can tell her that the Hawke’s Bay board like those in other parts of New Zealand does not provide race-based policies; it provides needs-based policies. The sooner that member works out that there are people who have needs the sooner she will become a better health spokesperson—or maybe she is about to be changed. 
Barbara Stewart 
: Why is access to primary health organisations at subsidised rates for elderly New Zealanders still dependent on where people live and when will she finally ensure that our senior citizens get universal access to subsidised primary health care? 
Hon ANNETTE KING 
: The member is quite a few months out of date. Since 1 July this year every person over 65 years of age anywhere in New Zealand in any primary health organisation has had subsidised primary health care. 
Heather Roy 
: Is it correct that primary health organisations that have more than 50 percent of their enrolled patients of Maori and Pacific Island descent get more Government funding than others and therefore their patients get cheaper doctors’ visits; if so why? 
Hon ANNETTE KING 
: Two years ago when we rolled out the primary health care strategy we rolled it out into areas with high need including low-income Maori and Pacific people. That was in the first year under access funding. Since then we have progressively rolled out money regardless of where people live based on age bands. I have never heard the member complain about giving cheaper care to old people—only to Maori and Pacific people. 
Broadcasting Minister—Confidence 
3.  
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First) 
 to the  
Prime Minister 
: Does she have confidence in the Minister of Broadcasting; if so why? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK (Prime Minister) 
: 
 Yes because he is also a hard-working conscientious Minister. 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: Is this the same conscientious and hard-working Minister of Broadcasting who has seen Judy Bailey’s salary go from $400000 to $800000 despite the fact that the Prime Minister herself said that she was revolted by Paul Holmes’ $760000 salary; and what on earth is going on in her ministry when such hypocrisy lies so rampant in our politics? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK 
: If—and I underline “if”—the salary is as high as that the directors appointed by the Government have some explaining to do to shareholding Ministers. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: Has the Minister of Broadcasting been able to establish from TVNZ whether in fact the salary is $800000 a year or thereabouts; if so and if it is true will she be requiring the board of TVNZ to resign as she suggested back in 2000 over the John Hawkesby issue? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK 
: It is my understanding that salaries are subject to confidentiality agreements. As I have said a salary at that level for the amount of time on air each day I would consider to be evidence of a culture of extravagance that requires explanation to shareholding Ministers. 
Rodney Hide 
: Will the Prime Minister be requiring the board of TVNZ to disclose to her or to her Minister what Judy Bailey’s salary is; if not why not? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK 
: It would be my understanding that the Government could not require that to be divulged but the Government makes it very clear to directors that it does not expect a culture of extravagance in public broadcasting when money can be well deployed to making programmes for the general public. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I notice that a number of other questions are set down today related to this issue. It might help the Prime Minister in her answers—and it might help the House to get answers—if she were to be made aware of the fact that Television New Zealand like all State enterprises does declare the salaries it pays in $10000 bands in its annual report. Is the Prime Minister really suggesting that she cannot find out about this salary and we have to wait for the annual report? 
Mr SPEAKER 
: The member knows that that is not a point of order. 
Larry Baldock 
: Is the Prime Minister aware of whether Judy Bailey received her $400000 pay increase in a brown paper bag over a meal of fish in an Auckland restaurant? 
Mr SPEAKER 
: That question is a little facetious. I am not allowing it. 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. Perhaps you could tell the member to go outside and say that whereupon I will sue his little pants off. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: That is not a point of order either. But I caution members to be careful about what they say inside this House and outside this House. 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: What has happened to TVNZ’s announcement that it will be introducing and embedding a more transparent and comprehensive remuneration and job banding model in this country; and given that say for a 40-hour week Judy Bailey is to receive $384 per hour is the Prime Minister not embarrassed when a single pensioner receives less than $250 per week? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK 
: I think I have made it abundantly clear that I would consider any such salary level to be evidence of a culture of extravagance. 
Schools—Enrolment Scheme Legislation 
4.  
LYNNE PILLAY (Labour—Waitakere) 
 to the  
Minister of Education 
: What reports has he received on possible changes to school enrolment scheme legislation? 
Mr SPEAKER 
: I am sorry Lynne Pillay. The Minister will sit down. Lynne Pillay is at the back of the House. She is entitled to be heard in silence and was not. I will now have her ask her question again. 
LYNNE PILLAY 
: What reports has he received on possible changes to school enrolment scheme legislation? 
Mr SPEAKER 
: I will not warn members again. I will ask a member to leave if there is any more noise during the asking of a question. 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD (Minister of Education) 
: 
 I have recently seen suggestions that children “can be herded like cattle to a local school of the Government’s choosing.” Those comments ignore the fact that under current enrolment legislation—passed by a National Government—parents are not forced to send their children to any particular school. In fact they are guaranteed the right only to send their child to their local school if they so choose. I suspect that once Dr Brash looks at the facts and consults the member for Epsom he will do yet another flip-flop on this issue. 
Lynne Pillay 
: Has the removal of school zoning been considered before? 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD 
: Yes. School zoning was abolished under the previous National Government which was then forced to bring it back in 1998—well supported by Christine Fletcher—in order to combat overcrowding. Removing zoning did not result in parents or students getting greater choice; it resulted in school principals hand-picking their students. This Government believes in the right of students to go to the school next door. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: That answer was too long. 
Hon Bill English 
: If the Minister believes that his current rigid zoning policy is so good why did he put out a press release in November claiming that the number of schools with zones was dropping and that that was a good thing when the real figures showed that the number of schools with zones was rising; when will he admit his flip-flop on that issue? 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD 
: I have already apologised on this matter. I relied on inaccurate figures. I also relied in making the statements on the support for zoning from Bill English who said that abolishing it would not work. 
Hon Brian Donnelly 
: Can the Minister confirm that school-zoning legislation was reintroduced by the National Government in late 1998 that the legislation had the full support of the ACT party at the time and that the only person in the House to raise objections to that zoning legislation was one Trevor Mallard? 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD 
: Yes. I think the legislation that went through at the time could have been better. That is why we improved it when we came into Government. 
Question time interrupted. 
Points of Order 
Prime Minister—Replies to Written Questions Nos 17295 and 17296 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First) 
: 
 I seek leave to table two documents. They relate to written questions to the Prime Minister that were lodged on 29 November and are the two answers received on 7 December in which she argues that the matter of car registrations is sub judice. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Leave is sought to table those two answers. Is there any objection? There is. 
Questions to Ministers 
Question time resumed. 
Tertiary Education Commission—Funding Outcomes 
5.  
Hon BILL ENGLISH (National—Clutha-Southland) 
 to the  
Associate Minister of Education (Tertiary Education) 
: Does he stand by his statements that: “The TEC will bring clear strategic direction to the system as a whole.” and “It is very important to ensure our research efforts and our student enrolments are concentrated in areas of high performance and high strategic relevance.”; if so is he satisfied with the quality of spending in tertiary education? 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY (Associate Minister of Education (Tertiary Education)) 
: 
 Yes I do stand by those statements made just last year when the Tertiary Education Commission was launched. I have been very pleased with measures that have been put in place to achieve that goal such as the Performance-based Research Fund; the Modern Apprenticeships scheme; the centres of research excellence; the programme of industry training; strategic funding for private training establishments; restrictions on aviation community education and growth rates; and a new performance measure that will focus on retention and completion; and I look forward to being further satisfied as the Tertiary Education Commission moves into its third calendar year of operation. 
Hon Bill English 
: Is the Minister aware that since 2000 he has spent $2.2 billion on diploma and certificate courses in tertiary education and that 70 percent of the students who enrolled in those diploma and certificate courses did not complete them? 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY 
: I am aware we have inherited a number of programmes from the National Government where we have had to move to a more strategic approach to funding in order to prevent a continuation of the very problem he now complains about after 9 years of doing not a single thing. 
Nandor Tanczos 
: What does the Minister think the strategic implications are for the sector—in particular for the smaller players within it—when institutions are having realistically to open for enrolment from August but are not being informed about Tertiary Education Commission funding decisions until mid-December? 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY 
: The member is referring to the profiles that all institutions have to put in which are fundamentally a funding agreement with the Tertiary Education Commission. All those institutions many of which I have spoken to personally understand that this is the first year of their profile and that they are being communicated with verbally by the Tertiary Education Commission and they are confident they will get their funding. 
Helen Duncan 
: As an example of the good work the Tertiary Education Commission is doing can the Minister tell us about its efforts to satisfy itself in relation to the quality of spending in Christchurch Polytechnic’s computing online course? 
Simon Power 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. On a number of occasions when members on the Opposition side of the House have not commenced a supplementary question with a question word you have pulled them up for that. On this occasion that matter was pointed out to you at the start of the member starting her supplementary question and I ask you to bring her to order. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: All I will say to the member is that it was Mr Brownlee who originally raised the point. I agreed with him and I thought he made a very sensible point. I now ask the member to re-ask her question starting with a question word. 
Helen Duncan 
: What progress has been made in the Tertiary Education Commission’s efforts to satisfy itself in relation to the quality of spending in Christchurch Polytechnic’s computing online course? 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY 
: I am pleased to tell the House today that Christchurch Polytechnic Institute of Technology chair Hector Matthews has issued a media release announcing that the Christchurch Polytechnic Institute of Technology council has confirmed that the polytechnic will cooperate fully to complete an evaluation by 22 December. It resolved that if the report identified that there are students who have not engaged in the COOL IT course the polytechnic will work with the Tertiary Education Commission to reach an acceptable solution. It has instructed the management of the polytechnic to continue to work with the commission in a cooperative and supportive manner to bring about an accord on the issue. I thank Mr Matthews for his comments and I look forward to progress on the matter. 
Hon Bill English 
: Is the Minister aware that parents of schoolchildren are selling raffle tickets so they can employ teachers at the same time as he has spent during his 4-year reign as Associate Minister of Education (Tertiary Education) $2.2 billion on formal diploma and certificate courses that 30 percent only of those who enrolled in those courses have finished which equates to $1.5 billion spent on courses that were never completed? 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY 
: Of course I would have to check those figures as I check everything from the member because he is so unreliable. I also point out to the member that without this Government we would not have a Performance-based Research Fund a Modern Apprenticeships scheme and industry training that is going through the roof. We would not have a Private Training Establishments Strategic Priorities Fund we would not have controlled the growth of organisations so that we know what we are getting and we would not have a performance measure. I could go on but the 4 years of work make the list far too long. 
Question No. 6 to Minister 
DAIL JONES (NZ First) 
: 
 I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. Perhaps the member before he asks the question or during the question could clarify the word in line four: is it “precedence” with a “ts” or “ce”? It is a little confusing at the moment; the two do mean slightly different things. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: The member raises a very good point. I have only just observed that not having read the question before but I tell the member that he has to read it as it is worded.  
Aotea (Great Barrier) Marine Reserve—Marine Reserves Act 
6.  
LARRY BALDOCK (United Future) 
 to the  
Minister of Conservation 
: Does he stand by his statement in his letter to Mr Friend of Outdoor Recreation NZ’s marine committee regarding the proposed Aotea (Great Barrier) Marine Reserve that: “It is not possible for any number of submissions in support to create precedence for the future since the statutory path of the Marine Reserves Act 1971 directs me as decision maker to consider my objections received on a marine reserves proposal not submissions in support. I do not base my decision on the number of objections versus submissions in support”; if so why? 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. That is precisely the problem. Now that the member has read it out we can hear that it is not a spelling mistake he is guilty of; he has just got the wrong word. It should be brought to his attention that he is talking about something that is entirely different from what he has expressed in his question. I thought that the Clerk’s Office should have helped him out at the time rather than let him come down to the Chamber and be a smart alec raise silly points of order and show what a silly boy he is. 
Hon Peter Dunne 
: I draw the House’s attention to the fact that what the member was doing was quoting from a letter from the Minister of Conservation. It was not the member’s quotation but the Minister’s quotation. If there is any error in the quotation it is actually in the quotation itself not in its reporting. I appreciate the point that has been made but I say that the error lies with the original writer not with the drafter of the question. I make one further point Mr Speaker: I was concerned to hear you say at the time the original point of order was raised that you had not seen the question. I was under the impression that all questions were vetted by you before they went on to the Order Paper. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Yes and on this occasion I made a mistake; I did not read the question carefully enough. I am occasionally known to make mistakes. [ 
Interruption 
] I am tempted to comment but will not. I say that this is a quote from a Minister’s letter. I assume that it is correct because that is the way the question was originally submitted. It stands and the Minister must now give his answer. 
Larry Baldock 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. It may be better if I seek the leave of the House to table the letter from the Minister which has that exact quote and spelling in it so that the matter is made clear. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: The member seeks leave to table the letter. Is there any objection. There is. 
Ron Mark 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker— 
Mr SPEAKER 
: I tell the member that this had better be a point of order. 
Ron Mark 
: I ask you please not to doubt me Mr Speaker. My point of order is in line with the comments made by the Hon Peter Dunne. The member did not read out correctly either the exact quote of what the Minister said or what is written here on the Order Paper. I draw your attention to the second to last line of the text of the written question which states: “… maker to consider any objections …” The member actually said: “… maker to consider my objections …” and the  
Hansard  
will prove that what I am saying to you right now Mr Speaker is correct. I think that that brings into question the whole validity of the question and the worth of having it read. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: If there is a grammatical error in a question that does not invalidate the question. In any case the Minister may answer. 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. It is not a grammatical error that my colleague Ron Mark is raising with you; he is saying that when the member got to his feet he did not read the question out as it appears on the Order Paper. The member just makes one mistake after another. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: I want to ask Mr Baldock one question. Did he read it out correctly? 
Larry Baldock 
: No it seems that I have made a mistake and have misquoted one word in the question. I should have said “to consider any objections” rather than “to consider my objections”. I apologise. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Right. 
Hon RICK BARKER (Minister for Courts) 
 on behalf of the 
 Minister of Conservation 
: Yes because the letter went on to state: “The Minister must consider each objection against the criteria set out in section 5 of the Marine Reserves Act.” 
Larry Baldock 
: Why did the Department of Conservation’s community relations manager Warwick Murray in his comments in the  
Rodney Times 
 on Thursday 4 November and Auckland Conservator Rob McCallum in his press release on 9 December and again in his comments on Radio New Zealand on 10 December make such a fuss about how many submissions were in favour compared with how many were against the reserve and does that not reveal the fact that the Minister’s staff do not understand the Act they are meant to implement; so will the Minister therefore call them in for retraining on the finer points of the law and if not why not? 
Hon RICK BARKER 
: The member is correct in that the number of submissions in favour or against is not a particularly relevant consideration. We take into account the criteria for judging a marine reserve and I will certainly make sure that the people concerned are aware of that. 
Edwin Perry 
: What did the ministry base its proposal for the Mimiwhangata marine reserve on when neither the local iwi Ngati Wai nor the local communities bordering the proposed reserve were properly consulted? 
Hon RICK BARKER 
: I believe that in the setting up of any marine reserve it is absolutely essential that local communities are consulted. 
Dave Hereora 
: Are submissions in support of marine reserves considered when decisions are made on reserve applications? 
Hon RICK BARKER 
: Yes the Minister can take into account submissions in support of a marine reserve but the Marine Reserves Act spells out that the first task in making a decision on a marine reserve is to consider whether to uphold any objection before considering the overall merits of any application. 
Larry Baldock 
: Will the Minister give the House an assurance that the independent review of the marine reserve proposal which he has announced will take place will investigate claims that the Royal Forest and Bird Protection Society of New Zealand was informed of the department’s intentions earlier than other stakeholders and was asked to drum up submissions in support of the reserve in order to seek to override the substantial objections from recreational users of the area proposed for the reserve and from the residents of Great Barrier Island; if not why not? 
Hon RICK BARKER 
: I will give the House an assurance that the independent review will cover the process very thoroughly and the Minister will look at that very carefully. 
Jeanette Fitzsimons 
: How will the axing of 13 Department of Conservation staff half of them scientists and some of them working on marine issues progress the work to identify and protect key marine biodiversity in marine reserves? 
Hon RICK BARKER 
: That is an operational matter. The Department of Conservation has had a substantial increase in its budget over the years but like all other departments it has to live within the confines of its budget. 
Larry Baldock 
: Is the Minister aware that NgatiRehuahapu of Ngati Wai objects to the director-general’s application for the Aotea (Great Barrier) Marine Reserve as do the Auckland City Council adjoining landowners the Recreational Fishing Council Option4 and the Big Game Fishing Council representing hundreds of thousands of hard-working taxpaying New Zealanders—or will this be just another case of a sham process of pretending to hear submissions while the department does what it wants regardless? 
Hon RICK BARKER 
: No it is not a sham process at all. The legislation passed by this House which I am sure that member supports sets out very clearly the criteria for objections and if one objection can be upheld to show that the objector has suffered undue adverse effects—just one objector—then the marine reserve proposal stops in its tracks. I am sure the member would see that as a very fair process. 
Larry Baldock 
: Will the Minister offer an apology to long-time residents and landowners like the Mabeys for the damage done to their reputations by the unethical scheming of Department of Conservation staff who tried to persuade them to support the marine reserve by telling them that they would be able to continue to fish in the reserve adjacent to their land and who published that in the draft proposal without the knowledge of the Mabeys giving the appearance to other residents that the Mabeys had sold out when that was clearly not the case since they had refused to accept rights others would not have and still remain opposed to the marine reserve to this day; if not why not? 
Hon RICK BARKER 
: I reject entirely that Department of Conservation staff have acted unethically. Department of Conservation staff have obviously been in discussion with the Mabeys. They have made them an offer which they have rejected and they are entitled to do exactly that. 
Larry Baldock 
: I seek leave to table a few documents. The first is the press release in the  
Rodney Times  
by Department of Conservation staff. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Leave has been sought to table that press release. Is there any objection? There is. 
Larry Baldock 
: I seek leave to table the transcript of the Radio New Zealand interview with the conservator. 
Document by leave laid on the Table of the House. 
Larry Baldock 
: I also seek leave to table the press release regarding the majority of submitters being in favour of the Department of Conservation proposal. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Leave has been sought to table that press release. Is there any objection? There is. 
Security—National Security 
7.  
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First) 
 to the  
Prime Minister 
: What steps if any is she prepared to take to ensure our national security is protected? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK (Prime Minister) 
: 
 Clearly Part 4A of the Immigration Act inserted in 1999 has not functioned effectively. The Government is now focused on drawing up law that can be effective in protecting New Zealand’s national security and we will work with other parties that share our concern about the evident flaws in the current law. 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: Will the Prime Minister give the same high priority she has accorded to other legislation rushed through before Christmas to my member’s bill which seeks to urgently amend the Immigration Act to close off the legal loophole that allowed the Supreme Court to free convicted Algerian Ahmed Zaoui; if not why not? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK 
: I do not think that it would be appropriate to support the member’s bill which is a simple piece of legislation that would see this Parliament passing law to put Mr Zaoui back in jail. I do not think that would be appropriate. 
Hon Tony Ryall 
: What sort of welcome mat for terrorists is her Government rolling out with its totally incompetent handling of the Zaoui case in which a man with terrorist convictions who had been kicked out of three Western countries could flush his passport down an airplane toilet claim refugee status be showered in millions of dollars of legal aid and can now qualify for a weekly emergency welfare benefit? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK 
: It would be a strange person who thought that 2 years in jail was a welcome mat. That particular welcome mat was provided for by legislation passed by the National Government in 1999. [ 
Interruption 
] 
Mr SPEAKER 
: I am warning members that I am having no interjections during questions. 
Keith Locke 
: Why is the Prime Minister in her proposed amendments to the security risk certificate procedure trying to take away or limit the longstanding right of judges to determine whether someone is unjustly detained and give that person bail and why does she think that Governments with political agendas should be able to use national security as an excuse to detain people without charge and without full recourse to courts to get bail? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK 
: A balance has to be struck between the requirements of national security and individual liberties and there will be times when an individual’s liberties are constrained because the interests of national security override that. 
Dr Muriel Newman 
: Does the Prime Minister support her security officials’ view that Mr Zaoui is a security risk; if so what does she intend to do about it? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK 
: I have never offered a substantive opinion on the Zaoui case. What I would like is for the law to work effectively. The law operates with the Director of Security on his own judgment without direction from me as Minister issuing a security risk certificate. The procedure passed into law in 1999 says that decision should then be reviewed by the Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security. Two years after this man arrived because this law created a litigator’s paradise that review has not been able to begin. That is what is wrong with the law and that is what I aim to fix and I trust I will have the cooperation of the member’s party New Zealand First and National for doing it. 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: When? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK 
: Next year. 
Hon Richard Prebble 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I appreciate that the Prime Minister gave a long and quite interesting reply but it was not actually to the question that she was asked. She was in no way asked for her opinion on the security status of Mr Zaoui—members in this House know that that is not a matter for Ministers. What she was actually asked was a very exact question: “Does she support her officials in reaching the opinion that Mr Zaoui is a security risk?” and that question she did not actually answer. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: I thought the Prime Minister did address the question. She gave a very long answer and made many points in her reply. 
Hon Peter Dunne 
: Is the Prime Minister able to give the House any assurance in view of the litany of events that she has just outlined that the Zaoui case can be brought to swift resolution and that he will not now spend his next 2 years on bail awaiting a decision? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK 
: Because the law has created a litigator’s paradise I cannot guarantee that he will not spend the next 2 years on bail. The Crown has of course appealed the Court of Appeal decision. The Supreme Court has not decided whether to hear it. It is going to hold a hearing on that matter in February and it will then no doubt deliberate on whether it wants to hear it and if it does want to hear it then no doubt it will take some time to find the time to schedule it. It may or may not uphold the Court of Appeal decision and we still do not have the beginning of the review. That is why I say that this law clearly cannot work satisfactorily and this country is entitled to national security law that enables people about whom serious issues of security risk have been raised to have those issues speedily judged. 
Keith Locke 
: Why is the Prime Minister trying to toughen up the security risk certificate procedures when judicial and quasi-judicial bodies like the Refugee Status Appeals Authority can deal with classified evidence in confidence and deal with national security threats; and is that not a better approach than the security risk certificate procedure where the final say lies with a Minister of the Crown whose judgment will be distorted by political considerations? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK 
: There are so many errors of fact in that question one does not know where to begin. In the first case the Refugee Status Appeals Authority did not see classified security information. I might also observe secondly that the Refugee Status Appeals Authority without hearing any evidence from the Governments of France or Belgium condemned their legal systems as somehow unworthy and improper in the decisions that they reached. It did not appear to take into account the fact that Mr Zaoui had appealed to the European Court and failed that he had been denied entry into the United Kingdom and that he was deported from Switzerland. 
Keith Locke 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I think the Prime Minister is misleading the House there because the Supreme Court— 
Mr SPEAKER 
: The member is trying to litigate an answer. He cannot do that. 
Television New Zealand—Newsreader's Salary 
8.  
GERRY BROWNLEE (Deputy Leader—National) 
 to the  
Minister of Broadcasting 
: What actions if any does he propose to take given reports in today’s  
Dominion Post 
 that Television One news anchor Judy Bailey has almost doubled her salary to $800000 a year and that he is angry at the size of the increase? 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY (Minister of Broadcasting) 
: 
 The salaries paid to staff of Television New Zealand are a matter for the board and management of the company to determine. The board is accountable to the Minister of Finance and me as shareholding Ministers in the company and we will be seeking an explanation from the board. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: Can the House take it from the answer given by the Minister and those given by the Prime Minister previously that all that the Government intends to do is blow a lot smoke over this particular issue then do absolutely nothing about this excessive extraordinarily large salary? 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY 
: As other answers to questions have stated the Government remains strongly opposed to salaries of the level reported in today’s  
Dominion Post  
being paid within public service organisations. However company law determines the extent to which Ministers can become involved in those Government bodies that are companies. It requires the business affairs of a company to be managed by or under the direct supervision of the board. Thus decisions on salaries paid to staff are matters for the board and management. However those people are accountable to two shareholding Ministers and they will be asked to be accountable. 
Mark Peck 
: How satisfied is he with the performance of Television New Zealand? 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY 
: Overall I am satisfied with Television New Zealand’s performance against its objectives of giving effect to its charter while maintaining a commercial performance. TVNZ’s programme line-up is increasingly more charter oriented and it has committed itself to a significant increase in local content. At the same time TVNZ maintained its commercial performance by generating a record level of advertising revenue of $335 million in the year ended June 2004. This Government sees broadcasting as a key element in developing national identity not as a commercial enterprise to be sold off before lunchtime. 
Deborah Coddington 
: Why is the Government putting any taxpayers’ money into TVNZ when it spends an extra $400000 to keep Judy Bailey given that if she went to TV3 or Prime more New Zealanders would get to see her anyway. 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY 
: I should correct the last assumption that was in that question; Television New Zealand clearly is still the leading television company in the country in terms of ratings. The reason we provide charter funding is to see more New Zealand programmes. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: Has the Minister taken the time to find out whether the board of Television New Zealand knew that the new salary for Judy Bailey would be around $800000 a year and has he asked the board whether it gave its approval for such an extravagant salary? 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY 
: My understanding is that a remuneration committee negotiates salaries within Television New Zealand. My understanding is that the board has full accountability for those decisions because it is advised of such decisions. As I said before the board is accountable to its two shareholding Ministers. 
Television New Zealand—Salaries and Funding 
9.  
RODNEY HIDE (Leader—ACT) 
 to the  
Prime Minister 
: Does she stand by her reported comments that she was revolted by Paul Holmes’ $760000 salary and that money paid to top Television New Zealand presenters makes her own pay look like “petty cash” and how much taxpayers’ money has the Government put into Television New Zealand in the last 12 months? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK (Prime Minister) 
: 
 I stand by what I said which was that there was public revulsion at that salary level. And yes any examination of such figures would show that my salary is indeed petty cash by comparison as indeed is the member’s. I can also advise the member that in 2004-05 a total of $30 million is to be paid directly to TVNZ consisting of charter funding and for transmission to remote communities. As well $3.075 million is from New Zealand On Air. 
Rodney Hide 
: Will that $30 million come under review in the coming year if in fact it is determined that Television New Zealand is to quote the Prime Minister “funding a culture of extravagance” and in light of the fact that the money is being used in part to stomp on TV3 and Prime as private sector competition? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK 
: I do not think that the last assertion would be true. There is a reason for having public television charter television and that is to have at least one television company in this country that is dedicated to reflecting the charter objectives on screen. But clearly the board of Television New Zealand is accountable to the Government for how it expends public moneys and the Minister of Broadcasting has outlined that he expects it to be held accountable. 
Gerry Brownlee 
: What does she expect the Minister of Broadcasting to do with the board of Television New Zealand if it went to him and simply said that it believed that that was the right thing for it to do? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK 
: Obviously I would not want to prejudge what the board will say to the shareholding Ministers. However I believe that the shareholding Ministers are certainly due an explanation if the report in the  
Dominion 
 is true. 
Deborah Coddington 
: Is she objecting to the amount that Judy Bailey gets paid and if so why pick on her and what about Mike Williams a Government appointee to some eight Crown entities or State-owned enterprises who I am told earns $542000 while working full-time for the Labour Party and does she think there is public revulsion over this? 
Rt Hon HELEN CLARK 
: This Government appoints people from across the political spectrum to boards and I can say that we have been rather more open-minded than our predecessors in that respect. We would also expect that anyone appointed to a State-owned enterprises board would really not be pulling in large sums of money for 4 minutes on air a day. 
Algerian Refugee—Solicitor-General 
10.  
KEITH LOCKE (Green) 
 to the  
Attorney-General 
: Does she agree with the comments of the Solicitor-General who when it was put to him in the Supreme Court last week that there was no suggestion violence might occur in New Zealand as a result of any activities Mr Zaoui might be involved in replied: “I think that’s fair Your Honour.”; if not why not? 
Hon MARGARET WILSON (Attorney-General) 
: 
 Yes as I understand it in the context of whether Mr Zaoui should be released on bail there was no evidence that he is personally a violent person. 
Keith Locke 
: Will the Attorney-General then encourage the immigration Minister to apply section 114N of the Immigration Act which allows him to cancel the application of the security risk certificate applying to Mr Zaoui particularly in the light of the admission by the Solicitor-General that Mr Zaoui presents no real threat? 
Hon MARGARET WILSON 
: No it would be inappropriate for me to interfere with the proper exercise of the Minister of Immigration’s powers and responsibilities. 
Luamanuvao Winnie Laban 
: Did the Solicitor-General refer the Supreme Court to any evidence relating to the possibility of violence resulting from Mr Zaoui’s presence in New Zealand? 
Hon MARGARET WILSON 
: Yes the Solicitor-General referred the court to the Director of Security’s summary of allegations and reasoning in making the security risk certificate about Mr Zaoui. The director concluded that the activities of which he Mr Zaoui was convicted in Belgium and France were clandestine deceptive or threatened the safety of persons. The Swiss Government believed that his activity in Switzerland “had led to acts of violence and even attacks in Switzerland” and that “Activities of this kind in New Zealand by Mr Zaoui or by others attracted to New Zealand by his presence here could threaten the safety of New Zealanders.” 
Hon Tony Ryall 
: On the matter of the national security certificate is it Government policy that someone deemed to be a risk to national security should be entitled to receive a welfare benefit in New Zealand? 
Hon MARGARET WILSON 
: It is not a matter of policy. It would be a matter of law and of whether there was eligibility according to the law in that instance. 
Keith Locke 
: Does the Attorney-General disagree with the Prime Minister’s comments just made that there is substantive material that was not properly considered by the Refugee Status Appeals Authority in relation to Mr Zaoui in light of the facts that the Supreme Court judges challenged the Crown to produce evidence that had not been dealt with by the authority and that it was not provided even in affidavits or in the court hearing last Thursday? 
Hon MARGARET WILSON 
: It is a statement of fact that the security material was not considered by the refugee appeal authority or the Supreme Court. In fact the frustration of this process has been to get that matter considered by the proper parties. 
Dail Jones 
: What instructions does the Solicitor-General have from the Attorney-General to make the statement that has been referred to by Mr Locke with regard to Mr Zaoui—a statement that now severely prejudices the inspector-general’s final certificate in this matter because it presumes that Mr Zaoui is not a danger to New Zealand and a statement that if it were true would prevent the inspector-general from issuing any form of certificate against Mr Zaoui resulting in his remaining in New Zealand? 
Hon MARGARET WILSON 
: The important point is that those comments were made in the context of an application to see whether Mr Zaoui should be released on bail. They were not done in the context of the substantive issue and I think that if the comments are seen in that context they do not necessarily carry the implications made by that member. 
Rod Donald 
: In the light of the Prime Minister’s concern about Mr Zaoui’s “future hanging up in the air after 2 years” why did the Crown oppose bail for Mr Zaoui last Thursday following the Supreme Court’s decision on 25 November that it had the power to grant bail to Mr Zaoui and why did the Crown propose his detention at the Mangere Refugee Resettlement Centre when it had previously said that was not an option? 
Hon MARGARET WILSON 
: It was the Crown’s contention that Mr Zaoui was a risk to security because that was consistent with the certificate that had been issued to date. Therefore it was consistent that the Crown should argue that there be some form of detention. The Supreme Court as it is perfectly entitled to did not agree with that and exercised its inherent jurisdiction to grant bail. The previous hearing was not for the Crown to take unto itself the law; it was in fact for it to abide by the law as articulated by the court. That is what the Crown has done. 
Dail Jones 
: What consideration is the Attorney-General giving to briefing someone other than the Solicitor-General to handle the final aspect of this case bearing in mind that the Crown and the Solicitor-General have been beaten at every point by a very junior lawyer—an obviously very able one—and that the time may have come to brief someone in private practice who may be somewhat hungrier than the Solicitor-General? 
Hon MARGARET WILSON 
: In fact the Crown has won at every level except the Supreme Court in most of these matters and it has been seeking a clarification of the law. I do not believe that any better representation could have given given the state of the law as it is at the moment. 
Keith Locke 
: Will the Attorney-General agree that her previous statement is a bit wrong in that it was the High Court that decided that the SIS should provide a summary of allegations to Mr Zaoui contrary to the Crown’s contention that it was the High Court that forced the previous inspector-general off the case even though the Crown was defending that inspector-general and that the Crown has lost all five substantive proceedings; and will it be re-looking at the whole case to see where it went wrong—perhaps in not considering human rights as much as it should have done? 
Mr SPEAKER 
: I was generous to the member. His question was long and not properly planned. The Minister may comment on two of the questions asked. 
Hon MARGARET WILSON 
: I apologise. I thought the question was in the context of bail and certainly we had won the previous two cases before the matter got to the Supreme Court on that issue. In terms of whether human rights is a matter that should have been considered that is precisely what we sought guidance from the court on. We were certainly always in a position to be able to release the information the member referred to. Finally on the state of the law it is apparent as the Prime Minister has indicated that the law does need a review and it will be having it. 
Spring Hill Prison Waikato—Consultation Fees 
11.  
Dr PAUL HUTCHISON (National—Port Waikato) 
 to the  
Minister of Corrections 
: Does he still stand by his comment “I consider the $1.3 million figure to be excessive” with regard to consultation costs for Spring Hill prison and does he consider there to be any further excessive spending on this project? 
Hon PAUL SWAIN (Minister of Labour) 
: 
 Yes and no. 
Dr Paul Hutchison 
: Does the Minister think that taxpayers will be pleased or outraged when they discover that his figure of June 2004 was that earthworks and services for Spring Hill would cost approximately $28 million but by November the estimated cost had increased to $38.8 million—a massive $10.8 million increase in 5 months? 
Hon PAUL SWAIN 
: Firstly those figures are estimates as the member will well know—[ 
Interruption 
] Calm down Hopoate. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Interjections can get out of hand but on that occasion the Minister knows that what he said was out of order. He will stand withdraw and apologise. 
Hon PAUL SWAIN 
: I withdraw and apologise. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Now please answer the question and no more. 
Hon PAUL SWAIN 
: The member will also know that given the current performance of the Government and the fabulous economy that we are now experiencing there is pressure in the economy everywhere. Construction is booming and costs are rising for diesel and labour as a result. Therefore there are some changes in estimated costs. But the member will also know that this goes back to the Budget process. All the figures are available. I welcome him to come to my office. I will provide the officials and give him a full briefing on the whole matter so he can get up to speed on the whole issue. 
Dr Paul Hutchison 
: Does the Minister agree that buying land for a prison near Meremere for $2.3 million then discovering that it was necessary to spend about $38.8 million on earthmoving due to the original site being suitable when there were 46 sites to choose from is a gross waste of taxpayers’ money; if not why not? 
Hon PAUL SWAIN 
: No because an exhaustive process went on in looking for the right site. I am not an engineer but the member should know that any construction such as this requires earthworks. Part of the reason actually is to make sure that any visible pollution which that member opposed right from the start is able to be minimised. So this is good value for money. 
Dr Paul Hutchison 
: How does he think the elderly distraught with news that The Salvation Army is exiting their nursing homes due to Government policy will feel when they discover the cost per bed at Spring Hill prison will be $384000 compared with the cost per nursing home bed which is on average $90000—a quarter the cost of a prison bed? 
Hon PAUL SWAIN 
: I think those people will appreciate that this Government is tough on crime and has had to build more prisons and more prison beds after 9 years of total limp-wristed inactivity from the National Government. 
Labour Market—Reports 
12.  
Hon MARK GOSCHE (Labour—Maungakiekie) 
 to the  
Minister of Labour 
: What reports has he received on the state of the New Zealand labour market? 
Hon PAUL SWAIN (Minister of Labour) 
: 
 I have seen several reports showing that the New Zealand labour market is in exceptionally good shape: over 2 million New Zealanders are in work; unemployment is at 3.8 percent the lowest level in two decades; paid parental leave is in place; the minimum wage has risen five times in 5 years; New Zealand employers plan to take on more staff than employers in other Asia-Pacific countries according to an international survey out today; and employers and unions are working with the Government to boost New Zealand workplace productivity—fabulous news from a fabulous Government. 
Hon Mark Gosche 
: What further reports has he received regarding New Zealand’s labour policies? 
Hon PAUL SWAIN 
: I have seen reports from someone opposing the Employment Relations Act 4 weeks’ annual leave and the New Zealand Superannuation Fund. I have recently seen reports showing that that person now supports those measures. I am sure that Father Christmas will be bringing a new pair of flip-flops to Don Brash given that his old ones have worn out. 
Peter Brown 
: Is the Minister aware that the most recent statistics show that the number of people working as a percentage of those who are available for and are seeking work has increased a mere 0.6 percent since 1996 whilst the number of people on a sickness benefit has increased by 35.4 percent since the year 2000; if he is aware of that would he agree that the picture is not quite as rosy as he makes out? 
Hon PAUL SWAIN 
: No I would not. I think the member is quite aware of two really important pieces of information: firstly that there are now more than 2 million New Zealanders in work which is a very important thing; and secondly that the unemployment rate is now 3.8 percent. I am advised that as a result there are now 16 percent fewer beneficiaries overall than there have been since about the year 2000. I think New Zealand will be congratulating this Government on the fabulous work it has done in the labour-market area. 
Peter Brown 
: I seek leave to table the statistics I referred to that I obtained from the Parliamentary Library for the Minister’s enlightenment. 
Document by leave laid on the Table of the House. 
Questions to Members 
Immigration—English Language Tests 
1.  
KENNETH WANG (ACT) 
 to the  
Chairperson of the Foreign Affairs Defence and Trade Committee 
: Has the committee met to consider the petition of Kenneth Wang and 7296 others requesting a review of the new English language immigration test which was presented on 17 December 2002; if not why not? 
Hon PETER DUNNE (Chairperson of the Foreign Affairs Defence and Trade Committee) 
: 
 Although the committee has had a couple of informal discussions about the petition it has not yet formally met to consider it simply because of pressure of other business. 
Kenneth Wang 
: Given that over 7000 people have signed this petition and it has been with the committee for 2 years does he consider it to be a low priority; if not will he commit to considering it in the next 3 months? 
Hon PETER DUNNE 
: The committee adopted the procedure of dealing with the petitions before it in the chronological order in which they had been received. As some of the petitions before us dated back to 1999 we accorded those greater priority. Whether the committee wishes to give this petition priority within the next 3 months is a matter for the committee to decide. 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: Why would the committee give this petition greater priority just because 7296 people had signed it when by the Government’s own admission there are now 300000 people in New Zealand who cannot speak English? 
Hon PETER DUNNE 
: As I said in response to the earlier question we give our priority according to the chronological date on which the petitions were received not the number of people who signed them. 
Urgency 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN (Leader of the House) 
: 
 I move  
That urgency be accorded the passing through their remaining stages of the Aquaculture Reform Bill the Subordinate Legislation (Confirmation and Validation) Bill (No 3) the Taxation (Annual Rates Venture Capital and Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill the Public Finance (State Sector Management) Bill and any bills into which those bills may be divided; the first reading of the Resource Management and Electricity Legislation Amendment Bill; the introduction and first reading of the Prisoners’ and Victims’ Claims Bill; Government notice of motion No. 1; the first readings of the Overseas Investment Bill the Securities Legislation Bill the Taxation (Base Maintenance and Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill the Education Amendment Bill the Coroners Bill the Gambling Amendment Bill and the Fiordland Marine Management Bill; the passing through its remaining stages of the Lawyers and Conveyancers Bill; and Government notice of motion No. 2.  
The motion is moved in order to complete the Government’s programme before the House rises for the summer adjournment. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First) 
: 
 Before you put that motion Mr Speaker on behalf of New Zealand First I seek leave for an addition to the urgency motion—to add the Immigration Amendment Bill in my name to the urgent business of the House it being a matter of critical importance to this country’s security. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Leave is sought to add that. Is there any objection? There is. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First) 
: 
 I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. New Zealand First made it very clear to the Government that we had no desire to join the committee being set up under Government motion No. 1 which is part of the urgency motion. We do not believe that the Government has the right to do so despite our clear view we do not wish to join this committee and the fact that we believe it to be a sham and a waste of Parliament’s time and our time as well. We do not believe that any other party in this House can force us to be members of that committee by simply adding it to the motion. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: That is not a point of order. 
GERRY BROWNLEE (Deputy Leader—National) 
: 
 I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. My question to you is: how can it not be a point of order? Surely a political party has a right to choose whether it belongs to a special select committee. The National Party will not be joining this select committee and we have made that abundantly clear as well. Even if this House were to muster enough votes to put the committee together on this basis we will not be there. Why is it that this has to be done under urgency and how is it that a Government can propose a nomination like this? 
Mr SPEAKER 
: The member should read the Standing Orders. It is a matter for debate when the House gets to that motion. It is not a point or order. 
Hon TONY RYALL (National—Bay Of Plenty) 
: 
 A couple of points of order—[ 
Interruption 
] 
Mr SPEAKER 
: The member will be seated or he will leave. 
Hon TONY RYALL 
: A couple of points of order ago the House denied leave for Mr Peters to have his Immigration Amendment Bill considered. The National Party considers matters of national security to be of the highest importance. We presume that the Government objects to Mr Peters’ bill on the basis of its retrospective nature. Therefore I seek leave for the House to include in the motion the Immigration Amendment Bill in the name of Mr Peters without the retrospective clause. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Leave is sought for that. Is there any objection? There is. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First) 
: 
 That being the case I seek leave for the words “New Zealand First” and the number “1” which are in the second to last line of Government notice of motion No. 1 to be removed from the notice of motion. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Leave is sought for that. Is there any objection? There is not. 
GERRY BROWNLEE (Deputy Leader—National) 
: 
 I make a similar request to the House—that the words “New Zealand National” and the number “2” be removed from that motion. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Leave is sought for that. Is there any objection? There is not. 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN (Leader of the House) 
: 
 I just make it clear that the Government will be making available House time if necessary should parties change their mind. I note that New Zealand First also declined to join the Fisheries and Other Sea-related Legislation Committee but later joined it in a very positive fashion. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That urgency be accorded. 
Ayes 61 
New Zealand Labour 51; United Future 8; Progressive 2. 
Noes 58 
New Zealand National 27; New Zealand First 13; ACT New Zealand 9; Green Party 9. 
Motion agreed to. 
Aquaculture Reform Bill 
Second Reading 
Hon DAVID BENSON-POPE (Minister of Fisheries) 
: 
 I move  
That the Aquaculture Reform Bill be now read a second time 
. The Aquaculture Reform Bill amends the Resource Management Act 1991 and the Fisheries Acts of 1983 and 1996 to secure a sustainable future for New Zealand’s aquaculture industry. It defines aquaculture’s place in the marine environment and addresses shortcomings in poorly integrated coastal planning aquaculture and fisheries management regimes. The bill balances economic development environmental sustainability and community concern. 
A significant aspect of the bill is that it resolves the unfinished business of the 1992 fisheries settlement. The bill provides for full and final settlement of post-1992 iwi claims to commercial aquaculture in the coastal marine area. The bill deals with the spatial aspects that were left unfinished by the fisheries settlement. 
The bill as reported back now includes a number of important changes. I thank the Primary Production Committee for its suggestions; I believe that those will improve the bill. 
It is recognised that the existing dual regime under the Resource Management Act and the Fisheries Act could not cope with the overload of marine-farming applications. It also led to higher processing costs delays and poor environmental results. The bill addresses those issues and lifts the uncertainty that has hung over the aquaculture industry since the 1980s. It has taken a lot of work and consultation. Much of the bill’s form is a direct result of considerable consultation with industry and local government. 
Let us be clear about what this bill means for the aquaculture industry. The bill makes the Resource Management Act the main legislation for managing aquaculture. That will enable councils to effectively manage aquaculture and encourage the aquaculture industry to develop in a sustainable way. Under the reforms new aquaculture will take place in aquaculture management areas which regional councils will implement through their coastal plans or which can be initiated by a private plan change. Aquaculture management areas will be created by the plan change process. Affected parties and the public will have a say over where aquaculture should be allowed to take place. Industry can initiate a facilitated private plan change and if successful will have preferential allocation of space. All marine farms with existing coastal permits to occupy space will be deemed to be aquaculture management areas unless those areas are identified in the plan or proposed plan as being unsuitable for aquaculture. Existing farms under a Resource Management Act regime will continue for the life of their coastal permits. 
The bill contains transitional provisions to move the existing marine-farming authorisations granted under the Fisheries Act or Marine Farming Act into the new regime. Marine Farming Act farms will have Resource Management Act consents for 20 years with one right of extension at the end of that period provided that the farm remains in an aquaculture management area. Marine farmers will no longer require a marine-farming permit under the Fisheries Act 1983. Their activity will be managed through the coastal permit under the Resource Management Act. Marine farmers will be recognised for the work they undertake in developing plan changes. We also want to provide greater certainty for existing marine farmers on the renewal of a consent. When a marine farm resource consent expires if the farm is still within an aquaculture management area and the operation remains similar the incumbent’s application will be considered first. Where the existing farmer is using the space properly we want to provide that he or she continues to do so. 
Certainty brings benefits both to the industry and to the community. However we do not believe that rights in perpetuity are appropriate for what is after all public space. The bill seeks to balance competing interests providing protections for fishing under the quota management system with an undue adverse effects test. The select committee has recommended provision of an opportunity for court review of any decisions made under that test and in the interests of transparency and ultimately fairness I agree that that is an important addition. 
Part 5 addresses Maori interests in marine farming. It provides iwi with where possible an allocation of an area equivalent to 20 percent of the total marine-farming space allocated since 1992 and with 20 percent of any new marine-farming space. This proposal is a full and final settlement of Maori claims to commercial marine-farming space post - September 1992. That represents a sound basis for Maori and the marine-farming sector to move forward. The select committee has recommended that iwi are allocated areas that are more manageable with fewer isolated blocks. That allocation model better fits with the planning process for developing and allocating aquaculture management areas. Initially marine-farming space allocated to Maori will be provided to Te Ohu Kai Moana Trustee Ltd to hold for direct allocation to iwi—those same iwi that are entitled to receive an allocation of inshore fisheries quota under the 1992 deed of settlement. Te Ohu Kai Moana Trustee Ltd will hold those settlement assets separately from the assets it holds in trust under the Maori Fisheries Act. 
It is clear that aquaculture was deliberately left out of the 1992 fisheries settlement by the then Government and that it has remained the unfinished business of that agreement. This bill has emerged from considerable consultation with industry and stakeholders. Feedback we have received to date from industry has been hugely positive especially in recent days with both the Marine Farming Association and the New Zealand Aquaculture Council saying they look forward to the lifting of the moratorium. This bill supports clarifies and defines aquaculture’s place in the marine environment and provides for the sustainable growth of the aquaculture industry in New Zealand. I am delighted to commend it to the House. 
Hon DAVID CARTER (National) 
: 
 This legislation extends the Treaty of Waitangi grievance industry for generations to come. National will of course oppose the Aquaculture Reform Bill and it will do so principally on that basis. The legislation without principle and without negotiation gives Maori 20 percent of aquaculture space. 
Hon Annette King 
: What did you do with the Fisheries Bill? 
Hon DAVID CARTER 
: I will tell the member about the Fisheries Bill if she gives me a minute. 
Not only does the Aquaculture Reform Bill give Maori 20 percent but over the next 10 years the Government is instructing councils to gift to Maori up to 40 percent of all aquaculture space about to be created. The important point is that when Maori submitters came before the Primary Production Committee the whole lot of them said that the bill will not settle any grievance. Not one Maori submitter said to us that this was settlement. All of them said that there has been no negotiation but here the Labour Government is trying to settle what it sees as a grievance simply by gifting to Maori without discussion or negotiation. Those submitters left us in no doubt at all that the bill will provide no full and final settlement. 
Why give Maori 20 percent or 40 percent? That is the important question I ask the Minister. The answer the Labour members gave us at the select committee was that this bill was unfinished business associated with the 1992 deed of settlement. We took the opportunity of asking the officials to give the select committee any proof that the business was unfinished and had been deliberately left to one side during the 1992 negotiation as the Minister has just claimed. 
Phil Heatley 
: Was there any proof? 
Hon DAVID CARTER 
: We asked for the proof and it finally came back from the officials that there was no written record at all as to whether the business was unfinished. But help was on the way. Maori submitters told us they had the proof and would table it. We waited days and days and days for the proof. 
Phil Heatley 
: Did it come? 
Hon DAVID CARTER 
: It never came—from any Maori submitter. Help was finally on the way. The Hon Dover Samuels stuck his hand up and said that in 1992 he had been one of the negotiators which was news to the select committee and he then promised to table documentary evidence that the aquaculture industry had had the claims associated with the 1992 settlement put to one side. To date we are still waiting for the Hon Dover Samuels to table any evidence at all. 
I take the opportunity of reading one paragraph from the 1992 deed of settlement signed between the Crown and Maori. Paragraph 5.1 states: “Maori agree that this Settlement Deed and the settlement it evidences shall satisfy all claims current and future in respect of and shall discharge and extinguish all commercial fishing rights and interests of Maori whether in respect of sea coastal or inland fisheries (including any commercial aspect of traditional fishing rights and interests) whether arising by statute common law (including customary law and aboriginal title) the Treaty of Waitangi or otherwise and whether or not such rights or interests have been the subject of recommendation or adjudication by the Courts or the Waitangi Tribunal.” That is absolute clear evidence that everybody who signed that document in 1992 accepted that it was full and final. 
I took the opportunity of talking to two former National Party colleagues Sir Douglas Graham and the Hon Doug Kidd. Both those Ministers who were intimately involved in the discussion say that there was no unfinished business associated with aquaculture. That is their clear memory of those discussions. Yet the Labour Government comes along and without principle or any justification at all—apart from trying to curry favour with Maori associated with the seabed and foreshore—is gifting to Maori up to 40 percent of aquaculture. I say to the Minister that generations to come will still be debating the Treaty of Waitangi and the grievances associated with it and this legislation does nothing to help. 
I turn my comments to the bill itself. In 10 or 11 years in this House I do not recall a bill coming before a select committee that was as incompetently prepared as this one from the new Minister of Fisheries the Hon David Benson-Pope. It was so incompetent that it simply would not work. Let us consider the first major issue the committee had to grapple with and that was the issue of security of tenure for existing marine farmers. It was as if the Minister had never bothered to get in a boat and go and have a look at some of these things because he would then know that in the case of some of the salmon farms millions of dollars are invested. The bill as it originally appeared before the committee meant that come the end of farmers’ permits to occupy the space they had no rights of first refusal unless their council agreed to it. 
What aquaculturalist would invest millions of dollars in an industry unless such a simple issue as security of tenure was addressed? That was the greatest issue presented to us at the select committee and I am pleased to say that the committee members and the officials worked hard to achieve what is now in the bill as reported back today. The aquaculturist now has the right of first refusal provided he or she has operated in a satisfactory situation unless in the exceptional circumstance that the council needs to consider another way. The feedback I have seen from the industry is that that is a vast improvement on what was presented to the select committee. That improvement came about because of the way the committee worked. It had nothing to do with the incompetence of the Minister the Hon David Benson-Pope. 
The second point that needs to be made in this debate is the time constraint the select committee was under. We had 4 months from the time the bill was introduced in the House. Ministers have had years to prepare the legislation. The Minister’s earlier response had been to impose a further moratorium but when he finally decided to table a bill he gave 3 or 4 weeks for submitters to prepare submissions for the committee and then he gave something like a month for the committee to hear submissions and a month to consider the legislation. I thank the officials for their work. Those guys worked 7 days a week to help get the Minister and his hopeless incompetent Government out of that mess. I also pay tribute to the select committee secretariat for their work. I thank Bob Bunch Mary Hay and Steven Mitchell for their huge commitment in working with the committee to right the mess. 
The select committee achieved a large number of changes through the legislation and I will certainly take the opportunity of speaking to those during the laborious Committee stage we will enter into shortly. But I want to say that the most telling line of submission before the select committee concerned the way it is becoming increasingly easier for New Zealand aquaculturalists to take their expertise to other countries. Countries like South America and Australia welcome the expertise of New Zealand aquaculturalists and make it easy for them to operate in their countries whereas this Government has been putting in place in front of the aquaculturalist more and more bureaucracy and more and more encumbrances to developing an industry that has huge potential for the country. 
The legislation has been hugely improved. I thank the select committee members who worked with me through that process. Some of them clearly got more involved in the process than others but at the end of the day despite the time constraint the 141 submissions the 34 hours of hearings and the 34 hours of deliberation the bill has been reported back in substantially better form than it was before it came before the select committee. 
JANET MACKEY (Labour—East Coast) 
: 
 It is with some relief I think we would all agree that this bill is being reported back and is going to be debated before the Christmas break. I agree with the chairperson of the Primary Production Committee that the schedule was very tight; not so much for the members of the select committee but certainly for the officials who were sent away to get more and more information and for the clerk and support staff of the committee who worked round the clock and weekends to ensure we would be able to see this bill go through the remainder of its passage through the House before Christmas. 
I think the bill has certainly changed in the course of its time with the select committee but that is the reason we have select committees. A committee is given a bill and there is then an opportunity for the industry to comment. I thank those members of the industry who provided their time as expert advisers to the committee. This bill is testimony to the effectiveness of a good select committee process. I thank the chairperson of the select committee because he showed a real commitment to improving the legislation and to working constructively rather than politically to ensure that we brought back better legislation to the House—legislation that certainly now has a lot of support from the industry. 
There were a number of issues that the committee considered vitally important to pass and I am sorry to hear that the National Party will not be supporting this legislation. I think its members will be in a very small minority of New Zealanders in doing so. Certainly the industry wants to see this bill passed. Its members want to see it passed for the reason that we need to create some certainty in the industry. There was a comment about people going overseas. I was certainly impressed by what Australia is doing to encourage New Zealand aquaculturists to take their skills and their investment to Australia and to set up their businesses over there. Many of those people realise the advantage of fish farming in New Zealand and it is important that this bill is passed so that we can create some certainty in an environment in which as the chairman said people are investing millions of dollars. 
There was a real problem created by the need to provide 20 percent of the fishery for Maori and that was that Maori would end up with small 20-percent pieces of the coastline. That would have been neither economic nor practicable and there would have been no guarantee that the areas they got would be any good for fish farming anyway. So I welcome the changes that have been made in that area. 
I acknowledge that there are perhaps still some concerns in the industry and I think there are still some concerns among select committee members over a number of issues. I acknowledge the concern that has been expressed over the private sector paying for treaty settlements. I think that that does create a precedent. However I would probably challenge people to find any other way in which to deal with that issue. Unlike the National Party the Government believes that it as a matter of good faith and in the spirit of the fisheries settlement Maori are entitled to 20 percent of that fishery. We can take that down to the letter of the law we can ask for proof and we can do whatever we want but in the spirit of that settlement I believe that it is absolutely appropriate that Maori are ensured 20 percent of the fishery. I acknowledge those submitters who have expressed concern over the private sector effectively paying for that settlement by applying for 100 percent and receiving 80 percent of the application. However I also say it is perhaps a moot point given that an application is not ownership. I do not think anyone can put in an application for a fisheries permit with any certainty that that application will be granted so we are hardly taking away from people something that they already own. But I do acknowledge the costs associated with the preparation for putting in an application. 
The other concern that I think may require the attention of this House sometime in the future—and it will be up to local government to ensure that it does not—is the ability of some smaller local authorities to manage their role in the fishery. That is certainly the case with coastal plans and with some of the skills and expertise that will be required. I know that smaller councils like my own came to the select committee and acknowledged that it was really beyond them. They did not have a lot of intention of doing anything actually and that concerned me because this legislation will rely very much on the expertise and management ability of local authorities to do their job and to do it well. I do not think we came out of the select committee process with any confidence that the smaller councils would manage that well. 
I welcome this bill coming back to the House. It is a year since we passed the extension to the moratorium. At that time there was a lot of political chest-beating and huffing and puffing over the Government’s inability to come back with legislation to manage this very complex fishery. I congratulate the Minister of Fisheries and his staff and I congratulate the officials who have come back to Parliament with legislation that I believe is an excellent beginning to the management of this fishery. I fully expect that in the future we may need to trim the bill or deal with certain issues that arise but the industry certainly welcomes this bill and so does the Government. 
R DOUG WOOLERTON (NZ First) 
: 
 New Zealand First will support this bill and in doing so I want to thank the chairman of the Primary Production Committee David Carter my fellow members of the committee—although it is sometimes doubtful whether I should do that—and of course the officials without whom we would be completely lost. 
New Zealand First believes that while the moratorium has been on the aquaculture industry we have been losing hard-won markets in overseas countries—markets that have been lost to other countries namely Australia South American countries and such like. So it is great that this bill is before us and shows a pathway ahead. I want to mention some of the issues that were somewhat contentious in the bill and give people our views on those issues. 
Firstly this bill is about allocating space. It is about allocating space on the commons or in public areas. It does not concern anyone that our ACT colleagues could say there should be a lease in perpetuity which is what they say in their minority report. The bill does not say there can be ownership by fee simple because it does not concern land; it is on the foreshore and seabed where this activity takes place. This is in short private gain on public space so it needs to be cared for and needs prescriptive legislation around it of a special kind and this legislation does that. 
When we are talking about 20 percent of new space for Maori it is simply misleading to talk about 40 percent of space for Maori. Whatever happens in the new space whether 40 percent of that is allocated to Maori at the end of the day—and people should be quite clear about this—Maori will receive 20 percent of space. Never mind where all these things came from—the Government of the day has decided that 20 percent will be allocated to Maori. It has said that upfront and that will happen. 
It is interesting though to consider where that 20 percent figure came from. That figure came as a precedent from the previous National Government when it passed the Fisheries Bill. That bill I might tell members—and my colleagues will speak more about this later—was passed not through a select committee but through this House in a great hurry—a hurry that makes this look like a walk in the park. So let us not forget that. 
In actual fact what will happen with this new space—bearing in mind that many of the aquaculture management areas that this bill sets up have not been defined; some have but many have not—is that some of the costs of application will come off the present players in the industry but the space will not. So it is facetious to be talking about space coming off other people. In actual fact in most cases extra water space will be allocated. Nobody will know whether that is the case or whether it is not and I am sure the councils that are charged with the responsibility of administering this bill will not be saying so. But in actual everyday terms more space will be allocated and that is where the 20 percent for Maori will come from. So there will be minimal cost to the present players and dare I say it minimal cost to the country. 
It is time we had a bill like this because when a new industry comes to New Zealand—an industry that brings in hundreds of millions of dollars—it is something we want to encourage but where and how it happens is very very important. There has been significant angst and significant argument over the original setting-up of aquaculture in this country and this bill although not faultless will go a very long way towards fixing all of that. Security of tenure as I have mentioned before was a problem. As the chairman of the select committee has said to the House that has been largely fixed up in this bill by giving present players in the industry first right of refusal—or right of first refusal which I am told is a different thing but I will not bother to try to work that out. 
Phil Heatley 
: The Green member will explain. 
R DOUG WOOLERTON 
: Thank you. New Zealand First is in favour of this bill. We will support the amendments and we will support the bill becoming law as quickly as possible. 
GERRARD ECKHOFF (ACT) 
: 
 I suspect that the marine farming industry will breathe something of a sigh of relief that at long last the industry can start to proceed. But I also suspect that when they listen to this debate over the next few hours or however long it takes and recognise the huge problems that they will face in the future they will see this bill as something of a dual-edged sword. 
I note that the chairman of the New Zealand Aquaculture Council Callum McCallum wants to say a big thankyou to the Government its officials and everybody involved in this legislation. I cannot help but wonder how long he will be thanking the Government for because his press release states that he has the Minister’s “direct assurances” that the complexities of this 214-page bill will be applied by the Government in a practical supportive way that respects investment commitments to date. What on earth does that mean? It will not be the Government’s role once this bill is passed to do anything at all; it will be up to the regional councils to decide what will happen with the aquaculture industry in the future. I have not the slightest doubt that this 214-page bill will become an albatross around the neck of the industry. 
In this second reading debate I can perhaps do no worse than refer to the ACT minority report. This is the summation of the way my party feels about this bill. We recognise that this industry has the potential to be one of New Zealand’s greatest export earners given our massive coastlines and our creative innovative people within the industry. But this Government appears to have decided to restrict control and confine the industry in the name of goodness knows what. Timorous attitudes will get this industry nowhere. The ACT party believes that this reform bill will hinder the development of this important industry and prevent it from achieving its fullest potential. 
Security of tenure—Mr Woolerton has already spoken about this—has to be the biggest single issue I was faced with during my time on the Primary Production Committee. Regretfully I was not there for all the meetings but I constantly advocated that there should be a lease in perpetuity. The reason for that is very simple. I have seen what happens to short-term leases in industries based on land for example. If one gives a short-term lease one will get a short-term solution and one will get long-term problems from that form of tenure. Security of tenure is vital because this industry requires multimillions of dollars for investment both now and in the future. Nobody will invest in this industry—well nowhere near their potential—with the short-term approach the Government has taken. 
A submitter from I think Blenheim said that five people from the industry have already gone to Australia because they will not put up with what this bill dishes out to them. They said that in Australia there are about four pages of regulations and requirements. In New Zealand by comparison there are about 400 pages I suspect—it is huge—and the industry does not even know what the regional councils will dish up to it in the future. The industry has been given 20 years’ security by this bill. The 20-year period is nothing but a blink of an eye in terms of establishing oneself one’s industry one’s offshore infrastructure one’s business associations and one’s markets overseas. Twenty years is a meaningless period of time. In fact in many instances it takes generations to establish industries. 
That is why I and the ACT party unrepentantly advised that this industry should have a lease in perpetuity—a perpetual right of renewal subject to some predetermined environmental considerations. We do it for land. Why can we not do it for the ocean? We have to. I suspect that in the future there will be amendments that actually recognise this point as was the case many years ago when we had short-term pastoral leases. The farmers of those days said that if they were not going to get their leases back they would become an extractive industry. They could not care less. Then it all changed of course and became hugely sustainable once that clause was removed—once the industry had a lease in perpetuity. 
Mr Carter has already alluded to the issues surrounding the allocation to Maori. The 1992 Waitangi fisheries settlement was stated to be full and final. What is it about the words “full and final” that the Minister of Fisheries does not really understand? That is clear and absolute and there has been no presentation of fact or document to prove otherwise. The select committee did ask for that information to be presented. It was not presented. What was presented and what I received was advice from Crown Law on this issue. Now I thought that it would be a pretty fair way of determining the veracity or otherwise of the Minister’s claim that 20 percent of the space should go to Maori under the 1992 Treaty of Waitangi fisheries settlement. The advice we received from Crown Law consisted of three blank pages where its opinion was withheld. Why? What possible justification can the Minister or Crown Law have for withholding that perfectly valid information? It is totally and utterly inappropriate for an office of the Government—the Crown Law Office—to withhold valuable information if that information would have assisted our select committee in getting this bill right. That surely is the purpose of the bill. It is to establish at this early stage of the industry the ground rules so that the industry can progress in a sensible and reasoned fashion. But that will not happen for another very important reason and that is because of the powers that this bill gives to the Department of Conservation. 
The bill essentially gives the Department of Conservation the power of veto. Why I say it is so terribly important to remove the department out of this whole process is that it has already stated that its intended policy is to ensure that 10 percent of the coastline goes into marine parks. So along comes the fishing industry the mussel farmers or whoever it might be and the department will say: “Oh this looks like a nice spot for one of our marine reserves. Permission declined.” It will not be the Ministry of Fisheries that runs this industry; it will be the Department of Conservation. Its tentacles have stretched right throughout industry in this country and certainly throughout primary-based industry. I note John Tamihere is nodding in agreement with me and I am delighted to see that. I am sure that next year—if or when he is back—he will be reining in that department. However it is totally and utterly inappropriate to give a Government department like the Department of Conservation the power of veto. It has a power of advocacy which is also quite wrong and I can only lament that the future of this industry will be tied inevitably with the Department of Conservation. 
IAN EWEN-STREET (Green) 
: 
 The Greens support this bill. Until now the marine farming industry in this country has been a very successful one. Most people do not know it but in Marlborough alone the aquaculture industry earns more for the province than the famous wine industry does. It is an industry that has been characterised by a boom-and-bust mentality in applications for water space but also by delays in the clash between the Resource Management Act and the Fisheries Act and it has been characterised by moratoria. 
This legislation was designed to get around that. It was designed to create aquaculture management areas where people could apply for marine space within the aquaculture management area and they could not apply in the exclusion zones outside the aquaculture management area. It took officials something like 3 years to write the bill. As others have said about 4 weeks were given for submissions and then the Primary Production Committee had about a month to hear submissions and another month to consider. The timescale was not good. However although we perhaps have not made a silk purse out of a sow’s ear I think we have done an extremely good job in changing what was unworkable legislation into something that is very workable. It is a credit to all the people who have worked so long and hard to get it to where it is today. I would like to pay particular credit to the officials—a couple of whom are here today—plus our select committee officials and all the members of the select committee led by David Carter the chair. 
Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER 
: I am sorry to interrupt the member but members should not be standing up and talking in the Chamber. Please be seated. 
IAN EWEN-STREET 
: I think they were standing to applaud were they not? 
I think that the main problem before this legislation came into being was the clash of cultures between the essentially community-based Resource Management Act and the essentially centrally based legislation of the Fisheries Act and the different cultures of the groups that administered those two different Acts. This bill is trying to put the control of aquaculture into the hands of the community; in other words through the regional councils under the auspices of the Resource Management Act. The Ministry of Fisheries will still have input at a very early stage. So rather than somebody going to the council getting a resource consent and then sometimes waiting for years to get a fisheries permit it is all done in one step under this bill. 
The aquaculture management areas are designed so there are areas in our sheltered waterways that are suitable for marine farming and for which people can apply for space and the exclusion zones are all those areas other than the aquaculture management areas where people cannot apply for space. Having said that it is possible for people to apply for space in the exclusion zones by initiating a plan change with the local council. That is a much higher hurdle than the resource consent as it is at the moment. 
As others have mentioned one of the main issues of contention in the bill as it was originally tabled was security of tenure. The bill provided that when an existing marine farmer had a lease that expired that space would go to tender. In other words it would go to the highest bidder. One does not have to be a rocket scientist to work out that it would not have taken very long for tendered space to always finish up in the hands of those people with the most money and almost inevitably they would be the big corporates. It was clearly an unworkable idea. On the one hand marine farmers said: “What we want most of all is security of tenure. We want the right of renewal in perpetuity.” Members of the committee said: “No this is public open space. This is commons from which you are trying to derive private profit. It is not appropriate for you to have a permanent right of renewal. Look at what has happened with the high country leases—we had to buy them back.” On the other hand there is the underlying reality that this is a biophysical process. There are physical limits to how many marine farms we can have in an area. It is not about simply allocating space; it is about asking whether marine farmers will be able to operate in that space. 
The compromise that we have come to which I think is a very good compromise is that instead of the water space being tendered the incumbent farmer has the right to make an application for a resource consent first. In other words that farmer’s application is heard first. If that application is successful the farmer gets a renewal of the lease for another 20 years. If the farmer’s application is unsuccessful then other things kick in and at that point it could go to tender or other applications could be received. There are a couple of instances where the person who is an incumbent will not get the right to make the first application. One of those instances is where the council decides that the area where the farm is will no longer be considered an aquaculture management area. In other words the council has changed the plan and the area is no longer suitable for aquaculture. At that point the incumbent farmer says: “Right that’s it. I’m out of here.” The farmer has no recourse and there is certainly no compensation to be paid. The other instance in which the farmer may not have the right to apply first for renewal of the consent is where he or she has not complied with the existing resource consent conditions. If the farmer has been convicted of some kind of unsatisfactory behaviour then he or she is deemed not to be suitable in terms of their specific resource consent. 
What the bill now states is that the people not only have to comply with their resource consent but also have to comply with the industry standards. At the moment industry standards—[ 
Interruption 
] 
Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER 
: When a member is speaking at the back of the Chamber it is really quite rude for members to interject across there. I call the member to order. 
IAN EWEN-STREET 
: I understand how the Minister gets quite excited. 
The incumbent farmers basically have to be good corporate citizens. There is no formal statement that this is an industry standard but what we are intending and hoping I guess from the passage of this legislation is that the industry will get together and form its own voluntary standards because the last thing people want is for their space which has become a valuable commodity to be taken from them and tendered to somebody else. 
The other really contentious issue I suppose in this legislation is the 20 percent of new marine space that will go to Maori. In essence the Government is trying to say that 20 percent of any new space that is created in an aquaculture management area is to go to Maori plus any existing space that was created between 1992—the year of the deed of settlement for fisheries—and the present also has to go to Maori. That was intended to be on a willing buyer willing seller basis so that if incumbent farmers wanted to sell and move on or to retire or whatever then the Government would move in buy farms and allocate that to Maori. The problem as we foresee it is that insufficient space will come up in a sufficiently short period of time for Maori to get 20 percent of that space. What the bill is allowing for is that Maori get 20 percent of the new space plus it may be that there is another 20 percent or up to 20 percent of that new space to take account of the 20 percent from the existing space that is unable to be allocated to them. 
We are also aware that if existing marine farmers want to extend their farms then the new space they are occupying would be treated as new space and 20 percent of that would go to Maori. This sounds fine but if there are farms dotted around the Hauraki Gulf the Marlborough Sounds or wherever we will finish up with tiny little patches of marine farms that have been allocated to iwi Maori. It becomes absolutely unworkable as they are uneconomic units. What we are trying to do is to encourage councils to aggregate these small areas so that iwi Maori have their space in a particular area in an area that is representative of the productivity of the rest of the space that has been allocated from 1992 until the present. The Greens are happy to support the bill. 
BERNIE OGILVY (United Future) 
: 
 I rise on behalf of United Future in the second reading of this bill to state that we will be voting for it and we would love to see it become law as soon as possible. There are very good reasons for us to do this which I hope to elaborate on in the second reading and if not then certainly in the Committee stage and the third reading. The reasons we are voting for this bill are very simple. As incredible as it seems the Primary Production Committee and officials after we had heard from all the submitters were able to turn the lemon that we had before us into a glass of lemonade. This bill is not 100 percent perfect but it is certainly 90 to 95 percent operational. In a world where getting it right seems to be problematic this is by and large an enabling bill to get this industry up and running again. 
The bill as it came to the select committee was a bit of a shocker and some submitters noted that very clearly. As I listened to some of the conclusions they made it was obvious there was really a great need for change to take place. The submitters had only 4 weeks to do what they could do whereas the drafters of the bill on their side probably had something like 4 years to do this. 
Out of all those submissions the objections raised have by and large been answered fully in this rewritten bill—those issues have been addressed and I want to take a bit of time to just go through some of those that caused concern. For instance submitters stated that aquaculture needed to be treated under the Resource Management Act like any other activity such as farming and not prohibited and not even put on a par with say nuclear waste. Now that has been accepted in this rewritten bill and I am very happy to support it because of this sort of change. 
The overwhelming number of submitters stated that many of the current problems in the bill were there because there had been a lack of listening by officials in the past and therefore the moratorium was put into place to try to steady the ship. There was a plea to the officials: “Please do not make the same mistake again.” That I believe has been accepted in this bill and makes us satisfied in that sense to vote for this second reading. 
We heard from an industry that had pioneered over some 20 years of work. It had very little hope that certainty would be available to it through the bill as originally proposed but now that has been provided through the rewriting of this bill. The problem with lack of continuity of tenure has been satisfied. Now every person has 20 years of tenure and the first right to continue to operate. In farming language that really means almost as if farmers can continue for ever and a day as long as they maintain the rules the regulations and the strictures that have been placed on aquaculture management areas by local councils. So as they keep farming they can be assured they will continue in the industry. That satisfied the submitters and we are very happy that that has been adjusted in this rewritten bill. 
The original bill was seen to set up possible fights between other marine players. For instance recreational and commercial fishers could have been fighting with farmers for years as they have done in the past. In some people’s minds it was therefore improbable that the undue adverse effects test would work especially on occasions when certain fishers would hold out on and renege against agreeing between themselves. Now this has been put aside. The bill now has a common-sense solution. It has used the 90 percent rule that applies with sharemarket takeovers and so this is now a very very excellent addition to the bill. 
We heard from submitters about the extraordinary time that had been taken in the past to get applications to the farming stage—we heard from some people that it took up to 9 years—and tremendous costs were incurred by farmers. We also heard in submissions that over $10 million was set aside in the Nelson-Marlborough area alone and that that had really crippled both the attitudes of people and their desire to go into further farming. They were once bitten twice shy I suppose. They were suspicious that this legislation would not give them freedom. The only people they could see making good on this were the lawyers. 
This bill now as it sits in its rewritten form I believe strips away that fear so those people can progress forward. So that is a very good addition to the whole bill. Certainty was needed not only for the farmer but for the lending institutions. Certainty has been put into this bill so that companies and investors can invest knowing what the rules are as it were. Labour can be satisfied. Exports can flourish. This bill in its rewritten form provides business certainty. 
Many submitters said that a public tendering process with no compensation for the intellectual property established could unjustly wipe the years of hard work from them as farmers overnight. It was their plea that the parties that had created the wealth should not have to tender for it. That injustice has now been resolved along common law principles in this particular rewritten bill. 
Some submitters said they feared that bigger companies were waiting to pounce to buy out the small ones that had no option but to sell if this legislation was passed unchanged through this House. They now have the power to raise their confidence they have certainty behind them incentives have been placed on local councils through this legislation to provide the aquaculture management areas and now their fears in that regard have been resolved. Private aquaculture management areas can now be established. The industry actually asked for that in submissions and has been heard in that process. 
United Future looks forward to this bill becoming law to help business in New Zealand. Our business friendliness is in sharp contrast to that which we have just heard from both the National and ACT parties today. Honestly how can those parties look aquaculture farmers in the eye and ask for their votes? Speakers from those parties in this House have put farmers down by being more ideological than in line with what the legislation actually offers which is now a fantastic business opportunity awaiting everybody. I was amused today with Dr Brash’s mathematics in his press release. If that is the way a Governor of the Reserve Bank does his sums then that would signal a rapid change of governors but I will deal more with that in the Committee stage as time is not with me at this point. I add and reiterate that United Future will be pleased to see this legislation move forward and become law. 
JOHN TAMIHERE (Labour—TamakiMakaurau) 
: 
 I rise to commend the Aquaculture Reform Bill and its second reading to the House. In doing so I shall map out firstly the way in which this Government approaches many macroeconomic issues. As we have demonstrated whether it is in the telecommunications industry or with regard to roads Tranz Rail air transport or the reformulation of our Stock Exchange we are a very business-friendly Government that is very supportive of Kiwi endeavour. This legislation with regard to aquaculture management areas is merely another litmus test that this Government will pass. I am grateful that we have received the support of New Zealand First of the Greens and of United Future on this wonderful legislation. It is about unleashing Kiwi potential in a new and dynamic way. No one has written the best manual on that but this is one of the best possible attempts to do so in legislation in a long time and I am grateful to the Opposition parties that are supporting the Government. The bill entertains for the very first time spatial rights in the seabed and foreshore areas. 
Hon David Carter 
: Not the first time. 
JOHN TAMIHERE 
: Yes it does to the extent that all communities whether they are local communities acting through local authorities under the Resource Management Act or whether they are Maori Pakeha or from Timbuctoo all have quite clearly been given a range of security in their opportunity to get into and finance the business of aquaculture. They have been given certainty and as usual they have been given closure. 
I am interested in and somewhat intrigued by some of the comments from National Party speakers. What I am intrigued about is that they practice one of the worst forms of selective amnesia this Parliament has ever seen. What is that selective amnesia? They have forgotten that one Douglas Montrose Graham cut the “Treaty of Wellington” in 1992. He had no process going through any select committee phase and no robust consultation process—nothing. He dropped the bill into this House and just rammed it through. At the end of the day that process might well have been fraught but members of the Opposition continue to practise that selective amnesia. They cannot remember Jim Bolger or Douglas Montrose Graham setting in place the legal and statutory framework that we are obliged to follow. In the event that we did not follow due legal process in terms of our constitution and in the event that we practised amnesia to the extent that the National Opposition members do surely one would have to go gaga and take a one-way ticket to Kurdistan. 
I tell David Carter and his erstwhile colleague from Whangarei that no one can remember the name of that when they get up on their feet to talk about the 20 40 or 60 percent of the quota for Maori we should explore that for one little moment. Douglas Montrose Graham cut a deal. Right now proceedings in the Court of Appeal in New Zealand have been adjourned sine die because Douglas Montrose Graham and James Bolger were directed to negotiate a settlement with Maori. That is our court speaking. Not only did our court speak but Parliament spoke. The previous National Government drove legislation through that stated it did not know what would come into the quota management system but whatever did Maori were to get 20 percent of it. Giving Maori 20 percent then freed up the whole of the quota management system. It was a world first and that was great. Today we hear from National and ACT party members that they want to recant that. They want to recant all the things their leadership did in those days in terms of the 20 percent that was to go to Maori. They do not want that. They do not accept that this is unfinished business and that this legislation does exactly what Douglas Montrose Graham and the Hon Jim Bolger portended. The framework is in place this is unfinished business and this Government cannot change an agreement that was executed between Maori and the Crown and enacted in legislation. 
I might say that the Hon David Carter voted for 20 percent. He did not know what it meant but he said that 20 percent or whatever the amount was would go to Maori. That is exactly what is happening right now. The member for Whangarei whom no one can remember— 
Clayton Cosgrove 
: Plonker. 
JOHN TAMIHERE 
: Whatever. He will get up very shortly and prattle off that Maori will be getting 40 50 or 60 percent. Maori as usual will get 20 percent because that was the deal that was struck by the previous National Government and it is one that we will continue to accede to. We will not overturn an agreement between Maori and the Crown that was executed as a deed of settlement and brought into this Parliament. There is a comment on and a description for that. I am not allowed to use it for the National Party of course. 
I conclude by commending the Minister of Fisheries for the fine effort he has made in bringing this legislation to the House. But because I am a good Labour MP and we are coming toward the end of the year the Christmas season and the like I say it is always good to remember the workers. Whether they are from the Primary Production Committee or the Ministry of Fisheries or whether they are our officials our messengers or our security staff in this building we honour and acknowledge them and pay them tribute for bringing forward a wonderful piece of work. I regret the mean-spirited nature of the Tories over there on the Opposition benches unably supported by the ACT party. Kia ora. 
PHIL HEATLEY (National—Whangarei) 
: 
 I say to the House that it should not be deceived by members on the Labour benches. This 20 percent allocation of aquaculture space to Maori has always been a quid pro quo for the seabed and foreshore deal. When the deal blew up in Labour’s face Labour figured that it could throw to Maori 20 percent of the aquaculture space and Maori would be satisfied with that. How patronising and how condescending can one get! That is why National will oppose this bill. Labour figured that it would do a dirty deal but the marine farmers who are out there working today Maori and others alike will pay the price for that. The moratorium will be lifted once the bill is passed and it is about time for that to be done. The industry has been hamstrung for too long with moratorium after moratorium being used as a solution rather than a tool. Marine farmers from across this country have been invited to Australia and to South America to set up camp there and some have. Fortunately others have stayed here in the hope that finally a bill would be brought to the House that would solve the majority of their problems. 
I also acknowledge the work of the Primary Production Committee. Through the select committee process we changed what had been a dog of a bill into a much-improved bill. We have changed significant aspects of the bill but National still opposes it on a number of fronts. Firstly as I mentioned at the beginning of my speech there is the issue of horse-trading with Maori. Labour thought that if it chucked 20 percent of marine space to Maori they would go away feeling very satisfied indeed and would not kick up a fuss over the seabed and foreshore issue. That is patronising and condescending. Now we discover that it could be up to 40 percent of new marine-farming space because the promise of 20 percent of aquaculture space to Maori may never be fulfilled. Marine farmers may not give up their current space and therefore 20 percent may not become available for Maori. So the top-up has to come from new space—anything up to 40 percent of it. Interestingly most Maori submitters did not acknowledge this bill as a settlement. There are several reasons for that. Firstly there was no negotiation with Maori over 20 percent of the aquaculture space. Secondly there is no deed of settlement over the aquaculture space to point to unlike the fisheries settlement of 1992 where there was a deed. Therefore many Maori submitters are already dissatisfied because of that lack of a negotiated deed of settlement. They are concerned they will receive space they would not have chosen for themselves: patches of random space uneconomic space and small space. That sets the scene for another revisiting of aquaculture-space settlements. 
I direct the House’s attention to the Ngati Awa Claims Settlement Bill which is the last bill on today’s Order Paper. Under clauses 118 and 119 of that bill Ngati Awa is to receive 5 percent of the aquaculture space through preferential tendering and that is over and above the 20 percent figure. Ngati Awa has its own separate little settlement. That bill is on the Order Paper in Parliament right now. So we have the Aquaculture Reform Bill giving Maori 20 percent of the aquaculture space and the Ngati Awa Claims Settlement Bill giving Ngati Awa another 5 percent. That is without mentioning Nga Rauru Kitahi and NgatiRuanui which get aquaculture space in their own settlement bills Ngati Tama which gets 10 percent of the aquaculture space in its own settlement bill and NgaiTahu which in 1998 received 10 percent of the aquaculture space in its settlement bill. Therein lies the problem. The National Party does not see a solution in this bill whereby we will put an end to treaty claims in aquaculture. 
We also have unanswered questions as to how the interests of aquaculture will be balanced with commercial fishing interests. Certainly National supports greater interaction between the two sectors. There has to be a timely fully transparent and cost-effective process to follow—namely commercial fishers talking to marine farmers and marine farmers talking to commercial fishers about their aspirations in a particular area reaching a transparent and cost-effective agreement and then moving forward. National is unsure how regional councils will be able to quantify or qualify aquaculture’s effect on fishing—effects such as those on spawning and stock development. We do not know how they are going to do it. We hope regional councils can do that because we want aquaculture to move ahead. In reality regional councils will have to employ very smart scientists and researchers in order to ensure they have the best advice on how to address that issue. 
Our third major concern is the right of first refusal for an incumbent marine farmer. National members on the select committee fought hard and it was a big win for us to get the gains we achieved. But we are still quite concerned that incumbent marine farmers will get priority over newcomers due to their pre-existing investment. Contrary to David Benson-Pope’s statements made in the media commercial aquaculturists have never asked for space in perpetuity—not ever. They have never asked for a right of renewal; they have never felt that public space should be in their hands forever. They have only ever asked for the right of first refusal—that they have first dibs at renewal if they have been good tenants. Yet in order to gain renewal they will have to follow industry-good practice and no one has defined that. It will change with changes in technology. Marine farmers now discover that regional councils may tender out occupied space if they feel it is necessary. We are not quite sure what the test will be in terms of being “necessary”. We certainly have reservations about whether those requirements and tests are sufficiently robust to provide the certainty that incumbents need for their investment. 
In the Committee stage I will be submitting various amendments to this bill. They will also deal with the ability of the Department of Conservation to intervene in the whole process and issue a veto as an objector under the Resource Management Act—the Minister of Conservation being able to veto the process. We need changes to this legislation in order to provide certainty for this fledgling industry. 
CLAYTON COSGROVE (Labour—Waimakariri) 
: 
 As a member of the Primary Production Committee I rise to support this bill. As I kick off my brief call it is fair to say that this bill came to the select committee with a high degree of contention and with some major issues. But the committee—apart from the member who preceded me—in the spirit and nature of its work got through those matters and I think we have brought a substantial quality bill back to the House. 
I want to correct a couple things put forward by Mr Heatley the well-known so-called member from Whangarei. The first—and he is right in this—is that one of the major issues in the bill was the perceived lack of security of tenure by industry players. Contrary to Mr Heatley’s submission to the House that has been fixed and he knows it. Existing marine farmers unless the aquaculture management area is changed get the first right to apply if they have been good citizens and have not breached their consents. Effectively unless the plan is changed they get the first option. Of course Mr Heatley conveniently forgot to make that point. What we heard from the National Party was the usual stir-up on race. Somebody should tell Mr Heatley and Mr Carter that Don Brash tried that in Orewa and it worked for 5 minutes. Now the tables have turned and the people have told Don Brash to wake up. Mr Heatley said that he fought hard in the select committee. Well if he fought hard in the committee then he fought harder than Don Brash did over the issue of the foreshore and seabed. 
The committee visited a number of marine farmers in Clevedon Auckland and Blenheim including people like Callum McCallum who contribute a huge amount through both their fish-processing factories and their aquaculture farms. They are battling Kiwis—great business people—who as Mr Ewen-Street said contribute much to the economy. It would be fair to say that in Blenheim when the Minister was down there recently and met with aquaculture people subsequent to this bill coming back from the select committee peace had broken out in respect of this bill. I think that in general most aquaculture farmers are pleased with the content of the bill especially in relation to the security-of-tenure issue which is most important to them. 
I also join in congratulating the officials the staff and the clerks who worked tirelessly on this bill. We had an interesting hearings process. A number of our members developed some new skills towards the waterfront in Auckland especially Mr Woolerton. I am sure he knows what I mean. But the process was a very good one. It was open and in the spirit and tradition of the Primary Production Committee in a non-partisan way we have brought a solid bill back to the House. I support it. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH (National—Nelson) 
: 
 After hearing that contribution from Clayton Cosgrove I now know why Kate Wilkinson will be the next member of Parliament for Waimakariri. At heart this bill is against everything that Trevor Mallard the so-called Coordinating Minister Race Relations promised. Supposedly at the beginning of the year this Government was going to eliminate all race-based politics. That is what we were told but this bill is proof that Labour is more interested in buying votes than in being fair to all New Zealanders. This bill is all about two very different standards of citizenship. With this bill a public resource worth hundreds of millions of dollars is being allocated to a group of people based on race. The National Party— 
John Tamihere 
: Based on rights. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: I suppose it is the same sorts of rights Mr Tamihere thought he had to the $200000 golden handshake that he promised he would not take; the same sorts of rights he believed he had to a car paid for by the Wairapeira Trust when he already had a car provided by— 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson) 
: I am sorry to interrupt the honourable member but I refer members on my right to Speaker’s ruling 56/1(1) which states that interjections are to be rare and reasonable. They should not be a running commentary. If members want to make a speech they can take the next call. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: This bill reinforces everything that New Zealanders dislike about this Labour Government. It is saying that if people are non-Maori New Zealanders— 
Mark Peck 
: National down! 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: One of the reasons Mr Peck has decided to throw away his seat in Invercargill is that he knows that the people there do not want to live in a country where the opportunities to create wealth are based on race not fairness. Trevor Mallard promised there would be complete race neutrality in the policies of this Labour Government. There is anything but that in this bill. 
Let us reflect back on the history of the fisheries settlement in 1992 the provisions of which were absolutely comprehensive. The settlement was to satisfy all claims current and future in respect of all commercial-fishing rights. This deed of settlement defines commercial-fishing rights as those that require a fishing permit under the Fisheries Act. If we look up what the Fisheries Act requires in terms of aquaculture we note that to have an aquaculture farm a person requires a fishing permit. There can be no question at all that the 1992 settlement involved aquaculture yet no member of the Government has been able to explain why the gravy train has been reopened. Under Labour full and final settlements do not mean full and final. Labour is happy to reopen the chequebook if it suits its political agenda. 
Darren Hughes 
: What did the judge say about this man? 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: Members opposite want to get into all sorts of irrelevancies because they cannot defend what they are doing in this regard. [ 
Interruption 
] 
I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. Since I have been on my feet I have faced a continuous barrage of interjections. I have heard three in the last minute in respect of what members opposite claim was a conviction. That is factually incorrect and it has been clarified by you on many occasions. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: The matter would not have been in  
Hansard 
 in that regard and I was trying to help the member out. Now that he has drawn attention to the matter there will be no further interjections on it. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: If we go back to the 1992 settlement we will see as I have carefully explained that it did include aquaculture because it was full and final settlement of all matters yet members opposite have reopened the chequebook. Let us ask the question why they have done that. Well it is actually very simple. When the foreshore and seabed issue arose the Government got itself into difficulty. It lost one of its Maori MPs then searched out as to how it could buy back some support. So in April the Government suddenly got extremely generous about throwing away rights that should have been shared by all New Zealanders and providing them exclusively for Maori. I say again that that is a tragedy. It is a tragedy because all New Zealanders should have an equal right to apply for and develop marine farms in this country. To have a race-based system under this Labour Government whereby people of one ethnicity have different rights is quite simply wrong. 
I also want to reflect on another botched process by the Minister Mr David Benson-Pope. Only last week we were in urgency dealing with legislation that was being rushed through under that Minister and here we are back in the House again once more in urgency dealing with matters promoted by that same Minister. The tragedy is that the aquaculture industry was put under a moratorium by this Government a long 4 years ago. During the 1990s under National’s careful stewardship we saw— 
Government Members 
: Ha ha! 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: I will put my record on it. I ask members: do you know how much the aquaculture industry expanded— 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Do not bring me into the debate please. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: You are so finicky with me Mr Speaker and so inadequate with every— 
Mr SPEAKER 
: The member will now resume his seat. His speech is terminated. I am not having that sort of rudeness. 
Hon Dr Nick Smith 
: That’s what I am talking about. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: The member will now leave the Chamber. 
Hon Dr Nick Smith withdrew from the Chamber. 
MARK PECK (Labour—Invercargill) 
: 
 During the course of that debate Jen McCutcheon knocked on another 200 doors. She is looking extraordinarily well placed to be the next member for Nelson. I must say that the House is looking forward to a real member of Parliament for Nelson particularly one who will be a member of the Government. [ 
Interruption 
] I can tell members that Wayne Harpur will fly in this place. He has my support as the new vibrant member for Invercargill. I support the second reading of this bill. 
Amendments recommended by the Primary Production Committee by majority agreed to. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the Aquaculture Reform Bill be now read a second time. 
Ayes 83 
New Zealand Labour 51; New Zealand First 13; Green Party 9; United Future 8; Progressive 2. 
Noes 37 
New Zealand National 27; ACT New Zealand 9; Maori Party 1. 
Bill read a second time. 
Instructions to Committee 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN (Leader of the House) 
: 
 I move  
That it be an instruction to the Committee of the whole House on the Aquaculture Reform Bill that it take the bill part by part. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the motion be agreed to. 
Ayes 83 
New Zealand Labour 51; New Zealand First 13; Green Party 9; United Future 8; Progressive 2. 
Noes 36 
New Zealand National 27; ACT New Zealand 9. 
Motion agreed to. 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN (Leader of the House) 
: 
 I move  
That it be an instruction to the Committee of the whole House on the Aquaculture Reform Bill that it have the power to consider and if it thinks fit adopt the amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 322. 
Motion agreed to. 
In Committee 
Part 1 Resource Management Act 1991 
Hon DAVID CARTER (National) 
: 
 I want to raise a number of points on Part 1. Now that the purpose of the bill has been split according to the subdivision of the legislation as we go to its final stages in the next few days under urgency I start by asking some questions of the Minister in the chair the Hon David Benson-Pope. I want some satisfaction as to the justification for clause 4A(b) which is the clause that empowers the Minister of Conservation to direct regional councils in relation to the allocation of space in the coastal marine area. The reason I am concerned is that this legislation starts a process that sets a precedent by which the responsibility for aquaculture is significantly being passed to regional councils. I have no problem with that. They are the local authorities that have the ability to determine where best to create aquaculture management areas but having passed the authority to regional councils the next thing this Government did was to straightaway insert a clause that gives the Minister of Conservation the right to veto. 
I say to the Minister that that fundamentally destroys the philosophy of the legislation. We are trying to take an industry with huge potential out of the clutches of a moratorium that was imposed then extended because the Government was bereft of ideas for giving the industry a chance to develop. Then we came up with legislation that gave the industry a significant chance to get back on the case and develop and promote before too many of our best brains in aquaculture fled across the Tasman or to South America—to Chile and countries like that—as we heard via the submissions process. 
However as we do that the first thing this Government does is to say that while it is giving the opportunity to regional councils it will rein them in with another check that means that at any time it can via the Minister of Conservation stop the process. One might not be too worried about that given some of the Ministers of Conservation we have had in the past but if we go to an MMP election and God help us the Greens are in a position of deciding who the Minister of Conservation is to be could the industry live with Nandor Tanczos being the Minister of Conservation and having the right to veto every application for aquaculture? That is the sort of nonsense that could develop out of this legislation. 
Our fisheries spokesperson Phil Heatley will be moving an amendment to delete clause 4A(b). I see no justification at all for the Minister of Conservation having those veto powers. This legislation gives every opportunity for fisheries to be involved as they should be. It gives every opportunity for the Minister of Conservation to be involved via the Resource Management Act process and I have no problem with that. But having gone through the community Resource Management Act process to give the Minister of Conservation yet another opportunity gives the industry no satisfaction at all that we are passing legislation today that will give it the opportunity to progress. That is the first point I want the Minister to comment on. 
For my second point I want flick to Subpart 2 “Privately initiated plan changes” in Part 7A inserted by clause 21. I ask the Minister to explain and to assure the Committee that the promotion of significant changes in that area by the select committee will enhance the system of giving the operators currently in the industry who want to move relatively minor private plan changes to expand their operations a fair opportunity to do so under this legislation. Those are the questions I want answered. 
GERRARD ECKHOFF (ACT) 
: 
 I too would like to draw to the Committee’s attention the influence that the Department of Conservation will have over this aquaculture industry. When I look at the bill I see that it is titled the Aquaculture Reform Bill but under the Department of Conservation it will become the “Aquaculture Restriction Bill”. It is not a bill designed to ensure that aquaculture gets its fair share; it is designed to ensure that the Department of Conservation gets what it wants then everybody else can have what is left over. 
I am sure the Committee can see from the clauses in Part 1 that the hands of Kevin Smith from the Minister of Conservation’s office are all over the bill. The Royal Forest and Bird Protection Society has got its way again under this Minister’s advocacy. He has buckled to the Minister of Conservation and to the determination—driven I guess by the Royal Forest and Bird Protection Society—to ensure that 10 percent of our coastal space goes to reservations and marine reserves. That is the expressed policy of the Royal Forest and Bird Protection Society. That is what Kevin Smith wants and under Chris Carter’s stewardship what Kevin Smith wants Kevin Smith gets. That is why this bill is so bad. 
I have no problem with reserves—none at all. The ACT party has no problem with reserves; indeed they are needed. We probably need quite a number of small reserves throughout this country. ACT is not opposed to conservation but if the Department of Conservation and the Minister had an ounce of integrity the Minister would have said to the Minister of Fisheries that the department had identified certain areas as being valuable and asked him please to ensure that they were well identified and that the public had a chance to comment on them before the bill went through. That would have been a fair and reasonable process. As it is we now have a situation whereby every time new applicants want to put an application in and go marine farming they will have to deal with the Department of Conservation and the Royal Forest and Bird Protection Society first. 
They will not deal with the Ministry of Fisheries or the regional councils in the first instance; they will have to consult with the Department of Conservation and give whatever concessions it wants. 
The real issue for me certainly is the advocacy role that the Department of Conservation has in this area. In some respects I cannot blame it because statute requires it to advocate for conservation. But it is surely the duty of the members of this Parliament to advocate for the industry—for the exporters who give us a living in this country. It is not the Department of Conservation or any other department that ensures the health and wealth of this country; it is the people who get out there and do the work. 
This bill through the Department of Conservation will make life for the producers of this country—the marine farmers—even more difficult. There are bureaucratic structures and a time lapse. I see in the bill that applicants have to give the Department of Conservation 4 months’ notice. Every application will time and time again drag out to the 4-month period. Any applicants in the aquaculture industry overseas would have their ropes in the ground and their buoys locked up or whatever they do. The industry would be up and running within 4 months. As it is in New Zealand the application will go in and nothing will happen for 4 months until the Department of Conservation has had a look around to see whether the seabed is suitable for its needs. 
Hon DAVID CARTER (National) 
: 
 I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I seek your guidance on the fact that the Minister in the chair has now changed from the Hon David Benson-Pope to the Hon Harry Duynhoven. We are seeking answers to questions. Mr Duynhoven sat with us on the Primary Production Committee. Is it appropriate for him as a select committee member now to sit in the Minister’s chair in the Committee stage? 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: I thank the member for that. That is a decision for the Hon Harry Duynhoven to make. 
PHIL HEATLEY (National—Whangarei) 
: 
 I will put six amendments to the Committee this afternoon on Part 1 that will deal with three broad areas. One area is to do with the degree of interference that the Minister of Conservation can have in the establishment of marine-farming space. The second major area is around the right of first refusal process which we can see unwinding due to unnecessary hoops that incumbent marine farmers will have to jump through. The third general area is to do with the ability of the Minister to revisit treaty settlements. I will put those amendments to members and I will take three calls to talk about them. 
The first amendment is to new section 165I(1)(b)(i) inserted by clause 21 to omit the word “necessary” and substitute the word “essential”. Under this proposed legislation incumbent marine farmers can get a right of first refusal to continue marine farming in a space if they have been good tenants. But if they have been there for 20 years they are an incumbent they have spent a fortune on establishing their business on and off the water they have employed staff and have 10 or 20 working for them they have done a good job in the industry they have been good environmentally and they have undertaken good industry practice it is absurd that after 20 years they would have to move out of that space and that someone else—another marine farmer—could come and farm in that space in their place. 
Why would one legislate for that? That is absolutely absurd. An incumbent should have a right of first refusal to continue in that space. That is all to do with investment. Why would marine farmers continue to invest if they knew that they would be shifted out after 20 years and that some competitor—a fly-by-nighter—would take their space? 
So National is saying that right of first refusal is a good idea. But we know that under this bill—it states so in clause 165I—regional councils can if “necessary in the circumstances of the region” not allow an incumbent marine farmer to stay there and allow a competitor to come in and take the farmer’s space investment staff and everything. National is saying that the word “necessary” is not a high enough test. If regional councils think they can do that just if it is “necessary” then that word is far too broad to allow them to do that. National will substitute the word “essential”. If regional councils see something as essential for the benefit of the region or for its circumstances then they can re-tender the space—not if they see it as necessary but as essential. That raises the bar. Regional councils will have to give a very good reason indeed before they can kick out an incumbent and bring a fly-by-nighter into that space. I will move that amendment and I trust that members will vote for it. 
The second amendment also regarding incumbency is to remove altogether clause 165ZF(1)(c) inserted by clause 21 which requires marine farmers to marine farm in an area under industry good practice. That sounds fine on the surface. I am sure people listening in would think that it seems fair that marine farmers should undergo industry good practice. The problem with it is that no one has defined what “industry good practice” is. It is vague and subjective. Not only that but the technology in marine farming is moving so swiftly with such investment in technology that “good practice” will change over time. So saying to regional councils that they can decline to renew a consent because a marine farmer is not following industry good practice is as I said too vague too subjective and too subject to shifts in technology. If industry good practice were defined that would be fair enough but in our view we should omit that clause. 
Clause 165ZF provides that if a marine farmer is not a good tenant he or she should not get a renewal and lays out what criteria the Minister or the regional council will look at in regard to breaches that have occurred while the tenant has been marine farming for a period of 20-odd years. The council will look at: “(a) the number of any breaches that have occurred; and (b) the seriousness of the breach; and (c) how recently the breach occurred; and (d) the subsequent behaviour of the applicant after enforcement action.” That clause should be omitted not because we celebrate breaches to a consent or bad behaviour by marine farmers—in particular environmentally—but if a marine farmer is farming in a space and does not uphold the terms of his or her consent so that there is a breach and environmental damage then the farmer should be nailed at the time. If it is as serious and as continuous as that it has such an effect on the neighbours—whether they are recreational fishers boaties other marine farmers or commercial fishers—the farmer should be nailed and pulled up on it at the time. Councils should not wait until consents have run out and then say to farmers that they will not renew them because of something that happened back in the 1970s. Those farmers should have been nailed at the time. So we will move an amendment providing that that clause be omitted. 
So those are the amendments I have spoken to. They are all about certainty for the industry. We say that regional councils need to have right of first refusal in their minds and there can be no right of first refusal for a marine farmer only if it is not just “necessary” but “essential” for the region for that to be the case; that “industry good practice” is far too vague and subjective will not keep up with technology and should not be a barrier to the right of first refusal; and that if a marine farmer is under constant serious breach of his or her consent he or she should be nailed at the time rather than there being something that comes up years and years later when a renewal is sought. 
There might even be a situation where a marine farmer who had been warned because of a breach of his or her consent had no idea that the regional council viewed it so seriously until that farmer came to a renewal process and was told that he or she would not even be allowed to continue even though he or she had invested millions. If the farmer had been told at the time when the breach occurred that it was so serious that the council was thinking of taking away the right to marine farm that would be better. The farmer could clean up his or her act it would be better for the environment it would be better for the neighbours and it would be better for the marine farmer and his or her staff. 
But to suggest that years and years later a regional council will haul up a history that it never policed at the time and suddenly say to a marine farmer that his or her investment ends there and it cannot continue is absurd. People wanting to follow good environmental practice would always pull up a breach at the time and deal with it. Marine farmers would be given the opportunity to clean up their acts so to speak. They would not be pursued after that time. 
JIM PETERS (NZ First) 
: 
 I am very pleased to follow Mr Heatley because he and I come from a district where marine farming is important and significant. This year there are 149 marine consents of various types in Northland. Ninety Mile Beach is the most significant source of mussel spat in New Zealand. Recently a consent was given for a spat farm in Whangape. Last of all in the identification of potential sites of great influence for this country Marlborough and Thames-Coromandel were just ahead of Northland. Therefore I am pleased to be able to speak on Part 1 on behalf of New Zealand First. We have waited impatiently for many many months and years to get to this point. 
I assure the Committee that the issues raised by Mr Heatley have been in the minds of regional councils such as Northland’s for many many months. There is nothing in the criteria and the steps set out in clause 4A “Purpose” that I find irregular or unusual. When reading paragraph (b) which states: “to empower the Minister of Conservation to direct regional councils” one is aware of the fact that the Minister of Conservation has such powers now. That Minister has such powers under the Resource Management Act in relation to marine activity which this matter is part of and therefore it does not seem unusual that the Minister of Conservation should be part of this process—he or she hitherto always has been. As those of us looking at the Marine Reserves Bill know there is dual ministerial duty over marine reserves at present by both the Minister of Fisheries and the Minister of Conservation. 
I see nothing here that we could not proceed with now in regard to my region. The criteria for councils to follow for defined coastal plans in terms of the effects on coastal space and so on which are outlined in subparagraphs (i) to (vi) of clause 4A are normal practice in regard to plans. Surely we are aware of the fact that if there are to be changes there is an orderly process and procedure for doing just that. Other parts of the bill set out how that should be done. There are certain criteria for publicly notified plans to ensure that they are all identified that the public are made aware of them and that they are part of public consultation. If there is to be a private plan procedure then again there will be public notification and all the issues set out in clause 4A will be carefully defined in that plan. So I see nothing irregular or unusual there at all. 
But I wish the Minister in charge of the bill David Benson-Pope was in the chair because there are problems in regard to Ministry of Fisheries’ farms and sites up to this point as many of them have not been under careful monitoring or care. When we went through Northland looking at the proposed marine areas we saw some disgusting evidence in Kerikeri and other places of abandoned or would-be abandoned sites of a historic nature that were all under the Ministry of Fisheries. 
One of the issues that concerns many councils is who will be responsible for that clean-up. Did the Government’s Ministry of Fisheries when it gave out those allocations take care to monitor and to provide for the very issues that Mr Heatley raised? In other words was there over the years such a lack of care and attention that abatement notices should have been placed upon those sites or licences—abandoned or not—but instead nothing was done? It is of grave concern that although any council will be able to work through the defined plans outlined here at the end of that exercise we still will find that although recently awarded council sites—in Northland there have been 35 since 1992—have been monitored and closely analysed many earlier sites were not. 
I am not blaming any Government ministry or department; I am merely saying that there is a real situation out there now of sites that were poorly looked after and that could be very easily identified but that could be part of productive industry in the future. They would be subject to planning but before that could be implemented there would need to be a dramatic change to and clean-up of those sites. 
The second issue that I want very quickly to look at and that I will come back to in some detail is that we heard some discussion earlier with regard to clause 21 and its effect on Maori and treaty issues—so-called. I certainly want to take a further call to develop that at some length. 
IAN EWEN-STREET (Green) 
: 
 I would like to start by making a small correction to what my colleague Phil Heatley said. He described incumbent farmers as having a right of first refusal to occupy the space again once their leases had run out. That is not strictly true. What they do have is the right to apply for a consent to the space they presently occupy. A right of first refusal in effect means a right of occupation in perpetuity and I do not think we want to give people the impression that that is what those farmers have. 
This bill is really about aquaculture management areas and how they are established. It was the intention of the ministry as I understand it to flag to regional councils some years ago that aquaculture management areas would have to be established in their areas. So those councils that had aquaculture management areas or big marine-farming areas like Marlborough Waikato and Northland have actually done quite a bit of work in establishing aquaculture management areas. I believe that they will simply take their existing farms and deem them to be aquaculture management areas. 
There was some concern that smaller councils or councils that had no real aquaculture activity had not been doing their job properly and had not been creating aquaculture management areas so it was interesting to hear from the smaller councils. I particularly remember that the Gisborne District Council I think it was said that it was the guardian of its ratepayers’ money that it had had no applications from anybody to do aquaculture in its area and that it felt it would be simply wasteful for it to use ratepayers’ money to create an aquaculture management area that maybe nobody would use so it would leave it to the private plan change to cater for anybody who wanted to create an aquaculture management area. 
Once those areas have been established if somebody wants to create a new aquaculture management area there are several routes that can be taken. The main one is a private plan change. An individual farmer or a number of farmers can band together and say they want to expand out of the aquaculture management area into another area. Normally that is an excluded zone so changing the plan is actually a much higher hurdle to leap over than gaining the original resource consent which process led to the boom-and-bust sort of scenario we have had under the present regime. We in the select committee were concerned that if those people were successful in creating a new plan change and had gone to the effort of doing that the council would then tender the space which is what the original legislation said and those people’s efforts would amount to nothing if someone else came along with deeper pockets. So we finally resolved that people instituting a private plan change will get 80 percent of the area they have applied for and been granted—the other 20 percent obviously will go to Maori. 
There was another little wrinkle in that scenario though: if the council initiated a plan change all the water space with the exception of the allocation to Maori would be tendered. There was a possibility that people would apply to have a private plan change that it would then be taken over by the council and that the council in effect would make it a council-initiated plan change. We were concerned that people who applied for the private plan change would again be left empty-handed so there is a statement in the legislation that private initiators will get 80 percent of the space they apply and get approval for—though that does not take away the ability of the council to have more space than that. 
In terms of incumbents present farms are deemed to be aquaculture management areas and they will get resource consents or permits for 20 years. At the expiry of that time the leases expire and the farmers have the opportunity to reapply for coastal occupation permits. They will have to fulfil a couple of obligations. First of all the council must not be going to change the plan and stop that area from being an aquaculture area in the future. Second and probably more important is the fact that we are requiring or encouraging marine farmers to play fair—to do the right thing by both their community and the environment—so that they do fulfil the terms of their resource consents. There have to be fairly severe breaches of the resource consents as Mr Heatley said for them not to be granted. People have to have been convicted of some major breach rather than their just being served an abatement notice by the local council. There could be somebody on the council who had a bit of a grudge against the incumbent. 
BERNIE OGILVY (United Future) 
: 
 I will touch on two things I want to bring to the attention of the Committee. One is with regard to a regional council’s activities in relation to its duty to act efficiently and the other is something to do with tender money. 
In section 165I inserted by clause 21 there is a duty on a regional council to adopt the most efficient and effective allocation mechanism. I have thought about this. The Primary Production Committee discussed it and made a number of amendments. The section states: “… a regional council must—(a) have regard to—(i) the reasons for and against adopting the proposed method;”. So the council is to act out its role very fairly and squarely so that nobody can say he or she was not heard or did not have the opportunity to contribute. The regional council will also have regard to “(ii) the principal alternative means available;”. The select committee then struck out—I think appropriately—“(b) be satisfied that the adoption of the proposed method is the most appropriate for allocation …”. We discussed that and it became very evident from the submitters that it did not really meet what they were asking for. So now we have got the wording down to what is in section 165I(1)(b)(i) which requires that the council be satisfied that the proposed method is “necessary in the circumstances of the region;”. That has a great deal more impact than what was there before. 
Hon David Carter 
: Is the member sure of that? 
BERNIE OGILVY 
: I am absolutely sure. Also subparagraph (ii) states: “the most appropriate for allocation in the circumstances of the region”. As the regional council deals with that it will I believe bring about the most efficient and effective allocation that meets the concerns of farmers and applicants to become farmers. 
The other matter I want to touch on is section 165U “Tender money” inserted by clause 21. When the select committee asked why the Minister would have 50 percent of the tender money and the regional authority would have 50 percent the actual response was that it was a judgment call—if I remember right. There is no basis for that except that we note that when the regional council receives its 50 percent it must use its money entirely for the purposes of this Act in coastal marine areas in its region. So I see this bill as promoting the outcome that the money collected through the tendering process go back to address the local regional council’s concerns—multiplication exploration and all the rest—in setting up the marine areas they need for potential farmers in the region. I think the bill is in these regards very clear and explicit and I think we need to realise that there is no way that one can be double-minded as to what could happen with this money. 
SHANE ARDERN (National—Taranaki-King Country) 
: 
 It is pleasing to see the Minister of Fisheries back in the chair although I was looking forward to asking the Minister for Transport Safety a number of reasonably curly questions on this legislation. Like a lot of members who have spoken I am concerned about the power the Department of Conservation has. Notwithstanding the comments made by the honourable member Jim Peters who has a great deal of knowledge in this area I suggest that clause 4A is not the sort of clause that is usually placed in legislation such as this. 
Let us look at Minister Carter the current Minister of Conservation—or more accurately at “Minister Smith” the former conservation director of the Royal Forest and Bird Protection Society who makes the decisions in the Minister’s office—or at whoever may be the Minister of Conservation in the future under an MMP coalition with the Green Party if God forbid the Labour Party were ever in a position to form another Government. Let us look at what might come of that. Of course we will not have as Minister the very good member Ian Ewen-Street who actually has some interest in this area and spent some time on the Primary Production Committee because he is retiring from Parliament. We will have somebody like Nandor Tanczos or Sue Bradford from the Green Party potentially ending up as the Minister of Conservation. 
Jill Pettis 
: Shane you are blinding us with your brilliance. 
SHANE ARDERN 
: I ask the senior Government whip who is chirping away over there to take a call and tell me that that will not be so—to rule it out absolutely. Her colleague the Hon Jim Sutton the Minister of Agriculture certainly will not. We have put it to him a number of times and he certainly has not ruled out Sue Bradford as the next Minister of Agriculture or Minister of Conservation. 
Let us look at what this legislation will do in terms of the power of veto it gives to the Department of Conservation. To start off through an Order in Council the Minister of Conservation can prevent or impose conditions on proposed allocation of space. On the surface that does not sound too bad if there is a responsible Minister. But as I said the chances of that happening are not great at all. The department gives effect to Government policy on the ability to include the Treaty of Waitangi clauses in allocating space. So there is a second issue that may or may not cause some kind of humbug there. The department can also under the Resource Management Act submit an individual consent or objection—that is the Department of Conservation or its Minister or “Minister Smith” whom I have spoken of could put in a private objection through the Resource Management Act process. If that fails—if the department still has not killed the aquaculture proposal which clearly would be the objective of that group based on its track record thus far—then it can effectively veto an allocation at the last hurdle under the guise of giving effect to Government policy. I ask the Minister in the chair to take a call and put to bed the fears of those who submitted to the very good Primary Production Committee with those concerns. I am sure he will have a view on that. 
I also ask the Minister to take a call to explain how the aquaculture management areas process will work in a practical sense with the Department of Conservation having so much power over it. I say to the Minister that given the track record of the Department of Conservation so far—its “preservation at all costs and to hell with business” sort of approach—the department will kill any proposed aquaculture management area or any proposed aquaculture investment that may be put forward. I also ask that the Minister take a call to explain to those who may be interested in investing millions of dollars in this industry why they would even bother to go through that process when there is so much uncertainty about the likely outcome. 
This industry particularly with the huge developments in technology that are taking place potentially could be one of this country’s biggest export industries. It is a growing industry. There is huge opportunity looking forward. With the kind of power of veto that is given to the department under this legislation why would people even bother to come to New Zealand and look at the proposal? They would look at other opportunities internationally and find that anywhere else in the world potentially they could have an easier go at it. 
Hon DAVID CARTER (National) 
: 
 In my earlier contribution I raised questions with the Minister regarding the power of the Minister of Conservation under clause 4A(b). I now want the Minister to take note of new section 165O inserted by clause 21 concerning the power of the Minister of Conservation because it is even more dramatic or more draconian than the clause I referred to earlier. We have here legislation that gives the Minister of Conservation the ability to affect Government policy. If Government policy was all about the genuine promotion of the aquaculture industry then I would be completely satisfied. But submitter after submitter came to the Primary Production Committee and said that although they hoped the select committee would be able to tidy up the mess around security of tenure they were equally focused on and concerned about the power of the Minister of Conservation. 
As a number of my National Party colleagues have already said at the moment the power of the Minister of Conservation rests in the hands of one Kevin Smith the Royal Forest and Bird Protection Society man in the Minister’s office. What about after the election? God forbid that this occurs but if Sue Kedgley were to become the Minister of Conservation— 
Ian Ewen-Street 
: Very good call. 
Hon DAVID CARTER 
: Ian Ewen-Street says that that would be a very good call. I am not so sure about that. We have seen reports in the paper over the last 24 hours that Sue Kedgley says it is bad to eat strawberries. Here we are a week away from Christmas and the Green Party has a policy that it is bad to eat strawberries. Why is it important for the Minister to be concerned about that? What if the next thing she says is that green-lipped mussels are bad for us? We could then have the Minister of Conservation—who could be Sue Kedgley—saying we should not eat mussels. For God’s sake! I say to the Minister that under this legislation the power exists for that to become Government policy and to stop aquaculture in its tracks. 
So if the Government is not putting those provisions in the legislation for good reason it should take them out. It should support the amendments that will be advanced by Phil Heatley the excellent fisheries spokesperson for the National Party and get rid of new section 165O. It should listen to the submissions of the likes of the New Zealand Law Society which told the select committee that in terms of all the legislation it has made submissions on that provision was as draconian as any provision it has ever seen. Submissions like that need to be taken note of yet the Minister in the chair David Benson-Pope will not justify why a provision like that in new section 165O(2)(a) needs to be in the legislation. 
I also want to refer to new section 165W and the subpart associated with private plans. This legislation allows an avenue whereby aquaculturalists who want to expand their operations can do so by means of a private plan change. But the industry said to us that if it goes down that path it must gift 20 percent of the space to Maori. That is fundamentally wrong. Why should an industry player have to go through the process at huge cost of promoting a private plan change and then lose 20 percent of the space to Maori? Not only do aquaculturalists lose 20 percent and bear all the associated costs but Government policy is even more stupid than that. What benefit is it to Maori to pick up 20 percent of all the little private plan changes around the Marlborough Sounds? The answer is that it is of no value to them at all. 
Those are the two points that I want the Minister to answer. I see the Chairperson is indicating that we have to get closer to the debate. He should pick up the legislation and look at it because he would see that that is in Part 1. New section 165W starts off new Subpart 2 “Privately initiated plan changes”. What privately initiated plan changes are all about is that people who want to expand their operation will have to go through a process with the local council and if they are successful they will then lose 20 percent of the space to Maori. That is wrong. The Minister David Benson-Pope can sit in his chair if he wants but I call on him to stand today and justify that. Why should an industry player have to pay the costs associated with going through a private plan change and then gift 20 percent of the space to Maori? 
Hon DAVID BENSON-POPE (Minister of Fisheries) 
: 
 I make no apology and neither does the Government—nor would I think most New Zealanders—for including in this bill statutory powers for the Minister of Conservation and also for local government to ensure that those privileges—and privileges they are to have use of the public domain and public common space—are properly safeguarded. Having said that I know the previous speaker is only too aware that much of what he is saying is not quite as close to actual fact as it might be given his familiarity as the chair of the Primary Production Committee with a lot of the issues. 
In terms of what is happening around this legislation I can do no better than to read out the statement that was released today by the chairman of the New Zealand Aquaculture Council Callum McCallum who stated among other things that: “The bill as reported back now is a summary of a huge amount of effort from industry Government and officials and from regional councils. Industry has sought law changes that will support and encourage existing investment in New Zealand aquaculture and will create the right environment to allow sustainable development of New Zealand aquaculture towards the industry targets of $1 billion export annually and so on.” 
I am delighted that the industry has the vision that is so palpably lacking on the Opposition benches. I am delighted that because of the extensive cooperation between the parties involved such as the Ministry for the Environment the Department of Conservation the Ministry of Fisheries local government the industry and also some members in this Chamber—though notably not from the National Party—we are now in the position to take the moratorium off as the National Party asked me to at the start of the year and to unleash the amazing potential that exists in this industry. 
GERRARD ECKHOFF (ACT) 
: 
 I would like to take a call with regard to new section 165U “Tender money”. There has been a lot of nonsense spoken about this particular issue—about the fact that this is public space and therefore we should give regional councils and the Government the right to charge whatever they like. Let us just think for a moment or two about some other industries in this country that use a public resource. What about the use of fresh water by Meridian Energy Genesis Power and Mighty River Power? Those companies use a public resource. Do they tender for the use of that water? I do not think so. So why do we not apply a consistent standard right across the board and say that everybody who uses a public resource should tender for it? Well that does not happen. For example all the natural gas and oil reserves are public property and resources so why in many cases do the oil and gas companies not have to tender to drag those particular valuable commodities out of the ocean floor? What is the difference between those companies and somebody who in many cases puts up vast amounts of capital goes through an extraordinarily elongated process to get a resource consent possibly even has to compete with the Department of Conservation in tendering for a particular space and then finds that he or she is being whacked with a huge rental for the use of that space? 
The Government is totally ignoring the fact that there is unemployment and that there is a very valuable use of that capital by an export industry. The aquaculture industry is potentially a multibillion-dollar industry yet the Government and regional councils are saying that they will charge for the use of that public resource. Well OK if the Government and regional councils are to do that then they should do it right across the board and apply it to Solid Energy as well. Solid Energy takes vast amounts of coal which is a public resource out of the ground so why do we not get it to tender for its use of coal which is our resource? This measure is an inconsistency and it is an example of how poorly the Minister in the chair the Hon David Benson-Pope has thought through some of the fundamental issues. The tendering process does allow for the best use. If we did have to tender for all public resources then we would end up with the highest use possible and that is not a bad system. 
I draw the Committee’s attention to the use of the public resource we call “fish”. We have a quota management system that is absolutely brilliant in comparison with anything else that we could have in terms of allocating that public resource but we can imagine what would happen if somebody with quota had to re-tender every few years for it. We would probably find that the Department of Conservation with its $300 million or $400 million allocation—as it probably will be next year—could outbid everybody and leave everything alone while we just try to eke out a living back on the land if we are still allowed to do that under that department as well. 
So I really cannot see why we have a tendering system whereby a marine farmer’s application has to go through a very very elongated process—a process that will cost the farmer tens of thousands if not hundreds of thousands of dollars—only for the farmer to be then faced with having to re-tender for space when it becomes available after the 20-year process. There will be regional councils that could be potentially controlled totally by the Green Party by that time. My God! We have only to quickly visualise that scenario to recognise what an appalling situation it would be. Where in this bill does it state that a regional council must accept the highest tender? As often as not when something is tendered there is a statement: “The highest or any tender not necessarily accepted.” So now there is another process whereby a regional council could veto an application. 
Dr LYNDA SCOTT (National—Kaikoura) 
: 
 A great many marine farms happen to be in the Marlborough Sounds which is a beautiful area that I represent at this time. Colin King will be the next MP for that area. He is a great guy. He is a farmer; a good hands-on farmer who knows what it means to work. If he were the Minister in the chair he would get up and speak for more than 1½ minutes. This Minister the Hon David Benson-Pope could manage only 1½ minutes. I was timing him—1½ minutes and he did not get it right. I have to ask what this Minister actually knows about this bill. This is a big test for him. All he could do was stand up and quote a press release from the Aquaculture Council. Well the council said the bill is better now—but it could not have become any worse I tell the Minister. It absolutely could not have been any worse. It was an absolute shambles because what started off as a vision to try to get this country’s aquaculture industry growing at the rate that it should be growing turned into a moratorium under this Government and it was bogged down. 
The Ministry of Fisheries the Department of Conservation and local government were all fighting about what should happen but who on earth was representing the aquaculture industry? It was not this Minister or the Minister before him the Hon Pete Hodgson. Who was standing up for the aquaculture industry? Of course the Government says that this is better—because the original bill was just a mess. What the industry wanted was a one-stop shop. It does not have that. What it wanted was some finality and to be able to get on and practise the business that it knows about and that it has built in this country. The marine farmers of Marlborough built a fantastic industry without a huge amount of Government interference and with that they were the highest-income earners for that region. They had an industry growing at a rate of 20 percent. 
I ask the Minister what the growth rate is now. Does he know? It is zero percent. There has been absolutely no growth while the rest of the world is growing at 30 percent. This industry has been brought to a standstill by this Government. Of course the Aquaculture Council says that it wants to get on with it it is happy and it wants things to move ahead. Of course it had to put a huge amount of work into it. It always surprises me that bureaucrats manage to get it so wrong. These industry people work in the field every day but some bureaucrats in Wellington have never actually been to a marine farm. I remember when the Primary Production Committee came down to Marlborough—we finally got them out of Wellington—and its members were all looking around and asking where the marine farms were. They had the impression that they were wall to wall across the Sounds which of course they are not. But what I have to ask under Part 1—and I want the Minister to answer this; he started to answer it before and he did not go any further—is if a private plan change occurs for a private person and 80 percent goes to him and 20 percent goes to Maori why on earth would Maori want just a little patchwork here there and everywhere? 
Hon David Benson-Pope 
: It has changed. The member should read the bill. 
Dr LYNDA SCOTT 
: It has not changed. The Minister does not understand the private plan change. If we look at Marlborough where a lot of people have their individual farms which will become aquaculture management areas if they make a change then 20 percent will go to Maori. Why would Maori want just little patchwork areas here and there? I cannot see that. Who will be the Maori who would get that? There are eight iwi in Marlborough and I ask which would be the relevant hapu. How will they sort that out? 
The provisions of the bill relating to aquaculture management areas and the 20 percent space to Maori came from the belief that Maori did not get a fair go in Marlborough. Maori have 30 percent of the marine farms in Marlborough at this point in time. If they get another 20 percent under this bill they would have a total of 50 percent. Where did this idea come from originally that they did not get a fair deal in Marlborough? That is not the case. Marlborough has a unitary authority and that was a really big breakthrough in local government. A lot of other areas should consider doing that. It makes it easier for Marlborough to be progressive in the developing of aquaculture management areas. 
The industry was desperate for first right of refusal. These are the men and the women who have been out there forging an industry for New Zealand and it is a wonderful industry with a very healthy product. 
Dr the Hon LOCKWOOD SMITH (National—Rodney) 
: 
 The Minister owes the Committee the respect to explain some of the complex issues contained in Part 1. I want to focus particularly on something said by my good colleague David Carter the chair of the Primary Production Committee. As chair he has some detailed knowledge of this bill; I confess that I do not—I am just reading the bill as it is in front of us. What I think deserves clarification is the issue around the new sections inserted by clause 21 starting probably at about new section 165X. The Primary Production Committee by majority inserted a whole new section 165Y going through to section 165Z and to 165ZA. 
I would like the Minister to focus on those sections in particular because they relate to where an individual seeks a change. It seems that the select committee suggested that the word “plan” should be dropped and it has suggested “request for change”. As I understand it these sections cover changes to areas that are covered by aquaculture. What is important is what exactly is meant here. There have been allegations that if an individual seeks a change—and the individual is going through all the expense of seeking the change—and should a council grant that change 20 percent of any area would be allocated to Maori. 
I think the Minister spoke to the Chair Ross Robertson to indicate that that may not be covered by this part—if I correctly interpreted the Chair’s hand signals. They were such that he wanted my good colleague David Carter to come back to this part of the bill. What is troubling me though is that it seems that this part does refer to this issue. I draw the Minister’s attention to new section 165ZA “Acceptance of request or part of request for change” which all goes back to section 165X and the issue of request for changes. What it actually states under subsection (1) is: “If the regional council accepts the request under clause 25(2)(b) of the First Schedule the council must specify that the person or persons who requested the plan change are to receive an authorisation under section 165ZB for 80 percent of the available space in the aquaculture management area.” It seems to me that the difference between 80 percent and 100 percent is 20 percent. The question is: what happens to the other 20 percent? Is that the 20 percent that is being actually withheld and allocated to Maori or is that in addition to 20 percent that has already been required to be allocated to Maori? This is what I believe that listeners deserve to be advised on and I would appreciate if the Hon Damien O’Connor would take a call—and I think he is one of the better Ministers in this Labour Government. I have to confess that I think he is actually a darn sight better Minister than the Hon David Benson-Pope. 
But the public does deserve to know what this means. Does it mean that where a change is requested—an additional area perhaps; say an existing aquaculture farmer for want of a better word has sought a change and been able to expand his or her operations and goes into a new area—in accepting this request the council has to allocate only 80 percent? Will that remaining 20 percent be allocated to Maori? Is that totally separate? If not where does that 20 percent go? Or is that 20 percent in addition to an overall 20 percent allocation that is being made to Maori out of aquaculture allocations in New Zealand? Because we hear it said from those who have been on the Primary Production Committee that in fact to bring Maori up to 20 percent overall 40 percent of new allocations could be going to Maori. 
I just think that the public of New Zealand deserves an explanation because clearly these clauses I am referring to refer to changes. They refer to what someone will have to go through and pay for if he or she is seeking an expansion to an existing aquaculture area. We deserve to know because it is not clear from the new sections. Does this mean if there is a new area to be allocated to an existing farm and he or she goes through the aquaculture operator or through the cost of seeking it 20 percent of that new area will be allocated to Maori? 
SANDRA GOUDIE (National—Coromandel) 
: 
 I would like to agree with my learned colleague on what has been said in the Committee about the atrocious nature of the amount of aquaculture space being accorded to Maori through the process of this bill when I note that there is no justification for it because aquaculture has existed only in the last 40-odd years. So really where is the premise on which that allocation has been based? I think it is disgraceful. I note that the Greens think it is a logical sequence of the Treaty of Waitangi (Fisheries Claims) Settlement Act 1992. I cannot understand why they would support that—or actually perhaps I can; it is the type of thing they would support. But why should they? If this is something that is new and did not exist in 1888 or whatever why should they be accorded that particularly or especially? Why will they have that ongoing advantage—and not only that the advantage of having authorities or organisations under the Tax Act that pay only 19.5c tax in the dollar? So there is no level playing field when it comes to their operations in regard to other operations which are managed by other organisations that do not have that exemption. 
SANDRA GOUDIE 
: I shall resume my discussion on the 20 percent gift. In essence that is exactly what it is—a 20 percent gift to Maori if one applies for a plan change to undertake aquaculture marine farming in an area. [ 
Interruption 
] Does that come under the definition of koha? Well it does because a koha is a gift and that is a 20 percent gift. We have already had the brain drain as a result of the huge delay in this legislation coming to some form of finalisation. People have gone overseas to establish marine farming in other countries. So we have had a brain drain in that regard. Why would people want to even bother looking at marine farming further in New Zealand if they now have to give a 20 percent gift of that area they are applying for when they apply for a plan change? As we know if they want to establish a new area they have to go through a plan change under the Resource Management Act and that is after they have applied for authorisation from the Ministry of Fisheries. 
First they have to apply to the Ministry of Fisheries for an authorisation. When they get that they then apply for their plan change. Imagine if a farmer on land had to give up 20 percent of his or her farm if he or she applied for a consent or a plan change! That would be absolutely unthinkable. I cannot understand why the Government has gone anywhere near this when as I said before aquaculture is a new industry for New Zealand. It has not been historic or been part of the lifestyle or the culture of anybody before 1920 at the very least. It has been suggested that aquaculture has been around for about 40 years but certainly in the last 10. It has been a significant advance in innovation in our marine area but then of course it became absolutely stifled by the delays in coming to some sort of finalisation. 
We are appalled that there will be that 20 percent gift and by the time it is added up it will be looking like 40 percent. When one has to go through the processes that one has to go through the Department of Conservation can make life very difficult and add incredible cost to the whole process. The department can be an objector under the Resource Management Act. 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: We are talking to Part 1. 
SANDRA GOUDIE 
: We are talking about private plan changes under the Resource Management Act in Part 1. This whole section refers to the Resource Management Act and also crosses into all the other sections. However as we know the Resource Management Act is a pretty dreadful document when it comes to applying for anything. Of course the proposed amendments by this Government will make it incredibly worse especially when it is affording iwi authorities just about the same status as local authorities. When people apply for a plan change I do not think they will be prepared for the amount of time and money involved to go through that process. It will take only one or two applications for the whole thing to grind to a halt yet again. We have seen that on land and we will see that on water; people will halt the process to such a degree that the activity will be driven off shore. People will not want to invest yet again in another industry that has huge potential. 
Hon MARK BURTON (Minister of Defence) 
: 
 I move  
That the question be now put 
. 
JIM PETERS (NZ First) 
: 
 I particularly wanted to raise the issue that has been raised by other speakers in this short debate with regard to new section 165C(1)(aa) and new section 165C(2A) in clause 21. They refer directly to the issue of the so-called Maori allocation. I want to establish the exact position of New Zealand First. 
In the first reading debate I raised the issue of the 20 percent threshold. As a caucus we carefully went back through this issue as it became more and more clear that 20 percent would be set down as the threshold. When I started to look at why that should be I came to the Treaty of Waitangi (Fisheries Claim) Settlement Act which has already been much quoted in the Chamber this afternoon. I found that a memorandum signed by the Crown and Maori set the level at 20 percent. At that time the National Government—and I was hoping Dr Nick Smith would be here because he was here at that time—did a most extraordinary thing. It moved the first reading second reading Committee stage and third reading all at once because it was so keen to implement that newly discovered threshold of 20 percent. Therefore when I heard the Hon Nick Smith say earlier that the 20 percent allocation was based on race I reflected back to 1992 and saw very very clearly that that allocation had been set then with regard to the narrow issue of fisheries. 
When I went one stage further and looked at the material and documentation brought to the House at that time I found that it was very difficult as has been already stated by one member to see whether that was so. But in reality I believe that the National Party should have credit for its Government’s far-sighted move back then which by the way was opposed by I Peters and W Peters. It was a very far-sighted move on its part. Rather than go back in time as the Hon Nick Smith did it is far better to see that that threshold is one that we have come to understand—unwillingly on our part—should stand in this legislation. The National Government at the time with the Hon Doug Kidd and the Hon Doug Graham set it down. By the way other members of the House who were here at that time have verified for me that although it was not formally discussed it was mentioned in caucus and in relevant discussions at the time. That has come from members of the then select committee. 
Hon David Carter 
: No that’s wrong. 
JIM PETERS 
: The member who has called out that is wrong was not here at the time; he does not know exactly what we are referring to so his “wrong” is right! 
I want to say very firmly again that what the National Government did right back in 1992 has clarified for New Zealand First members where we should stand in 2004. In so doing we know that there are immense complications in this matter when it comes to Maori iwi having to resolve what should be in my mind a hapu and whanau issue. But we accept the bill because we also accept that it gives a huge economic and social opportunity to the country but particularly to my region of Northland. The process with regard to aquaculture management areas being identified of setting aside a 20 percent piecemeal allocation for Maori is a very small concession to pay on the part of would-be marine farmers in regard to their total ability to have investment and have a future such as we know this industry can achieve. 
Hon DOVER SAMUELS (Minister of State) 
: 
 I move  
That the question be now put 
. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the question be now put. 
Ayes 70 
New Zealand Labour 51; Green Party 9; United Future 8; Progressive 2. 
Noes 50 
New Zealand National 27; New Zealand First 13; ACT New Zealand 9; Maori Party 1. 
Motion agreed to. 
The question was put that the following amendment in the name of Phil Heatley to clause 4A be agreed to: 
to omit paragraph (b). 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the amendment be agreed to. 
Ayes 36 
New Zealand National 27; ACT New Zealand 9. 
Noes 83 
New Zealand Labour 51; New Zealand First 13; Green Party 9; United Future 8; Progressive 2. 
Amendment not agreed to. 
The question was put that the following amendment in the name of Phil Heatley to clause 21 be agreed to: 
to omit from subparagraph (i) of new section 165I(1)(b) the word “necessary” and substitute the word “essential”. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the amendment be agreed to. 
Ayes 36 
New Zealand National 27; ACT New Zealand 9. 
Noes 83 
New Zealand Labour 51; New Zealand First 13; Green Party 9; United Future 8; Progressive 2. 
Amendment not agreed to. 
The question was put that the following amendment in the name of Phil Heatley to clause 21 be agreed to: 
to omit paragraph (a) of new section 165O(2). 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the amendment be agreed to. 
Ayes 36 
New Zealand National 27; ACT New Zealand 9. 
Noes 83 
New Zealand Labour 51; New Zealand First 13; Green Party 9; United Future 8; Progressive 2. 
Amendment not agreed to. 
The question was put that the following amendment in the name of Phil Heatley to clause 21 be agreed to: 
to omit paragraph (b) of new section 165O(2). 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the amendment be agreed to. 
Ayes 36 
New Zealand National 27; ACT New Zealand 9. 
Noes 83 
New Zealand Labour 51; New Zealand First 13; Green Party 9; United Future 8; Progressive 2. 
Amendment not agreed to. 
The question was put that the following amendment in the name of Phil Heatley to clause 21 be agreed to: 
to omit paragraph (c) of new section 165ZF(1). 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the amendment be agreed to. 
Ayes 36 
New Zealand National 27; ACT New Zealand 9. 
Noes 83 
New Zealand Labour 51; New Zealand First 13; Green Party 9; United Future 8; Progressive 2. 
Amendment not agreed to. 
The question was put that the following amendment in the name of Phil Heatley to clause 21 be agreed to: 
to omit subclause (2) of new section 165ZF. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the amendment be agreed to. 
Ayes 36 
New Zealand National 27; ACT New Zealand 9. 
Noes 83 
New Zealand Labour 51; New Zealand First 13; Green Party 9; United Future 8; Progressive 2. 
Amendment not agreed to. 
The question was put that the amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 319 in the name of the Hon David Benson-Pope to Part 1 be agreed to. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the amendments be agreed to. 
Ayes 83 
New Zealand Labour 51; New Zealand First 13; Green Party 9; United Future 8; Progressive 2. 
Noes 37 
New Zealand National 27; ACT New Zealand 9; Maori Party 1. 
Amendments agreed to. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That Part 1 as amended be agreed to. 
Ayes 83 
New Zealand Labour 51; New Zealand First 13; Green Party 9; United Future 8; Progressive 2. 
Noes 37 
New Zealand National 27; ACT New Zealand 9; Maori Party 1. 
Part 1 as amended agreed to. 
Part 2 Fisheries Act 1996 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: The question now is that Part 2 which includes clauses 36 to 53 and debate on schedule 2A stand part. 
Hon DAVID CARTER (National) 
: 
 We move on to another very important part of the legislation whereby we amend the Fisheries Act 1996 and develop a system that recognises the ever-competing interests of aquaculture with the other uses of coastal space. The Primary Production Committee was inundated with submissions from people who were concerned about the Ministry of Fisheries’ role particularly with regard to the undue adverse effects test. I can sympathise with the submitters. They have had years and years of management—or more correctly mismanagement—by the ministry. There was a distinct lack of confidence that Part 2 could if enacted be competently carried out. 
I have become very familiar with the legislation and I think this is one aspect of it that the bureaucracy has got right. The bureaucracy has acknowledged that there would be competing interests for aquaculture space. Having accepted that it has tried to develop a mechanism whereby the most economic use of space will come to the fore over a period of time and I support that. As we got into the debate it was clear that when aquaculture was proposed as a use there were three sectors of rights that could be adversely affected: customary fishing rights recreational fishing rights and commercial fishing rights. Most of the committee members were of the opinion that if customary fishing rights and recreational fishing rights were to be severely affected then aquaculturists had to consider finding somewhere else to go. There was an interesting debate around the possibility of a conflict of interest between existing commercial fishers and a proposed aquaculture use. That is an interesting issue when we consider the property rights that are being conveyed on to commercial fishers via the quota management system. 
I would also like to pick up on the comments made by Jim Peters earlier in the debate when he talked about the 1992 deed of settlement. I say to him that the 1992 settlement was very explicit about what it was for. It was a settlement to enable quota management to occur and a settlement of all issues regarding commercial fishing whether it was on shore offshore or coastal fishing. Therefore it quite clearly included aquaculture. But it was also a settlement whereby at that stage in recognition of Maori interests in commercial fishing 20 percent of all the species that were to go into quota would go to Maori. The National Party has no objection to that at all. In clarifying what Mr Jim Peters said let me say that we certainly object to the folklore that has developed at present around unfinished business but I will talk about that at later stages. 
With regard to the undue adverse effect test that acknowledges that if the Ministry of Fisheries recognises that an application for aquaculture will severely impact on commercial fishing rights then we have to develop a process whereby there can be some settlement of that. The legislation as it has come back from the select committee goes a long way towards doing that. The first hurdle the committee had to overcome was a distinct recognition that a property right was associated with people who own quota. In my personal view that was not a problem but I think many members on the select committee had a problem in grappling with the importance of that property right. Once we had achieved recognition that there was a property right then the ministry test had to judge whether the property right was affected adversely enough and we discussed through the select committee processes whether undue adverse effect and the wording associated with that was a strong enough test. At the end of the day I accept what the officials told us—that the test was severe enough—and I hope that proves to be the case. 
The undue adverse effect must be significant. However the solution to the recognition by the Ministry of Fisheries that there is an undue adverse effect is a process of negotiation between the commercial fisher whose property right is affected and the proponent of aquaculture. The bill as it came before the select committee was in the opinion of the committee members unworkable in that the proponent of aquaculture had to obtain 100 percent agreement from all affected commercial fishing property-right owners. After long deliberations and with considerable input from the submitters who appeared before us the possibility of getting 100 percent agreement became a threshold that was too high for the select committee to accept. We therefore developed a significant change in that area whereby a 90 percent acceptance on the part of each and every quota holder by quantum is enough for the test to be satisfied. 
We then dealt with the issue of the remaining minority 10 percent. The Green member Mr Ewen-Street—who I must say put an extremely large amount of work into this legislation and I thank him for that—was of the opinion that maybe that 10 percent had had the opportunity to come to an agreement and if it had not that was simply tough luck. In my opinion that was miles too tough. In many cases it is actually relatively easy to get 90 percent agreement between quota holders because one is dealing with only a couple of them. Maybe some people who own a limited amount of quota would be in that 10 percent group. They have a right to some satisfaction and through the select committee process a mechanism was developed whereby they will be paid out. It is a little like the takeover situation that occurs regularly on the stock exchange now whereby once an acceptance has been reached with 90 percent of shareholders the remaining 10 percent of shareholders are compulsorily wiped out. The select committee has provided a mechanism whereby the people who own the remaining minority 10 percent of quota interest at least have the protection of the High Court. The High Court has the opportunity to measure whether the amount of compensation being paid to the other 90 percent of quota holders is a fair and reasonable amount. 
I think that the select committee has come up with a vast improvement to the legislation as it was originally submitted to the House and that the officials have developed a mechanism that well and truly recognises the competing interests. But at the end of the day it is a matter of the most economic use of the space for New Zealand incorporated and that comes down to who can make the most money out of any particular spot. In saying that I have little doubt that if one measures that on a hectare-by-hectare basis then because of its intensity aquaculture will win the day. Having said that I say that a property right is a property right and that if quota owners are significantly affected then they must be compensated to an extent that makes it worthwhile for them to give away their property rights in order to allow aquaculture to develop. 
I think that is the major change that has been developed in Part 2. There are a number of other minor changes that I want to take the opportunity to speak to through the Committee debate but I look forward to hearing the Minister’s answers to the questions I have raised. I note we now have the third Minister in the chair the Hon Marian Hobbs. We hope she understands the bill somewhat better than the Minister does. He clearly does not understand it at all. That was shown by his answers to an earlier point in Part 1 which I will take the opportunity of re-raising in Part 5 regarding the 20 percent and the patchwork-quilt effect. 
GERRARD ECKHOFF (ACT) 
: 
 I refer to paragraph (b) of clause 36A “Purpose” which states: “require all fish farmers to be registered under the Fisheries Act 1996;”. I have a very simple question for the Minister in the chair the Hon Marian Hobbs: why? It is not a difficult question. Why do we not require all farmers on land for example to be registered? The principles of farming are pretty much the same in both contexts. Why do we not require everybody to be registered and have a huge Big Brother to keep an eye on things? Why do fish farmers need to be registered? Once they have been allocated space in an aquaculture management area why on earth should they then have to be registered under the Fisheries Act 1996? What useful purpose will that serve? Will it determine whether a fish farmer is a good a bad or a mediocre fish farmer? What are the sanctions— 
Simon Power 
: A sufficient fish farmer? 
GERRARD ECKHOFF 
: Exactly. What are the sanctions if someone is deemed to be a poor feeder of fish or a bad fish farmer? The mind starts to boggle. Will the Animal Welfare Act be invoked against fish farmers if they do not feed their fish adequately? What is the purpose of that measure? Why are we adding more bureaucratic structures to the industry when they are not needed? 
I can only assume that it is all part of a bureaucratic structure that ensures that everybody is registered and accounted for. We will have people poring over information to ensure that everyone is registered and up to date. That raises an interesting question: are fish farmers to be registered on a yearly basis or a 5-yearly basis? How often are they to be registered? And what happens if they let their registration lapse? What will occur then? What sanctions will there be against fish farmers if they are deemed to be unregistered? One finds the situation is quite extraordinary when one thinks about it. I ask those questions of the Minister in the chair the Hon Marian Hobbs who seems to be busy with her Christmas cards and is not overly interested in this debate. [ 
Interruption 
] I withdraw and apologise to the Minister. She is actually doing some writing. It is nice to know that that is keeping the Minister occupied. I am not really getting an answer on that matter. 
The other issue is that of fishers unduly affected by the proposed aquaculture agreements—the management areas—and of persons who wish to undertake aquaculture activities in their area. Let me inform the Committee of the comments made by the New Zealand Aquaculture Council which essentially said that the undue adverse effects test on fishing that is to be carried out by the Ministry of Fisheries uses a process that to marine farmers and fishers is not transparent. The council said that the process cannot be appealed on substance but only via judicial review and that there is also an option for an aquaculture agreement to be entered into with affected fishers although every quota holder and every fishing-permit holder in the area must agree. I understand that that has been altered somewhat and that there is now a provision for 90 percent acceptance which of course is perfectly reasonable. However I can foresee a time when even that change will not be sufficient. The New Zealand Aquaculture Council believes that the provision is unrealistic and unworkable. I cannot see an opportunity for even a 90 percent agreement to occur in many areas. So what will happen when we get a Mexican stand-off type of situation? As far as I can see there is no mechanism in the bill that will enable some movement to occur. 
IAN EWEN-STREET (Green) 
: 
 Under the present legislation if people want to establish a marine farm they have to get resource consent and then go to the Ministry of Fisheries for a fishing permit. This legislation proposes that those two steps be amalgamated into one so that the input from the Ministry of Fisheries is much earlier in the decision-making process. If a council wants to declare or to increase the area of an aquaculture management area it invites the chief executive officer of the Ministry of Fisheries to make an aquaculture decision about whether there is an undue adverse effect on quota holders or other fishers—and it is not just quota holders; it is people who have fishing permits for non-quota species as well. The hurdle to jump over is actually quite high. The chief executive officer has to say firstly that there is an effect secondly that it is an adverse effect and thirdly that it is an undue adverse effect. As the bill was reported to us if the chief executive officer said that yes there was an adverse effect—in other words said no to the council—it was a “black box” decision. The council invited the Ministry of Fisheries to make a decision and if it said no that was the end of it. There was no recourse except for perhaps judicial review. 
We did two things at the Primary Production Committee and I think they were very positive steps. First we allowed people to appeal the chief executive’s decision to the High Court on matters of substance as well as process so that substantive issues could go to the High Court. Second we provided that the alternative the applicant has is to seek the aquaculture decision that my colleagues have described whereby the person who is seeking to have a marine farm goes to the affected fishers whether they are quota holders or permit holders and seeks their agreement whether by paying them money or by some other agreement— 
Dr Lynda Scott 
: That’s bribery. 
IAN EWEN-STREET 
: No it is a commercial decision; it is not bribery. The applicant seeks their agreement to allow aquaculture in that space. I need to point out that we are not talking about fin-fish species—the migratory or the mobile species that can just swim away. If fishers have a quota for kahawai tuna or something like that it is very unlikely to be affected by a marine farm. The kinds of species that we are talking about are the sedentary ones. I guess that species like scallops and oysters are the main ones but it also applies to crayfish and other relatively immobile species like that. Those quota holders and permit holders have to be consulted by the people who want to get the aquaculture management area whether it is by the council or the individual applicant. 
My colleague David Carter said that I was a bit tough on the people who were left out when the agreement of 90 percent of the affected people was reached. My argument at the time was that if the applicant for a marine farm had been around to everyone and had got the agreement of 90 percent of the affected people we did not really want the last 10 percent to hold out just for a better price. My argument was that they had had their opportunity and that they could either accept the price that was offered or miss out completely. On reflection I think I was wrong in making that call originally—I think it was a bit tough. But I do think that the remaining 10 percent of affected people should not have an incentive to hold out. Those people should get the same price as the other 90 percent—the average price—or a price that is equivalent to what they got. The fall-back position if no price can be agreed on is recourse to the High Court. 
BERNIE OGILVY (United Future) 
: 
 As we are aware to make aquaculture a realistic occupation and business we had to make changes. There was a need for changes to the Fisheries Act 1996 and Part 2 relates to that. I want to just touch on two or three things. This whole part in the way it has ended up is very workable and worthwhile and I think the industry will be a lot stronger for it. 
One of the things that came across very early related to section 186E “Chief executive to make aquaculture decision” in clause 41. Originally that provision stated that the chief executive had to make aquaculture decisions “as promptly as was reasonable in the circumstances”. The select committee saw fit to put a deadline on that rather than to allow him just to go on and on. The submitters told us many many times about a sort of death by no answer and they did not want that again. So we put in “Within 6 months”. I thought that was a good threshold of time within which everybody could put in requests. It would allow time for everybody to examine and put some legs to this legislation with particular reference to the fisheries part of it. 
The second thing I make reference to relates to the undue adverse effect on fishing. A number of speakers have made reference to that. It really is the hub of certainty for commercial fishers who have been alluded to and talked about but I recall that the chief executive has to ensure that customary fishers as well as recreational fishers are satisfied. The undue adverse effect test is put in so that everyone can ensure he or she is covered and is not neglected in the negotiations or the inquiry to have an aquaculture management area. My friends the recreational fishers are very very happy that there is room for them to state their case and have the chief executive stand by and apply that test to the entire process of establishing an aquaculture management area. 
We think that with regard to the undue adverse effect test if the elements illustrated in new section 186G(a) to (f) inserted by clause 41 are not picked up by the regional councils and the chief executive then they are failing in their duty. By the councils and the chief executive applying those things as their duty the aquaculture farming industry should go ahead without as much default as in the past. So this is good legislation. 
The last provision I make reference to is section 186ZD “Fishers whose consent is necessary for aquaculture agreement” which relates to the owners of commercial fish quota. That has been spoken about before. When the bill came to us initially the proposals were fairly weak and draconian and possibly left a no-win situation for everybody. The present bill gives a clear 90 percent quota arrangement. If people cannot meet that then the 10 percent can be bought out as in a stock exchange parallel. But there is a process beyond that; if people wish to appeal they can. I think the High Court process that has been put in place strengthens this Fisheries Act and makes the position certain for everybody within the industry. 
So I am glad that Part 2 has been modified and strengthened from the provisions we first saw. I think we have taken account of the views of virtually all of those who objected by way of submissions. 
PHIL HEATLEY (National—Whangarei) 
: 
 I have to say that the issues regarding undue adverse effects and how commercial-fishing interests meet—and in many cases collide with—aquacultural interests were of intense interest to us on the Primary Production Committee. We had quite robust discussions with submitters as they presented their views. 
On the one hand aquaculturalists came forward and said on the whole that although they acknowledged that commercial-fishing interests have a part to play in the marine area—which is clearly obvious—they felt that the powers given to commercial fishers in terms of thwarting aquaculture were far too tough. On the other hand commercial fishers on the whole put forward their property rights and their concern that aquaculture should not develop too rapidly and too well in too many areas such as to impede commercial fishing particularly where sustainable commercial-fishing takes are proven and have been consistent over time. The committee members listened to those contrary views. We had robust discussions with proponents of both sides of the debate and came to some agreement as outlined in the clauses before us now. 
However there are still some unanswered questions on how aquaculture interests will be balanced with commercial-fishing interests into the future. National Party members support greater interaction between the two sectors. Together they must have timely fully transparent and cost-effective processes in order to come to some conclusion about the future of both in a particular area. The process as it stands is a split one. Marine farmers came to the ministry many years ago and said that the two-stage process whereby they got a fisheries permit under the Fisheries Act then a resource consent under the Resource Management was too time consuming exhausting and costly. They needed a one-stop shop. I know that the ministry looked hard at giving them a one-stop shop. It has not come up with a one-stop shop but with a process that is probably as close to it as one can get. 
If we explore the clauses here we discover that the process is still in two stages. The regional councils will look at the environmental effect that aquaculture may have on commercial fishing and the Ministry of Fisheries will look at what spatial restrictions aquaculture places on commercial fishing. When the regional councils go to the ministry for an aquaculture decision it will simply ask how the spatial element of an aquaculture management area will affect commercial fishers. How will it affect the access of commercial fishers to their fishery? One can imagine that with highly mobile fish stocks such as kahawai as I think the Green member mentioned or snapper or with those fish that are way offshore where there is no aquaculture issue such as tuna and that type of thing a marine farm will not have too much spatial impact. The fish are mobile; they will simply go elsewhere and be caught elsewhere. There is not much argument around that. But with largely immobile species such as crayfish or scallops or species that are inshore where marine farms are likely to be such as flounder or mullet there will be some sort of spatial impact on commercial-fishing interests. 
The Ministry of Fisheries has to make that decision but it is restricted solely to that spatial element. It has no say on what environmental effects marine farms might have on commercial fishing at all. 
Dr LYNDA SCOTT (National—Kaikoura) 
: 
 I wish to follow on from where my very good colleague Phil Heatley finished off and talk about the undue adverse effects of aquaculture on fishing. In the Marlborough Sounds at the moment the farms are really quite small in relation to what is being proposed with deep-sea farming. Deep-sea farming is quite experimental and as yet has not really been trialled because of the moratorium but it is the next big step for marine farming in New Zealand. If it goes ahead and proves to be successful those undersea farms will not have a visual impact but they could take up a large amount of space. If they do we will see more effect on the actual fisheries process. 
Marine farmers are happy at this time to see some finality so that their industry can move ahead but they certainly are not happy that a one-stop shop process has not been delivered by this Government. That was the other major issue they wanted. The first issue was first right of refusal so that those who had invested in the industry could maintain their business; the second was a one-stop shop. Those who have been around the aquaculture industry will know that the process at the moment whereby people have to go through a Resource Management Act process then through a fisheries permit process is extremely frustrating. The Ministry of Fisheries was taking over 2 years to process applications for just small—in some cases—extensions to marine farms and during that time the resource consents under the Resource Management Act would run out. When the Government extended the moratorium it had to pass special legislation to capture those people who had gone to the time trouble and effort to get a new resource consent only to find that because of the process through the Ministry of Fisheries it had run out. 
When they rang up and asked questions they were charged $200 an hour. That was the charge-out fee with which the ministry tried to stop angry frustrated marine farmers from ringing up and asking what the ministry was doing. When I wrote to the Minister of Fisheries about the issue he said he had offered the ministry more resources and it had said it did not need them—that it could cope. Two years later it is having to put in a whole lot more staff to deal with these permits. 
Members can understand an industry that was growing at 20 percent and is now growing at 0 percent becoming extremely frustrated. The men and women who forged an industry and developed it for New Zealand and who were way ahead of the game—way ahead of Chile and other areas like Australia—have been basically stalled at the gates of the 21st century. They are pleased to see this bill being debated tonight but they are not pleased that they still do not have just one process. They have to go through the Resource Management Act process for a consent but the Ministry of Fisheries can still stop a process from going forward. It can look at the spatial effects and stop the process if it feels there is an undue adverse effect on fishing. 
I know that the recreational fishers in the Sounds will be happy. We love those marine farms because there are always lots of snapper around them—but I should not give away the places where everyone should go and fish. The main effect will be on the commercial fishermen and they will have concerns about large spatial areas because they want to be able to fish in that space themselves. However aquaculture does make a lot of money for Marlborough—it was our highest income-earner—and it could make a huge amount of money for New Zealand. But the fact is that Australia and Chile are now getting into the game in a very big way and we have lost quite a lot of our intellectual capital to those countries because people have been so frustrated by this Government. 
DIANNE YATES (Labour—Hamilton East) 
: 
 I move  
That the question be now put 
. 
R DOUG WOOLERTON (NZ First) 
: 
 Part 2 of the bill as previous speakers have said is all about the tensions that exist for competing space— 
Simon Power 
: Tensions is a big word. 
R DOUG WOOLERTON 
: Tensions is the word—in public land. We are talking about the water column and the sea bed. We are talking about what people can do in it what its most profitable use is and also to a degree what is fair and how one goes about that. If it were perpetual lease as proposed by the ACT party one could just tell other people to go away. If it were fee simple one could tell them to go away: “This is mine and we don’t want to have anything to do with you.” But because it is not a mechanism needed to be worked out and I think that those of us on the Primary Production Committee at least have agreed that we have come up with the best we possibly can. We think it is fair we think it serves the commercial imperatives that are inherent in this business and we think that it is as good as we can get for the environment. Those are the things we have to worry about and those are the things that make it such a difficult business. When we are talking about other marine life and fish—scallops oysters flounder and other fish that hang around in the shallows— 
Shane Ardern 
: Making my mouth water. 
R DOUG WOOLERTON 
: Exactly. 
Dr Lynda Scott 
: I’d rather be fishing. 
R DOUG WOOLERTON 
: I cannot speak because my mouth is watering so much. All those things must be taken care of. I will go back to the fact that one of the reasons New Zealand First supports this bill is that it is balanced and it does all those competing things and takes all those interests into account. We believe that it does a very difficult job well. That is why we support it. 
Hon MARIAN HOBBS (Minister for the Environment) 
: 
 I move  
That the question be now put 
. 
PHIL HEATLEY (National—Whangarei) 
: 
 I will continue on from my previous speech regarding the tension between the interests of commercial fishers and the interests of marine farmers. I pointed out that the Ministry of Fisheries in making an aquaculture decision is to be focused only on spatial issues; that is how a marine farm or an aquaculture management area will spatially affect commercial fishing interests—how much commercial fishers will be displaced from a particular area by marine-farming activity so that they no longer have access to a fishing resource. We were particularly interested in submitters who talked about scallops simply because there is an enhancement programme in which the farmers seed scallops they grow and recreationalists have access to those scallops as do the commercial fishers. There is a concern that that enhancement programme could seriously be affected by marine farms and the industry developing excessively in that area. That was a good point made to us by submitters. Also inshore fisheries representatives such as flounder fishers put up a good case as did others that would be affected. 
The regional council on the other hand takes an aquaculture decision and lays upon it consideration of the effect that marine farms have on commercial fishing with regard to environmental impacts. Those environmental impacts might somehow affect water quality—because clearly if marine farming in any way deteriorates water quality and that affects the fish that will have an adverse affect on commercial fishing. If marine farms in some way are affecting spawning or stock development then that will adversely affect the fishery and commercial fishers as well. 
We raised a particular concern at the select committee and we have raised it again here tonight—perhaps the Minister in the chair David Benson-Pope would like to take a call on it—which is the issue of regional councils actually having the ability to measure the environmental impacts on commercial fish species. We know that the Ministry of Fisheries often subcontracts research to the National Institute of Atmospheric and Water Research on the environmental effects on commercial fishing species in various areas around New Zealand but where are regional councils to get that skill base from? Are they going to contract out? They will have to because currently no regional council in New Zealand—even Northland Regional Council which is far in the lead when it comes to aquaculture development and research—has staff skilled in that area. [ 
Interruption 
] The Minister suggests that the Ministry of Fisheries will be contracting to regional councils— 
Hon David Benson-Pope 
: The Ministry of Fisheries will be providing that support. 
PHIL HEATLEY 
: The Minister chipped in to suggest that the Ministry of Fisheries will be supplying that service to regional councils. Well I hope that the Minister’s assurance does come to pass. Regional councils certainly do not have the staff skills scientists or research base at the moment to measure the environmental effects on spawning on stock development on whole fishery development on the interaction between various fisheries aquaculture and marine farms and so on and so forth. 
So I thank the Minister for that and I put it to the Committee that there is a promise there from him as the Minister of Fisheries that his ministry will be available to regional councils and I hope that that is the case. My concern is that if all the regional councils or a fair number of them come to the ministry all at one time I hope that it has the ability to meet that scientific need. Certainly there will be a demand for that as required in this legislation. 
RODNEY HIDE (Leader—ACT) 
: 
 The ACT party is against this bill. It is a bill that shows how the Government and—after hearing Doug Woolerton speak—New Zealand First lack vision of what aquaculture could achieve through the years ahead in New Zealand. It also shows how they lack insight into what an industry needs so that it can develop. It is very very simple. Members should try to imagine—I would not expect the Minister in the chair to understand this but I would expect Mr Doug Woolerton to appreciate it—a dairy farm operating under rules like these. They should try to imagine developing the farming industry on land under rules like these. 
R Doug Woolerton 
: Dairy farmers have twice as many rules as there are in here my friend. You wouldn’t have a clue. 
RODNEY HIDE 
: Doug Woolerton calls out and says: “Hang on—the dairy industry has twice as many rules as the aquaculture industry has.” Well we are not about defending those rules for dairy farmers; we are about getting rid of them. But here is the thing: dairy farmers at least have some security of tenure on the land and some security of tenure on their investments. 
It is true to say that the socialist Government David Benson-Pope and Dover Samuels represent is marauding dairy farmers’ land and other farmers’ land with their “right to roam” legislation which I see that New Zealand First supports. We have tried this experiment before in New Zealand and it failed. We tried this experiment in the high country of New Zealand. 
Hon Dover Samuels 
: When? 
RODNEY HIDE 
: Yes we did. I know that Dover Samuels would not know but I expect other members to know. When the high country of New Zealand was put out at short lease like this what was the result? It was a failure of investment of over-grazing and of the destruction of the land. That is what happens when farmers do not have secure title. 
We have an enormous coastline and vast ocean resources out to the 200-mile limit for deep-sea farming. If we had a Government—indeed a Parliament—that had some vision for what New Zealand could achieve in this country with aquaculture we would not be debating this bill; we would be debating something far far better. Its basis would be secure property rights for aquaculturists just like those rights provided so that farming can develop in New Zealand. Mr Samuels should try to imagine these rules applying back in 1840 to the farmers who cut farms out of the bush of New Zealand. They would not have done it. They would not have invested and they would not have worked to develop their markets. Can we not learn from that lesson? Dover Samuels sits over there but he would not apply these rules to his wonderful motel in Matauri Bay because he would want to have secure property rights. He will not work away in an industry in which potentially he will lose his rights after a few years—where the Government can come along at any time and change the rules. 
This bill lacks insight into what an industry needs to develop and it lacks vision. It lacks the vision of what this country could achieve by looking ahead 10 or 20 years. I think that in the future when aquaculture around the world is a standard way of rearing and harvesting fish New Zealanders will look back at this legislation and wonder what Parliament was thinking of. How dopey could it be to repeat the mistake that had already been made on the land in the high country of New Zealand? Just as we look back on what was done in the high country we can ask how the Government could create such a perverse set of incentives that would fail to see an industry take off. Well that is what David Benson-Pope’s legacy to New Zealand is. I know that Dover Samuels has such a short-term horizon that he just thinks this is funny. However here we are standing at the dawn of a wonderful industry that could do so much for our country. 
Hon DOVER SAMUELS (Minister of State) 
: 
 I move  
That the question be now put 
. 
Hon DAVID CARTER (National) 
: 
 Is it not interesting that the two calls taken by the Labour member who sat on the Primary Production Committee the Hon Dover Samuels have both been to close the debate down? That was the member who promised to table documents before the select committee that set out the unfinished business yet we are still waiting. 
I shall talk specifically to two parts of the bill: section 186G and then section 186E inserted by clause 41. It is section 186G that proves the point of having a robust select committee hearing because this provision is all about the matters that must be considered before an aquaculture decision is made. I will not read them all out because that would take too long but Minister David Benson-Pope had originally included in the list of those matters under paragraph (g) “any other matter that the chief executive considers relevant.” Well members can imagine the response we got from the industry. There was enough of a test regarding the undue adverse effect that has to be gone through to establish equity between commercial fishers and a proponent of aquaculture but in that provision we were meant to give the ministry carte blanche to consider any matter at all. It did not have to be justified before it made an aquaculture decision that put that aquaculture proponent into huge difficulty. 
I have to say that submissions were unanimous in that regard. I cannot think of one in favour of the provision. Maybe we had one from the Environment and Conservation Organisations of New Zealand from the Royal Forest and Bird Protection Society or from somebody who may have been saying that it should remain but there certainly was not any relevant submission arguing that it should not be deleted. So in that regard the select committee resolutely argued and agreed and I thank Dover Samuels for his intermittent attendance at the committee when he too may not have been aware that we argued successfully for section 186G(g) to be deleted. 
The other thing I want to speak about is the way the Minister David Benson-Pope presented the legislation to the select committee. The chief executive of the Ministry of Fisheries was required to make an aquaculture decision but under the legislation proposed by the incompetent Minister he had as long as he wanted to make that decision. So a proponent for aquaculture would come along with a proposal and would have to go through the process of having it checked to see whether there was an undue adverse effect and then the Ministry of Fisheries could sit on that proposal absolutely forever. 
As was said earlier in the debate there was not a lot of confidence in the Ministry of Fisheries. That could be related to the Minister or it could be related to past history within the industry which would equally be absolutely excusable. But again the select committee worked hard to ensure that there was a time limit within which the Ministry of Fisheries had to act. That time limit is 6 months. Some people argued that it should be less. Why should the ministry not get off its chuff do the work and come up with a decision? I was one of those who felt that there had to be a reasonable period of time because too often I have seen in bureaucracy that if the decision is hard to make and the clock is ticking then the easiest thing in the world for the bureaucrats is just to put a rejection through and have the proposal not proceed. So I think the select committee has come up with something workable. 
The issue then arose as to whether if there is insufficient information the ministry should be able to go back and seek more information. The select committee supported that. In the event that that happens the legislation as it is now reported back means that for the ministry officials themselves the clock stops ticking. So there is a 6-month time frame and if at any time throughout that process the ministry says it genuinely does not think it has enough information then it goes back to the proponent and the clock goes on hold. 
JILL PETTIS (Senior Whip—Labour) 
: 
 I move  
That the question be now put 
. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the question be now put 
. 
Ayes 70 
New Zealand Labour 51; Green Party 9; United Future 8; Progressive 2. 
Noes 49 
New Zealand National 27; New Zealand First 13; ACT New Zealand 9. 
Motion agreed to. 
The question was put that the amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 319 in the name of the Hon David Benson-Pope to Part 2 be agreed to. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the amendments be agreed to 
. 
Ayes 83 
New Zealand Labour 51; New Zealand First 13; Green Party 9; United Future 8; Progressive 2. 
Noes 36 
New Zealand National 27; ACT New Zealand 9. 
Amendments agreed to. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That Part 2 as amended be agreed to 
. 
Ayes 83 
New Zealand Labour 51; New Zealand First 13; Green Party 9; United Future 8; Progressive 2. 
Noes 37 
New Zealand National 27; ACT New Zealand 9; Maori Party 1. 
Part 2 as amended agreed to. 
SIMON POWER (Senior Whip—National) 
: 
 I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. I notice that the size of Parts 3 and 4 is shall we say a bit on the tight side—that is one way to describe it. I wonder whether it would assist the Chair and perhaps the Government whips if we were able to minimise the number of calls on these two parts for obvious reasons—largely that we are dealing with only five clauses between the two parts. I note that Part 5 which deals with Maori commercial aquaculture claims settlement is a substantial part of the legislation. Although this is probably technically out of order just to assist you Mr Chairperson I advise that the Opposition will take a minimal number of calls on Parts 3 and 4 but I seek your indulgence in going through Part 5 as a substantial part of the bill. 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: I thank the honourable member for his contribution and just say that that is entirely up to the member. Of course when it comes to closures that is a matter for the Chair to decide but I am sure that what the member has made obvious will be taken into consideration. 
R DOUG WOOLERTON (NZ First) 
: 
 Speaking to the point of order Mr Chairperson I just offer New Zealand First’s cooperation. We would be happy to put Parts 3 and 4 without debate. 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: Of course that is up to the Committee. The member must— 
Ian Ewen-Street 
: Seek leave. 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: That is a matter for the member himself to decide. 
Part 3 Conservation Act 1987 
Hon DAVID CARTER (National) 
: 
 I certainly want to speak to Part 3 “Conservation Act 1987” which contains clauses 54 and 55 and the consequential amendments. I want to do so for two reasons because this part is unique in two ways. First of all amongst 141 submissions we got no submissions on this part at all. To date we have been debating all the controversial parts of the legislation with reams and reams of submissions received from people who knew that the Minister had made a mess of the legislation. Finally we come to a little bit in the middle of the bill—Part 3 “Conservation Act 1987”—with only two clauses and lo and behold even the industry had nothing to complain about in this regard. 
But this part of the legislation is also unique in another respect. Since the debate has started the Minister has had to table four separate detailed Supplementary Order Papers because of his incompetence and not one of them has to correct clauses 54 and 55. So I want to take the opportunity to thank the Minister. Good on him; he has finally got one part right—the only part in 200 pages of legislation that he can say he presented to the Parliament with any competence at all. 
While I congratulate the Minister that is a dreadful record. The Minister of Fisheries who is meant to be in charge of the aquaculture reform legislation presents to Parliament 240-odd pages that are a diabolical mess and causes the select committee to work for I think 34 hours of deliberation—34 hours of hearing submissions. And here we finally come across a little snippet in Part 3 whereby we find two clauses that the industry had no objection to and more important two clauses that the Minister has not had to bring a Supplementary Order Paper into the Committee for us to correct his incompetence with. 
The Minister might like to tell members how he got Part 3 “Conservation Act 1987” so right when it is not even his portfolio area yet he got every other part of the bill into one unholy mess. I do not think that the credit can go to Chris Carter—I do not think so. I think the credit does not go to the Minister either. I think that this is one where officialdom has done well. 
Simon Power 
: No! 
Hon DAVID CARTER 
: I think that it is. I do not think that David Benson-Pope even realised—[ 
Interruption 
] Ian Ewen Street mentions that I should wash my mouth out but I think we have to realise that in legislation like this if somebody gets something right it is fair to acknowledge it. That is the purpose of the Committee stage of the House. So in amongst— 
Hon Member 
: If they had a decent chair! 
Hon DAVID CARTER 
: Well Darren Hughes is saying that the chair is at fault—the chair is at fault because there are two clauses in the bill that did not require altering through a select committee. So that is the chair’s fault! Well I say to Darren Hughes that he is a new member and he will not be here for much longer because Nathan Guy is out there tonight. He is door-knocking in Otaki. He will be here and he will be an excellent member. Everybody says he will be an excellent member because they have expressed a lot of disappointment with Darren Hughes. But Darren Hughes will realise when he reminisces on his short parliamentary career that one does not blame the chair of a select committee when two clauses out of a couple of hundred come back unchanged. That is not something one praises the chair of the select committee for and it is certainly not something one blames the select committee chair for. It means that somebody presented that little part of the bill to the Hon David Benson-Pope and that little part was right. So I say to the Minister congratulations on doing that at least. 
PHIL HEATLEY (National—Whangarei) 
: 
 I also rise to discuss in detail clauses 54 and 55 in Part 3 “Conservation Act 1987”. Members will recall that this legislation is to be cut into seven different bills. One of them will be in relation to the Conservation Act 1987 specifically which is represented by Part 3 of this bill. Clause 55(2) proposes to substitute section 26ZG(2)(c) of the Conservation Act which provides: “(c) The taking holding possession sale or disposal of any freshwater fish under the authority of the Fisheries Act 1983 the Marine Farming Act 1971 or any regulations made under either of those Acts.” The new section 26ZG(2)(c) will provide: “(c) the taking holding possession sale or disposal of freshwater fish under the authority of—(i) the Fisheries Act 1983 the Marine Farming Act 1971 or any regulations made under either of those Acts; or (ii) the registration of a fish farmer under Part 9A of the Fisheries Act 1996.” 
That is what this clause does. It repeals those provisions relating to the taking holding possession sale or disposal of freshwater fish and replaces them with those provisions in clause 55. Why this is of interest to the marine farming and aquaculture sector is simply that the Fisheries Act 1983 the Marine Farming Act and a third Act the Fisheries Act 1996 all impinge on freshwater fish which may or may not be farmed may be wild or may be somehow in an aquaculture business. All those Acts impinge on those species. 
So under this reform bill there is a bringing together of the taking holding possession sale or disposal regulations under that one provision. Those reforms bring it all together. Having it spread out amongst the Fisheries Act 1983 the Marine Farming Act the regulations under those Acts and also Part 9A of the Fisheries Act 1996 made it all the more confusing. This is why we have general support from the industry on this. We have support from regional councils the Department of Conservation those on the Primary Production Committee and officials as well. There was no argument on it. It is nice to come across a provision in this reform bill where there is no controversy and there are no last-minute changes. As the Hon David Carter pointed out it is something we can indeed agree with. 
It is interesting that through the course of this debate the Department of Conservation has come under a fair bit of flack because of the amount of interference that it can have in marine farming under this reform legislation. We know that it can effectively veto the allocation of marine-farming space at the last hurdle if the department’s officials do not succeed as objectors to the consent being granted or succeed as objectors to the original aquaculture management area. So after the department has a go at the aquaculture management area that the regional council is keen to set up and it fails and after having a go at the resource consent that the individual farmer applies for and it also fails there the department can then have another slap at getting a veto in the end. 
GERRARD ECKHOFF (ACT) 
: 
 I would like to take a short call on Part 3. I am not sure I agree with Mr Heatley that clause 55 is a non-controversial clause. Clause 55(2) states that section 26ZG(2) of the Conservation Act is to be amended by repealing paragraph (c) and substituting the following paragraph: “(c) the taking holding possession sale or disposal of freshwater fish under the authority of—(i) the Fisheries Act 1983 the Marine Farming Act 1971 or any regulations made under either of those Acts;”. Well it has just occurred to me while I was sitting listening to the debate to ask the Minister for example—and I would ask him to take a call on this—where sea-run trout sit in this particular aspect. Are they freshwater fish or saltwater fish? Which category do they come under? 
If people decide that farming them is an appropriate thing to do and some sea-run trout are found in their salmon cage will the full weight of the law descend on those people? It is a perfectly reasonable question. Salmon swim up rivers. They are freshwater fish we might say but they spend a huge amount of time at sea as well. Are they freshwater fish or saltwater fish? I think those questions are perfectly fair and reasonable to ask given the fact that there is a horrendous penalty for anybody who dares to challenge the monopoly rights of Fish and Game for example. Part 3 is really all about the fact that Fish and Game does not want anybody to farm fish that have huge commercial value. Of course salmon have an enormous commercial value and they are farmed but sea-run trout are certainly not allowed to be farmed. 
I ask whether they are freshwater fish or saltwater fish for I am not sure and I do not have that knowledge. Maybe some member in the Chamber or an official knows. Indeed the Minister who is meant to know all about this bill should take a call to tell us exactly how this specific clause relating to the Conservation Act 1987 applies to sea-run trout. I see that the Minister is engaged in heavy conversation and is studiously ignoring this particular question. It is perfectly relevant. Can the Minister please explain why or how it is a silly question? It is perfectly reasonable for a marine farmer to look at farming sea-run trout in one of these aquaculture management areas. I ask why that could not or should not be done if in fact there is a first-rate market for them. 
One of the problems we have with this particular bill that this Minister totally fails to understand is that flexibility is part of this whole industry. If one particular fish species that is being farmed is not providing the commercial returns that farmers need then the marine farmers need to be able to change from that species to another species to develop a market and to make some dollars for themselves. That will possibly be outlawed shortly by this Government as well. Making money for oneself is not an acceptable process it seems to me in terms of the thinking of this particular Government so it tries to stop marine farmers from doing what I think is a perfectly sensible thing. I can only ask this Minister to give me the answer to this question of whether sea-run trout are classified as freshwater fish. It is a perfectly reasonable question and I yield my speaking slot to the Minister so that he can take a call to tell me the answer. 
SANDRA GOUDIE (National—Coromandel) 
: 
 I am delighted to speak to this rather significant Part 3 which relates to the Conservation Act. An interesting question has been raised by Gerrard Eckhoff. Clearly the nod from the Minister signified that sea-run trout is defined as freshwater fish so it cannot be farmed in the sea. That raises concerns around how far the Government wants to go with this issue. 
We read in clause 55(2) about the “taking holding possession sale or disposal of freshwater fish under the authority of—” the Fisheries Act or the Marine Farming Act or “the registration of a fish farmer …”. The reference to “fish farmer” reminds me of the previous provision that looked at the giving of authority. First of all the fish farmer has to go to the Ministry of Fisheries for that authority but either a resource consent or a certificate of compliance is required before that farmer can continue. But one does not have to have either of those things to be a fish farmer if one has a customary rights order. One does not have to have a certificate of compliance or a resource consent if one has a customary rights order. I would have thought that was a double standard. Given that largely it will be Maori who are customary rights holders compared with anybody else I definitely see that as a double standard and as the creating of an advantage for one group of persons over others who are required to go through the resource consent or compliance certificate process to be registered farmers as identified under Part 3. So we keep going back to the registration of fish farmers under Part 3. I am just reiterating the parameters by which fish farmers are established. I think it is absolutely amazing that we do have that double standard and that someone with a customary rights order can become a fish farmer without having a certificate of compliance or resource consent. 
Perhaps the Minister would like to take a call to clarify the situation in regard to that and whether it is actually appropriate. He is obviously declining to comment on that one. I think it is a significant issue and if I had had time when debating the previous part I would have gone into it more fully. 
I just bring members back to the registration of fish farmers as identified in Part 3 and ask people to think about the preference in law that is being provided here for customary rights holders who will be predominantly Maori—I cannot think of any instance that the case might be otherwise. They do not need a resource consent or a compliance certificate if they have a customary rights order. In my view that is absolutely atrocious. The same parameters should apply to all regardless of the customary rights order situation. Of course that is another little gift arising from the Foreshore and Seabed Act and I am sure we will be confronted with more of these little gifts which are absolutely atrocious. That is something we are appalled to see and we will be seeing it throughout the legislation. 
I will leave the Minister to respond and perhaps to address some of the concerns I have raised in regard to the preference being provided for customary rights holders over registered fish farmers. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That Part 3 be agreed to. 
Ayes 83 
New Zealand Labour 51; New Zealand First 13; Green Party 9; United Future 8; Progressive 2. 
Noes 36 
New Zealand National 27; ACT New Zealand 9. 
Part 3 agreed to. 
Part 4 Biosecurity Act 1993 
PHIL HEATLEY (National—Whangarei) 
: 
 The Primary Production Committee examined Part 4 regarding the Biosecurity Act and the effects that this reform legislation would have—and rightly so—on that particular Act. Part 4 is another part that will be divided into one of the seven separate pieces of legislation arising from this bill and deals solely and specifically with those clauses making amendment to that Act which was passed in 1993 under the then National Government. We see biosecurity in this industry as absolutely essential. Just as biosecurity is important in the commercial-fishing industry it is important in aquaculture. We see it as no less important for land-based aquaculture than it is for sea-based aquaculture. 
In fact it is interesting to discuss the regulations relating to land-based aquaculture because submitters came to us to ask why they were facing regulations and legislation that compounded the compliance costs placed upon them. They said there was absolutely no need for it so we asked the officials why it was so. People with aquaculture farms on land that were fenced off that were not on property that one could call public space—like the ocean—but were on private property asked why they faced so many regulations. 
Officials came back at us with two succinct arguments. One was the need for regulations to ensure that the policing of fisheries could be adequately carried out. By way of an example an on-land aquaculture farm might produce paua. If a land-based aquaculturist were found with paua he would need to have followed certain regulations to be able to prove that his paua were grown on his farm for sale. He would need records of the profit of his business—records of the seeding coming into the business the enhancement in the business and the on-selling of paua on to the market. That is fair enough; it is around the whole compliance and policing area. That is one reason why those farmers have to be subject to regulations and we accepted that. 
The other reason was with regard to biosecurity issues and the need for a degree of traceability. If there was a biosecurity scare whether because of threats within New Zealand amongst our own marine farms or because of a biosecurity scare offshore in our markets and relating to our particular produce then it would be a very serious matter for the marine-farming industry indeed. That is why we took quite seriously these particular clauses with regard to biosecurity and we do so now. 
Clause 57 amends section 43 of the Biosecurity Act in relation to risk goods. That is to ensure that information can be required on the full range of fish-farming activities in the event of a need to trace fish movements. So it is all about traceability. One can appreciate that smaller stock used for spawning can come on to a farm and can then be on-grown—transferred to another part of the farm or to another farm owned by the same proprietor or indeed to another farm owned by a separate proprietor. It can then be on-sold to a licensed fish receiver or directly into the market as in the case with exporting. If a biosecurity fault is found in that overseas market that product would need to be traced back through the licensed fish receiver or the marketing arm to the farm where it was on-grown then back to where it was originally brought on as young stock. That is why the amendments to the Biosecurity Act are so important and we acknowledge them. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That Part 4 be agreed to. 
Ayes 83 
New Zealand Labour 51; New Zealand First 13; Green Party 9; United Future 8; Progressive 2. 
Noes 37 
New Zealand National 27; ACT New Zealand 9; Maori Party 1. 
Part 4 agreed to. 
 Part 5 Maori Commercial Aquaculture Claims Settlement 
The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Clem Simich) 
: We now come to Part 5—clauses 59 to 105B. Members will know that it is in eight subparts. This debate includes debate on schedules 3 and 4 if members wish. 
Hon DAVID CARTER (National) 
: 
 We now come to the contentious part of the Aquaculture Reform Bill and why the National Party will oppose it. There was talk throughout the select committee process about unfinished business associated with the 1992 deed of settlement. I did what any responsible member of the select committee should have done: I sourced a copy of the deed of settlement and read it. That deed of settlement settled all commercial-fishing interests—coastal inshore and offshore. There was no unfinished business in that document signed by Maori of the day as a full and final settlement. 
We told officials and many other people that if there was some unfinished business in something as major as the deed of settlement there would be a paper trail. We were assured that there would be a paper trail. The more we asked for it the less available that paper trail was. There is no paper trail of this unfinished business. There is in fact no unfinished business. What we have here is folklore associated with Maori determining that they would not mind another bite of the cherry and the Labour Government being silly enough to see it as a means of settling its embarrassment over the seabed and foreshore legislation. 
The Government kept saying to us that it was based on a Crown Law opinion. After weeks and weeks of demanding the Crown Law opinion—in fact I got the select committee members to the stage that they were prepared to go on strike and not do any more consideration of the legislation until we had received that vital Crown Law opinion—we finally received it. I would like to describe it as five pages of waffle but I can describe only the first two pages as waffle because the next three pages of that all-important document are completely blanked out. That is the basis on which the Labour Government is giving up to 40 percent of future aquaculture space to Maori: a legal opinion from Crown Law from one Mr Peter Andrew that is so poor that the Minister is so embarrassed by it that he causes it to be presented to the select committee with three pages blanked out. 
The select committee did happen to receive some other quite interesting information which appeared unannounced. It was not requested by the select committee because we did not know that it existed. It was information collated by Gardiner and Parata which I understand is a firm of consultants here in Wellington. It was dated 20 May 2002 and we were told that it was commissioned by Te PuniKokiri. Gardiner and Parata went back amongst people it knew to be associated with the original negotiation of the deed of settlement to ask whether there was any truth to the argument that there was unfinished business. 
The first person it talked to was Phil Major a senior adviser to the then Minister of Fisheries the Hon Doug Kidd. It is worth noting that he currently works in Mr Sutton’s office. Was aquaculture excluded from the deed of settlement? Mr Major’s response was that he could not recall the matter being explicitly on the table. The firm then interviewed the Hon Doug Kidd and asked him whether aquaculture had been excluded. He said there would be no documentary trail because his recall was that the matter had been raised briefly on one occasion but that it was of no great substance. It then interviewed the Rt Hon Doug Graham. Similarly he made the comment that aquaculture had not been on the table. It interviewed DeneseHenare who apparently was a negotiator with Bob Mahuta and she was able to state quite categorically that she did not recall any substantive discussion or any documentation being tabled on aquaculture. 
They are only some of the people whom Gardiner and Parata interviewed. That clearly proves to me and to anybody interested in the truth that aquaculture was never on the table during the discussion of the 1992 settlement. Furthermore anybody who reads the 1992 settlement will see that it was signed up to by Maori as a full and final settlement of the grievances associated with commercial fishing yet 12 years later we are reinventing the wheel and recreating the grievance industry for generations to come. I say to the Minister in the chair the Hon Benson-Pope: “Shame on you for being involved in this legislation.” I also say: “Shame on the Labour Party for being involved in this legislation and shame on New Zealand First for being prepared to support this legislation which is without foundation.” 
I would be prepared to accept this folklore of unfinished business if anybody had presented any evidence at all of it to the select committee. At one stage the Hon Dover Samuels revealed to the committee that he had been one of the Maori negotiators. That was news I think to both the Labour members and the National members on the committee. He promised to table written documentation proving absolutely that aquaculture had been deliberately put to one side but I tell Dover Samuels that to date I am still waiting for those papers. I guarantee that we will never receive them because they do not exist. Folklore has developed around there being unfinished business; it is without foundation but we are passing legislation that will gift to Maori up to 40 percent of aquaculture space. 
Enough grievance has been associated with the Treaty of Waitangi. The National Party has a proud record of moving legislation through the House to put those grievances behind New Zealand. Yet sadly tonight we are reopening those grievances and without justification. Anybody who has studied this legislation as I have will note that in the deed of settlement with NgaiTahu we specifically gave them the right to have 10 percent of new aquaculture space by pre-emptive tender. It was not a gift but they had the right to obtain 10 percent by that means. Why would NgaiTahu have negotiated that right in the 1996 settlement if they genuinely believed there was unfinished business? The truth is they knew that fisheries had been tidied up with the 1992 settlement. They took the opportunity of their own settlement to obtain that pre-emptive right and I have no problem with that—indeed I congratulate them. But for anybody in this Chamber to argue that the matter was not totally dealt with by Doug Kidd and Doug Graham in 1992 is wrong. 
Labour claims that the settlement was rushed. Yes it was. There was a one-off opportunity associated with Brierley’s selling down Sealord’s. The settlement was then rushed through the House and I accept that but the Labour Party signed on to it. It saw it as a good way of settling Maori grievances associated with commercial fishing. Now 14 years later Labour members are flocking to the other side of the debate in an effort to save their own embarrassment around the seabed and foreshore issue. 
This is unprincipled legislation in gifting 40 percent of aquaculture space to Maori. I say that that is wrong and that this matter will cause problems with race relations for a long time to come. The Minister in the chair should stand and take the opportunity to present any documentation that shows that there was unfinished business. But I know he will not be able to do it. 
RODNEY HIDE (Leader—ACT) 
: 
 The country now has an answer to the question of how long full and final settlement lasts. I used to say that it was probably a generation but it is actually half a generation—it is now 12 years. That is how long full and final settlement lasts in New Zealand. New Zealanders as represented by the Crown can negotiate in good faith and achieve a full and final settlement. Then 12 years later it is renegotiated and once again the taxpayer of New Zealand forks out. 
I can understand why the Minister in the chair the Hon David Benson-Pope is not prepared to stand and defend this most important part of the bill. It is indefensible because as we have heard from the Hon David Carter this entire part of the bill is based on a lie—it is. The lie is that somehow when full and final settlement was negotiated in 1992 aquaculture was “unfinished business”. Ministers of the Crown promised to produce proof of that. They promised that to Parliament but could produce nothing. We just have to read the commentary on the bill to learn that it states: “The basis of the claim to the Tribunal was Maori concern”—members should note this well—“over their ongoing access to coastal space to undertake marine farming …”. Where is the property right concern or question in that statement? Does that mean that any group in New Zealand can come along and say it has a concern about access to Doug Woolerton’s farm or to Dover Samuels’ motel? Would that mean that Parliament would meet under urgency and give them all 20 percent of the area? I do not think so. 
That point proves something else about this Government and sadly about what is happening to this country. Our country our legislation and our policies are becoming riddled with race-based preferences that are available only to people of a certain skin colour and genetic origin. It does not matter how many times Helen Clark stands on a public platform or in this Chamber to pretend and say that a particular measure is based on need. This legislation gives the lie to that claim. There is only one thing that is driving the 20 percent reservation of the area for Maori and that is race. It is not based on a property right claim or on the Treaty of Waitangi. It is simply based on a racial preference. What is the logic of a 20 percent reservation? With whom was the 20 percent negotiated? David Benson-Pope cannot stand and say that the Government went through a negotiation process for the 20 percent. I say that the figure was plucked out of the air. 
What can New Zealanders assume about how long this measure will last as full and final? Will it be 12 years? Will it now be 10 years? It is clear that we have set up an incentive for one racial group in New Zealand just to bitch whine and complain to the Government and for the Government to come along offer it 20 percent and ask whether that will keep it quiet. That is what this Government is doing to New Zealand. Is that the way to develop an industry? I do not see Doug Woolerton saying that dairy farmers should hand over 20 percent of their farms because there is concern over access. 
I was astonished to learn that New Zealand First was supporting legislation like this bill which is race based. I can understand the Labour Party doing that because it speaks with a forked tongue. But I thought that New Zealand First prided itself on there being one law for all New Zealanders and on not supporting race-based preferences. I know that David Benson-Pope is a useless Minister. 
Lianne Dalziel 
: Don’t say that. 
RODNEY HIDE 
: Well when that member was a Minister she would take a call. 
GERRY BROWNLEE (Deputy Leader—National) 
: 
 This part could perhaps be best described as the part that points out the two parties: the gullible and the greedy. The gullible party is the Government of the day the Labour Government which has quite clearly decided that any old story that any group of Maori may like to bring along to it will be put on the table for consideration. Previous speakers have made it clear that as far as Parliament was concerned this issue was dealt with in 1992 and was then subsequently handled by way of treaty settlement in 1996 and over a number of years since then whereby treaty settlors were given the ability to pick up allocation. So the question is this: why are we here today to require that any new area set aside for marine farming be divided up in such a way that up to 40 percent of that new area is given to Maori? 
And let us be clear that the area is not given to just any Maori because this is where the greedy party comes in. The allocation will be given to Te Ohu Kai Moana Trustee. If any Maori in this country believes he or she will get some benefit from that trusteeship at some point down the line then I say he or she will have a very very long wait for that. There is little doubt that the recent fisheries settlement bill that was rushed through Parliament and passed by the Labour Government—at the point where it had been bent over backwards by the old guard that runs the Maori Fisheries Commission—left this country in a state whereby Te Ohu Kai Moana Trustee is a group that sits between the beneficiary the owner of the asset and the administrators themselves. So to ensure that that old-guard group known as the Maori Fisheries Commission continued to have its little sinecure set aside for itself the trustees have gone to the Government and asked it to give them a big chunk of the aquaculture industry as well. 
We know that the system will be such that those in the group will keep the funds that may flow from these areas in their back pocket to pay their fees and that the funds will go nowhere near the people who expect to benefit from the asset. Not only is it bad for New Zealand to have such a race-based allocation of asset going on but it is also bad for those individuals who think they will get something out of it. It is quite clear in this legislation that the value of the asset will be determined by the old group of seven—the elite Maori who sit on the board of Te Ohu Kai Moana Trustee—acting as the trustees and that the company acting as the trustee will itself decide on how much of the benefit will be passed down the line. 
That leads us to the real point here. We have a bill that is supposed to settle an issue—that is to settle something that Parliament understood was previously settled—but that will create nothing but grievance further down the track. At the time of the passing of the Maori Fisheries Bill I predicted that before too long those who were supposed to benefit from it would come back to Parliament and say: “Help look what you’ve done to us. We need to be got out of this.” And here is another lot. This is a bill that will simply see grievance further embedded into Maori culture. This will not be an allocation that lifts people out of the sort of economic deprivation we see in so many parts of the country and provides new opportunities for them. 
R DOUG WOOLERTON (NZ First) 
: 
 This reminds me of what happened in the Primary Production Committee when those members were rushing around trying to find evidence that something had gone on. Somebody had said something. I want to bring people’s attention to the fact that the purpose of Part 5 is to “provide a full and final settlement of Maori claims to commercial aquaculture”. [ 
Interruption 
] Well that does not actually matter very much because I understand that the Government has pre-empted claims. [ 
Interruption 
] Is that not so? That is what it looks like to me. I did not hear Government members get excited in the select committee. 
Hon David Carter 
: They never did any work. 
R DOUG WOOLERTON 
: Well I thought this was a Government bill. Somebody must have done some work somewhere. But let us not get carried away. The boys and girls are having so much fun getting excited about nothing. 
The fact is that 20 percent of the area has been set down to go to Maori interests. It is just 20 percent of an increased space in the ocean—not costed by anybody; it is just a little extra. It is not as though there is not enough ocean or anything like that or that it is being robbed off anybody or anything— 
Hon Dr Nick Smith 
: Don’t be naive. 
R DOUG WOOLERTON 
: I am not naive. What is naive here is to say that the 20 percent is coming off the present players or that it is coming out of somebody’s backyard. This is new space that we are talking about and there is plenty of ocean. I think that a perfectly sensible thing to do is to allocate a little more space at the beginning of the Act in order to make sure that things are tidied up early in the piece. But our friends in the National Party and in ACT cannot come to grips with something that forestalls a fight. They cannot come to grips with anything that staves off anger or anything like that. They want to have a fight and believe they have not won anything or done anything unless there is a fight. We in New Zealand First say that the Government of the day whose bill this is—it is not our bill—has decided to put that 20 percent in. It is a 20 percent allocation of freshwater space and we say we agree with that. 
METIRIA TUREI (Green) 
: 
 Is it not hysterical that here we have an amendment to the Foreshore and Seabed Act only 19 days after it was passed in this Parliament? It is only 13 days since that Act received the royal assent and the Government is putting in a Supplementary Order Paper amending the Foreshore and Seabed Act using the Aquaculture Reform Bill as its little tool. It is just another example of this Government’s use and abuse of parliamentary procedure of the democracy we have in this country to make the changes it wants to make to legislation. 
The Foreshore and Seabed Act is a travesty. It is an act of aggression. Thousands of New Zealanders recognised that travesty and fought so hard to prevent the bill from turning into an Act. We all know that the Foreshore and Seabed Act is a moral mistake. It takes from one section of our society the right to go to court to have its property interests investigated and clarified. New Zealanders are horrified at the theft of access to justice by this Government through the Foreshore and Seabed Act. We all know that the Foreshore and Seabed Act is an ethical mistake. A group of citizens went to court and they won their case. The Government lost. The Government’s response to its loss was to abuse its power as a lawmaking institution claim absolute parliamentary sovereignty and change the law to suit its failed legal argument. 
But here is the first of no doubt a long series of examples of the miserable practical mistakes that the Foreshore and Seabed Act is. The Government’s indecent haste to pass this legislation has meant that it has mistakenly confiscated millions of dollars worth of property from local authorities—property like Britomart Wellington Airport the Viaduct Basin and Victoria Park. That land is now owned by central government because of a stupid mistake made by the Government and New Zealand First. 
How terrible for the Hon Dr Michael Cullen! He made a multimillion-dollar mistake. He went to hui across the country and told Maori that they did not like the Foreshore and Seabed Bill because they did not understand it. Here we now have it. We know who did not understand that bill. Michael Cullen did not understand it and in not understanding it he has made a multimillion-dollar mistake that he is now trying to fix up through a cynical quick-fix solution that will cover his embarrassment about his mistake. 
This issue which is addressed in a Supplementary Order Paper should have been sorted out at the select committee but the Government and New Zealand First refused to allow the select committee enough time to deal with the issues in the bill and try to discover these sorts of stupid mistakes. They refused the requests from hundreds of submitters for the opportunity to be heard. Those submitters may well have identified mistakes that may yet be the subject of sneaky little quick fixes like this Supplementary Order Paper on the Aquaculture Reform Bill. 
Even the officials who had to work late into the night in order to get the Foreshore and Seabed Bill ready cannot be held responsible for this mistake. The Government’s indecent haste has meant that the select committee did not have enough time even to talk about possible changes to the bill and report back to the community in a way that respected the seriousness of the consequences of the legislation. The Government was in a massive rush to pass the foreshore and seabed legislation before Christmas and in doing so it has made a multimillion-dollar mistake. 
The Green Party recognises the need to remedy that mistake—land wrongly confiscated from local government. It is not without considerable irony that I note that the Government is going to such extraordinarily sneaky lengths to return this wrongly confiscated land to its rightful owners—the local councils and the people of this country. Of course the sole purpose of the Foreshore and Seabed Act was to confiscate only Maori land not land that belonged to local councils. 
The Greens recognise that the Supplementary Order Paper is a cynical manoeuvre by the Government to fix this one mistake at this time in this flawed process. Without doubt there will be further stupid mistakes discovered in the Foreshore and Seabed Act that will have to be remedied. I say to the Government that it should fess up that the whole Foreshore and Seabed Act was one huge dumb unjust mistake. It should fess up that it should never have happened and that the Act will cause only more problems be more divisive endanger the ecological security of our coast and further alienate mana whenua in their own country. I tell the Government to fess up and fix the problem. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH (National—Nelson) 
: 
 What is so important about this debate on Part 5 is that New Zealanders have learnt that the only two parties in this Parliament that can be relied upon to bring an end to the treaty grievance industry are the National and ACT parties. I find it particularly extraordinary that New Zealand First which campaigned on ending the grievance industry would vote for Part 5 which will result in hundreds of millions of dollars of resource being handed over. 
R Doug Woolerton 
: A bit of extra water. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: I say to Doug Woolerton that people in Hamilton may not understand what aquaculture means but that we in Nelson and Marlborough do. This part is as good as writing out a cheque to Maoridom for $200 million or $300 million or more. That the young member Darren Hughes does not give a hoot about handing away public resource solely on the basis of race is one reason why those members opposite will lose their seats at the next general election. It is so interesting to reflect back on the 1992 fisheries settlement. 
Jim Peters 
: Were you there? 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: I have looked at the  
Hansard 
. As my colleague David Carter quite properly asked when was it ever stated back in 1992 that aquaculture was unfinished business? Who said that? Did Winston Peters ask in 1992 about aquaculture? No he did not. Did any member of the Labour Party ask in 1992 about aquaculture? Did Rick Barker—who is over-excited and who knows that he is wrong that he is further in the treaty grievance industry and that this is unprincipled legislation based solely on dishing out public resources on the basis of race—or any other Labour member say at the time of the settlement that aquaculture was unfinished business? I have looked through every single page of the  
Hansard 
 
and not one member of the House said anywhere that there was a further issue with regard to commercial fishing and aquaculture. 
Jim Peters 
: You voted for a 20 percent threshold. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: I tell members to hang on for a second. The New Zealand First member Jim Peters campaigned at the last election on ending the grievance industry. The member was going to end it. That has to be the biggest have ever. Let me tell members how it will work. One of my constituents whom I met at the weekend has worked in the aquaculture industry for 30 years. He is a good Kiwi battler. He is one of the pioneers of that industry. He has created an industry that creates hundreds of millions of dollars of wealth for our country. We are saying to that 55-year-old Nelsonian: “Sorry bud you missed out. Your skin is the wrong colour. Because you are not Maori you will be treated as a second-class citizen when it comes to allocating aquaculture space.” I say to Mr Benson-Pope that that is wrong. 
Hon David Benson-Pope 
: No. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: The Minister says ‘No”. Let us look at what Part 5 states. The Minister in the chair is saying that Maori will get access to that aquaculture space due to their having preferential treatment over anybody else. What is it about Labour members who believe that somehow Maori are inferior? They are New Zealanders like everybody else. They have the same right to go to their regional council to apply for aquaculture space so why in this part are we giving them additional rights? Why will they automatically get 20 percent of the space? 
R Doug Woolerton 
: You set a precedent. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: I say to Mr Woolerton the member from Hamilton—who campaigned on ending treaty grievances and who will allocate another $200 million to the Maori bureaucracy—and to those in New Zealand First that every New Zealander now knows that New Zealand First members cannot be relied upon. There will be no full and final settlements while this sort of policy is adopted. 
LARRY BALDOCK (United Future) 
: 
 I rise to speak on the amendment to clause 105B set out on Supplementary Order Paper 322 in the name of the Hon David Benson-Pope which corrects an anomaly in section 18 of the Foreshore and Seabed Act. As the member before me has mentioned that legislation was rushed through Parliament several weeks ago. Many of us who opposed that legislation—not so much because of its content but because of the indecent haste with which it was being put through Parliament—warned the Government that there could be unforeseen mistakes in it. In fact in my minority report on the Foreshore and Seabed Bill I mentioned the fact that Local Government New Zealand might be quite concerned about some of the unforeseen issues that would arise. No one would have thought there would be as large an unforeseen issue as this which would be the biggest land-grab ever. The problems with the treaty issues and the confiscations in the 1800s pale into insignificance when it comes to central government taking most of downtown Wellington and prime pieces of real estate in my home city of Tauranga. There would be some land affected in Auckland as well. I raised an issue in my minority report about whether the Government could make compensation for the land it took. Well Dr Cullen’s huge surplus would disappear overnight if he were to pay compensation for that land-grab off local government. 
I have an image in my mind of Winston Peters towards the end of the debate on that legislation standing up and saying that New Zealand First had fixed the legislation and had taken care of it all. A number of the New Zealand First members stood up one after another and said they had done a great job of fixing the problems for New Zealand. I said to them at the time that if you want to claim credit for having fixed the legislation you must also take responsibility if you have not. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Clem Simich) 
: The member should not bring the Chair into the debate; he should use members’ full names. 
LARRY BALDOCK 
: I apologise; I will not bring you into it. I said that if the New Zealand First members were going to claim credit for having fixed that legislation they would also have to take responsibility for any mistakes that appeared. Here one does appear and it is a huge huge mistake. Of course it has to be fixed and of course we cannot blame the officials who worked so hard on that legislation but it is such an illustration of how we get things wrong when we rush things through under urgency without having a proper process for submitters to come and share their wisdom with us. 
The wonderful thing about the parliamentary process is that when submitters come and share their views they bring great wisdom to the table. They see things that perhaps we do not see here in Wellington when we look at legislation. I am sure that someone from Local Government New Zealand would have seen that glaring error and pointed it out to us had we had the opportunity over the summer to let people look at a draft of the bill before we then come back to it and pass it early next year. So it is unfortunate that we have made that huge mistake. I believe the people of Tauranga will be very very concerned about what their local member has done in contributing to that and conspiring with the Government to take away much of The Strand and some other very valuable pieces of real estate in Tauranga. 
United Future will be very happy to step up tonight and give our support to the Government in order for it to be able to make that alteration and correct the error. 
STEPHEN FRANKS (ACT) 
: 
 Part 5 of the Aquaculture Reform Bill has disgraceful provisions that bluntly appeal to race prejudice and appease threats as Mr Walton acknowledged. What was it he said—“head off trouble before it arises”? The provisions bluntly admit that they have nothing to do with the treaty. The clauses simply state that they relate to Maori commercial aquaculture claims settlements. There is nothing to do with the treaty in the heading and next to nothing to do with it in the clauses. Clause 61 “Settlement of claims” applies to all claims by Maori in respect of commercial aquaculture activities whether they are founded on rights arising in common law the Treaty of Waitangi or otherwise. Well they are otherwise founded because there is nothing in the treaty that justifies Maori claiming 20 percent—or any part—of aquaculture. Aquaculture was not even capable of ownership until a few years ago. Aquaculture is simply not capable of ownership until one can delineate and designate the areas that will be subject to it. It was not considered that we farmed the sea in that way. The notion that in some way the promise in the treaty of property rights and equal rights has been or could have been breached in relation to aquaculture is simply fanciful. 
Having noted the excellent speeches that have covered the general principles I want to look at some specific provisions. Clause 63A states that the space to be allocated to Maori must be of an economic size. It goes on to state under subclause (2): “However if it is not possible for a regional council to comply with … [that] the regional council must identify new space that is of an economic size even though the new space is not representative.” That will tie up local authorities iwi—or the iwi trustee—and other claimants before the courts for years. Councils are directed to find that 20 percent and to allocate it as representative of all the new space including a representative portion of amounts that are subject to reservations and then they are told that the space must be of an economic size. If a space is not of an economic size even though it is representative then councils must identify a new space that comprises a single area. Can members just imagine lawyers crawling over this legislation? It is all so subjective that anyone who wants to get a negotiating advantage will be able to tie this legislation up in court for as long as he or she wishes. Once again we will see our aquaculture tied up not because there is any justified claim but simply because of the delay in the procedure that this bill consciously sets out. 
It gets worse than that. When we look at allocations in respect of staged developments and harbours under clause 63B(1)(b) we see: “… that space must be representative of the new space available at each stage of the staged development or harbour;”. That 20 percent will obviously produce uneconomic areas. Some of the stages will be suitable for only one farm yet the space has to be given. We then go on to see that by the year 2014 the Government is supposed to have provided a value that is the equivalent of 20 percent of the existing space. The year 2014 is 10 years from now yet this process is expected to be still going on then. I believe that the National Party and the ACT party should make a pledge right now that the moment they get into power they will cancel the process and that if there is any space that has not been allocated at that stage all bets are off. It is a windfall in any event but there is no part of this racist provision that would survive longer than 60 days after the coming into power of an ACT and National Government. 
Certainly from ACT’s perspective we would vote to terminate a piece of racist theft like this the moment we had the ability to do so. It is quite possible to do so because this legislation contemplates that the process will go on for years. Anyone who has been involved in this bill knows and I am sure that the officials are well aware that none of the space will be allocated before the courts have crawled over it. 
PHIL HEATLEY (National—Whangarei) 
: 
 I would like to address directly Rodney Hide’s question to the Committee tonight which was: how long do members think this settlement will last with this Government? We know that treaty settlements with this Government—full and final settlements—last only a matter of years. My answer to Rodney Hide as to how long this treaty settlement will last is simply to say that if he would take today’s Order Paper and flick through it he will find that 32 bills are listed under Government Orders of the Day and after those comes the Ngati Awa Claims Settlement Bill which has an aquaculture component. 
Debate interrupted. 
Sitting suspended from 10 p.m. to 9 a.m. (Wednesday)