Heatley Phil: Aquaculture Legislation Amendment Bill — Second Reading In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Heatley Phil: Aquaculture Legislation Amendment Bill — Second Reading In Committee 
[Sitting date: 23 September 2008. Volume:650;Page:18995. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
PHIL HEATLEY (National—Whangarei) 
: 
 I acknowledge my colleague and the chairman of the Primary Production Committee David Carter—a man who is quick to his feet with a sharp mind and who helped navigate the select committee through its consideration of the Aquaculture Legislation Amendment Bill. I look forward like most members of the House to— 
R Doug Woolerton 
: He’s got no idea what he’s talking about. 
PHIL HEATLEY 
: Oh well there is Doug Woolerton toeing the party lie. We see that he is over there contributing to this House and we look forward to his integrity perhaps shining through when he speaks about this bill. I imagine it is very difficult to present that type of face to the country at the moment.  
I will return to the legislation. As the Hon Lianne Dalziel said on behalf of the Minister for the Environment this bill amends four Acts: the Fisheries Act 1996 the Resource Management Act the Aquaculture Reform (Repeals and Traditional Provisions) Act and the Maori Commercial Aquaculture Claims Settlement Act. That is why this legislation will be divided into four bills.  
The bill addresses the Environment Court decision of 9 May 2006. There was a difficulty there where a whole bunch of investors had applied for aquaculture space—marine-farming space—that was not deemed an aquaculture management area through the processes of the new Act which came into effect on 1 January 2005. Two things fell out of that. Firstly there were difficulties over what effect on fishing the marine-farming area would have and secondly there was an issue around the settlement with Maori—the 20 percent provision of new aquaculture space that was to be passed over to Maori as aquaculture developed in this country. Of course that was the provision of 20 percent of existing aquaculture space that Maori were entitled to in the form of cash aquaculture area purchased by the Crown or new aquaculture space. Those applications at the top of the South Island threw a spanner in the works so to speak and a court case ensued. This legislation seeks to fix that.  
There is some irony particularly in the Minister’s speech where she talked about the need for this legislation that in the relatively small area applied for Maori will get 20 percent of the marine farm area to be developed down there in the future. I say that because it has been over 1300 days since the Labour Government’s aquaculture reforms came into effect. The total area of new aquaculture management areas which are the areas where marine farming that did not previously exist that has developed in those 1300 days of marine farming now amounts to—and members need to get their pens out because I need them to write down this number—zero. I want the House to know that none zero zilch zip nothing has been created in the way of aquaculture management areas in over 1300 days—over 3 years—since those reforms were put in place. No new aquaculture management areas new marine farms or new areas have been created in that time under Labour’s legislation. Is that not absolutely appalling?  
Maori were to get 20 percent of the new space that was to be created—that is one-fifth of the new space for those members who are struggling. I want members to get out their pens and paper again because we will do a little sum. Are members ready? Essentially Maori have one-fifth or 20 percent of however much has been created in 3 years. So 20 percent of zero or nothing zip or zilch means that Maori have not received a single square metre of new marine-farming space in over 3 years anywhere in the country. Is that not an absolute disgrace?  
But the Minister has brought into this House some legislation that will patch up a small area at the top of the South Island and I tell members that the National Party will support it. Why are we supporting it when it goes very little towards fixing a 3 or 4-year problem? We think that anything we can do to help marine farmers is at least something so we may as well support this legislation even if it is only incremental. Could the Labour Government have done much better? It certainly could have done better than zero. We will help it to do this small amount; we will be supporting this legislation particularly given the input of National members on the select committee.  
The irony of the Minister’s initial speech about passing this legislation for Maori is of course that Maori have received nothing in terms of aquaculture space—20 percent of new space created—because no new aquaculture space has been created anywhere in New Zealand. Marine farmers in a mainstream sense across New Zealand have not received any new space and Maori have certainly not received any percentage of that. Therefore they are no better off after the promises of over 3 years ago.  
Hone Harawira might remember that there was a bit of quid pro quo 3 or 4 years ago when Labour said to Maori: “We will do you a deal. Stop marching for the seabed and foreshore and we will give you some marine-farming space.” Maori now have neither so I will be very interested to hear Hone Harawira’s speech shortly.  
It is true that this bill is very very complex. It reflects some of the fundamental problems with the underlying legislation. We know that it will go only a small way to fix it up—it is a sticking plaster approach—but we are happy to support it.  
During the course of the Committee stage I will speak about particular areas and particular clauses of the bill because we had some issues to resolve when the legislation first came to the House. The first issue regarded the way that new marine-farming space affects those who fish. Members can appreciate that if there is a marine farm across the surface of the water it is very difficult for fishermen to run a trawl line to run nets or to fish in that same area. They are essentially locked out of a geographical area of the sea. What happens is that there is a fisheries test—an impact assessment if you like—to show how a marine farm put in that area would impact commercial recreational or customary fishers.  
Unfortunately previously the Act was not clear about the negotiations between marine farmers and fishers to make it fair for parties so that they could both be satisfied that a marine farm could be put in place. It states that the parties have 6 months to undertake those negotiations but it was not clear as to when the 6 month-period started. The 6-month period was a bit open-ended so we have closed that loophole and identified when it is to begin.  
We have also looked at the issue of the regional council definition because believe it or not when the original Act was passed the Government when it identified regional councils in the Act it did not put in a definition of what a regional council was. Unfortunately under the Local Government Act the councils of Marlborough Tasman Nelson and Gisborne which are all unitary authorities—they have regional and district council functions—are excluded from the Act. But in this legislation before us we say that those councils should be recognised as if they were regional councils.