Parker DavidHon NATHAN GUY (National—Ōtaki): Part 2 is all about fast tracking and I will use my inside voice—CHAIRPERSON (Hon Ruth Dyson): The microphone is working—the microphone's working.Hon NATHAN GUY: It is; it's an open and live mike yes—inside voice required. Part 2 is all about fast tracking as I said but you may not have heard that!I want to focus specifically on clause 16(1) which is about referrals of a project requiring ministerial sign-off by the Minister for the Environment and the Minister of Conservation. So I'm particularly interested—and we transgressed this in the committee stage or the whole committee—because we've got a time frame on the panel and it's roughly about two months give or take that the panel has to make a decision.There's no time frame on Ministers. So you could end up in a situation where you have a Minister—let's say the Minister currently in the chair from the Labour Party and the Minister of Conversation from the Green Party. Now both of those Ministers may not necessarily agree to the specific project that's being requested to be called in and it relates to coastal marine area this one. So what safeguards can the Minister or what reassurance can the Minister give the committee that there won't be filibustering going on between one Minister who might be from a different political party but still in Government who requests more and more information from officials to slow down the process when this whole bill is about fast tracking and securing jobs and growing our economy?I have a real concern that you could have an example—and we saw it with different Ministers over the last 12 18 months with the Waihī mine where one Minister agreed and the other Minister didn't. So I'm concerned that this clause here about referrals of projects clause 16(1) where—CHAIRPERSON (Hon Ruth Dyson): I'm really sorry to interrupt the member. The time has come for the dinner break. The House will continue this debate at 7.30 p.m.Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m.Hon NATHAN GUY: Thank you Madam Chair. I hope you've had a good dinner like I did with my lovely family. Anyway now talking about this bill that we are debating this evening which to remind those listeners is the COVID-19 Recovery (Fast-track Consenting) Bill.I had a question that I'd like to put to the Minister and I'll just recap on that. He's one of the brighter ones in Cabinet so I'm sure he's taken it down but just in case he's forgotten during the dinner break it was around Part 2 clause 16(1) around whether if there was a delay at all hypothetically between the Minister for the Environment and the Minister of Conservation around basically getting agreement on a coastal marine area what safeguards would the applicant—might be the council might be a particular industry private company—have that that process didn't take forever and a day? And if one Minister—let's take an example at the moment. We have a live example. Minister Sage is Minister of Conservation from the Green Party and Minister Parker from the Labour Party—let's say that they don't agree. So I would be concerned and keen to hear from the Minister what safeguards would be in place to ensure that one Minister just didn't continue to get more advice and more advice to slow down this process.We've had an example of that occurring reasonably recently where Ministers didn't agree and that was to do with the OceanaGold application to take over a farm—what's commonly called the Waihī mine up North where they wanted to put tailings on a particular farm from my memory and Ministers didn't agree. So I'm keen to hear from the Minister in the chair the Hon David Parker what assurance he can give myself and others in the Parliament this evening that this fast-track bill won't be delayed unnecessarily if one Minister doesn't agree continuing to go backwards and forwards to get more advice and actually slowing down what we all want which is jobs in our communities on the back of COVID-19? Thank you.Hon DAVID PARKER (Minister for the Environment): Thank you. There is concurrence required between the Ministers of Conversation and for the Environment in respect of a proposal in the marine area. The member will be aware that there's precedent for that and he would have had experience from when he had fisheries responsibility in respect of various other things that have happened in the marine space that require concurrence between the Minister of Fisheries and the Minister of Conservation. But in respect of these I don't think many applications are actually going to be in the marine area but some will be. The way in which—Hon Nathan Guy: You could have a salmon farm one. That's a live example—farm switch.Hon DAVID PARKER: The way in which the Government is able to reach conclusions around those areas is actually illustrated in this very bill where at page 38 there's a map of one of the projects that's in the listed projects which is Picton Harbour which includes areas in the marine area where parties in the Government have been able to agree that that's an appropriate project for listing.In respect of time lines more generally—sorry so with—Hon Nathan Guy: It was more about two Ministers not agreeing and one filibustering taking forever and seeking advice.Hon DAVID PARKER: Well with concurrence it's always possible for one Minister to withhold their agreement—it's always been the case. So there is no time limit around that. But more generally there's a list of other Ministers that I as Minister for the Environment have to consult with and they are listed—I just had it there but I've managed to turn the page—and there is a 10 working-day period. For the listeners this is on page 17 in clause 21(6). It says I've got to consult with the various Ministers listed there and they've got 10 working days to reply. If they don't I can proceed anyway. If they do so late well so long as I haven't taken my decision I can receive their input late but if I've already made by decision it's too late.