Whaitiri Meka: Environmental Protection Authority (Protection of Environment) Amendment Bill — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeWhaitiri Meka: Environmental Protection Authority (Protection of Environment) Amendment Bill — Second Reading[Sitting date: 02 March 2016. Volume:711;Page:9353. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]MEKA WHAITIRI (Labour—Ikaroa-Rāwhiti): I move That the Environmental Protection Authority (Protection of Environment) Amendment Bill be now read a second time. It is my pleasure to speak on the report back of the bill after it has been considered by the Local Government and Environment Committee. Clearly Labour is supporting this bill in the House at its second reading. May I first and foremost acknowledge the support of New Zealand First the Greens the Māori Party and United Future in supporting this bill to the select committee. Can I also while I am on my feet acknowledge the many submitters who came from a wide-ranging field of expertise from many of our national non-Government agencies in the environmental space and Te Rūnanga o Ngāi Tahu and Ngāti Kahungunu iwi who felt it was important to make a submission on my bill.This bill amends the Environmental Protection Authority Act 2011 by adding an additional objective: that the organisation must aim to protect maintain and enhance New Zealand’s environment. When the Act was passed the stated objective of the Environmental Protection Authority contained an important oversight in that it did not actually require the protection of the environment as part of the authority’s role. This bill aims to correct that. What the bill does is place protection of New Zealand’s precious natural environment right at the heart of the law governing the Environmental Protection Authority. The bill does this by cementing in legislation the Environmental Protection Authority’s role in protecting the environment by amending section 12(1) by inserting the following paragraph: “(c) protects maintains and enhances New Zealand’s environment.”We had close to 200 submissions on this bill in select committee. Actually there were 206 submissions that we received—198 supported the bill and eight opposed the bill—and in the time I have got I would like to address the eight opposition views and what the officials fromboth the Ministry for the Environment and the Environmental Protection Authority said. Essentially the opponents of this bill made their position clear the bill was unnecessary amending the principal Act would create uncertainty and confusion the bill would impose delays and impose costs the amendment would prioritise the environmental protection over economic growth and sustainable management goals the bill would alter the scope of the Environmental Protection Authority and the amendment would create conflict with the Resource Management Act.Turning to the feedback from both the Ministry for the Environment and the Environmental Protection Authority there are comments there—from the Environmental Protection Authority particularly—saying that by adding this particular paragraph we are creating a new test in the account that potentially conflicts with the purpose principles and other considerations that the Environment Act may bring. That is the point. For a lot of the submitters who came to the select committee this amended bill actually clarifies the role of the Environmental Protection Authority. It makes it really clear by adding that objective that it is there to protect the environment. There is no ambiguity with those sets of words. They are very very clear and so I again challenge the findings of the Environmental Protection Authority when it alluded to the fact that this is only going to create another test and lead to further confusion.By way of example in its report to the select committee it referenced the unnecessary aspect of this particular amendment by saying it would lead to a particular conflict: managing the resources in a way that provides for people’s economic well-being may conflict with the requirements to protect and maintain and enhance the environment. But again that goes to the whole point of this bill because it makes it really clear that in addition to managing our environment it actually protects the environment. So I challenge that point in the feedback from officials.The other comment is the fact that the additional objective of the Environmental Protection Authority Act would likely have a negative effect on exploration companies and it is no surprise that the eight opposing submitters to my bill were actually exploration and petroleum companies. The point that they made was that by putting this in here it will cause uncertainty for those companies seeking exploration permits. They said it will be unclear it will be costly and the process will be extended and therefore they had complete difficulty with this amendment. But again I would say to the House that having the protection as a clear objective for the authority would make it very clear to oil exploration companies or mineral exploring companies that when they put in a proposal they need to make sure that it is not impacting on the environment.I turn to those submitters and I do want to quote from some of the submitters because they probably said it best as to why we need to support this amendment. I will talk specifically around the duplicated effort view that was proffered by the majority members of the select committee to basically say that this was an unnecessary bill. We had a submission from Te Rūnanga o Ngāi Tahu who made it really clear that this enabled the authority to apply another lens on consideration of permits. I think that it not only applied another lens but also ensured that the obligations entered into by Te Rūnanga o Ngāi Tahu through its Treaty settlement upheld the principles and guaranteed them under their particular settlement. [Interruption] I thought that was your bell Mr Assistant Speaker.Scott Simpson: Somebody else’s bell.MEKA WHAITIRI: Someone else’s bell. But in asking for the support of the members who first got this passed off to the select committee I say it is important to note that those who submitted be it Te Rūnanga o Ngāi Tahu the Sustainable Council of New Zealand or the Fish and Game Council—the support was overwhelming from the 198 submissions in that it made clear sense it was unambiguous it was first and foremost about protecting the environment and sending a very very clear signal that our economic development should not come at the expense of our environment. In fact our view on this side of the House was that when the officials advised the committee that it took an either/or approach one of the suggestions that we made during our select committee deliberation was that we look forward to officials giving advice where we look for and/ands—and there were plenty of examples in the submissions that we got that gave both protection for the environment as well as enabling development down the end.So from our side of the House this is an important piece of legislation and I hope parties across the House will give due consideration to supporting it. It is about our environment it is about our opportunity and it is about our image and who we are in this global world that makes us unique as Māori people and as New Zealanders. I commend this bill to the House.