Auchinvole Chris: Waste Minimisation Bill — In Committee 
Auchinvole Chris: Waste Minimisation Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:648;Page:17581] 
CHRIS AUCHINVOLE (National) 
: 
 I would like to take a very brief call on the Waste Minimisation Bill in part to support my friend and colleague Eric Roy because he is a rural dweller. I am sure we have had similar experiences. 
I have been fortunate enough to live in places like Devonport which was the first borough to start intensive classification of rubbish collection and to sort rubbish into biodegradable rubbish and that which could be reused. It was a good population there and it was very rare that at the end of a Saturday there was anything left at all except household rubbish fit only for throwing away. Everything else was recycled. It was a grand social event. It was beautifully tidy there was no smell and everything was categorised. A guy was imported from the United States to do it and rubbish was not a problem. One had to have a little sticker on one’s car to gain entry or exit. 
Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m. 
CHRIS AUCHINVOLE 
: To cut to the chase and not use all the 4 minutes I have remaining I would like to express the sincere hope that the Committee really has given full regard to the implications of this part. 
I mentioned that my baptism in waste management was in Devonport which I think was the first borough to specialise in sorting rubbish—and it was very very effective. I then went to Moana—at Lake Brunner on the West Coast—which had a traditional old-fashioned dump. There was no problem with leachate because it ran straight into the Arnold River which ran into the Grey River which ran out to sea. It was appalling but it did not last too long. When I was chair of the community association we started to make some effective changes and we now have a very effective recycling centre. Indeed Greymouth has a very sophisticated tip—if we call them tips nowadays—that copes with all forms of rubbish. 
But I note that the Minister for the Environment Trevor Mallard has insisted that there be no rubbish tips with a view on the West Coast. Therefore rubbish from Haast and Jackson Bay has to be dragged all the way up north to Greymouth. Let us remember that tourists going to that area produce 1.8 kilograms—those are the statistically correct figures—of rubbish per day. The Department of Conservation’s solution to having to empty rubbish bins was to take away the bins in the hope that tourists would take out what they brought in. Any rubbish collector who works for the Westland District Council will tell us that tourists certainly do not take out their rubbish. I hope this bill is designed for more than aspiration and I hope it will take into account the practical implications of rubbish collection and removal as well as the levies. 
As we are talking about levies let us remember that entrepreneurial people abound. Before we used the centralised dump at Greymouth near Runanga it was decided that each community could retain its own dump for the limited period of its approval from the regional council. An entrepreneurial young gentleman worked for a joinery company which was asked by Dobson ratepayers why it was dumping its rubbish for free in the Dobson dump when in fact it should have been paying to put it into the Greymouth dump. It turned out that the joinery company was paying the young guy $7 every time he took out the rubbish but because he lived at Dobson he knew he could dump it for free there. We have to take account of the entrepreneurial spirit of young guys who drive trucks. 
But seriously I would appreciate hearing from the bill’s promoter Russel Norman so we can hear that he appreciates the fact that the Buller District Council I think is considering a contract to dispose of its rubbish in Nelson. There are huge costs involved in moving rubbish. I would like to hear—and I am sure I will be able to take back—the Committee’s considerations on some of the distances imposed on areas that have a very low rating base.