Mallard Trevor: Rugby World Cup 2011 (Empowering) Bill — First Reading 
Mallard Trevor: Rugby World Cup 2011 (Empowering) Bill — First Reading 
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Hon TREVOR MALLARD (Labour—Hutt South) 
: 
 I thank the Acting Minister for his introductory speech which sounded a bit like it had been drafted in another office. It did not really sound like him. It sounded like his heart was perhaps not quite in it in the way that it may otherwise be. 
I will make it clear from the beginning that the Labour Opposition will support the Rugby World Cup 2011 (Empowering) Bill going to a select committee. I think it is important that that select committee has hearings especially in Auckland to work through the issues in the bill. But I do make it clear to the Minister that it may well be that Labour does not support it further unless some of our concerns around the bill are sorted out. 
I say to the Minister that our primary concern with this legislation is the power that is left in the hands of a Minister for liquor licensing town planning and resource consent issues in a way that in my opinion is inconsistent. I thank Mr McCully and his office for the consultation that has occurred to date and I think this bill is better than it was when we first saw drafts of it. But the concern that I have is that even with the guiding hand of the Minister for Economic Development I am not sure that any Minister should be making decisions about roads being opened or closed buildings being developed bars being opened or closed or licences being taken away or granted. My view is that our system works better when we have people who have a proper judicial or senior legal background making those decisions rather than those decisions being in the end political decisions. The legislation is drafted at the moment so that although a Minister must receive the recommendation from the Rugby World Cup Authority he is not obliged to take it. I think that is an issue that has to be worked through. 
As to the necessity for having legislation there are two areas that convince me that it is necessary. One is that in the end we do not know what we do not know. There could well be something that becomes apparent quite late in the process where we will need to have changes made that would go across normal resource consent procedures especially the time frames involved in those. There is a degree of unpredictability about what that might be. Some of it might happen right up until or even during the Rugby World Cup—for example if there is a transport planning problem that becomes apparent in Auckland and planning for particular streets needs to be changed. If it was in Wellington there would not be a problem as the local authority has systems that could do it relatively quickly. 
Then we get on to what the second problem is which is Auckland. Auckland at the best of times is not good at handling major events. Its regulatory processes are not good. Its ability to do things— 
Jacinda Ardern 
: It’s not our fault. 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD 
: Well it is not the fault of that soon-to-be local member for Auckland Central. I am sure that if we had the election early and Jacinda was the local member as she will be after the next election this bill would be unnecessary as within a couple of weeks she would have sorted the council out. 
The point I am trying to make in a serious vein is that Auckland has generally not been as good at accommodating events as Wellington Christchurch and to a lesser extent Dunedin because Auckland does not have things quite on the same scale. On top of that we have the super-city and its development. It will be about a year old and still developing its systems at the point of the Rugby World Cup. Many of those decisions need to be made well before then. 
I do not have a problem with the development of an authority and I do not have a problem with the time frames being more limited than they would otherwise be although I will say to people that they should not rely on this system. If they can get their approval under a standard system now they would be better to do it on that basis and have something that is enduring rather than just for the Rugby World Cup. Also I think people should not get the expectation that approvals will be anything like automatic under this legislation. This legislation does not change the basis for making the decisions or the things that have to be weighed up. The rules are not essentially changed in terms of the substantive balance required for making the decisions. I think there will be more consistency and that will be good but people should not rely on this. 
One of the concerns I have about the bill and the reason I am supporting a relatively limited select committee period is the fact that it has taken so long to get the bill to the House. It was my expectation that this legislation would be introduced in the first half of 2009 and we now see it about a year later than we thought it should be. I am not particularly criticising; in fact probably my own intervention held it up by a month or so in order to attempt to get it improved. But things would have been better if this had been in place at some time in the past and things could have been moved along. 
The other point that I make is that I am not in a position where I have any great concerns around the running of the tournament itself. I am sure the games and the arrangements will work well. I am pretty pleased with the development of the stadia. I took the opportunity to have a quick glance at the Forsyth Barr Stadium at University Plaza in Dunedin when I was down there for the weekend. It was opposite the nude rugby. I say this as a slight by the way; I was a touch judge on the adjoining ground to where the nude rugby game was being played and I spent quite a lot of time avoiding being photographed looking in that particular direction. 
Michael Woodhouse 
: Were you wearing dark glasses? 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD 
: No I was not wearing dark glasses but I was deliberately keeping my back as far as possible to that game. 
The point I am making is the stadium looks like it is making good progress. Certainly Eden Park is making good progress as well. There have been a number of areas including I understand in the Hawke’s Bay where things are completed to the point they need to be and that is good. There are some minor issues around Eden Park more around the public transport arrangements. My understanding is that the last bit of those will have to be put in place as a result through this legislation and I think that is something that would be useful. 
Another point I will make is I am getting a bit concerned at the leverage activity. As an aside I ask how come as we have all that great publicity coming back from South Africa there are no Tourism New Zealand stands. The organisation is meant to be supporting us and we have put money into it for media purposes—basic things like having New Zealand trade and tourism backgrounds when our All Whites are being interviewed—and that is not being done. It is just basic stuff that the Government has people over there to do but they are not doing it. I just wanted to say that I do not have enormous faith in some of the arrangements that are going on here. The Government has to stop the arguments between McCully and Brownlee and just get on with the work.