Hague Kevin: Oral Questions — Questions to MinistersText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeHague Kevin: Oral Questions — Questions to Ministers[Sitting date: 24 May 2016. Volume:714;Page:11105. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]5.KEVIN HAGUE (Green) to the Minister of Conservation: Is she confident that the Department of Conservation can carry out its work considering the inflation-adjusted reduction in Vote Conservation allocation it has endured under her Government?Hon MAGGIE BARRY (Minister of Conservation): I am entirely confident that the Department of Conservation (DOC) can carry out its work but I refute the idea that DOC has endured a reduction. It has not. The core Crown revenue provided to DOC in the dying days of the Labour Government in 2007-08 was $263 million. We are forecast to provide $338 million out of an overall budget of $391 million in 2015-16. This is an increase and in addition to that commercial-partnership funding has gone up over the past 7 years from about $4 million to $9.3 million—not a reduction by anybody’s mathematics I would have thought.Kevin Hague: I seek leave to table a document. It is a table prepared by the Parliamentary Library and it analyses the differences in conservation spending from a 2008-09 baseline in real terms demonstrating the reduction.Mr SPEAKER: Order! The last part is not necessary. Leave is sought to table that particular Parliamentary Library information. Is there any objection? There is none. It can be tabled.Document by leave laid on the Table of the House.Kevin Hague: Can the Minister confirm that 38 DOC-maintained structures are in serious or critical need of work including 23 bridges and six viewing platforms including a well-known viewing platform in Milford Sound?Hon MAGGIE BARRY: The member is being a bit selective with the places that he is highlighting. I would like to just put some facts out on the table. The data shows that about 13 of 944 huts that DOC manages had some serious work that was outstanding—something as small as a missing hearth brush is enough to mean that a hut does not meet its service standards. The number needing serious work equates to just 1.3 percent of DOC’s extensive network of—often remotely located—huts. This actually serves to reinforce DOC’s inspection and maintenance programme as very thorough. DOC spent more than $18 million on hut maintenance last year and it continues to invest—Kevin Hague: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker.Hon MAGGIE BARRY: —in improving its—Mr SPEAKER: Order! Point of order Kevin Hague.Kevin Hague: It is a long answer but my question was actually quite straightforward—Mr SPEAKER: Order! [Interruption] Order! The way forward because I do not think the question has at this stage been addressed is that I am going to invite the member to ask the question again.Kevin Hague: Can the Minister confirm that 38 DOC-maintained structures are in need of serious or critical work including 23 bridges and six viewing platforms including a well-known viewing platform in Milford Sound?Hon MAGGIE BARRY: There are tasks—and these are ones that the member alludes to—that the engineers have indicated a need to have carried out within the next 6 months. About a third of the work on the list that the member is citing and was provided with by my office has already been completed within this past month. The department undertakes tens of thousands of individual tasks such as these every year. All structures are inspected on a 2-yearly rotation. DOC takes its responsibilities for the public’s and its staff’s safety very very seriously and we have scheduled work for all of the projects that the member has noted to be concluded by November this year. We spend $45 million—Mr SPEAKER: Order! I think that the question was answered some time ago.Kevin Hague: Can the Minister confirm that there are 103 DOC-maintained bridges that either are not safe to walk across or are in critical need of repair?Hon MAGGIE BARRY: No. I would go back to the answer that I gave you before. DOC takes its responsibilities very seriously. I will not and do not confirm that the repair that is needed is of a substantial nature. If it was dangerous—if our inspectors who go through regularly and inspect it thoroughly felt there was any risk to public safety—then those structures would be closed down. They are part of a work schedule that is being done and that is being carried out with all seriousness.Kevin Hague: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I seek your guidance. The numbers that I am using in these questions have been derived from answers that the Minister herself has provided. They relate to the—Mr SPEAKER: Can I have the point of order?Kevin Hague: What I am not sure about is whether it is possible for me to table her answers to my questions for written answer.Mr SPEAKER: No it is certainly not and the member knows that. The question was answered immediately. The member asked whether the Minister could confirm and then went on and listed 103 bridges etc. being safe or in need of critical repair. The Minister immediately said no she was not in a position to confirm that. The question was addressed.Kevin Hague: Can the Minister confirm her answer to written question No. 4765 that a quarter of huts do not meet DOC’s own service standard including for example Whariwharangi Hut on the Abel Tasman Coast Track Great Walk?Hon MAGGIE BARRY: The member is misrepresenting the information that he was provided with. The data actually shows that just 13 of the 944 huts that DOC manages had serious work outstanding. Something as small as I said as a missing hearth brush—those are the things that count. So the number needing serious work is just 1.3 percent and we are working on it. We spent more than $18 million on hut maintenance last year.Kevin Hague: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. My question was about whether or not a quarter of the huts met the service standard and the Minister is answering about critical repairs. That was not the question.Mr SPEAKER: The question was whether the Minister would confirm an answer she had given to a written question that she had answered from her office and she immediately took the approach that the member was misrepresenting and misinterpreting the answer that has been given. That is a right that the Minister has. The member can take it further with supplementary questions but that question has been addressed.Kevin Hague: Can the Minister confirm her answer to written question No. 4766 that nearly half of tracks administered by DOC are not up to the department’s own standard including 60 percent of Great Walk tracks?Hon MAGGIE BARRY: When we look at the tracks 50 tracks have been closed since 2008 on our watch. That has often been due to unavoidable natural hazards but more than 400 tracks and more than 1000 extra kilometres have been added to DOC’s network over the same period. As with its hut network DOC is constantly reviewing and upgrading its network of more than 14000 kilometres of track. If it would help the member to go back over to the hut question the loose bricks that he identified in the chimney of that hut in the Abel Tasman have meant that the chimney has been demolished. The hut is still open for about 20 people to use and it is safe. It is fully functioning but the fire and the chimney have been cordoned off. These are the staged repairs that DOC does in an effort to keep tracks and huts and the people who visit our tracks and huts absolutely safe.Kevin Hague: Does the Minister stand by her answer to written question No. 4757 that indicated that there were some 168 structures administered by DOC that had failed their load capacity assessments and 709 that had yet to be assessed?Hon MAGGIE BARRY: I think the details that the member is going into are all very well. The general responses that I have given need to be applied which is that when something goes wrong with a DOC structure whether it is a bridge a platform a hut or a track we are on to it right away. We have various stages of importance that we address when we are looking at the stages of work and their priorities. DOC does that with the utmost integrity and with health and safety as our paramount concern.Kevin Hague: In this week’s Budget will the Government increase conservation funding to enable the Department of Conservation to ensure that the 142 species that have become closer to extinction do not become extinct that people do not put their lives at risk on DOC viewing platforms or bridges and that our huts and tracks—Mr SPEAKER: Order! Bring the question to a conclusion.Kevin Hague: —meet the expectations that New Zealanders have for them?Hon MAGGIE BARRY: There are not 143 species that are at risk. The member is definitely being disingenuous. As a result of further information and classification you boil that figure down and there are 14 and they are very detailed and we are working on them very hard. When it comes to additional funding every department in every Government would always say they would like more. DOC is adequately funded at the moment. We have had $20 million given for Battle for our Birds and more than $11 million last year for the kiwis. New Zealand species protection is a very important part of what DOC does and we take it very seriously.Kevin Hague: I seek leave to table a list of the 142 species derived from the Minister’s answers to written questions—Mr SPEAKER: Order! I just need to know the source of the list.Kevin Hague: It is a list compiled by my office from her answers.Mr SPEAKER: No. I refer the member to Speaker’s ruling 165/1. Information must come from a source like the Parliamentary Library which I would consider but if it is prepared by the member’s own office I am not prepared to put the leave.