Shirley Ken: Wellington Regional Council (Water Board Functions) Bill — In Committee 
Shirley Ken: Wellington Regional Council (Water Board Functions) Bill — In Committee 
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Hon KEN SHIRLEY (ACT) 
: 
 The ACT party supports this bill. It is a very simple bill. It is just a clear-cut provision to allow land that was designated for the very specific and confined purpose of providing a water catchment for the Wellington Regional Water Board—my former employer many years ago—to be used for a further purpose. But I believe that the bill raises a rather interesting philosophical issue which has just been touched on—that is that we should consider the multiple use of land. We have tended in recent years in this country to compartmentalise things. That has often been driven by mantras and ideological nonsense. We can talk about a few examples of that. We have here a bill that states the land is primarily water catchment land and is designated for that purpose. But that is not inconsistent with it having some windmills on it perhaps in order to generate some electricity. That is fine and we recognise the benefit of that. But then that raises the issue that I think my colleague from New Zealand First was alluding to. We have vast tracts of Department of Conservation land in this country which perhaps could equally share multiple functions for the benefit of our society at large. 
I will give some examples. We have the Resource Management Act and the whole philosophy of that Act as the Minister in the chair the Hon Marian Hobbs will be aware was for it to be effects-based. Everything was to be judged on its merits but what we have done over the years is to erode that. One example would be mining in Coromandel. Mining should be weighed up on its merits; it should be effects-based. If the community overwhelmingly says no it does not want mining it can express that in its district plan or set standards for mining that are very high. But what happened was that the Government said it would decree that mining was a banned activity which was actually in breach of the effects-based philosophy of the Act. We see similar situations all around the country driven by mantras and dogma rather than by the sensible analysis of accepting that we actually have the effects-based safety net of that Act to judge whether anything should or should not happen what the consequences would be and whether one could avoid mitigate or remedy some of the adverse impacts that may flow from it. If we really had confidence in the Act then we would not go in at the front end as it were start dictating land uses and be very prescriptive in the way we do that. 
Unfortunately though in the Department of Conservation and in relation to many reserve lands around the country situations are driven by absolute and utter dogma. There is no development whatsoever and nothing that could possibly conflict with the intrinsic unspoilt footsteps-only sort of mantra that that department tends to run. I would say and I put it to members that just as the Wellington Regional Council has identified a multiple use of its land with its proposal for the generation of sustainable energy from wind power then there are vast tracks of our hinterland which tend to be in the conservation estate that could similarly have multiple uses applied to them without in any way detracting from the values we all hold dear that are associated with that land. I raise those points; I just see an inconsistency there. 
The other point I would make though concerns the restriction we now have in this bill that the Local Government and Environment Committee inserted which is that any energy proposal be confined to sustainable energy. What on earth does that actually mean? Perhaps the Minister in the chair could help us? 
Hon Marian Hobbs 
: Renewable energy. 
Hon KEN SHIRLEY 
: I beg the Minister’s pardon; renewable energy was the term used. That makes it even more problematic. I ask the Minister what on earth renewable energy is and I would appreciate her taking a call—perhaps as the member in charge of this bill—to explain to us carefully her definition of renewable energy. We know that no matter is created or destroyed; it is just transformed. So I ask who decides what is renewable and what is not renewable. We are right back into the mantras and dogmas I have mentioned rather than into the evaluation of things according to clear criteria on the basis of their merits.