Roche Denise: Marine Legislation Bill — First Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Roche Denise: Marine Legislation Bill — First Reading 
[Sitting date: 11 September 2012. Volume:683;Page:5099. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
DENISE ROCHE (Green) 
: 
 I rise to take a short call for the Greens. As you have heard from my colleague Gareth Hughes we will be supporting the Marine Legislation Bill because we believe it does start to address some of the weaknesses in our legislation around protecting our waters from the marine disasters that we saw so clearly with the grounding of the  
Rena 
. It was an entirely predictable accident and I think others have mentioned that already but the deregulation of the 1990s which has carried on through until today actually has resulted in an enormous number of rust buckets—ships that are sailing under flags of convenience with foreign crews that are plying their trade around our coasts and in our ports—which are adding to the risks that we have. So it is good to see this Government wanting to introduce some regulation at last. 
It is really good to see the inclusion of the International Maritime Organization conventions in this bill although we note that the ones around oil spills and liability for shipowners still do not make them liable for paying the entire cost of clean-ups. We support this bill’s intention to amend the Maritime Transport Act to enable better local regulation by local authorities relating to local port and harbour safety. 
There are a few things that I am hoping will come through in the select committee—and I am on the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee as well. There are a couple of gaps. One is that this bill and the exclusive economic zone legislation as well does not address the issue of emissions of particulates and carbon dioxide emissions from the container ships and cruise ships that are berthing in our cities’ harbours. But there is a convention that we might want to sign up to—that is the International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships. We have got close to it with one of the conventions that is in this bill but we are not quite there. 
It would make sense to adopt some of the regulations that are international best practice now because the Auckland Council is already saying that there are huge peaks in carbon dioxide emissions from the dirty fuel that is used by container ships and cruise ships while they are berthing in Auckland. The Rugby World Cup last year was a great success for our country but during that time the dangerous emissions that came from dirty fuel from the cruise ships that were berthed there were quite beyond what is normal. 
We would also like to see this bill take into account some of the other international regulations around speed. Generally with the beefing up of the local authorities’ ability to set some safety and environmental regulations in their own ports there are still some issues around their ability to set the speed of the container ships in their harbours. We have got that situation in the Hauraki Gulf where I live. There is a population of Bryde’s whales. There are only 250 of them in New Zealand. They are very rare. There are 40 to 50 of them that live in the Hauraki Gulf and most of them are living and feeding and resting around the shipping lanes. The harbour master has set the speed limit for the area that he controls at 12 knots. However the ability of a Bryde’s whale to survive ship strike at 12 knots is pretty limited. There is a much better prospect for them surviving if the speed is under 12 knots and it is an even better situation for their survival if it is under 10 knots. 
The Environmental Defence Society has actually worked alongside the Hauraki Gulf Forum and the Department of Conservation to look at ways that we could be asking the Minister of Transport to start to have some regulations around speed. I would suggest that since this bill takes into account the fact of driving those great big container ships under the influence of alcohol we should be looking at the speeds that those things are going at because as we know from the  
Rena 
 disaster the faster you go the bigger the mess. Thank you.