Cunliffe David: Exclusive Economic Zone and Continental Shelf (Environmental Effects) (Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill — In CommitteeText is subject to correctionCunliffe David: Exclusive Economic Zone and Continental Shelf (Environmental Effects) (Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 17 June 2015. Volume:706;Page:4534. Text is subject to correction.]Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE (Labour—New Lynn):I was very much enjoying my colleague’s peroration there so apologies to my colleague. This is more of a signalling call. I rise to take a short call in support of this piece of legislation.I am going to pose a question at the start of this contribution and come back to it in the end. The question is: if a Minister falls in the forest and there is no one there to hear it has he really fallen? If the gas stops pumping from an offshore oil platform and no one hears it stop has it really stopped pumping? The answer to the latter question is that—Hon Craig Foss: If David stands for leader and no one votes does it happen?Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE: Mr Foss that was very Sino of you. The answer to the second question is yes because if the gas stops pumping people’s lights will go out people’s industries will grind to a halt and people will not be able to do what they need to do to get by. That is the kicker with this bill. We just cannot as a country on either side of the floor have a situation where a station that is producing 20 percent of our gas goes offline.That justifies an intervention that has been brought about because this bill needs to amend section 162 of the Exclusive Economic Zone and Continental Shelf (Environmental Effects) Act. The problem for those who have just joined us is that—Chris Bishop: Ha ha!Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE: Not you Chris Bishop; you joined us at the last election. I mean people who have just started listening in. Chris Bishop has been here 5 minutes and he thinks he is an expert. Well you know that will wear off. That will wear off Chris as the guy sitting right behind you will be happy to tell you.Tim Macindoe: How many do you think have tuned in at this point?Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE: Well you know the way the Government has been performing I would not be surprised if a few have tuned out. But here is why the change is necessary. Poor old Todd has got an appeal under way and the risk for the—Hon Craig Foss: The Hon Todd.Hon DAVID CUNLIFFE: Maybe not poor maybe not that old but it is a figure of speech. So the company has the potential for an appeal which could interrupt its resource consent under the exclusive economic zone legislation. If it is appealed the company is held up from operations until the appeal has been heard and granted. That is the catch-22 that this bill is seeking to correct and fair enough because we do not want an unintended consequence where a legitimate appeal right results in a pre-emptive cessation of production when it is not required. So that is the problem we are trying to fix.This however is an inelegant solution for a couple of reasons—inelegant but necessary. No. 1 is that the bill names an individual company. That is bad legislative practice. We ought to be making across-the-board rules not legislating for individual stuff-ups by Ministers. No. 2 is that it is retrospective. Only in the rarest occasions will Parliament accommodate retrospective change and generally only when it is citizen-friendly as this arguably is. No. 3 is that this is ad hoc not strategic. It does not as my colleague Stuart Nash said fit neatly in a plan of an ongoing increase in our energy self-sufficiency. However it is what it is. Fourthly of course it is a patch-up job. It is a fix-up for a ministerial error which brings me to the first of the two questions.The Minister falling in the forest of course is Nick Smith deputised today to be as far away from Parliament as he could possibly be because he has had a right roasting over housing. He is the same Minister who is responsible for the lack of foresight in seeing this appeal provision as a problem while putting the original bill through so that Parliament now has to arguably waste its time to fix up those mistakes. If a Minister falls in the forest but there is no one there to hear it has he really fallen? Well those who might be looking to fill his shoes will know that he has fallen. Can we fix this? Yes we can yes we will yes we need to. Should we be here doing this? No we should not. So it is with some reluctance but with cooperation that the Labour Opposition is supporting this bill.