Smith Nick: Environment Canterbury (Temporary Commissioners and Improved Water Management) Bill — In Committee Third Reading 
Smith Nick: Environment Canterbury (Temporary Commissioners and Improved Water Management) Bill — In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:661;Page:10054] 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH (Minister for the Environment) 
: 
 I will respond to some of the points that have been made by Opposition members so that people can be clear about the intent of the Environment Canterbury (Temporary Commissioners and Improved Water Management) Bill and so that we can be helped to have a constructive and robust debate. 
The first point is that Ruth Dyson made the argument that the Prime Minister today was incorrect in saying that we do not have a plan for water in Canterbury. She said: “Yes we do. We have the Canterbury Water Management Strategy.” That to me spoke volumes about why we have the mess about water management in Canterbury. If that is the understanding of the law about water of a senior Minister from the previous Government it is no wonder we have a problem. The reality is that the Canterbury Water Management Strategy— 
Hon Ruth Dyson 
: Smart alec. That’s not what I said and you know it. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: No it is actually Ruth Dyson who is being smart here. She probably does know that the Canterbury Water Management Strategy has absolutely no legal status as a plan. Under the Resource Management Act— 
Hon Ruth Dyson 
: Why isn’t it in the bill? 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: When the Prime Minister says there is no plan for water management in Canterbury that is because the natural resources plan is still being heard 18 years after the passage of the Resource Management Act. That is why the provisions in Part 3 of this bill enable us to both fast track that plan and for the very first time give some legal status to the Canterbury Water Management Strategy. 
A second question has been asked about water conservation orders. Again I am not sure that Opposition members understand the process as it is right now; I ask members to let me explain it. At the moment a person who wants a new water conservation order or a variation lodges an application with the Minister. The Minister appoints a special tribunal. There is all this rhetoric about my having my National Party mates on the tribunal—I can do that right now; I have absolute discretion about whom I appoint to the tribunal. The reason why I want water conservation orders to go to the commissioners is very simple and straightforward: if we are to properly manage water in Canterbury we need an integrated approach. Having one bunch of people over here making a decision about a water conservation order and a different bunch of people over there making a decision about the plan is to me a nonsense. There is one catchment and if there is anything I have learnt in my professional experience as an engineer with water it is that catchments have to be managed in an integrated way. So to have one group of people making decisions in the lower part of the river and saying “Here is what we are going to do.” and to have a different group of people making decisions in the upper part of the catchment makes absolutely no sense. I challenge members: I say that if they want an integrated approach to water management—and it is essential that that is managed competently—then it makes great sense for water conservation orders to be considered by the commission that is making the other decisions in respect of water in Canterbury. 
The next point I will make is that of course whether the decision goes to the commission or to the tribunal the decision on water conservation orders rests quite properly with a politician the Minister for the Environment. So in relation to all the stuff about a political agenda I remind members that the decisions on whether or not those orders proceed come back to me in both the current process and the amended process. 
The final point I will make is in respect of the Hurunui River application and I accept that what we are doing in this process does cut across its current legal aspect. But the real choice for the Government was whether if we had a particular view about water conservation orders in Canterbury and how they were to be integrated in the bigger picture it was better to allow all the money to be spent on lawyers before the Environment Court arguing a particular case when we already— 
Hon Member 
: It’s already happened. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: No; it has gone to a tribunal. It has not gone to court yet. It has gone to the tribunal; it has not gone to court—righto? So does it make sense for the Government if it has a particular view about the orders to pre-empt the process because I as Minister finally get to make the decision or is it more honest and upfront to say both to the applicant and to those who have a say that the Government wants an integrated approach to water management in Canterbury? Is it not more honest to say through this bill that that Hurunui application will go to the commissioners in Canterbury—who will be making the decisions about the regional policy statement as well—so they can make a decision in an integrated way? Let us open up the process as we do in this bill to all those parties including the applicants and anybody who has made submissions to the tribunal in order for them to have a new opportunity to be able to present that view. I suggest to members on the Opposition benches that that is a more straightforward and open way to do it rather than to have me as Minister for the Environment sit back and allow all that money to be spent on lawyers and process and then come to a different decision at the end.