Faafoi KrisClauses 1 and 2KRIS FAAFOI (Labour—Mana): Clauses 1 and 2 are the title and commencement clauses of this bill—The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): Order! I just got into a bit of a roll and forgot myself. The question now is that clauses 1 and 2 stand part.KRIS FAAFOI: Important pieces of legislation like this do not have an opportunity to be redrafted and changed so often. I believe this is the first real amendment of this legislation in at least 25 years. They are big changes but they are changes that on this side of the House we in large part do not agree with. We believe that the opportunity has been missed not only by the Minister who is responsible for this piece of legislation but by the Government to take and make some meaningful change to this piece of legislation to address some very important issues in and around our environment and importantly in and around building some houses for New Zealand.The Government has been quick to blame everyone else but itself when it comes to its complete and utter lack of movement around housing. But I think we need to look at the lost opportunity with this Resource Legislation Amendment Bill. One can only come to the conclusion that this has been a lost opportunity for us to seriously do something about planning rules to make sure that the houses that New Zealand seriously needs are provided. Nick Smith has to take the blame for that. The Government has to take the blame for that. As we get closer to election day we will find out that the Māori Party will take a lot of blame for that too.To stitch up this deal—a wafer-thin majority for a piece of legislation that should have had broad-spectrum appeal across this House to make sure it got there to do the important things that this Government needs to do to address the housing shortage—the Government went for a dirty old last-minute deal with the Māori Party to get it through with a one-vote majority. And it made some controversial changes that I think in the end the Māori Party will regret making because as was exposed in the words of the Minister himself last night around the definition of the word crop" the Māori Party has signed up to something thinking it has got a golden egg and it has got nothing but rotten eggs. That is the reality of this piece of legislation for the Māori Party.I am looking forward to the campaign and I bet my Māori colleagues on this side of the House are looking forward to the campaign when they can take it to their communities that the Māori Party sold itself short to have a short-term win that will end up being a loss for them in the long run. So those members have done the deal and the Government has done the deal to make sure that this piece of legislation can get a slim majority in this House but let us be fair: it does not achieve anywhere near what this piece of legislation should have achieved when it gets reviewed after 25 years of being enacted.I remember when Nick Smith about 6 years ago stood next to a pile of planning documents—Hon Dr Nick Smith: 2 years ago.KRIS FAAFOI: 2 years ago. Oh it feels like such a long time. It has been 8 long years—ha ha! He stood there and said he was going to do something about the Resource Management Act. Well I guess he can claim that he has done something but he has not done anything significant or of substance in this piece of legislation. What we are looking for is leadership from this Government to do something that will really help the families of New Zealand in one of the biggest issues that they have now and that is being in a home being able to afford a home being able to have a home. This piece of legislation sadly for the public does nothing to be able to advance that.That is a massively lost opportunity and 6 months out from an election I think the Government needs to be held accountable and it will be because if MPs like me are getting the influx of emails into their in-box from people who are saying "In the past I've voted National but because they've done this deal and they've pushed this legislation through in the manner that they have"—because it promised something significant but it has not delivered—this Government is going to pay the electoral price for that. So it is going to be very interesting to see what happens over the next 5¾ months and to see how the Government will be held accountable for its lack of action in the biggest issue as we go into this election—that is housing.We were hoping for something much more significant in this piece of legislation to deal with the housing crisis in New Zealand. Nick Smith not only is the Minister for Building and Construction but is also the Minister responsible for this bill. He had a once-in-a-25-year chance to do something significant but he let it slip through his fingers and people know that. People know that he could have got broad-spectrum support around this House if he had given each party a bit of something. But he chose just the one party and that party has been sold a pup. I suggest the Māori Party rings Fair Go because exactly what has happened is that it has been ripped off.Hon Ruth Dyson: Mr Chair.Eugenie Sage: Mr Chair.Hon Ruth Dyson: Go on.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Chester Borrows): Make your minds up."