Cosgrove Clayton: Land Transport (Enforcement Powers) Amendment Bill — In Committee Third Reading 
Cosgrove Clayton: Land Transport (Enforcement Powers) Amendment Bill — In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:658;Page:7216] 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE (Labour—Waimakariri) 
: 
 I will return to the previous contribution that I made and base this contribution on some of the comments made by the Minister in the chair the Hon Steven Joyce. I was quite surprised that in respect of noise the Minister basically said as I understand it he did not believe that the Government should make changes to the primary legislation but it might set a noise limit through a rule. I say this to the Minister: this is the highest court in the land. This is Parliament. If the Minister is of a mind to this Parliament can do anything that it likes. He could make changes in respect of the 90 decibel limit in this bill if he was of a mind to do that. He can do anything that he likes. This Parliament can pass any legislation saying anything. That is its constitutional power. 
Brendon Burns 
: Provided they have Maori Party support. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: Well that is another issue. But the Government has the numbers so it says in respect of this bill the Land Transport (Enforcement Powers) Amendment Bill. If the Minister wanted to do so he could flick in an amendment or a Supplementary Order Paper—he has done a couple of them which Labour supports—to change this bill. But he chooses not to do that. I suppose that in the first part of this bill it was a case of “They will know it if they see it.” and in the second part it is a case of “Well they will know it if they hear it.” 
Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m. 
Hon Darren Hughes 
: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. I wonder whether you could give some advice to the Committee about the appropriateness of the Minister of Civil Defence parading around the Chamber with a man bag. I am very concerned about that so could you give us some advice about that? 
Hon John Carter 
: At least no one can say I am not prepared for when it happens. It is all here; the recipe is here. I just hope everyone else has theirs. I am very proud of it. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch) 
: I know that the Hon John Carter was a boy scout. He is always prepared. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: Before I start again I say I am happy to yield to Mr Carter if he would like to tell us what is in the bag—unless it is his gym gear which would create a hazardous waste area within the Chamber. 
Hon John Carter 
: No more than that! 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: That is great. Before the dinner break I was discussing with the Minister who I know is very eager to take and answer questions the noise issue in relation to Part 2 of the bill. A number of members of Parliament are from Canterbury especially the vibrant member Nicky Wagner. Before and after the election she paraded around the countryside and she presented a petition from 435 venerable good-natured folk in Canterbury who demanded that the Government do something about the noise issue and set the level at 90 decibels. She said—she almost wrote it in blood—at a number of public meetings before the election that this would happen. She lambasted the previous Government and had a crack at us saying if she got into Government this would occur it would happen and it would be one of the first calls to action that her incoming Government would put through legislation on. Then what happened? Nothing. 
The Minister took a call in response to what I said saying—and I may be paraphrasing him— the noise issue should be dealt with in rules rather than in primary legislation. I ask the Minister why he rolled his own member of Parliament. Why did he roll his own Cabinet colleague? Kate Wilkinson a member who occasionally resides in my electorate also paraded around Christchurch saying if National got in it would fix the noise problem for Canterbury and for the rest of New Zealand. Gerry Brownlee said that as well although he may have been talking about himself rather than boy racers. David Carter and Aaron Gilmore said that as well. Even after the election those members still rocked up to public meetings and told people that now that they were in Government they would sort the issue out. I am sure the Minister will be pleased to know that those members were extremely complimentary when he took over the transport warrant. They said he was a man of action and he would deal to the noise issue. 
Hon John Carter 
: That’s why we’re here today. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: I tell Mr Carter that here is the problem: the bill does not deal with the noise caused by boy racers at all. 
The 90 decibel pledge that Nicky Wagner and all the National people made is nowhere in this bill nor is it dealt with in the companion bill. I say to the Minister that if he had a mind to he could have any legislation passed that he desired to pass. He could pop the 90 decibel limit into this bill now if he and the Government wanted to honour their pledge on that. I am sure Nicky Wagner is around the corners of this Chamber somewhere. I cannot quite see her but I am sure that she is here and will want to take a call as will the Leader of the House as he parades into the Chamber tonight. Gerry Brownlee is among the Canterbury members who said that the 90 decibel issue would be sorted and the noise issue in Canterbury would be sorted. I am sure Mr Brownlee will want to take a call and tell the people of Canterbury New Zealand why he says—if he sits down—it will be fixed now. Is the member proposing an amendment? 
Hon Gerry Brownlee 
: No I just think— 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: Well the member will be able to tell the people of Christchurch why he sold them out and why he his other Cabinet colleagues and Nicky Wagner were rolled. 
Nowhere in the two bills that we are debating tonight is there any reference to action on a 90 decibel limit. My friend Mr Burns has already alluded to that. Those members have been sold out. It is another broken promise from the National Government. We will enjoy as we do now constituents coming to us so that we can try to explain why the National Government has sold them out. I will be sending all of the people from Mandeville North to Kate Wilkinson’s office to get her to explain that. Brendon Burns will be sending his constituents to Nicky Wagner’s office for her to explain that. 
Hon John Carter 
: That’s a good idea; they’ll get decent service that way! 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: Well the 435 petitioners who signed Nicky Wagner’s petition did not get decent service from her because she that member this Minister and this Government have broken their promise. Where is the action? 
David Bennett 
: Oh! 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: I invite the chair of the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee David Bennett who is the member for Hamilton East or anyone else from the National Party to get up and tell me where in the legislation there is the solution to the promise to go to 90 decibels. Can the member point me to that on a page or in a clause or a paragraph of this legislation? Oh no the member for Hamilton East cannot do that because I suspect somebody got to him. His constituents in Hamilton East would be spewing to use a colloquialism if they knew what he was not doing now. He is not fulfilling an election pledge that he made. 
I say to the Minister that he has an opportunity. We are here to help; we would support him if he popped in an amendment. But we know because the majority of the select committee rejected setting a 90 decibel limit that the National Government will not have a bar of it. That is a shame because yet again the rhetoric does not match the action. 
Hon Steven Joyce 
: 9 years! 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: I know the Minister is calling for the chair of the select committee to jump up and move that the question be put because he does not want to be in the chair. I invite the member from Hamilton to get up and tell his constituents why he sold them out. Or is he so ineffective and the Minister so effective that he Nicky Wagner and every member in Canterbury including bizarrely the Leader of the House were rolled? I do not think it is good enough to make a promise like that before at and after the election and then like little lambs not to stand up and say “Well we promised to do it; we said we’d do it. But we conned you; we haven’t done it.” and not say why the promise has not been fulfilled. 
David Bennett 
: Rubbish! 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: Well where is it? Where is the clause in the bill that deals with 90 decibels? Hello? There is silence. It is deafening. Members speak with a forked tongue over there on the Government benches. The silence is deafening. They are being challenged; it is on the record. 
Brendon Burns 
: The silence of the lambs! 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: The Minister may take another call and tell us what he is going to do about the noise issue. 
I do not buy what he said earlier. As that Minister and most of the Committee know rules take a long long time to get through the labyrinth of processes in relation to transport matters. If that Minister wanted to do something he could pass the bill tonight with the limit of 90 decibels put in place as the National members promised. They could do that tonight and we would support it would we not? We would help to facilitate that but the National members will not do that. This bill is a bit like the bill that we will be debating later tonight as there is a big gap between the rhetoric and reality. Judith Collins said every car would be crushed then on Radio New Zealand National she said that meant 10 cars a year. She says “Ha ha!” to all the people in Christchurch and around the country who have to put up with this insidious behaviour. Effectively the National Government is saying to communities around the country “Ha ha! We hoodwinked you!” I am sure that the people from Noise Off from other interest groups from Cashmere from out my way and from Christchurch Central will be very very interested when they read in the paper tomorrow and the coming days that this bill is hot air. 
To be fair I say to the Minister that there is a lot of good stuff in the bill. I concede that but it does not deal with one of the core issues that National members of Parliament from around the country campaigned on. It does not even make reference to it yet those same members of Parliament—members like Nicky Wagner Kate Wilkinson Gerry Brownlee and the other two invisible men we have around Christchurch from time to time—will not get up and take a call to explain to their constituents why they have sold them out or why they have so little influence that they were rolled in the select committee. The 435 good souls who signed Nicky Wagner’s petition were rolled; they were not listened to in the select committee. They had no influence. 
The fact is that the National Government has broken a promise that to some people in our community is a core promise. The people in Blackett St in Rangiora have to put up with this noise every night. So do people in Cashmere and they called for this measure and National agreed to it but now the Minister is silent. The National members shake their heads and throw in the odd interjection but every time that Mr Burns or I have asked where the 90 decibel clause to fix this problem is in the bill there is silence because such a clause does not exist. I think that is a shame. To quote National’s jargon I think that is a “missed opportunity” because some of the measures in this bill are quite practical. They may go some way to solving or alleviating some of the problem unlike the companion bill that we will be debating next. But the Minister refuses to acquiesce on the issue of setting the noise limit.