Roche Denise: Resource Management Reform Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeRoche Denise: Resource Management Reform Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 27 August 2013. Volume:693;Page:12843. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]DENISE ROCHE (Green): Thank you Mr Chair and thank you for that contribution from the Minister in the chair the Minister for the Environment. I think there is still room for this plan to be appealed to the Environment Court and that is in the bill. It is where the council does not agree with the decision of the hearings panel or where the hearings panel makes a decision that is outside the scope of the submissions.I would like to say that this bill the Resource Management Reform Bill and how it impacts on the Auckland Unitary Plan is basically another classic example of Auckland being discriminated against. We have seen this time and time and time again with this Government. We have seen it with the Auckland Housing Accord we have seen it with the Land Transport Management Act and we are seeing it now with the unitary plan.The hearings panel will be appointed by this Government. I acknowledge the Minister’s comments that there will be consultation with the council but at the end of the day the panel will be appointed by the Government. In every other council and with every other unitary plan it is the council that determines those who will hear it. This is Auckland being discriminated against. The hearings panel can make recommendations on issues that are outside the scope of submissions which is not terribly democratic given that no one will have commented on those issues that are being raised by them. On the other hand the bill explicitly prevents the council from doing the same. It is not allowed to make decisions on evidence that has not been through the hearings panel so it is pretty clear where the Government places its faith. It places its faith in the appointees whom it has appointed to hear the Auckland plan.I would also suggest that this Government is seeking to undermine local government in Auckland through the recommendations that it is making and it has actually stated them pretty clearly in the Local Government and Environment Committee’s report. The recommendations say that “… section 139 [makes] it clear that the hearings panel must specify where it is making a recommendation outside the scope of submissions” and later on in that same paragraph it says: “[We] recommend amending section 143 to prohibit the council in making its decisions from considering new evidence or any other material that was not available to the hearings panel. This is intended to reduce the likelihood of the council making decisions based on inappropriate political lobbying and ensure that it follows fair process …”. This is really interesting. I will just read it again. It is to not make decisions “based on inappropriate political lobbying”.This is the same Government that is making a law on the International Convention Centre with a process that was fairly truncated as well—The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): Order!DENISE ROCHE: I am coming back to the bill in a second. I was using that as an example of inappropriate lobbying—the sort that this Government seeks to avoid by restricting Auckland Council in its decision making.The hearings panel is able to have extended decision-making powers and my colleague Eugenie Sage spoke about this as well. The ability for the hearings panel to make decisions on things that may not be included in the submissions basically comes down to its plan making rather than it blurring the division between plan making and interfering. I think we need to take into account the fact that these panel members will not be appointed by the city council and they will be making decisions based on their own judgment. It is not something that happens in other areas when they are considering their own unitary plans.The other area that I want to comment on is the fact that this bill does not actually take any real notice of the Auckland Spatial Plan. The Auckland Spatial Plan the 30-year plan that was developed with huge input from people right across Auckland and with enormous effort—and actually at huge cost as well to the Auckland Council because it was directed under the Local Government (Auckland Council) Act—determines and gives a broad outline of where and how our city should develop over 30 years. Under the previous Act which said that Auckland had to do this we were given a time frame that was incredibly tight. At the start of that process when I was actually a Waiheke local board member we were told the time frame and we were also told that in other cities like Vancouver this took 8 years to get it right.Auckland Council has done an amazing job to deliver as required by the Government an incredibly useful and sensible plan which we should be giving weight to. We should be having a unitary plan that is consistent with it. All it says in this bill is that the Government will give regard to it and I guess that is actually something that again undermines democracy in Auckland.There is one part of this bill that I do agree with and that is leaving the Hauraki Gulf islands unitary plan out of it. And yes of course I am slightly biased being a resident of the Hauraki Gulf. The Hauraki Gulf islands are actually in a much better position because we went through a democratic process to get our plan. It was quite a painful process I have to admit. There were thousands and thousands of submissions. The hearings took over 2½ years. I would like to acknowledge in this Committee Mr RayEricson who was on that hearings panel. He was the chair of our community board and then our local board. He was an elected representative hearing from his community what the issues were and how we wanted to develop our island communities for the future. It strikes me as incredibly unfair that Auckland—this new super-city which wascreated by this Government through its legislation requiring Auckland to jump through so many hoops—and its people do not get the same access to democracy. Thank you.