Mackey Moana: Crown Minerals (Permitting and Crown Land) Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeMackey Moana: Crown Minerals (Permitting and Crown Land) Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 11 April 2013. Volume:689;Page:9324. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]MOANA MACKEY (Labour): I am disappointed that the Minister in the chair did not take heed of what my colleague Ruth Dyson said in answer to her question about the commencement date. I think it has been disappointing this afternoon that we posed a number of questions to the Ministers in the chair and all of them have sat there like dried arrangements and done nothing. None of them have gotten up on their pins and actually answered the questions. That is actually what the Committee stage is meant to be about.This bill the Crown Minerals (Permitting and Crown Land) Bill is a very very serious piece of legislation. It has very very serious implications not just for the conservation estate but for the general public and their ability to oppose the Government’s plans to ramp up deep-sea oil and gas exploration and what it means for the Minister of Conservation. So it is disappointing that the Minister has chosen not to answer my colleague’s question about the commencement date but he will of course have an opportunity in this part.Well I too do not believe that the Crown Minerals (Permitting and Crown Land) Bill adequately reflects as a title what this piece of legislation actually does. I think that if I had to rename it I would probably start by calling it the “Crown Minerals (This Is The Only Plan We Have) Bill” because that is the reality of what we are doing here. Regardless of what you might think of oil and gas exploration and mining—some people are for it some people are against it and some people are in the middle—I do not think that there is anyone who would believe that this should be the only thing that we do in terms of economic development and jobs. I do not think there are many people even in Taranaki who would say that this is the only thing that is happening in Taranaki and that this is the only thing that creates jobs. But to listen to Government members you would think that it is the only thing because they have put all their eggs in this one basket. This is it. If this does not work they have no plan B. So if all these jobs and all this money that they have been saying for years is going to flow from more oil and gas exploration and more mining—if that does not work they do not have a plan B.There is no other plan for economic development and in particular regional economic development. That is why we are seeing the kind of legislation being passed today—currently there is the Resource Management Act legislation and the exclusive economic zone legislation but today there is the Crown minerals legislation—where the Government is trying to undermine this legislation in terms of its protections for the conservation estate and its protections for the environment in order to make it as easy as possible for industry activity to go ahead regardless of the consequences.I suspect that this bill could also be called the “Crown Minerals (This Is Going to Cost a Lot More Money Than the Government Seems to Think It Is Going to) Amendment Bill”. The reality is that New Zealanders largely have faith in the process that is currently set out under the Crown Minerals Act and the Resource Management Act is another example. The minute the public loses faith in that process it actually becomes a hell of a lot more expensive for industry. When people feel that they have to engage now they have to appeal and they have to protest because they no longer feel that the systems that their Government puts in place are systems that they can trust that will uphold the highest levels of health and safety and that will uphold the highest levels of environmental protection and ensure that the preservation of the conservation estate is paramount—as soon as the public loses faith in that process then it becomes more difficult for industry not easier.When the public feels that the process is fair they will let the process play out. They will play their role in it if that is what they want to do. A lot will not; many will not. But this is a false economy. This bill could be called the “Crown Minerals (False Economy) Amendment Bill” because this is opening up so much scope for far more legal challenges and far more judicial reviews than under the current system which has worked well. Members opposite like to talk about Taranaki as being the crowning example of what this activity could achieve for the rest of the country. Well all that happened under the current Crown Minerals Act. And all that happened under the current Resource Management Act. So why do we have to really completely undermine these pieces of legislation when all that is going to happen is it is going to result in it being more difficult for industry given that we now have processes that the public do not trust?So as I said this is all the Government has. This is why we are taking so much out of the Crown Minerals Act—because it wants to make it as easy as possible. I do not think it is going to have the outcome that it thinks. I think it is actually going to have the perverse outcome of doing the opposite. What we could rename this bill—and we did not know that this was coming up of course—in relation to the Minister’s Supplementary Order Paper 205 to stop protest vessels in the exclusive economic zone from interfering with installations or with vessels would be the “Crown Minerals (Some Dangerous Behaviour Will Be Outlawed but the Rest Won’t) Amendment Bill” because the ridiculous situation that we find ourselves in is that the Government is saying that this is about safety and about complying with our international obligations under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. Well that is all very well and good but then why does it not apply to every vessel in the exclusive economic zone?If it is about safety then why should we not apply the same standard to commercial operators of any kind whether they be petroleum exploration or fisheries or cruise ships or protest vessels? Why should everyone not have the same level of scrutiny and legal obligation as we are putting on these protest vessels? Currently under what we are passing here an activity that would be deemed illegal in our territorial waters under the Maritime Transport Act is not covered by this unless it is a protest ship and that protest ship is protesting specifically against petroleum and mineral exploration. That is the ridiculous law that we are going to pass here and no member of the National Government has stood up and addressed that particular point.Then we had Minister Finlayson. I was embarrassed to see the Attorney-General come down to the Chamber to defend this. We thought he must have a legal opinion. We thought that he must have got a New Zealand Bill of Rights Act vet to challenge the legal opinion produced by Greenpeace and the group of New Zealanders who have supported it and he had not. He had nothing. We could call this legislation the “Crown Minerals (The Legal Opinion You Have When You Don’t Have a Legal Opinion) Bill” because two Ministers stood up and basically implied that they had legal opinions that supported that Supplementary Order Paper. When they were asked to table them neither of them could because they do not exist.This Supplementary Order Paper is not compliant with our New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. This does not comply with our international obligations. It is an embarrassment and that is because this Government has mishandled the issue of oil and gas exploration particularly in the exclusive economic zone so badly—it has mishandled it to such an extreme—that the public are taking to the seas in protest because that is the only way they feel they can get the Government’s attention. And they got the attention of the Government all right. The Government is now legislating away the public’s right to oppose what the Government does. That is completely outrageousand it is an embarrassment for an Attorney-General whose job it is to uphold the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act to come down to the Chamber and defend it. It would have been better if he had just ignored it and not come down here and put on the petty show that he did attacking Geoffrey Palmer attacking Dame Anne Salmond—New Zealander of the Year—in a display that can be described only as waspish and not becoming of our Attorney-General. And then at the end of it to not even have a legal opinion—apart from his own opinion; I guess he is a lawyer and that is a kind of legal opinion—and to not actually have done the work to back up what he was saying that is a shame on this country that our Attorney-General does not take his very important constitutional role far more seriously.My colleague Ruth Dyson talked about the fact that powers have been taken away from the Minister of Conservation. I remember that press conference where Gerry Brownlee sat next to Kate Wilkinson and said: “This will be a shared decision-making power.” and the visual image just said it all really. Minister Wilkinson sat there and said absolutely nothing and was completely dwarfed by Minister Brownlee who was the Minister of Energy and Resources at the time and who completely ran the whole press conference. He ran the show. So this could be called the “Crown Minerals (No One Really Believes It’s a Shared Decision-making Power) Bill” because the fact is that the Minister of Energy and Resources is now in charge of determining whether or not mining will go ahead on conservation land. We know that will then skew the current balanced approach towards industry regardless of the impact on our very very valuable and precious conservation land.This is a very important role that the Minister of Conservation carries out on behalf of the people of New Zealand. The Minister of Conservation is the custodian of the Department of Conservation estate and it is entirely appropriate that that is the person who determines whether the impact on conservation land is such that an activity should go ahead or should not go ahead and now that has been stripped out. Now it is this shared decision-making power. As I said no one believes it is a shared decision-making power. This is once again a National Government that is so bereft of ideas to create jobs and to grow our economy that it is having to make these kinds of changes in order to smooth the way as much as possible for these activities regardless of whether they are carried out responsibly. Where they are carried out responsibly and with minimal environmental impact that is fine. That is what the current system allows for and that is absolutely fine. But that is not what is happening here. Now we are saying: “Actually that goes out the window.” and the impact on this conservation land—and we will see I think more mining projects on schedule 4 land because companies are out there right now having a look at what is out there prospecting. You do not pay the money to look unless you have been told that you are going to be allowed to go in and get. That is the reality. So that is a broken promise. This could be called the “Crown Minerals (Schedule 4 Promise Broken—Surprise Surprise) Amendment Bill” because clearly the industry has been told that schedule 4 will be opened up or relaxed.