Hughes GarethGARETH HUGHES (Green): Kia ora Madam Deputy Speaker. Ngā mihi nui ki a koutou kia ora. I think people in our rural communities call speeches like that bulldust". What we heard was petty politics—scaremongering coming from the National benches. Just revel in the irony of it. Here's the National Party which for nine years was prepared to ram through under urgency all sorts of things: unethical Acts where it comes to criminalising protest activity at sea—the so-called Anadarko amendment passed under urgency at Easter—and criminalising people for the Skynet laws where it came to kicking people off their computers. This is the party that in their nine years literally sacked the democratically elected Environment Canterbury commissioners because they were doing too good a job of cleaning up water quality.Oh the irony of the National Party which for nine years presided over a skyrocketing growth that hit "peak cow" that saw massive subsidies going to agricultural intensification and massive subsidies for irrigation. The irony of the National Party which presided over such a decline of our water quality; a National Party that saw by the end of its terms two-thirds of our kids getting sick when they swam in our rivers. What we don't need is more scaremongering more petty politics over an entirely reasonable use of it.The irony of course is that had the existing legislation gone through the public wouldn't have had a say the farmers wouldn't have had a say and the people involved in the business wouldn't have had a say. What you're railing against is the chance to have a 12-month review to get everyone around the table. For too long what we saw was those incredibly important issues like water quality swept under the carpet. When we saw fundamental issues facing our sector—like value-add innovation and how we're selling our agricultural products overseas—we didn't get everyone around the table and come up with real solutions. In fact we saw mock talk shops where an agenda was rammed through.What we do know is there's a limit to how many cows we can cram on to a paddock. Equally so there's a limit to how many people we can cram down in Fiordland. There's no limit to the export of smart intellectual property services software and value-added dairy products.It's important we get this right. Dairy is 40 percent of our primary industries' market. It's important we get it right. What National would have you do is go into the old legislation and make a simple change to the open entry and exit and the milk price monitoring regime because the Commerce Commission found that the threshold had been met in the South Island.What the National Party wouldn't have the industry the farmers environmentalists iwi and hapū do is have a proper review. I'd acknowledge the Minister Damien O'Connor because he's doing the right thing. He's giving people a chance to have a say on one of the most fundamental questions facing us: what is our economy going to look like over the next decade? What's our environment going to look like? Are we going to have swimmable rivers? I'd give him full credit because in that review there is going to be a look at organic farming which we know is more valuable for the farmers higher-value export industries. It's a good thing for our environment. We also know that there's going to be a look at how we encourage value-add into the environment.Critically though for the state of our environment where we have hit "peak cow" there's going to be a review into how we have the automatic entry and the automatic pick-ups. It's critically important that we can have these conversations nationally.This is I guess the sad irony. National is simply being oppositional for oppositional sake. They could get involved. They could have a say. They could partake in it. I know the Minister wants to have all conversations represented. Instead what we're seeing is opposition for opposition's sake.We think this review is reasonable. We think the time frame of 12 months is eminently sensible. What we want to see is a sensible long-term pragmatic solution that everybody can get behind. What we've seen for too long is things swept under the carpet the very serious problems solutions rammed through without getting those buy-ins. Let's get around the table together. Let's find those solutions together. Let's find those long-term cross-party solutions which mean everyone can have certainty. I guess our vision—right—is that we can have sustainable farming industry for the long term where there is community buy-in and community support there is a social licence to operate and where our rivers are swimmable once again. That's the vision for New Zealand.I look forward to making further contributions in this debate but it's eminently reasonable and eminently sensible. That's why the Green Party is supporting it."