Utikere TangiTANGI UTIKERE (Labour—Palmerston North): Kia orana Madam Speaker. That unabated rhetoric that has come from that has come from that Minister's mouth has done nothing except galvanise Labour's opposition to this particular bill this evening. We have opposed this bill at all stages and we will continue to do so tonight.What this bill seeks to do is issue a blanket extension for a 20-year period. We heard from the Minister this evening that he is concerned about environmental implications and impacts. There is nothing in the rhetoric that has come out of that Minister's mouth this evening that would give any confidence that that is in actual fact the position that he and his Government take.This is a bill that will change the date on existing permits to beyond a period up to 20 years. This has no regard to potential and actual environmental degradation that may actually follow. This has no regard to the numerous number of submitters that actually submitted to this select committee process. In a truncated period of 13 days 1100 individuals and organisations took the time despite the very short period to have their views known. The overwhelming majority be it 1000 of those submitters were very clear in that they did not want this bill to pass.It's also very interesting that as part of this process through the committee stage there were no changes that were adopted or entertained by the Government despite the fact that many of them were put forward. On this side of the House we were prepared to provide some element of compromise. We put up two possible amendments that would reduce the extension period—one of five years which was actually backed by a significant number of submitters through the select committee process; the other was a 10-year period—but none the less the Minister and members of this Government were not prepared to consider that. That would still provide the certainty and the confidence that this Minister rabbits on about on a constant basis to the many individuals and organisations that are part of this particular sector.Seven of the eight consent authorities—local councils—throughout this country oppose this legislation. They talked about the costs of the review and how that would serve as a disincentive for consent authorities to even think about going down that particular path or track. We also heard about the concerns expressed that the Director-General would be involved in actually making that decision something that is rather unheard of in Resource Management Act sort of spaces as well.When it comes to the cost it's extremely disappointing that the Government was not even prepared to entertain or respond to—despite this being put to the Minister on many occasions—the opportunity to have some sort of cap or ceiling so that there would be a two-pronged approach to councils wanting to seek cost recovery. Firstly that the cost would need to be fair and reasonable—and there's case law in in that particular regard. The second would be that there would be a cap of 50 percent so that you wouldn't be able to effectively recall or claim anything above 50 percent of the total costs that were in incurred for a council.Yet again this is a Government that is not interested in any of that because this is a Government that is more interested in lumping costs onto ratepayers who are doing it tough in this country right now. We've already heard this evening the fact that ratepayers receiving the council correspondence in the post or via email will be opening that up to significant rates increases. This will continue to be a disincentive for councils to head down that particular path. It is simply lumping costs on ratepayers because that is what the modus operandi of this particular Government is all about.One of the concerns that has been expressed is the whole process that the Director-General would take around making the decision as to whether a review would go ahead. There is no time frame for the Director-General to actually make that decision within. There are time frames for the provision of further information be it 20 working days and what's really I think quite important is that there is no guidance; there is no framework. Now the Minister was asked about this in this House last week. He was asked what are the guiding principles that the Director-General would be required to turn their mind to?Hon Rachel Brooking: Oh what was the answer? Well the answer Rachel Brooking was there was nothing. The Minister might be catastrophising in that particular space that there was nothing there at all.So there are concerns that this is a shambolic approach from this Government without any consideration about due process about the way in which these decisions may be taken or made. It's also of note that if a review process is actually given the green light—and bearing in mind that would be a disincentive for councils to actually do that—there is a requirement for there to be no hearing to be conducted. That is absolutely appalling and affronts natural justice in the sense of the decisions and opportunity for that information to be made available.This is a bad piece of legislation that has been hurriedly rushed through this Parliament. The big concern from my perspective also is not only around the time frames for information but there is a requirement for decisions on a review to be taken two years after initiating the review. Now this is a very interesting change from the bill when it was introduced because the bill as introduced actually referred to a time frame of two years from when the review began or at the beginning of the review. So this is again a ploy by this Government to shorten the time frame within which decisions can be taken and to throw the die against councils in this country. It is an unfortunate piece of legislation which this Government should be absolutely ashamed of. It is shoddy it is ridiculous and it is not something that the Labour Party will support this evening. The Government and Minister Jones should be ashamed of this particular course of action. I do not commend this bill to the House.