O'Connor Damien: Crown Minerals (Permitting and Crown Land) Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeO'Connor Damien: Crown Minerals (Permitting and Crown Land) Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 11 April 2013. Volume:689;Page:9301. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR (Labour—West Coast - Tasman): We are speaking on Part 2 here of the Crown Minerals (Permitting and Crown Land) Bill. I will say in the Committee that perhaps I was a little harsh on the Government when speaking on Part 1 yesterday; I just find it very difficult to praise the Government very much these days.Part 2 does deal with the conservation parts of the Crown minerals legislation but can I go back and make reference to Part 1 because of course there is the ability now to include in the permitting provisions requirements around health and safety. Indeed we have hopefully through the lessons of Pike River learnt that we must include protection for human values for human lives for health and safety up front in the permitting regime and the mining oversight regime from the department—the new super-department the Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment.It was perhaps pertinent that yesterday we were talking about that because I must make brief reference to the report—it is an independent report of course we are told—to the chief executive of the Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment the new department. It is very very sad reading. It says there have been systemic failures in parts of a now superministry which we are told have been addressed. I am not quite sure whether they have been. The point is that if those systemic problems have not been addressed then we are further exacerbating the problems through the superministry oversight implemented with the passage of this Crown Minerals (Permitting and Crown Land) Bill. It has good intent in some areas but as my colleague Moana Mackey said it does step back from safeguards for the natural values that of course are important to us not just now but into the future. So in making one step forward in protecting health and safety and human values the Government is taking one step backward in protecting natural values.The restructuring that has gone on in combination with the changes in this bill do leave a lot of New Zealanders wondering whether we are simply opening up the Department of Conservation estate to rampant development. On top of that there is a lot of experience within the Department of Conservation particularly in the West Coast - Tasman area where the department’s people have found the right balance between allowing wise and responsible mining on conservation land and protecting the natural values wherever possible.Part 2 deals with changes in the area of the conservation estate. It does allow the securing of some areas should they be deemed to be schedule 4 or of schedule 4 value but the question around other conservation land remains—that is if you gut the Department of Conservation if you—oh I see. If you remove the capacity—I am not allowed to use the word “gut”—within the department to astutely assess what is happening then people wonder whether in fact we are going to now see as we did with human lives a destruction of conservation values. That is not something that anyone wishes for any industry—mining agriculture forestry or whatever.So in summary I have to remind the officials and the Minister of Energy and Resources that if you can let the Department of Labour get to the point where “Its performance as a health and safety regulator of Pike was ineffectual and dysfunctional.” then this is the kind of oversight that can occur in a Government department if it is squeezed of resources. That is what the Minister of Conservation is doing to the Department of Conservation and that will lead to the same kind of dysfunctional oversight if we are not careful.So in Part 1 of the bill the Government has made some progress off the back of a terrible tragedy to implement some health and safety measures some requirements in the permitting regime for mining and some requirements in the ongoing oversight and that we welcome. In Part 2 rather than learning from the lessons of tragedies like Cave Creek and tragedies like Pike River we are making changes around the area of mining and conservation. I hope we are not setting up the department for a big failure.Although the Minister of Energy and Resources shakes his head his colleague the Hon Dr Nick Smith is not gutting but almost exterminating and certainly removing from the front line responsibility across the Department of Conservation and removing capability removing experience and destroying the livelihoods of people who have committed to conservation and the Department of Conservation all their working lives. They have been told that they are down the road because they are no longer needed. This is being done at a time when the Minister claims we are going to boost the capability of mining and we are going to allow mining companies to work in areas of conservation land. That is something I acknowledge we should do but we need to uphold the ability of the department to negotiate in a way that ensures the strictest of guidelines and protections for the water for the soil for the natural values and for all the protected species on Department of Conservation land.So this bill comes at a crucial time a time when we should be learning from the lessons of the past. A Green colleague today—and she is probably speaking here later on in the bill—raised the very sad issue of Cave Creek. I was a member of Parliament then. I dealt with the Minister of Conservation at that stage. He walked because he acknowledged that they had squeezed the department—just as the current Minister is doing now—to the point where the passion and the commitment to conservation by the individuals on the ground meant they got out and did work themselves. It was work that was proven not to be up to standard unfortunately in the issue of Cave Creek. But there is that same passion and that same squeeze on resources that is referred to in the Department of Labour report. Resources were not there to carry out the responsibilities of the Department of Labour and it gave rise to a dysfunctional and incapable Department of Labour in the area of upholding health and safety. The Ministers over there smile they shake their heads and they give reassurances. Some of those Ministers were in Government in 1990 when they did the same thing to the Department of Conservation.Part 2 of this bill deals with the issue of conservation. Unfortunately it does not deal with the issue of resources for conservation management. This very day people up and down this country are out marching protesting to try to protect and uphold conservation values. As an MP from an area of huge and spectacular conservation estate and resources I want good people to protect and look after that area. I also want mining and I want safe mining.So in this one piece of legislation we are summarising so many real issues that are at the front of the minds of people not only in my electorate but up and down this country around health and safety around the ability of the Government to regulate and oversee industry in the proper way and around the issue of the Government’s ability to manage conservation land on behalf of each and every one of us. We want that land to be there for our children and our grandchildren. We want jobs and mining is part of that economic mix but it must not be at the expense of New Zealanders’ lives and it must not be at the expense of the desecration of our environment or conservation land. This bill raises more questions than it provides answers for and I want assurances from that Minister that resources will go back into the Department of Conservation to properly negotiate in the areas of responsibility that are laid down in this bill.