Salesa JennyHon JENNY SALESA (Labour—Panmure-Ōtāhuhu): Mālō 'aupito Mr Speaker pea tuku mu'a keu hūfanga atu 'i he ngaahi tala fakatapu. As the former chair of the Foreign Affairs Defence and Trade Committee it is such an honour for me to rise and to give a speech on the inquiry we did on unregulated unreported and illegal fishing in the Pacific. I'd also like to acknowledge you Mr Speaker because you were the deputy chair of the select committee.The issue of illegal unregulated and unreported fishing in the Pacific—or IUU as it is commonly called—is a longstanding one and it is one where we've received many requests from many different Pacific countries asking New Zealand for assistance on IUU because we know that the Pacific is a really vast ocean and Pacific countries are not able to monitor the vast Pacific Ocean on their own.Now according to the Foreign Fisheries Agencies—or FFA—which has 17 member countries of the Pacific including New Zealand and Australia tuna fisheries contributed more than US$2.25 billion annually to Pacific Island economies in 2019. So we are talking about a lot of money. We also know from FFA that the annual amount of IUU fishing—and this is just an estimate—in the Pacific and this is in 2016 was around about US$616 million. Fisheries generates thousands and thousands of jobs in the Pacific and it is the primary and in some instances secondary source of income for up to 50 percent of households in the Pacific. So way back in 2021 our select committee—the Foreign Affairs Defence and Trade Committee—agreed that IUU is an issue and area which we should launch an inquiry about. We finalised terms of reference and we sought advice from five ministries. I'd like to acknowledge them not only for their hard work but actually many of them are here in the House today—the ministries of primary industries foreign affairs and trade defence the New Zealand Defence Force as well as the Department of Conservation. We called for public submissions and we received 34 written submissions and we heard oral submissions from 13 individuals and organisations and we also made 11 recommendation to address the environmental economic and social impacts of IUU fishing.We were also fortunate that as a select committee one of our members at the time—Ingrid Leary who is here in the House—wrote a very persuasive letter to the Speaker at the time and he allowed us as a select committee to travel to the Pacific. We went to Fiji in 2022 and the Solomon Islands and Tonga in 2023 as part of our inquiry. During these visits to Fiji Solomons and Tonga we found out first-hand some of the issues that folks are dealing with on the ground. For instance we were told that in terms of observers on the ground in Tonga some of the effects of Recognised Seasonal Employer (RSE) scheme was to an extent that it is really rare for them to be able to find and employ someone to go and be an observer to monitor fishing boats. There were many other issues that they told us about RSE.But I'd like to move to the recommendations that the committee made. First we recommended that we need to address the information gaps because the committee believes that the true size and scale of IUU fishing in the region is still unknown. Second capacity building in the Pacific in cooperation with Pacific countries to ensure that they can recruit and retain professional staff for fisheries monitoring surveillance and enforcement. Third that we need in New Zealand to review our own plan of action to prevent deter and eliminate IUU fishing and also that the Fisheries (International Fishing and Other Matters) Amendment Bill needs to contain stronger IUU fishing prevention measures and ensure that our vessels and equipment are fit for purpose for maritime surveillance. Fourth that we need to implement stronger measures to hold IUU fishing offenders to account. And fifth that we also need to initiate further regional cooperation around joint exercises and international development cooperation.Before I take my seat I also want to acknowledge and thank the Minister of Foreign Affairs the Rt Hon Winston Peters because he is committed to the Pacific. I'd also like to acknowledge and thank the Minister for Oceans and Fisheries the Hon Shane Jones because he is the one that's actually taking through the Fisheries Amendment Bill which does implement stronger IUU—Hon Member: Ah but who introduced it?Hon JENNY SALESA: —measures in the Pacific and we of course introduced it in Labour. But I do want to thank the current Government for continuing on to ensure that IUU fishing is addressed. Thank you. Mālō 'aupito Mr Speaker.