Carter David: Fisheries Amendment Bill (No 3) — Third Reading 
Carter David: Fisheries Amendment Bill (No 3) — Third Reading 
[Volume:619;Page:15271] 
Hon DAVID CARTER (National) 
: 
 I will comment on the issue of mussel spat shortly except I will say that I suspect that if Ms Pettis had given us the name of the person who wrote that letter we would find that he is one of the persons about to receive a substantial property right via the allocation of mussel spat into the quota management system. That person is about to become a very very wealthy man. 
I start by acknowledging as we debate the Fisheries Amendment Bill (No 3) that it would be hard to imagine that the new Minister David Benson-Pope could have got himself into a bigger mess if he had deliberately tried to do so. This is the first piece of legislation that the new inexperienced Minister has had the opportunity of presenting to the House. It was presented to the House and if my memory serves me right it was supported by most of the House. It went off to the Primary Production Committee where we started to examine its content in detail. It became evident very very quickly that this legislation was a huge mess. The Minister had clearly been totally captured by his officials. He had either not had the ability or had not used his own ability to question the officials’ rationale for putting this legislation before him so the select committee then had to do the sort of questioning we would have expected the Minister himself to do before presenting such legislation to the House. For the first time that I can recall in the last 5 years the Government’s legislation was lost at the select committee. The select committee voted for the legislation not to proceed further. 
What members need to appreciate is that that select committee is very diverse in its make-up. The National Party New Zealand First ACT Labour and the Greens are all represented on that committee. We found that the majority of those members voted strongly against the legislation and said that it was such a dog that it should not proceed any further. During the select committee process I felt a little sorry for the four Labour members Janet Mackey Clayton Cosgrove Harry Duynhoven and Dover Samuels. 
Shane Ardern 
: They were rolled. 
Hon DAVID CARTER 
: My colleague Shane Ardern says they were rolled. They sat there through the select committee process and realised that the bill was an absolute mess. What was most interesting was that they voted with very weak voices that it should proceed knowing full well that the select committee had the numbers for it not to proceed. 
It is of interest to note that to date Janet Mackey as the deputy chair of the Primary Production Committee has not taken a call. Clayton Cosgrove who normally rushes to the House to speak on legislation has not yet taken a call. Harry Duynhoven has not yet taken a call. I will guarantee that Dover Samuels does not take a call either. 
I want to refer to one other member whom we have not spoken about yet—the Green member Ian Ewen-Street. I am waiting for the Green member to take a call because in the select committee he voted for the legislation not to proceed but I understand there is a little whisper going around Parliament that this legislation will pass today with the support of the Greens. This is the party that runs around the country saying it is the party of integrity. It gets a chance to examine legislation in a select committee and votes against it. Mr Ewen-Street stated at the select committee that the bill was a dog yet he sits meekly in Parliament not prepared to take a call. In half an hour’s time when we vote on this legislation it will pass because his political party has changed its mind. How is that for gumption? He sits in a select committee does the work votes against it then realises that that would not be helping his Labour Party mates so votes for it. 
The real issue is not the embarrassing position that the Government is in or the very embarrassing position that Ian Ewen-Street is in—it is David Benson-Pope. Fancy advancing legislation that tries to extend the quota management system around the rest of the world! The Labour Party members look incredulous and say that it does not do that—but it does. This legislation proposes to put highly migratory species—and what that means in simple language is species that swim all around international waters— 
Jill Pettis 
: Fish can’t read prosecution signs. 
Hon DAVID CARTER 
: Jill Pettis said that fish do not know whether they are swimming into international waters or territorial waters. That is exactly the point. The Labour Party should not try to put those species into the quota management system which is a very good system that was designed for New Zealand territorial waters. The arrogance of the Minister and the Labour Party in thinking that they will impose the quota management system on the rest of the world frankly defies belief. 
I will speak very briefly on three particular submissions that came before us. I will talk first about Westhaven Shellfish and Sea-Right Investments because their situations were similar. They had huge problems over permitting issues with the ministry. They went to court took the Ministry of Fisheries on and won. This legislation effectively nullifies their win in the courts and I object to that. Ian Ewen-Street also strongly objected to that throughout the select committee process but in an interjection a couple of days ago in the House he said that the Minister had given him his word that those matters would be addressed in the Supplementary Order Paper. Ian Ewen-Street should wake up. Those issues are not addressed in the Supplementary Order Paper—the Green member has been conned. 
The other issue regards the cockle fishery. Again we had a very interesting submission from Mr Brierley speaking on behalf of Westpac Mussel Distributors Ltd. Eight fishers had organised themselves and earned catch history under the 1986 legislation. National’s Minister of Fisheries through the 1990s Doug Kidd gave these fishers the opportunity that if the quota was held in their own personal name and they wanted to corporatise and form a company then they would be allowed to do so. Quite stupidly in my mind the officials of the ministry gave them a double allocation—allocation in the fishers’ own names as sole traders and in the name of the company they then formed. That has resulted in five of those fishers getting a double allocation to the detriment of the other three that have not bothered to corporatise. 
That is wrong. The select committee acknowledged that it was wrong and again Ian Ewen-Street tells me that that grievance is corrected in the Supplementary Order Paper. I say to the Green member again wake up—it has not been addressed. Those people have been dicked by the Labour Government and the Green member is about to support that. 
In the closing minutes of my speech I want to make sure that the industry finally gets a Minister with some competence. We have had Pete Hodgson as the Minister of Fisheries. He was sacked because he was absolutely incompetent. We now have David Benson-Pope to whom the industry was prepared to give a chance. His first bill has resulted in the select committee saying it should not proceed yet the Government is ramming it through with a Supplementary Order Paper.