Dowie SarahSARAH DOWIE (National—Invercargill): Thank you Madam Assistant Speaker for this opportunity to rise in support of the second reading of this Exclusive Economic Zone and Continental Shelf (Environmental Effects) Amendment Bill. Firstly I want to take the time to congratulate my colleague the Hon Scott Simpson on his précis of the process and how this bill came into being: the fact that in the last Parliament we had the resource management reform. It was a complex set of reforms. As you heard from Mr Simpson there were over 700 clauses amended over 250 pages of material of various moving parts and it was very complex.One thing that I think was unfairly lobbed towards this side by the Hon David Parker was that this was our error. As anyone can see when you have a complex reform bill it's only natural—we hope it doesn't happen but it can happen—that certain things get overlooked when time pressures are on the table. I support the Parliamentary Counsel Office but it was a drafting error and it has resulted in this very minor and technical bill by way of a tidy-up. I'll certainly say to the Government at the moment that that criticism is certainly unfounded and unfair and I would simply draw their attention to their 100-day plan where they extended paid parental leave which certainly I was supportive of but when they did so and that was a relatively minor bill they overlooked extending the keeping-in-touch hours at the same time which resulted in me putting forward a Supplementary Order Paper and the Government adopting it. So that is simply a highlight of the fact that when we are drafting legislation—when we are doing it and it is complex or when we are doing it in a hurry—even the best of us can overlook some minor elements and we need to go back and tidy up.So here we are. We are here with a bill that is tidying up a technicality and it is minor. There is no substantive change here; it is a policy decision that was signed off by the previous Cabinet and we are making good on that promise in that it is only fair that when a private individual is looking to seek a private benefit in the marine space that when they apply for that consent and through a board of inquiry process they pay for the cost incurred of that assessment. This is what that bill does. It also enables the applicant to ask the Minister through the Environmental Protection Authority for an estimate of those costs. Again a fair mechanism to have and certainly not a policy change. And it also allows the Minister in considering that assessment and the consent—any offerings from the applicant that would reduce the costs as part of that application process. So the Minister can assess that and bring that into the mix when they are providing the estimate and their assessment of the reasonable costs for that application process.So as you'll see it's a very minor and technical bill which has resulted in this truncated process that was before this House and then before the Environment Committee. I am a little bit amused that this process wasn't truncated further. We had debate in this House at the first reading that the first second and third readings should be taken as one because it was so minor and technical. Regardless it was referred to the Environment Committee where it was again unanimously decided that no submissions would be taken. And as the Hon Scott Simpson pointed out we did seek further consideration from the Law Society which resulted in a very good submission to us that detailed three points. Two of those points we did decide were verging outside of the scope of the bill and verging into a new policy arena but certainly the first with respect to drafting and making the bill clearer with regard to cost recovery was taken on board.So anyway we are here now. We have our bill in front of us and it is supported by this side of the House. I'm certainly not going to take any more time in discussing this bill given that my colleague gave such an excellent précis of where we are to date and we support this bill in its second reading.