2. Question No. 2—EnvironmentMARAMA DAVIDSON (Co-Leader—Green) to the Minister for the EnvironmentQuestion No. 2—Environment2. MARAMA DAVIDSON (Co-Leader—Green) to the Minister for the Environment: How will new standards for freshwater announced last Thursday help create healthy waterways and swimmable rivers within a generation?Hon DAVID PARKER (Minister for the Environment): Yes. The Government is delivering on its commitment to clean up our waterways with reforms that will deliver environmental gains jobs and benefits for the economy while supporting farmers with $700 million in funding to assist with things like riparian planting and the installation and fencing of many wetlands to trap sediment. The standards apply equally to rural and urban waterways and include specific controls on covering urban streams. We're also setting higher standards for health at swimming spots putting controls on higher risk farm practice such as winter grazing and feed lots setting stricter controls on nitrogen pollution and new bottom lines on other attributes of waterway health. We're ensuring faster council planning requiring mandatory and enforceable farm environment plans and I've said these actions are supported with funding for on-the-ground works.Marama Davidson: How will embedding mātauranga Māori principles for water management in our regulations recognise iwi and hapū kaitiakitanga and improve water health?Hon DAVID PARKER: Consultation showed widespread support from all sectors of society for using te mana o te wai as the guiding principle to prioritise first the health of the waterway then the needs of people and then commercial needs. A mahinga kai attribute will assist in ensuring eco-system health so that all New Zealanders can enjoy and benefit from healthy rivers and clean water for the decades to come. And lastly in respect of the plan-making process that's being legislated under the Resource Management Act there will be an iwi representative on panels.Marama Davidson: What new obligations will be applied to regional councils to reduce E. coli and promote swimmable rivers and lakes?Hon DAVID PARKER: I think we've got to the point that virtually all New Zealanders now agree that New Zealanders should be able to pop down to their local river in summer and put their head under without the risk of getting crook. This package includes an additional E. coli attribute that will apply to primary contact sites during the swimming season and will require councils to reduce those risks substantially.Marama Davidson: What is the time frame for introducing a dissolved inorganic nitrogen standard to complement other tools for managing nitrogen runoff introduced in this package of reforms?Hon DAVID PARKER: That will be a decision for the next Government after the election. In the meantime there is a new input control which puts a limit of 190 kilograms of synthetic nitrogen to be applied per hectare per annum. This is estimated to require a change in practice from an estimated 20 percent of dairy farms—80 percent of dairy farmers already meet this standard. The package also strengthens the existing nitrogen toxicity attribute in the National Policy Statement for Freshwater Management by requiring protection of 95 percent of vulnerable species from the toxic effects of nitrate levels up from 80 percent in the current national policy statement.