Bennett Paula: Waitakere Ranges Heritage Area Bill — Third Reading 
Bennett Paula: Waitakere Ranges Heritage Area Bill — Third Reading 
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PAULA BENNETT (National) 
: 
 I am grateful for the opportunity to speak in the third and final reading of the Waitakere Ranges Heritage Area Bill. I must say there are a few things said by the previous speakers that I certainly agree with. One would be when the Greens said it has been a long 2 years. It certainly feels like it and it certainly feels like it for the residents of Waitakere and I am sure for the councils and particularly Waitakere City Council which sponsored the bill. 
I stand up with a smile because this bill has been a true reflection of democracy in New Zealand. I think in some respects we should stand up and be quite proud that there has been most certainly robust discussion around it. There has certainly been debate. I would certainly say that the residents of Waitakere support the Waitakere Ranges as does the National Party. I do not think there can be any question of that. 
On the poll just for one moment when people were asked whether they supported protecting the ranges the majority said yes. I say with a wry smile that I think if I had been called I would have said yes as well. But there is no doubt that 221 submissions on a local government bill means that there was a strong interest in this legislation in the local community. The community was split and it was split pretty much fifty-fifty. 
The local community has been split about this. I have been pretty upfront and available and have spoken to those who I believe support this bill. I have had no hesitancy in going to meetings where I have known I would not be the most popular person because the majority at those meetings were in favour of the bill and I have had no hesitancy in making sure that my office door was open and that I listened to those who were at times rather zealous and incredibly passionate about the issue. 
What I think is a bit of shame is that there has not been quite that feeling of openness and transparency from those who support the bill. In fact we have just heard a speech—just before mine—that tries to paint the people who oppose this bill as being “devil developers” who want to cut up the ranges into a thousand pieces and see houses galore in a tight-fitting subdivision. That is grossly unfair because it is so far from the truth. If we ask around the residents who live in Waitakere we will find that no one wants to see that sort of tight-fitting subdivision within the Waitakere Ranges and foothills. Certainly that is the answer we got when we talked about protection. So I do not think there is any question as to whether the debate was about a tight-fitting subdivision by those “devil developers”. Unfortunately that is how the debate progressed. 
I want to pick up on a few things which some of my colleagues have already mentioned. One has to be the fact that landowners are not necessarily the enemy. They are not the ones who barged in and cut down all the trees and turned this into a high residential area. In fact it is the opposite. In fact the people and the landowners in Waitakere have restored and rejuvenated the area. They are passionate about it and they need that opportunity. I think that to paint National members as the big baddies who want to carve it all up may fit the agenda of some people but the reality is we do not believe that this legislation will achieve its intention and we have been consistent in that view. 
We believe that this legislation is unnecessary and will potentially create huge litigation costs for ratepayers—and it should be done throughout the nation if we see cumulative effects as being vitally important. I for one do not stand here and negatively go against those who have put forward this bill and are supporting it. I think the intention has been genuine and I think the desired outcome is actually quite good. But will this bill do it and will it be any good for Waitakere? My answer is absolutely and categorically no. In the Local Government and Environment Committee we were not at any time assured that this bill would fulfil its purpose. I have heard that 25000 people—that is the latest count—live in the area and will be affected. To say they are not affected is to ask why we need the bill. It is a simple as that. 
There are other ways to get the desired results of this bill and it is through the Resource Management Act and a local district plan. Let us let a district plan do what it should do and plan how a district should be. This bill will not improve the quality of environmental management. It will simply add to the bureaucracy of existing plans and laws. 
I commend the members of the select committee who worked on this bill. What we see today is certainly not what we saw when the bill was first introduced. There will be so many people—well not so many; I do not believe that many people actually listen to these debates—who will find it quite hard to believe that at the select committee even on a bill this contentious we saw cross-party support to work our way through it. We may certainly have come at it from different angles and we certainly had different beliefs and wanted different outcomes but as the bill was to become law we had a desire to make this legislation as workable as possible for Waitakere residents.  
I want to touch on the potential for New Zealand. Let us have no disbelief that we have opened a can of worms that means that legislation like this can now come throughout the country. I want to pick up on what the Hon Peter Dunne said. He said that no one can deny the Waitakere area its natural beauty. I look at clause 8 and note one of the heritage features must be “natural scenic beauty”. I challenge members in this Chamber to stand up and tell me of somewhere in New Zealand that does not have that. But I can say to my Waitakere colleagues and the residents who may be listening that I do know of one place that does not have natural scenic beauty and that would have to be the Glen Eden overbridge but I will deal with that issue in another format I think. 
Chris Auchinvole 
: You’re probably right. 
PAULA BENNETT 
: Yes—bring it on ONTRACK! I want to talk about a couple of clauses. One which was an improvement made by the select committee means that the boundary of the heritage area can now be extended only by an Order in Council and has to be by way of a legislative amendment. That is certainly an improvement on the original provision. The features of the heritage area which are mentioned in clause 8 are still perhaps of the most concern certainly to us because they are the most ambiguous and carry the highest risk of litigation. So the clause still seeks to “protect restore and enhance”. It still talks about the quietness and the darkness but that sort of stuff is so open to interpretation. I cannot help but say to the Greens that a lot of their party members are involved in the Waitakere Ranges Protection Society and I sincerely hope it does not cost the Greens some membership and thousands and thousands of dollars to be debating in court what the quietness and the darkness of the ranges really means. 
It is important that the bill at least categorically states that if there is a conflict the Resource Management Act prevails. Thank goodness! But then why have the bill if it will not do something that the Resource Management Act does not do? 
It is fine for people to make little comments. It has been a personal attack for me quite frankly the whole way through and people can go on about how completely awful I am or where I live and the fact that I do not actually live in the foothills area but live instead in poor old Henderson which gets the raw end of this deal more often that not. It was fine for Mr Cunliffe to sit there earlier and talk about how no new person has been employed. That is not true. Already the Waitakere City Council has advertised for someone to work on this bill. 
I finish with a final plea and that plea would be that we turn this regional park into a national park. Let us give it that highest protection and let the foothills and the rest of the area covered by this bill actually be under the National Parks Act the Resource Management Act and the Local Government Act. If we had stuck with them instead of yet another piece of legislation and bureaucracy the Waitakere residents would be getting a better result.