Bridges Simon: Marine and Coastal Area (Takutai Moana) Bill — Third Reading 
Bridges Simon: Marine and Coastal Area (Takutai Moana) Bill — Third Reading 
[Volume:671;Page:17646] 
SIMON BRIDGES (National—Tauranga) 
: 
 The Maori Affairs Committee received nearly 5800 submissions and heard several hundred submissions orally. There was a lot of disagreement. There was not much consensus. But the process was as the departmental report made clear robust and we listened. The process was not a waste of time; it was valuable. We made changes that the constituency that John Boscawen is trying to appeal to as well as others will appreciate and be reassured by. Firstly we made it explicit in clause 27 that the public cannot be charged for access to the common marine and coastal area. Arguably we did not need to do that but we did. Clause 94 was amended so that negotiated agreements can now come into effect only following the scrutiny of this House and legislation. A large raft of technical amendments was also asked for by the courts etc. to ensure that this law works as it is intended. As I have said there was disagreement. People disagreed for completely different reasons. 
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER 
: I cautioned the previous speaker that in a third reading members can talk only about the contents of the bill as reported back from the select committee. This is a third reading speech. It is not a discussion about what happened at the select committee. 
SIMON BRIDGES 
: I am well aware of the submissions we received. But the question I would like to pose in relation to this bill—and the substance of the bill as it was reported back to the House—is what is a responsible Government to do in the instance where there is complete discord where consensus is not to be found? How should the Government deal with these hard issues? We could throw our hands up in the air and do nothing. Let us call that the ostrich option where we bury our head in the sand. But that option just leaves the problem as a problem. Another bolder Government that is more equal to the task would still have to find a solution. We should not just defer problems and that is not the kind of Government that I ever want to be a part of. Instead we have dealt with this problem. We have balanced the various competing views in the interests of all Kiwis. This means of course that there are a number of grumpy people—Steve Chadwick not the least of them. But that is better than the ostrich strategy where ignorance is bliss until the ostrich is finally road kill. 
Frankly with a complex issue like the foreshore and seabed there is no perfect answer. There is no quick fix. There are no simple truths that everyone can sign up to. Rather there are different perspectives where the best we can hope for is the least bad or least wrong solution. I believe that we have the best solution possible even if it may not be “the right one”. 
Hon Steve Chadwick 
: Oh! 
SIMON BRIDGES 
: Labour’s solution—and Steve Chadwick makes some faint moan—which is its sixth solution to date is to repeal the 2004 law and leave this hard issue to some unelected judges to sort out. That response is a cop-out. I agree with Paul Quinn that one of the problems is that we do not know what we will get but it is also an abrogation of our responsibility in this House to another less well-equipped branch of Government to solve the problem. When I say “less well-equipped” I do not mean any slight on the judges. It is just that they would have to try to do what we have just done which is effectively hold a select committee and listen to the various voices on this then attempt to balance the competing issues. The problem is that they cannot. Lon Fuller has noted that as jurists they are not set up for that. Courts are geared up to hear a couple of parties and to decide between their competing contentions. They have no process to hear from thousands as we did. We do. As a Government we will not cop out on this difficult issue.