Fitzsimons Jeanette: Address to Her Excellency the Governor-General 
Fitzsimons Jeanette: Address to Her Excellency the Governor-General 
[Volume:617;Page:13185] 
JEANETTE FITZSIMONS (Co-Leader—Green) 
: 
 I begin by celebrating a privilege that is increasingly rare in this world: the right to express our views very publicly and in large numbers without being shot or imprisoned. A number of times—most recently as I walked with the hikoi—I have reflected on how in many countries we would have been waiting for the army to open fire. We must guard those civil liberties jealously in a time when the war on terrorism may well start to erode them. 
Several members have expressed our great pride at being the first nation where women won the right to vote. But have we really changed the lives of women outside this House? Women are still far from having pay equity still suffer horrendous domestic violence and are expected to bear the brunt of child rearing and housework while still contributing to the family income. A few of us have become part of the elite by entering this place but for the many life goes on much as it always has gone on. 
As Rod Donald has said under the old two-party system many strands of society were not represented in Parliament. It was not until 1996 that Green members entered the House but the political movement we represent has a much older history. Our predecessor the Values Party was formed to contest elections and raise Green issues. It gained over 5 percent of the vote but it took 24 years until MMP was introduced and the first Green members were elected. 
One hundred and fifty years ago Parliament reflected a young colony that saw the environment as hostile and attacked it with chainsaw and digger to tame it for human needs. In those 150 years most of our indigenous forest has been logged or burned—mainly burned actually—and 90 percent of our wetlands has been drained. Many birds have become extinct and others are threatened having been replaced by a huge number of pests and weeds that were deliberately introduced because they reminded someone of home. 
 Waterways were used as sewers for industry even as late as 1954 when the Tasman Pulp and Paper Enabling Act specifically required that all effluent from the new Kawerau paper mill would be discharged into the Tarawera River.  
Hansard 
 shows there was debate about the effects of that on farmers downstream who used the river for stock watering but the discharges were described as “so slight as to be almost unnoticeable.” The exemption of the company from prosecution or individual action for damages was regarded as necessary in case “some crank gets a bee in his bonnet and brings an action for pollution.” That is the river that has widely been known as the “black drain” with the most serious dioxin contamination of any water body in New Zealand. Amazingly that legislation stayed in force until the passing of the Resource Management Act in 1991 and some of the effect of it was carried on even then under the “exceptional circumstances” clause in that Act. 
But even in the 19th century there were some parliamentarians who were aware of the harm that was accumulating. An interesting example as early as 1874 was Sir Julius Vogel until then a keen supporter of heroic rates of colonial expansion who had a road to Damascus experience while visiting the South Island and introduced the Forests Bill to establish and manage State forests. Speaking to the second reading he said: “The question involved in this forests matter is of something for New Zealand to cling to for generations; to shape its future; to decide its climate its adaptability for settlement its commercial value its beauty its healthfulness and its pleasure-bestowing qualities.” There was a storm of opposition from those who wanted to carry on what the Honourable O’Neill described as “reckless and wanton destruction” for personal gain but Vogel was supported by members like Stafford Gillies and Wood and carried the day. Perhaps if more people had shared his vision we would today have a thriving timber industry of sustainably managed native forests as well as representative areas protected from all human interference. Sadly with clear-felling continuing until the 21st century that opportunity has gone and it has taken a huge public fight to protect the last remnants of our publicly-owned native forests in perpetuity. 
We have still not completely outgrown our colonial frontier “develop or bust” mindset. It is critically urgent now that we grow into a new mindset of sustainable management and conservation. Parliament is not leading that transition. It is far behind many groups in the community—even behind some groups in business. The Greens are working for the day when this House takes a lead on this most urgent problem of our time.