Gallagher Martin: Resource Management Amendment Bill (No 2) — Instruction to CommitteeCWH In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee 
Gallagher Martin: Resource Management Amendment Bill (No 2) — Instruction to CommitteeCWH In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee 
[Volume:608;Page:5534] 
MARTIN GALLAGHER (NZ Labour—Hamilton West) 
: 
 I want to make a relatively brief contribution to this debate. I was interested in listening to the previous speaker Gerrard Eckhoff. I think it is important to focus on the key changes that this bill introduces. It was my pleasure and privilege to be a member of the previous Local Government and Environment Committee in the last Parliament and to be the deputy chair. My good colleague Richard Worth and I— 
Richard Worth 
: We worked hard. 
MARTIN GALLAGHER 
: It was a very good committee and I take the opportunity to pay tribute to people like Eric Roy and Owen Jennings. I found Owen Jennings to be a good member of that committee and a good member of Parliament— 
Gerrard Eckhoff 
: A good ACT man. 
MARTIN GALLAGHER 
: Yes and well should the member nod. We had some philosophical disagreements but he was a good Kiwi and a good New Zealander. I am not going to say how his party treated him because that is provocative and I think we can have a positive discussion. 
What this bill really involves is the balance between our need as a country to develop and our need not to lose by stupidity or by accident the very special qualities that make us the unique and beautiful nation that we are. It is really sad that members opposite immediately seize on this and moan and groan—but not all of them because there are one or two very good members in the Opposition. Let me pay tribute to Richard Worth who was a very good member of the Local Government and Environment Committee and whom I found personally very helpful. 
One of the things this bill is about is not repeating the mistakes of the past. One of the programmes that I became involved in as a very young environmentalist was lest we forget—and I think we should not forget—the Lake Manapouri campaign. Within our lifetimes and within our generation there was a Government which happened to be a National Government that was going to raise Lake Manapouri. It was going to lose a lake and an ecosystem that had evolved over millions of years for the so-called greater economic good. I wonder whether we could find anyone in this Parliament who would stand up be counted and be identified with that. Yes indeed we have the deputy leader of the ACT party. It is a shame he was not the deputy in terms of his list ranking. But he has made a good contribution and I do not bear any personal rancour against Mr Shirley. Stand up those who would still raise Lake Manapouri! 
The sort of thing that distresses me about this kind of debate and even in the community at large is a very distinct lack of balance. All the blame for some development issues and some processes are laid at the Act’s door as against the resourcing of the Environment Court. But dare I say it one of the dangers of ensuring that balance one of the issues that arises if we are not careful is that bit by bit we will lose what makes this country special. Because it is special it is competitive. It is an attractive place to invest in work in and live in. It is a bit like the whole thing about the loss of some of our public estate our high-country estate but particularly our coastline as it is subdivided and built on. Coromandel is a really good example; Jeanette Fitzsimons will know this extremely well. One day we will wake up and find that the last bit of unplanned development is happening and what was special about that area will have gone. We have lost squandered and stolen from our grandchildren what makes this country special. I think there are a number of members of this Parliament who in their heart of hearts know that to be true. 
Having said that I say that the other balance that we grappled with as a committee particularly around issues of introducing limited notification of resource consents—and I acknowledge the difference of opinion that Labour members have with the Greens on this issue and others—was the balance between what is in the broad community interest and the ability of what one calls the vexatious litigant to hold up unduly and unfairly and potentially compromise what indeed could be very positive development. I have experienced this at the local government level.