Moroney SueSUE MORONEY (Labour): Can I first of all start my contribution to the debate on this bill by taking the opportunity to extend my condolences to the family and friends of those who died and were injured in the earthquakes early on Monday morning and to pay homage really to the great Kiwi spirit and resilience of our communities which is once again being tested in the current environment. Are we not standing up. I see communities where people are seeing the best in each other are helping each other out and despite the adversity of the times we have a great community spirit which I believe is the thing that is going to see people through. I know that the coming weeks and months are going to be very difficult. I think that at the beginning of the process there is a great deal to be done there is a great deal to think about and people have had a new experience in their lives. And then the daily grind begins. So we have all got that opportunity now to help each other through that period of time.With this bill the Maritime Transport Amendment Bill it would be wonderful would it not if we were able to have the nimbleness in this Parliament to be addressing the things that we really need to address within our maritime transport system which I think is exposed when we have these natural disasters and these emergencies that we must respond to. It would be wonderful if this bill could enhance our maritime transport sector and in particular the coastal shipping part of our transport system not only in order to help us through times like this where it is really apparent that it is desperately needed to have a really robust coastal shipping strategy in place but also for our day-to-day way of shifting both people and freight around our country.If I were to be introducing the Maritime Transport Amendment Bill into this House I think that it would be a great deal more aspirational than this one is. I will say though at the outset that Labour is supporting this bill because it does have some useful measures in it. It certainly has some useful measures in it but we believe that it misses the opportunity—the big opportunity staring us right in the face—to enhance and improve our coastal shipping services as part of a fully integrated transport system. It certainly does not bring that about.In fact I think I could hear it in Minister Simon Bridge's voice when he presented his speech on this bill. Given the many complex issues that he is dealing with right now in his role as Minister of Transport—and I want to thank him for all of those efforts that he is making—to then come and present a bill about maritime transport like this to the House must seem deeply ironic. I know that the Minister will be thinking about the adequacy or the inadequacy of our coastal shipping fleet and its ability to respond in the current emergency situation. And yet here is this bill which actually does nothing to enhance that and I suspect—but I will be interested to hear from the submitters—it may even take us a step backwards.I am referring to the issue that the Minister raised in his speech that about allowing foreign-flag vessels to deliver coastal shipping services to islands in and around New Zealand. That I suspect will actually have the effect of decreasing the robustness of our domestic coastal shipping fleet and we have seen that already in recent years. We have seen that already where our coastal shipping fleet has diminished in numbers and capacity and capability and I believe that provision of this bill may well serve to undermine it yet again.I raise this issue particularly because when road and rail fail—as they have done when mother Nature gets hold of them and shakes them about and gives them a jolly good shake-up and they are no longer usable as has happened just this week—then the one reliable mode of transport is the transport system available to us by sea. Particularly for an island nation like ours that is the one area that we can rely on when these natural disasters occur. We have seen it today. We have seen people being removed in large numbers from Kaikōura by the Defence Force by sea—by ship. That has ended up being the most reliable way to mass evacuate that area.I know that the coastal shipping service—which is almost all in private hands—has been incredibly responsible in each of our emergencies that we have been faced with in pulling together and offering those services to make sure that New Zealand can continue to operate. I am concerned that there is at least one provision in this bill that may make that harder in the future but I will be very interested to hear what submitters have to say on that when they come before the select committee.The issues of safety in the marine sector are important so we will be supporting the drug and alcohol management plans that are proposed through this bill. That is a good thing. I would encourage the Government to look at other sectors where issues are probably more pressing and take an equally strong approach to ensure that workplace health and safety is first and foremost. Although I am not aware that drug and alcohol issues are a major problem for our maritime sector I am aware that the problem that we face with quad bike deaths in this country for example is an area where I would like to see the Government take a regulatory approach. I would think that that would have more of a priority than what we are debating here in this bill today. None the less that is a useful provision. It is a useful provision but I urge the Government to take an equally serious approach to that mounting problem of quad bike deaths which is plaguing our landscape as well. Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: You are moving away from the bill.SUE MORONEY: At the first reading—I will of course bring it back to the bill and will be discussing the bill's inadequacies as well.So to the other provisions of the bill: part of the bill addresses the shortcomings that were made very obvious when we had the grounding of the Rena some years ago. The shortcomings in our ability to require compensation from companies and international organisations that we should be able to expect compensation from are addressed by this bill and that is not before time. So we will be fully supportive of those provisions. It is important that we can have certainty that if these disasters—these oil spillages these wreckages—happen on our coastline we are able to ensure that it is not just the New Zealand taxpayer who cops the full force of the outcome of that. This bill certainly brings greater clarity and more options forward for the Government on behalf of the people of New Zealand to pursue compensation from those who have been complicit in creating the problem in the first place. There are many other bits and pieces—technical changes that are brought forward by this bill. They are measures that by and large we will support but we will listen very carefully to what submitters have to say. The people who are experts in the field and the people who work in the maritime transport sector are the people who will know what the very real consequences and implications are for all the issues that are traversed through this bill. We will listen very carefully to those. We hope that we will have a good working relationship with all members of the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee so that if there are unintended consequences that are discovered through that process we work together. I think that our committee does have a history of being able to work together to do exactly that. I look forward to hearing the submissions and working with all the parties to bring forward the best Maritime Transport Amendment Bill that we can at this point in time. But I would also urge the Government to be more ambitious about having a maritime transport sector that can fully participate in an integrated transport system whether it be in response to an emergency or on any other day of the week.