Goldsmith Paul: Riccarton Bush Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Goldsmith Paul: Riccarton Bush Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
[Sitting date: 17 October 2012. Volume:684;Page:5938. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
PAUL GOLDSMITH (National) 
: 
 It is very much my pleasure to take a call on this Riccarton Bush Amendment Bill’s second reading. During the dinner break I had the pleasure of going to hear an angel investor talking about his work in the city. It was very interesting to hear about listening to 300 or so people coming up with business ideas filtering them down to 20 that they would look at very carefully and actually investing in three or four. It was very encouraging to me to hear about so much entrepreneurial activity going on here in Wellington and in New Zealand. It is highly relevant to the issue of Riccarton Bush because fundamentally here we are celebrating the protection of a fine stand of kahikatea and bush in Christchurch but the foundations of it of course lie on the success of the Deans brothers and the Deans family who came to New Zealand in the 1840s from a little village called Riccarton in east Ayrshire in Scotland. They were entrepreneurs and that is what this country has been based on: people going out to the other side of the world and taking on enormous risks in order to create the wealth that we in New Zealand enjoy. They had to navigate their way past floods disease fire sharp depressions wars diseases of their own body and mind and also diseases of the sheep and the cattle back in the 1840s 1850s and 1860s in order to build the great sheep stations that the Deans owned and that provided the wealth from which they were able to hold on to and preserve this Riccarton Bush which this piece of legislation seeks to continue to preserve as it has. 
When we look at that question of entrepreneurship which has been so central to the history of New Zealand and the formation of our economy what do we look at? What do entrepreneurs like to have in their environment? What do they need for a supportive environment? When you start running through the list of things one of the things is a good sound rule of law—one of the great inheritances we had from the system of government that came to New Zealand through the United Kingdom. They need access to capital. A lot of them brought that their few carefully saved gold sovereigns in order to buy the sheep and the land to survive the years when it took a long time to convert these sheep stations into places that were productive and to get through the many depressions—a very sharp depression there was in the 1850s. They needed access to capital as they do indeed today but they also needed and relied upon sound money. There were not politicians around back then who were trying to water the milk and somehow think that this was going to create wealth in the country by debasing the currency. No they were relying on sound money the gold standard back in the 19th century. They were relying on access to resources because they had the ability to go out there and there was a clear understanding that New Zealand was a relatively empty wilderness. There were maybe 100000 Maori living across the whole of New Zealand at that time. Maybe a thousand or two living in the South Island so there was a very large area waiting for— 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: A thousand or two. Where have you been? 
PAUL GOLDSMITH 
: I read my history books Mr Peters. 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: No you haven’t. 
PAUL GOLDSMITH 
: It is true that you may feature in the history books but I read my history books and you have been around for a very long time. It is probably not unfair that we should celebrate such a long and extended career in the House but perhaps it has come towards the end of its usefulness. I am not sure. That is not for me to comment on. 
When we focus on things that were so essential to the formation of the wealth that is the foundation of our economy then we are looking at that access to resources. Then I suppose another issue is our access to skilled workers workers who can work out on the field and that was so important to how the Deans built their stations and created their wealth. Funnily enough when you run through all those sorts of things—rule of law access to capital sound money that has not been watered down by tyrannical politicians access to resources and workforces—those are just the sorts of things that this Government has been promoting and proposing in its Business Growth Agenda which underlines most of the activity of this Government in the economic growth area which underlines the strength that we have here and the ability for us to keep on doing what we are doing. 
I would just like to now draw at this point of the speech towards the Riccarton Bush Amendment Bill itself where we look at the objects of this being the Christchurch City Council’s promoted bill. It is all about modernising and updating the governance arrangements for the board known as the Riccarton Bush Trust in order to better define the board’s functions to provide for the continuation of its work and to enhance its finance and administration— 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: Is this guy Don Brash’s biographer? 
PAUL GOLDSMITH 
: You are just jealous that I have never written anything about you. The bill vests the land at 30 Kahu Road Christchurch— 
Hon Member 
: Yes you have—I read it on a dunny wall. 
PAUL GOLDSMITH 
: Oh that is true. Well you know I write about interesting people people who have achieved things— 
Rt Hon Winston Peters 
: Like Don Brash? 
PAUL GOLDSMITH 
: Yes that is right. If we drill down further to some of the things I just want to draw attention to some of the work that the Local Government and Environment Committee did. It received and considered two submissions. I remember it very well. At Antarctica New Zealand we listened to the submissions and the committee recommended that the bill be passed with amendments. On that matter I would like to continue just to say that I very much recommend this bill to the House and congratulate the MP Gerry Brownlee on his fine work in bringing this bill to the House. Thank you. 
Bill read a second time.