Sage EugenieHon EUGENIE SAGE (Green): Tēnā koe Mr Speaker. Thank you. The Green Party is opposing the Resource Management (Regional Responsibility for Certain Agricultural Matters) Amendment Bill. I'm really puzzled by the contributions I've heard from both the ACT member and the National Party because there is a widespread recognition that the failure to develop national policy and national standards under the Resource Management Act has been a problem. It has resulted in huge costs as regional councils and district councils around the motu seek to develop their own rules that are often challenged; that goes to the Environment Court. So there has been a huge amount of cost and unnecessary bureaucratic enterprise in each council attempting to develop its own rules and regulations and having those contested. Then what that has led to with the major intensification in agriculture and the incredible subdivision development on the edge of towns with earthworks and sediment loss from those is quite significant degradation of our rivers and lakes. And it has been this Government in the last term under Minister Parker which led the work to put in place some certainty some national regulations to prevent stock getting into waterways to ensure that there are standards through the National Environmental Standards for Freshwater for sediment for nitrogen and the use of synthetic fertiliser. What this bill will do will put it back to regional councils to each work on their own and not to have that efficiency of working nationally to have some consistent and clear standards. This is a very dangerous bill because it really highlights ACT's attitude to the future of farming—[Interruption]—and the future of the environment and you can hear the members getting quite excited. ACT goes round the country seeking to present a fresh face but it does not care about a healthy environment. It does not recognise that a healthy economy and social wellbeing are based on healthy nature. It wants to scrap critical regulation that it has taken 30 years to get through a board of inquiry process through public consultation through working closely with the primary sector councils primary industry organisations like Beef + Lamb Federated Farmers—and instead it's tossing that all out. ACT doesn't like regulation; we know that. But this is making it very clear that it's quite happy to have dirty rivers and continued degradation rather than working on a path to clean up those rivers and ensure that our farmers who are working to replant their riparian margins to protect gullies to recognise what they can do in catchment groups to restore waterways and are getting on with it as Minister Parker noted with a substantial investment of funds from this Government from this generation to repair the damage that was done in the past. And as Tangi Utikere noted on the Environment Committee we have been listening to dozens of submitters who want te taiao properly cared for who recognise that Papatūānuku is essential to our wellbeing and that we need a new approach. What does this bill do? It goes backwards. It's giving the nod to continued degradation and to continued pollution because it will put it back on the regional councils and undermine all of this work that has been done in the national policy statement and the national environmental standards for freshwater to put in place some bottom lines while allowing councils to work with their communities.So the funding support that this Government is providing to ensure that our rivers are swimmable is work that has been called for by the public for a long time. Yet National and ACT are going backwards. They are showing their contempt for nature for water quality for clean rivers and just putting the load back on regional councils again. So it would be a very dangerous combination of National and ACT in the 2023 election if they got elected that would seek to roll back the regulation that we've finally got in place in order to protect water quality. So this bill is a bad bill because it is a bill for dirty rivers for increased sediment pollution increased nitrogen pollution increased degradation of our aquifers and it's not about protecting farming's long-term future because farming's healthy future relies on a healthy environment. Kia ora.