Roche Denise: Crown Minerals (Protection of Public Conservation Land Listed in the Fourth Schedule) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Roche Denise: Crown Minerals (Protection of Public Conservation Land Listed in the Fourth Schedule) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
[Sitting date: 04 April 2012. Volume:679;Page:1701. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
DENISE ROCHE (Green) 
: 
 It is my privilege to rise to support this bill the Crown Minerals (Protection of Public Conservation Land Listed in the Fourth Schedule) Amendment Bill which is being brought to you from the Green Party. This bill would better protect our most precious conservation areas from mining. Today it is receiving its first reading and it is very heartening indeed to hear the support that is coming from across the House.  
We want to protect our national parks wilderness areas and marine reserves because they are our most precious conservation areas. Any decision to allow them to be prospected or mined should be made by Parliament through an Act of Parliament not by Ministers acting alone. Notwithstanding what this side of the House has been saying a judicial review is not going to cut it. It relies on a decision being made after a decision has been made. It also assumes that we must trust our Ministers and frankly I am not sure that that will cut it with the New Zealand public either.  
We need this bill because our most precious conservation areas need greater protection. The Government has a clear agenda to mine it drill it dig it up sell it off flog it off—whatever. 
Hon Phil Heatley 
: Shoot it! 
DENISE ROCHE 
: Yes. Let us take coal for instance. We have just had a massive demonstration about Bathurst Resources. Solid Energy has got 6 billion tonnes of lignite for urea briquettes and diesel that it is currently exploiting. There is deep-sea oil prospecting and of course there is also fracking. New Zealand is on the cusp of a large expansion of the fracking industry which to date has seen approximately 30 to 40 wells fracked in Taranaki since the early 1990s. A huge amount of the country is open to fracking with permits that allow it currently standing at 4.5 million hectares added to another 6 million hectares to be considered for fracking at the moment. In the last year we have seen a 170 percent increase in the rate of new wells compared with the average rate for the previous 18 years.  
Several oil companies are also very interested in New Zealand’s oil and gas resources and have indicated that fracking will also be on the cards. TAG Oil for instance has $120 million budgeted for exploratory wells and is pursuing what it itself describes as a very aggressive programme and it has stated that it will be applying for consents very shortly.  
The East Coast Hawke’s Bay and Horizons regions are just about to consent their first wells and we are entering a new stage in fracking history in New Zealand. The Gisborne District Council has admitted that it does not have the expertise to regulate fracking and in a recent report after investigating the Canadian situation is asking for standardising resource consent conditions. The Government has wiped its hands of this. It has left it up to small councils which have no resources to decide these issues. That is why we need protection for our most precious areas.  
This bill is simply about adding another layer of democratic protection to what we have and hold for all New Zealanders. It is simply about making sure that this Parliament the elected people of New Zealand gets to make a decision about whether schedule 4 should in fact be exploited and whether in fact that will benefit New Zealanders.  
This bill is not restrictive. There is flexibility there. It is simply saying that these are the things that we hold dear. We have had it mentioned before: 50000 New Zealanders marched to protect schedule 4 and oppose mining in schedule 4 places and to some extent the Government did listen. In the Hauraki Gulf where I am from Great Barrier Island had the schedule 4 mining removed. It was no longer under threat. We ask that that side of the House that the National Party support us in this bill. It is for the benefit of all New Zealanders and it is something that we all must do.