Ardern Shane: New Zealand Geographic Board (Nga Pou Taunaha o Aotearoa) Bill — Third Reading 
Ardern Shane: New Zealand Geographic Board (Nga Pou Taunaha o Aotearoa) Bill — Third Reading 
[Volume:647;Page:15888] 
SHANE ARDERN (National—Taranaki-King Country) 
: 
 It is with some concern tonight that I rise in opposition to the New Zealand Geographic Board (Nga Pou Taunaha o Aotearoa) Bill and I ask Mr Flavell to talk to me later about whether I got the pronunciation right. Some concern has been expressed as to why we oppose this bill but let me tell members as a member of the Queen’s honourable Opposition that one of the hallmarks of this Government is overwhelmingly to provide the Opposition with something to oppose and it has done so in this bill. I hasten to add that it is difficult to find the real mischievous socialist undoing in this bill but it has provided us with ample reason to oppose the bill. 
I want to share with the House the minority report of National members of the Government Administration Committee. “National members recognise the role of the New Zealand Geographic Board under the existing legislation. There appears to be nothing wrong with the way the current legislation is operating and accordingly National members see no need for change.” That is clear. There is no ambiguity about that statement. 
The bill we are currently debating no doubt came about as a result of a range of various submissions to the Minister that there needed to be some modernisation of the 1946 Act. But during the submission process at the select committee and from the advice of the officials the select committee members could find nothing in what they put forward that would require this legislative change. We then looked deeper to find out what the bill does. We found a bit of positive stuff so it is not all negative. 
The bill provides for a number of new functions to be carried out by the board including new administrative functions in relation to the official naming of geographical features not only within the territorial limits of New Zealand but also on the continental shelf and in the Ross Dependency. So we asked the officials what happens now and why there was suddenly a need for legislation to make this a process that is easy to carry out. The officials came back to us and said that what happens now is no different from what will happen in the future. 
There is an international discussion as one would expect there would have to be when we are talking about areas that are outside our economic zone or outside our jurisdiction. I will not use the term “united nations” because it is not under the United Nations but there is a South Pacific forum I guess one could describe it as that meets and discusses these issues—although the United States obviously has an interest in that from time to time as well—and it comes to a binding agreement amongst the nations. Hence National members asked why there was a need to change the current Act and we could not find one. So at the end of the day we were unable to uncover the reasons why this bill is before the House today and why we have gone through this process. 
An additional concern raised by National members was the impact of clauses 32 and 33 on private entities that are affected by the definition of “official document” and the requirements for the use of official names for geographic features. The reasons for the concerns are simple. A lot of people have a strong affinity with various areas. There are cultural reasons for various names being used in different ways. 
Business operators and tourism activities also use those names in their promotional material and in literature they provide not only to their customers but also to the Inland Revenue Department and various other Government agencies to explain what they are involved in. Potentially the introduction of this new proposal this clause relating to an official name could impose a layer of compliance requirements on these operators that is completely unnecessary and no evidence was brought to the select committee to show why this change was necessary in the first place. The National members of the committee opposed the provision on that basis. 
The commercial impact on tourism as I have just said could be very significant if for example a board took a business operator to the High Court for failing to comply with clause 32. Many tourist attractions hold their appeal because of their colloquial names popular names or the names they use in the promotion of their activity. All sorts of different activities around New Zealand spring up as a result of an attachment to an identity. 
The final argument put to the select committee and debated was the sensitivity and consultation that takes place around the process of changing names. I give the example of Taranaki and its mountain which has always been known by local iwi as Mount Taranaki and that is where the province got its name from. But of course Captain Cook sailed past and he looked at the mountain and said it looked like Mount Egmont so he called it Mount Egmont. That is what it was commonly known as by most Europeans until about 10 years ago when local iwi said that it was wrong that it was Taranaki and that they wanted the name changed back to Mount Taranaki. It did not matter which name one preferred to believe or which name one accepted it was changed back to Taranaki. Most maps show it as Mount Taranaki and people who travel through Taranaki know it as either Taranaki or Egmont depending on their preference. The New Zealand Geographic Board was able to accommodate that change. 
The other argument put forward was that a lot of the European names that had been adopted were not the original names and that that was wrong. I used the example in previous speeches that when one drives around the coast of Taranaki one starts in South Taranaki where there is Manaia Oeo Pihama Opunake Oaonui Rahotu Warea— 
Hone Harawira 
: That’s enough Shane. 
SHANE ARDERN 
: How far does one need to go to realise that not all of Taranaki was named by Captain Cook when he sailed past? The reality is that those names have both cultural and iwi significance. They also have a great colloquial meaning and people accept that that is what they are. Even though the Act was introduced in 1946 there is absolutely no need for Parliament to be addressing this issue tonight.