Robertson Grant: Appointments — Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Robertson Grant: Appointments — Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment 
[Sitting date: 10 May 2012. Volume:679;Page:2176. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
GRANT ROBERTSON (Deputy Leader—Labour) 
: 
 I rise on behalf of the Labour Party to heartily support the motion of the Government to reappoint Jan Wright as the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment. Dr Wright was appointed by the previous Labour Government in 2007. We believe that she has done an excellent job as the parliamentary commissioner and we are pleased that the National-led Government has decided to reappoint her.  
As was noted by Mr Brownlee Dr Wright comes from a multidisciplinary background and I think that is actually one of the great strengths that she brings to the office. She has a background in physics in energy and resources and indeed in public policy with a qualification in that from Harvard University. She has drawn together those elements of her scientific knowledge with her knowledge of public policy—the way that our Government operates—to be a highly effective Officer of Parliament. I think all members of this Parliament should be grateful for the level of work the integrity and the focus that Jan Wright has brought to her position as the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment.  
I think it is actually very good to hear Gerry Brownlee say that he has disagreed from time to time with the commissioner because that is indeed the point. The commissioner is an officer of this House— 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: So have I. 
GRANT ROBERTSON 
: And Trevor Mallard has disagreed with her and indeed I am sure members around the House will find that they have also done so from time to time and may well do so in the future. But that is exactly the point: as an Officer of Parliament she is independent. She holds that independence dearly I know and therefore I am sure she will understand exactly what the words from the Minister mean—that she is a person who upholds that independence very well.  
The other thing I would like to note about the approach that Jan Wright is taking to her role as parliamentary commissioner is the proactive nature of her work. It is the fact that she has been prepared to go out and take on issues that are as Mr Brownlee calls them contemporary and be prepared to investigate them and make reports with quite specific recommendations. In fact the parliamentary commissioner’s website offers the opportunity for New Zealanders to suggest to her topics for investigations. I think that is an excellent process and one that other Officers of Parliament do in different ways. I think that is a very open process. It is one that gives some assurance to members of the public that this is somebody who is working on their behalf and is doing work that is not necessarily that which the Government asks for.  
Most recently on this side of the House we are very very pleased that the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment has taken on a suggestion made by the Labour Party and others that there should be an inquiry into fracking. It is an important process for her to undertake. The Labour Party in our manifesto said that we should have an inquiry into fracking because it is an issue where there is now a lot of contested information. It is a process that has been going on in New Zealand for many years and it is important that as more information about the process of fracking comes into the public arena it is timely for the parliamentary commissioner to look at that issue not only to make sure that New Zealand has a system that is robust enough to use that kind of technology within New Zealand but also to look at the evidence from overseas. So on this side of the House we are extremely pleased that that will happen and that that inquiry will come through. We do urge the Government to listen to the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment when it does come to her inquiry on fracking. She is a person who always looks at the evidence and at the scientific basis for her decisions and we are looking forward to that report and to the recommendations that come from that and to the Government adopting those recommendations.  
The other element of Dr Wright’s tenure that I want to mention is her independence. In particular in recent times I have seen that through her excellent submission on the Exclusive Economic Zone and Continental Shelf (Environmental Effects) Bill which is currently before the Local Government and Environment Committee. Her submission was one that was critical of elements of that Government bill—in particular the fact that that bill does not meet our international obligations when it comes to these matters. It fails to reach the standards that are set by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. She also made recommendations around changing the purpose of that bill to reflect more closely the principles of the Resource Management Act—i.e. the principles of sustainable management rather than the bill introduced by the Government which actually talked about the balance between interests rather than having the presumption of sustainable management.  
On this side of the House we are very proud of the fact that the Labour Party was the only party to oppose the first reading of that exclusive economic zone legislation and we will await with interest the positions of other parties when that bill emerges from the committee. We have certainly seen Jan Wright’s submission on that bill as one of the most important submissions that the committee received. It was as ever evidence-based and certainly gave the Government some strong indications of how that bill could be improved. Once again we would hope that the Government would look at those recommendations and indeed others that have come through in the process and ensure that we have exclusive economic zone legislation that is robust that does not weaken what happens already inside New Zealand’s territorial waters and that makes sure we fulfil our international obligations.  
The other reports that the commissioner has under way as the Minister notes are on important areas: climate change electricity and biodiversity. We are interested in making sure that those reports also find their way to the House in a timely manner. The Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment has taken some innovative ways in getting her information out to the community and I am sure she will continue to do that. We see towards the end of the month her report around wild rivers which will be extremely interesting in the context of future care of our waterways and also energy generation.  
I want to reflect on one of the matters that Dr Wright has raised several times in her tenure and that is the desirability for better information about our environment and in particular her desire that there be some better environmental reporting mechanism. I have a bill in the members’ ballot for an environment reporting bill. It is an environment reporting bill that would require the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment to report every 5 years on the state of the New Zealand environment. It also requires the establishment of a standard set of indicators to assess the state of our environment. At the moment we have very patchy data in New Zealand and patchy information about the overall quality of our environment and the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment has raised her concerns about this several times. I am aware that various Government agencies have been doing work on this issue but the time has come for this kind of environment reporting. That is why I have placed that bill in the ballot.  
I hope that bill is drawn from the ballot but I actually hope more than that that the Government adopts a similar bill and actually puts it through the House so that we can have good quality data on our environment. It is simply impossible for policy makers and indeed for anyone interested in the environment to fully be able to adopt policy and to develop policy if there is not good information and data available. The Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment as an independent person in our system is exactly the right person to compile that report. The Ministry for the Environment does do good work but it is not an independent agency of Government as the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment is so that is why it is appropriate that she is the person who does the environment reporting that there is a standardised set of indicators and that we fill in the gaps in the data that we already have.  
On behalf of the Labour Party I am more than happy to endorse the recommendation of the Government to reappoint Dr Jan Wright as the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment. We believe that she has done an excellent job in her tenure. I am sure she will continue to do that and continue to uphold her independence as an officer of this House.