Whaitiri Meka: Reserves and Other Lands Disposal Bill — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeWhaitiri Meka: Reserves and Other Lands Disposal Bill — Second Reading[Sitting date: 19 May 2015. Volume:705;Page:3395. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]MEKA WHAITIRI (Labour—Ikaroa-Rāwhiti): Kia ora Mr Speaker. Tēnā tātou katoa. It is an honour to take this brief call on this important bill the Reserves and Other Lands Disposal Bill in its second reading. Labour supports it. I have heard previous speakers talk about it being a non-controversial bill but looking at the process by which this bill has come to the House it is anything but non-controversial.Let us look at when the bill was first introduced. I note that it was introduced on 15 August 2008 by a fine colleague of ours the Hon David Parker who I understand did an enormous amount of work to bring the bill to the House at that point in time so I want to acknowledge Mr Parker for that. We had the first reading on 10 March 2009 and the Primary Production Committee reported back on 29 September 2009. We are now in 2015.Previous speakers have made comments around the delay taken to get this piece of legislation in front of the House. I acknowledge the previous speaker Mr Woodhouse saying there are competing interests when it comes to determining what is on the legislative programme. But seriously one of the risks that we run in delaying such important legislation from my perspective is that things change in our communities. I want to particularly point out the change in iwi Treaty settlements and ensuring that those parcels of land that are protected and reserved for Māori interests are protected through this piece of legislation.Like I said the Hon David Parker introduced the bill in 2008 to change the status of some selected parcels of land. We continue to support it though we have a few reservations which we rightfully raised at the select committee. The select committee reported back in September 2009. This illustrates how desperate National is and how lacking it is in ideas.It is so lacking I guess it probably pays to acknowledge the Ministers in charge of this bill. Firstly we had Dr Richard Worth who was the Minister in charge of the bill from that side of the House at the first reading. Since the end of his career in scandal it was taken over by Maurice Williamson whose time as the Minister ended again in scandal. So it is probably the intention of the current Minister the Hon Louise Upston to make sure we get the passage of this legislation through as quickly as possible.I want to touch on two parts of the legislation which were raised at the select committee namely by the number of submitters who presented who overwhelmingly were not happy with the process. Labour joins with those submitters in saying that the process followed by the Auckland Council probably could have been done a wee bit better. Just to highlight what I mean by that the Auckland Council under the then mayor John Banks thought that it could make some decisions and then bring to Parliament some legislation that retrospectively approved some of the decisions at council level—and we all know that legislation passed in retrospect throws its own risks and challenges.I earlier mentioned how things change in our environment given that we are now 6 years on since the select committee reported back and I did mention briefly the importance of iwi Treaty settlements and the controversial land. I want in my closing remarks to make the point that in the Supplementary Order Papers that were introduced on this bill there are two particular parcels of land that I want to acknowledge: the Māhinepua Bay reserve land and the esplanade of Ōpua. I want to make sure that the Government of the day can assure the House that no individual particularly of Māori interest will be disadvantaged by the passing of this legislation. I commend this bill to the House.