King Colin: Environment Canterbury (Temporary Commissioners and Improved Water Management) Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee 
King Colin: Environment Canterbury (Temporary Commissioners and Improved Water Management) Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee 
[Volume:661;Page:9959] 
COLIN KING (National—Kaikoura) 
: 
 This is a short call during the second reading of this important bill the Environment Canterbury (Temporary Commissioners and Improved Water Management) Bill. I will start off by taking the House through an event that happened within the last month when the Kaikoura and Hurunui District Councils sat down with the Minister of Local Government and the Minister for the Environment. It was very interesting to take in the flavour that came out of the meetings with those councils. I heard the member opposite say that the mayors never discussed with their fellow councillor colleagues their response to the Minister of Local Government. Well I can testify that that is not the case. In actual fact there was a good canvassing of the views of the councillors and I would have to say that in the Hurunui and Kaikoura District Councils those views were canvassed to a person; everyone wanted something to be done that was quick and final. They did not see a future in Environment Canterbury because it was mucking around and wasting opportunity. 
Talking about opportunity I will refer to the Amuri irrigation scheme that in the late 1980s transformed a desolate wasteland which would have been blown away by the north-westerly into an oasis. The amount of game that was around at duck-shooting and times like that was just unbelievable and the win-win situation was outstanding. That is what those on the other 42000 hectares have been hoping for for the last 20 years but nothing has happened. So when we get to the second reading of this very important bill it is good to see that we have enshrined in it the vision and principles of the Canterbury Water Management Strategy. That is very very important. 
I will touch on a couple of important aspects because what we are hearing from the other side of the House and what is being very poorly represented by the Greens is the suggestion that environmental standards will go out the window. I want to draw the House’s attention to the primary principles of that water management strategy’s regional approach. It says that planning for natural water use is guided by the following first order priorities: consideration of the environment customary uses community supplies and stock water. Second order priority considerations are irrigation renewable electricity generation recreation tourism and other amenities. 
The point I am making here is that a high priority is put on the environment and with the Canterbury Water Management Strategy the environment had to be No. 1. The Government was very concerned that that strategy was very very fragile; I make the point again that if one person had felt that he or she had not had adequate provision consideration within that strategy and had pulled out it would all have been lost. It would all have been lost. So I make the point again that I made in my first reading speech that it takes 90 percent of the effort to get the last 10 percent. 
This Government did not come into power to sit down here purely to get its pay as we saw the previous Labour Government do over the last 9 years. It is with great pride and passion that I live with a vision that potentially one day we will have 42000 hectares of beautiful country in the Hurunui irrigated and I say “Thank goodness it will come from a National Government.”