Simpson Scott: Exclusive Economic Zone and Continental Shelf (Environmental Effects) (Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeSimpson Scott: Exclusive Economic Zone and Continental Shelf (Environmental Effects) (Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill — Second Reading[Sitting date: 04 June 2015. Volume:706;Page:4379. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]SCOTT SIMPSON (National—Coromandel): As chairman of the Local Government and Environment Committee it is a pleasure to rise in support of this second reading of the Exclusive Economic Zone and Continental Shelf (Environmental Effects) (Transitional Provisions) Amendment Bill in the name of my colleague the very good and capable Minister for the Environment Dr Nick Smith. Notwithstanding the very energetic speech of the previous speaker Megan Woods I am delighted to hear that Labour is going to support this bill and this reading as we discuss it and move it through the House this afternoon.The simple fact is that energy is important to us all. It is essential to every aspect of our daily lives in this modern world we live in. It is used in factories in hospitals for the production of fertilisers and chemicals for manufacturing and construction and for every kind of enterprise known to a civilised and modern society. We use it for heating we use it for cooking and we use it pretty much in every aspect of our day-to-day lives. New Zealand has been fortunate to always have a secure source of energy mostly provided by our hydroelectricity network. But in times of low rainfall we have been able to rely on the gas-fired turbines that are powered by the gas that comes from the Māui gas field off the Taranaki coast. This field which has now been in operation for nearly 50 years I think is a significant part of the energy network that supplies New Zealand’s energy needs.It is important as we discuss this bill that we note that it is a technical tweaking of the principal Act which came into effect in 2012. The purpose of this bill is to amend the principal Act so as to allow existing operators who have applied for marine consent to continue their operations until that application is decided and any subsequent objections or appeals have been determined. As the Minister said in his speech a few minutes ago this is a process that literally did not exist prior to the principal Act being passed. There are four other operators that in due course as their consents come to an end as their current licences come to an end will require new marine consents and need to go through the process. As part of the requirements of the Exclusive Economic Zone and Continental Shelf (Environmental Effects) Act Shell Todd Oil Services will be required to have its marine consent to continue operations approved by the Environmental Protection Authority by 27 June. That is why we are moving this technical amendment bill through the House this afternoon in its second reading.Marine consent is an approval granted by the Environmental Protection Authority to undertake managed activity under the principal Act. What might some of those activities be that a consent of this sort that is being discussed this afternoon include? It includes all the marine operations related to the existing Māui project—for instance the upgrading and maintaining of facilities both existing and those that are planned for the future. The consent would also include the actual requirement for drilling itself and of course for the actual extraction of the gas. A consent would include matters relating to environmental monitoring. It would also extend to covering logistics such as the use of helicopters and support vessels that service the actual Māui gas field platform off the coast of Taranaki. It covers of course as I said the extraction of the gas itself and the condensate.Shell Todd Oil Services is a longstanding corporate citizen of the Taranaki area. It has been active in operating in New Zealand for more than 50 years. It is a company that is owned by Shell Petroleum Mining and Todd Petroleum Mining each of which holds a 50 percent stake in that entity. During that more than 50 years of operation Shell Todd Oil Services has set its operational mandate and provisioning at extremely high levels. It pays enormous attention to environmental control and to safety benchmarking and it is considered to be a very prudent careful and successful operator in the gas and condensate field. As an oil and gas operator for more than 55 years it has got an active and ongoing relationship with the wider Taranaki community. The company currently employs I am told more than 300 direct employees and then of course there is a wide range of other people who provide services and support to the enterprise.At the select committee this bill was considered in the collegial manner in which most things are considered at the Local Government and Environment Committee. I want to take this opportunity to thank members from across the House for their careful and considered contributions to the debate at the select committee. We received five submissions on this bill and I think it is fair to say that they all made good points. We as a committee did suggest a couple of amendments and they are to be incorporated as we work this bill through the House. Megan Woods in her contribution prior to mine made comment about the requirement that the select committee has introduced for those existing four other licence holders to have their applications completed in a full and acceptable state before their current licences expire. In some cases that is up to 20 or 30 years hence. But their application for renewal to the Environmental Protection Authority should be in a full and proper manner 9 months before the expiry of the existing licences.We considered options for not placing any time frame on that application process but we settled on a period of 9 months based on advice from the ministry and also from submitters who were keen to raise this matter with us. I think that when we looked at the dates we considered 3 months; we also considered 12 months and 6 months but 9 months seems to be about right. It is largely academic because I think that any sensible professional corporation in its right mind would probably ensure that its application was in place well in due course. I cannot imagine that any senior executives of any of the companies involved would allow a situation to occur where they did not have their application in on time. But there was a question relating to the completeness of that application prior to the end of the existing licence and it was that issue of completeness that I think really swayed the committee’s thinking on this matter. It was a matter that was compelling and logical and I was pleased that the collegial nature of the committee endured on the day and that we got to a place where we could all agree.This is a piece of legislation that as the Minister said is a largely technical adjustment to the principal Act. Shell Todd Oil Services if it does not have this piece of legislation passed before 27 June this month—in fact enacted before 27 June this month—will be required to cease its operations. The potential impacts of that occurring are not ones that I think this House would want to consider for any moment at all. So I am hopeful that as we go through this debate we will find that there is support across the House for this technical adjustment and technical amendment to the principal Act. It is a good logical thing to do and I commend it to the House.