Parker David: Crown Pastoral Land (Rent for Pastoral Leases) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Parker David: Crown Pastoral Land (Rent for Pastoral Leases) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:678;Page:1275] 
Hon DAVID PARKER (Labour) 
: 
 I ask the Minister in the chair Amy Adams how when you are running a $12 billion deficit you can justify giving a rent discount to everyone? Some of the people have not asked for it some of them do not need it and just about all of them purchased under a statutory lease which clearly set out in law that the lessor was entitled to be paid rent at the rate of 2 percent of land value excluding improvements—hardly an extortionate rate. Two percent of the land value excluding improvements has been the rent for many many many decades  
Andrew Little 
: Very reasonable 
Hon DAVID PARKER 
: Very reasonable rent. There was a report carried out—I think it was in the 1970s or 1980s—called the Clayton report and it was chaired by Mr Clayton. That report said what was logical: if you give a discount for rents what you do is you increase the capital value of the lessee’s interest in the property because you decrease the value of the lessor’s interest—the Crown’s interest—and you increase the value of the lessee’s interest. This changes the balance of the division of value between the lessor and the lessee in favour of the lessee.  
I want the Minister to explain why it is necessary to give discounts to those people—multimillionaires in some cases—who purchase these properties not just for their pastoral values but to gain the exclusive use and possession of those lands and for the ability to use these properties as effectively large holiday home properties in some cases. Why should those people get a rent discount? There is no logic behind it. Where is the justification for that at any time? Where is the justification for that when you are running a $12 billion deficit?  
Why did the Crown not use its proper powers of negotiation if people want a rent discount to extract some of the values that it ought to be extracting on behalf of the lessor where lessees do need a rent discount? We concede that in some cases these rents are unaffordable for people who are extracting only pastoral values. What could the Minister have extracted? Well the Minister could say: “We want to protect access to some of our landlocked rivers and lakes.” It is an outrage that New Zealanders do not have access to some of their own rivers and lakes but the landlocked areas could have been fixed through negotiations around rent discounts.  
What about some of the wilding pines that are marching across the high country? Most farmers are very responsible; some farmers are not and refuse to carry out wilding pine control. It is a moot point whether it is necessary under the lease. Why does the Crown in return for a rent discount not clear that up and make sure the wilding pine work can— 
Shane Ardern 
: Because the Crown doesn’t do it on its own land. 
Hon DAVID PARKER 
: What is that? 
Shane Ardern 
: The Crown doesn’t do it on its own land. 
Hon DAVID PARKER 
: The Crown does not do it on all its own land; it does it on some of it. Some of these lessees should be doing that and are not. Why does the Crown not negotiate some other things like environmental benefits or the retirement of a little part of the land that is not important to the farm? Lots of things could be done in return for a rent discount.  
The other point of principle that I will address is to ask why lessees think that they can come along to the Crown and say “Please respect our rights.” and then go to the next Government and say “Please change our rights to the benefit of the lessee.” but never expect that there will be reverse action in the future by a future Government. I have got to say that it is incredibly naive to think that you can interfere with the legal rights of these statutory leases and their contractual rights the terms of which are set out in a statutory lease. If you start interfering with it for the benefit of one side of the transaction as is occurring here you can bet your bottom dollar that a future Government is going to do it in another way. I am not sure that is a good precedent for these lessees to be agreeing to. This bill has long-term consequences for them that would otherwise have been avoided had they just stuck with the original form of the lease and paid their 2 percent of the land value excluding improvements. Now we have this fiction that people should pay the same rent for a good property around a lakeside which people are buying because it is a cake tin lid or calendar property with a high value even though it is a higher-value property than one that is in the backblocks without some of those attributes. What an absolute nonsense. I call on the Minister to justify that.