Barry Maggie: Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga Bill — Third ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeBarry Maggie: Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga Bill — Third Reading[Sitting date: 13 May 2014. Volume:698;Page:17769. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]MAGGIE BARRY (National—North Shore): I rise to speak on the third reading of the Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga Bill. As the Minister for Arts Culture and Heritage who has shepherded this through the House Christopher Finlayson noted earlier this is a new era for the Historic Places Trust. He paid tribute to the people who have served loyally in all the branches and in the management structures of the trust over some 60 years now. The names of Judge Shonagh Kenderdine Naida Glavish Ian Athfield and Sir Tumu te Heuheu—these are people with enormous integrity who have put a lot of energy and time and effort into ensuring that the old Historic Places Trust did its job very well. But the purpose of this bill is to make the job of that trust—and it is a misnamed thing to call it a trust because it does not accurately represent its role.The purpose of this bill is to streamline specifically the archaeological authority process. That is a consent process for applicants under the New Zealand Historic PlacesTrust. When we look at some of the things that have been brought in as a result of the Local Government and Environment Committee process—and I was just reminding myself of it because this bill had its first reading on 8 May 2012 and the submissions closed on 19 July. We took about 30 oral submissions on the bill and they were very well considered. They were very well debated within the select committee process at the time when they were thought about and included and the Minister’s own rather large Supplementary Order Paper 444 has taken due note of them. The aspects that make the role of archaeological consent more workable have been reflected in the changes the select committee made.We have made practical and helpful suggestions—for example ensuring that non-invasive activities such as walking across a site are not going to be considered as exploratory investigation. There were quite a few submitters who said to us that the idea that you could not even walk across a site was very unworkable because how on earth do you do your job properly to actually assess what is there. We suggested clarifying that Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga access to sites with any assistance that is deemed necessary is also allowable—that is vehicles machinery and equipment—but these are to be used sparingly and not of course in any way likely to damage the site.I think that increasing the time that people are allowed to consider general policy statements from 12 to 18 months is also a very good thing because these things need to have that time and need to take that time and public consultation needs to be part of it. That was a message that came through very loud and clear.I think as well when you are clarifying the limit for the National Historic Landmarks List—initially it was thought that we had only 50 of those places in this country and there was a lot of debate around this—how do you deem one building or one site to be more worthy than another of historic protection at the highest level? Eventually the limit on numbers was thrown out and places will be assessed on their own merits. For example this building that we are in now is a precinct and it will be taken as one place and not as a series of buildings. So I think that there have been some very practical suggestions that have been listened to and will make the working of this piece of legislation all the better.The other elements that have had to be duly considered and perhaps the reason that this particular piece of legislation has taken such time are contained within the bill and within the Supplementary Order Papers—and we reflected Catherine Delahunty’s Supplementary Order Papers 372 and 373 as well and they were incorporated as part of this legislation. I think that it is another good sign that there has been a degree of cross-party cooperation and a willingness for politicians to put aside the petty politics and concentrate instead on what needs to happen for this bill to be workable for the sake of preserving our heritage. It was important that the Resource Management Act measures and the changes there have been aligned within this piece of legislation. Otherwise it might not be a workable thing.It seems to me that one of the great strengths of what this bill is doing is that it is making the process more transparent and easier to follow and therefore making it more likely that our heritage sites which are so precious to all of us will be protected in perpetuity. Also I think aligning things with the Environment Court is a very important thing. There is no need to reinvent the wheel.A lot of people have talked about the support and encouragement that they have drawn from that support for heritage. To me this has been a rallying bill. It has brought people together. There was initial discomfort around the disestablishment of the branches but it is now very apparent that people in various groups have welcomed the opportunity to examine what it is that we feel is important within our heritage and tounderstand the processes through which we need to go if we want to protect those heritage sites.So as the Minister said earlier it is a new name a new statute a new lease of life and a new era. That is why I commend this bill to the House. Thank you.