Smith Nick: Waitakere Ranges Heritage Area Bill — Third Reading 
Smith Nick: Waitakere Ranges Heritage Area Bill — Third Reading 
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Hon Dr NICK SMITH (National—Nelson) 
: 
 National members have had one question for Lynne Pillay the sponsor of the Waitakere Ranges Heritage Area Bill from the day that the bill received its first reading. It is a simple direct question: how will this bill improve the environmental management of the beautiful area of the Waitakere Ranges? We listened to her first reading speech we listened to her second reading speech and again today we listened to her third reading speech and we still have not had an answer. 
We are told that the bill is an expression of the local people’s connection with the Waitakere Ranges. We are told that it is recognition of the beauty of the Waitakere Ranges. What we do not have is any answer as to how the bill will actually improve the area. 
Jill Pettis 
: The connection with the environment is some kind of intangible thing. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: I ask the “Paint Stripper” opposite Jill Pettis to explain why the Ministry for the Environment opposes this bill. Why the resource management section of the New Zealand Law Society oppose this bill? Why did numerous submitters come before the select committee and say that this unclear fuzzy law would only make the existing problems of the Resource Management Act worse? 
You see we have national policy statements like the Coastal Policy Statement which is designed to protect the coastline. We have regional policy statements and regional plans. We even have district policy statements and district plans. We have three tiers of documents that are meant to protect the Waitakere Ranges. How many people in this House really believe that by creating a fourth tier of local plans— 
Lynne Pillay 
: The majority. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: I ask Lynne Pillay across the Chamber how a fourth tier of planning processes and strategies will really make a difference. You see the overwhelming view of New Zealanders including those who live in the Waitakere Ranges is that we have a fundamental problem already with too many words and too much fuzziness in the Resource Management Act and that the very last thing we need is more of that but that is what we get from this bill. 
What concerns me about this legislation is that it is actually driven far more by politics by spin than by substance. When we go through the provisions of this bill and when we ask the real practical question as to whether the bill will stop particular roads from being built whether it will stop particular subdivisions from happening whether it will stop particular changes in land use whether it will kill any of the pests that inhabit the Waitakere Ranges or whether it will improve the quality of the waterways in the Waitakere Ranges the answer to every one of those questions is no. You see the problem is that Labour has become so desperate for votes in Auckland that spin has overtaken substance. Labour has become far more concerned with the protection of its own political survival with the protection of its own dropping support in West Auckland than it is with the protection of the Waitakere Ranges. 
The one substantive argument we get is that the Resource Management Act does not do a good job of dealing with cumulative effects. Well if it does not do a good job of dealing with cumulative effects in the Waitakere Ranges what are we doing about cumulative effects in Banks Peninsula? What about the Queenstown lakes? What about the beautiful areas of Otaki or Golden Bay? If the Resource Management Act does not properly deal with cumulative effects we should fix those problems with the Act rather than introducing this sort of piecemeal legislation. 
National also wishes to make this key point about the statute: everything that Labour proclaims can be done in this bill can be done in the regional and district plans that govern this area. But the process under the Resource Management Act says that the time it takes for a council to change either the regional or district plan is 9 years. That is ridiculous. So rather than dealing with the real issue of the bureaucratic constraints on the regional and local councils being able to get proper rules in place to manage the environment of the Waitakere Ranges rather than fixing what really will make a difference Labour’s answer is more law more bureaucracy more plans more strategies and more policies. I say to members opposite that it will not work. [ 
Interruption 
] 
I challenge Mr Cunliffe to explain why we need four tiers of planning documents to properly manage the Waitakere Ranges. Every consent decision that is now made in that area will have to compare four lots of different wordy documents. If a member of that community wants to have a say about what goes on with the Waitakere Ranges he or she will have to make submissions on the local plan the district plan the regional plan as well as the national plan. And National says that is just too much bureaucracy—too many words and not enough action. 
My colleague Paula Bennett has actually made a very constructive suggestion. She says that the Waitakere Ranges should be a national park. We have no national parks north of Taupo despite the fact that more than 50 percent of our population lives in that area. National thinks that is a good idea. We think that under section 8 of the Conservation Act a national park assessment of the Waitakere Ranges should be done. We think that would be a constructive mechanism because we all know that the National Parks Act provides real protection for the Waitakere Ranges. That is why we think that that is a far better way forward. 
Paula Bennett 
: Write to the Minister. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: Paula Bennett wrote to the Minister of Conservation Steve Chadwick and asked why we do not do a section 8 investigation to raise the legal status of that area to really increase the protection—to look at it being a national park. What did Labour say? No. How can Labour claim it has some affinity for the protection of the Waitakere Ranges when it actually rejected a serious suggestion as to the way in which we should look to provide greater protection for that area? 
What concerns National about this bill and this law is as has been said by the Ministry for the Environment and as has been said by the environmental law section of the New Zealand Law Society that it takes the Resource Management Act in exactly the wrong direction. How many meetings do we go to where people say: “I think we need to make the Resource Management Act more complicated.”? How many meetings do we go to where people say: “Ah the answer to the Resource Management Act is that we just need more plans.”? How many people dealing with the Resource Management Act say: “We just need more policies.”? 
The reality is that the Waitakere Ranges Heritage Area Bill takes us in exactly the wrong direction. It is so telling that the Ministry for the Environment the agency charged with the job of championing good environmental law rejects this bill and says that it is flawed. It says that it is unnecessary and that it is full of wishy-washy language that will do very little to protect the Waitakere Ranges. Why can members opposite not answer those criticisms from the Ministry for the Environment? 
Lynne Pillay 
: What about confiscation by stealth? 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: The member opposite cannot answer the fundamental question: why does her Government’s own Ministry for the Environment not support this bill? The silence is deafening. 
The reality is that the Waitakere Ranges Heritage Area Bill is all about spin rather than substance. It is all about a few members from the Waitakere Ranges area wanting to cloak themselves in green clothes to say that they care about the Waitakere Ranges when in reality this bill will simply complicate the management of that area. National says that we do need to make changes in the Resource Management Act to deal with issues such as cumulative effects. We do need to consider a national park in the Waitakere Ranges; it is one of the iconic areas. But this bill fails to provide better protection for that area. 
Hon David Cunliffe 
: Are you committed to that? 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: I challenge the next member to answer a question for me. The first recital of the preamble says “this land is a fish”. I challenge any member to tell me how we improve the environmental management of this area by passing laws with that sort of mush.