Norman Russel William: Resource Management (Simplifying and Streamlining) Amendment Bill — Procedure Second Reading In Committee Third Reading 
Norman Russel William: Resource Management (Simplifying and Streamlining) Amendment Bill — Procedure Second Reading In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:657;Page:6220] 
Dr RUSSEL NORMAN (Co-Leader—Green) 
: 
 I seek the call to cover just a couple of issues one of which is the trees. I think we need to address the trees rather clearly. The other issue is the role of the Minister of Conservation. 
One of the things I think is a paradox about the Resource Management (Simplifying and Streamlining) Amendment Bill and what it proposes to do is that it is once again the Beehive telling Aucklanders what they can and cannot do. Aucklanders through their councils voted to have blanket tree protection rules. That is called democracy; they voted in democratically elected councils and those councils decided to have blanket tree protection rules. It seems to me that the Beehive the National-ACT Government is saying to Aucklanders that it does not care what they think. It could not care less that democratically elected councils wanted blanket tree protection rules. The Government says: “We do not care. We say you are not allowed to do it.” In effect with this bill the Government is introducing a maximum environmental standard. It is saying to people that they cannot have an environmental protection standard above this level they cannot have blanket tree protection rules and they cannot have a standard to protect trees even though democratically elected councils want to implement a standard. Central government and this Parliament assuming this bill goes through are saying to people that they are not allowed to have those rules. 
The Green Party has put forward a proposal to try to find some way through this paradox but it has been rejected by the Government. We have a Supplementary Order Paper on it as well. There is a very sensible compromise. First we should allow the trimming of trees. We should not have a blanket rule against trimming. Secondly when councils give consent for the removal of a tree they should do it at the tree itself. People would not have to go to the council or have some kind of elaborate hearing; it would be done at the tree itself. Thirdly there should be national guidelines so that there is some consistency around these rules because one of the issues has been consistency around the rules. Fourthly the process should be free. Mostly it is free now but in some places it is not. I think that is a very sensible compromise which allows the democratically elected councils of Auckland to maintain their blanket tree protection rules but takes away some of the unnecessary bureaucracy. 
That very sensible compromise which was put forward by Jeanette Fitzsimons in the Local Government and Environment Committee and is partly in an amendment that the Green Party is putting forward tonight has been rejected by the Government. Instead National’s bill means that where councils wish to protect trees on urban land they will have to schedule individual trees or groups of trees for protection. That is massively bureaucratic. If we take this move seriously if we accept the Government’s argument that it actually has the objective of protecting trees then it is still massively bureaucratic. The Government is talking about schedules to district plans that will be hundreds of pages long as councils schedule and identify each individual tree and each group of trees. It is massively bureaucratic. In effect the bill takes the evil red tape from the hands of those people who are trying to cut down trees and puts it in the hands of the councils that are trying to protect trees. This move is so bureaucratic that it will be very difficult for councils to use those rules to protect trees. 
I also think it is worth noting the comments from various Auckland councils and elsewhere that they will not schedule trees against the wishes of landowners. That means that once these current rules come off councils that wish to schedule protection for any tree on private land that they view as very important will not be able to do so if the landowner says that he or she does not want that tree to be scheduled. That is what councils have told us. So it is a sham for the Government to say that councils can use this mechanism when the councils say they will not use this mechanism to schedule trees. If councils try seriously to do this even where they are willing to override individual landowners’ consent in order to try to do it they will end up with an immensely bureaucratic process. It will be immensely expensive and time consuming. It will result in district plans with hundreds of pages of schedules to protect trees. 
Finally there is another issue relating to trees that I would be very interested to hear the Minister’s views on. It is to do with the changes that we are making to when plans take effect. Plans will take effect only after the decision on submissions has been made.