Brash Don: Resource Management Amendment Bill (No 2) — First Reading 
Brash Don: Resource Management Amendment Bill (No 2) — First Reading 
[Volume:607;Page:4307] 
Dr DON BRASH (NZ National) 
: 
 I have rarely taken more enthusiasm in opposing any piece of legislation than I have in opposing this bill. When the Resource Management Act was introduced in the early 1990s it was a well-intentioned law that made some significant improvements on what had been before. But it has been obvious for a number of years that there were some significant problems with that law and the last National Government moved to introduce some changes to it some 4 years ago. Sadly the bill before us today does almost nothing to improve the situation and almost nothing to remove the problems that the Act has created. Every survey of business compliance costs over the last 5 years at least has talked about the problems and the compliance costs caused by the Act. The problems are very substantial and this proposed legislation does almost nothing to fix them. 
There are at least four distinct problems with the present Act that this bill does not adequately address. The first and most obvious problem that we are aware of is the one that involves the extra costs and the long delays caused in any major project and the huge costs involved in lost growth opportunities in particular. Before I was elected Transit New Zealand told a select committee of this House that it can take up to 7 years to get approval for a major roading project through the resource management process. That contrasts with the situation in Singapore which can get approvals through in about 7 days. 
The Prime Minister has estimated that the cost of traffic congestion in Auckland City is approximately $1 billion a year. We will wait for years through the current process and through the process created by this bill to get those problems fixed. The mayor of Auckland the Hon John Banks has said that the problem is not one of money but of getting the consents through the process. This bill does almost nothing to fix that. 
We have been warned not simply about the problems of electricity generation this year—a dry year—but perhaps more ominously still about the problems that loom 2 3 and 4 years down the track. They can be dealt with if we have a process that will enable those who can invest in more generating capacity to do so briskly without undue delays. We know that Meridian Energy is having major difficulties and faces major delays in getting its Project Aqua through. I saw in the  
Dominion Post  
last December an article about the problems that Windflow Technology faces in getting its wind generating power facility established. The article states: “We can get by for several months but we can’t get by for a year. The Environment Court wait could be 1½ to 2 years and unless we can find a way round it we could run out of money.” This legislation does almost nothing to fix those serious problems that have a major impact on our growth. 
The second problem is that this legislation engenders “greenmail” blackmail and corruption. Bill Day one of New Zealand’s leading entrepreneurs stated again in the  
Dominion Post  
of late last year when talking about the impact of the Act: “That is the thin end of the wedge of corruption in New Zealand and as a society we have got to do something about it.” This bill fails to deal adequately with that problem. If we see more “greenmail” more blackmail and more corruption those will be some of the consequences of dealing inadequately with this important legislation. 
Thirdly the Act strains race relations in this country. My colleague the Hon Nick Smith talked about Ngati Pu and its advice to its iwi to object object and object. What it said was: “Time is of no importance to us only the applicant.” Not only does that stop development and investment; perhaps even more seriously it badly damages race relations in this country. Pakeha and indeed many Maori resent that kind of behaviour. Let me quote another comment this time from Ngati Whatua: “The Resource Management Act is being ‘exploited to the max’ by Maori says William Kapea an environmental and heritage consultant for his Auckland iwi Ngati Whatua. It’s a shame because there is a role for iwi. The RMA presented that and we are abusing it and it will end up disappearing on us.” We had a similar problem with Ngati Whatua members in Auckland recently when they objected to the wrong kind of sand being used to rebuild a beach. Then they objected to the wrong kind of shells being used in rebuilding some nests for dotterels. Let us leave aside as I say the damage to growth that that creates. It does huge damage to race relations in New Zealand and the Act makes that possible. 
The fourth serious cost that I think the Act has created and that this legislation does nothing to deal with is that it pushes up the price of residential sections. It has been pointed out in a number of studies that the cost of residential sections in the city of Auckland and indeed in the city of Christchurch is substantially higher than the cost of similar-sized sections in some of the largest cities in the United States. And why is that? It is because the Act has enabled local authorities to create restrictions on the supply of land thus pushing up the cost of residential sections and the price of homes for ordinary working New Zealanders. This legislation that we see before us does nothing to deal with that serious problem. 
So it worries me that one of the most important pieces of law on the statute book the Resource Management Act is recognised as an Act that creates major difficulties for the New Zealand economy by blocking investment deterring growth engendering corruption and “greenmail” straining race relations and pushing up the price of residential sections. We have an opportunity in the House to fix those problems and we are failing in our responsibility to do that. This bill could have been one of the most important bills before the House this year. Sadly it falls a very long way short of realising that opportunity. The Government has talked about its objective of getting New Zealand back into the top half of the OECD. It has obviously decided to abandon any attempt to put a date on that objective so that makes it a substantially easier task—indeed it makes it no objective at all. But in this legislation we have an opportunity to do something constructive to increase our growth rate—the Act is recognised by the business community and by all objective observers as being a major impediment to growth—and this House is on the brink of flunking that opportunity. I believe it is a sad day for this Parliament that we are missing this very important opportunity.