Mitchell ClaytonCLAYTON MITCHELL (NZ First): I would like to first of all acknowledge my pleasure in standing and taking a call on the Civil Defence Emergency Management Amendment Bill on behalf of New Zealand First. I will probably start my contribution by adding to what Clare Curran has previously spoken about because this issue is quite current where I am from in the Bay of Plenty and Tauranga and that is specifically to do with tsunamis tsunami warning systems and a national expectation of there being a siren there that we can identify with. We all remember the Japanese tsunami. We certainly remember the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami and the issues that that caused for so many people who were not ready for it. Certainly in Papamoa and down the coastline in Mount Maunganui we have had many many meaningful long discussions—at times quite heated—with regard to the concerns that local residents feel that they do not have enough time to respond in the event of a big event such as a tsunami as we have seen in the past. It is very relevant because we have had a number of large earthquakes off the East Cape in recent weeks and it certainly does get your ears pricked and your eyes very very akin to coming up with a plan of escape. There are stories in Japan where those escape routes that were planned for small children in schools to go to ended up being not in safe zones and many young children were swept away in that tragic event and we need to do everything that we can to make sure that we do not have an event that ends up with the same sort of tragic loss of life as we have seen around the world. Certainly a chorus of support will be coming from the wider Bay of Plenty and Tauranga. Along our coastline there we do have the Kermadec ocean trench and it would take only about 20 minutes if a large-scale earthquake happened there and caused an underground landslide to send a huge wave crashing into our coastline. I think more needs to be done and this is definitely the right vehicle to do it. So I would like to also say that New Zealand First will continue with our support along the lines from the first reading to now the second reading with potentially some Supplementary Order Papers that we may put through into the following stages. I suppose the biggest gripe that we are currently having is the time that it is taking to put this very important piece of legislation together. We have seen this House operate with lightning-speed reactions on bills that I do not think deserve that sort of pace whereas this bill is a bill that is designed to save lives and speed up the recovery and the response times for these civil defence disasters and emergencies to get people and communities back on their feet again. So we would like to see this bill being progressed through. Again we understand that this is just part one of a two-part reform coming through. This is to do with small- and medium-scale incidents ranging from—goodness me I have got a list here of the things that it covers off. Explosions—they happen around the world. It may or may not happen here whether it be a gas leak or the like. We have got sinkholes that happen too and of course terrorist attacks if that did happen in our country. Earthquakes eruptions tsunamis land movements floods storms tornadoes cyclones serious fire leakages or spillages of any dangerous gas or substance technological failure—goodness me if that should happen and the lights went out what would we do? And of course there are infestations and plagues epidemic failure or a disruption to an emergency service or a lifeline utility or actual or imminent attack or war-like act. That is what the civil defence is set up to deal with and that is why we should be putting absolute urgency on ensuring that this piece of legislation makes it speedily through the House. I would like to talk about the transitional notices—the local transition notices for 28 days versus the national transition notices of 90 days. I think they are a good opportunity to make sure that a seamless line is drawn between approaching the incident and going straight into the recovery and the response to recovery time is exactly what this bill is there to fix and ensure that we can actually move through very very quickly and easily. This bill has four parts to it really. Essentially it mandates roles and responsibilities for emergency service providers during an event; it strengthens recovery planning how we do it and how we get back to a status quo if you like; and it provides a framework to ensure a seamless transition from the response to the emergency to the initial recovery periods—and these are the transitional notices that I just spoke of. This here has got an enforcement aspect to it because when danger is staring people in the face and they are dealing with a situation where they do not want to leave their property—because of course sometimes irrational behaviour can actually make people make bad decisions; we see it all the time from this Government—sometimes they need empowerment; for somebody to step in to ensure their safety and take them out of harm's way. This bill enables that to happen so we can reduce the number of people being put in harm's way and therefore reduce the need for others to go out there and protect those people putting them in harm's way as well. Finally the bill gives legislative authority to allow Crown funding. In a local civil defence emergency the responsibility goes largely on to the local government and as has been said this will actually give some context around who pays what and will make sure that the Government actually comes up with what it needs to. What I would like to point out is an area that I think we would like to explore more. When we are talking about civil defence emergency management (CDEM) coordinating executive groups it has got here in the commentary on the bill: The second amendment we recommend is to insert a new subclause (2) amending section 20 of the principal Act to state that members who have been co-opted on to a CDEM Coordinating Executive Group under subsection (1)(e) may include a senior ambulance services officer." We would like to see "may" turned into a "must". I think the St John Ambulance and the ambulance service play a major role as an emergency service provider and one of the 12 submissions that came through was in fact from St John Ambulance itself—and it just beggars belief really. This is in the departmental report: "St John New Zealand recommends section 4 of the Act be amended to include emergency ambulance services in the definition of emergency services." The fact that they are not recognised as an emergency service provider is quite laughable. When you call 111 they say: "This is an emergency would you like fire ambulance or police?". We clearly recognise them as an emergency service provider and we should be mandating them to be part of those CDEM groups that this bill addresses. Aside from that the submissions through here were largely supportive. I acknowledge that the Bay of Plenty put in a submission that was very good and we would like to certainly work along some of those points. I think the bill as it stands now has been tidied up in a few areas. We certainly like the fact that the business to do with Ministers' roles of power particularly around the Order in Council provisions does not exist in this bill although it has been suggested that in part two of this review this may rear its head. Certainly New Zealand First would be concerned but we would like to know to what extent there will be Order in Council provisions in part two of this review. All in all it is good to be part of working together collegially with other members of the House and other parties and for Andrew Bayly's sake it is good to be working on that together. Thank you."