Nash StuartHon STUART NASH (Minister of Tourism): Thank you very much Mr Speaker and look I would like to thank that member Maureen Pugh for supporting changes to a practice that I feel has very real potential to harm New Zealand's clean green" "100% Pure" brand and is fast eroding or has already eroded tourism's social licence to operate in many of our towns and our cities in our tourist spots around our wonderful country. This is something that I have spoken on often both as the Minister of Tourism and in the past in Opposition and in other ministerial portfolios. It's something I'm very passionate about our brand and this is something that I think we can do to help maintain and enhance our brand as borders open. We need to make changes now. But the member must be very well aware—she must have been aware—that as the Minister of Tourism I am doing a lot of work around this area. She must have been aware when she put this bill into the ballot that discussion documents were out and it was very high on my work programme as I have articulated right across the media many times. But having said that her passion for this issue is commendable and I thank her very much for supporting an issue that as she knows I am also very passionate about myself and I'm making an assumption here—I hope I'm right. I'm making an assumption that the discussion document that we put out to a whole range of stakeholders on the change in freedom camping the member submitted on—and even though I couldn't find her submission I'm sure she did—because what I did do was I put out a comprehensive public discussion document canvassing a number of issues on solutions on how we can deal with the problem that is freedom camping. We received a lot of feedback on proposed options for changing and I've taken all these into account when designing a regime that I will take for Cabinet approval. It is a well-set-out and heavily consulted on document and I believe the proposals will make a difference in an area that I am very passionate about. Can I give the House some stats: only 74 percent of freedom campers and budget vehicles or purchased vehicles have access to an on-board toilet. Of those 74 percent of freedom campers that did have a toilet only 28 percent used it. So they either used facilities—which this Government has significantly invested in in partnership with local councils through the Tourism Infrastructure Fund—or they've gone outside. There is no reason for this and the reason I say that is dotted all around our fantastic country there are camping grounds and there are holiday parks within easy drive of each other. There's a whole network of them. The vast majority are very cheap they're accessible and they have all the facilities that people need when they are travelling around our fantastic country on a budget holiday. This does contrast with the premium end of the market which has fixed toilets. These are the big campervans we see traversing our highways. They do have fixed toilets and over 74 percent of the people in that premium end of the market actually say that they use the facility. So whilst freedom camping is a wide area and has a very wide definition under the legislation the area that we are really concerned about when we are looking at changing the law and really tightening it up are those vans that you see and you see the little blue sticker on the back that says "self-contained" and you go "No way—that is not self-contained." They often just have a bucket I'm told with some gladwrap over the top and I'm also told that sometimes if they return this with the gladwrap still there they get their deposit back—hardly an invitation to use the facilities and hardly self-contained by anyone's definition. This is what we're looking to change. In fact I found out in the consultation that these are called sliders and the reason they're called sliders is in the middle of the night you can hear that door slide open as they go outside to go to the toilet and you can hear it slide closed again. Like I said that's hardly the sort of activity or the behaviour that we want to see right across our pristine country. Certainly when I went hard on this in the media upon becoming the Minister of Tourism about 75 percent of the correspondence with my office was in favour of reform of this practice. It's one of the reasons why I've gone very hard and it is an issue that many Kiwis have a strong opinion on because the last thing we want to see if I'm to be quite blunt is toilet paper in rest areas on the side of streams and on our reserves and it's one of the reasons where only this week the Napier City Council—and I applaud them for this—has banned freedom camping on the Westshore reserve because there were too many instances of people defecating in this reserve which is used by families and kids and it's a fantastic tourist spot. The last thing we want is people using the Westshore reserve as a toilet and no doubt those who are watching this have numerous examples of where they have been around this country and they've seen toilet paper and defecating in our forests for example. It is the last thing we want to see and apart from a health risk as the previous member outlined it is just a really bad look and there's no reason for it. It's the reason why we're changing the rules. We recognised that this was a major issue when actually we first came into Government in 2017. The previous Minister of Tourism Kelvin Davis in 2018 set up the Responsible Camping Working Group. It was a group of mayors and engaged stakeholders who provided a whole lot of information and feedback to the Minister on what he could do to implement changes around this freedom camping space and in fact he put together a fund of about $25 million which helped deal with the issues. I just felt upon becoming the Minister of Tourism we had to take things to the next stage. I felt that we needed a legislative solution. Maureen Pugh I won't be supporting your piece of legislation. That's not because I don't believe there needs to be change but as the Minister of Tourism I am bringing my own legislation on this. I have to take it to Cabinet. It is very well thought through it is heavily consulted on and it deals with a lot of the issues. It deals—Chris Bishop: Oh just—come on. Hon STUART NASH: Oh "Come on."—Mr Bishop you know how this works. You've got a member's bill which is really good in principle but I have consulted widely with all the stakeholders. It is very well thought through. I understand the issues because I've been out to the people and I've heard what they've said and I've come up with solutions to what all the stakeholders are talking about. It's what we have done. But what I can say—and I actually heard Mr Woodhouse speak very clearly and articulately on this in a forum I was at and I see Mr Todd McClay over there as the Opposition spokesperson for tourism. So what I am expecting is that when I do bring a bill to the House very very soon after it goes to Cabinet I will expect the full support from the House because this is an issue we all know needs sorting. So Maureen Pugh thank you very much for this but my bill—[Interruption]—Todd McClay—is a bill that actually deals with the issues that all the stakeholders up and down this country and not just the West Coast but including the West Coast because I've spoken all your mayors—a fantastic group of people who have engaged widely and I applaud them for that. I really enjoyed my time with your mayors but they've told me it's a really big issue. So I won't be supporting this bill but I support the philosophy and the premise behind it and I fully expect Maureen Pugh Todd McClay Chris Bishop and the National Opposition to support mine when I bring it to the House. Thank you very much. Kia ora."