Dalziel Lianne: Environment Canterbury (Temporary Commissioners and Improved Water Management) Bill — In Committee Third Reading 
Dalziel Lianne: Environment Canterbury (Temporary Commissioners and Improved Water Management) Bill — In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:661;Page:10079] 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL (Labour—Christchurch East) 
: 
 I have to say that the third reading of the Environment Canterbury (Temporary Commissioners and Improved Water Management) Bill represents a very very sorry day for democracy in New Zealand. A very strong view has been expressed in Christchurch that this has been a set up from start to finish. I suggested a sequence of events during the Committee stage of this bill that started with the Ministers getting a National MP to ask her local mayor to approach the mayoral forum in order to write a letter of complaint. This was not denied by the member concerned nor was it denied by the Minister. That has added fuel to the belief that this is exactly how this matter has been brought to a head. 
Let us look at the process. A letter was written to Ministers by the mayors on 18 September 2009 despite the Canterbury triennial agreement which includes an undertaking by signatories with regard to the early notification of policy and proposals opportunities for involvement a no-surprises policy and joint and collaborative engagement with communities. Who would sign up to a Canterbury triennial agreement and then send a letter like that? Every single one of the councils in the region has committed to that triennial agreement—it is a requirement under the law—but that letter totally compromised the basis of that agreement. 
What is worse is that the mayors behaved as if they were the local authorities because not a single one of those mayors went to their local authority to get the authority to sign off on that letter. Not one single mayor within Environment Canterbury’s jurisdiction went to his or her councillors and asked them what they thought about the behaviour of Environment Canterbury because he or she was about to sign a letter with other mayors to the Ministers—which was completely in breach of the obligations under the triennial agreement—in which he or she would demand that the Government take action against Environment Canterbury. Not one single councillor was engaged in that conversation at the council level which is the governance level for councils. 
The mayoral forum has operated completely independently of its statutory obligations to get council backing for this kind of breach of the triennial agreement. Not one mayor has subsequently consulted with his or her council. They have taken the opportunity to put the boot into Environment Canterbury without bothering to even reflect on what they have agreed to. What on earth makes any one of those mayors think that this Government would not step in to undermine the democratic processes without wide consultation and a good deal of consensus about the way forward. 
I say to members that they should look at what has happened in Auckland because that could be coming to a region near them. The people of Canterbury should be thinking about that because this Government may well be thinking about imposing a super-Canterbury structure over the top of the structure that we have at the moment. I know from some elements of this report that individuals within Christchurch City will certainly want to see that happen as long as they are the ones left running the show. 
This is essentially what happened in Rodney. In Rodney there was wide consultation and a good deal of consensus about the way forward. I want to put on record the true sequence of events rather than the hysterical nonsense that we have had from the Minister. The Rodney District Council approached the Minister of Local Government to ask for a review of the council under section 692M of the Local Government Act. Who was in Government when the Rodney District Council approached the Government? 
Hon Ruth Dyson 
: Labour. 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL 
: No it was National. National was in Government when the council originally made the approach. A National Minister set up that review. During the course of the review there was a change in Government. That was when the new Minister of Local Government the Hon Sandra Lee was asked to extend the period within which the reviewers could report to the Government. She said that was fair enough as they wanted to do a good job. They called for public submissions by having public notices go out in the media and they held a 6-day hearing before reporting to the Minister. It was an extremely open process; not so in this case. 
When Sandra Lee appointed a commission to act in the place of the Rodney District Council on 11 April 2000 she did so with a great sense of reluctance but she felt that she had no choice because in the wake of the review’s findings the mayor and five councillors had resigned leaving three wards completely unrepresented. She could not ignore that. She ensured that fresh elections were held in March 2001 instead of October 2001 which would have been the normal run of events. There could not be a greater difference in process between what has happened today and what occurred in the early part of the decade. 
In the Rodney case the local National Party member welcomed the intervention. In this case Labour MPs have been completely left in the dark although it is obvious that National MPs have been consulted in this regard. So there has been no transparency at all with regard to this process. 
This report was commissioned in November 2009 and was released publicly in February 2010. It ran for about a month—or maybe 6 weeks at the most if we include the Christmas period—and no public input was invited. The report contains a list of stakeholders and we have heard people refer to who was consulted: “Forest and Bird Fish and Game White Water New Zealand Christchurch City Council Anderson Lloyd Brent Cowie Simpson Grierson Pattle Delamore Partners Central Plains Water Ashburton—Valletta Groundwater Applicants Canterbury Chamber of Commerce”—I think members will find that it is the Canterbury Employers Chamber of Commerce—“Federated Farmers Malvern Hills Protection Society Irrigation New Zealand Meridian Energy Ltd Robert Johnston Selwyn District Council Red Bus Company Staff representatives of Te Runanga o Ngai Tahu A joint meeting of all territorial authority mayors and chief executives (except Waitaki District) or their designated representatives.” That is who was consulted. It does not sound like a comprehensive list of stakeholders. In fact I would describe some of them as having a vested interest. 
Vested interest is something that was debated throughout the Committee stage of this bill. No one despite the Minister for the Environment’s nasty little asides from time to time has challenged the competence or the integrity of any of the individuals or organisations involved in the review. We have talked about conflict of interest and there is a difference because conflict of interest is either real or perceived. It does not actually matter whether it is real or perceived conflict of interest must be avoided at all costs when we are talking about protecting the resources of our environment. If the Government had wanted the process to look disinterested in that regard it would have appointed someone outside the dairy industry to chair the review. That is not a reflection on Wyatt Creech it is just a reflection on the Government’s incapacity to work out who should appropriately do that job. 
Let us talk about the other elements of process here. The review is riddled with anecdote. After stating that it had no evidence to back up certain claims made by interest groups the review panel still used these as evidence against the council. 
There is not enough time to highlight every aspect of it but I will return to one point that I made during the Committee stage which is on page 65 of the Creech report: “Christchurch City’s desire to become a unitary authority and ‘master of its own (expanded) destiny’ continues to detract from the relationship.” Christchurch City Council does not have on record any resolution supporting turning itself into a unitary authority. That is the mayor’s view about what it should be in the future and it may have been the view of a previous mayor but it has never ever been the decision of the Christchurch City Council. 
I for one am completely and utterly opposed to one of the polluters being the same authority that has to determine resource consents. The city council would be continuing to discharge into the estuary on the boundary of my electorate and the Hon Ruth Dyson’s electorate if the city council had been responsible for its own supervision in that regard. We need to have regulation of our environmental protection and that is what the primary role of Environment Canterbury has to be.