Burns Brendon: Environmental Protection Authority Bill — First Reading 
Burns Brendon: Environmental Protection Authority Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:669;Page:15710] 
BRENDON BURNS (Labour—Christchurch Central) 
: 
 I am pleased to follow the convenor of the National blue-green caucus—and how apt it is that I should follow on. Blue-green algae I understand is the most toxic algae found in New Zealand’s waterways. It is killing dogs in several rivers in Canterbury that manage to eat some of that blue-green algae. How appropriate and apt it is to follow on from that speaker Nicky Wagner! 
The referral of the Environmental Protection Authority Bill to the Local Government and Environment Committee will be supported by the Labour Party. We believe there could be some real value in a properly funded and constituted Environmental Protection Authority. But the question is whether this will provide the powers and teeth that are necessary to protect our environment. I do believe that is what the Hon Dr Nick Smith wanted—I believe that. He has spoken strongly about protecting the environment and prior to the election he and the blue-green caucus had a very strong paper  
A Bluegreen Vision for New Zealand 
 which promoted the Ministry for the Environment being replaced by an Environmental Protection Authority—and of course we see that heralded tonight—and also replaced by a ministry for sustainable development. I do not see the second leg of that policy emerging; maybe that is still in the offing but I have my doubts. I have very real doubts that we will see that— 
Hon Dr Nick Smith 
: It didn’t make it to policy. 
BRENDON BURNS 
: It did not make it to policy from  
A Bluegreen Vision for New Zealand 
 by the Hon Dr Nick Smith. So there we go; it did not come through. Why did it not come through? Prior to the election and certainly from the election onwards I think that Nick Smith lost ground and I think the first signal of that came on 20 December 2008 when a forum was called by Federated Farmers for irrigators across Canterbury. It was attended by Gerry Brownlee as Minister for Economic Development by Bill English as Minister of Finance and by David Carter as Minister of Agriculture but Nick Smith was not there. I think they did not want any environmental voice present at that meeting because that forum set the scene for the demolition of Environment Canterbury which followed in rapid fashion from thereon. 
I think the Environment Canterbury legislation went further than Dr Smith would have wanted—I really would say that. I think he would not have wanted for instance the inclusion at the eleventh hour of the move to do away with the process for awarding and retaining water conservation orders. That amendment to that bill as included and presented and passed by this House after 30 hours of urgency which I note we will see mirrored by this legislation tonight nearly cost him the support of many in the Land and Water Forum. Indeed I think his own good friend and confidant Guy Salmon was horrified at the late addition to the bill and he said so publicly. The environmental movement in trying to give some support to the good ambitions of Dr Nick Smith I think felt betrayed by the Environment Canterbury legislation and the Act as it was passed through. 
Then we come to today where for the second time I asked Dr Smith in the House about the Prime Minister’s statement in February that he wants to see new water schemes in place in Canterbury next year. The question that flows from that is how on earth he can as the Minister for the Environment get in place new environmental controls in that very rapid time frame. The truth of it is that he cannot do that. There is no way on God’s earth that he can follow through with the good recommendations from the Land and Water Forum which managed to hold together despite the tests that the Environment Canterbury legislation put to it. It knows there can be no way that Dr Smith can start implementing the recommendations that it has put up because they are complex. They require legislation and implementation and they will not happen in a rapid fashion. Here we have the Environmental Protection Authority as promulgated by this bill. It will not come into force until July next year yet here we have the Prime Minister saying he wants to see new water schemes in place in Canterbury and possibly Otago next year. There is no way we will see any environmental change through that time frame. 
The other aspect of this that is interesting is that the Minister wanted the Environmental Protection Authority to start a year earlier because he told the New Zealand Planning Institute on 8 May last year in a speech that is on the Beehive website that he wanted “the expanded EPA fully operational by 1 July 2010.”—1 July 2010. No wonder we are now seeing urgency attached because here we are nearly 18 months after he said he wanted the Environmental Protection Authority operational. I think the reasons for that are very very clear. I think what has happened in the Cabinet process is that a very clear message is being sent to Dr Smith to not think he will get new money for any agency especially to deal with protecting the environment because the Prime Minister has an agenda for rapid growth in Canterbury and other places and Cabinet does not want anything getting in the way of that through the Environmental Protection Authority or anything else. 
Of course even when the Environmental Protection Authority comes into effect on 1 July next year—so too late to stop any of the things that will happen with those new water schemes coming into place—how many people will be employed by the Environmental Protection Authority? How big an agency will it be to deal with all of the critical environmental issues that this nation faces and that I think this Minister acknowledges? Certainly in Opposition time and time again he took the call and talked about the damage to freshwater quality and the whole range of environmental damage that was being perpetrated. What will we see? The budget for the Environmental Protection Authority will be in the order of $26 million. That will involve 140 staff. One would think that that is a pretty good number of staff if we want to see some serious change to the way we protect our most precious resource. 
The very driver of our economic base as a nation comes out of our freshwater sources. We make our reputation in the world on the basis of being clean and green. Water is fundamental to that. Until we get water right and I believe that the Minister wants to get it right we will not protect our market edge in the world economy. We must improve water quality. If we have 140 staff dedicated to improving that that would be a great start. However there is a problem. Of that 140 staff that the Environmental Protection Authority will employ 90 of them are coming across from the Environmental Risk Management Authority. So 90 out of 140 will come from the Environmental Risk Management Authority. That is good; it does a great job too. It has an important environmental protection job but they are not new staff; they are transferred staff in this grand new authority that the Minister is establishing under this bill.  
What else will the Environmental Protection Authority do? It will take on and look after the issues of climate change. How many staff will be involved in dealing with that? Maybe 20 staff? So now we are up to 110 of the 140 staff of the Environmental Protection Authority who will not be dealing with the critical issue of freshwater quality. Who else will be employed by the Environmental Protection Authority? We will see staff working at the Ministry of Economic Development on management of living modified organisms. There will be a handful of staff there; maybe not a large number. The Antarctica division that is currently within the Ministry for the Environment is moving across. That division will be part of the new Environmental Protection Authority as well. Then we will also have staff involved in protecting our exclusive economic zone. There is one other element within the Environmental Protection Authority which is the fast-track agency. That is the agency that pushes through the projects like the Waterview Connection when the Government wants to fast track them. 
I want the Minister to say at some point what the numbers of staff are who will deal with the flagship issue of freshwater quality. Where are they? What will they do and how many of them will there be? By my count there might be none coming across to deal with the critical issue of freshwater quality. That will be to the detriment of New Zealand. The Environmental Protection Authority will be against a Prime Minister who is still pushing for rapid growth in Canterbury and still wants to see rapid runs on the board in terms of growth. We have a Minister with a much-vaunted flagship agency that will not actually have any staff to do the job we would all like to see it do in terms of protecting our most precious resource of all which is fresh water. There is nobody there to do the job unless Bill English digs into his pockets and finds some new funding. Given the track record of that Minister I suggest that that is very very unlikely. As my colleague Charles Chauvel noted the track record beyond the rhetoric of this Government is that it talks the talk of environmental protection and it established the Environmental Protection Authority under this bill but there will not be the staff and resources to deliver the goods that the Government says it wants to deliver and that New Zealanders want to see delivered. There is not the staffing there under this bill or under this agency and that is a tragic loss for New Zealand.