Simpson Scott: Environmental Reporting Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeSimpson Scott: Environmental Reporting Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 17 June 2015. Volume:706;Page:4542. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]SCOTT SIMPSON (National—Coromandel): It is nice to finally take a call this evening on a piece of legislation in the Committee of the whole House. This Environmental Reporting Bill is an important piece of legislation and in talking to Part 1 of the bill this evening I just really want to make the point that in the Local Government and Environment Committee we had very useful and constructive conversations and debates around a whole range of issues particularly relating to the purpose clause clause 3 which was well debated in the select committee. Ultimately the select committee decided by majority that it wanted to simplify the clause that was first proposed to it in the first reading of the bill which was long-winded and did not really get to the nub of what the purpose of the bill is. So we have ended up by majority landing at a place where clause 3 says: “The purpose of this Act is to require regular reports on New Zealand’s environment.” That is a short precise and succinct clause but it is important because what it does is neatly sum up the purpose of this bill. It does so without politicising it and without getting into an area where parties that want to grandstand and take a platform on issues could use the legislation to pursue their own political agendas. That is the purpose of depoliticising this clause of the bill.What we have heard in previous contributions on Part 1 of the bill is really opposition for the sake of opposing because as chair of the select committee I know that deep down members opposite really do want to support this legislation. They do want to support it because this is the first time that New Zealand will have a legislative regime once this bill is passed that ensures that we do have regular independent reporting on the environmental matters relating to the domains that are so important to our natural and environmental surroundings. Clause 4 the interpretation clause lists those domains—the air domain the atmosphere and climate domain the biodiversity area and climate is defined as well. These are where the meat if you like of the legislation is defined for reference in terms of the domain reports that will be provided on a regular basis once this legislation is enacted.It will come as no surprise to people listening to this debate this evening that in fact we have been as a nation a little tardy in this area in terms of reporting regularly and independently on our environmental status. We are one of very few—in fact I think maybe we are the only OECD country that does not currently have a legislative statutory regime for reporting of this nature. So this bill and the purpose clause neatly sets us in an area of best practice in terms of international best practice standards and also enables us as a nation to find that we have this independent reporting that is going to be so important to the underpinning of the legislation.Clause 4 the interpretation clause goes on to set out the role of the Government Statistician and the Ministry for the Environment by way of the establishment of a process for reporting. These are important matters and important parts of the bill because they go again to the sort of machinery to the mechanics of what makes this bill work and how it is going to tick. Bringing together the agencies of the Ministry for the Environment and the Government Statistician means that we will be able to draw as a nation upon the independent well-respected and credible resources of both those State agencies in a way that has previously been unavailable to us as a nation. The outcome will almost certainly help us identify areas where we could probably do better because undoubtedly in any environmental situation there is always room for improvement. It is very obvious to those of us who have been involved in business and commercial matters—and we understand—that what you cannot or do not measure really has no relevance or importance. For too long our legislation has not enabled us to measure these important aspects of our environment so I am very confident that where we have landed as a select committee will ensure that the role of the Government Statistician will provide the kind of robustness that will be equalled and measured by the input of the Ministry for the Environment and that those two agencies will be able to provide us with the independence that is being sought by members opposite.There is a Treaty clause. It is clause 4A of the bill and it is a clause that we included at the select committee in order to acknowledge the role of the Treaty and in order to recognise and respect the Crown’s responsibility to take appropriate account of the Treaty and its principles. This set of provisions in Part 1 goes a long way I think to establishing the foundations of a very good and important piece of legislation—one that if I was to be I guess picky I would say should have been advanced by a Labour-Green Government when it had the opportunity to do so. Members opposite are now literally clutching at straws to find reasons to oppose this very good piece of legislation when they had more than enough opportunity to bring something like this in themselves when they had that chance and they chose not to. They put it in the too-hard basket probably because they could not really get their heads around the way a piece of complicated measuring and reporting should be done. So to hear members opposite now opposing as I say largely for the sake of opposition a bill that deep down I know they wish to support is somewhat galling for members on this side to have to listen to.This is very good legislation. It does not have the flaws that members opposite are attributing to it and indeed my advice to members opposite is to stop looking for shadows where none exist. It is very easy I guess when you are in Opposition to do that and to get into a mindset where things may be conjured up out of the mists of nothing—The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! I am going to interrupt the member and in doing it I am going to plead guilty to being relatively slack in the early stages of chairing this part especially in Mr O’Rourke’s speech but also in the first part of the member’s speech. What we are debating at the moment is Part 1 of the bill as it has been reported from the select committee. All the changes have been accepted by the House so we are not debating what has been taken out. Mr O’Rourke was pretty irrelevant and—Denis O’Rourke: That’s absolute nonsense.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! The member will stand withdraw and apologise.Denis O’Rourke: I decline.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Well the member—in my experience in these matters and it is pretty substantial—does not have a choice. The member will stand withdraw and apologise.Denis O’Rourke: I withdraw and apologise.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): As I was attempting to say replying to speeches that are irrelevant is in itself irrelevant. The member has now got into that and it is my intention to tighten this debate right up to Part 1 as it has been accepted at second reading and to whether Part 1 implements the principles of the bill which the House has already accepted.Denis O’Rourke: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. I wish to say to you that I object very much to the comments you made about me and my speech. They were completely wrong not called for and not needed as part of the exchange you had with the other member. I would ask you to withdraw them.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Well I decline to withdraw to the member. What I did say at the beginning was that I did apologise to the Committee for not intervening sooner and the reason I did not intervene was that I wanted to consult the Speakers’ rulings and take advice as to whether or not the comments that the member made about whether or not clauses that had been taken out of the bill should have or should not have been taken out at select committee were relevant. The advice that I have received and I have taken and I have accepted and it is now the view that I have expressed to the Committee is that it is not relevant and therefore I am not going to allow Government members to go on about it because they would be being irrelevant too.SCOTT SIMPSON: I acknowledge the content of your ruling and accept it—The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Just do not comment on it at all.SCOTT SIMPSON: —without reservation. Clause 3 of Part 1 of the bill is the purpose clause and it simply says: “The purpose of this Act is to require regular reports on New Zealand’s environment.” What the committee was I think trying to get to there was a question of the nature of the regularity of those reports the nature and the breadth of the term “environment” and whether or not those needed to be extended in any way in the drafting of the clause. We ultimately decided against that.Clause 4 is the interpretation clause and therefore it sets out the various domains and the context required for defining those for the purposes of the bill. “Biodiversity” for instance is defined as meaning “the variability among living organisms and the ecological complexes of which they are a part”. So it is easy for us as a legislature to get into quite technical and succinct parts of language that have a very scientific application. I suspect that as members who are literally members of the House of Representatives we by and large do not have the expert knowledge that is required to come to terms with the absolute interpretation of those words that are used in the clauses as presented in the bill tonight. But what we do know is that the science specialists and those who have expertise in this area will be able to flesh that out in terms of the reports that are provided on a regular basis as proposed in clause 3. I think that is probably all I wish to say in terms of Part 1 of this bill and I look forward to the debate as it continues. Thank you.