Mackey Moana: Biosecurity Law Reform Bill — In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Mackey Moana: Biosecurity Law Reform Bill — In Committee 
[Sitting date: 31 July 2012. Volume:682;Page:4082. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
MOANA MACKEY (Labour) 
: 
 I intend to take only a short call on this part of the Biosecurity Law Reform Bill which is around ballast water. I do have a question for the Minister in the chair the Minister for Primary Industries  which is a serious question around the issue of cost recovery. We have seen as the member who has taken just taken his seat Steffan Browning has talked about that some of the penalties and offences that exist in Part 2 of this bill are an improvement but sometimes that means nothing when we are unable to actually get any of the money out of the individuals involved. You often find that the Government will say “Well we have got these significant penalties we are able to recoup some of the cost.” But I would like to know from the Minister where in this piece of legislation—maybe it is in the convention that is referenced here; I do not know—is that ability for New Zealand to enforce cost recovery so that if we do have a biosecurity incursion in our marine environment it is not the taxpayers of New Zealand who end up paying for that and it is not the people working in the aquaculture and fisheries industries who end up paying for that. 
It is the same thing that we have seen as my colleague Grant Robertson said in the exclusive economic zone legislation where we are still trying to discuss with the Government the issue of cost recovery and ensuring that the insurance and bonds that are in place up front do mean that that cost recovery is real. It is all very well saying we are going to go for full cost recovery but if the company then just closes up shop and the ship or vessel is registered in Liberia or somewhere on the other side of the world that has— 
Hon Clayton Cosgrove 
: Gisborne. 
MOANA MACKEY 
: No Gisborne would have very very stringent rules and regulations around this. Coastal shipping is a very important part of our economy on the East Coast and I know that the Gisborne port was very grateful for the focus that Annette King when she was Minister of Transport  put on coastal shipping. 
It comes back to I think a more general point about ballast water and the treatment of ballast water by the shipping companies which is that the decimation of our domestic coastal shipping fleet has led to far fewer safe practices in our territorial waters and our exclusive economic zone. This is really coming to light only now and even the Government is having to acknowledge it—not just practices around the environment such as the discharge of ballast water but labour practices and the way that employees are treated on these vessels which sometimes is not far short of slave labour as well as the way environmentally they operate in our waters. I know that what is left of our local fishing industry for example is very concerned at the unenvironmental practices carried out by some of these foreign fishing vessels. They come in and trap a number of New Zealand birds in their set-net lines then suddenly the entire fishery is shut down when we know that our local fishing guys really value and respect the environment in which they operate. It is no different when it comes to the discharge of ballast waters. I think that a strong domestic coastal shipping fleet would act far more environmentally responsibly in New Zealand waters than those kinds of rusty tin cans that come from overseas. As we saw in the case of the  
Rena 
 the impacts on the environment can be particularly disastrous. 
That was all I wanted to say on this part but my specific question to the Minister is around cost recovery—and Minister please do not say that that is not your area and that someone else is in charge of that. That is another thing I find frustrating about a lot of this legislation that is protecting the environment particularly in the marine area. Suddenly the biosecurity Minister says “No no no once something bad happens it is the Minister of Fisheries.” or “It is the Minister of Transport if it is an oil spill because that comes under the Maritime Act.” This is one of the big issues that we have: ensuring that when you have so many pieces of legislation all layered on top of each other there are not any gaps that mean that it ends up being the taxpayers of New Zealand who pay for any cost recovery any clean-ups and the biosecurity impact of an incursion. 
We need to ensure it is not those important industries which are the backbone of our economy that end up paying because they have to shut down their practices and lose a lot of their product especially in the case of aquaculture and fisheries. So it would be interesting to hear from the Minister where the cost recovery provisions are in this part of the bill.