Logie JanJAN LOGIE (Green): I am pleased to speak on the Civil Defence Emergency Management Amendment Act 2016 Amendment Bill at this the third reading. Firstly in this final contribution I want to offer my acknowledgment and thanks to the many public servants who have been providing really valuable advice through this process and who have enabled us to get the bill to this stage today. I think sometimes many people in New Zealand think of public servants as these faceless people who are a drain on our system who all live in Wellington and who do not understand what real life is like. Well I think the advice that we have had and this bill are an indication of the massive value that they offer to all of us and when Governments listen to the people and respond—and public servants provide the support beside that—then actually this is what collaboration looks like.It is—I do need to say again—unusual for the Greens to be supporting legislation through under urgency. We are comfortable doing it in this situation for two main reasons: one the largest part of this bill is bringing forward legislation that has already been passed very recently and that went through a full select committee process. The second reason is around ensuring councils or recovery managers and controllers have the ability to require building assessments to be done within a specific time frame and the results given back to those controllers. There is a need for that right now in Wellington. We understand that and we think this is appropriate to be done under urgency.I would on that note refer back to the story that was in the paper just a few days ago of the New Zealand Public Service Association raising the alarm on behalf of staff of the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA) who had concerns about the safety of their building. It turned out that a manager at NIWA had signed off the building as safe without it having had an engineer's assessment. So the union had to come behind those staff to be able to protect them from being in a building that they were unconfident was safe. So we do know that there could be a problem and so it is appropriate to provide Wellingtonians with that security. I am pleased to hear that the mayor himself was saying that he will be using this provision. That is about being able to be confident about the safety of those buildings across Wellington and in other areas now.It is also about knowing that there is going to be a series of aftershocks and we do not know how significant they are going to be. If we can get those assessments done now across the region then we have got that information on record at council. So if there are further significant shocks then we have that record of what state the buildings are in. Even if they are safe for people but there is damage we have that as our base which the council and the recovery team can use to be able to assess whether there needs to be another assessment done. That just helps with the recovery process and makes sure that things are streamlined which is part of the intent of the Civil Defence Emergency Management Amendment Act 2016 which we are bringing the implementation of forward.I will just reference a couple of points that came up through the select committee process of that original amendment bill which was the acknowledgement that it is important that local communities and councils are engaged in that recovery process and that the civil defence emergency management framework recognises that principle of acting locally coordinating regionally and supporting nationally. That is what this legislation at heart is about: us in this Parliament providing the support for that local action and it being collaborative and supporting agencies working together is a theme of the civil defence emergency management plan. It has been really pleasing to see that in practice through the process of leading us to this legislation today.When we heard submissions from Christchurch people on that bill they were telling us that the key lesson from the Canterbury earthquakes and the effect on Christchurch was the value of the collaborative approach. This legislation is an example of that collaboration in fact and will enable better planning and coordination for smoother collaboration at a local level as it implemented.There have been quite a few acknowledgments this evening of the National Government member Stuart Smith and Labour Party member Rino Tirikatene. And I do want to just acknowledge my Green Party colleague Steffan Browning who is also from the area and has been all over the area and went into Clarence at the time when the dam was building. He was checking on people and making sure that they had what they needed and he has been providing us with feedback from people in the local communities to make sure that our understanding of what is happening is grounded in those local experiences as well. That is so crucial—that this concept of collaboration does not apply just to Government. It is for all of us in this process of understanding to be grounding our understanding in the experiences of those most affected.What also has been raised is the issue about us needing to be able to address some of those wider issues at a later date in terms of the warning system. That is something that we also support in the Greens and it was mentioned how that applies in Porirua. I also would like to make particular mention that I lived in Japan at one stage in my life and there was an earthquake over there at the time. There was a tsunami warning alert that came out and I did not speak Japanese at that stage so the only word I could understand over the loud hailer was tsunami tsunami". It was absolutely terrifying. There is an understanding that the Deaf community is wanting a response to civil defence emergencies that will alert them—one that is not siren based because that relies on hearing. We need to ensure that people who do not have English are also alerted to be able to understand these warnings. That is also a lesson that we need to apply when we are talking about preparedness as we have in the House this evening which is something that needs to be happening across the country but particularly across the areas that have already been affected and are shifting into recovery. We do know that there are risks of significant aftershocks ahead of us and we do not know what scale they will be on. For all of us to be able to have a degree of comfort the comfort can come with preparedness and that is about getting your plan ready about getting your kit ready and about knowing where you are going and how to get to the people you want to be with. That has been pleasing to hear in the debate this evening—the common understanding around that and the support for people to be able to move forward into the future. Thank you."