Kedgley Sue: Historic Places Amendment Bill — Third Reading 
Kedgley Sue: Historic Places Amendment Bill — Third Reading 
[Volume:632;Page:3924] 
SUE KEDGLEY (Green) 
: 
 The Green Party strongly supports the retention of New Zealand’s heritage buildings and Maori sacred sites or wahi tapu. We are deeply deeply concerned about the continuing destruction of much of our heritage and about the fact that basically historic places and buildings in New Zealand are still largely unprotected in our law. We are also very concerned about the fact that there is huge variation in the way regional and territorial authorities carry out their functions under the Resource Management Act in relation to heritage sites and about the fact that all over New Zealand heritage sites and buildings are still being bulldozed and have been bulldozed over the past century. New Zealand is so much the poorer for it. 
 There is an understanding between Transit and the Historic Places Trust that if Transit wants the site of an historic place for a road the trust will not stand in its way. So in Wellington as one example our most historic area Te Aro which is a wonderful heritage area has basically been removed to build a motorway. The Historic Places Trust basically just capitulated to a request from Transit and allowed 46 historic homes to be knocked down or shifted. So we agree with the previous speaker that what we really need at this time and what this bill really should be about is a fundamental review of the Historic Places Trust and of how we can give it more teeth so that New Zealand’s remaining historic heritage does not continue to be bulldozed. 
The parts of New Zealand that have retained their heritage—for example Timaru Oamaru and Wanganui—have benefited hugely from that. They have become tourist sites. There is a huge attraction to those areas just because they stand out from other parts of New Zealand because they have actually retained their heritage. But so many other parts have lost much of their heritage and as I said we are all the poorer for it. 
In relation to the question about why the Historic Places Trust has virtually no teeth I have here a report from February this year. A historic Petone building is about to be bulldozed and replaced with a new apartment complex after a developer received the green light from the Hutt City Council. The article goes on to point out that the Historic Places Trust strongly opposed the demolition that the trust heritage adviser said that buildings contributing to Petone’s historic character should be protected and that the decision was disappointing. So in the end the Historic Places Trust was left wringing its hands and allowing yet another precious historic building in New Zealand to be demolished. We think that is what the bill should have been about—giving teeth to the Historic Places Trust to protect our remaining heritage. We strongly support any moves by this Government or any subsequent Government to review the Historic Places Trust. 
We support the bill but we do have some very serious reservations in particular about new section 42 in clause 19 which states that to represent Maori on the Historic Places Trust one no longer has to be Maori. This provision was opposed by the Maori Heritage Council by the Historic Places Trust and by many of the submitters but the Government Administration Committee simply ignored their submissions and it never gave any justification as to why we now have a new definition in law that could set a new precedent across all law in New Zealand that one no longer needs to be Maori in order to represent and advocate for Maori. How ridiculous is that? Why was no justification for it given in this bill? 
We might as well say that we no longer need women in various positions on various boards we can just have men as long as they have a little bit of an understanding of women’s issues. We could start appointing men all over New Zealand saying that they are advocates for women. That would be ridiculous and so too it is ridiculous that this legislation states that one no longer has to be Maori to advocate for Maori. 
The Maori Heritage Council pointed out that whakapapa is the foundation of Maori identity as tangata whenua and it is crucial that the relationship between Maori and their historic and cultural heritage is retained. The council basically said that people need to have whakapapa to be able to advocate for Maori and in particular for the preservation of Maori’s historic and cultural heritage. We think this provision sets a new bizarre and dangerous precedent that we are completely opposed to. It seems to be incredibly patronising and condescending and it has no justification. No reason was given whatsoever. 
So we do have that very serious reservation about the bill but we rather grudgingly support it despite the fact that the Government opposed our amendment to change clause 19 and remove that anomaly. We support the bill only because we are committed to supporting the Historic Places Trust even though we regret the fact that it is so lacking in teeth and lacking in power that over the past decades it has stood by and watched historic building after historic building and historic Maori site after historic Maori site be bulldozed and demolished because it does not have sufficient strength to stop it. 
We believe there needs to be review of that and also of the way in which regional and territorial authorities carry out their functions. We believe there needs to be much more funding and much more priority given to retaining what is left of our heritage in New Zealand.