Doocey MattMATT DOOCEY (National—Waimakariri): It is a pleasure and a privilege to rise in support of the Thames-Coromandel District Council and Hauraki District Council Mangrove Management Bill in its first reading. I must say that after listening to the member Catherine Delahunty who has just resumed her seat it is clear why New Zealand is looking for environmental direction from this Government when compared with the Opposition that is all it has to offer. It is very clear why we now have the Bluegreen platform of providing pragmatic and practical environmental policy because for us we believe that the world operates in a system. What this bill is ultimately underpinned by is the belief that the mangrove is growing out of control in the coastal system. So we are not saying: Let's completely eradicate it." I think the Hon Scott Simpson summed it up very eloquently when he said that it is not a scorched earth policy. It is very much Bluegreen thinking. It is pragmatic and it is practical and what we want to do is manage the system of mangroves. I cannot claim to have experienced overgrown mangroves myself. We do not tend to have them down on the Waimakariri coastline. Probably it is a bit too cold. But it was helpful to have that I suppose etymology lesson—well even probably a slight lesson in Latin as well—from Andrew Bayly who I think—The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): No. MATT DOOCEY: —perfectly captured the history and the background to this plant. I just wanted to add mine Mr Assistant Speaker because I did do my research on Wikipedia. In 2000 in the world the total mangrove forest covered 137000 square kilometres and it covered 118 countries. So the mangrove does get around. That in my calculation is about two-thirds of the countries. There we go. So that is the mangrove—it gets around. So clearly we have to be watching the mangrove because it does tend to take over. The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): The member might even like to refer to the bill. MATT DOOCEY: As you have quite rightly said Mr Assistant Speaker I will refer to the bill because this bill is a local bill and in fact the whole point of a local bill is to connect with local issues. So what we have got here is potentially quite a contentious bill that does need to go to select committee and I think Nanaia Mahuta clearly outlined the reasons of the two camps. In fact that is why we have the parliamentary process to send it to the select committee. It is disappointing that the Greens do not believe in that democratic process of sending it to the select committee. Let us hear what the public has to say and from that we can look at the bill give it a kick round and then bring it back in a good shape and that is perfect for the parliamentary process. I must say nearing the end of possibly the last members' day in the 51st Parliament I did not think I would be talking about mangroves so I do hope that I possibly get to talk about them again. But what we have here is a local bill that is trying to deal with the issue of bureaucracy. We have heard tonight that $1.5 million has already been allocated to the management of mangroves in this area and that led to only 10 percent of that money being spent on mangrove eradication. So clearly we need to address that bureaucracy. We need to cut that red tape. I think that by this bill we can have a mangrove management plan that will be agreed between two councils and that will ultimately achieve the end result where people in this area can enjoy their coastline without it being overrun by the mangrove. Thank you."