Smith Nick: Resource Management (Security for Costs)  Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Smith Nick: Resource Management (Security for Costs)  Amendment Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:631;Page:3595] 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH (National—Nelson) 
: 
 The reform of the Resource Management Act is one of the most significant and important legislative issues facing this nation of ours. The Act is holding back and delaying the building of new roads; it is preventing the timely construction of new electricity infrastructure; and it is also driving up the cost of subdivisions which reflects directly on the price of homes and therefore affects New Zealanders who long to own their own homes. I find it extraordinary that in this House when a good new member like Kate Wilkinson who has a great legal background comes with a very simple proposition that will make a material difference to that Act the tired parties in Government will not even support that bill going to a select committee. 
I want to rebut a number of points that have been made. I cannot believe the claims made by United Future that suddenly the Resource Management Act has all been fixed—that there is no problem. I say to Mr Copeland that I have heard some fantasies in this House but that one would have to be in the fairytale class. Keith Turner of Meridian Energy said only in the last few days that New Zealand would not be able to address its electricity problems unless there was reform of the Resource Management Act. Just today I was at a seminar about the Act in relation to roads. I spoke with the members of a frustrated community that applied for resource consent for a roading project on the Kapiti coast in 1997—and it is still not resolved. 
Every single day we see bad examples. Can I tell members how bad it has got? Tonight’s news featured a gentleman in Queenstown who was so frustrated at trying to get a resource consent for a sign he decided to mow his sign message into his paddock. He has received a notice today stating that he will be prosecuted for not getting a resource consent for mowing his own lawn. That is exactly what has happened today yet Government members say that the Resource Management Act does not need reform; we on this side of the House say that it does. 
I have been fascinated by the arguments effectively from Government members that they do not trust our judges to apply common sense. All Kate Wilkinson’s bill will do is allow a judge to provide for security of costs if he or she thinks that is warranted. Why is it that we allow security of costs in the High Court? We allow it in the High Court we allow it in the District Court and we allow it in the Employment Court. What is it about our Environment Court judges that members of Labour United Future and New Zealand First do not trust? If there were any environment in which one might be concerned one might expect it in the Employment Court but even there there is the provision that security of costs can be allowed. 
The naivety of parties in the Government amazes me. To get around the Resource Management Act all one needs to do is to form oneself into an incorporated society and to object all the way through the resource consent process imposing huge costs on the community and on others and knowing that that limited liability incorporated society will never be held to account for the costs imposed on those others. I reflect on the tragedy for the Whangamata Marina Society which went through a resource consent process lasting 13 years. There are vexatious and frivolous objectors under the Resource Management Act every day of the week and this bill from Kate Wilkinson will provide a small but effective measure that says to the courts that if they believe somebody is acting frivolously or vexatiously they have to provide a security for costs. That is all it means—a person has to put up 10 grand so that at the end of the hearing if there is a costs award there is some means to reinforce it. 
I am bitterly disappointed that this Parliament does not see fit to improve that situation for those who want to transform the New Zealand economy by allowing that sort of minor but important amendment to the Resource Management Act. I know indeed that this country will not have roads where people can drive without being congested will not have security for people about their electricity supply and will not have subdivision costs that make it affordable for the average family to own their home while this Parliament refuses to reform that Resource Management Act.