Mahuta NanaiaHon NANAIA MAHUTA (Labour—Hauraki-Waikato): There is an old saying that goes It's not what you know it's who you know." and something stinks here. People are joining the dots and they are thinking about Skycity they are thinking about the Saudi sheep deal and now they know something really stinks with the illegal dumping of fish.The question I want to ask in my brief contribution is: how long did the Minister sit on this information? We know it was for years based on some of the information that was gathered; but he just sat there. It had the potential to erode the reputation of our fishing industry and the Minister did nothing—nothing at all. It was an issue that had the potential to erode the confidence in our sustainable quota management system (QMS) and he did nothing. Why was that?There was information out in the public domain. The Ministry of Fisheries had raised it with the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) but MPI and the Minister did not act. Why did they wait until 2016 when ex-Solicitor-General Heron produced a report that said that the decision in 2012 not to prosecute those ships that dumped fish was flawed? Why did he wait so long? That is the question that everybody will be asking. You can rationalise everything after the event as much as you want but people right now are looking at this issue and saying: "Something stinks. Why didn't he act when he had the information and do what he should have done when he could have?". It is as simple as that because if we do not have accurate reporting of fishing and what is taken and if there is not reporting of what gets dumped then how can you have any credibility in your QMS?New Zealand was seen to be a forerunner of moving into the sustainable fisheries space when it introduced the QMS. But it did rely on good reporting and accurate information and here we have compelling evidence to do more. The fact that in the bycatch in the large number of dumpings that have occurred a Hector's dolphin was a part of that bycatch—it is all in the report. Still the Government just sat and did nothing. We want to promote New Zealand as a country that wants to protect the marine ecosystem yet nothing was done when it could have been.The other issue which I think is of more concern to laypeople who are trying to peel their way through this particular issue is how it is at a time when we are trying to promote New Zealand as a sustainable country—one that has a high-quality export product in our meat and in our fish—that we are not doing more to try to regulate the system. That is a real worry because as my colleague David Parker has identified no one was really policing illegal practices yet they knew something was happening in this space. So more needs to be done.We need to get on top of illegal fish dumping and ensure that we can breathe confidence back into the QMS and better manage fisheries stocks. But I think this will be a matter of trying to do things on the backwash—trying to make good of a very bad situation. The Minister had the opportunity to act he had information—compelling evidence that was captured by video tape—yet he chose to sit and do nothing. That is just not good enough. The fisheries quota is worth approximately $3.5 billion to our economy so to not do anything at a time when necessary decisions need to be made I think puts everything at risk.But most of all—and this is a comment raised by my colleague Kelvin Davis—it erodes the confidence in those fishers who fish legally who are doing things by the book who want confidence in our QMS and who want to ensure that there is greater regulation within the sector. That is what doing nothing has meant to those who do it by the book who do it the right way—it is that everybody now comes under a cloud of doubt.There has been some comment about fishers in Hauraki. Can I say that yes they are doing very well there. They are concerned however about the way in which the marine protected areas legislation is going to be brought into effect about not basing decisions on good evidence and practice in the Hauraki and the impact it will have on those 15 commercial fishers. I have met with them. They are not entirely happy with the Government's moves in this area.There is more to do. Let us hope that the Minister does not sit for a long period of time and that he comes up with some practical solutions to this very difficult situation. As for illegal dumping of fish the Minister sat for far too long before he did anything."