Benson-Pope David: General Debates 
Benson-Pope David: General Debates 
[Volume:619;Page:14619] 
Hon DAVID BENSON-POPE (Minister of Fisheries) 
: 
 Protecting our environment is a strategic investment in New Zealand’s future. So let me make it clear to members of those political parties—including the member who just spoke—that would like to see the Resource Management Act gutted and development proceed at the expense of local communities and the environment: it will not happen. As New Zealanders we value our clean environment and the lifestyles we have developed around it. We in Government are not pretending that the Resource Management Act is perfect. We are currently reviewing that Act and I have said we want to find more certainty of process for those seeking consents and better decision making in general. But we will not be watering down the Resource Management Act’s ability to protect the environment. 
National’s prescription for the Resource Management Act is to severely limit those who can have a say. Local communities would be bypassed with little ability for them to help solve the environmental problems that affect them. This takes us back to the days of the National Development Act and the Clyde Dam legislation where locals were shut out and projects half built before it was discovered they were not economical or environmentally sound. There are not many people in the southern cities of this country who do not remember being forced by the previousGovernment whose members are now in Opposition to sell the Waipori Dam or the threats to privatise the roading system. 
As a Government our objectives have been to build a stronger economy but not at the expense of empowering local communities to make decisions about local environmental issues. Cutting back on public notification and fast tracking new roads and infrastructure is a ticket to shoddy and haphazard development. 
The National Party Resource Management Act spokesperson Nick Smith says the Act needs to be rewritten to close the gap between New Zealand and Australia. He says the Act is stifling growth. That is yet more nonsense from Dr Smith. The 2004  
Index of Economic Freedom 
 published by the Heritage Foundation and the  
Wall Street Journal  
confirms that New Zealand is the third “free-est” economy in the world. The UK was seventh the US was 10th and Australia was 11th. In 2003 the New Zealand economy grew by 3.5 percent against an OECD average of 2.2 percent. Australia grew less than us at 3.3 percent. In fact growth has been significantly higher in New Zealand compared with most other OECD members for a number of years now. 
Statistics New Zealand’s household labour force survey shows unemployment dropping to 4.3 percent—the lowest rate of unemployment in 16 years. That is 193000 more New Zealanders in work since Labour came to office. Our unemployment rate is the fourth-lowest in the OECD; lower than the UK Japan the US and—I say to Dr Smith—lower than Australia. 
Dr Smith also says of the Resource Management Act: “There are some good features in the Act.” He went on to say: “The overriding principle of sustainability is also sound.” Mr Smith concludes however that: “Some New Zealanders are quite contradictory in their views”. Contradictory is too polite a word for Mr Smith’s rantings on the Resource Management Act. Earlier this month Transpower—the company responsible for South Island transmission in part—took the extraordinary step of issuing a news release to distance itself from the wild accusations of Dr Smith. Dr Smith having been corrected by those experts several days before his party’s national conference would have been expected to stop repeating such ridiculous claims. Oh no! Dr Smith’s regrettable speech on the Resource Management Act carried the same untruths regardless. 
Contradictory was exactly what his own party leader Don Brash was on the Resource Management Act. The very morning that Dr Smith was saying the Act had some good features Mr Brash was telling the media that the whole Act might need to be scrapped. The evening before National’s economic spokesperson John Key said much the same thing. He said the Act was anti-progress. Well there is a euphemism: progress! Is that what one calls National’s plan to create the bureaucratic monolith called an environmental protection authority? That is yet another copycat policy from National’s buddies the Americans and the Australians. 
We should not be surprised as it turns out that most of National’s flimsy policies are about taking the policy of the US or Australia twinking out those countries’ names and writing in the phrase “National Party” instead. Only yesterday Dr Smith tabled such feeble material in the House. If anyone had any doubts about the degree of contradiction on the Opposition’s side of the House let me read these remarks. Mr Connell said: “I would rather support a few discreet coal-fired plants located exactly where we need them than put up with the noise pollution from windmills.” Paul Hutchison said: “We are proud that Simon Upton led the initiative for New Zealand in the initial work at Kyoto. National supports any effective reduction of greenhouse gases.”