Volume 700 Week 78 - Tuesday 22 July 2014(continued on Wednesday 23 July 2014)Text is incorporated into the Bound VolumeVolume 700 Week 78 - Tuesday 22 July 2014(continued on Wednesday 23 July 2014)[Sitting date: 22 July 2014. Volume:700;Page:19333. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Tuesday 22 July 2014(continued on Wednesday 23 July 2014)PrivilegeConsideration of Report of Privileges CommitteeQuestion of Privilege Regarding Use of Intrusive Powers Within the Parliamentary PrecinctDebate resumed.GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central):Just to recap as I began briefly last night we are debating here a report that has arisen from one of the most shambolic episodes this current Government has been involved in: the leaking of a report into the activities of the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB). As I said last night to this day New Zealanders do not know for sure who it is who leaked that confidential report despite being given assurances by the Prime Minister John Key that the Government would find that out and that he would get to the bottom of that. The reason New Zealanders do not know for sure is that the person who has been identified as the most likely source of that the Hon Peter Dunne refuses to admit it and the Prime Minister John Key has refused to follow up that matter in the way that he would have been expected to do by most New Zealanders. On this side of the House we find that greatly regrettable.What then followed was an investigation into the leaking of the report that in itself was an ongoing shambles. It involved the provision of information that should not have been given to the inquiry led by David Henry. It was an inquiry set up with terms of reference developed by the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet and the GCSB with John Key as Prime Minister. Perhaps somewhat unsurprisingly given that mandate the inquiry was able to get a lot of information that as the Privileges Committee has worked through these questions we have been deeply concerned that they were able to get. But we should not leave the matter of how this inquiry came about how the terms of reference were written and the exertion of power in this case by the executive. Those matters were ones that the Prime Minister and his chief of staff should have been considering. There is no doubt in my mind that the fact that this inquiry was set up by John Key is one of the factors that led to information being released that should not have been released because the power of the executive was being used in that way. I will come back to that point in a moment.So with that as the background what we have before us today is a thorough consideration of the outcome of this shambolic set of events and that has turned into something useful. I do want to acknowledge Mr Finlayson as the chair of the Privileges Committee. He briefly left the Chamber last night as I got up to speak. I am sure those two events were totally unrelated. I was not able at the time that I was giving thanks to the various staff members and other members of the Privileges Committee to acknowledge Mr Finlayson for his role in chairing the meeting. He occasionally allowed me to speak—only briefly and only on matters that were wholly relevant to the report—and I thank him for his chairing of the committee and his shepherding of this report through to the House.I think it is important when we look at the report that we acknowledge a couple of things. The first is that the committee expresses in the report our grave concern at the lack of regard of those involved in this situation for the separation of the executive from Parliament. That is a very important principle that we are protecting today in the protocol that will be passed as part of this report. It does not matter which party is in power in terms of the importance of that separation but what was drawn out was that the decisions about the release of information in this inquiry process drew out the fact that there was now a blurring of lines between the executive and Parliament. Although the question of who should have access to that information is not an easy one to resolve as the report says there is no doubt in the mind of this committee and in my mind that that cannot be the prerogative of the chief executive of the Parliamentary Service or indeed the chief executive of any other department. As the committee says in its report we are troubled that this incident arose as it did because there are protocols in place about the release of information particularly involving the SIS and we will come to that in the next item of business.It does seem peculiar to me and it did to the committee that this information was ultimately released as a result of the say-so of the executive branch of the Government. It was in fact ultimately John Key’s chief of staff Wayne Eagleson who was the person on whom reliance was placed for whether it was OK to release information. I do want to put on record that the then head of the Parliamentary Service Geoff Thorn actually refused to release information multiple times because he felt that that was not something he had the power to do and it was only from Mr Eagleson’s intervention that he then did release the information. This is relevant to this report because that is what lies at the heart and the Privileges Committee has said that in our report: the concern that we need to have much clearer protocols in place to ensure there is separation between the executive and Parliament on these matters.So the main substance of our report is the drafting and release of a protocol for the release of information. As Minister Finlayson said in his speech there are key principles that underlie that. The most important of those for me as a member of Parliament is that we as members of Parliament retain complete control over information that relates to us. It has been said by other speakers in this debate that we do a number of different jobs as members of Parliament relating to individuals in the community and relating to other people inside these precincts that are not and should not be released unless we say it is OK. There is an element of privacy. There is a question of the constitutional role that we play as members of Parliament and that can be compromised if we do not have the kind of protocol that is here.The second core element of the key principles is that journalists working in the parliamentary precincts should also have that level of control. It is true we share this environment as a working space but journalists have certain obligations and roles in our society that need to be protected and they were compromised in this incident. The fact that swipe card information relating to a journalist was released is wrong. It compromises the ability of the fourth estate to do its job and it should never have happened. Under this protocol in the future it will not happen.The key feature of the protocol is written consent from affected individuals and that is something that we are very pleased to see in there. I do want to make the point before I finish that of course disclosure of information can be compelled by law through the Official Information Act in particular and also through the Inquiries Act. That is as it should be particularly because official information relates to the work of Ministers of the executive and there are plenty of clauses within the Official Information Act that ensure that things can be withheld if they need to be but that is the role of Ministers exercising their executive function. What this protocol protects is the rights of members of Parliament and those working in this complex to be able to know that their information is held securely. This is a very good report I believe from the Privileges Committee. I welcome the fact that the protocol has widespread support across the House and I look forward to the Speaker signing up to the protocol as is envisaged here.DENIS O’ROURKE (NZ First):New Zealand First considers the Privileges Committee report in this case to be of the highest importance. The recommendations are significant and go to the heart of our democracy. The recommendations are that the House adopt the protocol for release of information from parliamentary information and security systems; that the Cabinet Manual be updated to reflect that where an inquiry is established under the Inquiries Act 2013 the exercise of powers in relation to members of Parliament and the parliamentary agencies will require recognition of parliamentary privilege; and that standard terms of reference be developed for use in any inquiry where it appears that the powers may be exercised in relation to members and the parliamentary agencies. So those are the three recommendations we are here to consider.As we know the report stems from the letter Russel Norman sent to the Speaker on 11 July 2013 which was later ruled by the Speaker to raise serious issues surrounding privilege. The letter was in relation to the release of information that was held on parliamentary information systems for the inquiry into the unauthorised release of information relating to the Review of Compliance at the Government Communications Security Bureau report. That leak was of the Kitteridge report.The committee was not asked to determine who was responsible for the leak or treat the matter as a contempt of privilege. Actually it was hardly necessary to do so. There is no doubt in my mind that the person who leaked the report was Peter Dunne. I take no pleasure in saying so but it needs to be said. He has never really denied it. He has equivocated and obfuscated. In my opinion he has never really been very honest about it. That is a sad way to end a distinguished parliamentary career. Of course that will be up to the people of Ōhariu. Let us hope that they see their responsibility to do the right thing.The Privileges Committee presented an interim report in December 2013 which highlighted important issues about protecting the privileges and immunities of the House freedom of speech of members and Parliaments ability to maintain control within its precinct. The main consideration was firstly the issue of who should have access to parliamentary information and security systems and when which goes to the heart of parliamentary privileges. The role of the media as an essential part of an open and transparent democracy was also of course involved. Secondly the other issue raised was that information from the systems was more easily accessed through a request from the executive than it would have been had the New Zealand Police been investigating a criminal act. The need for a comprehensive protocol was pretty obvious.New Zealand First fully supports the principles to guide the release of information especially the presumption that any information held on parliamentary information and security systems should not be released. We think it is fundamental that individual members should retain complete control over information that relates directly to them unless they give clear and specific written consent. How on earth could members of Parliament operate effectively otherwise? They must never be in a position of having to worry about what might be released when they should have complete control and permit release only with specific consideration and consent. I think that is extremely basic and very important as otherwise the work of MPs would become almost impossible.The media who work in the precinct should also retain complete control over information that relates to them and it should be released only with their specific authorisation. Any information that does not relate to a specific member will be dealt with by the Speaker of the House of Representatives as the ultimate decision maker. That seems to be perfectly appropriate. We agree that the two underlying and overarching protocols and principles regarding the release of information are the requirement for written consent from the affected individual or party prior to the release of information in any circumstances or the disclosure of information being required by the operation of law but not in respect of requests under the Official Information Act or Privacy Act. In conclusion New Zealand First fully supports the committee’s recommendations which I outlined at the beginning of this speech and in particular that the House adopt the protocol for release of information from parliamentary information and security systems.CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka):It is impossible to consider this report into the use of intrusive powers within the parliamentary precinct without considering the context of how this all came about and why we are here having this debate. We are here having this debate effectively because a Minister of the Crown was accused of releasing a report and in the process of investigating that accusation a whole lot of files were accessed including phone logs email logs and so on. The question arises as to whether or not that was appropriate. It related to a journalist within the parliamentary complex and it related to a Minister and that raised the wider issue of members of Parliament and the information held by members of Parliament.I want to make a clear distinction at this point though between a Minister and a member of Parliament and I think we should never forget that there is a clear distinction there. A Minister is covered by the Official Information Act and the information that they hold in their ministerial capacity is public information covered by the Official Information Act with all of the rules that govern that. There are very clear processes around that. Members of Parliament are not covered by the Official Information Act nor are journalists who work in the parliamentary complex or many of the other staff who work in the parliamentary complex. The reason that I make that distinction is very important. Peter Dunne who was the Minister accused of leaking the report tried to make a distinction during the Privileges Committee inquiry between his personal email account—I do not know whether it was a Gmail account or whatever—his parliamentary email account and his ministerial email account. He argued that when he was sending any emails using his Parliament email account he was doing so in his capacity as a member of Parliament and that when sending any emails using his ministerial email account he was doing so in his capacity as a Minister.The reality is that the distinction is not that clear. It is not the means of the transmission of the communication that matters; it is the communication itself. So if it is ministerial information—i.e. it is public information—it does not matter whether it is communicated using a ministerial account a parliamentary account a private Gmail account an MSN Hotmail account or whatever other account you want to use. It is still official information and it is still covered by the Official Information Act because it relates to a Minister’s ministerial responsibilities. For example Ministers have parliamentary responsibilities too. They often deal with constituency matters. So if it is a constituent communicating with a Minister in their parliamentary not ministerial capacity that is a grey area quite frankly and that does become a lot more difficult because often it is difficult to establish whether this is a ministerial issue or an MP issue. That can be a grey area and Ministers need to have pretty clear protocols within their own offices about how they deal with that.But the critical thing with regard to this inquiry was that it could easily be argued that the information that the inquiry was seeking with regard to Peter Dunne could be obtained in an official capacity outside this protocol because he is a Minister. Because he is a Minister he is covered by the Official Information Act. What was interesting as the inquiry progressed was that it became clear that the inquiry never asked for that information using the channels available to it. It could have requested that information under the Official Information Act but it chose not to do that. So we got into quite a lengthy discussion with the inquiry about why that came to be but it became very clear that there were some significant issues with the way the Inquiries Act could be applied in the future. It became clear that there was a real need to clarify all of the issues and responsibilities here and to make sure that sufficient safeguards were put in place to protect all those working in the parliamentary complex including the fourth estate—the journalists—so that they could be protected from the potential abuse of power.I am not in any way suggesting that this could happen now but without these kinds of protocols in place there is a possibility that someone in a future Government whatever the shape of the Government may be could misuse the powers of Government under the Inquiries Act to effectively delve into the affairs of another political party a member of Parliament from another political party or a journalist and that they could do that inappropriately. The protocol that we are putting in place here which we are asking the Speaker to adopt makes sure that that cannot happen. It makes sure that there are safeguards in place so that the incumbent Government whoever it may be cannot abuse its position and cannot gain access to information that it could not otherwise gain access to. There is further to come in the next report. We are going to talk about the execution of search warrants within the parliamentary complex and so on because it actually all fits under I guess an umbrella of issues that governs what happens within the parliamentary complex.There are some important principles at stake here. Members of the public need to be able to communicate with members of Parliament and know that that communication is going to be protected. We deal with those issues all of the time. That is very important. Members of the fourth estate need to know that they can function within the parliamentary complex and do their role as a watchdog—a check and balance on the use and abuse or otherwise of power within the parliamentary complex—and know that they are going to be protected. What became apparent is that up until the point of this protocol journalists had greater protection when it came to court proceedings legal proceedings and so on than they had here in Parliament. I think this protocol goes some way to addressing that deficiency and making sure that all the rules are clear and that that power cannot be abused. I think this is a good report. I want to congratulate the chair of the Privileges Committee Chris Finlayson.Grant Robertson: Don’t go over the top.CHRIS HIPKINS: I am being warned by my colleagues not to go over the top but I think that the inquiry and the deliberations around the report were conducted in a fairly collegial manner by all sides of the House. We had some very interesting discussions. I think that the report that we have produced is a quality one. I think the next one that we are going to be debating is a quality one too and I think that we have also done quite a good job of deliberating on the Parliamentary Privilege Bill which we are also going to be debating.I also want to congratulate the Government in terms of the timing of when it is putting this legislation through. I think it is good to do it before an election so that it applies to the new Parliament. If anything it kind of follows the protocol that we have with the Standing Orders—that you make changes to the Standing Orders at the end of a term of Parliament so that it applies to the future Parliament and therefore avoid any accusations that any current Parliament is changing the rules to suit itself. I think the idea of having these reports go through so that they take effect from the beginning of the next Parliament—given that we have only 1 week and half of this one left—is an important principle and it is a good one.I will leave my remarks on this particular report at that. I think it is a good report I think it is good that the protocol is going to be adopted and I think it will provide that safeguard in the future that has been lacking.BRENDAN HORAN (Independent):I will take a very short call on the very useful report of the Privileges Committee on the use of intrusive powers here at Parliament. This debate is important because the report arises from a misguided attempt to gag the media and threaten the press gallery and that is always a mistake.I would like to draw attention to another recent example affecting the privileges of this House and an attempt to gag the media. Recently I was interviewed by Sean Plunket. I said a few things there and shortly after that the pet barrister of the leader of New Zealand First threatened that company with defamation. The connection and connotations involved with the pet barrister of the leader of New Zealand First representing an undischarged bankrupt who avoided tax tell their own story and make rather a mockery of any semblance of honesty in that leader’s speech to the convention on Sunday.I would be happy to table for the benefit of members the May 1997 decision of the Auckland District Court wherein the court found “Mr Henderson guilty and convict him on each of the 30 charges of smuggling and each of the 30 charges of wilfully making false entries.”Denis O’Rourke: What’s this got to do with this debate?BRENDAN HORAN: I take offence.Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Proceed.BRENDAN HORAN: Thank you. Anyway as I said it was just going—Andrew Williams: Come on Jimmy. Give us your best shot.BRENDAN HORAN: Mr Deputy Speaker did you hear the interjection from that member?Andrew Williams: Get on with it Jimmy.BRENDAN HORAN: Did you hear that interjection from that member?Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: I will chair the House; the member will continue with his speech.BRENDAN HORAN: I take offence at that interjection.Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member needs to take a point of order.BRENDAN HORAN: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I take offence at the interjection from Andrew Williams.Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: It was inaudible from here. If the member has taken offence the member Andrew Williams should withdraw the comment.BRENDAN HORAN: Thank you.Andrew Williams: I withdraw.BRENDAN HORAN: As I was saying it is very very important that the Privileges Committee report is looked at seriously and the motion passed. I hope that it will also look at some of those people who bully within Parliament like some of those members of New Zealand First. Thank you very much.Motion agreed to.Consideration of Report of Privileges CommitteeQuestion of Privilege Concerning the Agreements for Policing Execution of Search Warrants and Collection and Retention of Information by the New Zealand Security Intelligence ServiceHon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON (Attorney-General):I move That the report of the Privileges Committee on the question of privilege concerning the agreements for policing execution of search warrants and collection and retention of information by the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service be noted that the recommendations be adopted and that the Speaker enter into amended agreements on behalf of the House to be brought into effect at a time to be determined by the Speaker. In moving that motion I want to acknowledge the work of the committee. Finalisation of the report was delayed because the committee needed to finalise its report on the use of intrusive powers in the parliamentary precinct and as we heard that matter has now been dealt with. When this initial reference was made frankly I thought it would be a rather boring reference but it turned out to be a very interesting piece of work raising some very interesting questions and there are one or two further matters that the Speaker will need to consider arising out of this report. But before I deal with those let us just briefly summarise how we got to where we are.Three agreements were entered into between the Speaker of the House and law enforcement agencies. The Speaker has the authority to control Parliament’s precincts under the Parliamentary Service Act 2000 which is why he or she can enter into these arrangements. Indeed there is a very sound constitutional reason why the Speaker would enter into these agreements. Parliament as the legislative branch of government must be able to conduct the business of governance of this place without the disruption or hindrance of the use of intrusive powers. There are three agreements: firstly policing functions within the parliamentary precinct; secondly the execution of search warrants on premises occupied or used by MPs with both of those signed with the Commissioner of Police; and thirdly the protocol on the collection of information on a sitting MP signed with the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service. We think that these agreements—and this is a preliminary point—and any other similar agreements should always be published or otherwise made publicly available for example on Parliament’s website. Before the reference to the committee I for example was completely unaware of their existence. I think all MPs should be aware of them and should be aware of what the Speaker has done on behalf of Parliament.So first let us look at the policing functions protocol. We think that this protocol is working well. The protocol intends to make sure the police understand they should carry out their duties in a way that does not impede MPs from carrying out their duties within the parliamentary precinct. This protocol was entered into in 2007 and we think that the protocol could be reviewed by the parties so that its terminology and legislative references can be updated. We also think it would be useful to include a disputes resolution process in the agreement.Secondly the agreement relating to the execution of search warrants is an interim arrangement and so it actually has been very useful to take a good look at the agreement and see what can be done to improve it. An important issue arose about execution. Enforcement agencies’ preferred method—Grant Robertson: Interesting concept.Hon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON: Well in relation to you it would be a delightful one. Enforcement agencies’ preferred method—not you Mr Deputy Speaker of course—Chris Hipkins: He just can’t help but be nasty.Hon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON: I am not being nasty. A bit of jocularity across the House—Hon David Parker: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. Look I do not think that can be passed. You ought not to be executed.Hon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON: I was actually about to correct myself and of course I would never refer to the Speaker—Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: I will uphold the point of order. I might be leaving but I am not going to be executed.Hon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON: Well I certainly would uphold it and mea culpa mea culpa mea maxima culpa. So the preferred method before I was so rudely interrupted by Mr Robertson for executing warrants for information stored electronically is often seizing hard drives or other equipment in order to make clones so that the content can then be examined. That actually may not be appropriate where the possibility exists that the device could also contain material covered by parliamentary privilege. It would seem utterly inconsistent with the principle that the House has the exclusive right to control its own proceedings and so what we have recommended is that the protocol set out a system of chaperoning which is an interesting term the examination of electronic evidence—in fact I think the term came from an English report as I recall it—and that an IT specialist assist with executing the search warrants in relation to electronic documents. The protocol currently does not make explicit that privileged material may not be seized and we think this does need to be made clear as well as a requirement that any material later found to be subject to parliamentary privilege should be returned to the member in question. Determinations have to be made by the Speaker and we recommend that this be made very clear in the agreement.We also recommend that the agreement refer to the definition of proceedings of Parliament which is set out in the Parliamentary Privilege Bill the second reading of which the House will shortly be dealing with. We also think it would be helpful were the agreement to set out practical examples of material likely to be privileged in order to provide more guidance in applying the agreement.Then the third one was a very very interesting discussion that we had about the memorandum of understanding between the Speaker and the SIS on the collection of information. The SIS will not generally direct the collection of information on a sitting MP. If the service has a file on a person who becomes an MP the file is sealed for the duration of the member’s term in Parliament. The collection of information on a sitting MP will be permitted only where the particular member is suspected of activities relevant to security. The collection has to be personally authorised by the director and the Speaker is briefed confidentially about the proposed collection and the reasons for it. The agreement respects the need for confidentiality in relation to the service’s activities and we recommend that the agreement be amended to include a statement of principles and purpose and an expression of respect for parliamentary proceedings because this is a very important agreement raising some very very important issues and we think that a clear statement of principles is required.We also recommend the agreement should require the Speaker to be consulted in relation to any interception or seizure warrant to be executed on the parliamentary precinct or in an MP’s constituency office and that the director should provide a written memorandum to the Speaker in advance of such warrant being issued setting out the information held by or the activities of the member that may directly constitute a security concern. I think—well you would expect me to say this because I chaired the committee—the report is a very good one.I must say in conclusion that we had a really interesting and important discussion about the role of the Speaker—Dr Graham will say something about that shortly—and whether the Speaker can be trusted to receive some of this highly sensitive information and to adjudicate on matters relating to a member of Parliament who may come from a different party. They are very sensitive issues but the committee had a good discussion about it and the conclusion was that putting aside partisan differences when the Speaker takes the oath of office the Speaker is there to guard the interests and the privileges of all members of Parliament and when carrying out his or her functions in relation to these agreements will always need to be mindful not of partisan considerations but of the fact that there is a member of Parliament albeit from a different political party whose rights are being interfered with and so great caution will need to be exercised at all times. This just emphasises the incredibly important role of the Speaker as the guardian of the interests of members of Parliament. The Speaker must never ever forget that important task. Thank you.Hon DAVID PARKER (Deputy Leader—Labour):I agree with the comments of the Attorney-General who I think has expressed the issues well. I am not going to take the full allocation of time for my call but I will make a couple of points. This is another report in a series that the Privileges Committee has brought forward in respect of properly delineating the line of what is a parliamentary proceeding and being very clear that we are standing for the rights of Parliament not in respect of our own personal interests as members of Parliament but because we are trying to protect the essential privileges of Parliament in order that Parliament can properly go about its business and protect democracy. That is at the heart of the changes that have been made to the agreement with the SIS to make it absolutely clear that proceedings of Parliament are absolutely privileged and that even the SIS cannot overrule that. That is the first point I would emphasise.The second and final point that I want to address is the one that the Attorney-General ended on. Can I add my thanks to Dr Kennedy Graham in respect of raising this issue with the select committee which is that where there are outside agencies that come into contact with Parliament they do so through the Speaker. The Speaker of course has able assistance from the Office of the Clerk but the person whom they liaise with in a titular sense is the Speaker. The Speaker is relied upon by this Parliament to act absolutely impartially. Kennedy Graham raised the suggestion that in respect of some of these very very sensitive issues where it is possible that an outside agency might be doing something that is wrong or is political rather than be interested in purely security issues there was a need to bolster the efforts of the Speaker by introducing someone else whether it be the Leader of the Opposition or some other person. I am sure Kennedy Graham will address this more ably than I am.In the end the committee concluded that we have to rely upon and trust the Speaker. It was quite instructive for me because it reminded me of how important the independence of the Speaker is. I think it was the Attorney-General who said to the committee—and I did not know this until he said it—that in Great Britain for example once the Speaker is appointed the Speaker becomes a lot less political than the Speaker is in New Zealand. The Speaker generally exists beyond Parliaments in Great Britain—and the Attorney-General can tell me whether I have got this wrong—and indeed the tradition is that with regard to the seat from which the Speaker comes the other party does not stand a candidate against the Speaker. All of this emphasises the independence of the Speaker and the duty that the Speaker has to Parliament rather than to their own political party.One of the reflections I have as we come out of this report is I wonder whether as a country we can actually do a little bit better in the future in encouraging that independence of Speaker. This is not a criticism of the current Speaker or Speakers past but actually the independence of the Speaker in New Zealand is not quite as entrenched as it obviously is in England. For example some Speakers do and some do not—and this has happened on both sides of the House—attend caucus meetings after they have become Speaker. I suspect that in the UK they never do. We still stand candidates from opposing parties against Speakers and Speakers do not exist beyond the term of a Parliament in New Zealand. They generally leave with the governing party. If the governing party changes so does the Speaker. So it would be interesting for us to reflect I think as members of Parliament as to whether we would be a better institution whether we would run better and whether there would be more trust in things like question time if the Speaker really was imbued with these other attributes of independence. That is the only thing I would contribute to the debate. I recommend the report of the Privileges Committee which is unanimous to the House.Dr KENNEDY GRAHAM (Green):It is almost 2 years now since the Speaker referred to our Privileges Committee questions of privilege arising from agreements he had signed with the Police and the SIS. Those agreements were automatically up for review. The committee as is the norm worked constructively and to good purpose. In our report we suggested several changes to the agreements that in our view will improve matters. In one case however I shall explore the implications of the agreement even in its improved state because they raise profound issues attending to our notion of the world in the 21st century and New Zealand’s place within that.Let me make first a general comment. I do query whether confining these types of agreements to the status of memoranda of understanding is of itself sufficient. They reside at the centre of the constitutional relationship between the executive and the legislature. They evoke the most sensitive of all issues—domestic order on the one hand when it comes to the police and global order on the other when it comes to the SIS. They involve concepts that are subtle politically relative and open to contestation. In such a scenario if the chips are down it is likely that the executive will claim an imperative duty and prevail over the legislature in any dispute on grounds of national security. This occurs now when the Prime Minister as the Minister of intelligence services withholds information from the House on precisely those grounds. The system in this country defaults through lack of mature convention in favour of the executive. It might be queried therefore whether a memorandum of understanding which is legally unenforceable in the courts is the right way to go when the issue of executive-legislature relations is at stake. Perhaps we should give thought to incorporating this kind of thing into primary legislation as we are doing with the Parliamentary Privilege Bill but that is for the future.Let me comment on the Privileges Committee’s views as reported back to the House. With regard first to the two police agreements involving search warrants the Green Party endorses the select committee’s recommendations which included a disputes resolution process a system for chaperoning the examination of electronic evidence the engagement of an IT specialist an understanding that the Speaker determines when information is subject to parliamentary privilege a 24-hour default period to seek legal advice cross-reference to the Parliamentary Privilege Bill and the definition of “proceedings in Parliament”. We endorse all of this. The relationship between Parliament and the police will benefit from these improvements.Let me now turn to the SIS agreement on which we worked constructively across party lines while engaging in serious and meaningful dialogue in one particular area where we differed a little. First there are the areas of consensus. The SIS agreement should be amended to include a statement of principles and purpose. The Speaker should be consulted by the SIS director in relation to any interception or seizure. In advance of such a warrant being issued the SIS director should provide a written memorandum to the Speaker setting out the actions done or information held by a member that might constitute an issue of security concern. The agreement should specify that the Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security has a role in overseeing the actions of the SIS in relation to the agreement. Consideration should be given to whether it is necessary for the Speaker to enter into a separate agreement with the Government Communications Security Bureau in light of the organisation’s potential role in assisting others in exercising their lawful authority.Some of these recommendations are the result of Green Party proposals that reflect our concerns and I thank committee members especially the chairman the Hon Chris Finlayson for his capable and constructive stewardship. The committee stopped short of agreeing with all of our proposals and that did not come as a total surprise but it was the result of some useful discussion on the nature of national security perhaps to an unprecedented extent in the New Zealand Parliament.The essential issue is this. At present the SIS must close any file on any person who is elected to Parliament but it may reopen a file or open a file for the first time on a sitting MP if the MP is suspected of undertaking activities “relevant to security”. This may involve simply the collection of information or it may extend to a warrant for surveillance or interception. In these circumstances the SIS is to brief the Speaker who must ensure that parliamentary privilege is properly respected. The SIS director is to provide in advance a written memorandum to the Speaker setting out the actions done or information held by a member that may constitute an issue of security concern.This is fine as far as it goes and the requirement for a written memorandum was our suggestion. The problem we still have is that it is left to only one member of Parliament namely the Speaker to be briefed on what is a matter of security concern. The question of whether the opening of a file on a sitting member should be discussed by the SIS with only the Speaker or with any other senior member of Parliament was raised by the Green Party and the reason for raising the matter is the evolving nature of the meaning of national security in the 21st century.Security as defined in section 2 of the current legislation the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service Act 1969 has four components. One refers to espionage sabotage and subversion. The second refers to New Zealand’s international well-being or economic well-being. The third refers to activities that are influenced by any foreign organisation or foreign person and are clandestine deceptive or threaten the safety of any person. The fourth refers to terrorism. So you can see the scope for subjective difference of view respectfully held of what within that definition might constitute an act of security concern.A political party may have a fundamentally different interpretation of what constitutes security from an interpretation that might be embraced by the SIS. It could be queried for example whether the SIS should be permitted to undertake surveillance on New Zealand citizens who may hold different views from any Government on what is in New Zealand’s international or economic well-being. That might apply to any party—National as much as Green. This is not a matter of subversion; it is a matter of difference of democratically held opinion within domestic law. We therefore are of the view that although the Speaker is the embodiment of the House it is still a necessary reassurance to the public that an equally senior member of Parliament from another political party be briefed by the SIS at the same time in addition to the Speaker. The obvious person is the Leader of the Opposition as was noted earlier by my colleague David Parker. The conventions of independence of the Speaker and dissociation from politics and a particular party are not developed in this country as much as elsewhere—particularly in the United Kingdom. So even with the best of intent a Speaker may make a misjudgment or could be prejudicing the interests even of his or her own party colleagues as much as other party colleagues.Those are our views on the matter. I could elaborate but I think the discussion was sufficient in the committee to warrant further consideration. We believe that the report goes some considerable way to improving the operation of the SIS in relation to Parliament and to individual members of Parliament. We therefore endorse the report but there is clearly still a need for further ongoing dialogue on this vital and sensitive subject.DENIS O’ROURKE (NZ First):This report follows on from the report of the Privileges Committee into the Henry inquiry following the Kitteridge report leak. New Zealand First endorses the recommendations in the report concerning the amendment of the agreements for policing execution of search warrants in a way consistent with the proper functioning of Parliament and the collection and retention of information by the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service. Anyone who gives a damn about democracy—and New Zealand First certainly does—will consider this an important report in terms of New Zealand’s constitutional and parliamentary integrity.We must never have a repeat of the shambles that was the Henry inquiry. That exposed that there was indeed something rotten in the State of New Zealand. We had confirmation that what we in New Zealand First had been saying from the outset—that Mr Henry was not qualified in any way shape or form for the inquiry—was correct. Mr Henry was in fact a completely inappropriate appointment. Anyone could see that his record could not possibly have qualified him for the job. Of course that was precisely why the Prime Minister picked him for the job—just another example of the kind of tricky dick behaviour we have come to expect from this Prime Minister. And—surprise surprise—the Henry inquiry actually provided no answers; it just left more unanswered questions. The Henry inquiry was therefore more than anything in my view an indictment of John Key and of his contempt for democratic process.Our democracy is not just the right to vote every 3 years as we are about to do. Real democracy is a complex web of spoken and unspoken rules and conventions that give it true meaning—not just the semblance of democracy not just a veneer to keep the public calm and quiescent. The privacy of media communications is one of those aspects that are vital to an effective functioning democracy. It is a privilege that must be cherished and must not be abused and is one of the core elements that underlie our democratic State. The Privileges Committee made it clear that there had been contempt for this principle not just by Mr Henry but by senior parliamentary officials. If they are not guardians of democratic practices who is? The interim report talked of “errors of judgment” by parliamentary staff. That must be the understatement of the century. Mr Thorn fell on his sword and to his credit he accepted his accountability and left.But John Key was deeply implicated in this absolute mess as well. Where is the acceptance of accountability from him? Of course we have learnt not to accept any such accountability from this Prime Minister. This report is a wake-up call showing how easy it is for the essential props of democracy to be kicked away. One thing is for sure: when John Key is around hyper-vigilance is necessary. Mr Key and his cronies will unthinkingly trash our democracy just like they are trashing so much else in this country at the present time. That is the real message to be learnt from this whole sorry affair.GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central):I am going to take just a brief call on this report from the Privileges Committee looking at “the agreements for policing execution of search warrants and collection and retention of information by the NZSIS”. Comments made already by the Attorney-General Chris Finlayson my colleague David Parker and Kennedy Graham cover most of the material the report has.What I want to talk about are two things. The first is a very specific matter that when I came on to the Privileges Committee I was concerned about in this area and it is that when search warrants are executed—this is not just for Parliament but more generally—nowadays with the growth of the use of electronic information storage it is the practice of an agency to seize the entire hard drive of a person who is involved in an investigation in order to get the particular documents or information that is desired.When a member of Parliament is in that situation there may well be material on that hard drive that is quite separate from what is being sought and that actually could be captured and taken away from a member of Parliament in such a way as to compromise both parliamentary privilege and the general operation of our work as parliamentarians. So I applaud the recommendation that is in this report that actually—and this is the “chaperoning” concept the Attorney-General mentioned earlier—an IT specialist will assist in the execution of the warrants to ensure that our rights as parliamentarians are upheld and that parliamentary privilege is protected within that. I think that that is a small but very important advance for us to ensure that we do not as parliamentarians hand over material that ultimately is privileged and should not be part of those investigations.The other point I particularly want to make is around the question of the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service and its role with Parliament. I appreciate the fact that this report is in fact following on from an interim report of the committee in this area and following on from protocols that were signed off several years ago—Hon David Parker: By Margaret Wilson.GRANT ROBERTSON: —that is right—by Margaret Wilson as the Speaker.There is a fundamental principle that I think needs to be reiterated here and it is that the SIS is not under normal circumstances going to be collecting information about a sitting member of Parliament. As the Attorney-General said once someone becomes a sitting member of Parliament their file is closed immediately. I think it is very very important that we make sure that is on the record of the House as the fundamental underlying principle here.What can happen is that for reasons of national security there may be on occasions situations in which the SIS may want to be looking at the activities of a member of Parliament. The threshold for doing so must be very high because we as parliamentarians need to be able to go about our business unencumbered by the activities of State agencies with significant powers. It is on that point that I want to raise my concerns. They are that a review of the Security Intelligence Service was planned and was never completed. In the maelstrom of all of the concerns about the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) Kim Dotcom and the appointment of Ian Fletcher that review of the SIS was quietly shelved by John Key.I believe it is essential that that review is done. The Labour Party’s policy is that we need a review of both the Security Intelligence Service and the GCSB and in fact of all of the agencies involved in our security intelligence system which also now includes particularly the Organised and Financial Crime Agency of New Zealand as part of the police.In the absence of that review public trust and confidence in our security intelligence agencies has reached an all-time low in New Zealand. For my part I am deeply distressed by that. I am a person who believes that it is important that we get the balance between security and privacy in our society right. In the modern era that is even more important. I understand and the Labour Party understands why we have these agencies working for us. There are reasons. There are people in the world today from whom New Zealand needs to be protected but equally our privacy and our rights as citizens must not be compromised by that and our privacy and our rights as members of Parliament representing citizens must not be compromised by that.At the moment legislatively for the GCSB we now have in my view legislation that goes far too far in terms of that balance and we have lost that balance between security and privacy. [Interruption] That is right. As my colleague David Parker says the absence of the requirement for a warrant and the fact that we have to essentially rely on the assurance of the Prime Minister about how these investigations will be operationalised is ridiculous and is in fact an insult to this Parliament.The SIS sits alongside that operating in operations within New Zealand without the review that was meant to take place. We need that review to happen to restore trust and confidence. In fact for this report to have my full and complete confidence we need to know that review is going to happen. It is noted in the report that the issues that Kennedy Graham has been discussing in his contribution need to be considered whenever the legislation governing the SIS is reviewed. Well my view is that it urgently needs to be reviewed.Having said that the situation we find ourselves in today is that the Speaker is the person who acts on behalf of this Parliament in dealing with these agencies. We must have confidence that the Speaker will act in a way that upholds the rights of all members of Parliament no matter what party they come from. It is also true to say that under the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service Act as it stands the Director of Security does need to consult with the Leader of the Opposition from time to time. Without going into any detail about those matters I think they would tend to be at the more general level not at the specific level of what might be happening with a particular member of Parliament. Therefore the Speaker’s responsibility here is extremely high.I do not think we are at the end of our discussion about the role of the Speaker as David Parker has mentioned or indeed about the relationship between this Parliament and agencies with powers such as the SIS but this report represents a series of useful changes to the processes that were originally brought forward. From the point of view of the Labour Party we can support this report but we welcome the idea of ongoing dialogue about the role of the SIS in relation to Parliament. We strongly urge and in fact commit to the public of New Zealand that we will do the review of security and intelligence agencies that is needed to restore public trust and confidence in them.Motion agreed to.Parliamentary Privilege BillSecond ReadingHon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON (Attorney-General):I move That the Parliamentary Privilege Bill be now read a second time. I want to begin by endorsing what the deputy leader of the Labour Party said about the excellent work done by the officials because they really did do a tremendous job on this bill. I particularly acknowledge Debra Angus. I think in her we have as Mr Parker said a foremost Commonwealth authority on some of these difficult issues. I also acknowledge John Pike QC who has probably conducted more litigation in this area than any other lawyer in the Commonwealth.I also acknowledge the assistance provided by the submitters all of whom gave very helpful submissions to the committee. I acknowledge David Cochrane for the Legislation Advisory Committee and the helpful submissions and reports received from overseas Parliaments including the Joint Committee on Parliamentary Privilege of the House of Lords and the House of Commons. Although that committee recently considered that extensive codification is not required in the United Kingdom at the present time it concluded that legislation should be used only where absolutely necessary to resolve uncertainty or in the unlikely event of Parliament’s exclusive cognisance being materially diminished by the courts. The bill recognises that in New Zealand we have actually now reached that point.Before turning to the bill I just want to say something about the importance of the issue. Parliamentary privilege is not about giving a licence to members of this House to defame outsiders without having to suffer the consequences. Such a cynical view of parliamentary privileges probably to be expected from some in the community—and I can just about read now some of the portentous editorials and opinion pieces on the subject that can be expected to be produced any day now. I just want to say they are wrong. I support what the report of the committee says. Parliamentary privilege is in fact one of the building blocks of our democracy; it is the cornerstone of an effective Parliament and protection of parliamentary privilege safeguards democracy itself. It ensures that we the people’s representatives can debate and deal with the issues of the day freely and frankly without fear of coercion or punishment and without concern that matters of accountability will be adjudicated on by bodies outside the House. It ensures our democracy remains robust and strong.It is also important to emphasise three key points: firstly that parliamentary privilege belongs to Parliament not its individual members; secondly that others who interact with Parliament such as the media and members of the public or officials may also benefit from the existence and the protection of parliamentary privilege; and thirdly—and this is very important for all of us—that with these privileges come obligations. We must be circumspect in the use and application of these privileges. We have got to be mindful of their source and purpose when we invoke them.As can be seen from a cursory reading of the bill we have extensively restructured it to make it easier to interpret easier to navigate. Instead of two parts one dealing with substantive provisions and one dealing with savings provisions related amendments and repeals there are now in fact five parts. Part 1 deals with preliminary provisions. What we have done is recast the purpose clause in clause 3 into a main purpose clause and subsidiary purposes. That is there for all to see.Clause 3(1) sets out the main purposes of the bill—that is to reaffirm and clarify the scope and extent of parliamentary privilege as it applies to the House its members and committees and to ensure adequate protection from civil and criminal liability for communication of and documents relating to proceedings in Parliament. Yes indeed they are high-level statements of the principles but they were not so clearly and cogently expressed in the original clause. Clause 3(2) sets out the subsidiary purposes to help it achieve the main purposes. I will speak about them a little later on.Then what we have done is insert new clause 3A and that stipulates that the bill has to be interpreted in a way that promotes its main and subsidiary purposes and importantly that it must be interpreted in a way that promotes the principle of comity. Comity requires that the separate and independent branches of Government the legislature and the judiciary show mutual respect and restraint in the other’s sphere of influence. This is not a legislative innovation because this principle of comity has long been recognised. New clause 3A emphasises the importance of understanding this constitutional context when dealing with questions relating to parliamentary privilege or proceedings in Parliament.Then we come to new Part 1A. It is the very heart of the bill. Clause 6 sets out the purpose of parliamentary privilege—that is the privileges immunities and powers of the House are exercisable to uphold the integrity of the House as a democratic legislative assembly and to secure the independence of the House the members and the committees in the performance of their functions.Clause 8 of the bill as introduced broadly followed section 16 of the Australian Parliamentary Privileges Act 1987. But what we have done is work to make this provision clear simple and easy to understand. That of course is very important when one is considering a major constitutional piece of legislation like this. We have recommended changes for a new Subpart 2 of Part 1A of the bill to separate the key components of clause 8 into eight separate clauses. We have also recommended changes to simplify and modernise the language.What will happen is that these clauses still broadly follow section 16 of the Australian Act. They do not replace but declare the effect of article 9 of the Bill of Rights 1688 which states: “That the freedom of speech and debates or proceedings in Parliament ought not to be impeached or questioned in any court or place out of Parliament:”.We had an interesting discussion about some of the terminology and whether or not it could be updated but after some deliberation the committee suggested that the bill continue to reflect the original language of article 9 and this is reaffirmed by clauses 8A to 8H. These provisions do not directly override or amend article 9; rather they sit alongside it. So although clauses 8C to 8F make clear what is intended by impeaching or questioning in relation to a proceeding in Parliament the bill does not limit the full extent and the richness of the meaning of the Bill of Rights 1688 which is one of our most important constitutional documents.Clause 8B is an extremely important clause because for the first time I think we actually try to define “proceedings in Parliament” for the purposes of article 9 in the Bill of Rights. It is important to note the committee recommended changes to ensure that proceedings include matters that relate to the “transacting of reasonably apprehended business”. It is also made explicit that necessity is not—I emphasise that it is not—the appropriate test to apply when determining what may be a proceeding in Parliament.The changes recommended by the committee make it clear beyond any doubt whatsoever that the reduction in the scope of parliamentary privilege resulting from the decision in Attorney-General and Gow v Leigh is reversed. I quote again from the committee’s report: “Our proposed definition recognises that much of the vital business of Parliament is transacted away from the floor of the House or in reasonable anticipation of parliamentary business and it is critical that privilege apply to such proceedings.” The necessity test is with the greatest of respect utterly misconceived. “We consider the advice provided to Ministers in preparation for reasonably expected questions in the House”—as occurred in the Leigh case—“are proceedings in Parliament under this definition.”Let me also say something about another case that went off to the Privy Council after arising out of something here: Buchanan v Jennings. That was a defamation action against an MP who after making a statement in the House was said to have effectively repeated it when he said outside the House that he did not resile from the statements made in the House. The case established that where such a statement was made it was an effective repetition and that the proceedings of Parliament could themselves be used in evidence. In its 2013 report the Privileges Committee recommended the abolition of the doctrine of effective repetition and this was included in the bill as introduced. What we have done here is recommend changes to clause 8C including the addition of new paragraphs (d) and (e) to prevent proceedings in Parliament from being relied on to prove or disprove facts necessary to establish liability in court or otherwise being used to resolve support or resist court proceedings.The bill as introduced also included a statement in what was clause 10 that effective repetition statements were protected by absolute privilege as well as establishing an evidential barrier. The committee recommends removing all provisions relating to absolute privilege and relying on a strengthened evidential barrier against the courts using proceedings in Parliament.Part 1B further simplifies the framework for protecting the broadcasting and publishing of proceedings in Parliament. The new clause 15 replaces clauses 11 to 13 and 15 to 16 of the bill as introduced. It provides for a stay of court or tribunal proceedings that have been brought on the basis of a proceeding in Parliament or of a document related to a proceeding in Parliament communicated under the authority of the House such as broadcasts made under the authority of the House. Subpart 2 of Part 1B deals with the qualified immunity available as a defence to proceedings based on fair and accurate reports of proceedings in Parliament. Of course being a qualified immunity it will not be available where a defendant was motivated by bad faith or ill will.Time prevents me from dealing with the remaining parts so I will leave that to other members of Parliament to address but I simply say this in conclusion: parliamentary privilege stands as an independent and vital part of our constitutional arrangements. What this bill does is address incremental infractions on that constitutional principle over the years and affirms the principles that help ensure a strong democracy. I commend the bill to the House.Hon DAVID PARKER (Deputy Leader—Labour):Again can I endorse the Attorney-General’s comments in respect of the Parliamentary Privilege Bill which is probably one of the more important bills that we will pass in this Parliament. It will not be seen by a lot of people to be that but in my opinion it is. Democracy is a very fragile thing. Democracy involves this complex web of societal settings including respect for the rule of law protection of property rights prosperity a fair division of income a fair division of wealth an educated population a healthy population freedom from corruption transparency—all of these ingredients that you have to get right in order to have long-term democracies.There are very few long-term democracies that are unbroken in the world. New Zealand is one of the longest unbroken democracies in the world and indeed most of the long unbroken democracies in the world have their roots in the Westminster model of governance and the separation of powers. If you look around the world there are very very few countries that have our record of 150 years of unbroken democracy. That is the record in New Zealand—over 150 years of unbroken democracy. None of the countries in South America none in Africa and none in Asia have it. There are virtually none in Europe with a couple of exceptions there in respect of you might say Switzerland and you would certainly say the United Kingdom. Then the other exceptions include the likes of Canada Australia New Zealand and the United States. Even the United States democracy in an unbroken sense is not as long as ours because it of course had its Civil War.The length of democracy that we have in some of these countries that are based on the Westminster model has proven to stand those countries in good stead and at the heart of the balance of these different relationships that you need to protect in order to achieve a long and fair democracy lies as one of its principles the balance of power between Parliament and the courts. The elucidation of that relationship—if you want to look at that in a historical context for New Zealand—goes back to the Bill of Rights 1688. At that time there was conflict between the King and Parliament. The King had effectively usurped some of the powers of Parliament. He had overridden some laws without the approval of Parliament and had written some new laws without the approval of Parliament. There was a scrap going on in the UK between these different arms of the country these different powers within the country. I do not pretend to be an expert on these historical issues so I will probably get some of the detail wrong but essentially there was this contest between the powers of Parliament and the powers of the King then there was also the questions of where the power of the court lies in this and what the limit is to the court’s powers. Is it an arm of the King is it an arm of the Parliament or is it a separate arm that should stand alone and where does this intersection of powers exist between Parliament and the court?It was sorted out essentially through the Bill of Rights 1688. Freedom of speech was set out in article 9. It said: “the freedom of speech and debates or proceedings in Parliament ought not to be impeached or questioned in any court or place out of Parliament.” That is a pretty general statement. Sometimes these statements are actually best left a little bit general because at times there are grey lines that are very very hard to completely codify in a way that answers all possibilities into the future because they cannot all be thought of and circumstances change and if you go down that particular codification route you can actually get yourself into a pickle. In reality if you have an irresponsible Parliament that is going too far then I want the courts to push back against the way that Parliament is acting against the interests of the people. If you get courts that are going too far and they are writing too much law or going too far by effectively entering into the political realm then I want Parliament to push back against the courts.I quite like the generality of the provisions that sit in the Bill of Rights 1688 because it enables that mature sort of pushing backwards and forwards where these two incredibly important spheres of influence within society occasionally push up against each other. When that circumstance arises then we rely upon our traditions to make sure that we do that in a respectful way. If we think the courts have gone too far we respectfully push back a little bit and if they think Parliament has gone a bit far—as they have recently expressed in respect of issues relating to taking voting rights away from prisoners that this Parliament did against the opposition of the Labour Party I have to say but it did none the less—they gently push back the other way. They do it respectfully and this is the principle of comity that the Attorney-General was referring to.That for me is the generality of what we are dealing with. We have a fantastic system in New Zealand. We do not need to codify all of these things. We would be worse off if we did codify everything. Occasionally we still need to push back against the other and then through that respectful process we use to get there we actually get to a decent outcome that we can all live with. We get this balance of interests right which means our democracies endure and we have a peaceful prosperous and happy country. That is essentially what democracy should be trying to achieve. When you go from that to the specifics of this bill the specifics are dealing with what we in Parliament think has been a push a little bit too far by the courts into undermining what we think is the true intent of that freedom of expression set out in article 9 which guarantees “That the freedom of speech and debates or proceedings in Parliament ought not to be impeached or questioned in any court or place out of Parliament.”We think that two recent decisions of the New Zealand courts—namely the decision in Attorney General and Gow v Leigh and the decision in Buchanan v Jennings—in their own ways go a little bit too far. That is what this legislation tries to fix. It does so by choosing at the same time to set that out in statute and codify it in respect of what is absolutely privileged in terms of parliamentary proceedings. Parliaments in the Westminster tradition have been pretty slow to do that because we like the generality of rules but the Australians led the way and they seem to have got to a pretty sensible place. So the way in which we are trying to get back to what we think is the underlying intent in article 9 of the Bill of Rights is by codifying what we think is a parliamentary proceeding that ought to be subject to absolute privilege not for the benefit of members of Parliament but for the benefit of democracy. The legislation that the Attorney-General has brought forward does that.I also again repeat the thanks that I gave in an earlier contribution on a report of the Privileges Committee in respect of in particular the contributions of Debra Angus and I would also add my thanks to the Legislation Advisory Committee in particular David Cochrane’s contribution in respect of that. I think the suggestions they made that we were actually creating a bit of a problem in respect of importing defamation concepts into our parliamentary privileges legislation were wise and that is why in the bill as reported back from the select committee we fixed that in the manner that the Attorney-General has explained.In respect of Buchanan v Jennings the problem with that decision was that it—not in a deliberate way—took advantage of the liberty that Parliament is given in New Zealand and some other jurisdictions for matters that are absolutely privileged in Parliament to be used in court. We do allow that at times but it actually took that a step further and said that allowing that to happen should be seen to be allowing those statements in Parliament to be used to prove defamation in respect of effective repetition outside of Parliament. From our perspective that was the logical error in that decision and so we are trying to reverse that and say that it is a nonsense and it would be seen as being a nonsense by people outside of Parliament to think that a member of Parliament would be defaming—it might be the rich and famous who feel that they have been wrongly treated by a statement in Parliament—by saying nothing more than “I do not resile from what I said in Parliament.”If you say outside of Parliament what you said in Parliament and you actually repeat it of course that is another defamation and you can be sued for it. But not to be able to say “I don’t resile from these comments.” is a nonsense and actually makes politicians look silly which in itself would undermine public confidence in democracy which is what we are trying to achieve here. So I and the Labour Party support the second reading of this bill.Dr KENNEDY GRAHAM (Green):I do not intend to take up too much time in this second reading. I will reserve my more substantive comments on the bill for the third reading but I just say that the Green Party is very pleased with the progress in the Privileges Committee on the Parliamentary Privilege Bill. I do also want to join others in acknowledging the work of officials particularly Mary Harris Debra Angus and Meipara Poata. It is a privilege—if you will allow the word—to be a member of a committee served by officials of that calibre.The Parliamentary Privilege Bill is a most massive piece of work and it focuses on the most fundamental matters affecting the constitution that I think we have undertaken certainly in the 50th Parliament and possibly for some time before. It also involves the most intricate threads of reasoning that I have experienced in committee work in my time in the House and I pay tribute to colleagues Chris Finlayson David Parker Grant Robertson and others as well as the officials for collaboratively producing this bill.I want to make just one or two points of a general nature. We have been talking this morning about the principle of comity underpinning this bill and the relationship between the executive and the judiciary. I would wish to emphasise—and I am sure I speak for others—that the bill is not intended in any way as a sign or a gesture of disrespect to the judiciary. It is taking on some of the judicial decisions that have been made. As David Parker said there is a fundamental reason for that. The principle of comity rests on mutual respect and it is that that is driving to some extent this bill. But there is if I may say so a related principle and that is the principle of self-respect of the branches of government—self-respect by the legislature of the legislature and the interests of the legislature self-respect by the judiciary of the status and interests of the judiciary itself. And I think the mutuality that underpins the principle of comity rests on a recognition of the need for self-respect on both branches as well. I think it is very important that this bill—presuming it passes through the House—is embraced in that spirit by everybody in New Zealand and all branches of government.My second point picks up on something the Attorney-General has said about parliamentary privilege. I totally agree that privilege in this House is not a licence. It is not a licence granted to members—to insiders—to defame members of the public outside. It is precisely the opposite. It is not a licence; it is a protection. It is a protection that is exercised by the representatives who are elected by the people to ensure that the rights and the freedoms of the people are respected in perpetuity. So privilege is actually in a sense vicariously the privilege of every member of the New Zealand society and provided it is exercised with responsibility we should all be embracing it. With privilege of course comes obligation not least the obligation to ensure that we get this bill right.I would just want to make one last comment and that is in response to—at the risk of wafting into seminar-like ratiocination but I blame David Parker for that—Hon Todd McClay: You wouldn’t do that Kennedy.Dr KENNEDY GRAHAM: Yes it is David’s fault. It is true that bills of this nature underpin and secure the democracy that prevails in this country and it is incumbent on us to cherish and celebrate the status of democracy in this country. But I think there is an equal counter-requirement on our part not to overstate that and not to perceive our democracy as being superior to others. I think in fact that the moment we start to do that is the moment we start to take on the risk that you could undermine it.I say that because the Westminster model that we have inherited which Mr Parker mentioned has tremendous strengths but I personally think it also carries with it some weaknesses. I worked in an organisation that you Mr Assistant Speaker might possibly be aware of when I was in New York and my job was to relate to parliamentarians around the world and to parliaments. When you visit 30 or 40 parliaments you get a feel for the constitutional structures that underpin the politics and the society in those countries but also the dynamics and the chemistry day to day that give the blood to the veins of that kind of particular democracy. You go away concluding that every democracy has its strengths and its weaknesses and we have to recognise that ours has weaknesses.We talk about the separation of powers but we have just devoted the last couple of sessions—not so much with consideration of reports on the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service and the police but with the Henry report—to exactly this issue: the separation of powers and the problems that the merger of executive and legislature in the Westminster system gives to us. I think we could have regard actually to the republican constitutional status and the civil law code which have strengths that we lack. It is as simple as that.I think if we look at 30 or 40 Parliaments around the world that reflect the republican status the one defining conclusion I have drawn from visiting 30 or 40 of them is that a little bit of carpentry is not a bad idea for democracy. Those legislatures are hemispherical but the Westminster system is almost World War I trench warfare. There are times when I have concerns looking at the fine member of Parliament—and I really mean that—in the form of Grant Robertson and the fine member of Parliament in the form of the Attorney-General. They are two sword-lengths apart more or less. It is trench warfare and it undermines the ability to form a social consensus that can be sometimes quite critical to issues of defining importance where we must play down the adversarial nature of relationships between parties and the differentiation of policy between parties.Some things are too important for politics and we need to find an underlying consensus on which we can base a national policy that can move marginally from Government to Government not in the fundamental way that can happen in Westminster systems and in Australia and New Zealand probably more than anywhere else. I go through Europe as I did at the end of last year and I see the underlying consensus. Take climate change which I am devoting a lot of time to. There is a consensus there on which policy can rest that is lacking in this country and in Australia in Canada and in the United States. So I just mention that in passing because I think when it comes to supporting a bill like this it is critically important that we do support it and that we get it right. But let us also think about some of the other broader issues of defending the democracy that we do so cherish in this country. Thank you.Hon ANNE TOLLEY (Minister of Police):I rise to speak briefly to the Parliamentary Privilege Bill. I think from listening to the debate so far the collegiality that we see in the House even in the order of speakers is proof that it actually was an extraordinary privilege to come together in the Privileges Committee and talk about issues that have nothing to do with the day-to-day politics that we are all consumed with on a daily basis here but to be able to delve into quite critical issues for democracy. At times I have to admit as a non-lawyer it was a very esoteric discussion. But there were two very clear issues that we were addressing. One was the relationship between Parliament and justice—the courts—and that is of course defined as “comity”. That was actually around a decision made in the courts about how Ministers and MPs can get advice from officials and what protections there are for the performance of politicians to be able to rely on free and frank advice from their officials. The second issue again related to the ability of Ministers and MPs to speak freely in this House. Both issues need to be protected under parliamentary privilege and have a long history.Of course as a lover of history that fascinated me. Even though we think we are modern in the 21st century actually much of what we discussed goes right back to the 1600s and the Glorious Revolution which was to overthrow the Stuarts. Of course that is all tied up in religion but politics is at the heart of it. So we went right back to that Bill of Rights that was passed on 16 December 1689. That restated in statutory form the Declaration of Rights that was presented by the Convention Parliament to William and Mary inviting them to become the joint sovereigns of England. It laid down the limits of the powers of the Crown and set out the rights of Parliament and the rules then for freedom of speech. When you dig right down into what was a very simple matter that went to court about the ability of an official to give a Minister free and frank advice without fear of being taken to court for that advice it goes right back to William and Mary and the Bill of Rights.When you look at the Bill of Rights it laid out certain basic rights. The first was that there could be no royal interference with the law. Although the sovereign remained at the head of justice they could not unilaterally establish new courts or act as a judge. There were two other provisions that were of note for us. One was that there was to be no royal interference in the election of members of Parliament and secondly that the freedom of speech and debates or proceedings in Parliament ought not to be impeached or questioned in any court or place out of Parliament. That went to the heart of the second issue that we were dealing with. So MPs are able to stand in the House and ask questions to hold the Government to account and make statements and they are able to do so without fear of court action against them so that they have the right under parliamentary privilege—always taking into account that we have a huge responsibility not to abuse that privilege—to be able to stand by those statements that are made in Parliament without the fear of being taken to court.So those two particular issues—firstly being able to get free and frank advice from officials and secondly protecting that right to stand in the House and ask questions and make comments and statements without fear of the courts—were about the balance between the rights and privileges of parliamentarians versus the rights and privileges of the courts. In the end we felt that the balance was wrong and this bill attempts then to put back in place those privileges that we deem to have been granted to parliamentarians dating right back to 1689 in the new dating.It was a long and interesting discussion. I agree with the previous speakers that we were well led by the Attorney-General and David Parker but in the end all members were able to contribute to what turned out to be a most interesting parliamentary bill. It had a number of changes. We were extremely well served by the staff and the recommendations that we have made I think are of importance for all parliamentarians because they do restore the rights that we all assumed that we had and better protect the privileges that we hold dear in our New Zealand democracy. So it is a privilege to stand in the House and speak to the second reading of this bill and I recommend the bill to the House.GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central):I too join with other members in commending this Parliamentary Privilege Bill to the House. I will speak more generally in this contribution about the changes that we have made to the bill and save the details for the Committee stage when we come to that.I want to acknowledge the previous speaker Anne Tolley as one of the other non-lawyers on the parliamentary Privileges Committee. We were a small club in the room but we attempted throughout to try to ensure that what we were writing was not only legally correct but also understandable to a range of people. This was a challenge but we took it up. I agree with Anne Tolley that all members of the committee contributed strongly to the piece of legislation that is in front of us today.I will make some reference to the comments that Kennedy Graham made towards the end of his speech because I think they are important. I am not sure that the difference between what he said and what David Parker said is large but there are a couple of critical elements that I think are different and are very worthy of debate. One of those I will mention now. I respect the points that he made particularly about the adversarial nature of this debating chamber and the way in which politics plays out under our system. I think it is important to note that this bill and this report of the select committee are an example of where some of the personalities that Dr Graham mentioned actually were able to come together in a way that is I think what he would like to see as the ideal operation of our system—we sat down and we talked through the issues and came up with a solution that was one we could all agree on. We did that on the basis of the fact that this was a debate about the principles of how we run our system. There is no need in my mind for that to be done in an adversarial manner.What we can never do in my view is take the politics out of politics. That is actually a debate about ideas and different ideas for how to achieve the things we believe in. I believe we should be respectful when we are doing that—I will put my hand up from time to time under strong provocation from the Attorney-General—which occasionally perhaps may not be evident when people are watching us in the House but that is not to undermine our agreement on the importance of the principles of our democracy and our ability to be here.Hon Christopher Finlayson: He’s fixated on me.GRANT ROBERTSON: I think it might be the other way round. I have just got a feeling that it is the other way round—from the Attorney-General. But this is a serious point.Kennedy Graham mentions the issue of climate change and it is an issue where I would like to be able to say there is a core set of agreements within this House but actually in a question that the member himself asked yesterday there is still a debate about the legitimacy of the scientific evidence around climate change. I find it utterly ridiculous that there would be a member of Parliament who might think that but they do. The debate about that will become passionate it will become strong but that is part of what we do here. I do not think we should be unnecessarily adversarial but the notion that there is a consensus out there on most things is one that I find challenging by the empirical evidence of what I see in the community. But in terms of the processes and the systems that we set up to manage that yes I think there is a lot of scope for us to find ways that we can work together. This bill is an example of that.Our system is not static. I think that is very important. Kennedy Graham used the phrase of “using some carpentry” on the system. I think that is absolutely valid. If you look at the New Zealand system we have constantly done that. You can walk out the back doors of this debating chamber and see the empty Legislative Council Chamber. We can stand in here today and know that there is a multiplicity of parties represented in this Parliament as a result of a fundamental change that we made to our system. So of course the Westminster system evolves and of course the model of it that we practise is unfamiliar to those who actually sit in Westminster because of the changes we have made. It is not to say that we remain static. What I think is important certainly to me and I think to my colleague David Parker is that the core principles of our system have served us well. We must make them the best they can be when they are operationalised.The point that David Parker was making that is relevant to this bill is around the relationship between the judiciary and this Parliament and the push and pull that we see within that. I think there is something within the New Zealand psyche that is not too keen on making hard and fast rules and that likes the idea of there being a little bit of give and take and challenge based on a respectful set of principles and that is what I believe this bill does today. It provides us with the clearest possible explanation of those principles. As the commentary to the bill says “the bill seeks to restore and reaffirm understandings of the scope of aspects of parliamentary privilege and to consolidate and modernise existing legislation.” and it does do that. Underpinning it is the principle of comity which is the mutual respect of the legislature and judiciary which is what I have just been discussing. I think it is very important that that respect is noted and that we note that it is the core of this bill.The fact is that parliamentary privilege is a vital part of our democracy and not for us as individual members—a point made by others and also made in the report of the committee. We have it on behalf of Parliament and on behalf of the people whom we serve. Otherwise we cannot debate issues freely and frankly. Although from time to time there may be members of Parliament who misuse the parliamentary privilege process that we have that is rare. The reality is that it is incredibly important to us to stand up on behalf of our constituents and to be able to use this place knowing that we can speak freely and that we have freedom of speech and that there is not a sense of coercion or punishment—to go back to the history lesson that Anne Tolley gave us before. We need to stand up for those principles. The Labour Party and I believe that we have done that in this bill. We will ensure as the bill passes through this reading that we make some substantive comments on one or two of the aspects where I think the bill needs explanation.In my remaining time on this reading I want to do two things. The first of those is to go back to Attorney-General and Gow v Leigh which is the case that started this particular process off. There is no doubt that the business of Parliament is beyond what is necessary for the operation of and speaking in this Chamber. We all know that in preparing material to come to this House it is a proceeding of Parliament and that it is part of what we do. In another life I was one of those people who prepared material for Ministers to answer questions. That is a proceeding of Parliament. It is very much part of the process. Ministers in performing their role as part of this parliamentary democracy need free and frank and fearless advice and when it is used they need to know that they are using it as part of parliamentary business. So we have righted a wrong here in my view in terms of what was decided in Attorney-General and Gow v Leigh. That is important. This is not disrespectful of the courts; it is merely reasserting the fact that the business of Parliament is larger than the necessity of what takes place in this Chamber. It involves the people who work here and the business that is transacted in and around this building. I will come back to some details of that in the Committee stage.The other point is the one that has been raised already which is the other case Buchanan v Jennings around “effective repetition”. I think we have made that very clear in this bill—much clearer than it has been before—and I think that both members of Parliament and those outside will be able to see that simply saying that you stand by a statement that you have made in here is not repeating that statement. It is ridiculous. We are asked every single day by journalists whether we stand by statements. We cannot avoid that. If a member of Parliament having exercised their privilege to say something in this House that they know could cause them difficulties then goes outside of the House and expands on it they will bear the responsibilities of doing so. What we have done in this bill is ensure that we now have a clear definition of effective repetition and have put to bed that case as well.I commend the work of the select committee. I particularly appreciate the support that we have had from all of the officials. Mary Harris Debra Angus and Meipara Poata have been mentioned. I want to particularly mention Ross Carter and John Pike who gave us excellent advice on both the drafting and content of this bill. This is a very important piece of legislation and I commend it to the House.DENIS O’ROURKE (NZ First):People listening to this debate need to understand that the Parliamentary Privilege Bill is not just about protecting MPs from legal action in respect of statements they make nor just about protecting their support staff and it is not a self-serving measure for MPs or their staff. It is about protecting the right of representatives’ freedom of speech and it is about ensuring that advice given by their support staff cannot be used in legal proceedings brought by others. Nothing could be more important for our democracy. It is also important that it be noted that there is no real change here. The bill really just clarifies and partly codifies the operation of parliamentary privilege.The bill seeks to restore and reaffirm understanding of the scope of aspects of parliamentary privilege and to consolidate and modernise existing legislation following the judgment of the court in the defamation action Attorney-General and Gow v Leigh. Underpinning this is the principle of comity—the mutual respect that the legislature and the judiciary must have for each other. It is about reciprocal courtesy and respect between the courts and Parliament.The bill does not set out to limit article 9 of the UK Bill of Rights 1688 the first formal instrument from a Parliament protecting the freedom of speech and debates or proceedings in Parliament. Nor does the bill seek to codify comprehensively or replace entirely with legislation every aspect of parliamentary privilege. It is particularly concerned with one aspect—Parliament’s freedom of speech and the associated matter of communicating proceedings in Parliament to the public.New clause 3A emphasises the importance of understanding context when dealing with questions relating to parliamentary privilege or proceedings in Parliament. It would provide clear direction that the Act must be interpreted so as to promote the purposes of the bill and the purpose of parliamentary privilege. The Privileges Committee has revised clause 6 which sets out the purpose of parliamentary privilege to make clear the underlying justifications for parliamentary privilege. The privileges immunities and powers of the bill exist to uphold the integrity of the House as a democratic legislative assembly and to secure the independence of the House its committees and its members in the performance of their functions. Without that protection it has been suggested that Parliament would probably degenerate into polite but ineffectual debating societies and that puts the matter in a nutshell.Concerning the statements made outside Parliament the approach taken in the amended bill is an evidential prohibition approach regarding liabilities from statements that effectively repeat statements made in proceedings in Parliament commonly known as effective repetition and relies on reinforced provisions for stays of court or tribunal proceedings in respect of specified authorised communications of proceedings in Parliament. I agree that this traditional approach together with retaining the pertinent provisions of the Defamation Act should provide sufficient protection.New clauses 8A to 8H reaffirm and clarify article 9 of the Bill of Rights 1688 in accordance with the main purpose of the bill. They also would make clear what “proceedings in Parliament” as used in article 9 means and in particular seek to alter the law in the decision in Attorney-General and Gow v Leigh and would stop evidence being offered or received questions being asked or statements submissions or comments being made about proceedings in Parliament to inform or support effective repetition claims and liabilities in court or tribunal proceedings.The main purpose of this bill is to reaffirm and clarify the nature scope and extent of the privileges immunities and powers of the House. Article 9 of the Bill of Rights 1688which is part of the law of New Zealand says: “That the freedom of speech and debates or proceedings in Parliament ought not to be impeached or questioned in any … place out of Parliament:”. The approach taken continues to reflect directly some of the wording of article 9 particularly those words that “proceedings in Parliament ought not to be impeached or questioned in any court or place out of Parliament:”.New clauses 8C to 8F would make clearer what is covered or excluded from the term “impeaching or questioning” in respect of proceedings in Parliament. I think that is the right approach. Although article 9 excludes evidence where the reason the evidence is offered or admitted is to impeach or question it does not prevent evidence from being used with no impeaching or questioning to establish that something was said or done in Parliament as a matter of fact.New Part 1B deals with communication of proceedings in Parliament. It would simplify the framework for protecting the publishing and broadcasting of parliamentary proceedings. New clause 15 provides for a stay of court or tribunal proceedings that are commenced on the basis of a proceeding in Parliament or a document related to a proceeding in Parliament communicated under the authority of the House such as broadcasts made under the authority of the House. This clause would also provide for a stay of court or tribunal proceedings for which a copy of such a document was the basis. Subpart 2 deals with qualified immunity. Qualified immunity would be available as a defence for fair and accurate reports of proceedings in Parliament or extracts or summaries of documents published under the authority of the House.The bill strikes a harmonious balance in the area where the privileges necessary to protect the independence of Parliament and the important role of the courts intersect. It is of the utmost importance that conflict is avoided by careful and respectful consideration of each other’s constitutional roles. This bill strikes the right balance and reverses the decision in Attorney-General and Gow v Leigh and partly codifies the law of parliamentary privilege.New Zealand First wholeheartedly supports the amended bill and commends the committee for the very good work it has done on it.The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson): Just before I call the next member I wish to advise members regarding the use of laptops. They may be used only when on the dropdown work surface except when a member is speaking in debate when they may be placed on the top surface of the member’s desk.Bill read a second time.Kaikōura (Te Tai-o-Marokura) Marine Management BillSecond ReadingHon Dr NICK SMITH (Minister of Conservation):I move That the Kaikōura (Te Tai-o-Marokura) Marine Management Bill be now read a second time. Over the adjournment I took my children to the Ōhau Point area where the New Zealand fur seal exists in a truly beautiful spot. There were in a small creek over 100 visitors—families with children—watching a group of about 50 baby seals playing in a pond in a waterfall. That was that classic New Zealand visitor experience that is highlighted as one of the wonderful experiences in New Zealand in Lonely Planet’s guidebook. That visit reinforced for me the value in this Kaikōura (Te Tai-o-Marokura) Marine Management Bill. It provides for a New Zealand fur seal sanctuary at Ōhau Point. It provides for a whale sanctuary over that remarkable piece of coastline and ocean adjacent to the community of Kaikōura. It provides for a new and significant marine reserve the Hikurangi Marine Reserve. It provides for five customary fishing areas for Ngāi Tahu and the local rūnanga. It also provides for a tightening of and more sustainable approach to the recreational fishing along that treasured Kaikōura Coast.I want to begin by acknowledging the hard work of Te Korowai o Te Tai o Marokura. This is a process that has gone on for 20 years. The tensions were sufficiently strong 20 years ago in the early discussions when this community was at loggerheads over proposals for marine protection in Kaikōura. I want to pay tribute to every one of the members of Te Korowai who have come together with the proposals that are in this bill. I also want to acknowledge Colin King the member of Parliament for Kaikōura. He advocated for these marine protection measures as a candidate and it is fitting that on a day on which he gives his valedictory speech this Kaikōura marine management bill is to make further progress through the House.David Shearer: What did you push him out for? He was a good guy.Hon Dr NICK SMITH: Well unlike the Labour Party the National Party is rejuvenating Mr Shearer. We are bringing new bright talent through the ranks and that—David Shearer: Why are you still here then Nick Smith?Hon Dr NICK SMITH: Well I am substantially younger than those members opposite. I have not hit the grand old age of 50 yet and I can promise members opposite that there will be a lot more good bills like this one in my name as we make progress not just on marine conservation but on other issues.I do want to acknowledge the work of the Local Government and Environment Committee and its former member Ruth Dyson; Labour which has been very supportive; and the members of the Green Party who are supporting the bill. I am not surprised by their typical rhetoric that it is never enough but I do want to acknowledge their support and the agreement that has been reached to enable us to be able to progress this bill forward. I particularly want to acknowledge both those parties for their cooperation in allowing this bill to be progressed during the term of this Parliament. I actually think there is a pretty strong consensus across this Parliament that New Zealand has more work to do in respect of marine conservation and protection. I think it is the maturity of this Parliament that enables this bill to be progressed given the long debate that has occurred.In respect of some of the specific changes that have been made by the select committee in its hard work I want to acknowledge both Nicky Wagner and Maggie Barry for their hard work in bringing this bill back through. Firstly there is the proposal to change the name of the group that will have an ongoing oversight of these new marine protections tools on the Kaikōura Coast to guardians. We have guardians for Lake Wānaka we have guardians at Manapōuri and we have guardians in areas like the Fiordland coastline. I think it has been a good choice of the committee to use that term to aptly describe the ongoing role of the group that will be involved in providing an oversight of these new marine protection measures. I have also got to acknowledge that the select committee has tightened up the definition of the areas of the whale sanctuary the New Zealand fur seal sanctuary customary fishing and the marine reserve. It is a sign of technology that previously we have not defined a boundary to less than 10 metres but the select committee has said that actually with GPS technology today we can get a greater degree of accuracy even in an ocean environment. So that is being tightened up with the definition down to just 1 metre for the boundaries of these new marine protection measures. The amendments by the select committee also clarify the role of the Minister quite sensibly and they provide a broader role for the guardians in education around the marine environment. That I think is also important and is valued.I do note in the minority report that the Green Party has made the point that it would like the marine reserve to be bigger and that is a view I understand. But I also say that where you have these collaborative processes and where you have a community that is heavily divided over marine protection I think this Parliament needs to respect the trade-offs the gives and gains they have made. That is why the Government is not prepared to arbitrarily overrule that process and make the sorts of changes to the boundary of the marine reserve that the Green Party has promoted in its minority report.The bill as reported back from the select committee provides for a review of these marine protection tools after a period of 25 years. This was done in a pragmatic and in my view actually pretty cooperative way in discussions with the Labour Party and the Green Party. It is my intention to introduce a Supplementary Order Paper during the Committee stage to bring that down to a period of 10 years. I have discussed that with Sir Mark Solomon the chair of Ngāi Tahu. He too is happy for that compromise which enables us to be able to progress this bill.Much has been said about the Kaikōura area. Few members recognise that the richness of the marine life in the Hikurangi Trench has been measured by scientists to be the most abundant marine life at depths greater than 1500 metres anywhere in the world. In fact the truly remarkable figure is that it has about 100 times more species than the second-next area with the most abundant marine life. That I think reinforces the value of this marine protection tool. I also want to note this measure in the context of the debate around regional development. If you ever wanted to see a rural town that was 25 years ago quite economically challenged and a town that was struggling turn into a town that has truly blossomed it is Kaikōura with its opportunities that the whale-watching and other marine tourism experiences have added to this community.This bill is good for the environment. This bill is good for the economy. This bill sets a good precedent for the way in which we develop marine protection. It is provides for the very first whale sanctuary that we have in New Zealand and the very first New Zealand fur seal sanctuary. It is also one that fishermen have already agreed on. They are practising the reduced recreational catch limits. It is a real model that other communities around New Zealand need to look to as we take greater care of the ocean environment. I commend the bill to the House.Hon RUTH DYSON (Labour—Port Hills):Can I first of all acknowledge the drivers of the legislation the Kaikōura (Te Tai-o-Marokura) Marine Management Bill that we are debating today Te Korowai o Te Tai o Marokura the Kaikōura Coastal Marine Guardians. The leadership demonstrated within that group by a variety of people but specifically Tā Mark Solomon should be commended by everybody in this House.This process is unusual. It was actually instigated by the Hon Chris Carter during his term as Minister of Conservation in 2005 in response to a concern from the Kaikōura residents and users of the marine environment that there was very little protection and that the legislative framework we currently operate under does not provide a strong opportunity for people to get together and get an agreement such as we are seeing delivered today. The report from that group was not presented for another 7 years. That is how much effort and time has gone in but not because of arguments or any deliberate slowing down. There was no filibustering going on amongst this group. It was because of a genuine need to debate issues that are hard and that are contentious.The report was provided to the then Minister of Conservation and has been delivered by the current Minister of Conservation the Hon Nick Smith and I want to commend him for not just his work on this bill but also the way that he has responded to the comments from the Local Government and Environment Committee. We do not always have that response from Ministers and it is really appreciated when after the select committee has worked hard on an issue that issue gets a considered response from the Minister.The bill does some good things and I think that is of course to be commended. The concerns that were raised at the select committee however which the Minister has alluded to in rather a negative fashion—unnecessarily in my view—were that the agreement that has been reached is not consistent with best practice marine reserve protection. I think that is a tension that future Parliaments need to grapple with and resolve. You can legislate on top of local concerns or you can work with local stakeholders and come up with an agreement that might be less than best practice. There may be other opportunities to promote best practice and remove some of the concerns that local people have. In this instance it is obviously fishing. We are excluding some areas from pāua or crayfishing. In particular this area was of course a concern to local people. That is livelihood or that is their tradition but the marine scientists whom we had appear before the select committee said this does not cut the mustard in terms of best practice.So the decision for the select committee was whether we go part-way towards what would be the best marine sanctuary and accept the consideration of this local committee that as I said has been working for 7 years on this legislation or whether we say no we would rather hold out for best practice. I think we made the correct decision in saying we should support the hard work and commitment that has been shown by local people particularly given our understanding that at no time were they guided towards a framework of best practice marine reserve legislation. So on that basis we support it.I do not think that the National Government should be claiming great credit for this. Actually it has not done any work on it at all. It has been the work of the local people. The fact that it is coming before the House now and that it has been announced at least twice by the Minister of Conservation is really a bit of election year window-dressing to make it look as if the Government gives a toss about environment and conservation issues. I do not think that its track record is very good and I do not think its future commitments are any better.The undermining of the Department of Conservation in terms of the funding that has been allocated to it through the Budget in terms of the staffing resources and in terms of the total absence of the advocacy role—the core role of the Department of Conservation—is a matter to be ashamed of and I hope the Minister bows his head in that shame. There have been over 140 job losses at the Department of Conservation. It has really lost its connection with the community and that it not the fault of any single staff member. It is because the constant restructuring and the centralisation of its functions has meant that that so important ability to understand relate to and respond to its community has gone.We know that provincial New Zealand has been hardest hit by these cuts. In Nelson and Marlborough just this week we have had further job losses announced. So it is really the heart of the Department of Conservation that has been cut out. We know that we have some critically endangered species that the department no longer has either the resource ability or the clout to be able to do anything about.We know in particular of the issue of the critically endangered Māui’s dolphins. There are more National members of Parliament than there are Māui’s dolphins and I want to change both those figures in the coming weeks. I want the number of National members of Parliament to drop and I want the number of Māui’s dolphins to increase. The very future of that subspecies the future of the Māui’s dolphin is at risk because of the inability of the Minister of Conservation to stand up and speak on behalf of that critically endangered species. He has let the Minister for Primary Industries just ride roughshod over not only him on his own but also the future of that species.We know that in the proposal for the Ruataniwha Dam—the proposal that would turn the Tukituki River toxic—the Minister of Conservation made his views so clearly known that the Department of Conservation withdrew its substantial submission in opposition to the planned change and the Ruataniwha Dam—The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Order! We are on the second reading of this bill.Hon RUTH DYSON: Therefore its submission was watered down to next to nothing. So although this bill should be trumpeted and should be supported and will certainly be by Labour it should not be a gold star against the Minister of Conservation who has done no work in this space. The Kaikōura Coastal Marine Guardians did all this work. At the same time he is doing so little in areas that need so much attention.Of course the most damning aspect of the National Government’s proposals has been one that has had to be put on hold—that is National’s changes to the Resource Management Act. I want to put on record my appreciation to the Hon Peter Dunne who actually read the proposed legislation from the National Government and said National’s proposals to change the Resource Management Act would gut the very principles of the Act—The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Order! We are on the second reading of the bill.Hon RUTH DYSON: —and therefore he was not able to support it. So this bill is good but it has to be balanced up against the bad things that are either being done the terrible things that are not being stood up against such as protection of the Māui’s dolphins or the proposals that would gut the very heart of the Resource Management Act.I just want to return to my commendation of the guardians. It was a very unusual select committee process that we went through in Kaikōura. We had submitter after submitter after submitter from local residents and Ngāi Tahu representatives including Tā Mark Solomon. We had representatives from the pāua industry we had representatives from the crayfish industry and from the wider fishing industry. We had Forest and Bird representatives. We had representatives from whale-watching. So there was a wide range of representatives from the Kaikōura community all saying that they supported this legislation. I do not think that has ever happened before. I do not think we have had what is often a very controversial proposal to have marine protection to have exclusion of fishing from a specific area—I do not recall any time when we have had such unanimous support from the local community.This is the first whale sanctuary of its type. It is the first New Zealand fur seal sanctuary of its type. It includes five customary fishing areas two tai-ā-pure and three mātaitai. It establishes an advisory committee and it introduces fishing regulations that are specific to this area and of course the overall marine reserve protection.I want to just conclude by noting my appreciation of the advanced notice that the Minister has given us of his intention to move a Supplementary Order Paper that changes the review period from 25 years to 10 years. Labour will be supporting that Supplementary Order Paper in the name of the Minister. I think it is a good move. I think the idea of having a review of these marine protected areas is sound. There must be monitoring. There must be some science behind the review so that we can look at what we have currently and what we may lose but certainly what we will gain from this marine protection. That will give us a very solid base for the review in 10 years’ time and I look forward to it. On that basis I am pleased to add my support to this legislation.MAGGIE BARRY (National—North Shore):E ngā reo e ngā mana e rau rangatira mā tēnā koutou tēnā koutou tēnā koutou katoa. I rise with enormous pleasure to speak today to the second reading of this Kaikōura (Te Tai-o-Marokura) Marine Management Bill. It is a piece of legislation that is as the Minister of Conservation alluded to at the beginning of this debate unique in the sense that it is collaborative it is the hard work of the community and it is community-led and community-driven. Despite the political pot-shots that the member who just resumed her seat could not resist this has gone ahead despite the Greens and despite Labour. Yes there was some reluctant cooperation at the end but only because they acknowledged that the level of work and support that came through—Hon Ruth Dyson: We supported it you stupid woman.MAGGIE BARRY: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I object to that. I take offence at what that member has just said.The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): The member has taken offence to the use of those words. I would ask the member to withdraw that comment.Hon Ruth Dyson: I withdraw—but she is.The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Now the member will stand withdraw and apologise for that comment. Once I have ruled that is the end of the matter and there are no further interjections. The member will now withdraw and apologise for that comment.Hon Ruth Dyson: I withdraw and apologise.MAGGIE BARRY: The interchange we have just witnessed is pretty much symptomatic of that member’s contribution to what goes on at the select committee and in this House. I would have to say that the level of bitterness the level of I suppose just jaded over-it-ness of that member is a clear indication that retirement is overdue—long overdue I would say.Getting back to the bill what we have in this piece of legislation is a hard-working community who have looked very long and very hard at the issues that concern them. They are issues that are of great moment to that community. I was in Kaikōura earlier in the year when the Prime Minister the Minister of Conservation and the Minister for the Environment made this announcement. I commend the very hard work done over very many years by the local member of Parliament Colin King who has done enormous work in this space and has kept the lines of communication and dialogue open in a way that the Opposition ranks with their diatribe and bitterness would not have been able to do. It would never have got to this stage under that kind of administration.We on the other hand are very capable of listening to good ideas and of maintaining a position that is consistent and a little bit flexible. Marine reserves are something that the Minister of Conservation has been very committed to for a very long time as has this Government. To find a collaborative local solution like this was an excellent outcome. The guardians the kaitiaki spent many hundreds of hours discussing this amongst themselves in a very broad-ranging group of fishermen of local tourism providers of conservationists and of environmentalists. It was very interesting to see that when it came to the crunch when we as the Local Government and Environment Committee went to Kaikōura in May there were very courageous people who came forward including the local branch of Forest and Bird which stood against the national Forest and Bird’s view of this which was quite rigid and doctrinaire. It demanded that it be the same shape as other reserves etc. There were all kinds of suggestions from high or from a distance I suppose which the local group with very good awareness of what goes on in its community overrode. That took courage and we commend it for that. Many of their ideas were listened to and picked up.I suppose that when it comes to collaboration which is an alien notion to the Opposition parties we look at something that has been really worked through in a lot of detail. I think to be able to come up with a model that does give us our first whale sanctuary our first fur seal sanctuary—and as the Minister indicated he took his children to see it in the recent adjournment. The select committee stopped off on the way back to Christchurch and had a look at the seal sanctuary the baby fur seals. What an extraordinary and marvellous spectacle it was. I am extremely pleased that this piece of legislation will allow for that fur seal sanctuary and for the baby seals in particular—the baby seal creche we call it—to be safe and able to do their customary route down to the sea under the road. They go and visit their mothers. It is a time-honoured thing that this particular species has done. It is again an indication of the care and level of attention to detail that the local groups brought to this that that aspect and that particular element for the fur seals was enshrined and it will be in this legislation.We have a community-led and community-driven piece of legislation that really covers an area of our territorial sea that includes the exclusive economic zone from the Clarence River north of Kaikōura to just north of Gore Bay. It is about 91 kilometres of shoreline and it covers about 4686 square kilometres. GPS and modern technology is an important aspect of why this marine reserve is the shape it is and why it will work. When fishermen are out there how do they know when they are in the marine reserve? It will be very carefully gone through and calibrated with GPS. That was something that the select committee did some careful work on because there were some approximations around this that were not actually very helpful to do the demarcation of this reserve. So that was a very helpful outcome from the select committee process.I think that the advisory committee that advises Ministers on fisheries and conservation matters in Kaikōura has also been a very worthwhile channel of information coming through. The Minister’s decision to put a Supplementary Order Paper to amend the bill in order to have a review within 10 years is very much in keeping with what Sir Mark Solomon and Te Korowai o Te Tai o Marokura wanted to have happen. Again we are listening we are acknowledging and we are following through with that so that this will be a very workable piece of legislation and a very workable bill.For those of you who have ever visited Kaikōura going back probably 20 years—which I have done; I first went there in the mid-1970s—you will know that it was a sleepy hollow. It was a place that really did not have very much of a bright shining future. The whales have changed that. The way that the community has got together and has been revitalised by the marine life and the marine reserves which this bill will enshrine has really paved the way for a brighter future. Kaikōura has the resources the ability the knowledge and the passion for what goes on in its area to make this work terrifically well. I think that the gifts and gains part of this collaborative process is something that we could learn about as legislators and hopefully apply to other laws that we bring through as well. It is an absolute success story and a tremendous piece of legislation which is why I commend this bill to the House.MOANA MACKEY (Labour):I would like to put on record my disappointment at that speech from Maggie Barry because the Kaikōura (Te Tai-o-Marokura) Marine Management Bill is actually a very positive piece of legislation. My colleague Ruth Dyson whom she chose to attack was actually saying really good things about the process. I also want to put on record my thanks to the Minister of Conservation for the collaborative way in which he has worked with parties for this piece of legislation. I do not think we needed that level of negativity in that speech on a bill that we support overwhelmingly.I am disappointed by that but I also want to thank Maggie Barry for the work she did as chair of the Local Government and Environment Committee. It is a committee that works extremely well together. It is a committee that is very very busy dealing with a lot of environmental legislation. We had the privilege of travelling to Kaikōura to hear submissions on the bill and I must say what a beautiful part of the country it is. I actually had never been there before. Ruth Dyson and I arrived at the airport and drove down the Kaikōura Coast and it was just incredible to be able to drive down and see the seals right there on the side of the road. We could see the families out enjoying seeing such amazing wildlife so close up and it really makes you think how lucky we are to live in such a beautiful country. I was really privileged to be able to visit Kaikōura and to get a sense of what we were protecting. To the local member of Parliament Colin King who is retiring I say that I am sure he will enjoy spending a lot more time in a very beautiful part of the country and I wish him well.As my colleague Ruth Dyson said this process was started by Chris Carter and it is good to see it coming to a conclusion here. We have a marine reserve up just north of Gisborne where I live. That marine reserve was contentious. There is a view sometimes that marine reserves are locking up the ocean—which I always find odd; the idea is that somehow fish are not going to move in and out of a marine reserve—and there was concern about the impact on local fishing industries because whenever we do this kind of legislation we are dealing with a lot of existing rights. A lot of people already use and often make their livelihood out of that part of the ocean and there is a fear that this would somehow limit their ability to do that.Well I remember visiting the marine reserve just north of Gisborne with Chris Carter when he was the Minister of Conservation 4 years after it had been implemented. There was a young woman there who was doing her PhD. She was going out and putting craypots down outside the marine reserve and inside the marine reserve and then comparing the amount of stock. Only 4 years after the implementation of that particular marine reserve in a part of the country where our crayfish stock is severely depleted and it is a real issue outside the marine reserve she was getting less than 1 kilogram of legal-sized cray but inside the marine reserve she was getting more than 30 kilograms of legal-sized cray. So the regeneration that had occurred in the crayfish population in a very short period of time was incredible. Not only that but we started to see the fish stocks coming back to the East Coast that we had not seen in a long time because we had created a new environment for them. So it is a success story.I have personally seen the value of marine reserves up my way at home and I would like to see more of them. I want to mention just one area in particular and that is the Kermadec Islands. I think that this is an absolute no-brainer that would have support right across the House. The Kermadecs are an absolute treasure for this country and I honestly expected that this would be—and maybe it is still to come—an announcement from the National Government that it was going to put the Kermadecs into a marine reserve. To me that just makes so much sense. I cannot imagine why you would want to do anything around the Kermadecs that would be limited by having a marine reserve—for example mining or anything else. I do not know why we are not also passing legislation to put the Kermadecs into a marine reserve. I certainly know that the Labour Party would strongly support that move and I hope that the National Government does not have any plans for activities that would be contrary to the protection that a marine reserve would provide around that particularly important taonga for New Zealand.As I said we had some concerns going into this legislation and the chair of the select committee who has just taken her seat mentioned Wellington Forest and Bird. I do not think it was being doctrinaire at all in raising concerns about the size of the marine reserve the shape of the marine reserve and the science of it. It was not doctrinaire it was not being rigid and it was not sitting in Wellington and dictating. It was simply raising very very valid concerns which were backed up by science about why this marine reserve looks so different from other marine reserves. I want to thank Kevin Hackwell from Forest and Bird who gave that submission for being a very passionate and a very positive defender of our environment in New Zealand. He does incredible work and I would never ever say that just because he so passionately believes that we should have so much more of our marine environment in protection—and we agree with him—he needs to be well degraded really in a way that he cannot respond to.Then we went down to Kaikōura. I have to say—and Ruth Dyson and I were talking about it while we were travelling back from those select committee hearings—that we were very moved by the submission process. When we sat down and listened to all the various submitters—Mark Solomon in particular actually—all of whom had come together and heard their points of view and heard why the marine reserve had ended up being the way it was and why there was so little of the coastline actually in the marine reserve I gained a real respect for their position and also gained a far greater understanding of the huge amount of work that had gone into this collaborative process to come up with a solution that had the agreement of all stakeholders. I think Kaikōura is probably one of the parts of the country where there is an exceptionally large number of existing interests that operate in the marine environment so it was even more difficult to get everyone on board. We heard from crayfishermen pāua fishermen the Whale Watch Kaikōura people local iwi and local environmental groups. All of them came together and positively supported this legislation. As my colleague Ruth Dyson said I do not remember a marine reserve process that has ever been so positive and where all the stakeholders have come together and said that this is what they have agreed on this is what they want and they are really really passionate about this process the marine reserve and the protections they are putting in place.The very important message they gave us was that they will build on this marine reserve. Do not think that this is the end of a process and this is all that is going to happen in terms of marine protection in the Kaikōura area. They will build on this and because of the relationships they have developed through this process and because they have all listened and taken all the existing interests into account and respected people’s points of view and come up with a local solution that process will not end here. The process will continue and they will build on the protections that have been put in place. I have to say that I was really impressed by that and I really felt—as someone coming from the outside in—that we needed to respect the huge amount of work that had gone into that local process. Even though we would have loved to have seen more and even though we went in there with much greater concerns about how different this marine reserve was from the usual ones and about the different process that had been taken I was genuinely very impressed by what came out of that process and I genuinely respect the wishes of the local people.One of the issues of concern—and we never actually got an answer to it and I do not know whether the Minister has an answer to it—was that we found that in fact we had to make an amendment to the bill because it was actually 10 or 20 metres out. The marine reserve boundaries we had in the legislation were wrong by about 10 or 20 metres because apparently the Ministry for Primary Industries takes GPS coordinates to only two decimal places instead of three. We asked why the Ministry for Primary Industries takes coordinates to only two decimal places instead of three and we were just told that it is the Ministry for Primary Industries’ policy. For us it seemed very bizarre that if you could take coordinates to three decimal places and actually get the marine reserve right you would not do that. Why would you take them to only two decimal places and be 20 metres out?Hon Ruth Dyson: And what did they say? Because that’s how they’d always done it.MOANA MACKEY: They said that is how they had always done it. We thought “OK that is strange.” and we never really got a response. It is not the biggest issue in the world but it was one of those kinds of Gliding On moments I think where practicalities kind of went out the window a little bit.I want to acknowledge the officials and the very very hard work they did on this legislation. The other concern I will raise is around the policing because policing of marine reserves is also very important. The best fishing is on the boundaries of marine reserves so you need to make sure that marine reserves are being policed. I have concerns about the capacity of the Department of Conservation to do that given the cuts in funding and staff that it has had. You know a marine reserve and the boundaries are only worth anything if we know they can be policed and those boundaries are not going to be breached. The very department we rely on to do that is under enormous financial pressure and has lost a number of staff particularly in the regions. The policing of the marine reserve is one of my big concerns.But I congratulate the Minister on this bill. In fact I congratulate Parliament on this bill and I congratulate in particular the guardians who did all the work in getting us to this point.GARETH HUGHES (Green):Kia ora Mr Assistant Speaker. Ngā mihi nui ki a koutou. Kia ora. I rise to support the Kaikōura (Te Tai-o-Marokura) Marine Management Bill. The Green Party loves our oceans we love marine reserves and we love marine protected areas. We have a vision for New Zealand that every New Zealander can have their birthright and go swimming on oil-free beaches or in a lake or stream and to not get a one-in-20 chance of getting sick when they swim in some of our monitored rivers. It has a vision that Kiwis can go out and put craypots out with their dads keep fishing and—I am a bit of a hopeless surfer—that Kiwis are out there enjoying our surf and our treasured beaches. So I rise to support this bill which is a small step in the right direction toward protecting the waters coasts animals and species that we as New Zealanders love.This bill establishes a new marine reserve whale sanctuary and other provisions off the Kaikōura coast. The Green members will be voting in support of this bill. We have voted for it throughout. However in this speech after the Local Government and Environment Committee report-back I would like to note some of our concerns around the outcomes we see. First up we support this bill. We would like to thank the committee we would like to thank the new chair Maggie Barry we would like to thank the officials and we would like to thank all the submitters but most of all we would like to thank the local community and Te Korowai o Te Tai o Marokura which came together over 7 years to negotiate this. They used a gifts and gains approach to negotiate this and the member is correct that they have been contentious in our country’s past but this one has had a measure of community support which we welcome.It is great to see some marine protections on this coast given that New Zealand has only 0.41 percent—that is less than 1 percent—of our waters protected in marine reserves. What we know from all the evidence—from all the science—is that they are important they contribute to economic development in our regions they provide jobs for the local communities and importantly they actually work. They do protect the species and the ecosystems within them.We support it but let us touch on those three concerns I talked about. The first is that this process and this legislation soon to be passed do not even meet the Department of Conservation and the Ministry for Primary Industries’ Marine Protected Areas Policy and Marine Protected Areas: Classification Protection Standard and Implementation Guidelines. The Government officials and Ministers who signed it off have done an awful amount of work on these guidelines over the years to make sure we have good best-practice marine protected area policies like marine reserves but in this case we actually see it being absolutely disregarded. What I would have preferred to see is a more effective marine protected area being established than what we see here. The first concern is that the guidelines have not been met.Secondly when it comes to the Hikurangi Marine Reserve I think it is fantastic that we are using a marine reserve—the strongest protection measure—to protect this iconic feature of this coast the Hikurangi Trench. It is an amazing feeding ground for whales and an important part of the local economy. Kaikōura runs off the whale-watching operations which are responsible for numerous jobs in that community. It is great to be protecting it. However what we see with this marine reserve is that it must be one of the oddest marine reserves in the country. We are talking about a 12-sided—it is hard to describe—marine reserve covering only the bottom the benthos of the trench. The sides the important biological and ecological diverse areas where there are a lot of fish are not protected. We are protecting only the bottom. Only 1.97 kilometres of the coastline is protected. So what you see is this very odd complex multisided shape with very little area touching the coast. We have heard about the enforcement and detection fears with such a complex shape.We also heard from Dr Nick Shears senior lecturer at the University of Auckland who talked about the boundary effects. In any marine reserve no matter how big it is depending on the type of species that are resident in the marine reserve obviously they are going to move on the boundary be it a starfish moving slowly or a crab or a lobster moving maybe a little bit faster a crayfish or a fast-swimming finfish which can swim much faster. What the boundary effects show is that the actual effective size of the marine reserve is reduced by the boundary effects. When you have got such a complex 12-sided shape which is very narrow the boundary effects are magnified many times. What we heard on the select committee from this expert was that the marine reserve’s real impact on the marine environment and those protected species is limited because of those boundary effects.Lastly when you look at the new whale sanctuary it is fantastic that we are protecting the local whale species but the Green Party would not have stopped just there. We do not think that just a whale sanctuary is needed; what we need is a marine mammal sanctuary. There are other threatened and critically endangered species resident in the area such as the Hector’s dolphin. By setting up this stand-alone whale sanctuary there are no powers to protect those other species threatened by the Government’s deep-sea oil drilling agenda—from the gigantic underwater noise explosions of the seismic surveys through to the lethal fishing nets which still haunt the Hector’s and Māui’s dolphins—and these animals are not being protected because we are making only a whale sanctuary. The Green Party would have extended this and used the Marine Mammals Protection Act 1978 provisions to apply a more generous wider sanctuary encompassing more species.So in summary the Green Party supports this bill. We love our oceans. We want to protect them. We want to see New Zealand do a lot more than have just 0.41 percent of our waters—less than half of 1 percent—protected in marine reserves. We have got concerns around the process and the marine protected areas guidelines were not being used. The Hikurangi Trench is this odd 12-sided complex hard-to-enforce boundary-effects-magnified marine reserve. We think that we could have done better. We could have had a larger more uniform shape and that is what the experts have advised the committee. Lastly the whale sanctuary should have been extended to other animals. But we will be voting in favour of the bill. I urge any interested submitters to read our minority report which while supporting the bill points out these concerns in a bit more detail.On a final point the clock is ticking down. You also have to ask the rationale as to why this happening right now. It has taken 7 years and now the Government is trying to rush it through and the reason is that the Government is incredibly weak when it comes to the environment. New Zealanders tune into the TV and they see those dolphins that live in this area—the Hector’s dolphin and their cousin the Māui’s dolphin. They see a Government that is risking the future of the dolphins risking the extinction of the dolphins because of its actions. We see a Government that is happy to still allow lethal fishing nets in their sanctuary. We have a Minister who is happy to sign off on great underwater noise explosions that can deafen the Māui’s dolphins—the seismic surveys. We see a Government that in the last 5 years has covered one-third of the Māui’s dolphin sanctuary in marine mining permits—permits that the Department of Conservation itself says are troubling and likely to degrade the Māui’s dolphin environment. With 55 Māui’s dolphins left we should not be gambling with their future for the pollution economy.When it comes to our sea lions we are seeing them on a pathway to extinction because the actions needed to protect the critically endangered New Zealand sea lions is not happening. The Government embarrassingly backed to the hilt—including with public subsidies—Trans-Tasman Resources with Dame Jenny Shipley as a director. It is a company that even National’s Environmental Protection Authority could not grant the permit to mine the iron sands in the blue whale area—The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Order!GARETH HUGHES: Lastly when it comes to the marine reserves we have had a target for more than 14 years now to get to 10 percent. The size of this marine reserve is absolutely tiny. It moves only the decimal point when we come to the percentage of New Zealand’s waters being protected. The Green Party will get us to not just 0.41 percent; we will go further than this the step in the right direction. We will get us to 30 percent. It starts with the Kermadec Islands Marine Reserve and I have a bill in my name on that which overnight takes us from 0.41 percent to 15 percent.This election a lot of people get a choice on how we look after our oceans. We support this bill but I can commit to the people of New Zealand that we would look after the Māui’s dolphins and we would look after the whales the sea lions. We would do more to protect our oceans. Ultimately it is our birthright as New Zealanders to swim in oil-free seas to surf our beautiful beaches and to enjoy a coastline that has not been mined. I want my kids to grow up with a future with Māui’s dolphins not just hanging on but Māui’s dolphins thriving. That is the future. That is the smarter greener economy the Green Party is championing and that is what we will be doing this September. Kia ora.KELVIN DAVIS (Labour):Tēnā koe Mr Speaker i tēnei wiki o Te Reo Māori. E tika ana kia tukuna atu ngā ruarua kupu hei tīmata i tōku huihuinga ēngari e tika ana ngā kōrero o ō tātou mātua tūpuna ahakoa he iti he pounamu. Nā reira tēnā koutou e te Whare.[Salutations to you Mr Speaker in this week of the Māori language. It is fitting that I utter a few words to begin with but concur with the aptness of the sentiments of our forefathers that even though it is few it is a treasure. So greetings to you all in the House.]I have only recently come on to the Local Government and Environment Committee and I have missed the bulk of the Kaikōura (Te Tai-o-Marokura) Marine Management Bill. In fact I am quite disappointed that I hear the select committee went down to Kaikōura without me because if anyone knows the Reo Māori Kaikōura means to eat crayfish and I certainly missed out on that opportunity down there. In fact it is almost culturally insensitive to invite me on to the select committee after a visit to Kaikōura but maybe for old time’s sake we could have another meeting down there and I would get my colleague Moana Mackey to recommend a good restaurant for us to have our select committee hui in.The Kaikōura marine and coastal environment has unique biological features and is of historical cultural economic and spiritual significance. It is a thriving tourism industry as we have heard and as we know through Whale Watch Kaikōura which contributes some $134 million to the local economy. Despite these attributes Kaikōura has very little formal coastal and marine protection hence the establishment through this bill of a marine reserve a whale sanctuary a New Zealand fur seal sanctuary five customary fisheries areas and an advisory committee on fishing regulations.We need to acknowledge the work of the local community members who came together in 2005 and established themselves as Te Korowai o Te Tai o Marokura—that is Te Korowai Coastal Marine Guardians—to provide leadership about the use and protection of Kaikōura’s resources. We have heard that they developed the strategy over 7 years and they encompassed iwi representatives local marine industries tourism operators and environmental groups. They set out the vision for the area and reached a consensus on the coastal and marine environment and how it should be managed.Te Korowai in itself and I will jump a step here—the bill actually makes use of Ngāi Tahu names in recognition of Ngāi Tahu. I just want to explain about the name Te Korowai o Te Tai o Marokura. Te Tai o Marokura means the seas or the waters of Marokura. Te Korowai is a cloak. It was often used to lay down over something as an analogy for ownership or protection or guardianship over whatever it was laid over. So Te Korowai o Te Tai o Marokura literally means the cloak of Te Tai o Marokura. Culturally it means to lay the cloak or mantle of Ngāti Kuri who are the iwi of that area over Te Tai o Marokura caring for the seas around Kaikōura. I want to also make a distinction in relation to Ngāti Kuri around Kaikōura. There is also Ngāti Kurī up where I come from in Muriwhenua who are the iwi around Cape Reinga Te Rerenga Wairua.Another Māori name that has been used in this bill is Te Whata-Kai-o-Rakihouia. A whata is a raised platform where food was stored on top of it. Making reference to the evidence of Maurice Manawatu on behalf of Te Rūnanga o Kaikōura and Te Rūnanga o Ngāi Tahu when they submitted to the Canterbury Regional Council they explained the name of Te Whata-Kai-o-Rakihouia. They say in their records that Waitaha were the first people to have arrived at Te Waipounamu. Waitaha arrived under the leadership of Rākaihautū in the Uruao waka at Whakatū which is Nelson. They arrived there in about AD 850. From here Rākaihautū led a party inland and down the island but his son was Rakihouia. Rakihouia led another party in the Uruao waka down the east coast and landed at Kaikōura in the area that we have been talking about—the east coast of the South Island. Along the cliffs at Kaikōura Rakihouia and his wife Tapuiti were busy gathering food. Men were lowered down the cliffs in that area with flax ropes to secure eggs and young birds from the nests there and the precipitous seafront has since borne the general name of Te Whata-Kai-o-Rakihouia—the Lofty Storehouses of Rakihouia. This gives a bit of context around at least one of the names that is mentioned in this bill and it also goes back to what I said earlier that this area has cultural and spiritual significance to the tribes—Ngāti Kuri in particular—down there in Kaikōura.We heard from the Minister about the Hikurangi Trench and I just want to endorse what he has said about it in terms of the biomass that is in the Hikurangi Trench which is part of the reserve area. Just taking a report from the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA) website it talks about the Kaikōura Canyon which is part of the Hikurangi Trench. It says: “New Zealand’s Kaikoura Canyon is a ‘biodiversity hotspot’ containing far more life than seen before at such depths.” When this area the Hikurangi Trench was surveyed NIWA took digital photographs in different parts of the canyon at various depths. The photographs were analysed to determine the abundance of large invertebrates and fish as well as what they call levinspirin which are signs of life on or beneath the sediment surface. I hope I pronounced that correctly.A digital map of the floor of the Kaikōura Canyon was generated using bathymetric data. It was collected during the voyage by a multi-beam echo sounder. I am not sure whether many people know what a multi-beam echo sounder is. Certainly not many people have one of those in their garage next to the lawnmower I am sure. But this data was then used to estimate the total area of the canyon that could be considered to be a biomass hotspot. The analysis of fish abundance was undertaken using information gathered from the photographs and trawls taken during the voyage as well as the bottom trawl. But what the outcome of this said is that the Kaikōura Canyon is one of the most productive benthic—which means ocean floor—deep-sea habitats yet described exceeding by 100 times the highest biomass measured for large invertebrate at those particular depths. This productivity may contribute significantly to the surrounding ecosystem which includes deep commercial fisheries for hoki and orange roughy which in itself is a reason why this reserve the Hikurangi Reserve has been created.I also agree with what Gareth Hughes said about the shape of the Hikurangi Reserve and the fact that less than 2 kilometres of coastline is part of this reserve. I take his point that the odd shape of the reserve boundaries tends to undo a bit of the good of the boundary. However we have also heard how the boundary the GPS coordinates were measured down to two decimal places which gave it a margin of error of 10 to 20 metres in terms of any particular position on that boundary. The select committee has changed that so that it now measures down to three decimal places with a margin of error of about 1 metre.There is also a little issue with slipways in the reserve where people would launch their boats. We had to make a change because if people launched their boats and there was a rock or a bit of seaweed in the way of launching the boat they were not actually allowed to move that rock or that bit of seaweed. Anyone who did so would have broken the law so it was best decided that instead of putting people into that sort of situation we would change it so that the slipways were taken out of the reserve area. It encompasses only a very small area of some 20 square metres or so. We thought that instead of putting people in the situation where they may be breaking the law by removing rocks or seaweed or debris from the slipways we would just take the slipways out of that reserve area.I am proud to be part of a Labour Party that is supporting this bill. It is supporting the economic the cultural and the spiritual well-being of Ngāti Kuri and Ngāi Tahu in the Kaikōura area. Kia ora.ANDREW WILLIAMS (NZ First):I am pleased to take a call on behalf of New Zealand First on the Kaikōura (Te Tai-o-Marokura) Marine Management Bill. Having sat on the Local Government and Environment Committee for this legislation can I just say that this is one of the more pleasing pieces of legislation that we have had to consider in the last 3 years. Across all parties there was a real commitment to ensure that this bill progressed and it progressed positively for the best outcome of the marine environment of Kaikōura that special place and down the coast of the Kaikōura area.As a select committee we visited Kaikōura to hear submissions and we were all incredibly impressed with what the community had done there. Across whole areas of the community over 7 years Te Korowai o Te Tai Marokura the marine group had put it together—7 years of consultation. I was impressed to see submissions there from the local cray fishermen and from the pāua divers who are directly affected by all of this of course with their livelihood and their income. They were on board with it as well. So at the end of the day this will improve the whole marine environment down the coast there for the mutual benefit of everyone.The tourism aspect is immense in Kaikōura now with the whale-watching and the New Zealand fur seals there and people are just wanting to go there to see the marvels of nature and see what is so abundant there. There is a significant underwater canyon out off the Kaikōura Coast that is so abundant with fish life and all sorts of marine life and what that offers—and it is the breeding ground for the whales which stay there because of the abundance of plankton and the abundance of food—and that incredibly deep canyon provides such a marvellous area for New Zealand to cherish. We were a little disappointed of course that there were comments about the extent of the boundaries of that canyon and whether they went far enough. However New Zealand First is certainly of the belief that they are sufficient. They do represent a very very significant area of ocean out off the coast and by having that it certainly will provide the basis of ensuring that the whales and other marine life in the area there are given an incredibly important area of water.Similarly we went as a select committee to the breeding ground—or not so much the breeding ground but the creche as they call it—for the fur seal pups. It was marvellous to go up the inlet and up the stream—it is about a 5-minute walk off the main highway there—to see 40 or 50 pups or maybe more frolicking in several pools there. Apparently what the pups do is they leave the mothers they leave the parents and they go up the stream during the day while the parents are off getting food and all that sort of thing. The young pups were all playing around and jumping around and having a great time. It was just marvellous—marvellous—to see and that is all included in the sanctuary. It is amazing. So the whole area of the New Zealand fur seal colony there is protected under this bill as well. Again that is just such a marvellous thing which New Zealand can cherish.Can I also pay homage to Ngāi Tahu and local iwi and hapū who under the leadership of Sir Mark Solomon and many other leaders in the Māori community there have put so much effort into this legislation. Again it was very heartening to see how much they were involved in it and how there was so much buy-in from them working in with the cray fishermen working in with the pāua divers working in with the tourist operators and working in with all sorts of other interests there.Can I especially pay tribute to the Department of Conservation people in Kaikōura who took us and showed us the various areas of the sanctuaries and the marine colonies. What a marvellous job the Department of Conservation is doing in that area. I also pay tribute to the fisheries inspectors in the area. They are just tremendous people they were great hosts that day and they really are dedicated to what they are doing in the area and they are locals. You know they are working with the locals and they are locals. They are part of the local community but they are very much providing that Government input that legislative regulatory input and ensuring that it all works well for everyone. So I was very very pleased about the collaboration.As we have heard from other speakers this would probably be the most significant collaboration across a community in terms of developing a marine reserve a whale sanctuary and other things such as customary fishing areas and an advisory committee to oversee it. This would probably be the most comprehensive ever marine reserve in New Zealand and it was very very heartening to see.New Zealand First absolutely does support those initiatives and we were very pleased that the select committee was very collaborative in being able to work through it. However there was one area that we questioned and it was about those coordinates under the GPS. I think officials are still looking into that matter because there is no real reason why those coordinates could not go to three decimal places to ensure—Hon Ruth Dyson: Absolutely.ANDREW WILLIAMS: What was that?Hon Ruth Dyson: No you’re right—absolutely.ANDREW WILLIAMS: Yes—to ensure that there are no anomalies or errors or that certain rock areas or whatever fall just outside the area simply because we did not go to a third digit. I hope that common sense would prevail. As we all know New Zealand First’s policies are common sense—it is just common sense. As you will see on the billboards around New Zealand in the coming weeks it is common sense that we apply common sense and in this case it would be common sense to just simply add one more decimal place and make sure that these particular boundaries in these particular designated areas are not 20 30 or 50 metres away from the area they are supposed to be protecting.In saying all this we are increasingly aware of the fact that we are the guardians. Humans are the guardians of our planet the guardians of our oceans and the guardians of our land. In this case it is most important that we do all we can to ensure that what we are guardians of is taken care of. The number of marine reserves around New Zealand are increasing from the very first one at Goat Island up on the Leigh coast north of Auckland which is now a marvellous area to inner-city urban ones such as at Long Bay on the North Shore—which again has been marvellous in the Long Bay area—and many others around the coast. I visited the one in Akaroa which was established and extended just in the last year. Again it is very very significant.But it is important that at the same time we do not neglect other issues that are outside the marine reserves. Such an issue has been raised in this House today with the Māui’s dolphins. I am very very disheartened by the snail pace progress that has been made to protect the wonderful little Māui’s dolphins. When you look at these beautiful little creatures there are only 55 left of them in the world. They are all in New Zealand and they are mainly off the west coast of the North Island running down from Manukau Harbour down to Taranaki and indeed perhaps some are even down as far as Whanganui. When we are looking at marine reserves and at what we are doing here the onus is also on us to look at the wider impact on our oceans. We need to ensure that with beautiful little creatures like this and there are only 55 left of them left we have got to do something to protect them.So similarly in New Zealand First will be working and doing our darnedest post-election if we are in any position to influence the Government of the day to ensure that a much faster pace is taken in terms of protecting the Māui’s dolphins. Indeed we will extend that protection to the Hector’s dolphins too—they are under threat but not under the same level of threat—and ensure that New Zealand does play its part internationally in terms of protecting our marine species and our marine life.The last dolphins that went into extinction were in China on the Yangtze River—the round-nosed dolphin I think it was called. It would be devastating for New Zealand’s image if the next species of dolphin that was to become extinct was in New Zealand after China. That would be a terrible message. We cannot allow that.Today I was very pleased to meet with Professor Elizabeth Slooten and Gemma McGrath—and indeed in the past it was Christine Rose—who are doing a marvellous job on working to protect the Māui’s dolphins. In their survey we hear that New Zealanders overwhelmingly—80-something percent of New Zealanders—say that we have do something about this and that we have do something about it very soon. So New Zealand First commends this bill to the House.RINO TIRIKATENE (Labour—Te Tai Tonga):Tēnā koe Mr Speaker. Tēnā koutou e ngā rangatira huri rauna i tō tātou Whare i roto i tēnei wiki o Te Reo Māori.[Greetings to you Mr Speaker and to you collectively the revered throughout our House in this the week of the Māori language.]I am very pleased to make my contribution at this second reading of the Kaikoura (Te Tai-o-Marokura) Marine Management Bill. I do also endorse the spirit of cooperation and collaboration that has been embodied in this bill right from its beginnings and through the hard work of Te Korowai o Te Tai o Marokura and all of the stakeholders who were involved in that process. Although I am not a member of the Local Government and Environment Committee as the member for Te Tai Tonga I also have deep connections to Kaikōura through whakapapa through Ngāti Kuri and I have also been able to enjoy all the various aspects of fishing that the whānau enjoys along that beautiful coastline.Hon Trevor Mallard: I’ve enjoyed the products.RINO TIRIKATENE: My colleague here Mr Mallard has enjoyed a good kai as well. I am happy to host my whanaunga Kelvin. Any time he wants to come down there we will make sure he has a good hākari.This has been a collaborative approach from the community. I was pleased to be involved with Te Korowai o Te Tai o Marokura in its early stages back in 2005 I think when I was working for our own iwi in our fisheries. I am familiar with a lot of the commercial stakeholders—the pāua management company the cray or lobster management company the wet fish stakeholders the customary fisheries groups and also the recreational groups. It is definitely great to see this work come to fruition and I know that the fisheries were just one of many stakeholders. We can add in the tourism industry which is flourishing and has totally transformed the Kaikōura township over the last—coming up to—30 years. There are also the environmental groups and of course the wider community. That spirit of cooperation has flowed on and I acknowledge the work of the local member Colin King—it is sad for him to be departing this House but I am sure I wish him well and I am looking forward to his valedictory speech—and also the cooperation that flowed through to the select committee. I also acknowledge the Minister for his amendments which he will be putting through in the Committee of the whole House stage.This is a great initiative in terms of management measures for the marine environment conservation and protection. I commend the select committee for some very practical amendments that it has made—specifically the place names. I acknowledge my colleague Mr Davis whose abilities in Te Reo far exceed my own and who gave very thoughtful and helpful translations for the names. The amendments that have been made to the names reflect more of the Ngāi Tahu mita or perhaps the Ngāi Tahu way they would phrase certain place names. Those changes have been made and acknowledged in the bill. That is quite appropriate being that this is Te Wiki o Te Reo Māori—Māori Language Week.I do also commend the work of the committee for adding greater specificity to the actual boundaries of the marine sanctuary and reserve areas. By being more specific it has protected my very secret mark for bluenose. There are some really good fishing spots there. By adding greater specificity to the areas it is very good for the local fishermen as well so they know exactly where they can fish and where they are not allowed to fish. So it is great that the committee was able to hone in on those areas. Much has been mentioned about the size and the unusual shape of the reserve area. One marvels really at the aquatic life that is in such abundance through the Hikurangi Trench. It is obviously a feeding area and a navigation area for whales and much other aquatic life.We also know the fact that the boundaries did not include the sides of the trench or certain areas of the Hikurangi. I believe that this is a good thing because in certain instances there may be aquatic life or species that could actually be of benefit to New Zealand. I say that only to the extent that I am aware from my past experience working in fisheries that there is certain aquatic life such as certain sea sponges that is unique to that area. The research is ongoing but scientifically they have shown unique properties. One such property is cancer-fighting properties from certain sea sponges and other aquatic life—in this instance it was a sea sponge. We do not necessary want to close the door on what might aid research to aid the world. I know that the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research is doing a lot of research into understanding the particular sea sponge that comes from that particular part of the Kaikōura Coast. It is the only place in the world where this particular sea sponge is found. So we do not necessarily want to close the door on what might be very much groundbreaking research on unique attributes found in this particular species of sea sponge. So I can understand to that extent that a complete reserve status throughout all dimensions of the whole entire trench could indeed preclude what could be groundbreaking scientific discoveries.I would also like to touch on the regional development opportunities. Kaikōura itself as a township is a great example of regional economic development. We know the history of Whale Watch Kaikōura and the families of in particular the Kāti Kuri hapū who were involved in establishing the whale watching business. Through the establishment of that business it has transformed the economy of that whole township. I do acknowledge also the work of the late Hon Parekura Horomia. Yes there were five families who did mortgage their houses to actually set up that Whale Watch business but it was the good work of the Hon Parekura Horomia through the Community Employment Group—Hon Trevor Mallard: And do you know who helped a lot? The Minister in charge of regional development at the time Annette King—she gave the first grant.RINO TIRIKATENE: —and the very good Minister at that time the Hon Annette King who gave the first grant through the Community Employment Group that gave the tautoko to actually get that Whale Watch business established. So I do acknowledge that work which has aided in the regional economy. Of course everyone in the Kaikōura community wants to protect their coastline and they all support these measures. Just in closing I had a chat to a cousin of mine. I said: “What do you reckon about this bill cuz?”. He said to me that this bill is a great bill—just paraphrasing his words. He said: “Cuz it saves our kai moana.” We know how important to the taiāpure the mātaitai measures that are contained in this bill are. That is going to really strengthen protect and enhance the customary fisheries along the coast and so we support that. And finally I hope that this piece of legislation is a model that we can apply around the country. If we can go up to Tai Tokerau and further north to the Kermadecs and apply the same marine management reserves there all the best. Kia ora tātou.EUGENIE SAGE (Green):E te Māngai o te Whare tēnā koe. E ngā mana e ngā reo e ngā waka e rarau mai nei tēnā koutou katoa.[Greetings to you the Speaker of the House and to you all the powers voices and canoes settling in here.]I am pleased to take a call on the Kaikōura (Te Tai-o-Marokura) Marine Management Bill. The Green Party supports the creation of more marine protected areas around New Zealand and the protections contained in this bill. That is why we are supporting it because it does advance marine conservation. In New Zealand we are about a century behind on protection at sea compared with where we are on protecting land. New Zealanders generally think that about one-third of our marine area is protected according to a survey that the World Wide Fund did in 2011 but in fact less than 0.5 percent of our waters are protected as marine reserves. So this bill is a small step towards improving that statistic but as my colleague Gareth Hughes noted we do have some concerns about it and believe that it does not go far enough.Before I move on to that I would just like to acknowledge as others have done the huge amount of work that Te Korowai o Te Tai o Marokura did in discussing and identifying areas for protection and coming up with the package that has been put forward in this bill. I certainly enjoyed the visit that the select committee made to the Kaikōura area hearing the strong submissions from members of Te Korowai o Te Tai o Marokura and other members of the community about the bill because when law puts in place the views of the community it is generally good law.But this bill could have been improved if the marine protected areas guidelines that were developed by the Ministry for Primary Industries and the Department of Conservation had actually been applied to the process of identifying areas for protection as marine reserves and dealing with their boundaries. It is in that area that we have some significant concerns because as the Minister of Conservation noted the Kaikōura Canyon is nationally and internationally recognised as a hotspot of biodiversity. When you apply the marine protected area guidelines that is about ensuring that marine reserves protect a representative range of the biodiversity that is present. The guidelines also talk about avoiding edge effects and here we have a very odd-shaped marine reserve with two lobes and about 12 different sides within a very irregular shape that submitters have said will cause difficulties with enforcement and will also compound the problem of edge effects. It is widely known with a lot of the marine reserves here and overseas that fishers will often sit on the outer boundary of the reserve because the reserve assists in increasing marine life obviously. That fishing will have an impact on species within the reserve. Where you have an odd-shaped reserve that in parts is less than a kilometre wide those edge effects will be intensified because of the very odd boundaries. That will limit the effectiveness of the reserve.Those concerns were set out in strong submissions by the Royal Forest and Bird Protection Society’s national office and the Marine Sciences Society. Like Moana Mackey from Labour I strongly reject the claim by Maggie Barry that the submission by Forest and Bird was doctrinaire because it was based on very sound science about the impact of edge effects and about international best practice in terms of marine reserve design. It was very disappointing that the statutory agencies involved in the Te Korowai o Te Tai o Marokura forum process in that collaborative process did not help the forum to implement best-practice guidelines or the Marine Protected Areas Policy.We applaud the change that the Minister proposes to bring in a Supplementary Order Paper to reduce the review period from 25 years to 10 years and we hope that that review will address these issues of the extremely complex 12-sided boundary and the fact that the reserve does not protect all the areas that it should do. The experience around New Zealand has been that where you have had significant opposition to the establishment of marine reserves that has generally changed after they have been established and you have had strong community support. The Leigh Marine Reserve from Cape Rodney to Ōkākari Point—there was a lot of opposition to that. Yet when the Department of Conservation and others did a study in 2008 they identified that over 375000 people visited that marine reserve annually and they contributed $18.6 million a year to the local economy.So the fact is that this Hikurangi Marine Reserve protects less than 2 kilometres of the coast which is much less than any other marine reserve in New Zealand in terms of the length of coast protected. Even the tiny postage stamp Pōhatu Marine Reserve or Flea Bay in Canterbury which is only 215 hectares in size protects nearly 7 kilometres of coastline. Here with the Hikurangi Marine Reserve it is going to protect less than only 2 kilometres. That is overlooking a major opportunity for recreational tourism because the coast at Kaikōura is very accessible given that the State highway runs along it. As we have seen with the Tonga Island Marine Reserve in Abel Tasman National Park that resulted in a lot more visitors to the Abel Tasman more accommodation providers establishing more water taxi operators and more kayak companies. So there was a major boost in economic activity associated with marine protection and the same at Leigh. I think that if the reserve had been bigger along the coast so that it was easily accessible to people wanting to go diving and snorkelling and to see marine life where it is unfished that would have increased the significant benefits that Kaikōura already has from nature-based tourism around the whale-watching operation. So bringing that review period down to 10 years is certainly a good idea because we hope that the community will recognise that there are substantial economic as well as ecological benefits from increasing the marine reserve.We certainly support the collaborative process that has operated here but we think that it definitely needs to occur within the framework of the national policy—the Marine Protected Areas Policy—where you have scientists on the forum because there were not any scientists on Te Korowai o Te Tai o Marokura. We note in the regulatory impact statement of the bill that Te Korowai o Te Tai o Marokura identified the marine reserve as an area that would not have a major impact on fishing activity. So that focus on ensuring that the fishers are not too badly affected by the marine reserve and the lack of a strong science input has I think led to the very odd boundaries and the strange two-lobe shape of the reserve and the fact that it does not protect a lot of the canyon walls above 800 metres depth and that it has excluded areas like some critical seamounts which we know are a hotspot for biodiversity.So the opportunity for the review is where we hope some of the shortcomings in the marine reserve will be addressed but it is a bill that we support because it does take marine conservation forward. Thank you.Bill read a second time.Name changed to Kaikōura (Te Tai o Marokura) Marine Management Bill.The House adjourned at 12.22 p.m. (Wednesday)