Adams Amy: Civil Defence Emergency Management Amendment Bill — First ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeAdams Amy: Civil Defence Emergency Management Amendment Bill — First Reading[Sitting date: 08 December 2015. Volume:710;Page:8675. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon AMY ADAMS (Minister of Justice)on behalf of theMinister of Civil Defence: I move That the Civil Defence Emergency Management Amendment Bill be now read a first time. I nominate the Government Administration Committee to consider the bill. At the appropriate time I intend to move that the bill be reported to the House by a date that is 6 months from the day the bill receives its first reading. This bill will amend the Civil Defence Emergency Management Act 2002. It will make a significant difference for communities across the country hit by our most frequent emergencies: those of small to moderate size often created by the impact of floods storms and natural hazards. This bill is about helping communities get back on their feet more quickly after an emergency.When there is an emergency over time the focus switches from response to recovery and we need to better manage that transition. Historically most attention has been given to preparing for and responding to an event. However as we have seen in the Manawatū-Whanganui region following the severe storm in June the clean-up and the recovery phase can involve a huge amount of work. The new legislation will give clarity to those leading this work and help ensure it can be carried out as swiftly and effectively as possible. It will do this by providing the appropriate authority for those directing coordinating and managing the recovery. Strengthening the statutory framework for recovery from emergencies is one of the top priorities for the Minister of Civil Defence. By beefing up the legislative framework for recovery we will help communities recover from small to moderate emergencies more quickly and in better shape.“Recovery” is defined in clause 4 of the bill as “the co-ordinated efforts and processes used to bring about the immediate medium-term and long-term holistic regeneration and enhancement of a community following an emergency”. Recovery activities broadly mean those carried out under this legislation or any civil defence emergency management plan after an emergency occurs including the assessment and ongoing monitoring of the needs of the community affected by the emergency and the co-ordination and integration of planning decisions actions and resources. This includes measures to support the regeneration restoration and enhancement of communities across the four environments these being the built natural social and economic environments and the cultural and physical well-being of individuals in their community. This also includes measures to enable community participation in recovery planning and new measures to reduce risks from natural hazards and build resilience.In October the Minister for Canterbury Earthquake Recovery introduced the Greater Christchurch Regeneration Bill. Whereas that bill needs to target a specific set of circumstances the Civil Defence Emergency Management Amendment Bill needs to provide a flexible adaptable and scalable framework that is applicable to the consequences of any future emergency. Recovery needs to begin on day one of the response to an emergency but it can be complex. It involves many parties many resources and difficult decisions. With the current lack of legislative clout or provisions for recovery we have been running a system that has often relied on goodwill and relationships to get things done.This bill creates a framework that will better support recovery management to ensure that it is timely effective and focused. It provides authority and a stronger mandate for those directing coordinating and managing recovery. The bill conforms to the core civil defence emergency management principles of acting locally coordinating regionally and supporting nationally which support local devolution. It also includes better managing the transition once the response is dealt with to move into a greater focus on recovery. It does this while ensuring a principled approach for the use of extraordinary powers. Once the legislation is enacted we will see a legislative mandate for recovery managers a requirement to plan and prepare for recovery in advance of an emergency and powers to support the transition into the initial recovery through the transition notice mechanism. The bill also establishes a permanent legislative authority for the Government’s financial assistance to local government for eligible response and recovery costs.I want to briefly touch on some of the key features of the legislation. The first relates to recovery managers and planning for recovery. The bill establishes the role of national recovery manager and allows the Director of Civil Defence and Emergency Management to delegate certain functions and powers to the national recovery manager. It allows the national recovery manager to provide national and additional support to a civil defence emergency management group if the recovery is beyond the capability and capacity of the group to manage and coordinate. It requires each civil defence emergency management group to appoint a group recovery manager and alternative persons for the role and establishes powers of delegation for group recovery managers. It enables a civil defence emergency management group to appoint a local recovery manager at their discretion disestablishes the role of recovery coordinator provided for in the Act and requires that civil defence emergency management groups prepare strategic recovery plans to complement those currently required in group plans.The next highlight is that the bill enables civil defence emergency management groups to better transition from response to recovery. Currently the response powers available under a state of emergency cease when a state of emergency ends. During the transition phase after the response ends diversion of resources to business as usual can threaten the ability to fully recover from an emergency. This is not just an issue of getting things done quickly. It may impair the ability to recover in the longer term or may destabilise what was achieved during the recovery. That transition phase is critical.The bill creates transition notices and these will provide a defined subset of emergency powers to support the transition from response into focused recovery. There will be two types of transition notice: local and national. This is consistent with the principle of devolution to local authorities and offers the ability to appropriately and proportionately target the use of powers to a particular event. Just as a national state of emergency is very rare the issue of a national transition notice is also likely to be very rare. A range of criteria will be taken into account when issuing a transition notice: the area affected by the emergency; whether the focus of activities is moving from response to recovery including but not limited to whether a state of emergency is about to be terminated; and whether it is reasonable and necessary in the public interest to invoke extraordinary powers to manage coordinate and direct immediate recovery activities so as to ensure a timely and effective recovery in the long term.A local transition notice could also be put in place by a mayor or an elected representative of the local authority or a person of appropriate authority appointed in advance by the civil defence and emergency management group and chosen group members. The Minister may also put in place a local transition notice where he or she considers one is necessary but the local authority or civil defence and emergency management group has not issued one. The Minister of Civil Defence could also issue a national transition notice. This is consistent with their ability to issue a state of emergency declaration under the Act but I also want to note that a Minister has never declared a state of local emergency under the Act so I think it is unlikely that the Minister would ever need to issue a local transition notice.In some cases emergencies will generate such impacts of sufficient severity that the recovery may be very challenging initially but the safety of public and property is not in immediate danger and so no state of emergency might be declared. In these situations the Minister of Civil Defence’s approval will be required before a local transition notice could be issued. The Minister will need to have regard to whether invoking the powers associated with a transition notice is in the public interest and is necessary or desirable to ensure a timely and effective recovery. These safeguards are in addition to the usual public notification requirements.A transition notice should exist only as long as it is necessary to carry out vital and immediate recovery activities that could not otherwise be achieved during the transition phase. The maximum duration for the notices would be 28 days for local notices and 90 days for national notices respectively. The suite of powers proposed in the bill that will be available under a transition notice have been adapted from those available during a state of emergency but given the different demands of response and recovery the powers are not as extensive. The powers would be able to be used only for the purpose of supporting recovery activities during the transition and must be proportionate and exercised only to the extent reasonably necessary for the public interest. Examples of situations where these powers would make a material difference to recovery include where recovery managers need to prevent people from entering land that has subsided or that may be at risk or for example to conserve limited fuel resources in an isolated community. The powers would have the ability to impinge on property rights so they come with a range of proposed safeguards. Protections against the misuse of powers will be provided by the independence of the decision maker the procedure to be followed the test set out above the right of judicial review and the availability of compensation.Another key aspect is compensation. The Act’s current compensation sections have been extended in the bill to cover transition notice periods. Finally the bill extends the Civil Defence Emergency Management Act’s liability sections to provide protection from liability for people who carry out activities in good faith during a transition notice period. Separate to the purely recovery-focused aspects of the bill the bill also establishes permanent legislative authority for Crown reimbursement to local authorities for certain response and recovery activities. A permanent appropriation better recognises the Crown’s commitment to reimburse eligible response and recovery costs provided that relevant longstanding criteria that Cabinet has agreed to are met in claims that the local authority submits. The appropriation would provide sufficient flexibility—