11. Question No. 11—EnvironmentHon SCOTT SIMPSON (National—Coromandel) to the Minister for the EnvironmentQuestion No. 11—Environment11.Hon SCOTT SIMPSON (National—Coromandel) to the Minister for the Environment: Does he stand by all of his statements policies and actions?Hon DAVID PARKER (Minister for the Environment): Yes in particular my statement that New Zealanders need to work together to stop the quality of our fresh water degrading because if we let it get worse it costs more takes longer and is harder to fix.Hon Scott Simpson: Does he agree with the December 2018 National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA) report titled Water quality state and trends in New Zealand rivers that for water clarity phosphorous and turbidity in each case the trend direction indicated improving conditions."?Hon DAVID PARKER: I have the table of the results from the Land Air Water Aotearoa reports. For me the most disturbing of those results is in respect of the macroinvertebrates—these are the little critters that rely upon water quality to live—and it shows that roughly twice as many of the 673 monitoring sites were getting worse as were getting better. That's a clear indicator that we still have declining freshwater quality in our rivers.Hon Scott Simpson: Point of order Mr—SPEAKER: Yes I'm going to ask the member to ask his question again.Hon Scott Simpson: Does he agree with the December 2018 NIWA report titled Water quality state and trends in New Zealand rivers that for water clarity phosphorous and turbidity "in each case the trend direction indicated improving conditions."?Hon DAVID PARKER: I have the table which I think is referred to in the statement that the member just referred to and all of the areas that are shown in red and orange on that bar graph are rivers that are getting worse. We have a considerable number of our rivers getting worse and according to the macroinvertebrate indices more of them are getting worse. In fact twice as many are getting worse as are improving. In respect of clarity it is not as bad a problem as macroinvertebrates but other indicators are sure as hell not yet fixed.Hon Scott Simpson: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. Twice in a row I've made it clear in my questioning that I was referring to a NIWA report and twice in a row—SPEAKER: And the Minister indicated in his second answer if the member had listened that he was referring to a graph from the same report.Hon Scott Simpson: With respect sir I don't think he did.SPEAKER: Well I'm going to ask the Minister whether in his intersession in the middle of it he did or not.Hon DAVID PARKER: What I said sir was that I understood that this table of results was what lay behind the NIWA reporting.Hon Scott Simpson: Does he agree with the same report that stated for nitrate and ammonia a majority of sites in New Zealand showed improving conditions?Hon DAVID PARKER: Again referring to this table members will be able to see that in respect of nitrate levels roughly the same number of rivers are getting worse as are getting better. These figures undoubtedly show that many many rivers in New Zealand have got declining water clarity and worsening nitrate levels and as I said previously probably the best indicator of overall ecosystem health is whether the macroinvertebrates live and twice as many of those monitored sites have declining macroinvertebrate populations as are increasing.Hon Scott Simpson: Has the Minister read the December 2018 NIWA report titled Water quality state and trends in New Zealand rivers?Hon DAVID PARKER: Not today but I'm sure I've read it in the past.Hon Scott Simpson: Why does he insist on telling a narrative on water quality crisis in New Zealand when Government data for river water quality shows eight out of nine key water metrics actually had more sites improving than getting worse—SPEAKER: Order! The member's finished the question. He's had two legs.Hon DAVID PARKER: Because the freshwater Science and Technical Advisory Group report to me. The report of the Freshwater Leaders Group chaired by the former chief executive of Synlait and the Kahui Wai Māori group chaired by the current chairman of Miraka—another dairy company—all agree with what I have said or in fact they've made recommendations which we are adopting."