King Annette: Mount Maunganui Borough Reclamation and Empowering Act Repeal Bill — Second Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
King Annette: Mount Maunganui Borough Reclamation and Empowering Act Repeal Bill — Second Reading 
[Sitting date: 17 October 2012. Volume:684;Page:5918. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Hon ANNETTE KING (Labour—Rongotai) 
: 
 As the House has heard Labour supports the Mount Maunganui Borough Reclamation and Empowering Act Repeal Bill in the name of Te Ururoa Flavell. I congratulate him on bringing this bill to the House and getting it through with a lot of support. But I did wonder why the local member Simon Bridges who we have just heard does so much hard work up in that area did not bring the bill to the House and he had the opportunity to do that. But congratulations to Te Ururoa Flavell. 
As you have heard this bill seeks to repeal the Mount Maunganui Borough Reclamation and Empowering Act 1975 an Act that gave the Bay of Plenty Harbour Board the authority to transfer part of the seabed of Tauranga Harbour to the Mount Maunganui Borough Council. It then authorised the council to undertake reclamation of that part of the harbour for sewerage and for other purposes. Subsequently the council we are told reclaimed less than half of the available area and the authority to undertake reclamation of the rest was then revoked by the enactment of the Foreshore and Seabed Endowment Revesting Act of 1991. Therefore the Mount Maunganui Borough Reclamation and Empowering Act has no legal effect. The change made by this bill is to insert as you have heard a sunset clause that would provide for the Act to expire 28 days after it comes into force because without such a clause one Act with no continuing effect would be replaced on the statute book with another. One thing I do agree on with Nick Smith is that he said we would have a useless Act on the statute book and what this does is get rid of it. 
I think what was of interest to me during the debate on this bill was the historical perspective that was put forward by a number of members. It really did enlighten this House as to the effect on Nga Potiki of changes that were made over the years. Nanaia Mahuta and Shane Jones in particular gave a very good perspective of what it meant historically and Shane Jones pointed out his family connections and ancestral connections to the area. Also I thought Te Ururoa Flavell was able to set out the environmental and cultural importance of the area to Nga Potiki and the many people who had protested against the original changes must be delighted with this bill today. I also thought that Shane Jones brought a sense of balance to the debate at the first reading when he pointed out that sure this had affected Nga Potiki but in fact effluent does not draw a distinction between colour race and creed. In fact the disposal of effluent affects all people in the area and being able to tidy up with this bill will probably be of help to everybody. 
I would like to also acknowledge the work of the Local Government and Environment Committee. I was not on the select committee for this bill but we are told there was only one submission to the bill and that it was a very collaborative approach. Changes were made that have helped the bill and people will be very keen to see its passage through this House. I would just like to say that I think that this is one select committee that works reasonably well together and that Nicky Wagner does a good job of chairing that committee. I hope that that continues with the rest of the bills that we have particularly the local government amendment bill that we are going to be looking at over the next couple of weeks. I would hope that same cooperation and collaborative approach will take place with another very important local government bill. However I do fear that this bill is being driven by the former Minister Dr Nick Smith who also sits on this committee and maybe we will not see the same cooperation and collaboration. So as we said we support this bill. Congratulations to Te Ururoa Flavell on bringing it to this House and on having a bill to be passed in his name. No doubt when this happens to people they feel a certain sense of pride.