Auckland War Memorial Museum Site Empowering Bill

I move, That the Auckland War Memorial Museum Site Empowering Bill be now read a second time. I am very grateful to the Business Committee of this Parliament that it has agreed to take this bill through all its stages today. Members have agreed that it is an important bill and that it is necessary for the Auckland War Memorial Museum to start its major renovation project, which it hopes to start in the next month or so. As MP for Auckland Central I have been asked—

💬 Rodney Hide: Is that right?

Yes. Did the member not try to stand there once? As MP for Auckland Central I have been asked by the Auckland Museum Trust Board to promote this bill. I take particular interest in this bill also as the Associate Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage. This bill will repeal the Auckland Institute and Museum Site Empowering Act of 1918 and replace it with new legislation allowing the lease of land within the Auckland Domain for the purposes of the Auckland War Memorial Museum and for extensions to the museum. It also corrects some mistakes that were made in that earlier legislation to describe accurately the present site of the Auckland War Memorial Museum.

The museum is architecturally and spiritually significant to everyone in Auckland and, indeed, to all New Zealanders, as well as to visitors to New Zealand. It is a major and respected repository of Māori taonga, artefacts, and information. It is trusted by the people of Auckland and the greater Auckland region to keep those treasures, as well as being Auckland’s major war memorial. It is respected for its research and its educational role, and it is the keeper of many of our treasures. It is a vital part of our cultural tourism circuit, and therefore a major contributor to the economic well-being of New Zealand, as well as being a vital link to New Zealand’s growing information network. The bill will enable the Auckland War Memorial Museum to expand and redevelop to meet the needs of the people of Auckland and of all New Zealanders, and also meet the needs of the 250,000 or so international visitors to the museum each year.

I want to thank the Government Administration Committee for reporting this bill back to the House so promptly, so that it can be passed to enable the museum’s redevelopment and expansion project to start on time. I particularly thank the chair of that committee, Dianne Yates, who conducted the examination thoroughly, but in an extremely constructive way; as did all members of that committee.

When completed, the museum will house a much-needed and improved collection, and visitor amenities, befitting its role as one of New Zealand’s most important cultural institutions and Auckland’s major war memorial. Facilities will include new collection storage areas on site, for the first time—indeed, the whole collection will be on site for the first time. There will also be an enhanced learning centre, a grand atrium, and a new underground car-park. The car-park will start to address the parking problems associated with the popularity of the museum, and, indeed, the domain, almost any day of the week, all weekend, summer and winter. There will also be a new special exhibition hall, an auditorium, and improved refreshment and public facilities.

The Government is making a contribution of $26.5 million over 5 years from the regional museums fund, towards this redevelopment. That fund was set up to recognise the importance of Te Papa as New Zealand’s national museum and the vital national and internationally significant collections that are held around the country. Auckland and Canterbury museums have both had major contributions promised to them, as have museums like Puke Ariki in New Plymouth, Aratoi in Masterton, and the Eastern Southland Gallery in Gore. The contribution towards the Auckland War Memorial Museum is the biggest, and the total cost of that project will be double that $26.5 million raised by the museum board and the people of Auckland. The expansion project is scheduled, if this legislation passes, to commence on 1 October this year.

As a Government we are making this contribution to the Auckland War Memorial Museum because we believe that this investment is required, given the huge national and international significance of the museum’s collection and its programmes. The museum’s collection, and, in particular, its Māori and Pacific collections, are second to none in the world. They are part of New Zealand’s heritage and need to be conserved and protected for all new Zealanders to enjoy. The redevelopment project will enable the museum to house that collection much better, to display it much better, and to make it available to visitors to the museum, as well as to scholars.

Once completed, the redeveloped Auckland War Memorial Museum will not only have world-class collections but it will have world-class facilities. It will be a tremendous asset to the people of Auckland and for New Zealand as a whole, as well as engaging all those visitors. The passage of this bill is the final step to enable this project to proceed.

Again, I thank the Business Committee of the House for agreeing that this bill should go through all its stages today. I thank the Government Administration Committee, all parties in the House that have agreed to facilitate the passage of this bill, the Auckland Museum Trust Board, and everybody who has been involved in the museum redevelopment and this bill. The Auckland War Memorial Museum is a key component in our country’s cultural framework and this bill will enable it to carry out its role for future generations.

The National Party is very pleased to support this bill sponsored by the Auckland Museum Trust Board. We have also agreed to support the express passage of this bill to enable the redevelopment work to start. I must say I was somewhat surprised at that rather quick reading, and flat tone used by the member for Auckland Central, who is also the Associate Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage. I thought she would feel a lot more excitement to see an icon in Auckland get a very much-needed redevelopment and facelift, after 70 years.

The Government Administration Committee had the opportunity to hold its hearing at the Auckland War Memorial Museum. I think all the members who were there would agree with me that it was a very worthwhile exercise. The redevelopment project will cost $49.5 million and will make improvements on two fronts. First of all, personally, I was very impressed and moved by the staff at the museum who have to work in such outdated, outmoded, and very cramped working spaces, particularly in the workshops, and so on. It was almost sad to see people having to put up with working in such cramped spaces for so long. For the sake of the staff, I am really pleased that they will have improved workshops, where they do such innovative work in preserving one of the most prestigious collections of Māori artefacts, etc. We had a conducted tour and saw that some workshops are actually in the courtyard of the existing Auckland War Memorial Museum. For the first time, I had the opportunity to contrast the experience of a visitor to the museum, which is a magnificent site, and then be taken to the back room and see the types of conditions that the staff have had to put up with for so long. I am sure they will be pleased to see that their working environment will be hugely improved.

The other redevelopment phase concentrated on the new seven-level atrium, where the museum will be able to showcase musical sessions and hold seminars so the public can appreciate, even more, the collections of the museum and the exchange of ideas relating to collections and other valuables kept in the museum. The trust board and executive enabled us to see a very impressive demonstration of the utilisation of modern technology, and also the New Zealand culture, which will be showcased separately in public areas, in educational sites, and in unique types of display. When the work is finished, I think the public will be very impressed with that Auckland icon.

I think most people will agree with me that car-parking has always been a problem whenever special events have been held at the Auckland War Memorial Museum. Now we will have a covered car-park, which is another major improvement. People will be sheltered, which is really important for a site that exists in open space. I am sure that improvement will increase the patronage of the museum, which Aucklanders take such immense pride in.

We learnt something quite interesting during the select committee hearing. We were told that the legal description of the museum site is slightly different from the original legislation of 1918. So we need this bill to correct that matter, and also to address the concern of some people that the museum is located on top of a volcano, and whether activities need to be restricted. So this bill includes clauses to ensure that activities on the Auckland War Memorial Museum site will not be curtailed because of that concern.

The National Party is very, very pleased to support this bill, and wants to see the redevelopment work proceed quickly. On a personal note, I want to make two further points. The first is that in recent years, as someone who now lives in central Auckland, I have had the privilege of attending Anzac Day memorial services in the Auckland War Memorial Museum. The dawn service and the open day at the museum later on, have always made it a very special day. That particular site and the collection in the museum make the Anzac service a particularly moving experience for those who attend. The war memorial museum setting is very befitting, and it is pleasing to see the increasing number of people attending the dawn service, particularly the young people of New Zealand. I am sure that is a sign of us wanting to celebrate our shared history and shared losses, and the spirit of unity, as a nation, in remembering the people who have paid a high price so there can be peace in the world.

Secondly, there is a certain sense of sadness for me. When I visited the Auckland War Memorial Museum, at the beginning of the year to look at the redevelopment plan, I raised the point that nowadays in Auckland one in five people are of Asian ethnic origin. The discussion was quite positive, at the beginning, of maybe having a corridor or space in the museum for a dedicated Asian display area. However, I was saddened to learn that the museum board eventually turned down that idea. I hope that, in the not too distant future, the decision can be revisited, because Auckland and New Zealand are becoming increasingly multicultural. The museum is where people see our history and our past being celebrated and displayed. I would like communities from all backgrounds to have a special place in the museum—our place—to celebrate their culture. I hope to work with the Auckland Museum Trust Board in the future to redress that issue. Certainly, there is a special place for our Māori history, for the Pacific Island community, and for European history, and it is a very proud part of our history. I want to see other communities also being allocated some special place in the museum. But despite that, it is a very special place—it is our place. Today we are very happy to support the reporting back of this bill.

It is with pleasure that I speak to the report back of this bill. As Pansy Wong has said, this bill was unanimously and enthusiastically supported by the Government Administration Committee, and I thank all members involved. When I say “enthusiastic”, I mean that it was really good for us to meet at the museum to look at the plans, and to be excited about them. I just wish that more members of the House could see those plans. If members want, I have the DVD that shows how the whole atrium area—the seven storeys—will be developed, which will expand the display areas, the education areas, the café areas, and the theatre areas. Members from Auckland will be absolutely able to boast about this new facility that will be built.

As someone who comes from south of the Bombay Hills, I have looked upon the Auckland War Memorial Museum as an icon of New Zealand, not just of Auckland, but I have always thought when there that it is a bit shabby around the back. As Pansy Wong has mentioned, the yard is a yard, which, as was explained to us, is the size of nine tennis courts. It is that yard that will be turned into the grand atrium, which will come up in the middle of the circular part of the museum. An exciting development is planned, and, as part of the Government, I am pleased we are contributing to that new development.

During the select committee process we had to look at things that perhaps were a little bit boring: is the land appropriate, and has the land been measured appropriately? We found that there had been a little miscalculation of some of the figures about that land, and we have cleared that issue up. As Pansy Wong has already mentioned, an underground car-park is planned, and we had to ensure that facilities were there for that. There is the matter of roadway access, and that had to be clarified in terms of the description of the land. Then, as Pansy Wong has also mentioned, we had to make sure that everything was tightly and legally secure in terms of whether the museum was being built on a volcano, and whether it fitted in with other legislation in that regard. So I thank the advisers to the committee, who were also very careful to make sure that we got it right this time—that we had all the measurements right, that the description of the land was right, and that the development could go ahead.

As Pansy Wong has mentioned, the committee was quite shocked at some of the standards of the work facilities already there. The people who are doing tremendous restoration work on some of the exhibits, and so on, have very cramped workshops. The facilities for the library, and so on, were very, very cramped. We were assured that not only will the new design be beautiful but it will also be utilitarian. It will allow for a development that will, I am sure, not only increase the pride of New Zealanders in that war memorial, but also increase the number of tourists who will go through it, as well as increase its educational facilities for young people.

All in all, it was a pleasure to work on this bill. I thank the committee and all those involved with the bill—Pansy Wong, Judith Collins, Steve Chadwick, and David Cunliffe—for the work they put in. I also particularly thank the officials, and the Auckland Museum Trust Board for hosting us so ably and for conveying to us their enthusiasm for the project. I am sure with such people behind it, and with the Minister behind it with such enthusiasm, it can only be a success.

As we know, the Auckland War Memorial Museum stands on a commanding site, and has stood there for 70 years. It is a very worthy memorial to those who died in the service of our country. It is therefore fitting that at this stage, some 40 or so years after the last work was done, this bill comes to the House. On behalf of New Zealand First, I am very pleased to offer our support for the expeditious passage of the bill.

In so doing, I recognise that we are correcting errors of the past. We have recently had retrospective legislation in the House, and this is one such piece of legislation as well. It is perhaps an oversight, but we all agree with it. This House recently considered an Act retrospectively, and this is another such bill that, when passed, will correct the mistakes in a lease lasting over 70 years.

The Auckland War Memorial Museum has always been an educational place. It is quite fitting, therefore, to pay tribute to the past directors and staff. From the time that I had a brief teaching acquaintance with the museum, right through to the present time, there has always been a lack of space. Staff were always in the back rooms, trying to put collections together. But for those of us involved in education, the final effort—the actual work seen by the students who went through the museum, and the collection boxes that were sent out—were first rate and gave many country children their first insight into the work of a museum.

One of the things I found very hard to understand in the past was the lack of Government support for the Auckland War Memorial Museum. It makes quite a contrast to the taxpayer gift to the city of Wellington, on the waterfront, which incurred huge costs. Therefore it is quite fitting the Government has recognised that in the dollar for dollar funding contribution that has been set up.

The fact that the museum had an educational impact is important, because those of us in rural districts—and I mentioned this in the earlier debate—saw the Auckland War Memorial Museum as part of the former Auckland province. That is recognised in the names of those up there on the higher floor, and of those who have passed on. It is recognised in some ways by some of the former county councils and borough councils that made financial contributions pre-war, and up until after the war. But I said to the director when I met him recently that, in recent years, that overall response from the Auckland region, which goes from Taupo north, has not always been seen in the understanding that people in Auckland have of their museum.

It was an Auckland provincial museum, and that is particularly important for Māori, who gave willingly to the collection that was put together in terms of their objectives. So it is probably quite pertinent to look very quickly at the role of the Auckland War Memorial Museum—namely, the recording and presentation of the history and the environment of the Auckland region of New Zealand, the South Pacific, and, in more general terms, the rest of the world. In particular, the collections for Māori and the South Pacific are first rate, world class, and unlike collections in any other museum in the world. In that way, the museum is a world first, and a world best, as well.

I turn now to heritage issues. Educational work in recent times has concentrated upon the heritage aspects of the museum being represented in a modern way and in a modern dress. The promotion of scientific and cultural scholarships is one of the issues for a museum, in order to portray the past in a vital way and show that the technology of the past was important to people’s lives—to people living day by day, 20, 30, 50, or 100 years ago. That is the sort of historical promotion that museums can do very, very well.

Hopefully, museums can also promote themselves with prudent financial management, but that has not always been one of the issues for them. If we look worldwide, the prudent management of international museums of note, in New York, Boston, London, and so on, is quite an issue at the present time. It is very difficult to maintain the overall services that a museum wishes to provide, not only for those who are near, but for those who are far and come to visit, and to do that in a way that is efficient in a funding and financial sense.

It is difficult, most of all, to give to the wider community something of our past in a way that, I have to say as a teacher, many of our young people just do not understand. They do not understand—as we did in our day because we had a limited range of resources—just how important historical records are, and how important the visible record is, in the museum. That record is one thing the Auckland Museum has always had.

On behalf of New Zealand First I am very pleased to endorse the support that other parties have passed on. As I said earlier, the prime role of this museum was to be a war memorial, and that is still the hallmark of the place. Pansy Wong mentioned the Anzac Day services. Our family in our time in Auckland were there each year. The Māori Battalion made the annual Anzac parade one of its features of the year, particularly for Māori. Unfortunately, as my friend Bill Gudgeon knows, those service people have passed on. Again, we give our support for the bill, and our support for its quick passage through the evening’s debate. May the board prosper in its endeavours.

It was my pleasure to be a member of the Government Administration Committee for this bill. I have to state that I love the Auckland War Memorial Museum. It is what a museum should be. It looks like a museum; it acts like a museum; it is a museum. It is also a war memorial, and that is so important today, 3 September, which from my calculation is the 64th anniversary of the declaration of World War II, when New Zealand was the first country, as I understand it, to declare war. It is very important. It is also one day off being the anniversary of the death of my father, who was a veteran of World War II, so I am particularly pleased to be able to speak in support of this bill.

I fully support the war memorial museum. I take my son there frequently, and I love to go there. When the select committee went there to have a meeting and to have a look at the plans and the site, I was thrilled to find out that after all my years of going to the war memorial museum, and even as a little girl being brought up from the Waikato—

💬 Rodney Hide: Still a little girl.

I say “thank you” to Mr Hide.

Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m.

I was advising the House before the dinner break that when I was a little girl from the Waikato I was brought by my father and mother in the back of a car, with no seat belts—we did not have them in those days; I am that old—to Auckland occasionally to visit the extended family, and we would go to the Auckland War Memorial Museum. We would go to the floor where the war memorial is with the names of the soldiers—including my great-uncle, Norman Fraei—from the Auckland province who died in World War I. In those days, the Auckland province extended all the way down the top half of the North Island. After paying homage, looking around the museum, and looking again at the magnificent waka and the many treasures and taonga in the museum, we would then trot off to the Auckland Zoo. I have to say it is still a wonderful zoo and is supremely better than it used to be in my days as a child. It is another of those Auckland icons that I have to say is a world leader.

💬 Hon Judith Tizard: I think so, too.

I thank the Minister, Judith Tizard, very much for her support. When the Government Administration Committee went to visit the Auckland War Memorial Museum I was amazed to find a public library there. I thought I knew a lot about that museum and I thought that I had been everywhere in it. However, I did not realise that the museum has a public library open to people to go and have a look at some of the magnificent books kept there. It is a huge research facility that I did not know about. So, after all those years of going to the museum and feeling that it was utterly part of my New Zealand culture—part of who I am as a New Zealander, and part of where my family has been, and are—I felt that I had learnt something stunningly new. One thing I shall do during the next adjournment is go and have another good look in that library.

A lot of people have said to me they are concerned about the extension to the museum. Everybody who goes to that museum looks at the site and the building, and says that they hope no one will add any little bits on its side. But this will be the second major redevelopment of the museum. The first was back in 1960 when the back part of the museum—the round part, which makes it a bit like half a cake tin at the back—was added on by an architect called Mr Draffin. He was involved in all sorts of buildings at the time, such as the Bledisloe building in Wellesley Street and some that were not quite as well known as the War Memorial Museum. As someone who is interested in buildings, I was interested to find that he was the architect of that extension. That is why the back part of the museum is much plainer in many ways than the front part. The front part was built in the 1920s specifically for what it is—a war memorial—but the back part had really more to do with the housing of the staff and collections in the museum, and that is why it has different things on it. It is also the part of the museum that holds, of course, the war memorial for World War II veterans, which is at the southern side of the museum. As has been explained by my colleague Pansy Wong, that part houses a lot of the collections not on public display.

The War Memorial Museum holds not only many Māori taonga but also a tremendous amount of Pacific treasures. Having been many times to Samoa, the birthplace of my husband, and also a part of my family, I know that there are just not the facilities in the Pacific Islands to hold the sorts of treasures held by the museum on behalf of the Pasifika people. That is one of the other main attributes of that particular museum. All New Zealanders can be proud of this museum, and certainly Aucklanders can be, in particular.

I will discuss again the extensions to the museum. People worry about them. They do not want extensions to be coming out the side, with anything glitzy or, dare I say, Auckland-like. As an Aucklander, of course, I can say that. What will be built there will be inside the inner part of the extension from the 1960s, in the vacant area with just a couple of ramshackle buildings, including a smoking room for the staff. That will have to go if the Government gets its way! That area is the size of about seven tennis courts, and is unused apart from those ramshackle buildings. The only other thing of note is that the area holds a piece of One Tree Hill’s pine, which was cut down by the activist Mike Smith. That is really all it holds. One great thing is that the very extensive extensions to be made will not impede, or in any way compromise, the look of the museum, and that is so important. After all, it is a war memorial and a sacred part of New Zealand.

What is also great about the extensions is that the underground car-park will be just that—underground. It will be at the back of the museum in the southern part—

💬 David Benson-Pope: Unusual for an underground park to be underground.

Mr Benson-Pope might think that is terribly funny, but it is a culturally sacred site and he should have a little bit of common sense and sensitivity to those of us who feel we have a cultural New Zealand, even if he does not. Unfortunately, he is a bad product of a very bad education system—

💬 Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order!

In particular, that car-park has been designed so that it is not visually offensive to the grass area at all. We found that the part underneath the ground is part of the reservoir, so that means there is an ability at some stage to extend out. It is just marvellous that that is being done in such a way that the integrity of the property and of that cultural icon—that absolute monument to those people who gave their lives so that people could come to this House and have democracy, despite some of the behaviour that occurs occasionally—will be—

💬 David Benson-Pope: Running round telling porkies.

It will be kept, and that is absolutely amazing.

I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. I do not think it is all right for a member of this House to accuse another member of dishonesty. David Benson-Pope just accused me of telling porkies to the electorate.

💬 David Benson-Pope: No, I did not.

💬 Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member says that he did not.

The work that has been done by the trust board of the museum is just wonderful. The people we met during the committee hearing were absolutely great, and I congratulate them very much.

It gives me great pleasure to support the second reading of the bill. The bill allows the Auckland War Memorial Museum to lease the land in the domain, as well as including the planned extension to build a new underground car-park. It also ensures that the lease granted to the Auckland Museum Trust Board by the Auckland City Council in 1920 extends to the land included in the schedule, and will be treated as if this had always been the case.

I would like to take this opportunity to speak about how these plans will be affected by the work of the Government Administration Committee in scrutinising this bill. I certainly put on record my gratitude to the members of that committee for doing such a thorough job on the bill. I am an Auckland-based MP so I have a really keen interest in how the bill proceeds.

The purpose of this bill is to validate the lease of land in the Auckland Domain to the Auckland Museum Trust Board for the Auckland War Memorial Museum, and to increase the land area subject to that lease so that redevelopment plans for the museum can proceed. In doing so, the bill repeals the Auckland Institute and Museum Site Empowering Act of 1918. A sensible recommendation was made by the committee to clarify that the lease includes both the existing area and the proposed leased area. The difficulty with the bill as it stood was that it was unclear whether the description referred to the existing leased area, the proposed leased area, or both. I think the Surveyor-General pointed out this potential confusion, and advised that it was more accurate to describe the original area as the lease by referring to the plan that defined it rather than to the latest plan outlined in the schedule of the bill, because this shows the original area only as an abuttal. The committee recommended that the bill be amended to ensure that it referred to both the existing and the proposed leased area, and this seems to me to be an eminently sensible suggestion.

It should be noted that this bill also has a retrospective effect, because it corrects anomalies between the existing location of the museum building and the legal description of the site leased to the board back in 1918, through the 1918 Act. In general, I am not in favour of making retrospective law on principle. But in this case I can see that this would serve to correct an error, and that act would not conceivably cause harm to anyone. Thus, the bill validates the lease granted in 1920 by the Auckland City Council to the enactment of this bill.

I think it is right for the Auckland Museum Trust Board to seek a new bill to tidy this up once and for all, rather than deciding, as was an option, to amend or repeal the 1918 Act. That also shows in the council’s support for the bill during the submission process, as it also supports the redevelopment of the museum. The land described in the schedule of the bill is also deemed to have been always covered by that lease.

I was fascinated to learn that the discrepancy between the leased area in the 1918 Act and the actual location of the museum building was discovered only when the proposed car-park, which will be a part of the redevelopment, was surveyed. I guess that is what progress is all about—we find out little things like this. Given that the museum has been there for 70 years, I see no reason that now, when redevelopment is about to begin, this legislation should not have retrospective effect.

The other thing to remember is that the council already considers that the total lease area in the bill is largely within the area set out by the district plan for “museum purposes”, within, of course, the Auckland Domain. It should be pointed out that any development in the Auckland Domain is also subject to extensive controls, according to the district plan. The council has already issued a resource consent for the redevelopment, and it should be noted that this has been supported by the Historic Places Trust. The council has also made it very clear that any development in the Auckland Domain will always be subject to wide public and expert scrutiny. This also applies to a rather curious element that applies most specifically to development in the Auckland area.

Because the museum is situated on a volcanic cone it is included under a very old Act, namely section 5 of the Reserves and Other Lands Disposal and Public Bodies Empowering Act of 1915, which restricts quarrying, excavations, terraces, or cutting on the side or slope of volcanic cones or hills bounded by or abutting a public reserve. Because the museum site for the proposed car-park sits on top of the volcanic cone, not on its side or on a slope, then the 1915 Act, on the face of it in any case, does not apply to this very case. Indeed, the 1915 Act was not an issue when the museum was extended on two occasions, both in 1929 and 1960. Even so, I think it was wise for the committee to have put this issue beyond any doubt and to have recommended an amendment that would exempt the lease from the requirement of the 1915 Act.

Because the proposed lease area has been expanded from the original, it does include existing and proposed roadways immediately adjacent to the museum buildings. I have found out that all roadways in the Auckland Domain fall under the provisions of the Auckland Domain Act, which effectively means that all roadways within the domain remain in the ownership of the council, with consequent responsibility for their upkeep and maintenance. I commend the select committee’s decision to amend this bill to make absolutely sure that all the roadways on the proposed lease area are subject to the Auckland Domain Act and therefore remain under the council’s responsibility. I note also that this has already been agreed to between the council and the board. Similarly, the move to strike out reference to the 1918 Act—the very Act that will be repealed by this bill—means that a consequential amendment will be required to the Auckland Domain Act. This will exchange reference to the 1918 Act with reference to the Auckland War Memorial Museum Site Empowering Act of 2003, particularly for the purposes of determining responsibility for the care and upkeep of the domain roadways. Once again I believe that this was a sensible recommendation by the select committee.

I think at this point it is timely to remind members of what the statutory role of the Auckland War Memorial Museum is, as defined by the Auckland War Memorial Museum Act of 1996, because we have to look at what this bill attempts in that context. The board is entrusted with the recording and presentation of the history and environment of the Auckland region, New Zealand, the South Pacific, and, in more general terms, the rest of the world. It has responsibility for the institution itself, involving conservation of the heritage of the museum and of global resources. Something that should definitely not be forgotten is the role of the museum as a war memorial, which is something that I would like to talk about during the later stages of this bill.

The museum celebrates the rich cultural diversity of the Auckland region and its peoples. It provides education that involves and entertains people to enrich their lives. It promotes the well-being of society, and advances and promotes cultural and scientific scholarship and research. And, not to be forgotten, the museum is now committed to greater financial self-sufficiency through the prudent operation of compatible revenue-producing and fundraising activities that supplement public funding. The goal is to provide maximum community benefit from the resources available, and that should be the watchword for the museum as it prepares to embark on a major redevelopment at a very significant cost. This bill facilitates that process, and I hope that the goals I have mentioned remain uppermost in the mind of the board as it proceeds with its plans.

It gives me great pleasure, on behalf of New Zealand First, to join other members in supporting the Auckland War Memorial Museum Site Empowering Bill. I have had the pleasure and the privilege of living in Auckland for 43 years. One of the major sites in Auckland—a site that makes one feel one is an Aucklander—is the domain and the museum located on it.

I believe that we now have a wonderful array of attractions in the Auckland area, so much so that I think many Aucklanders should perhaps consider, in their summer holidays, taking a visit to Auckland for a change, as I did one year. One of the first places they should go to is the Auckland War Memorial Museum.

Too often, people dash up north, to Paihia or to Russell, those who can afford it go down to Pauanui, and others go to Hawaii or to Surfers, but I think consideration should be given by Aucklanders to visiting Auckland. They should consider visiting the museum, taking a trip across the harbour to Rangitoto, walking up the volcanic cone and enjoying the view of the Waitemata Harbour and the Hauraki Gulf from the top of Rangitoto. It is quite an amazing sight to see the Hauraki Gulf from that viewpoint. There is also the Museum of Transport and Technology.

There is another development on land. When we go down Meola Road—and those of us who lived in the Grey Lynn and Point Chevalier areas, as I did in 1960 and thereabouts, remember Meola Road as a tip site—we see how wonderfully that has been developed in recent years. Again, there is the Second World War influence, especially on Meola Road, when we take the shortcut to go from the North Shore to visit people who live in the Point Chevalier and Mount Albert areas. Then, of course, the other thing people should do when they visit Auckland, as an Aucklander, is walk the harbour bridge. That is a wonderful walk, as well. There is quite a nice package there, for Aucklanders to have a look around Auckland itself, starting, as I said, with the Auckland War Memorial Museum.

I take Dianne Yates’ point. It is very exciting to think that this museum is embarking on a $46.5 million redevelopment in October 2003. It is such a wonderful museum already. I take Pansy Wong’s point about the history of New Zealand and there not being enough of an Asian theme to it. On reflection, I cannot recall anything in the museum about, say, the gold-mining days and the influence that the Chinese people had on the Otago gold mines at the time.

💬 Judith Collins: It was Otago?

Yes, it was Otago, but it was a New Zealand concept. If we look at the main legislation, the Auckland War Memorial Museum Act of 1996, which created the museum, we see that section 11(a) states that the objectives include the recording and presentation of the history and environment of the Auckland region, New Zealand, the South Pacific, etc.

Another aspect is the Middle Eastern viewpoint. Many people do not seem to realise the remarkable contribution that Lebanese people made to New Zealand in the middle of the 19th century. Dunedin used to be very wealthy, and it was the Lebanese who made a significant contribution. There are still Lebanese families around the area. Perhaps their contribution is not as great as it used to be, but they are in the background still. One thinks of, perhaps, the Corban family as in a more obvious way coming from Lebanon, but that was in about 1901. But in the early days, in the Otago area and such like, the Lebanese made a significant contribution to New Zealand. So there is that thought as well—that the new museum could have an area set aside for the contributions made by people who have been virtually forgotten over time. We have taken where we are for granted. I recommend to the trustees that this development should take those early developments into account.

I have been in New Zealand for 43 years. I came to Auckland in 1960. My first visit to the Auckland War Memorial Museum was in the 1960s. It was quite an eye-opener to see all the canoes and the various things from the Polynesian area, and from Micronesia as well. I remember when I did History 1 in 1961, at Auckland University. I was asked to do an essay on the Māori Wars. I got an F for that, because I could not find any information on wars in New Zealand, for a start—nothing that really amounted to a war. So that was hard. Then, finding information on Māori wars, which I thought would have been fought amongst Māori, was also a failure. Keith Sinclair wanted me to write an essay based on his thesis, which was on the Māori Wars. That was fine. University lecturers always ask their students questions that relate to a book they have written. So finding anything on the Māori Wars was impossible for me at that stage. I ended up with an F, but I had the great advantage of going into a tutorial with Mr Stone, who was given all the duffers to handle—the ones who were totally ignorant on the subject. Professor Stone, as he now is, has written the book on Auckland. I always feel that I was quite lucky to take the view that I did, and, of course, it seems that I am right now. People say that the Māori Wars were actually in the 1820s and 1830s, and what we had in the 1850s and 1860s were the Land Wars. So I might get a better mark for that essay today, on the New Zealand wars, just to show how history can work. [Interruption] Mr Barnett can disagree with me, but I suspect that I know a lot more about New Zealand history than that even more recent immigrant would know about New Zealand.

The Auckland War Memorial Museum was very helpful to someone like myself in the 1960s. I think there might be quite a few people who did what I did. When a man first meets a young woman he fancies, he thinks of what he is going to do, and how he is going to pass the time away. Of course, that excludes some people all together. My then fiancée and I spent some pleasant times at the museum, because I lived in Birdwood Crescent, just around the corner. One did live in Parnell if one was a university student in those days, and the Auckland War Memorial Museum was in the middle of our respective addresses. So I walked past the Auckland War Memorial Museum at about 4 and 5 o’clock in the morning quite frequently. [Interruption] Yes, quite frequently. It was very safe to do that in those days. People cannot do that today—not with this Government. However, that is another matter.

The Auckland War Memorial Museum has played quite a significant part in my life. Members may also remember the Parnell Lawn Tennis Club. Those who played lawn tennis, and I emphasise the words “lawn tennis”, might remember that it was just on the museum site, as well. It is extraordinary, when I look back on it, how the museum could play a part in one’s life without one fully realising it.

My colleague Judith Collins reminded me that today was the date of the beginning of the Second World War, when New Zealand declared war on Hitler half an hour before anybody else. There is a lovely piece of Hansard to read, if members bother to read it. There was a short debate, members sang “God Save the King”, and in the space of half a page of Hansard we had declared war on Hitler, before Britain did. That was the way we used to do things in those days.

One of the best sections of the Auckland War Memorial Museum, from my point of view, is the Palestine section. Not many people appreciate the role played by New Zealand in liberating Palestine from the Turks and the Germans. I refer especially to the role of the Australian Light Horse Brigade, which was really infantry on horseback. They would ride their horses to a certain point, and get off, and do a lot of fighting. It was a funny way of doing it. The Australian Light Horse Brigade and the New Zealand soldiers, with the British force under General Allenby, liberated Palestine in 1917. That section of the museum is the only place where I have seen something on the liberation of Palestine—something I had read about in those jingoistic, very youthful books, as a young person.

There are these odd sections of the museum that are to be commended to people. If people, including Aucklanders, take a holiday in Auckland over Christmas, that is one of the places they should visit. I really look forward, with excitement, to the way in which this seven-storey building is to be erected, and the things that are likely to be going into it. I also look forward to more opportunities in the future to display the areas of the museum that are not fully shown today.

As an Auckland MP I am very happy to contribute to the second reading debate on this bill. It is a bill that is certainly overdue in relation to the money that needs to be put into significant improvements to the Auckland War Memorial Museum, and I congratulate the Minister with Responsibility for Auckland Issues, the Hon Judith Tizard, on sponsoring it.

It is interesting that we found through the select committee process that there are discrepancies, and previous speakers have aptly pointed to the discrepancies that need to be validated by this new piece of legislation. It is quite amazing that we have found that some of the decisions made long ago are now quite out of kilter in relation to the lease arrangements for the land, and needed to be validated also in relation to the 1918 Act. It has been determined that the museum site is on the cone of the volcano instead of the slope, and therefore the bill makes it clear that the site should be exempted from section 5 of the Reserves and other Lands Disposal and Public Bodies Empowering Act 1915. One only hopes that we do not have an eruption of that volcano in the short or long-term future. Obviously, if that occurs some of the valuable artefacts, the heritage and history that we have in the museum, may be lost.

I want to congratulate the Government Administration Committee on its work. The improvement that we hope to see developed next month, in October, is a significant one, and it is most apt that this legislation is going through the House tonight. The sum of $46.5 million has been dedicated to the redevelopment of the site, which will mean a 60 percent extension to the facility’s interior space, plus a new underground car park, which will improve the facility—certainly from the point of view of visitors. The Auckland War Memorial Museum is still one of the most visited attractions in Auckland. It is very important in terms of various aspects—not only in terms of what museums represent and what is stored in them from an educational and heritage point of view, but also in terms of the Pacific region.

As some of my colleagues have mentioned, the museum houses artefacts from the South Pacific that are very important and valuable for the region. I take up and support the points that have been made by my colleague Judith Collins, in relation to some of the Pacific treasures and taonga that are in the Auckland War Memorial Museum. They are valuable not just for Polynesia and its history but also for Melanesia and Micronesia, as my colleagues have mentioned. I am sure that the Pacific leaders who came to the Pacific Islands Forum recently would have been quite surprised at the treasures from the Pacific that are in the Auckland museum, if some of them had visited the museum during their short stay in New Zealand.

I commend the work done by the select committee on the bill. It is a bill that has the cross-party support of all parties and all members of the House. I believe that it is a very good bill, and I congratulate the Minister who is sponsoring the bill and those who have worked to improve the legislation. We have a worthy bill that will inject a significant amount of money into improving the Auckland War Memorial Museum, which is not just a museum but is also a tribute and memorial to those who have fallen in battle, and paid the ultimate sacrifice for the freedom that we enjoy today.

Bill read a second time.

Instruction to Committee