Resource Management (Aquaculture Moratorium Extension) Amendment Bill

I move, That the Resource Management (Aquaculture Moratorium Extension) Amendment Bill be now read a third time. The purpose of this bill is to amend the Resource Management (Aquaculture Moratorium) Act to extend the moratorium on new applications for aquaculture activities in New Zealand’s coastal marine area until 31 December 2004. The bill also reinstates coastal permits that have lapsed while approval was being sought for marine farm permits that are granted under the Fisheries Act for the sites, and prevents existing permits from lapsing, for the same reason. The bill extends the time limit that is currently provided for the Minister of Conservation to respond to requests for early uplift of the moratorium. The current limit has proved difficult to administer.

The moratorium was initiated to provide time for aquaculture law reform legislation to be passed, and for council planning to be initiated. The main reforms will provide greater certainty for applicants and submitters, making it clear where aquaculture can occur and where it is prohibited. The reforms will also enable councils to look at all the sustainability issues related to aquaculture, including fisheries, in an integrated way. Therefore, councils will be better able to deal with all environmental effects, and provide greater certainty for the aquaculture industry and the wider community.

The current moratorium has ensured that councils have not been flooded with marine farm applications in a so-called race for space, prior to the new legislation coming into effect. However, those reforms have not been progressed as quickly as expected, and will not be in place before expiry of the current moratorium at midnight on 24 March 2004. Although that delay in the reform process is unfortunate, regional councils have continued to develop aquaculture management areas during the moratorium. The delay will also allow time to clarify issues related to the foreshore and seabed, and supports the sentiment of the select committee, which emphasised that: “The new legislation needs to be sound and to give some certainty about the wider regime governing planning in coastal marine areas.”

There is an urgent problem concerning the lapsing of consents that is peculiar to the current Resource Management Act and Fisheries Act dual permitting regime. This bill fixes that problem. The situation will not be a problem in the future, as the aquaculture reform legislation will remove that dual permitting regime and replace it with a more comprehensive Resource Management Act regime. The problem arises only for some of the coastal permits that are still being processed under the existing dual Resource Management Act and Fisheries Act 1983 regime.

The problem arises because section 125 of the Resource Management Act provided that any resource consent would lapse unless the resource consent was given effect—for example, if a marine farm area was developed within 2 years of the date of commencement of the consent. Under the Fisheries Act, permits for marine farms can be granted only to farmers with Resource Management Act consents, and when this process blows out to more than 2 years there is a problem with consents lapsing. There are currently around 200 coastal permits that have not yet had their applications for a Fisheries Act permit considered, and about 100 applications for sites where the coastal permit has lapsed before the Fisheries Act permit has been decided. Failure to remove the lapsing problem would cause the industry to suffer large losses, would hamper planning, in Marlborough in particular, and would create unnecessary conflict and disruption.

In order to resolve that issue, the bill provides that the making of an application for a marine farming permit or a spat-catching permit under the Fisheries Act 1983 will be deemed to be giving effect to the coastal permit. These provisions would apply only to coastal permits for marine farming granted between 1 June 1995 and 1 August 2003. The bill will also revive consents for aquaculture that have already technically lapsed.

The provision relating to lifting the moratorium by Order in Council in specific areas now requires the Minister to make a recommendation within 40 working-days of receiving a request from the relevant regional council. It is likely that the extension of the moratorium will result in more use being made of the early expiry provisions. Those provisions are an important part of the transitional arrangements to the new aquaculture regime. Early expiry provides a route for councils to fold existing planning provisions, where these are suitable, into plans in the new regime. They also provide for the release of space for development.

This bill allows time for the main reforms to be completed when there is more clarity around issues in the marine environment. To do that, the bill extends the moratorium until the end of December 2004. It also reinstates permits lapsed due to problems in the dual permitting required for aquaculture development, and extends the time frame for decisions by the Minister of Conservation with regard to the early expiry of the moratorium.

I assure the House that, although I can give no ironclad commitment because of other factors occurring contemporaneously, I will give every endeavour to ensuring no consideration will be necessary for any further extension of this moratorium. I commend the bill to the House.

It is interesting, is it not, that when the moratorium was put in place over 2 years ago, the issue was all about a race for space. Lots of aquaculturalists saw an opportunity and wanted to gain space in the marine area. It was a race for space. Now, the issue has become one of space for race. We know that the Government is doing a deal with some Māori to give them 20 percent of the marine farming areas. It is about space for race—a deal done on the cheap at the expense of all New Zealanders. That is what the issue is all about, and we are pointing that out to the House today. It was about a race for space; now it is space for race.

Interestingly, I put this question to the former Minister on 29 July 2003: “Is he going to extend the 2-year moratorium on new marine-farming consents in light of the submissions made by Māori over seabed and beach ownership …?”. I asked him whether he was going to extend the moratorium over the issue of seabed and beach ownership, and the Minister came back to me and said: “As I told the marine-farming industry—”

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson): I am sorry to interrupt the honourable member. Can I say to members that there is nothing wrong with robust debate; that is part and parcel of the House. But I also say to them that they should refer to Speaker’s ruling 56/1. Interjections are to be rare, reasonable, and relevant. Any member can seek the next call if he or she wishes, but running commentaries are out of order.

Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker, for your consideration. This is what the former Minister said when I asked him whether he was going to extend the moratorium because of what had happened over the seabed and foreshore issue. The former Minister said: “my aim is to avoid any extension …, and I expect to know in a few weeks whether I will succeed.” He did not succeed in that. That comment was made back in July last year. The former Minister did not succeed, and the moratorium has been extended now for another 9 months. Aquaculture is on the back-burner. The Minister is doing deals that New Zealanders know nothing about, and we are seeing new marine farms go overseas.

Marine farms are shifting. We are seeing headlines like this: “Further delay on new marine farms”, and like this: “Marine farmers threaten to go overseas”. Farmers are well past making threats now; marine farms are going overseas. “Aquaculture delays will cost millions.”, as another marine farmer said to the Primary Production Committee. We have seen the special select committee set up by the Labour Government in order to avoid this whole issue. I am sitting on that select committee, and I say that it will end up being a shambles because Labour Party members have decided for some reason that they will cause a diversion and set up a special select committee, when the whole issue could be dealt with through the fisheries law, regional council law, and a different select committee.

Interestingly, we saw this article in the newspaper late last year, which I will reread to the House. The line I am interested in reads: “It is also expected that any deal on the foreshore and seabed will include giving Māori a share of the aquaculture industry.” I do not know, because the Minister of Fisheries has not told me—and he certainly has not told the rest of New Zealand—how he is to decide how much of the marine farming area he will gift to Māori. He has not decided how to measure how much he will gift to Māori, and in failing to do so, he has not told us whether he believes Māori own the foreshore and seabed. But I would have thought that if the Minister is to give Māori marine farming areas, in effect he is acknowledging that they own the foreshore and seabed. So one wonders why, if the Government is to give Māori 20 percent of the space, it does not give them the whole lot. That is the obvious argument and where the issue is heading.

When the moratorium was first set up, over 2 years ago, I was interested to be introduced to a number of Māori submitters. In fact, a high proportion of the 143 submissions we had were from Māori, and they raised several issues at that time. One issue was that the moratorium would have negative impacts on their development—and nothing has changed. They said the water within their rohe was of concern—and nothing has changed there; that still is of concern. Then they said that there would be adverse effects on the existing treaty settlements. Nothing has changed there with regard to the moratorium now. Māori also said back then that the 2-year moratorium needed to be opposed because there were issues to do with the ownership of the seabed and foreshore. That was 2 years ago. Māori submitters opposed the moratorium then. Nothing has changed, so they should be opposing the moratorium now.

But the seabed and foreshore issue is not the only one that is locked up in the whole moratorium extension. It is not the only reason that the handbrakes have been put on. There is also the issue of regional councils struggling to make any headway at all on aquaculture management areas, because the Ministry of Fisheries has not provided them with enough information. In fact, in this paper I tabled last year, regional councils stated this: “There is an inability to plan for aquaculture management areas in the absence of essential fisheries-related information held by the Minister of Fisheries, along with the gaps and inadequacies in that information.”

Further, they stated: “The use of a moratorium is a blunt and inflexible management tool, such that no new aquaculture activities can commence until aquaculture management areas are created.” That is a damning report.

I was concerned enough about that report to actually contact the former Minister through official channels and ask him about the new moratorium extension. I was concerned enough about the first 2-year moratorium, let alone the extension of the moratorium, to do that. I said he had not made any progress in 2 years, and asked him what made him think he would make any progress in the next 9 months. I asked what extra resourcing, if any, he would put in place to ensure that the ministry completed the reforms and other required tasks during the 9-month moratorium extension on new marine farm areas. That was a simple question. The former Minister was extending the moratorium for 9 months because he had made no progress in 2 years, so I asked whether he was going to chuck some more resources at the issue so we could get the job done. His reply was: “At this point”—and let us remember he had had 2 years to think about the issue—“I do not consider it necessary to make additional resources available to complete the aquacultural reforms before the expiry of the moratorium. The moratorium extension was necessary because of the unexpected complication of the foreshore and seabed issue, and the Waitangi Tribunal Ahu Moana report that delayed the development of the aquaculture legislation.”

The reality is that the Minister of Fisheries is not putting any resources into this moratorium at all. We will not see aquaculture management areas or the seabed and foreshore legislation resolved in the next 9 months, and in 9 months’ time we will be debating a further extension to the moratorium because no progress has been made. If we do not debate a further extension we will simply go back to the situation that we were at 2 years ago, where there was cumbersome legislation defining the aquaculture industry. There has been little progress since then.

National opposes this bill; we certainly will be voting against it. The Government should get on with making public the aquaculture reforms, so that regional councils are not flying in the dark any more when trying to manage aquaculture. Although the Government says that the intention of the delay is to enable more clarity around the foreshore and seabed issue, it should still be communicating with regional councils. We have no confidence that 9 months will be sufficient time to resolve the foreshore and seabed issue, particularly since the Prime Minister says that the legislation on that matter will not come into the House until after May. The Government has no time to enact the aquaculture reform legislation, and it has no time to help regional councils to plan for aquaculture management areas. There is not a dog’s show that what the Minister plans to do in the next 9 months will happen, and I say that the foreshore and seabed legislation and the deals done there are what is holding the whole process up.

I stand here to comment on that honourable member’s statement in the introduction of his speech to the House. He made what I consider to be an entirely inappropriate statement. He said something about space for race, and a race for space. I think that was entirely inappropriate, on the basis that it was not a race for space that actually generated the debate when one is talking about the foreshore and seabed, or about aquaculture and the extension of the moratorium. The debate was about space for race. If that member was honest and had any sense of integrity about what he said, he would admit in this House that it was actually the issue of space for race that ignited the whole debate that we are presently engaged in.

I need to clarify for that speaker that Māori were not participants in the space for race. There was a non-Māori monopoly on the licences granted for aquaculture space in Marlborough. I think that distinction needs to be made. It is already an absolutely proven fact.

💬 Dr Lynda Scott: It was 30 percent.

Yes, but Māori have been forced to buy space, rather than being granted a licence.

💬 Dr Lynda Scott: But it was only 30 percent.

If that member cares to debate the issue with the district council in her own area maybe she will be in a position to make a statement, rather than misleading this House with what I consider to be throwaway lines based on space for race. That is entirely unacceptable, and it shows the level of debate that is coming from the Opposition. All that that does is try to reinforce an agenda and continue the issues that we are fronting at the moment. My rating of that particular presentation would be a zero out of 10—there is no doubt about that.

That is my brief commentary on this issue. I do not see that space for race or a race for space has any relevancy to this debate, and I commend the Government’s move with regard to the extension of the moratorium.

Last night, and again now, I just wondered what a Carroll, a Ngata, or a Buck—all of the same persuasion of a party on my right—or a Ben Couch, a Duncan MacIntyre, or other Ministers of Māori Affairs in past National Party administrations, would think of present-day members talking about “dirty deals” for Māori, a “space-for-race” deal, and last night “throwing a bone at Māori”. Again, I ask my National Party friends where they are really going, because if they are people seeking an answer, for David Carter and others from the far reaches of Canterbury, there is an answer, and it is the New Zealand First answer. With regard to the issues of the seabed and foreshore upon which aquaculture is placed, we stated in June last year that this party stands for Crown ownership of the seabed and foreshore, with customary use yesterday, today, and for the future.

When that party over there comes to accept the reality of that position, and this party over here realises that that is the only answer, then, and only then, will the aquaculture reforms, which were so bravely announced in 2000, be really advanced. The sooner this House comes to that understanding the better, because the real issue in the House with regard to aquaculture is not the Māori issue. It is really the inability, the unwillingness, or the ill-preparedness of the Government with regard to aquaculture.

Let me refresh the Government’s mind about the brave new thinking of 2000, when Minister Hodgson released a discussion document describing “an important step in aquaculture.” He said: “I have no doubt that much of the growth in the fisheries sector will flow from investment in aquaculture in the innovative use of resources and new technology. I am encouraging further development along these lines because it will benefit the entire economy, particularly regional economies in which I have a special interest. The Government is committed to sustainable development of our natural resources by ensuring that economic, environmental, and social interests are considered together and not separately.”

Then he went on to talk about the ocean policy. Where is that? He said: “In terms of aquaculture there is a need for Government to provide a legal framework that can support sustainable development without undermining the rights of other fishers or allowing undue adverse impacts on the aquatic environment.” Those were brave words in October 2000. It was a brave Minister setting out in bold graphic terms the overall purpose and challenge identified by the Government. Where are we in 2004? We are here discussing the inability of the present Government to get on with the job. Over and over again, and one by one, submitters expressed that point of view to Government members in the Primary Production Committee.

The purpose of the first moratorium—so-called—was to provide time for aquaculture reform to take place, and for local authorities, both regional and unitary councils, to make aquaculture plans leading on to plan variation and plan changes. Finally, and accordingly, its purpose was to allow resource consents to be advanced with certainty as to what the reform process meant, and advanced with certainty as to the zone areas able to be farmed. That was the intention of the first moratorium. I have to say that as far as the Minister of Fisheries is concerned, he would not know whether that status is there now. After hearing his ministerial statement, I have some doubts whether he really understands the ramifications of the bill before us.

Submitters came to the select committee very concerned about the delay. They were particularly disappointed with the low flow of information from the Ministry of Fisheries and the Department of Conservation. One particular submitter—Cullum McCallum from the Auckland region—said that, effectively, an 18-year moratorium was already there. We know that, and I mentioned it yesterday in the Committee. As far as they were concerned, that was but another added distraction to be unwillingly considered.

That submitter and others were particularly concerned about the viability of the present development—an issue that had been raised by other members in the House. There was the matter of justice for the present permit-holder who had developed an aquaculture consent. If that person, or those persons, or those companies, should be subject to competitive tender in the future, then what was their future in the new zones that were set out?

Another submitter—a large one from the South Island—raised the issue of the cost of significant investments, and the need for clarity and certainty about that. The Minister for Small Business over there should know exactly what that is about, and he should be doing his part to ensure there is clarity for small businesses and other businesses.

💬 Hon David Carter: He’s making big businesses smaller. He’s doing a good job.

Yes, far better than going around and having some fuzzy-wuzzy talks, he should get down to practical action and see what can be done.

There has been concern, particularly from regional councils, about the lack of fisheries information from the Ministry of Fisheries. They are concerned that there appears to be inadequate research. Most of all, I am personally concerned about the inactive role of the Minister of Conservation and the Department of Conservation—a role that is an essential core component of any fishing permit.

I quote from a recent resource consent for Pegasus Bay, where a most surprising and unique theme was advanced by the Department of Conservation. At that hearing, a departmental officer said that because there was no information about the site, the application should be declined, and she spoke at some length on that. It was a very circular argument, because it meant that no farm can be established in an area where farms were absent, because the adverse effects of farming cannot be adequately assessed. If that is the attitude of the Department of Conservation with regard to that consent, there must be genuine fears in this House about its role in the future.

My concern about the Minister of Conservation and the Department of Conservation is that despite what has been said by Mr Heatley, at least one regional council in this country took the Minister at his word at the very beginning of the so-called moratorium. The Northland Regional Council understood—and I will say again that the third round of consultation is taking place right now—that the disturbance in relation to the local coastal community over the siting of any marine farm was likely to be great. Therefore, the greater the degree of understanding and the greater the amount of information about the impacts, the better for our community.

Despite what has been said in the House, that is another reason for New Zealand First to support this bill. This bill enables an enterprising and ongoing regional council that has met the conditions of the aquaculture management areas, and defined them, to have use of an early expiry of the date set down in the bill. I think that only one or two councils are in that position.

To conclude, we have a very unusual situation. First, we have been promised three times in the House that at the end of the moratorium there will be the ability to make further progress on aquaculture. There is no feeling around the traps that that optimism will be sustained, yet out there is an industry willing and able to go. The world demands for this industry are so great. The $220 million that was returned for mussels alone last year could be doubled and tripled with ease over the next decade.

It is most important for places like Northland, the East Coast, and the West Coast that the deep-ocean technologies allow that money to be earned now, and it should be. Last year The Economist spoke about marine farming as the “new food harvest of the future”. Last week marine farms were referred to in Northland as the “orchards of the ocean”. That potential income and those jobs can be realised and a long-term sustainable, sensitive industry developed, but they need that Minister who has just spoken recently, and his Government, to realise that that development should take place from 1 January 2005.

The Green Party supports the extension of the moratorium. I note that most of the other members who have spoken seem to believe that the extension of the moratorium represents a problem in some way. While I see their point of view, it is also a reality that we can see the extension of the moratorium as an opportunity for the Government and regional councils.

There has been much talk about the race for space—which is why the original moratorium was put in place—and the complication of the foreshore and seabed issue that is being debated publicly at the moment. If we look at the extension of the moratorium as an opportunity, we can appreciate the complexity of what aquaculture is all about. It is not just about people occupying space and making money. It is about a natural ecosystem that is being interfered with by humans. We need to spend time and money looking at research into the effects of marine farming.

If the Government got off its backside and very rapidly put at least a draft of the main aquaculture reform legislation out to the community, regional councils at least would be able to say that those are the kinds of areas they want to put into their aquaculture management areas, and it would allow them the time to do baseline surveys. What happens at the moment is that an individual company, or an individual person, says: “I’m going to put a marine farm here. This looks like an appropriate area.” They do their impact research on the local environment, and they get a resource consent, or not, on the basis of that information.

Further, if we are to extend aquaculture management areas in the future, we need to know what is there at the moment—in other words, in its undisturbed state—so that we can look back subsequently and say that is the impact that marine farms have had. In terms of cumulative impact, no reports have been done. No long-term longitudinal studies have been done on the impact of marine farming on the marine ecosystem.

There is also the question of the rubbish generated by marine farms, and that is a very real issue. I take my hat off to companies in the Marlborough Sounds—in particular, Sanford’s, which has recognised that rubbish from marine farms is a major issue. Floats break free, little pieces of rope are cut off in the harvesting process, and they tend to drift ashore and accumulate on beaches. To Sanford’s credit, it has adopted beaches, and encouraged members of the community to adopt beaches, and they have done clean-ups. But it is an issue that we have to look at, and we have that opportunity right now. If we know where the aquaculture management areas are likely to be, we can do baseline studies and find out what the situation is now before an aquaculture industry is developed.

There is also the opportunity to look at the interrelationship, or creative tension, between competing users of space. These are not just marine farmers, but boaties, recreational fisher people, and people who go to live in areas like the Marlborough Sounds for the natural beauty of the place and simply do not like to have their view disturbed. There are varying views on that, of course. Some people think that the busyness of a view adds to it. However, the residents of a particular area certainly have the right to be heard.

There is also the impact of marine farms on zooplankton and phytoplankton, the nutrient sources for the mussels; also the argument that mussels, by eating the phytoplankton, are not actually taking away a resource but creating a light space so that more phytoplankton can grow, thereby creating their own food. But we simply do not know what the long-term impacts are.

💬 Dr Lynda Scott: We do. Look at the Scottish study and the Tasmania study.

That is precisely it—look at the Tasmanian studies and the Scottish studies. What I am talking about is looking at the New Zealand studies. We have in New Zealand a unique species that grows nowhere else in the world. We need to do the baseline studies that have not been done, and we now have the opportunity to do them.

The Greens support the passage of this bill. I suspect, though, that my colleague Phil Heatley may be correct in that we will be having another debate on precisely this issue before December this year. That will be when the Minister discovers that a 9-month extension is simply not sufficient for regional councils to do the work required, and for marine farmers to adapt themselves to the upcoming aquaculture reforms.

Before commending the bill to the House for its third reading, I want to take issue with a number of assertions made by the member for Whangarei in his third reading speech. It is right in this House that we have scrutiny of the highest standard, and that robust accountability and transparency is asked for. It is not right when we are disingenuous in respect of a bunch of Kiwis solely because they are Māori, and that member went a tad too far today—as did his leader. We should lift our debate a bit and start to acknowledge that we have to start to move this thing forward. The comments made were not the best of comments, and I expect better from the member for Whangarei.

Inevitably, when aquaculture marine areas are declared in terms of space, it is obviously a proprietary interest that is granted, and just as people staked their claims in the days of the gold rush, so too that has occurred here. We therefore have to be very reserved and very reflective about the way proprietary interests in the coastal domain are handed out and applied, notwithstanding an industry on the cusp of being a sunrise industry, which aquaculture is. We acknowledge that.

I commend my colleague the Minister of Fisheries and members on this side of the House for a number of infrastructure things we have had to address. This is another infrastructural issue, and it is much the same as other areas we have had to clear up, such as telecommunications, electricity, transport, information and communication technology, and the roll out of broadband. It is this Labour Government that has had to put in huge effort to set in place prudent, appropriate infrastructure that allows fairness to all—not just to the big end of town that Dr Brash and his colleagues represent. I commend this legislation to the House.

I think it is of some significance to Parliament to note that on the Resource Management (Aquaculture Moratorium Extension) Amendment Bill the Government takes the opportunity to bring the Minister for Small Business, the Hon John Tamihere, from his parliamentary Beehive office to speak about this industry. And that is exactly what is happening with this legislation. There are some sizable companies throughout New Zealand, significantly those based in areas like Banks Peninsula, the Marlborough Sounds, and right up around the Northland area. These are large businesses, but because of the continual imposition of a moratorium that stops them from expanding, we will see them become small businesses and therefore come under the control and responsibility of that Minister, the Minister for Small Business. The industry needs to note that it is Mr John Tamihere who has been asked to make a contribution in the debate on this bill today.

I want to start my debate by noting that this legislation is now in the name of the new Minister of Fisheries, the Hon David Benson-Pope. I realise it is unlikely that in time to come historians will bother to study the parliamentary career of the Hon David Benson-Pope, but, if they are so inclined, I want them to note that the very first legislation this Minister passed into law after becoming the Minister of Fisheries was not legislation to help fishing but to stop it. So the proud record of the Hon David Benson-Pope will be that his first legislation through the House was legislation that stopped an industry from expanding.

For 5 long years now we have heard this Government pay lip service to the need for economic growth. We know that the Prime Minister stood in this House and spoke about the need to lift New Zealand back into the top half of the OECD. At the time she had a time frame of 10 years, and half of that time has now expired. During the Committee stage I asked the Hon David Benson-Pope whether he would rise and explain how this bill in any way at all helped New Zealand lift its growth rate.

What did he say?

The Minister sat silent. He had not actually thought about that, and the officials had not briefed him. But deep down he must know that this legislation did nothing to help New Zealand’s growth. In fact, it does completely the opposite: it inhibits a very vital industry.

We heard in the earlier stages of the bill’s passage through the House that aquaculture had the potential to be a billion-dollar industry. The green-lipped mussel is particular to New Zealand. Currently it is worth over $200 million in exports to this country, which puts it on the same footing as the New Zealand wine industry. We know the reputation and success the New Zealand wine industry has had. Our wine products are in demand all around the world, and here we have another industry, the green-lipped mussel industry, which is just as valuable to this country. The industry wants to expand. We are experts at growing green-lipped mussels. We have the ability to expand. We have the ability to lift our export earnings from this particular species. So what does the Government do to assist? It throws on a further moratorium, saying there are a lot of problems around issues to do with the seabed and foreshore and therefore it is imposing a moratorium to stop people from progressing and expanding their businesses if they are involved in aquaculture.

The job of any Government is to govern. That is the fundamental job a Government should do. Problems and concerns will come along and present a challenge to a Government, and the very thing that should not be done is what the previous Minister of Fisheries did. He has now been fired, so at least we have his scalp, and soon we will be looking for the next one—that of David Benson-Pope. But the previous Minister, the great Labour Party strategist, said: “We don’t know how to handle the issue. We’ll impose a moratorium.” But he did one further thing when imposing that moratorium. He gave a cast-iron guarantee to Parliament that under no circumstances would that moratorium, due to expire on 25 March, be required to be extended. Here we are on 17 March—1 week before the expiry of the current moratorium that Pete Hodgson guaranteed under no circumstances would require extension—rushing more legislation through that extends the moratorium for a further 4 months. That man, Pete Hodgson, has a huge amount of apologising to do to the fishing industry. The industry is delighted that he has been sacked as the Minister because he was hopeless. He will go down in history—

💬 Hon John Tamihere: Ha, ha!

John Tamihere laughs! That man, Pete Hodgson, was the man who thought up the flatulence tax. It was his idea. Does Mr Tamihere remember that? We had 2,000 farmers protest on the steps of Parliament, and under that sort of pressure Mr Pete Hodgson had to do another U-turn and acknowledge that taxing every sheep and cow in New Zealand was a rather silly idea. I see that Mr Tamihere agrees with that, and he should also agree with the other point I am about to make—that is, to impose a moratorium on a potential $1 billion industry is also a very silly idea.

However, I want to go back to my point about the requirement for an extension of the moratorium. Shortly I will discuss why it is happening, but I want to state on record that the current bill we are debating today extends the moratorium for a further 9 months, and we have had guarantees from the Government that a further extension beyond 31 December this calendar year will not be required. I say to Government members that I bet they do not have a solution to the issues around aquaculture and its expansion by the end of this calendar year.

💬 Jim Peters: I hope the member is wrong.

I certainly hope that I am wrong, too, but I guarantee that I am not. Before the end of this calendar year the Government’s solution will be to rush a further moratorium extension bill into the House and further delay this industry.

During the submission process some tremendous submissions were presented to us, but one that I remember—and I want the Government to take note of this one—was from a man called Mr Brad Govan, who manages Pacifica Seafoods. He came along to the select committee and said that he was desperate to expand his business. He had worked all his life in aquaculture so he had a huge amount of knowledge and managerial skill. He told the select committee that he had offers from both South America and Australia to take his skills off shore and establish aquaculture there. That did not seem to ring a chord with Labour members around the select committee, but it did with me. Why do we encourage capable, wealth-creating New Zealanders to consider taking their enterprises offshore? That is nuts. Those people should have the ability to operate in New Zealand, and this moratorium does not achieve that.

I want to conclude by saying that until the Labour Government sorts out the seabed and foreshore issues, there will be no resolution to the issues around aquaculture. Mr Phil Heatley used the words about the race for space fast becoming a space for race. Some of the Māori members have taken exception to that, but that is exactly the issue.

💬 Mahara Okeroa: No, it’s not the issue.

Mr Mahara Okeroa disagrees. He appears in Parliament so infrequently it is sometimes difficult to remember his name. Mr Okeroa says that it is not about that issue. The Government should resolve the seabed and foreshore issue, because until that is done it will not progress aquaculture in this country.

I rise in support of the third reading of this bill. It has the technical effect of extending the moratorium, as has been debated, from the end of March until the end of December this year. The Government has been quite honest and open in acknowledging that it would have preferred to have the issue resolved sooner, but what is more important to us is to get this issue right. The Minister has said that, and the other Government speakers, the Hon John Tamihere and Mahara Okeroa, have said that. It is important that we get the legislation right so that it does deliver for ordinary New Zealanders. The only thing I regret is the continued use of race by National Party members. It reflects very poorly on them.

I rise on behalf of the ACT party to oppose this bill. I have to say that, personally, it gives me no joy at all to speak in this debate. In fact, a debate like this makes me ashamed to be a member of Parliament, because this bill is a fraud. This bill is trying to signal to the whole marine farming industry that a moratorium will be lifted by the end of December this year. Every single member of this Parliament knows that that is a lie. The Government knows that it is a lie, yet it is forcing this Parliament to pass this blatantly false bill. In the time that I have been in Parliament I cannot remember having actually to do what I am doing now, which is to speak on a bill that is not true. This moratorium will not be lifted by December of this year. This moratorium will continue on for, probably, years and years. The Labour Government is trying to pretend to everyone who is involved, everybody who has aspirations for marine farming in New Zealand, that at some stage in the not too distant future those aspirations can be realised. That is an absolute, abject lie.

The moratorium was brought in a couple of years ago because the Government panicked when a whole lot of people decided that the marine industry had opportunities for them. There was a whole rush of applications, with many of them from Māori, who saw that this industry provided opportunities for them. The Government, faced with this rush of applications, panicked. Instead of just putting in place processes to deal with it, it put in place this moratorium, which was meant to last for 2 years and to run out on 25 March. The Government has now panicked again, and has brought in this bill, which extends the moratorium to 31 December 2004, but we all know there is absolutely no way that that deadline can be held to. I take exception at the new Minister of Fisheries, Mr Benson-Pope, who spoke at the beginning of this debate, saying in effect: “I give my word that there will be no further extension.” That Minister should learn that he should not start his career as a Minister by making promises that he knows will have to be broken. His reputation will be tarred because this Government has no intention at all of lifting the moratorium by the end of this year.

When the Government goes even further down in the polls, and tries to blame everyone else, it can look to its own record of broken promises and U-turns to give it some inkling as to why the New Zealand public is now losing confidence in the Labour Government. The reality is that the foreshore and seabed debacle, which is probably the biggest constitutional problem that New Zealand has faced in recent history, has been caused by the Labour Government. When faced with that problem, which arose through the Court of Appeal ruling, it decided it would use the opportunity to further appease Māori, to try to buy their vote at the next election. It had not realised that that would push its whole thrust towards trying to secure the Māori vote past a tipping point. When New Zealanders woke up to the fact that Labour had now become a very unfair Government because it was trying to push privilege too far in one direction, like the possum caught in the headlights this Labour Government panicked. From then on we have seen U-turns on the foreshore and seabed issue, and a whole bunch of lies as the Government tries to correct where it has gone just too far.

The best thing this Labour Government could have done as it entered this debate was to come clean with Parliament and the people of New Zealand, and simply say it was now caught up in difficult issues. It should have said that this bill would extend the moratorium, and that, unfortunately, we would probably have to look to extend it into next year or even beyond. If it had done that, I believe that it would have earned some respect, not only from members of Parliament but also from the public. Instead, it continues to spin its way out, but, as we all know, in politics these things do come round and bite one.

The problem too is that the Minister said in his introductory comments that this bill would bring greater certainty to the industry. Again, those words are simply smothered in snake oil. This bill does anything but bring certainty to the industry. If we look at what industry needs, we realise that certainty is absolutely essential, but it also needs honesty from the Government, and it needs to know that the Government understands what it takes to run successful businesses and to have people make business investments. It is no wonder that businesses in New Zealand do not trust Labour.

💬 Hon John Tamihere: They don’t trust you.

The Minister for Small Business got up a few minutes ago and made some statements that were absolute rubbish. The point is that the reputation of this Government as an anti-business Government is growing and it will continue. The small-business sector, which is faced with the new challenges that the industrial relations law reforms will bring this year, believes that this Government knows nothing about running business. Many New Zealanders who work for those small-business companies are losing faith, as well. If I recall, one of the latest polls shows that Labour is losing the support of ordinary-bloke workers, who have always supported Labour, but have now decided that this Government cannot be trusted.

The aquaculture industry is currently worth hundreds of millions of dollars to New Zealand. The potential, I understand, was for that industry to grow to $2 billion by the year 2020, if it were allowed to continue to expand, to grow, to develop, and so on. It is a shame when a Government panics, because what happens is that, firstly, an industry cannot grow and achieve its potential, and secondly, the players in the industry—the business people who have put their investment into the industry—face disruption, conflict, and losses because of the uncertainty that has been brought upon them by this Government. I would like to express my sorrow to that industry. It is unfortunate that the marine farming industry has the worst Government that it could possibly have chosen.

But I would also like to extend my sympathy to the regional councils up and down this country, which have been consulting, in a genuine way, over aquaculture marine areas, as they were asked to do. They have been misled by the Labour Government, because Labour should have told them late last year, when the foreshore and seabed debacle came about, that they need not bother consulting right then, because that debacle would put everything further back. Instead, this Government has allowed them to waste their money, and ratepayers’ time and money as well.

National will not be supporting the extension to the moratorium. Listening to John Tamihere, I have to say that he reminded me of the Norah Jones’ song, “Sunrise, Sunset”. The marine farming and aquaculture industry used to be a sunrise industry, but this Government has done its absolute best to turn it into a sunset industry—just like the Norah Jones song. That is what it has done to this industry. The reason the moratorium is not expiring on 25 March and is being extended for 9 months is that the Government could not get its act together. It could not get the aquaculture law reform legislation into any shape or form.

We have to remember that Marlborough is an area where Mahara Okeroa said Māori could not get involved in marine farming. That is completely incorrect. Māori own 30 percent of marine farms in Marlborough; 17 percent of those employed in the industry are Māori, compared with 11 percent in all other industries. Māori are more involved in this industry than in any other. It is not because they have had handouts or special privileges; it is because they have got in there and footed it with everybody else, and they have done extremely well. This Government’s patronising attitude to Māori has to stop. It tells Māori they are sick; it tells Māori they cannot do things without special privileges. I say they can, and this is a very good example of how they can do it. Māori own 30 percent of the marine farms in Marlborough, and they did not need a patronising Government to get them into the farms.

Aquaculture law reform has become totally and utterly bogged down. This business creates regional development. If we want to get this country going and have jobs for the people, then we want marine farming. I agree it used to be a race for space, because a whole lot of people wanted to get into it. But now this Government is going to pass the management of aquaculture areas down to the regional councils. That is like everything else it does. It passed health on to the district health boards and washed its hands of it. Sorting out aquaculture management areas will be passed on to the regional councils.

I do not believe that the Government has got itself into a position to handle the new aquaculture law reform. I believe we will see another extension to this moratorium, because this Government has not been able to manage this issue. Havelock, in my electorate, was full of empty shops and empty hopes 15 years ago, and now it is the thriving heart of the greenshell mussel industry. We will not see that happen around the rest of the country in places like Opotiki and in all those other areas that could be thriving with this sort of industry. But in Havelock we have work, we have new homes, we have an expanding marina, we have restaurants, and we have a sense of vibrancy—all because of an industry that was growing at 20 percent per annum. However, it is now stalled at the starting gates of the 21st century. It is stalled because this Government is bogged down by bureaucracy, by this moratorium that is now being extended because of the seabed and foreshore issues, by Environment Court hearings, by consultation, by the Resource Management Act—and the list goes on.

We heard Ian Ewen-Street talking before about how we do not know what the environmental effects are. Greenshell mussels are the only endemic species we farm, and we have had reports from Scotland and Tasmania showing that although there is a minor effect under the farm, outside the farm area there is very little effect. Let me give members an example of what this industry is facing. The latest, extremely expensive imposition on the industry is the Fisheries Resource Impact Assessment, otherwise known as a “FRIA”, to investigate the impact of marine farming on the environment. It cost the industry $170,000 to do that for just one bay, and basically it told us nothing more than what we knew from the Australian and Scottish reports. That was $170,000 imposed on the industry. I wish the Minister for Small Business had talked about some of those impositions and costs on businesses in New Zealand. The men and women who forged this industry—people like Jim Jessop, who went out and forged it into a sunrise, not sunset, industry—have absolutely had enough of the bureaucracy surrounding it today. Marine farmers are enmeshed in these treaty settlement obligations.

My friend Phil Heatley, the MP for Whangarei—and who will be the Minister of Fisheries in the next National Government—talked about the “space for race”, because that is one of the issues that is bogging down aquaculture law reform. This Government has not been able to deal to the foreshore and seabed issue of how much space will be allocated to Māori in aquaculture management areas. That “space for race” issue has not been sorted out, and it is one of the major reasons that aquaculture law reform is being held up, and why this moratorium has been extended. Then we get to the resource consents process—and thank goodness, for this is the only part of the bill I would support, because it would allow consents to be grandparented, and to go through. Can members imagine what people in the industry who have a small marine farm have to go through, with all the complicated problems involved in getting resource consent? The Minister, when he took a call, said that the process had blown out a bit. Blown out a bit? Marine farmers have only 2 years before their resource consents lapse, and the Ministry of Fisheries cannot manage to get around to giving them a fisheries permit. Can members imagine the frustration of those people who have gone through the resource management consent process and are waiting to get their permit? Two hundred people are waiting for fisheries permits. Of those, 100 have expired resource consents because they have been waiting for over 2 years.

To add insult to injury, what do Ministry of Fisheries officials do? If people ring up to ask why their livelihood is going down the gurgler, they are charged 200 bucks an hour for the privilege. That is how this Government works. It does not understand the needs of people in the industry. Marine farming had export earnings of only $25 million in 1989, but earned $260 million in 2002. We have 900 farms occupying 5,500 hectares, and that has produced 4,000 jobs. This industry—of which greenshell mussels make up 65 percent, with national sales of $220 million—could earn $1 billion by 2020. That is $1 billion for New Zealand, but we have had 5 years of a Labour Government that has sat on its hands and has not organised the aquaculture law reform legislation. So tonight we are debating, yet again, another extension to the moratorium, because the Government has not managed to get the new law reform in place.

The industry really wants this aquaculture law reform. It wants the process simplified; it does not want the two-consent process. But it can no longer support the tortuous, convoluted process that has been proposed, as the development of aquaculture management areas has become a bureaucratic nightmare. The only way we could actually see a change is to have a change of Government, and a change of Minister to someone who understands the industry and can sort this mess out, because 5 years of Labour Government has not done that.

💬 Hon Mark Burton: We haven’t had 5 years yet.

Well, it is getting close—it feels much longer than that. It has been 5 long years, and it has been so boring. We are turning a sunrise industry into a sunset industry, as Australia and Chile get out there and capture our markets.

A member opposite said: “Oh, boring”, but I say to him that it is not boring to the men and women of New Zealand who have put their livelihoods and functions into this industry. Terry Schwass, from the New Zealand Marine Farming Association, who helped set up Queen Charlotte College’s course in marine farming—a great guy—said: “Well done politicians and bureaucrats. You have brought a once viable and vibrant industry to a standstill.” That is what this Government has done. Under National, the industry was thriving, vibrant, and moving forward, with 20 percent growth in the 1990s. Now it has 0 percent growth, and this Government cannot deny that. If it wants the unemployment rate—which during the 1990s continued to decrease—to stay down, and if it wants jobs, then it has to do something about this industry, instead of having a moratorium that stops its development.

I want to take a reasonably brief call in this third reading of the bill. Before doing so, I say that I think the previous speaker made some of the most outrageous statements I have ever heard in the House, in relation to a number of issues. One issue was the “space for race”. If there was a race for space, and space for race, back in the time when National was in Government, then Māori were not even at the start line. They would not even have had a look in. I think that the member forgot that.

The next issue is that there really is a race for space in this particular industry, and that is the very reason the moratorium bill was applied 2 years ago. The esteemed member for Whangarei, Phil Heatley, was a member of the Primary Production Committee at that time, and he probably still is. The previous speaker stated that Mr Heatley would probably be the next Minister of Fisheries, which is totally outrageous—and I think that he, and the people of the north, agree with me.

Mr Heatley sat on that select committee, and he is well aware of why the moratorium was necessary. The moratorium was probably described as a blunt instrument, but had his party been vigilant in the 9 years it was in Government, it would not have been necessary to apply this sort of instrument to a very important industry. National went to sleep on the job. The industry developed to the extent that our environment—in particular, the Marlborough Sounds—was under threat from development, particularly in the choking of waterways. Name it, and it was happening in that industry.

Of course, marine farmers wanted to just proceed, pillage, plunder, develop, not take too much notice of the Resource Management Act requirements, not have much concern about the environment, and just keep going. The Minister at the time, the Hon Pete Hodgson—although he has a lookalike in the House at the present time—made the decision to apply a moratorium, and that is why we have it in place. It is necessary to extend it because a number of other issues have compounded this matter. I am sure that the previous speaker will appreciate that.

As for Māori in the industry opposing this moratorium, I think members of the select committee will recall that a number of Māori organisations had lodged applications with regional councils, having made quite a large financial commitment in terms of developing their farms. They were seeking some flexibility from the Government to allow them to proceed. That was the only issue those people had. I think that the statements made in the House this evening were pretty incorrect.

💬 Jim Peters: That’s just not true. That was wrong.

The member who interrupted was not even in Parliament at the time. That is how outrageous that member is. In fact, a lot of his own people from up north were appreciative of the time given, through this moratorium, to allow them to develop so they could get up to the start line. He was not even in this House at that time. That is all I have to say about this matter.

I want to make a contribution to the debate on the Resource Management (Aquaculture Moratorium Extension) Amendment Bill. There are three or four important points that I need to make. The first thing is, as has been said in this House by previous speakers, it is an absolute disgrace that we are here discussing this bill right now, given that we were given an absolute assurance when the bill was introduced that this Government would sort the whole mess out in 2 years. It said it would need 2 years. I distinctly remember the Minister at the time—

Pete Hodgson gave his word.

It was about the only thing he could give, because he has nothing else to give—and that obviously did not work, either. The point is that it has been 2 years, and what has happened? Nothing! Absolutely nothing! Now the Government is saying that it needs another 9 months. I am happy to wager that we will be back here in 9 months’ time debating another extension. We will be taking up the time of the House, using taxpayers’ money, and having to listen to my colleagues like Phil Heatley explain why this should not be happening, at the same time as the Government is determined to ram this sort of stuff through. It is just not good enough. It is not good governance. It is deplorable.

It’s not governance, at all.

It is not governance at all, as my colleague David Carter says.

There are a couple of issues that I have not heard anyone mention, and I want to bring them into the debate. We are now seeing in regions like Northland—and, indeed, across the country—as part of this move, regional councils going around advertising and having meetings about things called “AMAs”. I had a group of people come into the constituency clinic in Kaitaia on Monday. Those people were quite perturbed. They had brought in maps showing what had been proposed by the regional council. I must say that the council had tried, under quite difficult circumstances, to do its best with the issue, but the problem is that councils are not getting support from the Government. The major concern is that aquaculture management areas are being advertised as “AMAs”, because that is what the regional councils have been told to advertise them as, and no one knows what an “AMA” is.

💬 Hon Member: So they don’t turn up.

So nobody turns up. In fact, what happened up in Hauhora, where this meeting took place, was that somebody rang up Fish and Game after about half an hour and asked whether its members knew that the meeting was on. Three or four groups of people were invited, but not the people directly affected—not the fishermen or the landowners. There were one or two people whom the regional council thought it had to invite, so it let those people know about the meeting, but most of the public did not know. So members of Fish and Game and one or two other people heard about it—by sheer chance—went along to the meeting, and started asking some questions.

The upshot was that the regional council postponed that meeting and held another one. Word of mouth got around and in the meantime the local people held a meeting themselves, and there was a hall full of people who were suddenly concerned about what was being proposed. A significant part of their harbour and a whole chunk of their coastline was to be put aside for aquaculture purposes. Of course, they were interested in it. They wanted to know. They wanted to be told. They have a right to have a say. They do not want a Government like this just ramming those things through and interfering with the rights and the usage that they have had for years, but that is what is happening. It is being done by stealth.

We have to be concerned about that. It would have been far better for this Government to have gone out there and said: “Listen. You people in New Zealand need to know that we are going to set this bay aside for fishing and commercial fishing purposes, so that people can run their aquacultural commercial fishing enterprise here, and you need to know about it.” But oh, no, not this lot! They are sneaky as! I know—and I know that my colleague Phil Heatley will confirm it—that there will be places, right across New Zealand, where the regional councils had meetings to which no one turned up, because no one knew about them. The consequence is that these aquaculture management areas may well be passed, and people will find out in a year or two’s time that they have suddenly got some sort of marine farm out in front of their bay or in their harbour inlet that they did not know about. I am absolutely concerned that this sort of legislation does not help people to know what is going on in their backyards.

Even more important is that, as we see in the Waikere Inlet, there is now a conflict between aquaculture—in this case, oyster farming—and residential development.

And Māori.

And a number of other issues, as well. But, quite honestly, they are not compatible. Somewhere, somebody has to sit down—before we pass legislation and before we do the resource management—and decide whether we want to have an aquaculture industry. That is the first question to ask. Somebody needs to make that decision. If so, then someone has to be brave enough to stand up and say that, yes, we do want to have an aquaculture industry and, therefore, we are going to set aside areas of New Zealand—on the sea and in inner harbours, if necessary—where that will be the activity, and there will be no residential development, sewerage outlets, or activities that will pollute those farms, because they are not compatible.

That is what happened in the Waikere Inlet. That is a classic example. Over a period of time—20 or 30 years—oyster farmers developed beds. Twenty or 30 years ago, there was the odd bach dotted around. Some of them had a couple of outhouses, but most of them were not significantly used, so it was never a problem. Well, over recent times there has been significant development, and suddenly there is a problem with sewage—both from yachties and from some of the residential developments. There have certainly been problems with the Kawakawa sewage. Other things have also impacted on the oyster farmers’ livelihoods.

The upshot is that there is now a conflict to the stage that most of those farmers up there have gone bankrupt. It is not their fault, but it has become a major problem. Indeed, it is an issue that is going before the courts, to see whether it can be solved. But it will not be, because the two things are not compatible. One cannot have residential development—which has to have outlets for sewage and all sorts of things, in order to dispose of effluent and human waste—right alongside a fishing industry.

Someone needs to sit down and say that yes, we want to have an industry, and yes, we will be firm enough to say which areas will be set aside for the industry and which areas will be developed, and by the way, folks, that means no residential development here, because the two things are not compatible.

An aquaculture industry would have to be developed through resource management and through this sort of legislation, and when I see this Government coming back to the House with legislation containing proposals that are credible and that make some progress with this sort of thing, then members will find that we will be able to make a positive contribution. But all we are getting today is: “Hey folks, we just want another 9 months’ delay.”

That is just not good enough. I say to the Minister and to the Government that that is not acceptable. That is why our party—as well as a number of other parties in the House, I am sure—will be opposing this legislation. The Government has had 2 years to get this sorted out, and I have heard nothing that convinces me that, over that 2-year period, it has made any progress. Quite honestly, one would have thought that it could have, because it has done nothing else. Surely to goodness, in that 2-year period, the Government could have made some progress with this industry and done some of the things that I have spoken about, but I do not see any sign of it. My colleagues are shaking their heads and saying that they have not seen any signs of it. [Interruption] Certainly, another 9 months will not add to it. I am not convinced that it will. There is no reason why National should support this bill, and we intend to vote against it.