Urgency

I move, That urgency be accorded the introduction and passing of the West Coast Wind-blown Timber (Conservation Lands) Bill. Cyclone Ita struck on 17 April 2014, felling thousands of hectares of native trees on the West Coast. Much of that timber is beech and, as the Minister of Conservation outlined today, there are a number of other species that can also be recovered. This is high-quality finishing timber, but it is highly susceptible to attack by borer and sap staining in the spring.

As we start this debate today, we are in a rimu-clad room, standing at rimu desks, and enjoying the soft ambience that you get from these native timbers. To see those timbers wasted in the way that the political opposition to this move want to see is, I think, an utter disgrace. There is in this bill the opportunity to recover a substantial amount of that wind-blown timber, which would otherwise sit there and, over some decades, rot and be wasted. That timber will provide a significant opportunity to the people of the West Coast, an opportunity that certainly this part of the House if not their local representative, wants to see for them, I think this is a perfectly justifiable action this afternoon. Urgency should be accorded to this because in the early days of the fall there can be damage that does make that windfall less than optimal for retrieval.