Environmental Protection Authority (Protection of Environment) Amendment Bill

Tēnā koe, Mr Deputy Speaker. E ngā mema o te Whare nei, tēnā tātou katoa. I move, That the Environmental Protection Authority (Protection of Environment) Amendment Bill be now read a first time. I nominate the Local Government and Environment Committee to consider the bill. I am pleased to have the opportunity to introduce the Environmental Protection Authority (Protection of Environment) Amendment Bill and I recommend that the House refers my bill to the select committee for further debate. This bill amends the Environmental Protection Authority Act 2011 by adding the additional objective that the organisation must aim to protect, maintain, and enhance New Zealand’s environment. When the Act was passed, the stated objective of the Environmental Protection Authority contained an important oversight, in that it did not actually require the protection of the environment as part of the authority’s role. This bill aims to correct that defect.

What this bill does is place the protection of New Zealand’s precious natural environment right at the heart of the law governing the Environmental Protection Authority. This bill does this by cementing in legislation the Environmental Protection Authority’s role in protecting the environment by amending section 12(1) by inserting the following paragraph: “(c) protects, maintains, and enhances New Zealand’s environment.”—seven small words, but very, very important words. This bill is especially important in light of media reports this morning saying that staff at the Environmental Protection Authority are struggling to determine what the mission of the organisation is. Whom are they accountable to—the Minister or the public? We do not want a situation in the future where short-term economic thinking is allowed to impinge on the Environmental Protection Authority’s function because the agency’s mission is legally unclear. This bill will help make the Environmental Protection Authority a better-performing organisation by giving it a clear, well-articulated mission placing environmental protection at the core of everything it does. There is no ambiguity, no confusion.

It is an honour to have one’s member’s bill drawn from the ballot. I believe that members who bring members’ bills to the House do so with the utmost honourable intention: to address often very important issues, and we strive for clarity and practicality in our bills. For this bill, the words “protects, maintains, and enhances New Zealand’s environment.” are not only very clear but they are also very practical. I hope this fact is not lost on members across the House. This is an uncontroversial bill.

New Zealand’s beautiful natural environment is a fundamental part of our natural identity. As a proud member of Ikaroa-Rāwhiti, I, like many of my people, introduce myself by my maunga, my mountain; my awa, my river; my hapū, my subtribe; my iwi, my tribe; and my waka, which connects tribes to other tribes, but, more important, it connects Māori to our Pacific relations. This is a priceless inheritance we receive from our tīpuna, our ancestors before us, and we have a responsibility to leave it to our children and grandchildren. My maunga, my awa, my iwi, and my waka is me, and I am them. Their protection and preservation are my duty. Their protection and preservation are my responsibility.

Our environment is also one of our biggest natural advantages as a country. Our “100% Pure” green image is a boon to our exporters and our tourist industry. But if we do not protect it, we will lose culturally, socially, and economically. We hear often from my colleagues across the House that it is about choice. You can have a thriving economy or you can have a clean environment. In Labour we firmly believe in the balanced approach: a thriving economy from a protected environment. We believe, as Gaylord Nelson once said, that “The economy is a wholly owned subsidiary of the environment, not the other way around.” As the Government agency responsible for regulatory management of New Zealand’s environment, the Environmental Protection Authority is a vital part of protecting our environment for future generations. The omission in the regulations around the Environmental Protection Authority of protecting the environment is not spelt out in legislation. This bill aims to fix that.

If we want to protect our environment for the future, we must ensure its legislative safeguards are long-lasting. We have seen just today how a lack of statutory clarity can create problems when multiple internal reviews at the Environmental Protection Authority can lead to confusion over the agency’s mission, as we heard on Morning Report today. My bill is a sensible reform that unambiguously has the explicit objective of protecting, maintaining, and enhancing New Zealand’s environment—seven very small but important words. It will end the confusion of the Environmental Protection Authority and ensure better protection of our environment. This bill will offer more consistency across New Zealand’s environmental legislation, as stated under section 6 of the Resource Management Act, which requires all persons exercising powers under it to recognise and provide for the preservation and protection of various aspects of New Zealand’s environment. To ensure consistency across New Zealand’s large marine environment, it is sensible to make this change to the Environmental Protection Authority Act.

If opponents of this bill have drafting concerns, the select committee will provide an opportunity to discuss the best approach to inserting a reference to protect the environment in this Act. It will allow for expert evidence to be presented and for a full discussion of how we maximise the protection we give our environment.

In closing, this bill is very clear. It is very consistent with other legislation and it makes good sense. I commend this bill to the House. I ask that the House support it to select committee and helps us to take steps to give our beautiful natural environment the protection that it deserves in the years to come. Kia ora.

I rise to speak in this first reading debate on the Environmental Protection Authority (Protection of Environment) Amendment Bill in the name of Meka Whaitiri. I want at the outset to congratulate the member. It is always an honour, I think, to have a member’s bill drawn from the ballot. It is literally a lottery, so, therefore, not only is it an honour but it involves a degree of luck and good fortune, as well. Although this is a piece of good fortune that has befallen that member, the bill itself is one that I do have some problems with. I want to spend just a few minutes speaking to those issues and questions that I have with the bill, as it is proposed by Meka Whaitiri, and on where I think some of the issues are that would prevent me and the National Party from supporting it in its current form.

The addition of extra objectives into the principal Act is, in my view, completely unnecessary. The reason for that is simply that the principal Act sets up and creates the Environmental Protection Authority. This is an authority that was created during the first term of this National Government, which was done with the purpose of providing an operational organisation that would ensure that arm’s-length policy would be determined separately from the politicisation of us mere politicians. I contend, in fact, that if this bill were to be passed by the House, the inclusion of the seven small words that the sponsoring member has at the basis and the heart of this bill would actually be detrimental and would achieve a negative result, and the exact reverse result of the one that she is seeking to achieve. I think that that, of itself, is a fatal flaw in this bill.

The Environmental Protection Authority was set up, as I said, to be an arm’s-length operational entity. It is my view that this amendment has the potential to turn the agency and impinge upon its operational integrity and independence. I do not think that that ultimately serves the objectives that the member is seeking to achieve in terms of the amendment to the principal Act that she is proposing in this bill. The operational independence and credibility of the Environmental Protection Authority is at the very heart of that legislation. It is at the very heart of what it was designed to do. It was established precisely so that the difficult decisions could be taken independently and without the involvement of us mere politicians. Policy agencies operate best when there is less dependence on direction of that sort, and the Environmental Protection Authority, in my view, absolutely does not need to move in that direction. That would be, without doubt, I think, the potential impact if this bill were to proceed through the House.

The amendment that is being proposed would have a significant impact on the way that the Environmental Protection Authority carries out the existing functions that it is tasked to achieve. I note that there has been media commentary, which the member spoke about, in this morning’s media. I am not aware of that; I choose to listen to far more uplifting and enlightening morning radio than the member does, so I missed the commentary this morning. But I suspect, without having heard that media commentary, that if there are questions from staff members as to their role and the function that they have or that the agency that employs them has, then that is essentially an employment matter, and one that I think that the chief executive of the organisation should properly address. The principal Act defines the role of the Environmental Protection Authority in very clear and precise terms. That role, in my view, is completely unequivocal, and a role and a function that is understood, I think, by the vast majority of people who come into contact with the agency, the vast majority of its employees, and its senior management team. That there may be some employees who are confused about their role I think, of itself, is not a good reason to muck around with the objective provisions of the legislation and amend the principal Act.

There are functions to provide the assurances and the goals that the member seeks to achieve in this bill in other pieces of legislation. That is the way that the legislation has been particularly constructed. That is the way that it has been formatted: so that there are other pieces of legislation, such as the Resource Management Act and the Climate Change Response Act, for example, which provide exactly the kind of definitional functionality that the member is seeking from this bill. I am not arguing that the objectives that she is seeking are wrong or invalid; this is just the wrong place for them. Those objectives are well covered in other pieces of legislation that have been designed specifically for that purpose.

Although there is not a proposal to add any additional functions into section 13 of the Environmental Protection Authority Act 2011, this amendment, as it is being proposed, would still significantly, in my view, affect the way that the Environmental Protection Authority carries out its existing statutory functions and obligations. The Government set this organisation up as part of its first-phase Resource Management Act reforms, and the principal legislation was passed back in 2011. As members will know very clearly, it is the plan and proposal of the Government to introduce second-phase Resource Management Act reforms later this year. I know that the Minister for the Environment, the Hon Nick Smith, is working diligently and hard to achieve that, and as we speak, I suspect, is working hard to seek cross-party support for the much-needed Resource Management Act phase two reforms, which will make that piece of legislation, which is the cornerstone piece of legislation in this area, a more functional and worthwhile piece of law that will provide much of the confidence and support that our environment needs going forward.

As I said, the amendment, as it is being suggested by Meka Whaitiri, would, in my view, change the very purpose of the Environmental Protection Authority. It would change it in a way that goes well beyond the original purposes of the principal Act, and the bill does nothing to actually enhance the work of the agency. In fact, in my view, it has potential to detract from and, actually, diminish the work of the agency. It has the potential to, effectively, undermine the operational effectiveness of the agency. The result of this amendment bill could actually be that the Environmental Protection Authority is required to apply a whole new set of tests to its functionality, and that would translate to a whole range of new duties, a whole definitional new menu of objectives that, in fact, would detract from the effectiveness of the agency in its current form. I do not think that that necessarily provides any net benefit in terms of protection to our environment or the measurement of our environmental standards.

I do have clear difficulties with this bill. It is well intentioned, I know. I think the member is well intentioned; I think she brings to the House a piece of legislation that is thoughtful.

Debate interrupted.

The House adjourned at 10 p.m.