Wildlife (Powers) Amendment Bill

I move, That the Wildlife (Powers) Amendment Bill be now read a second time. I am very pleased to be able to rise to take the first call for the second reading of the Wildlife (Powers) Amendment Bill. I acknowledge the work of the Local Government and Environment Committee, chaired by my colleague Scott Simpson. The intellectual rigour those members brought to the process, the thorough nature of the approach that they took in examining all the details, and their recommendations have added value to the bill, and, I think, rigorously tested its parameters in a way that means that nature will be better protected. I will speak on those measures shortly, but, first, I think it would be useful to explain to the House and the wider public the context and the purpose of this bill.

Our native wildlife faces many threats. Introduced predators—the usual suspects: rats, stoats, and possums—are destroying our biodiversity. Our Government’s response to that has been to announce the visionary target of Predator Free 2050, and our Prime Minister is right behind it, as is our entire caucus. I think, too, the people of New Zealand have realised that our threatened species need better protection. Weeds are also a very big threat to our biodiversity. They smother habitat and food sources, they cause disease, and they cause a range of problems, hence the policies that I have brought in around the War on Weeds, naming the Dirty Dozen, and putting many millions of dollars, some of which I will be announcing tomorrow, around wilding pine control and other measures, because we acknowledge that our plants, as well as our precious taonga species, are under threat.

Poaching is a very real threat, and, at times, it can be overlooked. We have to face the reality, though, that it is a growing problem. There is a lucrative international black market in our native species, our spectacular geckos and skinks, and that drives some people to break the law, to seek to take advantage of our country’s remarkable wildlife. This can and does pose a major threat to its security. For example, reptile smugglers tend to target pregnant females, which is a real problem for the small, fragmented populations that breed very slowly. We know of one gecko population on the Otago Peninsula, for example, driven almost to extinction by smugglers, and another population where poachers took almost half the breeding females. My colleague Jacqui Dean’s excellent member’s bill, the Conservation (Natural Heritage Protection) Act, passed in 2013, and that increased and standardised the penalties for offences against protected wildlife, with fines of up to $300,000. It was designed to deter and to punish smugglers, as this Wildlife (Powers) Amendment Bill is.

Dealing specifically with the problems of illegal hunting is important and at the heart of this bill. Over the past few years people have killed whio, tūī, kererū, kea, kākā, shags, petrels, oystercatchers, and herons, and tried to sell blue duck chicks. Hunters and domestic dogs have killed kiwi, gulls, and weka. The Wildlife Act protects our unique taonga species from being illegally taken, hunted, killed, or smuggled out of New Zealand, but its enforcement powers, which were given to DOC rangers, have not been updated for 60 years and are no longer fit for purpose when our threatened taonga species are so in danger. Some of the language in the old bill is outdated. I have referred before to how it specifies that only men can be enlisted to help rangers. More broadly, the powers themselves need to be expanded and clarified to fit modern times and the threats that our biodiversity and our ecology face.

The purpose of the Wildlife (Powers) Amendment Bill is to better protect wildlife by modernising the protection and enforcement powers available to investigate and prosecute offences against protected wildlife. The bill affects only the Wildlife Act, and changes only enforcement powers. It does not change the protected status of wildlife or how wildlife is managed. The current training given to rangers covers the ground, and making these minor changes to the Act will not impact on DOC’s budget. They will, though, give full-time rangers four new powers. There is the ability to take action to prevent an offence about to occur or in progress, or to stop offending in progress, which will potentially enable rangers to prevent or minimise the harm to wildlife. In other words, they can act in a timely fashion to intervene before a crime is committed. Temporarily, they can stop persons suspected of an offence to allow investigation. This can be very important in situations where an offender is trying to evade the rangers or is trying to hide evidence of the offending.

It will also enable our rangers to seize a broader range of evidence, such as laptops, cameras, and mobile phones. This can help build a case, or help to prove intent—for example, whether an offence is commercially motivated. Also, they will have additional powers requiring proof of identification details from suspected offenders—specifically, their date of birth and evidence of their identity. This will support rangers to get information that is legally required before a person can be charged. In addition, this bill grants the power to arrest. That is limited to very serious offending against absolutely protected wildlife, such as that involving illegal hunting, killing, or export. Access to that power of arrest is also very limited: to full-time DOC rangers who are specifically warranted to use it. That is a very small team of highly trained specialists, many of whom are former policeman. This will most likely be used for the serious offences that I referred to earlier, such as international smuggling, because these can pose significant risks to absolutely protected wildlife such as our native lizards, and because the suspected offenders are a potential flight risk.

I welcome the Local Government and Environment Committee report on the bill, and the 14 tweaks and adjustments that are recommended—12 from DOC and two from the select committee, all of which have been adopted. They have clarified the nature and extent of the new powers and their relationship to existing provisions in the Act. The new section 39AA specifies which rangers will have access to the powers to seize evidential material, to require people to stop, and to intervene to prevent offences. New section 39AA clarifies that these powers are available to DOC full-time rangers, specifically those who are warranted and trained in enforcement work. They are also available to police officers and to fishery officers as well.

They are not available to DOC honorary rangers or honorary fishing officers or to any honorary Fish and Game New Zealand rangers. There was, and there is, a very simple reason why this was the case. Honorary rangers are at arm’s length from the Government. They are not public servants, and are not subject to the Public Service Code of Conduct which binds DOC and other full-time Crown staff who are employed by the Crown—and obligation, transparency, and accountability are very important parts of the rigour of this process.

The select committee also clarified the safeguards around some of the powers. Any evidence seized must relate to the investigation of a suspected offence. The power to stop a person may be exercised only in relation to a suspected offence, and does not enable the use of force. A person may also be stopped only for a time that is reasonable in the circumstances.

The committee replaced the existing section 40 of the Act to clarify the type of behaviour that constitutes obstructing a person acting under the Wildlife Act. The changes to the section take account of the new powers. The committee further amended the new section 66A, to make it clearer who can require identification information, and what types of identification information can be required from suspected offenders. The committee extended the ability to require suspected offenders to provide their date of birth to full-time Fish and Game rangers. That is, I think, appropriate for the level of offending that they are generally dealing with when they are managing game-bird hunting under the Act. The full-time Fish and Game rangers do an excellent job, as do the full-time DOC rangers, and I commend them all for the great work that they do, and for their sincerity, and for the—frankly—heroic nature of the work that they sometimes do in the field.

Rangers are out in the front line of conservation, day in and day out, sustaining the very essence of our New Zealand identity. Our DOC rangers maintain the tracks, the huts, the reserves, the special places, and the landscapes that we all—including visitors to this country—enjoy so much. They make our nation famous to the world, they keep the standards high, and they care. They also protect our native species in the heat of the summer, in the cold of the winter, and in the driving wind and gales which seem to come in every season, and which make it very difficult for the young fledgling chicks to survive—our DOC rangers are there every step of the way. They do that work in the face of often ill-informed and vicious abuse from the likes of the anti-1080 poison lobby. I take this opportunity in the House, with this bill, to commend the fortitude and the stamina of the DOC staff.

This bill is a small but vital way to help make their work a little bit easier, and to help them be even more effective in protecting our national monuments, which are our national taonga, from poachers. I commend the work of the DOC full-time rangers, the Fish and Game full-time rangers, and I commend this Wildlife (Powers) Bill to the House.

Labour is pleased to be able to support the progress of this bill through the House and to support the consideration of the Local Government and Environment Committee on what are some small but integral steps towards modernising the legislation.

I did not sit on the select committee. However, I know that from the considerations and from having read some of the submissions, it is clear that the committee took seriously some of the fundamental aspects of empowering DOC rangers by way of allowing and broadening their ability to intervene, to stop, and to detain people for illegal activities. I just want to summarise a couple of those submissions. First, the Legislation Design and Advisory Committee and the suggestions it made around the scope of the stop-and-search powers, to ensure that the objectives of the bill could be achieved while keeping in mind the balance between individual rights and conferring rights to DOC rangers—I think it made some helpful suggestions, which the committee and DOC officials reflected on. You can see that through the amendments to the bill that have been suggested.

The Minister of Conservation is right: protecting New Zealand’s biodiversity does matter. When we think about New Zealand and our conservation estate, and the rich biodiversity that we have throughout—which we can share with our children, the next generation, who are part of protecting and cherishing the estate—it is only right that we try to ensure that DOC rangers have the types of powers that stop people from, basically, plundering and illegally taking our natural wildlife. For that reason, I read carefully the submission by the New Zealand Fish and Game Council, and I did happen to be at one small part of a hearing when it was there. It argued against being excluded from the provisions of the bill. I think the committee deliberated on this matter, but, in the end, landed in the right place.

Some of the conversations that were had when I was at the select committee were largely around the fact that the Fish and Game New Zealand honorary rangers are just that—they are voluntary. They do not have statutory powers, and it would be difficult to try to confer significant powers on a group of people where, quite frankly—we did have the discussion during the public submissions—there could be a rogue ranger and they could just go all over the show with their powers. I think the committee, in good conscience, weighed up the submission from Fish and Game New Zealand and balanced that with some practical applications of what was intended in the legislation, and really narrowed down the powers there.

The New Zealand Law Society also gave a very useful submission. It wanted to stress and ensure that the powers that were being conferred in this bill aligned with the Search and Surveillance Act. That has been the case, and you can see it in the committee’s report back to the House.

The Minister has pretty much extensively covered the things that were considered: the power to seize evidence; the power to stop a person, in addition to the existing powers that are already there for DOC rangers; and the power to intervene to prevent offending. Those were the key aspects from the committee’s report, which many of the amendments focused on.

On the issue of DOC rangers and approved officers having the powers of arrest, one of the interesting points that the report notes is that the committee has narrowed the scope, or the potential for interpretation of the scope being too broad, in the way in which these powers were going to be conferred. I think, all in all, that suggestion was a very useful conversation in the committee.

The committee notes in the report that it heard a number of submitters and made various recommendations. Clarifying the classes of rangers was very important. Again—having only sat in on the submission from Fish and Game New Zealand—identifying who was intended to be covered by the Act and, therefore, who was not, was very well specified within the amendments being proposed. Making clear that rangers can seize evidential material and the extent of that evidential material, and, again, aligning those powers to the Search and Surveillance Act, gives greater confidence to the way in which the Act is intended to operate.

One of the things I remember from the first reading debate is the fact that we have DOC rangers out there doing great stuff, and often by themselves. We want to make sure, ultimately, that in carrying out their role and that by conferring extra powers of this nature on them, they are safe and they are able to conduct these types of duties and obligations in a way that will protect them as well.

One of the other aspects is the issue of requiring a person to stop and for how long you would retain them. I am sure that was a healthy conversation, and I know that a number of colleagues who were at the select committee will probably comment on the issue of detaining people and for what period. In the end, “reasonableness” became the operative word—being reasonable in that manner.

I want to spend some time on commenting on the type of information being obtained in order for a prosecution to take place, and requiring that date of birth information is obtained. This is a matter that I know my colleague David Parker, who was on the select committee, wants to raise in the Committee stage of this process. It is really to ensure that if you are going to pursue evidence that will potentially lead to a prosecution, you have then got to make sure that all of that type of information and the people who can collect it are able to do their role. I understand that there was some discussion around an extension to make Fish and Game rangers able to obtain this information for that purpose.

It had occurred to me, when listening to the Minister’s speech around this—and it is purely from a safety aspect—whether there would be some kind of a review around the way in which certain parts of the DOC estate at certain periods of the year might be better supported because there is, maybe, a trending of activities and things like that. That is an operational decision—I understand that—but if we are going to have a bill that increases the powers of DOC rangers to be able to intervene and stop illegal activity, then looking at the operational aspects of whether or not the capacity needs to be increased in various parts of the DOC estate is probably a natural consequence of those powers.

Finally, I know that the bill will go through its Committee stage and there will be some useful discussion around the narrowing of the powers, as suggested by the amendments by the select committee. There is ample time for that to be discussed through the Committee stage. But can I say, from my small part in the DOC estate that is within my own electorate, we are very grateful for the good work that DOC rangers conduct within our area. Over the summer period, in particular, you see a natural increase in the number of Kiwis enjoying the DOC estate and offering to help with the activities of DOC rangers, where they can. Just at the back of my house they are improving the tracks. If you are up for it, there is a great walk, with a number of steps. If you are up for it, again, you can help take stones up a stairway—called the Hākarimata Ranges, Minister.

But can I say that, in so far as the DOC estate is concerned, these amendments, albeit small, are useful amendments for DOC rangers. At the border, when you see eggs being smuggled out, when you see things coming illegally into New Zealand—reptiles and the like—you realise that we have the luxury in New Zealand, being surrounded by ocean, to be able to protect what we have here and to be able to ensure that we can stop wildlife from going out elsewhere as best we can. In order for that to happen, amendments like this are very practical and useful to achieve that purpose. Kia ora.

Before I commence my contribution, I would just like to acknowledge, with grateful appreciation, the speech of the member who has just resumed her seat, the Hon Nanaia Mahuta. I think she neatly and aptly summed up the opportunities and challenges that the Local Government and Environment Committee was confronted with in terms of addressing what, on the face of it, seems like a relatively minor change but is actually a change that extends powers to full-time DOC rangers and, indeed, to full-time Fish and Game rangers to help them do the good work that they have done for so long and will continue to do to protect our native creatures that these days, sadly, are highly valued on the international black market.

It is 60 years since the principal legislation was introduced. Most of us in this Parliament have not seen any change to this legislation in our lifetimes. So I want to commend my friend and colleague the Minister of Conservation, the Hon Maggie Barry, for introducing this piece of legislation to the House. I think it is a good piece of legislation. It is balanced, it is measured, and it is appropriate. It modernises a piece of legislation that has actually served us as a nation well, and it has served the Department of Conservation well, but it is time to modernise it.

I particularly noted at the select committee, and the Minister made reference to it in her speech, that the existing principal legislation has that rather quaint gender-specific reference that was typical of the time. For instance, currently DOC staff, if they need assistance from members of the public, for instance to help them do their duties and maybe apprehend or intervene in a matter, they are permitted by statute to only request assistance from men. Of course, that is something we would not want to have, necessarily limiting the ability of people of whatever gender to assist and be involved in the good work of DOC officers, should they need it.

The Hon Nanaia Mahuta and the Minister both made reference in their speeches to the delicate balance that we had to find in terms of getting the civil liberties aspects of this legislation in perspective and with the right balance. This relates to giving people some quite serious powers—the powers to stop, detain, and arrest. These are not powers that are given lightly by this Parliament, and nor should they be. So very careful consideration was given to how far we wanted to extend those powers. In the end, the select committee went further than in the bill as first introduced. After consideration and careful thought, we decided to extend those powers to full-time Fish and Game rangers, because they do excellent work. In fact, Fish and Game do excellent work, both full-time and voluntarily as honorary officers. But we thought, on balance, that the appropriate position to land this legislation was that full-time staff would be the best placed to do that, and not to extend it to volunteers, in this situation. I think that was about right. I do not think it is in any way a slight or a discounting of the work and effort that Fish and Game do in our conservation estate and, indeed, around the country.

This is a very good piece of legislation. As the member Nanaia Mahuta said, it is quite a small piece of legislation but its impact is quite large on protecting our native creatures and species from those ratbags who want to come here, steal them, take them away, and then sell them on the international black market, which I think all New Zealanders would want to be stopped. This bill extends the powers to enable full-time DOC rangers and full-time Fish and Game rangers to do the job that they already do, but to do it better. I commend this bill to the House.

I would like to acknowledge the Local Government and Environment Committee as well as the officials, who have put a lot of work into ensuring that this legislation comes to the House. Labour supports this bill. This is a bill that will reform the Wildlife Act of 1953, with the objective of giving full-time DOC rangers new enforcement powers when they encounter offences. Some of these new powers would allow DOC rangers the following power: the power to be able to seize a whole lot of evidence. Currently DOC rangers have the power to stop vehicles and to stop vessels, as well as bags in transit. However, this new legislation will allow them to stop a person, and, as previously discussed by my colleague Nanaia Mahuta as well as the Minister the Hon Maggie Barry and Scott Simpson, this is a power that is not given lightly—the fact that we are giving people the power to be able to stop someone else.

At the select committee a lot of submitters were very concerned about the length of time that DOC rangers would be able to stop individuals for, whether they would be able to stop people under reasonable circumstances, and whether they would have reasonable grounds before they would stop a person. We believe that the amendments that have come through after the select committee process are actually quite sound, so that the powers would be given only by the Director-General of Conservation before DOC rangers are able to use this power of arrest, and that it would be done by written authority. One of the things that the legislation now clarifies is that instead of the power to be able to warrant—because the power of arrest is actually the power to be able to stop someone without a warrant, the term “warrant” has now been taken out of the legislation.

However, we do have some concerns with this particular legislation, and I would like to turn to one of those concerns. My colleague the Hon David Parker intends to introduce a Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) when we come to the Committee stage, and his concerns were expressed during the select committee process. Right now, the prosecutorial guidelines applying in New Zealand require all charging documents to include a date of birth. This is in part to avoid confusion between two people of the same name, including parents who have the same name as their child living at the same address. This is an SOP to address, in particular, the Fish and Game rangers being excluded from this legislation. We were advised by the New Zealand Fish and Game Council that its rangers are currently limited in their ability to perform their statutory role of enforcing game hunting because they are unable to require date-of-birth information from suspected offenders, and they cannot prosecute unless this information is given voluntarily.

We were also advised by officials that although this would be a useful power for full-time Fish and Game rangers, it would not be necessary to extend the power to honorary Fish and Game rangers, because honorary rangers were said to be generally accompanied by full-time Fish and Game rangers. However, we were told by Fish and Game New Zealand that this information was incorrect. So the SOP that my colleague the Hon David Parker intends to introduce would be to address this particular issue.

Labour supports any measures that would help our hard-working Conservation staff to do their jobs properly. Our natural environment is a massive asset to all Kiwis, not just for recreation but for tourism, as well. Tourism, as we know, is one of the main ways that we earn funding from overseas folks. We also must ensure that the environment is protected for our future generations of New Zealanders to enjoy.

However, the other concern that Labour has is in terms of funding. DOC already struggles with the funding that it has to do the massive job that it currently does. Last year 1,500 of our DOC staff, out of frustration at the fact that they were being so overworked, took industrial work-to-rule action after being offered very little pay increase. In 2009 there were 803 DOC rangers, but currently there are only 637. So in terms of funding, in 2009 National’s cut to DOC’s budget was $46 million, in 2013 it was cut by another $8.7 million, and this year there was a further cut. We are going to hand over to our DOC staff even more powers, even more work for them to do. But, as we implement this new legislation, in order for this bill to work, the Labour Party is saying to the Government that it needs to fund DOC appropriately in order for us to ensure that it can do all of the work that we intend for it to do, with this additional work, appropriately. Thank you so much.

It is an absolute pleasure to rise in support of the Wildlife (Powers) Amendment Bill in its second reading, and in support of the Department of Conservation (DOC), which is one of the most popular Government departments in New Zealand. It has a very wide-ranging brief and it executes those functions exceptionally well. It has dedicated staff on the front line and in its back rooms, going in to bat for our wildlife and for conservation efforts, and it should be commended for that.

As such, I commend the Minister the Hon Maggie Barry for introducing this bill, which is well overdue—it is now 60 years that the Wildlife Act has been in existence, and it requires updating to give our wonderful rangers, full-time DOC rangers and full-time Fish and Game rangers, enforcement powers that are modernised and that are balanced with respect to individuals’ civil liberties but that are necessary to protect our wildlife.

Obviously, New Zealand is synonymous with its wildlife, with its parks, and with the nature of recreation in New Zealand, and one of the beauties of that is that New Zealanders can go into the bush, we can enjoy nature, and we can get to witness interactions or interact with wildlife in situ. Unfortunately, as my colleagues have mentioned, some of those species are very highly valuable on the black market, so we need to protect our ecosystems and make sure that those species are there for the enjoyment of all people. Notwithstanding that, of course, with New Zealand being synonymous with nature, our tourism industry is built on that—over 3 million visitors to New Zealand in 2015, and most of them visiting our national parks and wonderful spaces, which hold some of these wonderful, rare wildlife. And let us face it: New Zealand holds about two-thirds of the world’s biodiversity, so we need to protect that, and we need to give our rangers the powers to be able to seize evidence and arrest people whom they reasonably suspect of committing an offence by taking these wonderful species.

So I am very pleased that this legislation has been brought to the House. It was a robust select committee process, and I am pleased to be supporting the Department of Conservation in these efforts to give it powers that are modernised in order to help protect our wildlife. So I support this bill.

Tēnā koe, Mr Assistant Speaker. The Green Party is pleased to support the Wildlife (Powers) Amendment Bill, but I think we risk some of the Government members actually overstating what is in this bill when they talk about the Act being modernised. The bill is quite narrow in its ambit. It deals with improving the enforcement of the Wildlife Act, but there is a need for a major overhaul of that Act, and this Government lacks the vision to do that and adequately support the Department of Conservation through ensuring that funding is adequate. We can hear lots of speeches from Government members talking about the important work that departmental staff do and the importance of the department’s mandate in protecting our indigenous plants and wildlife and our special landscapes, but we do not see a commitment in the Budget to actually adequately resourcing that work. We do not see a commitment to ensuring that—

💬 Hon Maggie Barry: Predator Free 2050—visionary.

Well, yes, the Minister of Conservation may have a vision of Predator Free 2050, but it is the Green Party, through our Taonga Levy, that has actually come up with a practical proposition to provide the funding to support it, rather than the very ad hoc measures that the Minister has proposed—to provide just a bit of additional funding for kiwi and a bit of additional funding tomorrow for wilding control, which is a project that we support. But there is a total under-investment in conservation through the continued cuts to conservation funding that we have seen under this Government. The Government is very good at getting the headlines with all of its PR about how well species are doing, but it fails to look clearly at what bycatch is happening and at the continued underfunding of conservation.

This bill is very narrow in its scope. What we need is an overhaul of the whole Act to protect native fish species. It is under the Wildlife Act that we see most of our native birds protected—

💬 Hon Maggie Barry: Out of scope.

—except the—yes, well the Minister is saying it is out of scope. But if the Minister had had some vision, she would have embarked on a more comprehensive review of the Wildlife Act. The Minister and this Government do not seem to care about the fact that 72 percent—72 percent—of our native fish species are threatened with extinction, yet not one existing native fish is protected by the Wildlife Act. The only fish that is protected is the grayling, and that is extinct, Minister. So if the Government had some vision, we would be looking at a much more comprehensive overhaul of the Act, to protect native fish—to protect a taonga like the tuna, the longfin eel, which is still being fished to extinction. As the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment has said, it is on a slow pathway to extinction.

This bill will be useful in increasing the powers that the warranted officers within the Department of Conservation have available to stop, intervene in, and prevent offending. It will increase their ability to stop a person if they think that the person is about to commit an offence, allow them to stop a person’s vehicle but not hold the person for questioning, allow them to request identity verification and date of birth, and allow them the power to seize a broader range of materials that are connected to offending, for example, mobile phones and the like.

But this is not the first time that we have amended the Wildlife Act. We had a private bill in 2013 that increased the penalties for offending, which is all well and good, like this bill, but it is not actually addressing the critical issues of loss of biodiversity and the fact that our native fish do not have any protection under the Act. The whitebait season has started again, and yet most New Zealanders do not realise that of the juveniles of the five native species that make up the whitebait catch—the kōaro, the shortjawed kōkopu, the giant kokopu—are threatened with extinction. That is the sort of change that we need to be seeing to the Wildlife Act—actually providing protection for these species, and the Department of Conservation ensuring that there are adequate freshwater fish reserves to protect them—not just fiddling by improving the offence provisions.

The Green Party is supporting the bill. We will consider the amendments that the Labour Party members are proposing to put forward, because the advice that we had, in the Local Government and Environment Committee, was that warranted officers—State servants, Department of Conservation staff—should have these powers, and so should employed staff of Fish and Game New Zealand, but not honorary officers, because that was extending the powers too far. There has been a disappointing gap in the Wildlife Act in that there is no protection for our indigenous native fish, because they are every bit as important as our native birds, our skinks, and our lizards, which this bill is designed to protect through trying to stop smuggling, export, and capture of those species. The Government should be amending the law in a much wider way to provide proper statutory protection for all of our native wildlife, and not just the native birds, the reptiles, and a few species of invertebrates that are currently listed in the legislation. But we do support the increase in the provisions to stop offending. Thank you.

It is a great pleasure to rise on behalf of New Zealand First to take a call and speak to the Wildlife (Powers) Amendment Bill. In all of the years—I suppose it is 2 years now—that I have been speaking in the House, I do not think there has been one time that I have actually given a genuine nod of approval to Minister Maggie Barry for any legislation or views that she has brought forward. But today I am going to give you a genuine, sincere nod of approval, because I think this bill is quite good, and the amendments made by the Local Government and Environment Committee—

💬 Hon Maggie Barry: Good job I’m sitting down.

I know. You are going all red. It is like you are blushing.

💬 Hon Maggie Barry: No, no. Don’t push it.

Ha, ha! But the reality is, I think the committee has done a great job in making some amendments that are here before us today, particularly around extending those powers from not only full-time DOC rangers but to Fish and Game rangers as well.

I have to lament some of what Eugenie Sage has said in relation to the funding, because I think that is a real issue, and I will touch on that. But the essence of the bill goes some way towards tightening up on poachers and people who are abusing our wildlife.

At the end of the day, tourism, which is our largest GDP provider and our biggest export, is looking to grow absolutely exponentially over the next decade and more. That is largely because of our unique flora and fauna and, of course, our native species that people want to come and see and be part of. If we allow the proliferation and degradation in the taking of species illegally and we do not empower our people to actually enforce the law, then, clearly, that is just going to lead to the demise of what we hold absolutely pure: our ”100% Pure New Zealand” brand, which the world cherishes and which we should be should be cherishing too. This goes some way towards enabling that to happen.

The ability, in basic terms, to prevent an event from happening—so for a DOC ranger or a Fish and Game ranger to be able to step in and, if they feel that there is something that is going to take place that is potentially illegally, they can actually involve themselves in that situation—is a good step. Stopping and being able to detain somebody if they are in the middle of illegal activities, or are likely to be involved in illegal activities, is good. The reasonable stoppage time—the key word being “reasonable”—whether or not that goes far enough will obviously come out in case law when that is first tested. Perhaps the Government would like to consider putting in more definition and clarification about what is fair and what is reasonable. Of course, we do not want to be going into litigation with people who are illegally taking and plundering our natural resource, and then having to justify what a fair and reasonable amount of time was. That could actually open up all sorts of legislative issues around the time frames for which they were held. But it is still a good measure.

The ability for full-time rangers to be able to seize equipment and seize assets from poachers or potential poachers is a great idea. Enabling a ranger to be able to take a laptop or computer or cellphone to use as evidence is absolutely paramount. How can you build a case without the ability to gather that intel and information that can actually go towards indicting those people and, obviously, convicting them of an offence?

Finally, just like the powers of police to enable the police to get genuine information from those offenders—obviously, name and date of birth are essential, as well as addresses and proof of identification. Otherwise you are out in the bush, you are looking at or talking to a potential poacher, it is all going swimmingly until they give you an erroneous address of the person and there is no way to check up on that. These sorts of pragmatic steps have certainly been accoladed by New Zealand First, and we look forward to those being implemented.

I note the time in which—28 days after the Royal assent is given—this legislation will actually be introduced, so we would like to see this bill expedited through the House. Again, it is a good piece of legislation, as it was last night with the Charities Amendment Bill. We would like to see good, solid, robust legislation that has full support of the House to be pushed through at some sort of pace, unlike some of the other legislation that we have seen be put through in the past.

Eugenie Sage mentions that our fish are not protected under this bill. Well, I beg to differ, because we have got most of our native birds covered under this bill; all of our native reptiles, particularly the tuatara, which is a targeted species on the international black market—whether our own fellow New Zealanders are actually exploiting this creature or if it is an international group that is doing it, regardless, the tuatara is a very, very precious species and should be looked after. We have got two native species of frogs, the gold and, I think, the green—the bell frogs. We are not very creative with our naming, though, are we? Green and gold, North Island, South Island, Stewart Island; that was a guy who—you know. Anyway, bats of course—we have got a native species of bat—and there are eight marine invertebrate species that are protected, and certain specified native land all covered under this bill. So it does go some way. We do have concerns that our native species are being slowly but surely brought to extinction, and we need to do everything we absolutely, possibly can to ensure that they remain for future generations and they grow and flourish in this beautiful land of ours.

Certainly, we could talk about some other aspects of that, but I do want to go back to what is probably the overarching issue here: this is good legislation, a step in the right direction—a modernisation, if you will—but funding is absolutely paramount, and we have seen, since 2009, a reduction in DOC funding of $60 million.

💬 Hon Maggie Barry: Oh, rubbish.

Absolutely—it is here in black and white. I could come over there or I could table it if you like, but it is actually available if you just look for it. In 2009 we had $403 million, and in 2015 we had $342 million. In 2008 our capital expenditure within the Department of Conservation was $98 million, and in 2015 it was $23.5 million. That causes some serious concerns in relation to health and safety. We have seen our number of DOC rangers be reduced from 809 down to 637. We are expecting our front-line officers—

💬 Hon Maggie Barry: Stick to the facts. Stick to the point of this bill.

—to do more for less. Now Maggie Barry wants to chip in and be part of the conversation. No, you just do not like the reality that this is the truth and you are trying to shut down the truth from the people of New Zealand. This is the frustration that we have, New Zealanders: Ministers will not face the fact that you are being completely underfunded, and they are potentially putting our DOC rangers in harm by underfunding them—making them do twice as much for half the money.

The reality is that New Zealand First has some serious concerns. This Government has overcommitted itself, has not budgeted its finances properly, and is causing all sorts of issues in the long term in many sectors—which I will not segue into, but I might just talk about housing, police, corrections, and a range of other things—but specifically, the Department of Conservation needs to be seriously looked at.

New Zealand First will be supporting this through the final stages. We would like to see it hurried through. We would certainly like to put the acid on Minister Maggie Barry to seriously put funding as a priority for our most precious of items, our land and our native species, because at the moment, under this Government, it does not seem to be a priority and you are making our front-line officers do more for less. It is absolutely in black and white—you can deny it all you like, but, at the end of the day, you have had your lovely speech. We enjoyed it, because listening to Maggie Barry, of course, is like getting beat up with toilet paper—it is just so soft and smooth and silky. Thank you, I will end my contribution there.

E Te Māngai o Te Whare, mauriora. E ngā mema o Te Whare, tēnā koutou katoa. E Te Minita, tēnā koe. I would like to begin by acknowledging our wonderful Minister of Conservation, the Hon Maggie Barry, who does so much hard work protecting and defending the precious natural environment of our country. I want to thank the member who just resumed his seat, Clayton Mitchell, for the first 8 minutes or so of his contribution, which made perfect sense and which I agree with, but, unfortunately, he spoilt his otherwise good contribution in the last couple of minutes by engaging in some unfortunate numerical inexactitude.

This is a Government that has invested considerably in extra support for our environment and in making sure the Department of Conservation, which does such good work, has the tools it needs, the resources it needs, and the staff power it needs to get out and protect our precious natural environment in New Zealand. I am going to agree with the contribution made by the Hon Nanaia Mahuta, who said that this bill is a good balance between the individual rights of New Zealand citizens going about their business and enjoying nature and the powers of rangers to be able to do something when they detect someone they suspect of violating the general principles and the specific laws that we have in place to protect our endangered species—all of our native species—our plants, and our wildlife.

This bill brings in a great level of power to allow a full-time State-employed ranger to not just ask for proof of ID, which was the previous situation, but demand proof of ID—not just ask someone what their name and date of birth is but be able to demand it, and we are backing that up with the legal powers to do so. This is a huge gain, and this gives them a greater level of power than they have had in the last 60 years, but when we are giving stop-and-search powers it is important that these come with a balancing level of control. There are not, for a voluntary ranger, the levels of integrity and code of conduct controls that can be applied to someone who is in the service of the State—someone who falls under State Services Commission rules.

So I think it is important that we do distinguish between an honorary ranger, who does incredibly valuable work—and as my colleague Scott Simpson, the chairman of the Local Government and Environment Committee, said, this is not to underrate the work they do. But when we are giving powers that could be considered by some to be invasive we need to balance that with a countervailing level of scrutiny. This is something that, as a Government, we have approached very carefully. We do not want rogue rangers and we do not want vigilante action, and this bill achieves a very good balance between those things.

It was disappointing to hear a half-hearted, lukewarm, and half-baked contribution from the Green Party, which I thought actually stood for protecting our environment in New Zealand. This is a bill that significantly increases the powers of our hard-working rangers to be able to protect our natural environment and protect endangered species, so it is disappointing to hear that from a party that purports to protect our environment. This is a very good bill, it is a credit to a very fine Minister, and I commend it to the House.

The next call is a split call. Mojo Mathers—5 minutes.

I would like to start by saying that the Green Party absolutely recognises and honours the hard-working commitment of DOC rangers and staff. I also just want to acknowledge that they have been facing a totally unacceptable level of abuse as the symptom of, particularly, DOC’s use of 1080. I just want to put on our record that it is not acceptable that they should have to face that kind of treatment of having their photos splattered all over social media, their personal home addresses, and so on. That is just not OK.

We absolutely do support giving them more powers to strengthen their ability to enforce the Wildlife Act, but I also want to affirm that it is disappointing that the real problem, which is the underfunding and under-resourcing of DOC, continues to be ignored. It may be stating the obvious, but if you do not have enough people on the ground, giving them more powers is not going to make a lot of meaningful difference to protecting and saving our endangered and threatened wildlife. We need the numbers on the ground, and the numbers have been going down. Eight years ago there were 833 DOC rangers; now there are 788, despite the fact that we have a biodiversity crisis in this country.

So we support the bill, and we support it because we have a biodiversity crisis, with nearly 4,000 of New Zealand’s precious and unique species at risk of going extinct. Eight hundred are listed by DOC as being at very high risk of extinction, and that number has increased by nearly 200 species in the last 5 years alone. Nearly all amphibians are critically endangered, it is similar for many reptiles and birds, and just last week a marine environment report found that New Zealand has the highest number of threatened seabird species in the world, with 90 percent of our seabirds at risk of extinction, as are many of our marine mammals. Not only do we have the dubious honour of having the highest proportion of endangered species of any country on earth, the vast majority of these do not have any active recovery plans in place, and this is a disgrace. The biggest threats to our native species are predation, habitat loss, and environmental pollution. So, obviously, coming down very hard on people who are smuggling or killing rare and endangered species is the right thing to do. But they are only the edge of the problem. The main problems are, as I have said, habitat loss, habitat degradation, and predation, so it is a small part of the picture.

So we support this bill, but if we are talking about the biodiversity crisis, it is just tinkering at the edge of the margins, and this bill will do little to address that. We have to get real about what it is going to take in the way of resourcing and funding DOC to do its work.

I want to give as an example, very quickly, of how this is playing out on the ground. Six months ago I moved to a beautiful area that is right beside a scenic reserve: Peel Forest. This forest is not being adequately managed for pest control, so possums are running rampant through the forest—so much so, that on the edge of our property there is one small self-resetting trap where we caught 11 possums in a mere 2 weeks. That is how many pests are going absolutely rampant through this highly unique and important remnant forest, which is very precious in Canterbury because there is such a small area that is left of the forest type that used to cover a lot of the Canterbury Plains. Now Canterbury is one of the most modified landscapes in the whole of New Zealand, so we should be doing everything we can to be protecting these last remnants, and that is not happening because the DOC staff are understaffed.

Tēnā koe e Te Māngai o Te Whare, ā, huri noa i Te Whare nei, e mihi atu ki a koutou katoa. Ki a koe e Te Minita o Te Papa Atawhai, ngā mihi.

[Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker, and to you all throughout this House. My acknowledgments to you, Minister for the Environment.]

I want to rise in support of the Wildlife (Powers) Amendment Bill to highlight that this bill is a very important part of the Government’s environment and conservation programme, because it will reduce offending against wildlife. Most of what we do in the conservation space is about conserving particular areas of land and the wildlife that lives there. It is also about regulating human access to those conservation areas in a way that ensures we can all enjoy these areas without causing harm to our native species. A lot of our work is also about reducing predators. Well, actually, it used to be about reducing predators, but thanks to this bold vision that the Government has, we are going to actually eradicate predators and make the country predator-free by 2025.

There is also another type of predator that we have here that really does endanger our wildlife, and that is people—people who deliberately or carelessly endanger our wildlife by committing offences. But the issue we have right now is that the powers of the DOC rangers to deal with these offences are very, very limited. These rangers are highly trained and trusted individuals who do a fantastic job of looking after our most pristine natural areas. I think it is appropriate that we are now giving them new powers to prevent offences against wildlife and deal with the offenders whom they actually encounter.

These rangers are already very, very highly trained, and as a result of this bill they will receive further training to ensure that they understand their new powers and the limits to those powers so that they can apply them effectively to prevent the endangerment of our precious wildlife. That is really a big part of the essence of this bill. Under the bill, rangers will have the power to take action to prevent an offence about to occur or in progress. Powers of arrest will be limited. They will be limited to certain rangers authorised by the Director-General of Conservation, but other full-time rangers will have the ability to temporarily stop suspected offenders in order to allow an investigation. They will be able to seize a broader range of evidence that they currently at the moment cannot. So they will be able to require identification and details from suspected offenders. The range of powers that allow these offenders to be stopped is: to be stopped, identified, investigated, and in certain circumstances arrested, also then leading to prosecution. These powers, to me, as part of the Local Government and Environment Committee, are well-thought-out, they are sensible, and they carefully balance the operational requirements of DOC staff with the principle that agents of the Government should have no more power than they need in order to carry out their job.

In this case, this bill is an excellent bill. It is a reflection of the great work that has been done under this Government in the name of conservation. I acknowledge once again the Minister of Conservation in being the one who actually really is responsible for this bill coming to the House, and it is our pleasure to be sitting on the committee to assist in enabling that to happen. I have no hesitation in commending this bill to the House. Kia ora.

I am delighted to join the voices of support for the second reading of the Wildlife (Powers) Amendment Bill, and I want to particularly congratulate the Local Government and Environment Committee on the work that it did—very ably chaired by a member whose name just escapes me at the moment.

💬 Hon Members: Oh!

Scott Simpson, an excellent chair of the committee. I think the whole committee seems to have done a very good job on this.

This bill was certainly necessary. It is not a very big bill, it is not a very substantial bill, it has not got a lot of policy issues in it, but it was needed to update the powers that Department of Conservation (DOC) officers have. The main new power that is given in this bill is the power to seize a wider range of evidence. That is clearly to ensure that any prosecution has a more robust case behind it so that it does not fail. That is a smart thing to do. There is the power to stop a person—it might seem like that must be the case at the moment, but, actually, under the current Wildlife Act, rangers have powers to stop only vehicles, vessels, and other items. For example, if someone is carrying a bag, rangers can detain the bag but they cannot detain the person, so that obviously makes examination, calling the police, etc., a lot more difficult.

Currently rangers cannot temporarily stop people to assist in an investigation. So, obviously, if someone is doing something that is considered illegal they can just leave and, again, the rangers have no ability to stop them. If the rangers think that a person might have been a witness to such an offence, they cannot stop them either. They cannot seize evidence. They cannot seize cameras, they cannot seize mobile phones, and they cannot seize laptops. I think that the original legislation was passed before laptops and mobile phones were in use—it is 1953 legislation, so it is getting on. We did not have mobile phones and laptops, so I am told, in those days.

Another new power that is being given by this legislation is the power to require suspected offenders to supply identification details. Obviously, that is another critical bit of information that would enable a successful prosecution to later go through. In some specific examples there are warranted rangers and approved officers who would actually themselves have the power of arrest. So those are the main additional powers that are being given to all DOC rangers and some specifically warranted rangers and approved officers in terms of the power of arrest.

Labour supports any measure that will help our hard-working Conservation staff do their jobs properly. I do not think there would be very many New Zealanders who do not totally value the work that DOC does. It will be a good message for DOC staff to hear from this Parliament that their work is appreciated, because we know that they do not feel very valued. They do not feel as if they are properly supported to get on and do their job. The Department of Conservation does an annual survey, and the 2015 results showed that only 27 percent of DOC staff had faith and confidence in their senior leadership, which is a really sad reflection on how people whom we in this Parliament value so much regard the support that they are given.

We know that our natural environment is not just good for New Zealanders to love and value but is also a massive asset for our country for recreation as well as tourism. People come to New Zealand because of the beautiful environment that we have and, of course, because of the welcoming people as well. So we have to ensure that that environment is protected for future generations. We have a responsibility as parliamentarians to ensure that that protection is properly funded and properly supported.

We know that DOC has been struggling with funding over the last little while. I know that under the previous Minister there were substantial cuts to the DOC budget. The Minister came to a select committee that I was on and explained the reason for the cuts, and basically said: “You know, we haven’t enough money to go round and DOC has to have its share of the cuts in the same way as other Government departments and agencies have done.” That was his explanation. It was not well received, I know, by the committee at the time, because DOC is funded to only the bare minimum now, and it cannot really afford to face any more cuts.

We know that DOC staff, as I mentioned earlier, feel undervalued and they are also overworked. Last year 1,500 DOC staff took industrial action, and they were offered a pitiful pay increase. They felt as if it was a slap in the face, given all the work that they had done. In this legislation we are giving them additional work, and what would be really great to hear—and I am sure that DOC staff would welcome it—is that they are getting additional resources. They are getting all these additional powers. There will be more work when the Wildlife (Powers) Amendment Bill is passed, but where are the resources to back it up?

In 2009 there were 803 DOC rangers—that is public information; it cannot be argued because it is information that is on the public record—and now there are only 637. Again, that is information that is on the public record. There has been no change in the names of the rangers. There can be no explanations such as: “They are now called something else.” They were rangers then and they are rangers now, and the number has reduced substantially. Again, in this bill we are giving those very people more work to do. It is the DOC rangers who are going to be asked to do this work.

In 2009 the DOC budget was cut by $46 million. That was done by the previous Minister, and I have already explained the reasons he gave to the select committee for that cut. In 2013 it was cut by another $8.7 million. I want to know whether, in the next Budget, the addition work we are giving the rangers will be properly resourced. We should not be setting up public servants to fail. That is a very bad thing for this Government to do, and it is a bad thing for this Parliament to do. So although we support the intent of this legislation, and we will certainly be voting for it, I suppose the message to the Minister is: “Put your money where your mouth is.” Let us see the resources so that we can be confident that this legislation will be enacted in the way that Parliament has intended, in the way the select committee discussed in its careful deliberations, and in the way, I am sure, the Minister originally intended. Thank you.

It is a pleasure and an honour to rise in support of the Wildlife (Powers) Amendment Bill in its second reading. Could I acknowledge the Hon Maggie Barry, our Minister of Conservation, for all the great work she does and the ambitious work she and the Government do in ensuring we protect our wildlife.

We know that with New Zealand’s culture and economy our wildlife and our environment are a key part of that. It is something we should always be looking to protect, and it is great to see that this National Government, with its Bluegreen initiatives, is the party that is very much looking to protect our environment and protect our wildlife. A lot of constituents in my electorate say to me: “Why does the Green Party always default to far-left socialist policies? Why does it not get back to talking about the environment?”. Well, I suppose we have probably taken that space of talking about the environment, championing the environment, and championing the wildlife. I mean, when you look at the great wildlife we have, whether it be our kiwi, our tuatara—I am a big fan, being from Canterbury, of course, of our cheeky kea. It is a great bird.

The benefits of being an open country and connecting to a globalised world actually come with some risks and some threats. We know that in the days of the internet, as well as more accessible airline travel, this poses some risks from people who might choose to shop online for some of our wildlife, or who come over here to smuggle some of our wildlife back to another country. So it is quite right that we are taking a very keen interest in this space, and quite right that we have actually listened to Department of Conservation (DOC) staff. This bill is actually based on the feedback from DOC staff, and it is great that the Government is looking to empower them further to achieve their jobs. Their feedback was that they have not been able to seize devices storing evidence, such as cameras and phones. They were having a bigger issue around people providing false names and addresses and not being able to ask them to provide some proof of ID, and they have had an inability to stop people for a reasonable period of time. So that is what this bill seeks to address, and I feel, after going through the select committee process, we have gone some way towards achieving that outcome.

The bill comes back from the Local Government and Environment Committee in pretty good shape. It has gone through the submission process. I think we had seven submissions overall. Every submission was favourable to the intent of the bill and supported it, although there were some concerns. We have looked at them and pretty much looked at putting them into the amendments, and some of the amendments I would like to talk about today in this second reading.

The first one is around new section 39A in clause 5. There was a lot of discussion around extending the powers of rangers to seize evidential material. I suppose when we give people those powers to seize items, we should always ensure that it is proportionate and reasonable, and I feel where new section 39A has landed—it comes back into the House for its second reading, and it clarifies this to be proportionate and reasonable.

New section 39B in clause 5 amends powers to stop someone when investigating a suspected offence, and very much when we were looking at this we wondered whether we should be putting in something around a time frame for stopping someone. We found that that could not be defined, but what this amendment to new section 39B does is it comes back in clarifying that this section does not intend to give the power to physically stop someone. So it is not the physicality of stopping someone, but more just to direct or require them.

New section 39C in clause 5 looks to give reasonable grounds, where a person is committing or is about to commit an offence, for the necessary person to prevent or stop the offender. There was a lot of discussion at the select committee stage about what we are doing here, and whether we are actually going to be giving a new power to give people the right to go on to private property. It was something that we were a bit concerned about, but our amendment clarifies that it does not give the person—or a ranger, in this case—the right to go on to private property.

Just finally, around new section 39D in clause 5, what we are looking for is around clarity of arrest: are we saying it gives all professionals, in this case, the ability to arrest, or, rather, to just detain someone and wait for a constable to arrive and arrest the detained person? Where we have landed for this is that it just clarifies the ability for the ranger to have those powers as well. So, overall, it is a pretty good bill that has come back in good shape from the select committee, and I commend it to the House.

Bill read a second time.