Resource Legislation Amendment Bill

When the Hon Nick Smith spoke to this bill last Thursday—excuse me, I am fighting a cold—he said it was necessary because of the housing crisis in Auckland. Well, we know there is a housing crisis in Auckland, but it is wrong to blame the Resource Management Act (RMA) for that crisis. The RMA has been in force since about 1992. In 2004, when the RMA was enforced, there were 31,423 consents for new houses in New Zealand; in 2016, there were only 29,900. In Auckland the number went down, from 2004, from 12,000 to 9,000. The RMA was in force throughout. How can it be that Nick Smith can blame the RMA for the housing crisis in Auckland? It is a nonsense.

There is a problem with a lack of land supply in Auckland. The Labour Party has been saying that for about 4 or 5 years. I think it was Annette King who made the announcement with David Shearer at a conference about 5 years ago—we said we need a national policy statement under the RMA to free up land supply for affordable housing. I had a hand in that. I remember it. The RMA should have been the solution, or one of the solutions, to these problems; it should not be the whipping boy for problems with housing in Auckland. In truth, the more important solutions in respect of housing involve cracking down on speculators and getting the Government to roll up its sleeves and build a few affordable houses. Every few decades, the Labour Party has to do that, and that is actually, in the end, the essential component of decent housing policy. We also need, of course, to ban offshore buyers.

It is abundantly clear that the housing crisis in Auckland is no excuse for this deeply flawed piece of legislation. Last week I was complimenting Minister Finlayson and the National Government on a wonderful process in respect of the oversight legislation for the SIS and the Government Communications Security Bureau. Sadly, this particular piece of legislation falls on exactly the opposite extreme. This is an appalling piece of legislation. It is poorly designed in principle, and the detail of it is flawed in so many, many ways. I and many others, including Sir Geoffrey Palmer, have described the regulation-making powers that are conferred on Ministers under this bill as completely rebalancing the current division of powers between local government and central government in favour of the executive.

I ask this House: who in their right mind would give sweeping executive powers to Nick Smith to override—

💬 Phil Twyford: No!

Well, that is right. These are Trump-like powers. Who in their right mind—well, the answer is the Māori branch of the National Government. The Māori Party is pushing this appalling piece of legislation—which is opposed by Labour, and it is opposed by New Zealand First, by the Greens, by the ACT Party, and by United Future—through the House, and this terrible piece of legislation, which further complicates the RMA, will do nothing to improve affordability of housing. The Māori Party is pushing this through with its two votes, and in return for what? In return for improved participatory involvement for the Māoridom in plan-making processes and some consents. You know, I do not have a great objection to those provisions. They do not actually add much to what is happening, or what should happen, presently, because in theory, under the RMA, everyone has got the right of participation. So why would the Māori Party trade this appalling piece of legislation for some minor improvements to Māori participation rights? Well, it has got to answer that question.

There are three main forms of executive power that are being granted here. The first is Draconian regulatory powers to override rules and plans that the Government deems to be inconsistent with other legislation, which it would like to think is a code. It is aiming here at GM rules against rules and plans—rules against the use of GMOs in specific localities. The Labour Party position is that the safety decision should be taken by the Environmental Protection Authority under the hazardous substances and new organisms (HASNO) legislation. Clinical decisions ought to be taken by clinicians, not councils, but there is an economic decision that is legal for councils to take, as to whether they think it undermines, for example, the ability of an organic apple business in the Hawke’s Bay’s to have GM crops. That is the current law; councils can do that.

If the Government wants to make HASNO a code, it should amend the HASNO legislation. It should not give great big regulation-making powers—executive powers—to Nick Smith. It is similar to if the Government wanted to say that the Building Act was a code for insulation and wanted to stock colder centres like Dunedin and Christchurch, which want to have a more strict code so that their houses are warmer and drier. If those members want that to be a code in the Building Act, amend the Building Act; do not give some broad regulation-making power to Nick Smith. I do not trust him to have that power.

The other regulation-making powers here come through the plan to standardise plan formats and rules. We agree with standard plan formats and standard definitions. It is common sense. But those rules are cast so broadly that they can go to the substance of plan rules, not just their format and definition, and that goes too far too.

Thirdly, the rule-making powers of the Minister are also far too broad. These powers have been likened by some to the old powers that the Muldoon Government gave itself under the National Development Act and to the abuses by the Muldoon Government of regulation-making powers under the Economic Stabilisation Act 1948. We should never forget in this House that those broad regulation-making powers that were given to the executive just after World War II sat on the books for decades and were not abused until Muldoon came along about three decades later and used the regulation to impose a price freeze, a wage freeze, and a rent freeze through taking executive action by regulation, not through this House. This bill is not quite as bad as the Economic Stabilisation Act and the regulation-making power thereunder, but it is on that spectrum. It is on that spectrum, and I ask again: who in their right mind would be handing those powers across to a Minister?

This legislation was panned by just about everyone. Even the few people who came and supported it would say things like “Well, we support the intent of the bill.” before criticising much of its detail. Take the provision in respect of subdivision applications not being notified. Do you know who was opposed to that? The developers—the developers. They said: “It’s going too far. People should have a right of participation.” They further said—and some of the big developers came along and said—“We wear more than one hat here. We don’t just develop land; we run quarries. And when someone puts a subdivision next to our quarry and we have got no right of participation, we get worried because in 10 years’ time, those people will be trying to shut down our quarry, and we need quarries for the gravel for roads.” They came along and said: “This is just silly.” They said: “Abrogating rights of appeal to the Environment Court is wrong too. It will encourage stupid conditions from councils. If there is no right of appeal, they will write 50 conditions instead of 20, and there will be no recourse.” Appeal rights are important. They are not just rights that are important to objectors; they are also important rights for applicants.

There are lots of other things wrong with this bill. In terms of some of the underlying problems that we have got in society, we have got this appalling degradation of our waterways. Eight years after this Government came into power, 70 percent of monitored waterways have still got increasing concentrations of nitrates. Its pathetic swimmable standard, which it announced the week before last, had no provision relating to periphyton, which most people know of as “slime”.

💬 Hon Dr Nick Smith: Yes, it does. Not true.

No, Minister Smith, you are just wrong. You are spinning again. The standard that sits there is the old one that sat there for your wadeable standard. It is unchanged for swimmable rivers. I have said that.

You would not answer the question in the House, Nick Smith. I have tweeted and I have put out the information. People know where the truth is and that you have absolutely no credibility. You are letting our rivers be used as farm drains. You threw away the national policy statement that was available to you from Judge Sheppard when you came into Government that said that increases in land use intensity should no longer be a permitted activity. You nixed that, and what you have done since has been completely ineffective, and as a consequence we have got tens of thousands of people rising up around the country saying: “We want to be able to swim in our local river in summer, putting our heads under without getting crook. We want to have aquifers where we can use the water drawn from bores to make baby formula without our babies getting sick.” You cannot do that in South Canterbury now, according to the medical officer of health.

This is an appalling piece of legislation. It is typical Nick Smith—grandiose in intent and flawed in its detail, and it really should go in the trash can.

Tēnā koe e Te Mana Whakawā, and I would like to thank the previous speaker, David Parker, for his contribution. In fact, I quite like David Parker. I am not one who is into pointing fingers and saying horrible things about people, so I am going to say the wonderful things I like about Mr David Parker. I agree with him that he is a valuable man. He has given good input in his speech across a broad range of things that we actually agree on.

We come to this House and we come to the Resource Legislation Amendment Bill because we think we try to provide some balance to that. We have managed to maintain kaitiakitanga. We have managed to maintain the place of hapū and iwi in the management of the resources under this piece of legislation. We believe that protection and enhancement of the natural world can only be achieved when tangata whenua are involved in decisions about sustainable management and economic progress. We have this belief. It is also the belief of the Iwi Chairs Forum, whose technical advisers worked with us in negotiations with the Minister to carve back some of the things that the Hon David Parker—is he “honourable”? [Interruption] Yes, he is honourable—mentioned in his speech.

I mean that we want to be involved in a very real way, and to this end we have supported the call of Ngāti Tama, who have sought from the Minister for the Environment a water conservation order over the Waikoropupū Springs. We do this because it has been the experience of Māori in regional areas, under local government, to come and be consulted and tick-boxed and then to be ignored when decision making is made by regional councils and local councils. I could bring up the example in my own town of Masterton, where the iwi were consulted about whether to put the overflow from the sewerage treatment centres directly into the river when the treatment ponds were full.

Our objection was noted. Ngāti Kahungunu ki Te Wairarapa and Rangitāne ki Wairarapa said: “This is unacceptable. You cannot do that. You have another option available to you, and we think you should do that.” The local council said “Thank you very much for your consultation.” and did it anyway—to the point where that river is now so degraded that a farm dog drank from the river, not far from where that sewage outlet flows into the Ruamāhanga River, and died. That is right. That is how clean our rivers are. So, yes, we do believe that being given an increased say, through the Mana Whakahono a Rōhe arrangements for hapū and iwi, with their local council, is an important step, and it is a huge leap of faith for it to be legislated, in law, that they must do it, because it is variable around the country as to how much local government interacts with their local Māori.

Some people have called that separatism. Some people have said that that is special rights for Māori. Some people have said that that is privilege.

💬 Denis O’Rourke: That’s what it is. That, in fact, is what it is.

I will tell you what that is. That is correcting the imbalance. That is correcting the imbalance of a guarantee that was given to Māori under the Treaty of Waitangi, and we have sought to ensure the guarantee to all their resources, to all of their lands, to their rivers, to their fishers—

💬 Denis O’Rourke: That’s a different issue.

Oh, is that a different issue? I think not, thank you very much. So our concept of guardianship and kaitiakitanga, which embraces the spiritual and cultural guardianship of Te Ao Māori, is a responsibility derived from whakapapa—whakapapa that links us to our ancestral mother, Papatūānuku. That is our right, and that is why we stand up and fight for the right of Māori within this piece of legislation.

However, let us get to the GE-free debate that has been going on recently. I would like our public and our whānau to know that the Māori Party has been a supporter of GE-free Aotearoa since 2004. It has been in our policy manifesto. It has been in our relationship agreements with the Government. And based on this, there are some things that we would still like to negotiate with the Minister, because the drafting does not completely match the anticipated decisions that we came to and the agreements that we came to around policy.

So, in good faith, we are going to vote for this today, on the guarantee that we continue to have those conversations in order to put forward the policies of not just the Māori Party but, yes, regions such as the Hawke’s Bay, regions such as Te Tai Tokerau, and regions within Te Wai Pounamu, which are advocating for a GE-free stance.

The Māori Party will protect the natural environment and the ecological system. This comes straight from our policy. We will support Aotearoa remaining nuclear free and work towards achieving a GE-free New Zealand. That has been our policy for ever. It is not because people are jumping up and down. We have met with our GE friends throughout the entire process as we have sought to reduce the wide-ranging powers of the Minister.

You might have noticed that there used to be a section 360A, section 360B, and section 360C, as well as section 360D, and they have now gone, because that is what we have negotiated. We do that because we speak on behalf of the people whom we represent, and their technical advisers were completely involved throughout the entire process to ensure that we could get the best outcome for Māori. And guess what? They agree. That is exactly what we have done.

We have secured gains for kaitiakitanga in this bill. If the New Zealand First Party members have a problem with that, they should speak to a member of their party, who was the chief Treaty negotiator for our Kahungunu settlement, in which they were trying to get back the lake and the rivers and have equal management over those resources. He can tell them all about what that means to Māori, and that is exactly what we have sought to do here—so that you can not be just consulted, but up front, at the beginning, you are able to engage in a Mana Whakahono arrangement with your local council to determine in what areas you would like to have notifications around consent.

So, no, maybe iwi do not need to be consulted about a window in a building or a street that is going to be built in an area that has already been subdivided, but they may want to be consulted about a wāhi tapu, a sacred spring, a place that has been a gathering place for their people for centuries. That is exactly what happened with the springs that we talked about earlier, the Waikoropupū Springs.

We are willing to support this bill today on conditions. This is what we say to the Minister. We have been working in good faith with him, and we have made some gains for Māoridom within this bill, for the betterment of the whole of Aotearoa, because kaitiakitanga, linked through whakapapa to our Earth Mother, is the way that we ensure that our environment is maintained in its not wadeable, not swimmable, but in its pristine state. Our policy is not for swimmable rivers; it is for drinkable rivers, or, at least, drinkable where they should be drinkable and not in the middle of Rotorua when there is bubbling mud coming up through the water—but in its pristine state.

So we stand today to say that we give support. We give support to this piece of legislation at its second reading, but we are looking forward to the Committee of the whole House stage, at which any further negotiations that we may be able to get through to further protect the environment will be put through.

💬 Denis O’Rourke: Leaving it a bit late.

It is never too late. It is not too late until the fat lady sings, and I have not started singing yet. So the next stage, the Committee of the whole House stage, is the stage where we can bring Supplementary Order Papers to the House—the opportunity to make amendments, if we are able to do that, and let the rest of the House decide whether those things are appropriate for this piece of legislation or not.

This bill does not become law until it passes the third reading. That is the time at which you should measure how voting is cast—because I understand that has been raised in recent times, about the Māori Party being the Māori branch of the National Party. Well, let me just clarify before I finish: if I wanted to wear blue undies, I would be. I am not. Therefore, we seek to have an independent voice, and we can bring independent voice to this bill. We bring independent votes to this bill. We seek to uphold the wishes of our people who have put their trust in us, and that is what we are doing. Thank you.

E Te Māngai o Te Whare, tēnā koe. Otirā, e ngā mema o Te Whare nei, tēnā tātou katoa. I am pleased to take a call on the second reading of the Resource Legislation Amendment Bill. It has been almost 2 weeks since I have been in this House, and there has been a lot that has happened. If I can ask for your indulgence, Mr Deputy Speaker, I just want to acknowledge the victims of flooding, particularly the chairman of our Local Government and Environment Committee, Scott Simpson, in terms of the Coromandel, and those in west Auckland. My thoughts are with those communities, particularly our families that do not have insurance. Can I just put that on record. Secondly, can I just acknowledge the successful hosting of the largest cultural event in New Zealand, Matatini, in my area of Kahungunu. I just want to acknowledge Ngāti Kahungunu’s hosting of the many kapas that came and also acknowledge the overall winner, Whangarā Mai Tawhiti, which, obviously, comes from my electorate.

This bill is flawed, and I want to use the time in this contribution not to repeat what my colleague the Hon David Parker has said but to talk about the process—to talk about the shambolic process this particular bill has gone through—which has led us to have these grave concerns about whether this bill actually meets the undefined problem that the Minister is talking about, and that is a lack of housing up in the Auckland area. Can I just put on record that this bill was referred to the select committee in December 2015. Clearly, we were going to rise about a week later. We heard 210 submissions throughout the country. About 2 June 2016, which is approximately 4 months later, hearings were completed. If you think about it, that is 4 months of hearing over 210 submissions.

Then we had a departmental report, which was delayed month by month, and it received two extensions from the Business Committee. The select committee members were told that one of the reasons why we were constantly pushing out the report-back date was that Cabinet had not signed off the proposed changes. That tells me that in the National Government’s own caucus there were real concerns around this particular bill. Although not confirmed, I think the delays were because the Government did not have the numbers to pass it through the House, even though it had the numbers at the select committee.

Then we go on to 2 November 2016, and we had the second stage departmental report presented to the select committee, with some 400 pages. Because of the time delay, members were unable or unwilling to make changes. So, throughout the 400 pages that we had at the select committee, we listened to what submitters said. We were active members of that select committee to make the changes submitters had shared with us time and time and time again.

Then on 9 November we heard the Māori Party had cut a deal with the National Party, and it said that it was going to support the bill. The reason why it gave its support was apparently because of iwi engagement plans—iwi engagement plans. The co-leader Marama Fox, the member who just resumed her seat, talked about the importance of iwi being engaged. I want to put on record that we currently have 124—124—iwi and hapū co-governance arrangements with councils as a result of Treaty settlements. Before this piece of reform, 124 existed. I do not want people to feel that this is going to be the silver bullet that gets iwi to the table. It is currently there in our Treaty settlements—124.

There was a concerted effort by many to ask the Māori Party to withdraw its support. In fact, over the February break this year, at Te Rā o Te Raukura, talking to many of the Māori Party supporters, they were unaware that a 3-minute video had been put together by—hold on, Mr Deputy Speaker—the chairman of Ngāti Kahungunu, Ngāhiwi Tomoana, and the former captain of the All Blacks, Taine Randell, who is now a director on the Ngāti Kahungunu asset holding company. We had the mayor, who is actually a National Party candidate, Lawrence Yule. We also had growers and agricultural people. We had representatives at council level who participated in this video. Why, Mr Deputy Speaker? Because they realised that the Government was not listening to them. Their video—3 minutes—which is up online, and anyone can google it, was aimed at the Māori Party, asking the Māori Party to withdraw its support.

So this is the process; 14 months later, it comes back here. There was a huge disagreement in the select committee because, apparently, the Government Ministers would not allow us to report back with our minority report. So it came back to this House without a report. I think that is shambolic, and it calls into question the sanctity of the select committee process to ensure that we are making good, sound decisions around legislation that we present back in the House. On this particular occasion, I do not believe that was followed—I do not believe that. For 14 months, we to-ed and fro-ed—all sorts of things were happening—and, of course, at the end of the day, the people whom I represent in Hawke’s Bay have already made a delegation.

I want to just touch briefly on new section 360D, inserted by clause 105. I want to share what submitters said in relation to new section 360D in terms of the broad powers given to the Minister. Here is one quote: “I recommend that the broad powers that would be given to the Minister under section 360D(1)(a), (b), and (c) not proceed.” Who wrote that? That is from the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment. Here is another one: “The new regulation making powers are far-reaching and HBRC and LFNZ have concerns at several levels including: (i) the extensive use of regulations … (ii) the use of regulations imposed by central Government … (iii) the uncertainty as to what the regulations may contain; and (iv) the uncertain status of Ministerial policy statements…” Who wrote that? Hawke’s Bay Regional Council. Here is another one, which says: “We submit that 360D be deleted from the Bill on the basis that: The proposed regulatory powers are an excessive grant of power to a minister,”. Who wrote that? Pure Hawke’s Bay. Here is another one: “The Council supports a number of the changes proposed through the Amendment Bill, but is concerned that there are other aspects that may result in communities being less able to self-determine environmental outcomes, which is currently a central premise both for the Council and in the Resource Management Act 1991.” That is from Hastings District Council.

Again, going back to the Māori Party co-leader, around these hapū and the gains that they have received for Māori and hapū around here, there are existing gains that I mentioned early on—the 124. One of them is actually in my own electorate of Hawke’s Bay. This, again, is from the Hawke’s Bay Regional Council, which notes: “Lastly, with the recent enactment of the Hawke’s Bay Regional Planning Committee Act (HBRPC) 2015 it is important that the RLA Bill and any amendments made to it (including changes sought by Local Government New Zealand), must not supplant, compromise, or weaken this legislation. The HBRPC Act has resulted in fundamental and positive changes to the way in which HBRC operates and works with tāngata whenua. Vitally it was an agreed part of the treaty settlement negotiations with nine treaty settlement entities.” I hope that proves that there is wide-ranging opposition to new section 360D, particularly from growers, councillors, and iwi in the electorate that I represent, particularly in the Hawke’s Bay area.

I put this to the Minister for the Environment: there has been no business case presented that says the Resource Management Act (RMA) is the cause of the housing crisis suffered around this country. There is no business case that the housing crisis requires the Minister to have broad powers to override local plans, which is what this bill is doing. This is what this bill is doing. It is giving the Minister broad powers to override local plans, and that is why Labour cannot support this.

It was interesting, too, that the Minister talked about Labour’s lack of long-term planning when it comes to housing. Let me make it really clear, Mr Smith: Labour will build 100,000 affordable homes, we will address speculators in the market, and we will provide 5,100 extra emergency beds. That is what I call a comprehensive housing plan, not this dithering around with the RMA, which is there to protect our environment. Kia ora tātou.

With the indulgence of the House, I would just like to make a passing comment on the weather events that impacted on my electorate last week and to thank the previous speaker, Meka Whaitiri, for her thanks. I particularly want to acknowledge the first responders, the emergency personnel, who were busy protecting homes, property, and people during a very severe weather event across the Coromandel electorate last week. What we saw were neighbours supporting neighbours, communities supporting communities, and this week we have the sun back out in Coromandel and a big clean-up job ahead of us.

It is a pleasure for me to rise and support the second reading of the Resource Legislation Amendment Bill, and as the chair of the Local Government and Environment Committee, what a big job the select committee did. The previous speaker acknowledged the length of time this bill had been before the select committee. That of itself was not unusual—this is a large, complicated, and enormously important piece of legislation. Nearly 800 submissions were received, we heard from over 200 submitters, and we did a lot of very detailed work on this piece of legislation.

This bill, in its form returned from the select committee, is the most significant reform of the Resource Management Act since its inception in 1991. It is the phase two reforms that this Government has been talking about for so long and wanting to bring into the House with the cooperation of our support partners. What it means for New Zealanders is faster, simpler plan-making, thousands fewer consents that will be required, fewer opportunities for appeals, less duplication with other Acts, better management of natural hazards, and increased legal weighting for property rights. These are all good steps for New Zealanders.

This bill has some provisions in it relating to iwi participation, and it is to be remembered that iwi participation has been part of the Resource Management Act since the late 1990s, when Winston Peters supported those initiatives. In those days, Winston Peters used to support iwi participation, and now he has changed his mind. These changes will bring about a better level of cooperation and speedy efficiency that will ensure a more effective flow of consenting and processing of applications under the Act. So there will be an area of stronger national direction: standard planning templates and definitions, requirements to provide sufficient development capacity, and new regulation-making powers to avoid duplication with other Acts.

The new Act will provide provisions to have stock exclusion rules included. New procedural principles for timely, efficient, cost-effective, and proportionate impacts will be in place. There will be more flexible and faster planning, more effective and efficient engagement with communities, less consenting bureaucracy, and there will be fewer appeals to the Environment Court for certain activities, particularly those activities where residential activities have already been designated as being appropriate in residential zones. It seems silly to allow for appeals in that area.

To go into minute detail at this stage in this debate is not appropriate. We will have an opportunity to do that during the Committee of the whole House, but this is a good piece of legislation. It has been a lot of work for the select committee. I want to thank members from across the House on the select committee who, notwithstanding their different policy points of view, all engaged, I think, in an effective way to see a good result proceed. I support the second reading of this bill.

Tēnā koe e Te Māngai o Te Whare. Sir Geoffrey Palmer is right: Sir Robert Muldoon’s ghost is back in the Beehive. He is striding the halls of Parliament with this bill. “Muldoonism” was an assault on democratic processes and the rule of law, with legislation like the National Development Act and the Clutha Development (Clyde Dam) Empowering Act. Muldoonism was about the executive making a decision and imposing it by its will. That is what this Resource Legislation Amendment Bill is all about, not only in its content but also in the way in which it is being considered by the select committee and because of the way the Minister dominated the whole select committee process.

Select committees are supposed to be Parliament’s workhorses. They are supposed to be places where bills are scrutinised, where public submissions are heard and seriously considered and debated, and then changes are made to the bill as introduced and recommended back to Parliament. The Minister is claiming the select committee worked like that. He was not there, but we in the select committee had to wait 5 months on his pleasure while he negotiated and worked with officials and with the Māori Party to amend the bill and then have the final departmental report put in front of the select committee. So the select committee process was an absolute sham, and it acted more like a rubber stamp for the Minister rather than being a serious consideration of the bill.

The flimsy speeches by Government members opposite just show how weakly they engaged with the bill. They just waited until the Minister said “Oh, these provisions are all right.” and then they would approve them. That has been one of the problems with select committees under this Government and the way in which they have been weakened because the executive has dominated the lawmaking process.

But this is typical of what is actually in the bill as well, because increasing the power of Ministers and centralising decision-making in Wellington and overriding local and community decision-making has been one of the defining characteristics of this Government. We have seen it in the changes to the Local Government Act, we have seen it in Nick Smith’s dismissal of elected councillors in Canterbury, and we are seeing it in this bill with the major increase in the powers that the bill gives to the Minister, particularly the Minister for the Environment, to actually make regulations and then override local and regional councils and their ability to consult their communities and develop plans.

This bill is all about having development—and how it happens in our towns, cities, and countryside—happen much faster and through new processes where the Minister puts his or her stamp on them and is able to dictate the content of district and regional plans. This bill puts executive power and individual property rights ahead of community and environmental well-being and community decision-making, and it is all about Ministers in Wellington acting to speed up the decision making; it is not about the quality of those decisions.

We have heard from other speakers about the major opposition—from Fonterra, to Forest and Bird, to Fish and Game New Zealand—to the powers in new section 360D, inserted in clause 105 of the bill, and the Minister’s regulation-making powers. Those provisions in new section 360D have been reduced slightly, but there is still a major power for the Minister to directly insert provisions and plans through the new national planning standards, which were previously called a national planning template. The Minister for the Environment can use those to direct what provisions should be, not just in plans all over New Zealand but in specific regions. If the Minister says that a plan must be amended, then it has to be. Seventy-seven percent of submitters opposed the ability of the Minister to make regulations and then to have these national planning standards insert provisions directly into plans—77 percent of submitters—yet that provision is still in the bill. These regional and district plans are critical in guiding the decisions about how development affects our land, our coast, our air, and our water.

Yet the Minister wants the power to directly make decisions on plans in Wellington. In a process where there is considerable potential for abuse, private developers who are applying for private plan changes can apply and get the council and the Minister to agree to a streamlined process, and there may not even be any chance for members of the public to have a say in a hearing in front of the decision makers. Nor is there an ability for members of the public to challenge those decisions through the Environment Court in that streamlined process.

The other major element of new section 360D, inserted in clause 105, that is of concern is the ability of the Minister to use regulations to strike out provisions in plans that he or she considers duplicate or to overlap other legislation. From the start, this has been aimed squarely at those communities such as Northland, Auckland, and Hawke’s Bay, where there are GM-free provisions in their plans. It is aimed at allowing the Minister to remove those provisions in order to allow GM crops to be planted. What this Government fails to recognise is that a major sector of our marketing advantage overseas is because we are GM free, yet through new section 360D, which the Māori Party has not succeeded in getting removed from the legislation, we potentially undermine that and are able to allow GM planters and others to compromise our GE-free status.

Nick Smith claims time and time again that this bill is a litmus test on housing affordability. It is nonsense to blame the Resource Management Act (RMA) for the housing crisis that his Government has helped create. He has been the architect of spiralling housing prices by the Government’s failure to recognise and provide for the major increase in demand caused by the 2 percent population growth annually and the major increase in migrant flows, its failure to implement a capital gains tax to control speculation, its failure to encourage intensive urban development by properly investing in public transport so that people build close to rail routes and bus routes, and its failure to amend the Residential Tenancies Act to ensure that renters get a fair deal. It has exacerbated the housing crisis with its sell-off of thousands of State houses.

Nick Smith blames the RMA for high section prices because he wants to hide just how much this bill, with its very permissive approach to subdivision, is a charter for property developers. It could have been written by property developers because of the way in which it promotes ad hoc subdivision and development and urban sprawl, with little consideration of the impacts that this will have on our coast, on waterways, and on neighbours. Nick Smith’s claims about housing and the housing crisis and the need to amend the RMA are based on anecdote, and the regulatory impact statement made that very clear.

There is no compelling evidence, Minister, that the RMA is to blame for the housing crisis. In the Auckland Unitary Plan, we have provisions that encourage more compact and more intensive development. We do not need this bill to do this. The bill’s permissive approach to subdivision will not apply just in Auckland; it will apply around New Zealand. So unless there are effective plan provisions already in place, we will have much more subdivision occurring in sensitive areas, like on top of our beaches, and potentially in areas like natural hazard zones. What is the point of trying to control housing development in natural hazard zones if you have also got a bill that is encouraging residential development and subdivision as a permitted activity because of the way it overturns the presumption in the current Act that you cannot have subdivision unless there is a resource consent or a plan rule that allows it?

The Green Party also opposes this bill because of the way in which it restricts and overrides the basic rights of public participation. It goes against people’s right to have a say on development that affects their neighbourhood or places that they care about. Informed decision-making is good decision-making. A number of submitters, from airport authorities to Fonterra, highlighted the value of public involvement both in plans and on consent decisions. Airport authorities want the ability to make submissions on subdivisions that may be within an area affected by airport noise so that they do not have issues several years hence because of reverse sensitivity and people complaining about airport noise. But under this bill, that is potentially disallowed because of the very permissive approach to subdivision. So it is fast decision-making that the bill emphasises, not good decision-making.

We oppose the bill because of restrictions on the right to appeal to the Environment Court and the value that that court has in being a check on decision making. It is a bad bill. It should be binned.

This bill is nothing less than the most serious attack on New Zealand’s democracy in my lifetime. It seeks to so limit regional and local government that local councils and communities will become—

💬 Hon Dr Nick Smith: In the Northland election you said you’d back us.

—planning and policy slaves of the Government executive and its bureaucracy. Nick Smith is protesting, but in fact that is the truth of the matter—councils will be dictated to by ultra-powerful Ministers, especially Nick Smith, intent on their own agendas, with no regard to regional needs for development and with no regard for the diversity of values held by regional communities. It is an anti-regions bill and it is an anti-democratic bill. That is it in a nutshell. There is only one way to stop this, and that is to get rid of this awful National Government this year and also to get rid of the Māori Party, which is the only reason why the Government can even contemplate this horrible legislation. It is a 1 percent party—a tail trying to wag this dog of a Government.

💬 Marama Fox: Two percent at the last poll.

It was 1 percent—a 1 percent party.

💬 Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: How about we get back to the bill?

It is a party not actually interested in preserving local democracy or in regional self-determination on environmental standards, such as the freedom to adopt a regional genetic engineering - free region as a regional development initiative. Instead, the Māori Party has done deals with Nick Smith behind the scenes so that the Government gets its anti-democratic way while the Māori Party gets the influence it wants for some Māori iwi, with useless and unnecessary Māori participation agreements and mandatory Māori appointments to a raft of boards, panels, and committees, to further hamstring local government. The Māori Party has shown, by supporting this bill, that it is willing to accept a thimbleful of special rights for iwi and in return is gifting a bucketful of ministerial power to this Government.

New Zealand First rejects the parallel governance provisions promoted by the Māori Party in the bill. I am supported in this by a leader, by a caucus, and by a party that includes very significant degrees of Māori participation and representation. The whole part of the bill on these matters, as far as I am concerned, amounts to a significant constitutional-level change for New Zealand, reached only by way of a shoddy deal between the Minister and the Māori Party, and we think that is a disgrace. For that reason alone—

💬 Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! I am sorry to interrupt the member, but I should just draw to his attention the fact that if he feels so genuinely enraged about all these things, he should not have to read his speech. So I ask the member to carry on with his speech. He has another 6—nearly 7—minutes to run, but I would appreciate it if he delivered it without having to read it.

When the bill was introduced, New Zealand First had an open mind and was willing to consider it constructively. New Zealand First wanted to reduce costs and wanted less bureaucracy. In fact, the bill adds more bureaucracy—not less, as has actually been claimed by the Minister. The whole part on special rights for Māori will add a huge, cumbersome, expensive, and worthless layer of bureaucratic nonsense to an already overcomplicated piece of legislation. The Act is already adequate to ensure Māori have the consultation that they need and deserve. It is already adequate for those purposes.

New Zealand First will never compromise the fundamental purposes of the Act and, therefore, is not willing to admit the parallel governance provisions of the bill. And we are not willing to admit the marginalisation of local government either, nor the introduction of excessive ministerial power in the place of local decision-making. We also deplore the loss of many important appeal rights, to the extent, for example, that airport companies are validly worried about not being able to do anything about reverse sensitivity issues, which often arise as far as their activities are concerned.

The idea that the Resource Management Act (RMA) is behind the housing shortage is an extreme absurdity. It is grossly excessive immigration that is, in fact, the main driver of that, and it is the failure of this Government to actually directly invest in the housing shortage that is behind it. The Resource Management Act has never been one of the major drivers of that. That does not mean that it cannot be improved—we agree with that—but this particular bill will make no difference whatsoever.

The Minister in charge of the bill, Nick Smith, in his rambling and largely incoherent speech last week, used Christchurch as an example of why the bill is needed, but, in fact, the greater availability of residential land as a result of the earthquake had much more to do with this, because it led to huge developments in the Waimakariri and Selwyn districts. The lower prices have got much more to do with the availability of insurance money in Christchurch than anything the Minister claimed.

The RMA is our environmental management legislation. It sets the terms for our planning system, so changes to it need to be very carefully—very carefully—considered, and that is not what has happened in this case. Changes need to be based on a high degree of community consensus and with as much cross-party support as possible. The Government has been intent on proceeding with the support of only the Māori Party and no others. The changes represent crude National Party ideology, with the witless support of a self-centred Māori Party.

The new ministerial regulating powers in new section 360D, in clause 105, and sections 360F and 360G, in clause 151, are thoroughly objectionable, unnecessary, and excessive. They were vigorously opposed by most of the submitters that I heard. They compromise local government so that local government itself will be significantly emasculated. The Minister will be empowered to override local and regional plan making, with major ramifications for regional development. New section 360D empowers the Minister to remove and replace parts of the plan. That overrides the right of communities and local authorities to regulate land uses, such as, for example, the use of a genetically modified - free zone for a region that wants to do that. Why should they not be permitted to do so if that is what they see for their future?

A one-size-fits-all approach is apparently intended, but it is not suitable for most parts of New Zealand. Regional diversity is one of New Zealand’s great strengths. As Fonterra said in its submission: “These provisions can detract from local decision making on local issues; compromise the principles of natural justice for stakeholders; and compromise robust resource management decision making.”

Three-quarters of submitters supported a national planning template, but not mandatory content in plans. The bill significantly limits public participation rights in both plan making and consenting decisions, and that is the flaw. Similarly, the streamlined planning process gives the Minister the power in plan making while restricting public involvement. The Minister determines the process. He can make sure that there is no hearing. He has the final approval rights, and there are, actually, no appeal rights. It could not be a worse process as far as local communities are concerned.

Collaborative planning processes are simply not properly developed in this bill and are likely to create local problems, more expense, and delays for local councils, and that is not the objective of this bill, nor should it be. This bill is extremely bad for New Zealand’s local democracy. It is even worse for a comprehensive and robust and fair resource management system, especially for regional New Zealand. It is actually worse still, because it provides for special rights for Māori, which should never be incorporated in a bill of this kind. That is against, and totally contrary to, New Zealand’s local government and democratic position. This bill, for all those reasons, should not pass. New Zealand First will vote against it.

Before I start, I too just want to acknowledge what has been going on, particularly in my electorate of Hunua and also in west Auckland and Coromandel, with the extreme floods that we have had up there. I just want to acknowledge the fantastic work of all the fire services, the police, the contractors clearing the roads, etc., and the way the community all came together to help one another.

I just want to pick up a little bit around what the previous speaker, Denis O’Rourke, has just been raising. He made the claim that New Zealand First came to the select committee hearings willing to consider this bill constructively. I do just want to point out that I understand that the Rt Hon Winston Peters waltzed around Northland telling everyone that he would support National in passing a Resource Management Act bill. Why is it that when I read the report from New Zealand First, it is opposed to virtually everything in this bill? Not just one thing, but virtually everything. I have got to say, if we are talking about how we say and keep our word, this is something that National is continuing to do with this bill.

I just want to spend a little bit of time talking about the “Mana Whakahono a Rohe”, otherwise known as the “Iwi Participation Arrangements”. Courts have previously determined that iwi have a right to be involved in consents. That is a long-established legal precedent that has been tested, and it is a legal issue. It is case law. One of the other things that courts have defined is that iwi have a right to be involved in consents—not enforcement and not in monitoring, but they have a legal right to be involved in consents.

So what this bill seeks to achieve is to actually clarify those rights. What it does is it sets out the arrangement by which either party, being either the council or the iwi or the hapū, may enter into an agreement. I use the word “may”, and the word “may” is actually in the bill. It is not a compulsory thing. Furthermore, there is no legal obligation on the council to actually sign an agreement with an iwi or hapū. Unfortunately, some members of the Local Government and Environment Committee and this House do not spend the time looking at the bill.

One other thing I just want to draw your attention to is that there is a specific clause in the bill that precludes any possibility—which some members have asserted—that councils will be held to ransom if they do not sign an agreement. There is a specific clause in the bill that says that iwi cannot continue to withhold consent from consents while negotiation processes are under way. Those are very powerful conditions and clauses set out in this bill, but, unfortunately, a lot of the debate that we hear from members in this House is ill-informed and, in fact—worse than that; worse than being ill-informed—just downright mischievous.

The next call is a split call. Julie Anne Genter—5 minutes.

Tēnā koe, Mr Speaker. Tēnā koutou e Te Whare. Before I came into Parliament, I worked as an urban and transportation planner. I am really passionate about the opportunity we have to create cities that are better for people, that protect our environment, that make good use of infrastructure, that have affordable housing, and that ensure not only that we are we going to reduce our climate pollution but also that we will be more resilient to extreme weather events in the future, because the reality is that the flooding we saw in the past few days is something that will be happening more as a result of climate change, and we need to have a plan for how we are going to have infrastructure to deal with that and how it is going to be funded. Our current Government is completely neglecting to address those problems and issues.

This bill is passing by only a very narrow majority. I think that is a real shame because there have been calls across the board for a review of the Resource Management Act (RMA). The original architect, Sir Geoffrey Palmer, called for a royal commission of inquiry to ensure that we had a broad-based, evidence-based review of the legislation so that we could improve it and solve some of the ongoing systemic issues with it. The Green Party would support a royal commission of inquiry. But the Minister and the National Government have been reluctant to engage in a broad-based debate about how we can make resource legislation work better for everyone. They want to do it their way, and they are going to do it their way, and it is not a good bill. In fact, the vast majority of submitters—there were 647 unique submissions on this bill—made very similar points. Fish and Game New Zealand, the Environmental Defence Society, and Forest and Bird made similar points to people like Fonterra, quarry operators, and infrastructure operators. Many of them described the proposed ministerial regulation-making powers as excessive.

The bill that is before us today is not one that we can vote for. It is not being supported by the Labour Party or New Zealand First either. I think that the public should be very concerned about the one-sided approach that the National Government is taking to reforming resource management law, because it is something that affects everyone in this country. New Zealanders do want to protect the environment, and they do want planning and resource legislation law to be smoother—to operate in a more coherent way—and this bill is not going to achieve that.

We can see, from the great number of submitters that noted huge problems with it, that it is simply not going to solve the problems that the Government is claiming it will solve—most notably, that is housing affordability. The Minister claims that housing is unaffordable uniquely because of the RMA, and that is just rubbish. There is a whole number of factors that are influencing house prices. Some of them have to do with demand. If the Government had instituted a capital gains tax on investment properties, and if it had restricted the sale of real estate to New Zealand citizens and residents, that would have helped with housing affordability. Additionally, if it actually passed some laws to protect tenants—to ensure there was a warrant of fitness on rental properties—that would help reduce house prices and address the issues, which is that people do not have enough money to afford a place to live, whether they are renting or buying in Auckland.

Finally, they could be improving planning rules. One of my greatest passions is improving planning rules. I wish that the Minister understood just how much the land supply problem is related to unhelpful planning rules that prohibit increased density from being provided, because nothing in this bill is going to address that—nothing in this bill is going to address that. In fact, the Minister constantly conflates issues with planning rules with the RMA. The planning rules are determined by councils. If the Minister used national policy statements and national environmental standards to a greater degree and undertook the sort of consultation that is needed, then we might have better planning rules.

Finally, the Green Party would support a national policy statement on urban design to ensure that we have high-quality, people-oriented urban development. It also needs to be championed by the public sector. We need a public sector - led development agency. Just look at Hobsonville. The highest-quality development that has happened in Auckland recently is in Hobsonville. It was led under the Labour Government, with the local council—a public-private partnership, but master planned, and that is what we need more of in Auckland, not this.

The Hon Ruth Dyson—5 minutes.

There has been a bit of a theme running through the National Government over recent times. That is the theme of: “They know everything and everybody else is wrong.” That is exactly what the scrambled thinking of the Minister, the Hon Nick Smith, and the total lack of leadership of the Prime Minister, the Rt Hon Bill English, has demonstrated in this legislation. The Resource Legislation Amendment Bill is being used as an opportunity to reduce public input into decisions that have a major impact on the amenities and the environment in which we live, and the Auckland housing crisis is being used as the excuse. It is very hard to justify given that the Minister consistently denies there is a housing crisis in Auckland, let alone spreading throughout the rest of the country, but there clearly is. Then he says: “Because of this housing crisis, which does not exist, we are going to gut the Resource Management Act even further.”

I remember when the resource management legislation was introduced into New Zealand. For the first time, we had a change from the old town-planning regime of rules and regulations and we moved to an effects-based piece of legislation. It was a big challenge, but people were interested in looking not just at rules but at the impacts of development, the way that our cities and our rural towns could be friendlier to families and their citizens, and the way that we could develop our infrastructure in a manner respectful to the environment. Those are tensions that are hard to meet, and the Resource Management Act sought to do that.

The whole of Parliament agreed on that legislation. Of course, at that stage, there were only two political parties here—it was before the start of MMP—but it was supported by the whole of Parliament. In my view, something as important as the rules around developments that have an impact on our lives should be supported by the overwhelming majority of Parliament, if not by the whole of it, instead of this bill, which is going to just squeak through in what I think has been a pretty shabby deal. I say that with respect to the Māori Party. I do not agree with the deal that has been done having more merit than the damage that is being done by the rest of the legislation.

The resource management amendment Acts introduced by the Government since 2008 have just continually reduced the opportunity for ordinary citizens and communities to have a say in what is happening in their area. In Christchurch, the combination of the 2009 resource management amendment, combined with the central government imposition of a truncated and restricted input, let alone appeal of district plan changes, have caused communities to feel disempowered and tricked, and they have been by this Government—they have been. We no longer have the valid say on developments in our area that we used to. This is bad for local democracy. It is bad for the empowerment of citizens.

Anyone in this Parliament would, I am sure, sit around a table with the relevant Ministers and say “What are the problems with the Resource Management Act, and how can we work together to sensibly fix them?”, but that is not what the Minister does. The Minister, who knows everything, sits in his ivory tower totally ignoring all the contributions to this legislation. These are not fringe groups here—we had Local Government New Zealand, we had regional and district councils, we had Fonterra, we had Fulton Hogan Ltd, we had airport owners, we had the New Zealand Law Society, we had the Environmental Defence Society, we had Forest and Bird, and we had Fish and Game New Zealand. It was a pretty broad range of submitters, and they all opposed the legislation. But the Minister would say, from his ivory tower: “I know best. They are all wrong.” Well, Minister, I do not agree with that. I think that in this Parliament we should listen to submitters, particularly when a broad range such as I just outlined come in and say “This is a bad bill.”, and that is what they all said—“This is a bad bill.”

We could improve the Resource Management Act in a way that all New Zealanders would benefit from, but cutting citizens’ voices out of democratic processes and blaming the Auckland housing crisis is not the way to do it. It does demonstrate a scrambled way of thinking from the Minister and a total lack of leadership from the Prime Minister. We need more solutions working together, not this.

I stand to refute everything that that member across the House, the Hon Ruth Dyson, has just said, because I believe that the changes that are coming through this bill are going to be very beneficial for all councils and all the people of this country.

We have taken a two-phase approach to reforming the Resource Management Act (RMA). The first round was the implementation of the Environmental Protection Authority. Through that, the authority was able to deal with nationally significant infrastructure consents. It was able to speed up that process. Through this first round, there has been the opportunity for it to tighten up around enforcement and to look at fines for non-compliance. There are so many great things that the Environmental Protection Authority has done in the first round of the RMA process.

Our second round included some interesting points, because, contrary to what the Greens said about better planning, this particular bill has given an opportunity for excellent planning—not just better planning but some excellent planning—within both regional and local councils. We have also looked at the consenting process—making that process much simpler for organisations and for individuals to actually get their consents through the council. We are recognising affordable housing areas. We all know that there is a housing shortage in this country, and through this bill our Minister, the Hon Nick Smith, has done an amazing job in addressing the consenting processes for affordable housing. We need housing in our big cities and in other cities in this country, and this bill is actually going to speed up that process.

There have been other areas within this bill that my colleagues have covered, especially the member Andrew Bayly, around te Mana Whakahono ā Rohe. I just want to remind the House that it is in law—as in l-a-w, not as in l-o-r-e. So when I start to look at this bill, I see its alignment to the other Acts, and, therefore, there is a smooth transition for the passing of this bill and for it to be fully enacted. I have no hesitation but to commend it to the House. Thank you.

Nick Smith has tried to sell this bill as a way to fix the housing crisis, but the claim just does not stack up. It is so typical of much of what the Minister brings to the House, in that it is overcooked and the bill does not deliver on any of the promises that the Minister made when he so fancifully organised a press conference in front of a 3-metre-high pile of what were allegedly Resource Management Act (RMA) planning documents. So, although Nick Smith has continually tinkered with the RMA over the last 8 years—and, absolutely, this bill that we are debating today is more tinkering, although I would characterise it as harmful tinkering because it has many negative consequences—in that 8 years in Government, and after 10 years of blaming the RMA and blaming councils for expensive housing, he has done nothing substantive to tackle the real causes of expensive housing that lie within the planning system and the land-use system. He has done nothing about those things, and I am going to talk about those in detail.

Let us consider the claim that Nick Smith continually makes: that the RMA is to blame for expensive housing. We only have to look at the numbers. Between 2004—the last big peak in terms of consenting rates and build rates—and 2016, the number of consents fell by 18 percent. There was an 18 percent reduction in the number of consents between 2004 and 2016. The same RMA was in place, but the value of consents over that period almost doubled. So the cost of building increased by 94 percent; the average cost per square metre increased by 96 percent. It was the same RMA in 2004 as in 2016, but during that time the number of consents between the 2004 peak and the current level of building that the Minister constantly likes to brag about in this House actually fell by 18 percent, even though build costs doubled. In that time, the RMA has stayed the same. So it is obvious that Nick Smith’s love of blaming the RMA and blaming councils for being the overwhelming problem behind the housing crisis is just pure spin.

What does this bill do to fix the housing crisis? What does it actually do? Let us have a look. There are three main things that the bill does that Nick Smith claims will reduce the cost of housing. The first is that it gives Draconian ministerial regulatory powers to override council plans, control consents, and limit the rights of people, communities, and their elected representatives to have a say in the planning process. Secondly, it gives the Minister the power to set standardised plan formats and definitions—which we do not have a problem with, but it goes much further, and that is the problem. It gives Nick Smith the power to dictate the content and the substance of the plans that are developed by local councils. It is Draconian, it is Muldoonist, and we oppose it for those reasons. It also gives the Minister rule-making powers that are far, far too broad, and David Parker spoke eloquently about that earlier today.

Nick Smith’s impulse—his whole instinct—in trying to deal with this issue is to take powers away from councils and local communities and give them to himself. It is all about the centralisation of regulatory power in the executive arm of Government and, in particular, in the hands of that Minister. But this is the thing about this bill: it undermines and adds complexity to the RMA, and it takes power away from citizens and their communities and their elected representatives to have a say in the planning and land-use decisions in their local communities. To dress this up as some kind of solution to the housing crisis and the failure of our biggest city to properly manage its growth is audacious in its spin, even for Nick Smith.

The really crazy thing about the incessant tinkering by this Minister with the RMA—and after a decade of Nick Smith and Bill English blaming councils and blaming the RMA for the problems of expensive housing and the failure to properly manage urban growth—is that all of his tinkering up until now and this bill do nothing to tackle the actual root causes of expensive urban land and expensive housing that lie within the planning system. The core problem is that we have a highly restrictive planning system that stops cities making room for growth. It stops them growing up and it stops them growing out, and when you do that, only one thing happens: the prices go up.

Now, there are three parts to the problem. One is the excessive restrictions on height and density that stop cities from growing up. The second is an urban growth boundary where even the poorest urban growth boundary that can sometimes change and expand, like the one in the Auckland Unitary Plan, still rations the supply of new land for development. It drip-feeds new land into a speculative land market, which ensures that urban land prices are always very high. That is the core problem that we have in the urban land markets, which are so much of a problem, particularly in Auckland. That is a factor of the urban growth boundary being so restrictive.

The third issue is that the system that we have in this country for financing new infrastructure for development is broken. Central government does not want to fund it, councils cannot fund it because they are up against their debt ceilings, and developers struggle to be the middle man for the finance that is needed to lay the infrastructure down for new developments. The system is broken. Those three issues desperately need reform, but this Minister has done nothing about it, and this bill contributes nothing to fixing those three problems. All it does is tinker with the planning process and put more power in the hands of the Minister and take it away from local councils and local communities.

In 8 years, what has the Government done about this? It likes to claim responsibility for the Auckland Unitary Plan, but that is not its work; that is Auckland Council’s work, and, at best, that is a small, incremental improvement in the problems that I have been outlining. The Minister published a national policy statement that was a wasted opportunity to fix these problems. It has simply put in place a bureaucratic mechanism that tells councils to introduce, to drip-feed incrementally, bits of new land into a highly speculative land market. It does nothing to solve the core problem. In terms of the infrastructure logjam, the best that the National Government could come up with was a $1 billion line of credit—cheap credit—for councils that are already up against their debt ceiling. They are already too indebted. It is like offering a bottle of water to a drowning man. That is Nick Smith’s response to the infrastructure logjam. So this does nothing to fix those problems.

By contrast, Labour has put on the table bold and creative solutions to break the logjam for infrastructure financing. We have proposed bond financing, paid back by a targeted rate, which is supported by the Productivity Commission. It draws on international models of best practice that would cut councils out of the picture and give developers access to the cheapest possible credit through international bond finance that would be paid back by the landowners in that development over the lifetime of the asset. Our policy is to replace the urban growth boundary completely with more intensive spatial planning that will allow cities to grow and that will allow the market in land and the construction industry to be responsive to demand, to build houses when people want them, because the planning regime that this Minister defends does not allow that to happen, and that is at the core of the problem we have got. This bill is Draconian. It does nothing to solve the core problems that we face. It is just more tinkering by this Minister.

It is a pleasure and an honour to rise in wholehearted support of the Resource Legislation Amendment Bill in its second reading. I must say, what a very subdued Phil Twyford. In fact, can I reflect—

💬 Scott Simpson: No passion.

No, exactly—no passion; no belief, I think. You can just imagine Mr Twyford and the other Opposition members of Parliament being given their comms notes for this bill this morning and thinking: “Really? Is that what I’m going to have to say to a bill that will remove livestock from waterways, that will simplify planning rules and bring in national planning templates as well as improve capacity planning for much-needed residential housing?”.

When I reflect on what has happened in the Waimakariri since the earthquakes—under the Land Use Recovery Plan, the Government was able to step in and free up land. What we know is that when we free up land, it increases supply, which equals demand. When you look at needing some space for 18,000 houses—we have gone on to rebuild 23,000 houses, with annual house price inflation of only 1 or 2 percent. It shows, quite rightly, that when the authorities start to plan ahead and think about some of the constraints through land, which are restricting housing for many New Zealanders—that is the answer and that is exactly what this bill will do.

This is the second reading. We went through the select committee stage—and I must acknowledge the very hard-working Scott Simpson, who is the chair of the Local Government and Environment Committee—for a very big bill. We dealt with 764 submissions. Let us not forget our former deputy chair, Sarah Dowie, and our new deputy chair, Andrew Bayly, for shepherding this bill through the legislative process. There were 86 submissions from businesses, 544 from individuals, 57 from local government, and 44 from environmental and community groups.

I just want to finish with a quote from one of the submissions, from Dame Margaret Bazley from Environment Canterbury. She talks about supporting this bill, “including the addition of significant risks from natural hazards as a matter of national importance”, as well as “the new function for regional councils to ensure sufficient development capacity to meet long-term demand for urban development.” The submission also goes on to say that Environment Canterbury supports the two proposed new planning process options and the provisions for involving iwi in policy and plan development. That is why, in this second reading, I support this bill in the House.

The question was put that the amendments recommended by the Local Government and Environment Committee by majority be agreed to.