Crown Minerals Amendment Bill

on behalf of the Minister of Energy and Resources: I move, That the Crown Minerals Amendment Bill be now read a first time. I nominate the Economic Development, Science and Innovation Committee to consider the bill.

This will be one of the less controversial things that this Parliament deals with when it comes to Crown minerals over the coming months. It is a largely technical bill that makes amendments to ensure that the existing Crown minerals arrangements operate effectively. The bill will amend the Crown Minerals Act 1991. The Crown Minerals Act itself provides for the efficient allocation of rights to prospect for, explore for, and mine Crown minerals and the effective management and regulation of those rights. It also provides for carrying out of activities in respect of those rights and a fair financial return to the Crown in exchange for the minerals.

The amendments to the Act will clarify and update statutory provisions and address gaps, inconsistencies, and errors within the Act to give effect to the Act’s purpose that I have just mentioned. This Government is committed to ensuring that the regulatory system that manages New Zealand’s Crown minerals and permitting regime and that underpins those sectors is fit and robust. The changes to the bill will ensure that the regulatory gaps that currently have been identified are closed. It will ensure that there’s clarity for regulators and for the industry around permitting, and inconsistencies in the Crown Minerals Act will be addressed.

The bill makes these changes so that the permitting regime for New Zealand Crown - owned minerals can remain up to date, effective, and efficient, and there are three main measures that this bill puts in place: first, closing the gaps; providing clarity; and addressing inconsistencies. I’ll talk through each of those three in turn.

The first is to close the gaps in the legislation that currently mean the Act would be used in a way that is not currently intended. The nature of the petroleum industry is changing and as such the pressures on this part of the Act are also changing. There’s been an increasing amount of acquisition and divestment activity in the sector. These transactions reflect a global trend of consolidation and rationalisation by large companies. Smaller, more agile companies are buying up mature, older oil and gas fields from larger companies with the intention of extending the life of the fields using specialist expertise. It’s important to utilise the life of current infrastructure to maximise the production of existing reserves. As the Prime Minister has said, there are existing permits that stretch decades into the future and it’s important that we make the best possible use of these.

It’s also important that the Crown retains appropriate oversight of the acquisition and divestment activity in the petroleum sector. This is important in order to manage the risk that changes within the sector may bring. Under the Act, any change of permit operator requires the consent of the Minister of Energy and Resources or a delegated authority. A change of permit operator occurs when the day-to-day management of a permit changes from one permit operator to another. Unlike a change of permit operator a change to the control of the permit operator does not require ministerial consent. The change of control of permit operator occurs when the majority of voting rights for a corporate body are transferred. This is not in line with the intent of the Crown Minerals Act as it allows companies to transfer operator responsibilities with reduced Crown oversight. The bill closes a gap in the legislation which would otherwise allow for a change in the control of a permit operator to take place without requiring the consent of the appropriate Minister. The amendment ensures that the Minister of Energy and Resources has oversight of appropriate transactions in the sector. It also ensures that the Minister must be satisfied that a change of control of operator will not affect the permit holder’s ability to comply with an agreed work programme.

The second area which the bill addresses is around clarity. The bill provides clarity around the clauses in the Act which could be interpreted in multiple different ways or where the meaning of the clause is currently unclear. In order for regulators to effectively regulate the activities of permit holders and for industry to work within the regulatory system that is set out the regulatory system has to be clear and easy to follow. Legislation that is unclear may lead to confusion and unnecessary administrative burden for those regulating petroleum and mineral sectors and for the sectors themselves. For example, the bill clarifies that a permit holder must have an access arrangement to undertake minimum impact activities on schedule 4 land. Clarification such as this will ensure New Zealand’s regulatory system works effectively for both regulators and for the industry. A clear regulatory system will also provide a stable base for Government and industry to work together in a cohesive manner.

Finally, the bill deals with issues around inconsistencies. Where the wording of a clause is inconsistent with another Act or where it is inconsistent with the purpose of the clause, inconsistencies can create unnecessary administrative burden for those reliant on the regulatory framework and decrease the efficiency of the system.

The bill will ensure the regulatory regime that governs our Crown minerals is fit for purpose. The bill will close gaps, clarify unclear provisions, and address inconsistencies currently in the Crown minerals regime. This’ll ensure we have a regulatory system that remains effective and efficient while at the same time providing clear and transparent expectations to industry. Our goal is to have mineral and petroleum industries that are responsibly delivering value to New Zealand, and the amendments in this bill will help us to achieve that. I commend the bill to the House.

Well, that sounds like the old Labour Party, wanting to see a good and robust oil and gas industry.

I’m very pleased to stand and speak in support of this bill. Recommendations of these amendments came through the previous Cabinet and, obviously, are supported by the current Government. I notice that in the debate notes that were supplied to members who speak on this bill, from the Parliamentary Library service, that they say, “There will only be minor, localised impact on businesses.” It sounds like the same advice that they received when it came to no more offshore exploration. Oh! That’s right; they didn’t receive any advice.

I’d like to just address, and I think in a practical sense because I do support many of the statements that the previous speaker said regarding a robust regime—

💬 Hon Chris Hipkins: Which ones don’t you support?

Not all. Obviously he’s been well prepped. The issue is that when one company, through share purchase, is able to purchase another company, particularly around a petroleum asset, the concern that the Government, any Government of the day, has is that the new purchaser must have the financial wherewithal and ability to be able to follow through with the decommissioning of that asset.

When fields come to end of life, as Mr Hipkins has said, often what can happen is that a company that has developed and extracted from that field, often a large international company with very high overheads, will sell that asset to, as the previous speaker said, a more nimble company that has specialist skills, in order to be able to extend the life of that field. Often the owner of the field will sell that asset and that field and avoid considerable decommissioning costs in the long run. A field that is decommissioned, especially an offshore field, will often be in the realm of $100 million. So we are very concerned, this side of the House and obviously that side of the House, that companies that pick up those fields, because they have those skills to bring extended life and extended resource from those fields, have the capability when that field is finally exhausted to do a thorough and proper decommissioning.

So this is why this bill is saying that if there is the lack of consultation or the lack of information given to the Minister there is a penalty regime that will act as a deterrent. The maximum penalty for not notifying a change of control of a tier 1 permit operator is $200,000. If that new purchaser, new owner, absolutely obtains control of a tier 1 permit without ministerial consent, the maximum penalty is $800,000. So those are quite significant deterrents for not fulfilling those requirements.

Then, as the bill states, the Minister must not just be notified but the Minister must also give prior consent. So what will happen, of course, is that New Zealand Petroleum and Minerals, in this particular case, will go through and do a thorough assessment to understand and validate the capability of the purchasing company to be able to fulfil those requirements and obligations. Otherwise those costs will fall on the taxpayer. Let me tell you that the people I talk to in the industry never want that to happen. They have a fine reputation to maintain and a fine commitment to our environment and to serve the people of New Zealand.

So I’m very happy to support this bill to the select committee. Thank you to the select committee, and thank you to the former speaker, that he is sending it to the Economic Development, Science and Innovation Committee. We do hope that we won’t have any sudden Supplementary Order Papers land in the committee stage as well. Thank you.

I rise to commend this bill to the House. It’s a tidying-up bill. It’s a tidying-up bill in two senses. I do want to talk about both those senses in which it’s a tidying-up bill tonight.

As has been—eloquently?—described by Mr Young, this bill deals with what happens at the end of life, in some respects, of oilfields. This is the first aspect of tidying-up in this Crown Minerals Amendment Bill. What goes on when an oilfield or a mineral deposit gets to the end of its life is that the original firm that perhaps discovered, developed, and then used the oilfield or the mineral deposit or whatever—they pull out. They’ve gotten their share out of it, and they’ve reached the point where, from their point of view, continuing to work the field would just engage them in costs that they don’t want to spend—in fact, it’s reached the end of its profitable life from their point of view.

The original company or the business that has developed and used the field says that, actually, it’s time to move on. Look, this is a really common pattern in any sort of business or in many activities. In many activities it’s very easy to, say, get the first 50 percent of the profits—or, you know, from my old profession as a university lecturer, it’s dead easy for students to get the first 50 percent of the marks—but often it’s a lot harder to get say the next 20 percent of the profits. So you’re up to 70 percent overall; then, it’s even harder to get the next 10 percent of the profits. It gets harder and harder and harder to make a decent profit out of an oilfield. At that stage, what happens is that the company, the business that was exploiting the oilfield in the first place, stops and they hand it over to a specialist firm, a specialist firm that has real skills and expertise in, say, getting the last 20 percent of the oil, the gas, or the mineral out of the field. They’re clean-up companies. If we were being perhaps a little rude we might call them scavengers, but that would be unfair. What they are are firms with specialist skills in cleaning up at the end of a field.

It is in that sense that this bill is about tidying-up. It’s about tidying-up the end of an oilfield. As has been described, there are some real risks with this, because, typically, when the Crown allows a company to exploit an oilfield or a mineral deposit or whatever, one of the things that it is very concerned about is ensuring that that field is reinstated, that it’s tidied up properly, that any environmental ills are put right, that wells are properly capped off, and that when the last of the minerals, the oils, are taken out of that field, it is all tidied up. The big concern there is that the tidy-up firm will not have the resources to do it. That’s why we have a system of permitting in place: so that the firms are contractually obliged to tidy up at the end so that we can assess them as to whether or not they really will have the resources to follow through on that obligation. That’s why, when the permit to exploit a field is changed from one operation to another, we actually get some ministerial involvement. The Minister has to be notified and has to certify that it can all happen. So it’s ministerial approval. Now, that’s quite a high level of engagement from Government in a field.

But there’s a little bit of a loophole in the current legislation, and I want to make it very clear by means of an example. At the moment, when there is a change of a permit operator, then that requires the consent of the Minister. But what say the permit is held by a company which was set up for the purpose of just holding the permit? Imagine a firm, which we might call something like—I don’t know—Deep Drill Ltd. They hold the permit. They’ve got to the end of the life, and they decide that they’re going to transfer the permit, sell the permit on, to another firm—I’m going to call this firm something like Wring the Last Drop Out Ltd. When it is just transferred from Deep Drill Ltd to Wring the Last Drop Out Ltd, you sell the permit, then you get ministerial approval—you get the Minister involved. But there’s a way to avoid that. Instead of selling that permit, what could happen is that the company Deep Drill, which holds the permit, could be sold—all right? So the control of the company could be sold.

So Wring the Last Drop Out Ltd, instead of buying the permit, would, in fact, buy the company. So you change who controlled the operation of that permit, and at present that change of control doesn’t need ministerial approval. In other words, there’s a loophole there which needs to be tidied up and closed up, because, in actual fact, that is a change in who is operating that oilfield or that mineral deposit, but because it is the company ownership that changes rather than the ownership of the permit itself, the Minister doesn’t get involved. Yet the reality on the ground is actually exactly the same as if it would have been a straight board sale of the permit. So we’re going to get the Minister involved and make sure that when the control of the company that holds the permit is changed, then the Minister gets involved too. That’s one of the tidying-up aspects of this particular bill. It is seeking to tidy up that particular little loophole that was existing there.

The work that does all of this is sitting in clause 8 of the bill, and you’ll see that there are a whole set of rules there that in actual fact mean that when there is a change in control that means that the Minister must be notified and go through exactly the same sorts of processes as there would have been if the permit was sold directly. So that’s a very clear piece of tidying-up in this legislation around the tidying-up of the oilfields and mineral deposits. That’s the first obvious reason why it’s a tidying-up bill.

I do want to draw your attention and the attention of my colleagues to another aspect of this bill in the sense in which it’s also a tidying-up bill, and I invite my colleagues to turn to the actual bit itself in the general policy statement—that’s the first part of the explanatory note. There’s a particular word that is used again and again and again in this explanatory note. You see, the bill, the Crown Minerals Amendment Bill, clarifies that an extension of the duration of a permit cannot be denied. It clarifies time frames for notifying the ratification of permits. It clarifies processes in relation to changes of control. It clarifies that an access arrangement is needed. It clarifies which Ministers enter into access arrangements. It clarifies the applicable royalty of calculations. Clarifies, clarifies, clarifies, clarifies, clarifies—repeated again and again and again in the explanatory note of this bill. That’s actually really important.

A lot of the aspects that this bill addresses were kind of there in the legislation but just weren’t as clear as they might have been—in particular, they weren’t necessarily as clear as they might have been for changing commercial realities. So part of what this bill does is clarifies the regulatory framework for Crown Minerals Act. That’s really important. Businesses hate uncertainty. Regulators hate uncertainty. Government hates uncertainty. Business can operate pretty well in adverse conditions, business can operate well in good conditions, but talk to business operators and what they don’t like is uncertainty.

We are a Government that provides certainty. Our oil and mineral companies know with certainty how long they’ll be able to get exploration permits for. They know how long they’ll be able to continue to operate for. We have developed great certainty around this. This bill adds to the certainty of the regime around oil exploitation, around mineral exploitation, and around the exploitation of Crown minerals in New Zealand. That is why that word “clarification” is terribly important in this bill. It’s another aspect of the tidying-up that this bill does. So there are two sets of tidying-up: one for the oilfields that are being tidied up and one tidying-up the actual legislation to create certainty for business.

Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker, for the opportunity to speak tonight on the first reading of the Crown Minerals Amendment Bill. As my colleague Jonathan Young has pointed out earlier this evening, we will be supporting this bill. It makes a number of common-sense changes, as the previous member, Deborah Russell, spoke about, clarifying some of the processes around the Crown Minerals Act.

I am a bit worried, though, because, as all members can see, it is quite a skinny bill. So I’m a bit worried about what might happen to it in select committee and as the bill winds its way through the House. So I went through the principal Act this afternoon, which is the Crown Minerals Act, and it has in its introduction that “The purpose of this Act is to promote prospecting for, exploration for, and mining of Crown owned minerals for the benefit of New Zealand.” That intrigued me, because I thought to myself, well, this isn’t really a Government that’s promoting the prospecting for, exploration for, or mining of things in the Crown estates. So I’m a bit concerned about what the bill might look like after it does proceed through this House.

We’ve just seen, just recently, what this Government wants to do when it comes to the oil and gas sector. Right before the Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern jetted off to London to speak to a very important gathering of students in London, she announced, essentially, the shutting down of the oil and gas industry in Taranaki. So I’m very concerned about that particular paragraph in the Crown Minerals Act and what the Government might do to it through this bill if they choose to amend it, because it is so contrary—that paragraph—to what this Government thinks about the oil and gas sector. Mr Jones, “Matua Jones”, I know that he agrees with me, and that’s why he had his head in his hands at the announcement shutting down the oil and gas industry in Taranaki. What we’ve found out this afternoon from my colleague Jonathan Young, in questioning Andrew Little on behalf of the Minister of Energy and Resources, who came down to this House and said that they had consulted with the industry. He had to come back later on that afternoon and admit they hadn’t. He admitted they hadn’t. They hadn’t talked to Methanex; they hadn’t talked to the industry.

That brings me back to this Crown Minerals Amendment Bill. It’s about to go off to the excellent Economic Development, Science and Innovation Committee, where the Government does not have a majority on the committee. So I think there’s a valid concern about what this Government might do to this bill when it comes to the committee of the whole House in putting forward Supplementary Order Papers to change the purpose of the Crown Minerals Act and, once again, not give the oil and gas sector any opportunity to engage or consult on those changes.

We’ve already seen the devastating effect that that sort of announcement can have on the oil and gas industry. Literally the day that that announcement was made, the largest engineering company in Taranaki announced a halt on all new employment. Those are the regions and those are the people that these sorts of changes are going to impact on, and all the billion-dollar funds that Shane Jones has will not create those sorts of industries and employ those sorts of people in regional New Zealand. Thank you very much.

It’s an absolute delight for me to be able to contribute in this debate, but can I first of all say how disappointed I have been this evening with the lack of contribution from the National Party. This is an area where, I think, the industries need a clear message from this Parliament about the regulatory regime under which they should operate. And all I’ve had from the National Party is some quite petty point-scoring. I think this Parliament should—not on all occasions, sometimes there’s valid political points to be made, but on occasions like this, it would be appropriate for us to focus on the facts, focus on the bill, and get a good, strong, united voice from this Parliament.

I want to commend my Canterbury friend and colleague, the Hon Megan Woods, for this bit of work. She’s put in a huge amount of effort over very broad-ranging portfolios since we became part of the Government just six months ago. It’s certainly to her credit that she’s able to get on top of so many issues, including ones with quite complex challenges facing them. This Crown minerals legislation, I hope, is one of many in this space that we debate over the coming term of this Parliament. I imagine that this particular bill will be the least contentious. I think we’ll have far more robust debates in the future, as we have in the past, over Crown minerals, because we know that this is at the cutting edge of the difference between that side of the House and this side of the House and how we regard our responsibility to protect certain parts of our country.

But that’s for future legislation; this legislation is quite narrow. It’s quite technical, and as my colleague Deborah Russell noted earlier, this is really a lot about clarification rather than big policy issues. That is not to say that they’re not important. Clarity in regulation, clarity in legislation, is vital if we want to expect industries to make investments into our future, and, obviously, we do want to do that.

The member who just resumed his seat, Andrew Falloon, was rather cynical, I suppose, in his commentary about “Matua Shane Jones”, and I want to just rebuff that and say that I have known Shane for many years and he has never been short of a strong contribution to make. As the Minister who is charged with supporting and encouraging regional development, he has really put a huge amount of thought and effort and passion into it, and I would have thought that the National Party, who have members of Parliament elected to represent many of those provincial areas, many of the electorates within our provinces—I would have thought that they would have been working alongside “Matua Shane Jones” to say, “How can we get this done together for the betterment of the people in those regions?” And, actually, they badly need it. They badly need that support.

The other point in this legislation, as well as the clarification that provides the certainty that I mentioned—you know, clarity in many parts of this legislation—is to ensure that regulatory gaps are closed. It’s a bit like tax legislation: sometimes you don’t really realise there’s a problem until someone pushes the boundary and then you realise that, either for the purpose of avoidance or evasion or because there is a genuine loophole that has never been recognised before, there is a problem, and I think it’s the latter of those cases. This legislation has never been used in the same way as, perhaps, it has been used by people looking for tax evasion opportunities, but it’s clear that there are regulatory gaps, and this legislation closes them. So that is ensuring for both the regulators and the industry around permitting. There is no doubt at all about what the legislation intends. So the inconsistencies that were previously in the Crown Minerals Act that were actually drawn to the attention of the previous Government, who ignored it, who sat on its hands and did nothing, are now being closed by this legislation.

The first measure is to close gaps in the legislation that currently mean that the Act could be used in a way for which it was not intended. Now, I don’t think it matters which side of the House you’re on or which party are from, I think everybody would agree that legislation should only be used for the purpose for which it was intended. As we’ve heard a lot in the last few weeks, the nature of the petroleum industry is changing. There’s been an increasing amount of acquisition and divestment activity within that sector and these transactions reflect a global trend of consolidation and rationalisation by large companies. This is not something that we should ignore, and this Parliament should always ensure that our legislation keeps pace with those sorts of changes within the industry. So that means, increasingly, we are seeing smaller companies purchasing late-life fields with the aim of extending their life and increasing production beyond the standard time frames. There’s a lot of positives from those changes. Greater production helps us with energy supply as well as extending the life cycle of assets: good for employment, good for investment.

But it’s important that the transfer of those assets be subject to proper oversight, and right now one of the loopholes that I described earlier in the law means that that is not always able to be partaken of correctly. So, for an example, any change of permit operator requires the prior consent of the Minister of Energy and Resources—in our case, of course, the Hon Dr Megan Woods or a delegated authority. A change of permit occurs when the day-to-day management of a permit changes from one permit participant to another. So, unlike a change of permit operator, a change of control of the permit doesn’t require prior ministerial consent. A change of that control occurs when the majority voting rights for a corporate body are transferred. That is quite a different situation than the earlier one I outlined. So that is not in line with the intent of the Crown Minerals Act, because it allows companies to transfer operational responsibilities with reduced Crown oversight. So that’s just an example of one of the many loopholes that are closed—loopholes that have allowed this legislation to be used for unintended consequences and which I will be very happy to see not only clarification around but also the gaps that I mentioned closed.

The other provision that I’ll just briefly mention where clarification has been brought into the Act, because this section could have been interpreted in multiple ways, is where regulators, in order to effectively regulate the activities of permit holders and for the industry to work within the regulatory system that is set out—that system must be clear and easy to follow. This is another example where it isn’t. The bill permits that a permit holder must have an access arrangement to undertake minimum impact activities on schedule 4 land. We’ve had a lot of debate in this House, and on the streets of our cities actually, about the abuse of schedule 4 land, which was proposed by the previous National-led Government. The public won that debate, and I was delighted to be part of the opposition to the proposals, so this is quite a different proposal. This is not proposing to mine on schedule 4 land, which is what the National-led Government does; this is saying that a permit holder must have access arrangements to undertake minimum impact activities on that schedule 4 land.

So we’ll have a clear regulatory system as a result of the changes in this bill. We will have loopholes closed that have allowed the legislation to be used for intentions other than what it was originally designed to deliver, and it will address inconsistencies that are in the Crown Minerals Act. Even though it’s a small bill and quite technical, I think these are really important measures for this House to be considering. I’m delighted to have made a contribution. I’m very proud of my ministerial colleague the Hon Dr Megan Woods, and I commend the progress of this bill to the House.

Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. I’d like to commend the member who just took her seat, the Hon Ruth Dyson. Doing 10 minutes on a very small and minor technical bill is actually a feat indeed. I’m obviously not going to take 10 minutes to filibuster, because all parties are actually in agreement I think.

I was sitting outside in the lobby, just waiting and doing some other work, and I actually heard Deborah Russell speaking earlier. I just want to respond to her before I actually get on with this bill. I think she said—she said quite a few things, but I think there was one thing that she said that actually pricked my ears up. She was talking about how businesses don’t like uncertainty. I think she actually said that, “Businesses don’t like uncertainty”. I think on this side there were a few chuckles, and we have to actually agree that businesses don’t like uncertainty. I definitely agree with that.

The thing is that the oil and gas exploration industry, in Taranaki, got the message of certainty from this Government that they don’t back the industry, they don’t back the region, and they don’t care about regional economic growth or development. The Government doesn’t actually care about the 11,000 jobs that it literally killed off with its announcement to decimate the economic future of Taranaki and the oil and gas exploration. [Interruption] I know, I’m a little bit emotional, because I thought, “Hang on a minute. She makes sense. She’s talking about businesses needing certainty.” That’s right; they do. But the kind of message that this Government sends is the wrong certainty that they’re delivering for a region that they apparently care about.

Back to the bill. I know I get a little bit excited. I got this synopsis from the library. It’s a debate pack. This Crown Minerals Amendment Bill 2018 makes minor and technical clarification to the Crown Minerals Act of 1991. We should always do that. We need to update our legislation every so often. In terms of the kind of information that it gives me: it changes things like the duration of the permit, the time frames of notifying the revocation of the permit, the process relating to changes of control of permit, participants, permit classification. It just seems like they’re talking about permits, permits, permits.

But the thing that really, sort of, pricked my ear again was this whole issue of when the changes are not notified to the Minister, that it actually has a monetary impact on the company. Up to $800,000 when a Minister of Energy and Resources is actually not notified—I think that has to be a big deterrent for the companies to not break the rule.

I know I’m speaking slightly longer than I was meant to, and it actually reminded me of a recent event that happened in my birth country. On 27 April, the two Koreas actually came together in a big summit—the first time the North Korean leader actually crossed the border and they came together. This particular segment actually reminded me: is there a way that we could put a monetary penalty on any of those two countries, whether North Korea or South Korea, if they break the spirit in which they came together in the peace process? And I wish Korea the best of luck.

I commend the Minister. As the parties involved, we are all in support, so I commend the bill to the House and look forward to the submissions and the select committee.

Kia ora, Madam Assistant Speaker. Ngā mihi nui ki a koutou, kia ora. The last member, Melissa Lee, asked for certainty. This Government will act on climate change—you can have that certainty. This Government is not going to keep throwing tens of millions of dollars of taxpayer subsidies at the oil industry—you have that certainty. This Government isn’t going to open coalmines on the conservation estate—you can have that certainty. This Government isn’t going to mine schedule 4 land—you can have that certainty. This Government acts on the most pressing issue, which our Prime Minister says is our nuclear-free moment, the greatest issue of our generation—you have that certainty, Melissa Lee.

It’s important to act, because the issue we’re talking about is our kids, their kids, and threatened species. But it is not just that; it’s literally countries like Tuvalu, Kiribati, the Seychelles, and Mauritius that climate change is affecting right now. That’s why when we talk about certainty, let’s talk about the important things, which are cultural extinction, our neighbours and whānau in the Pacific, our planet, our home. So, look, while we’re debating this legislation let’s also not forget the certainty of the last Government, which was a Government which would throw between $46 million and $80 million a year in tax breaks for the oil industry. I remember when Phil Heatley, the Minister of Energy and Resources, blew 240,000 bucks on a weekend hosting just 10—just 10—oil executives from offshore.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): Order! Can we come back to the bill, please.

My point, Madam Assistant Speaker, is that the previous Government threw all the support at the industry, but what did we see? We saw Shell surrender their permits. Anadarko’s left, Petrobras has left, and Apache’s left. In fact, over the last five years more permits have been surrendered—twice as many—than granted. And this is the issue, because what we are seeing is oil companies flee New Zealand under National, despite National support, and now we have to deal with this loophole, which was their Crown Minerals Act problem. Now, the issue, of course, that this legislation deals with, the loophole, is that approval’s needed for a change of permit operator, but if someone changes the company by buying it out you don’t need that approval. It’s a good, technical common-sense change, which I’m glad to see all parties support in this Parliament.

This bill increases the penalties from $200,000 to $800,000. Now, that reminds me: when we saw our greatest maritime environmental disaster, the Rena, we saw 300 tonnes of oil wash up on our beaches, and hundreds of millions of dollars of environmental damages, and the maximum penalty under National’s Resource Management Act at the time was $150,000. So this legislation overnight is increasing the penalties for those who don’t inform the Government and the appropriate agencies for a change of permit operator to more than the entire costs that were recovered under the Resource Management Act for our greatest ever environmental disaster. That disaster trashed that beach, and it broke my heart seeing those oil blobs wash up on those beaches and those dead birds in those baskets. At the same time, National was doing everything they could to attract those oil companies down to New Zealand, but they’ve fled, and now we have to fix this loophole.

I do want a respond to some of the comment on this debate. I heard the member, National’s spokesperson for the oil industry, Jonathan Young, who said we need to preserve the reputation of this industry. What reputation? I’ve seen the groundwater contamination under the Kapuni wells. I’ve been in Taranaki backyards where the night turns into day because of the constant flaring. I’ve talked to the landowners affected, with the sham access agreements that were signed. I’ve been in those small rural valleys where National voters, with tears in their eyes, came to tell me how cowboys in the oil industry had ripped their rural community apart because there weren’t guidelines. I’ve seen the fracking without consents in Taranaki. I’ve seen the oil spills from the industry off the Taranaki Bight. So don’t come here and talk about our reputation when there’s unfixable groundwater pollution in Taranaki. Don’t come talking about that when I have come to this House with photographs showing cows literally wading in oil and gas fracking waste, because it was easier to get a consent to drill a water bore than it was to frack for oil and gas.

So when we’re talking about protecting the reputation of an industry, let’s have facts. What we’ve seen over decades in this country is an industry that only acts when it’s pushed, and an industry that hasn’t acted and hasn’t garnered that social licence.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): Order! Back to the bill, please.

It’s important to fix our regulatory regime, so while we’re amending the Crown Minerals Act tonight with a small technical amendment, we also need to keep our eye on the bigger picture, which is the purpose of the underlying legislation, the Crown Minerals Act, which is—as we’ve heard in the debate tonight—to promote oil drilling and extractive industries in New Zealand. Now, I would rather have—and I’m urging the Government to adopt—a regime where the purpose is actually the safe and sustainable resource extraction by making sure we have a world-leading regulatory regime, not just an agency which is promoting drilling, mining, and fracking.

I’ve heard members of the Opposition say that they’re scared of potential, hypothetical, maybe, amendments that might come at some future point. It’s entirely hypothetical. What I do remember, though, is the urgency they put this Parliament in to pass the egregious Anadarko amendment, where their agency for oil promotion was charging activists. That was a Government that came under urgency to pass it, and a Government that was so incredibly hopeless that it had to introduce a Crown minerals amendment bill to fix the mistakes they saw.

So I’m proud to be standing with all parties in Parliament tonight and voting for this legislation, but let’s keep our eye on the big issue, which is the issue of climate change and the issue of making sure we’ve got a robust regime and sustainable industries in New Zealand. But let’s keep our eye on the issue and actually look at the facts and make sure that we do protect those farmers and the school which is within 500 metres of an oil and gas facility right now, today, in Taranaki—which wouldn’t be allowed across the Ditch, in New South Wales. Let’s keep our eye on those big issues as we debate this small, technical amendment, which is albeit a step forward. Kia ora.

Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. I also rise to support this Crown Minerals Amendment Bill. Quite remarkable, really, as my colleague Mr Falloon said earlier, that the purpose of this Act is to promote the prospecting for, and extraction of, Crown-owned minerals for the good of New Zealand, when just a couple of weeks ago, the Government that is now introducing this bill took steps to completely destroy the oil and gas industries in New Zealand and the 11,500 jobs that are reliant, either directly or indirectly, on those industries—those industries undertaking the purpose that this Act is all about.

Then, this evening, the speaker who immediately preceded me, Gareth Hughes, was talking about providing certainty in the nuclear-free moment of climate change, and what have they actually done? Well, that announcement to have no more exploration for oil and gas will make not one difference to one emission in the world at all, because all that will happen is that instead of that oil or gas being extracted in New Zealand, it will be extracted elsewhere. It’s not going to reduce emissions at all. In fact, there’s a real chance that it may increase emissions in New Zealand itself, because, of course, companies like Fonterra—which is a great example—which had announced a conversion programme on its dryers in the South Island from dirty coal to gas, is now no longer really able to go through with that investment, one would argue. So they talk about what they’re doing for climate change, they talk about a “nuclear-free moment,” and—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Poto Williams): Order! I am encouraging the member to come back to the bill.

What they actually do is seek to undercut that and then introduce into the House this bill, which is about supporting the activities that are still able to go on in Crown minerals extraction—a bill which has as its overarching purpose the prospecting and extraction of Crown-owned minerals for the good of New Zealand. Do one thing with one hand, take with the other—this is a Government which is not only mired in crisis and doubt but quite inconsistent.

The bill itself is non-controversial and just a series of technical changes. It is worthy of support in this House, but it’s worthy of more than that. It’s actually worthy that the Government reflect on what this bill does and realise that what this bill does is worthwhile, and it’s worthwhile for the future of New Zealand, not just a short duration under these changes. They should look to step back from the announcement they made a couple of weeks ago and to support the oil and gas industry, along with the rest of the Crown minerals industries in New Zealand, not only now but in the years to come. I commend this bill to the House.

I call Parmjeet Parmar. I understand this is a split call; you have five minutes.

Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. I’m taking this call to support this bill. So it’s a pleasure to take this call to support the Crown Minerals Amendment Bill in its first reading. But I have to say that the pleasure is just this much—really small—and I’ll get into that a bit later. But I would like to first respond to a couple of comments that came from members from the Government side. We heard about certainty, and we also heard that this Government likes to act, and, yes, we have seen that they like to act to get rid of jobs. We also got lectured by a member on the other side that our contributions are shorter. What we are worried about is the Government not being able to bring any proper legislation before the House. So what we have seen is in the first six months they were just bringing previous Government—that is, National Government—legislation before the House, and now we have this legislation, which is just tidying up bits and pieces in the Crown Minerals Act.

Yes, this tidying-up is required, and that’s why we are supporting this bill, because with the changing commercial realities we have to make sure that this legislation is effective and is efficient and that permit regulation is maintained in an effective manner, and that’s why we heard that this bill actually clarifies various things. This bill clarifies permit classification; this bill clarifies the extension of duration—how the process is looked at. This bill also clarifies the process of revocation. This bill also clarifies access to schedule 4 land. So, yes, there are a lot of clarifications, and these clarifications are required to reflect current commercial realities, and that’s why we are supporting this bill.

And yes—more ministerial oversight; we support that too, but what I have to say is that it’s really important that the Government keeps in mind that the stakeholder consultation is important, as this bill will be going through the select committee process, and I really hope that they will take into consideration the feedback that will be received from stakeholders during the select committee process. So I support this bill. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Assistant Speaker. I’m pleased to take a call on the Crown Minerals Amendment Bill. This bill amends the principal Act, the Crown Minerals Act of 1991. I applaud the Minister of Energy and Resources, the Hon Megan Woods—Dr Megan Woods; apologies—for introducing this bill to the House and for the careful consideration and speech by Minister Hipkins. This bill, essentially, sets out to maintain the effectiveness and efficiency of the permitting regime established by the principal Act. The Crown Minerals Act, broadly speaking, has a purpose to provide for “(a) the efficient allocation of rights to prospect for, explore for, and mine Crown owned minerals; and (b) the effective management and regulation of [these] rights;”.

It is fair to say that this is not an earth-shattering bill. That’s my one and only pun—sorry! We will be closing loopholes. Essentially, this is a fix-it bill in the true sense of the word. The amendments create and allow for the legislation to operate as was intended. It is fair to say that this bill is a systematic clean-up of unintended flow-on consequences. However, I thought I would give those in the House and those listening at home a few interesting facts about the principal Act to give some local context to the Crown Minerals Amendment Bill. For example, petroleum, gold, silver, and uranium existing—

I apologise to the member. This debate is interrupted and set down for resumption the next sitting day.

Debate interrupted.

The House adjourned at 10 p.m.