Tasman District Council (Waimea Water Augmentation Scheme) Bill

I move, That the Tasman District Council (Waimea Water Augmentation Scheme) Bill be now read a first time. I nominate the Governance and Administration Committee to consider the bill. At the appropriate time, I intend to move that the bill be reported to the House by 7 November 2018, and that the committee have the authority to meet at any time while the House is sitting, except during oral questions, during any evening on a day on which there has been a sitting of the House, on a Friday in a week in which there has been a sitting of the House, and outside the Wellington area, despite Standing Orders 191, 193, and 194(1)(b) and (c).

Four major issues for Nelson and Tasman, as for New Zealand, are cleaning up our waterways, growing and diversifying our exports, providing more housing, and building our resilience to climate change. The easy part is giving speeches about those issues. This bill is about practical solutions. It enables the Waimea Community Dam to proceed by granting access to 11 hectares of public land. The biggest challenge for the Tasman District Council over this scheme has been funding the $100 million cost, to be shared between ratepayers, taxpayers, and horticulturalists. That has caused some to-ing and fro-ing over recent weeks but is now resolved. The issue for Parliament with this bill is authorising access to the Crown land, and, frankly, it’s a no-brainer. The detail is very straightforward. It grants the Tasman District Council an easement over 9.7 hectares of the Lee Valley in the Mount Richmond Forest Park for the reservoir, and enables the council to purchase, at market value, 1.3 hectares of riverbed managed by Land Information New Zealand for the dam structures.

I wish to make four points about the question of access to the land, and then four on the substantive issues of the scheme. The first is that the land area being required from the Department of Conservation (DOC) is very small. Out of the 166,000 hectares of the Mount Richmond Forest Park, it’s not 1 percent. It’s not even 0.1 percent. It is one seventeen-thousandth of that park.

Secondly, the DOC easement is only 11 percent of the reservoir area of 87 hectares. This is not the case of a piece of community infrastructure being put on DOC land as an easy or cheap option. Here, the council has identified the most practical site for water storage for the region and has acquired the bulk of the land from private landowners, and Parliament is being asked to unblock access to this last small remaining segment.

Thirdly, this is stewardship land, the lowest classification of conservation land. It’s not a national park. It’s not one of the 14 different types of reserve. It’s not a special scientific or ecological area. The area is so inaccessible that DOC has no records of any recreational use. It is riverbed, vertical bedrock, and beech forest. Now, I would take a very different view if this was unique or premium conservation land, like in Fiordland or in the Abel Tasman National Park. I am a practical environmentalist, not an ideological one.

And fourthly, the inundation of this small area of land was approved by the Environment Court in August 2004, with the agreement of DOC, Fish & Game, and the Royal Forest and Bird Protection Society. That consent order included an extensive biodiversity compensation package. It is disingenuous of individuals or groups, who have had ample opportunity to submit on the environmental issues during the resource consent process, to now want to relitigate those issues, particularly those that agreed to the consent orders. To argue this project is not environmentally sound is to argue that the Environment Court got it wrong. The project also has the strong support of former Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment Dr Morgan Williams and the Ministry for the Environment.

Let me give some detail on the four broader benefits of the Waimea water scheme. The Nelson-Tasman region has good overall water quality, with ratings amongst the best of anywhere in New Zealand, but we have a longstanding and significant problem in the Waimea River: most summers, around February to March, the flows drop to a trickle, the nutrients concentrate, and we get ugly algae blooms that are so toxic that regularly dogs die and the council has to prohibit recreational activity. We also have, in the lower reaches of the river during summer, the serious issue of saltwater intrusion. This is not the clean, green reputation that either Nelson or New Zealand prides itself on.

The benefits to the ecological health of the Waimea River from the scheme are enormous. It will enable the minimum flows in the river to be increased by more than fivefold, from 200 to 1,100 litres a second—that’s a healthy river rather than a polluted creek—and will provide big gains for fish life and recreation. The increased flows will dilute the nutrients, addressing the algae problem. This scheme means the Waimea River will be able to fully meet the national standards for freshwater quality. Some critics argue more irrigation means more nutrients, but that’s far too simplistic. Irrigated horticultural crops like apples actually release less nitrogen than the existing dry land farming. Nutrients will still need managing, but this scheme is the only realistic solution for cleaning up the Waimea River. The alternative of slashing summer water takes for all users would be devastating for the region and would cost thousands of jobs and millions in exports as well as introduce harsh water restrictions on households.

Alongside these environmental benefits of the scheme are the economic gains. The Waimea Plains is an abundant fruit bowl because of its rich, fertile soils, high sunshine hours, and natural shelter. It already produces over $250 million a year of apples, grapes, hops, kiwifruit, and berry fruit, as well as an assortment of vegetables and nursery plants, employing over 3,000 people. This scheme, in providing additional water for irrigating another 1,200 hectares, provides the capacity for another $100 million a year in exports and a further thousand jobs. We hear so much about diversifying our export base. This is doing it.

The third issue is housing supply and affordability. The population on the Waimea Plains in the time that I’ve been a member of Parliament has doubled, from 10,000 to 20,000. That’s amongst the fastest of anywhere in New Zealand, and it continues to grow. The biggest affordability issue is actually section price. The council cannot allow new residential subdivision in places like Richmond, Brightwater, and Mapua without secure water supplies. This project improves water security for existing households as well as providing for the new.

The fourth benefit is building our community’s resilience to climate change. Weather patterns are changing and that makes our water supplies more vulnerable. The scheme will ensure secure water supplies for the next century even in the more extreme climate change scenarios.

Critics of the scheme say there are better alternatives. I’m a sceptic, having seen 15 years and millions of dollars spent on investigations. I do cringe when I hear the Green Party saying that the answer for my region is to switch to different crops. Hops, grapes, berryfruit, and apples are part of Nelson and Tasman’s identity as well as being the foundations of our economy, and I’m not prepared to see them sacrificed on some sort of ideological green altar. We have an abundance of water, and we just need the infrastructure to be able to manage it through the seasons. I get equally frustrated with the Greens when they demand progress on water quality and demand progress on housing and on improving our resilience to climate change, but then come to this Parliament and oppose the very practical measures that will do just that.

The tight time frame for reporting this bill back to the House is necessary to meet the conditions of financial support for the project and to enable construction to begin this summer. It is not a complex bill, and it still leaves time for public submissions and proper consideration.

Can I pay tribute to the many community leaders, particularly the late Nick Patterson, people like Julian Raine, John Palmer, iwi leader Barney Thomas, and Neil Deans, and I particularly acknowledge Mayor Richard Kempthorne and his council for the work that has gone into the project and this bill. A vote for this bill is a vote for a cleaner Waimea River, a vote for more jobs and for growing our exports, and a vote for increasing the supply and affordability of the region’s housing. It’s also a vote for a local council that recognises that investing in water infrastructure is essential for securing its community’s future. Can I acknowledge the Government’s support from the financial side and those parties and members that are committed to supporting the Tasman-Nelson community as we address these challenging water issues with this bill.

I rise with pleasure, on behalf of the Labour Party, to express support for this bill. Can I thank the Hon Nick Smith for bringing this bill—

💬 Hon Nathan Guy: That’s good!

We have, piping up somewhat sarcastically, the former Minister for Primary Industries saying, “That’s good!” We’ve actually supported this all the way through, and actually for many years, despite considerable local opposition from some subsets of the population. In the Labour Party, we have actually consistently advocated for this with the council and are pleased that at long last it is being brought into being through this legislation, if passed. There is a temptation, as is shown sometimes by the Hon Nathan Guy, that when you’re in Opposition you criticise everything that the Government does. This would actually have been a very easy project for us to criticise and to rark up public opposition to, but actually we didn’t do that in the Labour Party. We have consistently supported this for the reasons that the Hon Nick Smith has outlined.

I actually don’t know of a better water augmentation scheme in New Zealand than this one. Despite the fact that it is one of the most expensive for those who are purchasing the water at the end of this, it is one of the best schemes, and I absolutely agree with the sentiments that were expressed by the Hon Nick Smith that, in order to get a better minimum flow in summer and in order to reduce the pressure on the aquifer, which is being mined down by current levels of take—and that is, in turn, having an effect on minimum flows in the river—this water augmentation scheme is necessary.

It was tempting when we came to office to say, “Well, we disagree with the somewhat generous allocation of funding from the Freshwater Improvement Fund that the prior Minister managed to achieve.” And I did go through the paper trail of that and looked carefully at the appropriation, and I concluded that it was just within appropriation, and notwithstanding the fact that it wasn’t recommended by his ministry and was a late addition to the scheme put on by the Minister for the benefit of his own locality, actually we in the end chose not to criticise it but rather to support it.

The funding from central government here is very generous—very generous. There is, in addition to the grant of $7 million, a $35 million loan from Crown Irrigation. Now, when we came to power, we said we were going to bring an end to large irrigation schemes, and we had a number of exceptions to that. We said that we would honour a number of existing investments, but we also made it clear that we were most worried about schemes that were going to increase the intensity of ruminant agriculture in catchments that are already over-enriched. This actually is a scheme that doesn’t do that; it’s one that supports horticulture as well as reticulated water supplies in the city.

I respect the right of people to have different viewpoints in New Zealand and to have a different view as to what should happen, but I am personally convinced that this is a good scheme, that it should proceed, and that we in this Parliament should facilitate that through the passage of this legislation to get over the complexity caused in respect of that small amount of land that is stewardship land. I further expressed the view that I think Parliament is going to have to perhaps look at those issues again one day. The range of discretions that are open to the Minister of Conservation following the Ruataniwha decision and the legal analysis that lies around this case show that the discretion of the Minister to give a concession for what we in Parliament are agreeing is an appropriate thing to do here looks like it might be unduly narrow. But that’s an issue for another day. In the meantime, we of course are all bound by the law as it stands rather than what we might think it ought to be.

The effect of this on improving instream values on enabling irrigation to continue to support local industry is good. When subject to appropriate minimum flows and protection of instream values, we ought to be maximising the economic value that we can get from our abundant water resources in New Zealand. I agree with that. I just don’t think that some of the larger schemes that were being promoted through the Crown Irrigation scheme, well-structured though they were—I admit that the unit was doing a good job to spend that money if it was going to be spent on those projects. We just didn’t think that, generally, we should be adding pressure to the load of rivers through more intensive forms of ruminant production.

Of course, as the Hon Nick Smith has already mentioned here, more land in this area will actually, over time, convert from sheep and beef to horticultural uses, partly because it will be horticultural uses that are higher value land uses and thereby will be more able to meet the high cost of water that comes out of this scheme. That’s a good thing. That’s progress for New Zealand and shows that, actually, with the right planning, including at times Government interventions to assist with smaller irrigation projects—and we haven’t closed our minds on those issues; some of those will be able to be funded in the future through the Provincial Growth Fund—we can actually find a way through, I think, that is more profitable for our country as well as has a better environmental outcome.

In respect of the difficulty that the Tasman District Council had to get this through, again, that’s local democracy in action, but I was pleased to see that, in the end, the leaders there did stand up and enough of them led to get this across the line. I would have been quite happy to get the money back for the Crown, to be honest; there are plenty of other good things that the Freshwater Improvement Fund could invest its money in around the country, because we do have some water quality problems in different parts of the country that are worse than they are in this area. None the less, it’s been such a long journey. I’m very pleased that, eventually, the leaders in that community managed to get it across the line.

Can I also mention John Palmer; the local mayor, Mr Kempthorne; and also Morgan Williams, who I think played a good hand at the end. Also, it is worthy to note that some of the wiser heads in this actually have a bit of grey—

💬 Brett Hudson: Hear, hear!

Ha, ha! And a bit of hair. And it was interesting to see that they rolled out Sir Geoffrey Palmer to say that, look, actually it is proper, in some of these decisions, for councils to actually reflect on what might be the consequence of the decision that has been taken and to have a think about it and reflect upon it, because if this hadn’t gone ahead, the effect on the local area would have been dire. It would have put real pressure on the economy. There would have been a decrease in output from horticulture. The minimum flow would have been enforced without the water augmentation, and therefore a haircut would have had to be taken rather than a route through found. And, actually, I believe also the advice that I had from the district council was correct that, over time, local water supply costs would have been more expensive because they would have had to augment sources of freshwater for their municipal water and they wouldn’t have had these egregious subsidies from central government to do so.

💬 Brett Hudson: You’re sounding like us, almost! Come across!

Ha, ha!

💬 Hon Nathan Guy: This is a speech that should be given from this side of the House.

Well, sadly you’re in Opposition.

💬 Hon Nathan Guy: This is the best speech I’ve ever heard.

Well, you obviously haven’t heard me speak very often!

With those comments, can I also reflect on the support of Fish & Game New Zealand and the Department of Conservation, who really did test the environmental case for this going through and concluded that this was not just economically sound; it was environmentally responsible. Indeed, overall, the environment will be better as a consequence of this project.

Finally, can I mention the saltwater intrusion issue. If this hadn’t been funded, the regional council—or the councils, because it’s a unitary authority—would have had to do its duty to the environment and actually stop what is causing those saltwater intrusions, which is excessive extraction from the aquifer in dry seasons. That’s a lesson that is difficult for councils to implement, but it is their duty to do so where the law requires them to. So, with those comments, I support the passage of this bill at first reading.

That was a great speech, wasn’t it? The Hon David Parker—gosh! I couldn’t believe the words coming out of his mouth. He said things like he’s constantly advocated for this scheme—

💬 Hon Member: Oh!

Yeah, he’s saying that’s true and that it’s the best scheme he’s ever seen. I couldn’t believe it. He went on to say that the Government has been very generous and that he could have clawed the money back but that they decided not to. I want to thank the Minister for his very good contribution. It was very reasoned. It was a contribution based on common sense. Water storage in this Waimea dam is based, fundamentally, on common sense. The benefits are going to be not only economic; they’re going to be environmental. And there are going to be social benefits as well. I want to cover all of those things.

First of all, I want to pay tribute to Dr Nick Smith. He has been in this House for longer than this bill has been thought of. This bill came out of the 2001 drought, when regional leaders and industry leaders in the Waimea and Tasman area in Nelson got together and thought, “We can’t handle these prolonged droughts. We need to do something.” So when that first vote from the council a couple of weeks ago failed, I was so disappointed. And to hear regional leaders and industry leaders on the radio saying that this is really going to cripple our community and our regional economic development—I want to put my hand up and say “Well done.” to all of those people who have driven this project for 18 years since its inception.

I also want to acknowledge Crown Irrigation, because the first vote was difficult for them to stomach and understand and reason with, but they got back around with the councillors and with the mayor, and struck a deal that is going to ensure that this project is built and is going to benefit many, many generations to come. In particular, I want to pay tribute to the mayor, Mayor Kempthorne, whom, when I was Minister for Primary Industries for a number of years, I got to know very well down there. Murray King, Julian Raine, and many, many others, like John Palmer, have helped to drive this project forward, but in particular Nick Smith is the sponsor of this local bill.

What was really telling in Dr Smith’s contribution is where he is sending this bill to select committee. Many would think, “Oh, it should go to the Primary Production Committee because it’s all about production and economics and growing vegetables and horticultural products, etc.” But he’s decided to send it to the Governance and Administration Committee, which I think shows the breadth of this bill. It’s not just about the primary sector and agricultural production; it’s actually about the community. This is going to supply water into the city and those other towns that are growing very, very quickly. We have heard numerous examples of where the Waimea is over-allocated. I was reading a figure before. It’s over-allocated by 64 percent. We’ve heard the Minister talking about saltwater intrusion. That is a big risk. We know that fish species are struggling to survive when we have a prolonged dry period like we had in parts of the North Island and across the country this summer. So this benefits, in particular, the community—those social benefits, providing a reliable source of water. It also means that the aquatic life is going to flourish into the future.

I’m looking forward to hearing from the Greens in a moment, because they have a bill that’s working its way through the Parliament. It’s going to be focused on native fish species. So you would think that the Greens would be standing up here this evening talking about the environmental benefits that we’re going to get from this scheme, because, ultimately, this will mean that instead of livestock production, it will change and we will have more apple trees. I’ve seen the economics on apples. It’s about $15,000 per hectare. No primary sector crop can match apples. So this will transform what happens in the Waimea Plains. There will be fewer nitrates into the water body, so you would expect that this would have the broad support of the whole of Parliament. I’m going to be really interested to see if the Greens support this bill this evening. I commend it to the House.

This is a very pragmatic bill. It’s trying to find a solution for a problem, and a very real problem, in the Waimea Valley. It’s not actually a particularly complicated bill, but it’s taken a long time to get here—years and years of consultation and agonising, trying to work out solutions, changes of Government, and so on—and it does represent a compromise. The compromise is that some conservation land will be used in order to secure the water supply in the Waimea water augmentation scheme.

For that reason, I just want to sort of contradict something that the Hon Nathan Guy just said. He felt that the bill was going to the right place in going to the Governance and Administration Committee. Actually, I’m very disappointed that it’s not coming to the Environment Committee, because, to my mind, the discussion we need to be having is around the conservation values and when we need to perhaps sort of say “We understand the conservation values, but we’re actually going to override them in this instance.”, or, as it were, try to barter them or try to come to a solution that’s better overall. I think it’s a discussion that’s worth having at length, but I guess the Governance and Administration Committee can have that conversation too. But I am, as I said, very disappointed that it’s not coming to the committee that I chair. I would have liked to have had the opportunity to talk about it. And, of course, it would be well debated by all members of that committee.

I do think that the taking of any conservation land needs to be assessed very, very carefully indeed. We heard from the Hon Dr Nick Smith that this was a no-brainer, that we should be going ahead and doing it no matter what. The solution was, to his mind, obvious. I’m not sure that it’s quite a no-brainer. I actually do think that taking riverbed, taking land that has been set aside for conservation purposes, even if it’s only stewardship land, is not a no-brainer. That is actually an issue that needs to be discussed, needs to be debated, and needs to be weighed up. Here, even though we are being pragmatic about this, I do want to refer to a quote that my colleague the Hon David Parker—goodness; all these “Hons”—often makes. It’s a quote from the World Bank economist Herman Daly. David Parker often uses it. It says, “The economy is a wholly owned subsidiary of the environment, not the reverse.” Now, I think the Hon David Parker endorses that often. Actually, I agree that the environment doesn’t serve the economy; it is the other way around.

Yet, in this instance, we seem at first glance to have an instance of the environment serving the economy. But that’s a simplistic way of thinking about it because, as has been discussed at length, this issue has gone to the Environment Court. It has been closely examined by the Department of Conservation (DOC). The costs and benefits—not in dollar terms; that’s a different issue—in terms of the environment have been assessed very, very carefully, and it does seem that on the whole the environmental benefits of this scheme will outweigh the costs of using some DOC land.

I think that has to be the assessment every time we’re engaged in one of these considerations of whether or not some DOC or conservation land should be sacrificed. We shouldn’t be assessing it simply on economic grounds, because it’s too easy to sell out the environment every time for the economy. It is much better to assess it on conservation grounds and on environmental values. Given that this has been through the Environment Court, given that DOC does support it, and given that there does seem to be a huge range of environmental benefits, I think, pragmatically, on the whole, this bill is a bill worth supporting.

It’s interesting to notice that the Tasman District Council has agonised over it as well. No one has come to this decision easily. So this is a bill that is worth supporting, certainly through this first reading, and it is a scheme, I think, that—for the reasons that Dr Smith has laid out—does need to find some way of being supported, because of the long-term benefits from it. So I’m looking forward to the discussion. As I said, I’m just disappointed that the bill is not coming to the Environment Committee.

It’s with much pleasure that I rise to offer New Zealand First’s strong endorsement of this Tasman District Council (Waimea Water Augmentation Scheme) Bill. Of course, we know this bill transfers, or seeks to transfer, 1.35 hectares of Crown stewardship land, administered now by Land Information New Zealand, in the Mount Richmond Forest Park. In doing so, it will create an asset for the Tasman District that will secure town water supplies into the future, and, also, allow us to irrigate up to 1,200 hectares of land that is suitable for horticulture.

We note that the resource consents have already been issued, but we also—as the previous speaker, Dr Russell, has alluded to—know that this has been a robust local debate. It did get the speed wobbles at the last minute, and the council, of course, originally voted it down. But I would actually commend those councillors who, when the second vote came forward, after new information was brought into the arena, had the courage to change their votes for the greater good, because these are 100-year decisions. These are not decisions about what the rate increase is going to look like on your next re-election pamphlet. This is a far-sighted, visionary bill that does take some courage. These are big numbers: $102 million, of which the Government is fronting in various forms with $42 million. Of course, $35 million of that is a loan, so that will be paid back by the farmers. And I think that’s worth noting. It is not a grant; it is a loan.

I just would like to give my own experience with irrigation. I grew up on an irrigated farm. I was one of the first farmers to drill a well in Canterbury, and through my farming career—I spent four years farming in north Otago—I saw the transformation of the north Otago District when the north Otago irrigation scheme went through. If you go to Ōāmaru now, you will see a thriving town—not only through the heritage that it has showcased but the economic impact of irrigation. The consistency of being able to guarantee production year on year has absolutely transformed this district. To any of those councillors who may have thought they’d made a decision that they may be uneasy with, I’d encourage them to go to Ōāmaru and their fears will be allayed.

It does allow for diversification into higher-value land uses, and we do have measurements now, or requirements and regulations, around nutrient management. Our investment in the OVERSEER programme enhances our ability to do that. So there are some protections on the environment. Of course, the minimum flows that we talked about are enhancing the recreational and environmental capability of the river. And we’re talking about minimum flows—in the 2001 drought that was referenced earlier, the river dried up completely. That is not a very environmental outcome, is it? So we’ve got the ability to mitigate that.

Of course, there is massive economic benefit. The $932 million over 25 years that’s been identified in the Northington report is real money flowing into the Tasman District and Nelson City, and for the likes of the Alliance Group, the meat plant—they’re a big user of water—that will secure their supply. So just that economic benefit, as well as the environmental benefits, will be significant.

These are intergenerational decisions. One thing I would say is that the farmers are often seen as the beneficiaries of this, but it’s actually the farmer’s children that are the beneficiaries, because the debt levels that are taken on are often generational investments. It’s the towns and the service people that benefit directly initially, but the farmers themselves are often taking on large portions of debt and risk, and that takes some time to pay off. So the thought that farmers are going to get rich off the back of taxpayers is just not how it works at all. So I commend this to the House.

This is a glorious day for water storage in New Zealand. To actually bring a scheme and a piece of legislation to this House that unlocks the potential for the Tasman District is actually one of the very reasons I came into this Chamber and into this House. I congratulate the last Government on putting together a package of around $42 million, which got this scheme under way, because, frankly, without it we wouldn’t be having this discussion.

I’m the National Party spokesperson for horticulture, and I proudly know that that is a shining industry that’s going from strength to strength. Current exports are around $7 billion, and they’re targeted to go to $10 billion. If you look at horticulture, it has got everything New Zealand needs: high-value, high-quality products; it is job-rich, and environmentally clean. It’s an intensive form of agriculture, but it’s incredibly gentle on the environment. This scheme has everything. It is a win-win-win in terms of water quality—and we’ve heard previous speakers, including the Hon Dr Nick Smith, talking about the increase in minimum flow in the Waimea River. It has better availability and security of supply for both the productive sector, and the urban residents in Nelson and the Tasman District. Fundamentally, it also adds the potential for significant jobs and job growth in this part of New Zealand.

I want to acknowledge the tension that seems to exist when it comes to irrigation. It’s actually not about the water; it’s actually about water quality and nutrients. We need to unwind that conversation in New Zealand and in this House, if we’re going to make use of schemes like this into the future as we battle pretty significant challenges around climate change. In my maiden speech, I said I thought it was unfair to link irrigation to nutrient loadings. If you deal with the nutrients, then irrigation is a fantastic technology that can help New Zealand grow. In this Parliament, I want to be a champion of water storage, and I was pleased to hear the Hon David Parker’s speech earlier. I was a little bit surprised, I might say, because what he said is, fundamentally, what I agree with on how water can enhance our economy.

This project has been going on for 15 or 18 years, and it does go right to the heart of what New Zealand’s going to have to do as it seeks to address economic growth along with climate change. This is a unique proposal. It has the agreement now of all the local authorities, Fish & Game, Department of Conservation, iwi, and we’re being asked in this Parliament to deal with 11 hectares of land. As the Hon Dr Nick Smith has just said, the stewardship land is largely—I can’t remember the number he said, but a very small 1.5 hectares of 165 hectares. It is a very, very small amount.

I want to acknowledge the leaders in this community that have fought for this. I don’t know them all, but the ones I do know, I hugely respect: John Palmer, Julian Raine, my friend and colleague Mayor Richard Kempthorne, who I know has championed this for a long time as a fundamental part of the Tasman and Nelson success. I want to pay particular tribute to the gentleman in front of me, the Hon Dr Nick Smith, who has worked in this House and with this community for 15 years, at least, to advance this scheme. I want to acknowledge his tenacity and courage—that even in Opposition, he is supporting a local bill through this Parliament that will allow this scheme to happen.

This morning, Dame Jenny Shipley said, at the 125-year women’s suffrage celebratory breakfast, that when you come to Parliament you have to come with a couple of things that you want to do. I give notice to this House, in supporting this bill, that I am a hugely strong advocate of water storage, and at every opportunity I’ll bring those schemes back to this House. Thank you.

The Green Party is opposing this bill to support the Waimea dam. We are very clear, and what we’re asking for—and I acknowledge all of the speeches that have just been put on the floor of this House. What we are wanting—and I want to support Deborah Russell in saying that this is not a no-brainer. At the very least, we need to acknowledge that there are valid, valid concerns and that this is not a no-brainer.

Now, I want to be very clear that we are sure that there need to be better assurances, especially environmental and ecological assurances. I think it was Mr Guy who previously stood and said, “I want to hear what the Greens have to say about endangered species.” We absolutely do have something to say about endangered species. We acknowledge the work of Forest & Bird, for example, who are highlighting species and plants that have not had their full day in being monitored and surveyed. We know this is not a “no-brainer”, as the Minister keeps insisting, and we are proud to continue to keep us all to account, making sure that absolutely all assurances and guarantees have been put in place so that we understand the social, environmental, and economic interdependent impacts that this dam will have.

I have acknowledged, and I do acknowledge, the arguments and the reasons that have been put forward by the members of this House to support this dam. What I am asking is that we haven’t had the full guarantees, particularly in the ecological and environmental monitoring. I also support Dr Deborah Russell in saying that it absolutely should go to the Environment Committee. I would be most supportive of this going to that select committee to make sure that the environmental impacts are being upheld just as much as the social and economic impacts. The Green Party has long understood that environmental, social, and economic impacts need to be considered together and that not one can be pulled out and looked at in isolation of the other. The Green Party has long understood that we need to understand the relationship between the causes and the outcomes of those sections of our lives and of our policies and of our laws.

So, yes, no one would be surprised that I am standing in this House to oppose this bill. I look forward to the submissions that may come if this bill goes through its first reading. Again, I want to support that this goes to the Environment Committee. I want us to consider the sentiments of Forest & Bird, talking about native snails and plant species, some of which will be majorly wiped out with the inundation of the land that is being proposed to be transferred to Tasman District Council. I want us to have those debates and be very, very clear that we also understand the long-term benefits, the long-term, seven-generations-ahead benefits, of this dam. While I won’t pretend to align this particular project with all of the large-scale irrigation projects that I’m proud this Government has committed to winding down, I want us to be very, very clear about the long-term, holistic aspects of this project and that we have those guarantees.

The Green Party does not feel that we have those guarantees all tied up here in this legislation. We understand that there are valid needs for the Nelson and Tasman communities. We understand the difference in value between using land for horticulture and agriculture. We understand the intricacies of what is being proposed. What we cannot see—and why we cannot support this bill—is that the assurances for long-term water quality, environmental quality, and, therefore, economic outputs have been preserved. Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker.

Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker. I’m happy to take a call on this particular bill, the Tasman District Council (Waimea Water Augmentation Scheme) Bill. Just a wee reminder to the House and to all those that are listening that, actually, this here is maybe a little bit unprecedented in terms of our party actually supporting this, as the Hon Dr Nick Smith and the Hon Nathan Guy also alluded to. They were quite surprised that we were supporting this bill, but, in fact, this here is us as a Government upholding our commitments.

You see, in April, it was announced by Ministers Grant Robertson and Damien O’Connor that the Government would be winding down all public subsidies for large-scale irrigation projects, and that is in line with our coalition and our confidence and supply agreements. But we also did this: we also agreed to honour the previous commitments to existing schemes, and the three in the works, including this particular one, the Waimea project. The other two projects in completion that we talked about were the completion of the $200 million Central Plains Water stage two in Canterbury, and constructing the Kurow Duntroon scheme in South Canterbury.

Minister Robertson indicated in April this year that the three developments could be met within the current appropriations. So I have heard we have absolutely pleased the other side of the House, we’ve pleased the mayor, Richard Kempthorne; we’ve pleased those people that were supporting the Waimea scheme, and we’ve also pleased those who voted for this Government and expected us to follow through on what we stood for, and that’s exactly what we’ve gone and done.

Let’s just take a moment to point out that the Waimea scheme itself doesn’t require parliamentary approval, but what this bill does is it enables Crown land to be accessed for this scheme—1.35 hectares of Crown riverbed on which the dam will be built. It also frees up the right to inundate 9.67 hectares of conservation land, about 1.6 kilometres in a direct line upstream from the dam, through an easement.

As our previous speakers have been talking about this bill, I’ve been wondering where iwi fit in this whole scheme of things. I had a little look into it, and I’m reassured when I see that iwi were consulted on this particular bill. I just wanted to point out this bit: the Tasman District Council has advised that all eight iwi with an interest in the bill have been consulted on it, with no opposition being expressed or expected. This includes Ngāti Kōata as an iwi with a particular interest being fully supportive of the bill, Te Atiawa and Ngāti Tama having confirmed their acceptance of it, and Ngāti Rārua are believed to be in support of it as well. To the extent that conservation land does not inundate it at any time, the public will have the same level of access as it does to the adjoining conservation land.

So despite this bill having quite a rocky road to get to this point, I’m happy to stand here and commend it to the House. It’s something that has been a long time coming, and probably, with the incoming Government, I’m sure the locals were probably a bit nervous about where the Waimea scheme was going to fit in with the future direction of this Government, but everybody that lives in the Tasman District should also know that we are supporting them on this particular project. This is a commitment from our Government. We’re following through with it.

I would like to point out that our confidence and supply partners over here, the Green Party of Aotearoa / New Zealand, are absolutely within their rights to oppose it at this stage. I think that they’ve raised some really important points, which, as the bill moves forward, we actually need to be answering. So I mihi to our partners over there, the Green Party of Aotearoa / New Zealand, and I encourage the select committee, as this bill moves through the select committee process, to actually look into what the Greens are saying, help to mitigate by finding some answers to the problems that they’ve raised, and help it move through unopposed. But for here and now, I commend this bill to the House.

Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker. I too stand in support of the Tasman District Council (Waimea Water Augmentation Scheme) Bill in its first reading here tonight. As we’ve heard from previous speakers, the bill does seek to acquire a very small portion of public land—11 hectares, in fact—in the Lee Valley, and I’m absolutely delighted that this bill has the support of Labour and New Zealand First.

This dam is not just so that more water can keep being drawn from local sources; it actually complements other measures which have been introduced over the past 17 years. We heard from the Hon Nathan Guy earlier that the need for this dam was highlighted back in 2001, in what has been termed the “Big Dry”. That was the most severe drought that the area had experienced in 60 years, and those areas that were affected went from Nelson, south to Richmond, and then all the way west, right to the coast, including Golden Bay.

The financial impact to horticulture and farmers was brutal during that drought and, of course, the damage to the river was significant. Throughout the first half of that year, the land was so dry and it posed such an extreme fire risk that even the Department of Conservation closed all of its conservation tracks up there—all of the walking tracks—including the Abel Tasman Coast Track, the Cable Bay Walkway, and the Queen Charlotte Track. The residents in those areas had their water supply severely restricted. This is, clearly, not sustainable, and in order to control water use, some water takes have been reduced by as much as 50 percent already. But even with the current controls, there will be times when we still won’t have enough water up there to keep both the river flowing and businesses and communities supplied with water.

Even though water restrictions have been required nearly every summer since the “Big Dry” in 2001, it’s been the irrigators who have felt those impacts the most. But, from November this year, when all of the water takes will be limited if the river falls below the minimum flow level, urban residents will also begin to experience more severe restrictions more frequently. They can expect about 50 days of restrictions on average every summer, and in drier times that could be extended and full cease takes for some of those people on the Waimea Plains.

Without the dam, the region could lose up to $1 billion of GDP over the next 25 years, but with the dam GDP could increase by about the same amount. I’ve spoken with one business in the Tasman District who supplies 60 percent of the apple trees to orchardists across New Zealand. Without the guaranteed supply of water, that business will either have to retrench or relocate. The use of this 11 hectares for the purpose of the Waimea dam has already been through the Environment Court and approved, as we’ve heard from Dr Nick Smith, and all the resource consents are in place.

The big winner from this dam is the Waimea River, and it means that minimum flows can be maintained in the river by releasing water from the dam, which, in turn, feeds the aquifers and the coastal springs and ensures the community’s water supplies are protected into the future and that the recreational benefits are maintained for families, and even the fisherman. It protects and enhances the Waimea River’s natural ecosystems, and it maintains the flow, which will prevent the saltwater intrusion into the drinking-water supply. Knowing that a consistent and safe water supply will be available will give absolute confidence to those industries in Nelson and Tasman that currently employ around 3,000 people.

I too want to lend my support and acknowledgment to Mayor Richard Kempthorne and his councillors, who have, after many years, approved this project. I also acknowledge the team of supporters who have courageously promoted this project over many years. I think we have light at the end of the tunnel. I have great pleasure in commending this bill to the House. Thank you.

We don’t have that many local bills coming to the House and I think it’s useful just to reflect at the outset on the fact that this is a local bill and it’s a bit different from the others that we often speak about. So the first thing that I want to do is just acknowledge that before this bill has gotten to the House, it has had to have been supported by a territorial local authority, which in itself has had to go through a great deal of work in terms of consultation, in terms of planning, to develop the proposal that is inherent within this bill.

So I would, in the first instance, want to acknowledge that work from the territorial local authority—the Tasman District Council, in this case. Also, I say that I think that when these local bills do appear before the House, it behoves all of us—no matter which side of the House; no matter which party we come from—to give some respect and some consideration for the fact that our colleagues in local government have done some of the groundwork before it lands before us and to give it some genuine consideration, which I believe that all parties have been doing in the debate so far.

It is a bill that requires careful consideration, and I would echo the comments of my colleagues earlier in this debate the Hon David Parker and Deborah Russell, who made the point that we shouldn’t simply sign off on these sorts of things when they come before us because some arguments are put up about economic development. One of the real problems that we have in this country, that I think most of us are aware of and certainly most New Zealanders are aware of, is that we have suffered a significant degradation of the quality of our waterways over the past generation or so. That is a matter of considerable concern to many of us in this House and many people in our communities, and a big part of that has been our interference with many of those waterways for the purposes of economic development.

We have, on the whole, been too loose in this area and so I think it is important that we give serious consideration to ensuring that where we enter into these water storage schemes or where we, at this end of Government, support those water storage schemes, they are sustainable and the decisions that have been made are wise and that we are stewarding those resources well. I do take issue with some of the comments from the other side of the House to the effect that any water storage scheme is good, that any water storage scheme that facilitates agricultural intensification must be good and must be supported. I don’t support that position; we must have a better framework for making these kinds of decisions.

What I want to put to the House is that actually a useful framework for considering this particular proposal is the Living Standards Framework as developed by Treasury and that the Government is doing significant further work on at the moment. It actually provides a nuanced structure for considering the types of investments and types of decisions like this from a whole range of different lenses. There are four capitals which feed into the Living Standards Framework. I think two of them are relevant in this respect: that’s natural capital and physical capital; the social capital and human capital considerations I don’t think are quite as relevant. But certainly when you pass this project through the lens of natural capital and of physical capital, I believe that it does pass the test.

So let’s just have a look at some of those factors. The first is on the natural capital side. We’ve heard some of the arguments in the debate so far. In the first instance, this is a river which does have issues with its water flow particularly in the dry months. We know that one of the chief causes of the degradation of many of our waterways is when the water flow becomes too low. So the impact of this scheme in terms of ensuring a minimum water flow during the dry seasons is certainly one of the boxes that we can tick there.

We’ve heard that there are problems with saltwater inundation—that that has a significant impact on the health and the well-being of this waterway, and that the scheme will assist in that regard. One of the very interesting points that did come up in debate earlier on was the fact that, quite possibly, this scheme may act as an incentive for the kind of horticultural development in the area and possibly a shift from some more intensive forms of agriculture to horticulture that may actually be gentler on our environment and gentler on our waterways in the long run, so that’s something to be encouraged as well.

If we look at physical capital—that is, the well-being—the assets that we have that contribute to the well-being of our people, to their livelihoods, to material living conditions, then again there are strong arguments for this project. It will ensure that we have a stable urban water supply to support our growing communities. It will support horticulture and industry in the area and, as I’ve said, potentially do that in a more sustainable way.

So, overall, I do think this is a project which passes the bar in terms of enhancing the well-being of our communities, through looking at all of those capitals that enable us to make a wise decision, and it’s certainly one the Labour Party and I wish to see proceeding further. Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker.

Can I, firstly, acknowledge the wide range of comments that have been made. I particularly want to acknowledge the Minister for the Environment, David Parker. I also think the final speaker, Michael Wood, made a very good point, and that is reminding the House this is a local bill, this is a bill that has been voted on by the Tasman District Council and widely supported, and reminding the House that, traditionally, we have taken a view that this Parliament will generally support local bills, providing they have gone through good process. Quite clearly from the debate, there is a difference between myself and the Green Party, but I acknowledge their point of view and would welcome their involvement on the select committee.

I do note, in moving the bill, that with Crown Irrigation Investments Ltd requiring that all of the legal issues be resolved by December, it makes it necessary for me to move a procedural motion following consideration of the bill to be able to meet those contractual obligations. Again, I thank all members that have made a contribution, and particularly those parties that have agreed to support the bill’s first reading.

I move, That the Tasman District Council (Waimea Water Augmentation Scheme) Bill be reported to the House by 7 November 2018, and that the committee have the authority to meet at any time while the House is sitting, except during oral questions, during any evening on a day on which there has been a sitting of the House, on a Friday of a week in which there has been a sitting of the House, and outside the Wellington area, despite Standing Orders 191, 193, and 194(1)(b) and (c).

Motion agreed to.