Thomas Cawthron Trust Amendment Bill

I move, That the Thomas Cawthron Trust Amendment Bill be now read a second time.

It is a pleasure to take the first call on the second reading of this important bill for the Cawthron Institute and my electorate of Nelson. Can I begin by putting my thanks on record to a number of people who have supported the passage of this bill. First I want to thank officials from the Office of the Clerk, Parliamentary Counsel Office, and the Ministry of Justice for their wise advice. This bill has meandered its way through the Parliament a little bit. It has required the occasional piece of advice from the Office of the Clerk, from the Parliamentary Counsel Office, and from the Ministry of Justice in order to get to this point, and I do want to place on record my sincere thanks to those officials for their professionalism in supporting this bill through its progress.

I wish to acknowledge members of the Cawthron Institute Trust Board, chair John Palmer, and two further trustees who have put a lot of energy and time into this bill, Sarah-Jane Weir and Harvey Ruru, who have been part of our discussions as a trust board over the last couple of years as we’ve progressed this bill through the House. I also wish to thank local iwi for the way in which they have engaged with the trust board to ensure that their views were heard throughout the development of this bill and through the select committee process. I particularly want to note the Economic Development, Science and Innovation Committee and the members from both sides of the House who have engaged constructively throughout this process. There have been a few amendments made to this bill, a number of questions through that process, and I want to acknowledge everyone who has diligently and wisely approached this bill so that it comes back to the House in a better form. That is very much appreciated by me.

Finally, to the two lawyers who have advised the Cawthron Institute throughout this process, David McLay and retired Justice John Wild, who have both supported the Cawthron Institute through the passage of this bill—and can I acknowledge that John Palmer, the chair of the Cawthron trust is in the gallery today alongside David McLay. I just want to acknowledge the tremendous work that you’ve both done to get us to this point. Finally, I do need to acknowledge the Business Committee, because we are in a position tonight to progress this bill through to the end of its passage, and I hope we will get there. We will be able to take this bill through the second reading, through the committee stage and through a shortened third reading tonight, and I hope we do get there because that will allow this bill to actually become law and then be utilised by the Cawthron Institute.

Before I get into the details of the bill, I do just want to note my own interest, which I noted in the first reading of the bill, that I wear a couple of hats, one of which is being the local MP for Nelson that is putting this bill through. But also, I sit as one of—what we colloquially call—the statutory trustees as the member for Nelson. I have a role as a statutory trustee on the board of the Cawthron Institute. So I note that interest at the beginning of this speech.

So first to who the Cawthron Institute is and why it is such a taonga within Nelson and also within New Zealand. The Cawthron Institute is New Zealand’s largest independent science organisation. It was established in 1921 and is over 100 years old. It was one of a number of organisations that were established as a result of a significant bequest from the philanthropic businessman in Nelson named Thomas Cawthron. Alongside the money that he left for a science institute and museum, he also left significant bequests to other parts of Nelson that are very special to those of us who call Nelson home, including the church steps in front of Nelson cathedral, the organ located within the former Nelson School of Music, the chains on Rocks Road, and, for those of us who have the lucky benefit of living in Nelson, when we drive around there are reminders of Cawthron’s contribution to our region everywhere we go.

There are a number of areas that the Cawthron provides significant research and support for, both within New Zealand but also on a global scale. We have an incredible number of scientists. We have around 300 staff at Cawthron, many of whom are young scientists who come from around 35 different countries from around the world, including China, Poland, the United States, France, Fiji, Australia, Germany, Sri Lanka, England, and Italy. There is significant scientific research occurring at the Cawthron Institute in areas of aquaculture, freshwater health, ocean health, our land and soils, seafood safety. There are two particular areas of research that have been in the media a lot, one of which is the work on algae and Asparagopsis, which is algae that can be feed to cattle and help reduce methane emissions; and the project around neosaxitoxin, which has a highly localised anaesthetic, and the incredible work that Cawthron is doing in conjunction with Boston Children’s Hospital to develop a new anaesthetic that does not have addictive properties. These are the kinds of projects that Cawthron is renowned for.

Cawthron is an organisation that was established before we had things like the Charities Act and so therefore has its own private Act of Parliament. But this Act does need some freshening up. In the past couple of decades, we’ve had two High Court orders made in 2003 and 2007 that amended, through the High Court, elements of Cawthron’s governance arrangements. We then had changes to the Trusts Act in 2019, and all of those changes together began a process of it becoming somewhat confusing about what the actual governance arrangements of the Act were. And so there’s components of those, which I’ll talk to in a moment, which needed to be tidied up.

But the most substantial change that we have in the Act is that we are adding a further what we call “statutory trustee”. So we currently have 10 trustees sitting around the table at the Cawthron Institute. There are four who are there by nature of their roles: the MP for Nelson, the Mayor of Nelson, the Mayor of Tasman, and the Anglican Bishop of Nelson. Those four trustees then appoint a further six trustees to govern the Cawthron Institute at that trust board level. There is a missing person around the table that the trust board has long wanted to add, and that as a representative of local iwi. So a significant amount of consultation has occurred with the eight iwi of Te Tauihu, across the Top of the South, and, from the point that this bill receives its Royal assent, Te Tauihu iwi will be able to nominate an appointee who will also fulfil what we colloquially call a statutory trustee. So they will have similar powers to the four of us in terms of being able to then appoint the further six members of the trust board.

Thomas Cawthron’s view was that one should be governed in a way that reflected the community. The will that he left made that clear, and it is the view of the trust board unanimously that it is appropriate, particularly when we have other elected representatives, the Anglican Bishop, that iwi are a significant part of our community and should be represented.

There are a couple of other small changes to the bill, one of which is to include the objects of Cawthron within the bill. We didn’t actually have that listed into the Act itself, and so this bill will amend the principal Act by sitting at the trust board’s objects, namely the advancement of science to benefit to Te Tauihu and Aotearoa New Zealand with a focus on natural resources.

There are some other changes relating to remuneration, and there’s one particular I want to note, which was that, through various court orders and adjustments to the principal Act, we have actually become somewhat confused around whether trust board members should be remunerated. Now, the trust board members do have a clear view that this is, for most people who sit around the table, a voluntary role. But we also note that we do require commercial expertise around the table. And so there will be times when it is appropriate to remunerate someone. We have made a change, though, to ensure that the statutory trustees—the MP and the mayors—are not able to receive remuneration.

So I look forward to the remainder of the debate tonight and the committee stage, where I can get into the detail of this somewhat more, and I commend this bill to the House.

The question is that the motion be agreed to.

Thank you, Madam Speaker, and it is a pleasure to speak on the Thomas Cawthron Trust Amendment Bill. I congratulate the member Rachel Boyack who has just taken her seat again, as one of the privileges I think of being an MP is being able to shepherd a bill as worthy as this through the House, which means a lot to the local community of a trust that was established over 100 years ago—how the world has changed since that trust came into being. I’m sure that Thomas Cawthron would be—or his legacy would far exceed his expectations I’m sure that he had 100 years ago. I didn’t know the chains around Rocks Road were donated by Thomas Cawthron. He was certainly a successful businessman, but philanthropy is something that we don’t see as much of these days in the way that it was in those days, when a wealthy person such as Mr Cawthron made a magnificent contribution to his community which not only endures today, it has way surpassed what it set out to achieve in the beginning.

I have been to the aquaculture park at the Cawthron Institute, and I urge anyone who gets the opportunity to go there—you should, it’s an amazing facility. I think Rachel said there were 300 staff—is that right? Three hundred staff at Cawthron and these are all highly skilled people who are passionate about their work. They’re not just turning up to do their work, they’re passionate about what they can achieve. I’ve had the privilege of hearing a presentation from the chief executive of Cawthron at a social event, who spoke with such passion—him and his wife gave a team act, as it were, about the importance of the ocean.

Covering 71 percent of the surface of our planet is the ocean. We are on the dry bits of land—a very small part of it, and a lot of the answers to the problems that we have today lie within the ocean, and Rachel spoke about that earlier with Asparagopsis and methane, for example. There are a lot of other things—there are a lot of medical uses for compounds that are found in the ocean, and that’s part of the work that is done at the aquaculture park, but I’ll come back to that.

I think it’s unusual today, and it speaks to the era that this bill came from that we have four trustees as of right, and two mayors and the member of Parliament which all kind of make sense—and the bishop. There wouldn’t be many pieces of legislation on the books where a bishop is required to be a person on a trust or leading that. No, I think it’s a pity, actually, that it’s not more often used in our society. I know we’re more secular than we ever were in those days, but it sort of speaks to the respect with which—and how—things were done in those days, and I think it should be acknowledged.

It was overdue to have an iwi representative formally recognised, even though they were a part of it, and Cawthron has a really good relationship with Te Tau Ihu, but having it formally in the legislation is—while the bill’s going through it might as well have that, and I think it must do actually. We did have a bit of an issue, through the whole process, where we heard evidence about variations on the spelling of Te Tau Ihu. And I guess that’s just a legacy issue, which we dealt with. But it was fascinating, and I do, as has been said before, thank those people from Cawthron who spent a lot of time helping us through the select committee process to get this bill right, and I’m sure we have.

It actually raises an issue, where these pieces of legislation, in theory, if things change in time, and they will, it will require another Act of Parliament to change that legislation and bring it into line. We did discuss how could we make this bill more enduring, and I’m comfortable we’ve done the best that we can. It’s probably not enough, but we won’t know that for decades, and none of us will be here in this House, I suspect. Although you never know, Simeon Brown might be—entering his middle age by then. It might be—but it is important that we think about these things, and, I don’t know, we did put quite a bit of time and effort into thinking about that. There was a lot of good contributions around the select committee table, as well as from the officials that were advising us, and the legal adviser for the trust, to try and get that sorted. I think we’ve done as best we can.

As I said, as has been alluded to before, bioactive compounds in the ocean are a really important area for research, and we’ve really barely scratched the surface. A topical issue that’s just happened in the last few days, Seagate, really highlights how little of the Earth’s backyard that we have actually researched. Going down to great depths, we barely—we just really deal with the shallows, but we’ve got a lot of aquaculture in Nelson and in the Marlborough Sounds, very close by where this aquaculture park is. The research that Cawthron does happens and has a good use every day in our region, and in Nelson—or my region and over the hill in Nelson—and everywhere else in New Zealand. Aquaculture is going to become an increasingly important source of nutrients and protein for us, for healthy diets and healthy lifestyles, and also a low impact source of food. Obviously, we need to do the research to ensure that we can make the best use of that. The aquaculture park also can actually—these bioactives that they can research, they can go right down the value chain, or even to the stage of running plant-scale production and synthetic modification of those particular compounds for use in medical and other areas.

That, as I’ve said, with all those 300 people there, the work that they’re doing in those particular buildings—they’ve got tanks where they are able to grow these things and observe them more closely than out in the ocean. It’s a phenomenal facility. Keeping them at different temperatures and different chemistries in the water, they’re able to make assessments of what would happen from a pollution perspective in the water, and how things might be actually even cleaned up by natural organisms in the water, and how that can be all controlled. The algae and cultural facilities is what I referred to—they’ve got a wet lab but they’ve also got a dry lab, and so all of that money has been put to good use.

I’m not going to take up any more time on this, but I would just like to reiterate that I congratulate the member for bringing this to this stage. I also congratulate the Cawthron Institute and their directors for the work that they’ve done, and indeed their staff for the dedication that they have. I think it’s testament to that how well the bill was supported through the select committee process, and indeed by the officials that made this process a lot easier than it could have been. So with that I commend this bill to the House.

Kia ora, Madam Speaker. It’s my pleasure to take a call on the Thomas Cawthron Trust Amendment Bill for its second reading. I just want to thank the member of Nelson, Rachel Boyack, who brought this bill before the House. Like everyone else has mentioned, she’s an extremely formidable MP, and it’s really good that she’s bringing this bill through the House, and then also for her ongoing work with the Cawthron Institute as a trustee on their board.

This private bill will make it easier for the Cawthron Institute to operate in a proper manner without needing High Court or parliamentary approval. It’ll clarify the administrative and governance matters, such as the responsibilities and powers of the board of directors and things like remuneration. This bill helps modernise the governance of the Cawthron Institute Trust Board, and it’s fit so it can continue its work more efficiently.

The most important aspect of this bill, for me, is that it allows for an additional representation of the iwi voice. Until now, the Thomas Cawthron Trust Act of 1924—it only allowed the board to have three statutory members, and they were: the MP for Nelson, the mayor for Nelson, and then the Anglican Bishop of Nelson. So to better represent and support the people of Nelson and New Zealand, it’s important that local iwis can participate in structures like the Cawthron Institute, and with this private bill Te Tauihu iwi now have a seat at this board, and this will be a huge benefit to the work of this leading science institution in New Zealand.

The Cawthron Institute has been an important part of scientific research and progress in New Zealand history for more than 100 years now, as has been mentioned in previous contributions. Since 1921, the institute has helped advance science to the benefit of all New Zealanders in many different fields, from things like agriculture, aquaculture, forestry, marine freshwater systems, and things like that.

Last year, the member for Nelson and I, along with a few of our other colleagues, went and visited the Cawthron national algae centre just to see some of the innovative research that they were doing. It was a whole lot of visits we did, but we ended up spending the afternoon there, which was absolutely fantastic. Interestingly, the first stage of the centre was officially opened by the Prime Minister two years ago, and that was just two years after $6 million worth of funding was provided by the Government’s Provincial Growth Fund. Cawthron also contributed $2 million towards the centre. The centre will enable the Cawthron researchers to build on their existing expertise to meet growing global demand for algae-based products and solutions. They’ve had some fantastic studies going on, from the extraction of bioactive compounds from microalgae for high-value pharmaceutical products through to methane-busting seaweed, as has been mentioned in other contributions. You know, there are enormous possibilities for a thriving New Zealand algae sector. It has significantly contributed to the growth of New Zealand’s primary industries, and now it’s helping protect our marine and freshwater environments.

Interestingly, seaweed cultivation is the world’s fastest growing aquaculture sector, with the global seaweed industry worth more than US$6 billion per year, and there are many species that have potential to be transformed into a range of commercial products. When the member for Nelson and I visited this institute, I thought there’d only be one kind of seaweed, but, interestingly, there’s a whole range of types of seaweed that are out there, and they are testing different types to see what response they have with methane busting, which is fantastic. That will get transformed into different commercial products as well as offering environmental benefits to counteract climate change. So we’re seeing some fantastic, innovative ideas going on down there.

The Cawthron Institute employs hundreds of highly qualified personnel that stand at the forefront of research in their fields globally, and recently the Cawthron Institute announced a breakthrough discovery in the production of algae-based pain medication that could become an alternative to opioids. So some fantastic innovation going on there, and they’re refining that as we go on. This was also made possible thanks to a $950,000 contribution by this Government.

Their work also protects our marine and freshwater environment. They have developed a promising prototype bubble blower installed beneath a pontoon to help mitigate biofouling, and it has the potential to be an important tool to reduce the spread of marine pests in our marinas. There are many marinas around the country that would absolutely benefit from this once it’s out there in full swing.

Their salmon breeding facility is also impressive, and we also visited that. So this area, it’s a segregated area within the facility. You go in there, you put on the white overalls, you put on white protective, like, boots to go over your shoes, and you go in there and you can see the experiments that they’re doing in there. It’s a selective breeding process, so what they’re trying to do is enable or research salmon farming that can be done in deeper waters and in waters of varying temperatures. What that will enable us to do is establish salmon farms in different areas that we’re not currently farming in. So that’s some very exciting research going on in that space, and this will allow Aotearoa to ensure that we can continue farming salmon as our sea temperatures change.

Other initiatives, like the Cawthron New Zealand River Awards, are very good too. They celebrate the achievements of people committed to improving freshwater health and show this institute’s contribution to the development of healthy ecosystems across New Zealand. This private bill will help the Cawthron Institute modernise its governance and proceed with its research to the highest international standards.

With the select committee process, I want to thank the Economic Development, Science and Innovation Committee—

💬 Glen Bennett: Great committee.

—for its work on improving this bill—yeah, absolutely, it’s a very good committee. I’ve subbed in on it on a number of occasions. But, you know, there have been some simple but important clarifications that have been made throughout the pushing around of this bill, and I agree with a lot of them—so, for example, that elected officials should not receive remuneration for their position on the board of the Cawthron Institute as they hold this position only because they are elected officials. It’s also important to better define the role the Te Tauihu iwi member will play on this board. The select committee decided that this member should also have the power to select six other board members. However, other considerations, such as the remuneration of that member, will be decided by the board itself, as iwi members often participate on such boards for other reasons than monetary remuneration.

What I’m really excited about with the Cawthron Institute is that a lot of the other contributions that they’re going to make as they further evolve in their research, particularly in the R & D space—their research, as we can all agree, is cutting-edge, and I have no doubt that integrating mātauranga Maori and iwi voices will really strengthen their board and the work that they do going forward. So I really commend this bill to the House.

Thank you. It’s a pleasure to take a short call on the Thomas Cawthron Trust Amendment Bill. I was not on the select committee that heard the evidence on this bill and made the decisions on it, but it’s unusual for a private bill to come to the House, in my experience, and have quite the number of changes that have been made to this bill. And I suppose that the trust board were fortunate to have had Rachel Boyack as the promotor of this bill, because she is a stickler for detail. Ha, ha! And she’ll make sure every word is right. But also it went through the select committee under the chairmanship or stewardship of Naisi Chen, and she’s a little the same.

I want to comment really on the background of this trust. I think it’s pretty extraordinary that one person can make such an impact on New Zealand—I know Stuart Smith talked briefly about this before. One person makes such an impact on New Zealand industry and, I guess, science and business a hundred-and-something years after setting up a trust to effectively—I think it was originally set up to promote agriculture, actually. There’s some irony in that too, and I’ll get to that in a minute. But now it’s quite a spectacular set-up. And it’s been well documented by the previous speakers as to what goes on at the Cawthron Institute, and I think it’s quite exciting.

The comment I wanted to make was the current chief executive, of course, comes out of the fishing industry and he tends to have a habit of criticising the meat and wool and dairy sectors and thinking that the fishing industry’s more sustainable. Well, the fact is the great thing about the dairy and meat industry is we’re totally renewable. We renew ourselves every year and we don’t yet have proof that the fishing industry is totally renewable. I think it probably is, having been the spokesperson for fisheries for quite a while. I think it probably is, but none the less I don’t think it’s great for us to criticise other sectors. And it’s very interesting, because we’ve seen this just in the last weeks really in the forestry industry where we’re tearing each other apart for no good reason. At the end of the day, this institute is of great benefit to New Zealand Inc., and I don’t think it matters whether it’s—in fact, we heard a little bit about the potential for it to produce all sorts of algae and things like that. Of course, to do that that will have benefits right across the sectors because you can produce these things, they turn up in animal feeds, they turn up in all sorts of places. So the work they do, I think is pretty special.

One of the things that interests me about this—and, no doubt, David Bennett will have a comment on that later—is it’s very difficult when you get community-based organisations appointing people. And lots of councils and communities grapple with this issue. This one’s quite interesting because it has the mayor, the two MPs, and the bishop—the Anglican bishop, David Bennett. Ha, ha! Most important to Nelson, of course. But it is interesting it also has an iwi member that appoints those trustees. I think it’s sort of an interesting structure and it’s a good structure, but the bill was needed and it’s been well documented again. The bill was needed to deal with this, because there was some uncertainty created by a variety of different issues that meant this bill was required to put back in order the things that were doubtful, I suppose.

I think it’s quite exciting. The bill, I suppose, sets up the structure for an entity that’s hugely important to New Zealand. I commend the work of the select committee in getting to this point with it and I need say no more. I’m sure it will be a great success and there’ll be more discussion on it tonight. Thank you.

Members, the time has come for our dinner break. I will resume the Chair at 7.30 p.m. tonight.

Sitting suspended from 5.58 p.m. to 7.30 p.m.

Members, the House has resumed. Before the dinner break we were on the debate of the Thomas Cawthron Trust Amendment Bill.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. It is a pleasure to rise and take a call on the Thomas Cawthron Trust Amendment Bill. I, obviously, don’t live in Nelson, but as evidence that they are far-reaching in their impact and their influence, as someone who has very strong connections to Havelock, it’s been really interesting to look at—you know, as we’ve all done our homework, it’s the impact that they’re having. They are far reaching in their efforts.

I have to say congratulations to the member from Nelson for the care and the diligence and the thoroughness with which she has brought the bill to this point in the House. She talked about the incredible work and effort to make sure that iwi have been brought genuinely along the way, and about the engagement with staff and with the community about the changes that needed to happen to make sure that this wonderful institution remains future focused, forward thinking, and able to be as innovative as it has been for more than 100 years. I think it’s testament to the commitment that the member from Nelson has to her community and to this institution that we’re in this place today.

People have already noted that there have been changes to the bill, and, again, I think that just shows how diligent the community is to this trust. I do need to talk for a moment about the fact that this trust is intensely local in its influence but also incredibly global. It hasn’t just been around for more than 100 years, but it is very committed and really comfortable with being really future focused and able to lead not just Nelson and Marlborough in the top of the South Island but actually the whole world in its thinking and its actualising of our just transition that needs to happen.

As we all do our homework and we find something that excites us about what the institute has done, it was really interesting to read about the dear little village of Havelock and the estuary at the head of the Marlborough Sounds. It’s the largest estuary there. Over the years, it has suffered, and it has become one of the muddiest estuaries in the country. I have a bit of a love-hate relationship with that. It has claimed a lot of my gumboots over the years as I ventured out from my grandfather’s sawmill—which Mr Brownlee will know, being connected to the Brownlees there in Havelock. There was just something really attractive, leaving the paddock at the end of the sawmill and being really determined to get out to the maimai. I never made it out and back with a gumboot intact, so I can attest to the muddiness of that estuary, but that’s not a good thing. Estuaries shouldn’t be that muddy. And it has had significant contaminants come into it over the years.

And what has happened is the Marlborough District Council, with the significant assistance of such an internationally renowned institution, has been able to really thoroughly explore every metre of that estuary and discover where the sediment and those contaminants have actually come from, connecting them up to where the council thought they were coming from because of consents and all those sorts of things. So, actually, what it’s going to do is give the council great confidence with its future decision making about how it will restore that amazing part of our country that I have strong connections to.

We’ve heard already about some of the incredible innovation—the bubbles in Waikawa Marina—and, I guess, their ability to test things out. I guess that’s recognition of their absolute fundamental understanding and commitment to our coastlines and to our oceans. And I guess that’s where you can shift to thinking about the significant investment that they’ve done with their brains, as well as resources into how we futureproof, how we make sure, whether it’s seaweed and methane reduction, as we’ve already heard about, or carbon capture with seaweed, but also the opportunities for protein and how we actually realise that just transition and how we make sure that we think about food and fibre. And it’s not just food and fibre and taiao but land and sea and their ability to be really inventive. And everything’s evidence based, which then reduces risks and it makes it much more likely for us to be able to boldly go into a future that can feel quite terrifying.

One of the other things is that—you know, when you go googling—you have an understanding of their intergenerational commitment. Those of us who have taught NCEA are always really, really grateful and really cherish opportunities for our students to actually go and do their assessments in real-world situations, not just because they’re learning things that are of practical use, which is the beauty of NCEA, but actually things that excite them and mean that they will then go on and continue to study and invest and commit into something as exciting as looking at our aquaculture and our future, investing in our biodiversity, or protecting our environment. So, for example, they have students from all over the place. All the way down to Otago, students come up to Nelson, and they actually get to be scientists in real labs and do a level 3 internal around their mussels. I think that’s really exciting, because when students really engage hands on in real-world experiences, they then go on and they become excited learners, and they become excited scientists and people who are going to help us to do some amazing things in the future.

They have open days, they have scholarships, and they are obviously incredibly excited when people want to engage with them, because they know how important it is to bring our future generations into that process of making sure that we’ve got a world we can—and want to—live in, in the future. They, like I say, have had students from across the country come and experience and do real-world assessment and achievement. And it’s great to see them being really ambitious and really excited about how they connect mātauranga Māori alongside science in a more Western sense, and being able to really bring those experiences and that world view to local children.

It’s really interesting to see that they talk about having the students from Waikawa Bay—so over the hill from Nelson and then over the hill from Havelock—over to Waikawa, where the bubbles are, and hearing how excited those environmental scientists are about sharing the diversity of the world view, which is actually really important if we want to be creative about how we move into the future with things like seaweed or other forms of aquaculture.

It’s a wonderful institution, and we’ve heard that all over the place, and it is really great to see the incredible care that has gone into bringing this bill to this point in the House. The changes that have been made obviously recognise this and show how much it is valued. The only other thing is when you hear them talk about the global opportunities that they have, and it isn’t just seaweed; it is about making sure that whatever we do with aquaculture is sustainable. We’ve had some really ambitious industry over the years in Marlborough. I’ve had plenty of scallops and mussels in Marlborough over the years, and it’s really great to see them supporting aquaculture with science, understanding where the limitations and where the opportunities are, to make sure that we continue to make sure that this aquaculture is something that can be sustained into the future.

It’s a really exciting moment. It’s a lovely opportunity to be able to show off to the world, via this process, the exciting things that we can do in this country. It will assist us to continue to be world leading, to be ambitious, and to support the diversification and the significant transition that we must make for a just transition, not just for industry but the restoration, like I say, of parts of Marlborough. Making sure not only that we restore the parts of our coastlines and our waterways but also that we don’t do further damage and that we can be really ambitious in the future.

It’s a wonderful piece of legislation. It’s a nice opportunity to hear across the House the recognition, the importance, the innovation, and the world-leading science that we need to have in this country if we aspire to be the best that we can be and to be ambitious. And because of this, I commend this bill to the House.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. I rise on behalf of ACT to take a short call on the Thomas Cawthron Trust Amendment Bill, and I also congratulate Rachel Boyack on bringing this bill to the House. Cawthron Institute has been an integral part of Nelson’s identity for 100 years in New Zealand—owes a lot to Thomas Cawthron. Thomas Cawthron came to New Zealand in 1949 at the age of 15 years. Life was tough, and he started work straight away, soon realising he wasn’t great at the physical stuff but he had a strong work ethic, which was going to see him right. He went to Wellington in 1849 to work in an office and returned to Nelson in 1855, five years later, when his father got sick. He had an eye for business and was a clever economist, getting involved with contracting work, and in 1859 he began a career in shipping at Port Nelson. He ran shipping companies for the next 25 years and made a lot of money with investments and in property and shares—and I suspect he would’ve opposed any capital gains tax.

Besides the Cawthron Institute, Thomas Cawthron will always be remembered for his financing of the Church Steps, the School of Music organ, the chains around Rocks Road, and many other projects for the people of Nelson. He died in 1915, aged 83, leaving the city with over £200,000 for the purchase of land and the construction and maintenance of an industrial and technical school, institute, and museum, to be called the Cawthron Institute. He was an amazing man with amazing foresight which has had an immeasurable benefit for Nelson, for New Zealand, and, ultimately, for the world.

The institute’s focus is on growing and ensuring the safety of the seafood sector, developing bioactive resources, and improving the health of our freshwater ecosystems and oceans. There’s a huge range of skills, with expertise in aquaculture research, marine and freshwater resource management, food safety and quality, algal technologies, biosecurity, and analytical, and a fantastic, enthusiastic, and multicultural staff. The objects of the board are—there are four of them—to “clearly articulate the objects of the Trust Board and the powers conferred on the Trust Board … [to] provide the appointment of a member of the Trust Board nominated by Te Tauihu iwi … [to] specify the legal liability of the members of the Trust Board; and [to] update and modernise the governance arrangements of the Trust Board”.

ACT opposed the bill at the first reading because we fundamentally believe that appointments to anything should be on merit, not based on race. Many Māori work at Cawthron Institute, and there is no doubt that Māori are able to be on the board because of their skills and abilities, not because of who their grandparents were.

I’ll read a short quote from an award-winning book I’ve just read; it’s called Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind. It says, “The megafauna of New Zealand—which had weathered the alleged ‘climate change’ of c.45,000 years ago without a scratch—suffered devastating blows immediately after the first humans set foot on the islands. The Maoris [sic], New Zealand’s first Sapiens colonisers, reached the islands about 800 years ago. Within a couple of centuries, the majority of the local megafauna was extinct”—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Poto Williams): Order! Could I just check the relevance of that to this bill, please?

It’s relating to the environment and what the Cawthron Institute stands for. That’s the end of the quote.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Poto Williams): I will allow—I’ll listen to a little bit more, but I just caution the member that we are discussing the second reading of the Thomas Cawthron Trust Amendment Bill, so I would ask you to bring your comments back to that.

Sure, I’ll just finish that sentence. “The majority of the local megafauna was extinct, along with 60 per cent of all bird species.” We’re all human, and the idea that everyone has innate knowledge depending on birthright doesn’t sit well with us—as if my Scottish ancestry means I must like haggis and play the bagpipes. However, despite these reservations, we’re not going to spoil the party. Thank you to the current board, especially John Palmer. There are some things we just won’t agree on, but that’s OK. I’m sure the Cawthron Institute will continue its great work and grow even more over the next 100 years. ACT supports this bill. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. It’s a pleasure to speak on the Thomas Cawthron Trust Amendment Bill, which is my first time, as I’m not a member of the Economic Development, Science and Innovation Committee. None the less, I’m a huge supporter of Rachel Boyack, the local MP for Nelson, and what a wonderful job the member has done.

💬 Hon Kieran McAnulty: You’ve always said that.

I’ve been consistent about that, haven’t I? Yes.

When I look back at her purpose for bringing this bill to the House, she talked about it being a privilege as a member of the institute trust board and one of the statutory trustees, as she is. She tells a story that all members of the trust board have their personal liability limited and indemnified by way of this bill. And I’ll come back to that, because I know that it’s been some journey—she mentioned it in the House earlier today; she mentioned it in her first speech. And I hope, as she said today, it’s done and dusted, and so we get through a truncated third reading and she can take it through the committee of the whole House stage, with all of your support.

I too want to thank a number of people who are involved. These things don’t come to the House without the hard work—and for some it’s many years. And I know, through the member, that the chair of the trust, John Palmer, is here today. There’s also Sarah-Jane Weir and Harvey Ruru. I had the pleasure of working with Archdeacon Ruru when I was in New Zealand Police, and he was, I think, the iwi liaison officer for the Tasman district. But they have been what the member would say are the driving forces around the introduction of this bill.

The lawyer is always important—

💬 Hon Dr Duncan Webb: Yeah, bro.

—and I think David McLay should get a mention. I see the member for Christchurch Central trying to put his hand up. He’s a Minister now; not a lawyer, but—oh, he’s both. But David McLay should get a mention for his patience and perseverance in getting the bill to the stage. It is a high bar to get anything like this into the House—and so it should be.

When I look at the purposes of the amendment bill—and, look, just bear with me, here—to provide for the appointment of a member of the trust board nominated by Te Tauihu iwi, to clearly articulate the objects of the trust board—I love all that legal language—to specify the legal liability of the trust board members, and update and modernise the governance arrangements. And, can I say, many other bills are brought to this House in terms of modernising legislation—I know the omnibus bills do that really, really well. In addition, there was a change made to the existing Act by the Trust Act of 2019, which I’m told was inconsistent with a previous High Court judgment, and this bill, this process, will correct that error.

There is some historical background there and several of my colleagues from across the House have talked about that. But it’s worth noting, first and foremost, that it is New Zealand’s largest independent science and research and institute—that’s been here for 100-plus years. They had their centenary in 2021, and I thought, “Wow”. And when I googled, actually, and had a look at some of the literature, I thought, “Well done for surviving.” I often think there are so many turns and intersections that institutions like this can have, but they can also live or die by the sword in terms of what they do. And, of course, I understand why the member for Nelson is bringing it, because it does play a special role in the life of Nel-Nelsonians—there we are. But it’s also what is known as the “jewel in the Crown” of the Te Tauihu, top of the southern region, the South Island, there.

Its benefactor, Thomas Cawthron—a name that anyone from Nelson will go, “Oh, yeah. Yeah, the institute.” And there are plenty of Nelsonians living here in Wellington and they certainly will always have some knowledge, small as it may be, but powerful in terms of its contribution. And I would like to say that words like “philanthropist” and “pioneering businessman” come to mind in terms of his contribution to the scientific community and the city of Nelson. Some might know that he was born in London in the early 1800s: 1833. Somehow, he hopped over the ocean and got into Nelson in 1849. But, none the less, he’s always had a link to the sea because he did focus on shipping—I guess his enterprise that focused on shipping enabled his philanthropic endeavours.

Can I also just acknowledge some of—and I know the member’s got a love in this area, too, in terms of music—

💬 Barbara Kuriger: She’s already refused to sing today.

She refused to sing. We may have to get her to sing after the final speaker, and she can demonstrate, as a tohu, her work to signify the late Thomas Cawthron’s efforts. And I know that the Nelson school of music is a beneficiary—

💬 Hon Michael Woodhouse: That’s right, it is a school of music.

Oh, OK, it sounds like we’ve got some students, or maybe people want to be students of—there’s a future career there, members, and you, too, can maybe sing in the iconic Christ Church Cathedral there in the heart of Nelson. Look, he gave some funding which is important—$127 million in today’s term—and got that, I guess, industrial and technical school, now known as the Cawthron Institute.

I want to say, when I talked about reading some of the literature that the Cawthron Institute has put together—a great website, I have to say—it’s a respected and focused science organisation. I know that every year I read some report, some endeavour that the wonderful staff there have put out that’s really advancing the scientific world, either here or overseas.

One of the areas of focus that I like about the institute has been on aquaculture and seafood safety—maybe just seafood, but aquaculture none the less—and ocean and freshwater health. These are some of the areas that I think have been very valuable in my little patch of the world.

And I always have to talk about Wharekauri, the Chatham Islands, and some of the work there. I would hope that one day there’s a much stronger link between the institute and the work that the Chathams and those on the Chathams do—they really have everything, the world, at their fingertips in this area. I just think they need a visit by a few scientists or two from the institute to help, particularly in seaweed—I know that there’s been work being done around that area—but also mitigating problems associated with warming seas and climate change.

If I look at the bill, I’m not going to repeat some of the changes to some of those clauses that have been talked about. But I do want to say that there are a couple of clauses that will ensure that the locally iwi can appoint a statutory trustee—I just wanted to get that right—to join those four existing trustees: the member for Nelson, the mayors—Their Worships—of Nelson and Tasman respectively, and then the Anglican Bishop of Nelson. And I think that’s honourable, and well done to the member personally. Actually, it’s a small piece of detail, but I believe—in terms of modernising legislation and reflecting where Aotearoa New Zealand is leading, and particularly some of the mahi of the institute—that’s an admirable piece of work to ensure that that is enacted to have somebody from the local iwi appointed as a statutory trustee.

I’ve only got a short time left. Can I just once again acknowledge the member for Nelson, Rachel Boyack: her mahi, her passion, how this has been a big part of her life, and for ensuring the work of the institute—the flow-on effects of their work across Aotearoa New Zealand and the rest of the world. It ticks a box with her passion for music—I think that’s a good thing—and I look forward to her getting this through the House tonight. Kia ora.

Kia ora a te Māngai o te Whare. Kia ora tātou katoa. It has been my pleasure to use the last 15 minutes to get up to date on this bill that I’ve never seen before in my life. It’s actually a pleasure to find out more about the Cawthron Institute Trust Board. We are talking about a hundred years of much loved work in the community, if I’m to take the kōrero from the rest of the House as any indication, and I acknowledge that a lot of the local and connected passion and connection to the work of the trust has been laid clearly on the floor in here.

So what I will do is pick up on some of the points of difference and expertise that I can offer to this conversation. A really important one is especially where it concerns our kaitiaki duties for our taiao, our living systems, and for generations to come—a hundred years is several generations. That is the sort of long-term thinking that this bill is about and that we should all be about in our responsibilities.

So just for the record, I am stating that the Green Party is, of course, supporting this bill, that it’s a private bill, and again, we congratulate Rachel Boyack, the Nelson member. The focus for me in my time will be the part of the bill that appoints a member of the trust board nominated by Te Tauihu iwi. To add to the significance of that iwi appointment, I wanted to acknowledge the letter that all the members will have received and just quickly go through the support from the iwi that represent that part of the private bill. So I am really happy to see that Ngāti Tama, Ngāti Rārua, Ngāti Koata Trust, Te Ātiawa, Ngāti Toa Rangatira, Ngāti Kuia, Ngāti Apa ki Te Rā Tō, and Rangitāne are all working together and collaborating and working with the Cawthron trust board on that part of the private bill; again, reminding us all that it is as a statutory trustee of equal status to the others. Fantastic!

I thought I’d pick up on what is on the Cawthron website in terms of what that private bill is picking up on. I was really pleased to see that the Cawthron Institute, as New Zealand’s largest independent science organisation, is proud to support a strengthening relationship with iwi and the significant value of mātauranga Māori—indigenous knowledge, experience, and connection. This is leadership. This is exactly what Aotearoa can be a leader in around the world. For the past several hundred years, we have seen an undermining and an ignorance of the value of indigenous knowledge—particularly when it comes to the work like that of the Cawthron Institute—which is all about protection and is a particular focus on research from agriculture to the oceans and picks up on the damage and the devastation of our living systems that has been happening over the many, many generations and over the many, many years.

One example that I was thinking about, if you’ll allow, in terms of identifying why that part of the private bill needs some considerable focus—I was thinking about the example of kauri dieback. We’ve had some fantastic researchers, some based here at Victoria University of Wellington, I believe, over the years who have been doing their research in the traditional places, in the labs, and so on and so forth. It wasn’t until they were interweaving their research and their experiments and looking for—I’m not going to use the word “cure”—a way to better protect kauri—

💬 Simon Court: There’s no cure.

Hon MARAMA DAVIDSON:—and that’s why I’m not using the word “cure”—but looking for a way to better understand what will enhance the resilience of kauri trees, of these ancient, ancient, ancient ancestors of our forests. She spoke with so much pride to the Māori Affairs Committee several years ago, when she talked about it wasn’t until she had generations of knowledge from a particular kaumātua who was able, through an oral whakapapa, to identify particular species that acted as guardians and gateways to protect the tree, the kauri, from kauri dieback—that the devastation of that ecosystem and the interdependent relationship between what the kauri tree requires for that protection was only made visible to her because of the mātauranga Māori. And she was then able to conduct her experiments for resilience and protection and to narrow down the areas where she could focus. And we all know—well, maybe some of us don’t—that the amount of research when you don’t have a foundation of knowledge that you then have to go through by trial and error can be years and years of difference. But with his whakapapa knowledge of the ecosystem of the kauri tree, she was able to narrow her research right down.

That is the sort of innovation that this trust is leading for all of us. That is the sort of innovation that the smart people know is necessary. Our world and the protection of it was never, ever supposed to survive with just Western knowledge alone. Never, ever is any species supposed to survive with the dominance of only one school of thought. And we can look at the ecosystem of a forest again to understand that. Any one species depends on the interconnected relationship between all of the other species. There is no one primacy. There is an interdependent relationship and any damage and devastation of one part of the ecosystem actually impacts on all the rest of the parts of that lifecycle.

This is what this private bill is properly recognising, and I hope it serves as an inspiration for all of us about what is possible when we not only honour the knowledge that we have all been denied, that we will be bereft of, but when we also uplift the whakapapa connection of mana whenua across all of our regions. That is an accountability that can speak, that cannot be narrowed down in just words. That is generations and generations of accountability and duty as kaitiaki.

I realise that others have been focusing on other parts of the bill. I wanted to be able to contribute what I have a particular privilege in knowing, and I hope that I have added to the contribution, particularly from a Green Party kaupapa perspective. Kia ora.

It’s a privilege to rise and take a call on this bill, and I’d like to first of all thank and congratulate Rachel Boyack for bringing the bill to the House, and I’d like to thank those involved in the institute for the work they do. I too was new at looking at this—I’m quite a new MP—and one of the things I’ve really enjoyed about the job is that it is just wonderful for your curiosity: you’re always finding out new things, and you’re always seeing the incredible work that people are doing out there; it’s an incredibly optimistic job in that way.

This was an institute that was set up over 100 years ago, and the seed funding was about the equivalent of $100 million. That’s a lot of money, and it went into the right place; it went into an area that is desperately needed in New Zealand society—the growth of our knowledge in the area of science. It cultivated the area of Nelson at the same time, and it’s brought very bright-sparky people to that area, but that knowledge has been shared through the country. So I’ve seen some of the work in other places, and I suspect it’s work that was built on the work that was done in the institute.

For example, one of the privileges that I’ve had is to go to Ōpōtiki, where there is a mussel farm that’s been built offshore. It’s been built with money from the Government and it’s involved the iwi in the area, and it’s been built around, really, a partnership between all parties. It’s led to very high quality work in a real attempt to meet the needs of that community. The mussels that are being farmed aren’t being used to eat; they are being used for exactly this: the use of the shells to build products which will be based on the research of this institute, which has discovered that the use of those shells can build up muscle and can repair from injuries. So that’s gold to this country; that’s an incredibly important thing, and what I saw it doing was transforming a community a long way away from Nelson in an incredibly valuable way in this community. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that that, too, was a collaboration with the iwi, and as things have evolved, this organisation has also wanted to step up in its objectives and its structures so that it is doing that job.

So we’ve seen an institute, from what I can see, that’s moved away from some of the things it originally dealt with. It was quite important to things like the pit fruit industry and it was important in the area of hops and forestry, and it’s ended up evolving into something that is quite specialist in the area of protection of marine life, the environment, fresh water, and sustainable primary industries. It’s moved into that space and it’s now an absolute world leader. It employs 300 people from 35 different countries, and those people are working in a space which I think is interesting because it’s independent; it’s not beholden to anyone, and it’s able to do that work and be absolutely focused on research, and that’s an incredibly important job.

It’s got a strange structure in terms of its governance being with MPs and mayors of Nelson and Tasman, so it’s evolving in that space too. Adding an iwi member to the trust’s board for the duration—it has chosen the duration that is the same duration as for the MPs, and it’s also got a board of directors. It’s going to set out objects, and I think that’s an important thing—I’m a lawyer; I like to see things which are certain in that way. Originally, the Act didn’t set out the objects. It now will, and those objects presumably are going to be broad enough to allow this evolution of the work that goes on, and basically a healthy reflection of those needs that perhaps we need to move into spaces sometimes. There needs to be some room for an organisation like this to grow and not always resort back to changes through what was, I think, through the Attorney-General and the High Court—there have been changes here. So, hopefully, this is a setting for this very important institute which is robust and allows that institute to thrive, and with it, New Zealand will thrive, because this is absolutely critical to our survival, this kind of work.

I just wanted to talk about a little bit of the other work that I can see is incredibly significant. I understand that the institute has made great strides in the area of using seaweed as a carbon sink. That’s an incredibly important piece of work—I don’t think you could get more important than that, and the potential of it is quite incredible. And I also know that up in Auckland, we’ve been grateful for the work that the institute’s done with regard to an algae that spreads in the water. It’s the method of trying to contain something that’s actually a really terrible algae that can suffocate other marine life—that’s been very helpful in Great Barrier Island, to try and contain that. So it sounds like it’s really got its work cut out for it as we hit a time of great challenge in terms of climate change, and it is a place of learning and of people being able to come together and foster those kinds of ideas.

I really like that it’s not based in Wellington; I really like that it’s based somewhere which actually is so elemental and it’s going to foster a town like Nelson, it’s going to bring life to that town, but it’s actually presumably attracting people because it’s such an area of natural beauty that the people who come to it, the scientists who come to it—I bet they come because of things like the Nelson Lakes, and I bet they come because of the beautiful waters of the Abel Tasman. So, you know, it’s a beautiful idea and I wish I saw a little bit more of this focus on some of those regions and some of those areas as places where we could really foster that kind of work rather than all in our bigger centres, because it’s an important thing to spread that, and it’s an important thing to be that connected with nature.

So I would like to commend those who are involved in bringing this Act into play here, and to the Economic Development, Science and Innovation Committee for having looked at this bill and done the work required. I am thrilled that today this will be passed and the institute will be on a strong footing into the future. I wish all of those involved—particularly the scientists, that they will actually make the best use of the opportunity they’ve got and enrich our country and create one that’s not only more productive, but also one that’s way more sustainable than it has been, and that we will move into areas of sustainable primary production based on this kind of science. So I commend this bill to the House.

I understand this is a split call—Joseph Mooney, five minutes.

Thank you very much, Madam Speaker. I rise to speak on the Thomas Cawthron Trust Amendment Bill, a private bill brought by the member for Nelson, Rachel Boyack. And congratulations for the work that’s no doubt gone on on behalf of the member and also all of the others who have been involved. There has been quite a bit of work, I understand, from a number who have been involved in bringing this to the House.

The National Party supports this bill. It does bring some changes and it reflects the wishes of the region for something that has been really important for the Nelson region for over 100 years. It is quite fascinating, actually; I think one of the good things about this is that it’s given a chance for more people to learn about the Cawthron Institute and what it does in Nelson. I agree with the previous member, Helen White, who said it’d be great to see more of these types of things in our regions. It is a key driver of science, of community, of lifting up the information base of the region, an economic driver as well, and probably focusing on things that aren’t seen as necessary is important for other regions for reasons that are understandable for those regions. But in Nelson, for example, the sea and the connection to the sea is hugely important. It’s the port where many of our biggest fishing companies base themselves from. It has a very vibrant sea life. I actually lived for a year myself in Nelson many years ago and I’ve been surfing there, I’ve been kayaking, I’ve seen the orca swimming past very close to the Boulder Bank, very close to me, and it’s quite something. So it’s quite a special part of the world, actually, and it’s great just for all of us to learn more about the Cawthron Institute and what it’s done.

I think I’d just say it’s probably been said before but it’s just worth going into this a little bit. The Cawthron Institute was established in 1919 by the last will and testament of the Nelson philanthropist Thomas Cawthron, who had a vision. He had a vision that science could contribute to the growth of a young New Zealand. That’s a fantastic vision that still holds true today, well over 100 years later. In fact, I think we’re realising more and more how important science is. So he was someone who contributed a lot to Nelson and New Zealand with that vision and that bequest. Following his death in 1915 he bequeathed the equivalent of $100 million in today’s terms—so a really huge amount of money and at the time the largest single bequest—to establish and maintain a technical school, institute, and museum which are the forerunners of today’s Cawthron Institute. It was officially opened in Nelson in 1921, following the establishment of the Cawthron Institute Trust Board. And it is New Zealand’s largest independent science organisation, producing world-class science that helps to protect the environment and support sustainable development in the primary industries in New Zealand and worldwide.

And when I look at the work that it’s doing, I have a personal interest in this: it’s aquaculture. I think aquaculture’s a big opportunity for New Zealand that we haven’t really taken advantage of yet in the way we could. There is some good work happening there. It’s on freshwater health, it’s on ocean health, seafood safety, and algae and bioactives. These are things I have a personal interest in because I spent a year of my life in my younger years, actually, studying marine science—and it was in the North Island, actually, in Tauranga. But I got a PADI Divemaster at the same time, so I did a lot of diving, did a lot of work transecting, studying the different organisations in the ocean, the science of the ocean, the health, etc. Our oceans are a huge resource in this country and something that I think all of us have a connection to, even though where I live now is quite a distance away from the ocean—I live in the mountains now. But I think all of us on these islands have a deep connection to the ocean. And it’s great to see this institute in Nelson which is focused on those matters which are really key for the country.

I think I’m going to have an opportunity to speak in the third and final reading of this bill, so I’ll save a few more comments till then.

💬 Hon Member: No!

💬 Barbara Kuriger: We’re not having a third reading!

Oh, we’re not having a third reading?

💬 Hon Member: Stick around for the committee of the whole.

OK. Well, just—Thomas Cawthron, he’s a self-made man who used his considerable fortune to make many gifts to his adopted city, including the steps in front of the church, including helping set up the Nelson school of music, where I actually was a student at one time as well. So I have a number of connections to this. It’s been a pleasure to speak on it.

I call Ingrid Leary—five minutes.

When I listen to the contributions in the House tonight, I’m getting a sense of kaitiakitanga coming through really strongly from all the different perspectives. We have heard about Thomas Cawthron and what he did to show kaitiakitanga to his adopted city. We’ve heard many stories about him. One of the ones I enjoyed reading about when I was researching this was the fact that although he was a good businessman, he was also seen as quite thrifty and perhaps a little bit mean. In fact, the piece was quick to explain that he wasn’t mean; he just wouldn’t give handouts with direct asks, yet if people had medical issues, or certainly when there were disasters in the region, he was one of the first and the most generous to respond. So certainly an astute businessman with a big heart, and what a fantastic legacy—his philanthropy and his kaitiakitanga for his adopted city.

I’m reminded about that again when I look up into the gallery up there and I see the chair of the institute, John Palmer, and also the lawyer, David McLay, both of whom came several times to the Economic Development, Science and Innovation Committee when we were looking at this legislation and who were really deeply, personally connected to what they were wanting to achieve from his legacy and from the philanthropy that they felt such stewardship over. So I really want to thank them for the care that they’ve taken, because it is people like them that ensure that these fantastic initiatives that get some life and sometimes have to stall or go through processes come out the other side in better shape.

There’s also the kaitiakitanga from my colleague Rachel Boyack, who we’ve heard tonight, but I must say it again; she has done a superb job in bringing this legislation to the House and understanding all the nooks and crannies of it. I can say, having worked through the bill at select committee and also just looking at the paperwork now, there were quite a few changes and some very technical things to deal with in such an antiquated piece of legislation, and Rachel Boyack showed her acumen in doing such a great job to ensure that we, as the select committee, were across things and could put this into the best possible shape.

So what the bill does is it updates and makes sure that the governance arrangements are fit for purpose. We’ve heard about the High Court orders that were necessitated previously that, hopefully, won’t have to happen again. But also there is the kaitiakitanga from introducing in the constitution, in replacement section 3, inserted by clause 6, “Te Tauihu iwi member”, a position on the board for mana whenua. I’m so happy that Marama Davidson from the Greens was able to explain and perhaps take our ACT colleagues along that journey of why mana whenua is important, why Te Tiriti is important in this context. She really made that very clear to us in her contribution. I don’t understand why we’re still having discussion in this House about things that have been recognised in law since the 1970s or 1980s. Certainly, there was unanimous support for that position from the trust board itself, so why ACT wanted to bring that into this debate is rather perplexing to me.

We’ve heard about the kaitiakitanga that the trust itself does in terms of the expertise that it has around aquaculture, blue technology, data science, biosecurity, and so on. One of the examples that I really like is this idea of seagrass, the three-year project where—I imagine that the seagrass is a little bit like gut flora—they are producing it to be able to find ways to clean up some of the pollution in the sea. There’s also their freshwater fish management programme, and anti-biofouling, which I hadn’t heard of until looking at this legislation, which is around ensuring that there are natural ways of keeping ship hulls and jetties and so on clean from contaminants.

We in this House have spent a long time discussing this bill and we have also spent a long time in select committee. When I asked my friends up in the gallery what the messages were that they would like to convey—because this really is their story—they impressed upon me that this is a story about philanthropy and the value of philanthropy. We’ve heard about that this evening. But also there is the vexed question of whether we should be spending this much of Parliament’s time doing this type of process. So I will leave you with those thoughts, and, in the meantime, commend all involved and this bill to the House. Kia ora.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. It is my pleasure to speak in the second reading of the Thomas Cawthron Trust Amendment Bill, and I’ve enjoyed the anecdotes. It’s not been a very technical examination of the bill and that’s probably not appropriate, but I think some of the broader contexts that have been introduced into this discussion have been helpful.

I want to start with the last one that Ingrid Leary made about whether such local bills, local Acts, are appropriate in a modern age. Actually, I’m pretty ambivalent about that, or perhaps a bit more than that—a bit more sanguine. Bear in mind that this is a 100-year-old piece of legislation and it hasn’t troubled the House too much over that century. So to be able to give effect to some of the court rulings that have been necessary over the years to modernise this legislation, while accepting that from time to time it may be necessary for the courts to have a say, is I think an appropriate use of the House’s time. I don’t want to sound in violent disagreement with Ms Leary, because she’s got a good point, but I just have a slightly different perspective.

Speaking of perspectives, I did appreciate Marama Davidson’s contribution to this debate, but I want to focus a little bit more on the positive. ACT had opposed this bill at first reading, and I was surprised by that. They’ve stated their reasons—and Mr Baillie reiterated them tonight—albeit my understanding is that that position has changed. I get the context of the concerns that they may have around certain aspects of co-governance or the universal franchise, but I, frankly, think that this is not only not an appropriate place to be having that discussion, but this is the very, very sort of legislation and trust and organisation where iwi can make a huge contribution, and will—and already have, frankly—in te mana o te moana, kai moana, seaweed. They are already contributing significant history, science, and strategy, and it’s entirely appropriate—and the Economic Development, Science and Innovation Committee strongly supported this call by the trustees—to have a member of Te Tauihu on the board. In fact, our biggest concern was how to actually spell it. One needs the wisdom of Solomon in that, and I think the select committee’s report on that matter shows that we sat firmly on the fence.

There were also some, I think, helpful changes through the select committee process, which was, I think, conducted in a very good spirit, and with the permission of the Business Committee, we recommend deletion of another perhaps rather antiquated provision for the setting aside of what used to be called a capital conservation account. In old accounting parlance, reserves like that were pretty common, but modern accounting standards mean that they’re no longer necessary. We struck the slight problem that deleting that section in the Act was going to be outside the scope of the bill, so we went to the Business Committee and said, “How about it?”, and they said yes. That was an appropriate response, and I think it also reflected the pragmatic and, I think, collegial manner in which the consideration of the bill was conducted.

I want to thank those who contributed to that consideration. The officials, as is stated in their departmental report, basically can’t make strong recommendations because it’s not a Government bill, but they were very helpful and they engaged with the trustees, and we thank them for that.

During the consideration, I was rather ignorant of the Cawthron organisation, and I visited it during that time and was struck by the sheer, extraordinary amount of research and science that’s going on there that, as others have said, will have not only domestic but global impact for the better. I wish them every success in meeting the many challenges that they have had to face, firstly, after storms and floods in the last 18 months or so have made simply carrying on a bit of a challenge, but they also do science in a way that simply blows my mind. I commend them for that, and I look forward to seeing this bill passing this evening.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. It’s with great pleasure that I rise this evening as the final speaker in this second reading on the Thomas Cawthron Trust Amendment Bill, which is, as we’ve heard, a private bill that amends the Thomas Cawthron Trust Act 1924. I’m very conscious that we have heard from many members this evening and I think we’ve traversed many of the paths to be traversed fairly thoroughly, but I do hope that I can add a little of value to this conversation.

But before I start, I would like to just take a moment to thank Rachel Boyack, the member for Nelson, because she is an extremely hard-working member of Parliament, and I don’t think Nelson could do better. She has brought an excellent bill to the House—it’s my personal view, and I’m entitled to it, but I think that all of us here today can be extremely proud of the work that she has done in bringing this to the House.

We’ve heard that Cawthron is New Zealand’s largest independent science organisation, with key areas of research in aquaculture, in seafood safety, algae and bioactives, and freshwater health and ocean health. I am going to expand a little bit on the exciting work that they’ve done, but I too want to share my appreciation of Thomas Cawthron. There’s an old saying, isn’t there, that you can’t take it with you, but Thomas Cawthron set up a $127 million - equivalent fund which he bequeathed for the purpose of setting up this institute, as well as others. My goodness—you can’t take it with you, but you can do such a lot of good with it if you bequeath it in a manner such as he did, which brings such enormous benefits to people so many years later. We’ve heard that the trust itself was established in 1921, so we’re looking at 102 years of benefit, which is brought not just to Nelson in the employing many, many people—and we’ve seen around 300 skilled staff from across the world, from China, Poland, the United States, France, Fiji, many, many other places. So not only to Nelson, not only in local employment, but in bringing such extraordinary research to the fore we can see benefit not just to Aotearoa New Zealand but to the entire country.

It’s no secret that I’m passionate about research. I’m passionate about health-based research in particular, and it absolutely warms my heart to hear of the revenue that the Government put to Cawthron Institute, because science is important—we recognise that. Research is important; quality research even more important.

I’m going to speak a little bit about the work of the institute, but before I do, I just want to highlight a little bit the work of the Economic Development, Science and Innovation Committee, which is so ably chaired by Naisi Chen. It’s also appropriate at this juncture, I believe, at the second reading, to address the submitters, to really thank them, always, for their contributions that they make to ensure that bills such as this, when they come before select committee, actually do end up in a better state than when they came in. We have heard from speakers earlier, but from the Hon Michael Woodhouse in particular, about some of the changes that were made.

But there were 11 submitters, I understand, on the bill, seven individuals and four groups. Three of those submitters were members of the trust board, including Rachel Boyack, and a submission was also received from the trust board itself. Five submitters supported the bill as a whole; one submission supported measures to modernise the bill’s governance and administrative arrangements but didn’t explicitly support the bill. But changes were made. There were some fairly interesting and—forgive me; I’m just going to explore those changes in a little bit more detail.

One of the changes that was made was to provide for remuneration for members of the trust board and board of directors. Some of this is to address inconsistencies in the law brought about by amendments to section 17 of the principal Act. We heard—or, rather, the committee heard; I didn’t have the privilege of sitting on that committee, but they heard from the Hon Dr Nick Smith. The Hon Dr Nick Smith recommended amending clause 11 to prohibit the Mayor of Nelson City, and he in himself does hold that role at the moment, the Mayor of Tasman District, and also the member of Parliament for Nelson, Rachel Boyack—it’s amending that clause to ensure that those members of the board are not reimbursed for discharging their functions under the principal Act. Dr Smith said in his submission that he didn’t feel it was appropriate for mayors or members of Parliament, who already receive payment as determined by the Remuneration Authority, to receive any additional payment for a role, as they said, that arises directly as a consequence of their holding that office. The committee agreed, and that change was made with the new section 17(1A).

There are other changes that were made: section 13 of the principal Act provided for a capital conservation account—that that should be repealed. That recommendation was accepted by the committee.

But before I get too deep into the weeds here, I’d like to spend a little bit of time just talking about some of the work that’s been done, because I found it so interesting and I know that the House will, too. One of the things I found particularly interesting was the bubbly boat berths. I am standing not terribly far from a member who is particularly keen on bubbly spas, and the Cawthron Institute—I’m not going to say who—has instituted a bubble blower from beneath a pontoon at Waikawa Marina in the Marlborough Sounds as an experiment to mitigate against—we heard, I think it was, Helen White, who was speaking about biofouling, might have been Ingrid Leary; forgive me. In effect, what this is using is the power of the spa as a positive thing—not that it ever isn’t positive to sit and enjoy the bubbles of a spa, but the bubbles themselves cause a disturbance in the water which hopefully, they say, will prevent damage-causing organisms from attaching to the underneath of marina structures.

We know, as we move through life—not so much from conversations here in the House—that, actually, it’s a genuine issue. Actually, having dirty hulls to boats is a real problem. Anybody who has seen rock snot in our precious rivers will realise that we need to take action, we need to do research to find new and better ways of making sure that our boats are clean, that our marinas are clean. We’ve heard even those massive cruise ships that come into our waters—we heard earlier on in the year that we had to prevent some of them from coming into port because they were dirty. So if a bit of a spa action can help us in that way, then that’s got to be a good thing.

We have bubbly spas bringing benefit from the Cawthron Institute, but we also have more exciting—to me—initiatives with algae-based local anaesthetics. In my role as a midwife before I entered Parliament, I did find myself using local anaesthetics fairly frequently. You’ll understand that this is something that’s incredibly important, and a new partnership between Government and the institute has delivered a potent microalgal ingredient for the world’s first algae-based medication. I was incredibly proud to see that the Government’s Sustainable Food and Fibre Futures fund partnered with Cawthron 2020 on the project and both invested $950,000. This is something that’s going to be, I hope, of enormous benefit to New Zealand. Incredibly exciting to think that we’ve actually managed to get—I can see by your faces you’re absolutely enthralled by the idea of New Zealand having the first algal anaesthetic on the market, which is completely in line with the Government’s aquaculture structure.

I could go on—I have pages of it—and I know that you want me to, but I am limited for time, so I’m going to commend this bill to the House.

Motion agreed to.

Bill read a second time.

In accordance with a determination of the Business Committee, this bill is set down for committee stage immediately. I declare the House in committee for consideration of the Thomas Cawthron Trust Amendment Bill.

In Committee

Preamble and clauses 1 to 12A