Waste Minimisation (Waste Disposal Levy) Amendment Bill

I present a legislative statement on the Waste Minimisation (Waste Disposal Levy) Amendment Bill.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Teanau Tuiono): That legislative statement is published under the authority of the House and can be found on Parliament’s website.

Hon PENNY SIMMONDS: I move, That the Waste Minimisation (Waste Disposal Levy) Amendment Bill be now read a first time.

One of the Government’s priorities is to improve and protect the environment from harm, particularly focusing on the most harmful waste. The Government also wants to prevent the impact of, and support recovery from, extreme weather events. The Government wants to do this while achieving financial stability and sustainability across the public sector. This bill is a step towards this.

The Government is changing the Waste Minimisation Act 2008 to allow the waste disposal levy to be spent on a wider range of activities, and to increase the levy incrementally over three years from July 2025. Broadening the scope of the waste levy will help fund a more comprehensive set of Government waste and environmental priorities. These changes mean that as well as waste minimisation activities, the levy can also support projects to improve freshwater quality, remediate contaminated sites, and restore the health of important New Zealand ecosystems. We will be able to fund waste reduction, ways to reduce harm from waste, resource recovery, and reducing organic and construction and demolition wastes.

Mr Speaker, I wonder if you would indulge me moving away a little from the bill at the moment, because I feel, as the MP from Invercargill, I can’t stand here talking about demolition waste without noting that this week in Invercargill, as the pyramid museum was being demolished—the museum held a tuatara enclosure. That enclosure was closed, and the tuatara were taken out of there in February 2023. But this week, as the demolition was occurring, four live baby tuataras were found in the enclosure. So what resilient little critters they are.

However, thank you for indulging me in that and I will return to the bill. The bill will mean that the levy funds can support local authorities with the costs of managing waste from emergencies. This includes supporting councils to repair or replace waste infrastructure damaged during emergencies. The levy will also fund the Ministry for the Environment’s waste and hazardous substance responsibilities.

This adjustment will achieve cost savings while contributing to improving and protecting the environment from harm. This is a pragmatic solution to the current fiscal situation to ensure that the ministry’s important work programme and environmental funding initiatives can continue. As well as broadening the scope of the levy, the levy will continue to increase incrementally over the next three years from July 2025. For municipal landfills, it will rise in $5 increments from $60 per tonne at 1 July 2024, to reach $75 per tonne on 1 July 2027. For construction and demolition landfills, it will rise in $5 increments from $30 per tonne at 1 July 2024, to $45 per tonne on 1 July 2027. For managed or controlled landfills, it will rise from $10 per tonne at 1 July 2024, to $15 per tonne from 1 July 2025, followed by a further increase to $20 per tonne on 1 July 2027.

These levy increases will provide further incentives to reduce waste going to landfill, as well as providing additional revenue towards Government waste and environmental priorities. This means central and local government can make a bigger impact on reducing waste and improving the environment. It means there’s a stronger financial incentive for people and organisations to seek alternatives to landfill, like reusing, recycling, and composting.

The Government will focus on investing the levy in the most effective way and to fill gaps in New Zealand’s waste infrastructure without crowding out the private sector. I will be particularly focused on measures to decrease construction and demolition waste so the levy changes support the building sector.

Importantly, the local government proportion of the levy will remain at 50 percent even with the increased revenue. Local government will continue to fund waste minimisation in line with their waste management and minimisation plans. This means councils can continue to invest in local solutions to reduce waste, like education, kerbside collections, food waste redistribution schemes, and supporting local business to reduce their waste. These changes will also support councils and communities to deal with the legacy of contaminated sites, including historic landfills and other sites that are vulnerable to the effects of severe weather events.

The changes will enable levy funds to support the remediation of these sites. The changes will mean that the Contaminated Sites Remediation Fund appropriation is replaced with levy funds. I also intend to substantially increase the amount of funding available for these remediation projects. It is estimated that there are hundreds of historic landfills and other contaminated sites vulnerable to the effects of severe weather, so we need to tackle this proactively wherever possible. I know councils have been asking for more support. No one wants to see another Fox River landfill event, where a 2019 severe storm spread waste along 21 kilometres of riverbed and 51 kilometres of coastline.

The changes mean we can fix these sites before they cause a problem, and support communities after severe weather events. The bill will also enable the Secretary for the Environment to approve the levy waiver for waste disposal from the remediation of contaminated sites and historic landfills, meaning we will be able to further support local government and communities to get these sites cleaned up. The frequency and magnitude of emergency events is increasing, partly due to the rise in severe weather events.

To date, the cost of managing waste caused by these events has been dealt with on an ad hoc basis. No standing funds were available to respond to community and council needs to deal with emergency waste. The changes will enable the Government to help fund the management of emergency waste, including repairing or replacing waste infrastructure damaged during emergencies. This will reduce the financial burden of these events on both central and local government.

The bill will enable levy funds to be used to support activities and responsibilities that address waste reduction, reduced harm from waste, and support other environmental outcomes. The bill will allow the waste disposal levy to be spent on a wider range of activities and to increase the levy incrementally over three years from 2025. The levy will also fund the Ministry for the Environment’s waste and hazardous substances responsibilities, allowing this important work to continue. This will contribute towards meeting the Government’s priorities while achieving fiscal savings.

The bill will enable an increase in the funds available for contaminated site remediation, which will benefit many communities. It will also enable the Government to help fund the management of emergency waste, including repairing or replacing waste infrastructure damaged during emergencies. In addition, territorial authorities will receive an increase in revenue from their levy allocation over the three-year period.

I commend the bill to the House. The bill will be progressed under urgency through the House. The progression under urgency, if the House agrees, will allow the fiscal savings to be realised for the 2024-25 financial year.

The question is that the motion be agreed to.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. Look, it’s interesting to be here at just on 11 o’clock on a Friday night, talking about the waste levy, but luckily for me, the waste levy is something that I’m very happy to be talking about at any time of the day or week.

Of course, the waste levy is something that was increased around 2020 and in a hypothecated fund, the idea being that money gained from waste being disposed of would go to initiatives to decrease waste. That’s how hypothecated schemes work. As the Minister, the Hon Penny Simmonds, has said, this levy was split in half; half of it goes to the local council where the waste is taken and half goes to central government. Under the Waste Minimisation Act, different councils have to have waste minimisation plans, and we all know that our local council, our city council, our district council, or our unitary council—depending where you live around the country—does a lot with waste. So it makes good sense that half of that money goes to those local governments. The other half stays with the Government, and the Government has funds—the Waste Minimisation Fund and the Plastics Innovation Fund—that then are contestable and can go to projects around the country. We heard the Minister say about the importance of waste infrastructure around the country, and I’m sure she’ll talk some more about that sort of waste infrastructure, but some of it is for the often quite complicated kit that is used for recycling, or it might be for large-scale composting and a range of issues. So the waste levy is a good thing.

The criteria are very tight at the moment in the legislation, and Labour’s position is not in opposition to the loosening of the criteria in part. However, this bill goes far too far in the widening of those criteria, and I’ll talk more about that in both the second reading speech and, of course, in the committee stage, as we’re under urgency and this isn’t going before a select committee. The question is: why does it go too far? I’ll talk more about this as well. The supplementary analysis doesn’t talk about how far this bill goes. The idea that the criteria should be extended to remediation of contaminated sites—so the landfill issue that the Minister referred to at Fox River—no problem with that. The idea that when there are emergency situations such as we had in the Hawke’s Bay and other areas of the North Island last year—no problem with that extension. The problem is that the bill says any other environmental thing whatever, and there’s no nexus to waste. And this is a levy, it’s not a tax, so there does have to be some nexus, and it’s the absence of that nexus that we are opposed to. I have Amendment Papers on the Table that will fix that problem, will still allow the extension to remediation and emergency, but not go to just anything that’s not related to waste at all.

So why do we have a bill in front of us that seems to change the process to now extend to wider environmental issues? The reason is, of course, that this Budget is terrible for the environment. Everything is cut. We knew, of course, that there were those cuts in the mini-Budget to environmental programmes and to the Ministry for the Environment, and now we have that 7.5 percent cut. We know, of course—and we’ve had this throughout the past six months—that every single climate mitigation initiative has been cut, and we’ve got rid of, of course, with this Budget, the climate emergency fund. We know that the Department of Conservation is being cut. That’s all on-the-ground conservation work. We know that the Climate Commission has been cut. Programmes for installation have been cut. Half-price public transport—cut. So all of these reasons, all of these cuts—we do need to do some things for the environment. What we see here, and what we see with this bill, with this widening of the criteria, is that it’s for the waste levy to pay for all of these things. And, of course, it doesn’t pay for all of those cuts—not at all—and it is needed to continue with what the Minister spoke about.

We do need funding for the remediation of landfills. We do need funding for the increase of waste infrastructure. But this bill goes too far, so we will be opposing it. We do have Amendment Papers for the Minister. If she is of a mind to change her mind, then that position can change.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. Well, I am pretty excited to be speaking about waste minimisation. It is one of my favourite topics and I have dedicated my career to waste minimisation.

Simon Court: Same! We’re going to get on.

KAHURANGI CARTER: Amazing—let’s do this. Let’s do it for our future generations and because environmental action is cool. That’s right—it’s cool. And I know you all want to be cool.

So what does this bill actually do? Well, I was brought up with the mantra “waste not, want not”, and I’ve taken that with me into my life. That is why I have been dedicated to waste minimisation since before it was cool—just like my learned colleagues here in the Green Party, and our members. So what is this bill actually doing? Well, like everyone here, I think that raising waste levies is an excellent idea. It is an excellent idea because what it means is that when industries have to pay more to send their rubbish to landfill than they do to reduce rubbish, then we’re going to be reducing that waste. It’s a great thing. Unfortunately, $5 a year won’t even keep up with inflation, and if we look at similar countries to ours—so in New South Wales, $160 per tonne—

Dr Hamish Campbell: It’s a state, not a country.

KAHURANGI CARTER: A state, thank you. In Victoria, $130 for a tonne, but in New Zealand: only $60—less than half than countries who are similar to us. So you really need to look at why that is, and we need to actually understand that we don’t need a bill to increase the waste levy; we actually don’t. We can just do that through our normal regulation process.

When I look at this bill and really dig into it, it’s like: what is this bill really doing? And my colleague here, on the right, actually got the nail on the head. What is happening is that the Government knows that New Zealanders care about climate action and they care about waste minimisation. That is why, in 2018, the Colmar Brunton poll showed that the thing that New Zealanders most cared about was that they were worried about the build-up in plastic in our environment. They care about the 1.76 billion plastic containers and bottles every year that we use here in New Zealand. And I see those hard-working Kiwis out there taking waste minimisation action, taking climate action. They’re using reusable nappies instead of disposable diapers. They’re doing composting. We’ve got teenagers who care about mindful fashion and—

Mike Butterick: Wearing wool.

KAHURANGI CARTER: Wearing wool, absolutely—that we can compost and we can take it and put it into our compost. What this bill is doing is it is taking money away from waste minimisation.

We have a $2.3 billion infrastructure deficit in waste minimisation. Where is that going to come from when you’re slashing and burning environmental protections, when you’re slashing and burning climate action? We need to put out that fire that you are creating by taking money from the waste minimisation levy. Let me say that again: we are $2.3 billion in deficit in infrastructure for waste minimisation. It is so important that we are keeping that waste levy in waste minimisation. Cutting $10 million from the Ministry for the Environment—with my former colleagues who work so hard on innovation and vision for this country.

We need to take responsibility for our waste, and clean up after ourselves, because our children, and their children in every generation after, deserve an ambitious Government—one who cares about Papatūānuku, one who cares about a livable planet for their mokos. We must look at waste as an opportunity to live in harmony with nature, because our children deserve it. When we continue down this exploitive, extractive system which we have right now, which is a straight line from extracting precious metals and finite resources from the environment and sending them on a straight line all the way to the dump, where our future generations are going to be mining those finite resources—we have to do better for our children, we can do better for our children, and I believe we can.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. The ACT Party’s proud to support this bill, the Waste Minimisation (Waste Disposal Levy) Amendment Bill.

I just want to give a bit of background and context for why I personally share the kaupapa of this bill. For six years, I worked on a solid-waste landfill. I qualified as an operator. Wheels, tracks, and rollers on a big beast like this. [Holds up picture] It was crushing thousands of tonnes of waste a day. I worked at a landfill out of a Portacom for six years, watching thousands and thousands of trucks a year bringing waste and dispose of it in landfills.

Hon Scott Simpson: Then you’ve come here.

SIMON COURT: Shortly after—Scott Simpson asked why would I come here. Why would I come here? Well, I’ve got to say, sometimes you can’t engineer a way out of a problem that the Government has caused—and successive Governments are the reason why we’re here today having to try to solve the problem of waste disposal that previous Governments failed to solve.

I want to give you an example. In 2005, I went to a waste industry conference when a former Labour environment Minister announced there’ll be zero waste to landfill by 2040. I thought, “That person has no idea how to achieve that.” In 2005, there were 2.5 million tonnes being disposed of in landfills in New Zealand; by 2018, there was around 3.5 million tonnes a year. So under a whole succession of well-intentioned but, unfortunately, people who had no idea how to actually deliver on good policy and outcomes, here we are today.

The reason I’m proud to support this bill—and I think it’s the right thing to do now—is because the original purpose of the original Waste Minimisation Act was to decrease waste disposal. I mean, that’s laudable, right? To “protect the environment from harm;”—well, of course, every day we get up in New Zealand, most people want to protect the environment from harm—“to provide environmental, social, economic, and cultural benefits.” Well, how on earth do you put all those things together on one plan so you actually know what to do?

This bill changes the purpose statement to actually promote and achieve waste minimisation. There will be tests, there will be cost-benefit analysis for the investments made with funds recovered from levying waste at the landfill gate and then applied to waste infrastructure and waste minimisation. Achievement will be—

Steve Abel: But also other things.

SIMON COURT: —a test, Mr Abel.

Steve Abel: But it’s going to pay for decontamination of—

SIMON COURT: We’ll get to that—we’ll get to that, Mr Abel. This is not lip-service, what we’re doing here. These are not slogans; these are not good intentions. The changes to this bill achieve waste minimisation.

Now, local government has the responsibility to minimise waste; manage waste. What we saw after Cyclone Gabrielle were some real challenges in separating out the silt, the twisted piles of fencing, the plastic debris, the geotextile cloth. This bill will allow funds recovered from the waste levy levied at landfill gates to be used to fund waste infrastructure, following cyclone disaster recovery.

One of the other good things this levy will be able to fund in future is more contaminated site and landfill remediation. One of the other tasks that I’ve carried out as a civil engineer is designing and carrying out remediation on some of New Zealand’s most hazardous sites and landfills. Some of those sites that are falling into the sea, where the rock protection, the sea walls aren’t sufficient, and where it would be fair to say that as a legacy of the past which remains unfunded by local government and by central government, there has not been one place—

Scott Willis: That’s right. This Budget has no climate adaptation.

SIMON COURT: —that’s right, that’s right. There has not been one place that local government and its partners in the private sector who actually have the machines that actually do the work can go to get funds to remediate landfills and deliver waste infrastructure to minimise waste to landfill.

So there is a role for a waste levy. Now, it would be fair to say that ACT is not a party that supports increasing charges and taxes and levies on the productive sector. But there is a role for a waste levy as long as it is applied to the right projects and the right programmes that achieve environmental outcomes and that meet a strict cost-benefit test.

That is why the ACT Party supports this bill and commend it to the House. The Minister for the Environment, Penny Simmonds, has done a great job and we look forward to getting a little bit more out and aerate a few more issues as we get into the committee of the whole House stage. Looking forward to it.

It’s great to see such enthusiasm right across the House for waste minimisation, for looking after our waste properly and minimising waste. I’m passionate about recycling, passionate about waste minimisation myself. Look, I just want to talk about this, the waste levy. The waste levy has been around for about 15 years—it’s hypothecated to waste—and what we’ve seen is it’s been steadily increasing over a period of time so that there is a stronger and stronger incentive to minimise waste, and the charge is also gone not only for class 1 landfills but now also across class 2, 3, and 4 landfills.

What this bill is all about is flexibility, because I’ve seen quite a number—in local government—of proposals which have got funding. Some of them are absolutely brilliant, but some of them are not. I think there is the danger, sometimes, of having this free money sitting there that has got to be spent somewhere, and sometimes it’s not actually particularly brilliantly spent. And I can see some mystification on the other side there, but I can point to you, Mr Abel—some of the projects which have been funded, you look at that and go, “That is not a good spend of money.” As a country, we need to make sure that the money we spend anywhere is really well spent.

Look, this bill does two things. One, it continues to increase the amount of cost that is imposed on people who are creating waste and disposing of waste—that is a good thing; it keeps that incentive becoming greater and greater to minimise waste. But the second thing it does, which is really important, is it gives more flexibility around how that waste levy is used: it’s about allowing us to do more clean-ups of contaminated sites; it’s about allowing us to respond to emergencies, and we heard the example of the Franz Josef one; and also about wider environmental programmes. So it’s useful flexibility.

I think it does two other things. One, is it means that some costs which are currently paid by the Crown will then come from this levy, so it’s saving money. Secondly, it means that there is going to be greater competition for that waste levy, and that means, I think, that we will end up with higher-quality spending because some of the lower-quality things will drop off there. So I think this is a very sensible approach, and I commend the bill to the House.

Kia orana, Mr Speaker. It’s a pleasure to follow those two previous speakers. I was looking forward to hearing Mr Foster’s contribution, someone who has been involved in local government for many years prior to coming to this place, so for him to make a two-minute-and-30-second contribution—

Andy Foster: It was two minutes longer than they wanted me to.

TANGI UTIKERE: —in the context—yes, Mr Foster; I’m pretty sure it was two minutes longer than they may have suggested to you. But, look, don’t be confined to the party whips over there. If you’ve got something to say, then I suggest that, given we’re in urgency, you say it.

Joseph Mooney: Wasted almost a minute on that.

TANGI UTIKERE: It was also very—what’s that, Mr Mooney?

Joseph Mooney: Wasted almost a minute so far talking about that.

TANGI UTIKERE: Well, look, we’re here because we want to be here. The other thing is I want to just follow up on the issues that were raised by Mr Court. Now, Mr Court and I spent some time on the Environment Committee last term. It’s fair to say that we’ve had our disagreements on policy from time to time, but, again, I commend him on taking a full call, which seems to be a rarity for Government members in this current phase of urgency. Actually, I have to say that he did get me thinking about some of the things that he was mentioning, particularly around funding, but he hasn’t tended to sway me—something that seems to be a common feature between the relationship that he and I might have.

But it is interesting that we are talking about waste at 11.20 on a Friday night and that there is a particular focus around where this split might be. Prior to coming to this House, like Mr Foster, I spent a decade in local government, so I know the importance that this particular levy does actually place on decision-making processes and opportunities for local councils all around the world—all around the country and all around the world, actually, when it comes to global waste. But what’s really interesting is that as the House is progressing this through urgency at this late hour of the evening, there actually won’t be an opportunity for councils in my region or in other regions to actually have their say on this, because the Parliament is going to, with the Government’s support, basically ram this through under urgency. I think that’s a shame, because already in some of the smaller contributions that we’ve had this evening, we’ve heard of some of the very creative initiatives that councils all around Aotearoa New Zealand—

Joseph Mooney: Two and a half minutes; still nothing on the bill.

TANGI UTIKERE: —are embarking—well, Mr Mooney, it might be two and a half minutes. It would be longer than any contribution you’ll give under urgency, I’d suggest. But I do think that the 50:50 split with local government is really important. But hearing what Palmerston North City Council might have to say on these measures would have been quite helpful. Hearing what the Tararua District Council would want to have to say about this would be quite helpful. Hearing what Manawatū District Council would want to say would be quite helpful. And I’m sure the member for Rangitīkei would also agree that those councils have an opportunity to say and feed into this process.

My colleague the Hon Rachel Brooking makes a very good point in her contribution, and that is that there is a real distinction between a levy and a tax.

Katie Nimon: Repetition.

TANGI UTIKERE: A tax—well, it’s not repetition, because I’m going to go on to the distinction. The Hon Rachel Brooking touched on the need for a nexus, and I think that’s really important, because where a tax might be effectively garnered which can be spent on pretty much anything, a levy is much more specific. This is the context within which this bill comes to this House. It’s around a waste minimisation levy, and so there needs to be a particular distinction between—even though it is hypothecated—where the levy is drawn from and where the levy will then be spent or where it will go.

So I think it’s unfortunate, again, that local communities, as we work through this process, will not actually have an opportunity to share whether they think the 50:50 split is right, whether they think the widening of this criteria that the Minister for the Environment is actually suggesting is wide enough or too wide. Here on this side of the House, we think that the widening exercise is far too broad and needs to be curtailed. And so, as the House progresses to consider some of those amendments that my colleagues on this side of the House will have in their name, I do hope that the Government, albeit in urgency, will be open to the suggestions in light of the fact that communities have not had an opportunity to have their say. My invitation to the Government is, as we move through the various stages this evening and, indeed, tomorrow, and perhaps beyond, that they do turn their mind to be open to the fact that communities have not had an opportunity to participate in this process and that there is a question of fairness. On that basis, at this stage, without any changes, we’re not supporting this bill.

Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. I listened carefully to the contribution of the Minister, who I thought put forward a very cogent argument for a prudent, practical approach to the waste minimisation levy and how it could be more flexibly spent in a way that advances the National Party’s blue-green principles that we’ve held dear for nearly 30 years. So, on that basis, I can support this bill wholeheartedly and I do so with enthusiasm.

Kia ora, Mr Speaker. I know it probably is difficult at this time of the hour, and it is, of course—it’s not easy listening to some of the contributions coming from the other side of the House, but I feel like we’re sitting on 30 May 2024 and it’s a long, long day. It feels like 30 May is going to go down in the history of New Zealand politics as a dumping ground—as a dumping ground of waste, of toxic legislation that is causing an impact on our country that we haven’t seen before.

When I say it’s a dumping ground, it feels like it’s a dumping ground for legislation that they want to ram through and they want to dump in here, whether it’s the Taxation (Budget Measures) Bill, dumped here into urgency on 30 May; whether it’s the Public Finance (Fines Collection Costs—Budget Measures) Amendment Bill dumped here; whether it’s this legislation, the waste minimisation legislation, it’s been dumped; or the Land Transport (Clean Vehicle Standard) Amendment Bill, dumped here on 30 May; the Local Government (Water Services Preliminary Arrangements) Bill dumped here. Just like this legislation here around waste minimisation, it feels like a dumping ground where they can just cover over; where they can just come in and they can just run things loose, quick, and fast.

Now, this legislation, as the Hon Rachel Brooking, an exceptional member of Parliament, spoke about, is something that we support in principle, but—and there is a “but”—it seems to widen the criteria. It widens to a place that goes too far. It widens it to a place where it’s not actually about waste minimisation; it’s around clawing money from here, from the environmental space, which they cut during this week’s Budget, to put over here in terms of waste minimisation. When we look at this legislation and we look at the way it expands how and where the levy can be spent, I realise that it’s something that actually runs roughshod over what the legislation, what the purpose of it, was about. When we look at why they’re doing it, it’s because they need the money. It’s because they need to find the finance, because the finance Minister took away from the environment.

Reuben Davidson: Robbed it.

GLEN BENNETT: She robbed the environment. When we look at what happened in this week’s Budget, we look at cuts—

Laura Trask: Stick to the bill.

GLEN BENNETT: —to supposed back-office expenses—and this is all about the bill, and I’m sticking closely to the bill—because they are having to make cuts, and so, therefore, they’re looking for ways to recuperate a pittance, a small amount. So whether it’s the $22.3 million cuts to the Ministry for the Environment, whether it’s the cuts to waste minimisation—$52.97 million cut to waste minimisation. That’s why they have to take this legislation, they have to dump it here on 30 May 2024, because they need to find money and they need to find it fast, because—because—

Miles Anderson: We’re waiting.

GLEN BENNETT: Yeah, please wait, because it’s important, and sometimes pregnant pauses are moments to reflect and think about our environment.

Hon Andrew Bayly: Get back on track.

GLEN BENNETT: The Hon Andrew Bayly talks about getting back on track. Well, to me, it’s going backwards and it’s tracking into the ditch and the dump of wrecking our environment.

This was a good Act. This was something that was working hard with local government, working hard with Government, to ensure that waste minimisation was realised, that that 2040 ambition that the honourable Simon Court talked about is something that actually could be reached. But this is robbing Peter to pay Paul, and, of course, who suffers the most? It’s the New Zealand environment.

This is a great bill that aligns with our aspirations to get great environmental outcomes. I commend it to the House.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I was just saying talofa—it’s still Samoan Language Week. You’ve heard our colleagues on this side who have provided a range of views with regards to the Waste Minimisation (Waste Disposal Levy) Amendment Bill. We won’t be supporting this bill, because, whilst we agree on some principles, it does broaden the criteria too far. I was quite lucky, just with my colleague Tangi Utikere, who also spent some time—over a decade—in local government. We worked really hard on the ground at that time to look with our communities at these matters of waste minimisation. In my local area, for those who are not aware, Māngere is one of the communities where we have a number of young people in our community who were very concerned at recent weather events.

I have read right through the supplementary analysis report which provides the context of which the Cabinet and the Government have made a number of decisions. One of my concerns—and it is outlined here—is that I’ve read on page 3 that the analysis and the modelling of this paper that has been presented of this legislation was done at pace, that communities have not been consulted, and what it tells me is that the modelling and the impacts have been quite rushed. So I’m very, very happy that we get the opportunity to speak right through this process, and question at the committee stage. But this bill really affects our lower socio-economic communities, and there are some really good initiatives that the previous Government supported, not just with the operational side but education. Why do many Kiwis or New Zealanders not utilise this programme under the waste minimisation?

You’ve heard the Hon Rachel Brooking in that we do agree on some of the principles but the broadening of the criteria, it just goes way too far.

Tangi Utikere: Too far.

LEMAUGA LYDIA SOSENE: Too far. One of the things for this community in my local community is that our young rangatahi, they want to be involved in waste minimisation programmes. Well, the cuts have been too severe, that we’ve heard yesterday. And programmes like Jobs for Nature, which were working really well in our local rohe in terms of young rangitahi that were not entering the workforce, those young people were entering programmes that were offered by the waste minimisation levy. So it is of real concern that when you are broadening criteria, what the Government is proposing for this waste disposal levy, that just goes too far.

So we bring it back to the context of when you are consulting with communities—those who are responsible for the supplementary analysis report—there is a critical voice that you don’t hear from, and it’s important that communities across Aotearoa, when the cutting of some of these programmes has happened, and they’ve happened at pace, how do you know that the problem definition has been identified? How do you know that the solutions that have been put forward under this current bill are the right choices that have been made by this Government? The whole waste minimisation programme is really, really important, because as we’ve seen, climate change is really affecting our communities across Aotearoa, and some communities are well-resourced and others are not. Education, under this programme, is really, really important.

Just as I complete my contribution this evening, what I want to stress is that there has to be a focus on what suits communities, and the only way you’re going to know for these types of programmes is that you have to speak to the community, whatever they look like. In local government, they need to be supported with the autonomy that as we speak to our young people right across Aotearoa, that their voices are involved in some of the opportunities in these programmes they offer, because they are the ones that will be standing here in 20 years’ time, making different decisions because today’s Government did not take that opportunity. So I just wanted to point this out, and I’m very pleased that I get another opportunity, and another opportunity just to raise some questions. So thank you for the opportunity.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. It is with great pleasure that I rise to speak on the Waste Minimisation (Waste Disposal Levy) Amendment Bill. It’s great to talk about waste minimisation, because this is a Budget which is cleaning up the mess of the previous Government, so it’s very apt that we’re talking about waste management.

One of the previous contributions talked about the “c” word, but they didn’t use the “c” word which is “common sense”. I think it’s only common sense that we spend some of this levy and allow the ministry to undertake its functions and duties and exercise its powers in relation to waste management and to minimisation of hazardous substances. That’s just common sense, and some of the other measures that the money can be spent on, including repairing damage caused by emergency—it is why I think this is a great bill and I commend it to the House.

This bill is set down for committee stage immediately—sorry, for second reading immediately. Sorry, just helping the House; it’s a long weekend. I also note that we’re doing a waste minimisation bill, which might have made a good reason to move on. This bill is set down for second reading immediately.

Second Reading